Author's Note: Title should tell you everything of what this chapter's about, but in case it doesn't, all I'm going to say is that it's going to answer some questions you've all undoubtedly had since the first chapter of this fic. But if it doesn't and only raises more question…well I can't help you there, yet. Enjoy.

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing

Warning: language, angst, shounen ai

The Truth of Duo Maxwell

The drive back to the mansion had been silent, utterly silent. Duo stared off into space, zoned out completely as his mind sought to shut itself down and go on autopilot. That was all good and fine with him since he really didn't want to be where he was.

He just wanted to curl up and fade away, immune to all the chaos and turmoil that this world had only offered him since he was born. Yeah, it would be neat if he could just vanish, never to be heard from again…yeah…

He must have blanked out or something since the next thing he knew, he was sitting on a toilet seat in Solo's private bathroom, said blond wiping away all traces of blood off of him. With the way Solo was working, Duo supposed that the guy had a lot of experience cleaning himself off. He bathed in the light of concern that those green eyes of Solo's were projecting, the gentle and practiced swipes of a wet towel cleaning his face of all blood that had found its way there. No spot was missed, not even the backs of his ears for some reason though he doubted that anything could've gotten behind those.

With a gentle tug on his arm, he was led back into the bedroom where Solo proceeded in undressing him of his dirtied garments and replacing them with some sweats and a night shirt. The moment he was clothed, he found himself enveloped in a tight bear hug, Solo seemingly not wanting to let go of him anytime soon. To tell the truth, Duo let himself accept the affectionate gesture. He couldn't, no wouldn't, ever get enough of it. Hey, that was an idea. What if he could fuse himself into Solo? Nah, bad idea. Too science fiction.

"Duo," Solo said into his braided hair. "Duo, I want to know."

Know? What did he want to know? What did he mean about that?

"I want to know everything," Solo continued. "I want to help you with this but I can't if I don't know what's going on. Talk to me, please?"

He blinked owlishly. Help? Solo wanted to help him? With what? What was there that he could possibly do to help?

"There others are also worried," Solo said. "My uncle, Q, even my dad. Trowa's also here. We're all worried about you Duo."

Well that was new. An entire group of people were worried about him. He could laugh if he knew what to laugh at. What would he laugh at anyway? The fact that he truly was his father's son? Well, that was as good a place to start.

"C'mon Duo, talk to me," Solo begged, turning him around so that those green jewels could plead into his violet ones. "Won't you say anything? Please?"

Wow, who knew Solo had it in him? The guy was actually begging him. He never thought he would ever live to see something like this. It really put into perspective how much power he actually had over this guy.

Solo's face was a portrait of desperation as he silently pleaded with him. Such a display didn't last long as soon Solo's features hardened in determination. Then Duo felt nothing but heat as Solo devoured his lips in a heated kiss, tongue invading his mouth and everything. His mind went absolutely blank as human desire overwhelmed him and he began to respond, his hands grabbing and clutching onto the blond's broad shoulders.

Solo's obvious skill and experience came to the forefront once again as Duo allowed himself to be taken along on this wave of pleasure, the ride sadly ending as the blond pulled away so that his eyes could bore into him.

"Duo…" Solo breathed.

Just like that, as if that one word was the key to releasing all the pent up emotions inside the braided one, the meaning of everything that had taken place on this ill-fated day, all the actions that he had committed, their enormity, their meaning, finally hit him. With the dam gone, he buried his face into Solo's shoulder and began to cry.

He was blubbering, he couldn't lie and deny that. He felt the arms that held and supported him tighten, the body that he was pressed up against begin to rock from side to side, and rough hands that only he knew that could express affection rub his back, trying to gently soothe his hysterics.

"It's going to be all right," Solo murmured, "everything is going to be just peachy. Calm down, everything's okay. Get it together, okay?"

