Sorry I'm so late. Hope you enjoy.

It was dark and light at the same time. A muffling sheen of shadow overlaying the full glow of an elegant, Victorian lamp. The muted hum of electricity meandered through the whispered rhythm of breathing. The slight 'tick, tick, tick' of a face-clock's second hand was somewhere to the right.

Aya opened his eyes to a stone ceiling. Dry mortar ran between the cut stone as they crisscrossed across each other in slanted lines. The gray rock seemed far above him, as if the sky had decided to cast the illusion of stone walls.

He tensed his arms and slowly began pushing himself up, stifling a groan as the movement pulled at the wound in his side. The colors in the room paled and he felt the blood drain out of his face. He held himself still, not yet fully sitting, until his breathing got a little less shallow and the ache in his limbs lessened.

Pulling himself up he leaned against the headboard of the queen-sized bed he was on, only to nearly loose his balance and tumble back down when he caught sight of his clothes. The green fluorescence of the shirt contrasted sharply with the maroon of the bed sheets. It was one of Yohji's only button-up shirts, a kind he wasn't very fond of because it wasn't skintight. On Aya it hung like a child wearing his father's jacket, not really too long but definitely too big. Four buttons were closed from the waist up, allowing clean white bandages to peek over the top. The shirt was accompanied by a pair of Aya's own dark jeans. He wasn't wearing any socks.

A muffled snore made Aya turn his head to the right. On a second bed of the same color lay Ken. He was sprawled on top of the sheets his arm atop the chest of Yohji, who lay straight as a board, except for the arm that was flung out and up to curve around his head.

The chair next to the bed was empty and there were no blankets on the floor, making Aya wonder where Omi was. There were no other sounds of movement anywhere in the vicinity. The old wooden face-clock ticked against the wall but other than that and soft human breathing there was silence.

Aya tensed his body and the swung his legs off of the bed. It was a frustratingly slow and painful process as it pulled wounds and left his body with a fine tremble. The uncovered stone floor was icy cold on his bare feet, but the shock of it cleared his head. He pushed himself carefully to his feet.

The walk to the doorway out of the bedroom was slow, but he shoved the steady ache to the back of his mind and forced himself to continue. By the time he had reached the door his body was moving easier as the stiffness slowly worked itself out. His hand clenched the frame of the door as he rested for a second.

The doorway opened to a living room of sorts. A lush red rug covered the floor and the room was peppered with beige and violet armchairs. A flat screen TV adorned one wall and windows showing a grassy courtyard the other. Five doors, including the one he was standing in the doorway of, lead out of the room.

He pushed himself forward and walked towards where he thought the bathroom was, only half-remembering the layout from the last time he was here. It hadn't looked like anything had changed but Aya didn't entirely trust his perceptions at the moment. The world kept fading at random intervals and it bothered him.

He flicked the lights on inside the door and was rather relieved to see he had found the right place. The mirror showed tired eyes framed by limp red hair. He face was paler than usual and an almost blue tint was on his lips. He realized that he was cold. Shivering in fact, that was what the trembling had been earlier. He turned the water on hot and then placed his hand under the faucet. He splashed the water onto his face and then turned the water off. He stood, both hands on the edge of the counter, face down, bangs dripping cooling water into the sink.

"Aya?"

It was Omi's voice, but Aya didn't answer.

"Aya? Yohji where's Aya? Yohji wake up. Yohji, come on, wake up, where's Aya? Yohji!"

"Why in the hell aren't you waking Ken up?" Yohji's voice was groggy with sleep.

"Because he needs to rest and-'

"Well I need to rest, too. I drove us all the way here while you took a nap."

"Yes, but Ken didn't. Now hurry up and get up."

"Damnit Omi, that still means I got less sleep then Ken."

"Not when ken stayed up with me to move all of the stuff into the building while you got your beauty sleep. I mean it Yohji, get up."

"Alright, alright. I'm up. You win. Hey, where's Aya?"

"That's why I was trying to get you up! I know you didn't have anything to drink last night so you must just be that stupid."

"Why, chibi, that hurt. I don't think I'll ever get over it."

"Sorry. Now, let's go find Aya."

"'K. And you know I was being sarcastic right?"

"Yes, Yohji, I know you were being sarcastic."

"Good, 'cause…"

Aya let the voices go and pushed himself upright. He did it too fast, causing black to quickly fan across his vision. When he could no longer see anything his knees went weak and buckled. It was almost a controlled fall as he cleanly sunk to the floor. Only he didn't control it.

"Whoa there Aya. I've got ya. You probably shouldn't be walking around just yet," said Yohji as he wrapped strong gentle arms around a dazed Aya.

"Is he okay?" Omi asked.

"Seems like it," replied Yohji. "You wanna go grab a blanket from the bedroom? Aya's cold as ice, I swear."

"Sure."

Aya's vision was clearing slowly when Yohji pulled him to his feet. His whole body still felt weak so Yohji supported him as they walked slowly towards the chairs. Aya would have chafed at his own weakness if he had the energy, but he only had enough to stay upright and keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Omi and Ken both walked out of the bedroom. Omi carrying a blanket and Ken just looking sleepy and rubbing his eyes. Omi handed the blanket over to Yohji then picked one of the chairs to perch on. Ken sprawled out in his own.

