Part Four: Stones and Messagners
"Yes, I did want to speak to you," Duo breathed into Relena's hair. "He's pathetic."
Relena looked up to Duo, refraining from kissing his neck for a moment. "Hmm? Didn't we already know that?"
Duo chuckled, "No, he won't get mad. He just stands there."
Relena then fixed her gaze upon me thoughtfully. "Really? Shall I take a try at it?"
Duo nodded. "Yes. That would be what my idea was. Be careful, love."
Relena smiled and kept her haze fastened to me tightly.
"Heero, don't be afraid to hit her." Duo said to me and crossed his arms. Was the Relena in this reality really that strong?
"So this is the Heero from a peaceful world." She circled me like a vulture looking at the carcass of a dead animal. She licked her lips. "Well he certainly looks weaker then our Heero. I wonder if he's as tough. Doesn't look like it." I glared to her. She raised an eyebrow. "Oh? Do you hate me? For what reason?" I opened my mouth but she put her fingers to my lips. "Oh don't tell me, Heero. Show me." I wanted to ripe those fingers off her delicate hands. Wasn't that what Duo wanted me to do?
That seemed to be what he was stressing for. "Heero, she invited you. Do it."
I kept my feet planted firmly on the ground. She laughed to herself and placed her hands on her hips. "Well I think he's afraid. He's not fit to know you Duo."
Duo turned his back and Relena opened her mouth once more. "It's a wonder why he ever like you in the first place." That might have been the stray the broke the camels back. I tightened my fist and took a lunge at her. She dodged it with cat-like reflects. I never thought I would miss if I tried to hit her.
She cocked her head. "Was that a punch? Or where you trying to shake my hand?"
Duo turned around and before I knew he was in back of me. I felt my cheek lashed by a slap. "Heero, continue to fight. You can't wait till you get mad to fight some one. Keep it going." If he wanted it so bad I turned around to him. I swung my leg in his direction but he easily caught it. Flipping my down to the ground I aimed for his legs to knock him over, he jumped up as my legs came toward him. He smiled to me. "Come on Heero. You can do better than this." I got to my feet and tried to prove him right by swinging my fist towards his stomach.
He blocked and with my other arm I swung to his face. Blocking that, I went to kick his legs out from under him, knowing that he couldn't block me with his arms. I began to move but before I could I felt myself doubling over in pain. He had done it first, but with a fist. Where did that come from?
I gasped for breath, clenching my stomach. He grabbed a handful of my hair and pulled roughly so I would face him. He smiled and his knee smashed into my forehead. It was deliberate; he wasn't trying to injure me too badly on my first try. I was now lying on my back, trembling from the pain in my stomach. I moved over and struggled to get up. As I was on my knees and moving up to my feet he waited for me to get up.
I stood up, fully now and looked to him. He walked over slowly: confident. He flipped me in one movement and I was on my stomach, falling from my neck. I moved to stand up. "Don't even think about it." I took in a deep breath and looked up to him. "If this was a real battle you would surrender or die. Don't push it when you can escape with your life. Surrender." I took a moment to think. Those words have never, ever left my mouth. I have never spoke them and I never thought I would have used them in this situation. I felt another slap, this time on the other cheek.
"Idiot, if you need to think about it that could be a bullet lodged in your forehead! Say it when it's true! With this kind of hesitation you should be dead!"
I turned my head upward and the deadly glare in his eyes nearly threw the words out of my automatically. But still I have to punch a little bit. "I surrender."
He smiled and offered a hand up. "Good."
Relena then tugged on Duo's braid. "Do you need me for anything else?"
Duo shook his head. "Nope, thanks."
She nodded, smiling and left, heading for the double doors.
"I didn't realize that I had grown so weak..." I trailed off, but he chuckled despite the seriousness of my voice.
"Heero, you're too tough on yourself. You haven't fought anyone for nearly a decade, that was okay!"
I laughed dryly. "J should have killed me. I never thought I could be this weak." Again, I felt Duo's hand slap my cheek.
By now I could taste the metallic blood tainting my mouth. "Baka, don't say that! We have a 'I will get better' attitude around here! I'm not gonna tolerate the 'I should be dead because I'm not as good at you' attitude."
I closed my eyes for a moment. "I didn't know that there was a category like that. I should have expected that."
Duo thought twice about slapping me again, but obviously went against his first instinct. "Heero. If you want to live here you need to have a better attitude. That's what got you killed last time. You expected since you had beaten Zechs before he would be a push over. I have news for you, people get better."
I turned my back to him. "How the hell am I going to get stronger in the time I have now when everyone else is better?"
I felt a hand on my shoulder. This one was comforting, unlike the previous. "You're still a perfect solider. We just need to change your oil." I hated that terminology. I wasn't some damn robot. I was human, even if I didn't want to believe it.
