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The Chains We Wear	By : LadyYeinKhan Category: Gundam Wing/AC > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 13123 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing/AC, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 17
- 18
- 19
You can find story updates and other random things at Ahsimwithsake.tumblr.com

A/n: This is by far the fastest chapter that I have ever written, and most likely the suckiest.

I’m still operating underneath deadlines with the help of my friend F. My most recent deadline was June 29, a full three weeks after the first. And in those three weeks, I spent two of them sick with a sinus infection. Have I mentioned its almost impossible for me to function with a sinus infection, mostly because I feel like someone is tap-dancing in stiletto heels behind my eyeballs?

That pained eased up last Sunday, which left me one week in which to write.

This chapter was finished on June 30^th, at 2:00 A.M. I missed my deadline by two hours—so I owe him money—but I still finished! And I wish I could say that it’s better than it is… This is a chapter I’ve wanted to write for a couple of years, and I have the feeling its more than a little forced.

My apologies to any and all Heero fans.

Warnings for this chapter: swearing

Chapter 18

For a criminal, Fahd thought that he had received an unusually high number of visitors in the last two weeks. The Preventers had dominated the first three days, what with Fahd having been holed-up in one of their Spartan but moderately comfortable holding cells. It had long since tapered off to hourly visits from time-to-time. But the headquarters was almost three hours from his new cell, so Fahd understood the sudden drop off.

And then there had been the press. Reporters, some curious, some ravenous, pressing in on all sides of the headquarters, hunkering down for a long siege, waiting to slipping through a hole in security. They had trailed after Fahd after he had been admitted to this high-profile, high-security prison. The weak ones had slipped off during the trek. The stronger lasted a few days outside of the prison before skulking away.

Only the lawyers remained a constant steady stream. The suits and briefcases came early and stayed late, filling most of his waking hours with their endless, irritating droning. So it was with an expected, heavy reluctance that he, once again, followed an officer out of his small, bland cell. Fahd had briefly hoped that his explosion halfway through their daily morning meeting might have at least frightened them off for a day, if only because he did not want to worsen his situation with a few accidental deaths. That, however, appeared not to be the case.

The officer led him, once again, down the bare, beige hall that was still the exact same shade of drab as his prisoner’s uniform. Fahd supposed there would eventually be some sort of effect: long, continuous exposure to such a nondescript but still overbearing color leading to some sort of physical or mental change. A weakening of the self, perhaps, or a gradual increase in the sense of helplessness, hopelessness, or worthlessness. Maybe even the eventual loss of identity.

Fahd felt none of these, but he had only been here for two weeks. If he wasn’t executed early, he was sure he’d eventually feel some of the effects. And if they replaced his constant headache, Fahd might not mind them.

The officer stopped at the end of the hall, just outside the very familiar door of the conference room. Fahd took a deep breath. He needed patience. He needed to stay calm. He needed to not throw chairs at the imbeciles when he saw them because nothing would get done if they cracked their skulls. He did actually need them, because they would do as he asked. Eventually.

The officer opened the door. Fahd stepped into the conference room. He nearly jumped when the door closed too soon behind him.

Fahd was not allowed to open or close doors himself, a demand of prisoners that he found astonishingly easy to abide by. He had, after all, spent most of his childhood and adolescence surrounded by servants and a father who thought opening any door but the bedroom’s was a chore fit for only lesser beings. Besides, opening a door while manacled had to be undoubtedly cumbersome.

But Fahd was also not to be alone outside of his cell, which was a demand he struggled with. There was always a guard somewhere. Usually, there were half a dozen of them. They breathed down his neck as they escorted him and lingered on the periphery as he ate, bathed, and met with irritating lawyers. Fahd was certain that if had they the man power, the prison would assign a guard to watch him while he slept.

Guards intruded on every possible aspect of his life, and one had just shut him into the conference room.

If it hadn’t been 01 standing on the other side of the table, Fahd was quite sure that wouldn’t have happened.

“There is supposed to be a lawyer here,” Fahd said slowly.

Fahd had seen 01 before, mostly through pictures compiled for research and then later extortion. So he was aware that the scowl was 01’s default expression, more or less. It did, however, seem unusually heavy today. 01 was obviously not happy about being sent to visit him, or else he liked the idea of lawyers even less than Fahd.

01 shrugged. “Call them, if you want,” he said, voice surprisingly even with such a glare. “I can wait.”

