Well, I finally continued Lovechild with two chaps in a row. I finished this one even before I managed to upload the second chapter. Now I'm so hot on writing the fourth, but I have to take a shower and get to somewhere…. Need to get a job.

Disclaimer: Weiß Kreuz and all of its charas belong to me not. They belong to the respective owners and I simply take them to cherish the imagination in me.


Lovechild 3: The Patient

The door to my office opened and entered Anna, the nurse who helped my works, followed by two other people, a teenage boy with short blond hair and brilliant blue eyes, and an older man. The man was dressed well with suit and silk tie. He was about my age. His hair was neatly cropped and he wore frameless glasses. He smiled at me and I rose from my seat to greet him.

"Tomi," I said, "It's been a while."

The man extended his hand to shake mine, as his smile grew wider.

"Uli," he said cheerfully, "How long has it been? Five? Six years?"

"It's good to see you," I said as I gestured the two to have a seat at my desk. I told Anna that she could leave. The blond nurse smiled and left the room.

Thomas Sauer didn't look much different compared to how he was back then. He didn't look even older than how I remembered him on our graduation day. We were in the same university. He was studying management while I was taking my major in psychology. We entered the university on the same year and finished it at the same time.

My eyes turned to the teenager. For a moment, I was caught by a couple of turquoise on his face. He looked impassive. It seemed that he didn't have a care about what happened around him. Even our cheerful reunion didn't seem to affect him.

He must be the child Tomi talked about over the phone several days ago. He said that he needed to put someone under my care. He sent me the boy's files. I have seen into the files although I hadn't given it a thorough study.

Christian Gottfried Liebeskind, born as Christian Gottfried, age 15 years old, going on sixteen. His father died when the boy was 11 because of stroke. His mother died not long after, saving the boy from a car accident. He was then taken under his grandfather's care, Jürgen Liebeskind, a millionaire who owned several department stores, shipping company, and a vast estate. The grandfather died about a year ago, leaving the fortune into the young teenager. Tomi was old Mr. Liebeskind right hand man and he acted also as the younger's guardian.

From what I have read in the report, the boy could be considered to be brilliant, perhaps almost genius. He was a straight-A student in every subject he was in at school. He even got the honorable mention for being the best student at school. The boy, who was sitting calmly before me now, was suspected having some sort of mental disturbance. A couple of months ago he killed one of his schoolmate, Heinrich Nathanael Guildford, students' representative at the school council and member of several activities in that exclusive dormitory school. Apparently, the victim was also his best friend. The two boys, according to other students, were very close and often seen together. They were also in the same drama club.

It was said that they, the two boys and their other two room-mates, were on a holiday in Tenerife, and they were making a party when a shotgun was heard and all the people rushed to the study where they found Liebeskind holding Guildford's body in his hands.

It was said that when they found the two, the boy looked impassive although he was crying. The strange thing was that ever since that day he never heeded anyone who called him Friede, the way he was usually called at school. He would say that his name was Schuld, as how the victim was often called. This might be a case where the patient was shocked that he subconsciously differed himself into another person. The boy never came to his best friend's funeral because he was confined in jail. If he had come there, he might be able to accept the fact that the boy he pretended to be had already been dead.

"Well," Tomi sighed, "Dr. Elmer," he said, turning formal all of a sudden and called me with my surname instead of my nickname, "This is the boy I told you about over the phone the other day." He turned to the boy and said, "Say hello to Dr. Elmer, Christian."

The boy merely rolled his eyes from Tomi to me.

"There's nothing wrong with me," he said suddenly, "Why do I have to see a doctor? And please don't call me Christian. I'm not Christian."

"Nobody says that there's something wrong with you," I put in, thinking that perhaps I could persuade the boy to stay, "I am here to proof that there's nothing wrong with you as the others suspect. OK?"

The boy diverted gaze from mine.

"I am not Christian," he insisted.

"All right," I said, "Then what's your name? I have to know so I could call you properly."

The eyes of the boy before me lighted up.

"Henry Guildford. But people call me Schuld," he said confidently as he offered me a handshake.


This boy, Schuld, filled my days. He was a very nice and polite young man, because he refused to be regarded as merely a teenager. And he was sure bright. We had a lot of conversation, especially about what he had gone through. According to his side of the story, Friede was a best friend with whom he shared everything. Surely there was times when he felt jealous that Friede excelled him in some things, but he admittedly say that he was fond of that boy, especially the way he could understand other people.

