Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Souls Disappear in the Snow ❯ Trust ( Chapter 7 )
[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]
Souls Disappear in the Snow- GW fanfic
Masamune Reforged '06
Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing or any of the characters therein.
Warnings: yaoi (established 3x4, developing 1x2 and 5x2, angst, violence, supernatural, cursing, death?* Characters doing some not so nice stuff to each other, some of which is violent in this chapter.
Archive: Anyone that wishes to archive this fic is welcome to.
Comments: to MasamuneEHS@hotmail.com
*Note: I am at this point clarifying the status of this story as deathfic or not.
IF you believe that the end of someone's existence is 'death', then no, this is not a deathfic.
IF you believe that the end of someone's physical life is 'death', then yes, this is a deathfic.
Last time I put this warning in.
Part 7 - Trust
Looking back on everything, I realize that there were six pivotal points that if only had been thoroughly understood, would have prevented later tragedy. I am filled with shame and frustration when I remember these times and wish with every fiber of my being that something else would have happened. I wish that I had seen the importance and had somehow been able to avert all the suffering. But these are burdens I never noticed were strapped to me until it was too late, and my feelings now are only natural misery and regret.
The first two events have already been accounted, though only one's importance and true consequences can be felt by the reader. The discovery of the map is one of those things that proved to be both a blessing and a curse. Had it not been found, it is possible that we could have stayed stranded in the Arctic mansion forever and all of us would have eventually become unhinged, cabin fever crazy. Most certainly if it had not been found, all of us would have perished.
But, the old map was found and can be considered the first step of our escape from the icy prison. However, it fooled us, made us too hopeful, too confident of our chances. Turning our focus to the snow blasted steppes, we missed the growing peril right underneath us. Since salvation did not come immediately, the map proved to be a major stress on Duo. A dancing, shimmering tease stoked his hope so it could be blown out.
Three of the other climactic actions will be recounted in time, but I am sure that the total effect and importance will escape the reader's grasp, exactly as it did mine, until... Well, it will come... Like the crucial event that took place in the kitchen, on the day Heero accidentally stumbled on the arsenal of guns, the others are cloaked in the guise of common day stuff. Just like the small black book Quatre found, major things may seem unimportant at first sight, like just another item in a just another room.
For a number of days, all the five of us did was search the endless rooms in the mansion for a more reliable guide to aid us in our escape. We simply couldn't trust our lives to some ancient scrap of paper, not against the unmerciful wild, no matter how much Duo insisted otherwise.
One day, while going through rooms that must have belonged to servants, for they were so cramped, ill lit and hastily made that none else could possibly have lived in them, Duo lost it again. He began to scream and snarl at the top of his voice about the "fucking damned ice" and Shinigami and the war.
This time though, none of us were struck quite the way we had been the first time. Quatre managed to get Duo under control in only a few minutes. We were growing numb to his mania, numb to everything. Each day seemed to blend and mesh with every other. The only notable difference came from a red curtain pattern in one room, to a towering mahogany closet in another, or the various items we would sort through. It was boring, monotonous work, but everyone else felt we needed to do it, so I didn't argue.
The black diary was found in one of the most cluttered rooms we searched. The occupant had been a man, an artist. He had been one of the first to live in this mansion. His room had been torn to shreds over the centuries, with everything of value stolen and the rest left in piles scattered about. The diary was in French, a language only Quatre knew how to read. I sat there in the room with him when he picked it up. He flipped through the pages, aquamarine eyes half-closed in lack of interest. He read a few random pages, then made to chuck it away, but did not. I watched him hold it in his hand for a second, and then finally drop it to his side. I assumed he wouldn't pick it up again.
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Quatre didn't read the diary for a good long while. He was busy with other problems. The lack of heat in the mansion made us all wear sweaters or coats constantly. And laboring in the basement, where the generator made it stiflingly hot only provided an evil contrast. Ranging from blue baby wraps to hulking overcoats, nearly every possible size and type of garb was at our disposal in the closets. But Quatre always wore long shirts that would cover far past every inch of his body. This little fact slipped right by me until the stretch of four days when the blonde only wore turtlenecks. On the third day, the sleeves happened to be so loose, that while Heero, Quatre and I were wasting away in the Hunt Room, they fell down to the skinny elbows, causing Heero to ask:
"What's that?"
