Archive of Our Own

Relena Peacecraft visits Duo in a familiar dark smoky bar on Cocker Street, dressed in an expensive peacoat and knee high boots.

She’s a pretty bird.

But Duo is wisps of brilliant hair and eyes like blue fire, and he lets smoke pour from his lips and takes a sip of his whiskey.

“Anywhere you want to live,” she says. “You name it. I could even assure you passage to Mars.”

Duo just smirks. “Heh.”

He stares at their reflections in the mirror on the back of the bar. This place has been here longer than the colonies have been in space. “Anywhere but here, huh princess?”

Her lashes flutter attractively, guiltily. “An-anywhere but here. Please, Duo.” She won’t sit, won’t order a drink. She just clasps her hands, white-knuckled, in front of her coat.

“I need him.”

“I can’t….”

“I can’t do this without him.”

Duo just sits on the high stool and looks at her, doesn’t turn to do it. A closed gesture from a supposedly open book. He says, “I hear Chang is on Mars.” He pulls the cigarette to his lips and exhales smoke through his nose. Relena tenses.

Duo doesn’t have anything close to clearance to go to Mars. She had only suggested it to make her point.

Duo just thinks icily, that’s her own stupid fault.

“I’ll….”

Duo can tell it pains her to say it.

“I’ll get you the first available seat on a sleeper to Mars.”

Because to her, Duo is just an ex-soldier with nothing under his belt but a gun and an inability to settle down. Someone whom Heero Yuy would drop everything to chase again. And she can see it sometimes; at least she can see it now.

He’s dressed in a solid warm pilot’s jacket with a thick twill scarf around his neck, warm pink lips poking out over it. He wears it well. His nose is a little red from the chill outside, and his hair is a thick rope of auburn with flyaways here and there. Long pianist fingers with stark defined knuckles, the hint of roguish stubble along his jaw… there are wild novels written about him. Three, actually.

“I want piloting rights.”

He watches her flinch in the mirror.

She is such a pretty girl. Heero would do right by her. He’s already done right by her. She’s smart. “Duo….”

“I mean it.” He raises his glass to gesture at her. “I want the restriction removed.”

“You’re just… blackmailing me.”

Duo slams the glass down so hard it gets hairline fractures. He turns and stands up.

He’s tall. Tall as Trowa now, and he’s filled out gloriously. His voice is deep and filled with gravel. “No, I’m giving you my soul.”

“I’m selling it to you.”

“I never said it didn’t have a price.”

He growls the words low and deep. Relena shrinks a bit.

“I ain’t never said Duo Maxwell’s soul comes cheap.”

“Mars and the ability to pilot again. That’s my price. I lent you my heart for three years. That’s what you asked for. ‘Three years Duo, just give me three years with him. I need his help right now.’ Those were you exact words.”

Duo took those three years and drifted, saw the world and helped a lot of people, grew up some more and lived with half a heart for a good long time.

Relena just frowns. “Duo, I….”

“You aren’t sorry. Don’t lie to my face, princess.”

There’s a long moment.

“I will… send you to Mars and I will remove the restriction.”

Duo smiles with an edge. “Good girl.”

“You’ll—you’ll stay away then!?”

Stay away like he’s a dog with rabies. He stubs out his cigarette. “I’ll even do you one better, princess.” He zips up his flight jacket. “I’ll tell the sorry son of a bitch not to follow me.”

“I—I can tell him—“

“No.”

“You really fucking can’t tell him to do anything. And you know it.”

He would never take her at her word about Duo. He has to hear it from him.

So Duo just walks through the gates of the Peacecraft estate with a duffel bag over his shoulder and his hands in his pockets. His braid is a couple inches longer than Heero would remember, and it flicks back and forth with his long gait.

Heero has a moment where he realizes it actually takes effort to not run to the front door. He passes Relena in the parlor, wringing her hands, eyes closed and brows drawn.

Heero is just… you’d swear he was the same boy, and all he did was get taller. He’s still a handful of inches shorter than Duo, but he’s lost his baby fat.

He looks good in civilian clothes, Duo thinks.

Relena watches them through the large front window. Heero runs down the steps, and down the walkway. Her hands clench when Duo opens his arms and Heero just grabs him tight. They sway, but Duo pulls away before Heero can kiss him.

And Relena is disgusted with herself but all she can think is good.

She can’t hear them. Duo brushes Heero’s cheek with his knuckles, and pats it open-palmed. He laughs and says something else, looks skyward.

Heero just seems to withdraw into himself, and replies mechanically.

Duo bumps Heero’s jaw with his fist, like he’s a big brother, and he says something soft.

Heero nods.

“I’m sorry Heero, I guess I’m just not cut from the right cloth for this.”

“Let me go with you.”

“…Nah. You’re needed here, y’know? This is your peace, and damn if you didn’t earn it, buddy.”

“Please.”

Duo just shakes his head. “What’ll the princess do without you?”

Heero curls his hands into fists.

“I… don’t care.”

“Heh, yeah you do. You love the girl.”

Heero flinches, because he does. And he feels like that’s somehow betraying Duo. “But I… you too….”

“We’re just too star-crossed.” Duo smiles gently. “You’re her prince, and she’d fall apart without you.”

“This pauper’ll be all right.”

Heeo can’t make this decision himself, so Duo just has to force his hand for him, against him. “I’m just here to say goodbye.”

“Probably for the last time, ok?”

Heero nods. Duo kisses his forehead.

“Maybe in another life.”

When Heero goes back inside, Duo looks at Relena in the window. He gives her a casual, flippant salute. She flips the curtain closed.

Duo makes it out of the gates before he breaks down against the brick wall outside. He slides against it, and sobs, and wishes he wasn’t such a good actor. Wishes Heero wasn’t such a bad reader of people. Wishes Relena wouldn’t be so fucking good at consoling him.

*

Nine months later, Wufei drops his clipboard when he looks down the line of construction mecha pilots, fresh off the sleeper ship, and Duo Maxwell stands there waving at him.

It’s been about five years since Wufei saw him, but… that’s him.

He dismisses the pilots, leaves them to the pair of guides behind him. He stops Duo. “How the hell did you get up here?”

“Sold my soul to the devil.” Duo gives him an easy grin.

But Wufei is sharp; that grin doesn’t reach his eyes in the slightest.

Even Wufei’s not allowed to touch construction mecha. He calls HQ and has them double-check everything four times. He even radios back to Earth. Every response comes back positive and he casts glances at Duo in his office every time.

And every time he thinks holy shit he grew up well. All the spacer-paleness has been burnt out of him by Earth’s sun, and he’s just tan and stonewashed with dark lines under his eyes, and a body to finally match that attitude of his. He’s got a big silver hoop in one ear, and a lynx claw in the other.

Wufei’s read the books about him.

“I told you, Fei,” Duo says after the fifth confirmation. He stares out the window past Wufei, and his expression is tame, but inside he’s just in awe of what Wufei’s created.

A Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering goes a long way toward spearheading the years-long endeavor to terraform Mars. Especially when it functions as an effective exile from Earth.

Most people willing to work on Mars are either naïve fools, or those who have nothing else left.

Through the thick layers of fortified plexiglass Duo can see a neighboring dome-covered crater, lined with construction Leos.

Wufei opens his mouth to ask Duo why he’s really here, even if all his new records check out, but Duo just stands up. His well-worn alligator skin boots distract Wufei as Duo crosses the room to the window. He raises a hand to touch the glass, and Wufei notes that the back of Duo’s jacket is covered in old OZ unit patches.

“God damn, Fei.”

“You built all this?”

And there’s just wonder in his tone.

Wufei’s shoulders drop a bit, still strong in his well-cut coat. “Well… most of it. I oversaw or had a direct hand in about… ninety percent of planning and construction.” He did almost everything but pilot the mecha himself.

“It’s amazing.” Duo laughs out, ends with a breathless “god damn.” He turns and looks at Wufei with those fiery blues. “You really made something of yourself.”

Wufei swallows; he just can’t meet Duo’s eyes for that long, he’s lost his immunity to them (not that he ever really had it). “I’m not in it for the credit.”

“You never were, god.”

Wufei makes one last confirmation. Relena answers the video call. There’s a five-second delay between responses. “Wufei it’s 2 AM here, what is all the alarm abou—“

Duo stares at her from across the room.

She goes a little still and Wufei says, “I need to confirm that Maxwell’s pilot license is real.”

A delay.

“It is.”

“And that he actually has clearance to be on Mars.”

A delay. Relena doesn’t stop looking at Duo the entire time. “Yes—yes, god, he’s allowed to be there, and he’s allowed to pilot. It’s 2 AM, I’ve a meeting in three hours, and I’m going to bed. Have a good afternoon, Chang.”

