Well, I had to finish typing this up at a friend's house because some low-down no-good dirty rotten little brother (I'm not naming names,) spilled Coca-Cola all over my keyboard, didn't tell me, and let me go on typing as if nothing was wrong. Hence, it's a day late. =( Sorry! I promise to get myself caught up a little further in advance from now on...I do admit I have a tendency to leave shtuff to the last minute...*blushie*

Disclaimer: It seems that children everywhere are conning their parents into thinking that a laptop and a cell phone are now required elements of back-to-school shopping. I tried to convince my mother that a matching set of five Gundam pilots were necessary items for back-to-FFN-shopping, but she didn't fall for it. =¬_¬= Darnit, ma...

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Episode Nineteen: Enter the Dragon

"The lion and the calf shall lie down together, but the calf won't get much sleep." ~Woody Allen

September 22nd, 1901

At an open-air French-style café in one of the classier districts of London, Wufei sat scowling at a newspaper as if willing it to spontaneously combust. He was looking over an article written by an American journalist that detailed as many personal facts as were available about the assassin who took the life of William McKinley. The name 'Heero Yuy' appeared nowhere. Wufei was most disappointed.

Worse still were the new orders he had received only two days earlier, to watch his rival rather than take his place. What am I now? A glorified babysitter for a weakling who couldn't fire one bullet for the cause? The Chinese boy snarled and tossed the newspaper aside.

He contemplated his tea for awhile, then picked the paper back up, flipping to the classified ads and reading over one ad in particular. He'd already looked at it eight times that morning, but the part of his brain that didn't quite believe it was there and kept insisting on proof just wouldn't shut up. Wufei sighed at the ad, slightly depressed at how low he had sunk.

Still, at least I do what I'm told, unlike other people I could mention, he thought. There is no honour in disobedience.

Just then, he glanced across the street, and there walked the very object of his contempt--the failed assassin on his way back from America. He didn't see Wufei staring at him since he was too busy strolling and chatting with the person second highest on Wufei's list of people to be eliminated, the Maxwell boy. Both he and Yuy were carrying a suitcase. Now, that's odd... He opened the newspaper wide and hid behind it, watching them.

Several yards away, barely squinting in the hazy mid-morning sun, Heero and Duo continued their conversation as they walked down the busy street. The ship had docked at 7:30 that morning, and although they had more than enough money for a sizable breakfast and a cab ride home, Duo wanted to get back to his roots by walking at least part of the way back to Bridlewood, so they did.

"It would probably be best if we arrived separately," Heero pointed out.

"Okay, tell you what...you take your suitcase back," Duo said, handing back the smaller of the two cases, "sit down, have a coffee, watch the world go by for awhile. I'll take a cab and jump out about a block from home, go in through the back, and see what excuses Hilde cooked up for me while I was gone. Give me about a half-hour head start."

Heero nodded and gave the boy ample cab fare from the change in his pockets. They parted ways and as Duo headed off in one direction, Heero picked up his cases and started walking across the street. Wufei stiffened slightly behind the newspaper, mind reeling with a hundred witty barbs he could use to defend himself in a verbal skirmish. As he waited and watched from behind the edge of the light gray leaves of newsprint, Heero stopped on the sidewalk just a few feet from Wufei's table. He took out his pocketwatch, checked the time, paused with his head only half-turned to look over his shoulder, then picked up his cases and walked away in the opposite direction.

Wufei blinked, then put the paper down and relaxed a bit as his nemesis disappeared into the crowd. Pity...I would have enjoyed some sparring practice before the big match.

**********

Charged with extra energy from having a wonderful brainstorm just before lunch, Relena went skipping gleefully down the hall from the conservatory, looking for her uncle. In her pale hands, which were trembling with excitement, was the morning newspaper. She finally caught up with the Count in the second-floor study and bounced over to his chair by the window like a rabbit on a sugar rush.

"Uncle Treize!" she squealed. "Wait till you see the wonderful thing I found in the newspaper today!"

