lank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Chapter One

"Duo!" Someone called out from the mass of people celebrating. He turned his head rapidly around, his braid flinging to his left shoulder, as he searched for the familiar face that went with that familiar voice. There was a bright blond head bobbing in the crowd. He waved his hand high to signal to his friend where he was. Suddenly baby blue eyes were infront of his violet tinted pair before he was practically crushed in an excited hug.

"It's over!" the slightly smaller boy yelled over the throng.

"Quatre… breathing…" he choked out, and then laughed as the blond gasped and let go, "I think you broke three ribs!"

"Won't stop you from talking, would it?" a Chinese youth asked as he stopped next to the pair. He smirked at the chestnut haired boy to show he was joking.

"Nothing could stop him from talking," a tall European teen answered matter-of-factly. A Japanese boy stood next to him, "We could rip his tongue out."

Duo grabbed his tongue with his right hand and tried to talk back. Quatre tilted his head slightly, "What?"

Duo let go of his red appendage, laughed out, "Wuffie is so mean. Trowa, you're right. See Heer? I can still make noise!" He started laughing hysterically as the Chinese boy growled out, "It's Wufei." Quatre laughed along and they all blended into the celebration to party for the first time in their lives.

~*~Ma~*~

It was annoying. The sound, that is. It kept going. The rhythm kept on. What was that sound?

Now warmth invaded his senses. That was nice, he knew. He was warm and comfortable for it.

Slowly he opened his eyes. The room he was in was bright! His eyes shut again rapidly. He groaned as they stung.

"Oh-me-God! He's waking up!" he heard a female voice say and then heard hurried footsteps rush away from him.

Footsteps again hit his hearing, this time coming toward him. He slowly opened his eyes again as a man with a black beard and black full head of hair came into his view.

Florescent lights and the sun coming in from a window made the small room very bright. The annoying sound was a heart monitor next to the uncomfortable bed he was flat on his back laying. A sheet and blanket were pulled up to his shoulders making him comfortable warm.

The bearded man hovered over him and shone a bright light into his left eye. Flinching and shying from the light, his hand came up to cover his face. "Sorry, " the man, a doctor, apologized.

"Where am I?" he rasped, quietly, his voice cracking.

"You have been admitted to St. Francis Hospital. You are in the brain trauma ward," the man answered. "I'm your doctor, Dr. Jamie."

"It's nice to meet you. I'm… I'm… " He crinkled his face as he tried to think about what his name could be. He looked at the white coated guy, "I don't know who I am," he whispered.

The doctor once again put the bright light into his eye; this time he let him do it. He switched to the other side. "You had a very bad concussion. Let's see what else you know, okay?" He nodded to the doctor to continue. The doctor sat at the end of his bed and said, "Okay, let's start with the year." He slowly shook his head. "Okay. How about your age…?" Again he shook his head. "Two times four?" the doctor asked. The boy looked at him strange and shocked, and said, "Eight." The doctor nodded. "So, schooling is still there. Do you, maybe, remember anyone else's names? Like friends or family?" The boy looked down at his feet for a minute and then up at the doctor, "No."

The doctor stood up as a nurse entered the room to start tending to him. "Well, that's alright. Does it make you upset to not know?" He shook his head a bit faster this time. "That's good. We're going to let you sit up in bed for a while. The remote to the TV is attached to the bed controls. The nurse here will help you with everything. I want you to stay in bed today, though. We'll start removing things tomorrow that you don't need any more and maybe even start getting real food slowly into you. I want to make sure that you rest today, though." He nodded his understanding as the nurse helped him raise the bed. The doctor left the room after giving the boy a reassuring smile.

~*~Ma~*~

The next day, when he awoke to the sun coming through the window again, he was happy to see the doctor striding into the room to start to unhook him from things. First they changed his IV to one that just would keep him hydrated. Then the doctor did the agonizing task of removing his cathedar. When he could breathe again steadily, he asked the doctor when he would be able to eat real food. His stomach was clenched in emptiness and he really wanted to find out what he liked. He couldn't remember what anything tasted like and he wanted to try everything off of the small menu. The doctor crushed him a bit when he told him that the nurse would be bringing him a bland diet of soups and breads.

He slumped a bit in his bed, his long hair pulled slightly and he reached up to bring it loose. The nurse came to him then with a small brush in her hands. "We should get the tangles out of your hair, okay?" He nodded and smiled at her. The doctor left with his instructions set and the nurse set to helping the boy brush out his long mane of hair. He turned in the bed to sitting on it sideways, his legs dangling off one side and he stared out the window. She knelt on the other side, behind him. It was so long that he sat on it. He didn't know how long it was, since he hadn't tried standing up yet, but he knew it was un-naturally long for a boy. At least, that is what he assumed since the three guys he had seen since waking up and the males on TV all had pretty short hair. She worked at it for a while, being careful to not pull at the long strands and break them. "Should I braid it?" He turned to her slightly with a questioning look on his face. "It was braided when they brought you in. I think with this long of hair it will probably be easier to care for if it was kept braided." He nodded and turned back to being straight and looking out the window.

"Why do I have my hair so long?" he whispered.

She finished tying it off and put the black clothed lined hair tie at the bottom of the long braid, "Maybe you just like it this long. Doesn't there have to be a reason?" she asked him. He shook his head, but he felt that the long hair was cumbersome and so there had to have been a reason he had it so long.

"I just was wondering why I can't remember anything. My hair is long, even by female standards, and so it's got to be hard to manage," he told her. It was the most he had spoken since waking up. She helped him turn to sit back against the bed and smiled at him.

"Are you getting agitated at not knowing?" she asked him. He shook his head. It didn't really bother him that he didn't know things, but he also knew that one of these days it might become something that he'd have to really analyze.

She smiled brighter at him, but it still had a slight tinge of sadness to it he realized, "Do you want me to turn the TV on for you?" He shook his head again. He had watched a lot of TV the day before and found that he couldn't like anything he saw on it. It was all just mindless drooling crap, he had thought. "Well then, what would you like to do?"

He thought about it for a bit and asked shyly, "Read? I think I know how to read. Can I get something to read?" She nodded and left the room. She came back in a few minutes later with a book in her hands.

"One of the nurses has a boy your age and she thought maybe you would like to read some of the books he owns. This is one of them," she handed him a paperback novel with a picture plastered on the front. He didn't know if it was something he would like yet, but it was probably better than drooling all over himself for the rest of the day.

He grabbed the book gently and asked her, "How old am I?"

She was startled for a minute, nodded to herself, and said, "We think you must be 12. Your body seems to have just started puberty, so that's why we calculated as about 12." He nodded and thanked her. She gave him a quick hug and left the room with the promise of bringing him food soon. He opened the book and started to read the first chapter.

~*~Ma~*~

For the next few days he read the book given to him, slept, and ate the bland diet of wheat bread and different broth soups. He thought maybe he should have been bored with only being able to get out of the bed to use the bathroom, the bath he was helped with once a day, and nothing else to do, but he wasn't. The book was interesting and the next book was at the nurses' station for he had been assured when he asked if it was a series. The doctor came in once a day to check on him and see if he remembered anything. By the fifth day awake he did finally remember something. He knew his name started with a D, but that was it. Every time he tried to get his name out, his tongue would start with the sound. The doctor told him that was good and it meant that maybe he would get his memories back. He also warned not to be disappointed if he never did.

He was looking out the window and trying to think about what his past might have been, when the lady he had never seen walked in. She had on high heels and a gray business suit. Her arms were loaded with files and paperwork, which she set on the tray next to his bed. She smiled at him and held out her hand, "Good morning. My name is Alecia Grahm."

He shook her hand, "Hello. I don't know my name." She nodded.

"The doctor told me. I'm sorry to hear that."

He shrugged, "It doesn't bother me, except that everyone keeps introducing themselves to me and I cannot do the same." She gave him a strange look that he could not figure out and then grabbed the file on the top of her stack.

"I've come here because we haven't been able to place where your family is. We have put your picture on the news a few times now and have asked around the best we can to find out who you are and where you come from. We even put it on national news stations, hoping that maybe we just hadn't looked far enough. There has been nothing, though. I'm sorry. No one has reported you missing, either. With how long your hair is, it should have been a red flag to anyone who knew you," she told him sadly. He nodded and looked back out the window. So, he was nameless and no one was missing him. He didn't care that he had no memories, but how come no one wanted him? She continued, "I'm here, though, to tell you that we need to place you with a foster family. At your young age, we cannot guarantee that you'll ever be adopted, but living with a foster family will allow you to go to school and at least be a normal preteen."

He turned his bright violet eyes to the woman, "I am leaving the hospital soon?"

She nodded. "The doctor called me in because, even though you still are getting your strength back, you'll be leaving in a week from here. I know you can't walk far on your own yet, or do strenuous things, but you were in very good shape when you came here." She used her hand to push back a strand of her brown shoulder length hair to behind her ears as she opened the folder she had laid on the bed next to him. "We need to put down a name for you in the system. Do you have any idea what you want to be called?"

He shook his head, "I just know that my name had started with a D."

"Okay, so do you mind if I named you right now, then? We will change it when you remember your name," she said to him.

He waved his hand at her, "Be my guest."

She nodded and said, "Daniel sound good to you?" He nodded. "Okay, any idea what your last name might have been?" He shook his head. She again nodded and said, "Okay, how about Daniel Francis? We'll use the name of the hospital." To him that seemed very fitting to be named after the place that saved his life. She continued on, "How about your birthday?"

He sighed, "I can't remember anything, and so whatever you choose for all of these questions is fine with me."

She sighed as well, "I just want to make sure you're comfortable instead of making all of these choices for you. Let's put your birthday down as the day you woke up, okay? June 1st. You will be going into 7th grade this coming September, but sometime next month a teacher is going to come to your foster parent's house and test you to find out where you are in your learning. We want you to be comfortable. I'm your social worker, so I'll be visiting you every so often as well to make sure that you're adjusting well to where you are staying. We want to make sure that, as you heal and grow, you do so as best you can.

"Your first home is going to be with Mrs. Winter. She is an older lady whose children have all left the nest. She fosters teenagers mostly, but we're going to place her with you because she has her home open currently. You will be the youngest child she has ever had, so I hope you remember that. You will be attending the public middle school in her area. She is within walking distance to it, and I'm sure she'll help you get there the first few times in September. She has no other kids with her currently, so you'll be alone in that sense. That isn't saying she won't get some, though. She is a kind lady. I think you'll like her a lot."

He nodded and again turned to the window.

"I'll leave you to rest, but this week the doctor told me that you will be required to gain your strength again. I am going to go and tell Mrs. Winter that she is going to have you in her home on Saturday, okay?" He nodded and they said good-bye to each other.

'I am 12 and without a home or family. No one knows who I am. How can I have gone 12 years without anyone knowing who I am?' he thought as he watched the tree outside his room sway in a breeze.

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

2: Chapter Two

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Chapter Two

His brain rushed through all of the information he had been gathering from his doctors and nurses for the last week. He would be leaving the hospital today for his new home. The hospital he had been rushed to by a good samaritan who had found him on the side of a highway in a ditch. He had been beat badly and left to die from all the reports that he could gather. His body did have a lot of old scars along it, as well. The doctors said that from what they could tell he had been through a lot of hell in his young life. He had obviously been starved, beat and suffered a lot. Anger rose up inside of him as he thought about it, because he didn't understand why anyone would want to hurt him.

The white haired nurse who cared for him during the dayshift came in to see him brooding on the bed in his oversized borrowed clothes. They had had to discard the clothing he had come in with. She carefully knelt down in front of him and lifted his chin with her fingers to look into his fiery eyes. His violet eyes met her brown ones with rage boiling inside them. She knew it wasn't anger at her, "What's the matter child?"

"Why would someone hurt me? What did I do to them?"he ground out through his clenched teeth.

The older woman sighed and sat next to boy on the bed. She pulled him against her into a hug and said, "We don't always have explanations for why people are cruel. I am happy to see some emotion coming from you, but holding onto that anger will just make you just as cruel as the people who hurt you. I know it will be difficult right now, but you will need to forgive them to move on. Especially difficult for you since you don't even remember what happened."

"I just don't understand, Nurse Rachel," Daniel sighed and loosened his body from its tense grip.

"We do not want to understand cruel people, child. Cruelty understood would mean that you justify it. We cannot justify abuse to anyone. Do you understand that?" He nodded against her.

"Do you think anyone was kind to me?" he asked. His eyes shut as he started to feel sorrow overcome him and the anger leave.

"Even if you do not think anyone has, you need to live life now. Remember kindness now," with this she gave him a big squeeze, "Remembering kindness now will let you escape what hate, anger and cruelty can turn you into." She let go of him and stood up. Reaching into her pocket she turned to him again and knelt in front of him. "This was on you when they found you." She held out her hand and put something cold into his palm.

She smiled and said, "Trust in it and trust in what it represents to guide you from now on."

He looked up her with watery eyes now. "I don't want to leave here."

She gave him one last hug and left the room. He stared down at the cross sitting on his right palm. He felt the tears disappear and strength return inside his heart. He can do this. He can survive. It was now time to face many unknowns, but he could do it.

~*~Ma~*~

The house was painted a light blue color on the outside with a nice brown as the trim around the blue painted door and windows. The yard was beautiful with flowers everywhere and what looked like a vegetable garden in the back. There were pathways with stones instead of a concrete walkway everywhere. Daniel felt awkward going on the stone path to the front door behind his social worker. He didn't have any bags and no other belongings than the oversized clothes he wore and the cross he kept fingering in his jeans pocket. They stood in front of the sky blue door and waited for the lady who would be caring for him. His heart was leaping in his chest and he felt a strong urge to turn and run away. He fought against it and wondered why he had it.

The woman was older but very much active looking. She wore a nice blouse and a long skirt with flowers on it. Her white hair was long, almost as long as his and it was tied up loosely into a high pony tail. She smiled at him and invited them into her front room and to the couch that leaned against the wall on the far side. He sat carefully down and straight backed. He knew he looked a mess, but he tried to make sure not to act like one.

The woman sighed and said, "My name is Christine Snow, you can call me Ms. Snow or Mama Snow, please. I will be caring for you while you are under foster care, at least for the moment. I am used to older kids, but I don't think that should be a problem. I have a few ground rules to go over with you for your stay here. There will be no tolerance for lying, cheating, stealing or contraband use. Please no swearing either. I request respect and I will give respect as well. We are both people and thus should treat each other as such. You will be responsible for your area, which will need to stay neat and clean at all times, and I expect you to pick up after yourself. Do not leave something lying around unless you want it to end up in the bin for the refuse men, because that is exactly where I will put it. You will also be expected to do one light chore a week, which will rotate every week so that you do not get bored with it.

"I am here to raise you to be productive to society. My rules are for a reason. Any questions?"

He thought about them all and then said, "I don't think I ever lie. I don't see a reason to. These are all very reasonable rules. I like them."

The woman opened up finally with a smile. "I will show you to your room now. I already have a few clothes in there for you that I was able to find, but we will go shopping as soon as we can to get you your own style clothes. I understand a little about you already, but whenever you feel you need to, I will be here to listen to you as well." They started walking down the hallway toward the bedrooms.

~*~Ma~*~

He lay on the bottom bunk of the wooden bunk beds that were in his room. He didn't have a roommate, but he was explained to that there was always the possibility that she could have another child come live with them. He was nervous today. He rubbed his fingers on the cross that was hung around his neck. It had become a habit to do when he felt agitated, he realized.

He had been here playing son for the woman for a week. They got along, but his lack of memories made some things very difficult. He had to be taught, as a young child would be, how to do some basic cleaning. She had said it was no problem, but he felt the frustrations deep down.

Now, today, a teacher was coming to give him a test to determine where he placed in school. They wanted to make sure to have his transition seamless into the public education system they lived near. Inside he was trembling. He already was learning so much about what he didn't know that he feared maybe the schooling was also really gone too. He knew a bit of what the doctor had questioned him, but what if he didn't know enough to enter the grade level his age was? His foot was swinging now off the side of the bed as his agitation increased.

"Maybe you have ADHD?" a voice asked from the door of his bedroom. He looked over and completely stopped moving. His foster mother stood in the middle of the door. "Sorry, I didn't mean to frighten you. Usually you hear me coming from a mile away." He nodded, his heart still pounding, as he willed his body to loosen from its frightened response. They had already found out that frightening him wasn't a good idea and that it took a lot to startle him in the first place. He seemed to know where she was at all times in the house. That one other time that she had snuck up on him, though, he'd run straight for a window and was out in the front yard before he could realize what he was doing. He still felt horrible for breaking the screen the way he did. He couldn't explain any of it to her, but she didn't push. "The teacher is here," she told him. He again nodded, shoved his cross down the front of his shirt, and got up from the bed.

He walked out and into the living room where a male adult was sitting on the couch in front of papers and a tablet laid on the coffee table. Daniel walked into the room and stood waiting to be acknowledged. The man looked up and smiled, "Hello. My name is Mr. Telisch."

"I'm Daniel Francis," Daniel answered back. It was nice to be able to give a name to someone. The teacher motioned to the couch next to him and Daniel walked to the right side of the man and sat down on the floral imprint.

"I am going to start your testing today and we will test everyday until I'm done, okay? This can finish today or it can finish by Friday, but we need to see how high you can go. Do not be afraid to push the button that you do not know the answer." Daniel nodded and the testing began.

~*~Ma~*~

"The thing is Ms. Snow and Mrs. Grahm," Mr. Telisch sat on the floral imprinted couch once again a week after he first started the testing for Daniel to see where he could be placed in school. "Daniel can probably pass college right now. He is exceptional in all areas and I am not sure what more the school district could teach him. The only problems I see are his levels of inattentiveness can probably get him into trouble. He gets bored easily and has trouble sitting still. I suggest we send him to school, anyway, so that he can make friends and learn how to be who he is truly inside. Since he has no memories he cannot tell us how he has so much knowledge or the fact that really he could probably be teaching the classes he is about to attend, but I think school can only be better for him socially."

