Disclaimer: is in the first chapter. And if you've come this far thinking that I own GW - I laugh at you.

Kuroi-chan's disclaimer: The nickname 'Sagi-chan is copyrighted to Kuroi. Any other who uses it will be mocked, laughed at, and will ultimately suffer at the hands of her vengeful and depressing wrath. That, and she'll nag me into yelling at you.
Saaski-chan's disclaimer: The nickname Leeni-chan is copyrighted to Saaski. Use it and die.

AN [slowly moves back into the light]. And after over a month... chapter six arrives [cowers in fear of the wrath of angry readers]. Not only is this chapter extremely late, but it's also rather short. Not much happens in it, because it's really only a filler chapter for what's to come. Sorry. And as of right now... I have no excuses. Except for the fact that I suddenly and randomly tripped into the Naruto world where I had a brief stay. But I've extracted myself and tripped my way back into the Gundam universe. I hope you all are happy.

Chapter 6

Trowa walked into his second period class, holding his flute loosely but firmly in his hands. The fact that he was the only male flute player somehow managed to elude him for the past four years, but it's not like he cared anyway. Gender rules and restrictions had never bothered him and he was very good at his chosen instrument.

"Trowa!"

With an imperceptible wince, said changeling turned to see his rather creepy and possessive stalker waving at him from her seat towards the end of the flute section. The fact that Catherine was really bad at her chosen instrument seemed to elude her for the past four years as well, something that the girl actually managed to work towards her advantage, and thus, against Trowa.

Trowa was probably the only one of the five friends that couldn't stand his stalker. It wasn't the fact that it was Catherine Bloom that stalked him - it was the fact that she tried so hard to impress him. But the fact that she had the most obvious crush - which she denied - and called him at least twice a day. Lucky for Trowa, his mother didn't answer the phone and he was rarely home at a decent hour.

Before he could begin trudging his way - and such a long trudge it would be - over towards Catherine, and be engaged in the inevitable before class discussion about people lower on the social ladder, Quatre appeared before him with a worried expression plastered on his face.

"Do you know what's wrong with Duo?" The small blond telepath asked worriedly in a low voice. "He's broadcasting a lot of sadness this morning..." Said boy then turned his unbeatable pleading blue eyes towards his friend. Those eyes set off warning bells in Trowa's mind. 'Warning: Quatre wants something!' "Could you go check on him? He's not answering me."

Well, that was a great thing to ask. Ditch class to check on Duo and thus be forced to face the wrath of the teacher and quite possibly the principle. Not a pleasant thought. On the other hand, if he skipped class, he could avoid Catherine until the end of the day, maybe until tomorrow.

Yeah, like that was a difficult decision.

"He's on the roof," Quatre supplied with a faint smile.

Without a moment's hesitation Trowa bee-lined towards the band teacher, one hand clamped against his stomach in a pretty bad attempt at an "I'm suddenly and randomly feeling sick to my stomach" act. After a few brief words, the tall boy slipped out of the room bearing a hall pass. He nodded towards Quatre, who nodded back with a triumphant smile.

Trowa moved in to the instrument storage room and quickly put away his flute before hurrying towards the roof. Upon reaching said place, he checked to make sure nobody was present before transforming himself into a cat and walking slowly towards his friend.

Duo barely acknowledged his presence. After a brief: "Hey, Tro." he remained silent and staring into the distance over the school wall.

Trowa sighed as best he could, considering the fact that he was still a cat. His little shoulders hunched in what could be perceived as a slump. It was moments like these that Quatre's telepathy would be more useful than his changeling abilities.

"I thought it was the boyfriend's job to provide comfort." Duo finally mused to himself in a failed attempt at dry humor.

Then again, Trowa thought, as one of Duo's hands began rubbing his back; there were a few plusses to his own mutant abilities. He purred, unconsciously arching his body towards that comfort giving hand. Whether he was Heero or not, he knew that Duo would appreciate somebody coming to check on him.

Wait - wasn't he supposed to be giving Duo comfort, and not the other way around? Oops.

"Hee-chan would kill us for this, ne?" Duo said with a half-hearted smile.

"..."

"Did Q send you?" Duo asked, still staring into some unknown distance.

Trowa refrained from answering. Because of two reasons, really. One, his current vocal chords didn't allow it - as he was a cat - and two, Duo already knew the answer to his question.