Fahd knew the protocols and legal ramifications. He knew the field day his lawyers were going to have once they learned that a Preventer had interview/interrogated him without legal representation present. He also knew the substantial stroke they’d have if they learned he had knowingly and willfully waived said representation. Fahd was tempted to, though, and not just because he wanted to stave off irritation for a little while longer. Once a lawyer entered, Fahd was sure that the reason 01 came would change, switch to something mundane like additional statements about his illegal activities. He was sure that right now 01 had a very good, very interesting reason. One that he didn’t particularly like.

Fahd was curious.

“That won’t be necessary.”

01 blinked once. “Are you sure?”

“Quite.”

01, blue eyes narrowed slightly, seemed momentarily tempted to force the issue. Obviously he didn’t exactly trust Fahd not to turn this decision against him. Fahd was considering it but thought it more prudent to wait until the end of the meeting for making his final decision. Finally, 01 nodded.

Fahd moved towards one of the chairs on his side of the heavy metal table. “Have you been named one of the arresting officers, then, Heero Yuy?”

“No.”

“Then it is customary for Preventers to assign unrelated operatives to visitations? I’m impressed. My statement alone must’ve taken you at least an hour to read—”

“I’m not here about your arrest.”

Fahd, frowning slightly, wrapped his bound hands around the back of the chair. He had been so used to seeing 01 in well-worn bottoms and tops that he honestly hadn’t noticed. But he had seen 03 in uniform enough to know that light-washed jeans, a green tank, and a denim jacket were not standard wear for the Preventers. Which meant that 01 was here in a less-than-official capacity.

“I imagine this meeting’s going to be rather short, then, since apart from my own transgressions, there’s not much else I can give the Preventers.”

“There is.”

“You’ve already arrested Reid, and I promise you, there are no other leaks—”

At the word, 01 tightened. His jaw clenched to the point where Fahd could swear he had heard cracking teeth, and if he had had the chair back in his hands, Fahd was sure 01 would have bent it with the sudden pressure of his hands. Fahd felt a small clutching in his stomach and was quite glad there was a large, heavy table standing between them.

“—in the Preventers. None attached to me anyway.”

“He ran.”

“I haven’t seen him since we were arrested. If Reid’s escaped—”

“Trowa ran,” 01 said, the small shift he surrendered the only indication that the fact somehow upset him.

Fahd gripped the back of the chair, because he was angry, of course. He was angry that he had somehow managed to escape. And maybe he was a little surprised, since the Preventers were probably hailing him a hero. Heroes didn’t have to run. Fahd was angry and maybe a little surprised. He certainly wasn’t confused, or even worse concerned, because he simply didn’t care that 03 had run. He didn’t care about the implications.

“When?” he asked.

“When you were arrested. Maybe a couple hours after.”

“That was nearly two weeks ago.

“I’m aware of that.”

Fahd frowned at him for several seconds. “You can’t find him.”

The right side of 01’s mouth twitched.

“Shouldn’t this be easy for you? Isn’t this one of your specialties?”

Now the left side of his body twitched, starting close to the knee where he locked it to stop himself from leaping across the table.   “Trowa was the infiltrator,” 01 growled.

“Are you telling me that you never once, at any point of Operation Meteor and the Eve wars, broke a system? Stole or rerouted data? Inserted yourself into society under a false identity?”

01 gripped the back of the nearest chair. Fahd shifted his stance, ready to duck or dodge, despite knowing 01’s reaction times were much better than his.

“Are you telling me you don’t even know how it’s done?”

“Of course not.”

“Then why didn’t you cut him off? Even if he is better than you, you should’ve been able to do that much at least.”

01 was, quite honestly, the best among the pilots, according to Fahd’s research anyway. He had the largest skill set, managing at least extraordinary in everything from explosives to espionage, from hand-to-hand combat to hacking. He had easily piloted the most mobile suits with lethal efficiency, and had survived the most explosions. And of course, 01 had that impossible control. He could exert such overwhelming, force over himself—his mind, his body, his emotions—that absolutely nothing deterred him from his mission.

Except, apparently, the cross-examination of an incarcerated terrorist. Fahd bit back a frown 01’s legendary iron grip quickly slipped, his standard slightly-irritated scowl degenerating into a barely-restrained sneer of rage at an alarming rate. He should have been worried, concerned that a visible slip on the face was a precursor to others, most likely a right hook judging by the rapid flexing of those fingers. All Fahd felt, though, was a nagging sense of disappointment.

“Obviously, you don’t understand,” 01 said through grit teeth. “How good he is. Give him two days and Trowa can make an identity even governments can’t see through. Give him two weeks and he’ll fade completely into it.”

“Knowing all that, you should have been able to head him off that first weekend.”

“He was planning this. For at least a week. He had to have had most of it in place—”

“You think I know something,” Fahd said.

He didn’t think 01’s scowl could get any darker. Sneering himself, Fahd leaned over the back of the chair, clutching it tightly.

