Changes

by Link Worshiper

Heero's doing it again, being hypocritical with his emotions and his advice. He's sure that securing Duo with a job and a real life, even if it means they can't be together, is what Duo needs. Too bad he realizes he was all too wrong all too late. 1x2x1

1. Down The Rabbit Hole

~* Changes

By Shannon the Twisted Link Worshiper

() The Author's Customary Blah () Since I am a music dork who is constantly wired for sound, it is my duty to listen to songs and get inspired. Therefore, you get this strange little beauty, a side-story type thing for my last big ass story, Coming Through the Rye. I think it would probably be in the reader's best interest to have read that before this, though I guess it's not absolutely mandatory. Same sort of warnings apply: 1x2 (yaoi, people, yaoi), cussing galore, angst, an uber-fucked Heero, plus some self-mutilation/suicide attempts in this one. Anyway, the song, Changes, belongs to the wonderful 3 Doors Down and Gundam is that of the usual gang (Sunrise, Bandai, et cetera, et cetera). Enjoy and don't forget to review! I know where you live! Grr!

(o) Session I (o)

()() Down the Rabbit Hole ()()

{I'm not supposed to be scared of anything,
But I don't know where I am.}

As I climbed the narrow rickety back staircase of the old school's dormitories, I could not help but ask myself why I had bothered to do this in the first place. It was not like I needed the education—most of what they had to teach here I had probably already learned at some point in my life and whatever they were to teach on the war would either be more than I need to hear or would be just plain ignorant and biased. As for my social life, well fuck, what the hell social life do I have? I knew I did not need any of that shit in the near future. But if that were so, if I did not want to learn and I wanted to get away from people, why did I bother coming back to school? I'm too screwed up for even myself to understand sometimes.

None of the other boys seemed to get it, not even Duo. I think I was just confused and needed time to figure out what the hell breed of misfit I really was. Duo was sad, but seemed to accept my decision with much reluctance. I wrote it off at the time saying that he wasn't someone who could see the big picture and that in the long run, this would be better for both of us. Trowa had seemed outright pissed off with me for my choice. I guess I deserved that punch he laid on my jaw right before I disappeared again. I haven't seen his face since. I think Quatre was of the same opinion as Trowa, though he took it better than his lover did, just shaking his head sadly at me and wishing me luck. Wufei got it the best out of the four of them, I think. I got a nod and an order to 'do what I needed' before he went off to join up with Preventers.

Then again, this is coming from the man who has made perhaps just one too many mistakes. For someone who always preached following emotions, I sure had trouble following through. Fucking hypocrite, that's what I am. You're an idiot, Duo, I had always said, when look at fucking me. I'm the real idiot. What the hell had I been thinking when I said he should go and get a job with Hilde? Obviously, I hadn't been thinking at all. I fucking hate myself.

{I wish that I could move, and I'm exhausted,
And nobody understands (how I feel).}

Reaching the attic floor, I fished around in the back pocket of my jeans for my room key, groping around my wallet and the extra couple bullets I kept for my lucky six-shooter in there, which, I might add, is safely tucked away in a pair of old gym socks at the bottom of my duffel. I finally managed to procure the damn thing from the tight pouch and glanced down at it, lying there innocently in my palm. It was an ancient looking thing made of iron, the head made of curly twists of iron, a silver medallion proclaiming my room number dangling off a little piece of string tied around it. The key to my future or the key to a life of everlasting torment, it was mine to choose… in theory anyway.

I readjusted my duffel on my shoulder, my fingers tightening nervously around the handle of my laptop bag and started down the hall with a heavy breath. I don't know why I even bothered packing. I don't really own anything worthwhile anyway, and in the end, it's not like I could take any of this shit with my where I was going anyway. All that anyone had ever given me that was safely mine was my ticket to heaven—or hell more likely. I was fucking damned from the second I was born.

Ahead of me was an arched dormitory window ablaze with yellowish afternoon sun. It cast the whole hall in a surreal pasty fire coloured glow. I don't think I've actually seen the sun in a good couple months, never mind that I've been on Earth for most of that time. I spent most of that time inside with my computer, keeping an eye on Duo and his assets to make sure he was doing well for himself. That was the best I could do for him, with perhaps the little add-on of a bit of hacking here and there to keep his bank account healthy. When all that business got old though, I eventually figured that if Duo knew how I had been wasting my life away, he'd shoot me in six random places before busting a cap in my skull, especially since I told him that he had to make it on his own. I guess that's what brought me back to school—it's just the sort of move Duo would pull.

At last finding my door, I pressed an ear to the wooden panel, listening for life within. Hearing nothing and hoping to God that I had a single dorm, I inserted the key into the old fashioned lock, ear still flat against the door as I turned the little metal implement, hearing the loud click as it pulled the deadbolt back. I opened the door and let out a depressed sigh—it was a double dorm after all, though whoever I was sharing with was not there at the present moment… not that I minded. Most of the kids were still off on spring break anyway, so I would have the place to myself for at least a couple days before I would be doomed to meet whatever unfortunate would be stuck with me.

Carelessly, I threw my duffel onto what seemed to be the spare bed, forgetting for a moment that I had at least four loaded firearms tucked away in the confines of that bag and set my laptop bag down almost lovingly on the floor beside it. The other half of the room by the window seemed to have been claimed by my future roomy. He had decorated the otherwise sterile room with a few posters here and there across the slanted roof, a wild neon green comforter spread across his bed, a lava lamp and a small boom box occupying the corner of the room's little writing desk that sat in his corner. I hope he kept his noise low, or I swear I'd have no qualms about using his stupid radio, or better yet, his head for target practice with one of said four firearms.

Having nothing better to do with myself, I sat down on my new bed and unzipped my bag, methodically removing the neatly folded clothes and stacking them orderly on the bed. They said they would get me a uniform before classes began in a few days and though I usually never put up a fuss, I secretly dreaded the thought. Though I might not look it, I really detest conformity. That's all Duo's fault, I might add. Well, that plus a childhood full of more conformity than I care to think about at present.

I finally got to the series of bundled clothes that contained my weaponry. I didn't really know what I might need a gun for in a snooty place like this, but I figured that it was better safe than sorry. It was part of my programming to always be prepared, like a fucking Boy Scout. I wondered briefly in the back of my mind if I was more worried about some nosy kid around here becoming a liability or if I had toted the guns along in case I decided that it was my mouth that had to be silenced. I quickly unwrapped each one to do a basic look-over, and though my revolver was in desperate need of a cleaning, I hastily packed them up again just as they were before and hid them artfully among the rest of my admittedly limited wardrobe.

