Disclaimer: I don't own the GW characters – am just borrowing to torment for my amusement
Warnings: Swearing, yaoi, violence, general angst, possible OOCness (ages since I've written fanfiction so may be a little bit rusty) m/m sexual relations, slight sap
Pairings: 1x2 , 3x4, 5+2
A/N: Hope everyone had a great Christmas and have an awesome New Years (I will be getting very very drunk). This is the nearest I'm going to get to sap in Domino… the calm before the storm chapter.
Song is Search Party by Enter Shikari.
Chapter Thirteen
A History of Conflict and Violence
The jump out of the hospital window was not going to be as spectacular as Heero's amazing swan dive. Mainly because I was only on the second floor as I am not suicidal and also because I was actually going to attempt to get down without injuring myself. I didn't have the guts to pop my own joints back into place for shits and giggles unlike some people. Plus I'm pretty sure my bony, skinny ass would just break as I wasn't genetically enhanced. A few shots to boost immunity was about all I got from G.
The bottom floor windows were barred to keep people from getting into the hospital but the upper floors had the intention of stopping people getting out. The glass was all reinforced, the windows themselves only able to open the smallest amount so no one thought of jumping out of them. It's a sad state of affairs when a hospital is scared that people are gonna jump and try and kill themselves but I guess that's the fun of the District.
I picked a ward at the back of the building as the sniper was trained on the front and then found a window that overlooked the park. My plan was – smash glass, jump out, land elegantly, stand up, get to park without being spotted, walk through the District without anyone giving a shit. Seemed like a good plan. Though from life experience, I figured that plans never work out. Remember, this is from the guy who planned on quitting the Preventers, who planned on begging Howard for a job… who didn't plan to be on L2 ever again.
The glass was reinforced so it took more effort than I wanted to knock it out. I wrapped my fist in some handy sheets and punched through it, letting the shards fall to the ground below and making a sound that was too goddamn loud for my liking. Now that the glass was out, I looked down to see the landing. It was higher than I really wanted – but damnit, I didn't really want to be jumping outta buildings in the first place so nobody gets what they want in life. I thought about Heero's words outside Wired "don't die" and my promises of no recklessness. This was possibly the most reckless thing I'd done in a while but was nowhere near some of my usual shit. Hell, in my period of being undercover and in various jobs I'd done a variety of drugs to fit in, Russian roulette to prove I was a badass and generally pissed off many, many guys who were much bigger than me to provoke them. This was cake. There were slight risks because if I landed awkwardly, I could twist something or break something and that basically put me out of commission but I wasn't gonna let that happen. If I got injured I would just be extracted and I really wanted to stick around. This was my job and I wanted to know what the hell Dallas and his crew were up to.
I wrapped my other hand in more bits of torn sheets, to protect my hands from glass shards, I've totally got the health and safety shit down and then climbed outta the window. I held onto the edges of the window frame and lowered my body, dangling above the ground before letting go and landing without any incident. I lapsed into old mission thinking. Status? Legs fine. Arms a few nicks from the glass. Hands functioning but a few cuts from glass were visible as I removed the bits of sheets – they were usable so passed the status check. Body was operational. Mission to commence.
The hospital provided enough shadow for me to stick to as I made way round to the park. I glanced back to the roof and saw no sign of the sniper and I made my run to the dead park and away from potential danger. If I'd been caught, I had no idea how I was gonna explain it – I suppose I would've just blown my cover and knocked someone out which was a risk I really didn't need to take so was relieved when I was walking through the back alleys of the District to get to Heero.
I stuck to the back alleys knowing the amazing shittiness of my current appearance. I didn't need a mirror to know the grime and dust and dirt and now blood that was staining my body. The only thing I can say is, there is a reason I always wear black, shows less stains and my occupation always made me end up covered in dirt. Even in the District, I would look bad so I stuck as much to the shadows and alleys, trying to hide myself as best as I could. The convoluted way I tried to get to Black Velvet meant I approached it from behind the buildings entrance and I walked down the alley expecting Heero to be there.
