When I Fall Ch. 04

This is a continuing Weis Kreuz fanfic.-- It involves m/m pairings and BDSM and fetishes. If any of these offend you-- you should probably read something else.

~~ @ ~~ @ ~~ @ ~~

Pulling on his mission gear, he went to join the other members of his team. The air was thick with tension. The others were ignoring him for their own reasons. Omi had not told the rest of the team about Farfarello, but they had other issues to deal with.

Ken wanted to scream. He did not know how to respond to Omi. The younger assassin must surely hate him now. Maybe he just needed some time to get over the shock.

The group tromped down to the debriefing room where Omi handed each a file and started to explain the mission. "Our job is going to be to hit the network data base, retrieve file information and blow up the computer system after uploading a virus to wipe out the international system hub. We are going to be working on the 20th floor. Schwarz is going in on a related mission. They are going to be assassinating the company board of directors that is scheduled for a monthly meeting on floor 27. Their targets are higher risk than ours and should draw more problems. However, we will be acting as the distraction while they carry out their mission. For that reason, only Yohji and I are needed to sabotage the computers. Aya will be staging a distraction at the front entrance and Ken is to go up to the 30th floor and start a large fire. Ken, you will be using plastic explosives, so be careful with the detonators and watch your timing. Do not hit the elevator or stair area as Schwarz and us are going to need those to get out."

"Aya and Ken should also be aware that we will be using plastic explosives on our floor as well when we finish with the computer systems. All of our hits need to be timed precisely. The fire on the 30th floor must start as soon as I hack into the system and disable the sprinklers. As soon as the explosion and fire starts on the 30th floor, Schwarz will go into action and take out their targets. By the time Schwarz finishes its targets and leaves, Yohji and I should also be finishing up and leaving. Ken you need to be the first out."

"Got it. When do we start?" Ken shuffled studying the layout provided.

"Exactly at 9 p.m., I have an office cleaners uniform you can wear to gain access into the building and avoid security while you are setting up. It's in the box on the kitchen table. So are your explosives and headset."

"Fine." Ken looked around; the members of Weis were still pointedly ignoring him. "Yeah, I'll see you later then." He left the briefing room and grabbed his gear and went to his bike.

"Damn them all. I can't take this silent treatment anymore; I am talking to Birman first chance I get. This is a seriously messed up situation. Maybe it's just coincidence that I pulled the worst part of this job. Just because I was the only one Kritker gave in-depth training to on explosives. But it seems suspicious. I doubt Omi would set me up, but what the hell is going on?"

The mission was going well. The com relayed the two teams' actions at various times and Omi gave the go ahead to start the fireworks. Ken had carefully set up the detonators and was just waiting for the signal. He had placed them in various areas with flammable material piled high around them. He had measured each bit of plastic down to the smallest gram so that the blast would start fires instead of the shockwave forcing them out. Running to the back stairs he pushed the button to fire the detonators. The building shook from the combined explosions going off. He made it down several flights of stairs without incident and was preparing to go onto the 23rd floor when a guard with a gun drawn swung around the stairs and fired. The bullet hit Ken in the thigh; the second bullet hit him on the torso. The assassin kept moving on pure adrenaline alone and tore through the man's throat with his claws.

"I'm hit." He announced to his team on the com.

"What's your location?" Omi asked.

"Stair well of the 23rd floor. Hit on the upper leg and left of the stomach, nothing critical, losing lots of blood."

"You need to keep moving, you have less than two minutes before the detonators on the 20th floor are fired and security has shut off the elevators. Back up is not possible at this point."

"Understood." Ken took off the com and threw it against the wall. "How the hell am I getting out of this one?" He pulled himself up on the handrail and considered something he had not done since he was a little kid. He pulled himself up on the rail and slid down the cold metal. He was able to hobble around the landing and slide down most of the rails. He was on the 17th floor when the explosion went off, blowing up the computer system. "Damn, Yohji used too much explosive. The whole damn building is going to fall."

