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"Caught in the Crossfire "Written By: Miss Murdered Disclaimer: I don't own the GW characters –
am just borrowing to torment for my amusement Rating: NC 17 Warnings: Swearing, yaoi, violence, hints of long
past NCS Pairings: Primarily 3x2, past/presentish 1x2,
past 3x4 and 1x3 Summary: When Trowa's nephew is threatened by
the ruthless father who abandoned him, Trowa needs help in order to
fight back and protect both Catherine and the little boy. Things get
complicated when both Shinigami and the Perfect Soldier come to his
aid as the three men must discover where they stand with each other
while they work out a way to protect Trowa's family. "Caught in the Crossfire "
Chapter Six The Pact The apartment was quiet and Duo sat with his feet up on the desk by the laptops with security feeds running. He was sure Heero would bitch about his boots being in the same vicinity as the expensive equipment but Heero was on the roof and wasn't in the apartment. "'Ro, status report, over?" "No activity, over." "You want some coffee, over?" "No, over." "Do we have to do the over shit, over?" He got a slight grunt, a thing that indicated Heero found him amusing and that in his own tiny way he appreciated Duo's humour. Not that he would actually laugh at a joke - Heero's laugh was a rare thing and mainly maniacal. "No." "I can swap, you know, you can have the feeds and I'll sit up there with the sniper rifle." The response was terse. "I'm fine, Duo." "Fine, freeze your balls off up there for all I care." That signalled the end of the conversation. They were being cordial. More than that, they were being vaguely friendly towards one another but it was difficult being in close proximity. Too much shit and in this apartment... that just made it a hell of a lot worse. Heero had not said much when they arrived. Looked around to see it was like it had been when he'd left and then ignored the whole emotional issue of this being their apartment. The apartment they'd shared when they were still a couple who worked together and lived together and fucked. It was all a lifetime ago. He just started putting up the surveillance equipment leaving Duo to check the rooms, open windows to let in fresh air and turn on appliances. There was not much to say - this had been their apartment. A few bottles of alcohol in a cupboard that Duo examined - thinking he might need it with spending time around Heero - and that was it. Duo had removed all the identifiers of their life after Heero didn't come back. And he knew he shouldn't have kept the place - drained him financially, not that it mattered being that the killing people business generally paid pretty well, but he shouldn't have held onto this place as it wasn't a home. It was a mausoleum to a fucked up relationship. Empty. Cold. And full of regret. He'd left Heero to his set up - wondered how the hell Heero got all the shit he did. His contacts were better than Duo's - better than Cypher though he wouldn't tell the dude that. He was surprised that Heero wasn't walking around in Kevlar body armour and in full black ops gear. Duo had retraced his steps around Sanc, finding the grocery store and buying essentials and feeling like the chick in the situation but he stopped on the toy aisle and figured that Eli was a kid and kids liked toys. He stopped and saw tiny little mobile suit replicas and action figures of some cartoon characters he didn't know and picked them up. It proved he was still a nice guy somewhere underneath the whole hit man thing. His thoughts were suddenly interrupted when the communicator crackled again. "I'm coming down." "'Kay." Duo knew why he was coming down now - Heero had probably calculated that everyone was asleep and he was maintaining distance not just from him but from everybody in the damn apartment. Trowa didn't even know Heero was here - hell, Catherine and Eli didn't as it seemed that Heero found it easier being on the roof than actually being in an apartment with an ex, a man he'd slept with, a woman who'd thrown knives at him and a kid. For Heero this was his own personal hell - complicated interpersonal relationships. And a child. Duo knew that kids had always been an issue - supposed that was the fun of not having ever been allowed to be one - that Heero just didn't understand miniature human beings and saw them as an alien species. When they'd been together, he'd gently teased and cajoled him into speaking to colleague's children but that was a long time ago. Duo really wasn't sure how he'd react to Eli. Yes, Eli was quiet and had been well behaved and just sat in front of a cartoon but he was still a kid. The door opened, proceeded by a rhythmic knock to confirm to Duo that it was not an enemy - but then, he was sure even if Nabokov scrambled the feeds or hid so damn well in the five minutes it took for Heero to be down the stairs to the third floor they would just burst through the doors so the warning seemed stupid. Old war time paranoia resurfacing. It seemed strange to be thinking in terms of enemies again. Heero entered the apartment, scanned it with methodical precision and then walked to the kitchen without a second glance towards Duo. 