Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Wasurenai yo - I won’t forget ❯ Chapter 5

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Disclaimers: I garner no profit from this fic. But if they want to give me a G-boy or two, I'd gladly accept them as a donation!

Warnings: Angst, AU, Shounen ai, character death, Quatre torture
Pairings: 1+2, 1+R, 3+4, 5xS, eventual 1x2, 3x4

AN: editing frenzie

Wasurenai yo
by priscel

five

The evening sky was clear for the first time in several weeks. It was like the sky was a canvas the Night painted with the deepest of blues and the stars random flicks of white paint that stood out brighter than the dwindling lights from the city of Duckwater in the distance.

‘Pancake Range.’ He traced their route through the range on the map and looked over the arid and mountainous landscape. His brow twitched when his eyes caught movement in the shrubs a few feet ahead.

“A deer?”

“Antelope.” Rashid answered, though it sounded like he wanted to say more.

Quatre ignored the urge to ask him to say it, already knowing it would be a tentative nudge to get him to get some rest. The antelope scurried away from the beam of the headlights and into the safety of the shadows. His eyes returned to watching the landscape and thought, ‘We could live here as though nothing happened.’ He rested his head against the window, a sad smile on his playing on his lips. ‘That’s just how peaceful it is.’

He would cherish a calm night like this, one among so few that left him with some sense of normalcy. Relena had dragged that concept through the dirt and back several times in her argument on the importance of the work they were doing together. ‘She could always make a convincing argument.’ Yet then again, so could he. They listened to her song and dance while they packed their things. He had long since been immune to its infectious beat, but he couldn’t say that about the others. Maybe Trowa, but Heero had always been there to help her despite his annoyance with her trailing him wherever he went. Though, he seriously doubted Heero would abandon all the work he’d done to narrow down Duo’s location to Relena’s sudden whims.
Wu Fei, he could never tell. It had been a shock to find him supporting Barton, though he knew Wu Fei was already punishing himself for his actions. But there was no placating the man, even after he’d assured him that they held no ill toward him for his decision. So when Relena focused her efforts on Wu Fei, he had been unsure of the outcome. They needed him but if he felt he was needed more at Relena’s side then they would let him do as he wished. Though Quatre was happy to find he had been too presumptuous. Wu Fei had held up a hand stopping her mid-spiel, giving her a respectful bow and simply said, “We’ve decided. We are going.”

Quatre smiled at the memory of a red-faced Relena, who couldn’t have followed even if she wanted to because someone in her position brought hope to the world that not all was lost. She had, unknowingly, made herself the figurehead of the restitution efforts and couldn’t go overseas no matter how much she wanted to. Even then, there would have to be some stability in the world as a whole, appropriate security measures with the man power to back it which wasn’t happening anytime soon with the Preventers and every other law agency stretched thinly everywhere. But Quatre was thorough, so if by chance there was even a small possibility that Relena would have the opportunity to follow, they had Zechs and Noin ready to make sure she didn’t sneak off and go endangering herself in her pursuit of Heero.

He rubbed his temples, looking at the eleventh ‘x’ on the map, they were headed for Lockes. So far, Nevada had minimal damages in the majority of its Northern regions except for Cherry Creek and Ely. He just hoped it was the same for many of the cities in the southern portion of this state.

‘Back to the compass and map.’ Quatre thought with a small smile when he considered that his empathy was their compass. The use of GPS was limited and though they could get access to the Internet, they knew that getting access to a satellite would be next to impossible with the heavy use of them by Aid efforts everywhere. They were lucky that with a little help from his sisters, they were given authorization for flight despite the restrictions on travel.

He wanted to try reaching out for Duo again but he was sure nothing would come of it except for more the incoherent, fragmented images or fleeting feelings he was giving off. It was like Duo was there but not. Sometimes, interestingly enough, when he was near Heero he got clear images through his link with Duo: a room, a little girl, a woman with a scarred face, a tall shadowy figure, fuzzy brows. Whenever the oddly colored fuzzy brows came to mind he chuckled, but there was never anything definite.

