Fate
By Alexis C.
You can't fight Fate.
Whispers from dried cracked lips.
The sound of thunder in your ear.
No one can. Not even you, herr Crawford.
You turned around, snarling inwardly like a rabid animal but he was already dead.
He was your first teacher.
The one who taught you how to kill and to use your power.
He was also the first man you ever loved.
Life passed on by in a blur but you never forgot the last thing he said.
You can't fight Fate. No one can. Not even you, herr Crawford.
He told you once, in an unusually serious mood that you would be the death of him. You laughed it off, not knowing that he meant it literally. How could you, when you thought of him as your own father? When he had taken you in and taught you all you knew in life?
Impossible, you told yourself, when his words came back to haunt you in the dead of the night and you lay tossing and turning until daybreak.
The very next day, he sold you to Estet.
You never saw that coming.
For years, you waited for him to come for you as you dwelled in a hell on earth. But he never came. Love turned to hate just as easily as tears turned to ice.
The first chance you got, you tracked him down and shot him point-blank. You didn't ask him why, but you think you understood as the years went by and what he said began to sink in bit by bit.
You can't fight Fate.
Sure, you were cheating Fate all the time, pulling the man you were protecting into a side alley, to prevent him from being shot by a sniper, switching places as needed with the target of an assassination, to deal with his attackers.
Somehow, you had been born with the gift of foresight and you used it, oh yes, you used it.
You used it to save the people you were protecting, you used it to kill and you used it to survive.
But then a pattern began to appear and it dawned upon you suddenly with a horrifying clarity.
You could do a thousand and one things to cheat Fate.
But Fate always won in the end.
Take Takatori Reiji for instance. You saw him die by Ran's blade in a vision. So, you stopped Ran from killing him during the whole human chess fiasco. You did everything you could to prevent his death, up to the very point that he terminated Schwarz's services.
After that, you just stood by and let Fate have her man. By then, you were old enough to know that you were merely a pawn in Fate's grand design of death.
You couldn't beat Fate at her own game after all.
And Takatori died at the end of Ran's blade.
It was a cold grim sort of satisfaction that you felt when you read about it in the papersthe next day.
You would never ever admit it, not in a million years, but part of the reason why you let Fate win so easily this time was because Takatori had taken a golf club to Schuldig.
And so what if it had all been Schuldig's fault to begin with? No one got away with messing with your property. And Schuldig was yours, all yours, from the first day you laid his eyes on the crazy red-headed, foul-mouthed German. He was yours to hurt, yours to break and yours to use.
He was yours to love. Yours and yours alone.
And love him you did, although you never let him know. You led him into thinking it was just sex because it was less complicated that way and because you had to be the frigid bastard he had always known you to be.
It was safer that way.
So you loved him in his sanity, loved him in his insanity, loved him when he was hurting, loved him when he was laughing, loved him when he hated you, loved him when he loved you.
Then Fate took him away.
You never saw it coming.
The kisses grew less frequent, the touches colder. He left your bed in the middle of the night. It irritated you and made you quietly furious, but you didn't think much of it. After all, it had happened often enough before and he had always come back to you in the end.
Wait, you told yourself. He would tire of his new play thing soon enough.
Only he didn't.
You realised it only when it was too late. Fate robbed you of your love, sending him to find comfort in the arms of another man.
You thought of having his lover killed, but then, Fate showed you that Schuldig would not come back to you, would never again come back to you whatever you did. Because Schuldig loved that man and not you.
You could hurt him and you could break him but you could not make him love you anymore.
You pretended you didn't care, pretended to be the same old uncaring heartless Crawford he knew because what else could you do? You watched in silence from your window as he left night after night to go to his lover.
He was yours, yours, but you let Fate take him away because you had never won against Fate
before.
You can't fight Fate.
Then working on a new mission file at your desk one day, you saw it.
That vision brought you to your knees.
Hours later, you woke up in a cold sweat to see Nagi, pale and worried, fretting beside you.
"What is it?" He had asked, his voice small and scared.
You brought your hand to your head and it came back smeared with blood. You had hit your head falling down like that.
"Nothing," you heard yourself say coldly, as you raised your eyes to the door at the sound of footsteps.
"Scheisse..." Schuldig whispered, as he stood in the doorway transfixed by the blood on your hands. He was at your side in an instant, gently cleaning the blood away from your forehead to see the damage and ordering Nagi out of the room for a first aid kit.
You caught his hand as he reached out again to inspect your wound. It was real as his presence.
"Brad," he spoke in a low voice, "What's wrong? Nagi's gone, you can tell me now."
You didn't say a thing, but searched his face quietly and with a sick sort of desperation.
You were willing Fate to tell you when and how it would happen, but fate was silent for once, refusing to allow you anymore glimpses into the future.
It would happen and soon, but how and when exactly, she would not tell you.
Nagi came and Nagi went, leaving behind some medical supplies and a worried look.
"Brad," Schuldig prompted you softly. "I need to treat your wound."
You didn't let go of his hand. When he tried to pull away, you tightened your grip and pulled him close.
He was bewildered and taken aback. You reached out with trembling fingers, and placed them
on either side of his face.
"I will not lose you to her," you said simply, before letting your arms drop to your side.
He stared at you dumbfounded, unsure of what to make of what you said. Then because he didn't know what else to do, he began bandaging your wound.
"What did you see?" He asked over and over again, getting increasingly frustrated.
You couldsee that he was spooked by what you had done and said. After all, you had never shown half as much emotion to him before. Sex with you had always been initiation on his part and he always thought you were in it for nothing more than lust.
You closed your eyes and made no reply. You were too busy trying to unravel the secrets of Fate.
You can't fight Fate. No one can. Not even you, herr Crawford.