"It's... nice that he's so worried about me," Duo murmured finally, looking down at the cat currently resting in his lap. "I guess. But he doesn't need to worry - I'm fine."

One of Trowa's furry ears twitched as the door to the roof opened and closed in a loud bang. He hissed slightly at the sound but otherwise didn't move in favor of Duo continuing to rub his back. It was nice that the boy had his priorities straight, at least.

"Duo?"

"Hm?"

The long haired boy looked up with a rather surprised look. Not surprise that somebody was skipping class to come to the roof, but surprise that somebody who wasn't one of his closest friends was skipping class to come and see him. His gaze landed on Hilde, the nice girl turned punk. But, she wasn't looking all that punk - in fact, was that a hint of color she was wearing?

"Hey, Hilde."

The girl twisted her hands together nervously in an attempt to pluck up enough courage for her next words. "...Can I sit down?"

Duo glanced down at the empty space next to him before glancing back up at the girl standing in front of him. "Sure, whatever."

Hilde winced and nodded before sitting down. Silence resumed as the poor girl tried to regain her courage. For some reason, there was something about Duo that just racked her nerves. Some hidden charm that disarmed all of her highly built walls and sent them crumbling faster than she could ever hope to rebuild them. And even though she knew that he was taken, even though she had already felt his rejection, she couldn't help but fall for that charm.

"Duo," she finally said quietly staring down at her knees, forcing Duo to lean closer in order to hear her properly. "I wanted to tell you that... I didn't tell anybody about you being gay." Her gaze remained focused on the hem of her pants. "And I'm sorry that I couldn't keep it a secret for you."

"I'm not gay."

"Huh?"

"Mrow?"

Duo smiled at that and stood up with a little jump. "I'm bisexual." Trowa's claws weren't enough to keep his feline self from falling and he tumbled gracelessly to the roof top at Duo's proud statement. The small cat looked up at his long haired friend with a low hiss of anger.

"Oops." Duo said sheepishly, bending down and taking a firm hold around Trowa's waist. Cat in hand, the long haired teen turned towards the still seated girl. "I know you didn't say anything, Hilde." He threw a blinding smile towards her and received a rather weak grin in return.

"Shall I walk the lady back to class?"

"Duo... we have the same second period."

"Is that a 'no'?"

"And... are cats actually allowed on school campus?"

"Eto..."

"Mrow?"

Trowa wiggled slightly and freed himself from Duo's grip. Landing on the roof with more grace than he had previously, he slowly made his way back to his own second period, leaving Duo and Hilde's odd conversation behind him.

"He's fine," The unibanged changeling reported to Quatre upon returning to the band room in his human form. The blond beamed at him in thanks.

And finally, unfortunately, Trowa had to sit down and endure the waving and screeching voice of Catherine.

===

"Father, I'm worried about Duo."

Sister Helen walked into the church office and sat down in one of the seats usually reserved for potential parents. Sitting across from her, Father Maxwell set down the papers he had been reading over and removed his reading glasses in order to properly focus on the nun in front of him. Seeing her worried expression, he sighed and lifted one hand to rub his temple.

"He's been so quiet lately! And distant, even to Angel. I'm sure that he's hiding something big from me, and I'm scared that he's doing something wrong. Even the children have realized that something is off about him and they've-"

Father Maxwell held up one hand, stopping the flow of words spilling from the nun's mouth. "Firstly," he said with a definitely parental gleam in his eyes. "I'm sure that Duo has done nothing wrong. He promised to us a long time ago to stay out of that kind of trouble."

Sister Helen looked down, immediately ashamed that she had thought the long haired orphan would do anything of the sort.

"Sister," Father Maxwell said, his eyes gentling. "I know that it's hard and that Duo has been with us for a long time, but he will come to us if he needs our help. There is nothing we can do to force him to tell us his problems."

There was a pause while Sister Helen wished desperately for the power to be able to turn back time to when Duo was still a small child. He was growing up too fast for his own good and it was scaring her.

"There's something else," Father Maxwell said, perching his glasses back on his nose and picking up the papers he had been reading before the nun had entered the room.

Sister Helen blinked, instantly recognizing the papers. "That's Duo's information," she said, standing up and moving so that she could look at the papers better. "Why do you have that out?"

