When Darius came back from his tryst with Armand, he was on cloud nine. Everything seemed perfect. If only he weren't a Key. If only he didn't have a Master. Then they could run away together and live somewhere where flowers grew year round and the baby birds never fell from their nests.
He shivered as a firm hand clamped onto his arm, tossing him easily onto the bed without letting go of his wrist. Darius screamed as his shoulder was dislocated and blinding pain rocked through him, even as his Master spread his legs, thrusting deeply inside with his dry cock. He let out a yelp of pain as he tore and blood seeped down bare thighs. "Stop," he choked out through his tears. "Please, stop..."
When Treize was done, he rolled over and went to sleep, expecting his Key to cry himself to sleep as he always did. Instead, a plan formed in Darius' head. A very stupid plan, but he was desperate the way murderers are often desperate. He could not let Armand see him like this, could not let the other Keys know. He would be considered weak.
He reached beneath his pillow, feeling around for the knife, and frowned as his hands only met soft bedding. A harsh chuckle filtered in through his angry haze, and it was then that he realized there was a knife raised over his body, stabbing him quickly in a rapid, patternless staccato. Blood rose in his throat, spilling over into his mouth. He was going to die.
"Armand..." He would never see his face again, never notice the way the light seemed to spill over his head in a golden crown, never feel the touch of his lips or his hands.
It could not be. Darius could not accept it. With the last vestiges of strength he possessed, he grabbed the knife, the sharp edges slicing through his palms, and forced it back towards his Master, biting his Master's hand to the bone. Crying out in pain, he dropped the knife, allowing Darius to take control of it.
He didn't stop until his Master was dead.
And even then, he hadn't done a thorough enough job.
Treize woke on a wooden altar, surrounded by flowers, the light aroma of spice and cinnamon in the air. He finally forced his eyes open, and screamed at the sight presented to him.
Everywhere he looked, mirrors stared back at him. His face, as badly burned as the rest of his body, looked like a strange mix between the creature from the black lagoon and steak kabobs. No matter where he looked, or how long he closed his eyes, that image was still there, still blinking back at him, the only thing not smoky and charcoaled his sapphire eyes.
Treize had never considered himself a vain man. A few scars here, a burn from an overheated reactor or fried mobile suit network. Such were the battle scars and as such, badges, of his way of life.
Yet as he looked upon himself, at the disfigured creature hunched over and stiff, blood oozing from some of the cuts on his legs, he began to scream. His face...that face...it followed him everywhere.
Even over the edge and into madness. That soft whiteness, pure emotion, reds and greens tumbling along a planaformed landscape, inviting him to join it. Become *it*, lose himself in the pureness.
And then he heard a voice.
And it told him things. Things about his life, about his future. He would be general of OZ. He would fight in battles, he would win battles. And he would lose wars.
It told him things, and it offered him a way out. To become like it, a part of the world and greater than the world, yet something outside reason, outside mathematical equations and rationale. There was nothing he would find impossible.
He accepted, and found himself, lying in his bedroom in a puddle of blood, his and someone else's, his head pounding and his heart...
He had no pulse.
He was dead.
Almost as if to spite him, as soon as his fingers touched his wrist, a steady beat thrummed there. Strange; he hadn't had a pulse until he had noticed it was missing. He searched his memory for a name, and, lips forming the words slowly, like a child reader their first primer, spoke.
"Trei-ze. Khu--khush--re-na-da."
The journey to the Palazzio was brief, if tense. With every beat of his heart, he could feel a corresponding pulse from each of the Gundam pilots, creating a pounding rhythm in his ears that he had to fight to suppress. Heero's had blinked out, as if he had died, then came back, stronger than ever. Heero Yuy, indestructible soldier. It figured. The closer they got to the Palazzio, to Heero, Duo, and Wufei, the more uneasy Quatre became. The entire mission had been too planned, too precise. Like they were inviting them to just waltz inside and escape with little or no resistance.
Closing his eyes, Quatre shut off all of his connections to the other pilots and released the controls. Now he was seeing with his uchuu no kokoro, not his fallible, human eyes. As he watched, tiny blue lights all over the world flickered and went out, reappearing in some places, disappearing in others, freed from the cycle of birth and rebirth. Their dance was so chaotic, but so ordered. In perfect harmony, always shifting towards a gap, filling a hole. And there was a very large hole hovering *over* Antarctica. Not actually touching the earth, not a part of the physical plane. But over.
Could that be...?
He heard a blip that told him it was time to land, and opened his eyes, only to find himself staring into the heart of space.
