Title: Joy
Author: Lady Lye
Rating: PG-13/R (Mature)
Archive: (www)(dot) thewordofgit (dot) com (slash)ladylye
Dated: Sunday, December 12th, 2004.
Disclaimers: I do not, unfortunately, own Gundam Wing or an of its associated features. I also cannot make any claim on the phrase cleverly worked in from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Furthermore, I do not encourage suicide (except in extremely rare cases- hint, you are not one of them, unless you make claims of victory on US battleships). Having covered my ass, I DO have rights to this story. All original content here is mine, and not to be pinched by tweenies too damn lazy to write their own material. Lawyers will be sent to ReallyBuzzed!Une for enemas with a cold and rusty needle.
Thank You to Mudpie ), for inspiring this fic. Her smoldering Heero is now at my beck and call, whether he wants to be or not. For a more elaborate version of how this fic came about, stay tuned at the end.
Once upon a time, there was a young man named Heero Yuy. Heero was a studious, focused young man, who worked hard to meet his goals. In order to meet these goals, however, he needed lots and lots of quiet and solitude.
"Quiet" and "Solitude" were not a part of the vocabularies of some of his fellow gundam pilots, however, and so he had been forced to shoot them. He made an anonymous call to emergency services- as he did not want to permanently lose vital tools for his future missions- but he carried off the one known as Duo Maxwell, whom he tended to stability, fed tranquilizers via his IV, and left in a spare room to snooze until Heero needed a good, hard, …bit of noise and raucousness. Even Perfect Soldiers liked to have fun every once in a while.
At last alone with the peace and quiet he had craved for so very long, Heero returned to his study.
It was a sparse room, its cheap walls whitewashed so many times that half the electrical outlets were virtually closed over. A single window let in a few measly strips of sunlight through its tight, regimentally stiff blinds. The floors were bare and uncarpeted, unadorned but for a single, squat black table perched in the center. Heero walked toward that table, and sat on the floor in front of it. There, nearly camouflaged on the black paint, sat his most precious possession: his laptop. It was custom-built, by his own- dare we call them tender, even loving hands…? Its capabilities were unparalleled, and it was the key to Heero's life and livelihood.
Almost reverently, he opened the screen, and booted her up.
Heero wasn't sure quite when he had begun referring to the machine as Joy, but to his mind, she was more glorious than any flesh and blood woman in the world.
Joy chirped obediently as his fingers flew over the keys. Her whirring hard disk said, Good morning, Heero! What will we be working on today? He replied, "Run: C:/DOS" and Joy gladly obliged.
For many an hour, Heero and Joy were as one, her fan and his breath, his prompts and her responses, all perfectly in synch. At last, triumphantly, he reached for the Return key.
Joy's monitor turned blue.
Blue.
The ominous Blue Screen of Death.
Heero's heart raced. What could possibly have happened? Joy? Joy! His finger zigzagged rapidly across the mouse pad, but his mouse was gone- there was only the screen.
Welcome, Heero Yuy, to Hell.
It read mockingly. He clenched his teeth, fingers itching.
If this is the first time you have received this message:
Press F2 for Help. Press Enter to try your request again.
He did not hesitate- the return key depressed.
The blue screen blanked, and new text appeared.
Hot Enough For Ya?
If this is the first time you have received this message:
Press F2 for Help. Press Enter to try your request again.
Heero considered asking for Help, but noticed the If Statement, and read on instead.
If you have received this message before:
There is no hope.
Death awaits ye with nasty, big, pointy teeth.
His eyes narrowed. Joy, what ARE you trying to do to me? Heero wondered. He pressed F2.
HELP—
If you are receiving this message, it is already too late for you. Your own private apocalypse is approaching. To commit suicide with a gun, place barrel in mouth and aim up toward the brain stem or cage. To commit suicide with a blade-
Heero was scowling, furious. Was this someone's idea of a joke? Quickly he returned to the first screen, and saw one last line in small print at the bottom.
There Are Worse Things Than DeathIf this is the first time you have received this message:
Press F2 for Help. Press Enter to try your request again.
If you have received this message before:
There is no hope.
Death awaits ye with nasty, big, pointy teeth.
If All Else Fails, Press ESC and think Happy Thoughts.
A fool. That's what they took him for, these diabolical monsters. Clearly someone was hacking into his machine- clearly Joy had been violated. He was certain the other pilots would remain in ICU for days- an OZ hacker?
With no other options left to him, and steeling himself for the worst but suspecting a hacker's juvenile dirty joke, he hovered over the Escape key, and pressed down.
The horror that filled his gaze sent him reeling. Bile rose in his throat to choke him and he clapped a hand over his mouth to hold it back. Red light cast upon the wall at his back, throwing the entire room into a hellish miasma of demonic shapes. And the sounds… oh the sounds! They ate his ears and stung his brain- that forever ongoing howl of "HEEEEEEEEEEEEROOOOOOOOOO!"
He had to stop it- he had to stop the madness!! Groping wildly behind him, his hand fell against hard metal, and within seconds, his weapon was unsheathed.
ONE- TWO- THREE! A pause, and sparks flew. FOUR-! Five-! SIX!
At last the harsh beast lay dying, and sputtered no more. Ah, Joy, Heero thought sadly, shaking his head loosely as he crumpled to his knees. When will you ever learn? When will I…?
Then he realized that a spare couldn't be delivered until next Tuesday, …and he wept.
THE END
For those too young and mouse-bred to know, The "enter" key is also known as a "carriage return" or simply "return."
Where this came from…
I was chatting to the infamous Mudpie the other night, and I had managed to tackle LeatherHotPants!Heero. He smoldered at me, and in return for allowed me to glomp him, he said, "I request a fic in which I sit at my laptop and NO ONE bothers me. Just me. and my laptop."
This, of course, would not make for a very interesting fic, so I asked, "...can the laptop be bothersome?"
He thought for a moment. "Yes."
My eyes went all large and shiny, "It caaaaaaan?"
"Of COURSE," he replied, as though this were obvious.
It seemed too good to be true. "REALLY? Think about this carefully, Hee-chan."
Unperturbed, he replied, "As long as I can shoot it."
"…Deal," I said, and opened my word processor.
That said... let me know what you thought!