Thanks to: The War Room, reviewers like Moffit, Merith, Triv, Mikke, Jeane, Nicole, Nikki, Cy, and anyone else I forgot to mention that has given me valuable feedback (nothing personal if I left you off, I'm just a ditz ^_^;; )
"I didn't know how many of them it would have taken to beat my ass....but I knew how many they were gonna use. That's a handy bit of information, right there."
--- Ron White
"When you're brought into this world , they say you're born in sin
Well at least they gave me something I didn't have to steal or have to win
Well, they tell me that I'm wanted, yeah, I'm a wanted man
I'm a colt through your stable, I'm what Cain was to Abel
Mister catch me if you can."
--- Bon Jovi, Blaze Of Glory
Fall From Innocence Part 4
Cue the Waltz
Duo "Kid" Maxwell was working on a mobile suit again, but this time, it was okay. It was a mining suit, not a fighter suit. He was in his home town, in a place he had known for most of his young life. He was also working on a mobile suit he had never piloted and never would.
Two and a half months had passed since he showed up in the L2 spaceport with nothing but a hundred creds in his bag, his tools, two changes of clothes, a toothbrush, and a set of forged identification.
Things were a lot better.
His worst problem was keeping his head down. Even though he knew Wufei's unit was probably stationed no where near L2, every time he saw a Preventer squad on the streets, he panicked at the thought of seeing Wufei with them, and Wufei seeing him.
He had a good job, a simple life. He didn't want to have to feel ashamed of it.
When he went on break, he went over to the small fridge near the door to Yofer's office and pulled out a beer, carrying it back over to the Leo he was working on and climbing up with it. He laid out on the flat of the mobile suit's hatch, cracking the beer open and resting it on his stomach, staring up at the ceiling and watching the fans turn.
Duo felt something that he hadn't felt in years-satisfaction. He was satisfied with his life.
Life wasn't perfect, not even great, but it was good enough for him, and better than a lot of people on L2 could ever hope for. When he first arrived in the spaceport that night, not knowing where to go or who he could trust, he thought that his life as an ex-soldier would be empty. But it wasn't.
He could enjoy little things again. He read Harper's books at night in the light of the red neon outside their window at night, some of them so old and decrepit the pages were falling out. He could laugh and joke and curse with the other techs. He learned that it was the same way it had always been; for all their rough language and explosive tempers, the lifestyle of a tech was a relatively carefree one.
It was great to know that this day he would work on the Leo, and the day after, too. And after the Leo was fixed, he would move onto something else, every day pretty much just like the one before it. There wasn't any rush, any peril, anything to catch him or throw him off his balance. Little things.
He had also rediscovered the joys of good, hard manual work. It was nice to have a job where no one was trying to kill you, and if you were a good guy, everyone liked you pretty equally.
A face suddenly leaned over him, and Duo jerked, spilling a little of his beer.
"Drinking on the job, Kid? Shame, shame," Harper said, grinning down at him. "Yofer or Johnnie catch you, they'll tan your hide."
"Jesus, Harp, don't do that. You scared the life out of me."
"Don't be so jumpy." Harper laid out on the hatch next to him, folding his hands behind his head. He yawned. "You finish the circuit board in the left pied yet?"
Duo could have finished it five times over already, but he figured it was better not to draw any attention to himself; he didn't complete his tasks any more quickly than the others. At least, not anymore. Not since that first day.
"Nope."
"Let me help. I'll run test in the hatch, and you can tweak it. We'll get it up before it's time to clock out, whatcha say? Then we can stop by Orion's, huh? Get a couple of drinks and something to eat? I'm starvin' over here."
Duo smirked. "You're always starving."
Harper laughed at him, turning to look him in the face. "Yeah, well, gotta feed the machine. So you in?"
"Sure," Duo said, smiling a little. "Sounds good."
And it did.
~*~
Everything was fine until the soldiers came in.
Duo didn't look up, but he could tell by the way the bartender tensed up, and the raucous conversation in the bar quieted a little. He glanced over at Harper, and saw the tense set of the other man's shoulders.
"Hey, check out the white wolf. Awrrooo!" one of them called from the doorway, and the others laughed.
Harper flinched, but stayed silent.
The one who had spoken stepped forward a few steps. His voice was quiet and vicious. "Think you're done with that drink there, pard. Make a little room at the bar. You're stinkin' up the place."
"Don't fight in here," the bartender said in a growl, glaring at the squad of soldiers who had come in.