“Has my arrest somehow escaped your attention?”

01 had the decency to look faintly confused, shifting back the barest fraction of a step.

“Or perhaps you are unaware of some of the finer details of my arrest? Like how Trowa Barton was holding my advisor at gunpoint at the time?”

01 managed to unlock his jaw. Fahd snapped before he had a chance to say anything.

“You all think it was some kind of plot? That I have some elaborate scheme to enact from inside a cell? You think I let Barton kill Nizar and run?”

“I don’t—”

“Barton wasn’t never in my pocket. He was in my bed, never my pocket. And even if he was, do you honestly think I put him before Nizar? No one goes before Nizar. I’ll kill him for those four bullets if I ever see him again—”

Fahd heard the sharp snap and thought for a moment that he had been shot. A silencer with a particular caliber bullet could make a sound like that, and adrenaline could hide even sharp, life-threatening pain for up to several minutes. But then 01 slipped the cell phone out of his pocket. He mashed his thumb against it three times before tossing it across the table. Fahd barely caught it before it skidded off the end.

“The quality’s shit, but hi-res would have taken a couple of days to go through.”

Fahd scrolled through the short album of grainy security photos. “What is this?”

“Darlian Memorial, a private hospital that opened up about eight months ago. Mostly footed by Relena Peacecraft, in memory of her father. They weren’t happy about the connection but it was the most discrete hospital within fifty miles.”

“How old are these,” Fahd asked as he stared down at the too-damn-fuzzy picture of a man in a hospital bed.

“72 hours. We have older ones. He was admitted last Monday, three days after the shooting. He was in the first surgery within the hour.”

“For what?”

“Shattered kneecaps and a busted hand. Someone tried improvised surgery. The hand was adequate, but they fucked his knees up even worse.”

“Define worse?”

“A young man would need total reconstruction and rehab for at least a year. Considering his age, the surgeons are thinking of cutting some corners.”

“Is he alright?”

“Well enough to threaten surgeons about how far he’ll throw them if they leave him an invalid.”

Fahd held the phone in his hands, thumb scrolling slowly back and forth between pictures of the bed and the hospital hall it was occasionally wheeled down. He had assumed Nizar was dead, that 03 had shot him in the head not even five minutes after Fahd had left. It was the only way Fahd could explain his lawyers’ obsession with finding loopholes and exit strategies, and their totally unwillingness to obey simple instructions. Fahd had wanted Nizar found. Nothing else, especially not his release, mattered until he knew where Nizar, or Nizar’s body, was. And as much as he insisted, as hard as he held onto that small hope that Nizar was alive, he had assumed his lawyers’ complete disregard for his orders had been a sign that they had found a corpse.

He hadn’t thought the idiots hadn’t even found him.

“A phone call could be arranged,” 01 said.

Fahd could already hear the scolding. What part of “I’m not worth this” did Fahd not understand? How many times did he have to tell him? The individual never matters! There are plenty of half-decent idiots to play advisor to him. Pick any of them, just don’t play ball with the Preventers. Don’t give them any opportunities. They’re not like the rest of the government; they will pull him down with whatever leverage Fahd gives them. Don’t play ball with the Preventers. Don't give them that satisfaction.

Fahd heard it all quite clearly in his head, but it lacked the proper strength. Where was the rise and fall of tone? Where was the low, extended hiss of his s’s? Where was the low quaver Nizar always developed when he worked himself into a fury? Fahd’s imagination simply wasn’t good enough for all of that.

He didn’t, however, think he knew enough about 03’s sudden disappearance to warrant getting his hopes up.

“As part of an exchange, I imagine,” Fahd said. He set the phone on the table. “Trowa Barton was never one of mine.”

“I know that.”

Fahd paused as he started pushing the phone across the table. It wasn’t such a surprising statement, but the emphasis made it uncomfortably interesting. “I” had not been noticeably inflected. It had barely raised an octave above the other monotone syllables. But 01 had filled it with a brief and intense bitterness that bordered on hatred. It was astonishing and Fahd found himself wondering after it.

Oh but of course… Half a dozen organizations, including the Preventers, had been vying for honor of his arrest for months. They had launched dozens of operations against him, and the rebellion had foiled every one. And throughout the tumultuous war the law and the rebellion waged underground, Fahd had stood in the public eyed. He had smiled and flattered and pouted enough to make the public adore and pity him, and his hunters despise him.

Of course they weren’t actually going to believe him.

