Chapter 11
Youji
Ah, a new day a new grievance. My problem this time? I was fuckin' starving and we had to wait for the chibi and the jock to get up until we could order any food! That way they could track the killer. Hmph, right now the killer was starvation! All I'd had to eat recently was a banana split and Aya ate most of that.
"Ayaaa, I'm so hungry I could die!" I drawled lazily. "Can't we just give the two of them a courtesy call?"
"They could track our phone calls; we don't want them to hear anything suspicious."
"Going to their room at eleven o'clock at night yesterday wasn't suspicious?"
"Hn." Man, why'd they have to come along and ruin my vacation with all of this mission bull?. . . Okay so it really was a mission but we'dve gotten around to it eventually. . . Honest!
Thankfully, there was soon a knock at our door and anxiously I hopped up to answer it. . . Surprisingly though, it was not the evil little pair of romantic mood killers. . .
"Anou. . . We didn't order room service," I corrected the young looking girl who was carrying a large tray with delicious looking pastries and other assorted breakfast items.
"The breakfast is courtesy of the hotel manager, Ayame Junko, on behalf of your unfortunate accident." Her voice was direct and to the point but she never made eye contact, a very prestigious server indeed.
"Uh, thanks then." Taking the tray from her, I closed the door gently.
"Aya."
"What?" Inquiring eyes made there way over to the large tray that I was carrying.
"Do you suppose that this is safe to eat?" As I questioned hopefully I could feel my eyes go wide as I prepared to beg. I was so God damn hungry. So hungry I could've eaten one of that Masafumi's genetically engineered crabs. . . Whole!
As he glanced at the food, I could tell that my little Aya was fighting an internal battle as well. Teehee, the Fujimiya junk food gene was kicking in. "We. . . We can't take that sort of risk!"
"But Aya just look at it! This nice, gooey, dripping with frosting, and layers of cinnamon donut just couldn't possibly be poisoned could it? Or what about this one? Oh, look they have Krispy Kremes. . . Mmm. . ."
Internally I snickered; the redheaded assassin looked like a man on death row who was being denied his last meal. Okay, so it was a little cruel to tease him so and I knew that we shouldn't eat the food- but it just smelled so damned delicious!
"Kudou," he growled. "If you don't shut up. So help me. . ."
Luckily, I was saved by another knock at the door. Aya was the one who rushed over to answer it this time.
"Ohayo!" The voice of the chibi, no matter how well disguised, as Omika was very recognizable. "We need you guys to meet us down in our room, we have a plan.
Aya
Sitting idly on the corner of one of two double beds I waited for the two younger assassins to explain the mission plans.
"All right," Omi began, a more serious tone taking over his voice for a change, "There are approximately 70 employees in the room service department alone. When corresponding information with the other killings there are 32 who have been working on all of the nights. After doing background checks, we have eliminated seven suspects leaving 25. Of those twenty five ten have registered guns, eight of which are colt pistols, which was the murder weapon in five of the cases."
"So we have eight suspects," Ken summed up Omi's long speech.
"Iya, we have more than that. Who is to say the person owns a registered gun?"
"And why did you eliminate the other seven suspects?" Youji piped in, for having been a former private detective one would have assumed that he'd be more productive in this case. I was partially to blame for that though, I should not have let him become sidetracked.
"Because they were chefs," Omi answered good naturedly, not offended by the doubt of his skills. "The chefs have no idea what's going to whom so they couldn't poison the food just for one specific target.
"This isn't going to get us anywhere," I sighed with irritation. "We need a trap for the killer."
"We're one step ahead of you," Ken grinned, taking pride in the fact that he got to share the credit for what was most likely the Bombay's idea.
"Aya, we want you guys to order room service and then act like you got food poisoning and just stay in your room for a while. Youji, you being concerned for your lover, are going go to the store to buy some medicine or something," Omi paused for a moment, most likely to catch his breath but then continued. "I think that the killer will most likely act if you two are separated and one of you is weakened. You see the majority of the suspects are female and two strong men can be intimidating."
"So what you're saying is leave Aya to be killed?" The anger that laced Youji's generally indifferent purr surprised me.