"What?" Innocently, but without the cherub smile, Quatre answered.
"On your arms," Heero coughed. He had a cold, probably from his lack of sleep.
The hands quickly dropped out of sight, the cuffs going past the fingers. Quatre's face flinched and got even whiter, until it rivaled the blanket of snow outside, until it almost appeared a sick green in the awkward light.
A wide, wide smile popped up on the Winner heir's face, and he stuttered, "N, no. What are you talking about Heero?" Heero's eyes narrowed until I could barely see the dark blue iris. I knew the Perfect Soldier was not fooled. Quatre quickly excused himself and an ill silence came over both of us. Heero began went back to his work, but I asked just what had he seen.
"Bruises," He dryly answered.
What? I shook my head and returned to staring out the window. What did that mean? Bruises...
...from Trowa?
<-><-><-><-><->
Now I couldn't believe it for a long time, but five days later, it really hit me. I had come to accept the two pilots' relationship, even the rocky time they were going through. Relations with fellow warriors initially disgusted me. To one who caught himself stealing longer and hungrier looks at a boy with a long braid, it was ridiculous hypocrisy at best. Quatre and Trowa made such a perfect couple… for a while... But their recent fights had gotten worse and worse, with Quatre only increasing problems by fighting to ignore and look past their problem. Neither did anything. The gap grew and grew uglier, until it blew up in an inferno in the late night.
Core of black night, I woke up, bolting upright in bed. I was so thirsty. It was almost like someone had dropped a small fleck of slow-burning coal down the back of my throat. My one good eye adjusted to the darkness quickly. The hour escaped me, but as I threw the covers off and slipped into my night shoes, I thought it to be around the wee hours of the morning.
I ran to the bathroom, the faucet squeaking as I turned the water on. The rusty, aged pipes groaned in protest, but the ice-cold water flowed. I cupped my hands and drank greedily. The freezing liquid splashed my face, shocking the last dregs of sleep away. I took a moment, staring at my reflection in the mirror, which had a crack directly down the middle, a remarkably perfect line. I could only see out of my right eye, but my left still moved in perfect unison, as I looked myself over. My blind eye blinked back at me, as if everything were fine. My thirst temporarily quenched, I felt no desire to return to bed.
I took a walk around the mansion. Some lights were off, others on. I left everything as it was, sneaking like a thief through the halls. Flurries dusted the windows and the wind warned of a storm. The electricity generator controlled the night, everything regulated by its loud, persistent hum. My leg hurt, but I was too restless, too uneasy to care.
As normal, my tired thoughts turned to Duo. I was starting to wonder if there was any correlation between his panic attacks and his sporadic relationship with Heero. I didn't get too in-depth, as I passed a promenade looking over the main dining area, which ironically had been stripped of its large tables. I stepped into the promenade, but dropped low, barely peeking over the banisters as voices floated up from below.
"… can't you leave me alone for awhile?," Trowa, with a bitter undertone to his question.
"Trowa..." A long whine, but backed with boundless passion and concern, Quatre. "You never want me-"
"Why can't you get it through your head?" The normally quiet clown spat. Quatre jerked into view, facing my direction. I ducked out of sight, but still caught Trowa's angry words, "You can't seem to understand when you're pissing me off."
"But Trowa!"
"Do you think I like having someone around who just pisses me off?" Peering over the top, I could see Trowa now. He was shirtless, his slightly tanned skin catching the light. He was probably in the middle of his religious sit-ups and push-ups ritual. A light sweat lingered on his skin.
Quatre began to speak, but the taller boy cut him off, stepping ominously forward, "Answer my fucking question!" An uncommon shout, I hardly knew it for Trowa's voice.
The soft Arab wrung his hands, looked at the floor. Trowa waited. His muscular back was drawn up, shoulders especially tense. A vein ran down the long neck. He looked larger than normal, fed fat on his own anger. I prayed they wouldn't see me.
"I, I know that," I hardly heard Quatre admit the hard fact, "I know that I annoy you sometimes…"
"So," Trowa's voice sounded flat, but I felt a sinister vibe there, "Would I want a pain in the ass near me all day long? Would I be happy with you being on me continually, like a leech?"
How could Quatre answer that? How could Trowa ask him that?
The blonde boy had no answer except for silence. I became aware of how loud the beat of my heart and my drawing breath was. Pained crystal blue grew bigger, threatened to spill over.
