Basket Case
Chapter 4: About A Girl
The next morning, after another rage from Wufei at the smashed pop cans around Duo's bunk, everything went by the norm. Duo came bounding in at promptly 11:00, but not by his late sleeping this time. The hospital wing had released him and he was free to join the mission they probably would be receiving that afternoon. He had walked in on the cooking Quatre darting back and forth from the sink to the sizzling range; secretly sneaking kisses to Trowa as they passed, the unibang pilot fixing up the ingredients at the counter. Wufei sat meditating on the mat between the couch and the table. Duo first ran into the bunkroom and tossed his body onto his bed, fishing out his hairbrush.
"Quatre!" he communicated across the apartment.
"Yes?"
Meanwhile, fingers left the pages of a rustic-smelling book and curled back the bunk curtain just an inch for a second. Heero blinked once at Duo, sitting on the top bunk diagonal from him with his legs folded and hair unbraiding messily, and then quietly closed himself back in, hidden from sight. He tried to just disappear into the wall again, feeling the boy's presence in the form of lurching stomach nervousness. He didn't want to hear any more thoughts. He tried to get out of range even though he knew it was impossible.
The American reached his arms behind his back and unwound his hair, starting from the bottom. He hooked the rubber band around his wrist and hooked his head out of his bunk. "When's lunch? I'm starving!"
"Just a second… Trowa! Hey-"
Duo blinked, confused. He brought his arm to his chest, and his hair clenched there sprayed out. Man, was it ever knotty…
"Heero, do you know they had absolutely no brushes in that hospital wing? I mean, they had plenty of combs, but those were reserved for the balding men there seems to be so many of," Duo chatted causally. He seemed to know that Heero was hiding behind the blue curtain and the American had a victorious smile plastered on. He lifted his hair and waved it toward Heero. "And do I look like one of those? Well, hell no!"
The muscles in Heero's neck tightened visibly as he felt Duo pull out one of the tougher knots in his hair. But he didn't reply in thought or words. He was going to avoid Duo today, he'd decided… first drowning himself… then all the mixed messages. It was driving him away from Duo, but at the same time he was being jerked closer in an ambiguous, torturous fashion.
Another knot was pulled and Duo kept the one-sided conversation going.
"Now that I think about it, hair can be really weird. Dark in the winter, light in the summer… its' odd if you really think about it. Life is like that, though… Oh, I remember when I was caught off guard and my friends dumped a container of strawberry pop at the church. I was the only red head without freckles in all the colonies. It wore off though."
Heero had almost fallen asleep by now. The dusty scent of aged paper and the rolling baritone voice outside his bunk and his exhaustion had lulled him to an absentminded state just before dreaming. Suddenly, the slightest rise and change of tone in Duo's voice jerked him back to reality.
"Oi, Heero!"
The Japanese pilot growled and tried not to think too loudly.
"What, Duo?"
The American audibly leapt from his bunk and sat against Heero's bunk, not bothering to open the curtain. He stretched his legs across the narrow hall and propped them on Wufei's bunk.
"Have you ever read something that really inspired you?"
"Yeah…" Heero stared at the silhouette of Duo's girlish hair that was cast on the curtain. "Once. Then I burned it."
"Why?" Duo had a laughing tone.
"It was a book on defense from daily stresses. It was really touching, but it didn't work," Heero replied dryly, hinting sarcastically, arching his back up against the wall and returning to his book, cold eyes focused only on the ink and print before him but his mind unable to totally focus with Duo's shadow cast into the detached comfort of his bunk. He prayed for him to go away.
The American collected his chestnut hair at his chest. He laughed softly, shaking his head simultaneously. "Heero, you're so blunt someone could use you as a bowling ball," Duo said. The silhouette of hair on the blue curtain morphed into a profile, as the American cocked his head toward Heero. He laughed, giving Heero the perfect vantage point to see his lips curl back and his teeth grin. "You'll never change."
Heero glared out of the corner of his eye. "Leave…" he growled.
"Fine," the American said without protest, giving the curtains a curt sock to rattle Heero.
Duo walked into the kitchen, sat down at the table, and smiled. He was going to drown his sorrows in a ketchup bottle, a grilled cheese sandwich, and the contentment of seeing Heero hold his nose up angrily and walk past, avoiding eye contact more than usual. He'd gotten under Heero's skin again, he knew. But whether that was a good thing or not, Duo wasn't sure. The only thing he'd gotten out of it before were indifferent glares, monotonous cracks at pessimistic jokes, black eyes, and an awakening slap in the face he'd like to forget.
