Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ One Day ❯ One-Shot

One day

*Author's note: this is the sequel to `Making the Team'. I apologise in advance, especially to any Americans, for this rather grim future, it's just I can't bear it when people write the future as though nothing's changed in twenty odd years, apart from the introduction of videophones. *

Nagi stared across the cracked asphalt and worn dusty field, a few slumps of grass still bravely trying to survive. It was no wonder they wanted to knock this place down. Didn't mean he had to be happy about it though.

A lot had changed since he was last there. Schuldig's fortieth birthday had brought that home with a thud last year. Since the end of World War Three Crawford had become a shell of his former self; he'd seen the end of America and hadn't been able to do anything about it. Farferello was a celebrity now, a miracle of modern medicine, the papers proclaimed. Nagi found his newfound sanity a little unnerving. Schuldig and Brad shared a house in the centre of Iceland now, which said a lot about Schuldig's state of mind.

Nagi was the only who'd stayed in Tokyo, despite the floods global warming had induced. Well, he'd had the most reason, hadn't he? He leant against the chain link fence dully and wondered what he and Tot might have been doing on their tenth anniversary. Sometimes he felt guilty for letting the law take are of the mugger's who'd killed her walking home from the doctors glowing with the news she would tell Nagi. He wondered if he should have used the talents SS had installed in him to take them out, to throttle them and rip out their hearts and do equally unspeakable things to them. But it didn't seem right any more.

"Nagi?" A voice he knew well interrupted his thoughts.

"I thought you'd be here. You know they're knocking it down tomorrow." Nagi didn't turn around.

"I know. Want to go inside?" Omi slipped his hand onto Nagi's shoulder.

"Why not?" Nagi let himself be led through the gap in the fence and across the litter-strewn tarmac into the changing rooms. "So, how've you been? I heard you came into a lot of money."

"I guess there are some advantages to being Takatori," Omi smiled grimly.

"What about the others?" Nagi asked, faintly curious.

Omi looked blank. Then it dawned on him. "You mean Weiss?" Sadness flitted across the older man's features and Nagi saw deep lines of pain ingrained on the once youthful face. "Ken's doing well. The greatest soccer played to ever grace the East, they call him, as you've probably noticed. I spoke to him the other day. He's thinking of quitting professional soccer next year to go back to coaching. He always did prefer coaching."

Nagi frowned. "But, Aya, I mean, Ran, and Yohji?"

Omi winced. "Ran was killed in WW3. He wanted to die when he signed up, it was only too clear. Yohji's death destroyed him."

"Yohji's dead too?" Nagi was shocked.

"AIDs."

They fell silent for a short while, picking their way across the broken floor to the only intact bench left. "It's funny, "Nagi said softly, "how they can cure Farferello's insanity but still can't stop a human created disease."

"I'm laughing," Omi snapped sarcastically. Nagi winced. He knew a lot had changed in everyone's lives, but he hadn't realised how much it would affect the genki chibi he had once been so head over heels in love with. His head spun as he thought back to that night in this very room, the sudden confessions of boyish love and the pain they had had to endure. It was only fortune and the prelude to war that had broken up both Weiss and Schwarz as they rushed to defend their homes. Nagi wondered vaguely if any one else had found out what had happened. He thought perhaps Schuldig new, but had shown considerably more tact than usual, just saying `It's for the best' one night when Nagi had been on the verge of tears. He appreciated that, and he realised now that he missed the telepath and the comfort it had been to know that no matter what happened, he never suffered alone.

Omi's arm snaked its way around Nagi's waist. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to snap. It's just, it seems so unfair, sometimes."

"That's life," Nagi said shortly. He leant into Omi's body, enjoying warmth he hadn't felt since Tot's sudden death. Other parts were enjoying the physical closeness just as much, it seemed. Nagi adjusted his jacket with one hand to hide the growing bulge.

"You haven't said what's been happening with you," Omi prompted gently.

"I got married. My wife got pregnant. She got killed." That killed the mood.

"I'm sorry," from Omi, the words actually seemed to hold some sincerity. Nagi clung to them. So much had changed.

~~~

Omi slowly drew the finger away and lowered his face to Nagi's. He allowed his cheek to brush Nagi's, to smell his hair and revel in the sensation of skin against skin, before gently resting his lips on Nagi's. It was a brief and bittersweet kiss, tinged by the pain of separation. They knew it could never be, but that never stopped either form dreaming.

Nagi slowly drew away. "I love you, you know," he said bitterly.

"I know. I love you too," Omi wrapped his arms around himself, trying to recapture some of Nagi's warmth to his body.

"But it can never be. Ever."

"Don't say never. Just not now." Nagi's head slowly turned to stare at the older boy.

"One day?"

"One day."

"Will we still feel the same, one day?"

"Don't ask questions nobody can answer."

~~~

"Has, has one day come?" Nagi asked tentatively.

"I don't know. Has it?"

"I think so. Sometimes, it feels like the last day has come."

"I know what you mean." Omi kissed Nagi's hair gently, smiling slightly as he noticed the younger man was thinning on top. It had been a long time.

"Can somebody answer the question now?"

Omi found to his surprise that he knew exactly what Nagi was talking about. He'd repressed the encounter, repressed the pain, for so long that the clarity with which it came back to him seemed odd compared with the dullness of his other memories from his time with Wiess. "I, I think so," he said hesitantly.

Nagi looked nervous. "Do you still feel the same way?"

"You first," Omi said, frightened as he had been of nothing else in his life.

Nagi grinned suddenly and pulled away. "I guess that answers my question!" Terror filled Omi suddenly, and he wanted to grab Nagi and hold him close again. Nagi clearly felt differently. Nagi had had a wife, Nagi was over his childish lust and puppy love, Nagi was relieved that nothing had happened, Nagi…

Nagi said, "I love you," and Omi melted in his arms.

"I love you too," he murmured against Nagi's chest.

Nagi slipped his arms around Omi's back and held him in a warm embrace. There was nothing bittersweet or fragile about this now. He grinned at Omi's head as he noticed the grey snaking it's way through the once blond/brown hair. It had been a long time.

"Come on," he whispered. "We have to go,"

"Why?" Omi demanded, face still buried in Nagi's chest.

"Because if we don't I'm going to take you here on the floor, and we'll both need tetanus shots if I do that." Both men laughed. Omi glanced down at the bulge in Nagi's trousers. It really was an impressive bulge. That much at least hadn't changed.

"How `bout a kiss, for old times sakes?" Omi asked, one hand twining itself in Nagi's hair.

"I have no objection."

Their lips met, a gentle brush of skin on skin, as chaste as it had been nineteen years ago. There was no pain here, no regret, no bittersweet vows of love, no reason for it to end this time. They pulled apart and Nagi stood up, reaching his hand down to haul Omi to his feet. They walked slowly out of the deteriorating hut and across the dead pitch towards the now pedestrianised road, hand in hand.

Neither said anything. There was nothing left to say.

* Funny, `making the team' was supposed to be the happy, light-hearted fic, but it ended up rather not. Despite the downbeat mood I tried to instil in this one, it turned out to have a happy ending.

All right, I planned it that way. But `Making the team' really was supposed to be happy, which is why I had to write this sequel. *