Petra: Well, it here is guys, my new story and this one's a long little bugger. I really had a lot of fun with this story because I got to imagine what Heero would be like without his memories and how Duo would act if Heero started teasing him.
Kati: The teasing parts not in this chapter, by the way, you have to wait a little while. ^_-
Petra: It was kinda hard for me to write this because I'd never really written a fic where it focused just on Heero and Duo and their relationship.
Kati: So, if at times, it seems uncomfortable, please forgive.
Petra: *shrugs* Anyway, for those who were wondering, this will not turn into yaoi (meaning graphic boy-boy sex for those who don't know). I find it vaguely disturbing that you can find very little good fics that don't have any graphic sex scenes and even more disturbing the fact that they have the two boys jumping down each other's pants within three seconds of admitting their feelings. So, I decided I would be different! ^_^ (That, and I would feel extremely uncomfortable writing something like that.)
Kati: Sorry, peeps, but that's the way it's going to be!

DEDICATED: For the gundam pilots; I would set them free of their memories and guilt if I could.
WARNING: Cussing, shonen-ai (meaning boy loves boy but no graphic sex), war (maybe if there were more warnings about war, people wouldn't make it as often)
DISCLAIMER: I do not own Heero or Duo but I do own the girls who help them on their way and, since they are based on my friends, please don't steal them... because they really aren't all that great! *sad laugh*

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If You Could: The Awakening

"This was what an angel died for--for the chance to change fate, to spare a single child a lifetime of war and pain. And even though he'd failed, I knew he never regretted trying" -Rose Argent; Rain (GW)

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AUTHOR'S NOTES:
1) Memories are designated by roses. Ex: @~~~ Once upon... the end. ~~~@
2) I don't really care for using Japanese, simply 'cause I don't like explaining it, but Heero will use Japanese off and on throughout the fic. You'll notice it's mostly when he's surprised or just answers without thinking.
3) Duo doesn't know Japanese. Not at all. From hanging out with Heero he understands what 'nani' and 'hai' and 'iie' mean, but that's about it.
4) Relena does know a little amount of Japanese; as the daughter of a foreign dignatary, she would also need to know the customs of other cultures and what is considered okay and a small amount of different langauges. Thus she would know what to call Heero and such...

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"Guys! C'mere, I think he's waking up!" the voice sounded as though it were coming from a long way away. He opened his eyes, only to close them again in pain as sharp, bright light stabbed and made the pounding in his head increase. "Turns the lights down!" When he opened them again the light was gone and he was looking into light blue-green eyes framed by silver-gold hair that fell to her waist. "Daijoubu?" she asked, her full lips smiling softly, and part of his mind realized that she wasn't speaking the same language as before, while the other part understood it to mean: 'Are you alright?'.

He opened his mouth but found that his throat, dry and cottony feeling, wouldn't produce any sound. Immediately a strong arm was placed beneath his back and lifted him up. He turned his head slowly, mindful of the pounding in his temples, to be confronted by eyes that were a startling green-gold, framed by a head of dark brown hair that was pulled into a ponytail, pink streaks (?!) making her hair look darker than it was. He turned his head back as a glass was pressed into his hand and stared at the woman who had done so. She was short, at least a head shorter than the other two girls, and her hair was a brown, maybe even a dark blonde, with the tips dyed a dark blue and cut an inch above her shoulder. Her darkly fringed brown eyes smiled warmly up at him, and almost seemed blue around the pupils.

"Don't worry, you're safe here," Brown-Eyes said, in English, before walking back to the laptop on the table and beginning to type.

A frown appeared on his lips as something was called forth from the dark recesses of his mind.

@~~~ Silent… silent except for the click of keys from a laptop.
Then, suddenly, running footsteps and a bang as the door is slammed open. Surprise. Pushes gun away.
Glares.
Laughs.
Glares again. Goes back to work on laptop.
Glares. "You know," the boy says, hand on hips, "You've got to get away from that damn computer at least ONCE in this millennia and, by God, if you won't do it yourself, I will!"
Jerks hands back as laptop is slammed down.
"Now get up! We're going to the movies with the rest of the guys because, hey, if Cat can get Tro to come with then I sure as hell can get you too!"
Looks up in surprise as a warm, soft hand grabs wrist, pulling him out of the chair. A glimpse of brown hair with gold highlights framing fleeting violet eyes… and then… ~~~@

The image disappeared to be replaced by the blue-eyed girl again. "Are you okay?" she asked again, this time in English, concern showing in her eyes.

