Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Coming Home ❯ 37 ( Chapter 37 )

37

My weakness - you know each and every one (it frightens me)

I awoke drenched in sweat, the screams lingering in my ears. For a moment I couldn't tell if the sound had been real or dream.

Then I remembered the dream. Nausea rose up in my throat and I bolted from the bed. How I managed to get to the bathroom I didn't know. I knelt by the toilet and retched, my empty stomach cramping instantly and my head pounding.

A soft knock sounded at the doorframe, then Yohji peeked in and asked, "You all right?"

I couldn't speak. My throat burned, and I couldn't stop dry-heaving. Remembered agony knotted my muscles and I clung to the toilet and wept.

Gentle hands pulled my hair back from my face, then Yohji was gone again and I heard water running in the sink. I groaned as my stomach lurched again, though all I had left to spit up was foam. Soothing coolness brushed over my naked shoulders and down my back, washing away the sweat. Yohji pulled my hair back again, then held it up and away from my neck. His other hand pressed a wadded-up washrag against the base of my skull. It was chillingly cold, and he used enough pressure to hurt.

"No, keep it there," he instructed as I tried to flinch away. He pressed harder, bracing me to keep still. "It's a pressure point. It helps with nausea."

Sure enough, the spasms receded. Yohji took my left hand and made me hold the washrag in place. He got up and brought me a glass of warm water to rinse with. By this time I was shivering, though I was glad I hadn't sweated up anything other than a borrowed pair of briefs.

Without saying anything, Yohji started running a bath. The sound of the water soothed my head. I dared taking a deep breath, relaxing little by little in the aftermath of something worse than a bad dream. As memory threatened to overrun my thoughts again, I moaned and closed my eyes.

"Come on, let's get you cleaned up," Yohji said, helping me to my feet.

I stood and tried to take off the sweaty briefs, but the movement nearly made me overbalance. Then strong and sure hands were at my hips, sliding the garment down with no pretense. I thought, this must be how Nagi felt, when I had to bathe him: helpless as hell.

Yohji guided me into the tub and helped me to sit, then sponged warm water over my back and my hair. Every now and then his hand would rest on my chest or on my back as though checking the temperature, or checking my breathing.

"I'll be right back. Will you be okay for a minute?" he asked.

I nodded. The nausea was gone, replaced with pain and weariness. Someday, maybe, it would all be gone, and I would just be Schuldig.

"Did you say something?"

I shook my head.

Yohji returned with my new clothes, tearing open the package of underwear and setting a pair on top of the jeans. He helped me get out of the tub, then slung a towel around my waist. "Need help drying off?" he asked, his hand on my good shoulder.

"No, I'm fine," I whispered.

"Okay, I'll make us some tea."

I toweled off, then dressed, all in what seemed like slow motion. The tremors from the nightmare had left my body, but the horror of it still circulated through my mind. It always did, though being close to Brad usually kept it a little further away. I looked at my reflection in the mirror. Was this the face of madness? "God, what did they do to us?" My voice fell flat and hollow to echo dully against the tile. I looked away from the blue-eyed brunette in the mirror, uncertain who the hell he was anymore, and made my way to the living room.

Yohji sat on the couch, a book open across his knee. On the table sat a tea set and an opened bottle of wine. The television was on, the volume down low. It looked like he was watching some kind of forensics program. As I approached, he turned off the television, set down the glass he'd been sipping from and gave me an encouraging smile. "Tea's ready."

I nodded, and he leaned forward to pour two cups. He offered me one. My hands shook as I accepted it.

"Want to talk?" he asked, watching me closely.

I sighed into my cup. An echo of steam rose up to dampen my cheek. "It's not something you talk about," I whispered, my throat still raw. "You can't comprehend it if you weren't there, and if you were…you already know it."

"I'll listen, Schuldig. You know I will."

I looked into his eyes, and saw a jade reflection of my own. Like me, Yohji knew the nature of hell. Perhaps not the same hell, but just maybe he could understand. I took a deep breath and said, "Sometimes I relive things, in my sleep. Bad things."

Yohji watched me in silence.

"Some nightmares never die. Rosenkreuz," I croaked, my voice failing on the name. I swallowed hard and tried again. "The place I was…trained. They don't just deal with mind talents. They're trying out new ways to control people, to control groups of people. They mix it all up with the psi training and the field training, but it's really about control." Using both hands I set the teacup back on the table, still nearly spilling it in the process.

