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-Eight: Transference "Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off the goal." ~Hannah MoreAugust 30th, 1902 There seemed to be an abundance of something at Bridlewood that the residents had not had the joy of experiencing for several weeks, if not months--feeling normal. It was pretty much accepted that nothing in the house would be exactly the same as it was before the war, but they were closer to that state of innocence than they had been for a long time. That is to say, the family felt normal; half the staff, however, felt decidedly strange, and at times, more than a little fearful for the state of the world. Relena, Milliardo, Lucrezia, and Dorothy were all having fairly normal mornings together, nibbling at breakfast in the parlour and having nice, normal discussions about nice, normal things. Milliardo acted far less suspicious of Dorothy than he actually was; he only had his sister's word that the Baroness was trustworthy, and Relena herself was quite a different person now. Opting to give them both the benefit of the doubt, at least for a little while, he waited for a concrete reason to disbelieve them. Partway through their morning meal, Otto entered with a knock, carrying a few bits of mail. "Bank statement, sir," he said blandly, bringing a crisp envelope to Milliardo's side. "Thank you, Otto," said Milliardo, extricating the latest report on their financial situation and glancing over it with satisfaction. He had been most surprised when Relena had agreed with him whole-heartedly that the mystery gold should be saved and invested instead of spent upgrading their lifestyle. Contained in the envelope was confirmation that their portfolio was in order, locked away in a safety deposit box, and that the gold itself was secure in the bank's main vault. "Everything is as it should be," he mused, looking up at his sister. "Are you absolutely sure you don't want to splurge just a little bit? To celebrate?" "Yes, why not?" Dorothy chimed in. "Treat yourself to a full beauty treatment, or a new dress!" Relena smiled, blushed, and swallowed her bite of buttered scone with some surprised difficulty. "It's alright, really. I look just fine the way I am, and I have plenty of dresses." The men looked at each other, bewildered. Otto cleared his throat. "There's also a bill here from the glazier's to cover the damage done to Sutherby House during the last hailstorm." He was about to hand the bill to Milliardo as well, but Relena's hand shot up as she sipped her tea with the other hand. "I'll take that one, Otto." Again, the men stared at each other in confusion. The girl certainly had changed. Otto gave her the envelope obediently and clasped both hands in front of him, turning back to her brother. "There was also a telegram for you, sir. Brigadier Hamilton insists you remain on extended leave for as long as you like." "That's good of the army, isn't it?" Dorothy opined as Otto yanked the bellpull to have the breakfast dishes taken away. Milliardo frowned. "I constantly beg them not to give me any special treatment because of who my father was, but I have a feeling I'm getting it anyway." "Don't be disparaging!" Relena demanded, smiling. "It's been perfectly lovely having you here, and I'll be glad to keep you as long as I can, no matter what the reason." "I must say, it has been a great relief, sir," Otto agreed. "And I'll throw myself in front of the Brigadier's carriage if he tries to take you back too soon," Lucrezia said jokingly, wrapping her arm around his. Milliardo was touched by the sentiment, and tried less than successfully to hide that fact. Just when he thought he was going to have to stand up and make an embarassingly self-indulgent speech to them all, Pegan entered to answer the ring of the bell, followed by Heero. The elderly gentleman had been reinstated as head butler by order of the new man of the house, and Heero had been demoted to deputy, with his pay knocked back to his original grade. Truthfully, Heero didn't mind. He needed to be a little more careful with his money anyway, and the slight decrease in duties would leave more time to organize his new team. "Your newspaper, sir," Pegan announced in his soft, dignified voice, giving the folded sheaf of newsprint to Milliardo while Heero began collecting trays and dishes. "Oh." Relena looked up, acting hard-done-by. "I couldn't possibly...take a quick run through it first, could I?" Milliardo held up the newspaper with surprise. "This?" Relena bounced up out of her plush chair and tripped daintily over to the sofa, where she snatched the paper out of her brother's hands and proceeded to dissect it thoroughly. "I just want the tiniest peek at the world news...and maybe the financial