Basket Case
Chapter 5: Here Comes Your Man
So that there would be no changing of the votes because of alliances in their little group that could sway the other member's opinion, Quatre made them all close their eyes while they voted. There were minor grumbles in the room, most of them Wufei voicing his disapproval of Relena staying directed more at himself than anyone. But each pilot closed their eyes, rolling them first optional, and sat back and waited for the each other to finish voting. As soon as his lids fell over his eyes, Duo's arm was straight in the air to vote 'opposed', his chest burning with anger at the nerve of that girl… invading and prancing in like she owned their own little private hell—no! It was theirs, and only theirs.
She hadn't been in the war like they had. While she had been calculating and strategizing and memorizing speeches to persuade the public in this little chess game of war, they had been the paws she'd been using. They were the ones giving up their lives, their chances for a normal life, permanently. It wasn't that she understood and still disrespected them… she'd never be able to understand period.
/…I think I'd rather kill myself than let her stay here…/ he thought bitterly. Duo didn't realize in his anger that another bout of feedback had gone through his head, since he'd become accustomed to it, and just how loud he was thinking.
/I won't let you. /
The alien sound of a deep, rough voice seemed to explode into existence in his mind. Duo's heart just about stopped, jolted by how suddenly it had appeared. He had to squint fearsomely so that he wouldn't open them and make them vote all over again, bite his lip so he wouldn't make a noise, and dig his fingers into his thigh to stop him from jumping in shock.
/Jesus! Scare me to death, why don't you! Man… /
/…I won't. /
/Heero? /
A mental sigh not his own filled the echo of his skull, as if his brain was an auditorium and Heero was standing with in that auditorium talking inches from him. It sounded—no, felt so real.
/…Yes, / he answered after a pause. The tired age was stunningly prominent in his voice. /…it's me. So you can hear me again.../
Duo kept his eyes closed, and paused to listen for Quatre to tell them to open their eyes. To tell them the voting was over and Relena was on the next flight home, but it was oddly quiet outside the strange new conversation in his brain. He "turned" back to talk to Heero again. /I thought it was you, but now… it just seems weird to actually be talking to you like this. Well… thinking to you or something like that. /
/Have you heard anyone else like this? /
/No. This has never happened before. I really don't think I'm psychic or anything. /
/Maybe it's a recurring hallucination…/ Heero's voice was tinted with flickering insecurity, as if his eyes were shying down to the floor.
/Be serious. No one has the exact same hallucinations at the same time, Heero. /
/…No, I mean… you could be the hallucination. /
/Me? Hey, you could be the hallucination too! /
/…You're right… then we're not imagining it. /
/Dammed right! /
/… Duo? /
/Yeah? What, Hee-chan? /
/…What did you mean by what you said… in the hospital wing?—/
Before Duo had a second to react, he could sense the feedback rising again in the back of his brain, sweeping over his hearing viciously and disconnecting them like it'd done before… but now it sliced into his ear drums and every cell in his brain like a frenzied butcher knife trying to beat the life out of him. It was thick, liquid, throbbing acid pain in his head that made him squeeze his eyes shut, teeth clamped down on tongue firmly to keep the yelp of sudden, unexpected pain bottled in. As the last remnants of Heero's voice in his head faded, he got a final spark of worry from him that melted into oblivion. Duo was alone now and his pain, instead of wavering and fading like Duo expected it should now that the feedback was gone, seemingly got a malicious will and intensified.
Finally, Duo let in and let out a shaky groan as he tried to sit up straight, pain racking down his neck and back like molten knives and eyes squinted painfully shut. Vertigo plagued him suddenly and he could hear wary voices calling out to him, their words slurred, and felt a hand on his shoulder as he toppled backwards, nearly taking the person with him. He hit the floor and the room erupted in the sound of people rushing over to him. All the while, the pain train was making steady progression down his back and through his chest. His vision was swirling pink and red and black behind his eyelids and hands were struggling to help him up, voices still murmuring off in the distance. Duo said something, although he wasn't sure what, and tried desperately to curl back up on the floor. The more they tried to stand him up, the more the pain intensified. In his daze, his arm whipped out, trying to discourage them, struck flesh, a hand let go of his shoulder, his head smacked against the floor, and blackness swallowed.
The smell of starched fabric was the first thing that Duo knew when he regained consciousness, the second was that his nose wedged firmly into his pillow and his hair was draped over his bare shoulder. Darkness greeted his eyes when he opened them, so he closed them again and prepared to roll over and dive into sleep again. But a spike of sudden hunger rushed up to greet him, like it had been caught off guard, demolishing any hopes Duo had of going back to sleep.
The American took in his first deep breath of the day—or night. He wasn't sure what time it was. Kicking the sheets slightly, he stretched his arms ritually to the steel bottom of the bunk above him while lying on his back, and then arched them back to touch behind his head, simultaneously tapping the wall down by his feet with his naked toes. He blinked the sleep from his eyes and brushed his hair over his shoulder back onto his back as he sat up to examine the room.
Black engorged the entire apartment, save for the glint of light under the door he could see through the open door to the bunkroom, and the mellow glow of a light in the empty bunk above him. Duo didn't quite connect that no one slept in the bunk above him, but instead busied himself with flexing his back muscles tentatively. Instant soreness. As soon as they moved again, they seized up stiffly but not enough to cause him real pain or inhibit him from moving. Duo grumbled to himself and flipped the blanket off himself, swinging his legs over the edge. His stomach was growling like a rabid pit bull by now.
Suddenly, a voice rang out above him, soft and dangerous, like a sleeping lion's purr.
"Get back in bed."
In the black, light poured out of the bunk above him as the curtain was pulled back. Duo squinted, his night-adjusted eyes stinging. He muttered a very intelligent, "Whaa…?" to go with.
Heero's disheveled head poked out, face stern and stone-set and a book in hand. His reading light flickered as he moved in the bunk.
"Get back in bed. I need to talk to you." His Prussian eyes seized on Duo's face, cocked up at him and pale in the yellow din of his reading light. They darted back and forth under furrowed brows, as he asked flatly, "Do you need anything?"
While mulling over the first part of Heero's statement, Duo rubbed at his eyes and mumbled, "…Yeah… some food…" When he realized how cold the apartment air could be while dressed only in his boxers, Duo quickly retreated back to his blankets and numbly watched Heero slip off his bunk and land silently on the floor. His head bobbed back up to be at eye level with Duo as he curled up in the secure darkness of his bunk, trying to hide under his cock-eyed bangs.
"It's eleven. You've been unconscious for nearly sixteen hours," Heero stated stoically, lifeless eyes staring into the black at the vague outline of his comrade.
In a gravelly, groggy voice, Duo replied sarcastically, "Nice to know I've been a lazy ass for an entire day."
Heero snorted humorlessly and started to shift off into the black.
The American propped himself up on his arms and asked suddenly, "Where are the others?"
"They left on a three day-mission." Heero paused, but didn't even bother to turn around.
