31-Jan-2001
Birthday present for Meikai Enzuru! I know it's past your birthday, but... *sigh* I tried. And then my beta reader, like... Died or something! *looks for Sana-chan*
The song isn't long, as far as words go... It reminds me a hell of a lot of 'Flying Away,' actually. The slower tempo, not as many words that are drawn out to seem much longer...
This is one of the first GW fics I started (about twenty months ago,) and I just finished, which is why the writing style changes so drastically. ^^;;; It's not related to the 'Best I Ever Had (Grey Sky Morning)' trilogy, but I'm working on part 3 of that. I swear. Also, each little part isn't necessarily related to the previous or next, so don't get confused if you don't know how they suddenly space shifted into a battle from a school or something. Scene change! Scene change! *red flashing lights go off* I've had people get confused on things like that before...
I wrote that last parts of this while looping "Still Time," by Hidenori Tokuyama (all you Jrock fans will really like him!), "Love & Joy" by Kimura Yuki, and "Groovy Blue," by Onsaka Masaya (as Dark Mousy.) A very eclectic mix, but all very cool songs. I suggest you all check them out! Dark Mousy... What a name. Lucky for him (and us), he's bishy as anything! *huggles*
Title: 'Letting the Cables Sleep'
Author: Ryan Harbin
Pairings: 1+2/2+1
Warnings: shounen ai (and rampant fluff and fun stereotypes... I try not to make presents too weird...)
Spoilers: Some, but not much higher than ep... ten or so. In fact, I change the story around a bit... *whispers* It's been about a year since I watched my GW, so I can't remember some of it very well... ^^;;;
Archive: GW Addiction
[You in the dark]
The only light coming from the LCD screen on a small computer Heero is busily calculating on, Duo watched him silently as he worked, each tap echoing down the ventilation shaft they occupied.
"Suki da," he whispered.
"Hn?" Oops. Heero heard something.
"Nan demo nai!" he answered quickly, almost forgetting to whisper. He was lucky it was so dark; Heero couldn't see the slight red tinge to his face.
"Hn." Back to the computer, totally unaware as Duo stared wistfully.
[You in the pain]
In the second school of one month, Duo watched Heero sleep. The pretense of the Perfect Soldier was gone as he dreamed. For one of the first times in the seeming eternity he's been familiar with him, Heero had a human expression. Whatever he was seeing was torturing him, that was clear from his twisted features.
Duo settled noiselessly onto the bed beside him, putting his face within inches of Heero's. He moved his hand to the Japanese pilot's face, measuring the curved planes of bone and flesh. Abruptly Heero shuddered and drew closer to Duo. He jumped up quickly, but the eyes and face betrayed that the pilot of Wing Gundam was still asleep.
Deep in his dream, Heero ran after a laughing figure with flashing violet eyes. He stopped, stretching out one arm in a silent plea, but the figure doesn't stop, giving one last mocking before disappearing with a last defiant flip of a long brown braid.
But the comment rang forever.
"Ha! I could never love you, Heero!"
[You on the run]
Everything was shut out as the Perfect Soldier, back in full for the mission, concentrated solely on the soldiers before him. Dropping one with a quick shot, he promptly dropped the ground and threw himself, rolling, out of the of the others' sights. After only a second's pause, Duo imitated his action, to a slightly different angle. Even that second, though, was too much. He gasped as felt a strange pain in his side - but he knew immediately what it was.
It didn't appear to be dangerous, or his body was channeling the pain away, so he continued after only a brief falter, jerking his head up so he could see the opposition. In the split second he hadn't been paying attention, Heero had killed or at least incapacitated all eight of the soldiers, and was busy reloading the ever present gun when Duo looked to him.
"Daijobu ka?" His voice is lower than normal, and there appears to almost be real concern in his face, quickly shuttered but still there. Duo smiled.
"Mouchiron! Aren't I always?"
[Living your hell]
Another new school. A tiny room with one double bed. Although they started on opposite edges, both Heero and Duo had tossed and turned their way to the middle. Duo was woken up to the sound of a loud gasp. Only a few inches from his own, Heero's face was once again pained, whatever demons that haunt his sleep back in full.
