AN: ^_^ Lookie! Two chapters in one day! Wow, arent you proud of me? lol, kidding. Anyways, here is the fourth chapter. Nagi makes an appearance! This chapter may be a little short, but oh well ^^;
Omi was passed out on the bed. Exausted from the tension he had been carrying for months in prision, the relief of freedom seeping back into him, the feel of a real mattress too alluring to ignore. Aya smiled at him just a little as he slept. So innocent looking. He wondered how many of those men in prision had tried to rape him. Then he wondered if any of them ended up dead for it. It wouldnt have surprised him. The bruises on his young partner's body conserned him, though. He wondered if those months in confinement had changed Omi. Aya shook his head to clear it of the thought. No, Omi was not the type easily broken.
His thoughts then turned to Brad Crawford. Alias Randall White. His violet eyes narrowed. Crawford's motives had been, and were in some cases, completely obscure. Aya could find no real motivation behind the style in which he was pulling off the crimes. The two had spoken very briefly on several occasions. Crawford's personality did in no way match his record. He was proffessional, conscise and impersonal. Very cool on all counts. Randall was always showy, sadistic, a little perverted, and always the trickster. Arrogantly leaving clues, jaunting messages scrawled across walls, and nasty rigged surprises for the various teams of detectives who came and went on this case. No one liked him.
But he was smart, calculating. He was never, never caught on a security camera. Never seen. Aya thought this was a little strange, or maybe just lucky... Until they caught Omi. Crawford had rigged a job. Gotten inside Aya and Omi's connections and pulled some strings. Then he told the cops, and sat in with them to make sure they got the job done. He was a theif himself, so he knew the tricks that no cop would have, and made sure he cut off all of Omi's escape routes, and didn't underestimate him, bringing in enough artillery to make sure he couldnt fight his way out. It was dirty. And now he was off the hook, no one would suspect him. Tsk.
Aya stood from the chair he had been sitting in, and stretched. He looked again at Omi, still sleeping like a log. Then he decided to go out and buy some groceries. The two of them would take a break from the cycle for a while and live normally until Omi fully recovered, and got restless again, as he did after too long a break from criminal behavior. He closed the door behind him quietly.
***
Ken awoke on the cool marble floor, from the warm sun falling across him. The first thing he saw was floor-to ceiling red velvet drapes. Familiar. He remembered this place, through the haze of his memory of the past few days. It came sharply into detail, and he picked up his head, sandy brown hair catching the light to turn into liquid gold. The hall had a high ceiling, arching gracefully two stories above the smooth black marble floors. The windows were long and recuangluar, the long drapes pulled over them casting most of the room in dimness. However the curtains over the window nearest to him had been thrown apart, angling too-bright sunlight on the ground around Ken. He blinked through it to the hall, sensing that he was not alone.
He had sensed correctly. A boy stood calmly regarding him, from the other side of the room, dressed in a navy school uniform, his arms crossed loosely in front of him. His hair was shortish, dark brown, and neatly brushed. He looked very fragile standing there, somehow. Ken sat up, and they looked at each other for a while. Ken was about to ask why he had been sleeping here, but then remembered. Clear memories, something he was grateful for. The hazy moments after awakening had too much of the same unnerving qualities of the day he had spent yesterday. Brad had left him here to take care of something, alone. It had taken too long, and last night Ken had been sleepless. So he had taken a nap. He was glad he woke up unharmed, this place had proved unpredictable before.
"Hello.."
He ventured. In a ungaurded way, though his instincts told him that this was, perhaps, not the appropriate tone. There was no immediate response from the boy. Must be Nagi. The way he held himself suggested that he felt superior to Ken. Yet so young... Brad had said he was still in highschool. It made sense. So he asked.
"Are you Nagi?"
"Yes."
A cool reply. Ken stood, and walked over, extending a hand.
"Nice to meet you. I'm Ken Hideaka."