pages...and if I have time, the editorials...open letters...letters to the editor..." The men stared at each other a third time, only now the gazes were twice as odd and twice as many. When Relena was finished tearing out pages for herself, all that was left for her sibling were births, deaths, and the agony column. She handed over the dregs with a sweet smile. "Thank you!" Milliardo turned the page over twice, then cleared his throat at her as she trotted back to her seat. "One page?" Distracted from the front page headlines, Relena turned and looked innocent as could be. "What are you complaining about? You never used to read the papers before..." "Nor did you, dear." Otto leaned down, turning away from the girl, and whispered in the young man's ear. "I should take what you've been given, sir, if you don't want to spark another war." With a sigh, the bedraggled brother leaned back and started reading his ration, unsure even if he would be granted another. Lucrezia looked at his pathetic expression and laughed. "So, Pegan," said Dorothy, demanding some of the attention for herself, "how do you find your young assistant?" Covertly, she threw a mean, catty smile at Heero as he leaned over her side table to stack her dishes onto an already precarious tray. Heero saw the look, and ignored it. "Most efficient, Madam Baroness," Pegan replied with a bow. "And you're back in the private butler's quarters on the main floor? How lovely! A rather luxurious suite for a servant, though, wouldn't you say?" She smirked at Heero again, apparently too lazy to ever find out that he was no longer housed in the dingy, drafty attic. A valiant effort kept Heero from smirking back as he carried the tray away. "I would graciously accept any accommodation offered to me," Pegan said in a kind tone. "It was very good of Miss Relena to keep my old room for me." He turned slightly and bowed a second time, in Relena's direction. "Again, many thanks." A little slow on the uptake because of all the exciting news in the paper, Relena took a few seconds longer than normal to glance up and smile in recognition. Across from her, oddly engrossed in his one measly page, Milliardo grunted and squinted at something halfway down on the right hand side, in the announcements column. He appeared greatly perplexed. "Something the matter?" Lucrezia asked, slipping her feet out of her shoes and tucking them up next to her on the sofa. "Who was that awful brunette woman who used to be over here at every opportunity, to bait mother into an argument about class divisions?" Milliardo asked of the room. Relena slapped down the paper and scowled at him. "You mean Lady Une?" "...yes..." He nodded, in deep thought. "I thought the name looked familiar." "What's she done now?" Relena growled, dreading what top members of the nobility she had lured into her brass and teak dining room for a well-publicized feast. Milliardo leaned away a little to his left as Heero appeared on Lucrezia's right to load up with her dishes. Being of a kind nature, she helped him stack the plates and cups, and made room on his burden for the sugar bowl. Milliardo ignored them. "She hasn't done anything, yet...I was only casually wondering how she knows Uncle Treize." Relena blinked. "Well...yes, I knew they were acquainted..." Milliardo folded his page in half, and half again, putting the pertinent news item on top in plain view. "They're more than acquainted. They're getting married." Almost everyone gasped. Heero, who was nearly at the door, on his way out with the tray of dishes, stopped in his tracks and had a bodily convulsion so violent that his arms shook the mega-tray enough to knock over the sugar bowl and spill part of its contents on the hardwood floor. All eyes snapped to him, startled by the noise, and he turned a bit and side-stepped away, looking at the group in a daze. Milliardo, Lucrezia, and Dorothy forgot him immediately and began chattering amongst themselves in shocked tones, but Relena stared. Her natural anger and confusion at the concept of Lady Une becoming her aunt was overshadowed by the amazing revelation that Heero was even more shaken by the news than she was. Heero was slow to leave, listening intently to the heated conversations about the couple-to-be, but a sharp glare from Otto sent him scurrying from the room, after glaring at Otto with double the ferocity. It all made Relena think, and she thought so hard that she just about sprained her brain trying to understand. Her eyes followed Heero out of the room, narrowing into tiny slits. You know something, don't you? The frantic exchange of ideas was carrying right on without her. Otto and Pegan were both explaining to Lucrezia what sort of scene-stealing, rouge-wearing woman Lady Une was, and Dorothy was