"It's going to take more then an oil change." He draped his arms around my shoulder from in back.
"Then we will just have to get you some new parts."
He came back with a couple bandages and a cup of water. He set down besides me, we where in the changing room. "Look at me." I turned to face him and he dipped his fingers in the cup of water, it might have been a disinfectant, now that I was looking at it. He rubbed the liquid over a scrape I had on my forehead, next to my eyebrow. It stung slightly and in reflect jumped a little bit. "Baby." He teased and I narrowed my eyes to glare at him.
He rubbed his fingers with the liquid covering them over a couple more areas that where on my face. Looking to see what was the larger of the cuts, he picked on of my cheek and the one next to my eyebrow. He took the bandages and peeled the paper part off. Sticking the band-aides over the cuts he pressed it firmly. "There, got your face done. Now that I think about it I think I was too hard on you. I was thinking you were the other Heero; you're not."
Was that why he was so distant around me sometime? Because I didn't live up to the other Heero's standards?
"Do you have any other injuries?"
I looked back up to him, snapping out of my faze. "What?"
"Any other wounds?"
I shook my head, even if I was lying. Of course I did, but if it was one thing that I didn't loose it as my endurance. He shook his head. He knew that I was lying. "Here," he lifted up my shirt and I felt myself stiffen. He dropped it and looked to me. "Take it off." I did as I was ordered I saw what he was talking about. I have a large cut across my chest and that must have been what was hurting me when I landed on my stomach. He dipped his fingers in the liquid and ran two across the scratch. I tensed up at his touch.
It stung more then I would have expected. He blew on it and that caused me to tighten even more. He scooped up more of the liquid and ran it across, blowing on that again. He repeated the process a bout more times and after the sixth time I was caused to question. "Why are you doing that so much?"
"It's a deep cut, you must have landed on something. It's too large to bandage without slowing you down so I'm trying to seal it."
It was short and simple and made since as well, I should have known not to question him. But I had another question that just kept running through my mind. "Duo?" I started and he shifted form my wound to my face. "Hmm?"
"About the memories or visions that you have given me..." His face told me to continue even if his mouth didn't. "Well I was wondering how you can give them to me. Is it something with this reality? Is it some acquired skill? What is it?" He shook his head; it must have been from my question, was the answer that obvious?
"It's actually a long story..."
I smirked and I knew it. "That's never stopped you before."
He chuckled and then covered his fingers again, still sealing the wound. "Are you sure that you want to know?"
I nodded. It was a mystery that I wanted to know about. "Well, it was when I first came here..." he blew on the wound but then looked closely at it to see how many more layers he would have to place. "Go on."
"As soon as I arrived here the first thing that I can remember is the sight of a young boy, he was dying. There was a bullet lodged in his chest that flew astray form a solider. "It wasn't supposed it happen this way," that is what I remember him saying. I knelt down and offered him my lap as his last moments where scattering. I asked him what wasn't supposed to happen this way? He looked up to me with the clearest eyes of some one that wasn't the boys age. There where years and years of wisdom in his glassy eyes, he handed me a little bag that he had kept tucked in his pocket."
"He then looked up to me and said "you must see what I mean," I opened the bag to see what he was talking about. In the bag a dozen black stones but at the very bottom there was one white. He picked out the white when I was holding the bag open. He took the stone and pressed it to his chest and started to cough. In-between gasps of air he told me a little story. 'With every existence there are dozens of ways it could happen, do you ever wonder what would have happened it you made a different decision?' I nodded when he asked me that, he continued."
"'When every there is a different way something could come out, it creates a different reality. It's like these stone, there is only one right way, one good thing and many tries. Like the black and the white, things can go different ways. This one was supposed to be the world where things when right, it hasn't happened, at least not now. I don't know how, but for some reason I think you can make a difference.' He handed me the bag of rocks, I took them and he dropped the stone back into the bag with the other stones. I looked at the rock and the boy's soul left."
"I was touched by his words and it was at that point, at the instant that I touched the stone, I felt that what the boy was talking about. I knew that it was true and that was when I realized that things weren't right. He had died and he had know it. I think that the stones pass along memory along with the gift. However, the talent can only be passed with the passing of a life. I had received the gift form that boy, I don't know how or why he decided to give it to me, but he did. Maybe because I showed him kindness when he was dying, maybe because I was the only one there. I guess I'm not gonna find out anytime soon."
I nodded, was that kind of fantasy really present in this world? Was there that kind of mystic power around here? I knew that people always have believed in a power that has been super-human, many people who want something to call it may call it "God." Others will call it kami or a goddess. Was that the type of encounter Duo had? Was that the reason he had been given the power? I looked to him as he stood up to put the liquid away. The wound was sealed completely.
"Duo, how many other people have been given the visions that you can induce?"
