Wufei was the first to wake that morning. As always, he woke up promptly at 8 A.M., stretching his long arms over his head in an invigorating yawn. The young Asian clad his naked body in his traditional white linen clothes and tied his black hair in a modest pony tail before heading off to make breakfast. Wufei would begin each morning with a bowl of rice and egg with two slices of plain wheat toast. He would then proceed to do basic chores around his house and in the yard.

Duo and Heero had a less traditional morning. Usually the two were up just an hour after Wufei. But this morning the two slept past 11, waking just before noon. Before heading downstairs for a late breakfast, Heero felt in necessary to check up and rebandage Duos' nose which displeased the braided pilot quite a bit. Having slept in so long, he was nothing less of starving. Heero dismissed his partner and turned back to his bed trying desperately to catch a few more Z's. It had been a very late night.

"Hey Fei," Duo hollered out into the front lawn, and empty egg carton in his hand, "I was gonna make scrambled eggs, what gives?" Wufei looked up from the light yard work he was doing and gave Duo an evil glare.

"There were two left, I always have two eggs, deal with it Duo or get dressed and go to the store."

"Get dressed? I wanted to make scrambled eggs for Quatre and Trowa, it's their fave breakfast food."

"Well," Wufei sighed, coming back into the house, "I haven't seen them all morning, and unlike you I have been up all morning. You should probably make plans to cook their favorite dinner."

"Oh man," Duo cooed worriedly, "you think they're ok?"

"They're probably just dead tired, they had a long night last night I'm sure," Wufei reassured. "Now may I please get back to my yard work?"

"Shouldn't you be doing some technical mumbo jumbo clean up work with Heero or something. I mean, after all, we blew up a major enormous OZ ship last night, in case you don't recall." Duo smirked.

"Yes, I do recall, but I was going to wait until Heero woke up, so until then.."

"I'm up now," came a voice behind Duo. Wufei peeked over to see a boxer clad Heero standing behind him.

"So much for your yard work Fei." Duo laughed.

"Duo, finish Fei's yard work, then after that there's a pile of dishes in the sink that has your name written all over them." Heero said without a hint of amusement. Wufei couldn't contain his laughter.

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Quatre awoke with the afternoon sun in his eyes. He didn't remember falling asleep; in fact he didn't remember much of the previous night. It was all just a nasty headache to him now. His body ached from sleeping all night in the tiny chair, and his vision had been reduced to a weak blur just in front of his nose. Quatre rubbed his eyes vigorously, but it didn't do much good. His eyesight had suddenly become very poor. Touching the back of his head, Quatre could still feel his bandages from the night before, which brought back a flood of awful memories. The ship, the capture, the beatings, the torture, the explosion....but that was all over now. Now it was time to nurse the wounds the battle had given them, though some ran deeper than others.

"Hey Quatre," came a perky voice, "did you have this door open all
night?"

"Yeah, it was warm..is that you Duo?" Quatre felt woozy.

"Course it's me, why? Do I look different?"

"No, but.." Quatre was ready to topple over.

"But what? Quatre, you're not looking too good." Duo placed his hand on Quatre's forehead.

"It's my vision, it's all blurry. I think," he said, reaching again for the back of his head, "I think something happened when that wrench hit me. Funny, I was okay last night.."

"I think we need to get you and Trowa a doctor." Trowa. Quatre felt his mind race, he'd forgotten Trowa. How could he?

"Duo, is he okay, I mean, how does he look?" The blonde tried to get up out of his chair, but Duos' hand restrained him.

"Relax, he's sleeping. If you want to get up be careful, I'd hate to see you injure yourself again."

"He's sleeping, are you sure?"

"Quatre," Duo sighed, "he's not dead if that's what you're asking. Here," taking Quatre's hand, Duo led his friend over to Trowa's bedside, where he placed Quatre's hand on Trowa's heaving chest. "See, he's fine." The young boy smiled, though his distorted vision he was able to make out his friends sleeping form.

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"I don't think we can manage a doctor," Heero said grimly, his eyes glued to his laptop screen.
"Can't manage?" Duo raged, "what do you mean? We have two seriously injured people upstairs, one's blind and the other is, I don't know, in a coma or something!"

"You know Duo, just because you yell, doesn't mean I'm going to do anything. Wufei and I have a lot of work to do, so if you please,"

"Heero, don't do this!" The braided boy whined, "this is totally serious."
"He is right," Wufei perked up, "I mean, how are we supposed to find a doctor? How are we supposed to get them here?"

"We look them up in a phone book and give them directions to the house, easy."

"No, it's not," Heero said flatly. "Our job, no matter what, is to lie low and not draw attention to ourselves. We can't just drag somebody we don't know, can't trust, can't believe into the house. What do we tell them? That those two were injured on a secret mission on an OZ ship? Which, by the way, is all over the news."

"Ok, so it's a risk, I understand that. But isn't it a risk to leave those two without any medical attention alone?" Duo was trying his hardest, but he had a feeling that wasn't going to be good enough.

