AN: Hi everyone! Hope your year is off to a good start! This one was slow to write. Thanks for waiting!

-Kat

Part 51: Lab Mice

The gateway outside the school was quiet. Well, that much was a given, since school was already in session. Krad strode past the gates until their brick facade transitioned into a chainlink fence. On the other side, a group of students were practicing baseball. The angel stopped and watched through the fence. He scanned the figures on the field for a minute. He didn't recognize any of the children. Jirou wasn't out here. Not even his terrible friends. Really, what were the chances he would actually happen to be out here?

For a long moment, he stared glass-eyed without really focusing on any of them. The crack of a batswing finally brought him back to reality. He deliberately turned without looking back at the field. It was no big deal. He'd only come on a whim, anyway. Krad took a few more steps, but his feet slowed. He drew the phone from his pocket and woke it. His contact list had three names on it. A slender finger paused above the second name. The baseball game continued behind him. Krad frowned and returned the device to his pocket. The kid was in school, and there was no real reason they needed to talk.

No sooner had he done so than the phone vibrated against his hip. Krad danced to the side like he'd been bitten. He was never going to get used to this thing. After a few tense breaths, he fumbled the damned phone out and answered it. "Yes," he growled, even though he knew it was probably Satoshi.

"Krad. It's Dr. Yamamoto."

The angel's fingers clenched around the phone until the case creaked. "Who gave you this number?"

"It's on file with the police department. It seems Officer Hiwatari put you as his emergency contact."

Krad felt heat rise to his cheeks. He did? "Well? Is there an emergency?"

"Of a sort, but nothing involving your handler. My team made a discovery last night that has drawn some...outside attention. Can you get here now?"

The angel frowned. "What kind of outside attention?"

"Can you come?"

The angel glanced again at the field behind him. "Yes."

"Be here in thirty minutes." The connection dropped.

Krad lowered the phone slowly. Today especially, he didn't want to go in. The coffee shop had put a sizable dent in his mood. What was Satoshi even thinking, inviting him out so suddenly like that? The boy had even called out of work. Krad was actually grateful to those brazen women who had interrupted them. Had they not asked if he and Satoshi were together, Krad might have misinterpreted his wing host's intentions.

"We're not."

The bluenette's disgusted expression was as vivid in Krad's memory as the fierce pitch of his answer.

Krad's mouth twisted upward in a sour smile. He'd finally gotten his answer. There was no reason he should be shocked by it. Of course they weren't together. He had practically tortured the boy. He'd destroyed his life. Krad grimaced down at the cell phone he'd been given. He recognized the device for the compromise it was. A safe alternative to the link that had caused all that pain. In what deluded reality had he come to think such a person would grow to love him? His wing host was simply too soft-hearted to throw him out.

The angel turned away from the schoolyard and put one foot in front of the other. He could walk in today. He was in no rush to reach the Ministry. A warm gust of wind tossed his loose hair around his face. Satoshi had rushed him out of the apartment so quickly that he hadn't bothered tying it back. Krad glanced to his reflection in the glass wall of the building next to him and studied himself as he walked. If not for the wings, would he look like a pedestrian on his way to work? He wasn't sure how he felt about passing for human. But earlier, for just a moment, he had bent. He'd caught himself wishing he were someone else. Someone who wasn't a half-souled science experiment.

He was still watching himself as he rounded the corner and smacked into another body. Their heads cracked together, exactly the same height.

A strange, familiar melody called through his blood. Krad staggered back, head smarting, and scanned the figure he'd hit. Violet eyes were wincing at him from a tanned face.

"Krad?" the other angel blurted. Dark recovered his balance and touched his forehead like it might be bleeding. "What the hell?"

The blonde stared at his counterpart. It was a public street, in broad daylight. Now that they had laid down arms against each other, Krad had no clue what to do in such a situation. He glanced over the purple-haired figure, who was clad in a pair of jeans, a silver belt, and a loose black tank. "Where are your wings?" he blurted the moment he realized what was different about his rival.

The thief looked over his shoulder for a moment. "In a half-phase between dimensions. It keeps them out of view when I don't want the attention."

