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"Bad Company"Written By: Clara Barton & Kangofu_CB Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing. The following
is an intellectual exercise with no intention of profit. That said,
these characterizations, words, and situations are mine. Please ask
before reprinting. Rating: NC 17 Warnings: Post-Canon, Undercover Missions, Undercover
as a Couple, Implied/Referenced Torture, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced
Drug Use, Human Trafficking, Gang Violence Pairings: 3x2 Summary: "The only hell and the only paradise are the ones we build ourselves." - Unknown This fic is dark. It explores the way the lines between good and bad, black and white are blurred, for those who work from the inside to bring down the bad guys. Clara and I do not, at any point, get graphic in our descriptions, but there is a lot of sensitive subject matter. We have tagged as clearly as possible, and individual chapters will contain individual warnings. As a general rule this fic contains: implied torture, death, description of a human trafficking organization and its methods, the surrounding implications of human trafficking including forced prostitution and what amounts to slavery, drug and alcohol use, and drug trafficking. We understand that these subjects are not for everyone. We have made every effort to be respectful and accurate without being gratuitous or disturbing. The bad guys are bad. The good guys are, sometimes, not much better. We use a liberal sprinkling of Spanish and Russian in this fic, and neither of us are native speakers of either. We’ve relied heavily on the internet, and so we apologize for any mistakes. We have also included translations at the end of each chapter in the form of footnotes.
"Bad Company"
Chapter 10 Ain't No Grave Well, look way down the river, what do you think I see? I see a band of angels and they're coming after me Ain't no grave can hold my body down There ain't no grave can hold my body down. -Johnny Cash "Yeshcho razik, yeshcho da raz! Ey, ukhnem! Ey, ukhnem! Yeshcho razik, yeshcho da raz!" The words echoed through Trowa's mind. Had, for as long as he could remember. He didn't know if they were a dream or a memory or a fantasy. He had turned them around in his head for so long, had tried to tease out who had sung the words, had tried to describe the feeling - the low, hoarse voice washing over him, and the feeling of firelight and warmth and the smell of pine. Trowa had told Duo about it, once. It had been so late at night that it was morning, and Duo had shuddered awake, eyes wild, breathing shallow and rapid, and when Trowa had asked if he was okay, Duo had made an awful sound - something between a laugh and a sob. So Trowa had pulled Duo close and sang to him while he ran his fingers along Duo's spine and tangled them in Duo's hair. And Duo had asked, because Duo always asked, but Trowa hadn't been able to tell him where or when he learned the song. He had had a moment of resentment - sharing this moment with Duo, and then facing the reality that he didn't know what it was. But then Duo had kissed his shoulder and asked Trowa to teach him the words. It had been the first song Trowa had taught him, the first- Duo . Trowa struggled through the memories, through the hazy white noise and- He felt pain, sharp and burning, and it took his breath away. It felt like his body was on fire, felt like his side was some twisting, molten thing that was going to eat him alive and- Duo . He had to save Duo. He had to do that one thing. He needed- * "... not gonna happen. I mean it - if you even think about asking him to do it, I will burn HQ to the ground." Everything hurt, but it wasn't the burning, suffocating pain that had defeated Trowa before. Now, everything felt distant and dull. There but not at the same time. Trowa realized he was still alive. "Duo," he tried to say, but even to his own ears, it sounded like a garbled croak. His throat hurt, and his tongue felt unwieldy and so dry . "Tro. Trowa, I'm right here." He tried to open his eyes, but the light was so bright - so, so bright. Slowly, carefully, he blinked. Duo was there. Duo was right there. He was so close and- "Tell me you're alive," Trowa said - tried to say, but instead, he ending up coughing and gagging, and fuck, that hurt. He tried to clutch his side, the source of the pain, but Duo was there, hands reaching for his and stopping him. "Oh no, you're not doing that again. Last time you ripped out the drainage tube and had to have another surgery. Leave it alone." Trowa tried to hold onto Duo's hands, felt the solid heat and strength of him. "You're alive," he sighed, and relaxed back against scratchy sheets. "Yeah, payaso , I'm alive. And despite your best fucking efforts, so are you." Duo looked pale, deep shadows bruising his eyes, and his hair - Trowa had thought it was a dream, a nightmare - some kind of death hallucination when Duo had held him and Trowa had seen the unevenly-severed hair curling around Duo's shoulders. But now it had been evened out, tendrils falling against