Title: Koji ma Oshi
author: Sol 1056
rating: NC-17 for sex, violence, and dirty mouths
warning: BDSM, psychological issues, post-post-EW
pairings: 2x1, 3x5x3, 4xR
Chapter Twelve
Wufei met us at the shuttle gate. The station was deserted, over on a little-used port on the lower side of L4's Lower Ring. He'd come via a different shuttle, flying in with a group that I'd only been told were the core of his and Heero's 'regulars.' That was the first I'd heard of it, and even that only once we'd landed. I was too busy dealing with navigating L4's elaborate extrastructure into the small bay to glare holes into Heero's head like I would've preferred, and he was out of the ship before I could pound him against the wall and demand answers.
"Took you long enough," Wufei said when we leapt down from the Stingray. He looked exhausted, and frustrated. "What did you do, stop for tea and cookies on the Lunar Base?"
"Ran into some amusement," I said, just as exhausted and probably five times as frustrated. "We tracked two honkin' big freighters through the off-lanes, and then at two hundred miles, they were pinged in a series of seemingly random shots. Next thing we know, they're peeling off in different directions and heading for parts unknown, with no warning. No discussion between them, either."
"And you know this how?"
"Stealth mode," Heero answered, coming to stand beside me, with his bag over his shoulder. "Where's the debriefing?"
"At the precinct," Wufei said, flatly. "Follow me."
"Wait a minute," I said, stepping in his way. "I just flew ten straight hours. The information said it'll be in another ten hours, so I need sleep, shower, and then to get in position. Not to waste--"
"Shut up," Wufei snapped, in an undertone. "Not now."
Even I know when to back down, and he had that look in his eyes like the next thing that stepped in his way was going to get karate-chopped into six pieces. No, make that twenty-seven very small pieces. And those pieces would be shot. Then dragged behind the nearest vehicle. I got out of his way, and I shut up.
Wufei led the way through the empty station bays towards the exit. The piped-in music echoed through the barren space, bouncing off the metallic and concrete surfaces.
"We arrived hour and half ago, and I reconnoitered the address given with three of my people. The place had been cleared out, and not even rushed, at that. The warehouse is empty, wiped down. Clean."
"They were warned," Heero said, rather unnecessarily.
"How the fuck!" I shook my head. "If an entire warehouse was evacuated, that would have been a good number of hours of work. How the fuck did they know?"
"Your informant," Wufei said. "How well do you--"
I cut him off. "Who else knew about this? I thought you two worked alone."
"We have teams," Heero answered.
"Preventers," Wufei added. "We'll have a debriefing with them in one hour."
"Just great," I said. A roomful of browns-and-greens--the very people allegedly in on the entire sordid mess. I was tempted to bash Wufei's head. I'd die, but it might be fun. Then I had a thought that made my stomach sour further, something I hadn't thought possible. "Any of them have connections to L4?"
"Most likely. They're from all over." His eyes narrowed, and he tensed. "We've worked with our teams for several years now. They're trustworthy."
"Bullshit," I retorted. I wanted to sit down. Lie down. Or shoot something. "Did you tell any of them who the perps might be?"
"I didn't have time for such details," Heero replied. He didn't look at Wufei; he seemed to be stunned, and disappointed.
"I simply told them to bug out, and meet us on L4."
"Exactly." I shook my head hard enough to make my braid whip behind me, snapping at the end. It was a great way to show just how pissed off I was, without me needing to yell. "We've been working inside Preventers all this time. Anyone with friends on the L4 force would naturally call up his or her buddies and say, hey, gonna be in town shortly!"
"They know how to maintain radio silence," Wufei said, brows drawn down. He was practically bristling.
"Against their own kind? I doubt it. I followed Trowa's plan, and I was the good little contact. There isn't a goddamn Preventer who isn't aware we're on some massive search for the Crow-71 distribution ring. So what would ever have given your guys--" I shot a nasty look towards Heero, just for waiting until the last minute to mention that detail-- "Any reason to think it wasn't okay to talk about it with other officers on the force?"
