15-Sep-2002
I know it's been over two years, but here, finally, is the second chapter of Itai. It's a bit experimental for us, so Tekka and I aren't sure how you'll like it--but, as always, we'd love to find out! ^_~
We've also decided that we're going to call this second chapter the
final chapter. (Tekka: Cutter finishes something! World shocked!)
After thinking about it for awhile, I started to realize that this is the
kind of story that could go on forever, with a chapter for each
character, and honestly at the rate Tekka inspires me, that could take the rest
of my natural life. And I think it works to stop here.
So, we hope you enjoy! And to all those who read the first chapter when it came out and wrote to me about it (if any of you are still out there [sweatdrop]), thank you--I don't know that anything could justify the wait, but I especially hope you like it.
Warnings/disclaimers: Same as before.
It works. It worked. I knew it would work.
If you figure someone out, you can make it happen. Doesn't matter who. Anyone. Everyone.
There's always something that will set them off. Heero, it was the figuring out itself.
I am a fucking genius.
I can do it. This will last me. This will last me until tonight, from the moment when I rise from this his chaste bed until the moment that I can lie down again--on a cot in a chair on the floor any where. Next safehouse is... who? Iceland? Iceland is Wufei.
Wu, the Ice Man.
I giggle.
I can make it. Tonight it might try to break out again, but tonight tonight tonight I will go to Wufei and I will ask him about Nataku. (Nataku, she knows what to do, she knows all the secrets inside of you...) Perhaps I will tell him about her, that I have seen her, that she does not think of him, that she never looks down.
Yes. And then next week I will be safehousing with Trowa and I will ask him what he feels like when he plays that flute. What it would feel like to see his sister's face if she missed with her knife. And then I'll go and Death with show his scythe to Sandrock.
A fierce grapple, a fierce grapple ladies and gentlemen...
And it all starts now; now that I have mastered it, now that I am the Master and nothing will ever get out of its proper container and all the petting zoo will stay where it is supposed to be in--
"Duo."
What? He is still in bed. How can he see? How can he see me?
I mean, I knew he was strong enough. That's why I chose him. That's why he can do it. But he is supposed to stay there stay there stay until I am safely out (in) until I have gone.
I blink. There is a glitch in the program. The program is hitching up.
I blink. His arm is around me like a steel band. I am admiration. I wonder if he even notices his broken rib rib is broken.
"You used me."
Well, of course.
Suddenly I am on the floor, my head hurts. The system is online again.
I'm needing more hits lately than I did before.
"Everyone is using you, Heero." Honestly, does he still not get that?
Heero ponders this for a moment. He always was the slow one. Smart guy--smartest there is, but very slow. "Yeah," he finally says, "but I understand their motivations."
"Oh, do you? Well, that's nice for you, Heero, although anyone who says they understand Treize Kushrenada's motivations is fucked in my book." Or just really stupid. But like I said, Heero may be slow, but I never thought he was stupid.
"What did you take from me? Why did you do it?"
Now this is unexpected. Has Heero ever been interested in the 'why's before?
"Fascinating question, but, you know, I have to be in Iceland by dark. I'll say hi to Wufei for ya." I make as if to move. Instantly he has me in a chokehold, only just barely loose enough so that I can breathe.
"You can't run, and you can't hide."
"And?"
"Why."
Maybe he's heard my catch phrase a little too often.
No help for it now.
"To keep it from getting out."
"What will it do if it gets out?" Who was it, Heero, who made you so merciless? Was it Dr. J? Was it the war? Was it me? Did I do that?
And how can he not see it? Isn't it obvious? In a way, I'm doing this for him, you know. Him and the others. I mean, everything he's worked for would be nothing. Nothing, nothing to bring home to the wife...
He slaps me. Hard.
Ah, concentration.
"What will it do, Duo?"
Is this terror? Am I terrified?
"Duo."
"Everyone will die."
I said it.
I said it.
Heero is staring at me. He is thinking. I do not know what he is thinking.
That is new.
"You were trying to pick a fight with me, weren't you." It was not a question. Told you he was a smart cookie. He's thinking now, harder than he used to. "This thing that will get out... it's inside of you."
Yes.
"When I... when I hit you, it stays in?"
"You have to keep it beaten back," I say.
"So it stays on the inside."
Yes. Yes. Yes.
"Last night. Was that enough?"
Enough. I chuckle. As if anything could ever be enough for it. It's very persistent, you know. I have to think very fast just to keep ahead of it. "For a little while," I say.
He seems to mull this over for a minute.
He is looking at me. Why is he looking like that?
"Then you'd better stay," he says.
The End
(:./cutter/itai2)
