Things are getting a little more serious. And I'm being mean to my boys again. Oh well. It's good for them! Otherwise, how would they ever know how strong they are? Right? Right?
Anyway, enjoy!
Heero's eyes felt like they were full of sand. He raised his hand to wipe the grit away, finding as he did so that his fingers were bandaged together. He blinked as his vision swam, dark shadows and shapes flitting in the corners of his awareness. The bandage on his hand was soft and smooth, made of the finest materials. And whatever he was lying on felt unbelievably soft, too.
His eyes opened wide as recollection returned. Quatre. The Fire Swamp. Zechs and his count. The fight. Quatre.
"Quatre!"
"Easy," came a familiar voice. "Don't move a lot yet. You're awake a lot sooner than I figured, but it takes a while to wear off."
Heero turned his head against the fluffy pillow, noting as he did so that he was in one of the royal bedchambers – one that hadn't been used since there were more than two royal heirs. It was decorated as befit a prince. Sunlight streamed in the many-paned broad windows.
"Duo?" Heero managed, his throat feeling dry and his tongue tasting of lead.
"I'm here," there was motion and suddenly the familiar form was leaning over him. "Feeling okay? Sometimes that mix makes people want to lose all the food they've ever eaten."
"Mix?" Heero forced his thoughts to obey. "Where's Quatre? What happened?"
"Okay, here's the short version: Cat and me had a deal that I would look after you if something happened to him. Well, with that crazy Treize guy, something happened all right. He and Quatre got into some kind of war of the minds, and he was losing. And you were getting ready to fight everybody off, but that was going nowhere, believe me. So Cat asked me to take you out. I hit you with one of my darts. Not the Shinigami mix of instant death, but the sleepy-time drug instead."
"Why?" Heero demanded. He tried to sit up but found his arms didn't want to hold him so he flopped back into the sheets with a muttered curse.
"'Cause that prince offered you a deal that would keep you safe. And Treize wasn't about to kill Quatre. Haven't you ever had to run away so you could regroup and try again later?" Duo shook his head. "Fighting would have gotten you both killed. Cat knew that. And from what Zechs said, this is about more than you and Cat anyway – it's about your whole dumb country. You can't help anybody if you're dead in the woods."
Heero frowned darkly and Duo shrugged at him.
"Yeah, as situations go, it's awful. But you're alive, and Cat's alive, and you're here," he indicated the room, "where you can do some good. Don't you want to find out what Zechs is planning and put a stop to it? I'd have thought the big important guard of the princess would want to keep her older brother from putting the whole kingdom in danger."
"Where is Quatre?" Heero growled.
"That…is the one snag," and Duo ducked his head. "He made me promise to watch out for you and I had to follow you all the way back here without losing track just in case. So I don't know where they took him. I've searched this place and he's not in the palace. But Treize is, so he can't be far away. I'll find him." Here his eyes took on a darker, creepy light. "Nobody walks off with my buddy."
"You've been here for how long?"
"A day or so. Long enough for you to miss me breaking a few house rules. Sorry about that," he managed a small, insincere smile. "But I didn't have to kill anybody yet. You got good security around here, but it looks to me like this whole wing of the castle is just Zechs's guards, and they're not nearly as good as the rest. Once I got past your buddies in the real Royal Guard, Zechs's goons were easy."
Heero closed his eyes to think for a moment. Zechs wanted a war with Oz, and was willing to do anything to get it. What Duo had said was true – Princess Relena was in terrible danger. Their father, the king, was in very frail health, bedridden and near death. His advisors and ministers were ruling while he still lived to give instructions, but the instant he died the crown would fall to Zechs. Relena was beloved throughout Sanc; if she opposed her brother's plans at all, she would be a threat to him and a liability, and Heero had a good idea he knew how that would end. His sworn place was here, in the palace, doing whatever he could to protect Relena. Even if that meant making an enemy of her brother.
But what about Quatre? What could Treize want with him? And what would Treize do to him?
"What can we do about Treize?" he asked instead. "You know more about this than I do."
"Cat's the expert," Duo shook his head. "Most of what I know is what Cat will and won't do, and how to block myself from somebody like him for a little while. I don't know what exactly our little buddy can do – he's always been more interested in what he should do."
Heero set aside that knowledge about Quatre for later consideration and focused on the more immediate fact. "You can block Treize so he can't read your feelings?"
"Yup, and I gotta teach you to do it too," Duo nodded. "Otherwise the minute that prince comes and asks if you want in on his crazy plan, Treize is gonna know what you really think. Besides, I don't think Zechs or Treize know what you and Quatre mean to each other, and unless you want them to figure it out, you're gonna have to keep that count out of your head."
"Agreed." This time Heero was successful in levering himself up to a sitting position.