muttering quietly but furiously to herself in Italian, wringing two great handfuls of pastel satin in her white-knuckled hands. Relena thought that was very odd, too. If I didn't know better, I'd say Dorothy looked insanely jealous...but how can that be? Could she have been infatuated with Uncle Treize all this time and not told me? "...Relena? .....Relena?" The girl's head whirled back around as her brother's concerned voice cut a swath through the dark jungle of her thoughts to bring her back to attention. "Hm?" "You're awfully quiet. Are you feeling unwell?" "Uh..." She had every right to feel unwell, but it was everyone's reaction to the news that was to blame, so much more than the news itself. Her mind was suddenly a blank, and she sat frozen with her mouth hanging open until Heero returned with a dustpan and hand brush, all ready to sweep up the sugar as slowly as possible to maximize eavesdropping time. Before he got anywhere near the pile of sugar, however, Otto stepped in front of him, snatched the cleaning implements from his hands, and advanced on him, all menacing and bear-like, until he had backed the boy right out the door again. Otto shut the doors in Heero's peeved face and huffed quietly to himself. "...nosy." Relena laughed nervously. "Me? Oh, I'm fine! I'm wonderful! Couldn't be happier for them! Would you excuse me for a moment?" She got up and took her humourless smile around Otto, who had stooped to sweep up the sugar himself, out the door and into the hall, too quick to be stopped by anyone. She paused, to make sure no one tried to follow her and offer some vacant words of useless comfort, and went looking for Heero. He wasn't difficult to find; the clattering and clinking of dishes drew her right to the door of the servants' kitchenette off the dining room. Very, very quietly, she pushed open the swinging door and saw her quarry, spooning out the rest of the tainted sugar from the bowl to the bin with jerky, fitful movements. He appeared much more agitated by the situation than an ordinary butler should have been. Relena wondered if she could make him jump, and coughed lightly. Heero didn't jump, but did manage to glance briefly over his shoulder and go straight back to his work. Relena took a few steps forward, with her hands clasped behind her. "Problem?" she asked dryly. The boy turned around with a pasted-on look of peace and contentment, tapping the rim of the sugar bowl lightly with the spoon. "Not really...after all, we can afford it." "Not the sugar, the engagement," she said sharply, getting right to the point. "I know you didn't get along perfectly with my uncle, but why should you care if he's getting married?" Heero shrugged. "I don't." Relena sneered as he turned away to load the dishes into the dumbwaiter. "Yes you do, you're reeling from it! You can't hide behind your work and pretend it doesn't bother you, everyone can see that it does!" It was a safe bet, in Heero's mind, that 'everyone' had long forgotten his minor display of surprise, although he was rather disappointed in himself for it. "I caught my toe in the fringe on the rug, that's all," he said, lowering the wooden capsule down to the kitchen with the worn rope and pulley system. Once it hit bottom, he turned to leave the kitchenette, but Relena stepped out and blocked his path. "There's something strange going on with my uncle," she began with an eerie kind of calm, "something more than just trying to rob my family, and don't ask why, but I think you know what it is. Now that I'm looking back on it all with a clearer head, it's more than what I just saw you do, it's everything you've done since the day we met. You don't make any sense, Heero. You don't fit." In the time it took to blink twice, Heero assessed the risk levels of the situation and resorted to a well-used technique that had a decent success rate for bamboozling the girl without a lot of fuss. His stern features melted into a divine, heavy-lidded smile, and his voice became softer than a gust of wind too weak to move a feather. "I'm sorry," he purred, crinkling his eyes the tiniest bit to show that he was serious. "I never wanted to upset you. I only reacted to the news when I thought about how devastated you might be...you know I couldn't bear to see you unhappy..." During his quaint little speech, while her eyes were transfixed by his, he reached behind her left hand with his right, lightly touching the inside of her wrist and dragging his fingers slowly and teasingly up the back of her arm as far as the elbow. Unexpectedly, Relena took a giant step back. The charming tricks he once used to bend her to his will were now completely and utterly useless. She was immune. "I don't believe you," she said, "and I may never believe you ever again." With