Heero pounded again, but still there was no answer. "Damn it," he swore, ears red and spewing unsuppressed frustration. "This was all Duo's idea." His fists weren't the least bit understanding.

    It was Saturday. Morning study and work detail were over. Lunch had been brief. Wufei and Trowa were heading off to the mall for the afternoon. Little Quatre had waved him back a hasty good-bye, with a wink and a wiggle of his butt, as he hurried to catch up. The last minute invitation for Heero to join them all had been unexpected, curious.

    Totally without precedent.

    And Heero declined before he knew what he'd done. Stupid.

    Not that he actually regretted it. But now he would have to be satisfied to stay in his room. To study, to work on this or that. Do things on his computer. Something worthwhile. Purposeful. Effective.

    He really didn't need anybody to spend his free time with, of course. He'd find something. Or make something to do. He snorted at the very idea, stared down the barrel at the weakness of it - need. But Duo had talked him into it that Friday night - whined, wheedled, and begged, Heero smirked. Duo had insisted: they were going to the movies, today. Just the two of them.

    Together.

    So here it was, Saturday. And Duo wasn't to be found.

    Irritated - but equally unwilling to renege on last night's promise of an outing - Heero had looked everywhere. It winched his angry shoulders together, cemented his jaw, tightened his abs. Painful. He realized that he was wasting his own precious allotment of free time, stressing just to arrange doing something - doing with someone else!

    Weak.

    And weakness made Heero furious. Especially his own.

    He imagined giving up directly, forgetting about going out. It hadn't really been what he wanted to do in the first place, when Duo had overcome his reluctance and asked. Although he'd accepted willingly enough. And Duo hadn't actually had to ask that hard, he admitted, more truthfully now.

    Plus, too, he had been thinking about it as he lay in bed waiting for sleep. And all during this morning, as well.

    They'd have an OK time, he had figured.

    Besides: it was already too late. He knew if he gave up on the issue, he'd spend the afternoon in his room, brooding. Or on the courts with a basketball, working it out that way. But soon he'd be wanting for a buddy to go one-on-one at the hoops, and with every sweaty dribble he'd start to get lonely. Lonelier - he was already detecting the seed of that deadly flower beginning to sprout inside of him, send roots into the soil of memory. He struck at the wall, anger and impatience seething, watering that new bud within, even as he sought to defoliate it.

    Nothing he could do would make the afternoon pass any quicker, and he'd loath every wretched minute of it.

    Heero never whined about unfairness: he simply shot things. But there was no target here, save impersonal institutional rules - and poor planning. Nothing concrete to blame. And no one to take it out on.

    Except himself. And Duo, of course.

    Angst threatened to bloom into self-pity, as anger stared back now from the accusing dent his fist had made in the wall. That weed had to be plucked out early, he knew.

    Certainly not that either he or Duo were ever like this on missions, careless. Curious: it was just when it came to personal time. Or recreation, between the two of them. Then, they could never manage to get together on things.

    When they were together. He sighed.

    Still, Heero wished for someone to hurt, something to kill, as he tried the door to Duo's room, twisting the handle in savage frustration.

    To his surprise, it opened at once. "Well, Duo can't be far," he stated obviously, with a sour, hollow laugh at his own bland intelligence. "Why hadn't I thought to try the damned door, instead of just knocking?" With no further consideration, he poked his head inside, boldly.

    "Maxwell? You in here?" The shower was running, the scent of damp soap apparent, honey and bitter olives.

    Mystery solved.

    Heero closed the door behind himself, crossed quickly towards the bath as his eyes adjusted to the bedroom dimness. "There's gonna be some ass-kicking goin' on," he determined, under his breath.

    But then he halted outside the bathroom, the reflection off white tile throwing a sudden self-conscious spotlight onto him. For Duo hadn't closed that door, let alone lock it, either. Not that odd, really, but... He put the thought behind him, faced the confrontation ahead. There flashed through his mind the image of Heero himself marching right in there, and taking up Duo - surprised and nude and dripping - for making him wait, for wasting his time.

    But the humiliation was his own, instead.

    He watched himself, twisted in ugly anger, drawn steadily more to distraction by the plain vision of his honest friend wearing nothing but tall, slender adolescence, standing there in the shower as free of shame as of dismay. Duo, still and staring, unperturbed by shock or the tidal force of the unexpected dressing-down, all glistening wet and deliciously naked.

    Then another image: Heero's raving fury draining weakly away, like the soapy-slick water off Duo's bright, bare skin. And growing dirty shame at what he was doing, ogling his friend like that; and at what he'd done, barging in, frothing mad; at how childish he was acting. Embarrassment over what he was feeling, now oh-so-obvious on his blushing face, as humiliation dried his mouth like contrite cotton, silencing his rantings. Standing before Duo, unable to speak, he'd be more exposed in his outburst than Duo in unconcealed nudity.

    And Duo quietly looking on, patient and unblinking - naked and unashamed - as calm and unself-conscious as ever. He'd simply let Heero wear himself out, lapse into babbling and thence finally into the shocked silence of surrender. And, beaten without a word, Heero would turn resignedly, drawing the shower curtain with close contrition as he left the cool-steamy bathroom.

    Heero shook his head violently, purging that desperate scene on a righteous flood of manly disgust. "I'm not walking in there," he resolved instantly. It made him feel better to be able to do something determining, even if just to make a decision. Yet the too-vivid mental picture of Duo, all shower-slick and naked beneath the spray, was not as quickly dealt with. Frustrating. And the guilt at hidden desires, secret helplessness, wormed its loathsome way like a blush of pimples to the surface of his face.

