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The Road to Kindness	By : shinigamiinochi Category: Gundam Wing/AC > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 7934 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
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
- 42
- 43
- 44
The Road to Kindness
Author's Notes: I have returned!! Oh, man, writing a novel was an ordeal, but I got the damned thing written. Now I just have to edit it and plan on how it's going to be published. I was pretty terrified to return to this story, and I really hope it doesn't sound repetitive in some parts. It was hard getting back into the flow of things, but also kind of a relief to come back to my favorite story. Thank you to everyone who still expressed interest in TRTK despite all the time that I was away writing.
　

Chapter 8

Part 11
　

　

St. Peters, for all its faults and ugliness, its darkness and arrogant denial of its own sickness, could be quite beautiful, Heero thought. He was sitting on a bench in the town park and watching the last family; a mother, father, twin girls that couldn't be older than five, a teenaged boy, and a golden retriever, pack up their kites and food and the table cloth they had laid on the ground to eat lunch on, and left by foot, probably living nearby. The day had been warm while not giving in to summer humidity just yet, and the sky had been a clear blue all day long. Heero had been sitting on this park bench for three hours now and the sun was setting in the sky, the low light somehow making things look prettier and more peaceful. The sky had turned into this beautiful orange, red, gold mixture, like fire. It reminded Heero of Duo's hair as, the later it got, the more that orange darkened into a deep red and gold. In all of the time he had been here, Heero hadn't moved from this spot once and no one had approached him. Not that that surprised him.

It had been three days since Duo had gone missing. Three days since he had been kidnapped, and what little doubts he had had that it hadn't been Wes had vanished a long time ago. Heero was sure that, by now, he looked like the sort of person parents and teenaged girls felt an instinctual wariness of, and he was surprised that no one had called the cops concerning the strange, sullen boy with the unkempt hair watching children playing in the park. He hadn't been sleeping or eating lately, and was that so shocking, either? He hadn't eaten or slept well the last time this had happened, when Duo had run away from school after Heero had found out about his deal with Zechs. This was exactly like back then, looking desperately for his best friend, only to turn up with no clues at all.

'It's only been three days,' he thought even as his heart quaked with fear. It hadn't stopped since the moment Trowa had called him in London, 'he was missing for a lot longer that time, but he survived it. Wes should have killed him for running away from him, but Duo survived.'

'Yeah,' a dark, cruel voice chimed in, 'and last time, he chained him to a bed for a week and had strange men rape him over and over and over...'

Heero moaned, an intense pain filling his heart. His back bowed and he gripped his hair so hard that it hurt his scalp greatly, but he was beyond caring about his own pain at this point. He felt like he would throw up with the thought of Wes repeating his past actions, that Duo might be being raped at this exact moment. It had only been three days, but he was already at the end of his rope. He was losing his focus with every second Duo was far away from the safety of their home. He couldn't even consider the possibility that Wes might have killed Duo. He knew that the moment he did, he would lose his sanity. They had looked everywhere. Just like the last time Duo had disappeared, and even Heero's search for the blonde man who had helped him then had been fruitless. But what could he do? Stay at home and sulk, hoping for a miracle? That seemed so pathetically useless, like he was giving up on the one he loved more than anything. That was impossible.

And what miracle was he supposed to hope for? Treize and Une hadn't seen or heard anything more than they had and, according to Treize, nothing extraordinary had happened before, during, or after their meeting. He had told Duo the good news about his grades, and that Williams was the culprit, and then Duo had left in high spirits. Une remembered seeing him leave the school premises with a group of kids. She had never seen him with them before, but she knew that some of them took the public bus every day, so she made the same assumption that the rest of them about Duo taking the bus. It had been hard getting that information from them without letting on that Duo was missing. His mother was keeping the situation very close to the chest, wanting to keep Duo's kidnapping between them, not knowing what would happen if Duo's classmates and teachers found out. Heero didn't care either way. There was nothing Treize and Une could do that they hadn't already tried, so what difference did it make?

The police and his mother's private investigator had both turned out to be useless. Heero hadn't been relying on the police for anything. Duo had always seemed distrustful of authority and Heero was sure that Wes had some, if not a great deal, of power over the local law enforcement. From the start, he had decided that, if the cops didn't contact them, it didn't have to mean that there was nothing to be found, only that they were incompetent or corrupt. But not getting any information from the private investigator had been much more disheartening.

Name had kept Heero, Trowa, and Quatre in the loop concerning her contact. After she had initially called him, he had been feeding her constant information about his search for Duo, including what he had learned about Wes from rumors and people who had met the man and were willing to talk for a price. Not surprisingly, there hadn't been many people willing to tell anything about the crime lord. The investigator had learned that Wes Maxwell was more urban legend, more ghost story, than he was a man. But unlike other urban legends, the things that prostitutes, addicts, pushers, and others had said about him had ended up to be true. The man known as Wes (the investigator had never gotten any confirmation that this was his real name or just an alias) had shown up in St. Peters about ten to twelve years ago (the accounts varied on this, but they all agreed that he hadn't been here for more than twenty years), with some unreliable, scattered reports of people who had heard from a friend of a friend's 'insert relative here' that they had heard of, or personally seen him, in some other state further north. The state always changed from story to story, so the PI had easily discarded these stories.

In just the first two years that Wes had shown up, he had created contacts with the most seasoned and powerful players in the sex, gun, and gun trades, and pretty much any other organized, illicit activity there was an avenue for. Even back when his organization had held only a handful of people, he had pretty much single handedly taken out three prominent and especially violent and powerful gangs. He had taken out the leaders of two of them, disbanding and absorbing whatever members wished to join him and had something to contribute. Those that refused to join, or, something that none of the other gang leaders had done, were useless to him, he had slaughtered. The third gang, however, had also been the first he had dealt with, and every single person who had informed the investigator of this had expressed equal shock and confusion to his actions.

This particular gang had plagued the area for a shorter amount of time than the others, but had gained a greater control, and a greater amount of fear than the others. The gang had been insidious, gaining more and more members through acts of terror, forcing unwilling individuals into the gang with murder and blackmail. Members would tell homeless kids and teenagers that they would be well taken care of, only to turn them into druggies and whores, or thugs akin to nothing more than pawns. There had been some... talented people in that gang and, according to the PI's contacts, any sane man trying to create his own organization, would have jumped at the chance to at least pull in the higher ups. Wes, on the other hand, had killed every last member of the gang, sending a clear message to the other gangs in the area. He was new, but he was not to be fucked with. Sufficient to say, most of those that he had offered to give a job to in his organization had dropped their loyalty to their original gangs immediately.

After that, the word had spread very quickly on the street that anyone or group that the blonde had his eyes on had better start watching their shadows very carefully. He had had a few competitors in the years he had been in this area, mafia or drug lords that had been situated in the town for several decades, or newcomers that were too stubborn or stupid to get out of his way and had been decimated, but no one had left a single dent in his ranks and probably never would have. Street kids, prostitutes, and pimps regarded him with equal fear, and hearing all those accounts and knowing that Duo had lived with such a man, had grown up with and raised, had horrified Heero. He had understood Duo's terror of the man long before he had learned of how infamous his cruelty was, but to that extent...

Beyond rumors of Wes' illegal actions, the private investigator had had little useful information for them. The last report he had given Heero's mother had been hopeful. Although some of his more promising contacts had dried up, he had managed to spot Wes personally and had started to tail him yesterday. Then, when it had come time for him to contact Name again, there had been nothing. His mother was hoping that this just meant that he was on Wes' trail, biding his time until he figured out where the sociopath was hiding Duo, but Heero wasn't so optimistic. He was absolutely sure that Wes, like a male crocodile that sensed another in his territory, had found out about both the investigator and those contacts that had 'disappeared'. He knew that they wouldn't be hearing of the private investigator again. His body would turn up in a river or dumpster, if it turned up at all.

Heero let go of his hair and realized that his hands were shaking. He clenched them into fists, but could still feel them quivering. He didn't know what to do. That was all he wanted. Someone to tell him what he should be doing right now. Anything at all was better than this... this thing inside of him, this horrible feeling eating away at his insides. He hated being home. With Duo gone, it felt so hollow, so cold and lifeless. Every second he was in that place, he felt like his skin was itching, his very being knowing that something so very vital was missing from his life. Food tasted like dirt and sewage in his mouth. He would shovel in what he could, to keep his strength up and to keep his mother from lecturing him, but only if she was there to watch him eat. Otherwise, he just couldn't force himself to. His stomach hurt constantly, this heavy, throbbing, hot feeling. It wasn't just a feeling of stress, it was an actual, physical pain. He would spend several hours, laying on his bed, curled into a ball with his arms wrapped around his stomach.

