By this point a fair number of people (too many, in his personal opinion) were familiar with Duo Maxwell's trademark braid. To date, however, he was aware of only one other person who had seen his hair loose; that person was now watching him brush it out with fascinated irritation.

"You realize what a waste of effort that is," Heero commented in his usual tone. "You spend entirely too much time on it."

"Time which could be better spent, blah, blah...maybe this helps me think, hmm?" Duo paused and flipped his hair across his shoulders to brush the other side.

"Well, lord knows you need all the help you can get," Heero remarked, and flopped (though not in the casual, freer sense that most people used the word) on the bed, tucking his hands behind his head and glaring at the ceiling for some imagined sin. Duo merely chuckled and continued brushing, watching the death of a sunset out the window.

At length Heero spoke again: "You know what people are saying about us."

"Hai, Heero, I know." They'd been in this safehouse for nearly a full week, which in itself was impressive; the fact that they'd shared a room (as opposed to Wufei, who insisted vehemently that he'd rather sleep under the stairs than with another pilot) had made itself easy prey to idle speculation by people who had time for such things.

"Well?"

Duo shrugged and set the brush down, combing his hair back out of his face with his fingers. "So let 'em talk."

"Yeah, I suppose you wouldn't mind; they say stuff like that about you anyhow," Heero snorted.

"And I should care why, precisely? Doesn't matter, Heero; they're just looking for something to talk about before the odds catch up with them." The survival rate of those in knowledge of a Gundam pilot's whereabouts was not good, a fact in which all involved parties were well-versed.

"Not worth the time it would take to kill them," Heero muttered, shifting. Duo shrugged and leaned on the windowsill, counting the stars as they appeared, hair spread down his back.

"So what's on the docket for tomorrow?"

Heero paused.

"If I told you I'd have to kill you," he replied quietly, expression an absolute deadpan. Duo snickered; Heero's sense of humor (what there was of it) did require interpretation, but something about it had always struck Duo as more amusing than it probably was intended. Of course, he'd always seen humor in things most 'sane' people didn't...

"They bugged the room again," he announced brightly. "Wanna give 'em something to listen to?" Duo hopped on the bed, bouncing to make the springs creak.

"Knock it off, baka," Heero grumbled, rolling to his side.

"Tsk...can dish it out, but you just can't take it. What's the matter, you afraid of what Relena would think?"

Heero turned enough to pin Maxwell with one of his patented dead stares. "Shut the hell up."

Duo considered responses, then with all due aplomb, stuck his tongue out.

"Stop acting like such a child, Duo. You're an embarassment to your mission."

"And aren't you a bit young to be an old fart?" Duo replied, wrinkling his nose. "I know your age is supposed to be classified, but you never struck me as a fifty-year-old man before."

"I said shut up; go to sleep and stop making more of a fool of yourself than you already are."

"Well, sweet dreams to you, too," Duo snorted.

"Keep that stupid mane of yours on your side, got it?"

"As ever, Heero..." A few moments silence and attempted sleep. "Just one thing? Just for the bugs?"

Heero sighed. "What?"

"Good night, Heero my love," Duo whispered, fighting down snickers; he was about to follow it up with a passionate sigh when a hard kick (really hard...damn offworld training) from Heero made drawing breath at all suddenly more difficult.

Duo coughed and held his side gingerly. "You're no fun at all, you know that?"

"Go. To SLEEP."

"Yeah, yeah..." Duo muttered and stretched out on his side, facing the outside of the bed as Heero was doing. It was quite amusing, really, Duo mused as he drifted off; some situations were just too simple for the dubious of nature to understand. Back to back, the two slept lightly, guarding against the world and letting the idiots wonder.