Kyuuketsuki Duo: The Movie
Sanguis Draconis Part 15

"Damn this!" Wufei's cry rang out loudly in the stone courtyard as he burst out of his seated position and sprang into a restless pacing. All of the morning and most of the afternoon had been filled with fruitless efforts to contact the power that they knew must surely be lurking around Shenlong's old estate. He had tried one approach after another, following the suggestions of Quatre and Meiran, and even the odd comment from Haoxian. He tried it with the sword and without the sword. He had both concentrated and emptied his mind. He tried it standing and sitting and in this room and that. Nothing had worked. In fact, as if to taunt him, it felt as if he were getting farther and farther from it with every try.

Meiran couldn't say that she was surprised that Wufei had finally exploded in frustration. As time passed, she had witnessed the furrow between his brows grow deeper and deeper. Wufei had never been a particularly patient man to begin with, and he demanded perfection from himself. Failure was unacceptable. On the rare occasions when he performed inadequately, he pushed himself harder to achieve, ever onward until his goals were reached. Upon consideration, however, perhaps that was exactly the wrong thing for him to be doing just now.

"Wufei," she said. "You need to calm down."

"I was calm," he answered in clipped tones. "It obviously didn't work."

"And obviously frustration isn't working either. Maybe you're trying too hard. You know sometimes the concentration can impede the--"

"Yes, yes, I know that. I don't need you to tell me that."

"Well, if you know it, then why aren't you acting on that knowledge?" She couldn't help the waspishness that crept into her tone. She was getting frustrated, too.

"What do you think I've been trying to do?"

"You obviously haven't been staying calm and open."

"Hey, guys, this isn't going to help."

"Stay out of this, Quatre." The spiritualist was reminded of just why he never liked interposing himself as peacemaker between the two of them, and he backed down with a sigh.

"Hey, you don't have to be rude about it, Wufei." At least she believed in keeping the others out of their bickering.

"If you people are going to say something, then how about trying to say something useful for a change?"

"We are trying to be useful."

"You are failing." Each word was carved into the air with flat, deliberate syllables.

"Ooh, I swear, Wufei, if you weren't the only one that could do this, I'd so be over there kicking your ass right now! Of course, that might help, so maybe I'll just do it anyway!"

"Yes, I am the only one that can do this. There is nothing that you can do to help with this, so why don't you just stay out of it?"

"Well, it's a little late for that now, don't you think? I'm here, after all, aren't I?" His level, though obviously irritated, tone only served to infuriate her even more.

"I never asked you to be here. If there's nothing you can do to help, then you shouldn't be here at all. You'd just be in the way."

She stared at him for a moment, understanding the implication and not liking it one bit. "I'm sorry, did you just call me weak? Ineffective? Useless?" Those were some of the deadliest insults in Wufei's vocabulary, and she didn't have to take them.

"..."

"If you have something to say to me, then say it!"

"...You should never have come."

Time froze for a long moment, to be shattered when Meiran turned on her heel without any more words and walked swiftly out of the room.

He watched her storm off with his lips pressed into a thin line. Only after she had disappeared, leaving a thundering silence in her passing, did Wufei make a loud sound of frustration. He turned away from her exit and laid his forehead against a nearby support pillar, silently begging patience from uncaring gods.

The others looked between Wufei and the door through which Meiran had left, waiting in antsy silence. Finally Duo shrugged and decided to just go ahead and say it. "Stop being an idiot already and go after her."

Wufei stiffened and turned slowly to face his accuser. "Excuse me?"

"Just because it was a demon in a woman's form that took advantage of your cousin's weakness and brought ruin to your house, is no reason to be mean to her."

His eyes narrowed dangerously. "What does that have to do with anything?"

If he didn't already see the connection, then Duo would waste no breath explaining it to him. "She's not as weak as you think. You're very wrong if you really believe she has no right to be here."

"Mind your own affairs, Guardian."

"This is my affair. I didn't bring you all the way out here just so you two could bicker at each other."

"Oh, but you did bring us out here just so you could stand back and watch?" What gave Duo the right to criticize now when the guardian himself had gone through such an unstable time, only to come to his current uncooperative state of dark brooding and few words?

Duo's eyes, already in a continuously silvery state, chilled down another notch. "You're the only one that can do this, remember? You need to find your own answers. I can give them to you no more than Meiran can. Or does that mean that I should take my leave of you as well?"

Wufei pinned the guardian with a sharp glare, but it had little effect on the uncaring figure. Finally, with a look that swept disdainfully over the rest of their companions, he stalked out of the courtyard in the direction opposite the one Meiran had taken.

In the wake of his departure, the others stood in silence once more, unbroken until Haoxian yawned in boredom. It was a prompt for Quatre to speak. "There were other ways to handle that, you know," he started conversationally.

