Disclaimer: My current defence against any corporate lawyers who might decide to beat down my door and present a "cease and desist" order from BanDai is that I've been working on this for a WHOLE YEAR now, and if they even tried to shut me down, they'd have hordes of angry fans swarming all over them and plucking out each and every one of their body hairs, one by one by one. Right guys? *looks expectantly at her readers* ... *crickets chirp* ... =o_o;= *gulp* Uh...right? =D

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Episode Fifty-Four: A Day in the Lives

"The difference between perseverance and obstinacy is that one often comes from a strong will, and the other from a strong won't." ~Henry Ward Beecher

July 22nd, 1902

"8:15 am. Each day, I have prayed for my family's salvation, but we are no closer to freedom. Today, I will find a solution, or my sisters and I will leave England and take our chances elsewhere. Laying low is one thing, but living like a flock of ostriches, that's unacceptable."

Yasmeen closed up the gilt-edged book in which she wrote of her cross-country adventures, and tucked the pen into a pocket of its leather casing. Unlike so many other women of the same age in her native land, she was highly independent and an accomplished mathematician, and was also certain that she could feel her brain cells expiring from boredom, being trapped in an Englishwoman's cellar. In addition to her daily journal entries, she frequently jotted down complex equations to keep her mind in top shape, and her book was getting full. This was secretly a major motivation for wanting to get herself and her sisters out of hiding, for that was the only way she might safely go out and buy another book.

Urgent to get on with her plans, she made a perfectly-timed venture up to the attic and changed clothes into a black dress made of ornate brocade silks that she had found in a trunk. Well-practised in stealth, she was able to creep up via the servants' stairwell and poke around in the dusty storage areas, once she knew the daily routines of all the housemaids. The black silk monstrosity was about the only sensible thing she could find in the antique trunks that was suitable for making her look like she belonged in London, and it was about her size too. She found it odd that there were so many women's clothes up there that weren't being worn by anyone, but resigned herself to never really knowing why.

Packaged with the ruffly gown was a funny looking metal basket made of a very fine mesh, but it was a totally impractical shape to use for shopping or even as a purse, so Yasmeen left it behind. As a result, when she put on the dress, it drooped at the back where the wire mesh bustle was supposed to be, but she knew very little about English fashion, and didn't connect the two curiosities.

To complete the ensemble, she found a wide-brimmed hat of black-dyed straw, which she reasoned would slightly shade her middle-eastern features if she went out in bright sunlight. She wrangled her hair into a sloppy bun which she needed two full cards of bobby pins to secure, and topped it off with the hat. The total effect as shown by the dusty full-length mirror looked decidedly strange, but it was as good as it was going to get. Guided by a prayer, she closed the trunk gently and tip-toed back down the stairs, but a raised voice made her stop between the third and second floors.

"Can't you find someone else? I'm desperately in need of some chocolate biscotti, and the only store that imports it closes at noon!"

"Just five minutes, my sweet! This is a very important decision that really requires a woman's expertise."

"Oh, honestly..."

Intrigued by nothing more than the sound of some new and different people, Yasmeen padded closer to the ruckus. She took off the straw hat, rolled it into a tube, and tucked it into the same hand that was holding up the excess folds of the dress, and very carefully peered out of the stairwell and into a hall she had never seen before. A girl with long hair the colour of Hessa's, but seemingly closer to Nashida and Asalah's age, was walking away and turned into a doorway about two-thirds of the way down the south hall. After how hard Yasmeen had prayed the night before, opportunity could have lurked behind any corner, so she gathered up her borrowed skirts and slunk down the hall after her.

"Alright, what's so important?" the girl's voice whined.

Yasmeen approached the open door and immediately saw a tall, broad-shouldered man with reddish-brown hair and rather demonic forked eyebrows, looking in her direction. Panicking, she ducked into a door on the opposite side of the hallway. To her benefit, that room was dark.

"I have an important business meeting on the horizon," the man said. Yasmeen guessed that she hadn't been seen after all, and opened her door a crack; she could see that it was only the man's reflection in a full-length mirror like the one in the attic, and relaxed a bit. She could also see a sliver of the blonde girl's dress, and a few locks of her hair fluffing out past the door frame. "The reading of Lord Peacecraft's will was set for the end of the month yesterday, and I have to look my best for it, don't I?"

"Only you could call something morbid like that a 'business meeting'," the disembodied girl's voice scoffed.

"Well, there's going to be an awful lot of momentous paperwork transpiring between Mr. Marlowe and myself, and who knows? We might even be visited by members of the press once the future of this estate is revealed." The auburn-haired man held up a blue sport coat on a hanger, standing behind it and looking off into the imaginary distance. "What do you think...intellectual and cordial, with an air of incumbency, or..." He paused to lower the blue coat and hold up a black one, pinstriped with red satin lining, looking off in a different direction. "...inwardly contemplative, yet prestigiously triumphant?"

"What's the difference?"

