Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Reflections of Aya ❯ Of White Mice and Dream Visions ( Prologue )

Behind a Mirror Darkly

by Reflections of Aya

Disclaimer: I do not own Weiß Kreuz or any of the characters portrayed in this series. This fiction is a work of my own design, and not intended for any profit. Please don't sue.

Notes: italics depict thought, bold italics depict telepathy.

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I stared down at the piece of paper on my desk, with my fingers curled around the slender black ink pen that I'd been holding for the past half hour. One sentence leapt out at me, over and over again from the page, screaming in stoic silence a single phrase: "Let it go."

I'd started writing with the intention of clearing my mind of the things that I'd seen the night before, but I could not get the images of shattering flowerpots and red blood against clean, white tile to leave no matter how hard I'd press down on the paper with my pen. The dream was always the same, and I'd been having it for over a year, now, since joining Weiß.

It would always start with me standing behind the register, ringing up flowers for a young girl with pink ribbons in her hair, she'd purchased a dozen white roses. I could hear Omi arguing with Ouaka about some inane flower arrangement that she wanted; it was her only excuse to be near to Omi, and I didn't have the energy to tell her to leave.

Ken and Yohji were in the back, filling out orders to be delivered by Ken later in the day. I remember turning to get something off of the shelf behind me when I heard the sound of Yohji's voice approaching from the right.

"Aya? What about him? There's nothing I want to talk about, Ken, he's an eccentric megalomaniac with the heart of a Russian Bear in winter."

I still don't understand the next part, and I probably never will, I've never been one to grasp symbolism easily and I read in a book on interpreting one's dreams that all dream matter is simply symbols from the subconscious.

I'd been holding a flower pot in one hand, and no, I don't remember how it got there, but this was a dream, but as I listened to Yohji's voice fade into the background noise of the flower shop, I saw the pot slip from my fingers and shatter on the floor at my feet. I could hear gasps and screams from some of the customers, and it always took me a minute to realize that I'd clutched the young girl's roses so hard that the thorns on the stems had pierced my flesh, causing me to bleed. I watched the blood, like crimson faerie dust, settle against the broken porcelain shards of the flowerpot, gleaming dully. Two hundred microscopic droplets, like water might look if had come from Mars, sprinkled like colored salt and pepper over my shoes. Red and White.

I'd always wake up sweating, clutching at my left hand with a dull ache behind my eyes of a forming headache. I think it's the headache more than the dream itself that always wakes me up, I have trouble sleeping through pain. It's one of the reasons that I fear ever having to undergo surgery; the anesthetic might wear off half-way through.

I folded the piece of paper up and slid it into the top drawer of my desk, capping the pen as I returned it to the tray where it belonged. Everything in its place, my room was always spotless...I liked it that way. I could hear Omi outside, moving things in and out of the hallway from his room. He'd been at it all morning, rearranging his furniture.

It's a Saturday, and I'd gone downstairs earlier for a glass of water, and passed his room only to find him sitting with his back to the far wall, clutching a small box in one hand. Curious, I'd watched as he stood up and made his way to the closet, grabbing the lid to the box and slamming it on top of what had once been a resting place for his sneakers. He saw me watching him, and shook his head with a tiny, distant smile.

"Oh, gomen, Aya-san. Did I wake you up? I found a dead mouse under my chest of drawers, Aya-san, it looked like it had been squished. I guess I must have crushed it when I was moving things around earlier."

He'd looked so sad, resolved to the fate of this insignificant rodent, as though it had been a person he'd killed instead of a mouse. He'd brushed past me on his way down the hall, carrying the box like a coffin in one hand. A coffin for a mouse. It disturbed me a little, the fact that he always wears that same far away smile when we're moving the bodies of the dead targets that we've killed to a safe-point for disposal. It's as if he feels the same way about dead people, as he does about dead animals.

I can't help wondering if it's because he thinks that they are on the same level, deserving the same respect. I don't feel that's an appropriate way to think about animals at all; I've met dogs that deserved military salutes, but I haven't yet killed a target that I felt had earned a smile like that from Omi.

I glanced up at the digital clock on my desk as I rose from my slender wooden frame chair. In thirty seconds, Yohji would bang on his bedroom wall and shout at Omi to stop creating tiny earthquakes while he was trying to sleep. And lo, like clockwork, the slumbering beast bellowed his rage with an accompaniment of fists on thinly sliced wood. The only thing about Yohji that I can ever really count on is his apparently antagonistic attitude towards Omi.

I have my own theories on why this is, but then, I have quite a few theories on everything that Yohji does. He's like an ape in a zoo, to me, something to be studied, as though perhaps I could figure out the distant relationship between his species and mine.

Rummaging through my desk in search of the cloth that I use to clean my Katana blade with, my fingers brush against the binding of the leather bound journal that Yohji had given me a few months ago for my birthday. How he'd known that it was my birthday I still haven't discerned, but I think he must have bribed Manx for it. He probably threatened to kiss her if she didn't give him what he wanted.

I picked up the journal and allowed my fingers to play over the smooth, cool surface where a golden rose had been etched with neat, precise lines. It's very fitting for me, this journal, but I've never written in it. I'd like to figure out the mystery behind it before I do, and besides, I never thanked him for it in the first place, so it isn't as though it's entirely mine to do with as I please.

I put the journal back in my desk drawer and closed it, picking up the empty water glass from atop the dark, damp coaster on which it had been sitting all morning. Making my way to my bedroom door, I'm surprised to see Manx standing there as I open it, staring in at me with a slender black envelope in one hand. She waves the envelope in my direction like a sword, and jerks her free hand towards Omi who's watching her curiously with a pile of books in his arms.

"Gather up your team, Aya. We have a new mission. Meet me downstairs in five minutes."

I watch as she turns to go, the sound of her heels on the stairs fading in the distance. I turn to Omi who's set his books down on a small, narrow table and my voice is surprisingly strained when I speak. I think I'm catching a cold, which is rare for me.

"Go wake up Yohji and Ken."

He doesn't question me, just moves off down the hall on the assigned chore. I think he'll take a singular, morbid pleasure in carrying out my request. At least, as far as Yohji is concerned. I can just imagine the playboy's colorful curses following Omi all the way out the door. It almost brings a smile to my lips. It would taste good on my lips, this smile, like crimson chocolate staining freshly fallen snow.