He turned to me, after pouring the remainder of the liquid into the sink. "Only you Heero, whether it be the Heero I knew, or the Heero I know now, it has only been both of you." For some reason that didn't make since, two of me? It still made me feel special, but he held me to completely different standards then that other me. I didn't like that at all. I was being compared to what I could have been.
"Duo? Tell me about the other Heero."
"The other Heero...?" He looked
to me a bit confused, even though I didn't blame him. I was confused
myself. I wanted to know about the other me Duo seemed to love so
much. "Yes, tell me what he was like." Duo was almost ready
to begin
flabbergasting; he looked as if he was. "Well, um, what do you
want to know...?" That was what he said as a response.
"How was he different from me?"
Duo put some thought into it before answering me. "Well, for one thing Heero in my reality had to stay tough, he was physically stronger then you, he kept his hair the same length. Umm, he discarded the tank top and spandex for our uniform. Umm..."
"Duo, I mean personality wise, not physically."
"Well..." he took a long pause. "This Heero was the one that was J's ideal perfect solider. He would do anything for the sake of a mission, no matter what it was..." Duo looked sadly to the floor as he took a seat next to me, but future then before.
I moved a little closer to him. "Give me an example of the missions that he would do that made him so ideal."
Duo stuttered even more, "I don't know why I said that, I guess you would take any mission, right?" He seemed to want to change the subject and as fast as I could. That wasn't like him at all and it caused me to linger on that thought.
"He was different. He made up for things different and he was more aggressive..." that didn't surprise me- that was the only thing that didn't. Well, if there had been a war for fifty years I couldn't imagine not being aggressive. I wanted to know about the missions that Duo seemed to be avoiding.
"Duo, what where the missions?" Duo stood up and began to walk away.
"Heero, I'll show you to your room. Do you want one with the soldiers or a guest room?" He obviously thought more of the other Heero.
My pride might have been getting in the way, but at this point it didn't matter. "Solider." Duo then turned around to look at me.
"I'm not sure you want to do that, they're not too friendly to new people. Especially since you are Heero, even if you are a different one."
I shook my head. "I can take it."
He took in a deep breath, the obviously thought I was being moronic. "Fine, if you insist, but if you want to change then tell me! Don't let your pride get in the way of common sense!"
Too late.
I heard a small yelp coming from behind a locked door. Then it hit me. "Where did you put Jackie?"
Duo chuckled. "Do ya want to see her?"
I nodded, from that look he wasn't playing fair. "Follow me." He went to the door I had heard the yelp from and opened the dark room. He flipped on the light and looked to little Jackie in a cage. "I didn't know you had pets here before."
He crossed his arms. "Oh, you mean the cage?"
I nodded.
"That's not for the pets! We use that to interrogate spy's! You can torture people a lot better if they're in a small area."
"You torture them?"
"If interrogation doesn't work and we need the information."
"Don't you have a drug by now that can do that effectively?"
He grinned to me. "We're not rich enough to get all those. Oz has put up a blockade that doesn't allow us get any goods." I nodded in response, but still torture? Jackie bit Duo's ankle and he glared to her. "Why the hell does that dog hate me so much?!"
I shrugged. "How would I know? I'm not her."
He began to walk again, "I'll show you to the soldiers quarters."
I then followed him down another hall, passing at least six rooms. I wondered what all those rooms where for, I would ask later.
We stopped outside another pair of double-doors and he opened them. There where about twenty soldiers sleeping and seven walking around.
"Hey everyone, listen!" All of them fell into a silence and lines up in front of Duo. I felt like I was in grade school, being introduced at a new school.
"We have an new solider joining us. His name is Heero Yuy. Make sure not to give him a hard time. If I get a report of anyone putting him through hell then I will punish you personally. I don't think you would want that." The soldiers grimaced. Some of them probably had to live through a punishment before.
Jackie barked and jumped up to a certain solider and jumped up and down. That meant that she wanted to be picked up. "Go ahead and pick the dog up, Quinsy." The man named Quinsy picked Jackie up and she greeted him by licking his face. I saw him smiled. Jackie had an ability to sense kind hearts.
"And I don't have to warn you about the bitch. She'll punish you herself."
Duo then left. I looked to all the soldiers who went back to doing whatever they had been engaged in. Quinsy was petting the dog.
I walked up to him. "What's her name?" He had to be around fifteen, young.
"Jackie." I said simply and he smiled as she squirmed around even more, but not wanting to be dropped.
"Ah, Jackie, huh? She's yours?" I nodded. If one wanted to be technical, she was Quatre's, but Quatre wouldn't probably see her again. I hoped he wasn't really attached to her.