The sound of a pair of guys out in the hall distracted me for a moment, and old instincts had me automatically on the alert, listening like a keen fox to their each and every movement. Though I detected only two voices, their clopping footsteps gave away the presence of another in their company. I was annoyed at the notion that students were already beginning to return from break. That meant I might not have all the time to myself that I had previously hoped. I could tell they were drawing nearer to my room, getting dangerously close as their conversation on how many girls they had fucked over the holiday became amplified with their approach. I had only fucked one person in my life (in more ways than just one), that being one Duo Maxwell, and I knew I would never do another. Yeah, even right then, I could tell this was going to be a fucking long year.

{I'm trying hard to breathe now,
But there's nowhere in my lungs.}

I ignored irritating din, as it seemed to have halted outside, their conversation no longer wafting towards my door. For a moment, I thought that I had been safely removed from the threat of my roommate coming back any time soon and returned to my prior state of smug happiness that I would have the place to myself for a few more days. That was all dashed to pieces soon after I had thought it though, for right then, the lock snapped around and the door swung open. I had been so jarred from my mental ruminations that I found myself reacting to reality the only way I knew how—efficiently panicked. The trio of boys squeezed in the doorway were staring at me oddly as my hand immediately flew for the nearest of the bundles concealing my guns, my paranoid fingers hovering over the ball of cloth as my logical thought pattern kicked in and instilled some sense into me.

One of the larger boys was glowering at me like I was some kind of rat that needed to be crushed into submission before school got going again. "The hell are you?" he snarled at me, pushing past his other two comrades into the room.

I was still feeling a little nervous, trying to make the removal of my hand from the hidden gun as inconspicuous as possible. "Heero Yuy desu," I returned before I even realized I had reverted back to my native tongue. "Yoroshiku."

"The hell is that supposed to mean?" the asshole moaned, annoyed that he could not understand. I mentally slapped myself for making myself stand out so much with the knowledge of another language. I supposed so long as they only knew I spoke one other language, I would be safe and my slightly oriental features would explain the fact why I might know Japanese. I'd start having problems if they caught onto the other nine languages I could speak fluently.

"Oh, wait, are you the new kid?" the smallest of the bunch piped up, sliding around the other large asshole standing in the doorway. "Heero Yuy's your name?" He smiled almost genuinely in a way that reminded me of Quatre and might have looked just like him too, save for the curly reddish blonde hair and green eyes. "I'm your roommate, Thomas Bingley. Pleased to meet you!"

I nodded at him and said nothing else in return, blatantly ignoring the outstretched hand he held out to me as I went about rooting through my bag for the remnants of my belongings. I pulled out a few more pairs of socks, two green tee shirts, one my traditional tank, the other a tight short-sleeved affair of the same colour, a pair of jeans and a wooden box.

The box was easily the most precious of everything I had brought with me, a place for me to keep the things that were most important to me. It wasn't much to look at on the outside; there was no real ornamentation decorating its lacquered sides, its corners beat and on the whole covered with a multitude of scratches from the love it had endured over the years. I'd found the thing forgotten in one of the first dorm rooms Duo and I had ever shared together, sitting innocently atop the table beside the bed I was to occupy for the next few months. I couldn't explain what about the box had possessed me to keep it, but keep it I did. I had started keeping old this-and-that in there at some point even before I had admitted to Duo that he was more than just a convenient fuck-toy, beginning with an old hair tie of his. There wasn't really much else save an old dried up daffodil, a scrap of charred white cloth, photographs (mostly of Duo) and such, the newest addition being his dear golden cross. I wonder if it was some kind of hint that most of that stuff had reminded me of Duo or my crappy past. I don't know where he got the words, but he had been the one to carve the inscription on the underside of the lid with the large hunting knife he kept in his boot: Could you believe in heaven if heaven was all you had?

"Are you mute, new kid?" the other guy commented from the doorway, his arms crossed angrily over his chest. "Or is that gibberish language the only one you know how to speak?"

Now that was a thought…. Maybe if I pretended that Japanese was the only thing I understood, I could avoid talking to them…. Hell, it would never work, with the classes here being taught in English and all, good idea as it was. Fuck. I found my trigger finger twitching unconsciously.

"Quiet Austin," Bingley snapped moodily at the boy in the doorway. "Just because you failed your foreign language class three years in a row doesn't mean you have to hound on everyone else who didn't."

The other large boy found that as grounds to give Bingley a hearty shove. "Shut up yourself, Tom," he barked dangerously—at least, would have been dangerous for a kid like Bingley. Someone of my training was easily able to detect that he was bluffing and would not really do much more to hurt the small strawberry blonde boy.

"If you want to be the complete and total bastard you are, Darcy, take Austin and beat it," Bingley challenged, though coming from such a slight boy, it was hardly cause for alarm to the larger boys. Then again, I had been stupid enough to misjudge Duo's light frame the first time I met him. On the other hand, Duo was trained to be a Gundam pilot, as these boys had not. Still, it was not necessarily in Duo's muscular strength that the danger lied; Shinigami was more likely to creep up on you in the middle of the night and slit your throat while you dreamed.

"Who says you get to boss us around?" the one called Darcy complained, cracking his knuckles against his beefy hip.

"Since you walked into my room," Bingley snapped back almost on top of Darcy's last statement. "Go have your conversation about all those girls you banged over break in your own dormitory."

Austin was going to open his mouth and say something rude when I decided I had had enough of this foolish banter. "Will you three just shut the fuck up?" I growled, my tone completely precarious. Unlike them, I was not afraid to use physical violence when I so needed to. Fuck what I said about never wanting to kill again. Perhaps at that precise moment with that Mariemaia child, Relena and Lady Une all staring at me like I was some kind of mythological hero had something to do with my state of mind then, but right now I was feeling positively murderous. For the first time, I was starting to really regret not just my most previous mistake of letting Duo go, but just about every other stupid thing I had ever done before that as well. I sure was good at fucking people over… particularly myself….

{There's no one here to talk to,
And the pain inside is making me numb.}

"You have some nerve, new kid," Darcy stated, getting huffy and seemingly offended by my command. He struck me as the sort that was used to being obeyed. Unfortunately for him, so was I, and I somehow favoured my own odds against his in a fight. "Where do you come off saying shit like that when we've known you for all of ten fucking minutes!"

"Fuck you," I snarled, my eyes still staring down at the bed as I gave him the finger, a little gesture I had picked up from Duo.

"Get the fuck on your feet," Austin ordered, finally stepping into the room. "You've got some attitude for a new kid, new kid. I think you should learn your place around here."

"Take another step and I won't be accountable for whatever injuries you incur because of it," I warned him, my eyes rising to meet his in one of my more unfriendly stares, not budging an inch from my spot on the bed. I think Duo had a name for it; called it my 'death glare' or something like that.

"What's a little string bean like you going to do?" Austin shrugged confidently, daring to take that step I'd told him not to. Admittedly, I was a bit on the short side, and my coat and jeans concealed my muscled arms and powerful legs, which I admit, were even still rather slim, despite their strength. Obviously, he did judge on appearances, and the fighter in me idly commented that he would make a lousy soldier.

