Disclaimer: Don't own Gundam Wing

Pairing/Warnings: 2x4, m/m sex, bad language, some angst, some violence of the not too graphic variety

A/N: This is based off a piece of art done by Nachte (link found on my profile) which please check out if you don't already know how amazing this artist is.

Beta'd by Lunar Pull.

Bodyguardin'

In the dim light of his penthouse hallway, Quatre waited until he was given the all clear and every room had been given a thorough search. Though it was highly damn unlikely that anyone had entered the place, and it had been proven by camera and scanners, Duo still felt the need to do a check through as they arrived back. Quatre got out his phone, sighed at the amount of emails, felt briefly for the small firearm holstered under his jacket and he finally heard an "all clear" that meant he walked from the hallway to the main, open plan room of the penthouse.

"I don't know why you feel the need to check," Quatre said watching as Duo's eyes still moved around the room cautiously. "Yentov is too deranged for a plan of action."

Duo rolled his eyes, holstering his gun and walking over to where Quatre was stood as he removed his suit jacket, removed the cuff links - ridding himself of the clothing he despised. The clothes his father would've probably approved of. He wore the suit like armour, it was like being in a Gundam again in its own way – putting it on was his defence from the scrutiny of men who wanted a young rich and powerful businessman dead. Maybe not dead but it was well known that the traditional elite disliked him. Disliked the attempts of WEI to rehabilitate poor nations and colonies – Quatre had long since held the belief that the diehard traditionalists wanted to keep the poor poor and the rich rich while talking bullshit about equality. He could barely stand looking at some of them but tolerated the chess game of business dealings and idiots to actually do some good somewhere. Some days it just seemed harder, he thought, as he removed his gun holster to put it to the side and removed the weapon to place in the drawer of a bureau.

It wasn't the only weapon in the penthouse, it was one of many and Quatre had a ready supply of them, his own caution evident.

"Yeah, well, Heero was deranged and they let him near a fuckin' robotic machine of death."

Quatre laughed softly. "Deranged?"

"Yeah - waving guns around in everyone's faces, wearing those ugly ass sneakers and spandex and seriously don't even get me started on his whole Mr-Self-Destruction thing."

"Yeah?" Quatre quirked a brow in response as Duo was now in front of him.

"I got an essay on how crazy that move was – it has PowerPoint and shit, lemme tell you, and I have let Heero hear it far too many fucking times. And I will never let that asshole forget. Gave me a heart attack."

"Think we all had one."

He thought of that moment, years ago now, when they were boys not the men they were today. When the battles, while violent, had been easier in some ways. He felt nostalgic for a time when he was fighting for peace, not in board rooms and conferences centres and over video calls. It was ten years since the war and on days like this, he missed the rush, missed the camaraderie of the Magunacs and most of all, missed Sandrock. Quatre felt Duo's hand on his chin, the press of his thumb in the small dimple and he was forced to look up into blue eyes.

"I'm just saying Yentov may be a kook or he may be a serious threat but I don't like it whatsoever. I know he ain't mentally stable and all but he's already tried three times. I'm not gonna let him close again."

"You worry too much," he replied, batting away Duo's big hand from his face.

Duo only gave a faint shrug as his hand went down to his side. "Yeah, well, that's what you pay me for."

The comment prickled and Quatre reacted to it, grabbing at Duo's arm and pulling him towards him sharply, the violence of the sudden movement making him stumble a little but he regained balance as Quatre mashed their lips together firmly. Duo was his bodyguard, paid and hired and contracted to WEI but there was a rule to their relationship – that Duo wasn't his employee at the end of the day, when the suit came off, when the phone was put on the side, when the lights went off and as punishment for breaking the rule, Quatre grabbed at that braid – even longer now than its war time length, and nipped at Duo's lips, slid his tongue, ground his body a little into Duo's making him very aware of what he'd said.

As he hadn't intended to start sleeping with Duo, never damn intended it as he was an employee and a friend but then his options were vastly limited and there was so much shared history. So much understanding that when their lips met that first time – some argument about his security that Quatre was disregarding – it was natural and led to fucking on his teak wood desk. That was the only part of their relationship Quatre regretted – not the sex, instead, the secretary who walked in during. It became the rule then – that work was work and it was kept professional but at the penthouse, at the apartment that Duo kept despite Quatre's attempts to persuade him to make the move to his home more permanent, he was not the boss.

