EEP! *hides* Dun kill me! I'm building up to a reallllly good
part, I swear. All these damn interruptions, eh? ^^;;
I hope the length of this chapter makes up for the delay! Being busy and having a mental block does -not- help a person when she's trying to write. Hope you all enjoy!
***
Knock, knock, knock.
"Hope you're up, Duo, I'm coming in." It was Heero. Obviously, tonight was a 'come barging into Duo's room in the middle of the frickin' night' kind of thing.
Wufei jerked away and suddenly vanished without a word.
Face flushed and his heart beating madly in his chest, Duo managed to get the door before Heero entered, trying to appear as composed and relaxed as he could. Or at least not like a certain aforementioned Chinese pilot had just planted one on his lips.
"What's up Heero?" He slouched against the frame just so that Heero was stuck in the hallway, he didn't exactly now where Wufei disappeared to, but he didn't want to chance that if he hadn't hidden well enough that Heero would spot him.
"Another mission. Quatre and Trowa already have something that will occupy the next few days, and I'm flying solo in a few hours, so that leaves it to you and Wufei." He answered flatly. If he had noted Duo's flustered demeanor, his stoical expression didn't let it show.
"That's it? Alright, so just send the stats to Scythe's computers, I'll relay the info to Wu in the morning," Duo shrugged indifferently. At that, Heero actually raised an eyebrow, though -very- slightly.
"Hn..."
Great. He waited impatiently as Heero left, then, "Did ya catch that, Fei?" As Duo shut the door yet again, he emerged of his hiding spot.
"Yes," Wufei hesitated. "I- I apologize, for the -er- that moment before Yuy came in-"
"Don't worry about it," Duo softened, then winked impishly. "Just next time...Give me a little warning, will ya?"
He blinked at the brazen assertion, but visibly eased. "Is it fine to go rushing into another mission? Has your shoulder healed?"
"Oh yeah, 'course it's a bit sore, but all things considered, I'm peachy." To prove his point, Duo rotated his left shoulder without the smallest hint of pain.
"That's good," Wufei's appearance seemed to do a total three- sixty as he smiled fully now, he no longer looked at all contemptuous and royally pissed off at the world, almost unrecognizable. Duo liked him a lot better that way.
"So what are you gonna do, Fei?"
"What?"
"Well, are you gonna go back out to Shenlong to wait, or do you wanna brave goin' into your room with Heero gettin' ready to leave? 'Cause I dunno about you, but I'm dead tired and I wanna get some sleep before I go through the mission objectives," Duo yawned widely and flopped onto his bed. "Or you could just stay in here, whichever suits you."
Despite the welcoming invitation, Wufei shook his head. "No, I think I'll go back out. Come and notify me when you get around to the assignment in the morning."
"Alright."
He turned to go but Duo spoke again.
"Fei?"
"Yes?"
"G'night...And I really am glad you came."
Wufei glanced over with a slight smile. "Good night, Duo."
***
Quatre and Trowa were sitting together silently at the kitchen table the next morning when Duo came flying in from upstairs out of the blue with a big grin on his face.
"Mornin' guys!" he chirped, making himself a cup of coffee.
Quatre and Trowa glanced at each other in surprise at the sudden reappearance of the braided pilot.
"What has you all ecstatic?" Quatre asked pleasantly.
"New mission. I'm gettin' ready to go load all the info in a minute here-" Duo grimaced at the first hot acrid sip of coffee then downed the remainder. "- Heero's left, right?"
"Yes...either that or he's managed to dislodge himself from his laptop long enough for us not to hear him." Trowa said, though with no inkling of jest.
"Ha ha, good, that means it's all there- I'll see you guys later then," Duo grinned again, going out through the garage as abruptly as he had entered.
"-We-?" Quatre blinked.
"Maybe you are more convincing than you thought you were." Trowa commented insinuatingly.
"Huh...maybe..."
***
Duo sat in Deathscythe's cockpit, skimming through the -ton- of data Heero had sent him. He muttered about the injustice of having to read so much so early in the morning and opened a vid- com link to Shenlong. Wufei looked like he was still asleep with his elbow propped up on the arm of the chair and his chin cupped in his hand, eyes closed. He seemed so peaceful that Duo was almost sorry he had to rouse him. Almost. He grinned mischievously.
"Wuuuuuuuuuu!"
"Yes, Duo?" He cracked an eye open with an amused smirk.
"Damn! Ruined a perfectly good moment- didn't know you were really awake..." Duo grumbled. "I WILL get you back for scaring the crap out of me last night!"
