NIOBE'S VIOLETS

by Ashura

DEDICATION: For Dan, for his 1x2 School fic contest

DISCLAIMERS: The usual. I don't own any of the characters, names or places from GW, I've just warped them.

WARNINGS: Eventually Yaoi (3x4, 1x2), but I have no idea what else.

AUTHOR'S NOTES: AU, Humour, Drama. Contrary to what you may think, the inspiration for this actually came from watching "Real Genius" for the millionth time, but influences include the X-Men, Harry Potter, Escaflowne, the Young Ones, and the Heralds of Valdemar. The title...well, that should be explained later.

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Chapter One

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Duo pelted down the rough, narrow confines of a back alley, conscious of the ever-growing sounds of pursuit and the burning of his own lungs. Ignoring the pain shooting through his side, he leapt the fence that barred the way to the street, all the breath leaving his body as he landed hard on the pavement.

"Get back here, you little brat!" The shouting behind him grew louder, more chaotic, and ever more threatening. Winded, Duo was losing speed--but he kept on, booted feet pounding against the street.

It was times like this, he noted reflectively, that he wished he had somewhere to call home, where he could take refuge from the street gang whose consistent goal seemed to be to beat him into the pavement. //In the old days,// he thought, catching a hurried breath against the brick wall of an aged tenement building, //I would have taken sanctuary in a church. But somehow I don't' think these guys have much respect for holy ground.//

His lungs heaving, he started to run again, scanning the street for a safe haven--somewhere populated, at least, where his pursuers might be deterred purely by the number of witnesses. But there just weren't many people around at this time of night, even in the busier segments of town, and Duo was quickly nearing exhaustion.

A hand grabbed his collar and jerked him back. It was almost a relief when his legs refused to bear his weight any longer and he collapsed to the ground. Blackness washed over him, and he struggled against it, feebly clawing his way to consciousness, and /pushing/ with all his will.

Around him, people were screaming--

"What the hell? He's AAAAAAUUGH!!"

"Somebody grab his hands!"

"Shit! Oops--run!"

Heat surged once through him, then his sore and battered body gave way. Silence fell thick around him, and darkness consumed him.

*********

He blinked slowly into consciousness, vision greeted by a blur of sterile white walls, and cold fluorescent lighting that glared off the metallic surface of mirrors and surgical implements. A stiff, starched percale sheet was draped over his body up to his chest, which led to the further observation that his clothes were missing. The thick air reeked of medicine and disinfectant.

"You're awake. How are you feeling?" A calm, soothing soprano coalesced in the light and became a white-clad woman, short brown hair framing a face lit by pale blue eyes.

Duo blinked rapidly against the dizziness of motion, watching the world take form around him. "Where am I?"

"St. Frances hospital," the woman answered, seating herself on a stool next to his bed. "I'm Dr. Winner. Can I ask what your name is?"

"Duo. Duo Maxwell." He rubbed his head, taking comfort in the thick length of braid hanging matted and damp down his back. "What am I doing in the hospital?"

Dr. Winner fixed him with a curious gaze. "Duo, what do you remember?"

He shook his head, trying vainly to clear the cobwebs from it. "Running," he answered hesitantly. "Being pulled down to the ground...."

"Did you do anything to the people who caught you?" the doctor asked gently, but Duo just stared at her blankly.

"I heard yelling...then I guess I passed out."

Dr. Winner sighed, absently twirling a pen in nervous fingers. "According to the witnesses, Duo, you glowed green and shot beams of light out of your hands at the person who grabbed you--who is now dead. The police arrived, and when they tried to restrain you, you did the same to them. Fortunately, they're made of stronger stuff, or you'd be in a lot more trouble now."

Duo just stared at the young doctor in disbelief. "Glowed /green/?" he repeated incredulously.

She nodded. "So say at least twelve separate witnesses, I'm afraid. They wanted to tie you down, but I convinced them that if whatever power it was manifested by your feeling threatened and helpless, then keeping you in such a state was in nobody's best interest."

Duo rolled over on the narrow hospital bed, burying his face in the limp pillow. "So what happens to me now?"

"Well technically, you're still under arrest," Dr. Winner answered, turning him gently back toward her. "You did kill someone, after all. On the other hand, he's not a person anyone's really going to miss, and the police department here really isn't equipped to handle this kind of thing. They'd like nothing better than to sweep it under the rug and pretend it never happened."

Hope rose in Duo's violet eyes at last. "So...?"

"Officially, you're going to reform school," she explained. "You get off the hook and off the streets, and the good officers here get to feel they've done something toward the rehabilitation of youth."

"And unofficially..?" Duo wondered.

"Unofficially, you're still going to school. It's called the St. Gabriel Institute. It's a place for students with...unusual abilities."

"Newtypes." Duo winced as the word left his lips. "I'm not one of those."

Dr. Winner shook her head, almost sadly. "Not necessarily newtypes. Those are common enough, even if current sentiment has made them all pretend to be otherwise. No, the students at this school are /really/ special."

Duo sighed. "All right, I'll go. Not that I have a feeling I actually get a choice in the matter."

The doctor shrugged. "You don't. Someone from St. Gabriel's will be here to collect you soon."