Duo shrugged. "This way seemed rather effective to me."

"Just because it was effective, doesn't mean it was the best way."

"Hn. Take this up with me some other day. I might be more receptive to it then."

Hilde punched him in the arm. "Hmpf, men. No sense of romance. Why do you have to be such a bitch?"

"You know why." A flash of darkness flittered through his expression.

"I know why," she sighed, sliding her arms around him and giving him an intimate squeeze. "Well, whoever this big nemesis of yours is, you'd better kick his ass, and soon. You're starting to get on my nerves."

Duo smiled thinly. "Don't worry. I intend for there to be some major ass-kicking sometime in the near future."

"Hmmm, good. And when he's back, will you two indulge in a glorious orgy of reacquaintance for me?"

"Certainly not. Not for you at all, Hilde."

*****

As Wufei walked through the dragon's lair, the peaceful, unstirred quality of the silence and solitude took its toll on his anger and calmed him significantly. He was well aware of the fact that frustration would net him nothing, and yet one could not really be control of one's frustration. His failure to achieve contact with Shenlong's power was wearing on him. It was simply unfortunate that the others had gotten in the way of emotions that had been ready to spill forth.

The acknowledgment of the true target of his emotions did not soothe him. He should not have snapped at Meiran and Duo, and he should have had better control over himself and his emotions. His irritation with the others was not dispelled, only reflected doubly back at himself.

In his unthinking wanderings, he had forgotten the layout of this place. The wings were arranged in a loose ring, and it was only a matter of time before he inevitably came to the end of his side of the circle, only to come back to the far end of the direction in which Meiran had retreated. He found her perched on a stone railing separating the courtyard from the walkway surrounding it. She was leaning against one of the vertical posts holding up the overhang at the end of a section of railing, her legs kicking idly back and forth as she tried to breathe the peace into herself. Her back was to Wufei, having positioned herself to keep sight of the entrance through which she had entered. If anyone had come after her, she had assumed they would have followed her path.

Wufei watched her careless movements with a critical eye that slowly softened to a quiet regret, and finally he sighed to himself.

"I heard that." Meiran said it without turning around after it became clear he had no intention of announcing himself.

She was more perceptive than he thought. No, more accurately, he had always known her to be so very perceptive, but he periodically forgot. At the most inconvenient times, Meiran might claim. Well, he might have been a failure, but he was no coward, so he forced himself to leave his place of relative safety and approach her.

He leaned up against the opposite side of the same post she sat next to, and there they each waited the other out in tense silence, not even a foot apart. Neither knew how to begin. Wufei was too proud to outright apologize, and Meiran still smarted from Wufei's sharp remarks.

The long void between them stretched until Meiran gave in to her need to know. His words still echoed in her mind. "Did you mean it?"

Her tone pained him more than anything harsh could. They had spent years trading insults and disdainful banter, but now she spoke in a soft, steady voice, trying to hide the hurt.

"I know you were upset before," she continued levelly. "So you... were possibly unclear about what you really meant." She chose her words carefully, not wanting to offend, nor give ground. His frustration was forgiven; it had been completely understandable. While she was annoyed that he had insulted her in his momentary loss of control, she was willing to let that go as well. It was what he had actually said that had gotten under her skin. It had to have come from somewhere. She wanted very much for him to have not meant what he said, but she had her dignity, and she wouldn't go begging for him to take back his words. She wanted Wufei to respect her only slightly less than she needed to respect herself.

It was a more complicated question than it seemed, and he wasn't sure if he could explain it properly before offending her further. He asked himself if he wanted to explain it at all. The answer went deeper than he would have preferred to go, deeper, perhaps, then he had ever gone himself, but he wouldn't be able to sleep at night if he answered with a simple yes or no. He could dodge the truth, but it would be an act of weakness. "I didn't mean it the way it sounded," he finally decided.

"Then tell me how you meant it."

The barest of smiles touched his lips where she could not see. Strangely enough, he was both unspeakably relieved and oddly proud that she wasn't weeping in an outrageous display of womanhood. He didn't know how he would have handled things had tears been falling from her eyes. "This is my task. You should not have to be involved."

"Don't give me that crap, Wufei. We've been over this before. You don't have to do this alone. I won't let you." She hesitated only a little before resolutely adding that last bit.

"That may be so," he conceded slowly. "But that doesn't stop me from wishing it were otherwise."

She sighed tiredly. "Why must you insist that you alone suffer? We're all here to help you, you know."

"That does not make it any easier."

"Why not?"

"You are here because of me. There is a burden that comes with that responsibility." If something happened to them, it would be on his head. If he failed, they would have made the journey for nothing. If he made a mistake, he would betray the confidence they had in him. If he died... he wondered if they would carry on the fight.

"We all chose to be here, Wufei. We are not your responsibility. Have a little faith in us."