The images, though, were what got him every time. Since the incident he picked them up along with partial words like a TV with poor reception but the emotions were sharper. Before, he could sense those around him or people he cared for if concentrated hard enough, but even that had been limited by distance. He closed his eyes and felt the numbing fear he'd sensed earlier become anxiety then an edgy calm the further away their caravan got from the antelope they'd frighten earlier. He was improving, he sniffed as quietly as he could under Rashid's watchful eye at the familiar tickle in his nose. Yet each time he tried to find Duo with his empathy, it felt like he was slipping away. They needed to find Duo, not just for their sakes but for Heero’s.

He gave Rashid a sleepy smile as he patted his shoulder and gave up the passenger seat to Wu Fei. He walked into their six-person Kea motor home. He smiled, collapsing into the seat on his left. ‘Rashid really did know how to prepare for any excursion,’ he thought, leaning with his elbows on the table as he gazed out the window. The headlights of the vehicle behind them flashed in greeting, he stuck his head far enough out the window to wave before closing it so that it was only open half way. They were being followed by four other vehicles attended by five other Maguanacs. They had enough supplies to offer what assistance they could and when they went into the cities they used the two Jeeps to avoid drawing too much attention to themselves. He glanced back at the man he’d come to think of as a second father, smiling as he mumbled. “And I thought I was thorough.”

They had Heero’s laptop that Heero had produced from somewhere. Since the beach incident, Heero was the first to begin making preparations to leave but he was always by his or Wu Fei’s side. He rested his chin on his upraised hand and wondered if Heero had hid it in some secret compartment in his spandex. He snickered to himself briefly, his smile becoming melancholy as memory reminded him of their braided friend. Duo always joked about that and he would have taunted Heero if he had known their friend had worn those things under his jeans that day.
He took a deep breath, his eyes returned to the interior of the cabin where Heero shifted in the seat across from him as his face slowly turned away from the window. He stared at his friend’s sleeping face before his eyes were drawn to the back of the cabin where Trowa’s long limbs shifted and stretched over the seats. He knew that his bed had been turned down before he even peeked up at the cozy little overhead resting space. He wondered why his friends hadn’t prepared their own, but he knew why, they were just as concerned about him as they were worried about Duo.

A darker, more morose part of him laughed and mockingly said that wasn’t the real reason. They were all exhausted and healing but he would never admit to any of them how little he was sleeping if Trowa wasn’t there. To say he was a wreck while Trowa spent one week in South America constructing a framework and reliable line of communication between with the Preventers there and then the following three days and four long hours apart while Trowa worked with his team in Cherry Creek, Nevada was a gross understatement.
He was not himself. He worked his PA unit with frigid exactness. Though his facial expression made him look gentle, his eyes were cold and hard when he gave his unit orders. Orders like continuing to other impact sites when the casualties among the civilians at one city outnumbered the survivors they came across. His one saving grace was that they were doing multiple sweeps of the areas. He mumbled a few words stating this and the men who wanted to challenge him held their tongues while the others commended him for ‘staying in perspective’. They didn’t know how much he was struggling to keep it together and he liked it that way. He shivered at the memory, well at what he could recall of the day Duo blew up the colony chunk.

Quatre had lost consciousness from the shockwave of pain that overwhelmed his senses as the explosion rocked them. Moments later, Trowa sat him down in the nearest chair with one long-fingered hand resting on his right shoulder keeping him upright. Quatre’s head lolled to the side, coming to rest against Trowa’s side as Trowa balanced himself on the left arm of Quatre’s seat. He waited patiently with Quatre for the doctor to come look him over. The doctor patching up Heero moved to come to them when Trowa heard a muffled, strangled sound. Before he knew it came from Quatre, Quatre had jerked out of the chair and out of his reach. He stared in disbelief and his ears protested at the horrible screams that seemed to be ripped from Quatre’s lungs.