Quatre suddenly lashed out, making me jump, "You never want me around anymore! You-"
"You're right!" Trowa cut him off, yelling louder. "I don't want you around! Great!" He faked cheer; "You figured it out!"
"No. No, I'm not hearing this." Quatre backed up, but Trowa took one step to make up for Quatre's four. "This isn't right. Something's not right!"
"I don't talk to you anymore. I don't sleep with you anymore. I don't bend over backwards for you anymore. I don't respect you anymore." The strange cruelty grew, even as the voice dropped to a softer volume. "Yes. Something's wrong Quatre, something with us. I don't want to do any of those things anymore. Can you guess why?"
Tears rolled out, aquamarine shivered. "You don't love me anymore." Not his words, Quatre was only restating something he had heard, repeated it in a blank, dead voice like the one that had broken his heart with it.
The Latin youth didn't reply, turning in my direction. I ducked out of sight again, and heard Quatre say, "No! No Trowa, something else is wrong! There, there's something wrong with this place, with this mansion! With all of us!"
"Oh please, not this shit ag-"
"No, no, no! Listen to me! There's something bad, evil. I feel it Trowa! It's… sinister and- "
"Quatre," Trowa's voice fell softer, almost defeated. "I don't believe in spirits or weird feelings from people or places. You're just making excuses. Damnit. You expect me to believe bullshit like that? You disgust me sometimes... Don't you think you're capable of being wrong every now and then? Does everything have to be blamed on something else?"
I had heard of Quatre's ability, his power to sense things no one else could detect.
"Duo… Duo agrees with me. He thinks something's off in this place too," Quatre was pleading, praying for Trowa to believe. I wondered why this was such an important issue.
"Duo is off. He's crazy from being cooped up here," Trowa wouldn't believe. He shook his head and asked, "Quatre, will you please leave me alone now? We've had this conversation before-" It hit me. This fight was just mirroring all the other arguments Quatre and Trowa got in. They could get at each other's throats over any little matter, and each small battle was a part of the growing war between them.
I looked up to see Trowa's arm grabbed by Quatre, powerful negative energy flowing out of the taller boy as the comparatively minuscule youth begged, "Please believe me." The blonde wanted more than Trowa's belief; he yearned for his love again. "Believe in me, in us." Quatre wanted the brunette's love so badly that I could feel it all the way up on the promenade, feel it grow and reach out desperately for Trowa. "I love you so much."
"Get away from me," Trowa's speech was hard, a warning. "Let go-"
Something flickered on Quatre's face, like a puzzled misunderstanding or inability to comprehend, "Trowa-"
"Let go!!" With a shove, Trowa pulled his arm from Quatre's grasp and pushed the blonde away. Caught off balance, thrown by his lover, Quatre fell to the floor. Tears flowed down his cheeks as he looked up unbelievingly at Trowa.
Trowa turned away. Quatre picked himself up from the floor. Trembling, he choked out, "What's wrong with you Trowa?"
I saw the green eyes snap open, fists clench. Whipping around, Trowa suddenly lashed out with his long left arm, landing the savage blow square on Quatre's surprised face. A half grunt, half yelp escaped the rich blonde's lips as he fell back again. Red appeared on his white shirt, and he began to crawl away. Trowa stepped forward, snarling:
"YOU!" Fury garbled the Latin youth's words. He took towering steps towards the shaking Arab, scampering back, still on the floor. "Nothing's wrong with me! YOU'RE the problem! You keep coming to me, even after I warn you to stay away. How can I make it any clearer," Quatre's back pressed up against a wall, he was trapped, "that I don't want you around?"
Sniveling something that missed my ear, Quatre babbled only for a second before letting out a shout. Trowa grabbed the poor, smaller boy at the collar and raised him by it. Their heads were level, eyes locked. Quatre's feet were a considerable distance above the wood surface and he struggled to catch a breath of air.
"I used to love you. I can't even remember why," Slowly punctuating each syllable, Trowa ground out the words. “I hate you when you're around me, like a stray dog begging.”
"Did, did you just say that you d,d,don't always hate me?" Quatre struggled to get the air to ask, a bad move.
