Charles Leistung was tired of waiting. He knew that they could send a thousand Sweeper teams out there with little more result than the deaths of a few worthless psychics. The group Bradley Crawford had allied himself with was too powerful. Especially his contact. It was that loose telekinetic Rosenkreuzt was dying to get their hands on. He had disappeared from their scanners several weeks ago, they had assumed he was dead.

But no, judging by the handy work bestowed upon the last Sweeper team, the little brat was alive and making dangerous new friends.

This was not acceptable.

It was time someone, someone other than that idiot Hotzmann, took control of the situation...

==========================================================================


...oh how low he had sunken. He, Bradley Anthony Crawford a son of a wealthy New England stock broker, top of his class both in the European boarding school he had been attending before he was 'transferred' to Vienna and in his studies in Rosenkreuzt, had been reduced to begging for money.

No, he thought angrily, trying to hold onto some of his dignity. Not begging, borrowing. And it was only a small amount, just enough to buy a newspaper. Asking an adult for the change hadn't been that demeaning, yes, it was almost noble in fact. It showed his humility, he decided. Besides, it was a necessary evil.

They needed to find a place to stay. Golden brown eyes flicked off to the side, and money. Lots of money...

...And a straight jacket. A heavy duty straight jacket.

And maybe some duct tape. For Schuldig. Yes... duct tape.

He buried his nose in the classified, stepping around the corner, expecting to find his fellow escapees right where he left them. They had better have stayed there, he told them he would be right back. It only had been an hour. News paper stands were far and between in the area of the city they were currently situated in. What could have gone wrong in an hour?

Bradley Crawford passed a spiky white head, not giving it a second glance. He flipped the newspaper and found the apartment section. A four bedroom flat would be nice, he'd settle for three, even two, the others could bunk together whatever the situation was, so long as he had the master bedroom to himself.

Caught up in his thoughts, Crawford missed the meeting spot. He sighed and folded the paper, back tracking. He walked by the spiky white, almost silver, head again. This time it registered.

Crawford's lips parted. "Farfarello..."

A single amber eye blinked up at him innocently.

"...what the hell happened to your hair?"

"Bad dye job." Came the calm reply. Farfarello had his hands on the Sweeper's bowie knife and was carving an image into the bench he had been told not to move from.

Schuldig crossed the street and shrugged, shoulders sagging a little bit in defeat. "It was suppose to be blonde. I guess red doesn't need as much bleach as black."

Crawford actually appeared startled. He leaned towards Schuldig and half whispered. "...you're aware your hair is now green?"

The now emerald haired Schuldig looked as if he might cry. "It's not totally green! It's white with...green highlights! There's a fucking difference." He crossed his arms and pouted, "I thought, y'know, Farfie's hair is red like mine, right? So, I'd test the dye on his first. See how it turned out. Well, his hair is a darker shade than mine, and when it turned out white, I thought, well hell, since I'm lighter, mine will go platinum but..."

"Instead it went..." Crawford finished flatly.

Schuldig nodded. "Green."

Crawford gave him a look.

"You were the one who thought we stuck out! I was trying to make us look more normal." The fourteen-year-old complained. His voice lost its defensive edge and melted into something more whimsical and childish. "Besides, I thought blonde would be uber-sexy. It makes freckles less noticeable, you know."

"Don't say uber ever again." Something struck him. "...where did you get the dye?" He was met with a blank stare. Slowly his companion motioned towards the walk-in salon behind him. Crawford raised a second eyebrow, speaking slowly, as one would to a child. A very thick child. "...and you paid for this how...?"

Schuldig dug a wallet out of his pocket. He opened the bill and proudly revealed what was left of his stash. Crawford took note of the driver license inside. Catching his thoughts, Schuldig hastily removed the photo ID of Mr. Hans Schneider and tossed it over his shoulder.

Crawford gave him another look.

"...Nagi lifted it." Schuldig said quickly.

The child in question stepped across the street, thumbing through another wallet. He glanced up at Crawford and for a second looked almost guilty. Clearing his throat, and hiding the leather purse behind his back, he murmured in his dead calm tenor. "I thought he would use it for something important."

"Hair is important." The...green head... interjected.

