Once on the lawn, they
begged me to keep my wings folded and opened theirs up above mine. My feet were
intertwined with their heels, so I would not dangle in between them while they
were flying. The braid, Heero must have made while I had been asleep, was
fluttering to the beating of their white wings, as we fluttered towards Meiran.
It was quite an uncomfortable ride, but it didn’t harm me. It must have been
quite strenuous for Quatre and Heero to carry me. They pulled me through the
narrow passage and inside the cave. Meiran was immediately at my side.
“He is sick, he couldn’t
stay in the dungeons any longer,” Quatre said, grabbing a blanket from Meiran’s
things to wrap me in it. Meiran sat down at the fire, and so did Quatre, once
he had finished with me. Heero sat down right behind me, caressing me weak
wings, patting and massaging them. It was quite a pleasure to feel his warm
hands on the skin there, not to mention that he was quite good at massaging.
“I wanted to ask you anyway,
to get Duo out of there,” Meiran said.
“Hn,” Heero grunted, “He
wouldn’t have survived much longer.”
“Trowa will bring Wufei,
soon. I have no idea in what shape he is. I hope he feels better than you do,
Duo. Else, there will be a problem getting him here. I figured, what has
happened has not calmed the angels down, it has encouraged them. It is good,
you reacted so quickly, Quatre and Heero, when Duo was in danger. Sooner or
later, the clans would have found out about this conspiracy, anyway.”
“We have done quite some
good acting, so far,” came Trowa’s voice from the passage. My face lightened in
joy as his head popped out from the entry and he crawled inside. Then, a very
dirty, but otherwise fine Wufei sat down next to us.
“Trowa! Wufei!” Quatre
cheered, and crawled over to give them both a big hug. The little angel was
just too sweet. Trowa received an extra-large one, with so much energy, it
almost knocked him down. Quatre sat down next to him, smiling, filled with joy.
Wufei and Trowa looked at me.
“Ohayoo,” I grinned.
“What happened?” Wufei
asked, checking my glassy eyes.
“You’ve got a nice dungeon,”
I answered, “just a little wet and cold.” Wufei raised his eyebrows as he
understood what had put me into this shape. Heero flicked the braid over my
shoulder, since it was in the way of his massaging.
“What happens now?” Trowa
asked, looking around. He seemed a little disappointed by how things had turned
out.
“Good question,” I admitted,
“we can’t just stay--- ahhhh!” I couldn’t finish my sentence, because Heero
rubbed his knuckles over an extremely sore spot between my wings, giving me the
most relaxing, but strong pain I had ever felt. This guy knew how to massage a
battered angel, absolutely. I arched my back some, squirming, trying to get
away from his hands, but what he did was just necessary to relax my tensed
muscles. “Heero! Ow!” I complained, as he did it again. The zero-born stopped a
moment in contemplation, and then moved his knuckles over the same spot with
some pressure again. “HEERO!” I cursed, as the pain came up inside me. He
repeated the move, and the pain grew less intense with each time he did that.
My muscles relaxed, and I closed my eyes, now enjoying the procedure.
“What you wanted to say,
Duo, was, that we cannot stay in here, Meiran, without being discovered, and we
can’t go back, either,” Quatre picked up the conversation.
“We can’t do anything as
long as Duo isn’t back to his normal self,” Wufei said, pointing at me with a
wave of his head.
“Well, excuse me!” I
protested, “Tell your angels to build a better prison!”
“Not your fault,” Trowa
said, to both me and Wufei, “Let’s accept the facts as they are.”
“I know,” Meiran said, “I am
sorry, I have no plan, either. There is no place I can think of for you to hide
away. This is absolutely not going the way it was supposed to go.”
We spent the whole morning
trying to find something to do, thinking about places in the vast lands, we
could use to hide, before any clan would have the idea to search Meiran’s
modest premises. We had a hard time coming to conclusions. We thought about
talking to all of the angels in our group of five, so they could see,
Shinisouls and Shouriwings could get along quite well. But this was too
dangerous. Hell, someone even
suggested in a mere mood of sarcasm, we should cut our wings, and cast
ourselves out. Maybe pity would lead them into freedom. Could have been my
idea, but this time the master of angry sarcasm was Wufei. He didn’t mean it,
though.