    He glanced around awkwardly, nervous yet attempting control, away from the doorway from which bright steam and the brilliant strains of Aida poured. "At least he sings OK," Heero credited, not begrudging a fair complement. He wasn't exactly a connoisseur of opera himself; he liked plain old rock music, when he actually cared to listen. Which wasn't often. "But that stuff's for sissies."

    Then he snapped like a rubber band, tension overcoming inertia, flew to a seat on the corner of the bed, right in the center of the room. It was cool and quiet in Duo's bedroom, peaceful and silent - save for splashing from the shower and the operatic arpeggiation issuing from the open doorway. Whence came most of the illumination, too. The carpet and coverlet were both of dark, rich forest-earth shades, and thick matching drapes obscured the light at the window. But it wasn't stuffy at all; cool and secluded, a private hideaway. Heero liked it better than his own room, which was arranged and decorated for carefree efficiency, rather than comfort and restfulness. He just couldn't feel part of it, right then.

    A pair of dark suede shoes snoozed casually at his feet, a languid heap half-concealed, dozing just under the edge of the bedclothes. Probably where Duo had kicked them off, he observed. It was just something random he'd noticed: his mind, a winded sparrow, cast about for somewhere to alight. Heero lifted one by the scruff, weighing it distractedly, caressing the soft, furry leather. He noted that the long laces hadn't even been untied. "Lazy."

    He turned the hound over and over in his hands. Boredom and nervous energy, underbelly of the mind, made it impossible to contain himself. "Hurry up, Duo," he whispered, anxiously.

    The shoe leapt away, restless to rejoin its mate, when Heero noticed the rest of Duo's outfit on the bedspread beside him. The black shirt, still well-pressed and quite spotless, dark as midnight and free of lint, was jeweler's velvet to the pearly white collar strip which lay on top. He lifted the linen band, inspecting the familiar-yet-strange article. It felt a forbidden thing to be touching it - heavy - checking it out, oddly somewhat like playing with Duo's discarded underwear. At which he laughed. Yet he wasn't disgusted with it, or himself after a moment, just curious: it wasn't like it was really underwear, after all. And fascinated by his own curiosity, too, he was. Which curiosity, and fascination, ebbed - and he was soon casually tossing the collar back and forth between idle workshop hands, lacing it through fingers, as he waited, anxious.

    Without so much as a glancing thought, Heero cast the collar onto the laid-out shirt again, where it bounced casually, once, twice, and then rested forgotten. He hunted about for a pillow to kick back with. But Duo's bed was made, quite neatly in fact: bolsters tucked beneath coverlet, all square and perfect. Maybe Duo's not that lazy after all, he decided. And felt oddly uncomfortable at the thought of messing it all up.

    Then grew suddenly sensitive to the weakness in that very reluctance.

    "Why the fuck do I care what Duo thinks?" He saw himself raping the coverlet from the bed, snatching a plump and virgin pillow for mean comfort. And not giving it a second deflowering thought. But it was strangely, Heero realized, as if he weren't alone there, trusted and unwatched in the familiar room of a teenage buddy. Nervous, he fought the guilty urge to stand, to erase the intimate liberty he'd taken of lounging on Duo's bed. To escape eyes upon him.

    The shower was still playing, a harmonic river of splashing accompaniment, and Aida's Egyptian cohorts now making their move. Heero wouldn't have minded taking it easy for a bit, riding the waves of Duo's rich baritone in the stretch for those high notes as his friend rinsed and scrubbed and rinsed. Yet try as he might, he couldn't be still. He tugged at his shorts, itchy with confined restlessness.

    "I guess church choir did his voice some good," Heero remarked. A picture of his friend, in collar and cassock, snowy-white surplice covering all, sprang to his mind. He'd never been in a church himself - well, not that many times, anyway. And the image he'd conjured of Duo, open-mouthed, with face ovalled around a hymn, was plagiarized from a thousand tacky holiday cards.

    He was just too keyed up for serious music, today. Any music. "Just nervous from waiting, that's all." He jerked his finger from his mouth, the nail now frayed. How he wished Duo would hurry!

    The wholesome shower poured down, a dramatic, earnest cascade, as the grand tears of Verdi's Ethiopian princess proclaimed her solemn virtue. Heero wondered what it was like, as he played with Duo's shirt collar... wearing it, wearing that white collar. The shirt.

    Being part of what Duo had.

    What Duo had grown up with, church.

    Heero wasn't thinking about religion, of course. Or even church. He snorted, knowing just where he stood on that matter. "Hell, even Duo isn't into that stuff, either - and he still wears the drag!"

    But there are all sorts of other powers in the world, too. Nothing transcendent, spiritual. Just simple, basic stuff that even Heero, only lately beginning to perceive such things, and the depths of the emptiness within himself, could grasp. Belonging, for instance.

    He sensed that that simple shirt tied Duo to something. Maybe it was just a feeling inside Duo, something that he got from wearing that stuff. Just a feeling maybe and nothing more - after all, what good are feelings?. But it connected him to his past. Heero could see that now. To people Duo had loved, and a life he'd been part of. To a past.

    "Something I don't have..."

    And something bigger than himself, too, perhaps.

    Heero sighed out.

    "I wish I could be like that," he confessed, his heart in simple words. "Takin' it easy; takin' life as it comes. Doin' whatever I please." Of course Heero could do as he pleased. More or less. But lately he'd been discovering that the things he pleased to do weren't the things he wanted to do.

    "But I don't want to have to fight, sometimes." And never simply to feel some dignity inside, he added, awkwardly. "Not to have to fight, period!" That was a strange notion, with Heero the perfect soldier! He struggled as he put it to expression, uncertain, on the brink of something larger than Heero ever had in his own experience. He fought to stay with it long enough.

