Disclaimer: Gundam Wing is not mine! STFU!

“Duo!”

“What the hell is going on in here?”

“Wufei, Wufei, Duo has...”

“Has what?”

“I... I came to tell him... to say that Heero had... but before I even said it, he...!”

“That would be because you came here in tears! Love, if you'd wanted to send a positive message, you pretty much failed miserably.”

“Oh no! What do I do? What do I do?”

“Hush; we've already called the doctor.”

“Good God, and Yuy is demanding Maxwell something awful.”

“...Yeah. I can hear him. You'd better tell him what happened.”

“What? Are you crazy? He'll definitely get out of that damn bed then!”

“...Then Quatre should tell him. It's his fault.”

“Trowa!”

“Well it is.”

“You'd just feed me to the lion like that?”

“I guess I could come with you. I'm used to dealing with lions, after all.”

“Oh, bad pun, Barton.”

“And while we're gone, you can watch over Sleeping Beauty here.”

“He's the safer of the two right now.”

“Ah, but he won't be when he wakes up.”

“...Sadist.”

“Have fun. Let's go, little one.”

“You're both sadists.”

<*>

As always, the very first thing I was aware of was the agonizing pain in my entire body. It was a normal enough thing, though it hurt like hell, and it was quickly eclipsed by the panic that froze my chest.

Heero was dead.

No. No, no. It couldn't be. He couldn't. He couldn't. No!

My eyes snapped open and I forced myself up.

I looked around. No one? There was no one in my room, no one waiting to stop me from doing something stupid. Did that mean... were they all in Heero's room?

No. No, no, no! He couldn't do this to me!

Selfish, something said. I snarled at it and swung my legs over the side of my bed, ignoring the agony of it. The railing almost defeated me for a moment, but I managed to get my legs up and over it and I pushed myself so that I could sit up without my arms supporting me.

“Yuy, stop! You're in no condition to-”

“Where is he?!”

I think I choked. Or at least I made some sound that sounded like choking. It wasn't heard by those outside the room, and I managed to clap a hand over my mouth before I did something stupid.

Heero was...

...alive?

“Sleeping, dammit, and in bed. Where you should be.”

Wufei sounded both pissed and worried at the same time. I had yet to meet someone else who could manage that interesting little feat. Except maybe Heero, but they sounded too different to be...

Heero was out of his bed. And injured.

“Fucking hell,” I breathed, and slipped off my own bed. My legs almost didn't support me, and I had to grab the offending railing to keep myself up.

Heero was alive. Heero was awake. Heero was being stupid.

“Yuy, dammit!”

“No! Not yet! I have to...”

I hurried then, pushing myself off the bed. Wufei made a distressed sound. “Winner, help me lift him!”

“No!” Heero shouted again.

Lift him?

I stumbled over to the doorframe and managed to peer out despite a wave of dizziness. Heero was indeed on his hands and knees. He looked bad, with a hospital gown making his lean frame seem almost fat and his face pale and sweating.

“Heero, you idiot,” I breathed, and got an immediate reaction.

Heero's eyes snapped up, finding and latching onto me. Wufei's eyes snapped up, too, and when the Chinese man saw me leaning weakly against the doorjamb I thought he would combust.

“You're both fucking idiots!” the man screamed. He managed to help pull Heero to his feet, and Heero let him. Those cobalt eyes never left mine.

“Duo.” Heero's voice was hardly even a breath, and he stepped forward, toward me and not back to his bed. Wufei huffed agitatedly but stepped forward as well, helping him. It took a small while, but finally Heero was within reach.

I didn't reach.

“You're alive,” he said again. Then without warning Heero's fist smashed into my face.

“Yuy!”

I took it without a murmur, just leaned back into the jamb to keep myself from falling.

“You selfish bastard!” Heero shouted, and I made myself look into those cool blue eyes. “How could you do that to me? To us? You just wanted to take the easy way out! You didn't once think about us, about all of us who would be left behind!”

