Chapter 25 Reflections

As sure as Duo Maxwell always tells the truth, he was awed by Heero's fighting ability…it also terrified him; the violet-eyed youth was afraid for his fellow slave…and also of him. The last time he had seen that dark fire simmering in Heero's cobalt blues the other boy had nearly strangled him with his own braid. Duo had seen death and knew the deadly specter trailing the gladiator like a tattered cloak. The only reason the champion of Verona was still in the land of the living was the fact that Heero happened to looked up before snapping the man's neck. Zechs had been directly in the path of that wild-eyed glare and seeing his lanista's impassive face and the purposeful gesture of closing his thumb in his fist compelled the battle hungry Sissori to spare his defeated opponent.

But the shadow remained. Treize didn't seem to notice it as Heero had stepped forward to empty his share of coins on the corner of the bed. But it was there none-the-less. Reflected in the tightness of his back and the set of his shoulders, his general posture practically screamed "Hands-off!" Duo knew it wasn't just the fight that brought on the change. In hindsight it was clear Heero had been pulling away from them since Trowa's…accident. It took little effort to for him to plunge head first into the realm of what he knew seeking safety.

That was something else Duo understood intimately. After leaving the mountains behind and descending into the bustling civilization at Arminium he had tried to run off. Duo swore had not intended to abandon Treize and the others, that hadn't been a lie. But had been willing to put himself in a position where local horde could try to convince him to stay. And they would have done their level best to do just that, just as Solo would have. A sweeper, someone with knowledge of other places and ways of doing things, was a benefit to the gang. They were held in a place of honor and respect. Treize treated them with respect, Duo's rebellious mind interjected. And he couldn't deny it. Self-delusion was after all just another lie and, pricked his continence just as sharply. Granted respect from one of the elite felt strange, almost alien. It made Duo uncomfortable. Seeming to compel him to be better than he was, in order to keep, or perhaps justify, that regard. And that idea frightened him. He had wanted to be back among his own kind and, at that time, in that place…the urge had been overwhelming. So he had taken the opportunity to slip of his horse and vanish into the busy crowd.

Duo had half-suspected the others wouldn't notice he was missing. They were all so preoccupied with Trowa. And why not, he was clearly as shattered as the mask Heero carried so gingerly from the ruins. But Zechs had been on him within minutes. And the wolves…it was hard to reconcile those golden eyed terrors with the slathering creatures he slipped morsels of food to when he thought no one was looking. They growled and showed their fangs…but when they took him down it was their weight that pinned him. He had been well aware his actions brought him to bear on the knife's edge. One command from Zechs and the pair would be squirming and licking his face in playful jubilance…a different command and they would rip his throat out.

Heero was like that too…though Heero's version of 'playful exuberance' was easily confused with 'grudging contentment'… but the 'deadly'…that was apt enough. Having Trowa more or less back to his right mind seemed to make the 'beast' he had seen loosed in battle soften a bit. It wasn't gone not by a long shot… he suspected Treize was the only one who didn't see it there lurking in Heero's eyes…perhaps because he chose not too. Duo wondered if ignoring what was, in favor of what might be, was one of the many prerogatives of the rich and influential. Surely the oversight would prove fatal to a lesser man.

Duo knew he, himself was not the most well balanced of individuals…he wouldn't have been abandoned on the streets by whomever chanced to give him life if not for some defect…and no one survived that life entirely unscathed. But he never suspected himself to be crazy enough to actually feel better after a sound whipping. It was something he had thought about long after the sting of the lash had faded. WuFei termed it 'sulking' and told him to stop. But as they mounted up and left Verona behind Duo finally realized what he had been doing…Testing Treize. Testing his limits, Making sure the man SAW him as he was -- a dirty…rebellious…street boy. Was he really trying to force his master to 'act' like a master? Was that what Heero was trying to do with Zechs when he took up the champion's challenge?

-Whack- WuFei's hand contacted with the back of Duo's head. "Stop sulking!" the eastern youth reiterated, since the braided boy obviously hadn't heard him the first time he had said it "Trowa is feeling better. His muscles are sore from being manhandled like an overstuffed sack of rice…but he is himself again."

"Am I?" The green eyed slave wondered leaning back against Quatre, whose mount he shared.

"You've got your own feet under you again T-baby, that's a good sign." Duo flashed him a smile. "ZZ and T wouldn't have let you ride with kitty a day ago because, even though he and Sandy have an understanding, he's new to the saddle and that would have been 'iffy with you too out of it to handle the reigns."

