Disclaimer: No, I don't
own them. That honour goes to Sunrise and Bandai. But, if any of their
representatives were wondering what to buy me for Christmas, a certain suicidal
Japanese Gundam pilot would be acceptable. Tied up in a big red ribbon. Holding
a large box of Maltesers. Thank you.
A.N. As you have probably
gathered, my Math's teacher didn't shoot me.
Dude Where's My Duo?
By anime animal.
Chapter 4: Tick Tock, Tick
Tock.
"I think we can safely
assess the situation now." Dorothy said once the phone was put down. "Duo has
been lost."
"Please keep it down!"
Catherine hissed. "Honestly, do you really want to wake Hilde up on the
happiest day of her life, four hours before she is supposed to get married to
the guy of her dreams, with news liked that?"
There was a long silence,
during which the girls thought out their plan of action.
"I say we ring my
brother." Relena said finally.
"Are you mad?!" Sally
cried.
"Shh!" Everyone said.
Sally grinned sheepishly
and frowned.
"Sorry. Are you mad? What
good will that do?"
"He's very good at finding
stuff." Relena said in a manner that a small child does when defending her
opinions against the school bully.
"I'm sure he is, but do you have the integrity to wake him up at
half past nine in the morning on a Saturday?"
The others looked at her
strangely.
"Sally, you have been
spending way too much time with Wufei.
Hell, you're beginning to sound like him." Relena laughed.
Sally grinned.
"I guess I must be."
Dorothy frowned.
"You say that like it's a
good thing." She muttered.
Sally's eyes darkened in
anger and she stood up with a glare on her face, clenching her fists.
"You got a problem with my
partner Psycho Bitch? Just you say that to my face…"
"Guys please!" Catherine
said soothingly. "C'mon, who really wants to walk down the aisle with scratches
across their face?"
Sally and Dorothy hung
their heads.
"I didn't think so. OK,
now can we concentrate on the problem at hand?"
"Which is?" Dorothy asked,
still glaring at Sally.
"How exactly are we going to hide the fact that Duo is missing
from Hilde?"
Heero and Trowa were
walking surprisingly quickly for ten o'clock on a Saturday morning,
particularly after a boozy Friday night. But, if one of your companions happens
to be moaning about a certain addition to his skin that he had no idea that he
actually possessed, then you'd be walking quickly too. Particularly when they'd
begun to lose count of how many times the words 'Injustice', 'Dishonour' and 'I
swear that baka is a dead man' could be used in one verbal onslaught.
"You'd have thought that
the novelty would have worn a little thin after the third 'baka'," Heero said
dryly. "I wish I'd never taught him that word."
Trowa nodded and then
pointed to the end of the street.
"There it is, Tony's
Tats."
Wufei paused from his
round of 'Maxwell is a dead man' and growled.
"I think I'm going to
sue…"
"Shut up Wufei."
Wufei hung his head.
"Sorry Heero."
(A.N. Tee hee, I'm
rather enjoying Heero telling him off all the time!)
Tony, it appeared, was a
rather obese man who clearly practiced his trade on his own anatomy, as there
wasn't a square inch of flesh on him that wasn't covered in body art. On their
arrival, he looked up and grinned broadly, revealing a gold tooth.
"Ah, so you want them done
too?" He said to Trowa and Heero before turning his attention to Wufei. "And
how's yours feeling this morning?"
Wufei set his lips in a
thin line and folded his arms across his chest.
"How much for laser
removal?" He muttered.
Tony laughed out loud and
smacked his expansive hands on his quadriceps.
"Aw ya killin' me! You
were so adamant for that one too. Those two were trying to persuade you to have
some broad's name on your back but no, you had to have that weird word on ya back.
I hope I spelt it right…"
Heero held a
teeth-gnashing Wufei back at the comment about Nataku being a weird word.
"We're here because we
appear to have lost one of our party." Trowa began. "How many tattoos did you
do for us last night?"
Tony grinned again.
"Well, apart from that
weird word on your friend's back over there…"
Before Wufei could act,
Heero had purposefully slapped him on the exact spot where his tattoo was,
causing him to flinch momentarily and tears to come to his eyes.
"There was one of you that
wanted a peace sign on his shoulder…"
Heero and Trowa
simultaneously looked at their shoulders and breathed sighs of relief. Yet
another thing for poor Quatre to regret this morning… (It might be useful to
mention that at this moment, Quatre leant up against a doorframe and recoiled
as though a bee had stung him.)
"And then there was that
other guy who wanted 'Shinigami' on his, * cough * posterior."
Wufei, Heero and Trowa
looked at each other for two reasons. 1- Duo had been with them at the tattoo
parlour and 2- He'd be feeling very uncomfortable right about now.
"Yeah, and you wanted some
random phrase on your back," Tony said, looking at Heero, "but I didn't know
how to spell 'Oh my yay oh koro sue' or whatever it was you said so you left
it."
(A.N. Omae o
korosu, but as I only know Japanese from spelling and not hearing I'm not sure
whether this is the right way to pronounce it.)
Heero's eyebrows
disappeared into his hairline and he mumbled a very quick thanks before the
three of them retreated outside.
"Thank God you and I had
the sense not to be so stupid as to get tattoos." Trowa said.
"Well you weren't, but
Heero was ready to." Wufei grinned smugly, sounding like a cat that had got the
cream.
Heero's eyes narrowed.
"Shut up Wufei."
"Sorry Heero."
Again, as he was beginning
to get accustomed to, Wufei hung his head and shoved his hands into his
pockets. He frowned and produced a stub of a movie ticket.
"I think I've got
something that might help in our search for the Braided Baka."
Trowa took the stub and
looked at it.
"The 03.25 showing of…
Dude Where's My Car? We saw that?"
"Must have done." Wufei
said. "I can guess where our next port of call is."
Heero stroked his chin
thoughtfully.
"I dunno, this is
beginning to sound like a pretty big clichéd coincidence to me…"
"Well we better go and
check out the movie theatre if we were all there." Trowa said thoughtfully. "What's
the time now?"
Heero looked at his watch.
"10.10."
"Gah!" Wufei yelled. "We've
only got four hours and fifty minutes to find him!"
"Then we had better keep
looking hadn't we?" Heero said sarcastically.
Trowa shook his head. The
harder they searched, the more fruitless the search for Duo was becoming. One
thing was for sure: If Wufei and Heero didn't issue serious pain on him for
putting them through such Hell then his newly acquired tattoo surely would.
To
be continued…
There's another chapter all nicely done and dusted. I'm thinking maybe another two, maybe three chapters before I wrap it up. What do you all think?