"Schuldig said you instructed us to do it. Telepathically."

"...oh, did he?"

"Hey, don't look at me. It's not my fault he's gullible."

"You're not suppose to say telepathic." The now silver haired Farfarello quietly pointed out.

Crawford felt a headache coming on.

========================================================================

The twenty-one year old was waiting in his office when he returned from lunch.

Sazha still lived in Vienna, waiting to be assigned a team and a mission. Rosenkreuzt had been reluctant to let the psychic go, for danger of him being injured. They had yet to receive a client who would need a Talent of his degree, a job of his prestige, a payer willing to pay the price offered for his services. With expectations like that, it was easy to understand why the red eyed young man was surprised and slightly offended to be called in to capture three renegade psychics.

It was always said that Sazha was too thin for his height. He had a slim, almost feminine body. Maybe it was his hair, a thick pool of liquid ebony that flowed down his back, neatly tied at the very end. Sazha's features could best be described as elven, dark and mythical. His demonic eyes were calculating and evil. Someday he would be one of the head Councilmen.

And he knew it.

"Schuldig." The German Mind Eraser opened, not allowing Leistung to talk. That's how important he was to Este. "He was suppose to be part of my team, once he matured?"

Sazha had led a few temporary groups before, nothing permanent, mostly because he had the bad habit of allowing his charges to be killed during missions. He had never worked with the German telepath before, he hadn't wanted to. Telepath's were cattle to Mind Erasers. They fed on them.

But this boy... he was suppose to be very special.

Leistung nodded. "Yes."

A packet of folders had been laid out on the old man's leisure couch. He knew Sazha would show up sooner than he was suppose to and would be curious to see who he would privilege with his hunt.

Now he stood, studying the pictures and instructor notes on each boy. Farfarello's profile had been tossed back onto the cushions, Sazha had no interest in a Manipulator. But this one...

"Bradley Crawford..." He purred, trying the name out on his tongue. "Who is he?"

"Someone who has more ability and cunning than we originally suspected." Leistung answered stiffly.

Sazha ran a hand along the photograph of a thirteen-year-old Crawford, it was the shot they had taken the day he arrived at the academy.

Leistung shivered.

Sazha was rumored to have been caught in the dorms with a few of the younger boys...

"I won't kill them of course. Or break them." He promised. The folders lowered in his hands and he smiled at the old man. Leistung gripped his wolf head cane even tighter, knuckles white. "They already destroyed a Sweeper team? Hoztmann's babies, worthless soldiers, only good for capturing frightened children."

"They serve their primary purpose." Leistung said. "It's not every day a group of students escape the gates."

A feline smile pulled tighter across Sazha's thin lips. "They think they've crawled out of hell, when they've only entered the inferno. My inferno. Leistung, tell Hotzmann to call back his troops. We don't want to waste resources collecting bodies, do we?"

Pushing down his sudden rage at being ordered around by... by another child... Leistung growled. "So, you will return them for me?"

"In time," Sazha said. "in time."

Let them enjoy their freedom, he thought. It will make their imprisonment all the more damaging.

========================================================================


Not much disturbed Naoe Nagi. He had become desensitized to violence, gore, sorrow, darkness, and people. He had become immune to the supernatural, psychics and psychopaths. He was even developing a tolerance for Schuldig, who was an entire category of horror all together.

Naoe Nagi was pretty much fearless.

However, seeing the indestructible, unshakable Bradley Crawford suddenly drop forward and go limp, whimpering, just plain irked him.

"Hey. Hey." The little boy whispered, leaning on top of the sunken American and shaking him. Crawford was so much bigger than he was, it was hard to move him, unless he used his powers. "Hey." Nagi cried, half yelping as Crawford twitched, moaning. "H-hey."

The two were alone at a table, they hadn't ordered anything to eat yet, they had seated themselves. It was an outside bar and grill, fenced off with a low hanging oak deck, over-looking a merchant littered square in the center of the city.

Schuldig had dragged Farfarello off a while ago, claiming Crawford's newspaper search too dull for his refined tastes. They had floated into the crowd, easily disappearing. Schuldig had been right, they stood out less with their new looks. Their heads didn't shine like beacons at least.

"Hey..."