"That's just the thing," the elderly priest said, rustling the papers irritably. "A man came to me a few days after the Open House; he asked if there were any teens here. He said that he his most beloved grandchild had just died of cancer and he was looking to see if there were any teens here that he could look after. I don't think he wanted to adopt anybody, but be more of a "friendly guardian". So, I told him about Duo and he got very excited..."

"Father, you're making no sense."

Father Maxwell sighed. "I'm know that I shouldn't be acting like this - I'm just a temporary guardian for these kids, but I can't help but think that having a man like that in their lives wouldn't been a good thing. He seemed... odd. Or insincere. And I can't keep him away from Duo, or any of the kids, but Duo's been acting so strange lately..."

"You think that he's already been talking to him?" Sister Helen asked.

Father Maxwell sighed; his posture slumping back into something that would undoubtedly hurt his back later on. He just didn't know anymore. He had never had a kid in the orphanage as long as Duo had been with them. He had never had a kid likely to turn eighteen... all of them had been given homes before the age of ten. But Duo - didn't seem to want a home. He wanted to stay in the orphanage. Despite the teasing he must have endured through school, despite all of the kids around him who complained about having parents who cared too much. He didn't know how to help Duo anymore. And as for the problem with the old man, Dr. G Gersbad, he thought the name to be, he couldn't do anything to stop the man from talking to Duo.

He could only hope that nothing negative came from the outcome.

===

Heero arrived last in field one for lunch that day, throwing a rather jealous looking glare towards Trowa as he sat down next to Duo. Trowa smirked at him, knowing the exact reason that his friend was looking at him like that. Heero scowled, his blue eyes smoldering, and placed a rather possessive arm around Duo's shoulders.

Trowa continued smirking.

Heero continued glaring.

Quatre and Wufei failed in holding back their laughter.

Duo just sighed.

"I see you heard about second period," Duo muttered, eyeing the arm wrapped around his shoulders.

Heero sent another dirty look towards Trowa.

"Gods! It's not like we did anything!" Duo continued, ignoring the electricity crackling between his two friends. "Catherine already has her claws embedded in Trowa's flesh, remember?"

Trowa shuddered; Heero smirked and finally removed his arm from Duo's shoulders. "Hn."

The "tension" evaporated and the five began eating their lunches in relative silence. Until, of course, Quatre began begging for food.

"On no you don't!" Duo said, smacking the blond's hands away from his lunch. "If you're so hungry, you need to start bringing more food for yourself. Wufei almost collapsed yesterday because you stole his lunch again!" Violet orbs darted quickly to check over his friend's health before continuing. "He's finally started teleporting more and he needs all the energy he can get! DO YOU KNOW HOW LONG I'VE WAITED FOR THIS TO HAPPEN?!"

That last part had Quatre staring at his Chinese friend with a look akin to guilt, while said friend hid his face with his hand in an attempt to pretend that Duo hadn't just screamed that last part out loud. It was true that Wufei didn't teleport all that often, and hadn't ever since he first discovered that he could. At first he had claimed that it was too hard, then it was too tiring, and the boy finally decided that he just didn't like it all that much. Duo had protested to that, saying that Wufei had been born with it, so it was a part of him. Duo had also claimed that one couldn't hate such a large part of themselves - but Wufei had stayed firm in his decision. The fact that the oriental boy was finally embracing the fact that – hey – being able to teleport is actually kind of cool, was heaven to Duo - who loved to teleport as well.

"I'll start bringing three lunches then!" Quatre decided after getting over his slightly guilt trip at causing Wufei problems with his gift. "Two for me and an extra for Wufei."

The other four blinked, not comprehending the blond's logic. But they knew better then to question him, so they left Quatre to feel as though he were doing yet another wonderful thing in order to help others. And Wufei's face slowly broke into an amazed yet satisfactory smirk.

"Because we're now talking about random subjects..." Trowa said, breaking the silence. "Who's up for a camping trip? Or, a sort of camping trip. My uncle said that we could borrow his lake cabin this weekend."

The was a brief pause.

"YATTA!" Duo screamed, jumping up and thrusting one fist into the air.

And that alone seemed to decide for all of them, because the rest of the lunch period was spent planning out their weekend trip to the lake.

AN Please review. I'll attempt to update faster. (But I don't promise anything.)