Heero Yuy, L6, and the Second Suit Wars | ELLE

Okay well I think this is the chapter everyone has been waiting for, so I won't say too much other than... enjoy! ;-P

To Remsky and SnowDragon - You two crack me up! I so do the same thing though. Back before I knew Miss-Murdered and I was reading Domino, I was totally gutted when Heero came back into the story and I was like, how would anyone guess this?! Then I re-read the description and I was like, oh, guess that's pretty obvious... -_-! So I totally do the exact same thing! And yeah, despite being a mech anime, not too much mech in fan fiction - go figure. ;-P Hopefully I won't disappoint although my initial idea for this fic isn't working out quite as I had planned when I had named it...

Zuzanny - You will see, that's all I can say...! =P

dkAdeena - I was thinking about you now that Quatre came back into the picture...! Certainly there is more to him than meets the eye, of course. ;-)

epifonia - OMG how cool! I love that my story has traveled through Spain with you! :D (I am quite a bit jealous, I wish *I* was traveling through Spain instead hehe!) Glad you are enjoying and making such an effort. Definitely flattered! =)

PART TWO | A Former Life Reprised

2.13 The Apology

Quatre had a member of his staff show us to two rooms situated next to each other and she explained that she would have clothing and food sent up for us to be set in the shared parlor room between the two. I was fairly certain Duo would want to have nothing to do with me so I was surprised when she left us and he followed me into my chosen room, slamming and locking the door behind him.

Immediately he grabbed an end table with what I hoped wasn't a priceless vase and threw it with an unbridled amount of force into the ground. His eyes glowed dangerously and I found my heart pounding in my chest, my desire for him reaching an unprecedented high. Something about today – working together again, seeing Gundams again, feeling his adrenaline fueled need under my fingers again – reignited my passion for him in a way I was helpless to combat, especially now that we were truly alone. And those eyes... I knew what was coming. I knew the abuse he wanted to rain down on me and I wanted it. I wanted his angry hands on me. I wanted him to slap and scratch and bite me.

Fuck but I wanted him so goddamned bad – !

"I can't believe you would think about getting in one of those things again!" He pointed angrily but he stood his ground, his arm shaking in his rage and I knew it was only a matter of time before he broke and got physical again.

"I have to," I replied simply, waiting for the onslaught.

"The hell you do!" He stepped forward, his boots crunching into the shattered porcelain beneath his feet. I knew he had to be stopping himself because he had to know what was coming, what would happen if he laid a hand on me. "You destroyed our lives the instant you stepped into Epyon, you know that, right? If you'd never piloted ZERO, we wouldn't be doing this right now."

"I had to pilot ZERO. And I've destroyed more than just our lives now." My voice started picking up as my internal frustration grew. "Lennon, Ralph, Blair, Miguel, all those people up, they are slaves – slaves I created. Don't you understand? I can't live with myself knowing I created that and did nothing to stop it."

"Always gotta be the goddamned hero, don't you?" His voice was quiet, dark, as he took another step forward and I waited for the snap.

"I'll atone for my sins."

And then the first punch came. It landed hard on my jaw and I quickly jerked my head back around to look at him, anticipating another hit.

"Your sins are too great," he warned me dangerously. "You will never be forgiven."

"Good," I snapped back, feeling the crushing weight of his words, knowing he wasn't talking about God or whatever astral force humanity prayed to. He was talking about himself. And everything I felt on L6 came rushing back to me with a poignancy that rocked me harder than Duo's fist and my hands tightened so hard they hurt. "You shouldn't forgive me. I don't want your charity. I never wanted your charity."

I watched as something changed in Duo's eyes and his anger turned to rage. His next punch landed on my ribs and was immediately followed by his left fist attempting the same maneuver but I grabbed, twisting his arm painfully and he became like a wild animal. He reached up with his right hand, digging his nails into my face.

"Don't be so fucking self-righteous you dick," he sneered, rending his left hand from my grasp in the sudden burst of pain I felt at his claws. "I knew my love would never be enough for you but I didn't realize you were such a goddamned narcissist." He slapped the area he'd just raked across my cheek and the pain was somewhat unbelievable to me. "I just wanted to care for you, be by your side, be your companion. I thought you loved me but you fucking abandoned me!"

