At The End of the Day
~ Chapter Twenty-Nine

June 2, AC211
- Winner Residence, L4-A00001

Duo was the type of guy who came by unexpected. More often than not, it was Wufei who was victim to his unannounced visits. Today, it was Quatre.

Past midnight, the timing was just right. Quatre was surely home from work and without a doubt, still up continuing to work. They hadn't been close since the wars, but it was easy to guess that Mr. Winner didn't have a thriving company without hard work and didn't rebuild destitute colonies in no time by sleeping a reasonable six to eight hours a night.

Sure enough, when he knocked on the door, Quatre greeted him with his glasses on top of his head and his hand rubbing at his eyes. Someone was reading, not sleeping like he should, and Duo just happened to show up at the most opportune moment. It was almost impossible to schedule an appointment with Quatre. Better he show up at his front door than wait months for a mere chance at an appointment.

"Duo?" Quatre said as his glasses fell back on top of his nose. "It's pretty late."

"And the perfect time to visit," Duo continued as he let himself in without waiting for an invitation. "You got bad eyes now? I see age is catching up with you."

"Yeah," Quatre responded, taking his glasses out and folding them.

"Tell me about it. I threw my back twice this week."

Duo laughed awkwardly. He certainly didn't want to talk about how he was aging and none too gracefully if he admitted it to himself, but after not being in contact with Quatre for so long, he didn't know how to approach him. Quatre had been more and more closed off recently, skipping gatherings and not returning phone calls. At least he heard that he was once again on good terms with Heero.

"Want me to make you something?" Quatre suggested as he closed the door behind them.

"Why not?" Duo responded.

Surprisingly enough, getting past the awkward stage was easier than expected. Quatre treated long absences like it was nothing. He first proceeded to turn the lights off in his study before leading him to the kitchen. Quatre could cook despite not much into eating himself. Duo was glad that he didn't forget about his bottomless stomach. A few months spent with him at a hideout were all he needed to figure that out.

Duo followed Quatre, not failing to notice the limp in his stride and the very obvious brace on his leg. For once, he didn't seem to come out of a dire situation unscathed. Public Quatre didn't have the brace, so it was safe to assume that he only wore it at home, away from prying eyes.

"I got Rayne this week," he started as he checked his pathway to make sure he didn't trip over anything in the dark.

"Oh," Quatre said as turned the lights on and opened his fridge to scope out available ingredients. "I didn't think it would take this long."

"She's got type I diabetes. We had to take lessons. I guess whoever adopted her before didn't have the patience."

"Thank you," Quatre said next, which was a bit of an unexpected response. He didn't face him but continued to rummage through the fridge. "Thank you for making her a part of your family."

He should have been the one thanking Quatre for making it possible to have a family at all. His new daughter was a precious gift and despite having her for just a few days, he couldn't imagine what life was like without her.

"You've got this all in reverse, Quat," he said, making himself comfortable on the bar stool overlooking the kitchen. "I wanted to thank you personally. Hilde also sends her thanks, but she wanted to stay home with Rayne when it's this late."

"Which means that you shouldn't be out this late either," Quatre said as he took some eggs, ham and cheese out of the fridge. Omelet was Duo's best guess for that night's late meal.

"You're forgetting that I've been out with you on a Saturday night," he responded while watching Quatre scramble some eggs. "You keep later nights than nocturnal animals."

Quatre did not respond as he started next on grating some cheese. He didn't seem chatty enough, but then it was late and he must have been tired.

"Cheddar?" Duo inquired.

"Sharp cheddar," Quatre responded. "I know you like it sharp."

Duo chuckled. It felt nice to be pampered by Quatre. He was an attentive friend who could make you feel like you were the most important person in the world. However, that was only whenhe could give you the time of day.

"Did you hear that Wufei's quitting the Preventers?" he brought up next.

Thanking Quatre was not the only reason why he came. The matter with Wufei was peculiar. Sally said they wouldn't talk about it as it was a confidential and sensitive matter. They were hiding something and Quatre's name just happened to slip during the conversation.