"Even if we got a good doctor to treat the two, there's still the issue with Trowa's," Wufei paused, "Trowa's rape. Any doctor would have to call the police, we'd have to file a report and cross all sorts of red tape."

"Wufei, come on, you've seen them, they're in terrible shape. Quatre is half blind now!"

"They're right Duo." Three heads turned to see Quatre, disheveled, tired and still dressed in his clothes from yesterday standing before them. "I can't risk the sacrifice of the whole group just for the two of us. I can take care of Trowa, he's not in the best shape right now, I know. He still hasn't woken up." There was a heavy silence there. The four of them were in the living room, which was basically a large office with a couch and TV. Heero sat on the floor, his lap top in hand, Wufei beside him with numerous papers piled up around his as well as a laptop. Duo was pacing about.

"Wufei," Duo began, "what was the name of the lady friend of yours?"

"Oh, Sally?"

"Yeah, she's a doctor, ain't she? And we can trust her."

"Well," Wufei sighed, "I'll have to find her first. There's no telling where she is, can never keep track of that woman."

"But if you find her, Heero, we can bring her here, we can trust her. Right?" Heero groaned, then rubbing his eyes and looking at Duo:

"Fine, if Fei can find her. But only her."

"Wufei?" Duo asked hopefully?

"I'll get right on it."

Sally didn't take too long to find. As a matter of fact, she wasn't too far away. She had spent the last 5 months in south Asia aiding in barbaric guerilla wars that had finally been called to a halt. She agreed to doctor the two boys. She'd take a plane from where she was in Cambodia and see the boys that evening.

"She said around eight or nine," Wufei informed Quatre, who was sitting in his chair beside Trowa's bed, "so, if you can make it till then."

"I'll be okay, my vision is getting a bit better."

"And Trowa?"

"Don't know yet.."

Trowa finally woke up around 7:30 that evening. Quatre noticed two tiny green blurs and felt his heart jump into his throat.

"Oh, Trowa, you're all right! I was so scared! Are you okay, are you in any pain?" But there was no response. "Trowa, it's okay, you're safe now. We rescued you, remember, everything is going to be okay. No one is going to hurt you." Silence. "Trowa?"

At 8:17 Sally arrived with a few modest medical supplies packed neatly into an oversized military bag. She seemed thinner than usual, and she wasn't wearing all the make up she generally wore but that didn't bother the boys too much. They were just happy to see her.

"It's good to see you again," Wufei said, giving Sally a firm handshake. She laughed a bit.

"You too, now, where are my two patients?" She looked around, and caught a glimpse of Duo and his broken nose.

"Is this him? I hope you didn't call me all the way from Cambodia for a broken nose."

"Oh, no, not me," Duo said, self conscientiously covering his nose, "they're over here, follow me."

By that time in the evening, the house was pretty dark save for a few misplaced lights that Heero bought for a total of eight dollars at a thrift store. But Trowa and Quatre's room was surprisingly bright and cheery, despite the sad scene that was being played out in it. Quatre was still sitting in the chair, worriedly looking over poor Trowa, he didn't even notice Sally come in.

"Quatre," she said quietly, placing her things on his bed. Quatre looked up, squinting his eyes.

"Sally? You here?"

"Yes, I've come to have a look at you and Trowa."

"Fei told me," Quatre said quietly, getting up from his chair, "would you look at Trowa first? I can't understand what's wrong with him."

"Well, explain to me what happened." Sally said casually. She began to dig though her bag. "The other boys were a bit fuzzy on the details, I'm not too sure about what's going on other than you boys were involved with the destruction of that OZ ship."

"Yeah we were, but, that's all they said?" Sally nodded her head.

"I figured you and Trowa would be better at telling me what's wrong anyway. Why is he lying down?" Quatre suddenly felt ill. He didn't want to talk about this, he didn't even want to think about it.

"Well, Sally," he began quietly, "Trowa was badly beaten by the soldiers."

"Oh," came Sally's concerned voice. She quickly looped a stethoscope over her neck and approached the bed. "And broken bones, fractures?"

"Not sure, he hasn't spoken at all. He only woke up maybe half an hour ago."

Trowa, can you hear me?" Sally boomed. "If you can hear me please respond." Silence. Sally pulled out a small flashlight and looked into Trowa's eyes. "He's conscience, at least. Trowa, you want to tell me what's wrong?" No answer.

"There's more too," Quatre whispered.

"I'm sorry, what did you say?"

"There's more, Trowa wasn't just beaten."

"What do you mean," Sally asked, still checking Trowa's eyes.

"He was.."

"He was what, what's wrong?" Quatre took a deep breath. Then, quietly:

"Trowa was raped." A heavy silence immediately filled the room. The
blur Quatre recognized as Sally looked up at him, and slowly, walked over to where he was.

"Are you sure?" She asked. You could tell she wanted the answer to be
no.