"I still feel strange." Trowa admitted, "As if my mind isn't quite focused and I've got double vision." Seeing the look of sudden concern darken WuFei's gaze the young man clarified. "I see fine." Momentarily focusing his attention on his surroundings; green eyes drinking in the orderly geometry of fields and crops, interspersed with small groups of dwellings, and a network of roads leading in all directions around the town, the whole scene framed silver ribbons of river and the pink limestone lines of the walls sheltering the town where they had spent the night.

"That is 'Verona I recognized the name when Treize told me but before waking this morning could not have said I had ever been there. Someone…a mercenary captain I think he was, taught me that eighty or ninety years ago the senate sent six-thousand former soldiers to this place in order to 'transform the natural environment' into a place of 'civilization.' But another part of my mind rejects this knowledge and the one who gave it me. It insists civilization existed before the meddling of the Rumax (Romans). That part insists the rocks and trees, the earth beneath our feet declares this place will always be 'Verucchio, 'the city where the river splits.' There is the feeling that I should recognize those grassy bulges on the hillside there as Suthithi, burial mounds containing the spirits of the Rumate. I know this is where the elders of my village, had they lived, would have brought my parents to rest among the ancient kings of my people. Then again…I am a slave. I have no people...no name. I am Triton, I am Trua, I am Truna I am Nanani, I am none of these." Trowa shook his head and shrugged listlessly, the brunet curtain sliding over eyes of jade. "It is very confusing," He admitted.

Heero, who had been following at the rear of the column, dug in his heels to close distance with the others. His mount passing between Quatre's and Duo's. He slowed to match their pace only briefly locking his intense cobalt on the former Retarii. "You told me would always answer to Trowa." His voice was toneless but it had a hard edge. "That is the name you chose…all the others were given to you but that one you took."

"I did." Trowa nodded wonderingly. "I took it, so I suppose it IS mine."

Heero nodded curtly and spurred his horse forward to fall into position behind Zechs silver-gray charger.

"You have people too." Quatre said quietly. Trowa held Sandrock's reigns and the smaller boy laced his arms around the other slave's waist to keep steady in the saddle. "We are your people…your family; if you will have us."

The declaration was a little too intense for Duo and he felt the urge to say something, anything, so Trowa wouldn't feel obligated to respond. But what he came up with was, "So, Fei, have you ever had a family?" His midnight stallion sidled up to the scholar's red roan. Obsidian eyes flashed with fire and for an instant Duo suspected he would get some acerbic comment like "What, do you think I hatched, or grew from a tree perhaps?" but no.

The dark-eyed slave's expression softened and his voice took on a wistful tone, almost reverent. "I loved my mother." WuFei admitted with uncharacteristic tenderness.

"Your Father?" Quatre asked.

"I saw him twice. Once when I was about four, a column of soldiers was passing through the Long village. He was at their head carrying the imperial standard. Mother pointed him out to me. The second time was when I was in the capital with Master Ron he was standing at the emperor's elbow, whispering in his ear. He must have been a very important man, one of the greatest generals. My Mother was a strong woman. All others pale by comparison. She would only have conceded to be with a man beloved of Nataku. But I don't think he ever knew about me. Or if he did, he didn't care."

"Treize cares--" Duo bit his lip uncertainly. "--or seems to at least."

"He does. Zechs too, though I think it confuses him." Quatre confirmed a bit dreamily. "I can feel it

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Weeks ago, Quatre would never have dared tell anyone about his uncanny perceptions. But Zechs assured him that empathy wasn't a curse to be hidden away or ignored. It was something inborn, a gift to be nurtured and used to help those you care about. The realization had taken time to get used to but the others had seemed supportive. Duo even admitted he had similar abilities of his own. But being Quatre's 'gift' didn't extend to mind-reading and the blonde wondered whether the others thought he might be less than sane when he just came out and said things like that.

Granted he was a bit more out of touch, emotionally speaking, than usual. He had been blocking himself off from his companions for the better part of a week. Since Lady Dorothy's unexpected appearance in the villa they had been taking turns running riot with his soul-sense. Emotion from one or another battered almost constantly against the walls he had built to protect himself and he had been sure it was only a matter of time before his perpetually sunny disposition crumbled and left him a sobbing wreck. It had nearly happened when Duo had run off. But with Trowa down…Duo missing and the rest tied up in their own emotional turmoil…they could not afford to have him fall apart too. And so the young blonde has grit his teeth, smiled and continued on with a tenacity that might have even impressed Yuy.