that, she turned and left. Heero felt like he was in a surreal dreamland after that, and paced around the kitchenette with his hands in his pockets for quite some time, wondering whether or not he should care. **********Not long after Relena excused herself from the parlour, Dorothy felt the need to escape as well. Both Treize and Lady Une were supposed to be her business partners, though on totally separate projects, and now Dorothy was getting the distinct feeling of being shut out. Had Treize blabbed to Une about the Peacecraft gold? Had Une squealed to Treize about the Winner tontine? Or had they found an even more profitable venture and decided to cut Dorothy out of the loop? She had to know. She fled the parlour and paced frenetically around the foyer in front of the grand staircase, thinking. I have to find out what they're up to! It must be a sham wedding! Une told me she'd never marry Treize until she was the wealthier of the two! I'll go down to her house in person! ...no, I can't talk to them at the same time or they might find out they were both being double-crossed. I'll send Une a telegram! ...no, Treize might receive it by mistake, and I know how he loves reading other people's correspondence. I'll bribe a stranger to peek in the windows and spy on them! ...no, they both know that trick...I'll use the telephone! I'll telephone the house and whoever picks up the line, that who I'll have it out with first! Yes! Maddened by her own addlepated thought process, she dashed around the corner and sat quickly down next to the Chippendale table in the north hall, leaving loud skid marks under the chair. She picked up the earpiece, smacked its cradle several times, and gave pointed, desperate instructions to the bothersome, tinny voice of the operator. It wasn't long before Dorothy had her answer. "Busy!? How can it be busy!? I'm very important to the people at the other end! I demand that you bump whoever's wasting their time and put me through at once!" The tinny voice blathered in dull, uninterested tones. "All morning!? ...no, I will not try again later! This can't possibly wait! .....well, you're the telephone company, can't you put my call through now and then put the other people back on when I'm finished?" The tinny voice began questioning its years of education just to listen to aristocrats whine. "Well, that's a stupid way to run a telephone service! Let me speak to your manager! I'm a paying customer and I demand satisfaction! You lower-class plebs think you can just walk all over me and.....hello? Hello?" Dorothy looked at the earpiece that had just made the offensive clicking noise in utter appallment. "Oh! Really!" She slammed it back down on the cradle, got up, and stomped all the way upstairs to her luxury suite, throwing herself on the bed in frustration. All of upper-crust London must be calling to congratulate them. They could be tied up for days. Despondently, she reached up behind her head, grabbed one of her baby blue ruffled pillows, and dragged it on top of her face, sighing deeply into it. This is a nightmare... **********It was the third day straight of tiddling, dabbling, drizzling rain, but Quatre wouldn't be dissuaded from going out shopping when it was for something he really, really needed. Having no umbrellas of their own, he and Trowa ventured out and drenched themselves in search of bow rosin. Outdoor duties always seemed to slow down in the rain, so for two whole hours, neither one of them was severely missed. Though they came back sopping wet, they had obtained the priceless little tin of rosin Quatre needed to keep his even more priceless violin in top working order. Even after changing into drier clothes, they still felt soaked, so rather than track two little clouds of humidity into the kitchen, they flopped on their respective beds to await the call to lunch. They stared at the ceiling of their joint bedchamber without uttering a sound for several peaceful minutes. "It's so quiet in here," Trowa remarked. "Yeah," Quatre slurred through an uncharacteristically devilish grin, "ain't it great?" Trowa propped himself up on his elbows and smirked at his companion. "You're not sorry they're gone?" "Of course I am!" Quatre countered. "But still...it was getting crowded in here. I'm not too worried, as long as they're in England they're probably a lot safer than they would be at home." His voice trailed off and he looked to his left, where a broad green leaf sat on the bedside table since being dropped near Hessa as she strolled through a public garden days before. It was another message in code, already beginning to pale and wither, but it still bore the clearly-printed '21' written in blood, symbolizing how many of the Winner siblings were still in the hunt. The death