Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Reflections ❯ Guilt ( Chapter 11 )

Reflections: Guilt

Chapter 11

A Weiss Kreuz fanfic by L.A. Mason.

Standard disclaimer applies: No copyright infringement intended. No profit being made or sought.

Aya knew…? Ken felt his mouth open, but nothing came out as he struggled with conflicting impulses. He wanted to comfort the miserable, withdrawn creature facing him across the kitchen, to tell him that it was all okay, that it wasn't his fault. He wanted… to scream, to rage, to strike out at Aya for keeping his damned secrets. And, that last was the impulse that won out.

How could Aya, one of their own, have let his partners go into a mission with faulty information?

Then the guilt sucker-punched him, pulling the berserker in him up short by the scruff of the neck. Aya had gone through a life-altering crisis, and his team hadn't been there. Ken hadn't been there. It had been in the back of Ken's mind for a while that he was guilty of the most heinous crime, of leaving a teammate abandoned and alone, without the backup that he needed and deserved.

And here was the proof.

"Oh, God, Aya! I'm so sorry!" Ken couldn't stop to analyze the impassioned shout that burst from him. All he cared about was somehow getting the point across to the handsome man in front of him, that he hadn't meant for any of this to happen. And for the second time in a week, saw Aya's infamous, controlled mask torn away.

The beautiful eyes, Japanese in shape and alien in color, widened in dumb shock. Likewise, Aya's mouth dropped open, but no words came out, and Ken had the pleasure of seeing the self-assured man for once wanting to break the silence, but incapable of it. It gave him a weirdly warm feeling that he was pretty sure that he shouldn't be enjoying, yet at the same time it was a distinct, wicked thrill to know that he - Hidaka Ken - had reduced his opponent to tongue-tied idiocy.

Ken had never been especially good at expressing the thought processes behind the emotional maelstrom, and Weiss' recent past had done nothing to improve his tenuous hold on the ability. But this time, this time would be different. Euphoria filled him, balancing out the sin that he had committed. Fueled by that certainty, words finally tumbled out at breakneck speed. "It's all my fault. I should have known better than to let you keep going out like that. I mean, hell, what are friends for, right? I should've been there to watch your back. Nothing I can say will ever make it up to you, but I swear, from here on out, I'm gonna be there."

"Wha--?" The confusion in the tremulous whisper was complete. Ken strode around the end of the table, ignoring the still dead-to-the-world wire man who slept with his head on his folded arms. Yohji might as well not have been there for all the attention Ken felt like showing him; everything he had was focused on the stunned red head who shrank back against the kitchen counter as if Ken had sprouted horns and a tail.

"The team." Ken replied curtly. Aya was smart; let him figure it out. If, as the others claimed, the reason they were together was that they had been deliberately picked for their compatibility, fine, so be it.

Of course, that presupposed that Aya was inclined to cooperate. Mastering himself, his head jerked up, an angry sneer twisting the mouth that Ken had good reason to know could be wonderfully pliant. "Oh, let me guess." he snapped sarcastically. "Your sense of self-sacrifice demands that you take responsibility for my actions." His posture shifted, returning to hostile self-confidence. Aya was still leaning against the kitchen counter, but now he dropped his hands to rest on the edge to either side of his hips, challenging the shorter athlete to make something of it. Still on a roll, understanding hit Ken. Aya intended to provoke a fight. Was counting on it, in fact. If they were occupied with yelling, then everyone would be distracted - again - from the underlying causes.

"You asshole, are you the only important one here? Your revenge? Your sacrifices? So what if I want to take responsibility? Just how do you think you're going to stop me?" Flushed and exhilarated, Ken shouted back from a distance of mere inches.

Those hard, amethyst eyes narrowed dangerously at the expertly aimed questions. Just as Ken knew they would. Aya with his ingrained, wounded-animal reflexes, fluctuating between bitter disdain and icy hatred was a familiar part of his world. How many times had he watched that same reaction? They had gone toe to toe more than once, even though matters hadn't devolved into a serious physical brawl since that first time, but this was different. This time, Ken consciously chose the intoxicating proximity. His fighter's instincts registered the near-subliminal twitching of muscles beneath the armor of Aya's clothes; the shivering caused by his desperate fight for control.

The prey was mortally injured; blood was on the ground. All he had to do was to close for the kill. Vibrating with tension, Ken whispered, "For once, just shut up." and reached for a handful of the wine-dark hair to pull Aya down for a kiss.