Duo's neck and just barely brushing the collar of his shirt. "Your hair." He tried to lift a hand to touch it, but he couldn't summon the strength. Duo's lips twisted. "Yeah. My hair," he said. "You got a problem with it?" The front was there, aggressive and challenging, but Trowa could see it, could hear the vulnerability there. "Suits you," he managed to rasp, and Duo's face relaxed. A throat was cleared, and Trowa jerked away from Duo, reaching for a weapon he didn't have. Une stood in the opposite corner of the room. The hospital room, Trowa realized. Her arms were folded over her chest, and she was wearing a skirt, jacket and blouse in shades of dull gray that made Trowa wonder if something was wrong with his vision. The expression on her face was somewhere between annoyed and bored. "Agent Barton. There are some things we need to discuss. You've been unconscious for the better part of four days, and time is critical. We need-" " You need to back the fuck off," Duo warned. "Agent Maxwell." Une was definitely annoyed now. "I told you, I'm out. We're both out . We're done with this shit." Une merely arched an eyebrow, unmoved by Duo's scathing tone or the frozen anger of Shinigami in his eyes. Instead, she turned her full attention back on Trowa. "Your associate, Anhil. We believe he has information that can help us track down the remaining contractors on L3 that the Sinaloa-" "Salome," Trowa interrupted, looking to Duo. "Is she-" "Sally got her," Duo answered with grim satisfaction. "She and Alessandra - well, Veta took care of Alessandra." "Veta?" Duo's grin was sharp. "Yeah. She-" "Gentlemen. If I can have your attention. We need-" "Look, Director, I respect you, and I don't want to get arrested, so I'm not going to shoot you, but you need to leave right now," Duo growled. "I don't know how many times I have to say it, but we no longer work for you . We aren't doing shit. Trowa isn't going to help you anymore. We-" "I'm not?" Trowa asked. Duo's rant was derailed by the question, and he looked at Trowa. "No. We're done. We've done enough, Tro. We-" "My life," Trowa said. "My call." Duo looked mutinous, jaw locking and nostrils flaring, but they had spent too long watching each other's backs to have an argument in front of a threat. "Excuse me, Mr. Barton?" The tension in the room was broken by the arrival of a woman in dark blue scrubs. She was slim and dark-skinned, and despite the polite tone, the look in her eyes made it clear that she had lost patience with the world in general about one hundred years ago. "Yeah?" "I'm Alison, your nurse. I need to examine the incision site." "Can that wait?" Une asked. "No, it can't fucking wait," Duo snarled. "This is his fucking health, and he's not-" "Now would be great," Trowa sighed. Alison looked at both Duo and Une and lifted her eyebrows. "You two can wait outside," she said when neither gave any indication of moving. "I won't get in the way," Duo protested, not budging from Trowa's side. "Not outside, you won't," Alison agreed, and made a shooing gesture. It would have been funny, this civilian shooing one of the most deadly men in the entire Earthsphere. It should have been funny. But all that Trowa felt was exhaustion and pain, aching and throbbing in time to his heartbeat. Duo waited until Une walked out of the room before following, shooting a glance back over his shoulder towards Trowa, holding his gaze until Alison firmly shut the door in his face. "I take it your mother doesn't approve of your boyfriend," Alison said as she moved to Trowa's bedside. Trowa stared at her in confusion. "What? I-" Oh God. She thought Une was his mother ? Surely, she knew who he was - she had called him Mr. Barton. Had Une- "I'm sorry, that was a joke. I'll hold off on making another until you're not quite as high on pain medications." "Oh." It was all he could think of to say. "Mm." Alison seemed efficient, her touch somewhere between clinical and gentle, and Trowa found himself admitting just how much pain he was really in when she asked. She gave him something, more medications to combat infection, something for anxiety that he tried to balk at until she pointed out that the last time she had taken him off that, he had ripped out his central line and almost ended up going back into surgery for the fourth time. "Get some rest," she advised as she gave him another dose of pain medication. "You're safe, and you're healing. You need to rest." "Duo," he said, and he didn't know if it was a protest or a request. "Do you want me to send him in, or can I send him home? He's been a menace these last few days. Hasn't left the floor since you arrived in the ICU." Trowa frowned. He honestly didn't know if he wanted Duo with him or not. He wanted to touch him again, wanted to run his fingers over the scar on Duo's left forearm from that mission they had barely survived, a clusterfuck on L3 that had been their first assignment together. Duo had gotten the scar by being an asshole, throwing himself between Trowa and a man twice his size, and taking a knife to the forearm that had been meant for Trowa's