"I wish he could tell us how he got this education… he seems to weird even without memories. His body seems to remember how to do certain things, like he fixed my car the other day when it wouldn't start, but he cannot remember how to turn on a washing machine," Christine shook her head, "And he is a danger in the kitchen. I will never have him try and cook again. He is brilliant, but cannot follow a recipe?"

Mr. Telisch laughed a bit, "That could be his inattentiveness."

Alecia sighed, "We'll put him in with the seventh graders and we will not tell him what his scores are. We do not want him to know he is ahead right now. I think it would do him good, as well, to be in with kids and learn once again to socialize with children his age."

They all nodded and started the paperwork to enter him into the school district. Behind them the news continued to rattle away on the television, "Once again we are asking anyone to come forth who might know of a young boy, about 12, who was found on the side of Highway 90 a month ago."

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

3: Chapter Three

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Chapter Three

His purple eyes stared right back at him as he once again tugged on his sleeves. They just didn't seem long enough to hide the scars on his arms from whatever happened to him in the past. The shirt was black with an emblazed logo of some band that his foster mother assured him every child his age was listening to in their area. His jeans hung nicely to the floor and were folded slightly at the bottom. A hole was already in the left knee area that had been created just the other week before when he slid onto the side walk trying to escape, once again, from some nightmare he didn't remember when he woke up. His foster mother had put motion alarms onto his window and bedroom door that were turned on at night so that she could get him from his terrors. He sighed as he fingered the cross around his neck. Nodding to himself in the mirror he shoved his cross into his shirt and turned to leave the bedroom.

In the kitchen he sat down at the breakfast nook while Christine put a bowl of cereal in front of him and the jug of milk. "You're going to be very warm today if you wear that shirt," she informed him kindly. He nodded, sighed, and looked at her worriedly. He pulled up the sleeves of his shirt to point out the scars that she already knew existed. "Daniel, I have told you many times, no one is going to notice those unless you point them out."

"I don't want to go," he mumbled while looking down at his cereal loops.

"School will be fun. You will make friends. You will be fine." She sighed and walked around to him. Carefully she slipped her arms around him and gave him a hug. "You can do this Daniel. You are stronger than you think."

He turned and looked at her. He shut his eyes, breathed in deep, and nodded. Determination filled his eyes as he opened them up and looked at the woman. She smiled brightly and walked towards the front door. With the keys to her car in hand she turned to him, "Alright, let's go." He smiled back and jumped up from the stool to follow her out the door, grabbing his backpack from the floor of the front closet.

~*~Ma~*~

He sat in his first class willing his fear down and bringing up his courage. He knew he had to have courage, because how else could he have survived through all of the scars on his body. The woman at the front of the class was talking about what things they would be reading the first quarter of the school year.

His fear subsided as the she turned around to write on a white board the list of titles that they were to start reading on their own for study. His leg started to swing slightly under the desk and he tapped out on top of the wood with an index finger. His brain was racing now. As each title came out, his brain supplied him with information. He knew the characters, the plots, and could even quote the books that were written on the board. Confusion filled in where fear had been and he felt a bit of panic coming through.

'How in the…' his brain was unable to finish the thought as a folded piece of paper fell onto his desk from his right. In a split second he willed his body to not run from the shock of it. It had taken by complete surprise and every fiber in him wanted to run through the class room door. He stared at the paper and willed his body to move slowly. His heart pounded in his chest. The paper was like a bomb to him, with how he looked at it. The top of the folded paper read, "Open me". He finally was able to reach out after what seemed like an eternity to him, but really was just half a minute. He opened the note and read its contents inside.

You okay?

He looked over at the brown headed boy next to him and nodded slightly. The boy looked away for a second to check that the teacher was still facing the board, and then he turned back toward Daniel and waved for the note to be passed back to him. Daniel handed him the paper. The other student turned and quickly started to write on the paper again. Then he checked on the teacher while handing the note back to Daniel.

You looked like the end of the world was coming and you were confused by it all. My name is Sam.

Daniel picked up his pencil and wrote underneath the cursive of the other boy, My name is Daniel. I am fine now. I already read these books.

The note started its careful path back and forth from both of the boys.

~*~Ma~*~

The weeks passed by easily for the braided boy. His classmates never questioned his clothing choice and he had found a best friend in Sam. School was also very easy for him, and he never questioned it. He really didn't find the need to as his days blended peacefully into each other.

The two boys were walking down the street toward their neighborhood. Their backpacks were lazily hanging off of shoulders as Sam was energetically talking, "Yeah, so my mom said that you can come over and watch the movie tonight!"

Daniel nodded and said, "It's based off the book, right?"

Sam looked at him like he was turning purple, "You read that already?"

Daniel stopped walking, "I read it while everyone was doing their placement tests. I had nothing better to do." Sam stopped walking, too, and then laughed. Daniel tilted his head slightly confused. "What's so funny?"

"You, man, are very sensitive about the fact that you like to read," Sam gasped out.

Daniel rolled his eyes and crossed his arms. "Okay, fine, I just don't want to be called a geek by anyone." Sam shook his head and continued to giggle as they continued on their way to Daniel's house. They didn't take long to reach the front door. The long haired boy opened the door and called out to the quiet, "Mama Snow?" He didn't receive an answer. Christine was always home when he showed up. She would greet him every day at the door and ask how his day had been at school. He leaned back and looked at the driveway. Her small car was sitting there. She had to be home.

He took off his shoes and motioned for Sam to stay in the door. He slowly and silently walked into the house. He went into the living room and saw nothing amiss. He couldn't figure out where his foster mother could possibly be. "Mama Snow?" he whispered this time. He crept far into the house, and back into his room, where he saw the kind lady on the floor. "Mama!" he screamed as he rushed forward to her side. She lay fallen onto her stomach toward the window as if she had just entered the room suddenly and lost her balance.

"Sam! Get me the 'phone!" Daniel screamed to his friend still at the front of the house. He heard his friend quickly slip off his shoes and come running through. He heard the other's footsteps slid on the flooring in the kitchen and then come pounding through to his bedroom. The other child gasped at what he saw when he came with the telephone into room that Daniel was kneeling in. The long haired boy quickly grabbed the black wireless phone from his friend's frozen hands. He dialed quickly. "C'mon!" he screamed into the receiver as it continued to ring. "C'mon!"

Finally the ringing tone ended and a female voice answered, "Nine-One-One what is your emergency?"

"I need an ambulance for my mom. She is unconscious at five-sixty-four Emerald avenue," he choked out a soft sob, reached forward and touched the side of her neck, "Her pulse is weak." He then continued on checking his mother by touching her upper lip, "Her breathing is shallow and erratic. Please, please, hurry!"

Sam came down beside him and put an arm around his friend's shoulders as Daniel continued to answer the lady's questions on the phone, "I don't know what happened. I came home from school and found her. Please, tell the ambulance the front door is open. We are in the back room. She is in my room. Please, hurry." He felt himself about to lose himself in worry. The ambulance siren seemed to take forever to finally hear over his pounding heart. He could feel the sobs start when the men swept into the room, Sam pulling him away from his foster mother's side to keep him from being in the way. He followed the gurney from the room after they had secured her to it.

"I am coming to. I'm her son!" he yelled as he chased after them. He turned to Sam, "I'm sorry." Sam smiled and waved his hand to cast aside the apology.

"I'll just go home and tell my mom what happened. We'll see you at the hospital," Sam said seriously. He ran out behind them as they all left the house. Daniel quickly shoved his feet into his shoes, Sam grabbed them without even bothering, and quickly shoved his key into the door.

The braided boy was pulled into the back of the ambulance by a helping hand and grabbed onto his rope of hair before the doors were slammed shut on it. He sat in silence and watched the paramedics try to stabilize the woman who cared so much in such short time. 'Don't let her die, please! I need her,' he thought as the sirens started to wail again and the medic bus raced towards salvation and his name-sake.

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

4: Chapter Four

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Chapter Four

He was cold. His whole body seemed to be completely numb. His brain was shut down and he stared at the straight pattern in the linoleum flooring in front of the hard plastic chair he sat in. He couldn't think, because every time he tried to tear his eyes away from the one spot, his brain came up the images of his foster mother lying on his bedroom floor. Why had she been in his room? What happened to her? The image once again came into his brain.

Suddenly a hand touched his shoulder. He jumped up and grabbed roughly onto the arm of the person who had scared him. His heart was racing as he forced his body to stop in its fight or flight response. This time he wasn't going to flee, but rather it seemed his body was going to continue on and hurt this other person. Wide brown eyes stared at his at the other person realized he made a mistake in touching Daniel. The braided boy quickly let go of his only friend and turned and punched the wall behind the chair he had just been sitting in. He felt his knuckles crack against the wall as a spider web crack formed into the hard covering over the cinder blocks behind the paint. Sam rubbed his wrist where the bruise was forming from Daniel's grip. Sam's mother, a blond like her son, came forward and pulled both of the boys to her chest. "It'll be okay," she whispered into their hair as the brunette finally broke down and started to sob.

Daniel cried for a good ten minutes and then gently pushed away from the woman. Sam stayed in his mom's arms as they watched Daniel compose himself. His long braid swung back and forth as he shook his head from thoughts that even he couldn't comprehend.

A woman in a long white coat came into the room and saw them. She approached the small group, "Mr. Francis?" Daniel nodded and stepped forward toward the short cropped hair woman. "I have contacted your social worker, honey. You will not be able to return to Mrs. Snow."

Daniel felt his world coming down around him again, "What happened to her?" He looked hopefully at the doctor, "Please, tell me she is going to be alright?"

The doctor looked undecided for a minute. "I can tell you that she will be okay. I cannot tell you her diagnose, because you are not her family." He nodded and sat down in the seat again. Sam's mother sat down next to him and again pulled him close to her flower blouse upper body. He didn't cry this time, though. He just let the woman hold him.

"Can't we take him, mom?" Sam asked his mother as they sat there waiting for Alecia. His mother shrugged her shoulders. Sam collapsed down next to Daniel and leaned into his friend. "I hope we can."

They sat that way for over a half an hour when Alecia walked into the waiting room. She ran her hand down her black skirt that went to her knees, as her heels clicked against the flooring. Her hair was curled and put high into a pony tail on her head. Her button down plain blue shirt had a few wrinkles caused by her seat belt on the ride to the hospital. Daniel raised his purple eyes to her as she approached them.

"Daniel, I'm sorry to hear about Ms. Snow. I have gotten what I could from her house for you with her permission and so it's all set into the car and ready," she spoke softly to him as she brought her hand down to him to bring him to standing. He stared at it as if he didn't know what it was.

Sam's mom spoke up then, "Can't we take him home with us?" Alecia looked at the other woman. Blue eyes looked deep into blue as Alecia's went sad and she shook her head.

"I'm sorry, but unless you have qualifications through the state, he cannot."

Daniel looked down at the flooring again, sighed, and stood up. His eyes hardened, once again, with determination. "I'm ready." He didn't grab onto the outstretched hand as he walked toward the doors. Sam ran after him and together they went through the doors as the adults followed behind him.

They reached the car parking area and both boys turned toward each other. "Call me, K? You still have to see that movie," Sam choked a bit on the last word.

Daniel stepped closer and put hands on both of Sam's shoulders, "Hey man, don't worry, k? I have your number memorized. I'd have to have amnesia to not call, K?" They both laughed and hugged each other. "I'm sure I'll be watching that movie with you next weekend if my new foster parents aren't crappy, k?" They let go of each other. They gave each other weary smiles as they followed their respective female adults to the vehicles onto their new adventures. Both of them knew that no matter what they would always are good friends.

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

5: Chapter Five

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Chapter Five

He stood in the doorway of his new home. It was not as spacious as his last home. The coats hanging in the closet, which had no door on it, were crowded and shoved almost haphazardly on the hangers. He looked down and noticed the clump of shoes just tossed on top of each other at the floor of the entry way closet and flowing out like a sea of tennis shoes. Alecia followed his gaze and commented, "No shoes allowed in the house." He nodded his understanding. Leaning down he carefully untied his shoes and placed them at the front of the tidal wave of foot wear. He stood back up and watched as a crowd came from a room in the back of the hall entrance.

"Alecia!" the man exclaimed and gently hugged Daniel's social worker as it seemed they were friends. The man's face was broken into a wide grin, which showed black, chipped and crooked teeth. His beard was full and trimmed neatly. It was dark brown, like his short hair, but flecked with white. He must have been in his forties, Daniel determined. A woman behind the man had bright blond hair that showed brown roots, meaning she needed to touch her hair up and soon. She smiled with her mouth closed and gently stepped forward to hug Alecia as well. Daniel looked at their clothes and determined they would not shop for him at any moment. The man was in denim overalls and a plaid button shirt. If they hadn't just driven through the city, Daniel would have thought they were on a farm. The woman wore tight jeans that were two sizes too small for her girth and the boy thought the button should have popped off at any moment. Her shirt was a t-shirt that stated 'White trash is the now the in crowd'.

Alecia stepped a little into the hallway and motioned for Daniel to follow her, "I'm sorry Bill, but I need to place another child here temporarily. I know you're crowded as it is, but you know how it is around here. Too many kids and not enough people willing to take the older ones in." Daniel followed her and his new family into a small living room area. A couch, which was ripped and worn beyond repair, sat against the far wall. An outdated television, one of the old box ones, was sitting on top of a TV dinner tray. Daniel wondered at how long the poor thing would be able to continue to hold the weight of such an antique. A recliner, which was in worse shape that the couch and stained to the point of not knowing what the original print used to be, sat in the corner next to a lamp that had an inch of dust on the torn lamp shade. It was a fire waiting to start and Daniel made a mental note to clean the light bulbs in this place as soon as possible. The carpet was also shredded in places, stained and needing to a replacement sometime soon. The family all piled in. Alecia pointed to the couch, giving Daniel the signal to sit down, which Daniel did reluctantly. He looked around some more and found the walls were not covered in beautiful landscape pictures like his last home, but rather pictures of children in front of many different settings. Many of the kids were all teenagers. "This is Daniel Francis. He is about twelve years old. I'm sure you've been seeing his picture on the nightly news."

The man smiled again his creepy toothy smile, "Yes! I have! Well, you're a celebrity I guess!" He sat down next to Daniel and patted the boy's thigh. Daniel tensed up and nodded to the man. He was now extremely wary of this new family. The woman continued to stand next to Alecia.

Alecia continued, "Daniel, this is Billy Franks and his wife Clarrissa Franks. They are foster parents for the nine kids here," she gestured to the other teenagers standing around the room. She continued to point to each in turn, "This is Jenny, Waylon, Dennis, Kevin, Lisa, Kerry, Dana, Charlene, and Laura." The five boys and four girls nodded their heads politely as they were introduced. Looking at the children he deduced that Waylon could have been a biological child, but the other children were definitely foster children.

"Boys, why don't you help Daniel gather his belongings from the car and get him settled," Billy pushed gently on Daniel's back to force him off the couch. Daniel followed the five other, and older, boys from the living room to get his suitcase and school bag from the back of Alecia's car. Once of the front lawn of the small house the boys turned around and stopped Daniel from progressing in getting his things.

Waylon crossed his arms covering his blue t-shirt and separated his legs in an obvious aggressive stance. "We are crowded here, so you need to know now who is in charge," he drawled out, sounding a lot like Billy, and confirming to Daniel that this was their biological child. The other boys stopped and turned around to watch their interaction. No one seemed willing to stand against Waylon. The peppered blond boy pointed his finger into Daniel's chest hard, "I make the rules and you will follow them. Any snitching will get a soap beating and you stay out of my way."

Weighing his options, Daniel decided that agreeing would just be best at this time. He nodded his head and smiled. "No probs. I don't plan on stepping on any toes while here. I just want to get out of here." The other four boys glared back at him as if he just insulted them.

Kerry and Dana shook their heads and leaned into the back of the car to get the two bags of things. Waylon led them all back into the house, through the entry, passed the others in the living room and continued down the hall to a bedroom in back. They walked into the room and Daniel looked around and wondered how this was going to work. Kevin seemed to notice his thoughts, "There's four beds. We were rotating who slept on the floor, and it looks like you'll be added to the rotation."

"Except that one," Waylon pointed to the top bunk of the two sets of bunk beds. "That one is mine. I don't sleep on the floor and I do not share my bed." He pulled himself up onto it without using the ladder. "I'm the real kid here, so I get the bed all of the time. This is MY room and you'll be lucky I am willing to share any of it."

Dennis, the tallest one of them all, went to the small closet and slid the door open. Reaching in, he grabbed down a fluffy, folded sleeping bag from one of the top shelves. "This will be yours while you're here. I'll get it down for you at night and you'll hand it to me in the morning, folded, to put back. You're too short to reach it without me, so don't go being bratty on this."

Kevin slid his bags underneath one of the bottom bunks. "We keep our stuff in our bags and they go under the beds when we aren't in them. The drawers and hung up clothes are Waylon's."

Daniel sat on the floor while his new foster brothers started doing things around the room. Dennis sat on one of the bottom beds and pulled a book from the back pocket of his baggy jeans. His blue eyes moved rapidly back and forth on the page. He shook his head a few times to move a strand of his blond shaggy hair from his eyes. Kevin was a brown headed boy, but Daniel could hardly tell since his hair was buzzed very close to the top of his head. He brown eyes, but they were currently closed while he bobbed his head to his headphones. He sat on the floor, leaning against the wall between the beds. Kerry and Dana looked alike, and must have been siblings. They were playing a board game of some sort on the other bottom bed, under Waylon. They were dark skinned and had black hair. Their eyes were so dark that Daniel would have guessed black from far away, but seeing them close he knew it to just be very dark brown. He looked up at Waylon, who was glaring hatefully down at him. Daniel rose one of his brown eye brows, "Problem?"

Waylon jumped down from the bed and stood menacingly over the younger boy. "Are you a boy or a girl?"

Daniel was taken aback by the question. "Boy. I'm sure I'm a boy."

