Warnings: AU, TWT, angst, shonen ai, some language, mentions of yaoi.

Author's Notes: My muses spent a LONG time vacationing with Shira's muses. Duo and Wufei finally decided to come back and they brought with them the inclination to write this little fic start to finish. Don't blame me!

Main Pairing: 2+5

Dedication: This fic is dedicated to Shira for sending my muses back to me and to Rhina for allowing me to care about her. The part of Vow is written in memory of Patches.

Dark Clouds and Silver
A Gundam Wing Fic
By: Yuuki Miyaka
Chapter Eight

Wufei all but leapt out of bed, staring at the painting of Duo he'd completed while the man was still there, Duo's slender form stretched out on the living room couch. He'd been adding the final touches when Duo prodded him about his childhood. Duo had been looking at it when he mentioned that Wufei should do a self-portrait. It captured the lazy, sensualistic grace perfectly. Wufei stared at it and wanted to weep at what he'd lost, what he'd allowed himself to lose.

"I," he announced to Vow quietly, "am a fool. But I am about to be a very drunk fool." The dream had been too much. He'd never realized, he reflected as he searched for the bottle of brandy he liked to use sometimes for cooking, that nightmares about Duo could hurt worse than nightmares of the war. But they served to intensify the loneliness within him until it seemed like a black hole pulling him inward. Soon, there would be nothing left but the shell, and he would be grateful for the lack of anything. No innards meant no emotion. No emotion meant no loneliness. No loneliness meant no pain.

Wufei poured himself a VERY generous glass of the brandy, sat down at the chessboard, and decided that he was a miserable idiot. And then he took a gulp of the amber liquid, letting it wash all other thought away.

It took one hangover to convince Wufei that he NEVER wanted to get drunk again. He hadn't liked the feeling of not being in control, but even worse was the feeling that someone had pulled his head off of his shoulders and was playing speed-golf with it. And every single yowl of Vow's had only added to his misery. So he stared up at the picture, which seemed to smirk down at him as though keeping all of his secrets inside it's subject's soul, and swore that he would be miserable, but he would not be miserable and drunk again.

Amazingly, the oath lasted. Three and a half months passed like that, with Wufei confiding all of his miseries either to Vow or to the dream-image of Duo. It was during those confessions that he came to realize just how much Duo had helped him, just how much the friendship had meant. More than anything else, Duo had become a sounding board for everything. And as he realized that over the months, he realized something else as well. If Duo never came back, Wufei would be grateful for the time they'd spent together. He could think of no-one else whose companionship he'd valued so much, with the possible exception of Meiran. And he'd only noticed how he felt about her posthumously.

When the period of understanding finally came to a close three and a half months after Wufei'd gotten drunk, he recalled Duo's words. "Let me go," the chestnut-haired man had pleaded, and Wufei finally understood that he'd never let Duo go. That was what brought him to the campsite they'd visited so very long ago, Vow tucked gently into her carry-case and a sheet of drawing paper with a sketch on it the only real things he'd brought other than food. He wouldn't stay longer than overnight, just long enough to complete the task he'd set for himself, the task that would show him that he COULD let go of Duo. Forever, if need be.

With one hand firmly clutching the golden cross that Duo had entrusted to him, collateral against his ultimate return, Wufei held the paper before his eyes. The sketch solidified into a picture of Duo, long tresses of hair brushing gently around his shoulders and arms, flowing and loose. The priest's outfit was on, that smirk of a grin that told so many secrets a comfortable smile on Duo's face. In one hand, he clutched the pocket-watch locket Wufei had given him. The other was outstretched toward the viewer, pleading with Wufei to join him. The sable-eyed man shivered once, then held the paper over the flame, allowing it to catch fire and burn. When the fire got too close to his own fingers, Wufei dropped the sheet into the conflagration and stared as it crumpled and turned to ash. It was time to let go, before he got any more hurt than he already was.

