Yami No Matsuei Fan Fiction / Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Monozuki ❯ Aya and Blue Violets ( Chapter 14 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Monozuki - An Idle Curiosity
A Weiss Kreuz/Yami no Matsuei crossover.
 
Monozuki 14 - Aya and Blue Violets
 
By Lisa
 
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No matter that the strange man claimed to be a doctor, and that by the bluish tint Omi's lips he desperately needed one; and no matter that the delicate little assassin had said to allow it, and Aya trusted the boy's judgement as much as it was in his admittedly suspicious nature to trust anyone's; it still all came down to his gut saying: This guy doesn't feel right…
 
Aya's gut was never wrong.
 
Following close behind, Aya had a good opportunity to watch the interloper move, and if he was any judge of his opponents, this one would be dangerous to fight. The dove-gray suit he wore with easy grace was tailored to not hamper anything short of the most extreme in martial arts maneuvers. And the newcomer was young, and fit too, more so than could be accounted for by a wealthy doctor's access to a gym, or a fanaticism with golf. On the one hand, the auburn haired man was weighed down by the slight body cradled with admitted care in his arms, but on the other, he was above Aya in the gravity well of the staircase. It would be entirely too easy to toss the youngest Weiss, and while Abyssinian was off balance trying to save him, to lash out at the red headed Hunter and kick him backward down the stairs.
 
Eyes narrowed thoughtfully, Aya had to admit that if he were in the other man's position, and intended harm, that that was what he would do.
 
Omi's rescuer was still listing off supplies that he needed, continuing the recitation he had begun downstairs. Aya forced himself to focus less on the warm, deceptive tone, and more the words themselves. “… if you don't have isopropyl alcohol, we can make up a solution with providone iodine.”
 
“Upstairs.” The red head snarled impatiently. Would the man never simply shut up? They reached the top step, and stopped, warily eyeing one another. The doctor's kindly mouth tightened, and there was a hint of steel in the hazel depths, but he made no overtly threatening gestures. Perhaps it was this supposed doctor's intent to get the Kritiker team off balance? Worming his way into their confidences by treating the injured boy would certainly be one way to do so.
 
Aya resolved to not let his guard down, even should the offer of aid for his littlest partner prove to be in good faith.
 
It was with some chagrin that Aya realized that the stranger was staring at him quizzically, one eyebrow raised in silent interrogation, and had been for at least a minute. Why the hell was he zoning out? A blush rose to the swordsman's cheeks and he shoved past the man angrily, wrenching open the door to the shared living room. It banged into the wall with unnecessary violence and the blush deepened till it clashed with his scarlet hair, forcing Aya to busy himself with pushing aside their cluttered coffee table and tossing the mismatched floor cushions into the corner.
 
“Ah, good thinking.” the doctor said, kneeling to lay his limp burden carefully onto the cleared floor. He seemed unaware that dark stains marred the front of his gray jacket. “Do you know how to do CPR, by any chance?”
 
“Yes.” snapped Aya curtly. He wasn't about to tell this unknown in an nice suit that a lifetime ago he had spent months earning a life guard's certification in hope of a summer job at a resort. Hopes died too easily, and it was no one's business what Ran's might have been. Least of all a potential enemy's. But, he told himself, there was nothing wrong with using skills from his past life if it would save Omi. Crouching on the far side of his too still partner, Aya spared the man a glare and rummaged in his pocket. There was a small, utilitarian knife, left there from opening a bag of sphagnum moss, and Aya hesitated only long enough to think, Omi's going to kill me for this… before he slit open the front of the boy's ruined tee-shirt. It was too bad that the kid had picked today of all days to wear a favorite: his L'Arc en Ciel shirt from their American tour. But better the shirt than Bombay's life, he reasoned uneasily.
 
Although, it might not be too bad of an idea to go online later and see if he could locate a replacement.
 