Krad grimaced at the concept. It had never occurred to him to hide his wings that way. They were his. But in hindsight, it might have saved him quite a bit of trouble. His mind flitted to the image of Midnight's man on top of him, rubbing the sensitive flesh between his feathers while rough hands held him down. Shit. Why am I still thinking about it? He clenched his eyes and banished the memory.

"Krad?"

When the blonde opened his eyes, Dark was inches away. The thief had bent forward to get a better view of his face. Krad defeated the urge to skip backward. He wasn't afraid of Dark, but interacting with him like this was unnerving. "I'm late for work," he said, brushing past the violet-haired man.

"Work? You have a job?"

The thief was following him. Krad sighed. "Yes."

"What kinda job?" Dark seemed to be enjoying his obvious irritation now.

"It is none of your concern." Yellow eyes warned the thief to back off.

Dark crossed his arms, chin perking curiously. "How mysterious. Maybe I'll just follow along, and visit you at work," Dark threatened with a smug grin.

Krad didn't reward him by turning around. "Fine by me. It's through the Police Department. I'm sure they'd love to see you there." He spared a bitter smile over his shoulder to see the thief's reaction.

It wasn't quite what the blonde had hoped for. Krad wasn't sure what had happened, but when he looked back at Dark, the other angel looked more dumbstruck than annoyed. Oh, well. Krad kept walking, ignoring Dark's now-quiet footfall behind him. What, was he trying to be thiefy in broad daylight?

"Are you working for the police department, then?" Dark's question was surprisingly serious.

Krad rolled his eyes. "No. The Chief of Police arranged something." He crossed the street, but the other angel pursued him.

"When did this start?" Again, that serious tone.

"Three weeks ago. Mousy," Krad stopped and turned to confront the thief, "Get lost."

Dark hesitated, staring at him with the strangest look.

"What?" Krad snapped.

"Just," the thief broke off, looking confused. Was that worry on his face? No, that didn't make any sense. "Krad, I meant what I said last night. If you ever have shit you need to get out," Dark glanced aside, "I will listen."

Krad sighed. "You're being more irritating than usual, Mousy. I have somewhere to be." He unfurled his wings and rose in the air. Hopefully Dark wasn't ambitious enough to get his wings out just to keep bothering him. He cloaked himself from sight and got himself to the Ministry faster than he necessarily wanted to. As he walked in, he immediately noticed a difference in the atmosphere of the place. Four men in suits were standing in the lobby, talking to Dr. Yamamoto. All five turned their full attention on the white angel as the glamour fell from his form.

Krad neither advanced nor retreated. "What is this?"

"Krad," a grey-suited man in his mid-fifties stepped toward him. "I'm Kousuke Seiseki, Ministry of Defense." He extended a hand to the blonde. Krad studied him without taking it. Unperturbed, the man dropped his arm to his hip. "My colleagues and I have been following the work you're doing with Dr. Yamamoto. We're….inspired by your progress."

The angel's eyes narrowed to golden knives. "I'm ecstatic."

"We'd like both of you to accompany us to our Osaka office for the day. We have equipment we're confident would speed Dr. Yamamoto's work."

Krad's heels planted themselves to the tile. He looked to Yamamoto. "This was not our agreement."

Seiseki nodded his way into the discussion. "Of course, working with our Ministry would change the terms of your contract. Upon completion of four months of research, I understand the Ministry of Health has offered to provide a favorable recommendation against the charges placed against your handler." He showed Krad a conciliatory smile. "If you comply with this adjustment, I will shorten your contract by ten weeks."

Krad eyed him quizzically. He'd already worked two weeks. If the contract was adjusted as the man said, he would have just four left to go. But little was worth dealing with yet another human government organization.

Seiseki seemed to expect this reaction. "As an additional incentive to work with us, I will arrange for the charges against your handler to be dropped and his former title restored. Effective immediately."

The mask of indifference dropped from Krad's face. Immediately. Satoshi could have his old job back. Charges dropped, not just scraping by on a recommendation.

