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"Young Gods"Written By: Clara Barton Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing. The following
is an intellectual exercise with no intention of profit. That said,
these characterizations, words, and situations are mine. Please ask
before reprinting. Rating: NC 17 Warnings: angst, language, sex, supernatural things,
violence, drug use Pairings: 3xR, 2x5, 4x6, others no doubt Summary: A Phoenician relic finds its way into Dr. Relena Peacecraft's hands. An unexpected group must decide the fate of the world. Full of sex, adventure and sass.
"Young Gods "
Chapter One "I hope the sex was worth it." It was two a.m., Meilan was exhausted and irritated and furious, and the coffee in her hands tasted like actual battery acid. The twenty-four hour diner they sat in was stained, lit so dimly that she was convinced there were even more stains, but it was nearly empty and, well, the coffee was hot at least. She looked across the table at her cousin and saw his shoulders stiffen at the words, saw his dark eyes narrow and his lips tighten. Having said the same thing to him herself for hours, Meilan really shouldn't care that the words seemed to cut into him. But she did. Because she wasn't the one saying it. Heero Yuy wasn't what she had expected him to be. Then again, nothing about tonight had gone as expected, so she really should just accept that the antiquities agent sitting beside her in the chipped linoleum booth looked more like an action hero than a scholar. The three of them had spent hours scouring the club and several blocks surrounding it, looking for the gweilo that Wufei had fucked in the bathroom. Their search had been unsuccessful, and Meilan had had the dubious pleasure of stabbing one of her stiletto boot heels into a man's foot when he followed her down an alley and offered to 'assist' her by grabbing her ass. When Wufei didn't respond to Yuy's reprimand, the man shifted in the booth. He put an arm across the back and turned to her, boxing her in even further. She hated the feeling, but she forced herself to turn her head and meet his glare with her own. "Your grandfather made a deal with the Collection to deliver the artifact. They are going to be very displeased when I come back empty-handed." Yuy was good. Using the personal attack on Wufei to make him ashamed, but reminding Meilan of her grandfather and her failure to him was exactly the best way to make Meilan feel guilty. There was also, of course, the mention of the Collection, the shadowy European group that had reached out to the Long clan seven months ago with the offer to buy one of grandfather's artifacts. They had gone back and forth for months, grandfather insisting on keeping the object in the family and letting his heirs sell it after he died if they so wished, but the Collection had sent one representative after another with offers to buy the artifact. Meilan had seen her grandfather go into the meetings with each of the gweilos looking politely disinterested and, hours later, come out with a tight expression of anxiety. The last meeting had been that afternoon, between Grandfather and the man now sitting beside Meilan. She hadn't been present for the meeting, and when Grandfather had called her to let her know of the deal and to ask her to present the object to Yuy that same evening, Meilan had been taken aback. She, as his only heir, hadn't been particularly invested in the artifact. It was, after all, only one of the many coins and statues in her grandfather's possession, and one that she hadn't paid much attention to since her early childhood. Meilan could still remember the last time she had touched the medallion. She couldn't have been more than three or four, and Grandfather had kept the medallion in a golden box on a lacquered table that was almost but not quite too tall for her to reach. The medallion had been as large as her palm, the gold soft and heavy in her grasp, and the worn engravings - outlines of lions and arrows surrounding a slim, tall figure - had been wonderful to trace. She had been at the age where 'playing' with things too often resulted in their destruction, and Grandfather had shifted most things of value out of her reach. But the medallion... Meilan had cradled it in her hands and stared at it for what had felt like hours. It had grown warm, and she had felt the heat of it spread through her small body, had felt as though the sun was shining directly upon her, and Meilan had fallen asleep. She had dreamed of an impossibly tall, thin woman with hair twisted into two braids and eyes darker than night and lips stained red. The woman had walked around Grandfather's study, had leafed through the ancient, priceless tomes that he collected and smirked at the collection of bronze weapons in the locked glass cabinet. And then she had turned to Meilan, had reached out and touched her face and whispered words that Meilan hadn't understood. And then... And then Meilan had woken up to her grandfather shaking her, crying and begging her to open her eyes. The box with the medallion had been moved that very day, and Meilan