"Wufei is a principled man," Duo continued. "He wouldn't quit a respectable job without good reason."

Quatre seemed uncertain as he took a knife out of the drawer. He cut the ham into pieces but didn't look at Duo, didn't even respond to the news, which only meant that he knew something. If he wasn't going to get anything out of Wufei or Sally, then he was going to get it out of Quatre. The only other alternative, the inscrutable Mr. Barton, required a magician. In other words, it was impossible to get it out of Trowa.

"He wouldn't quit for just any reason," Quatre echoed after a few moments of silence. He seemed to be contemplating his statement the same time he started up the gas stove. He stared at the fire absent-mindedly before remembering that he was supposed to put a pan over it. Duo was sure his mind was connecting pieces of information together.

"If you know something, you've got to tell me," Duo encouraged. He hated being out of the loop, especially for something as important as his best friend quitting his career.

"I wouldn't know for sure," Quatre said as he added the ingredients to the eggs already cooking in the pan.

"I'm sure you've figured out something by now," Duo said with little patience. Patience was never his forte. "Just tell me what you know."

"I have to assume a lot of things to come to a proper conclusion."

"Quatre," Duo whined.

He left his seat to approach Quatre and when he was close enough, pulled the back of his shirt up without warning. It was a playful gesture, really, but he was surprised to find what he did.

"Duo," Quatre scolded, almost hitting his face with a wooden spatula as he turned around to get his shirt back in place.

"You don't have any scars," Duo said in surprise and a little bit of awe once he was out of harm's way.

It was like Quatre never got shot. He could have been more surprised, but this wasn't the first time it happened. Duo had already noticed the disappearing scar phenomenon after his abduction by the criminal only known to him as 'the Croc'. Wufei had mentioned it more than once back then, but he'd always dismissed it, thinking that Quatre had better things to do than be reminded of what happened. He assumed that erasing the scars was a way to make him forget, but the funny thing was that, over time, it was them who'd forgotten. Combining of a lot of time with very little reminder was an ingenious plan only Quatre could have concocted himself.

"I showcase my body for a living," was Quatre's immediate response, quick thinker that he was.

"Oh, bullshit," was Duo's just as instantaneous reply. "You expect me to believe that? I may look like an idiot, but I've got my theories. Spill it, Quat. I'm not leaving until you do."

Quatre moved to transfer the cooked omelet on a plate just as his eyes darted to the nearest area of escape, but Duo was quicker. As soon as the pan was back on top of the stove, Duo cornered him by blocking his way. When Quatre attempted to turn, Duo locked his hands on either side of him. As tall as Quatre was, Duo was sure he was stronger. He, at least, ate three meals a day.

"As the oldest out of the five, I get the right to interrogate you."

"About what exactly?"

Dealing with Quatre's twins was easier than this and he lovingly called them the demon twins. At first, Duo thought that their difficulty was a trait that came out of nowhere. Quatre was always a sweet guy, but now that he was witnessing this, it was safe to assume that the attitude came from their father.

"People erase things when they want something forgotten. You were gone for nine months in the summer of 200, Quatre. What happened? I want the truth."

"Why bring that up all of a sudden?"

"Because I have a feeling that it's related and I trust my instincts on this."

When Quatre persisted on keeping stubborn, Duo pulled the brace out of Quatre's leg, knowing full well through observation that he couldn't stand very long without it. It was underhanded. It was dirty. He would even admit that it was torture, but Quatre was keeping something from him that had gone long enough and he was paying the price for it. Really, it was for his own good if he told him what happened and why he had to keep it secret. It was pathetic what he did for the sake of his friends and for the sake of the colonies. It was even more pathetic what he continued to do for a man who could never seem to realize that he loved him. Yes, he knew this of course. Everyone knew it but denied it all the same.

"Duo, I can't," Quatre said, gripping his hand on the counter to balance himself. Duo's hands remained on either side of him, preventing his escape.

"You can't tell me?"

"No. I can't stay standing for too long. It hurts."