"Why are you here? Shouldn't you be helping them?" He couldn't even see the Japanese boy anymore; he'd stalked off into the dark toward the kitchen. His eyebrows furrowed confusedly as he traced the sound of Heero's footsteps approaching the scanty fridge, a short-lived burst of starchy yellow-white light off in the distance, the muted clinking of a plate, and after a few seconds of wavering silence, footsteps returning to the bunkroom. Heero shut the door behind him and flicked on the lights.
Duo's eyes stung with more unexpected light, but he sucked it up and, wrapped thoroughly in blankets, hooked his legs over the edge of his bunk and stared at the bowl of questionable looking food and water bottle Heero handed him. Despite the unattractive smell the pale-colored soup gave off, Duo's hunger won over his taste buds and he dove right into it. The American recognized it as the nutrition soup that was a staple of Heero's diet, so buzzing with superfluous and essential vitamins and proteins alike that he could almost taste them. He quickly finished the thick soup and then took a long thirsty drink from the water bottle. When he wiped off his mouth, he saw that Heero was still standing there and apparently had been watching.
"Done?" he asked.
Duo mutely nodded, taking one last drink emptying the water bottle, and handed back the bowl and bottle back to Heero. "Thanks," he said lifelessly. His comrade just stashed the dirty dishes on his bed, which was immaculately made and wrinkle-free like always.
Duo wrinkled his nose, remembering what he had said a few minutes ago. "You still haven't answered my question," he said quietly, drained of his usual bravado and energy. "Why'd you stay?"
Heero climbed into Trowa's bunk, directly across from Duo's, and said, "Someone needed to stay back to look after you." His Prussian eyes drilled into Duo with just as much lackluster as the American's. "I stayed, that way we can settle this issue for good."
"What issue?" Duo asked, genuinely unknowing, sleep still clenching most of his brain.
Heero's face darkened slightly across from him. "You being able to hear me in your head," he pointed out impatiently, face settling back into the hint of a scowl again; a deep, dark, discontented shadow that contorted his face out of its normal stoic poise.
"Oh." The American's eyes strayed into the space between his toes. "I forgot… Hey, whatever happened about the b—I mean, Relena?"
"We finished voting without you," Heero stated.
"I hope you put me down as opposed," Duo snorted agitatedly, the image of that girl and her undressing, innocent green-blue eyes that feigned the act of a nice girl so wickedly just to get his friend where she wanted him. As much as he wanted to be bitter forever, how much easier it would be, Duo realized that it was wrong to take his frustration out on Heero if he was too naïve to recognize advances when they smacked him in the face with a shovel. He leaned forward, resting his hands in his lap, and asked, "…So… what was the final vote?"
"Two opposed, three not opposed."
Duo bit his lip, instantly. "Damn," he grumbled, the usual glint of dynamism completely void in his expression. Even his reserve of cynicism, saved for last, seemingly had gone bone dry. He was about to comment negatively on the subject further when Heero butted non-abrasively in first.
"We made a compromise to let her stay, but in the room across the hall instead of here. Happy?" Heero said harshly, picking up on the American's pessimism and striking back with his own. "She won't be interfering with us directly, then." Heero rested his elbows on his knees and scoffed. "And you won't fight with her."
"What?" Duo said, surprised. The Japanese could boldly see the frightened whites boring into him like a surprised ghost accusation.
The returning expression was smug. His Prussian eyes brooded under a cocked eyebrow, a dark knowing hint on his face, as he said, "Don't think I don't listen to you, Duo. Most of the time you don't even notice I'm there and you manage to rant a lot about Relena. The thoughts about just how you might be able to sneak past Wufei to stash the body are especially easy to pick up on—and hard to ignore." Duo was equally shocked by the fact that Heero had stalked undetected in his brain waves, his private thoughts, and by the rare humor in his comrade's voice. It died as quickly as it had bloomed, depriving his face of all hospitality like a desert chasing away incoming, life-saving rain clouds.
"Duo…" Heero's slightly nasal, rolling voice brought Duo's embarrassed, nervous eyes out from the crevices of his toes where they had quickly dropped.
"Yeah?"
"… Do you think you could learn how to shut me off, sort of tune me out?" His voice was hungry for answers and pure, hard, untainted facts.
The American gazed thoughtfully back for a brief second, scanning his brain for an opinion, then finally ended the search with a tired, slight shake of his head. He shifted within the warm billows of the blankets wrapped around his lower half uneasily; thoughts of what Heero could have eavesdropped upon in the sacred caverns of his brain still haunting him. "No," he said finally, "I don't think I can. I have no control over it… I don't even know when it's coming or leaving… Except for when it's gone…"
"Hn?" The curious tone meant for him to elaborate.
Duo quickly rubbed at his temple, then answered, gesturing in an aimless circle with his hand. "When your voice fades out… I get this weird reverberation in my brain, the same you get when you plug in a guitar the wrong way or mess with a microphone. It usually only stings a bit when it happens, but the last time it happened was when I got knocked out." Duo's violet eyes glinted up at Heero suddenly as he jerked his thumb toward the space behind the bunks where it had happened. "It felt like someone had poured acid on my brain and then stomped out the fire with steel-toed boots."
Suddenly, Heero's throat wasn't big enough to let air through and his mouth turned dry. He remembered the pain Duo had experienced vividly, albeit slightly nulled from being an second-hand experience. He nodded to himself, while closing his eyes; Duo's description hit the nail on the head fairly hard. "I know," Heero commented in a gravelly voice, gaze down. He sensed Duo's eyes freezing on him confusedly. "… I felt it, too…"
"What? ……Okay, wait a second. Let me get this straight," Duo said, punctuating with his pointing finger. "You felt… or you can feel what I feel? Pain? Emotions? Anything?"
"All of the above," the other pilot answered, stoic face drained. "Yes, it's true… that's why I threw up when you did… I don't get what you describe as feedback. I hardly know when I'm connected to your brainwaves." He tentatively lifted his eyes back up to gauge his comrade's reaction, to see if explanation swept across his face. Two purple eyes darted furiously back and forth, processing the answer, until finally the knot between his eyebrows tensely released with an angry sigh.
Duo threw his arms into the air, exasperated by this new burden to be carried on his shoulders, and flopped lifelessly back onto his bunk, barely missing smacking his head against the metal wall. "Peachy… just frickin' peachy!" A loud, abrasive sigh rushed through the air again. "Not only do we have a war to fight, we've got even more psychological shit to deal with. I'm messed up enough without literal voices in my head. What if this stuff never goes away, Heero? You're my friend and all, but my head is my head and it's no place for strangers.
"If it's causing you physical pain, that could be dangerous," Heero commented.
"Yeah, I know... I'm afraid of what it could degenerate into, but I don't know any way to get rid of it..."
Or if he wanted to.
"There's got to be a way. Otherwise," Heero mused, "suicide might be the only option. I wouldn't be able to stand it for long."