The auburn-haired man lowered both jackets and scowled at the girl in mild exasperation. "They each require a different pair of shoes...shoes that will have to be polished before the reading! And there's ties to consider! It's important that I walk into that room looking like an English millionaire," he said, walking out of the mirror's view, "...since I'll be walking out as one..."

"You have to make such a production out of everything, don't you?" the girl commented. Her words mingled with the clinking of coat hangers, and the man returned to the mirror with an austere gray jacket, holding it up in the same manner and smirking at himself in the mirror. The girl went 'hmph.' "You don't even know what's in the man's will! This whole charade could be a complete waste of time!"

"Not so, my lovely," the man cooed. "I've never felt so confident about anything." As he angled his head this way and that in the mirror, he stopped and stared...stared in the exact direction of the slightly open door across the hall.

Yasmeen held her breath, unsure of whether or not he could see the shine of her eyes. Don't...blink.....stay absolutely......still... He stared for ten thousand eternities, and the slightest flinch in the glint he saw across the hall would be rightly interpreted as a sign of life. Yasmeen's eyes were beginning to sting from being forced open. Fuzzy patches of red and gold and purple flashed across her field of vision. Every muscle in her face was screaming in agony, and just when she thought she couldn't take anymore, the man flicked his peculiar eyebrows up in a shrug and looked away. Yasmeen gasped quietly and dropped her head into both hands, feeling an autonomic surge of emergency liquid flowing from both tear ducts.

"Have you thought about what to do with the rest of us who aren't so lucky?" the girl sniffed with sarcasm. "I hope I'm not going to find myself homeless once this is finished."

"I'm not a cruel man, Dorothy," the gentleman purred. "You and Relena and Otto will be perfectly welcome in my new home. As for the rest of these...squatters, well...painful decisions will have to be made."

Though her vision wasn't completely restored yet, Yasmeen could hear by the smile in the man's voice that there would be nothing painful about it, whatever it was. The two of them spent another ten minutes or more on clothes for the gentleman's upcoming occasion, then left the room together. Yasmeen was surprised at how deeply she had been affected by the minor spectacle, and knelt down behind the door to record her thoughts in the little gilt-edged book she carried, after checking her weather-beaten watch by the sliver of light coming in from the hall.

"8:42 am. I have just seen two of the indigenous faunae in their natural habitat, and I can't say I'm impressed. The gentleman, if one can call him that, seems to have all the integrity of a used horse trader, and has the kind of smug attitude that makes me want to rip those unholy eyebrows off his head and stuff them in his mouth. The lady whimpers like a starving jackal, though I'm sure she's more than well-fed, and I imagine she's never blessed herself with an honest day's work in her life. I can say this with confidence because I'm related to several more whimpering jackals just like her. I also know when people are up to something rotten, and these two take the prize, but a pair of vipers like them will never share in the same kill. They'll bite each other eventually, and if I see them together again, I'm going to run the other way."

Yasmeen put the pen in the book, put the book in the pocket of the billowy, diaphanous drawstring pantaloons she was wearing under the dress, collected her hat and her skirt, and got back up on her feet. A set of light footsteps swooshed past the door, and she held her breath again. They soon passed, and she was free to slip back into the servants' stairwell and continue her descent.

When she was almost down to the main floor, the footsteps that once passed her came barrelling down after her instead. She dove out of the stairwell and into the hall, but froze at the sight of another tall, broad-shouldered man walking away from her position. In a scramble, she fled a few doors down towards the front of the house and ended up safely tucked away in a closet by the time the footsteps swept past her again, and was quiet enough that the man didn't turn around.

"S'cuse me, sir," said a young, timid English voice, "but 'ave you seen the mornin' paper? Only I've started followin' the Royal Family, see, an' since I don't go nowhere, the paper's the only--"

"Yes, yes, alright," a gruff male voice answered. "You can have it as soon as I'm finished with it, wherever it's got to. I need it to find an alternate supplier for the staff uniforms...I suspect we're being overcharged."

"Yes, sir. Shall I 'ave a look through the study for it, sir?"

"No, I've already looked there."

Another set of footsteps announced themselves, coming from the back of the house and stopping right in front of Yasmeen's closet. "Have either of you seen the paper this morning? I want to look something up and I can never find it anymore."

Yasmeen recognized the voice. It was Quatre's tall friend, Trowa. She could have safely revealed herself to him, but didn't know the other two, and so stayed firmly put. She was fairly sure, however, that the young, timid voice was one of the housemaids.

"Well, when we find it, you can 'ave it after me," the maid said.

"I need it first," the gruff man insisted, "then Bethany, then you."

"That's hardly fair," Trowa said. "You've got all day to sit inside and read the paper, I've only got five minutes before I'm needed outside again. I think I should have it first because I've got a lot of work to get back to."

The housemaid gave an offended little snort. "Uh, s'cuse me, what d'you think I do all day, fling me duster about once or twice an' then put me feet up? There's others in this 'ouse who've got schedules to keep!"

"Quiet, both of you!" the gruff one barked. "I'm the one with the most seniority, and nobody's picking that paper apart before me."

