---------------------------
       Heavy Thinking
~ A Moment in a Dorm Room ~
---------------------------
	Duo peered through the little glass window in the door, 
unsurprised to see that the curtain had been drawn around the bed.  He 
probably would have done the same.  It sucked to have a door that didn't 
lock; it sucked even more to have a door people could look through any 
time they wanted.  He knocked, and waited for entrance to be granted.

	There was really only one set of people that would knock on 
Heero's door.  Everyone else was a member of the medical staff and had 
no such respect for him.  He twitched aside the curtain, made eye 
contact with the face in the window, and that was enough to let Duo know 
that his presence had been duly acknowledged.  The door opened, and the 
lithe figure slipped in.

	Duo stopped at the foot of the bed and took a moment to study 
his wayward roommate.  It was promising to see him sitting up, on top of 
the blankets and no longer in a hospital gown, but a tank and sweat 
pants.  "Have I told you lately how absolutely ridiculous you look?"

	Heero self-consciously flicked away the wire dangling in his 
peripheral vision.  Within moments, it fell back into place.  He glared 
at it out of the corner of his eye.  "The electrodes are necessary for 
the EEG, therefore they must be tolerated."

	Duo smirked.  "I'm well aware of what the electrodes are for.  
Doesn't make you look any less ridiculous."  Using a careful finger, he 
lifted and inspected the data being printed out by the 
electroencephalograph Heero had been hooked up to for the last few days 
for constant monitoring.  If nothing else, this little episode had been 
educational.  They had all learnt a lot about the human brain in an 
attempt to keep up with Heero's progress.  "You're looking better."

	He shrugged, setting aside the engineering periodical he had 
been reading.  "I'm medicated."  In his eyes, he wouldn't be 'better' 
until things were back to normal, or whatever was normal for him.  "They 
think they're closer."

	Releasing the length of paper, Duo cast him a wry look.  
"They've been saying that every day for the last five."

	"The EEG and the MRI confirm it."

	The cold analysis of mere machines?  Duo trusted what he could 
see, so he wielded the eyes that had become attuned to the details over 
the past few days, trying to find visible confirmation.  Heero had never 
looked blatantly ill to begin with, discounting his condition when they 
had first brought him in.  After that, it had been a challenge to find 
the hints that could clue the observant person into realizing that 
something was off with him.  Heero generally masked the effects of 
medication well.  "How can you tell it's working if you're medicated?  I 
mean, unless you plan to exchange one addiction for another.  They can 
fix it, right?  Without you having to be medicated for the rest of your 
life?"

	"So they assure me."  Heero said it evenly, but the thought of 
it being otherwise sent a small shiver down his spine.  "I've already 
refused to take as much as they would like to manage my symptoms.  I can 
deal with the peripherals.  They need to concentrate on the problem."

	"They treating you alright here?"  He cursed the establishment 
for forcing the rest of them back to school and their classes while 
their teammate stayed at HQ.  It made them all feel antsy and out of the 
loop to have Heero vulnerable and in the hands of people they didn't 
necessarily trust very much.

	Heero shrugged again.  The electrodes stuck to his forehead made 
expressing himself with his usual eloquent looks somewhat awkward.  "I 
think it's in their best interest to treat me properly.  They're 
learning a lot about the effects of the Zero system, after all, and if 
they ever plan on using a similar technology, they'll have to learn to 
deal with the consequences."

	He received a sharp look.  "Have they said they're going to use 
Zero someday?"

	"They couldn't salvage enough of the original system to use, but 
that won't stop them from trying to emulate it in the future.  They 
didn't say as much, but they're a little too interested in my brain 
waves, if you ask me."

	"Shit, do we need to break you out of here?"  It would be a 
little harder than the last hospital break-out he had orchestrated, but 
it could be done.  He started thinking about escape routes before he had 
even finished asking the question.

	Heero shook his head, the wires from the electrodes swaying with 
him.  "They can't use the Zero system that I used, and they can't 
replicate it.  They'd have to start from scratch, and that would take 
years to reach Zero-like levels.  We can easily keep an eye on them.  
Besides, the system has other applications, not all of them necessarily 
bad."

	Duo's answering frown was skeptical.  "Are you sure?"