Trowa's muscles bulged even larger and he shook Quatre like a doll, banging his head against the wall, speckling blood over both of them. His free arm cocked itself. An animal-like cry passed through the Heavyarms' pilot's lips and he shook terribly. Quatre did not try to block. There was a sharp crack as Trowa's fist broke Quatre's nose. Immediately, the arm was pulled back, like a bowstring, and let fly again, and again. Trowa had grown to a million times the size of the blonde, hiding the boy from my view as he abused him. It seemed to go on forever, but I only drew a few breaths during the time. Nothing moved me an inch, not even Quatre's pleas. I was frozen.
Then the shaking stopped. Trowa reduced in size, leaned in close to the quivering boy he once tenderly loved, his words impossible to make out from my hiding spot. All I heard was Quatre sobbing and gasping for air. With a quick motion, Trowa let go, sending the Arab sprawling on the floor. He didn't look back at all or even collect his shirt. He just stomped out of the room, nearly ripping a door off its hinges.
I stayed deathly still. How long had I been watching? Why had I watched? Why hadn't I stopped them?
My teeth were clenched and my leg throbbed from sitting in the same position for so long, but I waited motionlessly. I barely peeked over the promenade's railing. I stayed like this while Quatre sat, fixed in his misery, blood and tears mixing on his face. I stayed still even when he got up, only to get a cloth to wash up his own blood from the floor. I stayed until he collapsed in a chair, crying sometimes, but always trembling, head to his chest and arms hugging his body as if to comfort all his woes.
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This next part I am going to relate as best I can. However, it may not be totally accurate and some of it is still muddled because… Well, what happened was this:
A few days after witnessing Trowa horribly rough up Quatre (Quatre insisted that he had hit his head while in the basement pantry. And, I decided, if he wouldn't stand up for himself, I wasn't about to either) we were searching rooms still, looking for a clue that would help us navigate to safety. Searching through a room on the ground floor, we stumbled on a liquor cabinet. It was filled with all sorts of different kinds of hard alcohol, but Duo grabbed out a big glass bottle of Smirnoff vodka and, against Quatre's advice, decided we had searched enough that day. It was time for some relaxation.
The five of us settled into the Hunt Room, Duo offering the bison at the entrance a swig. He wasn't in the mood for it. We set up a roaring fire and all of us, save Quatre, began to drink. We drank straight from the bottle, washing down the burning, acrid taste with various drinks from the kitchen. The powerful alcohol soon loosened us up and we started joking around, laughing and enjoying each other's company for the first time in as long as I could recall.
Quatre soon went off to sleep. All our restraint went right out with him and the bottle quickly began to disappear. Now, I had never been a big drinker, but one thing I remembered was that when you're drunk, you can get really, really horny. And with Duo wearing an almost skin tight, long sleeved shirt, unconsciously flaunting his lithe body as he moved and joked around, I got hotter and hungrier for him with every teasing motion, every swig of burning spirit. Taking my eyes off of him got harder and harder to do and as we got continually drunker. My thoughts turned to how I could quietly get him out of the room to a more private spot.
I don't know if Duo picked up the pheromones I was letting out, or if it was just by chance, but he said out of the blue, "Ya know, one thing's been driving me nuts iz that I haen't gotten any ass at all since we got here." Heero's and my jaws dropped simultaneously, but Duo went right on, saying, "I mean, I don't get fucked a lot, but jusht the option of going out to a bar or club or just cruising ish real nishe to haf."
Did he just say, `I don't get fucked a lot' ? This was the first time the American devil had come straight out and admitted his homosexuality in front of all of us… Not like it had been a secret though.
I began to laugh, passing the vodka to Trowa; "You're a regular trashy hoe Maxwell!"
Duo shrugged, jumped up and snatched the bottle before Trowa could put it to his lips. After taking a long chug, he grinned loopily, "Jerkin off juss iss'n as satisfyin, even with thad dildo I found." He winked jokingly at me, but Heero sounded like he was wheezing to death. Duo put the Smirnoff to his mouth again, speech garbled, "Calms down there guys. You shoulda seen yer faces juss now."
He gave the round tip of the glass bottle an imitation blowjob, cramming all of the neck into his mouth. Laughing, smiling wide, he gave the bottle to Heero, who did not wipe off the drool.
Heero asked, "Do you have to be so crude?" The soldier, who had been relatively high-spirited all day, now sounded irritated, bothered. Both Duo and I knew what was getting him so riled up.
