Dragon Lady: Wow, I'm being good about my stories lately. *giggles*
Ken: *scowls* About your GW stories. *crosses arms childishly*
Trowa: Good for me. ///_^
Dragon Lady: ^^;; I put up a chapter of a Digimon story too, so stop your whining, Ken. =P
Ken: *shrugs* True.
Trowa: So, Sinister Shadows gets an update, then? Forever Forgotten is still my favorite story that you've done.
Dragon Lady: Yeah, but this one's not finished yet. Forever Forgotten is. ^^
Ken: Hey, her original Digimon fantasy fics rate up there.
Trowa: Yeah, but that's Digimon. So that automatically makes it inferior.
Dragon Lady: Oooh.
Ken: Ouch. =P
Trowa: *shrugs indifferently*
Dragon Lady: I still like BOTH. ^^;;;
Trowa: So…onto the story?
Dragon Lady: *agrees* Yes.
Ken: Yaoi warning, though it should be kind of apparent at this point. 3x4 and 1x2.
Trowa: Dragon Lady doesn't own Gundam Wing.
Dragon Lady: Don't I wish. $_$
Trowa: ///_^;;;
Ken: And she doesn't own Lois Duncan's Down a Dark Hall. Which is what this fic is based on. So don't tell her that this isn't original in your reviews, she knows. =P
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Sinister Shadows
By: DigimonDragonLady
It had only taken him a minute to put the violin back in its case and slide it under the bed. Then after shutting and locking his door, something that he had taken to doing not long after Duo had given him the sketch of himself, he allowed Trowa to lead him downstairs to the kitchen exit, rather than the main doors.
Just before they went out, they were stopped by Hilde.
"Where do you young men think you're going?" she asked suspiciously.
"Just outside for a walk, Hilde," Quatre answered when Trowa remained silent. "We won't be out for long," he assured her quickly.
Hilde's expression softened when she looked at Quatre. Though she still said little to him, she had become very fond of the boy, because he always had something nice to say whenever he saw her.
"Its getting cooler outside," she said with a nod. "The headmaster wouldn't be pleased if I let you catch a cold." And without another word she turned around and left.
Trowa pushed the door open, and they walked out into the night. "We never see the headmaster," he said, as if continuing a conversation with Hilde. "Doctor J doesn't even join us for the evening meal, so why should he care if we do catch a cold."
Quatre said nothing, just walked along silently beside him.
"Quatre," Trowa said, stopping suddenly and grabbing his arm to pull him to a stop as well. "Look at St. Gabrielle's."
Quatre did as Trowa told him to, and let his eyes travel up and down the building. "What about it?" he asked, guarding his expression carefully and attempting to make his voice sound as casual as possible, but he was almost certain that he was failing miserably to keep the nervousness out of his tone.
"How do you think of it in your mind?" Trowa asked him. "How does it make you feel?"
Quatre stared at him and swallowed. "I-I don't know," he lied, the nervousness in the pit of his stomach intensifying.
"Yes you do," Trowa replied bluntly, and looked slightly disapproving. Quatre winced. "If you had to describe it to someone in one word, just one," Trowa continued in his persistently silent way, "what would that word be?"
Quatre only shook his head, but Trowa took his shoulders in an iron grip and forced him to look up at him. "One word, Quatre," he repeated. "Would it be 'evil'?"
Quatre was trembling, and as he looked down at him, Trowa's gaze softened. He released Quatre as if he were on fire and he had just been burnt. "I'm sorry," he apologized softly. "I didn't mean to hurt you."
"That's all right," Quatre murmured awkwardly, looking at the ground instead of meeting the boy's intense green-eyed gaze.
"I just needed to step back and look at this place that we're living in now. How long have we been here? A month? And I was remembering when I first saw it…how that word came to mind first. Evil."
"But, its really not, is it?" Quatre asked softly reluctantly looking up at him, but as if he were in desperate need of reassurance. "We've been here for a while now, and nothing really bad has happened. It was all just silliness in the beginning, wasn't it, Trowa? Wasn't it?"
"No. No, wrong, Quatre," Trowa said so fiercely that it caused Quatre to take a step backward away from him. "Its not the atmosphere of the house that has changed. Its us. We're becoming accustomed to it. We're adapting. Starting to become part of the shadow that haunts its hallways."