Heero moaned as he woke, head lolling against his chest. He could hear someone whispering frantically to him, and he could feel something rubbing against his leg...
"...Heero!" Duo. Duo was in trouble. He took a deep breath, and forced himself into consciousness, immediately wishing that he hadn't. Rats. Rats everywhere, crawling over his legs and his feet, nibbling on the tender flesh, their red eyes glowing. They were hanging, suspended over a large pit filled with the squeaking creatures, probably designed to keep them motionless. If they moved, the ropes would rub against the boards supporting their weight and they would fall into the rat pit.
Heero couldn't stop a tremor from running its ice cold finger down his back, but his own fears were pushed aside as he saw Duo, hissing and wailing as the rats clung to him. His poor lover was hysterical, throat raw from screaming, his voice only a whisper to the noises the rats were making.
"Heero!" he whispered, eyes wide with horror, unseeing. "Heero! They're *on* me, Heero, get them off, get them off, GET THEM OFF!!!!" he screamed, throwing back his head as he let out a cry of pain and fear that shook the Japanese Key to the core.
"Duo!" He tried to adjust his shackles so he could turn towards Duo, but stopped as he heard a board above creak. "Duo, I'm here. Duo--" "They're going to eat me!" he declared, shaking his head, lower lip trembling. "Heero, Heero, please HELP ME!" He screamed again, letting out a cry as a rat sank its fangs into his leg, blood dripping down to pool in the little curve of his ankle. He began to writhe, the rope tying his wrists together slowly beginning to snap, coil by coil. "Duo!" Heero screamed, seeing the fine line his lover walked. "Duo, listen to me. Duo!" The American pilot looked over at him, mouth fixed in a trembling line.
"They ate him, Heero," he whispered in a hollow voice. "And now they're going to eat me."
"No, Duo, close your eyes! Don't look, Duo!" The pilot Deathscythe, too terrified to do anything but follow instructions, slid his violet eyes shut. "You're safe, Duo. You're in a bed--"
"With you?" Duo's voice cracked painfully; it struck Heero to the core to see him reduced to such a mindless state.
"With me," Heero affirmed. "And there's just us, just the two of in bed--"
"NOOOO!" Duo screamed, arching his back violently. "THEY'RE ON MEEEE!!! GET--THEM--OFF!!!" With that final tug, the rope snapped, and Duo was falling, falling into the waiting darkness below. Heero watched in stunned disbelief, wings beating desperately, trying to free himself.
"Duo..."
<DUO! Are you--?>
<GET THEM OOOoofff...>
He saw the braided boy falling, heard his screams even hidden within the stone crevice. For a moment, he was sorely tempted to simply let Duo fall, to let the rats devour his body. Then he could have Heero... He looked over at his would-be-koi, and, seeing the look of despair etched onto his pretty face, took flight, wings stretching, tendons unused for years suddenly pulled taut with his own weight.
Zechs swooped down and caught Duo in his arms, cradling the frightened pilot in his arms as he flew up to the ground level. Carefully depositing the American onto the ground, he flew back down for Heero, who had retreated inside himself in the face of Duo's impending death.
"Duo," Zechs snapped, slapping the boy hard twice across his cheek. The crack, strangely unsatisfying to his ears, echoed throughout the pit. Eyes slightly glazed but slowly focusing, Duo came to with a jolt, feeling blindly around for Heero. Their dependence was amazing; taking a closer look, Zechs suddenly frowned. She had bound them. The fucking bitched had Bound Heero to a mortal! Although it seemed Dominic had already made some...adjustments... Duo cooed softly to Heero, wrapping bloody arms around his body, rocking him gently.
"Come back to me," he whispered, pressing a light kiss to Heero's forehead. The Japanese pilot stirred in his arms, dark blue eyes fluttering open as if it were the first time he had ever laid eyes on the world. "I love you," Duo choked out, burying his face in Heero's hair. Two warm arms slid around his waist, and they sat there, hearts pounding and unwilling to slow down. They had always eluded death before; why should now be any different?
Those were humans you were fighting with, Duo reminded himself. Meanwhile, Zechs paced restlessly back and forth, hands clasped behind his back.
"That wasn't part of the deal," he muttered angrily.
"When you double cross someone, it is easy to get double-crossed yourself," a voice rang out, almost a hiss. Zechs whirled around, eyes rapidly darkening to a shade of black that was almost absolute in its absence of light.
"I don't know what you're talking about," the blonde man replied flatly, his wings folding and unfolding in distress. He made a great show of smoothing back his hair, the whole time obviously avoiding Dominic's eyes.