On the other side of the closet door, in the pertinent hallway that was hosting the argument, a fourth person stepped in, just to confuse things for Yasmeen. "Is this what you're all squabbling over?" the newcomer said in a sweet but condescending tone. Yasmeen dared to open the door a crack to take a peek. It was a fair-skinned blonde girl, but definitely different that the one that had been talking to the demonic-looking man upstairs. Her voice was warmer, and her hair was of a much darker, more honey-like shade. She was carrying a newspaper, and stopped in front of the trio, folding her arms. "Let me tell you something..."

Yasmeen winced. She knew that tone meant someone was in for a tongue-lashing.

"You know what you people are? You're newspaper piranhas. Every time you get your hands on one of these, it gets torn to shreds. Pages missing, ink smudged, sections scattered all over the house, and there's invariably something that's been cut out from the opposite side of every single article I want to read! I am lady of the manor, and this is my newspaper! I pay you all a fair wage, and I know you have more free time on your hands than you claim in your daily whining, so you can either wait your turn, or go out and buy your own paper!"

The message didn't get through very well. All three piranhas reached out for the newspaper and rapidly insisted that each of them 'would only take a second' to find out what they wanted to know. In the muddled tri-voice chorus that stepped on its own words and meshed into an annoying buzz, Otto droned about new suits, Bethany about the royals, and Trowa about cricket. With a sigh and a scowl, Relena came to the conclusion that it would only 'take a second' if she did it herself.

"Enough! That's enough!" she snapped. "Otto, the suit you want is on sale at Clark and Debenham, but it only comes in brown. Bethany, Prince George and Princess Mary are definitely expecting a baby, it's due in December. Trowa, there's a rumour circulating that England are replacing Jessop with Fred Tate for the test match against Australia, and the forecast is for rain." Relena slapped Otto in the belly with the newspaper, and he latched onto it with a startled arm before it could drop to the floor. Her Ladyship took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and put on a mask of total relaxation. "If anyone needs me, I'll be at the newsstand."

The suddenly silent trio watched her walk away, humbled and a little bit frightened of the strong-willed ghost that had possessed their employer. On her way to the front door, she stopped at a curio cabinet, opened a drawer, and withdrew a number of coins from petty cash. The servants were all still standing in the same place as she flew with quick, sprightly steps towards the foyer, and hardly blinked when she nearly collided with Heero, who was coming out of the parlour carrying her near-empty breakfast tray. They simultaneously moved left, then right, then left again trying to get out of each other's way, following which Relena actually shoved him aside and continued on to the hat rack.

Heero spun around and steadied the tray, and for a moment, the clinking of the unbalanced teacup was the only sound. "Is...everything alright, m'lady?" he asked, approaching slowly and carefully.

"I have to go to the newsstand and buy one of everything," she answered hurriedly, tying on a light straw hat with a pretty blue ribbon. "I just found out now that America was at war with the Philippines! Did you know about this?"

Heero blinked. "Actually, I need to speak to you abou--"

"Of course, it's all over now, I missed it! Heaven knows how long that's been going on, and if I missed that much, what else don't I know about? It's infuriating!" She tugged on her gloves with almost lethal force.

"...yes. What I'm trying to--"

"How could I have gone through life for so long and not know a thing about current events!? The whole southern hemisphere could've collapsed into the sea and I'd never have known about it!" As a final touch, she tied her hair back at the base of her neck and straightened her dress in a nearby mirror.

"About the reading of the wil--"

"I'm sorry, Heero, I'd love to chat, but I have to go." Lastly, she snatched a gingersnap off the tray he carried and bit off a chunk, mumbling around the crumbs. "Russia is giving Manchuria back to China, did you know that?" With a wide-eyed shrug, she twirled around and dashed out the door, not even closing it properly on the way out. The ticking of the grandfather clock only yards away filled up the space where the servant's collective backbone had been, before getting trampled.

Heero couldn't help feeling a bit queasy. I really didn't know that.

Trowa slunk up beside him, and assisted him in staring at the half-open door. "...who's Fred Tate?"

Thrown terribly off-balance by the realization that Relena was gradually catching up to him in international news, Heero felt queasier. He dumped the silver tray into Trowa's hands and rubbed his eyes. "I'm going to go lie down for awhile."

Eventually, they all shuffled off into their own little corners, more stunned than anything else. Still listening astutely from the closet, Yasmeen smirked. When all seemed quiet, she crept back to the stairs and padded down to the kitchen, intending to play it safe by shooting out the back door instead of the front. Her mind was swimming with thoughts that she just had to get down on paper, so she ducked into the pantry and crouched next to a crate of homemade strawberry preserves, digging the journal out of her dress yet again.

"9:08 am. I think I have just seen the queen bee, and she rules her hive with an iron fist. Her power is impressive for one so young. I can't understand why Quatre's friends called her 'flighty' and 'childish'...she seems alright to me. I'm sure under different circumstances that she and I could get along very well. As for her subordinates, they could all use some extra discipline and treat her with a little more respect. If she's really as bright and involved as she sounds, she deserves at least that much."

