Chapter the Second
Title: Schwarz Farm
Chapter: the Second
Characters: Schwarz, Aya, and Omi (so far)
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Weiss Kreuz is the property of its creators and the crack they were smoking
Spoilers: only if you read it
Notes: This is an AU and thus subject to strange warpings of the space-time continuum, i.e. my will. The area in which it is set is fabricated. Some of the plot events may appear familiar to a lot of you, though not all of them. I'm working on a timeline where, in the 'present,' Omi and Nagi are sixteen and Ran is eighteen (before anyone gets confused). And thanks be to htebazytook, the fastest beta in the west.
Three Years Previously
Omi leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes, panting.C'mon, you can do this.
His mind stayed blank for a moment. Cool brick, he could feel the pattern against his shoulders. No footsteps. The security guards' patrols put them at the sides of the house right now. Not for much longer.
Omi opened his eyes and faced the door. Smoothly, he plugged the sleek decrypter into the high-tech lock mechanism. That's right. Professional. He watched intently as the numbers cycled. Omi had already got past the outer fence (easy) and taken care of the attack dogs (he hoped he'd used the right darts). All that was left was to open the door, deal with whomever he met on his way to the target, and get out.
Omi's stomach tightened. He really hoped he didn't meet anyone.
After a small eternity, the light on the lock-panel flashed green. With steady hands, Omi disengaged the decryptor and put it away. Darts in hand, he cracked the door open and slipped through.
Inside, the house was beautiful. Luxurious rugs seemed to envelop Omi's soft-shoed feet to the ankle. Rich hangings ran along the hallways, offsetting the dark, expensive wood. He kept half an eye on the crystal chandelier as he ascended the main staricase. Third door on the left. Don't worry about the cameras, don't worry about-
The target wasn't there.
The study, then, and Omi told his thudding heart to stop that racket, he needed to keep his hands from shaking. Just keep on to the end of the hall and it's there on the right. Omi paused. He told himself he was listening for voices.
Nothing. Omi inched the heavy, well-oiled double door open.
"Giuseppe? Is something wrong?" asked an ascetic, greying man at a paper-strewn table. Giuseppe was his head of security.
Omi stepped into the room, closing the door behind him. The target hadn't looked up from his half-empty glass of whiskey. He didn't now.
The darts nestled like doves between Omi's fingers, ready top st-no, that was wasps. Nestled like wasps-
Well, screw the flashy similes anyhow. A hideous heirloom of a grandfather clock was ticking by the seconds in what Omi couldn't help noticing was an obvious and melodramatic sort of foreshadowing. He should kill the target now and leave, faceless, nameless.
"Nicolai Montarsolo."
The target's head jerked up. His whiskey just barely missed sloshing out of its glass and onto the Moroccan rugs.
"How did you get in here, child?"
Omi stepped closer, readying his darts. They were familiar, comforting.
"It wasn't that difficult, really." Omi couldn't quite smile.
Montarsolo smiled. He looked like someone's grandfather, if someone and his grandfather had happened to live in the nineteenth century.
"What do you want, child?"
"I'm going to kill you," Omi told him. A silence followed that pronouncement. If it weren't for the acid churning in his stomach, Omi would have labelled this surreal. Like something out of Poe, complete with velvet curtains.
"What kind of a joke is this?" Montarsolo demanded.
"The kind that isn't. You must die in the name of justice, for the crimes you have committed." Omi's high voice cracked more than once during his delivery. Of all the times for puberty to set in! Omi swallowed, his mouth unexpectedly dry. Montarsolo's outrage burned as though it were branded in his eyes.
This man killed innocents. Was part of a corrupt, heartless system that Omi couldn't stand. How could people be so cruel?
Montarsolo opened his mouth, began to stand up. Without thinking Omi aimed, threw. He hit his mark, of course. He;d neen practising with the darts since he was eight.
Thunk. The corpse hit the ground. Its expression was round-lipped and absurd. A wet stain spilled across the carpet to the hardwood floor. Montarsolo hadn't even had the chance to put down his whiskey.
Shaken, Omi backed away. He turned and saw someone at the door-shit, he hadn't even noticed it opening.