"You know exactly what I'm talking about. I thought you were on our side, Zechs," Dominic said, his tone a bit hurt. Then he grinned. "What a storm," he sighed, nodding towards the ceiling. As if on cue, lightning, so bright its radiance could be soon through the hardest granite, flashed across the blackest skies.
"So. You've avoided death this far, Heero. Duo." He nodded his dark head towards them, as if in approval. "Perhaps you aren't as weak as I thought you were, Maxwell. It must have taken great courage to Bind yourself to Heero."
"What?" Duo glared at the older man, oblivious to the fact that the light was slowly draining away from the room, being sucked into some black hole unknown to them. "What the hell are you talking about?"
"You didn't know?" He laughed harshly, the darkness slowly swirling around him, running over his skin, into his mouth. "So Yalith did it. She was never 'straight with you', as you children say it nowadays. Did she tell you that angels never die, Duo? Did she tell you that?!" His voice cracked on the last word. Duo stared, gaze fixed on the shrieking man's face, as his sockets grew more pronounced and his eyes began to fade away to nothing.
"Did she tell you that gods never die? Did she lie to you, Maxwell?" Another hysterical laugh. Duo felt a hand tugging his, and saw Heero, slowly backing away as Dominic ranted. "Yalith lies. Gods can die, Duo. I've killed a god. I KILLED GOD!" he roared, just as thunder boomed, shaking the entire Palazzio. Small pieces of stone began to fall from the ceiling, raining dust down on the four men.
"I killed him," he whispered, slowly sinking to his knees. "I killed God. I killed my father. He was my father, Duo, and I killed him." As they all watched, horrified, a single hole opened in each of his hands, bleeding crimson all over the ground, sizzling as it met with the dirt.
"Oh my..." Somehow, it seemed blasphemous to invoke the name of God, when they had been so blatantly forsaken. Gripping Heero's hand in a hold of steel, he suddenly yanked hard, sending them both running out of the pit, towards the door. Was it *shrinking*? It was!
"Heero, hurry up," he urged, pulling the Japanese pilot with him. "We're almost there!"
He heard laughter behind him.
"You can't escape a GOD, Duo. I can see you when you sleep. I can hear you when you pray. I'm in your dreams, and your nightmares, when you cry and when you fuck your little Japanese lover. Does he cry, like you used to?" Shaking his head, Dominic turned his attention back to the remaining Gundam pilot that was trembling before him. Only another step, and they were home free.
The American pilot could almost taste the sweetness of the air on the other side. With a grunt, he threw himself through the hole, gasping as the darkness raked over his side, tearing flesh and breaking bone, but they were through, gasping for breath, trembling, but alive.
It was only then that he remembered.
"Zechs..." He shook Heero's shoulder frantically. "Heero!"
"What, Duo?" Heero asked sleepily, rubbing his bright blue eyes.
"No time to sleep now, love. Zechs is still inside, and--" They both watched with a mixture of relief and horror as the doorway between the pit and the heart of the Palazzio closed.
"They've all abandoned you, Zechs. I'll take care of them later." Pulling a rose from thin air, his face melted into that of a certain ginger-haired general of OZ. "Zechs! What punishment befits that of a traitor?"
"I was never on your side," Zechs growled. "I never will be, either. You might as well just kill me."
"Kill you?" Treize/Dominic raised a single eyebrow. "Ah well," he sighed. "If that's what you truly want." Before Zechs even had a chance to react, Dominic, reverting to his first form, hurled a dagger of white light straight through the blonde man. He watched with an impassive smile as blood began to rise in his mouth, dripping down his chin, and then the young man slumped over, dead, his wings shriveling into dust.
"My pretties," he murmured softly, reaching down to pet one of the rats. It arched into his caress, cold wet nose nuzzling his palm like a cat. "Enjoy." With that, he kicked Zechs' body into the pit, breaking out into a high-pitched laugh as the frenzy of squeaking noises rose to a fevered pitch below.
"We've got to get out of here," Duo said reasonably, though he looked as if he might start laughing uncontrollably at any moment. He let out a giggle as Heero's hand touched his shoulder. Nerves, most likely.
"Back the way we came?" Heero suggested, pointing towards the stone door Yalith had led them through. It seemed like such a long time ago...
"No," Duo said after a moment. "We're underneath the Palazzio, right? It would take us forever to climb back up, and I know that I wasn't paying attention when we came down the first time."
Nodding slowly, Heero considered. "So how else are we supposed to get out?"
