Author's Note: FINALLY! Sorry this took so long to get out… I had a horrible wall of writer's block that squelched any writing for the past two weeks… everything was planned but I couldn't seem to get past this one scene. Credit goes to Leeko for this one… I know she's already done this prank before, but it's such a great one, I had to do it again… hope it's not too similar… if it is just tell me, I'll change it… And now… introducing… the next victim of Duo's Pranks… Trowa Barton! (applause applause)
Disclaimers: Don't own Gundam Wing. Just borrowing Trowa's lions…
Devil in the Lion's Den
by Dorothy Winner
~*~
Duo and Hilde sat at the kitchen table one morning, eating breakfast. Hilde was reading the front page of the paper, while Duo was reading the comics section.
"Hey Duo," said Hilde, "there's an article here about Trowa's circus. It says they're going to have several performances here on Earth after having toured the colonies for the past six months."
"Really?" Duo asked, spooning a mouthful of Froot Loops into his mouth. "Where?"
"Well, according to their touring schedule, it looks like they're going to be making a stop here in our town—"
"What?" Duo nearly spat out his Froot Loops. "When?"
"Next week," said Hilde. She began to read parts of the article to him. "Trowa's trained his lions to do some new stunts, they have a brand-new trapeze act, they're going to be strapping Trowa to a spinning wheel for the knife act, and Catherine will be riding an elephant… It says here that it's going to be at the…" She paused and looked up at Duo. "Duo? Are you listening to me, Duo?"
But Duo hadn't heard anything past the words 'next week.' Everything else Hilde had said had simply gone in one ear and out the other. A plan started to form in his mind… and an evil grin spread across Duo's face.
"Oh no…" Hilde could almost see the wheels turning inside Duo's head. "I know that look on your face… Please," Hilde begged, "please, whatever you're going to do, don't do it, please…"
Hilde might as well have been talking to a brick wall. Duo's mind was already off scheming in his own little world of pranks… and not even Hilde could bring him back.
~*~
Trowa and Catherine stood on platforms opposite each other, fifty feet in the air, preparing for their trapeze act. Trowa was wearing dark green tights with a gold tank top. Catherine wore a dress similar to her pink one, except it was a deep, royal blue color. An imperceptible signal passed between the two of them as they simultaneously launched into the air.
The crowd below cheered wildly as the brother and sister team performed a series of complex, daring flips and somersaults, each one more dangerous than the next. The routine ended with Trowa doing a spectacular quadruple somersault and catching the trapeze bar one-handed.
Hilde and Duo were sitting in the front row, in seats courtesy of Trowa and Catherine. Hilde applauded enthusiastically. "That was so wonderful, wasn't it, Duo? Duo?"
"Yeah?" Duo turned, his face sticky with cotton candy. It looked like he had a pink beard. "Can you get me another one of these, Hilde? This stuff is great…"
"Duo!" Hilde said in exasperation. "Your face is a mess! You have pink sugar all over your mouth and chin! And no, I am not getting you another cotton candy, you've had three already…"
"Awww…" Duo groaned in disappointment. He then comically proceeded to try and lick the sugar from the edges of his mouth with his tongue.
"Ugh! I swear, it's like I'm taking care of a big kid sometimes!" Hilde turned Duo's head towards her and started to wipe the sugar off his face herself with her handkerchief.
"Ooooh! Ooooh! Hilde, it's the balloon guy!" Duo exclaimed, pointing. "Do you think he can make a balloon Deathscythe for me?"
"No, Duo, those balloons are only supposed to be for little kids, now will you stop acting like one?" Hilde finished wiping the last of the cotton candy off of Duo's face. "Now please, just sit still and watch the show. Trowa and his lions are going to be on next…"
The circus lights dimmed and a single spotlight circled around the circus ring before focusing at the ring's entrance, where Trowa emerged, flanked by two, full grown African male lions. At a gesture from Trowa, both lions reared up on their hind legs, towering nearly twice Trowa's height, and gave a loud roar.
