Omi sat in the room Rin, Kisoka and Aniko had given him in their house. It was the only place he'd been for the last few days. It was all he could do as he tried to understand what was going on around him.

He had no idea where he was, and even less idea why he was there, but he didn't care. Better here than a lot of the other places he could have been, like back at that flower-shop. He vaguely wondered whether or not Kritiker had replaced Weiß, or if they were still looking for replacements. It didn't really matter to him, just so long as they left him alone. Weiß was no longer his concern.

Perhaps they wouldn't replace Weiß, after all. He wished the best for whoever they were replaced with if they actually ended up replacing the assassin team. It wasn't something he had enjoyed doing, but it was the only life he had known for the longest time. He wasn't proud of who he used to be, either, though. So what did that leave him with?

Not a lot, really. And there wasn't anything he could do about it. His life had always been that way. His choices were little to none, usually people made up his mind for him; despite being a leader in name, he was a follower. He could make plans, spend his life researching on people, hacking, and killing people. It almost made his stomach turn to think he could do things like that for so long.

So many people had called him 'innocent' that it made him wonder what they'd think if they knew who, and what, he really was. He held his life in bloodied hands; it wasn't surprising that it was all slipping through his fingers, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

No matter how many people he got rid of, there would always be more bad people, and he would never forgive the bad ones. No matter what. They had stolen Ken from him. Ken, and Yohji and Ran. He would never get them back, because the bad people had stolen them. They had swallowed them up in their darkness, trapping them in the same way those bad people had trapped his soul. And there was nothing he could do about it.

It bothered him because he was supposed to be protecting them. That was his job as their leader - well, ex-leader. It wasn't what he was supposed to be, it wasn't the kind of person he was, not that anything could take back all the things he had done. Life wasn't that easy.

Another thing that bothered him was Aniko, Rin and Kisoka. They kept talking about him. He could hear them whispering quietly on the other side of his door just before they came in each meal with food. Aniko obviously thought he was crazy, while Rin wasn't sure, and Kisoka refused the concept entirely.

He wasn't all together sure that Aniko was wrong.

Omi sat up and looked out the window to see the sun shining brightly. It brought back memories that he really didn't want. He remembered once after a mission Ken had taken one too many blows to the head and was mumbling incoherently. He'd told Omi his smile out-shined the sun, and that the Gods should envy him for his eternal happiness. The very next day, Omi had told him what he'd said and Ken had just laughed and said: "It's true, 'Mittchi! Perhaps I wasn't as incoherent as you thought."

He laughed slightly at the memory, before heading for the door, the first time he'd left his room for a reason, besides needing a bathroom break.

"Kisoka-chan...?"

Kisoka blinked in surprise at Omi being out of his room, but smiled anyway. "Yes, Omi?"

"…Do you… have a garden?"

"Yeah... But it's in a really bad state of disrepair, why?"

"…Would you mind if I turned the yard into my little flower area?"

"Not at all! Here, come sit and we'll write down some flowers you want to get and some trees too if you want! You can make our yard pretty for us, we're often too busy with work to do things like that," Kisoka smiled, amiably.

"I'd like that... Thank you." Omi sat down beside her and began listing off flowers.

He had decided it would be a memorial and he would have different sections for each of his team members. After the list was complete, Omi found a piece of paper and a pencil, then began setting up where he wanted each area set. The front yard was larger than the back yard, and was facing north, while the back yard was rather small, with trees planted all over in no orderly fashion.

Ken's memorial was going to be the one to the east side of the front yard, while Yohji's was to the west, and Ran's sat in the middle. There was no walkway to the front door, only grass, so he resolved to make stepping stones, with flower designs in them as a path of sorts.

Kisoka left to get Rin, then send him off to the nearest nursery to buy the flowers and trees that Omi had listed. It took Omi nearly two days to set up where he wanted everything, and how, but by Saturday, he was out in the sun with a spade and seeds and bulbs of all sorts, along with young trees in pots, and the occasional blossom in a pot.

He started with Ken's memorial, carefully placing each flower where he wanted it, as well as an occasional tree.

It took him most of the week to finish the area, but on Friday he came out with a watering can and the things he needed for Ran's area. Before he started, he watered the already planted flowers over to the eastern side. When the can emptied, Omi moved off to grab a hose. He crouched down beside the base of the tree letting the water soak into the ground.