Quatre sat down after finishing, draping the greased up apron over his chair. "Well, one more meal down," he commented to himself. "I wonder what we'll be doing today... There hasn't been a lot said on the situation, not to me at least." He turned to Trowa, who was just sitting down with his plate of hot food. "Did you hear anything?"
He mutely shook his head, taking a drink of water.
"We do have a mission," Wufei said. The Chinese pilot was polishing his sword carefully while still in meditating position. "They'll alert us of the details after the strategies are formed. We should probably head out right away and do some last minute repairs."
Duo licked some ketchup from his fingers, then stopped, taking in the other pilots' conversation. "Oh shit, I forgot! How's Deathscythe?" The American was mentally slapping himself. "I just left her there and got in trouble with the tub right after that. Jesus, I can't believe I neglected her…"
"It's fine," came Heero's gruff voice. The stoic pilot yanked out his chair and sat roughly down. He looked to Duo once and then just grabbed a slice of toast that would suffice his tough body for at least a few hours until he got around to cooking. He was trying to drown out that horrible taste of grilled cheese.
"Are you sure?" There was no fooling around in Duo's voice this time.
Heero's Prussian eyes flashed lowly to Duo. "Kitto. I took the liberty of checking on it while you were sick in bed."
Violet eyes were just as dangerous. "I was not sick, just injured – You were!"
The snap was received and answered quietly. The Japanese boy leaned subtly forward to grasp another piece of toast, but his intention was to get close enough to whisper in Duo's ear. "I was, but I wasn't dumb enough to drown in a two-foot deep bathtub."
Duo glared. "Shut up," he said angrily, crucifying his sandwich with a fork and sharply tearing his eyes away. He simultaneously shifted his chair further away from Heero's and cocked it to the side, so his shoulder was to his best friend. It would have been so much easier to be mad if they didn't sit next to each other.
Quatre giggled and shook his head. As he stood up, finished with his lunch, the overworking blonde felt Trowa grab him by the hand. It wasn't rough at all; just Trowa's more causal way to get his koi's attention. Wide, innocent blue eyes met enigmatic green and Trowa motioned with his eyes toward Duo and Heero, who had begun what he knew as 'the first-stage': mistimed glances at each other between sparing mouthful of food. Quatre smiled and let go.
Trowa had been asking for Duo to pass a glass, when the American's eyes turned into frightened, horrified saucers. He suddenly yelped and dropped it to shatter into tiny slivers of fractured glass on the floor.
Quatre turned quickly, along with Heero, Trowa and the meditating Wufei to see the Queen of the World standing in the doorway. But that wasn't the reason Duo had shrieked in terror, and continued to stare like there was an army of knife wielding bloody serial killers.
It was the suitcase she had and that ridiculously overly eager smile.
Relena's aqua blue-green eyes lit up like a Christmas tree at the sight of Heero, who was glaring over his shoulder before he realized just who was in the door. She brushed a strand of hair from her face with long fingernails in a very rehearsed manner. "Heero!" she cried out across the living room and joint kitchen, bowing her head politely. It was in more of an excited spoken manner than a yell.
Duo instantly dropped his fork.
"R--Relena," Heero replied, feigning indifference, but with dinner-plate eyes betraying shock and bits of mulling annoyance, "what are you doing here?"
The queen of the world sauntered in, obviously flaunting her new-looking high-heeled shoes. Her eyes seemed never waver from Heero's paling, and slightly confused face, matching his glares blow for blow. "I've come to help settle the confusion. You have no mission at the moment, correct?"
"Not for a few hours, yes, but Relena you have to understand—"
"I do understand," the girl said, prancing up to Heero. She was dangerously close for a non-pilot, close enough to see the individual bangs frayed over his temples, close enough to see the shocked whites of his eyes, close enough for instantaneous death. She lifted her suitcase. "I rushed up as soon as I heard you were in a political jam. I can help you get back on track and figure out just who would be more rewarding to fight or unite with. This war doesn't have to go on forever."
"That's very kind of you, Relena, but—"
Her honey grin spread happily, watching the flustered expression on the Gundam pilot's face and misinterpreting it, twisting it in her mind so she would see what she wanted to see. "There's no need to be bashful about this, Heero." She let a coy grin escape her and she gently brushed her finger on Heero's bare shoulder in a friendly gesture, but one that was much more than that. "You're welcome."
