Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Wasurenai yo - I won’t forget ❯ Chapter 7

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

Disclaimers: I garner no profit from this fic. I don't own nor did I create the GW universe, I'm simply letting my imagination have its wicked way with the characters therein. ^_^

Warnings: Angst, AU, Duo torture, language
Pairings: 1+2, 1+R, 3+4, 5xS, eventual 1x2, 3x4

AN: ^_^ Refund... sorry, all purchases are final
Here's the rest, unbeta'd.

Feedback is appreciated.

Wasurenai yo
by priscel

Seven

He was warm, uncomfortably so. He threw off the covers and tried to roll his aching body over to a cooler side of the bed but his braid was caught on something . . . no, under that something. He rolled back and tugged at his braid. His hand grasped for something thicker but what he came across was much smaller.

‘Two inches wide, one inch thick,’ he did the measurements without thinking, a grimace beginning to show on his face.

‘Plait,’ he corrected himself with a bitter tone as he groggily pushed at the warm, malleable thing in front of him. It groaned. Duo blinked open sleep heavy eyes to see a muscled back and a blond head of hair with dark roots. He jerked back and cringed, biting his lip and gingerly rubbing at the side of his head, ‘Damn plait.’

Duo soon stopped his rubbing the side of his head and watched the steady rise and fall of the man’s sides, keeping his eyes from wandering down the man’s hip where his shifting had caused the sheets to leave him bare. He didn't want the visual confirmation of what he brushed up against while he slept. He gently pushed on the man’s back and slowly began to pull his plait free. He let go of the breath he’d been holding silently once his plait was loose but his teeth worried his bottom lip.

He stared at his fingertips in the dimly lit room and rubbed them together. He knew that this was his chance to escape. He stretched his legs and winced at the pain that raced up his side, but unfortunately it seemed he'd have to limp as fast as he could to get out of the room. He glanced back at the man's back, his fingers following and ghosting over the dozens of scars that only would have been noticed by touch. He withdrew his hand, damning his curosity as he pulled his plait over his shoulder and rolled over to inch toward the edge of the bed in hopes of not disturbing its other occupant.

He found it hard to hear over the frantic thrum of his heart as he neared the edge of the bed. Duo’s body tensed before he felt the puffs of breath against the back of his neck. “Didn't they ever tell you to never turn your back on the enemy?”

“Mmph!” A hand covered his mouth and nose while the other slipped around his waist, dragging him back against the blond haired man.

Fred pressed his cheek to the side of Duo’s face to keep the boy from getting enough leverage to head butt him even though Duo seemed more concerned about pulling his hand away from his nose. He wrestled with him for a few minutes as the deceivingly frail looking boy put up more of a struggle then he had anticipated. He held Duo tighter as the boy’s body jerked in demand for air. Soon Fred made a sound of disappointment once Duo’s hands dropped away from his, twitching reflexively toward his face. He removed his thumb and index finger from over Duo’s nose, other than feeling the instinctual draws of gasping breath over his fingers the boy didn’t move.

“It’s hard to believe that you’re one of them.” He sat up on his elbow and turned Duo around to meet thick lashed, violet slits that glared hate. He barely had time to react to the open, scarred palm that shot up toward his nose. He swallowed, jerking the thin wrist away from his face, all too aware of the result of taking a heel to the nose at that speed.

“That’s more like it.” He wrenched Duo’s other bandaged hand forward and held them together as he stared down at the boy whose eyes gradually widen in disbelief as fear slowly bled into them. ‘This might work out better than I’d hoped.’ He smiled and the boy shrunk back into the bed tugging at his trapped hands.

“Now if you promise not to scream or do anything to bring unnecessary attention to us, I’ll let you go. This is not at all what you think it is, alright?”

Fred watched as Duo nodded stiffly, a distrustful frown marring the pleasant face he'd seen unconscious on countless occasions.

“So why am I here?” Duo rubbed his wrists, feeling the ache from the bruises to come with a thoughtful look on his face.

Fred smiled salaciously at the boy when he remained where he was. “Straight to the point I see. Are you sure you don’t want to indulge in this scenario . . . We wake up, have a little rough sex where you play the virgin?”