"It is not you that I have too little faith in."

"Wufei... We believe in you. Otherwise we wouldn't be here. Why do you find it so difficult to believe in yourself?"

What reason did he have to do so? His record thus far had not been encouraging. "I want to end this, Meiran. I want to end this so badly that I cannot help but consider the consequences of my failure." The confession somehow seemed less personal if he wasn't looking at her as he said it. He could almost pretend that he was whispering it to himself in the silence of his mind.

"That makes so little sense. You should be so focused on ending this that all you can see is your success. Or at least the execution. If you can't envision it, you can't make it happen. You don't try as hard as you do, just to expect failure."

He didn't feel up to arguing the point. She was more optimistic than he, perhaps. The burden undeniably weighed more heavily upon his shoulders. He had seen the consequences of his failures in the past; it was all he could do not to stand paralyzed in the face of a repeat performance. If he displayed an arrogant confidence to the world, it was because sometimes only sheer pride and stubborness would carry him through his day. Honor and dignity were a sturdy framework for behavior on which he could rely to help guide his actions. He could not fail because he was the only one remaining to carry on the task of his bloodline. He was the only one remaining because he had once failed. He continued to push forward as he did because it was all that he could do.

Had there ever been a time when he had seen a victorious conclusion to this battle? On the first night, he had let the flame of purpose burn away the weariness in his soul. Had he lost that fire? The -need- to bring Epyon down gnawed at him as fiercely as ever, but it seemed the more time that passed, the more the gap between himself and Epyon widened. Every day that dawned was another day lost to the demon. All his companions now were simply witness to his shame.

"Why did you come?" Something inside of him wanted to know the answer, but he couldn't have identified what.

"I have faith in you." It was not an answer, but she tried to get away with it. She would take any opportunity she could get to remind him of it. Still, they had never had this particular conversation, and she had had a sneaking suspicion that it would come up eventually. Wufei had never been given opportunity to officially object to her presence on this quest, as she knew he would have. The others had simply taken her presence for granted, and from there she had steamrolled her way in.

"You can have faith from afar. Why did you come?"

"...I told you. I'm not going to let you do this alone." She could repeat her point ad nauseum, and never get through to him completely. She could only wear away at him, so she let it drop for now. Familiar with his ways, she knew that if she pushed too hard on anything, he would start pushing back with equal, if not greater, fervor. There was so much more she could have said, but now was not the time.

They had spoken. That was an improvement over the gulf that had encompassed the empty space between them. But she knew her original question had not been answered, and the need for that answer was still burning a painful hole in her breast. It was her turn to ask a question, and she used it well. "Before... you didn't mean 'you' in general. You meant 'you' as in me." She took his silence as assent. "Why?"

A shout would have been much more preferable than the calm inquiry he got. Then he could answer in kind. "I promised your father a long time ago that I would take care of you."

"That was a long time ago." The promise had been sought for mere peace of mind, nothing else. Her father had gone on his business trips, leaving her at home by herself, for years before Wufei had come to live with them, and nothing had ever gone awry.

"I promised it to myself, too." He took his promises, especially this one, very seriously. The images he had seen when held by the trap Lei Fang had laid for him flashed briefly before his eyes before he willed them away with a mental growl. He would allow no harm to come to her.

"I'm not a person that needs to be taken care of."

"No... I suppose you never were." His unexpected admission sent a surprised warmth through her, and it was even enough to soften her protest to the rest of his answer. "You never let me when I tried. I wonder if I ever could."

"I don't know why you feel so useless, Wufei. I'm the one feeling useless here. I'm the one that can't do anything fancy." She wished she had more strength to lend her flagging friend. In her own way, she would protect him, if she could.

"Don't say that." He answered automatically, but immediately found himself at a loss as to what to say after. What she had said was undeniably true, and yet, the idea somehow rankled him as surely as it must have Meiran, though the reason eluded him. The first thing that came to mind was that surely the succubus had been more useless than she. Meiran had, after all, proved an excellent foil for Quatre's ideas and theories. All the she-demon had done was hang off of Duo's arm and soothe him until the return of his partner.

The comparison was not a pleasant one, but it came nevertheless. Perhaps another of Meiran's duties had been to help keep him in line and in focus. He had most certainly not needed it nearly as much as the wayward guardian had, but he hadn't forgotten how she had been there for him whenever he had felt down or discouraged. She had always been there for him, believing in him and trusting him and having faith in him. Her very constancy made her easy to overlook.

"You don't have to be fancy. Strength cannot be measured in fireballs and thunderbolts. You have your own strengths, as well as your own weaknesses. So while you should never have come..." She waited patiently, almost with an amused curiosity as to what neutral words he might come up with. "...It is not altogether a bad thing that you did."

