Author: Tsuchi

Pairing: 5x2, 2xH (sort of)

Disclaimer: Would I be writing fanfiction if I owned the series? Probably, but it wouldn't be fanfiction, it'd be canon. And there'd be a lot more of Wufei. Don't own, not making money off it. This is all for my own enjoyment.

Warnings: Contains Shonen-ai! Since this is I left out the sex scene. If you want to read it, visit Ring

Oct 205 AC

"I was, uh wondering… That ring, in your paperweight, would you mind if I wore it?"

Wufei's face pinches as he rubs his wounded arm. "Go ahead," he said, in a voice that is almost enough to convince Duo he doesn't care.

"I mean, you would… Can I wear it to my wedding?" Duo asked, pleading in his mind that Wufei won't make him say it. The Chinese man meets his eyes, and a sneer forms on his elegant features.

"I don't see why not. I hardly have need of it, and I'm sure," the sneer is from the good old glory days of fighting among the stars, a mask, and one Duo hurts to see again, even though he knew it was coming, "working in a junkyard doesn't pay nearly as well as Preventers does. If you can't afford two rings on your own, I understand."

Duo sighs: Wufei really is going to make him say it.

June 200 AC

They lay together, legs tangled as badly as the sheets after the frenzied lovemaking they'd committed, pressed up against each other, knowing that these moments were the last they would have before their respective masks would come on, and all the love they felt would turn to pestering, and disgust. They had so little time.

"Love you," Duo murmured, half asleep.

Then the alarm, set for 6:00 in the morning (an ungodly hour), graced their ears with the discordant sounds of one of the few radio stations they both cared for, and whatever response Wufei might have made was lost to the morning, to the masks, to the Job.

Being a Preventer sucked.

Feb 201 AC

He could feel the barrel of the gun against his head, through his hair. He looked pleadingly into Wufei's eyes, begging him to let him die, make him live, do something other than the nothing he was doing now.

Two instincts warred in him, and in Wufei- the man had no idea how to conceal his emotions sometimes. The first was of the lover, the Duo Maxwell that came out after dark, and only then if he was at home, at ease. It begged at Wufei to save him, and then to quit this life-threatening job that was coming in between them all the time. It begged at him to end the secrecy, or to shoot him now.

They worked together, and lived together, and because both of them were 'irreparably straight' in the eyes of their coworkers, thanks to Duo's penchant for flirting with anything wearing a skirt, and Wufei's natural inclination to blush and stammer whenever the words 'female' and 'companion' (or really, any words to those effect) were put together in the same sentence, no thought anything of it.

And now he was standing in a terrorist base, with a gun against his head, and a lover who he couldn't even say 'I love you' to, lest there be cameras pointing in their direction.

And now his lover was leveling a gun at the man behind him, and firing, and Duo was falling down and to the side as fast as he could, and rolling to come up, unharmed, by his lover's warm body, and thanking God he was alive, and cursing him too, because he knew that at least in Wufei, the second instinct had won. Again.

It ruled his lover's life, this second instinct, the one that demanded he follow the rules, and law, and justice, and particularly the part of Preventers' code of conduct that said partners couldn't 'fraternize', which made it sound creepy, like he was sleeping with his brother, but really he wasn't, he was having sex with the strongest, gentlest, and yet most complicated man he'd ever met, and if the man was his partner, too bad.

Except it wasn't too bad for Wufei. He'd had a problem from the beginning. He didn't want people to know things about him, didn't want people to get too close, and cared too much about his job to get fired for sleeping with his partner, who was his partner in all senses of the word.

"I always knew you'd get killed without me, Maxwell." And so they hid. They hid behind their wartime facades as if there was nothing else to them: they were Maxwell, the braided moron, and Chang Wufei, Ice Prince, impossibly paired, and impossibly in love, except no one knew that last part.

