A/N: Lyrics at the end are from Every Time We Touch by Cascada

I had not wanted this, had not asked for it. But something this intense does not 'just happen', so I really do not know how it started. I suppose 'co-workers' molded into 'friendship'. . . and from there things between Omi and I changed into more than I had ever dreamed of.

Six months ago, Mamoru Takatori hired me as his bodyguard. I think at first he hired me more out of rebellion against his grandfather, Saijou Takatori, than out of feeling a real need for protection. Hiring a former member of Schwarz as the bodyguard for the head of Kritiker; how much more rebellious can you get?

I took my duty as his bodyguard very seriously. I followed him everywhere. Maybe I overdid it a bit there at the beginning, but I was determined to prove that I could make it outside of Schwarz, and that meant keeping this job. I knew he could defend himself very well -- I'd fought him enough myself in the past to know that -- but even he could not stop a bullet if someone was determined to end the Takatori line. That, I could do.

When Mamoru decided to leave his grandfather's manor to get his own apartment, I went with him, moving into the guest room. I would not say we were friends yet at that point, but living together has a way of changing that. We settled into a routine quickly, alternating cooking meals and shower schedules.

About a week and a half after we had moved into the apartment, I had been reading in my room when I heard a loud crash from the bathroom where Mamoru was showering. I flew to the door, my mind flying through all the possibilities of what had happened. Had someone come in through the window? Had some sort of explosive been thrown in? I should have known better than to allow him to rent an apartment with a window in the one room I could not follow him into!

I used my powers to blast the lock on the door and pushed my way in, prepared to defend my boss from whatever had threatened him.

It was that night that I discovered that I not only had to defend Mamoru against others, but also from himself.

The Mamoru I had come to know at the office and even here at the apartment was not the same man who was now huddled on the floor in a puddle of glass. It seemed that in a fit of anger, he had punched the mirror and had sank down into its remains without thinking of his own safety. He was covered in glass shards and blood. . . and tears.

When I asked him what had happened, he had looked up at me with those tear-filled blue eyes and hesitated for a moment before answering. During that moment's hesitation, I could see him pull the cloak that was 'Mamoru' over himself. He apologized, very politely of course, for the mess and commotion and said he would clean it and himself up.

I could have let it go at that. . . it really would have been the professional thing to do. After making sure he was not seriously injured, to simply walk away like a good bodyguard. But even Mamoru could not hide the tear stains on his face and had not been able to hide that flash of pain and despair I had seen in his eyes before he had hidden it.

"No," I had said. "Tell me what happened." It was the first time I had defied him.

I thought for a moment that he was going to frown and send me from the room, but he did not. His face fell, tears filling his eyes again. He whispered apologies as I knelt there beside him, and once he started talking, the words spilled out in a barely understandable mix of syllables and sounds. Every once in a while I would catch the name of the members of Weiss, most often that of Siberian, Ken Hidaka.

I managed to get him into his bedroom, where I painstakingly removed all the bits of glass from his cuts using my telekinesis. As I was bandaging the worst of the cuts, Mamoru asked if I ever missed 'them'. Assuming by his tone of voice that he meant Schwarz, I replied that yes, sometimes I did, but I had never contacted them since I began working for him. He had requested that much of me when I began working for him, as assurance that I was not selling Kritiker secrets.

He told me then that if I wanted to call or see them sometime I could, as long as we did not discuss anything concerning Kritiker. "I would not wish this isolation on my worst enemy, and you are far from that, Nagi-kun," he had said. "You are the only friend I have right now."

Those words shocked me enough that I paused for a moment as I was bandaging his hand where he had punched the glass. Mamoru considered me as a friend? I had never really thought about it that way. . . I had never really had a 'friend' before at all. Schwarz was a very close group, yes, but I had never really thought of them as 'friends'. . . more of a twisted sort of family.

"Mamoru-san. . ." I had started to say something, but it was forgotten as soon as he placed his uninjured hand on top of mine.

He pleaded with me with his eyes as he asked me to call him Omi when we were not at work. "Please. . . I need something to remind me that I was someone else before all of this," he had said, with a desperate edge to his voice. "That I was once something more than my grandfather's puppet," he added a bit angrily.

After that episode I made a point of doing more of the mundane chores in the apartment, and even tried to help Omi with office work when I could, just to lighten his stress load. I think it did make a difference, as the bags under his eyes slowly began to fade and his 'episodes' happened less and less frequently, going from as often as once a week to possibly once a month. However, it was after one of the worst of these incidents that everything changed.