I said nothing in my defense.

“Yuy, this isn't the time or the place!” Wufei hissed, but Heero ignored him.

“What were you thinking?! How could you?! How could... do you have any idea...!”

Heero's rage seemed to have tired him out, because suddenly he was a dead weight in Wufei's arms. This time Wufei's huff was from pure exertion.

“Fucking hell,” the Chinese man said. “Maxwell, get back in bed. If you aren't in there by the time I get back, I'll fucking hit you.”

I just watched impassively as Wufei lugged Heero back into his room. Quatre, nervously standing by the door to Heero's room – all the way down the hall – finally came up to help, now that it was apparently safe. I could very faintly hear Trowa speaking, saying that it wasn't yet safe to go to Heero. Ah. So he'd been acting as guard for the foolish nurses and doctors that had wanted to intervene with a soldier on a mission.

I was very, very silent as I returned to my bed.

It had been the first, the very first of time Heero had yelled at me. At least, since... since the war. And even then, Heero had never yelled. The man never lost his cool like that. Never.

Heero was alive.

He was alive, and that was all that mattered. I deserved the man's scorn. His fury.

But right now... I needed to sleep, and to forget. At least for a few more hours.

<*>

“You should get therapy,” the doctor told me gently.

I, of course, was not so polite. And it was just barely hitting the afternoon mark. Which made me even less polite, considering time schedules. “Fuck off.”

“Mr. Maxwell, you just attempted suicide. Normally it would be required to get psychological therapy, but...”

But Quatre, bless his interfering soul, had somehow come through for me.

“No.” I rearranged my feet, but kept my arms crossed. This man had been going at it practically since I'd woken up. Though it was a very, very nice distraction from Heero's... reaction... to seeing me again, it was also an extremely annoying one. I'd rather go to surgery for something.

“Mr. Maxwell,” the man tried again.

I noted, not for the first time, how my 'friends' had made a not-so-discreet exit when this man had entered the room. At least the bastard had known enough to keep quiet about the bruise on my jaw.

My jaw that still hurt from smiling a bit too wide.

“No. Absolutely not. Not happening. No way in hell. There are a few less complimentary ways for me to say this; do you want me to start listing those, too?” I snapped him a fake smile while I glared at him.

“No, that would be unnecessary,” the man sighed. “But I must tell you, Mr. Maxwell, that you have obviously suffered psychological damage. Therapy can help.”

So could more poison. I very carefully swallowed that witty piece of repartee back.

“Whatever you've gone through, Mr. Maxwell, perhaps talking about it can-”

“No.” I had several witty responses to pretty much everything the guy said, but I doubted the man would leave if I said anything other than that one word.

Although it hadn't seemed to work that well so far.

The man sighed again and looked down at the clipboard in his hands like it could potentially hold an answer or two. Then he fixed his glasses and looked back up. “Are you absolutely certain that I can't convince you?”

“Yes.”

The doctor tried to stare me down, but it obviously didn't work and after a few more seconds he simply sighed again and turned to leave. “All right. There isn't much more we can do for you here, so you will be released tomorrow morning if your condition remains the same. Do you have someone who can pick you up to take you home, and someone to care for you when you get there?”

“Yes.” But a sudden thought entered my mind, followed by another one immediately after, and I found himself thinking furiously, so much so that I missed the man's last words before he departed.

Did Heero's house fully exist yet? I'd heard someone say at some point that insurance would fix Heero's house, but even though Une had said during the two months of recuperation that Heero's house was being rebuilt, I had no idea if it was inhabitable again yet.

Then there was the absolute first thing I had thought of, something that my more martyr mindset had brought to me before my logic had pointed out the previous little dilemma, and that question was: was that my home anymore?

I took a careful breath. It was a painful thought, but one that had to be asked. Was it really somewhere I could return to? And I'd blatantly lied when the damn doctor had asked me if someone was there to care for me – obviously I didn't! Having someone who would want to take care of you – wouldn't that be a detriment to the whole suicide attempt thing?

