Disclaimer: Unfortunately, I do not own Gundam SEED.

Warning: Slight language...and OOC of course! How can you have a parody -without- OOC characters?

Chapter Two – Scheming Sidekicks

For every main character conceptualized for a story, there is a sidekick included solely for aiding the main character in achieving his or her goals. Well, we've met our two (very unlikely) protagonists in the previous chapter, so this author thinks that it's high time we meet the beautiful, pink-haired tutor of the Princess Cagalli.

With her big, baby blue eyes, long and flowing pink hair and graceful disposition; it came as no surprise when the King chose Lacus Clyne to 'teach' Princess Cagalli the finer points of being a well-mannered and gracious princess.

Another reason was Lacus' famed patience. The girl was probably the most patient human being ever to grace the rowdy princess' presence. But at times like this, Lacus felt her infinite patience running thin.

"Princess Cagalli," she sighed heavily as she carefully put down the thick science textbook that she was using. "Please pay attention. Now, according to the cell theory..."

Cagalli slammed both her hands on the table. "I don't care about a freakin' cell! I'm bloody getting married in less than a week and here I am studying about cells and other blasted stuff instead of planning my escape!"

"Princess... didn't we discuss this already? As the Princess of Orb, you have duties and responsibilities..."

"Aww, come on, Lacus!" Cagalli interrupted her. She sharply turned her flashing amber eyes in her direction. "Cut the tutor crap and revert back to friend mode! I'm in dire straits here!"

Lacus gave her a mock scandalized look. "Princess! Such vulgar words!" Then, unable to control herself anymore, she burst into giggles. "Sorry, Cagalli-chan," she apologized in between giggles, "I couldn't resist."

Cagalli glared at her, which prompted her to cease laughing. "Lacus! What am I going to do!" she burst out in desperation. "I haven't even seen his -shadow-! What if he turns out to be some kind of wacko? He's practically -begging- for a wife! That's a big, glaring clue on how he must look like!"

"He's a -wealthy- wacko, that's for sure," Lacus murmured absently as she stared at the piles and piles and -piles- of various expensive gifts scattered in the study room.

Cagalli let out a breath of frustration and burrowed her head in her arms. "Lacus! You're not helping one bit," came the muffled accusation.

Lacus patted Cagalli's shoulder sympathetically. There was nothing funny with the Princess' situation...well, there –were- a few things which can be considered as funny, but if she were in Cagalli's shoes, she'd probably feel the same. She looked at their schedule and grimaced inwardly. "Why don't we go outside for some fresh air, Cagalli-chan?"

"Yeah, right. Good luck finding fresh air in all that smog," Cagalli retorted jokingly. "But I'm willing to inhale poisonous gas, as long as it gets me out of here." She stood up and quickly dragged Lacus to her room.

"Cagalli? Why are we going to your room?"

Cagalli didn't even stop walking as she gave her answer. "There's no way in hell I'm walking around town wearing this (she gave the green dress that she was wearing a violent tug) dress!" She looked over her shoulder and smirked at Lacus' clothing. "And you'll have to change into something less eye-catching so we don't attract attention. We're going to wander around aimlessly, not going to attend some ball or party or whatever."

Lacus just smiled. Cagalli was always making fun of her clothes, insisting that it was much 'too girly'. She wasn't just a tutor... No, she was also the Princess' best friend. Sure, Cagalli was a handful; but with her infinite patience, she -always- managed.

Plus, the pay was -good-.

-

And speaking of sidekicks... let's go over to the darkside...

"Aw, man! You cheated, Yzak!" a blond, tan-skinned young boy pointed a finger accusingly at his silver-haired friend.

Yzak Joule just raised his eyebrows and sneered in reply.

Dearka Elthman, the blond, shot his hand forward and pressed the reset button on the game console that they were playing.

"What are you doing, Dearka!" Yzak demanded angrily. "I won fair and square! Why did you press the goddamn button!"

Dearka smirked at him. "You cheated! I demand a rematch!"

"You could've done it without pressing the reset button, you idiot! Do you know how long it took for me to get to that level?"

"Well, you should've thought of that before you cheated!"

"How could I freaking cheat on this game!"

"Cheater!"

"Idiot!"

"Cheater, cheater, cheater, cheater..."

"Would you guys -shut up-? I'm trying to work here!" a green-haired boy suddenly shouted. "You'd think being -older- would also mean being more -mature-."

