Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Nothing There Anymore ❯ Chapter 4

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

Nothing There Anymore- by masamune

Chapter 4

Turning the doorknob so as not to make any noise, Trowa entered the safehouse. Checking his watch he was shocked to find that it was well past four in the morning. Lazily throwing his overcoat into the closet, the Heavyarms pilot leaned forward on the white wooden doorframe. Fatigue, the latest mission, concern and millions of other factors had deprived him of sleep recently and despite all his training and experience it was affecting him.

/All the cars were in the garage/ Trowa thought, pushing away from the door and walking toward the kitchen. /Wufei must have found Quatre. He would never have come back without him. God, I could sure as hell go for a beer now. Shit!/ Trowa barely muttered the harsh oath as he tripped over the carpet and had to catch himself on the banister that lead upstairs. /A little reward to myself for going through all this hell the past couple days. Better make it vodka tonight/

Staggering over to the refrigerator, Trowa threw open the door. White light shot everywhere, casting long, lingering shadows over all of the room. The coveted bottle lay on the second shelf from the bottom. On closer inspection Trowa found it to be nearly empty.

"I got some left if you really want it," The voice came from nearby, but in Trowa's poor state the sound seemed to eminate from everywhere.

Looking up, Trowa made out the sight of Heero sitting at the kitchen table. The Wing pilot was sitting in his usual spot at the long table, almost blending into the gray shadows. The refrigerator light gave Trowa a better look at the Wing pilot. He was holding a glass out towards Trowa. The drunken Japanese soldier seemed almost demonic in the grim light, sitting at a table for five with only two chairs sitting side by side, a wiry smile on his face, bags under his eyes and hair more unruly than normal.

"Come on, sit down," Heero offered, pulling out the only other chair so it was more accessible. "You look like hell; you need a good drink."

"That 2 liter bottle was full when I left," Trowa noted aloud, plopping down wearily in the chair. "You didn't have all of it tonight did you?" He raised a quizzical eyebrow but gave no other sign of emotion other than being very tired.

"Been drinking it over the past few days," Heero shrugged, a stoic reaction as normal. "Duo had quite a bit too, a few nights ago when you called saying you'd be delayed. For a skinny guy he can put a good amount down."

/Looks like the same goes for you old friend/ Trowa observed. /But since when did Duo start drinking? …Forget that, I need to ask you some questions/

Trowa barely blinked and asked back, "What happened between you and Quatre?"

The name fell like a dead grenade. Making only a small plunk but capturing the special attention of all nearby as if it were primed and ready to explode. All was quiet save the hum of the refrigerator, door hanging open, long forgotten but still casting the only light in the entire room. Heero's defenses almost fell for a moment, emotion getting the better of him as he mulled the subject over cautiously. But all he did was shrug casually and grunt back.

"Hn. Doesn't really matter much at all," Heero insisted. "Don't worry about shit like that. Here take a drink…"

/Avoiding my question. That's very unlike him. Why's he been acting so strange recently? What's gotten into him?/

"I really want to know what happened," Trowa's calm voice demanded obedience and Heero wasn't going to be one to put up a fight after guzzling away as much alcohol as he had. Trowa knew better than anyone else how alcohol could open up a person and make them talk about otherwise taboo issues.

Sighing heavily, Heero said in reply, "Fine, then I'll tell you."

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/Sleepless nights seem to be coming more often/ Quatre thought. /Within the last two months I've just had so much trouble sleeping that it's even been affecting my piloting/

Quatre found himself staring out the window while he lay on his bed. The sky night was filled with stars, all glittering and twinkling. But the still jungle forest around the safehouse was dark and forlorn.

/There's no moon tonight, Makes it so much darker/ The thought brushed through Quatre's mind. /There are so many stars and they're all large suns… but the smaller moon is all that sheds light on us in the nighttime/

/Nights when I couldn't sleep… Heero would hold me in his arms and tell me to not think about anything/ Quatre thought wistfully, tears beginning to form in his eyes. /This is the first night that I've had to sleep without him by my side. It felt so right and so safe, sleeping in his arms/

Quatre looked around the lurid room /He's taken all of his things away. Probably moved back to his old room. Of course he wasn't going to share the same room with me after what I did/ Quatre thought bitterly, biting back the tears that seemed to overtake him like a flood. /I guess I'll have to cope with restless nights by myself now…/

Throwing his head back on his pillow, blonde bangs fell over his face. Not even caring enough to brush them away, Quatre shut his eyes and tried to fall asleep.

"On Wednesday, when you were still on your mission, some people came to the safehouse."

/People coming way the hell up here?/ Trowa thought, knowing how much that jeopardized their safety. /Why would anyone come here? Iie, I should listen to Heero's story first. It'll probably be the only time he tells me it/

"They were part of a hiking group that got lost while on a safari or some silly thing," Heero went on, fingering his empty glass but holding eye contact with Trowa. "There was a mother and a little girl, said they got separated from the rest of their family in a rainstorm. No phones, GPS, or food. Honestly I was surprised how those two had managed to find their way here. Those hiking trails are all the way on the other side of the mountain and they said they'd been lost for three days."

Heero stopped and tilted his head sideways as if something had suddenly caught his intention. He smiled slightly, "They were just ordinary citizens, no military training or anything. And the girl was very small, about 6 I'd guess." Trowa raised an eyebrow and Heero quickly got the hint and went on with the more important part of the story.

"You know full well that whoever sees a Gundam or Gundam pilot or should happen to stumble on a safehouse has to be eliminated," Heero's voice was cold and curt. The Wing pilot wasn't smiling anymore. "I didn't think those two would be an exception either."