For him, Friede was the one who died. He said that Friede found a gun in Woodsy's – their friend Rachel Selva, whose parents own the villa where this all had happened – father's study and then he committed suicide.

When I asked if he knew why Friede wanted to die, he said that Friede was tired to hear things. I asked him what kind of things this Friede had heard and he explained that his best friend could hear voices from people, and he said it stressed him out. He told me that Friede killed his mother because he knew that his mother missed her dead husband so much that he would given up everything just to make her smile again. He also said that Friede killed his grandfather too because the old man was in grief that he never told his only daughter that he was sorry for turning her away from the household. Of how Friede killed them, he refused to tell.

He occupied one room at the west wings, and he made friends with other patients, no matter how crazy they were. He seemed to understand them very well, and could even help the nurses and doctors. At one time, he explained that one of our long-time patients, Mr. Felder, who refused to talk for the past ten years, only wished to go back to the West Indies and live under the tall palm trees. Right after he said that to the nurses and Dr. Raupe, who were checking on the old man, he started to cry, a show of emotion he never showed to anyone. He said that the man was so sad that the country in which he had lived had long perished after a revolution right after the World War II ended, and he could never go back there no matter what.

The next time the boy managed to approach Miss Rosenmohn, a thirty something multi-personality patient, and talked to the real Miss Rosenmohn, which hardly ever emerged to the surface. I was going to check on him when I saw them talking under the willow tree next to the pond. The one we used to see in her was Marry-Anne, a childlike persona, or Lucy, a fiercer and brutal teenager version of her. Nevertheless, the one I saw that day was Miss Rosenmohn who talked in a shy and nervous voice. She talked to him that she liked the pond because she could see the reflection in the water and realized that she still existed. At that point, I noticed that Friede, or rather Schuld, never bother to look in the mirror.

Surely there mirrors in the bathroom, in his bathroom also, but after that day on I noticed that he always averted his eyes from it. Once I decided to ask him about the mirror and why he never bothered to look into it, even when he was combing his hair or fixing his clothes. He took his eyes away from me and did not answer my question. I decided I didn't want to push him far about it, but I decided to bring the question to him sometime later.

A few days after I decided to ask the question again. I did it as we were sitting by the pond, under the swaying willow leaves. It was a hot summer afternoon as we talked there. We had some ice cream with us. He liked ice cream, choc-cherry flavored, but today we had vanilla instead.

I told him that the pond was a nice spot in this asylum. I said, "Look down there and you will see a whole different world," without really making senses at all, "There's sky inside water," I pointed again, this time I pulled my face to the water.

He laughed, not a laugh that meant to laugh as if what I said was ridiculous, but rather a laugh that he also found the thing amusing.

"There's another dimension inside this pond," I said again, this time beckoning him to look closer as well. He looked hesitated, but then he lay on his stomach and with an unsure face, looked inside the pool. His eyes fixed on the reflection of the bright blue sky, which looked rather vivid, compared to our dull reflections because we were under the shadow of the willow tree.

"It's nice to see the water played on the sky and it made it looks like it flows," I said again, encouraging him not to leave the spot, "See," I pointed as a carp swam by, making the sky inside the pond curled and bent.

He nodded. He seemed to enjoy the reflection of the sky.

"And everything that is, are also inside this world," I said again, carefully not to use the word "reflection" in front of him, afraid that he might withdraw from his place.

"The clouds up there are also inside," I said again, and noticing that his eyes followed the places I pointed with my finger, I took a sharp breath and continued, "And also there's the willow and you."

His eyes moved from the willow leaves inside to his own reflection. He gasped and suddenly retreated to the willow tree and sat there, shivering.

"I didn't kill him," he said, trembling, arms around his knees, "He wanted to die. He wanted to die so I pulled the trigger for him because he didn't dare to. But I didn't kill him."

"Who you didn't kill?" I asked slowly as I approached him and kneeled beside him. I held my hands on the ground, not yet wanted to extend them to calm him.

"He wanted to die. He wanted a perfect ending and I pulled it for him," he said again, half sobbing, as he rock his body back and forth. "But in the end he said he regretted to die. He wanted to live. He told me I would be better off dead and he was the one who was supposed to live."

