Chapter 2
The next morning, 6:45.
Heero thought about his actions the previous day as he took out his frustrations on a punching bag, one of the five that the gym contained.
'Why exactly did I do that?' he questioned himself, as his assault on the punching bag became even more heated. The room was resounding with a loud, though dull, thud, at least once every half-second as his hurtling fists and vicious kicks contacted the equipment. 'I should be able to control myself. Whenever she is around, my mind slows. What. Is. Wrong. With. ME!?'
This last thought was accompanied by a crushing kick that struck the bag with a sound like thunder, splitting it wide open. Heero silently watched the light, densely packed powdery substance pour onto the floor. He wondered with vague interest what exactly that substance was as it piled on the gym mat.
Little did Heero know that Relena had been watching his display for ten minutes, mesmerized. No move was made that would have made him vulnerable. She had been watching, and he had thrown, at one point, FIVE punches in ONE second. Then came the kick that would probably have turned a brick wall into powder, and the punching bag had been slammed open. She didn't even think that was possible. And he was going to be teaching her this? She didn't care HOW much he taught her, there was no way she'd ever be able to do THAT.
Heero picked up on her presence right then." How long have you been there?" he calmly questioned her.
"Long enough to watch you turn that into a sand pile." Relena answered, with a hint of awe in her voice.
Heero glanced back at the ruined remains of the former piece of equipment, and a small smile crept over his features.
Relena was taken aback at that. Heero? Smiling? Those were two words she never thought she'd hear in the same sentence. And what was he smiling at? The deceased punching bag?
"Well, should we get started? How do we begin?"
"We begin with basic fighting techniques. I know you're a pacifist, but there are people who will convert you to lunchmeat if you don't fight back. Self-defense is not aggression, simply self-preservation. Now, do you wish to learn, or not?"
"Yes." Relena stated confidently.
"All right. For the first few lessons, you can wear these padded mitts. They will protect your hands from the pain of an improperly thrown punch. Put them on." Heero helped Relena into the black gloves, tying them quickly. "Now. Contrary to anything you may have heard, fighting stances are blatantly unnecessary except in tournament fighting. Stances will give away what you are about to do to the enemy. Certain stances suggest certain attacks and defenses favored by that stance. No stance will lure your enemy into believing that you either do not know how to fight, or are not ready to fight. Understand?"
"Yes. I think so." Relena was frankly surprised that Heero would be such an apt teacher. He had just said more at once than almost every other time she had ever heard him say anything COMBINED. And she was enjoying the sound of his voice very much.
"Now. When you throw a punch, there should be no backswing. The punch will be faster, and more unexpected by the enemy. Speed is a critical factor in fighting, and can only be increased with practice. Which I will give you. When the punch is thrown, your hand should not be in a tight fist. It should be in a loose fist until you are about six inches from the target. When you get to that point, tighten your fist. The strain on your hand will be significantly decreased, and the power behind the strike will be greater."
Relena was taking all of this in, thinking 'Who taught him this? And at what age?'
"Now. Let's begin the actual training. This is a right jab." He demonstrated in slow motion, stretching his right arm in front of him, curling it into a fist at right about the time it would connect.
"Now, you try. Your other arm should be ready to strike or block, at your side, like this."
Relena followed the instructions, and threw a right jab, feeling slightly silly.
"Good. Now, you want to turn that into this as soon as possible." Before Relena really had time to think about it, Heero's fist was positioned about an inch and a half from her face. She gasped. She hadn't even seen him move. And he was in the same place he had been before, except his fist was almost touching her nose. Relena's eyes went wide, and stared at his fist for a second before turning her gaze to his face. A motionless mask. He had not even changed the look on his face while he threw a punch that had probably broken the speed of sound. She stared into his eyes for a moment. They were like blue chips of ice imbedded in his face. Then, they softened, and he seemed to come out of battle mode. He slowly gave her that enigmatic smile again, and her eyes went even wider. She was being trained by someone more than human, whose humanity was beginning to resurface.
"Now, come with me." He led her over to another punching bag, and gestured. "Go ahead." He moved to her side and watched.
Relena followed his instructions and hit the bag. "OW!" she said, shaking her hand. "That hurt!"
"And it will until you do it right. Here." He moved closer, knelt and put her legs in the proper position to strike. "You must be braced. Otherwise, connecting with the target may knock you off balance."
