Party Night- Take 2
Chapter 10
by Scarlet Eve
Two guards stood posted at the front door of the building. They appeared to be checking everyone's identification before allowing them to enter. Wufei glanced at Sally, a skeptical look on his face.
"How could that possibly be a good plan?" he asked in a low whisper. They were hiding behind two large columns in the lobby. Sally shook her head. "How could they even know who is supposed to be here?"
Sally pressed a finger to her lips, shushing Wufei from his talking. He scowled at her and turned his attention back to the guards.
"Let's go," Sally whispered, when the lobby was finally empty. The two came out from behind the columns and strolled towards the doors, looking as couple-like as possible. As they approached the front doors, the two guards turned to watch them through the glass doors.
"'Scuse us," Wufei mumbled as they stepped through the doors, the guards partially blocking the way.
"You live here?" one of them asked. Sally lifted an eyebrow.
"Dear, when did they hire such rude doormen?" Sally asked, throwing a look at Wufei. The two guards growled low in their throats.
"No idea," he replied. The guards took steps towards Sally and Wufei, but they released their arms once more and circled the guards' necks in a flash, and had them down, passed out, on the ground.
"Idiots," Wufei mumbled. He dragged the two guards to a small alcove while Sally rummaged through one of the wallets.
"Hmm, interesting," she said, flipping a laminated card to Wufei, who had just finished tying the guard's wrists together with a thick zip tie. He caught it out of the air, glanced it over, and snorted a laugh.
In his pocket, Heero's phone buzzed. Casually turning to lean against the banister, he pulled his phone out and looked. It was a text from Wufei that simply read, Barton.
Heero frowned for a moment. Trowa?
No.
The Barton Foundation.
Heero rolled his eyes and glanced back at the guards standing with the President. No wonder they were inept. The whole operation just got a lot easier.
Duo slid up behind the nearest guard and knocked him out with a quick squeeze to the neck area. The guard slid down, but Duo caught him and lowered him down to a lying position. Leaving him there, Duo took the guard's gun and slung it over his shoulder, and moved onto the next guard.
He wasn't as lucky this time. The guard shouted, and was making his way towards Duo.
"Great," Duo mumbled. The guard was running towards him now, so Duo ducked and rolled away, and sprung back up a few feet away from the guard.
"Sorry buddy," Duo said, leaping towards the guard and knocking him to the ground. "Can't have you ruining my friend's party." Duo knocked him out, and left him there.
On the other side of the roof, Trowa had already taken out the rest of the guards, using his acrobatic skills to move stealthily around, and surprising the guards from unexpected angles.
Trowa and Duo met in the middle.
"I got a text from Wufei. He knows who's behind this," Trowa said. "The Barton Foundation."
"I thought we squashed them!" Duo cried. Trowa shrugged.
"There must have been others, or short-sighted people who decided to take up the mantle."
"Is it always going to be this way? Fighting off factions of groups that we've already destroyed?" Duo mused.
"The curse of being a soldier."
"Quit being poetic," Duo said, nudging Trowa in the ribs. "Come on. Let's help Yuy."
Relena couldn't focus on Catherine's performance. She was still too nervous. Beside her, Dorothy stood in a relaxed position, casually nursing her wine.
"Miss Relena, please calm down," Dorothy whispered to her.
"I'm worried about the president," Relena replied, trying to refrain from glancing back to where the man stood, still flanked by the imposter guards.
"The boys will take care of it," Dorothy assured her. Relena wanted to believe Dorothy, but flashes from the last time people were in danger continued to rise in her mind. Was she doomed to this life until the end of her days? Always looking over her shoulder for a would-be assassin?
Relena glanced at Dorothy, about to ask her about her thoughts, but Dorothy was craning her neck, looking over the crowd in a different direction. Relena tried to follow her line of sight, but the other young woman was taller. Finally, Dorothy looked back down at Relena.
"Come," she ordered. Relena nodded without protest, and followed Dorothy through the crowd.
Once they were no longer surrounded by party guests, Dorothy leaned to Relena.
"Heero wants us to distract the President, so we must go engage him," Dorothy whispered hastily.
"How do you know that?" Relena asked, feeling a slight stab of jealousy. Dorothy smiled at her.
"I can read lips, dear. How do you think I learn so many secrets?" Dorothy said, then stepped off in the direction of the president. Relena stared after her for a moment, and that familiar distrust of Dorothy welled up inside of her. At least, Relena thought, she's on my side.
They approached the president together and squeezed in on either side of him, purposely bumping the guards away from him.
"Miss Darlian, Miss Catalonia," he said with a large smile. He rested his large hands on their shoulders. "This is a lovely party, and your entertainment is fantastic!"
"Isn't she?" Dorothy said, her voice velvet. Dorothy quickly changed the subject to a new policy that was currently being debated, asking the president for his opinion. Relena glanced around, and saw Heero standing with Duo and Trowa. They were talking quickly to each other. She wished she could read lips. As she stared, Heero turned his head and met her eyes briefly, flashing her a small smile before turning his head back to the others. Relena's heart hammered in her chest.
"They're still too close to the president. He could get hurt," Trowa said, looking at the president over Heero's shoulder.
"Agreed. We need to lure them away."
"Cause a distraction?" Duo suggested.
"Negative. That would bring all the guests' attention to us," Heero said. He turned his head and looked at them again. Beside the president, Relena was talking to him and Dorothy. They must have gotten her on a topic she liked, because she was animated, and no longer looked nervous.
Even more important than not harming the president, would be not harming Relena.
Heero hated having to think of creative ways to do things. He liked to just burst in, firing a weapon. It was much easier.
"Duo, go be yourself to them. Start talking about their guns or something. Draw them away," Trowa said, his hand on Duo's shoulder. Duo looked skeptical, but Heero shrugged his shoulders.