But the emotional assault on his shields was lessening. Trowa was regaining his psychological balance. Duo was resolving what ever issues he has had since before he had run away. WuFei's amorphous sense of guilt had mellowed and Zechs and Treize seemed to have left what ever troubled them at the Villa. With Trowa feeling better and the quest well underway he had risked lowering his shields a bit more than he ought after getting a read on the masters…and was nearly hit in the teeth by Heero's…he didn't even have a word for the sensation, or rather lack there of. It was as if he were eclipsed in shadow…or void. If he was any judge, Quatre suspected this, what ever it was, was a fairly new development. In fact, he was sure he had felt something from the other boy hammering against his shield when he had spoken to Trowa before riding past; but now there was nothing, it was like Heero had no emotions at all. Quatre shivered and tightened his hold on Trowa's svelte waist.

"Are you all right?" The other slave asked, leaning into Quatre's chest, seeking refuge against the mid morning chill.

"I'm worried for Heero." The blonde sighed. "He fought the local champion and won but he has been…different…since. More like the way he was when we were in the slave markets together. I'm having trouble sensing him.

"Hmm." Trowa rumbled pursing his lips into a thin line.

Chapter 25 notes

Closing his thumb in his fist. Hollywood mythos tells us that in the arena the audience would dictate the fate of the defeated by using the 'thumbs up' or 'thumbs down' gesture. Historians concur that 'thumbs down' meant death it was the representation of plunging the sword into the body, likewise the thumb up drawn across the neck meant 'slit his throat' but there is no account for the thumbs-up everything is o.k. signal popularize by one Arthur Fonzerelli on happy-days. In-stead the gladiator's sword was symbolically sheathed by hiding it in the palm. Shaking a closed fist means nothing good to modern audiences to alterations have been made. I figure that in a crowd as large as those in the arena any signals were largely lost especially with the blood pumping in their ears and the adrenalin running high in their veins. So like the umpire in a base-ball game the fighter looks to his trainer, or the master of ceremonies, (ie the emperor) to decide his opponents fate. Luckily Zechs knew what he needed to do.

Duo's attempted defection took place in Arminium (Modern Rimini) it was in the days of the Romans it was a major military and trading harbor. Situated at the junction of several important roads making it a strategic junction for communications between the north and the centre of the country, as well as the point of departure for long routes towards central and eastern Europe. One route through the Marecchia valley (via Arretina) that existed since pre-historic times. If Treize were following an equally ancient but less traveled route through the mountains it might have converged with this road. In addition "pedemontana" track emerged from Arminium and proceeded northwards, along the coastal routes.

The ancient routes, with the exception of the Via Arretina, were honored with the title of consular roads, the motorways of the time, prime players in the process of conquering territory and favoring the economic interests of the Roman state would have been equipped with way stations and accommodations at regular intervals. The Via Flaminia, (the road Treize should have) taken begins, at the Milvian bridge in Rome and ends at Porta Romana, the southern gateway to Ariminum. the Via Aemilia (187 B.C.) begins at the opposite extremity of the city, crossing the river Ariminus, traverses the Po Valley Plain in a north-westerly direction and touches all the towns at the confluence of the Appenine valleys as far as Milan; the Via Popillia (132 B.C.), the natural continuation northwards of the Via Flaminia coincides for a little way with the Via Aemilia but then follows the coast as far as Aquileia. Treize was very careful not to miss the turn off this time. So he made it to Veronia.

If you recall Verona was the setting for Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. It had a long history of conflict. It was originally Etruscan but became a Roman colony in the year 89 BC, it was elevated to a 'municipium' in 49 BC. The former ford was replaced by two bridges, one of which, the Pothumius Bridge, acted also as aqueduct and as dam where naval battles were staged in the Theater on the shore. The city also had a forum, not far from the current Piazza delle Erbe. This was the location where Heero had his confrontation with the local champion. Outside the city walls was a famous Arena the remains of which are still fairly intact today. but this impressive structure was not complete until 30 AD so it would likely still have been under construction during our boys visi. Like the town of Arminium, Verona's strategic importance lay in its position at the junction of four main roads: the Via Gallica, from Turin to Aquileia, Via Postumia, from Liguria to Illyria, the Vicum Veronensis, which connected the city to Ostiglia and last, the Via Claudia Augusta, which our fellows will be using to travel northward into the wilds of Germania.