"Ey!" Jumping out of his chair, Duo yelled in mock anger. "A guy can' help hisself, an' you heard Ufei, 'I'm a shlutty hoe.' Hahaha, hic, right?" The braided boy had put down more alcohol than any of us and it was showing now. Duo dropped his chaser drink. Orange energy drink spilled on the carpet. Duo quickly bent down to pick it up, but didn't stand up very fast. Instead he fumbled with his glass, waving his ass around, which happened to be directly facing Heero.
Duo wasn't fooling anyone. Heero, shifting around uncomfortably, said in a somber, serious tone, "What are you doing Duo?"
"Ha! Really Eero, you that naïve?" Duo flashed another brilliant smile and went on, "I'm puttin' the moves on ya. You know, seducshun. I mean, why should I be complainin'm sbout bein' lonely when dere's three hansome young men igh`ere?" He looked around at all of us, then began to slide his hands up and down his body, tossing his wild hair around. Lowering his voice to a husky tone, he whispered, running his hands provocatively down his tight frame, "All it take isht a few moves."
With that Duo began to dance around, his braid whipping around crazily as Shinigami did his best imitation of strip club music, "Da dada, da da, da, oops.” He tripped. “Da da da." I watched silently, taking the Smirnoff from Trowa and cringing down only a small sip before passing it back. I wasn't bothering to reach around Duo to pass it to Heero. Trowa took a chug and gave it back to me.
"Damni', you guys is a tough crowd," Duo complained, flashing a sour face at our lack of reaction. Well, just because I wasn't making it obvious didn't mean I didn't have a reaction. In fact, I was so hard I could have used my 'reaction' as a lethal weapon.
I grimaced when I saw the vodka in my hands again, its malicious effects beginning to stir hell in my guts. I didn't even drink, but passed the bottle to Trowa again. The mercenary took the same amount down each time, but had yet to say much all night. In fact, I couldn't remember the last time he had spoken to anyone, except, ironically, Quatre…
"Hn," Heero gave a disapproving grunt as Duo started to get bolder, gyrating his hips and doing all sorts of crazy things like sucking and licking his fingers erotically with his tongue. Sticking the pink organ far out of his mouth and leaving his hand in a glimmer. I laughed at Heero's reaction as Duo took a moment to catch his breath. The Wing pilot looked like a cartoon character, with his eyes nearly bugging out of his face, accented by the deep bags underneath them. He was breathing heavily. So was I.
"Whas rong Hee-chan? Not endoin' the sshow?" Duo had a crazy, devilish grin on. It was like he knew how much Heero really was enjoying it, but how cruel the swaying temptation directly in front of him was. The Japanese machine couldn't take his eyes away, even for a second. "Wufei'ss haffin imself a gran' lil time, ain't you Wu-man?"
I laughed mid swallow, the hand holding the Smirnoff bottle dropping in-between my knees. I tried to smile innocently. "What can I say?" Was my drunken reply.
Strands of loose brown hair were harassing Duo's face. Even after throwing his head back, some stuck, gripping on beads of sweat. "Oh Wu-man, Wu- man, Wu-man," The long haired American shook his head and half-danced, mostly staggered, over to me. "An' I always taut you were sush a good boy."
He dropped to his knees, taking the entire neck of the bottle, so close to my crotch, into his mouth with one deft movement. I didn't flinch; not even when Duo put a hand on each of my legs he was crouching between and squeezed. Duo took in the glass length with a considerable amount of moaning and guttural noises. His head slowly raised itself up off the bottle, tongue trailing out, leaving a wet glimmer on the clear glass, swimming amethyst eyes never leaving mine. When he reached the very nozzle of the bottle I lifted the bottom, pouring the maximum amount of alcohol into him. He swallowed once, twice, thrice, and only when clear liquid escaped his lips and dribbled down his chin did I let up.
It was hard for him to keep it down, I could tell from his slight gag. Wiping off his chin, still positioned on the floor in front of my chair the intoxicated beauty said to me, "Yer moore evil dan anyone coul' thuspect."
It was deathly silent in the room, and my mind was running wild with what I'd be doing to Duo right now if the others weren't there with us... But I didn't do anything, only maintained eye contact. Duo's purple eyes were glossy and dark violet from the gleaming lights in the room. He blinked at me once, twice, thrice, and then suddenly swung around and looked over at Trowa.