/He killed a helpless woman and her little child?!?/ Trowa thought, a chill running over him. /They weren't OZ soldiers or even local police!/

/Would I have acted any differently in that situation?/ Trowa asked himself and realized, in almost equal horror what his answer was. /Civilian casualties are just another part of war. But sometimes they're just so unfortunate that afterwards you feel you're that much less of a human being. But wasn't that something we were all trained not to mind? As Gundam pilots, two people no matter how innocent, shouldn't mean a thing to us/

"As you can guess, Quatre stopped me," Heero said, completely cutting off Trowa's train of thoughts. Trowa was surprised that anyone could stop Heero from killing a person after he'd decided to do so. "I had them locked up in the cellar, even had to put a gun to the onna's head make her cooperate." Heero's voice never broke or changed as he spoke.

"I was about to pull the trigger when he came running. The woman's constant damned screaming and the kid's crying had Quatre flying downstairs like a banshee. We fought for a long while but eventually he convinced me to let them go."

/That doesn't explain anything, there must be more to it/

Silence fell over the two. Realizing that the refrigerator door was still open, Trowa got up to close it. First making sure to grab a beer, he closed the door and the room was dark again. His eyes taking a moment to adjust to the pitch black, Trowa walked back to the table and sat down.

"The policemen came just this morning," Heero's words stunned Trowa. "There were three of them."

"Nani? Police came to the house?" Trowa spurted out, his surprise showing.

Heero just turned to him and nodded. "Hai," He said darkly, "Just policemen, not military or anything else. More than a coincidence, although Quatre claims he swore the woman to secrecy before letting her go. One of the officers was babbling about how a woman told him the way here. I made sure to kill him first."

"…" Trowa had nothing to say to that.

"Wouldn't you have also?" Heero's voice was calm but his words slightly slurred from all the vodka he'd had. "They could have been real trouble. And if I could, I'd go and track down that woman and silence her too." There seemed to be an alien lack of confidence, an uncertainty that made the Perfect Soldier waver uncharacteristically

Trowa decided to test Heero's words. “What about the child?” Heero blinked. Trowa had hit the nail on the head. “Would you kill her too? Or just leave her an orphan?”

Heero didn't respond. Trowa took a moment to crack open his beer and take a swig of the cold liquid.

/Ch'… Guess that question's inappropriate. I don't even know what I would do…/

Since he didn't want to think about it anymore, the gangly youth switched the playing field. "Won't more cops come?" Trowa asked, and in a flash of paranoia thought he heard sirens. He hurried to finish his beer, hoped it would settle his nerves.

"Iie. Those three were the only ones that knew the way here. The back roads are impossible to navigate unless you know the way. One of the men told me before he died."

"And that's what got Quatre all pissy," Heero went on. "He begged, pleaded for me to spare those three also! Despite that the whole thing got out of hand in the first place because of his 'sympathy'," Heero spat the word like a vile curse. "So I finally told him what I should have a long time ago."

"I told him that he was weak and naïve. One of the reasons I thought I was in love with him was that he seemed strong in his own special way, something different that I had never seen before. Ch'. I was wrong; he's not strong at all. He's a scared, little boy and the battlefield is no place for scared little boys. I don't understand how he could have become a Gundam pilot in the first place."

/Quatre got as caught up in the fight as anyone else. Fate and chance brought us here for a one reason or another. Trowa thought and shuddered as he blocked out his own past phantoms. /But Quatre isn't that weak. He's proven himself not only as a pilot but as a brilliant strategist. It's a miracle that he's still such a nice and innocent person. There's no need for Heero to put Quatre down just because the war has made his heart so black and made him almost into a machine/

Heero leaned forward and his cold, cobalt eyes fell into Trowa's unblinking depths. Both locked their gaze and seemed to scan the very soul of the other. Trowa thought that beneath the stoic stare he could make out stronger, almost hidden emotion. But exactly what it was eluded him.

"He wasn't everything that I fell in love with," Heero said, his voice lowering to a soft whisper. Cobalt flared and suddenly Trowa recognized the look in those eyes. "But, I think you are."

Quickly leaning forward, Heero's mouth muffled any protest that Trowa might have mustered. Heero's lips mashed into Trowa's and the overwhelming stench of vodka filled the Heavyarms pilot's nostrils. Trowa felt Heero's tongue push open his mouth and roughly invade.

/Iie!/

"Iie," Trowa finally breathed, pulling himself away. Taking a deep breath of night air that was much cooler than Heero's mouth; he looked warily at his fellow pilot.

"Trowa, come on," Heero said softly, inviting him in the sparkle of his cobalt eyes.

Heero darted forward mouth taking Trowa's again, seeking to conquer the slender boy he swiftly wrapped in his arms. The odor of liquor was dank and stagnant. For a moment, Trowa closed his eyes as Heero kissed him. All was dark, no sound except his and Heero's breathing, feeling Heero kissing him. …Heero…He and Heero?... Almost instantly the image of Duo flashed through Trowa's mind.

/Duo/

"Stop, Heero," Trowa said firmly, pulling away again and backing away from the Wing pilot.

"Trowa, onegai," Heero spoke softly, speech slurred by a drunken stupor.

Taking a step forward, Heero reached out, attempting to embrace the young circus star. A soft curse escaped Heero's lips as he crashed into a chair, sending it careening across the floor. Stumbling, but desperately trying to regain his balance and simultaneously find Trowa in the inky dark, Heero tripped over his own feet. He fell in a heap on the floor, almost a whole step away from where Trowa stood.

/I understand it all now/ Trowa thought to himself, taking only a moment to glance back at Heero, turning and leaving the dark kitchen.

-end part 4