The call ends and the red timer blinks at Wufei for a few seconds before he says, “Well, she’s as sweet as ever.” He forgot what time it was on Mars, actually; daytime or nighttime hours mean little anymore with his schedule.

“Yeah, peaches and cream, that one.”

Duo’s leaned against the wall, hands in his pockets. There’s bitterness and a story there that Wufei wants to know.

He just says, “You might even say she can be a right devil.”

Wufei regards him. He’s missed… a lot of things because he was up here working ceaselessly to build, after nearly two straight years of doing nothing but burn and destroy. He offers Duo a tour of the main complex, before the new pilots’ regular orientation.

He looks like a folk hero. There’s a falcon feather tied to the end of his braid, and his shirt’s just a Russian linen homemade thing that a baba gave him for fixing her jeep. He’s got a belt buckle with hand pressed death lilies on it.

Wufei feels like a child looking at him, thinking gosh, the stories I read about him were true after all! Duo just turns heads with every step. He’s a legend.

And Duo simply falls in step beside Wufei, shows him nothing but good humored respect. Wufei shows him the hydroponic gardens; in a way, this is his pride and joy. There are a good number of plants and vegetables from L5 grown here, brought back from a few precious seeds and a lot of hope.

Duo doesn’t just “ooh” and “ahh” over it, either; he asks real questions.

“Where’s the water come from?”

“What kind of filtering are you running?”

“Have you thought about using fish as well?”

Wufei would be extraordinarily lucky to get that many good questions from a group of twenty investors.

As they stand next to a row of UV bulbs perched over some small but healthy sprouts, Wufei half-jokes, “It’ll be a shame for you to lose that tan.”

Duo looks at him.

Actually looks at him, for the first time without Heero tied to him. He meets Wufei’s eyes, and then seems to take in the whole picture.

The pause is long enough that Wufei just thinks his joke sucked. “The… sun is weaker and you’ll probably be keeping odd hours.”

Duo exhales through his nose and chuckles. He thinks to himself when did Wufei grow up so damn well? “I’ll keep it working in the repair yards, don’t you worry about that.”

One thing Wufei remembers best about Duo is the wicked speed and absolute perfection with which he repaired all their Gundams. There isn’t anyone he could possibly trust more to repair anything. Wufei huffs a sigh. “Well, I’ll be counting on you.”

Duo smirks. “You didn’t even know I was comin’.”

“No, you blindsided me utterly.” Wufei looks at Duo confidently. “But you wouldn’t be here without a reason, so I’m counting on you now.”

“…But you won’t be getting any special treatment,” Wufei recovers slightly, leans a small ways back.

Duo stops, and just looks at him, and laughs. “Fei if I’d wanted special treatment I’d have joined the Preventers.”

Wufei works his jaw a little, still unable to get over the nickname, and just says, “Dr. Chang.”

And Duo just goes, “Woof.” His voice is deep. “Dr. Chang, I’d have signed Une’s contract, not bummed around in the back of pickup trucks across the earth for three years.”

“I promise you I won’t be askin’ for no special treatment.” He says it “fer” instead of “for.”

Wufei’s mouth twists a little wryly, something trying to be a smile that he’s fighting down. “Let’s head back to the main lobby. You’re going to be late for the welcome lunch.”

Attendants and interns check with him at the door of the gardens, and Wufei just gives them quick orders and tells them to keep up the good work on his way out.

Wufei sees Duo off to the meeting room where the other pilots are, and goes back to his office.

It was a nice visit. Maybe he’ll see him around when they’re not both neck-deep in paperwork and grease, respectively.

*

Sometimes Wufei forgets Duo’s even here until he hears someone talk about “Maxwell.”

A lot of people talk about Maxwell.

Apparently he basically lives in the repair yards, full of sun and dust and mech parts. He makes miracle fixes every day. He’s the king of jury rigging, which is particularly valuable since it’s so many months before anything can be delivered to Mars from Earth or the colonies. No one’s better at making do than Maxwell.

It’s been three weeks, and a man stumbles into Wufei’s office and stammers out that they just lost the beam cutter to Mars rust.

Before the guy can finish his report, before Wufei can finish standing and slam his hands on the desk, someone else stumbles in, panting, “Nevermind, Maxwell fixed it.”

Wufei just sits back down.

The beam cutter is really just a beam rifle, but it’s unsavory to call it that now. Now it’s a construction tool to carve out craters and reshape them before building in them.

Mars rust claiming it would have put the whole operation on hold for a year, or possibly worse.

Wufei decides it’s probably time to pay Duo a visit, to thank him.

He hooks his glasses into his collar and stands again, clips his badge to the lapel of his coat.

Duo is shirtless and shiny with sweat, a thick power coupling over his shoulder, muscles stretching as he carries it across the yard.

And he’s got muscles. A solid ravenous diet and a life-on-his-back style of living has pretty much demanded Duo stay in shape, just to keep up with his own adventures.

He grunts and drops the huge coupling down next to the solar generators, and swipes his arm across his brow. “Deckard! Drop that left pully down a knot or two would ya? I’mma try and recouple that piece of shit X-G08’s arm back on and see if the fuckin’ kernel will actually register it this time!”

Wufei finally clears his throat when he’s done both admiring Duo’s physique and lamenting the loss of his own. “Maxwell!”

Several heads snap toward Wufei’s voice on reflex. To some, Dr. Chang is a slave-driver who does not tolerate failure; to others, Dr. Chang is a slave-driver with a lot on his plate, and thus does not tolerate failure. There’s some awkward collar-straightening from the mechanics, but Duo just eases up slowly, pops his back, and turns around. There’s a tattoo of a rosary around his neck, and a 01 over his heart.

“Hey, Fei.”

Wufei gives him a look. At least try to play the game right.

Duo grins easy. Who are we kidding with the game?

“Wong tells me you saved the beam r—cutter from rust.”

“I used the O2 scrubbers and sorta prayed it was like that time Heero dropped his fucking life’s purpose in the ocean for two weeks.”

Wufei sputters a short, quickly stifled laugh. “Good work. You really saved us a huge delay. Thank you.”

The mechanics are just staring. Nobody has seen Dr. Chang laugh before.

“Hey—“ Duo runs a hand up through his bangs and pushes them back.

“How about you put your coat on when you’re actually supposed to get off, and show me where a guy gets a good drink ‘round here?”

Duo smiles, and it makes his eyes crinkle.

Wufei’s gaze flicks from the fingers in his hair to his eyes to his mouth.

“I’ll… meet you at the B-side doors at….” Wufei grimaces and checks his watch because, once again, he has no idea what time it is. “18:00.”

“Sounds good, Fei. You’re welcome for fixin’ the rifle.”

Duo doesn’t even pretend to use the “proper” term. In a way Wufei’s relieved for it. “Not gonna lie though, I’mma knock everybody else down to get in line to fire it.” He turns and laughs all the way back to the power coupling and generator.

Wufei smirks rather knowingly.

Two mechanics are still staring and Wufei catches himself, looks sidelong at them, and they jolt and busy themselves. Wufei turns on his heel and leaves the way he came, hearing on the way out a few comments like, “I didn’t know Doc Chang could look all friendly.”

Wufei makes two short stops on his way back to his office, checking in to make sure the generator complex hasn’t seen any problems today, and dropping by administration to just collect the next morning’s meeting agenda on his handtop.

He sits back down at his desk and spends the last two hours before meeting Duo going over reports and receiving more before the day shift ends at 17:00.

He didn’t have the heart to tell Duo Mars is a completely dry establishment.

*

Duo works just as much as Wufei, but his personality doesn’t make people think about it. He takes power naps inside a legless scrap-Leo’s cockpit, not unlike what Wufei does with the couch Duo spotted in Wufei’s “office closet.”

They both get odd looks for the places they sleep.

“Hey Max, how’d you get so friendly with Doc Chang?” Old Hank asks during a between-crises lull (also known as lunch break).

One mechanic comments on the side, “I still can’t believe he’s friendly with anyone.”

“Mean cuss, for how young he is.”

“Well I guess that’s what piloting one of those damn horses of the ‘pocalypse does to ya.”

The grunt workers are wary of him, while the the administrative staff put him on a pedestal. Wufei’s not really fond of either.

But the wariness he’s already used to, anyway.

Duo just cuts off his blowtorch and pushes his goggles up. “Piloting a Gundam doesn’t make you an ornery cuss, that’s just Fei.”

“Yer jokin’? Doc was a kid in the war! I bet all them pilot kids came out bitter fuckers, who wouldn’t?”

“I mean with what they prob’ly saw.”

Duo’s grin is a little sharp-edged. He says with a calculated casualness, “I wouldn’t call myself bitter.”