Yzak and Dearka glared at Nicol Amarfi and the latter returned their gazes equally. After a few minutes, "You blinked, Dearka! I saw it!"

"I did not!" Dearka protested.

Yzak, in turn, was ecstatic. "Haha! I win! Both of you are losers!"

Rau Le Creuset, who was watching the entire ordeal from his hiding place, slapped his forehead with his hands in frustration. 'So this is what these idiots do with their free time!' After deciding that he couldn't take anymore of the shitty scene unfolding in front of him, he stepped out of the shadows and cleared his throat.

"I won!"

"It wasn't a freakin' staring game, Yzak!"

"Both of you, just stop it already!"

"Shut up, you whiny loser!"

"Whiny! I'm going to tell on you!"

"Commander's pet..."

Rau sighed and cleared his throat again, this time -much- louder. The three stooges didn't stop whatever they were doing and he felt the familiar beginnings of a migraine (i.e. an -intense- headache). 'With all the money that I stole from the treasury, you'd think that I could've gotten -smarter- minions than these.'

The three continued their relentless bickering. He expected this kind of behavior from Dearka and Yzak, being the childish morons that they were. Nicol, however, was a different case. He'd always thought that he wouldn't have problems with the soft-spoken, mild-mannered boy. But, apparently, months and months of being cooped up with the other two was rubbing off on him.

Rau felt that if he didn't put a stop to all the noise, he'd pop a blood vessel. "GODDAMNIT! WOULD YOU ALL JUST SHUT THE F--K UP! YOU SONS OF B-----S DISGUST ME! WHAT THE HELL'S THE F-----G MATTER WITH YOU!"

Realizing that all was quiet now, Rau stopped and took several deep, calming breaths.

"Wow! I never knew your language was so colorfully explicit, Commander," Dearka observed.

"Suck up," Yzak hissed under his breath.

Rau rolled his eyes but the effect was lost because of the fact that he was wearing a mask. So he settled on the next-best-thing: He sneered. "Look, you three, I have a job for you."

Nicol's face lit up at the mention of something to do other than 'hanging out' with Dumb and Dumbass. "A job, sir?"

Yzak rolled his eyes. "Must you repeat it?"

Rau waved a fist threateningly at the two. "Don't force me to stuff this in your mouth to make you shut up!" he snapped. There was silence again. "Good. Now, as I was saying, I need you to do something for me. After this -" he made invisible quotation marks in the air "- mission, my dream of becoming the king will cease to be a dream." He snarled, "So you better not mess this up!"

The three nodded wordlessly. They gave him equally curious stares and waited for him to divulge more.

He paused dramatically. "I need you to kidnap Princess Cagalli."

Three faces simultaneously gaped dumbly at him.

Dearka broke the silence by snorting in disbelief. "That's all? I thought we had to get something big and valuable!"

"She -is- big and valuable, you idiot," Yzak retorted.

Nicol gave Rau a puzzled look. "But... isn't she getting married soon? If we kidnap her, the wedding will be postponed! Or -worse-, get called off! Couldn't we wait until -after- the wedding?"

Rau fought the urge to pound the boy's head on the nearest wall in order to instill some common sense on his thick skull. 'God! Why me? I know I'm an evil villain and all, but this is too much of a punishment!' He took a deep breath and once more pushed his lung power to the limit.

"THAT'S THE WHOLE F-----G POINT, YOU F-----G MORON!"

Nicol's eyes widened as his mouth formed a big 'O'.

'When this is over, I -swear- on my maker's grave that I will never, -ever-, ask help from these idiots ever again,' Rau thought inwardly. 'Then again, I think I can get away with cheerfully murdering them.'

-

"Hey, Kira! Get me a glass of cold water!" a sharp voice commanded, obviously directed to the meek, brown-haired young man sitting next to her on the bench.

Kira stood up wordlessly and rushed to the vending machine a good 500 meters away. He ran back to lounging red head and thrust the bottle on her face. "Here, Flay."

Flay Allster took one long look at it before snarling, "It's not cold enough!" Kira stood there, still holding the bottle when Flay raised an eyebrow at Kira, as if to say 'Well? What the hell are you waiting for?'