"Are you asking me to live in Osaka?" Without Satoshi. His eyes were calm and deliberate. His heart was screaming at him.

Seiseki grinned mildly, as though he already knew he had him. Krad hated him already. "No. Come with us for the day. After that, Yamamoto will continue her work from this lab."

Krad stared, posture frozen.

Yamamoto turned for the door to her office area. "Come with me. There's some new paperwork for you to sign first."

Krad had a moment to loathe how sure they all were that he'd take the deal. Then he exhaled, and followed her through the doors.

oOoOoOoOo

The room was huge and bright, with a high ceiling and shiny white everything. It was quite different from Yamamoto's cluttered lab. As expected of a place funded for the military. Krad sat in a steel chair, his arm resting palm-up on the table in front of him. He didn't pay much attention to the tube threaded up the vein in his hand. He was pretty used to tubes at this point. His blood ran through the IV to a sterile container on the counter, which they had linked up to a computer.

In front of the angel was an injured mouse, lying in a clear plastic box. Both of its hind legs appeared to be crushed. Its tiny, laboured breaths hurt to watch. Krad observed in silence as they injected a small amount of his blood into the creature's shoulder.

"When you're ready," prompted Seiseki. He and Yamamoto were set up opposite him across the table, each focused on a monitor.

Yamamoto opened a valve on the side of the container, "Just as you did in my lab," Yamamoto prompted.

Krad's gold eyes studied the suffering creature. "That was restoring a molecule. This is alive."

"Don't worry about what it is. We just want you to activate whatever magic you were using then. Strike the spark. The machine will use your blood to amplify it."

It seemed highly doubtful that this could work. Krad's eyes glowed to life, power radiating through him. He focused on the mouse's trembling form. As he closed his eyes, he let the magic shoot through him.

A storm tugged through his blood. For a second, Krad thought he would be yanked inside out. He startled back and cut off the spell, nearly falling out of the chair. "The hell was that?" he spat. His heart was beating its way out of his chest.

"Why did you stop?" Seiseki asked. "It almost worked."

The blonde's whole upper body was heaving with the labor of his breath as he followed Seiseki's gaze to the mouse. The creature's body was a smear of fur and organic slime inside the box. Krad gagged. "It's dead, you piece of shit," he snarled at the scientist.

The man straightened his tie. "You left it mid-state. You need to focus until its original form is completely restored.

"It's dead!" The only thing keeping Krad from screaming was the certainty that he would vomit if he raised his voice.

"Then wipe your nose, and start again," Yamamoto said, handing him a paper towel. "I'll get a new specimen."

That was the first Krad became aware that his nose was bleeding. He stared down at the droplets that had landed on his shirt, and rubbed his face clean. He didn't feel well at all. When he next looked up, a new case with a fresh mouse was sitting in front of him.

"Why does it have the exact same injuries?" Krad growled. He already knew the answer. He was just too disgusted to ignore it. "You crushed their legs."

"We want to know if your power can heal. For that to happen, we need to start with something unhealthy," Yamamoto answered without remorse. "It's only a mouse, Krad. Do it again. This time, don't stop, or the same thing will happen again."

Krad's eyes danced around the room, but didn't find a way out of this situation. His temper seared white behind his eyes. "Human garbage," he seethed.

He focused on the mouse. A moment later, he began to glow. So did the IV stretching from his arm. The computer screen sizzled and went dark on the table. Krad's breathing hitched. His eyes burned gold, bright enough to make the scientists look away. He held it for a few seconds more, and then the light in his eyes snuffed out. He dropped bonelessly back against the chair, outcold. The monitors flickered back to life. Yamamoto and Seiseki stared at the readings on the screen.

The mouse stood up, and investigated the walls of its box.

oOoOoOoOo

The lights were much too bright. That was all Krad could really care about at first. He squinted up at the fluorescent ceiling and wanted to puke. He was lying on a workbench in the back corner of the lab.

"Welcome back," a woman's voice said from next to him.

He looked over at her. She had precisely curled black hair and was petite, sitting in a chair at the desk next to him. "I'm Dr. Seiseki's assistant," she said primly. She didn't offer a name. "You've been out for a while. Eat something." She held out a packet of crackers to him.