“Well yeah, you didn’t pilot no Gundam! Duh, you even listenin’, Max?”

One worker’s face just goes slack as he puts two and two together before old Hank does.

“Hank—“

Duo just smiles and lets the guy tell him. He pushes his goggles down again and goes back to welding. Hank makes a noise like a strangled goose.

At 18:03, Wufei arrives at the B doors in the mechanic block. To him, he’s late. He keeps too many staggered, rhythmless schedules to have a proper internal clock anymore. His watch is a lifeline.

Duo comes out at 18:10 in his bomber jacket and twill scarf. He watches Wufei slip his handtop back into his coat pocket and push off the wall. It’s only been a couple of hours since they last saw each other, but Wufei’s already looking tired.

He hasn’t actually slept in about twenty hours.

Duo is close to the same.

“I’m going to break it to you now before we get there.”

“There is no alcohol on Mars.”

Wufei watches Duo open his mouth like he’s going to laugh, but it looks a lot like the face he had after they hauled him out of Wing’s ZERO system.

Wufei nods at his expression. “I was afraid you’d say that.”

Duo spins on his heel and just presses his forehead to the wall, arm above his head. “Relena is laughing. I can hear it all the way here.”

“I know virgin cocktails and smoothies pale in comparison,” Wufei says with a tone almost halfway to sympathy. “If you still want to go have a drink, though….”

Duo just chuckles and looks heavenward for a moment. His face is a sort of bemused grimace, and he rubs at the handsome scruff on his jaw and heaves a sigh. Wufei’s eyes follow the motion.

“Maybe in another life,” he says softly to himself. “She got me, that bitch.”

“She got me so god damn good—yeah, c’mon Fei, let’s go get that drink.” He pushes off the wall and staggers lazily in one direction, then the other. He makes it look smooth with those long legs.

Wufei falls in step—it’s like marching compared to Duo—and quietly adds a couple more questions to his growing mental list of things to ask Duo later when he feels he’s earned the right to ask. He leads Duo to the general cafeteria; there are very few people in the establishment, since the night cycle work shift has already begun. The only ones in the main room are among the sitters and sleepers, those not entirely unlike Wufei in that they simply take their work with them when they’re between shifts.

They stare at Duo and Wufei. Mostly Wufei.

“You don’t get out much, do you?” Duo asks as he holds the door to the fake bar open for Wufei.

“I can’t usually afford to,” Wufei admits. If he has a spare moment he’s usually either sleeping, showering, working out (driven by guilt for getting soft), or getting into other business.

“You’re gonna die before you’re thirty, you crazy motherfucker.”

“Hopefully by then Mars will be self-sufficient enough to go on without me,” Wufei grouses.

“Knew you’d say something to that effect.” Duo sits down at the bar, and looks at the woman behind it.

“You’re an alcoholic, huh?” she deadpans.

Duo ducks his head and grins. “Damn, that obvious?”

“Heh, oh yeah.”

“Ok look, give me the most alcoholic non-alcoholic thing you have, if it burns enough I’m pretty good at pretending.”

Wufei wonders what made Duo an alcoholic. Wonders if it might have something to do with the 01 over his heart.

The bartender makes Duo a drink that does, in fact, burn. It’s good enough. Wufei just order an orange-mango smoothie, because he doesn’t really care about appearances. Most of it is just dehydrated powder reminiscent of what the fruit once was, put in smoothie form. It’s good enough.

Duo glances at him. The atmosphere is plenty bar-like, dark and almost smoky. Wufei just looks… strong.

“You can ask, y’know?”

“You earned the right a hella long time ago. We fought a god damn war together, Fei.”

Wufei blinks once and turns his face to him. “Why did you come to Mars? Something tells me it wasn’t a whim.”

Duo shrugs, “Because I’ve seen everything else, I guess.”

“Hmm.” Wufei tries again. “Ok, why did Relena Peacecraft unground you?”

“Because I—“

Duo grits his teeth and leans back, hooks his boots around the legs of the stool so he can. Look at what an evasive shit you’ve become, Duo, he thinks. Tell the guy he can ask, and then you just vomit half-truths.

One hand still half-curled around the base of his glass, Wufei leans his cheek on one fist, turned more toward him, politely expectant for Wufei.

Duo looks at him, finds himself thinking, again, how god damn well the man grew up.

Gorgeous.

“Because I…”

“Because I’m a sack of shit. That’s why I’m ungrounded.” And Duo believes it. He stares at his drink and tries to willit into hard liquor. He just wants to drink himself fucking stupid and not think about it.

Wufei’s eyebrows just lower. “What.” His voice is just deadpan disbelief.

Duo just looks at his drink and thinks about Heero’s face and maybe in another life, buddy.

The moment stretches long enough for Wufei to shift slightly in his seat, and try again a little softer. “Is it about Heero?”

“I gave him away,” Duo croaks. “I sold him for a ticket to Mars and a pilot’s license.”

And he sounds so… miserable and guilty. Wufei slowly, almost tentatively, reaches out for Duo’s shoulder. He can’t recall the last time he actually touched someone meaningfully. Duo just leans into it.

“I don’t think it matters that Mars is dry. There’s not enough fucking liquor in the universe to get me as drunk as I wanna be.”

Under his hand Duo just feels well-worn, like soft leather over warm stone. Wufei squeezes his shoulder briefly before letting go. Duo wavers and rebalances.

“I told you I was a sack of shit.”

Wufei quietly memorizes the look of Duo sitting beside him. It makes his chest feel full quickly, so he just gulps and shifts his gaze to the synthetic-wood bar instead.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Wufei murmurs. Because it’s true.

Duo looks at him. “I missed you.”

That trips Wufei up enough to turn back to him. His face just says really? in a kind of sad way.

“Relena came to me in that shitty little bar on Cocker Street. The one we all drank in that night before we went our ways.”

Wufei is still kicking himself for not kissing Duo that night like he’d been wanting to for ages. “I remember,” is all he says.

“The first time she asked me to ‘borrow’ him.” Duo laughs bitterly. “’Three years, Duo,’ she said.”

“Go see the world, and let me have him for three years, I need his strength.”

“I think you were off-world at university on L4 at that point. So I just… I said ok, because Heero really wanted peace, and if Relena needed him to keep it then who the fuck am I to piss on that?”

Wufei watches the way Duo’s face moves, how his mouth turns up automatically but his brows pinch. He’s never actually seen Duo frown.

“So I went and saw the world twice as hard, ‘cause Heero couldn’t.”

“I ain’t gonna say it was all heartbreak and shit, but there were some bleak times. I came crawling back a few times.”

Wufei remembers wanting to do something similar while he was alone. But he wouldn’t have known where to crawl at all, anyway.

“I tattooed fucking 01 on my heart after half a gallon of bathtub vodka and a really rousing four hours of fucking Russian drinking songs.” Duo chuckles. “Not that I regret it, I’m not in the business of regretting jack shit, but damn it was stupid. Like wow.”

Wufei smiles with a dry sort of sympathy. He rather knows that realm of “stupid,” he just doesn’t have anything to show for it.

Well, except maybe a Ph.D.

“Anyway, I come home and there she is. Wringing her hands like a girl with her hand caught in the cookie jar.”

“I knew, y’know? I knew when I said yes, it would happen. He loves her.”

“God he fucking loves her.”

It sounds like a shot in the heart, and Wufei thinks he feels it too. Everyone thought what Duo and Heero had was romantic. Even himself, in a defeated way.

“And she’s smart, god she’s smart. Smarter than me.”

“Not that that’s hard.”

Wufei doesn’t believe that, but that’s an argument for another time.

Duo just tips his glass around in a slow circle. “She said she’d send me anywhere. Anywhere I wanted.”

“Anywhere but ‘here,’ huh?” Wufei hazards.

“Yeah.” Duo pauses. “Y’know…. The first thing I thought about was you.”

Years of practice keep the boyish hope from Wufei’s face at Duo’s admission.

“I… sold her my soul for a god damn plane ticket and the right to fly. I told—”

Duo’s voice catches.

“I told Heero—“

He can’t say it.

He just sets his drink down.

Wufei knows, acutely, just how well Heero followed Duo when they were pilots. He puts it together so Duo doesn’t have to say it. “You told him not to follow you.”

And Duo just nods because he doesn’t trust his voice. He props his brow on his fingertips, and he grimaces while he tries not to cry.

His own petty feelings aside, Wufei can honestly say, “I’m sorry.”

“I’m gonna—“ Duo’s voice cracks and he inhales sharp, forces an exhale. “I’m gonna build you the best damn planet, Fei.”

Wufei didn’t expect to hear that. But it sinks in and it just… warms his heart. Duo cracks his glassy eyes and gives Wufei the strongest fucking smile. It’s the saddest as well. Wufei swallows.

