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"Friends "Written By: Karina
Series: Friends Pairings: 2+6 Ratings: M 15+ [In Australia] Rated in the event of bad language and violence. Disclaimer: I don’t own Gundam Wing or the characters. That’s the way it is. Warnings: Not a death fic despite how it starts.
Aussie spelling and unbetaed. Summary: When Milliardo Peacecraft is abducted
and left to die a solitary death Duo Maxwell decides to take a hand
in the proceedings.
Chapter 17 “You will be piloting?” Quatre stared out at the garden, blue eyes softening as he took in the wonderland the blizzard had made of the normally green landscape. The hardy children Sanc bred were out in force, his employees born and bred to the northern climate ignoring the biting cold air and the still falling snow. Those with free time watched their children run riot in the snow. “I will. Chang will work navigation and Heero will co pilot.” “I wish I could go with you.” He was heartily tired of being The Winner. It had been bad enough as the Winner Heir, but being The Winner was more than a mere loadstone around his neck. The weight of responsibility threatened to grind him into the ground, the burden a little heavier with each day. He would give anything to throw dignity aside and run in the snow as the children did. He could build snowmen, have snow ball fights and laugh until his sides ached. Young and carefree. Allah, there were days he so wanted to laugh, and knew to do so would be to dissolve into helpless, hysterical weeping. He hated being the person his father had intended him to be. “Quatre?” Dragging himself back to the moment he forced himself to smile. A shadow of the smile he once had laid claim to. “How long before you depart?” “I will need to leave for the airport in fifteen minutes. We should be airborne within an hour after that.” “Watch yourself. There will still be rogue air currents up there. You can easily be taken unawares; the highlands of Sanc are notorious for erratic winds.” Commercial air traffic avoided the mountains for that very reason. The runways of the airport were angled to keep their approach lanes as far from the treacherous region as humanly possible, but every few years a near crash would result. Three times in the last thirty years large commercial traffic had come to bloody grief. Trowa knew all this. He knew Trowa knew it, but he had to say something to keep himself under control. He ached to strip the business suit off his back and pull on a flight suit. He wanted to be on the helicopter with his friends, and he wanted to be flying the bird. He was a pilot and a damn fine one too. He could make the flight and his empathic tie to Duo, and awareness of Milliardo Peacecraft, would be enough for him to find them, without the aid of a global positioning unit. There was so much he wanted to do in his life that he could not. A time was coming when he would scream long and loud. He would scream until he was hoarse. Not that it would do him any good. “Quatre?” Trowa was looking at him, concerned for his melancholy. Perhaps wondering if it was a reflection of what he sensed around him, or if it marked an emotion genuinely belonging to him. “I know. You have to go. Duo is okay, I can still feel him. He’s warm and comfortable, but feeling a little depressed. I assume Marquise may be sleeping and no distraction for him.” Trowa scowled, sighing. He was concerned for Duo, Quatre knew that, but Trowa was so strong in many ways, and sometimes he could not understand that even a Gundam Pilot had moments when he was entirely too human. “He should be over the war now.” Quatre could only shake his head in denial. “No. There are no time limits on these things, Trowa. I still have nightmares of the war; of what I did. I still feel the guilt for my father’s death. I…I had not…” No, he would not go there. He had made this mistake for years after the war, blaming himself for every wrong imaginable, and he would not go back to the guilt. He had had enough of blaming himself exclusively for the wrongs in life. What was wrong with the ESUN he could try to fix; he could at least help to improve living conditions for those less fortunate than himself. What he must not do was blame himself for what he saw about him. Injustice. Poverty. Hunger. Blackmail, anger and despair… It was all in the ether, laid open to his empathic ability, and if he weakened it became his fault such things existed. Duo had taught him he was better than that. His psychiatrist had earned her money to get him over that failing. Some days he wondered if he was not the one who was poor. There were more important things in life than money, and they were things money simply could not buy. A person could be rich beyond the dreams of avarice and not have a credit to his name. True wealth, he had discovered, was not material in nature. It was disturbing to him one of those