Fahd wondered if Reid had come up with the idea all on his own. He might have heard, if he had been held at the headquarters for even a short time, whispers that 03 had disappeared. He might have thought it would give him an edge. Or the Preventers might have given it to him. They might have connected their own dots and offered up some leniency in exchange for the rat still at large. And Reid, the imbecile that he was, might have pounced on it. He could be quick witted when his ass was on the line.

How many lies did that red-haired waste of skin spin for them, and how many did the idiots swallow?

Enough to yank 01 off the case.

The Preventers had to know about the war. At the very least, they had to be aware that they were living together. And obviously they saw that closeness, that camaraderie, as dangerous. They saw 01 (and 02, maybe even 05) as too close, too susceptible to influence. They didn’t want clean operatives aiding or abetting a rogue agent, or worse joining him.

So they must’ve pulled him off—maybe they even watched him—and put other operatives in charge of the hunt. Operatives who had none of the skills, and none of the background, to counter 03’s skills. They probably hadn’t lasted a full week and left behind an impossible mess.

No wonder 01 was frustrated.

“What exactly are you looking for, Heero Yuy?”

“Information.”

“Such as? Barton didn’t tell me he planned on running after shooting Nizar three times, and he certainly didn’t do any planning at my place.”

01 was silent before his mouth split into a strange sneer.   “You know things. You were extorting him for sex for almost five months. You know plenty.”

Fahd knew 01 was far more in touch with his emotions than people assumed, that he simply held them on a tight leash that was only rarely loosened. Seeing, in the span of a few minutes, irritation, rage and discomfort was unusual but not surprising. Fahd never, however, expected to see such blatant feral possessiveness cross 01’s face. Not even briefly.

“Maybe I do,” Fahd said. “Maybe it’s worthless.”

“At this point, nothing is worthless.”

“Is that so? Then what’s Trowa’s favorite color?”

01’s face was blank for nearly five seconds. “What?”

“What is Trowa’s favorite color?”

“Green,” he answered begrudgingly after a moment.

“Actually it’s burgundy, but green is in the top five. Now does he prefer bright or dark colors?”

“Dark.”

Fahd eased himself into the chair. “I suppose that one was a bit too easy. Who is his favorite composer?”

“Kader.”

“You don’t seem very familiar with the classics, so I’ll give a choice: Bach or Vivaldi?”

“Kader.”

“Although it’s rather obvious.”

“Are you done, Kader?”

“Are you going to answer, Yuy?”

“Vivaldi.”

“You guessed.”

“Is there a point to this?” 01 snarled.

Fahd rested his elbows as comfortably on the table as the manacles allowed. “‘Nothing is worthless,’ right? I’m not stupid, Heero Yuy. Trowa Barton is gone, faded, as you said, into an identity that, for whatever reason, you can’t follow. You can’t take the steps you normally would. You can’t track him down pilot to pilot, so you’re looking for something else. You’re looking for personal touches. You’re looking for the identity that you missed before. The Trowa Barton who’s not a pilot. And you’re assuming that since I managed to keep him under my thumb for five months, I have to know quite a lot about that Trowa Barton. And you’d be right. I made it my business.”

There was a faint, unfamiliar sound. At some point in the game, 01 had gripped the back of a chair, the pressure of his fingers increasing with every sentence. Fahd wondered if it was now slightly bent.

“You’re hoping I know something that’ll narrow down your very long list of places he could’ve run off to. Let’s find out. What’s his favorite food?”

“Spinach wrap,” 01 said, yanking the chair out and sitting down. “With lettuce, tomato, mozzarella, and Portobello mushrooms.”

Fahd arched an eyebrow. Perhaps 01 wasn’t so disappointing after all.

*-----*-----*

The only thing stopping Heero from turning around was the knowledge that he would never find Trowa if he was arrested. And he would be arrested. No less than seven cameras had seen him walk in and out of the high security prison, three of which got more-than-decent shots of his face. Those same three cameras were all on the fast route to Kader’s cell and Heero had neither a hood nor a change of clothes.

Heero could always jam the camera system; dismantle it entirely if he absolutely had to. Remotely, it would take less than an hour. Slipping past the prison’s mediocre watch would be ridiculously easy. He’d enter the cell in under ten minutes.

The problem was that Heero was a mercenary, not an assassin. Fast and efficient, but often rather noisy and messy. Of course, he could be clean. Heero had knives and silencers. He could pinpoint, with adequate accuracy, body parts best suited for a quick and clean kill. Right now, though, Heero wanted it to be messy. He wanted it to be loud. So unless those cells had soundproofing, camera system or no camera system, the entire prison was going to know when Fahd Kader was dead. And then Heero would have to kill the guards.

He didn’t particularly want to kill the guards, but Heero did want to kill Kader. A very slow, noisy, messy kill. And the only thing stopping him was Trowa Barton.

