Clothes Make the Man
By Mieren
Quatre stared into the hall nervously, afraid to leave his room despite the fact that Duo was nowhere within sight. Actually, that was the problem. The previous night, the braided lunatic had vanished, grinning from ear to ear as he flounced out of the mansion. One of Quatre's servants had spotted the American as he returned, large bags in either hand filled with… things. That's all he knew. The servant hadn't been able to see more than that there was something in the bags. That unknown something was already giving Quatre gray hairs.
Trowa pushed him out of the way and peered into the hall, squaring his shoulders and striding purposefully towards the kitchen. Unlike his little blond lover, he knew that hiding would do him absolutely no good. If Duo wanted to do something, he would do it come wind or rain or Wufei with a chainsaw. The Chinese pilot had refused to divulge the reason why he had been chasing the hyper idiot with the chainsaw, but Trowa suspected that it had something to do with Duo's fascination with whittling at that time.
Letting out a worried whimper, Quatre followed the taller pilot down the halls and to the kitchen, determined to get something to eat before making a mad run for his car. He had an important meeting today with one of the Winner Corporations and he knew that Duo was targeting it… again. Two months ago, Duo had somehow managed to find a photosensitive dye and slip it into his shampoo unnoticed. On the drive to the office, the sunlight had activated the dye, turning his hair a brilliant lime green. He hadn't noticed until he had returned from the meeting and met Wufei in the main lobby, at which point the raven-haired teen had promptly commenced laughing himself sick. Pictures of him with green hair appeared in newspapers for a week.
Trowa had suffered a different fate the last time Duo's sights had been on him. Immediately before one of his shows with the lions, something had been slipped into the laundry detergent to make all of his clothes smell exactly like a lioness in heat. He had returned from the ring clawed, disheveled and squashed but fortunately free of any lion loving. All of the males in the ring had decided to fight over him and he had simply gotten dragged into the fray.
The banged pilot smirked, banishing the thought of the near disaster in the ring. Today, he was on the trapeze, so he was safe from any meddling pheromones. Correctly interpreting his thoughts, Quatre merely shook his head, muttering under his breath.
"He's coming for us… he's coming…"
"Don't worry, Quatre," Trowa said calmly. "You'll be at a business meeting surrounded by fifty company presidents. Assuming that your hair doesn't change color or fall out, what can he possibly do?" Quatre glared at him.
"He'll think of something," Quatre assured him darkly.
"At least Wufei will suffer dearly for this," Trowa said dryly. A morbid chuckle escaped his lips. "I almost feel sorry for him."
"I don't."
"I said almost."
"Ah."
* * *
Quatre edged into the massive room he had prepared for the meeting. He had already checked his hair for altered coloration, made sure that all of the food was prepackaged and had ordered the staff to check for a fifty-pound block of exploding Spam. He had to give Duo credit for the last one. No one had seen it coming and it had brought a rather tedious meeting to an abrupt end.
The food at assemblies still scared him. Duo had hit the food several times using laxatives, alcohol, sedatives, stimulants and various dyes. The meeting where twenty men in suits had gotten so drunk on the alcohol they couldn't taste in their beverages that they were singing karaoke and stripping had been somewhat amusing, but Quatre had not been pleased to learn that his mouth had been dyed black after a meeting a week later. The conference with the laxatives had been downright disgusting.
After an hour of speaking and comparing notes and corporate strategies, Quatre began to relax. If nothing had cropped up after an hour, odds were that he was safe. After another few uneventful minutes, he glanced up curiously when the door to the room opened. What he saw stunned him to silence and froze him in his seat.
Duo sauntered into the room, his appearance screaming sex. Black leather pants rode low on his hips, fitting him so tightly that they almost appeared to be painted on. Simple black slippers covered his feet, making them look smaller and slimmer than they were. A leather vest hung open from his shoulders, the edge barely reaching the end of his ribcage, completely exposing his chest, stomach and lower back. A black choker adorned his neck, a silver ring hanging from the front where a leash could be attached. Kohl lined his eyes and lips, accenting the features and giving him an almost delicate look. To top off everything, his hair was down, falling in luxurious waves to his knees.
While Quatre stared, mouth open, Duo glided across the room, swaying seductively as he moved closer to his target, fully aware that he had the attention of the entire room and was drawing several appreciative looks. The Arabian only realized the danger he was in when the longhaired pilot sank to his knees by his chair, laying his head in the blonde's lap and looking up at him with wide innocent eyes.
