Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Breaking All the Rules ❯ Schwarz Arrives, “Christie” Dies ( Chapter 2 )

Title: Breaking All the Rules [chapter 2 of 8]

 

Book 3 of the Realizations Arc

 

Author: Enigma (also known as “E-sama the Llama”)

 

Series: Weiss Kreuz

 

Rating: NC-17

 

Grouping for Lemon: Yohji/Ken/Aya

 

Other Pairings: Omi + Nagi, Brad + Schu

 

Warnings: Yaoi, angst, violence, bloodshed, coarse language, past abuse, sexual triangle (Yohji/Ken/Aya), detailed threesome lemon including masturbation, oral and anal sex, etc. AU-OOC.

 

Disclaimer: “Weiss Kreuz” is the property of Koyasu Takehito and Project Weiss. All original characters including “Christie”, etc. © Enigma, 2007. This unauthorized work of unpaid fanfiction is intended for entertainment only.

 

//internal thoughts//

[[telepathic communication]]

 

 

~+~+~+~+~+~

 

Unbeknownst to the recently arrived quartet of killers that Kritiker had sent, their arrival and subsequent movements had not gone unobserved.

 

From a vantage point atop one of the warehouses on Tezuka dock number 4, a pair of merry green eyes danced even as a slightly Germanic telepathic voice sing-songed, [[Oh, Bra~ad!]] Dressed in rarely seen and quite blah street clothes---at least blah by his own fashion forward standards---a redheaded man smirked to himself and added across their private connection, [[You were right as always. The Weiss kittens are indeed out for a stroll tonight!]]

 

[[Be quiet and don't `send' to me, Schu,]] a bespectacled man dressed in an atypically understated steel gray coat commanded tersely. [[You're giving me a headache.]] Like a shadowy sentinel, Crawford was poised vigilantly on a rooftop two buildings away yet in plain view of his lover who merely laughed before leaping across the relatively short distance to join him.

 

“Spoilsport,” Schuldig gently mocked even as he crouched down on the apex of warehouse 4-B and peered curiously at the activity on the damp pavement below.

 

If they had been at home sequestered in the protective confines of the Schwarz compound, he might have dared to behave in a more caring manner toward the American precognitive, but not under these circumstances. Crawford had some very definite rules for how his underlings comported themselves whenever they were out together, especially with regards to their interpersonal behavior.

 

Generally speaking, anything that could be interpreted as kindness to one another was forbidden in the hopes of giving their enemies one less weapon to use against them at some point. Despite common misperceptions, the crime-fighters searching the area nearby were far from the most dangerous foes that Schwarz had to their questionable credit.

 

Since actually expressing his recently growing concerns for Crawford openly was out of the question, Schuldig focused on the newcomers instead and reported his observations by saying, “Hmmm… It looks like two of them went south on dock 5, one is coming west towards us, and the other one went north. Want me to mess with their heads, boss?” His eager offer was underlined by a hint of madness as gleaming jade eyes gazed up longingly at his team leader.

 

Crawford sighed and shook his head. “Not this time, I'm afraid. We're not here on official business, you know. As pathetically clueless as the Weiss boys usually are, they'll probably never even realize we're here and I want to keep it that way.” The manner in which his lover was staring up at him with that incredibly irresistible bloodlust in his eyes ignited a familiar, truly heartfelt warmth within him which his hands itched to express directly. To avoid making a fool of himself, however, he stuffed both hands into his jacket pockets and turned his amber-brown eyes elsewhere.

 

Despite Crawford's mental shields, Schuldig still picked up stray images from him on occasion thanks to their abiding bond and with a self-congratulatory smirk, he remarked, “You almost petted me on the head just now, didn't you? How sweet.”

 

Refusing to even look at the man who drove him insane both in bed and out of it, Crawford hid his expression behind a hand that was ostensibly adjusting his glasses while muttering, “I did not.”

 

“Did so!” Schuldig teased and gladly would've taken the playful harassment even farther except a sudden mental banshee cry distracted him. This was followed by a bloodcurdling albeit entirely human scream that echoed far from the rooftop where they stood watch.