Sleep was useless except for when he was so tired, his body was ready to shut down. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Duo as he had seen him before he had left for London, smiling and healthy and safe, and felt an intense guilt. When he did sleep, he had the worst sort of nightmares. Awful things full of monsters and blood and the sound of a child crying, dreams he couldn't quite remember when he woke up, but still made him feel sick. He knew that he was killing himself, depriving himself of the things that his body needed to keep going, but he couldn't help it. He felt like he was being ripped apart. Every time he went out to look for Duo, he had to force himself to come back home, knowing that if he stayed out too late, his mother and friends would just come looking for him, worried for his well being. It made him resent them, even though the more rational part of himself knew that that wasn't fair of him.

He was incredibly grateful that school vacation had started. To sit there for most of the day, listening to his teachers drone on and his classmates talk about pointless things like fashion and sports and celebrities like chittering monkeys would have driven him insane. Heero felt like he had before he had met Duo, wanting to cause some destruction and feeling bitter, argumentative, and angry at everything. But he fought against those bad habits, not wanting to go back to that dark and lonely place he had been in before he had moved here. Mostly, he didn't want to disappoint Duo. What would his best friend think when they found him and he learned that Heero had been fighting with his mother and friends just because he was furious and hated himself for this situation? He clung to that thought desperately.

He should be out on the streets right now looking for the red eyed man, Heero realized, but a dark thought had come to him last night when he had been tossing and turning restlessly. What if Duo had escaped from Wes like he had last time? And, just like before, he was hurt or suffering from one of those awful panic attacks he had sometimes? While escaping from Wes seemed like a wonderful thought, he remembered how Duo had been when Wes had assaulted him outside his job. They had all been there for him, and Wes had gotten away with only shooting the violet-eyed boy in the shoulder, but Duo had been a wreck, barely able to form coherent, intelligent thought without them leading him. How had he reacted when Wes had kidnapped him? They had gotten lucky last time. Duo had been on the verge of death the last time he had escaped from the bastard, his spleen ruptured and bleeding internally. Heero still had no clue how his friend had found the strength and clarity to go to his house and hide there, somehow understanding that he would be safe there. IT still amazed him. Duo even admitted that that was a whole blur to him and he couldn't remember how he had gotten there, either.

What if the past was doomed to repeat itself, but worse? What if Duo was hurt bad and having a panic attack, but was lost, with no idea where he was and how to get home? They were all so busy trying to find Wes, assuming that Duo was with him, but what if Duo was holed up somewhere, somewhere he thought was safe, waiting for them to rescue him? Heero realized he was crying and succumbed to it, too tired and heart broken to find the strength to deny himself the tears. What if he was still failing the boy he loved?

He had spent this entire day going to all the places duo might go to hide; the condemned apartments Trowa had found him at that time he had run away, the school, the public library. He had finally come to the park, remembering Duo telling him that, aside from t he library, it was favorite place in town to just relax and be himself. When he had been upset, he had taken bread or crackers Wes wasn't eating and fed the birds and squirrels. This was also the place he had met with his cats when he had thought that Name wouldn't let him keep them at the house. But he had failed again. Duo wasn't here.

"Heero?"

The blue-eyed boy turned quickly, looking behind him and saw his mother there, approaching the bench. He hadn't even heard her walking on the cement of the pathway in her heels, too absorbed in his turbulent thoughts. She had just come from work and was dressed nicely so it had probably been something important, not that Heero could remember if she had told him. Her startled, hurt expression destroyed the facade of a cool, composed CEO as she looked at her son, whose appearance was completely opposite of hers, dressed in a pair of old, torn jeans and the same shirt he had worn yesterday (he needed to do his laundry and hadn't been able to muster up the ability to care that he was wearing dirty clothes), his hair more mussed than it usually was, dark circles under his eyes and tears falling down his cheeks. He wiped at them, but the gesture was useless as more just spilled down.

"Mom?" he whispered as though he was so far gone that he couldn't be sure if he was awake or trapped in a dream, "How did you know I was here?"

"I told you I was going to the police station after work today," she reminded him, "I was on my way back when Trowa said he hadn't heard from you. I've been looking for you for the past two hours and was on my way home when I saw your car parked across the street from here."

It took awhile for his mother's words to make any sense at all in his head, and then another full minute for him to bring the conversation this morning to mind. He was operating on too little sleep, his thoughts faint and strange, bordering on nonsensical. He blushed a little as he remembered that his mother had told him that she was going to be in a meeting today, but after that, she was going to go to the police to see how they were progressing. He knew that she was not only losing her patience with them, but actually getting angry (a very rare thing for her) and had no doubt that quite a few threats and accusations had flung their way this afternoon. He had also forgotten where he had parked his car. What was wrong with him? Why was all of this so difficult, the very smallest of tasks? Just because he was sleep deprived, or because he was stressed about Duo? Name stood in front of him, her expression wavering back and forth between anger and worry.

"Heero, Trowa and I have been trying to reach you for hours, but you have your phone off!" she scolded, "Do you have any idea how terrified was?!"

"Terrified?" he murmured, not getting why him turning off his phone would terrify her.

"Yes," she knelt down and grabbed his hands, forcing him to look her in the eye, "When I couldn't reach you, I thought the worst, that you had found Duo, and Wes had kidnapped and hurt you as well, like in Boston," her voice hitched, "losing the both of you... I can't go through that again. You have to keep your phone on and let us know where you are!"

"I left it in the car," he murmured, "It must have run out of power."

He had meant to charge it last night, but had forgotten, which was so fucking stupid of him! What if Duo had tried to call him? Heero started to panic when he remembered that Duo had the house phone number memorized and would try that before his cell phone, if he had the time to make two phone calls. His thoughts were distracted as his mother brushed his cheek with her knuckles, swiping away one tear trail.

"Heero... what are you doing here?" she murmured and that familiar tone of his mother, worried about him and loving him, nearly broke him for a moment.

"I thought... I thought he might be here," Heero said a rough, raw tone, "Duo came here to look for his cats, and he found them, one by one. I had hoped... that... if I came here looking for him, I would find him, too."

Heero realized his own stupidity then. He had stayed here, on this bench, for three whole hours after he had walked through the entire park, looking for some sort of clue or sign that Duo might have been here. And of course there hadn't been any. Because Duo hadn't escaped from Wes. Somehow... all along... he had known that. There was this feeling, deep in his gut, this fear, this sort of understanding and sixth sense that everything was wrong, deeply wrong. He should have combed the park, then continued on, go through his rounds of looking the streets and asking questions about Duo, Wes, and the red eyed man until he either found one of them or it was his curfew to head back to the house. Instead, he had stayed here, wasting valuable time watching people come and go, like he was a statue.

He had stubbornly clung to the hope that Duo, like any stray cat, would eventually come back to him. He had felt frozen with helplessness and fear, his heart like a shard of ice so thick, no warmth could thaw it. His mother's dark brown eyes brightened with her own tears, both from her son's very visible pain, and her own longing and sorrow to see the other boy she loved home where he belonged, but also feeling powerless, something that she was not accustomed to at all. She wrapped her arms around her son and half held, half clung to him. She usually had steel-like composure, but she forgot that they were in a public place, even if no one was near them now, and cried silently against his strong shoulder.

For a brief moment, she realized just how much like his father Heero was becoming. It was a wonderful, terrifying thought. There was a part of her that loved the idea that Heero would be like his father, would grow up with his confidence and kindness and strength. But there was another part that hated the knowledge that he was quickly approaching adulthood, and for all her power and wealth, this was one thing she had no control over. Heero would grow into his own person and she understood what not many parents did, that she had no say, no authority over who that person would ultimately be. She could hope to push him in the right direction, but she didn't want to be the sort of mother that set out to try to change her son, instead of just letting go of the reins, letting him become the adult that he was going to become either way. But seeing those little things that reminded her so much of her husband; the wideness of his shoulders, the softness in his blue eyes when he was with Duo and the hardness in them, the protectiveness when his best friend was hurt, either emotionally or physically, made her heart hurt sometimes. She couldn't tell if it was twinges of loneliness, how much she missed her husband, or empty nest syndrome, seeing that, eventually, Heero would go off to do his own thing.

