Disclaimer: I don’t own Gundam Wing © Sotsu,
ANB, Bandai, and
AN: This is set just after the Endless
Waltz. 6x9 of course…
Rose-Scented
Candle
Trinity Valentine
Noin sighed and breathed in his scent again, wallowing in her joy
that she was finally allowed to express.
She listened to the strong, steady heartbeat beneath her ear and felt
the soft noise of his deep sleep breaths.
She smiled and nuzzled into him closer, feeling the heat of his body
through his clothes. His warm, living body and his strong, beating
heart.
Zechs stirred slightly beneath her,
scratching his nose with one hand and pulling her closer with the other. He had been exhausted after the final
battle with the Serpents and Noin had suggested that he come to her place to
rest up. She had built a fire in
the nearly unused fireplace while he had barely ditched his heavy boots and
Preventers jacket before collapsing on the floor in front of the laughing
flames. Noin had been covering him
with a quilt when he had suddenly reached for her. He had simply sat there, a gentle hand
wrapped lightly around her wrist with exhausted yet questioning eyes asking her
if it was okay. She had smiled and
silently lay next to him. He seemed
relieved and fell back to sleep almost instantly with an arm draped over
her. Noin was happy to keep him
warm. A general sense of calm,
quiet contentedness filled her heart that felt so perfectly right with her next
to him.
It had been so long since she had heard his
voice, felt his touch, caught a whiff of him if she stood too close…so long
since she could look him in his eyes and utter his name without a disapproving
look from Sally or Une. He was
finally home.
It was two and a half hours before Zechs
stirred again, eyelids fluttering open to see Noin smiling dreamily at
him. He blinked for a minute,
disoriented and surprised momentarily by Noin and the unusual surroundings
before settling down once again. He
was still awake, lazily gazing at Noin who just as lazily gazed back.
“Hey,” Noin smiled, warm and cozy between
Zechs and the simmering fire.
“You seem comfortable,” Zechs observed as he
too basked in the fire’s radiating heat.
He partially closed eyes closed again, sleepy yet alert, refreshed from
the nap.
“I am,” Noin murmured in return as Zechs
smiled. His blue eyes slowly
reopened as he watched Noin as she gazed contentedly into the flames.
“I missed you,” he said suddenly, his face
changing from sleepy to serious.
Noin turned to face him, the same look set on
her features, “I missed you, too, Zechs.
I’m so glad that you’re alive and well.” Her voice dropped to a whisper as she
finished, looking away from Zechs and back to the flames once again.
“I’m sorry. I know I should have said something
sooner but…I thought it was too late by the time I could.” Zechs’ voice had an uncharacteristic
note in it. He didn’t usually voice
his regrets, and when he did, he used the same cold, detached tone associated
with Heero Yuy. Noin looked at him
curiously.
“What do you mean?” she questioned, her
amethyst gaze falling into his topaz one before he looked away from her once
again.
“When Libra exploded, I thought I was pretty
much done for. Epyon was a chunk of
shrapnel when I finally saw its remains.
I ended up crashing down on Earth, in
“They told me I was lucky to be alive but I
didn’t believe them. I had wanted
to go down with that bloodthirsty battleship and yet I had somehow survived…if
you call recovering from six broken ribs, third degree burns, and a concussion
‘surviving’…”
Noin gave him a strange look. It was somewhere between a disapproving
glower at him for giving up so easily with wanting to die along with Libra, but
her look also held admiration that he did indeed keep going on and sympathy
that she wasn’t there for him in his times of need.
“But the worst part,” he continued, “was my
hands. An explosion evidently
jerked me forward through some of the controls…” Zechs brought his left hand up and
indicated the long scar between his forefinger and thumb through the soft
part. His right hand had the white
scars from his knuckles to his wrist, the skin torn from glass screens as well
as other instruments.
Noin, still silent, gingerly took his left
hand into her own, tracing the jagged scar that appeared on the back just as
much as his palm with her own forefinger.
Zechs watched her silently with a child-like innocence as Noin kissed
the long mark on his hand before releasing it. Zechs acknowledged her in gratitude,
closing his eyes and leaning his head toward her briefly.
“It took me a long time to recover and it
seemed even longer in a strange country with a different people and a different
language. I tried to contact you,
but I didn’t know where you were. I
tried
“Why did you come back, Zechs? Why did you try so hard to find me
again?”
Zechs glanced to her once more, “For reasons
like this,” he gestured to how they were laying together. “Because I knew I could count on
you. Because I heard you cry out
when Libra went down…” his sentence faded as Zechs looked into Noin’s eyes,
filled with a year’s worth of pain and hoping and waiting. He just seemed to realize how close they
were. He could feel Noin’s breath
and heart beat quicken as he watched the firelight dance across her skin and
flit through her eyes like so many flaming phoenix birds.
