Farfarello watched as everything he and his newfound brethern had worked to obtained was thoughtlessly destroyed in a stream of bullet's from an overly equip semi-auotmatic rifle. His chin was tilted inward, the bone protecting his neck. His lips, which were often described as pouty and angelic, were pulled into a death sneer of one ready to accept whatever end was given to him.

The glass from the porch window was shattered, the living room table, the television set, the arm chairs were torn to splinters in the blink of an eye as the faceless Sweeper team fired blindly into the darkness. The power had been knocked out, but when? One of the Sweepers must have hit an electric cord.

So bold, so aggressive. Farfarello fingered the kitchen knife in his possession, pondering the newfound vigor of the once subdued posse of Rosenkratz bloodhounds. These were the men who stalked around in the shadows, who dove in like vultures when the prey was weak and dying, who made every kill clean and quiet and untracable.

There was nothing clean and quiet about this.

So why...?

"How did you get here? What are you doing?" Nagi was beside him, back pressed against the wall. The child was in hysterics, his hands wrapped tight against the base of his head, pulling at the hair. "You've been tipped off, haven't you? Crawford betrayed us!"

Why would the Sweepers move in for the kill when only three of their four targets were present.

Farfarello's gaze shifted from the team to the couch where Schuldig laid, dried up and dead to the world. Not even the shit storm of gun fire was enough to awake the gluttonous telepath from whatever self induced coma he had placed himself into. Farfarello stared at Schuldig...

At least one of them would go peacefully.

Someone was going to die tonight.

"Crawford betrayed us!" Nagi screamed, falling back and sliding down to the floor. The boy curled into himself, cursing inwardly at his stupidity. He was starting to develop some serious trust issues.

Three rather large rifles trained on Farfarello's head, where he still stood in position, chin lowered, guarding his neck. He kept the small, practically useless kitchen knife hidden behind him.

"Look at you," a voice said, and Farfarello looked, although he had noticed the speaker a few moments earlier. When he was putting the situation together. "Just... look at you."

Preditory ember met demonic crimson in a gaze that wasn't suppose to last as long as it did. Valentine was smiling, his blood red hair moving softly in the wind, keeping sway with the over-exaggerated tail of his thin leather trenchcoat. The Talent stood upon the small metal railing that seperated the balcony from the long drop off the side of their apartment building. He seemed to meld with the bars, his display of balance and grace inhuman, an indicator of his talents.

"You look like a caged animal." He said.

But then... the Irish Manipulator wasn't exactly human either.

Farfarello smiled, just to prove to the Sweeper team that yes - dispite being away from padded walls, straight jackets, and regular heavy dosage medication - he was still crazy. One of the riflemen had the good grace to lean away from the unnatural grin.

Smart boy, Farfarello thought. He'd kill him first.

The front door opened and another psychic stepped in. This one was small, pale, twitchy looking. In his hands he carried an assortment of oddly clashing flowers. Farfarello only recognized one of them, the tiny poppy flower because that's what they used to decorate the grave of his mother - after he killed the bitch. The scent made his nose curl.

The new comer regarded Farfarello with a cool sense of approval.

From the building opposite, Sazha and Nigel stood on the roof watching in the shadows.

"Our leader just wants the telepath," Valentine negotated. Not that it mattered, he was the one with the goons and the guns. "Just hand him over and we won't have to kill you."

"You'll come back and do it anyway." Farfarello grunted. He was calculating how far he could get with ten or twenty bullets in his chest. He might be able to take out all three of the gunners. But the two Talents?

Nagi...

Valentine shrugged, "You're fun to chase anyway. I'll let you rats stay in the maze a little while longer, I've just been told to get the telepath." He stepped down from the balcony and his movement was liquid. Farfarello followed the motions with a scowl, trying to ignore the Sweepers in favour of seeing how quickly Valentine would stop playing and grab what he wanted.

He almost missed the odd creak and churn of metal that squeaked before him. It was an easy thing to overlook given the current situation. He dared not lower his eyes towards Nagi, for fear of drawing attention to the quivering child and ruining his only chance of...

Valentine moved then... in a slip of red lighting that made the Irish boy dizzy. His body phased from the broken porch enterance to the side of the untouched couch, the slick glow of his red eyes the only thing leaving a trail of the path he just crossed. Valentine drew Schuldig in his arms and lifted him into the air. Talbot thumb wore down on the stems of one of the poppy's until it snapped in half.