"I'm scared... all the time for him, Mom," the Japanese boy said in a tight, almost childish tone of desperation and heartache, "It's all I can think about... what Wes is doing to him right now... how he might be hurting or crying when we should have saved him by now... I should have saved him... but all I can do is sit here and think that I've failed him again! I feel... paralyzed... terrified... I don't know what to do! And I keep thinking 'what if we don't find him? What will I do if Duo never comes back home?"

Name stiffened, hearing the same fear that she had felt every minute since Trowa's terrible phone call from her son. She grabbed at his shoulders, not caring about how her face looked, wet with tears that she so seldom shed.

"Sweetheart, I want you to listen to me," her eyes looked like there was some kind of fire burning in them, her tone passionate and determined, "I will find him. No matter how long it takes, no matter what I have to do... I will bring Duo back home and I will make sure that Wes can never harm him again."

Heero didn't need to see her expression, he could hear it in her voice, this change in her. He knew that she had always hesitated in deciding how to deal with Wes. She had always been torn between wanting to keep her ideals, both for herself and to prove to Duo, not only that she understood his hesitance towards violence and didn't think less of him for it, that she could be the kind of parent he needed and, they both believed, had always wanted. Someone strong, someone who didn't need to resort to the same kind of terrorism and insidious methods that Wes used to get his way, just for Duo to have some piece of mind and safety. Heero knew that Duo couldn't stand that. It was the reason why he had reacted so strongly to Wufei's guilt over not killing Wes before. As much as he hated Wes, and as much as he was scared of him, Duo didn't want to be pushed into corner where, his only choices were to kill his former abuser, or continue to be abused by him. He had always hoped to be better than that and Heero knew that his mother hated the thought that she might, one day, have to hypocritically let Duo down when what he really needed, what Duo really needed, was justice, not vengeance.

But that day had come. They had hesitated, all of them, when they should have struck. They had all been worried about trying to help Duo heal after everything Wes had done to him, about giving him confidence and trying to do the right thing, they had forgotten that you could only heal after a wound had been made. But Wes hadn't been finished with hurting their friend, not at all. They should have been more concerned with making sure he was safe, taking the threat out before the strike. But was that fair? Had it really been an either or situation? Duo's safety or his emotional state?

Trowa had let him risk himself so he could feel more confident about himself, so, in the long run, he wouldn't be in the high state of terror he had been lately. He had hated his long time friend for that decision, but had he been wrong? Duo had been kidnapped, but if that hadn't had happened, would he be viewing it as a such a terrible choice? He wished that he had killed Wes back then, in the woods, that he had been the one that had gotten the gun and pointed it at Wes' head. He was sure that Wufei had thought that he would be able to pull the trigger, was sure that many people would say that, in a situation like that, they would do what needed to be done, and most of them wouldn't be able to. But he would have been. He knew that, down in his very core.

Wufei hadn't had to listen to the countless stories of abuse, hadn't had to hold his best friend while he cried like a little child in his lap about being raped so brutally, he had been unable to stand for days, or all the verbal abuse that had made him actually believe that he was worse than scum or trash, or the horrible mind games that had made Duo doubt such simple things like human kindness and decency. After all the pain Wes had put his best friend through, the kindest, brightest, most beautiful person he had ever met, he would have pointed that gun in between those cold, inhuman grey eyes and pulled the trigger in a heartbeat, then none of this would have happened. But what about Duo? What would he have felt because of his actions?

Heero knew him so well after all these months together and he knew that he would not thank him for killing for him. He would be horrified. Half because of his conflicted feelings for the bastard and half because Duo, where so many others had been unable to, saw something better in him, something special. He only would have felt guilty, believing that it was his fault for making Heero a murderer. Still, he knew the conviction in his heart, what he would do to Wes if he was ever face to face with the man again and he had a knife. He would become an animal, a protective wolf, and maybe that was a bad thing, but he had never before felt a rage like he had when he had met Wes in those woods, remembering what he had done to Duo, now and as a child. If the two of them went at it, it would be animal on animal violence.

Duo deserved justice. He deserved to stand up in court, in front of a jury of his peers, and tell them all what Wes had done to him. He deserved to see his abuser behind bars, to regain some faith in humanity and right and wrong. But all Heero wanted to do was tear the rapist to shreds. He saw this same conviction in his mother's eyes and realized that she had finally reached the breaking point. She couldn't rely on her morality, what was right and wrong, when one of her children was in mortal danger. She wanted to, he could see that. She wanted to believe that if she just did the right thing, everything would work out, but she also understood that, far too often, the world did not operate that way. The best of people had to dirty themselves, pervert themselves, for that right thing to happen. It shouldn't be that way, but a rapist of children shouldn't be allowed to walk around in daylight with all that power and money and smugness when one of his victims suffered constantly, just from his memories. That wasn't right, either.

He especially shouldn't be allowed to continue breathing, threatening Duo's life and safety when they had the means to stop him. But did they? For the first time in his life, Heero doubted the power of his family. Could they stop Wes? They had tried to just get Intel on him, and that had failed. What did they have to do to put a stop to this, get a team of assassins? That was a part of Wes that he hadn't considered. He had always seen him as some petty thug, a man who listened to his baser urges and got away with it because the town's police force was corrupt. But he had taken out their investigator. Duo had told him once that Wes was cold and calculating, but he also had a mean streak fifty miles long. When things were just business, he could hire or rely on just about anyone to take out a potential problem for him. Just like with the Yuy empire, such problems even tended to work themselves out, without him giving a single order.

But every once in awhile, a different problem presented itself. A previously reliable drug mule or prostitute or partner would go behind his back and steal his money or drugs or try to take him down. Wes never relied on others in these situations. He seemed to have this twisted moral code. In a business problem, he was that same calculating person, but when one of his own disobeyed him, the monster in him came out to the surface. Heero believed that, if Wes had found out that they had put a tail on him, he would have dealt with it on his own, especially since it was because of Duo and he had a personal hatred for Heero and his family. But his mother's investigator had also been tasked with neutralizing Wes, as easily and quickly as he could even if he had to kill him, which to Heero meant 'trained assassin'. And Wes had taken such a man out in less than 72 hours. Which of course meant that the sociopath had some skills as an assassin all on his own. Just who the hell was Wes Maxwell? Where had he come from?

Heero didn't think that even Duo knew the answers to those questions. Could they really kill a ghost, something that none of them knew very much about? It wasn't that he thought that they couldn't. He was sure that, through trial and error, they would manage to find the right man for the job, someone with more skill and tenacity than Wes, it was just a matter of time and connections. They had the latter, but the former... Heero was scared that, the more people they sent after Wes, the more likely he was going to get skittish and end up being pushed into a corner. When he had heard all those stories about Wes and had seen the coldness of his eyes, he had seen him as a shark. But the more he thought of it, the more he remembered the things that Duo had told him, the more he realized that he had been wrong.

Sharks ate a wide variety of meats, but could also be choosey. They would test their prey with smaller, curious bites, and if they didn't like it, would move on to better food. But Wes wasn't like that. He gave no warning, no testing. He was like a Saltwater crocodile, one of this big, man-eating ones they had shows on television about, that stalked tourist swimming areas in Northern Australia. They would study their prey, even humans, and move like shadows in the water, their every move calculated. They were smart and powerful. They were fast in the water, their strikes like being hit by a truck. Their hides were like armor, they had no natural predators besides people, and when one of them had its jaws around you, there was nothing you could do but hope that it would let you go, or that it had your arm so, when it ripped it off, you might escape with the rest of you.

Most sharks, when cornered, will briefly lash out, then flee, only really concerned with their next meal or mating instead of winning a fight against a human. A large, male crocodile will stand its ground for a much longer time, fiercely territorial and stubborn, as though they know that they had been around longer than people, and would probably be around long after humans went extinct, so sure of their survival. Or perhaps they just hated being attacked that much, so used to being the top predator. If they cornered Wes, one of three things might happen. He would attack them in turn, take Duo and run, or he would kill him, just to spite them, to take away any kind of victory for them. At this point, Heero was more scared of them posing a threat to the man and shoving him into a corner where he thought it would be necessary to strike. But even then, it gave him a dark thrill, seeing the resolve in his mother's eyes and knowing that she was finally willing to do something dirty and corrupt if she had to.

"What if he's dead?" Heero heard himself whisper, unable to stop from voicing that fear, the fear that they had already failed. He felt his mother's fingers dig into him and knew that he had hurt her with that fear.

