Ha. I made it. I am pleased with myself. ^_______^ I figured as sure as I didn't call the Thanksgiving fic the unbirthday fic, I wouldn't get this done in time. But look! I even have a day to spare! *struts* And not only that, but it's the next piece of Karma! *struts more* This may even be the end... Karma!Duo seems to finally be shutting up for some odd reason. ^^;
So happy unbirthday to all the November folks! *throws streamers and balloons*
Karma IV
In the realm of reading emotions, until recently, I had equated 'mud' with the ultimate in unfathomable feelings. I think of mud in relation to Duo Maxwell more often than not. He's probably the hardest of my friends to read, something he delights in. But after spending an afternoon trapped with a post-surgery Duo Maxwell... mud just didn't seem to describe it anymore.
Sludge was closer. Oily sludge.
I had wrestled with the decision to call Heero for a couple of hours; I knew he was going to be pissed if I did, but it had worked out pre-surgery pretty darn well. He might not have been thrilled with making the trip down to the clinic, but it hadn't taken him five minutes to achieve a calm in Duo I hadn't managed with over an hour of prodding. It had actually been kind of irritating. But while pre-surgery Duo had been... touchy, post-surgery Duo was... weird.
'What the hell do you mean 'weird', Winner?' Heero wanted to know. 'What is with you today? You're not normally this damn... helpless.'
'I'm not helpless!' I snapped, it had been a long day and the Tylenol I'd finally had the time to acquire during the actual surgery, weren't doing a thing for my Duo-induced headache. 'And weird as in... weird. He's worse than muddy! He's all... muted. And depressed. And upset again, only different. But all he does is just lie there and look... sludgy.'
Heero just stared at me for a minute. 'Sludgy. Are you serious? I don't think Duo is the one with the problem here... I think you are.'
'Just shut it until you've tried to talk to him yourself,' I growled and turned to lead the way down the hall.
'If you dragged me down here for nothing,' Heero muttered behind me, 'I'm going to kill you.' But he did follow me. Sometimes the guy can be such a pain in the ass.
Even if it would have pissed Heero off if there had been nothing wrong by the time we got to Duo's room, I couldn't help wishing just that. As irritated as I was with the whole world at that moment, Duo is still my best friend and I seriously did not like seeing him so... weird.
But, unfortunately, Duo was still just lying there staring with his uncovered eye, at... nothing much. And the aura around him was still just as muted and morose and so horribly not Duo, it was creeping me out.
'Duo?' I called gently, 'Heero's here.'
He looked faintly confused and rolled his head just enough to verify what I was saying. I have to confess, I'd been harboring a secret hope that just his partner's presence would be enough to penetrate the fog he seemed to be in, but there really wasn't much of a reaction.
'Heero?' he asked fuzzily. 'Are the reports done? Why are you back again?'
Heero snorted, and his irritation with me would have been plain even if I hadn't been able to feel it. He set it aside for Duo though. 'Somebody keeps getting his panties in a bind and calling me.'
'I don't wear panties, Yuy!' I exclaimed, and wondered at what point a headache caused your brain to just meltdown.
Duo did that same slow roll of his head to bring me into his field of vision, and I reflected that perhaps I should have stayed on the same side of the bed with Heero. 'Why'd you call Heero, Quatre?' he wondered, sounding like he wasn't sure he really even cared.
'Well...' I began, not quite sure how to phrase it. You don't go around telling Duo Maxwell that you think he's afraid of something. But that's what I was feeling... deep down underneath a lot of other crap, Duo was scared. In a weird sort of way. I just couldn't figure out of what. 'He's your partner, and I just thought he ought to be here for you. To see you. After. And all.'
Well, that hadn't come out real great. I was opening my mouth to try again when Duo managed to work up some irritation of his own. 'I'm not gonna be the raccoon because you wear panties, Winner. If the 877s don't happen on time, you can be the fucking raccoon.'
I turned wide eyes in Heero's direction. 'You see? Tell me that's not weird?' I was kind of pissed when Heero just laughed.
'Makes perfect sense to me,' he chuckled, his mood lifting just a tiny bit. But then he cocked his head and gave me a penetrating look. 'Quatre, have you never sat with anyone after a surgery before? They do drug you, you know. He's so far off in la-la land, it's not even funny.'
'I know la-la when I see it!' I growled, grabbing at the bed rail in my frustration. 'And I'll give you that the drugs might be accounting for the weird muted part, and the fog... but they don't explain the scare... uh... upset feelings under that.'
Heero looked at me and then looked at Duo. 'Are you being a dumb-ass, Maxwell?' he asked, and all I could do was gape at him.
Duo frowned in concentration. 'I dunno. I don't think so.'
We both just stared at him. I had been expecting a certain amount of annoyance over the dumb-ass remark, but he seemed to honestly be considering it. Tell me that's not weird?
'Duo,' Heero said patiently. 'You are fine. You are drugged. Winner is an idiot is all.'
'What?' I had to resist the urge to shake the stupid bed rail. 'I am not!'
'Drugged?' Duo wondered out loud. 'You think so?'