"Austin, I do not want you starting a mess in my dorm with my new roommate!" Bingley protested in vain. He was a little too feeble and a little too unsure of himself to do much more than that. Perhaps he was not as much like Quatre as I had previously thought. Quatre might have been small, but strong, a good leader and could bravely fight his way through even the toughest of situations. I regret to think that I had thought ill of the little Arabian boy the first time I had met him—not that it was really much different for anyone else I knew. I noticed I was always mistrusting on the first go.

It was too late for anything he had to say though. In a decision that took exactly 1.3 seconds, I decided that pulling a gun and wasting a bullet on him would be highly unwise and took the more physical route, flying off the bed and taking him down with a straight-on tackle that hit him right in the kidney. All this took a total of two complete seconds.

"Shit," was all Darcy could think to say at the sight of his burly comrade lying flat on his back and staring up at the ceiling blankly.

I straightened myself up and readjusted my shirt, dusting absently at a surface burn that had turned up on my elbow. "I told you not to come any closer. Now you know why."

"The hell are you made of?" Darcy gasped, bending down to sling his fallen friend over his shoulder. He dragged him to the door, shooting a wary glance back at me before getting his ass out of there like he was scared I might come after and kill the both of them with my bare hands. I couldn't safely say that the fear wasn't justified. I was in one fucking bad mood.

{I try to hold this under control.
They can't help me,
'Cause no one knows….}

When they were gone, Bingley sat down on the bed on his side of the room, hands fidgeting nervously in his lap as he watched me return to the spot where I had been before they had interrupted me. I could feel his anxious darting eyes watching my every move as I went about reorganizing my clothes on my bed, unfolding and refolding methodically for lack of anything else to do. Much as I hate menial labour, it kept my mind busy enough to ignore both him and those thoughts of happier times that continued to plague me, constantly reminding me that I just might not be as damn clever as everyone seemed to think. "Don't mind them," he commented softly to my back. "They're actually really nice guys…. They're just always rough on people they don't know very well."

"As am I," I remarked blandly, still focused on my folding. I said nothing more and left him sitting there, trying to figure out what the hell I was thinking about. Hn, good luck to him.

"You… you can put your things in that chest of drawers," he said to fill the silence, his tone suggested that I had successfully managed to scare the living shit out of him. Good, I figured as I looked up to see him tentatively pointing at a bureau sitting near the door, a dark stare in my eye. "All my things are on the bottom. You can take the top three drawers… that is, if you'd like of course."

I nodded to acknowledge his suggestion and took up an armful of clothes, moving quickly across the floor to the bureau. I pulled open the top drawer and carefully laid the stack of shirts inside, making sure they were all sitting neatly inside the box. I repeated the process with the rest of my clothes and the next two drawers, artfully dispersing the bundles that hid my guns among the rest of my innocent garments.

"So," he said, taking a pause to suck in another edgy gasp of air before going on. "So, where'd you learn to take a guy like Austin down like that? You gotta pack a lot of muscle to be able to do that."

"I had efficient teachers," was my plain reply. The kid might have just been trying to be nice, but I was in no temperament for it. It had hardly been two or so months since I had decided it was time Duo should go and get himself the life he had always deserved, and I was already starting to reap the pain of my decision. I think I was beginning to realize why Duo had always hated it when I made choices like that for him. Little had I realized that such a choice would affect me as much as it would him. The notion that we should have gone our separate ways because he deserved a chance to make a life for himself was starting to sound dumber and dumber every time I recalled it. The look on his face before we had parted ways had seriously suggested to me that separating from me was not the way he wanted to go about living his life.

"Oh," Bingley replied, unsure of what to make of such an ambiguous answer. He seemed to be thinking of something else to say in the silence that ensued. "Well then, uh, 'Heero', was it? That sure is an interesting name. How did you come to be here? I mean, we don't get many exchange students and—"

"It's personal," I cut him off, slamming the last of the drawers shut violently, speaking before he had a chance to dig his grave any deeper. I had to admit that I kind of liked this Thomas Bingley, and I would probably regret it if I lashed out at him. But I knew that if he kept moving his mouth, there was a good chance that he might end up seriously hurt, even if I didn't mean it.

"Oh," he sighed almost sadly. I guess his idea of a getting-to-know-you session wasn't going exactly as planned. "I'm… I'm sorry. I didn't mean to intrude…."

"It's fine," I told him curtly, trying as hard as I could to sound humane. "You didn't know."

"Is it something to do with the war?" he asked innocently, missing my flinch as my back was facing him. "I mean, a lot of the guys who were recruited to fight are coming home and have to enroll in school now that the war's through. It's kind of sick how young some of those kids are…."

"Yes," I agreed, thinking back to the eight-year-old me that had been subject to watching his father-figure die in cold blood before being snatched off the streets by a crazy scientist who seemed to have had the whole thing planned out from square one for the sheer purpose of turning a boy into a weapon. "Much too young."

"So, I mean, is that it?" Bingley implored. "Is that it? You were fighting in the war?"

"I… I guess you could say that." I decided that would be a fair enough answer after a brief lapse in my stony façade.

Bingley seemed to pick up on something in my voice, for his next comment cut through my skin and made me feel as if he were able to see my thoughts, a notion that instilled great fear in me. "There's more to it than just that… isn't there." It was not a question really. It was merely an understanding, a statement. Maybe Duo was right about me being really easy to read. Or maybe just too much time with the baka had made me a little frayed around the edges… though I can't really say that I minded those new threadbare aspects of myself.

"There is," I said, still trying to supply him with fair answers. That was only because his kindness reminded me of Quatre. Otherwise, I probably would have told him to fuck off.

"But you…."

"…Won't talk about it, yes, that's right. I won't," I finished for him. I turned around to face him at last, taking in the very concerned expression that riddled his soft features. He most certainly was a pampered rich boy, though I could tell that his eyes were not totally masked by the rose-tinted glasses often worn by the upper crust of society. "I don't expect you to understand. I don't expect anyone to."

"I see," he said for lack of anything else, his eyes still watching me keenly as I returned to my bed and sat down on the edge of the springy mattress. It occurred to me that I had rarely boarded without Duo in the same room as me and the few times that I had gone it alone, I had been severely at unease. I was now positive that I was going to have a horrible time this year. Shit….

{Now I'm going through changes, changes.

God, I feel so frustrated lately!
When I get suffocated, save me.
Now I'm going through changes, changes.}

Spring break finished faster than I had anticipated and next thing I knew, I was waking up at six in the morning to prepare for classes. I beat Bingley to the shower that morning and hastily washed up, thankful that I did not have to battle for a spot in the communal showers as all the double dormitories had their own water closets. I emerged from the bathroom five minutes later to allow my roommate access to the shower and unearthed one of the stuffy uniforms they had fitted me for me soon after arriving. Not needing the aid of a mirror, I pulled on the dark slacks and the stiff button-down oxford. With the addition of the matching waistcoat and the black necktie that tied in a loose bow underneath my chin reminded me a little too much of the wretched uniforms worn at Relena's old school in the Cinque Kingdom. I didn't even bother to try and tame my hair; it would forever remain in perpetual disarray.

