Alright, alright, took me long enough *grumble grumble* but I made this one
extra long, so...hehehe...makes up for it. ;) C&C welcome as always.
--
Katsu no Miko (ICQ me! 13773131)
Wufei no Seishi
Keeper of Duo's Angst
Duo's Grand Inquisitor and Head Torturer
Keeper of Duo's Stake, Mallet, and Browning .40 Hi-Power III
AND: Keeper of Ad's Sanity! (*snicker* What sanity?)
"Erst wenn die Wolken schlafen gehen/kann man uns am Himmel sehen/
wir haben Angst und sind allein.../Gott weiss ich wil kein Engel sein..."
(~Ramms+ein~)
Standard disclaimers apply. Bleh.
Pyractomena Borealis Part III
Annoyingly enough, nothing happened for the next several days. I probably
should have been happy about that, but I wasn't. I could feel something
hanging over us like an axe dangling from a little piece of shredding
twine, and I knew it was just waiting to happen. The fact that nothing did
just made me tenser and tenser. I can only wait so long for the other shoe
to drop before I start getting a little bit jumpy about things.
I'm not normally all that high-strung, but the tension was starting to make
things worse than normal for me. I started getting minor stress headaches,
which made me grumpy, and I was wire tight and had a tendency to react
violently if I was startled. To make things even harder one me, we were in
an actual lull as missions went. Oz was keeping to itself, strangely
enough; there were no new movements or installations to check out. It would
have bothered me a lot if I hadn't been spending most of my time worrying
about that damn exploding hot dog cart. I actually started hoping that Oz
would try to pull something. I kept getting the strange feeling that
Deathscythe was getting restless; he'd been cooped up under a camo-net for
over a week in a nearby forest.
I stared up at the water-marked ceiling of my dorm room. This one was quite
a bit bigger than the last, which was great. The old one had been so small
that Heero and I had been practically sharing a bed, which did not do me a
bit of good when it came to the libido-controlling department. 'A little
lust is a healthy thing' my ass. Whoever said that had never had to deal
with a potentially homicidal roommate...
Or nightmares that wouldn't let them go.
Nightmares. I hate fucking nightmares. For a long time, they bothered me,
but then I got used to them,
and they didn't any more. My adventures six months ago had provided my
nightmares with all sorts of
wonderful, new material, though, so I was back to being bothered. Very
bothered. As in sickened and half-terrified.
Which was why I was staring at the water marked ceiling of the dorm room
at--I glanced at the clock--three in the morning. Class first thing in the
morning tomorrow was going to suck. It didn't help that my first class was
technical writing, a subject that I was hard pressed to make myself care
about. Creative writing is fun. Philosophy is fun. Technical writing is
boring and useless as far as I'm concerned. The day a Gundam Pilot needs to
be able to write a business briefing will be a sad day in the world indeed.
Why bother learning how to write politely worded memos? Blow shit up. It's
easier, and a lot more persuasive.
I glared at the ceiling a little harder. I really needed to just fall
asleep. Sleep...sleep...sleep...
Ok, the self-hypnosis thing was just not working.
I sighed quietly and sat up so I could look over at Heero. He was dead to
the world, sleeping the sleep of the wicked...well, not exactly. I knew
that if I so much as made a suspicious noise...or a suspicious lack of
noise, he'd be up in an instant and I'd have the barrel of a gun stuffed up
my nose. It had happened before. A hair-trigger partner is not exactly
conducive to hanging loose and relaxing.
I played the events of the afternoon over in my mind; me taking his hand
before Relena found us, him grabbing my arms after the explosion...I wasn't
sure what to make of it all. Sometimes, he acted like he really did care,
that maybe...but then again, a lot of the time, he acted like I was just
another annoyance in his life, about in Relena's class. I wasn't sure what
to do. It was driving me bonkers.
I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to go over to him and sit on the edge
of his bed and watch him sleep, or maybe even be really daring and kiss
him, even if it would get me a gun up the snoot. I'd lost him once already,
and I'd come close to losing him again only six months ago...and now that
Relena had shown up, I wasn't sure what to think. And it was about to start
up again. I was scared.
What the hell had I been thinking today, when I grabbed his hand? The hand
in question clenched into a fist, seemingly of its own volition. What did I
think was going to happen? Me and Heero walk down the street, hand in hand
like a couple of lovebirds? No, no way. How could I do something like that?
I didn't have the right to touch him or have thoughts like that about him,
or anyone else for that matter. Never.
