Disclaimer: The characters belong to Sotsu, Sunrise, Bandai Entertainment, I neither claim them nor certainly make any money off them!
Pairing: 6x2
Rating: Lemony in places
Time Setting: Post-series, three years later (minus events in Ground Zero, Blind Target, Endless Waltz as when I started this, I hadn't seen or read about these yet)
Summary: A chance meeting leads to the recovery of a wounded heart.
Duo went back to his own room after ten minutes, unable to sit still to wait for Zechs to return. He puttered around, putting the neat room in even neater order, repacking his belongings just in case, sampling a beer from the stocked refrigerator in his room, then turning on his laptop.
There was a call coming through right *then*. Hastily Duo opened the transmission channel. It was Heero. "Hey, buddy, miss me already?" he quipped, wondering why his friend was calling from the shuttle.
"Did he talk to you?" Heero asked. He didn't see Zechs in the background, was Duo alone?
"Er, yeah, he sure did," Duo admitted with a relieved smile. "I owe ya, too, buddy."
"I'll remind you of that sometime," Heero replied coolly. "So, where is he?"
Duo flushed. "Um, he needed a little space."
"Hmph. So, how did the talk go?"
[Why is *Heero* asking me this?] "Fine, it went fine," Duo muttered. "We're okay, really."
Heero looked askance at him, but didn't push it. "He just called his sister to ask her to open an office for the Peacecraft Foundation on Earth."
"He did?" [Whew, maybe he isn't out there moping around after all...]
"Yeah. She called me immediately. I'm glad he did that -it's been a long time since she's felt anything but helpless around her brother. Zechs... has a way of doing that to people sometime."
Duo frowned. "You implying something here?"
"Not at all." Heero even managed a little smile. "I'm just glad he's turning his life around. And I'm glad you're there with him."
"Heero... why are you so concerned? Why did you call me, just to check up on your repayment?"
The look he got from Heero stunned him. The other man actually looked hurt. "Easy, Duo, you don't need to be so defensive. I know it surprises you to know that I care, but I do. You're a friend... and I'm glad I could touch base with you again. It's been a long time. And Zechs..."
Duo felt more than defensive all of a sudden. He crossed his arms over his chest and glared challengingly at the other ex-pilot. "What about Zechs?"
Heero nodded, accepting the challenge. "I don't know if it's because of Relena or because of all those battles we fought together, but somehow I feel as if he's my brother or something." He gave a little contented sigh. "I think Quatre and I are going to be good for each other. I see how you got it bad for Zechs, Duo. I can relate, for I've kinda got it bad for Quatre. So I guess what I'm saying is that I'm definitely not any kind of competition with you for Zechs, though I feel close to him. I want to see both of you happy."
[When he talks, he really lets loose,] Duo thought, relaxing. [Although I still think he needs to rethink the Quatre thing and look a little closer to home...] "That's the most you've ever said to me, Yuy."
"You're welcome. Do you feel better? I just care about you both and want to see you happy together, that's all." Heero was relaxing further, too. Away from a mission and certainly away from the war, Heero Yuy had finally learned how to let others in his life.
"You do? Heero!" Duo's face lit up with delight.
Chuckling, Heero nodded. "Yeah, funny thing that, eh? It seems in some ways that the war still connects us all, like we're one big happy family. We need those connections, Duo."
"You said it," Duo murmured, remembering how lonely he'd been just a short time ago. "Hey, maybe you'll get to be our best man, Heero."
"I'd like that," Heero replied with a smile. "Say, I have to go - just wanted to touch base with you guys one more time. Glad everything is... progressing. Take care, Duo, okay?"
"Yep, you, too, Heero," Duo responded. When he turned off the computer again, he found tears in his eyes again. [Oh, Heero,] he thought, taking a deep breath, [I needed your friendship a hell of a lot sooner than this...]
There was a knock at the door. "Come in, it's unlocked," he called out. To his relief, Zechs stuck his head in the door tentatively.
"Duo," Zechs began, but paused when he noted that Duo's eyes were glistening. Had he been crying? Resolutely, he came inside, shutting the door behind him, and was by Duo's side in a few steps. He tipped the boy's chin up to look at him, slipping a hand around his waist. "Is something wrong, angel?"
The look of avid concern and the endearment melted the young man even more. "Not any more," he breathed, looking up into the handsome face of golden skin, high cheekbones, the prominent eyes of pale blue crystal, and the white brows drawn together in concern. "God, you're so beautiful... do you know that at first I figured you didn't want me because of what I was?"
Zechs's eyes widened. "I... I don't understand..."
"You know," Duo replied, putting on a grin he didn't feel. "A street rat. A punk of a former pilot, a scrap dealer, a useless..."
The taller man stopped the self-derisive verbiage the best way he knew how, with a kiss. Zechs pulled Duo more firmly into his arms, bending to take his mouth. He slipped his tongue inside, intending to explore... and love.