The American was instantly revived to his sitting position at this, face and most his body covered in the shadow from his bunk. An alien glare lit in his eyes, one to rival Heero's own fiercely, and an involuntary snarl caught his lip in an unpleased frown. Heero flinched, realizing it was a frown, in both a bit of fear and confusion. He'd never seen Duo mad like this… this dark, broody angry that wasn't unlike his own. A pit of sludge like bitterness wallowed up in the pit of his stomach, channeled from Duo. He flinched again when Duo hissed, "You hypocritical asshole."
He leaned forward, strangely threatening for a reasonably waifish boy bare-chested and wrapped up in a blanket from the waist down, and glared at Heero. A swirl of pain flickered in the bitterness Heero sensed for a second, and then was quickly smothered in more fuming and confused outlets of frustration.
"I get ratted on for sarcastically saying I'd kill myself, which I wouldn't do for no good reason, but it's alright for anguished Heero Yuy to turn to suicide to solve a problem, huh? …You think you're the only one not having a good time in this war? Open your eyes and take a damned good look around. Not everybody's got a big sappy grin on, Heero, and half the time they do, it's so that other people don't start getting even more depressed than they already are or need to be. So I think you should just suck it up some more and stick it out like the rest of us are trying to do." Duo's anger wavered, diminishing quickly after it had begun to vent, like a racehorse quick to retire, and he settled back, this time less severe in his tone. "You're not the only soldier who has to fight, Heero, so don't be so blind about it."
The Japanese boy stared back, uneased by the expression on the American's usually energetic, optimistic face lit with vigor that was as tried and gaunt and drawn as his own and the gurgling, exhausted sensation in his stomach that wasn't his. He managed not to break eye contact and used his stoic look to hide behind.
"Okay?" Duo asked, like a collage professor following up on a confusing lecture.
"Hai." Heero's head shied slightly off to the side, mentally smacking himself for letting himself get so self-pitying that he couldn't see Duo's point on his own… He'd gotten so numbed to the fact that everybody had been negatively affected by the war that he'd overlooked it until it became oblivious fact. Of course Duo was right, that damn idiot was right again… His face burned and he felt like a piece of shit, product of his own selfish perfectionism and self-destructive habits.
"I'm sorry," he mumbled.
Duo sighed. He'd finally come down from the adrenaline rush of his unexpected vent like a bad hangover and felt the stress causing his stomach to tense up around the diluted, hungry mix of only soup and water. He glanced back to Heero, hidden by his usual stoic façade, but obviously ashamed. "There's no reason to be sorry, Heero…" he said softly. "I kinda overreacted there. I haven't been feeling very good lately and I'm sorry I had to vent it out on you. I really am sorry."
/How can he be so forgiving like that? / Heero wondered.
Duo waited for Heero to respond patiently, then felt a little hurt that he'd probably soured his tentative truce with Heero, maybe stomped out the possibility for a friendship between them for a couple weeks, and Heero still sat staring at his hands, no doubt thinking and beating himself up. He flickered his eyes back and forth uncertainly, and then came to a decision. He slipped off the bunk, kicking off the blankets, to pull out an short knife from under the mattress where he hid some of his weapons.
Heero now was focused completely on what Duo was doing. "What is that for?"
The American paused, his back turned to his comrade, and then turned around with a joker mask plastered cheaply to his face. "I going to test our theory," he said, flicking the blade out in the poor lighting of the bunkroom. "Come down." Slipping off his bunk as silently as he could, Duo straightened up and patted his hair down for a second so he wouldn't look like a slugabed. Heero complied complacently, and was standing in front of Duo; nervously and respectably spaced, though.
"What are we doing?"
"I wanna prove if you really do feel everything I do," Duo said darkly, giving no clue to what his intentions were with the weapon. Heero's eyes lit on the knife blade as he causally shifted it around and had a pang of sudden fear. Luckily, he didn't seem to sense any suicidal urges from Duo, so he let it continue. But his eyes never left his face, ready to
"Hold out your arm," Duo ordered.
Heero did, so he could see the light golden skin of his arm dashed with faded scar tissue here and there. Duo did the same, raising the blade to his own skin. He glanced back to Heero for a second, unsure of what he was really looking for in his dark Prussian eyes, maybe fear, maybe reassuring stoicism. They were flat. So he looked down at his work.
With a flick of his wrist, he made a nice clean shallow cut over the outside of his arm so that blood came rushing to the surface to clot. He barely winced at all, because he was staring intently at Heero's arm, waiting for a reaction, whether it'd be nothing or that Heero dropped dead where he stood. After a minute when no physical cut appeared, Duo took a hold of Heero's loyally outstretched arm and stared at it closely. He snorted, being slightly disappointed. If he was going to be cursed like this, he wanted the full perks.
Still turning the arm and prodding where the he'd fabled the cut to appear, Duo asked, "You still felt it though, right?"
"Yeah."
"So… you feel it, but it's not really physically happening to you," Duo concluded. His head was still bowed down so that his long braided hair, now sprouting thin flyaways from sleeping on it, slid over his shoulder to rest over his chest like some strange pet.
The Japanese boy stared down at the back of the American's head. "That would explain why when you were drowning in the tub, I was still conscious."
A few playful tsks were emitted from the longhaired brunette, as he dropped Heero's arm, finally dissatisfied enough to be satisfied. "Hmm…what a strange disease you've infected me with, Heero."
"Hn," was all Heero could think of to comment with. He shifted uneasily, the incessant curious poking at his arm finally catching up with his patience, and tried to pull back from Duo. The American let go luckily soon enough so that it was one smooth, nonoffensive gesture. He groggily scratched at the tangled lump of hair at the nape of his neck and staggered back so that he sat down on Wufei's bunk. He hadn't made it before they'd left on the mission and the covers were lumped in one corner. Heero didn't move, still standing like a specter in the hallway.
"Who did I hit?" Duo asked once he was settled down. "I remember smacking someone before I lost consciousness this morning. I hope I didn't hit Wufei, he'd have my hide for it—"
"You hit me," Heero confessed, folding his arms, feeling it a necessary defense to keep Duo from getting under his skin. He tried to inject more lifelessness into his voice to hide the slight insecurities that he heard in it as well.
Duo's face lit with an apologetic smile, trying to ease some good will back into his sour-faced comrade. He never very well that Heero never took any of it, like a patient rejects the wrong blood type, but he always had to give himself an A for effort. As soon as Duo got, "I'm sorry," off his lips, Heero's always-analytical voice broke in.
"You were panicking; you would have hurt yourself if we let you continue."
"Uh-huh… so me smacking really didn't rattle you that much. You still think like a solider," Duo said with a half-amused tilt of his lips that eyes upset him in a strange way and it was the only way he knew to suppress it. Heero took as treacherous. Maybe he was on edge or something, but the tone, the dim flash of teeth, the glint in the big violet
"What do you mean by that." There was no question in his voice, just hostility.
Duo furrowed his eyebrows at Heero's response, surprise that such an impersonal seeming person would take it so personally. "It's a fact, Heero. There's nothing wrong with it. You talk like… a soldier. You analyze what you hear and state it the way you analyze it. There's not much to it. You think in war terms, how to be efficient." He snorted light-heartedly. "There's nothing derogatory about it, okay?"
