Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Goodbye Yellow Brick Road ❯ Part Two ( Chapter 2 )

Part Two

Duo sighed as he stared up at the ceiling. He hadn't slept at all that night, his eyes were painful and dry and it hurt to blink.

Fear coursed through every vein in his body. He kept hearing the door open and Teachers march in. And even though every time it was just his imagination, it felt so real he jumped.

Finally, the door did open and harsh golden light flooded into the room. He lay flat as a board, hoping he could just sink into the sheets and disappear.

"Duo Maxwell?" the second voice from the night before asked.

"Yes?" his timid voice replied to the robed figure.

"We have a little friend for you. Sit up."

Duo did as he was told.

"This will be your new roommate. His name is Heero Yuy. He's Double Band and his Art is Earth. Be nice to him and try not to scare him with your stupidity like you do everyone else."

Duo gave a curt nod and didn't fall into relief quite then. He wouldn't be safe until the man had walked out the door, down the hall, and out of the Student's Chambers.

The man turned to the newbie and smiled.

"Enjoy your stay at our Academy."

With that he left the two boys together. Duo was dead silent as he used his power to waft the sound of the man walking out to his ears.

As the last door shut, Duo collapsed upon his bed, breathing deep and heavy.

The new member of the room snorted and sat down on the other bed.

Then Duo sat up once again and looked at his new roomie whose name he couldn't remember for the life of him.

The boy was thin, with a well-muscled build. His crisp blue eyes were alert and seemed to study everything constantly. His hair was a dark brown and fell in an unruly mop over his eyes.

Duo found him interesting to look at.

He didn't want to admit it, but he knew he was going gay. He hadn't been around women since he was five and he was longing for a little romance.

"So, what do you think of our wonderful school?" Duo mocked cynically.

"It's bull piss," the other replied darkly.

"Ding, ding, ding. We have a winner. Congratulations. You've won our Grand Prize. You get to spend all eternity here. How do you feel now?" Duo spoke dully, sarcasm oozing out of his voice.

"Pissed on," the other replied.

Duo smirked. This guy was promising to be a blast. He was the kind of person the Teachers would hate.

"What's your name? I'm sorry, I didn't catch it."

"Heero Yuy. You are Duo Maxwell, no?"

"Yep. That's right. I'm not quite as stupid as they make me out to be. I play dumb because the Teachers don't mess with you so much when you're dumb."

Heero grunted. "They mess with me and I'll blow them off this fucking Earth."

"Hate to break it to you, buddy, but these bitches" - he lifted his arms, indicating the bracelets - "only allow you to access a little of your power, not anywhere near enough for me to cause a small twister in the palm of my hand," Duo spat with disgust.

Heero smirked. "Oh?" With that, the bracelets unsnapped from around his wrists and fell into the lap.

Duo just gawked at what at he previously thought was impossible.

"No, no!" he then cried. "You'll die with them off!"

"I'm not dead yet. I've known my Art since I was three. This is the first time I've ever heard of any 'Bands' or dying. I don't think I'm in too much danger if I've lasted all of my life without these things. I don't think anyone's in danger. I just think they want to keep anyone with power close to them."

Duo was clutching his hands to his chest defensively. "I don't know...."

"But for now, I'll be keeping them on." Heero clicked the Bands back on around his wrists. "Don't want the Teachers finding out I can take these things off. I didn't mean to scare you."

"You didn't scare me!" Duo replied, indignant. In truth, this new boy scared him out of his mind. Everything he'd believed, the world he'd been raised in, suddenly crumbled under his feet. Did the bracelets not even matter? Could you.... Could you truly survive without them and not...go mad?

Heero smirked. "I know."

Heero pitied the brainwashed boy across from him. He seemed to be clinging to the feeble teachings of this school as if they were the only things left in life.

What had they done to him?

Duo stuck his nose in the air arrogantly. "I can't wait 'til you get your ass kicked, Mr. Mighty. Don't mock me."

Heero rolled his eyes and lay down.

"When's First Block Class?" he asked as he traced the ceiling with his eyes.

"In twenty minutes."

Heero wondered what he'd do for the next twenty minutes and resorted to snapping the bracelets on and off. And on. And off. And on....

"Why in the hell are you doing that?!" Duo finally shouted, his annoyance clear.

"I'm bored."

Duo barked a short laugh. "Bored? Bored?! You're bored? Hell! Everyone is 'bored'! But that doesn't mean you have the permit to drive a person insane! Click, click, click! Ah! Stop it!"

Heero turned his head to look at his roommate, who was almost ripping out his hair in frustration.

"You could have asked nicely."

Duo promptly rolled his eyes, picked up a thin pillow, and threw it at him, with a little added force due to his Art.

Heero clicked off his bracelets and Duo's bed was over turned on its side and smashed him into the wall. Duo's cry was stifled by the sheets as hopelessness overwhelmed him, trapped to the wall by the bed.

"Don't ever," Heero growled the warning, "raise you're hand or use your Art against me again or I will pull your body apart piece by simple piece and watch as you scream and bleed to death. Got that?"

Duo's apology was strangled and barely heard from where he was ensnared alongside the wall.