Treize didn't seem to mind having his quiet morning disrupted, and if he did mind, he didn't let it show. "Oh really? What is it, my dear?"

"Well," Relena began, squaring her shoulders and shaking back her long blonde tresses, "you know how I've been trying to improve myself, socially, right? When we had the Dorchesters over for dinner, Mrs. Dorchester was simply crowing about having her sitting room redecorated in 'Art Nouveau', so I thought it'd be lovely to take some of those older rooms in the house that we hardly ever use and have them decorated!"

Treize looked fatigued and bewildered at the rapid stream of feminine ideology flying in his face, but Relena hardly noticed as she whipped open the paper and read to him from the classifieds. "Listen to this: 'Exclusive interiors! Upmarket decorating firm available for your high-class interior design needs. Specializing in Art Nouveau, Rococco, and Oriental themes. Be the envy of your neighbours when you entertain surrounded by our quality home makeovers.' Doesn't it sound simply perfect?" Whoever had written the ad knew precisely which of Relena's buttons to push to get results.

The excited girl barely paused for breath. "I know it's an extra expense, but you've done such a marvelous job managing father's investments, I'm sure we can afford it! Think of the payoff when we start attracting the most exclusive guests in London to our dinner parties!" She turned her head to gaze quietly and ecstatically into space, eyebrows twitching to betray her state of total euphoria. "We'll be important..."

"Yes...well..." Treize muttered, not particularly wanting to get caught up in such trivial details, especially today. "I don't see any reason why you can't have a few rooms redone, but the decorators will be entirely your responsibility. I have some very important business to attend to, so keep them well out of my way."

"Oh, thank you, Uncle!" She flung her arms around his neck and gave him a giant hug, then let go and sprang for the door, pages of the newspaper fluttering in the breeze she created.

"I trust you can make the arrangements yourself," the Count said, turning disinterestedly back to his pipe, "decide on a date and time to have them in..."

Relena stopped at the door and half-turned towards him. "Oh, it's alright, I've already called them. They're sending someone 'round this afternoon. Bye!" She scampered away, victorious.

Treize smirked and shook his head. Fortunately for Relena, he remembered being an impulsive teenager once himself.

On her way back to the conservatory, Relena was stopped by a very humble Hilde, who curtsied and lowered her eyes as she spoke. "Begging your Ladyship's pardon, but Duo's just arrived." 'Just' was a bit of an exaggeration; he'd actually spent the previous ten minutes being debriefed by herself and Trowa on recent events.

"Ah, good," her Ladyship said authoritatively. She set the newspaper down on the hall table next to the telephone and marched quickly towards the back stairs, her good mood gone. She stamped down to the basement at a blinding pace, fists balled and brow knit, ready to have it out with her wayward chef. The girls ran into the kitchen and Relena spotted her quarry right away, standing in the center of the room and looking down at the floor in repentance.

"Duo," she said sharply, folding her arms, "you appear to be in fine health now. Have anything to say to me?" Duo opened his mouth to speak but was quickly cut off. "I expect something in the way of respect and consideration from my employees, and am not used to one of my most essential workers swanning off to visit relatives without asking me first!"

Duo tired hard to look remorseful. "I know, m'lady, and I'm awfully sorry, but I had to go!" He took a worn photograph of a fair-haired woman out of his jacket pocket and showed it to Relena. "I mean...poor, poor Auntie Helen, all alone in a miserable one-room flat with no heat, a broken cooker, and about tuppence ha'penny left of her dearly departed husband's military pension, hacking and coughing as she chops up her last few sticks of furniture to burn in the soot-filled fireplace just to get enough hot water for the hot water bottle to put on her bad back, and what with having the electricity cut off last month, and taking in all the abandoned puppies and kittens off the street and giving them the last of her food, and the thunderstorm that flooded the--"

"Alright! Alright!" Relena shouted, bringing up her hands to shield her eyes from the unfortunate woman's portrait. "That's more than enough information, thank you."