Duo gulped and silently took a drink of his juice, closing his eyes. He waited for it…
Two masculine eyebrows hooked together, a lip curled upward in annoyance, and Heero's patience stuttered weak. "Relena…" he whispered heatedly, as she giggled and amused herself with glancing around the poorly furnished, stingy apartment, taking no notice of the dangerous emotion registering on the stoic face behind her.
"Relena!" he said loudly.
She turned back around, her face picturesque innocence. "What?"
"I understand that you are trying to help, but this is not the place to be doing it. You'll only be a disruption to us if you try to… to…" — he pointed, almost disgustedly, to her suitcase — "make peace here. Go to the source of the problem if you must help—Go to your speeches and treaty signings."
"It's dangerous here," Quatre commented.
"We do not need an onna in our midst to help us prepare to fight in our apartment," Wufei said firmly, hunching over his meal and breaking eye contact. He seemed to keep a steady air of indifference, but his patience, too was fading. "Yuy is right."
This was the only time even acknowledged the other pilots existed beyond Heero. She raised her stern blue-green eyes to each one, spending the least amount of time on Duo, who cut away to stare down at his lunch. "Nonsense," she declared, after a tense moment with intense pilot eyes on her. "You won't even notice I'm here. I'll be perfectly quiet and while you're out on missions, I'll be out talking to officials."
Duo's eyes narrowed at his food, taking another stab.
"Listen, Ms. Relena," Trowa said, "it's not the best time to be here. We've had odd incidents and sicknesses happening lately and we don't want to shoulder any of the responsibility if you were to get hurt."
"Thank you for the thought… uh…"
"Trowa," the unibang pilot finished, green eyes betraying no emotion.
"Anyway," she continued hastily, haughtily even, with a narcissistic flip of her long honey hair. The girl turned back to Heero, who was trying to piece his patience together behind a set face, and smiled again, broader. She lifted her suitcase on her knees giddily. "Won't you show me to my room, Heero?"
"We have not decided if you're going to stay, Relena," Heero said darkly, his stony blue eyes trying to strike some sense into her where she stood. "We make decisions that affect the whole as a whole. Now, if you'd excuse me, we have a decision to make…"
The Queen of the World blinked, a bit taken back by this new resistance to her powerful willpower to finally see love reflect in those Prussian eyes, love for her, a barricade to her all-important goal, to the rest of her life, to her come-to-life dreams, and just nodded like a good little girl should have. She numbly watched the Japanese boy subtly nod his head toward the bunkroom, causing his bangs to shift back and forth over his eyes, and the rest of the pilots hurriedly jumped from their chairs, filling the apartment with this cacophony of chair legs complaining against the wooden kitchen floor. The last to get up was Duo, who hurriedly stuffed the scrappy remainders of his grilled cheese sandwich into his mouth, then chewed it maliciously. All the while, he stared at the silent girl in the center of the joint kitchen and living room, somehow subdued by the possibility that she might not be living with her precious Heero into a little vulnerable, dumb love-struck girl. He grinned then dashed toward the bunk room.
/Ha ha. /
The American shut the door quickly on a menagerie of soft-spoken anger and agreeing yet uncertain opinions, ricocheting off the closed walls. Duo glanced back out the cracked door to the living room once, seeing Relena sitting on the couch, then slid it quietly close again. Why did she have to come now?!—Of all the unexpected, inconvenient times, with the worst, most complicating intentions; stay over! A sleepover! A chance to get her obsessing love into her bed—No way! Puffing out an angry breath, the American hurried past the bunks to the small open space behind them, in the corner, where the four other pilots were sitting, standing, leaning in a small, private circle, their voices not so private.
"We can't! That … that girl will interfere with us, no matter what she says. It may be true to her, in her little mind, but I know she will," Wufei said indignantly, folding his arms and flashing glances at everyone. "We can be as polite as we want to be, but it's weak to just let her in and deal with it."
Quatre bit at his finger, staring at the ground. "Point taken, but…"
"But what, Winner? What is there to argue in her favor? We all know that girl is dying to get her claws into Yuy, and political reasoning or not, this would give her a chance," the Chinese pilot commented.
The American entered the ring of conversation with Heero leaning against the far corner, Trowa sitting on a storage box pressed against the back of his bunk, Wufei standing with arms imposingly folded, Quatre sitting beside the storage box on the floor. He lazily attempted a titled smirk and said sarcastically, sitting down on the floor beside the blonde, "Like Heero has anything slightly romantic for her to get any claws into." It was another jest in the game that had been started at the table at lunch, and it invoked a nasty but still stoic look from Heero.
