Disclaimer: Don't own Gundam Wing or The Parent Trap.

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The Maxwell Trap

by Dorothy Winner

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Sydney Maxwell was bored.

For the past two hours, Chang Wufei had been over at their house on Preventers business, going through stacks of files and papers with Hilde in her office. Hilde, of course, had confined Sydney inside the house, lest she do something else to Wufei's recently repaired car. Sydney giggled at that; after all, she knew just as much about repairing cars as she knew about sabotaging them…

On the other hand, Sydney had spectacularly crashed Heidi's computer the week before, having somehow completely wiped the entire memory core after attempting to load one too many computer games onto it. Now she couldn't even get so much as a blinking cursor. Figuring that it was something Heidi could probably fix herself, Sydney decided against approaching her mother for help. The rest of Heidi's room wasn't in much better shape either; it looked like a Gundam had gone trampling through it or something. Yep, she had pretty much made a mess of everything, Sydney thought proudly. She had absolutely no intention of cleaning up, however; there were differences between her and her sister that were simply going to remain that way.

However, when it came to Uncle Wu… 'I know!' Sydney thought suddenly. 'I'll make my special Oreos!' Sydney went downstairs and grabbed a package of Oreos from the pantry. She had once done this to her dad… Giggling madly, Sydney opened the package and took out about fifteen of them. One by one, she twisted them open and licked the frosting from the center.

Sydney then went into the bathroom and triumphantly returned with a tube of toothpaste. Working carefully, she squeezed toothpaste onto each Oreo half and sandwiched them back together, creating… well, mint Oreos. She put them all onto one plate and set aside some normal Oreos on another plate for her mom, taking care to remember which was which.

After pouring some milk into two tall glasses, Sydney put everything on a tray and went into her mom's office. "Hey Mom?"

Hilde looked up from a stack of papers she was reading. "Yes, what is it, Heidi?"

"Well, I was thinking you might be hungry after reading all those papers, so I brought you something to snack on." Sydney found a clear space on the desk and set the tray down. "Milk and Oreos; not exactly brain food, I know, but they're just so much fun to dunk."

"Into the milk?" asked Wufei. "Seeing as I'm lactose intolerant…"

"Oh yeah, that's right, I forgot," said Sydney. 'That just means he won't have anything to wash them down with…' "But you can still eat the Oreos. Go on, dig in."

"We could use a little break, Wufei," said Hilde.

Wufei shrugged. "Why not?" Sydney watched in eager anticipation as he reached for a toothpaste Oreo…

The whirring of the fax machine caught everyone's attention just then. Wufei paused, the Oreo halfway to his mouth. "I'd better get that," he said.

"No, no, I'll get it," said Sydney. "You just eat your Oreos…" She went over to the fax machine and watched in dismay as the fax slithered out. It was a detailed sketch of Deathscythe, with a speech bubble saying 'Help! Emergency!!!'

Sydney looked from the fax to her mom and Uncle Wu and back. How was she going to explain this? Thinking quickly, she shuffled the paper in the feed tray and grabbed a blank sheet. "That's strange; it's just a blank piece of paper. Guess the fax didn't go through." She began to make for the door, hiding the fax behind her back. "Um… I gotta go to the bathroom. Yeah. Enjoy your Oreos." She bolted, not even sticking around to see Wufei's reaction to the toothpaste Oreos.

Wufei went back to his papers and took a bite from his Oreo. "Bleaaargh… toothpaste!"

~*~

Sydney ran up to Heidi's room and dialed the operator. "Yes… I'd like to make a collect call to L2, please…"

At the same time, Heidi was pacing back and forth in Sydney's room, anxiously awaiting Sydney's call. She pounced on the vidphone the moment it began to beep. "Hello? Yes, I'll accept the charges…" Sydney's face appeared on the screen. "Sydney! Thank goodness you got my fax! I'm absolutely desperate!"

"What the hell're you doing sending me a fax like that?!" Sydney exclaimed, not bothering to keep her voice down. "Mom would have gotten it if I hadn't happened to be in the room right then!"

"That's the least of our problems!" Heidi's expression was frantic. "Sydney… Dad's getting married!"

Sydney wasn't sure if she was hearing properly. "Say what?!"

"Married! Going to the altar! Tying the knot! Getting hitched!" Heidi cried. "The wedding is in two weeks and—and if we don't do something quick, we're goners," she moaned despairingly.

"Dad's getting married?" Sydney repeated. "How could you let this happen?!"

"Me?!" Heidi exclaimed. "You were the one who refused to help me when I asked you for it!"

"You were supposed to break them up before it got any more serious!"

"Do you think I didn't try?! She's not stupid, you know! Everything I did just made her more determined to marry Dad!!"

Sydney took a deep breath. "Okay. Let's stop playing the blame game here. Mom's going to be busy for the rest of the day so I'll tell her first thing in the morning. What should I say?"

"Well… we can't tell her everything yet," said Heidi. "Tell her about how we switched at camp, but not the part about how we're trying to get her and Dad back together. Absolutely do not tell her that Dad's getting married. Howard and I are still putting a plan together, but I'll call you about when and where we'll all meet."

Sydney raised an eyebrow. "You told Howard?"

"He pretty much figured it out on his own, but don't worry, he's on our side. He says he'll help in any way he can."

"Good ol' Howard," said Sydney. "Well, I guess I should go then; I gotta figure out what to say. Good luck, okay Heidi?"

"Same to you," said Heidi. "Don't worry, everything will be fine."

"Thanks." Sydney smiled, trying to be brave. "Call me soon."

"I will. Give Mom a kiss for me, okay? Bye, Syd." Heidi disconnected and Sydney's screen went black.