He curled himself even tighter.

I decided to hear his rambling, so I didn't say anything, but I came closer to him and wrapped my arms around his lean shoulders.

"If it was a good ending, he would not be dragged to jail, and he would not have to stay in an asylum. I'm the one who deserve all that. He didn't deserve anything for a crime he never did."

It dawned on him that the boy I was holding was Friede. All the confidence I felt whenever I talked to the one who called himself Schuld was gone and in my hand curled a fragile person I had never learned to know. He gave up showing himself after the third month of his stay here, all thanks to the idea that Miss Rosenmohn gave me when she talked to the boy.

He cried himself to sleep in my hands and then I carried him to his room. I never realized that he was so thin until I lifted him up and felt that he was a little underweight. Funny that I found myself caressing him as he slept soundly in his bed. I developed an attachment toward my own patient, something that was wrong but felt so right at that moment, and now I realized that I had fallen into his beauty.


By the time he opened his eyes he suddenly became hysterical. He said something about too many voices at the same time. His blabber was a mix of English, Dutch, German, and French. He was calmed down with some tranquilizer. He lay there, on his bed, awakened but not really aware of anything around him, including me.

I reduced the dose of his tranquilizer shot little by little until a certain limit that we could communicate. I didn't dare to go further, afraid that he might become hysterical again.

"Hallo," I said, "Do you recognize me?"

He closed his eyes, too tired to force himself to nod.

"Do you still hear voices?" I asked. I always tried to show all my patients that I understood and trusted them no matter how ridiculous they said it.

He closed his eyes again. "They're far away," he said in a hushed voice.

"You are Friede, I assume?"

He smiled wearily.

"And you are worried," he said as if "worried" was my name.

I gave a nod.

"You are my patient," I said, "I worry about all of them."

"Friede," I asked again, "Do you know why you are here?"

He gave a small nod this time and said, "They realized I hear voices. Isn't it?" he asked back, but then he said again, "No, no…" his voiced trailed off before he took a deep breath and said again, "Because he tried to live within me."

"Who tried to live within you?" I asked.

He averted his eyes and kept quiet for a couple of moment before he turned his face back toward me and whispered, "Schuld regretted he died."

"How did you know that?" I asked.

"He told me before he died. I heard him."

He paused.

"Look, I don't want to talk about this. I'm sleepy."

"Fine," I said then, "I'll be back later to check on you."

"Can I call you Uli?" he asked suddenly as I reached the door.

I said that he could call me by any name he liked.

He gave me yet another smile and then he closed his eyes. Perhaps the tranquilizer was still too strong to keep him awake.


I was just sitting at my table to read reports from the nurses when someone knocked the door to my office. I looked up from my table and said, "Come in."

Dr. Raupe came to my room followed by Tomi and another person I never saw. The man was around twenties with shortly trimmed black hair and a pair of oval frameless glasses. He could be someone from the Liebeskind enterprise or something, I thought to myself.

Tomi gave me a smile and I smiled back at him. We exchanged our hellos and told them to take a seat. It surprised me that Dr. Raupe also took a seat for himself. I thought he was only taking the guests to my office.

"Uli," Tomi said as he regarded to the fine young man beside him, "This is Brad Crawford. He is one of our partners." He didn't tell what kind of partnership though he brought that certain partner with him to this asylum.

I shook his hand and was surprised that he shared the same kind of confidence that Friede, or rather Schuld, showed when I first met him. We exchanged our "How do you do?" out of mere politeness. I didn't like him in instance. To me he ruined the memory of meeting the Schuld in Friede.

"I heard that Christian had already found himself back," Tomi said. I saw that Dr. Raupe nodded his head.

"Yes," I said, "I sent you an e-mail regarding that. Do you wish to see him?" I asked, "But I'm afraid he is sleeping as we speak."

I look sideways toward the Crawford person.

"It's OK," Tomi said, "You can say anything in front of him."

I took a deep breath before I continued, "I still put him under tranquilizer because he might break out and become hysterical. He said he hear voices."

I saw that Dr. Raupe nodded again while Tomi gave out a meaningful smile. The Crawford was still impassive. I could not read him.

