Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Blue Lightening ❯ Saying Goodbye ( Chapter 2 )

As Duo parked the car and strolled up the lawn to the French windows at the rear of the house, he was accompanied by a soft flute and violin duet, the music of the two instruments coiling around each other in a complex melody. It said it all, without words. The tune was complete; there was no room for him here.

Duo slipped up to his room using the servant's stairs. He re-packed his duffle and filled his rucksack, placing items he no longer needed in a cardboard box he had picked up from the recycling bay near the kitchen - with so many servants and their families living on site, the Winners had apparently seen the need to have the house and grounds properly taken care of.

The cardboard box he left on his bed. There wasn't a whole lot there. Some explosives and electrical parts - he was keeping his gun. His priest's outfit and his tuxedo. One of Relena's hair ties, stolen as a joke. His old boots. A blue towel, burnt in an attack. A bottle of mentholated spirits. A book Wufei had lent him. The keys to a motorbike - he didn't know which one or what had happened to it.

He was keeping the spoils of his shopping trip, the clothes that Quatre had given him. The photographs taken at the ceremony declaring peace. The pack of cards he had found in a room at some school. His gun and lock picks, of course. Should he take his laptop?

No. If he was going to L2, there was no need of it. Besides, it was getting to be out of date, and the screen was cracked in one corner. The keyboard was sticky because of the time Heero had surprised him while he was tinkering with some parts, and he had knocked over the bottle of lubricant. The lid was scarred with blobs of melted soldier from the time he and Quatre had tried to fix Quatre's desktop.

The laptop went into the box with the other items, and Duo sat next to it on the bed, leaning on the closed lid as he wrote his goodbye note. He could still hear the music floating in through the open window.

 

Hey guys,

 

I'm off, as I'm sure you've already guessed. You'll find you car at the shuttleport. I'll contact you when I find a place to settle, ok? But I need to do a few things, hopefully lay a couple of ghosts to rest.

On a lighter note, I found some wacky models of our Gundams in the store today! Seriously, Q, you should think of getting Winner Corp to make some better ones. I'm sure they'll sell great as a novelty toy, especially as yours'll be more accurate than the crappy excuses for MS they're passing off as Gundams.

Don't worry about me; I can take care of myself. If you're lucky, you'll get a vidcall in a few weeks. Until then, try not to keep the servants awake!

 

Ja!

Duo

 

He left it on top of the box and packed the notebook and the pen into his rucksack. Now, all he needed to do was sneak out and get to the shuttleport. Oh, and grab his toothbrush. Would Q notice if he took the nice fluffy towel too?

Probably.

Oh well. His street instincts took over, and he found himself hurriedly folding the towel and wedging it into his duffle. His toothbrush went into the end pocket, next to the soap and shampoo. It was strange… he used to keep the C4 in that pocket…

Shaking his head to dispel the unwelcome memories, Duo shouldered the rucksack, grabbed the duffle and headed out the door. After all, he had to be ok. He had a towel with him, didn't he? (1)

*

The shuttleport was crowded. At least the queue for hops between colonies was shorter than the queue for the trips to Earth or the Moon. It was disconcerting to acknowledge that all his worldly possessions despite his shopping trip still only amounted to hand luggage. But then, he had never owned anything more than hand luggage. And a Gundam, but that was a little different.

It was strange, not piloting. If he had asked, Quatre would have let him borrow a shuttle. But that would have meant a whole load of fuss over him leaving. His knee was aching; time to break out the painkillers. Looks like those little bottles of water they give you on take off do come in useful for something. His neighbour was giving him funny looks, and Duo was tempted to shove the label, “co-codamol”, in his face. Jerk.

The pilot was a good one. Smooth flying all the way, and no excess jets. But then, this was a commercial shuttle. Maybe they were on autopilot? No, his senses told him as they deviated slightly. He caught sight of the remains of a space mine floating outside his window. Of course, with all the debris littering space at the moment, the autopilot wouldn't be safe.

Duo stared out of the window, unconsciously twirling the end of his braid between his fingers. What if he had been the one to cause this debris? What if it were his fault that it was that much more dangerous for people to travel through space? The idea made him shudder.

“Hey,” said his neighbour. “You all right, kid?”

The name took him back with a start. Solo had used to call him that. He managed a shaky grin. “My knee's playin' up a little, s'all.”

His neighbour was a middle aged man, with graying curly hair and brown eyes. He looked concerned. “What did you do to it?”

“Aw, I just busted it up, no big deal.”

“I hope you didn't get in a fight!” he was admonished.

“You sound like Sister Helen,” he said without thinking. The man looked confused.

“Who's she?”

It was too late to back out now. “Uh, she was the nun who looked after me when I was a kid.”

“A nun, huh? Bet she disapproved of fighting then. Are you a Christian?”

The man was cutting deeper and deeper with every sentence, but he didn't have a clue. Yes, Sister Helen disapproved of fighting, and she would have been horrified to see what he had become after her death. He let his cap shadow his eyes as he replied.

“No… I'm not a Christian. I tried, but I cannot believe that a God who loves everything and everyone would allow so much death.”

The man nodded. “My wife said the same thing. I always tried to argue with her, but she was persistent. And she did have a point. I too found it hard to believe after our son was killed in the wars.”

Duo felt cold ice spear through his stomach. “I'm sorry,” he managed. “Uh, was it recently?”

“Not in the last battle, no.”

“Was he stationed in space?”

“Yes. He was killed by OZ.”

