Author's Note: Okay, I wrote this way way the fuck a long time ago, as the original beginning of Warning Signs. However, considering the substantial wait my readers have had to suffer in between chapters, I've taken this piece, revamped it a bit (a BARE minimum… haha, I laugh at spellcheck!) and stuck it up here as a standalone flashback.
Anyway, enjoy this little trip into the past, while it lasts.
-Onions
Almighty
a prequel to Warning Signs by Onions Make Me Cry
(St. Rupmand's church of the Almighty)
(DUO POV)
Dear Lord,
Fuck me in the ass. What am I gonna do?
Bones cracked. Knuckles bruised- and every square inch of Gundam Pilot Duo Maxwell's brain burst and bled with concentrated effort. Wringing both hands together, which wrapped themselves now like iron around a delicate rosary, Duo prayed with all the fervor and determination of a man possessed.
I'm going crazy. Genuine fucking loony. Jesus Christ, have mercy on my soul.
I shot a woman by accident. I shot her. I did it. And I fucking killed her, but Jesus Christ, I did it by mistake! I didn't mean to, but she caught me off guard-- It was dark, and I was exhausted. That woman must have been up there on the landing by my door already when I got there, but I felt sick from my mission, and I was caught up with the idea of my bed, and just passing out into it, that I didn't even... Fuck me, the look on her face when the bullet caught her. It was terrible. But I didn't- I just- It was just a reaction! Jesus… She lived in the apartment above where I was staying. Dunno why she wasn't in bed at that hour, but there she was all the same. Touched me on the shoulder, soft like a bird. I got her straight in the head. I splattered the bitch's brain-juice all over the wall behind us, and I didn't even stop to think about what I was doing. Shit, I ran so God damn hard, I thought my guts were gonna spill out over the sidewalk and trip me up. Jesus Christ have mercy. Jesus have mercy. I wish Heero was here.
The church hung in an evening calm, doors thrown open to allow in the first tentative breezes of summer. With the fading day had come the lighting of the pew and altar candles, friendly eruptions of warmth against the stone facade of the squatting walls. The building was a small one, no bigger than a roomy convenience store, but within it's confines it owned enough pomp and circumstance to certifiably label itself a true blue Catholic establishment. Duo, decked today in a grease stained mechanic's jumpsuit, appeared unusually out of place, despite the rosary that he worried between his fingers. Kneeling in reverence in front of an elaborate gold altar of the Crucified Lord, the pilot rocked a little, back and forth, back and forth, and then back and forth again in a silent, private fury.
Why isn't he back yet? Where is he? Heero was supposed to be here by now. By last week! What God damn good is a lover who doesn't even bother to show up every once in a while?
Shit… Maybe he's dead.
Then I really would be fucked.
I hate it when he does this. When I see him next, I'm gonna put a fucking bullet through HIS head and see how much I like it then. I bet I'd love it. I'd lick the blood off his forehead I'd love it so much.
From somewhere behind him, Duo was vaguely aware of the sound of two confessional booths swinging open, followed by the soft smattering of gentle conversation between an elderly priest and an older sounding woman. She chuckled quietly, and their shuffling footsteps receded into the distance, leaving only silence in their stead. This was a comfort to the weary youth, who sighed and hunched over the communion rail, eyes still closed in prayer.
Straight up, God, I'm going to hell, right? You can tell me, it's okay. Because, I mean, I've got to be fucked anyway. I chopped that woman up and hid the pieces. I didn't want anyone to know what I'd done. You've gotta help me out here. Please. Give me a sign, a message…drop a fucking piano on my head if you like-- I don't know what to do.
As the sun burned a red paint across the pristine carpet of the tiny chapel, the elderly priest ushered a surly looking figure inside. A strange, limber figure whose tangle of wild brown hair shadowed in the dying light like a woebegone storm cloud. The two men nodded at each other, and the priest hauled the two wooden doors together into a final irrevocable silence.