With another soft sigh, I stood, making just enough noise that Heero
wouldn't think I was sneaking around, and padded to the room's bathroom. I
needed a shower. Maybe is it was warm enough, it would relax me enough that
I could get some sleep.
***
"--Duo? Duo!"
It finally registered. Someone was saying my name. Loudly, now. "Eh?" I
muttered quietly, raising my head with a concerted effort of will.
"Are you alright?" Wufei asked from across the table. He actually had his
eyes open, a highly unusual thing for him in the morning. There were also
three empty tea cups by his elbow, which pretty much explained that.
"Oh yeah, I'm fine. Why?"
"You were about to stick your nose in your coffee cup." Wufei remarked
blandly.
I blinked stupidly and looked down at the offending cup, then quickly set
it on the table when I noticed how close it was to spilling. "Oh." The all
night insomnia parties were really starting to get to me. "I just had a
little trouble sleeping last night."
Wufei looked unimpressed by the explanation. Without looking, he reached to
the side and grabbed Quatre's shoulder, saving him from hitting his plate
of runny eggs and toast face first. Quatre started and tiredly opened his
eyes, smiling sheepishly. Weird. Quatre's normally the annoyingly cheerful
morning person of our merry little group.
Huh. So I wasn't the only one having problems sleeping. Maybe Quatre was
feeling the tension, too.
It was nice to think that I wasn't the only one. If Heero or Wufei or Trowa
were bothered by it, they weren't giving any sign. Heero and Trowa were
disgusting aware and awake no matter what unholy hour they got up at, as
always, and Wufei was as doing about as well as normal, considering he
wasn't a morning person by any stretch of the imagination. "You ok,
Quatre?" I asked.
"Yeah...just having a hard time sleeping." he said.
I managed to grin slyly past my utter fatigue. "Oh, is Trowa keeping you
up?" Man, I am such a putz in the morning.
THAT woke Quatre up. He gave me a glare that was almost worthy of Heero.
"Jerk." he muttered, then smiled sweetly at me. "I don't know, is Heero
keeping you up?"
Touche. I snorted. "I'll thank you to leave my personal life out of this."
/I wish./
Wufei was eyeing both of us rather strangely. He finally shook his head.
"Morons."
I didn't give him the satisfaction of a comeback. Well, actually, the
clever comment I was going to make got swallowed up by me yawning loudly.
Quatre sighed and poked at a bit of egg on his plate with a rather burnt
piece of toast. I hastily looked away, back down at my coffee. Food. Ugh. I
don't know how he does it. "So why are you having a hard time sleeping?" I
asked.
He shrugged. "Not sure. I just have an odd feeling...and I've been having
strange dreams." he glanced up at me, eyebrow upraised.
"Nightmares. Same ol' same ol'." I shrugged a lot more nonchalantly than I
felt.
"You know you're always welcome." he said.
I shrugged again. Truth to be told, I knew I was welcome, but I hated
intruding on Quatre and Trowa. Sure, nothing was going on between them
right now, but you never knew...I wanted to give Quatre as much time alone
with Trowa as possible. I mean, hell, if I can't get any, I at least want
one of my friends to. It's the next best thing...because then you can get
them to tell you all the gory details. Who me, a voyeur? Nah. "It's nothing
that I can't deal with. Really, what's giving me more trouble is the fact
that I'm sharing a room with Heero. Again." I sighed. I had a feeling that
Heero cooked the room assignments, which was a nice thought, but I had no
way of proving it, and if I asked, all I got was a glare and the usual
'baka' or 'omae o korosu.' "I figure I just need a little distraction
before bed. Maybe I'll start taking walks or something again."
Quatre nodded. "Just do us a favor and take a partner."
"I'm a big boy." I grimaced. "I can dress myself and everything."
It was Wufei's turn to laugh. "Trouble follows you like a bad smell. I'm
tired of having to jump in to save you."
I flipped him off, which only made him laugh harder. Some people, I
swear... "Fine." I growled. "I'll take back up." I thought for a minute.
"I'm not taking Heero. He wouldn't go for it to start with."
"You never know." Quatre somehow managed to fit half a slice of toast in
his mouth. I'll never figure out how he does it. "He might want to go." He
leered--god's honest truth, Quatre LEERED at me. "You never know, he might
just be waiting for the opportunity..."