"I know," Duo replied, remorseful of what he was doing. Sometimes, you had to be tough on the ones you loved.

Quatre remained silent and it was then that Duo decided that he would stay there as long as it took for him to talk. On the back of his mind, however, he considered that Quatre may have gone through worse, so this may have been nothing more than him being a horrid friend.

He counted the minutes on the microwave clock. Quatre was stubborn. It took fifteen minutes before his leg gave in and another five before he attempted to clutch it in pain. He may have been able to erase the scars on his back left by the bullet wounds, but this was something he would never be able to hide.

A few more minutes of silence later, Quatre was at his limit. He started to sweat and since he couldn't grasp his leg, he leaned against Duo instead. Duo almost gave in, but he remembered that Quatre, the damn genius, was a cunning manipulator. Everything always went his way.

"Not working, Quat," Duo said as he remained in his position, but he was still a sucker so he rubbed Quatre's back in commiseration.

"The Croc… It was the Preventers. Wufei might have found out," Quatre said before Duo immediately released him.

"What now?" Duo said and quickly pulled a chair out to let Quatre sit. He didn't think it was connected all the way to Wufei's situation, but if that was explained too then he was certainly not complaining.

"He was a plan of the Preventers. I'm sure neither Wufei nor Trowa was aware of this."

"What?" Duo said again, this time louder as if the volume would give it more sense. "You mean the Croc?"

"Yes," Quatre said as he eased into the chair. His hand immediately clutched his knee. "They hired him to get me to reveal where I hid the ZERO system."

"You still have ZERO?" was Duo's next question. He was getting louder with every statement, an uncontrolled reaction to his disbelief. "What is going on? Quatre, it was you who suggested we get rid of the Gundams."

"ZERO has more than one application," Quatre explained. "I kept it so I could use it."

"For what?"

It didn't make sense to him. Perhaps he made the mistake of prying into something he should have no business knowing, but it was too late to turn back. He didn't believe he was hearing this. It was unconscionable what people have done with ZERO's technology. Still, he trusted Quatre and believed that he had very good reason to keep something as dangerous as that.

"The schematics fit perfectly with high speed transportation purposes."

"You used ZERO to build those shuttles? Your project was based around ZERO?"

Duo knew he was overreacting, but he did have a bad experience with the system and could only associate it with terrible things. Quatre didn't have such a great reaction to it either and destroyed two colonies as a result. He would only honestly trust Heero with it though Quatre used it successfully once in a strategic manner.

"How could you even configure that thing?"

Now that he thought about it, how did Quatre even build ZERO? Duo was a mechanic himself but he could never really build something as complex as a Gundam even with the blueprints in hand. Only crazy scientists built the Gundams. Surely the ZERO system wasn't something you simply plugged in.

"I have a degree in Aerospace engineering."

"No shit?"

Quatre didn't look like he liked where it was going, but sitting in a chair in front of the stove flanked on one side by Duo and on the other by a sore leg, he had no choice but to talk.

"When I met Professor H, I had just gotten my undergraduate degree. My father tolerated him when he used our family's resources because he thought I was working with the professor to get my doctorate."

Duo grabbed a chair and sat himself next to Quatre. He must have been thirteen when he graduated. All this time he'd thought only Heero held a degree. He didn't even see a diploma on the wall.

"That's hard to believe," he admitted.

"My father wouldn't let me come home from boarding school. It was all I could do to finish up as fast as I could to be back home with him. Even then, he couldn't spend five minutes with me."

"No diplomas, Quat," Duo said next.

"I served it to my father for dinner one night - flambé."

Duo placed his elbows on his knees and his face on his open palms. It took him this long to ask. It took Quatre fifteen minutes to tell. If he could, he would rate himself as the worst friend imaginable.

"Why didn't you tell them," Duo said as he watched Quatre massage his own leg. "I'm sure Wufei and Trowa would have chosen you over their job."

"The Preventers is more than just their job," Quatre explained. "It's their perspective on how peace should be maintained in the colonies post-war. It's not just a matter of deciding who the good guy is."

