Part 4

Brad cursed his inability to tell how much time had passed. Their captors had searched them thoroughly, and taken anything that might conceivably be or be used as a weapon in any way - and that included anything metal, like watches.

Not that it would have helped him to know how much time had passed, but at least it would be one less thing to fret over. He was a man who liked to have control and order in his life; as Schuldig frequently complained, he tended to micromanage everything around him. This was partly because of his need to minimize variables in order to use his powers more efficiently, but it was also partly just a facet of his personality.

Right now he was in control of almost nothing, and any order in his life had been established by someone else, not him. Although he had tried to train himself to use his powers as a check and a last resort, rather than as his primary planning tool, he was realizing now that he relied on them far more than he'd realized. He'd felt awkward and sluggish since waking up in this cell, and at first he'd thought it was a reaction to being knocked out. As time passed and the feeling persisted, however, he came to understand that his precognition actually had him contstantly living a split second ahead of time. It was such a subtle effect, and was so consistent, that he had never before recognized that aspect of his abilities until now when it was missing.

What worried him more, however, was the total silence from the cell on his left. Schuldig had continued to scream for a very long time as Emmanuel rearranged his mind, and nothing Brad had been able to say or do had deterred the older telepath. Emmanuel had continued to stand before them, half in trance, for quite some time after Schuldig had finally passed out.

Brad had tried to subvert the child accompanying the Instructor while the man's attention was elsewhere, but he'd had no luck. The youth didn't respond to anything Brad said, simply staring blankly into space. Finally he'd given up, and simply stood there with his hands clenched around the bars, seething with hatred and glaring at Emmanuel.

Now, however, he was fairly certain that several hours had passed since the telepath had left them, taking the child with him. Brad had paced the length of his cell for quite some time, trying to vent his frustration at being so helpless. Eventually he'd flung himself down on the cot and just stared at the wall separating him from Schuldig, as if he could see through it if he just looked hard enough.

Normally the calmest, most unflappable member of Schwartz, the American now felt distinctly on edge. He despised this feeling of helplessness, of not knowing what was going to happen next. He couldn't imagine how ordinary people could live with this constant, total uncertainty. Events sometimes managed to sneak up and surprise him, if he wasn't using his powers assiduously enough, but it only happened rarely. Between that and his worry for Schuldig, he was barely able to contain himself.

The German hadn't made a single sound since he'd stopped screaming. Brad couldn't even hear him breathing, though he was fairly certain Schuldig wasn't dead. Emmanuel had seemed pleased when he'd left, and Brad had gotten the distinct impression that Emmanuel very much wanted Schuldig alive and well.

Whatever the older man had done, it hadn't triggered the wave of destruction that Brad had so often seen in his visions whenever he contemplated trying to bring Schuldig's memories back. It occured to the precog that he hadn't considered that particular possibility in a very long time - not since he'd given up on ever having Lukas return, and had arranged Schuldig's happiness with Nagi. It was possible that the years had dulled whatever memory it was that Schuldig was hiding from, enabeling him to be reminded of who he had once been.

Brad was shocked to discover that he honestly wasn't sure whether that thought appealed to him or not. On the one hand, he'd longed for the companionship of his former best friend for so long, it was a constant part of who he was. On the other, he had truly let go of his love for his friend, releasing Lukas in his mind, wanting only for him to be happy with Nagi. If Schuldig regained his memories now, after so long... how would that effect their partnership in Schwartz? Would it tear them apart, or bring them closer together? Would Nagi be able to adjust to such an abrupt change?

Once more he cursed the loss of his powers as he automatically reached to see the future possibilities and ran into a blank wall. He was afraid that if this continued, he really might begin to lose his grasp on reality, creating hallucinatory visions sheerly out of desperation to KNOW what would happen. Just as Schuldig had already begun to question the reality of people around him, now that he couldn't sense them any more.

A soft moan cut into his wandering thoughts, followed by quiet but heartfelt swearing in German. "Schuldig?" he said, standing quickly and making his way to the corner of his cell. "Are you awake?"

