It was a fine house with a deep veranda, spacious rooms and gas lights as befitted a businessman of Crawford’s standing. He had invested in Porter’s import business and already a few items hitherto unheard of had found their way into the local store to the delight of the ordinary citizens.
The fact that both he and Schuldig had become almost legendarily lucky gamblers while Yohji and Aya had disposed of several of Everette’s goons had helped their standing in the town too.
As had the fact that Ken had gotten into a brawl in the saloon and knocked out one of the local bare knuckle boxing champions of the town. A man who happened to be on Everett’s payroll and who was known for picking on men smaller than himself. A mistake since he’d chosen to bully Ken for that very reason.
When the man picked Zeshin for his next target the error had proven even more dangerous, and he’d been lucky to escape with his life, though he’d had more broken ribs than he’d have gotten from being kicked by a mule.
Kai and Nagi were keeping lower profiles due to Nagi’s talent and Kai’s skill with the sai, neither of which would be considered anything less than magical in such a backwater. As a result of being such dark horses, when they were seen around town they were treated with some degree of respect. Especially after one of Everette’s men mistook a respectable woman for a prostitute and was found with a strange weapon embedded in his chest.
Aya-chan was considered by many to be Mr Crawford’s mistress or fiancée and was rarely seen abroad without at least two escorts.
The laundry was finally making a profit, thanks to Crawford’s men’s liking for clean clothes and the tailor and storekeeper were also keeping more of their profits due to at least one of Crawford’s men always being around on ‘collection’ days. Of course, for that consideration, all three business men gave Crawford and his associates healthy discounts on anything they bought.
However, there was still a fair way to go before decent folks could walk the streets in complete safety. There was the seemingly endless supply of hired muscle that Everette kept producing like rabbits out of hats, and the more ominous presence of his gunslinger and telepath, both of whom were keeping clear of Crawford and his ‘boys.’
Yohji leaned back in the wooden chair that he kept on the porch, his long legs elevated on the corner of the railing, the chair tipped back so it was standing on the two rear legs. His gun belt was slung low on his hips, the new belt a very dark brown that went nicely with his green shirt, dark brown vest and pants.
As always, his rose coloured glasses were perched on his nose, a cigarillo dangling from his lips trailing a thin stream of smoke as he watched the quiet street.
It had been quiet for several days now, all of Everett’s men staying well away from them out of fear, or by order of their boss, maybe both. He inhaled and then blew out a slow stream of smoke, wondering when the others would get back from their excursion to buy more supplies.
He was bored and missed TV and dance clubs and everything else that was part of the time they’d come from.
The door opened and Aya-chan appeared through it, gracefully manipulating a hoop and voluminous petticoats, as she brought him a cup of coffee. She sat on the rocking chair that her thoughtful brother had provided for her and sipped at her own coffee as she regarded the blonde.
“Do you mind if I ask you something?” she asked eventually.
Yohji put the remains of his cigarillo into the empty jar by his chair, took a sip of the steaming coffee and shrugged, “That depends on what you’re going to ask me.”
She stared down at her own coffee for a moment before replying. Then she asked her question. “You seem like the sort of man who could have anyone he wanted. So I was wondering if you really love my brother.”
She glanced up then, her dark blue eyes almost as fierce as Aya’s could be on occasion.
“Enough that I’d die in his place if it came down to that,” Yohji answered without even the slightest pause to think about her question. “Enough that I’d do anything to make him happy and keep his love.”
Her eyes softened considerably as she heard his reply and she even smiled. “Then you deserve him,” she said. “I’m sorry to have bothered you with it, but he never was very good with people and he made some dreadful mistakes before Takatori fucked up our lives. He was very shy then and altogether too trusting.”
Yohji regarded her, his gaze thoughtful before he said, “It’s hard for me to imagine him any other way than he is now. It still takes me by surprise to see him smile, or to hear him laugh.
“What was he like before Takatori fucked up your lives?”
“I used to see him smile and laugh a lot, but he was comfortable with me. We were laughing together the night we walked into the house and found our parents bodies. He had a sense of humour back before then, although strangers rarely saw it. He had to get to know people really well before he would even attempt to joke with them.”
She gazed into the distance, remembering Ran rather than Aya. “When he did decide to joke his humour was sly and always dry.”
“He had a couple of crushes but he never let on to anyone but me. I think both guys were straight anyway and it often made him unhappy that so many girls seemed to like him but that he couldn’t respond to them.”