"Yeah, well," Duo added, "I'd hope this household would show a little gratitude towards this woman. After all, she's the one who taught me everything she knew about cooking!" He saw how totally disarmed Relena was after all that, and felt quite proud of himself. Everything he said about Helen was true, it just didn't all happen at once or in the last two weeks, so techinically, he hadn't exactly lied.

Relena was humbled, but unflustered. "I am very grateful that I have a competent chef working for me, however you are not indispensable, and if there are any further acts of disrespect such as this, you may find yourself back in Peckham baking pies," she said forcefully. "Do we have an understanding, Mr. Maxwell?"

"Absolutely, m'lady," Duo answered with a grin. Ha! Sucked in! "I guess I'd better get back to work then, huh?"

"Yes, please," Relena said, her exasperation with the boy beginning to show. She vanished back up the stairs, and both Duo and Hilde sighed with relief.

Duo walked up quickly to the girl, putting the photograph away in his pocket. "Right, where is he?"

"In there," Hilde said, indicating the direction of the bedroom shared by the gardener and the stable boy, "but don't be too long, he's very weak."

Nodding, the chef went swiftly out the wooden door to the other half of the basement. Far above, he heard the faint clanging of the front doorbell chiming out 'Rule Britannia'. That must be Heero coming back, he thought, and not a moment too soon. Steeling himself for what might be in the other room, he pushed Heero out of his mind and went ahead to check on the bedridden gardener.

**********

With a strange sense of déjà vu, Heero stood on the front step of Bridlewood Manor with two suitcases and scowled at the ostentatious doorbell once again. Still, though he'd barely spent three months under its roof, the sprawling mansion felt faintly like home to him now, and on some level, he was glad to be back.

The door opened. "Oh, it's you. Back from yer 'olidays, eh? Well-rested, are we? Alright for some..."

No matter how deep he searched, Heero could find no level on which he was glad to see Elsie. He glared at the back of the woman's head as she walked away from the door in an unpleasant huff. As he carried his cases inside, he immediately heard the expected set of soft footfalls approaching, and saw their owner soon after.

"Heero, you're home!" Relena chirped as she half-ran, half-skipped into the front hall. "I got your postcard! Isn't it awful, what happened to the President? You must have been there the very same day it happened, you poor thing..." Involuntarily, perhaps, she reached forward and brushed a few earth-brown locks of hair away from the boy's face in a nurturing fashion.

Heero blinked at the strange action, then quickly changed the subject. "I brought you something," he said, setting his suitcases down and taking an object out of his coat pocket. Remembering Relena's instruction to bring her back a present, he had made time while in New York to shop for a trinket to keep her happy, although choosing what to buy had been a definite struggle. He pulled a black velvet box from his pocket and handed it to her silently.

Eyes bright with cheery anticipation, Relena took the box, opened it, and gasped at what was inside. Perched delicately on the little cushion of white satin was a golden charm in the shape of a swan, with a clear, sparkling stone for an eye and a fine gold chain, a kind of homage to the costume she wore on the night of the fancy dress ball. The tag bore the name of a high-class jeweller's on 5th Avenue.

"Oh, Heero," she breathed, "it's beautiful...I love it! Thank you!" She threw her arms around him and kissed his cheek, clutching the velvet box tightly.

That was unexpected. Heero stood there like a mortified statue with his employer draped all over him. He looked up, and at the other end of the great hall, standing just visbly in the doorway leading to the back of the house, was Duo. He was buttoning up his white chef's uniform and throwing a very dark look at the scene before him.

Relena let go of her butler and stepped back, smiling; Duo ducked out of sight to await her departure. "Well then," the girl cooed, patting Heero's arm, "I suppose you'd like to get settled back into your quarters before serving tea, so I'll let you get to it." She gave him another sweet smile and headed down the south corridor, tossing a twiddly little wave of her peaches and cream fingers over her shoulder as she did so.