"Stay on topic," he growled.
Quatre seemed deaf to their conversation. "I know, I know, I know Wufei. But it's not just about her thing for Heero; she might actually do some good for us, clear the path for us to get something done and end this famine."
"She doesn't have to stay here, though," Heero said darkly. "Why not on Earth or the colonies?"
The blonde shook his head and looked down at the floor, clawing his fingers through his hair. Something definitely beyond the issue of Relena's vision on the apartment being an open hotel was affecting him. "It's really her choice. We have become dependent on her to handle the political matters of this war, and it would be much easier to protect her when she's this close to us."
"What about when we can only protect ourselves, on missions? And what's going to protect us from her?" Wufei retorted, having a strategic and biting return for every point Quatre made.
Duo withdrew from the conversation, willingly, letting it rage on between Quatre and Wufei, the Arabian pilot arguing reluctantly for her, the Chinese pilot arguing vehemently against her. He was unusually silent and withdrawn, even to himself. Trowa and Heero had their inspired moment when they would participate in debates or arguments, but in their own restrained way, and this was not one of those days.
Duo's newly coined stoicism piqued a new curiosity in Heero, who could take in the conversation with one half of his consciousness, and watch the American at the same time. He watched his mannerisms… for… nothing better to do, he thought, and started to memorize them more than he had before. He recognized the nonchalant arms behind his head, his cocky, American-brazen akimbo stance, and the grin… all the most obvious things. But now he noticed everything so much more, the emotions that came with each mannerism since he was so in tuned to the American, but some force unseen. Heero watched Duo's vision shift back and forth to Quatre and Wufei as they debated and felt a pang of… resentment? The wide, caricature violet eyes settled on Quatre, and… jealousy? Wufei and… depression? Trowa and… admiration?
Suddenly, two eyes were on him and fear not his own shot into his heart like a needle straight into his vena cava. Duo looked at him, and… was afraid? Heero blinked in shock, then ripped his eyes hastily away, knowing that although Duo jerked away as well, he still was glancing up at him.
Because the fear was still there, in Duo, therefore now installed in him.
The two were revived to the conversation by Wufei's voice. "—Fine, Winner, fine."
"I'm glad we agree."
"Well, I'm not agreeing," the dark-haired pilot said in defense, "I just see your point. Now…"
"A vote," Trowa finished, raising his right palm in the air.
"Those opposed?" Quatre asked, turning eyes to meet black, blue, green, and violet. "Say 'I'."
The room was awfully tense as the hands began to move and vocal chords warmed.
Outside, Relena stared down at her fingernails and danced them for herself in nervousness, in heartbroken want. /Oh, please let it work... please let him love me... I know he does... he must... he has to.. ./
---
GAWD that took long, didn't it. I hope nobudy forgot about me. I am the most forgetful person with the shortest attention span, so things can get swept under the rug every easily. I pulled this one back out and read it and said, I have to keep going. The plot is a little twisted now, because I don't have the same vision as I did when I started writing but it got better, I think. Bitch relena.... ooooh bitch relena is bbback. It's kind of a crappy ending, but I didn't want to rush into another cliffhanger, but this one is sort of one, too. Take a guess why Duo has fear of Heero? A) Heerophobia? B) He knows that secretly, Heero made a Hello Kitty shrine for the band Devo to take on their Wisconsin tour? or C) He owes him money. If you answered with any of these, you're insane! What are you doing, talking to the screen?? There are people looking at you, aren't there... ha, I thought so. THANK YOU SOO MUCH for all the reviews... I feel so loved and accepted, thanks. thanks. thanks to That Girl, Takatome Ichido, Katie, Meri, BluWlf, XiaoBaoBei, ShiTiger, Nif86, Deathwish, Ais, Neo, NightCrawler, Imp Gurl, Potato King, everybody! Bubbye! Oh, the lyrics! The first three songs are Green Day, my second favorite band with the second hottest man on the planet [to me] Billie Joe Armstrong, and this one, About a Girl, is by Nirvana, my favorite band with the most beautiful, hot, sexy funny man who... uh, was on the planet, Kurt Cobain. Stupid courtney. She killed 'im, ya know. Hehe, I hope no body knows her and tells her I said that...