Duo looked at him as if he’d grown another head and moved away when the older man leaned down as if to kiss him. Fred chuckled, propping himself up against the headboard and let eyes linger on Duo’s blushing face even after Duo looked away. “You look too much like bait anyway.”

“Then we . . . I mean we didn’t . . . ” Duo gestured nervously toward Fred’s lack of clothes and his missing shorts, flushing red and pulling the sheet and his shirt toward his lap. The answering laugh from the older man had Duo glaring at him one second and averting his eyes the next, his hands fisted the sheets as he reminded himself that he wouldn't see anything if he just kept his back turned.

“No,” he chuckled, noting the boy didn't seem to remember being restrained by him, “You’re an exhibitionist in your sleep.” He said huskily as Duo hunkered down in his shirt. He couldn’t help teasing the boy when he left himself open for it. “You might wanna stop that.”

“What? Shit!” Duo floundered, whipping back around in a jerk that set off the quiet ache to a painful throb in his back.

“That.” Fred laughed at Duo’s effort to reign in the blush that was steadily taking over his face. “Well that’s what usually happens when one person hogs the covers: one of us ends up . . . naked. And if you get any redder,” he poked Duo in the shoulder. “You’ll probably pass out and . . . ” he leaned in closer, speaking again with a husky tone that held a distinctive Russian accent, “then I’ll have to resuscitate you. Now they can’t prosecute me for performing CPR.”

“Get some clothes on!” Duo threw a pillow at him, pulling his knobby knees to his chest and yanking his shirt down over them. He ignored the ache from his back though it served as a reminder to his healing body that it shouldn't be responding even if he didn't notice yet. Duo wrapped an arm around his shirt-covered knees, determined on staying in that position or least he see more of what he didn’t want to see. Well not really, his eyes itched to peek back at what the man so willing showed and he closed his eyes against it. The man was sexy in his nakedness with the remnants of a baby face broadened by age. Duo caught himself peeking and felt more heat suffuse his cheeks as he squeezed his eyes shut.

Fred caught the pillow, laughing at how the boy reacted. “It’s my room,” he grinned as he put the pillow down.

“Then why am I here?!” Duo grumbled out, jerking at his shirt once more.

Fred smirked, tossing Duo his shorts from under the sheets. “Relax Drew. You must’ve kicked them off in your sleep. It’s expected since they’re too big for you. As for why you are here instead of your room, I was on pool duty and I found you in the storage closet.”

Fred shrugged to himself, though immensely amusing there was the no point in making the boy more anxious than he already was. Really, the boy only had to be breathing to serve his purpose. He paused at the momentary regret he felt, “I didn’t know where your room was and I didn’t feel like talking to your overprotective sibling.” He left it at that getting out of bed and bending over to retrieve a cigar from his discarded breeches. There was no need for modesty, it was his room after all.

He twirled the cigar between his fingers as he watched the boy bashfully pull the shorts off his head and shuck his long legs into them. He crushed the expensive import, kicking his pants in frustration from the middle of the floor to the bed, seeing his thoughts for what they were. It had been nice having another body in bed with him, to wake up with and talk to without any one-night awkwardness. Was he really that lonely? Alex had been careless with both their lives. If he had only listened to him, then maybe they would still have had each other.

He let go of his wistful thoughts and focused on the here and now. The people at the Inn had been willing to accept his sob story that he was searching for his sister, who he offered up a picture of and was currently studying in Italy- one of the places missed by the falling debris. He laid low and watched the boy currently sitting on his bed for over a month. Duo had struggled despite the limits set by the drugs and being alienated by kids his age and it had endeared him to him.

He looked at his ruined cigar, ‘I could keep him and kill the others.’ He smiled to himself, glancing at the boy and feeling the subsequent tug in response . . . that had nice possibilities. With a lighter step and warmth coiling in his lower regions, he went to the bathroom. “I'm going to take a shower. If you want one, you are welcome to join me.”

“You said I was jail bait.”

“I’ll just tell them you molested me.”

“What!?” Duo choked, turning around to see the wide grin on the man’s square face. The older man wagged a brown brow and Duo collapsed on the bed, laughing himself to tears. “You think . . . me . . . and they’d . . . ” He continued to laugh and Fred disappeared into the bathroom with the door half open.

