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Chapter 3
"Brittany," Heather hissed quietly as she tapped on the glass of her friend's window. "Brittany please wake up!" She pressed her cheek to the window and tried to see through the blinds.
"Heather...?" A sleepy voice answered quietly as the blinds rose to reveal a sleep-tousled sixteen year-old girl. "What the hell are you doing here after midnight?" Brittany slid the window open.
"I need you to come with me... It's kind of an emergency," Heather fidgeted slightly as she looked up at her friend. "You remember how I told you about those guys we met who looked just like Weiss?" Brittany nodded and finger-combed her hair. "Well, Youji's been injured and they brought him to my house... Can you come help me keep an eye on him?"
"I guess..." Brittany yawned. "You're lucky my family left a night early, otherwise you'd be getting me in big shit."
"I know... I'm really sorry. I just... It's been a crappy day and I don't want to be there alone with him..." Heather looked at the ground.
"It's okay, Hon," Brittany leaned out the window and gave her a hug. "Just let me grab some clothes and stuff and I'll be right out."
"Thank you," Heather smiled in relief. "I really really appreciate this!"
"No problem," Brittany smiled and shut the window as Heather walked back to her car.
*****
"Schuldig, what are you snickering about?" Crawford glared at the redhead out of the corner of his eye as he drove back towards the house where Youji was being kept.
"She's gotten a friend to come over and keep her company, it seems to make her feel safer." Schuldig smirked and gazed out the window with a bored expression. "She has no clue what's coming."
"Of course she doesn't, she's just a stupid human," Crawford continued driving. "She will learn soon enough."
"Ja," Schuldig's smirk widened. "I'm sure she will."
*****
Heather and Brittany were sitting on the side of the queen-sized bed Youji had been occupying for the past hour.
"He looks pale," Brittany commented as Youji shifted in his sleep and she pushed away the strands of hair that had fallen over his face.
"He lost a lot of blood and I think he's still bleeding in a couple of places," Heather pulled down the blanket to check on his shoulder. "I hope it stops soon."
"Do you think it was okay to leave him alone when you came to get me?" Brittany tucked the blanket back up under Youji's chin.
"I don't know, but I think at least one of us should be watching him at all times for the rest of tonight," Heather eased herself carefully off of the bed making sure she didn't move it too much. "I'll go get an extra chair."
"Alright," Brittany kept watching Youji's chest rise and fall with a mesmerized look on her face. Heather walked through the hall and dining room to the living room and was about to start dragging the rocking chair back to the bedroom when a knock sounded on the door. Sighing she walked over and opened the inner door before pushing aside the curtains over the tiny window in the main door.
"Holy fuck.... Brittany! Lock the door to your room!" Heather pressed her back against the door and closed her eyes praying that she hadn't just seen what she'd thought she saw. A second later she was flung from the door by some invisible force and fell to the floor. Scrambling around to face the entrance she watched fearfully as the lock moved of it's own accord and the door swung open.
"Good evening," Bradley Crawford told her with a cold smile as he stepped into her house. She squeaked and ran towards the bedroom door before he could take another step. Standing against the cold wood she closed her eyes again until she felt a hand grabbing the front of her shirt and looked up in time to see Brad smile cruelly as he flung her across the hallway into a wall.
"Ow..." Heather slowly sat up and rubbed her head.
"Nagi, open it," Brad stood back and let the younger boy unlock the door.
"Hello, need a hand?" Heather looked to see a hand being held out and a pair of green eyes above a malicious smile. "I'm Schuldig, sorry for bursting in on you uninvited like this." Heather could hear the sarcastic insincerity echoing through his words, but took the offered hand anyway.
"Schuldig..." Brad warned over his shoulder as he threw the door open and marched in.
"Go away!" Brittany was standing between Youji and Brad with a lamp held threateningly in her hands.
"Leave them alone!" Heather had been trying to get her balance back but nonetheless tried lunging at Brad who simply moved out of the way and let her nearly fall again.
"We only need the one on the bed, stay out of this and we'll kill you quietly," Brad grabbed the lamp as Brittany swung the object at him and set it down on the desk beside him.
"Dammit! What good will it do you if he dies because you move him?!" Heather moved to stand between Crawford and his target yet again.
"How could you have any idea what we want to do with him?" Brad sneered.
"A hostage does a lot more than a corpse," Brittany glared up at Crawford defiantly as she attached herself to Heather's arm.
"She's got a point there, Crawford," Schuldig leaned on the door frame and grinned at the situation.