As they slipped apart, Quatre leaned his forehead against Duo's. "You're not on the clock."

"Just let me worry a little until he's caught, kay?"

Duo fingers teased at his sides, hot through the material of his shirt and he felt Duo wrinkle his nose and softly snort.

"You know, you kinda smell, Quat."

Quatre glared in response. "And you need to shave. I don't want to go into a board meeting with stubble rash – it'll get them talking."

"Huh, yeah, wouldn't want some stuffy dudes in suits worrying about your sex life now, would ya?"

Quatre slid his hand from its resting spot at Duo's side to the small of his back, finding the point where fabric joined and his long fingers made their way up to feel skin. "Okay… I'll go in the shower – want to join?"

"I would but I want to report in with the team," Duo stopped as he saw Quatre's frown. "Then I'm totally off the clock and no longer your faithful bodyguard."

"What are you then?"

"I'm your sexy ass boyfriend."

There were times Quatre didn't have a response to Duo so he shook his head, and started to unbutton the white shirt as he walked towards the bathroom, feeling Duo's gaze on him as he did. He looked back briefly, saw that look of concern on Duo's face, that little knit of brows and he realised how tired he was, how he'd been so unsettled, saw those wounds he'd suffered recently on one of the recent assassination attempts on Quatre's life and he sighed audibly. He did worry too damn much but then Duo did that – anyone he'd cared about had died. If it made him a little twitchy about people trying to kill him, then Quatre didn't blame him.

The shower in the penthouse was one of the many things Quatre was thankful for. Unlike many people with his wealth, he didn't hire staff – maids, chefs, personal assistants. It was the one thing he had hated as a child – that intrusion, that his home had never truly felt like a home due to the staff that cycled through it and as an adult he had not wanted that. While perhaps his standard of cleanliness was not up to scratch and occasionally, he did hire a cleaner for a few monthly sweep, but he preferred that his home was his and his only. It was his sanctuary and it was where he dropped the label of being the head of WEI, of being the wealthiest man in the earth sphere – where he no longer thought about the bureaucracies of working within the defined parameters of politics and he didn't have to spend his days arguing to do what was right – what needed to be done. It was here, he was no longer the boss of WEI, he was simply Quatre and for these brief moments he revelled in.

It was vaguely disappointing Duo didn't join him, that they didn't kiss underneath the water or touch, mutual hand jobs exchanged with the slick slide of soap and water but then Quatre enjoyed the spray, his head forward and hand holding himself up against the tiles. The water flowing down his body, over each scar, each imperfection.

Quatre was covered in scars like all of the former pilots were but the recent ones were what troubled Duo. He had been the focus of assassination attempts for years, since the end of the war, since he "came out" as a Gundam pilot, since he tried to rebuild so much that had been destroyed. There had been protests, there had been rival businesses trying to destroy his credibility, his life, his livelihood but Quatre had not given up. Yet recently with Yentov the threats had become more obvious, more dangerous - a bullet had grazed, an explosion had rocked a bistro he was having a business lunch in and he and Duo had been injured in the debris. An entire trip to earth had been aborted due to a particularly vicious and nasty threat from the man and it seemed that Yentov wanted him dead so badly that he'd evaded capture, managed to travel between colonies undetected using whatever skills he'd acquired during his years of working at WEI and through his years of isolation.

It was not that Quatre didn't understand Duo's concerns – just that he wanted Duo to forget. For Duo to be no longer his bodyguard and be the guy he fucked around with. His "sexy ass boyfriend" to quote.

He stepped out of the shower, dried himself and looked down at the one mark on his skin that was funny rather than damn depressing. That stupid moment when he acted like a twenty-something. When Duo had persuaded him to go get tattooed, disguised him ridiculously with a wig and an oversized hoodie and they'd found a small tattoo parlour and he'd laid on his back as he got the twin shotels of Sandrock on his hip. Duo had a habit of kissing them and making him laugh irrationally. It was rare that he got to be just a young man and he only seemed to do that when Duo was with him.

It was as he went to the bedroom of the penthouse, the towel slung low on his waist that he assumed he could pounce on Duo waiting there, that they would have hot and sweaty sex but he was a little surprised to see Duo leaning against the headboard of the bed, his head on his chest, snoring softly, his open tablet starting to drop from his hand and into the bed covers. Quatre determined he was fully asleep so went about changing into a tank with WEI branding left on the floor and boxers, barely caring about the state the bedroom was in. He liked its relative untidiness, the fact it felt like a bachelor pad rather than the ordered sanitising of the rest of his life and he crawled onto the bed, sliding the tablet out of Duo's fingers as stealthily as he could. Duo shifted, an eye cracking open.