"So, the police are sending children to do their jobs?" asked Montarsolo's son. Contempt bled into his voice like freshly dyed silk bleeds into a river.
"I'm not the police," Omi yelped in indignation, then clamped his mouth shut. He felt the blood rush to his face. "The law couldn't touch him; you know that!" There, that was better. Omi drew himself up and looked the hard-edged man straight in the eyes.
Omi almost shrunk down again under the force of the fury-mad horde in Caspian Montarsolo's glare. They shouted and pummelled one another and in general set up such a clamour as would have left anyone in a direct line from those pupils with the undeniable impression that Caspian no longer had a hold of all his horses. Omi, who was instead about six inches below and slightly to the right of this point, got the message anyway.
"Who, then?" the man snapped, advancing. "Whose family are you working for?"
Omi took a step backwards, readying his darts as a warning. "No one's!"
"Don't think that because you're a child you're safe. Tell me who ordered this!"
Caspian Montarsolo was a big man, and Omi was only slightly taller than the newly exed don's table. Which was a shame, he thought now, because he's really like to hide under it.
"Justice!" shouted Omi reflexively, the back of his head connecting with the dark, polished oak. "He was a criminal! He killed people's families!" Omi swallowed apprehensively, waiting for Caspian to move.
Caspian was wholly engrossed in menacing his way towards Omi. Moments of tense and theatrically stretched silence followed.
Omi made a little sound of uncertainty as Caspian Montarsolo drew nearer.
"Jesus Christ!" Caspian took his cue belatedly. "You killed my father! I'm going to wring your neck until you tell me who you're working for!"
"That's hardly practical!" Omi squawked in protest and ducked around the table. His disproportionately large eyes peeped over its edge, concentration outweighing gear. His gaze flickered between Caspian and the door.
Caspian appeared to be considering overleaping the table and pursuing his avowed course of action anyway. This was very, very bad and if Omi didn't stop it soon the shouting would draw guards.
"I told you! I'm not like you; I work for justice. He deserved to die!" Omi made a break for it.
"Why you fucking little...!"
Caspian Montarsolo launched himself across the table toward where Omi was racing around it. He skidded, disarranging the papers his father had been perusing. Omi, whose attention was fixed on Caspian rather than his footing, stumbled on something on the floor and went down. The frenzied mobster sailed over Omi's head, landing in a tangle with a chair instead.
Omi found himself vis-à-vis with the corpse of Don Antonio Montarsolo.
"Uglrck," Omi said rather than screaming-which was the less professional, though admittedly more natural, option. Flailing at his growing panic with commendable enthusiasm, Omi got his arms under him. Fine. Good. That was step one. His left hand was on a dead man's stomach, but he could handle that. Legs next. Omi dared a quick look at Caspian Montarsolo. No, that wasn't a good idea. Omi scrambled to his feet and lurched towards the door.
"Coward!" came the voice like a plank between the eyes. Omi froze. "Run back to mommy, eh?" The virulent hatred was more than Omi had had directed at him in his short, tragically peculiar, life.
Omi's hands were dry as he clenched and unclenched them spasmodically. He palmed a dart, its metallic warmth like the whiskey-smell in the air, stilling his hands.
It had just occurred to Omi that he couldn't let Caspian Montarsolo walk away from this.
"That's right." The man's tattered voice was getting closer. Omi could hear Caspian's breathing, clavicular and fast. His heart was pounding with it. "Tell me whose skirts you're running to hide behind, you little shit."
Omi wheeled around. It was foolish, really, not taking the time to assess the situation before striking, but it worked this time. He stood, shaking, the only live person in the room.
But not in the house. Right. Omi shook his head to bring back all the things he had to worry about. Time to go.
_ _ _ _ _ _
Ran stared at the last box. His entire life, packed up in boxes. Most of them he'd never see again. He didn't fool himself; it wasn't the government. It was the mob. Mr. Sanguigni was hip-deep in it, Ran knew. That was probably the only reason he was alive. There was no leaving now. No money, in any case, except what he'd saved. Nowhere to go.
No point.