Yasmeen's train of thought was broken by the back door opening. The kitchen had been vacant up until then, so her guard was slightly lowered, and the noise made her jump. She squished herself up into a ball around the corner and watched what came through the door--and it was a strange sight indeed.

Quatre came through and charged down the short concrete steps first, followed by a dark-haired maid, a young Chinaman in white clothes with a shoddily bandaged and red-streaked right hand, being supported by the maid, and a policeman. The girl seemed to be helping the foreign boy stagger over to a kitchen chair, while Quatre wrung his hands in worry and the policeman folded his arms and watched sternly. At no time could Yasmeen clearly see the girl's face, due to a bad viewing angle that only got worse as moments ticked by.

"Now, I have your solemn word that you'll inform your employer about this?" the tall, stern officer of the law said to Quatre.

"Yes, sir, of course we will," Quatre said nervously. "It's just so much easier to bring him in through the back, where the kitchen sink is, and...everything..."

"Mm-hm," the officer hummed, partially convinced. The odds were better that when he and his constables arrived at the address printed on a slip of paper in the half-drunk Chinaman's pocket expecting to drop him off to his employer via the front door, the gardener panicked and asked them to bring him in through the back door because something underhanded was going on that he didn't want his employer to know about, which could have turned out to be a juicy case. On the other hand, it was a minor first-time offence, and it was hardly worth the man's time getting embroiled in family controversy for something that would really only merit a strongly-worded caution. The policeman walked up to the chair in which the foreigner feebly sat and raised his voice. "Can you hear me, young man?"

"Mmph," the boy in white muttered.

"The owner of the pub has agreed not to press charges, since no serious damage was done, but he doesn't want to see you in his establishment ever again. And I expect you to stay on your best behaviour, or next time I'll be taking you to the station house instead, do you understand?"

The humbled miscreant propped his head up on the table with his bad hand and appeared to sway back and forth slightly.

"We'll explain it to him," the dark-haired maid said with an innocent smile.

"Yes, well...see that you do," said the officer. "I'll see myself out." Casting a navy blue shadow all the way to the door, he vanished out the back and went to reassemble his men. Quatre and the maid looked their young visitor over and whispered back and forth about what to do next.

"How much do you think he's had to drink?"

"Dunno...I can't really smell it."

"I thought he was getting along fine here. Why did he leave?"

"And if he didn't want to be here anyway, why come back?"

"Maybe something dangerous was going on and he was worried for us."

"I wonder if he can hear us at all."

An executive decision was needed here, and Quatre didn't feel he was executive enough. "We'd better tell Heero right away."

"That'll be the last thing you do!" the boy shouted, springing to life when it mattered most.

Quatre folded his arms triumphantly. "So you are listening. What were you doing, getting drunk and punching a brick wall? You could have been arrested and gotten hauled off to jail for disorderly conduct! What would've happened to you then?"

The boy in white stared at the tabletop, specifically at a blop of marmalade that breakfast had left behind. "Does it matter?"

"Of course it matters!" the maid exclaimed. "We would've gone straight down to the police station and bailed you out, wouldn't we?"

Quatre nodded. "You didn't have to disappear like that, Wufei."

The one he called 'Wufei' snarled and clenched his damaged fist, banging it on the table just once. It made his opponents jump away in fright. "You don't know anything about what I have to do, for you or anyone else!" After that nasty little outburst, he calmed down and cradled his right hand with his left, and wouldn't look anyone in the eye. "As soon as my head clears, I'm gone. Out of here. Permanently."

There was complete silence as Quatre crossed one ankle in front of the other and leaned one arm on the back of another chair, with his hand on his hip, and Yasmeen fully expected to hear one of her brother's selfless speeches about sticking together, but what actually came out, after a prolonged exhalation through his nose, was a surprise.

"Well, fine. I'm tired of going out of my way to help people and getting kicked in the head for my trouble. I've used up all my caring and understanding for the next six months, and I do not have the strength to work through whatever neuroses you've decided to inflict on yourself. You do what you want to do. I've got rose bushes that need pruning." No one was more shocked than Yasmeen as he walked away from the kitchen table and out the door. For the first time, it was blindingly clear what sort of strain he'd been under the last few weeks.

With the gardener's departure, the petite housemaid was left alone with the foul-tempered foreigner, but she didn't look like she was about to flee for her life. Instead, she settled comfortably into her chair and laced her fingers together on the tabletop. "So.....who came along and dropped a porcupine in your pouch?"

"You wouldn't understand," Wufei scoffed snidely.

"Well, how are you ever gonna find out if you don't take a risk and tell me?" the maid asked. "I just might surprise you."

Wufei snorted and turned away. "Leave me in peace, woman."