"You should go shower."

"Not yet," Duo said with a little whine.

He shook his head as Duo leaned his head against his shoulder and instead of putting it down, Quatre looked at the tablet and the intelligence it showed. It was then he saw the picture of Yentov, the face grizzled and he tried to remember him – he'd worked at WEI for so damn long, in the Research and Development, but he'd been fired in a storm cloud as he had begun using the resources to create things that were not in his remit. He remembered the head of the department coming to him, explaining his seventeen years of service but the unsettling developments and Quatre agreed as anyone would – firing him and ensuring that all his research was destroyed. And it was why he wanted him dead but still… looking at the files he'd not seen was unsettling. The files Duo had tried to hide.

Quatre already felt Duo's breathing return to something softer, sleep once again claiming him. It was something Duo always did – a childhood spent living on warehouse floors and under cardboard boxes meant that Duo could sleep anywhere and he showed that now. He would tease him about it if the reason was not damn sad. Yet he was glad of his sleep as Quatre slid through the intelligence, as he swallowed and understood Duo's caution – the images of the death threats. The pictures that had been sent that made his stomach turn. And while Quatre had killed men and done some violent things, he suddenly knew why Duo wouldn't just dismiss him. Deranged had been his word. It had been accurate without him knowing.

"Duo," he whispered and was amused as Duo started awake.

Just as he could sleep anywhere, Duo could go from asleep to alert just as swiftly and he yawned, stretched, the tight long sleeved sweater riding up enticingly to show the hint of abdominal muscles, the trail of hair down where the tight black jeans sat low. Quatre swallowed yet his thoughts turned from sexual to something else as Duo's eyes trailed to the tablet in his hands.

"You looked?"

There was no point in denying it. "I wanted to know."

Duo sat up fully, took the tablet and looked at the page Quatre was on before he slid it to the floor. "It's not that I don't think you can protect yourself and shit… just this is one sick fucker. You've had threats before… but this… and he's smart. And he doesn't give a shit." Duo paused and moved closer, his hand ghosting over Quatre's jaw. "And I'm gonna be on high alert until he's locked up."

Quatre looked down then. A little guilty at not taking the threat seriously – but then, he had so many and so many had ended up being ineffective. Stopped by himself or others – Quatre had broken a wrist of one idiot trying to shoot him and ended up with someone trying to sue him. But this one… this one was different.

"You know I take my duties very seriously," Duo said, his hands sliding from Quatre's jaw down his chest, his muscles fluttering in reaction, "I take guarding your body as a twenty four hour responsibility."

Quatre tried not to roll his eyes. "You are so damn cheesy."

"Yeah, and you love it."

There were other things Quatre could've said but he found their lips meeting, Duo insistent, demanding, as though between them they were burning away the memory of Yentov and his death threats. Quatre found himself pinned to the bed, Duo's hands around his wrists, mouths open, slopping kisses full of teeth and tongue. Duo's lips slid from his mouth, to his jaw, his neck and Quatre bucked up against Duo's firm body, proving that he was not easily dominated but also bringing their dicks into contact with each other, echoed gasps coming from their lips.

"And this is guarding my body, how?"

"If I'm on top of you ain't no one's gonna get past me."

"And you are so sure you are going to be on top of me?"

Duo answered by grinding his body against Quatre's, his grip still tight on his wrists, his eyes impossibly close and large and damn blue. "You know I take my duties really fuckin' seriously."

"Show me," he said in challenge and Duo answered it with his mouth, his hands finally releasing Quatre's wrists to slide them down his body, reaching for a leg and Quatre followed the move, hooking it over Duo's back and pushing up into Duo's downward motions in imitation of fucking.

It didn't matter – the bruises, the stubble, the fact that there was an insane person on the loose who wanted to kill him, Quatre only thought about Duo Maxwell – the way he was fiercely protective, violent, strong and above all, the man who had turned him on no like other. It was as fingers slid under the waistband of shorts that Quatre pulled back and with a sharp tug reached for Duo's hair – the loud "hey!" indicating the braided man's displeasure - and he used that moment to reverse their positions, pushing him to the bed, his hands on Duo's broad shoulders. The reversal of position allowed Quatre to pull at his belt buckle, to unzip jeans, Duo watching him closely as he did.