"Then all we have to do is eliminate you two," Crawford pulled out his gun. "Waste of bullets."
"Three hostages are better than one!" Heather only flinched a little as the gun was aimed at her head and Brittany closed her eyes. "I'm sure Weiss would do a lot more for all three of us than for just Youji..." Crawford looked thoughtful as he pulled the trigger back.
"And then we could take care of him for you!" Brittany opened an eye to see if the gun was still pointed at them.
"Give 'em a chance, it might save us some work and trouble," Schuldig winked at the girls. "They could deal with Farfarello's wound as well." Brittany winced slightly at Schuldig's last comment.
"This would also give us a place to stay without rent," Crawford mused and tapped his gun against his chin.
::Stingy American...:: Brittany thought to herself.
::Oh, you girls have no idea just how bad he is,:: Schuldig's voice slid into their minds. ::You should also be thanking me for saving your lives.:: His smirk grew.
::Later,:: Heather slowly walked towards Crawford again. "So, if we give you a place to stay and take care of the wounded you won't kill any of us?"
"Not yet," Crawford snapped the safety of his gun back on and stowed it back in its pocket. "Schuldig, bring Farfarello and the medical supplies in."
"I'll stay here," Brittany whispered to Heather and went back to sit by Youji.
"Okay," Heather carefully stepped around Crawford to follow Schuldig.
"Please, make yourselves comfortable," Heather told Crawford and Nagi sarcastically as she left the room. Crawford spared Brittany a last glance before turning to leave, Nagi falling in automatically behind him.
"Jerk..." Brittany muttered to herself.
::Definitely, you learn fast,:: Schuldig's laughter rang through her mind.
"Get out of my head," Brittany glared at the wall wishing she could set his hair on fire with her eyes from where she was.
::Touchy...:: The voice receded from her mind, still laughing.
*****
"The computer is in the corner," Heather caught Nagi's attention and directed the serious-looking youth over to the machine as she waited for Schuldig to return with Farfarello. "There's a bunch of games on the white shelves beside it if you want to play something," Without saying a word, Nagi sat himself down in front of the computer and hit the start-up button.
"Do you not get the provincial paper?" Crawford sat himself down at one end of the larger couch.
"No, find some news on the TV," Heather gave Crawford a flat look that he ignored and threw the remote at him. He caught it without any apparent effort and she sighed.
"Here we go, Farfarello," Schuldig pushed the bleeding Irishman through the door. "Now stop trying to make your arm bleed more and let Heather help you."
"Thanks," Heather gave Schuldig a flat look as she caught the medikit Schuldig tossed her while he walked past Crawford and neatly grabbed the remote. She warily moved closer to the white-haired man as he regarded her with one cold eye, "could you please sit down, Farfarello?"
"You didn't bother to restrain him, Schuldig," Crawford made the bored question into a statement.
"You didn't tell me to," Schuldig flipped through the channel guide until he found a channel that interested him. "So I didn't bother." Crawford sighed in frustration and pinched the bridge of his nose.
"Can you just try and relax if you won't sit down," Heather walk to the kitchen and returned with a damp rag to clean Farfarello's arm off with. He continued to stand there impassively as she started to wipe up the worst of the blood and see how bad the damage was. "Dammit, sit down!" Heather kicked at the back of his knees as she pushed him towards a chair. In a moment she found herself on the floor, Farfarello still staring into space and Schuldig laughing at her from the couch.
"Farfarello, sit down," Crawford ordered and the injured man turned a quick glare at Crawford before slowly sitting down.
"Thank you," Heather scooped up the few wrapped bandages that had fallen from the box of medical supplies and finished washing off Farfarello's arm. "Dear god," She gently stroked the cloth over the four slash wounds. "How did you get this?" She knew exactly how he'd gotten it, but she asked anyway and looked up to see Farfarello's eye staring straight at her.
"What did ye say?" He asked as she looked away and started preparing his bandage.
"N-nothing, that's just a fairly impressive wound. Please don't move because it bleeds more," Taking the cloth again Heather wiped away the few new trickles of blood and applied some antiseptic before pressing a folded wad of gauze to the wounds. Winding a tenser bandage around his arm to keep the gauze in place she sighed. "I'm never becoming a nurse..." She said softly. As soon as she was finished Farfarello quickly stood -- causing Heather to flinch -- and walked over to the end of the couch where he curled up quietly.
"Schuldig, take the hostage and go and bring in our bags," Crawford idly flipped through a National Geographic that had been lying on the coffee table beside him.
