Fallen stars
Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam wing or it's characters.
Chapter one: the beginning
When did attraction turn into affection? When did that affection turn to blind love? These were the questions that Duo Maxwell found himself pondering through out the war. He had long ago realized that his heart beat for another...that his very soul burned for that person. The one person that would never reciprocate his feelings, that did not seem able to. Heeor Yuy...the perfect soldier.
Throughout the months of the war that Duo had known Heero he had wanted to get closer to the composed boy. Wanting to befriend him...and later finding himself hopelessly attracted to him. Drawn to his beauty, that childish innocence he tried to hide behind the wall of emotionless. Duo had only seen past that wall once.
It had happened several months after their first meeting. They were the only two that were left in Quatre's safe house since the other three were sent off on missions. Heero had just barely managed to escape the last mission with his life and make it back to the safe house. The wounds had been impressive. Contusions, fractures, dislocated knee...Duo had spent half the night patching the unconscious pilot up.
Duo sat in the chair next to Heero's bed side watching over him and daydreaming as he ran his hand through his hair faintly. He found his heart in his throat suddenly when he realized, that somehow, his emotions had changed for the perfect soldier laying battered out before him. That at the thought of Heero failing in a mission, of him not coming back one day, this brought a strange tightness to his throat and made his eyes water.
For weeks he'd watched Heero and the others, tried to engage the slightly taller boy in conversation. He had taken his time to learn the many different meanings of the others patent "hnn" response. The others didn't notice...but Duo did, Duo recognized the other moods as if they were his own. He had always justified it to himself by saying that the other intrigued him...that he was interested in getting beyond those walls of ice and steel.
Now though he wasn't sure why this was such a solid goal for him. Did he want to be friends with Heero? Or something so much more? Why did his heart beat so fast whenever he was around him? Perhaps it was his train of thought, or the soft admittance of his own mind finally realizing just how much the other meant to him that cause him to do what he had. Leaning forward, ever so s lowly he let his lips touch Heero's in a gentle, slow kiss. Tasting those unresponsive lips, and the warm taste of cinnamon and strawberries. How...different. Duo let himself enjoy the way the other tasted for a few more minutes before pulling back and letting his eyes open again to look at the other's face.
What he saw there made him freeze. Twin cobalt jewels looked up at him their surface swimming with too many emotions to name. The sight stole his breath away. Never before had Duo seen Heero look like that. The other pilot looked so genuinely confused that he just couldn't help but hold his breath as he watched the others emotions flicker across his face one after the other almost too fast for him to catch. A moment later anger sprang up in place of confusion and before Duo could even register his own alarm a white hot pain flashed before his eyes as he vaguely felt a fist smash into his temple. Colours swam in front of his eyes for a moment before darkness.
The next thing Duo could remember after that was waking up in his bed, Quatra fussing over him. He'd later asked the blonde what had happened. The blue eyed boy had told him that he and Trowa had returned to find him collapsed in the bedroom, and after asking Heero; who despite his own injuries was already seeing to zero's damages, what happened had put him in bed. Luckily that had only been the night before so Duo had only lost a few hours instead of days from the hit. Suffering from a rather irritating concussion he was luckily alive.
Duo had found Heero to be even more cold towards him than before. The later opting to ignore him all together instead of tolerate him with small responses like he'd once given him. Though feeling rather disappointed at the sudden and unbreakable wall of cold fury that he found any time he tried to talk to Heero he continued his attempts to get the other out of his shell. This resulted in several black eyes and a threat on his life.
It wasn't for at least a month that something changed the now awkward relationship between the two of them. Duo found himself falling apart after a rather disastrous mission. Barely walking he somehow found the energy to get into a yelling match with Wufei about his being a "baka" for almost jeopardizing the mission. Pressing against Quatra, who had stood between them to keep them apart he'd glared at the other with narrowed eyes for some time before the world just tilted and he blacked right out.
What he had expected to see when he woke up again he wasn't sure. Maybe it was the gates of heaven, or the burning fires of hell...what he hadn't however expecting to find was Heero Yuy standing near the window in his room watching him "sleep". Duo had always been a master of waking up without changing his breathing or anything to signal that he was in fact conscious. Watching Heero Yuy through lidded eyes for several minutes he'd finally croaked out some sort of smart remark. To this day he still couldn't remember what it was. What had happened afterwards just shocked him far to greatly for something so unimportant to really stick.
Heero had turned on him then and studied him more closely before walking forward and before duo could even defend himself from what he thought was going to be another lecture about " endangering the mission" he had found himself drowning in cinnamon and strawberries. His violet eyes stared up at the serious, reserved cobalt eyes of the perfect soldier as he felt strong arms encompass him and before he really knew what was going on he'd felt himself giving in to those touches now running over his body.
Their first night together was nothing more than magical to Duo. His heart soared every time he thought about it. The gentleness of the other's exploring fingers and lips the way the other was so conscious of his injuries as he undressed him and then finally took him to that place of pleasure that he had never been before. He felt again that all consuming feeling for Heero then as he clung to him, moaning for him and giving himself completely to the other's will. It was then...in the after glow of it all that he muttered three words he regretted afterwards. "i love you" Those words would haunt him for as soon as he spoke them, the trance that had held them both there was broken and he was left with the perfect soldier staring coldly down at him once again.