back. "Rest." Alison pressed a hand to his shoulder, and Trowa closed his eyes. * There was blood everywhere. Warm and thick on his hands, clumped in his hair, metallic tang poisoning his tongue, and still, Trowa pressed down. He had to stop it. There had to be a way to stop the blood, to stop- to save him. But Duo was pale and still below him, chest stained so dark it was nearly black, and nothing Trowa did could stop the tide. And behind him, Salome laughed. She laughed and laughed and- "Trowa." He snapped awake immediately, hand going under his pillow for the plastic knife that a nurse hadn't noticed was missing when he took away Trowa's nearly untouched food that... morning? Afternoon? Yesterday? The room was dark and still, cold and silent in a way that made Trowa's breath catch. "Trowa." His name, spoken again in a low voice. He looked to his right and saw Heero sitting in a chair, face barely illuminated by the monitors over Trowa's bed. "Duo," he panted, the image of his lifeless face still floating before Trowa's eyes. Heero stood up. "He's gone." " Gone ?" It had been a dream, hadn't it? A dream . He couldn't be- Trowa remembered Salome's laugh, could feel the cruel curve of her smile chasing a shudder up his spine. He felt his guts twist, felt something burning and bitter on his tongue, and he struggled to sit up. Heero was there immediately, hands pushing Trowa back down even as Trowa pushed against him. Tears pricked at his eyes. Gone . All of that, all of that, and Duo was gone. How- He couldn't remember anything. Hadn't he touched Duo? Hadn't he heard his voice and- "What the hell is going on?" It was Quatre, stepping into the room with a scowl on his face. "I don't know," Heero snapped. "He woke up asking for Duo, and then he started to panic and-" "Trowa," Quatre hip-checked Heero to the side and replaced Heero's hands with his own. His touch was gentler, but no less firm. "Trowa." He looked up at the blond-haired man. "He's gone?" Trowa hated his voice, hated how raw and broken it was. Quatre's brows furrowed together. "Yes. He went home to shower and shave. He was starting to smell. He'll be back in the morning." "He's alive?" "Yes. He's alive, Trowa." Trowa sucked in a breath, trembling with the force of his relief. Duo was alive. Quatre glared over at Heero. "What?" Heero demanded, folding his arms over himself protectively. "He asked, and I said he was gone." "He thought Duo was dead ," Quatre hissed. "How was I supposed to know that?" Quatre muttered something under his breath, and then turned back to Trowa. He rubbed his hands over Trowa's shoulders and down his arms, the touch grounding, reminding Trowa that he was in his own skin, his own broken body. Duo was alive. And Trowa was alive. "How are you feeling?" Quatre asked him eventually. "Like I got shot." Quatre's lips quirked, and even Heero, back in his seat, let out a chuckle. "You need to stop doing that," Quatre admonished him, one hand smoothing over Trowa's stubble-rough cheeks before carding through his hair. Trowa sighed, and let his head fall back and his eyes close as Quatre continued to work his fingers through Trowa's hair. "I'll work on it, mladshiy brat ." "Duo quit Preventers," Heero spoke up. "Mm." So that hadn't been a dream. Duo had been there. So had Une. "He said he would kill anyone who tried to get you to go back," Quatre added. "Wufei said he would help hide the bodies," Heero continued. Trowa snorted a laugh. He could so clearly picture that conversation in his mind's eye that it was a little unnerving. There was a reason Wufei and Duo didn't get put on ops together. Well, there were reasons that went beyond Wufei's complete inability to comprehend ‘undercover'. "I don't get any say in my own life?" Trowa sighed, fully aware that with Quatre still petting him and the pathetic state he was in, hooked up to machines and too weak to even get out of his bed to piss without assistance, that the words sounded petulant. "Of course you do," Quatre's voice was firm. "But you're not making decisions about your life, Trowa, you're trying to make them for your death." That... that was probably true. Trowa hadn't thought about it like that, not in those terms, but Quatre wasn't wrong. Trowa had always known that he was living on borrowed time. For as long as he could remember, he had known death was just a few steps behind him, and he had spent his entire life waiting for it to catch him. "What do you want, Trowa? Is this... is this the life that you want?" Quatre's voice was kind, painfully sincere, and Trowa finally pushed his hands away. "I don't know," he said, because Quatre deserved honesty from him. "You should think about it," Quatre said. "If you're going to go around getting shot, you should at least know why you're doing it." * " Razovyom my beryozu, razovyom my kudryavu! Ai-da, da ai-da, ai-da, da ai-da, razovyom my kudryavu. " It was Duo singing. Trowa recognized it this time. His voice wasn't as deep as the voice from Trowa's memory, and it was richer - rougher, somehow. He opened his eyes and saw Duo looking right at him. "Hey," Trowa