The Lightning Arc 7 - My Rose
Fandom: Gundam Wing
Rating: M/NC-15 for m/m relationship
Pairing: Zechs and Treize
Warnings: m/m love, some swearing - if you are hoping for explicit scenes though, you are likely to be disappointed.
Spoilers: everywhere, in all my stories.
Summary: see Chapter 1.
xxx
Chapter 2 - Dawn
It was over so quickly, Zechs hardly registered the blast. Amid the eerily silent flurry of laser blasts, mobile suits, burnt out shells and bloated corpses... the stillness of space littered with bursts of soundless fire, the groaning that shuddered through the Libra when the Peacemillion rammed into the main cannon of the battleship. Zero yelled at him inside his head so loudly that all around him were shadows, numbers, co-ordinates, faceless, cold, factual... scenarios, tactics, models, games...
He did not need a strategy anymore. He had never thought he would, for his goal was so simple – why could Treize not see? And still Zechs clung to the battle station of the Libra while the great ship began to break apart. She bucked and lurched, moaning as though she was a living being when cracks began to shriek through her metal skin, fire racing through her innards and smoke choking her hallways and cabins.
He had refused Treize's challenge for a duel, confused as to why, and then it hit him with shocking clarity – he would not do him the favour, not THAT favour.
Remember... a duel at sabres, on a sun-drenched summer meadow, the blade gleaming and shining back from Treize's eyes, laughing at him, challenging him...
And then gundam zero-five was cutting its way through the fire and the debris, past mobile dolls and his fellow gundams that seemed to support Treize, oh yes, of course, everyone had joined up, they were all against him, the Lightining Count, everything had always been united against him, and he had always beaten all the odds.
Blades crossing, then clashing, hard, fast, murderous, their playful sparring turned into something else entirely by Treize who would not yield an inch to him. Treize had piqued his pride, stoked his heat by goading him, mocking his inexperienced fervour and plunging him into a frenzy of calculating passion... making him want to win at all costs...
All against one, how strange that Treize should accept to become part of such an uneven struggle, but Zechs would show them just what it meant to go to war, with thunder and lightning indeed. And when he was done, Earth would be no more, cursed be it and its spawn.
And won he had, tumbled into the trampled, fragrant grass, the steel at Treize's throat drawing the finest line of crimson, Treize laying still beneath him, but the smile... in those blue eyes shone with undiminished, thrilled arrogance: I have seen you bare now, Miliusha...
And then... another explosion, larger than the others, brighter, dazzlingly intense, and Zero sliced into his brain with a blast of pain that knocked the breath from him and brought him screaming to his knees... as he stared, eyes going impossibly wide, at this glare that swept over the screen, filling it out until there was nothing else but light.
And too late he had realised that he had given himself away completely. That he did not care... and found himself begging... I want you... want you... please...
A white, silent ball of light in the frigid blackness. Blooming slowly.
Gods, Treize... please...
He refused to believe what he saw... what he felt as the beam of gundam zero-five sliced into Treize's Epyon.
Love me... love me... love...
The soundless tearing asunder of armour plating.
Inside me... my heart... my body... my soul..
The gush of debris, sucked into the insatiable hollowness of space: small things, once needed, now pointless.
My Self... yesss...
Floating, dancing, like specks of dust around a brightly blossoming star.
Forever... forever... forever mine...
But in his head, Zero shrieked Treize's dying at him.
For me... wait for me... come for me... scream for me...
Every brutal second.
Every terrified heartbeat.
Every scorching breath.
For you are mine...
Until the shield of Treize's cabin burst.
My rose...
The light faded into a slowly billowing cloud of luminescent dust, and stillness poured into Zero.
My rose...
From Zechs tore a scream, unending, breathless, howling
My rose... my rose... my rose...
And he let himself fall, welcoming the fire.
Stardust...
To Ashes...
And Tears...
To Dust...
The flames that engulfed the brightness within, heading for Earth like a shooting star as he made his wish.
I am coming for you, my rose...
On Earth rose another dawn.
So far away... let me reach... hold me fast... you promised... you promised... you promised... my heart...
As the scorched shard of the Libra tore a sparkling path into the vast brilliant blue of the ocean.
On fire...
A wide arc, written by the still white-hot shield, a spray of salt-bright diamonds rising high as the fragment sunk deeper into its own gleaming wake, shooting towards the rock-strewn beach with the speed of a torpedo.
You promised...
Bursting through the foaming surf that broke over salt-washed rocks, smashing stones out of its way, ploughing sharply into the soft sand that flew up high, wings of sand, heavy, flapping wet, grey curtains that rose and fell sluggishly.
To wait...
A steaming veil of sand, draping over the tangled lump of cooling metal that still glowed dark red on its ragged upper side even as it was chilling to an angry black-blue below.
Please, take me...
The surf roaring...
With you... don't... leave... me... alone...
Thundering its farewell...
A fate worse than Death...
To a soldier...
I beg of you...
"Lieutenant, over here! We found him! We found him!"
Grant me...
"Lieutenant Noin, sir! He's alive!"
Release...
"Get the ambulance! Where are the cutters, move it, cut him outta there, and where the hell is the oxygen..."
But I cannot grant...
"Milliardo."
This wish because...
"Milliardo, can you hear me?"
I love you.
"...but you know that, don't you?"
xxx
Next chapter: Do Not Believe
Note:
(1) Treize's dying - see 'Grief' for more detail on those moments