"Then what is with the hair? You one of those trannies?" Waylon sneered. Daniel stood up, but only was as high as Waylon's chin. His glare wasn't strong at his height, but it said enough. Waylon balled his fists and Daniel braced for the punch.

Just as Waylon was bringing his hand up to hit Daniel the door opened and in walked Clarrissa. She looked at the scene in front of her, but didn't comment on it. Instead she said in a small timid voice, "Boys, dinner is ready."

Waylon shoved Daniel down into the post of the bed and walked passed him and his mother. She looked down at Daniel, and again didn't comment on what had just transpired. Denny, Kevin, and Dana walked out the door, too. Clarrissa followed the three boys. Kerry held his hand down to Daniel. "You won't find sympathy from her or Billy. Waylon is a golden child and we aren't even worthy of third class citizens here." Daniel took the hand up gratefully and followed Kerry down the hall to another door which led to a dining room.

Plastic outdoor chairs were set up with TV dinner trays in front of them. No table or a traditional setting was to be found in this place it seemed. Billy was served by his foster daughters, then Waylon was served, then Clarrissa was served, then the foster brothers and then the foster sisters and it seemed that not only was gender given priority, but also age. The youngest foster sister, Jenny at the age of fourteen, was the last to get a meal and she had to bring it from the kitchen herself. Daniel looked at her plate and realized that it also meant she got whatever was even left in the pans from the other room. Tonight his plate was flowing with bounty and she was missing portions. With him added to the family now it would seem she would be the one to suffer. He smiled at her and held his plate out to her, "Did you want my potatoes? I don't really care for them." Everyone stopped eating and stared at him like he had just announced that he killed the pope in Rome. Clarrissa's eyes widen to fear and Billy looked like he was going to burst from anger.

Quickly Billy's face turned from anger to slight amusement and chuckled, "Ah, Daniel, let me enlighten you a bit, boy. Girls aren't worth your potatoes. They are, by God's grand nature, to be slight, weak and thus under us. Eat your potatoes and ignore the girls." Billy then went back to eating and so did everyone else. Jenny smiled slightly at Daniel as way of thanks, but ignored his still stretched out plate.

What kind of hell did his social worker place him into? If the boys weren't even third class citizens, then what did that make the girls in this family?

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

6: Chapter Six

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Warning: I have some strong language in this chapter.

Chapter Six

He should have known that the new family wasn't the only problem he was going to have to face in this area. He sat in class and could hear the guys snickering behind his back. The teacher had set his new course schedule down in front of him and had looked him over carefully. Why did his social worker send him to such a bigoted section of the large city? As soon as he saw Alecia again he would question her on this and possibly beg for another solution. He would really rather not be here.

His day progressed slowly and painfully. He had been shouldered, shoved, and even spat on at one point by another student.

By the last bell he all but ran to his foster home to avoid the mass student body.

~*~Ma~*~

He fingered his necklace as he was sitting on the floor to the living room working on his science paper for his third hour. It wasn't difficult, but he was struggling with how to apply the words he had knowledge of onto the sheet of paper in the limited amount that was required for the class. The subject amused him mostly.

He heard an aggravated sigh from the other side of the room where his foster sisters sat separated from him and his foster brothers. He looked up and saw the dark skinned and dark haired Dana chewing contemplate on the end of her pencil. She sighed again. He stood up and walked to the other side of the small room, "Are you struggling with your history?" His kind words brought everyone from their school work. Again he felt that maybe he had done something taboo.

He heard Waylon begin to laugh behind him and he turned to see horror on his foster brother's faces and a cruel amused look on the biological child's face. "You should be a girl Daniel. Maybe we should call you Danielle instead?" Daniel felt a temper he didn't know he had well up inside of him.

"Helping other people isn't just a female thing to do. It's the mark of a true human," Daniel defended. He clenched his fist beside his hips to stop from stomping over to the older boy.

"Compassion is what women have. Men are stronger than that and certainly not pussies like you are," Waylon stood up from his spot in front of his own English work.

That was how Clarrissa found them as she walked into the room. She looked between the boys and turned to Daniel who was still near the girls. "Daniel, go to your room until supper," she said quietly.

Daniel's mouth opened like a cod. "What?!" he screeched. "I didn't do anything wrong!"

She didn't talk again, but stood there with her arm pointing toward the hallway. He quickly and angrily grabbed his school work and stomped out of the room.

"And he PMS's like a chick, too!" Waylon shrieked with a fit of laughter. Daniel could hear the other boys laughing, but it sounded very forced.

He wanted out of this Hell.

~*~Ma~*~

Another day and another horrible school adventure for him. He figured he must be Christian, but he was not like this family he was staying with. Their version of the Bible was a horrible misinterpretation at best. How could he read the same passages of the same book and not hear the same message? He stumbled on a crack in the side walk as he once again brought his thumb across the Christian symbol hanging from his neck.

"Fag!" he heard from a voice behind him. He pivoted nicely and stared at the group of ten or a dozen boys his age running toward him.

Fight or flight took over his body as his adrenalin once again shoved through his system. He took flight this time. He was not going to fight off a dozen twelve and thirteen year old boys, some of whom were larger than him. His lungs started to burn as he forced his legs to continue in a pattern toward his salvation and home of Hell. He didn't make it as the first kid literally tackled him to the sidewalk.

The random punching and kicking ensued and he endured as best as he could. He brought his arms up to protect his head and forced his body into a fetal position to protect his innards from the bombardment. Then the most horrible thing happened right before darkness claimed him. He heard a boy yell out something, felt his braid grabbed and his head pulled back, and heard the horrible sound of a "skink" as his head became very light suddenly.

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

7: Chapter Seven

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Warning: Possible graphic triggers for abused PTSD sufferers.

Chapter Seven

The numbness had returned to his body. He couldn't feel every bruise, every scratch or the broken ribs in his back chest area. Two of them, to be precise with one cracked. His left arm was in a sling to hold it still and not aggravate the broken bones. His right arm should have been painful as well as his hand gripped tightly onto the ends of his hair right about shoulder length. It was horribly uneven and he knew he should take the kind nurse up on her offer to straighten it, but a fear kept him from wanting scissors near his locks. He suddenly swallowed bile that had crept up at the thought. No, he really couldn't imagine why they had done such a horrible thing.

Why did he care, though? It was just hair, right?

This time he couldn't stop himself from retching. He tossed the little bit of soup into the bowl the nurses had left him. His back flew into a fire so great that he gagged and threw up more. Broken ribs and horrible depression were fighting against his mind. He still held his hair back as he spat the remaining acid from his lunch into the bowl and slowly leaned back against his pillows.

He was sitting almost completely straight, still. The doctor said it was to allow him to breathe comfortably; well, as comfortable as one can with broken and cracked ribs. He pushed back the need to cough and really tried to think of better things. The doctor had also said he could leave the hospital in a week if his ribs were healing nicely.

His hand clenched and unclenched his hair again. His purple eyes scanned the very common looking hospital room. The TV was off and on a high triangle stand in the corner of the room. It could have easily been mounted to the wall, but someone had thought instead to use the old stand that probably held one of those vintage box televisions at some point. The large window had a lace curtain and a heavier ugly gray blue colored cloth to block out the sun. His hand left the nape of this neck and fell to his lap. He really wanted that heavy curtain pulled closed so that he could sleep a bit. He also needed the bowl emptied.

Smiling a bit at the silliness he was about to do, he rose his right hand toward the curtain and thought really hard about it closing. Nothing happened. He knew it wouldn't. He had just read it in the series he had first started reading from the other hospital stay he could remember. Real powers didn't exist, but it was fun for a moment to pretend.

He gently sighed, his back protesting a bit, and pushed the call button for the nurse.

~*~Ma~*~

Sam came running into the room early the next morning. Visiting hours had started less than five minutes before and the twelve year old boy didn't want to waste any time. His mother walked at a slower pace behind the eager preteen, but still seemed to be in a rush to check on her son's friend. Daniel didn't know what to say. The healthy child stopped before reaching the bed. His eyes grew wide as he looked at the form on the hospital bed. "Daniel, what happened?" he whispered.

Daniel lowered his eyes to his hands in his lap. He could clearly see the scars littering his exposed arms around the bandages for the new scrapes. The bruises were sharp contrast against the white healed skin. "I got jumped," he whispered. He felt ashamed now for not fighting back. He might have even been able to take them all, but he would never know now.

A hand came gently down on his shoulder and brought down all of the emotions he was trying to hold inside. He wept, covering his face with his right hand and leaning back against the pillows to try and stem the pain from his broken ribs.

Once again his despair over his entire being and life crashed against him as he cried out every pain he knew of and every pain he could not know of. Why were others so cruel? Where was his real family? Why was it that he was all alone still even after almost six months of being in the state care system? Why was his hair such a large thing to him that now that it was hacked off he felt empty and horrible inside? What was going on and why couldn't he remember anything before the day he woke up in St. Francis' hospital? Why? Why?!

~*~Ma~*~

It had taken a full week to recover from the beating he had taken from the other twelve year old boys. Alecia had returned a few times and Daniel refused to look at her. Once again Alecia tried to apologize as they drove towards another foster situation. "Daniel, we try very hard to weed out the bad homes, but there is just a few that slip through the cracks. We need the children in these homes to come to us when a problem becomes evident. Do you understand?"

Daniel didn't speak or acknowledge her. He felt horrible inside still. His right hand fingered his cross necklace to keep from pulling on the strands of his now straightened hair. A nurse had been kind enough to straighten it out for him and was gentle enough to not take off more than needed. Still it was loose and hung behind his ears just below the base of his skull. He hoped length would return quickly. His purple eyes watched as once again the world passed by the window of the small car. Alecia's promises and apologies were just excuses to him to know that he probably would be continuing to be brought into bad homes. She was right; there were so few good people out in the world. So many of the good homes were given to the younger children, and he knew that very few people wanted any teenagers or children passed the cute stages of life. He had heard the boys talking from his last home. Even a bigoted family was better than the state ran orphanage.

~*~Ma~*~

It was his fourth day with his new family, the Robinson's. Mom Robinson was kind, short, blond and a wonderful cook. She had always wanted children and doted all over Daniel when he came through the door the first time. Pop Robinson was a smiley man, tall and gangly, and hadn't raised his voice once since Daniel had met him. He was strict but fair. They had a foster daughter with them when Daniel had arrived, Karri. Karri was a year older than Daniel, quiet, and very much the troubled teen. Where Mom Robinson and Pop Robinson were conservative in their clothing, Karri was downright blatant about her body. She would walk through the house in only a bra and underwear and Mom Robinson would tell her to go back to her room constantly to change into appropriate clothing or to just put clothes on.

Daniel lay on his bed unable to sleep. He battled with himself inside. He knew he had to call Alecia in the morning. The sounds coming from his foster sister's room were not appropriate for a thirteen year old girl's room to be having. Mom Robinson had gone out with her other mother friends for cards tonight. Pop Robinson had sent them both to bed two hours ago. Daniel forgot to take his pain killers for his broken arm and was going to get them when he heard Pop Robinson go into Karri's room.

Daniel fought again with himself as he heard a partial scream come from next door. He should go and just stop what was happening, but he was broken. His body hurt and he knew that even though Pop Robinson wasn't a big fellow, right now Daniel would be easily beaten. In the morning Daniel would call Alecia, tell her what happened there at this house where it seemed they had the perfect foster parents, and once again Daniel would be shifted to another home.

Why wouldn't his real family just call and get him back now?

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

8: Chapter Eight

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Chapter Eight

"You're the kid from the TV!" he heard from behind him as he was folding the last of his clothes into his dresser drawer. He turned around in the small room and looked at a little red headed boy of about nine years. He nodded slowly and then turned back to continue unpacking. Why he was unpacking he couldn't say and it seemed ridiculous to him to be doing so. He didn't seem to stay in one place for long really. "Wow, dude, you look beat up, too," the kid continued. "My name's Jonah, but I'm not like a whale or anything. The kids call me that, but Annis saids I am too skinny to be a whale and they probably's named me wrong." Daniel looked over at the child now sitting on one of the bottom bunk beds of the three sets in the room.

"I'm Daniel," he told the child. "Do you sleep in this room too?"

"Nah! I sleeps with the younger kids in the room next door," he answered as he casually leaned back onto someone else's bed. He pulled down his striped blue shirt as it rode up from leaning back against the quilt. His khaki pants were riding high on his ankles as well and Daniel wondered if he chose to wear clothes too small or if they hadn't taken him shopping for new ones yet.

The last of his clothes fit neatly into the only drawer he was given and he closed it shut with a bang. "So, anything I need to know about this place?"

"Well, food is served at six, twelve, and six. If you's don't get there in time, then don't be surprised to not eat. I heard the budget sucks right now and so eating three meals isn't a priority for everyone. I suggest not screwing off in class before lunch, because I know I hates loosing lunch because I was held back by the professor," Jonah laughed and straightened up. "Also, don't try and fight for any's of it. The bigger kids got bigger for a reason." He smiled suddenly, "Though I don't knows what kind of fight you been in, but I hope you won and the other guy looks worse!" He laughed a high pitch squealing giggle and ran from the room.

Daniel sat down on his bed, the bottom bunk in the back of the room by the window, and thought about what the other child had said. He looked at his watch. He had three hours before meal was served for supper. After supper Annis, the woman who ran the home for needy and discarded children, said that he would get his assignments for the week. The assignments were chores and such that children did in places like this between the class's three professors came in to teach six times a week and between meal times. He reached down into his jeans pocket and pulled out the brochure on the place that Alecia had handed to him.

"I cannot place you in another home right now. I need you to go to this place instead and wait for a home to open up for you. It's like a boarding school for orphans. I think you'll be safe to heal there and get a good education as well," she had explained.

Daniel sighed and threw himself back onto his own quilt. A place full of other children and it sounded like it was mostly take care of oneself and hope to survive. His ribs screamed in protest as he sighed harder. His hand once again came up and rubbed along his only possession from before his memories disappeared. Who had given it to him?

~*~Ma~*~

Jonah hadn't been joking about the wolf mentality of the children in the place. First meal was like being thrown into a cage of twenty children and only one bowl for everyone. His left arm protested as he reached quickly for a biscuit before a larger and older child could get it from the main plate in front of him. Someone had placed multiple serving dishes out with food in the center of the table and then Annis had opened the main doors to the dining area and left the room; as soon as she had shut the doors behind her the chaos had emerged from the quiet children. No one screamed or shouted at each other, but the hands grabbed frantically at whatever they could get onto their own plates and as fast as they could get onto their own plate. Daniel, in a lot of pain now that he had over extended his broken arm and pushed against the table with one of his bruised ribs, had only been able to grab one biscuit and a scoop of mac'n'cheese from a large bowl before everything had been taken.

He looked around at all of the kids in the room. Everyone was ten or older in this room; Jonah was probably in with the younger kids in the other dining room next door. He quickly ate what was on his plate and saw other kids doing the same. There hadn't been enough food, though. He realized that even his frantic grabbing had been just about the same as everyone else. Meager portions had been served on them all.

As he downed the last of his water glass the doors opened again and a hand bell rang. Everyone stood up and walked towards the large bathrooms down the hall to wash their hands and faces and then to start on their evening assignments. Daniel walked to the door and waited next to Annis as she watched the boys and girls go their separate ways. "Follow me Daniel and I will set you with some assignments," she said in a gentle but firm voice. They walked down and passed the bathroom doors and into a small office.

One side of the office was a wall of books. Old books from the looks of them and Daniel wondered who even ever read papered books in this day. Even the poorest of poor was able to get a second hand reader from a thrift store now for about thirty dollars and borrow books from the library on it. He had a reader that Alecia had given him to have his school texts downloaded onto no matter where he went. Annis followed his gaze as he casually looked over the titles of them all. "They are antiques. If you want to read a title we can have it downloaded onto your reader for you," she answered casually. He smiled a bit and nodded. Taking his seat in front of the large desk he noticed more around the room. Her vid phone, her computer, and her own personal note pad were all on standby on her desk. She went around her desk and turned on her note pad. "I think this week I shall put you in on kitchen duty. Do you know how to scrub and clean properly?" she asked him. He nodded and remembered Mrs. Snow and her kind lessons. She stood back up after typing quickly on the touch screen lying on her desk.

Daniel stood as well and followed her out of the room. They passed by the bathrooms again, this time Daniel could see in both of them as kids cleaned them and some kids walked with large push brooms down the hall passed them shoving dirt and dust down to the end. He could hear a vacuum somewhere up the stairs and above him. They passed the two dining rooms and into the kitchens. A huge machine with steam coming from it was being loaded with plastic crates full of dishes. Two older kids were rinsing the plates and such in a large sink and loading the crates as another child put them on the conveyer belt to be shoved into the washer. Another child was taking them from the end of the machine and stacking them to dry in a corner. The kids all looked up as Annis walked in. "This is Daniel, everyone. He will be on this assignment this week with you all. He will go in with your rotation. Daniel, this is Marie, Annie, Mike and Bryan." Marie and Bryan were rinsing the dishes, Annie was loading the dish washing machine, and Mike was stacking the crates at the end. "Daniel I think it would be best if you swept floor and washed it after everyone is finished with the dishes. After you sweep, while you're waiting for the dishes to be done, it would be best if you grabbed a few towels and dried the dishes and put them away. The others will join you as soon as they are finished with their current tasks." He nodded and went and grabbed a large broom. Annis walked out of the room.

No one seemed to talk much as they cleaned up the large kitchen. Daniel liked that just fine. He didn't want to make any friends here. He knew that soon enough he would be moving on to another home and hopefully soon his real family will come for him.

~*~Ma~*~

He was correct in assuming he would be staying very long. Two long weeks of barely eating enough to fill him in any meal and Alecia showed up and told him to pack his bag again.

