Hey-o, and welcome to my Lil' World of Weirdness!!
I state for the record that I don't own Gundam Wing, or the wonderful characters that will be gracing this story. This story is dedicated to my ever wonderful Beta-reader, the Bluegoo, my new beta reader, Clow'd9, and to everyone who helped me out, or wrote to me, reviewed me to tell me to come back during my various stages of depression!
Okay, that's the legal stuff out the way!!
Thinking
"Speaking"
Stress/Emphasis
PlayTime
By Doctor Megalomania
Okay, so this is a series of little ficlets, there's no time line, no real point, nothing that links them, except for the fact they all came to me during various times when I was messing about with my mates . . . yes, I do still like to play with my friends, I am a child at heart and hope to forever remain so! Please R&R!! Oh, and you have to guess which point of view it's from, since it's one pilot's POV about another!
Zero Three: Control Freak
Click
"--ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHH—"
Click
"--Why you!! How dare you—"
Click
"--Well, I just came on here to tell all of you that I'm really . . . a man—"
Click
"-- Rocky! Brad! Janet!! Doctor Scott—"
Click
"-- I fear no man." "Oooooh! That's a lot coming from a man who wears a basket on his head—"
Click
"-- And IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII-iiii-IIIIIIIIIII Wiiiiiilll Allllways Loooooove YooooooOOOOOOOooU, Will Always—"
Click
"-- Can I phone a friend?—"
Click
"--Pukka! Now for the sauce!—"
Click
"-- Do you expect me to talk?" ". . . No, Mister Bond . . . I expect you to DIE!!—"
Click
"--Space . . . the final frontier . . . these are the voyages of—"
Click
"--Well, Kyle's mom is a bitch, she a big fat bitch, she's the biggest bitch in the whole wide world, she's a stupid bitch, everyday she's a bitch, she's a bitch to all the boys and girls—"
He snickered. Click
"--And for only forty-nine, ninety-nine, this will all be yours—"
Click
I hate it when Quatre and Trowa have a spat.
Click
"--There are no cats in America! And the streets are paved with Cheese! There are no—"
Click
No seriously, worse than when Duo is back from his mission and he's too injured to play with his models. Quatre is up on the fifth floor, and I'm stuck with Trowa. You'd think he'd be really quiet. But no . . . I mean, technically he is . . . but Trowa has this ability to bend the noise around him to fill the void.
Click
"--And God says, God says to phone this line to be saved! I know, yes sir, I know you've been told this all before but this new kinda of—"
Click
I don't know what he did to get Quatre so irked at him, but . . . I sighed and paused in my report typing. Even with headphones on the muted undertones of Trowa channel hopping just filtered through.
"Trowa. . .?"
Click
"-- Transformers, Robots in disguise—"
Click
He gave a deep sigh. A dark green eye deigned to swivel in my direction. He blinked once, his motion to me to speak now or forever hold my peace. I pushed away from my laptop and walked passed Duo's model shelf. A small paper dragon had appeared there recently, and I was left wondering what kind of truce Wufei and Duo had recently come to. I shrugged it off, making a note to ask Duo about it later.
Click
"--Frankly my dear . . . I don't give a damn!—"
Click
Trowa's gaze slipped off me and returned to the TV. I swallowed; he was as pissed off as Quatre. Not that I knew how pissed off Quatre was, but if you looked at one, generally the other was in the same level of disgruntled-postal-worker-ness.
Click
"--Mother . . . no, mother . . . oh god, mother! The blood, the blood!—"
Click
"--Teletubbies! Teletubbies, say hell-lo!—"
I stared at him for a moment longer before sinking into the giant beanbag Duo seemed to make magically appear every time we moved to a new safehouse.
"Trowa." I began, "Look; you know I'm not good—"
Click
"--Look . . . don't think I don't understand . . . I do . . . really, I do. It's just . . . I don't care!—"
Click
"Trowa!"
He glanced at me, his postal-worker-about-to-go-postal-a-metre notching one strike closer to him disappearing on us and running away to the circus . . . after he'd wreaked some sort of destruction on us.
Never on Quatre's property, no as that would just get him even further in trouble.
Just on US. The other pilots. Last time they had a fight, Duo found his chocolate double chocolate chip cookie ice cream MINUS the chocolate chips. Yes, Trowa is that spiteful when he puts his mind to it.
