You should see the big poster I've got on my wall now. It has almost all the episodes plotted out between now and February. I have no life.

Disclaimer: This year, for my birthday, I asked for omnipotent control over the five Gundam pilots contained herein, which I didn't think was too extravagant or outlandish. What did I get? A set of green plastic see-thru picnicware from Zellers. I hope my now-ex-boyfriend puts a little more thought into his next girlfriend's birthday gift. If you want to sue me for control of the picnicware, well, whatever floats yer boat, I guess... =P

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Episode Nine: Pride, Son of Ego

"Be careful what you wish for--you just might get it." ~Anonymous

July 12th, 1901

Ever since his arrival, Relena had been sweetly nagging her Uncle Treize to teach her how to be a better hostess, as it was often a woman's hostessing skills which propelled her into social stardom. More than a little amused at her impatience, he promised to find her an upwardly mobile guest of the proper wealth bracket to have over for tea, someone for Relena to practice on.

Blissfully unsuspecting of the harsh lesson she was about to learn about having designs above her station, she wore her new summer gown into the front parlour, a light yellow chiffon embroidered with daffodills, and sat down opposite the piano. Fiddling with her hair again, she wondered who the surprise guest could be that Treize had found. He only described the person as 'suitable', and gave no name or other description.

At a few minutes past three, Treize sauntered into the parlour, glancing at his pocketwatch. He looked down at his fidgeting niece and smiled. "Nervous?"

Relena switched from twiddling with her hair to smoothing out her dress. "More anxious, really. Secrets drive me crazy! I can't wait to find out who it is!"

For the moment, luck was on her side; mere seconds after she spoke, the doorbell rang. Treize ducked his head out into the hall just as Heero was on his way to the front door. He snapped his fingers and called out haughtily. "Boy?"

Heero stopped dead in his tracks. Treize's superior tone of voice sent homicidal images through his brain. I will not lose my temper. I will not lose my temper. I will not lose my temper. He counted to ten and turned around. "Yes, sir?"

"The guest at the door has been invited to tea. My apologies for not informing the staff sooner, and would you kindly pass word along to the chef?"

There went Heero's plans of evaluating Duo's skills as a spy; he'd already waited all day for his assistant to finish perfecting his recipe for raspberry profiteroles, and now the afternoon would be shot making cakes and sandwiches for Treize's guest. "Certainly, sir." This is turning out to be a productive day, Heero thought sarcastically. He continued on to the massive door in the east wall and pulled it open with a bitterly angry tug. Upon recognizing the guest, he froze once again.

"Why, look who it is! Has your mistress let you off your leash for the day, or shall we be seeing you at tea?" the guest chirped in a shrill, mocking voice.

Heero slumped a bit. I will NOT lose my temper. I will NOT lose.....dammit. "Right this way, m'lady," he answered as nicely as he was able, which at the moment, didn't amount to very much. His duty very much in mind, he led the guest down the hall to the front parlour, where she entered with a flourish, not bothering to wait for Heero to announce her properly.

Relena didn't even have time to get up from her chair and smile beams of sunshine at her test subject, and wouldn't have anyway, once she saw who it was. "...Lady Une?" She looked despairingly at her Uncle, the last person she ever imagined would betray her in such a vicious manner, but his eyes were already far away.

Once Lady Une and Count Khushrenada set eyes upon each other, they might as well have been all alone on a grassy hill in the middle of nowhere, oblivious to all except each other's presence. After what seemed like an eternity, Une gracefully offered a hand to the Count, and he bestowed a chaste, gentlemanly kiss upon the silken white glove. Their eyes met again, and a pocket of warmth separate from everyone else in the room surrounded them completely.

Une played a black lace fan with satin trim the same blue as her dress coquettishly over her face, smiling and perhaps even blushing. "So good to see you again, Lord Treize." The blonde girl by the piano rose and cleared her throat gently, sounding just a trifle petulant. "And Relena, darling, how mysteriously convenient are the tiny threads that bind us together!"

Treize looked back and forth between them with a surprised smile. "You two know each other?"

"Oh my, yes!" Une squealed. "We've run into one another on a number of occasions, her and I. Haven't we, my dear?"