Duo sat up, wiping the tears from his eyes, “You’re a freakin’ lunatic.”

“Just Fred’s fine.” Fred called out, his amusement clear over the running water of the shower. “I don’t mind if you keep me company, just make sure to tell your psychotic keeper that I didn’t kidnap you.”

Duo cursed and looked around the room. “Did I bring my cane with me?”

“What?”

“My cane?” Duo shouted.

“Dunno, Duo, I found you in the closet remember.” Fred snickered and Duo glared at the bathroom in question of its occupant. Duo shook his head and looked out the window, ‘First floor.’

It was morning, he could tell that much from the sun’s position as he stumbled to the door and braced himself against the pain. He winced, hobbling out into the hall toward the main lobby and noticed the beginnings of bruising around his wrists and other small ones along his legs and on his arms. He kept going, if the guy had used him in that way, there would’ve been pain but there was none. By the time he got to the entryway, he was panting with a pleased smirk cutting through the pain. He knew he probably looked like an idiot just standing there and smiling, but he couldn’t help it. It felt good that the usual fatigue he experienced doing anything more than the Doctor said was gone.

He wished the same was true for the pain but God didn’t create the world in a day. His smirk wobbled, he remembered a kind person saying that to him once. He knew he’d get better but the time it took to get there was what got him. The impatience of youth . . . He turned his head in confusion, he was sure he'd heard someone speak.

‘God didn’t create the world in a day,’ he leaned against the wall thinking as his lips mouthed the words. He had been told those kind words by his father. He shook his head, ‘not my Father . . . Father Maxwell had said that.’

His face scrunched up in pain and he rested the side of his aching head against the cool wall as an image and memories followed the thought out name. He struggled to stay upright and his eyes went round at the devastation that followed that stable and content moment in his life. His throat constricted from the flood of emotions that came next, making his mouth open as if to scream but he choked on it instead. His eyelids drooped and his head fell forward as he leaned heavily on his shoulder against the wall.

‘Solo.’ Another person, an older brother he'd lost, along with their gang. He stared at the floor beneath his bare feet and watched as splotches of water appeared. Duo wiggled his toes when several drops fell on his feet. ‘Warm. Why’s it raining inside?’ He wondered, raising his head to feel two warm streams running down his face.

He rubbed them away, surprised by the heat in his face. He closed his eyes trying to hold back the tears even though his eyes ached to spill them. Haunting green eyes, lacking any sort of demarcation that hinted if it was human or any animal he’d seen, filled his mind’s eye. He unconsciously reached out to it, ‘Death Scythe. My -’

“Bye!”

“Thank you.”

“Bye-bye Bee.”

“Take care Embelli.”

“We’re going home, Alice!”

“Good. I don’t have to worry about you guys eating up all my sweets,” came the familiar grumble.

They were coming from the lobby. ‘Did someone leave the TV on?’ He wondered as he listened, it was rare that people watched it in the Inn because it- more often than not with its news of ‘the crisis,’ photos and grief stricken faces -brought down their spirits. Through the murmur of their voices, he heard a procession of shuffling feet headed to and out the doors of the Inn.

‘Home?’ he frowned, his melancholy mood deepening. He pulled himself up from his downward slump as his legs continued to do their best impression of jello. After getting his knees to lock, he peeked around the corner. There was a potted fern in his line of sight that kept him hidden from view as he watched Hank leaning against the reception desk and Alice standing next to Bishop who had his hand extended.

“Mr. Harden.”

“Bishop, please, only the children call me that.”

A tall man, though that was debatable since even Duo seemed tall in comparison to Bishop, with the Preventers’ insignia on his shirt shoulders smiled, shaking Bishop’s hand with both of his. “Bishop, thank you for housing-”

“Please, no thanks needed. We only did what anyone would do.”

“Not everyone would sir.” Another Preventer said in passing.

“The families of these people will be relieved to have them back with them.” The Preventer held his tongue, not wanting to dampen the mood with the reminder of their losses.