When he wasn't, I paused and leaned against the wall and thought, shit. Not having a watch, my sense of time was a little whacked and I only wanted to risk an hour outta the hospital. Plus I was going to have to find a way back in that didn't mean going through the front doors and as the windows were barred and all other doors secured from the ground floor, I wasn't sure how I was going to do it. Damn it, Heero. You're the one who's supposed to be superhuman here and all you had to do was leave an apartment with a few dudes tailing you.
Then I heard the quiet footsteps and I grabbed for my knife. It seemed trust wasn't our strong point as he had a gun out and pointing at me. I pushed myself off the wall and turned towards him.
"Thanks for finally turning up, Heero."
"I was watching from the roof in case you were being followed."
"Was I?"
I hadn't felt like I was tailed. Usually, you get a feeling and then you know you have someone to shake off. I'd had none of that.
"No."
"So you're just being Mr Super Paranoid? What about your buddies? Thought Dallas has three guys on you at all times?"
"It's not a problem," he said cryptically.
The look in his eyes was cold and slightly creepy. I decided not to press the matter further as he looked me up and down seeing my filthy clothes and amazingly gross hair.
"You're bleeding."
"It's nothing."
He stepped forward and pulled up my hand and looked at my palm where blood was flowing at a fairly rapid pace. I hadn't noticed it as I'd slunk around the alleys in the darkness of the District. Adrenalin always helped in battle and missions. You didn't notice the pain until much later and you can deal with it. I always found being captured harder – being beaten, you notice every moment of pain as your disadvantaged, weak, unable to fight back. His fingers were covered in my blood and I looked at them before meeting his eyes.
"How?"
"I pulled one of your stunts. Jumping out of hospital windows is less fun than you made it look."
"I'm extracting you."
The words didn't sink in straight away. Call it his unbelievably logical and blunt way of bossing me around or call it the slow coming down from my own amazing escape act but I was not thinking at full capacity. Factor in lack of decent food, lack of sleep and generally, finding out about a massive amount of virus, reliving the fun time memories of death and grief and yeah, my brain didn't take in the word "extracting" straight away. Once my brain caught up, I think I saw him tense as I'm sure he knew I was about to explode at him. I was not ready to be extracted and he sure as hell couldn't make the call. He was not my handler. He was… god, I don't know what we are to each other. Fuck buddies still? Something more? Whatever the current situation between us gave him no right and I was ready to tell him that.
His body tensed before I could say anything. I was as predictable as he was and instead of saying what I goddamn wanted to say, he pushed me against the wall of the alleyway with more force than he needed to and his mouth was covering mine. I wanted to push him away and say something sarcastic about him knowing the one way to shut me up – having something in my mouth – but somehow thought processes and resistance were just not working for me so I let him slide his tongue in and pin me against the wall.
He released my lips and then glanced to my right. People were walking past the alley. It was all for a little bit of cover. Two people making out in alley is completely acceptable and expected in the District. But damn, he could just miss me and want to kiss me.
"You're not extracting me. I gotta finish this," I said quietly, my forehead leaning against his.
"We should move," he said.
Awesome. Back to being ignored by Heero Yuy. Felt like we'd just gone back in a time machine and he was pretending I didn't exist. Repeating old patterns.
"We can't go anywhere near Wired."
"I have somewhere else."
"Well, I guessed since it was compromised and all…"
"Follow me."