Yohji listened to Aya-chan speak of a boy he’d never met, could never know. There was a hard knot in his chest when he thought about what Takatori Reiji had done, how he’d turned an innocent boy named Ran into the killing machine that Yohji knew as Aya.
“He still can’t respond to them,” the blond stated quietly. “I think you’re the only woman who’ll ever touch any part of his heart. He loves you, but I think you know that.”
“Yes, I know, and I love him. We’re all that’s left, after all.” She sighed slightly. “Although I’m glad to be with him and the rest of you, I’m also not sure that a brother’s love is enough for me.”
Yohji stared at his cup of coffee, “You’ll find someone, Aya-chan. Probably not here, but you’ll find someone.” Exactly how that would happen even if they got back to their own time Yohji wasn’t sure, but he didn’t want to think about the girl being alone amid a sea of gay men her whole life either.
And he wasn’t about to broach the subject of becoming her lover. For one thing he wasn’t sure how Aya the man would take the idea, nor was he sure it would be fair to her, all things considered.
“Perhaps,” she said, “although while people are regarding me as Crawford’s mistress it might be difficult. I know what they’re saying and I know it’s expedient to let them think it while we’re here. It still annoys me though.”
“We won’t be here forever,” Yohji reminded her. “And I don’t blame you for being annoyed with the situation, but it does help keep you safe. Besides I can’t think of a single man in this town that your brother would let get within talking distance of you, much less anything more intimate.
“Not that any of us would let any of them get close to you.” He smiled, “Hell I think even the Irish nutcase is becoming protective of you.”
That produced a chuckle. “He’s very sweet to me and is teaching me how to swear in Gaelic. I like him. I like you all. I’m just fed up with being so much excess baggage.”
Yohji sighed and took a drink of his cooling coffee. “Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and I hear his voice talking to Schuldig. I don’t know what he’s saying, but it sounds...” he shook his head, “just like any man in love with someone. It’s still hard for me to think that the crazed psychotic killers I knew and fought are able to express any tender emotion.”
He laughed softly, “I guess even a madman and a half-crazed telepath are still human to some degree.”
She cocked her head to one side as if considering something. “Did you know it was Schuldig who woke me from the coma? It was his voice calling my name that brought me back.”
She shook her head at the memory. “Back to find my brother apparently dead and that strange doppelganger Sakura dressed exactly like me. It was not the best awakening although I’m told it would have been worse if I’d awoken even half an hour earlier.”
“Yeah, that’s true,” the blonde agreed. “I don’t even like remembering that night. Truthfully I had nightmares over that whole sequence of events for a couple of weeks.
“When you disappeared from the hospital Aya was... like a man possessed. I don’t think he slept much, he hardly ate anything, but he wouldn’t accept help either.
“It was a bad time for all of us, especially your brother. Sakura didn’t help either, she was obsessed with him. She would have done anything to make him love her the way she loved him. Sakura didn’t know he was gay. All she knew was that she wanted him. It probably didn’t even occur to her that her resemblance to you would probably have creeped him out even if he’d been straight. I mean.. how could he have loved her as anything but a sister when she looked so much like you?”
He frowned at the memory of how the girl had hounded Aya, following him, making a total pest of herself. Yohji’d wanted to scream at her to stay the fuck away from Aya, but didn’t dare interfere. It would have revealed things he hadn’t wanted any of his team mates, or Kritiker to know, like the fact he was deeply in love with their icy cold leader.
“I love him. I’ve loved him for a long time.”
“And I think you kept it hidden for a long time,” Aya-chan said thoughtfully, “which was probably not a bad idea with that little creep Takatori living in the same house. He broke both Aya’s and Ken’s hearts by turning on you all the way he did. If he’d known your feelings he’d have used them against you probably.”
“As for Sakura, she was weird. She told me the whole of what she knew about you all and then took me to the shop you used to run suggesting it would be a great idea if I ran it instead and she could help me after school. I agreed as although I was nineteen by then and unable to go to school, I still looked sixteen and nobody else bar Momoe-san would give me a job. Then she hung around me till I wanted to scream at her to go away.”
She sighed. “I sometimes wonder if she saw me as a substitute for my brother. We were both led to believe that none of you had survived you see.”