And it wouldn't be so bad, except Wufei had been coming home later, and later each night, and sure he never seemed like his attention was wandering to other, more available, people- he brought gifts home, really nice stuff, kinda girly sometimes, but they had an image to maintain- but he'd always have a look on his face like he was going to drop a bombshell the size of Deathscythe, and Duo found that he was waiting for it.

And he smelled really nice lately. Really nice, and that just didn't fit. Wufei'd never cared about his appearance aside from the uniform, but he'd come home smelling really awesome lately, and it was creeping Duo out. He'd yet to see a cologne bottle in the bathroom.

Mar 201 AC

And that was it. Wufei walked in, five hours late, carrying a bag from Spencer's in the Mall, third floor, and smelling like, like… and looking like it kinda sucked to be here, and Duo put it together.

"Hey," he said, feeling it was his right to be unaccountably silent.

"Hey," Wufei echoed back, giving a weak smile. "I'm sorry I'm late, there was something I needed to… pick up from…" he let his sentence be taken away by the intake vent, and he just stared at the apartment.

In his pocket, Duo's hand clenched around a ring. He'd made dinner- actually made it, and he was a pretty damn good cook when he wanted to be- and set the table real fancy, and then it'd all gone to waste, because Wufei hadn't come home.

They got off work at the same time, but to keep up the pretense of working together unwillingly, they took separate cars home. Duo'd gone to the jeweler's on Fifth, because they'd called at work to telling him that his ring, with the engraving, to my love, for all eternity, was ready.

He'd expected Wufei to beat him home. But he hadn't, and Duo'd figured that was a good thing, 'cause then he could make the day he asked Chang Wufei to marry him real special.

"Is there some occasion?" It was code, really: Is there someone here? Do I need to pretend? Duo pretended he didn't notice the hidden question.

"Yeah, it's the day I figured it out." He was pissed. Five years. He'd lived with Wufei since a year after the Mariemeia bit, and they'd been lovers for four of those, and every one of them was a lie. 'Cause Wufei wasn't pretending to be 'irreparably straight'. He was irreparably straight.

Wufei's eyes widened, in what might have been a comic if Duo hadn't been feeling like shit right now. He clutched the plastic bag in his hand, and asked, "Figured what out?"

"You fucker, you won't even admit it now!" Duo was gone, hiding in his hand that hid the ring he was going to give. It was Shinigami facing this uragirimono, this traitor.

"Admit what?" The look on Wufei's face was gone, replaced with a wariness reserved for wild animals, and psychopaths. Appropriate really, 'cause Duo couldn't guarantee Shinigami wouldn't kill the Preventer right now.

"You fucker." Shinigami strode over, and loudly sniffed the air around Wufei. "Relena wears this shit!" he growled, and threw out his hand to point at the door.

"Duo, I-"

"No!" he yelled. "You've gotten four fucking years, you're not getting one more second! Get out! GET OUT!"

Caught off guard, Wufei did as he was told, stumbling backward toward the door. His eyes were blank, and to Shinigami, that was as good as a Supreme Court verdict. He'd been cheating, and Duo'd caught him, and Shinigami was getting rid of the bastard before he did anymore damage.

Jan 204 AC

And now he was in shit.

He'd quit being a Preventer. It was the first thing he did after throwing Wufei out. The apartment was in his name, after all; he could do what he wanted. So he gave it up, and moved in with Hilde.

She'd held him when he told her about him and Wufei, and about how Wu'd cheated, and she given him a proper introduction to Noin, and the both of them had become good friends over their mutual hate of Wufei. And Une had found out about their relationship, and she wasn't happy about it, but there wasn't much she could do. It had been long enough for him to get over it.

But he didn't get over it… him. Two years, and he hadn't gotten over it. Sally murmured something about wallowing in his pain during the last 'War Session', as he called them. Basically, every one they knew who'd fought in the war on either side, pilots, Noin, Sally, Zechs, hell; even Relena got an honorary place as a 'fighter' since she had an uncanny ability to be in the same place as Heero was all through the war. Every one except Wufei, 'cause it was either Duo or him, and Quatre was pretty cool about Duo being not cool with Wufei.