I need an easy friend
I do... with an ear to lend
I do... think you fit this shoe
I do... but you have a clue
Take advantage while
You hang me out to dry
But I can't see you every night free
I'm standing in your line
I do... hope you have the time
I do... pick a number too
I do... keep a date with you
Chapter 4: About A Girl
The next morning, after another rage from Wufei at the smashed pop cans around Duo's bunk, everything went by the norm. Duo came bounding in at promptly 11:00, but not by his late sleeping this time. The hospital wing had released him and he was free to join the mission they probably would be receiving that afternoon. He had walked in on the cooking Quatre darting back and forth from the sink to the sizzling range; secretly sneaking kisses to Trowa as they passed, the unibang pilot fixing up the ingredients at the counter. Wufei sat meditating on the mat between the couch and the table. Duo first ran into the bunkroom and tossed his body onto his bed, fishing out his hairbrush.
"Quatre!" he communicated across the apartment.
"Yes?"
Meanwhile, fingers left the pages of a rustic-smelling book and curled back the bunk curtain just an inch for a second. Heero blinked once at Duo, sitting on the top bunk diagonal from him with his legs folded and hair unbraiding messily, and then quietly closed himself back in, hidden from sight. He tried to just disappear into the wall again, feeling the boy's presence in the form of lurching stomach nervousness. He didn't want to hear any more thoughts. He tried to get out of range even though he knew it was impossible.
The American reached his arms behind his back and unwound his hair, starting from the bottom. He hooked the rubber band around his wrist and hooked his head out of his bunk. "When's lunch? I'm starving!"
"Just a second… Trowa! Hey-"
Duo blinked, confused. He brought his arm to his chest, and his hair clenched there sprayed out. Man, was it ever knotty…
"Heero, do you know they had absolutely no brushes in that hospital wing? I mean, they had plenty of combs, but those were reserved for the balding men there seems to be so many of," Duo chatted causally. He seemed to know that Heero was hiding behind the blue curtain and the American had a victorious smile plastered on. He lifted his hair and waved it toward Heero. "And do I look like one of those? Well, hell no!"
The muscles in Heero's neck tightened visibly as he felt Duo pull out one of the tougher knots in his hair. But he didn't reply in thought or words. He was going to avoid Duo today, he'd decided… first drowning himself… then all the mixed messages. It was driving him away from Duo, but at the same time he was being jerked closer in an ambiguous, torturous fashion.
Another knot was pulled and Duo kept the one-sided conversation going.
"Now that I think about it, hair can be really weird. Dark in the winter, light in the summer… its' odd if you really think about it. Life is like that, though… Oh, I remember when I was caught off guard and my friends dumped a container of strawberry pop at the church. I was the only red head without freckles in all the colonies. It wore off though."
Heero had almost fallen asleep by now. The dusty scent of aged paper and the rolling baritone voice outside his bunk and his exhaustion had lulled him to an absentminded state just before dreaming. Suddenly, the slightest rise and change of tone in Duo's voice jerked him back to reality.
"Oi, Heero!"
The Japanese pilot growled and tried not to think too loudly.
"What, Duo?"
The American audibly leapt from his bunk and sat against Heero's bunk, not bothering to open the curtain. He stretched his legs across the narrow hall and propped them on Wufei's bunk.
"Have you ever read something that really inspired you?"
"Yeah…" Heero stared at the silhouette of Duo's girlish hair that was cast on the curtain. "Once. Then I burned it."
"Why?" Duo had a laughing tone.
"It was a book on defense from daily stresses. It was really touching, but it didn't work," Heero replied dryly, hinting sarcastically, arching his back up against the wall and returning to his book, cold eyes focused only on the ink and print before him but his mind unable to totally focus with Duo's shadow cast into the detached comfort of his bunk. He prayed for him to go away.
The American collected his chestnut hair at his chest. He laughed softly, shaking his head simultaneously. "Heero, you're so blunt someone could use you as a bowling ball," Duo said. The silhouette of hair on the blue curtain morphed into a profile, as the American cocked his head toward Heero. He laughed, giving Heero the perfect vantage point to see his lips curl back and his teeth grin. "You'll never change."
Heero glared out of the corner of his eye. "Leave…" he growled.
"Fine," the American said without protest, giving the curtains a curt sock to rattle Heero.
Duo walked into the kitchen, sat down at the table, and smiled. He was going to drown his sorrows in a ketchup bottle, a grilled cheese sandwich, and the contentment of seeing Heero hold his nose up angrily and walk past, avoiding eye contact more than usual. He'd gotten under Heero's skin again, he knew. But whether that was a good thing or not, Duo wasn't sure. The only thing he'd gotten out of it before were indifferent glares, monotonous cracks at pessimistic jokes, black eyes, and an awakening slap in the face he'd like to forget.