He stared at me, getting more and more angry by the second.
Click
-- "Oh, please Mister Frodo!! Don't let him turn me into anything . . . unnatural . . ."—
Click
I had to act fast.
I had cherry bakewells stashed in my cupboard and the cherries are my favourite bit.
No way in hell am I eating a cherry bakewell without a cherry sitting primly in the middle of the inch thick icing. That's just . . . wrong!
"Go apologise to him."
"To who?" Trowa raised the remote control and switched the channel again.
Click
"--That would be the French. . . Latin based o'course . . . Inventers of Mayonnaise—"
Click
"To you know who."
"What? Are we playing a game now?" Trowa muttered darkly. I could almost hear my cherries shaking with fear. "Can I play? How about you get you know what, coat it liberally with some you know what else, stick it up you know where and twirl on it like you know how?"
I had a secure lock on Wing, I could just hide my cherry bakewells there. . . although . . . that would leave them open to attack from Duo . . . hmm. . .
Click
"-- Then why don't you just say it, damnit it! Why don't you just say you were wrong?!—"
Click
Duo eating them all, or Trowa stealing the cherries. . .?
"Trowa. . ." I leant forward and clasped my hands, "I'm telling you that you should listen to your emotions. . ."
"And if my emotions are telling me right now to sit here and flick channels all day and all night what do I do then?"
I wanted to slap my forehead, but I didn't want to give him the satisfaction. "Trowa. . . look past the emotions that are bad, and think about the ones which you care for Quatre with. . ."
He blinked and looked at me, actually turned his head and squinted at me.
What?
I was desperate. I've not had cherry bakewells for ages, and it's the one treat that Relena DOESN'T know I love. . . Christmas Time, right? I made a vaguely pleasant sounding 'Hn' when Duo fed me some eggnog he'd cobbled together. Next thing I knew, Relena was having fancy French-style, the most expensive kind known to mankind, eggnog trucked – yes, Trucked, she bought a whole truckload – to the Christmas place we were staying at.
Has the girl not heard of subtly?
Did she not realise that I didn't try the official eggnog on serving?
Perhaps she missed the fact that Duo's eggnog was almost seventy percent alcohol, and had Duo's Special Touch.
Oh, I know what she didn't get!
The fact Duo had leapt into my lap and, quite drunkenly, spoon-fed me with this eggnog.
Click
"--This film is rated R, for scenes of a sexual or possibly violent nature—"
Click
Back to Trowa.
He was still squinting at me, trying to figure out where this kinder, gentler Heero had come from.
"Why is it so important to you?" He asks, his uncanny ability to hit the nail in the head comes into play and I have to improvise.
"I don't what this unwarranted tension between you affecting your overall ability to perform on the battlefield. It's a security risk and if you do not resolve it . . ." I nod, all the time in my mind I keep getting this mental picture of two little versions of me, one with angel wings and the other with devil wings. The Angel-Heero was nodding majestically, occasionally muttering something about the Mission. The Devil-Heero – who oddly sounded a lot like Duo – just kept running in little circles, chanting about cherry bakewells.
Click
"--That boy's got a one-track mind, Myrtle—"
Click
Sue me.
I'm single minded.
Trowa stared at me as I lay out my threat.
". . . if you cannot resolve it, I will not hesitate to eliminate one of you."
And most likely . . . the little devil in my mind growled, that will be you, Trowa . . . yes you, he who would desiccate MY cherry bakewells.
"Oh . . . I get it . . ." Trowa flicked the channel. "You're worried about your cherries."
Click
"--It's a lie, a dirty lie boss! Don't rub me out, boss! I'm beggin' yer boss!—"
Click
I blinked. Trowa's psychic, must be. I grit my teeth, "No . . . I'm worried about two of my friends, who are so close to each other and have never had a reason to fight, who adore each other!"
"And would these friends happen to be both very small, sweet, red, glacier, and sitting perfectly in the centre of half an inch of icing?"
"Yes." He smirked. The TV clicked. I jerked, "NO!! I mean you and Quatre!"