Heero knew that he had to stay in Relena's good graces in order to keep a close eye on Treize, but this worried him. It especially worried him that Duo had seen the kiss, and hadn't looked pleased, and he wondered if the golden charm had been too extravagant a gift. As soon as Relena was gone, the chef popped out of his hiding place and marched towards Heero, who saw the boy's expression and expected some king of acidic and transparently sarcastic commentary on how little he cared who kissed his friends and who didn't. His suspicion didn't prepare him adequately for what Duo's words of wisdom actually were.

"Quat's been poisoned."

**********

Heero spent a long time by Quatre's bedside while Duo took his suitcases back up to their room. While there was really nothing he could have done to prevent the attack, he still felt somewhat responsible just for having been away. Trowa waited with him until Quatre awoke from his much-needed sleep, then left the pair to talk for awhile; it was some time before the usual pleasantries took a back seat to more serious conversation.

"Dr. Poole's been taking good care of me," Quatre whispered weakly. "Hilde and Trowa have been wonderful too." He tugged a little at the covers but could barely budge them; though Trowa reported that the boy was out of immediate danger, the poison had already ravaged his system, leaving him feeble and exhausted.

Despite this, Heero had let him do most of the talking up to this point. He didn't see what good mere words could do Quatre now. "I regret not being here to help," he said finally.

Quatre smiled. He knew Heero blamed himself quite a bit more than that, but he didn't give away any clues that he could sense it. "It's alright. You're back...and Duo's back...everything's going to be fine now." He nestled his head back into the pillow and began to drift closer towards sleep. Heero did nothing to stop him.

The butler rose and went back to the kitchen where the others were waiting, seated around the heavy wooden worktable and looking sullen. When the big picture was taken into account, each of the four had a hand in letting the poison slip into Quatre's hands, and yet each of them was partly responsible for saving his life. Duo, Trowa and Hilde all looked up at Heero with guilty but grateful eyes.

Heero looked at each of them in turn; they seemed to be waiting for him to make some sense of it, to pull it all together and give them their confidence back. They wanted to protect their friend properly from now on; they were capable, but disorganized. They needed a leader.

Heero stood ramrod straight. "This is never going to happen again."

"But what can we do?" Trowa begged of him. "His family obviously knows where he is now!"

"He won't leave Bridlewood," Hilde added, "because he can't stand the thought of disappointing Miss Relena!"

Duo leaned back and folded his arms. "But we can't watch the guy 24/7! Trowa has to sleep sometime, and the rest of us all live on a different floor!"

Heero put both hands on the table and leaned forward. "We will find a way to make this work. Right now, he always has someone with him because he's still sick, but as soon as he's well again, the five of us are going to Arthur's cottage and hold a serious strategy session. We are not going to let his sisters get the better of us."

The others seemed satisfied with this, and indeed they would have to be, for no sooner had the butler finished speaking than the doorbell rang, and they all realized that it was business as usual upstairs. Heero would be at the household's beck-and-call for the near future, so the strategy would have to wait.

The three seated servants nodded agreement at each other as Heero left, mulling over Quatre's situation as he walked up the stairs. He hadn't even had time to change clothes yet, so whoever it was would simply have to take him as is. As if I needed more complications, he thought. I should have known something unpleasant would hit me as soon as I walked in the door, but at least I'll have some time to think this afternoon.

He pulled open the door. There was a dark-haired visitor facing the street, wearing a sumptuous suit of red satin, embroidered in several places with lavish ornamentation. Upon hearing the door open, he turned around, already wearing a smug grin. "Good afternoon, sir. I'm here to see Lady Peacecraft, if you please."

Heero narrowed his eyes and let out a low growl. "Chang."

"You don't sound as if you had a nice holiday at all," Wufei said cynically.

Just as Heero was about to utter one of his well-rehearsed death threats, Relena's voice sailed in from the front parlour. "Heeeee~ro! Is that the decorators calling?"

Heero snapped his head around to glare in a horrified, shell-shocked way at the intruder. "Decorators!?" he whispered viciously.

Wufei shrugged. "If you've got it, flaunt it."