On far too many occasions, Relena thought, resisting the urge to throttle the woman right where she stood. "Yes indeed, m'lady."

"Well! Isn't it a small world?" Treize said quickly, preferring to dismiss the subject and stare at the dark-haired woman some more. They took their places around the ornate coffee table and exchanged pleasantries; Relena said all the right things at all the right times, and tried very hard to say them with a smile, but it was hideously painful to do so. While they chatted, Dorothy sailed in wearing a forest green tea gown and greeted the assembly, and even more meaningless pleasantries were handed out. It was perhaps the most boring and obligatory part of hostessing, but Relena fought hard at playing her part to perfection, all the while worrying that Treize was evaluating her every move.

Heero escaped the den of insincerity and fled to the kitchen to warn Duo that he had less than an hour to prepare a meal for four. He spent the time helping out a little, but mostly moping around the kitchen bored out of his skull, and yet when the little silver bell rang indicating the upstairs crowd was ready to eat, he dreaded the thought of actually having something to do, if that was all he could have. He trudged back up to the parlour like a zombie, and Duo couldn't help but feel sorry for him.

When Heero arrived with the rolling silver cart carrying the tea set and pastries, there was already a conversation in full swing. Treize and Lady Une were looking rather intensely at each other, but pleasantly so; Dorothy was examining the pair of them, and Relena just looked uncomfortable.

"...and so I hired him on the spot," Une said, "and I must say the arrangement has worked out beautifully. You wouldn't find a better hall porter in the whole of London, that much is certain. I was lucky to find him," she proclaimed proudly.

Relena scowled. I'm sure of that. He did work for my father at one time, you thieving wench. She wished someone would turn the topic away from how many of her servants had been tempted by Lady Une's superior riches. Her eyes lit up when Heero arrived. He would save her from this dreary conversation, he had to!

"Although, I always liked that gentleman your father had, Relena, the stuffy one with the hawk's nose and saggy face," Une added, "what was his name again?"

Lady Peacecraft winced against the hurt-filled memories. "Do you mean Wagner, the butler?"

"Yes, that's the one!" Une exclaimed with glee. "All stiff and starchy and so much fun to annoy! I loved the way he said 'Would mawdam kindly step this way'," she said, imitating the man's deep, stately voice.

Treize nodded, rubbing his chin thoughtfuly. "Yes, Wagner...a good man. Very dedicated to his work, and a credit to his uniform."

Heero was listening the entire time, and Treize's statement made him falter slightly, and the cup of tea he was pouring nearly overflowed before he caught himself. Something about what the Count said didn't sit right with Heero, but he didn't have the time to analyze it just then.

"If I'm not prying, Miss Relena," Dorothy asked delicately, "why did you let Wagner go if he was that good?"

Relena knew that question was coming. "We didn't. He was very loyal to my father, and after his death, Wagner was simply too distraught to continue his work. He said he couldn't bear to live in this house anymore, so he left."

"How fortunate that you were able to find such a charming replacement," Une declared as Heero handed her a teacup and saucer. She gave the boy a teasingly sultry look designed to shake him, but it barely registered, and he turned right away to hand Dorothy a cup of tea as well.

Finally, a topic Relena had some interest in! Her eyes sparkled and she suddenly sprang to life. "Oh, but yes! Heero is by far one of the cleverest and most engaging of servants that's ever lived under this roof! He's just rich beyond anyone's dreams with hidden talents!"

While his back was turned and he arranged the sandwiches on silver trays, Heero cringed, praying that he hadn't slipped in saying something over the past six weeks that would damage him if she blabbed it in front of Treize. He half-turned towards her in mock humility. "Begging your Ladyship's pardon, but I'm sure there are much more interesting topics besides myself."

"Nonsense," Une interrupted, "all I've heard from my friends for the last week is 'Wimbledon this' and 'Wimbledon that'. I could do with something new and different." She leaned on the arm of the chair, propping up her head and smiling.

"Yes, Heero, don't be so modest!" Relena scolded. "He's very up on world events, he speaks several languages, and you should see the ingenious thing he's done to the bell pull system! He's really a treasure!" She smiled venomously at Lady Une. That's right, a treasure. I have him, and you don't.

