Dangerous Game by HeeroWZero

Dangerous Game

Quatre Winner was utterly bored with his work. In the few months he'd held the position he found it to be mostly enjoyable. Helping to build a new colony was something he really liked doing. Laying the foundation for a place where people could work, play, love and generally live their lives was exciting to him. When he first came on the job it was mostly the work aspect: directing the laborers, distributing the resources, solving the little problems along the way. But now that the redesigned plans were being debated upon in committee after committee, he could do little more than sit on his hands and hope for approval.

In the past, Quatre would have felt better just knowing he was not alone in his plight, but the fact was that he may as well have been. Sure, he had managed to make some new friends among his co-workers, but none of them understood him. They often chided him and wondered why he hadn't taken over his family's business. He told them he had no real interest in it, which he didn't, and had left it in the capable hands of his sisters. Secretly, he had other reasons for taking this job instead. He saw it as a way to repay the colony citizens for the destruction he had caused while under the influence of the ZERO system. Only a select group of people understood the person that was Quatre Winner and it had been much too long since he had seen any of them. Well, that wasn't completely true.

A couple weeks ago he had flown out to a neighboring colony when the circus had come to the area, and along with it Catherine and Trowa. It had been nice to see them again and catch up on everything he had missed. But of course, he had too much time and they had too little before they had to move on. Quatre had not seen the others for much longer. Relena managed to write when she could and Duo and Hilde stayed in touch. Heero, of course, had disappeared again and he knew that Sally, Wufei, Noin, Zechs, and Lady Une were busy with their Preventer duties. That left only Dorothy. He hadn't seen her since shortly after the war ended back in AC195. He often found himself wondering how she was doing and what she was up to. Not just her, of course, but mostly her.

His thoughts were interrupted by a shrill beep. He had an incoming video call. Quatre strode slowly away from the window he had been staring out of and over to the desk.

"Yes? This is Quatre."

"Hello there, my friend."

"Winston! How are you?"

"Well, I'm doing just fine, but I'm afraid I'm the bearer of bad news. The committee didn't make any progress at all with our plans today. In fact, with all of their bickering, they may have set us back another week or two."

Quatre sighed and hung his head.

"I see. Well, thanks anyway for letting me know."

"Sure thing. You know, you look kinda beat. Maybe you need a vacation or something. Anyway, I'll catch ya later!"

Quatre ended the transmission and sat back in his chair, propping his feet up on the corner of the desk.

*No, not a vacation. I need to leave this behind entirely.

Dorothy Catalonia sipped idly at her drink. Her mission was not going well by any stretch of the imagination. At first, she had flat turned down the assignment and discounted it as complete nonsense. But after a few hours of mulling it over in her thoughts, she'd gone back and practically begged Lady Une to forgive her and assign her the mission. If Quatre was up to something, she wanted to be the first to know. Not so that she could rub it in his face, but simply so she didn't have to hear it from someone else, bias attached.

So here she sat at a restaurant bar feeling depressed. Part of her was wishing she could have stayed with her initial decision and part of her wanted to just get the whole thing over with so she could prove she'd been right all along. But so far, it looked like there were in fact chemical weapons being developed at the Winner facilities in Italy.

*I hope he's not involved. Please don't let him be a part of this.*

If someone had heard her thoughts and asked her why, she would have said that she held a deep respect for him, but she would have been lying. Deep yes...respect it was not. Dorothy loved Quatre Raberba Winner for all she was worth. True, he had no reason at all to return the feeling, in fact he had reason to hate her, but she couldn't help wondering if he felt the same way she did. But that was part of why she was depressed. She was like Heero in that she was completely to her missions, though not so extreme as he was, but also like Relena in that she had fallen head over heels for a Gundam pilot and there was nothing she could do about it. Of course, she could conceal it better than the former Queen of the world, but that was beside the point. Her feelings and emotions were swirling around in her head, tearing at her sanity. She let out a mournful sign and returned to her drink.

"Hey there lil' lady."

Dorothy's head turned slightly toward the man now sitting immediately to her right. He was a big man, probably six and a half feet tall, about two hundred fifty, two hundred sixty pounds, mid twenties. His large arms and square jaw made him look like the stereotypical football player.

*Great. Just what I need. A big, ugly, drunken moron trying to pick me up.*

Dorothy turned back to her drink without a word, but he pressed on.

"You look depressed. Anything I can do to help?"

"No."

"Aw, come on. Gimmie a chance here. Big Al will make you feel lots better!"

In a darkened corner of the restaurant, a young man poked at the food on his plate. The Tuscan Steak and Fettuccine Alfredo were excellent, but he didn't have the appetite he thought he did. Perhaps leaving his job had been the wrong thing to do, though it seemed like a good idea at the time. Maybe he should have waited a little longer before throwing in the towel. A week or two might have made all the difference in the world.

Regardless of whether it was a good idea or not, the truth of the matter was that he had quit and there was nothing he could or even cared to do about it. He was about to ask the waitress for the check when a small commotion at the bar caught his attention.

"Come on now. What can Big Al do for ya?"

Dorothy moved her hand quickly before he had the chance to grab it.

"Big Al had better keep his hands to himself if he knows what's good for him."

"Come off it! You're not waitin' on anyone."

"Maybe I am."

"Bullshit! Who? Who you waitin' for, huh?"

"She's waiting for me."