The doctor apparently misinterpreted his worried frown, shooting Aya a quick smile and remarking gently, “Your friend's strong, and in excellent health; I'm sure he'll be all right.” Long, agile fingers raced across Omi's bloodied chest as it laboriously rose and fell with each shuddering breath. For the moment, the man avoided the saturated bandages, leaning down to listen to the sound of the boy's lungs, then pressing fingertips lightly to his carotid artery. “Hmm…” he murmured, “Could be better, but it could be a lot worse, too. Pulse isn't as strong as I'd like, but it's steady. His lungs are clear, but he's having a lot of difficulty inhaling… Could be a neuromuscular blocker, at that.” The hands paused, resting, and then the man took a deep breath. “Okay. Let's check that wound, shall we?”
 
Gingerly, the deft fingers peeled tape from the red streaked skin, leaving white rectangles that seemed weirdly out of place. As he folded back the soaked gauze, fresh blood welled sluggishly from a wound that Aya instinctively knew was all wrong; it was only a shallow slice, barely deep enough to separate the tough strands of muscle in Omi's abdomen, and certainly no where near life threatening. Yet, the oozing flow refused to stop. Urgently, he demanded, “What's making it do that? I've never heard of-- ”
 
“Damn!” the other man hissed. Trying to apply pressure, his fingers skidded across the darkly glistening surface. Omi gave a final, painful wheeze and stopped breathing.
 
Training kicked in, and Aya quickly tilted the boy's chin up, ensuring that his airways were clear. But when the moment came to seal his own mouth to Omi's, he balked, and had to mentally slap himself. This is not a kiss! Aya thought frantically. Certainly not with a child his sister Aya's age. The chilly flesh was unresponsive under his lips, and hardly felt alive any more. A surge of revulsion at the thought that he might be in such an intimate position with a corpse nearly made Aya gag, but grimly he swallowed the disturbing idea back down to where it deserved to be, deep in some recess of his subconscious. Just as he refused to think of his little teammate in a sexual way, he wouldn't think of Omi as dead, because the teenager wasn't. He couldn't be. The boy had never had a chance to really live his life, and the fact that neither had any of the rest of them was completely beside the point. Aya just wasn't going to accept Omi as dead.
 
The standard rhythm of breath and count steadied Abyssinian's free-falling mind. He had found his partner's pulse with shaking fingers, and that meant that there was no need to do compressions. That knowledge freed a tiny portion of his brain to observe the doctor working beside him with feverish speed, and the assassin had to admit that at least the man seemed to have some idea what to do.
 
Or, so he thought until the handsome stranger sat back on his heels, and pressed both hands flat to the boy's lean stomach and began to chant. A Buddhist prayer?! Dumbfounded, Aya lost the rhythm, and had to force himself to pay attention, dammit, to what was really important. Not to some deluded idiot who wanted to pray at a critical moment like this.
 
And around whose hands a pale, rosy-gold light was gathering, like a swarm of fireflies made out of pure sunlight.
 
The warm light gleamed on the sweat sticking strands of auburn hair to the doctor's forehead, casting odd shadows under his chin and along the plane of high cheekbones that became too prominent. For the barest second, Aya thought that the skull beneath the skin was clearly visible, but then he blinked and all there was were blood smeared fingers locked into a complex mudra.
 
Omi sputtered, choked, and took a breath on his own.
 
Index and forefinger outstretched together brushed against the man's now soundlessly moving lips, then swept out in a graceful arc. Aya blinked, caught by a surreal double image of wide, white silk sleeves stitched with scarlet thread that fluttered in unseen breezes. Instincts that he wasn't even aware of having somehow recognized the gesture and propelled the assassin backward into a defensive crouch. Dammit, he couldn't explain it, but Aya knew beyond a shadow of any doubt, that the thing in front of him wasn't human.
 
The man's hazel eyes were fixed with single minded intensity on the prone boy, so he might have missed the way Aya's expression slipped into feral fury, but some innate sixth sense warned him when the assassin leapt, utility knife aimed with unerring accuracy for his throat. He completed the spell, or what ever the Hell it was, laying the two fingers against Omi's wound, even as he was dodging. The part of Aya that made him so deadly in a melee had already anticipated that, and his knee was in position to block while his free hand slammed the other backwards, flat onto the floor. Mouth opening to speak, all the doctor managed to get out was a pained woof! as the air left his lungs.
 