If he had bothered to think the situation out, Ken would have figured on needing something atmospheric, like incense and candles, or shoji slid artfully open to frame a full moon. Not a brutally hard assault in an out-dated, slightly shabby kitchen. The short, chopped-off strands of sleek hair were slithering through his grasp. Automatically, one hand shifted to grasp the nape of his quarry's neck, fingers digging in with the force of someone used to fighting hand-to-hand. The minute flinch of pain under his palm made Ken irrationally want to deliver more, and he bit down savagely on the soft swell of Aya's lower lip.

The harsh, iron-rust bitterness of blood flooded his mouth, at once urging a killing frenzy, and also pulling him back from the precipice.

The shivering had ceased; Aya had surrendered. But life-less acceptance wasn't what Ken wanted, either. Revulsion flooded over him: Aya was continuing to stand there, unresisting as a marble statue, now just letting himself be mauled. Ken jerked back, colliding with one of the kitchen chairs. Its wooden legs slid across the bare floor with a screech that perfectly mirrored the frantic howl locked inside his gut. What the hell did he think he was doing? After all of Yohji's pressing of the man about whether or not he was raped, and Aya's furious, vehement denial that any such thing had happened, here was Ken pushing himself on the teammate in question. Anguished, Ken scrubbed his knuckles across his mouth, mumbling thickly, "Christ, Aya. I didn't mean to-- " Thin fingers with a grip like a steel vise closed on Ken's biceps, and for a split second, he thought he was going to be picked up and slammed into the opposite wall for having the gall to lay a hand on the prickly assassin. But much to his surprise, the harsh grip reeled him in, and held him, immobilized, while Aya's mouth descended with bruising force on Ken's.

Passive observer turned aggressor, Aya was far from shy of taking advantage of his greater height. His lips slanted sideways, leaning down into Ken, as he set the sharp point of a canine into the tender threshold of the younger Hunter's mouth. When Ken responded with a yelp, the bite was transferred to the tip of the brunet's tongue, releasing the iron sweetness of blood into his mouth.

It hurt, but Christ, it felt good, too, as the sinuous, wet stroking of a tongue followed the teeth. Omi had kissed with a sweet hunger, but this was on an entirely new plane. It drove a lingering thought that Aya might be faking a response just to get it over with straight out of his head; no one, not even the frigid assassin who would do anything for the sake of a mission, could possibly fake kissing with that kind of fervor. But then the capacity to think about it at all ran away; Aya obviously had a thing for ears, and necks, because God help him, the razor sharpness was trying to pierce the lobe of his ear. Ken's head rolled to the side, welcoming the alternating pleasure/pain of quick nips and more leisurely licks and suckling that traced the margin of Ken's ear and moved on to the hollow by his jaw, and the straining tendons of his throat.

"Oh… yeah." he gasped. There wasn't so much as a whimper in reply, not even when the shaking in the athlete's muscular legs got so bad that it was the deceptively frail red haired convalescent who ended up holding him up.

Aya really had dressed for battle, with the maximum amount of armor. Ken's questing fingers found the hem of first a turtleneck beneath the rusty black sweater, and beneath that a tight tee-shirt that his imagination assured him would look every bit as good as it felt, if he could manage to get that far. It didn't seem likely that fingernails over the taut material would do him any good, but to judge by the way Aya shuddered, there were plenty of nerve endings that were alive and well in there.

It was too bad, but that was the moment that one of the swordsman's hands closed on his wrist, putting a stop to his explorations. Thwarted, the brunet's returning capacity for thought finally caught up to the message that his brain and ears had been sending for a while: there were not-so-smothered sounds of chortling coming from somewhere behind his back.

He jerked around so fast that he nearly landed on his ass.

Of course. How in the hell had they managed to forget that the team's resident expert on matters sexual and perverse had been snoring at the kitchen table? Operative words being `had been.' The bastard was leaned back in a chair, snickering, and looking like the only thing lacking was a set of Olympic-styled score cards.

A reassuring hand settled on Ken's shoulder, and squeezed. Startled, the younger man glanced back at the warm presence at his back. Aya slowly licked his lips, removing the smudge of blood that leant them added color. "This isn't over." he promised. The surfeit darkness sent a shiver down Ken's spine, but it didn't stop him from snapping back, "Damned straight it isn't." His precise wording caught up with his brain when Aya quirked one elegantly thin brow upward, and Ken winced. `Straight' wasn't exactly the best choice, given the ideas swirling near-out-of-control through his brain.