I had come home from the store that day to a completely darkened apartment. Not a single light was on, nor a single curtain open to the setting sun. Omi was definitely home; his shoes were by the door and his coat was on the rack, but it was way too quiet. Immediately concerned, I had dropped the groceries on the counter and ran to the door of the room whose occupant I could now call my 'friend' without hesitation or reserve.

When knocking and calling Omi's name several time yielded no answer, I used my power to pop the lock from the inside, and gently eased the door open. I could almost physically feel the despair rush over me as I stepped into the room, but I could not see Omi anywhere. The bed was empty, as was the chair by the window that he often liked to read in. It was then that I heard a muffled sob from the other side of the bed.

Omi was huddled against the bed, knees against his chest and arms resting on top of his knees, face buried in his arms. When I approached him he looked up at me, eyes wide with what looked like horror. Drawing on how I remembered Brad handling me when I used to have panic attacks (I still do sometimes, I just hide them better than Omi), I knelt in front of the man and gently asked him what was wrong.

Abyssinian had been injured on a mission the night before. Nothing more than a flesh wound, grazed by a bullet, but an injury nonetheless, while on a mission Omi had assigned to Weiss. "He could have been killed," Omi kept whispering desperately, "because of me!"

I spent nearly an hour and a half there on the floor with Omi, trying to convince him that there will always be outside variables in missions like that that he will never be able to control. He was protecting Weiss as much as he could; he could not control every variable involved.

I finally convinced him to eat some soup that I brought to him in the bedroom. His sobbing had given him a horrible headache and he did not want to even contemplate turning on a light. After he had eaten and I had put everything away, I went into his room one more time to check on him before bed.

He was acting fairly normal, for a man with a migraine anyway, trying to give weak smiles to assure me that he was fine. But I could not ignore the haunted look that lingered in his eyes. I nearly chose to keep my professional façade; I nearly walked out the door and left him in peace. But that haunted look stayed with me, and at the door I turned back, and asked hesitantly if he wanted me to stay.

In that moment, and those directly following, my entire world was turned upside down. Omi sheepishly replied that he had been too scared to ask, but please, would I? He had held up the corner of the blanket in such an innocent manner that it seemed no big deal at all to climb into the large bed. He needed comfort and stability and I was his bodyguard; it was my duty to supply that for him. However, once Omi fell asleep, which was very quickly thanks to the painkillers he had taken, he shifted closer and closer to me in his sleep until he was all but wrapped around me. With Omi's arms and legs draped over me in an almost possessive manner and his soft breath on my neck, I slept better than I could ever remember sleeping.

From there, it was all a matter of time. We slept alone the next couple of nights as a matter of course, but a few nights later Omi held up the corner of the blanket again, as if we slept in the same bed every night, and I once again climbed in without argument. We were only sleeping in the same bed together, nothing more, but it seemed that it was inevitable that things would progress farther.

The first time Omi kissed me, I thought I was dreaming. Warm lips pressing against mine, a gentle hand cupping my cheek -- surely such things were only found in dreams for me. But no, I opened my eyes and met Omi's. When he realized that I was not angry and not going to crush him with my telekinetic power, he deepened the kiss, his tongue seeking my own, and from that moment I was lost. We both called in late to the office that day.

There are some days that I can hardly believe how far we have come. Omi really never has those 'episodes' any more, even though he does suffer from a bout of depression every once in a while, as do I. But we are there to get each other through it. I have never really been in a relationship before -- Tot hardly counts -- so perhaps I am naïve in thinking that I am in love. What I do know is that the depth of feeling I have for Omi is stronger than anything I've ever felt before. Sometimes I wonder if I'm worthy of the love he gives me, if perhaps I should leave him so that he could find someone better, someone more pure to love, but then I see that look in his eyes, the same look I saw when I opened my eyes that morning he first kissed me, and know, however much it may amaze me, that he loves me as much as I love him.

Your arms are my castle
Your heart is my sky
They wipe away tears that I cry
The good and the bad times,
We've been through them all
You make me rise when I fall

Cause every time we touch I get this feeling
And every time we kiss I swear I could fly
Can't you feel my heart beat fast?
I want this to last
Need you by my side
Cause every time we touch I feel the static
And every time we kiss I reach for the sky
Can't you hear my heart beat slow?
I can't let you go
I want you in my life