So he decided he wasn't going to anymore. Wallow, that is. He worked harder at the junkyard, and started going out at night, hanging with Hilde after hours. And it was all great, except Hilde didn't get that she was a sister to him, and started telling people that they were going out.

Duo was caught between a rock and a hard place. Or rather, being miserable himself, going out with a girl he didn't like that way, or hurting the closest thing to family he'd had after the war. And then she caught him, up late at night, turning the ring he'd bought for Wufei in his hands, and it had gotten worse.

And now he was in shit, 'cause Hilde thought he wanted to marry her, and Duo just had no idea how to say 'Sorry, Hil' but I don't like you that way'. Well, he could, but not without hurting her somehow.

July 205 AC

He was in Spencer's once, just for the hell of it. The cashier there was so flirty, and Duo flirted back just to see Hilde's jaw grind. Okay, it was cruel, but if he was flirty with enough women, maybe she'd break off the engagement with him. So he talked for a long time with the cashier, and the pieces of 201 AC falling into place. And they all came in a nice innocent looking package:

"I love working here!" the cashier's nametag said Hi; I'm Shery How can I help you?

"Yeah? 'Cause you're the prettiest cashier around, right?" That got Duo both a smile and a glare.

"No," Shery was blushing. "'Cause all the hot guys come here! I mean, there was this one guy, I haven't seen him around lately, but he's pretty unique, must be the only pure Asian since L5 blew up."

"Yeah?" Duo'd had to work hard to keep the smile in place. Around 100 AC, Earth had tried to homogenize the human race, and it ended with the inhabitants of L5 being just about the only people with pure bloodlines: it was why both Quatre and Sally looked nothing like an Arabian or a China… woman. Wufei was the only obviously Chinese man left.

"Yeah! He was so hot! And he always used to get stuff for, well he said 'a friend' but he was blushing so hard it had to have been a girlfriend, or something." 'Or something' was right, and Duo wished Shery would stop talking now, and let him wallow in self-pity as he wondered if this was the chick Wufei'd cheated on him with. "I felt kind of guilt. I used to keep him here for hours. I'd use the perfumes and colognes as an excuse to talk to him." She blushed and giggled, and Duo wished that punching her was a viable option for getting her to shut up.

But she didn't, and he felt like punching himself, 'cause Shery said the last thing Wufei'd bought was a custom ring, and she remembered it was in March, at least a few years ago, cause she'd thought that a black opal and white gold ring was kinda depressing for the beginning of spring.

Aug 205 AC

He was only just figuring out how to break off the wedding (yeah, kinda late, with the wedding four months away, and most of the plans done up, but he was kinda stuck for ideas! Getting out of an OZ cell was easier than this!), when that bombshell the size of Deathscythe dropped on him.

He met Wufei's new partner, a pretty cool chick, who complained that he was always leaving her behind, and Duo thought 'Yeah, I know how that feels', and they laughed over Wufei's quirks, like how he scorns 'weakness', but sneaks a chocolate bar into his massively restrictive diet, and how he'd zone out sometimes and fiddle with a pen. Except,

"I've never seen him do it with a pen," she said. "Mostly it's with his paperweight."

"Chang has a paperweight?"

"Yeah! You've never seen it? He takes it everywhere with him!" She pulled out a notepad that was like Wufei's paperweight in that she took it everywhere, and made a quick (and really bad) drawing of a square with a two circles in it. "It's this crystal cube, with a ring inside," she explained, "Really pretty." And yeah, looking again, Duo could see the circles' resemblance to a ring. Sort of.

But why would Wufei keep the ring? And Duo began putting it together again.

Oct 205 AC

And that's why he's here, in this hospital, because Wufei wouldn't let his partner go with him into a dangerous situation, and got shot in the arm. Still finished the mission, though. He looked over Wufei medical chart while he watched his ex-lover sleep. He'd been injured a lot recently, and had been more than usually annoying about not giving himself time to heal. He was also the guy who bought the apartment, when Duo sold it.

