20-Feb-2002
Title: Running With the Devil/part five
Author: Ebonydove
Warnings: violence, language.
Author's note: Quatre POV. Takes place during the series but no spoilers. For
you Quatre fans out there, this may leave a bad taste in your mouth, but I don't
regret it. Feedback appreciated, but apologies not guaranteed.
Pairings: 4+2/1+2
"Quatre? Are you okay?"
I opened my eyes to find Heero standing over me with his features as neutral as ever. "Heero, oh Allah, Heero. Duo is dead. He's dead." I started to cry.
"Quatre. Duo's right here. He's breathing, but until you unwrap yourself from him I won't be able to check him out."
I sat up hearing Duo groan under me. I looked at him. We were on the couch. In the cabin. I spun my head to look around the space and heard the popping of the woodstove and felt its warmth. I looked to my hand and saw it wrapped with the remains of my pink shirt. It had been a dream. Duo was alive, and Heero had found us.
Heero's expression changed as he put a hand to my head. "Quatre you have a fever. And are probably slightly hypothermic. I brought some warm things for you to put on." He stood up and removed some thermals and a heavy wool sweater from his duffel along with socks and a blanket. "Put these on. Then wrap yourself in the blanket." When I didn't move he pulled the blanket out from the bundle and slowly wrapped my trembling form into a blanket and helped me to get up off of Duo, who I was still partially sprawled on. "Get up now so I can look at Duo."
I did as I was told. Then moved down to the end of the couch and curled into a ball at Duo's feet. I couldn't tear my eyes from Duo's pale, still form as he slept at the other end of the couch.
Heero knelt next to Duo his frown deepening and then looked back to me. He lifted Duo's bangs out of his face and dabbed the gash with peroxide and placed a bandage over it. Then he ran his hands over Duo's body and stopped at his chest. "His sternum is bruised badly but there's no internal injuries that I can find."
I watched as Heero tenderly looked at each scrape and bruise on Duo's body and I could feel myself begin to come back to my senses a bit. "He's got some cracked ribs." I mumbled as tears still rolled down my chapped face.
He wrapped Duo back up with the first blanket and then put a second one over him. "I'll heat up some soup for you both. We'll stay here to ride out the snow storm."
"Storm?" What storm? I shivered and prayed to Allah that I wasn't dreaming again. I got up and dressed in the clothing that Heero set on the floor next to me.
"It's been snowing for four days. I couldn't get here before the front moved in."
"Heero. I know this is going to sound crazy, but... what happened?"
He gave me a look like I had lost what little of my sanity I had left while he stood to finish unpacking his gear, including his laptop. "I got your transmission signal two days ago and found your wreck yesterday evening. I tracked you both here. Trowa and Wufei were too far away to get here to do a pick up. Does that help?" I could tell he was trying to figure out just why I was so unnerved, but his face remained calm as he let me digest the information presented to me.
"So Duo and I have been sleeping for four days?"
"It's possible, but from the looks of things it was more like three. You have been through a great deal Quatre. Be glad you're alive and only lost a few days. When I woke up after Siberia, a whole month had gone by." He gave me what I considered to be a smile as he began making the soup over the hotplate.
I had finished getting dressed and curled back up with Duo. I heard him grow very quiet and felt his eyes on me as I settled myself back down with Duo on the couch. I lay my head on his chest and listened to his raspy breathing and wrapped an arm around his waist. Duo mumbled something softly and burrowed closer to my warmth. He was still cold. I opened my eyes to look at Heero from where I had put my head down. "What?"
I saw him look at the sleeping boy I was wrapped around. "When I woke you. You said Duo was dead." His eyes flashed from mine back to Duo's face and I could tell that the emotions he was keeping hidden were starting to slowly surface.
I shut my eyes and frowned, remembering how Duo looked sitting in the snow. It was like watching Death. The snow was drifting down all around him as he sat in the blanket of white. His face was ashen and his lips had turned purple. The blood that had run from his cuts had dried and crusted in streaks of dark crimson like some distorted kind of greasepaint. His cheeks were slightly pink from the wind and his hair was frozen and speckled with the white flakes. His eyes were huge and vacant, seeing nothing in front of him. But the worst part of it all was that there was absolutely no sound but my ragged breath and the slight rustling of bare tree limbs overhead. "The devil almost caught us, Heero. He was on our heels, but somehow, somehow we got away." I shut my eyes and let Duo's soft breathing lull me back to sleep. We were safe.
"Quatre?"
I was warm. I could smell chicken soup and could hear the snapping of the fire. I blinked my eyes open and found myself looking into pools of indigo.
"Hey sleepyhead." I felt Duo's breath as it washed over my cheek and saw his bright smile. "Are you okay?"
"Oh, Duo. I thought I lost you out in the snow. I was so afraid." I whispered fearing I would start to cry again.
He smiled softly at me and wrapped his arms around me settling their weight on my back. "I'm sorry Quatre. I didn't mean to scare you. I'm okay now though. Sore as Hell, but alive." He gave me a reassuring squeeze and we slowly untangled ourselves from each other. "Looks like ol' stony made it." He chuckled rising slowly from the couch, shivering a bit in his briefs as he reached for the clothing Heero had laid out for him.
I looked to where Heero had been sitting at a table that I never even realized was here. He was looking at some data on his laptop and had a bunch of the chips we stole spread out before him. He looked up hearing Duo's voice and I watched as he carefully assessed Duo's condition.
"Good thing or you would have been dead." He grumbled from across the room.
"That would have been a shame, the strongest of us Gundam pilots dying like a frozen popsicle out in the tundra." Duo shot back laughing a little louder.
His eyes met mine and he gave me a small smile before glancing back to his laptop. "No, Quatre's too smart to die like a popsicle." He shot back smirking.
Duo snorted in protest and I laughed as he feigned hurt. Heero got up out of the chair he was at and crossed the room to where Duo was standing in front of the woodstove, pulling on articles of clothing and shivering still. He took the blanket we had discarded from the couch and walked up behind him, wrapping it around him tightly. I heard the little startled 'meep' from Duo as he realized Heero was trying to keep him warm and relaxed back into the loose embrace that Heero offered.
I watched them stand in the soft glow from the flames of the open woodstove while I took the soup off the hotplate. Heero whispered something softly into Duo's left ear and gave him a small squeeze before releasing him and moving back to the table the computer was on. Duo closed his eyes and stood in front of the warmth of the stove, a small smile creeping over his face.
They made me smile, and I hadn't meant for the chuckle to escape my lips as I thought of the two finally admitting their feelings, at least that's what it looked like to me. I glanced to Heero who was also watching Duo from his position at the laptop. His eyes darted to mine upon hearing my laugh and I smiled, blushing slightly that I had intruded on the tender moment. I had decided that although Duo and I had grown so close these past days, his heart was still free.
I settled myself back down and slowly ate some of my soup. Duo joined me on the couch with his own bowl, but proceeded to pick out all the noodles from mine. Which I didn't protest him doing. I was getting used to him stealing. After all, he stole a bit of my heart on this mission. A piece I was glad to give.
fini
(:./ebony/running7)