Yohji nodded, "I know. That was what your brother wanted. At the time anyway. And yeah, you're right about Aya and Ken. What Takatori Mamoru did... well none of us can forgive him. Not for this."
He shook his head, "I feel sorry for Zeshin. The little bastard really did that kid wrong, worse than he did with us."
"And Sakura is a subject best not spoken of in front of your brother. I think he wants to forget her and leave her in our past. And I can't say I blame him either. Her obsession with him was.. disturbing. And I think you're right about her friendship with you. It was her way of clinging onto the hope she'd find your brother again. I don't think she bought the lie Kritiker told her that we were dead, not when she knew what we did. She probably knew it for the lie it was."
“She did drop hints from time to time and when they first told us she simply refused to believe it. I was quite relieved that she wasn’t at the shop when Brad came to tell me where my brother was.” She smiled. “But then that was probably deliberate on his part.”
The smile died slowly and gradually became a frown. “What did that little beast do to Zeshin that could be worse than letting me think my only family was dead and then trying to make sure he was?”
"For starters he sent Zeshin to kill us, knowing it was a death sentence. If he'd killed me, Aya would have..." the blonde shook his head, "it doesn't matter.”
“And that was just for starters? Kami-sama! The man’s a monster! Zeshin is a kind and loving boy. He didn’t deserve that. And I’m not stupid, Yohji. I know there is more to him than anyone is saying. It doesn’t matter though. He still has a gentle soul… unlike my brother.”
Yohji carefully changed the subject. Talking to Aya-chan about her brother and his... pet... just wasn't something the blonde felt comfortable with, not in the least.
But he did feel he needed to mention one thing to her about the 'gentle soul' she thought Zeshin was. "Aya-chan, one thing you should keep in mind about Zeshin... he's a killer too. Don't let the way he speaks and acts fool you. He's every bit as much a cold-blooded murderer as your brother.... or me for that matter."
“I know that. I’ve seen him in action, remember. I also know what he is to my brother and it saddens me but, at the same time, they both seem content with the situation. I think it is you who has the problems.”
She held up her hands. “Please, don’t bite my head off. I meant it in the best possible way. I think you are still too much the gentleman to want to discuss such things with me. The problem is me. I’m tired of being treated like a very dumb piece of porcelain.”
"Yeah, I guess that has gotten old, hasn't it?" Yohji asked, carefully skirting the issues she's brought up concerning Zeshin and her brother, as well as the tangled mess the relationship between Aya and himself had become.
"The only suggestion I can make is for you to talk to Aya. I can't promise he'll listen. Hell, even if he does I can't say how Crawford would take you suddenly becoming more than self-moving baggage." He pulled another cigarillo from his pocket and considered lighting it. "I'm not sure Aya's ready for you to grow up."
“I don’t care whether he’s ready or not! I am more than ready to grow up! I was running the Koneko on my own for quite a while where it took all four of you! Drat! That was childish of me. But I am very nearly twenty now whether I look it or not and I’m tired of being patted on the head and treated like a goddamn child!”
Having got that off her chest she stormed back into the house, slamming the door behind her.
Yohji'd made a mess of his attempt to speak to Aya-chan. Lately every conversation he had seemed to go off track. Sighing he put his cigarillo into his mouth and lit it.
Schuldig rode up a few minutes later, dismounted and joined Yohji on the porch having first tethered his horse to it.
“You look glum. What’s up?” He leaned against the wall and dug a cigarillo out of a pocket and lit it.
"Aya-chan's not happy. Can't say I blame her, we do treat her like a fragile child." He glanced up at the German, "I thought you were with Vater," he said, using the telepath's own word for Crawford with an amused glint in his jade eyes.
“Farf’s still with him so he’s perfectly safe. Besides I left him discussing imports with Porter and I can’t really see our so polite friend being anything but civil. Everette and company are laying low but Ken, Nagi, Zeshin and Aya are keeping an eye on them while Vater’s in town.”
He smirked at his cigarillo. “As for Aya-chan, I wondered how long it would be before she exploded.”
"I knew it was coming too," Yohji admitted. "She's been really tense for a few weeks now." He took a long drag from his cigarillo and exhaled slowly, "She's lonely. Everyone has someone but her... Well... not everyone, but most of us are more or less happily paired, plus she's a virtual captive in this house. No matter the beauty of the place, a cage is a cage."
Schuldig sighed. “Ja,” he agreed. “And Zeshin would be no good for her so that leaves you.” He glanced at Yohji to see how he would take that.