As for the hideouts... the
vast land is not really big, it is hard to travel it unseen, and there were no
hideouts that were not known to the angels. Briefly, there was no way to hide,
except Meiran’s place, which was a bad hideout. We thought about maybe digging
a secret cave for ourselves, but it would take way too long, and we’d be
discovered quickly. We all sat, pondering in silence, as a voice called from
outside.
“Meiran!” We exchanged
glances. It definitely was Treize. Meiran hurried outside before he would crawl
through the passage. It was quite a funny thought, to imagine Treize on his
knees, squeezing himself through the entry with his big wings, and maybe
getting stuck...
“Oh, Treize, what a
surprise! Nice of you to visit me,” we heard Meiran say, and she tried to sound
naturally happy. Our bodies were tensed, and we hardly breathed, hoping we
would not be heard.
“I’m here on business,” he
said. “Trowa and the Shouri, we imprisoned, have vanished. Do you know anything?” His voice was harsh and
demanding, so that Trowa and I automatically hid in our wings. Angel-reflex,
you know... If there had been any sympathy left for Treize till than, any of my
old adoration at all, it was gone now.
“You know, Treize, I have
got nothing to do with this war anymore,” she answered bravely “You know my
opinion about your battles, and for your information, Milliardo misses his boys
and Duo, too. See where this war leads you! Now you lost those precious kids.
Maybe they are somewhere out there, slaying each other, because they have never
learned to do anything else!” I had no idea she was such a skilled liar. I
don’t like lying, really. I do a lot of bad stuff, but I never lie. I didn’t
mind her doing it this time, though, because Meiran did a fine job out there,
and it saved us!
Treize had obviously flown
away, since Meiran reappeared in the cave. He transparent shape shimmered
somewhat feebly, as she tried to calm down. “Ignorant idiot!” she gasped.
“Let’s see to the facts,”
Wufei said, rubbing Meiran’s shoulder some (yes, she was transparent, but I
never said, you couldn’t touch her!), “We are just five weak young angels,
trying to correct the world. We are no part of them, we don’t belong here.” He
was totally miserable, as it seemed.
“Right,” Quatre agreed, and
swallowed a lump in his throat. “I think... I think it is time to say our
good-byes.” We silently agreed. Do you think we gave up easily? We had not
said, we did not intend to come back, but as things were currently, there
really was no point in taking any action. Patience is a virtue, and as Wufei
had said: We were of a different kind. We were not at all like these guys.
“Maybe, the time for peace
has just not come yet,” I said, “but we’ll never give up.”
“Right,” Meiran said to me,
“I am counting on you, still.”
“Meiran,” Wufei addressed
her quietly. “Will you come with us, of we should leave this country?” There
was a begging in his voice, something I had never heard from Wufei. He looked
at Meiran fully.
“I will live in both worlds,
when you are gone,” she said, almost sadly. “I can keep you posted on the war,
and we shall never forget our mission to bring peace to these fighters. I will
try to find out, when the time is right, and when they learned, what they have
done by loosing you...”
Wufei nodded, and swallowed quietly.
I had expected her to say something like that, and so had he. He looked down
onto his cross-legged legs. There was a moment of embarrassed silence.
“Will we just sneak away
like that?” Quatre inquired after a while; a question directed to all of us.
Heero, who had been playing with my wings all the time, finally spoke, too.
“No. Our will is to bring
these people to peace. We should let them know why we are going.” We all agreed
with him, yet, we still had to figure out, how we would manage to do this. We
could not let them have the opportunity to catch us and keep us from going.
We finally figured out a
way: Meiran would invite the fighting parties to an old tree close to her
hideout. She would admonish them to keep peace for our sake, as long as the
meeting on the oak tree would last. We expected them to care for us enough to
keep this agreement. There, we would be waiting for them, ready to leave, ready
to tell them, why we were going away from the land of war.
We had to wait, though, I
was not in shape to fly to another land, yet. So we spent three days in
Meiran’s cave. Only at night, the others would carefully sneak out, get some
food for us, while I was still recovering. In the meantime, several people were
inquiring Meiran about us, but she always prevented them from entering the
cave. Overhearing their conversations, which sometimes were quite long, we
found out, that most of them really missed us, and were worried. Whenever there
was a chance, Meiran tried to make them see, that it was time to rethink the
war-question. The only one, she got close to in this matter, however, was
Milliardo’s sister Relena Peacecraft. She said, she would try to talk to
Milliardo, since the boys (she meant us), were more important, than any
fighting.