"I saw the whole thing, it happened right before my eyes. Look for
yourself if you don't believe me." Quatre swallowed hard. He watched Sally's blur walk over to the bed and peek under the sheets. A soft crying noise came from Trowa. "Careful," Quatre added. After a few moments Sally looked up.

"He's going to need stitches." Her voice was grim, and understandably so.

"It's that bad?" Quatre was ready to vomit at the thought.

"Yeah, and I'm going to need your help." Sally said, slipping on a
pair of rubber gloves. "Sit by Trowa and try to keep him relaxed. I'm afraid this will hurt a bit." Quatre sat down at the head of the bed beside Trowa, and gently placed his hand on his friends.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly, "I didn't want you to feel anymore pain."

"Ready?" Sally asked, sterilizing a few frightening looking tools.

"I suppose so. This will be quick, right?"

"I'll try my best." Sally lifted up Trowa's legs and spread them wide
open exposing the injured area. She then seated herself at the foot of the bed in front of him, like a doctor in front of a woman in labor. Something about it made Quatre uncomfortable.

It took about ten minutes for Sally to put the stitches in, but those ten minutes could have easily been ten hours. Quatre begged Sally to stop after the first stitch, Trowa was crying out in such violent pain, he knew neither one of them could take much more. It hurt him tremendously to try and restrain his friend, Trowa was flailing around in agony, crying at the top of his lungs.

"Trowa, it will all be over soon," Sally said, trying to hold Trowa's
legs still.

"Maybe we should stop, he's in so much pain already," Quatre pleaded.

"This is for the best, the skin is ripped. Besides I'm almost done." When it was all over, Trowa has a total of 11 stitches in him. It wasn't a pretty sight to say the least.

"I don't understand it," Quatre said, tucking Trowa back into his bed, "whenever I try and talk to him he won't respond, but when you put in the stitches he was yelling and screaming. Does this mean he's in a coma or something?"

"Not really," said Sally, "it might mean that..uh, Quatre?"

"Yes?"

"The bedding is all askew, you want some help with that?"

"Oh, sure, I didn't notice. See," Quatre pointed to his bandage, "I got hit in the back of the head and this morning my vision was all blurry. I haven't been able to see correctly since then."

"Well, why didn't you have me look at that?" Sally dashed over to Quatre and flashed her little light in his eyes.

"I thought it was more important for you to see Trowa, I've been worried about him. What were you saying about him being in a coma or not?"

"Oh sorry," Sally turned off her light, "you know, it may be better if we go out in the hall."

"I see," Quatre said quietly. He had a feeling that couldn't be good.

The rest of this house was dark, very dark, Quatre couldn't even make out Sally's face.
"He's been beat badly, I'll say that," she began, "bruises, scratches, tearing of the skin, thankfully no broken bones. But he lacks any head injuries. I wasn't able to detect anything severe."

"He's been like this since we found him," Quatre sighed.

"What do you mean?"

"The OZ ship fiasco, it was a rescue mission. Trowa went alone and hadn't returned. When we found him he was a mess. He wasn't speaking, barely even moving and.." Quatre paused.

"And, what else?"

"When I saw him get raped, I have a feeling it wasn't the first time. His was body had been beaten so badly, and the way the men would talk." Sally nodded.

"I agree, there's no way one person did that one time to him, which leads me to believe that his behavior is all psychological."

"So, physically he's all right?"

"He's going to need some time to heal his body, but his behavior is not a result of that. What Trowa has gone through is extremely traumatic, there's no way to say how he's feeling or how he's going to deal with the number of emotions inside of him. Right now, he's probably in shock and his body has just shut down."

"Shut down?" Quatre raised his voice.

"Yes, his body and mind may have just, well, stopped. The mind is a mysterious thing, and like I said, there's no way to know about how he's going to deal with all this."

"Well, what a, I supposed to do?" Quatre asked feeling panicked. Nothing Sally was saying was really making any sense.

"Keep him comfortable, relaxed, make sure he's taken care of and try not to upset him. Other than that there isn't too much you can do except for sit and wait for him to come out of it." Quatre sighed a muffled "Oh God," and placed his head in his hands. "Would you like me to tell the others?" Sally offered.

"No, I can do it," Quatre said quietly.

"All right, before I go though I want to give you glasses for those eyes."

"Glasses?"

"Yes," Sally replied, "I don't have any great medical equipment with me right now, so I can't say for sure what's wrong with your vision. But for now, I can give you some glasses which may help you see a bit better. Though I'm sorry to say you're vision may never be as good as it used to be." Quatre didn't respond, he simply just looked sad. "Don't worry," Sally said to him quietly, putting her hand on his shoulder, "you're going to be okay, the both of you. In our lives, we will always manage upon hard times, but through the strength we find in our loved ones we ourselves are able to find the strength to go on. Trowa needs your love now, that is what is going to pull him through all this. Give him your love, give him everything you have inside. I know it will be enough." Quatre wanted to smile at her, to let her know he acknowledged her kind words, but that moment no compassion could reach him. His world was shaken in such a disturbing way he began to doubt his own heart and its ability to love.