02 - [open]

[stoicperfection]

Heero was hunched over a table, a dissembled pistol lay in pieces on top of the table in the common area. There wasn't much light to work by, given the time of day he was working, but he knew the mechanics of a gun like the back of his hand. Fixing the jam would be no problem and it needed a good cleaning anyway.

It had been days since the last time Heero had slept. With the nightmares and things everyone were experiencing, he wasn't going to take a chance and be forced to go through the same. Nightmares drawn up from memories were the last thing he wanted to experience, especially since he was now sharing a room with two other people. For the time being he flat out refused to sleep, using every bit of his training to stay awake and finding things to do. Exploring, tinkering with a pistol, training, and other things. However, it was getting to the point that pretty soon he was going to have to nod off for a bit. He couldn't keep going at this rate.

Occasionally he stopped, lifting his head and looking around the common room for other people. After being attacked and having Duo nearly try to kill him, he was on a heightened guard. No one was awake, but that didn't mean the shadows wouldn't come back for him. Hell, maybe his attacker would like to go for a second try with him. 


((ooc: It's the middle of the night and Heero is busy maintaining a weapon. Feel free to sit with and bother him.))

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[tophbeifong]

"Uaaaaaaaaagh," Toph yawned, stretching her hands over her head as she shuffled in to the room. She slapped a hand to her forehead and slid it down her face. This place was really messing with her sleep schedule and she was waking up at all weird times. She was sure her room mates loved that.

The poor room mates. Between Quatre's hair-trigger reflex to wake up at the slightest of movements, and Ratchet's great big catch-every-noise-you-make ears, Toph was positive she was really annoying to both of them. Instead of tossing and turning, trying to get back to sleep, she decided to head out and let them rest and maybe try to fall asleep at a table or something.

The darkness wasn't even an issue for Toph. She fetched herself a drink of water and made it over to the tables without incident. She paused, lifting her head. She'd noticed Heero around, maybe once or twice. Beyond that, he was there a few nights prior when Duo had his break down. She hadn't really had a chance to talk to him, despite being in a slough of mutual friends.

With that thought in mind, she approached him. She could sense something on the table when she touched it, so when she sat, she made sure to leave him enough play room and sat her cup at the end, just in front of her.

"Hi," she greeted after a moment of silence. "So I'm not the only one having trouble sleeping."

[stoicperfection]

Heero glanced up from his work for a moment. "I'm trying not to sleep." He looked back down at his gun, using the remaining scraps of the tank top he came to the castle with to give the pistol parts a good wipe down. They needed it desperately and it wasn't like the cloth could really be used for anything else.

"Having nightmares?" It seemed to be the most obvious reason for her not to be asleep this time of night. Everyone else that he knew seemed to be having the same problem.

[tophbeifong]

Trying not to sleep? That was a new one she hadn't heard yet. She yawned again before answering.

"Nu uh," she laid a hand flat on the table to watch him work.

Then again... "... actually I don't know. I don't think so, but I can't tell."

Her dreams were different than other peoples' dreams. Nightmares typically
manifested themselves as sensations that became too real and woke her up, but dissipate just as soon as she regained consciousness. It was hard to pin anything on nightmares with the way her dreams worked.
"Didn't think of that. Makes sense I guess. I was just out here to keep fromdisturbing my roommates.

"What are you doing staying up? You'll just get more tired until it's too hard to stay awake, and even harder to wake up."

[stoicperfection]

"Hn." Heero knew all to well about the roommate situation, mostly because he was one of those roommates that would wake at the slightest sound. As for the rest of his roommates, he didn't know how they slept and he didn't care to know either. very little of this time was actually spent in that room.

"I'm used to it." It was the best reason he could come up with without going into all the details. There were multiple reasons he was good at resisting sleep.

He set the cloth down and began reassembling the gun, looking up at Toph as she watched him.

[tophbeifong]

"Yeah, Quatre and Duo say the same thing."

She sounded bored, or tired, and rested her head in her hand.

"Seems like nobody sleeps anymore."

What had Duo called that... Thing? A gun? Something like that. More technology mumbo jumbo that she could hardly keep up with, but she couldn't deny a slight interest in it all. She was quiet as she sipped her water. He probably liked his concentration.

[stoicperfection]

He did, probably more than he cared to admit. Not this gun of course. The one that was still back home.

"They would. We were all trained alike." At least his versions of them were. From talking to Duo, he gathered that things pretty much stayed the same up until a certain point and then split.

It wasn't much longer before he had the thing assembled, obviously quite skilled to have done it as quick as he did.

"It's too risky to sleep right now."

[tophbeifong]

Trained? "Oh yeah, something about a war, right? Fighting someone down on the earth because they threatened life on the moon? Or... No, he said colonies... Right?"

See? She could keep up.

""If you feel unsafe, you can go have my bed. Between Fuzz Face's ears that hear everything and Quatre, nothing will get close to you unnoticed."

[herotherhalf]

He woke as soon as the night fell and he emerged from his room. He was hungry again, the strain of going two weeks without a blood meal starting to strain on him. He imagined he'd start getting sloppy soon enough, or he'd start having to eat the rats and the birds around here. And oh, but he had. Three rats, but that wasn't suitable, nor was it enough to satiate him.

But he was patient. He was cool headed, more so than any of his primitive peons. However, the smell of Heero, the smell of his flesh and blood? He yearned for another taste, but not yet. He'd have to find someone else to take advantage of.

Instead, he sat at the table across from the boy who was not much older than he was when he was turned.