“I don’t think I said this before but….” Wufei trails off. “I….”

“Welcome to Mars.” He holds his mostly-finished drink out in a very late toast.

Duo clinks his empty glass against Wufei’s. “Here’s to another life.”

Wufei’s lips tug up just a little. “Yeah.”

*

The builders of Mars form what basically amounts to a pre-city, spaced out in a handful of large craters surrounding the huge main-complex crater and connected by underground roads. Every worker is paid well, but there’s not a particular need for currency on Mars itself. Many, like Wufei, have just been letting their money sit in their bank accounts until their two- to five-year term ends, and using an easy barter system in the meantime.

However, unlike Wufei, most people actually do go home and spend their money when their term is up. Only the mining team stays for one-year shifts, excavating and collecting Martian minerals that pull in basically all the income Mars uses to build, and makes the planet worth terraforming in the first place. They think the ones who stay for longer are a little crazy.

Wufei is the only one who has not gone home once since he came to Mars. Technically, Mars is the only home he has, now.

Even the other scientists and planners at the head of the operation with him have homes they return to.

Staying behind and leading without a break has done two things: it’s made everyone defer to and respect Doctor Chang Wufei, and it has massively amplified Doctor Chang Wufei’s control issues.

There is no real official chain of command, but Wufei has always been the one to get things done since the beginning. Everyone else on his supposed team just talked about doing; Wufei got down and started doing. And he never stopped doing.

Duo Maxwell’s arrival on Mars has brought Wufei out of his shell a little bit. They go to the bar once in a while. Duo will show up in his coat, ready to go, and he’ll drag Wufei out of his office by his ear if he has to.

Over time, Duo’s become a folk hero again; he lets Tarvis’ girls braid ribbons in his hair, and he wears hemp bracelets they made him. He wears all kinds of ridiculous trinkets, things people have given to or made for him. Somehow they all still suit him.

And, over time, Duo’s wrestled control of the repair yards from Wufei.

Wufei still makes him give weekly reports, which are generally short emails that say things like Nothing exploded too badly. Hank told a hilarious joke.

The fact is he’s spread so thin that it takes two and a half months for Wufei to realize that Duo still does not actually have a place to live in the residential block.

He finds out by accident; there’s a small package for him, delivered from Earth, and Wufei can’t actually find Duo’s address.

He’s been so wrapped up in work he overlooked the fact that Duo’s power naps in that Leo cockpit are his only sleep.

Duo receives an email while eating lunch on top of a suspended I-beam.

Come to my office when your workday is over.

He gets another email almost immediately after.

Be here by 18:00, it occurs to me that your day is never over.

Wufei forgets what time it is until Duo steps in smelling like oil and smoke and dust, wearing just a pair of ragged jeans and a wife beater covered in grease. Wufei sits back, pops his neck and puts his pen down.

“…We have hygiene rules here, Duo.”

“I shower.” The girls at the public bath try and steal peeks at him.

“Sure you do.” Wufei pushes his glasses up. “Anyway, that’s not why you’re here.”

“Why aren’t you in the housing registry?”

“Uh?” The sound Duo makes is one of the most honestly curious things Wufei’s ever heard.

He rephrases. “Why don’t you have a home?”

“I—“

“And why didn’t you tell me?”

“Do I— uh—hold on.“

Duo’s brows knit.

“Do I have to have one?”

“Have to—“ Wufei makes a noise that amounts to something like “bfuh.” “Yes!”

“Oh.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really! You can’t just live in your Leo.”

“I like my Leo, step off.”

Duo puts a hand over his mouth and seems to think seriously about it. He hasn’t even thought about a home. He hasn’t had or particularly needed one… ever.

“I’ll just get a welcome mat for it, done.”

Wufei sighs and downplays his bewilderment. “No. You have to have a spot on the registry, and a home. Otherwise we can’t deliver things to you, and you won’t be properly accounted for.”

“And that is not something we can have here.”

Duo rubs his neck. “Seems like a waste of valuable space, can’t I just bunk with someone else or something? I don’t… I’ve never had a place.”

Wufei lets that sink in slowly. “You never— …how are you even real?”

“Uh.”

Duo gets embarrassed and it turns his cheeks pink. He scrubs his neck again and looks to the side. “Well I mean—I lived on the streets and the orphanage was sorta—and then I snuck on the Sweeper ship and there was the war and…”

“And after that I was traveling—I just, well—“

Wufei runs a hand through his hair. “I—ok.” His fingers shift to rub his hairline where he can feel a slow headache coming.

“Why don’t I just live with you?”

That puts a dusting of red on Wufei’s face. Duo living with him? That would be heaven and hell simultaneously.

“I mean, Tarvis would bunk me but… he’s got enough on his plate with Lizzy and Madeline, and I don’t think Hank knows what a shower is….”

Wufei interrupts him, “You—can’t just—I mean.”

“My place is small and—no, you’re not going around the rules this time, you’re getting your own apartment and that’s final!” He calls up administration and makes them send him the requisite papers, as well as the forms Duo already signed at the beginning, to keep everything straight and fix the gaps.

“That’s a waste! Someone else could use it more than me! Just put my name on a mail box and let me sleep in my damn Leo, Chang.”

Dark eyes narrow. “You’re not sleeping in your Leo on a permanent basis.”

“Why?” Duo looks earnestly dumbfounded. “Why does this matter?”

Wufei lets out a frustrated noise. “Accountability!”

“I’m right fuckin’ there!” Duo’s belligerence makes his voice raise in pitch.

“Not on paper you aren’t!”

“Then write it on the god damn paper. Duo Maxwell, domicile: the shitty Leo without legs!”

Wufei’s hands slam on his desk. “It doesn’t work that way, damn it! This place is on the edge of a knife and if we let something slip through the cracks, it could have massive repercussions later!”

“We’ve just started and I’m not going to let anything jeopardize the framework we’re laying.”

“Even something that seems trivial like housing registry.”

“If something happens and there’s an incomplete record, that falls on everyone who was responsible for those records, including me.”

“There are rules here, Duo Maxwell, and I know you don’t like following them to the letter, but you don’t have a choice to abide or not abide.”

Wufei uncurls the fists he didn’t know he’d made.

He looks haggard.

Duo just steps around the desk. “Fei, nothing’s gonna happen.” It’s not an argumentative tone. Wufei turns in his chair to keep Duo facing him.

A tanned, well-worked hand falls on the arm rest. “You need to stop.”

“You need to stop trying to be everywhere at once, Fei.”

Wufei’s brows lower. Duo just continues. “I haven’t met a single person on this operation who wasn’t more than competent. Nothing is going to fall through these cracks, Fei.”

The nickname keeps cutting through his resolve, and he almost hates that it does. “I’m… I know they’re competent. That’s not the point.”

He’s mad because Duo’s so fucking handsome it’s distracting him. He smells good, like dust and motor oil. He doesn’t smell clean and it’s just refreshing after years of carefully regulated sterilization.

“Wufei, a guy living in a Leo isn’t going to dissolve your entire work.”

“I mean—fuck—I’ll get a house if you want me to so god damn bad.”

“But the point is that you’re sorta a train wreck and that’s saying something coming from me, ok? I mean you’re a beautiful one, train wreck that is, and you still roll down the rails at mach speed.”

Wufei isn’t sure he should be flattered by that.

“But you’re gonna explode sooner than later, Fei.”

A long, slow exhale passes through Wufei’s lips. He turns a document tablet around to Duo, pulls the stylus out of its holder and flicks a few pages in with it. “Just put your name on this one and I’ll… get you sorted.”

He admits, “Whether you actually, physically live in your Leo or not doesn’t technically matter. Just as long as you’re living somewhere ‘real’ on paper, and come check your mail and such.”

Duo presses again. “Then let me move in with you. Hell, I might actually go home then.”

Wufei can’t say no to that face, but neither can he allow himself to read into those words the way he really wants to. He’s just rooming with an old war buddy.

“F… fine.”

Duo smiles. “Good, now let’s grab a drink. It’s 18:30 and we are the only ones left in the building.”

There are still a couple of notices and reports to sift through, and Wufei turns and peers back at his screen on his desk. He hesitates.

Duo just picks him up, fireman carries him through the door. It really drives home that Duo’s not the scrawny underfed runt of the litter he was five years ago.

“Whuh—what are you doing!?” Wufei sputters.

“Not taking no for an answer.”

“I wasn’t gonna say no…!! Put me down you idiot!”

Duo just grins, “The security detail are gonna get a laugh outta this when they watch the feed in the morning.” He waves at a camera brightly when he walks past it. Wufei’s face is hidden in his hands.

 “What if I walked you all the way to the bar like this?”