His voice was deadly soft and terrible to hear. "Trowa, please stop," Quatre begged, taking more backward steps. "You're scaring me. I don't want to feel afraid again. I only want to feel…"
"Safe?" Trowa asked, and Quatre flinched.
"Yes," he whispered. "Safe."
"I don't think that we could ever be safe here, Quatre. I'm sorry."
Quatre shivered and looked away from Trowa, once more staring up at the Institution. Then he frowned. "Trowa, that window, the one right there," he pointed. "That one is my window, isn't it?"
Trowa followed his gaze and nodded in agreement. "Yes, mine is three windows to the left." He looked at Quatre curiously. "What's wrong?"
"The light to my room is on. I turned it off before I left. There's someone in my room."
"Maybe its Duo looking for one of us."
"No. No, that can't be it," Quatre said. He put his hand into his vest pocket and pulled out the key that Doctor J had given him to his room. "I locked it before we left…"
Trowa grabbed his hand and proceeded to drag him inside. The command to "hurry," was the only instruction he gave.
* * *
They practically flew up the stairs to Quatre's room; attracting the attention of the teachers and Heero in the parlor as they raced by it, but not bothering to stop and answer when they called out, asking what was wrong.
"Try opening the door," Trowa commanded when they finally reached Quatre's room. "See if it's unlocked now."
Quatre tried pulling on the door handle, but to no avail. By this time all of the teachers and Heero were standing in the hallway with them.
"What's going on here?" Lady Une demanded.
"Quatre saw a light on in his room, and he locked the door before we went outside," Trowa answered gravely.
"You must have left the light on when you went out, Quatre," Ms. Noin said reasonably.
"No," Quatre shook his head. "I'm sure I remember turning it off."
"Is your door locked now?" Zechs asked.
Quatre hesitated. "Yes," he answered quietly. "Yes it is."
"Young man you gave us all a terrible fright," Mr. Treize admonished.
"It only proves that you were wrong about the light if the door is still locked, Quatre," Heero said. "No one but you has a key to your room, right?"
"That is correct," Lady Une agreed, giving Quatre a severe look.
Trowa took Quatre's key from him and unlocked the door, pushing it open for all to see. Quatre sucked in a small breath of air. The room was now as dark as when he had left it.
"But-but the light is off again," he stammered. "I know I saw…"
"You must have been mistaken," Lady Une said.
"Why don't you go to sleep early tonight, Quatre," Ms. Noin suggested. "You've been looking awfully tired lately, and your eyes can play tricks on you when you're in such and exhausted state."
"Indeed, it can," Mr. Treize agreed.
They all turned and began to walk away, back toward the parlor, clearly none of them believing him. Only Heero hesitated.
"I know I'm not imagining things," Quatre whispered. "You saw the light too, Trowa."
Trowa put a comforting hand on Quatre's shoulder.
"Come along, Heero," Lady Une said, glancing backward.
Quatre turned to look at Heero, his eyes pleading with his friend to stay and believe him. Heero, however, only mouthed, "later" and turned to follow Lady Une, leaving Quatre to stare helplessly around his room.
* * *
Quatre had another restless night. His mind was troubled and weighted down by the things that Trowa had said to him, by all that he had heard and saw.
He had, upon Trowa's insistence, gone through his things to see if any of his possessions were missing, and had found that the one thing that was nowhere to be found was the portrait that Duo had drawn of Quatre. Neither he, nor Trowa, knew what the disappearance of the sketch could mean. Trowa was sure that someone in the Institute must have copies of their room keys, but they couldn't come up with any reason for one of their teachers or the adults to take something that seemed so trivial.
During his sleep, Quatre's dreams were troubled by many different images. The sketch of himself, a scene with him pleading with Iria and Rashid to come and take him home again, of him telling Wufei all of his fears and watching his friend laugh at him.
And in the shadows, as he was walking down the halls of St. Gabrielle's, there was always a figure shrouded in darkness. Watching him. Always watching. But the figure was not alone. There were so many eyes, everywhere he turned there were eyes. All around him; surrounding him, until Quatre could no longer move because he was frozen to his spot, paralyzed by a blinding fear.