"What's your first class?" Bingley asked, trying to start an amiable chat as he exited the bathroom wrapped in a large white towel, heading over for the bureau to retrieve his own similar uniform. He had been attempting to engage me into a conversation all throughout break, and though I secretly appreciated the effort to reach out to me, I would have nothing of it and usually brushed him off with vague answers and one-worded replies and grunts. Duo had done the same thing to me and I ended up falling head-over-heels in love with him and look how that ended up. I refused to let anyone else get close to me after that catastrophe.

"Molecular biology, followed by literature and then post-colony history," I answered for etiquette's sake. Sometimes I felt bad about the cold shoulder I gave the kid, but talking too much would probably end up in a discussion that related to my past much more than I would care to divulge to him. It went without saying that I would not even dream of telling him that I was one of the revered and hated Gundam pilots, specifically the hailed and spat upon 01. It wasn't really that that bothered me. It was trying to explain my feelings concerning Duo to a third party that would take courage. I had taken advantage of, abused and loved the braided pilot in ways that could not even be described in words. I couldn't even explain it to myself, let alone a boy I hardly knew.

"Oh I have history with you then!" Bingley exclaimed, obviously happy. I inwardly groaned. Such a course was sure to discuss the recent wars and inevitably, the Gundams. I was not in a fair position to give my opinion on either.

I managed a weak smile at him as I bent down to lift up my school bag, shouldering it and walking swiftly from the room without another backward glance. Guilt is a nasty thing, let me tell you.

The first two periods went by without a hitch. I was formally introduced to the class at the beginning of each class. I would give a curt bow and glare as harshly as I could at them, just daring them to try and approach me before being directed to a seat, from whence class would commence. Soon realizing that most of the material that would be presented to me in the science class (and presumably math courses as well) were things I had known since I was a boy, I tuned out the droning professor and turned my focus inward, thinking of my past transgressions against the world and the people… person… I loved most.

{I'm feeling weak and weary,
Walking through this world alone.}

History indeed proved to be the hell I expected it to be. I heard various students rail for and against the Gundams, the teacher seeming to be unsure of exactly what role we pilots had in the battle for peace, calling us a 'necessary evil'. It was all the stupid meaningless ideals that those who did not actually have to fight usually tended to spout. I guess I could understand why the common populace of the world would be of the disposition they were. They were not there in the cockpit with any of us as we fought. I sincerely do not think that the general public truly understood what the essence of the fighting had even been about, and to that notion, I remain true.

So lost was I in my inner grumbling about the class and haphazard daydreams of Duo, that I was only half aware when the teacher called on me unexpectedly. This is exactly why I knew I would hate this class. "Mister Yuy… Mister Yuy!" he was saying, trying to grab my attention. When I finally snapped out of my inner pondering, he asked his question, which I was more than reluctant to respond to. "Mister Yuy, what is your opinion on this most recent war concerning the coup of Mariemaia Kushrenada? Was it justified?"

"I have no opinion," I said dismally, cradling my chin in my palm, the bored expression apparent on my face, "other than that what happened was proof that winning peace is one thing, but keeping it is another. The people cannot be handed such a precious gift and be expected to keep it without any work. Obviously the world was spoiled enough to let that happen and hopefully, they were able to learn a lesson from it easier than I did."

"And if that is so," the teacher prodded, trying to get at some unknown point, "what have you done, to keep this peace that is so hard to control, Mister Yuy?"

My face hardened as my eyes rose to finally meet his, boring down across the room to rip holes through his body. I think I saw him visibly wan at my expression. "I have fought a very long and hard road for peace."

"I do not understand your meaning. Specifically, please, Mister Yuy." Despite the commanding request, I could tell the teacher was a little frightened to ask it of me. I wondered if it was a good or a bad sign that I was starting to put up all my old shields and defenses. Not that it mattered; none of these fools would be able to penetrate them anyway.

"I cannot tell you more than that," I answered, my voice grave. I think he was going to open his mouth to say more, but I refused to give him the chance. He was just as sheltered, seeing the world through those rosy lenses as the rest of the children in the class, his teaching showing it well. "It is more than you or anyone here could ever hope to comprehend."

"I do not take keenly to impudence, Mister Yuy," he scoffed at me, missing the angered and pained expression in my eyes. "Perhaps I was not clear in my question, Mister Yuy. Let me restate: What are your feelings about war and how did you deal with it?"

"Have you ever buried your face in your hands because no one around you understands what it is that makes you be?" I went on to ask, still sounding as dark and serious as before. I could feel the entire room staring at me with open jaws and startled eyes at one, my words, and two, that I had dared to challenge the teacher's authority. Despite Bingley's comment from break about soldiers coming home from war, I was pretty sure that a very small percentage of this school's population had been personally touched by war. "Have you ever felt like there was someone else keeping score and what could make you whole was simply out of reach?"

"I… I…" he stammered, taken aback by my comments. There was no way he could ever understand the weight of what I had said. He had not walked my life in my shoes, so how could he? He had not undergone a childhood of rigorous forced training and mind control, did not comprehend what it was like to be screaming at the top of his lungs unheard. Nor did he know what it was like to struggle with distorted and suppressed emotions that seemed to have no place in a soldier, constantly yearning for something more and not knowing where to even begin looking for it. The teacher eventually gathered himself and answered. "No, Mister Yuy, I have not."

"I have," I finished, crossing my arms and leaning back in my seat, blue fire dancing in my eyes. "Tell me if this answers your queries: If the truth walks away, then who is there to make the world better? Evil prevails when good men do nothing, Sir. So as you stand there talking about what the Gundams did or didn't do, should or should not have done, know that what they did was for everyone but themselves and that even now, they continue to fight. And I don't expect anyone who was not on the battlefield to understand." With those words, I stood up and picked up my bag, nodded to the teacher and promptly walked out of the class, leaving a room full of dumbfounded stares. I turned and said in an ambiguous tone before I closed the door behind me, "So if you walk away, who will remain there to bring change? I would like to think the world has become a better place." And I left.

Did I mention I had always hated ideological discussions on the Gundams and the war? An incident like that had managed to take place without fail in each and every similar class I had been forced to sit through from the beginning. Needless to say, I would not be returning to that class anytime soon.