Once Quatre slid off black boxers, Duo sat up to remove the sweater, and Quatre's clothes followed suit – the tank top, branded WEI discarded to the floor and without it, he had no affiliation to that business – the only marks on his body his battle wounds and the shotels tattoo. Duo leaned up, his lips glistening with saliva and touched the ink there and then let his hand drift to Quatre's cock grasping it, pumping and Quatre threw his head back at the firm knowing touch and lost his advantage, his leverage as their positions were reversed once again.

"Sorry, boss, I'm the one meant to be guarding your body tonight."

And Quatre knew he was lost at that point, Duo's mouth, his hands, the way he pushed him down and it wasn't that he submitted, hell no, just that he liked the way Duo fucked him – so hard that Quatre braced himself against the bedframe – his body pushing down into Duo's deep thrusts. They faltered briefly, as the coffee mug balanced on the bedframe fell off, both of them stopping, laughing, a tie ending up on Quatre's face as their fucking rocked the bed, the debris and mess of their combined lives together falling onto them. As Duo began moving faster, Quatre wrapped his legs tighter, his heel in the small of Duo's back to force him tight, close, making it impossible for him to move too far away, Quatre grinding up into him until both of them tensed, bodies stuttering against each other, until they came, white, hot, sweaty, bodies collapsing together.

Duo rolled off Quatre's body, his breathing returning to normal and he chuckled as he looked over to Quatre whose hand had automatically gone to his braid, toying with the end.

"I think I totally need to get a raise."

"I hate you sometimes," Quatre said, dropping the braid onto Duo's chest and he got a smirk in return.

"And you love me sometimes. Balances it out to liking me all the time, I figure."

"Go to sleep."

"Yes, boss."

"Duo," he growled.

"Night, Quat."

Quatre checked his phone one last time, ignored his emails and then settled down on the pillow – the business world didn't stop but sometimes, just sometimes, he did.

It wasn't unusual for Quatre to wake up in the middle of the night, check his emails, and then try to go back to sleep after seeing it but it was damn unusual for him to wake up without Duo in the bed and not notice him leave it. Even though Duo was a stealth expert, Quatre had lived his life on edge and any unusual sound put him on high alert but this time, he hadn't. He sat up, head dull and mouth a little dry, a slight panic surfacing at the weird sensation and he slipped into his boxers and a tank before he went in search of Duo.

Maybe it was reading the information on the tablet but something didn't feel right and before he left the room, he grabbed for a weapon, Duo's gun was gone which indicated he too felt the same and the only weapon left was the knife which he picked up from an ornate sheath the Rashid had given him as a parting gift.

There was an odd feeling in the pit of his gut and while Quatre had not fought for years, he still worked out, he still trained and still had practice with firearms and he was in no way defenceless. The penthouse was eerily quiet and Duo would make noise, at least some, the sound of a television, a radio, something to indicate he wasn't sleeping but there was nothing. And he walked slowly, steadily, each footfall deadened by the thick carpeting and his bare feet.

As he walked further to the main room of the penthouse, he anticipated seeing something but not quite this, Duo was stood wearing only boxers and a knife was at his throat, a man behind him that Quatre had recognised from the tablet even though he wore a gas mask over his face. Yentov. At seeing the delicate scene, the danger, he slid the knife out of view, as he faced the man who had already tried to kill him three times.

The man lowered the mask, still keeping the blade poised at Duo's throat and he understood now - Yentov had used something - gas to make them drowsy, to overpower and Quatre remembered all his expertise as an R and D man and it was an uncomfortable thought.

"Nice to see you can join us, Mr. Winner."

He sounded like a movie villain cliché and so Quatre answered it with one. "I'm not Mr. Winner – that was my father."

He met Duo's eye, a shared glance and he could see how tight the blade was against his throat, far too damn close so that a thin trail of red was running down his neck, startling against his pale skin. He was calm, though his Adam's apple still bobbed with each breath and Quatre didn't communicate with him verbally, only through that look.

"Ahh yes, though you will never be him, will you? A great good man - your father wouldn't have fired me for developing weapons - he would've encouraged it, praised it even."