Heero nearly snapped his key in half when he ripped it out of the ignition.

He tossed the mangled key on the dash and sank back into the driver’s seat. He shifted, moving his knees as close to shoulder’s-width apart as the cramped seat allowed. Gripping them, Heero shut his eyes and breathed. Two sharp breaths in, hold the third, toss it out like a curse. Repeat. After twelfth repetition, he could almost get that third breathe to ease past his lips. By the eighteenth, his pulse started to drop.

Heero didn’t like coming home angry. He didn’t like admitting he had lost control, and he liked infecting the house with emotional toxins even less. While Quatre, with his heightened empathy, was the only one to ever suffer physically, he’d be a fool to think it didn’t manipulate everyone. His anger, raw and powerful because of the leash he usually choked it with, always raised Duo’s defenses. It made his lover frighteningly wary, and then combative as it backed him into uncomfortable mental corners. Even Trowa had stiffened in the face of it, bringing his limbs oh-so-slightly closer to protect the core, holding his breath for a barely noticeable second as he decided between fight or flee.

He choked on the breath he was holding.

When he had finished coughing, Heero glanced up at the house. It looked odd in the early evening. Dabs of sunset broke through the overcast cloud that had been clinging for the past week, giving off just enough to make the porch light still unnecessary. Most of the curtains were drawn, however, and no light made the gray fabric warm within. It looked uncomfortably lonely.

Uncomfortable being perfectly acceptable, Heero got out of the car. He locked the door out of habit and walked through the space between his and Quatre’s car. He didn’t try to stop himself from shifting slightly to the left to avoid the kickstand that wasn’t there.

Now even more distracted, Heero opened the door and was unable to stop himself from stumbling back as the smell rolled over him. It took him three seconds to identify, and then he let out a soft sigh of pleasure at the thought of slow-cooked beef and vegetables.

He at least managed to keep his voice mostly even. “Hey.”

There was a clatter from the kitchen. Quatre poked his head around the short divide that separated the small dining from the living room. He stared at the shadowy walls almost curiously before looking at him.

“You’re back.”

Heero nodded as he shut the door. Duo’s head poked out above Quatre’s.

“We thought you’d go back to ‘quarters.”

“Was going to,” he said while shrugging out of his denim coat. “Une told me not to bother.”

Heero was sure the order had less to do with the lack of sleep, the time it took to get back to his desk, and what he could manage in a few hours, and more to do with her not wanting him to break anything—or anyone—by accident. She could be astoundingly perceptive sometimes. And he had only just recently stopped snapping pens when people mentioned Kader’s name in his presence.

Heero caught the look they shared as he hung up his coat. Wanting to put the conversation off as long as possible—or until he could answering without swearing—he voiced some of his surprise. “Something smells good.”

“Pot roast,” Quatre said with a smile, slipping away from the wall to turn on the living room lights. “I thought it be a nice surprise.

Heero let out a low hum.

“And I made lemon chicken for me. God knows I’m not wasting a perfectly good pot roast again.”

In his defense, Heero had felt bad about wasting Quatre’s time, and a delicious pot roast. But a point needed to be proved and stubbornness almost always worked.

“As long as you eat.”

“I was going to eat then, too.”

“You were going to have left overs while Duo and I ate.”

“There’s nothing long with leftovers.”

“There is when you spend five hours making dinner for the rest of the house.”

“Okay, technically it’s two because it spends three hours stewing in its own juices, and I did not. Trowa was going to have leftovers too.”

And as it happened whenever they accidentally mentioned Trowa—which happened a lot more than Heero assumed it should—an awkward silence swept in and crushed the conversation.

Duo salvaged it after only a couple of minutes of shuffling and swallowing. “This one’s got to stew for four hours, it’s so big. So you’re going to have to wait an hour before chowing down.”

“That’s fine,” Heero said slowly.

“I thought,” Quatre started, looking at the lamp switch until he got his usual lilt back. “You’d be longer. I was hoping it’d be a surprise.”

“It’s still a surprise.”

Quatre smiled. Only a bit of it was faked.

“Any particular reason for it,” Heero asked as he headed for the dining room. Quatre shrugged.

“Thought it’d be a nice treat. And I had the time.”

Heero didn’t doubt that. Even with Kader imprisoned, Quatre was still under heavy protection. There were still too many people unaccounted for, people with the means and motives, to let Quatre wander without supervision.

If the situation was different, Heero thought Quatre might actually enjoy the restriction. Witness protection was an excellent excuse for missing work.