"Hey, look," Yohji said, "only tell me what you feel safe saying, okay? I'll listen to everything, but you look like it's really painful to talk about."

"Yeah, it is. In more ways than one." I took a deep breath, then another. I shook my head. For some reason I found myself staring at the potted orchid across the room. I spoke to it, rather than Yohji; it seemed easier that way. "They leave things in your head, things to keep you in line. Telepathic commands. Conditioning. Programming. It's harder to talk about than you can imagine." Deliberately I turned to look at him. "But we're supposed to be free, Yohji. I don't want to do this anymore."

"And they won't just let you go," he stated.

I shook my head. "They'll never let us go. They think we stole the Elders' power or something, I don't know. Maybe they just hate being made fools of. In any case, they want to kill us. Or take us back." I looked down at my hands, at my wrists, at the fine white scars there. "Rosenkreuz is worse than death."

A warm hand moved to cover my scarred wrists with its gentle strength. "You've made it this far," Yohji reminded me.

I sighed and nodded. "I know. It's just, in some ways, I feel like I've never left. It's still in my head, all the pain and…" My voice trailed off. In the silence I could hear my own screams, echoing inside my skull. I couldn't make it stop. Then or now.

Without a word, Yohji gathered me into his arms, cradling me against his chest. I shuddered, fighting down a dozen unwelcome reactions. I tried to concentrate on just breathing.

As I huddled there, I became enraptured of Yohji's heartbeat. Slow, steady, calm; muscle pounding out the rhythm of blood. I used to listen to Karl's heart beat as he crooned soft words of comfort in my darkest moments. My hands drifted up, fingers twining in curly hair as the warmth of his body flowed through my skin. For a moment my weary mind forgot that this was not Karl, and tried to link with him.

Vaguely familiar surface patterns brought me back to myself, on the couch, clinging to Yohji for dear life.

"I - I'm sorry," I stammered, starting to pull away.

"It's okay," Yohji said, releasing me slowly. "I don't mind. I know what can happen, in places like that."

I sucked in a deep breath and steeled my resolve. "Yohji, I hope to God you can't imagine any of it. They use torture and coercion and anything else that might increase their power. And they have a lot of power."

Yohji eyed me speculatively. "Did they torture the kid, too?" he asked, voice low.

I closed my eyes against a sudden rush of despair. God, no! I didn't want to think about this!

The cushions shifted as Yohji got up. I heard his clothing rustle as he paced around the room, but I couldn't open my eyes for fear the tears would come and never stop. Dimly I heard an almost chant-like growl, the sound of a man regaining his composure with difficulty. Then I felt the air shift as he strode back toward the couch, and around it. "Let it go for now," Yohji said, voice low; I couldn't tell if he was talking to me, or to himself. Fingertips brushed the back of my neck, then strong hands gripped my shoulders. Carefully, so as not to further injure my right shoulder, Yohji began kneading into the cable-hard muscles. I winced, then tried to relax. I wasn't used to this sort of care; usually I was the one doing the massaging, not receiving it.

Yohji massaged my shoulders and neck until the tension seeped away, then continued until the coldness inside my muscles had changed to a grudging warmth. When I heaved a sigh and sank back into the couch, he gave a final squeeze and said, "Drink your tea."

He went into the kitchen, and I heard him open the fridge. I swallowed the tea, poured more, and drank it just as quickly. When he returned with two bottles of fruit water, I took one gratefully and started in on it.

He watched me, then said, "Guess that explains why you look tired all the time. Anything I can do to help?"

"Remind me that I'm still human," I told him, surprising myself a little. Pushing brown hair out of my eyes I looked up at him and said, "Remind me that they haven't won yet."

"Sounds to me like I'm taking over someone else's job," Yohji said softly. "Tell me about Karl. You've mentioned him before, and I thought I heard you call his name a couple times tonight."

"Dear, sweet Karl," I whispered, then found myself smiling. "Karl's a telempath, he can feel other people's emotions and sensations, and change them if he wants to. He…was my best friend." I looked down, fighting back the sorrow. It had already been too long; grieving time was over. "Anyway, we'd meet up whenever we could sneak away. You didn't get a lot of free time there. Everything was done on the sly. We'd slip into an empty classroom or a closet or whatever. Sometimes we'd talk, sometimes just breathe together. Sometimes we fucked." I laughed softly at a memory. "Karl could get into your mind and pull up your most fantastic sexual memory. You'd have a great time, and he wouldn't even have to touch you."