The watchful twilight gaze flickered past him to the smiling senior assassin, visibly weighing him, determining whether to kill him now or hold it over his head for later. Amused, Yohji treated them to a widening smirk, earning him a double-barreled glare from both members of his audience. Decision made, Aya released Ken's shoulder, slipping past him on silent, stocking feet toward the stairs and the haven of his own room. It was more of a `strategic retreat' than a rout, but it still had the effect of leaving the former soccer player bereft of team support. And, damn it, he had meant what he said about what friends were for; it would have been nice if the anti-social redhead had reciprocated.

Still… Ken had just kissed the daylights out of the prick. And gotten kissed back.

Ken gave up trying to restrain the idiotic grin stretching his face. Whirling about, he whooped and punched the air with a fist. Not even the knowing, canaries-and-cream look Yohji wore could spoil the manic delight that sang through his veins: "Just you wait, Fujimiya!" he yelled up the stairs, repeating, "Damn straight that this isn't over!"

Yohji just had to spoil it with applause.

But he had the presence of mind to slap a humble, submissive look on his face when Ken advanced on him with a fist raised. Injured or not, the irate athlete wasn't about to cut him any slack, and Yohji knew a beating when he saw it coming. Placatingly, he offered, "Hey, hey… It's just about time, is all. I've watched you guys dancing around the issue since the day you met."

That made him pause. Not too long ago, he would have protested automatically, but now… Yeah, there had been something there, even then. Except that it hadn't taken Aya long to scare him off. The kenkaya was downright terrifying when he wanted to be.

Musing out loud, Yohji rubbed at his tender ribs and kept on talking while Ken's attention wandered. "In some ways, you and him, you're exactly alike. Both of you want to charge straight ahead toward justice. Both of you would do anything to protect the weak, and the innocent. That surface stuff, like him being cold and logical, and you always following your heart without thinking, it's not as big a deal as you would think. You really do fit together." The flat delivery grabbed Ken's notice. The something that he didn't like was back again, turning the flippant playboy into an unfamiliar person, melancholy and unhappy. And he didn't know how to fix it.

"Back to your theory about how we're meant to compliment each other, is that it?" Ken asked in a whisper.

"Yeah. We all were. So don't quit going after him, okay?" The serious light vanished from Yohji's sad eyes, and his more typical, devilish humor returned. "Although, seriously, anticipation is a great spice-`er-up for a budding relationship. Believe me, when you two finally get there, Omittchi and me, we're going to need ear-plugs."

"What?! Hey-- !" If this was what a stroke felt like, Ken could see why people died from it. The blood was roaring in his ears, and his face felt incandescent.

"Yup. You'll either be really, really happy, or the two of you will be trying to kill each other." Mercurial, his grin shifted back to the wistful end of the spectrum. "Just be good to one another, okay? You both deserve it." Yohji dragged his aching body up from the chair, and sauntered toward the door to the living room, one hand raised in a careless farewell. Ken was so stunned that he actually let the blond go without retaliating, until finally, he whispered, "We… deserve it?"

Was it true? Did assassins like them deserve anything good? And if he and Aya did, then what about a certain smart-ass blond?

***************

The shrilling of a phone nearly startled Ken out of his wits. It had been so long since he had heard one, and it felt so totally of a piece with the normalcy of that world that they had left behind, of flower shop, and teen-aged girls, and everything else, that he could barely comprehend what the sound was.

So of course Omi was the one who beat him to answering it.

A cheerful grin split the youngest Weiss' face, instantly turning him back into an enthusiastic kid again. He listened intently, nodding along although there was no way that the speaker on the other end could tell, until "Hai!" burst out of him. He dropped the phone back onto its charger and spun around, announcing to the three other members who had all converged from their separate directions, "That was Manx. She'll be here in about four hours. And, she has some news for us!"

It would have been funny under other circumstances, but the net effect of Omi's announcement was to galvanize the team into cleaning. There was nothing that they could do about the broken window, for example, other than suddenly find themselves in agreement that the storms of the past winter had been to blame. As their tech pointed out, he had complained long and bitterly on more than one occasion that the flexing of the big panes played havoc with the sensitive contacts glued to them, and there had been reports of wind damage all over the city as recently as a month ago. But for the rest, the cabin was scrubbed and vacuumed within an inch of its life, and they were all exhausted by the time they staggered, freshly showered and clothed, into the living room and collapsed.

"Remind me why I care." Yohji grumbled. He gingerly pressed a hand to his abused ribs, glaring over the tops of his sunglasses at first one, then another of his teammates.

"Shut up, Kudoh." The clipped words came from Aya, slumped in the solitary chair closest to the dark fireplace. His pose mirrored that of the older blond, splayed fingers supporting his wounded side through a plain black turtleneck shirt. Annoying as always, the invalid had insisted on shifting the furniture during the cleaning frenzy, and Ken suspected that he had pulled something in his half-healed side.