Another explosion rocked the building, throwing Ken to the ground onto his wounded leg. "Shit!" He struggled to pull himself back up and leaned against the rail panting heavily. "Okay, let's focus, this doesn't hurt anymore than when Farfarello was pouring wax across cuts on your back, get it together Ken." He mumbled to himself. "True, but I wasn't losing buckets of blood at the time either." Ken made it down one more floor before he blacked out from the blood loss.

~~ @ ~~ @ ~~ @ ~~

"Damn, it I can't raise him on the com!" Omi yelled to Yohji as the raced out a service entrance and into an alley.

"Fuck it, the police are on the way. We have to get out of here." Yohji grabbed Omi around the wrist and pulled him to the waiting car. Aya was behind the driver's wheel.

~~ @ ~~ @ ~~ @ ~~

"Farfarello, Schuldich is going with you. He's somewhere between the 15th and 18th floor. You will bring him back to our safe house and Kritker is sending out a medical team. Birman has been dispatched to deal with Weis." Crawford relayed the directions that he had received from Kritker to Farfarello via cell phone.

"We're on it."

Schuldich found the guard with the elevator keys in the lobby dazed in the chaos. He was easily able to get the man to hand them over. The two men waited with strained breath. Running out the door on the 15th floor and rushing to the stairs. They found Ken unconscious on the 16th floor landing and carried him to the back service elevator and quickly out of the building.

~~ @ ~~ @ ~~ @ ~~

Birman walked into the mission room and looked at the assembled members of Weis. Her eyes silently condemning. "I want an explanation and I want it now. You abandoned a teammate that could have been backed up by either Omi or Yohji and I want to know why. If the answer is not forthcoming immediately, you will all be disciplined and the reassigned to units with no contact between each other."

Aya pulled himself up, away from the wall. "We received information from another Kritker agent that Ken has been trading secret information to an outside source." Omi gasped.

"Yohji and I knew about it but we hid it from Omi." Aya looked sternly at Birman daring her to contradict his reason.

"I see. So you were taken in by this person. We had Schwarz working on a leak for the past several weeks; they discovered the source late yesterday. The man was known as Snake. Bald guy, wears sunglasses, sound familiar? He had a high-level security clearance and was planting information in various cells as to one of the members being a traitor. Schwarz became suspicious when he contacted them and Nagi had run background checks. Once they had the hard evidence of large amounts of money in various accounts, they confronted him and Schuldich got the rest of the information out. That is the reason behind the hit that you carried out today. That board of directors was trying to take down Kritker from the inside to cover up their illegal activities."

"As of this moment, you are on suspension." Birman started to leave.

"Wait. How is Ken?" Omi asked clearly upset about the events that had transpired and finding out that the others had thought he was a traitor.

"I don't know that information as of yet." She walked up the stairs and left without a backward glance.

Aya bent his head, looking at the ground in defeat. Suddenly he lunged and punched a hole in the wall.

"We fucked this one up good. Huh?" Yohji leaned back into the couch staring at the ceiling, a far away look on his face.

"Yes."