"Sure...you just keep telling yourself that," Wufei replied, sitting up straight. "What's our new assignment?"
"Man, there's a lot of stuff here...It seems they're constructing masses of some new type of mobile suit and all that'll be able to hold larger energy cells to last longer in battle and have the capabilities to carry heavier artillery...you know the deal. This time the target's not so far as the last one was, and I think the same plan should work fine too."
"As long as it doesn't end up as the other did," he said solemnly.
"Hey, now do I look like someone who would do the same stupid thing twice?" Duo pretended to puff up indignantly to lighten the mood.
"Of course not..."
"Yeah, that's what I thought."
"...though there is that little reoccurring matter of having a heart attack every time I catch you off guard."
"Ouch! That was a low blow, Fei!" he pouted. "Don't get me started on your little 'morality' rants."
"Fine, we're even then," Wufei conceded and before Duo could retort, asked another question. "When are we leaving?"
"ASAP, sooner if we can. If they get a fleet of these things out, then we'll be working our asses off," Duo answered. "I haven't gotten around to totally fixin' Scythe since our last MS battle, and I know Trowa definitely has no ammo for all his little guns and cannons on Heavy Arms. And we have no clue were Heero went off to, so there's no tellin' how long it would take him to help relay the new suits-"
"I get the picture, Duo," he interrupted. "I can be ready within the hour."
"Great, meet me at the truck then and we'll get going." He flashed a grin and ended the transmission.
***
Quatre and Trowa weren't surprised the second time when Duo came barreling into the living room to the staircase. Though the loud crashes and thuds they heard through the ceiling a few minutes later was a bit disturbing. The reason for the noise was explained a while after when he returned with a duffel bag hanging from the crook of his arm, clipping a gun holster to the hem of the back of his pants.
Wufei was already waiting beside the beat up truck when Duo entered the garage, leaning against the passenger side door.
"We're going to have to move safe houses again soon, the base outcroppings are beginning to close in, and that's not good," he said as Duo hopped in on the driver's side and started the truck up.
"Yeah, knowing Heero though, he's gonna wait 'til the absolute last minute to do it too, just to piss the hell out of OZ," he chuckled, keeping his eyes on the rearview mirror as he pulled out.
"When are we ever -not- pissing them off?" Wufei replied cynically.
"True- are you gettin' a sense of humor on me again?"
"Of course...not. I don't know what you're talking about Duo," he snorted.
"Sure..." Duo said doubtfully, shooting him a sly grin.
For a while they were quiet, but it was an easy silence and neither of them was too compelled to work out any nonexistent nervousness. Before long though, they drew a few miles away from the compound and Duo pulled off the road and into the trees, going on until they were about a mile off. He grabbed his duffel from under the seat and took out a black jacket, all sorts of different sized explosives, and the detonator from them all. The inside of the jacket was lined with pockets that were all quickly filled with the lightweight explosives, the detonator going into his pants pocket as he threw the jacket on.
"I think you have enough C-4 stashed away to blow this place to the Moon," Wufei remarked dryly as they climbed out of the truck.
"Can't leave any traces behind, can we? Just bein' careful, geez," Duo rolled his eyes. "Now, the control center is up on the third level and, if I read the schematics right, it should be over looking the lower two floors' hanger, so it'll be the closest room to the stairs. While you disarm the systems, I'll be running around attaching bombs to anything I can so we can 'blow this place to the Moon'." He grinned devilishly. Wufei nodded as they stuck their transmitters on their ears and went off.
The factory itself was enormous, especially in the shroud of night when shadows distorted its shape even if there were spotlights lining doors and dark corners or on security cameras. Standing in front of it, it was two stories tall, but the first level went down under the ground, creating a third floor basement that was only separated from the first if they closed the tarmac over it to conceal the new mobile suits during inspections. There were very few windows, even so, the few there were only gave light to a couple of the top story rooms, the rest of the compound was all sheer cement with no way whatsoever to scale unless you were able to drill holes into it. Two armed guards bearing the insignia of OZ kept vigils at all the entrances and there were hundreds more within that worked on the mobile suits during the day.
Duo and Wufei wasted no time on finding a way in though, they just barged up to the first threshold they found and rendered the guards unconscious, taking their pass cards so they cold get around easier.
"Have fun, Fei," Duo winked as the door slid open and he took out his gun, disappearing inside. There obviously wasn't going to be an inspection any time soon. The tarmac was wide open and there were many half-finished mobile suit skeletons suspending from cranes on the first floor and when Duo squinted down into the basement level he could distinguish a good five fleets' worth of suits in line accompanying together.