 

“Farf finally found a kill?” Crawford sighed as he removed his infamous glasses before rubbing his eyes in a failed attempt to ease some of the all too familiar pain that had increased dramatically lately. Not making much progress against the almost debilitating headache, he complained quietly, “That took long enough.”

 

“Yeah,” Schuldig allowed a small amount of his normal mania to slip aside as he fluidly rose back to his feet. Deciding that it was worth the risk of being bitched out or worse for it, he then replaced Crawford's hands with his own and began expertly massaging the taller man's temples as he offered, “Want me to go make sure that he gets what he wants so we can get out of here?”

 

With his lover's talented fingers easing some of the chronic ache that was afflicting him, Crawford sighed deeply and said, “No, let him play.”

 

Like the sub-aural hum of a warning claxon that one can't quite hear, Oracle's powers kept trying to tell him that something was terribly wrong. Yet instead of giving him useful information, the overall effect was just making him even more miserable than he already was.

 

Perhaps it was a blessing that he was unaware of the fact that this was nothing more than a prelude to a far worse period for Schwarz when it would seem as if fate itself was striking back at them for all of their evil misdeeds. A karmic backlash, if you will.

 

Without subtlety or apology, Crawford guided Schuldig's hands infinitesimally lower and encouraged him to rub taut neck muscles as well. It might not give him much respite from the throbbing headache that he could barely endure, but at least it was a hint of the mutual affection that they both needed to share while their Irish teammate finished venting.

 

Glad to be given such freedom by his commander in so arguably public a place, the Schwarz telepath proceeded to give Crawford as much relief as he could short of reaching beneath his clothing, something that he planned to do later at home anyway. For now, he'd simply have to stifle the often unbridled lust that physical contact with this unique American could engender.

 

On rare occasions, these two often ruthless killers acted like any other loving couple might, and for a few precious, stolen moments, this was one of those times.

 

The manner in which they had met---it certainly hadn't been a pleasant coincidence by any stretch of the imagination---followed six months thereafter by the first sexual encounter that they had shared was a topic for reflection some other time. On this night, as the second of July was about to give way to the third, they had simply gone out to allow their resident sociopath a little well earned fun.

 

The Irishman whose ability to withstand physical pain made Crawford increasingly jealous had willingly confined himself to his padded cell for days on end recently. The addition of a well shielded computer whose internet connections were untraceable had kept him more than a little occupied lately. However, Farfarello's inherent need for violence and bloodletting could not be ignored forever if Schwarz itself was not to suffer because of it.

 

The reaction that news of this unplanned little excursion initially received from a certain diminutive telekinetic hadn't been surprising in the least.

 

With a derisive snort, Nagi had demanded why he had to come help “walk the family dog,” too. But when Crawford had given him that disturbingly omniscient smile of his and simply murmured something about Weiss possibly being there, he was all for it. At the time, it was merely a bluff on the precognitive's part, yet he should've realized it was more like a hunch than a statistically justifiable partial truth.

 

As far as where, precisely, either of the two junior members of their group had gotten off to, well, the two men currently standing on the rooftop quietly together would figure that out soon enough.

 

Even as the Weiss assassins found themselves in disarray while trying to figure out what the hell just happened that had caused a man to cry out as if he was being torn limb from limb, Crawford and Schuldig enjoyed their brief, peaceful interlude.

 

But such things never last, and finally the raven-haired man asked tiredly, “Do you think Nagi is keeping track of Farf like he was told to?”

 

“I doubt it,” Schuldig answered with a shrug. He continued to massage tense shoulder muscles as he stated the obvious by asking, “His favorite boytoy arrived a minute ago, didn't he?”

 

“That's true,” Crawford's lips formed a dissatisfied line that bordered on a frown and told Schuldig that it was time for them to focus on their obligations to their teammates once more. After shrugging the redhead's hands off of his neck, he slipped the infamous wire-rimmed glasses back into place before gazing at the overcast sky above while adding, “Remind me later why I'm just standing aside while he seduces the enemy.”