Kira merely sighed and ran back to the vending machine. 'If she wasn't so pretty... I'd have stopped hanging out with her...' He went as far as to ask for a cup filled with ice on a nearby stall. 'The things I do for - for what? Love? Not likely... Anyway, the things I do for -Flay-...'

"Um, here. I brought a plastic cup with ice on it," he said timidly.

Flay wrinkled her nose and pushed the cup away. "Ugh. This is disgusting! Here, take it back! Get me juice instead!"

Kira sighed once more, for it was the only thing that a man without a backbone could do. "Whatever you say, Flay."

He ran back but his mind was on other things that he didn't notice an equally pre-occupied young man muttering mindlessly to himself.

Kira didn't notice until -after- he bumped into them and heard a string of curses from the young man who landed on his backside.

"Hey! Watch where you're going, you jerk!" he snarled. He rubbed his behind delicately.

Kira came to his side in a flash. "I'm sorry. Are you hurt?"

The young man finally raised his head to glare at Kira, "Well, nothing seems to be broken but - Holy cow!" and was promptly given the surprise of his lifetime.

Kira gaped at the mirror-like image in front of him. They looked -exactly- alike. Well, except for their respective hair and eye colors. "Wow! You look just like me!"

The person growled. "Hey, are you saying I look like a boy!"

Kira got another surprise. "You mean you're a - a girl?" he sputtered in disbelief. He pulled the -girl- to her feet and looked at her chest discreetly. Yup, the unmistakable bulge there meant she really was a -girl-.

The -girl- brushed away the dirt that might have stuck to her pants and glared at Kira. "Well, what did you think, you dolt? But come to think of it, we do sort of look alike..."

Kira picked up her hat that was knocked off her head due to their collision earlier. "Here, wear your hat again."

The girl complied and peered into his eyes. Her blond hair was partially covered by the hat and the shadows that the hat provided made her eye color darker.

"Wow. The resemblance is uncanny..." Kira observed.

"We could be twins!" the girl squealed, showing her inner girlishness within.

Kira chuckled and thrust his hand forward for a formal hand shake. "By the way, I'm Kira Yamato."

The girl looked at his hand, puzzled, but took it nonetheless. "Huh?"

"My name is Kira," Kira repeated.

The girl fidgeted a little. "Oh. I'm, uh, Cagalli," she said in a feigned nonchalant voice.

Kira's smile became wider. This girl was stealing identities left and right! "Cagalli? Hey! You have the same name as the princess!"

-Cagalli- shifted her weight to her other foot and smiled weirdly.

Realization dawned in. "Wait a minute! You -are- the princess? Cool!"

Cagalli smiled fuller now. She didn't expect -this- kind of reaction. Most people would curtsy and immediately treat her like a God…which she definitely was –not-. "It's not so bad."

Kira gave her an amiable smile and opened his mouth to ask her something. He was interrupted, however, by the arrival of a pink-haired girl carrying to tall plastic cups of frappuccino. Lacus Clyne stopped in her tracks and if not for the frappe's on both her hands, they would have flown to her mouth in shock. "Princess, we have to get - Oh my!"

Cagalli, not one to miss the most curious expression on Lacus' face, snickered and turned to Kira. "Lacus, this is Kira. Kira, Lacus." She gestured to an awestruck Kira. It seemed like Lacus was not the only one who was –impolitely- staring.

"You look just like the Princess..." Lacus breathed. 'Plus, you're male and –way- gorgeous!' she added mentally. Realizing what she just thought (proper ladies shouldn't think that way, after all), she blushed.

Kira stood speechless for more or less the same reasons as Lacus'. They stood there, silently (if you ignore Cagalli's snickers) admiring one another, when a loud, grating voice floated across the park. "Kira! Where the hell is my juice?"

Cagalli's head turned sharply to the direction of the voice. "Who's that?"

Kira sadly glanced away from Lacus and sighed. "That's Flay. My...come to think of it, I don't even know what she is to me."

"So she's not your girlfriend…" Cagalli said slyly, more to herself than to Kira. She glanced at her best friend and a plan began to form in her head. A –matchmaking- plan. Well, if she can't find her true love in this lifetime, she'll be damned if she let her best friend experience the same fate!

The red-head banshee shrieked again. "Kira!" She finally saw him and was glaring daggers at Cagalli and Lacus. "I'm waiting! Don't make me come there!"

