[fic] Quartz
Just wrote this for the gw500 prompt "rock". I'm not sure why my brain went right to drugs, but it does that a lot. I'm on a gritty kick right now, I guess!
Title: Quartz
Pairing: none
Warnings: drug use, language, episode zero Duo
It was raining with the sun out again.
Duo, pressed against the window, tried to shut the pane against the sudden storm, but succeeded only in deepening the wide crack in the yellowed glass. He didn't risk a second try, lest he shatter the damn thing and ruin his only protection against the elements. Fucking weather controls must have been going haywire again. Everything was a mess on this colony, right down to its climate.
He turned away from the window and took a look around his room. No, not his room, he reminded himself. He was homeless again. His room was now a pile of ash on the ground.
This room belonged to a guy who smoked in the alley where Duo liked to ply his trade, behind the strip joint where the guy worked. He was somewhere in the vicinity of eighteen and he had complimented Duo on his pickpocket technique. That had led to a conversation which had ended with an invitation to stay at his place as long as Duo wanted, which was looking to be a long time indeed.
The guy--Ax, he called himself-- was in the center of the room, surrounded by three people, all sitting on the floor. The girl, whose name he didn't remember, had something in her hands, a small glass tube, rounded at one end, like a thermometer. She pulled something out of her pocket, a small clear bag, and shook its contents out into her hand. Duo didn't have to see it to know what it was, what they were doing. Whenever Ax wasn't at his job at the strip club, he was doing this with a rotating cast of participants. Duo had seen those small, milky-white rocks held in the palms of more people than he could count, seen them drop them into the glass and hold a lighter, a match, a burning sheet of paper, whatever they could find to the end, and close their mouths over the hole at the top and suck in that cloudy thick smoke. This was the third time he'd seen the pipe brought out this afternoon alone, and the air already hung acrid and dense with the smell of the smoke, like burning plastic, like chemicals that melted brick and steel and people. It was the same smell. It was the smell of all things terrible.
Ax looked up, saw him watching them from the window, the young boy with no home. He held the pipe up, a curl of smoke drifting over its lip.
“Duo, you want a hit?”
He couldn't blame them for it. It did what sleep couldn't, what time could only manage at a fraction of the speed. It made you forget. Forget where they were (a shithole of a colony), forget who (the collateral damage in a war of attrition), forget when (the heralded apocalypse.) It turned you gaunt and yellowed, it made your teeth fall out and your hair thin to balding, but really, it was a small price to pay for the incredible gift to forget it all existed.
It was a tempting offer to take.
“Duo?” Ax said again, gesturing with the pipe.
The room stank of polyurethane, of chemicals aflame, of a church in burning pieces. It stank of memories he'd rather forget.
He could end it here.
“Hey, kid, you want some or not?”
Duo shoved off the window ledge. Damn rain in the sunlight. He hated walking in that shit.
“No thanks.”
He made his way to the door. Ax merely shrugged and lit the pipe again. Duo turned and walked out of the room, heading for the street.
Let them forget. Let them have that mercy. He'd remember for them. He would not allow himself to forget who was to blame for it all, no matter how much he might want to.
He owed the dead and the willfully dying alike that much.
He turned off down the sidewalk and set off in search of the next place to call home.
Title: Quartz
Pairing: none
Warnings: drug use, language, episode zero Duo
It was raining with the sun out again.
Duo, pressed against the window, tried to shut the pane against the sudden storm, but succeeded only in deepening the wide crack in the yellowed glass. He didn't risk a second try, lest he shatter the damn thing and ruin his only protection against the elements. Fucking weather controls must have been going haywire again. Everything was a mess on this colony, right down to its climate.
He turned away from the window and took a look around his room. No, not his room, he reminded himself. He was homeless again. His room was now a pile of ash on the ground.
This room belonged to a guy who smoked in the alley where Duo liked to ply his trade, behind the strip joint where the guy worked. He was somewhere in the vicinity of eighteen and he had complimented Duo on his pickpocket technique. That had led to a conversation which had ended with an invitation to stay at his place as long as Duo wanted, which was looking to be a long time indeed.
The guy--Ax, he called himself-- was in the center of the room, surrounded by three people, all sitting on the floor. The girl, whose name he didn't remember, had something in her hands, a small glass tube, rounded at one end, like a thermometer. She pulled something out of her pocket, a small clear bag, and shook its contents out into her hand. Duo didn't have to see it to know what it was, what they were doing. Whenever Ax wasn't at his job at the strip club, he was doing this with a rotating cast of participants. Duo had seen those small, milky-white rocks held in the palms of more people than he could count, seen them drop them into the glass and hold a lighter, a match, a burning sheet of paper, whatever they could find to the end, and close their mouths over the hole at the top and suck in that cloudy thick smoke. This was the third time he'd seen the pipe brought out this afternoon alone, and the air already hung acrid and dense with the smell of the smoke, like burning plastic, like chemicals that melted brick and steel and people. It was the same smell. It was the smell of all things terrible.
Ax looked up, saw him watching them from the window, the young boy with no home. He held the pipe up, a curl of smoke drifting over its lip.
“Duo, you want a hit?”
He couldn't blame them for it. It did what sleep couldn't, what time could only manage at a fraction of the speed. It made you forget. Forget where they were (a shithole of a colony), forget who (the collateral damage in a war of attrition), forget when (the heralded apocalypse.) It turned you gaunt and yellowed, it made your teeth fall out and your hair thin to balding, but really, it was a small price to pay for the incredible gift to forget it all existed.
It was a tempting offer to take.
“Duo?” Ax said again, gesturing with the pipe.
The room stank of polyurethane, of chemicals aflame, of a church in burning pieces. It stank of memories he'd rather forget.
He could end it here.
“Hey, kid, you want some or not?”
Duo shoved off the window ledge. Damn rain in the sunlight. He hated walking in that shit.
“No thanks.”
He made his way to the door. Ax merely shrugged and lit the pipe again. Duo turned and walked out of the room, heading for the street.
Let them forget. Let them have that mercy. He'd remember for them. He would not allow himself to forget who was to blame for it all, no matter how much he might want to.
He owed the dead and the willfully dying alike that much.
He turned off down the sidewalk and set off in search of the next place to call home.