Nagi ignored the extended hand. He didn't like unnessessary contact with people. It made him nervous.
"Nice to meet you."
Nagi allowed a slight formality, though questions were bubbling up in his mind. What excatly was Brad thinking? Ken. Truthfully he was expecting something more. This man, standing in front of him...seemed so naieve. Trusting, like he had never been hurt. Nagi narrowed his eyes just a little. He had noticed the pearls.
"Why are you wearing those?"
One of Ken's hands went a little self-consciously to his neck, where the opulent strand of pearls lay.
"I know it's kind of weird..Brad gave them to me to hold for him."
"It's not "weird." But it is dangerous. You don't even know what they are do you?"
"Oh..yeah, I know. Pearls. They were probably stolen, right?"
Tsk. So he didn't know.
"Yes and no. You don't seem too trustworthy to me, I don't see why Brad let you wear them."
Slight confusion, and a little offense flickered across Ken's features. Then he shrugged and put his hands in the pockets of the dark green sweater he was still wearing.
"Hn. Anyways, I was sent in here to get you. We're ready to meet, follow me."
He started to walk, past Ken, to the arced mahogany double doors on the opposite side of the room. He only got halfway there.
"Nagi, wait.."
The younger boy's footsteps paused.
"You're so young..why are you involved in all this? This anarchist group..."
A direct question. And personal at that. Nagi would have been slightly impressed with the forwardness, if it had been in his nature. He turned back around, his eyes holding an unreadable emotion, his face as serious and expressionless as it had been the entire time they had been talking.
"A debt."
"What?"
"To Crawford. It's none of your buisness."
Ken blinked, the second question dying on his lips. It was true, who was he to pry? He simply watched as Nagi turned on his heels and walked out of the room. Then he followed.
The rest of the house he was sure he had seen, but did not remember. It was nice, though a bit eerie. Everything either had a feeling of great age or was extremely modern. A laptop sitting on top of an 18th century writing desk. Very anachronistic. Even the outside architecture, as Ken had observed upon pulling up, strands of white christmas lights strung out between classic pillars and balconies. Hw wondered whose idea it had been, or how they came across this house, whenever they had chosen it for their headquarters. At least it was painfully excluded, and removed from the near traffic-less highway. It might have been some secluded summer home for a vacationing millionaire.
Brad was sitting on a large black armchair, looking comfortable, but sitting with immaculate posture. Francine was sitting on the floor near his feet, cutting something into small pieces with a knife. Ken couldn't make out what it was, and didn't think he wanted to. There might have been red stains on her fingers, but he pulled his eyes away before the thought could register as true. Schuldich was perched on the arm of a couch, the kind of really nice furnature that one would never think of sitting on improperly. But the man defied the norm in other ways as well, he wasn't surprised at his choice of situation. Nagi was standing with his back to Ken as he entered, and facing the other three people in the room. No one was saying anything, and he immediately felt uncomfortable. Out of place.
Then Brad stood up, smiling a little, and walked over. Some of the tension seeped from Ken, Brad's presence reassured him a little. After all, he wasn't just being used by these people, he was... In agreement? The thought had never occured to him before. That he was on their side. But was he really? It was something he had sworn to himself, a hot-tempered youth, dreaming up revenge. Now that the dream had become solid reality, and he was older, in posession of a more rational mind, what was he relly going to do? The question was too heavy, he decided to put it aside and let it turn itself over somewhere in his subconscious.
"Sorry I took so long, we had to discuss you. Your presence would have made the situation awkward."
A small smirk from Brad. Ken sweatdropped just a little. Well, at least Brad was honest.. he had assumed that was what went down, but hadn't expect to be informed of it so casually.
"And?"
The question was a little tenative. His fate wasn't really hung on what these people thought, but...
"Well, it was inconclusive. Sit down somewhere, don't look so nervous."