“What if you didn’t.”

Duo laughs.

He puts him down in the elevator. Wufei’s red-faced as he pats himself back down, straightening his lapels and brushing his sleeve.

Duo always thinks he looks so… sharp. Wufei dresses like he’s worth a few cold mil. He gets a little flustered when he figures Wufei actually probably is worth that kind of cash.

The “story” that night is about Duo’s trip through north Africa. Wufei tries not to compare it to how it was written.

They look starkly different seated together at the bar: the sun-weathered world traveler, and the shrewd futuristic world builder.

Duo steals a sip of Wufei’s smoothie.

“I meant what I said, you know,” he says during a lull. “You need to learn to hand over a little control.” Duo knows what trying to control everything does. He’s seen Heero break down first-hand.

“I’ve already handed control off to you.” Wufei says it like that’s it, he’s done, that’s all the control he had to give away, and he already did it.

Duo chuckles. “You’re gonna hand off a lot more before I’m done.” He’s not looking at Wufei when he says it.

Wufei glances at his profile. His eyes are serious and deep-set, and his lips are at rest for once, neither up nor down. He’s dead serious. Wufei finds himself studying the expression like it’s a brand new species. This is the man who made Heero Yuy human. Who gave Trowa Barton a name. Who taught Quatre Winner friendship.

Who gave Wufei hope.

The truth is Duo’s lost under all those layers. His eyes waver like he doesn’t know what he’s looking for in himself. He’s just fixing everyone else.

It’s not entirely unlike Wufei, with his layers upon layers of hard work. And underneath that, what? A boy with a crush and a world of grief.

Wufei finally delivers Duo’s package to him. It’s small and thin, a book-sized box. The return address is Relena’s.

Inside the box sits Duo’s rosary. The note says in her handwriting, This belongs to you.

It’s from her, and not Heero.

Duo’s face is a storm of emotions and Wufei doesn’t know whether to flee or weather it. Duo grips the box so tight it starts to crumple.

He gives a haggard sigh, and shoves all of that back down inside himself, and offers Wufei a rueful smile. And then with a strange expression he offers the box to Wufei.

All Wufei can do is look between Duo and the rosary.

“I—“

“I wouldn’t give it to just anybody, y’know? Take it.”

Wufei still can’t help but feel like a rebound. He knows it once lay around Heero’s neck. But it’s impossible to refuse something this important. It’s a gift.

The rosary is tarnished and old. The fire opal beads are as real as the gold, and the crucifix is a little melted on the bottom. It’s seen several different hells. Wufei takes it gently. It’s not the slightest bit religiously significant to him; it almost feels wrong to accept it.

“Do… you want to go take a walk?” He suddenly feels exposed in the corner of the bar. Or maybe he just doesn’t want anyone to see Duo or himself like this. Doesn’t want them to see ex-Gundam pilots looking so oddly vulnerable.

Duo gets up and turns so he’s hiding Wufei from the rest of the bar. He takes the crucifix out of the little box. It catches the dim ambient light, beautiful and sad. He loops it around Wufei’s neck.

The cross feels strangely heavy, lays right in the middle of his chest. Wufei touches it almost hesitantly.

Duo has a deep conflicting thought that it feels more right on Wufei than it did on Heero. He finally answers, “I’m all for a walk.”

They get to pass the gardens, and Wufei can’t resist peeking in. The lights are off and it’s empty but for the dull soft glow of the UV lamps that purify the water. “You wanna go in?”

Wufei will never get over the low purr of Duo’s voice.

“Not too much micromanaging?” Wufei’s smile is sarcastic.

“I’ll make sure you don’t check any data screens or turn the lights on, scout’s honor.”

When they go inside Duo’s voice is soft. Quiet, even. “It’s pretty.” The blue glow of the water on the plants really is breathtaking. “Everything you’ve created really does just blow me away, Fei.”

Wufei finds himself tucking his chin and ducking modestly while he checks new plant growths. The light is just dim enough to pretend the warmth of his face doesn’t show up well enough to catch. “We… had a pretty big celebration when the first sprouts started growing here.”

“First Martian crop.”

Duo stands so close their shoulders touch, and it’s his turn to study Wufei’s profile. He gets a little lost in those dark eyes. He’s never been in love before.

Wufei’s pride is gentle. “It was allium chinense. Chinese onion.”

“I have no doubt you’ll be growing mangos and bananas soon enough.”

Wufei laughs soft. “Here’s hoping.” And Duo’s heart skips a few beats.

“Hey.” Those dark eyes look up at him, blinking to shake a reverie. Duo just says, “I’m glad I came.” And it makes Wufei want to kiss him so fucking much it hurts.

He wavers, almost starts, but Duo pulls away and straightens up.

Wufei swallows hard. “I. Yeah.” His heart clenches painfully in his chest, right beside the string of fire opal. Stop dreaming.

*

Duo doesn’t come home.

Then again, neither does Wufei.

But the paperwork says that Dr. Wu Fei Zhang (Chang) and one Duo Maxwell now live together.

In a rare moment of downtime, Duo makes a welcome mat out of scrap metal for his Leo. It says “Piss Off” with a heart next to it, and hangs around the Leo’s neck. A bright pink hand flipping its middle finger is painted on the mecha’s square camera-face. Wufei chokes on his coffee when he sees it, and tries not to laugh in front of the other mechanics (and mostly fails).

Ironically it’s more homey than Wufei’s own domicile, and he’s had since it was built almost five years ago.

“Why am I not surprised?”

“Because you know me well.”

Wufei fights not to smile.

The rumors pour out from administration with a quickness, and they make it all the way to the mechanics’ complex where the Mars grease monkeys tease Duo about it, even though they know he never leaves the yard.

“Don’t you ever get stir crazy, kid?”

Duo huffs. “I’ve had enough wanderlust, trust me, now shut up and ease up on that clutch while I try and figure out what those fucking morons did to this engine.”

Hank chuckles somewhere behind him, “When you got a looker like Chang in your bed, who cares what’s beyond it, am I right?”

Duo almost gets his braid caught in the alternator belt. He jerks up and looks Hank dead in the eyes like a lion at a gazelle. “You implyin’ something?” And he stands up, cracks his neck, and suddenly he’s The Garage Boss.

“Uhhh, nu-uh. I ain’t said nothin’, forget it.”

“That’s what I thought.”

Wufei clears his throat, and Duo whips his head around so fast he damn near breaks it. His face goes red.

“Hhh—shit, h-hey, Fei.” He scrubs at his neck and ducks his head.

Hank leans over to River. “If he ain’t fuckin’ that he’s a moron, he’s obviously already in love with him.” River just nods sagely.

Duo half-turns his head. “That fuckin’ 23-G Buggie ain’t gonna fix itself!” he snaps. They all lurch and go back to work while Duo wipes his hands on a rag and approaches Wufei.

He’s a little pink but otherwise unruffled. He holds the plans for the next city in his hands. The real city. The city that, when it’s finished, they will open immigration to. But the crater needs to be carved first, and Wufei only trusts one human in the universe to do it.

This city will take ages to complete, but it’s finally within sight and Wufei’s honest to god excited.

They stand over a table under an old canvas canopy, and Wufei spreads the blueprints out on the display, scaling up and rotating them with his fingers. Duo just whistles. “God damn.”

Wufei half-grins. “Five years.”

Duo hides the city and architecture overlay and looks at the basin measurements and carving specifications. He opens the tool set and makes a few corrections right there to the minor mistakes Wufei missed. He doesn’t say anything, just fixes them. He knows what happens when you stare at something too long, he’s just got fresh eyes is all.

And Wufei can’t even bring himself to be particularly embarrassed at not picking out those mistakes.

“You’re gonna need good pilots to make cuts like this.”

“I know.”

Duo rubs his chin and studies the layout, then points at a few places. “These would be better cut with a beam blade. Rifle’s not delicate enough. But not many guys have much experience with that these days.”

“Mm,” Wufei nods. “That’s why you’re in charge.”

“I—“

Duo stops.

His mouth is still open and his eyes slowly move to stare at Wufei.

“This is a full time five year operation—“ Duo snaps his mouth back shut.

And he grins.

Wufei looks back at him evenly. “And I can’t trust anyone else to see it through.”

“You’ll let me pick my crew?” Duo looks pointedly at him. Wufei has forfeited about twenty percent control by now, but it’s still nowhere near enough and Wufei’s still a massive micromanager. To his credit, he only hesitates for a moment.

“Yes.”

He purses his mouth.

“But I still have to approve them.”

Every single one of them are Sweepers.

Duo drops the dossiers on Wufei’s desk and crosses his arms.

None of them have college degrees.

Arguably, few of them have much of a high school degree, either.

But they have all spent their entire lives building and tearing down space in some form.

