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"Going the Distance"Written By: Clara Barton 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: Angst, language, violence, sex, AU Pairings: 1x2x3 Summary: Duo Maxwell has just signed on to join Team Gundam Wing, an upstart League of Legends team looking to win the World Championships. Duo Maxwell, the first openly gay professional gamer. Duo Maxwell, the guy hated by almost all of Reddit. Duo Maxwell, the guy whose own brother hates him. Duo Maxwell, the guy who really just wants to find a team that doesn't hate him. A/N: This fic is an AU that has the boys playing professional League of Legends. I'm going to try my best to not get bogged down too much in game terminology or things like that, but, well, I WILL reference the game and try to explain as much as I can, as I go. I'm also way too lazy to make up "new" teams for the league, so I will be using existing teams and players, with the exceptions of Team Gundam Wing, Zodiac Gaming, and the Valkyries. So… I will be referencing real people and real teams. A/N #2: I tweaked reality a bit. When you spectate
a game in League of Legends it is on a three minute time delay, for
all of the obvious reasons. So, when Duo is watching the game in this
chapter, I've made is "live" and cut out the three minute
delay for… reasons. "Going the Distance" Chapter Eleven "You promised me that I wouldn't have to do any more interviews unless they were game interviews," Duo reminded Relena as she ushered all of the TGW players into the van. She glared at him. It was nine in the morning, and she had already had to struggle with Quatre, dragging him out of bed and shoving him into the shower still in his pajamas and turning the water on cold, successfully waking him and everyone else in the house up when they heard his shrieked "What the fuck?" Wufei, never too thrilled about interviews, had also given her flack, grumbling about the uselessness of it all. Only Trowa and Heero seemed nonchalant, showing up downstairs on time, Gunnar glasses on, team jerseys, jackets and pants immaculate and neutral expressions on their faces. "I know," she agreed. "But this is out of my hands. Your contract with the League states that you - that all of you," she added with a glance towards the scowling Wufei, "will make yourselves available for interviews and promotional spots for the League. It's going to be fine," she continued. "Two hours and then we can head back home and you can spend all day practicing before you start Super Week tomorrow night." "And sleep," Quatre muttered, his eyes closed and his head already resting on Duo's shoulder. Relena rolled her eyes at them and turned back to the front, muttering something to Sally beside her that sounded like "stupid boys." When they arrived at the studio half an hour later, Relena passed out a Red Bull to each of them, and Quatre practically inhaled his. Wufei, with a sneer, handed his can over to Quatre, who drank that as well. "Dude," Duo shook his head and sipped on his own. He didn't drink Red Bull's too often - usually a can of Coke was more than enough sugar and caffeine for him in a day, but it was pretty early and he had had another late night on Solo Queue with NoName3. Relena led them into the studio, but instead of going towards the mainstage or holding rooms, they went in a different direction, towards the small recording studio where the league filmed promos and interviews. They were greeted by a guy in a suit and glasses, who looked about as far from a gamer as you could get. It was clear he was a management type, and as he laid out the plan for the interview - generic questions they should answer, no language, positive attitudes, only a very little bit of bad mouthing other players - it was clear that he was there to make sure this interview didn't turn into a disaster. "So," he finished his directions, "we're just going to get you guys one at a time. All of this will be edited into a two minute spot - so try to keep your answers short and catchy." Wufei rolled his eyes, and Duo could only imagine what he was thinking. "Quatre, you first." Everyone else sat down on the chairs off-camera, but Quatre walked forward to sit on a stool that had been situated beside their team banner, facing the camera. "Okay, tell us what TGW's biggest accomplishment has been this season." Quatre waited for the signal, and then started to speak. "I think Team Gundam Wing started these season with a lot of expectations. A lot of people expected us to fail, and we've proven that we can succeed against our toughest competitors. Our biggest accomplishment this season has been coming together as a team, and proving to ourselves and our