Part 2
WHEN HORSE SHIT HITS THE FAN
Dr. J came back home to his beloved lab hidden in the grungy, abandoned ghetto of L-1.
The crippled old man slipped off his waterproof coat and closed the door on the rain outside. The door had been unlocked. Suspicious, his prosthetic eyes in the form of green glasses focused on the keys that had been put on the mahogany table in the hallway. The first part of the house was normally furnished, complete with a library, clean kitchen, and even a home theatre. But continue down stairs, it was turned into a laboratory. Dr. J snatched the keys and shuffled down to his lab, which was lighted and even lightly air-conditioned.
He found his first suspect, a young Japanese boy he'd taken on as his new student, in the corner. The old man, grabbing his lab coat on the way, scrutinized the little form in the corner near his office. With his prosthetic claw, he tested the waters by gently tapping the gaunt frame and found that the boy, Yuusuke, was in a deep unconscious state. Some kind of tranquilizer. Obviously not the own boy's doing. He'd taken him up off the streets in Heero's absence and had eased him much more slowly into the crime mindset than his previous subject. There was no way he was adept enough to find the drugs and accidentally swallow them. If so, there would have been evidence, a broken bottle, needle, and an eyedropper maybe. This was obviously a stranger's work.
Dr. J didn't fear a hostile intruder. If death came for him now, it came for him now.
But it didn't add up to a burglar. Even an amateur would have use stronger drugs. Yuusuke would probably wake up in a half hour, at the maximum. He left the boy there and shuffled along past his bubbling experiments and caged animals, into the mechanics room, where he heard the rolling of wheels and metal being struck and contorted. It was the only other large room in the lab, besides the solitary confinement room, medical room, and the small space where Heero slept. He carefully turned the knob on the large metal door he'd installed to stop the spread of a car fire, if one ever happened. It opened up into a brightly lit room with a huge metal suit as centerpiece.
He had a mixed reaction when he saw his first student, lean and fit Heero, positioned under the emerging mobile suit, fixing the self-detonation and engine systems. The boy went on obliviously, but Dr. J knew he was just ignoring him. Poor bastard, he thought, closing the door, he's jealous…
"Heero!"
Instantly, Heero's head snapped to attention. His head was almost wedged between the bulk of the gundanium machine. From this distance, Dr. J could almost see the frown. The old professor folded his arms and waited for him to get up. Rolling out on a wheeled board, Heero staggered up, a bit numb from lying so long, and tried unsuccessfully to wipe off the oil from his skin. He frowned again and walked up, words already forming on his thin lips.
"No excuses!" he snapped. The Professor had to look up to make eye contact now that Heero had growth spurts, but it didn't make him any less malicious. "Straighten up."
Heero did so. Like so many times before in his life, he had to pass the physical. Look an ounce overweight, have a few inches of dormant muscle, anything under the rigid standard would earn him full week of training. His scruffy blackish-brown bangs were disheveled from working on the half-finished suit, his Josh Hartnett/Pearl Harbor tank was stained black along with most of his torso, and he just stared straight ahead like a disinterested racehorse being shoed. Dr. J's prosthetic claw made a whirring as he tipped back his chin. "Straighter!"
Finally, it seemed okay. Dr. J let him relax and suspicious brows framed his piercing green shades. "Explain."
Heero got a stony look. "I told Yuusuke that he didn't know what he was getting into and he had an overreaction. Panic attack. So I gave him a sedative."
Dr. J. didn't buy it.
"You tried to warn him, didn't you Heero? You told him to run."
Heero stood straight as a braced cactus and as abrasive as one. His lips twitched once then fell into silence. There was no way he could stare into those glasses and not give it away in his eyes. Dr. J knew him too damn well; he had his mannerisms and personas memorized. The crippled old man simply snorted and limped over to the tool table. "You can relax, Heero," he said critically over his shoulder.
Heero turned around, wiping the sweat from his greased forehead. He stared at the once great bulk of the "Gundam" he'd been working on for most of his productive life. It had once been in perfect working condition, even painted to a gleam. But a quick dispatch by the best Deuce demolitionists had made quick work of it. Two men and one woman had snuck into the laboratory during the night. Heero remembered not waking, probably because of a hard day of training. Dr. J had come running, as fast as he aged body would allow, downstairs. The metal door separating the mechanics room locked the second Dr. J managed to drag Heero from his bed. The demolitionists had done their work though and faithfully committed suicide to protect the syndicate. The experiment had been completely ruined and they had started over from square one. Sad… Heero'd been looking forward to piloting it.
Dr. J watched Heero stare for a few seconds, and then cleared his throat. "Well," he cooed, "get to work, would you?"
Heero gave him a glare out of the corner of his eye, and then returned to his work.
After five hours, Heero began to lose track of where he was. All the wiring and the gleaming metal slowly began to blur until he could hardly keep his vision straight. He even tripped getting out of the half-wired cockpit and wiped out into cold gundanium. Dr. J sighed and yelled at him to call it a day. The Professor disappeared and he heard the door slam. Had he been watching the entire time? …It didn't' matter. Heero rubbed his face, which had not surprisingly gone numb, and tiredly slipped off the mecha torso. He flipped off the lights, came back to turn on the security system, and then crossed the lab to his small room, or cupboard under the stairs, so to speak.
Heero frowned when he saw that Yuusuke had already found quite a nice spot in his bed. He returned to the cockpit of the Gundam and curled up in the seat for the night.
This was a bitch.
And tomorrow didn't look any better.
"Do these shades make me look fat?" The figure vainly posing before him kept scrutinizing his own face through the tinting quality of the glasses. He combed his hair quick with his hand.
The other man just smoked some more.
The younger one, only fifteen but with a body to shame the twenty-five-year-old jocks, turned viciously on him. "I said," he snapped, rolling his eyes, "do these make me look fat!"