"Huh, man, I'm almost gonna feel sorry destroying these MS. They seem like they'd be pretty good contenders in battle and give us a run for our money," he said wistfully as he threaded his way in between the huge manufacturing machinery, occasionally attaching one of his little explosives to one of them and pressing a button to activate it.
"-You- were the one who accepted Heero's mission, Duo," Wufei's voice replied in his transceiver.
"Yeah...but-"
"No 'buts'."
Duo sighed as he started scouring the murky darkness for a route down to the basement landing; his job on the first was nearly done.
On the top, Wufei was just sidling out of the stairwell and into the spacious corridor. It reminded him of the exact opposite of a hospital, though it was just as unadorned and bland as one, it didn't have blinding white floors and walls, everything was dark and rather dismal. With one hand held tightly around the hilt of his katana, Wufei edged down the hall until he came to the entry to a room. He pressed his unhindered ear to the door and not hearing anything inside, he slid the pass card into the panel and found the control center just as Duo had said.
The officer sitting at the security desk was fast asleep; not taking any need at all to the monitors in front of him that would have shown the two pilots infiltrating the factory. Other than him though, there was no one else in the room, which made Wufei extremely nervous because it wasn't all that late at night and he knew there should have been more guards than there had been.
But he had a mission to complete, so that came first. Wufei made the slumbering officer's death quick and painless, then took his place at the security desk to get rid of any evidence of his or Duo's existence in the compound first. Then he would move on to the next computer and eliminate all the files on the new mobile suits. The process easily took less time than Duo's had; Wufei didn't have nearly as much information to terminate and within a good half an hour he was heading into the corridor again.
Back in the basement, Duo's hoard of explosives was at long length beginning to run low as he stood three fourths of the way amidst the colossal humanoid machines.
"Hey Wu, I'm about through down here, so if you get done before me, just wait out front, 'cause I won't be long if this keeps up. I've only run into like ten Ozzies the entire time."
"Well then I will be seeing you outside, because I am-" Wufei's transmission crackled, then filled with the sounds of a brawl, a round of gunshots immediately followed by Chinese obscenities, and at that point cutting off abruptly.
"Fei?" Alarm bells rang in Duo's head. "Wufei!" He hastily threw his jacket and the last of the explosives away and sprinted back to the stairs.
***
I hope the length of this chapter makes up for the delay! Being busy and having a mental block does -not- help a person when she's trying to write. Hope you all enjoy!
***
Knock, knock, knock.
"Hope you're up, Duo, I'm coming in." It was Heero. Obviously, tonight was a 'come barging into Duo's room in the middle of the frickin' night' kind of thing.
Wufei jerked away and suddenly vanished without a word.
Face flushed and his heart beating madly in his chest, Duo managed to get the door before Heero entered, trying to appear as composed and relaxed as he could. Or at least not like a certain aforementioned Chinese pilot had just planted one on his lips.
"What's up Heero?" He slouched against the frame just so that Heero was stuck in the hallway, he didn't exactly now where Wufei disappeared to, but he didn't want to chance that if he hadn't hidden well enough that Heero would spot him.
"Another mission. Quatre and Trowa already have something that will occupy the next few days, and I'm flying solo in a few hours, so that leaves it to you and Wufei." He answered flatly. If he had noted Duo's flustered demeanor, his stoical expression didn't let it show.
"That's it? Alright, so just send the stats to Scythe's computers, I'll relay the info to Wu in the morning," Duo shrugged indifferently. At that, Heero actually raised an eyebrow, though -very- slightly.
"Hn..."
Great. He waited impatiently as Heero left, then, "Did ya catch that, Fei?" As Duo shut the door yet again, he emerged of his hiding spot.
"Yes," Wufei hesitated. "I- I apologize, for the -er- that moment before Yuy came in-"
"Don't worry about it," Duo softened, then winked impishly. "Just next time...Give me a little warning, will ya?"
He blinked at the brazen assertion, but visibly eased. "Is it fine to go rushing into another mission? Has your shoulder healed?"
"Oh yeah, 'course it's a bit sore, but all things considered, I'm peachy." To prove his point, Duo rotated his left shoulder without the smallest hint of pain.
"That's good," Wufei's appearance seemed to do a total three- sixty as he smiled fully now, he no longer looked at all contemptuous and royally pissed off at the world, almost unrecognizable. Duo liked him a lot better that way.
"So what are you gonna do, Fei?"
"What?"