Duo gaped. "Th… those are Trowa's lions?"
"Yeah, aren't they amazing?" Hilde shouted over the cheering crowd. "Go, Trowa!" she exclaimed as Trowa signaled the lions to jump through a series of flaming hoops.
Duo watched the lions uneasily. This was going to be harder than he thought…
~*~
Later after the show, Duo and Hilde went to go visit Trowa and Catherine. They took the back exit of the main circus tent and looked around.
"Hilde! Duo!" Catherine waved merrily from the door of the trailer she and Trowa shared. "I haven't seen you in the longest time! Please, come on in!"
Hilde and Duo stepped inside. It was a small but cozy trailer, decorated with a wide variety of things from the many places the circus had traveled.
"Oh, I like to get something at each place we stop in," said Catherine, who emerged from the kitchenette with a large steaming pot and several bowls and spoons. "Would you like some soup?"
"Uh…" Duo had once been told by Wufei to avoid Catherine's soup at all costs. "Um—"
"Sure, we'd love to," said Hilde eagerly, who obviously had never been warned by Wufei. Catherine gave them two bowls with a generous helping of the soup. Duo looked at his bowl with some trepidation.
"Eat up," said Catherine brightly. "Come on, I want to see how you like it."
Duo reluctantly put the spoon to his lips and took a sip. He promptly spat it out. "Gaaaahh! What the hell is in this stuff?"
Hilde tried the soup as well and a strange expression crossed her face. She managed to cough the soup down. "Oh… oh dear…"
"Another two victims of my sister's soup, I see," said Trowa, walking into the trailer. "Catherine, what did I tell you about giving your soup to others?"
"Well…" stammered Catherine, "it… it was a new recipe… I was so sure they would like it…"
Duo, meanwhile, had run to the sink and was gulping down copious amounts of water. "Geez, Tro', no wonder you're so skinny, if you have to eat this stuff every day…"
Catherine looked crestfallen. "Don't worry about it, Cathy," said Trowa, putting an arm around her, "I'm sure you'll get it right someday. C'mon, some of the stagehands are having a barbecue out back…"
Trowa led the three of them to an area behind the main circus tent, where a large grill was barbecuing away very nicely.
"Mmm! Burgers!" Duo cried out and took off after the grill like a shot.
"It's okay, guys," Trowa called out when the stagehands protested as Duo grabbed four burgers at once, "he's a friend of mine. If you guys run out I'll go into town and get some more burgers, okay?"
"You know," said Hilde, "Duo could be an attraction at your circus. 'Duo Maxwell: The Amazing Eating Machine!'"
Trowa watched Duo, who was already on his second burger, "No kidding… he eats more than the rest of us Gundam pilots combined…"
After having eaten, Trowa and Catherine showed Duo and Hilde around their circus camp. "We usually don't use the main tent unless we're rehearsing or performing," said Trowa. "That area behind the main tent where we just were is our eating area. The cluster of tents and trailers where ours was is where everybody sleeps for the night. That big tent over there on the right is our costumes and props tent; that's where we get fitted and dressed and get our makeup and everything. Now here is where we keep the animals…"
The four of them came upon several cages lined up in two rows facing each other. "Oh wow," said Hilde, walking up to a cage with a magnificent white tiger in it. "It's so beautiful…"
Another cage contained a camel. It turned and looked at Trowa with its big eyes. "This guy came to us courtesy of Quatre. He found it wandering alone in the desert. He thought it would be happy here," said Trowa, petting its muzzle.
"All the animals love Trowa," said Catherine. "It's like he has a special bond with them. They get irritable and restless when he's not around."
"Cool! Monkeys!" Duo exclaimed, running up to the monkey cage. The monkeys immediately started screeching and leaping about madly.
"Careful, Duo, you're scaring them!" Trowa warned.
"Naaaah, they're just excited, they like me!" said Duo, reaching out to pet one…
SPLAT.