That was it. Farfarello was on his feet and leaping forward, knife bared and aimed at the throat of the first Sweeper he chose to die. The team of three reacted with unprofessional surprise, leaning back to fire their weapons. The rifles imploded inward, malfunctioning from the ever so slight crush Nagi had placed upon the barrel's during Valentines dialouge. Shreds of flesh and bone matter sprayed in every direction as the Sweeper's hands were blown off their wrists. Farfarello ended the life of the first Sweeper quickly.

Talbot laughed and lunged towards the albino, making a mistake by forgetting and passing by Nagi. The cowering telekentic lifted his head and his eyes lite up, Talbot soon found himself spiraling through the air and crashing into one of the already destroyed cabinates. The dark haired boy picked himself up with a growl and turned on Nagi.

Farfarello dislocated the jaw bone of the third Sweeper with a swift quick and used the shattered bone fragments from the impaction to end the untalented assassin's life with a second swift delievery roundhouse. The shards of marrow and ivory slide back into the Sweepers throat and cut it open, blood spreads in a thick belch from the man's mouth as he choked to death. Farfarello flipped his knife around and buried it into the back of the second Sweeper, shoving the second's head into the ground and expecting him to lay there and wait for death.

He searched for Schuldig and found him out of reach, in the arms of the enemy who was once against standing on the thin balcony ledge. A harsh wind blew forward through the gape in the wall, moving glass dust and forgotten death flowers around haphazardly. Farfarello's fists clenched and Valentine laughed.

"What're you going to do? Come after me? I'm too fast." The Stream Slipper sneered, "You're just a caged animal and I'm done playing with you."

"Stupid." Farfarello growled, whether he meant the other psychic or himself was unclear. All he knew was that one of them was going to die tonight. He stepped forward, intent on ripping Schuldig from Valentine's grasp.

"Oh," Valentine said, his voice high with mock concern. His demonic eyes even rounded slightly and he tilted his head to the side. "Don't come after me, my Talbot is about to kill your little boyfriend."

Talbot. Right. In his rush to reclaim Schuldig, Farfarello had forgotten about the other one. His neck turned and he let out a gasp of horror, snapping around to tackle the Absorber before the rather cruel looking switchblade Talbot had drawled out of one of his pockets was put through Nagi's face.

Nagi held his arms over his head defensively, his powers completely blown out through panic and stress. He was completely helpless at the moment, weak and in need of protection. Just like Schuldig. And, Farfarello realized, as he jumped onto Talbot's back, he had just chosen Nagi over Schuldig. With Nagi being the most likely he could save.

Valentine chuckled and disappeared into a slash of glowing crimson.

From the other building, Nigel snorted. "They're all bloody idiots if you ask me."

The knife was knocked from Talbot's hands and both boys wrestled on the floor to grab it. In their attempts to capture, the knife ended up just being pushed further and further away from their grasp. At the same time, both psychic held onto each other, biteing and kicking and clawing when the moment opened itself. Suddenly Talbot ended up on his back with Farfarello's hands holding down neck.

From the roof of the other building Sazha smiled as he studied his new prize. A beautiful new German to play with. Completely unaware, helpless. Valentine dropped Schuldig onto the ground and eagerly trotted towards the edge of the roof for a better look at the action below. He didn't seem phased to see his lover in such a compromising position, with the Irish psychopath ontop. "He's got no where to go..."

Sazha ran a hand softly through Schuldig's hair, "Didn't you know, Valentine?"

A scream peirced the air followed by the snarl and growl of something that was defiently not human or beast. Someone was going to die tonight.

"When some animals are pushed into a corner, they turn feral."

000

Kudoh Yohji banged his head against the post of his bed in his haste to get out of it. From the other room he could hear his companion, Bombay, moving as well. Both young assassins moved towards their bedroom windows to search for the scream that had woken them up. They saw nothing out of the ordinary in the cold, dark Vienna streets. Normally Yohji would have crawled back into bed, but whatever hell scream had awoken him from his peaceful and erotic slumber had gotten his heart racing so quickly that he doubted he'd be able to drift off again anytime soon.

"What the hell was that?" He yelled down the hall, poking his head out the door.

"I have no idea, but I bet it has something to do with our assignment." Bombay was already pulling on his mission gear and hoping towards the door. Yohji rolled his eyes, shrugged and went to find a clean pair of pants.

The cold barrell of a silencer against his naked shoulder stopped his search dead in its tracks. Yohji stiffened, hands already raising in surrender. Someone was inside his bedroom... and they were going to kill him.

"I won't apologize because I don't feel sorry. You're in my way." A cold voice informed him before pulling the trigger.

Yohji fell back into his bed sheets, body bouncing a few times. The pounding of his heart slowed to a soft beat.