{Everything I say, every word of it,
Cuts me to the bone (and I bleed).}

Hardly in the least bit hungry, I returned to my dormitory at lunchtime to mull over the misadventures of the day. Perhaps school had not been the best choice of ways to occupy my time. It had been so much easier before when I had Duo to help me along. Usually I was able to just let him do all the talking while I just sat in silence and watched. But now that I was forced to do that on my own, I was beginning to find it over my head. Perhaps the laughing jester's costume that Duo so often chose to conceal his own tormented soul within was not as easy as I had written it off in days past.

Not expecting any company for the next hour or so, I spent my time in one of the few strangely calming activities I knew. Rooting through one of my drawers, I withdrew a spare pack of cigarettes, a lighter and the balled up sweatshirts wrapped around two of my favourite guns, bringing them to the desk to give them a much needed cleaning. I had set up my laptop there already, Bingley's stereo having been moved to the floor underneath the little writing table, though I consented to allowing him to keep his gaudy lava lamp there. Truth be told, I liked it because it was the sort of tacky ornament that Duo would have liked to keep. I think I recall him having a purple one in his cabin on the Sweepers ship. I moved my laptop out of the way and set down the two bundles, unwrapping one to reveal the sleek black handgun I had usually carried with me during the first war. It was the one I had constantly threatened Relena with, the one I had brought with me when I thought I might execute Duo on the lunar base myself, the one that held far too many memories to let go.

I withdrew a cigarette from the pack and lit up. The roll of nicotine hung lazily out of my lips as I pressed the magazine release on the gun and let the clip fall out of the gun's handle into my awaiting palm, setting it aside gently. From there I proceeded to dismantle the rest of the weapon, unscrewing the silencer and muzzle, lovingly setting aside each piece as I did so. The task made me feel like I was back in my past, living in some school with Duo, waiting for him to come back from a late night partying. It had always been that way. I would hang out alone in the dormitory with my guns and my laptop while he was out socializing… not that he didn't try and get me to go with him. Little did he know that I the reason I hated to accompany him to such… 'shindigs' as he called them… was because I had more than a little trouble watching him dance. Actually, Duo dancing by himself was a very sensual thing. To be exact, I hated watching him dance with other people. I hated watching them put their hands all over him and grind close in a mess of swaying, sweaty bodies and heavy breathing. He was mine. He always joked about how I hated sharing my toys so much. Fortunately, he would always return, and I got to have him all to myself for the rest of the night. I don't think he ever truly understood how important those trysts in particular meant to me. It reminded me that there was still someone who would care enough to come back for me, someone who might cry if I never did.

{I've got something to say,
But now I've got nowhere to turn.}

I was so lost in these thoughts and the cloud of smoke that wafted around me, that I did not hear the door open and, reacting on the instincts that lived in those memories, I was more than quick to grab my lucky six-shooter from the other bundle, aiming it at whoever it was that stepped through the door. It took a few seconds before the blood drained away from my vision and I saw that I was pointing a very illegal gun at my roommate, who was standing there with his arms raised over his head and sweating bullets. I hastily lowered the pistol and laid it on the desk, not bothering to hide it again, as there would be no point. "Sumimasen," I whispered, scooting my chair away from the desk, eyes focused on my lap. "I did not know it was you."

"A-Are you saying you would have fired if it was anyone else?" He let out a nervous chuckle as he slowly stepped into the room and closed the door after him.

"I might have," I said, a sadistic grin creeping across my features, "though it might have brought me a good deal of unwanted attention."

"Who are you?" he wondered aloud, still staring at me with wide green eyes. He looked rather pale and dizzy as he sat down on the foot of my bed as he watched me from the other side of the room at what he judged to be a safe distance. Not that distance meant much to a sharpshooter sitting a mere five feet away. "Your comments in history this morning were very… interesting…. And now I find out you keep a gun…. I'm almost afraid to know what other secrets you have."

"I am… no one," I told him, lifting my chin up, eyes wandering across the ceiling, withdrawing the cigarette from my lips as I let out a heavy smoke-filled breath of air, tapping the ashes accumulating on the tip across the floor. "And I'm through with secrets. All they ever got me was the fucked up existence I call my past. Now I'm just…. Just a nobody with no direction and no life now that the war is over."

"Oh." I did not like the pity I heard in his voice. The last thing I wanted was pity. Pity would get me dead. I could not afford to be pitied.

"Have you ever walked through a room and it was more like the room passed around you like there was a leash around your neck that pulled you through?" I asked, my mind returning to that state it had been in when I had lectured the history teacher third period.

"Sometimes," he admitted. I think he was being honest with me. Quatre came to mind again and I remembered why I liked this boy. Being so easily reminded of someone I was familiar with made me feel more comfortable, a feeling that I had almost forgotten. "It's like being somewhere recognizing everyone's face until you realize that there was no one there you know."

"It's like… falling," I assessed with another inhalation of my cigarette. I really didn't mind if the damn cancer sticks killed me. I wished I could fade away. Quite frankly, I didn't give a shit if I woke up in the morning or not. I sighed, letting out another mouthful of smoke. "Maybe someday I'll try again, get it straight, stop pretending, stop forever."

"What… happened to you to make you this way?" Bingley asked. I don't think he even really knew what he was asking of me until he started to babble away mercilessly in an effort to make amends when he saw the pained expression cross my face. At least I was past showing him unkindness. "Not that you have to tell me or anything. I mean, I guess I have no right to pry and—"

"Thomas, enough, please," I said, cutting him off prematurely. He looked up, startled at the sound of his first name. I extinguished the burning cigarette on the back of my hand, barely flinching as I did so. I think he felt the burn more than I did, and the visible wince on his face certainly demonstrated so. Such pain reminded me that I was alive, not a dead wandering shade that wandered with the souls of those who died during the wars. "I wish I could tell you but in truth… I don't even know how to…."

"You… were a soldier, weren't you," he finally stated.

"It's that obvious?" I questioned curiously. I figured he probably would have discovered at least that much eventually, but I wanted to know why he decided that was so.

"You're… different from everyone else here," Bingley explained, still fidgeting a little with his hands. "Everyone else lives in their little clouded bubbles, living out their lives like nothing else matters. They talk about politics and other such idioms without really knowing what they're saying. They've never wandered the streets to see how the real world lives. The highlight of their lives is the parties and the dances of high school, whether or not they get to go to prom or if they're popular or not. I knew you had to be somehow different…. There's this look in your eye. The minute I saw you, I knew you were a rebel and a fighter. All that matters is whatever it is you believe so hard in to fight a war for."

I let out a low amused laugh, slouching back in my chair, legs spread over the corner, my arms flung lazily over the back. "You're pretty astute for a rich snot in a place like this."

He took my sarcasm well, though I have to say that the comment, cynical as it might have sounded, was my true thought on his comments. Maybe there was more to Thomas Bingley than what met the eye. I'd made that mistake of taking someone at face value again. Heh, and I complain about other people judging books by their covers.