Duo emitted a muffled gasp of delight into his lover's mouth, his arms going around Zechs's neck as the other collected him into his embrace. [Oh, NOW we're getting somewhere!] he crowed to himself. But where he would throw abandon to the wind and turn up the heat between them, Zechs did not seem ready to go there, kissing Duo slowly as if he wanted to take a very long time.
[I'm already hard for him,] Duo realized with a rush, squirming a little in his lover's long arms. [Oh, shit, I want to go back to that night, continue from where we ran out of steam...] He pulled himself up against Zechs all the more, letting the tall man bear his weight, pressing his hardness against the man's hip.
Much too soon, he was being set back on his feet and steadied as Zechs pulled slowly off his mouth then turned his head to the side. He'd felt the erection pushing against him. "You... you mustn't speak that way about yourself," he murmured, breathing deeply. "It's bad enough when I do it. We don't both..." [I shouldn't have kissed him... now he's aroused! I can't... not yet...]
Duo was kissing his cheek, jaw, whatever he could still reach. "Okay, just love me," he breathed, threading his fingers into the long fall of silken platinum hair. "I want you so much! I want you to go back to our one night and continue, but this time, to make love to me, to fuck me, Zechs..."
Abruptly Duo found himself picked up and deposited on his bed, but not for the reason he'd hoped. Zechs had turned him around to face away from him, seating Duo on the bed then climbing onto it himself to sit behind him. He draped his legs to either side of the smaller man, then with a long sigh pulled Duo back against him into his arms, trapping Duo's arms at his sides.
It wasn't until then that Duo realized that Zechs was shaking. Stunned, he laid his head back against the broad shoulder. Biting his lip, he made himself wait for Zechs to tell him what was wrong. [Okay, so he's still not ready - what did I expect? It's me, I'm greedy. I'm head over heels in love with this beautiful man, this kind, loving soul, and I want him so bad I could gnaw my knuckles off... shit...]
"I... I'm sorry," Zechs murmured brokenly a moment later. He nuzzled his nose against the thick brown hair. "I must tell you, Duo Maxwell, that I'm not a very casual man. That one night we had... th...that was very strange of me. I don't normally take casual lovers -ever. As soon as I could tell in a relationship that it was not going the way of permanence, I ended it. I... have had three like that."
[I'd put good money down that one of those was Treize Khushrenada,] Duo thought, his heart sinking. [So is he trying to say that he doesn't want a deeper relationship with me?] But still he bit his lip, not letting himself speak prematurely.
"I tend to be... consuming," Zechs admitted, his voice dropping a register.
[And I want to be consumed!] Duo thought, the deep words sending a spike of lust up his spinal column. [Body, soul, mind, baby, I'm yours...]
Zechs began to kiss Duo's hair gently, feeling the sweet ache of love in his own chest for his beautiful little lover. "I... should tell you about the others."
Duo swallowed a sudden lump in his throat. "You don't have to, Zechs. You really don't."
"I do." The tight grasp pinning Duo's arms loosened and Zechs's hands came down to twine with Duo's in the boy's lap. "The shortest one was with another soldier after I became an officer. It was joyous but brief, both of us seeking something else, someone else... I don't know. It helped me settle my own preferences, I suppose." Absently he rubbed his thumb against Duo's fingertips.
[God, I love him holding me like this,] Duo thought, relaxing a little.
"Then shortly before graduation from the OZ Academy, I had something... with Lieutenant Noin." His breath caught in his throat, the pain returning as if fresh. "It was not meant to be, and I never fully succeeded in getting her to believe that."
Duo cleared his throat. "She left us to remain at your side at the end," he reminded Zechs gently, though he knew the memory must bring the man pain.
"We were close friends," Zechs admitted, his lips against Duo's hair. "She told me once that I had to allow her to feel as she did for me, even if I couldn't feel the same thing... even as she knew we would never be together. Then..."
[Here it comes...]
Zechs inhaled deeply of the younger man's scent, uniquely Duo and mixed with something soft and fragrant from his shampoo. [He is my anchor now,] he contemplated before responding, [and I will love him as fully as I may, how I never was able to before. No political machines separate us, and few years. I must have fallen deeply in love with every one of them, Treize, long ago. When did it happen? Did you know? Is that why you pulled away, to spare me? Did you see how they consumed my soul and that is why you let me go? If only you'd met Heero sooner, or your Wufei, you might not have let me get so obsessed... And now, Treize, I have found one of these mighty stars who actually wants to love me back! Do you understand from your lofty tier in heaven?]
Then the bitterness returned. [No. You never understood, Treize Khushrenada, not fully. Or else you would never have built Epyon and inflicted it upon Heero Yuy. I ceased loving you then for the last time.]