The stunned butler stood paralyzed as Wufei shoved past him into the foyer, looking around the room with broad, sweeping glances. Relena emerged from the parlour and was frozen to her spot, immediately impressed by the stylish young ponytailed gentleman the decorating firm had sent her. "Good afternoon," she ventured, smiling, "can I help you?"

Wufei seemed not to hear her, instead striding around the foyer, studying the architecture. "...marvelous example of the transition between Romanticism and Neo Renaissance...very free and natural use of space...and yet I see strong overtones of Garnier, almost making it a battle between order and beauty...simply marvellous..."

Heero rolled his eyes.

As the satin-clad boy strolled nearer to his hostess, he remembered his manners and extended both hands to her warmly. "Lady Peacecraft?"

Relena smiled, blushed, and met his hands with hers. "Yes, indeed! Forgive me if I've pulled you away from anything important today, but I'm so glad you could make it on such short notice!"

"Not at all, m'lady," he said gallantly. "My name, for your interest and curiosity, is Chang Wufei, and I have come to transform your bleak old-world rooms into exquisite, charming, enviable treasures...much like yourself." He bent down and kissed one of her hands, and she giggled and squeaked with delight.

Heero folded his arms and leaned stiffly against the door.

"If your Ladyship would like to get started right away, we can have a look at these living spaces in such desperate need of emergency surgery." Wufei offered Relena his arm and she took it immediately, still blushing.

They started walking casually towards the drab north wing of the house; Relena paused and looked over her shoulder at the butler. "Heero, don't slouch. Go fetch tea and bring it to the north wing." Wufei smirked at Heero as she spoke, and the pair resumed their tour of the manor, already chatting up a storm.

Heero glared. He was beginning to strongly wish that he and Duo had stayed in America and quit their jobs by post.

Ignoring his sudden pounding headache, he went down to the kitchen, told Duo who was upstairs and why, told him to stay calm and not do anything rash, and collected tea and sandwiches for two. He walked up to the north wing like a zombie, already fairly sure why Wufei had weaselled his way into the house, but at the same time wanting to hear it from his own lips. He found them in a little-used drawing room with fairly ordinary carpeting, wallpaper, and decorations.

"Lilies and vines are the look this year," the Chinese boy was saying. "Of course a much bolder colour scheme is needed, and most of these things...and the furniture...well, it all has to go."

"Oh, I don't mind that, we can move it all to other rooms!" Relena turned long enough to indicate nonverbally that Heero should set the tea things down and pour two cups at once. "How long do you think it will take?"

"It rather depends," Wufei said, watching Heero carefully to make sure nothing lethal found its way into his teacup as he poured. "It would be helpful to establish a theme first, and I quite often prefer to create a space centered around a single piece of art. Tell me...do you have any 'Gauguin's?"

Relena looked aside as she ran through her mental catalog of the manor's many paintings and sculptures. "No, I'm afraid not."

"Any 'Toulouse-Lautrec's?"

"...uh-uh," the girl denied.

Wufei looked desperate. "A 'Seurat'?"

Relena bit her lip and shook her head guiltily. There had probably not been a single new piece of art added to Bridlewood's collection in forty years.

"Well, that settles it," Wufei declared, accepting his cup of tea from Heero with a wink. "We'll have to go shopping."

Relena received her tea deep in thought; suddenly, her eyes brightened as she got her second terrific idea of the day. "Why don't I have Heero take you up to the attic?" Heero froze. "There's scads of storage up there, and who knows, you might find something to your liking!"

Wufei turned to Heero with a wide smile. "Yes, let's!"

"Go on, Heero, show him the storage areas. You must have noticed them before, they're right by your room!"

If Heero's eyes were shotguns, his glare would have sheared Relena's head off. Naturally, she didn't notice as she turned to take one last look at the drawing room before it was transformed. Wufei set down the half-empty teacup and sauntered over to where Heero was standing, smiling that devious smile again. "Shall we go?"

"...hn. Right this way, sir."

