A/N: Warning for brief mention of animal abuse, everything else in canon-typical. X-posted to archiveofourown at amorekay.
( a boarding school near the coast: )
The thing is, Heero is terrible about blending in. He seems to think he has this undercover thing under control, and sure, maybe if you're going undercover as a teenage terrorist, but if you're just supposed to be a normal student at a normal school he sticks out like a sore thumb. Everything about him is not right: too controlled, too militarized, too lacking in understandable human reactions. And yet, for some portion of the student body, he seems to be the grand romance they're been waiting for all their lives. He attracts crushes like moths to some super mysterious flame; something he's clearly, for all his training, not actually been prepped for.
Duo thinks it's hilarious. He also thinks Heero could use some serious pointers about the value of a smile in slipping under the radar, but, whatever, the guy's managed to stay alive this long. Partly thanks to Duo, really, since he did break him out of the hospital. "So what do you have to do when you leave?"
"Transfer files, erase all evidence of ever having existed in the school system." Heero barely looks at him, focusing on data he's pulled up on the computer. The light from the screen illuminates his back to Duo, the rest of student lab completely abandoned – it's a little after two in the morning and all the good little boarding students are in bed.
"Right, and about all the rumors that fly around after you're gone?"
Heero glances over at him. "You're the one who stands out too much. That's not my problem."
"That's where you're wrong, buddy," Duo says, leaning forward. "I talk and joke and have fun—something you could seriously do with a little more of—and when I'm gone someone will go 'hey where's Duo, that's a shame' and then they'll never think of me again. But you've got half the school thinking up tragic reasons for your, I quote, 'oh-so-dreamy, cold-but-kind eyes,' and hey," he shrugs, "they might not be too far off, who knows what happened to you, but when you up and leave suddenly it'll be just another piece of the fiction and they'll be talking about you long after you're gone."
"Not my problem," Heero repeats.
"Says the guy who had a girl he tried to shoot follow him all the way here." Duo flips around the other chair and sits down backwards on it, shaking his head. He still doesn't understand that one. But hey, not-normal attracts not-normal, right?
"She's not an issue. I'm taking care of it."
"You know, she had me fish you out of the water. I was debating just leaving you there, seeing as you did just wreck my Gundam. But she demanded help and then jumped in after you, and I couldn't exactly let her drown trying to pull you to shore – it would've made the whole thing pointless, what with the just trying to save her life from the guy with the gun and all." He shakes his head again. "I still don't know how I ended up being the bad guy, there. But anyway, she was still there when I made my exit before the base's back-up could come to check things out. Maybe you should thank her."
He didn't miss the flicker of something that passed over Heero's face during the story. It wasn't the full story, either, he left out the part where he had checked Heero's pulse and breathing and wondered if shock was going to kill him, while she looked on, her dress torn from the makeshift bandages on Heero's bleeding arm and leg, face set and strangely determined. But even that expression had been only a pale shade compared to the look on her face when she'd shown up at this school. Duo wonders again just what the hell happened between the two of them.
He's pretty sure he's not going to get an answer from the guy in the front of him. Worth a shot, anyway, he thinks, opening his mouth to ask.
"I'm trying to concentrate," Heero says before he even gets a word out. "If you're going to keep making noise, you should leave. It's more suspicious with both of us out here, anyway."
Duo closes his mouth. He pauses, and then snorts. "I don't understand what anyone at this school is thinking, you're the least dreamy dude on earth."
( off-grid in the Middle East: )
Quatre in his kindness gives him his own suite in the villa. The irony is, he's probably wishing a good night's sleep for Duo, but he's making it hard as hell to follow through. On Howard's ship the crew slept in hammocks, all shuffled into the same room, always someone's breathing to follow along to and the unending rustle of men shifting in their sleep. Duo isn't used to this much space. In Deathscythe there's the humming of machinery, the close cocoon of the cockpit around him, a familiarity so ingrained it's settled deep. A lifetime of the press of walls against him, of sleeping in nooks and crannies, of a body or a buddy pressed near. Deathscythe is both, inhabiting buddy and body to the core.
So he sleeps like shit in Quatre's fancy bed in his fancy villa with his people who disappear like mice after dark. He even takes off his boots before he gets into the bed, feeling like it's something he should do with the sheets so clean, but it feels wrong to lose the solid weight of them against his feet. He gets up after ten minutes and puts them back on, says a half-hearted apology to the nice sheets, and tucks himself back into the corner of the bed with his hands behind his head.