Heero tightened his arms and grunted. It was all the answer Duo got. The American suddenly got a wish that he could feel Heero's emotion, that way he wouldn't be so damn fickle like this… this hostile, brutal, testosterone-fuming, I-know-ninety-nine-ways-to-shove-your-head-up-your-ass-so-don't-annoy-me kind of fickle that drove Duo to the edge and back but never soured his good feelings toward the Japanese pilot.
"Sorry," Duo tried again.
Staring back, the Japanese pilot smothered the frustrated but oddly content bubble in his stomach he knew was from Duo. He'd become amazingly effective in the short time it'd been going on to recognize what came from Duo and what didn't.
The all-effective grunt was appropriate at this time, as the unease returned to his stomach. Even gnashing on Duo didn't get rid of it. He knew that as long as he stood here before the half-naked Duo, it would grow and seethe and breed in his stomach until it grew infectious like his laughter. The American was making himself visibly comfortable for coaxing Heero into conversation, which had happened. It hadn't been on Duo's usual topics, but it had been conversation nonetheless, and this pointed out how easily his defense mechanism could be hacked into by this pilot.
Heero made a quick and cold decision to end the conversation. "You should get some sleep," he said. Duo nodded in response, rubbing some sleep from the corner of his eye. "You need to get back into normal sleeping rhythm."
"Right," he agreed again, stretching his arms sleepily.
Heero looked down at Duo's bare chest, pale in the yellow light… pale in any light for that matter. He finally realized how thin and breakable Duo looked, like he was a starving child in the streets of a tiny, run-down village, how vulnerable to attack and ruin his body seemed. Heero knew for a fact Duo could hold his own against any grown man extremely well, but it wasn't so much as pure, unadulterated strength as it was dynamic nerves, agility, and a near bastard-like recovering ability that made up for any lack of muscle he had. But even then, Duo wasn't at all physically incapable. Heero blinked, realizing just how long he'd been standing there, and hastily left the room on a silent and stiff note.
The other pilot shut the door behind him, leaving Duo alone to shut the light off himself, then stagger back through the dark to find his bed, sighing to himself.
He grumbled a thought in his head, slurred by this sudden pang of exhaustion that he hoped Heero didn't hear. For a moment, before turning around and returning to the warm cocoon of his bed, he pressed his ear to the door and could faintly hear Heero settling down on the couch. The American rubbed at the back of his head, then realized the thick presence of his braid was still there. Sitting quickly down on Wufei's bed, the nearest to him, he loosely, sleepily separated the three ribbons until they flowed down his back in a familiar warm sheet. Guiding himself off the bottom bunk in the dark with his eyes closed and by familiarity alone, he clamored back into his own bunk, slipping back into the blankets as quickly as he could, but the warmth he'd generated was long gone.
"Great, now I have warm up all over…" he mumbled to himself as he drew the blanket over his shoulder and dove head first into a welcome emotionless black unconsciousness that was sleep. He prayed for no dreams, but doubted that God was even real to answer that prayer.
Meanwhile, Heero lay on the couch in the comforting black that breathed around him, the blanket still kicked down at the foot from a few days before. He hadn't slept the entire day, this odd, paranoid feeling keeping him awake. The fear from watching Duo lie virtually dead in his arms, cold, blue and head lolling like a dead fish, a pale, ashen and stark contrast from the glowing life that came from him normally had come back to him after the sudden spike of pain that he'd sensed caused Duo to collapse with a vengeance. Not to mention the near psychotic worry that the odd psychic happenings had installed in him.
Suddenly, the room became bitingly cold. He hadn't felt the cold in the apartment before, so when he started shivering, he thought it was odd, but finally resorted to pulling the blanket around his bony shoulders. It wasn't necessary for him to be worrying and cold at the same time, he concluded, even though he didn't feel he deserved much more than being warm on the couch.
Staring off with sightless blue eyes into the dark, he began to drift off in thought, thinking about nothing, aching about everything, trying to minimize his world into one speck of light that he could concentrate on and ignore the rest. Accept the simple and mandatory and disregard the redundant.
As Heero finally moved toward his version of restless, lifeless sleep, a sudden sound jerked him awake. It was so quiet that it jerked him awake with the worst kind of fear, the unknown, unjustified but still disturbing fear like the sound of a door opening somewhere far off. He leaned upward in the black, eyes searching as well as his ears for the sound, but, with his blood pounding in his ear, couldn't hear it. The Japanese pilot reluctantly laid down, then suddenly scented on it. Faintly, he could hear breathing in the back of his head. With a weary sigh, he realized that he was once again immersed in his American comrade's thoughts, but strangely heard him breath as he sleep.
/Duo? /
No answer.
Lying on his back, Heero drew his eyebrows tightly together. This had never happened before…
Suddenly, the unease that had plagued his tossing stomach died, and before he could think about the sudden breathing in his head, he was asleep as well… finally led into black.
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gaawd i take long to write.... I should take more sugar or something because I'm dead tired. it's only eleven, when i usually start writing, but now I can barely keep my eyes open and I'm telling myself just goooo tooo sleeep.... like in my history teacher's class, Mr. VanRanst, or Mr. V, or Mr. V-Ran, or Mr. Big Answer, whatever you prefer. He can talk and talk and.... he'd go in to a boxing ring with the energizer bunny and it would be asking for like protein shakes and energy bars just to keep awake from all his talking. No offense, Mr. V, if your reading. yeah, hell if my history teacher wanders aroudn the interent looking for gundam wing yaoi stories to read. Now he might read civil war yaoi stories... but that's still a stretch. Sorry it took so long but I'm working simenotaneously (damn, where's my dictionary when I need it?) on the second chapter for twelve and it's really draining to shift back and forth from complicated plot line to complicated plot line in a matter of seconds and keep the situations straight. One sentence for Basket Case, then one sentence for Twelve.... it huuuuuurrttss my brrainn hurrts. thank you for hanging on for so long... thank you merci arigatou. I'm going to SLEEP!! No wonder why I wrote them sleeping at the very end, that's what I want to do! bye... oh and the title is one of the best jangly/melodic/cutesy/ballad-like songs ever, played by the awesome alt band the pixies, ever heard? okay, now bye. oh wait, I'm planning to draw pictures for this soon, probably when I wake up. over work myself? naw. okay. now. good. bye.