toll was climbing. "None of us should stop living because of what might happen." They only had a moment or two to ponder the bitter realities of existence before a knock came at the door. No longer afraid to welcome visitors into their sparsely populated bedroom, they got up, brushed themselves off a bit, and answered the door. It was Bethany, acting as a messenger. "Madam wants to see you right away, in the drawin' room," she said to Quatre. The blond boy paled. "Uh...which 'madam' was it?" Bethany scowled. "Miss Relena, o'course, who d'you think?" Relieved that he wasn't being summoned by Dorothy, Quatre exhaled sharply, then looked down at his shabby work clothes in despair. "Oh...but I'm in no condition to be upstairs, not wearing this..." "Madam says come as you are, an' no dilly-dallying," the housemaid snapped impatiently. She waited while the boys shrugged uselessly at each other, tapped her foot impatiently while Quatre took off his muddy shoes, and led him upstairs to the drawing room, stocking feet and all. Quatre still felt so unworthy being in the upper part of the house. Despite being brought up for the lifestyle of a prince, playing the part of a lowly servant for the past two years or so had made such an impact on his personality that he didn't know any other way to behave, at least in that house. He knocked very meekly on the drawing room doors and they shifted slightly, apparently having been left unlatched. Swallowing compulsively, he poked just a piece of his head inside. "Miss?" "I'm going to get very cross if you don't start calling me by my name," a sweet, honeysuckle voice said. Quatre squinted. It sounded like Relena, and yet it didn't sound like Relena. He stepped all the way into the room and saw a girl on one of the plush sofas, facing away from him and slightly towards a very small, smouldering fire in the fireplace. The girl looked like Relena, and yet didn't look like Relena. She wore a white lace gown styled for a girl much younger than herself, and her hair was pulled back into a childlike rope of golden silk. As he got closer and snatched a look at her from the side, he saw that she was actually wearing a tiny hint of rouge, and her bangs were fluffed up very artistically. There was even some dark, glittery stuff accentuating her eyelids. The dress and the hair made her appear innocent and frail, but her made-up face made her look about five years older. "You...wanted to see me?" squeaked the gardener. "Come sit next to me," the strange girl invited warmly. Even from four feet away, Quatre could feel that Relena wasn't quite right. He didn't honestly know what made him sit down instead of running a mile in the other direction, but by the time he sank into the squishy velvet fabric it was much too late to do anything about it. He looked over at Relena and smiled as she twirled a lock of hair around her finger, then looked straight ahead, waiting for further instructions. "I suppose you've heard by now...about Uncle Treize..." Quatre had discussed several possibilities with the other boys regarding Treize, and they all flooded his brain at once, but no one concept outweighed any other concept. "No." Relena's shoulders slumped. "He's going to marry Lady Une. You remember her, don't you? She's come by to visit a few times...you've probably seen her in the garden at one of my parties." Oh, I know her alright...but not the way you think. "I think so." He twiddled his thumbs idly. "Does that upset you? Him getting on with his life so quickly after leaving?" Relena sighed suddenly and touched a pale hand to her forehead. "Ohhh...I've been going out of my mind ever since I found out! I just know Uncle Treize is up to something! He won't be satisfied after the way I threw him out! He's somehow going to use this engagement to get back at me!" She shivered and whimpered, choking out a few short sobs and finally tossing her rumpled head on Quatre's shoulder. Quatre could feel a frazzled fog of emotion leaking right through his shirt and waistcoat where her head rested, but it was too much to sort through. He couldn't tell whether she was really upset or being melodramatic, and also felt a growing tension in his own overloaded nervous system at her physical closeness. If Otto caught them in that position, he'd likely have Quatre's head on a proverbial platter. He swallowed and glanced back at the door. "Do you want me to go get Doris or Lucy so you can talk to one of them about this?" he asked. "No...I feel better just talking to you...in fact, I miss talking to you. I just wish..." She laughed lightly and snuggled up a little closer, kicking her feet up on the unused portion of the sofa. "Oh, never mind, it's so silly." The snuggling part was making Quatre more than a little uncomfortable, and