There was no way Heero would want me back in that house, was there? The man was absolutely livid. It would be stupid to assume I was still welcome in Heero's place.

But then who would listen to me if I said that? Would Wufei and Quatre and Trowa agree with me on that, or... what? Would they believe Heero would want to take care of me? Heero was a nice guy, but he wasn't a fucking saint. And he'd just punched a guy who was recovering from strychnine poisoning. It would be stupid to assume that the man would actually want me living with him again, wouldn't it? But then where would I go? Where could I go?

My first thought was to my Wing, but who would let me do that? I knew Wufei and Quatre would still be worried about me and would want me somewhere where they could take care of me. Would that mean that I would go live with one of them? Somehow the idea was a bit repulsive to me. Embarrassing, at best. There was no way I'd agree to that. No way, no way, no way.

So what did that leave me with? Where could I go? I certainly couldn't mooch off of Une anymore, and I certainly wasn't going to any of the above-mentioned places.

Wing. I would definitely, definitely go to Wing.

I felt calm as I outlined my ridiculous plan. I'd lose my laptop, but it was an acceptable loss. It had things on it for Heero, anyway, things I didn't want or need.

I made a mental alarm clock in my head and closed my eyes. In six hours, I would be sneaking off. And this time, Heero would be too fucking drugged up to notice I was slipping out again.

<*>

I woke up at exactly the right time: good-bye visiting hours, hello night staff. And I immediately wondered if I was being stupid again. Or, worse... selfish.

So I switched up my plans a little bit.

I slipped out of my bed – damn it hurt to do that – and hobbled my sorry ass over to the doorway. A quick peek showed me the coast was clear and I went gliding... okay, wobbling drunkenly... down the hall, almost to the very last door. The door was open, and it was easy to slip inside, especially dark as it was in the room – obviously to try to get Heero to sleep. I closed the door.

It didn't surprise me to see the tiny glint of eyes watching me when I looked up. “...Heero?”

“Duo.” His voice was strong, but quiet. “What are you doing out of bed?”

I resisted the urge to tell him off for the hypocrisy of the statement. “I'm... supposed to be released in the morning.”

Those eyes glittered. “So?”

Ouch. Maybe that was my answer right there. “I... I need to know something.”

And suddenly a billion questions tipped themselves on my tongue. A trillion things I wanted to know.

“What?”

His voice was ice-cold, but I could hear the resignation in his voice. But he was wrong – for right now, I couldn't let myself care about that.

There were questions that were much, much more important.

“Am I... do... do you...” I sucked in a deep breath, sent my eyes to the floor, and just blurted it out. “Do you... still want me around?”

Heero hissed.

My heartbeat was a very powerful, very tangible thing just then, beating against my ribs so hard it hurt. Pound. Pound. It felt thick, two times bigger than normal.

A squeak of hinges warned me of Heero's movement, but by the time I'd looked up he was already up, IV drip lying lonely on the bed, and those glittering eyes were capturing mine again.

I took a step back as he came toward me, but then steeled myself for whatever he intended.

He grabbed my face, gently rubbed his thumb over the bruise he'd given me. “Always,” he breathed. “No matter what... always.”

And he pulled my head back and kissed me.

It was sweet and hungry, demanding and giving, all at once. I moaned and carefully wrapped my hands around his neck and only kept my own weight by reminding myself of what I'd done to him.

I didn't know I was crying again until Heero broke our kiss and leaned his forehead against mine, whispering stupid, clichéd little phrases to me.

This, I think, was where I seriously, seriously broke down.

I sunk to the floor, and Heero despite his injury followed me, and I was curled up in a little ball, leaning on my knees and hugging myself and shaking and crying like a child. I heard myself talking, heard Heero move from me for a moment, a frightening moment, until I heard the click of a lock and the movement of something heavy and then he was back, hugging me, encouraging me.