What can I say...? The
conversations almost broke our hearts, and we were about to dismiss the plan
about going away. However, our will to teach these angels a lesson, and our
knowledge, that we would only live in constant disappointment, if the war
didn’t stop, made it reasonably impossible to us. We had to go!
When the third morning came,
Meiran flew out, to hand out her invitations for the following evening.
Meanwhile, Wufei had managed to steal new clothes for himself, and my old black
stuff had been washed in the lake at night. I felt much more comfortable and
healthier now. We were all ready to leave, taking not much more with us, but
these clothes, and our wings.
Meiran returned
successfully, the message would surely arrive and spread among the angels. Now
we only could wait. Noon passed by with us talking about how we would miss our
old homes, this cave and the vast lands. Meiran advised us to sleep, since we
would have a long journey this night. Quatre laid his head on Trowa’s hips and
fell asleep. I couldn’t really, and maybe the others could neither. I was
leaning on the wall next to Quatre, Heero was on my right, leaning back against
my wing. Wufei had his head on Heero’s shoulder. All of us seemed to sleep, but
maybe we all truly were not. We just kept our eyes shut to not disturb the
others.
Except for Quatre, maybe....
the blond angel had really been asleep, and woke up after an hour, yawning and
stretching. It was the sign for all of us, to ‘wake up’, from our rest, too. We
stretched and massaged each other some, to get rid of this unnatural tension,
before it was time to go to the oak tree. I was so nervous, I swear! We were
determined, not to fail our self-control, and fall for people holding us back.
No, we would go, we would leave
and make our point clear. No matter how hard they would try to hold us back.
And if they did not try at all, we would not be disappointed about them not
caring.
We were coming through the
open fields, walking. The white- and black-wings were already there, neatly
separated into two groups, refusing to look at each other. Yet, they kept some
sort of peace. The tree was ahead of them. With hanging heads, we arrived, the
evening sun cast big shadows to our left. When we arrived, we could not help,
but feel sadness. It had come this far, and that was disappointing. Around us,
eyes blinked, wondered, asked silently. We had no idea, how we were supposed to
begin, or who should speak. Trowa took the initiative and flew onto a big
branch above them all, standing there in the evening sun. Quatre flew to his
side, while Wufei, Heero and I occupied another branch. Trowa stood, while we
all sat down, gazing at the angels below us. They looked sad. Maybe they
couldn’t understand our moves.
“Angels,” I heard Trowa’s
voice, “we have missed your company, for you are our families, and we love you
all. And we know, you love us, but you refused to listen to our cry for piece,
and it disappointed us. You know our opinion, for Wufei and Duo have made that
clear to you. They have taken great suffering to do that, and you should know,
that all of us stand behind them and admire their bravery to face such angels
as you.” He looked over at Quatre for a moment, “I don’t feel I am a Shinisoul
anymore, and I can speak for my friends, that they don’t feel they belong to
you, either. Since we can’t bring peace to your minds, and we cannot live in
war anymore, we decided to leave Yagen Valley, the Cleeve Hills and the vast
lands, to search for peaceful grounds. We five may look different from each
other, but nothing can separate us.” There was gasping around. Quatre almost
started to cry, as far as I could tell, and I didn’t feel very joyful, either.
Trowa’s speech really took it out of me... Heero dangled his legs softly, his
pure white wings surrounding me and Wufei, all spread out. I for myself, had no
strength, to spread the black skin. I kept my wings folded.
“Whenever you are willing to
take our help in peace-matters, we will be in reach. We are still trying to
help you, but it became clear for us, that this world is maybe not ready for
it, yet. We decided to wait for you to grasp the meaning of peace.” He paused a
little, opening his mouth, searching for the right words. “From the moment I
first fought Quatre, I noticed, that there is more to white-wings, than what I
had been told. I realized, that our generation was completely detached from
this war, that we were innocent, that Quatre was innocent. When he surrendered,
I regretted, I had not been the first to take this move. Maybe, Quatre was,
after all, even more thoughtful and reasonable than I was.