 

Schuldig considered doing so immediately since it all had to do with unmet needs and the tragedy of an abused Tokyo street urchin's life. Wisely, he did nothing of the kind, but said instead, “Anything you want, Brad. Just name it.”

 

Arching a brow and gazing at his lover while wondering if the often challenging twenty-two year old was being facetious or not, Crawford chose to say nothing of the sort. Instead, despite the fact that it would leave him in even greater agony than he already felt, he attempted to deliberately catch a glimpse of the immediate future through his prescience.

 

Forcing his so-called gift into action always cost him dearly in the form of severe headaches and other maladies. The creeping sense of dread that he'd already being feeling, however, left him with few options to avoid doing so.

 

Despite the horrible penalty that this gambit would exact on him later, Crawford might not even be allowed to see whatever the future held that was nibbling at his confidence like a parasite would gladly gnaw at his entrails.

 

This was easily the greatest weakness of the curse of precognition that he'd borne since late adolescence. Much like playing the lottery, he'd learned that he could risk agony to gamble on his power but it would not always pay off the way that he needed it to not only for himself, but also for those under his command.

 

This was especially hurtful when the one who took the greatest loss because of it was the German currently giving him worried looks since he simply hated the cost of trying to tap into eternity. Schuldig had argued passionately against these sacrifices in the past, but the one word that often best described Bradley Crawford was “determined” and there simply was no dissuading him when his mind was made up.

 

After skimming future stock results and other useless information, he was ultimately disappointed by what he did discover in the very near future. With a dark sigh, he said simply, “We have to go. Farf's about to cause a problem that you and I will have to clean up.”

 

“Oh, shit,” Schuldig grumbled and then shrugged complacently. Certain routine changes in plans stopped surprising him quite awhile back. With his amazing and inexplicable ability to cover considerable distances in next to no time, he nodded once and then bounded off across the rooftops while sending back, [[SNAFU, yet again.]]

 

[[Indeed,]] Crawford agreed and then followed at a somewhat slower pace.

 

For Schwarz the phrase “Situation Normal: All Fucked Up” usually meant someone would be dead soon. He just wanted to make sure that it wasn't one of his own operatives or one of the men whose lives Eszett valued enough to put an order of protection on due to their role in a major offensive in the future.

 

If the Weiss assassins had ever even imagined that they had such malevolent guardian angels hovering nearby, they might have felt even more ill at ease than they already did.

 

~+~+~+~+~+~

 

Even as Farfarello had proclaimed his blood-spattered jubilation telepathically so only his teammates would be aware of his role in it, the men of Weiss had been understandably dismayed when they had heard the death scream of his latest victim.

 

For several minutes, there had been the usual chatter back and forth across their headsets as they tried to make sense of what was going on around them.

 

They had fully expected to encounter the serial killer who raped the newly made corpses of the young girls that he killed. After all, that was why they were out on their second assassination attempt in one night despite their shared sense of fatigue at this point.

 

The agonized cry that they'd just heard had been unquestionably male, however, and was therefore unlikely to be one of “Christie's” victims. They had neglected to plan for the possibility of more than one murderer being active in the Old Dock district that night even though this wouldn't have been the first time such an event had unfolded around them. Now, however, they were made retroactively aware of their understandable tactical error which was an outgrowth of the lateness of the hour and the tiredness these unusual young men were all suffering to one extent or another.

 

Serendipitously, the unexpected shriek had helped Persia's personal strike force to focus on their actual mission instead of their internal debates, and that was a very definite improvement.

 

In the end, a few appropriately harsh words from Abyssinian got his underlings back into harness and the search for “Christie” resumed more quickly due to concerns that someone else might steal their righteous kill from them.

 

Random acts of violence were commonplace in this aging and neglected corner of the otherwise glittering city. The Tokyo police department had long ago conceded control of this one area to not only the yakuza but also to any number of anarchistic groups who lived for the joy of blood sport and the like.

 

In large part, this explained why they were sticking to the shadows even more than normal simply to avoid run-ins with noncombatants. For the Weiss claw-wielder, the potential presence of bona fide villains of the more mundane variety was actually a relief.

