Miss Europa Disco Dancer

Part 2.


Once again, don't own, don't sue. Situation mine, characters and songs, nu-uh


They got into the car in silence, neither of them looking at each other nor speaking until Yohji
finally turned on the engine.

"Ken.."

"Yohji.."

They fell silent at the same time. Yohji laughed softly and ran a hand through his hair.

"Ken...eh..let's just talk about it at home. After everything's done, okay?"

Ken pursed her lips but nodded.

Yohji pulled out of the parking lot and into the road and was driving quickly to headquarters
when Ken finally spoke up after several minutes of uncharacteristic silence.

"Do you..Do..You regret it?"

Yohji was glad he wasn't drinking. He would have for sure given the world one of the greatest
spit takes ever if he had.

He had no answer to that simple question. So he did the sneaky flip.

"Do you?"

He hated doing that, but he needed to buy time to figure out exactly how he felt about what
happened in the club. He was shocked, surprised, happy he was still alive..but regret really wasn't
an emotion that had been connected to the experience as far as he knew.

Ken looked out the window before slowly shaking her head.

"Why do you think I would then?" He asked.

A shrug was his only answer.

"Did you do it only because of the mission?" Ken asked him, her voice low.

Yohji pulled out a cigarette and stuck in his mouth. He chewed on the filter for a few minutes
before finally lighting it, all the while mulling over Ken's question while trying to decide what the
answer to that was.

"No. I did it cause I wanted to. Nothing more, nothing less."

Ken nodded.

"Do you want to continue?"

Yohji blew out the smoke into the dark night and watched as it dissipated into the darkness.

"Yeah. Even though the voices in my head are telling me it may not be best thing for the both of
us."

Ken laughed then and leaned over to look into his eyes.

"Yeah. The voices in my head are agreeing. But.." She tilted her head and looked up at the sky
and at the moon that hung like a silver sickle in the sky.

"It will be worth it and for that fact alone, I could hardly give a fuck."

~*~*~*~*

"Where yellow roses bloom

A sacred mountain near Peterborough where clouds paint a picture so calm.."

It had started, the dance between them. A waltz of attraction that involved intricate steps between
them. A look, a touch, a flower left in a room. Roses, Gentians, Cattleyas. Poems. Slips of paper
slipped under doors. Omi and Aya tried not to see it. They knew that if they pushed too hard, the
movements would become stiff. The waltz would falter and the dancers would pull away.

The only time the dance was put away was when night fell. It was locked into the further parts of
their minds.

They didn't want for the waltz to be crumpled and stained with the blood of their missions.

The purity would be gone. The sweetness would fade. And everything would go to waste.
Nothing would remain the same.

Yohji wanted it that way. He knew he wouldn't be able to deal with it if his personal life bled into
his professional life. Ken understood the separateness and obeyed it.

On the rooftops, in the alley-ways, they weren't Kenken and Yotan. They were Siberian and
Balinese. Partners in death. Nothing more.

"What are they doing in there?

Have they got guns?

Make you run up and down the same hill

And they'll break your will.."

"Balinese, Abyssinian in position." The comm crackled and Yohji let his hand drop to his side.

"I hope it's quick." He muttered over to Abyssinian, who was standing opposite from him, his
eyes trained on the entrance. Yohji looked up, checking the rafters just in case.

They had completed the first part of the mission, which was destroying the guards while Ken and
Omi got inside and grabbed evidence. The target was expected at 01.15 hrs. It was now 00.36
hrs.

The second phase would require them to kill the target and flee the scene after lg itg it low. They
would go home and file the report before calling it all a night's work.

"They will be." Aya had muttered back, his words clipped and short, as if he hated to waste the
effort and time that it took to speak.

Yohji shrugged and kept at his scrutiny of the dark warehouse, all the while wondering what the
hell was so fascinating about warehouses that most evil organizations needed them as
headquarters.

"And they always have a small office in the back." he mused as his eyes focused on the
aforementioned structure where Omi was busy downloading all of the files in the database and
Ken was keeping watch on his back, that much he could tell by the fuzzy shapes he occasionally
saw moving.

"Well," he thought with a smirk "At least this one had the distinction of having a door leading to
the outside."

He still wasn't sure whether it was a liability or not.

"The files are 74% done." Bombay's voice crackled over the comm.

"Roger." Balinese replied, feeling relieved about the speedy download. He wanted the mission to
be over soon. Not only was he getting paranoid (more so than usual) he had the annoying feeling
that something wasn't in place. He couldn't put his finger on why he was feeling that way, but he
was. And he knew that the sooner the mission was over, the sooner the feeling would go away.