"Soon" turned into "instantly," though, as a light knock sounded on the door. A tall woman, dressed in a simple black suit, with vivid blue eyes and short-cropped dark hair, slipped inside and gave Dr. Winner a warm smile.

"Is this the one, Iria?" she asked, motioning toward Duo.

Dr. Winner nodded. "This is Duo Maxwell. Duo, Lucrezia Noin, from the St. Gabriel Institute." She slid off the stool, adding, "I've explained the basics to him, but I left fielding the hard questions for you."

Noin merely nodded. "No time like the present, then. I'll wait outside if you want to get ready, Duo..."

Duo, after a quick scan of the room to reveal that the desired articles were in fact nowhere to be found, just asked, "Can I have my clothes back?"

Iria's fingers flew to her mouth. "Damn, I forgot. There wasn't much left of them, Duo--whatever you did, you shredded them good. Let me go see what I can find." She disappeared out the door, leaving Noin and Duo alone in the room.

Duo looked up at her, questioning. "Did I really do what they say I did?"

Noin shrugged. "It looks like it, kiddo. They don't make these things up--they try to pretend they didn't see it, if they can. The fact that twelve people say you did...well, that says something."

"I'm sorry," said Duo.

"Hey, don't be." Noin perched on the stool recently vacated by Dr. Winner, reaching over to squeeze his hand. "Well--be sorry you accidentally killed somebody, sure, but that's exactly what it was. An accident. You were defending yourself."

"I'm not in trouble then." The realisation came as a profound relief.

"No, you're not." Noin might have said more, but the door opened again at that moment, and Iria tossed a pair of pale blue scrubs onto the bed.

"Sorry, that's all I could find. It'll get you out of here, anyway, and they did salvage your boots." She turned back to the door, leading Noin with her. "We'll give you a minute to get dressed. Then--listen, Lu, take him out and get him set up, okay? Whatever he's going to need to be comfortable. I'll take care of it."

Noin nodded. "Thanks, Iria." The two women ducked outside, and as the door swung shut behind them, Duo was already crawling out of the bed.

He discovered, while pulling on the surgical scrubs over his malnourished, too-thin body, that aside from the usual protrusions of ribs that characterised a starving teenager, there wasn't a mark on him.

//Then again,// he thought dryly, //that's hardly the strangest thing that's happened to me this morning.// He laced up battered combat boots and decided it was probably best the room had no mirror. His vanity didn't need the beating it would take.

"Ready?" Noin asked when he finally joined them in the hallway, and he nodded. "We're going to take a detour or two on the way to get you some things, then I'll get you set up at St. Gabe's."

Duo shrugged. "Lead the way."

********

The next several hours proved to be among the most enjoyable of Duo's short, if hard, life. One thing the street-rat had never had the opportunity to do, and decided he could quickly learn to get used to, was to go shopping and actually be able to buy what he looked at. For once, salespeople were not following him around their stores trying to catch him shoplifting--not that they ever /did/ catch him, he was too well-practiced for that, and he made a habit of taking only what he really needed. Cocky thieves were the ones to get caught.

But this was an entirely new experience. His original guilty, hesitant insistence that he didn't actually /need/ anything was met with a laugh from Noin, and a determined shake of her head.

"Sorry, Duo," she told him. "Iria Winner said to get you whatever you need to be comfortable, which in her terms does not mean the bare minimum. She'd have my head if I took you back like this. And since she's not only my friend, but in charge of the disbursement of funds from a corporation whose annual grants pretty much keep our school running, she outranks you. We're going shopping."

After the initial heady rush of consumerism, Duo had decided not to complain. It was like stepping into a new life. By the time they returned to the car, he had new clothes--not ones that had been worn by six other people and finally cast away at a homeless shelter. He had clean sheets, and warm blankets, and a pillow that was as tall as he was. Not to mention decent shampoo and a brush that wouldn't pull his hair out. Then--after hearing his stomach growl and discovering he hadn't eaten in what she termed "the recordable past"--Noin treated him to a bagful of cheeseburgers and a chocolate milkshake.

And of course, there was riding in Noin's car. It was a new-model Mustang, shiny, black, and fast enough to make the other cars on the road look like they were moving backwards.

Duo was in heaven.

Noin's cellphone rang as he was staring out the window, watching the plains stretch out lonely and empty on either side around them. St. Gabriel's was apparently in the middle of nowhere, but that made sense, he supposed, given the sort of school it was. She answered the call with her name, and despite telling himself he wouldn't eavesdrop, Duo found himself listening anyway.

"Yes, I've got him, and we're on our way....We had to make a stop or two first, Treize, the boy didn't even have any clothes." Duo felt he should have been embarrassed at that, but his grasp on reality had slipped so far through his fingers by now that he didn't actually care. "Well, based on the data Iria gave me, I'm assigning him to L2. Right. So can you drag Hilde Schbeiker out of whatever else it is she's doing so she can show him around? ETA about fifteen minutes. Thanks." The phone clicked off, and she shot Duo a smile. "Almost there."

"Miss Noin..." Duo fiddled nervously with the end of his braid. "What kind of talents do the other students have? Are they all like mine?"