When Rin walked out and stood behind him, Omi greeted him with a smile and a "Hey Rin-kun!"

"Hey Omi." Rin smiled. The young blonde had been a lot happier since he'd been working on this garden of his, and that released a lot of tension within the rest of them. "You'd think you were in love with this garden or something. First you'd never leave your room, now you work out here until its too dark to see, what's with you? Your working too hard! Lighten up!" the older boy grinned.

"...Lighten up?" Omi grinned widely. "You want me to lighten up?"

"I think that's what I just said!"

"You asked for it!" Omi laughed and turned the hose on him, effectively soaking him from head to toe. Rin stood there, sputtering and laughing, trying fruitlessly to get out of the stream of water.

Eventually Omi turned the hose off and just laughed at the now soaked boy, while Rin wrung out his shirt and shook off his hair, spraying Omi with little water droplets. Aniko laughed from the doorway, where he had been standing, ready to summon them in for lunch.

"Well get you a towel while we're at it," Omi snickered, while Rin just flung an arm around the blonde neck and laughed with him.

"Yeah, a towel would be good."

Omi waited with Rin in the room just inside the door while Kisoka went off to get a towel. Soon, Aniko came in with a camera, and quickly shouted 'CHEESE!' making both boys look up, before taking a picture and running off, the other two boys still laughing.

"You shouldn't get other people wet!" Omi said, trying to get out of Rin's wet grasp.

"Hypocrite," was all Rin had to say to that, before Kisoka handed him a towel.

Slowly over the next four weeks, Omi finished the garden and took careful care of it, mulching it as the weather turned cold. As well, Omi and the other three grew to get along better.

"Rin-kun?"

"Yes, Omi?"

"...We should get Kisoka-chan something for her birthday..."

"Like what?"

"...Roses or something."

"...You're really into flowers, aren't you?"

The two youngest boys were conversing over lunch, the day before Kisoka's birthday, December eighteenth. Kisoka and Aniko were currently out at work, while the other two were left at home. Rin had offered to keep Omi company and had been outside with him all morning, joking around and having snowball fights with him. They had come in when they got hungry, and, even though the youngest boy was smiling, Rin noticed that he was upset about something.

"Yeah... It comes with working in a flower shop..."

"...You used to work in a flower shop?"

"Yeah..."

"What was it called?"

"..." Omi was quiet for a little bit, stirring his hot chocolate, before smiling a little. "Kitten in the house."

"Ah... Kisoka went there once. She said it was really crowded, but for good reason, because there were 'two totally cute guys working there!' as she put it."

"Oh? Did she describe them?" Omi glanced up, with a slightly curious expression.

"...Yeah, there was a tall blonde, whom she could barely see due to a flock of girls crowding around him. She said he seemed very self-confident, if not conceited, and a little irritating, but he was cute."

"That's Yohji-kun... He's better than he seems, but he gets slightly irritating sometimes."

Rin laughed. "Well, there was him, and there was a tall brunette with blue-green eyes, and a dark tan. She said he looked like an athlete, a swimmer or something perhaps-"

"Soccer..." Omi cut him off quietly. "Ken-kun... was a soccer player..." the blonde stood up, abruptly, and brought his now empty hot chocolate cup to the sink, before cleaning it, drying it, and putting it away. "Excuse me..."

Rin watched as Omi retreated to his room, his body shaking with suppressed tears. He sighed. It was hard to talk about his past, Rin knew that from experience, and he felt bad for upsetting Omi, even though he had volunteered the information.

Rin watched Omi's door close, then sighed and put away his own dishes, before heading out to buy the flowers for Kisoka. Curiosity getting the better of him, Rin headed off to this 'Kitten in the house' shop that Omi had worked at.

Just as Kisoka had said, the shop was full of girls, but not as full as he'd been lead to believe. The three boys in the shop were working quietly, moving about as though the girls weren't there. The blonde that Omi had said was Yohji was smiling at girls, but that smile seemed rather empty, while the brunette went about his work like some sort of empty shell of a person. The redhead just watered the plants, glaring at then girls, eventually snapping an 'If your not going to buy something, leave!' causing only a few girls to exit the shop. Rin made his way to the blonde, smiling cheerfully.

"Afternoon!"

