Chapter Nine: Motion

Schuldig had only just managed to fall into a pleasant doze after his cold-ish shower when the door banged open.

Nagi was standing with the light in his back, breathing heavily. "You have to come see this." He darted off before he even finished the last word.

Schuldig groaned when the dark figure disappeared from his door frame and rolled to his side, rubbing his face. "Perfect." That was the last thing they needed, any more complications while the team was ripped in two pieces and their team precog was not with them and nobody was allowed to contact anyone, either.
From the way Nagi had just acted, the complications would have to have been quite something. Schuldig was sure that the boy would have fidgeted nervously had he not run off, again, right away. Nagi had a poker face if he ever saw one in somebody so young, so whenever that wavered, there was trouble.

Trouble without Brad. Some shreds of the restless dream he'd had before he was woken still clung to him. He didn't remember exactly what had happened in it, but Brad was there, and he wanted to curl up and go back to sleep. The fact that he had thought that it was a gunshot that woke him, at first, didn't help one bit, and dread settled in his stomach.

He shook his head and stumbled out of the room. He found Jack and Youji pacing in the room, both with thoughtful frowns on their faces, the kids on their equipment, fingers flying over the keyboards and Aya standing solemnly and unmoving.

Omi stood, immediately, leaving his spot to Nagi. He approached Schuldig. "I think we found the Rosenkreuz base."

Schuldig shrugged. "So? We're not going there, alone." Right now, the base was the last thing on his mind.

"We're not," Omi agreed. "But that political network in England?"

Schuldig blinked.

"One of the next targets followed us here."

Schuldig's expression froze. "Followed?"

"Followed, as in, he left the country after us, coming to this city."

"Are you telling me, we are being rounded up by a team with a capable enough precog to pinpoint us, while our own precog is not here?"

"Not just the precog," Youji added.

Schuldig squeezed his eyes shut. He had been right, before. Perfect. "Farf is not here."

Jack walked around to look at the computer screen. "We have the location, but we can't tell the others. They can't be found, but we can. Splitting up was a pretty stupid idea."

Schuldig shared a quick look with Aya. Focus... This was not the time to freak out. He might not have been the precog nor the best strategist ever, but he did have the training for the latter, at least. He made a quick decision.
"Where is the base?"

Omi stared at him, wide-eyed. "We're not going there, alone, are we?"

Schuldig waved him off. "That would be a guaranteed suicide mission instead of mere lunacy with the whole team." Time to take over. Crawford had always warned him that something like this could happen, at some point.
"Location?"

Omi fidgeted. "Switzerland."

"We already knew that," Schuldig urged him on, impatiently.

"San Gottardo pass. On the pass."

"How did you find it?" Jack wanted to know.

Nagi cleared his throat. "We had an approximate, and then we tracked an... unusual delivery."

Jack wasn't sure he wanted to know what had been delivered.

"They disguised it as a congress centre and hotel," Nagi added. "They probably let people use it as that as well, to make sure. The facilities appear to be underground."

Schuldig was busy keeping his telepathy under control while his mind took various turns and twists. Finally, his eyes landed on Jack.
"Well, Captain? We seem to be running out of options."

Jack returned the look. It was clear that Schuldig had automatically taken the lead, and he was kind of glad that his opinion still held some kind of merit for the German. Jack was as much a leading personality as Crawford was.
"Doesn't look like we can do anything but take out our pursuer, right now."

"That would have been my estimate," Schuldig agreed, nodding.

Aya moved from where he was leaning against the wall. "Crawford said no telepathy." He was not going to let those two take over the team without having his say in it. "And there is no way I'm letting you do this without it."

Youji groaned. "Three leaders. Great. Just what we needed." He didn't know whether he should be amused or terrified at this, but he definitely preferred decisive action to sitting in a dark hole waiting.

Schuldig just smirked. "Since we appear to agree, this won't be a problem."

Omi rubbed his face and Nagi swallowed. The younger said: "We're going to go against Crawford's explicit orders," it was not a question, nor really a statement, more like Nagi repeating what the others were implying.

Jack huffed and crossed his arms. "Well, if he wanted us to stick to his orders, he should have made sure that we even have that option." He looked at all of the men in turn. "Well, we don't."

"I agree," Aya said, coolly. "We can't risk contacting the others while we are being followed, and we can't tell them that we have the location. We have to take out the agents on our trail."

All of them nodded in agreement, even if the kids were a bit more reluctant about it.

Schuldig turned to Nagi and Omi, again. "You say one of the politicians is after us?"
Omi nodded. "I caught him on a flight. I don't know if he allowed us to catch him or if he thought he'd slip through."

"Fake ID?"

Omi nodded, again. "Of course. He's not that stupid."

"And he's also not alone."

This time, Omi shook his head and bit his lip. "He might have a higher-up with him. A woman." He peeked at Schuldig from a downturned face.

Schuldig sighed. "The Duchess?"

Youji narrowed his eyes. "That rings an unpleasant bell..." Though he wasn't quite sure where he'd heard the code-name before.

Jack looked from one to the other. "Explain."