{It feels like I've been buried underneath
All the weight of the world.}

"…Heero…." he spoke up suddenly, distracting me from my thoughts. He seemed afraid to ask whatever it was he had to say, despite my extremely lax demeanor then. He rolled it around in his head for a little bit before he actually spoke, not able to look me straight in the eye until he was through. "What is it you're fighting for?"

Now there was a question I had not been expecting. Shit. And I didn't even know how to begin to answer. There was so much more to it than just peace and war. Things that were almost more important than such trivialities….

"Whatever it is, I can tell it's important to you," he went on, sensing the unease in my silence. "You're still fighting, even now."

"Have you ever had everything you could ever want, only to throw it away because you didn't understand what it was you had?" I asked, hoping that perhaps whatever he had to say would help me to explain how I felt. He had been good with his words so far…. I hoped his winning streak wasn't about to run dry. I could use the support, much as I hated to admit it. But I was falling faster and faster, and if I didn't grab onto something quick, I would drown.

"Well-l-l, I don't know," he said slowly, diplomatically weighing out his words carefully, just the way Quatre used to. "Perhaps not on the same level, but I… Yes, well, perhaps I do think I know what you mean."

"I had it," I said, leaning forward and resting my elbows on my knees, head drooping so that all I could see was the grain of the wood swirling beneath my shoes. "I had… everything, that is, and I didn't even realize it until I gave it away. It's like…. It's like having some priceless artifact you always had lying around that you dug up in the attic and giving it away, not ever once knowing its true value until you looked back on it and realized its worth."

"You were… in love… weren't you?" He was really getting good at these guessing games. It was time we stopped before he found out more than I cared for him to know, not necessarily for my safety, but for his. "That's why you think you're alone."

I said nothing to this. To be honest, I was afraid that he might try and lecture me on my stupidity, something I really didn't need to hear from anyone—I got that kind of rap from my own conscience more than enough. So I merely responded by turning away and staring aimlessly at my dismantled gun, thinking of nothing but anger and regret.

It wasn't until he started trying to fill the silence with his explanations to justify his statement that I reacted. Not with words, mind you, but with the plainness of my actions. My hand nearest the desk slowly extended, as if in a trance, sliding across the flat tabletop like a dark cloud until it found its way to the handle of my six-shooter. Fingers tightening around it, I pulled it back towards me and held it between my legs, staring down at it like it was some kind of god.

{I try to hold this under control.
They can't help me,
'Cause no one knows….}

"Heero…." I heard him say in a warning tone, though his words were more like a dizzy blur that whizzed by my head in a loud whistling howl.

One corner of my mouth quirked upwards into that dangerously smug little grin of mine as I pulled back the hammer, hearing it withdraw the safety on the gun with a satisfying kerchick. Still entranced by the antique weapon's silver sheen, I raised the gun up, my eyes slowly rising to look across the room at Bingley, who was watching me with a horrified look in his eyes. My smirk grew wider, my eyes dilating in an almost maniacal way as I pressed the slim muzzle of the revolver against my temple. I'd toyed with this kind of fire before, and every time I'd lost my nerve. Usually it would happen in times like these when I had decided that life was just too fucking hard to put up with anymore and that I needed a quick way out. And every time, next thing I knew, I would get some kind of revelation, a reminder as to why I needed to stay alive. Usually that came in the form of either a certain pilot with long braided hair, his goofy comrades or a towheaded schoolgirl whose very presence radiated the essence of hope. Why did all those people have to believe in me so fucking much when all I wanted to do was disappear.

"Sayonara, Thomas," I whispered, my finger tightening around the trigger, a strange sort of release beginning to consume me. "Omae wa… shinsetsu deshita."

"What the hell are you doing!?" he cried, leaping to his feet as my finger pulled the trigger back further. Everything seemed to suddenly be moving in slow motion, the analog clock on the wall seeming to cease its ticking for the moment. Bingley was rushing towards me as quickly as this retarded time warp would allow. Dimly, I was aware of the slight clacking noise as the chamber rotated around, aligning the harbinger of my freedom with my head. Just a little tighter…. I was tired. So very, very tired…. I wanted badly to sleep forever. So tired…. Only a bit more and I could go to the world of dreams forever….

Time suddenly blew back into its normal flow as my finger finally finished its slow journey towards the handle. I felt the gun shudder in my hand as an explosion of power ricocheted through the barrel against my head, sending me careening over onto the desk in a limp mess. The revolver flew out of my hand and landed on the wooden floor with a clatter, gliding under the bed into perpetual darkness. As my head hit the tabletop, I found that there was no pain anymore and felt peace at last that now I could be free before an unending darkness clouded my vision. And then there was nothing.

{Now I'm going through changes, changes!
God, I feel so frustrated lately!
When I get suffocated, save me!
Now I'm going through changes, changes!}

I woke up later, unsure of where and when I was, or even if I was alive or not. Was hell designed to be just the same as the miserable living world? My eyes focused on white. As my vision became less hazy, I realized that I was staring at a ceiling, the cracked ceiling over my bed to be more specific. With a slight pain shooting through my head and down my spine, I turned my head to find Bingley sitting on the desk chair beside my bed, his attention consumed by my revolver, which he was currently playing with, sliding the rotating clip in and out, in and out.

"Have I made it to hell and are you a servant of the Devil?" I asked feebly, the sound of my voice disgusting to my own ears, though it seemed to make Bingley happy to hear it.

"Perhaps it is Elysium," Bingley suggested, his eyes wet with emotion, as he looked up at me, his cheeks red and sticky, though his hands were still fumbling with the gun. He had been crying, I think. (I guessed so because that's how Duo looked after he cries.) "And maybe I am the Devil."

"No, you can't be," I sighed, turning away from him to watch the cracks on the ceiling again. "The Devil doesn't look like you."

"You know what the Devil looks like?" He sounded shocked, intrigued and a little bit curious too. I knew he was waiting for an answer because his fiddling with the gun ceased for a moment.

"Yes," I answered, still staring at the ceiling mindlessly, never before realizing how entrancing and strangely beautiful a brackish ceiling covered in fissures, chinks and faults could be. "The Devil has these mystical plum eyes of many layers that you could just drown in forever and never once know you're slowly dying, gasping for air and struggling as you sink deeper and deeper into those bottomless drunken irises. And his hair isn't like yours. It's long, long, oh so long, and light brown like… like oak or chestnuts…. His face is rounder and his nose smaller, slightly upturned, like an elf's. His ears are elfin too, somewhat pointed at the tops and a bit outturned. And his lips…. Oh his lips are full and of the palest, most exquisite coral pink you ever did see, perfect for kissing…"

"Oh. Heh, well then," he stammered, unsure of what to make of my blathering. I hated it when these delirious spells set in; I always said the strangest things without understanding how or why they came to be from my mouth. "…Maybe you are in Elysium after all, soldier boy."