"Don' feel negleted, negleted, kneeglected!" He consoled the silent boy, "U've got tha best sheat in the housh, right up width the pole."
Duo tripped on his way over, but finally reached the tall lamp pole next to Trowa. He wrapped his hands around to start a pole dance. The manic joker jumped up. He didn't get far as his leg caught the arm of the chair and he was sent sprawling into the arms of Trowa, who barely reacted at all. I couldn't stop laughing. Heero looked peeved.
"Hahaha, oops, hic, hahahehe," Duo broke into a fit of laughter on Trowa's lap. "Guess I ha' a teeny bit mush," He let out a long, tired breath and sighed, "Damn, Towa, ya cumftable. I could shleep like thish righ' now." He was falling off a bit and put a hand on Trowa's left thigh for support and gasped. "Damn! What-" I looked over. Heero raised a questioning eyebrow. "That's?... !" Duo patted his hand a little lower on that spot on Trowa's upper leg and exclaimed, "Fuckin shit' Tro!! Itz a monster!" The Heavyarms pilot blushed blood red in a heartbeat and made to shake Duo off, but the American wrapped his arms around the long neck and crooned, "You win! I'm goin' to your room tonight!"
I couldn't breathe, I was laughing so hard, not caring that my jealousy was stirring. I was too drunk for such negative emotions. Heero, however, had had enough. He stood up and began to leave, only barely muttering, "I'm done with this. I'm going up to-"
"Hey!!!" Duo yelled out suddenly, scrambling off Trowa's lap. "You're not goin' aneewear you." Duo raced over and without warning jumped on Heero's back, shouting happily, "Got you!"
"Duo get off me, I'm going to bed," Heero's mechanical tone was still holding up strong.
Duo clung on for dear life, shaking his head like an uncooperative toddler and protesting, "No! No!" As it became clear that Heero was not going to throw the Deathscythe pilot off, the American calmed down, laying his head onto Heero's right shoulder and softly demanded, "Tae me with you."
I was silent and still, like I had suddenly vanished. Trowa was still sipping down hard alcohol.
"Duo… I-" The Wing pilot was going to put up a front of resistance.
But we all knew it was going to fail, especially Duo. He simply squeezed around Heero's chest and murmured again, "Please?"
Finally, heaving a defeated sigh, Heero shifted to adjust the load, then carried Duo out of the room. Minutes passed, Trowa drinking silently. I refused the bottle whenever he tried to give it to me, and after awhile he just held on to it. I was getting queasy, but I wanted to make conversation so I asked:
"Could I get a bit?" He passed it over. I asked, "Are you all right? You've been silent all day."
He shrugged, green eyes scanning my face for a second. He shrugged again, "I'm OK."
Trowa bit his lip. Something was bothering him. I let the minutes slide by, knowing the only way Trowa would open up to me was on his own volition. I sat as still as possible, staring into the fireplace. It was like my stirring would scare the Heavyarms pilot away.
“Wufei,” He finally began. I turned to him, smiling reassuringly. “Have you been… Have you ever…” … …
“What is it?” I asked.
“Forget it. It's stupid.”
“No. You were going to ask me something,” I pressed. “Just spit it out. No such thing as a stupid question.”
Trowa looked over his shoulder, paranoid someone, I have no idea who, was listening in. He leaned forward, slightly glazed over emerald eyes unsure. He whispered, “Have you had any weird dreams?” I blinked at him.
It took me a second to realize he was not going to elaborate on the inquiry, but was still expecting a response. Weird dreams? Where does one draw the line between a normal dream and a weird one? Funnily enough, now that he mentioned it, I could not remember a single dream I had had the entire time we had been isolated in the mansion. Even before that I didn't dream often, and always tried to forget them anyhow.
“No,” I answered simply. “Why?”
“It… it's not real, right? No, of course not. But…” Trowa seemed to be having an extra hard time speaking today. I could not tell if it was from the alcohol or insecurity or… “It's just a dream, right? It doesn't mean anything… not about me… … right?”
I nodded, “A dream is just a dream. Even with all the technology and science we have, we still don't know what they mean.”
Finding myself wanting to launch a different path of inquiry, I tried to form the best way to address the issue. There was only one thing that I could imagine would be bothering the Heavyarms pilot. A direct question about him and Quatre wouldn't work, would it? Trowa still seemed lost in thought, absentmindedly drinking from the vodka container.
