Title: Alternate Dualities
Author: WingNut
Archive: http://www.fanworkrecs.com
Disclaimers: I don't own the characters from Gundam Wing, I just play with them for non-profit fun until they run screaming back to their creators.
Warnings: AU - AAAAAAAAAAAU. Some yaoi, lemon, violence, language. You should be a legal adult to read this. Open-mindedness helps, too.
Pairings: all over the map; Duo-centric. yaoi and het.
Author's Notes: A huge helping of "suspension of disbelief" would be appropriate before you read this. I'm sure J or G could explain the science behind it, but they're kinda dead right now...
Part 1 ~ Singularity
"Shit!" Duo ducked in front of the prototype weapon he had been examining as several armed guards poured into the room.
"We're Preventers! Throw down your weapons!!" he yelled, knowing it would do no good but obligated to try. People who set up well-guarded secret research labs did not give up that easily. Damnit.
The apparatus beside him began a low, resonant humming, and Duo leaped away from his vulnerable position in front of it - only to scramble back a second later as one of the guards opened fire from behind a desk.
Double damnit! Standing in front of a black hole generator was not a good choice for cover. He was sure Heero would have something caustic to say about it. If he survived...
He risked a quick peek under the targeting dish of the now- thrumming machine to get his bearings, noting three more guards moving to flank him, and a female scientist standing in the doorway holding a keypad. He couldn't see his partner, but judging from the sounds, 'Frost' was steadily decimating the guards at his end of the room.
Several shots clanged off the edge of the aiming mechanism, encouraging him to draw his head back, and the woman yelled, "Don't shoot the generator, you fools!"
Extremely anxious to be away from the weapon beside him, which was now emitting bone-shaking vibrations, Duo snaked his gun arm into the open and squeezed off two rounds, aiming by memory. He shot right through the desk, drawing a shriek and a thud from the guard behind it, followed by silence. Wasting no time, he pivoted to the other side and took out two of the guards closing on his position.
The third proved to be more tricky, being both a good shot and clever enough to have found cover behind a blast shield built into one wall. Duo tried to escape from the fire zone in front of the throbbing generator, and received a graze in his upper arm and a more serious wound in his leg before admitting that he was pinned down.
Duo swore - the deep thrum was rising in pitch, and he knew he didn't have much time. He ran through his options quickly as he wrapped a strip torn from his shirt around his bleeding thigh. Break cover, with a wounded leg slowing him down, and almost certainly get shot by that damned guard. Stay here, right in the target zone, and be... shot? fried? blasted into a million atoms? when the mechanism finally went off. Or maybe... stay here, but deactivate the machine before it fired?
He heaved himself up and over to the dish immediately, noting the beam shield discs studding the rim. He scrambled up inside and swiftly began to pull the discs out of their quick-release clamps. If he could destabilize the shielding, the machine might overload, or be torn apart by the intense energy being generated. It was worth a shot...
He had a disc in each hand when the humming rose to a piercing shriek and purple light began to gather around his body. He jumped backwards out of the dish, his wounded leg giving out on contact and tumbling him to the floor amid the other discs he had removed.
A thin beam of purple light shot out from the dish, slicing the air above Duo's prone body and coming to a focused point two feet from the wall. The shield discs around his body absorbed the radiant energy and connected to each other with crackling lines of plasma, the pressure snapping them into alignment automatically.
For one ecstatic instant he thought he was safe.
Then he felt himself being pulled towards that brilliant point, where gravity was being built up to intolerable pressures.
He tried to dig his fingers into the floor, to stop himself by friction alone, but he slid faster and faster, and he didn't dare move because the purple beam was just above his chest and he could feel the energy snapping against his flesh and then his head smacked into the wall and his vision darkened and he was floating and a million ants were crawling over his skin and agonizing fire hissed along his nerves and he couldn't think, couldn't breathe, couldn't exist...
Part 2 ~ Awakenings
"Mmph-mm" Duo mumbled, coming slowly to the surface of consciousness.
Instantly, warm arms wrapped around him, lifting him slightly from the bed. "I'm right here, koi," Heero's slightly nasal voice said in his ear.
Koi? Duo wondered muzzily. Wasn't that short for 'beloved' or something? He must have heard it wrong...
But he had to admit, the hug felt great. Heero must have been really worried to forget himself like this. Duo sighed and snuggled a little, enjoying the moment. There was nothing like a hug to make you feel warm and secure.