Duo continued to crush his face into the larger teen's shoulder. There was a sense of déjà vu about this. The tears soaking into the shirt in front of him, snot leaking out of his nose like a river, Solo holding him up against him, letting him cry out all of his sorrows. If he didn't know any better, this was almost like that time in the nurse's office only this time he wasn't the one beaten up but the one who had done the beating up.

As his sobs began to quiet down, he was able to make out the gentle nothings that Solo was whispering to him, trying to calm him down. How had he gotten so lucky? God, how much shit had he put Solo in over this? He tightened whatever holds he had on the blond, refusing to let him go.

He didn't know if he would be able to survive without him if he did.

"Better?" Solo inquired as soon as Duo's sobs became merely sniffs.

Not trusting his voice, Duo nodded, hiccupping.

Solo pushed him back gently so as to get a good luck at his face. Duo gulped in air as he looked the blond in the eyes, not knowing anything else that he could do. Solo gave him a small smile, as if trying to assure him of something and then he began to remove his ruined shirt, revealing the wifebeater that he wore underneath it.

Using the cleaner parts of the shirt, Solo began to clean his face up, clearing away the tear stains and any snot that may have taken residence. When Solo covered his nose with it, Duo instinctively blew into it, clearing out the inside of his nostrils. Taking the shirt away from him, Solo casually tossed it away without a care as he brought Duo back up against him again.

Exhaling a deep breath, Solo said, "You know you're going to have to talk with Uncle and the others, right?"

Duo only nodded, taking in another gasp of air.

"Well, sooner you can get this over with, the better."

Once again, Duo only nodded.

--

Perhaps he should have stopped to think about what he had been agreeing to.

Unfortunately it was too late to back out now. Quatre was demanding answers, Trowa right at his side. Mr. Winner was off to a side, already knowing his story. Solo's father was hanging around in the back, as if intimated by his own son. Said son was reclined on a couch, serving as a body pillow for Duo as he laid on it.

He really, really, did not feel like doing this.

As if sensing his distress, Mr. Winner suggested, "Would you prefer it if I told them, Dwaine?"

"Dwaine?" Solo piped up. "You mean to tell me that your name is Dwaine? Not Duo?"

That seemed to lighten the mood up, or at least Duo's mood as he recalled the time he first learned Solo's full name. However, it seemed he was the only one to think that funny as the others, with the exception of the incredulous Solo, remained in their somber personas.

Duo shook his head in the negative to Mr. Winner's offer. Ultimately this was his story to tell and there was no way anyone was about to let him off the hook this time.

Sighing, he asked, "What is it you want to know?"

"Everything," Quatre stated, his normally kind eyes boring into him.

"Just the bare essentials," Trowa clarified.

Well, this was it. No going back now.

"I guess you could say it all started when my mother met my father," Duo began, settling back into the physical warmth that Solo provided him. "Since you all know who my father is, I'll just go with my mother. My mom was a hooker, a prostitute, that kind of thing. Looking back on it now, it's a wonder she didn't get an STD or some shit like that. From what I've been told, she ran into a lot of bad luck, just one thing after another until she had no other choice.

"Needless to say, that was how my parents met. He was just some guy with money looking for a quick screw and that's exactly what she offered him. Nine months later, I popped out. My father was not pleased; he hadn't expected me nor did he want me. When my mom came, asking for child support, he told her to drown me in a river and leave him alone.

"Now, my mom wasn't the best kind of person; she wasn't a saint, not by a long shot. She was an opportunist and she saw she had one with my father. That's right; she was going to try and screw him out of as much money as she could and using me to do it. Despite being at the lowest rungs of society, she still had some friends in all the right places and she got the court to force him to pay her the child support money.

"I've never really been sure about this next part but I do know that her friends know quite a bit of it. Anyway, I was three at the time and had no clue as to what was going on around me so when she died, no one was more surprised than me. My father didn't want to have anything to do with me so I was up the creek without a paddle. That's where my mom's lawyer, Howard, comes in. He managed to get custody of me before the government and my father forced me into an orphanage or a foster home, whichever one came first, and made sure that my father couldn't get out of the child support.