Duo felt something smelly and warm hit him in the side of his face. "What the…" He gingerly touched it and stared at the brown mess in his hand. "Shit!"
Trowa struggled to keep a straight face. "Um, yeah."
The other monkeys decided to follow their fellow monkey's example and started to fling their poop at Duo.
"Aaaaahhh! Nooooooo!" Duo cried as he was pelted with pieces of… monkey droppings. He ran from the vicinity of the monkey cage, away from the monkey's firing range.
Hilde was laughing so hard she was leaning on Catherine for support, who was giggling as well. "Oh, D-Duo…" laughed Hilde, "you-you… sh-should… see yourself…"
"It's not funny!" said Duo, trying to get the mess out of his hair, and only managing to spread it more. "Damn it! Crap!"
"Exactly!" Hilde burst into another fit of the giggles.
"Well, I told you you were scaring them," said Trowa. "They were simply defending themselves…"
"By throwing their poop at me?"
"I don't know, don't ask me to fathom what goes on in the mind of a monkey," said Trowa.
"C'mon, Duo, let's get you cleaned up," said Catherine. "I'm sure we'll have some clothes that will fit you. I don't think you'll be those back…"
"You'll probably want to hose him off," said Trowa.
"Hose me off?"
"Well, I'm not touching you covered in… that," said Catherine, looking at his poop-covered clothes. "Let's go, Duo, follow me… the hose is over by the elephants…"
"Elephants?"
~*~
"That water was cold," complained Duo, who was back in Trowa and Catherine's trailer, re-braiding his now clean hair and wearing a pair of Trowa's jeans and a yellow t-shirt.
"Well, you can't really be picky about it," said Catherine, "after all, you shouldn't have made those monkeys angry in the first place."
The trailer door opened and Trowa and Hilde walked in. "Trowa showed me the rest of the animals," said Hilde. "The monkeys liked me, Duo; Trowa even let me hold one…"
"Yeah, well, I never liked monkeys that much anyway," said Duo.
"Yeah, especially now that they've thrown their… excrement at you," teased Hilde.
"Oh thanks," said Duo, a little miffed. "Glad to see you've had a good laugh at my expense."
"Oh, and I'm sure you would have been rolling on the ground laughing your ass off if it had been me," said Hilde. She looked at her watch. "Well, I guess we'd better get going. It's getting kinda late, and I'm sure you have to get up early to prepare for tomorrow's performance."
"Five o'clock every morning," said Catherine. "We have two performances for tomorrow; one in the afternoon and one in the evening. It's all in the life of a circus performer."
Trowa and Catherine walked Duo and Hilde back out to the front of the main tent. "Thanks for visiting us," said Trowa. "We hope to see you guys again soon…"
No one saw the impish look in Duo's eyes. Oh, he was going to be back sooner than they thought…
~*~
A black Ford pickup truck with a license plate labeled 'SHNIGAMI' drove into the circus camp later that night, even though it technically was already morning. The truck drove past the main circus tent and parked by the animal cages. A figure dressed all in black jumped out of the truck and stealthily snuck past the cages, avoiding the monkeys' cage with a wide berth.
The lions immediately became alert, sensing movement nearby. They sniffed the air, trying to identify the scent. The black figure reached into its enormous pants pockets and pulled out two large steaks. Unwrapping them, the person threw them between the bars to the lions. The lions immediately set upon the meat, veraciously eating the steak in a few bites.
