Chapter 7
Half an hour later, the group met in the dimly lit parking garage on the west wing of the compound, Duo in black jeans, his black leather jacket, and his crimson shirt, standing next to his plain black motorcycle. Wufei was dressed primarily in black also, except that he had a white T-shirt on under his jacket, with an almost identical motorcycle at his side. The motorcycles offered a similar feeling to the Gundams for the pilots, and all of them, including Quatre, owned one, which they kept spotless and in excellent condition. The responsiveness was a characteristic they all enjoyed, as was the sense of speed. As the other two arrived, they commented on the macho factor of motorcycles, and black ones at that, were given helmets and boarded behind the two pilots. They sped out of the garage into the night, and headed for Chinatown.
Heero and Jai, however, were not so relaxed. They knew they'd been had by Duo, and were both honest enough to admit that they had deserved it, even if it wasn't any of his business. As they cleaned the room, they began talking, and reasoned out what had happened. Heero had given what he knew Quatre would think was unwittingly relevant information, which would not be blamed on Heero. Quatre would then, in his anger, stay away from Jai. He had not known his sister would either find out or care if she did. She had found out, and now he knew that feelings similar to the ones Quatre had experienced were now swimming around in Jai. Both wanted the other to be a little more than a friend, and Quatre did not know that Jai either knew how he felt or felt the same way. They'd get back at Duo later. Right now, they had to rebuild Quatre. Actually, first they had to rebuild this room, THEN they'd rebuild Quatre. Then they'd kill Duo. Quite an impressive list, fitting of trained assassins.
Meanwhile, back on the highway, the passengers on the bikes were starting to forget to breathe. Duo and Wufei were shooting across the pavement at what Sally and Hilde were pretty sure was close to the speed of sound. They were gripping the pilot's midsections with about ten thousand pounds of pressure per square inch. There were small headsets in the helmets, so they could all talk to one another without difficulty.
"Would you guys ease up?!" Duo gasped, trying to breathe with Hilde's arms displacing his intestines.
"If you'd stop driving so damn fast, I would! I'm sure as hell not letting go!" Hilde stated, tightening her arms as he swerved around another car.
"Ye gods, onna! Let me breathe! I can not drive if I can't see! And you're putting circles in front of my eyes!" Wufei exclaimed, as he followed Duo's lead.
"Are you going to stay like this once we stop?" asked Duo, the effort to speak present in his voice. "If you do, we won't be able to get you off with crowbars!" They pulled off on the next exit, and had to slow down, otherwise they'd have driven like maniacs straight into the waiting room of whatever restaurant they picked, probably on the highly discriminatory basis of whichever one they couldn't turn in time to avoid.
As they got off the bikes in front of a small place Wufei frequented, Duo stood up and stretched. "I'll be hungry again once my stomach migrates back to where it's supposed to be. Damn, you're strong! Have you been working out or something?"
"YOUR stomach has to migrate? Mine is back at that last tollbooth, looking for correct change! I almost lost my lunch when you hit that goddamn speed bump at twenty-five miles an hour! You face death on a weekly basis, you don't need to get bucked off that damn bike and end up with your face stuck to the blacktop fifteen feet behind the rest of your body!"
Duo was able to meet Hilde's tantrum with a cool head, and even a certain amusement. Calmly, and somewhat contentedly, he said, "I only drive like that so you'll hold on tighter. It's cool enough when you're riding a black motorcycle, but when you've got a hot babe snuggled against your back with her arms around your midsection, that's another story." He smiled at her, and she let out a little bubble of laughter. A little arrogance combined with what she probably thought was an unintentional compliment always helped to calm her down when she was pissed, and he knew it.
"You have an answer for everything, don't you?"
"Yes I do. And I also know that Wufei agrees with me. Doesn't he?" Duo aimed a mischievous smile at Wufei and Sally, which Sally returned, being behind Wufei and out of his line of vision.
"Silence, baka. Now, let's go."
Wufei was trying to pretend not to notice that Sally, even after they got off the bike, was staying fairly close to him. And the odd thing was, he didn't mind. As they walked into the restaurant's waiting area, Duo with his arm around Hilde's shoulders, a young Chinese girl greeted them.
"Welcome back, Chang-san." She said with a low bow. "Table for four? This way, please." She led them near the far corner of the restaurant, to a table with Chinese paintings and characters hanging on the walls around it, soothing music playing over the speakers that had been hidden somewhere. Sally understood why Wufei came here every so often. It was where he could relax and not be disturbed by anyone. The music and the atmosphere fitted Wufei's personality very well. When he was alone, anyway. Duo began filling them in on exactly what had happened between Heero and Jai, and the others very quickly figured out for themselves why Quatre had seemed so pissed for almost two months, not to mention that he had gotten like that almost upon arrival of Heero's sister. Everyone had expected some sort of dating scenario to play out, what with the big eyes Quatre had made at Jai when she had first been introduced to everyone. And that made it worse when Duo notified them that Jai was psychic, though she tried not to use it on friends. He told them about the fight, and said he would grace them each with a recording of it. He had more than enough of them, anyway.