“But…” He paused again, not even looking at me, not even focusing his eyes. “…But… it's so real… And I'm back there… L3 all over again… Every last detail… I'd forgotten…
Trowa paused and remembered. Then he continued:
“But why now? … … How do I get back? I don't want to remember but…” Trowa stopped, his ramble sliding off into oblivion. I had no clue what he was trying to get at. His awkwardness was starting to unnerve me. I thought about Quatre's words to him:
`Something's not right.' `There's something bad, evil.'
“Quatre says he's been feeling, hearing things, strange things,” Trowa suddenly seemed to get a grip on his words. He looked at me, eyes still awash in the ocean of wonder. “Human, almost. Not just in his dreams, but when he's awake too. He told me it was like someone yelling out, begging to be found, but another, something blocking… I don't know… I wonder if he's... Have you heard anything like that?”
“No,” I lied, anything but eager to recount the ghostly child's voice that had mysteriously blinded my eye on the Artic steppe. “Nothing like that.” Then I decided to ask him, “Have you heard voices in your dreams or anything like that?”
“Not voices...” Trowa shook his head, his hair falling so it was impossible for me to see his face with my one dead eye. I turned, giving the healthy one a better view, but his hair fell like a veil over his features. “But when I dream…” His voice trailed off again. “I was young… I trusted so easily… ... They… …I tried but… they… I forgot it all… All of it… It should be gone…”
“Now they're back… still alive… …still L3… but… …but now… …I'm them… …I… I do it… … … and Quatre…”
Trowa left it at that, lips sometimes moving, but no more decipherable sound escaping. I lost hope. Whatever he had meant to say was not something he was comfortable talking about with me. I sipped and thought for a moment. I waited a minute, but then decided I had to talk to him about something, even though I knew he would be hesitant and it wouldn't be the type of conversation the two of us would normally have:
"Things have been hard for you lately," I started. Trowa blinked at me with his visible eye. I sensed his rising discomfort, but went on, knowing I would get a reaction out of him only if I got more specific, only if I made him more uncomfortable. "It's hard, fighting with a loved one."
"It happens," He flatly replied, reaching for the vodka instead of shrugging, holding his blank tone.
"When I was younger… Well, where I grew up it was custom to arrange marriages for certain young people. I had to marry a girl from my colony and it-." I paused for a second. What the hell was I saying? "It really wasn't easy. For a while it was as if I was cursed, eternally stuck with this person even if I didn't want to be. It made me so angry."
"But that's different," Trowa answered. "You had no choice. I should be able to get away sometimes. It gets, almost scary, like he has a kind of control over me." I hadn't gotten a chance to tell the main point of my story, but I was fast forgetting it and decided to just let the Latin performer continue. "I just want to have some control of the relationship I'm in. It's a two sided deal."
"Quatre doesn't want it to end," I said. "So it's going to be up to you to break it off. You have to take a solid stand. If it's a two sided arrangement, then one person has the power to shut it off."
Trowa shook his head at my advice and sadly sighed, "But I'm also not so sure if I want to end it. I still-"
"Don't expect anything to happen if you can't get your thoughts straight first," I advised, berating his silly, wishy-washiness. I thought better of him. "You're obviously not happy with how things are between you and Quatre. If you can't make up your mind, don't put it past Quatre to try to make it up for you."
"Quatre is just too naïve, pestering sometimes," Trowa spoke in a far off voice, finally meeting my eyes and keeping eye contact for more than a split second. "He's too soft and kind. It just makes me feel like less of a man when-"
The silent clown looked away and stopped, only to turn back and glare angrily, as if he were mad at me for letting out his true thoughts. I stood up, tipsy and tired. I didn't want Trowa's grief towards me. He was angry with Quatre, not I.
"It's rough since we're stuck here together," I forlornly said. "Just don't let him make you think whatever he wants. Stand up for what you feel, even if that means being rough, being straightforward with him. Goodnight."
I left him with the little bit of vodka that was left at the dregs of the container. The hallways were dark and I groped around in them like a blind man. Only when I was near the bathroom did I remember that Quatre had mentioned to me that he wanted to talk to Trowa before he went to bed. I thought about going back down to one of them, but I don't think I did. At least I can't remember if I did or not. The rest of the night was wiped from my mind when I woke up in a strange room in the morning.
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