"Damn!"

"Yeah." I glanced up at Yohji and said, "That's how he stayed alive." Yohji scowled; I looked down again, burning in shame. I was torn between telling him everything and hiding my ugliest secrets; I didn't want him to despise me, and I was very afraid he would. But something about him seemed to say he wasn't that kind of friend, the kind who leave when things get unpleasant. I took a deep breath and started talking before I could change my mind. "I stayed alive by bending over. You either do, or get done to. That's another way they control people: they let that shit happen. The students pretty much do whatever they can get away with. The only real rules are don't fuck with the teachers, and don't get caught. You learn pretty quick which side you're on, whether you're a hunter or the prey, and then decide how much you really want to live." My eyes closed as I whispered, "I was too afraid of death to fight."

"Fear of death is overrated," Yohji told me. "It's no substitute for a love of life."

I blinked, then stared at him in surprise. His words rang true. No wonder Esset still had power over me: I was living out their programming, even now.

"You were telling me about Karl," Yohji prompted gently, reaching for his cigarettes, then lighting two.

"Right." I accepted the nicotine stick with a faint smile. "They didn't go too hard on him, because empaths break fairly easily. But I was sort of a problem child. I spent a lot of recovery time with him."

"How so?"

"He could make the pain go away. When I needed it most, he reminded me that I'm still human." I sucked on the cigarette, its bitterness echoing the bitterness of loss. "Karl was the brother I never had. I haven't seen him in about four years. They assigned me to a team, and the last I heard he'd gotten on a team, too. He's probably dead by now. The gentle ones don't last long." A horrible, terrible thought occurred to me then, and I whispered it aloud. "Or they're making him look for me."

"Why, because you were close?"

I shook my head. "Wouldn't matter. Brad said they'd come after us with everything they've got, and a telempath would be very useful if they wanted to take us alive. Which I believe they do."

For a couple of minutes, the only sound in the room was the hiss of burning tobacco.

"I hope he's dead." My voice sounded harsh in the stillness.

"I'm sorry for your loss," Yohji said, not looking at me. "I know it hurts." He stubbed out his cigarette and reached for his wine glass. "I lost someone too." He looked at me out of the corner of his eye and added, "I still have nightmares about it."

Again silence filled the room. My cigarette burned down, turned to ash.

"She was my best friend," he stated, speaking to his glass. With a wry quirk of his lip he said, "Sometimes we fucked. I would have given up everything for her. I did give up everything." He frowned then, and took a sip of wine. With exaggerated care Yohji set his glass on the table, then looked at his hands as though reading his future in them.

Something about his manner unnerved me a little. I picked up the wine bottle and drained it, though alcohol has never brought me courage. "I'm sorry," I murmured.

"Schuldig, what did you mean when you said Karl would remind you you're still human?" Yohji asked, not looking at me.

"Laughing. Smiling. When we were together, sexually," I told him. "Machines don't fuck."

"Is that it, being able to have sex with someone?" he asked, seeming to wait for a certain answer.

I thought about the question more deeply now, taking my time with it. "No," I stated. "It's more than that. But sometimes, that's all you have." Talking once more toward the orchid in its sleek black pot I whispered, "They didn't even leave me my name."

We sat in silence once more. I noticed the edges of the window shade growing light with the coming dawn. I closed my eyes; sunrises were for other souls than mine. The light only reminded me of the boy I had once been, the boy who was lost forever now. The pressure of a headache pulsed behind my eyes, the way it always did when I dared to look too deep. I pushed my thumb and forefinger against my eyelids, bringing bright starburst flashes to my weary head and not doing a damn thing for the pain. With a sigh I lowered my hand and blinked, trying to focus.

Yohji muffled a yawn with the back of his hand; deep shadows ringed his eyes. He offered me a tired smile. "Look, it's almost morning," he said, his voice gentle. "Do you want to try to sleep, or do you want breakfast? Either way, you're on your own because I'm reclaiming the bed for a few hours."

My voice sounded hollow to me as I said, "I'll crash out on the couch, then."

"Linens and blankets are in the hall closet. And there's headache pills in the bathroom. Help yourself." He got up, then leaned down to kiss me on the cheek. "Get some sleep. We'll talk more later."