Duo hopped out of Deathscythe's cockpit after the gundam had been properly docked. He was met with Professor G, who pleasantly thanked the braided boy and gave him a handshake.

"Putting Deathscythe to good use, I see. Very good, I knew you could be counted on."

"Wait a minute, I'm on a mission? I thought I was just blowing shit up!" Duo smirked at the professor's raised eyebrow, but the infectiousness of it eventually caught up with him. The boy had always been a friendly person, and always determined. It was his competitive nature and natural skill that had attracted the professor towards Duo as a potential candidate for the Deathscythe's pilot. He had just enough skeletons in his closet to be an effective killer and as of yet, hadn't been a disappointment. The remainder of their conversation had been brief before Duo shouldered his bag and floated off towards the room he'd be keeping for the next several weeks.

"It is absolutely imperative that - why hello there, Mr. Maxwell." Dr. J waved a mechanical arm as Duo turned the corner. The boy stopped dead, nodding as respectfully as he could before catching sight of Heero, whom he'd been speaking with prior to the interruption. When neither of them seemed like good candidates to look at, he turned his eyes towards the ground. "Your appearance is good timing, I was just going over your next mission."

"That so?" Duo chanced a look upwards, making an effort to ignore the doctor and his creepy demeanor. He'd never cared for Dr. J or any of the others for that matter. He appreciated the skill it took to create such a war machine that he piloted, but that's about where it stopped.

"Indeed. You, Mr. Yuy here and Mr. Chang will be escorting the Maganacs into space. It seems as though Sandrock's repairs are out of their hands and they'll be sending him up via capsule. We need Mr. Winner to be ready as soon as possible and don't have time to wait."

"And I assume that OZ caught on, and plans to intercept it."

"Precisely."

"Fair enough. And Trowa?"

"It turns out that Heavyarms wasn't completely outfitted for space travel as you may have noticed back in L2." Duo pondered, nodding. True enough, the gundam had been dragged behind Wing Zero who thankfully had enough flying power to lift the massive Gatling gun of a machine. Duo shrugged, starting in the direction of his room with another polite nod. So much for enjoying space for a while. He waved lazily at both Trowa and Wufei as he passed their rooms, smiling to himself.

If there was anybody besides Quatre that he didn't mind the company of, it was Chang. Sure, he was a little hot-headed, but that's what made him so fun. The whole 'honorable samurai' thing was pretty funny too. Okay, so he just enjoyed laughing at the guy. What was so wrong about that? A few minutes later he'd found his own room, floating in and nearly changing gravity from the shock he'd gotten at who was sitting on his bed.

"Look, I love you Quatre, but this is turning into stalker behavior!" Duo gasped, grabbing at his chest as he tried to get his breath back. The blonde was frowning with a serious expression, unphased by Duo's dramatics. The braided boy sighed as Quatre started on a spiel, removing his clothes from his backpack along with a towel and soap. Ah, finally. That shower that he oh-so-deserved.

"I'm glad that you're back safe. You didn't answer my calls."

"This is starting to sound like we're going out or something." Duo muttered, unbraiding his hair.

"Duo, I'm being serious! You never told me what happened, and darn it, I'm not leaving until you do!" The statement almost sounded like a pout from Duo's point of view. He pulled off his over shirt, mentally reminding himself to leave the hair braided until after the clothes came off next time. He strode over towards the bathroom and turned on the water, then came back towards his bed. Quatre still sat there; it seemed as though he really wasn't going to disappear. Duo sighed.

"Nothing happened. It was hypothetical, remember?"

"Nothing, huh. That sure doesn't look like nothing, Duo." He looked at Quatre for a moment, then followed his gaze to his shoulder. All hope of covering it up was lost thanks to a barely noticeable set of teeth marks. Wait, when had that happened? Either way the now unbraided boy locked his door in case of prying eyes or ears, even worse. Quatre's gaze had gone from angry to entirely too concerned for Duo's liking. He hated when the blonde got like this. It was cute, but dammit!