Ran picked up the box. It was a small one. Walking down the steps, he thrust it under a mover's nose. The man fumbled for it hastily, taken aback. It galled to surrender to this quietly. Knowing that Mr. Sanguigni was enduring this humiliation because of his parents made it worse. Ran turned, not looking at the moving-van, and slammed the door closed behind him.
Mr. Sanguigni had generously offered to let him stay on. The Revettis had left as planned. Ostensibly, they were retiring, with their last daughter off to college this year. They could find less physically stressful work. Now Ran suspected that they were getting out while they still could. Only old Aunt Peggie had insisted on staying. Ran would be occupying her basement, while strangers moved in here. It would be too painful to stay anyway.
Ran made one last sweep of the house. He paused in Aya's room, tears stuck in his throat like the grit that oysters turn into pearls. Ran made them into a sort of hiccoughing growl.
A goldish glint tapped at the corner of his eye. Ran stooped and ran his hand across the hard-wood floor, stripped of Aya's cheerful rugs.
An earring. Huh. Ran scoured the room, but he couldn't find its mate. He reached into his pocket and weighed it thoughtfully. Heavy, but not heavy enough to be real gold. It was chintzy too; just a simple dangling bar. Old, he guessed. Aya had probably picked it up at a yard sale.
Aya. Ran saw her sweet, smiling face while she lobbed pillows at him. The way she'd run, sobbing, and fling herself at him so she could dump snow down the back of his coat in the winter. The stupidest, most ridiculous, most charming fucking things.
Their parents had failed her. Ran had failed her. Everyone important in her life had let her down.
A Resolve formed itself in Ran's lavender eyes. He would not disappoint her in death.
He should have done this before he cleaned out the house... Ran removed the needle from the oven-top flame. He'd had to take it out of Aunt Peg's sewing box. Gritting his teeth, he grasped the hot metal and plunged it through his earlobe. He absolutely refused to faint. Cursing softly, he ran cold water over his fingers.
_ _ _ _ _ _
Schuldig drove down the dirt lane, looking distrustfully at his surroundings. Farfarello was quiet in the seat next to him. Schuldig had manfully resisted swapping Nagi's higher brain functions with those of a tree-what if it tried to put down roots?-for about half an hour, at which point he decided he didn't have to put up with this shit and demanded a switch. Nagi had actually seemed a bit offended. Sweet of him.
They pulled up next to Crawford in front of a two-storey house. The plans said that the ground behind it fell away, giving access to the basement through a very convenient back door.
Schuldig jumped out of the truck, stretched, and inhaled deeply. "Mm, the homey smell of cow manure. Crawford, have I mentioned that I'm going to kill you?"
The precog alighted with greater aplomb. Schuldig had to admit, he'd outdone himself on Crawford's wardrobe. There wasn't a single item in it that the seer would have bought himself.
"Empty threats don't become you, Schuldig," Crawford told him.
Schuldig tossed his hair haughtily. "Of course they do. Everything becomes me. In my case, the man makes the clothes. Or the descriptors."
Nagi snorted. "I didn't think you knew how to sew."
"Let's just say that before we had you, my little treasure, speed was the key element in stitching up Farfarello."
"And patience was the key element in repairing Schuldig afterwards," Crawford remarked.
The madman looked as innocent as a wolf in a poorly sewn sheep's skin.
"Rich man, seven o'clock," he said.
Crawford straightened. Schuldig lost it.
"Don't...just...O fuck, Brad, just don't," he managed between bursts of laughter. Crawford gave him a look-professional-you-goon glare and turned to greet their employer. Somehow, Schuldig still felt like Crawford was watching him.
"Mr. Crawford. A pleasure to meet you at last." Sanguigni held out his hand.
It's safe, Schuldig averred.
"Likewise, Mr. Sanguigni." Sunlight flickered across Crawford's lenses. Gee, that wasn't foreboding at all.
"And these would be your companions." Sanguigni nodded at Nagi, Schuldig, and Farfarello. "I have heard good things about you."
"I trust you won't be disappointed," Crawford said smoothly.
"So do I."
Their eyes locked. Eventually, Sanguigni nodded. "I think we understand one another. Here are your keys. If you run into any problems, you need only call me." He smiled like a beneficent grandfather, as if they weren't talking about murder. If nothing else the moustachioed Italian had a talent for double-talk, Schuldig thought as he walked away.