I stared at Quatre wide eyed for a moment while he let the thought trail
off, still leering at me. It was about on par with the time I watched a
rabbit attack and attempt to hump a small dog as far as weirdness factor
went. The effect was finally destroyed when he inhaled the rest of the
toast. Wufei was choking on his tea. I glared at him. "I'll think about
it." I said, then grinned. "I'll just make sure to bring you along."
THAT wiped the grin off of Quatre's face. I smirked into my coffee cup. The
day was looking up.
***
The school day was completely uneventful, which was both good and bad.
Good, because that meant that all was as it should be with the world. Bad,
because I fell asleep at my various desks several times. I'd never thought
it was possible, considering how hard those wooden chairs at the desks are.
Guess I'm just talented.
After class was done, I went right back to my dorm room, took off my jacket
and the stupid strangling tie, and just flopped on my bed. I was at that
stage where I was very tired, but not quite tired enough to take a nap. So
instead, I felt around under my bed until I located a few dog-eared manga
that I'd picked up...somewhere.
I stared at the black and white pictures in the manga I was holding, not
really seeing them. I could hear a soft hissing in the background; Heero
was taking a shower. Images of Heero, naked and wet danced in my head, and
I growled quietly to myself and tried to concentrate on my manga. Damnit, I
did not need this. My hormones live to make my life hell, I swear.
I could almost imagine getting up, slipping into the
bathroom...and...and...
Crap.
I put the manga down for a minute and rubbed my eyes. Yeah, right. If I
actually tried that, Heero would probably be wiping blood off of the tiles
for the next couple of days. I firmly told my hormones to bugger off and
picked the manga back up. It was a nice violent one, about some swordsman
that was immortal or something--every time he got injured, weird worm
thingies would close the wounds up. Trying to read the manga in the dim
evening light was giving me a stress headache, but I didn't feel like
getting up to turn on the light.
Heh. Maybe that was how Heero did it. I snorted. Naw, it would be too
logical. This was Heero. If there was a good reason, it was going to be a
hell of a lot weirder than simple magical worm thingies.
The hissing abruptly cut off. Heero was done with his shower then. I glared
at the next panel of the manga, puzzling at the kanji. There was one I
didn't recognize, and it was starting to piss me off. I really didn't feel
like looking it up. Still, it was pretty clear what was going on; the main
sword guy was cutting someone in half. That didn't take a whole lot of
explanation.
A door opened, and the room immediately brightened as buttery light spilled
out of the bathroom. It dimmed momentarily as Heero stepped out.
Some things are like car accidents; no matter how hard your brain is
screaming "Don't look! Don't look!" you can't help it. Slowly, reluctantly,
my gaze inched up, until I was peering over the top of my manga at Heero.
He had one of my teeny tiny towels wrapped around his waist, and that was
it. The light from the bathroom glittered across his skin; he was still
damp, and water was dripping from his slicked back hair, running down his
neck and shoulders in rivulets. He ignored me and walked toward his bed.
The towel sure didn't cover a whole lot. I manfully fought off the urge to
stand up, grab him, and lick the water that was running down his nicely
muscular chest.
Someone up there either loves me or hates me. I have a hard time deciding
which, at times.
I followed him with my eyes as he walked past me. The rear view was almost
as nice as the front view. He reached down to take the towel off...
Gah! What the hell was I thinking?
I hastily looked back down at the manga and flipped the page. I would not
look. I would not look. I would
not look.
Damnit. I wanted to!
My hormones took over and slowly, I looked up again...oh man, no...
He'd put his boxers one while I'd been struggling with my hormones. I was
torn between being relieved and being upset. Relieved won out, and I let
out a tiny sigh.
It wasn't the smart thing to do. Heero turned to look at me, pinning me on
the spot with his eyes. I managed to look him in the eye defiantly. So my
partner had caught me almost ogling him. I was not going to be the first to
flinch. Heero raised an eyebrow, and I could feel my face getting hot. I
was starting to blush. Of all the lousy...he couldn't possibly know what
kind of dirty thoughts I'd been thinking, could he? God I hoped not. I
didn't want him to know how much I'd fallen. Before he could say anything,
not that I was really expecting him to, I shut the manga and stood quickly,
grabbing the Browning and tucking it into the waistband of my pants. If I
untucked my shirt, no one would be able to see it. "I'm going out for a
walk." I said.
Heero raised his eyebrow a little more. "I'll go with you." he said.
Shit. I couldn't exactly tell him that I was going out to get away from
him, could I? I grimaced internally. Damn him for picking this once to be
interested in what I was doing. "Don't worry about it." I said hastily.