"I decided to move him from your hand to Dr. Raupe's," Tomi said again.

I stared at him in disbelief, "What?" I asked as if I couldn't hear him right. Just as I started to get into my patient, he had to be moved under someone else's care.

"Dr. Raupe is more experienced in this matter," Tomi said again. He then gave an apologetic smile. Maybe he saw my disappointment.

"Look, Uli, I didn't mean to disregard your ability," he said again, "But I want the boy to get the best he could get, and Dr. Raupe is one."

I stole a glance at the doctor. He was my senior, and he had ten years of experience before me. I couldn't deny that he had handled many kinds of patients, but I was mad that my own colleague would take away a patient that I myself capable of handling. That was not fair.

"I have arranged it with the hospital's management," Tomi said again as he looked sideways at Crawford, as if this Crawford was the one who took care of that problem, "You don't have to worry about Christian anymore."


So the deal was made. The boy was moved out to a bungalow a bit separated from the main building where most people lived and I wasn't responsible for the boy anymore but I still visited him from time to time out of our friendship that had grown for the last three months. He was still under tranquilizer then, although in lesser amount, and I was not allowed to see on his files. Even patients' files were classified safe from the patient's own doctor and family. I knew, though, from Friede, that the man called Crawford came occasionally to Friede's chamber, but not Tomi.

I asked Friede what that Crawford had done during his stay here and he replied that the man merely stood by the bed and looked at him. But he said that the man was silent, and he said that the only time that man spoke was to say that he could tell him how to hide himself away from all those voices.

"I didn't hear voices when Schuld lived through me," Friede said, "Maybe I should just go back there. And I wish that he were still alive."

"He does live," I said, "Here."

I pointed to his chest.

"And here."

I pointed to his head.

"And so do your parents," he said with a vague smile as he lifted his hand which seemed like a big effort for him to my chest.

"Maybe I should stay by the name Schuld," he said.

"Why?" I asked him.

"Do you want to know why I called myself Friede?" he answered back with a question.

"No," I said, "Why?"

"Friede, Gottfried was the name of my father, and I used it for the memory of my parents."

"I see."

"And I might put up Schuld for later use," he gave a chuckle.

"But you are not him," I said, trying to make sure that he was not anymore confused with his own identity.

"I know."

I looked at him. Unconsciously I pulled my hand and started to stroke his hair.

"Schuldig would be a good name though, because I'm guilty anyway…" he trailed off and turned his eyes away from mine to the dotted acoustic panel on the ceiling.

"That Crawford thought that I introduced myself as Schuldig."

I raised an eyebrow.

"I guess he mistook what I said then."

I gave a laugh, induced by his chuckles. I guess I understood what he meant.

"Does your new name make you happy?" I asked him.

"I guess so," he said again as he heaved a sigh, "It reminds me not to fall into voices again."

"So you still hear those voices?"

He gave a nod.

"I'm surprised you didn't wince if I say so. You don't even think I'm crazy," he said, "That man Crawford didn't as well."

"Do you like him?" I ask, trying as best as I could not to show my unexplainable dislike toward the man.

"In some ways," he said, "You don't like him, don't you, Uli?"

I shook my head.

"Do you hear it from me?" I asked.

He nodded.

"And you're not afraid?" he said.

I shook my head.

He smiled. "Thank you."

A creak at the door made me turned toward the source of the voice. Dr. Raupe came with Crawford trailing behind him.

"I have to go now," I said to Friede. I raise myself.

He waved his hand.

"I'll see you around, Friede," I said as I made myself to the door.

"I am Schuldig now," he said with a chuckle.

He said it as I passed in front of Crawford. I stole a glance at him and his puzzled look, he didn't understand the joke we made over him, and I couldn't help laughing as I walked out the door. I heard Friede, or rather called Schuldig now, was laughing as I strode to the main building.

- end of chapter 3 -


If you want to know what was so funny about the notion that Schuldig told Dr. Elmer, just wait for it in the next chapter, I want to put in Crawford's POV, finally! I never imagined I would write that someone actually laughed on Crawford aside of Schu, but the idea of this nice doctor to laugh on Crawford was so amusing that I couldn't put it off.

Oh, and actually all the conversations done here were in German… I definitely could not build all those in proper German, and it would be too bothersome for you to read through the translations.