Click
"--Pinky . . . Are you thinking what I'm thinking?—"
Click
He glanced at me again, "There's nothing wrong between us . . . your cherries are safe . . ." He didn't need to say it, but I still heard it like he'd hollered it. '. . . for now'. Even his hair seemed to cackle evilly. I pursed my lips.
"Trowa."
No, I was not going to let it go. Cherries aside, Trowa was one of my best friends, Quatre was another. To see them hurtin—Damnit! My cherry bakewells are at stake!
"Just go apologise to him."
"Why should I apologise? It wasn't my fault!"
Click
"--OOOOOOOoooooooooooooooooooHHHHH!! JERRY! JERRY! JERRY!---"
Click
"Well, whose fault is it?"
He was silent.
I'll take that as a big fat, OKAY IT'S MY FAULT!
"Trowa. . ."
Click
"--Scully. . . the truth . . . the truth is out there. . . we just need to keep reaching for it. . .—"
Click
"Stop flicking the channels. Go upstairs. Find Quatre and apologise to him." I gritted my teeth as he raised the remote again, "Will it kill you to just go to him?"
"Possibly, last time I saw him he had a definite ZERO system look in his eye. I've been blown to smithereens once before." He pressed the button down hard, and the channel jumped again, "Not again, thank you very muchly!"
Click
"--I've got a nine letter word . . . Frustrate. As in to frustrate the hopes of someone. . . –"
Click
I wanted to bang my head against the wall. Why wasn't Wufei here? Or Duo, even Duo could word things so Trowa would have no choice but to go upstairs and apologise to Quatre! Not that anyone would understand him, sometimes that boy just speaks way to fast, but at least the key words would stand out, Trowa would leave just to Duo to shut up and I would be able to return to my cherry –uh, my report with the satisfaction that Trowa wouldn't be able to touch my cherry bakewells.
Click
"--Mary-ann . . . I just . . . I just want to tell you that I . . . I love you Mary-Ann, I know it ain't proper for a boy like me to . . . to talk so openly about matters like this but . . . –"
I blinked, Trowa wasn't flicking away. We sat watching the program for a while. It was an old, old, pre-colony thing. A romantic trashy love story about a poor boy and his rich master's daughter. He was too poor to even buy the right shoes to take her to the ball. It was worthless pap but I glanced at Trowa and saw he was almost completely engrossed by it.
Trowa . . . Trowa was never quite over the gulf between him and Quatre's statuses. During the war we needed money. I hacked into accounts and transferred it, Wufei sold some old heirloom of his family, Duo relied on Howard and their system of 'I'll scratch your back and you scratch mine'. Duo got his Gundam fixed, in return Howard woke up after every major mission Duo had with a nice hold filled with working debris from suits that had gotten destroyed or 'liberated'. Quatre was of course the richest of us all. He had a huge corporate machine and the use of the Magnurac to help him. Quatre's father's will stipulated that while his daughters were well cared for, then all he wanted for the rest of his money and for his son was the upkeep of peace.
Trowa in the meantime had the most expensive Gundam and the least resources.
He had no family heirlooms, no outside accomplices to trade favours with and not quite the computer skills needed to delicately extract funds and hide them as soon as possible. On top of that, Trowa was damned stubborn and always refused to accept anyone's charity.
While the Barton foundation continued to be coerced into sending enough money to buy the bullets, missiles and some of the more important parts of Heavyarms, Trowa's living expenses had to be paid for by himself.
"--You?! Heh, you're nothing but a servant! Why would Miss Grace be interested in a whelp like you?!—"
So Trowa worked at the circus, as one of their star attractions, he worked damned hard. I always listen to the local radios around the area he works in. Always looking out for the circus, how it's doing, where's they going . . . I know the others do it too. How can we not? Trowa's our friend!
He doesn't know it, but Quatre, by the way of many false fronts, other companies and a tangle of red tape, paperwork and grim faced pencil pushers, partially funds the circus. More specifically, he funds the upkeep of the lions . . . by providing the bedding and the cages, and extracting a promise from the master of circus that should the circus ever run into financial trouble and it looks like they may have to get rid of the animals that all he needs to do is pick up the phone and dial a certain number, state the problem, the amount of money needed to make that problem go away, and then to go to bed with ease of mind.
"--I won't let you get away with this, you whelp! You'll never be worthy of her!—"
The ringmaster doesn't know whom he'd deal with.