 

//That “most probable” description of the serial murderer rapist guy that Kritiker's profiler gave us sure sounded lame and easy to take down. Some jackass salaryman with a totally fucked up view of reality is too easy, really, and that sucks! Maybe we'll run into some other assholes who need to be put in their place tonight!//

 

After so much introspection, self-doubt, and confusion, Siberian had found that the adrenaline rush of the hunt had given him a taste for combat despite his inherent tiredness and other problems. If he got his wish, by morning he'd be sore from an honorable battle well fought rather than in pain from the heartache which he wrongly felt that he'd brought upon himself in the first place.

 

Running full tilt through the damp night, all Ken really wanted was to escape the morass that he'd become ensnared in even if only for a few harrowing moments. As physically sore and heartsick as he was, it never even occurred to him that he might eventually regret his desire for stress-relieving conflict.

 

Hurtling from building to building, combat-hungry brown eyes sought the unidentified and ill-described target, yet the claw-wielding teen was not the one destined to find him.

 

Siberian's headset crackled to life as Bombay's voice cried out in a loud whisper, “Guys! I think I've found one of `Christie's' victims! I'm down by the far end of the dock where it ends at the river.” Realizing that he had to offer a better location reference in case he needed backup, he hurried to add, “Um, I'm near warehouse 5-F and it looks like this girl's been dead just a little while! He must be close by!”

 

Both Siberian and Balinese were very relieved that Bombay had found the victim and not Abyssinian. The last thing that they felt they needed at that moment was for their field leader to have yet another crisis due to stumbling across the body of a young woman who was a dead ringer for his little sister.

 

The rustling of fabric as the Weiss archer checked a rapidly cooling corpse for indicators of the time of death was heard through the earpieces of all of their headsets followed by a startled shout, “Oh, hell! I think he saw me!”

 

“Bombay!!” Several voices cried out in unison as the other three Weiss assassins swiftly redirected their trajectories. Just because a dead girl had been found hadn't meant that they were sufficiently close to getting a lock on their target until this very moment.

 

Unwilling to let the murderer of his classmate's cousin escape, Bombay was already on his sneaker-clad feet and in pursuit as he reported, “There's a black-haired, kinda short man running away from me who's wearing some kind of grungy old beige suit and is headed north towards building 5-G right now! I can't be dead certain it's `Christie', but he's got blood and all sorts of nasty stuff all over him, so I think it's a pretty good chance that it *is* him!!”

 

Even though he had no way of knowing it at this point, the Weiss archer was correct that the unkempt, thirty-ish man that he was in pursuit of was indeed the necrophiliac rapist that they had come to know as “Christie”.

 

Following a recent job loss that his slowly developing dementia had blamed on everyone except himself, he had lost touch with reality so badly that he had embarked on a killing spree. Lost in his own alternate universe, he'd stopped caring for himself in any sane manner the way that normal people would. Hence, his previously neat and tidy business suit was now splashed liberally with the blood and bodily discharge of his victims, something that forensic scientists might be able to use in the future.

 

Regardless of this, when he turned madness-filled sloe eyes on Bombay for less than a moment, he'd seen the end of his life coming in the form of a frighteningly young looking boy dressed in shorts and that spurred him on even more.

 

“Don't lose him!” Abyssinian's steely mission voice commanded even as he raced towards Bombay's last reported location.

 

“Fuck, fuck, *fuck*!!” Siberian cursed angrily. Due to the fact that he had been following standard search protocol, he'd gone in exactly the wrong direction and now had the greatest distance to cover if he wanted in on the actual execution. At that instant, all that he could think of was joining in the fray so that the burden of guilt wouldn't all be on his seventeen year old comrade's thin shoulders.

 

“Calm down, Siberian,” Balinese's dangerously cool mission voice urged in his panicked lover's ear. The powerful, underlying emotions behind this excellent advice were lost in the sound of his own heavy breathing and desperation as he, too, struggled to get to his teammates' sides even as he asked, “Where are you?”