"Common sense," Wufei shot back. "There's no--"
"Man, you're stupid. For a scholar, you're damned stupid," I exclaimed. "I will never believe that a bunch of seasoned Preventers would keep secrets from former buddies or coworkers... especially on the orders of a Gundam pilot."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Are you bloody naïve?" I laughed bitterly and threw my hands in the air. "If anyone on your teams knows anyone involved in the ring--whether or not they're aware of it--or has even the remotest suspicion that we were narrowing in on Preventers as possible perps--they would alert their friends first. They'll see it as a case where they should pass judgement, not us. We don't get that right. Wufei, it may have been ten years, but we'll always be Gundam pilots."
Heero stiffened; Wufei's face went perfectly expressionless. Yeah, that would be: say, Duo, you just hit a hot button. Shut up now, if you have a sense of self-preservation. Well, I do--but I'm talking truth here, and I was never good at keeping my trap shut if there's a chance to enlighten someone.
"Even on L2, there were folks not so keen on me. L5 might be a different case 'cause of you being a well-known secret, but L4 is distinctly anti-Gundam, even if they willingly play the game of pretending to forget when it's Quatre they're dealing with. The rest of us don't get that leeway. L1 and L3? Forget it. Just like on earth: we are tolerated, but we will never belong."
"Which means the Sweepers could've taken you for a ride just as much," Wufei pointed out, with a crisp, dry note in his voice that bespoke his fury far greater than any screaming.
"Maybe, but I doubt it." I stared Wufei down; Heero stepped between us, with a weary, resigned expression.
"No, the Sweepers' wouldn't send misinformation just to damage a Gundam pilot," Heero said. When Wufei started, Heero frowned, slightly, and he seemed both certain and yet... damn it, I needed that Heero-English dictionary, and pronto! "They're not doing it to help Duo. The Sweepers are participating because Crow-71 was the cause of death for one of their own."
"Hilde," Wufei whispered, then glanced sideways at me.
I nodded.
"I see." Wufei rubbed his temples, and let out a long sigh. "Okay. So what do we do now?"
"Do your briefing," I said. Wufei dropped his hand, startled, and I shrugged. "And tell them you've called off the mission."
"But that's twenty-four people, of whom at least one is a rat." Wufei shook his head. "And the repercussions--"
"No, don't come down on them," I said, my mind already spinning, moving through the possibilities and down various avenues. "Use them. Disinformation... tell them... the informant was an L4 Preventer. Turn them on their own."
"It was your informant," Heero pointed out. "You can tell them in the debriefing--"
"I'm not going in there." I came to a halt just in front of the station bay exit, and crossed my arms. I didn't care if Heero tried to carry me; I wasn't gonna budge. I wasn't that stupid. "You two are the faces they know. They saw enough of me four months ago, when we set up surveillance, and that was possibly the damn stupidest thing I've done in a long time." Okay, not the top of the list, but close. "I'm not reinforcing their connection between me and you."
"But we need to find out who it was," Wufei insisted. "And the fall-out from announcing the assignment's failure--"
"Let it happen. As far as we know on our end, there was one informant, and no real indication that the informant's news was even correct, other than the fact that the anonymous tip was traced back to the L4 Lower Ring precinct. Then let them fight it out, and we go back to doing regular surveillance. We hunker down."
"Maxwell... " Wufei looked unimpressed. "If they're moving such huge shipments--"
"Then they'll do it again once the heat is off, or at least once they think it is. In the meantime, our real--and only--source becomes the Sweepers." I shook my head. "No offense, guys, but this was a mistake, getting the Preventers involved."
"You couldn't have gotten this far without us," Wufei replied.
"Like hell I could, and I would've gotten four times as far."
"Not without some kind of authority," Heero muttered. "What would you have done, a citizen's arrest?"
I was thinking more like waltzing in and slitting the throat of every man and woman present at any Crow-71 major buy... but with Wufei and Heero staring me down, suddenly that didn't seem like a good idea to say that. These two were walking the edge of legality, somewhere between what Preventers could do--and what they did when people didn't know. Who knows what they were authorized to do to me, if they thought they'd be preventing a crime--or mass murder.
Ah, fuck, what's a bit of genocide between friends? I shrugged, and grinned. "Never mind. We'll take it down to open ears along the Sweepers and Runners, and see what turns up. Just going to have to be low-key for awhile until the dust settles, I guess."