"I will find him," she repeated, "No matter what. I'll bring him home."

Heero closed his eyes, feeling more tears pour down his cheeks, and nodded. They would find him. Even if there was nothing more than a body to bring back, they would bring him home, where he belonged.
*****
It was always dark here. He could no longer tell if his eyes were open or closed, it was all the same. Days and nights... time didn't exist. He was floating, just like before. How long had he been here? That thought felt so familiar... he had thought it before, back then. Everything was back then, this same darkness, this feeling of sickness. But this sickness was different somehow. His body ached and his throat felt hot and dry, but not from all the cocks he had sucked. They weren't coming this time. Just Wes. In some ways, that was good, in others it was worse. Just one man, not all those strangers... but he was alone more than before, just himself in this dark place. He hated the sound of his heartbeat, the only sound he could hear when Wes wasn't here.

At first, he had sung to himself. Anything at all to relieve the darkness and silence. But after awhile, his throat had hurt too much and he had begun to cough. He had thought that, if he stayed quiet for a little while, the cough and sore throat would go way, but it hadn't. It had only gotten worse. He missed singing, missed hearing a sound that wasn't his heart and breathing, or his cries. He had cried a lot in the beginning. Useless tears. His heart aching for light and touch and warmth. He was too tired to cry anymore. That alone told him that something was very wrong with him, something more than just being locked away in the dark.

It was hard for him to make his limbs move, his body feeling too heavy. Was he drugged? Had Wes given him something, maybe KL6 again? Duo tried to move his fingers and felt utter relief when they responded, curling then relaxing. He could remember needles, but the idea that Wes had shot him up with something seemed wrong. His body didn't just feel heavy, but... not there. He felt he was dreaming. Wes came for him occasionally. He was always felt this awful excitement and relief when he heard his familiar footsteps in the hall or saw that strip of light under the door meaning that someone was home. Just to know that someone was there.

It was always dark when Wes opened the door, though. This didn't mean anything, only making Duo feel more disoriented by the possible time. There were no windows out there, so no matter if it was night or day, the only light had to come from the hall light. Sometimes, Wes would have sex with him. Including that first time when he had used the wires, they had done it seven times now and Wes had forced him to give him oral sex three of those times. It was the only thing he could measure in this darkness, how many times Wes had raped him, but even that was beginning to blur. He remembered chains and being shoved down onto a soft bed, unable to move, but that was wrong. The only thing binding him was the leather cuffs around his wrists and there was no bed. He was confusing that time with now, everything become one stream of events. He was breaking... was he dreaming now? Wes had let him go... had done that wonderful thing and he had disappointed him again, made him lock him in here. It was better than the bed, though. Anything was better than the bed.

And sometimes, Wes would just sit here with him in the dark, watching him, not fucking him or letting someone else fuck him. It was disturbing, but not so different than how he had been before, watching him in his most private moments, but it was also a sort of relief from the bad things, at least it didn't hurt. Or maybe those were more dreams. He slept constantly. AT first it had just been an attempt to escape the darkness and loneliness, but now he felt tired all the time. He couldn't know how long he had slept each time. Time felt chaotic and endless. Just like last time.

He kept thinking that. "Last time." But was it last time, or was it this time? What if they were the same? The things he dreamed... that beautiful white house, the loving mother, the boy he loved... they were the things he needed to go back to. He had these memories, times of warmth and love so brilliant, it made him hurt now. But those memories were too clean, too perfect, too absent of the pain he had known his entire life. How could they be real? This was the reality, this closet, the darkness. All this perversion and pain. When Wes had chained him up in that bed, he had dreamed wonderful things then, too. Things so similar... a home and a family that loved him. Loved him. That, in itself, was a dream.

What if his memories were lies? Pleasant illusions to keep him from going insane? What if he had never escaped from here, but had merely dreamt that he had? What if HEero still hated him, had never forgiven him at all? He was still the same ugly person with no future and no purpose besides to be a whore and the only person who loved him at all, and ever would, was Wes? Duo curled up into a tight ball and felt tears prick his eyes at the thought that all those wonderful things that had happened to him, Name taking him in and giving him so much while asking for absolutely nothing in return, had all been his imagination. He supposed he still had the energy to cry after all. He wanted HEero. He wanted his cats. He wanted his mother. He wanted to go home!

'Home isn't real,' a voice in his head said, 'The Heero that told you that you deserved so much better, that you are beautiful and that he could never blame you for any of this isn't real. There's only this. Lying in the dark, waiting for Wes to open the door so you can feel the touch of another human being. Heero isn't going to come rescue you and he sure as hell doesn't love you.'

Duo sobbed, pressing his face into the pillow. It smelled of his sweat and was still damp from the last time he had cried into it.

'Heero Yuy love you?' the voice continued, a voice that sounded exactly like his own, but colder and bitter, 'Who are you kidding? What is there in you to love, even as a friend? You're weak. Even in your dreams, you can't make yourself into anything else better! You're pathetic, just lying here, sick and crying. Why would he want you as a friend, let alone a boyfriend? But Wes loves you. All these years, he fed you, clothed you, and even let you go to school. When he's here with you, doesn't the loneliness go away a little bit? Who else is going to take care of a useless piece of shit like you? Look at you. Homeless rat turned cheap whore. You're shaking just from being alone in the dark, like a little child without his night light. Scared of a few shadows, broken so easily. If you say yes, he'll let you walk in the light again. He'll make sure you're looked after, and isn't that better? You sure as hell can't take care of yourself if this is any indicator, not anymore. You used to, when you were younger, but now you can't even be alone for five seconds without panicking. As terrible as he is, he's the only one who cares about you. You should consider yourself lucky! A powerful man like Wes wants you, a timid mouse, who knows why. So why... why can't you just say yes?'

It was true. He was shaking. He trembled like this every time Wes left him alone. He was so scared of it, of being by himself. He wanted to be touched, to be held. He wanted to feel the warmth of Wes' body, even if that meant he had to have sex with him. Anything was better than this cold deep down in his heart. He might hate him, but he loved him, too. And, lately, it hadn't been that bad, being with him. Had it? Wes had been frustrated with how weak Duo was, his tiredness, his inability to tell him that he wouldn't try to run away anymore, his coughing. The cuts on his arms from the wires had bled for longer than they should have and the places that Wes had touched or grabbed roughly, even if it shouldn't have been hard enough to leave a mark, had bruised to black. Every time Wes yelled at him for these weaknesses, he felt useless, weaker, and pathetic.

HE hated having sex with him, too. He hated the feeling of his large, calloused hands on his hips, his hot breath ghosting over his skin, his hips pushing against his. He especially hated the way his cock felt inside of him and the taste of his cum. Even though it was just Wes and not that constant stream of nameless men, it still made him feel filthy. It made him feel like a whore. And his acceptance of this, his lack of desire to fight back, made him feel worse. But WEs hadn't really hurt him at all. He hadn't broken anything, or cut him, or tortured him. So why did he feel like this? Like... like... abused? He should be happy. Compared to before, being treated like a cheap sex toy and a worthless punching bag, this was incredible, so much more than what he had ever had, and what WEs was offering him...

What was he expecting? What was he waiting for? That voice in his head was right. He wasn't fighting against Wes, was so beaten down and tired that he wasn't even trying to escape. Hadn't tried to escape all those years. Wes' love was more than what a pathetic person like him deserved. The man had money and power, fear and respect, and he wanted to give him a better life? He didn't need to wonder why a part of him had always been so deeply connected to WEs. The man was a monster, he knew that. After everything he had put him through, all the tears and screams, breaking bone after bone, one act of torture after another, he knew how horrible the blonde was. But he had one quality that Duo craved, had craved since he was a little boy, like a terrible addiction he couldn't stop no matter how hard he tried. One by one, everyone in his life had abandoned him. His parents, Sunshine, Helen, Yuki, Heero... No one stayed, his life had taught him that.

No one, except for Wes. His pimp and guardian had been with him for eight years, longer than anyone else by far! In a sick way, he could rely on WEs to always be there for him. Wes loved him. Every time he had run away from him, he had dragged him back. He could have turned his back on him and left him be, but he hadn't. And Wes would die. He wouldn't leave him like that. The man took good care of himself. There wasn't an ounce of fat on him, he didn't eat cholesterol rich foods like Chris did and, besides the smoking, he didn't have many unhealthy habits. He had a beer or two occasionally, but he never got drunk, he didn't like that kind of loss of control.