"Fat as 'ell," the smoker said in a heavy British accent. He tapped the glowing end of his drug into the floor and rubbed it with the toe of his shoe. "You can barely see your code wit'dat bloody second chin. Ever think about joining Jeeny Craig?"
"Jenny Craig and no," the kid corrected. He soured his lips at him and went back to vainly posing. He tucked his hair into the back of his long black trench coat over a black tank and black jeans. He examined the makeup on his throat. "And you're not supposed to see the code anyway. I think it's such a stupid idea. It's just screaming, 'Come and kill me.'"
The other man laughed, reclining into his chair. "You, my friend, are the one screaming come and kill me."
"What do you mean?"
"You know what I mean." He puffed once deeply and stretched out his arm. "Even Oprah after five minutes my friend would be screaming for you to shut your cake hole."
The kid shot him a raspberry via the mirror and trotted over to the surveillance cameras on the other side of the dark apartment. The kid slipped into a swivel chair and snatched up the Brit's cup of tea there jokingly as he scanned each blue screen. The older man just rubbed his stubble with a smile as the kid took a spit take, complaining of burnt lips. The other one smiled at his pain and the kid wiped it on the back of his hand. He glanced around the screens again, and found something interesting. He waved the British man over, who sighed and complied.
The kid pointed to a screen that was planted slyly on the doorstep of the Winner's on L-4. The reception was a bit fuzzy but it served it purpose just fine.
The blue light lit on the Deuce's face with a mischievous glow. "They're running be-hiiind…" he taunted, running his finger over the two figures on the doorstep.
Heero's lips were again frowning when the political figure escorted him to the Winner's lavish estate. The sky was padded with misty gray clouds, like damp lint hanging in the sky. A very beautiful analogy, when he thought about it. A pair of shades hid him from the rest of the world, making his pale skin under his scruffy dark bangs him seem like walking dead. Faithfully posing as a son, Heero folded his arms, wishing he had the security of his gun in his pocket. He coldly brushed off a bit of last second advice from the old man besides him, muttering that he was just fine.
The door opened via servant into a large dining room and lobby. A tall, sandy blonde man stood there, Mr. Winner. Heero'd been up in his cockpit early that morning looking up the Winners on his laptop. It didn't hurt to be prepared. A moderately figured girl in a formal dress with the same sandy blonde hair stood beside him, ushering them in with a dazzling smile. To the side, she yanked a blonde boy out from his hiding place. Heero wanted to sigh but the two political figures had already begun laughing and talking causally. Heero's "father" led him in and the two polite children dragged him off into the backyard.
Hello Hell.
It was a short and lavish shortcut they took, straight through the thin dinning room out onto a deck and Heero was almost disappointed that he couldn't see the world-famous Winner mansion. Almost. Sophistication had been off his list of things to be a long time ago. Paintings bored him, but abstract photography was a hobby he wanted to take up enthusiastically. He truly could live without fashion lectures, architecture, or rich trinkets. The two slim blondes darted ahead of him, clearly more excited than he was to pull him into the acres and acres that spilled out like a green gown behind the huge house. With confused faces, they tried to calm themselves and eventually settled back to Heero's nonchalant pace. Wild horses… that's what they were like.
The girl chatted wildly about Heero's visit and twisted her made-up face so much with expression it would have been ugly on any other girl. Lucky for her, she had a way of pulling it off. Heero saw her eyes search for his politely, but lose them somewhere in his shades. He wanted to smile, but then again, he'd been told his smile was like the devil's. No need to scare the shit out of them.
"Hello," she said brightly, "I'm Iria, Iria Winner. How do you do? …You came from L-1, right? You speak Japanese, don't you? Oh, let me try! Konnichiwa! Hajimashite."
"Very good for an anorexic prep," Heero said in Japanese back. Then he smiled faintly and repeated the greeting.
Just like he wanted, the girl was dumbfounded at first. Then her face flushed an angry red when the translation clicked. By now, the shier boy at the side of his sister had opened the polished glass doors to the backyard and had finally summed up the courage to talk. Iria, taking up some of her black gown in her fists, stormed out in front of the two boys to find her place on a lounge chair besides the pool on the cement patio.
"You'll have to excuse her," he said sheepishly. "Iria can be temperamental when it comes to foreigners. Especially if they insult her."
Heero hesitated for a second. He snorted incredulously. "So you understood that too?" he inquired brazenly.
The blonde boy, with his big aqua-blue/green eyes, nodded and followed Heero out onto the patio. "Pretty clear actually."
The Winner son plopped down into a chair around a glass table besides Heero, like he expected a pampered boy to. He'd be damned if this kid had never left L-4, or even his own estate. A tray of coffee and what smelled like tea sat in front of them. Obliviously, they liked to treat guests right.
"So, did your father make you come with?" the boy asked. "I don't like to ever sit in some stranger's house; I'm so afraid of breaking something I can't fix."
Heero generously took a cup of coffee. He still felt beddy and his body was running on cold, so some wouldn't hurt at all. "Well, let's just say it's required. It's not my cup of tea either," Heero replied flatly. When he saw a teacup pressed to the blonde's lip, he wanted to laugh at the pun he'd made.
"You're not like the other Sheep that come here," the Winner kid said.
"Sheep?"
"Oh, I'm sorry," he apologized, running a finger or two through his platinum hair. "Family lingo. Iria and I always call the kids of the political figures that come Sheep because they always get herded around."
"By you two?" Heero asked bluntly.
The boy laughed. Probably a yes.
Heero, his voice locked in his stoic throat, just dragged out of his coffee cup and licked the bitter stuff from his lip. It felt oddly comforting warming his stomach, but then again, it could be the hospitality sinking in. The Winner kids had been a hell of lot more down to earth than he'd pictured. Human. Heero wondered how long he'd be able to keep up the brash and aloof façade.