hadn't seen it again until the Collection had started to negotiate with her grandfather for the thing. And even then, Grandfather had made it very clear that she was to never touch the thing. That no one should ever touch it. His vehement insistence that the oil and bacteria on human hands would destroy it had only made it even more clear to Meilan that Grandfather was getting very, very old. "Why was he the one carrying it?" Yuy asked, and jerked his head towards Wufei. Her cousin scowled, but instead of offering a biting retort, he kept his eyes on the table. Wufei really was ashamed, Meilan realized. "Why did you want me to give it to you at a club at midnight?" Meilan asked instead of answering Yuy's question. The man's blue eyes narrowed. "The intention was for the hand-off to be discreet." Wufei snorted. "And you didn't think I was going to be at all suspicious of giving you a priceless family heirloom on the dance floor?" Meilan demanded. Yuy's lips tightened, and his eyes flicked over her face, studying her. "You wanted him to carry it in case this was a setup," he sighed. "You should have trusted me." "Yes, because trusting a man she has never met in a nightclub was clearly the natural choice," Wufei finally spoke up. Yuy didn't even spare him a look. He continued as if Wufei hadn't spoken. "The Collection has already transferred the money to your grandfather's accounts." "I know," Meilan sighed. She had managed the Long finances for years now, and she had been the one to show her grandfather the notice of the two million dollar transfer into their account before Grandfather had sighed and taken the medallion out of the safe. Yuy tapped his fingers on the tabletop, still staring at her with disconcerting intensity. After a moment, he looked away, and Meilan had to clamp down on her urge to sigh in relief. Yuy was back to glaring at Wufei. "You need to tell me everything you remember about him." Wufei glared back. "I already did." "Long brown hair and blue eyes and tight black clothes cannot possibly be everything you remember about him." "I told you his name," Wufei grumbled. He shifted in his seat and folded his arms across his chest. It was a defensive posture that he had used for his entire life, and Meilan rolled her eyes at him. "Duo isn't a name," Meilan sighed. "That gweilo played you and-" "You think he stole the medallion?" Yuy asked, his voice dangerously casual. Wufei hesitated, and then shook his head. "No. I think he was just trying to return it to us. I- What the fuck was that thing anyway? What happened?" It was the question that Meilan had been afraid to ask, but it had been plaguing her for hours, ever since she and Wufei had watched the white man pick up the velvet bag and pull out the medallion. He had vanished before their very eyes, leaving both of them speechless and frozen. And then Heero Yuy had burst into the bathroom and taken over immediately. Yuy leaned back in the booth, his fingers still tapping out a slow rhythm on the chipped tabletop. The silence stretched between them, taut and unbearable. "Well?" Meilan finally prompted. She had lost too many staring contests with Wufei to expect him to speak up. "Your grandfather..." Yuy frowned, and then drew in a deep breath. "Your grandfather has made the decision not to tell you about the nature of the artifact. I will respect his wishes." "That thing just made a man vanish!" Wufei snarled. He leaned across the table. "So tell us what the fuck it is. Master Long's wishes be damned!" Again, it was exactly what Meilan had wanted to say. "It's not my place," Yuy demurred. Meilan turned to glare at him. "And what exactly is your place? You can't expect us to believe that you're some... researcher or archeologist who works for the Tartarus Collection. Not when you're built like a Navy SEAL." She reached out and shoved a finger in his chest. "And why the hell do you need to wear body armor?" Across the table, Wufei's eyes narrowed. He hadn't noticed, then. Meilan had, watching Yuy inspect the bathroom and order them around. Yuy grasped her hand, his grip firm on her wrist, and moved it away from himself. "Strength of body doesn't preclude strength of mind," he said, the words sounding like some catechism that Grandfather or even Wufei would spout. "And I like to be prepared." "And if we had been prepared, none of this would have happened," Meilan pointed out. Yuy's lips tightened. "Again, that was not my choice. You-" Meilan twisted her hand, relaxing and turning and then pulling, and suddenly it was Yuy with his hand in her grasp. She twisted the hand behind his back and slammed his face down on the table and braced her other hand on the back of his neck. "Everything is fine. She's just teaching him some manners," Wufei said, assuring the mildly concerned waiter and cook behind the diner's bar. Their eyes slid away from the booth. "Tell us what it was," Meilan hissed. Yuy stared up at her, eyes cold and empty. His body wasn't even tense; he wasn't attempting to struggle at all. If anything, he seemed more relaxed now than he had all evening. "You wouldn't believe me even if I did tell you," he