There was a startled silence, and then Schuldig replied in English. "Brad? My God, is that you?" His voice was soft, and he sounded as if Brad's voice was the last thing on earth he'd expected to hear.

As always the sound of his name said in Schuldig's voice made Brad uncomfortable, especially given his earlier thoughts about the past. But he decided that now was not the time to berate the German for using his proper name... he was too relieved that Schuldig was conscious and coherent once again. "Yes," he answered in the same language. "How do you feel?"

"Like a piece of shit that just had a Mack truck run over it," the German said drily. Brad's lips twitched.

"Sounds like you're just fine," he replied, voice equally dry. "What did he do to you, can you tell?"

"What did WHO do to me?" He heard the telepath rustling about in his cell, then footsteps approached the corner nearest Brad. "Where the hell are we?"

"Don't you remember? We were captured," Brad told him, growing concerned. "They did something to you... one of the telepaths was trying to rearrange your mind."

"Well... I feel fine," Schuldig answered slowly, "But I sure as hell don't remember being captured. What the fuck is going on?"

"What's the last thing you remember?" Brad asked, mind racing over the possibilities. Perhaps Emmanuel had caused some blackouts in Schuldig's memory, either on purpose or as a side effect of whatever else he was trying to do. Either way, they needed to figure out how much the German had lost.

There was a pause, presumably as Schuldig tried to arrange his thoughts. "The last thing I remember... fuck, it's hard to think. Like the neurons are swimming through tar, or something." He made a frustrated noise. "There's some stuff I can't really remember... feels like a nightmare or something, all dull and fuzzy and vague. Nothing definite, just impressions, you know? Terror, pain, desperation." His voice shook slightly. "The last thing I can remember clearly is... uh... shit."

"Don't force it," Brad advised, eyes narrowed. Presumably the 'nightmare' was what Schuldig's already vague memories of the attack on Schwartz had become. "Just relax and tell me the easiest thing for you to remember."

He heard the telepath take a deep breath and hold it for a count of ten before blowing it out again. "I remember... talking to somebody... uh... Dekane, I think. Yeah, I'm pretty sure. Everybody was strung out and nervous... the Instructors were all going nuts. He told me I was being assigned to the field early, that my plane was leaving soon and I had to go pack." The younger man paused, then shook his head. "That's it, that's the last thing I can remember clearly."

Brad was absolutely certain that he'd just had a telekinetic blast to the chest. He couldn't breath, and he was positive his heart had stopped. He clutched at the bars of the cell for support. "My God... Lukas?"

Ken finished ringing up the order, and smiled cheerfully at the customer as he handed her the receipt. "Thank you," he said, and she smiled back at him and gathered up her new potted fern. "Please come back soon!"

The bell over the door jangled as she left, and then blessed silence descended. The schoolgirl rush had been worse than usual, and with only Ken and Aya there to handle it, it had seemed to last for hours. The last of the girls had finally left for dinner, leaving the two of them alone in the shop.

He stretched his arms above his head, feeling the vertebrae in his neck and mid-back pop back into place. "Damn, I think this has been one of the longest days of my entire life!" he exclaimed wearily. "Youji sure is taking a long time with those deliveries."

"Probably why he volunteered in the first place," Aya noted drily, sweeping up the leaves and petals littering the floor. "So he could get out and avoid the rush."

"True," Ken grimaced. Sighing, he glanced toward the door up to the apartments. "I feel bad, I told Omi I'd check on Nagi every so often, and I haven't had a chance... hey!" he said in surprise, seeing a small form standing mostly hidden in the shadows behind the door. "Nagi? Is that you? C'mon in, we won't bite you."

Slowly, the dark-haired boy edged his way into the shop, eyes wide and flitting nervously between Ken and Aya. He was walking oddly, a strange gliding limp, and Ken realized after a moment that he must have been using his telekinesis to allow him to walk without putting weight on his bad ankle. Wryly, the ex-soccer player thought of a few times in his life where he'd have paid his weight in gold to have that ability.

