A Crooked Fantasia

by Sicilienne

Author's Note: This is basically just a tasting of things to come. I've put aside my rabid obsession with Utena for a few moments to indulge my writing skills in another very cool anime series, Gundam Wing. I've always wanted to write a story featuring one of my all-time favorite characters, Duo, and writing in Hilde's POV made it all the more fun. This is not AU, just my crazy mind envisioning what might have happened after Endless Waltz. So, with that said, sit back, relax, and enjoy the fic!

Disclaimer: I'm sorry to say that no I don't, and never will, own Gundam Wing. Though I believe in miracles and perhaps one day I'll get my grubby little hands on it.

Chapter 1: An Abridged Romance Tale

We never kept anything from that junkyard. It was one of those places where we repaired cars or appliances, shipping them out as quickly as they came in, taking joy in the mechanics of the machines rather than the story that each one held. But it was a job, and a nice one at that; mechanic's heaven.

And Duo Maxwell was in heaven.

He moved on, like the others had, after the war ended. He had gone back to leading a normal life, or at least what he thought was one, balancing his life precariously between school and keeping peace in the colonies. He always set aside a little time for us; a small holiday, a weekend, or even an hour or so between classes. We did the usual things teenagers do, go to the movies, out to eat, or just stay in his dorm. And it was those times in that dorm that I cherished the most, because it was there and only there that he would open up and let me see a tiny snippet of the real him. We grew close in that year, and I believed that Duo was my best friend. I never asked if I was his. I just assumed he felt the same way.

But then the Marimeia incident occurred and we recognized that the perfect world the Gundam pilots fought for wasn't so perfect after all. Everyone turned to the things they knew, routines they memorized, people they trusted in. And Duo turned to his machines and me. We were the ideal team, him and me, talking, thinking, and I even believed feeling on the same level.

And now, when peering through the blinds in the office, I am faced with the cold, hard truth. I can see Duo amongst the junk piles out there with him. A tightness builds in my throat, and I turn away, instead filing new claims and getting satisfaction when hearing the hollow clangor of the file cabinet when I slam the door shut. It calms me for the time being. But there will be a time in the not-so-distant future when I see/hear/think of Duo, the tightness will return, and I will realize for the thousandth time that the perfect world I created for the two of us had a fatal flaw woven in it.

I never meant to keep Duo all to myself. But now I wish I had.