"I-I can't remember who I am…" he whispered, watching as the girl's exchanged surprised but sad looks, as though this confirmed their worst fears.

"We're not too sure who you are either," the one holding him up said, and then propped up pillows against the headboards before leaning him back against it. "Tia-chan, you did say that he bumped his head, right?" Green-Eyes looked up at Brown-Eyes who had stepped away and back toward him.

"Yeah…" 'Tia-chan', pushing a stray bit of dark blond hair out of her eyes, frowned pensively, looking at him. "Sir, my name is Hestia Rhea, this is Artemis Leto, she's a senator," Hestia said, motioning to the blond. "And this is Athena Parthenos, Arte-chan's bodyguard." He knew there was something strange about their names but he couldn't quite place is finger on it. Hestia suddenly brought her hand up, brushing some hair off his forehead, and he tried not to flinch as her fingers stroked against an extremely sore part on his forehead. "You've got a rather nasty bump there... this is probably the reason behind your memory loss. Can you remember what your name is?"

He closed his eyes and his brow wrinkled as he tried to part the foggy curtain that seemed to separate his memories from the rest of his mind. @~~~ "Lowe Odin desu," a strong, warm hand was laid on his shoulder in a father-like gesture as the voice behind him continued. "Lowe Odin, Jr., o goshokai shimasu, watashi no musuko." ' My name is Odin Lowe. Allow me to introduce to you Odin Lowe, Jr., my son.' ~~~@

"Lowe Odin, Jr." Odin said, the name felt right to his mind but strange on his tongue.

"Well, Odin-san," Artemis said, smiling warmly. "Do you remember anything else?"

Odin strained to remember something, anything else, but the curtain didn't want to part this time, and remained closed, trapping inside the memories of his past and the key to his future.

"Odin-san, we can't really help you much. We could find no identification on you, and we can't get past any of the password protected things on your-" Hestia paused a moment, looking at Artemis.

Artemis sighed and, at the questioning look Odin sent her way, replied, "The only thing we know about you is that... well... you're a Gundam pilot…" Artemis trailed off, a hopeful look on her face as she look at his face. Odin closed his eyes as he felt something begin to surface from the black pool of his mind but, faster than he could blink, something pushed it back down, as though not wanting it to surface.

Odin opened his eyes in surprise and looked at Hestia, "Sore we okashi…" That's strange… "I-I almost had something, but it felt as though something pushed it back down."

Hestia sighed, a sad smile crossing her face. "So young…" she murmured. "Frankly, to tell you the truth, I'm not surprised. You more than likely have many terrible memories, and apparently some part of your mind knows that and is keeping them from surfacing."

"Will I ever remember?" Odin asked, almost afraid of the answer.

"Maybe..." Hestia said. "You have three things that might happen. One, you could never remember anything from your past but... as you're getting your memories back already, that is highly unlikely. Two, you could get all your memories back. Three, you could get only some memories back, and the memories you'll forget will be the painful ones. I'm sorry, but I'm more likely to think that it will be the third one, as you said something pushed the memory back down. My guess, you'll probably get all your memories back except for the painful ones and, if I may say so, as a gundam pilot, that most likely means that you'll get very few memories back."

Odin sat back, thinking this over, before nodding determinedly. "Will you... will you tell me what a gundam is?"

"Yes..." Artemis paused and looked at Hestia questioningly who nodded, causing Artemis to smile. "But, better yet, I can show you. Ena-chan?"

Athena smiled and, wrapping a strong arm around Odin's waist, helped him out of bed. Odin was surprised to find that, despite the fact that he had probably been in bed for a long period of time, his legs were only a little wobbly. "How long was I asleep?" he asked, brushing some hair out of his eyes.

"Only a week..." Hestia said, as Odin wrapped an arm around Athena's broad shoulder. "Normally it would have taken at least two or three weeks for your body to heal, but you body is... different... you've had something done with your body that speeds up the healing process."