Crawford distributed the keys, and they started unloading the trucks. Schuldig was trying very hard not to hear the cows chewing their cud when something caught his eye. It was tall, with hair the colour of pooled blood and an earring almost tacky enough to be worthy of Schuldig.
Ashes. My life is ashes, Ran thought miserably. He tired not to see the strangers busily moving into his house. A wave of resentment and despair washed over him.
Schuldig glanced over at Farfarello, who didn't need to read thoughts to see the potential in this package. Their eyes met, challenging.
"On the count of three... One...two...three!"
Scissors and rock. Schuldig moaned tragically.
Nagi sneered. "You two are disgusting."
"Nagi!" Schuldig affected a shocked attitude. "You brood too much to be anything but a teenager. Don't try to tell me you don't have hormones. How can you not appreciate such a thing of beauty?" The angst, oh, the angst is sweet, he whispered in Nagi's mind. Though it'd bore me sooner than it will Farfarello.
Get out of my head.
Schuldig smirked. We definitely need to get you laid. It might even improve your disposition. A pause. You're going to have to get over it sometime, you know.
Shut up! Tot's none of your business. Neither is anything else, Nagi snarled for good measure.
Hey, we're a team. Feel the love. And lack of privacy. You're stuck with our problems and we're all stuck with yours, too. I offered my help-
No!
--and you didn't want it. So your other choices are limited. Think about it, Naggles.
Schuldig snickered as Nagi's shields locked down like the blast doors in a missile silo. Some people just didn't appreciate the resources they had available to them.
"No body parts," Crawford told Farfarello.
"You take all my fun away, Crawford." The lunatic pouted. "No body either, I suppose."
"Maybe later. I'll let you know."
Farfarello considered. It was more than you usually got from Crawford. "I'll think of something to do with him." The look on his face was not at all comforting. Whatever it was, Schuldig had confidence in his team mate's ability to be inventive. So far, this place was dull. Schuldig agreed with Farfarello: it would benefit from some artistic touches.
~
s
b
Chapter: the Second
Characters: Schwarz, Aya, and Omi (so far)
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Weiss Kreuz is the property of its creators and the crack they were smoking
Spoilers: only if you read it
Notes: This is an AU and thus subject to strange warpings of the space-time continuum, i.e. my will. The area in which it is set is fabricated. Some of the plot events may appear familiar to a lot of you, though not all of them. I'm working on a timeline where, in the 'present,' Omi and Nagi are sixteen and Ran is eighteen (before anyone gets confused). And thanks be to htebazytook, the fastest beta in the west.
Three Years Previously
Omi leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes, panting.C'mon, you can do this.
His mind stayed blank for a moment. Cool brick, he could feel the pattern against his shoulders. No footsteps. The security guards' patrols put them at the sides of the house right now. Not for much longer.
Omi opened his eyes and faced the door. Smoothly, he plugged the sleek decrypter into the high-tech lock mechanism. That's right. Professional. He watched intently as the numbers cycled. Omi had already got past the outer fence (easy) and taken care of the attack dogs (he hoped he'd used the right darts). All that was left was to open the door, deal with whomever he met on his way to the target, and get out.
Omi's stomach tightened. He really hoped he didn't meet anyone.
After a small eternity, the light on the lock-panel flashed green. With steady hands, Omi disengaged the decryptor and put it away. Darts in hand, he cracked the door open and slipped through.
Inside, the house was beautiful. Luxurious rugs seemed to envelop Omi's soft-shoed feet to the ankle. Rich hangings ran along the hallways, offsetting the dark, expensive wood. He kept half an eye on the crystal chandelier as he ascended the main staricase. Third door on the left. Don't worry about the cameras, don't worry about-
The target wasn't there.
The study, then, and Omi told his thudding heart to stop that racket, he needed to keep his hands from shaking. Just keep on to the end of the hall and it's there on the right. Omi paused. He told himself he was listening for voices.
Nothing. Omi inched the heavy, well-oiled double door open.
"Giuseppe? Is something wrong?" asked an ascetic, greying man at a paper-strewn table. Giuseppe was his head of security.