"Ne… Don't be like that, Aya-kun, Yohji-kun." Omi interjected a bit desperately. "You know it's only because it's Manx-san who's coming. We always try to make a good impression on her."

"Huh." Yohji bit back. But he stopped there, swallowing whatever else he had considered saying, fishing instead for the battered pack of cigarettes in the pockets of first the green button down shirt he wore, then in his jeans. When he realized that they weren't there, he snarled a curse under his breath, adding, "All right, Aya. What did you do with them? If you threw them out, so help me God, I'll make you go through the garbage to find `em."

Puzzled, Ken and Omi both stared at the older pair. What in the world…? Abruptly, Ken snapped his fingers; that was right, as pinch-hit medic, Aya had taken the cigarettes away from Yohji when he and Omi had returned from their ill-fated recon mission into the city. Ken had seen them jammed into the back pocket of the redhead's jeans… jeans which were currently going around and around in the washing machine back in the cramped utility room.

For once, God was on their side. Aya glared back at Yohji, shifting minutely to find a more comfortable position, then relented and snapped, "Upstairs. On the dresser in my room."

Still grumbling, Yohji uncurled his rangy, long-limbed form from the sagging embrace of the old couch and stomped off up the wooden steps, getting the maximum amount of noise from each of the treads. Given that he was in stocking feet, rather than wearing his usual low boots, the performance was pretty impressive. Omi huddled in on himself, burying his face in his hands.

Ken had a pretty good idea what was bothering their team's youngest. Omi filled the role of negotiator, more often than not, and had the best rapport with their handler. It must be driving him crazy to see their recent camaraderie dissolving back into the tense hostility that had been there toward the end of the old days, before Aya had been kidnapped. Interestingly enough, the frown on the redhead's face was just as unhappy, and before Ken knew it, he had made a decision, and his mouth was already moving. "Hey, Omi, why don't you go check up on Yohji? It's been a while since his bandages were changed."

Puzzled, their regular medic opened his mouth to disagree, to point out that it had less than an hour because he had taken care of that chore as soon as Yohji had finished his shower, but Ken forestalled him with a glare. Willing their silent habit of communication during missions to work for this situation, as well, he flicked a significant glance toward Aya, moodily staring out the window, and jerked his head toward the stairs. Comprehension cleared the shadows from the younger Hunter's features, and he nodded. Of course. "Yes, I should look in on him. It wouldn't do to have Manx-san think I wasn't taking good care of him." Unspoken, the return message was Okay, I'll deal with Yohji-kun; good luck with Aya-kun, and then the slight figure was bounding up the stairs, two at a time.

Ken dipped his head, a wasted acknowledgment given that Omi was already out of sight, and took a deep breath. He so did not want to try to reason with Aya. The swordsman had barely spoken two words to him since the passionate exchange in the kitchen, and he wasn't entirely sure if promise to continue later still held good, or not. But… nothing ventured, nothing gained. He pulled himself out of his end of the couch, and approached the silent man.

But once he got there, he was at a loss how to proceed. Standing over the seated form felt like a kind of intimidation, and sitting on the floor was right out, because then Aya would have the upper hand, and would be able to continue staring out the window, ignoring the athlete. That left perching on the arm of the chair, which was no good since it meant getting inside the zone that Aya always marked out as his personal space. Plus, it felt kind of intimate, and he wasn't sure if that was allowed. Clear violet eyes glanced up, meeting Ken's dark brown before he could figure out what to do.

"What do you want?" There wasn't as much of a sting to the low words as there usually was, and that encouraged Ken. He spread his hands wide, displaying his lack of threat.

"To talk. That's all."

"Hn." the taciturn redhead grunted. But he seemed to grasp the reason for Ken's hesitation, and straightening, hooked the battered hassock that matched his chair with his foot, dragging it close enough for Ken to use, or not, as he saw fit. The ambiguous invitation was about as much as he could expect, given that this was Aya, and Ken felt a tiny smile tug at his lips. He sat.

"So, what do you think Manx has found out?" he ventured shyly. Wrenching his attention back from the blue-violet view of the stony mountain slope outside, Aya shot him a hard stare.

"If we knew enough to speculate about that, she wouldn't be coming here, would she?" he snapped.