Today was actually the first day in two weeks Quatre had remained in the house under the protective order, with Duo as his body guard, of course. Recently, he had been coming with them to the office every day, where he was quickly but comfortably “sequestered” in one of the conferences rooms with “books” and the “occasional project” for “Miss Relena.”

His sources were no help, either. Not even Rashid.

Heero wondered if he missed the domesticity. These two weeks had shattered their long-established routine. There were no quiet meals or chores with mildly teasing. Normalcy, as it was for them, had fallen quickly to the wayside. Quatre spent just as many hours at the Preventers Headquarters as they did. He sat at a computer, at a phone, at a long list of flights, for just as long as Heero did. Heero wondered if the old routine was a way that Quatre could stave off the worst of the anxiety. Or if he somehow thought that going back to it, even for a moment, would somehow fix everything.

It was a very strong, and rather dangerous, temptation.

Still, one good thing might come out of a brief return to a normal routine. “Tell me we’re doing laundry this weekend.”

Duo looked at him, scratching his neck slightly. “I think so. We’re going in tomorrow, but I can be home on Sunday. I think.”

“If you make it an issue, we can all be home Sunday. You can’t exactly leave me alone.”

“Une’ll love that,” Duo snorted.

“She’s going to have to. I need clothes.”

“Really,” Duo smirked. “I could have sworn you were wearing some now.”

“Work clothes. Or else the next time we have to talk to him, you can go in plainclothes.”

Duo frowned slightly. “I thought Une told them you were coming.”

Obviously she had. The warden, a former general named Andrews who still had enough muscle and ferocity underneath the fat and wrinkles to be momentarily formidable, had greeted him at one o’clock exactly. That had not, however, spared him the arrogance and blatant curiosity of the prison’s secretary.

“The secretary obviously didn’t get a good look at the file,” he said.

Quatre, who had at some point made his way back into the kitchen, looked up from the cutting board. “How did it go?”

“She actually asked to see my badge. Although that was slightly more tolerable than when she thought I was some school boy visiting family.”

Duo snorted as he tried not to laugh. Quatre smiled faintly over his shoulder.

“I meant the meeting.”

Heero had opened up the possibility of having this conversation by even mentioning the prison, so he couldn’t do more than shrug stiffly as the irritation prickles. Quatre nodded once before turning away.

He had made three cuts of something before speaking again. “Did you learn anything?”

Oh he had learned plenty, first and foremost that not taking his gun had been both a very good idea. Or a very bad one, depending on how he looked at it. For hate as he might, Kader might have given something to work with. The bastard.

“It’s possible. It’s also possible that Kader’s too much of an asshole to be the least bit helpful. I’ll have to wait and see.”

Duo, mouth opened slightly, shifted away from the table. Quatre actually put his knife down for a moment. Heero swore just about as often as he did, or maybe it was the way he gripped the table, or the rage that colored his voice that surprised him. Heero released the wood and took two quick breaths. Duo shifted a little further.

“Well, it has to help,” Quatre said, voice rising faintly. Breathing wasn’t helping. Heero closed his eyes. “Doesn’t it?”

“Not necessarily,” he said through grit teeth. There was a faint drumming. Heero opened an eye and watched Duo worry his fingers against the back of a chair.

“Then what was the point?”

Heero unwillingly found himself trying to breathe with the fast staccato of Duo’s fingers, his pulse skyrocketing as a result. Heero closed his eyes again.

“What was the point,” Quatre demanded, hearing his own anger in his voice. Quatre was feeding off it, as the empathetic sometimes did. “You said he might know something. You said he had to know something, that Trowa couldn’t just disappear without—”

“Of course he can’t!”

Heero forced his eyes open, Duo’s sudden explosion better than any breathing exercise at shoving his anger back where it belonged. He had been avoiding that word for just this reason, but it might have been prudent to have warned Quatre about it.

Duo leaned over the back of the chair, gripping it hard enough to bruise his palms. “People don’t disappear,” he snarled. “People go places. They run,” His violet eyes, wide with rage, misted over with old and new pain. “They’re kidnapped, they’re hurt, they’re killed.   They show up in a ditch somewhere six months later but they don’t disappear!”

There was a long, ringing silence, interrupted only by Duo’s heavy pants. By the time he managed to take a couple of heavy breathes, shuddering as he gulped down air, Quatre’s face had broken from its pale, startled expression. Quatre shuddered once as he lapped up the excess agony. Then he dropped the knife to the floor and hurried upstairs.

Duo seemed calm enough, but his eyes were still distant, clouded over with the distant misery he tried so very hard to hide. Heero waited until he had blinked some of the violet back into them before frowning.