His eyes snapped open in the dark; stunning aquamarine orbs filled with an inexpressible terror. His bed sheets had twisted themselves around his legs as he had tossed and flailed helplessly in his sleep, and Quatre struggled like a mad beast to rid himself of them.
He crumpled to the ground the moment his feet first touched the solid oak floor, but stood again on shaky legs and practically threw himself at the door in his desire to escape. Quatre tugged on the handle desperately, hands scratching and clawing to get it open, but it wouldn't come.
Locked . The door was locked.
He was trapped!
Quatre's strangled cries died in his throat.
In an instant, however, the door had been flung open, and Quatre found himself trapped in a pair of arms. He panicked and pushed and strained to free himself from their grasp, but the arms encircled him and held him tightly.
"Quatre, Quatre calm down. It's all right. Everything is all right."
Quatre tried to struggle more, but found himself drained of his strength, and his body went limp against his captor. Those arms supported him, held him, carried him back to the bed; a deep, calming voice soothed his fears.
"Trowa?" Quatre rasped.
"Ssh," the boy replied. "You're okay, Quatre. You're safe now."
"Safe?" Quatre repeated pitifully, his body trembling.
"Yes. I'll protect you."
"Oh, Trowa!" Quatre buried his face in the other boy's shoulder.
"Ssh," Trowa repeated, laying him down on the bed, stroking his hair soothingly.
"It was so horrible," Quatre murmured. "And I was so scared."
"I know, Quatre. I know."
"No one would believe me, Trowa. No matter what I said. Wufei laughed at me, and the shadows…the shadows." His body shuddered. "They were encircling me, and there was no way from me to escape…"
"I won't let the shadows take you, Quatre."
The blonde looked up into dark green eyes pleadingly. "Promise?" he whispered, refusing to release his hold on Trowa's neck, lest he disappear and leave him alone again.
"I promise."
"Okay."
Trowa gently removed Quatre's arms from their strangle hold around his neck and pushed the sweat drenched blonde bangs out of the boys eyes. "I'll stay with you tonight, if you want me to, all right?"
Quatre nodded thankfully, his eyes never leaving Trowa as the other moved around the small room, shutting the door and fixing the twisted sheets before lying himself down beside Quatre. He put a comforting arm around him when the smaller one snuggled against him, wrapping his slender arms around Trowa's waist and laying his head on his chest.
"I'm sorry, Quatre," Trowa murmured, running his fingers through the silky blond locks of hair. "So very sorry."
"For what?"
"I-I only wish that we could have met somewhere else, some other way, under different circumstances…"
"Mm," Quatre replied. "I think-I think I'd go through all of this again, rather than risk not meeting you, Trowa."
"Why?"
"Because," Quatre answered. "Because I think I've fallen in love with you, even though I tried so very hard not to. I'm sorry…"
Trowa softly kissed his brow. "You can go to sleep, Quatre, I won't let anything hurt you."
"I don't think you could protect me from dreams, Trowa. Not these dreams. And not even you," Quatre said sadly, snuggling closer.
"Well, you don't have to sleep if you don't want to," Trowa responded. "We'll stay just like this until morning if you so choose."
"I'd like that."
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Dragon Lady: Another chapter down. ^^
Ken: Uhg. Pure sap, woman. Can't you write anything but fluff?
Dragon Lady: ^^;;;; Um…yes?
Ken: *raises eyebrow at Trowa* You're her GW muse, can't you inspire something with more of a plot and some suspense?
Dragon Lady: Now, that's not fair, Ken. You've been my muse for almost two years now. Trowa's new at this.
Trowa: Fan girls like the sappy stuff, right? Besides, you definitely have your fair share of sappy Digimon fics.
Ken: *coughs* Yeah, well.
Dragon Lady: Yes, I like fluff. Fluff is GOOD. ^_^
Trowa: Please review.
Ken: Review! Review, review, review, REVIEW!!!!!
Dragon Lady: Why do you insist on making me sound really desperate, Ken-chan. I write because I like to, not because I'm in it for the ego-stroking. =P
Ken: *shrugs* Whatever. We still like reviews!
Dragon Lady: -_-;; Right over his head…