"Can't I get out of this mission because of that Furrie one?" Schuldig asked. (See Malarkies & Mayhem- A/N)

"That one was taken care of while you were in Florida. Nagi covered for you." Crawford explained. Schuldig's eyes widened, while Nagi shuddered.

"You owe me big for that one Schuldig." Nagi spat.

"Hey, I wasn't exactly having a ball having my mind raped by toddlers." Schuldig said defensively.

"Either way, we're all unfortunately eligible for this mission and no amount of griping is getting us out of this." Crawford said with a long suffering sigh. He certainly hadn't wanted to accept it, not that refusing it had been an option. He'd tried claiming they were too busy guarding Takatori, but that was a fucking joke and Eszet knew it. The man had a private army at his command, so a mind sweep here, a vision there and their job was done for the day.

"I don't know what you're all complaining about. Sounds like fun to me." Farfarello spoke up.

"Fun?" Nagi asked.

Farfarello shrugged. "It's certainly better than our last job-"

"Farf, we agreed never to speak of that fiasco with the amphibaninjas." Schuldig cut him off while they all collectively shuddered.

"Alright, I'll cede that point. Anything was better than that job we don't discuss. But going undercover as carneys? That's just demeaning. Why does Eszet even have business with carneys?" Nagi demanded.

"Our mission's mostly tied to the freak show. You know how much our employers love experimenting on people. We need to off a few of the freaks, and to get close Eszet have taken the liberty of getting us jobs at the carnival." Crawford explained.

"Ooo! Ooo! Can I work one of the crooked games?" Schuldig asked excitedly.

"I want to run the rides." Farfarello said with a lopsided grin, visions of a ferris wheel coming loose and rampaging through the park lighting his face with twisted glee.

"I don't know. They'll size us up when we get there tomorrow."

Meanwhile 

"This has got to be one of the lamest dark beasts we've ever gone after." Yohji announced as the lights went up. They were sitting in the mission room, fresh from a viewing of their latest mission tape.

"What do you mean? It's pretty sleazy what they're doing." Omi said. Yohji shot him a look. "Alright, this doesn't quite compare with human chess or missing kidneys."

"A dark beast is a dark beast and it's not up to you all to rank them. That's Persia's job. Will you be accepting?" Manx asked.

"Shouldn't there be some legal route you guys can take? I don't see why we have to kill them." Ken noted.

Manx sighed. "First, we're having a slow week. After that plane landed and the media hopped over what you did to the kidney doctor, we've had a bit of a shortage in dark beasts to send you after and I assume you all want your paychecks?" There was a collective groan of agreement. "Secondly, this may seem a bit drastic to you, but we're hoping to scare away people who may potentially do the same thing in the future."

"Which is to say, if there are cameras around to catch these guys' mangled corpse, that would be preferable?" Yohji asked.

Manx nodded. "Just don't get on those cameras yourself."

Their dark beasts were responsible for the manufacture of fake charity merchandise. Sure, it was a pretty sleazy thing to profit under the guise of charity, but that hardly deemed a death sentence. One thing Manx certainly wasn't going to tell them was that back in his high school days, Kiriyama-san, who ran the company distributing the fake merchandise, had picked on Persia and stuffed him in his locker a fair few times.

"So…do you accept the mission?" Manx asked.

Some very unenthusiastic 'What the hell' type of answers were heard, but all four Weiss accepted.

No one really declined the missions anymore. That had been a problem for awhile, until Persia had thought up a way to fix the system. Now they were paid by the mission, more money for more difficult missions. If Aya wanted to keep his car in good condition (and oh yeah, Aya-chan and her medical bills…) then he had to accept every mission thrown his way.

As soon as Manx passed out the manila folders with the specifics of the mission, he rather wished he'd passed. The most opportune moment to take out the targets would be during a 'charity' dinner at the yacht club. Thusly, the best way to get inside would be to go undercover…as yuppies.

ELSEWHERE

Crawford distinctly didn't like the look on Schuldig's face. The slightly glazed look to his eyes that meant he was playing with someone else's mind. Normally he couldn't be bothered by it, but they were sitting outside the hut of their temporary boss at the carnival having their jobs decided.

And sure enough, Schuldig was picking through the man's mind, seeing what he had planned to use them for. He was going to assign Schuldig to one of the Kiddie land rides. Hell fucking no, he was not going to be dealing with squealing, happy children ever again if he could help it. He implanted a suggestion that Nagi would be much better at that, and then guided the man's mind to put him in charge of one of the dart games with Farfarello. That left Crawford. He was going to give him the semi-respectable job of managing the pizza shack (after all, from the man's resume he was overqualified for every job they had open) but after a little tampering from Schuldig, the man couldn't figure out why he'd never noticed that Crawford would make a perfect dunk tank clown.

