Title: Still
Author: Link Worshiper
Pairing: If you have to guess, lay off the acid.
Stuff: angst, sap, etc. (also not beta read)
Disclaimer: Christmas is coming, but the most GW thing anybody ever thought to give me were the Heero and Duo pics I stuck to my monitor. I'm not holding my breath.

Also, damn you, Dave Grohl. Again. You're like the drabble king.

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There was nothing left to do - no other options to try. Two of his periphery monitors were down, crackling with white noise and filling the tiny cockpit with gray, speckled light, and the ones that were still operational were cluttered with enemy mobile suits. It had been a lonely battle, and here, he'd suffer a lonely end, yet all he was aware of was the stillness in the air around him. He closed his eyes, breathing slowly; he thought about what he had left and realized there was nothing.

Heero had been the one to show him how to be. Behind twitching eyelids, he followed Heero's sweat-soaked back through the trees, content to waste that same day with him over and over again. The twitter of the woodland cicadas filled his ears as Heero led the way, a quietly swishing bottle of liquor swinging at his thigh. They forgot their troubles by a forgotten creek getting drunk and skipping pennies across the water. The sky was blue, the grass was wet, and the sun traced a halo around Heero's whiskey-stained lips as he whispered his final wish. There was no need to say anything else because they didn't have to, and together, they lingered there in the silence. It became a silence that would never be broken.

A dark orange sun came up over the charred planes. His brow pulsed at the thought of it as he pressed his sweaty palms against the consoles on either side of him, remembering how Heero had stood so defiantly in its light: Heero, alone, with that destructive switch clutched vehemently in hand. The enemy had come roaring in, and Heero had risen to meet them.

He was never coming back.

Fragmented inklings of friendship lacerated his memory as Heero's body had arced through the air, shrouded in their silence. He looked on at the crooked body that now lay quiet in the grass, and everything was still. A smear of blood, broken bones and Heero's whisper in the quiet: "Promise I'll be forever yours. Promise not to say another word."

Promised....

His brow pulsed again as his hand moved over the side console with a strange, alien sort of familiarity. His fingers absently punched in the code that unlocked a switch he never thought he'd want to push - one he'd never feel the need to. And yet, now that he thought about it, he didn't mind: after all, what was done was done. He didn't care if the others thought he was seeking to go out in the same blaze of glory Heero had; their ignorance didn't matter. He simply wanted to hang in that silence with Heero again, to relive that day - even if was to be deep beneath the dirt.

A small chuckle escaped his lips as he regulated his breathing, taking a final moment to allow himself simply to be. Heero had transcended all this - had become more a part of him than ever before, and yet, had never left him feeling so alone. He, too, would take that fall to rise above.

Another calming breath escaped him. Heero's choice would be his choice. He lifted his hand: a final breath.

Always was a lucky one.

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End

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