He knew Duo had a strong “pack” mentality. It was how he operated, how he understood and thrived among people. He knew that, as much as Duo teased and railed and complained, he had always considered Trowa one of “them.” So Heero knew that Trowa’s disappearance—and there was no better word for it—had hurt Duo deeply. Because Duo knew, better than any of them, what people meant when they murmured, or simpered, that someone had “disappeared.”

“Duo,” he said quietly.

Duo looked at him for a full minute without actually seeing him. He blinked, a single tear dripped down his face, and then he seemed to come back. Wiping his cheek against his sleeve, he looked around. Momentarily confused by Quatre’s sudden disappearance, he finally noticed the knife on the kitchen floor.

He stared at it before swearing. “Shit.”

“He’s upstairs.”

Duo tripped in his haste, catching himself on the bottom stair before bounding up them. Halfway to the second floor, he leapt back down. He ran to Heero, stopping just shy of his feet.

And then, with a grace and slowness that still surprised him occasionally, Duo held him. He wrapped his arms tightly about his waist and shoulders, pulling him flush against his chest. His fingers ran slowly up the side of his neck, into his hair, and scratched with a light but constant pressure before nudging ever so gently. Heero leaned with the pressure until his head rested lightly against his, Duo’s pulse beating softly against his temple.

Heero basked in the affection for a moment before stepping carefully out of the embrace. Duo’s arms slipped to his sides, his lips quirking lightly in satisfaction. He caught Heero’s fingers. Heero returned the small squeeze before going to the kitchen, Duo’s footsteps fading behind him.

He still wasn’t sure, as he picked up the knife and replaced it on the cutting board, why Duo insisted on such displays, although he did appreciate them. Heero wasn’t jealous. There was no fury at lost affection or hidden anxieties about being replaced. In many ways, he was quite glad for Duo and Quatre’s relationship, especially since it spared him from trying to fulfill certain needs. Quatre could stand the constant energy, the constant need for physical and verbal contact. In fact, he seemed to thrive on it. Heero, however, needed silence and stillness at least on occasion. He needed to indulge in the physical presence silently, and without the constant petting or need to be petted.

He had hoped— Well, he had hoped.

But he wasn’t jealous, and he didn’t need a physical reminder of the permanency of their relationship every time Duo went off with Quatre, for physical or emotional reasons. Even if he did, Heero would only have himself to blame. After all, Duo hadn’t been the one to moan Trowa’s name as he climaxed.

It hadn’t been one of Heero’s greatest moments.

Duo, thankfully, took the indiscretion rather well. Better, actually, once he was sure that the name came from a sexual fantasy and not the memory of a previous rendezvous. That, of course, did nothing for Heero’s embarrassment, or the momentary burst of fear that he had made some irreparable error that was going to end their very tentative relationship once and for all.

But Duo, who could barely be trusted to know the red wires from the green ones, was extraordinarily good with people and even better with relationships, having been in several, of a multitude of intimacies and connections, himself. Fantasizing was perfectly normal. People did all the time, even with the one they loved. Most of them, however, were at least pretty good at keeping enough of their consciousness on the act at hand to stop embarrassing little outbursts. It was a skill that Heero could learn apparently. And learn it he did.

That didn’t stop the fantasies.

Heero had thought the exercise of mental control would at the very least color them, eventually making them less likely to appear because of simple negative association. It was irritating to have to think so hard during sex. But it didn’t. Heero learned not to call the wrong name in the middle, or usually the end, of sex, but Trowa somehow still managed to intrude on occasion. Worse, he started flitting into his thoughts when he wasn’t with Duo.

That had been concerning, since most of Heero’s private thoughts at the time always centered on Duo. Trowa had only been so prominent in the beginning, tapering off as the relationship budded and blossomed. Heero assumed that the move was to blame. Trowa’s closer proximity—much closer, he slept in the room beneath him—was unduly influencing him, reminding him what had originally been a physical phenomenon based on need and aesthetics. He simply hadn’t known Duo well when the need for release had first gotten to be too much. He had known Trowa. He had watched him every day for a month as he moved about the trailer, trained outside in a bizarrely enticing manner, ate little but gracefully, and changed Heero’s bandages with surprising care.

And Trowa was astoundingly beautiful.

Beautiful or not, however, Trowa was distracting and now becoming a serious problem. Of course, Heero couldn’t ask Trowa to leave just because he couldn’t control his own imagination. In the first place, it would have been unfair. In the second, it would have been horribly embarrassing. So Heero did what he always did, what he was good at: mastered himself.

And when that had failed, he did the other thing that he was good at: research.

And it was there, in the myriad of idiocy that was the internet, that he found a curious answer buried underneath the pornography and zealous declarations that he was destined to burn for all eternity (which made no sense because if Hell was underground, where there was less air, then there was no way for a fire to maintain enough oxygen to burn for an hour, let alone eternally).

