Bishi Pile Challenge: Challenge response to Hair Minor to Wind, Assassination, Shadow Word count: 2,554

Series: Friends 50/??

Author: Karina

Pairings: Duo + Zechs, Quatre x Trowa

Ratings: M 15+ [In Australia] Rated in the event of bad language and violence.

Archive: Under the name kt at Gundam Wing Universe at /

Gundam Wing Diaries -wing-diaries.

Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing or the characters. That's the way it is.

Warnings: Not a death fic despite how it starts.

Many thanks to Katie for beating Friends.

Character Challenge =

Chapter 50

When Duo opened his eyes it was to the muted shadow that was daylight in the pantry, and to the sounds of movement beyond the tent. He made no immediate move, lying still and idly wondering when he had fallen into oblivion. He had slept, not for a few minutes or an hour or two only to wake screaming in terror, nor sobbing air into lungs aching with the need to draw breath beneath the smothering pressure that was a lack of air.

It had been a long time since he had enjoyed a sound and truly restful sleep.

He blinked, realizing he was staring at a fall of pale silk just short of tickling his nose. The heat emanating from the tall form lying beside him offered more comfort than the sleeping bags; his backside felt decidedly cool in comparison to his front. Sometime during the night he had snuggled close to that warmth and his body seemed greatly reluctant to move now that he was awake and aware.

Unwilling to wake the man when they did not have to stir immediately, and that was a luxury he rather enjoyed, he took the moment to luxuriate in the warmth and the novelty of feeling rested.

Yuy and the others were out there, busy bees flitting from task to task, and why the hell should he voluntarily freeze to assist them? They were intending to take his hot water bottle away and Zechs, damnable fool that he was, was going to permit it.

"...even see the helo. It's buried up to the blades and it will take hours to dig it out."

Chang and he sounded pissed.

Well, what did they expect? It had been snowing heavily for days up here and Mother Nature had been enjoying her play time. Such incidentals as the inconvenience of humans being stuck on the mountain side did not factor into her grand design. Mr. Chang Wu Fei could be as pissy about it as he liked; snowfall would hamper their plans and not simply melt away at one of his glares.

Duo sighed, deciding he really should not be avoiding them. They were his friends. He should get his backside out of this comfortably warm nest he had created and face up to the trials of the move. They were going to move. The others were determined to return to New Port City and throw Marquise to the wolves.

Then they were going to walk away.

There was no reason why they should not, after all they had nothing to do with the man, or who he worked for. This was only a job to them, an assignment. None of them actually knew Zechs Marquise the man. They only knew the man shown during the war and would judge him on that, wrongfully. It was not as though they had been any more sterling in their past performances. They had had their own private agendas too and they did not explain themselves to anyone.

Forgive and let live, that was Duo's motto… It was a pity no one else seemed to share his viewpoint and would allow him to move on.

He was as trapped by his past as Marquise.

He should force himself out of their bed. Marquises' breathing was still regular and light and he should get them to take their conversation out of the pantry and allow the man to sleep, but that would involve moving. He so did not feel like braving the chill of the air beyond his nest and entering into a conversation that would undoubtedly be as chilly as the air, if not more so. Chang had his boxers permanently bunched, a disagreeable attitude that seemed permanent when it came to Duo and now Marquise, and he really did not want to face yet another confrontation.

The truth was…

He didn't want to leave the cabin.

There, he'd said it to himself. He'd owned up to it, even if he did so only to an audience of one. He really was not interested in returning to the city and leaving this isolated haven to return to civilization.

He didn't want to go back.

Quatre tried, but some days Duo acutely felt the gulf that existed between him and the rest of the world. There was no going past the fact that he was a marked man. There was always someone out there who had to make a comment, who had to prove how big an arsehole they could be. Because of his so called friends, by nightfall, he would be back in civilization, dodging attention, trying to escape the finger pointing… and maybe assassins.

Zechs wanted him to go to ground for a reason.

