Bloody Valentine

Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing AC. I tried to come up with something witty to put here but nothing comes to mind. So you'll just have to suffer through the wasted words of this completely unneeded disclaimer, not like any of you actually read this. If you did take the time to though, I think it'd be funny if you put '(9)' at the end of your comments, if you deign to leave one. Anyways, I think this pointless disclaimer has gone on long enough, you most likely just want the story to come and be done with it. Can't blame you, I usually skip through this part anyway+echoing voice+ "Remember...Remember the tooth- I mean (9)" oh and, I don't own 'My Bloody Valentine' the song in which this was based on.

Ehem...yes, well, Today We Have: Bloody Valentine"

---- Bloody Valentine is dedicated to the song that I listened to while I wrote this piece of…work…: Blood Valentine by Good Charlotte (BEST EFFING BAND EVER)----

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Story One- Bloody Valentine (note: this is placed at some time after the main series-es, Duo is around 25, in a brief month of peace and what not...anything else is a spoiler.)

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Duo walked through the deserted hall ways. Occasionally scuffing his expensive leather shoes against the cheap linoleum flooring. He shuddered every time one of the florescent lights flickered. Too many memories. Haunting smiles. Beautiful words. Dead eyes.

Duo tried to gain control of his emotions, he lost the battle. The only enemy Shinigami couldn't defeat. The oppressive sensations centering around one day, one man, one love. Duo had heard that it was better to have "loved and lost, than not loved at all," he knew for a fact that was a load of shit. The people that had made that sentence hadn't been in deep love with the ones they had lost. They hadn't mourned for almost 6 years. They hadn't felt the need to get rid of the grief, but were unable too, out of guilt, out of horror, and out of the general feeling of helplessness.

Wind whipped through the open doors at the end of the hallway, Duo's black trench coat was lashed about his body, mirroring his inner turmoil. Black, wild, untamed, angry. His braid also began to whip about; the bracelet-fastener he used was making a soft tinkling sound that transported Duo to so many different places. Haunting smiles. Beautiful words. Dead eyes.

No matter what he did on this day, Duo's mind always transferred somehow to his one and only love, the light in his bleak life that had left him in darkness. A suffocating, numbing, submergence. Duo couldn't feel when he let the black consume him; he didn't have to worry about caring, smiling for his friends. Even if they could see right through the flimsy grins.

He stood in the doorway for a long time, relishing the feeling of freedom the wind had, wishing with every scrap of will he had left that he could have been born the wind. Wild, untamed, passionate, resonating. There was a sudden break in the clouds and sun poured through it and the surrounding leafless trees with a vengeance. Making up for lost time. Duo felt the warm rays contradicting the biting wind of the mid-morning air. The two extreme temperatures brought his mind to happier times, when he and his love had been caught in the unpredictable weather.

This inevitably led to the memory of their first meeting. Their first kiss. Their first passionate night. Their anniversaries. "Every second counts…" If only he could have known that it would all end so soon. They had pledged eternal love to each other nightly, every second possible. Eternity wasn't supposed to last only 2 years. They had only just begun to explore each other. Haunting smiles. Beautiful words. Dead eyes.

Duo began to walk along the gravel path. He was able to zone out of the physical world, allow his mind free reign. Not that he really wanted to have nothing to focus on. It was just this path, his body had its contours, steps, mucky parts, all memorized. Just like all the sensitive spots, pleasure nodes for his one and only love, even after all this time.

How he wanted to forget. Forget and move on. "First love is hardest won, hardest lost, and hardest forgotten." For once, Duo found himself agreeing with a quote. It had taken him 3 years to really admit it too himself. He had almost committed suicide 10 times after the initial news; he didn't bother now, because he knew he was going to die now soon anyways, eaten away by grief. 'Hardest forgotten,' if 6 long years wasn't long enough to qualify for that then his name wasn't Duo Maxwell.