Ken flinched, but nodded. So, Aya was apprehensive, too. Butterflies were tumbling around in the brunet's stomach, and it figured that they were affecting even Mr. Steel-for-Nerves. He'd noticed that the older man was capable of intense focus - when there was something to focus on. Take away any semblance of a concrete goal, or an identifiable opponent, and Aya crumbled. And, Aya hated being unsure of himself and the ground under his feet. Keeping his tone calm and neutral, Ken remarked, "She told Omi that they had made some progress identifying the bodies from the first two attacks. But he noticed that something about it had her worried. It makes me wonder who those people were."

"Aa." Aya turned entirely from the windows, fixing his attention entirely on the younger man seated in front of him. He frowned slightly, generating a faint crease between the red wings of his brows. "Then, they weren't yakuza, or some other group that we've had dealings with before…" The words trailed off as the man's clever mind sank deeper into the net of implications. The situation was also something that warranted Manx coming to see them, rather than preserving the secrecy of their whereabouts by minimizing contact. "Ken," he said softly, "what is it that I've stumbled into?"

The plaintive words cut him right to the bone, and without bothering to consider the consequences, Ken leaned forward and rubbed the backs of his knuckles gently down the line of Aya's jaw. A fractional tilt of the head returned the pressure. "I don't know." the brunet admitted quietly. "I get the feeling that we're sitting on the tip of an iceberg, there's so much that we don't know."

"Just so long as we're not sitting ducks." The merest twitch of Aya's lips telegraphed that he had meant the reply as a joke, and Ken felt one of his own eyebrows take off for his scalp. He had heard samples of Aya's dry wit before, and suspected that there had been a lot more occasions where it had gone sailing unnoticed right over his head, but this was the first time that the redhead had invited him to share in it.

"Hmm." Still not thinking, he followed the line of his wrist and hand up, grazing a light kiss along Aya's jaw. A slight turn of the head, and he found warm lips instead. Was he letting Aya take advantage of him, to use him as a distraction? If he was, Ken didn't care.

A quiet cough behind him brought Ken back to his senses, only to find that he was kneeling in the chair, practically straddling Aya's lap. He tensed to spring backwards, but a firm tug on his hip stopped him. Aya. Aya's hands were holding on to him, fingers laced through the empty belt-loops of Ken's worn blue jeans. His t-shirt, which had been sloppily tucked to begin with, was now completely free, and he could swear that the skin along his waistband was buzzing from the glancing contact of those long, agile fingers.

"It's a good thing that I'm not Manx-san." Omi said teasingly. "Kritiker may have planned for this, but I think it would still give her a heart-attack to see it in action."

Ken opened his mouth to protest vehemently, but Aya beat him to the punch. "Omi. Shut up." Surprisingly, there was the faintest tint of pink along the prominent cheekbones.

"Yeah, kiddo. Considering the last couple of days, it's `hello? pot? kettle, here" for you."

"Yohji-kun!"

Ken considered twisting around to see how the latest installment in the running battle of the blonds was shaping up, but something in Aya's gaze stopped him, and he was again drowning in the twilight shades of lavender and pewter. If this was what Aya looked like when he used someone to take his mind off of worries, he was welcome to, any time. The hands restraining Ken tugged slightly, and he was drawn down for another leisurely teasing of lips and tongue against his. He ended up resting against Aya's chest, his elbows propped against the back of the chair, one to either side of the man's head, when the slam of a car door made both of them jerk. Aya's fingers lazily unwound themselves from his belt-loops, tacitly giving permission for him to withdraw. The swordsman's unblinking eyes held him in thrall as Omi exclaimed excitedly and went galloping for the back door. Somewhere, there was the click-flick of a lighter, and Yohji's exhalation, murmuring, "Jesus… Way to defuse the tension, guys."

By the time Manx walked in, Ken was back in the sofa, knees drawn up to conceal his groin, just in case she should notice anything, and Aya had a foot propped negligently on the footstool resting in front of his chair. Yohji was smoking, staring at the beamed ceiling, and muttering to himself. Omi was chattering away about trivialities as if he hadn't a care in the world, reminding his team that he wasn't quite as innocent and transparent as they tended to think he was. Ken, especially, caught the wicked grin and wink that the teenager shot his way from behind Manx's back.

She looked them all over, and nodded, apparently satisfied by what she saw. It was a distinct possibility that a large part of her reason for insisting on visiting was solely to check up on them. With that in mind, Ken just hoped that his face was something approaching a normal color. "Well, let's get down to business then, shall we? I have some news, and not a lot of it is good."

Omi took her fur-trimmed coat, and went to hang it neatly on a hook in the hall to the utility room. Two plastic sacks of groceries, courtesy of the petite woman, went into the kitchen. By the time he returned, Manx had appropriated both the empty spot on the couch, and the hacker's laptop, slipping in a cd-rom that emerged from inside her fire-engine red suit coat. The smaller youth dropped down onto the floor, seating himself between the handler and Ken, turning the athlete's shin into a backrest.