Outside there's a boxcar waiting
Outside the family stew
Out by the fire breathing
Outside we wait 'til face turns blue
I know the nervous walking
I know the dirty beard hangs
Out by the boxcar waiting
Take me away to nowhere plains
There is a wait so long
You'll never wait so long
Here comes your man
Big shake on the boxcar moving
Big shake to the land that's falling down
Is a wind makes a palm stop blowing
A big, big stone fall and break my crown
There is a wait so long
You'll never wait so long
Here comes your man
There is a wait so long
You'll never wait so long
Here comes your man
Chapter 5: Here Comes Your Man
So that there would be no changing of the votes because of alliances in their little group that could sway the other member's opinion, Quatre made them all close their eyes while they voted. There were minor grumbles in the room, most of them Wufei voicing his disapproval of Relena staying directed more at himself than anyone. But each pilot closed their eyes, rolling them first optional, and sat back and waited for the each other to finish voting. As soon as his lids fell over his eyes, Duo's arm was straight in the air to vote 'opposed', his chest burning with anger at the nerve of that girl… invading and prancing in like she owned their own little private hell—no! It was theirs, and only theirs.
She hadn't been in the war like they had. While she had been calculating and strategizing and memorizing speeches to persuade the public in this little chess game of war, they had been the paws she'd been using. They were the ones giving up their lives, their chances for a normal life, permanently. It wasn't that she understood and still disrespected them… she'd never be able to understand period.
/…I think I'd rather kill myself than let her stay here…/ he thought bitterly. Duo didn't realize in his anger that another bout of feedback had gone through his head, since he'd become accustomed to it, and just how loud he was thinking.
/I won't let you. /
The alien sound of a deep, rough voice seemed to explode into existence in his mind. Duo's heart just about stopped, jolted by how suddenly it had appeared. He had to squint fearsomely so that he wouldn't open them and make them vote all over again, bite his lip so he wouldn't make a noise, and dig his fingers into his thigh to stop him from jumping in shock.
/Jesus! Scare me to death, why don't you! Man… /
/…I won't. /
/Heero? /
A mental sigh not his own filled the echo of his skull, as if his brain was an auditorium and Heero was standing with in that auditorium talking inches from him. It sounded—no, felt so real.
/…Yes, / he answered after a pause. The tired age was stunningly prominent in his voice. /…it's me. So you can hear me again.../
Duo kept his eyes closed, and paused to listen for Quatre to tell them to open their eyes. To tell them the voting was over and Relena was on the next flight home, but it was oddly quiet outside the strange new conversation in his brain. He "turned" back to talk to Heero again. /I thought it was you, but now… it just seems weird to actually be talking to you like this. Well… thinking to you or something like that. /
/Have you heard anyone else like this? /
/No. This has never happened before. I really don't think I'm psychic or anything. /
/Maybe it's a recurring hallucination…/ Heero's voice was tinted with flickering insecurity, as if his eyes were shying down to the floor.
/Be serious. No one has the exact same hallucinations at the same time, Heero. /
/…No, I mean… you could be the hallucination. /
/Me? Hey, you could be the hallucination too! /
/…You're right… then we're not imagining it. /
/Dammed right! /
/… Duo? /
/Yeah? What, Hee-chan? /
/…What did you mean by what you said… in the hospital wing?—/
Before Duo had a second to react, he could sense the feedback rising again in the back of his brain, sweeping over his hearing viciously and disconnecting them like it'd done before… but now it sliced into his ear drums and every cell in his brain like a frenzied butcher knife trying to beat the life out of him. It was thick, liquid, throbbing acid pain in his head that made him squeeze his eyes shut, teeth clamped down on tongue firmly to keep the yelp of sudden, unexpected pain bottled in. As the last remnants of Heero's voice in his head faded, he got a final spark of worry from him that melted into oblivion. Duo was alone now and his pain, instead of wavering and fading like Duo expected it should now that the feedback was gone, seemingly got a malicious will and intensified.
Finally, Duo let in and let out a shaky groan as he tried to sit up straight, pain racking down his neck and back like molten knives and eyes squinted painfully shut. Vertigo plagued him suddenly and he could hear wary voices calling out to him, their words slurred, and felt a hand on his shoulder as he toppled backwards, nearly taking the person with him. He hit the floor and the room erupted in the sound of people rushing over to him. All the while, the pain train was making steady progression down his back and through his chest. His vision was swirling pink and red and black behind his eyelids and hands were struggling to help him up, voices still murmuring off in the distance. Duo said something, although he wasn't sure what, and tried desperately to curl back up on the floor. The more they tried to stand him up, the more the pain intensified. In his daze, his arm whipped out, trying to discourage them, struck flesh, a hand let go of his shoulder, his head smacked against the floor, and blackness swallowed.
The smell of starched fabric was the first thing that Duo knew when he regained consciousness, the second was that his nose wedged firmly into his pillow and his hair was draped over his bare shoulder. Darkness greeted his eyes when he opened them, so he closed them again and prepared to roll over and dive into sleep again. But a spike of sudden hunger rushed up to greet him, like it had been caught off guard, demolishing any hopes Duo had of going back to sleep.
The American took in his first deep breath of the day—or night. He wasn't sure what time it was. Kicking the sheets slightly, he stretched his arms ritually to the steel bottom of the bunk above him while lying on his back, and then arched them back to touch behind his head, simultaneously tapping the wall down by his feet with his naked toes. He blinked the sleep from his eyes and brushed his hair over his shoulder back onto his back as he sat up to examine the room.
Black engorged the entire apartment, save for the glint of light under the door he could see through the open door to the bunkroom, and the mellow glow of a light in the empty bunk above him. Duo didn't quite connect that no one slept in the bunk above him, but instead busied himself with flexing his back muscles tentatively. Instant soreness. As soon as they moved again, they seized up stiffly but not enough to cause him real pain or inhibit him from moving. Duo grumbled to himself and flipped the blanket off himself, swinging his legs over the edge. His stomach was growling like a rabid pit bull by now.
Suddenly, a voice rang out above him, soft and dangerous, like a sleeping lion's purr.
"Get back in bed."
In the black, light poured out of the bunk above him as the curtain was pulled back. Duo squinted, his night-adjusted eyes stinging. He muttered a very intelligent, "Whaa…?" to go with.
Heero's disheveled head poked out, face stern and stone-set and a book in hand. His reading light flickered as he moved in the bunk.
"Get back in bed. I need to talk to you." His Prussian eyes seized on Duo's face, cocked up at him and pale in the yellow din of his reading light. They darted back and forth under furrowed brows, as he asked flatly, "Do you need anything?"
While mulling over the first part of Heero's statement, Duo rubbed at his eyes and mumbled, "…Yeah… some food…" When he realized how cold the apartment air could be while dressed only in his boxers, Duo quickly retreated back to his blankets and numbly watched Heero slip off his bunk and land silently on the floor. His head bobbed back up to be at eye level with Duo as he curled up in the secure darkness of his bunk, trying to hide under his cock-eyed bangs.
"It's eleven. You've been unconscious for nearly sixteen hours," Heero stated stoically, lifeless eyes staring into the black at the vague outline of his comrade.
In a gravelly, groggy voice, Duo replied sarcastically, "Nice to know I've been a lazy ass for an entire day."
Heero snorted humorlessly and started to shift off into the black.
The American propped himself up on his arms and asked suddenly, "Where are the others?"
"They left on a three day-mission." Heero paused, but didn't even bother to turn around.