Krad sat up slowly. He did not take the food. "What time is it?"

"It's seven thirty. You've been unconscious for three and a half hours."

Seven thirty. He was usually home by eight or nine. And he'd agreed to watch a movie with Satoshi. He jammed a hand into his pocket and jerked out his phone. The screen was completely black. What? He pressed the right buttons, but nothing happened. Was it broken? At a time like this?

"We've prepared space for you to remain here under surveillance tonight. If all is clear, you can go back tomorrow."

"I don't do sleepovers," Krad snarled. He swung his legs off the table and pushed up to his feet. His head felt a bit prickly, but his body seemed cooperative. "My contract says I go home. Every time."

The woman rose and tried blocking his path. "Sir, Dr. Seiseki instructed me to let him know the moment you-"

Krad thrust his hand out toward her and curled his fingers slowly. A magical grip tightened around her lapel and tugged her upward until her feet dangled. "I'm in a bad mood right now," he purred fiercely, "Don't get in my way."

She nodded, white with shock. The angel dropped her back to her feet, and she promptly collapsed to her butt on the floor.

Krad didn't wait for her to recover. "Where is it?"

"Where is...what?"

His gold eyes simmered with anger. "The one I saved."

"The…" Her eyes drifted to the table where he'd played out Seiseki's little experiment earlier. The woman pointed slowly.

Krad crossed the room, located the mouse in its box on the table, and scooped it out. He held the creature in a loose grip and walked past the stunned assistant again on his way to the emergency exit in the corner of the room. He slammed aside the lock and thrust the door wide, triggering an alarm as he did so. The blonde smirked as he heard the first signs of chaos in the building behind him. He took a few steps out onto the grass, dropping the wriggling mouse to the ground next to him. "Let's go," he muttered, facing the twilight sky. By the time the door swung shut, the angel was long gone.

oOoOoOoOo

The wind was an unexpected obstacle on top of everything else that night. His long flight feathers strained against his flesh as they propelled him. After this much flight, each inch of his wings felt bruised. A tremor rattled through the sinuous limbs each time a gust clutched at them. He couldn't remember how long ago his magic had run down. Whatever that machine had done, it seemed to have drained him in one go. The burnout wasn't too severe, but it was strange. He couldn't remember ever having this persistent pounding from the base of his skull. To keep it from getting any worse, he had switched to using his physical strength to propel himself forward. Physical stamina was a finite resource, just like his magic, and now that had also run low. The muscles in his wings and back were tight as cords and searing from the sustained use.

Honestly, he wasn't sure anymore how long he'd been in the air. Being tired altered his sense of things. His phone, which might have told him the time, was unresponsive in his back pocket. He'd been following the railway that had brought them there. It had to lead back to something familiar eventually.

Another stray current caught at him, sending fire through his shoulders and down his spine. He swallowed a gasp, and tried to stretch his left shoulder without losing altitude. The wind was a nuisance, but it wasn't like he'd never been tired before. It couldn't be far now.

If he stopped, it wouldn't be fun trying to lift off again. Best to just keep moving until he got home. He followed the line of the railway below him. A wide highway flanked the railroad to his left. He wondered absently if they ran parallel all the way home, or if they diverged. He'd noticed fewer and fewer cars on the road as time wore on. It was probably getting late. Probably too late for whatever movie Satoshi had wanted to watch. He let himself imagine what that would have been like. He pictured the boy's relaxed posture on the couch next to him, his warmth radiating across the narrow gap between them. Not really touching him, but almost. Close enough to make his teeth ache.

Would another chance like this come? Thanks to those government snakes, he had a feeling he'd betrayed an important gesture from the boy. He would probably be angry. Then again, everything Krad did seemed to anger him lately. Krad nursed his frustration in silence and beat his wings rhythmically against the night air. The wind picked up again, trying to blow him sideways. He snarled at the pressure. It was a waste of energy fighting it. He dropped down to fly right along the highway shoulder. He might be spotted flying this low, which he wasn't crazy about, but the steep cliff that bounded the road was a good shelter against the wind.