The pair exited and spoke not a word to each other until they were all the way to the attic. At the top of the stairs, Heero judged that they were too far away to be heard by anyone if it came to a shouting match, or if he had to kill Wufei with his own bare hands, and was the first to speak. "Why are you here?"

"Isn't it obvious?" Wufei said nonchalantly. "I've been told to watch you, to see that you behave in a manner befitting an agent, and to make sure you don't fail his Lordship any more than you already have. Quite ironic, really, since I've wanted you to fail for months. Where's this storage room of yours?"

Still glaring, Heero walked briskly to a nearby storage area, carefully avoiding the one that held his secret wall safe. He could bet that it was secure against anyone in the house who might stumble across it, but he didn't know about another agent who had been trained at least as well as he had. "Don't evade the question. Tell me why you're really here," he demanded, lighting a lantern and setting it on a stack of metal boxes.

"You think I'm going to cause some little 'accident' that will effectively end your career so I can replace you on the spot? What do you take me for, Yuy?" the other boy said, already perusing the contents of the storage room. "I've been ordered to watch you, and watch you I will. Unlike yourself, I carry out my orders promptly, efficiently, and without question. The only reason you're standing this close to me right now and still breathing is that Lord Jeffrhyss ordered me not to harm you." He looked over his shoulder at Heero. ".....deliberately..."

Heero raised an eyebrow. I'd like to see you try. He leaned against the wall and watched his rival poke through crates of old, dusty paintings. "How much does he know about what happened in America?"

"Worried?" Wufei quipped with a smile. "I don't blame you. You should be worried. You failed the mission, got rid of a very valuable weapon, and somehow 'lost' your fee. Your overall scorecard isn't looking too sunny right now." He picked up a statuette of a soldier on a horse, studied it for a moment, then put it back down. "You should be worried about what his Lordship has planned for you in the way of punishment...and I can safely promise you that it will be far from pleasant."

"I already know how he operates," Heero growled, "so there's no point in trying to scare me."

Wufei smiled. "I know. But it would be fun to worry you. Fear comes and goes in waves. Worry gnaws at you constantly, never easing up, eroding your spirit and wearing down your mental defenses. Then you'll make a mistake and get yourself killed, and then I'll have this assignment. See how patience pays off?"

"Kindly tell his Lordship that I don't appreciate him sending a smart-mouthed lackey to check up on me."

"Tell him yourself," Wufei snapped matter-of-factly. "He'll be sending for you soon anyway. You should expect a summons in the days ahead, and then you'll have to face him and account for your disobedience, alone." He picked up a stack of selected pieces and started towards the door. "I'd sure hate to be you. Now if you'll excuse me, I have some objets d'art to peruse."

Heero made no move to stop the conspirator as he walked haughtily past him and back down the stairs. Even though he couldn't see it, he felt sure the boy had looked in the opposite direction and spotted the bedroom with the open door, the bedroom with two well-travelled suitcases in it. Knowing that Wufei now knew where he slept was an uneasy feeling, and he decided to put a stout lock on the door at the next earliest opportunity.

As much as he didn't want to, Heero extinguished the lantern and headed downstairs after the boy. Relena probably would have no further need of him except to take the tea set away, but so long as Heero knew he was being watched, the only defense was to watch back, and that meant sticking to Wufei like glue.

**********

In the second-floor study, the one that had belonged to Lord Peacecraft in his time, Count Khushrenada had barely budged since Relena came in with the newspaper. He didn't need to read it, for he already knew what it contained, and yet its words were swirling around in his brain as he fought hunger and fatigue to stay there until he had solved the puzzle.

He sat by the window, occasionally looking out at the mackerel-gray sky that had formed since lunch. In his left hand was his pipe, long since burned out without much use over the afternoon. In his right hand, perched on the side table, was a postcard written by Heero Yuy. He read it a dozen times over several hours, and kept looking at the postmark with frustrated eyes. He turned it over and over in his hand, balancing a corner on the edge of the table and sliding his fingers down it's smooth surface a hundred times or more. The mystery wouldn't get out of his mind.