So he's watching Wufei sleep, and Jesse was right, that paperweight does follow him everywhere.

Wufei wakes up, and stares Duo, and sits up.

"I'm getting married." Duo says, 'cause he doesn't know what else to say to the man he'd thought for four years cheated on him.

"I know," he says, and Duo stares, because he didn't think Wufei'd know. "Quatre's informed me of every detail of your life since we…" he stops, looking away, "since you broke up with me." Oh, Quatre had? Duo hadn't known that the Arabian was still on speaking terms with Wufei. Duo hadn't asked, actually, had just assumed that Quatre would share his feelings on the matter.

Duo has the sinking suspicion that he's going to see Wufei's mask snap up any second now, and he dreads it, because it took him a year (two, with the war) to break through that mask the first time, and it's gonna be so much harder to do again now that he's fucked up. But he's going to try, 'cause his life isn't right without Wufei, and he knows all about Wufei's risky mission success tactics from Jesse, so he thinks Wufei feels the way.

So he asks: "I was, uh wondering… That ring, in your paperweight, would you mind if I wore it?"

Wufei acts like a complete jerk about it, acting like he doesn't know what Duo's talking about, and Duo ends up glaring at him again, because when Duo thinks about it, Wufei doesn't look like he's acting.

"It's not about money," Duo says, and Wufei raises his eyebrow in an annoyingly familiar expression. And this time, Duo's ready for the dead look in Wufei's eyes (and he's kicking himself in the ass in his head, because somehow the day he kicked Wufei out, he forgot that blank thing Wufei's eyes do when he's hurting).

"Then what is it about?" Wufei demands, "I only ask, because I cannot see any other reason to pilfer a ring from a paperweight when there's no guarantee it will even fit on Schbeiker's finger."

Schbeiker? Hilde? Duo's mind reels at the thought that Wufei thinks Duo wants to marry Hilde. "I… I don't want to give it to Hilde," he says, and Wufei looks up sharply.

"Ah, then you'll wear it yourself? Fine, take it, it's yours." Wufei turns away disdainfully, but Duo doesn't feel like having this conversation end this way, nor does he feel like having to do this a second time: visiting hours are almost over.

"Damn it, I'm not marrying Hilde," he growls, and Wufei's eyes turn back to his, slowly, warily. Duo's reminded of the night in March when everything ended: himself frayed at the edges by worry he isn't sure how to deal with, and Wufei being more than usually dense.

"Then why do you want my ring?"

"Because I wanna marry you!" Duo shouts, and then slumps back into his chair. He and Wufei stare at each other for a long time.

June 206 AC

Schbeiker still isn't over it. Wufei understands. He wouldn't want to be dumped, two months before his marriage. Of course, he didn't like the alternative, either, and he still isn't sure whether being dumped on the night you're going to risk your job and your reputation by asking your secret boyfriend to… 'Come out' with you, and announce your love to the world, through marriage.

In retrospect, neither is desirable, though Winner has assured Wufei that Schbeiker and Noin have hit it off quite well, united by a mutual hate of Gundam Pilot 05. He has also been assured that both will be on their best behavior, for Duo's sake.

And now, Wufei is standing in front of the mirror of an upstairs bedroom on one of Winner's estates, surveying his image one last time. He purchased a new ring for Duo. The process by which he'd had the ring encased in crystal was more expensive than the ring, had been, and was impossible without destroying the ring.

The first he didn't care about, but he'd rather not destroy the symbol of his love for Duo: the symbolism of that was… disturbing. So he bought a new ring, identical to the one Duo had bought for him (and retrieved from Schbeiker). The only difference was the inside engraving, hidden because there was not way that Wufei would let others know he'd had eternity is only forever if you're not there engraved on the ring.

Winner found out anyway, and thought it was terribly romantic, and Duo took offense before he realized it wasn't an insult. But then, life would be terribly boring without him. And for those who wondered, yes, Wufei's paperweight ring still sits on his desk, right next to his wedding photos.