"Really?" Treize drawled, looking the boy over anew. He hadn't really thought of him as a master dialectician, certainly not with his hair constantly falling in his eyes. The Count remembered thinking the boy's name was rather odd that day when they were introduced on the front walk, but until now, it had never been a point of interest. "Where are you from originally, Heero?"

Direct questions like that were a royal pain. He couldn't lie, because even though there were no official records of his existence anywhere in England, Treize had enough connections that he could probably find out his nationality easily. Not that it probably mattered. "Japan," Heero said helplessly.

"Oh, how exciting! Say something in Japanese!" Une begged.

The whites of his eyes grew exponentially, then he frowned stormclouds. Oh God, here it comes. The inevitable linguistic sideshow starring Heero the Magnificent. Give me strength... "I would hardly know where to begin, m'lady," he answered, trying to hide his scorn for the meddling busybody.

Une was undaunted, determined to have her entertainment. "Say anything!" The brunette pulled on a venomous smile of her own, the one she wore when she was about to shame somebody, and aimed it directly at Relena. "Say 'She's a pretty girl'."

Heero both blessed and regretted the fact that he left his gun upstairs. Knowing full well what Lady Une was trying to do, he forced himself to swallow his pride and choke out the works, if only to humour the group before him. All their eyes were focused on him; better to be foolish now and disregarded later than be labelled antisocial and attract suspicion. "Kanjowa kawaii shoujo da," he managed.

Treize, Une, and Dorothy looked suitably impressed; Relena looked smug, pleased as punch to be showing off her newest toy to the woman she despised most. The underlying meaning of Une's choice of words had escaped her. "That's not all he can do, I distinctly heard him speak to my gardener in Arabic on the day he arrived, and he talks with the stable lad in Spanish, too!"

That did it. To Heero's ultimate dismay, the ladies began throwing random pointless phrases at him, demanding that he provide their equivalent in whatever language was desired of him. The trio giggled and cheered as they played with him, eating and drinking and enjoying themselves while the butler suffered one long stream of horrid indignities. And through it all, Treize simply watched.

Heero saw him at all times, out of the corner of his eye, watching, observing, thinking. The Count was absorbing every detail of the wretched display and cataloguing it away for future use, Heero could tell. As the party game continued, Treize's calculating expression slowly grew into a tiny smirk, and it was then that Heero realized his mission could be in jeopardy.

**********

Partway through tea, Lady Une excused herself to the powder room to fix her face, and Dorothy opted to follow. Otto directed them to a prim little room with two identical patterned chairs facing two identical multi-drawer vanities with oak-framed mirrors. It was designed perfectly for the lady of the house and her maid to touch up their cosmetic applications before heading back, primped, fluffed, and ready to face the world again.

They each claimed a seat and began pulling compacts and other articles from their dainty handbags. Une set to work straight away patting down her nose and cheeks with a pale powder puff. "Quite a man, isn't he?"

Dorothy lightly attacked her eyelashes with a spiky black wand. "Indeed. Although, I probably haven't the in-depth personal knowledge you seem to have, otherwise my opinions of him would use much more flowery language."

Une raised an eyebrow, then smoothed it out with a tiny brush. "You're not his consort, then?"

"Oh, no, we're merely...business associates." Dorothy switched to a sterling silver pot of rouge and began tapping the powder on her cheeks. "But he seems to think very fondly of you..."

"Did you know Count Khushrenada has proposed marriage to me on three separate occasions?" Une laughed as she pulled an elegant brush through her hair. "Of course I refused him each time, but affectionately so, and I've always secretly harboured it as a source of personal pride that I caught and held the eye of one of the most powerful men in Europe."

Dorothy took out her own exquisite hairbrush but paused with it in her hand, frowning at her reflection in the mirror. "Why do you say 'of course'? Weren't you the least bit tempted by his offer?"