"Quatre's already going with me."
His eyebrow cranked up a little higher. I managed to keep a hold of my grin
through sheer will power. "I promised." I said, putting in one of my best
nonchalant shrugs. No need to tell him WHAT exactly I had promised.
Heero watched me for a moment longer before he shrugged, then sat down at
his desk in front of that damn laptop. "Stay alert." was all he said before
he started powering the machine up and went back to ignoring me.
I sighed silently and watched his back for a moment, then headed out the
door. I don't have a lot of self control at times, so I've learned that the
best way to keep myself from doing something I'll regret later is simply
remove the immediate temptation. It's a good idea. I stuffed my hands into
my pockets and slouched toward Quatre and Trowa's room. Theirs was located
in the floor above mine and Heero's, right across from
Wufei's room.
When I knocked on their door, there was no answer. I waited a couple
seconds, then knocked again. Still no answer. Wufei's door was open a
crack, indicating that he was in and willing to be sociable, or as sociable
as Wufei gets, so I pushed it open the rest of the way and stuck my head
in.
Wufei was sitting on his bed, jacket off and tie undone, his head bent
overa book that was sitting in his lap. As soon as the door opened, he put
his finger on the page he'd been reading to keep his place and looked up.
"What do you want, Duo?" he asked, raising his eyebrows a little.
For once, he didn't sound too annoyed. I grinned at him. "Have you seen
Quatre?" I asked him.
"He convinced Trowa to go out with him. I think they're shopping for
books."
"Damn." I said softly. I'd promised Quatre that I wouldn't go out by
myself, but I REALLY had to get away from Heero. "Ne, Wufei..." I said.
He looked suspicious. Can't understand why. "What, Duo."
"I'm going to go take a walk..."
"And...?"
"And I promised Quatre that I wouldn't go by myself..." I grinned
charmingly at Wufei.
"No." he said. "I'm reading."
"Alright." I shrugged. "I'll just go out by myself, since you're the last
person I have to ask. I have no problem with that. The theater district is
interesting enough that I don't need company." A very true statement, but I
had promised Quatre, and Duo Maxwell is a lot of things, but a liar isn't
one of them.
Wufei put his head in his hands. "Wait a minute...you're going to go and
wander around the theater district by yourself?"
I grinned and nodded. I've hung around Wufei long enough to know exactly
which buttons he has to push. The theater district was by no means a rough
part of town. The crowd was just a little more...colorful. I like it down
there.
"Hold on." Wufei shut his book and grabbed his jacket, straightening his
tie out. "I'd better go along, to keep you out of trouble." he growled.
I just smiled at him. Damn, I'm good.
***
The theater district was packed, strangely enough. As early as it was in
the evening, there shouldn't have been too many people there--the really
interesting folks don't crawl out from under their rocks until after
midnight, normally. Still, it kept things interesting, or so I told myself
as I brushed past someone that was dressed almost entirely in feathers, and
appeared to be a woman at first glance. The second glance was a different
matter entirely. Women normally don't have stubble. Or at least none of
the women I'VE met.
I took a few more steps before I noticed that something was missing, namely
Wufei. I glanced back. He was starting at the women--er, man. I snorted and
grabbed his arm, then started walking again. "Wufei, man, you have to
learn, they can smell your fear."
Wufei glared at me and removed his arm from my grasp, none too gently. "Are
you done walking around yet?" he muttered.
"Nope. Still haven't gotten all the frustrations out." I grinned. Really, I
was thinking about heading back myself, but I'm just too contrary to let
Wufei off the hook that easily. That was why we were down in the theater
district anyway. I hadn't really felt like going down here, but once I told
Wufei that it was where I was going, I didn't have a lot of choice.
It was full dark now, and the street was becoming more crowded. Neon stood
up against the black sky, blood red and poison green screaming out the
names of various theaters and dance halls. I knew from personal experience
(hey, I'm a curious guy) that most of the dance halls were oriented towards
the homosexual crowds. I'd found that out when I went into a couple of them
just for the hell of it and gotten propositioned more times in five minutes
than I'd had total since I hit puberty. It was actually impressive and
flattering in a kind of disturbing way. The tamer theaters had drag queen
acts. I didn't want to know about the less tame theaters.
We walked past a dark brick walled building with a huge swirl of bright
blue neon that said "Theater of Mysteries" on it when my back, right
between my shoulder blades, got that kind of itchy, uncomfortable feeling.