fans that we are one of the best teams in North America." He almost sounded cocky, but his sincere smile saved him from sounding like an asshole. "What has been your biggest challenge as the team captain?" Came the next question. Quatre gave a self-deprecating chuckle. "Taking over as the team captain has been a huge challenge. I'm on a team with four other guys who could easily call the shots, but everyone has been really great about communicating and trying to stay on the same page. Probably the biggest challenge for me is trying to balance what I need as a mid laner to win the game with what my team needs from me as a shot caller to win the game." "Last question. What do you think your chances are of making it to the All Star games in Rio?" "I think we have a great chance of making it to the All Star games. Right now we're tied for third place. The Spring Playoffs are two weeks away and I think we have a real chance of taking down TSM, Cloud 9 and Zodiac gaming and claiming that spot in Rio." It was definitely a bold challenge, and as Quatre got off the stool and walked towards them, Duo couldn't help but shake his head. "You know that the other teams are going to throw that back at us, right?" Quatre shrugged. "Like I care. We can take them down. We will take them down. I'm not sitting at home this year - we're going to the All Star game." Duo had seen Quatre determined before, and it always amazed him when Quatre's game face appeared, when he became serious and focused and the shy, goofy guy he lived with disapeared. But this was a new level. "Duo, you next." He stretched and tried not to feel anxious as he sat on the stool. Everything was going to be fine. This was a League interview - they didn't want to stir up shit. "What does it feel like to finally be a pro gamer?" Duo had to grin. "It feels awesome to finally be playing in the highest competitive level. I've been on other teams and I've subbed in a few games before, but being on Team Gundam Wing is the best experience of my life. I'm seriously lucky that this team picked me up." Relena, standing behind the camera, gave him a thumbs up to that response. "Who is your biggest rival?" Duo barely stopped himself from glaring at the camera. "I don't think it's a secret that Team Gundam Wing and Zodiac Gaming are rivals. It helps motivate us to always play our best, knowing that we have someone to beat." It was as neutral an answer as he could give, and both Relena and Quatre nodded in support of it. "What players do you respect the most in League?" "The League has so many good players - everyone has gotten so much better since this game started and the level of competition is fierce. But I think that I have the most respect for guys like Prolly on Complexity. He's been in the pros, out of the pros and back in again. He has crazy good skills and a great attitude. But I also have to say that I respect my own team. These guys are dedicated to getting better. We practice all the time together, and everyone practices on their own. We take this job very seriously." Maybe the answers were boring, but when he was ushered off the stool, at least Duo didn't feel like he had been attacked or committed some horrible faux pas. Wufei was up next, and his interview was just as boring as Duo's. Heero also seemed on their path of bland responses, until he also got the rival question. "Zechs Merquise probably wants me to say that he is my biggest rival," Heero said. "But he's not. I think Sneaky on Cloud 9 is the marksman who presents the greatest challenge to me." Duo had to clap a hand over his mouth to keep from reacting. Damn. Heero had totally called out Zechs, and Duo wondered if the League would use that clip. Trowa was the last one, and he presented the same kind of stock answers - love the team, love the sport, love the fans. "Last question. What is the greatest strength of Team Gundam Wing?" Trowa actually smirked before answering that. "It's obvious Team Gundam Wing's greatest strength is Duo Maxwell. He's a huge asset to the team because of his skill level, but he also pushes us, all of the time. He tries new things and makes all of us have to play that much harder, to practice that much more, just to keep up with him. If he wasn't on our team we'd be at the bottom of the standings. What other Jungler in North America has a Pentakill this season?" "Okay - that's all. You guys are free to go. Thanks for your time!" Duo couldn't help but stare at Trowa stupidly as he got off the stool and walked back to the team. "Great work guys!" Relena congratulated them. "And see, it wasn't too bad at all, was it?" Wufei glared. "It was still a waste of time," he muttered. Relena gave him a long, hard look. "It's