They looked at each other and at me, and I knew they were waiting. I pointedly looked at the exit, then turned around and headed back to the Stingray. I didn't even see reason to tell them what they needed to do--I'd said it once, and that had better be enough for them. Waving over my shoulder, I made my way back to the ship, climbed in, set myself up in the single bunk behind the main cabin. Punching in access codes I knew only Heero would figure out--WingSucks--I collapsed onto the bunk and was asleep immediately.
I came to at Heero's whisper, and the touch of his hand on my arm. "Hunh?" I blinked, and dropped my hand from his throat.
"Just landed on the MEO," he said. "Couldn't wake you when we returned... but now we have to transfer."
I could only yawn in response. I sat up, grabbed my bag, and followed him with half-closed eyes to the MEO-Earth shuttle. Wufei was the only one of us who seemed awake. Oh, that's right--he hadn't been up all night at the point of departure, and he probably got to sleep a fair bit of the trip to L4 from Earth. Bastard.
I settled into the seat behind yet another green pilot who insisted on calling out his moves. Heero sat next to me; not close enough to be touching, but close enough I could feel the heat coming in waves off his body. He looked haggard, and utterly exhausted, but when I made moves to stay awake, he managed a smile.
"Sleep," he said. "I'll be here."
That was good enough for me.
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When I woke up, we'd landed in Bremen. It had been two in the morning when I'd gotten the call, four-thirty when we'd left Earth, six in the morning--Bremen time--when we arrived at the MEO. Three in the afternoon--Bremen time--at L4, three hours and no dinner... damn, had it been that long since I'd eaten? No wonder I'd been chewing my own damn braid. Left at nine, and eight-thirty in the morning I was guiding Heero into a cab at the Bremen shuttle port. I'd woken up, marginally refreshed and hungry enough to eat a Gundam.
When I told Heero we could take a cab back together, he'd nodded, sat down at the shuttle port's diner counter, and immediately fallen asleep. I wolfed down my breakfast, and woke him up long enough to steer him towards a cab, where he fell asleep again. When he sleeps, he really sleeps--but he did that in the war, too. When his body shut down, it didn't come back, but that was only once he'd determined the mission was done. Until then, he was hair-trigger all the way, baby.
Watching his sleeping face as we rode in the back of the cab, I knew he must've decided the mission--or this stage of it--was over. The cab pulled up at Heero's address, and it took several minutes for me to navigate two bags, paying the fare, and then waking Heero enough to pour him from the cab.
"Damn, you're toast," I told him.
He smirked, sagging against me, and I shook my head and threw his arm over my shoulders. Somehow I got both of us to the building's door, but I didn't bother asking him for his keys. I considered digging in his pockets, but even half-asleep he'd probably still break my wrists for the impropriety--some instincts die hard, if he were anything like me. So I just picked the lock and let us in, and then took the elevator to the top floor. The door at the end of the hall looked like the only one facing the front of the building--plus the small 'H. Yuy' on the door was a dead giveaway.
I picked that lock--remarkably easy--and the door swung open... to a brightly lit, if sparse apartment. Then again, it had to be sparse, to make up for the walls. It took a moment to plan a route--the walls were covered in bookshelves, with books and various old engine parts and pieces of construction and what looked like wreckage pushed between the books. More books on the floor, with notepads covered with his angular scrawl, and more books on the table between two overstuffed high-back chairs.
He even had a fireplace! Bastard. I had wanted a fireplace, but then I'd probably test stuff in it and that would be bad. Okay, pay attention. Kitchen to the left, barely big enough for the oven, sink, and fridge. Two doors to the right. One would probably be the bathroom--okay, the one ajar, there's white tile. Other one, bedroom. Heero was still half-asleep against me, his head resting on my shoulder. I hauled him the ten feet to the second door, pushing it open with my shoulder. Futon on the floor, low table beside, and I lowered him onto the bed.
Heero mumbled something, and I shushed him, unlacing his boots and pulling them off. Then I rolled him in his light blanket. His hand appeared, feeling around under the extra pillow, and I dug around in his pack until I found his gun. It was remarkably light, and I wondered how he'd modified it, but I put it in his hand. He was instantly asleep, hand curled around the butt of the gun. Talk about a fucked-up security blanket, but I sleep with knives, so I can't exactly be one to talk. Sighing, I left his bag by his bed and picked up my own bag. I could let myself out, or I could just curl up on one of his chairs and wait for him to wake--he'd done it for me, after all.
