"Hey, let's play cards."
Crawford didn't use to indulge Schuldig, so it was sort of a surprise when the tall precognitive got up from his comfortable and expensive-looking armchair and walked up to the orange haired German, neatly taking a seat in front of Schuldig's shuffling hands.
Not questioning his good luck, the telepath grinned and began to deal. He couldn't help but remember a scene of the past, so long ago, when they were both still at Rosenkreuz.
----------------
"You'll be terminated if you keep on giving trouble."
It was rare that a senior approached him, and to warn him with no apparent threat in his voice, no less. Schuldig wondered what the fuck the tall bastard wanted out of him.
"Oh, really?" Slow and mocking. As if the redhead didn't give a damn. Well, to be honest, he didn't. At that time, he had thought that he would rather let himself be killed than be tamed.
"I can convince them to let you live."
Ah. The heart of the matter. Four-eyes seemed to be quite straightforward for a Rosenkreuz spawn.
"And what will it cost me? A blowjob?"
It wasn't such an appalling prospect. He had done it before and this tall freak was above average. He knew that the half mocking tone wouldn't let Four-eyes know for certain if he was just laughing at him or not.
"No," was the calm response. The tall stranger didn't show either whether he had believed Schuldig's offer to be true or not. "You'll accept my orders as the leader of your team."
Schuldig's half-hooded eyes concealed well his surprise and excitation. Being part of a field team meant what he had always pined for: freedom. Mistrustful, though, as life taught one to be, he closed the short distance that separated them and breathed over the tall senior's lips:
"If I give you what you want, will you give me what I need?"
The hazel eyes of the stranger went slightly out of focus and the dark-haired man concentrated on something that Schuldig could only interpret as the use of a talent. The German didn't sense an interference with his shields, the room about him or the minds of those around them, so he supposed that Four-eyes was a precog or something. Schuldig didn't understand, why was the freak scanning the future when he could just… He could have laughed at the sudden realization - instead of crushing his lips and fucking him senseless against the wall as the rhetorical question and body language would lead a normal person to, the freakish bastard was consulting the future for an answer!
Incredulity well hidden, Schuldig was shocked nonetheless when the stranger's gaze focused again on the present to give him his answer.
"Yes."
Schuldig smirked.
-------------
He was losing and had no way to know if Crawford was cheating him with his talent or not. He refrained from asking, though. If the bastard was, Crawford would eventually make him know that he knew Schuldig was cheating in a more conventional manner and would stop the game. But the precog, until now, hadn't, so Schuldig kept on playing. And losing. With marked cards. Damn.
Schuldig had always loved gambling. It was in his blood to play games. And when one reached a certain age, no game was fun if there wasn't some wager at stake. He sometimes played the roulette and other luck games, but the real challenge was when the outcome depended on your skill and ability (that included cheating without being caught), not on the whim of a fucking piece of wood to stop spinning.
However, being what he was, playing cards was a bore. He always read the head of his counterparts before he could shield himself not to do it. It got the fun out of everything.
With Crawford, it was different. The bastard's shields were so strong that Schuldig couldn't even catch a glimpse of his most superficial thoughts. So he was the ideal partner to play with. And although the tall American didn't seem to enjoy the game (not like Schuldig did), he sometimes complied and played some hands.
Schuldig never questioned Crawford about it and just had his fun as he chain-smoked under his leader's reprobatory scowl. The Oracle never told him to put out his cigarettes, though, so the redhead kept on going.
It was at moments like these that Schuldig went back to that weird first encounter and the certain answer that tall bastard had delivered to him: "Yes."
Hiding his grin behind his cigarette as he chose the next card to throw, Schuldig couldn't help but admit that the dark-haired fucker, as always, had been right.
