29-Mar-2001
Goodness, I haven't posted this in awhile. Well, it's finally finished, so here's this, and one more, right after this. If you've never read this, or you have but it's been so long you have no clue what's going on, you can find all the other parts, as well as the first two stories, at GW Addiction (http://www.gwaddiction.com)
You can also find descriptions for the next installment of this series at my
website http://members.nerve.com/sparcck
See the prologue for any and all disclaimers, warnings, and whatnot.
Feedback should be sent to sparcck.
AC 196
"The war we fought is over." I pulled back sharply, narrowly avoiding a saber through the chest.
His voice crackled over the commlink, his breathing erratic. "So we don't need warriors? So soldiers who know nothing but battle get tossed aside?"
I don't even think he realized he had switched words: there was a time when Wufei made a sharp distinction between himself -- a warrior -- and the rest of us misguided soldiers.
/What happened to you, Wufei? What happened to the warrior I once knew?/
Wufei never looked more the part of a soldier than he did then. In his starched-white, sharp-collared shirt, silver pins gleaming on its cuffs. But the expression on his face -- the rage, the passion -- I wished I could show that to him.
I remember when Treize died. I remember the wail of agony that blasted over the communication channels from the Altron, still sparking from its confrontation with the OZ general. That was Wufei the scholar, the lover, who had lost everything. I guess we all should have seen it coming.
He came at me again, swinging his saber in a wild arc. We clashed and held, Altron and Zero, Wufei and I, perfectly matched. Counterparts.
I remembered a conversation between Duo and I, just after the War ended. "Soldiers have fought to attain a sense of peace," I said, but the image of Duo stuck in my head, his face soft and almost out of focus. I struggled for calm.
~/"Believe in what we made."/~
"Believe the in the world we live in," Duo said, speaking through me.
Wufei, if he noticed the change, didn't stop.
I grabbed Altron and bodily flung it off Zero, propelling it towards the Earth. He needs to see, I thought. He needs to see the world without space between them.
"I'm acting for the people used as weapons. I'm fighting for all soldiers, *including* you!"
"Wufei..."
The question on my mind, when he became a soldier like me, went unasked.
The atmosphere around us started burning as it reacted with the gundanium, the two of us streaking into Earth-space as we once had years ago. /So full of hope then./
That must have been Duo again. The world tilted and I lost my grip on Altron.
"You and I are fighting like this," Wufei ground out. "Don't you feel fulfilled, as I do, when you're fighting?"
I paused, my grip on reality slipping a bit. I did feel alive, adrenaline pumping through me, my heart beating a slow, steady beat that I only had during the war.
~/"Believe in me, Heero."/~
"You and I are the same! We can only acknowledge our existence on the battlefield." Wufei banked Altron hard, trying to throw me off.
I was so off-balanced by his words that I almost didn't see it when he pulled his saber. But something in me - the Soldier, I know - reacted, and grabbed it mid-swing, trying to crush the metal in Zero's grip.
~/"Can you do that? Believe in me?"/~
I knew what it was to have to choose between what you know is right, and what you want to be right -- I can only imagine what Wufei must have felt to have to fight his lover. I wondered if he ever saw Treize, covered in blood, looking at him with such blind faith and acceptance, and was unable to speak in the face of such love... My voice was heavy when I spoke. "Remember, Wufei, Treize is dead. You've already defeated him."
There was a slight hitch in his breathing before he exploded. "You're *wrong*! I *still* fight him, even now!" With a burst, he pushed away from me, and we both dropped into the clear sky of the Earth, pulling up just to go at each other again. He was still speaking, almost lecturing me.
"I do not approve of Relena Peacecraft's ways. Her belief that peace comes from discarding weapons and confining soldiers is wrong."
/Is she that wrong?/ I thought. /No, I came to the same conclusion... to save Duo... /
~/"It's not that simple."/~
"So that's why you're allowing Mariemeia's autocracy?"
"That's where the souls of soldiers congregate!" And he flew at me again, a blur of green metal and blazing thermals. Altron slammed into Zero, crushing the cockpit inwards and setting off the internal alarms.
All my external cameras blinked into static, my air supply stopped; I felt like I was cut off from everything, except for Wufei and his anger. Wufei and his confusion and weariness. And suddenly, *I* was weary, and I needed for this to be over.
