13-Jan-2001
REVISED: 01/13/01
POSTED: 09/15/00
AUTHOR: Jay / carboxylated@yahoo.com
ARCHIVE: Gundam Wing Addiction (Tyr), Desolation Angels (Ashura, if
she wants it)
[Full fiction index @ http://www.oocities.org/fenris_wolf0]
Disclaimer: Scroll down (invariably at the bottom)
Title: Star Cross'd
Category: Yaoi, sap, angst
Pairings: 2x1
Rating/Warning: R. Non-graphic descriptions of a sexual situation.
Mild angst.
Feedback: Craved, desired, wanted, coveted, yearned for, wished for,
and longed for. C&C will be repaid with dancing G-boys, my endless
adoration, as well as a nice slice of karma.
Note: I write stories with intentional tense and POV shifts. It can be a bit disconcerting. It shouldn't be very confusing, however.
"Take the pain away," he whispers, dragging his fingers over my skin. We stare at the cracks in the ceiling and listen for the dripping facet and the wind outside. The lone light bulb suspended over us crackles and fades. His nails dig into my skin, just enough to cause discomfort, leaving red half-moons over my shoulder. His eyes plead and he whispers into my ears, again. "Take the pain away..."
There's a low rumbling sound in my throat; the answer is caught at some junction. I'm choking in the silence. It should never be like this. It should never happen in a cheap hotel room, not on this godforsaken colony where, somewhere outside our window, a car alarm goes off, sirens wail in the distance, children cry, and mothers pray for salvation or the next quick fix. It should never be because he needs a drug to numb the hurt that wallows in those Prussian eyes. But I can't say no-- I could never say no to him-- so, instead, I block out the sounds (tires screeching sirens screaming infant sobs a mother's amen) and shift my body until we lie against each other, face to face, pressing against each other and trying to find redemption in the small spaces between us. My fingers brush his hair hesitatingly, sweeping away pretension, façades, and barriers until it's only us: small, vulnerable little boys, trying to find comfort in the warmth and friction of another human body.
His hand reaches over, tangling itself in mine; it's such a small, needy action from such an unlikely person. Our palms meet, fingers interlaced, and I think I could be caught in this moment, the sanctity of this frame of time-space. I could preserve it before our actions are just meaningless motions because I know my body inside his is as futile as a needle piercing the skin, seeking out a throbbing vein.
I close my eyes and promise myself that someday it'll be something more than an escape.
Outside, glass shatters as we twist on the dirty sheets. He grabs blindly at my hair and moans into my lips, his touch trailing an electric fire over my skin. I have learned that desire and need do not subside until completion and, despite my promises (sex is not an escape, sex is surrender), I find myself grinding against him with the same ferocious desperation as he does against me. His legs are hiked over my shoulders, my lips slide across his chest, and the bed creaks and the floor groans and Heero moans, shutting out the sound of gunfire resounding in his brain.
My hands settle on his hips and he moans again; a little girl slips from his mind, into the swirling mess of his consciousness. He does not exist, suddenly. Heero only feels now, trapped in physical exaltation. My rough fingers brush the base of his arousal and the dying screams of civilians fade.
I thrust and all he smells is the lavender of my shampoo, not gunpowder and dried blood. He thinks of flowers instead of pain and war and screams my name like an Amen into the vastness of space and time, into the confines of this hotel room. He kisses me harshly and pulls me down, closer, drowning in aesthetics and motion.
She must have been pretty when she was younger, he thought. He looked again though; there was a thin mask of premature aging that framed her features. The fine lines made her seem indefinitely older than what she must have been: barely thirty. She had light, slack curls and luminescent skin that seemed smoky in the yellow lights. She seemed friendly enough, her slender frame against the harsh red brick, arms wrapped around her knees.
"You from around here?" she finally asked.
Duo Maxwell craned his neck and looked at her a little more carefully. Her clothes were worn; the denim was frayed. But she almost seemed young as he was. Her voice held the buoyancy of youth.
"Yeah," he offered. "L2. Home colony."
She nodded her head slowly. "I'm from L1... but... looks like I ended up here." There was a wistful tone in her voice that he understood: people "ended" up here when they finished sliding to the bottom. The cracked pavement between his sneakers was littered with broken glass.
"That's the way it goes," he said.
She smiled and motioned to the artificial sky, bright holograms in place-- artificial stars. "You ever think about what's beyond that?"
"Sure."
"The stars." Her voice was wistful again and slightly awed. "Can you imagine a field of stars?"