Harper took a swallow of his drink. He didn't turn to look at the man taunting him.
"You ain't so big now, are you reb? See you're still wearing your mark. When are you going to give it up? Take off the band." The last wasn't a question. It was an order.
Harper didn't look at them, but Duo could see his eyes narrow as he stared into his glass.
"Last time I checked, this was an American colony. Pretty sure that makes it a free fuckin' country," the blond tech answered softly, before nursing his whiskey.
Duo cut his eyes at the tech sitting next to him. But neither of them turned around.
The five Preventers circled them, closing in.
"What about you, faggot? Yeah you, guy with the long hair. You are a guy, right? You a rebel, too?"
Duo turned to him slowly. He smiled, the most friendly, open smile he could pull off. One of the Preventers smiled back at him, unable to help it. Duo liked to use the fact that it was hard not to smile at someone who was smiling at you. He looked at the one who had baited him, grinning widely.
"Hey, man. You used to be an OZ soldier?"
The black-haired soldier looked taken aback for a moment, then his expression sank back into a baleful glare. He sneered. "How'd you guess?"
Duo shrugged, still smiling. "You smell like an Ozzie."
The soldiers looked at each other, confused.
"Smells kinda like...chickenshit."
"You brat bastard! " One of them grabbed Duo by the back of the jumpsuit, hurling him down the bar, shattering shotglasses and steins. Duo slid off the edge and cracked his head on a bar-stool. He fell to the floor, his head bleeding, stunned.
"You! Soldiers! No fighting in my bar, motherfuckers! I'm calling the cops!"
One of the soldiers launched a kick at Duo's ribs he was too dazed to avoid; he attempted to roll away, but he was cornered against the bar. It wasn't the sharp pain he expected, but a huge, all-encompassing numbness. He wondered if his ribs were broken.
Another drew back a heavy boot to kick him again, and Duo closed his eyes. There was a sound of struggling over him, the sound of a fist connecting with flesh in a meaty thumping sound, and a body thudded next to him on the floor.
The other patrons of the bar edged towards the door, and the bartender glared at them helplessly, raising a glass he had been cleaning as if to hurl it at the soldiers.
"Get out! Get out! Jesus, Harper, take it outside!"
Harper pulled out a twenty-cred and laying it on the bar before jerking Duo to his feet by the front of his shirt. Once Duo was steady, he let go, eyeing the other soldiers with a strange smile.
"You heard the man. Let's take it outside, boys. Leave the kid out of it. I'm the one you wanted, right? C'mon. I'll take you one at a time or all at once. Doesn't make any difference to me. Your blood in the gutter. I don't care if you mix it or not."
"We'll be waiting," the soldier replied, a hard grin on his face. He kicked the one on the floor, who was groaning, a hand up to his face. "Get up." He got a groan in return, and the fallen soldier turned his face to the floor. He made a disgusted sound and turned away.
The remaining four soldiers stalked out.
Harper grabbed a half-full bottle of beer from the bar that had been miraculously spared from Duo's free-dive across the bar-top. He emptied it out onto the fallen soldier, then slammed the end of it against the edge of the bar, causing one of the female patrons to shriek from where she sat in a corner, covering her head with her hands.
He studied the jagged, shattered end, then nodded, as if it pleased him.
"Sorry 'bout the mess, Charlie," Harper said softly, his voice barely carrying, even in the silence. "I'll wait tables. Make it up to you. C'mon, Kid. But stay out of it."
Duo gasped softly, one arm against his chest. He could feel stinging warmth on the back of his head; blood trickled down the nape of his neck. He reached into his pocket, feeling for his switchblade with fingers that had gone numb. There was slivers of glass in his arm, and they were beginning to sting. He pulled out the knife, leaving it folded in his hand.
He looked over at Harper with a pained, lopsided grin. "We...we can take 'em."
Harper glanced down at him, smiling back faintly. "What part of 'stay out of it' don't you understand?"
"The... stayin' out part. Be careful, Harp. They got guns."
"They won't use 'em."
Duo shook his head slowly as he walked forward, wobbling a little from the blow to the back of the head. "They will. Maxwell's Law of Stupidity. Any pissed off idiot with a gun is gonna use it."
"Who?"
"Nevermind."
They walked out of the bar. The soldiers were waiting for them. They fanned out on either side; Duo and Harper moved back-to-back, and Duo's switchblade came out in a dove-gray flicker under the streetlights. Harper's broken bottle sparkled.