sighed. "One minute the gweilo was fucking my cousin, and the next minute he vanished. I think you'll find we're willing to believe quite a lot of things right now." Yuy's lips twisted into what might have been a smirk. "The medallion is likely Phoenician in origin." Meilan arched an eyebrow. She wasn't all that interested in a history presentation. She twisted Yuy's arm more. He didn't react at all. "Phoenician... The Mediterranean merchants?" Meilan rolled her eyes at Wufei. Of course her cousin not only knew who the Phoenicians were, but wanted to chat about them. "Wufei," she hissed in warning. "Yes, the merchants," Yuy confirmed. "Among other things. You've seen the medallion?" He was looking at Meilan again. She nodded. "And?" "And what? There was a figure surrounded by arrows and lions." "Lions were sacred animals for the Canaanites." "The Canaanites? I thought we were talking about the Phoenicians. Who the hell are the-" "They're the same people," Wufei interrupted her. "I think," he added with a frown. Yuy managed to nod. "Yes, they are. The Hebrew Bible-" "Oh, for the love of fuck, I don't care about ancient history! What was that thing, and what happened tonight?" Yuy's lips compressed for a moment. "The figure on the medallion is a Canaanite goddess." "Which one?" Wufei asked. "You know the Canaanite pantheon?" Yuy asked, sounding amused. Wufei flushed. "I don't know who she is," Yuy answered. "That's why we want her. The medallion isn't- It isn't safe." "Obviously." "Whatever goddess is on the medallion was powerful - is powerful - and she's looking for a way back into the world. I'm guessing she just found her first priest." "What in the actual fuck are you talking about?" Meilan was even more confused now than when Yuy had started to 'explain' things. Unbidden, the memory of the tall woman with bloodied lips rose to her mind. Meilan forced it aside. She had been three, and she had been dreaming. "Are either of you religious?" Meilan snorted derisively, and Wufei shook his head. "That's unfortunate." "You are?" Meilan asked, not bothering to keep the disdain from her voice. "I believe there are forces beyond our control that have shaped this world," Yuy answered cryptically. "And you've just seen proof of that." "What- You really think some ancient goddess made that gweilo vanish?" "Do you have another explanation?" Yuy's voice was mild and amused again. She didn't. But that didn't mean believing some goddess was real and had used her powers to- to what? "What happened to him?" Meilan had to ask. "I have no idea. Hopefully, he's not dead." "Hopefully?" "Corpses get looted." Wufei's face turned grim at Yuy's words. "This is boring me," Yuy sighed, and, before Meilan could even react, broke free of her grip and stood up beside the booth. Meilan stared up at him with wide eyes while Yuy dipped a napkin in his untouched glass of water and wiped his face off. "Tell me more about Duo," he said to Wufei. "I already told you-" "Did he have any piercings?" "Yes? I think he had some on his ears." "Where on his ears?" Wufei scowled, and lifted one hand to his own ear. "Here," he tugged on the lobe, "and higher, up here?" He moved his fingers to the top of his ear. "Tattoos?" "Not that I could see." Yuy arched an eyebrow, and Wufei flushed. "We didn't take off our clothes." "Circumcised or not?" If possible, Wufei's face reddened even more. "Not," he muttered. "Any jewelry?" Wufei started to shake his head, and then paused. "He had some kind of gold chain around his neck. I don't know if anything was on it." "Any rings?" "No. But..." "But?" Yuy prompted. "But he had ink stains on his fingers. On his right hand." "Ink stains?" Meilan asked. "What-" "They were faded, like he had tried to scrub them off but it didn't work." Yuy dropped the napkin back on the table. "That's helpful. If you think of anything else, let me know." He slid cards to both Meilan and Wufei. Heero Yuy Consultant The Tartarus Collection On the back was a phone number and email address. There was no logo and no background image. Just black lettering on crisp white cardstock. "Tell your grandfather that the Collection will take responsibility for the artifact. It's no longer his burden." "Burden? What-" But Yuy was already walking away. Meilan finished the impossibly bitter dregs of her coffee and pulled out her wallet. She left a twenty dollar bill on the table and then stood up. Wufei followed her out of the diner, silent and sullen, and together they walked back to the lot where she had parked the car. It wasn't until she was in the car, with the doors locked and Wufei strapping on his seatbelt in the passenger seat, that the full weight of what had happened hit her. "Grandfather is never going to forgive me," she whispered, imagining his face filled with disappointment, imagining the silence that would hang between them while she drowned in guilt. "I'm sorry." It might have been the first time Wufei had ever apologized to Meilan for anything. For some reason, the words infuriated her. "You're sorry? Wufei, we had one job to do tonight - one thing to focus on, and you- you don't even like clubs! You