Quatre could feel them all: they were burning, screaming, grieving and dying. Dying. Overwhelming him as more screams of anguish cracked against the inside of his skull. They were emotions but somehow they were screaming. He screamed along with them, a little of him dying with each life he felt flicker out. He could hear Relena ridiculing him, the emotions of everyone in the room when their success had been a Pyrrhic one. He could hear everyone but Heero and Trowa. And for that he was grateful, though he wasn’t aware of much else. He didn’t respond to Trowa pinning him to the wall or to the grip Trowa had on his hands.

Quatre went into convulsions, foaming spit seeping out the corners of his mouth as Trowa desperately tried to keep him still. The doctor that had been treating Heero was at his side but somehow Quatre got free of Trowa’s hold on him and his fist whipped out in a deadly arch cracking against the side of the Doctors’ face, bruising several officers and nurses that tried to help him. Trowa caught Quatre’s punishing fist and managed to cross Quatre’s arms over his chest, imprisoning them between their bodies. Trowa slid down the wall with him, forcing Quatre’s mouth open and holding onto the other teen’s tongue when the doctor warned him that he could swallow it or bite it off.

Quatre was trembling in the circle of Trowa’s arms, the mental gauntlet that assailed his every sense was slowly receding to the edges of his mind. He could smell his blood and felt it trickled from his nose and something warm drip out of his pulsing ears. His jaw and mouth hurt like it had been stretched. Before he could access anything else about his condition, he was distracted by the annoying pat of a warm, moist cloth to his face. He turned away from the warm compress as it pressed to his nose. The hand that held it hesitated before following, pressing against his nose and pushing his head sideways to rest on a partially exposed chest. Quatre recognized then the hands and chest that he felt, without pain, was Trowa’s.

He watched with disinterest as a nurse approached their intertwined legs with what he guessed was a tranquilizer shot. ‘Don’t touch me.’ He thought, his head listing forward cutting off his air as he swallowed painfully, tasting the thickening glob of his own blood before it went down so he could breathe through his mouth. In the second he blinked, he was screaming again when the nurses’ bare hand touched his skin.

He panted. His pulse pounding in his ears as he was shifted and ensconced in sheltering warmth that he unconsciously burrowed against. He shakily rubbed away the gummy substance that was over his eyes, opening them as slits before blinking owlishly around the room.

Everyone was gone. How long had he been out?

Movement by the door told him not everyone had left, his frayed senses instinctively reached out and he winced at the shock of pain that had him tasting blood again. But he could see that it was Heero at the threshold of the entryway with Relena supporting him. She was urging him to move but he stood there stubbornly, a mess of patched gauze, staring at him . . . no them. He was sitting, half laying on the floor, wrapped around Trowa and he him. He thought he heard humming but he realized all he could hear was the hammering of his heart against his eardrum as he watched Relena’s lips move soundlessly. A disparaging look contorting her face when he didn’t reply to whatever it was she was saying.

That was when he realized that something was wrong. There were no more voices, only a dull thumping that he hadn’t really noticed until now. He shivered, feeling empty and clammy all over. The last time something like this had happened, he had nearly killed Trowa.

He froze. Slowly tilting his head up so his wide aquamarine eyes could look at Trowa. Trowa was still. Quatre took a shaky breath as he waited in the loose loop of Trowa’s arms for that telltale sign of life: the rise of his chest beneath his torn shirt as he breathed. He couldn’t trust his hands to find a pulse. He bit his lip when Trowa’s dark brown lashes remained lowered, showing no signs of them opening or fluttering against his skin as he had seen them do hundreds of times as he slept.

With an unsteady hand, he touched the smears and flicks of blood that marred Trowa’s pale face. He had imagined Trowa actively holding him.

He had imagined it.