Relena's face flushed as Heero's hands moved her legs to the proper position. Was what he was saying true? Yes, it made logical sense. Then his hand moved upward, brushing her hip. She blushed a little, wondering if he was enjoying this. His hands gripped her shoulders, gently and subtly massaging them. Oh yes, he was enjoying this. He turned her upper body, facing her toward the bag. He positioned his body against hers, taking her wrists and putting them where they would be ready. And then……….
FLASH!
Heero's head snapped toward an almost hysterical Duo, standing in the doorway to the men's locker room and holding a camera. He let go of Relena and flew toward Duo, Getting halfway across the room before Duo realized what was happening and cried "THERE'S NO FILM!! THERE'S NO FILM!!" and frantically turning and tearing back into the locker room, hoping to get somewhere safe before Heero shot him, which a pursuing Heero silently swore to do once he caught the braided ass and his damn camera.
Relena was still in the stance Heero put her in, staring dumbfounded as Heero gave chase to Duo, hurtling back into the locker room, and undoubtedly back into the hall. She shook her head, turned her attention back to training, and began to practice her punches.
Duo slowly walked into the med lab to get an ice pack. Heero had caught him with a lunging tackle from behind while he had been running away, banging his forehead into the ground. He had then taken Duo's camera and opened the back, taking the film and tossing the camera back at him. He had then calmly walked away with the already ruined film. Duo had to laugh at how that must have looked, him running away at top speed through the halls, shrieking, with Heero in hot pursuit, and then Heero flying horizontally through the air and crashing into him at a good thirty miles an hour, skidding down the tiled hall for at least fifteen feet. He took the ice pack and pushed the fridge shut, hoping one of the security cameras had gotten it on film. He'd be watching it as often as possible for the rest of his life. He'd send a copy to Heero, too. He just had to show that to Hilde. He grinned as he anticipated her reaction, which would probably be to laugh so hard she passed out. He laughed outright at that, easing the pain above his left eye a little.
As he left the med lab, he saw Hilde at the end of the hall, and ran over to her. She always was kind of an early riser. She was headed for his quarters, he guessed, because he was headed in the same direction.
"Hey, babe! How's it going?" he asked, sounding a little more cheerful than he felt.
"Oh, hell! Duo! What happened to your head?!"
"Come here and I'll show ya." He said, leading her toward the security room.
"Where are we going?"
"To get ourselves a home video."
"Home video? What the hell are you talking about?" she asked as he led her into the security room. This room housed the surveillance equipment and tapes, which were held on discs.
"Now will you answer me? We can't really go any further. What are we doing in the security room?"
"Come here and I'll show ya." He gestured to an empty seat next to him, and she sat down and stared at the screen he had brought up. She saw Heero holding Relena pretty close in the gym.
"Duo! What are you doing? Spying on them?" Then a bright flash filled the picture for a second, and Heero was instantly staring at the space directly below the camera. And faster than Hilde would have thought possible, was racing after what she supposed was the source of the flash. Then the screen shifted to a view from outside the boy's locker room, and caught a brief shot of Duo running for his life with a camera in his hand, followed closely by Heero. Now she knew what the flash was. "Duo! You were spying on them!"
"Watch this, Hlide." He told her as the screen shifted. It was now from a hidden camera mounted on a wall in a hallway, about six feet up. It presented them with another image of Duo, though on this one you could see Duo's face, which was some twisted combination of terror and hysterical laughter, and was almost immediately followed by Heero's darkly serious face, which had death written all over it.
"He looks like he's about to strangle you. You really pissed him off." She'd never seen Heero angry enough to actually give chase to Duo.
"You ain't seen nothing yet. Take a look." Duo pointed to the screen, which had shifted back to another wall camera. Duo's hysterical face passed again, followed by a strange sight. Heero looked like he was flying. He whizzed past the camera at what looked like superhuman speed, completely horizontal. Before Hilde could give much more than a small cough of laughter, the screen shifted again, just in time to catch the now flying Heero slam into Duo from behind, wrapping his arms around his waist and tripping up his legs. Duo smashed into the ground, whacking his head into the floor and the both of them rolling across the ground for a couple of seconds. Duo had his Cheshire cat smile on his face, and as soon as the screen showed Heero jump on him, he began to howl with laughter. Hilde wasn't too far behind, but when she saw Heero stoop to pick up the camera, tear the film out, put it in his pocket, and toss the camera back at a seemingly unconscious Duo, it only intensified her peals of hysterical laughter. They both had to lean on each other just to keep from falling out of their chairs.