A pair of violet eyes flashed mischievously in the darkness. Duo had laced the steaks with enough sedative to lay an entire barracks of OZies out cold. He just hoped it would be enough. Kidnapping Heero's ferret was one thing, but kidnapping two grown 400-pound lions was quite another. For one thing, it was a lot harder. Duo was starting to think this wasn't such a good idea after all… putting super glue on Trowa's trapeze bars would be much easier…
'No! Duo Maxwell does not give up!' After all, he had once seen Relena puck up two lions at once… how the hell had she done it? But those weren't as huge as these… those must have just been cubs or something… Maybe he could settle for kidnapping just one lion. How was he supposed to get them into his truck anyway? He wished he had someone to help him…
Duo watched as one lion gave a big, sleepy yawn and curled up to sleep. The other lion did the same. Soon both of them were out like a light. 'Showtime.' Duo easily picked the lock open on the cage door and stepped inside. 'Okay, how am I gonna do this…' Duo grabbed the lion's two front paws and pulled. He barely managed to drag the lion a couple of inches. 'Shit, this is heavier than I thought…'
Duo stepped back out of the cage and pondered the lions again. He looked at the cage. 'Wait a minute… they're a traveling circus… the cage is on wheels…' Mentally cursing himself, he went to his truck and backed it up to the cage. He got out and linked the cage to his trailer hook. Chuckling gleefully to himself, he got back into his truck and drove away, lions in tow.
Trowa was going to be in for a big surprise tomorrow…
~*~
"Trowa… Trowa…"
Catherine's voice seemed to come from very far away. She shook the still sleeping Trowa. "Wake up, sleepyhead!" she said cheerily. "It's five o'clock! Time to get up!"
Trowa groaned and turned toward the wall of his bunk, away from Catherine. "Go 'way," he muttered drowsily. "S'too early… mmm sleep…"
"Sorry Trowa, but there's lots of things to do! C'mon, rise and shine!"
Trowa screwed up his face and yawned tremendously. He sat up and hit his head on the top bunk. "Owwwww…"
"You really should watch out for that and be more careful," said Catherine, throwing some clothes at Trowa. "You'd better get dressed. And get some gel for that hair, bedhead," she teased, ruffling Trowa's hair, his usual unibang sticking up in every direction.
Trowa scowled. One didn't need an alarm clock if they had Catherine for a sister… Who invented big sisters anyway? With both eyes, he shot Catherine a very accurate impression of Heero's deathglare.
Catherine just smiled and handed Trowa a piece of paper. "Now here's a lost of what Manager wants you to do today. You'd better get going!"
Trowa grabbed the sheet of paper and stumbled groggily to the bathroom. He took a quick shower and got dressed. Using a liberal amount of gel, he tamed his hair back into its usual unibang. He walked out of the bathroom and into the kitchenette, where Catherine had set out a plate of scrambled eggs, bacon, some toast, and orange juice.
Trowa looked uncertainly from the food to Catherine. "Don't worry, I got it outside from the other guys," she said. "You can eat it."
Trowa took a bite of the eggs and discovered it was quite good. He looked down at his list. "Okay… feed animals…" After finishing his breakfast, he went outside and made his way over to the animal cages. He froze at what he saw.
"Trowa! Trowa!" Catherine ran toward the animal cages, waving a piece of paper in the air. Trowa had left his list at the table. "You forgot your list!" She spotted Trowa huddled on the ground, shaking. "Trowa! What's wrong?"
"The… the lions…" he murmured, his eyes strangely glassy-looking and dilated, staring blankly ahead of him. "They're…gone…"
Catherine looked toward where Trowa was staring. There were four large dents in the ground where the wheels of the lions' cage should have been. "Oh no! But who would want to take them?"
"I don't know… my poor lions… all alone… what if they're hurt? What if someone sold them on the black market?" Trowa's eyes became wide and frightened. "What if they were made into lion skins or something?!"
"Don't worry," said Catherine, "I'm sure they're okay. Come on. We'll tell Manager and everybody will help look for them." She led the nearly catatonic Trowa back to their trailer and sat him down in a chair. "I'll be right back," she said. "I'm going to tell Manager what's happened. Don't go anywhere, okay Trowa?"
Trowa didn't even respond. He just sat there, unblinkingly, staring as though he could still see the empty space where the lion cage was supposed to be. She left for the manager's tent, figuring that Trowa wouldn't be going anywhere in his state.