As the glazed look left his eyes, Schuldig smirked evilly and Crawford liked that even less.

LATER

"How did you know you were gay?"

Omi choked a bit on his cereal as that's not what one was accustomed to hearing as breakfast conversation, but then, he only would have been shocked if he'd heard Aya say it. He wasn't surprised at all that he'd be having this conversation with Yohji.

Actually…considering Aya's help with his makeup for the gay prom, maybe he'd only be surprised that Aya was talking…

"Well…for starters I like guys." Omi answered.

"Don't you have anything more in depth to add to that?" Yohji snapped.

"Yohji-kun…I just woke up." Omi whined.

"I'm sorry."

"So…that fling with Schuldig really bothering you?" Omi asked.

"What? How did you know about that?" Yohji sputtered.

"Nagi told me." Omi said, grinning madly. "They've been teasing Schu about it relentlessly from the sound of it."

"Well that's just great." Yohji snapped sarcastically. He sat down heavily on the kitchen chair opposite Omi. "Do you think I'm gay?"

Omi hesitated before answering. "You…fit a few stereotypes. But that doesn't really mean anything. I mean, it all comes down to whether you prefer the company of men or women." Omi said carefully.

Yohji nodded. "Wait. What stereotypes do I fit?" He demanded.

"Er…" Omi was tempted to say all of them, but that wouldn't be entirely true either. He'd never once heard Yohji lisp.

"If you say how I dress…" Yohji had a frightening glare fixed on him.

"Hey, look at that. I'm gonna be late for school!" Omi said suddenly.

"Omi!" Yohji exclaimed.

"Listen, there's not much I can really do to help you. Maybe you should talk to Schuldig." Omi suggested.

SKIPPY SKIPPY

"Hey there sweetheart. You don't look like you're from around here. You speak English?"

Schuldig turned on the barstool to face the inebriated man who had spoken to him, a smirk on his face. Before leaving the apartment he shared with the other members of Schwarz he'd promised to behave, but when something like this just fell into your lap you couldn't ignore it. It wasn't his fault, really. Besides, that had been an empty promise given just to get out the door and if Crawford pretended to believe otherwise he was lying.

"Yes." Schuldig answered with amusement.

"Y'know yer pretty cute, even if you are kinda flat." The man slurred, sitting down next to Schuldig. He smirked even more broadly now.

"Flat eh? Well I prefer to keep my man-tits to a manageable size. Yours are lovely though. What are you, a C-cup?" Schuldig asked pleasantly.

The man's eyes widened in shock. "You're a guy? What're you doing with that long hair? You a faggot or something?"

"Well, you're the one who just hit on a man, so I suppose that makes you more of a faggot than I am." Schuldig answered in that same, patronizingly pleasant tone. He faced towards his drink again, knowing exactly where this was going. The man's thoughts reeked of panic and rage. Panic at having done something that put his masculinity in danger. He had a group of friends nearby watching him, and drunk as they were, they would eventually notice that Schuldig was in fact, male. The shiny-fluffy clown hair only hid so much. Besides, he was planning on making a point of it.

Seems the man had never been all that secure about his masculinity. His name was Lindsey, after all.

Schuldig decided he would have to visit the United States at some point. He really enjoyed fucking with the tourists he met while staying in Tokyo. They were all so angry and defensive, at least the ones that visited the bars he frequented. Mix that with the subdued Japanese patrons (even the ones used to Western tourists were sickened by the chaos he stirred up) and damn did he create some interesting angry mobs. 

Lindsey grabbed Schuldig by the collar of his shirt and aimed a punch that never connected. Schuldig was quick to react, and with the alcohol in Lindsey's system slowing his movements, it didn't take him much effort to tilt his head to the side. Then Lindsey overbalanced and fell over. He almost took Schuldig down with him, what with that death grip on his collar. Schuldig wrenched his shirt free and then leered at the enraged American, now lying on the floor.

"I'm gonna fucking kill you."

"Well you're certainly welcome to try." Schu said cheerfully.

"Stop smiling you bastard!" Lindsey yelled.

At this point, his friends, who had been watching his pick-up attempt from across the bar, noticed him sprawled on the floor and came over to see what was going on. Schuldig sized them up. Counting Lindsey on the floor, he was looking at four good sized Americans. The perfect outlet for his aggression. And if he didn't kill any of them, then they probably wouldn't end up on the morning news, and then Crawford wouldn't threaten him with castration again.