desperate for a distraction, he pressed her for more information. "No, go ahead. What were you going to say?" Relena licked her lips and stared straight into the fire. "I wish I knew what else could be happening in this house that my uncle could use against us, and I mean 'us,' because you're just like family to me. You know that, don't you?" Quatre mumbled in the affirmative and looked at the ceiling. "And because we're like family, it's doubly important that we look out for each other, I think. I mean, if I ever heard about something that could be bad for you, I'd tell you about it right away, because I want what's best for you. See what I mean?" "...I suppose..." Very unexpectedly, Relena reached across Quatre's lap, grabbed his farthest hand, and sat their hands together on his knee, closely interlocked with her thumb gently stroking the backs of his fingers. Quatre squirmed. "Um..." "There's something going on here," she cooed in her highest, meekest, most pitiable voice, "and I'm terrified that it's something my uncle can take advantage of! Heero's involved too, I can sense it somehow, and since you two talk once in a while, I wondered if he might have said something, anything that might give me some clue about what to expect. It may be nothing, but I just don't know! Can't you see how awful it is for me, having to wait for the axe to fall and not even being able to guess where it's going to hit?" "N-no! I mean...yes! I mean...I don't know! Why are you asking me!?" Relena sat up and pressed herself against him, dragging her hand up the back of his arm all the way to his shoulder and stopping there, clinging to him like a lifeboat in a torrential sea. "I'm asking you because I know you will tell me the truth! You've never, ever lied to me, and there's so few people left in my life who can say the same! So just do this one tiny thing for me...if it's nothing, I won't worry about it, but I just want to know what it is that Heero's involved in! Does it have anything to do with Uncle Treize, or the way he manipulated me? Please tell me! Even if you're involved too, I won't be angry with you, I promise!" As a grand culmination of her speech, she fluttered the hand she kept on his shoulder, pulling it around the side of his neck and down the front of his shirt. That was all he could stand. Quatre leapt off the sofa, nearly tipping Relena over onto the floor in the process, tugging the two halves of his waistcoat together in a subconscious attempt to hide his form. "I have to go!" he yelped apologetically, backing up into a chair and yelping again. "I've got a...a very sick ficus plant in the conservatory that needs attention right away!" Relena perched right on the edge of the sofa and swivelled at the waist to watch him leave, panting and sweating and wiping the palms of his hands on his trouser legs. When he was gone, she sat back, folded her arms and thought. As far as she could tell, she made all the right moves...so...why didn't it work? It's possible he really doesn't know anything, but I think he does. He can't spend as much time with Heero as he does and not know what he's really doing here. Maybe I should have practised in front of the mirror more... **********"No one in the stairwell," Duo said from the foot of the servants' stairs. "No one in the back yard," Trowa said from the back door. "No one in our room," Quatre said from his bedchamber door. "No one in the pantry or the scullery," Wufei said from beside a sack of flour. Heero nodded and pointed open-handedly to the kitchen table. "At ease." Long after cleaning up from lunch, the five of them all took a seat around the heavy wooden slab to discuss the problem of the day, Treize's sudden sense of romanticism. Trowa couldn't help but notice that Quatre was acting rather edgy and nervous, but there wasn't time to ask why. The meeting had already started. "Now then," Heero began with a professional tone, folding his hands on the table, "the first order of business is to determine whether or not the Count's upcoming marriage could possibly pose a threat to--" "Excuse me, Mr...Chairman, or whatever," Trowa said, dipping his hand meekly up in the air, "but aren't we supposed to start every meeting with old business? If that's true, then the old business of finding a better place than the kitchen to hold our meetings hasn't been addressed yet." "I thought every meeting started with the reading of the minutes from the last meeting," Quatre added. "We didn't take any minutes at the last meeting," said Wufei. Trowa put his hand back down. "Well, even so, finding a new meeting place is old business, and Treize and Lady Une are new business, and old business always comes before new business." "The longer we spend trying to figure out which is which, the