Quatre sat down after finishing, draping the greased up apron over his chair. "Well, one more meal down," he commented to himself. "I wonder what we'll be doing today... There hasn't been a lot said on the situation, not to me at least." He turned to Trowa, who was just sitting down with his plate of hot food. "Did you hear anything?"
He mutely shook his head, taking a drink of water.
"We do have a mission," Wufei said. The Chinese pilot was polishing his sword carefully while still in meditating position. "They'll alert us of the details after the strategies are formed. We should probably head out right away and do some last minute repairs."
Duo licked some ketchup from his fingers, then stopped, taking in the other pilots' conversation. "Oh shit, I forgot! How's Deathscythe?" The American was mentally slapping himself. "I just left her there and got in trouble with the tub right after that. Jesus, I can't believe I neglected her…"
"It's fine," came Heero's gruff voice. The stoic pilot yanked out his chair and sat roughly down. He looked to Duo once and then just grabbed a slice of toast that would suffice his tough body for at least a few hours until he got around to cooking. He was trying to drown out that horrible taste of grilled cheese.
"Are you sure?" There was no fooling around in Duo's voice this time.
Heero's Prussian eyes flashed lowly to Duo. "Kitto. I took the liberty of checking on it while you were sick in bed."
Violet eyes were just as dangerous. "I was not sick, just injured – You were!"
The snap was received and answered quietly. The Japanese boy leaned subtly forward to grasp another piece of toast, but his intention was to get close enough to whisper in Duo's ear. "I was, but I wasn't dumb enough to drown in a two-foot deep bathtub."
Duo glared. "Shut up," he said angrily, crucifying his sandwich with a fork and sharply tearing his eyes away. He simultaneously shifted his chair further away from Heero's and cocked it to the side, so his shoulder was to his best friend. It would have been so much easier to be mad if they didn't sit next to each other.
Quatre giggled and shook his head. As he stood up, finished with his lunch, the overworking blonde felt Trowa grab him by the hand. It wasn't rough at all; just Trowa's more causal way to get his koi's attention. Wide, innocent blue eyes met enigmatic green and Trowa motioned with his eyes toward Duo and Heero, who had begun what he knew as 'the first-stage': mistimed glances at each other between sparing mouthful of food. Quatre smiled and let go.
Trowa had been asking for Duo to pass a glass, when the American's eyes turned into frightened, horrified saucers. He suddenly yelped and dropped it to shatter into tiny slivers of fractured glass on the floor.
Quatre turned quickly, along with Heero, Trowa and the meditating Wufei to see the Queen of the World standing in the doorway. But that wasn't the reason Duo had shrieked in terror, and continued to stare like there was an army of knife wielding bloody serial killers.
It was the suitcase she had and that ridiculously overly eager smile.
Relena's aqua blue-green eyes lit up like a Christmas tree at the sight of Heero, who was glaring over his shoulder before he realized just who was in the door. She brushed a strand of hair from her face with long fingernails in a very rehearsed manner. "Heero!" she cried out across the living room and joint kitchen, bowing her head politely. It was in more of an excited spoken manner than a yell.
Duo instantly dropped his fork.
"R--Relena," Heero replied, feigning indifference, but with dinner-plate eyes betraying shock and bits of mulling annoyance, "what are you doing here?"
The queen of the world sauntered in, obviously flaunting her new-looking high-heeled shoes. Her eyes seemed never waver from Heero's paling, and slightly confused face, matching his glares blow for blow. "I've come to help settle the confusion. You have no mission at the moment, correct?"
"Not for a few hours, yes, but Relena you have to understand—"
"I do understand," the girl said, prancing up to Heero. She was dangerously close for a non-pilot, close enough to see the individual bangs frayed over his temples, close enough to see the shocked whites of his eyes, close enough for instantaneous death. She lifted her suitcase. "I rushed up as soon as I heard you were in a political jam. I can help you get back on track and figure out just who would be more rewarding to fight or unite with. This war doesn't have to go on forever."
"That's very kind of you, Relena, but—"
Her honey grin spread happily, watching the flustered expression on the Gundam pilot's face and misinterpreting it, twisting it in her mind so she would see what she wanted to see. "There's no need to be bashful about this, Heero." She let a coy grin escape her and she gently brushed her finger on Heero's bare shoulder in a friendly gesture, but one that was much more than that. "You're welcome."