Again, there was concealed humor in his voice and expression. As if sharing a private joke with Ken. Ken was watching the expressions of the other three in the room, and from the extent that they were pretending this was not unusual, he could tell that Brad acted differently around him. And knew that his teammates were put off by it. Of course, it amused him to no end. He sat back down in the black armchair. Ken looked around, then decided to sit on the couch, the opposite end from where Schuldich was lounged. He ws still suspicious of the german, who seemed through that lazy smirk to be calculating ways to screw him over. Which he undoubtedly was.
Schuldich laughed. Ken threw a glance at him.
"It's funny... Your thoughts on us."
His head tilted to one side, green eyes locked on Ken, orange hair falling over one shoulder.
"Perhaps it is less amusing the other way around."
"Hey, could you stay out of my mind?"
Schuldich smirked in reply, and Francine, from where she was sitting, giggled a little, leaning her head on Crawford's knee and looking towards Ken with her one golden eye.
Ken looked to Brad for help, and Crawford, in turn, gave Schuldich a hard look. The telepath winced and put a hand to his head.
"Ja, ja. I get it. Fine."
Ken looked relieved as he felt the ghost of Schuldich's presence dissappeared from his thoughts.
"Now.."
Brad was speaking, and everyone just naturally gave him their attention. He was the kind of person who could demand attention easily.
"This isn't a social gathering. We have a lot of buisness to discuss. And Ken, you've been kept in the dark for too long."
A slight pause, in which Ken had the chance to look relieved.
"However.."
Ken's expression faultered. Damn he wished Brad wouldn't do that.. Brad looked at Ken.
"You must decide if you are going to accept our offer to join Schwarz. Understand that this is binding. We are functioning secretly, and everyone here is under a vow of silence. Our goal is to destroy the current government, and throw the country into temporary anarchy. The system has become so corrupted that the downward spiral will take us all with it, and probably lead to a second civil war. Which no one wants. I have constructed a plan whose foolproofness I would stake my life on. Ken Hideka, make a descision."
Ken hesitated. Then answered, clearly.
"Yes. I'll join you."
AN: Please tell me what you think minna! ^_^ Theres going to be another flashback in the next chapter, should be up before too long ^^
Omi was passed out on the bed. Exausted from the tension he had been carrying for months in prision, the relief of freedom seeping back into him, the feel of a real mattress too alluring to ignore. Aya smiled at him just a little as he slept. So innocent looking. He wondered how many of those men in prision had tried to rape him. Then he wondered if any of them ended up dead for it. It wouldnt have surprised him. The bruises on his young partner's body conserned him, though. He wondered if those months in confinement had changed Omi. Aya shook his head to clear it of the thought. No, Omi was not the type easily broken.
His thoughts then turned to Brad Crawford. Alias Randall White. His violet eyes narrowed. Crawford's motives had been, and were in some cases, completely obscure. Aya could find no real motivation behind the style in which he was pulling off the crimes. The two had spoken very briefly on several occasions. Crawford's personality did in no way match his record. He was proffessional, conscise and impersonal. Very cool on all counts. Randall was always showy, sadistic, a little perverted, and always the trickster. Arrogantly leaving clues, jaunting messages scrawled across walls, and nasty rigged surprises for the various teams of detectives who came and went on this case. No one liked him.
But he was smart, calculating. He was never, never caught on a security camera. Never seen. Aya thought this was a little strange, or maybe just lucky... Until they caught Omi. Crawford had rigged a job. Gotten inside Aya and Omi's connections and pulled some strings. Then he told the cops, and sat in with them to make sure they got the job done. He was a theif himself, so he knew the tricks that no cop would have, and made sure he cut off all of Omi's escape routes, and didn't underestimate him, bringing in enough artillery to make sure he couldnt fight his way out. It was dirty. And now he was off the hook, no one would suspect him. Tsk.
Aya stood from the chair he had been sitting in, and stretched. He looked again at Omi, still sleeping like a log. Then he decided to go out and buy some groceries. The two of them would take a break from the cycle for a while and live normally until Omi fully recovered, and got restless again, as he did after too long a break from criminal behavior. He closed the door behind him quietly.