Yohji looked up as a midnight blue haired boy, around Ken's age, greeted him with a cheerful 'Afternoon!' and smiled back.

"Afternoon yourself! Can I help you with something...?"

"Umm... yeah, actually. See, this girl I know is having her birthday tomorrow, and a friend of mine suggested we should get her some flowers, earlier. But, he's a bit upset now, too, so I thought I'd get him flowers as well, he enjoys them. Can you suggest anything?"

"A birthday and a 'feel better soon' kind of thing? Yeah, just a minute..."

He saw the boy nod and headed off. Roses, always roses for a girl, but what would you give to a gloomy boy? Lily of the valley, perhaps? He sorted through some flowers and brought out a few of both, and wrapped them, returning to the boy.

After the boy had paid and left, Yohji frowned a little. For some reason, he looked familiar, and Ken must have thought so, too, because he was watching the boys back as he exited the shop.

"...Yohji..."

"Hm...?"

"...That's the boy from the picture!" Ken's eyes were slightly wide, as he seemed to realize this.

"...You're right!" both stared at each other for a moment before Ken darted outside to find the boy, to no avail. By the time Ken got outside, the little blue beetle the boy was driving had disappeared.

Rin arrived back home, and parked the car, then walked along the pretty engraved stones that Omi had made to the front door. He put away his coat, and shoes, and headed down the hall to Omi's room. The door was closed, and locked, but mumbling was emitting from the room.

"-But he won't come back. I left him to die, didn't I? No! It wasn't my fault! It can't've been! I didn't kill him! ...But I didn't save him...That makes it my fault, doesn't it?" the quiet mumbling continued, making Rin frown a bit.

He'd had a few weeks where they'd been almost sure he'd recovered, but he was back at it again, now. Perhaps if he didn't say anything to Kisoka and Aniko, he'd get better again, and return to who he had been. But that wasn't really fair to Omi, or the other people that came into contact with him, was it? Because then he wouldn't ever get it out of his system.

He thought about this as he went to his room, to put Kisoka's flowers into water for tomorrow. When he returned to Omi's room, the boy was quietly sobbing, mumbling things that made no sense - Something about various cats and swords and such. When he knocked, he was ignored, so he just waited for his friend to open the door, which was the first thing Kisoka and Aniko saw when they returned home.

"Rin...?" Kisoka blinked at him, taking off her shoes before walking over to the boy.

"...It's happening again," Rin sighed, putting a hand sympathetically on the door, as if to consol the young occupant.

"He's talking to himself again?" Aniko frowned a little, listening as Omi mumbled something about his brothers death.

"That, and he keeps talking about a few diffrent weapons, and killing people, and something about the Devil being after him. he told me earlier a little about how he used to be, how he worked at the Kitten in the house - remember telling us about it Kisoka? He told me who the people you saw were, Yohji and Ken, and that Ken's a soccer player, not a swimmer, but once he said that, he just disappeared to here," Rin explained.

"I got curious, so I went to see this flowershop, and it seemed a lot quieter than you described it. The brunette, Ken, looked totally out of it, like Omi had when he first woke, almost. He's like a twin of Aniko, so I suppose thats why Omi mistook him for Ken. Yohji seemed normal, except for his expression, his eyes seemed kind of empty, like something tragic had happened, and he was trying to get over it, but not really succeeding.

"There was someone else there, too, though, someone you hadn't meantioned. A redhead with the most bizarre eye color I've ever seen, they were kind of purple, it was neat. Anyways, he looked really grumpy and kept demanding that 'If your not buying anything, get out!' It was really creepy how quiet he and Ken were..."

"Poor Omi, I don't know if we can do anything..." Kisoka sighed dejectedly. "We've done everything we could. We let him stay here, we didn't force any information out of him, we helped him work with things he liked and was used to, but he's still like this..."

"Your going to give up, after all this time?" Aniko asked, watching he door.

"...What else can I do?" Kisoka asked, the rhetorical question obediently remained unanswered. "We'll take him down tomorrow morning..." the boys nodded and Kisoka sighed again, putting her hand onto the door as Rin and Aniko headed off to make dinner. "I'm sorry, Omi, I tried, I really did."

A/N: Re-written... It's hard to believe after a year I'm finally getting back to this. It's also hard to believe how horrible my grammar was a year ago. Kill me now for any bragging I might have done about my English skills.