Duo gulped and silently took a drink of his juice, closing his eyes. He waited for it…
Two masculine eyebrows hooked together, a lip curled upward in annoyance, and Heero's patience stuttered weak. "Relena…" he whispered heatedly, as she giggled and amused herself with glancing around the poorly furnished, stingy apartment, taking no notice of the dangerous emotion registering on the stoic face behind her.
"Relena!" he said loudly.
She turned back around, her face picturesque innocence. "What?"
"I understand that you are trying to help, but this is not the place to be doing it. You'll only be a disruption to us if you try to… to…" — he pointed, almost disgustedly, to her suitcase — "make peace here. Go to the source of the problem if you must help—Go to your speeches and treaty signings."
"It's dangerous here," Quatre commented.
"We do not need an onna in our midst to help us prepare to fight in our apartment," Wufei said firmly, hunching over his meal and breaking eye contact. He seemed to keep a steady air of indifference, but his patience, too was fading. "Yuy is right."
This was the only time even acknowledged the other pilots existed beyond Heero. She raised her stern blue-green eyes to each one, spending the least amount of time on Duo, who cut away to stare down at his lunch. "Nonsense," she declared, after a tense moment with intense pilot eyes on her. "You won't even notice I'm here. I'll be perfectly quiet and while you're out on missions, I'll be out talking to officials."
Duo's eyes narrowed at his food, taking another stab.
"Listen, Ms. Relena," Trowa said, "it's not the best time to be here. We've had odd incidents and sicknesses happening lately and we don't want to shoulder any of the responsibility if you were to get hurt."
"Thank you for the thought… uh…"
"Trowa," the unibang pilot finished, green eyes betraying no emotion.
"Anyway," she continued hastily, haughtily even, with a narcissistic flip of her long honey hair. The girl turned back to Heero, who was trying to piece his patience together behind a set face, and smiled again, broader. She lifted her suitcase on her knees giddily. "Won't you show me to my room, Heero?"
"We have not decided if you're going to stay, Relena," Heero said darkly, his stony blue eyes trying to strike some sense into her where she stood. "We make decisions that affect the whole as a whole. Now, if you'd excuse me, we have a decision to make…"
The Queen of the World blinked, a bit taken back by this new resistance to her powerful willpower to finally see love reflect in those Prussian eyes, love for her, a barricade to her all-important goal, to the rest of her life, to her come-to-life dreams, and just nodded like a good little girl should have. She numbly watched the Japanese boy subtly nod his head toward the bunkroom, causing his bangs to shift back and forth over his eyes, and the rest of the pilots hurriedly jumped from their chairs, filling the apartment with this cacophony of chair legs complaining against the wooden kitchen floor. The last to get up was Duo, who hurriedly stuffed the scrappy remainders of his grilled cheese sandwich into his mouth, then chewed it maliciously. All the while, he stared at the silent girl in the center of the joint kitchen and living room, somehow subdued by the possibility that she might not be living with her precious Heero into a little vulnerable, dumb love-struck girl. He grinned then dashed toward the bunk room.
/Ha ha. /
The American shut the door quickly on a menagerie of soft-spoken anger and agreeing yet uncertain opinions, ricocheting off the closed walls. Duo glanced back out the cracked door to the living room once, seeing Relena sitting on the couch, then slid it quietly close again. Why did she have to come now?!—Of all the unexpected, inconvenient times, with the worst, most complicating intentions; stay over! A sleepover! A chance to get her obsessing love into her bed—No way! Puffing out an angry breath, the American hurried past the bunks to the small open space behind them, in the corner, where the four other pilots were sitting, standing, leaning in a small, private circle, their voices not so private.
"We can't! That … that girl will interfere with us, no matter what she says. It may be true to her, in her little mind, but I know she will," Wufei said indignantly, folding his arms and flashing glances at everyone. "We can be as polite as we want to be, but it's weak to just let her in and deal with it."
Quatre bit at his finger, staring at the ground. "Point taken, but…"
"But what, Winner? What is there to argue in her favor? We all know that girl is dying to get her claws into Yuy, and political reasoning or not, this would give her a chance," the Chinese pilot commented.
The American entered the ring of conversation with Heero leaning against the far corner, Trowa sitting on a storage box pressed against the back of his bunk, Wufei standing with arms imposingly folded, Quatre sitting beside the storage box on the floor. He lazily attempted a titled smirk and said sarcastically, sitting down on the floor beside the blonde, "Like Heero has anything slightly romantic for her to get any claws into." It was another jest in the game that had been started at the table at lunch, and it invoked a nasty but still stoic look from Heero.