Something about the killing was pissing Crawford off lately. Something about it messing with his 'low-profile' plan. But if that was the case, then he really should piss and moan to Farfarello instead of Schu. Going out every now and then and getting into a bar fight was on a completely different scale than going out on a regular basis and killing religious figures.

"Wha's going on Linz?" One of the three asked.

"This fuckin' faggot's asking for a beating." Lindsey grunted in what he thought was a very manly way. Schuldig leaned against the bar and folded his arms across his chest.

"Your friend got very disappointed when he realized I'm a man. I think he might be a self-hating gay." Schuldig answered.
"That's it. Kill the bastard." Lindsey grunted, now that he'd gotten helped to his feet from Mark.

Ooo…what interesting thoughts were running through Mark's head. Apparently he actually was a self-hating gay. And in love with Lindsey to boot. What drama.

Although how one could be attracted to Lindsey, Schuldig couldn't really understand. The man was about fifty to seventy-five pounds overweight, had shaved his head, and sported a few obnoxious tattoos. Not to mention he reeked of cheap beer. Clearly Lindsey must have had a very nice personality when he wasn't drunk and angry.

"Hey, if you're going to fight, take it outside." The bartender instructed.

So, a few minutes later, they had relocated to the back of the bar. He'd gotten them nice and motivated to kick his ass. Lindsey needed to atone for his grave mistake of hitting on a guy, and Mark needed to defend his unrequited love's honor, as well as pound the scapegoat faggot to appease his own uncertainties about his sexuality. And the other two, Alan and Ernie, well, they were helping their friend. And relatively sure the four of them could take the one skinny German.

"They're all so drunk they're about to topple over anyway. Where's your sense of sportsmanship?"

Schuldig whipped around. He hadn't even noticed someone else entering the alley. Ah, the gay cowboy from Weiss. Although not dressed nearly as horribly as usual. He was wearing black jeans, and a very large button down blue shirt. Now if he'd only left the black cowboy hat at home, he would have looked decent.

While Schuldig was distracted by Yohji's sudden appearance (apparently the orange hair practically glowed in the dark and was easy to follow), Mark broke a beer bottle against his face with enough force to send him into the nearest of the brick walls of the dark alley.

"Clearly they're not as drunk as you thought, now stay out of my way." Schuldig growled at Yohji, ducking their blows and looking for weapon. He had a gun on him, but if he used that then he'd most likely kill them and then he'd have to dispose of the bodies and lie to Crawford, and Crawford would know anyway, and it would just be a hassle.

Lindsey rushed Schuldig while he was concentrating and knocked him into the wall. Schuldig almost passed out from Lindsey's foul breath in his face, not to mention the good three hundred pounds of meat crushing his ribs against unrelenting bricks, but he managed to knee Lindsey in the crotch, which was below his usual standards and he wasn't very pleased with himself. Damned cowboy, throwing off his fighting mojo.

"That was classy." Yohji called from the sidelines.

"There are four of them and they're all meaty!" Schuldig grunted, ducking another blow and simultaneously grabbing another one by the arm and flinging him into the dumpster. Where he found a two by four. Great.

"I'm guessing you're the one who provoked this, so you probably shouldn't complain." Yohji noted.

"Do you have a purpose for being here?" Schuldig demanded, now relying entirely on his speed to keep from being massacred. They weren't going down as easy as he wanted them to, and it really wasn't as much fun as it was supposed to have been. Maybe he would take out the gun.

"You know, there are four of us in Weiss and you don't have nearly as much difficulty with us. It's almost insulting."

"Yes, and when I take you on I have Schwarz backing me. Could you just shut up?" Schuldig snapped. It was a pastime of his, going out to clubs and bars and getting into fights. He liked playing with people's minds, and the fact that he didn't look very physically intimidating made for really fun bar fights…most of the time. Being wailed on by four tourists in front of one's adversary was not his idea of a fun time.

Yohji, on the other hand, was enjoying himself. He decided to put off that discussion about how they'd inadvertently slept together, instead focusing on Nagi's request to do anything he could to annoy Schuldig, and he couldn't just ignore an opportunity like this. He decided to start playing with Schuldig's telepathy, and did the most annoying thing he could. He thought very clearly and as loudly as he could, the most annoyingly chipper and happy J-pop songs he could in Schuldig's direction.

Not expecting the sudden onslaught of joyful mental music, Schuldig was caught off guard and he himself was hurled against the dumpster by Lindsey. Yohji watched in amusement as one of them grabbed Schuldig's arms and the other one grabbed his legs. He was still fried from the J-pop, and it was noticeable as they carried him over to a stack of trash cans and stuck him inside one of them. They then knocked it on its side and gave it a good hard kick that sent him rolling out into the street.

