Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ A Spoonful of Sugar ❯ Team of Evil Assassins Seeks Dependable, Courageous, Discreet... ( Chapter 1 )

Dedicated to bews and Lily. Sorry for your tribulations, dears.
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Team of Evil Assassins Seeks Dependable, Courageous, Discreet...

Crawford was relieved when he pulled the car into his garage and turned the key. Finally. It would not do for the Oracle to fall asleep and wrap the BMW around a light pole. That was too...salaryman.
Bed. Nagi had probably left a plate for him, but if it wasn’t portable, Crawford wasn’t eating it. A couple sticks of yakitori, though, wouldn’t slow him down.
Crawford thought of the stairs and decided he could sleep on the couch just one more time. He could eat one stick of yakitori between the refrigerator and the couch.
He hoped Nagi had made or ordered yakitori. If he opened the refrigerator to sushi again...
Smoke. Oily, foul-smelling, black smoke, coiling through his kitchen.
“Scheisse!”
“Mastermind, what the hell are you doing?”
Something clattered, thumped, and swore. Crawford left the door open, stepped to turn the fan on above the American-style stove. The funk cleared enough he could see Schuldig. Wearing a leopard-print toga and sucking on his hand. No, it was a sheet. And he was sporting spots of his own, across his forehead and from the neck down. The telepath glared.
“What the hell does it look like?” he demanded, waving a reddened hand. He cursed and stuck it back in his mouth. “’m magin’ dimma,” he mumbled.
Crawford pinched the top of his nose. He didn’t care, he really didn’t care.
“Fine,” he said, and walked on. Behind him the German yelped.
“It is not! I’m hungry, and it burned my pizza! The damned oven—“
Crawford sighed and turned. “Schuldig, even you should know better than to put a plastic-handled pan in the oven. Why didn’t you use a baking dish?”
“Because they’re all dirty!” The German gestured at the sink, where the hot pan was melting through plastic bowls and plates and...other things.
“Run cold water over your hand, Mastermind. And use the dishwasher!”
“It’s full!” The redhead turned the faucet on, yelped again as steam enveloped him. A loud CRACK told Crawford the abused pan had burned its last. Schuldig snarled a stream of swear words in at least seven languages.
“Schuldig!” Nagi ran through the door. In a kimono. And spots. “Crawford-san! Make him stop, he’ll burn the house down!”
“It wouldn’t have happened if you’d made dinner!” Schuldig spat.
“I would have,” Nagi shot back as he shoved the smoke out the door, “if you hadn’t said you’d rather eat fried cat than whatever shit I came up with tonight!”
“That was before I knew about Farf!”
“Then I suppose you should have—“
The Oracle did not sneak. But if he just quietly walked around—
Farfarello came to watch the fight, blocking his exit. The Irishman was wearing pink restraint pants. And bandages. He, too, was spotted. Farf scratched absently as he watched the argument; blood flowed in several places. What the—
Oh hell. There was no way out. Even Crawford couldn’t sleep through Nagi and Schuldig shrieking like Weiss’s damned fangirls. He’d have to...sigh...deal with this.
“SILENCE!”
It was rare he had to yell, but he still got obedience when he did. Crawford shoved his glasses up and pointed at Nagi. “Tell me what is going on, Prodigy.”
“What it looks like.” The teenager folded his arms. “Schuldig is too stupid to cook frozen pizza.”
“You little—!”
Crawford held up a finger. “Why not order in?”
“Don’t you think I tried?” Schuldig snapped. “The Palace laughed when I told them the address. The girl at Pizza Hut screamed. I told the fried chicken guy I’d meet him two blocks away, but he said he liked his balls attached.” The telepath glared at his Irish teammate. “Can’t imagine who scared them all.”
“Crawford-san,” Nagi interrupted, Crawford noticed the boy was keeping his distance from Farfarello, “I think he...took Schuldig’s suggestion for dinner. Takanata-san has been looking for Fluffy for hours.”
Farfarello grinned. Schuldig threw his head back and laughed. Crawford pinched his nose again. “Why not go out?”
Schuldig squealed rage. “Like this?” He spread his arms as if the spots didn’t show enough. “Let people see me like this?”
“I had sushi,” Nagi proclaimed. “I am not hungry.”
He was going to have to ask, didn’t he? Crawford took a deep breath and asked.
“Why are you all spotted?” Please, please, not the chicken pox...
“We tried,” Nagi snarled, “to share out the chores. Your damned madman was supposed to wash the clothes.”
“An entire goddamn box of soap just so he could watch the bubbles and we’ve been scratching all fucking day,” Schuldig muttered.
Crawford did not want to know what else his team of highly skilled assassins had attempted and ruined today. He just wanted to sleep. He turned for the living room and oblivion.
“Crawford!” Schuldig yelled after him, “Do something!”
“I’ll hire another maid tomorrow,” he said over his shoulder.
“You said that two weeks ago!”
“Didn’t anyone come at all?” Crawford turned back. He’d called one of the best services—
“Oh.” Farfarello tried to look innocent. “Is that what she was for?”
Nagi groaned. Crawford sighed. “I called back,” he said. “When nothing happened, I called back.”
Schuldig found something very interesting to peer at above the refrigerator.
“I’ll hire another one.”
“You said that a week ago!”
Crawford stopped to stare at his couch. His white suede couch. Covered with...chocolate fingerprints, drops of blood, smelling of beer and other less identifiable—for which he was grateful—things, and spilling stuffing from the end when it was only six months old.
“You idiots don’t need a maid,” he snarled as he turned for the stairs. “You need a nanny!”