Catherine returned to the trailer a few minutes later and found Trowa with his head between his knees. He seemed to have had started hyperventilating in her absence.
"Trowa!" She went to the cupboard and grabbed a paper bag. "Here Trowa," she said, "breathe into this." Trowa took the paper bag with trembling hands. "That's it, deep breaths. I talked to Manager and he called the local police. They're looking for your lions right now. Everything's going to be okay."
Trowa continued to gasp into the paper bag. Catherine looked at him with concern. She hadn't seen Trowa look this shaken since the time he had had amnesia and Duo had arrived at the circus and told him he was a Gundam pilot…
Right on cue, the manager ran into the trailer. "Trowa! The police have found someone who says they've spotted the lions…"
"Where?" Trowa knocked over the chair he was sitting in and turned on the vidphone that was built into the wall of the trailer. A policeman appeared on the screen. "Haveyoufoundmylions?" Trowa said in a rush.
"Not yet," said the policeman. "But we may have a lead. Someone claims to have seen a black pickup towing a large cage going down the freeway. The lions may be inside."
"Which way are they headed?"
"The truck seemed to be going east on the freeway—"
"Isn't the Sanc Kingdom in that direction?" asked Trowa.
"We believe they may try to hide within the large Sanc Kingdom Preserve," said the policeman.
"Did you get a license plate?"
The officer flipped through several notes. "Actually, we only got a partial… Shini-something…"
Trowa and Catherine jerked their heads toward each other.
"DUO!!!"
~*~
Trowa's truck, once used for transporting his Gundam Heavyarms, was now barreling down east on the freeway toward the Sanc Kingdom Preserve in speeds excess of 100 miles per hour. Catherine was clutching the armrests of her seat for dear life. "Trowa!" she yelled. "Please slow down! This isn't a Gundam you know!"
Trowa's foot just continued to press down harder on the accelerator. "Must… find… lions…"
100… 105… 110… 120…
SCREEEEEEEEECHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
"Aaaaaaahhhhh!" Catherine was violently thrown forward, and then back in her seat as the truck skidded to a halt. "What, are you trying to get us killed or something?" she screamed at Trowa.
"Look!" cried Trowa, not paying attention at all to Catherine's scolding, "there's a scrape of red paint on that tree! The lion cage has red paint! And there! You can see tire tracks going into the forest!"
Catherine took a breath from yelling at Trowa to see that he was right. "You spotted that going at 120 miles per hour?"
But Catherine was simply thrown back in her seat again as Trowa stepped down, hard, on the accelerator and drove right into the forest. Catherine screamed again. "Trowa! This is a protected wildlife sanctuary! You're destroying the habitat! Think about the animals!"
But the only animals Trowa was thinking about were, apparently, his lions…
~*~
Duo had parked his pickup and the lion cage in a clearing in the middle of the forest. The truth was, he hadn't planned on what to do with the lions once he had kidnapped them, and hiding in the forest was the only thing he could think of at the moment. After all, driving around with a pair of lions was just a little too conspicuous. So he decided to stay in this forest until he decided what to do.
Duo got out of his pickup and looked at the lions nervously. Unfortunately, it looked like the lions were going to be doing the deciding for him. The sedative was beginning to wear off, and he had already used all the sedative on the steaks. And it looked like the lions were very hungry…
A flock of birds in the distance suddenly took off into the air. Then there was the sound of… branches snapping… and trees falling? Whatever it was, it was coming this way!
Trowa spotted the top of the lion cage. "There it is! I found them!" he cried happily. The truck lurched to a stop. Catherine looked up and saw Trowa running for the lion cage. She jumped out of the truck and ran after him.
"Fuck!" Duo saw Trowa running toward him, and Catherine not far behind. Oh, he was in serious trouble now…
Trowa and Catherine came to a stop a few feet from Duo. Trowa had a very scary glint in his eyes… "Catherine?" spoke Trowa.