"Or Brad, but I think he's as gay as..." Yohji looked up at the German, "the rest of Schwarz." He took a slow inhalation of smoke from the cigarillo and let it out slowly, "Or Ken, I know he's been with at least one girl." He looked thoughtful for a moment, "Never mind. I think he's too involved with Nagi though..." the thoughtful look deepened, "She's the same age they are, more or less. I wonder... I mean Nagi was with that Tot girl and Ken had Yuriko... Hmm..."
“And that means they’ve both been through too much already to add the emotional stresses and strains of a third party to their relationship,” Schuldig said. “What exactly are you so afraid of Kudoh? Abyssinian leaving you? Not going to happen. Him killing you? He’d follow you almost immediately if he did that. Or are you afraid of being in love with both siblings?”
The blonde replied, "You have to admit there's a bit of a kink factor in fucking a brother and sister. I'm not sure that's something I want to try. Besides I'm having enough trouble with the relationship I've got with Aya, much less getting involved with his sister."
“Oh? I thought you’d sorted that out now. Zeshin still bothering you?”
Yohji made a negating motion of his head, and fell silent. He wasn't going to discuss the more intimate details of his rocky relationship with Abyssinian but the truth was the red-head occasionally got a bit more rough than Yohji could handle.
Schuldig picked up on his thought processes of course. Yohji often forgot that he was empathic as well as telepathic. “You need to talk to him if he’s getting too…er…boisterous. He loves you enough to listen.”
"Keep your mind to yourself, Schuldig. I can handle things with Abyssinian on my own, I'm a big boy." He stood, intending to go inside but he caught a movement from the corner of one eye and stopped.
Everette's gunslinger was standing on the corner at the end of the street. "Company," the blonde remarked softly, as he took a step toward the front door. "I wonder what he's doing here."
Schuldig winced as Aya’s voice shouted in his head. *The gunslinger is heading towards the house.*
*He’s already here and there’s no need to shout.*
Aya’s mental voice became calmer. *Ah, ok, I thought Yohji was on his own with my sister.*
*Nope, just got back so Jesse James, or whoever he thinks he is, is unlikely to try anything today.*
He turned to smile at Yohji. “Your boyfriend is worried about you.”
"Aya always worries. It's part of his job description. And the gunslinger's alone. I don't think he'd try anything without back up." The blond opened the front door to see if Aya-chan was anywhere in sight. "You feel any of Everette's other morons around?"
“No. I think Aya and the others have them locked down so we’ll know if they make a move.”
Aya-chan, having heard the door open glanced up from the book she was reading. Her line of sight gave her a clear view outside and she visibly tensed when she saw the gunslinger. “Why is he here again. He gives me the creeps.”
"He's just here to make us nervous, at least that's my guess," Yohji answered.
"Schuldig, what do you think about having a little one on one chat with our local irritant?"
Schuldig shrugged. “Sounds like a plan,” he said. “Can’t do any harm at least. Do you want to do the honours?”
"Yeah. You stay here with Aya-chan and I'll go have a talk with him." He gave the telepath a tight, humourless smile, "Maybe I can convince him that working for Everette is going to shorten his life even more than his choice of profession will."
“Good luck,” Schuldig said with a grim smile in return. “I have a feeling you’re going to need it. I’ll be on the porch, just in case.” He turned to Aya-chan. “I think you should stay inside for now.”
Although she shot him a hard-eyed stare, she had no real intention of moving.
Yohji gave a curt nod in acknowledgement of Schuldig's words then stepped off the porch heading toward the dark haired man his revolver a solid weight on his right hip.
The gunslinger remained where he was, neither moving away nor forwards. He merely waited for Yohji to approach.
When he was about ten feet from the other man, Yohji stopped and regarded him for a moment, his jade eyes sweeping over the other man as if sizing him up. "Is there some reason you feel the need to watch Mr. Crawford's house?"
Cold eyes raked over the Japanese assassin before the gunslinger spoke. Even then he didn’t answer the question. Instead he smiled a cold lifting of the thin lips that didn’t reach the arctic grey eyes.
“I bin wonderin’ which of us would be the faster if it ever came to it,” he said.
"And you came all the way over here to think it over, is that it?" Yohji asked, not buying the answer. "The way I see it you might live a might longer if you walked away from this. Everette can't win, not against our boss."