She surprised him by giving him a sharp smack upside the head, grabbing him by the ear, and dragging him over to the sink. Before he could react, she whipped off the rag wrapped around his hand, turned the cold tap on full blast, and jammed his hand underneath it, still keeping a firm grip on his ear and tugging sharply if he dared protest. She didn't let go until the deep scrapes on Wufei's knuckles had been blasted clean, and even then she wouldn't relinquish control without one more good shove to the side of his head. He was then marched back to his seat and forced back down into it, and his injured hand was pulled up above his head. "Don't move that," the maid instructed curtly.

Wufei actually feared what would happen to him if he disobeyed. There was a formidable spirit contained in the girl's small frame, and it reminded him so much of his lost love, Meiran, that he found himself craning his neck around the raised arm to watch her as she walked towards the pantry.

"You know, you don't make it very easy to be nice to you," the maid said, twisting around and backing up the rest of the way to the pantry door. Again, Yasmeen panicked, realizing that she was about to be discovered, and had been too enthralled with the scene to retreat in time. As she scrunched up even further away from the door, sandwiched between the shelves, the girl dipped an arm into the pantry and felt around for something while keeping both eyes on Wufei. "I should think a loner like you would be grateful of someone taking an interest in your well-being. At the very least, it wouldn't kill you to be polite..."

Yasmeen looked up and saw the maid's hand struggling to find something. Her slim fingers kept missing one object in particular, a small Cadbury's cookie tin, and if she didn't reach her target soon, she might very well have turned to look, which would have been disastrous. Holding her breath and hedging her bets, Yasmeen reached up and gingerly shoved the tin an inch closer to the searching hand. Once the maid felt the object in question, she smiled and grabbed it, pulling the lid off as she walked back to her patient. "Now why don't you tell me what's bugging you?"

She sat down next to Wufei, yanked his arm back down, pulled a roll of gauze from the tin and began carefully re-wrapping his hand with a touch more gentle than the brush of a dove's wing. Wufei swallowed. "It's just...I've wasted my life so far, chasing after the illusion of revenge...it's cost me everything."

"I thought you and Heero worked for the same setup."

That caught Wufei off-guard until he remembered that this girl was included in what could be called the household's inner circle, and had been for quite some time. He shrugged. "It really is a setup. They let me think I was invaluable, and then they used me. Now...I don't know what to do." He also didn't know why he was opening up so easily; the girl was having a peculiar effect on him, one that he didn't have the mental resources to analyse.

The dark-haired maid thought about the problem, even with such minimal information, and tied off the gauze around Wufei's hand before pressing him further. "Why don't you go home and think it over? Sometimes just taking a vacation can give you fantastic perspective."

Wufei studied her handiwork and, to his continued amazement, found it to be absolutely flawless. "I don't have a home to go to anymore. Years ago, I got into a huge fight with my father, and I ran away. That's what got me into this mess." He slumped pitifully forward, staring at the patch of marmalade again as if it held the answers to all of life's mysteries. "I can't go back...I can't go forward.....it wasn't perfect, but I used to have a place in the grand order of things, and now I have nothing."

"Okay...so...why don't you just stay here with us? Nobody has to know you're here, and if you get really stuck for ideas, I'm sure Heero can think of som--"

At the mention of the rival agent's name, Wufei balled both fists and growled like a very angry bear. "I don't want him to hear a word of this! I don't want anything to do with him, ever!!"

That piqued Yasmeen's curiosity greatly. She thought Heero was loyal, intelligent, and very fair, and had never heard anyone say a word against him. She would have scooted a little closer to the pantry doorway to listen more closely, but at that precise moment, she felt something touch her foot and immediately changed her plans. Her eyes widened.

"What's wrong with him?" the girl asked. "He's always been there to help whenever any of us needed him, he's smart, he's kind, he's--"

"I know, I know! He's Mr. Wonderful, alright!?"

Yasmeen looked to her left, where both of her feet were tucked off to the side, and saw two small, glossy turquoise eyes staring back at her. It was the little gray house cat, with one paw resting on her shoe. Yasmeen couldn't help it, but she cringed. She and her sisters had been formally introduced to the animal several weeks ago; the other girls all took turns petting it and cuddling it and showering it with affection, but Yasmeen kept her distance, because she was allergic. Now the cat was moving in for a closer inspection of what it had missed at that early meeting.

"What kind of attitude is that?"

"You don't understand, he..." Wufei paused and swallowed to keep from choking on his wrath. "For years, all I've ever heard is how talented Heero is, and how efficient and obedient he is, and what a brilliant addition to the organization he's made, over and over and over...and because of that, I've been killing myself trying to match the standards he set. Every chance I got, I tried to batter down his ego and just when I thought I might be rewarded for my loyalty with the gift of his mission, I found out I matter less to my superiors than the furniture they sat their fat backsides on while I endangered myself to serve their interests!"

Whiskers twitching, Shadow climbed all the way up Yasmeen's leg and perched elegantly on her thigh. Yasmeen could feel tiny beads of sweat forming under the collar of her dress.