"Fine." Duo snapped quickly. "Someone couldn't keep his hands to himself. Or... his teeth. That's all. He's not a wife beater, and I'm not dying. Are you satisfied?"

"You know how dangerous that is."

"Don't need to tell me, I'm not the one making the moves here." Duo responded in aggravation. He removed his pants rather violently, nearly tripping over his own feet before stalking into the bathroom and engaging in the shower that he wanted more than talking to Quatre. Unfortunately the blonde followed him, eyes wide and voice filled with disbelief.

"I always wondered, but I never thought he'd actually do it!"

"You're clearly a better reader of intentions than I am." Duo muttered while he washed off.

"Dr. J can't find out about this."

"My lips are sealed, beautiful. If I'm feeling lucky, it'll never happen again."

"Why not?" Duo blinked, opening the screen far enough to shove his head out. Soap dripped onto the floor and Quatre jumped.

"Why not? Who was just talking about how much danger I'm in!" Duo made a face and returned to his shower, snapping the screen shut. Several moments of silence followed before he spoke again. "And besides. He doesn't play nice. You saw the proof." Duo scrubbed at his shoulder, hoping that he hadn't caught some kind of robot rabies from the perfect soldier. Another twenty minutes passed before Duo finally thought of himself as clean enough. Quatre moved back into his room and he dried off, climbing onto his bed. He allowed the blonde to brush his hair.

"Don't be mad at me, Duo. I'm just worried about you. You're my best friend."

"The last person who said that didn't last long."

"That Shinigami stuff is all in your head. It's one of those self-fulfilling prophecies that Rasid talks about. You can't keep blaming all that bad luck on yourself. Besides, the gundams are here to make it right, right?"

"Supposedly. Some crotchety old guy told me I was chosen by God. Hmph." Duo rolled his eyes as Quatre started on his braid and slouched forward tiredly.

"Maybe you were." The blonde responded softly. "War doesn't ever make sense, why would people want to kill each other? Maybe we're destined for it. God gave you the life he did to prepare you for what we're doing now. Perhaps OZ is the devil's minions, and we're the angels that will bring peace back to the colonies. Maybe we'll understand it when we're older."

"Do you have any idea how crazy that sounds?" Duo smirked, shaking his head.

"Not any crazier than Heero getting the jump on you."

"Touche." Quatre finished the braid and tied it off. He pushed it over Duo's shoulder and used his back as a pillow. The braided boy laughed silently for a moment. "You realize that still makes me an angel of death, right?" Quatre snickered, wrapping his arms around Duo's waist in a tight hug.

"Do you think he actually likes you?" Quatre sighed, content to stay where he was.

"I doubt it. There's only one way to find out."

"Be careful, Duo. You may not realize it, but people do care about you."

"Speaking for yourself, I assume." Duo smiled and cringed as Quatre hit him gently.

"The other pilots too. Howard, and Sally, and all those kids on L2. The Maganacs, and anybody who understands why we're doing this. You're important, Duo. If this war had never started, I may have never met you, and I'm glad that I did. I'm sure everyone else is too." The way he said it caused Duo to get butterflies and a goofy smile. He wasn't sure if he'd be able to keep from crying if the blonde kept it up. How someone could stay so positive in light of all the destruction going on, Duo had no idea. It was moments like these that made him realize why he'd become friends with the soft-spoken Arab, moments that made Duo sure that he'd take a bullet for the kid.

"All staff, please report to room four-thirteen at eleven hundred hours for a briefing." Duo tilted his head towards the sound, eyes moving down to the clock beside his bed. He immediately slid away from Quatre and put on a new change of clothes. As he was doing this, Quatre answered the knock at his door, taking a step back so Duo could see who it was. Wufei put both hands in the air and stepped away from the door.