said. Duo's lips tipped up into a crooked smile. "Nice to see you too, asshole," Duo said, and it startled a smile out of Trowa. "I love you," Trowa said, the words slipping out entirely of their own volition, and without any conscious thought on his part. Duo's smile froze for a second, his eyes growing wide, and Trowa suddenly and acutely wished he could get out of the hospital bed and run the fuck away. "I know you do," Duo said. He reached out and took Trowa's right hand, lacing their fingers together and squeezing. "I know you do, Trowa. And I love you, Tro. I love you so much it fucking terrifies me." "You're not scared of anything," Trowa scoffed. Duo snorted in blatant disagreement. "I'm not insane, Tro. I'm scared. I'm scared shitless of losing you. I- I can't do that again, Tro. I can't watch you do that again." "I'm not in a hurry to get shot again, either," Trowa sighed. "That's not- that's not what I'm talking about, Trowa." Duo waited until he had Trowa's full attention, his indigo gaze dark, and his mouth a firm, pale line. "You were waiting to die, Trowa. The whole time I was there - fuck, who the fuck knows how long before I got there - you were waiting to die. You gave up, Trowa. You- you were gone , payaso ." "I wasn't gone. I didn't give up. I was doing my job , Duo, and I-" "And just what the fuck was that, huh? What the fuck were you doing on that fucking op? We both- Fuck, everyone knows that op should have been mine, and you shouldn't have been there in the first fucking place. And then when I do get there to save your ass-" "I don't need you to save me," Trowa pulled away from Duo's hand. Duo arched an eyebrow at him, and pointedly looked at Trowa's body stretched out in the hospital bed. "That's not-" Trowa groaned in frustration. He could never find the right words with Duo. "I'm always waiting to die, Duo," he finally admitted. Quatre's words, his face, came back to him. "You're right. I was waiting to die, and hoping I could do something halfway decent before my time was up." Duo was quiet for several minutes, and Trowa was too much of a coward to look at him. "You're so full of shit, Trowa." That got his attention. He looked over at Duo and saw that the other man's jaw was locked, his lips pinched and his eyes dark with fury. "‘Something halfway decent before your time is up'? What the fuck is wrong with you? Do you not remember fighting a fucking war when we were fucking fifteen? And then doing that shit all over again a year later? Do you not remember the last ten fucking years? Tell me what kind of batshit fucking crazy heroics you have to pull off for it to qualify as ‘halfway decent', because from my seat, all you've ever done is put your life on the line acting like a damn hero and saving the world over and over again." "It's not good enough, Duo. I'm not- I'm not good enough." "So now you're insulting me." Trowa frowned in confusion. "What? No, I'm not-" "I told you I'm in love with you, and then you sit there and tell me that you aren't good enough, so what - you take the one fucking thing I love, the one person I love, and shit all over them? That's insulting, Trowa." "You're so fucking impossible," Trowa snapped. "You're damn right I am. Get used to it." Trowa glared. "You quit," he reminded Duo. "I do remember that." Duo's grin was fierce. "Oh no, you remembered that just fine. Which means I've got all the time in the world to sit on my ass and wait for you to come home from your stupid fucking ops. You still want to play soldier? Fine. It's your life, right? You do that, and I'll be there waiting for you to come back to me, and when you don't come back, when you go out and never come back and leave me like fucking everyone else, I'll deal with that, won't I?" "That's not fair." "You know what's not fair, Trowa? What's not fucking fair is watching you try to kill yourself, and then being made to feel like the bad guy because I want you to want to live ." They glared at each other. It could have lasted for seconds or minutes or hours. Trowa had no idea. "What else am I going to do?" he finally asked. " Anything ," Duo's response was immediate. "Trowa, you - we - can do anything. Anything you want. We can go anywhere, we can do whatever the fuck we want." Duo took his hand again. "Just don't give up on me, Trowa. Please." Please . Duo didn't play fair at all. He sighed. "Get me out of here," Trowa begged. "Can you even walk?" Duo looked at him dubiously. "I can sit in a wheelchair." Duo snorted. "You lazy fuck." He leaned over the bed and kissed Trowa, a swift, possessive crush of their lips that left Trowa feeling breathless and lightheaded. "I love you," Duo said the words again, and then stepped away. * For once, Duo drove the speed limit. It should have made Trowa worry, but he was too focused on trying not to panic after the phone call he had just had with Une. He had quit. He had said the words himself. He had walked away - well, was being driven away - from the only order and logic his life had. He was turning his back on the one purpose he had found, the one place where he could exist. Trowa