The best thing about Earth is the sky. Space, all laid out in a way he never knew it could be: the moon like a beacon from above, illuminated now even through the wisp of a cloud — the stretch of stars beautiful and vast through the window. He can lose himself in it, can remember the feel of deep space, can smell the tinge of ozone that lingers in his hair and his suit after being out there. It's a comfort in the empty, quiet room. The quiet of space makes sense; this quiet makes him itch. What are they going to do now?
The colonies can be used against them. Heero sacrificed himself to stall the possibility. Quatre seems resigned to waiting and watching, but Duo can feel the impatience growing between them both. He wants to fight, can feel the pull of Deathscythe, covered and sleeping, simmering beneath his skin, the rage at OZ for taking the dirtiest trick in the book, rage at himself for failing to stop them before they could put anyone else in danger. Damn them. Damn them to hell. He itches for something to burn.
"Duo?" A gentle knock at the door. Quatre's uncanny, he thinks with a rueful laugh, hopping off the bed. Quatre looks at him when he opens the door, composed and neat as usual, sans his now-perpetual cup of tea. "Quatre. What can I do you for?" Duo asks, stepping back to make room for him.
"Sorry for bothering you so late —I thought you might still be awake." He hovers in the doorway. "I wanted to talk about what to do next."
Seriously uncanny. He wonders if Quatre's any good at poker. There's another second of hesitation, then Quatre continues.
"Duo, do you think we're doing the right thing? Your friend—" Duo wants to laugh again, like that guy ever thought of him as a friend, "—destroyed his Gundam because he believed it was the right thing to do. I want to fight, I still believe we can fight, but…" Quatre's fists curl at his sides. "the Maganac's village was destroyed because of me. So many people sacrificing for us, and are we really helping? Or are we just making it worse?"
Duo sighs, and sits back down on the bed, staring at the moon behind them. "I came here to fight for the colonies. I'll keep doing it until they get rid of me or there's no more need. I can't give up yet."
"The Maganac Corps taught me the value of living a life I—and those I care for—can be proud of. I can't let that go to waste, I can't let them down."
"So," Duo starts, and Quatre looks at him. Duo grimaces. "We keep waiting until we can plan our next move. Damn, I hate this part."
Quatre laughs at that, and Duo flashes back a grin to echo him. "Me too. But we'll get our chance, I know it. I have to believe in it." The last part is said more to himself than to Duo, and Duo watches him deflate again, his eyes shadowing. He's seen enough of Quatre to already know he takes on too much, and while he seems a little less eager to blow himself up at the drop of a hat, there's still something about him that makes Duo wonder.
Then again, he is a Gundam pilot, there's no need to wonder. Anyway, the most important thing now is figuring out what to do while they wait.
"Hey, Quatre," he says, leaning forward on his elbows. "You any good at card games?"
( deep in the Lunar Base: )
Wufei is a terrible cellmate. Heero's gone more often than not, taken out by Trowa and his entourage to play pilot like a good prisoner, and Duo is left in here with the next most boring guy in the world. Duo can't rile him up; he at least wants someone to have a good argument with if not a good conversation, and he can see the reactions boiling beneath the surface, but Wufei seems to be carefully concentrating on not losing his composure. It sucks. Everything about this sucks. He's bored as hell and sore on top of it.
"Hey Wufei?"
Wufei opens his eyes and then, after a moment, shuts them again. A clear dismissal. Rude, Duo thinks. But it's a reaction.
No reaction is worse; it's like you're already dead.
There was this place, the hollowed carcass of a building on a mostly burnt out block, where Duo would hide out sometimes if the local folk were getting too antsy about them being underfoot. There was this dog chained up across the way —probably contraband, something weird about the way it looked, and it'd never respond to Duo's cajoling. Nothing could get it to react. He'd flick his fingers and whistle and send rubble scattering down the path and it'd never even look up, just lay there like it'd already given up and was just waiting for its body to get the memo. He was so angry about it. He wanted to set it free, but taking a rock to the chains didn't do anything.
He only hid there once after Solo died, and the dog was gone. Probably the owner panicked after the latest sweep of the military, decided it was too risky to keep something so obviously illegal hanging around. It was probably dead.
Duo rubs hard at his face with his arm, irritated by the restriction of the cuffs, the pull on his bruised ribs. "Shit," he mutters, "you'd think they'd at least spring some decent digs for their best customers, if they think making us dance will help them single handedly win the war—"
A snort from Wufei. Duo props himself up on his elbow, stares at him.
"What," Wufei says, total deadpan.
"I didn't know you had a sense of humor."