The first soldier laughed. "Look out, boys. They're gonna try to stick us."
Suddenly, one of them aimed for Duo, swinging a slow, powerful haymaker, and Duo ducked under it easily. He reached up and hit the guy in the face with the heel of his hand, breaking the man's nose. He was careful not to hit too hard and drive shards of bone into the soldier's brain.
A second attacker hooked his fist around as hard as he could, but Duo was just not there. He dodged like a ghost and came around, landing a solid jab to the soldier's nose, bloodying it. The man swung blindly again as he staggered, but Harper turned and caught him with the bottle, slashing his arm from wrist to elbow. Duo floored him with a blow to the side of the neck, then went to the ground on his hands and knees, feeling at the soldier's side.
The third soldier swung doubled fists at Harper from behind, bringing them down hard against the back of Harper's neck. Harper toppled to his knees, dropping the bottle, and then there was a ring of cold steel against the back of his head.
"Don't move, grease monkey, or I'll blow your goddamned brains out. I'm takin' you in for assaulting an officer."
Duo's voice came from deep in the shadows, low and soft. It was enough to cause a chill to race down Harper's neck.
"No, you guys don't move, not one fucking inch, or I'll kill you both."
Duo stepped into the pool of streetlight, face pale. His eyes were dark and blazing.
"Now, you just put that gun down, boy," the black-haired soldier said gently, not moving. "You move and I'm gonna blow this fellow's brains out. You don't have the guts to shoot a dog on the street, so just lay it down. Don't make it worse for you than it already is."
Duo's voice was calm and soft. "You shoot, and I shoot. Swear to God. No more fighting. Hasn't there been enough?"
The black-haired soldier reached up with his free hand, wiping blood from a busted lip. He looked weirdly young and sullen, like a teenage boy whipped for shoplifting. "You rebel bastards killed my lil' boy."
"And I'm sure he'd be real proud to see his daddy about to shoot a mechanic armed with a broken bottle. Look, guy," Duo said, his voice soft. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small piece of metal. It shone under the streetlight.
L2's Star Cross; courage under fire. L2 had wanted to throw a ceremony, but Duo ducked out of it, and Quatre had simply delivered it through Trowa. He held it up under the streetlight, so the Preventers could see it.
"You think I don't understand? I do. He's not a soldier, he's a tech. Same as me. He's trying to live in peace, just like me, and just like you, right? There isn't any need for this shit. We're never gonna have peace until we put the damned war behind us. So drop it, okay? Or else let's finish this thing. Just a couple more bodies on the curb, right?"
The remaining two soldiers looked shaken.
Finally, the dark-haired one lowered the gun. "All right," he said, quietly. "All right for now." He looked down at Harper, and a flash of that inexplicable hate crossed his face before disappearing again. "It's over. You lost. Damn sure better remember that."
The soldiers helped up their fallen comrades, walking off with them.
Duo let out a shaky sigh, lowering the gun, and Harper stood up, watching them walk away. His voice was almost a whisper when he spoke again. "You were really going to shoot 'em, weren't you Kid?"
"Naaaah, I was just bluffing them out," Duo replied, forcing a grin. Harper didn't look convinced, looking at him silently in a way that made Duo want to squirm with discomfort, as if he was being caught in a lie. "I wanted to," he finally admitted, softly.
"Why didn't you?"
"Woulda made us no better than them," Duo said, raising his hand to the back of his head. He grimaced, wiping the blood onto his jumpsuit in a bloody streak. He glanced up at Harper. "Why didn't you say something, back there, huh Harp? Why'd you just sit there and let them talk to you like that?"
Harper looked at him, smiling a little. "Always better to let the other guy throw the first punch. Right?"
Duo smirked, and Harper raised an eyebrow at him.
"Didn't even use your blade."
"Didn't have to."
"...Can I see that brass?"
Duo hesitated a moment, the medal clenched in his fist, then handed it over. Harper turned it over on his palm, rubbing his thumb over it, before reverently handing it back. Duo pocketed it quickly, then began to walk back to Yofer's. Harper walked next to him, silent for a few moments. Finally, he spoke again.
"Where'd you get that, Kid?"
Duo glanced over at him, then winked.
"Stole it."
"Well, where'd you learn to fight like that?"
"Boy Scouts," Duo answered, without missing a beat.
Harper's laughter rang into the night.
TBC...
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