Omi stepped into the room, closing the door behind him. The target hadn't looked up from his half-empty glass of whiskey. He didn't now.
The darts nestled like doves between Omi's fingers, ready top st-no, that was wasps. Nestled like wasps-
Well, screw the flashy similes anyhow. A hideous heirloom of a grandfather clock was ticking by the seconds in what Omi couldn't help noticing was an obvious and melodramatic sort of foreshadowing. He should kill the target now and leave, faceless, nameless.
"Nicolai Montarsolo."
The target's head jerked up. His whiskey just barely missed sloshing out of its glass and onto the Moroccan rugs.
"How did you get in here, child?"
Omi stepped closer, readying his darts. They were familiar, comforting.
"It wasn't that difficult, really." Omi couldn't quite smile.
Montarsolo smiled. He looked like someone's grandfather, if someone and his grandfather had happened to live in the nineteenth century.
"What do you want, child?"
"I'm going to kill you," Omi told him. A silence followed that pronouncement. If it weren't for the acid churning in his stomach, Omi would have labelled this surreal. Like something out of Poe, complete with velvet curtains.
"What kind of a joke is this?" Montarsolo demanded.
"The kind that isn't. You must die in the name of justice, for the crimes you have committed." Omi's high voice cracked more than once during his delivery. Of all the times for puberty to set in! Omi swallowed, his mouth unexpectedly dry. Montarsolo's outrage burned as though it were branded in his eyes.
This man killed innocents. Was part of a corrupt, heartless system that Omi couldn't stand. How could people be so cruel?
Montarsolo opened his mouth, began to stand up. Without thinking Omi aimed, threw. He hit his mark, of course. He;d neen practising with the darts since he was eight.
Thunk. The corpse hit the ground. Its expression was round-lipped and absurd. A wet stain spilled across the carpet to the hardwood floor. Montarsolo hadn't even had the chance to put down his whiskey.
Shaken, Omi backed away. He turned and saw someone at the door-shit, he hadn't even noticed it opening.
"So, the police are sending children to do their jobs?" asked Montarsolo's son. Contempt bled into his voice like freshly dyed silk bleeds into a river.
"I'm not the police," Omi yelped in indignation, then clamped his mouth shut. He felt the blood rush to his face. "The law couldn't touch him; you know that!" There, that was better. Omi drew himself up and looked the hard-edged man straight in the eyes.
Omi almost shrunk down again under the force of the fury-mad horde in Caspian Montarsolo's glare. They shouted and pummelled one another and in general set up such a clamour as would have left anyone in a direct line from those pupils with the undeniable impression that Caspian no longer had a hold of all his horses. Omi, who was instead about six inches below and slightly to the right of this point, got the message anyway.
"Who, then?" the man snapped, advancing. "Whose family are you working for?"
Omi took a step backwards, readying his darts as a warning. "No one's!"
"Don't think that because you're a child you're safe. Tell me who ordered this!"
Caspian Montarsolo was a big man, and Omi was only slightly taller than the newly exed don's table. Which was a shame, he thought now, because he's really like to hide under it.
"Justice!" shouted Omi reflexively, the back of his head connecting with the dark, polished oak. "He was a criminal! He killed people's families!" Omi swallowed apprehensively, waiting for Caspian to move.
Caspian was wholly engrossed in menacing his way towards Omi. Moments of tense and theatrically stretched silence followed.
Omi made a little sound of uncertainty as Caspian Montarsolo drew nearer.
"Jesus Christ!" Caspian took his cue belatedly. "You killed my father! I'm going to wring your neck until you tell me who you're working for!"
"That's hardly practical!" Omi squawked in protest and ducked around the table. His disproportionately large eyes peeped over its edge, concentration outweighing gear. His gaze flickered between Caspian and the door.
Caspian appeared to be considering overleaping the table and pursuing his avowed course of action anyway. This was very, very bad and if Omi didn't stop it soon the shouting would draw guards.
"I told you! I'm not like you; I work for justice. He deserved to die!" Omi made a break for it.
"Why you fucking little...!"