 

“I'm on the wrong damned *dock*, Balinese!” Siberian's agony was clear in his voice as he rushed to explain, “I'm on dock 4, just now passing building 4-H! I should be over there in a sec!”

 

Ignoring mission protocol entirely after a terrifying flash of intuition wrenched his heart badly, Yohji hurried to warn, “Just be careful, Ken!” The desire to say more was squelched as he resumed his mission-persona and silently wished that his booted feet could run even faster.

 

Balinese had traveled north across the broad roadway that was the lifeblood of the Old Dock district since he felt that the low slung office buildings there were just as apt to contain their prey as the warehouses on the actual docks were. Again, this was standard procedure when a precise rendezvous location was impossible to attain, but at that exact moment, he desperately hated the way that things were playing out.

 

Even as Balinese was dodging trucks and running south, he could easily imagine the layout of this entire area clearly in his mind. With a devilish smirk, he realized that he and Bombay could conceivably catch their prey in a pincer move. This thought spurred him on especially since if he really hauled ass he might be able to keep his dangerously distracted young lover out of harm's way entirely, a highly desirable outcome to be certain.

 

Earlier that very evening, before Omi and Aya's noisy return which had led to all manner of unfortunate events unfolding, Yohji had been terribly worried about Ken.

 

Even though he didn't allow himself to be distracted by recalling this now, in the back of his mind were the concerns that he'd had after walking in on his lover drowning in tears in the kitchen. He'd wanted to get to the bottom of all of that, yet the spurious discussion about whether or not anyone viewed Ken as “womanly” had prematurely ended it.

 

On top of this, and far more recently, Yohji had felt dreadfully disappointed in himself for having yelled at the beloved brunette boy over the headset between missions. It wasn't as if he could pretend that he had no clue that Ken was submitting to Aya sexually, he simply and foolishly had chosen not to face the facts for a week and a half.

 

Worse, Ken wouldn't even look him in the eye once they were reunited and that alone gave the usually confident playboy a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. Sharing Ken with Aya was one thing. Losing him to the redhead was quite another.

 

Now, though, was the entirely wrong time to be thinking about any of this and so Balinese didn't allow himself to do so, yet his feet had never flown so fast before as he attempted to put his impromptu plan into motion.

 

Refusing to participate in the unnecessary chatter among his teammates and thereby denying them any knowledge of his own location or intentions, Abyssinian was well ahead of Balinese and was near building 5-B while moving south. Since Bombay had reported seeing “Christie” on the eastern side of dock 5, he wisely chose to stay on the western side in case their target tried to dodge capture by going in the other direction.

 

As the tails of his maroon trench coat flapped around his legs, he distantly hoped that Bombay wouldn't feel compelled to bring down their quarry with his crossbow. If they did indeed have the wrong man, killing him would leave additional emotional scars that the young blond simply did not need.

 

As Weiss closed in on their target, the men of Schwarz were having problems of their own.

 

Earlier, Farfarello's straightjacket had come off within the ramshackle confines of building 4-D. Once loosed, he'd been left to his own devices and ran amok until finding an unlucky homeless man who had been his first victim of the night. After reveling in the bloodletting as well as the man's screams, Farfarello had moved on and then rapidly put an end to another unfortunate soul who would never be missed by a self-important society which chose to forget those it had no use for.

 

By this point, though, Schwarz's Berserker had almost sated his need for carnage and was merely wandering in the general vicinity of buildings 4-A and 4-J, licking the blood from his twin razor-sharp blades as if they were ice cream cones.

 

As noted earlier by those who knew him best, the sixteen year old assigned to keep watch over Farfarello had abandoned his task the very moment that he spotted a familiar shape skulking around across the water.

 

Using his telekinetic abilities and an old dinghy that he'd found propped against a building, Nagi had easily traversed the calm wavelets of the deep water access channel between docks 4 and 5. After regaining his footing on dry ground, he had been on his way toward building 5-E and ultimately to Omi when he heard a victorious howl in his mind.