“Everette does as he pleases,” the gunslinger said indifferently. “I know our time will soon be up and law will find its way west. What will you and that redheaded Chinaman do then? Cos I don’t think neither of you works within the law. And you both like the killin’ too much to settle, I’m thinking’.”
"We'll manage," Yohji replied knowing full well what they'd be doing once they'd had time to really become familiar with their individual powers. They'd go back to their own time and deal with Rosenkreuz and it's agents. After that, well they'd have to decide what to do.
"Take my advice, walk away from this while you can," Yohji told the other man.
“And do what? Buy a farm? Pan for gold with all the other idiots? I don’t think so. We’ll meet sooner or later, boy. I’m lookin’ forward to it.”
With that parting shot he deliberately turned his back on Yohji and walked slowly and nonchalantly away.
The blonde shook his head. He'd given the man a chance to escape death and he hadn't taken it. Yohji turned and walked back to the house, knowing that more people were going to die before this whole mess came to an end.
But that wasn't anything new for Weiss or Schwarz. They were professional killers, like the gunslinger he'd just spoken to. The main difference was, at the end of it all, Yohji was pretty sure who'd still be alive, and it wouldn't be any of Everette's men.
Schuldig was still standing on the porch. “I take it that little conversation came to nothing,” he said. “I guess the guy is getting old and wants to die with his boots on.”
"Yeah, maybe." Yohji propped himself against on of the porch rails, "I just wish we could get this over with soon. I want to get on with this training thing that Crawford wants us to do. I really miss cold beer and real cigarettes."
“I don’t think it will be long before things come to a head. Everette’s losing money everywhere and is just stupid enough to take us on over it. He’s also thrilled to bits with his little telepath who is a natural talent and arrogant with it. He didn’t get the training I got.”
A dark look settled over Schuldig’s face before he shrugged. “Pride cometh before a fall,” he quoted. “And Everette’s telepath is full of that.”
"So are a few other people I could name that live under this roof, present company included, and no, I'm not leaving myself out."
He crossed his ankles and rested more of his weight on the rail, his own expression as darkly thoughtful as Schuldig's own, "I thought the reason we came here was to learn how to control our abilities. Instead we seem bent on helping Crawford assure he's got a fortune when we get back to our own time. I wonder if we're setting something into motion that will change our own histories." He gave the German an odd grin, "You know, like those American Sci-fi shows where people change who they are by tampering with their own pasts."
“You’re forgetting Brad’s talent,” Schuldig said easily. “He knows exactly what he’s doing and he’s working for all of our futures not just his own. If we’re to deal with the future that I believe he has in mind we’re going to need a great deal of money.”
“I wish he’d confide in us a bit more. We still don’t really know what his plans are. At least,” he eyed Schuldig speculatively, “we former Weiss don’t.”
He looked at the end of his cigarillo, watched the thin trail of smoke it was making, “That’s another thing. We aren’t Weiss anymore. You guys, well you still identify with Schwarz and your own past, but some of us don’t know how to relate to our future here with the four of you.” While he didn’t voice it, what he really meant by ‘we’ was just himself. Just a very unhappy Kudoh Yohji caught between what used to be, and what might be. Or, what he might never have again.
Schuldig tossed the butt of his cigarillo over the rail into the street and sighed before turning to gaze thoughtfully at Yohji. “Perhaps we identify with being part of Schwartz because we were all each other had. I know you trust Ken and Aya for the same reasons and I know how much it hurt every one of the three of you when the little Takatori showed his true colours. I know how I’d feel if it had been Nagi or Farf.”
He shrugged slightly. “As for the future, Brad always plays his cards close to his chest but I do know that this time we’re relying on you and Aya to hone your skills before we can be sure how things will pan out. You’re both very strong, natural talents but you need to work on controlling and directing your talents. Also, I know that Aya-chan is imperative to whatever Brad has planned. That’s why we tried to take her with us after the battle with the Elders.”
“Has he always kept all of you as in the dark as we are? I know he’s a secretive bastard, but...” Yohji flicked his own cigarillo into the street, “it irks me that he won’t tell us anything beyond how much we’re needed for his plans to succeed.”
“Yeah, he’s always a secretive bastard,” Schuldig said with one of his smirks. He chuckled at some private thought before becoming serious once more. “But I will say this, as annoying as he is, he’s never led us wrong.”