Catherine will never know that her 'brother's' beloved lions are indirectly protected.
Therefore Trowa will never ever know that Quatre is silently making sure Trowa's favourite animals are never taken from him. Quatre is not keeping Trowa. No. Every penny Trowa earns is his own, has never seen the inside of the Winner vault, and most certainly is not charity. All Quatre does is protecting Trowa's lions.
Almost like I protect my cherry bakewells.
I can almost feel a tear prickling the corner of my eye, the similarities are heartbreakingly close.
"-- You fool! It's not you I love! You and your money! It all means nothing to me!—"
There was a quiet click from the door behind us, and Quatre paused there. He stared at the TV for a moment blankly, looking utterly miserable.
Click
"--Ayuh, Jerry! I came on here, The Jerry Springer Show, to let healing begin . . .—"
Click
The moment passes and Trowa resumes his clicking, Quatre's eyes narrow and he's angry again. He walks through to the kitchen and starts making something . . . something that requires the food processor to be on and very, very, very loud bangs of the pots and pans.
Click
"-- Wha-what are you doing here? I thought you were in Denver . . . marrying that girl from Connecticut–-"
Click
Trowa's hand clenches.
Click
"--Lock and load! All sights on the target!—"
Click
I get up to stand by my laptop, shutting down the applications and the reports. Finally, it looks like I get to watch some television tonight.
Click
"--Grissom, did anyone ever tell you? You are one strange guy . . . isn't there anything that grosses you out? I know it's not dead people, bugs, putting your hand down toilets . . . come on Griss, tell me—"
He bites his lips. He can hear, just as well as I can the muffled sniffs and the quite cursing of his name.
"-- Grissom. . . I'm waiting. . .—"
Trowa's eyes start to grow sad. No matter how deep his self-pitying depressions rip into him, the ones that tell him that Quatre's just way out of his reach, the idea that Quatre's hurting because of him cuts him just that tiny bit deeper.
"-- well, if you really need to know . . .—"
I smile. Cherries are safe. Trowa stands and starts toward the kitchen.
"-- it's soppy, happy endings . . . they just give me the shivers! –"
And now Trowa and Quatre's relationship is safe too.
My cherries are safe.
Click
"--Myrtle, if I didn't know any better, I'd say that boy's got a one-track mind . . .—"
Click
I know Quatre and Trowa are going to be safe.
Everything pretty much safe.
Click
"--Tell me how do you do it, walk me through it, I'll follow in every footstep, Baby on your own you take a cautious step, do you wanna give that up? But all I want is for you to Shine! Shine down on me, shine down on this life that's burning out!—"
Click
You know . . .
I sat back; digging deep into the sofa and pulling out a small metal box I'd hidden there for safekeeping. Just a little pick-me-up. Just when I was too tired to get up and walk all the way to kitchen.
Click
"--He believes in a beauty, he's Venus as a boy, he believes in a beauty, I'm jealous! He believes in a beauty, he's Venus as a boy . . .-"
Click
The cherry bakewell's perfect little cherry smiled up at me as I opened the box. Like I had completed my mission tonight, the little cherry was about to complete his.
Click
"--You know . . . you're a lucky son of a gun, but I like ya . . . Kid, you're alright by me—"
Click
The food processor clicked off and the pots and pans stilled. I allowed myself a small smile as I chomped down on my saved cherry bakewell.
Click
"--Don't you just feel all warm and fuzzy inside, like gramma stuck your feet in the oven with her oatmeal cookies?—"
Click
You know, when Trowa acts all possessive and so totally focused on something like that you'd think he was some sort of control freak . . .
Click
"--Hey Ted, you know the other day when you asked what Irony meant . . . well, here's a good example of it, right here, right now. . . –"
Click
Damn, you'd think with five hundred channels there'd be something worth watching on . . .
Click
"--And that . . . that is the end of that chapter, my friends . . . take a bow, you boys, you did good tonight!—"
Click
---------
And Now It's Time To LEAVE IT TO DOCTOR MEGALOMANIA!!!
DrM: Tah dah!! A new chapter!! See, see!! I haven't forgotten about this story… it's just taking me a hellava long time to get them done!! Please RR and tell me what you think!! Thank you!