"Oi, Heero," he whispered. His partner's prussian blue eyes flickered open, the panicked look in them quickly shuttered, replaced by the indifference Duo had come to hate so much, shutting down at the slightest hint of pain
"Nani?"
"Nan demo... Nevermind." He could see the puzzled look, could tell Heero was about to question him, but Duo closed his eyes quickly.
"Oyasumi, Heero," he said, pretending to be tired.
[Living your ghost
Living your end]
Molten metal and flaming shrapnel rained from the sky, and among them the solitary figure of a lone boy was thrown - likely to his death. Duo watched, not aware that his mouth was wide open and that he'd forgotten to breathe, as that body was quickly town from his sight and launched somewhere in the crater that marked the final battle of Wing Gundam.
"He... Heero?" he whispered.
"Duo, come on!" he dimly heard Quatre yell. He barely felt the convulsions of Deathscythe as the shock wave hit, even as monitors fizzled and Quatre's visage on the view screen shook and then disappeared for an unnoticed second. It took only that second for him to compose himself, and he tried his best to appear nothing but a concerned comrade and as and Quatre quickly vacated.
[Never seem to get in the place that I belong]
"My Dad says that the Gundams are nothing but renegades who like to kill and don't care who they fight!" His head jerked up as the comment, made in passing by a girl at his school, seemed to echo endlessly in his mind, reverberations of the first evidence of betrayal. He schooled his face into something other than the study in pain he knew it had become as he stood, mostly successful in stopping the shaking in his hands. Before he could stop it, his mind wandered back to Heero. If he'd been here, what would he have done? Probably taken it all for the sake of the mission... But would Heero have let the first signs of discontinued belief stop him, or would he have fought on? Because he sure as hell felt like dropping it all right now, maybe following Heero into hell. Maybe in hell he'd be happy... Since maybe he'd see him there.
[Whatever you say it's alright
Whatever you do it's all good]
His body dropped heavily, jolting old injuries given no time or fuel to heal. Heero backed away after dumping him unceremoniously onto the cot, putting the safety back on his gun and setting it down with a harsh clank.
"You're injured," he stated tonelessly.
Duo shrugged. "It's not much. Some good old fashioned R&R and I'll be fine!" He attempted his familiar saucy grin, one that failed at the sharp pain shooting from his shoulder.
"Uso da," Heero replied just as coldly, moving away briefly.
"So what if it is?" he asked belligerently as Heero returned, glaring at the Wing pilot's back. Heero returned Duo's gaze stonily over one shoulder, bright blue eyes staring into his.
Heero turned back around, revealing some sort of medical kit. Duo had to admit with an internal chuckle he hadn't been sure whether Heero ever owned one, or if the Japanese pilot left healing up to nature.
His companion kneeled next to him, deft hands tracing over his skin for any sign of a wound. Duo's slight stiffening as he passed over the right shoulder blade gave him all the warning he would ever need. He slowly unbuttoned the boy's thin black shirt, intensely aware of the social boundaries he'd long struggled past.
Duo's body hummed tensely, not solely because Heero was methodically applying pressure to an area that suddenly felt as if it were on fire. He battled with himself, his knowledge versus feelings, logic versus the reasonless bounds of human emotion.
"Heero..." he murmured. All that diverted from the solemn pilot's task was his eyes, shifting quickly to the sound of his voice as his hands continued to expertly bandage lesions he hadn't even noticed.
"Thank you," he whispered, darting his head forward to brush his lips over Heero's cheek lightly. When he could see them, Heero's blue eyes were slightly surprised, before he nodded and continued with his task. Leaving Duo to fiercely debate his interpretation of Heero's actions, or lack there of. On one hand, his reply was far from ideal. but then again, what was ideal? Not getting punched in the face? In that respect, that was the perfect response. Heero had somewhat expressed a calm acceptance, even trust, in Duo's deed. Whatever Duo chose to do, it was all right.
Duo smiled. That was a fine state of affairs.
[You in the sea on a decline
Breaking the waves]
It was an uncommonly beautiful sight, one privileged to few. Heero Yuy, not glaring, not gazing listlessly behind you, but standing, knee deep in water that lapped quietly at his legs, staring thoughtfully at the setting sun. The slowly falling orb streaked the sun and ocean pink and orange, colors that would have been too harsh if presented anywhere else. The same distorted rays tinted Heero's face, open and almost wondering, reflecting in the whites of his eyes.