Wufei knows he is being tested. He is being tested by Duo and the gods and everyone. He has to stop and take a deep breath halfway through the dossiers.

Duo stares at him. He is, in fact, testing him. But really, Duo just knows the men for this job, so he picked them. Simple as that.

Wufei pinches his nose.

“I don’t know how I’m going to get this past the board.”

“You’ll manage it, I know you.” Duo grins. Then he dims a bit. “I won’t… be able to work much in the yards though, during this. I mean…” He narrows his eyes in thought and rubs the back of his neck. “I’ll pull double shifts when I can….”

Wufei just folds his hands. Duo’s as much of a workaholic as he is, really. “I need you in this as close to one hundred percent as you can be, once we get started. The garage will go on without you.”

“Right.”

Duo has to build a beam cutter.

Mars is considered “international,” so it’s not illegal to build it, but trying to acquire one through other means is.

“I’m counting on you.” Wufei’s lips turn up just slightly.

“Yeah.”

*

Duo gets more done in less time. No one in his crew is a green horn in the slightest, there are no pilots fresh from school. They all know their way around a schematic and they all know Duo.

He’s almost always gone.

Wufei is almost perpetually biting his metaphorical knuckles. He studies satellite images and videos of the construction, and takes shuttles out to look at it.

He rarely catches a glimpse of Duo beyond the construction mecha with the rifle on its back. Despite the paperwork, Duo doesn’t live with Wufei; he still sleeps in the Leo. But he’ll show up sometimes when the public bath is busy, or he’s dead tired. Every time Wufei gets used to his place being empty, Duo shows up.

They dance around each other this way for a solid year.

One evening—or night, or morning, Wufei isn’t sure anymore, he has been awake for far too many hours in a row—he comes home to his apartment.

Duo is passed out, in his flight suit, on the bed.

Wufei blinks at him several times. He peels off his coat and hangs it up.

“Shouldn’t sleep in flight suit,” he mumbles to the cool recycled air. He’s too tired to get embarrassed and flustered about fussing Duo out of it.

Duo goes with it with a dull compliancy, and he’s left in a wife beater and boxer briefs and scruff on his jaw that’s getting dangerously close to full beard status. He wets his lips and traces groggy fingers down the bead-and-chain around Wufei’s neck.

Wufei catches his fingers, and pushes them back down hesitantly. Duo doesn’t fight it; he’s been running on empty for way too long. He shifts and rolls onto his side, and pretends to be asleep as he watches Wufei undress.

When he’s comfortable in his sweatpants, Wufei sits on the edge of the bed. He still has the rosary on. Duo faces him.

Slowly, Wufei starts to pull it off, but Duo reaches out and catches his hand. He pushes it back down.

Wordlessly he winds his arms (pale, when did they get so pale?) around Wufei, and he just pulls him backwards into bed.

Wufei’s heart thuds in his chest, not fast, just strong. Duo sinks his nose into the nape of Wufei’s neck, spoons his tall form around him. He reaches down and yanks the thick comforter and soft sheets up over them, and returns his arm around Wufei’s middle.

There should be some kind of preface to this, Wufei thinks numbly. It’s like they skipped a few steps to get here. But his brain is slowing down, and even though he left the kitchen light on, and he didn’t set anything out for the next morning, he just feels Duo behind him, warm and solid, and lets that lull him to sleep.

He thinks it was a dream when he wakes up.

But Duo shifts in his sleep, and drags his large palm up Wufei’s bare chest for a better grip, and nuzzles closer in his sleep. Weak sunlight spills in through the window over the bed.

Wufei can’t fall back asleep, but he doesn’t want to get up, either, for once.

He reaches for the bedside table where his tiny hand-computer is.

Duo wakes up, but doesn’t stir. He just watches over Wufei’s shoulder with barely open eyes. He’s checking messages, and there’s one from Duo.

All it says is Phase 1 is complete.

Wufei rereads it five times.

It should have taken two years. And for anybody else, it would have. Wufei looks back at Duo; his eyes are closed and he looks completely asleep.

Slowly Wufei extracts himself from Duo’s arms. Duo lets him.

Before he leaves to start work again, Wufei indulges, almost nervously, in brushing his fingers along Duo’s jaw.

The next big review is in three months.

Thanks to Duo and his team’s immensely speedy progress, it is suddenly much less daunting.

*

Duo shaves his face, and braids his hair tight and neat for Wufei.

“Because it’s important, right?”

But it’s strange; Wufei thought he would look better cleaned up, but he finds he likes Duo scruffy more after all. It’s familiar, and it suits him. He dresses in new dark pants, and tucks into them a hand-embroidered shirt he was given in India. Even cleaned up, Duo still looks like a gypsy. He wears all his ridiculous jewelry because he feels like he’s insulting the people who gave it to him if he doesn’t. Wufei understands that feeling, thumbs absently at his chest where the cross sits warmed by his skin.

“I gave the crew shore leave. And told them to keep their asses outta trouble and outta sight.”

“Good.” Wufei’s still apprehensive about them, if only because if they do mess up, it’s all the worse since they’re technically “unqualified” for their jobs. Not that he believes they will misbehave, he’s just a worrier.

But the fact remains the sweepers’ work is not only fast, it’s good. The results are worth far more than credentials, Wufei’s coming to understand.

Duo smiles. “Don’t worry, they’re probably just sleeping. Like I should be.” The smile falls enough for him to just look haggard.

They get two weeks off before phase two. A normal civilian crew would have two months.

Wufei just nods. “Sleep when we’re dead.”

Duo barks out a laugh and punches Wufei in the shoulder. “Damn fucking right.”

*

Quatre Raberba Winner is one of the largest investors in the Mars Project.

He steps off the sleeper shuttle and looks out at the sight. Photos do not do Chang’s child justice. He outright hugs Wufei when he sees him. Neither of them were expecting Quatre; he’s a blond Adonis with dimples and everything, and Duo whistles.

And Quatre was not expecting to see Duo. He stares at him like he’s just seen a movie star. He gives Duo a bigger hug and Wufei doesn’t feel bad about it. Duo picks Quatre up and spins him.

“Oh dear god you’re tall! What are you doing on Mars!?” Duo’s got Trowa’s height and twice the muscle and he sets Quatre down easy.

“Just another adventure, Cat. Playing in the sandbox!”

The rest of the board directors look uncomfortable and a little intimidated. Duo basically is a movie star; Quatre is a multi-billionaire playboy philanthropist; Wufei might as well be the god-king of Mars.

Wufei spends the next thirty minutes catching the board up quickly on the last four years of progress. The rest of his scientists remain outside, working as usual and covering for Wufei’s absence, and finding themselves scrambling to do everything he does.

He finds it’s a lot easier than he thought it would be to get them all on his side, “irregularities” and all, though it’s mostly thanks to Quatre. He looks at all the work as they sit in the board room, and when one man opens his mouth to question the choice of crew, Quatre is faster.

“A sweeper crew was a stroke of brilliance.”

The man blanches, cut off. “I—Mr. Winner? They’re… unedu—”

“They built the starship we rode in on, Mr. Mathias.” Wufei nearly wants to hug Quatre every time he opens his mouth. “Who heads your team, Dr. Chang?”

“Duo Maxwell.” He says it like he’s referring to a king.

Duo is asleep in Wufei’s office.

Quatre just smiles. “I’ll be doubling my investment, then.” And the rest of the board just balks. “That would explain how you managed to get six sweeper engineers to willingly come from Freeport.”

“When I’d heard the rumor you were using such powerful tools I frankly wasn’t sure how. I’ve offered a few of them considerable sums to work for me, to be honest.”

“They won’t even consider the offers.”

The other board members scramble to invest. Quatre has never invested in anything that wasn’t going to triple its profit margin. And Wufei’s never wanted to cry in public before.

Halfway through the meeting, Duo comes in. He hasn’t slept more than four hours in the last twenty-four, but it doesn’t show at all. He just activates the holo-deck in the middle of the long board meeting table.

He proceeds to shock everyone when he says, “I suspect we’ll have phase two done in six months.”

It should take fifteen.

“After that I’ll need to recruit two more teams, but if Dr. Chang respects my choices I assure you phase three will also take ideally six months, maybe eight at the most, depending on the Mars winters.”

Wufei’s heart skips just a tiny bit hearing Duo say “Dr. Chang.” He just talks, clear and dictating. Both Quatre and Wufei’s eyes meet. Quatre’s expression is a weird smug curiosity. Oh isn’t this interesting? Wufei drinks his coffee, eyebrows raised as his eyes shift away.

“Three years,” Duo says. “I’m going to finish the entire project in three years.”

Wufei nearly spits his drink. Luckily none of the board members are looking at him. All eyes are on Duo.