    "It's like... Duo's everything he wants to be. And just by being, too! Certainly the best pilot of all of us. And he doesn't even really try at it - never even breaks a sweat. He's always there to back me up, too." No matter how I act sometimes, he appended, silently.

    "Like - he's not so into his own fight" - his own inner fight, thought Heero - "that he can't see when someone needs help! Needs... him.

    "I wish he'd see that in me, sometimes. How I need him..."

    His susurration was as the forest breeze in high summer, and thick and turpentine with pining for that attention for which he couldn't bring himself to ask. Duo's. His friend's large, liquid blue eyes were suddenly before him, an enchantment. Deep, open, and receptive. Oh, how easy it would be to slip into there, he dreamed.

    "I wish I were like him. More self-possessed." Heero snorted, finally bringing himself around. "So maybe I wouldn't need him, in the first place!" He laughed, and shook his head again, flinging sentimentality away, as easily as water from long hair.

    Of course it wasn't what Duo wore that made him special. Heero knew that. "It's not like this is a sorcerer's robe or something!" The clerical shirt regarded him solemnly from beneath his caressing hand, both drawing his gaze and repelling every single thought he put to the object. "If there's magic there, it's just from the heart inside, Duo's heart." Duo's balance. Even if he couldn't often admit his own need, Heero knew of his friend's inestimable value.

    To earth.

    To the colonies.

    To them all.

    "Hell, without Duo, we'd all be at each other's throats! Or going our own ways. The space colonies would be lost."

    And me, too, he appended, uncustomarily honest; bare in the draft of vulnerability again.

    A faint mark of sweat was barely visible on the whiteness of the starched linen in his hands, where it had touched Duo's bare flesh. Where it had touched what really mattered - Duo. He stroked it with a gentle finger. Much more to this than religion ever could be, Heero understood now, nodding almost imperceptibly. More to Duo's past than simply the loneliness of an orphanage. Duo had built something inside himself, something difficult and worthy and a joy to possess:

    Himself.

    "And all I do is fight. Battle. Pilot the damned Gundam suit. Next to him, I'm empty inside. Just a battle suit, myself."

    The moment seized him, the crescendo as the Pharaoh's slave girl cast off the ultimate of bonds and seized her destiny, when Heero had slipped from his loose green shirt. There was just something he felt an urgent need to try.

    His own shoulders were wider, but Duo's chest bigger. It worked out, however, and the clerical shirt went on easily enough. It felt warm and delicious; buttery-soft, oddly peaceful. Peace-full. The clean crispness of the heavy cloth had been made friendly by a light wearing that very morning. He even imagined he could still feel the maleness of Duo's body heat on the garment.

    He could certainly smell his friend on the shirt. Vanilla and apples, and a campfire in the wilderness - the kind of campfire that's a treat to relax beside, not the essence of survival in a rough and deadly spot. He smoothed the fabric over bulges and rips: his biceps, his pecs, his abs. The feeling was strange, yet fresh. Filling. He quickened, a light-headed rush of haste, buttoning up and securing the collar tight. He'd watched Duo dress enough times, with guilty and curious eye drawn against his will, to know how to fit the linen band at the neck, as well.

    It was weirdly exhilarating, and brisk as the finale of an Italian opera. Perhaps it was just the danger, the perverse thrill at possibly getting caught. How in the world could he ever explain this to Duo? But that didn't matter right then. Heero stood, greeted by his reflection in the floor-length mirror opposite the bed. Or what should have been his reflection.

    Eyes met his.

    Unfamiliar eyes.

    Heero's hands went to his cheeks, which blossomed rosy in the sudden silence. His jaw felt strangely elastic, loose, as he worked it between his fingers. He swallowed, pushed the hair back off his forehead. And found his face fuller, rounder, relaxed.

    The essential angry strain, the tight, screaming demand of over-acheivement - the fragile quavering tension there - it had faded! His brow seemed higher, broader, blending into wide intelligence above. And his glowering eyes were as cool and placid as a stream in an unfound forest.

    The eyes were different, he realized, gazing. Larger. Deeper. Blue, yet darker. Shadowed, amethyst and jet. Profound with an clearness that spoke trust and hope.

    He jerked to, again, extracting his eyes from the eidolic. And felt suddenly betrayed, furiously upset. "What in hell is up with this?" Clothes make the man, of course - but this was too bizarre for words! His hands seized the collar of the shirt, intent on making good his escape from whatever mindlessness had drawn him to put on Duo's clothing in the first place. But those same eyes, his and his no longer, found the mirror again - curiously, needfully, seeking a part of himself that he seldom ever had looked upon.

    The face in the mirror, it wasn't one that had ever gazed on killings uncounted, on death wrought by own hands. The image that stared back placidly at Heero was still capable, experienced. Tough and ungentle. But plainly untainted in its history - by its history. And mild at the very core. Conquering, yet compassionate. And confident in that very strength.

    He shook with fright. The experience threatened to overwhelm him, to make him at last a stranger of his own self. And with that the anger was back, his potent help in time of trouble.

    "Damned priest-magic," he hissed, tearing at the cuffs of the shirt. Then he would rip the collar from his neck, be free of it. Did it really do these things to Duo, when he put it on every morning?

    Heero didn't think so. Duo was still just a teenager, a boy much like himself. "Maybe not as screwed up. OK, well, a pansy sometimes..." - worse than being screwed up, in Heero's opinion. "And it's not like Duo's any sort of saint, either. Baka! It's all just stupid!" But in his haste, he only fumbled helplessly at the buttons.