Health wise, if he didn't get lung cancer or something from those damned cigarettes, WEs was destined to live a long life. And Duo couldn't see the stubborn force of nature that Wes was succumb to something so insidious and sneaky like cancer. But health wasn't the only thing he had to worry about. With the kind of power that Wes held, there was always someone who wanted to overthrow him. His low key lifestyle didn't help, either. Yes, it made people underestimate him, and helped to throw the cops who weren't on his payroll off his trail, but it also wasn't very intimidating, unlike other drug dealers that had their own protective details. Not only that, but Wes had destroyed a lot of lives. He had kidnapped people for leverage and prostitution, gotten kids and teenagers addicted to drugs, and killed who knew how many people by his own hand, which made him a target for revengeful parents, siblings, spouses, ect.

Just in the years they had been living together, there had been 37 attempts on Wes' life, and those had just been the ones that Duo had known about. And in all of those attempts, Wes had stopped all of his attackers with no more effort than if he had been batting away a particularly pesky fly. The closest he had ever come was when he had gotten shot in the shoulder and he had only done that to draw the assassin out. The would-be killer, a vengeful cop that, after refusing to come to Wes' side, had become a widower once Wes had planted a car bomb in his wife's SUV, had faired far worse in the shoot-out than Wes had. It was like Wes was made of Kevlar, nothing could hurt him.

If he stayed with Wes, he would never be alone. He had never been able to feel that towards any other human being and it made him feel... happy. Happy and warm. Even if Wes wasn't the one he wanted, deep down in the more secret places of his heart, wasn't it a good thing to have that with someone, that reliability? He had lived his entire childhood before WEs alone and isolated. He knew how it invaded you, more thoroughly than any cancer, the loneliness. How it made you scream and want to cling to the closest warm body, as tightly as you could. All he wanted was to be cradled, to have someone care whether he was breathing or not. It had been that loneliness that had been his downfall. Being abused by WEs was one thing, and it had been terrible, but it had felt so awful because he had needed something else from him. And even if Wes had hurt him, the pain had still been better than the nothingness.

Suddenly, a horrifying thought occurred to him. What if he did say yes to Wes? What if he cut all of his ties here, dropped his schooling, never saw Heero, Name, Quatre, Trowa, Wufei, Shi, Solo, Amaaya, and the twins ever again? He would have to leave his cats behind. Wes hated pets, especially cats. What if he did all that, just to be with Wes, to be loved by someone, did everything and agreed to everything that Wes wanted from him and Wes got bored with him? HE would fall out of love with him as suddenly and chaotically as he had admitted his love to him in the first place. He would abandon him, just like everyone else.

Duo shuddered and burrowed deeper in the blanket. 'Duo'... such a stupid name had picked for himself. He knew that, if he had only been aware of what a duo was, he never would have taken it. Pairs... Solo had had the right idea, although he didn't know if his friend had chosen it consciously or not. When had he ever belonged to a pair of anything? Even among Solo, Shi, Amaaya, Hi, the twins, and Yuki, he had been the outsider. With Heero, Quatre, Trowa, and Wufei, he had felt the same way. He didn't know if his paranoia about his memories was well-founded or not, but around them he had always felt not a stranger. Dreams or not, he and Heero had gone through a lot and even before that huge fight they had had, Duo had felt so close to him. Maybe these feelings were born from his desperation to be connected to people, even with all of his trust issues. Heero had somehow broken through all of it, his fear of people, his inability to believe he could have any friends that weren't fellow whores, and even those friends were as rare and precious as gold, because of how dark and twisted his life was, all the secrets he had to keep, and that he didn't deserve those connections, that warmth and companionship.

If his memories were just illusions, fevered dreams created to stave away the dark and pain by a broken mind, it was terrible... no, worse than terrible, there was no word he could use to describe how that possibility made him feel, because if his memories of his life with Name and Heero, living with them, becoming a part of their family, weren't real, that meant there was absolutely no point in even trying to escape. He had nowhere to run to, no one who would shelter him. He couldn't risk Shi and Solo's lives by turning to them. And HEero hated him. Name probably thought he was scum, lying to her son like that... he had thought all these things before, so very long ago, but found himself returning to them, not able to trust his own mind that was telling him he didn't need to hurt over those things anymore, Heero and Name had already forgiven him for everything.

How many times had his mind betrayed him? How many times had he realized that he was missing memories, or pieces of the memoirs he did have were confused, jumbled, or just plain wrong? He felt like he had schizophrenia, unable to put any faith in what he perceived as 'real'. He needed to know... he needed to know that Heero and Name were worried sick about him, that his cats were safe at home, that he had a home to return to, that these doubts were just because he was breaking again, because he was delirious with what felt like a very bad fever and not because there was any truth in them. And what if his memories were real, did it matter? He still couldn't escape, could still never see Heero again. He was so tired... not just because he felt sick. He was tired of all of this, of fighting and worrying and hating himself. Tired of loving Wes and hating him. Wouldn't it be better to just say yes to him and to forget about anything else? Forget about Heero and Name and his future and his past... just focus on letting Wes do whatever he liked so he didn't have to think anymore... he knew that was one of the reasons why so many people got addicted to drugs. It wasn't just the chemicals, but that feeling of forgetting, of letting go. It wasn't right, but it was comforting, wasn't it? So why couldn't he do that?

"Is it so wrong that I want the best for you? After everything that�s happened, I want you to be happy and have the life that you deserve, not just because you were hurt, but because you�re a good person and you do deserve the best! If I have to fight the whole world for that to happen, then I will! Why do you give up so easily?!�
An ice-cold shiver went down Duo's spine. Hearing Heero's voice, even just in his head, was like an electric current. It made goose bumps appear on his arms and he felt like his hair was standing on end. Heero... he rubbed his head against the pillow, suddenly hating Wes for tying up his wrists, wanting to hug it to his chest. He would have let Wes cut both of his hands off if it meant he could wrap his arms around Heero again.

How could he be so wracked with indecision? If he couldn't trust his memories, it was Wes' own fault! He could remember that day, in bits and pieces, a confused jumble of fear and pain. Mostly, he remembered the pain. That feeling that went through him when Wes had grabbed his head and, in a feat of fury that he had never witnessed in another human being before then and now, had slammed him into the floor. He remembered heat, like a fire raging in his skull, then this pain that was so intense, it was like ice.

He had been so sure, when he had heard this... this noise in his head, not shattering, but almost like cracking, the heat that had blossomed in his ear and how everything had kind of echoed, sounds so distorted, that Wes had killed him. That he had cracked his skull wide open and he would die on the apartment floor. There had been blood and he had shook. Not the way you would if you were cold. It had been like a seizure. And then, when he had woken up, he had thought Wes had done something with his vision in his sleep, had given him some kind of drug. He hadn't realized that the man had damaged his vision with that violent move, that it wouldn't get better until Heero had gotten it fixed... but that hadn't happened, had it? That had been in his dreams.

Duo felt fear overcome him as he looked around in the dark. Was his vision fixed, he thought in anxiety. He couldn't tell... but his eyesight had been blurry the last time Wes had opened the door. Was that just his imagination? He didn't want to know. He didn't want to open his eyes and realize that it all had been a dream. The dark was terrifying, but in that moment, he wanted it to stay dark, so he could keep up the illusion that his memories were memories and not dreams. And if they were dreams... that meant that his vision wasn't fixed. There had been no miracle surgery. He remembered how Wes had commented on him wearing contacts and realized now when he hadn't then that Wes hadn't realized his vision was better.

For the first time in his entire relationship with the sociopath, Duo felt hatred. Pure, unconfused hatred. It had been Wes' fault that his vision had gotten fucked up! Wes' fault that he couldn't even trust his own goddamn head not to lie to him! The man hadn't even thought twice about slamming his head into the floor. He hadn't cared if he had hurt him! That kind of blow could have paralyzed him or given him severe developmental disabilities, especially at that young of an age! He had been lucky to have walked away just with short term memory loss and vision problems. It wasn't that, for a moment, Wes had lost control over his anger. He just hadn't cared. Duo could have died, and he wouldn't have cared.

In their entire relationship together, Wes had turned him into a rag doll. Every scar on his body was because of him, regardless if he had been the one to put them there. He had sliced up his feet, hit him with a baseball bat, thrown him into a tub full of ice-cold water... this was the man he was thinking about leaving everything he loved to be with? Even if he loved him, living with someone like that... wouldn't that be like attempted suicide?