“Three—!?”

“I’d heard before this would take at least five!”

Duo nods, lynx claw swinging slightly. “It would. But there’s a critical distinction between a civilian estimate and mine.”

“And what is that, Duo?” Quatre asks with a coy smile.

“My entire crew is comprised of spacers.”

Nobody says “spacer” anymore. It’s not “colonist,” there’s a difference. A spacer conjures the image of a hard-as-nails sweeper who never sleeps, and fixes space ships in mid-flight. Duo uses the word as if referring to direct descendants to the first space pioneers.

“We’re taking a two week break between phase one and phase two.”

“And a one week break between subsequent phases. One month between phase four and the last phase, which I suspect will take ten months. Possibly a year, depending on the weather.”

The board is just silent, floored. “And you’re sure about this.” One says, almost disbelievingly.

Duo just looks at her. “I built a Gundam in a month, by myself.”

Awe hangs in the room heavily.

“And Dr. Chang’s designs are flawless.”

Wufei’s head tips up slightly.

“In fact, I would argue that his engineering is the only reason I can do this in three years. There is literally no waste of production in the entire design.”

The bottom of Wufei’s cup almost crunches in his grip. Duo’s just looking right at him.

One board member asks curiously what Duo’s credentials are. He just answers chipper, “Did I mention I was fifteen when I built that Gundam?”

Three board members wheeze. Wufei adds, “He’s made frankly miraculous repairs on the fly, both during the war and here on Mars. I couldn’t have dreamed of finishing this anywhere near as quickly without him. He’s the most valuable asset we have here.”

He meets Duo’s eyes for a moment. “I’ve seen more, faster progress in one year with Duo than the last five years we’ve been running here.”

Quatre just offers politely, “Mr. Maxwell is a savant, ladies and gentlemen. I mean that in the most accurate of textbook definitions. It’s not a compliment, just a fact.”

Duo gets a little flustered and laughs them off weakly. “Re-regardless.” He coughs and gestures to the stop-motion 3D diagram of the project. “I estimate a forty-six percent savings in wage costs cut, but a fifteen percent increase in supply cost. I’m going to need three more beam ri—”

He clears his throat.

“Three more beam cutters, if we want to progress through phase two and three in a year.”

“Whatever helps this go along at such a screaming pace, you got it.” An older board member strokes his short beard.

Wufei would have had to argue for a year just to get one more rifle, but with the board eating out of Quatre and Duo’s hands, they hardly blink. He’s never been happier to have these men on his side.

Quatre is having a strange realization. He doesn’t even need his empathy to see it.

Duo is madly in love with Chang Wufei. He’s been mostly quiet ever since Duo had complimented Wufei’s designs, and his empathy confirms that Duo probably doesn’t even realize he’s in love. Indeed he probably has issues identifying his own emotions at all, though he’s adjusted to it by going completely with the flow and smiling for every emotion.

Quatre suspects it’s because of too much early childhood trauma, and never having a baseline. Nobody taught Duo emotional range, so beyond a weird, bland “happy” or “sad” Duo doesn’t try to figure it out, because it just makes him uncomfortable and upset.

He doesn’t have to look at Wufei. He knows that Wufei’s had feelings for Duo since the war; he sees it in his very fiber. He still hurts a little just thinking about Wufei holding onto that for six years.

“Right, that concludes what I’ve got to tell you.” Duo’s well-worn hands slip into his pockets. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a shift in the repair yards.” He turns and leaves.

“Does that lad ever stop?” One of them asks, a little windblown.

Wufei adjusts his tie. “No, he does not.”

And neither do you, Quatre thinks. He’s quiet for the rest of the meeting. Just thinking.

A few members of the board suddenly want to tour the repair facility, just to see Duo Maxwell at work. Wufei coughs and excuses as politely as he can, “It’s best not to have too many extraneous people in there while on-shift. Safety hazards.”

Quatre stares into nothing behind his steepled fingers. Wufei gives him a wary look; that’s a dangerous position to see Quatre in.

Duo is sacrificing a lot, though not in a traditional way of thinking. But Duo’s a savant, and he has a lot of the negatives that go with it.

Quatre’s no idiot. He knows Duo has a case of wanderlust that is heavily rooted in the sheer mental inability to sit still.

But for Wufei he has sat still for nearly two years.

He couldn’t even do that for Heero Yuy. Quatre knows Heero follows Duo. Everyone follows Duo. But Duo does not stay for anyone.

Eyes narrowing very slightly, Quatre watches Wufei explain in-depth construction plans for the city post groundwork, and doesn’t really hear it. He just studies Wufei’s face and his heart.

He’s just… energized. Wufei’s been happier (for Wufei) and more relaxed (for Wufei) just because Duo’s been there to help him. Help him, and wrestle some control from him, to be sure.

When the last of the board members leave the room twenty minutes later, Quatre leans back in his chair all the way, and un-steeples his fingers. Wufei just exhales and slumps a bit, turns and jumps slightly when he sees Quatre leveling a predatory look at him. His head is tipped to the side and he’s smiling brightly.

It’s so sugary-fake and coy it hurts.

Wufei’s head inclines slightly. “Thank you for the backup.”

“Backup? Wufei I am in this for the money, let’s not even pretend.”

“I know, but even so.” Wufei rubs his neck.

“I just know an incredibly lucrative investment when I see it.”

“I wasn’t kidding, by the way. I offered three sweeper engineers a one point two million dollar yearly salary to work for me and they all turned me down.” Quatre’s chair squeaks just a little as he leans back more. “Duo asked them nicely and they’re working for scraps.”

Wufei looks a little distantly at the wall behind Quatre. “He’s something else….”

“He’s madly in love with you.”

Quatre is twenty-two years old and going on a hundred, and he is done trying to beat around the bush.

Wufei forgets how to breathe. “C…come again?”

“I mean earth-shatteringly so. The kind of love people write books about.” Quatre pours himself a glass of water from the pitcher on the table.

“I.”

Wufei’s brows draw down.

Quatre looks at him and takes a calm sip of his water.

“What? How?”

“I don’t have to be empathic to tell, just so you know. Let me explain my deduction.”

“Duo has sat still on Mars for two years.” He opens his hands like tadah. Wufei just stares. Quatre rolls his eyes and sighs. It’s never just that easy, is it. “Duo is a savant, Wufei.”

“I said it wasn’t a compliment, it was a fact. Duo has never sat still for anybody, not even Heero. I’m well aware of the fiasco with Relena. She’s a very smart girl, because she understood this. Duo wouldn’t stay in Sanq. Duo can’t stay anywhere, he doesn’t have a home and he doesn’t know how to have one.”

Wufei remembers the argument they’d had over housing. It seemed such a strange thing to get so worked up about, but now it begins to make sense.

“He would have lingered maybe a few months and then he would have left, and Heero would have followed to the ends of dark space. And Relena would have lost Heero forever.”

“But Duo has sat. Still. On Mars. For two years, Wufei.”

“And you think he did that… for me.” Wufei’s voice is flat and still a little shell-shocked.

“I am absolutely positive he did. I don’t think he realizes it, he’s terrible with his own emotions.”

“I assume you thought he and Heero were romantic partners? They never had sex, you know.”

Wufei looks at him. “They didn’t??? But they—I— they were inseparable, are you serious?“

Quatre smiles. “Heero is straight, Wufei.”

Suddenly Wufei needs to sit down. He leans his forehead on his hand. Quatre’s heart bleeds while Wufei realizes I had a fucking chance all this time. Wufei grinds the heels of his hands into his eyes. “I have written so much shit off to wishful thinking.”

“To be fair, Duo’s perhaps just as emotionally stunted as Heero. He just hides it considerably better. I don’t think he even knows where to begin with how he feels about you.”

“God, that makes two of us.”

“That’s poppycock. You know exactly where it begins and ends.”

Wufei just sits up and looks at Quatre like who even uses that word anymore? Quatre’s lips quirk. Wanna fight about it?

“…Terraforming Mars was basically my personal message to the solar system saying ‘Look what you can do by redirecting your frustration from years of unrequited love!’”

“What star-crossed lovers you two are.” Quatre smiles kindly. “Because I suspect Duo is building you a planet on sheer grit alone to prove the same message, because that’s how he’s expressing it. He doesn’t know any other way to say ‘I love you,’ Chang, so he’s taking your dreams and doing his damnedest to make them reality, as fast and hard as he can.”

Wufei heaves a long sigh. He mumbles, “He is going to take that welcome mat off that Leo if it’s the last thing I do.”

Quatre cocks an eyebrow. “What?”

Wufei shakes his head. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Right,” Quatre chuckles.

Slowly, tiredly, Wufei rubs his jaw. “Well, this has been a long day.”