    Or... Maybe - could it be? - Duo just knew how to handle it, whatever the magic was? Like he'd learned to deal with it, or something. The way Duo could deal with everything else that life threw at him. Effortlessly. Heero's fight for escape lapsed, unnoticed.

    There was far, far more to Duo than Heero had ever realized. He took that for granted now.

    And then a new notion took Heero aback. Something that someone else could do, but he himself couldn't master? He wasn't at all the slave to pride, no matter how tough and capable he was: pride only served to get a tough job done. But he just wasn't going to stand for it, being bested by Duo and his damned shirt.

    It was, curiously, the honest purity of intelligence, that won out over the need to be superior. Whatever happening inside him was deep. It felt... It felt... something. "That's it!" It made him feel! Want to feel!! The tingle was almost palpable. And he needed to know what it was, what it was inside himself that he was now in contact with. He yearned for it, hungered. The flame must be fed.

    He didn't feel like he was in competition with Duo, at the moment, as he cast the light of new awareness into the mirror again.

    Yet the face there, his and yet not his, called him out. It challenged him firmly, man to boy - dared him to try - to stand and face the magic. "Might as well go for the works," he mumbled, as his shoes padded across the carpet to greet Duo's beside the bed. The spandex of his shorts accordioned as he pushed them off, over his tight narrow butt, and on down his sinewy thighs. Duo's dark slacks fit well enough.

    He buttoned and belted and zipped. Adjusted. And then found he couldn't raise his eyes, to look in the mirror.

    A strange sense of humility told Heero that he couldn't face what he would find there. That he just wasn't ready for it. Curiosity was now alone not near enough. There simply wasn't that sort of strength in him at all. Yet the memory of that wonderful face - those eyes - bade him defy the arrogance of fear, to draw himself up and receive the new revelation manfully.

    He did so.

    And closed his eyes tight the very first moment he was able.

    "Trick of the light," he moaned, trying to find calm in reason. "Of course it is." He didn't feel reassured, not in the least. Science and optics held no sway here. He felt terrified.

    And when he was able to see again, the aura of power which he couldn't deny feeling was at once almost visible in the mirror before him. But this time he couldn't withdraw his gaze, not even to save himself, to preserve enough defensive space to think. It was as within him as without, undeniable as the stirring in his pants, a rush of heat from hands and heart. And it rolled over him like a wave of royal adulation, applause acknowledged yet undeserved, leaving him weak and trembling.

    Duo's jaw dropped, and so did the bright yellow towel, leaving him both stunned and naked at the sight he'd bounced out of the abandoned bathroom to find. His heavy braid, plaited damp, thwacked him audibly on the ass.

    "I can explain," Heero whispered, his rising tone strained with the start, then suddenly breaking. The power running through him was like ice and lava by turns. Explain? - he couldn't even think! He knew he was sweating as Duo moved towards him, face quite opaque, palms unseen. He felt the carpet under his bare feet, black knit pants against unbriefed behind. Heero's wide blue eyes were fey, obvious with guilt and convicting surprise.

    "You can't," Duo breathed frankly, licking his lips. "No way in hell. If I can't explain it, you surely..." There was no anger in his eyes, Heero realized. Just the light of ale-pale awe casting its dumb pall over Duo's face. Awe, and wonder - and something else.

    Something like the memory of fire.

    "Arigato, Duo-san. I shouldn't have..." Heero bowed off, the attempt at formal self-effacement running out, as he realized what Duo had been about to say. "You mean, this?" His hand went protectively - yes, oddly so - to the white band of linen against his neck, the black collar surrounding it.

    Duo nodded.

    "You mean... It's real?" One look at Duo's face gave Heero the answer. An answer he wasn't able to accept. "But what is it?" His voice was paranoia now.

    "I don't know." Duo was trembling, his voice cracking with the intensity of his bewilderment, his fear. Something huge was spreading itself like inescapable wings upon them both. "But it's amazing. And what it's done to you! You're so - different. So...much more. And so damned hot!"

    His mouth was on Heero's, awkward, as unprepared by awe as Heero's was by shock and fright. An elemental force, akin to arousal, but only just barely, passed between them like a sacred current. Heero moaned into Duo's mouth, reaching down one hand between them, as his friend held him fast. He was anxious that he would instantly, accidentally defile the slacks he'd borrowed.

    But the kiss broke off before Heero climaxed. Fulfillment denied turned to frustration; frustration unrelieved, to anger. He didn't even notice Duo's eyes, glazed like warm cake, and sweetly helpless beyond all caring. Heero was too blinded by sudden disgust.

    "Baka hentai, Duo-san! What the hell is this craziness? First I have to put on your damned clothes - like I can't help myself. And then, it does - what? Something! - to me. And then... this... like - I don't want to be part of no sick fetish of yours! Goddamn it Duo: what the fuck's going on here!"

    Duo laughed, clear and light. It burst from him before he could stop it. Heero had guessed, had struck upon his secret inner kink. But that wasn't what was going on here. Not by a long shot.

    His hands moved to Heero's shoulders, squeezing strongly at firm muscle, reassuring. Or manipulating, Heero suddenly suspected. The touch was not at all welcome to him. Not just mildly distasteful. But he was too overwhelmed by all that had happened, and caught in Duo's irresistible embrace, to think of escape.

    And in his friend's face there was surprisingly all too little strength, he saw. Less for pointless explanations, none at all for lies and deceit. Even as Duo's hands held Heero firmly, his eyes cradled tears.

    A stranger in a strange land, Heero's only hope the odd boy nude before him, he knew he must trust.

