Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Winter Demon ❯ One ( Prologue )

Winter Demon

By Nix Winter

Pairings: 2x1, 1x2, past tense Relena+1

Notes: AU

Warnings: Child Abuse, OC death, attempted suicide, it's gonna be long and I'm gonna finish it before Nov.. so it's going to be fast and furious :*smiles*

Duo's rooms were above the art classroom. His windows looked out on the courtyard. The rooms themselves were comfortable. A million books and manga lined the walls, expensive tastes really, as one had to pay weight tax on the things one owned on L2. He made up for it a little though by having almost nothing for furniture, just a thick mat on the floor that he'd stolen from Heero and never bothered to roll up the way the Japanese man had, and a table with a insta-hot unit on it. He ate in the cafeteria with the other residents of Maxwell Academy most nights.

He hadn't tonight, having actually gone out to dinner in honor of Heero's birthday, even if it was a day late. The artificial sunlight had started to fade by the time he got up the stairs and to his room. The whole building was like the oldest building he'd seen in the Sanq kingdom, like something from before Earth ever thought about colonies in space. His door was the only one in the place of real solid oak and it cost him on the weight tax, but there had been oak paneling in the room, this Victorian hotel room, the very first and only time he'd had sex with his soul mate. That's why his door was oak, and why all the other doors in the whole place were synth-oak, each done in nice Victorian style.

Dressed in black, he almost looked like he'd taken the final step and become a priest. Black pants, jacket, but black shirt ruined the effect. His cane was black too, with a silver demon rising up in front of the handle, the open wings arching back over his hand. Not really a standard cane for the professor of antiquities at the finest Catholic academy in the colonies, maybe in all of Earth as well, but then Duo Maxwell didn't do anything standard, not his heart, not the longevity of his love, and definitely not his cane.

The limp was a little worse than usual today. It always seemed to get worse around Heero's birthday. The joint was healed, as well as it would be, until he let them replace it. Two years had taught him to limp with it. Stubborn as Earth's ice and snow, he had his standards and he wasn't going to let anyone touch his knee until, until what was broken in the snow was fixed. And well, it didn't snow on L2.

His key was old and black, not iron but a nice replica. It slipped into the thick lock and opened the door, releasing all the myriad of unseen security. He'd built this place, after all, designed the buildings and stolen the money for it. Hell, he occasionally still acquired money for it. The Church's standard of financial support didn't seem to cover the school's needs, not when over half the students were orphans and the academy gave them access to the best in technology, the best of everything. The Maxwell Academy even had a painting of Father Maxwell and Sister Helen in the chapel, which made it feel holy, mostly home like to Duo. Shinigami had come home.

Duo pushed his door open. The smell of books and burned coffee, laundry that could stand to be washed greeted him, right along with the photo of he and Heero that hung on the wall. With less need to be dignified, he set his cane by the door, reset the security, and moved slowly towards the windows, to close the blinds, he told himself, but once he was there, he laid his fingers over Heero's face in the photo, putting even more finger prints on the glass. This was an old pain too, older and sweeter than his ruined knee. "I love you," he whispered to the photo, in the highest polite form of Japanese, I love you forever, I am yours forever, You own my heart, so it still beats. "I love you, Heero," he said again, in English.

Limping, he crossed to the computer as he unwove his braid. There was only one message, and he tapped the screen, telling it to play. Relena's voice stopped the whole room, Duo's breathing. "Duo. This is Relena. Call me. It's about Heero. Urgent."