As the computer's screen lit, both Yohji and Aya took up positions behind the couch, with the older blond perching himself, one foot swinging casually, and Aya folding his arms predictably across his chest. Manx ignored the maneuvering, intent on bringing up a series of mug shots in a neat array across the screen. "There were eleven bodies recovered from the three attack points." she explained, "With the evidence suggesting that the four of you may have accounted for as much as twice that number in kills. The number of wounded that were removed, and the total size of each assault force is unknown, but we estimate that the enemy's strength may have been as many as thirty men. That's unfortunate, because, as you all know, there are few organizations in Japan capable of fielding a force of that size."

"Taketori." Aya breathed. Ken was startled by the freight of rage packed into the four syllables. Shaking her head, Manx promptly demurred. "No. Your opponents were all well-trained. Following the collapse of Taketori Reiji's brief take-over, there aren't enough experienced men left from his special forces to make up a group like this. And besides-- " She clicked on the middle thumbnail in the top row of images, expanding it to fill the screen. "At least some of them are strangers to Japan."

Ken leaned to the side a little, attempting to get a better look at the face on the screen. It was that of a middle-aged, nondescript man. Asian, probably Cambodian or Lao by the flat planes of his features and the shape of his eyes. Manx tapped the screen with one long, exquisitely manicured scarlet nail. "The last name we have for him is Nyung Phoc. He used to belong to the Shining Path."

" `Shining Path?' Sendero Luminoso…? But, they're South American?" Omi's sweet alto was confused. He wriggled around, looking to each of his teammates for confirmation. Aya nodded. Yohji shrugged.

"Yes. But there are a lot of ties to Asia in their group. In Peru in general, in fact. For example, Alberto Fujimori, their former president, is here in Japan, where he's fighting extradition on nearly twenty charges of corruption, and allegations that he authorized death squad killings. He's been here since 2000. But to continue-- " She clicked open another tiny image, expanding it to fill the laptop's screen. "This one is Leung Choeun. He is known to have been a part of the Khmer Rouge up until Ta Mok's capture in March of 1999. His whereabouts was unknown after than, until he turned up dead at the Kritiker safe house. And this-- " The mouse cursor skated rapidly to another icon, putting two photos up simultaneously. One was that of an obviously dead woman, eyes vacant, while the other showed a blurry image of a vivacious face with long, dark hair. "Our intelligence division is not able to confirm her identity, but we believe her to be a Chinese national who's been a member of a hit squad that dates back to the Cultural Revolution."

A three-way argument erupted between the Weiss at that point, with Manx waiting patiently for the more vocal members to subside. Aya didn't bother to; his sharp exclamation of "Enough!" cut across the others like the razor edge of his katana. Ken twisted around to stare up at the grim man. He snapped, "Drop the other shoe, Manx."

She shrugged, and complied. "In short, gentlemen, it's our considered opinion that you've gotten involved in more than we can handle.

The brief answer meant nothing to Ken, but it apparently made sense to at least the brains of the team. Omi managed to find his tongue first. "No, no - it doesn't work. They're all Communists, sure, but the Shining Path are a splinter Maoist group. They would never have anything to do with a Khmer Rouge. And the one guy, the guy from Bulgaria, or where ever it was, that's a whole other flavor."

The rapid flood meant something to Aya, who frowned, deep in thought. "Mercenaries, perhaps? Expatriates?"

"Maybe." Manx agreed. "It would fit for most of the others that we've gotten a handle on. But either way, we're out of our league. After the fall of the Persia that you all knew…" She hesitated delicately, unwilling to name Taketori Shuichi in front of either Omi or Aya, but they all knew what she meant. "The surviving organization made the decision that politics was a slippery slope that we would do well to stay far, far away from. What one person sees as evil, may be perfectly justifiable to someone of a different ideology. As a result, it was determined that Kritiker would concentrate on the Dark Beasts alone, and on bringing them to justice. Not on political agendas. In addition, after Taketori Reiji's attempt to take-over the government, and then the encounter with Esset, we simply don't have the level of personnel it would take to go up against a group like this. I'm sure that by now you've all figured out that you are the only formal unit left that is authorized for deadly force. I have some sweepers and cleaners, but not enough to be effective."