In a quick motion I grabbed the base of his head by his hair and whipped him around, slamming him across into the wall. I stalked after him, restraining him against the wall by his throat with one hand. "I tried to protect you and you –"

"You don't have to fucking protect me! I'm not a goddamned princess!" he shouted his interruption, his hands clawing furiously at my wrist, knowing he was incapable of removing my iron grip. I found it difficult to focus on his words in my frustration and my fingers tightened slightly around his windpipe.

"I am a machine," I told him darkly, trying to impress on him the one thing no one understood about me, the one thing I would never be able to escape no matter how many happy days we spent together in cohabitual bliss. "I am no different from those Gundams. I am a weapon, an instrument of war, designed by war, forged in war. I do have to protect you. I have to protect everyone from myself."

"Heero," his voice was barely a whisper against my vise and I watched as his eyes shifted to that pity – always that goddamned pity – and my anger, a coiled and constricted snake in the pit of my belly, struck out and I threw him on the ground, my boot planting firmly in his chest.

"Don't do that," I growled down at him. "I don't need it. I don't deserve it."

"What? Care?" He glared back up at me. "Too fucking late for that buddy." But the pity was gone and the anger was back and in a swift movement he grabbed my leg, smashing the back of my weak knee and forcing me onto the floor with him. My face ground into the shattered pieces of broken vase and I felt the cuts distantly as Duo dug his hands into my jumpsuit and drug me back to standing, turning me to face him, a cruel hand shoving the sharp grit deeper into my cheek.

I met his eyes and I did the one thing I thought could hurt him more than any other, even though I knew it would hurt me too. I leaned in and kissed him.

His fist clenched tighter in the material of my shirt and my mouth immediately filled with the taste of blood as he bit down on my lip. But my hands gripped his head and held it in place as he tried to pull away from the kiss. I felt my head buffeted with smacks from his free hand and his booted foot kicked my shin as he fought to get away. I forced him backward until we slammed into the wall and I pinned him there with my hips. I was so hard it hurt as my mouth finally left his to trail bloody kisses down his neck, biting into the soft flesh as his hands clawed at me. His angry fingers tearing down my neck just fanned the fire, my arousal utterly possessing me, and I fought not to turn him around, hold him down, force him. I might've done a lot of shit in my life, but I wouldn't do that. I couldn't do that.

And then I realized that his fingers had stopped and he held them weakly against my collarbones. He tilted his head to allow my teeth better access to the juncture between his neck and his shoulder and I lavished attention on it, hopeful that he felt what I did, that this turned him on as much as it did me. Just like old times, when we fought to feel something because in the absence of the intensity of war, we found it difficult to feel at all.

His fingertips trembled and I felt them slide to my jumpsuit, hooking in the zipper and pulling it down. I gasped as his hands slid across my t-shirted abs, over my hips, down under my boxers to my ass where he grabbed, tightly, holding my hips against his. My head slammed forward into the wall, my body veritably sagging against his, and I moaned urgently as he jerked his hips upward against mine furiously, the friction more than I could stand.

I grabbed his hips then, stopping his movements so I could gain an ounce of brain function back, and I stared at him, his chin covered in my blood, his eyes laden with lust, and damn but I thought he was the most fuckable thing I'd ever seen. I had never been with anyone else, but I didn't see how anyone else could ever compare to him.

And then he was kissing me, his tongue needy in my mouth, his hands ripping the jumpsuit off of me. And I was reciprocating, trying to get him undressed as quickly as possible in our frenzied desperation.

"Do you think – Q has – any – ?" he panted out and pushed off the wall, tumbling us backwards towards the bathroom, neither of us able to stop touching the other. I finally had his jumpsuit at his hips and was tearing off his undershirt, frantic to see that muscled body I'd loved so well. He helped by lifting his arms as we reached the bathroom door and I threw the shirt to the floor, immediately drifting my fingers roughly over every rippling curve of his musculature.