Kneeling astride his opponent, Aya flipped the knife, reversing it in his grip for a downward slash. It was too bad that the short, triangular blade wouldn't allow him to stab to any depth, but the box cutter's blade was razor sharp and would make short work out of the stranger's neck. Focused, Aya's hot violet gaze zeroed in on the point where the carotid was most vulnerable, just where the faint beat of a pulse was visible. He was peripherally aware of Omi, struggling to sit up, and of the fainter sounds of a ruckus from below, but they were completely unimportant at that instant.
 
Hazel eyes widened in shock, as the man's splayed hand rose in mute protest. Aya ignored the motion as too little, too late to interfere with his attack, but then he found himself flying, ass over tea kettle and headed for the living room's far wall. Twisting in mid-air like his feline namesake, Abyssinian managed to tuck his shoulder and roll so that it was his hip rather than his head that took the brunt of the impact. But dammit, it still hurt like a bitch. He was back upright, feet drawn under him in a crouch and ready to spring before the enemy could even flounder into a seated position.
 
Omi flailed his way to his knees, arms outstretched like a goalie trying to block a score, and screamed “Aya! Stop!
 
Aya stopped.
 
Oh, not completely; his trained mind was still busy picking out spots that the opposition was failing to protect adequately, and running through strategies for each, but he would allow his miraculously recovered teammate one chance to talk him out of finishing that inhuman man off. Then his ass was grass.
 
The stranger backed away warily, dabbing at a shallow cut that trailed a thin thread of crimson down his neck, and into his ruined shirt collar. Even as Aya watched, it sealed itself shut and vanished, leaving only the bloody evidence behind to prove that it had ever existed. Abyssinian gave an involuntary start in wordless protest - Cuts did not do that! - and a faint, vengeful smirk flitted across his intended quarry's handsome face. Omi missed that part of the show, being as his presumed savior was behind his back, but his puzzled frown spoke volumes to his confusion over Aya's reactions.
 
“What's going on here?” asked the smallest Hunter slowly.
 
Aya ignored the question, addressing a growled “Schwartz?” to the interloper, instead.
 
The man shook his head. “No, we're not from Schwartz. As a matter of fact, we're not here to fight you, at all. We'd rather work with you, since it appears that we have a common enemy.”
 
Omi wobbled, and sat down shakily on the floor. “Oh, gods… another team. You guys are another team.”
 
“Er… yes, as it happens, we are.” A thud and a crash from below distracted the man, and Aya tensed at the opportunity that the shift in attention provided. Omi's quick, slicing gesture forestalled his impulse to leap, however, and he subsided with ill humor. A quick glance up by his opponent told Aya that the doctor had caught the silent exchange. The man coughed, clearing his throat, and said quietly, “We are not your enemies, no matter what you may think just now. The one who left that abomination in your kitchen, and who wounded your partner, he's the one you have to watch out for. If he's targeting you, you're going to need our help.”
 
Before Aya could open his mouth to growl `No!' Omi waved him to silence and demanded rapidly, “Takashi-san, how can you know that it's the same person? We haven't told you anything about the man who attacked me at the mall. I barely even saw him. And what about our kitchen?”
 
A smile twitched at the corners of Takashi's mouth when the small blond had to pause for a breath. “Your injury was caused by a knife bearing a curse. Something similar - I didn't stop to examine it - was left in your kitchen downstairs. My partner, Kyo, is dealing with it. The reason that I believe them to be the work of the same man is that they feel as if they have the same psychic signature.”
 
“I knew it!” the furious red head burst out. “You are like Schwartz!”
 
“What?” Omi twisted about, staring at his older partner in confusion. “What are you talking about?”
 
“Ask him what happened to the cut I gave him.” Aya ground out. “Ask him.”
 
