Side Story: The Day we Met

Disclaimer: Don't own Weiss Kreuz, but the OC Mu Mochou codename Enchantress is my own creation.

Notes: Originally this was suppose to be chapter 5, but I keep getting struck on it, and it doesn't really go with of the story, so now it's going to be a side story to 'Past Left Untouched'.

This chapter will be told from the POV of Brad Crawford codename Oracle, I thought I might want to have a chapter that flashback to the past and discloses some of Schuldig's tragic past. But at the same time I realize that Schuldig would never want to talk of his past, so Crawford will be remembering it. Also found out how Yohji truly first met Estet, it was years before the anime, and they were asking him to join them. Find out why Yohji rejected a chance at comfort and wealth for a life on the streets. Also realize how much Schuldig's and Yohji's past mirror each other's, see what one choice could change the course of the way they live.

(I also just realize that in chapter one I spelled Yohji's last name Kudoh, while in the rest of the chapters I spelled it Kudou, sorry for the confusion. For the rest of the chapters I will be spelling it as Kudou.)

Warning: Hints of child abuse and molestation, major OOC-ness, swearing, references to drug abuse, prostitution of minors, some grammatical errors, suicide.

(In Berlin, Germany, Brad Crawford has been in a conference with the leaders of Estet for four days straight, he has just return to his hotel room taken a quick shower and gone to bed. Then meeting had been very stressful, so even though he's tired he can't sleep, he just lies awake starring up at the ceiling, thinking of the past he wishes he could forget.)

Crawford's POV

The conference went badly today, it seems that Estet always has something to complain about it's funny that they even send for me to come, since it's quite clear that they have no intention of asking for my opinion about the Takatori situation. They only keep me here for appearance sake, in case Takatori Rejii finds it a bit odd that the bodyguards that Estet send to them isn't even here at the conference to discuss the Takatori family joining them. Its always the same meeting, the only differences is the subject is different, but everything is like it always is, even the shadows that hide the leaders faces are at same place. It reminds of …that one meeting, five years ago, my first mission to Japan…the object of the mission to recruit Naoe Nagi and Kojiro Kudou to join with Estet…the mission proof to be a interesting one…it was the only mission that I ever worked with her...Enchantress. An orphan abandoned by his parents when they discovered he was different and a prostitute on the run from the law, I thought this would be an easy mission… and in Naoe's case it was, but with Kudou it was a different story…

I thought it would be easy to convince Kudou, after all just three months before Estet had sent me to recruit a sixteen year old German hustler from the Red District of Berlin…a annoying redheaded telepath who I later come to know as Schuldig codename Mastermind…he was first recruit I was send by Estet to receive this amazingly powerful telepath from the Red Light District, even though he only had his powers for a few years he already figured out many methods to use his powers for. I have always found Balinese and Mastermind to be rather ironic creatures both having such mirroring pasts and taking similar roads as assassins, but one fights simply for the money, the other fights for a illusion of justice. Mastermind like Balinese was the child of a single parent a teenage working-class girl who got pregnant by the neighborhood bad boy, who when she declared she was with his child, he told her she was a slut and more than likely had let half the neighborhood boys have their way with her, took off. The poor teenage girl, after being rejected by her soul mate than was kicked out of her family having a child out- of- wedlock, she ended up working at a dingy pub as a barmaid, and becoming middle-aged by before she turned thirty. She was killed during a drunken bar brawl turned riot at the pub she worked seven nights a week at. Mastermind at the time was six years old, given to his mother's second cousin the only person in her family that still spoke with her, but unfortunately as turns out he was pedophile who kept in contact with her because the rest of the family found him one day trying feel up his eight-year-old nephew, that's when the family went after him with clubs and bats, but no one ever told her that, so she let him stay around them. It seems he only started molesting Mastermind after his mother died; his dear old cousin never quite had the chance to 'play' with him when his mother was still hanging about. Mastermind's mother truly did love him with a intensity that Balinese's mother lacked, though Balinese has in his mind warped his memory of his mother from a woman that turned a blind eye to what was happening to her only child in exchange for the comfort of a wealthy lifestyle to a poor frail woman that was ignore of what was going on around her. Anyway soon after Mastermind was in the care of his 'dear cousin' he learned against his will the fine points of taking the whole length into his throat and how to give a mind blowing hand job. Mastermind wash is dear old cousin's plaything for the next seven years, until Mastermind turn thirteen found his cousin's pistol in the trunk inside a closet, than he shot pointblank his cousin in the head, and rest as far as he could from the place. But it soon became clear that he no skills other than the skills his dear old cousin forced upon him, his cousin refuse to let him go to school and he could barely spell his own name, so he was force to hustle himself out to strange men to survive on the streets. It wasn't long after that, when his powers of telepathy came, according to Estet scientists the reason his powers came so late his life was because it was originally a dormant gene, but with the anguish of killing his abuser added with the shift of hormones in his body at puberty it cause his dormant gene to go active. At first mastermind believed he had finally cracked, but after meeting with a Gypsy fortune teller one day who sense his power and told him he was crazy, it seems the old fortuneteller actually did have some psychic powers she wasn't strong enough to foretell the future without using the Tarot cards as a medium, she had had a cousin with the minor ability to read minds on were need the level of Mastermind (In fact Mastermind is actually the third strongest telepath in the world), but enough that the fortune teller had experience with dealing with telepaths, so she thought him the basics of shielding and transmitting thoughts. After a while, Mastermind was able to use his powers to have people just hand him money without any reason and to forget about a moment after, and to make people believe that he did pay for his meals, so he could just get a free meal from expensive places. Unfortunately the old fortuneteller was beaten to death after a robbery gone horribly wrong. It was a real pity, for she was the last person to ever truly value Mastermind as something other than a tool.