He was there. Yuy was there when the President was shot. But he did nothing. Did he back down from his orders? Did someone else get there first? Did he miss? Or was he merely sent there to watch the proceedings and report back?

Treize liked the last option least of all, and his instincts told him that the possibility he detested the most was also most likely to be true. His employer sent him across the ocean just to watch? What scheming, presumptuous, high-and-mighty devil is this?? If his master really sent him as an observer, what a demonstration of indifference that would be, as if the man is saying that all things are possible for him, but only if they be found interesting or amusing. What an ego! He disliked Heero's master even more strongly now, and he didn't even know his name. The idea that he would go to such trouble and expense just to show off that he could have murdered the President was a self-righteous display of the highest degree.

Slightly stuff, Treize finally rose from his chair and stretched, setting the postcard on the table. I can make demonstrations too, he decided, and with that thought to fuel him, he marched downstairs to make a very important call. This mysterious person who pulled Heero's strings was getting a little too puffed up for Treize's liking; something would have to be done to humble him, and the easiest outlet was Heero himself.

He rounded the corner coming off the grand staircase and walked down the hall, but was severely disappointed to see that the only telephone in the house was already in use. By Dorothy. He leaned gruffly over the girl, and she looked up at him innocently. "I need to contact someone. Now," he insisted.

Dorothy held up her free hand and mouthed the words 'five more minutes', then shooed him back a few feet as he glared ineffectively at her. Numerous repetitions of admonishments to get the heck off the phone were useless, and Treize shuffled away to the front parlour in defeat. After a few minutes, however, he decided it was for the best, since he hadn't eaten in five hours, and rang for someone to bring him tea while he waited.

Back in the hall, Dorothy cradled the earpiece of the telephone and continued her hushed conversation, but only when she was sure nobody was listening. "They won't let anyone in to see him, but I heard them say he's not going to die."

"Good," a small, tinny female voice crackled through the earpiece. "But I'm not pleased at what's happened. Those greedy, grasping desert women could come back at any time. We need to get our claws into him now, not a year from now."

Dorothy almost nodded, but thought better of it. "I understand, m'lady. What do you suggest I do?"

The tinny voice paused, as if thinking on the other end of the phone line. "I have a few suggestions for you...of course you'll have to decide, but you should think carefully about how much you're willing to sacrifice for this money. I know you say we will share it equally, but I'm already quite wealthy, as you know, and you're living off Lady Peacecraft's generosity. Since I don't really need the money except to catch a man, the question becomes: How far are you willing to go for the fortune of your dreams? How much are you willing to sacrifice?"

Another pause. This time, Dorothy was thinking. Lady Une was quite right. She could survive very comfortably for years and years in her massive mansion; Dorothy was the one who really needed an infusion of cash, so naturally she'd be doing most of the hard work. She bit her lip. It was difficult, but acceptable. "Tell me your plans."

**********

Just a little while before dinner, Duo's workspace was invaded by a very grouchy excuse for a butler, who stomped down the stairs and planted himself at the kitchen table, right where Duo needed to be to cook dinner. Never one to pass up an opportunity to make Heero smile, the chef walked slowly over to him, carrying a bowl of something dark brown and very gooey-looking. "So, how's the 'decorating' going?" he chirped.

Heero grunted and looked away.

"That good, huh?" Duo sat next to him and set the bowl down in front of them. "What happened?"

Heero scowled. "He sent me out of the room. Said I was disrupting his feng shui." He slouched as far as he could in the stiff wooden chair and glared at nothing.

"...his what?" Duo asked. "No, never mind, it doesn't matter. How long does he plan on staying?"

Heero rubbed his eyes. The headache was getting worse. "At least until he's redone one room and Relena decides whether to have him do more. Until then, he's staying in one of the guest rooms...at her invitation."