When I stepped out of his room, I realized: there was a man in the chair facing away from the door. He was older than me, with black hair graying at the temples. It took a second to place the face: Rex, from the club the other night. I didn't wait for him to explain, but I kept my voice low, mindful of Heero asleep in the next room.
"How the fuck did you get in?"
"I have a key, and I was here the whole time," he answered. Outside the club's noise, his voice was low, with a strange accent I couldn't place. I was too busy cursing myself for still being so tired I hadn't registered someone was in the room.
"You can leave, then, because I'm here," I informed him. I dropped my bag by the second chair and sat down, arms crossed, giving him a lazy smile.
"I'll wait until Heero's awake," he replied.
"It'll be about six hours, possibly more."
"Is he injured?" Rex wasn't glaring, but it sure felt like he was trying to burn a hole through my head with that intense examination.
"No. Just exhausted."
"What did you do to him?"
"Nothing." Asshole thinks this has something to do with the club scene? "He did it all on his own. Part of our jobs." A flick of my wrist and I had a butterfly knife in my hand; I began casually cleaning my nails as though utterly disinterested in his presence. "This is not the time for you to be protective, and I doubt Heero would appreciate it."
"So you're Duo," Rex said, and leaned back, hands clasped across his stomach.
I waited for him to say it, in that patronizing tone: I've heard so much about you. Yeah, blade through the forehead, buddy, hear this one, too. Fuck, I'm too tired for this crap.
"Yeah, and this is the cranky version. I'm about to fall asleep, so I suggest you leave." I pointed nonchalantly towards the door with the knife, as though waving him off. "Once I'm asleep, you make the slightest sound and you'll have a blade buried to the hilt in the moving appendage."
"I don't take kindly to threats."
"It's not a threat." I smiled widely, and flashed a second blade.
With the first, I picked my teeth; with the second, I flipped the butterfly knife open and closed at rapid-fire. Clack, clack, clack, too fast for the human eye to see the halves opening and closing against the blade. Finally I stopped long enough to throw the knife--butterflies aren't the best balanced, but I've had years of practice. The knife buried itself in the arm of Rex's chair--between his second and third fingers. Good for him he'd frozen the instant I'd raised my arm.
"Heero and I go way back. He'll sleep, knowing I'm here. When he's awake, it'll be my turn." I put the first blade away, tucking it out of sight and from Rex's slightly widened eyes, I knew he hadn't been able to follow the movement. I let my grin go just a little bigger, showing too many teeth. "There are eight more where that one came from. Test me, and I'll send you home as a pincushion. Understood?"
"You've hardly been on speaking terms all this time with Heero," came the reply. Had to give the man credit; he was still trying to talk down to me. Or perhaps he wasn't moving for fear I'd still try to nail him, despite my partially-awake state. "I'd rather make sure of his safety and health, on my own. That's what friends are for."
"What more do you want to assure you that he'll be okay?" I stretched, and yawned, then slumped in the chair, as though I could care less. "I doubt you could provide the security I can."
"And I doubt you could provide what I can," he replied.
What the fuck was that supposed to mean? I barely had time to register the growl in my throat when we were both stopped by a weary sigh. Heero stood in his bedroom doorway; he slumped against the doorjamb, gun in his hand, pointing down in loose fingers.
"I will shoot both of you," he snarled, "if you don't shut up."
Oh, like that's gonna happen. Heero must've pulled his gun on me twenty times if once when we boarded together, and he never shot me. Not then, not on L2, not any time. He just likes waving the damn thing around. I smirked, and Heero's expression didn't change.
"Tranquilizer bullets, Duo, so yes... I will shoot both of you. At least then I might get some sleep."
Rex chuckled, and came to his feet. In two strides he was standing before Heero, and it took everything I had not to jump up and dash between them. I stayed rooted to my chair, and kept that lazy smile on my face. Cause, y'know, old friend. No need to get up. Don't stand on formality and what the fuck are you doing--
He was kissing Heero. Nothing deep--not too long--but longer than a peck on the cheek and when did Heero let people kiss him even on the cheek? Other than Relena, that is--but... Rex's back was to me but that still wasn't just a kiss on the cheek--
I felt like Heero had shot me, maybe at some point between breaths when I'd blacked out from shock, and maybe that's why I couldn't move and the world seemed drilled into place, stuck in slow motion. Then I remembered: Rex's hand had been around Heero's waist. So. Just casual. Not exclusive. Right. Heero said that, and he's not one for dissembling--sucks at it, so I would've known--wait, are they still kissing?