A pair of headlights budded over the horizon, moving toward him on the highway. From the roar of the engine and the size of the bright silhouette, the angel identified the machine as a tractor trailer. Krad shifted a little higher in the air to avoid drawing its driver's attention. He kept a close eye on the vehicle as it approached.

Another engine sounded from the roadway behind him. Two cars at once - more traffic than he'd seen in some time. He wondered again how late it was. The truck roared by below him. Krad directed his attention back to his flight.

A deep honk broke the silence of the evening. The sound was followed by the wail of truck brakes. Krad hesitated, jerking around to face the vehicles behind him. At first, his eyes didn't really make sense of what he was watching. The trailer of the truck was jack-knifing sideways while its tires shrieked on the pavement. The other car was somewhere on the other side of it. Krad couldn't see past the blaze of headlights.

The sharp crunch of bending metal resounded through the otherwise empty roadway. Krad pulled up to a stop, beating his wings to hover in place. His brow arched curiously. A collision? It felt like slow motion in front of him. The tractor trailer tumbled onto its side and slid across the roadway, sending up showers of bright sparks where steel dragged against pavement. The other car came into view as the truck slid onward. It didn't look like a car, so much as a hunk of wadded tin foil.

Time was suddenly moving again. Krad stiffened. He had no reason to care who was inside that husk of a vehicle. But it was unnerving that death had invaded the quiet evening beneath him so quickly and light-handedly. After all, whoever was driving that car had to be dead… didn't they?

He flew to the the smoking car and dropped to his feet next to it. The vehicle's crumpled metal still crackled, as if refusing to accept its new, ruined shape. A sobbing child's voice bubbled up first as a whimper, then escalated to a flat-out wail. Krad stiffened at the terrified sound. Then he noticed the soothing murmur of a woman's voice comforting her child. People were alive after all that?

Krad stepped up to the side of the car and looked in to see a woman bent over in her seat. She was reaching back toward the rear seat and speaking to her sobbing son. She said something to him before turning to try her door again. She winced as she did so. It looked like the crumpled metal had swallowed the area where her legs would be.

That was when she noticed Krad staring at her across the glass. Her eyes went wide as saucers, tears forming in them for the first time. Krad recognized the hope gleaming in her expression, the terrible relief of not having to be in charge of the situation. She assumed he was there to help them.

He frowned. Was he? Well, if all she wanted was the door open, he could do as much and be on his way. He grasped the handle and pulled. The walls of the car had twisted in on themselves. The door didn't budge. Oh. No wonder she couldn't get out. Krad tried the back door, and it seemed to be in better shape, but only moved about an inch. The angel grabbed the protruding edge, annoyed, and summoned a burst of power, blasting it around the frozen joints of the door. The metal gave, and Krad pulled the weakened metal off its hinge. He threw it to the ground next to him, and before he could think of what to do next, tiny arms threw themselves around his hips. A boy about Jirou's size perched with his knees still on the back seat, clinging to him for dear life.

Krad grimaced. He was not enjoying this. He couldn't very well leave the woman, at this point. He ignored the child, letting it cling to him for now, and threw his elbow into the driver's side window. It smashed easily, and he was able to get a better view now of the trapped woman's legs. She was pinned. "I'm okay!" was the first thing she screamed through the new space between them. She waved at him strangely. "He's going to fall!"

Krad glanced at the kid in confusion. The boy was perhaps a bit spooked, but fine. Maybe the woman had knocked her head in the crash. The blonde started looking for a way to get her loose without making her legs worse.

"Please, please!" the woman cried, staring at something behind him. "If he falls-!"

The angel took a guess and stopped to look over his shoulder. The tractor trailer had slid through the guardrail at the edge of the roadway, and the cab was hanging bonelessly over a fifty foot drop. Only its connection to the overturned trailer was keeping it suspended, but the trailer itself was bobbing on its axis, and the steel coupler was creaking ominously under the cab's weight. Krad couldn't quite digest it. The woman was still trapped, and she was worried about the trucker? Moreover, what made her assume he would do something about any of this?