All the blood in Quatre's body rushed to his face. He would have bet his entire fortune that even his hair was blushing. After several failed attempts, he managed to speak in a high, squeaky voice.
"What are you doing?" he demanded hoarsely.
"I came to see you, master," Duo said in a sultry voice, looking up at him with hopeful eyes. "I got bored in the car, master."
"This isn't funny, Duo," Quatre said stiffly, trying to push the brunette off his lap without success. Duo was stronger than he looked.
"Is something wrong, master?"
Quatre bristled at the innocent tone, baring his teeth at the kneeling pilot.
"Duo. Out. NOW."
Duo drew back but stayed on his knees, head hung low. He trembled slightly for the benefit of the avidly watching men in the room.
"Have I upset you, master?" he whimpered, not looking up. "Are you going to beat me again?"
"LEAVE!" Quatre snapped.
"Yes, master," Duo responded meekly. "Where would you like me to wait, master?"
"In traffic," Quatre snarled.
"Y-yes, master," Duo stammered timidly, turning to leave. He slipped out the door and was gone before his 'master' could say anything else.
Suddenly, Quatre was aware that all eyes in the room were locked on him. He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. This one would take a lot of time to explain. He wasn't looking forward to tomorrow's newspapers.
* * *
Trowa walked confidently into the ring. There were no lions to attack him. Catherine had given him a new set of clothes she had ordered for him, so he didn't have to worry about Duo tampering with them. No pheromones. No itching powder. Nothing to get him this time. New lights had been installed earlier in the morning, so there was no danger of them exploding again. They were a little brighter than he was used to and the color was slightly different, but it was nothing he couldn't adjust to. He was safe.
Even better, he had informed the other performers to watch out for a braided teen in a priest's outfit. No one to that description had been seen. Too bad they hadn't been watching for leather-clad sex slaves.
Silence met him when he reached the center of the stage and he frowned slightly. Normally at least a few people would have been applauding by now. He was somewhat famous at the circus. Confused, he raised his hands to shamelessly beg for cheering as many of the performers did before an act. Another few moments of silence followed before tentative clapping, loud whistling and several extraordinarily lewd catcalls greeted him. He blinked.
Mentally shrugging, he climbed the ladder to reach the first trapeze in a line of five. During the climb, he had to ignore the laughter and mostly hysterical cheering. It was extremely disturbing. In all his time at the circus, he had never heard anything like it.
Deciding to think about it later, he began his routine, swinging and flipping across the swaying trapeze bars. Slowly, the cheers grew louder and the whistles more numerous. There was still a large amount of laughter among the crowd. One of the loudest voices caught his attention. He knew that laugh.
Finishing his routine, he did an extreme flip through the air, falling the thirty feet to the ground to land lightly on his feet. His mind wasn't on his movements. It was solely on finding the source of the voice he knew so well. His eyes quickly locked onto the front row where a longhaired brunette in leather winked and blew him a kiss. It took him several seconds to recognize Duo. The moment he did, however, he began to look for whatever it was the braided menace had done. He knew that look well. They all did.
Now that he was looking, he found the prank instantly.
His clothes. In the lighting, the new material was completely and utterly see-through. The entire audience had just gotten an eyeful. He realized suddenly that Duo had swapped out his new clothes and had been responsible for the change in lighting. Flushing, he snapped his hands down south to cover himself as he sprinted off the ring. The laughter in the crowd rose to a deafening roar.
In his run for cover, he saw Catherine, redder than even he was and refusing to look at him. He was thankful for that as he looked frantically around for something to cover himself with. The ringmaster came to his aid, tossing him a blanket. The older man's face was strained with his effort to contain his laughter. Trowa spared a moment to glare at him before retreating to Catherine's trailer to change into his normal clothes and to plot a way to murder a certain braided idiot.
* * *
Duo hummed merrily to himself as he changed into his normal attire.
"That will teach them to listen to me when I say 'I didn't do it.' They should know by now that I don't lie," he chuckled. "Oh well. Mess with the best and die like the rest. Speaking of which, it's Wu-man's turn."
Somewhere far away from the plotting American, a certain Chinese pilot shivered in abject fear.
To Be Continued…
I'm not even going to pretend to be stopping this anymore. You all should know better by now, and if not, shame on you. Next stop, Wu-Wu gets his. ^__^
This story happened after an hour of loading my car with my junk, driving ten hours to get to my apartment, taking another hour and a half to get it up three flights of stairs, then running errands. It's about 6am right now. If you see any typos or anything else wrong in here, that's why. o_O;