(HEERO POV)
"Hn."
Heero snorted a little at the ease he'd had in finding the braided youth. A dingy blue spot against a background of glittering gold, white, and mahogany, Duo stuck out as badly as a skunk in the snow. From his position at the far end of the pews, Heero observed the empty church and wondered why Duo would choose to come to such a secluded place. Hadn't he always preferred the company of at least a hundred thousand other people? It always seemed so, or at least to the stoic pilot it did.
Making his way cautiously down the isle, Heero wondered briefly what kind of reprimand would come from his chocolate-haired lover for being gone for so long. The truth of the situation was, he'd simply been busy making several delicate adjustments to Wing, and had forgotten about the progression of time… if not just for a little while. Duo would be infuriated, no doubt, and it was with hesitancy that Heero crept around the sharp wooden corner of the confessionals towards the kneeling figure.
Duo was… Heero drew his eyebrows together in a frown. Duo was, what was he doing? Shoulders hunched as if the weight of the world rested on him, the braided boy's figure sung distress as he wrung at the rosary in his hands.
What is-?
Prayer. The realization came to Heero as if someone had suddenly handed him a baby, and with all the awkward ungainliness of handling such innocence, the perfect soldier simply came to a halt. Feeling a little off-kilter, the boy tried to digest the idea. The concept of religion wasn't beyond him, but in practice, Heero found the entire establishment of such a thing pointless. Duo's connection to that world had always filled Heero with a little unwanted emptiness, and for want of any, more permanent solution, the boy simply tried to glare the issue away.
Pausing for only a moment to consider, Heero settled on interrupting with a loud cough.
(DUO POV)
The rough, crude tone of an uninvited interruption lashed through the silence like an axe.
Coughing. How disgusting.
Duo's eyes snapped open in irritation, and for a moment all the boy could do was stare at the ceiling and clench his teeth. Whoever the hell it was that was interrupting him would pay dearly. What fucking asshole interrupted devotion time? It couldn't be the priest… Duo had heard him closing a few doors, one of which was to the pastor's offices, and hadn't heard it opening again. The boy let out a deliberately audible sigh, and clenching his fists tightly around the wooden communion rail, he slowly turned around.
(HEERO POV)Predictably, there was murder in Duo's stance as Heero watched his lover take his time to turn. The stiffness of the gesture was more than enough to allow the pilot to know that he'd come at a bad time. Great. Duo would, of course, make a scene. Heaving a sigh himself, albeit a much quieter one, Heero leaned wearily against the elaborately decorated wooden paneling of the confessionals, and waited.
The first flash of violet revealed nothing but animosity. Heero inwardly nodded, his suspicions confirmed. But moments passed, and as the two young men stared into each other's eyes, a change of expression took place in the braided youth. The boy's eyebrows curved upwards, and his lips parted a little for want of breath- and for a few glorious moments, Duo Maxwell looked for all the world like he was about to burst into tears.
Heero raised an eyebrow. "What?"
But no more words came, because Duo ploughed himself over the body of his lover, arms slung around the neck he found there, and covered Heero's lips with his own.
(DUO POV)
At first it was only happy laughter which managed to squeeze past Duo's busy lips. But time broke down to a snail's pace, and as the boy poured all of his gratitudes out and onto Heero, with hot kisses and with rough fingers, so also came words as well. Words and Duo had always been good friends, regardless of the fact that when they were together they never did make very much sense.
"Heechan you came at such a good time- God, I hate you!" The braided pilot gasped, and pulled back the collar of his lover's jacket to suck at the stretch of smooth neck he exposed.
Heero's hands came up and rested stiffly on Duo's shoulders, and Duo could feel the hesitancy in his lover's stance. A reaction which was blatantly ignored.
"Speak English." Heero demanded, though a well of heat had caught roughly in his throat. His knees were also beginning to give way… an easy read by the way Heero bowed a little to the right, almost involuntarily making room for his lover's ministrations.