I had intensely injured him,
and guiltily took care of his wounds. But knowing, that my family, which was
supposed to only mean the best for me, would not understand my care about an
enemy – not after they had been about to re-wing him. I searched a hideout to
be able to help him. Even Duo did not seem to really understand. I found a
hiding place in Meiran’s cave, and I found much more there. I found, that Duo,
Wufei and Heero felt the same me and Quatre did, I found the truth about the
past... But the most precious thing, I found that night,...” Trowa was
swallowing a little, his voice had a faint quiver to it by now. “...the most
precious thing was, that I learned, how much is possible between Shinisouls and
Shouriwings.”
His voice merely was a faint
whisper now, only carried over to the watching warriors by the light breeze.
“That night, Quatre and I exchanged out vows of love.” His hand reached out for
Quatre’s, a faint blush was on the Sandrock-born’s cheek. Now, there was no
question anymore, who had been mostly hurt by this war. We hadn’t known this,
we had not understood the slight hints, implying this relationship. It must
have happened before I had joined them in the cave... No wonder they had been
so close to each other the past few days... Quatre had edged closer to his
lover as he tugged on his hand. They watched each others eyes, and Quatre
whispered to the angels, as barely audible as Trowa had been before, “Now you
can probably understand, why we cannot feel and understand the depth of this
war like you do.”
He laid his head on Trowa’s
chest, wings spread. Trowa laid his own black velvet, as well as his arms,
around his lover protectively. It was the most beautiful sight I had ever seen.
The dark orange sunlight did it’s rest to the scene. I don’t know how many of
these angels down there were about to cry, I surely was, and I honestly tell
you that.
Suddenly, both Trowa and
Quatre, arched their backs and screamed. Our hearts froze in shock, as they
clenched their hands into each other. There was a bright light, blinding me,
and I closed my eyes in reflex. When I opened them again, Trowa and Quatre were
still hugging each other tightly, Trowa’s wings embraced both protectively. It
was amazing: Where there had once been dark black and bright white wings, there
were golden ones now, resembling Heero’s in size and shape. Long, silky, golden
feathers were sparkling in the sunlight, and I seriously wondered, whether
Trowa and Quatre knew what had happened. Their eyes were tightly shut, they
were clenched into each other, probably still reflecting the pain, from a
moment ago. The other angels, though, were in shock, staring at the lovers
stupidly. Not all of them possibly knew about the golden-wing thing, which had
happened in the past. I am pretty sure, Milliardo and Treize knew, judging from
the disbelief in their faces.
Meiran hovered in front of
the tree-trunk, and her shape seemed stronger, less transparent and more
shining. I don’t know how to tell, but she was blazing from her inside. And there was something else
about her... I had never noticed that, but she, too, had wings. They looked a
lot like Trowa’s new ones, but they were, as the rest of her, transparent. She
fluttered mildly, staying in place.
“You saw what happened,” she
said with the most sweet and composed voice I could imagine on her. Her long,
dark, transparent hair fell down her shoulders to her elbow -, in a sparkling
way, I had never seen on her. “For once, someone has spoken truth from his
heart, and I am very thankful for that. I can feel and see in your hearts, more
distinctly with every minute passing, and I know, there’s more truth to be
revealed. I also learned to see into the hearts of my friends,” she made a wide
gesture to the crown of the tree, we were sitting in. “And I think none of you
should be afraid to speak truth.”
She turned around a little,
setting her eyes on us. “Heero, I know there’s no reason to hide your truth. I
can feel your heart, and I can feel the other’s. Don’t hesitate, for I know,
nothing can go wrong...”
Heero blinked at her, really
surprised. I felt, as if the other angels down there in front of the tree were
not present anymore. I had no idea what was going on, believe me or not, but it
seemed as if Meiran knew perfectly well, what she was talking about – and so
did Heero, even though it shocked him.
The white wings, that had
been spread out behind me all the time, gently touched my black ones, as if
wanting to grab my attention. I could not really grope what was happening.
Cobalt blue eyes looked at me. I blinked, when Heero’s arm slid around my
waist. I felt hazy and warm, confused and happy, all at the same time. Heero
smiled, but I could not react. This was all too new and too strange for me. And
seeing Heero smile made it even more weird. He carefully tilted me forward
until our cheeks touched. When his lips were close to my ear, he whispered:
“Suki desu, Duo.”
