Answers We Never Wanted to Hear
Summary: Sometimes, the answer to a question isn't what one wanted to hear. OneShot.
Warning: For some reason, Mamoru is the one the easiest to write for me.
Set: Story-unrelated, perhaps during Weiß Side B
Disclaimer: Standards apply.
For laurose. For no special reason than a thank you.
At some point – and he remembers full well when it happened – Omi Tsukuyono and Mamoru Takatori have merged. They have become one person, one heart, one soul, and as much as other people want to believe he hasn't changed – he has.
He is not the way he was. He is not the way people think he is, either.
Knight isn't right when he says Mamoru has been swallowed up by his fate. Aya is wrong when he only sees a Takatori in Mamoru now and Ken is partly right when he says he still is Omi. Sometimes, he catches himself thinking of himself in the third person. What would Omi do? The voice in his head doesn't answer. Is this something Mamoru would want? Omi wanted to know the truth and Mamoru wanted to protect the people that were most important to him. Are those goals incompatible? Is he allowed to carry two souls within his heart? Why can't they see, can't believe in him? Mamoru is Mamoru and Omi and Persia and Weiss, all at once. Mostly, it scares him to death.
...
On other days, he learns to live with it.
He never goes to see his grandfather again. He attends business meetings, press conferences and ceremonies instead. He works hard, doing normal work – leading a family, leading a trade empire – by day and secret work by night. He goes through the files for the new Weiss team. It's the fifth generation and he wonders how long this will have to continue. How many people will die at his hands. He meets politicians and lobbyists and foreign businessmen and days pass, too many to count, too little to make him forget. But does he want to? He doesn't know. The picture is hidden in his desk drawer, deep down, underneath papers and pens, files and even more papers. He sits at the desk that still feels oddly too big for him (he prefers small tables crammed with a computer screen, messy, hand-written notes, schedules, bills for flowers and pots and orders), in an office that feels to airy for him (he misses the dark, cool basement room smelling like Yohji's cigarettes, the wet leather of Ken's soccer balls and the spicy scent of the mixture Aya uses to polish his katana), wears a suit that feels oddly itchy even though it's made from finest silk (he wants his T-shirts back, his simple vest, clothes he liked and was able to move in freely), talks to people that don't know him and plays games that don't amuse him. But it's not bad, really. His life is a necessity the way it is and he gets along. He works hard. He gets through the days and sometimes he even forgets why he should feel uncomfortable in the first place.
The nights are worse.
The images return, and the faces. The smiles. The scowls. The happy moments and the sad ones. The memories. Mamoru Takatori has a lot. He has money, and influence, and power. But his money can't buy him happiness, his influence can't bring back his friends and his power can't change his fate. Soft beds don't automatically bring sweet dreams. It's the first thing he learns – but then, he has already known it. Every fulfilled dream demands a tribute, as every decision has its price. Darkness equals loneliness equals angst equals doubt times a thousand and it's a concept he is painfully familiar with by now.
So he smiles.
It upsets them, each time again. Knight is most susceptible to his fake smile. Maybe Yuushi Honjou can feel it. Maybe the tall man feels the lie behind his smile but if he does he doesn't understand because every time they meet – and they meet often, strangely, Persia never met Weiss in person – he drops a nasty hint, veiled criticism or less-veiled accusations. Ken would have started a fight, Aya would have silenced him with one glance. Mamoru thinks he has no right to argue with him. He has lost the right to defend himself so he simply smiles – or, if the occasion asks for it, silences Knight with a curt remark – and pretends he isn't hurt by the cruel words. At the same time he knows only the truth can hurt. There has to be some of it in Knight's words and in that case Mamoru has even less right to deny him the poor satisfaction of lashing out against the one person that makes him suffer.
Yes, the truth hurts, and Mamoru knows the phantom pain it causes.