for the fans and it's for the sport. It's for our team and it's for your paycheck. None of those things are a waste of time." Wufei glared back at her, but Quatre stepped up and put a hand on his shoulder. "Let's head back to the house and practice. This weekend is going to be intense and I want to make sure we are prepared." It wasn't until they were back at the house and eating lunch that Duo had a chance to confront Trowa about his interview. He, Heero and Trowa sat on the back porch while they ate their sandwiches, and Duo just couldn't let it go. "You didn't have to say that stuff about me," he said. "I'm not the biggest strength of this team. It was nice, but it's not true and-" "Shut up," Heero muttered. Duo looked at him in surprise. "What?" "I said shut up. There are enough people out there who talk trash about you every day. There's no need for you to jump on that bandwagon too. Trowa things you're the biggest strength of this team or he wouldn't have said so. So either you accept that, or are you trying to say you think Trowa is stupid?" "What? No." Duo looked over at Trowa, who was looking at both of them with an amused expression on his face. "You're not stupid. I just don't get why you would say that about me." "Because, like Heero said, I think it's the truth." Trowa shrugged. "I'm allowed to have my opinions and you're allowed to have your own wrong, stupid opinions if you disagree." "I don't like you two when you gang up on me," Duo muttered. Heero laughed, and like every time when he laughed, it made Duo kind of forget what he was doing and he stared for a moment before he caught himself. But not before Trowa saw him and arched an eyebrow. Duo felt himself blush. "Right. I'm going in." He stood up and then paused at the door. "Thanks," he said, over his shoulder to Trowa. "I - it means a lot that you said that stuff about me." -o- On Friday night they got back to the house at eleven and everyone was exhausted. They had played two games that night, one against the Valkyries and another against Curse. Their game against the Valkyries had been tough on Duo, because Hilde had been at the top of her game, but the rest of the team had not been. Duo had heard from Hilde that Dorothy and Sylvia were having problems with each other, and it really showed. Half of the team would go in on fights and the other would hesitate, and it ended up getting them killed. It reminded Duo of the beginning of the season, when Wufei still refused to follow him in, and he hated that Hilde was going through that. Despite the fact that she finished the game with six kills - half of those on Duo himself - the Valkyries lost. It had been easy to shake their hands and tell them good game, but it had been hard not to hug Hilde and tell her he was sorry. She had looked furious, just this side of exploding on her teammates, and Duo hated that he knew exactly what she felt like. The hardest part of the night, however, had been TGW's second game, against Curse. The game had broken three League records - the most Pentakills in one game, with Heero, Quatre and Duo all scoring Pentakills; the best comeback ever - Curse had been down thirty kills and twenty thousand gold before they miraculously and devastatingly came back to win; and the longest game, at ninety-three minutes. It had been exhausting, and heartbreaking and the van ride home had been in silence. This was the fourth game TGW had played against Curse, but only their first loss against them this season and it was crushing. When they got back to the house, Quatre stopped everyone from going to bed right away. "Look, that game with Curse was shit. We had it in the bag and we got cocky and we threw it away and we will not do that again. We aren't going to spend hours tomorrow talking through it and figuring out where we went wrong. We all know where we went wrong. And we're not going to do it ever again." He looked at each of them in turn, his blue eyes fierce. "So don't think about it. We did it, we failed, we're moving on. Tomorrow we play Team Solo Mid and ZG and those games are going to be the hardest games we've played all season. But we are still tied for third after tonight - we can still win the playoffs and we can still go to the All Star games and this game against Curse doesn't matter." Duo had to agree with Quatre's mindset. The game had been... a clusterfuck. Nothing much could be gained by looking back on it, and while he knew he would fall asleep tonight replaying every mistake in his head, he was relieved that he wouldn't have to sit through one of Sally's brutal team meetings of "this is how you fucked us up big time." "Now, get some sleep. Relax. Our first game is tomorrow at noon. And it's going