Odin's mouth opened in a silent "Oh" as he looked at Hestia. Suddenly he stopped, looking past Athena. Artemis and Hestia turned to see what he was looking at and saw that he was staring in the mirror. "Don't you even remember what you look like?" Artemis asked and, at the shake of his head, motioned Athena to lead him to the mirror.

Odin stood looking at himself for a long moment, almost as though he was sizing himself up. He was taller than Hestia by at least a head, but only taller than Artemis by a few inches, making Athena only a few inches taller than him. Dark blue-gray eyes, ones that reminded him of the sky before a storm, stared back under dark brown bangs from the bottom of a messy head of hair. His body was almost sickly thin but his arms and legs betrayed the looker for, somehow Odin knew, they were extremely strong. He was wearing just a plain, skin tight, black spandex biker shorts. He wrinkled his nose in disgust. Really, who had picked these out for him? As though reading his thoughts, Athena said, "You were in those shorts when we found you, along with that green tank top." She nodded toward a green tank top that was thrown on the back of the chair. "I sure hope that you were forced into that outfit because, if you weren't, we're going to have to kill you out of mercy for the rest of the world. I mean, we can't let someone with that bad of taste wonder around the world."

Odin laughed but stopped, surprised to find that the sound was one that seemed somehow… new to his ears. It wasn't like he hadn't heard it before; it was more like he hadn't heard the real thing in a long time.

"What's wrong?" Athena asked, her brow wrinkling in confusion.

"Kami-sama! My-my laughter sounds weird, as though I haven't heard it in a long time…!" Odin said in surprise, looking at them.

"Well…" Artemis trailed off, looking thoughtful, "You're face, even now, isn't very emotional. I think that you're used to hiding your emotion, Odin-san… you must not have had a reason to laugh, not that I could condemn you for that. With the life you've probably led, it wouldn't be-unexpected."

There was a long silence, where the women didn't know what to say to him and Odin didn't know what to think. Hestia interrupted the silence, "So… you want to see your gundam? It's still pretty bashed up from the fight you were in and we could only fix so much because we didn't know much about it. Your programs were password protected and had a code on them that, if they were entered in wrong once, the whole thing would self-destruct, so we decided to wait until you were awake."

Odin nodded and they continued walking. They walked down a long flight of stairs, apparently Odin had been kept in the attic, and even after they got to the main part the continued to go down. Past the basement, past the cellar, past the wine cellar, and even deeper until Odin thought that they were going to keep walking forever, and then they came to large door had a huge hole through it. Artemis smiled and stuck her hand in there, seeming to twist and turn certain things, before pulling her hand out triumphantly. Odin stared at her, for nothing was happening, and then looked at the door… and then back at her… and then at the door… and this time the door slowly began to shake and rose slowly until there was a gap enough so that they could walk through. As they went in Odin's brow furrowed as he noticed that there was no other door on the side, just a wall. He was just about to ask Hestia or Artemis what was happening when the door slammed shut behind them, leaving them in pitch black.

"Odin-san, daijoubu," Athena whispered, feeling him tense up in the dark beside her. Then she stepped away from him and he suddenly felt very alone.

Before he could say anything Athena cried out, in a language completely foreign to him. "Asi!" Suddenly, a crack of light appeared at the floor and he saw Athena take her right hand away from the wall, where she had apparently punched it. This time, there was a simply a small keypad on the floor filled with letters. Hestia held him back when he started to walk toward it and shook her head silently.

Then she stepped toward it and began to dance, ballet jumps and leaps, landing on letters in a perfectly trained dance. In the end she landed on the large enter key drawn on the ground and did a graceful bow, smiling.

"We do this," Artemis explained, walking through the closing door and standing in the room, which was now loosing its light, "So that no one else may come in here. Now we have but one last test, please be quiet." Without another word she walked up to her friends, who were standing in the middle of the room, and together they sang. It was a strange language that Odin didn't recognize but it had a lullaby like quality.