Damn it, where's that hole in the earth to open me up so I can just head back to my place and pretend like none of this happened and why the fuck did I just open my fat mouth twelve hours ago and ask Heero if he wanted to scene--damn it, he's been in for three years, it's the war all over again, with him studying all his life and me just landing in the action feet-first and figuring out what I'd do by the seat of my pants--
I realized I was yawning, but not because I meant to cover my panic--not panic, admit it, but complete and total humiliation. So much for showing off with my blades, fuck, Duo, forget the foot, swallow the entire fucking leg why don't you--and it dawned on me that Rex was whispering into Heero's ear. He wasn't kissing Heero, at least. Or not any longer, but Heero just looked annoyed.
"Later," Heero growled, loud enough for me to hear. He looked past Rex to me, and said, quite clearly: "Duo will show you to the door and lock up behind you."
Well, hot damn. Score for me and game over, asshole! Suddenly the bored, smug look on my face wasn't for show. I came to my feet, modulating my expression into one of pleasant hospitality when I noticed Heero's glare had gone up a notch. I smiled at him: hey, I can be magnanimous--fuck yeah, when I won, hot damn. I'm almost positive Heero shook his head in disgust or amusement--or both--before shutting his bedroom door again. It was almost enough to make up for the fact that I could've sworn Heero had been kissing him back. Almost. Maybe not quite, but enough...
"It was a pleasure," I said to Rex, and jerked my blade from the chair. Snapping it open and closed, I spirited it away into its hiding place against my forearm inside my jacket sleeve, and opened the front door. "Sorry you had to run."
Rex chuckled, and nodded. He didn't seem bothered in the least; surprisingly, he seemed a bit worried. "Don't ever hurt him," he said to me, in a warning tone.
"I couldn't even if I tried," I said. "Heero's more than capable of--"
"I know what he's capable of," Rex replied.
I doubt it, I thought, darkly. You have no idea what that boy-man has done in his life. Even the news reports on the Gundams left out nine-tenths of what we did...
"And I know that he's--" Rex stopped, then shrugged, and had the audacity to clap his hand on my shoulder. "Don't break the toys," he said, in a joking manner. Old scene joke, Zorya had told me--one can't play with a broken toy, so treat the submissive well--but I wasn't in the mood for jokes.
"Touch me again without my permission," I said, "and it won't be a toy that's broken, but every bone in your hand. We clear?"
Rex's hand moved away. Quick, but slow enough to just push the edges of my limits. He nodded, grinning a bit too cheerfully for my taste, and left. He even fuckin' whistled while he strode down the hallway, and he didn't look back as he descended the stairs. Asshole.
I shut the door softly, checked the locks, and collapsed back into the chair. For a long time I stared at the chair where he'd sat, and tried to figure out which end was up... but I was too tired, too keyed-up, and every time I looked at Heero's door, I could see the echoes of Heero, that tired, worn look in his eyes... and Rex, leaning over him...
Damn, if only there were a way to scrub one's memories. There's a lot of things I'd want to forget, but at that moment, the sight of Heero kissing someone else was definitely near the top of the list.
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When I woke up, the sun was setting, and how's that for fucking with a person? It took a heartbeat to place where I was--the only thing I knew was that one leg seemed to be asleep, I was curled up in a ball, and my right-arm knife was out and pointing at a sound.
Turns out it was Heero, in the doorway to his room. He'd changed, into loose blue jeans that hung down low enough on his hips that I could see he didn't wear underwear. Still didn't, that is. And a view of his chest, sculpted muscles and scars and dark nipples and look away Duo, or just take a picture for happy dreams for the rest of your life. Stretch, and grin to cover. I gave him a groggy smile and popped the knife back into place; he snorted and trudged to the kitchen, easily navigating the stacks of books.
He returned a few minutes later, and handed me a cup of coffee. Still silent, he sat down on the chair opposite me and for several moments we sipped our respective coffees and seemed to find the books terribly interesting. Finally Heero lowered his mug with an unexpectedly shy smile.