With a faint sigh of regret, Une turned to face her new acquaintance. "Being tempted was hardly the issue. It has simply been my lifelong policy not to be the weaker half of any partnership, romantic or otherwise. I have enormous wealth and influence by London standards, and there are hordes of common little plebs who would give their eye teeth to be in my position, but..." Her eyes showed a mix of envy and self-reproach as she weighed her options for what seemed like the millionth time. "My power can't compare to that of Lord Treize. I could never hope to approach him as an equal, or better, and since I refuse to lower myself below the status of any partner, least of all a man, well...how could I allow myself to marry him?"

Despite the self-important substance of her ego showing itself so plainly, there was a genuine sadness in the way she spoke, as of one witnessing an inner battle between principles and true love. Dorothy brushed through her light blonde tresses, thinking rapidly. "If you did have money and power equal or greater to his, would you marry him?"

Une looked boldly at her reflection. "I would."

The fierce eyes of the Baroness Catalonia were alive with a devious fire, and she smiled at her own ingenuity. I needn't worry about my influence not extending past Italy. She has more than enough influence for both of us...and for my plan, as well. She turned to look Lady Une straight in the eye. "Suppose...just suppose, that there was an easy way for you to acquire a fortune ten times what you have now, and all you had to do was look after a meek little gardener while his entire family self-destructs?" She gave the older woman a sinister, challenging smile. "What would you say to that?"

Lady Une straightened in her chair and looked the youngster over, deciding after only a moment that they were most certainly on the same wavelength when it came to money and how to get it. "I'd say, 'tell me more'."

**********

Nearly an hour later, the moment her Ladyship and the others had all emptied their cups of tea and their plates of pastries, Heero whisked the dishes away on the trolley, grateful for an excuse to escape Relena's chamber of horrors. He raced from the parlour to the kitchenette just off the dining room and whipped out his pen and notebook. His mental storage buffer was approaching the fill line, and he had only minutes to make a written record of the conversation he had just witnessed before it vanished from his memory. Pen in hand, he leaned his back against the wall and began writing furiously.

"Oi, Heero! Whatcha writin'?" came a voice from nearby.

With an inaudible groan, Heero looked up only to verify the identity of the trespasser. He didn't have time for this. "Go away."

Duo leaned against the doorframe with a contemptuous snort. "But you said today was for..." He struggled for just the right words to convey his meaning without giving anything away to any possible eavesdroppers. "...assistant lessons."

"Not now, Duo, I'm working." He could feel delicate trickles of disappointment fluttering across the room, and sighed slightly. "I'm sorry, but something came up. I couldn't help that." Every fifteen seconds, Heero filled a page of his notebook and flipped over to a fresh one, creating a smooth rhythm of pen scratches and paper crinkles that punctuated his statements.

More than a little annoyed, Duo walked right up to him and considered snatching the notebook out of his hands. "Do you want a second-rate assistant who doesn't know what he's doing? 'Cause that's what you're gonna have if you don't let me get some practice in!"

"Practice some stealth and be quiet," Heero said, calmly but sternly.

Duo turned around dejectedly and slumped into a chair at the flimsy little table that served as the only dining surface. He'd hoped that being Heero's assistant, in whatever secret work he was doing, would allow him to spend more time with the boy, but instead of getting closer, Duo found himself being constantly pushed away. It was exceptionally frustrating the way Heero could sometimes seem vaguely warm and open, enough that they might actually become friends. And then he smacks me in the head or yanks my braid and it's business as usual. He's a miserable excuse for a human being...at least, the part he lets people see.

Heero made every effort under the sun to keep Duo at a professional distance, but the very force of his life energy was so magnetic to the lonely American that he felt compelled to battle every one of Heero's obstacles for a chance to hover near him. Duo couldn't explain it, even to himself; it defied logic on one level, and seemed to make perfect sense to him on another. He decided that they shared the same inner fire that only the two of them could possibly understand; one of them had accepted that fire long ago and learned to find life in it's heat, while the other one, the one with the notebook and the stiff white collar, was in denial over it. Who better than me to help him figure it out? It might be fun, too....

Uncounted minutes passes, and Duo never realized he was staring until the blue-eyed object of his fixation started staring back. Heero gave him an aggravated sigh and put down his work. "You want something to do?"

Duo perked up, grinned, and saluted brightly. "Yes, sir!"

