Disclaimer, I don't own Gundam Wing, though I do own Arielle Pierce.

Anybody notice all my fics thus far revolve around Duo or Heero? *beams*


With Time Comes Change
Part Two

    I was three years old the day my older brother and I ran away from Hell, our father being Satan himself.  I could remember the events of that day almost as if they'd happened yesterday.  The events still plague me in my nightmares.  But with each day, they become less and less a part of my life.  But nothing will ever take away the memory.

    Arielle looked away from her laptop computer and looked around the bedroom, searching for the right way to word the next part.  Her eyes rested on the bed where Heero was still sleeping.
    They had left the dormitory shortly before midnight, after her roommate returned early.  To get away from the girl's constant chatter and high pitched, always chipper, voice, they left and eventually wound up at Heero's apartment on the other side of town.
    She stared at his naked form, illuminated by the glow of the computer screen.  She couldn't believe what they had done that night, but it felt right at the time.  She felt...safe.  Lying next to him, she slept easily for the first time in many, many years.  But she still had awoken early.  Tumbling around in the darkness, she had grabbed the first articles of clothing she could, which was a pair of Heero's boxers and one of his tank top shirts.
    She turned back to her computer screen, determined to get this part of her story over with.  She heard Heero shift in the bed behind her.  She sighed as she closed her eyes.  She hadn't thought about her past in a long time, except for the nightmares, the memories.  She opened her eyes, again as she remembered the pain.

    I had awoken from a light sleep as my seven year old brother cracked open my bedroom door.  I could hear the shouting downstairs.  Papa was home, and very mad, though that was something quite usual for him.  I could hear Mommy plead and cry.
    I lifted my head and looked as the door as my brother, Devon, slid through.  He closed the door and walked up to my bed.
    "Don't be scared, Angel," he whispered as he patted my head.  "It'll be over soon, and Papa will be asleep."
    He stayed by my bedside for nearly two hours, but the shouting downstairs never ceased.  As a matter of fact, it got worse.  The shouting got louder, accompanied by breaking glass.  Mommy's crying turned into screams.
    I quickly covered my ears to block it all out, but it didn't work.  I closed my eyes, wishing it would go away.  Then Devon tapped my shoulder.  I opened my eyes and looked up at him.
    "He's coming," he whispered in a silent panic.  "Papa's coming."
    I could see tears forming in the older boy's eyes.  Every time Papa came upstairs, it meant that he was really, really mad.  It meant pain.
    Devon quickly ran to the door and opened it, hoping to get to his room, where he had a small chance of hiding, before Papa made it up the stairs.  He was too late.  Papa was at the door.  Devon froze in sheer terror.
    I heard Mommy scream again, from downstairs.  "Leave the children alone!" I heard between her sobs.  "Please, Charles, leave them alone!"

    Arielle closed her eyes again, tears threatening to form at the memory of that night.  She couldn't count how many times she'd wished she could forget it.  She didn't know if she could continue this right now.
    She opened her eyes as she felt Heero's hand on her shoulder.  She hadn't heard him get up.
    "Are you sure you want all of humanity knowing about your past?" he asked softly as he ran his other hand through the tangles of her long brown hair.
    "They'll find out sooner or later.  If I intend to be an authoress."
    Heero kissed her bare shoulders.  "Best take it in small steps, then.  It'll hurt less than to remember it all at once."  He kissed her cheek.  "Turn that off and come back to bed.  If I know the Maxwell's, we'll be out quite late."
    Arielle looked to the screen a moment and nodded.  After saving her document, she shut down the computer and joined Heero in his bed.

