Crossover With Non-anime Series Fan Fiction / Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ On a Pale Horse ❯ A Sound Thrashing ( Chapter 13 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Disclaimer: As far as Mobile Suit Gundam Wing goes: Bandai has rights. Sunrise has rights. Sotsu Agency has rights. Rally does not have rights; she just likes to play with the characters. It's so much fun. As far as the world of Valdemar and Velgarth go: Mercedes Lackey has rights. DAW books have rights. Rally (again) does not have rights; she just loves dropping confused bishies in and waiting to see how long it'll take them to swim. (Again) it's just so much fun!

A/N: "Italics" is Duo speaking in Standard. "No italics" mean he's speaking Valdemaren. :Colons and Italics: indicate Mindspeech.

On A Pale Horse
- A Sound Thrashing -

Duo sat up a bit straighter. He had come here to deliver his firm no, all the while knowing that the Dean wouldn't accept it. Even though, at first, it seemed as if Ayden had, he was now presenting his counter-argument. It really didn't matter what the Dean was about to say, Duo had no intentions of becoming a Herald. However, if he wanted to figure out how he'd ended up in Valdemar in the first place, he still needed to find a way to stay on Palace grounds. That meant, he had to stay in Ayden's good favor and that meant that he had to at least hear the man out.

"I do not understand."

Ayden gave him a small smile before continuing. "We didn't ask you to be considerate of our needs, though I'm glad to know that you've got it in you. Did you really think that we wouldn't want you to return to your home if that is what you desire? Did you think that we wouldn't help you in that endeavor?"

Duo kept silent. That was exactly what he had thought but admitting it out loud would have been beyond rude. At this point, he was pretty sure that Ayden wouldn't take much offense but the question was would he take enough offense to withdraw his offer of support.

"I see you do," Ayden surmised, not unkindly. "I assure you that we take your problems as seriously as our own and helping you to find your way home is a priority."

"Is a priority, not will be if I become one of your Heralds?" Duo challenged.

Ayden didn't take even a second to think it over. "Is. You want to go home and we will help you, if we can. Your choosing to join the Heralds is irrelevant in that matter."

"Why?" Duo hadn't meant to ask it out loud, but the question needed to be asked. There was no reason these people should be helping him. If anything, he should have been sitting in a jail cell awaiting punishment or been tossed out on the streets with no knowledge of where he was or what was going on. There had to be more to it. No government in the world would take kindly to finding a stranger, even a half-dead, unconscious stranger, within the secured walls of their states grounds, not to mention offering to assist him. "Why would you want to help me? You get nothing from it."

"Duo, do you really understand the significance of Onette Choosing you?"

Okay, where had that subject change come from? He dredged up his history lesson from the day before. "Companions Choose Heralds, but—"

"No, buts," the Dean interrupted. "Companions Choose Heralds and they do not Choose wrongly. We Heralds accept all who are Chosen without prejudice, be they male, female, young, old, rich, poor, thieves, murderers or the God of Death, Himself. Onette Chose you and now you are like kin."

Duo's stomach dropped at the mention of the God of Death, but Ayden didn't give him a chance to react.

"We ask you to train as a Herald because we trust that that is what is needed, for you as well as for us."

Duo felt a pull that drew his gaze down to his right hand. It sat cold on his leg and that image made him think back to both of the visions he'd experienced the day before. That nagging sensation of almost dread returned prickling along the back of his neck and that voice, that cold, cruel voice, whispered its chilling promise again. "What if you are wrong?"

"Duo, my boy," Ayden replied, almost cheerfully and yanking Duo out of his dark musings, "Companions are never wrong."

"Never" was a pretty harsh word. No one was never wrong, but it seemed as if Ayden believed it completely. Duo shook off the lingering sense of dread and leveled his focus back on the Dean. "You are not going to let me leave until I say yes, are you?"

Now, Ayden gave him a smile full of humor with just a touch of encouragement. "I figure I can keep this argument up until at least midnight, before relenting and offering you a place to stay until you find a way home. I'm really not trying to coerce you. Either way, you won't be left to fend for yourself. If you don't decide to become a Herald, I'll admit, you probably will have more time to investigate how you got here, but you may not gain enough knowledge to discover the means of remedying that situation. From what I've learned where you come from is very different from here and discovering those differences might be necessary for you to succeed. If you do, if nothing else, you will be able to learn enough about our culture so that you no longer feel like an outsider."

"And when I leave in a month? Or a year? Or two years?" Damn, how he hoped it didn't take him two years to get home. There wouldn't be anything left to go home to. "You will not for a moment think that spending time to train and money to feed me was a waste?"

"No, that would never be a waste," Ayden replied with such sincerity that Duo knew, without a doubt, that he meant it. Ayden well and truly believed what he said.

It was all Duo could manage to keep his expression from displaying his outright surprise. "You are the strangest people I have met." Or the stupidest, but Duo was certain they weren't stupid; perhaps entirely too trusting, but not stupid. Well, the core of his objection just got soundly thrashed and trampled and then thrashed again. They weren't going to force him to stay. Hell, they weren't even going to object to him leaving when he figured out a way home. He had no reason not to agree. Aside from that, Ayden was right. He needed to learn more about this place and that wasn't going to happen while he was sulking in his room, mooching off the kingdom's coffers. "All right. I will do it."

To be continued...