Warnings: Shounen ai
Pairings: 2+5, 1+3(minor)
Summary: Wufei's depression begins to take its toll and Duo is worried.
Dying While Alive
by Amyeyl
Chapter 1
Wufei walked into the house he was currently sharing with his fellow gundam pilots. The others were all in the living room, watching something on television. Wufei stood in the doorway for a bit, quietly watching them. They all looked so happy together, even Heero looked more relaxed that usual. His presence apparently having gone unnoticed, he turned and made his way upstairs and into his room. As he left, a pair of worried eyes glanced at the spot where he had been standing.
In his room, Wufei fell gracelessly onto his bed. His eyes squeezed themselves shut as fingers searched blindly for something to latch onto. Coming in contact with his pillow, he pulled it to himself and buried his face in it. Minutes passed quietly, the only sounds coming from the pilot's troubled breathing. Wufei slowly relaxed his hold on the pillow and sat up, dragging a hand across his still dry eyes. On one level he was proud of himself, it was weak to cry, something only an onna would do. He shook his head briefly at the stupidity of the thought. He didn't really believe that, those statements were designed to keep everyone away. Deep down he hated it. It wasn't fair that he could no longer cry, could no longer find any release in the seemingly simple act.
Still holding his pillow he stood up and crossed the room to the window. He leaned against the cool glass and peered out at the world below. Quatre found him that way a few hours later when he came to get him for dinner. "Wufei?" The blonde boy pushed the door open enough to poke his head inside. He was met with darkness. "Wufei, why are the lights off?"
Getting no answer, he moved into the room fully and groped along the wall for the switch. As the lights flickered to life and illuminated the room, he couldn't help but stare in confusion at the sight that greeted him. Wufei stood against his window staring out into the darkness. He was still dressed in the boots and coat he'd had on when he'd come in from the cold hours ago, and he was clutching a pillow tightly to his chest.
"Wufei? We've been calling you for a while now, dinner's ready..." he trailed off as Wufei turned to face him. "Quatre?" the teen blinked slowly at him, "what are you doing in here...?"
"Um, dinner's ready Wufei. Like I said, I came up here to ge-"
"I'm not hungry..." he was cut off by Wufei's reply. "Thank you for coming to get me, though." Quatre was about to try again to get the other boy to come to dinner, but Wufei had turned back to his window, obviously finished with the conversation. Quatre frowned as he closed the door to Wufei's room and made his way back downstairs.
"Hey, Q. Where's Wu-man?"
"He said he's not hungry," Quatre sat down with a frown.
"That's the third time this week..." Duo murmured, frowning as well.
Later that night Wufei lay awake in bed. The entire house was quiet and dark. He hated the dark. He didn't fear any monsters or demons that may be lurking in its depths, he just hated the fact that it hid everything. The slight illumination forcing its way through the tightly drawn curtains just barely allowed him to see out to where his hands were, provided they were held directly in front of his face. He didn't like the fact that it left him alone with himself. In the dark he couldn't even use his precious books as an escape. He was forced to deal with his thoughts, or try and make himself go to sleep hoping all the while for the nightmares to stay at bay.
Of late, the latter was more difficult than the first, but he wasn't sure how much longer that would last. As this night seemed inclined to be, most were spent analyzing things he'd done or said during the day and how foolish and weak they must have made him appear to the other pilots. No matter the action or comment his mind could find something wrong with it, and it was slowly wearing down what little self-esteem he had left. Of course he couldn't let the others know how weak he truly was. They'd laugh him right out of the safe house. They would most definitely be appalled if they knew his true nature, and want nothing more to do with him; he was barely tolerated as it was.
It was times like these that he wished he believed in suicide. When his thoughts came to the logical conclusion that there was no reason he should be alive, that the others would be better off with him dead, he longed to reach for his sword or even a gun and to end it all. However, he viewed suicide as cowardly and selfish. That was one of the few positive things he had to say about himself, he wasn't a coward. Serious about it or no, he couldn't help but wonder if the other pilots would miss him if he were gone...perhaps Quatre would. Nonetheless, he would continue to live. It would be a great dishonor to his colony, his clan, Meiran, the pilots...if he was to do otherwise.
Duo stretched and yawned as he made his way to the kitchen for breakfast. He was greeted by the familiar sight of the four other pilots performing their usual morning routines. Heero was busy at his laptop, a cup of coffee close at hand. Trowa was picking at his breakfast, trying to both stare at Heero without getting caught (at which he failed miserably) and ignore the mothering efforts of Quatre who was trying to make sure Trowa ate a proper breakfast, not played with one. And Wufei was... Duo stopped scratching himself to look about the kitchen for signs of the other pilot. Usually he'd be across from Heero, his nose buried in a book '...and what a cute little nose it was...' Duo couldn't help but think, '...especially with those little reading glasses...' Of late, Duo had had increasing difficulty in keeping such thoughts of the raven-haired pilot from parading through his brain. He frowned, forcing the mental picture back. Now wasn't the time to be thinking such things. He had more important things to do, like finding said pilot.