The telekinetic swallowed, and hesitantly said one word. "Y-youji?" he asked, voice wavering.

"He's not here," Aya said harshly, eyes narrowed at the boy. His tone was distinctly unwelcoming, and while Ken understood his lover's feelings, he couldn't help but feel that Aya was being just a little too tough on the boy. Nagi was obviously scared and uncertain, and probably feeling rather trapped, surrounded by his enemies as he was.

"He went out to do deliveries," Ken added, trying to soothe the frightened teen. "He should be back soon. Omi ought to be back soon, too. I told him I'd help you while they were out. Did you need something?"

Nagi shook his head, and edged a little closer, holding out a piece of paper towards Ken. "I f-found something else," he whispered, eyes lowered and fixed on the floor at his feet. "The police found the v-van dumped outside the city."

"Hey, all right!" Ken said, taking the paper and glancing at the address. "That'll give us another point to check out. I'll go call Omi and let him know. Good work, Nagi."

The boy brightened somewhat at the praise, and Ken reflected that he was rather like an abused puppy, expecting blows rather than encouragement. The thought made him absolutely sick... given Nagi's situation, the only people HE could think of who would have brought about that kind of abused look in the boy's eyes were Crawford or Schuldig. Given that he knew for a fact that Nagi was Schuldig's sub, it didn't take him long to decide where his money lay.

Which meant it was possible - likely, even - that the German had done the same thing to Omi, or started to. The idea of seeing Omi edging around like this, too frightened to raise his voice above a whisper or look anybody in the eyes, had Ken trembling on the edge of rage.

"I'll be right back," he said, and went into the back room quickly before he could get really angry and blow up at nothing. Once out of sight, he took a couple of deep breaths and forced some control over his temper. On the spot, he decided that if he had anything to say about it, Omi was damn well never going to be put back into that bastard's hands - and neither was Nagi. And he was going to make damn sure he HAD something to say about it.

He messed with the seedlings for a few minutes, trying to calm himself down before calling Omi. If he didn't, he'd probably end up saying something he'd regret later... or causing Omi to suspect that he was planning to interfere. Ken knew how stubborn his best friend could be... sometimes you just had to do things for his own good.

When he thought he was calm enough, he grabbed the shop phone and dialed Omi's cell. It rang a few times before the boy picked up, and Ken could hear the sound of traffic in the background. "Hey," he greeted his friend.

"Ken-kun! Is everything okay?" Omi asked, sounding concerned.

"Yeah, we're fine," Ken answered, leaning back against the counter. "Nagi found some new information... the police have located the van."

"Oh, good!" Omi exclaimed. "Where is it? Have they hauled it away yet?"

Ken relayed the address Nagi had given him. "I'm not sure if they've taken it yet. If they haven't, they might still be in the area, looking around... make sure they don't see you."

"Teach me to do my job," Omi teased him. "I'll check it out - that's not too far from where I am now. How's Nagi doing?"

"He seems a little skittish," Ken noted, reminding himself not to get angry again. "Is he always like that?"

"Not usually this bad," Omi replied. "But yeah, he's generally a little touchy, especially around people he doesn't know. Youji's still not back? Figures. Take care of Nagi for me, Ken-kun."

"Sure thing, buddy," Ken agreed. "I'll see you when you get back." He hung up, and sighed. Omi had sounded very glad to have the new lead, and Ken hoped that meant the white hunter wasn't having any luck. As far as he was concerned, it would be best for all of them if Schuldig and Crawford just disappeared into the void.

At last he drew a deep breath and headed back out into the main room. He was brought up short in the doorway by the sight of his lover, who had backed a cowering Nagi into a corner. Aya was snarling something too low for Ken to catch most of it, but he heard 'Aya-chan' and knew this was trouble.

"Aya!" He exclaimed, rushing over. He reached them just as Aya drew his fist back, and caught the older man's hand. "Aya, enough! What the hell are you doing?"