What had he done to deserve Wes? To deserve his abuse and perversions? To deserve all the times he had raped him, trussed up, bleeding, and choking him? All those sick, sexual games and all the nasty things he had trained him to do... In his life... in his childhood, had he done something that he had deserved to be punished for? He had stolen to survive. Had stolen from dumpsters and restaurants and convenience stores. Had pick-pocketed wallets and spare change and jewelry, all for his next bite of food or some shoes. He had stolen food from other street kids, ones just as hungry as he had been. He had been unable to save Sunshine and Helen... his only chances to redeem himself, to do something good with his garbage of a life... and he had failed both times. He had proved to the world that all the things those people said about kids like him, that he was trash, that he didn't deserve a chance to prove his worth, that if he was given a chance to get an education and a family, he would just fuck it up by becoming some drugged out punk, were true.

Was Wes his punishment, then? Was there really a God and He had thrown Wes in his way to hurt him because he had been unable to save two of the best people he had ever known? Even if Wes wasn't some kind of divine retribution, surely he still deserved all the pain and humiliation he had put him through. Hadn't there been something he could have done to have prevented all of this? His being locked up in this closest... was this his fault? Had there been some kind of warning back then, before Wes had taken him to his apartment, some indicator that he had missed because he had been too stupid to notice? No... no, that threat had always been there. There had been no warning... Wes had been waiting for him, like... like his destiny. Just waiting for him to fall into the trap and no matter what he could have done, it would have ended the same way. Somehow, that was worse than the possibility that he could have prevented all of this, knowing that he had been fucked since day one. He had been powerless against it.

And because he had been powerless, did that mean that he deserved to be raped over and over again, as some kind of justice? Was there some kind of higher power, taunting him? Letting Heero come into his life and then just... rip him out of it again. There was something wrong with him, some flaw that he had had since childhood, some kind of deficiency and he needed to be punished for it and no matter what he did, even if he escaped from here now, Wes would just find him again and hurt him again. Duo rolled onto his back and looked up at the ceiling, not that he could actually see it in the complete darkness. Tears ran down his cheeks and he could hear his breath hitching, partially in sickness and partially in distress.

"God," he whisper out loud, his violet eyes shining with fever, "if you really do exist and I've only chosen to believe that you don't because you never showed me any kind of kindness... please... please, tell me... if this is my punishment for being too weak, too pathetic, for not being strong enough or not doing anything in my life that has any value... why can't I be forgiven? I want to be forgiven... I want this to stop. I don't want to be here... anymore..." his voice was starting to get faint from his sore throat, his delirium making it hard for him to think coherently, "Please, Heero... forgive me... I want to go home... with you..."

He felt his tears, unpleasantly warm on his fevered cheeks, trickle down his neck. He turned his head into the pillow again, rolling onto his side. It hurt his back to lay on it like that. He wasn't sure if it was because of the last time Wes had had sex with him or because of how hard the floor of the closet was. As he rolled, he felt the scars from when Wes had shot him in the shoulder and the ones in his side pull. He hissed. For some reason, his skin felt really sensitive lately, or was that an illusion, too?

Duo's eyes widened in shock at that thought. An illusion... if his memories were wrong, then why did he have those scars? Wes had shot him... Heero had been there, he had been the one to take him to the hospital. And when Chris had ruptured his spleen... that was real! These scars weren't a dream. And hadn't Wes squeezed them earlier? They had to be real... He supposed it was possible that the wound was indeed real, but that he hadn't knocked Chris out that night, that the bear of a man had brought him back to Wes, who had been the one to get him fixed up... No, no that wasn't true!

Maybe he was delirious and his mind was cracking from being back here again, but those memories weren't lies! He remembered the joy he had felt at seeing Heero's face again, of hearing his voice, even if the Japanese boy had been furious at him. He remembered how scared he had been, trying to get back 'home', how he had kept throwing up blood and had thought for sure that some terrible demon was chasing him. He remembered Heero carrying him to his car to drive him to the hospital, his body wracked with agony. He couldn't have dreamt that pain, right? His mind was full of darkness. He never dreamed, he only ever had nightmares. Even when he had been chained to the bed, he had been aware of his fantasies, had known that they weren't real. His mind was incapable of allowing him to believe in that kind of hope, that kind of beauty.

All those moments with Name, Heero, Trowa, Quatre, and Wufei... there was no way his sick and twisted mind could come up with people who loved him that much, who accepted him so completely! Even before he had run away from school, Name had been so kind to him... was it really so hard to believe that such a person could exist in reality? And if it was hard to believe that, how could he possibly dream it? All those months... he couldn't have dreamed all those things that had happened. Because it wasn't the huge things that made no sense to have dreamed, but the little ones. The monotony of his day to day life. Opening the mail, dusting the house when Name was at a meeting. There was too much, no one's imagination could be that vivid.

No, it wasn't the tiny details, either. Every time Heero's hand had touched him, or he had said his name, Duo had felt this incredible warmth in his heart, these little electrical currents that had made him feel... loved. Those feelings had been so intense, so powerful, he just couldn't believe that they weren't real. Name and Heero were out looking for him. All those things had happened, not because he thought he finally had the proof of it, but because he wanted to believe that! Duo felt a hysterical relief that, not only he had a family and a home that he could believe in, but that he had made a decision. He couldn't make up his mind about Wes, which was still tearing him apart inside, but he had made up his mind about his memories, all on his own. It gave him hope that he could do the same thing for Wes.

Duo struggled to sit up, suddenly finding the strength as just a bit of the fuzziness in his head from the fever abated, giving him a momentary clarity. He remembered now, that long drive to the hospital with Heero. He had bled all over the car, but Heero hadn't been angry. So many of his johns, with pieces of shit cars, would have hit him for getting a single drop of blood in their cars, but Heero hadn't cared. Duo had been sobbing, the pain so bad that he actually dry heaved from it, and Heero had tried to soothe him. He couldn't remember what Heero had said to him, but it had comforted him through the pain. It had gotten him through the hellish trip when, he knew, if he had been alone, he would have succumbed, not having the will power to fight. That pained haze seemed so much more real than this reality, trapped in the closest.

This was not that chained bed and he was not that same person he had been. He could move, just not his arms, and he was sick, but he was beginning to realize that it was not from abuse or neglect. Wes had been feeding him and giving him plenty of water, unlike last time. He even put his jeans back on after he was done with him. There was something else... something important that he was forgetting... Just as it was about to come to him, the bottom of the door lit up in light. Duo froze, listening in desperation to the sound of Wes' footsteps out in the hallway. He was home.

"Wes," he cried out, slamming his bound hands against the door over and over and over again, the door shaking a little but otherwise not budging, "Please! Let me out! Let me out!"

The footsteps passed the door, moving towards the bedroom in an obvious dismissal.

"No," Duo sobbed, hitting the door again, but he started to slump, what little adrenaline he had managed to get quickly fading, "Let me out... please... just let me go... let me go..."

He felt limp to the ground, shivering. He was too weak, too dizzy. He had nothing left in him, no more fight. He had had little to begin with. When it came to Wes, he just couldn't do it and now his body was physically failing him. He coughed loudly, almost hacking. His throat convulsed, protesting all the yelling he had just done and feeling like he was swallowing steel wool. He was so tired... he could sleep, couldn't he? The boogieman would come for him regardless, so he could sleep... now that he knew that Heero was out there, that he still cared about him and wasn't angry or a figment of his imagination, could he dream about him? Could he see something pleasant finally when he closed his eyes instead of those terrible grey eyes, leering down at him?

The door suddenly swung open and bright light spilled into the small closet. Duo squeezed his eyes shut as pain spiked through his head and eyes, but for a brief moment, he saw Wes in perfect clarity, no blurred colors, no vision problems at all. He had his black jacket clenched in one hand and a bottle of something in the other. duo didn't have the time before the light overwhelmed him to see what it was. The blonde was wearing jeans instead of pants and a green shirt. The shirt and the top of his jeans were sprayed with blood. He reeked of it, but his face was clean of it and his hair was damp, so he had probably taken a shower before coming back to the apartment and hid the blood with his jacket. But it didn't matter because of that smell... it was so cloying and thick it made Duo's stomach twist with nausea. He had gone out and killed someone. He hadn't just shot the person, either. With that much blood, he had to have done something nasty, which meant that it was a personal matter, not a professional hit.

