Schlaf, Herzig Ermorde III
--By Youko Fujima
I loved her. I really did, and it’s a myth I didn’t love her cuz I fuckin’ killed her. But I seriously loved her, even if I go around getting new girlfriends everyday.
She was very pretty, very elegant. Her face had beautifully large blue eyes that could drown a person if looked into too long. I guess that was what prompted me to fall in love with her. She claimed that she liked me as well, and so we moved in together during college. While living with her, I found that she really lived up to her name, Asuka. Every morning I woke up, she would have a different scent on her, and always sweet.
God forgive me, I was always so stubborn when we were together. But she always put up with it and lived with me. For instance, I would never trust or listen to anything I didn’t hear myself from the original speaker, which frustrated her. Another one of my stubbornness came from the fact that I was a perfectionist. I always went too deeply into cases; I always wanted to solve the cases. This trait in me killed her for the first time eventually…no, it killed "her." Another person was born in her body after that… Asuka died on that case, that mission, "Neu" was someone else…
Can I convince myself to believe that? Can I convince myself that the woman I killed was not Asuka, but some woman who looked and sounded exactly like her? No, I goddamn can’t. If I were that shallow, I wouldn’t be wallowing over it now.
I really don’t want to get all philosophical or anything… But I really feel that way. If anything… Anything at all, I would want to just see her smile and hear her laugh when I tell her, "Thank you muchly." I love that. So did she.
********************
I must’ve been gaping at him for quite some time; his green gaze had flashed a few times from blinking as we stared at each other. The man in front of me asked his question again, "Who are you? Where am…?" He interrupted himself and glanced in the mirror on the table next to the bed. A shocked cry erupted from his lips as he looked at his own image. Another voice mingled with his cry, it was my scream.
"Youji!"
********************
What in the world happened?! I was in a strange room not my own, and someone was calling me "Youji." I stared at the redhead in front of me, who stared at me as if I was some sort of alien. My eyes zipped over to the mirror quickly.
Brown hair. I had brown hair, like my cousin’s. As soon as I calmed down, I explained what happened the night before to the redhead in front of me, who told me his name was "Aya."
"My name is Uriel Tier, I am Youji’s first cousin," I started, the redhead looking at me as if what was coming out of my mouth was a joke. "I was born of his mother’s brother. That’s why we look so much alike. But my hair was originally blond, I don’t know why it was dyed…" Aya shifted in the folding chair he sat one in front of me, his suspicion dying seemingly.
"A few days ago, Youji phoned me and told me that he thinks he’s going to die. That was the first time in two years since he contacted me, and everyone said he was dead. So I decided I should go to him. He told me he was in Tokyo, so I took a plane from New York the next day. He picked me up last night from the airport, and then I don’t know what happened…"
The room seemed to go quiet all of a sudden. Aya gawked at me for what seemed like an eternity. "Look, I can prove it to you!" I shouted, reaching for the duffel bag next to the bed I laid on. From it, I took out a photo album. Flipping though a few pages, I turned the heavy leather bound book over to Aya.
********************
Apparently, this seemed like a joke to me. The man in front of me looked too much like Youji and sounded too much like him to not be him. But as the plastic-smelling book was handed to me, my doubt was drowned out by the harsh reality. The photo showed a boy, perhaps no more than 18, standing next to a younger looking Youji, posing in the traditional "Nippon Ichi" pose. The boy next to Youji had shoulder-length blond hair with green eyes, his smile as wide as Youji’s. The two, standing together, looked almost like twins. At the corner of the photo, Youji’s calligraphy written in Sharpie Marker read: "Hey Uriel! –Yo-tan."
My eyes flashed from the photo to the man in front of me and back again. "Then…" I began, pointing at the photo, "What happened to Youji?"
The door to the bedroom opened then, and Birman stepped in with her annoying high-heels. "He’s dead," she announced.
********************
"What??" Uriel squeaked, leaning forward on the bed, "He’s dead? What happened?" Aya sat quietly on the folding chair, trying not to look surprised. Birman closed the bedroom door behind her and walked in front of the bed.
"He’s dead, I said," she spoke with a nonchalant tone, "He went to pick you up at the airport last night, and apparently took a couple of drinks on the way back. The car swerved and crashed." Uriel watched her intently as the words rolled out of her mouth. Birman flopped onto the bed, sitting herself on the edge of it. Her large obsidian eyes rolled in their sockets to look at Aya then glanced back at Uriel. "You were more or less unharmed, Youji died instantly in the crash. You managed to get out of the car with your duffel bag and collapsed a couple of yards away from the burning car."
Aya stood up from his sitting position finally and his eyes held the look of bewilderment. "Then…" he stammered, "Uriel is…"
Birman smiled and looked back and forth in an instant at Aya and Uriel. "Uriel is the replacement of Youji. Like it or not, Youji can be called the pillar of Weiss for being the eldest and perhaps the most skilled fighter in the group. He is the only one within you guys who doesn’t have a weapon with a blade on it, you know," she took in a large swallow of breath before continuing. "If Youji were to die right here, what would happen to Weiss? So he needs to live for a while longer." Aya’s eyes widened in disbelief, disbelief that Youji was no more than a lamb, a sacrifice to Weiss.
"How can you do that?!" Uriel cut in, "My parents…they’ll wonder where I’m at…" Birman smiled, her smile almost poisoning the air. "Youji’s body was burned to near-cinders in the fire. We’ve already shipped the remains to your family in New York. Your files in the census and citizenship are now permanently deleted. You—Uriel Tier, are considered dead."
********************
What was this woman saying?! It all seemed too fantasized for me to believe. Fighter… Weiss…it all sounded jumbled to me, what did Youji do during the two years after we heard he died? What was this woman talking about?!
"But Birman, this boy cannot fight!" Aya shouted from the side, "He has no idea of how to use Youji’s weapon…" The woman, "Birman," slid her gaze to Aya and interrupted him, "I’ll give him a gun and keep him away from the others on missions. Don’t worry." I tugged on the sleeve of the pajamas I wore-- a nervous habit, and looked at the two of them exchange glances.
Suddenly Birman stood up. "Understand now? You can only live as Youji Kudo now. If you dare try to do anything that’ll go against this, you’ll just be another dead body," she threatened. "And Aya…" she breathed, turning her attention to Aya again, "I trust you to not tell anyone, either." Her gaze looked as if she had a hold on him. "Tell him the basics of Weiss later after the shop closes. Right now, you need to go and help with the flower shop." With that, she walked out the room; Aya following her, looking back only a few seconds before the door clicked shut.
How in the world did this happen? Is this a dream? This must be a dream… It couldn’t happen like this in real life!!!
I tried to convince myself that this was a dream, which was too weird to happen! This couldn’t have happened…it’s not real! It can’t be real…
It’s a dream…so I’ve got to fall asleep, and then wake up again… My body didn’t let me sleep, however. All I could really feel was the excruciating pain that shot out from my wrist. I wanted to scream, but my mouth felt so dry that I couldn’t. I was only able to sit there on Youji’s bed, in Youji’s clothes, listening to the ticking of the clock outside. The pain seemed not to be my own, shocking me.
Let me sleep!! Let me wake up from this nightmare!
Part Three End
Author’s Rants: And yet another really horrible chapter to a really horrible fic… You can tell where this is going if you’ve ever read "Kaine" by Kaori Yuuki… Uriel was my own character. The name "Uriel" belongs to the Angel of Death, so to relate to Youji. The story is going to get much darker after this, so watch out… Flames to
youkofujima@hotmail.com. Thanks! ^o^