They laughed over dinner, and complimented the quality of the food to the waitress, which further intensified her cheery smile. Once they were done eating and received the check, Duo snatched it before anyone else could think about it, and grinned.
"Well, after all, I am an honorable man. My treat. My dinner was the most expensive anyway."
"It was expensive because it was gargantuan. You may not know it, but what you ordered was the biggest meal on the menu." Wufei informed him, a hint of amusement lifting the corners of his mouth into a sardonic smile.
"Yeah. How do you manage to stay the way you are? You don't work out as much as Heero does, and he eats a tenth of what you do. I bet if he ate what you just did, he'd bloat up and have to be rolled back to H.Q." Hilde commented.
"I do so work out. Just not as much or as obsessively as Heero does. That guy spends a minimum of two hours a day in the gym, especially now that he's training Relena, and at least another hour in the gun range. I pity the poor soul who ever has to tangle with HIM. I've managed to avoid being seriously pounded for almost seven years now, and I don't want to start now. I want to live to a ripe old age, and not be obliterated by a Heero signature deathblow. I'd wind up in the casket in about five pieces."
The rest of the group was quietly snickering at Duo, and he joined them.
Wufei let out a small snort, and addressed Duo. "You want to live you want to live long enough to become decrepit, huh? Sitting in your big chair, your braid trailing twelve feet behind you, and laughing with borderline idiocy at these humiliating discs you've managed to procure? Are you insane? If you keep this up, you won't make it another year. I would not be surprised at all if those two murderous little demons have installed deathtraps in your room. Or at the very least, changed the locks on your door. I don't know if you noticed, but those two were VERY pissed off. I'd try to avoid them for a while, and hope they don't hold a grudge. We all know I would."
Sally snorted, ad gave him a shove, and he glared at her. "We all know that you hold a grudge. It's one of your paramount qualities." She added sarcastically, and he glared harder. At that, she kicked his leg under the table.
"Ow! Baka onna, do NOT kick me! You can just as well walk back to H.Q., and if you hurry, you may be back by five A.M. "
"Oh, please. Like I actually WANT to sit behind a hyperactive speed demon like you. Besides, we all want to watch that tape Duo…stole."
"Ah, yes, of course. That will be amusing, if it's half as good as the last one. Well, we've screwed around enough here. We should be getting back. Let's go." They left the tip, and walked out to the bikes while Duo took care of the check. When he got back, he hopped on, and Hilde sat behind him.
"Duo, you want to keep the speedometer below ninety this time? Like, maybe obey the speed limit? You're gonna get us pulled ooOOOOO!" Hilde called out as Duo took off like a bat out of hell, Wufei and sally not far behind.
Back on the interstate, they began their dance with slower vehicles again, Wufei and Duo having agreed to a little contest as to who could reach H.Q. first. Sally and Hilde repeatedly told them to slow down or they were going to knock them out, sling them over the back seats, and drive back to H.Q. at a reasonable speed, such as eighty, as opposed to one twenty. The men knew they were bluffing, though, inasmuch as they both knew that they could no more let go of their waists than they could grow two heads. Wufei pulled ahead and laughed when Duo attempted to drive on the median, and suddenly found the he could no longer draw breath around two very strong forearms under his ribs, forcing him to get back on the road so he could make practical use of his respiratory system again, but sped up and caught up to Wufei again, staying virtually neck in neck. They wove through traffic, and eventually made it back to H.Q. in one piece, Wufei about ten feet ahead of Duo, and both of them going about as fast as they dared into a closed area.
Wufei parked his bike, and Duo did the same about three seconds later. Wufei got off his bike, and helped Sally off the back. Hilde, once Duo allowed the bike to stop all the way, jumped off, yanked off her helmet, and whacked Duo upside the back of his head with it. Fortunately, for Duo, anyway, he still had HIS helmet on, so the only thing that did was knock the face guard into the handlebars. Wufei snorted back a laugh when Duo objected, in the form of falling the rest of the way off his bike. He got up quickly, and pulled his helmet off.
"Don't worry, Hilde. He does not seem to have any physical injury, and as we all know, he has no pride, so you didn't hurt anything." And with that, Wufei and Sally walked off to the elevator to the higher floors, where the living quarters were.
Hilde gave Duo a nasty look, and said " Duo, is there even a speedometer on that thing, or are you blind? You're going to get us both killed! What is that damn thing's top speed, three hundred? And I know you aren't going to listen to a word I say, so just let me rave for a minute!"
She did so, and continued as Duo walked up to her and began to guide her in the direction that Sally and Wufei had gone a minute earlier. Well used to the rages of the others in the building, he was able to regard her with a certain amusement and patiance. He pulled her into the elevator, and pushed the button while she yelled at him and likened him in a highly vulgar manner to very unflattering farm animals.
