December 27, AC 199

This is an open prayer to any random deity that might be taking requests at the moment: Please, please, please don't make me have to lie to Catherine any more! I'm a really lousy liar and besides, she's like a sister to me.

Short story: Catherine had come to spend the Bicentennial with us.

Long story: Quatre was in the Preventer's infirmary recovering from weirdness galore, which we needed to keep from her—and everyone else, I imagine. We had already lied through our teeth to the Winner girls and the Maguanacs about Quatre's situation, so it was no great leap for Trowa to tell her that he had gone off on some private vacation. We smiled and hugged and did all that sibling stuff while he did the lying thing, and I hated every minute of it. Lying offends me.

Yeah, we all know my shtick: I run, I hide, but I never lie, but do you know where that comes from? No? I'll tell you, then: Lying takes an excellent memory and the truth is always easier. I always take the easy way out.

That was why I began to hate Trowa after he badgered me into making breakfast for three while he caught up with his sister. What's it gonna be, folks? Substituting his hair gel for toothpaste? His toothpaste for wood glue? His lube for wood glue? I plotted evilly while I fried the eggs…yeah, he's gonna kill me, but it'll be worth it.

December 27, C 199

Duo was planning something evil; I can sense it. His grin was showing too many teeth, and he was way too cheerful. I told Cathy to hold on for a moment, and then I went into the kitchen where I caught him squeezing wood glue onto the fried eggs.

"Duo, now isn't the time." I told him. I took the frying pan off the stove burner before it caught on fire and set off the smoke alarm.

He looked massively disappointed. I swear that even his braid sagged. "But we want her to go away, don't we?" He whined. He must have gotten into the Choco-Puffs. He's rarely this obnoxious so early in the morning.

"No. Cathy can do whatever she wants. If she wants to stay here and watch the bicentennial fireworks, for example, she can do that." I kept my voice as firm as possible, although I was anxious to return to Cathy. She worries about us.

"But she'll ask embarrassing questions!"

Well, that was true. "She might, if we give her anything to worry about. Down, Rufus." My dog had chosen that moment to get all affectionate and started sniffing at my crotch.

"She'll ask where the other guys are!" Duo said.

"I told her that—down, Rufus—Wufei was at work and that—down, Rufus—Heero was out shopping and that Quatre was—down, Rufus—on vacation with one of his sisters. Down, Rufus."

Rufus finally got the message and rolled over on his back to beg for a treat. Duo gave him a slice of bacon, which I would have throttled him for had my sister not been in the next room. Instead, I just washed out the pan and started to fix a proper breakfast.

I didn't really get the chance, though. The phone in the kitchen rang just as I was whipping eggs, and Duo informed me that it was for me.

"Fine, but don't touch anything!" I said, taking the handset from him. He just stuck out his tongue at me and ran off to go bother my sister. God, can he really be 19 years old?

"Tro, it's me," Wufei said on the other end of the phone. "Listen, we've got a mission."

There's a word I'd never thought I'd ever have to hear again. No, correction; I hoped I'd never had to hear again. I'm not naturally inclined to optimism, however, so it had been a rather thin hope. "What kind of a mission?" I asked as my mind conjured up all sorts of horrible things, most of them revolving around Relena.

Wufei must have read my damn mind. "It's about Quatre."

That shocked me. I had thought he was out of danger. "Quatre? Is he all right? I thought Sally said he was going to be okay after they took the chip out?"

"Calm down, you," Wufei said, and I swear I heard a smile in his voice. He was practically laughing at me. "He's doing fine. Sally's taking the stitches out of his wrist right now…and Heero's watching over her like a hawk."

I could picture that easily. When it came to any one of the other four of us, Heero didn't trust anyone else to so much as administer an aspirin or apply a band-aid without his direct supervision. Of course, the rest of us aren't much better. "If he's doing so fine, then why do we have a mission that involves him? Down Rufus." My dog had decided that he really needed to lick my face right at that moment. I think he's jealous of the phone.

The other love of my life began to sound impatient. "We need to know who put that chip in Quatre's head, Trowa! Whoever did it had far too much foreknowledge of what was going to happen during the wars, and they not only controlled him, but the rest of us by association. I, for one, am not about to let that action go unpunished."

Oh, that. I should have known. One of the things I both admire and hate about Wufei is his need for justice. Somehow he got the insane notion in his head that life should be fair. It's funny—out of the five of us, I think he's the biggest idealist, thinking the way he does. However, sometimes I'm not convinced that he can tell the difference between justice and revenge. Actually, I'm not too sure of the distinction myself…

"Hang on, Wufei, how in the world are we going to be able to find out who it was? If Quatre himself can't remember, then how the hell are we supposed to find out?"

"We can start on MO-III, the satellite where he met Instructor H and the Maguanacs. There must be some record of his early training there."

I lost control of my jaw for a second. "The Maguanacs? You don't think they—"

"No, I don't suspect them, although they might have some useful information. I was thinking more along the lines that there might be some medical records still there."

I felt relieved at that. The Maguanac Corps, every single goddamn overprotective maniac among them, were above reproach, especially when it came to Quatre. If I ever thought that any of them might have betrayed him, I'd…I don't know…stake them out naked in the lion cages and smear their genitals with cat food, maybe. "That's a good idea—" I started to say, but at that moment I was cut off by Cathy's blood-freezing shriek and death threat.

"DAMN YOU, DUO MAXWELL! WHEN I CATCH YOU I'M GOING TO SKIN YOU ALIVE!" She raced out of the bedroom with her hair done up in two ridiculous little braids that stuck off the top of her head like antennae. That was Duo's work, I imagine.

I cleared my throat. "But I'm afraid I'm going to have to decline the mission, Wufei. I'm needed here at the moment."

He paused for a minute. "Was that Catherine I heard screaming?"

"Yes. You should see what Duo did to her hair."

"I do not want to know. Look, why don't I take Heero and Quatre with me while you and Duo coordinate things from there?"

I looked over my shoulder and saw that my sister was chasing a black blur with a braid around the living room, screaming obscenities in a voice that would have curdled milk. "I have a better idea. Why don't you leave Quatre here and take Duo? Cathy's only been here half an hour and I'm already having to run interference for his life."

He chuckled at me. "I feel for you, Tro, I really do, but I think the original arrangement is for the best. Quatre needs to be with us."

Duo raced by me screaming, "HELP ME, TROWA! GET THE CRAZY LADY OFF ME!" while the 'crazy lady' zoomed after him, only slightly slower in her slippery two-inch heels than he was in his boots. I don't know which one it was, but one of them knocked over the bowl of eggs I'd been stirring earlier—which were the last eggs in the house, by the way—and Rufus came out of where he had been hiding under the table to lick them up.

I tried to stop grinding my teeth because they were starting to hurt. "Wufei, let me put it to you this way: Either you take Duo with you, or you're not getting any for a month. It's up to you."

I could almost hear the color draining out of his face. He knew I was serious. I don't make threats often or lightly.

"Fine." He said at last. "Tell Maxwell to pack up his things. Chang out."

He hung up on me. I sighed and started to clean up after my now-sick dog while Duo and Catherine duked it out loudly in the bedroom. God help me, I was almost glad for this mission!