A few months later Estet found our dear Schuldig, and I was send to receive him, I will never forget what he said to me riding back to headquarters in the Estet's black limo; "Call me Schuldig, for I am guilty of being a survivor. My survivor means more to me than anything else in this world, including the lives of the so-called innocents."

(Flash forward three months)

Three months later came the turning point of my life it was a Thursday, I remember that very well for it was suppose to be my day off. They had called me in for emergency meaning; "Oracle, we need your special talents for a very delicate new mission. The mission is in Japan, you one of the few members that speaks fluent Japanese…there are two extraordinary psychics in there that will make important additions to our organization, one is abnormally powerful ten year old telekinetic and the other is a sixteen year old with remarkable clairaudience. You and Enchantress will leave in an hour to Japan to receive them, you will have three months to bring them over."

At the time, I thought it was laughable that we would need two months to bring over a pathetic little orphan that was abandoned by his parents after he started making things fly and crush into walls whenever he cried, and a young prostitute that was fighting multi drug addictions. And it prove true, after less than one week Enchantress and I had gotten Prodigy over to our side, the other thing difficult about it was that Enchantress and I had to pose as a married couple in order to adopt him, so that the nuns would let him go. The adoption was relatively quick and simple, except for Mother the rest of the nuns were all too happy to get rid of the 'devil child', so we had him packed and back to Germany by the end of the week.

Sadly however Kudou actually did prove to be more difficult than I foresaw being a clairvoyant won't help much against another psychic that is on same level as you are. The biggest problem was that Kudou distrusted all men on principal, so often when I was around he would try to sneak away. That was where Enchantress came in, sigh…Enchantress other wise known as Mu Mochou a second-rate telepath nowhere near Mastermind's level. She was found in an orphanage in Mainland China, one of the many girls that were disown so the family could have a boy, she was bought over to Estet at the age of eight the owners of the orphanage were all too happy to get rid of the little crazy girl that heard voices. Being grateful to Estet she had been their loyal agent for the pass fifteen years, even after seeing all of what Estet did she chose to be loyal to them anyways for being able to get her out of the abusive orphanage in that respect she is very much like Prodigy, though Prodigy a least doesn't wear rose color glasses like she did. Mochou was never very pretty, in fact the peasant ancestry was very clear in her appear her compact stocky body and dark farmer's skin along with big strong hands that were surprisingly gentle and cool to the touch, no she was far from being a beauty in fact she was a fairly homely creature, but she was always so sweet and gentle that she had a Earth Mother aura her that made you feel safe and want to trust her.

I never worked with her before, though I had met her at quite a few meetings, she was so stereotypical of the Asian woman, quiet demure and always deferring to men, which in a way made her the prefect woman in my eyes always kowtowing to men and never disobeying orders. She was the prefect woman for me, what she lack in physical appearances she more than made up for with her non-confrontational nature. To say that we were in love is quite humorous no I didn't love her; she was too much of a simpleton for me to love the only reason I had started sleeping with her was she was a willing warm body who after many years of pleasing various members of Estet had become quite skilled courtesan, though a part of her always seem untainted and pure despite it all. As if the well-versed harlot in bed were different person from the pliant young woman that always looked down at her shoes when speaking to a man. Mochou was not a woman to fall in love with, someone to play around with but far from being a keeper.

After my attempts at trying to corner Kudou failed, it seem the fact that the whispers avoided speaking of me it send alerts up for him. Whenever I found him on the streets, he somehow found a way to run into an alleyway and disappear, it seems the years of living on the streets had given him a valuable lesson in always having an escape route. Finally I realize that this mission would require a woman's touch in order to be success and Mochou was the perfect bait for recruiting him, she was everything that Kudou wanted to protect, a woman that he was under the delusion of as being just like his 'fragile' mother. It was truly an amazing in just a few hours of spending time in each other's company they were sitting in the park eating ice cream cones together, as the two months flew by they spent more and more time just enjoying each other's company and eating strawberry flavored ice cream. Mochou and Kudou form a bond with each other that seem to transcend the fact that they only met each other they were kindred spirits. I barely saw Kudou after that since putting him into the jurisdiction of Mochou I put him out of my mind, if failure I would blame it on Mochou's inability to convert him and that while I did try Kudou fear men too much to trust one. While another man could be jealous of 'his'woman spending so much time in the company of another I was quite content, their was nothing sexual about them being together it was more of brother-sister relationship, and the more time they spent together the more time I could spent alone relishing in more 'hobbies'. The yakuza have always been a special interest of my they were more subtle and refine than any of the American Mafia and far more low-profile than the Sicilian's, this was actually how I was first introduce to the Takatori family, I always believe that for Estet to flourish it must gain some ties to the Asian cartels for they always seem to have a hand in more of everything.