Heero would never say he was an expert on relationships, but he would admit that he knew even less than he thought if there existed a state of emotional existence outside of one-to-one human connection. And polyamory seemed just as complicated as monogamy. Unfortunately.

He quickly stopped trying to understand the minutia—closed versus opened, triads and quads and V’s, the household, the harem, unicorn hunters and cowgirls—and focused on the simple fact that some people had relationships with more than one person, and as long as everyone knew, it was acceptable.

As long as Duo knew—and preferably agreed—it was okay. Because Heero had long since realized, in the hours he spent at his computer scrolling through essays and forums that were occasionally excellent but usually mind-numbing, that Trowa was much more than sexual fantasy and much less than a usurper. That for all the times he dwelled on the vividness of the man in his imagination, he still enjoyed and yearned and needed Duo. Duo still gave him stability and comfort that he could get nowhere else. That he wanted from no one else. The things Duo gave to him were only his to give, and the things Heero wished from Trowa were only his.

It had been comforting, and frightening, revelation, because now he had to tell Duo.

And tell him he did, in the only way he knew how: a concise report that separated him from his emotions as far as humanly possible.

Duo, who had been familiar with the term for years, had actually laughed.

And then they talked. Or rather Duo talked, incessantly, and Heero absorbed, occasionally making a comment when he had enough information for one and then waiting for feedback. The conversation lasted fir weeks, with plenty of day-long pauses as Heero tried to organize his thoughts into enough coherency to explain his feelings. Because Duo insisted that that was necessary, that nothing could go forward if Heero wasn’t totally honest with him and with himself.

When Heero was totally honest with himself, he loved Duo. He loved Duo to the point where he would do very stupid, unnecessary things to either protect him or make him happy. When he was totally honest with himself, he liked Quatre. He liked him enough to enjoy the closeness Duo and Quatre shared, and enjoy intimacy with him because occasionally he needed the physical connection as much as they did. And when he was totally honest with himself, he wanted Trowa. When he was totally honest with himself, he found Trowa far more intriguing but not less desired. When he was totally honest with himself, Heero wanted to him in a way that was different but equal to Quatre’s friendship and Duo’s love. He still wanted him.

Trowa was gone.

There were no footsteps on the stairs. No creaking floorboards. They had to be in one of the rooms, most likely Quatre’s as that was where he usually went when his empathy was out of control. They’d probably be a while.

Heero checked to make sure everything that could boil over or burn was either on low or off before heading for Trowa’s bedroom.

He hadn’t gone in since the night Une had called, when he had searched it for tell-tale signs that Trowa had fled. He suspected, though, that Quatre came in regularly, and that Duo had at least twice. They touched nothing, however, as if Trowa’s absence was temporary and he would notice the minutest change upon his return.

Or as if they had stumbled into the room of a dead man.

Heero, however, sat down on the edge of the bed after shutting the door.

He had never spent much time in Trowa’s room, knowing how much the other had valued his privacy. But now as he sat on the red—the burgundy—comforter, he noticed the small touches Kader had already known. He saw the carpentry and horticulture books that took up an entire bookshelf, and the nature albums that took up half of the one beneath it. He saw the armchair in the corner with its stiff cushion and the squished, flattened pillows piled up in the corner of the deep window sill. He saw the piles of music sheets, folded and creased at the corners but otherwise in perfect order.

Heero rose and went to the music-covered desk. On top of a small pile of Vivaldi’s “Winter” adapted for flute was a wooden case. Heero picked it up and felt its smooth, honey-colored surface before opening it carefully. Trowa’s flute lay on a thin bed of red satin inside of it.

The black plastic case with the felt lining was in the desk.

Heero closed and set it down carefully. He left the room, closing the door behind him. In the living room, he dug his laptop out of its bag and sat down on the couch. He had limited time before Duo and Quatre came back down for either dinner or breakfast and a long list of coastal towns to research.

And a warrant to write.

A/n: I’m sorry. Did I fail to mention that I am something of a die-hard 01x03 fan, or that I’m poly-friendly? Oops.

No, this is not an indication that this story is ending 01x03. It can’t since Heero is poly and that would be mean to Duo. This story is ending… God I still have to think about that.

I’ve wanted to write Heero for years. I find his character fascinating, and of course I probably screwed it up. I should not be allowed to explore the inner workings of interesting people’s minds.

As always, please read and review. That email notification really makes my day.

I remain, as always, your humble story teller.

~*~LadyYeinKhan~*~

You can find story updates and other things at ahsimwithsake.tumblr.com
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The Chains We Wear