"There really is something different about you, I just can't put my finger on it," the boy said, almost frustrated, summing up his face. "It's driving me crazy, actually."
"Is it the bastard attitude?" Iria snapped from her lounging spot.
"Iria!" the boy said. "Honestly...''
Heero curled his lips a bit. "It's okay," he said, "I get that a lot."
"That you seem different?"
"No, that I'm a bastard."
Thin blonde eyebrows framed those innocent-looking eyes with confusion. This boy obviously hadn't had nearly the life he had. Imagining what the scarring of underground war would do to him was like Heero playing a psycho ward advertisement in his head. "If you haven't noticed, I can be pretty cold when I want," Heero explain, casting his eyes into his coffee as he took another drink. He offhandedly took off his shades.
"I have." The other boy watched him. After a few seconds of silence as Heero drank, he folded his arms and leaned forward with a flat expression. "I suppose you want to be allies, or are you really what you are?"
Heero looked up, a sense of red-alert lighting up in his head. His eyebrows furrowed and he clinked his cup down. "What do you mean?"
"You're not Mr. Naogaki's son, are you?" A smile lit on his lips, but Heero wasn't sure if it was maniacal as in, 'I've got you, now I'm going to pull out my gun and shoot you,' or if it was just a smile.
Heero yearned for the cold, deadly reassurance of his gun pressing his thigh. His Prussian eyes scrutinized the peach-colored, innocent face for a flaw. Anything to make him feel better. He didn't like going into situations without warning or information. He decided that if this kid had something planned, lying wouldn't make him on any better terms.
"No," he admitted.
"I thought so." The blonde drank from his teacup, but with no threatening look. Actually, it looked like he was about to giggle.
Heero stared at him for a second. It was nearly impossible to figure this kid out. He sat back in his chair and folded his arms. "You…"
"…Have been through this just yesterday," the boy finished, smiling with his eyes closed into his cup of tea. It was kind of an incredulous tilt of the lips. He looked up almost apologetic, shrugging. "I suppose I should have told you straight off the bat. I knew you probably were acting from the minute I noticed your eyes were blue. I saw Mr. Naogaki's real son once when he was six and he had brown eyes. Besides, you're the first Japanese person I've ever seen to have blue eyes."
Heero sighed. /Bitch! /
"You're from Jisatsu right? Maxy warned me that they would send someone today. He came yesterday to talk–"
Heero jerked. His fist came down hard on the table, making the tray clatter. "Maxy?"
He remembered the name, but only vaguely. Something important…
The blonde boy looked frightened. Like Heero'd grown fangs. "Well… that's the name he gave me," he said tensely. "Why? Is it important?"
Heero frowned.
The Japanese boy hid his upset behind glazed over eyes that just numbly took in colors and shapes. Behind them, Heero kept imaging a scarred American waiting for him with a gun somewhere in the Winner mansion, maybe even in his home. He suddenly snapped to attention, noticing that Quatre had already started talking without him.
"…A kid from the Deuces came yesterday, doing what you came to do today. He just wandered up to the door like he had a sleepover with one of my sisters. Of course, one of my sisters did yesterday, and he looked enough like a girl that I let him in.
"He didn't say anything thing so I just left him. I went out to the horse stable and he came up behind me and just started talking. He told me that he was with the Deuce gang and asked if I would support them. You know, become like extended family. He was so sincere about it, I mean; he really looked like he wanted friends, so… I said yes. I said I would back him as much as could, whenever I could," he said. The blonde cocked his head. "… But that doesn't mean–"
Heero held up a finger.
The boy hushed.
"Listen," Heero said reassuringly, "I have no reason to be hostile with you or orders to kill you so don't worry Mr. …Uh, I never got your name."
The blonde boy elatedly flung out his hand to meet Heero's calloused one. "Quatre R. Winner," he introduced with a pearly grin.
"Heero. Hajimashite"
"Just Heero? Is there a last name to that?" Quatre asked humorously.
He shook his head.
"Okay then, just call me Quatre."
"I assume we're on good terms now, correct?"
"Yes."
Heero smiled, hoping it didn't come across as evil as usual. It was nice when he had a few moments to his own devices, bleeding thoughts of gangster life, callow memories of dark rooms and darker situations, and masked humanity all shoved aside.
Fuck Maxy. He could wait. Heero Yuy would be living in the trench coat again soon enough. If the superiors didn't send him investigating after this "Maxy", he would do it himself.
"I'm not saying I have a closed mind. I'll still support you, of course, but you won't earn my trust just by glowering and drinking coffee," he said.
Heero fingered his coffee mug, which he just noticed the gold leaf adorning the lip. His Prussian eyes lifted up. "You mentioned you had horses…"
* * * * *
The hot, sensual breath of horse clouded in Heero's face, accompanied by the metallic clink of tack jolting around loosely on its body. Dust kicked up by the scuffing motion of the blood bay's hooves swirled in the late evening sun. The afternoon had been overcast thickly, but now the sun was alone in the October orange sky. Heero sneezed once and the horse roughly shoved its muzzle into his hair, snorting impatiently. He smiled smugly and wrapped his fingers around its halter. The name on the bronze plate read Sarava, a typical Arabic name. Heero slipped it off, the horse chewing at its newly freed jaw, then fitted a bridle on him. The blood bay whinnied as Quatre trotted past, already saddled and on his white horse, Sandrock.
"You okay?" he asked, pulling the horse's unruly head back.
Heero pulled the under strap tight. "Fine," he said, tossing his hair a bit. He was surprised how much dust there was in a horse stable the size of a small house. It looked like dandruff floating off his hair.
Quatre's horse shifted under him, yearning its head toward the open field. He titled his head, watching how easily Heero fitted his horse. "Do you have horses in L-1?" he asked, turning his steed so he could face him. "You're going faster with the tack than most of my sisters, and they're out here crooning over the ponies all the time."