"So were you really the target?"

Duo liked seeing things in black and white, no matter what Quatre explained. If he found out that the Preventers were out to harm Quatre, he would be the first to confront the main office to demand an explanation. To him, Quatre would always be the nicest, most well-intentioned guy on the Earth and colonies.

"No. It was Trowa," Quatre replied and instead of getting an answer to a simple question, Duo became even more confused. "It was the PPM who was targeting him," he clarified.

"His wife worked for the PPM," Duo said.

Quatre looked at him and then looked at the omelet cooling down on the plate as if telling him to get his food. They were surely going to have a very long talk.

August 12, AC211
- Royal Penthouse Suite, President Wilson Hotel, Earth's European Nation

He was breathing heavy with both hands braced against the bathroom counter as he looked at himself in the mirror. Trowa could not believe what he had done but what was done was done and if the hand anchored around his neck and the head buried in his shoulder was any indicator, he couldn't take this one back. More than one damaged psyche had already come out of it.

He wasn't thinking or rather, he was thinking too much. His realization came together at the worst possible moment and he'd reacted to it instantly. What he was even doing there was the biggest question. Why he'd come to Earth with no particular goal in mind was puzzling. Or perhaps, his questioning of his own actions may have been nothing more than hypocrisy.

A whispered 'Happy Birthday' was able to sneak past his heavy breaths as he continued to remain where he was. Any greeting was as good as any to break the palpable silence.

In reaction to this, the hand immediately left his neck and the head once on his shoulder fell back into the bathroom mirror. Trowa stared at the closed eyes before him ahead of paying visual homage to the lips he'd kissed. They were red and swollen with a slight downward pout. Considering he had initiated it himself, the kiss was passionate and unbridled, almost needy in a pathetic way. His partner, though shocked at first, had responded in kind, completely branding the incident as both their mistakes.

"My birthday was last month."

Trowa translated it as a preamble to an upcoming fight. He hung his head, trying to come up with something to calm the surely enraged predator before him. Counting down the seconds to an outburst was terrifying. The tension rose little by little until suddenly, the air of animosity was broken through by an unexpected source.

The door to the suite opened and closed with a loud, inconsiderate bang. Silence that filled the room was a mere memory as obscene calls came out of a boisterous mouth. Eventually, the source of mayhem found them in the ornate bathroom still positioned where they were.

"Oh Quatre, ready for some wild-"

And instantly, the calls stopped in their tracks. Quatre remained seated on the bathroom counter, his hands having fallen listlessly to his sides. Trowa turned his head slowly, purposefully to the man holding a chilled bottle of champagne in one hand and two fluted glasses and a pack of condoms on the other.

"He doesn't drink," Trowa supplied. It was a trivial fact and he felt smug for knowing it.

The musician was too shocked to find him there that he couldn't say anything. Trowa knew Quatre was seeing Limerence's lead singer. How could he not know? The tabloids liked covering the phenomenon in great detail in a cheesy beauty and the beast sort of way. Tasteless as the coverage was, the pop icon didn't help alleviate the vulgarity, not in public and not even now at what Trowa considered a delicate moment. It was unfair to judge as the singer didn't know he was there and it wasn't him who was interrupting in the first place, but Trowa had been anything but rational all evening.

"But I drink," Trowa said with continued clam. "Leave it on your way out."

Aldrige, as he remembered the name of the man was, walked backwards in a comical way - so inappropriate for the situation - before doing as he was told and shutting the door behind him. Quatre did not leave him time to digest the situation any further.

"Name one instance when I didn't give you what you wanted."

Trowa turned his head back to Quatre. Eyes that were previously closed were now staring at him with very little fight. He was expecting the usual, the argument, the back and forth. Instead, he had no choice but to witness this sadness, this heartbreaking melancholy. It didn't help that even in such a scandalous circumstance, with his clothes clearly in the first stages of a make-out session; he left little room to counter.