***
Ken awoke on the cool marble floor, from the warm sun falling across him. The first thing he saw was floor-to ceiling red velvet drapes. Familiar. He remembered this place, through the haze of his memory of the past few days. It came sharply into detail, and he picked up his head, sandy brown hair catching the light to turn into liquid gold. The hall had a high ceiling, arching gracefully two stories above the smooth black marble floors. The windows were long and recuangluar, the long drapes pulled over them casting most of the room in dimness. However the curtains over the window nearest to him had been thrown apart, angling too-bright sunlight on the ground around Ken. He blinked through it to the hall, sensing that he was not alone.
He had sensed correctly. A boy stood calmly regarding him, from the other side of the room, dressed in a navy school uniform, his arms crossed loosely in front of him. His hair was shortish, dark brown, and neatly brushed. He looked very fragile standing there, somehow. Ken sat up, and they looked at each other for a while. Ken was about to ask why he had been sleeping here, but then remembered. Clear memories, something he was grateful for. The hazy moments after awakening had too much of the same unnerving qualities of the day he had spent yesterday. Brad had left him here to take care of something, alone. It had taken too long, and last night Ken had been sleepless. So he had taken a nap. He was glad he woke up unharmed, this place had proved unpredictable before.
"Hello.."
He ventured. In a ungaurded way, though his instincts told him that this was, perhaps, not the appropriate tone. There was no immediate response from the boy. Must be Nagi. The way he held himself suggested that he felt superior to Ken. Yet so young... Brad had said he was still in highschool. It made sense. So he asked.
"Are you Nagi?"
"Yes."
A cool reply. Ken stood, and walked over, extending a hand.
"Nice to meet you. I'm Ken Hideaka."
Nagi ignored the extended hand. He didn't like unnessessary contact with people. It made him nervous.
"Nice to meet you."
Nagi allowed a slight formality, though questions were bubbling up in his mind. What excatly was Brad thinking? Ken. Truthfully he was expecting something more. This man, standing in front of him...seemed so naieve. Trusting, like he had never been hurt. Nagi narrowed his eyes just a little. He had noticed the pearls.
"Why are you wearing those?"
One of Ken's hands went a little self-consciously to his neck, where the opulent strand of pearls lay.
"I know it's kind of weird..Brad gave them to me to hold for him."
"It's not "weird." But it is dangerous. You don't even know what they are do you?"
"Oh..yeah, I know. Pearls. They were probably stolen, right?"
Tsk. So he didn't know.
"Yes and no. You don't seem too trustworthy to me, I don't see why Brad let you wear them."
Slight confusion, and a little offense flickered across Ken's features. Then he shrugged and put his hands in the pockets of the dark green sweater he was still wearing.
"Hn. Anyways, I was sent in here to get you. We're ready to meet, follow me."
He started to walk, past Ken, to the arced mahogany double doors on the opposite side of the room. He only got halfway there.
"Nagi, wait.."
The younger boy's footsteps paused.
"You're so young..why are you involved in all this? This anarchist group..."
A direct question. And personal at that. Nagi would have been slightly impressed with the forwardness, if it had been in his nature. He turned back around, his eyes holding an unreadable emotion, his face as serious and expressionless as it had been the entire time they had been talking.
"A debt."
"What?"
"To Crawford. It's none of your buisness."
Ken blinked, the second question dying on his lips. It was true, who was he to pry? He simply watched as Nagi turned on his heels and walked out of the room. Then he followed.
The rest of the house he was sure he had seen, but did not remember. It was nice, though a bit eerie. Everything either had a feeling of great age or was extremely modern. A laptop sitting on top of an 18th century writing desk. Very anachronistic. Even the outside architecture, as Ken had observed upon pulling up, strands of white christmas lights strung out between classic pillars and balconies. Hw wondered whose idea it had been, or how they came across this house, whenever they had chosen it for their headquarters. At least it was painfully excluded, and removed from the near traffic-less highway. It might have been some secluded summer home for a vacationing millionaire.