"It's the only way Youji and we'll be watching him the entire time you know. Also he'll be wearing a bullet proof vest-"
"A lot of good a bullet proof vest will do if they're gonna shoot you in the head!" Despite a generally stoic face, I knew that my features must have been registering shock. Why was Youji acting like some over protective mother?. . . Did he really care that much?. . .
"Well what do you want then?!" Ken spoke up with frustration. "Do you want to be the bait?"
"Yes." The monosyllabic answer was spat in such a manner that most would have expected it to have come from me and not the other way around.
"Youji. . ." My own voice startled me.
"Don't take it personally Aya, but I can handle women better, even vicious homophobic killer women," he winked indifferently but it was obvious, at least it was obvious to me, that he wasn't doing this for my lack of ability.
Youji
"Okay, so Youji gets food poisoning and Aya goes to the store," the chibi sighed with frustration. . .
Drowning out the mission plans, I began to ponder why I acted that way. Aya was perfectly capable as an assassin, probably even more than I was. But. . . The thought of him being murdered was too much for me to bear. It was one thing to die on a mission and go out fighting, but just waiting to be killed by some psychopath. . . I could not let him do that. He had to live for his sister! I still didn't know much about her but I could tell that she was an incredibly important person to him and that she was not well. Who would take care of her if he was gone?
Also, I wanted us to both make it out of this alive. Right now, I knew in my heart that what I was feeling for the bratty, icicle man was something that I had not felt since Asuka. I'd been struggling for years to get over that loss and find such a feeling again. Now that I'd found it I'd be damned if that'd be taken away from me. . . Even if the happiness that I had found was with another man, and an assassin at that.
"Youji. . .Youji!"
"What?!" Ken's voice startled me out of a daze.
"We're you paying any attention at all?"
"Uh. . ."
"What I was just saying, Youji," Omi began. "Was that you're going to take some food from our room, so that it's safe you know, and put it with your room service food up there. You'll eat it etc. But first we need to attach a camera to you. . ."
So now Aya and I were back in our room once again, I was now heavier with the weight of a bulletproof vest, a wire, and a small camera all underneath my shirt. Grimly I took another bite of the pastry that Ken and Omi had provided me with, hn, not even close the quality of the food that had been sent up earlier. Hell that food was probably perfectly safe with our luck.
"Hey Yuki," I murmured making sure to use the codenames lest the camera man. . . Or woman as everyone suspected, be an adept lip reader.
"Yeah?" Aya asked looking up at me. Currently we were both on the bed, me lying in a reclined position watching the television (luckily there weren't anymore bad YAOI movies to rent) and Aya was lying down horizontally with his head in my lap. Aww, but we made such an adorable couple. I bet that all of the girls back at the Koneko no Sumi ii would just flat out and die with jealously if they knew. . . Oh wait, we weren't actually a couple. Signing softly I reminded myself to stop thinking like that.
"Shuichi?"
"What?" I looked back down at him.
"You said my name, what is it?" Oh yeah, I'd forgotten.
Leaning down so that my hair would obscure the camera's view, I whispered to him. "How long does food poisoning take to go into effect?"
"Hmm," Pensively he pondered this. "I guess it depends. The digestive system takes about four hours to get to work but I had food poisoning once and it only took about half an hour.
"Really? What did you eat?"
"A birthday cake. . ."
"Hn, some happy birthday."
"It was my sixteenth birthday." How sad! No wonder Aya could be such a grump, bad stuff always seemed to be happening to him! And of all the birthdays that could be ruined. . .
"Did you sue the bakery?"
"Hmph, no." It almost sounded like he had meant to laugh there. ". . My sister made it."
"Man, I've heard about sibling rivalry but that's pretty harsh!" Thank God that I was an only child.
"No, she was really trying. . . It was just undercooked and had something to do with the eggs. . . She was only 14." Okay so his sister was. . . Two years younger, I noted and committed to memory. If there was any one thing that I had learned from being a detective, it was how to develop a good file cabinet in your head for all of those little factoids that could prove to be useful in the future.
"You really love your sister don't you?" It was more of a statement than a question but he regarded it as such anyway.