They happened to be on a hill. They gave the barrel another good kick that sent Schuldig straight to the bottom.

LATER

Schuldig stumbled towards the elevator, sometime around one in the morning. He bumped into Farfarello and Nagi, who had spent the night tailing their new coworkers from the freak show.

"You're looking well." Farfarello greeted. Schuldig growled at him in response.

Bloodied, bruised, reeking of garbage and with teeny tiny pieces of beer bottle stuck in his cheek, Schuldig wasn't in a very good mood. After escaping the barrel, Schuldig had been faced with two tempting options. Sneaking into his room and never speaking of the events of his bar fight gone wrong for the rest of his days, or sneaking into Kudoh's room and shooting him in the back of the head. He'd decided on going home, both because they still needed Weiss alive, unwitting pawns, blah blah blah, and he had a slight worry in the back of his mind that he might do something other than shoot the prick.

God he missed it when he could pee without that burning sensation.

Schuldig growled again, and Nagi and Farfarello gave him some space in the elevator.

The three made their way into the apartment, Schuldig intending on downing a bottle of aspirin and passing out in his room, but they all stopped in their tracks and gaped at what they saw in the living room.

Brad Crawford, who didn't show emotion unless you counted scowling and the occasional arrogant smile, Brad Crawford who no one had ever seen in anything less proper than a pair of khakis and a button down shirt, that very same arrogant bastard leader of Schwarz, was sitting on the edge of the couch, eyes glued to the television screen, wearing jeans, a red sox jersey and a Yankee haters cap yelling at the screen.

Apparently he hadn't expected them to be in so quickly.

He saw them staring and tried to salvage what little of his image was left, and then David Ortiz hit a homer that sent the Sox into game five and he gave up completely.

"YES!!! GO BIG PAPI!!!"

The three Schwarz jumped back, something resembling fear on their faces as Crawford smacked the coffee table and hollered.

"So…you're from Boston?" Schuldig asked once Crawford had settled down, latching on to the only thing that made sense in his new world. In all the years he'd worked with the man, he'd learned nothing. No hobbies or interests, no family, no idea where he was from, zilch. And Schuldig had thought he was being all mysterious keeping his real name a secret from everyone.

"No. But I am from New England." Crawford answered, trying to regain his composure. He looked a little embarrassed. "You're home early."

"They're not going to win." Schuldig put in.

"I thought they won the game. Isn't that why everyone's hugging that fat black guy?" Nagi asked.

"They can't lose against the Yankees at all if they want to make it to the series. There's no chance. Plus the curse and all." Schuldig explained. Crawford leveled a gun at his head, and he scowled, not intimidated in the slightest. "Please. I plucked that information from your head, you think I give a shit about American sports? You know they have no chance, so don't get all pissy with me."

"Then you should have also caught on the fact that Red Sox fans are crazy." Crawford answered.

"You want I should kill some Yankees?" Farfarello asked hopefully.

"No, it's not a real victory unless we beat them fairly." Crawford explained, putting away his gun.

Schuldig grinned. "I think I just became a Yankees fan." 

SKIPPY SKIPPY 

"How exactly does one go about disguising oneself as a yuppie?" Omi asked.

"Beats me. Jeans aren't yuppie, right?" Ken asked.

"Depends. How much did you pay for them?" Yohji inquired.

"Half price at WalMart." Ken said proudly (notice the author's brillaint dodge of having to convert dollars to yen, swish!)

"I don't think WalMart is very yuppie." Omi said with a frown.
"WalMart's more ghetto. Yuppie is…Yuppie is more like Abercrombie and Fitch. Or the Gap. Think sweatshops." Yohji explained.

"Well I don't have anything from stores like that. Who would waste that much money on clothes?" Ken demanded.

"The point is yuppies are rich. Maybe I'll borrow some clothes from Ouka and go in drag." Omi muttered.

They were prepping for a simple sweep of the yacht club, to take notes on things like security before the big charity ball. As of right now, the three Weiss were still trying to figure out exactly what a yuppie was and how to dress the part.

Aya entered the room in perfect yuppie-guise, getting stunned reactions from Omi and Ken, while Yohji was unable to meet his eyes. Aya fixed a glare on them.

"What?" He demanded icily.

"Can you help us with our disguises?" Ken asked, very impressed at Aya's ability to blend in. This was the least conspicuous disguise the red haired, purple eyed assassin had come up with yet (A/N As far as I am concerned Aya is NEVER inconspicuous, EVER!)

"…sure. Omi, lose the rainbow bracelet."

"But Nagi made it for me…" Omi whined.

"Lose it. Yuppies are closeted."