Brad was sitting on a large black armchair, looking comfortable, but sitting with immaculate posture. Francine was sitting on the floor near his feet, cutting something into small pieces with a knife. Ken couldn't make out what it was, and didn't think he wanted to. There might have been red stains on her fingers, but he pulled his eyes away before the thought could register as true. Schuldich was perched on the arm of a couch, the kind of really nice furnature that one would never think of sitting on improperly. But the man defied the norm in other ways as well, he wasn't surprised at his choice of situation. Nagi was standing with his back to Ken as he entered, and facing the other three people in the room. No one was saying anything, and he immediately felt uncomfortable. Out of place.
Then Brad stood up, smiling a little, and walked over. Some of the tension seeped from Ken, Brad's presence reassured him a little. After all, he wasn't just being used by these people, he was... In agreement? The thought had never occured to him before. That he was on their side. But was he really? It was something he had sworn to himself, a hot-tempered youth, dreaming up revenge. Now that the dream had become solid reality, and he was older, in posession of a more rational mind, what was he relly going to do? The question was too heavy, he decided to put it aside and let it turn itself over somewhere in his subconscious.
"Sorry I took so long, we had to discuss you. Your presence would have made the situation awkward."
A small smirk from Brad. Ken sweatdropped just a little. Well, at least Brad was honest.. he had assumed that was what went down, but hadn't expect to be informed of it so casually.
"And?"
The question was a little tenative. His fate wasn't really hung on what these people thought, but...
"Well, it was inconclusive. Sit down somewhere, don't look so nervous."
Again, there was concealed humor in his voice and expression. As if sharing a private joke with Ken. Ken was watching the expressions of the other three in the room, and from the extent that they were pretending this was not unusual, he could tell that Brad acted differently around him. And knew that his teammates were put off by it. Of course, it amused him to no end. He sat back down in the black armchair. Ken looked around, then decided to sit on the couch, the opposite end from where Schuldich was lounged. He ws still suspicious of the german, who seemed through that lazy smirk to be calculating ways to screw him over. Which he undoubtedly was.
Schuldich laughed. Ken threw a glance at him.
"It's funny... Your thoughts on us."
His head tilted to one side, green eyes locked on Ken, orange hair falling over one shoulder.
"Perhaps it is less amusing the other way around."
"Hey, could you stay out of my mind?"
Schuldich smirked in reply, and Francine, from where she was sitting, giggled a little, leaning her head on Crawford's knee and looking towards Ken with her one golden eye.
Ken looked to Brad for help, and Crawford, in turn, gave Schuldich a hard look. The telepath winced and put a hand to his head.
"Ja, ja. I get it. Fine."
Ken looked relieved as he felt the ghost of Schuldich's presence dissappeared from his thoughts.
"Now.."
Brad was speaking, and everyone just naturally gave him their attention. He was the kind of person who could demand attention easily.
"This isn't a social gathering. We have a lot of buisness to discuss. And Ken, you've been kept in the dark for too long."
A slight pause, in which Ken had the chance to look relieved.
"However.."
Ken's expression faultered. Damn he wished Brad wouldn't do that.. Brad looked at Ken.
"You must decide if you are going to accept our offer to join Schwarz. Understand that this is binding. We are functioning secretly, and everyone here is under a vow of silence. Our goal is to destroy the current government, and throw the country into temporary anarchy. The system has become so corrupted that the downward spiral will take us all with it, and probably lead to a second civil war. Which no one wants. I have constructed a plan whose foolproofness I would stake my life on. Ken Hideka, make a descision."
Ken hesitated. Then answered, clearly.
"Yes. I'll join you."
AN: Please tell me what you think minna! ^_^ Theres going to be another flashback in the next chapter, should be up before too long ^^