His new family was again a small dwelling. A woman and man and a younger boy, a seven year old foster child, stood on the porch in the crisp afternoon to great him as he slowly brought himself from his social worker's car. The woman wore baggy jeans, a large sweater, and a kind smile. Her hair was cut shorter than Daniel's and was a touch lighter in its brown color. The man was of a larger built. He wore a nice fitting sweater vest over a dress shirt and blue dress pants. His blonde hair was cut in a professional way that made Daniel think of a lawyer like the ones he had seen on daytime television. The other boy was of an Asian decent and had slightly long hair brought back into a tight pony. For some reason Daniel thought it looked vaguely familiar. Like this child reminded him of someone he knew and he felt a giddy feeling come over him as he smiled brightly toward the child. He didn't know why but he could feel a wonderful sense of joy come over him.

They guided them into a wonderfully decorated house. Flowers adorned the mantle, knickknacks of miniature houses were on shelves high toward the ceiling and surrounding the living room area showed a sense of taste for lovely things. Portraits of paintings of people who could have been family members of past were hanging on the walls around him as he sat on a plain white couch. The carpet was wonderful under his socks and soft in color and feeling. He could see into the dining room where a large table with an old fashion candelabra type chandelier hung above. Later he would find out that the bulbs inside the chandelier even flickered like candles and made eating a wonderfully relaxed feeling. The pictures on the wall in the dining room were of old fashion settings of the United States during the colonial times with horse drawn carriages and streets full of people in older clothing.

There were only two rooms on the second story. The master room was closed off and Daniel was told that he was not allowed to enter in there. He would share the other bedroom, not terribly small, with the little boy, Chia Xiao. There were two twin size beds in the room and a large picture window with a bench in front of it.

Kira and Justin Mack seemed like the perfect family for him after the Hell he had been through the last few times. The adults left Daniel to unpack in the dresser, telling him he had the top two drawers of the four drawer dresser. Chia sat on the bed covered with a cartoon character comforter. Duo placed his bag on top of the other bed, one with a generic brown and red patterned comforter.

"Chia, what should we do before supper is served?" Daniel asked the little boy who sat quietly across from him on his bed. Chia smiled shyly from the other bed and pointed to the closet door. Daniel stood up and opened the door. Inside were shelves full of board games. "You like board games, huh?" Chia nodded. "Okay," Daniel reached up and pulled down Guess Who? "How about this one?" he asked the little boy. Chia finally smiled bright enough to show off his teeth, including the fact that he was missing a top front tooth. Daniel smiled as well and they both sat down to begin their game.

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

9: Chapter Nine

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Warning: Possible graphic triggers for abused PTSD sufferers.

Chapter Nine

Daniel had found himself enjoying having a little brother. The younger child was quiet, like him, but Daniel could see an inner prankster. This made Daniel thrilled, though he couldn't explain why he would be excited about rule breaking. The weeks with his new family had been passed like a dream.

He should have known life wasn't going to be paradise, though.

It was Friday. School had ended and Daniel had walked home in the crisp February air in peace. His mind had wandered to possibly showing Chia a prank to do on a friend with a paper clip he had borrowed from the English teacher. He intended to return it, so he had forgot to actually ask permission to borrow the paper clip.

Ah, school, his brain shifted thoughts quickly. This school was like the others, except for the horror school from the bigot area. No one bothered him much here and he chatted when people talked to him. He wasn't a click kind of guy, though, and hadn't made any friends like the friend, Sam, that he already had. The same Sam that called every night to talk about random movies and plot to kidnap Daniel for a sleep over that would be the sleep over of a century, or so he kept saying.

Daniel walked through the front door and felt a new sense come over him. An instinct told him to run. He shoved it down and called out, "Mom! I'm home!" Silence greeted him. The horrible memory of finding Mama Snow unconscious assaulted him. "Mom?" He walked further into the house and heard a small noise coming from the master bedroom.

He knocked quietly and heard sniffles and choked sobs. "Mom?" he asked again as he slowly opened the door. The room was dark, the blinds drawn shut. He allowed the light from the hall to come across a figure hunched and sobbing into a pillow on the bed. His foster mother was trying to stifle the crying into the blue pillow case. He walked over to her and laid a hand against her shoulder. "Mom, are you okay?"

She shook her head but didn't bring it up to see him. She was in her night clothes still and he could see horrible angry purple bruises all down her arms. He hadn't ever seen her arms before. She kept them covered, but since it was cold and winter he had never thought anything about it. Now he saw that someone was hurting her. The large hand marks where she had been grabbed stood out against some of the lighter healed bruises.

"Who did this?" he asked quietly. A fire of anger came over him and he climbed onto the bed in front of her. Gently he brought his hands in to bring her face up to see him. The tears had caused rivers to run down her face and he could see an angry shade of red, purple and blue covering a swollen closed left eye. It was the only damage done to her face but since her arms spoke of multiple attacks, he knew the damage done to the face was a rare occurrence of repeated abuse. "Are you hurt anywhere else?" he asked his foster mother.

She looked at him with her only good eye and saw the light of someone not twelve dwelling inside the small body of the boy in front of her. "It hurts to breathe," she whispered and gasped again. "I… I…" she didn't know what to tell the child.

With careful hands he brought them down to her sides and gently pushed against her ribs. She gasped when he touched her fourth rib on the right side. "Bruised but not broken," he told her. He looked back at his current mom, "Did dad do this?"

She nodded and threw her face back into the pillow. She mumbled into it making it hard to understand her, "I didn't have lunch ready for him today."

He felt his world shatter again. He had thought this was an awesome family. He hadn't ever seen his new foster father raise his voice or even get angry. He was strict, and had made it clear that he expected his foster sons to do their best in everything they ever set out to do, but he had never gotten angry or even punished physically.

"I can't have children," she admitted and peaked up at him. He nodded. He understood. They were there to keep her from being beat while they were home. His foster father would never hurt his wife in front of people, and especially not in front of the kids. He needed to keep his mouth shut to keep his foster mother safe.

~*~Ma~*~

Once again, though, he should have known that this man who hurt his love wouldn't settle for just hurting the woman. Daniel asked Chia if their new dad had ever lost his temper with him, but Chia said he had never been even spanked. Daniel, on the other hand, wasn't seven. He was twelve and should have known that setting the man off could result in the same punishment he gave his wife.

So, when the hand came at him suddenly back handing him across the face, he really shouldn't have been surprised. Justin sailed a tight ship, and Daniel had caused a delay in their schedule that morning. They were getting ready for church and Daniel couldn't get his newly chopped hair to lay right. It took longer than he thought it would to brush it out and use some brush through hair gel to get it to not have bed-head.

As he walked out of the bathroom the hand came out of almost nowhere. It completely caught Daniel off guard and he was thrown back and against the wall of the hallway.

"We're late now," Justin didn't yell. He growled. Now Daniel knew why they had never heard the man yell. He wasn't a screamer. He was a hitter and would lower his voice. Justin stood grabbed Daniel by his collar and forced him back onto his feet. Daniel grabbed at his shirt to stop from choking as he was pulled roughly through the now empty house and toward the car.

Before he was able to get into the back seat Justin pulled him close, nose to nose, "You tripped." He didn't have to say more. Daniel knew he had a mark across his face and it could possibly bruise. The threat was there, though. He nodded. A smack across the face was nothing compared to what his foster mother would go through if he was removed and right now he was glad the man had hit him and not the woman.

This he could handle, and it would protect the other two in the house. He now knew he could bring the wrath on him and this would be acceptable to him as long as the woman and child didn't get any of this pent up anger this man held in a barely controlled check.

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

10: Chapter Ten

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Warning: Possible graphic triggers for abused PTSD sufferers.

Chapter Ten

"You're limping today," the voice came to him from his left. He turned and looked at the girl who sat next to him in his math class. She wasn't smiling but looking at his shirt curiously with bright blue eyes. Her brown hair was messy, like it hadn't seen a brush, and was pulled back into a pony tail. Her clothes were baggy on her; her pants seemed to have a few stains of unintelligible origins. "Last week you were favoring your left arm, and today you walked in trying not to show a limp."

"I'm clumsy," he answered back the unasked question. She smiled and chuckled, but still didn't look at his face. He tilted his head down a bit trying to get her to look at him and she turned toward her hands on her desk to away from him.

"I don't think anyone is that clumsy. I understand, though. I guess you can say I'm clumsy, too," she laughed a bit as if she was saying a joke. "You can come and sit with us at lunch today, okay?"

"I'm fine," he said. She shook her head. "What?" he asked.

"It wasn't a question. You need us," she stated matter-of-factly and went back to doing her math work on the paper. Lunch was after math, so when the bell rang not long after she grabbed her book bag and then onto his long sleeve and dragged him along with her.

The "us" she had been speaking about where a group of misfits who sat together and were the newest group formed in the school. He had heard from some of the other students that they gathered the bullied and the out casts and made themselves a group like non-other in the history of the school. Usually in middle and high schools the picked on stayed away from others to avoid more harassment. These girls and boys' motto was that you can't be picked on if you had a group and so they pulled in any who seemed to need a friend. Daniel thought that it wasn't the worse group to be invited into. She sat down and so did Daniel. He brought out his home packed lunch from his bag, but saw that most of them didn't have any food in front of them. There were four girls and three boys sitting there on the steps to the court yard in the corner and away from the larger more popular groups. He knew the girl from math was named Jenna, but the others were just from passing. Jenna seemed to sense his hesitation as he didn't eat his meal so she pointed to each in turn starting with the girls, "This is Bob, Starr, Jessi, and the boys are Lep, Keenan, and Kenré." Once again Daniel noticed she didn't look at anyone when she did the introductions. The other's, except Kenré, all nodded their heads and smiled at him. "You all already know Daniel," she stated as she looked up finally to another two people approaching the group with their arms filled with food from the cafeteria. "Those two are Ashley and Rosemary," Daniel recognized Ashley from the special needs students who came into P.E. with him during that hour. She was severely mentally challenged but very quick to smile and want to be everyone's friend. He had felt horrible with how he watched the female P.E. students treat the girl during the hour.

They all had "reasons" that the popular groups picked on them. They were either extremely obese, mentally challenged, or homosexual. He was sure Lep was homosexual if the rainbow wrist bands, choker, and earrings were anything to go by. He suspected Kenré was mentally challenged, but he was mainstreamed unlike Ashley. He wasn't bothered, though, by these things. He didn't think any of those were reasons to not like someone. He had been bullied enough in the bigot school to understand the need to just be yourself. He smiled and bit into his sandwich while their food was distributed. Kenré pulled out his meal from his pack as well and without looking at each other, he handed a similar lunch bag to his own over to Jenna.

"My mother made your lunch for you," he explained as she took it and opened it up. "She even remembered to cut the bread correctly. She is so sorry she forgot yesterday." Jenna smiled and pulled out the contents of the bag and precariously set them out on her lap. She brought everything out and then carefully refolded the bag to a square shape. Being as meticulous as she could she start to eat off her lap starting from left to right. He looked over at Kenré who was eating from his bag instead of pulling things out all at once. He reached in and then ate what came out as it came out.

The others all ate as well and talked about random things. Staying at each other's houses and then everything changed to the mall after school. Lep turned to Daniel, "You're coming with us." Once again Daniel didn't know whether to be annoyed or not that they were ordering him to do something.

"I have to tell my mom first," he said as he took another bite of his sandwich.

"My sister can drive us there first, then," Jenna said. "I'll take Daniel, Kenré, Lep and Ashley in our van. We have one more seat if someone wants it. I'm sure Niki won't mind."

Bob spoke up, "I think you should take Starr, too. You know she would be upset if she was separated from her girlfriend for too long!" They all laughed, except Daniel and Jenna, as Jenna turned bright red. Daniel looked at the group and realized that they teased each other, too, but it was out of camaraderie and not out of malice. Starr reached over and punched Bob in the shoulder, then stood up and sat next to Jenna to say something into the other girl's ear. Jenna turned an even brighter shade of red. Bob laughed harder and choked out, "My brother will take the rest of us. We'll meet in front of the Chinese food place in the center." Starr kissed Jenna's cheek when the bell rang and Daniel wondered how his thoughts that Kenré was dating Jenna turned to sudden realization that Jenna was with Starr. That wasn't something she expected.

~*~Ma~*~

It was Jenna and Daniel only in the van as they waited with Jenna's sister for the rest of the group to come out of the school. Daniel was nervous and hoped his mother didn't mind him leaving for the few hours to be with his new friends. Jenna was taping onto the handle of the front seat as she waited. She started rocking in her chair along with the rhythm and humming quietly. Daniel became more nervous as he waited. He didn't know what she was doing, but it was starting to feel weird to him. Niki, Jenna's eighteen year old sister, turned in her seat and looked at the wide eyed Daniel. "Jenna," she brought the girl out of whatever she was doing in a quiet voice. "Jenna, did you tell Daniel about your Autism?" She stopped humming, but now added shaking her head to the rocking. Niki turned to Daniel, "She'll stop soon. School overwhelms her. She has higher functioning Autism."

Daniel looked more at the girl in front of him, from what he could see at least, and realized the unbrushed hair, the not looking into his eyes, and sometimes how she would draw circles on the top of her math work was all signs of this disorder he really didn't understand. "Is the mall a good idea?" he asked. "If school overwhelms her, then won't the mall put her in a worse… uh… mood?"

"Over stimulation is something she does to herself sometimes. She'll calm down at home as long as she doesn't see our dad tonight," she stopped talking and looked conflicted. Daniel remembered Jenna saying that she was also "clumsy". Realization once again dawned onto him. Her father didn't like her behaviors or maybe didn't like her girlfriend. Something caused him to want to hurt his daughter. "She deals just fine and the others bring out her inner personality more. She'll stop once we start driving," she said.

Kenré chose that moment to open the other sliding door and look at Daniel. "That's my seat," the blond told him. He stared straight into Daniel's eyes for the first time ever. A challenge, he realized. He nodded and unbuckled to let Kenré climb in and he went to the seat behind Kenré.

"Can I sit here?" he asked the other boy. Kenré nodded and then looked up at Jenna. "Oh…" he said as he noticed Jenna rocking and humming and now shaking her head. He looked out the window and watched everyone streaming out of the building. Lep and Ashley filed in next and took the back bench with Daniel. Starr got in, shut the sliding door, buckled and then leaned forward to pull Jenna back into her seat and squeeze her lower arm.

"Shh," she said to the other twelve year old. "Okay, Niki, we're all set." Daniel watched Lep pull the seatbelt around Ashley and latch it. Jenna lowered her window and waved her hand through the wind as it blew through like a ship on water. Kenré covered his face with his hands from the wind and Daniel heard him start to hum as Starr reached down and brought a blanket up from the floor and give it to the other boy, "Kenré, here's your blanket dear." Kenre grabbed it and pulled it over his head to completely cover himself from the wind.

Daniel turned to Lep who was next to him in the seat, "Is Kenré like Jenna?"

"You mean Autistic?" Lep asked back. Daniel nodded. The red head smiled at him and nodded, "Yeah, but they are different. Things Jenna enjoys can set Kenré off. They both enjoy the mall, though. Jenna can't stand strangers touching her or talking to her, but she enjoys the sounds and sights. Kenré is extra social, we have to watch him carefully because he'll wander off to talk with strangers, and he enjoys all of the strangers."

Daniel looked over at Ashley, "And Ashley?"

Lep looked at the girl who had pulled out a coloring book and was coloring a page of Disney Princesses all red instead of changing colors. "She is mentally slow; about the age of a three or four year old. Her mother said she was born like this. She lets her come with us because she is thrilled that Ashley finally has friends. She's a sweetheart and always happy. She also has to be watched, though." Lep sighed, "I usually get Kenré duty since I know how to calm him down if he starts to stim."

"Stim?" Daniel tested the new word.

"What Jenna does in the van after school. Autistic people have different ways to get stimulation to avoid the real world. Kenré can start to stim, but if whatever is bothering him isn't removed or he isn't stopped, then he becomes violent. Jenna has also had a tantrum during an outing, too, but her's are rare. Only her dad can bring out those tantrums more than usual," he had the look that Niki had when they spoke of the man. As if they were saying too much. "Starr has Jenna and Rosemary takes Ashley." Daniel nodded. "We all help, though. If we see one of them wandering off or needing help, we step in."

This was an odd group Daniel had found himself in. He turned away to see Starr looking at him cautiously. He smiled at her. It might be an odd group, but it didn't bother him. It was still a way to stay away from his foster dad.

~*~Ma~*~

They were standing in line for Chinese food, which Jenna refused to eat and so had a sub from SubWay in front of her made just the way she'd eat it, when a stranger approached them. He had bright blond hair and baby blue eyes. He was older than them by a few years but he seemed to come out of a confused daze when he locked eyes with Daniel. "DUO!" he yelled as he came rushing over. He was a half a head taller than Daniel.

"Duo, where have you been? We thought you were in Spain," he said to Daniel. Daniel shook his head slowly and looked at the others in the group watching.

"My name is Daniel," he told the older boy. "I don't even speak Spanish." At least, he didn't think he did. The boy had an Arabic accent that was almost hidden with his perfect American English.

Starr came over then with Jessi next to her, "Maybe you do know him, Daniel." Starr pointed to the boy who kind of did look familiar to Daniel. "Maybe you know Spanish, too." They had just been talking about his amnesia after he had gotten permission to go to the mall with the others. They had said maybe he would find his family and here was a boy that looked nothing like him who said his name was a name that started with a "d" like he had thought.

"Duo?" the boy asked concerned.

"Look, my name is Daniel. Please stop calling me this other name. It's kind of unnerving," he said. He started to walk away from the blond. He didn't want to know how this older boy knew him, because right now he was finally starting to not mind his life.

"He was hurt about a year ago. He has amnesia," he heard Jessi explain to the other boy. Great, even his new friends were trying to "help" when he didn't want them to. If he wasn't around to take the brunt of Justin's temper than he could turn onto Chia.

The boy broke away from the group of children and grabbed Daniel's arm. Daniel didn't even think about it, he turned and swung a punch at the older boy. To his surprise the older boy caught the punch before it could impact his face and held the fist tightly in the air. Daniel grabbed back his hand and stepped away. "I'm sorry," he mumbled. He took off down the long halls of the mall toward the bathrooms on the other end.