He drifted back to sleep with a pleased little smile on his face.
The next time Duo woke, it was to see Heero sleeping upright in a chair beside his bed. He sat up, stretched and yawned before the memories of the previous night resurfaced.
He frowned, trying to visualize the sequence. The infiltration, the weapon, the sudden fight, that damned third guard, the shield discs, the purple beam, and... floating? He seemed to remember floating in blackness for an eternity, watching brief flickers of colour and light flash by him, and then he was waking up here in what was obviously a hospital. And Heero had hugged him...
He smiled and glanced over at his sleeping partner. Heero was still wearing his 'stealth' uniform - tight black t-shirt and black pants. The drab Preventer jacket was slung over the back of the chair.
Something out of place caught his attention, and he sharpened his attention on his friend, frowning. As if the scrutiny disturbed him, Heero shifted and opened his eyes, instantly alert.
Then Heero smiled at him. Duo blinked slowly, his jaw sagging open in shock. He couldn't remember the last time he'd seen Heero smile. In a happy, non-psychotic way, that is. Damn, he looked good - the expression lit his entire face, warming his eyes and...
Duo's thoughts dribbled to a halt as Heero leaned over him and pressed their mouths together. Then Heero's tongue slipped between his shock-parted lips and began to caress him. Duo's eyes stretched wide, his hands fisting around the edge of the blankets in his lap. After a moment, his eyelids sagged half- shut as he began to respond to the erotic invitation.
Several long, enjoyable moments later, Heero pulled back, rubbing his nose gently against Duo's cheek. "Baka. When are you going to learn that I'm the indestructible one?"
"Uh... wah...." Duo was unable to think of a single thing to say.
The door opened at this interesting point and Wufei poked his head into the room. Seeing that the patient was awake, he entered.
Even in his dazed state, Duo noted that Wufei seemed not at all surprised by Heero's position, sitting on the edge of the bed with his arms around his partner, his cheek resting on Duo's hair. What the hell was going on?
Wufei folded himself into one of the visitors' chairs as Heero shifted, turning to half-sit, half-lie beside and behind Duo, pulling his partner into a loose embrace against his chest. Again, Wufei made no comment, raised no eyebrow, didn't even seem to notice.
"How's the arm?" Wufei asked.
"Uh, f-fine." Heero's lips were gently brushing against his temple, and he could feel a blush covering his face. Get a grip, for heaven's sake!!
"I hadn't noticed it, actually," Duo confessed. He flexed his slightly stiff (now that he thought about it) left arm, feeling the bandage pull tight against the strain. Wait, the arm wound was just a graze; hadn't he been shot in the leg? He shook his head, confused. His leg didn't hurt at all...
"Good. So you should survive Colonel Une ripping a strip off you for that stupid stunt." Wufei smirked at him.
"Stunt?" Duo repeated foolishly.
"Baka," Heero's lips brushed his ear and he shivered. "You started pulling the shield discs off the machine while it was powering up. One of them was live when you ripped it loose, and the shock damn near killed you. If Wufei hadn't gotten the remote and powered down, you would have been fried. As it is, you've been unconscious for almost two days."
Duo frowned, now totally confused. That wasn't how he remembered it at all. "Wufei? You forced her to? But you weren't... there..." his voice trailed off as he noticed something about Wufei, the same thing that had niggled at him before, when he had first looked at Heero.
The Preventer uniform was blue and green, the identifying patch a hexagon with a pale P on a green background. But on Wufei's uniform, the patch had a scarlet background. He looked at Heero's jacket, hanging over the back of the chair. The bright red flash on the sleeve was clear to see.
"You bang your head when you fell?" Wufei said, bringing him back to the conversation. "You'd think all that hair would cushion it." The Chinese man smiled, a sardonic twist to his lips.
Duo narrowed his eyes. He trusted his own recollection. He didn't trust a lot of people, but himself he trusted implicitly. This had to be some sort of colossal joke. It was Wufei!! He must still be angry about the time Duo had convinced him Sally was pregnant with twins...
But how did he get Heero to go along? And to go so far...? Duo blushed again, remembering the kiss. Well, two could play at that game...