Omi left the other two behind and ran up to his room slamming the door behind him.

~~~~@~~~~

The blood loss had been far more severe then anyone suspected at first. Ken was in a coma for 48 hours before his body started to recover from the shock. Slowly, his consciousness began to register and he came closer to the surface of reality.

"The kitten is finally awake I see." A grating, nasal voice announced. Ken's eyelid were heavy, his body stiff, he was afraid to move even the smallest muscle for fear that it wouldn't work. 'I feel so dry.' He thought.

"Farfarello, your pet is waking up and he would like some water." Schuldich yelled into the hallway.

"Don't yell Schuldich, it's irritating." A soft voice spoke.

"Master?" Ken whispered in surprise.

"Shh. You are safe. Here I have some water for you to drink." Farfarello lifted Ken up into a sitting position and helped him steady the glass.

"This sucks."

The master slid in behind his slave and leaned against the headboard pulling Ken down to lean on his chest. "You lost a lot of blood. Do you remember anything?"

"Yes, my team left me behind. They didn't even care if I died or not." Tears dripped from the corners of his eyes. "We have been through so much shit together and they just fucking left me!" Ken slammed his fist into the bed in pain and anger at the betrayal.

"I know it hurts, but to be fair they were given some very incriminating evidence by another Kritker agent that made you look like you were selling them out." Farfarello started to stroke his hair gently.

"They believed it? They didn't even question it? God, Aya is so paranoid. I thought he got over that after Omi found out he was related to Takatori." He laughed weakly. "I would expect Omi to have more loyalty."

"Omi wasn't told about the accusations. I think he was upset with you because of me."

"I was hoping he would get over that in a couple of days, instead he left me to either die or get picked up by the cops. Sweet huh? Such strong bonds of friendship." Ken paused collecting his thoughts.

"I won't go back there. I want to be in a different team. There is nothing left for me there."

Birman walked into the room; she had been on her way in to talk with Siberian when she heard him make that last statement. Her eyes took in the broken figure of one of the strongest assassins Kritker had. And it wasn't an enemy that broke him. "Although, I believe that you could still salvage your position in your team. I sincerely doubt that the dynamics would ever be the same. For the time being you will be staying here and working with Schwarz. If Crawford feels that you are a useful person to him then he will accept you as a member of his team on a permanent basis. If you don't gel then we will probably send you to a sweeper unit for awhile until we can find a better match for you. We also have some overseas missions we could offer you, but I don't know if that would work out well as most of them are solo and you work better with a team."

The room was silent as the members absorbed this arrangement. Birman pulled up a chair and handed a file to Ken. "This is the information that the Snake fed your teammates. He did this to three of our other teams as well, yours was the only one that took the bait."

He flipped through the folders, there were pictures showing him with a high level Mafia head and some others that he didn't recognize. As well as, transcripts of conversations that he supposedly had. "These pictures are so bogus. I never met any of the people in them and I certainly never talked to them. I can't believe Aya and Yohji fell for this. Especially since Aya and I were involved at the time."

Schuldich just gave him a sympathetic look and went to discuss the news with Crawford and to see where Ken would fit into their group. He wasn't a psychic like the rest of them. Although he was fairly skilled in other areas.

Ken relaxed into Farfarello's body, letting his warmth seep through chilled skin. He couldn't decide which was worse, knowing why his team abandoned him or not knowing. He decided not to think about it any longer.

"I will go with Ken to pick up his things and help him pack. I don't want him to go alone and I don't think he would appreciate anyone else looking through his things." Farfarello told Birman.

"That will be fine as long as you don't create a riot." Birman warned.

"Pity, riots are fun. I especially like the big ones where people start burning things. Burning churches is probably my favorite." He smiled sweetly as if he didn't say anything odd.

"Yeahhhh, ok, well on that note, I have to go. So much paperwork, so little time." She scurried out the door.

Farfarello watched her go with a smirk and languidly licked at Ken's neck. "That was amusing."

Schuldich popped his head around the door. "What did you do? She asked if you forgot to take your medicine today."

"It was nothing. Would you be so kind as to fix my pet something to eat? Preferably not heavy."

"Since when am I your maid? You are entirely too used to being the dom all the time." He looked at the vacant brown eyes of their guest and sighed. "Fine, but you had better fix that."

"It will take time."

~~ @ ~~ @ ~~ @ ~~

Birman opened the door of the flowershop just as it was closing for the day and walked in to the bright interior. Days like this she really hated her job. The boys immediately finished their tasks and filed down the stairs to the mission room.

The darkness of the room reflected their somber mood.

"How is he?" Aya asked, voicing the question they were all wondering.