“Nani? Takashi-san… what cut? What happened while I was unconscious?” Omi's husky voice was tremulous, and the boy's wide, worried eyes sent a twist of doubt though Abyssinian's omniscient gut. Perhaps pushing the injured boy was not a good idea?
 
That the same thought was in his late opponent's mind was apparent from the way he blanched and hastily said, “It was just a scratch, Omi-kun. But your friend is right; we do have some unusual abilities. Nothing like the Schwartz people, but fast healing is among them. All of us can do that, just as all of us have at least a little ability in shaping the forces that you would call magic. The wound you sustained - normally, it would be a very minor thing - yet it bled excessively, and the effects of the drug used were extreme, were they not?”
 
“Y- yes…” Hesitantly, Omi nodded. “You're right. The pain is gone, and I can feel my legs again. And the bleeding has completely stopped.”
 
“That's because I broke the curse on it. Fortunately, it was not a very complex one, or I might not have managed it in time. Because, as a doctor, I can assure you that no normal healing art would have been enough to save you.”
 
At the earnest sincerity of those words, Aya felt his blood run cold. Had they really been that close to losing their littlest member? The memory of corpse-cold lips against his assured him that yes, whatever had been at the root of the encounter at the mall, it had nearly been fatal. He might not believe this talk about magic, but death he understood. The muscles along his jaw bunched in anger and rage narrowed his violet eyes; someone was going to pay for hurting the kid like that.
 
“Oh… And you think the spell was cast by the same person that you're investigating?” the petit blond asked in complete seriousness.
 
Takashi coughed. “I meant to ask you… You mentioned Tsuzuki. How did you come to meet him?”
 
Omi blushed uncomfortably. “Ah, you see, he came by to check up on me, the night before last, and stayed for pancakes.”
 
“Pancakes!?” Both Aya and Takashi shouted. They exchanged incredulous looks over the boy's head. Aya had a fleeting thought that the way things were going lately, he ought not to be surprised that there seemed to be something that they agreed upon… but really, Omi feeding pancakes to a member of an unknown team was a bit much. Especially as it explained why there had been none left when Aya had come down for breakfast, and dammit, he liked pancakes. With butter, and raspberry syrup. And here Omi had fed them to someone else.
 
Kneeling there on the floor, trembling with delayed reaction from blood loss and exhaustion, drying flakes of rust peeling from a childishly smooth chest within the remains of a tee-shirt that hung like a ragged vest from his shoulders, Omi should have looked anything but impressive. Yet, somehow, he managed to draw himself up and say with dignity, “It was an excellent opportunity to gather information. Particularly seeing as someone didn't believe me when I said I saw that boy, Hisoka-kun, flying.”
 
Choking, Takashi sputtered, “F- flying? `S- `Soka-chan? Oh… Tatsumi will-- ”
 
Omi quelled him with an annoyed glare that rivaled a Fujimiya Special, before turning that self-same, narrow-eyed laser-beam on Aya. Carefully, clearly, he bit out each word: “It's okay if you suggest that they have Schwartz-like abilities, but when I told you about him flying, you didn't believe me. Even though we've both seen that boy, Nagi-kun, do it. Now, why do you suppose that is? Hm?”
 
Aya briefly entertained thoughts of abandoning his young partner with the representative of the rival team, and taking his chances with Yohji and Ken, downstairs. After all, they were only up against one weird teenager, and there was safety in numbers. But in the end, he gave the idea up as cowardly and, taking a deep breath, did the impossible, saying “Sumimasen, Omi-kun. You were right. I should have listened to you.”
 
A pleased look of shock lit the blond assassin's features, closely followed by a sunny grin. “Domo arigato, Aya-kun!” he crowed, throwing himself bodily into the older Hunter's arms and hugging him fiercely. Consternation gave way to resignation as Aya carefully returned the embrace.
 
“Do itashimashite, Omi. I guess I should say it more often.” he sighed. From the safety of the other side of the room, Takashi snickered.
 
 
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Violet (blue) - Watchfulness; faithfulness;