"That may be okay for now," I said, not even knowing if he was hearing me. "But Mariemeia will end up repeating history: a history full of miserable wars. Unless we stop this process now, more soldiers like ourselves will become necessary." I paused, my breath coming much harder as I struggled for air in the small space. "If that happens, a history of tragedy will keep repeating itself."
I wanted contact, more contact than the sound of Wufei breathing over the commlink. I needed to hear something, to feel something real. I flexed my hands around the controls.
"Wufei, tell me... How many more people must we kill? How many more times must I kill that girl and her dog?" My skin was burning from the outside and the inside -- the cockpit straps bit through my clothes and cut into my collarbones; my heart felt like it would explode from my chest.
~/"Of course it is."/~
My head was spinning. I was alone. So alone in this world. I had no future, and my past seemed so very far away.
And Duo. he was like a dream, like the thread of a dream that you can't hold onto upon waking. There was a blip, and for a moment I could make out Wufei's blurry form on the HUD, but then even he faded into static.
~/"It's not... it's just not..."/~
I was losing it. I was losing my grip. And Zero had abandoned me.
/Show me my future, Zero/, I thought desperately. I saw nothing but white, buzzing white, an endlessness of nothing.
/Zero, don't leave me now./
~/"Not what?"/~
"Tell me," I said, my voice hoarse and distant. "Zero won't tell me anything..."
Zero disintegrated around me, the controls dissolving in my hand. I felt like I was plunging downward into nothingness.
"Tell me, Wufei..."
Heavy hands dragged at me as time slowed to a crawl and space dropped out from around me.
There was an implosion of sound and the world turned to freezing liquid.
~/"It's not a matter of belief."
"You're wrong. I know you're wrong."
"How?"
"Because I believe in you."/~
And then everything faded to white.
AC 195
The first time I watched him sleep, it was like an almost-revelation that I wasn't ready to face yet.
It was a rare moment of quiet, since he hadn't been sleeping well. And I only wanted to watch for a little while, to try to figure out what made him so still like that where he was so alive during the day. While I walked around like a ghost and got restless the minute the sun went down.
I felt... light when I touched him.
He mouthed my name in his sleep.
It felt like falling. It was a completely alien feeling, and suddenly, my hand burned where it touched his skin.
When we transferred schools, I made sure to get us separate rooms. For all the good it did me.
"I know it's late..."
I looked up to see Duo stiffly standing in the doorway to my dorm room. "What?"
He cleared his throat. "I know it's late, but I was wondering if I could stay in here tonight. Again."
"I don't care."
Screwing up his face up on one side, Duo stuck out his tongue. "Gee, thanks." He paused. "Seriously, though, I really appreciate it. I mean, even if you do still owe me."
I raised an eyebrow and he clucked his tongue. "What can I say, man, parts are expensive."
I just shrugged and turned back to my laptop. That's what he had said the night before when he came to ask if he could stay with me, and the night before that. Something in me refused to figure out what that meant, even if there was a nagging at the back of my mind insisting on knowing.
I chalked it up to mission premonition. Nothing more.
There was rustling behind me and I watched Duo's reflection in the screen as he stripped off his over-shirt, tucked the collar into a sleeve, and folded it all into a makeshift pillow before settling down on the floor.
I tried doing work, but soon my mind was filled with the sound of his soft breathing, and I resigned myself to getting little done over the next few hours, the same fate my work had suffered the past two nights.
I studied his dark reflection in the screen and found him staring back at me.
"Are you okay?" he asked.
I grunted in response, tilting the monitor so all I could see was his midsection, twisted along the icons running the top of the desktop.
"Is this what you do every night? I thought you were just ignoring me when we roomed together."
It took everything I had not to spin around to face him; instead I pressed my fingers hard into the keyboard, watching gibberish fly across the screen.
"Do what you want, I mean, I'm just saying. You don't *have* to let me stay here."
My heart jumped and I felt anger race along my nerves. I didn't want to be feeling this, I didn't want to be afraid he would leave or afraid of asking him to stay. I was a soldier, trained to fight and take orders; I utilized my emotions, I didn't let them tangle my stomach into knots over some boy.
"Do you want me to go?"
He knew and he was doing it on purpose. He wanted me to say I wanted him to stay, wanted me to somehow not be the person I was trained to be. And the unsettling thing was that I wanted to not be that person, either.