"He will make a full recovery in a few weeks. His intestines needed to be sewn back together, he was at high risk of infection because of where the bullet hit and he lost a lot of blood. Siberian is dealing with more emotional trauma then the physical. He doesn't want to come back to Weis and I can't say I blame him. Currently he is being assigned to a new unit."

"Will I be able to see him? I need to apologize to him. We had an argument earlier the other day, before the mission and I said some terrible things to him." Omi asked.

"He will be returning sometime next week to pack his things. Until then I doubt his new team will let you see him."

"Oh, Ken's with Schwarz." There was no doubt in his voice when Omi stated his revelation.

"Yes. They went back in and found him and now Crawford is claiming finders, keepers. I can't argue with them about it either. They are the team that he has had the most contact with and he knows how they work." Birman sighed at the disapproving glares of Weis.

"Suck it up. If you guys had trusted him and treated him with respect and consideration to start with we would not even be discussing this now." Birman's anger showed on her face. "I have other things to do, I'm out of here." She stomped out of the room and slammed the door behind her.

"What is it with slamming doors in this building?" Yohji asked.

~~ @ ~~ @ ~~ @ ~~

Over the next week Ken learned the different personalities of Schwarz and tried to cope with the oddness of each of the members. Schuldich was very irritating, always prying into his mind, Nagi was quiet all the time and Crawford seemed to have some kind of superiority complex. In short, he was not comfortable with them as a team. However, they did not treat him like trash either and that was all he was willing to ask for.

Finally, the doctor let him off bed rest, so he and Farfarello made the trip across town to pack his things.

Ken let them in through the back door and the managed to carry several large boxes up to his room, without seeing any of the other members of Weis. They were not to escape notice for long however as the other members of Weis had noticed a van in back of the building and assumed that it was probably Ken.

Omi was at the top of the stairs and rushing to Ken's former room with alacrity. He paused sticking his head inside the door. "Hi."

Ken looked up briefly but didn't say anything to him.

"I want to..." Omi began as he stepped further into the room. "I'm so sorry Ken." Shame etched across his face. "I didn't know that you couldn't get out of the building. I removed my com unit and... Oh God! I would have never left you behind!" Omi cried, tears trailing down his face. "Please talk to me, you're my best friend." Omi sunk to his knees. "I don't want to lose you."

Ken sat beside Omi on the floor and gingerly wrapped his arms around the younger assassin. "I know you wouldn't set me up like that."

"I don't like that you chose Farfarello as your new boyfriend but, if he makes you happy. That's all that matters. He can't treat you any worse than Aya." Omi laughed weakly.

"Farfarello is good to me. I can't really explain our relationship, but he is what I need."

Aya and Yohji slowly entered the room. Yohji waved a white handkerchief tied to a pencil. "Hey, can we call a truce?"

"I suppose." Ken mumbled standing up and moving away from his two former teammates.

"Look, we screwed up. We know it. Someone gave us some evidence that, at the time we thought looked pretty damning. After finding out all the facts from Birman, we went back through all the stuff that the mole had given us and realized that we had acted irrational and stupidly. You were our teammate and we knew better than to believe that crap. There is no excuse for what we did. I only hope that you can forgive us." Yohji spoke for both Aya and himself.

"I honestly don't know if I can. You assholes left me unconscious, bleeding to death, with a huge fire in the building, guards and police swarming the place and another team had to go in and recover me. The worst part is you did it on purpose." Ken turned to look out his window, idly picking up a soccer ball.

Farfarello had been standing in the far corner with his back to the room. He removed clothes from the closet and dresser, neatly packing the items into a box. He did not care for the other boys from Weis and wanted as little to do with them as possible. This was Ken's battle to deal with.

The brunette moved closer to his master wanting emotional comfort, hoping to feel warmed from the bitter cold gripping his heart. The platinum blond pulled him into his body.

Aya growled deep in his throat. "You may not have sold us out, but hooking up with a member of Schwarz is just as bad."

The accused spun around to face his tormentor. "You fucking bastard! The world does not revolve around you." They stepped closer to each other. Shouting in the others face, anger radiating off their skin.

"God, I can't understand what my sister sees in you." Aya hissed between clenched teeth.

"Is that what this is about Ran?" Ken emphasized the name pointedly. "Some twisted thing about your sister?"

"Shut up." Aya's voice chilled to a deadly quiet, his eyes drilling through the other man. "My sister likes you."

"You know that would never work. Besides the fact that I'm gay, I'm also a paid killer, in case you have forgotten."

"No shit."

"Is that why you fucked me, then fucked me over?! Because of your sister?"

Aya twisted around and wrapped his arms around his waist. "Just shut up."

"Truth hurts? So this was some kind of bizarre, psychological, incestuous relationship? You are a sick puppy, Ran." Ken never saw the fist coming. The impact knocked him off his feet. The pain in his gut made him choke down hot bile as his stomach started to heave.