And it very well isn't his born name. For all he knew his real name could be Bob Builder. This thought made him smirk, his little 'niece' was addicted to that show and couldn't get enough of the episodes. He smiled a little at 5 year-old Andrea Barton. The last thing that kept Duo alive, Andrea and Trowa. She was like a cat, "Curiosity killed the cat," she also had a dangerous obsession with the Gundams.

Duo felt his feet slow as he neared his destination, as always he took time to read the never changing grave stones to his left. Loving this, loving that, dead here, lived there. The oldest one was for Robert Lamareed, who had died sometime around Duo's assumed birthday. Haunting smiles. Beautiful words. Dead eyes.

It was three more 'stones until he reached his destination. A small obelisk of black and white granite. The words, "Excellent pilot, devoted friend and love. 'Every Rose has its thorns, just like every night has its dawn.'"

There was a song quote on the eulogy, from the song they sang each other when they were feeling cold, alone, inhuman. Duo's blood still boiled at the atrocious acts committed in the name of keeping peace. In the name of corrupt greedy politically powerful war-mongers. Intent on ruining as many people as necessary for their fucking schemes and standings.

Duo reached into his coat pocket for a single rose, he dropped this on the grave of his one and only love. The grave held so much in so little space, "My Well of Mnemosyne(1)." Duo's entire life and meaning were engraved with gold lettering on a smooth granite surface, in the middle of an old-fashioned graveyard. Haunting smiles. Beautiful words. Dead eyes.

Relaxed and forgetful for the first time in countless years. Duo laconically checked his watch, the steady 'thwump' of a helicopter just barely audible.

Right on time.

Being the political monster that he was, the man Gravess probably wouldn't be late unless his head was cut off, even then he might move for a little. Like a chicken. And Gravess certainly was a chicken.

He waited for the helicopter to come into view before sending a signal to tell the man's helicopter where to drop Gravess off. He was settled and staring into the distance, his back to the man who had come here to trade in 'information.' Duo turned around with a deadly smile. "Hello, Mr. Gravess. Do you recall how many people were lost on this day 5 years ago?"

The fool. "I don't suppose that you remember two…extraordinary pilots that sacrificed themselves for the sake of all the innocent's caught in-between you and your rival…?" Duo turned his eyes from Mr. Gravess, not wanting the other man to see the few tears left for those horrendous scenes. Haunting smiles. Beautiful words. Dead eyes.

"What does any of this have to do-"

"It has everything to do with it. Adonis Gravess." Duo felt a small smile of satisfaction curl his lips into a killer's smile. "The cat plays with its food before eating or throwing it out." The man seemed to blanch even further, but he still managed a defiant posture, demanding even if his eyes did wander suspiciously. As if a hidden attacker might just suddenly pop up.

"I give you my word that no other is here to harm you," Duo smiled a little when Gravess relaxed; evidently he knew Duo's personal code, "I run I hide, but I never lie." And he never had lied, he'd just gotten adept at twisting words around meanings of a different sort.

He fingered the little detonator in his left pocket, and then the good luck charm in the right. "Right, well I've already said you wouldn't be harmed. Very well, shall we continue on with our business, Maxwell?" Did everyone think he was a fool? Did they not think that he had his own living thinking brain? He knew that Gravess had already ordered someone to train a red dot on his head. Haunting smiles. Beautiful words. Dead eyes.

"Business, Mr. Gravess, had already been taken care of," Duo managed the most voracious smile he could muster, tears just behind his vicious mask. He had the satisfaction of seeing Gravess take a step back, eyes wary. "But-" Duo took a step closer to Gravess, making sure that the sniper with Duo in his sights only got his back and couldn't see Gravess' pathetic fear.

"It was my friend's, Gravess, Quatre and Heero, that died that day so long ago. Gravess you have lived 5 years past when you should have. I'm here to meet out justice… Happy Valentines." Duo clicked the button a split second after he grabbed Gravess, leaving no chance for escape from the bomb under Duo's jacket.

They blew apart split seconds after the bullet took Duo straight through the heart. Haunting smiles. Beautiful words. Dead eyes. "Good bye, Heero, Happy Valentines, love."

1: Mnemosyne. Time.

Owari