He had done the unthinkable and Trowa had died keeping him from harming anyone else. The world doubled with each beat of his heart as the word ‘monster’ reverberated in his head. He could hear the screams of anguish and the tsunami of emotional distress encroaching on his raw senses. It was comparative to a song of promised pain sprinkling salt on his open, bleeding senses and his tears were its accompaniment.

‘I’ve earned it.’ He thought cynically, untwining their limbs as he backpedaled out of Trowa’s slack embrace. ‘That’s why everyone’s gone. I’m the reason why Relena is taking Heero away.’ His mental voice breaking up as the thumping in his began to pound the further he moved away from Trowa.

He managed to get his legs under him and started to push himself up when he was pulled back down and squeezed tightly. He felt a warm hand touch his face before he found himself looking up into half open verdant eyes.

“Tro-” He touched his throat, his voice sounded like something out of a horror movie. He smiled deprecatingly at the thought. It reminded him of Duo. He laughed, it was a breathy sound, horse and scratchy once it left his mouth. Unchecked tears ran down his face as he pushed out of Trowa’s arms and wondered why he was always losing the people he loved.

He was convinced that Trowa was dead and he was hallucinating. He must have sounded quite unstable laughing without sharing the joke because someone was shaking him. But that really didn’t matter, he was losing it again. He was sure that this time there would be no coming back from the mental assault. He was still laughing when he felt the hand that was so much like Trowa’s swipe at the tears on his face and then cup his cheek. Before he could turn away from the guy, Trowa, he pressed his mouth to his. In the moment their lips touched, the tender hold he had on his sanity strengthen and the void he thought would swallow him whole was being forced back once more.

He tried to giggle into the kiss, baffled that such a chaste and clumsy thing could have grounded him so. His body was tense but compliant in Trowa’s hands and he idly wondered if Trowa thought he’d been drinking.

‘I’m drunk on Trowa.’ He really wished he could giggle but the horse sound he made earlier would probably worry Trowa more. It felt so good to let go as something-a half translated, partially veiled emotion- tickled his strained senses. He had always been receptive to Trowa’s emotions, so much so that they sometimes came across as thoughts. Trowa’s thumb flicked across his cheek catching an errant tear. He thought he was going crazy going through so many highs and lows in such a short period of time, but his happiness was bubbling up in him and he figured he could stand a little more pain if his empathy could decipher what it was he’d felt from Trowa.

His aching muscles that had begun to relax tensed up again when doubt swelled up in his mind. It occurred to him then that this was a necessary measure to save a friend from going into shock, effectively stopping a shock with a shock. The thought that it was nothing more than that had him pushing away again, breaking the kiss. What Trowa had done would have to be enough for him to stay aware of who and where he was . . . even if knowing that meant that there was no ‘together’ with Trowa.

‘Better this,’ he thought, ‘than the false hope of there ever being anything.’ He felt he had ruined that chance long ago. He tilted his head slightly at Trowa’s moving mouth and wondered why Trowa was mouthing words to him when he could hear the voices calling for him. He opened his mouth to ask that when Trowa crushed his mouth to his in a bruising kiss. It forced all thought from his mind and stole his breath away, literally. He lost consciousness mid-kiss.


He had never known how open the mind could be just before death. He hadn’t expected to be imprinted with the snippets of thoughts, regrets and hopes of the dying. He rubbed at his temples again. If he had only closed himself off instead of trying to use his empathy to reach Duo then he wouldn’t have lost it like he had. He would have been of greater use to the others.

‘Why do I always lose the people I love?’

It hurt to remember the forethought, but it was one of the many echoes he lived with now. He wouldn’t give it up, not that one. It was warm and familiar. It was Duo. That had been one of the reasons when Heero had come to him asking if he could sense Duo that he gave him a doubt-filled answer. The more Trowa shielded him, the more he came to understand that he wasn’t just picking up the dying.