Crawford came back to himself, body regaining its tension. Mumbling something in English, which the Japanese boy didn't understand, he moved back into his seat. A dazed expression washed over his usually stern face and he tried to signal towards a waitress for water.

The woman, brighter than the one they encountered at the breakfast cafe, gave him a dubious look and asked where their parents were.

"Never mind." The American all but growled. The waitress shot them another suspicious glance and walked off, intent on ignoring them.

Nagi leaned against the head of his chair, trying to figure out what happened. He asked, trying not to sound concerned. Crawford had really scared him.

"Vision." Was the muddled explanation, Crawford pinched his nose, collecting his bearings. "A long one."

So that was what it was like to be an oracle.

"Is it painful?"

"Very." He sighed and shook his head. The color was beginning to return to his cheeks. Crawford didn't bother to mention that he handled the flashes better than most other oracles. He hadn't always. When he first came to Rosenkreuzt he had been just like everyone else, thrown to his side, foaming, sometimes screaming in a seizure as the vision played out. "But at least I know that we won't have to worry about the Sweeper team tonight."

The last sentence was spoke low enough not to be detected by the 'college' age boys who miserably sat a few tables away.

=========================================================================


Dusk was coming and Schuldig was once again hungry. He didn't know how many dumb bimbos served dinner in this town, and frankly, he didn't want to risk it. Currently he was on a hunt, for 'honest money' as Crawford said. He had an idea in mind, but if that didn't work out, he could always turn to petty prostitution. He heard male whoring was good money in Vienna.

Schuldig also kept Farfarello busy, distracting him from the voices in his head.

He had learned a lot about the young psychopath in a matter of hours.

One, he found out, Farfarello could be dragged away from his delusions if he was verbally comforted. To know that what was being spoken to him was real, Schuldig had to place himself in front of Farfarello and speak slowly, so that the movements of his mouth connected with the sounds pouring into Farfarello's ear. Touching also helped, a overextended, slow touch on the arm, with Farfarello watching the movement the entire time, so that he couldn't confuse it for a hallucination. Schuldig was trying hard to convince Farfarello's mind to relate any image of himself, Crawford, or Nagi with reality instead of one of his day dreams.

And he was doing fine.

He really had an interesting mind. The squall of thoughts wasn't as annoying as he first thought. Not at all.

However, Schuldig noted, flicking a glance over his shoulder. Those three Sweepers, all of them useless Manipulators, were beginning to get on his nerves.

==========================================================================


The Sweeper leader nearly jumped out of his chair when his cell rang. He hastily yanked it out of his jacket and held it up to his ear. "Yeah?"

In front of him, the oracle turned slightly, head tilted.

It was Hotzmann and he sounded angry. "Come home."

"...home?" The leader echoed, a little too loudly. The child lifted his head, looking over the oracles shoulder at them. "Sir?"

"Home."

The line went dead.

===========================================================================


How was this for honest money?

"Ladies and Gentlemen!" The former red head chanted, voice high and echoing in the microphone. A few of the night walkers paused to stare at the child, expecting nonsense. "This is an American song: Introducing the Chocolate Starfish!"

Farfarello cradled the other microphone with his hands, eye closed.

"And the Hot Dog Flavored Water!" A small crowd formed around the two boys. "Don't laugh, this is the only song I know. Listen up!"

"...you let me violate you..." The Irish boy began to sing lowly.

God bless the karaoke machine and Vienna's boheme-hippies.

Schuldig unhooked his 'phone from the stand and began to pace around, mouth piece pressed tight against his lip. His high nasal voice added to the sound. "It's a fucked up world, we're a fucked up race..."

The song wasn't accurate word per word, but the audience didn't know that.

Besides, they were tranced by Schuldig's presence, or more correctly, his psychic appeal. Money, he whispered as subliminal as possible into their minds. With his voice screaming out verbally at the same time, it was harder for them to catch the difference in their thoughts.

"Everybody's judged by their fucked up face."

"You let me desecrate you." Farfarello continued to whisper in the background. "You let me penetrate you."

"Fucked up dreams, fucked up life," Schuldig gestured with his free hand, "A fucked up kid with a fucked up knife."

Oh. Puny.