"So you gotta swallow your pride once in awhile. So what? When you've spent half your winters in a train station hawkin' red carnations for businessmen to wear in their buttonholes for just enough money to barely avoid starvation for another twenty-four hours, then you can talk to me about lowering your standards!"

The girl's impassioned speech brushed only slightly against Yasmeen's ears, for she had bigger problems. Shadow had moved up to the crook of her arm and stretched out to place both paws on the upper part of her chest, just below the hollow of her throat. The cat blinked curiously and put her face right up to Yasmeen's, sniffing. Now Yasmeen's nose was beginning to twitch.

Wufei shook his head with a bitter half-grin. "You women see things so simply."

"And you men overcomplicate everything so you can look like big shots when you finally solve your problems," the maid said with a bit of smug sarcasm, "which, I might add, is frequently accomplished through utilizing a suggestion made by a woman."

Yasmeen felt a sneeze coming on. Shadow continued to sniff around her face, and an avalanche of ticklish pressure was building up in her sinuses. On top of that, her eyes were watering, her throat was coated in kitty tuna breath, and her legs were falling asleep from the knees down. She was so close to cracking that she could have screamed.

"I don't know if I can let go of everything so easily," Wufei admitted, barely above a whisper.

The maid smiled and patted his arm. "Don''t worry about it. Just figure out what you're going to do today, tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow, and don't even think past that until you're settled. That's how I get through rough patches. You can't stop and think seriously about the big things until you've got a routine that takes care of the little things."

A strange aura of peace washed over Wufei, and he didn't even realize he was smiling. "Thank you.....uh..." Unfortunately, the kind girl's name escaped him.

"Hilde," she said.

"Hilde."

They said nothing for almost a minute, a spine-tingling, brain-spinning minute that left them mute with mutual curiosity. Finally, Hilde felt a little surge of warmth touching her cheeks and stood up, breaking the silence with the scrape of a wooden chair across the tile floor. "Well! ...what say we get you out back to see Arthur? Y'know, he's kinda missed having you around...like yet another grandson he never had."

Wufei's eyebrows reflected his surprise that anyone would miss him at all. He rose from his own chair and exhaled deeply. "Agreed." They walked across the kitchen, up the half-flight of steps, and out into the backyard. Shortly after they were gone, the back door swung closed with a clunk.

"................--CHOO!!"

Yasmeen sneezed. Shadow went 'Rowr!' and jumped off her, scooting out to the kitchen and disappearing up the stairs. Pondering the total lack of progress that she had made that morning, she took out her journal and crystallized her feelings into a single, succinct entry.

"9:26 am. I hope I get my sisters sorted out after today, because I am never doing this again."

Too tired and frustrated to care how safe it was to move, she stumbled up on her wobbly legs and fought the severe sensation of pins and needles all the way to the back door, where she slipped out, unnoticed.

**********

There was no smooth sailing for Duo and Heero at the Muddy Nag. When they stopped in for an after-dinner lemonade and strategy session, they found the building in a discombobulated mess, with bricks and bits of wood lying around and workmen shuffling to and fro with their ripped blue coveralls and their sagging toolbelts. Apart from that, half the dining room was missing, covered by a curtain of gray and paint-splattered tarpaulins that separated the pub into 'the good half' and 'the moderately questionable half.' Heero tried asking Catherine what was going on, but she evaded the question with a coy smile and muttered something about minor renovations. There was more to it than that, Heero was certain.

Nevertheless, they didn't go there to pry into Catherine's affairs. They sat in their usual booth, fortunately in the untouched portion of the room, and conducted their meeting with a glass of lemonade each, accompanied in the background by a chorus of hammers and saws. "We have nine days," Heero began.

"Until what?"

"The reading of Lord Peacecraft's will. Ten o'clock on the thirty-first, Marlowe's office. I know Treize must have a plan in place by now, but I'm not sure what to do about it."

Duo sipped, then added another teaspoon of sugar from the covered sugar bowl. "Are we invited?"

"You, definitely not. Me..." Heero sipped, and wished he could have taken about the same amount of sugar out. "That's what I've been trying to arrange with Relena all day, but she doesn't seem to have five minutes for anyone anymore."

"Yeah, isn't that weird? Something's gotten into her lately, everyone else's noticed too."

Heero thought quietly, watching Duo fold a bar napkin into an accordion shape and fashion it into a fan with which to fan himself. "She's changed..."

The conversation wandered in other directions after that, and they stayed until the sky turned streaky and purple. Catherine clammed up even more after the workmen left, so they didn't get any clues as to why the pub was being deconstructed on one side. The pair left peacefully, but they had only gotten a few yards away from the door when Duo paused and stared at something across the street. Heero stopped also and tried to follow his gaze.

It was normal evening traffic as far as Heero could see, but Duo quickly pointed out something on the curb, a lady in a long black dress. She was sitting right on the curb looking very tired and travel-worn, with half of her hair spilling out of a sloppy bun and fanning herself with a black straw hat. "Doesn't she look familiar to you?" Duo asked.