"Me, in a paradise created for heroes?" I couldn't resist the laugh that spouted from my throat and leaked over my lips at that comment. Gathering myself and sucking in a deep breath, I turned my head to him again and told him exactly why that could not be true. "The Devil himself said he would see me in hell. I believe him. So that leaves only two options. One, I'm dead and in hell, as promised, or two, I fucked up again and I'm still alive."

"Thank goodness you are," he whispered, ignoring my maniacal stare. He returned to staring at the gun before speaking again. Holding up the weapon, the clip rolled out to the side, revealing the six bullet chambers within. "Two bullets. Two stupid bullets!" His voice was soft but firm, almost desperate. Even I could tell he was disappointed with my gun slinging antics. Obviously he did not know me very well if this was the sort of thing he considered abnormal. "You only had two damn bullets in this gun and you just had to go and scare the shit out of my with your little game of Russian roulette! Now you listen to me, Heero Yuy, and you listen damn good, you hear me? I may have only known you a few weeks, and I know I couldn't ever hope to understand what you've been through or what goes through your head every day, but don't you ever try to do that again! Don't you ever think that your life is worth throwing away? What about those you leave behind? Did you ever think of that? Huh, did you?" He was yelling by then, his face getting red again. "Do you understand me?"

"Shinigami wasn't ready for me yet," I whispered, sounding all too much like Duo. "That is all there is to it. It was no fault of yours or mine."

"Oh, it wasn't your fault that you put a gun to your head, pulled the trigger and were lucky enough to only get out of it with a bruise on the side of your face?" he raged. I personally don't think he had any right to get mad at me when he didn't even understand why I did the things I did. I guess he really was a sheltered rich kid at heart, better than most, but still blind.

"Correct," I said, getting tired of this useless banter. I rolled over on the bed with my back facing him so I wouldn't have to look at his face. …Or perhaps it was so he wouldn't have to see the moisture clouding the blues of my eyes that I had survived my little experiment.

"I'm sorry," he whispered quietly. I heard the light metallic rattle of the revolver as he laid it down somewhere nearby and the hollow sound of a drawer being pushed in. His footsteps filled my ears, slowly clopping their way towards the door at the foot of my bed, the opening of the door, and another whispered statement before he left. "I hope you're sorry too… for whatever you did."

{I'm bound and shaking,
Bound and breaking,
I hope I make it through all these changes!}

I think I slept a long time after that. I skipped classes the next two days and never once left the safety of my cocoon of blankets, not even to eat. I think Bingley had made up some excuse along the lines of the poor new exchange student having trouble adjusting to his new lifestyle and falling ill or something. I was snappish and even moodier than usual, forbidding anyone other than my roommate to set foot inside the dormitory. I yelled at Bingley whenever he tried to talk to me, even if it was to offer me food or something and nearly took his head off when he tried to move my dismantled handgun into a more secretive place from its current spot, still strewn across the desk. After that, he gave up on me, declared me incorrigible and thankfully hasn't spoken to me since.

At long last, after almost four straight days of pessimistic moping around the dormitory, I finally managed to haul my ass out of bed, unable to take my own state of disgusting uncleanness any longer. It was about four in the afternoon on a Friday. Most of the school was either packing up for the weekend or lost in the sweep of preparing for the weekend. Bingley may have thought that I was dead to the world, but I sure had him fooled. I had kept perfect track of every hour, every second that ticked by since my dance with the Devil earlier that week.

I slowly made my way to the little bathroom, hardly able to keep on my own two feet for the trip there. For a kid who had been forced into enough training to make him the very essence of what a perfect solider 'ought to be, my precision and balance was horribly off. I entered the tiny room, kicking the door closed behind me, barely able to make it to the sink. I had to support all my weight on the porcelain bowl, staring down at the dark drain like it was the most amazing thing I had ever laid eyes on.

"Life's a lot to think about when you're living in between the lines," a voice said. I looked up, glancing warily around me for the speaker, my darting blue eyes finally settling on the hollow reflection shining in the mirror before me. The image there was distorted, strangely me and yet, not me at all. He was an empty looking man with wan skin as powdery white as a glaring spectre, his once intense blue gaze muted and dull, sunken back into empty eye sockets that were ringed with blackness. His cheekbones were gaunt and his once full lips pale enough to blend in with the rest of his sickly skin. Matted dark brown hair was pressed strangely against his head, sticking up at weirder angles than usual, his unruly bangs plastered to his forehead with sweat. "What do you get to help you through the sleepless nights?" the reflection asked me tiredly.

"I don't have anything with no one there to hold me," I answered the mirror image of myself, raising a hand to meet his upon the gleaming quicksilver surface. "All I have is what I feel… and I feel…."

My vision blurred a little and the picture I was watching in the mirror changed. In place of my tousled appearance was the sunny countenance of Duo Maxwell, his cheeks flush and cherry, eyes wide and lilac violet. He had that sly half-smirk on his face, arms crossed in an almost mocking manner. At the hallucination of my lover, I started to feel a little light-headed and sick to my stomach. "I know you feel helpless and I know you feel… put on."

"I am helpless," I whispered to myself, panting a little bit. I was starting to get the dry heaves, retching over the sink in desperation to lose whatever was sloshing in my stomach so violently. "I feel like I'm so far away from the sun. No one can see me. You have to tell me which way I 'ought to go from here, Duo!"

"Heero, that's the same road that I'm on. I know you're just trying to find where you belong," my doppelganger Duo replied plainly, hands now on his hips. "It all just depends on where you want to get to."

"I… I don't much care where," Heero answered weakly, trying to reach out to touch Duo's face, but finding only a cool barrier separating them, "just so long as I get somewhere."

"Then it doesn't matter which way you go," the mirror phantasm replied smugly, his words practically riding on the tail end of mine. "You're sure to get somewhere, if only you walk long enough."

I felt this could not be denied and hung my head in thought, the back of one hand pressed against my lips to stop the threat of anymore retching, though I could not help but gag a little as a faint sensation took flight between my ears.

"What is it exactly that you are looking for, Heero?" he asked.

I felt a pull in my chest and the rise of bile in my throat. I gurgled it back, swallowing the foul-tasting muck back into my suddenly churning stomach as I looked up at the still swaggering vision of Duo. "Whatever it is, I can't reach it. It's nothing tangible," I tired to explain vainly, feeling worse. "I think it's through the looking glass."

"No, Heero," Duo replied ambiguously, tilting his head somewhat to the side, thick chestnut braid snapping up from behind him like a tail when he flicked it back the other way. "It is you who is through the looking glass."

"…Am I crazy, Duo?"

"Oh you can't help that," the mirage of Duo smiled like a Cheshire cat and purred in the mysterious tone of his that sounded so much like the Duo Maxwell I knew and loved and yet, rang with an almost disturbing quality that I could not place. "We're all mad here. I'm mad, you're mad…."