Unable to ignore it any longer, I isolated and defined the thing curling through my limbs. It was need. And want. And if he was offering it, why deny myself? Why not just take it?
I powered down the machine and flipped off the lights, making my way over to where the braided pilot lay on the floor. I reached down and pulled the bundle of shirt out from under him, smiling almost against my will at the satisfying crack of his head against the wood.
"Ow! Shit, Heero, what the hell was that for?"
I pulled back the covers on the small bed and gestured, knowing he could see me even in the dark. "Sleep there," I said roughly.
"And where are you going to sleep?" He said this almost cautiously, rubbing the back of his head gingerly, as though I would revoke the offer if he made too much of a fuss.
I raised an eyebrow but was silent.
He chuckled. "Subtle, man."
"Not like that," I snapped.
He pulled off his undershirt, slowly, stretching his arms over his head.
I looked at him steadily, refusing to let him know how he was affecting me. And he *was* affecting me: my belly clenched and my groin pulled at the sight of those long muscles shifting under his skin.
He made a big show out of folding his clothes as I lay down on the narrow bed, declaring that he was going to add the cost of his shirt to my "tab" if it was ripped.
I realized, too late, that by getting in first, I would be trapped next to the wall. But I resigned myself to it, already counting the hours of tense, missed sleep.
Duo waited until I was settled before climbing in. He seemed to hesitate a moment, one knee to the mattress, then he was clambering over me, sliding his body into the small space between me and the wall. I didn't miss the wicked gleam in his eyes as his face passed close enough to mine for me to feel his breath on my cheek.
He was definitely doing this on purpose.
The dark was almost soft as it filled with the sound of his breath in my ear; his proximity had exactly the opposite effect as I thought it would.
It calmed me. For the first time in my life, I didn't feel like my nerves were strung tautly across my body. My muscles weren't coiled and ready in case someone ambushed us.
I was just... calm. My heart was beating slowly, steadily, and I relaxed into the feeling of being tired.
And he was so warm next to me.
I turned again to the feelings coursing through me, and I picked through them, defining each one and then moving on. There was still want there, but the need was sated. And there were new feelings there, ones that I couldn't place because I had never really felt them before.
"Stop thinking so loudly, dammit, I can't sleep," Duo mumbled. He dragged his braid from under him and rolled on his side, presenting me with his back.
I was familiar with the little bubble of laughter that was caught in my chest; I had roomed with Duo for about a month after all. But these others were confusing; the best I was able to liken them to were comfort, maybe, contentment.
This was the beginning of actually being human, I realized, the beginning of being alive. Of wanting to live, instead of taking it all as one lump mission.
I reached a hand out, and there were more new feelings. Wonder, which I was finally able to place as that rushing sensation of falling I had felt when I watched his lips form the shape of my name.
Wonder. I should have been able to marvel at things. I was fifteen years old.
He twitched suddenly, and rolled his head back to look at me over his shoulder. "Oh, for-- Come here, stupid." And he scooted back a little, until my hand, still outstretched, collided with his back.
And then it was easy.
Sliding an arm around his waist, twining my legs with his, spooning my body to follow his curves, resting my head so close to his I could smell spice.
A warm, dry hand covered mine and he sighed.
"Subtle, man," he said again, but there was gentle humor there, and the laughter bubbled up easily.
"Sleep," I said, and I tried to let the laughter show in my voice.
A gentle squeeze of his hand told me he had heard it, and I was inordinately pleased. "Yeah, sleep," he murmured.
AC 196
"Can you get up, Zero?" I whispered.
I wanted to fight.
Being human meant sacrifices. It meant making decisions and following through. Odd how much that was like being a soldier.
But now I was doing it for myself, not for any mission. And that thought made me think it was okay.
Zero's systems came online silently, a soft whir of internal mechanisms.
/Duo./
I blasted out of the ocean with a roar, and as the glowing arc of the sky stretched out, for a moment all I could see was Duo, and I knew that no matter what, I would do whatever I needed to protect him.
Save the world. Save Duo. Ninmu ryokai.
Simple. Human.
I smiled.
End Part 10
"But Jeanine," I know you're thinking. "This is so happy compared to your other fics. That's great!"
*innocent smile* Angst? What's that?
Concluded in part 7
(:./sparcck/waltz10)