"Then we had best begin to dig it out. I will restock the wood supply, we will need to return periodically to thaw out and we can rotate the digging. Someone will have to keep the fire going and monitor Marquise, though he appears to be healing well."

Heero sounded as unflappable as ever. What more could one expect though, he had a mission and that always made Heero Yuy happy. Admittedly, none of them liked to be at loose ends, but Heero jumped at anything remotely resembling a mission.

//I wonder how well he will cope with being Mrs. Foreign Minister?//

Heero would probably treat being treated as Relena Darlian's husband, and therefore a necessary piece of the Senator's luggage, with the same stoic doggedness as he treated life in general. Would it bother him? Maybe not, not if he thought of his life with the woman as a mission. It was a hard mindset to throw away and Heero had been harshly trained. It would not be easy for him to lose it entirely.

Shaking his head at his wandering thoughts Duo stretched, slowly and languidly, yawning hugely. It felt wonderful to be rested. Really rested. He had not dreamed…

"The wind will blow them away."

Zechs had said he would not dream, he would not live the nightmare last night. Zechs had sounded so confident, as though he could know beyond a shadow of a doubt that Duo would be spared the nightmares. How could he have known?

Duo was almost sure he had dreamt and it had been something… good? What had he been dreaming about? He was sure there was something there, and it had been far from unpleasant. It had left him feeling content and ready to face the day in good cheer, once he could convince muscles too long tense and now relaxed to move.

Damn, he was feeling good. He knew once he stirred himself he would face the day with a bounce. He was alert mentally, just feeling too content, too comfortable to move. He had not woken this alert and content since before the wars… since the first time he had sat in the cockpit of DeathScythe. Come to think of it, that was about the last time he had had pleasant dreams too. He couldn't recall what they had been about then either.

There had not been a great deal in his life that mirrored such a feeling of content.

"Did you sleep well, Duo?"

Marquise had not moved, had not even turned his head, but his breathing had deepened over the last minute or so. Duo smirked, noting the man did not appear to be any more inclined to move than he was. He didn't seem phased by having a near naked male lying along the length of his back either. Jerking away would only draw attention to how close they were and make them both uncomfortable, so Duo decided to stay right where he was and enjoy every bit of body heat he could.

"Yeah. Yeah, I did. It's been a long time since I had so good a nights sleep. Thanks."

"It is a great pleasure to find the good things to be found in dreams." The words were barely more than a whisper of sound. "A pleasant change of pace."

That… was an odd thing to say…

Duo stared at the pale fall of hair for a long moment then hitched himself up onto one elbow, looking down at the blonde. That shimmering mass of hair conveniently obscured his face, and Duo was sure Marquise was glad of that curtaining screen of moonlight silk. The man wore his bangs long for a reason, a convenient screen behind which to hide.

His budding question died with the rustle at the tent flap, the scratch of fingers against material and a pause, the silent request for acknowledgement. Someone was being careful, no doubt aware to startle at least one of the tents occupants might be to have an up close and personal conversation with a bullet.

His chance, for the moment at least, to question Marquise was gone, but he determined to find another chance where he could ask as many questions as he could think of… and that was sure to be a lot. He would have to try to get some answers before they reached New Port City.

"Yeah, what? We're awake."

The flap unzipped and Heero's head filled the gap. "Can you see to breakfast and guard the fire while we make a start at digging out the helo? It will go faster if we can spread the effort."

"Yeah, sure. Don't suppose you brought powdered egg and bacon did you? I'd kill for bacon and eggs just now."

"Plaspack field rations, every soldier's personal chef."

Duo stared. Was he seeing things or did Heero 'no nonsense, get the mission done' Yuy just crack a grin? And that was a joke, right? Okay, the day was off to a weird start.

"Fine, I'll sort something out to eat as soon as I deal with the necessaries." Duo waved Heero off. "Go work up a sweat in the snow."

Yuy vanished from sight and as he did so Duo sat up and indulged in a moment to yawn wide enough to threaten to crack his jaw.

"Hey Yuy! What's the weather like?"