I wasn't going to protest as he took me round the back of the building row to another scummy apartment block that basically overlooked the back entrance to Black Velvet. I smirked as I realised we were heading into that particular building. I guessed the strippers used the employee entrance so if you lived in that particular block you could observe their arrivals and departures. I'm sure there were people who lived in this building who enjoyed the show but could imagine Heero didn't notice in his usual mission orientated way. This apartment was worse than Wired – hell, it wasn't an apartment, it was a room with a bed and then a sink and toilet plunked in the corner. It was still much better than some of the places I'd stayed. There had been some really fun safe houses during the war and I'd stayed in some amazingly shitty rat infested places in undercover ops. My perspective on niceness of places was very skewed. I turned to see Heero locking the door and putting a chair behind it for extra security.
I stood at one side of the room and he stood near the door. We were doing our best stand-off poses. We should just play this game like a western and see who had the quickest draw.
"You can't go back. Dallas is suspicious. You have the vial and that will be enough evidence for the Preventers."
I took a deep breath in order not to just start shouting at him. I could fly at him – say everything I wanted to but I wasn't going to repeat history. We didn't need to fight and do what we'd always done.
"Yeah, it's enough evidence for Dallas and the kids but, come on, look at the vial. There's something else going on here. That's what I've gotta get to. That's why I've gotta go back."
I passed him the vial from my pocket which he looked at closely.
"Core Technologies. Doesn't sound real, does it?" I said as his intense blue eyes stared at it.
Heero looked up at me. "It could be a dummy corporation."
"Yeah, plus I saw a dude that Dallas met who was kinda suspicious. I just got a feeling that there's more to this than just a simple act of terrorism. If they wanted to just kill Quatre then that would be it – but why have the virus unless they wanna use it?"
"We'll find out."
"Like we always do, huh? Always us saving the day."
He frowned at me and I wandered to the window. The window was unbelievably grimy and difficult to see through but on looking out my earlier suspicions were confirmed. The employee entrance to Black Velvet was visible.
"Wanted to move near to Niko and the strippers?" I asked as he put down the vial carefully on the bedside table – the only available surface apart from the bed. "Damn, didn't know I could be replaced so quickly."
"No one replaced you."
Blame my brain not working at full capacity but I just stared. I watched as he produced his duffle and started looking for his portable med kit and seemed to be concentrating on ignoring me again. He'd realised what he'd said and so did I.
"You mean you haven't been with anyone else since me?"
"No."
Now that floored me. No one else in three years? Hell, I was gonna give him an award for celibacy and commitment here but I felt more than a little weird. I rubbed my tattooed arm, smearing blood over the ink – blood creating a pattern over the Celtic cross. It hurt somewhere inside me. I'd slept with other guys. I didn't have a big "number" but it was still not just him. Maybe I should've done the whole celibacy shit.
"Not even a quick fuck?"
"I've said no once already," he said, his eyes returning back to my face. His patience was wearing thin with me but my mind had gone from mission to what the hell? "Come over so I can look at your hand."
Instead, I held my ground and stood by the window. "So I'm like your… one and only?"
"Come over here so I can treat your wounds."
"Huh, you're deflecting and as king of deflecting, I know it means you're trying to distract, confuse and make me forget. I'm so not gonna do that, 'Ro."
"Give me your hand."
Feeling particularly childish in this whole situation, I walked over to the bed and sat where he motioned but then held it to my chest instead of letting him look at it. I wanted to have this conversation.
"Hand," he said again.
I offered it to him and he looked to see under the light that there were a few pieces of glass embedded in my skin. He sighed at me and then grabbed his portable med kid to remove said pieces of glass. I watched as he used tweezers to remove it and then sterilized it before bandaging it up a little. I watched skilled fingers work and thought about how to say what I wanted to say.
"You like… waited for me?"
"I thought you were dead."
"No, you didn't. You said that but you stayed in touch with Trowa as they were trying to find me. You didn't think I was dead. You waited."
Blue eyes blazed at me looking up from my wounded hand. "What if I did?"
"Then it's like either really romantic or really stupid. We weren't that great together first time, remember? I wasn't worth waiting for."