When he finally returned to the misfit group all eating their supper at a large table the blond kid was gone. Starr reached into her pocket and handed him a note. No words were exchanged as he opened the note up.

I'm sorry I scared you away. I heard more of what happened from the kids. I would like to talk with you. We didn't know you were in the States or we would have gotten you earlier. Please just call or text my number and meet me soon. I think you should know who you are. Having amnesia cannot be any fun. I'm sure Trowa would understand better than me, but he's off planet. I'll contact him as well since he can help you better, but I do think you should talk with me as soon as you can.

-Quatre

Below that was a phone number for a cell. He sat down with the others who were chatting amongst themselves again and he was grateful they ignored him. He had wanted someone to find him for so long, but now he didn't want to abandon Chia to a possible life of abuse nor did he want to disappoint Kira with having them remove Chia for his protection. Maybe knowing more about who he was wouldn't cause them to remove him? He could only hope, because his curiosity was too great not to contact this other boy.

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

11: Chapter Eleven

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Warning: Possible graphic triggers for abused PTSD sufferers. This chapter has some blood.

Chapter Eleven

It had been three days since the incident in the mall. Starr had tried to talk to Daniel a few times about it during their lunch period, but he had studiously ignored her every time. He even caught Jenna actually looking at him the third day with a curious expression on her face, but she didn't say anything and turned away as soon as she was caught. Bob would ramble on about nonsense things and he was sure it was her way to trying to keep the subject away from him. He was thinking about just telling them that he really wasn't interested in this Quatre guy and hadn't any plans to contact him while he was walking home that day. He stumbled a bit on the side of the walk by the street a few times when his bad leg, due to his foster father tripping him and kicking him there four days before, would catch on the uneven slabs.

He walked into the entry way and immediately could feel something wasn't right. The air had electricity to it that wasn't usually there. All four senses heightened on him suddenly and he walked through slowly into the living room. Standing in the middle of the room was Justin. He had his arms down at his sides, a t-shirt that was stained in black from dirt or grease, and jeans on. Everything on him screamed danger to Daniel and he shifted his eyes a bit to look around for his foster mom and for Chia. They weren't anywhere in sight and he couldn't hear them around, either. "Justin," Daniel said politely with a slight nod. "Something the matter, sir?"

Justin didn't blink for a bit and then lunged forward suddenly at Daniel. The boy only had a second to think and he lowered himself quickly to use the man's body weight against him. He flipped the man over his head and sprang back up to his feet in shock. He backed up quickly away from the man stumbling back to his feet. The larger guy growled like an animal and went to Daniel again. The boy ran. He didn't want to attack and so he couldn't think of anything else to do. He went for the back rooms and into the master room.

The scene in their made him stop. The room was covered in blood and on the bed he could see what was left of his foster mother. He turned away and started for his room he shared with Chia. 'Please,' he begged in his head, 'not the boy, too.' He didn't make it as a body shoved into him and he hit his head at an angle on the wall. The world blurred, pain erupted across his body, and then everything went numb and black.

~*~ Ma ~*~

Pain again, which meant he was alive, was the first thing that came to him when he started to wake up. He didn't open his eyes and instead listened around him for verification of his surroundings. A high pitched, female, voice was speaking harshly to someone in the room and the beeping of machines told him he was in the hospital again. The voice filtering in to him was his social worker's voice. The other voice only sounded vaguely familiar.

"You cannot take him, Mr. Winner. He is a ward of the state," Alecia said exasperated. She must have been arguing with the other person for a while now.

"Ms. Grahm, I don't want to patronize you anymore than I already have, but you know that you have no choice in this matter. He will be released to me as soon as he is healed," Daniel now recognized the voice well; it was Quatre from the mall. His voice then turned into something Daniel didn't think a child should ever sound like, "You will be contacted shortly by my lawyers."

Alecia seemed to stutter for a minute and then huffed out. Her heels clicked harshly on the flooring as she left the room. The door slid closed behind her and Daniel stayed completely still. Quatre sighed and the seat next to the bed squeeked. "Daniel, I know you're awake. Your heart rate has increased slightly…" Daniel still didn't move and Quatre sighed again, "Okay, well, I am taking you home with me as soon as the doctors release you. I have already contacted the others and they will all be here within the week."

"Please…" Daniel croaked out. He turned to the blond sitting next to him. "Please tell me… tell me did Chia… is Chia…?" He couldn't get it out what he needed to ask. His foster brother was all that he could think about right then.

The blond looked down at the side of the bed for a minute in contemplation, "He's downstairs. They think he'll make a full recovery, but he was also attacked." He paused for a minute while Daniel started to let the tears fall from his eyes. "Uhm, but… but the mother…" he didn't continue and just looked away to outside the window.

"I saw," Daniel whispered. "I only stayed to protect them and I failed." He turned away to face the door.

"It happens sometimes. We can't protect everything. We try, but you know it just doesn't always happen," Quatre said kindly. "I'll let you rest for a bit. I have a few things to do and I'll be back later after supper tonight." He stood up and walked out the door. He didn't turn around to look at Daniel at all, which the injured boy was grateful for.

~*~ Ma ~*~

The doctor came in a few hours later with the boy delivering his evening meal. He was over weight, had on a sharp grey suit and a white lab coat over that. His expensive dress shoes made a slight click on the floor when he walked. "Mr. Francis, I am Dr. Kohl. I am just going to check on your healing and progress. Tell me where things hurt, please." The exam was painful but the doctor was kind. His ribs had been broken, but mainly he had been stitched from many knife wounds in his back, legs, and some in his stomach area. His head still pound a bit, too, and that was from the concussion he had received when he had hit into the wall.

"Doctor… uh, Quatre is eighteen, right?" he asked.

"Mr. Winner? Yes, I believe he is," the doctor said as he was writing into the chart at the end of the bed.

"He said that he knew me before my amnesia… could I be eighteen?" Daniel asked as he settled back against the pillows.

"The doctors at Saint Francis Memorial Hospital calculated your age based on the fact that you are just entering puberty. It is possible that you are older if puberty was halted due to malnutrition, hormonal suppressants, or even some different drugs. The amount of all of that had to be extreme, though, for us to calculate you at twelve. I do believe that you are around the age of twelve to fourteen years of age," the doctor explained. He set the chart down. "I will return in the morning to check some more on your stitches. Please call the nurse if you need anything." He clicked out of the room and the door shut behind him softly on its hinge.

Daniel didn't touch his food and stared at it. Quatre had seemed a bit small for being eighteen, so maybe Daniel was really not so young. It would explain so much, but why would someone do so much to him to hold him where he was. Quatre was still taller than him, though, by about a quarter of a head. Why was he so little compared to the other boy? What happened to him before waking up at the other hospital just less than a year ago?

~*~ Tsuzuku~*~

12: Chapter Twelve

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing. I also do not own Willy Wonka Candy Factory.

Warning: PTSD triggers

Chapter Twelve

It was too hot. Something was wrong. He could feel as if his body was on fire. What was going on? "Duo!" he heard a young voice yell out. "Duo, fight it," the voice continued. He opened his eyes, but couldn't see anyone around his hospital room. "I'm sorry Duo," the voice said weakly. "Take care of the others for me." He felt the tears prick his eyes as he threw the sheets off of him. "Solo! Don't DIE!" he heard his own, but younger, voice call out through the room. He licked his parched lips and tried to sit up. Something was wrong.

~*~ Ma ~*~

"He has contracted an infection somewhere in his body. We are currently doing everything we can to lower his temperature and help him fight it. The problem we are seeing, though, is that he is very weak," the doctor looked Quatre in the eyes and spoke frankly.

"Just do whatever you have to do. He cannot die," Quatre's blue eyes turned to steel and then he turned toward the bed where his friend was moaning, sweating, and weakly calling out gibberish in his heat induced nightmares. "Anything you have to do is completely covered and will be paid in full."

The doctor nodded and left the room. Quatre walked over to the bedside and sat down in the hard guest chair. "C'mon Duo… Daniel… whatever you want to be called… I need you to fight this and come back again." His eyes watered up as he watched his friend fight against something that wasn't really there. "We're sorry we lost you and we need to apologize to you." The tears fell from his aqua marine orbs and onto the bed linens already drenched in the other boy's sweat.

~*~ Ma ~*~

Someone was laughing insanely. It was him, but it wasn't at the same time. Why was he laughing? He opened his eyes. Around him were bodies burnt, bleeding, and dead. He stood in the center of them all. Women, men, and even children were surrounding him and he was laughing like a maniac. What had he done?

~*~ Ma ~*~

The boy thrashed about in the bed and it took all that Quatre had to hold him down with the nurses to strap him in. He was pulling open his stitches with every scream as he fought them. "Duo!" he kept yelling at the boy. "Calm down! We're friends!" The brunette was not listening. With every last bit of strength the child had he fought them until they finally had everything strapped down well. Quatre stepped back from him and felt the tears coming again. He breathed in deep as the extra nurses left and the on sight nurse reattached the IV and put medication into it. The sounds coming from the bed slowly decreased as the hurt child slowly succumbed to the medications and relaxed into a deep sleep.

"Oh Duo…" Quatre sighed as he sat down again in the chair to watch over his friend.

~*~ Ma ~*~

"Where am I?" he asked the darkness.

"Where you belong, demon," a deep voice cut through.

"Why did you kill us?" a child's voice yelled.

"Why?" a man's tenor voice this time.

Then the screaming started. Blood curdling screams from different people assaulted him. He couldn't see anything, feel anything, but the screaming insisted he heard them. The people he had killed or watched die over the years attacked him in the only way they could. "NO!" He screamed back against them.

~*~ Ma ~*~

"No!" He yelled as his eyes opened up to the white sterile room. He breathed harshly into the silent air around him. The screaming had stopped. He looked around carefully and tried to move. His arms were buckled against the bed and his legs strapped to the end. He was stuck. His breathing slowed down as he realized he was completely alone in a hospital room again. He once again looked down at his hands, "It would suck if my nose itched." He smirked slightly at the thought and then relaxed again against the pillows. He was safe, alone, and everything was finally quiet.

Staring up at the darkened light fixture above his bed he tried to decipher his dreams. How long had he been asleep and why have such horrible nightmares? Where those memories?

"Duo?" he heard a voice ask. He looked around the room. No one was around. "Take care of the others," it continued. His eyes widened. It was a voice just he could hear; a memory coming through the amnesia concussed brain. He had nothing better to do now that he was restrained, so he tried to remember the name for that voice. It was a child's voice, he could tell that. He should know the person. He had been a very important person in his life at one point… and Daniel knew he had also died around the time he could remember the boy saying the sentence.

"Is everyone from my past dead?" he asked the empty room.

~*~ Ma ~*~

The sun was shinning brightly behind the closed curtains when Quatre walked into the room at the start of visiting hours. Duo had been in a medically induced coma until his fever broke for three days, but they had said at the nurses station that he had woken up and was finally back on the mend again. He thought about bringing balloons or flowers with him, but didn't know Duo's current mood and didn't feel like finding out if he was still snarky, upset or even in the mood to tease him today. Instead he brought in a large bag filled with individual boxes of Duo's favorite candies: Nerds.

The patient was sitting up in bed unrestrained. He was facing the closed curtains completely engrossed in his own thoughts. "Good morning," Quatre said as he walked further into the room. He made it to the end of the bed and was about to bring out his treat for the other boy when Duo spoke.

"I killed people, didn't I?" Purple eyes turned toward him. Sadness, grief, and unimaginable pain were hidden in those ever expressive eyes. Quatre stopped pulling from the bag and just laid it on the bed. Duo turned away from him again and back toward the sun glare trying to light the darkened room. "I'm a monster."

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

13: Chapter Thirteen

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: Same as last chapter!

Chapter 13

Quatre didn't know what to say at first, "You're not a monster… we… you…" The other boy looked over at him again with a bit of a tear coming down his left cheek. "Monsters don't cry for the dead. We have shed a lot of tears over what happened, but you crying means you're not a monster. War does horrible things and it takes horrible things to make it end. We saved more lives than we took, I promise you that." The other boy shook his head and turned back toward the window. The blond waited for a minute and was about to speak when the burnet did instead.

"What's in the bag?" He turned to the blond with an obvious mask into place and a bit of a smile on his lips. Quatre almost felt relief to see the boy he knew hidden in the amnesia child sitting on the bed.

"You're favorite candy," Quatre said proudly. He opened up the bag and pulled out the plastic wrapped boxes. "Unless you got a new favorite that I don't know about?"

Daniel shook his head and reached forward for the treat, "I haven't actually eaten much candy since waking up without memories. I've been trying to figure out what my favorite other foods are. So, nerds huh? Did they make me smarter?" He laughed at his own joke and opened up a box of purple little hard candies smaller than his nails and in odd shapes. "Woah, these look awesome!" He tilted the box back to pour them into his mouth. He crunched through them with his eyes closed. Quatre wondered if he was trying to remember what he thought about the candy or if he was just enjoying having the candy. Purple eyes met his baby blue's, "Yup, I agree, these are certainly my favorite! Can I eat them all now or do I have to save them?" Quatre looked at him in almost shock and sadness. Daniel continued, "I mean, uh, could you get me more if I eat them all?" He looked down at his blanket now and shut off all signs of emotions.

"I can get you more whenever you want," Quatre smiled. "I… uh, well, why don't we do something fun? I know sitting still isn't your strong suit." Daniel gave him a confused look. "Oh… uh… okay, well, how about I see if the nurses have any board games?"

"You mean B-O-R-E-D games!" Daniel said and smiled. They were awkward around each other and Daniel didn't like that. This boy had known him before he lost his memories and he wanted to ask more about him. So far he was gleaning a bit of what he had been before the accident, whatever that accident had been, and he was learning a lot about the cautious blond too. The older boy nodded and walked regally out of the room. "Okay, and he's rich… I can see that within a few minutes of knowing him…" he whispered to himself out loud. Had he been rich, too?

Quatre walked back into the room with a wooden board and two wooden jars. "We're going to play I-Go. You were never really good at it, but it was always fun. Do you remember how to play?" Daniel looked at the board and opened up the wood container to see little white stones inside. The rules flashed through his brain and he nodded. Quatre positioned himself on the end of the bed and put the board between them. "You go first, please."

The game started off. As they set their stones down with rhythmic clicks Daniel looked up at Quatre, "Can I ask you questions?" Quatre nodded as he placed another stone down. He knew that the amnesiac boy would probably ask many questions about their pasts. "Are you rich?" Daniel asked as he slid his white stone against one of Quatre's black ones.

The blond paused in his gathering of a stone in his wood round box. He looked up in shock at Duo, "Yes." He answered plainly, but he didn't expect that question to come from the other boy. Duo had always made comments and been amazed at the extravagance that surrounded Quatre, but had never actually ever come out to say that he was rich. "In a way I am, I guess. I have money and I own my own company… I also have very good friends and that makes me even richer." Daniel rolled his eyes and Quatre laughed.

"Am I rich, too?" Daniel asked. Quatre looked away for a minute and sighed.

"Duo… uh, I mean, Daniel… you live comfortably now," he answered. Daniel leaned back and stared at the board of stones. He wasn't stupid. Quatre was trying to be nice. He had some money now, or had before the amnesia, but he hadn't always been so fortunate.

"How poor was I?" he asked. The game was forgotten as Quatre tried to decide how much Duo needed to hear now. The pause was long and Daniel finally snapped, "Tell me!" Quatre jumped at the uncommon outburst from his friend.

"You live on L2 growing up. From what you have told us, which isn't much I might add, you lived… uh… you didn't have much of a structural home…" Quatre stuttered a bit and tried to gage his friend's reaction. The other boy was obviously volatile in his state of mind.

"Just say it, Quatre, I live on the streets…" he whispered. He sighed and leaned forward. His hand motioned to the board, "It's your turn." Quatre nodded and placed a stone down. The conversation was dropped as they continued to via for position on the board with their stones. In the end Quatre won by a landslide. "I'm not very good at strategy games, huh?" He smiled at the blond and laughed a bit. "Next time we need to play something I can win… like maybe poker." Quatre smiled back and nodded. He left the room with the board to return it to the nurse's station and came back with a book.

"The nurse out there said you can borrow this if you like," he handed the book over. Violet eyes widened and a huge grin took over the boy's face.

"Oh WOW! It's the next book in the series! I didn't know it was released already!" he bounced a bit in the bed, but stopped when he felt a slight stinging sensation on one of his stitches. "Okay, inside glee only… gotta remember I'm hurt." He giggled.

"Go ahead and start reading it. I have to go now, anyway. Work to do and all of that… Duo, uh, Daniel, I'm sorry I upset you. I did mean it when I said you could ask me anything…" he smiled at the boy who still was giddy from getting the new book. It was a mask, though, and Quatre knew that Duo was good at those. "Heero should be here by tomorrow. The others are coming later this week. Doctor said you can be discharged by next week if everything continues to go well." He smiled one last time before leaving the room.

The smile slipped off of Daniel's face and he sighed. He looked at the new book and then at the clock. The nurse would come in to check on him in five minutes. Meal time would be another two hours later and that would be when they come in again after the next check. An echo of the screams from his memories came through the room. The nurse came in after them and his smile was plastered on his face again. "Thank you so much for the book! I am addicted to the series!" he said as she checked his stitches and blood pressure. She chatted along merrily with him and then left the room. It was now or never, Daniel thought. He slipped from the bed and made his way to the drawers along the far side of the room. He opened on up and found what he was looking for. Tearing open the package that held the sterile instrument he held the scalpel toward his face to see the gleaming sharp edge. He had to stop the screams and never hurt anyone ever again.

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

14: Chapter Fourteen

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: Still don't own Gundam Wing.

Chapter 14

The beeping sound was both a surprise and an annoyance. With it came the knowledge that he had failed in his attempt to end the memories and it was also very irritating to hear when he had pain rushing through his body. With every beep it coursed through his head as a pounding drum and up his arms like a wave from his fingers to his shoulders. His eyes slid open and he expected to be blinded, but the lights above his bed were off.