"Good of a plan as any," Heero conceded.
"Roger." Duo stepped away from the two pilots and stuck his hands in his pockets, strolling along the balcony, picking up a drink from a nearby table before approaching the guards behind the president.
Trowa stepped closer to Heero.
"Once Duo has them a safe distance away from the president, we can swoop in a get them," Trowa said. Heero nodded.
Duo stepped up beside the guards behind the president, and looped his arms over their shoulders.
"Hey there buddies!" Duo said, slurring his words slightly, to give the effect of intoxication, though his buzz had worn off a while ago.
Both men turned towards him sharply, their dark sunglasses flashing in the slowly fading sunlight.
"Step back, citizen," one of them growled.
"Todd? Charlie? Isn't that you guys?" Duo said, making up names. "You remember me! We met at the Preventer building a few weeks ago." Both the guards stared him down, neither moving.
"Hey, I heard you guys got issued the new Sigs. Can I check 'em out?" Duo asked, using his arms around their necks to turn them slightly away from the president and the girls. The two guards grumbled, but moved away from the president. One of them unholstered the pistol at his side and handed it over to Duo, barrel side pointing at him. Duo shook his head. Even if he hadn't suspected a thing before, he'd know for sure now that these two were not the president's actual guards.
He took the gun anyway and looked it over. It wasn't a Sig, as it should have been. It was some crappy make that Duo had never heard of. But he acted impressed, assuming that these idiots didn't know the difference.
While he looked the gun over, he began to ramble about his made up history with these two guards, trying to make them uncomfortable. It was working, as the two become more and more fidgety the longer he talked. From the corner of his eye, he saw Trowa and Heero approaching slowly. And in the distance, a sound caught his attention.
It was a low humming, and still far enough away that it was barely noticeable. More like an undertone. Duo tried to ignore it and focus on the issue at hand.
The crowd of guests on the balcony erupted into applause. Duo glanced over to see Catherine was bowing; her performance was over. Time to move fast.
Duo circled an arm around one of the guard's necks and rotated to stand behind the man, and pinned the guard's arms behind his back with Duo's other arm. Heero rushed forward with that super-human speed and took down the other guard - almost gracefully.
The humming got louder.
The crowd began to chant, "Encore!"
The two guards were struggling under Heero and Duo's grips, trying to shout above the noise. Trowa posted himself in front of the struggling guards while Heero and Duo dragged the two off towards a darkened corner of the balcony.
"What the hell is going on?"
Duo's head jerked up. The president had turned around, and was standing with his fists planted on his hips, looking exceptionally angry. Dorothy had one eyebrow arched and a smirk on her lips, while Relena had a hand pressed to her face.
The president's outraged exclamation rang in Relena's head. She removed her hand from her face and looked at the scene in front of her. And to her horror, more and more guests were catching on, no matter how hard Catherine tried to draw their attention back to her.
Heero and Duo had dragged the two guards in the corner, both of whom were still struggling. Trowa was trying to block the scene.
"What is that noise?" Relena said, the humming she'd heard getting louder and louder, and seeming to echo around the surrounding buildings. She looked up to the sky, along with several others. The president did too, though his face was still beet red.
With a woosh and burst of air, two helicopters appeared from the other side of the building, high above the roof. A few people screamed, while others held an arm to their face, blocking the wind. Relena squinted. One of the helicopters was branded with the Preventer emblem on the side, and was painted their signature dark brown color. The other, however, was white, with a large red rose painted on the side.
"Who…?" Relena began to ask.
"Lady Une," Dorothy answered for her.
The Preventer helicopter landed on the roof of Relena's building, while the white one hovered for a moment. The door slid open, revealing Lady Une, wearing her Preventer uniform. She kicked a rope ladder from the helicopter and climbed down, dropping gracefully onto the balcony, turned, and waved off the helicopter, which rose and landed on the other side of the apartment building.
By now, all the guests were staring, their mouths open in shock. Relena wanted to melt into the ground.
"Commander Une! What is the meaning of this?" The president asked, stepping forward to meet the head of the Preventers.
Lady Une was already surveying the scene, a Dorothy-like smirk on her face.
"Mr. President," she said with a slight bow. "Your security team was compromised by members of a faction of the Barton Foundation. Several members of my organization, all guests here, recognized the problem and alerted us, while at the same time, protecting you from any harm that may have come."
Relena listened, feeling her knees go weak. Mixtures of relief and anxiety flooded her veins, so she stepped to Dorothy and took her arm, leaning on the other woman for support.
The president was now looking around at everyone. A commotion by the door drew the crowd's attention, where several Preventers burst onto the balcony, headed by Wufei and Sally. They both nodded to Lady Une, then pointed at the two fake guards. The Preventers hurried over and arrested the two men.
"Mr. President, if you'll be so kind as to come with me, we'll relocate you somewhere safe until we can gather your other security team to take you back home," Lady Une said. The president looked annoyed, but without another word, he followed a few Preventers back through the penthouse.
Lady Une approached Relena and Dorothy.
"Thank you," Relena said, releasing Dorothy and grasping Lady Une's hands.
"Of course," she said, smiling. "Wufei and Sally called, so we left right away. We're just glad no one was hurt."
"Yes," Relena said, nodding her head.
"Lady, what's with the helicopter design?" Dorothy asked, gesturing with her glass to the white helicopter on the room. Une smiled.
"Just my tribute to Mr. Treize," she said softly. "He always did have a flair for the dramatic."
The woman chuckled. Une bowed to them, and called for her other Preventer agents to follow, hauling the remaining two imposter guards with them.
A/N: That's why Dorothy's hair is so big. It's full of secrets.
No but seriously.. sorry for the delay. 3
-SE