Two dead, one imprisoned. But the walls around Ken's prison are made of stone. The walls around Mamoru are made of memories and duty and there is no way out. Kritiker's official files never lie: Kudoh, Yohji, dead. Fujimiya, Ran, dead. Hidaka, Ken, removed. Tsukuyono, Omi, dead. Only one person knows the truth about the members of Weiss Kreuz and he, coincidentally, is the one who made sure the files were seen to. Did it himself, even. Ken had often remarked that Omi had a remarkable skill when it came to computers and hacking. Aya died on a street in New York, stuck down by a knife. Yohji died in a collapsing building, smiling up at them and promising to catch up with his team as soon as possible. Ken – Ken probably died at the airport, or maybe long before Aya left, Mamoru isn't sure. And Omi died only half, stupid idiot he was, and became Mamoru instead. Can't even get that one thing finished, huh.
When, he wonders, will they come to ask?
Perhaps Ken will be there first, impatient as he is, stomping in and yelling at Mamoru what the heck he thought when he hired some blue-eyed American guys to kill Aya in the middle of a city. Maybe Aya will turn up a bit later, lean and graceful as ever, and quietly (threateningly) inquire why Mamoru agreed on sending Ken to prison when he should have taken care of him instead, seeing he had always been Ken's best friend and had known him longest. Or maybe Yohji will slunk in one day, cigarette between his lips, drawling away how he could have let go of himself like that and would he, please, stop acting so high-and-mighty. And he almost expects Omi to enter, silently and smiling, and even if he doesn't say anything his eyes will ask. It is always the same question; the question whose answer he fears and yet cannot let go, can never forget and yet drowns out forcefully. But it doesn't matter, doesn't change things. They don't come. He waits for them, day after day, in his too-big office behind his too-big desk in his too-comfortable chair. None of them ever comes and he knows they won't but a tiny part of him cannot help waiting, hoping and praying.
...
Knight asks the question when he already has given up the hope that anyone ever will.
It's almost a relief. At the same time it is torture, too. The simple word is stuck in Mamoru's mind, running like a broken record. It returns, especially at night, when he is all alone and being swallowed up by the darkness that surrounds him. Knight hadn't expected an answer, had only been challenging his superior and greatest enemy, as always. Had tried to throw him off-track, tried to preen a reaction from a man who had rigidly trained himself not to react. And Mamoru could give him what he wanted. He could answer the simple question, could even answer it honestly because he has mulled over the answer himself, has been desperately hoping someone, anyone would ask him, would let him explain and give him the chance to redeem himself. But answering would mean he would destroy the little comfort the tall man finds in torturing him. Answering would mean Mamoru himself would lose the last straw he is clutching at, would lose the guilt that propels him forward. No, some questions are allowed to be asked but not to be answered. The relief of hearing the answer would shatter too many other things and he can't afford that. At the same time, some answers never should be voiced because what is relief to the one can be torture to the other. No. It is fine. Like slow torture, perhaps, but fine nonetheless. Mamoru talks and lives and breathes and hurts and smiles. He deserves it. He needs it. While he provides some sort of solace for Knight and the others, he has to deny himself the same.
It is an odd thought, strangely comforting in its own way.
Knight has asked the question. Thrown it at him, rather, angry and challenging. Mamoru knows the answer. He pushes the thought away whenever it appears but still, it is there. Some nights he pokes at it, like someone might prod at a wound in order to test whether it still hurts. Sometimes, if he is tired enough and it is dark enough and his mind is bleary enough, the knowledge makes him smile. It's a sad smile, full of loss.
Because, in order to protect you, I have to dispose of you. Dispose of you like trash so you'll never return.
And you will despise me for it.
A/N: I don't know whether Knight and Omi meet more often than the one time they do meet at the end of Glühen. I don't know who stabbed Aya in New York and why. I don't know many things but I know I love Weiss Kreuz and I enjoy writing fan fiction.
For the ones who might comment, I tend to answer the reviews as soon as possible. Which, sadly, this time means not until October, since I'm gone for the next two months. And yeah, probably no internet.