He dropped my hand and grabbed the back of my head, pulling me close enough to kiss forcefully, my eyes fluttered and I reached out with my injured and still bloody hand pulling him closer by his shirt. I think I was seeing stars or at least I was ready to crawl into his lap and start to grind our bodies together. It just felt like something I needed. I wanted blissful ignorance, sweat, tongues, teeth, hands… he could have me anyway he wanted me. Bed, wall, floor but hell, there was no time and we both knew that.
Our lips parted and he looked at me so goddamn intensely. "Stay. Don't go back."
"I can't, 'Ro, gotta finish this."
"There's nothing I can do to change your mind?"
There was a glint I recognised in his eye and I smirked back at him, running a hand down his chest and feeling his breathing speed up again. "I'm sure you could do things that would make me forget but… I gotta see this through."
He nodded and returned his gaze to my wounds. I tried to return my body and breathing to normal and tried to think of seriously unsexy thoughts.
Heero knew I was a stubborn son of a bitch and there was no way I'd back down. He also knew my devotion to the mission – that was something Heero Yuy got and he knew I was as bad as he was – determined, stupid, single minded. And it all felt too personal. It was the virus that had killed Solo and tons of other kids, Dallas was an asshole who was like a freak show mirror version of me and kids were just kids whose lives have been fucked over. I was not gonna walk away until there was some sort of conclusion. As much as I wanted him.
He gently cleaned the rest of my wounds, sterilising them I think purely for some punishment and let me attempt to wash myself over the sink to get rid of at least some of the shit. My hair was just gonna stay a nightmare but he had my duffle bag so I could change my t shirt as the one I had been wearing was a complete loss – I didn't even want to wash it. My jeans were pretty trashed but I just dusted them off and put them back on though I was super grateful for clean boxers. We looked at each other as I stood, dressed again and it seemed neither of us knew what to say to each other. With Heero that was kinda typical but with me… my heart was in my throat and I didn't know what I wanted to do.
"'Ro… after all this, I'm through with the Preventers so you know… if you want to work shit out…"
I didn't have any articulate words. I was shrugging. I was doing the whole scratching the back of my head thing. I was running my fingers over my tattoos. I was doing my whole Duo-is-awkward-and-doesn't-have-words routine. I was kinda hoping it was endearing. That my lack of emotional competence and massive intimacy issues were not freaking him out.
Heero just looked at me. Completely blank. I was thinking he'd short-circuited. That whatever programming that the Docs had done to him had just gone well and truly wrong.
"Heero? You dead in there?"
"No."
"No? No what?"
"No I'm not dead."
"Okay…so what's your response to what I just said? You know, that's as near as you're gonna get to me being all sappy and shit. "
"Yeah."
"Yeah to…?"
He stood up and approached me, I took a step back for some reason – fight or flight shit. I was now trying to be mature and give myself up to someone – to trust, to, whisper it, try and love someone again and there was the ingrained feeling to just run away before I got hurt.
"Just promise me."
His hand touched my face and I glanced at his fingers rather than look at his face.
"No more running, hiding or pushing me away."
"Promise though it kinda makes my motto redundant. I'll just go with never tells lies from now on but being that I'm still undercover…maybe just no motto anymore."
He gave me a small smile that was more genuine than any of my Cheshire cat grins. It was only the slightest thing but he was… so, Jesus, I hate being cheesy but I'm gonna go for beautiful. I leaned in to kiss him all gentle like and then backed off before it got hot and heavy. I needed to back at the hospital and doing my actual job. I'd got the vial to Heero – he could do his side of the job now and get the shit to 'Fei and I'd just try to find out more before the Preventer team came in and arrested the gangs asses. Once I was extracted, then we could start again. Be different. Better. Give us a real shot. See if I could actually handle a mature relationship. See if he could deal with the whole bucket of crazy that was my head. See that we could stop repeating a cycle of fucking and not much else.
"See you on the other side."
"Be careful."
"I'll try, Heero, but you know, it ain't always possible."