Heero wasn't sure, so they crossed the street to get a better look at her. It took a moment for the face to register out of its usual context, but when one blocked out the hair and the dress, a poorly-exercised memory was excavated. "...Yasmeen..."

"Yeah, that's her!" Duo walked right up to the woman and sat down on the curb next to her. "Hey..." he greeted cautiously.

The woman in black looked up, and was startled to realize that she knew the face of her young visitor. She clutched timidly at the neckline of her gown. "You...you recognized me? In this?"

Duo lifted his head proudly. "I never forget the face of someone who compliments my Key Lime Pie."

Yasmeen smiled tiredly. "It's good to see some friendly faces...after the day I've had."

"Don't take this the wrong way," Duo said after looking up and exchanging a glance with Heero, "but what are you doing out of your cave?"

"Is something wrong?" Heero added, still choosing not to ruin his own slacks by joining them on the curb.

Yasmeen sighed and leaned both forearms on her knees, letting her hands and her hat dangle. "You have been very kind to us...and we will be eternally grateful...but we cannot stay in that house." Duo looked disappointed, but when she looked up at Heero, she saw that he understood. "I've been searching everywhere for a new place to hide, but my failure makes me wonder if we shouldn't just pack up and go home...and pray for good fortune when we see the rest of our siblings."

"You're not serious, are you?" Duo whined. "There must be somewhere else in the city you can go, rather than go back! Quat would never forgive himself if anything happened to you gals!"

"Let us help you look," Heero offered. "With more of us searching, we can cover a larger--"

"No, please!" Yasmeen begged, putting up her hands. "You both have very important tasks to complete, and my family worries mustn't get in your way. Besides...this is something I need to do myself. I took responsibility for my younger sisters when I brought them here, and it's my job to make sure they're safe."

Heero frowned helplessly. "At least let us give you a ride home. It's a long walk."

Yasmeen slowly shook her head. "Thank you, but I'm not ready to go back yet. You two take care of yourselves. I'll be along eventually."

Duo crinkled his eyebrows sadly. "If you're sure..." She nodded, and he stood obediently. They said their goodbyes, and the boys took a hansom cab down the street and out of sight.

With a deep sigh, Yasmeen pushed hard on her knees until she was standing reasonably straight, and had a good look around. The day's not over yet. Opportunity could still be waiting to leap out at me. While her mind was a little clearer, she became more aware of her surroundings, and searched yet again for some dark corner to adopt as a new hiding place. A vacant building would have been ideal, which is why the apparently empty shop across the street caught her eye.

It was part of a long string of conjoined buildings, the nearest of which was some sort of eating establishment that looked very busy. Yasmeen walked up to the vacant shop and peeked in the window through a hole in the butcher's paper covering the inside. She saw a young redheaded woman walking around inside and became very disappointed, thinking that perhaps it wasn't vacant after all.

Yasmeen leaned back and pondered. A door opened to her right moments later, and to her surprise, the same redheaded woman stepped out of the restaurant with a small stepladder. She set it down, climbed up on it, and used a long tapered match to light the old gas lamps that still hung around the public house door. Now the wheels in Yasmeen's head began turning at a fantastic pace.

When the redheaded woman went back inside, Yasmeen followed. Inside the pub, she looked around carefully and got the overall impression of a very relaxed, very genial atmosphere, with some terribly interesting details. It wasn't long, though, before the redheaded woman spotted her looking unattached to a table and came to her assistance. "Good evening, madam, may I show you tonight's menu?"

After a small pause during which she sized the woman up for signs of a deceitful nature, Yasmeen smiled. "Yes, thank you."

The woman showed her to a table, introduced herself as Catherine, the proprietress, and ran down a list of the evening's specials. Catherine then noticed that her new customer was dressed all in black. "Gee, who died?"

Yasmeen looked blank and confused, then looked down at herself, then up again. "Oh, no no! This was...the only thing I had that was clean this morning."

"Boy, I know what that's like," Catherine laughed. "I'm not very domestic either. Now, what can I get you?"

"Um..." The minuscule amount of money she had borrowed from Quatre to buy food was all gone. "Perhaps a glass of water while I decide?"

"Sure!" Catherine skipped away, and Yasmeen swithced into hyper-active analytical mode. She told herself that she was sitting in a combination alcoholic tavern and casual restaurant, with stairs leading up to the second level and a sign advertising rooms for rent. At the moment, the 'No Vacancy' sign was up as well, but she was much more interested in the portion of the building that lay behind the tarpaulins. Catherine returned diligently with a glass of fresh water. "Here you go."

"Thank you," Yasmeen said. "Please, sit down! You look as though you've been working very hard today!"

Catherine smiled. "Well, yes, it's been a little hectic with the workmen and such." Seeing no other customers in dire need of prompt service, she availed herself of the opposite chair.

Yasmeen sipped her water and composed her thoughts. "They appear to have been very busy. I hope your business wasn't damaged by fire or flood recently..."

"Nah, just a little project I'm working on," Catherine said with a grin. "Some minor improvements and modifications...really top-secret stuff."