"I would've cleaned if I'd known I'd have company," he said, motioning towards the piles. "I was doing research."
The word 'company' made me think of Rex, and everything came rushing back. So much for the warm fuzzies of getting to stay while Rex got escorted to the door. Fuck. I sighed, and sipped my coffee to cover for not knowing what to say.
"I... I didn't expect he'd be here," Heero said, and was that almost an apology? "I sent him word of a work-related emergency, and then let him know I was returning. I didn't think he'd... " He shrugged.
"What were you doing? Checking in?" I could barely keep the sarcasm from my voice.
"No!" Heero frowned and leaned back, gripping his mug tightly. "It's not like that. I left abruptly, and... that's what friends do. They let each other know what's going on." He didn't look me in the eye when he said it, though.
"Yeah, maybe you were right then."
He looked surprised.
"When you said we're not friends. Just coworkers," I spat. "You never told me you had a team of people working for you." I set my mug down on the nearest stack of books, grabbed my bag, and climbed to my feet. "And you never told me you were--that wasn't just some--oh, fuck it. Never mind. I'm going back to my place and sleep in a real bed, not curled up like some pretzel--"
"Duo," Heero said, and I blinked. I was a foot from the door, and he was somehow between it and me, with a hand on my chest. "Don't--I'm tired of arguing."
"We're not arguing," I said, somewhere between annoyed and panicked at the way heat from his hand seemed to be soaking through my shirt and straight into my skin. Could he tell? Could he feel my heart pounding at top-speed or maybe he'd write that off as caffeine, since I'd sure like to-- "We're not," I repeated, feeling a bit lame.
"If we're not," Heero said, and his gaze was on his hand, still on my chest. He pushed, very lightly, and I didn't budge. "Then you shower... sleep... and then we play?"
Play...
I think my stomach just fell down to my kneecaps, hit my shins and bounced right up into my throat. If I open my mouth, every word I've choked back in the past fifteen hours will leap out and--I wondered if I looked like a deer in the headlights. I just stared at him, until the slightest little smile tugged at the corner of his lips.
"Scared?" he whispered.
"No," I said, automatically, and rewarded him with a wide grin that probably looked far more self-confident than I felt... and it turned right into a yawn.
"Bed's available," he said, and pushed again.
"You feed me caffeine, and send me to bed," I grumbled, dropping my pack and trudging towards his bathroom. "Not exactly efficient."
"I've mellowed." Heero sat back down in the chair, and picked up the book nearest him, along with a pad of paper. Just as I turned in the doorway to his bathroom, he glanced up with a distinctly wicked smile. "But not completely."
Yeah, that's just what I need to hear before I sleep. One big guess what I'd be dreaming about, and no hints required. I could still feel the heat of his hand on my body, as though scorched through my clothes, deep into my chest.
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It wasn't what I expected.
But then, nothing really ever is.
I woke two hours later, to find he had coffee waiting. We'd covered the basics of negotiation on the flight to L4, and although I wouldn't have scened with anyone else on such sparse knowledge... I guess there was something else at work, when it came to Heero.
But this wasn't what I'd expected.
I stifled another sigh, feeling the ropes tighten around me. Blindfolded, standing with my feet shoulder-width apart in his bedroom... he'd folded the futon off to the side, and we'd stared into each other's eyes for a long moment--the last sight I had was of his solemn blue eyes before the blindfold came down over me.
Then he'd removed my shirt.
It had taken everything I had not to shy away from his touch, not to shout out a safeword and lunge for my shirt. I wanted him to touch me, like fuck I wanted his hands on me, but at the same time, I didn't want to be that...
Vulnerable.
Not if he wasn't, also.
And yet I was still wearing my black jeans, if only those--why was I feeling so exposed? I didn't like it, but I talked myself out of the panic. It's okay; it's Heero. It's okay; it's just a bare chest. Then fingers trailed down my chest and I wanted to arch up against him, but as soon as I even breathed, he was gone.
Ropes... running across my chest, around my arms, binding my arms in front of me--at least he had the decency not to push it too far. There was a knife tucked into the hip of my jeans, and my shoes were by the door, and I... no, calm down, this is Heero.
And then the panic subsided... and the boredom set in. It dawned on me that although we'd negotiated touch as important, we'd not even kissed. And then I had a flash to Heero kissing Rex, and wondered why in space I'd been so stupid as to get myself into this.