"Ever since then, he's been taking me back to court to either reduce the money he has to pay or to get the entire thing cut. Howard's been fighting him every step of the way. As you can probably guess, nothing he's done has endured him in my heart."

"One question," Trowa said. "There's something I'm not getting. Is there something else? Besides trying to stiff you, that is."

"That's one thing you're right about," Duo replied. "There came a time, a couple I think, when he thought it would be easier if I happened to have an 'accident' and, you know, get buried six feet under."

He felt Solo's body beneath him tense with this piece of information. He could see the horror that had etched itself onto Quatre's face. The other remaining three remained impassive, though Trowa looked startled. Mr. Winner already knew about it and the other elder Winner, who knew?

Yeah it was a bitter piece of information and it may have sounded like fantasy but it was all pure reality. What could he say? His father worked for Romafellor and they did anything and everything to ensure that they got what they wanted. Duo knew he had used up a couple lifetimes of luck getting this far and now that he was with the Winners, he was almost sure that his father wouldn't try something.

Almost.

He had had to move to different apartments because of it. His more recent one had been the fourth or fifth one he had lived in since the seventh grade. It was a struggle making sure that his father didn't know how to find him, and being a full time student didn't help him at all.

"Father, did you…?"

Looking up, he saw that Quatre was looking at his apparently impassive father, searching desperately for any sign that his father may have known about this.

Without saying a word, Mr. Winner confirmed his son's suspicions with a single nod. Quatre could only gasp and sink into further horror. Duo felt sorry for him, no really, he did. The Winner had been spared this kind of intrigue all of his life and yet he was to be expected to take over the family business when his father retired. He would have to take this sort of thing as an option, especially when dealing with Romafellor. They employed those tactics on a daily basis.

"How long?" Quatre finally managed to ask him.

"The day when Duo stayed home from school," Mr. Winner answered. "I sat down with him and had him tell me everything. He asked me not to say anything about this to anybody."

Then Quatre turned his sights onto him. Those sorrowful blue eyes tore at the braided one. They weren't accusing, something Duo would have expected. They were sympathetic, that was the word. Or was it pity? Duo couldn't handle pity; never had, never would. But he knew Quatre enough to know that he wouldn't give him pity.

At least, he believed Quatre knew enough to know not to do that.

Of course, just because Quatre knew didn't mean that Trowa did. From the one eye that he could see, he saw that emotion reflected in it. If he had not been using Solo as a piece of furniture, he didn't know if he would not be able to hold himself back from striking at him.

Now that was an interesting question. How was Solo taking all of this. He couldn't see what the guy's reaction was to his revelation and that made him nervous.

--

Solo found himself in a stupor.

He had never thought that the story that Duo had hidden from him would be like this. He had thought it was probably like some sort of teen angst, disagreement-with-the-folks estrangement kind of thing. Never in his wildest dreams could he have cooked up such a fantastic story like this. It was something that only Hollywood could have come up with.

It was unconceivable that a father would hate his own son enough to try and kill him off just because he wanted nothing to do with him. Solo knew that he had stiffed off many responsibilities in his time but he was nothing compared to Duo's father. From what little he heard about the man, he didn't like him one bit.

The only thing he didn't begrudge him was the fact that it was because of him that Duo existed. Otherwise, the man could die of gonorrhea and rot in hell for all that he cared.

Now that he was on the subject of Duo, he had to do what any good boyfriend had to do. He needed to give him all the comfort that he possibly could while assuring him that there was no way in hell that he was going to let something like this come between them.

So without hesitation, he wrapped his arms around the prone braided teen and held him tightly like a child with a stuffed animal. He would not be releasing him anytime soon, especially not with everything that had happened that day.

He was certain that this was only the calm before the storm.

Then he remembered the words that he had had with his uncle some time ago.

They echoed within his mind, as if they had only been spoken moments ago…