looked over at Duo, at the way the setting sun bathed his profile in golden light. Duo felt his eyes and glanced over, a smile lurking in his eyes and on the corners of his mouth. "I love you," Trowa said it again, and the smile on Duo's face made his chest hurt in a way that wasn't entirely about pain. Duo held his right hand out between them, and Trowa took it with his left. It brought their tattoos together, Duo's lion and Trowa's promise. ‘Til Death . He had always thought that would be sooner rather than later. Had always known it would be too soon. Duo drove past the highway exit to their apartment. "Where are we going?" Duo licked his lips and looked a little uneasy. "Home?" Trowa hooked a thumb over his shoulder, indicating the apartment they were rapidly leaving behind. "That's not home." He hadn't even really needed to hear Duo say the words. Just thinking about it, picturing the rooms with their blackout curtains, the empty walls and the mismatched, serviceable furniture. There was nothing there, except for a few books, a turbine from some pre-colonial ship Duo had salvaged, clothes... Nothing, really, that couldn't be replaced. Nothing that made it home . Trowa squeezed Duo's hand. "Sounds good." Home turned out to be the Peacemillion , docked at the shuttleport two hours away. Trowa hesitated when Duo parked the car on the tarmac. "We don't have to," Duo said. "No," Trowa sighed. "No. This is good." He followed Duo up the service ramp, lowered and nonchalantly guarded by a sailor who blinked and mumbled an awed greeting to Duo, and then stared at Trowa as they walked past. Howard was in his office, feet propped up on his perpetually cluttered desk. His sunglasses were on, his head tilted back at an unnatural angle, and he was snoring. Duo and Trowa exchanged smirks. "Hey, old man!" Howard startled awake, arms momentarily flailing before he pulled himself upright. Even behind the glasses, Trowa could feel the heat of his glare. "Permission to come aboard?" Duo asked with the same cheeky grin he had worn when he told his OZ interrogators to do increasingly anatomically impossible things to themselves. "You fucking punk," Howard sighed. He got to his feet, shoved his sunglasses onto his head, and looked both of them over. "You okay?" Howard asked. Duo nodded. "Gonna be," Duo said after looking over at Trowa. Trowa nodded in agreement to that. "Yeah, well. Good. How long're you two staying this time?" Duo arched an eyebrow at Trowa. "As long as you'll have us," Trowa decided. Howard's lips twitched under his mustache, and he came around the desk. He hugged Duo, and then, to Trowa's complete shock, wrapped his arms around Trowa. "I'm going to hold you to that, son," Howard said, voice gruff with unfamiliar emotion. The words made Trowa's throat constrict, but he managed to nod. "Thank you." Howard released him, and snorted. "Don't thank me until you've eaten a meal here. I swear to fuck, our new chef is trying to fucking poison us. And the mechanics - oh, Trowa, Trowa, you need to see these guys. Please, teach them something, will ya? They're killing me. And that security tech you recommended, Duo? He's a fucking child. A toddler. Barely knows how to wipe his own nose." Howard continued to complain as he led them out of his office and towards the crew quarters. "This okay?" Duo asked, his voice low. Trowa took his hand again. "It's good to be home," Trowa assured him. -o- THE END (except for a very smutty epilogue courtesy of CB - you all are welcome) Translations: "Yeshcho razik, yeshcho da raz! Ey, ukhnem! Ey, ukhnem! Yeshcho razik, yeshcho da raz!" : From a Russian folksong, the Volga Boatmen,
Once
more, once again, still once more Payaso : Spanish for clown. Meant as an insult. mladshiy brat : Russian for ‘little brother' Razovyom my beryozu, razovyom my kudryavu! Ai-da, da ai-da, ai-da, da ai-da, razovyom my kudryavu : From the same Russian folksong, the Volga Boatmen,
Now
we fell the stout birch tree, Note from Clara: Writing this fic has been one of the greatest pleasures of my life. When CB and I first starting talking about this.... wow, almost a year ago now, I was so full of excitement and trepidation because our friendship was still fairly new and because I know what a pain in the ass I am. But you know that feeling when you meet someone and they change your life? You know that feeling when they SAVE your life? That was CB, for me. She's more than a friend, so much more than a writing partner, and I will never be able to accurately express how much she means and how damn lucky I am to have her in my life. This fic is undoubtedly my favorite thing I have ever written, and really that's BECAUSE of CB. Working with her, sharing the writing, sharing the character growth and the creation and getting to see how she works and share how I work - it's been of the best gifts I've ever had. I also wanted to thank everyone who read this fic and took the time to comment on it. CB and I both appreciate so damn much the encouraging words, the flailing, the wonderfully incisive commentary - all of it. Thank you so very, very much. |