"I told you," Duo commented lightly from his perch on a low hanging rock, his feet dangling in the sun-warmed waves.
[Watching the lights go down]
It hadn't taken much prodding from Duo, surprisingly, to convince Heero to accompany him. The solemn-eyed boy had followed him diligently, customarily not saying a word. But it was a different kind of silence, contemplating instead of cold, reflective but not distant. Duo hadn't disturbed him as he may otherwise have, refraining from any sort of comment until they' reached their destination. He'd seen the small inlet from his window, and had been wanting to see it up close since he'd arrived at the school. Moving around so much may have been a good idea, but it didn't leave them time to get acquainted with an area.
[Letting the cables sleep]
For whatever reason, Heero was letting his walls down, admitting Duo through the chinks in the armor which had been his protector and his curse at the same time.
He moved to stand should to shoulder with the blue-eyed pilot, his footsteps sloshing through the golden-hued water, stinging a bit on still open scrapes.
"Ne, Heero?" He inquired somewhat tentatively. "Ever had a water fight?"
Heero shook his head, though the dawning comprehension in his eyes made it clear he understood the implications.
"Eh? Hontou?" Duo asked, amazed even though he'd been fairly certain of the answer even as he'd first wondered. He paused for a moment to wonder that Heero had never enjoyed simple pleasures of childhood that even Duo, a street child on a dying colony, had experienced at least once.
"It's getting dark," Heero commented, turning his back abruptly and splashing to the shore, putting his shoes on over his still sandy feet.
Duo frowned. 'Don't close up on me now,' he pleaded silently.
[Silence is not the way]
The walk across the dunes was hushed, Heero mute as usual and Duo still not speaking, although for a different reason this trip.
With a devilish grin, he tensed without warning and shoved against Heero, overbalancing the dark-haired boy and sending him tumbling down the sandy hill. Duo jumped after him, landing gracelessly to flop next to Heero's sand-dusted form.
"Got you!" he crowed, rolling into a casual sitting position. 'Make him angry, surprise him, anything to get him saying something again...'
Heero blinked, dragging his arms through the cloying sand with a squeaking, scraping sound to support himself on his elbows, shaking particles from his hair and face.
"No, you don't," he said, smirking, before breaching the distance between the two and using his weight to pin Duo in one smooth movement.
Shock flickered briefly in Deathscythe's pilot's round eyes, but he inwardly applauded. "Oh, yeah?" he taunted, responding in kind, flipping Heero's still body. His attack was blocked halfway, and he fought back fiercely, the two wrestling playfully, throwing up sand that sprinkled lightly back down.
[We need to talk about it]
"Now I have you," Heero finished, slightly triumphantly as Duo ceased struggling, exerted and content at once.
His quarry nodded. "Yes, you do."
Something too swift to be identified flashed across Heero's face, lighting the delicate features briefly.
Maybe it was the overt familiarity of the two, maybe the surprising beauty of nature they'd been presented with, but the normally stiff and closed off boy was more open, letting himself be exposed as his face softened and the liquid lines of his body uncoiled.
[If heaven is on the way
We'll wrap the world around it]
Had either of them been different people, Duo would have wanted more, a solid vow of some sort of commitment. But commitment in their situation was absurd, one couldn't pledge their life to a person when it was already sworn to fight someone else's war. Just as well, Heero, he knew, wasn't the type of person to so readily offer himself. That much he'd gathered from watching his quiet compatriot with Relena, with the other pilots. Hell, from watching Heero react to Duo's own actions.
If this was all he would get, an unspoken feeling of something greater than Heero's customary apathy, he was happy with it. And who knew, maybe they'd both be fortunate enough to survive the war. Maybe then he would confront Heero more thoroughly.
Maybe then.
Kitto.
Eh. Don't particularly like this one... Whatever. Hope you don't hate it, Meikai! Sappy, altogether too sappy... That's the kind of present I like.
However, I am happy I finally managed to finish this one! It's been too long since I started it...
Ryan Harbin
Please send comments to: rioroute_vilgyna@yahoo.com