Marked for Death Part 12
Heero took the two blades from his shoulders and held them tightly, one in each hand. Jumping into the battle before him he used them much like daggers, moving around and slashing through the air. The tall soldiers around him didn't have a chance to react to his quick, watery smooth, movements as they were all sent to the ground.
He moved through the men without much thought, his mind concentrating on the battle. He narrowed his thoughts to the simplest of instincts and then opened those to their fullest ability. To fight. To live. To survive. He used his body just like the weapons in his hands, focusing it all on one goal: to come out of this battle alive, or at least in better shape then those he sent dead to the ground.
Before he knew it the fighting around him had died down. Bodies lay on the ground, wounded or dead, most not moving. A quick look around and Heero spotted the others who were still fighting. But there weren't many soldiers left, and in the distance he could see a few running off and disappearing into the trees.
Going for reinforcements?
Frowning he raced over toward the others, making his way toward Trowa.
"Reinforcements will be coming soon," he said, jerking his head toward the retreating soldiers.
Trowa nodded, his vines tossing away one of the few remaining men who attempted to hurt him with a sword. "Head to the caves, we must get there before the reinforcements arrive."
Heero nodded once and turned, making his way toward the caves. As he ran he replaced his blades back on his shoulders, feeling the familiar cold metal melt back to become a part of his skin.
He didn't need to round up the others, didn't need to tell them where to go. Instead he just moved for the caves, knowing that they would follow. All the Marked Ones were prepared for an attack like this, they all knew what the signals were to retreat, and one of them was Heero racing for the caves at top speed.
Footsteps fell in behind him and he glanced over his shoulder just once, surprised to see Duo behind him. For a moment Heero didn't even recognize the Shadow, since he'd never seen Duo with his hair down before. But now it was a sight he was sure he wouldn't forget, even if he'd only glanced over his shoulder for a mere second.
Duo's dark clothes were almost perfectly intact, with very few cuts to be seen. His showing skin glistened with sweat from the strain and excretion of fighting, while his eyes burned with the familiar fire of a warrior in his finest hour. Duo looked every bit like he'd been fighting just as much as Heero, save for the very interesting fact that there was barely a scratch on him. His skin remained unbroken in all places that Heero could see and any blood that was on the Shadow certainly wasn't his own. Duo's unbraided and loose hair only added to the eeriness of his condition as it swirled around his body in the non-existent breeze.
"Are we retreating now?" Duo asked, matching his pace to Heero's so they were only a few steps apart.
Heero grunted an affirmative and picked up speed, hearing more footsteps falling in behind him. This time he didn't have to look back to tell who they were. He knew it was his own people following Trowa's unspoken order to retreat. All of them were now headed for the caves as fast as they could move. Wounded were gathered from the ground and carried, but not many of them were wounded, least not badly. As he ran Heero noticed very few still bodies of his fellow Marked Ones, for which he was very grateful. Thankfully only the soldiers had suffered major losses.
They reached the caves only to be greeted with darkness and silence. There was no sign of the children or of the others that hadn't joined in the fight. Heero stopped at the entrance to the cave and waited in watch, carefully eyeing the trees around them as the others ran inside. It was his job to watch for any soldiers who might follow. His kind knew the caves so well they could lose anyone in there, provided they weren't following right behind.
Soon everyone was inside and Heero followed the last person in. With a small amount of interest he noted that Duo had entered the caves but hadn't gone much further in. Instead the Shadow had elected to quickly re-braid his hair as he waited for Heero to enter the caves.
Upon entering the cave he moved around completely from memory. None of the Marked Ones carried torches or any other source of light. Instead all had been taught the caves as soon as they were old enough to walk, in preparation for this day. Everyone knew the route by heart... except Duo. Heero watched with a small amount of confusion and amusement as Duo held onto his wrist, silently asking Heero to guide him through the utter darkness.
He expected Duo to hesitate or talk to one of the others, considering the misunderstanding between them but Duo didn't. In fact he seemed perfectly content with letting Heero lead him through the darkness. Did Duo trust him now? Was it safe for him to think such an irrational thing? Heero could only hope.
The caves twisted and turned around them, rising and falling. They passed many openings and different passages but all the Marked Ones knew where to go, keeping at least one hand on the wall as they moved. Silence filled the caves save for their echoing footsteps and the muted sounds of water running somewhere in the distance. Heero acknowledged that the first time he'd entered these caves it had taken him an eternity to find his way out again, but now it was all familiar. And in no time at all he reached the meeting place.