'Charming,' Duo thought but figured it was probably better that way. Maintaining distance and all. As the screens had shown nothing more interesting than a drunk chick a few hours ago who had been dropped off in a cab and had issues with both walking in heels and the tight dress she was wearing, Duo got up, for some reason snagged his gun from the desk top, and joined Heero in the kitchen. He leaned against the door for a second before entering. Apartments in Sanc were generally of the European model and the housing was expensive. The kitchen was a separate room, tiny and not somewhere two people could be in comfortably without touching and for a second Duo wondered why'd he'd followed but then as he watched Heero's careful precise movements around the small space, he guess he knew. He figured they needed to talk despite Heero's usual reticence at such things. "There's only shit coffee," he said, closing the door a little and jumping up onto the counter as he'd have done when he was seventeen and this was their place. He'd only bought necessities when he'd gone to the store or things he figured a kid liked. Chocolate cereal. Coffee. Milk. Bread. Cheese. Eggs. Nothing exciting but shit if he knew how long they'd be cooped up in the apartment and he needed to talk to Trowa before they worked out the duration of the stay. He watched Heero move around the confined space, his careful movements as he spooned cheap coffee granules into a mug, recently rinsed to get rid of the dust that had collected, and then poured the boiling water from the kettle. The normality of the moment seemed out of step and weird. The things that Duo had just left, the everyday things, being used again after years of apartment being unattended apart from the cleaning company who checked it monthly. The small space meant that there was little room between them as Heero turned and leaned, holding the coffee cup in his hand, cradled as though to warm him. "You kept this place." "Wondered how long it was gonna take ya to say somethin'." Heero grunted and took a sip of the coffee which would still be too hot and looked around the familiar room. He never bothered with milk in his coffee - took it black. Strange the things Duo remembered. There was nothing left that identified the apartment as their place - the appliances and glasses and plates were all things they'd had to buy as that was required and Duo had left them - thinking maybe, one day, he'd come back for some fucked up reason. But the fridge door had no images on it like Duo had put there when they'd lived in the space - no stupid mobile suit shaped fridge magnets - and the plant that had managed to survive that had lived on the windowsill had been thrown in the trash. Duo wondered if memories of the place assaulted Heero like they did him - painting the walls, lazy Sundays in bed, cooking in the space with some success and regular sex without anger and aggression. "Why?" Duo looked up and realised he'd been a million miles away. Or maybe not, just a million years ago. He refocused his eyes on Heero whose eyes were carefully avoiding his. "Huh?" Heero rolled his eyes impatiently. "Why did you keep this place?" "That's the million dollar question, ain't it?" "You thought we'd..." Heero's voice drifted. Duo figured he wanted to say "get back together" or "settle back down" or hell "become room mates with the added benefit of fucking" but Heero didn't complete his sentence. Took another sip of the coffee and put the mug down on the counter. "Hell no, 'Ro. I figured the day you went and fucked Tro kinda burnt the bridge for normal relationship shit. And our fucking the last few years was getting to the point where one of us was gonna end up dead so, no, this ain't some screwed up love letter to you. We don't exist anymore." "Then why?" "I wanted a property portfolio," Duo said with a shrug and a smirk. They stood in silence but Heero didn't move - Duo expected him to drink the coffee and go back to the roof - he was about to suggest that he should eat but he figured Heero probably had a supply of power bars or other nutritionally balanced but tasteless shit that meant he could maintain his post with minimal trips down to the apartment but then other words slipped out of his mouth. He decided it was just the place. The memoires that clung to the walls despite the fact Duo thought he'd stripped any meaning from the apartment - anything that related to a relationship that ended with them unable to even look each other in the eye. "You ever gonna forgive me for Rio?" "I already forgave you," Heero said, his words slow and deliberate. "I just never could forgive myself." "You forgave me?" Heero nodded, stormy blue eyes meeting Duo's for the first time in what seemed like forever. "I just couldn't look at you after that... see that look in your eyes. It's all I could see." "I didn't blame you." "I wish you had." Duo laughed, the harshness of it startling even himself - too bitter. "Shit. Think we should've talked about this eight fucking years ago." They stayed silent for a few minutes - Duo stared at his boots rather than Heero or the surroundings and tried not to think about Rio. The sound of gunfire and the smell of explosives and the gnawing feeling in the pit of his stomach that meant failure... "You said you'd die if I left you," Heero stated. "Yeah, I remember that," he replied in a beat despite the slight surprise at the words, "what can I say? I was eighteen and drunk... and being a melodramatic ass." "You changed... after." "Easier that way, 'Ro. Just couldn't be him anymore, you know?" Heero picked up the coffee cup, finished drinking it and then walked to the sink to rinse it out, the size of kitchen forcing his body to brush past Duo's legs as he did. It was clear that was the conversation was over and that he would return to the roof where he would be more comfortable - alone and away from anything that was difficult to deal with emotionally. The small task done, the mug left on the drainer, Heero walked past again, that contact still creating some sort of reaction that Duo couldn't deny and this was the most they'd talked about shit that meant anything for years. "You know I still love you," he said both regretting the words and not. Had to be said. Heero stopped on the threshold of the doorway at Duo's words, his shoulders slumped and he didn't turn to look back, only spoke quietly, words barely above a whisper in the silence of the kitchen. "I love you but one day I'd kill you." And Heero left the room, leaving Duo sitting on the counter looking down at the tile feeling like a part of his stomach had just dropped out - it was fucked, them, the situation they were in - everything. Every instinct