Duo leaned back and let the sheer scope of the problem wash over him. There was no question that Wufei wished serious harm upon Heero, so having him stay at Bridlewood was not a good thing. "Oh man...it's exactly times like this you just wanna hide somewhere with a bowl of chocolate and forget your troubles, eh?" he said, pointing to the bowl with a slight grin.

Heero looked away again. "I don't eat chocolate."

"What, you mean never? Chocolate is the greatest coping mechanism of the twentieth century, and I don't care that it's not even two years old yet." Duo thought for a moment. "You've never ever had chocolate before? I've made chocolate desserts here lots of times!"

"I don't eat dessert."

"You ate dessert my first night here, I know 'cause you told me yourself, so nyah."

Heero looked back at the chef. Sometimes he hated it when Duo was logical. "That was out of morbid curiosity."

"Fine, have it your own way," Duo groaned. He tipped the bowl up and drained the chocolatey goo into a square baking pan, scraping the batter out half-heartedly. "When you told me Wufei was here, I decided to make brownies. This is by far the best way to relieve tension and feel better, and I figured you needed that after this afternoon. Now take this and help me lick the bowl." He held out a spoon.

"I don't see what good it'll do," Heero said flatly.

Duo narrowed his eyes menacingly at his friend. "Shut up and do it." The spoon was snatched out of his hand with annoyance. Duo was probably the only person other than Sally Poole with the guts to take on a Heero in a bad mood. Slowly and carefully, Duo demonstrated how to scrape the residual fudgy brownie batter from the inside of the bowl and lick the spoon clean. Heero reluctantly followed his lead, but found the sticky substance to be actually quite good. After only one spoonful of chocolate, the ugly shadow lifted from his face, and he didn't seem to be in such a bad mood anymore.

"The problem with you," Duo mumbled in between bites, "is that you haven't even been back a day yet, and you already seem to have forgotten that we're in this together. Your problems are my problems, got it?"

Heero nodded quietly like a child, totally wrapped up in fudgy ecstasy.

Duo stopped eating and let Heero finish off what was left while he lectured him gently. "Okay, so this Wufei guy is out to get you. From what I heard him say before this mess got rolling, he's not too thrilled with me at the moment either. We're in trouble together, and we're gonna deal with it together...that's sort of the whole point of being friends, see? So, I don't want you coming in here, moaning and groaning about how rotten it is when things don't go your way. I guess that's sorta my fault, since you had so much fun in the last two weeks that everything else is slave labour by comparison," Duo added with a grin. "So will you calm down and let me help you?"

Still savouring the chocolate batter even though it was gone, Heero nodded humbly, his headache rapidly fading. He decided that Duo and chocolate were equally nice, but when combined, they had the power to ease his pain and soothe his spirit. He felt better. "Thank you."

Duo draped an arm around Heero's shoulders and smiled. "What are friends for?" He got up and popped the brownies into the waiting warm oven, then returned to the table. "There's still half a dozen jars of food left in the pantry, wanna pick out something for dinner tonight? You can have anything you want as long as it's soup..."

Heero looked up and faintly smiled for the first time since his return. They rose as one and went hunting and pecking for something to eat that night, once again confident in each other and their partnership. It was going to be a trial having to wait on Wufei hand and foot while he looked down on them both, plotting and scheming...but together, they could handle it.


~~~~~~~~~~

Next, in Episode Twenty: Dorothy decides to take action towards capturing Quatre and his money as her own, and she seems not to care what she sacrifices in the process. Wufei causes disruption in the everyday running of the manor, and an unexpected but happy event causes surprise and confusion for the servants sleeping in the attic.

Alrighty...I'm going to try REALLY hard not to let two delays in a row turn into three delays in a row. I just HAD to waste Friday shopping for wedge-heel shoes to go with my lime green skirt, didn't I? =~_~= How was I to know my bro was gonna spill Coke on my keyboard! Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, this is the face of an innocent Mitsugi! =o_o= Well, sorta innocent. I'm marking down Episode 20 for September 30th, and I'll be ding-donged if I'm gonna let THAT one be late too. =^-^= Ja ne!