"I just haven't found much use for it in a situation like this," Wufei replies, voice prickling with irritation. Duo's instincts jump at the shift, a clear opportunity presenting itself to get under Wufei's skin and play on his annoyance, maybe finally, finally get more of a reaction than a single snort and some bland words.
But Wufei shuts back down just as quickly, his face going hard and blank as he shutters his gaze and breathes in. Duo's been watching him the past couple of days, tracking his eyes darting behind closed lids and the minuscule changes in the expression on his face, and whatever was going on behind the scenes in Wufei's head seemed a lot less pretty than what he was privy to out here. Honestly, where did they find these pilots? They were all messed up. He laughs at the thought, his own inside joke. Where did they get these pilots? A stowaway on a sweeper ship from L2.
Wufei raises an eyebrow in question, fixing him with a stare. Duo lifts his hands to wave it off, then frowns down at his restraints when they make it look less like a wave and more like a flop. "That one's less funny," he says, cheerfully. "But seriously, Wufei, how did you end up here? You seem a little more sane than the great indestructible boy there."
Wufei frowns. "The same reason as you, I assume. To fight for the colonies."
"Well, you never know," Duo says, and flashes Wufei his widest grin, all teeth. "I could just be in it for the thrill of the fight, with no regard for who I cut down. The colonies and this whole war could be just a lucky excuse."
"I don't believe it."
Huh. That's pretty interesting. He wasn't sure Wufei had made much of an opinion about him at all. "Why?"
"A Gundam pilot believes in his duty above all else. Otherwise, you wouldn't be here."
"Yeah I guess it doesn't make much sense with the colonies having washed their hands of us. Only someone this insane would keep fighting for people who don't even want them anymore, free of charge." The mood in the room sours. The throbbing in Duo's ribs grows in persistence until he gives up and lays back down, staring up at the blank, dark ceiling of their cell.
"Augh," he groans. "What a mood killer. I hope you know now that you've shown me there's still life in you, Chang, I'm expecting you to entertain me."
"Don't count on it," Wufei replies, a hint of irony in his tone. Blink and you'd miss it.
Duo laughs.
( aboard the Peacemillion: )
The Trowa he remembers is all focused energy, sharp lines, a perfect persona in an OZ uniform with slender fingers never far from a gun. This Trowa is uncomfortably soft: everything about him blunted, from his voice to his walk, all of it edged with confusion. Duo doesn't really know what to do with it. He doesn't exactly avoid Trowa, he just doesn't go out of his way to seek him out, either.
He should have known that, amnesia or not, Trowa would still be observant as hell.
"Was there a problem between us?" Trowa's frowning, standing a couple feet away from him, in a corridor off the main level of Peacemillion. Duo's just finished with repairs and was ready to sack out for a couple hours until they got the next update on troop movements. He wasn't really planning on a first degree from a guy he'd figured too jumbled to corner him like this.
Duo scratches the back of his neck. "Uh," he hedges. "That's kind of a difficult question, man."
"Quatre says we worked together before, on missions." Quatre's idea of how much they all worked together seems pretty generous, considering Duo could count the number of times he worked with Trowa on one hand. Not to mention the amount of impressively convincing threats and imprisonment involved. Or that fight they never got to finish when they first met up at New Edwards. Or that time Trowa blasted Deathscythe to smithereens on colony-wide television.
Huh, okay, maybe he has a little resentment. No big deal.
"Well you destroyed my Gundam, once." Duo says, laughing a little uncomfortably. "I guess I can't really hold it against you, I mean, you don't even remember doing it, and you had a good reason, but man, it still stings."
"Oh. Sorry." Trowa's frown deepens. Duo's not sure if he feels bad about Deathscythe, or if he's still trying to remember and frustrated that he can't. "I don't think I wanted—"
His eyes widen and start to tremble, and Duo realizes what's happening a second before Trowa drops to the ground. "Hey Trowa—" he starts, but Trowa's already far gone, locked in some battle somewhere back near a ruined colony. Quatre had told him a little more about it, haltingly, what the Zero system had done to him and how he'd left Trowa and his suit wrecked in space in the midst of it.
Duo's seen plenty of this. Space sickness was par for course in some of the less reputable junkers, the ones willing to take on a kid as their smuggler, the kind he worked with before Professor G offered him a deal — you leave a man out there too long with nothing but his brain and the total silence of space and you come back with a raving madman, usually. Sometimes they were mostly fine once they got some time back in dry dock, sometimes they kept the space and lost everything else. Duo knew a group that used it as punishment.
But Trowa's a tough bastard, it seems. He's kept more of himself than he could've, even without the memories.