She had calmed down to the point where she was still insulting him, though much more quietly and not so enthusiastically, by the time that they had gotten to the living quarters. When they got to Duo's quarters, which were closer en route to Hilde's, Duo tried to turn the knob, and discovered that the door was locked. He got out his keycard, and to his surprise, the lock would not respond.
"How the hell did those little wackos manage to change my lock and clean that disaster area in under three hours?" Duo asked, to no one in particular. Though he had, in the back of his mind, somehow suspected this, he had not believed it himself. It was hard to swallow that Heero and Jai had done two, hopefully ONLY two, fairly large things in a very short time.
"What the fuck? Hey uh….Hilde, do you think I could stay in your quarters tonight? I can get this fixed tomorrow, but aside from breaking down the door, which would be kind of counterproductive, I can't really do much about it right now." He said, gesturing toward the innocent looking lock.
Hilde looked at him with a rather enigmatical smile on her face, and that somehow unsettled him. He had never seen Hilde with quite that look on her face, and he wasn't sure he liked it.
Hilde looked at him for a couple more seconds, and then rolled her eyes at him and turned toward her quarters, gesturing for him to follow.
"Well, thank you. To what do I owe this change of heart?"
Hilde gave him another look he hadn't seen before, and he began to wonder how many of those things she had. And how many of them could make him uncomfortable like this.
When they arrived at Hilde's, she opened the door, and walked in. He followed, and closed the door behind him.
"I have to go change. Get that disc ready, I'm dying to see how those two destroyed that room." Hilde said, and walked into her bedroom, closing the door with a soft click. Duo watched the doorway for a couple of seconds, thinking. He decided to get the disc ready, and wait. He produced on of the several he had stowed about his person, and slid it into the slot. He had at least five dozen discs hidden around and inside the building, mostly in places where you wouldn't think there COULD be places. Like inside a tree, for example. He sat back, and picked up the remote for the player.
Hilde came out a short time later, and was dressed in a more casual outfit, consisting of a pair of jeans and a lavender shirt. He saw her come out, and waved her over. She sat down and said "Well, let's see this tape. It doesn't have to be much for YOU to think it's hysterical, but Heero and Jai seemed to be trying to kill you with thoughts, so it has to be pretty big."
Duo obliged her, and pushed the button. It started with Jai coming through Heero's door while he was working on his laptop, and she crunched the back legs off his chair, and it all went downhill after that. It was hard to even keep up with it, though it WAS funny. She was trying to hold it in for a while, but that soon proved futile. It was almost impossible to not laugh while watching two people try in vain to kill each other, flying through the air, and crashing to the ground, and stomping through floors, and punching through walls, and so on and so on.
When it was done, the pair were both trying to catch their breath, and it was almost midnight, considering that they had watched it almost eighteen times, slow motion, instant replay, pause, and all the nice little functions.
Hilde wiped tears from her eyes, and said "Oh, I HAVE to get a copy of that." Duo immediately held up another disc, and handed it to her.
"Here. I've got like ten more, just on ME. I've got more, but I wouldn't be surprised if they have this room bugged, so I'm not going to tell you where the rest of them are right now. They're probably ransacking my room right now, so that gets rid of four or five discs, except for the ones I KNOW they won't find." Hilde took the disc, and looked at it for a couple of seconds, before setting it on the armrest.
"We ought to go to bed. It's like twelve o'clock." Hilde said, and got up, walked to the hallway and opened a cabinet. She pulled a thin blanket out of it, and handed it to Duo.
"Well, which side of the bed do you want?" Duo asked, and made as innocent face as he could as he waited for the almost impossibly certain answer.
"You're sleeping on the couch, and you know it. Here." She handed him the blanket, as he made a mockingly disappointed noise, and proceeded to spread the blanket over the couch. "You're getting up when I do tomorrow, so get some sleep. You have about eight hours." She turned around, and headed back toward her room. Duo went back to making his "bed" when he heard Hilde say his name, very softly, and he turned to her. She was leaning against the doorframe, and said, just as softly, "Goodnight." Duo smiled warmly at her, and she returned it, before turning back to her room, and closing the door. Duo watched her door for another couple of seconds, and then flopped down on the couch.
He thought about what had just happened, and came to a conclusion. There had been almost a genuine tenderness in her voice when she had said that, and while she couldn't very well have refused his request to stay here for the night, she hadn't had to be so pleasant about it. She could have at least feigned resentment, but had not. That led to one major, sensible conclusion. He, naturally, liked her as at least a little more than a friend, as most men seem to from the beginning of any sort of relationship, casual or not. But he had not really known up until that moment that she did, too. That was an…..ODD feeling, though it somehow put him even more at ease than he already was, considering that he knew Heero and Jai would not attempt murder where there were innocent bystanders. Even so, he would have to tread carefully the next couple of days, or he would be in some DEEP crap, and he was already in pretty deep. Oh, well, he had to get some sleep. He, as Hilde said, had to get up pretty early tomorrow. He had….things to do. He grinned to himself, and floated off to his subconscious.