His voice was everywhere. Old and world-weary, it haunted you in your dreams and your waking moments.
You kept Schuldig close to you and forbade him from going off alone. He was sullen and resentful, but he obeyed because his loyalty to you was absolute.
You did not have his love but you were at least assured of his loyalty.
You kept him safe that way.
Your forages into the strands of time unveiled nothing further save for more visual clarity of Fate's intent.
You didn't stop trying.
This was one game you had to win.
It happened during a routine surveillance.
He was scanning the area, his face creased in concentration, when suddenly, his eyes snapped open. There was open fear in them and without a word, he shoved open the car door and set off running.
You were after him in a flash, your heart hammering against your chest like a wild thing.
You caught hold of him and slammed him up hard against the wall, fear and rage sweeping through you.
"What do you think you are doing?" You demanded of him in a furious hiss as you fisted the front of his shirt and yanked him forward.
He lashed out at you mentally, suddenly, with blinding intensity. You had never had him attack you with such strength before and your shields shattered under the assault like breaking glass. You staggered backwards, gasping, at the violation and the pain. The world was tilting hazily on its axis around you and before you knew it, the floor was rushing up to meet you.
I'm sorry, Brad. He needs me now.
The fading sound of running footsteps was the last thing you heard before the darkness claimed you.
Farfellow looming over you and licking his blade was not the first thing you expected to see when you woke up. Momentarily panic hit and your first reflex was to shove him away. Your
head was throbbing fiercely but you got on your feet unsteadily somehow.
"Where did he go?" You demanded.
Farfellow rolled his golden eye and flicked a tongue out to the tip of the cold glint of steel.
"I didn't see him around. He was gone when I found you here."
You shoved him out of your way without another word and headed in the direction Schuldig had
set off in before you had stopped him.
The visions were assaulting you endlessly as you pounded down the narrow alley leading to the disused rundown building where you knew Fate waited for you with a cold smile on her icy
lips. The images were running through your head like an old film strip, each merging with the other before it, surging onwards like a raw unstoppable tsunami of blood.
Fate was mocking you.
You gritted your teeth, telling yourself that this time, this time you would not let the damned bitch win.
You stepped through shards of broken glass from the shattered glass doorway of the entrance and paused.
The images in your mind were falling fast and heavy in a furious hail.
You ignored them and drew your gun.
Schuldig was in the centre of what looked like a massacre. Various bodies were scattered around him, all caught in various macabre positions of death.
Schuldig turned and when he saw you, he looked uneasy.
"Brad," he began unsurely, caught like a deer in the headlights of oncoming traffic, an arm around the injured Weiss member, supporting him.
"Move aside," you said icily and fired.
The bullet tore through the left shoulder of the blonde Weiss member, and entered the chest of the would-be assailant rising up behind the pair. The silver blade that was clutched in his hand clattered to the ground as his body fell to the ground with a heavy thud amid the scream of pain from the blonde man.
Blissful emptiness filled the space left by the vanquished images in your mind like deafening silence following the incessant clanging of a bell.
Understanding dawned in Schuldig's eyes a split second after anger did. It did not stop him from protesting your course of action.
"Fuck it, Brad! Wasn't there a better way to do this?" He snapped as he lowered Yohji to the ground slowly.
"I told you to move aside," you said unhelpfully, hardly able to believe that it had worked and nothing had intervened to stop the bullet.
"I could have killed him even if you hadn't," Schuldig protested angrily, his eyes worriedly scanning the extent of the damage to his lover's shoulder. He yanked off his own shirt and tore off a strip from it, working quickly to stop the bleeding.
"You would have been bleeding out your guts on the floor if I hadn't fired that bullet," you informed him.
His fingers stilled for an instant over the bloody wound on his lover's shoulder. Then he resumed his tender ministrations again, visibly easing the pain of his partner with his telepathic powers.
He said nothing more to you but addressed his lover instead.
"Can you walk?" He asked softly.
The injured man nodded, eyes fixed on you warily. Gingerly he got to his feet with
Schuldig's help and they made their painful way towards you.
"I've numbed the pain, but we still have to get you to the hospital immediately," Schuldig told the man leaning heavily on him in a quiet but urgent voice. You watched, a turmoil of emotions warring within you.
Without warning, a completely blank look descended over Schuldig's face, just a mere metre away.
Then he was a blur of motion, too fast for you to catch. A heavy weight slammed into you, and instinctively, you grabbed Yohji, to steady him before he brought both of you to the ground.
The sound of a gun shot resounded in your ears.
You looked up past Yohji, just in time to see blood spreading across Schuldig's chest in a dark crimson mess. He gave you a pained twisted little grimace of a smile and crumbled to the ground in a heap.
Beyond, the man that you had earlier shot breathed his last and let slip the gun he had been holding in trembling fingers.
You let go of Yohji, whose look of horror must have mirrored your own and slumped back against the wall, eyes staring numbly at the crumpled form of Schuldig on the ground.
"No," you heard Yohji whisper in a broken voice as he stared numbly before him.
There was a wailing in your soul, like a part of you had been ripped out cruelly, never to be regained. The pain in your chest was so real, you could hardly draw your next breath. He was gone and you could feel his absence physically.
You closed your eyes, in hopeless helpless despair. In the absence of vision, you felt the soft touch of an inhuman hand upon your face like gossamer threads falling gently on you. A face appeared in the darkness of your mind, one that you had seen many times in your dreams.
It was a woman, a beautiful one, and she leant over you, her hair falling around you, very much the same way Schuldig's once did. You would have screamed at the words she whispered to you had you found your voice.
Fate had taken her man and you belonged to her and her alone once again.
You can't fight Fate.
Whispers from dried cracked lips.
The sound of thunder in your ear.
The End.