"Well, are you gonna go back out to Shenlong to wait, or do you wanna brave goin' into your room with Heero gettin' ready to leave? 'Cause I dunno about you, but I'm dead tired and I wanna get some sleep before I go through the mission objectives," Duo yawned widely and flopped onto his bed. "Or you could just stay in here, whichever suits you."
Despite the welcoming invitation, Wufei shook his head. "No, I think I'll go back out. Come and notify me when you get around to the assignment in the morning."
"Alright."
He turned to go but Duo spoke again.
"Fei?"
"Yes?"
"G'night...And I really am glad you came."
Wufei glanced over with a slight smile. "Good night, Duo."
***
Quatre and Trowa were sitting together silently at the kitchen table the next morning when Duo came flying in from upstairs out of the blue with a big grin on his face.
"Mornin' guys!" he chirped, making himself a cup of coffee.
Quatre and Trowa glanced at each other in surprise at the sudden reappearance of the braided pilot.
"What has you all ecstatic?" Quatre asked pleasantly.
"New mission. I'm gettin' ready to go load all the info in a minute here-" Duo grimaced at the first hot acrid sip of coffee then downed the remainder. "- Heero's left, right?"
"Yes...either that or he's managed to dislodge himself from his laptop long enough for us not to hear him." Trowa said, though with no inkling of jest.
"Ha ha, good, that means it's all there- I'll see you guys later then," Duo grinned again, going out through the garage as abruptly as he had entered.
"-We-?" Quatre blinked.
"Maybe you are more convincing than you thought you were." Trowa commented insinuatingly.
"Huh...maybe..."
***
Duo sat in Deathscythe's cockpit, skimming through the -ton- of data Heero had sent him. He muttered about the injustice of having to read so much so early in the morning and opened a vid- com link to Shenlong. Wufei looked like he was still asleep with his elbow propped up on the arm of the chair and his chin cupped in his hand, eyes closed. He seemed so peaceful that Duo was almost sorry he had to rouse him. Almost. He grinned mischievously.
"Wuuuuuuuuuu!"
"Yes, Duo?" He cracked an eye open with an amused smirk.
"Damn! Ruined a perfectly good moment- didn't know you were really awake..." Duo grumbled. "I WILL get you back for scaring the crap out of me last night!"
"Sure...you just keep telling yourself that," Wufei replied, sitting up straight. "What's our new assignment?"
"Man, there's a lot of stuff here...It seems they're constructing masses of some new type of mobile suit and all that'll be able to hold larger energy cells to last longer in battle and have the capabilities to carry heavier artillery...you know the deal. This time the target's not so far as the last one was, and I think the same plan should work fine too."
"As long as it doesn't end up as the other did," he said solemnly.
"Hey, now do I look like someone who would do the same stupid thing twice?" Duo pretended to puff up indignantly to lighten the mood.
"Of course not..."
"Yeah, that's what I thought."
"...though there is that little reoccurring matter of having a heart attack every time I catch you off guard."
"Ouch! That was a low blow, Fei!" he pouted. "Don't get me started on your little 'morality' rants."
"Fine, we're even then," Wufei conceded and before Duo could retort, asked another question. "When are we leaving?"
"ASAP, sooner if we can. If they get a fleet of these things out, then we'll be working our asses off," Duo answered. "I haven't gotten around to totally fixin' Scythe since our last MS battle, and I know Trowa definitely has no ammo for all his little guns and cannons on Heavy Arms. And we have no clue were Heero went off to, so there's no tellin' how long it would take him to help relay the new suits-"
"I get the picture, Duo," he interrupted. "I can be ready within the hour."
"Great, meet me at the truck then and we'll get going." He flashed a grin and ended the transmission.
***
Quatre and Trowa weren't surprised the second time when Duo came barreling into the living room to the staircase. Though the loud crashes and thuds they heard through the ceiling a few minutes later was a bit disturbing. The reason for the noise was explained a while after when he returned with a duffel bag hanging from the crook of his arm, clipping a gun holster to the hem of the back of his pants.
Wufei was already waiting beside the beat up truck when Duo entered the garage, leaning against the passenger side door.
"We're going to have to move safe houses again soon, the base outcroppings are beginning to close in, and that's not good," he said as Duo hopped in on the driver's side and started the truck up.
"Yeah, knowing Heero though, he's gonna wait 'til the absolute last minute to do it too, just to piss the hell out of OZ," he chuckled, keeping his eyes on the rearview mirror as he pulled out.
"When are we ever -not- pissing them off?" Wufei replied cynically.
"True- are you gettin' a sense of humor on me again?"