people who cared not a fig for material things, namely Duo Maxwell, was suffering, and it was a pain only Duo himself could cure. Duo had little material wealth, but from the earliest time he had known him Duo had seemed so full of life. He had a zest; a faith in the good things, and he did not worry about mundane things only money could buy. Duo had been so much a part of that other wealth, and had shown him another world entirely. Lately Duo had lost that zest, that spice. His ability to laugh honestly. He could help. For once he could use the material wealth he had in such abundance for his friend. He had convinced Duo, as once Duo had convinced him, to see a psychologist and he paid for Duo to see the very best. Seeing the woman had been a step forward for his friend, but until Duo was ready to let the past go, there was little anyone could do to help him. “I had thought he and Hilde would be closer than they are.” Startled he glanced up at Trowa and shrugged. He had entertained a brief hope for something more to develop between the two, but he had realised quickly Duo was not sexually interested in Hilde. In fact, Quatre had detected little in the way of sexual interest in Duo at all. He was probably bisexual, Quatre suspected from the way he reacted to male and female alike, but those reactions had been little more than flickers of interest. Duo had not found someone who stirred a fire, not just a flicker of flame within him. “Nothing more profound than friends, I am afraid. They fought recently, when Hilde revealed she was hoping for something more from him. Unfortunately Duo could not give her what she wanted.” “Unfortunate.” Trowa determined, then elaborated, surprising Quatre. “That is what he needs to distract him from the past.” Quatre smiled, sliding into the offered embrace and sighing as he rested there. Trowa had wonderfully developed muscles and his arms, strong and sure around him, always made Quatre feel safe. It was stupid really, he was a big bad Gundam Pilot from the war to end all wars, and he loved nothing more than to be cuddled by his boyfriend. When Trowa embraced him everything seemed unimportant. “Yes, I suppose that is what he needs, or will eventually. We all need love, but for Duo… not yet. He is not ready.” None of them could be for Duo what he needed. None of their elite group could fit his needs. Heero was interested in Relena Peacecraft, who now seemed to think playing hard to get would secure him. Surprisingly it seemed to be working, and Quatre derived a great deal of amusement from watching them. Wu Fei also had a heterosexual orientation. He was showing interest in Sally Po, who was interested in his interest. They danced around each other, Sally thinking the four years separating their age too much, making her too old; Wu Fei considering himself too young for such a mature woman, even as he sought her out at every opportunity. One day, and Quatre suspected it might be soon given the tension they were giving off; something would break in their relationship. They would either be at each others throats or locked in the throes of passion, and for his sanity it could not come soon enough for him. On his particularly sensitive days their intense restraint gave him a headache, and he could scream at them to get a life and have sex already. How embarrassing that would be. He might gain a laugh out of the looks on their faces, which might make the embarrassment worthwhile, he mused, but it was of no help with Duo. A strong finger hooked under his chin and turned his head up. He could see beneath the fall of hair into brilliant green eyes, and he basked in the love he saw and sensed there. “Would you like to try with Duo?” His heart clenched with reaction to Trowa’s emotion. A hint of fear he was not enough for Quatre, curiosity as to what it might be like with Duo; fear again; Quatre, who had always been close to Duo after days in the desert, would prefer the other man. The deep well of warmth he equated to Trowa’s love for him; the captivating, bottomless warmth he luxuriated in at every opportunity. “No.” He felt the tension in his lover ease and could not blame Trowa. He also did not wish to chance breaking what they had together. Not even for Duo. There would be another solution; he merely needed to find it. “Sex is a long way from what Duo needs. It is only a quick fix, and quick fixes never last a lifetime. Duo needs friends, Trowa. Real friends, not an interim lover.” For a few brief minutes he could luxuriate in his lover’s arms. Together they watched the children in their games, the lights of the house bathing once green lawns and gardens as the snow fell. The blizzard might be over in New Port City, but in the high mountains the wind still blew, and the snow still fell. “I had better go.” “Bring them back. Bring yourself back safely.” ~ * ~
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