Authors notes: Haha! It is finally here! A fic co-written by Marika Webster and me, Sailorcelestial! Haha! This fic is all Marika's idea, folks, so don't blame any of it on me! Actually, you can blame me if the plot gets too complicated or angsty, seeing as it's my mission for this fic to keep Marika from diverting the plot until the end in favor of romance. ::kicks Marika:: I promise I shall perform this solemn duty with my life! Or… something. I'm gonna stop babbling now. I give my usual thankies.

Disclaimer: I don't own The Crow or Weiss Kruz. Don't bother asking Marika, she doesn't own them either no matter what she tells you. ::whispers:: She threatened to kidnap Michael McManus once. Nutball.

The Thinnest Veil – Chapter One

Yoji paused before the last door. In his hand he clutched a feather duster with all the grief that held his body. His entire frame shook. Yoji tried to force himself forward, through that last door, but it was the one place he couldn't seem to pass. It seemed as if a solid but invisible barrier barred him from that room. The barrier, he knew, was his own sorrow and guilt.

He breathed deeply, ran a hand through his hair, and backed away. One more day he'd challenged himself, and one more day he failed.

In the front room, Momo sat in her chair and watched the few customers who drifted in and out. Yoji scowled and tossed the duster behind the counter. The old woman looked over his way with her serene smile and waved. He didn't have the heart not to wave back, though his own movement rather resembled that of a limp noodle. Momo didn't seem to notice, and went back to her silent appraisal of the flowers, smile never faltering.

"Yoji-oniisan?" A girl approached him, one of the flock that used to swarm the flower shop. He looked on her without speaking. She sniffled and seemed to gather her courage about her. "Yoji-oniisan, I want to say that . . . that I'm . . . really sorry. I know I'm a little late, but I just couldn't come before now." Her dark eyes were rimmed in red. The girl was young, too young for him, the kind he would send along to Omi. If Omi weren't . . .

"It's okay," he told her, straightening himself. If he couldn't maintain some semblance of calm, how could he expect her to? No, he had to remain composed for her sake, if not his own. "It's been what, a year now?" He shrugged and led her towards the door. If he had to look at those eyes any longer he would burst. "It's hard, but I'm dealing. You should too."

He pushed her out of the door without ceremony, and slammed it shut behind her. No other customers inside, Yoji dug his keys from his pants pocket and shoved the proper one into the lock. Safely locked away inside his dying flower shop, Yoji grabbed a pot of daises and slammed them to the ground. Dirt, petals, and pottery shards streamed over the floor.

In the silence that followed, Yoji's chest heaved and he feel on his knees in the center of the mess. A small trickle of blood mingled unnoticed with the potting dirt. Head in his hands, the unflappable Yoji sobbed.

"God fucking damn it. God fucking damn it all to fucking hell." Those muttered words dropped into his hands and melted through his fingers. Before his closed eyes swam the image of short strawberry blonde hair, always so clean and shining. And those blue eyes . . . gods . . . what deep depths of kindness and love had been extinguished that day a year ago? Ken and Aya he missed, yes, they were his friends. But Omi, little Omi, so small, so good, so . . . so . . .

Beautiful.

Yoji sniffed, pushing himself up. His moment of self-pity felt good, but had to end. He couldn't allow himself to be bogged down with grief. After all, he was all that remained of Weiss. Krittiker didn't know yet who had ordered the events that let to four deaths, but they would. And when they found out, the bastards who killed his friend better sure as hell watch their backs.

~~**~~**~~**~~**~~**~~**~~

Swift, so swift. In life, even such a life as he had led, he hadn't been this fast. Or this strong. Or this . . . calm. Calm was the only word that could possibly describe the way his insides settled to the pit of his stomach and refused to budge. Only "calm" could explain away the lack of interest he took in the beauty of the city he passed, things he knew he had once been enraptured with. Why? Why were things so much duller now than before?

Because of the calling. Yes, the calling, the pull, the hatred no longer forced to reside in the back of his heart. No more did the strictures of existence demand that he hide away that loathing he felt for those dregs of society determined to destroy themselves and take all humanity with them. His malevolence could fly on wings of night and crush the guilty between strong, unyielding jaws. Not all the guilty. No, unfortunately his hate called for the death of only a selected few. But oh, their dooms would be so much fun to cause. So very much fun.

Until then, however, where to go? Where to go, where to go? Somewhere. He should be somewhere. Someone was supposed to . . . to help him. That much he knew. The whirling bit of midnight feathers that cawed at him told him so. And whatever Feathers said must be true.

He giggled at his name for the beast.

So where to? He sent the thought spiraling upwards and outwards, knowing the creature would swoop down and snatch it from the air. In a moment came the answering caw, and a streak of ebony sky veered off to lead him to the place where all of his hatred would brood and breed, waiting to be released.

I wonder how Yoji is?

A sharp squawk cut into the thought almost before it birthed itself fully. No, even thinking about the comrade left behind could damage his mission. The Crow only brought its ministers back for so long as their killers still hunted the innocent. After that, the grave would beckon him home.

A sorrow deeper than any felt in life crept into his chest. Some things were dulled by living death, and some things were made clearer. Pain, anger, hatred, sorrow. These things were a thousand times stronger than before. No mortal could feel emotions such as these and survive.