He snuggled back into Heero's arms and almost grinned when they tightened around him. "Yeah, okay, things are becoming clearer. A lot clearer." He smirked right back at Wufei, then turned his head and captured Heero's mouth in a rather blazing kiss, even if he did say so himself.
And he would have said so, had Heero not kissed him back quite thoroughly and expertly and made him forget what the hell he was supposed to be doing....
Duo wound up gasping and gazing lustfully into Heero's dark blue eyes for a long moment afterward before memory trickled back. Oh yeah... revenge... this was not real... and he definitely wasn't getting an erection...
Duo had expected Wufei to sputter, or curse, or suffer a sudden nosebleed, but he merely sighed and stood up, rolling his eyes. "So glad to see you're back to normal, Duo. Get plenty of rest before tomorrow when you face Une." He nodded to Heero and left quietly, not at all discomposed...
...leaving Duo alone with his partner, who was nibbling on his ear and... purring? The next few moments were an erotic delight, in a hazy and thoroughly confusing way. He'd never realized how sensitive his chest was before...
But soon his gasps of pleasure began to have a sharper edge; the sensual shivers were replaced by a tingling all over his skin, like a million tiny hot needles. From far away he sensed Heero's deep concern, but then his back arched and his eyes rolled back and he was being torn in two and he screamed...
Part 3 ~ Grief
Duo sat bolt upright in the hospital bed, screaming. His heart was hammering to get out of his chest and he couldn't catch his breath.
And he hurt. His leg blazed with agony at his sudden movement while his ribs vied for attention with stabbing pain. His head throbbed with each beat of his racing heart, and he had ripped an IV out of his arm.
He fell back against the pillows, groaning. He tried to breathe shallowly, to avoid straining his obviously broken ribs.
Then Wufei was there, soothing him, brushing the hair out of his eyes. "Shhh, you're safe, Maxwell. Just lie still." Black eyes looked down at him worriedly.
He could barely catch his breath, so he couldn't ask the billion questions buzzing in his brain. Like, what happened? Did he have a heart attack when Heero was kissing him? Where was Heero? Why was Wufei here? Why did he hurt so much more now than he had before? And where the hell was his partner?
This last question made it out as a gasped, "Heero?"
Wufei gripped his shoulder, looking somber. "Don't you remember? Heero's dead, Duo. He didn't make it. I'm... I'm sorry."
Duo gaped at his friend. OK, a joke was a joke but this was going too far. He hurt far too much to appreciate any humour. "Yeah... right... funny... still pissed... about... the twins..." he managed between panted breaths.
"It's no joke, Maxwell," Wufei retorted. He looked annoyed for all of a second, but then his expression smoothed back into patient concern. It scared Duo. He glanced at Wufei's sleeve patch, but the background was back to its normal green.
"C'mon, Wuffie... don't mess... with my head," he pleaded.
Wufei shook his head slowly. "I would not lie to you about this. He charged a guard hiding behind a blast shield. He was dropped with a single shot to the head. On my honour, Duo, he is dead."
Duo sat there, struggling to breathe, aching all over and knowing, absolutely knowing, that Wufei was not lying. And the sleeve patch was normal, which meant the last memory he had, of Heero holding him, kissing him... It was all a lie. A trick of the mind to shield him from the bitter truth.
He should have realized it was a hallucination when he noticed he felt less hurt than he knew he was. He should have known...
He should have known why he had stayed with Heero after the war, been his partner and roommate and best friend. He should have known why he had never dated much. He should have realized what his true feelings were, as revealed by the dream he'd had of a loving Heero. He should have known... but now it was too late.
"Damned... guard... had me... pinned down..." It was too much. He bit back a sob, realizing forlornly that Heero had died trying to save him. Boys weren't supposed to cry; but then, Heero was never supposed to die, either...
Duo was awake and staring at the wall, when Hilde came in. She crossed the room in three quick strides to sit on the bed and wrap her arms around him.
"Oh, Duo! I came as soon as I heard. I'm so sorry!" she whispered.
"It's my fault. He would have been fine, but I was trapped and he had to come rescue me..." He muttered the confession into her shoulder, wanting her condemnation almost as much as her comfort.
"Shhh, love, shhh. You could never tell Heero what to do. It was his decision. The odds just caught up with him, that's all."
She began to rock him gently, and he leaned into her, grateful for her support and caring. And he discovered that boys do cry after all.
End Page 1
(:./wingnut/alter1)