"Hai." The answer was curt and cold but you could tell by the slight gleam in his eye that he truly meant it.
"What was her name?" I ventured to ask again despite the fact that the first time that I had proposed such a question I was met with silent disapproval.
Wistfully he sighed, as if he were deep in thought. A few moments passed awkwardly between us before he answered. "My sister's name is Aya. . . You probably already knew that it was not my real name. . . Ran."
"Hmm?"
"My name is really Ran."
Before I could help myself, the words slipped out. "Ran-chan! That's so kawaii!" That was such a cuter nickname than Ayan or Assassincicle. Ran-chan. . . I like the sound of that.
"Urusai!"
"But Ran-chan, it's such a cute name!"
"Don't you have an illness to be feigning?" Twin violet orbs narrowed menacingly at me.
"How am I supposed to fake it? Just sit in the bathroom for hours?"
Sighing the redhead brought a hand up to his forehead as though my idiocy pained him. "I knew that I should've been the one to fake sick. . . Y-Shuichi."
"Hai?"
"Why did you want to take my place?"
Aya
Now that I had him alone I could reprimand him for being an idiot. If he couldn't act sick than this part of the mission was a failure! It was crucial for him to be ill. . In addition, I really wanted to know just why he cared so damned much. No one else on the team would've taken my place, and until recently I would have figured Youji to be the last person to ever volunteer. . .
"I. . ." He stammered as he desperately tried to come up with an excuse. I knew him too well to assume that he would give me a truthful answer the first time around. "You're a bad actor."
Sitting up from my lying position, I faced my koibito and glared daggers at him. "You're lying."
"Aya," he said softly, now that his face was blocked from the camera. . . At least he didn't call me Ran-chan again. If anyone else found out my name so help me God I'd kill him. I don't know why I even told him. . . Actually I do. As shameful as it is to admit it, deep down the reason that I told him is because if we ever did manage to. . . Have sex, which was looking quite doubtful due to all of the interruptions that we'd been suffering, if we did do it. . . I didn't want to hear my sister's name in that situation.
"Aya-" His words grasped my attention once again. "I'm sorry but I guess that I just got sca- I was worried about you I guess."
"Youji. . ." Touched by his words I leaned forward and embraced my older comrade. After chastely holding the hug for a moment, I whispered softly against his ear. "Now I want you to push me away and run to the bathroom with a hand cupped over your mouth."
"Always with the mission," he sighed but one could tell from his tone that he understood that this was business. Softly his lips brushed my neck before he violently shoved me back, vaulted up and ran towards the bathroom.
Doing my best to make an expression filled with both worry and concern I up righted myself and headed over towards the bathroom. Meeting Youji there we both waited a minute or two then headed back over to the bed, him carrying the empty ice bucket just incase and me holding a damp rag for his forehead.
I had to give the man credit. He really did look sweaty and feverish; I don't think that I could have pulled that off. . . Perhaps the paleness but nothing else.
"Shuichi-koi, are you alright?" I sounded like some desperate onna from one of those terrible shoujo mangas that my sister used to be so fond of. . . It disgusted me.
"I'll cough be alright. . . Yuki." However, at the very least I didn't sound as clichéd as Youji currently did.
"Do I need to take you to the doctors?"
"No. . . But if you could get some. . . hack Pepto Bismol that'd be dandy. . ."
"Dandy?" Oops, I didn't mean to be an echo but who the hell says dandy?
"Please Yuki. . ."
"Anything for you koi." Leaning down I kissed his forehead before getting up, grabbing the key and putting on my jacket. "I'll be right back, don't go anywhere." With that warning, I made my leave.
Youji
Finally my years of learning how to act sick, AKA junior high, were paying off! I had gotten up once again to vomit and come back to lay down, taking note to increase my breathing. Eventually though I decided to succumb to a fake sleep.
As I was actually starting to dose off I heard a knock at the door. Still acting sickly, I gathered my strength and shuffled towards the door. Opening it, I fought back a gasp.
"Omae. . ." Before I knew what was what there was a cloth covering my mouth and nose. Despite best efforts, I eventually inhaled and the chloroform turned the world around me black. . .