Duo hesitates, and then sits down next to him, leaning his head back against the wall of the corridor. Trowa's sucking in deep, gasping breaths, but he doesn't flinch away when Duo presses a shoulder against his. Duo remembers this, too. The presence of someone near you, the noise to break the silence, how it helped.
"Did you know frilled sharks have like 300 teeth? They're like, living fossils, and man, do they look it. Super creepy. Well, you maybe saw them yourself, though I don't know how much time you spent taking Heavyarms deep sea diving. But seriously, what the hell, right? Hilde thought I was making shit up when I described one to her —she knows I wouldn't tell a lie!"
As soon as he gets going on the subject, it's easy to continue, because seriously Earth is full of some massively weird shit. He's used to the debris of space, and maybe he'd expected oceans to be the same —but the oceans are full of bizarre things he hadn't even known existed. He starts to tell Trowa as much.
He thinks it's kind of awesome and amazing, the way things grow and live there in ways they'd never be able to in the controlled environments of the colonies. Not that his colony's enviro controls were so well-controlled, but.
"Duo," Trowa finally interrupts, quietly.
Duo pauses his own half-enthusiastic, half-mindless chatter about the size a goldfish —a goldfish!— could grow to in an actual natural ecosystem. "You good?"
Trowa's hair is tilted low over his face, the bridge of his nose only just visible from Duo's side as he dips his head."I'm not much use, like this."
"You're probably right." Duo shrugs. "We could use another Gundam pilot, but you're—" he flashes a wry smile, "—missing the Gundam part right now. Though, I don't know what Quatre's philosophy is, but I do my best work alone anyway."
"I don't know how but," Trowa's hands twitch against his knees, "it was easy to pilot the Taurus. It's a faint memory, but I feel like I've been doing this all my life. Cathy says I worked at the circus with her, but…"
For all Duo knows, he could have been born in a cockpit. He wouldn't be surprised. No way someone cartwheels straight out of a circus circuit with the skills, undercover and tactical, that he knows Trowa has. It brings him back to that ever-present question: Where did they find these pilots? Not anywhere normal, that's for sure.
Trowa tilts his face lower, his shoulder still close enough that Duo can feel his shaky exhale as well as hear it. Probably not the best road to continue down right now. He bumps his shoulder against Trowa's.
"I don't know if it's the amnesia talking, but you're lot harder to hold a grudge against than I expected, Trowa."
"I think that's a compliment," Trowa says, dryly.
"Ha, see, that's more like the Trowa I remember."
( an inner room at ESUN's headquarters: )
As one of the many in limbo after the call for the world to put down all weapons and turn to peace, Duo's been passed through a series of interviews and some not-so-subtle surveillance since landing Deathscythe after the final conflict. No one's quite sure what to do with them. The Gundam pilots, once a symbol of freedom, have almost instantly turned into a symbol of the very way of life this new world sought to avoid.
It seems no one's quite sure what to do with a girl no longer Queen of the World, either. Relena's standing in the doorway to the waiting room, probably on her way up to her own 'discussion of options' with the same politicians she ruled over just weeks before. Duo snorts, and her gaze lands on him.
He pats the spot beside him, says cheerfully, "Come on, let's reminisce about old times."
A slight smile from her. "Duo, you barely know me, I hardly think—"
"Aw come on, even ignoring the whole 'saved your life and then you forced me to jump into the ocean after you' thing —which, I'm gonna need a better explanation than the nothing Heero gave me on that whole situation sometime— I'm pretty sure we both ended up in detention once," he winks at her, amused by the memory. "Not sure why you were there, but I had been pretty busy with other things. And if disobeying authority doesn't bond people, I don't know what would."
He's rewarded with a laugh. Relena takes the seat beside him, hands slowly relaxing at her sides, her back still ramrod straight and poised as if she's about to break into another world-changing speech right there. Honestly, he thought Heero was uptight, but maybe this girl could give him a run for his money. The thought makes him tired.
"What do you plan to do?" Relena asks, tone polite. He's not sure if she's actually interested or just following proper protocol for small talk. Duo scratches the back of his head.
"After they decide what to do with me? Well, I don't know. I guess it depends on the verdict. Guess I've got my whole life in front of me now." And isn't that a scary thought, he doesn't add. Relena frowns down at her hands. The silence stretches between them for a moment.
"I was trying to follow Heero," Relena finally says.
"What?" Duo asks in surprise, and then —"Oh. Wait. So you snuck out in the middle of the night or something to follow Heero and that's how you ended up in detention? How did you explain that?"