"I've had training," he said flatly.
Quatre titled his head. "Really? Horseback riding doesn't seem like a very terrorist thing."
Heero jolted up into the saddle and gathered up the reigns silently. Then, while the horse gnawed on his bit, he gave the blonde a look. "Who said I was a terrorist?"
The Winner son looked flustered. "Oh, I'm sorry!" he said, urging his horse along side Heero's. "It's just that I've been told all my life that Jisatsu is just a desperate terrorist group. You know, by my father and such. He never wanted me to get soft toward your group or the Deuces. He's a very lawful man."
Heero smiled. "And yet you still form alliances with them behind his back."
Quatre nodded sheepishly. "I never said I agreed completely with my father."
They guided their horses, which seemed to flock close to each other while impatiently brushing necks, off of the cemented floor into the lush grass. The horses seemed to know the path and confidently walked toward a pond surrounded by a thick group of trees. The blonde boy simply let the reins lay slack against his horse's neck and Heero caught on and did the same. Their steeds would just carry them where they wanted to go. They'd been there probably many times before.
"So… if you're not a terrorist," Quatre brought up again, "what exactly would you call yourself?"
"Besides a bastard? – Gang member, you know, crime syndicate. Scarface, Mafias, men living off crime …" Heero said nonchalantly, watching the golden sun drown in the silhouette of the upcoming trees. "I was born into this. So I have no choice but to go with it until they let me retire."
"And you hate it?"
Heero nodded. "…Yours? You like it? Or is a phone on a silver platter too much?"
He smiled. "Yeah, I do, but no body's life is perfect. The traveling is great; I get to see more than most people dream of. But I hate the fact that we live in a world where some people, like me, have more money than we care for, and some people have absolutely nothing. I'd like to give it away, but my father insists we could do better good for the colonies by investing it in politics and government," Quatre answered. "He calls my visits to the poor villages 'crusades.'"
"Not a dog's life," Heero said dryly. "Huh?"
"Heero? What exactly do you do… in the syndicate?" Quatre asked.
"You're not going to let me go until you know something, aren't you?" Heero said to himself, relaxing and pulling his feet out of the irons. "Does my life really interest you that much? You've done nothing but poke at it."
The blonde boy sat crooked to face Heero. "I must admit, I'm curious," he said, shrugging his frail shoulders. When he looked at them, the agent saw how easily this boy could die in a rough game like Heero's life. One hand to those shoulders looked like it could snap them. "I've been told one thing, then another. It's hard to tell what's truth and what's a ploy by an enemy of yours. People today get disillusioned easily."
"If you think its all James Bond and leather-interior corvettes, you'd be in for a hell of a surprise," Heero said coldly. He stared ahead, face taking on its usual stony tone.
"Bad?"
Heero looked at him dead in the eye. "Hell."
A glittery look like a child in all the horror movies he'd seen lit in Quatre's eyes. He apologized under his breath.
"Don't take it personally," Heero said, craning his neck under a branch. He shook a leaf from his hair. "That's what I tell everybody," he explained monotonously.
Now they had penetrated the miniature forest and went toward the pond. The horses automatically paused at the water. Quatre smiled at Heero. His hands gathered up his reins subtly. "I'd hold on if I were you," he warned. "They like to race."
Sandrock's ears flattened and he tossed his mane. Heero's horse, Sarava, did the same momentarily. Their hooves were lapped by the water and pawed there. And suddenly, in perfect unison, they both bolted out across the water like horses out of a Derby gate. Heero recovered, as Sandrock pulled out ahead, from almost being thrown backwards. He had to slip back into the saddle again and urged his heels into Sarava's side. Quatre was already across the shallow pond and his horse was laboring up the other side and cutting a sharp corner on the path out, dirt flying from the hooves. He could hear laughing floating back to him and Heero just was more determined. He reminded himself not to get rabid over it, but he was so easily swept up in competition…
He kicked his horse and followed.
The sun had sunk down below the mountains in the distance after the race, which Quatre had won, by default. Sarava had never been the quick one to warm up to strangers, and had thrown Heero once up the other bank, sending him rolling back into the water. The two boys were tired from their bones being jolted as the estate came up into view.
At first, it seemed the way they had left it. The reduced light made it seem like a huge white block with rooms dotted here and there on the outlying platforms. On the other side, Heero could see the familiar red and blue dashed light of cop cars, and could hear the ominous sound of low voices and crying before Quatre even saw anything different. As the horses plodded up the slope, Heero listened faintly to what the blonde was saying. The kid seemed so wrapped up that the words didn't form. He stared at the house, backgrounded by the red-blue flashing.
Quatre noticed.
"Heero? What's wrong?"
The Japanese boy was about to say something, when a ragged-looking Iria ran up, oblivious to her beautiful black dress tearing under her frantic feet. "Quatre!" she screamed.
"Iria?" The blonde boy jolted on his horse as it skittered at his sister's wild approach. If it hadn't been for her elegant jewelry, muted makeup, and purse still clinging to her shoulder somehow, the Jisatsu agent would have mistaken her for a fevered blind woman, flinging her arms at her brother and making wild noises that melted into sobs.
"Iria calm down!" Quatre leaned off his horse until he almost was falling off. His sister's arms were around his small shoulders faster than lightning. Her sobs subsided in the fabric of his shirt and her fingers strained into his skin. Her glossy lips spilled out garbled words. "Iria! Calm down! I can't understand what your saying."
"Daddy! Mr. Naosaki!" She managed to scream out. "Gunshots!"
"What?" Quatre shook his sister's shoulder, trying to snap her out of her craze. "What gunshots? What happened? Are they okay? Iria!"