'Of course you're drugged!' I exclaimed, and had to stop because I realized I was getting a bit louder than was called for in a hospital.
Heero sighed. 'That's not what he means. He knows he's drugged. Keep up, Winner.'
'He said I'm all muted, Heero,' Duo said plaintively, like a little kid telling on a sibling.
'And let me guess,' Heero growled, turning to glare at me. 'This would be when you suddenly decided he was 'upset'?'
I had to stop and think about it, and then had to confess that maybe that was a possibility, I couldn't really remember feeling it before. 'Uh... maybe?'
'Dr. J was the creepiest son of a bitch ever to walk,' Duo muttered to himself, staring off at nothing again. 'Really creepy. Did I tell you he gave me nightmares? He gave me nightmares.'
I blinked at the sudden wander off track, and felt a weird roil of Duo's sludge. The depression was coming back to the surface.
'What does Dr. J have to do with anything?' I wanted to know, but Duo wasn't really listening to me.
'Maxwell,' Heero prodded, tone chiding. 'You are being a dumb-ass... knock it off.'
Duo rolled his head again, looking at Heero with the most God-awful kicked puppy look I have ever seen. 'I thought it would be all at once,' he informed nobody in particular. 'But I think it's gonna die slowly.'
Heero groaned in frustration and turned a glare in my direction again. 'You have really got to learn to mind your own stupid business, damn it!'
'I didn't do anything!' I barked, and let go of the bed rail when I heard it rattle alarmingly.
'You are feeding his damn delusions!' Heero snapped back, leaning over the bed in my direction, his finger stabbing accusingly. 'You don't half understand what you're sensing and you just...'
There was the strangest little noise then, that I have ever heard in my life, and it stopped us both cold. We looked down at the same time, and there, rolling slowly down Duo's cheek was... a tear. Duo. Crying. I think my world tilted on its axis.
'Damn it!' Heero muttered and the raw anger that was radiating from him was just freaking scary.
'Just gonna slowly fade away and then I'll be creepy too,' Duo sighed, and morose wasn't the half of it.
'Maxwell,' Heero said, 'Duo! Stop listening to him!'
The part where he kept trying to make the whole weird mess all my fault was just seriously starting to make me mad. 'I didn't damn well tell him anything! Why do you keep trying to blame me for this?'
'I'll just keep losing parts...' Duo sighed, and something about husks and souls that I missed when Heero really lost his temper.
'You and that damn touchy/feely emotion reading crap!' he snarled, jabbing that accusing finger my way again. 'You don't understand what you're meddling with and you're just compounding the problem!'
'Ha! You admit there is a problem then!'
'... don't wanna live all creepy...'
'Oh, for the love of God!' Heero exploded, his emotions flaring so hotly, I half expected him to haul off and deck me. I was not expecting him to suddenly lean down and shut Duo up with a big, fat, sloppy wet kiss. A rather long one.
The room was dead still and Duo's aura cleared like a damn silver bell ringing. The fog was gone. The morose was gone. Hell... even the vague fear was gone. And then Heero let go, but he didn't straighten up, staying in Duo's face until he had his full and undivided attention. Like he didn't already have it after that last move.
'Did you damn well feel that?' he demanded.
Duo nodded dumbly.
'Now pay attention, Maxwell. You are fine. You are drugged and that is making you feel strange. That will pass. You are not losing your humanity. You are not losing your soul. You are not creepy. You got that?'
Duo nodded dumbly again, staring at Heero like he thought he'd disappear if he blinked.
'You got that?' Heero repeated.
'Yeah,' Duo responded dutifully. 'Got it.'
'Good,' Heero praised and then turned to me. 'You may go home now, Winner.'
'But... but...' I stammered, looking from the one of them to the other, trying to unravel what I was feeling. I was almost sure that had been a first kiss; I could feel Duo's shock. It's what had made his sludge coalesce into something... else. But Heero had been kind of pissed and now... not. Only it was just as sharp, only different.
But then, even as I stood staring at him, he went all... muddy. And smirked at me while it happened.
Son of a bitch.
'Go home,' he ordered again. 'It's too damn late to get the reports in anyway. I've got this.'
'You can have it,' I grumbled. Whatever the hell 'it' was. I was still baffled, and my head was threatening to split. 'As soon as you explain to me what in the hell just happened.'
'Don't tell me that took Mr. I-Know-What-You're-Feeling by surprise?' he wanted to know. 'Seriously? It's been a long time coming and I thought everybody knew it.'
Duo was gazing up at him like he was the center of the universe, and drugged as he was, he wasn't doing much with his annoying mind games. I could read him clear as glass. But... that's what that feeling was? Well, I'll be damned.
'I always thought it was some kind of partner thing,' I confessed, and just got a derisive snort in return.
The look on Heero's face suggested he was about to deliver something rather... unkind, when Duo suddenly went all muddy again, and said, 'Heero? You're not gonna make me be the raccoon, are you?' And that was about where I decided I'd had enough. Heero sighed rather heavily and it was my turn to smirk.
'Here,' I offered, and handed over the bottle of Tylenol. 'You two have a nice evening. And if you need anything... call Wufei.'
OWARI
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