    "But it's not like that, Heero-kun! It's not the clothes... It's you! Your face. Your heart!" The look in Heero's eyes told Duo that he'd already seen it himself. In himself. Was still fighting. Duo smiled, a warm, broad grin. Accepting. Disarming. Reassuring Heero that this wasn't all a dream.

    And Duo firmly, inexorably, turned Heero away from the mirror.

    "You're different, now. More - well - manly! Beautiful, like a young Arthur, all bearded and regal, and glowing with health and presence. Grace - that's it. The grace of a king." He caressed Heero's smooth chin, his soft, full cheeks. And then ruined the moment with a silly giggle. "I don't know. It's just so - incredible. Overwhelming! Amazing! You're just so much more. So much more...

    "I'm sorry I kissed you," Duo then offered evenly, holding Heero's gaze as easily, inescapably as his shoulders. "It just happened."

    Heero found no sorrow in Duo's expression. On the contrary!

    But, inexplicably, he didn't begrudge his friend the delight, the excitement. The thrill which Duo was receiving, as eye to eye they shared the magic. He sensed his own resonance with his friend's trembling, these crashing feelings that visibly rocked the boy's nakedness from head to foot in waves of passing color.

    Strange, Heero thought, with all that's happened to me. That I'd still have room left to take on someone else's feelings, too. Or the inclination to notice, either. And it doesn't seem weak, not at all.

    His hands went reluctantly to the back of his neck, to the secret spot that fastened collar to shirt. He knew it was no game, now, what was happening here. No figment of overexcited imagination. Nor twisted adolescent fetish. And it was too powerful to feel safe with, too seductive to feel dangerous. Better just to end it now.

    "No, no," begged Duo. "Please, just... just let me look at you." The large, liquid cobalt orbs called to Heero, promised a sweet, slow delicious death by drowning. The two boys were balancing on the cusp between the erotic and the profound. "You're just so... so full, Heero-kun! Like something you missed has finally found you." Duo's voice throbbed with deep passion, as if he, too, would be lost in sexy deluge.

    "Baka Duo," Heero whispered, kindly, eschewing the romantic as always. His voice, richer now, profondo, was wracked by subharmonic tremor. Yet more fragile, it; more precious, a first keening thrill that is trebled joy and life quickening within. Something, which once broken, should never come anew.

    A healing hand reached out to caress Duo's cheek. "It feels like that, inside, too. Something that once was lost. And now is found." He sighed. "Amazing. Duo-kun? What kind of magic is on this stuff, anyway?" His fingers kissed the graceful linen at his own neck.

    Duo laughed! Suddenly. But not unkindly.

    "Nothing. That shirt's, umm... 'just off the rack', if you get my meaning. But you felt - something? I'm surprised..." He was silent for a long time, thoughtful. His implacable grip didn't abate for an instant, the grin on his face disguising irresistable mental delvings. Unless Heero wanted to wrestle, neither one of them was going anywhere for the moment. He sought within, to the uttermost depths of the his heart, considering; deep into his friend's eyes, probing. And weighed the secret impossibility of choice.

    Heero returned the gaze softly, peaceful and undemanding, more open and vulnerable, brave - and joyous in his weakness - than he ever knew he could be. It felt so good to be there, to be all in one moment like he never was before, unashamed and whole, dressed strangely - and strangely bare and exposed within Duo's grasp.

    Reveling in the power within himself. A power which left him no self at all.

    Sharing it with one who'd must have known such things before in his own body, too. He basked in the pride flowing from out of Duo, who stood robed in a man's own nakedness, loving and affirming as the father Heero had never known.

    And when the unexpected tear eased its kindly way down Heero's cheek, Duo's hand came gently to meet it. Duo touched it to his own forehead, kissed his fingertips, laid that hand upon his heart. "It is in you," he whispered with awe. "The clothes don't matter. Not in the least." But at that moment his decision became clear. The air in the room began to thrum.

    Duo hesitated, torn between venerating Heero, worshipping at arm's length, and the wild, heady thrill of close osculation. "I want to stay here forever with you, Heero-kun, just like this! Just as we are." Dressed perfectly, both of us, he added, mentally.

    "But what is it, Duo-kun? I still don't understand!"

    Duo giggled, wistfully shook his head. "I don't know what magic is, even. Though sometimes it's planned, and sometimes it's not, and just happens anyway. Planned is often more powerful; accidental, even more surprising." He stopped. The whispering, tickly undulations of his braid died away.

    "Will you try something with me?"

    Heero nodded. It felt like... strangely like a sort of giving. He sensed he could give and give and never regret it, just then. Never run out - and, well, he'd find more of whatever it was, if he did. And swore to himself that never again would he see weakness in generosity.

    "It might be dangerous," Duo confessed, a dark cloud passing over the eager sun. He couldn't let his friend go forward uncautioned; himself, unabsolved. Though, truly, they were both beyond any experience familiar to him.

    And they were now about to go further than he'd ever imagined.

    Heero nodded, with deliberate dignity and happy reserve. Anything that his friend could ask, that he would accede willingly. His heart throbbed in his chest, anticipation mingling with trepidation. He trusted Duo with his very soul.

    Which was strangely appropriate, he soon realized.

    Duo moved to his wardrobe, opening the bottommost drawer, wide and broad and shallow. He knelt, retrieved something large, white - linen and lace that reminded Heero of someone's great-grandmother covering a small round table. "I really shouldn't have this," Duo admitted, sheepishly. "And especially not this." But Heero couldn't see what he was then referring to, as, still naked, Duo rose, turning to face him.