He shuffled a bit in his position and earned himself a glare from Aya. Feeling guilty, he forced
himself to remain still and look at something else.

He had just focused his attention on the dusty windows and their gratings when the screeching of
rusted hinges and the loud metallic bang of a door being slammed brought him out of his zone-out..and in time to see three men, including the target, barge into the office.

'Shit!" Aya cursed as he and Yohji rushed over to the office to help Omi and Ken.

Lights flooded the small structure just in time for the older Weiss to witness Ken going into
action.

She was good. She had killed one of the men right away, his throat nothing more than a raw ruin,
and was now doing short work of the other with her bugnuks. She had just thrust the metal blades
into the abdomen and twisted, the man's entrails then oozing out of the gory hole she had
shredded when Aya and Yohji stepped in.

Ken pulled her hands out of the man's ripped belly and had spun to send the other man into hell,
but he was just a fraction faster and had manget get get all ten inches of his serrated hunting knife
into Ken's torso, ripping up flesh and muscle before sinking into her lung and possibly other
internal organs.

Ken's eyes widened as she pitched forwards, the surprise clear on her face even after the man
threw her off.

He thought he had won, that much was certain by the way he smiled down at her before ripping
the knife out, leaving a wide open wound were bone could be seen.

He still thought that when the filament wire came out of nowhere and snapped his neck seconds
before a cool metal blade severed his head from his shoulders.

~*~*~*~*

"Was it Christmas or Groundhog Day when your friends turned to shadows

And they dragged you away

Tell nobody that you've been here, don't breathe a word that's been said

Now there's a scar upon your forehead..."

"How is he?" Omi asked as he gratefully took the cup of hot chai that Aya handed to him. Sitting
down at the kitchen table, Omi then took a sip of the hot, sweet liquid.

Aya didn't reply right away, since he was still in the middle of contemplated the night's events.

It had taken both of them to hold Yohji back as Ken was rushed into emergency, since the older
man had refused to let Ken out of his sight.
hadnhadn't spoken a word since he had rushed to Ken's side and worked hard to stanch the blood
flowing from the ghastly wound. He had worked like a madman and hadn't let anyone else touch
her until he had been forced to give her up to the skilled hands of the Kritiker doctors.

After she had disappeared from his sight, he had remained trapped in the eerie silence that had
fallen over him. He acted as if he were unaware of everything around him, his eyes dulled with
grief as he contemplated his life without Ken. Contemplated not being able to save the person he
loved. Again. Contemplated how he was going to live with the gaping hole in chest that grief
surely would tear out even more than before.

He barely registered his teammates leading him back to the car. He just followed them numbly.
Into the car. Out of the car when they arrived home. Into his bedroom. It wasn't until the door
clicked shut that he somehow pulled himself out of his fog and stripped off all of his bloody
mission clothes.

He sat there in the dark for several moments before he recalled he had to put on something if he
wanted to go out.

Opening the closet door with a rough yank, he looked inside. None of the clothes seemed to be
right. They were..too cheerful. Too flashy..too empty.

Shoving trousers and shirts aside after a perfunctory inspections, he finally stopped his maniacal
searching when his hand camecontcontact with a silky fabric.

Frowning, the blonde man pulled the garment off the hook and examined it closely.

It was a Sheffield United jersey.

He crumpled the fabric up and brought it to his face, the tears he had been expecting finally
pouring forth and soaking the fabric.

His legs gave out and he landed heavily on the carpeted ground with a muffled thump.

And cried.

Fifteen minutes later though, saw him dressed in the jersey, black trousers that didn't fit Ken
anymore and a black trench dug out from his closet.

His keys dangled from his hand as he quietly exited the flat. He passed Aya on the stairs and only
gave a sharp nod of acknowledgment to the other man before exiting in silence.

After that, Aya had come into the kitchen and made some c the the closest thing that he, with his
reserves saw as comfort drink. He took a few sips of the creamy drink before finally answering.

"Out." Came the calm reply. Omi put his cup down and looked at his older team-mate.

"Do you think it's a good idea to let him be by himself right now?"

Aya took a sip of his own chai before replying.

"No. Not really" Omi was about to complain when Aya's quiet voice continued on.

"His demons are in need to be laid to rest and he needs to do it by himself."

"Aren't you worried that he might do something?"

Aya shook his head, his hair swishing softly with the movement.

"I'm worried he *won't* do anything and let it eat him alive from the inside out."

Omi nodded and finished off his tea in silence before walking up to his room.

On the way there though, he noticed Ken's door was open. Deciding to close it, he turned and
reached for the door-knob. His hand though, remained there as he then looked around the room.

