Written for the Slytherin Collective's All Hallow's Eve fanfic contest.
Happy Halloween!
Duo smiled as he approached the pilots' current safehouse. Just returned from a mission, he was dressed all in black, his gun holstered at his hip, and several knives hidden across his body.
He had worked hard to time his mission just right, had he finished any sooner, he could have been home days ago, which while annoying, wouldn't have been too bad, but if he had finished later... he'd have lost his chance, at least until next year.
Grinning wickedly, a look on his face that, had anyone seen it, would have sent even Trowa, the most emotionless person he'd ever seen, running for cover, Duo pulled a small folded object from a hidden pocket in his shirt. Unfolding it revealed a thin cloth mask – black with white lines in the form of a skull – wrapped around a pair of long black gloves.
Pulling on the gloves, and tucking the mask back into his pocket for the moment, he ducked around the house, pulling out several bags of... supplies that he had hidden behind the thick shrubbery just before he left. Time to get to work!
- - - - - - -
Having finished with his... decorating, Duo pulled the mask over his head, slightly surprised that no one had seen him. Sure, they were in the middle of nowhere, with no nosy neighbors, but as Gundam pilots – possibly the most wanted people on Earth, not to mention space – they usually had better security. But he was a master of stealth, even when the 'stealth' was involved in something that was not easily hidden.
With one last look around the yard and the porch, he nodded in satisfaction and rang the doorbell.
-o-o-o-O-o-o-o-
Heero was on his laptop when the chime rang, a sound that set him on his guard immediately. No one who knew about the current safehouse would ring the doorbell. There was only one key – and that never actually left the building – but all five of the pilots were, if not skilled, at the very least proficient at picking locks, and none of them had any qualms with just letting themselves in.
Had Duo not been on a mission, he might have suspected him of doing it – a bored Duo would do almost anything to alleviate his boredom – but he was, and he wasn't expected back for at least another day or two.
Reaching for his gun, Heero silently stalked towards the front room. The other three pilots joined him, wary curiosity in their expressions, though, had any of the more stoic boys looked carefully, they might have seen a spark of amusement in their blond companion's eyes.
Realizing that whoever had come to the door might be a perfectly innocent civilian (who had traveled miles of the beaten path to bring his or her new neighbors cookies), Heero held his gun out of sight as he opened the door, Trowa, Quatre and Wufei preparing to come to his aid if necessary.
Eyes wide, Heero blinked, then blinked again, unable to believe that what he was seeing was real. The others joined him in the doorway. Wufei swore, Trowa just stared, and Quatre... Quatre began laughing hard and loud.
In the dim evening light, the... cotton? that was stretched out between bare-limbed trees resembled nothing less than cobwebs, there were tombstones stuck randomly across the yard, with odd sayings on them. There was even a sheet with eyes painted on it, hanging from one of the higher limbs of the trees.
Stepping out to better see the damage showed them the pumpkins lining the porch, their carved faces grotesque and eerie as the candles inside them flickered in the wind.
Heero turned to Quatre for an explanation, as he was the only one not stunned by their yard's new design. Quatre just laughed and shook his head, no, he hadn't been the one to do it.
Suddenly, with a rustle of leaves, a slim figure, dressed entirely in black, with a stylized skull over his face, landed in front of them. "HAPPY HALLOWEEN!"
Not really a real ending, but I couldn't seem to get anything after it to sound right.