"Why are you here? Shouldn't you be helping them?" He couldn't even see the Japanese boy anymore; he'd stalked off into the dark toward the kitchen. His eyebrows furrowed confusedly as he traced the sound of Heero's footsteps approaching the scanty fridge, a short-lived burst of starchy yellow-white light off in the distance, the muted clinking of a plate, and after a few seconds of wavering silence, footsteps returning to the bunkroom. Heero shut the door behind him and flicked on the lights.
Duo's eyes stung with more unexpected light, but he sucked it up and, wrapped thoroughly in blankets, hooked his legs over the edge of his bunk and stared at the bowl of questionable looking food and water bottle Heero handed him. Despite the unattractive smell the pale-colored soup gave off, Duo's hunger won over his taste buds and he dove right into it. The American recognized it as the nutrition soup that was a staple of Heero's diet, so buzzing with superfluous and essential vitamins and proteins alike that he could almost taste them. He quickly finished the thick soup and then took a long thirsty drink from the water bottle. When he wiped off his mouth, he saw that Heero was still standing there and apparently had been watching.
"Done?" he asked.
Duo mutely nodded, taking one last drink emptying the water bottle, and handed back the bowl and bottle back to Heero. "Thanks," he said lifelessly. His comrade just stashed the dirty dishes on his bed, which was immaculately made and wrinkle-free like always.
Duo wrinkled his nose, remembering what he had said a few minutes ago. "You still haven't answered my question," he said quietly, drained of his usual bravado and energy. "Why'd you stay?"
Heero climbed into Trowa's bunk, directly across from Duo's, and said, "Someone needed to stay back to look after you." His Prussian eyes drilled into Duo with just as much lackluster as the American's. "I stayed, that way we can settle this issue for good."
"What issue?" Duo asked, genuinely unknowing, sleep still clenching most of his brain.
Heero's face darkened slightly across from him. "You being able to hear me in your head," he pointed out impatiently, face settling back into the hint of a scowl again; a deep, dark, discontented shadow that contorted his face out of its normal stoic poise.
"Oh." The American's eyes strayed into the space between his toes. "I forgot… Hey, whatever happened about the b—I mean, Relena?"
"We finished voting without you," Heero stated.
"I hope you put me down as opposed," Duo snorted agitatedly, the image of that girl and her undressing, innocent green-blue eyes that feigned the act of a nice girl so wickedly just to get his friend where she wanted him. As much as he wanted to be bitter forever, how much easier it would be, Duo realized that it was wrong to take his frustration out on Heero if he was too naïve to recognize advances when they smacked him in the face with a shovel. He leaned forward, resting his hands in his lap, and asked, "…So… what was the final vote?"
"Two opposed, three not opposed."
Duo bit his lip, instantly. "Damn," he grumbled, the usual glint of dynamism completely void in his expression. Even his reserve of cynicism, saved for last, seemingly had gone bone dry. He was about to comment negatively on the subject further when Heero butted non-abrasively in first.
"We made a compromise to let her stay, but in the room across the hall instead of here. Happy?" Heero said harshly, picking up on the American's pessimism and striking back with his own. "She won't be interfering with us directly, then." Heero rested his elbows on his knees and scoffed. "And you won't fight with her."
"What?" Duo said, surprised. The Japanese could boldly see the frightened whites boring into him like a surprised ghost accusation.
The returning expression was smug. His Prussian eyes brooded under a cocked eyebrow, a dark knowing hint on his face, as he said, "Don't think I don't listen to you, Duo. Most of the time you don't even notice I'm there and you manage to rant a lot about Relena. The thoughts about just how you might be able to sneak past Wufei to stash the body are especially easy to pick up on—and hard to ignore." Duo was equally shocked by the fact that Heero had stalked undetected in his brain waves, his private thoughts, and by the rare humor in his comrade's voice. It died as quickly as it had bloomed, depriving his face of all hospitality like a desert chasing away incoming, life-saving rain clouds.
"Duo…" Heero's slightly nasal, rolling voice brought Duo's embarrassed, nervous eyes out from the crevices of his toes where they had quickly dropped.
"Yeah?"
"… Do you think you could learn how to shut me off, sort of tune me out?" His voice was hungry for answers and pure, hard, untainted facts.
The American gazed thoughtfully back for a brief second, scanning his brain for an opinion, then finally ended the search with a tired, slight shake of his head. He shifted within the warm billows of the blankets wrapped around his lower half uneasily; thoughts of what Heero could have eavesdropped upon in the sacred caverns of his brain still haunting him. "No," he said finally, "I don't think I can. I have no control over it… I don't even know when it's coming or leaving… Except for when it's gone…"
"Hn?" The curious tone meant for him to elaborate.
Duo quickly rubbed at his temple, then answered, gesturing in an aimless circle with his hand. "When your voice fades out… I get this weird reverberation in my brain, the same you get when you plug in a guitar the wrong way or mess with a microphone. It usually only stings a bit when it happens, but the last time it happened was when I got knocked out." Duo's violet eyes glinted up at Heero suddenly as he jerked his thumb toward the space behind the bunks where it had happened. "It felt like someone had poured acid on my brain and then stomped out the fire with steel-toed boots."
Suddenly, Heero's throat wasn't big enough to let air through and his mouth turned dry. He remembered the pain Duo had experienced vividly, albeit slightly nulled from being an second-hand experience. He nodded to himself, while closing his eyes; Duo's description hit the nail on the head fairly hard. "I know," Heero commented in a gravelly voice, gaze down. He sensed Duo's eyes freezing on him confusedly. "… I felt it, too…"
"What? ……Okay, wait a second. Let me get this straight," Duo said, punctuating with his pointing finger. "You felt… or you can feel what I feel? Pain? Emotions? Anything?"
"All of the above," the other pilot answered, stoic face drained. "Yes, it's true… that's why I threw up when you did… I don't get what you describe as feedback. I hardly know when I'm connected to your brainwaves." He tentatively lifted his eyes back up to gauge his comrade's reaction, to see if explanation swept across his face. Two purple eyes darted furiously back and forth, processing the answer, until finally the knot between his eyebrows tensely released with an angry sigh.
Duo threw his arms into the air, exasperated by this new burden to be carried on his shoulders, and flopped lifelessly back onto his bunk, barely missing smacking his head against the metal wall. "Peachy… just frickin' peachy!" A loud, abrasive sigh rushed through the air again. "Not only do we have a war to fight, we've got even more psychological shit to deal with. I'm messed up enough without literal voices in my head. What if this stuff never goes away, Heero? You're my friend and all, but my head is my head and it's no place for strangers.
"If it's causing you physical pain, that could be dangerous," Heero commented.
"Yeah, I know... I'm afraid of what it could degenerate into, but I don't know any way to get rid of it..."
Or if he wanted to.
"There's got to be a way. Otherwise," Heero mused, "suicide might be the only option. I wouldn't be able to stand it for long."