“And,” Zechs whispered, “Because of this…”
his lips pressed to hers, gentle and unsure. Noin’s eyes widened before sealing
passionately behind her long, dark eyelashes, drowning in Zechs’ deepening
kiss. They both poured a year’s
worth of pain, hope, despair, and unrequited love into one passionate and
longing kiss. Neither one of them
ever wanted that pinpointed light of heavenly bliss to end.
Finally they broke apart when the need for
oxygen overrode the need for catharsis.
Noin smiled at him, electricity still lingering on her lips.
“Sometimes, Mr. Zechs Merquise, I’m glad you
think with reason.”
“And sometimes, Miss Lucrezia Noin, I’m glad
you don’t,” Zechs broke eye contact with her, staring into the fire blandly
with a bitter, sorrowful guilt eating away at his insides.
“It doesn’t make any sense,” he muttered,
shaking his head, his bangs swaying a little before his eyes.
Noin lay her head back down on Zechs’ chest
again and sighed frustratedly. “Zechs, this is one of those times when
I don’t like that you think with what you call reason. Why wouldn’t I love you?” Her voice was a gentle sigh, filled with
something unidentifiable.
Zechs’ head snapped around to look at
Noin. She was simply looking at him
expectantly, waiting for his response.
“What is there to love?” he asked while a
demon of his own clawed through his mind and heart. There was nothing in his heart worth
loving at all.
“Do you really want me to get started
listing? We may be here for a
while,” Noin smiled sadly, wanting to break down Zechs’ walls and come into his
heart at least for a while. She
wanted to be a flame in the night for him.
Zechs glanced at her, doubt and disbelief in
his eyes could be seen in his eyes before he looked away.
“I once knew a kind-hearted boy prince,” Noin
began, boring into the flames before her.
Zechs’ face turned pensive as she continued.
“But people grow and change, and when he did,
I realized that I would always be by his side. He was kind, intelligent, gentle,
understanding…he still is and always will be.” Zechs glanced at her from the corner of
his eye, his expression unreadable but the wheels in his lightning quick mind
were turning.
“Like all humans, he can be cruel and
ruthless, so can I. His tarnished
golden heart is the greatest treasure of all.”
They fell into a deep silence, Noin’s
confession still echoing off the silent walls and in the limitless fathoms of
both minds. Zechs appeared deep in
thought, eyes unfocused and distant.
He supposed he had always known Noin loved him, but some part of him
still refused to believe that love was a possibility. It was melodramatic and it felt like he was
simply fighting another miserable losing battle, the victor unsure. He knew to love her would change
everything…but in reality, everything needed changing. Everything. If he was ever to move on with his
wretched existence he had to start somewhere and Noin was waving a green flag
for him. Yet another way she had
managed to help him out: guide him
when he was so lost he couldn’t find his own hands or face.
Zechs closed his eyes, continuing his deep
contemplation, wondering over what Noin had just revealed to him. If he accepted her confession and loved
her in return, the he could move on and start someplace new. But if he pushed her away, everything
would just be worse than before.
Everything good in him decidedly came from her. She kept him patient and kind when his
first instinct was to fight back.
It was her who had made him want to destroy Libra. It was her that brought light in
darkness, his candle in the night.
It was her that brought him back from the grave and into the lands of
the living once more and be damned if he were to ever toss and turn in that
tomb again.
“I don’t know what to say,” he murmured as he
stroked the back of Noin’s head.
Her violet blue eyes closed and reveled in his touch.
“You don’t have to say anything, Zechs. I just had to tell you I love you…you’ve
been gone too long.” She smiled and
snuggled against him, still listening to his beating heart and rejoicing in his
life.
“Yes, I have,” he agreed after a moment.
Noin cracked open her eyes just enough to see
Zechs scowling into the fire. He
looked angry, but she knew he was only concentrating.
“I’ve been gone long enough to realize that I
can only be dead without you around to bring me life. Change is inevitable, so I’m going to
change,” his voice was a low murmur, like thunder rising over a spring hill in
the distance signifying the coming of a life-bringing rain.
“And for everything I regret and for
everything that could have been different, I choose to stay here. Heaven knows how long it will take, but
Noin, I’ll learn to love you in return someday.”
The dark-haired woman looked to her
pale-haired companion. “I’ll teach
you. We’ll learn together.” She smiled, satisfied and heart floating
on the warmth Zechs brought her.
Zechs stared back at the warm face that was
nuzzled into his chest. “Thank you,
Noin. Thank you for
everything.” Noin smiled wider in
acknowledgement.
She had such a flame, a deep fire burning
within her that was just hot enough to melt the ice that clung to his heart; a
fire bright enough to be seen day and night for a whole year, dimming the sun
in its pathetic radiance; a fire small enough to burn and simmer low and loving
and large enough to consume whole heart.
She was the candle’s flame in the eternal darkness of space. The rose-scented
candle that finally led him home.
Home…where he belonged.
~*~*~
Thanks for reading this little one-hitter. Feedback appreciated! (ya see THAT one everywhere…^_^) 6x9 forever!