Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Eternal Betrayal (Extended) ❯ Ch. 5 ( Chapter 5 )

Disclaimer: Don't own GW.

 

Chapter 5

Unspoken Fears

 

January 29th, AC 202

Duo sat on the hospital bed, typing on the laptop in front of him. His body was feeling better after the virus had been cured, and he was finally able to sleep throughout the night. The other Gundam pilots had come only three times since he woke up last week. The braided captain didn't mind; he wanted to keep the new project secret from them as long as possible.

A knock at the door alerted Duo to a visitor's presence. “Come in,” he said without looking up from the screen.

“Are you still working, Duo?” Ran said jokingly. Duo grinned at her. She looked at the computer screen. “Especially on that project.”

“Relena's not going to wait for very much longer. Especially now that I've taken her best soldiers out of the battle.” He laughed slightly. “I wonder if we'll get the system up and running fast enough…”

“With your genius mind at work, nothing is impossible.” Her cell phone rang softly. She took it out and listened to the one-sided conversation. “Okay, bye.” She closed it and put it back into her pocket. “I have to go, but I'll send Erik over with more information tomorrow.”

“I'll be waiting anxiously,” Duo replied sarcastically. He returned to his work.

 

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Damitri walked into the hospital room. Duo had been transferred to a separate building that was much smaller and easier to monitor. The braided captain had stabilized, so having less staff watching him would be better for all of them.

Duo looked up from his laptop. “Ah, Damitri…” The doctor saw his nose twitch. “I smell… Pasta with chicken…” Damitri laughed at the young captain's face. Duo was practically drooling in anticipation. “The food in this place sucks horribly. I almost wished for ration packets the other day,” he said jokingly.

Damitri laughed with the young man. Duo had seemed out of it for the past few days after recovering from the virus. He was still pale, and his neck was still bandaged from the suicide attempt a few days before he collapsed in the Angel Room. Damitri hadn't told Duo about the five times he'd nearly died while being cured. Duo would have been destroyed. He set the tray down on the bedside table. Duo reached over to grab it. He ate it quickly but not fast enough to cause him to retch it up. It was good to see that Duo's appetite had returned. The captain had always been thin, but the nearly month in the hospital had turned him into a stick. “I want you to eat all of that, Duo. I'll be back in the morning to check-up on you and bring breakfast. Alright?”

Duo nodded unconsciously. Damitri smiled slightly before he turned and left.

 

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Duo woke up in a dangerously familiar room. “Where…?”

“It's good to see you awake again, my pet,” a man said nearby. Duo tried to jumped off of the bed, but straps on his wrists and ankles held him down. “Now, now… Is that anyway to greet your lover?” The man laughed hauntingly. Duo crushed the urge to scream. The man continued laughing. “Now, now. I don't want to have to punish you again, but I will if necessary.” He pulled a knife out from the folds of his white lab coat to prove his point. Duo's eyes widened, and he trembled in fear.

 

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Alone in the small hospital branch, no one heard Duo scream.

 

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Hilde froze suddenly. The phone fell from her fingers to the ground. “Hilde? Hilde, is everything alright?” Damitri asked. Hilde didn't reply, but he could hear her footsteps echoing through the phone as she ran out the door.

 

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Sanji led the two pilots through the maintenance tunnels. “How do you know he'll be down here?” Trowa asked. The captain looked back.

“Duo always comes down here when he gets stressed,” Sanji said calmly as he walked down the long stairs. The man knew the path down to the secondary Angel Room. Duo had fled there once nearly a year and a half ago after Hilde got in an accident. Sanji had barely managed to convince him to leave the safety of the secluded room and visit her in the hospital.

After a while, Sanji found the proper hatch and opened it. He walked down the corridor, turned left, and continued down the hall. He could hear Quatre and Trowa talking to each other softly behind him. The captain ignored them completely. He followed the corridor to the correct door. He knocked on it twice. There was no reply; Sanji knew that this episode must have been extremely unnerving for the generally stable captain. He opened the door slowly.

 

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Quatre heard singing again. He knew that no one else could hear it, but he could, clearly. It was a soft voice, angelic and sweet. Sanji moved out of the doorway into the room. “Duo, it's alright to come out,” Sanji said calmly. “It's safe. I brought Quatre and Trowa with me.” He motioned for the two Gundam pilots to come in.

Quatre looked around the large room. He could see large piles of books lining the walls around a small tank filled with a cloudy silver liquid. About a dozen interconnected computers were bunched in a corner. A small pile of cushions sat in another corner with a blanket thrown haphazardly over them; obviously someone had been sleeping in it recently.

Sanji walked around the tank. He sighed deeply and knelt down. He talked softly to someone hiding behind the cloudy tank. Sanji glanced over at them. The two pilots walked over to him. Sanji turned back to the person. “Duo, your friends are here. Do you want to talk to them?”

Quatre paused when he saw Duo curled up against the glass tank. The braided captain shook his head. “No, it was just a bad dream. I'll be fine. I just want to sleep a bit.”

