Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ To Those About To Die ❯ Chapter 15 - Underworld ( Chapter 15 )

Chapter Fifteen - Underworld

We arrived at our assignment shortly after six in the evening. The project leader had requested our presence there for seven days, though something about Shimojima's manner suggested things would be moving far more quickly than that. If anything were to happen tonight, I would need to get rid of this damn headache, and fast.

The three of us were left to ourselves until such time as they called for us. They provided us with a suite and a meal, but the thought of food made me queasy; I retired to one of the narrow cots and closed my eyes against the harsh fluorescent glare.

When the sounds of dinner were done, I heard the door between our rooms open and shut, followed by the almost bouncy tread of Kiko coming toward me. My eyes opened only enough to glare at him. "What?"

"Your head still hurt?" he asked.

"Yeah."

"Roll over," he instructed, pushing his sleeves up.

I could feel the energy flowing through him as he increased his body temperature. I took off my shirt and lay back down. Hot hands gently kneaded my back, finding the tense places and pushing warmth into them until they began to relax. I sighed. "Kiko, you would make a wonderful masseur."

"So what's wrong, Berger? Why so tense?"

"Oh, Kiko," I murmured, not wanting to discuss my misgivings with him. "It's nothing. I just don't like these people."

"Bullshit," he stated, then leaned down and put his lips to my ear. "Bull. Shit. Berger, I know when something's bugging you, and you haven't been right in weeks. We've got some time, talk to me, damn it. You can't fall apart here, you're the only one who speaks the stupid language."

In spite of myself I laughed. Before I could tense up again, Kiko placed his hands over my spine and pushed. I gasped as several vertebrae realigned with a series of loud cracks.

"See? Kiko made it all better," he said with a rakish smirk. "So talk to me, Berger?"

I sighed and rolled over to look at him. "I've been having nightmares."

"No shit! Not like I haven't been woken up by your loud ass," Kiko grumbled. "But you never wanted to talk about them. Is that what this is?"

"I dreamed I would die in Japan."

This time Kiko didn't speak for a while. He seemed to be looking for the right thing to say, and not finding it. Then, in a soft voice, he said, "But, Berger, wouldn't that put you back with Toni?"

I blinked, startled.

"And if you don't die," he continued, "we'll just keep doing what we've been doing, and life will go on, right? So what's to be afraid of? Besides, you've got me here. Nothing's going to happen, Berger. It was just a dream."

I reached up and took hold of his hand. It was still very warm. "Kiko, my friend, I wish we were not here tonight."

"Berger, are you coming on to me?" Kiko asked, kneeling down beside the cot. "Because, you know, I don't mind if you are, but this isn't really the place, and the mood's all wrong."

Again he made me laugh. I shook my head at him. "No, you crazy fool. I'm trying to thank you, and I'm trying to tell you I hope this isn't a very bad situation for us."

"Thank me? For what?"

"For being my friend. For giving a damn whether I live or die, and whether I am happy."

"Oh, Berger, of course I give a damn. That's what friends are for. Besides, you don't see that dumb bitch caring about either of us. I say we leave her here, go catch a show in Tokyo or something. Come back in a week, pick her ass up and go back to being bored."

"Kiko, we're nowhere near Tokyo."

Kiko shrugged. "So, what do we do now, Berger? If we're not going out to a show, anyway."

"Now? We wait."

"Waiting sucks." He got up and paced around the little room. "Hey, Berger?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you think they'll be here?"

My hackles went up. This wasn't something I was really prepared for. "I don't know," I told him. "In my dream, they warn me, then there's this figure wreathed in fire who tells me I'm going to die."

"It's not me, is it? Because, Berger, if you want to dream about me, I've got some better things to talk to you about than that shit."

I snorted a laugh, then realized my headache was gone. I took a deep breath and enjoyed the pain-free moment. "No, it's not you," I murmured. "It starts off looking like Crawford, but it isn't. Or maybe it is, I really don't know. It's weird, Kiko. And that's why it bothers me so much. It's not like any kind of dream I would normally have, you know?"

"Yeah, those can be creepy." He wandered back over, grabbed my foot, pushed it back on the cot, then sat down where my foot had been, draping his arm over my upraised knee. "So, you didn't answer my question. Do you think they'll come?"

"Why would they?" I asked, suddenly skeptical of my own obsession.

"I don't know, maybe they don't like unauthorized copies?"

I frowned at him. "Kiko, what are you saying?"

"Well, with you reading all that detective stuff, I've come up with a deduction of my own," he stated with a grin. "If I was trying to clone a psi-talent, and if I was using someone who had been at Rosenkreuz, right, who would I pick? I mean, would I use a bunch of different people, or just one? If I had one good subject, why try for others? And we know that they collected genetic samples from all of us there, right? So it could be anyone!"

I slid back into a sitting position and watched Kiko put this together. "Go on."

"Well, Berger, you saw the briefing stuff, who are they most afraid of? If they could make one they could control, wouldn't that be what they're after?"

I thought of the information they had sent us about the cloning project, and the photographs of a pretty Asian youth named Toudou. A boy with hauntingly familiar features. "Naoe Nagi." I whispered the name as though ghosts were listening.

Kiko nodded. "Elementary."