The American was instantly revived to his sitting position at this, face and most his body covered in the shadow from his bunk. An alien glare lit in his eyes, one to rival Heero's own fiercely, and an involuntary snarl caught his lip in an unpleased frown. Heero flinched, realizing it was a frown, in both a bit of fear and confusion. He'd never seen Duo mad like this… this dark, broody angry that wasn't unlike his own. A pit of sludge like bitterness wallowed up in the pit of his stomach, channeled from Duo. He flinched again when Duo hissed, "You hypocritical asshole."
He leaned forward, strangely threatening for a reasonably waifish boy bare-chested and wrapped up in a blanket from the waist down, and glared at Heero. A swirl of pain flickered in the bitterness Heero sensed for a second, and then was quickly smothered in more fuming and confused outlets of frustration.
"I get ratted on for sarcastically saying I'd kill myself, which I wouldn't do for no good reason, but it's alright for anguished Heero Yuy to turn to suicide to solve a problem, huh? …You think you're the only one not having a good time in this war? Open your eyes and take a damned good look around. Not everybody's got a big sappy grin on, Heero, and half the time they do, it's so that other people don't start getting even more depressed than they already are or need to be. So I think you should just suck it up some more and stick it out like the rest of us are trying to do." Duo's anger wavered, diminishing quickly after it had begun to vent, like a racehorse quick to retire, and he settled back, this time less severe in his tone. "You're not the only soldier who has to fight, Heero, so don't be so blind about it."
The Japanese boy stared back, uneased by the expression on the American's usually energetic, optimistic face lit with vigor that was as tried and gaunt and drawn as his own and the gurgling, exhausted sensation in his stomach that wasn't his. He managed not to break eye contact and used his stoic look to hide behind.
"Okay?" Duo asked, like a collage professor following up on a confusing lecture.
"Hai." Heero's head shied slightly off to the side, mentally smacking himself for letting himself get so self-pitying that he couldn't see Duo's point on his own… He'd gotten so numbed to the fact that everybody had been negatively affected by the war that he'd overlooked it until it became oblivious fact. Of course Duo was right, that damn idiot was right again… His face burned and he felt like a piece of shit, product of his own selfish perfectionism and self-destructive habits.
"I'm sorry," he mumbled.
Duo sighed. He'd finally come down from the adrenaline rush of his unexpected vent like a bad hangover and felt the stress causing his stomach to tense up around the diluted, hungry mix of only soup and water. He glanced back to Heero, hidden by his usual stoic façade, but obviously ashamed. "There's no reason to be sorry, Heero…" he said softly. "I kinda overreacted there. I haven't been feeling very good lately and I'm sorry I had to vent it out on you. I really am sorry."
/How can he be so forgiving like that? / Heero wondered.
Duo waited for Heero to respond patiently, then felt a little hurt that he'd probably soured his tentative truce with Heero, maybe stomped out the possibility for a friendship between them for a couple weeks, and Heero still sat staring at his hands, no doubt thinking and beating himself up. He flickered his eyes back and forth uncertainly, and then came to a decision. He slipped off the bunk, kicking off the blankets, to pull out an short knife from under the mattress where he hid some of his weapons.
Heero now was focused completely on what Duo was doing. "What is that for?"
The American paused, his back turned to his comrade, and then turned around with a joker mask plastered cheaply to his face. "I going to test our theory," he said, flicking the blade out in the poor lighting of the bunkroom. "Come down." Slipping off his bunk as silently as he could, Duo straightened up and patted his hair down for a second so he wouldn't look like a slugabed. Heero complied complacently, and was standing in front of Duo; nervously and respectably spaced, though.
"What are we doing?"
"I wanna prove if you really do feel everything I do," Duo said darkly, giving no clue to what his intentions were with the weapon. Heero's eyes lit on the knife blade as he causally shifted it around and had a pang of sudden fear. Luckily, he didn't seem to sense any suicidal urges from Duo, so he let it continue. But his eyes never left his face, ready to
"Hold out your arm," Duo ordered.
Heero did, so he could see the light golden skin of his arm dashed with faded scar tissue here and there. Duo did the same, raising the blade to his own skin. He glanced back to Heero for a second, unsure of what he was really looking for in his dark Prussian eyes, maybe fear, maybe reassuring stoicism. They were flat. So he looked down at his work.
With a flick of his wrist, he made a nice clean shallow cut over the outside of his arm so that blood came rushing to the surface to clot. He barely winced at all, because he was staring intently at Heero's arm, waiting for a reaction, whether it'd be nothing or that Heero dropped dead where he stood. After a minute when no physical cut appeared, Duo took a hold of Heero's loyally outstretched arm and stared at it closely. He snorted, being slightly disappointed. If he was going to be cursed like this, he wanted the full perks.
Still turning the arm and prodding where the he'd fabled the cut to appear, Duo asked, "You still felt it though, right?"
"Yeah."
"So… you feel it, but it's not really physically happening to you," Duo concluded. His head was still bowed down so that his long braided hair, now sprouting thin flyaways from sleeping on it, slid over his shoulder to rest over his chest like some strange pet.
The Japanese boy stared down at the back of the American's head. "That would explain why when you were drowning in the tub, I was still conscious."
A few playful tsks were emitted from the longhaired brunette, as he dropped Heero's arm, finally dissatisfied enough to be satisfied. "Hmm…what a strange disease you've infected me with, Heero."
"Hn," was all Heero could think of to comment with. He shifted uneasily, the incessant curious poking at his arm finally catching up with his patience, and tried to pull back from Duo. The American let go luckily soon enough so that it was one smooth, nonoffensive gesture. He groggily scratched at the tangled lump of hair at the nape of his neck and staggered back so that he sat down on Wufei's bunk. He hadn't made it before they'd left on the mission and the covers were lumped in one corner. Heero didn't move, still standing like a specter in the hallway.
"Who did I hit?" Duo asked once he was settled down. "I remember smacking someone before I lost consciousness this morning. I hope I didn't hit Wufei, he'd have my hide for it—"
"You hit me," Heero confessed, folding his arms, feeling it a necessary defense to keep Duo from getting under his skin. He tried to inject more lifelessness into his voice to hide the slight insecurities that he heard in it as well.
Duo's face lit with an apologetic smile, trying to ease some good will back into his sour-faced comrade. He never very well that Heero never took any of it, like a patient rejects the wrong blood type, but he always had to give himself an A for effort. As soon as Duo got, "I'm sorry," off his lips, Heero's always-analytical voice broke in.
"You were panicking; you would have hurt yourself if we let you continue."
"Uh-huh… so me smacking really didn't rattle you that much. You still think like a solider," Duo said with a half-amused tilt of his lips that eyes upset him in a strange way and it was the only way he knew to suppress it. Heero took as treacherous. Maybe he was on edge or something, but the tone, the dim flash of teeth, the glint in the big violet
"What do you mean by that." There was no question in his voice, just hostility.
Duo furrowed his eyebrows at Heero's response, surprise that such an impersonal seeming person would take it so personally. "It's a fact, Heero. There's nothing wrong with it. You talk like… a soldier. You analyze what you hear and state it the way you analyze it. There's not much to it. You think in war terms, how to be efficient." He snorted light-heartedly. "There's nothing derogatory about it, okay?"