She pulled away, holding her hand up to her mouth. "They're dead…"
WHEN HORSE SHIT HITS THE FAN
Dr. J came back home to his beloved lab hidden in the grungy, abandoned ghetto of L-1.
The crippled old man slipped off his waterproof coat and closed the door on the rain outside. The door had been unlocked. Suspicious, his prosthetic eyes in the form of green glasses focused on the keys that had been put on the mahogany table in the hallway. The first part of the house was normally furnished, complete with a library, clean kitchen, and even a home theatre. But continue down stairs, it was turned into a laboratory. Dr. J snatched the keys and shuffled down to his lab, which was lighted and even lightly air-conditioned.
He found his first suspect, a young Japanese boy he'd taken on as his new student, in the corner. The old man, grabbing his lab coat on the way, scrutinized the little form in the corner near his office. With his prosthetic claw, he tested the waters by gently tapping the gaunt frame and found that the boy, Yuusuke, was in a deep unconscious state. Some kind of tranquilizer. Obviously not the own boy's doing. He'd taken him up off the streets in Heero's absence and had eased him much more slowly into the crime mindset than his previous subject. There was no way he was adept enough to find the drugs and accidentally swallow them. If so, there would have been evidence, a broken bottle, needle, and an eyedropper maybe. This was obviously a stranger's work.
Dr. J didn't fear a hostile intruder. If death came for him now, it came for him now.
But it didn't add up to a burglar. Even an amateur would have use stronger drugs. Yuusuke would probably wake up in a half hour, at the maximum. He left the boy there and shuffled along past his bubbling experiments and caged animals, into the mechanics room, where he heard the rolling of wheels and metal being struck and contorted. It was the only other large room in the lab, besides the solitary confinement room, medical room, and the small space where Heero slept. He carefully turned the knob on the large metal door he'd installed to stop the spread of a car fire, if one ever happened. It opened up into a brightly lit room with a huge metal suit as centerpiece.
He had a mixed reaction when he saw his first student, lean and fit Heero, positioned under the emerging mobile suit, fixing the self-detonation and engine systems. The boy went on obliviously, but Dr. J knew he was just ignoring him. Poor bastard, he thought, closing the door, he's jealous…
"Heero!"
Instantly, Heero's head snapped to attention. His head was almost wedged between the bulk of the gundanium machine. From this distance, Dr. J could almost see the frown. The old professor folded his arms and waited for him to get up. Rolling out on a wheeled board, Heero staggered up, a bit numb from lying so long, and tried unsuccessfully to wipe off the oil from his skin. He frowned again and walked up, words already forming on his thin lips.
"No excuses!" he snapped. The Professor had to look up to make eye contact now that Heero had growth spurts, but it didn't make him any less malicious. "Straighten up."
Heero did so. Like so many times before in his life, he had to pass the physical. Look an ounce overweight, have a few inches of dormant muscle, anything under the rigid standard would earn him full week of training. His scruffy blackish-brown bangs were disheveled from working on the half-finished suit, his Josh Hartnett/Pearl Harbor tank was stained black along with most of his torso, and he just stared straight ahead like a disinterested racehorse being shoed. Dr. J's prosthetic claw made a whirring as he tipped back his chin. "Straighter!"
Finally, it seemed okay. Dr. J let him relax and suspicious brows framed his piercing green shades. "Explain."
Heero got a stony look. "I told Yuusuke that he didn't know what he was getting into and he had an overreaction. Panic attack. So I gave him a sedative."
Dr. J. didn't buy it.
"You tried to warn him, didn't you Heero? You told him to run."
Heero stood straight as a braced cactus and as abrasive as one. His lips twitched once then fell into silence. There was no way he could stare into those glasses and not give it away in his eyes. Dr. J knew him too damn well; he had his mannerisms and personas memorized. The crippled old man simply snorted and limped over to the tool table. "You can relax, Heero," he said critically over his shoulder.
Heero turned around, wiping the sweat from his greased forehead. He stared at the once great bulk of the "Gundam" he'd been working on for most of his productive life. It had once been in perfect working condition, even painted to a gleam. But a quick dispatch by the best Deuce demolitionists had made quick work of it. Two men and one woman had snuck into the laboratory during the night. Heero remembered not waking, probably because of a hard day of training. Dr. J had come running, as fast as he aged body would allow, downstairs. The metal door separating the mechanics room locked the second Dr. J managed to drag Heero from his bed. The demolitionists had done their work though and faithfully committed suicide to protect the syndicate. The experiment had been completely ruined and they had started over from square one. Sad… Heero'd been looking forward to piloting it.
Dr. J watched Heero stare for a few seconds, and then cleared his throat. "Well," he cooed, "get to work, would you?"
Heero gave him a glare out of the corner of his eye, and then returned to his work.
After five hours, Heero began to lose track of where he was. All the wiring and the gleaming metal slowly began to blur until he could hardly keep his vision straight. He even tripped getting out of the half-wired cockpit and wiped out into cold gundanium. Dr. J sighed and yelled at him to call it a day. The Professor disappeared and he heard the door slam. Had he been watching the entire time? …It didn't' matter. Heero rubbed his face, which had not surprisingly gone numb, and tiredly slipped off the mecha torso. He flipped off the lights, came back to turn on the security system, and then crossed the lab to his small room, or cupboard under the stairs, so to speak.
Heero frowned when he saw that Yuusuke had already found quite a nice spot in his bed. He returned to the cockpit of the Gundam and curled up in the seat for the night.
This was a bitch.
And tomorrow didn't look any better.
"Do these shades make me look fat?" The figure vainly posing before him kept scrutinizing his own face through the tinting quality of the glasses. He combed his hair quick with his hand.
The other man just smoked some more.
The younger one, only fifteen but with a body to shame the twenty-five-year-old jocks, turned viciously on him. "I said," he snapped, rolling his eyes, "do these make me look fat!"
