The Valley of the Shadow of Death
Rokesmith

Disclaimer: Weiss Kreuz, its characters, indices etcetera belong to Takehito Koyasu, Kyoko Tsuchiya and Project Weiss. This fanfic was written for fun rather than profit and any resemblances to persons living or dead are purely coincidental.

Author's Note: This fanfic is something of a team effort. It is the twin of quietladybirman's fic Through a Glass Darkly. The overall plot of the story – centring on a captured Ken – was her idea, and we worked on it together. However became clear that in order to tell the full story properly, the fic would need to split into two very different parts: one focussed on Ken and the other on the rest of Weiss. While she wrote Ken's experiences, she asked me to relate the story of his capture and the efforts of his teammates to get him back. Both parts can be read separately, but together they provide a more complete understanding of the tale.

Warnings: Later chapters of this story deal with mature themes including premature burial and torture, which some readers may find disturbing. Rated for language and implied physical and sexual abuse.

Chapter One: Trouble is Near

Youji Kudou stood in a car park on the outskirts of Shibuya, beside the remains of a shattered radio. It was definitely Ken's, he had instantly recognised the large orange headphones that Ken wore as camouflage, blending into the crowds as just another young man walking along listening to a CD player.

"Ken!" he shouted. "Ken!"

No answer, just the reply of his own voice echoing between the cars and the concrete walls. He had not expected one. The radio and headphones were smashed, crushed by something heavy, and in the empty space beside them Youji could easily make out the dark streaks left by tires; rubber abandoned on the ground as the vehicle had accelerated towards the exit ramp.

Youji gave the area one last look over, getting down on his knees and peering under cars for any sign of his friend, but there was nothing. Then, for the fifth time in ten minutes he swore, loudly and helplessly, and then turned and ran as fast as he could towards the subway station.

* * *

It had started the same way any mission did. It was closing time on a Wednesday afternoon. Omi was in the back room with the takings, Ken was carrying the final plant in from outside, Aya was trying to shoo the last schoolgirls out so they could close the shutters, and Youji was leaning against the table, idly pushing a potted plant back and forth and wondering how long he should leave it before he started threatening them with the hose.

Then he saw Manx.

She appeared out of the dusk and stepped calmly into the shop. Her blue eyes swept over the scene inside – Ken momentarily freezing as she looked at him, Aya giving barely a nod of acknowledgement – before settling on Youji. He smiled at her, his best broad friendly smile, but it was not returned. It never was, but he tried anyway. Manx was one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen, even more beautiful for the fact that she was completely unobtainable. The eyes were cool, calm and detached; she was, Youji thought, like a nurse, unwilling to let herself feel for those she watched over because she knew what might happen to them. Even so, some part of him longed to see behind the facade, to know the woman beneath.

Ken snapped his fingers in front of Youji's eyes. "Earth to Kudou." He snapped them again, then looked up nervously. "Hi."

Manx didn't resist as Youji slipped his arm around her waist, half enjoying the whisper running through the girls by the door. "Is she Youji's girlfriend? She's really pretty."

Aya used the distraction to force the girls through the door, then he and Ken closed the shutters. Manx, apparently oblivious to the arm around her waist, walked into the back room. Omi looked up from his accounting and then sprang to his feet. He gave Manx a brief bow and then hurried down the stairs into the basement where he waited in the chair. Youji had enough time to make himself comfortable on the sofa, lounging back as though he were about to watch a movie he'd rented, before Ken and Aya arrived. Ken slumped next to him and Aya leaned against the wall by the door, and then Manx started the message from Persia.

"Men of Weiss..."

Youji had lost count of the number of times he had heard those words from the silhouette behind the desk. If he was honest with himself, he didn't want to count. It was a lie anyway. At first he had been the only man in Weiss, now there were two, but Ken and Omi were still just boys. The only thing, he thought, that the four members of Weiss actually had in common was that they took orders to do murder from a shadow, for reasons none of them really understood.

Then he forced it all back down, deep into the dark part of himself where he only dared look when he was too drunk or too lonely to stop himself, and concentrated on the briefing. Boys disappearing from all over Tokyo; boys younger than Omi, the oldest fifteen and the youngest eight. A dozen that Kritiker could count for certain, and all of them in the past few months. Two bodies had been found, buried in cheap coffins in the woods just outside Tokyo. Each skeleton had at least one bone missing leading the police to blame a cult, but Kritiker had discovered the truth. The killer was, in fact, Takeshi Nakajima, a popular young artist fashioning sculptures out of, amongst other things, bone; bone that a Kritiker agent had determined came from a prepubescent boy. The other target was the artist's patron, Gabriel Morin, the cultural attaché at the French embassy, who was helping abduct the boys and using his diplomatic privileges to protect himself and Nakajima.

"I've heard about Nakajima," Youji explained as they left the basement. "I was out with a girl from the Asahi last night. Sumiko's the cultural reporter and she wouldn't shut up about him after I told her I did a bit of art. Of course, I didn't mention I just did sketching and knew nothing about sculpture."

"What's a cultural attaché do?" Ken asked.

"I don't know, Ken-kun," Omi replied. "I'll get into his records at the embassy and tell you when I find out."