longer it'll take to actually do anything," Duo snapped. "You wanna keep looking over your shoulder every time we have to discuss something?" Trowa shot back, folding his arms. "We can't make any decent decisions here if we're worried about getting caught!" "We could've made ten decisions by now if we'd just decide already instead of--OW!" Duo stopped short of a full-blown argument to twitch in pain and reach a hand down to massage his injured shin. He glared angrily at Wufei, who sat closest. "Point of order! Kicking an advocate under the table is against the rules!" Wufei smirked. "Sorry, I was forced into a quick decision and made an error in judgement." Heero rubbed his eyes and sighed, a gesture that went unnoticed as the other four began to bicker and squabble like children. Eventually, they noticed the bored, tired look on Heero's face and sheepishly came to order once again, waiting for his instruction. "Are you through?" They all nodded. "But we still need a new meeting place," Trowa said in a tiny voice. Heero rolled his eyes. "Agreed. Proposals for a new meeting place?" The five looked at each other with a questioning glance that made two full circles around the table before Duo put up a roadblock to stop it. "How about the Muddy Nag? We all know where it is, it's got high-walled booths to sit in, and we've got a room there to stash stuff in." Heero nodded thoughtfully. "Any other suggestions?" None came. "All in favour?" His, Duo's, and Wufei's hands all went up, leaving the butler somewhat confused. "Opposed?" Trowa and Quatre looked very briefly and furtively at each other as they raised their hands. There was something odd about the way they seemed to exchange a thought without speaking. "Alright, then you two pick a place," Duo huffed. "Well...we don't know any other places, really," Quatre admitted. "They why the objection?" Heero asked. "It's not that we don't like the pub, it's just..." Trowa ran a hand through his bangs, wondering how to avoid saying what he meant to say. "It wouldn't be my first choice." "Or mine," Quatre agreed. "It would seem to be immaterial, seeing as how you've already been outvoted," Wufei pointed out. Trowa and Quatre slumped. Even though its discovery was now inevitable, neither could bring themselves to tell the rest of the group why it might not be the best thing to congregate in that particular pub. Seeming satisfied that the vote was legal, Heero moved on to the new business. "As to the Count and Lady Une...would their legal union be counterproductive to our goals?" "I don't see that it would make much difference," Duo said. "Could be they're just getting married to be married. Most of us have seen them together here and there, right? They're a pretty cozy couple." "But Lady Une is very rich, even more so than Relena," Quatre added. "If the two of them pooled their resources, maybe Treize would have enough money to join Jeffrhyss' club after all." "That's if she would just hand over all her wealth to him," said Wufei. "Or...if she had a sudden 'accident' that left him as her sole beneficiary. Anyone know if this woman has substantial life insurance?" "The rules say Treize has to have fluid assets equal to the average wealth of Jeffrhyss and the other three, right?" Trowa asked. "We need to know how much that is, don't we? Even if we had Treize's account number right in front of us, we'd still be guessing blindly at whether or not it would be enough." Heero looked to his left. "Mr. Secretary?" Duo's hand flew up in a salute. "Yessir!" "Official documents for the Cinq Association, please." "Right!" Duo got up and walked over to a cupboard a few doors down from the oven. Crouching down and opening it, he was faced with four large canisters with air-tight clamp-down lids, each with a newly-printed label. From left to right, they read 'Salt Pork,' 'Wheat Germ,' 'Dried Prunes,' and 'Cod Liver Oil.' He looked back up at the group. "What category?" "Financial." Duo's hand landed on the canister marked 'Wheat Germ' and carted it to the table, kicking the cupboard door closed along the way. He unclamped the lid and poured out the contents onto the tabletop, a thick, rolled-up stack of papers that had come out of the Egyptian puzzle box in Giorgenson's office. Duo slapped the empty canister shut and patted it on the lid. "Safest place in the whole house." Quatre tapped his nervous little fingers on the table. "Duo, what if someone wants some wheat germ on their cereal?" Everyone stared at Quatre. "Alright, what if I want some wheat germ on my cereal?" Duo perched a hand on his hip. "Then you can go wear out your own shoe leather to get some, and you can keep it in your own room, because I'm not having anything that looks like sawdust and smells like a squirrel's nest