"Yes?"
"I'm going to make sure the lions are okay. Will you take care of Duo for me?"
Duo did not like the way Trowa said the words take care…
"Of course…" Duo paled as he watched Catherine procure several knives from her skirt…
"Yikes!" Duo had never run so fast in his life.
~*~
"Come back here Duo Maxwell!" Catherine yelled. "You're so going to get it for what you've done to my brother!"
Duo hadn't counted on Catherine to get angry as well… now he had a brother and a sister after his head… and he definitely didn't want them to be. 'I have got to stop letting people chase me through forests,' he thought. He spotted a large tree and hid behind it, hoping that Catherine would pass him…
THUNK. THUNK. THUNK. THUNK. THUNK. THUNK. THUNK. THUNK.
Duo now found himself pinned to said tree with several knives. "Shit!" he yelled as he struggled to extricate himself from the knives, but to no avail. Catherine was standing in front of him. "Trowa!" she called. "He's over here!"
To Duo's dismay, he saw Trowa and his two lions approaching him. The lions looked very awake… and very angry…
…and they were staring at Duo with a hungry look in their eyes.
Duo sweatdropped. "Heh… nice kitties…"
~*~
Hilde had woken up in the morning to find Duo gone. He had left a note saying that he had to leave on an emergency Preventers mission and he hoped to be back the next day. Hilde sighed and went downstairs to eat breakfast. She turned on the TV and started making some coffee.
"… a strange story… two lions have been reported missing from the local circus…"
Hilde nearly dropped the coffeepot.
"A cage with two lions has been spotted being towed by a black pickup truck going east on the freeway. If you have any information, please call…"
Hilde turned off the TV. "Preventers mission, yeah right," she scoffed. "I knew you were up to something, Duo…"
Just then there was a knock on the front door. Hilde put the coffeepot down and went to answer it. She opened the door and gasped.
"Oh my god, Duo!" Hilde cried. "What happened to you?"
Duo stood there, with bloody scratches and claw marks all over his face and body. One arm hung limply at one side at an unnatural angle. His clothes were all torn and ragged, and had what strangely looked like several knife holes. His braid was unraveled and tattered and looked like it had been chewed and gnawed on. His face was swollen and bruised, with a large black eye, and a bloody "Hilde… help me…" he croaked.
Duo then promptly passed out on the front step.
Hilde managed to drag him inside and hoisted him onto the couch. She looked at Duo in his sorry state and sighed. "Oh Duo…" She then left for the bathroom to get some antiseptic and bandages to patch Duo back up.
~*~
Luckily for Duo, Trowa and Catherine decided not to press charges against him.
The two siblings were now standing on their trapeze platforms, about to launch into the air for their trapeze act. It was their last performance in this town before moving on to the next city on their tour.
Catherine grabbed onto her trapeze bar and swung into the air. Her hands suddenly slipped off the bar and she fell forty feet, landing in the safety net. "Aaarrgh! Damn it!" she yelled, in an unusual show of her temper, bouncing up and down in the net She looked at her hands. They were covered in a sticky, gooey black substance. Engine grease?
Trowa, meanwhile, had taken off into the air as well. "Catherine!" he yelled as he saw her plummet. But as he neared the next trapeze bar, he found himself unable to let go of the one he was holding on to. "What the…"
The crowd below murmured in astonishment as Trowa swung back and forth in the air, his hands stuck to the trapeze bar. The stagehands below ran around frantically, several of them scaling the large fifty-foot ladder to try and get Trowa down.
Trowa had no choice but to wait for them and simply hang in midair from a trapeze bar that, apparently, was covered in super glue. He immediately knew who had done it. "Duo," he growled.
A figure in black watched through the tent flaps, with an arm in a white sling and several cuts and bruises on his face which were still healing. His long, brown braid swung in the breeze as Duo walked away, chuckling.
Oh what a circus, oh what a show…
~*~
Fin