When he had recovered enough, Duo wiped the tears from his eyes and began copying the entire debacle onto seven discs he pulled out of a drawer. He'd give one to Hilde, one to Heero, one to Wufei, one to Trowa, one to Quatre and keep the last two for himself. When it was finished, he and Hilde walked back to his quarters, him with his arm over her shoulders and them both quietly shaking with barely contained laughter. They'd watch it again, this time on his couch, where they wouldn't fall off their perch so easily.
Duo took his time delivering the tapes. It took him all of about fifteen minutes to distribute them to the proper rooms, in small boxes outside their doors.
Wufei woke up to the sound of people outside his quarters. Laying one hand on the katana stand he (naturally) kept beside his bed. He sat up and listened to the sound of retreating footsteps. Removing his hand from his companion, he slid out of bed and recalled why he had become possessed to place his katana stand beside his bed. The reason for this was, he had woken up one morning to find that one of his hair ties had somehow been interconnected, via methods unknown to him, with a seemingly endless chain of more hair ties, ending with a small note signed with a smiley face. "Have fun?" It read. He knew immediately who had done this, and that he would kill him in the longest way possible.
He was only able to dwell on that thought for a moment, however, because his mind suddenly had another question for him. 'How the hell did Duo get in here?' The door was still locked from the inside.
He had still not found the answer to that inquiry, and he did not believe he ever would. He got dressed, and headed for the cafeteria, and their Muffins of Doom. He opened the door and found a small package waiting for him on the floor. It had that same smiley face and he knew who it was from.
'What in all hells has that baka been up to now?' he wondered as he set the package down at his desk, producing a small dagger he used as a letter opener from his top drawer. He carefully removed the packaging tape, and extracted a video disc. 'I'm not sure I even want to know what this is. That baka is worse than any onna when it comes to gossip and other such nonsense.' Curiosity got the better of him, and he calmly walked to his monitor, sliding the disc into the small slot. 'WHAT the HELL?' the screen produced an image of Heero and Relena. It was obvious enough what THAT was. Then a flash renewed his curiosity, and he continued watching as Heero went tearing through the door. 'That was odd.' Before he could form another thought, the screen changed, and an apparently horrified Duo came hurtling out the doorway. 'I suspected as much. That baka gets himself into more hot water than anyone I've ever seen.' He continued to watch the chase, and the sides of his mouth twitched upward as he saw Heero swoop across the screen, almost immediately followed by a screen switch and an extraordinarily satisfying scene, witch ended with an apparently either dead or unconscious Duo lying facedown in the hallway. Even if Duo he was alive, it did nothing to lessen his good mood.
Wufei left his quarters, and headed for the cafeteria. He normally did not enjoy the food that was served there in the least, but at the moment he was not concerned with the quality of the food. He was looking for someone whom he would not normally seek out, in order to share the bizarre, though highly entertaining, gift he had received from Duo. When he was in a good mood, no one kept him in it like Sally. He knew he was acting like a baka, but he didn't care. For the first time in he didn't know how long, he felt sheer cheerfulness overwhelm his pride. Strange that it had taken probable injury to Duo to make him act like this. Remembering the tape, his mouth twitched a little, and he had to restrain a gasp of laughter. That was not something he was accustomed to having to do, though he was also not accustomed to seeing physical harm caused to Duo.
"Hey! Wufei! Over here!"
Wufei looked over his shoulder. Sure enough, there was Sally. She waved him over, somewhat bewildered at the expression on his face.
'What's going on? He's never happy. And he is not a morning person. Or an evening person. Hell, sometimes I wonder if he is a person.'
Yet, sure enough, there was a hint of a smile to his face, and his eyes were not the usual obsidian crystals she knew so well. He seemed almost lighthearted, a welcome change from the loud, angry, annoying justice freak she had seen just last night.
"So, what's with you? Why are you so…. cheerful?"
"That baka Maxwell has redeemed himself. If I ever get the chance, I will show mercy and kill him quickly."
Sally blinked at him. "What?"
"I have received a generous gift from Maxwell. Ironically, he was hurt in the process. And he was kind enough to record it for our viewing pleasure."
He had a tape of Duo being hurt? It wasn't too bad, or she'd have heard about it by now, but that would cause Wufei no end of satisfaction. Still, she'd have to see it.
"So, Wufei, where is this tape?"
"In my quarters, onna. Now, come with me. We will watch it."
Sally decided to ignore the commanding tone, but followed him anyway. She walked beside Wufei out of the cafeteria and down the hall, his expression never hardening at her presence or questions. She had no idea this side of Wufei even existed, much less that she'd ever see it. He was……..pleasant. She had never thought that would become any more than a distant, intangible dream……..and she accused him of being a baka.