"I'll call the police, so please!" she begged him, scrambling for her phone. "Honey, let him go."

Krad wanted to laugh at her. He had been flying for hours already, and he was not in his best condition at the moment. Moreover, he had promised Satoshi his time tonight. He owed these people nothing, and everything about his day fell neatly in the "I loathe humans" pile. The boy next to him released his leg, staring at his mother for instructions.

"It will be okay, Aiden," she promised the boy as she dialed something into her phone. "Mommy's fine."

She didn't look fine. A metallic creak drew Krad's attention back to the truck. It was slowly tipping, sheet metal scraping forward on the pavement as it began to tilt in favor of the cab's weight. He gritted his teeth. There would be no harm in investigating, at least. Krad beat his wings, sending spasms up through his tired back. He rose and flew over the edge of the road to hover beside the truck cab. The fall from here was a steep one, and not likely survivable, especially trapped in a metal box. The cab was not in good shape. Its doors were bent in, much like the car, and the driver inside appeared to be unconscious.

There wasn't time to get the man out, even if he wanted to. Krad jerked back as the cab lurched a few feet further downward. The trailer moaned. Its mangled rear end began a slow swing upward into the air. Crap. Krad threw his hands out, and a shielding spell halted the vehicle's movement. The base of his skull throbbed. Stupid! Of all the spells he could have grabbed for, this one was probably the most unsustainable. He needed a second to think. Krad released the shield and replaced it with his physical hands against the front grill of the cab.

The exertion ripped a fierce groan from his throat. This thing was heavy. He used his wings to thrust the vehicle back into equilibrium and held it there, gasping. His arms and wings weren't built for this kind of punishment. He used a burst of magic to shove the weight upward and give himself the chance for a better grip, then flexed back against the truck. His blood grew so loud in his ears that it almost sounded like screaming. It took a few moments to register that those were actually sirens in the distance. He remembered the woman in the car making a phone call to the police. Were they coming here? How far off were they?

It didn't matter. His strength wouldn't last that long, and he didn't even know these humans. He would need to let go, but he decided to postpone it a few more seconds. When those seconds passed, he gritted his teeth and decided a few more would not kill him. Three minutes later, it was starting to feel like he'd come this far anyway, so he might as well see where it led. The sirens sounded like they were just around the bend, but it had seemed that way for a while already.

The woman's fearful request still stuck with him. She was in danger herself, and the trucker was probably at fault for all of this, and yet she'd been honestly afraid for the stranger's life. Humans could be terrible...and amazing. Krad didn't want to admit it, but he kind of liked that such a woman had trusted him blindly. He decided that he didn't want to drop the cab if he didn't have to. The time ticked on and on. The man in the cab eventually roused, raising his head blearily. The stranger caught sight of the angel on the other side of the windshield. It took the driver a few seconds to realize where he was, and what Krad was doing. The man's eyes widened in heartfelt astonishment. Krad winced back at him across the hood of the cab. The man's face was streaked with blood from a head wound of some sort. The driver regarded the angel with a grateful, concerned stare, touching his blood-smeared fingers to the windshield as if to provide him some kind of support.

Krad cursed under his breath. Don't. He couldn't drop the damned human if he looked at him like that, and it wouldn't be a matter of choice for much longer. His searing back warned him that if his muscles gave out, he'd meet the same fate as the truck. He had not meant to get in this deep, but it really made no sense to stop now. The blood in his ears deafened him. It was only the strobing flash of squad cars that finally alerted him to the arrival of the police.

"...ad, can you...n for a few m…" Krad only picked up fragments of the unfamiliar voice that was calling to him over a megaphone. The attention unnerved him. He wondered if they had cameras. If he dropped this truck now… He could just imagine Satoshi and the rest of the world watching the news tomorrow morning to see the heartless white angel abandoning a truck to its doom. What had he gotten himself into? He vividly remembered how Satoshi had reacted when he'd failed to hold up the collapsing school. He didn't want the boy to look at him that way again. He didn't want to be the bad guy this time. Now that he'd started, he had to finish.