The four of them exchanged glances around Manx. None of them had missed the possessive manner in which she referred to the ordinary suits. But of greater importance was the implication that Kritiker had taken a hard blow to the body, and simply could not stand against a professional force. A chill shiver ran down Ken's spine. If the enemy had fielded a force of at least thirty, and only eleven were confirmed as dead, that still left five for each Weiss; he didn't care for the odds too much.

The same thought had occurred to Omi. The youth spoke somberly. "Manx-san, I agree that we can't stay on the run forever, but this? How are we supposed to take on a paramilitary group? We don't even know how they came to capture Aya-kun. Or why."

*************

With Manx gone, the kitchen was a better place for a meeting than the living room, especially with the boarded up window providing a vivid reminder of Aya's fragile mental state. It was a distinct possibility that an awareness of that fact was also what drove Omi to bustle around the kitchen, raiding the bags that their handler had brought them, and fixing a hodge-podge of the foods that he liked best: comfort foods like pancakes and steamed dumplings, and a heaping bowl of ice cream with a ton of toppings. Ken noticed that tempting tidbits kept appearing at Aya's place at the freshly-scrubbed table, and that when no one was watching, the redhead actually ate. It gave the soccer player an odd lift to his spirits that the morose man wasn't starving himself.

When Yohji, late as usual, finally ambled in, Omi let loose an exasperated breath and shoved the blond at the remaining empty place. A plate clattered down in front of him, followed in rapid succession by a mug of coffee, the sugar bowl, and the carton of milk. Chuckling, the older man doctored his coffee and helped himself to enough food to feed the whole team. "Mmph. Good." he declared around a mouthful.

"Even that doesn't shut you up." Omi groused. Good-naturedly, Yohji flipped him off and continued eating while their cook concentrated on scooping softened ice cream onto a pancake. Ken stared in fascination as his agile fingers folded over the lop-sided circle of dough. Omi took a blissful bite. A pale dribble of melted vanilla ice cream escaped down the beardless chin and the startled brunet had to look away before he did something stupid, like sit there with his tongue hanging out. Instead, he shifted uncomfortably in his chair, and took a turn at Aya-watching.

Not that looking at the handsome young assassin was that much of a chore. Aya gotten up to put his dirty dishes in the sink, and peeled off his rusty black turtleneck to put it to soak to get out a stain. The t-shirt that he wore beneath was just as dead in color, but it fit his trim lines like a glove. Exhausted though the man might be, his erect carriage warned the others subtly to stay at a distance. To Ken's mind, the combination was attractive as all get out; blending as it did with the memory of pressing that slender body against the kitchen counter.

Sheesh. Between Aya and Omi, he was at risk of developing a one-track mind. He glanced back at Omi in time to see the older blond lean over and swipe at the trail of melting ice cream on the blushing teenager's face with one long forefinger, saying, "See? This is how you do it-- " as he popped the finger into his mouth and sucked.

"Eh, yeah." Omi squeaked. He busied himself with flipping open his laptop and powering it up, but Ken heard him mutter under his breath, "So not going there, thank you very much."

Well. That was interesting. It was looking as if Yohji had gotten over his discomfort at having the words `Omittchi' and `sex' in the same sentence. Ken mourned fleetingly for the loss of their sure-fire, favorite prank. It just wasn't the same, pretending to make sounds of passion, when the playboy wasn't going to be flustered by them. Hell, considering their recent `team-building' activities, it would probably end up being him that died of embarrassment. He stole another glance at Aya, and was immediately mesmerized by the way his shoulder blades moved beneath the taut fabric as he scrubbed at the shirt.

Omi leaned over and poked the distracted athlete in the side of the neck. Hard.

"Ow! Hey, what was that for?!"

"I already said `Earth to Ken-kun' twice." Omi responded mildly. He rolled another pancake-and-ice-cream sandwich and bit into it with sufficient lasciviousness as to make Yohji burst into laughter.

"Sick." Ken muttered. "You're both sick."

Aya stayed where he was, leaning against the edge of the counter with his arms folded defiantly. Ken wondered at that, briefly. He had noticed that during Manx's report, Aya had returned to pissy and stand-offish. Which, while hardly unusual, still seemed a bit excessive. Ought he to go and try to distract the tense redhead again, or would it be better to leave well enough alone?

He watched the minute bunch and ripple of the muscles in Aya's forearms, how they shifted as he clenched his hands within the concealment afforded by his armpits. No, on second thought, approaching the swordsman would be suicidal. Definitely one to leave alone. Aya's cold, precise voice cut across his thoughts. "Omi. You wanted us to meet, to continue the discussion. We're all here. Would you get down to business?"