	He inclined his head.  "I'm just saying that we won't let them 
surprise us, Duo, not that I'm trusting them blindly.  They haven't 
earned our trust yet."  His eyes flicked past Duo, in the direction of 
the door behind the curtain that was still hiding his bed from view.  He 
blinked contemplatively at the sheet as if he could see through it, 
through the door, and into the outer room.  When he spoke, the words 
were slow and carefully chosen.  "I... feel more secure knowing that all 
of you are here."

	That was the only thanks he would give for their daily presence, 
regardless of whether they did it out of friendship or defiance.  Either 
way, they presented a united front to the government force.  As soon as 
their classes ended, they all piled into the car and made the trip out 
to Brussels, where they spent all the hours they were allowed camped out 
in the area outside Heero's.  They kept him company, kept him briefed, 
but they respected his need for quiet and privacy, so they didn't all 
crowd into his small room the whole time.  Duo was typically sent in as 
their representative.  Since they were regularly roommates, it was a 
frail imitation of normality.

	Duo uncomfortably accepted the subtly phrased gratitude and 
quickly found something else to talk about.  "So what sort of symptoms 
are there?" he asked, thinking that he would probably never know of them 
unless Heero actually nentioned them.  He wondered if Heero would 
actually give him any straight answers about his current weaknesses.

	His roommate looked steadily at him, then decided that, in light 
of his previous statement, it wouldn't make very much sense to withhold 
such basic information.  None of his symptoms were severe enough to use 
against him.  "Typical.  Slight fever.  Headache.  Loss of appetite.  
Dehydration."  Speaking of which, he reached out for the sealed water 
bottle standing on his bedside table, took a hold of the cap, and 
twisted.  The cap laughed mockingly at his effort.  He frowned, firmed 
his grip on the cap with an exertion of will, then succeeded in opening 
the bottle.  He caught Duo noticing his lapse, and he shrugged to the 
inevitable.  "Weakness.  But my concentration is better."  He lifted his 
bottle in his own personal defiance and drank, focusing on keep his hand 
steady.

	Duo liked the way the muscle fatigue was brazenly swept beneath 
the rug, but dwelt on it for a moment more after eyeing the collection 
of new water bottles on the bottom shelf of the bedside table.  "So 
you're weak, but they expect you to twist open all these things 
yourself?"

	Heero gave him a dry look over the rim of his bottle.

	He rolled his eyes.  "Of course, they wouldn't think about that 
if you didn't tell them."  Duo wouldn't have told them either, and it 
was a sign of trust that Heero told him now.  Of course, Heero was 
really sharing good news rather than bad.  He shuddered to think how 
things would be if his roommate wasn't on any drugs.  "So I take it 
they've okayed you for heavy thinking again?" he asked instead, 
gesturing at the periodical Heero had set aside.

	"Aa."  The day they had insisted he keep his brain activity to 
resting levels had nearly driven him mad.  He was not accustomed to 
idleness.  It probably hadn't done him much good in the end, given that 
his ailment only made it difficult for him to regulate his thought 
patterns in the absence of any external stimuli.  That gave him another 
reason to be grateful for the presence of the others.  "Not that there's 
much heavy thinking to be done here."

	"Umm..."  Duo made a show of patting himself down.  "Well, 
sorry, all I've got is a deck of cards," he offered, pulling said item 
from his jacket pocket.

	Heero gave it a moment's thought, then nodded.  "That'll do."

	"Seriously?"  He had just snagged the deck from a store on a 
whim.

	His roommate tilted his head in assertion.  "Publication of 
Stadtler's report on mobile suit efficiency was delayed because of the 
war.  It's all old news, now."  Rattling off suit mods he could do in 
his sleep; it took a little more effort to keep up with Duo.

	Duo blinked.  "Ooookay.  So, what do you know how to play?"  He 
brought over a chair and set it next to the bed, then reached into 
Heero's backpack and pulled out the calculus text that he wasn't using 
for his homework and used it as a tabletop.

	A particularly long list of games did not come to Heero's mind 
as he thought about it, absently tucking the wires dangling from his 
head back behind his ears.  While Heero didn't particularly understand 
the reason behind Duo's long hair, he at least could understand why Duo 
kept it in a braid all the time.  "Gin?"

