Rain and Music Boxes | Chapter 5
A Weiß Kreuz Fanfiction by Majokai Yukiko
Pairing: Brad Crawford + Schuldich
This is an amateur effort and does not intend to infringe on the rights of Takehito Koyasu, Project Weiß and its associates.
A/N: Sorry for moving too fast in this chapter, I just thought I had to get on with things. There's only so long you can mope over amnesia, you know. ^0^ Oh, and if this chapter sounds rather strange in anyway, I apologize too. Have been too into X Men slash these days that I forget in WK fandom, telepaths are not mutants…
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It was the first time I ever looked at Brad with anything less than rose-colored lenses. Whatever fantastical impressions I had for him dissolved the day I woke up in the hospital and realizing that I'm seventeen instead of thirteen.
They all told me that I had simply lost my memories. And some things about myself told me exactly that too. For example, my hands were never that big and strong, I had never been able to control my telepathy, nor had I ever seen so many battle scars on myself, may it be bullet wounds, or what not.
They told me many other things to. That I am an assassin working for this cult called Estet. That I am now on a mission as a bodyguard to some koala-look-alike called Takatori Reiji. But they told me nothing of what I want to hear about, nothing about my mother and what had happened to her, or anything about what was left of my lover, the mysterious young boy who had bought me expensive gifts when all others shunned me.
I took another look at the man in the room through the small rectangular window at the door, and sighed. If this was how Brad Crawford had grown up to be like, I wished I had never known him before.
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"Good morning, Brad," Chris Heinrich greeted the Schwarz leader when he entered the room. Crawford looked up briefly at the German.
"It's Crawford to you, Schuldich." The American answered curtly, turning back to whatever that was on his laptop screen.
Chris cringed, visibly, at the name he was called. Nobody he had talked to had any idea why he was called Schuldich. All they said was that it was what the telepath had introduced himself to be. As to what had happened in that four years that had caused him to name himself "guilty", he did not know. Neither did anyone else.
Perhaps Brad would know something about it. But said man had pointedly stated that he had not knew him before Estet, and that Chris had mistook him for someone else.
Chris did not believe him. If only he could get hold of the diaries he remembered keeping. Then maybe he would find the answers to all his questions.
"Have anyone told you that you look like a high school prefect like this?"
Crawford winced.
"Nobody but you dares to get on my nerves, Mastermind."
"Oh really?" Chris smiled, thinking that he had finally found a way to ruffle up his leader's overly well-groomed feathers. "And why is that so? Are you known to bite?"
"Don't mess with me, Schuldich." Crawford warned.
Finally, it was the last straw. He had enough of people calling him "Schuldich this and Schuldich that", can't they see that he was not Schuldich? He was not the person they want him to be. When he was thirteen, people shunned him for being a freak that can read the minds of others, 'devil's spawn', that was what they called him. Now, even when he was supposedly seventeen, he was still doing whatever others expect him to do. He was a lap dog, nothing more, and nothing less. And lap dogs were just supposed to kiss your feet and fetch the papers, right?
"And what if I want to mess with you? You were the one who's messing with my life now. Who told you I want to be in Estet? Who told you I want to be in Schwarz? Who the fuck ever told you I want to be here?!"
That was the most Crawford could take too. Throwing his chair back, he grabbed the lithe German by the shoulders and threw him, sprawled across the long meeting table. Sapphire eyes darkened into a shade of midnight as Schuldich glared back at him with unequalled amount of hatred, anger, hurt and desire?
Pulling off his tie, Crawford straddled the other man and held him down with a firm and not so gentle grip over his mouth.
"Shut up, Schuldich. I told you not to mess with me."
"Those words you just said could jolly well get you killed. And you are not doing anything that compromises the team."
The team. It was always about the team. It was always about Schwarz, wasn't it? Crawford had the slight inkling that it was not always so. There was a point of time where he did something for himself. But when could that be? He loosened his grip on the younger man.
"When was it, Brad?" Schuldich asked.
"Brad?" The boy gathered his lover closer to himself. They were inside a church. Nobody could get them in here. God simply would not allow it.
"It's going to be all right, Chris. They won't get you. They won't get us." Brad buried his face into the spicy-sweet scent of his lover's hair. The cold metal of a gun in his hands brought no more comfort than the heavy rain outside. It was the rain again
Deep inside he knew the truth. The painful truth was that they were going to be captured and given a fate worse than death himself. Against people as powerful as the Magi, two teenage kids simply had no chance at victory.
The grand church doors opened and a dead body was thrown towards them with a cruel laugh. Chris made the mistake of looking up from his lover's embrace and screamed when he recognized the corpse.
It was Anna Heinrich.
Crawford closed his eyes painfully. What was that onslaught of image about? He never saw the past in his visions before. He was one man who lived in the future. But those images he had just seen, they were not figments of imaginations. They were memories…long forgotten memories of despair, pain and love.
"Brad?" Schuldich muttered.
Déjà vu.
Just like what he had done years ago, Crawford got off the young man and gathered him into his arms. The Geman stiffened slightly, and then gave in to the embrace, knowing nothing of the visions that had changed Crawford's entire demeanor.
The American had no idea what he was doing. He had no idea what those memories were trying to tell him. He had no idea where in the timeline of his life he could place them. But he knew for certain that those were definitely memories. Only when, and how? The first time he met Schuldich was the arrogant bastard who swaggered down the hallway of Rosenkreuz as if he owned that place.
"Brad?" Chris tried again.
The only reply he was given was the tightening of arms around him, and the wet spot on his shoulders that Brad was causing with his tears.
----
Nagi quickly got out of the room when he saw the two eldest members of Schwarz hanging onto each other on the meeting table as if anyone of them would drown if somebody let go.
Calmly, he closed the door behind him and leant against its cool polished surface.
Since none of them seemed rather interested in getting lunch, he would have to go out himself then.
He had no idea what had gotten into him to think that it was a good idea to pay a visit to the park before lunch. True enough, he felt more at peace with nature than anywhere else, but it was no reason for him to be out in the sun. He had only himself to blame for that pounding pain in his head.
Now he had a vague idea why Schuldich was an asshole whenever he got one of those telepathy-induced migraines.
"Hey," A cold water bottle pressed itself against his forehead. The Japanese boy looked up and met the laughing hazel eyes of that klutz he met some time ago. "You okay?"
The cool surface of the bottle was relaxing and doing some good, albeit not enough, to his headache. Nagi nodded weakly and moved away slightly.
"Hey?" The telekinetic frowned and tried his best not to glare. Was this man so thick headed that he could not even tell he wanted to be left alone?
"My name is Hidaka Ken." The soccer player wiped his sweaty hand against his jersey and held it out, as if asking for a handshake. Nagi looked at the said hand curiously before taking it.
"Naoe Nagi."
+End of Chapter 5+
+Continue to Chapter 6+