    Who did something odd with the white cloth, now obviously a garment, turning it inside-out over his forearms as if preparing to don it himself. It looked curiously like a nightshirt, Heero thought, but a very large and voluminous one, if so. Then Duo stopped, and moving close to Heero, replaced his hands again on the other boy's shoulders. More gently, this time, with a quick reassuring squeeze. He smirked.

    Heero understood, sliding his arms, warm in the soft black shirt, along Duo's pale and naked ones. At once he was up to his shoulders in the ample linen sleeves.

    Duo grinned, and backed away, disengaging himself from the so oddly intimate embrace. He motioned Heero to bow his head, and coming close, lifted the back of the surplice up and over. The fabric cascaded in full, lacy pleats, all around Heero's person, envesting him to the hips.

    It was like a jolt of electric fluid, taken neat. Heero's breath came with an icy, shocking hiss that made Duo reel back in naked surprise. He was stripped to the skin in a blizzard - more: with every hair and half his skin rubbed right off. Heero didn't feel magically cleansed inside, but as if new-made, and sudden. White hot iron from the refiner's strong fire. Simply and efficiently transmuted, left behind by this anonymous power that toyed with him. And small.

    So very small.

    The purity of the snowflake was on him, pristine, sharp and perfect. Yet a tiny, fragile thing he was, so ephemeral that a child's delighted mitten would be his own undoing. He floated free in the raw, preserving breeze, borne only by crystalline air, protected as with a shield from all taint and touch.

    But even as purity in a vacuum is nothing but emptiness, this feeling reached out of him. Heero embraced all things, cleansing them with himself, filling the emptiness, brightening both the sad and the dark of the world. So caught up was he, that he missed the moment of backlash. The shame and guilt, which had always clouded his mind and gripped his thoughts and twisted at his stomach, vanished as a dirty fog before a gust of good, crisp winter wind.

    He took Duo's face gently into his pulsing, firey hands.

    "I love you... I can hardly believe it! Hardly believe I'm saying this! But I love you, Duo-kun. And it doesn't hurt any more!" Tears, the life-giving rains of first thaw, fell like early spring onto the square white superpellice yoke. He flailed, weak as a new leaf in the grip of an arctic breeze.

    Duo held him close, moan quaking with emotion. The wonder of it all, the awesome touch of things unseen, the mystery and the magic - and Heero's release - even Duo was beside himself, carried along by forces and well-springs beyond his control and understanding. He could see now in Heero everything he ever wanted, everything he ever wanted to be! It was sublime and erotic all at once! Before him stood friend and brother, father and lover; all in one body, all in one heart. Perfection! All things bright and beautiful, all maleness: great and strong. The moment would pass - was passing - must never pass!! How could he bear to lose it? Duo groaned aloud, suddenly, forcefully, holding Heero away to gaze upon him.

    Can he go through with this? Duo wondered. All of it? And can I take him there, after all? Yet as his sight found Heero's face, he discovered his answer. Discovered he must.

    For Heero's own eyes were shining, adamantine blue, purified by hardening fire and quenched with living snow. His cheeks glistened no longer, tears boiled away by love and fierce openness. And he was radiant - from every pore of his being. Even the blackness of the collar-shield and shirt, visible above the surplice, shone brightly.

    "This might be dangerous," Duo repeated, firmly. Yet the doubt in his voice was gone. "Are you sure?" He knew the choice to resist was beyond them both.

    It was simply no longer in Heero to be able to stop what was happening. Where Duo was taking them. He would follow wherever it led.

    "Please, Duo-kun! I beg you.."

    Violet silk, like a strange purple chrism, flowed in twin amethyst streams from Duo's shaking hands. It caught the light, cast off cold prismatic shards. A long strip of fabric, the color of Power. Duo closed his eyes and bowed his head, a squire proffering a weapon, a sword beyond the mightiest ever unsheathed by king.

    And as Heero watched the ends of the stole dangling, moving with wine-pale, deceptive limpness, Duo raised the center of it to his lips. His eyes took Heero's, and the violet kiss made Heero long to be silk. It was when the purple garment moved towards his own mouth that Heero first realized he should be afraid. Yet his lips sought it, eagerly. Took from it what Duo had left in trust. It was softer than the kiss of kisses that his heart believed he'd never receive.

    He bowed his head, waited.

    And as the stole came down over his shoulders and around his neck, Heero began to scream.

    If the other had been spark, this was electrocution. And a glorious death it was! His head snapped erect. He howled with the pain of it, the glory. A terrifying joy, and a joyful terror. It was strength beyond strength, unhampered by the limitting span of mortal life. For at that moment, Heero felt as though Death Herself would never reach him.

    He spun with the cosmos, danced with galaxies immortal. It was the ageless gift, the gift of agelessness. He was at once ancient as light, as fresh as the newest flower. Huge. He understood in a single instant what Duo had said about Arthur the King, of youth and royalty and virility. It was irresistable, and dangerous, this awesome fullness.

    Majesty.

    The Sacred.

    The power to call down the planets themselves as his avatars, and crush their celestial spheres in his own bare hands. To fight gate-crushing battle at the heart of the enemy stronghold, to vanquish all resistance, to brave the threshold of the impossible. To stand in the face of sure destruction, steadfast, unwavering. And wholly without courage, vain bravery. For nothing possible could hold arms against him now, nothing quell the simple imperative of transcendence within him.

    And a yoke it was, too, and a burden unthinkable. Mankind, flung to the farthest reaches of the cosmos - they were all now his to care for. His to defend and protect. Not just to free the colonies from the bondage and domination of Zechs and his masters of the Alliance. Life everywhere was his for the nurturing, his to ennoble and cherish until the end of all things, and beyond.