Kira sighed once more. "Just a minute!" he replied, a tad bit annoyed. "Uh, I have to get going," he said to Lacus and Cagalli. "It was really nice meeting the both of you."

"Jeez! You make it sound as if we won't be seeing each other again!" Cagalli rolled her eyes. "You can come visit us in the palace!"

"Really?" Kira asked, his eyes growing wide. Being invited to the palace by none other than the Princess herself was an honor. It would look very good in his résumé if ever he went looking for a job. Plus, he would see this pink-haired lady again…

Cagalli nodded excitedly, happy that her plan was moving forward. "Yeah. I'll send a carriage for you! Meet us in the park again, same time, the day after tomorrow!"

Kira waved at them. "Bye, Cagalli. Bye, Lacus. It was nice meeting you!"

Cagalli and Lacus watched Kira walk away with the red-head girl giving them murderous glares while admonishing Kira.

"Well, wasn't that nice?" Cagalli commented, waving back at Kira and ignoring Flay, while observing Lacus' reaction at the corner of her eye.

Lacus sighed, a serene smile on her lips. "Yes, he was nice…"

Cagalli laughed and Lacus ignored her, not seeming to have noticed her slip of tongue.

-

"Ouch! Quit shoving, Yzak!"

"That's not me, you moron! It's the phlegm-haired freak!"

"Who the hell are you calling a phlegm-haired freak? And I wouldn't shove you, Dearka, if this white-haired asshole didn't shove me in the first place!"

After hearing Rau's ridiculously clichéd scheme, they immediately sought to finish the task. The faster they wrap it up and Rau becomes the king, the faster they can get out of the masked maniac's employ. Maybe with the money they'd make, they'd be able to get themselves to Timbuktu without hassle. Rau's sneers were becoming more murderous with each passing day, in their opinion.

So there they were, all bunched together uncomfortably behind the tall columns in the palace courtyard. Their plan? When the princess decides to get some 'fresh air', they tackle her from behind and take her away. Plain, simple, and direct-to-the-point unlike their commander's plots.

"What time is she planning to come out?" Dearka sighed impatiently. They had been waiting there for hours.

Yzak cursed and then grumbled. "When she reads the note that I made up, she'll come here. Until then, we wait."

"Why'd it have to be tonight? I have an appointment!" Nicol whined. The other two promptly ignored him. He seemed extremely happy that morning for reasons unknown. And then, when Yzak reminded them of their plans for tonight, he sulked.

"How did she get that note?" Dearka asked eager to find a loophole in Yzak's 'plan'.

"Nicol delivered it, of course," Yzak answered promptly, proud that he had thought of this. He made a note to the Princess saying to meet her in the courtyard and signed it as her 'Secret Admirer.' He snickered. Girls were suckers for that kind of stuff.

Nicol scratched his head. "I did?"

Yzak felt his mouth go dry. "Huh? The paper I gave you! Didn't you send it?"

"I thought it was for me! I thought that –my- secret admirer sent it!" Nicol answered.

Silence. And then…

"YOU IDIOT!" Thunk.

Next Chapter: What of Cagalli's impending marriage? Will she meet the prince –before- they say "I do"? Is Cagalli's un-ladylike behavior finally rubbing off on Lacus? Will Kira finally gain a backbone by saying 'No' to Flay? Will he set foot in the palace again? Does Nicol have bad-boy material? Will Dearka regain consciousness? What are Yzak, Dearka and Nicol going to do when they reach Timbuktu after Rau's plans?

All these and more in the next chapter of "The Princess and the Pauper"!

-

Author's Notes: After a long hiatus, I finally decided to continue this story. Updates will be much faster than before for those who are following my other stories! I finally got my wish! I got my own typing machine (i.e. a laptop)! Yay! Now my dream of becoming a writer will finally be a reality! –smile-

I apologize for not updating much faster. I recently received a review from my other fic. I was happy that the reviewer found my story interesting but I was annoyed when she wrote that I was "ruining" it for them by not updating that story. It is in my full intention to finish my stories one way or another, not only for the people who read it, but also for my peace of mind. I wrote that story four, three years ago. The story, in my opinion, is mediocre and plot-less (like my other stories are any better...). I am thinking of revamping my other stories to fit my growth as a writer. If I do that without planning it thoroughly and while I am uninspired, the result will probably be worse than the original. As I've said before, I don't like half-baked stories.