"Fat as 'ell," the smoker said in a heavy British accent. He tapped the glowing end of his drug into the floor and rubbed it with the toe of his shoe. "You can barely see your code wit'dat bloody second chin. Ever think about joining Jeeny Craig?"
"Jenny Craig and no," the kid corrected. He soured his lips at him and went back to vainly posing. He tucked his hair into the back of his long black trench coat over a black tank and black jeans. He examined the makeup on his throat. "And you're not supposed to see the code anyway. I think it's such a stupid idea. It's just screaming, 'Come and kill me.'"
The other man laughed, reclining into his chair. "You, my friend, are the one screaming come and kill me."
"What do you mean?"
"You know what I mean." He puffed once deeply and stretched out his arm. "Even Oprah after five minutes my friend would be screaming for you to shut your cake hole."
The kid shot him a raspberry via the mirror and trotted over to the surveillance cameras on the other side of the dark apartment. The kid slipped into a swivel chair and snatched up the Brit's cup of tea there jokingly as he scanned each blue screen. The older man just rubbed his stubble with a smile as the kid took a spit take, complaining of burnt lips. The other one smiled at his pain and the kid wiped it on the back of his hand. He glanced around the screens again, and found something interesting. He waved the British man over, who sighed and complied.
The kid pointed to a screen that was planted slyly on the doorstep of the Winner's on L-4. The reception was a bit fuzzy but it served it purpose just fine.
The blue light lit on the Deuce's face with a mischievous glow. "They're running be-hiiind…" he taunted, running his finger over the two figures on the doorstep.
Heero's lips were again frowning when the political figure escorted him to the Winner's lavish estate. The sky was padded with misty gray clouds, like damp lint hanging in the sky. A very beautiful analogy, when he thought about it. A pair of shades hid him from the rest of the world, making his pale skin under his scruffy dark bangs him seem like walking dead. Faithfully posing as a son, Heero folded his arms, wishing he had the security of his gun in his pocket. He coldly brushed off a bit of last second advice from the old man besides him, muttering that he was just fine.
The door opened via servant into a large dining room and lobby. A tall, sandy blonde man stood there, Mr. Winner. Heero'd been up in his cockpit early that morning looking up the Winners on his laptop. It didn't hurt to be prepared. A moderately figured girl in a formal dress with the same sandy blonde hair stood beside him, ushering them in with a dazzling smile. To the side, she yanked a blonde boy out from his hiding place. Heero wanted to sigh but the two political figures had already begun laughing and talking causally. Heero's "father" led him in and the two polite children dragged him off into the backyard.
Hello Hell.
It was a short and lavish shortcut they took, straight through the thin dinning room out onto a deck and Heero was almost disappointed that he couldn't see the world-famous Winner mansion. Almost. Sophistication had been off his list of things to be a long time ago. Paintings bored him, but abstract photography was a hobby he wanted to take up enthusiastically. He truly could live without fashion lectures, architecture, or rich trinkets. The two slim blondes darted ahead of him, clearly more excited than he was to pull him into the acres and acres that spilled out like a green gown behind the huge house. With confused faces, they tried to calm themselves and eventually settled back to Heero's nonchalant pace. Wild horses… that's what they were like.
The girl chatted wildly about Heero's visit and twisted her made-up face so much with expression it would have been ugly on any other girl. Lucky for her, she had a way of pulling it off. Heero saw her eyes search for his politely, but lose them somewhere in his shades. He wanted to smile, but then again, he'd been told his smile was like the devil's. No need to scare the shit out of them.
"Hello," she said brightly, "I'm Iria, Iria Winner. How do you do? …You came from L-1, right? You speak Japanese, don't you? Oh, let me try! Konnichiwa! Hajimashite."
"Very good for an anorexic prep," Heero said in Japanese back. Then he smiled faintly and repeated the greeting.
Just like he wanted, the girl was dumbfounded at first. Then her face flushed an angry red when the translation clicked. By now, the shier boy at the side of his sister had opened the polished glass doors to the backyard and had finally summed up the courage to talk. Iria, taking up some of her black gown in her fists, stormed out in front of the two boys to find her place on a lounge chair besides the pool on the cement patio.
"You'll have to excuse her," he said sheepishly. "Iria can be temperamental when it comes to foreigners. Especially if they insult her."
Heero hesitated for a second. He snorted incredulously. "So you understood that too?" he inquired brazenly.
The blonde boy, with his big aqua-blue/green eyes, nodded and followed Heero out onto the patio. "Pretty clear actually."
The Winner son plopped down into a chair around a glass table besides Heero, like he expected a pampered boy to. He'd be damned if this kid had never left L-4, or even his own estate. A tray of coffee and what smelled like tea sat in front of them. Obliviously, they liked to treat guests right.
"So, did your father make you come with?" the boy asked. "I don't like to ever sit in some stranger's house; I'm so afraid of breaking something I can't fix."
Heero generously took a cup of coffee. He still felt beddy and his body was running on cold, so some wouldn't hurt at all. "Well, let's just say it's required. It's not my cup of tea either," Heero replied flatly. When he saw a teacup pressed to the blonde's lip, he wanted to laugh at the pun he'd made.
"You're not like the other Sheep that come here," the Winner kid said.
"Sheep?"
"Oh, I'm sorry," he apologized, running a finger or two through his platinum hair. "Family lingo. Iria and I always call the kids of the political figures that come Sheep because they always get herded around."
"By you two?" Heero asked bluntly.
The boy laughed. Probably a yes.
Heero, his voice locked in his stoic throat, just dragged out of his coffee cup and licked the bitter stuff from his lip. It felt oddly comforting warming his stomach, but then again, it could be the hospitality sinking in. The Winner kids had been a hell of lot more down to earth than he'd pictured. Human. Heero wondered how long he'd be able to keep up the brash and aloof façade.