The look on his lover's face was beyond rage - it was the same all-consuming hatred he had once held for Takatori. "He has the nerve to come to US for help... to rescue the people who tried to use my sister to summon a demon... and now we find out they've subverted Omi and Youji as well?"

Ken took one look at the absolutely terrified look on Nagi's face, and the way the youth was plastered back into the corner to try to get away from the enraged assassin, and hauled Aya back away from him. The redhead turned on him, intending to chew him out no doubt, but Ken was more than familiar with his lover's mercurial moods, and beat him to the punch.

"Aya, forget about being angry for a second and THINK, will you?" Ken commanded in a harsh whisper. "I'll be the first one to join you in hating Schuldig, Crawford, and Farfarello, okay? As far as I'm concerned, I hope they're already well on their way to Hell. But for God's sake, take another look at that kid, will you? We've seen enough abuse victims in our work... you KNOW they way they react. Flinching away from every little gesture, afraid to draw attention to themselves... that boy is literally COVERED in scars. Every damn inch of him, just about. We already know he's a sub... Christ, Aya, he was afraid to EAT without explicit permission from Schuldig."

Aya had remained steely through most of that diatribe, but Ken saw his eyes starting to soften near the end. Knowing he was finally getting through to the other man, he sighed and softened his voice. "Just LOOK at the kid, will you? He..." he glanced over to prove his point, and Nagi was nowhere to be seen. "Hey, where'd he go?" he finished in surprise.

Glancing over, Aya blinked and looked startled. "He was there a second ago..." They both turned to look around the shop. There was no sign of the telekinetic, and neither of them had heard him leave. "He can't have gone far with his ankle as bad as it is," Aya finished, but he didn't sound quite certain.

"I wouldn't bet on that," Ken replied. "He was using his powers to help him walk when he came down here - I don't think he was putting any weight on the foot at all." He sighed and scrubbed at his face. "He's probably hiding under Omi's bed, or something. I'll go look for him in a minute. I want to finish this, first. What happened? What set you off?"

Aya had the grace to look slightly ashamed. "I... lost my temper," he admitted. "I asked him to give me one good reason why we should even be looking for Crawford and Schuldig... except possibly to make sure they were finished off."

"And he... what? Argued with you?" Ken asked, doubting it.

"No... he just... stood there." Aya shook his head. "Looking at the floor. I thought he was admitting that he had no good reasons, and it pissed me off."

"I think he was probably just too scared to answer you," Ken pointed out. "You come off as pretty overbearing sometimes, lover. He's really skittish - having you back him into a corner probably didn't help, either. Out of curiosity, do you have any self-preservation instinct at all? Remember what he did to the Schreient mansion? Backing him into a corner and snarling at him wasn't the smartest thing you've ever done, regardless of his attitude."

"You're probably right," Aya admitted, sinking down into one of the chairs with a sigh. "Looking back on it, he does act like an abuse victim. A really badly abused one. I was just too angry to see straight."

Ken couldn't help but smile a bit at that. "Well, at least you're willing to admit it. That's a hell of a step up from your total obsession with Takatori."

The redhead nodded. "You think Crawford or Schuldig did this to him?"

"Yeah, that's what I figure," Ken agreed darkly. "My bet is Schuldig, but Crawford couldn't have NOT known about it, so even if he wasn't directly responsible, he was still letting it go on. What worries ME..." he paused significantly, "is what we know now about Omi's relationship with him. If he was abusing Nagi badly enough to make him act like he hasn't got a thought of his own, do you really think he wouldn't have done something similar to Omi?"

"I'm certainly not buying their insistence that they're with him of their own free will," Aya noted. "He's done something to them... like he did with Sakura-chan, forcing her to fire that gun at me."

"If we're right, then Nagi is every bit as much of a victim as anybody else Schwartz ever hurt or killed," Ken pointed out. "Christ, remember what they did to Tot? I don't think he had a hell of a lot of choice about following his orders. So go easy on him, okay?"