The place was neat. Not extremely so, but that couldn't be helped since Ken was such a pack-rat.
Comics, sketch books, CD's and clothes were all sitting around in tidy piles. Soccer posters were
on the walls. A soccer ball sat in the corner. A messy bed on which a deep red rose lay alongside
a card with her name written on it in Yohji's careful Kanji.

Seeing the card and the rose, Omi then scrubbed at his eyes while trying to force the tears back
that were pooling at the corners of his eyes before turning around and slamming the door shut.

~*~*~*~*

"Whether Mount Pinatubo

Or the threat of God's love

There'll always be something that's raining

Down from above"

The graveyard was deserted. Fittingly enough, it was raining. A damp drizzle that soaked deep
into the flesh and bones, making it seem as if a person's soul was leached out of every warm
emotion they had ever held.

He walked on though. Kept on walking through the family plots, not caring that his hair was
sodden and water was dripping into his collar and running down his back, making the jersey stick
to his shoulders and waist.

It was cold. Extremely cold, but he ignored it. It didn't matter if he got sick. He hadn't anything
to live for. He hadn't anyone to smile for anymore.

He knew that there could be a chance that Kenwoulwould pull through, but the kept that thought
squelched down as far as it would go.

He didn't want to have the hope only to have it crushed as it was with Neu.

Never again.

He didn't think he had enough of a heart left to shatter in the same way. Nor did he care to find
out.

He kept on walking, trying to block out the thoughts tumbling through his mind, not caring where
he went, only wanting his mind to be stilled by his walking.

As he walked, he asked himself whether he had been a fool in thinking that things would have
turned out differently this time. That maybe he had expected too much from Ken. After all, it
seemed that every person he had deemed strong enough to stay, had left. Either abandoned him,
like his bitch of a gaijin mother had, like his father had, or died. Like Asuka.

He sighed. He must be a pathetic person if he was still hoping that someone would stay.

He just his thoughts off when he found himself standing at the front of the Kritiker Medical
Center. He laughed bitterly when he saw the cool, efficient looking building looming in front of
him. Yep, he was a pathetic individual.

He stood there for several moments, debating whether he should aspire to higher levels of
masochism when a woman accidentally shoved him into the lobby and decided his course of
action for him.

Shrugging, he headed over to the elevators. Might as well get on with it.

~*~*~*

He felt like an idiot. A masochistic, pathetic idiot.

He had been so focused on his own woe-begone little diatribe that he had completely forgotten to
check for a room number. He at least recalled Aya and Omi talking in the car anntiontioning the
floor they had placed Ken at before they had left the hospital. That at least saved him some
embarrassment. He had debated peeking into rooms, but had been lucky enough to have run into
a pretty nurse that saved him from a potentially embarrassing situation.

He was grateful for the girl looking up the information, since he really didn't need to add
'humiliation' to his growing list of why he was such a waste of space.

Luckily, he had been on the East wing and Ken was in the west Wing of the fourth floor. All he
needed to do was retrace his steps and turn left at the elevators.

"Then it's not ICU?" He asked the nurse as he pocketed the slip of paper she had written the
information and her phone number.

"No. That's on the third floor. Fourth floor is surgery and recovery." She informed him.

Yohji nodded, still not trusting the supposedly good news just yet.

"Thank you." he turned to leave when the nurse became bold and grabbed his arm.

"Hey, maybe after you visit your friend, we could go for coffee and talk. I'm off in half an hour."

Yohji blinked before removing his arm from her grasp.

"Sorry to disappoint you, but it's not my friend I'm going to visit, but my girlfriend."

She pouted at that, but the gleam in her eyes told him she was far from discouraged.

"Well then..maybe in the future then?" She pressed on hopefully.

Yohji smiled, but shook his head. "Sorry. This one's a keeper."

He replied before smoothly walking away from her to search for Ken, leaving her staring furiously
after him.

~*~*~*~*

"With grace we will suffer
With grace we shall recover
There by the grace of God
There by the grace of God "

Her face was practically as white as the pillow her head rested on, the only splash of colour being
her black and red hair and the pale blue blankets covering her. Tubes were in her nose and in her
mouth. I.V. lines were in both arms, making her look like a corpse in his opinion.

He would have thought her dead if he hadn't grabbed her hand and felt the warmth of it bleeding
into his own cold hands, or the way her chest rose and fell with the ventilator pumping air into her
lungs.

He rubbed small circles on the back of her hand with his thumb and stared blankly at her,
completely at a loss for what to do now that he was there. Now that he had seen proof she hadn't
deserted him like the rest.

"She's a fighter." a low, almost toneless voice remarked. Light footsteps followed it, stopping
right beside Yohji.

