I've never uploaded so many chapters at once! If I screw this up, I'm gonna freak. =*_*=

Disclaimer #1: I don't own GW...*cries*...but if I DID own it, things would be SO different, but then again if "ifs and buts" were candy and nuts, we'd all weigh 300 pounds, so there. =P

Disclaimer #2: I was an English major, so when I write, I write wordy. You have been warned. =P

Disclaimer #3 (last one, I promise): This is a very confusing story. Gomen nasai. Don't get lost. =^_~=

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Relena woke the next morning with a foul taste in her mouth. Black coffee and surrealism, with two sugars. Silently cursing her alarm clock, she propped herself up against the luxuriant pillows and rubbed her tired eyes. She vaguely remembered the door opening, shutting, and locking itself around 11:30 last night, but that was pretty much it. Was that before or after the horrible nightmare?

Groggily, she stood and stumbled to the bathroom. Splashing some cold water on her face, she tried to recall just what it was that had put her so thoroughly under the night before. Looking up at the mirror, she let out a sharp scream as it all came back to her--the face of Duo Maxwell was there instead of her own. It wasn't a dream.

Her scream partially woke the Relena-shaped lump on the sofa, also groggy and insensible. Duo sat up and hollered, "Keep it down in there! Cripes, can't a guy get some--" He paused when he realized the sheer idiocy of that remark. Despite having had pretty much the same night, he was a bit quicker on the uptake this morning.

He found Relena crumpled on the floor of the bathroom, leaning against the bathtub, sobbing. It turned Duo's stomach to see himself cry; it just wasn't natural. He sat next to her and tried to think of something remotely comforting to say.

"Hey...c'mon, quit it." He hesitantly put an arm around her. "It's not all bad, think about it! I'm the one doing all the hard work here, you get to be me! Yay me!" Relena seemed unimpressed, and continued to whimper. "My life is great, y'know, I have more fun than one person can handle...you gotta pick up the slack for me, ok?" He grinned.

Relena lifted her head at last, pathetic tear-stained face looking plaintively at Duo. "I want to go back." she choked.

"Ah....well," Duo started, "I haven't exactly, uh...finished what I was going to do to help you. I need a little more time."

"You had all yesterday afternoon! Didn't you see Heero after his last class?"

"Uh....no, I must've missed him." A filthy, rotten lie. So much for his reputation for absolute truthfulness, but these were harsh circumstances. "I'll catch up with him today, alright?"

"What are you going to tell him? I still don't understand what you think you can accomplish that I couldn't...I mean, I know you're his friend and all, but..." she sputtered, grabbing a Kleenex and blowing her sore nose.

"Just leave it with me, I'll knock some sense into him." he said, standing and pulling Relena to her feet. "Now...just sit tight. Go to class. Forget all about it for a few hours. Alright?"

"......alright." she sniffed.

Relena dutifully went to all of Duo's classes for him, and took the best lecture notes he would ever have. Duo sat in Relena's first class for about twenty minutes, got bored, faked excruciating cramps to get out, and skipped the rest of the day. Even after breakfast, he still felt weak and tired, and after some thought, decided it must be due to Relena's lack of any decent muscle tone. This would never do. He spent the time between breakfast and lunch at the campus track running laps in Relena's gym shorts. After only 400 metres, he thought he was going to fall over; the girl had been keeping herself in a deplorable condition, but then what was one to expect of someone who was waited on hand and foot most of her life?

He tried her body out on every apparatus he could; weights, rings, hurdles, anything available. Then he goaded a few other girl students into some martial arts sparring; they had never spoken to Relena before, and always assumed that she thought she was too good for them, so they relished the opportunity to show her up at something. Pity for them, because Duo's instincts and knowledge won out despite Relena's sorry conditioning, and after a few throws, every one of the girls retreated to the locker room, defeated. That felt better.