The only word most of the listeners understood from the English lyrics was the f-curse, and that was absolutely fascinating.

"Fucked up moms, fucked up dads..."

"You let me complicate you."

"A fucked up cop, with a fucked up badge. Fucked up job, with fucked up pay. Fucked up boss, it's a fucked up day."

Even at his age, Schuldig had the nature and front to pull off what he was screaming. His green eyes were wild as he moved back and forth, reciting a song he loved solely for the repeated use of the one word...

"Help me..." Farfarello had a terrifying angelic voice, like a choir boy. "I broke apart my insides... Help me...I've got no soul to sell."

"Fucked up press, and fucked up lies."

Schuldig moved into the crowd as the karaoke machine blasted into the chorus for his song. He moved from person to person, or more specifically, from cloaked Sweeper to cloaked Sweeper. Now he was intentionally altering the lyrics.

The backup to the first machine whispered: hey, it's on.

"Everybody knows it's on."

He jabbed a Sweeper, a telepath a grade ahead of him, in the chest.

"Everybody knows it's on."

Farfarello bared his teeth, "I wanna fuck you like an animal..."

Schuldig returned to the front, roaring, "You wanna fuck me like an animal?"

"I want to feel you on the inside."

"You'd like to burn me on the inside."

"I wanna fuck you like an animal..."

"You wanna think that I'm the perfect drug."

"You get me closer to God."

Schuldig pointed into the crowd, which had become large by now. "Just know that nothing you do," he challenged, "will get you closer to me."

Among the masses, Sazha watched, enthralled.

"You can have my isolation, you can have the hate that it brings." Farfarello offered, voice taking on a tone of hysteria. He was getting into the music. He loved the band.

The other boy made a flippant gesture, "Ain't it a shame that you can't say fuck? Fuck's just a word and it's all fucked up. Like a fucked up punk with a fucked up mouth."

"You can have my absence of faith, you can have my everything. Help me... tear down my reason."

"Nine Inch Nails can get knocked the fucked out. Fucked up babes."

"Help me... its' your sex I can smell."

"Fucked up sex." Schuldig made his hands into claws and turned them inwards against his rib cage, bouncing them up and down. "Fake ass titties on fucked up chests."

The money that was coming in suddenly increased, two patrons who understood English hooted. The women who understood shook their heads, pulled their male companions away, and walked off. A few just grinned.

"Help me... you make me perfect. Help me... become somebody else."

"We're all fucked up," Schuldig announced, then grinned at the Sweepers. "So what'cha gonna do? Fucked up me. And fucked up you!"

The boy has no inhibitions, Sazha noted.

"I wanna fuck you like an animal. I want to feel you on the inside. You get me closer to God."

"YOU WANNA FUCK ME LIKE AN ANIMAL? You wanna burn me on the inside? Just know that nothing you do will get you closer to me. Ain't life a bitch? A fucked up bitch."

Farfarello hissed, "Help me... I've got no soul to sell."

"A fucked up soul with a fucked up stitch. It's a real fucked up crime. If I say fuck two more times," Schuldig held out his fingers, then quickly switched them to fit the next numbers. He was fast. "That's 36 fucks in this fucked up rhythm."

Farfarello returned to the refrain, completely lost in his own little world.

Schuldig was drunk on adrenaline, no longer singing for the money or the attention, but to Rosenkreuzt and its dogs. "Listen up baby." He growled, "You...can't...bring...me down... I...don't...think...so."

The British and American Sweepers glowered.

Schuldig bit off every word as if it was its own independent sentence. The new venom was enchanting. "You better check yourself, before you wreck yourself. Kiss my Starfish, my chocolate starfish."

"Through every forest, above the trees..." Farfarello's melody was nothing but background noise now. "through every forest, above the trees...

Sazha laughed and walked away.

"You are the reason I stay alive."

"Just know that nothing you do will get you closer to me."

The music stopped.


====================================================================




Author Notes -

That song addition was... tacky to say the least. It just seemed like
something Schuldig would do. If you listen to both songs side-by-side,
they have similar music cues.

"Hot Dog" by Limp Biskit, Chocolate Starfish &
The Hotdog Flavored Water.

"Closer" by Nine Inch Nails, The Downward Spiral.