Duo had been there-- up in those stars-- in the bleakness of space; it was awe-inspiring, but in a cold way. Space was inhospitable. It was a floating scrap heap playing infinity's junkyard. But this woman, with her child's eyes, could imagine them however she wanted to.
"Never really thought about it," he replied, shrugging off the lie easily.
"Yeah. Endless fields of stars." She reached into her jacket pocket and brought out a cigarette. She arched her eyebrows, offering one to him. Duo shook his head, declining. "Good," she said, flicking on a lighter. "It'll screw up your lungs." She inhaled deeply, nodding sagely. "Kill you young."
He thought for a moment that he could reach over and just take it out of her hands, toss it over his shoulder, and see the embers skitter. He decided against it though, and just watched her smoke. She puffed in silence for a little while, watching him the entire time with warm eyes.
"How old are you?" she asked.
"Fifteen."
"Fif-teen." She repeated, enunciating. "Fifteen. That's nice. That's really nice." She tilted her head a little before continuing, her eyes fixed on his priest's collar. Abruptly, she grinned. "So, what's a guy like you doing in a place like this?"
He laughed lightly and motioned to the alley with a sweep of his arm. "L2's home."
"Darkened alleys at 2 a.m.? Don't you have a family to go home to?"
His face hardened, and he whispered, "No. No, I don't."
Her face crumpled; it tugged at him, somehow. "Oh. I'm sorry." She sounded sincere. Her cigarette was promptly crushed beneath one booted foot. "I have a son your age," she said conversationally.
"My age?" He was mildly surprised and reevaluated her age. She must have seen this because she laughed.
"I was around your age when I had him, too." She tucked one loose strand of her light hair behind an ear. "Maybe a little older. You know, teens. It's been a long, long time though." She was suddenly absorbed in her fingernails as she murmured, "I think he'd be about your age..."
"Don't you know?"
"I gave him up for adoption the hour he was born." Her face darkened. "I only got to hold him once." Her eyes lightened with a mother's pride. "Oh, I could tell he was going to be beautiful. With my hair and his father's eyes. Some days, I don't know if he's dead or alive, but I think, mainly-- yeah, I believe he's out there."
"Are you looking for him?"
"No. It's been too long." She sounded forlorn and defeated.
Duo stared at the canopy of hologram stars. "Oh." His eyes were riveted on the barrier between him and space. "Yeah, I guess so." He tried to understand why this woman was talking to him; comprehension-- a revelation, really-- slithered across his mind before it disappeared.
"Do you think it's stupid to love someone you don't know?"
He thought about the safehouse a few blocks away and the pilot in one of the twin beds, tapping on a keyboard. "No."
"Good," she said softly and looked up into the stars. "Yeah." Her voice carried through the alley and ended in a series of hollow echoes. "A beautiful, beautiful kid. But I'd already signed him away..." Her voice faltered. She looked at him with sharp eyes. "Want to see something?"
"Yeah, sure."
She offered him her wrist; little cuts and scars lined the central vein. She saw the pity in his eyes and hastened to say, "I didn't try anything. But the guy who adopted him-- some kind of biochemist genetic scientist-type guy-- he wanted to make sure my little boy would be special. I spent my last trimester in one of his labs hooked up to machines, having them inject stuff into me. But he promised me that they were immunization shots-- that my baby'd never get sick, never suffer through disease. They changed his pain threshold with one shot and sharpened his eyesight and hearing with another. Pretty amazing what science can do these days, right?"
His face was uncertain. "Yeah, pretty amazing."
"I always had the monitors on. It was a pretty rough imaging program, so sometimes when it was dark, he was only splotch of pink, but I used to spend hours staring at him on those monitors." She shook her head. "But I signed, anyway. Signed him away." The fire died from her voice, leaving it empty. The flatness of it was familiar.
"I'm sorry," he proffered, genuine regret tingeing his voice.
"Yeah, well, make sure you learn something from this. Don't let your blessings slip through your fingers." She held up her hand, curling it into a fist.
"Yeah..."
"Listen, kid," she said, straightening herself, "sorry about that. Kinda awkward, just listening to some lady talk about a kid she never knew. I just... I don't get much of a chance to talk to people like this. I don't know anyone who would just *listen*."
"No problem."
"Hey, who knows, maybe I'll even track down Jenova and Odin," she said brightly.
"Who?"