I snapped downwards, still barely able to hold myself up over the sink as my mouth fell open, a thick slop of stomach juices and bile emptied from my stomach, coating my lips in a fetid sheen of dank orange-yellowish goo.

{Now I'm going through changes, changes.
God, I feel so frustrated, lately!
When I get suffocated, save me.
Now I'm falling apart, now I feel it!}

Panting harder than before, I slowly lifted my gaze back to the mirror, my own tentative reflection slowly rising up into the oval frame as I did so. I could barely recognize that frightened man staring back at me. I sneered at him, rage building at the reflection's equally disgusted sneer that met my eyes. "Fuck you! Let me out of this damn prison!" I cried breathlessly as I pounded the bottom of my fist onto the mirror in an effort to wipe that damn look off my twin's face. I didn't even realize it as the mirror's glassy smooth surface splintered and cracked a little under my fist. "Fuck you!" I shouted at it again, slamming my fist straight on into my reflection's face, my entire hand gliding right through the mirror and lodging itself past my wrist in the frail drywall underneath. Bits of plaster and glass chipped and sprinkled down over my arm. "Fuck you! Let me out!" I could see the blood lining the edges of the broken mirror and staining hole in the drywall. "Fuck you," I whispered, eyes wide and still breathing hard. "Let me out, please. I don't want to be trapped here forever. Just let me on the other side of the looking glass, even just for a little bit. Onegai…."

I slowly withdrew my hand from the cavern in the wall, looking down in awe at the bloody carnage that smeared it. I was almost entranced by the violence I had done to myself, looking up at the destroyed mirror, unable to see one clear image of myself anymore. Rather, there were multiple smaller versions of myself, all staring back at me from their individual jagged planes of sliver glass. My hand fell limply to my side, the blood trickling over my fingers, leaking out of the wounds in my palm that my fingernails had inflicted, dripping down to the floor in large droplets of syrupy red liquid. "I hate this," I said quietly, looking down my arm at the streaming crimson rivulets. "I hate…. Hate…. I hate when all I want is love. And I know pain when I can't feel…."

I had no time to finish my mutterings as another bucket of retched bile climbed my esophagus and poured forth into the sink. The putrid stuff was dried and caked to my lips and chin, tainted by the stroke of scarlet the crossed my mouth as I swiped the back of my hand across it in an effort to wipe it clean. "The pain makes me real," I spoke in hushed tones as I stared down at the mess slopped across the sink bowl, various angular flakes of glass lost here and there amid the heavy juice. My mutilated hand slid down the smooth curve of the sink, fingers wading through the bile as they searched out one of the larger shards of mirror. Callused digits closed around the glass as I lifted it from the mucky graveyard and held it aloft before my eyes for careful scrutiny. It was stained with daubs of blood and bile, obscuring my reflection in its irregular shape. I squeezed it tighter, flinching a little as the razor edges cut into my skin, drawing bubbled founts of blood around its sides, as my grip became more and more vice-like. "This is real. I'm real," I reminded myself as the searing sting whistled through my nerves. "I'm not a toy, not a wind-up doll or a puppet," I kept on muttering, taking my other hand and swiping it across the top edge, slicing a fine gash across the palm. "I'm real, I'm alive. I am… I am…."

I raised my left hand, the one that I had just injured, staring incredulously at the seeping wound on the pad of my hand. Other than that brackish red patch, it was pristine, with only a few nicks and calluses tainting its white flesh. It bothered me, that perfection. I hated it. I hated perfection. I was not perfect anymore. I lowered my hand, bringing the other across my torso to stroke it almost lovingly with bloodied fingers, painting my own blood across the white canvas. "Pain… I am pain!" I cried, raising the hand wrapped around the glass and bringing it flying across my wrist in a perfect swooping arc, slicing a sloppy and thick slit across the ashen flesh. "And I no longer care!" I screamed, bringing the glass blade back across my skin in another violent swipe. "Take me back!" I shouted at the glass as I repeated the damage a third time, the sting not being anywhere near enough to assure me that I was truly alive. "Take me away from fucking Wonderland!"

"Heero?" a soft panicked voice on the other side of the door called out to me tentatively. Bingley…. "Heero? Are you alright in there?" He was rapping lightly on the door as if he meant to get my attention. God, he was one of those fucking politely rude types.

"Hai, daijoubu," I growled softly, not paying attention to the language I was using as I threw my weight against the bathroom door with a dull thud. I pressed my hands against the door, palms down, feeling the warm slick squelch as they gilded easily over the wood with the lubrication of my own blood. My wounds were leaking profusely now, plopping upon the greenish linoleum floor in endless streams. I could see the blood splattered across the lip of the sink, spattered across the wall, splashed in shallow puddles on the floor, my footsteps slurring the reddened pools in streaks leading to my spot against the door. It looked like someone had been murdered in there. I started to laugh a little to myself, at myself, for what I had just done. I had painted this room red myself with my own hardships. It reminded me of what my life and my dreams were like, hideous and sprayed with blood. My chuckles inclined a little bit, resembling those old psychotic laughs I used to let out when Wing and I had killed something.

"Heero? Heero!" I heard Bingley shout at me again, his pounding on the door becoming faster and more worried. I don't know what was scaring him so much. This was all okay. It proved to the world that I was a human and that I was real. It proved I wasn't just a lost and confused character in a storybook, tumbling down a rabbit hole into a world of oblivion and fear. "Heero, open this door right now!"

I ignored him and stumbled blandly towards the middle of the little room again, turning around to face the door. It was sullied with a wide smudge of my blood that seeped and blended it with its wooden surface. My head was spinning as I tried to grab the edges of the sink, missing the bowl entirely, beginning a slow descent to the bloody floor.

{But I'm going through changes, changes!
God, I feel so frustrated lately!
And I get suffocated; I hate this!
But I'm going through changes, changes….}

The last thing I registered as I knocked my chin roughly against the lip of the sink was how alone I really was. No one knew of my inner turmoil. No one cared…

…. Not even me.

*~ '…Cheshire Puss…. Can you tell me which way I 'ought to go from here?' ~*

()() OWARI ()()

A/N Uh, hope you liked it. Maybe I'll do another chapter…. Like I said, it might not be absolutely essential that you read Coming Through the Rye first to enjoy this story, but I think this reads more completely if you kind of know how Heero is operating in that story. And if you caught the trend with the other kids' names, snuggles! I'll hint you that they're from an old classic, two of them characters (both of whom I like, by the way) in the story and the other named after the author, hehe. Um, sorry for the random Offspring and 3 Doors Down song lyrics littered throughout the story, but that's just because of whatever I happened to be listening to at the time and they seemed to fit, so there you go. Oh, and if you caught all that obvious Alice in Wonderland stuff, kudos to you! I love that book…. (Heh, on a random note, don't you think that it's interesting that Lewis Carol wrote that about opium and shit?)

Don't forget to review, fools! ~L.W.