Duo hit desperately for a light with one hand as the other dug painfully into my hair as we kissed. Finally light flooded the room and Duo pulled away to turn reluctantly in my arms. I grabbed his hips agonizingly tight, dragging him up against me, my hips grinding willingly against his ass in an imitation of everything I wanted to do to him. He steadied himself by gripping the sink with one arm while he threw open the mirrored medicine cabinet with the other. I heard the glass shatter as it banged into the wall but I didn't see it as I buried my face in the back of his neck, nipping it, one hand trailing up the soft hair above his boxers up across his abs and to his pecs where my fingers flirted with a hard nipple, twisting it and eliciting a sharp gasp from him.

"Fucking Vaseline," I heard him mutter and he turned back around, creating a little distance between us and kicking out of the rest of the jumpsuit so that he was left only in boxers. My eyes slid down his body to his fully erect dick hanging out and the sight was unbearable. I rubbed a hand over my own painful erection, still clothed in way too much fabric, and Duo grabbed my wrist with his free hand, his fingernails digging into it, a chastising look on his face.

"Nuh uh-uh." His eyes narrowed and he moved my hand to his ass, pressing back up against me and forcing me backwards, out of the bathroom. My knees found the edge of the bed and I sat abruptly. I tugged off his boxers as he disrobed me to my waist and then I didn't care what kind of repercussions I got, I leaned down and took him in my mouth.

His fingers twisted in my hair and shoved me forward uncomfortably, but I took it, the feel of his cock swelling in my mouth better than I ever remembered. I reached out a hand, feeling for where Duo had set the Vaseline, and I found it with a sense of triumph, opening it behind Duo's back as he tried to restrain himself from shoving further back into my throat. I coated my fingers in the thick gel and felt his whole body tense as I slid an exploratory finger into him.

"Jesus fucking Christ!" he ground out through clenched teeth as he came hard in my mouth, collapsing over me, folding his upper body around my head. I hardly got to taste him as he shoved as far as possible forward and I sucked gently as he finished, his whole body shuddering with the sensation.

I let him go and looked up at him, unsure of how he wanted to proceed. He looked back down apologetically.

"I'm sorry, you just –"

I stood and kissed him, not wanting him to apologize and take the heat out of the moment. His fingers moved across my thigh to rub me through the jumpsuit and I groaned into his mouth.

"Fuck me," he said, his lips against mine, driving me fucking mad. "I need to feel you fuck me."

I turned him and threw him down on the bed, shedding the rest of my clothes and staring at the handsome form of my lover, my partner, my mate, as he propped himself up on his elbows, spreading his legs wide for me. I climbed over him on the bed, kissing his abs as my fingers went to work stretching him. The whines and moans he made at my careful ministrations were so delicious I didn't think I would last very long at all once I finally got inside him. And I noted with a certain level of satisfaction that he was already getting hard for me again. Between the two of us, Duo always had the higher libido, and his recovery time was exceptional. I never could keep pace with him but if I managed to satisfy him twice in a row I took it as a point of pride.

My hand found his quickly hardening dick and I pumped it as my fingers slid in and out of him, his head whipping back and forth as his moans became more desperate. Watching him thrash helplessly like that was fascinating and I felt my cock twitch in response.

"What the fuck are you waiting for?" he asked of me in a rush and I stopped, pausing to slick my dripping dick hastily in Vaseline before positioning myself under him. And despite how violent we were and how sadistic we could be, this I always did gently. The trust this required I would not sacrifice.

I groaned as I penetrated him slowly, noting how his fists balled up in the sheets, his legs trembling against my ribs. My hands kept his hips still as I pushed forward, his warmth enveloping me in a feeling of homecoming that nearly made me weep. It had been so long and I had felt so sure I would never have this again... Even before the fall and the hospital and Jack, everything was wrong, everything was bad, and I was so scared I was going to hurt him, and I thought every time would be our last. This, now, it was unbelievable to me and all I wanted was for this moment to last forever.