Aya didn't remember where he'd heard about her, either, but whoever she was, she certainly had an impact on Schuldig.

The German stood with his arms crossed. "Assuming that it is her; this shit just got real." He snorted.

Jack rolled his eyes. "Let me guess, you always wanted to say that."

Schuldig grinned. "Been waiting patiently for years." Then he sobered and shook his head. "She's one of the Rosenkreuz elders. Telepath. Freaky as fuck. If she's accompanying a low ranking paranormal to Austria..."

The penny dropped with Aya, in that moment. "Is she the one who got out of the fall of the museum?"

Unconsciously, Schuldig's hand had wandered to his mouth and he was nibbling on his thumb nail, until he noticed it and snapped his hand back down. "Yeah. I have no idea how she managed to gloss that over. She's a telepath, yet she somehow foresaw what would happen and conveniently failed to attend the ceremony."

Youji raised a sardonic eyebrow. "Coincidence?"

Schuldig snorted. "There's no such thing."

Nagi's quiet voice piped up. "I don't get how she sold the story to the other elders."

Youji tilted his head. "Let me get this straight. We're half a team and up against a Rosenkreuz telepath telling the future without a precog of our own?"

"Her premonition might have been a fluke," Schuldig noted. "I have hunches, too. I doubt her precog abilities are even classified."

"Suppose we take her out," Jack began, "how badly would that hit Rosenkreuz?"

"Badly," said Nagi and Schuldig at the same time, and Schuldig continued: "She's high ranking for a reason. Taking her out would be tricky..."

"But she's not on her own ground, and you're the stronger telepath," Jack asked for confirmation.

Schuldig nodded. "Theoretically. But if she's here, knowing that I'm here, she must think that she has chances of beating me." He bit his lip. "And... not all of the conditioning is gone," he forced out. It made him literally sick to even think about the reactions any Rosenkreuz operative still caused within him, much less say it out loud. He just wanted them all gone... but wanting them gone also meant confronting them.

"Oh, don't be an idiot!" Nagi uncharacteristically burst out. He didn't even care that everyone was staring at him. "The conditioning is gone, you're just afraid." His dark blue eyes stared down the telepath.

"And with good reason," Schuldig hissed. Conditioning or no, his triggers were more than enough to incapacitate him in the wrong moment. And someone like that woman knew how and when to apply pressure on them...
Shitshishit. If he didn't watch himself, he'd panic before long, and he was supposed to lead, he was supposed to kill, he was supposed to succeed.
Shit. The Duchess.
He felt dizzy.

Nagi refused to just take that. "Are you going to take her out?"

Schuldig stared at him, not entirely sure if 'Yes' would be the right answer. They both knew what the institute was like. They both knew how hard it was to go against them, once they had let you know what they were capable of. Fear within their own operatives was one of their strongest points.
Their enemies knew every single weak spot. And they would use each and every one of them. And then some.

"Because we don't have a choice in this," Nagi clarified, not backing down. "We either take her out or die, be that now or later. And frankly, I prefer my chances anywhere but in their own base, thank you very much, never mind that she is here now and will probably hunt us down, anyway."

The sick dread coming off Nagi in waves hit Schuldig despite the block he had on his telepathy, and some part of him wanted to grab the kid, hold him and tell him that they would get through this.
Schuldig realised that Yes would have been the right answer, after all. "You're afraid," he noted, coolly, instead.

"DAMN RIGHT I AM!" the boy screamed, his voice breaking and his eyes watering. He trembled all over and never even noticed that warm arms held him. "So let's just get this over with and kill the bitch!"

For a long time, in which all people in the room could all but hear their own hearts beat, the two did nothing but stare at each other.

Then, as if a switch had been turned, Schuldig blinked and his expression settled.

Nagi didn't notice it, was still breathing harshly and hoping with all his might that Schuldig would tell him that all was going to be alright. That they would make it. That before long, they would all be together and would not have to worry about the institute, ever again.
'Please,' his eyes said. 'Please.'

"Let's." Schuldig nodded, once. He turned hard eyes to Omi. "You can stop hovering and tell me where we will find them."

Youji and Jack almost audibly released their breath.

"Well, hold on there, though guy," Jack said, nonetheless. "I appreciate your change of heart, but..."

"I've worked without Brad, before," Schuldig interrupted, harshly, all but daring the man to question him. "I can do it, again." His eyes wandered to Nagi, once more. "And Brad said that we can make it. He has said so for ten years, and his premonitions have never let us down." He nodded at the boy, again. "If this situation is where his premonitions lead us, it is a situation to get us to our goal."
He watched as Nagi visibly felt his reassurance, and he made sure that Omi, Aya and Youji were with him. Omi nodded trustfully, Aya gave him a short nod as well, and Youji smiled crookedly.
Then he returned his attention to Jack. "Enough?"

Jack shrugged and grinned. "Good enough for me."

Gwen sat on her small chair, watching Farfarello slowly beginning to stir. It wasn't really a gradual waking up; it was more like a shift.

Before the man opened his eyes, Gwen said: "Good morning."