The cab's hideous weight laughed down at him. It lit the angel's back on fire. He cried out, eyes shining, and shoved himself pointlessly back against the pressure. Might as well throw everything into it. Let the human he was about to doom at least see that he tried. No point in conserving strength. He wasn't going to have it in him to make it back to Satoshi's after this, anyway.

A gray blur in the corner of his vision took his gaze to the side. When he brought it into focus, he nearly lost his grip. A huge metal hook was hanging beside him. The megaphone was shouting something to him. Krad raised his eyes blearily and saw the helicopter several yards above him. It was strange that his ears barely noticed it. He didn't understand their shouted instructions, either, but the hook was self-explanatory. Krad summoned another burst of magic, probably the last he could pull off without passing out, and used it to shove the cab upward while he grabbed and placed the hook under the front axle. The cab's weight sagged onto the hook, and the helicopter held it fast.

Krad released his grip. His pulse tantrumed inside him. The moment his hands left the truck, his muscles were already going cold. He looked up at the edge of the roadway a few yards above him. The thought of ascending up to it made him want to retch. He was starting to sink in the air. The megaphone and flashing lights were on some other planet as he beat his wings much harder than he should have needed to, and strained toward the top of the cliff.

He didn't quite make it. His footing failed on the crumbly rocks at the road's edge, and he slipped. The angel caught a torn railpost with one arm and hung from the lip of the cliff. He tried his wings, but instead he felt something rip inside his back. Krad grunted sharply. His grip on the post frayed.

A few seconds were swallowed in blackness. When his senses returned, he was being pulled up by the arms, several sets of strong hands hauling him onto the shoulder of the road. They laid him flat. Voices called out from above him. Krad could hear questions and could even make out their words, but his brain didn't feel like stringing any of it together for him. He clenched his eyes and didn't respond. He was surrounded by strangers, and he was helpless. He didn't think they were going to hurt him, but he felt himself break out in a cold sweat anyway. Why had he done this to himself?

A hand touched his arm and he twitched back. The asphalt smelled like tar. Or maybe that was his back charring. More voices. The next time a hand touched him, he threw it off with a pulse of magic, choking out a few choice words at whoever was messing with him. He blinked and blinked, but he couldn't bring his senses back online. The world was melting orange.

Damn it. Damn it!

ooooOooooOoooOoooo

Satoshi paced back and forth across his small living room, a mug of coffee in hand. For the umpteenth time, he paused by the window and searched the horizon. It was nearly midnight, and there was no sign of him. Frustration had turned to anger and, finally, to worry. He was usually back by eight. Despite the mess at the cafe, the blonde had seemed prepared to go through with the movie tonight. But now, Satoshi was wondering if his behavior that morning had changed the angel's mind after all. Maybe after all the rules and mercurial rejections, the blonde had finally given up.

Was that it? Had Krad left him?

Why shouldn't he leave?

He stared blankly out the window again. His fingers played around the edges of his coffee cup. The drink had been cold for a while now. It just gave his anxious hands something to fidget with.

What if Krad didn't come back?

He pulled out his phone and brought up Krad's number. He'd called the angel three times already, and the phone had been off. Satoshi's pride said not to try it again, but he did it anyway. The voicemail box wasn't set up. Surprise, surprise. The automated service announced Krad's number in slow, mechanical syllables and asked him to record a message. Satoshi swallowed. This time, he would leave something. Maybe Krad would figure out how to check it. But what on earth should he say? His lips parted to speak just as an incoming call beeped at him.

Satoshi pulled the phone back from his ear to see who was trying to call him, hoping desperately that maybe it was Krad on another line. Instead, the caller ID read "Isehara Police Department". The bluenette's heart sank. It had to be about Krad. What else could some other prefecture's police department want with him at this hour? What had the angel done?

He answered with a stiff "Hiwatari here."

"Officer Hiwatari, sorry to bother you so late. It's about your associate, Krad."

oOoOoOo

TBC!

Thoughts? Requests? Protests of my perpetually abusing Krad?

Sorry I'm a monnnsteerr. 3 ^_~