23-Dec-2000
Category: Sap (literally! >_< Oh, I kill me....)
Rating: PG, I guess
Pairing: 2+1/1+2
Warnings: Sap (^_____^), shounen-ai; some may find this OOC. Takes place in that fic-writers' never-never land of extra missions and safehouses, too, so I'd call it a TWT (this is someone's cute abbreviation for "timeline? what timeline?" ^_^).
Disclaimer: The boys belong to Sunrise, the Sotsu Agency, Bandai, and associated parties, and I intend no infringement upon those rights.
Notes: This is a holiday present for mine own Draco-spousey, whom I adore. Hope you like it, dear one!
/ denotes thoughts
The infiltration operation had gone flawlessly. The Oz security guards were distracted by what sounded like a festive party--the colonel's birthday provided ample grounds for general drunkenness-- and no one even blinked when five more uniformed cadets moved around the edges of the crush and entered the office block. The colonel's office wasn't locked in any serious way, and his files didn't offer any greater resistance. The pilots had what they needed in under ten minutes, well within mission parameters. Heero ducked down the hall to retrieve additional data from the adjoining computer bay, and the others were doing a final sweep when Quatre lifted a polished paperweight from the colonel's desk with a look of wistful appreciation.
"It's beautiful," he sighed, turning the curious object to watch lamplight glow through its translucent depths.
"What is it? Glass?" Duo draped himself over Quatre's shoulder, poking one long finger at the golden sphere.
"Amber. Fossilized tree sap. With a--grasshopper? I think that's what those are called."
Trowa leaned closer, then nodded. "A little one. They get a lot bigger than that."
"So this little guy was minding his own business, climbing a tree, maybe thinking about eating some leaves, and boom! Stuck there for good?" Duo looked a little stricken.
"If you want to put it that way, yes. But he gets to be part of something lovely forever. I think it's beautiful," Quatre repeated, glancing shyly at Trowa.
"Gah. If drowning in sap for eternity is your idea of a good time, you go right ahead. Sounds to me like suffocation, pure and simple." Still in mid-gesture, Duo was turning to demand Wufei's agreement when he locked eyes with Heero in the doorway. The sea-blue gaze was pretty much unreadable, as usual, but Duo was the object of a thoughtful stare before Heero turned back into the hall--presumably to check their escape routes, though he didn't bother to explain.
/Great. Why not shred a few valentines while I'm at it? Kick a puppy, maybe? Nice work, Maxwell--making fun of all that endless- love stuff in front of the one person who actually makes it worth imagining./ Duo knew he was blushing furiously, and tried to cover it by gathering up his equipment. "Are we out of here, or do we stay for punch and cookies?"
Quatre reluctantly set down the amber paperweight--no sense drawing attention to their activities with petty theft--and they made for the exits.
Coming home from a solo mission two weeks later, Duo was still kicking himself. Heero had been unusually withdrawn--even for him-- in the days before Duo left. Just when it seemed like they were getting somewhere with this odd connection, Duo had managed to screw everything up. Trying to explain would only have opened up another mess--whatever you wanted to call this relationship they were inventing, it was way too new to be discussing heavy things like the life span of the average love affair.
No one seemed to be in residence--no one answered his bellowed greeting, anyway--so Duo climbed wearily up the stairs to his room. Dumping gear as he went, he planned a solitary evening: a shower sounded good, and then maybe a big sandwich, and then he'd sleep for about a year. Halfway to the dresser, he stopped.
On the bedside table was a small cage made of twigs, painstakingly woven together with braided grass. From base to handle, it was a meticulous copy of--something, Duo wasn't sure what, but the style looked vaguely archaic. As he peered at it, a light flashed inside, and then another. Fireflies? Lots of them. When had Heero found time to--
A sheet of paper was partly visible under the cage, and Duo slid it toward him. Heero's handwriting was angular, abrupt, as if the act of writing were an unnecessary interruption of more pressing duties; not surprisingly, there weren't many words on the page: "Open the door."
Which door? Both of them, probably--and anyway, Duo wasn't about to fill his bedroom with bugs, even pretty blinking ones. He lifted the cage gingerly and carried it into the fragrant dusk, where insects he couldn't identify were singing desperate love songs into the night.
Once he was well away from the house, he dropped to a crouch and inspected the cage door for a latch.
"There's a loop." The low voice came from the deeper shadows under a nearby tree; Duo looked up, not quite surprised, to see Heero leaning against the slim trunk.
"Got it." The delicate door swung open, and the fireflies made their way--first one or two, then all of them--up and out into the night, telegraphing desire to the answering lights in the air and in the grass. Sitting back on his heels, Duo watched them go.
"Pretty." He looked up with a grin, but his eyes were questioning. "What's with the entomology project?"
"Fossilization didn't sound like a good idea to you. I liked this kind of forever better, too." Heero almost sounded nervous, but that was simply impossible--wasn't it?
"You getting metaphorical on me, Yuy?" Duo couldn't shake the feeling that something very strange was going on here, something too big to be blamed on the otherworldly atmosphere supplied by the summer night.
"Maybe." Heero had let a firefly land on his arm, and was watching with apparent fascination as it climbed purposefully toward his lifted fingertips. Its glow lit his face with random flashes of greenish-yellow bioluminescence. "Nothing's happy in a cage, not really. But they didn't fly far when you let them out, did they? Now they're staying close because they want to, not because they have no choice."
Now Duo got it, but still didn't quite believe what he was hearing. He forced a ragged laugh past the lump forming in his throat. "Fireflies live for about a week, Heero. Some 'forever.'"
Heero shrugged, evidently undiscouraged. "It's still their whole lives. And anyway, there will be more next year. Changes happen."
"Unless you're a grasshopper in a paperweight." Looking fixedly at the ground, Duo twisted a wisp of grass into a figure eight.
Heero decided to cut straight to the central problem. "No one's locking you in a cage, Duo. And you're not stuck."
"Not even if I want to be?" He looked up sideways as Heero settled onto the grass beside him.
"You wouldn't want that. I wouldn't, either." Heero's eyes were steady, but there was the tiniest hint of a catch in his voice as he went on. "Just fly close, if you can. For as long as you want."
The lump in Duo's throat had become a boulder, and something suspiciously like tears stung behind his eyes. He blinked furiously, grateful for the darkness. "I can do that."
He had every intention of sitting there at a calm, reasonable distance until he pulled himself together--but when Heero laid a hand on his shoulder, Duo practically dove into his arms. And stayed there, watching through slightly blurry eyes as the living sparks darted through the darkness around them.
-end-
(:./lilias/forever)