    Duo sat in the kitchen, at the table, in the dark.  The clock on the microwave said 5:30.  Hilde was still asleep.  Duo didn't want to bother her so early in the morning.
    Nightmares, that he hadn't had since becoming a Gundam pilot, had plagued him that night.  He couldn't help but see a pain equal to his own, in a past that was hidden behind Arielle's eyes.
    The eyes.  The violet eyes that he and his son had were a dominant trait of his mother's side of the family.  Arielle had those same eyes.  Also, even to look at the younger woman reminded him of his mother.  The features of her face, the shape of her body, it all reminded him of his mother.
    He sighed as he shifted his bare feet that rested on the cold tile floor. He rubbed his tired eyes.  He couldn't believe the nightmares were back.  Fifteen years ago, he and his little sister ran away from their broken home and extremely abusive father.  How many times he had wanted to go back for their mother, he couldn't count anymore.  How many times he wish he hadn't been separated from his baby sister, was an even larger number.  He wondered, every day, where she was, what she was doing, or if she was even alive.
    Because of Hilde, and eventually the other pilots, this family had began to fill the hole left by the memory of his childhood.  When D.J. was born, Duo swore up and down that his son would never have to deal with a childhood, like that.  After he had found out that Hilde was pregnant with D.J., Duo immediately stopped drinking anything alcoholic; he resigned from the Preventers; and went to school, determined to work towards a job that paid enough so that Duo could give the boy anything and everything he would desire.  He soon found out that what he could give to D.J. that really mattered, was love.  Material things would only spoil the boy into wanting more.  The Preventers provided enough to live off of, and Duo loved his work there, not to mention his co-workers.
Living day by day, instead of planning for the future, or looking back on the past, Duo had eventually forgotten the pain that was his childhood.
    But the day he met Arielle Pierce, that changed.  Something in the woman sparked those memories.  It had to be the eyes.  Those deep violet eyes.  And, it also had to be the resemblance to his mother.
    “Can it be you?” he whispered in the dark as he closed his eyes a moment.”
    “Angel.”
    His eyes tightened as the memory returned, tears threatening.
    “Duo?” called Hilde from the door way.  She walked over to him as his eyes opened.  “Are you alright?”
    He nodded and just kinda brushed her question aside.  “What are you doing up?”
    She twirled the end of his braid around one finger.  “Wondering why you are up.  What’s wrong?”  She sat in a chair beside him.  “Tell me.”
    “Remember, yesterday, that I told you there was a part of my past that I didn’t want to remember?”
    She nodded.
    “I’ve been seeing that past over and over, every time I close my eyes.  And it didn’t start until I met your friend, Arielle.  My hidden pain is reflected in her eyes.  And her face is a reflection of my mom’s, even thought I barely remember her.”
    He sighed as he looked at his wife.  “Life on the street was good for me, Hilde.  Better than the life I had before that.  Even though I had a home and a family, there was one thing that made that life a living hell hole.  My dad.”
    He felt Hilde’s hand on his arm.  he looked to her as he felt tears beginning again.
    “I was seven the night my baby sister and I ran away from Hell.  
    “My mother was a beautiful caring woman.  My eyes are a dominant trait from her side of the family.  She didn’t have one cross molecule of her being.  She loved and cared for us very much.
    “My father, on the other hand, couldn’t have been more of a bastard.  He was a soldier in Romefeller, and one of their top generals.  And he ran his home like a damned army.  I don’t think that would have been half as bad were it not for the alcohol.  He was a drunken bastard ninety percent of the time, and a drunken soldier the other ten percent. His favorite past-time was to come home and start an arguement with Mom, just to give him an excuse to hit her.  Sometimes he would make me watch.  When my baby sister got older, he made her watch, too.  If he was drunk enough, he’d even hit us, too.”
    Duo looked away from her for a moment, letting tears slide down his cheek.  He took a few deep breaths and looked back.
    “The night we ran away, I woke up to their shouting.  I went across the hall to my sister’s room.  She was three.
    “Shouting turned into screaming.  Screaming turned into breaking glass.  Then we heard heavy footsteps on the stairs.
    “He’s coming,” he whispered, shuddering.  “Papa’s coming.”
    Hilde moved her chair closer to her husband and wrapped an arm around him.  He laid his head against her.
    “He was at the door when I opened it.  He took me by the arm.  He shot a glare at my sister.  A glare worse that one of Heero’s ‘death glares‘.  She scampered out of her bed and followed us as he literally dragged me down the stairs...”
    His voice trailed of as tears overcame him.  It hurt to remember.

    After Papa pulled us downstairs, he made us sit on the couch and watch as he hit Mommy over and over, harder and harder.
    Devon, sitting beside me, was curled up against the back of the couch, crying, trying to hide between the cushions.
    Mommy quit moving after a while, and Papa came over to the couch.  He grabbed Devon’s ankle and pulled hard, pulling Devon off the couch.  Devon tried to hold on to the couch cushions, but they came off with him.  The cushioned his head as it hit the living room floor.
    I watched as Papa started hitting Devon, just as hard as he was hitting Mommy.  I think he got bored with Devon, because he didn’t hit him as much as he hit Mommy.  He kinda threw Devon on the floor beside Mommy and looked at me.  It was a scary look.
    I jumped off the couch and stood still, staring up at Papa.  I didn’t cry. I didn’t flinch.  I didn’t do anything.
    “Finally,” he said as he grabbed a handful of my hair and tugged it back so I was looking almost straight up.  “There’s one soldier in this family.”
    He took a drink from the bottle in his hand as he let go of my hair.  He kinda pushed me forward, on top of Mommy and Devon, and walked out the front door.
    We heard the car start and drive off.  I got off of Mommy and shook her, trying to wake her.  She wouldn’t move.
    Devon stood up and limped over to me, grabbing my hand.  “We gotta get out of here.  Now.”  I was still trying to wake Mommy up as Devon pulled me away from her.  We left the house out of the back door and ran.  We kept on running until we couldn’t run anymore.  And somewhere, along the way, we got lost from each other.  We never saw each other again.