"Really?" Yasmeen's eyes brightened in artificially-enhanced interest. "I'm absoutely fascinated by construction and renovation, would you mind letting me have a look?"

Catherine didn't know why, but the tanned woman was quite the charmer, and she found herself unable to resist. "...sure, why not? Follow me!" They got up and crossed the room to no man's land, and Catherine held aside the tarpaulin so they could both nip through. The wall between the pub and the vacant shop had been knocked down, and steel support beams had been strategically placed to keep the ceiling from caving in while the men worked. "The fabric outlet next door closed and moved up west, and since my sales have been through the roof lately, I decided to buy it and expand my business! I'm adding a whole new dining area with some private rooms for meetings and parties, and there's a complete second floor upstairs that I'm going to turn into more rooms for rent, sort of like a mini hotel! I've been dying to tell someone about my epic vision, but I wanted to keep it a secret from my regular customers so I could have a grand re-opening sometime next month! What do you think?"

Yasmeen could tell Catherine was the sort of person who craved attention and loved having her ideas praised, so she indulged her greatly. "I think that's a magnificent plan! And what an enterprising spirit you have!"

Catherine blushed. "Aww..."

"And what planning this must have taken! I'll bet when it's finished your clientele will quadruple overnight! You'll be rushed off your feet!"

"Heh...uh, yeah..."

"I admire your work ethic greatly. Not every young woman would commit herself to serving the needs of close to a hundred people at once, fetching whatever they desired at your best speed, never letting your smile fade no matter how badly your feet hurt!"

".......uh huh."

"I wouldn't be surprised if all the extra work sends you to an early grave, but at least you will have died an honourable death, serving the needs of your community. You are to be commended!"

"............oh my God."

For some odd reason, Catherine looked absolutely petrified now. Yasmeen smirked, but only on the inside. "Whatever's the matter?"

"I...I never stopped to calculate how much extra work it'd be maintaining the extra space once it was built! Holy smokes, I can't handle it all by myself! What was I thinking!? What possessed me to figure I could do this!?"

Yasmeen patted her shoulder comfortingly. "There, there, if you can't do it alone, you'll just have to find someone to help you, that's all. You need more people around you. More serving staff."

"More serving staff," Catherine repeated numbly. "You mean waitresses? Wow...this place has always been small enough that I could do everything myself, even at peak hours. I don't even know what it would cost to hire people...it could eat up all my profits after I renovate the fabric shop, and then I'll be in debt! Oh no! What have I gotten myself into!?"

"Hush, dear," Yasmeen said, putting an arm around the distraught girl and steering her back towards the functional part of the pub. "I know a bit about business expenses, maybe I can help you. It seems to me that you need five, maybe six extra helpers to cook the food, wait on tables, clean the rooms upstairs...let's go to your office and have a chat. I may be able to help you." They disappeared behind the bar and nobody heard from them for a long time.

**********

Yasmeen didn't get back to the house until very late, but at least it was under the cover of darkness so she didn't have to creep around as much. The black silk dress she had borrowed from the attic had taken quite a beating, and she felt badly about that. Since morning, she had decided that the dress must once have belonged to a member of the family that was no longer in the house. Quatre had once told her that Relena didn't have a mother, so it logically must have been her dress. Yasmeen vowed that she would clean it, repair it, and apologize to it until her conscience was settled over stealing from the departed.

When she made it to the back door of the house, she saw that all the kitchen lights were on, and that there was some sort of meeting taking place. She knelt carefully by one of the sunken windows to have a look. All the boys were standing in a clump next to the kitchen table, including Wufei, who spent a great deal of his time looking at the floor. Hilde the housemaid was also there, and kept smiling and prodding Wufei in the arm every few seconds. The Chinese boy addressed the others, especially Heero, whose back was turned to the window, but Yasmeen couldn't make out a word he was saying.

After Wufei had finished his short speech, discussion floated around the circle like berries in a bowl of water, complete with conversational hand gestures and shrugs. Finally, Heero spread both hands out in front of him and said something which made Wufei quite surprised. It was a long, drawn-out explanation that kept everyone engrossed, and that ended with Heero extending a hand to Wufei. With a slow smile, Wufei grasped the hand and shook it, cementing their apparent peace accord. Yasmeen sat back against the brick facade of the house and smiled to herself. Things were finally looking up, and everyone's hard work was paying off at last. Haggard and disheveled, she took out her journal and made one last entry to finish off the day's events.

"10:41 pm. I think we're going to be alright."


~~~~~~~~~~

Next, in Episode Fifty-Five: Lord Peacecraft's last will and testament is unsealed and read in front of many witnesses in the offices of Mr. Marlowe, and not one of them know what it has contained all this time. Duo discovers mail-order catalogs. =o_O=

...mail-order catalogs. Yeah. =^-^= Anywho, hiya! Quite a departure from the usual style of episodes, but I hope you enjoyed it! As stated by two of our cast members, the next memorable event will be on July 31st, so I'll see you then! =D Ja ne!