“I'm sorry, Heero, I'm so sorry...”

“No, love, it's all right; I had taken that chance-”

“I hurt you, I scarred you, I almost killed you I really tried to kill you-”

“It's all right, love, I swear-”

“Never again, I swear, never again-”

“Shh, it's all right, love-”

“I can't stop, I can't stop thinking about how-”

“Shh, I'm fine now.”

“No, you're not, and it's all my fault!”

We just sat like that for a while. Eventually I became aware of other noises; the sounds of voices, mostly panicked. From outside the door?

I looked over to it, my eyes fucking coated in tears, and saw that the something heavy in front of the door was a freaking hospital bed. I gasped. “Heero! Your injury!” I looked over to it and saw a blotch of red.

“Oh God,” I moaned, and just sunk even further. “Oh God, can't I do anything right?”

“Duo. This was my decision.”

“Because I-”

“Enough, love, please.”

And Heero's voice was so full of its own pain that I immediately dropped the subject. “Get back in bed,” I whispered, and I stood so quickly it might have scared Heero. He looked up at me in shock. “Get back in bed,” I repeated, my voice a bit more securely bolted against the sobs and hiccups that pushed against my throat. “I won't have you getting hurt any more than you already have.”

Heero's eyes turned sad. “I understand,” he murmured, and let me pull him up. Once he was in the bed, I moved to the door and tugged against the bed.

Fuck it was heavy.

“Duo,” Heero called, and I looked back just in time to see him slip the IV back into his arm, “should you be doing that in your...” He frowned; I could fucking hear it. “Wait... what is your condition?”

“Pissed,” I grumbled, and tugged again. My muscles, my poor, abused little muscles, sharply protested being used so heavily after their previous beating.

“Duo.”

The warning voice. I ignored it. “Fucking hell, Heero, how'd you get this bitch to move?”

“I pushed it,” he said easily. Well, the bastard was healthy enough to tease me, that was for sure. “What did...” He paused for a moment, and I realized that it was because he was having a hard time saying the words.

“What did I do to myself?” I said for him, my voice a bit softer. He didn't make any noise then; apparently hearing it out loud hurt. It was more humiliating for me, but I tried to imagine Heero trying to commit suicide and felt a shadow of the panic. Fuck. I'd been so selfish... “I poisoned myself.”

Heero made the same choking noise I'd heard myself make earlier.

New voices joined the ones behind the door and I sighed with relief. Apparently the hapless staff had called in familiar cavalry. “Hey, guys!” I called out. Wufei cursed.

“What the fuck are you two doing?” he snapped out. “Neither of you are in any condition to be-”

“Whoa!” I interrupted, blushing beet red. “It's not like that. But Heero stupidly moved this damn bed over here and I can't fucking move it. Are Quatre and Trowa with you?”

“Of course. Stand back.”

The man sounded long-suffering.

“Poisoned yourself?”

Heero's agonized words reminded me of the conversation I'd been in. “Uh, yeah.” I couldn't look him in the eyes.

“What?” he breathed, and I knew exactly what he was asking.

“St... strychnine.” I hardly said it, but Heero's sharp breath told me he'd heard nonetheless.

A horrible screeching met our ears, and both of us turned to watch the door being forcefully shoved open.

“You're both bastards!” Wufei shouted in suddenly. He probably shouldn't have been pushing, but thinking about it, he probably shouldn't have been carrying Heero, either. Guess it was his idea of physical therapy.

“Fucking assholes.” Trowa's voice followed Wufei's, a bit calmer but still full of heat.

“His fault,” I muttered. “I didn't move the fucking bed.”

“No; you just took a midnight stroll,” Quatre huffed.

I grinned; fuck it, my friends ruled. “Details.”

Quatre huffed out a laugh.

I very carefully ignored the searing gaze that was blistering my back. No way, no how was I answering that.

So as soon as that door was open enough, I made a very hasty exit.