    With immortality comes awesome responsibility.

    Yet nothing was beyond him any more. Or so it seemed. Small and unproud though he now felt, he knew he was equal to any task. Simply, unequivocally. Devoid of hubris, self utterly burned away. He could swim the vacuum of space unclothed, slay the dragons of Venus, feed the dying places of the universe with the blood of his own pellican heart. And that knowledge laid on him the obligation unendurable, the imperious touch at which quivers noblesse. He was master and servant, and nothing could withstand him now. Nothing, too small for his cares. And as fear shrank towards zero, engagement bounded towards infinity. His chest, expanding ever and again greater, taking it all in, threatened to explode.

    And explode it did. With a great rush of air, Heero realized he'd been holding his breath. Then suddenly light-headed, he sat heavily upon the bed. As swimming spots and dancing nebulae slowly receeded from his vision, the first thing he saw was Duo grinning down on him, shaking like a terrified child. Smiling, but with tears in his eyes. The violet stole he was folding between his hands had just been lifted from Heero's shoulders.

    "Are you all right?" They both spoke together. And laughed. One nervously, full of dread; the other, simply full.

    "Heero-kun! What happened? That was so cool! You yelled, and then - I swear - you got seven feet tall and burned like a supernova! What was it like? What happened? What did you do?" Even trembling as he was, Duo's moist, blue eyes were huge with wonder.

    "Are you well, Duo?" the other asked softly, with genuine concern. The boy was indeed pasty-white. Whatever this power had been like to see from the outside, it wasn't as common and casual as Duo had tried so desperately to make it out to be. Heero pulled his friend down to kneel before him, took the pale, worried face in his hands.

    They kissed. It was warm as summer morning, and sweet and soft as new milk for cereal. Wild and heady. For the first time, Duo was actually conscious of his nakedness, descending from the peak of emotion only to rise to another at the bidding of Heero's mouth. Sated, he longed for a towel, a robe, anything.

    And stood, lifted Heero up to himself. Heero approached smiling, warm and receptive, as for another kiss.

    "Let me help you out of that stuff," Duo stated, a touch sharply. Insisted, the gravelly rasp of adolescent lust welling up again in his voice. "You do not need clothes any more..." It was clear as ice water from the first melt, to Heero: he was about to be taken to bed.

    And on the moment, the unlocked door opened wide, and in bounced Quatre.

    "Hi, Duo-kun! Thanks for the hat you let me... Whoa!" He fell off with a gasp, spying the pair: Heero in black and white vestments, Duo in nothing but skin and a smile.

    The tableau held. They inhaled soap-scented tension.

    Duo watched Quatre's face blanche, saw his lovely eyes go wide. With surprise? Shock? He made a move towards the horrified blonde boy, not even knowing what he intended to do. Could do, even. Then froze, blushing to his heels. Quatre catching Heero dressed up like that was bad enough. But with Duo himself standing there naked, close enough for a kiss, Quatre couldn't help but assume the most twisted, kinky obvious. And how far had they actually been from that twisted obvious, anyway?

    What would innocent Quatre do? A quick glance at Heero's face told Duo nothing, bespoke that his poor, humbled friend hadn't even a hint of the trouble they were both in. Would Quatre laugh? Run out, hollering, to tell the others? And tell them what? That Duo and Heero had been up to the most hentai game they'd ever imagine - and listen close, here's the details!

    A wave of chagrin nearly knocked Duo from his feet. This was something that he and Heero would never, ever, live down.

    But Quatre's soft, sensitive blue eyes didn't seem to take in Duo at all. Duo almost resented being ignored out of hand so casually! For the blonde boy's attention, whole and intense and unwavering, was centered on Heero's face. He moved magnetically, slow and stately, towards Heero. Who stood, still and commanding, kingly and fatherly and divine, to receive the approach. Their gazes, level and cool, weighty - one assenting, one enrapt - accepted each other without reservation. Quatre's kind, honest heart; Heero's infinite one.

    The blonde boy was trembling, too, now. Duo even thought the gentle teen might cry. Feared he would laugh in shame, instead. Heero's face was so strangely unread, able to him, too - but there was no shame, no fear there. Simply strength. And Duo, for his part, was lost, uncustomarily hopeless, helpless with nowhere to turn.

    And a great need to be somewhere else. Anywhere else.

    Then Quatre sank on one knee, slowly, eyes still locked in royal embrace with Heero's own. A prince giving a prince's concession. He reverently took Heero's hand in both of his. It was no mockery, this. "My father and my mother," he whispered, the earnestness in his voice and manner and expression unbetrayed by the slightest trace of deceit, as he put the fingers to his lips. Yet his gaze would not relinquish its hold. His cheek brushed softly, smooth as a peach, across Heero's knuckles; his head rested lightly on Heero's loins.

    Duo was exasperated, confounded gasping beyond surprise. But Heero looked to him, his patient, deep, imperturbable eyes again seeking answers still unknown. "I told you, Heero-kun," Duo said, helpless and out of breath. "It isn't the clothes." Anymore.

    Of what was happening here, Duo had absolutely no clue. Clearly the danger, if danger there was, was of a wholly different sort than public exposure. And it certainly did feel perilous. But Heero's face was still, peaceful, with the hinting traces of a kind smile growing upon him, as he gazed down upon the boy, prostrate at his feet. At Quatre, experiencing in his own way with Heero, what Heero had found within.

    It's because Heero's no longer looking for answers now, Duo suddenly knew.