Heero had left him then with out a word. Leaving Duo to curl up alone in his bed snuggling into the fading scent and warmth of the body that had been pressed so tightly against his own just moments before that.
Weeks later was when things had started. Heero had approached him first, demanding that he explain why he'd kissed him, and then stalked off after duo had tried to explain how he felt. That night when the others were all busy he'd again come to Duo's room, where they'd spent a night together, this time there was no gentleness, there was only lust and desire. Duo gave into the touches because he too felt those needs and he let Heero explore sex with him...he let himself be Heero's Guinea pig mostly because he was sure that was the only way the other would ever have him. Being close to Heero was worth it even if it was so small a way. Even if his heart would never be his...when he lay in Heero's arms he could at least pretend for a small period...that he was Heero's as much as Duo wanted Heero to be his.
Duo never made the mistake of saying those three words after sex again. It was obviously not accepted and through out the rest of the war Heero would come to him whenever he wanted and they would share a brief...moment together before going back to being soldiers. Perhaps it was born by Heero's confusion over emotions that were never shown to him. Or perhaps it was because they felt a connection because of their bodies' reactions to one another but Heero allowed the encounters to continue after the war.
The others all settled into every day life, Duo was happy to work for a repair company on earth in relation to the Preventers, repairing their cars and other things they needed work for. This way he could always be close to the others. Duo was so happy when finally Quatra came out and told all of them that he and Trowa were seeing each other. Duo could still remember the looks on Catherin and Wufei's faces as the small blonde had blushed and cuddled into Trowa's arms, the silent giant just smiling gently down at his little lover.
Things like that had made Duo's heart swell with happiness. His small family had found their ways to be happy. Trowa had Quatra, and after the Mariemaia incident Wufei had finally settle down and taken Sally Po's offer to be come a preventer and the smell of love was in the air for anyone that happened to be in the presence of those two love birds. Try as they might to deny anything going on. Duo was so glad that Wufei had found someone to be with, and seeing him almost every other day the once proclaimed shinigami made it his special duty to invite everyone over to his and Heero's house for dinner at least once a week.
Yes his "and" Heero's house. The static youth had agreed to move in with him after several attempts at keeping his own house had proved that he wouldn't go more than two or three days without spending the night over at his house anyway. So finally finding a bigger place the two ex-pilots had moved into a two bedroom townhouse. They weren't a couple, heaven forbid that they should even breach the subject of becoming a couple. A coworker of Duo's had said it in joking once when he came over and saw the two living together. Needless to say Heero had been gone for a whole week before coming back.
Despite the fears of loosing Heero all together, Duo was happy. He could be here with Heero, spend his nights with him. At least he thought he was happy...but when faced with the true happiness of Trowa and Quatra, and even Wufei and sally...he knew why his heart ached when he lay wrapped up in Heero's arms at night.
Still, despite the feeling of emptiness at knowing that even though he loved Heero more than anything and he would never accept his love and repay it, Duo was happy. He enjoyed his little life and for almost half a year after the war he was the happiest man alive on earth or the colonies.
Unfortunately that wasn't meant to last. It was the first week in August when Heero got himself a new job. Feeling listless with life Heero had quite his last job and been out of work for a few months, living off the money he'd sifted off of oz during the war. As far as Duo had asked and been told it was some sort of body guard job. Things seemed to spiral down hill from there as far as duo could tell. It was only a couple of weeks later that Heero was spending more and more nights away from home with his "client" and only two months later, just before Christmas that he came home to find Heero nestled in bed with none other than Relena Peacecraft.
Calling Quatra, Duo had packed his bags and found himself in his car on his way to the little blonde's house before Heero had even crawled out of bed after him. It was only then that Duo admitted to Quatra how he felt for Heero, the smaller of the two seeming rather unsurprised really, but when duo told him about his and Heero's arrangement over the last year the blonde had sat there gaping at him until Trowa had pointed out that a fly could get in if he did that.
The two ex-pilots agreed to help him hide from Heero who honestly didn't seem to understand why he was so hurt. Calling him to see when he was coming home, wondering why he'd run off in the first place. Duo cried about it for several days until Wufei had given Heero a visit to inform him that Duo "would not" be coming home. The Chinese ex-pilot later told Duo that he'd told Heero what he was doing to Duo and how inappropriate he had been in going to Duo for that sort of relationship if he had no feelings for the baka American.
This had been a surprise to Duo and he'd found a source of strength in Wufei's friendship. Duo loved Quatra to pieces...but the way the blond always fussed over him, calling him to make sure he was okay even after he'd moved into an apartment on the other side of town and gotten a new job. Trowa was a silent pillar most of the time but his time with Quatra had softened him and he was more prone to tell the American what he felt or thought as well and Duo just couldn't handle it.
To disappear had been a though that Duo had been playing with for a few weeks before "it" happened. It being the night that he had decided to disappear from the pilots lives all together...the night that 'Duo maxwell" died.