Because you're male, and you have a dick. And because somewhere inside you since the moment he walked through that fake travel agency door you've thought about what he looks like naked... well, what he looks like naked now and it doesn't help you have a half-year's memories of what he looked like then. But the one thing you never saw was what he looked like when he came. What he'd look like when overtaken, crying out at the force of--
No. We're not going to have sex, right?
Right.
No sex.
Just... just his fingers trailing down my body, and damn, the rope itches. So maybe there's the trigger of having to trust him, okay, he's paying attention to that, but there's something...
Why does it feel like something is missing?
I took a deep breath, and centered myself. It wasn't like feeling Heero's vibes or anything esoteric like that. I simply listened to his breathing pattern--slow, and deep--and his fingers across my skin, and I realized with a sinking feeling that he wasn't shaking. There was no tremble in his fingers. He was stroking my skin, and it felt good--outlining the itchy ropes and nothing else was happening--what was he waiting for? Get on with it.
And there went my erection.
I was almost shocked at how fast it was gone, and struggled vainly to get myself excited again. Something inside of me wanted to scream, wanted to thrash about, some kind of reaction--damn it, what the fuck was wrong? Why was it Zorya could produce such a reaction in me, then that scene with Libri--man, that was just...
That was a lot like this one. What was it? I hadn't really had a chance to stop and think about it, and here I was, wrapped around with ropes while Heero's fingers trailed across my skin, and I was pondering the last scene I was in. Zorya would've popped me upside the head, I was sure; Hilde would've taken my head off with the nearest pillow.
Whatever Libri wanted, wasn't really--at heart--what I wanted. But that's what I was supposed to do, right? Create the scene she wanted... so why did I now feel like it was my fault I couldn't create the scene Heero wanted?
A submissive's role in the scene is to submit. Yeah, and what the fuck was I doing, crocheting a rug? I was tied up. Submitting. Check that off the list. But I was also supposed to please the dominant. Right. Please Heero.
That didn't get me very far--just got me that sinking feeling again, and I realized he was checking the knots and beginning to work down my arms. His callused fingers moved across my arm, tucking the rope around my arms, across my chest, and I didn't shiver or get hard. I had to work not to flinch. Fuck, what is fucking wrong with me?
Isn't this what I wanted?
Yes. I had decided I could be a good submissive--maybe I had been high from the scene at that point, maybe submitting was just a one-time thing, or a five-time thing, and all due to Zorya--and maybe I was just...
I realized he was whispering in my ear, and I wanted to groan. I nearly did, but it wasn't from pleasure... I had to think fast. What would please him? I can fake it. I don't care. I will fake it. I'll do whatever, because he's been in the scene three years, he knows what he's doing, and if I could just--like, find the cheat sheet and catch up. Fuck, it's just like the war. He never meant to shove it down my throat, but it was always there, right up to that damned punch-exchange in the control room on L3. Stay here, it's for your own good. You just fell into this, and I'll take it from here.
Like I'm the bloody damn sidekick.
He went and got his bachelor's, his master's, his doctorate. I don't even know where my GED is, and what I know of mechanics I learned for Operation Meteor or from blowing stuff up and figuring out what not to do the next time. He's been in the scene for three years, obviously playing with the same people for a long time now, and me? I just landed in it a few months ago, and I have no idea what I'm doing...
Why don't I trust him? I do. He could stand at my back with a gun and I wouldn't look, I'd know he had my back and not to stab me but to fight at my side. I slept with him in the next room and more peacefully than I have in months, but--
"Duo," Heero murmured. His fingers ran down my throat, around and tracing a line up to my ear, and down my jaw, across my lips. "Duo," he repeated, sounding less confident, almost curious, perhaps confused.
I opened my mouth, and tensed. I'm not going to say it. I'm in this scene, I agreed to this, I will do whatever I have to... damn it, I just want to please him. If that means he punches me and tells me it's for my own good, well, hey, been there, done that. I can handle it. Punch me! Do something! Just give me a sign of what you want, because I can't figure it out, and the only thing I know is that it feels like you're not enjoying this either--
"Duo," Heero said, a little more urgent.