Duo slid a cool hand down the back of Heero's pants, and felt the body against him shudder.
"I am speaking English."
"I mean, make sense!" Iron fingers dug into Duo's shoulders and Heero began to try to pry himself free. Already he was beginning to look over his shoulder, paranoia battling dangerously against lust. "You don't want me here? And stop doing that."
"No." Duo's free hand slithered up the front of Heero's shirt, and hearing his lover gasp, took advantage of the moment to send them tottering back against the refined wood of the confessionals.
"What do you mean, 'no?' Which one?"
"Yes I want you. No I won't stop. Do you only have one jacket? I never see you wearing any others…" Digging his hand a little deeper, Duo tickled at the back of Heero's thigh, while at once beginning to yank off the left sleeve of the other's outerwear, a look of heady determination touching him.
For a third time, Heero sucked in another involuntary gasp, and suddenly seemed just as determined to rid himself of the advances he was suffering. With an almost preternatural strength, he shoved Duo off, and the boy tottered, dangerously close to falling over. Heero caught his arm in a painful grip, and righted him.
"Explain to me what you're thinking." Came the frigid demand, the rift Heero forced between them pressuring Duo into giving a straight answer. "You have thirty seconds."
Violet eyes turned up to meet Heero's own half-angry, half-preoccupied expression, and for a few agonizing seconds, Duo abandoned everything but straight, cold truth. "I've had a bad week. Actually… that's kind of an understatement, because it was worse than that. There, that's ten seconds. Will you let go of me? You're hurting my arm."
He watched Heero taking in his appearance, and oddly, Duo felt a grimace coming on. Leave it to Heero to make you feel like he was sucking your thoughts out through your eye sockets.
But then, Heero surprised Duo by softening a little. Letting go of the other's arm, he folded his own arms across his chest and tilted his head up a little in a way that told Duo he was considering something.
"You look awful. Why do you have that bruise?"
Duo blinked, puzzled. "what bruise?"
Glancing to the left, into the gold plate of metal which slid across the Confessional's window, Duo spied a curved, maroon blotch at the end of his right eyebrow. "Well fuck me."
"What happened, Duo?"
"Where were you all this week?" Duo made a demand of his own. Heero faltered a little.
"That wasn't the topic of discussion."
"Well it fucking is now!" The fury Duo had so rabidly dwelt on in prayer was beginning to well up again. Of course he hadn't actually intended on shooting Heero, but the idea was beginning to seem more and more appealing as time went on. "I just, I… I needed you!"
Heero frowned… a surpassingly compassionate expression considering his mood. "Why was I needed?"
"Because I shot a woman."
"You shoot women all the time. And men."
"Yeah, well, they aren't your garden variety innocent kind."
Immediately after delivering the sarcastic line, the humor of it totally and completely disappeared. Silence took over, and hung thickly between the two young men like the heavy smoke of a firecracker, as the full implications of Duo's sentence sunk heavily home.
(HEERO POV)
The silence burned. And for once, Heero loathed the noiselessness.
"… I'm sorry."
Duo huffed, and waved a hand in sudden false-complacency. "Don't be. It wasn't your fault or anything."
Again Heero frowned, though this time with a certain twang of sympathy. He knew the burden of such an action, and from the moment Duo had voiced the problem, he knew why he had found his lover so fervently at prayer, instead of being in the company of others. Heero blinked out of present time and saw himself in the past. Like puzzle pieces, Duo's kisses, too persistent, and too heady in their intensity, made sense as well. Poor Duo.
"What did you do with the body?" The azure-eyed pilot questioned, sounding stiff and formal at once.
Duo looked up sharply, shock tracing his eyes. The expression faded though, into something blander, and a touch distant. "I sectioned it, bagged the pieces, and buried them."
Mentally, Heero kicked himself for asking such an impersonal question. Duo obviously hadn't appreciated it. "… I'm sorry." He repeated.