Strange, but as time went by the more Mochou spent in the company of Kudou the more she begun to transform; it started small with her disagreeing with what to have for dinner which soon progress to her actually disobeying some of my orders. It should have enrage me that she was growing a backbone, but for some reason that I still can't to this day understand I began to find it endearing and refreshing. For some reason, these changes in her soon, reshape our relationship from a purely physical one to something with real emotions in it. The more she changed the more I started finding her to be attractive, I had always thought that would want the stereotypical Asian bride, it soon became clear that I liked her more when she stood on her own two feet.

Soon the three months were over, it was only than that I remembered our original mission being so busy with forming alliances with the yakuza and the budding of my relationship to Mochou I barely remember being part of Estet. On the last day in Japan I told Mochou to start packing and to bring Kudou to airport by five o'clock. When the time did come, neither one were at the airport for a half an hour I spent their waiting for either one to show, finally I give up and went to the hotel were Mochou and I spent the two months it was five-star hotel that Estet put us up in. What I found in that hotel room shock me; Mochou's telepathy was weaker than my clairvoyance so I always been able to vaguely predict what she was up to, but this I never expected. I found her lying on the bed with her arms folded neatly on her chest and next to the bed on the dresser was an empty bottle of sleeping pills and a suicide note. It appeared she had died a little more than an hour. The note read;

My dearest Brad,

All my life, I have been the servant of men, never daring to be anything else. But than we came to Japan and I met this boy Kudou Yohji he was so different from all the other men, maybe because he was still a boy himself not a man yet he understood things about men and power. My mission was to bring him over to Estet, the more spoke of Estet to him the more, and he started to open my eyes about them. They aren't the kind masters that I always made myself believe in order to cope with the things they did to me. When you this morning told me that the three of us would be returning, I realize that I couldn't let what they did to me happen to him, he has already had so much pain in his life he doesn't need the grief that Estet will give him, so after you left the hotel I went to the abandon warehouse were he was staying and I erased all his memories of the last two months that he spent with us, it took all my strength to do it, he really has a powerful mind. I have a confession to make to you, there was a reason why Estet pair us together, they wanted to have a child with both telepathy and clairvoyance of the highest caliber, since I am the strongest female telepath and you are the strongest precog they pair us together. At first the sex was about getting with child, but as time with on and I started changing you started to care for me, I realize that I began to fall in love with you. I always believe that if I became more opinionated all the men will dislike me and I would be forgotten by them, you didn't you actually care for me more…I want to tell you that I have fallen in love with you and I am pregnant with your child. It's been in my womb for six weeks and I realize I love this child so in order to protect our unborn child, neither I, nor the child can be allowed to survive. I'm sorry my beloved.

Mu Mochou

(Flash forward to now, Crawford lying awake in his bed in hotel in Germany.)

Mochou and the child that I would never know, yes they do haunt me. At times I have wonder if Balinese still remembers Mochou or knew about the unborn child. He was more powerful than Mochou so I doubt her erasing his memories was anything more than temporary but still it seems that at part of him doesn't want to remember her and how he had actually been tempted to join Estet if only to get off the street. Estet stopped trying to make me their breeding stud, after Enchantress and how show a total lack of interest in women after that, it shocks me how much I let Enchantress under my skin. For all the dysfunction that was our relationship, it was truly the most special thing to me.

-Owari

Mu- Chinese for 'Dream'

Mochou- Chinese for 'Sorrow free'

So, Mu Mochou means 'A sorrow free dream' that was what she was to Crawford, a dream that was too good to keep. I was thinking of reasons why Crawford would be such a bastard, so I came up with this one that at one time Crawford had been in love with the woman of his dreams, but the fact that Estet was hanging over their heads got in the way so when she and their unborn child died, he shut off his conscience. He decides to become a cold-hearted bastard that will never let anyone trust him or trust anyone ever again. Do you like the idea?

Also I decided to mot give Mastermind a real name because I thought that he should have some secrets left and if I give him a name I would take away his cloak of secrets from him. But I am thinking of letting Schuldig tell Yohji in the end of the story as a gesture of trust between them.

I don't actually know how long Nagi has been on Schwarz, so I made-up five years is that right?

Please, please review!