 

[[I'm going to gut a kitten!!]] Farfarello shouted out across the mental channel that Schuldig maintained for the team's use on nights like this. It was certainly more convenient than the headsets that Weiss used, but at times like this, the cranial roar could be deafening.

 

Wearing fairly nondescript clothes so he could blend into the shadows better than his usual dove gray, school-inspired uniform allowed him to, Nagi clutched both hands to his head and sank to his knees even as not only Omi but also “Christie” came into view. The Schwarz telekinetic had no idea who the geezer in the rumpled beige suit even was, but he still held out an open-palmed hand to exert force to stop him since his battle-suited boyfriend was obviously chasing him.

 

“Christie” was suddenly pinned in space like an ugly butterfly on an unseen backing board. For a moment, the loathsome necrophiliac squirmed there, screaming obscenities and trying to break free.

 

It took a half-second for Bombay to recognize the welcome interference and with a gleeful smile, he toggled off his headset's microphone long enough to shout, “Nagi!”

 

Still on his knees and in considerable agony that would wane shortly, the boy whose eyes had flared red with psychic exertion even as his hair danced on nonexistent breezes demanded, “Who the crap is *this*?!”

 

“Our target! You got him!” Omi answered with a happy smile even as he kept running closer. His joyful reunion with his beloved would have to wait, though, as a flash of maroon leather in the distance caught his eye. “Oh no! It's Aya-kun!!”

 

“Shit,” Nagi cursed and scrambled to his feet. Heading for the safety of the inky shadows cloaking the front of warehouse 5-E while telekinetically slamming the man that his boyfriend obviously intended to kill to the ground hard enough to knock the wind out of him, he called back, “I'll meet you after school tomorrow! Usual place, okay? Talk then!”

 

“Right!” Omi agreed. Even as his heart sang with delight since the telekinetic's luminous midnight blue eyes promised him much more than mere chatting might ever entail, he lunged at “Christie” as if he himself had made the tackle which had subdued him. Toggling his microphone back on, Bombay announced to his entire team, “I've got him! I've got the target down right near building 5-D!”

 

“On my way!” Abyssinian growled back, loosening his katana as he ran. The way that he could sling the scabbard for his treasured killing device over his back made confrontations like this even easier to resolve. Otherwise, he had a sheath concealed within the lining of his maroon trench coat, but that arrangement hampered him far too often and was poorly designed in the first place.

 

Earlier, for only a moment, Abyssinian had thought that he'd seen someone crouching on the ground near where Bombay currently held their prisoner who was struggling mightily. Now, however, he assumed that it had just been his imagination since the security floodlights were less than perfect in offering illumination across the entire dockyard. That, or he was just too tired to see straight at this point.

 

Even though he'd rather bite his tongue off than to admit it aloud, Abyssinian was feeling somewhat sluggish both mentally and physically. Unaccustomed to sexual exploits in between periods of high activity, he needed time to recover from bedding Ken that he simply hadn't had. Adrenaline had helped keep him going thus far, but Aya could tell that he was going to be exhausted later.

 

“No fair!” Balinese cried out across their private radio channel. “I'm barely across the damned road! Fucking ice trucks got in my way! Not even to building 5-J, yet!”

 

Neither the Weiss field leader nor the team's tactician graced this outburst with a response. They were now in the deadly serious final stages of a successful hunt and had no time for such distractions. Bombay was searching his wheezing captive for evidence of his crimes and Abyssinian's only focus was on sparing his youngest teammate the lingering guilt of a solo kill.

 

After rooting through the man's slovenly clothes, Bombay found a disrespectful plastic baggie filled with jewelry.

 

Thanks to numerous hours spent preparing for this assignment, he immediately recognized some of the necklaces, bracelets, and rings as those reported missing from the bodies of the wayward schoolgirls whose lives had ended so tragically. The baubles that their streetwalking money had earned them couldn't possibly have been worth the sorrow that their deaths had brought their families.

 

The tendency of serial killers to collect souvenirs from their victims transcends all cultures, but what these numerous trophies also told Bombay was that there were unreported victims whose last rites had been denied them. Perhaps, Omi would later pray, the death of their murderer might bring their souls some peace even if it meant their bodies might go undiscovered for quite some time.