If nothing else came out of the whole debacle, Omi had at least lost his tendency to cringe when Aya used that tone. Gentian-blue eyes shining, the teen bounced his feet on his chair's rungs. He nearly vibrated, and it wasn't entirely due to a sugar high. "I've been thinking," he announced cheerfully, "And I have an idea how we can carry the attack to them, instead of sitting around waiting."

Mean finished, Yohji dropped his chop sticks onto his plate, leaned his cheek on his hand and twitched one corner of his lips up in a smirk. "Ah. Why am I not surprised? Go for it."

"Thank you." Omi sketched a bow in the older man's direction and glanced around at the rest of his team. "I think that we're not the only ones hampered by a lack of information. Like, take the ambush at the parking garage. They fired at me with tranquilizers, and at Yohji-kun with bullets. That suggests that they wanted to take me alive for some reason, but weren't interested in him. That would fit only if they believed we were who we were pretending to be. I would be of value if they were curious as to how much I knew about Aya-kun, and the two foreign men who kidnapped him."

"But… That doesn't make sense." protested Ken. "We've tangled with them three times now. They've gotta know what we look like. What all of us look like."

With growing excitement, the younger blond shook his head vigorously. "No, wait. Not necessarily. At the mansion, you and I didn't leave any survivors in the Aya's room. In the kitchen, when Aya interceded, one man did escape, but at the time, I was over next to the refrigerator with Yohji-kun. There's a good possibility that we weren't seen. At the loft, the one Aya-kun captured committed suicide, so, again, there was no one who got a good look at us. If they managed to follow us to here, to the Villa, we've all kept a low profile, staying indoors, and away from vantage points. Their behavior all suggests that they're fishing for information. I don't think that the enemy knows any more about us, than we do about them. Less, maybe, since Manx has promised me everything that Kritiker has been able to learn from the bodies that the clean up crew processed." He finished the last, rushed sentence with a triumphant grin.

Yohji whistled, impressed, and lit up. He tossed both lighter and cigarettes on the table, and leaned back to blow a stream of smoke at the ceiling. "Could be…" he mused. "I have history with the cops as a private detective. You definitely looked your part. Even turning Aya loose with those chips in him, and following him is something I could see them doing if they were trying to figure out his associates."

Jumping up, Omi headed for the refrigerator. As he opened a can of Coke, he tossed an observation over his shoulder: "You know, you can always tell when you're on the right track. Everything just feels so right. This feels right. I just know we're onto the right track."

His enthusiasm was infectious. Nodding, Ken had to admit that Omi had a way of making even the craziest idea seem straight-forward and logical. If Manx was able to come through for them, they might have an edge and finally be able to take the offensive. He gave his friend a high-five as Omi rejoined them at the kitchen table.

"When I'm right, I'm right." The mixture of smugness and modesty would have had the fangirls at the flower shop swooning in the aisles. "There's more," Omi cautioned, passing his soda from hand to hand. "I've also got some thoughts as to how we can turn all this to our advantage."

The devil in Yohji found teasing the wound-up teen irresistible. Sunglasses perched in his tousled hair, he planted his elbows on the table, interlaced his fingers, and used them to support his chin. He gave Omi a patently fake look of adoration, and drawled, "Hey, Omittchi… Didja know `smart' is also `sexy?' Now might be a good time to make your move." He gave a not-so-subtle jerk of his head toward Ken, who blanched.

"Wha-- ?" The timing was perfect. Comprehension soaked in just as their tactician was winding up to deliver round two on his theory. The can of soda wobbled dangerously close to the edge of the table, unheeded as Omi goggled at Yohji and flushed a deep scarlet. "Y- Yohji-kun! How-- ?" he sputtered. Yohji howled with laughter and launched himself out of his chair before his chair before the outraged assassin could reach him. The Coke can wanged off the corner of the stove when Omi pegged it at him.

Aya caught the petit form as he rounded the end of the table, swinging him around with surprising ease. Omi found himself back in his seat before he even registered than he had been captured. He blinked owlishly at the long, pale fingers resting on his shoulder, then up at Aya, who grimaced at the snickering playboy. Ken braced himself for the inevitable explosion, sure that they had gone way past the man's limits, but it never came. Instead, Yohji had the good grace squirm uncomfortably, and slink quietly back to his place.

The slender hand gently squeezed the youth's thin shoulder. "Omi? Are you sure that setting yourself up is a wise course? They haven't shown much reluctance to kill those who are in their way."

Nodding, Omi laced his fingers together with Aya's. "I know." he answered solemnly, blue eyes fixed unblinkingly on violet. "But it's time to take the fight to them. We've let them choose the time and place for far too long."