“Well, then. Get some rest,” Sanji said calmly. “We'll be waiting for you back at the hospital. Damitri and Hilde are going to be angry, so try not to stay too long, alright?” Duo nodded, already half-asleep. Sanji stood up and walked away. He gave Quatre and Trowa a look that told them to follow him quickly.

 

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A few hours later, Duo was back at the hospital. Damitri and Hilde had lectured him about suddenly disappearing like that. He was tired from the lack of sleep, and he was still feeling the effects of the flashback. His nerves were shot to hell.

Erik knocked on the door. “I heard you needed more information on the defense system,” the blond man said calmly. He walked across the room. “So here it is.” He handed the jump drive to Duo. The braided captain put it into the necessary port on the laptop. “How have you been feeling?”

“Better.”

“That's good to hear.” Duo felt Erik place a hand under his chin and lift it up. He stared into the strange yellow-green eyes. Suddenly Erik bent down and captured Duo's lips.

 

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Heero turned the corner. He froze when he saw Duo and another man kissing. Duo seemed to enjoy the intimate touch of the stranger. Heero was surprised when he felt the intense urge to go over there and take the other man's place. He quickly fought down the urge. He turned and walked out of the hospital.

 

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Duo gasped when Erik broke the kiss he'd forced on the captain. “You fucking son of a bitch! What the hell gave you the right to do that to me?!” he yelled. He slapped Erik across the face. The blonde took a step back to get out of Duo's range, holding a hand to his cheek. “Get the hell out!!!”

Erik's eyes darkened. “I know the others follow you like little puppies after a toy, but you have to realize some of us gave up our lives for you and your damnable little colony! You should be willing to pay us back for our services!”

“Go to hell!!” Duo yelled back. “Any payment I am willing to give out does not include anything close to sexual favors!!”

Erik smirked dangerously. “I heard what happened to you on that colony.” Duo paled slightly. “Every night, those men would come.”

“Shut up!!” Duo launched himself at the Sweeper. “Don't talk about that like you know what it was like!” Nurses and security people ran into the room. Already Duo had wrapped his hands around Erik's neck and was trying to pound the blond head into the tile floor. “Don't ever speak of that ever again!” He felt the security guards pull him off of the man. “Let me go!! That bastard deserves to die!!!” he screamed in anger, struggling against the holds.

Duo felt a needle enter his neck. Instantly a numbing sensation swept through his body. He looked over at the `attacker'. “D-Damitri…?” He slumped in the guards' grip. His eyes fluttered shut.

 

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Hilde paced the kitchen floor. “What? What do you mean he had to be sedated?!” She listened to the other person. “Erik Hister? That Sweeper stationed on the Serenity? What caused the argument?.... What?! Is he alright?.... I'm heading over there right now.” She turned the phone off.

“Is everything alright?” Quatre asked. Hilde turned towards the blonde.

She sighed. “Duo had to be sedated after having a heated argument with another Sweeper. He's going to wake up soon, but I doubt he's going to be very happy at all. I take it you want to come?” Quatre nodded. “Hurry up then. They're planning on snow tonight.”

“Snow? I don't have a coat.”

Hilde gasped. “Well, I'm sure Duo has one that you can wear. He obviously tends to collect things, including coats. They're in the closet to the right of the kitchen.” She pointed to the necessary path. A few days after the other pilots arrived here last month, pressure had forced Duo to make clean paths to the most used areas of the house. Quatre followed the path to the kitchen and turned down the one to the closet. He opened the door. Inside were about a dozen coats of various sizes and colors. Quatre grabbed a long dark blue coat with a black belt sewn around the waist. “You have an excellent sense of fashion, Quatre. That one I think Duo bought on the Serentiny when that line first came out last winter.”

“Thank you,” he said, putting the coat on. He was surprised to see it went down past his knees. Up close the blonde could see strange markings on the shoulders that went down the sleeves. “This is amazing! It's so light, but it's warm as well.”

“The new ones are even lighter. Duo wore one of those to the meeting on Earth. Soon, the coats might become bulletproof or fireproof. The Serenity is the ship in charge of those inventions. Perhaps I'll take you there sometime.”

“That'll be good. Well, let's go.”

 

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“He's not yet conscious, Hilde. We had to give him a stronger drug than we normally do.” The doctor led the pair down the hall. “He should wake up within the hour, though.”

“Thank you, Damitri,” the woman said calmly. “What caused the argument?” The young doctor looked nervously at Quatre. Hilde glanced at him. “I understand. Quatre, you can go into the room. I'll be there soon.” She and the doctor walked off to speak privately. Quatre turned and walked into the room.

Duo was sleeping on the bed. A laptop sat on the bedside table. It was on, but Duo had plugged it into a nearby socket. Quatre glanced at the sedated captain before he walked over to the computer. He scanned the window. “This is a mobile suit piloting program,” he muttered softly. He noticed a jump drive attached to the computer. He opened the files. “An auto-defense system?” Quatre looked at Duo. “Why would they need a MS piloting program and auto-defense system?”