Caspian Montarsolo launched himself across the table toward where Omi was racing around it. He skidded, disarranging the papers his father had been perusing. Omi, whose attention was fixed on Caspian rather than his footing, stumbled on something on the floor and went down. The frenzied mobster sailed over Omi's head, landing in a tangle with a chair instead.
Omi found himself vis-à-vis with the corpse of Don Antonio Montarsolo.
"Uglrck," Omi said rather than screaming-which was the less professional, though admittedly more natural, option. Flailing at his growing panic with commendable enthusiasm, Omi got his arms under him. Fine. Good. That was step one. His left hand was on a dead man's stomach, but he could handle that. Legs next. Omi dared a quick look at Caspian Montarsolo. No, that wasn't a good idea. Omi scrambled to his feet and lurched towards the door.
"Coward!" came the voice like a plank between the eyes. Omi froze. "Run back to mommy, eh?" The virulent hatred was more than Omi had had directed at him in his short, tragically peculiar, life.
Omi's hands were dry as he clenched and unclenched them spasmodically. He palmed a dart, its metallic warmth like the whiskey-smell in the air, stilling his hands.
It had just occurred to Omi that he couldn't let Caspian Montarsolo walk away from this.
"That's right." The man's tattered voice was getting closer. Omi could hear Caspian's breathing, clavicular and fast. His heart was pounding with it. "Tell me whose skirts you're running to hide behind, you little shit."
Omi wheeled around. It was foolish, really, not taking the time to assess the situation before striking, but it worked this time. He stood, shaking, the only live person in the room.
But not in the house. Right. Omi shook his head to bring back all the things he had to worry about. Time to go.
_ _ _ _ _ _
Ran stared at the last box. His entire life, packed up in boxes. Most of them he'd never see again. He didn't fool himself; it wasn't the government. It was the mob. Mr. Sanguigni was hip-deep in it, Ran knew. That was probably the only reason he was alive. There was no leaving now. No money, in any case, except what he'd saved. Nowhere to go.
No point.
Ran picked up the box. It was a small one. Walking down the steps, he thrust it under a mover's nose. The man fumbled for it hastily, taken aback. It galled to surrender to this quietly. Knowing that Mr. Sanguigni was enduring this humiliation because of his parents made it worse. Ran turned, not looking at the moving-van, and slammed the door closed behind him.
Mr. Sanguigni had generously offered to let him stay on. The Revettis had left as planned. Ostensibly, they were retiring, with their last daughter off to college this year. They could find less physically stressful work. Now Ran suspected that they were getting out while they still could. Only old Aunt Peggie had insisted on staying. Ran would be occupying her basement, while strangers moved in here. It would be too painful to stay anyway.
Ran made one last sweep of the house. He paused in Aya's room, tears stuck in his throat like the grit that oysters turn into pearls. Ran made them into a sort of hiccoughing growl.
A goldish glint tapped at the corner of his eye. Ran stooped and ran his hand across the hard-wood floor, stripped of Aya's cheerful rugs.
An earring. Huh. Ran scoured the room, but he couldn't find its mate. He reached into his pocket and weighed it thoughtfully. Heavy, but not heavy enough to be real gold. It was chintzy too; just a simple dangling bar. Old, he guessed. Aya had probably picked it up at a yard sale.
Aya. Ran saw her sweet, smiling face while she lobbed pillows at him. The way she'd run, sobbing, and fling herself at him so she could dump snow down the back of his coat in the winter. The stupidest, most ridiculous, most charming fucking things.
Their parents had failed her. Ran had failed her. Everyone important in her life had let her down.
A Resolve formed itself in Ran's lavender eyes. He would not disappoint her in death.
He should have done this before he cleaned out the house... Ran removed the needle from the oven-top flame. He'd had to take it out of Aunt Peg's sewing box. Gritting his teeth, he grasped the hot metal and plunged it through his earlobe. He absolutely refused to faint. Cursing softly, he ran cold water over his fingers.
_ _ _ _ _ _
Schuldig drove down the dirt lane, looking distrustfully at his surroundings. Farfarello was quiet in the seat next to him. Schuldig had manfully resisted swapping Nagi's higher brain functions with those of a tree-what if it tried to put down roots?-for about half an hour, at which point he decided he didn't have to put up with this shit and demanded a switch. Nagi had actually seemed a bit offended. Sweet of him.