He heard a sound next to his bed and turned slightly to see bright blue eyes staring back at his purple ones. The boy next to him wasn't moving, but he could see he was breathing. Bushy brown hair fell slightly down into his eyes, and Daniel softly wondered if he even combed it. He was being glared at and he didn't like it, so he matched the glare with one of his own. "Who are you?" he choked out through a dry throat.

At first he didn't think the other boy would answer him. He seemed to be very angry at Daniel as he said, "Why would you try to kill yourself?" Daniel rolled his eyes and turned away. "Duo… Quatre said you were starting to remember… Why would you try to kill yourself?" Daniel studiously tried to ignore him. He didn't know this other guy, though the boy said he knew him and he mentioned Quatre. He could be one of the other three Quatre was talking about he supposed, but that didn't narrow it down far enough for him.

They sat like that for a long while. The other boy was quiet but fixated on staring at him. He could feel the blue eyes boring into the back of his head. After watching the clock for about an hour Daniel gave up, turned to his companion and answered, "I can't remember anything but screams. I want them to go away. I did what I thought was possible to stop them." He glared as hard as he could at the brown haired boy who seemed satisfied with the answer as he sat back in his chair, but he still held onto the severe look.

"We all have those, Duo." His voice was deep and didn't hold much change in tone. It was certainly not sympathetic like Quatre's was.

"My name is Daniel," he sighed and looked down at the bed lining. "Please, I just want to be called Daniel… that other name seems to hold all of the bad memories and I don't want them to come to me right now."

The boy nodded quickly. "Your name can be whatever you want it to be."

Daniel looked over at him again, "What's your name?"

The other boy seemed to think it was a trick question as he paused and waited for something to happen. When nothing did, though, he answered, "Heero. That's what everyone calls me now… you really were compromised? You really have no memory of me or the others? You have no information on how you came to be with this amnesia?" Daniel felt like the other boy was interrogating him.

"According to the police report a motorist stopped to help me when he saw me fall from the backseat of another vehicle. The other vehicle didn't stop and only barely seemed to have slowed down. I rolled down the side ditch on Highway 22 and came to a stop in the thankfully dry center," he shrugged. "Been trying to figure things out since I woke up… Is it true that I'm like seventeen or something?"

The other boy shrugged, "We figured our ages to be about that."

"We? How is it the doctors think I'm twelve, or almost thirteen, instead?" Daniel carefully pulled himself up into a sitting position. The other boy automatically moved to help and Daniel let loose a few grunts of pain from his now mangled wrists and forearms. When he was settled he looked expectantly at Heero who had settled back to sitting straight backed with his arms crossed in the guest chair.

"For some reason you stopped taking the pills," he answered. Daniel waved his arm in the air for the other boy to continue or elaborate for him. "When we joined the doctors for Operation Meteor they gave us a series of shots to stop us from getting larger and to stop us from growing. Now that we're not needed to fit into the small cockpits of the mechas anymore we started to take pills to stimulate our pituitary glands again."

Daniel looked down at his hands for a bit, "And I stopped taking them? Why would I do that?" Heero didn't even acknowledge Daniel had been talking, which was fine since he was really trying to push his memory to give him some answers. Nothing, though, and at least the screams from the past didn't come either.

They sat in their own silence for a long while again. Finally Daniel tried to reach over to grab the book that the nurses had let him borrow, but his hand wouldn't hold onto it. He sighed, "Heero, I can't hold anything with my wrists mangled. Do you mind if we either chat or I watch some TV?"

Heero grunted in response and handed the remote over. Daniel stared at it for a minute and then figured the silent boy maybe had met his quota of words for the day. He did get a lot of information to Daniel in the gruff manor that Daniel figured was just how the boy was. He gingerly balanced the remote on his open palm, set it onto his knee and angled it up to bounce the signal into the receiver above the screen.

"Anything in particular you want to watch?" Daniel asked. The other boy leaned back and shut his eyes. His arms were still crossed. "Okay." He shrugged and turned on a random show; it was about how things were made in factories. It was noise and right now Daniel just needed that. "Heero, you can leave if you're bored. It won't offend me."

The glare he received told him enough without any words. Heero was not leaving until someone sat with Daniel to make sure he did not repeat his earlier suicide attempt. He smiled brightly to cover up his annoyance at being babysat and turned back to the TV show. They couldn't watch him forever. He grabbed onto the cross still hanging from his neck and slid his fingers down it gingerly. He ignored the pain that came with each movement as he thought onto everything he had learned.

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

15: Chapter Fifteen

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: Don't own Gundam Wing

Chapter 15

By the fourth day of being confined to the bed and on twenty four hour surveillance by an ever persistent Heero, Daniel was about to snap. They stood glaring at each other with their arms crossed in the doorway of the bathroom. "I just want to pee," Daniel grounded out as Heero blocked the door from shutting with his body. Daniel was half tempted to just slam it anyway into the other boy, but with the way Heero's biceps trembled he knew he wouldn't win a shoving match with the older teen. Adding in that Heero was a head taller than him made Daniel realize shoving was also out of the possible solutions. "Heero, buddy, pal, I have that damned catheter out and I need to tinkle now. Kay? Got it? Now, leave so I can let my bladder feel relief." He didn't even get a grunt from the blue eyes in front of him. He narrowed his own purple eyes and almost smirked at the thought. "Fine. I won't go then. I'll hold it until my bladder literally bursts and poisons my body from the inside. Good idea, Heero! You're a genius!" With that said he went to get back into his bed.

Heero moved to hold him in the room. "I will turn around, but you are not going to be left alone," he said with his ever present scowl. Daniel rolled his eyes, but turned toward the toilet to get the relief he sought. He looked over really quick to see Heero's back toward him.

After he was done with the toilet, lowered the gown again, and flushed, he could hear the slap of Heero's tennis shoes against the tiles as he turned back around to make sure Daniel was alright.

Yes, he was being babysat constantly. He would even wake in the night to see Heero staring at him from his chair he sat in and refused to leave unless Quatre was there during visiting hours. Daniel didn't know if Heero ever went to the bathroom except during the two hours Quatre was there, because he never was caught alone in the room.

He went back to the bed and lied down immediately. They had pulled the catheter out three hours before but an IV still was attached to his arm and streaming in fluid. He had thought it would be freedom, but Heero dashed those dreams just then. In anger he rolled onto his side to face the room and away from where Heero had sat back down again. Thoughts swirled in his brain and most of them centered on what he wanted to scream at his so-called friends. Sighing in defeat he shut his eyes to go into another nightmare filled sleep of screaming people and blood filled pools.

~*~ Ma ~*~

The blond boy was smiling brightly as he talked to Heero while Daniel limped his way into the bathroom alone. His arms were filled with clothing to finally get out of the horrible open backed hospital gown he had been tortured to be in for the last few weeks. His arm still smarted from the sting of the IV coming out, but he was just glad to be rid of it. Quatre and Heero had gone into the bathroom before him and had pulled out everything they considered could be used to harm himself, but he didn't care at that moment. He wasn't stupid enough to do that again while people were within saving distance, and he wasn't going to do it again in a hospital.

The doctors had given him release from this prison of overly nice people and the ever watching eyes of Heero. Quatre was bringing him to his mansion on the river just outside of town. After living in middle class and lower class for the last almost year of having any recollection of being alive he was excited to see a mansion.

He wondered as he pulled his t-shirt over his head if he could possibly bring his friend Sam over. He might not really be 12 or 13 like the doctors said he was, but he had made a good friend and he didn't really feel as old as 17 or 18 years. He was smaller than Quatre and Heero and from what he could make out from Quatre's description of his other "friends" then he was the shortest of them all since he hadn't been taking the pills to counter act the hormone repressing drug some mad scientist shoved into his veins when he was a kid.

He looked at himself in the mirror as Quatre called through the door for him. He didn't answer as he turned and opened the door. Quatre held a brush out and a hair tie to hold back what it could of the almost shoulder length locks. He saw for just a second almost a sympathetic look on Heero's face before his scowl deepened and he turned to pack his bag beside the bed. A bright smile came with the black bristles, though, and Daniel was glad that Quatre didn't show pity.

After making sure his hair was combed and set right he looked to his friends. "So, do I get my own room or my own wing of this place? Oh! Is there going to be ice cream in the freezer? Do you have a whole room as a freezer? How about some of those nerds?" he started to ramble while they walked out of the hospital room and Quatre laughed a bit as the questions came faster than he could answer them. Heero followed behind the two silently. Both of the knowledgeable pilots wondered if Duo was talking out of nervousness or to belie the fact that he was plotting another attempt at his own life.

~*~Tsuzuku ~*~

16: Chapter Sixteen

Blank Slate

By: France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing. I wish I owned it, or maybe even the mansion described as Quatre's. I don't own one of those, either.

Chapter 16

Daniel was amazed when they drove through the white large fence gates. There were big burley men, dogs, and guards everywhere. He watched carefully as they passed each one but the house froze any thoughts he had of trying to deceive his way out of the sanctuary. The mansion was huge from the outside and his purple eyes immediately took in the gleam of where the sun bounced off of the security cameras. This place was more secure than he had ever thought before. Whoever did the security was a genius. His brain tried over and over to come up with ways to avoid the guards, dogs or cameras. "Wow…" he breathed as he stepped out of the parked black sedan onto the gravel entry. Quatre and Heero stepped out of the front seats, Quatre had been driving. He heard a chuckle from the blond and turned to look over at him.

"You said that the last time you were here," Quatre smiled at him. "When I asked you and Heero here to check the security I have and upgrade it all?" It was a question on whether Daniel remembered. He didn't so he ignored it and started to follow the silent soldier into the huge double doors ahead. They had done a wonderful job on the security and Daniel couldn't remember if he had left any holes big enough for him to slip out of.

~*~Ma~*~

Two other friends showed up the next day. Daniel refused to come out of his room, but they refused to leave him alone. They had given him a bedroom with a lock but he quickly found that they were just as good at unlocking it as he was at rigging it to be locked.

The Chinese boy, Wufei, seemed to be on guard and Quatre said he was waiting to see if Daniel was faking the amnesia. It only took the first day for Wufei to relax and realize that Daniel was not playing a joke on him or the others. He was smart and just a slight taller than Daniel. Wufei scolded him like a father would when he found out Daniel hadn't been taking his growth pills, but Daniel could not be remorseful since he didn't know why he had stopped taking them. Daniel noticed quickly that Wufei was a ranter and it was a bit funny to watch the other boy in his animation about things he took to heart.

Trowa was silent but not harsh in his quiet. He sat comfortably and even seemed to listen intently as Daniel rambled about different things. He answered questions Daniel asked with a way that made Daniel think he thought of every precise word like they were golden truths to be delved out to only a select few. Quatre had told him that Trowa had had amnesia like he did at one point and Daniel wanted to cling to that knowledge like it was a life saver. How did this boy in front of him, who Daniel knew had just as many terrors as he did, not go insane when he got his memories back?

A rotation was set and once again Daniel was on 24 hour surveillance. He almost wondered if he should try to escape just for the fun of it after a week passed by.

~*~Ma~*~

"Wu, can I call my friend?" he asked suddenly while they were reading their books still in Daniel's room. The Chinese eyes looked at him calculating for a minute before reaching into his pocket of his jeans and passing a cell over. "Aw, thanks man!" he almost squealed out just to annoy the other boy, but thought he'd better not test his luck. He quickly dialed the number he had memorized. It only rang once before a frantic woman answered.

"Hello? Sam?" she asked.

"No, this is Daniel. Is Sam okay?" he asked into the receiver. Wufei brought his attention up from the book he had gone back to. They stared at each other as Daniel heard Sam's mom on the other end.

"Sam is missing Daniel. He's been missing for a week now. He never came home from school last Friday," the woman sobbed. "I'll call you when the police find anything, but they told me to keep the phone line clear. Please Daniel, pray for my son to return home." The line went dead and Daniel felt his breathing and heart stop as he lowered the cell to the bed.

"Sam is missing… he had to have been kidnapped…" Daniel felt the tears coming to his eyes while Wufei's widened and then turned determined. The Chinese boy rushed out of the bedroom and left Daniel alone for the first time in weeks.

Why hadn't Daniel thought to call Sam last week when he came home from the hospital?

~*~Tsuzuku~*~

17: Chapter Seventeen

Blank Slate

By: France Gamble

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Chapter Seventeen

Daniel was still staring at the chair Wufei had vacated when the other four pilots came into the room. Quatre immediately went to sit next to him on the bed while the others stood around. Daniel looked over at Quatre, "Sam is missing." Quatre nodded.

Wufei looked down as his cell phone beeped. "It's from Lady Une. She says she is looking at the police reports now." He waited as his phone beeped again. Heero sat down and pulled his laptop from underneath the bed. Daniel didn't even know that he had kept it under there. The tapping from both of them had everyone else watching as they waited. Wufei continued, "She sees nothing amiss with the reports. Looks like a standard grab and disappear. No connection."

"No connection from the underground, either," Heero said as he continued to read and type randomly onto the pad.

"Connection to what?" Daniel asked. They stopped and everyone looked over at him.

Quatre sighed, "No connection with what happened to you." His blue eyes searched the purple in front of him and Daniel knew he was looking for if Daniel could remember anything more than what they had already figured out, which wasn't much besides he was found in a ditch. He looked away and fingered the cross hanging from his neck.

"If it had been connected, could we have found him?" he whispered.

"We are going to find him," Wufei said as he turned off his phone and shoved it back into his jeans pocket.

"We are?" Daniel asked as he looked up hopefully to the Chinese boy.

"No, you are staying here. We, as in the rest of us, are going to go and find him," Quatre said as gently as he could. "Please don't hurt yourself while we're away. We want to bring Sam back to you alive and well." Daniel nodded and whispered out a promise. He was disappointed to be staying behind, but without his memories his body and brain did not always meet in the right place. He couldn't remember all of what the others could do and he probably would hinder the investigation more than help at this point.

"If I get my memories back, can I help?" he asked. They looked around at each other.

It was Trowa who spoke, "Of course." With that the others left to start on finding the twelve year old boy.

Daniel was determined now to get back to being Duo. He needed his memories, even the ones with the screams, if he was going to help find his friend.

~*~Ma~*~

Daniel had his hair pulled back and he was crouched down low to the grass as he watched the dogs walk by. Their ears swiveled toward him but they kept on walking alongside their handlers. Slowly he crept out and kept alongside one of the hedges. Counting to five in his head after watching the camera turn he dashed across the lawn toward the tree. He stayed still against the tree as guards with guns walked by. He shut his eyes to keep the light from their flashlights from bouncing in reflection. Listening intently he knew when the crunch of their feet was far enough away.

He looked really quick for the sign of the camera making its rounds. He had four seconds to make it to the wall and shimmy up. He took off again. Using skills he didn't remember having he launched himself up the wall, over it and onto the street on the other side. He allowed himself to fall down to his knees to quiet the landing on the pavement.

His smile broke as he sighed. He made it out of Quatre's compound even without memories on how he knew what to do. He didn't need his memories to find Sam. Now he just had to go back to the front gate, tell Rashid what he had done, and call Quatre to tell him he can join in the search.

His feet didn't even make it away from the wall when pain shot through his neck. He reached up and pulled out something. Confusion came into his brain as he held what looked like a dart in his hand. Then the world turned into a swirling mess before he felt his legs give way. It spun and spun as darkness engulfed him.

~*~Ma~*~

His shoulders hurt, his side hurt, and as he pulled on his legs he realized his ankles hurt. Slowly he opened his eyes. Black, so black that for a minute panic almost set in. Was he blind now too? No, it was just a closed room. Not even a sliver of light came in from where ever the door was. The air was stale, too, meaning that there wasn't a vent in the room. It was sealed and his only hope to not be suffocated was that someone opened the door in the next two hours. His brain supplied all of the calculation and a bit of a memory of something similar happening at some point in his life… with Wufei, he thought. He shuffled a bit and heard the scrape of his cross against the floor. So the floor was made of concrete and so were the walls from the way the acoustics bounced.

If bats could have echo location, than he was sure he could as well. Carefully he scooted until he had the chain in his mouth. He tapped the end of the cross against the floor he listened for return sounds. The room was empty from what he could tell. The pinging stopped and settled. His arms and ankles were tied tightly and he knew his fingers had to have been purple. They really didn't want him to escape. He felt a giggle peak up through his throat, but choked it down. He'll laugh later when the kidnappers arrive or right before he died.

He lay there and thought of anything else besides the fact that he really didn't want to die of lack of oxygen.

~*~Tsuzuku~*~

18: Chapter Eighteen

Blank Slate

Chapter Eighteen

His body shuddered, sweat ran down his face and skin, and he tried his best to not gasp or pant. Sleep called to him from the darkness and he fought as hard as he could to not succumb to the temptation. "Now… I… lay… me…" he said slowly to the black. He never finished as his fight against the lack of oxygen was lost.

~*~ Ma ~*~

His body was being dragged to somewhere else. His head was hitting the bumps in the concrete flooring and his ankles were being gripped by strong hands. The headache pounding in his brain meant he was alive. The glorious air was filled with much needed oxygen. His lungs burned with the sudden need to get as much as possible into his system as quickly as possible. He couldn't even care at the moment where these bad guys were taking him, because he was alive. His eyes stayed shut and he almost grunted with each abrupt smack against his cranium.

The person stopped pulling him and dropped his legs unceremoniously back onto the concrete floor. Daniel would have said that the man threw them down, but he reasoned that the lack of oxygen made his muscles pain anyway.

"Daniel!" a high pitched male child yelled into the room. Daniel opened his eyes as the man pulled him to an upright position. He looked across the room of a warehouse to see his friend Sam strapped into a chair as the man did the same to Daniel. "Daniel!" the boy cried out again before another man, one Daniel hadn't registered was there, shoved a cloth into the child's mouth.