[stoicperfection]

That odd sensation returned when Harth decided to sit across from him. Heero had felt it a few days prior when they were being watched by him from across the common room. He didn't understand why he was feeling it, only that he did whenever Harth was near him.

He didn't look up from the parts on the table, using a small piece of material from his tanktop to clean them. However, he did keep his other senses open just in case this feeling turned out to mean danger.

[herotherhalf]

"What's that you're doing." Harth asked, settling against his elbows on the table as other people tended to do. He would be going out to explore for a while tonight, but first?

He didn't mind speaking to Heero at all, but all of that tension he was feeling from the boy? Made sense given what he saw in Quatre's dream.

[stoicperfection]

"Maintenance." Harth wasn't going to get more than one word answers from him. Not yet. He should consider himself lucky he was even getting a response.

Setting down the last piece and cloth, he began to deftly reassemble everything. This was something he could do in his sleep. Caring for a weapon was one of the first things Odin taught him.

[herotherhalf]

He watched, vaguely aware of the type of weapon Heero had, and acutely aware that it did nothing to him. It tore into his flesh, but stung only as if pelted by little BBs.

Putting on a bored expression, he turned his eyes to the corridor leading to the fountain, then towards the pigeon room.

"Nice...uh... nice meeting you." He bowed his head and took off.

[stoicperfection]

"Likewise." His response was quick and clipped, his eyes narrowed as he watched Harth remove himself from the table and move on. That feeling remained the entire time that boy sat with him.

Once he had finished assembling everything, he slipped the completed pistol in the waistband of his pants and decided on heading back to the rooms. Maybe he would check in on Quatre and Duo before he headed off to do other things.

[stillshinigami]

"Heero." Duo moved across the room from his room and pulled out a chair to sit near his friend. Four chairs away, enough to give him room. Let them talk a minute.

"Hey." It'd been a couple days since the incident in question. Nearly a week now. He folded his arms in front of them and leaned against them. Was he even in the mood to talk? Accept his company?

"That's one of mine, huh? How's it handle?"

[stoicperfection]

"It handles fine." Heero replied as he began to reassemble the pieces back into a functioning gun. He'd need to go out later and make sure the thing didn't jam up on him. Still, it wasn't the gun he was used to carrying.

Looking up from his work, he turned his head to look at Duo. Things were a bit strange the past few days. Duo had tried to kill him, but it was over the nightmares that had been going around. He didn't blame the older man one bit, but he didn't seek him out either. He figured Duo needed his space.

[stillshinigami]

Duo seemed a little fidgety as he nodded to the other man's word. Sure. Sure. Just fine, right? And the gun handled well, good.

He rubbed his hand, offering a small smile to his friend. "Uh. It's... Everyone told me I can't take the blame for what I did, and they're right. Sort of." He paused and leveled his eyes onto Heero.

"Didn't think that's much of an excuse." Considering it actually happened at one point in his past.

[stoicperfection]

"It's not." He replied, the look on his face clearly showing how serious he was. It wasn't an excuse at all. Duo had no control over himself because of what he was seeing. He just happened to be in the wrong spot at the wrong time. Heero expected awkwardness between them because of who he was.

"You weren't under your own control. You didn't manage to kill me. Just forget about it." Turning away, he returned to the task of piecing the gun together again. "There's no point in dwelling on it."

[stillshinigami]

"I know, I know." He sighed. It was kind of a big deal for him, since he'd happened even once before, him losing control.

"Takes focus away from the real problems, I should know better after all." He just huffed. It was harder to shake it than Heero knew, and he just didn't seem to have his coping mechanisms in order.

He pauses, watching Heero play with his gun for a while.

[stoicperfection]

"That's not why." Heero shot Duo a look before he returned to his task. That was just an excuse to hide behind and one he used quite often. But there really were more important things to worry about.

Having assembled everything back, he slipped the completed pistol in the waistband of his jeans before he seated himself again. He looked over at Duo again, leaning against the table top slightly. Duo clearly needed to keep his mind on something else.

"Ask me a question."

[last_lombax]

Soon Heero would hear the sound of footsteps approaching him. Ratchet was walking through the common area on his way back from his small patrol of the outside area. Sleep hadn't come easy for him either as he had been avoiding sleep now. Small naps during the day, nothing more than an hour or two was all he was getting now. He wore his new wrench on his back. It was his newest companion, his new Clank almost.

He spotted the human and recognized him as one of Duo's friends, specifically the one who helped him when he was trapped in the sarcophagus. What was he doing up?

"Hey. Can't sleep?"

[stoicperfection]

Hearing the footsteps coming towards him, Heero was on alert. It seemed he was even more anxious and tense since he had been attacked, so now he was acting accordingly. When he saw it was just Ratchet, he relaxed a bit and returned to work on cleaning the pieces scattered on the table.

"Trying not to."

He lifted his head again to look at the Lombax. The last time he saw him, he had helped save him from the sarcophagus. "How are you?"

[last_lombax]

"Pretty much the same." The Lombax shrugged and moved closer to Heero so he could watch what he was doing. "Insomnia is helping too. So why are you trying not to sleep? Bad dreams?" It was a wild guess but hey, maybe they had that in common?

[stoicperfection]

"Other people's dreams." He replied, picking up another piece of the gun's mechanism and began to wipe it down with a green cloth. "I'm used to my own nightmares."

[last_lombax]

"Other people's dreams? How does that work?" Okay, you got the Lombax's curiosity piqued. He wants answers.

[stoicperfection]

"No idea." How could one really explain what the castle did to people? All he knew was he didn't want to see anymore of Duo's dreams.