"Why can't Nagi do that," Schuldig was still wrapped up in watching his television show.
"Nagi should be researching the whereabouts of Weiss for us," Crawford didn't even look up as the Japanese boy slouched almost imperceptibly and set down the CD case labeled Myst.
"Fine," Schuldig growled and stood up. Roughly grabbing Heather by the wrist he pulled her outside and up to the car with him.
"You don't get along well with him do you?" Heather rubbed her wrist as soon as Schuldig let her go.
"He's a fucking asshole half the time and right now he's worse because he's trying to make a serious impression on you hostages. I don't think he's quite sure how to handle an unusual situation like this," Schuldig unlocked the trunk to the sports car parked on the side of her property and wrenched it open. "The only time he's any fun at all is when he lets us kill someone."
"You know don't you," Heather balanced the bags he tossed at her and began to walk back inside. "So why haven't you told him yet?"
"That you and your friends know who we are? Of course I know that. I've never seen this cartoon that we apparently star in but I do know a lot of other things about you and Weiss that I'm not going to tell him either. It's so much more fun if he has to struggle to find the right questions to get the answers he wants," Heather heard the trunk slam behind her and continued to mince her way across the cold ground back towards the door. "If I feel a need to I might tell him, but until then he can be at least that much in the dark," Schuldig was suddenly talking quietly into her ear and Heather froze. "But I was going to ask you if you had anything good to eat, I'm getting hungry," He calmly walked past her.
"You can look in the fridge and cupboards, though I'm not sure you'll find anything you like," Heather walked up the two steps to the tiny porch in front of her door and gratefully stepped onto the warmer floor mat. Wiping off her feet she walked the rest of the way in and kicked the doors closed behind her. She set her armload of baggage beside the bags Schuldig had brought in and managed to get through the living room undisturbed as she walked in to check on Brittany and Youji.
*****
"God, what a mess," Heather moved some of her mother's books off of the lazy boy and slumped down into the soft cushions. "An injured Youji Kudou from Weiss, a bleeding Farfarello, a cold and mean Bradley Crawford, a love-deprived Nagi and a sarcastic Schuldig who seems to want to fuck both of our minds over," Heather leaned her head backwards and closed her eyes slowly.
"Not exactly a dream beginning to the weekend, huh?" Brittany walked over to Heather and sat in her lap. "At least you're not alone, Hon. Now we just need to figure out how we're going to deal with this until at least one set of our parents comes home in two weeks or so."
"God, I don't know if I can," Heather sighed and gave Brittany a hug. "I'm sorry for dragging you into this but I don't think I would survive if I hadn't."
"It's okay," Brittany hugged back. "I wouldn't leave you here alone for anything. Besides, I want to see this Ken you've told me about," She grinned as Heather opened her eyes to give her a flat look.
"You had damn well better be kidding," Heather laughed as she let her head fall backwards again.
"Mind if I watch?" Schuldig strolled into the room with a glass of milk and a handful of cookies.
"If you can't deal with our friendship go jerk off in the bathroom," Heather growled.
"Wow," Brittany was almost shocked by Heather's harsh (for her) words. "You are stressed!"
"Naw, it's no fun alone," Schuldig smirked as he thunked down on Youji's bed and bounced the sleeping man.
"Leave him alone!" Brittany hissed at the redhead until he waved his cookies at her in a kind of apology.
"Okay, okay, I'll be careful," Schuldig stuffed a cookie in his mouth and downed it with a gulp of milk.
"You'd better be," Heather glared at him until she was satisfied that he wasn't going to try anything more. "What do you people have against Youji, anyway?"
"He stole some disk that we were sent to retrieve by our current employer. I don't suppose you happened to see said disk lying around when you patched him up?" Schuldig sighed when both girls shook their heads. "I guess we get to do this the old-fashioned way of cat and mouse then."
"Schuldig, bring them out here," Crawford's voice traveled clearly from the living room.
"Ja, hold on a minute, Crawford," Schuldig lazily stood and motioned them towards the door. "Let's go see what his highness wants now."
*****
An hour later Heather crawled tiredly into her sleeping bag and settled for the evening. After briefing them on the duties of hostages Crawford had asked for a tour of Heather's house and decided on sleeping arrangements. Schuldig and Nagi were to have the bunk beds in her youngest brothers' room, Farfarello was to stay on the sun room couch during the night, Crawford was going to use Aaron's small room at night and the girls were to bed down at the foot of the bed Youji was in. After some vehement nagging Brittany was able to convince Crawford to keep Farfarello in Aaron's room most of the time and sleep on the large living room couch himself. Using the excuse that he would have to keep watch on them anyway she claimed the small couch and Heather had thrown up her hands in defeat and gone to grab a sleeping bag for herself.