Who? One of his people that had stepped out of line? Or someone that Duo knew, someone who might have gotten too close to finding out where he was? He felt his heart quake with the knowledge that the man before him, the man he had considered running away with, had just taken someone's life. What was so shocking about that was that he was shocked at all by it. What the hell was wrong with him? He used to handle WEs' violence so much better than this. Living with him, it had been common place. But no matter if he had gotten used to it or not. It was evil. He could reason his feelings, his love for the man, but he was evil. Compared to Heero's warmth and kindness, he was nothing more than a monster. Wes looked furious as he glared down at Duo.

"Will you shut the fuck up?" he snarled and pushed Duo further into the closet with his foot so he could walk in.

Duo breathed in relief despite the rough, angry shove when the tall blonde didn't shut the door behind him, leaving it open for light to continue to pour into it. The first time Wes had closed the door during one of his visits, trapping Duo with him in the small, black space, effectively taking away one more of Duo's freedoms, he had had a screaming panic attack so bad, he had fainted.

"Stay still," Wes ordered as he grabbed Duo's wrists.

He turned the boy's hands over and saw black bruises there were he had slammed them against the door. Wes didn't notice Duo's look of both fear and relief at his presence and touch. His brow furrowed further in anger and frustration. He knew that there was no way the teenager could have hit the door hard enough to make bruises that bad and even if he had, they shouldn't have formed that quickly. His eyes traveled down the rest of Duo's arms.

"Goddamn it," he growled as he saw that his cuts were bleeding again, not just a sluggish trickle, but nearly as badly as when they had first formed. All of his other bruises had turned a dark bluish-black as well.

His snarl turned into a deep frown as he pulled Duo's arms straight. Beyond the marks his own stronger hands had made from grabbing him previously, there were more bruises along his arms. They were as deep and black as the others, but Wes knew for a fact that he hadn't put them there, and with Duo's wrists bound up, he couldn't have done anything to cause them, either. Phantom bruises. He had been trying to deny that the kid was sick, but with his fever, these bruises, and the constant, rasping cough, especially at night when Duo couldn't hold them in and assumed that Wes was asleep, he knew that the longer he put off doing something about it, the less likely just fluids and antibiotics was going to help and the more likely a hospital was going to be needed. It was such a pain in his ass, not to mention inconvenient. The Jap bitch was still sniffing for his blood. Taking out her noisy assassin hadn't deterred her any.

Oh, Wes knew that Yuy was aware that he had killed him. She was a butch cunt but she was far from an arrogantly stupid one. She was keeping things quiet, not kicking up a fuss. She knew that things would go more smoothly for her the less she broadcasted her actions, just as he did. Sure, she could let people know about the hit, the cops, FBI, or even the media, but that would draw just as much of his attention to what she was planning. Instead, she had done nothing and that worried him greatly. Yuy was not a woman who sat back and waited or idled in indecision. She was a woman of action, of progress and confidence. In that respect, Wes had to grudgingly respect her. Under her leadership, Yuy Corporations had grown during an economic period when other large, old, and powerful companies had died out and succumbed to bankruptcy. The two of them were very similar, they both were ruthless, strong, had no tolerance for weakness, and would rather get their own hands dirty than to rely on their underlings. They just happened to play at opposite ends of the field.

And while it had appeared on the surface that Yuy had been unfazed by losing her man, Wes knew otherwise. He had taken care of all the little piggish that had squealed on him to the detective, and the families of the worst offenders, sending a clear message to anyone else thinking of making a quick buck at his expense, but since he had gotten rid of the detective, there had been one person after another gunning for him.

These hadn't been street thugs or assassins hired by someone in his business. These had been grade A professionals, ghosts posing as men. He had offed two of them, but it had been a close thing and he knew that he couldn't stay here for much longer. The bitch had his scent and she was as tenacious and stubborn about the kid as he was. He guessed he did mean more to her than just charity, something he had always suspected, not that he would ever admit it to him.

Maybe he couldn't give Duo all that Yuy could, and that pissed him off. The brunette was his, his property, not hers! That there was someone in Duo's life who had more influence over him, who held sway, not over his physical body or life, but his heart, something he couldn't control in the way that he used to be able to, frustrated him. He would never submit to her, no matter what she threw his way. He had been waiting for the right moment to kill the bitch's brat, but maybe that moment had come. Maybe it would make her hesitate and give him the time to move the kid... or it would make her even more determined. It was probably stupid to think that he could hide from her just by moving to another state. A different country would be a better bet and even then... but Wes was quite adept at disappearing and he had to admit that playing cat and mouse with one of the most powerful people in the world excited him.

He might get away with taking Duo to the hospital if he was coming down with something really nasty, but there was no reason for him to take that risk. He had been taking care of him since he was seven years old and he had seldom needed the help of doctors to keep him going. He knelt down in the closet, putting the bottle on the floor.

�Sit up,� he barked, taking a bottle of pills from his pocket.

Duo automatically sat up. He didn�t even think about anymore, about trying to not do what Wes said, just because he didn�t want to fall into old patterns. It had already happened, little by little, he was becoming that person again. He hated it, hated realizing how second nature all of this was, but it was easier. He was just too tired to do �what he was supposed to�, to try to be strong. It was so much easier to just do whatever Wes wanted, to wait for someone to take him away from this place. The last time he had escaped, he had only done so because of Heero. His presence had given him the strength to try to run. On his own, he had no hope. Relying on people wasn�t in his nature, but neither was trusting his own abilities. He hated that part of himself, hated just lying here and acting like a puppet, but he was so lost.

He watched Wes sharply as he took the lid off the bottle of pills and took one out. The bottle had no label, which told him that Wes hadn�t gotten it from a pharmacy, but through some sort of illegal means. The pills were white and unmarked, and for a moment Duo wondered if he was trying to give him ecstasy again. Hadn�t they gone past that, past the drugs and coercion? He knew that Wes understood that drugs weren�t going to keep him here if Duo got the chance to escape and he had hoped he would use them just for his own sick enjoyment. It was hard enough to keep a handle on reality in this closet. Between the sensory deprivation, his inability to see the outside world, and his sickness, he was losing his grasp on everything. Drugs would probably just give him a full, psychotic break at this point. But these pills were big, far too large to be ecstasy or any other recreational drug Duo could think of.

�Open your mouth,� the blonde ordered.

�What is it?� he rasped, not doing what he was told instantly for once.

�Antibiotics,� Wes told him roughly, �Very strong ones, so I�m only giving you one a day. It should make you feel better by tomorrow morning.�

Duo�s violet eyes widened at that. So that was why there was no label... he knew what kind of antibiotics they were. They were expensive, especially if you got them illegally, and they were high quality. Usually, the current, more commonly used antibiotics took two to three days to do anything. These were used for people with serious problems and you needed a special kind of prescription to get them. He couldn�t remember the name of the antibiotic, or how he knew about it, he just remembered someone telling him about it and that it was important somehow. A part of him felt annoyed that Wes could get them just like that, and for him, who probably just had a cold or fever or something, but another part felt a wash of warmth, that Wes would pay for an expensive antibiotic for him when the man was usually so tight fisted about his money.

Then, it hit him. Senxomycin (1). Dr. Stark had been the one who had told him about it, when he had been lecturing him about the possible after effects of having his spleen removed. That was what was wrong with him! How could he have forgotten that? The second he had started to feel sick, he should have realized that it was because he hadn�t been taking his medicine. He wracked his brain, trying to remember through the fevered haze everything that Stark had told him. Something about his immune system and white blood cell count... he couldn�t remember a lot of it, but he did remember the asshole doctor informing him that if he skipped his medication, he would get seriously sick. The human spleen was like a filtration unit and without it, you had an increase in white blood cell count, lack of response to some vaccinations, and a loss of immunity to several bacteria and illnesses.

It was especially tricky because the bacteria you could be susceptible to were a variety of types that were hard to target accurately with most antibiotics. But Senxomycin was different. It not only targeted a wide spectrum of bacteria, but was pretty powerful. It was the antibiotic Stark had given Name a subscription to if Duo got really sick, especially soon after his surgery, but they had never filled it. The worst thing that had happened was when he had run away after learning about Heero�s engagement, or more accurately his lack of, and his immune system had gone down enough for him to have picked up a cold. This was worse, much worse.