He returned the next day, Vow's case in one hand and the keys in another, all his camping gear waiting in the car for when he was ready to get them again. He froze as he looked up from choosing the right key for the top lock, the figure on his doorstep stopping him cold. The figure looked up, flashed a cheeky grin, then rose slowly. "You took your sweet time getting home. I've been here since sun-up."

Duo's words, so casual and amused, startled Wufei out of his reverie. The black-haired man stepped up to the door, hastily opening it and ushering his surprising but always welcome guest in. "I didn't realize you'd be arriving today or I would have come earlier. Have you graduated seminary?"

The question was merely a preliminary to simple conversation, Wufei told himself as he set Vow's carrier down and let her out. She sniffed daintily at Duo twice, then wound around his ankles briefly before heading to her litterbox and food bowl. Duo watched her go, then grinned. "Beautiful cat. I changed my mind halfway through."

The lightning-quick changes in conversation confused Wufei briefly before he put the two sentences into the proper order for him. He blinked, then stared at Duo. "Why did you change your mind, precisely?" The words were slow, cautious. He'd just let Duo go and he was about to be sucked back into the addiction that came with spending time with the free-soul known as Duo Maxwell.

Duo stepped forward, swallowing once. Nervousness seeped into the deep indigo-violet pools that were his eyes, radiated from every line in his body. He reached a trembling hand up, gently brushing Wufei's cheek. "Because of you, Wufei. I can't be happy in seminary. I can't be happy as a priest. I can only be happy here."

"Why?" Wufei asked shakily, hands rising of their own accord to rest on Duo's shoulders. They stared at each other from mere inches away, the air fraught with the tension of love unspoken. And then Wufei pulled back, slipping the cross he'd kept on a chain around his neck out from under his clothing. Duo smiled at the sight of it, tracing it's straight lines with a feathersoft fingertip. And then he was in Wufei's arms, hugging the man so tightly that Wufei could barely breathe.

If I die right now, Wufei thought giddily, I will be forever grateful for this moment. But he didn't die, and the hug eventually ended, and they stepped just far enough back to talk. "You're my grounding, Wufei," Duo explained, his eyes tracing Wufei's face slowly, as though memorizing everything he saw. "Without you, I'm not a free spirit. I'm a flighty airhead."

Wufei shook his head. "Not true. I've seen how you act. You're more intelligent than the rest of us put together."

Duo nodded, conceding the point slowly. "But . . . I don't feel grounded. I feel as if my soul is slowly disappearing into the air, as if the hot air that keeps me afloat is cooling and I have no way to secure myself for the fall that's coming. I'm scared of that fall, Wufei. If you keep me grounded, then I'll never fall. At least . . . I'll never fall out of love with you."

It took several seconds for what Duo had said to penetrate Wufei's brain. When it finally registered, his eyes widened and he stared at Duo incredulously. "You . . . love me?" he eventually asked, much to Duo's amusement. Duo nodded, and was pulled into a sweet and not entirely chaste kiss. "Ancestors, Duo, I've been praying you'd come back to me and say that. I've loved you since . . . since . . . I don't even KNOW how long I've loved you anymore."

Duo smiled. "I'd . . . I'd like to take things slowly. This is kinda new to both of us, and I'd like it to be comfortable before we proceed to the next step." Wufei agreed eagerly. For Duo . . . anything.

"Just promise me one thing, Duo." Wufei's request surprised Duo, but the American smiled agreement, certain he could willingly do anything Wufei asked.

"Always, ALWAYS, come back to me."

Dark clouds once covered Wufei's entire world, so thick and so black that he couldn't see the silver tinging them, promising happiness. Those clouds kept their promise of happiness by granting it to him in the form of one day that would ultimately change his entire life. His wedding day. He married Duo in a black tuxedo with silver trim. Duo loved those colors for, as he said, "Every dark cloud has its silver. You just gotta wait to see it, is all."