The braided boy blinked as he realized the room had become quiet, even the sound of Heero clacking away had ceased. He looked up to see three, no two and a half, sets of eyes staring at him. He laughed uneasily and backed out of the kitchen. As he left, the other three shrugged and went back to their breakfast.
Due trudged up the stairs, wondering if Wufei had for once taken a clue from him and slept in. Perhaps he was in the shower, or training out back? A smile crossed his face. That's probably where Wu was. Either getting all hot and sweaty out back or removing the sweat from his gloriously sculpted, naked body in the shower. Key word being naked, and Duo quickened his pace to the bathroom. He frowned when he found the door slightly ajar and the lights off. He poked his head in just to be sure, but no, the little pilot wasn't inside. 'Backyard or the bedroom?' Duo mused. Since he was already upstairs, he picked the bedroom.
He continued down the hallway to Wufei's room and knocked on the door.
"'Fei? Are you in there?" Duo stood outside the closed door, hand on the knob. Wufei, who was still lying in bed, wished he'd locked the door after Quatre had left last night. He could either invite the braided boy in, or hope he went away without opening the door, which he knew wasn't very likely. He sighed and forced himself to sit up. Even the simple things required so much effort nowadays.
"Yes, Maxwell, I'm here. Come in." And so, Wufei sealed his fate. Duo slowly entered the room, and was shocked to find Wufei in bed of all places.
"Are you sick or something?" he asked, staring at the other boy.
"Or something..." Wufei muttered shifting under the intensity of Duo's gaze, and wondering what the boy could possibly be thinking. Duo crossed the room and placed his hand against Wufei's forehead.
"Umm... doesn't seem like you've got a fever. Want me to call Quatre? He's better at this sorta thing than me..." Wufei pushed his hand away and glowered at him.
"I said I wasn't sick." Talking with people had always been difficult. So difficult that at times he felt it wasn't worth the effort he had to put forth to do so, and it always left him feeling so drained afterwards. With simple interaction requiring so much of his energy, Wufei rarely bothered try and be civil. It was all too much, and he found such an attitude usually caused the other person to leave him alone sooner. Since he began piloting, this had become his normal method of dealing with people. Now, however, even this was beginning to feel draining. He wished Duo would go away so he could be alone again.
"Okay, Wufei..." Duo said softly, staring down at the other teen with a slightly hurt look on his face. Wufei sighed softly to himself. He hadn't meant to upset Duo; he just couldn't bring himself to act any differently. Duo, he was certain, would never understand that though; the boy had excellent people skills, something Wufei envied at times.
"What did you want Duo?"
"Just wondering where you were. I mean, you didn't come to dinner last night and you weren't at breakfast this morning... Are you hungry? I, I could make something for you..." Wufei stared at him for a moment.
"Yes Duo, I'd like that. Thank you for offering." Wufei said it as politely as he could manage. He really hadn't meant to make Duo uncomfortable earlier. He didn't like to see his friends upset. So, this was his form of an apology. Duo, for his part, was stunned, but he grinned and hurried out of the room to start on breakfast. He stopped at the door and turned around.
"Don't go falling asleep on me 'Fei. Breakfast will be ready in a few minutes." And then he was gone.
Wufei sat in bed staring at where Duo had been standing. He sighed and squeezed his eyes shut, pressing against them with the heels of his hands. What he really wanted was just to try and go to sleep. However he couldn't do that, he'd promised Duo. Since he was already sitting up, he hoped talking himself out of bed would be easier.
Duo stood in front of the stove, dutifully making breakfast for himself and the Chinese pilot. As he cooked, he chewed absently on the end of his braid, wondering about the small boy. Of late, he'd been acting strange, well, stranger than what was normal for him. He'd always been sort of aloof from the others, choosing to separate himself, but never before to this degree. He'd requested more and more solo missions and was starting to purposely avoid everyone, even going to the extent of skipping meals. That really worried Duo. Wufei was most likely the smallest of them all, and that was small. There was no reason for him not to be eating. His behavior towards Duo himself of late also bothered the braided boy. He was usually arrogant and cocky in his attitude towards him, but the way he'd simply given in this morning... Duo'd expected him to yell at him and tell him that he was no judge of the boy's health, and so on. With a sigh, Duo let his braid slip from his mouth and finished up breakfast.
As he turned off the burner, shuffled footsteps alerted him to the upcoming arrival of his breakfast date. He turned from the stove and was greeted with a vision he'd love to wake up to every morning. A still sleepy looking Wufei had paused in the doorway of the kitchen and was rubbing at his eye with the back of his hand. The nightshirt he was wearing was way too big for him and made him look like a little boy who'd been playing in his father's clothes. His hair was a little messy, Duo guessed he hadn't bothered to comb it, and to top it off Wufei's slim golden legs were bared to his lingering gaze. To sum it all up, the boy looked absolutely adorable, and Duo was definitely going to look his fill.