    When Heero glanced up, more briefly this time, the violet stole was quietly being laid upon him again. "Thank you," he whispered to Duo. His eyes seemed to be gifting Duo with something. And with his free hand, the one not clutched to the kneeling boy's wet face, he took up an end of the purple riband of power, laying it carefully on Quatre's blonde head. He caressed him, petting lovingly, nurturing the teen - and whatever was finding its way into him. Or out.

    They remained thus, for a long time.

    When Quatre rose, Duo knew they had nothing to fear. His rep, and Heero's, would be safe. He'd been staring at the pair, still out of his head with consternation, knowing he'd never understand was was passing between them. And jeopardy: assured that he'd never be able to face any of his friends again, if word of this got around. Quatre's hand went to the back of Heero's neck, and their kiss was firm, mature as between men; delicious as harvest apples, and hearty and common as bread. There would never be word of this in mess hall, Duo knew, never giggled whispers in the locker room. Quatre was fully and inexplicably part of whatever magic Heero had shared out to them all.

    The blonde had risen carefully, shaky at the knees. With a half-hearted grin and a wink for Duo, a secret promise and an unsought intimacy that made Duo - still naked - shudder violently, Quatre reverently and quietly left the place where he, too, had touched that something that none of them ever understood. When the door closed, Heero sank back, an exhausted figurine clumsily released from the strings of an impassioned puppeteer.

    Duo rushed to him before he could fall, taking his friend into strong arms. Heero was light - weightless, it seemed. If I let go of him, Duo thought, he'll just float away. Quickly, before the magic could take them anywhere else, he stripped the stole from Heero's neck, the surplice from his body. They now reposed quietly, innocuously, on the chair at his desk.

    Waiting, Duo thought. Waiting.

    He continued to divest Heero, first the linen collar, which he expertly and quickly unfastened, then the black shirt. How odd, he mused, to be helping someone else out of clothes like these. Ever again.

    Pants dropped heavily to the carpet when he unbuckled them and lifted Heero, yielding, and naked as himself, from the pile of clothes on the floor. He only gave them a single, passing glance.

    The bed was warm and soft and welcomed them both.

    "But what was it all about?" Heero questioned, softly. Afterwards.

    They had made love. Pure love, void of the delightful, sordid taint of the male upon male. But so complete it had been, rich and wet and strangely full of other things, eternal beauties and energies never touched before. Powerful love, too, electric - the severing of temporal flux as galaxies spun and collided in the great cosmic generation of life. Duo even called out several times from the sheer force of it; as Heero led, and he followed; their gazes locked, hearts fused with stellar heat. It felt as if Maleness itself were making love to Duo. They ceased only long after they both were sated.

    And now lay together in the tangled dampness of sheets. Duo lolled sleepily, his head in the hollow of Heero's shoulder, braid enveloping their shared, cooling nakedness. A kiss would spoil it, he dreamed giddily.

    "I purely wish I knew, Heero-kun. But I don't. There's nothing 'up there', no one in the sky watching us. I know that. We've both been in space before. We've seen more death and horror than ten people. I don't know what happened this afternoon. But if there's magic here..."

    He paused, gazed up longingly, lovingly at Heero. Whose face told him all. There was still magic here! "If there's magic here, Heero-kun... It was just you."

    "I did it? C'mon! Yer kidding me, right?" The awe of the experience, the unearthliness was fading, anyway, refracting. Heero hoped it wouldn't. And knew that it had to: he could never live feeling this way.

    "I think so. It certainly wasn't me! And even the guys who wear them - the robes and vestments and such, like that - they don't believe there's any power contained there, in cloth itself.

    "Whatever you touched, Heero, it had to be inside you.

    "It had to have been inside you, all along."

    Heero assented, mildly.

    Duo could see that Heero wasn't entirely satisfied with the reason he'd given. Perhaps just passive in the afterglow of their lovemaking, he supposed. Or maybe, maybe more of the change had stayed with him. The purity and confidence that openness brings. The wholeness, the virility uncontested.

    Duo was content just to snuggle in the scent and sweat of their love.

    There was a quiet knock on the door. Duo hopped up to answer it, still wearing only his braid.

    And Quatre entered, timidly. His easy composure was only a veneer, cheery complexion the color of a brindled mouse. The boy's round cheeks were swollen, nose red. When his clear blue eyes found Heero, sitting knees-drawn-up against a pillow, he whimpered, and cast himself weeping beside the bed.

    Their blonde friend wouldn't be consoled, unmanned as he was, wouldn't stop crying to explain. Heero held the sobbing child to himself, as Duo undressed him. They bundled Quatre, shaking with tears and naked as a babe, into the bedclothes next to Heero. He clung for life to the affirming body against to him, seeking warmth from the warmest of hearts, crying and sniffling by turns. And snuggled close, burrowing against Heero's chest.

    At Heero's glance, Duo simply shrugged. "I don't know!" he mouthed. "But I tell you, it isn't the clothes. Hell, you're not wearing any!"

    "Neither are you!" Heero retorted, with a grin.

    Duo blushed - all over, in fact - feigning embarrassment. He covered himself with his hands. And jumped into bed, snuggling comfortably, soothingly against Quatre's back.

    Whose weeping settled to smooth tears, at length exhausted itself of trembling. Quatre lay quiescent, curled against Heero, in a fashion more timeless and intimate than the touches that Heero and Duo had just shared. He was too close to sleep, blonde and innocent and smiling, where he cuddled against Heero's neck. Duo knew he couldn't disturb them, as he eyed the two other boys.

    Duo's eyes were indicative, Heero noticed. He knows Quatre's seen it in me, too.

    And Duo snuggled close, his head on the firm, warm flesh of Quatre's back. "What have I gotten us into now?" he whispered, with reckless wonder.