Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters…or the songs… or anything at all… please feed the poor college student… w/reviews of course!
So Close... And Yet So Far
Part Five: Compromising Situations
Sandrock's lights flashed red in warning, as the alarms sounded around him. Quatre fumbled with the controls trying to figure out what was going on. The alarms were getting louder and louder. BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. The sound seemed to be getting more high pitched as the hatch opened before him. Beep. Beep. Beep. He squinted, blinded by a bright light. The alarms were still sounding, as he shielded his eyes with his forearm. Beep. Beep. Beep. Quatre fumbled around trying to find the source of the noise when he finally opened his eyes against the light. The daylight. The vidphone was still beeping. He answered it, still dazed from sleep.
"Mr. Winner, it's 6 am. This is your wake-up call," came the voice, and picture, of the hotel clerk. As she looked into the screen, a blush crawled up her cheeks. Quatre, now fully awake, wondered what she was blushing about. He looked down to see that he had fallen asleep in his bathrobe, which was now fully open, baring his very nicely toned (AN: if I do say so myself ::drool:: ^_~) body to the bashful young woman on the other side of the line. Quickly clutching his robe closed, he replied with a polite,
"Thank you ma'am," before abruptly cutting off the line. He bounced out of bed in a hurry to get dressed. Dorothy's flight would be arriving in an hour.
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Sally twisted in her sleep. At least she tried to. It seemed that none of her body parts wanted to cooperate with her. It didn't help that she felt extremely hot and sticky. She couldn't feel her legs at all. Probably asleep. She tried to move her arms and found that they were pinned down. She shifted around some more and realized that one arm was pressed underneath her own body, but the other one… She couldn't understand what was preventing its movement. Finally, she squinted open her eyes. She looked for the offending arm, only to find that it didn't look quite right.
Suddenly, she heard a soft snore. Her eyes snapped wide open. She realized that that arm was not her arm. Craning her very achy neck she looked up to see Wufei, head leaning against the window, cradling her in his arms, one of which was tightly wrapped around her own arm. They were still in her car. Apparently, they hadn't left it since last night. No wonder she felt so hot and sticky. The car was an oven thanks to the sunlight's little greenhouse effect. Plus, Wufei was still slightly damp from last night's rain.
Sally tried to pry herself out of Wufei's grasp, trying not to wake him. Unfortunately, she was unsuccessful. Wufei snorted sharply and his head jerked so fast that he smacked it against the window. Sally stifled her laugh as his hand flew to the back of his head to assess the bump that was most likely forming there. Finally freed from his vice-like grip, Sally quickly sat up. Hand still on the back of his head he glared at her. Sally looked back expectantly.
"What?" she finally broke the silence, "I have no idea why we were sleeping in the car, so don't look at me like this is my fault."
"As a matter of fact, it is your fault. If you hadn't fallen asleep…"
"That doesn't explain why you're sleeping here," she replied defensively. "This is my car, and we're parked in front of my place. So what are you doing here?" Wufei flushed, with anger or embarrassment, Sally couldn't tell.
"You—I—Argh!" he stuttered. "This is so dishonorable." He leaned his head against the steering wheel in defeat. It seemed he was taking this way too seriously.
"Wufei, it's not a big deal. I'm sure there's a perfectly good explanation for all this. After all we didn't do anything wrong." She patted his shoulder in a motherly fashion. Composing himself, he glared at her.
"You were sleeping when we got here. I tried to wake you up, but you're as stubborn in your sleep as you are when you're awake." Sally ignored the comment graciously, realizing he was still a bit embarrassed by the whole situation. "I was trying to be nice you know," he accused, defensively. "I didn't want to carry you out into the rain. I thought I'd wait for it to stop." Sally gave him an amused grin. She had to admit she admired his chivalry, to a certain extent.
"It's still raining," she said matter-of-factly.
"Really…and all this time I was wondering why the windshield was sweating so profusely." He replied sarcastically, obviously over his 'dishonor'.
"Whatever, I'm going inside. Are you coming or what?" Sally could see the gears working in his mind, weighing the situation. "How are you going to get home, anyway? You're not taking my car." He glared at her. "Come on." She opened her door, and gestured her hand in invitation. Sighing heavily, he gave in. He stepped out into the drizzling rain, and watched her race to her front door. She unlocked the door and called him in with a wave of her hand. Water clung to her disheveled hair, and Wufei couldn't help but smile before following her in.
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"Zechs, don't you think we should at least get some room service?" Noin suggested sleepily. "We could both use a cup of coffee."
"Speak for yourself," Zechs growled back. "The only thing I need is to get back to the explosion site," he added pulling her down the hallway with him. They got into the elevator, which conveniently also contained a room service cart.