	"Wouldn't mind some of that right now," Duo muttered, breaking 
the seal on the box and pulling out the cards.  Before he looked up, he 
put a grin on.  "Sure.  I'll deal."

	He shuffled with an ease that made it look like he must have 
done it all the time, but it had really been a long time since he'd last 
played anything.  Solitaire a few times, when the mood had struck him 
during the war.  Card nights with the Sweepers.  He wondered where Heero 
would have played before.  Then again, where had Heero learnt to ride 
horses?

	Dealing himself ten cards, and Heero eleven, he figured he might 
as well just ask.  Nothing ventured, nothing gained.  Besides, Heero was 
medicated.  Maybe he'd actually answer.  "So where'd you learn to play 
gin?"

	Heero picked up his cards and studied them for a couple of 
seconds, frowning a bit when too many possibilities occurred to him.  He 
shut his eyes for a fraction of a moment, focused on a good strategy, 
and then organized his cards accordingly with a slight contemplative 
air.  "Denver."

	"Eh?"  Today was Duo's lucky day, it seemed.  He took a look at 
his cards, then ignored them in favor of looking at his roommate.  
"Denver?  That's in North America, isn't it?"

	"Art Denver.  He was a tech on the project.  'Mathemagician', he 
liked to call himself.  A real whiz with numbers.  He could calculate 
out square roots to four decimal places in his head, multiply five-digit 
numbers together without a problem, that sort of thing.  And game 
theory.  He was really into game theory.  He shared a few things with 
me."

	"Damn, does that mean I'm about to lose?"  He joked, but on the 
inside he was still blinking over the fact that Heero had just given him 
unnecessary information on a guy he used to know.  Had it only been for 
intimidation?  No, that wouldn't really explain the soft tone...

	Heero almost smiled.  "To a guy doped up on medication?  I hope 
not."

	Maybe it really was the medication.  "You're on, Yuy.  You're 
on."

	They played five hands, neither keeping score on any piece of 
paper, but each still well aware of where they stood in their heads.  
Duo was in the lead by sixteen points, but it could have been attributed 
to the luck of the draw.

	On the sixth hand, Heero asked conversationally, "Duo, are you 
cheating?"

	"What?"  Duo stopped short of the word being a squawk of 
righteous indignation.  "You really think I'd cheat -- against a guy on 
medication, no less?  You think that's the only way I could be beating 
you?"

	He shook his head, taking a card in his hand and moving it to 
the other end of his arrangement before discarding a jack.  "So that's 
not it...  It's just... I feel like I'm missing something.  Like... 
there's something going on right in front of my eyes, and I'm just not 
noticing it."

	So his concentration was still not all quite there.  Very well, 
Duo would forgive him the unjust accusation.  Once.  "Well, I assure 
you, it isn't me cheating."  Duo added the jack to the end of his hand 
and threw out a seven in exchange.

	"I didn't think it was..."  Maybe it was something totally 
obvious about his hand?  Like, he had gin already and just hadn't 
realized it?  No, the feeling had persisted for several deals of the 
cards.  He drew a new card, blinked at it thoughtfully, then discarded 
it.

	He watched Duo carefully through the next few exchanges, and 
when Duo added a discarded four to the back of his hand and tossed a 
nine out from the middle, Heero had his epiphany.  "You don't organize 
your cards."

	"Hm?"

	"Every time you pick up a card, you just add it to the end."  
That was where that random suspicion of cheating had come from.  The way 
he played conveyed the appearance of not trying at all.  Looking back on 
it, Heero realized that he only arranged his cards when he declared his 
hand at the end of a winning game.

	Duo seemed about as surprised at the revelation as Heero.  "Huh.  
I guess I don't.  Never thought much about it.  But I guess it, uh, 
doesn't give anything away to my opponents?"

	"Hm."  After the quiet agreement, Heero decided he would give it 
a try.  It took a little more concentration to keep the cards in order 
in his head, but a mental challenge was what he had been looking for 
anyway.

	A few games later, and Heero had narrowed the gap to eight.  He 
found that playing without organizing his cards was in some ways easier.  
It made them seem less fixed in their patterns, and a fluid hand meant 
more possibilities for success.