told him to run - just to walk out of the apartment and remember that he'd spent the last eight years running from this. A life he'd tried to have that was normal and functional - maybe being a hit man was all he could be and he was better just running back to L2 and sitting with Cypher and taking whatever job paid the highest rather than be here. But he'd promised Trowa - promised that he'd help that kid who'd sat in front of some cartoon and quietly hugged a lion toy and he couldn't walk away from that. Not when some asshole wanted to do god knows what to that kid. It made him shiver. He was about to return to his post and the feeds when the silence of the apartment was broken and Duo instinctively reached for the gun in his pocket. He hopped down and positioned himself into a more battle ready stance. It didn't matter that logic told him who was moving about, it was better to be prepared and Trowa walked too damn quiet for a man of that height and build. He'd not spent a lot of time around Trowa but knew he was a sneaky bastard, probably as sneaky as he was, and he walked with eerily silent footfalls. Duo could calculate size and the potential target from people's steps but Trowa walked more gracefully than a man like he should. It was disconcerting. The figure appeared at the open doorway and Duo lowered his weapon, securing it back in his pocket, the safety back on. "You done sleeping?" Duo asked, his voice oddly strained as he tried to sound light-hearted. Duo blinked as his gaze landed fully on Trowa, dressed only in black shorts, hair mussed. He realised he was probably damn staring but Trowa was all muscle, more so than Heero, broader, paler and more defined. A few scars littered his body as they all had - old and new. Old from the wars. New could be from him being in the circus. The whole concept of Trowa being in the circus still made Duo want to chuckle - it just seemed totally weird to know someone who did actually run away with the circus. "I heard," he began and then faltered, seemingly unsure of what to say next. The braided man just nodded. "You heard me and Heero?" "I didn't intend to." Duo shrugged. They hadn't been talking loudly but then Trowa was probably like all of them - learnt to pick up sounds more acutely than was natural, whatever drugs given to them by their respective doctors enhancing some of their senses. Stuff that had never truly worn off despite the years since the war and training. Things that were never unlearned. Natural as breathing to them. "Don't worry, buddy, it's ancient history and all. And I totally never had any problem with you and Heero... you know." He knew he'd usually be cruder and just say fucking but Duo could remember sharing a total of something like five conversations with Trowa and was censoring himself ever so slightly. He'd been doing it all day with the kid around. "I didn't realise he was here." "Yeah, well, he's hiding on the roof as that's easier for him, like, it means he doesn't have to spend time around two men he's slept with and he don't do well with kids." He stopped and gave a lopsided smile that wasn't particularly friendly. "And I thought we need him, you know, if Nabokov is gonna try and kidnap Eli again... I think between the three of us he won't have a chance." He didn't add anything else to that - that both he and Heero would and could kill if Nabokov tried. Duo had no morals about killing some men sent to kidnap a little boy even though he was aware Trowa was struggling with killing those mercs - or more that he'd killed them in front of Eli. Trowa's face was hard to read and Dup looked away, scanning the kitchen, giving him space. He may not have said anything much but the whole way Trowa stood showed that he was uncomfortable about the entire situation and staring at him didn't help. Despite the fact it was ever so distracting when the guy was that built and shirtless. It was bad for his brain to appreciate that considering the conversation he'd just had with Heero so he diverted his attention to the coffee mug on the drainer, the fridge door, something else. "I meant to say thanks," Trowa said, finally. "Hey, Tro, don't worry 'bout it. You asked. I came - I seriously had nothin' better to do. Just be waiting between jobs." There was no point in elaborating about his jobs so he didn't. Trowa probably already knew what he did was illegal - no one has that amount of available cash at their finger tips legitimately. Unless you were Quatre but that was not someone who Duo would mention in front of Trowa. He didn't know enough about how that relationship had ended but he figured it wasn't pretty. "You didn't have to." "Yeah, but I wanted to. Eli's a good kid. He don't need some bullshit dad who didn't want him for the first five fucking years - he needs his mom and you. Not whatever the hell Nabokov wants for him." They stood in silence until Trowa spoke again, his words slow but the intention behind them clear. "I want him dead." Blue eyes met green then and Duo looked straight at his face. There was a grim determination there - that look that all of them had before battle. Remembered it from Peacemillion, the only place he'd truly spent any time around the former Heavyarms pilot and there was that look that they all had in those days - waiting for battle, knowing what they had to do and knowing that they could die but not caring. There was also that spark, that thing that maybe Wufei and Quatre had moved on from - but Duo hadn't. Heero hadn't and despite Trowa's initial feelings towards killing for the first time since the war, it was obvious that he hadn't either. That spark that came from the power of life over death and the fire that came from the fight. "Then we'll work out a way to kill him," Duo said, simply. It felt like a pact in the middle of the night - in a tiny kitchen in Sanc - and Duo knew it would be the start of a bloody and violent road.
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