14-Apr-2005
Title: Burn
Author: Sol 1056
Rated: PG-13 for violence, language
Pairing: none for now
Warnings: spoilers for the entire series
Dormitories: it's like a facsimile of a home, and I wonder why that would feel so appropriate. I toe my shoes off by the door and pad over to the bed, a collapsed fall backwards, groceries spilling out across the covers. To hell with it, I'm not that hungry anyway. I'll save the energy bars for later.
Idly I dig into the bag without looking. I wrap my hand around the apple, rubbing my thumb across its smooth surface. Duo had eaten one while I worked, offered me one even, but I'd turned it down.
I lift it up to my face, studying its red surface, slightly bruised, gleaming in the light of my laptop. The laptop clicks off into sleep mode, and the room is shrouded in darkness. I drop my hand and sigh.
I'm not really that hungry. I'm just waiting.
My laughter dies by the time I've left the base's smoking ruins behind me, but I can't keep the grin off my face. Duo looked... I can't think of the word. Something extreme, a good word would be unusual, because to see him loose his cool? I'm not sure why I think that's uncommon, but...
We're even, I'd told him. He'd saved me from the military hospital for whatever reason of his own, and now I've paid him back. Of course--and I grin, running my fingers across the controls to power down as I drop Wing into the heavy forest around Cinq--I paid him back in spades.
Gobsmacked, that's the word.
I shut down Wing, and run the final diagnostics. It's within operable levels, and ammunition will do for another mission, I think. I'll have to find J's contacts to purchase more.
Dropping from Wing's cockpit, I deploy the tarp, letting it fall gently across the darkened machine, and repeat the word to myself again. I realize I'm walking just a bit slower than usual, and pick up my pace, reminding myself to stay alert.
I still can't help a smug grin.
This isn't what I expected. Everything was clear when I'd left; when did it get so confusing? I attended classes; I wore the uniform. Now I'm done. I've packed. I stripped the system of all records, all traces I existed. And I'm ready to remove the final trace, but she looks me straight in the eyes and tells me--without a single ounce of fear--that if I kill her, it'd just bring more attention to me.
She's right, of course, but that doesn't stop me from knowing it's what I should be doing, questions be damned. And then she invites me to the dance.
Now I follow her down the hallway, and I can't help but glance down at her hand in mine. Her fingers are smooth, a little cool against mine, soft; she has a scent I can't place, but makes me think of something sweet. I don't understand why I've agreed, and I don't know why she keeps glancing back over her shoulder at me, like she knows something I don't.
Makes me wonder what else J told her. That gimpy bastard. Maybe I shouldn't have loosened the bolts on his prosthesis that last time he fell asleep during a training simulation.
"Dance with me," she whispers, at the edge of the ballroom. Relena hesitates, her fingers squeezing mine, just a little tighter, then relaxing. "You know how?"
"Yes," I manage, uneasy at the people around us. I feel exposed, and I don't move when she tugs at my hand again.
"Heero... " She laughs gently and positions my hands--one on her waist, the other against her palm. She counts for a second, under her breath, and then glides backward. I follow, falling into the pattern after a moment's awkwardness. Relena smiles, her lids lowered. "See? It's not that hard."
I'm supposed to kill you, I want to say. You're not supposed to be looking like you find something immensely satisfying. There's not supposed to be a pleased little smile playing across your lips.
I suppose it's my turn to be gobsmacked.
Damn it.
I leave it all behind, and flee across the night sky. It takes a minute to realize my hands are shaking. How did they find me? It must've been through Relena. She met with J, he spoke to her, and she returned to the school... Damn it, I should've killed her. But...
Two people know who I am, now, if I don't count the whole Sweeper crew seeing Wing, as well. Too many people. We're on the same side, she'd said. Like Duo. Another ally.
I don't need allies. They're just going to get in my way.
It's easier to be annoyed than it is to admit that I'm completely bewildered. I'm starting to feel like perhaps there's a target on my head that says, anyone unpredictable, come make Heero's life a confusing mess.
Duo finally stops staring up at the moon out the shuttle window, returning his attention to the controls. He's a deft, capable pilot--more than that, he's a damn fine pilot. Realizing that only makes me grumpier. People aren't supposed to be like that, like him, like Relena. They should make sense. They should say what they'll do, mean what they say, and that be the end of it. None of these private smiles at jokes I don't understand.
I turn my head away, staring out my own window, watching the nighttime world pass beneath us. Duo takes us up higher, above the clouds, and soon it's only darkness. We'll be at the base before dawn; I have a few hours.
I consider talking, but I don't know what to say. Who are you? Why don't you go find your own base to destroy? But I know the answer to that: he's drawn to the notion of destroying OZ, too, once and for all. I just can't figure out why he'd be wasting time looking forward to going home. That's just a distraction.
It's much easier to feel annoyed. Then I don't have to think about the fact that I envy him. Home, he's looking forward to going home, and what do I have? An old barrack, a hangar... and if there's no battle, there's no Wing, and if there's no Wing, there's no need for me.
I don't want to go home. Somewhere, deep down, I want it to last a little longer.
I shift, tightening my arms across my chest.
"You can sleep," he offers, and for once he's not grinning, nor looking like he'd willingly slit my throat if I closed my eyes. It's something... else. I can't place it, so I just scowl at him. He laughs, and shrugs. "Or not."
"Shut up," I tell him, leaning my head back and closing my eyes. "I'm sleeping."
"Sure thing," he replies, chuckling a bit softer.
The engines lull me to sleep, for real, and I dream of a smile I haven't thought of in years. When I wake, the sky is pre-dawn gray. I can't remember my dreams, but neither can I shake them.
End Part 3
(:./sol/burn3)