"Blue sky and wind."

"Well, that's a vast improvement. Looks like we will get out of here today."

He listened to the sounds of movement for a moment and scratched his scalp. Looking around for his pack he considered digging his brush out to deal with his hair, but his bladder was aching and Marquise would be in the same condition. He wasn't particularly fond of the idea of peeing in a bottle, nor was he enamoured of the idea of relieving himself with an audience. He'd just let the others clear out of the cabin first.

"There will likely be clouds come mid afternoon, but when the weather breaks, sometime around nine or ten I would estimate, it will be rain, not snow."

Marquise inched himself around to lie on his back and then sat up slowly and carefully, pulling one of the packs to baluster his back. Studying him Duo decided he looked better than he expected him to; the light spilling into the tent touched pale skin and hair with a deeper gold, but Duo could see clearly enough a healthier colour underneath.

There was a lot to be said for nanobots, he decided.

He heard Trowa's voice and someone, he thought it might have been Yuy, cursed. Something particularly acidy was said in Chang's voice, though Duo could not hear the actual words, but it suggested Yuy had slipped on the ice as they made their departure from the cabin.

"I'll attend to latrine duty first and then start breakfast." Duo crawled out of the sleeping bag, huffed at the bite in the air and looked for his clothes. "Are you going to be okay to be moved today, or do those little microscopic buggers need a day or two longer?"

There was a flash of very white teeth in the charming smile as Marquise inclined his head to watch him.

"I will survive the move, Duo. I assure you, I have had worse injuries and functioned adequately at need. I will, however, hoard my resources if you would permit and rest through the day, while I am able."

"You never slept well last night?"

The smile was a brief tilt of fine lips as Marquise turned his attention to rummaging in a bag, producing a hairbrush and comb.

"I slept quite well, thank you. You make an exemplary hot water bottle, one that does not, I have observed, require regular reheating. This evening will be… difficult, and I will need to govern my strength accordingly."

"Yeah. Difficult. That is one way of putting it." Duo hunted around in amongst the equipment piled to one side of the tent and tossed a bottle to the blonde. "Pee in the bottle for me, there's a good invalid."

Marquise sighed, rolling his eyes at Duo's irreverent grin.

"I'll make sure you are stretchered out to the chopper, okay? There is no need to have anyone suspect you are in better shape than you have a right to be after the treatment that psycho dealt you. Yuy won't tell the others unless he feels it is necessary, and I don't think he will mention it unless he has no other option. It might lead to someone asking him how he knows about nanobots."

"Allow me to do your hair?"

Duo blinked, head coming up and turning to pin the blonde with an intense look. Where had that question come from? Marquise had dipped his head, one hand wrapped tightly around the handle of the brush, the other fisted in the sleeping bag. The abrupt change in the demeanour of the blonde took Duo aback, but then a man's hair was sacrosanct, when one had hair as he had… as Zechs had…

It was an intensely personal thing, to permit anyone to brush your hair. He had taken care of brushing that cascading silver blond mane; he knew how silken it was when brushed to a glowing lustre. He had gotten to run his fingers through the thick mass; he knew how thick it was, how it chased his hand charged by static electricity; how it was best to apply just a little water to keep it under control when brushing.

It was like a river of moonlight and he would have liked to brush it by moonlight, the highlights would be silvered, subtle… magnificent.

Zechs had great hair.

He would not be able to touch it again after today…

"Okay, soon as we get latrine duty out of the way, but I get to do your hair… one last time."

He would let Marquise into his personal space. He would let the man touch his hair, brush his hair… plait his hair into his signature braid. He had only ever allowed Sister Helen to handle his hair… Marquise knew though. Marquise knew what the hair meant, even if they had never talked about why he grew it; why he didn't cut it off and hide himself in anonymity.

Marquise would know the hair was Duo Maxwell, every centimetre of it was representative of the facets of his life, good and bad. Marquise would know, because Marquise wore his hair long for similar reasons.

"It would be an honour."

End

Karina Robertson 2009