But he was already dead.

~~**~~**~~**~~**~~**~~**~~

Nagi looked up into the midnight sky and waited. Something in the darkness beckoned him, called for him to be awake, to watch, to wait. Out there, in the city that rejected him as normal, someone or something wanted him. For good or ill, he couldn't tell. He shivered. Nagi reached up and pulled down the window, shutting himself away from whatever in the night searched for him.

Did shadows stalk the darkness, calling out to chosen ones? He didn't think so. It sounded like one of those tales Farfarello told in his more twisted moments to try and frighten him. Nagi never believed a word, of course. Merely the rambling of a man not quite right in the head. But the feeling that stayed with him even though the window was closed . . . it made him wonder if maybe Farfarello had somehow glimpsed some truth in his insanity. They did say that a fine line existed between genius and insanity. If this were true, Farfarello must be the most intelligent man on the planet.

Together the feeling of being watched and the thought of what his insane teammate might do if he knew his stories were having an effect gave Nagi the extra boost to take a risky chance. With the smallest burst of effort, he gathered energy around his form and pictured in his mind the other place he'd rather be.

The flowers cast strange shadows in the dark. Those figures so beautiful in the daytime only made him shudder again in the night. Silently on his small feet, Nagi climbed the stairs. He passed three doors he knew he shouldn't open. Yoji wouldn't be very happy about that. Especially that one. It was the fourth door, the one at the end of the hall, that Nagi stopped at and knocked gently on. There was a grumpy snort from the other side, the sound of bed springs creaking, then nothing. Nagi knocked again, a bit louder, as though afraid of wakening the spirits of those three who once inhabited the other rooms. He half expected to see Aya step out of one door, katana ready. Instead the bed squealed again in protest, and the sound of tired feet scuffling to the door made Nagi take a step back.

Yoji's sleepy eyes peered out from a small crack. "Nagi? What the hell? It's three fucking o'clock in the morning." A yawn. "How'd you manage to sneak past the other three?" Yoji opened the door wider to let the younger boy inside. "Nevermind, I don't want to know. What I do want to know is why you're here."

"I felt strange. I wanted some company."

"Company?" Yoji yawned again and pushed his hair back from his face. Nagi realized this was the first time he'd seen Yoji without the ever-present sunglasses. "I'm afraid I won't be very good company at three in the morning."

"Do you ever feel like you're being watched?"

Yoji blinked and stared at him. Nagi could tell the older man really wanted to ask what had brought on this question, but fortunately restrained himself. Instead he sighed and sat down on the bed.

"I've been an assassin for several years, Nagi. I always feel like I'm being watched."

"By something evil?"

"Killers are evil."

"No, I mean real evil. Dark."

Again that pause and wondering, appraising look. In the silence, Nagi had time to notice that Yoji wore only a pair of boxers and socks. He shifted and looked to the floor. In the few months since their unexpected and initially uneasy friendship began, Nagi found himself looking more and more at his older friend as he imagined Omi once saw him. And this thought, these new insights, frightened him almost as much as the mysterious watcher.

"There is no evil other than human evil." Yoji reached over and grabbed a cigarette from its pack on the dresser. Orange light bounced from the walls as he lit the end, breathing in a long drag. The smoke released curled over his lips and into the air, creating a screen between their two dimly lit forms. "Murderers, rapists, kidnappers. Those people are evil, and they're the only kind of evil."

"Do you really thing so?"

"I know so, kid. I've seen them every night, and I have yet to see a demon rise from the pit of Hell." He flicked ashes into the waiting ash tray and flashed a Yoji grin. "Unless you count that whacked out teammate of yours. What's his name? Farfie-yellow?"

"Farfarello."

"Yeah, him. He's pretty damn scary."

A small smile slipped past and lifted Nagi's lips despite his best efforts to curb it. On more than one occasion he'd had exactly the same thought about Farfarello. Damn scary. Yes, that just about covered it.

"Look," Yoji continued as he tapped the burning cig against the ashtray a second time, "you're young, and you're living a life most kids your age don't have to live. Hell, most people don't have to live your life, period. I'm a little surprised you chose to come over here this early to have this conversation, but not surprised that you thought of it. Do you think you're evil, is that it?"

Nagi blinked. Actually, the thought of himself being evil had never crossed his mind. No, he only wanted to know if evil existed, if that thing out there watching him could be evil. It certainly was dark, he knew that.

"No. It's not that."

"Then what?" Smoke curled high into the air.

"I don't know." Nagi looked up. "Can I stay here tonight?"

"Uh, yeah, sure, I guess." Yoji snuffed out the cigarette and sniffed, wiping his nose on his arm. "You can, uh, sleep in one of the other's rooms I guess." Confident Yoji, the one who always knew what to do and say, seemed to crawl somewhere beneath the bed and leave behind a stuttering idiot. "I'll, uh, go get the keys."

Yoji jumped up and left Nagi in the room. The boy smiled ever-so-slightly to see his older friend so uncomfortable. Then his senses spread out to the darkness, where the something unnamable still waited. It didn't care where he went, where he hid, it would find him anyway. And Nagi wondered again if this thing were evil.

If HE were evil, was this something sent to drag him to Hell where he belonged?

A hoarse caw sounded in the night.

End Chapter One.