They pulled up next to Crawford in front of a two-storey house. The plans said that the ground behind it fell away, giving access to the basement through a very convenient back door.
Schuldig jumped out of the truck, stretched, and inhaled deeply. "Mm, the homey smell of cow manure. Crawford, have I mentioned that I'm going to kill you?"
The precog alighted with greater aplomb. Schuldig had to admit, he'd outdone himself on Crawford's wardrobe. There wasn't a single item in it that the seer would have bought himself.
"Empty threats don't become you, Schuldig," Crawford told him.
Schuldig tossed his hair haughtily. "Of course they do. Everything becomes me. In my case, the man makes the clothes. Or the descriptors."
Nagi snorted. "I didn't think you knew how to sew."
"Let's just say that before we had you, my little treasure, speed was the key element in stitching up Farfarello."
"And patience was the key element in repairing Schuldig afterwards," Crawford remarked.
The madman looked as innocent as a wolf in a poorly sewn sheep's skin.
"Rich man, seven o'clock," he said.
Crawford straightened. Schuldig lost it.
"Don't...just...O fuck, Brad, just don't," he managed between bursts of laughter. Crawford gave him a look-professional-you-goon glare and turned to greet their employer. Somehow, Schuldig still felt like Crawford was watching him.
"Mr. Crawford. A pleasure to meet you at last." Sanguigni held out his hand.
It's safe, Schuldig averred.
"Likewise, Mr. Sanguigni." Sunlight flickered across Crawford's lenses. Gee, that wasn't foreboding at all.
"And these would be your companions." Sanguigni nodded at Nagi, Schuldig, and Farfarello. "I have heard good things about you."
"I trust you won't be disappointed," Crawford said smoothly.
"So do I."
Their eyes locked. Eventually, Sanguigni nodded. "I think we understand one another. Here are your keys. If you run into any problems, you need only call me." He smiled like a beneficent grandfather, as if they weren't talking about murder. If nothing else the moustachioed Italian had a talent for double-talk, Schuldig thought as he walked away.
Crawford distributed the keys, and they started unloading the trucks. Schuldig was trying very hard not to hear the cows chewing their cud when something caught his eye. It was tall, with hair the colour of pooled blood and an earring almost tacky enough to be worthy of Schuldig.
Ashes. My life is ashes, Ran thought miserably. He tired not to see the strangers busily moving into his house. A wave of resentment and despair washed over him.
Schuldig glanced over at Farfarello, who didn't need to read thoughts to see the potential in this package. Their eyes met, challenging.
"On the count of three... One...two...three!"
Scissors and rock. Schuldig moaned tragically.
Nagi sneered. "You two are disgusting."
"Nagi!" Schuldig affected a shocked attitude. "You brood too much to be anything but a teenager. Don't try to tell me you don't have hormones. How can you not appreciate such a thing of beauty?" The angst, oh, the angst is sweet, he whispered in Nagi's mind. Though it'd bore me sooner than it will Farfarello.
Get out of my head.
Schuldig smirked. We definitely need to get you laid. It might even improve your disposition. A pause. You're going to have to get over it sometime, you know.
Shut up! Tot's none of your business. Neither is anything else, Nagi snarled for good measure.
Hey, we're a team. Feel the love. And lack of privacy. You're stuck with our problems and we're all stuck with yours, too. I offered my help-
No!
--and you didn't want it. So your other choices are limited. Think about it, Naggles.
Schuldig snickered as Nagi's shields locked down like the blast doors in a missile silo. Some people just didn't appreciate the resources they had available to them.
"No body parts," Crawford told Farfarello.
"You take all my fun away, Crawford." The lunatic pouted. "No body either, I suppose."
"Maybe later. I'll let you know."
Farfarello considered. It was more than you usually got from Crawford. "I'll think of something to do with him." The look on his face was not at all comforting. Whatever it was, Schuldig had confidence in his team mate's ability to be inventive. So far, this place was dull. Schuldig agreed with Farfarello: it would benefit from some artistic touches.
~
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