The thin cavern walls opened up to reveal a large room where there was a hall in the ceiling. Fresh air! Not to mention this one hole provided a very small amount of light that wasn't visible around the corner from which they had come. To his relief he found the majority of the village inhabitants had gathered here and there weren't many missing, though a good number seemed to be nursing small wounds and resting. Nearly all of them had made it out alive, as far as he could tell. Heero's people had faired better than he expected.
"You should have been there, Trowa, you wouldn't have believed it! I barely do!"
Heero turned to see Trowa standing in the corner speaking with Brei and Hijiri in hushed voices. Yuki stood next to Brei, apparently they'd already exchanged their greetings, and now Brei was telling Trowa a very animated stories as Yuki was trying to remind her to keep her voice down so they wouldn't attract attention. Discreetly Heero took a few steps closer to listen. Duo, on the other hand, walked over and made it very clear he was listening.
Hijiri nodded his head. "It was like in all the old stories Brei tells, people using their blood as weapons!" His eyes were lit up in amazement and Heero knew he must have been repeating whatever events they were speaking about in his mind. Whatever had happened it had shocked them, but also amazed them. Now Heero was very curious.
Trowa frowned slightly. "What happened? Slowly, Brei."
Brei took a deep breath and nodded, calming down. "We were getting the children to the caves, but the soldiers must have suspected we would do this and there was a group waiting for us. I stayed behind to distract them while the children got away," Yuki flashed a look of concern at this but said nothing. Brei continued, "I wasn't able to take on all of them, so Hijiri ran out to help. But Quatre appeared out of nowhere and caught the blade with his bare hands. He said something about being Izardl and then his blood came to life and killed the soldiers. Not like our tattoos, but his actual blood became blades and cut them to pieces. His blood!"
Trowa's eyes widened. "Is he all right?"
Brei nodded. "He's resting over... there." Her voice died as she pointed to a section of wall, but it was empty. Heero frowned, Quatre must have overheard and taken off.
Trowa must have suspected the same thing because he glanced at Heero in question, but Heero shook his head. He hadn't seen which direction the blond thief had gone, and that meant only one thing. Quatre was some where in the caves around them, wandering off and probably lost.
"All right, I want everyone to keep moving through the caves to the other side. A small group will remain behind to look for him; we can't leave him wandering around when the soldiers are out there. And we are not leaving him lost in here."
"I'm staying," Duo said immediately. "It's my fault he came with us, I insisted he travel with us, so I'm going to help you look for him."
Trowa nodded his agreement.
Yuki frowned and crossed her arms. "And if your little group doesn't make it to the opening in time, are we still supposed to seal it?"
"Yes, we will find another way out."
The black haired Marked One frowned deeply at this, making it very clear she wasn't happy with this idea. "I have to be there to collapse the opening, so you're taking Heero with you." It wasn't a request; it was a direct order. Heero would have gone with anyway to protect his friend, but he was glad that Yuki insisted on it. It was Yuki's job to protect Trowa until she was assigned a kingdom to go to and she took her job very seriously... sometimes too seriously.
Trowa still agreed. "The rest of you get moving, we've rested long enough. Make sure you leave no evidence that we were here."
At those words the group split up and began moving once again. Trowa, Duo and Heero waited for the others to take off and checked over the cavern again, making sure there was no evidence left, then they took the other tunnel leading out in the opposite direction, moving in silence.
Not to Heero's surprise they soon came to a fork, forcing them to split up. He clasped his hand on Trowa's shoulder and frowned at his friend, even though he knew Trowa couldn't see his expression in the darkness.
"Be careful. You know Yuki and the others will skin me if anything happens to you," Heero said lightly.
Trowa let out a soft laugh, he was very aware of how angry Yuki might become if something happened to him. "Good luck, my friend."
And then they took off their separate ways, down the paths.
~*~
It was strange, Duo reflected. He should have felt strange clasping onto Heero's hand and letting himself be led through the caves with absolutely no light. Everything around him was completely dark and if it weren't for the hand gripped around his he would have been convinced he was alone. In most cases the darkness around him would have been suffocating, but it wasn't. He couldn't even see to the end of his nose, and yet it was strangely comforting to him.