Heero nodded. "Measure all the rooms." He lifted the notebook once again and continued writing.

Duo looked from side to side, then back at Heero with a look that shouted 'what?' Heero sighed again and mimed stretching a measuring tape across the length and breadth of the kitchenette. Duo folded his arms. "You want me to measure all sixty-two rooms?"

"And bring the measurements to me, each clearly labelled with the room's name, and floor of the house," Heero dictated mechanically. He was back to looking intensely down at his notebook, watching the words nimbly dodge the distractions to land neatly on the page. "And once you've finished that, you can go look for the blueprints to the house. Try up in the attic."

Duo's eyes went wide and a little lopsided. He shook his head and banged a hand against one ear, trying to jar loose the offending bit of illogic. Finally, he slapped his knees and stood, looking straight up and letting out a slow, deep breath through his clenched teeth like a leaky balloon. "Let me get this straight," he said, taking prolonged steps towards his teacher. "You want me to run all over the house and measure all the rooms, then go get the blueprints which undoubtedly have all the measurements on them already? In that order!?" The boys were now standing only a few inches apart.

Heero looked up and raised an eyebrow. "Do you have a problem with your instructions?" When Duo failed to answer, the look turned to a glare.

Only mildly humbled, Duo backed off a bit, but he was still irritated. "No, no problem at all! Let's give the idiot Yankee some mindless busywork to keep him out of the way! Sure! Fine! Go measure all the rooms? You got it!" He swung around and stomped off angrily to find a measuring tape. "That's all I'm good for around here, isn't it, I cook and I clean and what thanks do I get..."

Heero allowed himself a miniscule grin as the chef's irate voice disappeared down the hall. Just as his hand began to cramp up from writing so much, he finished his transcript of the conversation between the aristocrats upstairs. Flipping through the white and blue leaves, he searched for that one exchange that was stabbling prickly hot needles into the back of his brain...and then he found it.

The butler looked over his notes, squinting. Une and Relena were discussing their servants of past years when they mentioned Wagner, my predecessor. Treize said he was a good man and that he admired the fine effort he put into his work...but Treize has never visited Bridlewood before, at least that's what I've been led to believe. How then could he have known--

His train of thought was derailed by a hand jabbing into his side, a hand holding one end of a measuring tape. He glared sharply at the owner, who was working his way down one wall of the kitchenette with the yard-long cloth tape stretched as far as it would go. It only just happened to be the same wall against which the butler was comfortably leaning. The chef turned his elven nose up at the butler and lowered his eyelids.

"Excuse me, my good man, but I do believe you're in my way."

"Hn." Heero moved away from the wall and let Duo pass, trying to get his thoughts back into order. He must have met Wagner at some point....perhaps before he was employed at Bridlewood. Treize doesn't strike me as the sort of man who would offer such high praise based strictly on hearsay, so they must have known each other. I should pay Mr. Wagner a visit, find out if he's ever been abroad--

Heero felt something jab him in the back and jumped forward with a start. As if intentionally trying to piss him off, Duo was working on the second measurement by coming straight up through the center of the room and right into Heero, instead of measuring along the wall. He held the stretched-out tape perpendicular from the wall to where Heero had just been standing.

"You're in the way again," Duo sang.

Heero reached over quickly and gave the boy's braid a sharp tug, making him yelp and drop the tape. "Baka! Start in a different room!" He threw himself into a chair and stared down at his notes, trying to scrape together a bit of concentration.

Duo smiled at the back of Heero's head while he smoothed out his rumpled hair. Even when he was angry, the dark-haired boy gave off a captivating energy that Duo found...interesting. He was going to befriend the hot-headed youth if it destroyed the pair of them, and if he was very lucky indeed, he could show him what they were both truly made of at the same time. He would make it his life's mission.

All because of that fabulous energy, Duo thought. Can't you feel what's in your own veins? You're not suited for this kind of work if this is the state it leaves you in. I mean, just look at you...snarling...languishing...unfulfilled. You need to get your blood pumping, not sit there staring at your dumb notebook.