Trowa’s concern was a wonderful embarrassment, allowing him to wake every morning with him at his side. Sometimes when the dreams were too much, Trowa would climb in bed with him and hold him until he could sleep. Heero had seen them there one of those times. Even though it made them appear to be a couple to everyone else, he knew the truth. He watched as Trowa shifted again, his face relaxed by sleep and those long lashes fluttering as he dreamed. There was no point in deluding himself. Foolishly, he pushed a kiss with Trowa and it ended with Trowa checking his eyes, his temperature and putting him to bed. Alone.

That had been his proof that nothing would come of it. He knew it as well as his doubts and fears. He was afraid of the time he’d slip up, overexert himself, and Trowa wouldn’t be there or couldn’t get to him fast enough to stop the whispers from engulfing him. He clenched his teeth, that sort of dependency, clinging to Trowa like a lifeline, was not how he wanted to live. At least he knew that Duo felt the same way Heero felt for him.

He sighed. He didn’t have a choice in the matter. If he lost it when Trowa wasn’t around, there would be no saving him. No one, not even Trowa, knew how very sensitive and raw he was on the inside, even after a month. He knew better; it would take a long time for wounds like this to heal. ‘You can’t go to a doctor and have it looked at or treated,’ he thought bitterly, thinking back to the loss of his father and how Trowa had been the one to bring him back in the end. His neediness . . . that same dependency, he felt, was why Trowa remained at his side no matter where he went since they met up at Cherry Creek. He blamed himself for that, just when he had some room to breathe . . . That was a lie right there, he had been deathly afraid he wouldn’t be able to keep it together while Trowa was away in the states.

Yet, he had done it and made a fool of himself again on the day they met up with him. Trowa had been kind enough to accept his exuberant hug. Releasing him, Quatre had suggested that they use his empathy to point them in the right direction since Heero’s work had narrowed down the search considerably. His friends refused his offer and like an ungrateful brat he did it anyway. Shutting out their concerns- he wasn’t well enough, he should take it slow, do it when he was ready.

The only thing he regretted about what he had done was Trowa’s stunned, pale face as he hemorrhaged from his nose and went into convulsions. Quatre remembered saying something as he pointed them in a direction and Trowa, who had familiarized himself with the topography of the state, told them that the Nellis Flight academy was in that direction before the bleeding started. He’d been rushed to a hospital and their search delayed by two days.

He smiled, just as they had snuck sedatives into Heero’s food to make him rest, he had to promise them he wouldn’t: overextend himself, wouldn’t use his abilities unless they had all agreed to him doing so and when he did use them it would be for very short periods after which he would rest. Those had been the terms that he was coerced to agree upon under the threat that Rashid would tie him to his hospital bed and force feed him tapioca pudding.

He smiled. Rashid seldom babied him like that but it did lighten the glaring concern he had been receiving from everyone.

Tapioca pudding wasn’t all that bad either.

It had been a week since then and by following the ‘guidelines’ his friends had set for him, he had succeeded in getting Trowa to switch off of his mother-hen-watch-dog mode and the ‘nap time’ made it possible to cover up the nose bleeds or get rid of the bloody after taste he sometimes got. Though with Trowa there were still the little things. He glanced back at the made bed, he was tired but he didn’t intend to let a beautiful night like this slip away.

He filled a kettle with water and put it on a burner set to high. Just thinking about the metallic taste of his own blood unsettled his stomach. He shifted through the drawer filled with tea and smiled back at the two in the front seat. He picked up one at random, putting the scented packet to his nose and smiled in pleasure.

‘Orange chamomile,’ he smiled taking out three mugs, then a fourth on second thought. He leaned over the counter with an unconscious, though slight, contented wiggle to his hips as he explored their new found treasure trove of teas.

He was inhaling the heady cinnamon spice-filled aroma of a blended black tea when a half-thought out image invaded his senses, sending a wave of sensual heat through him. The tea pack fell forgotten to the counter as he sat up and glanced around the cabin then at the doorway to the cabby. The erotic image was disconnected from its owner and so it began to fade, showing him the fuzzy dream of someone getting it from behind while leaning over a table or counter top.