Wes had just chosen this antibiotic because of its potency and his refusal to take Duo to a doctor, but the teenager felt relieved. This wouldn�t solve the problem, but it might help with the fever. He let Wes put the pill in his mouth. It was horribly bitter, but that only meant that it was probably as strong as Stark had said. Wes brought the bottle of liquid to his lips and Duo tasted non-pulp orange juice. His sickness had made him slightly dehydrated and he quickly realized that his fever was getting worse, spiking rapidly and making him feel more than just slightly delirious, the citrus tasting more wonderful than it should. He drank it down greedily, each gulp of it only fueling his desire for more until half of the bottle was gone and Wes took it away from him, setting it back on the floor.

�Enough,� the other man said gruffly, �Save some for tomorrow.�

Duo closed his eyes, feeling tiredness overwhelm him, as though it had just been waiting for Wes to return. He laid down on the floor, not even caring about laying on the pillow and blanket. What little clarity and energy he had gained with Wes� arrival left him quickly and he sunk into himself, not quite asleep, but barely awake or aware of anything around him. Some part of himself knew that it was because of whatever bacteria was making him sick, but the rest of him didn�t care. Little details, like where Wes was, what he was doing, or if he should try to escape faded away until he could only feel things on a very base, emotional level.

Wes noticed Duo�s sudden apathy and put a hand on his forehead, pushing his bangs back. He frowned, feeling waves of heat radiating off of the boy�s skin. The antibiotics should help his fever, but if they didn�t, he would have to get a doctor, one that wouldn�t ask too many questions and would be easily intimidated. He trailed his hand down his cheek, caressing it a little, then pressed his fingers to his neck, checking his pulse. Even though he was lying completely still, his heart was racing. Wes patiently waited until he felt Duo�s heart skip a couple of beats, slow down for a few seconds, then pick up again.

Wes swore under his breath. He was still having heart palpitations. This wasn�t just some stupid cold, or even a bad flu. He had no idea what this was. Fucking kid... it was just one thing after another. All of his survival instincts were telling him to ditch the longhaired boy here, let him starve in this closet. He was just going to slow him down, was only going to pervert him more, the longer they were together. What the hell was he going to do with him anyway? It wasn�t like he could trust him to not run away again, no matter what he said, he only wanted to hear the boy submit to him again, he wanted him to believe that running away from him was pointless, for as long as possible. He wanted things to go back to the way they had been, when Duo had belonged to only him and he had had complete control over him. But he was weak. Pathetic. He couldn�t leave him.

Or rather, he didn�t know what would happen if he did. Not having control over his own future... that was unacceptable. Even if he had to drag the boy to the bowels of hell with him, he would still have that iron clad grip on him and that was all that mattered. He stood up to leave.

�Don�t leave...� Duo�s voice was tiny and weak, like a little kid crying out in a nightmare and the next word he uttered was no more than the breath of a whisper, but Wes heard it clearly, �...Daddy...�

Instantly, Wes thought the brunette was dreaming of some past memory, but when he glanced down at him, Duo was looking straight at him. His eyes were barely open and were glazed with delirium, but he wasn�t dreaming or hallucinating. Just as quickly as Duo had let that word slip out, he was closing his eyes and fall asleep, as though he hadn�t just had a near panic attack at Wes leaving him. The tall blonde watched him, like a fox would watch an injured bird. There was that warmth again, that weird tingling in his heart. He hated that feeling, this hesitance and uncertainty. He wanted to hurt the boy, to grind him into nothing.

�Daddy,� huh? He was nobody�s fucking father. He wasn�t exactly daddy material. He had no urges to find a bitch and start a family of his own and had never given having a child more than a second�s thought. Whenever he saw a child crying, his only �instinct� was to slap it so it would stop making that infuriating noise. AS far as he was concerned, being a parent was useless, just an excuse to fuck and boost your ego by saying, look, that�s a piece of me! Fuck... Duo had been as close to a son as he would ever get and he was more than enough, he couldn't even deny that it felt kind of... kind of warm and nice, hearing the kid call him that. No, he was too much. It wasn�t in his nature to take care of other people, but he had raised the boy without even realizing it. Originally, he had planned to keep the kid at the apartment until he had trained him up enough to be a high sell, get him addicted to drugs and beat him down until he would be loyal to only him and understand his place as a piece of property, then he would ship him off to one of his brothels, moving onto his next acquisition.

But then a year had passed, and another, and another. He had gotten the little rat trained up all right, and it hadn�t been easy. Duo had been stubborn and intelligent, always resisting him even though he had been too scared to run away after that first time. He learned quickly, but somehow never completely broke. He had never been a hundred percent loyal to him, either, always wandering off to who knew where when Wes slackened his leash. And then there had been the school thing. He never should have let it get to that point, should have shipped him out after that first year. But Christ, he was a grade A piece of ass.

The boy had been profitable, that was for sure. To any of the men Wes had pimped him to that hadn't had a problem with screwing a boy, he had made him a lot of repeat buyers. He wasn't a broken down shell like his other whores, too strung out or lost in their own little worlds to know what was happening to them anymore. He always had that spark in his eyes, even when he was in a bad way, this kind of intelligence, rare not just in street kids, either. And he was pretty, especially after Wes had gotten him cleaned up. When he had seen the kind of potential Duo had, he had been hesitant to send him away, not only scared that he might get stolen by a rival or a john that wanted him for longer than a couple of nights, but because he had enjoyed fucking him, too. It wasn't like his other whores had been undesirable to him, but he had gotten easily bored with them after the first couple of times.

Duo had never bored him. After eight years, that was something... unique. And when he had asked himself why he was treating the brat special, he had simply concluded it wasn't really inconveniencing him any. Sure, he had to make sure he kept him alive and more or less healthy, but he made him pay for his showers, at least one meal a day, medicine, and clothes with his body. If he wasn't behaving, or he just didn't want to, then Wes had refused him those thins and Duo had taken it. What else could he do? And anything Wes paid for, well, it was a tiny amount compared to the money he had. In return, he had a live-in whore that he could do whatever he wanted to.

So, he had kept the kid, nothing special about that, it had just suited his needs like everything else. Then one day, out of the fucking blue, he had begged, actually begged that Wes let him go to school like all the other kids. All the other kids, ha! He had nearly laughed then, thinking it was nothing more than a joke. But it hadn't been. The little shit had actually thought that he was like those other kids, that he deserved the same things as they did. A home, an education, three hearty meals a day, and parents that loved him and would take care of everything if things got bad. He had momentarily forgotten the truth, he was a whore, nothing more than a piece of property he sold to men to sate their carnal urges. A thing he had every right to do whatever he liked to. And he thought he deserved the same things as anyone else?

If he hadn't found the kid, a ghostly, thin waif, barely surviving on the streets, he would have been taken by some other pimp, or dead. The idea of one of his hookers going to school, trying to get an education with the rest of the brats, even the ones from the upper class areas of town, wasn't just damned funny, but dangerous, too. All it would take was one noisy teacher or classmate to ask the right question, then Wes would have to go out of his way to fix things. It was liable to be a giant pain in his ass, and what the hell was a prostitute going to do with a high school education anyway?

Anything that that damned school could teach him that he would need on the job, Wes had already taught him. Like how to count money or talk like he hadn't crawled out of the gutter. He wasn't going to get another job, Wes wouldn't let him do anything that would eat into his time even if it would get him some extra cash. Wes didn't need some pocket change from a nine dollar an hour job and there was no way in hell he would have given him that kind of freedom. And even Duo wasn't dumb enough to think that college was in his future.

But he had let him go anyway. He shouldn't have, in hindsight. He had been lucky that that pathetic, blonde bitch had been the only one trying to track him down. He should have pulled him out years back, but it had just given him one more thing to control Duo with, one more thing to punish him with or threaten him with if he stepped out of line, if he dared to think for a single second that going to school made him special, gave him ideas that someone in his situation didn't have the right to think. It had been useful, but if he had never let him go, he never would have met the Yuy brat. He never would have thought that trying to run away from him might be a good idea, that he didn't need to rely on him because he had something to run away to.

"Daddy."

He wouldn't be making that mistake ever again. He wasn't going to give him a place to hide from him ever again.
End part 11
　

　

(1) No, this isn't a real drug. I've gotten some messages from being confused by this, which I sort of understand because all of the hints have been vague, but this story takes place in the future. By this time, an antibiotic has been created which is stronger and faster than the ones we have now. I just pulled the name of it out of my ass.
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The Road to Kindness