Duo felt relief sweep through him and was careful not to let it show. However, the old man must have managed to pick up on something, because he was suddenly looking at Duo very carefully.

“Were you a fighter?” he asked, dropping his voice slightly.

Trapped by the earnest gaze, Duo gave a slight nod. He didn't lie, and this man seemed like a pretty nice guy. Besides, the war was over, so why not?

“Which side?”

“I fought for the colonies.” It was true, as far as sides went. Revenge, his true goal, was what he had fought for, but the freedom of the colonies was a close second. He didn't know quite when he began fighting for Peace rather than Freedom, but the others seemed to have gone along with Heero's driving goal, so he had followed.

Feeling uncomfortable with this chat with his neighbour, who seemed intent on stirring up old memories with every sentence, Duo faked a yawn.

“Sorry. Man I'm tired.”

“The pills must be making you sleepy. Get some rest,” the man advised.

Duo smiled at him and pulled his cap over his eyes, shutting out the lights from the cabin. He quickly fell into a light doze, ready to wake if anything changed.

*

~dream~

Heero grabbed tight onto his hand and dragged him out of the store, face like stone, blue eyes flashing lightening. Duo, jester mask firmly in place, pretended to be oblivious.

“But Heero! We didn't get any ice-cream!”

“The others will get it.”

“But Tommy didn't tell them what kinds to get, he told me!” Duo protested. Heero's hand tightened around his fingers. Owch.

“Baka. You're injured, you should still be at the school.”

“Aw, Heero, I didn't know you cared.”

For a minute there, Duo thought that he was going to get away with it, but no. Heero crushed his heart yet again.

“I don't. I need you well in case we get a mission that needs your skills.”

“Cold, so cold…” Duo wailed theatrically, covering up the real pain he felt with a comically tragic mask.

When they reached the dorm, he was unceremoniously dragged to their shared room and dumped onto his bed.

“Aw, Heero, aren't you even going to kiss it better?” he asked, working to keep a cheerful note in his voice.

Heero looked puzzled. “Kiss… it better?” he asked.

“Yeah. If you kiss something, it gets better quicker,” Duo told him, grinning. Heero's skepticism was obvious, and Duo was amazed when Heero swiftly bent over and brushed dry lips first over his shoulder (the injured one that he hadn't been pulling him by) and then on the bruise on his forehead.

Duo sat there gaping. Had that really just happened?

But the next morning Heero had gone. And the next thing Duo heard, he had been moved to another school in another country, leaving Duo to explain why neither of them had been at the party the night before, and why there hadn't been any ice-cream.

…

He woke up in hospital, and the pain ripped through him like a pack of hungry wolves. As soon as a portion of his brain was free from coping with the hurt, the second volley came as memories attacked.

“Shit,” he whispered, screwing up his face. Boys didn't cry. So what was this wet stuff on his face?

Something soft swiped across his cheek and he automatically opened his eyes. Shit, he was crying in front of Heero Yuy. Way to go, Maxwell. Waitaminute! Heero was… wiping his tears away?

How disgustingly sappy.
“It's ok now, you're out of there. I got you out.”

Somehow, it was what he needed to hear. And Heero was there, when he collapsed into his arms, sobbing. It was then that Duo realized that he was perhaps a little in love with the pilot called the `Perfect Soldier'.

But once again, when he woke up the next morning, Heero had gone.

It was then that Duo decided to squash the fledgling feeling, because Heero could not be trusted. He would trust 01 to watch his back, to carry out his part in a mission and to get the job done if someone fucked up. But he couldn't trust him with anything more. Heero was messed up emotionally, and Duo was unstable enough himself without trying to prop up a partner that was perhaps even worse than he was.
Now that that relationship was killed before it begun - good luck to Relena; even if she was a bitch, she was a mentally stable one. Although there was evidence to the contrary; she protected the guy who tried to kill her for fucks sake!

Duo wasn't like Relena. He couldn't throw his life away on a whim. If he was going to die, he was going to die for a cause, and take as many OZ bastards as he could with him.
~end dream~

*

Duo woke with a start as the shuttle swerved off course, probably to avoid another remnant of a furious battle. Man, that dream had been a trip down memory lane. He raised his eyes and found his neighbour looking at him over the top of a cup of coffee.

“You sleep lightly.”

Duo gave a non-committal grunt and fished around for his bottle of water to wash the fuzz out of his mouth. He had been asleep for about an hour.

“I've always been a light sleeper,” he said once he felt a little more human.

“Dream any?”

“A little. How long have we got left?”

“We're about half way. There'll be food soon.”

Duo pulled a face. “Oh goody. Well, I suppose it is going to be my last decent meal for a while, even if it is shuttle food.”

His neighbour smiled. “It is notorious. What do you mean, last decent meal?”

Duo frowned. “Curiosity killed the cat,” he retorted, using Sister Helen's favorite phrase.

The man immediately backed off, leaving Duo feeling a little guilty. “I'm sorry, it's been a boring trip,” the man apologised. “I didn't mean to-”

“It's ok.”

“We could chat about something else if you like.”

“Um, ok.”

Duo spent the rest of the shuttle ride listening to stories about the other man's life. The food was, as predicted, awful. The company was slightly better. Just so long as he didn't get to the point where he was repeating himself, Duo could cope. Some of the stories were even kind of funny…

 

 

 

(1) yeah, I'm a hitchhiker's fan. So what? Shame on you if you did not get this reference. Someone tell me, are the authors comments good or not? Do they add or detract from the enjoyment of the fic?