 

“So, it *was* you!!” Bombay seethed, practically snarling in rage at the thirty-ish man who was struggling to escape his clutches. Grabbing soiled lapels, he pulled the man's unappealing, pockmarked face closer to his own and demanded, “Why?!? Why did you kill and rape all those girls?! They never hurt you!”

 

Crazed black eyes that were so wide that the whites completely ringed the irises stared up at him as the man dubbed “Christie” hissed back, “They laughed at me! All my life, those spoiled little bitches *laughed* at me! My *money* should've been enough for the little whores, but no!!”

 

His maniacal ranting ratcheted up a notch and his spittle spewed forth like a noxious fountain as he proclaimed, “They called me `No-dick Daisuke' and `Flaccid Fujita'! But I showed them all! I know how to make them take it!!”

 

Pure revulsion crossed Bombay's face as the confession that he received was far more graphic and disturbing than what he was ready to hear. Instinctively rearing back from so deranged and heinous a creature as this allowed an opportunity for escape that the monstrous villain gladly took.

 

Shoving the seventeen year old aside roughly, Fujita Daisuke, better known to Weiss as well as to Kritiker as “Christie”, clambered to his feet intending to make a getaway, but considering that this would have put him on a collision course with Abyssinian, his aborted flight would have been short-lived anyway.

 

With a two-handed overhead strike that would have made his old kendo master proud, Abyssinian issued his trademarked death sentence by screaming, “Shi ne, `Christie'!”

 

With a single solid hit, he sliced into the man's cranium so powerfully that the blade became briefly trapped in the resultant mix of shattered bone and brain tissue. Once his intended victim's eyeballs bulged dangerously from their sockets and death was certain, he wrenched the blade free with a sickening twisting motion that sent bits of blood-infused gray matter erupting everywhere.

 

Even as he was wrecking righteous albeit overdue vengeance upon a raving beast, the portion of Abyssinian that was Aya distantly hoped that this would soothe his tortured soul and allow him to regain his sense of calm. This was what he'd pinned his hopes on when he'd spent the entire day researching the case and, thus, he felt confident it would make the immense difference that he needed it to make.

 

Sadly, nothing could have been further from the truth.

 

As he was about to discover in a most unexpected and painful manner, it was the situation at home that had truly been plaguing his conscience. All the criminal small fry in the world that Persia might send him to dispatch would never be of consequence compared to the unique men that he shared his life and increasingly his heart with.

 

Even as “Christie's” body writhed and then fell gracelessly to the side, Abyssinian reached out a gloved hand to the teen who remained seated awkwardly on the ground and asked urgently, “Are you okay, Bombay?!”

 

Despite being well versed in the ways of dealing death to those who certainly deserve it, Bombay had still been taken off-guard enough to not avoid the usual horrific splatter that such a blow inevitably caused. Accepting his teammate's hand rather sheepishly, he admitted, “I'm fine, Abyssinian.” He brushed some of the mess from his bangs to help hide a smile as he remembered who was watching from the shadows. Slightly more loudly but not noisy enough to incite curiosity, he reiterated, “I'm completely fine.”

 

Unaware of the presence of an enemy agent only a few short yards away, Abyssinian was still breathing hard after his dash and briefly leaned on the hilt of his sword for support as he nodded his understanding. Once he could breathe normally enough to do so, he crouched low and tried to wipe the worst of the mess from his blade onto “Christie's” gory beige suit coat. With a grimace, he then returned the sullied sword to its scabbard and straightened up once more.

 

Abyssinian's intention to follow this up by announcing their success to the rest of the team was short-lived as a voice unexpectedly moaned through the earpiece of his headset, “Oh, crap.”

 

Siberian had totally forgotten that his microphone was set to broadcast and his announcement of impending doom was entirely unintentional as he muttered in a voice like that of the condemned facing the gallows, “I'm a dead man….”

 

~+~+~+~+~+~

 

 

To be continued…