Heero tightened his arms and grunted. It was all the answer Duo got. The American suddenly got a wish that he could feel Heero's emotion, that way he wouldn't be so damn fickle like this… this hostile, brutal, testosterone-fuming, I-know-ninety-nine-ways-to-shove-your-head-up-your-ass-so-don't-annoy-me kind of fickle that drove Duo to the edge and back but never soured his good feelings toward the Japanese pilot.
"Sorry," Duo tried again.
Staring back, the Japanese pilot smothered the frustrated but oddly content bubble in his stomach he knew was from Duo. He'd become amazingly effective in the short time it'd been going on to recognize what came from Duo and what didn't.
The all-effective grunt was appropriate at this time, as the unease returned to his stomach. Even gnashing on Duo didn't get rid of it. He knew that as long as he stood here before the half-naked Duo, it would grow and seethe and breed in his stomach until it grew infectious like his laughter. The American was making himself visibly comfortable for coaxing Heero into conversation, which had happened. It hadn't been on Duo's usual topics, but it had been conversation nonetheless, and this pointed out how easily his defense mechanism could be hacked into by this pilot.
Heero made a quick and cold decision to end the conversation. "You should get some sleep," he said. Duo nodded in response, rubbing some sleep from the corner of his eye. "You need to get back into normal sleeping rhythm."
"Right," he agreed again, stretching his arms sleepily.
Heero looked down at Duo's bare chest, pale in the yellow light… pale in any light for that matter. He finally realized how thin and breakable Duo looked, like he was a starving child in the streets of a tiny, run-down village, how vulnerable to attack and ruin his body seemed. Heero knew for a fact Duo could hold his own against any grown man extremely well, but it wasn't so much as pure, unadulterated strength as it was dynamic nerves, agility, and a near bastard-like recovering ability that made up for any lack of muscle he had. But even then, Duo wasn't at all physically incapable. Heero blinked, realizing just how long he'd been standing there, and hastily left the room on a silent and stiff note.
The other pilot shut the door behind him, leaving Duo alone to shut the light off himself, then stagger back through the dark to find his bed, sighing to himself.
He grumbled a thought in his head, slurred by this sudden pang of exhaustion that he hoped Heero didn't hear. For a moment, before turning around and returning to the warm cocoon of his bed, he pressed his ear to the door and could faintly hear Heero settling down on the couch. The American rubbed at the back of his head, then realized the thick presence of his braid was still there. Sitting quickly down on Wufei's bed, the nearest to him, he loosely, sleepily separated the three ribbons until they flowed down his back in a familiar warm sheet. Guiding himself off the bottom bunk in the dark with his eyes closed and by familiarity alone, he clamored back into his own bunk, slipping back into the blankets as quickly as he could, but the warmth he'd generated was long gone.
"Great, now I have warm up all over…" he mumbled to himself as he drew the blanket over his shoulder and dove head first into a welcome emotionless black unconsciousness that was sleep. He prayed for no dreams, but doubted that God was even real to answer that prayer.
Meanwhile, Heero lay on the couch in the comforting black that breathed around him, the blanket still kicked down at the foot from a few days before. He hadn't slept the entire day, this odd, paranoid feeling keeping him awake. The fear from watching Duo lie virtually dead in his arms, cold, blue and head lolling like a dead fish, a pale, ashen and stark contrast from the glowing life that came from him normally had come back to him after the sudden spike of pain that he'd sensed caused Duo to collapse with a vengeance. Not to mention the near psychotic worry that the odd psychic happenings had installed in him.
Suddenly, the room became bitingly cold. He hadn't felt the cold in the apartment before, so when he started shivering, he thought it was odd, but finally resorted to pulling the blanket around his bony shoulders. It wasn't necessary for him to be worrying and cold at the same time, he concluded, even though he didn't feel he deserved much more than being warm on the couch.
Staring off with sightless blue eyes into the dark, he began to drift off in thought, thinking about nothing, aching about everything, trying to minimize his world into one speck of light that he could concentrate on and ignore the rest. Accept the simple and mandatory and disregard the redundant.
As Heero finally moved toward his version of restless, lifeless sleep, a sudden sound jerked him awake. It was so quiet that it jerked him awake with the worst kind of fear, the unknown, unjustified but still disturbing fear like the sound of a door opening somewhere far off. He leaned upward in the black, eyes searching as well as his ears for the sound, but, with his blood pounding in his ear, couldn't hear it. The Japanese pilot reluctantly laid down, then suddenly scented on it. Faintly, he could hear breathing in the back of his head. With a weary sigh, he realized that he was once again immersed in his American comrade's thoughts, but strangely heard him breath as he sleep.
/Duo? /
No answer.
Lying on his back, Heero drew his eyebrows tightly together. This had never happened before…
Suddenly, the unease that had plagued his tossing stomach died, and before he could think about the sudden breathing in his head, he was asleep as well… finally led into black.
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gaawd i take long to write.... I should take more sugar or something because I'm dead tired. it's only eleven, when i usually start writing, but now I can barely keep my eyes open and I'm telling myself just goooo tooo sleeep.... like in my history teacher's class, Mr. VanRanst, or Mr. V, or Mr. V-Ran, or Mr. Big Answer, whatever you prefer. He can talk and talk and.... he'd go in to a boxing ring with the energizer bunny and it would be asking for like protein shakes and energy bars just to keep awake from all his talking. No offense, Mr. V, if your reading. yeah, hell if my history teacher wanders aroudn the interent looking for gundam wing yaoi stories to read. Now he might read civil war yaoi stories... but that's still a stretch. Sorry it took so long but I'm working simenotaneously (damn, where's my dictionary when I need it?) on the second chapter for twelve and it's really draining to shift back and forth from complicated plot line to complicated plot line in a matter of seconds and keep the situations straight. One sentence for Basket Case, then one sentence for Twelve.... it huuuuuurrttss my brrainn hurrts. thank you for hanging on for so long... thank you merci arigatou. I'm going to SLEEP!! No wonder why I wrote them sleeping at the very end, that's what I want to do! bye... oh and the title is one of the best jangly/melodic/cutesy/ballad-like songs ever, played by the awesome alt band the pixies, ever heard? okay, now bye. oh wait, I'm planning to draw pictures for this soon, probably when I wake up. over work myself? naw. okay. now. good. bye.
Outside there's a boxcar waiting
Outside the family stew
Out by the fire breathing
Outside we wait 'til face turns blue
I know the nervous walking
I know the dirty beard hangs
Out by the boxcar waiting
Take me away to nowhere plains
There is a wait so long
You'll never wait so long
Here comes your man
Big shake on the boxcar moving
Big shake to the land that's falling down
Is a wind makes a palm stop blowing
A big, big stone fall and break my crown
There is a wait so long
You'll never wait so long
Here comes your man
There is a wait so long
You'll never wait so long
Here comes your man