He didn't look up. He could tell from the black trousers and plain black shoes who it was.

"I never said she wasn't."

A humourless, harsh laugh was his answer.

"You gave up on her before we even got her here."

"Wouldn't you have? She was bleeding her life out in my coat!"

"Very true. But I didn't think she was going to give up and die so easily."

Yohji looked up then, and was met by a blank, carefully neutral face that reminded him way too
closely of a decorative porcelain mask. Not even the violet eyes seemed real. They looked like
amethysts, cut so carefully and crafted so well that a careless glance could give emotion to their
crystalline depths.

"This isn't even about her, isn't it?" Yohji flinched and shook his head.

"I don't know what it is about, Aya. I was so careful, when I came to be Weiss. I was so careful
not to get that close to all of you. Then I found myself falling in love, and it hurts. It hurts
knowing that I can't get up in the morning and forget your names. Forget everything except the
feeling of tenderness between warm sheets and embraces."

Aya frowned, shattering the porcelain mask of his features.

"Would you rather be lost? Would you rather have everything be locked up and bleeding inside?"

He jammed his hands in his pockets and looked at the unconscious Siberian.

"We're all lost. We're all afraid of being alone. Being abandoned." Aya whispered, thinking of his
own sister, who lay in her own cocoon of dreams. Dreams that he hoped were better than his life.

"We have to make the choice of finding something, holding onto something before we fade away.
Before we become so jaded, so disconnected from everything that we just turn into ghosts to keep
company to the phantoms already in our heads."

Yohji bit his lip at those words.

"Why are you choosing the other route then?"

Aya looked down at him and smiled bitterly.

"I don't have enough strength to come back, only to point out the routes to others."

He replied softly before he left the room, leaving Yohji staring after him.

~*~*~*~*~*~

"A voice so pure

A vision so clear

I gotta learn to live like you

learn to sing like you."

He found her sitting up, being propped up by many pillows, her face turned to the window.

At first, he thought she was watching the rainl, bl, but on a closer inspection, he found that she
was asleep.

The sight of her lying there, her mouth slightly open as she breathed in and out made him smile.

He shook his head before putting down the arrangement he had made for her on her bedside table.
Even though her room was filled with flowers from neighbors, the boys and the soccer team, he
still wanted to give her the flowers he had picked out for her.

Smiling slightly, he sat down and watched her as she slept savouring the way her eyelashes rested
like half-moons on her cheeks and how her skin, so pale weeks before was looking healthy once
again.

It had taken at least several weeks for Ken to begin to heal from her injuries, since a torn lung
and internal bleeding as well as the complications that arose from them, despite Ken's usual
stamina; were taking their sweet time to heal. Which in turn left a lot of time for Yohji to reflect
over what Aya had said to him, his own hang-ups and what exactly he was going to do when the
time came to make a decision.

These things he kept stewing over as he watched Ken, or when he tossed and turned in his bed as
he waited for Ken to exit the fog she inhabited due to physical pain and morphine.

Lucidity had returned to Ken a few nights prior, but it hadn't been the time to bring up anything
serious. Especially not in front of his other team-mates and especially not when she had just
woken up.

It had taken a wha while to get the perfect opportunity to talk to Ken, namely because she had so
many visitors or nurses poking about at any given time he had visited. Or he had simply chickened
out and had sat making stupid jokes to cover up his reluctance.

But when he had woken up today, he knew that today was the day.

Deciding on that, he had quickly cleaned up, got dressed in the Sheffield jersey and track pants,
grabbed the arrangement he had made earlier and had sped off to the hospital.

There he was now, watching her sleep and laughing at himself as he did so.

"It figures." He shook his head and sat back in the chair. He checked his watch and his smile grew
wider. Breakfast would come soon, he knew that much from being jolted awake by the orderlies
after managing several vigils in the first crucial week of Ken's convalescence.

He had been sitting there for a short while when he felt a poke in his arm that made him
practically fall of his chair in astonishment.

"Sorry. I didn't meant to scare you!! I just wanted to get your attention!" Ken apologized, her
tone one of utter mortification.

"Hey, no worries. It's cool." Yohji reassured her as he settled himself on the chair once again.

"How're you feeling today?" He asked once he was comfortably settled.

"Bored. It sucks being here!" Ken exclaimed, running her hands through her hair.

"There's practically nothing to do here and there's no footie on the telly..and I want to go home
and play soccer! Hell, even the stupid girls and guys at the shop would be better than hanging out
here!"

Yohji had to laugh at the outburst. Yep, Kenken was sure feeling better if she had enough energy
to go into a full-blown rant like that.