in my kitchen!" Before another argument could take root, Heero instructed them all to sift through the paperwork looking for any figure resembling what might be the average wealth of four-fifths of the organization, but to their dismay, they found everything but. Without knowing what Jeffrhyss and the others were worth, they had no way of knowing whether the happy couple's combined net value would be sufficient, and without knowing that, they didn't know whether to stop the wedding or bring their smiling faces to the reception afterwards. The meeting ended in something of a stalemate, and the only conclusion the group could arrive at was that they needed more information, and possibly a plan as well. **********Up in one of the games rooms, with the doors locked and firmly barricaded, Relena vented her frustrations on the hated page of the newspaper bearing the equally-hated news of Treize and Lady Une's upcoming nuptials. She had ripped the announcement right out of the page, stapled it to the dartboard, and had been furiously throwing darts at it for the last hour. With each dart she threw, she tried vainly to slide a piece of the extraordinary puzzle before her into place, squeezing new thoughts in between the sharp, wooden sounds of the metal spikes hitting the black and red circle on the wall. *thok*...I'm getting tired of being treated like a child who can't bear to hear the truth...*thok*...Heero won't tell me what's going on...*thok*...Quatre won't tell me what's going on...*thok*...I can't run to Milliardo because he just got here, and doesn't know the half of what's happened in this house yet...*thok*...I can't go to Otto because he'll tell Milliardo everything we talk about, and he'll just take over whatever I'm trying to do...*thok* She ran out of darts quickly, but had plenty of angry thoughts left over. Yet again, she stomped up to the dartboard, mounted on a large piece of cork painted a once-attractive green, and snatched the darts back for another set of throws. Her aim was actually improving, and that time she hit the dartboard six times instead of the cork. *thok*...Who else can I try to weasel information out of? ...*thok*...Bethany was making goo-goo eyes at Trowa for months after his arrival and he barely even noticed. She eventually gave up...*thok*...so I probably wouldn't have much luck there. Duo...hah! *thok*...I'm not even going to waste my efforts on him, especially if Heero's up to something suspicious. He'll just protect him...*thok* Hanging onto her last dart, she scrunched up her eyebrows in thought and paced around the room. And the four of them must still think they've fooled me about Wufei. I know he's here, I've seen him from the third-floor window using Daddy's birdwatching binoculars. He's hiding out with old Mr. Dunnet. He's no interior decorator, then. Relena paused and smiled. Well...not a previously-established decorator, at worst. He has the best taste out of anyone I've ever met...but all signs point to the theory that he's up to something suspicious too. She ran her thumb lightly over the point of the dart, thinking about her earlier encounters with the men of the household that day. Maybe...maybe Wufei would respond a little more easily. I know so little about him, so there's no reason to assume he wouldn't...and if he knows anything at all about Heero or Treize, I'm sure I can find a way to squeeze it out of him. After all, I've had the best possible teacher. She ran a hand through her fluffed-up bangs, pulled her other hand back, and hurled the last dart at the dartboard, skewering the scrap of newsprint squarely in the middle--a perfect bullseye. Relena folded her arms and stared at the board with eyes of steel, looking forward to her next opportunity to use everything Heero had unknowingly taught her. |
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| Next, in Episode Fifty-Nine: The Regents Park Irregulars try out their new meeting place at the Muddy Nag, which, coincidentally enough, is celebrating its grand re-opening, with some newly-acquired staff members. Relena confronts Wufei with unexpected results. |
*looks at Relena, bug-eyed with fear* =O.O= I've created a monster! Or rather, Heero's created a monster...or if you wanna take it a step further, Jeffrhyss made two monsters for the price of one...sheesh! Somebody better stop this girl before she turns into a junior Scarlett O'Hara clone! *ahem* Anywho, next eppy will be Sept. 9th, because next Friday is too soon for me, and I'm tied up all that weekend. Plus, I don't want to delay it any more than that because of the expected ceremonies and stuff that'll be happening on tv all week. The Baby Boomers all remember where they were when Kennedy was shot, and well...our generation has 9/11. 'Nuff said.