Both heads snapped around at the sound of the voice behind them. To Dorothy's surprise, Quatre stood an arm's length away in all of his nearly six foot glory. He was wearing a white, short sleeved knit polo with his hands in the pockets of his khaki slacks. She noted he was still a slim guy, but he had definitely put on some muscle doing whatever it was he was doing. The sight threw her for a loop.

*Wow! Chemical weapons or not, he's still gorgeous!*

"Who the hell are you?"

"I'm a friend."

"Oh yeah? Well beat it, friend. Me an' the lady here are havin' a talk."

"That;s not what I would call it."

"The hell do you know?!"

The man lunged at Quatre, who deftly sidestepped the attack sending the man stumbling into a nearby empty table.

"Oh you're gonna get it now!"

Al threw punch after punch at Quatre, but the Gundam pilot easily avoided the drunken onslaught.

"Just calm down and we'll talk about this."

"Shut your mouth, pretty boy!"

He kept up the assault until Quatre had his fill.

"I don't want to do this, but you're not leaving me much of a choice."

As Big Al's arm flew past his ear, Quatre balled his hand into a fist and struck him squarely in the nose. The bigger man tumbled to the floor with a crash and didn't move. Quatre rubbed at his stinging knuckles and noticed the bartender walking in his direction.

"Um, I'm sorry about that."

The older man behind the counter gave him a wink.

"Sorry for what? I didn't see anything. As far as I know, he fell off his stool and hit his face on a table."

"You mean you're not upset?"

"Upset?! I should say not! Hell, next time you come by I'll give you a free dinner if you like. Me and some of the other guys have been wanting to that for ages."

Quatre felt thoroughly embarrassed when a handful of people at the bar and a few of the tables started applauding him.

"Well, um, thanks I guess. But what about..."

"Ah, don't worry about him. We'll get him cleaned up and straightened out. You just forget all about it."

Quatre just scratched his head and shrugged. The bartender and the others went back about their business as if nothing had happened.

"Well...Mister Winner. We meet again."

He turned to see Dorothy half smiling, half smirking at him and grinned back.

"So it would seem."

"I could have taken care of myself you know."

"Um, yes...well. He did kinda come at me. Sorry about that."

Dorothy found herself giggling.

"Even after all this time you still apologize for everything you do. Why is that?"

"Well...I, uh...that is..."

Dorothy laughed again.

"Forget I asked. So, to what do I owe the honor?"

"Well, I have a table at the back. Would you care to join me?"

As much as she wanted to jump at him and say yes, she thought she should be a bit more reserved than that.

"Well, I suppose. It's bound to be better than sitting here by myself."

Quatre led Dorothy to his table and the two sat across from each other. They talked about this and that for nearly two hours. The war, the "Dekim Barton Incident" as it had come to be called, but they managed to keep from talking about work, since neither of them wanted to talk about their job or lack there of. At about eleven thirty, Dorothy decided she had better leave.

"Well, Quatre, it has certainly been nice to see you again and talk with you, but I think I had better be on my way."

"Oh. Do you have a place to stay then? I'm checked in at the hotel up the road. They know my family around here so they gave me the biggest suite they have. There's more than enough room if you need a place to stay."

"Why Quatre Raberba Winner, are you trying to get me into bed?"

"N-N-No! That's not what I meant!"

Dorothy smiled at his look of unadulterated shock. She'd only been half joking. If he had said yes it wouldn't have made much difference to her.

"I'm only joking. But yes, I do have somewhere to go. Thank you for the offer though. That was sweet of you. Anyway, I have to be up early so I think I'll leave before I give you have a coronary."

"Oh? What do you do?"

*Damn! I almost got out of here without lying to him.*

"Well, I'm...I do...research."

*There. Not completely a lie.*

"Really? Say, you're not employed at my family's biochem research facility near here, are you?"

"Well, no. Not exactly. But my work does occasionally take me there."

"Hmmm. I see. Well, I'd better not keep you if you have an early morning. Oh, that reminds me. I was going to visit the Preventers headquarters tomorrow and check in on everyone. Anyone you want me to say hello to for you?"

*What? Going where? Hmmm...that's OK...that's fine. If he finds out, he finds out. Just act natural.*

"Um, well, I guess say hi to everyone."

"I'll do that. And thank you for talking with me tonight."

"You're welcome"

"Good night, Miss Dorothy."

"Good night to you, Mister Winner."

With that, Dorothy bowed her head and left. Quatre sat for a moment staring at nothing in particular. Then, with a smile and a wave to the bartender, he paid his bill and walked out the door.

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Gundam Wing. It is copyrighted by people who have a lot more money than I do. This was written for fun and for the fans of the series. The storyline is mine, the characters, other than HeeroWZero originals, are not.

NOTES: Rather interesting thus far, wouldn't you say? Some notes on setting. The first part is obviously in space...pick a colony. It doesn't matter really. We'll say it's somewhere near where he went nuts with the Twin Buster Rifle. That's as good a place as any. Down on Earth, they're in Italy. I don't know where specifically. It's a small, semi-ritzy town kind of out on the edge of some suburban area. The Winner biochem facility is nearby, but far enough out of town so that if it explodes, nothing too serious will happen to the town. I'm gonna say that the Preventer HQ is somewhere on the northern coast of Europe...maybe the eastern part of Germany near Denmark...right about where I'd put the Sanc Kingdom. I think that's about it. So tell me, what did you think of Quatre getting into a bar fight (sort of)???

Comments and criticisms are welcome. Please send them to HeeroWZero@hotmail.com and be sure to include your name so I can get back to you. Thanks for reading!