Duo observed most of the people he’d seen at the pool say their good-byes to Bishop, Hank and Alice. He looked away, why wouldn't they be happy? All of this had been an unreal camping trip to most of them who had homes, if not family to go back to. People were looking for them; they were missed. He entertained the thought of joining them, walking with them to be a part of the leaving group even if it meant he met with reality at the end of the ride. They'd realize he had no place to go, no family, no home. He remembered a man with a whack hairdo and another who had a hundred kinds of hawaiian shirts but wore only three of them. Though he knew their faces, he was doubtful that they would be as easy to find just by picking up the phone book.

“We’ll be back to check on you. Mr. Warrington, are you sure about your wife sir? And that other young man-”

“Cedric, he should be fine if it is just exhaustion as Dr. Campbell says it is.” Duo saw something unspoken pass between them. “I doubt Shalita would let you take her to a hospital, even if I threw her over my shoulder and handcuffed her to the backseat, she'd still refuse to go... maybe once things die down.”

The Preventer nodded with a whimsical smile on his face. Duo listened to them without really hearing them, ‘They didn’t . . . ?’ He shook his head. It didn't matter that they hadn't mentioned him. He wasn't going to be staying there much longer.

“Well, if it's not too much to ask . . . Could you let us know about Tamara?” He heard Alice ask as he snuck behind the counter in a low crouch then sidled into the corridor that lead to several rooms on that floor, one of which belonged to Cedric.

He entered the quiet room that was very similar to his own except it had only one window and uncarpeted floors. He limped into the room and braced himself on the back of the chair that he was sure that Alice had spent the night sleeping in. He pushed it closer to the bed, turning it so he could lean over the back and sat down with a relieved breath as he rubbed agitatedly at his left hip and side. Worried violets panned over his sleeping guardian and dwelled on the discoloration in bushy brows. He wondered if Cedric even knew that whatever it was that was afflicting him had spread to underneath his hair.

“Seeing you like this, makes this one hell of a day,” he said with false bravado and a wry grin. “I th-think this is where everyone ends up . . . ” he breathed the words as he stared at the man's sleeping face.

“Ced, aren’t you the one whose supposed to be visiting me?” Duo gave Cedric a watery smile as he took Cedric’s hand and swiped his wet cheeks against his shoulders. He thought he had the waterworks under control. He squeezed his eyes shut then blinked several times, trying to dispel the ache in his lids, ‘it feels like I have hundreds of needles in my eyes.’ “What’s going on with you?”

“You may not feel it but he burnt up his hands back . . . when he went home.”

He realized, belatedly, that he had left the door open. Duo didn’t turn to her, resting his head on his arm as he let his fingers trace the too smooth skin and brownish pink marks that went up Cedric’s forearms. The scars were darker on the inside of his arms, suggesting that something really hot landed there or he had held it. “Is he going to be alright?” Her silence made Duo anxious. Alice must have seen it in his face because he jerked when she laid a comforting hand on his shoulder.

Alice kneaded the stiff muscle of his shoulder before she ran her hand over the top of his head and smiled sadly down at Cedric. The pet was something she often did to comfort him when he had these fugues, but it was hard to accept it because he always felt like her dog or something. “I dunno. I suggested that it could have been related to that condition they were talking about on radio, Fume fever, but Doctor Campbell dismissed it saying his apprentice worked too much. The Preventer’s medical officer agreed after he examined him and said that it was unlikely Cedric’s condition was related to those cases because of the timing, that the symptoms for Fume fever would’ve shown up a week after exposure to the crash site if not sooner.”

She shook her head, “the medical officer diagnosed it was the flu and exhaustion. He was barely able to prescribe bed rest with some cold medicine before Doctor Campbell carted him off to check on Shalita.”

Duo blinked up at the disdain he heard in her voice as she went to the other side of Cedric’s bed and studied the medicine the Doctor had left behind. Even though it sounded like her bitter words were meant for Shalita, they weren’t.
“Drew, don't take any of the medicine he gave you.” He heard her mutter as she put the bottle in the bottom drawer, it sounded half-hearted, like an afterthought that reminded her he was still in the room. He watched her cross her arms over her stomach and hug herself as if she was cold. “It all matches up with the reported cases of Fume fever. I should have known- paid more attention to what he wasn’t doing. The day of the Barton Coup, Cedric dropped me off at home and then headed to his place. I- my family was fortunate, at least on this end. They didn’t know that I was coming home for Christmas had already left town for our usual family reunion in North Dakota. I-I was a mess, I heard over the TV what was happening when they started advising everyone to seek cover. It was the next day when I made my way back to Cedric.”