Odin felt himself falling into a trance-like state, as the words, in no alphabet he had ever seen, ran across the stones. His mind began drifting off into the mists where his memories had once been…

@~~~ Pain! A moan of pain… whose is it? Mine…?
"Shh… 'Ro… it's okay… just hold still…"
A warm hand on a cold shoulder. Stills, though it still hurts… then blackness…
" 'Ro… c'mon, wake up…"
A warm hand holding a cold one. Warmth…
"You've gotta wake up!"
Struggling… So much pain… Then light… and an angel with the face of a pixie, bright violet eyes, a slightly upturned nose, and full lips…
" 'Ro!"
Warmth… warmth as strong but gentle arms wrapped around his waist. For a minute… just a minute…
Pushed roughly away.
… Glare.
Nervous laugh. Waist-length braid tugged at and brought to full lips. "Sorry… but you've been out for a day and a half and I was starting to worry."
"…"
"…"
Closes eyes. "Gomen nasai… Thanks for staying with me…" Falling asleep…
Surprise. And then, "I'll always stay with you… as long as you don't ask me to leave…"
Dreaming… must be dreaming… but a such a wonderful dream… ~~~@

The singing stopped, suddenly and abruptly, making Odin wonder how long he'd been standing there, lost in the memory. The darkness cleared from his vision and he found that all three girls were looking at him. "What did you see?" Artemis asked, staring at him with a strange look in her eyes, and Odin vaguely wondered how she knew he had remembered something.

"I… was hurt and… someone was watching over me while I was sleeping. It was strange because he was really happy when I woke up… and…" Odin paused trying to think. "He… he kept calling me 'Ro and… I think he said something at the end but…" His eyebrows drew together as he tried to remember what the beautiful boy had said but it was like from a dream he couldn't remember and he could only catch small slivers of the cloudy memory even now.

"You can't remember," Hestia said, giggling just the tiniest bit. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed that Athena and Artemis exchanged quick glances before turning back to him.

"Iie… hai… well… I don't think I remembered when I had my memory either…" Odin frowned slightly, his mouth turning down just the slightest.

The three girls looked at each other and then shrugged, before motioning to the now open wall. He stared at them and then stepped forward, looking around the edge of the door/wall, his eyes widening at what he saw before him. There, surrounded by machines that had obviously been taken apart for its own use, was a huge machine in a shape of a man. Slightly glowing eyes glared down, as though looking at him, condemning him, and Odin felt like recoiling in disgust.

He felt conflicted emotions about the strange machine in front of him. There was one part of him that loved the machine as a partner, respected its power, and wondered at its marvel. The larger part shivered inside him at the sight of the thing, a whisper of pain and death trailing its fingers down his spine. Slowly, hesitantly, he walked forward until he was standing in front of the thing's foot and then, with trembling fingers, he reached out and lightly brushed his fingertips against the cool gundanium… Instantly feelings of hatred, sadness, and pain assailed his senses, crushing his breath, and his vision began to go black. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Athena step forward to catch him but, as though she could travel faster than anyone he knew, Artemis was there beside him, cradling him so gently he thought that perhaps she was made of clouds… and then all thought ceased…

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IMPORTANT NOTE: For those of you that wish it, DUE TO MY SPORADIC postings, I am offering you, the readers, A MAILING LIST to sign up to. When I finally UPDATE, I will SEND OUT AN EMAIL informing those of you that are on the list that I have finally updated. I need you to EMAIL me, telling that you wish to sign up, and whether it's for ORIGINAL FICTION or FANFICTION. I WILL NOT accept those people that ask to be up on it in a review because I can't be sure that email is real. The mailing list will ALSO OFFER the TITLES of those works that I am posting, the COUPLES (if any) that are in it, which FANDOM it is from, and whether it is a SEQUEL to anything.

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Kati: So, what'd you all think?
Petra: I hope you all like Arte-chan, she's based on a very good friend of mine. So are all the women, actually. ^_^ Arte-chan's a really likable person in real life and I hope I got her right. Mari-chan, who it's based off of, will be reading it with the rest of you! ^_^ Hope you liked it, Mari-chan!!! Love ya, grl! And love all of you readers, too!
Kati: You know what to do and, if you don't, READ AND REVIEW...
Petra: Please...
Kati: Pretty please...
Petra: With a cherry on top...

"I dream of a day when I can open my eyes, and my dreams won't disappear."
-Rose Marie Ledam

~Petra Megami Assari~
*The Gentle Tiger Goddess*