"I hope you can read French," Aya said.

* * *

Ken drew the first shift following Morin the next day; on Thursdays he went to a particular food shop on the edge of Shibuya for special supplies. Ken knew the area well, it was, he said, a good place to food from around the world; there were not that many places in Tokyo for a Frenchman to buy something to eat that reminded him of home. Omi, as far as his school was concerned, would develop another nasty case of the flu while he set to work on the computer, slicing his way into the targets' lives with the precision of a surgeon, seeking, with infinite care, the point of greatest vulnerability, and that was where the surgeon analogy came to a frightening end. Youji claimed he would do some research of his own, and took Sumiko out for another date and let her tell him about how wonderful she thought Nakajima's work was. She clearly very rarely met men she could talk to about the art she loved, and expressed her gratitude for his enduring attention in no uncertain terms.

He drove home at two in the morning, listening to the Seven's engine purr in the darkness, and wondered what it was that was bothering him. It was nothing that he could name or point to, nothing he knew for certain, but it was there. It was more than the dawning realisation, as he arrived home, that with Omi on the computer and Ken tailing the target, he would have to get up at seven to open the shop with Aya. There was something obvious, something right in front of him that was bothering him, something that didn't make sense. The instinct that he relied on to keep him alive was demanding his attention, and he was tempted to wake up Ken and talk it over with him, but knew he would get nothing but abuse for his trouble. He fell into bed, staring at the ceiling, wishing he had something to go on beyond the certainty that something was wrong with the mission.

The next morning, all he felt was tired. Two cups of coffee, five minutes under a cold shower and a cigarette woke him up enough to get to breakfast and down to the shop, but he still felt like the outside world was happening at arm's length. Aya gave him a disinterested look that said the other man had expected nothing less, Omi disappeared into the basement without a word, and Ken, as he prepared to leave, suggested that maybe Youji should think about whether he had a morning shift before he went out for the night. Youji smiled back, pushed up his sunglasses, and prepared to confront the morning rush at the shop.

"I'll see you later, guys," Ken said as he picked up his headphones.

"Be careful, Ken," Youji called after him.

He did not know why he said it. Ken gave him a confused look, and then a cautious nod. Youji heard the back door open and then close, reassuring himself that Ken was as well trained as he was, that the boy had the reflexes of a cat and was about as easy to knock down as a brick wall. Then he wondered why he was so worried.

He pushed his sunglasses up to keep out the morning light and lounged by the cash register. The shop was already full of schoolgirls, but Youji gratefully realised it would be half an hour – forty-five minutes at most – before they actually had to go to school. Several of them asked after Omi and Ken, and he did his best to be friendly, but they were used to him being tired in the mornings. Aya was dealing with the girls who actually wanted flowers, encouraging purchases as only he could.

"Buy some flowers or leave."

He smiled and thought about dozing off, but that was not to be.

"Youji, can you wrap these flowers for me?"

Youji blinked and looked up at the dark haired girl standing calmly over him. He recognised the voice instantly, no other girl in the shop spoke with that kind of confidence.

"And when you've wrapped them," Ouka continued, "can you give them to Omi and tell him that I hope he feels better soon?"

There was no sign of Aya, so Youji dragged himself to his feet and did his best to organise the flowers. He made a mess of it, but Ouka politely ignored this. Youji Kudou was many things, but a great florist was not one of them.

"Will you tell me what he says when he gets them?" Ouka asked. "Not if it's something strange though. Omi does say the strangest things to me."

For a second, Youji froze. He was suddenly wide awake, and his mind finally latched on to what had been eluding it. Ouka had that effect on Omi, but Ken said strange things all the time. He'd been thinking last night that he wanted to talk to Ken about it, that Ken had a way of seeing the obvious, but Ken already had. Ken had said it. He'd put his finger on the nub of what Youji suddenly realised had been bothering him, and none of them had noticed.

He felt Ouka's curious glance, but forced himself to say it was nothing, take her money and promise to deliver the flowers. And once he was sure she was gone, he'd turned and bolted into the back room, dropping the flowers as he did so and hurrying down the stairs into the basement.

Omi looked up from the computer. "Youji-kun?" he said. "I've been looking at Morin's records at the embassy and there's something strange about them."

"Call Ken back!" Youji told him. "Now!"

"I just tried to get through," Omi replied, "but Ken-kun's not answering."

"Damn!" Youji exclaimed. "I'm going to get him."

"He's only been following Morin for half an hour," Omi told him. "What's wrong?"

"Ken saw it." Youji grabbed his coat. "A cultural attaché couldn't hide a murderer. Cultural attaché isn't even a real job. You said there's something odd about his records? Keep digging and you'll find out who he really is. And keep trying to get through to Ken!"

Omi nodded, fear in the big blue eyes. "What's wrong, Youji-kun?"

Youji was halfway through the back door, pulling his coat on, realising he hadn't actually answered Omi's question. All he could think about was getting to Ken, knowing that the Tokyo traffic would mean he would have to take the subway. He only just had enough sense left to turn and tell Omi the answer.

"He's a spy, Omi. The Frenchman's a spy."