"Heero," I croaked out, against his fingers. I thought of licking them, pulling them into my mouth, and I wanted him pressed against me, but I wasn't hard, and not getting there. And if he did move against me, he'd know... and it just wasn't happening. I sighed. "No, Heero." That wasn't the safeword, and I didn't care. The tone, flat and weary, probably said it all.
"No?" The word, the question, was barely a breath.
"I'm sorry. Could you undo me?"
"I... " He was quiet, then his hands dropped away from my lips.
I wanted to call him back, insist that I'd try harder. At what? What the fuck else could I do? I couldn't lie. I could only do one thing, and hope I'd not ruined everything for being a damned fool who could only think with his dick, and couldn't even... couldn't submit, couldn't give like the submissives I'd seen. They gave so freely, and here I was thinking about old history and puzzling it out and it... it just sucked.
He undid about half the knots, around my arms, and then I heard him swear softly under his breath. Next thing I knew, a blade snicked near me and I momentarily panicked--not the braid, not the braid!--and then cold steel brushed my skin and the ropes were falling away. I shook my arms, and the coarse-seeming ropes slithered down my chest. Before I could reach up, Heero removed the blindfold and I was left blinking at the darkened room.
I could see my shirt lying on a small wooden chair, and I picked it up, pulling it on and buttoning it up with trembling fingers. Look, now at least one of us is shaking with emotion, but I doubted it was the good kind. I shoved my feet into my boots by his bedroom door, and put my hand on the doorknob. What should I say? What could I say?
"I'm sorry," I finally whispered. "I... I guess I'll see you in the office tomorrow."
He was quiet, and I dared a glance over my shoulder. His head was down, those long bangs obscuring his expression, but he held the blindfold tightly in his hands. Every line in his body--the white knuckles, the slump of his shoulders--made me want to cringe at my utter stupidity, but... face it, I didn't know him well enough. If it were Hilde, I'd be across the room in two steps and hugging her. If it were Quatre, or Relena, the same--but this was Heero. I'd trust him to watch my back but I wasn't sure if I trusted him with my...
I didn't want to go there.
"I'm sorry," I said again, and felt helpless. "I'll understand if you'd rather act like this never happened."
With that, I left his bedroom. In one swift move I grabbed my bag, and never stopped. I let myself from his apartment, down the stairs without waiting for the elevator, and out onto the street. My chest felt like it was ripped open, and I had to hold my fist against my ribs, as though holding something in or stopping something from falling out.
You asshole, I wanted to scream at myself. You've fucked it up. You should've stayed, should've pretended, you've done it before. You did it with Libri, just rode on through and figured it out and handed it over on a silver platter. And really...
I stepped off the curb, and dared a look over my shoulder. The windows in Heero's apartment were still dark. I guessed he'd remained in his bedroom, maybe even still standing there with the cut ropes like dead snakes around his feet and the blindfold in his hand. And me, I was running, full-speed, back to my own apartment, up the stairs, jiggle the lock and disarm security and inside and bolt the locks and set the alarm and spin and throw my bag down and land on my bed.
After a minute I rolled over, and felt around in the bottom drawer of my side table. Hilde's drawer, with everything of hers that was really important to me, including the old sweater she'd worn during the war. I pulled it out, and laid it across the bed and felt like a fool but... it wasn't like there was anything else I could do. I laid it out with the neck at the pillow and the arms crossed over the stomach, and then carefully laid down next to it, and placed my head on the shoulder and my arm across the bottom hem.
And after awhile, I could even believe she was hugging me back, and that the hot sting in my eyes was just part of my exhaustion and hunger and loneliness, and had absolutely nothing to do with what I'd seen when I'd sat up to bring out the sweater.
Through the open bedroom window, I had a clear view down to the street. And there was no way to fool myself into believing that wasn't Heero stepping out of his apartment, dressed in black, waiting for a cab.
No. That wasn't him, just like this wasn't an empty sweater. If I could convince myself Hilde was with me for just a minute, then I could convince myself that Heero was...
But I couldn't. I slept, and dreamed of knives and smiles with too many teeth, and running through hallways only to find Heero kissing someone who laughed at me.
When I woke in the morning, I knew that even if Heero was willing to act like it'd never happened... I could never forget that it had.
I just didn't know what I'd do about it.
On to Chapter thirteen
Back to chapter eleven