“Yes, and I suspect Duo’s still working in the repair yards.” Quatre stands and picks up his files and briefcase. “Don’t worry about entertaining the associates and me while Duo has these two weeks off. I’ll handle it.”

“Thanks, Quatre.” For everything adds itself to the silence. Quatre grips his shoulder, squeezes it.

“We all deserve happiness.”

“And I suspect if you and he are this productive now, I can’t imagine how hard you’ll burn together.”

“I expect quadruple the amount of my investment back, at least.”

He chuckles to himself at the idea on the way out.

Wufei huffs a small laugh, looks up at the ceiling lights. He stares for about five minutes straight. Then he gets up, and puts his coat on. He pulls the rosary out from under his collar, lets it hang in plain sight, scorch marks and blackened chain and half-melted cross and all. It’s one of the most valuable things he’s ever been given.

He practically marches down to “Maxwell’s garage.”

Duo is prying apart reactor plugs with a long screwdriver and a pair of pliers. There’s a pile of split ones and a pile of ones yet to be split. He’s already got grease and dirt all over his new jeans.

He doesn’t even hear Wufei come up behind him. “Duo.”

Duo jolts and drops the screwdriver, and reaches for a gun at his back that isn’t there. He flounders at air for a moment before he realizes what’s going on. “Jesus Christ.”

“Sorry.” Wufei’s not that sorry.

“God walk louder, for my poor heart’s sake.” Duo hauls up off the dirt and brushes himself off. “How’d it go? Did I do ok?”

Wufei just leans forward and kisses him, holds him by the cheeks to do it.

Duo forgets how breathing works so he just stops. Wufei pulls back barely an inch to answer, “You were amazing.”

“Th-that good huh?” Duo’s voice cracks a little bit.

“Yeah.” His hands slip and fall to Duo’s shoulders. “Look, I….” Wufei swallows and he isn’t sure where to start so he just says, “I’ve been in love with you for a long time.”

“Like, a stupidly long time.”

“Do you remember the lunar base prison?”

Eventually Duo croaks, “Yes.” He doesn’t think he could forget.

“That long.”

“I—that… that’s almost s-seven years.”

Wufei exhales through his nose. “Seven years, two college degrees, and one big terraforming project, yeah.”

Duo kisses him. He grips the back of Wufei’s head and hooks and arm around his waist and just kisses him as hard as he can. Wufei wraps his arms around Duo’s neck and they just burn.

It’s the best feeling Wufei’s had in years. Duo backs him up against a shipping container, pushes him against it and kisses him stupid. When they stop to catch their breath Wufei just huffs softly, “I want you to live with me.”

“I already live with you?” Duo pants, smoothing stray hair back from Wufei’s face.

“I mean actually live with me. As in no power naps in your MS, and not using the public baths. Living with me.”

Duo’s heart skips a beat or two. Home is not a place; home is the people you share it with.

“Ok?” Wufei searches Duo’s eyes.

“Yeah.” When Duo smiles, it ignites his eyes with the fierce blue fire they’ve been missing.

“Good. Hah, fuck, good.” He grabs Duo’s face and pulls him in again.

Hank drops his armful of armatures when he rounds the corner, and stares in shock.

Wufei and Duo both jolt apart like it’s an ambush.

Duo roars “GET OUT!” and Hank bolts. Wufei runs a shaky hand through his hair and just starts laughing.

Duo looks at him and it’s not long before he cracks up too. Wufei drops his forehead against Duo’s shoulder and he just shakes. “Hahahaha, f-fuck.”

He gets hauled up and thrown over Duo’s shoulder. His laugh cuts off with a “Hey!” and Duo just carries him right out of the yard and leaves his work completely forgotten.

When they get to Wufei’s unit Duo’s not even winded. Wufei grouses it’s not fair; he let himself get soft and Duo just carried him all the way home with no problem.

Duo lays him out on the bed and looks down at him. He’s just breathing a little hard and that’s it. Duo’s cross lies diagonally over Wufei’s heart, and he’s a little breathless himself, though not from exertion.

There was sex in the novels about Duo. Wufei knows the page numbers. But he wonders if that was just embellishment.

He hopes not.

Duo pulls his shirt off, and the 01 on his chest doesn’t sting to look at. Wufei’s coat and tie come off and he starts on his shirt, but just has to stop and drink in the sight of Duo as he grins and undoes his jeans, eases them down. The only place not tanned on Duo is the line where his boxers would be, if he was wearing them. “God look at you,” Wufei breathes.

The gold cross is a little cold when it touches Wufei’s skin again. He exhales a little sharper at that. His fingers rise and touch the rosary tattooed around Duo’s neck. Duo catches his hand and guides it to the inked beads at his collarbone.

“Here, Fei.” His voice is low and filled with heated gravel. “Let me teach you how to say your Hail Marys.”

Wufei doesn’t think those words should sound so hot as Duo straddles him. He starts at one bead, whispers one Hail Mary, two, drags Wufei’s fingers down his skin to the next beads, three, four, and he steadily guides Wufei’s hand farther down his chest. His skin is hot and smells like dust and beautiful industry.

Duo pulls Wufei’s hand past the cross all the way down his chest and stomach, and just leans forward and kisses Wufei and rocks himself into Wufei’s palm.

Wufei doesn’t know how many times he’s fantasized about this; too many to count. He huffs against Duo’s mouth and strokes Duo’s cock eager and strong, and Duo quivers under his touch, pants against his lips.

He reaches down and finishes unbuttoning Wufei’s shirt, pushes it open and just drags his hands over all that perfect olive skin. Wufei’s hand loses its rhythm a couple times just because Duo’s hands are on his body and he’s perfect and he’s wanted this so goddamn badly for so long.

He flips them and straddles Duo’s thighs. Duo looks up at him, eyes barely open, lips parted and wet, arms akimbo above his head. Wufei drops his shirt from his arms and just tosses it. He rubs his clothed erection against Duo’s as he thinks about Quatre’s words. His expression is just He loves you in an earth-shattering way.

Duo jerks his head back against the pillow, arches clean off the bed and groans. Wufei does it again, harder, and the rosary bounces off his chest a little. Duo’s hands snap to the headboard, white knuckled. His stomach flexes and the muscles define themselves; he hears the sound of the rosary clinking softly around Wufei’s neck and it makes him hot in a way he’s never experienced.

It’s possessive and powerful and so much headier than petty lust.

Wufei leans down and kisses Duo, thumbs open his pants and pulls them down just enough to get his hand around both of them, and fuck it’s better than Wufei thought it would be with him. Duo just wheezes out one long, low, guttural fuck. Wufei’s answering exhale is almost a growl, and he nips at Duo’s lips gently. Duo bites back and pulls his bottom lip with his teeth.

Duo struggles to find words for this. It’s so much more intense than anything he’s done before. There are just emotions that were never there, that he’s never bothered to identify or explore.

They’re the ones Wufei’s carried like hot coals in his heart for years.

Duo just says, “It… hurts.”

Because it does. It hurts to love someone this much. To want to build entire planets to make them happy.

Wufei just looks at his face, and remembers Heero saying the same thing, in the same lost tone, to Duo once. It’s the exact same expression. Wufei strokes his cheek with his free hand. “I know.”

“I’m going to help ease that pain. We’ll make it into something else.”

“F-Fei….” Duo nods, and pants, “I need you.” And it’s such an inclusive use of the word. Not just sexual.

Wufei just kisses him chastely on the lips. “I need you too.” God he does.

What would he have done once he finished his work on Mars, years and years from now, without Duo?

He’d have just been done and felt empty for it and lived a generically satisfied life.

“I’d have wandered forever.”

Duo says it out loud, and Wufei knows exactly what he’s thinking about. Wufei murmurs back, “I’d have stayed in place and never, ever moved.”

They burn that night.

*

Quatre has a vid call with Heero Yuy.

“He doesn’t hate Relena too much, does he?”

“I don’t think he has it in his heart to hate anybody, Heero.”

“Did I do the right thing?”

Quatre pours himself a glass of brandy. He smuggled it himself. “I think you did the right thing. He wouldn’t have let you go, tough love is still love.”

Heero nods.

Quatre continues, “I don’t suspect you’ll get the rosary back, I hope you weren’t expecting to.”

“I wasn’t the one he should have given it to in the first place.”

Heero’s the only “prince of the stars” who kept his title. Quatre smiles when he thinks about it. Though he suspects “the god kings of mars” is certainly an upgrade. “Billionaire playboy philanthropist” still beats them all.

He pours another glass because phone sex with Trowa with a five second delay is fucking stupid, and he’s stuck on this rock for six months.

*

Duo puts the welcome mat from his Leo on the doorstep of his and Wufei’s home.