hate going out, and the minute we got there, you started dancing! And you let yourself be distracted! Are you thatdesperate for sex that you had to let him fuck you in the bathroom? That's not even- that's not even like you!" Wufei's jaw locked, and she could see a muscle spasm. "I know." His voice was low and raw. "I know it wasn't like me. I don't understand what- I have no idea why I did that. I've ruined everything. I-" "Oh, for fuck's sake, do not make me start comforting you. You fucked up, and now we're screwed. Don't you dare pull your 'woe is me, I should just kill myself' shit again." Wufei leaned his head back against the headrest and closed his eyes. "He just vanished. He was there one minute and- This is insane!" It was. It absolutely was. But all Meilan could think about was the feeling of sun on her skin and the touch of the woman in her dream. "Yuy said that Grandfather chose not to tell us. He- Grandfather knew. He knows what that thing is." Wufei scowled at her. "So you want us to go to his house, tell him we lost the medallion, and then ask him what the fuck it is and how it made a man vanish?" Meilan glared at him. When he said it out loud, it sounded... insane. "What else can we do?" "Yuy said that his people were going to take responsibility for it. We should just pretend this never happened." Meilan snorted. "Yeah, that'll be easy." "Easier than telling Master Long what we failed to do." That was true. But Meilan hated lying to her grandfather. The man had raised her almost from birth, when her parents had died in a train derailment, and he was the only family she had left. Aside from Wufei, of course. But she didn't really count a distant, antagonistic cousin as family. Not in the way that Grandfather was. Meilan sighed and put the car in gear. "I'll figure out what to do," she muttered. After dropping Wufei off at the decrepit walk-up he lived in in Astoria, Meilan drove back into Manhattan and to the apartment her grandfather owned in Chinatown. She had lived on her own for a few years - insisting on living in the dorms at Fordham when she went to college, and then, while getting her MBA at The Stern School, she had rented an apartment in Greenwich Village. She had moved in with her girlfriend during her last year at Stern, and continued to live with her until they broke up two years ago. The timing had coincided with a decline in her grandfather's health, and Meilan had moved back into his apartment to keep an eye on him and, at his insistence, start managing the family finances more directly. But this apartment would always be home. She hoped so, at any rate. She parked her car and took the private elevator up to the apartment, and wondered what she could possibly hope to tell Grandfather in the morning. The morning which, she realized as she looked at her phone, was already upon her. It was almost four, and Grandfather got up no later than five-thirty every day. With a sigh, Meilan stepped off of the elevator and into the apartment foyer. She drew in a deep, calming breath and stepped out of her shoes. Something was burning. "A yèh?" There was no answer. Meilan walked towards the kitchen and found the source of the burning smell. A kettle had been left on on one of the burners. She turned the burner off and used a potholder to lift the kettle off of the oven. She set it in the sink and removed the lid. The water had completely boiled off. With a sigh, Meilan left it in the sink and decided to go upstairs to check on her grandfather. She walked past the library that she now used as an office, glancing in to see that a light was still on and stopping to turn it off. The room was a mess - books pulled from the shelves, the desk so chaotic that it made Meilan's usual state of disorder seem neat, the carpets pulled back and some of the furniture overturned. "A yèh?" she called again, anxious now. She raced down the hall, only briefly glancing into the main library to see that it too had been wrecked, and then wrenched open the door to her grandfather's bedroom without knocking. It was completely dark, with only the faint light of the city making the closed curtains glow dimly. "A yèh?" She approached the bed cautiously. The white sheets and comforter were twisted around a dark form. Meilan turned on one of the bedside lights and then looked back at the bed. "No!" She crawled onto the bed and pulled her grandfather's limp, pale body against hers, ignoring the blood that clung to her hands and pooled on the sheets. "A yèh! Please don't be dead. Bùyào líkāi wǒ!" His eyes were wide open, staring beyond her into the darkness. TBC Notes: Gweilo - Cantonese slang for a white person, it means white ghost. It CAN be derogatory. Meilan certainly means it that way. a yèh - Cantonese for paternal grandfather. Bùyào líkāi wǒ - okay so google translate says that this is "simplified Chinese" for Don't Leave Me. I can't find anything that will translate English to Canto for free for me so... I'm sorry. *I'm going to go with the idea that the Long family came from Hong Kong. I have zero evidence to support this and I apologize for not doing any research. Chapter 2 |