Duo glared a little, and wrapped his arms around his own shoulders. his fingers found the fabric lining, and fiddled with it. "Stop saying that."
"Okay."
The silence fell again.
Underneath the blanket of quiet, Heero, feeling anxious, examined Duo's face, and Duo, downcast as he appeared to be, examined the tips of his sneakers.
It was then, with feather-light steps did Heero at last draw closer, and with shockingly soft fingers he coaxed Duo's face up again from the floor.
Jesus Christ, Duo… what did you do?
What could he say? What words of comfort were big enough to encompass such a wound? Heero felt sick in the pit of his stomach at the idea of having to verbally justify what his lover had done, because he knew it couldn't be done. Physically, he didn't think he was capable of that kind of comfort, not to mention he couldn't be morally justified if he did do what he thought Duo wanted-- He couldn't in good conscience say what Duo looked like he needed to hear. Things like 'It couldn't have been prevented.' or 'you weren't in the wrong.' They would be lies, like raindrops, pointlessly filling a bucket in droves of a thousand.
So, instead, he gave the boy a kiss.
That, of all things, seemed most appropriate. How easy it suddenly all was. And then the silence was his friend again, as Heero lifted gentle fingers to touch Duo's bruise in loving strokes. With a butterfly touch of their lips together, Heero could plausibly communicate an essential message. 'I understand. I love you even after what you've done. I accept you. I accept what happened to you. I'll help you.'
When Heero moved away, Duo wore an expression of skepticism. "I thought you didn't want me touching you."
"That was different. I touched you."
"yeah, with your lips. On my lips. In a sexy touching kind of way. Oh, that's real different."
A sudden, unexpected grin flashed across Heero's lips, and Duo, across from him, looked immediately dumbfounded.
"Oh fuck, what?"
"You read into everything. It's… attractive." Heero murmured. "Sometimes." he added, dropping his grin in favor of a sterner look.
The braided boy quirked an eyebrow. "Sometimes but not now?"
Heero paused in mock-consideration. "hmm… maybe now. I'm not sure."
"You're flirting with me." Duo decided, looking speculative.
"Is that a problem?"
"No, not really… but if you don't want me to touch you, I'd hold off if I were you. I'm pretty seriously needy right now."
It took a moment for Heero to realize that Duo was completely serious. Not for the first time, the youth allowed himself to be thrown by the strangeness of his lover. It must have been true about opposites attracting for such a relationship to function…
"We're in a church." Heero said, voice taking a darker edge.
"An empty church." Duo amended.
"A public place."
"I don't care."
"Don't you think that your God would be watching us?" Heero whispered, a hint of bitter sarcasm leaking it's way through, despite his attempts to conceal it.
Duo, at last, grinned a little. "I think God is feeling particularly favorable towards me right about now."
"Why do you say that?"
"You're here."
Heero drew his eyebrows together in what must have been the fiftieth frown of the evening. It was always strangely offsetting to hear comments of affection from Duo, despite the fact that they'd been together for a decent while. But most of all, it was how the words made Heero feel that prompted such strange thoughts. Duo had never ceased to be able to make Heero feel… wanted. He would always be needed as long as the war stayed true to it's course, but never before Duo had Heero experienced the emotions equated with his presence being truly desired somewhere. It made things clearer, somehow, on a scale much larger than either of them individually.
"I love you." Heero said plainly. If that would be of any comfort to the boy at his front, then it would be given without reservation. It was obvious a little comfort was in need.
Duo grinned a bit, and touched his fingers to his lover's mouth. "I know you do."
When their lips at last came together again, it was with equal appreciation.
(continued in Warning Signs part I)
Author's Note: wow, standalone this is okay, but couple it with Warning Signs? This is now officially the most bizarre, scattered, disconnected, unidentifiable and certifiably crazy piece of collected writing i have ever had the (mis?)fortune to be a part of. Someone end my life... TT;;;