	Duo laughed as he shuffled for their ninth game.  "Man, this is 
so surreal.  I mean, you're in a friggin' hospital bed, and if you 
weren't on meds, you'd still be withdrawing 'cuz the Zero system screwed 
you over, and possible permanent brain damage was lurking over the 
horizon just a few days ago, and we're sitting here playing cards.  It's 
too mundane, I tell you.  It's weird."

	"And what should I be doing, Duo?" Heero responded blandly, eyes 
watching Duo's hands as they played with the deck.  "Their little 
exercises?  My homework?"

	He shrugged uneasily.  "I dunno, man.  Railing against the 
fates, or something.  I mean, you got shafted on this.  Losing deal, 
short end of the stick and all that, and you're not the least bit... 
whatever?  Pissed or bummed or anything?"

	It was Heero's turn to shrug again, the movement once again 
dislodging his wires.  His hand moved to tuck them away again before he 
had to give it much thought.  "It happened.  I deal."

	"But it shouldn't have happened," Duo answered heatedly, setting 
the cards down heavily against the textbook-table with a muffled thud.  
"You shouldn't have had to take one for the team."

	If Heero could have raised an eyebrow, he would have.  "I 
didn't.  I needed the edge, and now I find there was a downside.  Fair 
enough.  Sometimes you have to take a hit to go in for the finishing 
blow."

	"Dammit, that's not what you said before!"

	He blinked.  "Before... when?"

	Duo calmed his tone with a deliberate effort.  "Before.  When 
you first woke up."

	The fact that there were electrodes stuck to Heero's forehead 
did not stop his brow from crinkling around them.  "...I don't remember 
what I said."

	Figured.  Did that mean he hadn't meant it?  Duo had been trying 
to puzzle out its meaning for days now, but if it had been something 
muttered in the throes of sedation, did it even matter anymore?  Or did 
that just make it all the more true?  Dammit, this was keeping him up at 
night, the idea that maybe there was something deep going on inside 
Heero Yuy's head.  "You said...  I was talking about how all the others 
still looked up to you, saw this whole thing as just... like you took 
one for the team.  Like it's just the hit you took for the finishing 
blow.  Like, wow, that was awfully noble of him...  I asked how you did 
that, how you could make them think those things... and then you said 
you wished you knew... so you could stop doing it."

	The repetition of the conversation jogged something in Heero's 
memory.  It sounded familiar, but he still didn't remember saying what 
he allegedly said.  He admitted to himself that it was something he 
might think, but he was surprised to find that he might have said such a 
thing aloud.  Until proven otherwise, he would blame it on the drugs he 
hated taking.  He sighed in tacit admission.  "I... may have said that."

	"Then what might you have meant?"

	He tossed the conversational highlights around in his mind, 
searching for the right angle.  Having already said it, was there any 
point in deliberately obscuring his meaning?  It just didn't seem worth 
it.  He was tired.  He had been tired when he said it, he was tired now, 
and he had been tired for years.  He just wasn't feeling the motivation 
to hide it, so he confessed.  Softly.  And slowly.  "I don't want 
anybody looking up to me."

	Duo looked at him with a puzzled expression, so he continued, 
staring a hole into the knee of his sweats.  "I did what I did.  I 
didn't think about it.  It wasn't... noble, or self-sacrificing... I 
just did it.  I don't want anybody thinking it was more than it was.  I 
don't want those... expectations."

	Duo blinked at him.  "But you..."  He went mute, trying to work 
it all out.

	Neither of them broke the silence for a few long seconds, and 
when the tension cracked, they still had not spoken.  It was a dull beep 
that spoke to them.  They both jumped a little at the sound.

	It took Heero a moment to place it.  He turned his head and 
reached for the printout the machines were steadily churning out.  His 
brainwaves had shown a brief pattern of instability, prompting the 
machine to give a tentative warning beep.  He smiled lopsidedly in grim 
amusement and twisted the paper in Duo's direction.  "Never mind.  Just 
crazy talk, I guess."

	Duo derived the meaning in the jagged set of lines and snorted.  
"Crazy talk, eh?  Hm.  Sure.  Just crazy talk."

	But that didn't mean it wasn't true.



_________________________________________
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The basis for this fic, i.e. Gundam Wing, 
Kyuuketsuki Miyu, et al., is the property 
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been an entirely automated message.
http://www.cs.hmc.edu/~jchew/misc/gw.html

last modified : 4/7/2004 23:12:32 PST