Quatre tried not to laugh or at least balk at the words. His father, the one he'd rebelled against in his trip to earth, that he'd disappointed with blood stained hands would have done the same. Hell, worse, perhaps. Prosecuted for using WEI technology to create something violent, dangerous.

"My father was a pacifist - he wouldn't have wanted weapons created - he'd be more opposed that I am. Now please but the knife down - Duo is not a part of this."

Negotiation was one of Quatre's fortes but that was with rational men and he doubted Yentov was one. However, strategy was his other and so he took a step forward and saw Yentov tense, the blade slide perilously against Duo's skin and he saw Duo eyes widen at the increased pressure and Quatre stopped.

"You want me, right?" he asked.

Yentov eyes were narrowed, dark, a brown so dark they seemed black in the dim lighting and he made a sharp nod.

"Then let Duo go – you don't need to kill both of us. I'll approach and you let Duo go and then you have me, agreed?"

"Quat –"

Duo started but Quatre shot him a sharp glare he usually reserved for people he had no patience for and Duo shut up. If he could've clued him in to the blade, he would've but he had no choice to look like a lamb to the slaughter. He knew Duo's arguments even as they died on his lips – that he wasn't worth a damn, that Quatre was needed for the still recovering world but fuck, he did not want to hear any of those and he needed to get Yentov to lower the blade before he did anything. It was too close… too damn close.

He approached slowly, worried that the man seemed skittish and that a slight movement would involve Duo's throat slashed and him bleeding out on the floor. Yet as he got closer, Yentov was torn and Quatre would act on that indecision. He walked slowly, trying not to cause panic and Yentov's empty hand reached out towards him. In that moment the blade moved fractionally from Duo's throat and that allowed Duo to act. Duo reached for the wrist with the knife in and twisted, the weapon dropping from his fingers and Quatre reacted to Yentov's curse and the blade hitting the floor by ramming his own knife into shoulder. Yentov yowled with pain to which Duo pressed the advantage, swinging his body to take his legs from under him, Yentov crumpling to the floor – his body in the fetal position. Duo stepped back – his hand on his throat, the wound, instinctively.

The man made a pathetic sound as Quatre kicked him over with his foot and he looked at where the blade was still lodged. He wasn't going to pull it out – the paramedics could do that – but he did make sure the man was incapacitated.

"Call it in and there are handcuffs in the bedroom to hold him. Bottom drawer."

Duo raised an eyebrow. "And you never told me? Damn…"

He heard Duo muttering something along the lines of "kinky motherfucker" as he walked away, and with Duo gone from the room, Quatre leaned down, and grabbed hold of the blades handle, his face close to Yentov.

"I should kill you but I'm not like you," he said, his voice low, a veiled threat behind every word as he slowly twisted the blade in the wound, the agonized moans of pain loud from Yentov's lips. "And if you ever threaten me or anyone I love again you will no longer be breathing – do you understand me? You were right – I am not my father and I will kill you if I need to."

Quatre twisted the blade a little sharply and Yentov's head slammed hard against the floor, the carpeting providing some deadening of the sound of a skull cracking against the floor. Duo returned, spinning the handcuffs briefly around his finger before handing them to Quatre, his eyes narrowing in suspicion as Quatre grabbed at Yentov's wrists, snapping them into the cuffs.

"I called it in – the rest of the security team will be here in five," Duo said, walking to lean against the couch as Quatre rose back to his feet, looking down at the man before looking back to Duo – the small line of red bleeding a little in a parody of what almost happened.

"I think I need to dock your pay."

Duo gave him "huh?" expression, a hand drifting to the back of his head and scratching underneath his braid as Quatre had seen him do so many times before.

"You said you were guarding my body. I think you'll find I saved your ass," he teased, approaching, the small whines and grunts of pain from the incapacitated man ignored. "I thought you were the one on high alert."

"High alert when he sends some weird as shit gas in here and my usual all-star bodyguard alertness are two different things, Quat."

He didn't tease again, seeing a slight wounding to Duo's pride, and he only smiled and reached a thumb to the small wound, checking the bleeding.

"I should patch you up."

"Naw… it's a flesh wound, is all," he replied with a usual bravado. "Just glad he's caught is all."

Quatre glanced over, saw Yentov cowered in pain and fear – the man who had tried to shoot him, blow him up, gassed him, and all of it had failed as Yentov had forgotten one important thing – he may have a bodyguard and he may be Shinigami himself, but in the end, Quatre needed no one to protect him. Not even Duo.