"Interrupting something? Meeting in ten, Maxwell." Quatre snickered as Duo raised an eyebrow at the Chinese boy, rolling his eyes. However, a view of the boy behind him turned both pilots somber. Heero watched the both of them silently, moving on only moments later. Trowa came up behind him, beckoning Quatre with a finger. The blonde boy looked back at Duo with an 'it'll be alright' smile before heading after the group. Duo shook his head and followed the parade beside Wufei with his hands shoved into his pockets.

The meeting had been nothing interesting. The pilots had been formally introduced to the crew that would be working on their machines, and any upgrades since the last workup were noted. Duo passed notes with Quatre (some of which were intercepted by Trowa, after which he'd look between the two suspiciously), and eventually they'd gotten to the meat and potatoes of the thing. Several missions had been laid out that they were to accomplish over the next few weeks. Even Duo agreed that some of them seemed like suicide. It wasn't until nearly two in the morning that the group was finally released.

"See ya'll in the morning." Duo yawned, stretching out. After a tentative wave to the group, he headed off towards his room. It wasn't until he reached the door that the braided boy had stopped to think. There was indeed only one way to find out the answer to his question. He wasn't sure if he wanted to know the answer. Life without Yuy would be much more simple, but whether things happened between them or not, they'd still have to deal with each other. Duo rolled his eyes to himself, turning away from his room and skirting down several hallways.

He'd stepped into Heero's room since the door was open. The Japanese boy sat on his bed with a laptop, ticking away at what, Duo couldn't guess. Heero had realized he was being watched and turned his eyes upon the guest, but said nothing. Duo assumed he could walk in and did so, leaning on the wall beside the door. The room was dimly lit, but Heero never did seem to be fond of bright lights. Bright anything, really. Darkness was safe, Duo could understand that. Several long minutes had passed before any words were spoken.

"Did you need something." Heero didn't interrupt his work to pose what sounded more like a statement than a question. The answer that he sought didn't come quickly, however. Duo spent the next several minutes thinking of how to bring up an issue to a robot. Perhaps the boy had forgotten that he was even there. Why was he letting something this stupid get under his skin? Why should Heero be any different than anybody else?

Duo had nearly pissed himself off with all the internal arguing before finally stepping away from the wall and towards Heero, who looked up long enough to have his laptop plucked from his hands. Duo threw all caution to the wind, leaning in unbearably close to him; it put him off for a moment that Heero hadn't attempted to stop him yet. It took more courage than he'd expected, but he'd planted a kiss on the boy's lips that ended up getting more extreme than he'd planned for. When Duo finally pulled away, he realized that he'd been holding his breath.

"That's all I wanted."

"That's it."

"Mm." Duo moved away from the boy, heading towards the door. Oh, how he wanted to stay.

"Was there a point to that?" Heero inquired in his usual monotone, replacing his laptop to its former position on his legs. The clicking continued as Duo stopped in the doorway.

"Yeah."

"Which was?"

"Makin' sure that yesterday wasn't a fluke." He turned around and waved at Heero, who stared at him for a moment as if he'd just drawn an incredibly large blank. He still hadn't been able to make sense of it before the boy and his braid disappeared from view. Perhaps he hadn't made it obvious enough to the Deathscythe pilot the first time around that the feeling was mutual. Then again, the concept of feelings often went up and over the Wing pilot's head. Even more so now that he was in the company of a man who allowed him no compassion whatsoever. There had always been thoughts in Heero's head; it was the only thing that Dr. J couldn't take away from him.

At this moment, those thoughts were on Duo. He wondered what the boy had been talking about with Quatre and if it had anything to do with what just occurred. The thought process was cut short, however, since only minutes after Duo left, Dr. J was standing in his place.

"What was that about?" He asked.

"Asked about the meeting." Heero responded immediately. It was a blatant lie, but telling the truth was hardly an option. The doctor shook his head, and his clawed hand twitched.

"Of course, always so forgetful. Annoying little rat that one is."

"Hm." Heero returned to his work and the doctor continued on his stroll.

Memento Mori. I often find myself knocking on death's doorstep these days.