"Don't mind if I do," Noin mumbled to herself, grabbing a croissant and pouring out a cup of tea. The attendant looked on helplessly.
"Damn elevators take so long. You'd think with the kind of technolo-" he was silenced by a croissant. Noin glared at him lovingly. "Eat." Inside, Zechs was fuming, but he just chewed in silence until the elevator doors opened.
Click! Flash! "Mr. Peacecraft! Do you have any statement to make on the condition of your sister? Mr. Peacecraft! Is the White Fang still active? Mr. Peacecraft! Is it true that you and Preventer Une are having an affair?" Noin opened her mouth to give an indignant reply, only to be stopped by Milliardo. "My turn," he said smugly, after cramming a taste of her own medicine down her throat. She glared at him furiously, banging on the 'door close' button of the elevator.
"If I wasn't afraid that I would be accused of assassinating the other Peacecraft heir," Noin began.
"Now, now Noin. We're pacifists, remember?" Suddenly, the doors slid open to reveal a very high-strung Quatre R. Winner.
"Miss Noin, Mr. Milliardo, good morning! You'll have to excuse me. I'm very late." He pushed himself in to the elevator. "Going down?" he asked anxiously.
Noin gave Zechs a bewildered glance, as she began cautiously, "Quatre, I don't think you should go downstairs."
"What do you mean? Why not?" asked a puzzled Quatre. In the back of his mind, a singsong voice reminded him, Dorothy's going to kill you…literally.
"The media's camped out in the lobby, waiting for victims to come out of the elevator," Milliardo seethed.
"So how are we going to get out of this hotel?"
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"Of course, I'm just supposed to sit here and suffocate from claustrophobia. I mean how long does he think a person can stay confined to one room?" Relena muttered to herself. "Now I know how housewives feel. Stuck in the house 'til the hubby comes home." The more she thought about it, the more she realized how much like a housewife she really was. Except in her case she was married to her job instead of a bread-winning husband. She was a mother to billions rather than the average 3.3 children per household, always putting her needs second to those she was left to care for. She needed a vacation, badly. "Well, this is as good a time as any. I'm outta here."
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Dorothy clutched the armrest as another wave of turbulence shook the shuttle. You'd think that with the amount of money I paid for this ticket, they could provide a decent pilot!
"We're sorry for the inconvenience folks," the static filled voice of the pilot came on as if cued by her thoughts, "but the runway's packed with grounded flights due to the weather. We won't be landing for another 15 minutes."
"Didn't he just say that 20 minutes ago?" came a murmur from the other passengers. Hmph, no wonder some people are still unsatisfied with peace. Things like this could make anyone want to revolt. She settled back into her seat finding comfort in the idea of Quatre's baby blue eyes filled with worry, as he waited for her at the baggage claim.
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Quatre's eyes were filled with worry all right, though mostly with the idea of what Dorothy was going to do to him when he arrived there half an hour late. He tried to free his minds from such unpleasant thoughts as he watched Zechs try to hook the end of Quatre's umbrella to the fire escape of the building next door. In a feat of ingenuity that seemed such a trivial use of Quatre's problem solving skills, they had decided to tie some bed sheets together and then tie those to something that could catch hold of something on the adjacent structure.
Finally, the umbrella had found a niche. Zechs tested its strength by tugging vigorously on the bed sheets. He turned to Quatre.
"Now what?" As Quatre opened his mouth to reply, he was interrupted by a loud crack. Both heads turned to spot Noin, broken leg of a chair in hand and a wry smile on her face.
"Zip glide?" she suggested, matter-of-factly. Two more loud cracks were her reply.
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The first thing she needed to find was a café. Sure the food at the diner was delicious, but the only thing they had with coffee in it was, well, coffee. She missed her daily mochaccinos. She pulled her hat down tighter as a gust of wind blew the rain straight into her face. The familiar blue lettering of a Universal Café brought a smile to her face. For once, she appreciated the ubiquity of commercial chains. The feeling of walking into the warm, aromatic coffeehouse saturated her as she ordered her tall mochaccino with whipped cream, chocolate and caramel swizzle.
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He needed to get away from her. She was encouraging too many emotions to bubble up within him. Of course he could never give that as a reply to Duo Maxwell's question. Duo should have been used to silence as a response, but he always was stubborn.
"Yo buddy, you awake? I asked you why you're here so early." He paused, hoping for something. "Fine. Well, I couldn't sleep. That's why I'm here. Thought I'd watch some TV before the meeting started." He walked over to the screen and pressed the power button. "Aren't you even gonna ask why I couldn't sleep?" he prodded, as he adjusted the volume. Dismissing any hope of a reply he began, "See, the thing is—" Heero had gotten very used to filtering outside noise. Now if only he could drown out the noise inside his head.
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