to feel really, really good when we win." Quatre and Wufei headed off to bed, as did Sally and Relena, but even though Duo was exhausted, he didn't want to try to sleep yet. He needed to play at least one more game, to get that one out of his head. It seemed like Heero and Trowa had the same idea - they were already in the game room when he entered after a detour to the kitchen for a snack. They were already loaded into a game, and Duo almost thought about just sitting down and watching them instead of playing himself, but when he logged on he saw that NoName3 was on. He was about to message him to see if he wanted to play, but it said he was already in a game. Duo had never actually watched NoName3 play on his own before, and he was curious about his play style when he didn't play with Duo. He entered the spectate mode, and as the game loaded in he looked over the other players. Perfect Soldier01 was on NoName's team, playing a marksman, and the game records said that they had entered the game as a duo. Duo stared - what were the odds? His two Reddit fans actually knew each other? In recent weeks, Reddit had been a lot kinder to Duo, but he still received a fair amount of hate, and he still saw NoName333 and PerfectSoldier01 constantly jump into the fray and defend him. NoName3 was playing the top lane as usual - he had started playing Yorick last week and he had been even more devastating than he normally was - and PerfectSoldier01 was playing Twitch. Heero had played Twitch that night, in the game against Curse, and he had played it exceptionally well. Duo was curious to see how PerfectSoldier01 would stack up. NoName3 destroyed his lane, as usual, and PerfectSoldier01 did okay. He was clearly a great player, but his support wasn't the same caliber, and made a few mistakes that set back the marksman in the early game. But by the mid game, when NoName3 made a surprise appearance in the bottom lane, he and PerfectSoldier01 got a triple kill and then moved to the mid lane and aced the enemy team, working together to kill everyone and then, as soon as the enemy team respawned, they kept up the pressure and succeeded in carrying their team to an early twenty-minute Victory when the other team surrendered. Duo had to laugh - he didn't blame the other team for surrendering. Getting killed as soon as you respawn four times in a row was incredibly disheartening. Duo leaned back in his chair to stretch and saw that Heero and Trowa's game had just ended as well. And actually - Duo scooted his chair closer. Holy shit. The post game stats on Trowa's screen showed the exact same stats from the game Duo had just watched. So did Heero's. "What the fuck?" They both turned at the sound of his voice. "You're NoName3?" Duo asked Trowa. Trowa and Heero exchanged a look. "Yes," Trowa said after a moment, admitting to the obvious. Duo stared at him. For months - Duo had been playing with Trowa and he hadn't even known it? "But you don't play Top Lane." "I joined the team to play Support for Heero," Trowa said and shrugged. "And I practice it for ten hours a day." Duo held up his hands. "I'm not calling you out. You're an amazing Support. Like, top two or three in North America easily. I just - holy shit. You're the best Top Laner I've ever played with." Heero looked smug. "I told you," he said to Trowa. Trowa spared him a glare. "Wait." Duo put more of the pieces together. "You're NoName3 and he's PerfectSoldier01." They nodded and Trowa arched an eyebrow in that amused, slightly patronizing way he had. "You guys have been posting stuff about me on Reddit since I joined the team." "Yes," Trowa said, and there was something about his expression... "You said I have a sexy ass." "Yes, I did," Trowa didn't look like he was going to back down from that. "And you said I had a killer smile," Duo turned to Heero. "Yes. I did. You do," he added. "What the fuck? You two are gay?" Heero and Trowa exchanged looks. "Did you not... you walked in on us. You saw us having sex," Trowa pointed out. "Right but - but I thought you two were just... I don't know. Like straight friends who didn't have time for girls and just messed around to ease the tension?" "That only happens in bad porn," Heero muttered. "Wait. So -" "Guys. It's almost one in the morning. Get some rest." Quatre walked into the room, wearing his pajamas and looking a little cranky and Duo realized he had probably raised his voice a few times. "Tomorrow is a big day," Quatre continued when they didn't move. Duo sighed. He was right. And whatever this was - whatever he was finally starting to realize about his teammates - it could wait. -o- They beat Team Solo Mid. Despite the fact that the entire studio shook with the