"There really is something different about you, I just can't put my finger on it," the boy said, almost frustrated, summing up his face. "It's driving me crazy, actually."
"Is it the bastard attitude?" Iria snapped from her lounging spot.
"Iria!" the boy said. "Honestly...''
Heero curled his lips a bit. "It's okay," he said, "I get that a lot."
"That you seem different?"
"No, that I'm a bastard."
Thin blonde eyebrows framed those innocent-looking eyes with confusion. This boy obviously hadn't had nearly the life he had. Imagining what the scarring of underground war would do to him was like Heero playing a psycho ward advertisement in his head. "If you haven't noticed, I can be pretty cold when I want," Heero explain, casting his eyes into his coffee as he took another drink. He offhandedly took off his shades.
"I have." The other boy watched him. After a few seconds of silence as Heero drank, he folded his arms and leaned forward with a flat expression. "I suppose you want to be allies, or are you really what you are?"
Heero looked up, a sense of red-alert lighting up in his head. His eyebrows furrowed and he clinked his cup down. "What do you mean?"
"You're not Mr. Naogaki's son, are you?" A smile lit on his lips, but Heero wasn't sure if it was maniacal as in, 'I've got you, now I'm going to pull out my gun and shoot you,' or if it was just a smile.
Heero yearned for the cold, deadly reassurance of his gun pressing his thigh. His Prussian eyes scrutinized the peach-colored, innocent face for a flaw. Anything to make him feel better. He didn't like going into situations without warning or information. He decided that if this kid had something planned, lying wouldn't make him on any better terms.
"No," he admitted.
"I thought so." The blonde drank from his teacup, but with no threatening look. Actually, it looked like he was about to giggle.
Heero stared at him for a second. It was nearly impossible to figure this kid out. He sat back in his chair and folded his arms. "You…"
"…Have been through this just yesterday," the boy finished, smiling with his eyes closed into his cup of tea. It was kind of an incredulous tilt of the lips. He looked up almost apologetic, shrugging. "I suppose I should have told you straight off the bat. I knew you probably were acting from the minute I noticed your eyes were blue. I saw Mr. Naogaki's real son once when he was six and he had brown eyes. Besides, you're the first Japanese person I've ever seen to have blue eyes."
Heero sighed. /Bitch! /
"You're from Jisatsu right? Maxy warned me that they would send someone today. He came yesterday to talk–"
Heero jerked. His fist came down hard on the table, making the tray clatter. "Maxy?"
He remembered the name, but only vaguely. Something important…
The blonde boy looked frightened. Like Heero'd grown fangs. "Well… that's the name he gave me," he said tensely. "Why? Is it important?"
Heero frowned.
The Japanese boy hid his upset behind glazed over eyes that just numbly took in colors and shapes. Behind them, Heero kept imaging a scarred American waiting for him with a gun somewhere in the Winner mansion, maybe even in his home. He suddenly snapped to attention, noticing that Quatre had already started talking without him.
"…A kid from the Deuces came yesterday, doing what you came to do today. He just wandered up to the door like he had a sleepover with one of my sisters. Of course, one of my sisters did yesterday, and he looked enough like a girl that I let him in.
"He didn't say anything thing so I just left him. I went out to the horse stable and he came up behind me and just started talking. He told me that he was with the Deuce gang and asked if I would support them. You know, become like extended family. He was so sincere about it, I mean; he really looked like he wanted friends, so… I said yes. I said I would back him as much as could, whenever I could," he said. The blonde cocked his head. "… But that doesn't mean–"
Heero held up a finger.
The boy hushed.
"Listen," Heero said reassuringly, "I have no reason to be hostile with you or orders to kill you so don't worry Mr. …Uh, I never got your name."
The blonde boy elatedly flung out his hand to meet Heero's calloused one. "Quatre R. Winner," he introduced with a pearly grin.
"Heero. Hajimashite"
"Just Heero? Is there a last name to that?" Quatre asked humorously.
He shook his head.
"Okay then, just call me Quatre."
"I assume we're on good terms now, correct?"
"Yes."
Heero smiled, hoping it didn't come across as evil as usual. It was nice when he had a few moments to his own devices, bleeding thoughts of gangster life, callow memories of dark rooms and darker situations, and masked humanity all shoved aside.
Fuck Maxy. He could wait. Heero Yuy would be living in the trench coat again soon enough. If the superiors didn't send him investigating after this "Maxy", he would do it himself.
"I'm not saying I have a closed mind. I'll still support you, of course, but you won't earn my trust just by glowering and drinking coffee," he said.
Heero fingered his coffee mug, which he just noticed the gold leaf adorning the lip. His Prussian eyes lifted up. "You mentioned you had horses…"
* * * * *
The hot, sensual breath of horse clouded in Heero's face, accompanied by the metallic clink of tack jolting around loosely on its body. Dust kicked up by the scuffing motion of the blood bay's hooves swirled in the late evening sun. The afternoon had been overcast thickly, but now the sun was alone in the October orange sky. Heero sneezed once and the horse roughly shoved its muzzle into his hair, snorting impatiently. He smiled smugly and wrapped his fingers around its halter. The name on the bronze plate read Sarava, a typical Arabic name. Heero slipped it off, the horse chewing at its newly freed jaw, then fitted a bridle on him. The blood bay whinnied as Quatre trotted past, already saddled and on his white horse, Sandrock.
"You okay?" he asked, pulling the horse's unruly head back.
Heero pulled the under strap tight. "Fine," he said, tossing his hair a bit. He was surprised how much dust there was in a horse stable the size of a small house. It looked like dandruff floating off his hair.
Quatre's horse shifted under him, yearning its head toward the open field. He titled his head, watching how easily Heero fitted his horse. "Do you have horses in L-1?" he asked, turning his steed so he could face him. "You're going faster with the tack than most of my sisters, and they're out here crooning over the ponies all the time."