Someone was watching me, and watching me very intensely. Casually, I
reached around my back, like I was going to scratch an itch or something,
and hitched up my untucked shirt just a little so that I had a more
unobstructed reach toward my gun. What I really wanted to do was draw it,
but that didn't seem like a terribly smart idea in a big crowd. "Wufei--"
--There was a flicker of movement ahead of us, then something grabbed me
from behind and slammed me into the brick wall of the theater, very hard. I
had time to pull my gun out of waistband before I hit the wall. It knocked
the breath out of me, and black sparks danced in front of my eyes for a
moment as I struggled to draw some oxygen into my complaining lungs.
Something dark and very, very big was looming over me, gripping my
shoulders almost tightly enough to leave indentations in my bones, holding
me suspended several inches above the dirty concrete sidewalk, and there
was an odd glow near the bottom of my peripheral vision.
My cross was glowing. Oh shit.
I started to bring my gun to bear on whoever or whatever was in front of
me. Almost negligently, it let go of one of my shoulders and grabbed my
arm, slamming it firmly against the wall. The impact hurt, but I kept my
grip on the gun and started struggling wildly. I might as well have been
trying to move the theater with my bare hands for all the good it did me,
so I started yelling since I didn't have anything better to do. My vision
finally cleared, and I could see the person in front of me, tinted a sickly
blue by the neon glow.
He looked like a hit man out of a classic gangster movie. That's all I
could think of. He was big, his shoulders looked like they were wider than
I was tall, he had a crew cut, a nasty expression on his face, and he was
wearing a suit that stretched tightly over his many and way too big
muscles. He grinned at me. He didn't have fangs.
Everyone was still walking along the street like nothing was happening. No
sir, no teenagers getting assaulted here. No one even looked our way, even
though I was yelling at the top of my lungs and I'm not exactly quiet.
I was in real trouble. Something was VERY wrong.
I heard Wufei growling off to the side and I looked over. I didn�t have
anything better to do, after all; Mr. Muscles wasn't budging. A much
shorter, much skinnier man had Wufei pinned against the wall one handed,
kind of like I was, if you ignored the fact that Wufei was being strangled
and I wasn't. He had his hands firmly locked around the man's wrist. I
think that's all there was saving him.
The man was shielding his eyes with the hand that he wasn't holding Wufei
with. "Take the boy's cross off." he said.
Mr. Muscles let go of my wrist just long enough to grab my cross and yank
on it hard, snapping the chain. he threw it away behind him. I was suddenly
very glad that I'd decided to get a second cross and wear that instead of
the one Father Maxwell had given me. It still wasn't a good thing that I'd
just lost it, but at least that one didn't have sentimental value attached
to it.
The cross sailed through the air and hit a woman in the head. She stopped
and shook her head, then looked toward me. For a moment, I felt some hope.
She squinted and stared for a moment, then shook her head and started
walking again.
Fuck.
There was one good thing, though. Mr. Muscles didn't grab my gun hand as
well as he had before. I still couldn't break free, but... I twisted my
wrist in his grasp, and fired, hitting the vampire--he had to be one, he'd
been affected by my cross--in the stomach. It wasn't a clean shot by any
means; the bullet went in at an angel that wasn't even close to solid, but
it expanded enough that it made a pretty big hole when it hit. Blood
sprayed from the vampire, splattering all over Wufei and several passers
by. One of the people, a woman, looked down at her freshly stained clothing
and started screaming. Pedestrians all over the place stopped and started
looking around. A very good sign.
The vampire shrieked and dropped Wufei the instant the bullet ripped
through it. Wufei landed in a heap on the ground, then scrambled quickly to
his feet. Mr. Muscles slammed my hand into the wall again, and this time, I
did drop the gun, mainly because my hand went numb. "Wufei! Run for it!" I
yelled.
Instead of following my good directions like any sane person, Wufei
launched himself at my captor and hit him with a knife hand in the armpit.
Mr. Muscles dropped me and swung at Wufei.
At that point, I ate concrete for a minute and didn't see much of anything.
I could hear more people screaming. Maybe they'd recovered from whatever it
was that had been done to them. I didn't care at that point. I scrambled
along the ground until I found my gun. My hand closed over it and I rolled
quickly to the side...but not quickly enough. Strong, clawing hands picked
me up and threw me against the wall of the theater. I hit head first.
The world went black.