I paused when I was completely buried in him, staring at his sweaty, panting body, his eyes meeting mine with expectation, with imprudent affection, and I leaned down to kiss him. It was a soft kiss, so different from the others we'd shared tonight. And as we kissed I slid back an inch and forward again into him, fucking him so damned gently it hardly made sense considering the events leading up to this moment but that is what I wanted to do. That is what I had to do.

Laying my head on his chest I grunted softly as I moved back and forth and his fingers slipped through my hair, stroking it, kissing it with light caresses. I turned my head into his flesh, my lips moving across it with tenderness as I made my way back up into a sitting position. Duo was watching me carefully, biting his lower lip, and it was then I realized he was as close to tears as I was and I hastily looked away, focusing back on his body, hoping to give us both some dignity.

My hands found his dick again and I focused on that as my speed increased, hoping to bring him with me this time. He mumbled incoherencies as I slid forward, each thrust bringing me closer to the edge.

"Aw, fuck, 'Ro...!" he cried, something like a sob catching in the back of his throat as his body tensed down around me and I shoved forward once more before I was gasping and falling on him, my arms wrapping around his waist and dragging him closer to me as I buried myself as far as possible in his body. I pressed my face into his stomach, not caring about the smattering of cum there, just desperate to feel him on every surface of my body, wanting to melt into him so that we would never have to be apart again.

My eyes burned as his hands cradled my head and I was loath to pull out of him, unwilling in the aftershock of such an intense orgasm to force myself back to a reality that had too many problems, too many harsh implications. Regardless of whether Duo wanted my protection or not, the fact of the matter was that I couldn't truly protect him from this. From the future. From whatever was going to happen now. It was too late. I couldn't protect anyone.

I realized I was sniffling and I sat up, wiping at my eyes and the cum on my face. Duo was chuckling weakly and he sat up next to me, his strong hands resting on my jaw, forcing my eyes to meet his, and I realized they shone with tears too. He kissed me hesitantly, mindful of my smarting lip that suddenly seemed to hurt a whole lot worse than it had before, and he rested his forehead against mine, nuzzling his nose against mine slowly.

"I love you," he whispered. "No matter how much it hurts me, no matter what you do, no matter what you think you are, I love you."

I crushed him against me then, the confirmation I longed for finally received. He pushed me back after a moment, meeting my eyes again, both of ours a bit drier now. Duo gave me a tentative smile and brushed some hair out of my eyes.

"Will you trust me that I can handle your shit?" he asked, repeating familiar words overheard at Relena's cottage what seemed like a decade ago but was actually only a few weeks.

I nodded solemnly, realizing that had I just been forward with him from the beginning all of this probably would've been avoided. But at the time it seemed so prudent I protect him... during a time when there were no greater threats than myself. I was the last relic of a deadly war, the last weapon of that horror left on Earth and in space. I thought I was the worst that could ever happen. Now I knew I was wrong.

"Will you trust me to do what I need to do?" I returned the question I knew he would have a difficult time answering. Four years ago I needed to disappear and the outcome of that was his abandonment. Now I was talking about recreating the experience that lead to that event. Piloting ZERO's sister system. But I had just promised to be open with him, so that changed things to a degree.

He sighed and nodded. "But can I make a suggestion?" I gave him a curious look as a smile teased his face. "What you need to do right now is go get that food that's supposed to have been left for us, pick that vase out of your face, and take a shower or your hair is gonna stick like that." His little, familiar smile was a comfort I seemed to forget how much I missed until it was there again, shining up at me with true, simple fondness.

I placed my hand on his cheek and ran my thumb across it, assessing him, waiting for the smile to falter. But it didn't.

"Are we all right?" I asked at last. He took his time answering so I knew it wasn't flippant.

"Yeah," he finally said. "Yeah, I think we're gonna be all right. Just... you know, there's still some shit to talk about but... I forgive you."

In a move uncharacteristic for me I slid forward, wrapping him in a loose hug, resting my face in his shoulder. "I love you." A whispered a phrase I rarely spoke, my throat tight. His hands just stroked across my back in reply.