Archive: Just ask! =)
Disclaimers: I don’t own any of the rights to Gundam Wing! Nothing wrong with a little wishful thinking, though….. is there?
Blame: I don’t know what came over me when I wrote this, but I’m in a mood to type it up so here it is!
You knew the consequences.
You knew you could not compromise the mission.
You knew you could not afford emotions and their connections.
Yet you took a lover anyways.
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
Heero knelt in the center of the white room: if it was a room, he did not know for certain, nor did he know the color of it. It could have been white, or black, or puce-and-lime polka dots for all he knew, and he did not want to. He did not want to see his judges: he knew what he would see. There was no defense against the… voice? Voices? They sounded different, came from different directions, yet they were similar enough to have been caused by echoes where they sat so far above him. Looking down on him, measuring up every one of his faults. No refuge from their piercing eyes that could nail him to the surface he stood on yet saw nothing, knew everything. He wanted to hide, to run and bury his face in his love’s shoulders, to have those marvelously strong arms cradle and protect him, to have that low, husky voice that reassured him that everything would be kitto okay backed up by happy violet eyes.
Of course, if that were possible he would not be here right now, on trial by his own conscience. Rather, by what conscience he had left.
Your lover was not from outside: he was a comrade.
You endangered the one you loved.
How could you think that either one of you could fight properly while
worried sick for one another?
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
Every repetition was a razor-slash to his soul, or what soul he had left. Not much remained, now. Tears flowed freely, here, where he could shed them with no shame: each one seared a course of flame down his face. Heero knew what came next, and he knew what his punishment would be. He dreaded that more than he feared death itself.
Your lover counted on you for backup.
You made the conscious decision not to help him.
He would receive no chance to present evidence: this jury already had all the facts.
Even surrounded by mobile dolls—
As we both were! Heero tried to shout out.
—you should have helped your wingman.
You should have rescued him.
You betrayed his trust, Heero Yuy.
He died because of it.
Because of you.
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
Do you deny it?
Heero mutely shook his head, staring down at the slick red liquid that covered his hands, seeing but not feeling the gashes his sharp nails had cut in them and in his wrists. He did not care. Nothing could hurt as badly as what he had done to his lover, the one who had trusted him the most. It was no matter, compared to that.
You are guilty as charged.
Guilty. Guilty. Guilty. Guilty. Guilty.
The words reverberated like a death knell in his ears, in his heart, in his mind, in his soul. His sentence would come next.
You will live.
He had known this was coming, but it still scared him more than anything ever did.
You will live. And as long as you live, you will not forget.
In shock he nodded. Still on his knees, he turned at a gesture and opened blurry, burning cobalt eyes. He was never alone in this, had to face all those who had ever died because of him. But even after his judgment, he was not expecting one visitor in particular to be numbered among them. The scream ripped from his came from the depths of his soul, filled with loss, pain, regret… and despair.
“DUO!”
The black-clad young man who had once been his lover looked up from folded arms, face solemn. He regarded Heero’s bloody, outstretched hands as though they were not to be touched. Heero saw smooth, unblemished skin and clean neat clothing under a vision of the tattered curtain of blood and hair and fabric and debris that the destruction of Deathscythe had left its dying pilot with. Then Duo turned away.
“No, Duo. Please. Don’t…” Something inside of Heero told him that, if Duo left him, he would never come back. If Duo left now…
Duo’s form faded into mist, and into nothingness.
And something inside Heero snapped completely.
Quatre woke screaming in pain. Trowa tried to comfort the little Arab’s tears, but Quatre pushed him away. “Go check on Heero,” he told them.
Wufei ran downstairs to the couch where Heero had gone to sleep. The Japanese pilot lay there, pale under a favorite afghan of Duo’s and the light streaming through the gap in the window drapes. The moonbeams hitting his face highlighted the red, salty lines that were the tracks of tears down to slightly parted lips.
“Yuy, wake up. We’ve got to help Winner.” Heero did not stir. Normally he would have woken up at Wufei’s entry into the room. “Heero?” The touch on the throat that would have sent Wufei to the floor immediately drew no response, and he checked for a pulse that was not there.
A noise from behind drew his attention: it was Trowa, carrying a weeping and thoroughly exhausted Quatre downstairs in his arms. They looked at Heero, then at each other and at Wufei.
“I’m sorry, Quatre, Trowa…”
“We knew,” Quatre whispered. “I think we all knew this would happen.”
“We buried Duo yesterday,” Trowa murmured, “and burying one was dooming the other…”
“How?” Wufei asked: Quatre could most likely tell him, although Wufei could take a pretty good guess. Despite his words, Trowa had been hit and hit hard by the double loss. “His only wounds are surface scratches on his hands and wrists, bleeding but not deep enough to cause serious damage.”
Quatre and Trowa exchanged a look, a look of understanding, the the blonde spoke through his tears.
“A heart, once broken, is never fully mended after and will never be the same.”
~ Owari ~