"Let's do this, then," Duo sat down on the edge of the bed. "I'll teach you all my tricks right now. Then, the sooner I know you can hold your own against those two, the sooner I can get back out there looking for Cat. I gotta keep an eye on you because I promised, but if you are playing along with those guys, I won't have to watch you all the time, just when you're doing something dumb."
"I won't do anything dumb," Heero retorted, but he sensed the smile behind Duo's expression and a corner of his mouth turned up. "I've got enough to do putting a stop to a war and keeping Treize and Zechs focused on me until you can get to Quatre. When I have him back, though," his eyes flashed, "then nothing will stop me from doing my duty. My princess and this kingdom will be safe, even from their own prince. This is one mission I will complete without fail."
"You keep those two looking at you, and I'll be ready when you want to make your move," Duo agreed. "I can even bring in the Maganacs, 'cause there's no way they'll stay out of a fight Cat's in. When you need, well, not an army but a bunch of us, we'll be there. And when it's done and we're all big heroes, you and Cat and stay here and hang with that princess kid or come with me or whatever you want."
"When the kingdom is safe for Princess Relena," Heero nodded, a warmth spreading in his chest, "I will go home with Quatre and never fight again." And he realized he longed for that day with surprising passion.
Unbeknownst to either Duo or Heero, as they settled in to prepare Heero to defend against Treize's empathy, that feeling of warm love and hope and peace was echoed in another heart elsewhere in the kingdom, waking Quatre from the stupor into which he had fallen.
Quatre's first awareness was of Heero's feelings, and that was a great comfort against the next sensation to reach him – pain. Unremitting pain behind his eyes and also thudding hotly through his shoulder. The latter was the legacy of the giant rodent, but the former was the lasting impact of his duel with Treize; hopefully the count had a matching migraine in return. He blinked and raised his head slightly, finding that he was lying stretched on a table, his wrists and ankles secured with heavy manacles. The remains of his shirt had been removed, and the cold of the space bit at his exposed skin. The place looked like an underground cavern, and the smell of wet earth was mixed with what could only be the scent of blood.
The echoes of pain and suffering, of terror and grief and rage he could sense at the edges of his heart certainly didn't add to Quatre's appreciation of his surroundings.
His exhausted empathy warned him only moments before his ears caught a squeaking sound. From his right a figure in grey appeared, pushing a cart whose wheels were in desperate need of repair. It was a woman, long white-blonde hair pulled tightly behind her. She wore the robes of a cloistered maiden, but the gleeful expression in her eyes suggested her piety had nothing to do with holiness. She mixed a few bowls of fluid on the cart and began dabbing at the wound on Quatre's shoulder.
"Where am I?" he asked.
"The pit of despair," she responded with a bright smile as if she were discussing the beauty of the stars. "Don't even think about trying to escape. The chains are far too thick. And don't dream of being rescued, either. The only way in is secret, and only the prince, the count, and I know how to get in and out."
"So I'm here until I die, then?" Quatre asked wryly.
"Until they kill you, yes."
Quatre eyed her surprisingly careful ministrations of his shoulder, where she was now adeptly cleaning dirt and sand from the torn flesh. "Then why bother with this?"
"The prince and the count always insist on everyone being healthy before they're broken." The emphasis on the last word was accompanied by a thrill of dark pleasure that made Quatre want to shiver.
"Torture?" he asked. Her smile widened and he let out a long breath. "I am not afraid of torture."
"Oh," she giggled, "you should be. I hear you survived the Fire Swamp, so you must be very brave. But not even a warrior, not even an empath like Count Khushrenada, can withstand the machine."
"Are you so sure?" Quatre replied, looking for chinks in her armor he could use to gain an advantage.
"Quite sure," she almost sang back at him. "After all, I was once nothing but a maiden who longed to assist a healer with my herbs and my kindness." Her face darkened in a wicked, cruel grimace. "Then the machine changed me, opened my eyes. And here I am!"
She actually twirled, arms outstretched. Facing him once more, she considered her bloody fingers and folded them before her in an imitation of prayer.
"The machine won't kill you. Probably. But it will make all those evil impulses in your heart strong until you are free of the constraints of yourself. It did this to me and I had the mildest gift you've ever heard of. I can't wait to see what it will do with the potential in you. You won't be dead, but anything you think you are now will be burned away until you are what you always should have been!"
"And what is that?" Quatre made himself ask, utterly sickened.
She leaned close and whispered in his ear, lips caressing the skin that had gone cold and clammy.
"A monster."
-==OOO==-
"She leaned close and whispered in his ear, lips caressing the skin that had gone cold and clammy. 'A monster.'..."
"Oh poor Quatre!"
"Is this too scary for you?"
"Um...maybe a little. Is it going to have a happy ending?"
"More or less."
"What does that mean?"
"I'm not going to give it away. You must have courage to learn the truth, little one."
"Okay...okay, I can do that."
"Of course you can."