Trowa did not speak because he had nothing to say. What, indeed, did he ask for that was not given? As a righteous sixteen year old, he had asked this man to give up his hopes of a normal relationship to rebuild the colonies. He did and now the bright young man was a working drone. He asked him to do what he was supposed to and what was expected of him. He married and was now divorced with ten children. He told him to protect the interests of the colonies because no one else would and now he had a successful company that contributed to more than half of the colonies' assets. Not too many years ago, he asked Quatre for his blessing when he married the woman he'd revealed was his first love. Quatre gave that to him too.

"You put a ring on my finger," Quatre said as he slowly lifted his left hand to display said ring. That particular hand, having never been adorned with anything, even during his marriage, looked different with the new trinket. The item was silver, subdued and elegant. At the same time, it looked like a heavy chain with the way his hand was weakly holding it up.

"I didn't think you could hurt me more."

Trowa continued to remain silent. Whatever he needed to ask for, he already did. Whatever he needed to explain regarding his request, he'd already done so and in great detail. Whatever he did to damage their always-too-precarious relationship, he'd already done and done in such a shameful fashion that he was too embarrassed to explain himself.

"Do you know why I'm with him?" Quatre questioned and Trowa was forced to pay attention. "When was the last time someone followed you around with a camera?"

Trowa bit his tongue. He was too much of a coward to admit that despite the press hounding him, he rather liked being linked to Quatre. It was late. He knew that. Too many years had gone by; too many rejections given out. He was quite simply, baffled by his own thoughts and actions. They were foreign to him or perhaps, these feelings had always been there, repressed and lagging far behind until event after event forced them to catch up and then blow up in an distasteful manner.

"Your wife is dead," Quatre said. He was looking at a spot on the far wall, a spot probably more significant to him that night than the person before him.

It didn't take Trowa very long to react to this one and to get his mind off Quatre and instead at the more important topic at hand.

"Don't tell me something I already know," he countered.

It still hurt. Despite what any of his friends may have thought, she'd never been just a passing interest nor had she been a tool to aid his investigation of her organization. Just because she happened to work for the PPM didn't mean that it was his intention to use her. In fact, he'd requested to be transferred to a different assignment several times. It was never to happen because by then, he was already in too deep.

"You want me to fix this," Quatre said as he transferred his attention to the ring on his finger. "You're throwing me to the sharks, Trowa. Just because I always seem a little suicidal doesn't mean I'd be willing to leave my children fatherless."

"I can't think of any other way," Trowa responded while watching Quatre play with the ring. "The public already thinks we're together. It's just a matter of taking it a step further and making the PPM think we're-"

"No, the public thinks I'm with the man you just kicked off the room a few minutes ago."

"Quatre," Trowa said with exasperation. "I can't count on anyone else. You come up with the best strategies. I don't even know how you got Ralph Curt to talk."

"Fine," Quatre said, motioning for him to move out of his way. "But I'm doing this for you, not the Preventers."

He seemed to be in an understandably sour mood as he got off the counter and fished a pill case out of his pocket. He shook a few out and swallowed them while raising his head to make its passage easier. For the first time, his age was showing, exposing itself for only Trowa to see. He looked tired, distressed, his blond locks revealing stray whispers of gray. He was still and would always be the most beautiful creature Trowa ever saw.

"I'm sorry."

Whether Quatre heard it or not, the apology was not acknowledged. Another couple of tiny white tablets made its way out of the pill case and into his palm.

"I hope you're not taking those to deal with me."

"No. For you, I need something stronger," Quatre said, swallowing the next batch as he did the previous. "I'll have something ready when I get back to the colonies next week. In the meantime, I would appreciate it if you gave me some space."

In other words, Quatre was telling him to leave him alone. Fair enough. Trowa made his way out of the bathroom with no protest, but just before he made it out through the door, a few last words came out of Quatre.

"Trowa," he said without looking at him. One hand was braced on the sink while the other was held up. "I'm keeping the ring after as a late birthday present."

"Sure," Trowa responded with a tiny smile before gently closing the door behind him.