Duo gobbled down the kind of lunch Relena wouldn't have touched for all the tea in China, thinking about how to spend the rest of his early Halloween. For most of the morning, he had totally forgotten about Heero, and was simply enjoying pulling the wool over the entire school's eyes. After lunch, he sauntered up and down the halls, trying to draw attention with that swishy, navy blue skirt. He liked the way the boys were looking at him now, hungry and lustful; If only Heero would...

His reverie was snapped apart by a gruff voice to his left. "Hey, babe, whatcha doin' after you finish dancin' at the Euphoria?" A group of male students were gawking and hollering; the one who spoke was the ringleader.

Duo knew the Euphoria, though not from personal experience. It was a club downtown, from what he had gleaned off his classmates. It was a strip club. Not funny.

He stopped, turned, and gave the brute his very best Deathglare. Heero would have been proud, because most of the boys saw the look and backed away. All except the lead brute. "What'sa matter, honey? Ain't got nobody to take ya?" He took two steps forward, two more than he should have. "I know where it is, so tell you what, I'll give you a lift. I'm sure you can fine SOME way to repay me..." The innuendo was bad enough, but the smirk pushed Duo over the edge.

With a savage roar, he leapt on the beast and cracked him hard in the neck with a knife hand, followed by a snap kick to the belly and a palm fist to the chin. The blows weren't as fierce as they would have been had he been back in his own body, and he regretted that, because the tall, muscle-bound boy just shook them off and grabbed him by the arm. "Why you little..." He slammed Duo against a wall of lockers and started groping him. Where the hell were all the teachers when you actually needed them!?

He turned his head away from the beast's foul breath and leering eyes. Some of the boy's churlish friends had returned to cheer him on. On the edge of his vision, he saw a thin figure in white trying to tear apart the growing pack of howling wolves. He didn't bother to wait for the figure to pull them away one at a time, there were too many of them now; if he was going to get out of this, it was up to him...and his secret weapon.

Shinigami gave him strength. He flung his attacker off him and into the opposite wall. The students formed a circle around the pair, as the brute staggered to his feet, angrier than ever at this impudent little wench. Duo assumed a fighting stance and waited for the boy to make his first move.

He didn't have long to wait. The beast lunged at him, and Duo effortlessly threw him into the near wall. Undaunted, his assault continued, fuelled by the cheers of his cohorts. Swinging at the tiny "girl" with both fists, he was pummelled by hands moving faster than he could see. Duo landed blow after blow with perfect rhythm. He heard nothing but the air being cut by his movements; he didn't feel his own body moving, or Relena's, he simply felt fluid motion. The crowd took a giant step back, at once, to avoid getting too close to the karate maniac in a short skirt. Dozens of blows and kicks sent the beast reeling, until he finally toppled, bleeding from the face and fearing for his life more than his image. He escaped, half crawling, half running, just as a burly math professor from down the hall began shouting at the crowd to get to their classes.

Duo straightened his skirt and readjusted Relena's purse strap, vindicated. The professor took one look at him, braid still neat and tidy, decided that it must just have been two students fighting over "her", and went back to his room once the crowd had cleared. Duo looked all the other boys in the eye as they were leaving, challenging them silently. None accepted.

When the hall was emptied of all but a few stragglers innocently on their way to one place or another, one person remained besides the karate maniac. The figure in white that had tried to break through the human wall, and then stopped suddenly. He had stood back and watched the fight, not moving from his spot even when the others were sent back to class. Duo looked at the figure in white and froze. It was Wufei.

Shit.

They looked at each other for awhile; Wufei looked badly in need of some rice wine after witnessing the delicate Relena Peacecraft take out the football team's prize halfback with about two ounces of effort. He turned, still keeping an eye on "her", and finally left without a word.

Duo stood there for a long time, starting at the space Wufei had occupied. He couldn't possibly...no, no way. If he knew, he would have said something. For all he knows, Relena's been taking defence classes....yeah, that's it. He exhaled sharply, and continued on his way, shaky but relieved.


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=O_o= The plot thickens...