Farfarello turned his head on the bed that he was still tied onto and opened his eye. "Is it?"

Gwen tilted her head. "Good or morning?" She felt an odd sense of pleasure when talking to Farfarello. It felt like a riddle, a hunt, following the hints of a trail she knew nothing of.

"I expect you are capable of reading a watch, Mrs Williams."

Gwen's lip twitched, but she looked at her watch. "Only just." It was a quarter to noon.

"And is it good?"

"Well... not really, no," she admitted.

"Ah." Farfarello relaxed on his bed, not making any efforts to escape. "Are we quite stuck?"

Gwen shrugged. "I think Crawford's been hit by a premonition, earlier. He tries to make sense of it."

Farfarello chuckled. "This time, he won't be able to do anything to intervene." He looked at her. "We will have to wait and see if everything he's done so far to lead us to this point will get us beyond it, won't we."

"You don't seem worried," she noted.

He smiled and didn't answer.

"Who is she?" she finally asked what she had wanted to ask since she had last spoken to him.

Farfarello's one eye glinted at her as his smile widened. "She is everywhere. At all times."

Gwen frowned, confused. "Are you speaking of... God?"

Farfarello cackled, the high pitch giving him the eerie air of a giggling child. "My dear, in my dispute with Him, I have chosen to give Him the face that the people who chose to make Him grand to gain power gave Him."

Gwen blinked and had to think for a moment. "You mean the church."

"They use Him as He uses me," he spat, and for a moment, the madness flared despite the medication.

"But who is she?" Gwen asked, again, rightfully assuming that they wouldn't get far if she allowed the discussion about God.

"She will come for me and take it back."

Gwen stood from her seat and approached the bed.
Farfarello wasn't going to tell her who she was, and she was beginning to think that maybe the man had reasons for not telling her. Possibly not reasons she would understand, but if not even Crawford and Schuldig could see or foresee what Farfarello saw, knew and thought, those reasons might be sound even if nobody understood them.
"What will she take back?" She finally asked, settling on the edge of the bed.

"I was never supposed to have it."

Gwen smiled. "Then it's a good thing that she will come to take it back, right?"

Farfarello returned her look for a moment, looking more puzzled than she had ever seen him, which wasn't that much, but visible, nonetheless.
"I... don't remember."

Gwen wasn't really sure what to say to that. She decided on, "You will."

They didn't get to discussing whatever they were talking about further, because the door banged open and Crawford purposefully strode inside, while Ken marched right past him and began opening Farfarello's restraints.

Ken smirked at the man lying on the bed. "You about ready to go?"

"Certainly," Farfarello confirmed. He was indeed about ready to let some demons out to wreak havoc.

Gwen stood from where she was sitting and looked at Crawford in askance. "What's going on? Where are we going?"

Crawford crossed his arms. "We are heading for Switzerland. The other team will meet us there, soon."

Gwen situated herself right in front of the American and copied his stance. "And? What are you hiding?"

"They will have to face a threat on their own. There is nothing any of us can do to help them."

Gwen's eyes widened. "Jack is with them."

"Indeed. As are five other people."

She ran a hand through her hair. "What do you mean we can't help them? What will happen?" She was definitely approaching frantic, again, now.

"If we try to contact them by any possible means, they will be detected too fast."

"Will... will they be alright?"

Crawford looked distinctly uncomfortable. "This is a crossing point in time. Since I can't influence anybody's choices, it is not yet certain what will happen. But chances are that they will survive, yes."

"How big are those chances?" She didn't trust Crawford at all, and she had no doubt that Jack was not considered as big a part of the team as Crawford's other team members, not to mention his lover.

"They are at about fifty percent."

Gwen's hands shot in front of her mouth.

"You realise... that your friend is immortal. Retrieving him would still be possible in the case of a failure." His voice shook as he said it. "My team is highly professional, as is Captain Harkness. I have foreseen success over ten years ago. This is the first time that a short-term premonition does not entirely coincide with a long-term one, but I don't see why we should assume failure."

Gwen rubbed her moist eyes, sniffed and refused to break down. She took a deep breath. "So we will expect them in Switzerland and make sure we have everything ready, right?"

Crawford nodded.

"We'll make it," Ken assured both them and himself. They could make it, he knew it. They'd made it so far, hadn't they?
"I'll go get Griffin."

Gwen forced herself to keep thinking, rationally. "We do have the meds, this time, right?"

Crawford nodded, again.

"Good," she said, sounding as busy as she could make herself. "So let's make sure we're ready to get Jack, your team and your boyfriend back, shall we."

She fled the room.

Crawford felt more than saw Farfarello come closer to him. "Any piece of insight or advice would be welcome," he let the Irish man know without turning around.

"This was all supposed to happen."

Crawford knew that, but he wasn't going to get into an argument with the lunatic, now. He just rolled his eyes.

Farfarello smirked. "But I bet you wish you'd have done what the Captain told you to do, don't you?"

Crawford remained standing in the room for several seconds longer after Farfarello had left, until he realised what the man had been talking about. "You rotten Irish bastard," he murmured into the empty room.
But damn the man. He was right.