He could hear their footsteps echoing lightly through the tunnel and he found himself concentrating on that warm hand clasped around his own. The hand of one person, who he'd seen s many sides of. The hand of someone who had looked so quiet and lost that first time he met him. The slave boy... who expected to sleep with someone... who supposedly was trained since birth to take up such a job. Duo now knew that that person had only been a mask, but he couldn't help but associate that person with the Heero he knew now. Something about them was so similar.
"You were completely prepared to sleep with me, weren't you?" Duo asked softly. His voice sounded incredibly loud in the darkness, yet it didn't make him cringe. Instead it didn't feel any different from muttering to himself in the darkness. The complete black that surrounded them was more like the world inside his mind rather than a world where others could hear his voiced thoughts.
Heero didn't respond and Duo actually began to doubt if he'd actually said his words out loud. But then Heero did murmur an answer, an answer that was soft and quiet despite the tendency of the smallest sound to be caught by the walls and echoed all around them.
"Yes."
"How could you do something like that? I mean I know it was your job or something to find out what happened to Sorata, but why that? Why pose as someone like that? Why be that type of person? Did you just need to get that close? And why me? Why me of all people?" Duo sighed loudly and pulled his hand away from Heero's, not wanting to walk any farther. Instead he stood there in the darkness, no longer touching the only person who would be able to show him the way out. But he just stood there.
Silence surrounded him and he waited for a while, halfway expecting Heero's hand to reach out and grasp back onto him. Part of Duo wanted to reach out into that seemingly endless darkness and search for Heero. Without that warm hand clasped around his own he felt strangely empty... and very alone.
"I want to hate you," Duo said lightly, his voice reflecting forced anger. Anger he didn't really feel, couldn't feel. He didn't care if Heero had continued on down the tunnel, because, he realized, these words weren't only admitting his feelings to Heero, but also to himself.
"I wanted to hate you for nearly killing Wufei. My only friend, the only person who ever cared about me my entire life since my parents died! My only family that I can actually remember! I want to hate you for coming so close to taking that away from me! But you know what hurt me more, Heero? What hurt me more was the fact that you gave me a taste of something I'd wanted for so long, and then you ripped it away. Do you understand what you took from me?! Wufei gave you to me so I would have another friend. Another friend to talk to... someone who might actually be able to understand, at least to listen to me. Someone like... someone I could..." Duo's voice dropped away and he sighed softly. He took a noisy step back and sighed again, running his hand through his bangs and pushing his hair off his shoulders.
"Someone I could talk to. Someone who might actually treat me as a person rather than a shadow on the wall." He closed his eyes and clenched his fists together. "I'm sick of not being treated as a human! I'm human too! I'm sick of people not seeing me! I'm sick of not being seen! And I should really hate you, Heero, because you know what you did? You only served to remind me of that fact, remind me that no matter what in the end I will always be a Shadow. In the end I am nothing but the one who stands behind the prince, nothing but a black mark on the wall, something to be ignored. I'm not even human anymore!"
Duo felt his knees give out and he dropped to the ground, hitting the floor of the caves hard with a loud thump. His cheeks felt hot and his eyes itched, showing just how close to tears he actually was. "Why?" He whispered softly. "Why'd you have to leave... why'd you have to take away what little you gave me in the first place?"
To Duo's surprise a hand timidly touched his shoulder... from behind him.
Behind him?
No, that wasn't right.
His body stiffened and he held his breath, his mind concentrating on the hand on his shoulder and the silence around him.
"Heero?" He whispered softly.
How had Heero ended up behind him? Had the Marked One moved that silently? He didn't remember hearing Heero move and yet he also didn't remember turning around as he spilled out his feelings. But the hand was still resting on his shoulder and it gave him the creeps.
"Well, if it isn't my favorite little shadow," said a low voice.
Duo's blood ran cold and he nearly choked on his own throat.
There was the snap of rock and suddenly light filled the cavern. Duo gave a small cry as his eyes burned from the sudden change of light. He brought his arms up to shield his eyes just as he felt something cold and metallic rest against his neck.
He froze.
The cavern was now filled with light and he was able to see Heero standing in front of him, the Marked One shielding his own eyes from the light. But he could also see the look of anger tinged with a small amount of fear on the boy's face. And it didn't take much thought to figure out who was behind him and holding the blade to his neck. He'd recognize that voice anywhere.
Duo's eyes narrowed as he hissed under his breath.
"Darrin."
TBC...
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