With a mischievous gleam in his amethyst eyes, Duo crept up behind Heero and leaned over him, with one hand on either side of him on the table, and his lips poised just behind his ear. He whispered huskily through the messy, earth-brown strands of hair tickling at the tip of his nose. "Don't you find life in this house a bit...bland?"

Heero looked up from his work with a fierce expression, but while the sensible part of his brain was telling him to slap Duo until he was no longer within reach, he couldn't seem to make his arm move to the task. Duo spoke the truth, but how did he know?

"I know this isn't what you're really like," Duo purred, "taking orders from little girls, spying on rich folk and writing down your little notes there, serving tea and scouring the newspapers for God-knows-what..." Keeping his hands firmly on the table, he switched to Heero's other ear, breathing into it and watching the boy flinch before continuing his lecture. "You don't need to carry a gun just to do that, do you? I think you were hoping for something a little more exciting out of life, weren't you? Something a little more...dangerous..."

Cursing himself immediately, Heero shivered. It was true. It was all true. He thought once he was released into the world, out of the expert 'care' of Lord Jeffrhyss, that life would get better somehow, but he was still just taking orders and doing the grunt work for his master. A drudge. A puppet. A slave.

Alarm bells went off in Heero's mind as he realized Duo was leaning over far enough to read the contents of his notebook; flustered, he slapped it closed. Duo turned around and bent to pick up the measuring tape, then reached over Heero's shoulder and dropped it in a heap over his hands.

"You see...I'd say neither one of us is suited to these menial tasks. We're more the swashbuckling adventurer type, but we're both stuck in this place because of our jobs, because of our weak human need for food and shelter, right? It doesn't mean we have to play the obedient chef and the humble butler all the time, you know. There are...temporary alternatives."

Heero squinted in confusion, his back still turned to the raving looney behind him. What does he mean, 'temporary alternatives'? And what's made him so bold all of a sudden? Has he been drinking?

"I've been watching you, Heero. You're like a caged tiger being forced to live off lettuce and soggy bread. This tame, soft soap, double-pasteurized life isn't what you need," Duo hissed into his captive's startled ear. "You need meat."

Heero shut his eyes tightly. Oh God, he's right, he right! I hate these meaningless chores, I hate these divisions of society I'm forced to live under, I hate it all! After what I've been trained to accomplish, I'm being wasted in this house! His azure eyes snapped open as the rational part of his brain struggled against the treachery of his own thoughts. To suggest that his place was not wherever Jeffrhyss chose to put him was to suggest that Jeffrhyss was wrong. Jeffrhyss could never be wrong. It was a mortal sin to even think it.

Letting his basic programming reassert control, Heero took a calming breath and glared straight ahead. "Get back to your work."

Duo smiled. "Whatever you say, boss," he said smoothly. He reached down and plucked the measuring tape up off the table, deliberately brushing his own hand against Heero's as he did so. Using every bit of his thief's skill of silence, he slipped out of the room for destinations unknown.

When Heero finally looked behind him to see that Duo was indeed gone, he let out a breath he didn't even realize he'd been holding. Running one of his still tingling hands through his hair, he detected a thin layer of moisture on his forehead, an unexpected phenomenon. He was sweating. Forgetting his once vitally-important notebook, he reached into his inside jacket pocket for a slip of paper containing the calming five-phrase mantra given to him by his master. He needed it after what had just transpired.

This Duo was not the frightened little mouse who ran from the sight of Heero's revolver. No, something had changed in the boy; either that, or something was resurfacing that had always been there.

A taste for danger.


~~~~~~~~~~

Next, in Episode Ten: Heero takes time out from his mission to investigate the mysterious Mr. Wagner with Duo in tow, while Une and Dorothy approach Quatre with an offer he can't refuse.

Nya-ha-ha! What's Duo got in mind? Something exciting and dangerous, no doubt... =^_~= (No, not THAT, you hentai's! Patience!) Am I taking terrible liberties with Une's personality? Well, if I am, tough luck for her, because we need her character just the way it is. =P~ Are you liking this so far? I'm having LOADS of fun!! In fact I'm having so much fun I seem to be ignoring my other half-finished fics...um, heh. I'll make time, I promise. =^-^= So, shall we meet back here on July 18th? OK! Arigato!