"What are you staring at?"
"Ah, nothing!" Duo quickly turned back to the stove to hide his embarrassment at being caught staring. Wufei sighed as he moved to sit down at the table. He wondered why Duo had been staring at him. He'd probably been shocked at his appearance and then turned away so Wufei wouldn't see him laugh. Yes, Wufei knew he looked stupid, but he couldn't bring himself to care. He wasn't wearing his pajama bottoms and his hair was a mess. But he'd had a hard enough time just getting up this morning. His pants twisted uncomfortably as he tossed and turned at night so he'd decided long ago to stop sleeping in them. The shirt covered everything anyway, so he hadn't bothered to put them on after he'd gotten out of bed. And his hair, well, that didn't really matter either. He remembered hearing somewhere along the way that he shouldn't force himself to do anything, but if it came down to it, only the most important. He figured getting up and then coming down to breakfast were the most important of the four, so it was all he talked himself into doing.
He frowned as he thought that. It was quickly becoming that he had to talk himself into doing things more and more often. He didn't like that; it meant he was getting worse. That was a very bad thing. He hoped briefly that he didn't get a mission until he'd had a chance to get himself under some semblance of control again.
Duo watched with a frown on his face as Wufei sat motionless staring at the kitchen table. The others had left sometime before Duo had come back into the kitchen, so the two of them were alone. And while Duo thought Wufei looked unbearably cute they way he was dressed, he couldn't help but be worried. He'd never seen Wufei this out of it before, and it was really bothering him. All the stuff earlier, and now this... He sighed and slapped a smile on his face as he set Wufei's breakfast in front of him.
"Eat up!" He set his own plate down and dropped into a chair. He didn't start shoveling food into his mouth until Wufei had picked up his fork and at least started poking at his breakfast.
"C'mon Wu-man," Duo managed around his mouthful of food, "I didn't make that for you to perfect the art of playing with your food." Wufei dropped his fork as Duo's words registered. He stared at the utensil for a moment before slowly lifting his eyes to Duo's.
"Hey, are you okay? I didn't mean to scare you or anything..." Duo was up and moving around the table to Wufei's side. He put a hand lightly on his shoulder. Wufei didn't turn to look at him; instead he looked back down to his plate.
"Wufei?"
"I'm sorry." He pushed back from the table and headed out of the kitchen, Duo following quickly behind him. As they entered the hallway, Wufei abruptly stopped walking. Duo tried to stop, but slammed into the other teen's back. Wufei staggered forward, crashing right into Heero, the reason he'd stopped. Heero caught the two of them and held them until they regained their balance.
Taking a step back, he eyed Wufei critically. To put it simply, he looked like shit, but he wasn't about to say that out loud. Wufei would probably try and hit him...then again, with the way he'd been acting he might not. There was no question as to which Heero found more disturbing. Still, it wasn't what he'd come downstairs for.
"Wufei, you have a mission," he said instead. Seeing the raven-haired boy nod, he stepped out of the way and allowed him to pass. As Wufei made his way upstairs, Heero quietly watched him. He didn't like what he saw. He turned to Duo, who was looking at him pleadingly. He nodded once and looked back at the stairs.
"Go with him."
It was a simple mission, seek and destroy, that sort of thing. It was the kind Duo usually enjoyed, he got to show off Deathscythe's many talents and humiliate Oz at the same time. It was great, and something Wufei should have been able to handle on his own. Get rid of any mobile suits that showed up, blow up the base, etc. etc. etc. So why wasn't that what was happening?
Duo grunted as he slammed into one of the dolls, knocking it away from a careless Wufei. Either the pilot of his self-proclaimed Nataku was blind, or he'd fallen asleep at the controls. "Wufei!! What the hell are you doing?!"
Wufei looked down at the angry face of the boy on his monitor. He mumbled an apology and threw himself once more into the fight, this time doing Nataku justice. As they returned to the hidden hanger for their gundams, Wufei rubbed the monitor where Duo's face had been earlier displayed and thought back on the battle.
It would have been so easy to have just stopped fighting, to allow Oz's forces to simply kill him there. In fact, that's just what he'd been trying to do. He probably would've succeeded too, if not for Duo. The braided boy had saved him every time he thought he would find release. His life was now in the hands of the God of Death, just not in the way he wanted it to be. And whether it was because he'd finally gotten to the point of actively seeking an end to his life or because Duo was the only thing at current moment keeping him from doing so, he couldn't say; but one thing was certain, and that was that Chang Wufei, gundam pilot and sole survivor of the Dragon Clan, was afraid.