After setting up her bed below Youji, Heather had gone down to her room with Brittany and found suitable pajama's for the both of them. They had returned with two more sleeping bags -- one for Brittany and one for Crawford -- and had been promptly ordered to go to bed. Wishing a good night to Brittany, Heather had picked up a pillow and headed immediately for her sleeping bag. Letting the soft down of the bag soothe her, Heather curled up on her inflatable mat and went straight to sleep.
*****
At some point during the night Heather woke suddenly and froze until she realized where she was. She climbed out of her sleeping bag and quietly walked to the kitchen to get a drink before returning to bed. Opening the fridge she held a foot out to keep it open while she grabbed a mug from the cupboard and then pulled a box of apple juice from the middle shelf. She filled the mug and was reaching back to open the fridge again when her hand encountered fabric.
"Who...?" She whirled around and found Crawford staring at her quietly. "Why are you up?"
"I could ask you the same question," His looked down at her disapprovingly, his eyes narrowing to a glare.
"I was just getting a drink..." Heather mumbled and shifted slightly, completely conscious of the fact that she was in baggy jogging pants and a short nightgown with Snoopy on the front. She put down the small mug decorated with kittens peeking over a fence and tried to get around him.
"Well, now that you have it you might as well drink it. Don't let it go to waste," Crawford didn't move until Heather picked up the mug again and gulped down her juice.
"Happy now?" Heather walked past Crawford into the sun room and sat on the arm of the couch.
"Why aren't you going back to bed?" Crawford paced after her and kept glaring at her.
"Because I don't want to, I'm not tired anymore," Heather splayed her legs out in front of her and leaned forwards to stare out the window at the trees and stars lit faintly by the moon. "Go away."
"I'm not going back to bed until you do," Crawford gracefully sat himself in the rocking chair in the corner and watched her through partially closed eyes.
"Fuck off," Heather got up and walked into the room Farfarello had been assigned to. She sat herself down on the bed beside him and started into his one amber eye. "You couldn't sleep either, huh?"
"No," Farfarello seemed surprised by the fact that she'd actually come into his room, let alone talked to him. "There are to many signs of God in this house.
"Don't worry about it, my parents are just pastors," Heather looked around the room as Farfarello made a small growling sound in the back of his throat. "And you got one of the most unchristian rooms in the house, anyway."
"God has made this place sacred, I must defile it with sin," Farfarello growled and strained against his straight jacket.
"Yeah, whatever," Heather smirked slightly and looked into space. "Like God will actually care if you slice up a few books or smash some pictures."
"I'll pour yer blood across His holy things," Farfarello muttered ominously.
"Look, let me give you a hint. My blood isn't holy enough to make God cry and it never will be. Don't even bother trying to slice me up," Heather turned to look at Farfarello again. "Why don't you try finding some other goal. There are a lot easier and more rewarding things to do than spilling blood that's already tainted. What makes God cry the most is probably what a human does to his or herself throughout life, not how painfully they die or if you spill blood on some 'holy' pages."
"Ye lie," Farfarello's eye was opened wide in surprise. "Ye, th' child o' two o' God's most precious humans, speaks blasphemy..."
"And your point would be...?" Heather stood and began to leave the room. "Has anyone ever told you that you have a one track mind?"
"Why d' ye say such things?" Farfarello asked her.
"I don't know," Heather turned to look at him, "but sometimes I wish I did."
"Are you ready to return to bed now that you've had your little theological discussion?" Brad asked as she shut the door behind herself.
"No, you go ahead. I'm just going to sit here for a while if you don't mind," Heather returned to the arm of the couch. "I really don't need to have an eye kept on me like a small child."
"Fine," Crawford stood and walked back towards the living room. "If you wake up and think about taking any more midnight walks in the future try and quell the urge."
"Sure," Heather waited until he had gone then flopped over onto the couch and stretched out to look through the windows at the night sky. "This really sucks..." She whispered as Farfarello started mumbling to himself again in his room. "I feel like I've just lost fifteen years of my life and have reverted to babyhood with Brad as a bitchy father."
::Shut up and go back to sleep,:: A slightly sleep-fuzzy and irritated voice brushed across her mind.
"Go away," She sighed as she got up and tiptoed back to her sleeping bag, making sure to check on Youji before sliding back into her bag and tossing herself back into the arms of sleep.
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