She shook her head. "No--actually, if your gift is what I expect it is, you'll be the only one. Everyone's talent is different, you'll meet them all when you get there."

He grinned up at her slyly. "What's yours?"

"I'm a clairvoyant," she answered without hesitation, confirming Duo's suspicion that the faculty at this school were of the same peculiarity as the students. "I can see things that are happening far away." She shot him a warm smile, and added, "I don't expect you'll have any problems with the others, Duo. There are only ten students in the school. We're a tight group. We take care of our own."

"Only ten?" he repeated. He'd been envisioning something much larger--an entire underground community of savants, perhaps, studying together in candlelit hallways and ancient brick buildings. And he told Noin so.

"Well you're right about the bricks," she answered with a laugh, "but I'm sorry to disappoint you about the candles. We /are/ technologically equipped, you know. Running water, electricity, and our own intranet. We're secluded, it doesn't mean we're completely out of touch!"

A wrought-iron gate, that somehow fit Duo's previous vision just perfectly, loomed from the mist before them. The building, sure enough, was aged, ivy-entangled brick, with turrets and steeples and gardens all enclosed by a tall fence. A bronze sign on the outer wall informed them that they were entering St. Gabriel's, and a few moments later Noin pulled the Mustang to a halt on the lawn.

"Is this him? Is this him?" a cheerful, feminine voice called as Duo was climbing out of the car. A slender form darted from the shadows of the doorway--petite, pale, blue-eyed, her dark hair cut in the same style as Noin's but topped by a cranberry-hued beret. She was wearing faded blue jeans and a blue button-down shirt covered with paint stains, and at Noin's nod of confirmation, she favoured Duo with a brilliant smile. "Great! I'm Hilde. Let me help you carry your stuff." Without waiting for an answer, she hoisted a pile of Duo's new blankets over her shoulder. "I'll get you set up in your room, Treize already gave me the key. Oops--is that okay Miss Noin? Or do you still need him for anything?"

Noin laughed, waving them on. "Nope, he's all yours. Just come find me when you're done, so I know he's settled in, all right? Duo, Hilde should be able to take perfectly good care of you, but come find me if you need me for anything. If all else fails, just pick a place to stand and yell for me. It works for everybody else."

The blur that was Hilde was already halfway to the door, and Duo shouldered his bags and hurried to join her. "I should tell you," she explained, leading him through a labyrinth of hallways, "that you've been assigned to my section--L-2. We're the only ones in it. What this means is that you're going to get really sick of me, really fast, because not only are you rooming nextdoor, but unless they reassign you somewhere else after they test you, we're going to have exactly the same schedule."

"Oh." Duo stumbled up the stairs after her, just trying to memorise where it was he was going. "What do the sections mean?"

"They're based on your talent," the girl explained blithely. "The intensity of it, at least. There are six sections. L-0 is things they haven't figured out all the way yet, or can't classify. Then for L-1 through L-5, it goes up depending on the intensity of your gift. Example. L-1 is for purely physical mutations, like Heero, who has super-strength. Then you and I are L-2, so you can figure out about how strong that is. The Wonder Twins are L-3, Quatre's an L-4, and Wufei is L-5."

"Oh," said Duo again, waiting for all this information to settle itself in his head.

"And here we are!" Hilde exclaimed, before he could think of any more questions. She unlocked a door in the side of the passageway and nudged it open. "Your room. Welcome home."

Duo felt a ridiculous grin spreading over his face. Welcome home indeed! The room was small, but not cramped. A bed lined the opposite wall, and a desk faced the door just to the left of him. A bookshelf and a closet took care of what wall space remained, and a door in one corner led to his own private bathroom, but the best part by far was the window crowning the bed--fully four feet square, bordered by homey calico curtains and overlooking the garden outside.

"Don't move the furniture around," Hilde was telling him, while she unpacked his sheets and began making the bed. "It's all set up this way because of the energy flow, so that you get the most out of whatever you're doing. The best sleep, the most productive worktime, whatever." Efficiently, she spread the last blanket out on the bed and tossed herself onto it. "Nice pillow. So hurry up and unpack, and I'll give you a tour. We've got one more class before dinner--at least I assume they want you to just jump in--you may as well, and it'll be the fastest way to meet Mr. Treize anyway."

"Tell you what," suggested Duo, starting to feel a bit overwhelmed, "I'll just hold on tight, and you can lead me around and tell me what to do."

Hilde laughed. "Aw, I know, it's all new, isn't it? Don't worry. You'll get used to it. And there's nobody here you have to worry about, anyway. Everybody's--well, if not nice, at least not dangerous. And you can always ask any of the teachers for help with /anything/. They're great. Are you done yet?"

Duo stopped folding his clothes and stared at her. "Tell me, Hilde--is your special talent that you don't have to stop talking to breathe?"

Her eyes narrowed, sparkling with mischief, and before Duo realised what was happening, she'd grabbed him by the hair and was dragging him outside. "That's it, you're done. We're going to class, you can finish this later. What the hell do you need to fold everything for anyway?"

And Duo, true to his own prediction, just trailed along in her wake.

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