Daniel tried to clear his head as he looked around. They were in a shipping warehouse of some sort. Light streamed in through windows three or four stories above the concrete floor they were on. It was daylight out. Boxes stacked around them had no markings to identify what was inside. Daniel had thought there were two men, but now he realized there were at least five. The men all wore the same gray t-shirts, blue jeans and had shaved their heads clean. They were all tan and Daniel was guessing some form of Latin American. They didn't talk as they stood around with space between them waiting for something. The boss was late or trying to make an entrance.

Daniel tried to show Sam with his eyes that everything was going to be alright. He would have called out to him, but breathing was still difficult enough. 'Please understand,' he thought.

As his breath started to calm down and oxygen filled his body again in the places he desperately needed it to be in, a woman clicked into the room. At first Daniel thought that his brain still was deprived of cellular use, but then it all caught up to him as she spoke, "Hello Duo. I hope they didn't rough you up too much."

"Alecia," he whispered harshly into the stillness of the room. His social worker smirked at him and then full on smiled brightly. "Why?"

"Oh Duo…" she walked forward and leaned down in front of him, "You have something of mine. I need it back. Where is it?" Her sweet smile turned to a sneer. Her manicured hands came out and brushed down his cheek, "I know your memories are returning. I just want to know where you put it and I'll let poor little Sam go home." Behind her Sam started struggling in his bindings and humming against the dirty cloth. She moved out of Daniel's view so he could watch his friend.

"I don't know what you're looking for!" Daniel yelled. "Let us go! I really haven't gotten my memories back!"

She started to tisk against her teeth as she walked over to the younger boy. The blond looked from Alecia to Daniel and tried to struggle out of his chair. "Oh, poor Sam… Boys, why don't you help Duo remember what he stole from me?" One of the henchmen nodded and walked toward Sam who was now screaming in fear and crying.

Daniel didn't have the chance to look away as another bulky guy grabbed his head and forced him to watch. "I don't know!" Daniel kept chanting as loud as he could. He tried to keep his voice above that of his friend's so that the crazy lady would listen to him and stop.

"I don't know!"

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

19: Chapter Nineteen

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Chapter Nineteen

Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing. I think I forgot to say that last chapter. Don't sue me! I don't have enough lint for a lint ball!

Warnings: I tried to not type out the torture that was done, but there is violence in this chapter. I had six paragraphs of graphic torture and deleted it all telling myself this is rated T.

The screams finally silenced as their echoes disappeared against the walls. Daniel's sobs, though, didn't stop. "I really don't know," he continued to cry as he watched the henchmen check the pulse of the younger boy. Daniel couldn't recognize him any longer and he knew that the poor child would have nightmares for years to come from this. If Daniel could give them the information before they were both killed, that is. "Please, leave him alone. Come after me! Leave him alone!" his last words were screamed in anger at the woman he had been relying on for the last year.

"Awe, darling, I couldn't do that. You were trained to withstand such torture. We have tried that before," she said as she sauntered up to his bound chair. "I was hoping we could get you to talk with just torturing your innocent friend, but I guess we'll have to put him out of his misery."

Daniel thought fast to try and delay them in killing Sam, "Before?" It worked as Alecia turned back around from where she had been about to give the order to kill his best friend.

"Oh, right, amnesia… I'll play along.

Yes, 'before'. After you stole from us we found you in your hide out and flushed you out. We then did everything we could to gather the information from you. We would have just killed you, except you kept saying it would be found if you die. As we were transporting you to another place, because Preventers had been tipped off somehow, you escaped. Brian forgot to put the child lock on the back doors of the car. He won't be making that mistake, or any more mistakes, again," she smiled at him with full teeth. It was a smile Daniel had thought once to be kind, but now wondered if this was her version of a shark grin.

"My day job allowed me to get close to you when we found out you had been saved from death. I was weary at first that you'd recognize me, but you didn't. I kept moving you to different places, horrible ones when I had the chance, to try and get you to remember something," she sighed. "I don't want to have to kill your friend. He really didn't even know he was making friends with a terrorist and thief."

Daniel asked, "What did I steal?" She needed to be talking to delay the inevitable. He didn't know why but he was sure that he just had to buy them time. "Maybe I'll remember if I knew what I took."

She stopped for a minute. A complete stillness came over her as she studied his purple eyes. She finally spoke, "Our plans for spreading a disease using foster care children. It is a brilliant plan, really. At first I thought you were pretending amnesia to get into the system to learn more about what you had stolen… anyway, long story short, it's already begun. We started in Britain yesterday and today millions of foster care kids are getting vaccinated against a new disease that we have let the media suppose was running rampant through the country. Just like bird flu and swine flu, it is said to originate through cows and their meat. In all meat eating countries it was perfect."

Daniel tried to wrack his brain to remember if he'd seen any news reports like it. He hadn't, but really it was because the other pilots had cut his cable off in his room. They had numerous times tried to get him to sit with them for the evening news in the main living room of the mansion, but he had refused. For a week now he had missed this vital information spreading across the airwaves because he had been depressed.

Anger shot through him. His arms tightened against their bindings and he felt the rope dig into his wrists. It wasn't long before the tickle of the blood pooling from his wounds came down his fingers. His violet eyes turned dark as he stared at this horrible woman in front of him.

She didn't seem to notice the sudden burst of strength from her captive, "Of course we do have a counter virus. We have inoculated the higher ups with it. The rich have requested the 'vaccine' as well and have received the true vaccine. The poor are a leech on our system and the foster care kids go to the poor who abuse it. They get medical free and food free. These people take and take and take. We're doing everyone a favor by ridding the obsolete from this world."

As she talked flashes of memories came to Daniel's mind- No, not Daniel, Duo's mind. Solo dying as he coughed from a plague that took out the entire gang of friends, family, he had when he was just a small child. Dead bodies everywhere and hunger pains attacking his body as he was afraid to leave them alone. For some reason, though, he didn't get sick. The plague had taken out most of the poorest populations on L2 and he had survived. He was Duo, named after his older brother Solo.

He pulled harder on his ropes and felt them begin to snap. His body had been dormant for a year, and he had eaten well but not what he would normally eat to keep up strength. He didn't care as he heard Sam start to come back to the world on consciousness. He needed to get out of here, find where he had hidden the information he stole, and get Sam to safety.

Alecia stepped back as the bindings broke and he stood up. He didn't give her time as he lunged forward to get her into his bloody hands. She stepped back and away as her five goons jumped into action to save their leader. He was punched in the face before her broke the first goons neck. He tripped the second one, but everything stopped when the windows above them burst out. Yelling came from all around them.

Alecia, the men that were still alive, and Duo all raised their hands in surrender to black clad, gun toting, and armor wearing army that stormed the building.

"Duo!" he heard from behind the army as a blond head came rushing through to grab onto him in a hug. "You're safe!"

He almost laughed, but instead he pulled the Sandrock pilot away from him, "No. There's a virus out there spreading right this minute. We need to stop it!" He looked over as Trowa and ambulance crews were tending to Sam. "And he needs his mom." Quatre nodded and pulled Duo away from the arresting of Alecia.

"Tell me everything," Quatre said in a commanding voice as they rushed out into the sun filled area of a shipping yard.

~*~Tsuzuku~*~

20: Chapter Twenty

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing. Please don't sue me.

Chapter Twenty

Duo sat in the exam bed with his feet swinging off the sides while he waited for the doctor to come in and release him. At least, he hoped he'd be released. He was rushed to the hospital by ambulance as a precautionary action. They had taken Sam first, though, and he was in extremely bad shape. Duo let anger build up inside instead of the sorrow, because at that moment he didn't need to cry.

The doctor came in and gave him a discharge paper. He warned him of possible side effects from lack of oxygen, such as dizziness, and not to over exert himself. Duo almost laughed, but instead he thanked the doctor and ran out as fast as he could.

Outside of the room stood the four other Gundam pilots silently. They all were deep in thought, but Duo couldn't stand the silence for long, "Who's funeral?" They all looked up at him.

"What?" Quatre and Wufei said at the same time. Duo smiled a bit and repeated, "Who died?"

Quatre smiled brightly, "No one."

"Exactly!" Duo said loudly as he grabbed onto Trowa and Quatre's shoulders to start guiding them out of the hospital, "And we're not going to let anyone die. C'mon guys! We have a bad virus to go and get rid of!" Quatre laughed as they walked through the sliding automatic doors away from the emergency room.

~*~Ma~*~

Purple eyes bore into the blue ones of the lady underneath the bright light. "Tell me what I need to know," he said slowly in a deep tone. It wasn't a look or voice she had ever seen from him before. Alecia only smiled, though. She wasn't going to talk.

Duo knew that outside of the interrogation room of Preventers, the others were making phone calls across the nation to stop the vaccination process of the children. They had brought in every agent they could and Quatre had brought in office people from his company as well. The lady in front of him wasn't going to get away with harming the poor people of this country, and if Quatre and Preventers were fast enough, any other country. Britain area was under quarantine as they had already been vaccinated two days before.

"Which agencies have the antidote," Duo asked his enemy.

"They'll start coughing first," she said suddenly. It almost made Duo jump because he wasn't expecting her to say anything. "The cough will be mild, but effective. They are contagious as soon as they start coughing. Two or three days later the fever will take hold. It's a horrible fever. The coughing will start to sound like a pack of seals, but it's the fever that is the killer." Duo's eyes widened. "Oh, and we couldn't find anything known to lower the horrible heat coming off of our test subjects." She smiled wider and sat back against her chair. She shrugged as if he said something but didn't continue.

He stood up and ran from the room. "Wufei!" he called as he made his way passed the phone lines. He stopped in front of the Chinese man who was about to eat a large bowl of noodles.

"What's the matter, Maxwell?" he asked the boy panting in front of him. "You're out of shape."

"Shove it," Duo said finally. "We need to quarantine all who have been vaccinated immediately. Coughing spreads it to non-vaccinated. The fever is what kills them, though." Wufei shoved his chair back loudly and ran for the Preventer Supervisor's office.

Duo leaned down to put his head onto the table and let his legs come to crash against the tile flooring. His brain was racing as his body tried again to grab oxygen. The doctor had told him not to overdo it since his body had gone through such a shock before, but he had forgotten in his haste to save lives. He shut his eyes as his vision wavered in front of him and the tiles turned into black spots.

A hand came down gently and slowly onto his left shoulder, "Are you alright, Duo?" He nodded against the table as he gasped again. "Still not responding well?" Heero asked. Duo's head bobbed a bit. A few seconds passed and Duo could feel his body panic as he couldn't seem to gather the much needed air.

"Duo, you need to measure your breathing," Trowa's voice cut in. He started a cadence of "Breath in… and out… and in…" Duo matched his words and slowly the world started to come back into focus again. With everything becoming stable again, he was surprised by the strong arms now pulling him to standing.

"It's cool, guys. I think I'll be okay now," he answered as he wavered in Trowa and Heero's arms. They kept him steady as his vision again went spotty and cleared. "Woah, head rush," he joked, "Who needs alcohol when you can just deprive your body of necessities?" His audience didn't chuckle or respond as they moved him to sit in the chair Wufei had vacated. "Thanks," he mumbled.

"Sorry I'm a bit weak," he said after a while of silence. Trowa shook his head a bit and Heero gave his most convincing grunt. Duo translated it in his head to them saying it wasn't his fault. He chuckled and looked up as Lady Une and Wufei came from her office with grave faces.

~*~ Tsuzuku ~*~

21: Chapter Twenty-One

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing. I just torture the characters.

Chapter Twenty-One

Long brown hair shimmered underneath the glaring florescent light. Lady Une was a beautiful woman, no one could deny that, but she was strict. Duo stood up from the chair as she spoke to them, "We have been able to quarantine those who have been vaccinated. Unfortunately the number will still be staggering in the deaths, and we don't know if the volunteer doctors will be able to not contract the illness either. We need the cure, Maxwell." He nodded and looked down at the tiles.

"Can I hit her?" Duo asked. Everyone shook their head and he sighed. "Just a little hit. Something to make her fear me." Une told him under no circumstance could he hit their prisoner. He rolled his eyes as he stomped off from their group. He heard shoes coming up from behind him, but he kept going at his slow pace toward their break room. He needed a coffee or soda and he wasn't going to wait for whomever to catch up.

As he popped open the top of his bottle of cola, the other person sat down in front of him with a tea for themselves. Quatre's blue eyes bore into Duo's violet ones for a long while before Duo rolled his eyes again and said, "I'm fine!"

Quatre smiled a bit, "Am I mother henning you?"

"A bit," Duo answered before taking a swig of his soda. "Look, Cat, I love ya, but I'm fine." Quatre nodded and sipped his own tea as Duo continued, "I just wanna smack that… uh… crap, I can't think of a work appropriate word since cussing has been banned from here!"

Quatre giggled a bit and shook his head. He offered, "Female dog?"

"Oh, yeah, good, we'll use the dictionary definitions…

"I just wanna smack that female dog for what she did to Sam and the other kids. I mean, why target kids?! What is killing off a bunch of kids going to prove?" He threw his hands into the air and smacked them down onto the table. They sat in silence for a minute while Quatre allowed Duo to gather his thoughts together and calm his temper, "How many?"

"Excuse me?" Quatre asked. He searched Duo's face for a second and saw the tears gathering in the bottom of his eyes. He was glad suddenly that they were alone in the break room, because Duo needed to let the feelings out now instead of in the field later.

"How many are infected? Do we have a count?" Duo repeated. He looked down at the table as if to hide the unshed water gathering.

"Our latest count was just over twenty thousand exposed and quarantined," Quatre sadly reported. Duo cussed under his breath and let his head go down onto the table. He curled his arms around and his shoulders shook. "It'll be okay Duo. My company is working with top medical industries to come up with a cure as quick as possible." The smaller boy continued to silently sob into the top of the wood as Quatre rubbed his back from across him.

In the doorway Trowa appeared silently. He looked at them and Quatre shook his head in a silent plea to not step into the room. The taller boy nodded and walked away as if on air. Duo cried for almost ten minutes before uncurling and mumbling something about needing a napkin. Grinding the chair's legs against the flooring, Quatre got up to get a handful of the abrasive paper products from near the vending machines. He returned and handed them to his friend.

Duo blew his nose and used a new one to wipe away his eyes. He then smacked his face a few times to get his complextion back and stated, "Alright. Let's go save these babies. I don't care what Une says, I'm going to get answers from that piece of poop in the interrogation room. I will…" Duo's eyes flashed with what Quatre and the others had deemed a long time ago the spirit of the God of Death.

"Duo," he said quietly, "We need answers and not another death." Duo unclenched his fists, stood up, and nodded. They both walked out of the break room and Duo made a bee-line for the room where Alecia was being held. He wasn't going to kill her, but he certainly wasn't going to make her life easier from this day forth. "I'll have Trowa ready to resuscitate her for you," Quatre smiled, but his eyes also turned to steel as they split from each other.

~*~Tsuzuku~*~

22: Chapter Twenty-Two

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing.

Chapter Twenty-Two

"Tell me where the antidote is!" Duo yelled as he slammed his hands down in front of Alecia. The table rattled with her chains holding her onto it. "Tell me!"

"Oh, poor Duo. No memories and now all of those babies are dying. Didn't you learn anything in foster care? Poor people are scum who prey on the weak. I am doing everyone a favor," Alecia smiled in a sweet way with her perfect teeth shinning. Duo lost it inside. His hand went back and he ruined that perfect smile with a right hook. The woman fell from her chair and her arms were stretched to the max against her cuffs. She gasped as the room echoed with the crack as one of her wrists broke or was dislocated. Duo didn't care which one it was. He was seething and his control was slipping. He felt the urge to jump and finish the job of detaching her hand from her arm. Just as he thought maybe it wouldn't be so bad to do, arms came around him from behind strongly.

"Maxwell!" he heard Wufei yell. The rumble from the chest behind him broke through his bloodlust and snapped him back into reality.

Alecia was being helped back into a sitting position on the chair by Heero as Trowa uncuffed her to check the damage done. She at first hissed as he poked it, but then an insane laughter built up from the woman. "No wonder we couldn't break you! You're insane!" she laughed.

A hand came out of nowhere and grabbed the front of her prison outfit to pull her on top of her injured hand. Quatre held her nose to nose and said in a very threatening voice that made shivers go down Duo's back, "He isn't the insane one." He let go of her and marched back out of the room leaving a very stunned bad person behind. Wufei guided Duo out after Quatre as Heero and Trowa were left to continue to treat the prisoner.

"We can never leave you alone with a prisoner again!" Wufei yelled once the door was shut and they continued their walk toward Une's office. The Chinese man didn't even knock before bursting in and shoving the American through. Quatre followed more sedately and almost giddily behind them.

"He did it," Quatre informed Une as they shut the door to give them privacy.

"Did what?" Wufei and Duo asked at the same time. They looked at each other and then over at Quatre and Une who were both now behind the desk.

"You know the answer to the antidote, Duo. She said so while you were screaming at her. Hitting her…" Quatre said.

"Hitting her?!" Une interrupted, but Quatre continued as if no one had talked.

"…was probably not needed, though." Quatre shrugged.

Duo rubbed his hand where his knuckles stung a bit from the force of the punch. He then started to rub against his cross, the bad habit continued even though some of his memories were returning slowly. He had it in his brain and now he needed to pull it out? He had tried for months to get his memories back. The adrenaline was started to wane from his system a small headache was pulling from the back of his head. He shook his head and looked down at his tennis shoes.

"He can't remember," Wufei stated to everyone, "We need to find it another way." Duo continued to shake his head as his headache continued to rise.

"Duo?"

"Maxwell?"

The world spun. He could hear them, but suddenly his voice was gone. 'This is going to hurt,' he thought as his vision blacked out and he felt his body crumple to the floor. Arms had tried to steady him, but his weight overwhelmed them too suddenly. 'Really hurt,' was his last thought as his world turned into a massive exploding headache and then blank.

~*~Ma~*~

He looked around at the field he was suddenly standing in. "Where am I?" he asked as the wind blew gently against his body. His hair was loose and brushing along his shoulders.