He splashed cold water from their kitchenette onto his heated cheeks. He carefully felt around him once more, he figured it had to come from someone close by since he hadn’t been using his ability. But then again, the person could have been projecting it strongly. He felt somewhat relieved that it didn’t seem to belong to anyone he knew. He jerked upright at the quiet whistle from the kettle. He figured he was picking up someone else’s dreams and glanced at Heero, who was still sound asleep. He shook his head, Heero was blissfully dead to world.

‘Trowa or Wu Fei must have gotten him to take the sedative again.’ He was thankful that his own insomnia hadn’t been noticed yet. He didn’t think he could take being locked inside some of the dreams he had. He brought Rashid and Wu Fei two mugs of hot water then returned with and impish smile as he held his cupped hands full of tea to the both of them. They smiled their thanks and Quatre settled on a vanilla Chai when he went back into the cabin. He sipped it as he leaned against the side of Heero’s seat, looking out the window. Quatre blew over the hot, sweet-smelling liquid in his mug when he felt Trowa presence before he walked past him.

‘Quiet moments like this . . .’ Quatre smiled over his cup at Trowa, realizing he’d still been blowing his tea when Trowa gave him a slight nod in greeting. ‘I can bear it and appreciate this if it is all we’ll ever be . . . Just as long as he doesn’t hold me. Duo would probably say that’s the result of reading to much poetry or the words of a martyr.’ He looked away, his left arm dropping to rest across his stomach while the other still held the mug posed to his mouth, the wisps of steam curving upward and toward his lips as he inhaled.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

He really preferred coffee but tea would do for now. He had just dropped a tea packet into his mug when his eyes caught the sight that Quatre made. He was barefoot, wearing loose beige slacks and an untucked, button-down white shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. The shirt was form fitting so the outline of his toned chest and the hard point of one erect nipple greeted his perusal with interest. His came to settle on Quatre’s slightly damp bangs, sticking to random places along the sides of his face and the faint flush to his cheeks. He wanted to brush those wet bangs away from his face, he wanted . . . he stopped the thought when he was flashed by his waking dream, a waking wet dream to be precise. But dream Quatre had been wearing the very same clothes before he removed them, bent him over and . . . those lips. He sent a glare at the steam that curled about Quatre’s lips but kept it to a minute twitch of his eyebrow.

Trowa chided himself while he kept a careful restraint over his emotions. Quatre was in no condition to receive anything more than friendly feelings from him. He’d seen how the blonde empath reacted to stray emotions; he unintentionally acted on them. Several times it had happened and Quatre had no memory of it nor of the names he spoke. They agreed not to tell him either. One time he woke in the chair by Quatre’s bed and found him gone. He caught up to the small blonde to find Wu Fei twisting Quatre’s hand in an attempt to stop him from slicing his wrists with a kitchen knife.

He closed his eyes as the green tea bled into the water and let the quiet of the cabin soothe him. He wouldn’t let anything like that happen again. And he wouldn’t let his emotions leak out and drive Quatre to act on feelings for him that weren’t his own. He’d wait, but that wouldn’t stop him from missing that kiss even if his emotions had driven Quatre to do it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~````~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“You have a message.” The synthesized female voice prompted, dispelling the default screen saver with a twirling envelope icon.

The blue glow from the computer brought life to the muted walls and sparsely decorated bedroom. A resounding click flooded the living just beyond the door with light shortly followed by the clank of keys and the sound of a door shutting. The computer chimed and the message repeated.

A blue illuminated hand used the mouse’s cursor to click the email prompt. Deep brown eyes crinkled at the corners, moving from line to line. He sat down in his chair, it rolled back a little from his desk as he smiled. “One’s all I need to catch the rest.”

Tbc . . .