"I've had training," he said flatly.
Quatre titled his head. "Really? Horseback riding doesn't seem like a very terrorist thing."
Heero jolted up into the saddle and gathered up the reigns silently. Then, while the horse gnawed on his bit, he gave the blonde a look. "Who said I was a terrorist?"
The Winner son looked flustered. "Oh, I'm sorry!" he said, urging his horse along side Heero's. "It's just that I've been told all my life that Jisatsu is just a desperate terrorist group. You know, by my father and such. He never wanted me to get soft toward your group or the Deuces. He's a very lawful man."
Heero smiled. "And yet you still form alliances with them behind his back."
Quatre nodded sheepishly. "I never said I agreed completely with my father."
They guided their horses, which seemed to flock close to each other while impatiently brushing necks, off of the cemented floor into the lush grass. The horses seemed to know the path and confidently walked toward a pond surrounded by a thick group of trees. The blonde boy simply let the reins lay slack against his horse's neck and Heero caught on and did the same. Their steeds would just carry them where they wanted to go. They'd been there probably many times before.
"So… if you're not a terrorist," Quatre brought up again, "what exactly would you call yourself?"
"Besides a bastard? – Gang member, you know, crime syndicate. Scarface, Mafias, men living off crime …" Heero said nonchalantly, watching the golden sun drown in the silhouette of the upcoming trees. "I was born into this. So I have no choice but to go with it until they let me retire."
"And you hate it?"
Heero nodded. "…Yours? You like it? Or is a phone on a silver platter too much?"
He smiled. "Yeah, I do, but no body's life is perfect. The traveling is great; I get to see more than most people dream of. But I hate the fact that we live in a world where some people, like me, have more money than we care for, and some people have absolutely nothing. I'd like to give it away, but my father insists we could do better good for the colonies by investing it in politics and government," Quatre answered. "He calls my visits to the poor villages 'crusades.'"
"Not a dog's life," Heero said dryly. "Huh?"
"Heero? What exactly do you do… in the syndicate?" Quatre asked.
"You're not going to let me go until you know something, aren't you?" Heero said to himself, relaxing and pulling his feet out of the irons. "Does my life really interest you that much? You've done nothing but poke at it."
The blonde boy sat crooked to face Heero. "I must admit, I'm curious," he said, shrugging his frail shoulders. When he looked at them, the agent saw how easily this boy could die in a rough game like Heero's life. One hand to those shoulders looked like it could snap them. "I've been told one thing, then another. It's hard to tell what's truth and what's a ploy by an enemy of yours. People today get disillusioned easily."
"If you think its all James Bond and leather-interior corvettes, you'd be in for a hell of a surprise," Heero said coldly. He stared ahead, face taking on its usual stony tone.
"Bad?"
Heero looked at him dead in the eye. "Hell."
A glittery look like a child in all the horror movies he'd seen lit in Quatre's eyes. He apologized under his breath.
"Don't take it personally," Heero said, craning his neck under a branch. He shook a leaf from his hair. "That's what I tell everybody," he explained monotonously.
Now they had penetrated the miniature forest and went toward the pond. The horses automatically paused at the water. Quatre smiled at Heero. His hands gathered up his reins subtly. "I'd hold on if I were you," he warned. "They like to race."
Sandrock's ears flattened and he tossed his mane. Heero's horse, Sarava, did the same momentarily. Their hooves were lapped by the water and pawed there. And suddenly, in perfect unison, they both bolted out across the water like horses out of a Derby gate. Heero recovered, as Sandrock pulled out ahead, from almost being thrown backwards. He had to slip back into the saddle again and urged his heels into Sarava's side. Quatre was already across the shallow pond and his horse was laboring up the other side and cutting a sharp corner on the path out, dirt flying from the hooves. He could hear laughing floating back to him and Heero just was more determined. He reminded himself not to get rabid over it, but he was so easily swept up in competition…
He kicked his horse and followed.
The sun had sunk down below the mountains in the distance after the race, which Quatre had won, by default. Sarava had never been the quick one to warm up to strangers, and had thrown Heero once up the other bank, sending him rolling back into the water. The two boys were tired from their bones being jolted as the estate came up into view.
At first, it seemed the way they had left it. The reduced light made it seem like a huge white block with rooms dotted here and there on the outlying platforms. On the other side, Heero could see the familiar red and blue dashed light of cop cars, and could hear the ominous sound of low voices and crying before Quatre even saw anything different. As the horses plodded up the slope, Heero listened faintly to what the blonde was saying. The kid seemed so wrapped up that the words didn't form. He stared at the house, backgrounded by the red-blue flashing.
Quatre noticed.
"Heero? What's wrong?"
The Japanese boy was about to say something, when a ragged-looking Iria ran up, oblivious to her beautiful black dress tearing under her frantic feet. "Quatre!" she screamed.
"Iria?" The blonde boy jolted on his horse as it skittered at his sister's wild approach. If it hadn't been for her elegant jewelry, muted makeup, and purse still clinging to her shoulder somehow, the Jisatsu agent would have mistaken her for a fevered blind woman, flinging her arms at her brother and making wild noises that melted into sobs.
"Iria calm down!" Quatre leaned off his horse until he almost was falling off. His sister's arms were around his small shoulders faster than lightning. Her sobs subsided in the fabric of his shirt and her fingers strained into his skin. Her glossy lips spilled out garbled words. "Iria! Calm down! I can't understand what your saying."
"Daddy! Mr. Naosaki!" She managed to scream out. "Gunshots!"
"What?" Quatre shook his sister's shoulder, trying to snap her out of her craze. "What gunshots? What happened? Are they okay? Iria!"
She pulled away, holding her hand up to her mouth. "They're dead…"