Epyon. The dark half of his soul.
"I loved Treize," he spoke at last, his emotions settling. "But I think he knew how deeply the Gundams, all you pilots, were affecting me... and he cut me loose shortly before I came to outer space as an ambassador from the Sank Kingdom."
Duo's heart sank; how the hell was he supposed to compete with the memory of someone larger than life like the Soul of OZ himself, Treize Khushrenada? But something in Zechs's honestly spoken words sounded strange. "Affecting you? Um..."
Zechs sighed and kissed Duo's hair again, smiling. "I think I began to fall in love with you Gundam pilots... by then it had already happened. After Heero's self-detonation in Siberia, when that selfless little warrior threw away his precious life to make a statement to OZ... I began to change. Duo, I knew Heero wasn't dead. I knew it."
[What if he wishes I were Heero? Did he want to be with him? Am I just the ex-Gundam pilot that's available?] Duo worried, wondering if that was why Zechs was keeping him so close right now... to let him down easy.
"Okay," Duo made himself say something, anything, when Zechs paused. "You have a connection with Heero, don't you? Perhaps if it had been him who stumbled into you that day..."
"What?" Zechs interrupted, surprised. "What are you talking about?"
Duo firmly extricated himself from Zechs's embrace, scooting away and turning around to face him. He sat cross-legged, his arms folded defensively over his chest, the large, luminous blue-violet eyes fixed intently on the older man. "This... I'm just the one that came along, aren't I? If it had been Heero..."
"I don't want Heero," Zechs broke in breathily, frowning at him. "I want you, only you, Duo, but if I love you, I know I'll never love another." He crawled closer, taking one of Duo's hands and bringing the knuckles up to his lips for a courtly kiss. "If you want something that intense. I... I can get very intense." He bowed his head then glanced up again. "And here I was fearing you'd rather be with Heero yourself."
[Intense...] Duo's mind was still spinning dizzily with joy as he thought about being consumed in love with Zechs Merquise. "Huh? Heero?" Duo shook his head emphatically, then threw his head back and roared with laughter. "Hee, hee, it doesn't matter, Heero is madly in love with Quatre!" [Or Trowa...] Then he recovered his old fire as he pushed Zechs back into a sitting position and landed firmly in his lap, not heeding that he nearly knocked the breath out of the other man. "Intense? Hey, this is DUO talking! I'm the one who begged you to control me and you don't think I can do intense?"
Zechs found himself with a luscious armful of ex-Gundam pilot straddling his hips, arms circling his shoulders, a wide grin on the younger man's face. "Maybe I misspoke," Zechs said, looking into his eyes hesitantly. "I mean permanent."
The grin faded but was replaced by a wide-eyed wonder and hope that did a lot toward healing Zechs's ailing spirit. "I... I didn't expect you'd bring that up already," Duo whispered, reaching up to touch the man's cheek tenderly.
The man's eyes narrowed intently. "I would not mislead you, Duo Maxwell. You should know now that I cannot be merely your lover." Zechs slipped his arms around Duo's back, supporting him and drawing him closer. "How can I not want to marry the man who is healing my heart? I love you, Duo, only you."
Duo swallowed a sob that wanted to break out. "Are you asking me to marry you, Zechs?" He gazed into the crystalline blue eyes, wanting to drown in them.
Zechs also felt like drowning. "When I am healed, I will ask you, yes."
"Mmmm?" Duo looked at him strangely. "That's a no... and you seem pretty good to me..."
The man leaned his forehead against Duo's and took a deep breath. "I will be. There's something I've got to do someday - clear the air with Noin. I owe her that. I've talked to my sister, finally... but it would help to see her. And... I want to go public with the Peacecraft Foundation. It's time I stopped hiding from the colonies." He kissed Duo's forehead tenderly and straightened. "I will need to lean on you for all that. Then I think I can start my life over with you."
Duo smiled slowly, relaxing. "Well, when you ask me, Zechs... I'll be saying yes."
Zechs bit his lip. He wanted to protest that he didn't deserve Duo's love, but he wasn't supposed to say things like that. Obviously those voices hadn't been silenced yet. Only in time. He nodded, then pulled Duo close against his chest. "Thank you... in advance," he whispered hoarsely.
[Then I'm never letting you go, Zechs Merquise,] Duo thought happily, hugging his beloved hard. Then his stomach growled, causing him to laugh again. "Whoops, guess it's time for dinner!"
"Can we go out, angel?" Zechs whispered, his breath hot in the other's ear.
[Shit, anything...] "Yep, that'd be great - beats room service!"
A half hour later, they were sitting in a restaurant. Duo was chatting animatedly, his fork held aloft and threatening to throw a bite of salad somewhere where it wasn't wanted... and Zechs Merquise was enjoying the display and thinking that he was the luckiest man in the EarthSphere.
End Part I