"Of course...not. I don't know what you're talking about Duo," he snorted.
"Sure..." Duo said doubtfully, shooting him a sly grin.
For a while they were quiet, but it was an easy silence and neither of them was too compelled to work out any nonexistent nervousness. Before long though, they drew a few miles away from the compound and Duo pulled off the road and into the trees, going on until they were about a mile off. He grabbed his duffel from under the seat and took out a black jacket, all sorts of different sized explosives, and the detonator from them all. The inside of the jacket was lined with pockets that were all quickly filled with the lightweight explosives, the detonator going into his pants pocket as he threw the jacket on.
"I think you have enough C-4 stashed away to blow this place to the Moon," Wufei remarked dryly as they climbed out of the truck.
"Can't leave any traces behind, can we? Just bein' careful, geez," Duo rolled his eyes. "Now, the control center is up on the third level and, if I read the schematics right, it should be over looking the lower two floors' hanger, so it'll be the closest room to the stairs. While you disarm the systems, I'll be running around attaching bombs to anything I can so we can 'blow this place to the Moon'." He grinned devilishly. Wufei nodded as they stuck their transmitters on their ears and went off.
The factory itself was enormous, especially in the shroud of night when shadows distorted its shape even if there were spotlights lining doors and dark corners or on security cameras. Standing in front of it, it was two stories tall, but the first level went down under the ground, creating a third floor basement that was only separated from the first if they closed the tarmac over it to conceal the new mobile suits during inspections. There were very few windows, even so, the few there were only gave light to a couple of the top story rooms, the rest of the compound was all sheer cement with no way whatsoever to scale unless you were able to drill holes into it. Two armed guards bearing the insignia of OZ kept vigils at all the entrances and there were hundreds more within that worked on the mobile suits during the day.
Duo and Wufei wasted no time on finding a way in though, they just barged up to the first threshold they found and rendered the guards unconscious, taking their pass cards so they cold get around easier.
"Have fun, Fei," Duo winked as the door slid open and he took out his gun, disappearing inside. There obviously wasn't going to be an inspection any time soon. The tarmac was wide open and there were many half-finished mobile suit skeletons suspending from cranes on the first floor and when Duo squinted down into the basement level he could distinguish a good five fleets' worth of suits in line accompanying together.
"Huh, man, I'm almost gonna feel sorry destroying these MS. They seem like they'd be pretty good contenders in battle and give us a run for our money," he said wistfully as he threaded his way in between the huge manufacturing machinery, occasionally attaching one of his little explosives to one of them and pressing a button to activate it.
"-You- were the one who accepted Heero's mission, Duo," Wufei's voice replied in his transceiver.
"Yeah...but-"
"No 'buts'."
Duo sighed as he started scouring the murky darkness for a route down to the basement landing; his job on the first was nearly done.
On the top, Wufei was just sidling out of the stairwell and into the spacious corridor. It reminded him of the exact opposite of a hospital, though it was just as unadorned and bland as one, it didn't have blinding white floors and walls, everything was dark and rather dismal. With one hand held tightly around the hilt of his katana, Wufei edged down the hall until he came to the entry to a room. He pressed his unhindered ear to the door and not hearing anything inside, he slid the pass card into the panel and found the control center just as Duo had said.
The officer sitting at the security desk was fast asleep; not taking any need at all to the monitors in front of him that would have shown the two pilots infiltrating the factory. Other than him though, there was no one else in the room, which made Wufei extremely nervous because it wasn't all that late at night and he knew there should have been more guards than there had been.
But he had a mission to complete, so that came first. Wufei made the slumbering officer's death quick and painless, then took his place at the security desk to get rid of any evidence of his or Duo's existence in the compound first. Then he would move on to the next computer and eliminate all the files on the new mobile suits. The process easily took less time than Duo's had; Wufei didn't have nearly as much information to terminate and within a good half an hour he was heading into the corridor again.
Back in the basement, Duo's hoard of explosives was at long length beginning to run low as he stood three fourths of the way amidst the colossal humanoid machines.
"Hey Wu, I'm about through down here, so if you get done before me, just wait out front, 'cause I won't be long if this keeps up. I've only run into like ten Ozzies the entire time."
"Well then I will be seeing you outside, because I am-" Wufei's transmission crackled, then filled with the sounds of a brawl, a round of gunshots immediately followed by Chinese obscenities, and at that point cutting off abruptly.
"Fei?" Alarm bells rang in Duo's head. "Wufei!" He hastily threw his jacket and the last of the explosives away and sprinted back to the stairs.
***