My eyes sprung open wide in
a sweet, sensational shock. I reached out a hand to pull on his shoulder until
he was totally leaning against me. His warm body was incredibly close to mine,
our wings touched on numerous spots. So all the caressing my wings, messaging,
combing my hair, the bandaging and the trust had been nothing but an exchange
of affection... And I had enjoyed all this, because I returned that feeling.
The endless nights in the dungeons, the wish for him to never leave,... I
slowly became clear of my feelings.
“Suki desu... I love you,” I
said, and I hadn’t known that myself all the time. Why had Meiran known it,
then...? Poor Heero, he probably had waited for me, to show that I returned his
feelings, but I had known myself too little, to know that I loved him. And to
tell me honestly, he had needed Meiran’s encouragement. I embraced him tightly.
Yes... I did love him.
Then, I felt a familiar
crawling in my bones... a snake in my flash. I was about to curse, I didn’t
really want any pain. Yet,
the sensation could not be stopped. I dug my hands into Heero’s arms, as we
both pulsated in pain. We didn’t scream, we were prepared for the pain, and we
had each other. He clutched me as tightly as I clutched him, until the pain and
the light were over. We let go of each other for a moment. There he sat, right
beside me, golden wings spread out widely, and he looked at me with the most
loving eyes, I had ever seen.
“Meiran!” I heard Wufei’s
surprised voice at my side. I turned around to see her, and there she was...
but she was not transparent anymore. She was an angel, complete with golden
wings, dark black eyes, dark hair, and a long, silky dress. Wufei almost fell
off his branch.
“Thank you, Heero,” Meiran
said, he cheeks seemed slightly flushed. “Thanks to you and Trowa, I have
returned to my normal shape. Thank you for speaking honesty from your hearts.
My words can’t express my gratitude...”
I think the others (I slowly
became aware of the fact, that there still were others), were totally puzzled by now. Well, you would be, if these
angel-guys on the tree suddenly cuddled and transformed into golden-winged
ones, now, would you? But it set the alarms off in them, and that was good.
Treize separated from his group, holding out a hand to Milliardo. Heero and I
cuddled and watched in happy anticipation.
“I am sorry, my friend and
brother,” Treize said, as Milliardo took it, “can we bury the fight and
restart? Lets head towards a new peaceful era!”
“I think we can,” Milliardo
said, “if you want to go that way with me.” He laid his other hand on the
shaking ones and so did Treize. The other angels watched the floor timidly.
They didn’t really know whom to excuse to. Relena met Lady Une in a hearty
embrace. Slowly, angels separated from their groups and excused to one another.
Hilde started off with Sally, and it seemed to be a good example to the others.
Slowly, white- and black-wings mixed up. Everyone had someone he really needed
to excuse to. Trowa, Quatre, Heero and I watched the beginning of peace with
joy. Only Wufei sat sadly on his branch, watching the big family re-unite.
“Hey Wufei...?” I asked
concernedly.
“Everyone is so happy...” he
said in contemplation, “and I am up here on my own, watching.” At this point,
Meiran came up beside him, sitting next to him.
“I told you, I can look into
people’s hearts,” she said. “It was time, Milliardo and Treize became
friends... but theirs’ are not the most interesting hearts I’ve seen this
evening.” She leaned against him lightly. His white wings immediately enclosed
her in an embrace, as if they had a life of their own.
“No...? Then tell me, who has the most interesting heart?” Wufei asked.
“You have,” she answered in
a light, clear voice.
“Why?” he said, with a
nervous laughter, as the sun set.
“Because you love me,” she
whispered, and kissed his cheek. Wufei blushed a little and nodded. She grabbed
his hands and pulled them around her. Wufei was totally caught by surprise and
couldn’t do much more but let it happen.
“Hold me tight, you will
need it,” she said. And really, a moment later, he clutched her tightly, almost
too hard. His face changed in pain, as the light shot through his back,
revealing bright, golden wings.
I bet this old oak tree was
the luckiest tree in the world. It had the first six golden angels of the new
age sitting on them, and after years of fighting, it could watch, how peace was
made under it’s crown. Slowly the air cooled off and darkness spread around us.
Angel after angel sat down in mixed groups under the tree. And after a while
there was peaceful silence beneath us.
Angelic peace, really.