"He was… I didn't want to lose him again. I didn't know what he was up to, and I was determined to find out. But the night staff caught me on my way down the stairs."
Duo shakes his head. "And this is after he tried to kill you. You really did have a death wish."
"My father died," she says, softly. "OZ killed him. I was ready to die then, but Heero… Heero was so strong and so courageous and he fought for what he believed in, I could see it even then, even before I knew… He gave me strength."
"Yeah," Duo says. "He's good at that."
Relena laughs at herself, rueful. "It seems silly now, a naive girl's foolishness, chasing after the idea of a boy she'd made up in her head. But I know Heero now, and he truly is a kind person. I only wish I can do as much for the Earth as he's done for us."
She pauses, looking away from Duo, and when she speaks again her voice shakes the slightest bit.
"I don't know what to do, now. I'm not Romefeller's Queen anymore, I never… I have a duty to uphold to the memory of the Sanc Kingdom and to the people of Earth and the colonies. We must keep peace now that we have finally attained it, I will not let anyone's sacrifices be in vain. I simply…."
Duo's not sure what she wants him to say. He's not sure why she's telling him this, of all people. Maybe it's just because he's the one who happens to be around, in this rare moment she's away from the press and before she has to go into a room full of people who all want a piece of her power. It's not like there's any reason for pretenses between the two of them.
He's not sure Relena's peace is anything actually attainable. Sure, the people are listening now, with the threat of mass destruction and the words of one charismatic girl fresh and passionate on their vid screens, but he's seen the same thing happen again and again. He's lived the same thing. The people try for peace, the people get antsy, the people break into groups and fight —and the innocent and pacifists suffer for it. Churches burn. Orphans are made. Children are raised into killers, ready to fight and die for the cycle that never ends. So really, what was he fighting for, if true peace is never actually possible?
And there's the kicker. He wants to believe her. He thinks he understands the way Heero's been lingering after her like she's a new ideal to follow. Duo had thought maybe it was just a crush, at first, the way Heero's been hanging around watching her since they've been all been grounded in political limbo, but honestly he's not sure Heero gets crushes, and from the vague things he said about Relena and peace and the future, it seems… Maybe he's just as lost as Duo is feeling in all this.
He frowns.
"Most of my life has been about survival. It doesn't matter what you do, just survive it. Piss people off if it reminds them that you're alive. When Professor G took me on and I learned about Deathscythe, I saw this chance to get back at the Alliance for everything they'd done to us. Plus, I had this knack for cutting short the lives of people around me, might as well put it to good use. Then no one had to suffer but me and my enemies.
I don't know if I believe in your peace. 'Total pacifism.' I saw someone just like you get killed over the ideal. They had no chance…" His hands tighten into fists. "Relena, OZ and the White Fang aren't going to slink quietly back into the miserable holes they came from, just because they said they've surrendered. People don't stay put like that."
"We'll meet them with policy." Her politician's pose is back, her posture straightened and determined again. "No one can truly want war. We'll find their grievances and we'll work together to fix them, so no resentment can ever grow into senseless violence."
Duo shakes his head. "I'd have to see it to believe it."
Her face hardens in conviction. "I know what I want to do, now. I want to work between the United Earth Nations and the colonies, for the goal of everlasting peace. I want to hear about their struggles, and their anger, and their hopes, and I want to make a future where everyone's voice can be heard and respected, equally. The military has held control through fear and violence for too long."
So Duo was right about the 'ready to break into speech at any moment' vibe. He scratches the side of his nose. "I respect that, I really do, but."
She smiles at him. "Watch me, Duo Maxwell."
The doors to the room slide open, and an aide stands there with a tablet in her hand. Time to face the music, Duo thinks, but her attention shifts to Relena instead. "Miss Peacecraft? Sorry for making you wait."
"Darlian."
"Sorry?"
Relena stands and smooths her skirt. "I'm Relena Darlian."
"Oh. Well. Miss Darlian, if you could follow me this way, please."
Her face is already schooled back into perfect composure as she steps forward, but she pauses in the doorway and looks back at Duo. He gives her a little salute, grinning. She smiles back at him, a quick, private sort of a thing, and then her heels are echoing softly down the hall. Duo leans back, tucking his arms under his head and staring up at the bland ceiling.
So that's the face of peace. He thinks back to Relena's words. It'll be interesting to see what she can accomplish.
He closes his eyes. Maybe he really can give this whole peace thing a try. After all, he apparently has his whole future to look forward to now. And if there's any indication that the world is changing, it's that.
Worth a shot, anyway.