shouted TSM chants of the audience, TGW won. It was incredible, a huge adrenaline rush and the team left the stage smirking and grinning and laughing and the game with Curse last night was completely behind them. "We're top four no matter what happens in our game with ZG," Quatre informed them backstage, as they waited in the holding room. There was one game between their last one and their next. So, while the Valkyries played against Dignitas, they got to wait backstage and try to keep their energy high and the momentum going - and Duo tried his absolute best not to freak out about the fact that they were playing ZG again, and this game would decide whether or not they finished third or fourth. Everyone settled into their normal pre-game routines: Wufei read a philosophy book, Relena communed with Twitter and Reddit, Quatre paced and Heero set up a custom game to keep his fingers warmed up. Duo actually found himself at a loss for what to do - he almost wanted to join Heero in a custom game to keep his fingers and brain busy, but he also wanted to watch Hilde's game. Trowa had two pre-game traditions - napping or watching Heero play, and he seemed just as torn about what to do tonight as Duo was. He slid over on the couch, leaving room for Duo to join him, and Duo sat down beside him to watch Hilde's game. It was hard not to think about last night - about the fact that Trowa and Heero were his secret internet fan club, or about the fact that they seemed to be... attracted to him? Or about the fact that Trowa was, hands down, Duo's dream of a Top Lane player and he wondered how he could play Support every game and listen to Duo and Wufei bitch when he knew he and Duo worked well together. "How long did you know that was my account?" Duo asked him, keeping his eyes on the game display because he had long ago established that looking at Trowa could be very distracting. "I... suspected it was yours after the first few games we played, but I didn't know for sure until last week." "You suspected?" "Your playstyle is pretty unique, Duo. It's not like there are many other Junglers in North America doing Gragas Jungle at our level of play." Duo had to chuckle at that. "Yeah, well... I feel like I do play differently on that account, with you." He did risk a look over at Trowa then, and it was definitely a mistake, because Trowa was looking back at him. "I know," Trowa said. "And you do." Duo sighed. Trowa knew exactly what he wanted to say and couldn't. Duo wanted him. Duo wanted Trowa as his Top Laner, not Wufei. Duo wanted to have that kind of connection, that kind of trust and synergy. "Well, at least we can use Skype when we play together now," Duo muttered. Trowa smirked. "True. It will be nice not to have to read your chat commands all of the time while trying to farm my lane." Duo rolled his eyes. "Listen, dude, if reading is that hard for you to do, we should probably address that in a team practice." Trowa smirked at him. "I feel guilty though," Duo admitted, and he glanced towards Wufei, engrossed in his book. "It's like I'm cheating." Trowa frowned. "I'm not going to start playing Support on that account." "I'm not saying you should. I just... feel like an asshole for wanting to play with you on that account." Duo was distracted from their conversation by the game, when Hilde stole the Dragon from Dignitas and they started to gain a lead. Trowa watched with him. "She's really good," Trowa commented. Duo nodded. "I know. It's got to be killing her to be on a team that has all of this potential but can't get their shit together." "Voice of experience?" Trowa teased. Duo shrugged and gave him a rueful smile. "Maybe." The Valkyries managed to hold onto their lead and they won the game fifteen minutes later. Duo was thrilled for Hilde. The Valkyries would still finish at the bottom of the standings, but they were now only two games behind the seventh place team, and that wasn't a bad position to be in for a first time team, with so many new players. "You ready for this game?" Trowa asked Duo as they stood up and started to gather their gear. "Yeah," Duo sighed. "If by ready you mean terrified." Trowa reached out and put a hand on his arm. "I meant what I said in the interview," Trowa said, his eyes intense. "You are our biggest strength. You belong on this team. On this stage. Don't let anyone take that away from you." Duo swallowed hard and nodded. He didn't really know what to say in response to that, and he was pretty sure it would be way too emotional any way. Heero closed out his game and packed up his mouse and keyboard. He looked over at them. "Ready to do another early game invade like we practiced?" Duo smirked. "I was born ready." ~ * ~ |