When Heero was satisfied that he got the message, he gave a curt nod and flicked his wrists and the bed came down and Duo collapsed on the floor next to it.

With out a second thought or concern for the boy he just offended, he snapped the bracelets back on and lay back down on his bed.

Duo figured that maybe he was insane, he just didn't know it.

~~~

Duo saw Quatre nowhere the next day at lunch.

All he wanted was to sit down and eat a nice lunch with his best friend, but that wish didn't seem to be one he was going to have granted.

"Trowa!" he called, walking up to the tall boy who seemed to always have a shadow over his eyes and a chip on his shoulder. "Have you seen Quatre today?"

"Duo," he acknowledged, tilting his head to the side to get a good look at him. "No. I haven't. Do you know what could have happened? I haven't heard him since Wednesday."

Duo sighed and didn't want to talk about it, but figured that Trowa had a right to know.

"They asked him to translate something. He did. It was a little less than what they expected and they didn't believe him."

A flicker of anger passed over the boy's usually tranquil face.

"We won't be seeing him today. Nor tomorrow, most likely, either," he spoke softly, sadly.

"It has been taking a lot out of him recently," Duo admitted, trying to sound casual.

"They shouldn't do that kind of thing to people. Especially Quatre...."

Duo suspected that Trowa had a thing for the blond haired boy, but he didn't say anything. It was better to keep you're lips sealed then to speak, Duo had learned, in almost every circumstance.

"I know." Duo sighed. "You might be amused by the situations that filled my morning, if you would like to get your mind off of it...."

Trowa looked up at him and Duo sat down next to him.

"I got a new roommate and the guy's a fucking freak. Trowa, he..." -at this point Duo's voice dropped to a whisper- "...he can take off the Bands."

Trowa's eyes widened in shock as he moved back to get a clearer look at Duo.

"Are you out of your mind? Are you okay?"

"Of course! He took them off and he smashed me into the wall with the bed. He didn't even touch it. He just lifted it with his Art and pushed me into the wall! I'm going to have bruises forever! How could he do that unless he had taken them off, huh?" he hissed.

"What did you do to make him so mad?"

"I threw a pillow at him! That's it! I got upset 'cause he keep snapping them on and off and on and off in the dead silence of the room and it was just getting on my nerves a little bit, so I threw a pillow at him. That's all. Then he got all freaky on me and told me if I rose a hand to him again he'd rip me into little pieces."

"What's his Art?"

"I think its Earth."

"Oh. Maybe he works well with metal and can ease apart the atoms? He must be pretty good, for having just joined the Academy."

"Double Band."

Trowa was silent. "Duo, don't let this man be the death of you."

"Man?! He's only my age!"

"Whatever!" Trowa exploded in anger. "Man, boy! I don't care! Don't let yourself be killed by him, okay?"

"Yes. There must be a more honorable death."

Both boys turned in surprise to see their quiet friend who had snuck up on them.

"I hate it when you do that," Duo muttered.

"I don't care," Wufei replied. "Back to the point. Avoid the man and don't push his buttons."

"Are you suggesting something?"

"I'm suggesting you know how to annoy people, but you're still my friend and I don't want you to die such an dishonorable death."

"Wufei, you are a loony," Duo sighed, looking out at the people around him as he munched on a stick of bread. Heero sat by himself, eating quickly and efficiently as seemed everything he did. Unlike all three of them, with their assorted fresh bandages, Heero had none.

"I wonder if he's lonely...."

"Why do you care?" Wufei asked, playing with his ruby-studded Bands, freaked out by hearing that they could be taken off. "He threatened to kill you."

"Still.... It's no fun to be alone...."

~~~

Duo wandered through the halls after Fourth Block. He hoped to get to the library and find that book once more.

But before he got there, he noticed, glancing down a hall, that Heero was on the other end, turning into a forbidden hall.

No matter what Heero did to him, he didn't deserve what he'd get going down that hall.

No one did.

He ran down the cold, slate floor and grabbed Heero by the shoulder, pulling him back into the safe hall.

"What do you think you're doing?!" Duo hissed.

"What do you think *you're* doing?" Heero replied angrily, removing Duo's hand from him. "Didn't I give you enough of a warning?"

"Hell, I just saved your sorry ass! You go down that hall and you wish you were dead! They do stuff to people that go down that hall. They do mean stuff." Unconsciously, Duo had wrapped his arms around himself and shuddered. "Don't go down there."

Heero was fascinated by the fear that the simple hall seemed to evoke in the other boy and tilted his head.

"What do they have down that hall?"

"I don't know...really.... I only went down their once and I will *never* do it again.... I clung to the other side of the wall for weeks, and that was when I stopped taking the longer route to the library."

"Nothing can be that bad," Heero replied, turning to look at the entrance of it. Some strange language was carved into the curve of the entrance and he wondered what it meant.

Duo looked at the words on the door and shuddered.

He would've never went down there if he knew what they had said when he was a curious eight year old, but he wasn't in tune with his Incarnate self, then.

He wished he were, because what they did to him would fill his nightmares for the rest of his life.

~Til Then~