DISCLAIMER: I don't own Weiss Kreuz!

Chapter 1

It was a regular day at the flower shop. The birds were singing, the wind was calm, Yohji was hitting on more girls…it was just normal. Too normal.

Aya was out on a mission. Persia said that he had more information about Abyssinian’s past, so he sent him out on a lone mission to Denmark, where he would meet with the renowned psychologist and genealogist, Dr. Frank Tehadinushded. He was to return home that night. So, after they finished closing up the flower shop for the night, Omi decided to bake a cake.

“Do we even have flour, Omi?” Yohji asked, the anti-cake.

“No, but we have chocolate cake mix, Yohji!” Omi replied in a matter-of-factly tone.

“Aya doesn’t even like chocolate, he likes vanilla!”

“I thought he liked strawberry,” said Ken, who was sitting at the counter, watching his two co-workers argue while sipping a glass of ginger ale.

“You can’t bake a strawberry cake!” debated Yohji.

“Sure you could.”

“I’m still making chocolate,” said Omi while getting a bowl from a cupboard.

There was silence for a moment while Omi mixed ingredients and Yohji thought of another argument. “We don’t have frosting!”

“Aya doesn’t like frosting,” said Ken.

“Yes he does!” said the other two at once.

“No, he doesn’t. He doesn’t like the tex…” Ken was cut off by the doorbell ringing, “…ture.”

The three boys looked at each other for a brief moment. “Well go on, get it,” said Yohji.

“Why can’t you?”

“I’m arguing with Omi.”

“Why can’t Omi?”

“Hello, I’ve got a cake to bake,” replied the youngest.

Ken rolled his eyes and stood up, stretching. He pulled the drawstring on the lamp inside the main flower area and opened the door. Nobody was there. “Hello?” he called up and down the street. “Damn hooligans! Next time you ring my doorbell I’m calling internal affairs, you hear!” He shook his fist at the shadows covering the street.

The young adult put his arm down when he felt a tug on his apron. Ken looked down and saw a little boy there, not much older than six. The boy had scarlet hair and deep purple eyes, and looked familiar somehow. “Hey…where’re your parents?” Ken asked, all anger forgotten as he crouched down to the boy’s level. The boy shrugged. “Why’d you come here?”

“Some weird old guy told me to,” said the boy.

“Huh…come on in, then. We’ll find your parents soon,” Ken said, beckoning the boy into the shop. The boy stepped shyly into the building, and Siberian closed the door behind him. He led the boy over to the rest of his friends.

“Who was it?” asked Yohji, now in Ken’s chair and smoking a cigarette.

“Umm….” Ken put his hands on the boy’s shoulders. The other two looked over at the newcomer. Yohji’s face erupted with surprise as he snuffed out his cigarette.

“…Aya?” he asked, astounded.

“Eww…I’m not Aya. She’s my little sister, stupid!” the kid asked. Ken let him go, and he climbed up onto a stool next to Yohji. “I’m Ran,” the boy said, his chin reaching the top of the counter he was sitting at, and his short legs dangling above the rung.

A few minutes later, Ran was sipping a soda nonchalantly through a straw.

"What's your name again?" asked Yohji.

"Ran Fujimiya," replied the child, taking a break from his drink.

"Do you know who i we /i are?"

Ran looked at each of the others in turn and shook his head at the end.

"Didn't your mother tell you not to talk to strangers?" asked Ken.

"But you guys aren't strangers."

"You just said you had never seen us before."

"I never said that. You asked if I knew who you were, and I said no. I remember seeing you though, here. I don't know what I was doing here, but I was taller. And I had a cool sword!"

"Holy crap..." swore Yohji. "Aya remembers being Aya but then again...he doesn't remember...being Aya..."

Omi and Ken both gave him confused looks, to which the older blonde shrugged.

"For the last time, I'm not Aya, I'm i Ran /i ."

"Yeah, well, Ran, it's i waaay /i past your bedtime," replied Ken, entering what Yohji liked to call his "male-mother mode" behind his back.

"But..."

"No "buts" about it. I'm going to call your mother tomorrow and she'll come and pick you up."

"Okay...who are you guys?"

"I'm Ken, this is Omi, and that's Yohji," said Ken, pointing at each of them in turn. "Now come on."

Ran hopped off of his stool and followed Ken up the stairs and into Aya's room. Ran wandered over to the single bed under the window, and poked at the plant on the sill. The boy kicked off his shoes and snuggled under the bedcovers there. Ken looked around the room quickly. "Ah...I'll be taking this," he said, taking Aya's katana in its scabbard. "And this." Ken picked up a gun off of the dresser. "And...what the hell...I mean...sorry. And this." He picked up a magazine off of the dresser as well and tried to hide it as best he could from the innocent eyes of the little boy. Ken smiled. "Well, goodnight Ran."

"Night Ken-Ken," the child said, turning over to his side and shutting his eyes.

Ken gave a little smile and shut off the lights, then closed the door, leaving it open about 4 inches to let the light from the hallway illuminate the room a little bit. He turned to see Omi and Yohji coming up to check on them, and quickly dumped the weapons in his own room and shoved the magazine at Yohji, whose face lit up. "Hey! Where'd you find this?" he asked.

"In Aya's room."

"Wha-ha! Thanks man!" Yohji said, flinging the magazine into his room. The two shut their doors tightly and headed back downstairs to tidy the kitchen quick.

"So...what should we do when he finds out that we aren't going to call his mother?" Omi asked.

"I don't know..." sighed Ken, covering the unfinished cake batter with plastic wrap and sticking it in the refridgerator.

"We'll cross that bridge when we get to it, okay?" said Yohji, taking Ran's soda and pouring what remained in the can down the sink. "What are we going to tell Persia? We have a mission tonight."

"We'll tell him the truth," Omi replied, wiping the counter with a damp paper towel.

"The truth? 'Hey Persia, we can't go on the mission tonight because Aya's been changed into a little kid.' He'll think we're nuts!"

"It's worth a shot," said Ken.

Yohji sighed and tossed the can into the recycling bin. "Fine. Let's go."

The three boys headed over to the door on the left of the refridgerator. Yohji unlocked it with a key he took out of his pocket, opened it, and the headed down the stairs there. They all sat in their usual spots. Ken thought he heard the slight creaking of the floorboards above him. He looked up and shrugged it off as just regular house noises. Manx had the day off for personal reasons.

Persia appeared on the screen, his back to them, as usual. "Weiss. Tonight you must infiltrate a high security buildi-"

"We can't," interrupted Ken.

"What?"

"He said we can't," said Yohji.

"Why?"

"Well, you see..."

"Aya went on his mission and came back as a little kid," Omi said, speaking very quickly.

Persia took a moment to sort through his thoughts before continuing. "Understood."

"Wait. You're not going to ask us to show him to you or anything?" asked Yohji.

"I heard tell of this from one of my colleagues, but didn't believe it until now. You may take the day off. You will have another chance at tonight's marks some other time."

"Thank you, Persia," said Ken.

Persia disappeared from the screen.

As the three headed up to bed, Ken could have sworn he saw Ran's eyes wide awake and peering through the crack in the door.