"It doesn't matter," his own voice came to his ears, but he hadn't spoken them. He turned around to see a version of himself standing against the wind. His hair was braided in its long pleat and was waving around. In the other self's hands were two crosses and around his shoulders was a brown cloak that was torn and ratted. It was whipped around as the wind grew against them both.

"What does matter?" he asked the cloaked mirror.

"The crosses," the boy said gently as he smiled brightly and then it shifted into a manic smirk. "All that matters is the crosses."

The wind continued to beat against them both as the mirrored boy disappeared by melting down into the field of flowers. "My brain is freaky," Duo decided right then and there. He sat down against the ground and decided that now was probably a good time to wake up. He really needed Quatre's brain on this one. He was pretty sure Quatre would tell him it meant something significant and it wasn't just that he had finally gone insane.

The sky went black, the wind stopped and Duo felt his body start to float once again into a nothingness.

~*~Tsuzuku~*~

23: Chapter Twenty-Three

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing and I have NOTHING against the Catholic church or religion (and I am also not Catholic myself, so I'm sorry if I offended anyone.)

Chapter Twenty-three

He woke up to a sudden pain in his lower arm. "OW! What the hell!?" he yelled as he pulled his arm to his chest to rub the assaulted area.

"He's awake and responsive," he heard in almost a monotone voice. He then heard Quatre start to giggle next to his head. All around him were the four other pilots and Une all sitting on the floor. His first thought was that they all must have been very worried for him as Quatre's laughter subsided.

"That was cruel and unusual punishment, Trowa!" Duo said as Heero started to help him sit up. He looked around more and saw that he was still in the office. "How long was I out?"

"About twenty minutes," Heero said. They held him to a sitting position and didn't let him move any further off the cold tiles.

"What happened Maxwell?" Wufei demanded as he crossed his arms over his Preventers uniform.

Duo rubbed his head for a second and thought back to his dream. What had happened? "The cross…" he mumbled and his hand came around the cross still dangling from his neck. Quickly he undid the chain and held it out to Wufei. "This is what happened! It's on here! The formula for the antidote!" he yelled. He scrambled to his feet even with the protests coming from Quatre. He rushed over to the tablet sitting on top of Une's desk and pushed the button to turn it on.

"That's locked!" Une yelled as she went to get to his side. He smirked and held up an unlocked screen to show her it wasn't locked anymore. "Why am I not surprised?" she asked herself as she threw her hands into the air. "Fine, show us how this works," she crossed her arms in a good imitation of her senior agent, Chang.

Quickly Duo started to slide his fingers across the screen and downloaded a program into the memory. "C'mon," he said impatiently as it finally started up and a blank white screen was presented. He took the cross and laid it directly into the center of the tablet. Then carefully he tapped into the right corner of the screen and the display started to form words, formulas, and pictures. "I stole this information from the real bad guy, and I was trying to get it here to you all before they rolled it out," he said as it continued to scroll. "Alecia isn't our main dude. She is a lacky and a horrible person, but we have a bigger fish," he snickered here, "to fry." Everyone gave him a confused and slightly concerned look. "Oh never mind. It's Catholic humor. You'll understand soon enough." As soon as the download was finished he started to tap above the cross in a rhythm the others couldn't comprehend. "There, now it's all saved onto the tablet," he brought his head up and smiled at his audience.

With a large grin he pulled the cross off and put it back around his neck. He handed the tablet over to Lady Une, "Just use your regular word processor to open the files. You can also email them to every scientist who wants a hand in saving the world."

Then he turned to everyone else, "Today's Sunday. We are so being blasphemous right now. We need to go and repent. I have the perfect place!"

~*~Ma~*~

"Take this left coming up at the light and it's on the right side," Duo directed Wufei down the street passed the busy traffic. They stopped in front of a large cathedral made of brick. High on top was a large cross that looked like the gold one his mirror boy dream. "And this looks like the right place. Everyone ready to hear some confessions?"

"I thought we're supposed to give the confessions, Maxwell," Wufei said as they all left the small car.

Duo shook his head, "Oh, usually, but we have to catch the bad guy first… anyone bring Hell fire with them?" The other four stopped to stare at him again and Quatre giggled. "Okay, fine! Did everyone bring their weapons and badges?" Quatre couldn't hold it anymore as the other three seemed to be losing patience with their friend. He burst out laughing and pulled Duo up the steps to the front two story large double doors.

"I think Duo would be the first one to burn up out of all of us," Heero said in his monotone way. Trowa laughed and Duo joined Quatre is his own gaffaws. They were all seemingly in light spirits as they entered the large prayer room. Duo didn't seem to be on guard and this relaxed the others. The ceiling was covered in a beautiful mural of pictures depicting scenes from the Holy Bible. It was five stories tall and large stained glass windows with the saints shone the sunlight through to create wonderful light patterns around the multi-pathed pews that were made out of a nice wood. Kneeling on the top step in front of an altar with a smaller replica of the large cross outside was the old gray haired priest in prayer.

"Father Brennon," Duo called out. "You are under arrest for connection to terrorism." The old man stood up from his spot and turned around to face them all.

"You have your memories back… or did Alecia finally give in to whatever sick thing you Gundam pilots call justice?" the dark brown eyes of the man were weathered, but still held steel as he marched down the pulpet to the face them square. "Suffer the little children…" he started to say before Duo cut him off.

"The parable holds that only the poor can enter heaven freely due to not having envy and the poor children are allowed to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven because they are pure. You need to brush up on your Bible, sir," Duo grabbed the man's robed arm and turned him around as Heero pulled out the cuffs. "And your Latin sucks, by the way!"

Duo stood in the center of the cathedral as Heero and Trowa brought the priest out of the front double doors to the waiting preventer's cop car that had shown up behind their own civilian one. Quatre and Wufei watched as Duo turned back toward the altar. "Wufei, there are boxes of the antidote down in the basement. The door to access it is on the left behind the pulpit."

He then knelt down onto the carpet and bowed his head. Wufei went down a line of pews to get to the outside of the church wall so as not to interrupt Duo in his place of worship. Quatre put a hand onto the smaller boy's back in support and then left also through the front doors of the church.

Alone in the chapel Duo whispered, "Forgive me Father…"

~*~Tsuzuku~*~

24: Chapter Twenty-Four

Blank Slate

France Gamble

Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing… *sniffles*

Chapter Twenty -Four

Duo was making himself a tuna and celery sandwich when the others came into the break room. He generously gestured to his food asking if they'd like one, but they all declined in their own ways. Shrugging his shoulders he sat down with them at a large circular table. "The last of the antidote left the tarmac about fifteen minutes ago," Quatre informed them all.

"We found enough antidote to convict the priest," Wufei said in answer. Duo snorted and swallowed his large bite, "FAKE priest." Wufei waved his hand and nodded to concede the man had definitely been an imposter. "We can only link Alecia Grahm into all of this because she confessed, but now she is going against what she said. She has also lawyered up, and they are pressing for confession under duress." All of them made a small noise to show what they thought of that idea.

"We are making what we need of the antidote now that we have a sample batch to compare it to, as well," Trowa said after a moment of silence. Duo took another large bite of his sandwich and mumbled something.

"Oh for the love of the Earth, chew and swallow before talking, Maxwell!" Wufei yelled as he turned away from the burnet. Duo started to choke and cough and finally was able to get down what he had taken.

"I said, I'm glad I finally had it figured out… What was the casualty count?" he turned to Heero.

The Japanese boy said in a quiet, but still firm voice, "There were almost 500 dead last we checked. This is all in the British region, though. Here in the United States we haven't lost anyone." The unsaid 'yet' hung in the air as they knew the first batch of antidote went straight to Britain to stop the dying children from continuing. Their new batches would be ready soon, but they didn't know how fast the disease could spread in some people and it was a give and take on how long the fever rose to kill certain kids.

"Do you have all of your memories back?" Quatre asked after they were brooding for a while on the innocent children. Duo had taken another bite of his meal so he started off with nodding, and then decided to shake his head, and then rock it side to side and finally just level it all off with an indecisive shrug.

"That was an interesting display of charades," Wufei said.

"Very expressive," Trowa added. Heero finished it all off with, "And he still answered." Quatre laughed as Duo finished the last of his food and stuck his tongue out at them all like a little child.

"I have a lot of them back," Duo finally said. He used a napkin to wipe his hands and face. They all stared at him, "You want me to elaborate?"

"We want to know where you were before you lost your memories," Wufei informed him.

"It would be helpful to know how you came across Brennon and Grahm," Heero added.

Duo sat for a minute and studied the grains in the wood table. "After the party settled down I went to Spain for a few weeks. It's a large Catholic area, and I thought I could blend in there well and maybe get into one of the churches. It wasn't so easy, though. After almost three weeks I came to this area. I went to the Cathedral and met with Father O'Neil. He was a bit on the older side, and he at first mistook me for being a kid, but I convinced him I wasn't and we got along great. I worked in the church doing things that would usually cost money to get done. In repayment I was given a small room up in the Priest's house on the grounds in the backyard. Many nights Father O'Neil would sleep in his office in the Cathedral, so when he didn't come home I didn't panic.

"One day, though, while I was setting up for morning Mass another priest came in to help me. He was surprised to see me, and when I asked where Father O'Neil was, he told me that O'Neil had been sent to another church during the night due to an illness of another priest. It was almost a good lie, and at first I was inclined to believe it, until about three days later during Latin Mass he mispronounced a ton of words. The congregation didn't catch it, but we're all very fluent in many languages and a good priest knows his Latin."

"You figured he wasn't a real priest when he didn't speak Latin?" Quatre asked.

"It's like if an Imam didn't know Arabic, Q-man," Duo shrugged. "Anyway, I decided to do some snooping around to figure out what was going on. He hadn't been there for a month before I found the information on his computer about the virus and the antidote. At first I was confused about it all. I was starting to get worried for Father O'Neil not showing back up, and everything was clicking into the wrong places in my brain. It was another week before I went down to the basement and saw the completed antidote in crates and Brennon and Alecia having a chat over the boxes.

I ran back to my room to pack my things so I could find you guys or just get to a Preventer station as fast as possible. I never made it out of the room. I don't know what they got me with, but it must have been the same stuff they shot me with later when they had grabbed Sam. Waking up hurt like a… uh, female dog," he shifted his gaze to Quatre's and continued, "and I realized I was being tortured by Alecia and some wonderful henchmen. I think they could have been the same guys that hurt Sam, but it's all still a bit foggy.

I don't know how long they held me, but at one point they frantically tried to get me moved to another location. The back door, though, wasn't locked and I was able to shimmy my way from my ropes. I remember thinking that the ground was going to hurt as I went out head first, but I don't remember the pain." He sat back and looked up at the ceiling. "Father O'Neil is dead, huh?"

Wufei nodded, "We found him behind the crates in the basement. He was released to the church for a proper burial."

"Why did you stop taking the pills?" Heero asked after a short silence in honor of the priest.

Duo sighed, "I took them for the first four months I was there, but when Brennon showed up he took me as a kid. I knew something was off with him, so to keep myself from getting bigger as fast as the pills were working, I just stopped taking them. I was going to continue after I reported Brennon for being a fake, but… well, it's difficult to take something like that when you don't even remember you need them." He rolled his eyes and then looked over at the machines before getting up to get a cola from one of them. "Being an adult, though, means I can't be told to not drink or eat shit foods!"

"Duo!" Quatre scolded. The burnet shrunk his head down into his shoulders.

"It's not a bad word, Q! I swear it is useful!" Duo defended himself as he sat down with his caffeine and sugar filled drink. Wufei made a face at his selection and the American stuck his tongue out at his friend.

"Cussing is for the uneducated and inarticulate. You are far from being either of those," Quatre said as he also stood up to get a water from a machine.

"He certainly doesn't ever shut up," Wufei added.

"Shove it, Wuffles," Duo said before drinking a swig. He then looked over at his blond friend, "Can we throw a party?"

"His A.D.D. has returned," Trowa said in his calm voice. Heero shook his head and gave a small smile to show his amusement. Duo ignored them and waited for Quatre's answer.

"Sure. I think we deserve to have a party," Quatre said before taking a drink of his water and smiling at Duo who was showing his excitement by hooting and hollering while throwing his arms around in the air.

~*~Ma~*~

There was cakes, soda machines, water coolers, a fruit bar, and meat and cheese plates. All around Duo was a beautiful display of food and delights. He held back, though, as guests arrived through the doors to the mansion that Quatre had officially given to him just the day before. Duo had argued about it, of course. He wanted to pay for the place or maybe just rent it from his friend, but Quatre insisted and in the end Duo's arguments didn't hold water. ("Did Quatre just out-talk Duo?" Trowa asked. Wufei answered, "We are in a lot of trouble.")

Duo greeted everyone as they came in and he felt his heart fill with a joy he had lost when he had had to leave each of these people for the next foster home. Mrs. Snow showed up first and Duo had hugged her without thinking about it. As more and more people showed up he felt overwhelmed a bit, but happy inside.

"I'm glad you know who you are now," Mama Snow said as they were talking over a fruit kabob.

"Can I still… uh, can I still have you as, well…" Duo didn't know how to phrase it without sounding like a creepy guy.

"Duo, I would very much still want you for a son," Mrs. Snow pulled the boy into a hug. "And at least with you being seventeen, you can drive to see me!" He laughed against her shoulder.

"The scary thought is someone gave him that license," Wufei said from behind them.

"Don't mind him, Mama Snow, he has ring-worm and it's really itchy," Duo informed his foster mother.

"Are you ever going to grow up, Maxwell?" Wufei asked as he crossed his arms in irritation.

Duo put a finger against his chin and looked up in mock contemplation. "Nope! This is my Neverland and I will never grow up!" he declared. He ran from a now seething Wufei Chang and went to hide in the corner by the soda machines. He looked around as he sipped on a glass of coke-a-cola. Jenna, Starr and Bob were talking with Mama Snow and Quatre. Kennan, Kenre, Rosemary and Ashley were all bent over a table while Heero showed them something on his computer to get a formula for something Duo wasn't caring about at the moment. Jessi and Lep were trying to convince Trowa to kidnap them into the circus. Wufei was eating from the fruit bar on the other side of the room and eyeing the braided teen back.

As Duo was about to join one of the groups chatting when a woman came through the front door looking hesitant. It was Sam's mom and Duo felt his heart drop at the sight of her. She had bags under her eyes and her hair was a bit stringy from lack of care. She had done a good job putting on make-up to hide it all, but even her shoulders drooped a bit low. It was hard to see for him, but he had invited them to the party because Sam was still a great friend to him. He walked up to her and looked down at the floor, "I'm so sorry I put him in danger like that."

She grabbed him into a fierce hug, "You all saved him!" She breathed in trying to hold her tears back. "He will be released from the hospital next month. The doctors say he is doing wonderful and he loves that you call him every day." She pulled back and smiled at him. He smiled back and brought her around the room to introduce her to everyone.

As everyone was having a lot of fun and enjoying the party, Duo turned to the door as another person, the final person, arrived. "Chia!" he yelled out and ran toward the young child being wheeled in by his new social worker. The little boy smiled brightly and waved one of his hands. Duo stopped in front of the wheel chair and lowered himself down to about eye level, "How are you holding up, little buddy?"

"I wish I could play soccer again," Chia admitted. He blushed a bit and turned to look at his hands and away from the violet eyes.

"We'll get right on that, then!" Duo said as he gave the boy's shoulder a light squeeze. He then stood up and faced the lady, "Thanks Melissa."

"You take good care of him, Mr. Maxwell, or I'll flog you myself," Melissa pushed a strand of hair back behind her ear and the rest of her high blond ponytail shook a bit with action. It was such an innocent gesture that Duo didn't doubt the lady would whip him if something happened to one of her charges. No one was that innocent, and the gesture reminded him a bit of Releena Peacecraft.

"I wouldn't hurt him," Duo promised.

Chia looked up at the lady still holding the handles to his chair, "When are you going to come and get me?" Duo looked down at him and then back at the state's lady.

"You didn't tell him?" he asked with shock.

"I thought it best that you told him," she smiled and walked away leaving a confused Chia.

"Chia, bud, this is your home now! We'll be brothers forever now!" Duo said happily. Chia's face brightened fast and a brilliant smile over took him. The other people in the room couldn't help but smile and some even giggled a bit at the excitement that the little boy shown. Duo grabbed onto the wheel chair and brought the boy around to mingle with all of their friends.

After the whole afternoon slipped by people started to leave and promised to not stay away for long. Mama Snow hugged Duo and then hugged Chia and promised to be back later in the week to play with them both. Mall trips, circus trips, and study dates were all promised. When everyone was gone except for the pilots and their new little brother, Duo disappeared into one of the many doors. He returned with a broom handle duct taped to a child sized cleat shoe.

"What is that?" Wufei ask as Duo handed the handle to the little one in the chair.

"His foot to play soccer with!" Duo said happily. "I made it last night. The basketball court is going to be converted tomorrow with new lines for goals. We're getting an electric chair tomorrow too. Now we have an even amount of players, we are so going to play soccer next weekend!"

Chia started sobbing and Duo leaned down quickly to embrace him into a hug. "What's the matter?" Duo asked.

"I don't know," the little boy cried, "I've never been this happy before, but I can't stop crying."

Quatre came forward to hug him as well, "Tears of joy. That is what they are called." They held the little Chinese boy until all of his tears were spent. Then they set about cheering him up.

"I don't play soccer," Wufei said sternly as he crossed his arms when they started picking teams. Quatre gave a disapproving look and Trowa pointed to the boy stuck in a wheel chair for the rest of his life. Heero didn't seem to change his demeanor at all, but Wufei knew he was also siding with the others.

Chia smiled brightly, though, "Duo, I have an idea!" He motioned for Duo to come over to him and started to whisper into his ear. As he was told the idea, Duo's face turned into a mischievous grin and then he locked eyes with Wufei. He pulled away from his little brother and said, "That is brilliant!"

Wufei paled, "Oh no, we have two of them!"

~*~KANZEN'NA~*~

I dedicate this story to my sister, Kier: 1987-2009. She was the only reason I ever wrote and I know she would have loved this one too!