Translated: he was glad she was there. She smiled. "So... is this the closest I'll get to an apology from you?" There had been no apology of any sort, but they had been unnaturally open with each other, and the give and take was peace offering enough. Straightforward words were unnecessary when compared to the tacitly regretful air they had conjured around them.

"...I shouldn't have snapped at you." He had been remiss in saying so earlier.

"But you're not sorry you snapped at me. You're just sorry you lost your temper, right?"

"I--"

"It's okay," she dismissed with a cheerful shrug. "I understand. Just don't... well, try not to do it again, or I might not be so nice next time, okay?" She pushed herself off the railing and landed lightly on her feet. They'd hadn't nearly said enough, but it was far more than she had expected to hear. Well, she reminded herself firmly, there would be time enough later to discuss these matters. She stretched, and took a moment to study her surroundings. She'd only been staring blankly at the far wall before Wufei had found her. Now she noticed the odd absence of the sounds of nature. No breeze created a quiet whisper of background noise. No birds chirped in the trees. In fact, the trees themselves were no sparkling specimens of horticultural pride, although they leaned more towards autumn, as opposed to the winter near the outer walls. It should have been quite a depressing place, but something soothing still hung in the air. Perhaps it was proof that Shenlong's power still haunted this place.

"...Thank you."

"Hm?" Wufei's murmur sounded suddenly in the silence.

"...For always believing in me."

She wondered briefly how hard it must have been for him to say that before she had to force the corners of her lips back down into an appropriately sedate expression. She didn't want to embarrass him any further by acknowledging his stilted words, so she didn't. He would know she had heard them anyway. "We should probably be getting back to the others." She walked towards the gateway she had entered through, but it wasn't long before she noted that he was not following. "Well?"

He was staring off at some distant point again, and she took advantage of the moment to study his profile. In this secluded place, his features were not schooled into that proud mask he wore before the others.

"I never wanted this," he said almost abruptly, a small surge of resentment overtaking him before he could suppress it. "I never planned on becoming... some great warrior-avenger."

Meiran shut her eyes briefly against the bittersweet nostalgia. "I do recall, you always did prefer to bury your nose in your books."

Wufei closed his eyes against the pain. "I don't remember when was the last time I read anything for pleasure."

"Maybe you've given too much of yourself to this." The suggestion was voiced calmly, but quietly, as if that might make it less bold. No hesitance held her back from presenting her conclusion before he could point out the necessity of it all. She knew it all already. "Maybe you need to have a little something to keep all to yourself, just to ground you. It's almost impossible to keep a good perspective when you have nothing else to reference against. Besides, after this is all over, you'll need something to do."

'After'. Not 'if', hinting at the possibility of failure. Not even 'when', a singular moment in time. 'After', which spanned all the many days following 'when'. It was not something he had thought about for a long time. 'After' was still a nebulous thing to him. Would he be normal then? Would he even be able to return to his books? He found he had no idea where to restart his life, and that thought itself was enough to urge him to flee back into the dark comfort that pessimism brought with it. But Chang Wufei did not flee.

"What would you suggest?" He turned to speak to her face to face for the first time since entering the courtyard. The question was both dry and challenging. It implied his own lack of ideas, and an assertion that she was probably in a similar state. "Gardening? Stamp collecting? Tai chi?"

She bit the inside of her lip in thought before taking the plunge. "...Me." There, she said it, gave at least a vague voice and form to something they had danced around for years. She would not dream of interfering with his duty, but still, this thing between them existed, there for the taking if only they would acknowledge it.

Wufei blinked at the strong, beautiful woman before him, and saw an 'after' that pulled at him with such longing that it seemed to suck the moisture from his mouth, the breath from his lungs. He saw a 'before' and a 'now' of never treating her as she deserved to be treated, but still she stood by him, encouraging, understanding, and patient. When had she gone from being a girl to be tolerated, to being a reliable source of strength for him to count on? It struck him just how important it was to him that she believe in him.

"Meiran..." The memory had been pushed away, but now it had found an opportune time to fight its way back into his consciousness. He remembered a time when he had looked upon her with the possibility of more than friendship in his thoughts. His brief lapse had been sternly corrected, his attention re-focused upon his task, and his wistful, futile dream relegated to some corner of his mind where it would not distract him. There was no room for such things in his life. But after? Dare he? "After this is over... I..."

"Shhh." She was standing before him. When had she gotten so close to him? "After this is over. That's all the promise I need. What comes after... will come. I just need for there to be an after."

"You will have it." It surprised him how much an after could affect the now. It surprised him how much a few simple words could focus a will into a sharp determination for success. It surprised him how a hand in his could start from a single point of warmth and spread throughout his body. And it surprised him how a simple smile could lift the weariness from his soul.

TBC...

 

To The Next Chapter

To The Previous Chapter

Back to Jei's Fanfictions Page

Back to Guests Fanfictions Page

Back to Main Page