Sydney sighed heavily. 'Come on, you knew you had to do this sooner or later…'

To her horror, she heard someone behind her clear their throat. Swallowing fearfully, Sydney slowly turned around to find Wufei standing in the doorway. "H—hi, Uncle Wu… How long have you been standing there?"

"Long enough." Wufei walked into the room and shut the door behind him. "Perhaps you would like to explain to me what is going on here, Maxwell…"

"What—whatever do you mean?" Sydney said nervously.

"Do not play games with me," said Wufei. "You're the twin that's supposed to be living with Duo. It's Sydney, isn't it? Give me one good reason why I shouldn't go back downstairs right now and tell your mother who you are and what you've done."

Sydney thought for a moment. "Because… you know that I should really be the one to do it?"

Wufei blinked. "You don't know how shocking it is to see a Maxwell thinking… Your mother's genes must have some kind of redeeming value after all. All right, I'll agree to keep your secret… Just tell me this. How did the two of you, a pair of eleven-year-olds, manage to dupe everyone all this time?"

"Dumb luck?" said Sydney, shrugging. "Howard's the only one who figured it out, and that's just cuz Heidi wouldn't know her way around a garage if she had a map. Dad's been too busy drooling all over Melanie, and I guess the rest of you weren't paying close enough attention to the signs. Would you have figured it out if you hadn't been eavesdropping?"

"…No," Wufei admitted.

"Really, Uncle Wu, you should be ashamed of yourself; after all, where would Heidi have learned to hotwire a car? Liane must not have told you about all the chaos we caused at camp. You should ask her sometime; it was wild… You know what, it's really thanks to you that Heidi and I met each other at camp; if you hadn't told my mom to send Heidi to camp for crashing your computer, why, none of this could have ever happened. How'd you like the Oreos, by the way? Dad ate three before he figured out what was different about them… Aren't you glad there are two of us? Now Heidi can crash your computer, and I can crash your car… Heidi was right, it is fun to torment you…"

Wufei held up a hand. "Enough, enough. I see you are just as much of a chatterbox as your father…" He walked toward the door and opened it. "Whatever you are planning to do, keep me out of it, okay?"

"Sure thing, Uncle Wu," said Sydney, grinning.

Wufei shook his head and left the room. "Two Maxwells. Nataku help us all."

~*~

Sydney stood in front of her mirror the next morning, trying to decide how to break the news to her mother. "Mom, you won't believe me when I tell you this, but… no, no… Mom, I'm not exactly who you think I am… ugh… Mom, there's something really important you need to know about me… Mom, I haven't been completely honest with you since I came back from camp…" Sydney shook her head. "This isn't working. I guess I'll just have to wing it." She went down the hallway to her mother's bedroom door. It was slightly open; she knocked softly and peeked inside, hesitating to go in.

Hilde was sitting upright in bed, talking on a headset phone and writing on a legal pad. "Yes, Commander Une… I'll have it ready by next week… I'll be sure to tell him… Twenty copies? I'll send them out… Yes ma'am. Goodbye." She took off the headset and looked up. "Good morning, Heidi. Come on in," she said, patting the bed. Sydney crossed the room and climbed in next to Hilde.

Hilde wrote some last few notes on the pad of paper. "I just have to run some papers to the Preventers office, and then we'll have the rest of the day to ourselves." She looked at Sydney, who was nervously twisting her fingers in her lap. "What's wrong? You're not sick, are you?"

"No, I'm fine," said Sydney, feeling far from it. "Mom, can I ask you a question?"

"Sure. Go right ahead," said Hilde.

"Mom, if you found out I'd been keeping a really big, important secret from you, would you be mad at me?"

"Well…" Hilde thought for a moment. "I would think that you wouldn't need to keep secrets from me, so I might be a little upset. But as long as you tell me the truth, I think we could work it out. Why do you ask?"

"Because that's what I'm going to do. Tell you the truth," said Sydney. "But you have to promise to tell me the truth too."

"That's fair," said Hilde.

"Okay." Sydney took a deep breath. "Mom, I met a girl at camp. Her name is Sydney Maxwell."

Hilde's eyes widened. "You… you've met Sydney?"

"Yeah. At first we hated each other's guts, and after we got ourselves into a boatload of trouble we ended up getting confined in a cabin together for four weeks. After a while, we got to talking and… pieces of the puzzle started to fall in place." Sydney paused. "Once we realized we were twins, we decided to… switch places. Heidi had never met Dad and I had never met you… and so here I am."

Hilde's eyes filled up with tears. "Oh my God… Sydney…" She took her daughter into her arms and hugged her tightly. "My beautiful little girl…"

"I just don't understand," said Sydney, "why you kept it from us… why we never knew about each other… why you've been just a face on a picture for most of my life…"

"Oh Sydney…" Hilde gently wiped the tears on Sydney's face. "I never meant to hurt either of you… Your father and I were barely twenty when the two of you were born… we were just so young and confused, and our relationship wasn't working out… It just seemed like the best thing to do at the time… There hasn't been a day when I've looked at Heidi and haven't thought of you. I'm so sorry for separating you and Heidi like this."

"Are you going to have to switch us back?" Sydney asked, looking away.

Hilde sighed. "Legally, you belong to your father and Heidi belongs to me."

"It's just that… I don't want to go back to the way it was before," said Sydney. "Now that I've met you and Heidi, I don't want to live apart from you guys."

"I agree. I've missed out on your life for eleven years and I want to make up for it," said Hilde. "I guess we'll all just have to get together and work something out."

Sydney smiled. "I guess we will."

~*~

TBC…