"She's a pretty dog, pure breed? You don't see many of those now days. I used to have a black lab, I have to get rid of him when I joined this group. I thought you where dead." I closed my eyes and tried to think up a reason. "I'm a relation to the Heero Yuy you must have know. I look a lot like him, he's my cousin. I was on L8 when I heard that he had died. I thought I could help out."
He looked to me suspiciously. "Why the hell is your name Heero Yuy too?"
"My family had a fixation on the pacifist that died many, many years ago." He nodded, but I didn't think that he was buying it.
"How hard of an instructor is Duo?" I asked suddenly.
"Let's
just say you don't want to get in trouble and you always try your
best around him."
I looked to Jackie who growled at Duo's name. "Why is that?"
"Let's just say that if you don't, you're in real deep shit." I didn't realize that Duo was this hard on people. He seemed open to talk to. He probably didn't want to get in trouble from Duo's warning.
"What was Duo's relationship with my cousin?"
He raised an eyebrow. "Shouldn't you know that?"
I shrugged. "I'm not that close
to my family, I only heard about his death and
rumors about him. What was it?"
He took a moment to think about how to phrase it. "Umm, well, Heero and him where real close. I'm not sure how close, when ever those two where together I saw the way they looked at each other. If there was anything outside of longing, it's beyond me. They wouldn't let it get out. Duo was pretty depressed when Heero died, so I heard. After that he toughen up beyond reason. I think he was trying to keep Heero alive by acting a part of him." Was that it? Was that why he acted that way?
"But you know, I wasn't apart of this group when that all happened, I heard it from other people. Even if there is the war going on, we keep the gossip flowing. Duo's always the one we find ourselves talking about, don't know why." I suddenly lost my footing from a push. Tripping, I picked myself back up. "Hn, Yuy. You sure lost your touch after your death."
One of the soldiers confronted me, glaring with death in his eyes. "He ain't Yuy! He's a cousin of Yuy's!" Quinsy tried to say but the other guy shoved him backwards.
"Ruddy, don't give Duo a reason to kick yer ass!" I heard from behind. "Shut up! I don't think that Yuy would tattle on any expense."
He was right. Duo's order didn't weigh anything on these soldier's shoulders. I wouldn't tell.
"What of it? What do you want?" Ruddy shoved me backwards for good measures.
"I wanna kill you for screwing Duo up so bad, jackass!"
I questioned his statement, but didn't get a chance to think it out. His leg lashed out and tripped my, I crashed to the floor.
"Ruddy! Stop it!" Quinsy tried again. I admired his ability to speak up against that some one stronger then him.
"Heh, I'd be careful about your own skin!" Ruddy approached me as I sat on the cement floor.
"Ruddy! I'll tell Duo of you even touch him!" Ruddy stopped him his tracks. He knew that he would tell and that was the weight.
"Che. Be lucky Yuy! In battles there are a lot of casualties and it doesn't matter from which end they come. A stray bullet just might pierce your scull." Idle threat. What a bastard. Ruddy backed away and left the room. Quinsy was the first up and offered me his hand. I accepted and he smiled to me. "Hey, the bunk I have had an extra space. You want top or bottom?" I shrugged, wiping the dust off my knees.
"It doesn't matter to me." He nodded and Jackie jumped to the spare bunk, it must have been his.
"Okay, then let's get you unpacked!"
"I didn't bring anything."
"Huh? Nothing?"
"I left in somewhat of a hurry."
"Really, well I can see why. How did you get here and when?"
"As soon as Duo got back."
"Hm, where did he go?"
"To pick me up?"
"Well I guess, but he said something about information, where did he get that?"
"You seem to think I have all the answers. I don't know."
"Sorry! Geez, you act just like him!"
"Who?"
"Your cousin."
"My...? Oh. It runs in the family."
"Hey, mind if I ask you a personal question?"
I shrugged, I guess I didn't mind. If I didn't want to answer I didn't have to. There wasn't any harm in him asking. "Has Duo made any passes at you?" Or maybe there was. I felt uneasy, dammit.
"Why would he?" I looked away from Quinsy so he couldn't see the expression plastered to my face.
"Well you look so much like Heero, why
wouldn't he. I don't think he would
do it to just any of his men, but since you look and act so much like
him..."
"You assumed wrong."
"Okay, okay! I got it! You sound mad, why is that?"
"Nothing."
Jackie yipped and that made Quinsy smile as I turned back around. "This dog thinks that you're not telling me that truth, what is it Heero? You can tell me! It's not as if I would tell!"
I glared to him. Great, I was already glaring at people. "I think I'm going to get to sleep."
"What? At this time of day?" I nodded and laid down on the bunk, I probably was getting too much sleep, but I kept feeling the need for it. I hope I wasn't catching a cold. Jackie jumped to the lower bunk I was on and snuggled up to my chest. While I shut my eyes I could hear Quinsy mutter something to himself, "che, be that way."
I will.
I will.
End of part four
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