"Can't you do something, Yotan?" Ken whined.

"Nope. Sorry Kiddo. You know what the doctor said. You have to stay here for another week."
Yohji told her in a stern voice that should have made it obvious to Ken she wasn't going to get
anywhere with him.

Ken opened her mouth to protest, but Yohji cut her off before she could get a word out.

"Ken, no. You were practically dead when we brought you in, okay? These past few weeks have
been waiting and watching that you didn't slip in a coma or that you didn't get any fatal infections
from the operations. You nearly died, Ken. And I'm sure as hell not going to have you relapse or
worse just because of your impatience, understood?"

Ken blinked at the vehemence of Yohji's words.

"But Yotan..."

"Ken..." Yohji sighed and looked Ken straight in the eyes as he then spoke.

"Ken, if that fucker had driven the knife with a bit more force, he would have reached your heart.
It was bad enough as it was. When I picked you up and wrapped you in my coat, it seemed like
you had practically bled dry. I..I..I thought you were going to die for sure. When they told me you
were going ake ake it, I didn't believe them. Especially not when you cn't n't breathe on your
own or when your lung got infected. I nearly lost you at least three times this past month. I'm not
going to take any chances that it might happen again."

Ken closed her eyes at the pain-filled words she had just heard.

"I'm..I'm.. I Yohji. I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking.."

"No. I know. You shouldn't have to apologize. After all, you're the convalescent here right?"

"It doesn't give me an excuse to be a wanker though. Especially not to someone that cares about
me." Ken replied softly.

"Ken. I care. It's true. But I also love you. Desperately. I can't conceive living without you. I
don't want to remember my life before you came in it. You are..who I live for."

Ken blinked and watched Yohji take one of her hands and cradle it gently between his own.

"I know I wasn't saying it loud and clear before. Mainly because I was scared of being left behind.
That has always been my fear and my curse. Being left behind."

He shook his head and smiled bitterly.

"My mother was the first one. She left me in a motel room in Hong Kong so she could return to
her family in Germany. Then it was my father, who left me in a convent. After that, it was.."

His voice gave out for several seconds before he continued.

"Asuka. It hurt, being left behind. It hurt and I never wanted to experience that pain again. I never
planned on liking, much less falling in love with any of you. You were my team-mates and I
preferred it that way until a year ago. I found myself actually..caring. I found myself listening to
you talk about soccer. I found myself worrying about Omi's grades. I found myself even caring
about Aya! It was so gradual that I didn't even think of it until I brought you home after this
happened to you."

He took a deep breath before continuing.

"I found the feelings getting stronger, but I didn't act on them. I knew that if you left, I would
have failed again. I would have failed in not only keeping you safe, but being able to keep you
from leaving me. I couldn't handle another person having that power. But at the club, it became
something worth giving. And sure enough, you nearly were taken away from me."

Ken bit her lip as she watched Yohji struggle with the tears that were threatening to spill over and
failing miserably. She watched him in silence as he began to cry, loud sobs wracking his body as
he did so.

Shtchetched impassively until he had finally cried all of his emotions out and was now sitting
silent and much more calmer than before.

"But I wasn't." Ken's quiet voice made him stop his sniffling and look at

"Yohji...I don't know what is going to happen. I can't see that far ahead. I just can see what's in
front of me. Right now, I see a man that is sweet, and kind and has been hurt way too often by the
world. I see a man that is afraid of opening up in case he can't take the pain of losing someone
else."

Ken sighed and reached over to smooth back Yohji's honey-blonde hair away from his face.

"I wish I could tell you that I't e't ever leave you, but I can't. Or that I will be beside you when
you draw your last breath, but I can't. Everyone dies alone, there's no help for that. The only
thing I can tell you is that while you and I are alive, I will love you as much as I can. I won't ever
leave you, unless I can't help it. I will always care about you, even after you or I or both of us are
gone. That is all I can promise you, but I promise it with all my being."

Yohji nodded, digesting the words she had said to him.

It wasn't the perfect declarations of love he had read in novels, or seen in movies. Or heard
deluded fools make in the street or in dark cafes.

But it was the most honest, pure and simplest one he had ever heard. And that made it sweeter
than anything else he had ever, or was ever to hear.

"Thank you." He murmured as he leaned over and sealed the promise with a kiss.


Ende


Notes: Songs used are as follows:

"Miss Europa Disco Dancer", "Let Robeson Sing", "There by the Grace of God." All by Manic
Street Preachers.

"Down From Above" By Moxy Fruvious.

I also have nothing against industrial and I'm quite aware of the pronoun errors, since they were
made on purpose.