After a long moment, Aya nodded. "I'll try," he said. "I've hated them all for so long, I can't promise to change overnight. But I'll try."

Ken grinned, injecting a note of lightness into his voice. "And hey, just think... if we can convert him, get him to agree to join us... Christ, there won't be ANYTHING Weiss can't do!" He shrugged out of his apron and hung it on its hook. "I'm gonna run up and check on him, make sure he doesn't die of sheer fright or something."

He trotted up the stairs, heading for his own apartment first. Digging through his drawers, he found the door key Omi had given him some time ago. He let himself into Omi's apartment, kicking off his shoes at the door automatically.

"Nagi?" he called, heading for the bedroom, figuring he'd probably find the boy there. "Nagi? Hey, don't be scared... Aya gets pissy sometimes, you just learn to ignore it after a while. He's not mad at you anymore." He opened the door to the bedroom, and frowned when he didn't see Nagi. "You in here, kid?"

He stood in the doorway for a moment, listening intently. He didn't hear anything but the soft whir of Omi's computer, but that didn't mean anything. Nagi had obviously been scared out of his mind down in the shop - he might very well have hidden somewhere in an attempt to keep himself safe.

"All right... if I was a terrified telekinetic, where would I hide?" Ken muttered to himself as he started poking around the room. He checked under the bed first, and found only a scattering of electronics, floppy disks, and CDs. Chuckling softly to himself at Omi, he moved on to check the closet. He went right inside, pushing past the hanging clothes to check into both corners. There was no sign of the missing psychic.

Crawling out again, Ken dusted off his hands and stood in the center of the room, looking around. Where else might someone conceivably hide? Dredging up distant memories of hide-and-seek games he'd played as a child, he checked every possible hiding place, and even some that were unlikely, like the clothes hamper.

"Well, shit," he finally concluded when he was in the living room again and still hadn't found any clues to the telekinetic's whereabouts. "Maybe he didn't come up here after all..."

He checked his own apartment when it occurred to him that a deadbolt probably wouldn't be much of a deterrent to someone like Nagi. Then he checked Aya's, just in case. He didn't have a key to Youji's apartment, and he wasn't any good at picking locks, so he left that until the playboy returned.

Heading back down the stairs, he entered the shop with a frown on his face. Aya looked up, and raised an eyebrow at his expression. "He causing trouble?" the redhead asked.

"Only indirectly," Ken replied. "I can't find him. He's definitely not in Omi's apartment, mine, or yours. I can't get into Youji's. D'you think he might have hidden somewhere down here?"

As one, they looked at the corner where Aya had backed Nagi against the wall. "The door to the back room is a lot closer than the door to the apartments," Ken noted thoughtfully. "The front door is all the way across the shop, and he'd have had to cross our line of vision to get there. So he's either in Youji's apartment, or he went into the back."

"I've been in the back a couple times since you left," Aya told him, "but if he was hiding I might not have seen him."

"I'll check," Ken offerred, making his way to the back room. He poked around, checking all the storage areas, looking in the cupboards and even into the refrigerator where they kept fresh blooms. Now getting seriously worried, he went down to the mission room and checked there, but there was still no sign of the boy.

Alarmed, he went back up the stairs and looked around the back room. There were only three doors leading from it - the one to the shop, the one to the mission room, and the one to the back alley where they kept their vehicles, and where the trash from the store was dumped. His heart sinking, Ken went out the latter door, scanning the alley.

He almost missed it - in the gravel near the door was a single footprint, too small to belong to any of them. It was pointed in the direction of the street, and was blurred around the edges as if something other than just the shoe had put pressure there.

"Fucking hell," Ken swore, eyes wide as he ran back into the shop. "Aya... we've got a BIG problem!"

|Part 1| |Part 2| |Part 3| |Part 4| |Part 5| |Part 6| |Part 7| |Part 8| |Part 9| |Part 10| |Part 11| |Part 12| |Part 13| |Part 14|

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