She broke off, her hand covering her mouth. Duo lowered his eyes, he wasn't sure if he wanted to hear this. His newly recovered memories were still so fresh on his mind that he thought he could smell the smoke, see the charred flesh and taste the ashes in his throat. He ran his thumb over the back of Cedric's hand, tracing the healing burn scars there that he hadn’t seen earlier.

Alice made an odd sound in her throat, lost in the memory, blind to his actions. “H-he had dug them out and the smell . . . God I dunno how he did what he did, but he had the shredded remains of a shirt wrapped around his hands when I found him rocking his brother.” She swallowed thickly with a slight cough, “His skin was pink and almost too hot to touch and their home was still burning . . . I had to fight him to get him to leave.”

Duo squeezed his eyes shut and tried to ignore the gritty taste in his mouth. There wasn't anything there. He was here . . . right? “Why didn’t you tell them to take him? Tell them about his hair?” At her blank look, he pointed to Cedric's full head of black hair, forgetting that what he'd seen was underneath it all. He forced himself to breathe normally and tried to focus on something else.

He ran his thumb over the too smooth skin, there wasn't anything else in the room that would be a good focal point. He didn't want to remember. Duo examined the scarred hand in his and talked past the tightness in his throat. “Why is he still here?” It was little more than a whisper but Alice was more there with him than before. “Why is he still here like-like this when he could have been taken to a hospital?” His voice firming, he hadn't been able to do anything for them then, but they could now. His emotions were a garbled mess of anger, hurt and helplessness that left him unable to distinguish the past from the present.

Duo could smell it, an acrid scent that lingered in his lungs long after he’d exhaled. And in that instant he could feel her body become limp as she, like everyone else he had ever cared for, left him behind.

Alice stepped back from the bed, stunned by Duo’s heated gaze for a moment before her lips pursed into a frown. Duo didn’t look right, his eyes held a look that said he’d seen far too much. Those hard, dead eyes showed nothing of the loud, boisterous, smiling boy that they’d known for the past few months. Out of curiosity, she shifted and shuddered at the lazy way his eyes tracked her movement while the rest of him remained perfectly still.

“Drew?” She hadn’t meant to whisper his name but there was not even a hint of recognition in his eyes and his hollow laugh made her shudder.

“Drew?” She tried again, shaking off the fear that he was invoking in her.

“Everyone dies.”

It sounded like a threat at first that made her want to push him away from Cedric as if separating them would buy them some time. But Cedric wasn’t dying, as far as she could tell and she wasn’t going to think otherwise.

‘They came and with the right medicine Cedric can be helped.’ She had pocketed the medicine the Preventer left and she used that to ground herself. Alice stared at Duo, deciding it wasn’t a threat. It was a heart wrenching loneliness, drenched in so much despair and resignation that it hurt to hear it come from someone so young. It made her wonder how he’d coped in the past. ‘Was he reliving some memory?’

“I’m always left behind.”

Whatever it was, she didn’t like it. “Drew?” She called to him more firmly.

“Everyone dies.” She’d crossed the short distance between them and let her hand fly.

Duo heard the smack more than he felt it. He blinked up at her as she towered over him in confusion. “It slipped my mind to mention his eyebrows were not some bad dye job because I was too preoccupied with trying to find the person he was most concerned about.”

He flinched at the verbal slap; it hurt more than the physical blow she’d dealt him. He hadn’t meant to accuse her of doing nothing. His attention returned to Cedric at the feel of pressure on his hand.

“I didn’t want to go, Vic. I couldn’t leave you there.” Cedric said weakly trying to sit up, Duo looked at him in confusion.

“Cedric,” Alice chided gently, pushing him back down on the bed. “That was his brother’s name.” She whispered as she pulled the sheet back up to his chest not looking directly at Duo but at their joined hands.

tbc . . .