Aya felt Yohji wrap the blanket around him and then push him lightly into a seat. He didn't fight him, as tired as he was, and concentrated on holding the blanket around his shoulders. Aya looked up to see Yohji stretch out in another chair so that all the rest of Weiss sat facing Aya. He leaned back in the chair, drawing the blanket tighter, and steeled himself for the up coming conversation.

"So, Aya, you wanna tell us why we're in this freaky mansion?"

The next hit by the woman forced Schuldich to veer off the road.

They smashed through the guardrail and began careening down the hill, hitting every bump on the way. Schuldich felt his lower jaw snap up to the roof of his mouth but didn't have time to wince at the bitten and bleeding tongue before they were hit again.

That chick had to be absolutely crazy. She was chasing them down hill in a flimsy car in the middle of the night. She was chasing them with a car. She was trying to kill them with a car. Has the world of assassinations sunk so low? Schuldich was vaguely aware that he had bigger problems that he should be worrying about but, come on, seriously? A car?

Nagi's yelp of pain brought Schuldich back to the present with a particularly vicious jerk. Or that could have been that the car had slammed into them again. He could just barely hear the sharp scream of the metal and the crinkle of shattered glass.

Schuldich started to concentrate, focusing his will on the mind behind them. His fingers tightened on the steering wheel and he unconsciously moved away from the woman's next hit. He could feel the mind slowly coming into focus like a fuzzy picture though a camera over the pain in his skull. Almost…

"No! Who do you think is driving this car Schuldich? Stop this instant."

Schuldich immediately responded to the low voiced command. He snapped back into his own mind at rigid attention. No one disobeyed Crawford when he used that tone of voice. Schuldich had done some of the most distasteful things in his life on orders from that voice and he would still do them. That voice had gotten people put under isolation and torture for years, and did not tolerate resistance.

That voice had also saved his ass more times then he could count.

A huge, grayish, malicious looking rock flung the car up and into the air. The whole word inverted as the car flipped. Schuldich only had time for a vain "Oh, shit" before the car hit down with a jarring thud on the passenger side, rolled once again to land miraculously on its wheels.

The car behind them hit the same rock and Schuldich would have yelled 'yes!' and praised the same rock he had been cursing the second before, except for the fact that he couldn't seem to get his brain working much less his mouth. The car didn't flip, but landed nose down onto the ground with a satisfying crunch as the entire engine crumpled into the space of two feet. The back wheels landed down and bounced off the ground before becoming still. There was no movement in the driver seat.

There was no movement from the passenger seat of their car either. Nagi was mumbling and moaning holding what was probably a broken wrist, while Farfarello barreled trough the side window (the doors were all broken on lock) and practically skipped with glee over to the other crashed car. Schuldich supposed the whole skipping thing was his mind on panic mode, since he would never imagine Farfie skipping. Skipping Farfie, ohhh man.

The source of his panic lay still, limp and utterly unaware of the upset his frozen form was stirring up. His glasses lay shattered on the ground where they had flown out the broken window. Sharp, shallow cuts covered his face, one cut down over a closed eye, half a thin slice above, half below.

Schuldich's hand shook as he reached towards his unconscious leader. Crawford lay slumped against the door, his shoulders folded in and his head hanging down. Schuldich fingers felt for the pulse in his neck and for one terrible moment he felt nothing. Crawford was dead.

Then the faint pulse of blood traveled under his fingers. It was weak and slow, but there.

"Schuldich," said a hoarse Nagi. "Is Crawford?"

"He's not dead." Schuldich couldn't keep the relief, or worry, out of his voice. He didn't even really try.

"Neither is the woman," said Farfarello. He was walking back to the car the limp form of the chick slung over his shoulder, head flopping with Farfarello gait.

"Then kill 'er," Schuldich snapped. The woman was as good as dead for hurting them.

"We need her alive for information," stated Nagi matter-of-factly. "We should probably head for that inn Crawford was talking about. We can interrogated her when she wakes up."

"Fine. Farf, get in the car. You can dump the bitch in the trunk, I don't want her stinking up the car," Schuldich lied. It didn't have anything to do with the small, though she did smell of sickly sweet perfume, he just didn't want her near them. With Crawford down for the count they had no insight into the future, so he wasn't going to take any chances.

As Farfarello opened the trunk and locked the woman in Schuldich reached over and carefully rearranged Crawford, checking for other wounds as he went. He was bleeding from a large cut on the back of his head. Gushing was more like it, but Schuldich had learned from personal experience that head cuts were never as bad as they looked. Head wounds were another problem but Schuldich didn't have time to check for a concussion. He wrapped the cuts with the bandages they had stored in the front seat compartment.

Farfie got back in through the window and Schuldich started the car. It caught, died, caught again and then held. Schuldich drove carefully off of the hill and onto the highway.

The sunrise was beginning to light the sky.

I know I made Aya sound very...un-Aya, but that was the idea. He'll get better. Or I'll get him hurt again. Or maybe I should do both?

Anyway, Review and Return.

03/04/06 5:54