"I'm not leaving without Wufei," Duo said stubbornly. "He's one of us, man! Besides, his sense of justice wouldn't let him leave any of us here, you know?" Heero had to admit, he did know what Duo was aiming at. Even if he didn't like it.
"So we find Wufei?"
"I'm right here."
They both whirled around, eyes wide.
"So." Wufei examined Treize with new eyes. "What are you?"
"Dragon," Treize murmured, nuzzling his ear. "You don't--"
"I do," the Chinese boy snapped, pulling away from the older man quickly. "I want to know."
"A quick lesson in philosophy, then," Treize suggested. "You have heard of theories that everything in the universe is made of one natural substance and this substance has been around since the beginning of time? An interesting proposal, but wrong, nonetheless. Well," he amended, "to a certain extent." A quick snort reminded him to stop trying to avoid the point.
"In the beginning, there was no God. There was nothing. But from that nothing came something, and that is the greatest paradox of life, reflected in everything we do. From non-existence to life in a second, in a year, in a millenium. It doesn't matter. The point is that life embodies certain paradoxes, and this is one of them.
"The other thing that I suppose you should know is that there was substance, if you like, that the entire universe was composed of, in one way or another. But, as you know one thing cannot be two opposites, one thing cannot hold the paradox of life. And so it split, into two forces.
"Some people call it the yin and yang. For others, it is good and evil. For some, fire and water. I fear that Yalith...in her...haste, may have attempted to mold Heero into a template embodying water, which is most unfortunate." Treize sighed.
"Why?"
"Heero is...the perfect soldier. But he is also a kind and compassionate person, as far as I can tell, and these opposites war within him. They war within us all, but they are stronger with him. The split has...created a possibility for..." He paused. "Let me stop there, dragon. I do not wish to speak of certain things, for they may never come about either way.
"You could say that I am of the same substance as Dominic. Dominic is a mystery. He may have been born centuries ago...or eons ago. He could be a liar. He could be a savior. I don't even try to understand his reasonings."
Wufei sighed. "Back to Heero," he growled. "Template? As in...?"
"As in the oldest battle known to man. The battle between good and evil, Heaven vs Hell. Of course, these were metaphors for what was going on at the time, but some of the Bible is correct, however archaic and badly translated it might be." He nodded towards the door. "Have you figured out what a Key really is?"
Wufei paused. "Heero's a Key. You should have executed him when you captured him, but you brought him here instead. He's different. You said so yourself." His nose scrunched up in an endearing way, or so Treize thought. "Is that why? Are they 'templates'?"
Treize chuckled. His dragon was intelligent indeed. "Close. They aren't templates--yet--but they have the possibility locked within them. Why do you think you are so adept at piloting a Gundam, Wufei? All the Gundam pilots are, if ever captured by OZ, slated to become Keys. It binds them. It makes them safe in the only way possible." His nose curled in disgust.
"Unfortunately, a few Keys--well, not Keys anymore, templates, I suppose, though that is a rather crude way of describing them-- escaped, Darius among them. And now I fear that they seek to destroy the Palazzio, and the boundaries around it. Can you imagine, hundreds of men in the prime of youth, kept young by the time spells here, freed and loosed into the world?"
"I'm still not convinced," Wufei began, when suddenly he heard a muffled voice.
"So we find Wufei?"
Where was it coming from? He heard a scuffle, and his head swiveled to the left. The wall! The Chinese boy hurried over to one of the eight sides of the room, missing the look of annoyance that quickly flashed over Khushrenada's face. Hollow! The wall was hollow. Feeling the cracks for a trigger point, his foot nudged a stone at the base of the wall, and suddenly, he found himself standing in front of two very naked Gundam pilots.
"I'm right here," he said, raising an eyebrow. They both turned around at the exact same time, identical expressions of surprise painted onto their faces.
"Wu-man?" Duo asked incredulously, moving forward tentatively. "Is that you?"
"I'm not sure, Maxwell," Wufei replied seriously. "It all feels unreal to me."
"Unreal or not, you'd better get a move on," Treize suggested, moving in from behind Wufei. Heero's lip immediately curled into a scowl. "What are you doing here?" Wufei saw Duo's hand drop to his waist out of habit, and involuntarily, his eyes strayed left to the light brown thatch of curly hair. Mentally slapping himself, he raised his eyes to find Heero watching him with a strange expression on his face.
"Just watching out for Wufei," Khushrenada replied, removing his shirt as he spoke.
