Chapter Five – Honesty is the best policy

I want Schu back too, but it's going to be a wait. I have two years to fill, and a bit more Brad torture. And I have such great plans for such wonderful shounen ai. Sigh. Oh, and Valentine's theme because I'm writing this a few days before the day singles dread…

The first thing Bradley noticed about the second year was that they shared a lot of lessons with the third year. This made him particularly happy, as both he and Tanya had 'passive mental' talents, which left them together in several lessons. Uninterested in forming any kind of bonds with the other students, Bradley spent as much time as possible with the enigmatic Russian.

Bradley also began attending one-on-one lessons with Madame DuBois. As tedious as she was pitiful, Madame DuBois lectured on defining reality and slipstreams of time and some complicated physics that went straight over Bradley's head. And, of course, she hit on him.

She flicked her hair and crossed and uncrossed her legs and pouted until Bradley thought her lips would fall off. Unlike most of the other Rosenkruez teachers, however, she didn't demand anything. Bradley put this down to the fact the lifelong anorexia had left her bones brittles as winter twigs, and even a sneeze would crack a rib, let alone a flailing punch of an unwilling paramour.

He put up with it. In amongst the swathes of meaningless babble, meaningless to both of them, that is, there was the occasional gem of wisdom, like a diamond in coalmine. She had, after all, been a seer much longer than Bradley, and even if the theory went straight over her head, the practice came naturally to her. She didn't know how to be a seer, but she was a seer, and Bradley learnt by example.

He learnt to filter his visions, keeping them relevant and understandable. He learnt to distinguish between likely, definite, and ambiguous. He learnt to follow his instincts, not just his common sense, as the former were an extension of his gift, and the later was an extension of his ego.

The year past swiftly, the turnover of students keeping faces fresh and new, and the turnover of teachers reminding Crawford exactly why he wanted to get out of there. It wasn't long before he could recognise the strength of power in a fellow pupil, and the more importance strength of will. Those that failed died.

Tanya had that strength of will. Every day she came up with a new way the system ought to be run, a new problem with the current order of things. And Bradley listened to these potential changes happily, sometimes evaluating them in his own mind, sometimes merely evaluating her.

It was nearing Valentines Day when Bradley worked up the courage to tell her of his blossoming feelings for her. He'd searched the ground, and eventually come across a small patch of snowdrops, which he carefully picked. He didn't care if they were the only symbol of hope in the ground, the last semblance of freedom in the prison; he wanted to give flowers to Tanya and there they were.

Clutching them in a sweating hand, but otherwise calm and collected, Bradley approached the common room allotted to third years. He knocked politely on the door, but there was no reply. He placed he handle on the slimy doorknob and froze.

~~~ gloves off pain hair white hands laughter screaming gloves on the floor pain screaming more screaming everyone screaming laughter gloves o the floor white hands blood on white face screaming blood gloves screaming screaming gloves blood screaming blood gloves… ~~~

Bradley jerked his hand back and stood there for a moment, gasping. It was a future that had nothing to do with him, and future very close to becoming the present, a definite future. His heart raced and he stared at the doorknob.

Inside the common room the first screams could be heard. Bradley listened to them for almost a minute, still dazed. A thin trickle of blood seeped under iron door, dark on the stone floor. He recovered himself and opened the door.

Inside the room it was chaos. Tanya was lying in the centre of the floor, like the eye of a storm, calm when all about her were going mad. Calm, unconscious, but still screaming. Blood was seeping from her nose, from her mouth, from her ears. Others in the room were wailing, panicking. One shoulder length white glove was lying beside her, and her snow-white hand was bare against the floor.

Making his way through the pandemonium Bradley approached the girl, still holding the flowers he'd brought for her. Gently he slipped them into her palm. The screaming grew a little less intense. He collected the glove and laid it beneath her skin, separating flesh for stone. Stone that held the tortured souls of centuries of Rosenkruez. No wonder she was screaming.

Bradley stared around the room. A boy was still laughing. A sallow faced, greasy, black haired boy. The boy who had had the bunk above his when he was still a first year. Crawford frowned at him. A fellow second year in the third year dormitory? Still, he'd kill the little punk.

Crawford raised his voice, "If you would all kindly shut the fuck up!" he bellowed. Silence echoed through the room. "Thank you." Bradley stared around. "You, fetch a member of staff. We need another passive mental, and you find a telekinetic. The less she comes in contact with the better. You two find a healer, to deal with the rest of this crowd. You three, start clearing this up. You lot, I want you to calm the 'active mentals', they're still in a state. And you," he glowered at his ex bunkmate, "are going to come and stand right here, with me."

The teenager sauntered over. "What d'ya want?" he drawled.

"Your life," Crawford said simply. He punched the younger man full in the face. He hoped the boy would fight back, give him a better excuse to kill him, but he knew the boy would flee. The boy spun around and Crawford grabbed the slick ponytail. The unwashed hair slipped from his grasp, though not before the boy gave a yelp of pain. He went to run through the door, but as he opened it he slammed into the chest of Herr Hertz.

Crawford grimaced. He'd forgotten that Hertz was a healer. The man still frightened him in ways he couldn't comprehend, but it didn't occur to him until much later in life that as a healer the man could manipulate his glands on a microscopic level. The boy whimpered as Hertz shoved him away and strode towards Crawford. Crawford refused to be cowed by the short man.

"This young man removed this clairvoyant's glove. She has suffered immensely, and though she appears somewhat stabilised now it foresee months of recovery for her," Crawford reported sharply. "She is one of our most powerful clairvoyants, and be damaging her he has damaged both Rosenkruez and Estet." The boy snarled at him, finally realising the depth of the trouble he was in. Unfortunately, Crawford wasn't clear of the water yet either.

"And you, a second year, in here?" Herr Hertz smirked as he waved in an assistant telekinetic to help remove the still moaning Tanya.

Crawford weighed his options. Lie, and risk discovery, or tell the truth and risk punishment. To what extent would Hertz recognise his dishonesty?

"I am a companion of Tanya. I was coming to request her company when I had a vision of this situation. I entered hurriedly, aware that it was unpreventable, and took control of the situation as no one else seemed able to."

"You intended to lie," Herr Hertz noted aloud. A smile tugged at his thin lips. "What made you change your mind?"

"You have control of my life," Crawford said candidly. "It seemed unwise to lie to someone who controls me to such an extent. You have a very powerful gift, I do not know the extent to which you can pick up on physical changes that occur when a person is dishonest. Also, I couldn't think of a good lie."

Hertz let out a peal of laughter. "You are a fool," he smirked. "You continue to tell the truth, knowing full well I'd recognise any lie, but in doing so you are condemning yourself." Crawford squared his shoulders and spread his feet a little further apart. A nervous sweat was forming between his shoulder blades. "You have not mentioned the glory of Estet or Rosenkruez ye-et," Hertz sang.

"I did!" Crawford bit his tongue sharply. Contradicting a superior? Not good. "I mean," he began to attempt to repair the damage, "while you were attending to Miss Tanya I pointed out how this young man's joke jeopardised her potential as a servant for Rosenkruez and Estet."

"Can you see the light, from the bottom of your hole?" Hertz taunted. "Come, Herr Crawford. You and I will have a little 'talk'."

It's short, but it's such a perfect place for a cliffhanger. Mwahaha…