Part 6:

"Have I waited too long

Have I found that someone

Have I waited too long

To see you…"

----"Hit Or Miss", New Found Glory

            The pale, heart-shaped face was moving away from him, removed from his from his sight.  "No!"  He tried to lash out, but something – no, someone – was holding him back.

            "Let me go!"  The desperate strength with which he flung his restrainer off would have knocked out a lesser person, but Noin had been prepared, and managed to grab Heero again before he attempted to follow Duo into the operating theatre once more.

            "Heero! Snap out of it!  You aren't helping him at all!  Heero!"  The young man she had been clinging to with all her might gradually stilled, and she cautiously loosened her grasp.  After it was established that Heero would not rush the doors again, she slumped down on the hospital bench with a long sigh of relief.  She closed her eyes momentarily, hoping that her head would clear from the blow it had received during the struggle with Heero just now.

            Seeing the normally impassive boy stripped of his iron-clad control left her strangely shaken.  Her mind tiredly drifted back to the scene they had arrived upon…

***

            The van the terrorists had escaped in lay on its side, the windscreen shattered while four of the dead bodies were strewn around the back door of the vehicle, a neat hole through each of their foreheads.  They had probably died without even knowing what had hit them.

            And sitting in the remnants of that violence was Heero, clutching the blood-soaked figure of his American partner within his arms.

            For a moment all of them, the newcomers, had gone silent, struck.  Noin's heart had contracted then, as her eyes darted to Duo's limp body.  Her mouth opened soundlessly, and she forced herself to form the words and push them out.  "Is… is he… Heero, is Duo—"

            "No!"  The denial was filled with a pain, a deep-seated anguish Noin had never heard before in the voice of the ex-pilot.  His eyes blazed as he glared up at her, and his grip on Duo visibly tightened.  Noin thought she could detect faint tear tracks on his face, but the dim light made it all uncertain.

            Heero's actions broke the frozen tableau the others were in, and they soon had Duo in the ambulance, swiftly heading towards the hospital.  Throughout all the examination and emergency first aid, Heero had stayed by the unconscious American's side, hovering like a hawk.  The blank intensity of his gaze as he stared at Duo's bloodless face unsettled Noin.  It seemed like he had become sealed off, as when she had first seen him on the battlefield, all those years ago.

***

            She drew in a deep breath and opened her eyes again.  Heero was still standing by the doors to the operating theatre, fists clenched and face blank as before, but there was just something in his posture that made him seem so… lost.

            A quiet beeping interrupted her musings and she dug out the small comm unit out of her pocket, flipping it open to see Lady Une's face looking out at her anxiously.  "How is he?"

            Noin sighed and shook her head.  "I don't know.  He's just went into the operating theatre.  It may be a few hours."

            "Oh…"  Lady Une's brow creased as she frowned worriedly.  "Maybe I should come down as well."

            "No, there is no need," Noin replied.  "Just stay with Relena.  The last thing we need right now is another assassination attempt."         

            "Alright," Lady Une acknowledged.  "Just keep me informed if anything happens?"

            "Yes."  She was about to sign off when a sudden question from Lady Une stopped her.  "Noin, how is Heero holding up?"

            /How did she know?/ Noin wondered.  She herself hadn't even noticed the slightest inkling that the Japanese pilot's feelings for his partner had run so deep – which was probably part of what was keeping her in this sustained state of shock right now.  Yet, Une, with an uncanny intuition that made her so invaluable during the war and now as Head of the Preventers, had detected it, even though she saw less of Heero compared to Noin.

            "He's…"  Noin struggled to find the words, but in the end, only came up with what she had felt when she opened her eyes to see him standing there.  "He's lost, Lady Une."

            Lady Une's eyes darkened with sorrow.  "I hope, for both their sakes, that the surgeons do a good job.  Remember to call me if anything happens."

            Noin nodded and the small screen on the comm unit went blank.  She closed it and put it back into her pocket, looking up at Heero.

            He was still in the same place.

            "Heero, it may take a while.  Come sit down," she attempted half-heartedly.

            The perfect soldier did not budge.  It was doubtful he even heard her. 

            Noin sighed and leaned her head back against the wall.  It was going to be a long night.

***

            Blankness.  That was all there was in his mind.  A thick, mind-numbing layer of blankness that had descended upon him once Duo's arm had slipped from around his neck and his eyelids slid shut concealing the violet orbs within.

            Nothing could get to him.  Everything seemed fuzzy, half-removed, like he'd stepped into a dimension half out of sync with the rest of the world.  The sharpness with which his emotions had pounded through his bloodstream when he'd leaned down to silence Duo with his kiss had disappeared.  The clarity of the fiery streak of Duo's lips, the metal taste of his blood, was dampened by the lethargic fog.

            Distantly, he sensed that there were seething emotions wanting to erupt, but for now a cocoon encased him, and all he could do was just sit there, gazing at the pale, heart-shaped face, wondering vaguely how he had missed it all before.

            The concern, the jibes, the actions…  Swift, secretive glances form the braided boy suddenly evolved a new, deeper meaning.  His words adopted a different tone, and the occasional fleeting brush of skin on skin, indelibly recorded on the soldier's mind, became a shade richer.  With a sense of detachment, he also catalogued the past instances of annoyance and irritation when it appeared that Duo was interested in someone else, and the flutter of elation and relief when it turned out to be nothing.

            "Follow your emotions…"

            He was taught that, but somewhere along the way he had lost its meaning.  He no longer considered his own feelings, jus shoving them into compartments at the back of his brain.  But now it seemed they were all clearing out.

            And once this blessed numbness lifted, they would descend upon him with a vengeance.

End part 6