"What are you doing?" Wufei demanded. Treize raised a single forked eyebrow and nodded towards Heero and Duo, who clung to each other, scowling defensively. He smirked as he handed his shirt to Duo, the taller of the two. Swearing about self-righteous pricks, the American pulled the plain cotton shirt over his head, grateful that it was long enough so it came to rest at midthigh. Blushing, Wufei yanked off his own silk shirt and tossed it at Heero, who took his time pulling it over his head.
"Aren't you coming, Khushrenada?" he asked, feeling rather foolish for asking as Heero and Duo exchanged knowing glances. "We can't have any leaks," he added severely, but it was too late, the damage had been done.
"I fear I must stay here and await my destiny apart from you," he replied softly, sapphire blue eyes staring straight at Wufei, making it more than obvious that the 'you' was singular. "One last kiss, dragon? I fear I may never see you again..."
There was only a moment's hesitation before Wufei cried indignantly, "No!" The older man nodded sadly, as if he had expected it. Duo tugged on his Japanese lover's arm, and they moved to the other side of the room, as if giving them room to...
"Ch'," he swore, a rotten habit he'd picked up from Yuy. "Fine." Showing him a delighted smile, Treize lowered his head gently, lips brushing lightly over Wufei's. He found himself leaning into the kiss, almost wanting to part his lips, let his tongue slide in.
Had the world been a different one...
"Time to go," Heero called. Wufei snorted, hiding his embarrassment behind his bravado, again.
"Not yet, Yuy. I still--I still have to find someone..." He looked desperately at Treize, and he smiled. Trapped between duty and love, between the past and ensuring a future. Wasn't that how he had lived his entire life?
"I'll watch out for her. You'll be back; all of you will." He nodded at the brown-haired Gundam pilots. Leaning closer to Wufei, breath tickling his ear, he whispered, "When you return, I want you to kill me. Even an angel can kill. Even a demon can die."
With that, Treize stalked out of the room, melting into the shadows as many before had.
"So, where do we go from here?" Duo finally said after a long moment of silence. Almost like they were mourning for Treize.
"We have to get out of here," Heero said, chewing absently on his lower lip. "How did you get in?"
Wufei pointed wordlessly to a door on the other side of the room.
"Same way as us," he sighed. "There's got to be another way..."
No sooner had he spoken than a large metal foot belonging to Sandrock crashed through the roof, splitting level after level, coming a halt not five feet from them.
"Jesus, Quatre!" Duo yelled, cupping his hands around his mouth. "Cuttin' it a little close, aren't you?"
There was a pause, and then, "DUO?!?" He saw the flash of golden hair before he saw the actual face, and then Quatre was walking out, standing on a platform as he called to the others. "Who else is down there?"
"Wu-man and Hee-chan," Duo replied with a straight face.
"DUO!"
Trowa had to fight back a smile as he watched the joyful reunion. Wufei and Heero were happy too, even if they weren't busy hugging each other and jumping up and down like children.
"...and then we screwed like rabbits for a few hours, and then--"
"DUO!"
"Gomen, Hee-chan."
He was glad that Heero and Duo had finally gotten together; or rather, that Heero had stopped being so blind to everyone around him. Soldier no more, he thought wryly.
A loud crash of thunder reminded them all exactly where they were.
"Let's get going," Quatre suggested. "You all could ride in the ammunitions storage."
"How generous," Wufei snickered. "I'd rather--"
"Stay here?" Heero suggested. The Chinese pilot blushed faintly, but shut up. "You guys came alone?"
"No, we came with--it's a long story," Quatre sighed, catching Trowa's eye as he smiled. "Let's go, everyone!"
A panel of Sandrock's leg slid away, to reveal a small pile of guns and some bullets. There was plenty of room for the three of them--if Duo didn't get hyper. Feeling terribly sorry for Wufei as the panel slid back again, he climbed back into his own Gundam and turned on the comm-link to Quatre's Gundam.
"We ready?" he asked.
"Darius is ordering a full retreat," Quatre marveled. "You'd think his plan was to get all the Gundam pilots together and then..." Intuition flooded his brain, and the blonde Arabian shook his head, blonde hair glimmering even inside the cockpit. "They're always using us, Trowa. When this is over..."
"When this is over, it will be over and we will talk then," the green-eyed pilot said firmly. Quatre nodded, and began the ascent back to earth.
And out of the darkness, a hand dug into soft dirt, clinging to the surface, white skin scratched and bloody, but alive. He was alive. A squeaking protest rose from below him at the loss of their supper. Zechs choked back a laugh.
Alive.
End Book Two, Part Two
Ariana
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