“So you’ve said several times,” Yohji pointed out.
He changed subjects, “Ever wish you had that ability? That you could walk through a minefield and never step on one because you knew where they all were?”
Schuldig shook his head. “If I keep repeating myself it’s only to get the truth into that thick head of yours!”
“As for wishing I was a pre-cog, no fucking way! Can you imagine seeing six or seven versions of a tiny part of the future and then having to make the right choice as to which one should come to pass for the good of yourself and your team? That’s pretty much what he has to do nearly every day of his life. And he’s tired and needs to be able to see the future and simply let it take it’s course.”
Schuldig sighed slightly. “I know we were your enemies when you were part of Weiss but, like you, we were simply doing what we had to do. Did you ever ask yourselves why we never killed you? We could have done so many times. Aya could tell you how close he came until Brad saw a vision that included him.”
“Like Crawford, Aya keeps a lot of things to himself. No, he never said a thing that would lead me to believe anyone ever got close to doing him in. he...” the blonde closed his eyes, “he’d not in the habit of talking, even now.” He pulled out another cigarillo, realized how many he was smoking, considered putting it back but lit it instead.
He took a long soothing drag off the newly lit cigarillo, exhaled slowly, “I guess any power has it’s drawbacks. But if I could choose, I’d have wanted to be a precog.
“Being Aya’s lover is very much like living life in a minefield. One false step and there’s an explosion.”
“Yeah, he’s pretty high-maintenance I’d imagine,” Schuldig agreed, “but deep inside he worries about the same things as the rest of us.”
He studied his nails for a moment or two before speaking again and then it was almost as if to himself. “Most people who know me or come across me soon know that I’m a telepath. Almost as many see that I can move with telepathic speed. What most either forget or never find out is that I’m also an empath.”
He looked up then and looked directly at Yohji. “I can’t read Aya’s thoughts. He’s one of those people who has natural shields.” He shrugged. “Understandable when you consider his power. What I can do, though, is read his emotions and I promise you, Kudoh, that he loves you more than his sister even. He has done for years.”
“I know,” Yohji admitted softly. “I’ve got some empathic ability too. It’s not his feelings for me I’m doubting, it’s my ability to be what he needs. Between that and my sorry ass inability not to piss him off at every turn I don’t know if I can hang on to him, and gods, Schuldig, I just can’t imagine a day without him.”
He turned away to hide the up welling of tears in his eyes, blinked and shoved his sunglasses back up his nose. Smoke and mirrors to hide the emotions, but he knew damned well that of them all, Schuldig wasn’t someone he could hide anything from.
“Do you love Farfarello like this?” he questioned, showing Schuldig that he was really beginning to think of them as being as capable of gentler emotion as any other person.
Schuldig lit another cigarillo of his own and blew out a cloud of smoke before replying. “When Farfarello and I first got together as lovers, I felt pretty much as you do. I wasn’t sure if I could be his bitch and he wouldn’t have it any other way. Add to that the fact that the man is always unpredictable and I defy your minefield to be as dangerous as mine was.”
“I, too, wasn’t sure if I could be what he wanted and, like you, I thought I knew exactly what he wanted.” He smiled gently, an unusual expression for him. “Turned out that I was completely wrong so I stopped worrying about it. That’s when we stopped annoying the hell out of each other and found what worked for both of us.”
“Maybe we’ll get to that point someday,” Yohji replied.
For a few minutes he just stood there silently, then he said, “We have to do something about Aya-chan. She’s lonely.”
“It’s not up to us, Yohji. We’re both spoken for.”
Schuldig chuckled softly. “I’m often surprised by how fundamentally alike our two teams are. Aya and Brad could have come from the same mould and Ken is almost as psychotic as Farf. You and I are fine till it comes to our respective lovers and did you ever notice the same uptight little prick syndrome in both Nagi and the little Takatori? We were like mirror images of each other.”
Yohji considered that for a moment. Oddly he found, in retrospect, that it was true. "It's a small, weird world."
Schuldig chuckled. “At least neither team was ever like Schrient,” he said soothingly.
Yohji grinned, “Well, Aya is bitchy enough to be one of them, but yeah, you’re very right there.” The memory of choking Neu returned, but this time it lacked the power to hurt the blond assassin.
He had Aya now and the love they had was far more powerful than the memory of any phantom Asuka, or even the ghost of Asuka herself.