"Oh, yeah. Dr. J and Odin. They're the guys that adopted my boy." She waved a dismissive hand. "But I don't think so, you know? It's too big." She gestured to the stars again, ignoring the sharp intake of breath Duo gave. "All that space..." Her eyes were wounded for a moment. "Do you think..." she whispered, softly. "Do you think-- he's happy? I mean, with things as they are. War."
Duo said, "'Gaudeamus igitur iuvenes dum sumus.'" She looked at him inquiringly. "It's Latin. 'Therefore, let us rejoice while we are young.'" he added, slightly apologetic.
She nodded in agreement and leaned against the wall, hands behind her head. "Yeah," she said, pensively. "While you're young." She paused. "Hey."
"Yeah?"
"Do you believe in all that star cross'd stuff? Destiny? Kismet?"
"Yeah, sure, why?"
"Just wondering." Her smile was peaceful. "Me too." He stared into the familiar pools of Prussian and felt his heart catch in his throat. She got up and extended her hand. Dumbfounded, he shook it. She grinned. "It was nice talking to you, mister...?"
"Maxwell. Duo Maxwell."
"It was a pleasure, Mr. Maxwell." She began walking away from him.
"Hey!" He yelled, suddenly, waving his hands. "I'll see you around?"
She never turned around, but he could hear her musical laughter reverberate in the alley, silencing sirens and wails and static noise. Whatever final words she might have said crumbled in the air as she strolled away, melting into light and darkness.
Duo stared from the alley; it seemed darker now that he was alone.
He had to go back. Heero would be waiting.
The door clicks open and I open one eye. I'm sprawled on the bed and Duo walks in, a slender figure in black. His hair is braided messily, and a black cap shadows his eyes. He sits on the bed, his back to me, completely silent. I trace a finger down his back; he stiffens initially, but relaxes, leaning into my touch.
"Where'd you go?" I murmur.
"Out," he replies, still facing away.
"What'd you do?" I try to coax out a nonsensical string of syllables and words that I'm used to from him.
He turns around and my heart skips a beat: he's been crying. He takes the cap off and lays it on the bed. "Why do you do it?" He asks.
"Do what?"
"With me. Why do you do it?" There's something raw in his voice, something I can't identify.
"Because... I want to."
"But *why*?"
I can't answer that, so I stare at him instead, battling the rage of emotions that hides behind my gaze.
"I thought so," he answers quietly. He gets up and walks into the adjoining room, leaving me alone in the bed we've shared for so many nights.
Duo was curled up in Deathscythe Hell, yawning. The pilots had taken to simply floating around space instead of staying in the colonies; after the last attack on L2, they'd decided that the risk for civilian casualties was too high and left to drift in the empty space between the colonies and earth.
His communications screen beeped and flashed green.
"Duo?" Heero's handsomely disheveled face appeared on the screen.
"Hey," Duo said carelessly, inwardly folding into himself and away from the piercing gaze. They'd slept separately since the night on L2. Heero had never answered him, and he had never asked again. He stroked the seat of his Gundam. It was lonely waking up alone.
"I have your answer," Heero said, eyes unnervingly bright. "I'm sending you the coordinates of the path of the 124P/Gamma Nine orbital."
"The answer to... w-what? 12-what?"
A separate screen popped up; it was an image of space, crisscrossed by green gridlines. Deathscythe began to plot the coordinates fed by Wing Zero. The gridlines disappeared, leaving only black.
"Heero? What is this?" Duo asked apprehensively.
"Be quiet and watch," Heero whispered.
Duo watched, and after a little while, two edges blurred white. Two comets shot through the blank black of space, crossing each other's path. His eyes followed the faint trails of the tails, until his screen was black again.
/...trying to find redemption in the small spaces between us.../
/Do you believe... star cross'd.../ A musical feminine voice asked him, softly.
"Duo?"
"Yeah?" His voice was thick.
"That's my answer."
Duo stared at the empty screen, switched it off, and turned to Heero. His laughter drifted into space and into the small cockpit of 01, filling in those small spaces. Heero stared at a pair of violet eyes on his screen, and forgot about the war. He could faintly smell lavender, conjured up from somewhere in his mind. The words on his tongue disappeared into a mauve haze, in which he gladly drowned.
The pilot of 02 tilted his head and offered a skewed smile. "I believe you."
Fin
Comments: My revenge for filling up my mailbox so much this week. BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
Duo: Oh, yeah, smiting them with your fanfiction. I tremble before you.
Jay: IT WAS A SOUND IDEA!! [wails]
Obligatory Disclaimer: is quite long, and available upon demand. ^^;;
Jay