"Stay on topic," he growled.
Quatre seemed deaf to their conversation. "I know, I know, I know Wufei. But it's not just about her thing for Heero; she might actually do some good for us, clear the path for us to get something done and end this famine."
"She doesn't have to stay here, though," Heero said darkly. "Why not on Earth or the colonies?"
The blonde shook his head and looked down at the floor, clawing his fingers through his hair. Something definitely beyond the issue of Relena's vision on the apartment being an open hotel was affecting him. "It's really her choice. We have become dependent on her to handle the political matters of this war, and it would be much easier to protect her when she's this close to us."
"What about when we can only protect ourselves, on missions? And what's going to protect us from her?" Wufei retorted, having a strategic and biting return for every point Quatre made.
Duo withdrew from the conversation, willingly, letting it rage on between Quatre and Wufei, the Arabian pilot arguing reluctantly for her, the Chinese pilot arguing vehemently against her. He was unusually silent and withdrawn, even to himself. Trowa and Heero had their inspired moment when they would participate in debates or arguments, but in their own restrained way, and this was not one of those days.
Duo's newly coined stoicism piqued a new curiosity in Heero, who could take in the conversation with one half of his consciousness, and watch the American at the same time. He watched his mannerisms… for… nothing better to do, he thought, and started to memorize them more than he had before. He recognized the nonchalant arms behind his head, his cocky, American-brazen akimbo stance, and the grin… all the most obvious things. But now he noticed everything so much more, the emotions that came with each mannerism since he was so in tuned to the American, but some force unseen. Heero watched Duo's vision shift back and forth to Quatre and Wufei as they debated and felt a pang of… resentment? The wide, caricature violet eyes settled on Quatre, and… jealousy? Wufei and… depression? Trowa and… admiration?
Suddenly, two eyes were on him and fear not his own shot into his heart like a needle straight into his vena cava. Duo looked at him, and… was afraid? Heero blinked in shock, then ripped his eyes hastily away, knowing that although Duo jerked away as well, he still was glancing up at him.
Because the fear was still there, in Duo, therefore now installed in him.
The two were revived to the conversation by Wufei's voice. "—Fine, Winner, fine."
"I'm glad we agree."
"Well, I'm not agreeing," the dark-haired pilot said in defense, "I just see your point. Now…"
"A vote," Trowa finished, raising his right palm in the air.
"Those opposed?" Quatre asked, turning eyes to meet black, blue, green, and violet. "Say 'I'."
The room was awfully tense as the hands began to move and vocal chords warmed.
Outside, Relena stared down at her fingernails and danced them for herself in nervousness, in heartbroken want. /Oh, please let it work... please let him love me... I know he does... he must... he has to.. ./
---
GAWD that took long, didn't it. I hope nobudy forgot about me. I am the most forgetful person with the shortest attention span, so things can get swept under the rug every easily. I pulled this one back out and read it and said, I have to keep going. The plot is a little twisted now, because I don't have the same vision as I did when I started writing but it got better, I think. Bitch relena.... ooooh bitch relena is bbback. It's kind of a crappy ending, but I didn't want to rush into another cliffhanger, but this one is sort of one, too. Take a guess why Duo has fear of Heero? A) Heerophobia? B) He knows that secretly, Heero made a Hello Kitty shrine for the band Devo to take on their Wisconsin tour? or C) He owes him money. If you answered with any of these, you're insane! What are you doing, talking to the screen?? There are people looking at you, aren't there... ha, I thought so. THANK YOU SOO MUCH for all the reviews... I feel so loved and accepted, thanks. thanks. thanks to That Girl, Takatome Ichido, Katie, Meri, BluWlf, XiaoBaoBei, ShiTiger, Nif86, Deathwish, Ais, Neo, NightCrawler, Imp Gurl, Potato King, everybody! Bubbye! Oh, the lyrics! The first three songs are Green Day, my second favorite band with the second hottest man on the planet [to me] Billie Joe Armstrong, and this one, About a Girl, is by Nirvana, my favorite band with the most beautiful, hot, sexy funny man who... uh, was on the planet, Kurt Cobain. Stupid courtney. She killed 'im, ya know. Hehe, I hope no body knows her and tells her I said that...
I need an easy friend
I do... with an ear to lend
I do... think you fit this shoe
I do... but you have a clue
Take advantage while
You hang me out to dry
But I can't see you every night free
I'm standing in your line
I do... hope you have the time
I do... pick a number too
I do... keep a date with you