Hear the beating
Author: Nekocin
Warnings: OoC, life based on my experience, (I noticed that in larger resolutions my chapters appear very short. UMPH! Nyaaa nuoooooo! So I made this chapter a bit longer and it turned out ugly).
Disclaimer: Gundam Seed doesn't belong to me. Ice of Prince and its character don't belong to me either.
Author's note: Hmmm... I'm itching for a fanart based on this story. Nyaaa! I'll see what I can do for my upcoming fanarts! Maybe I'll draw DM, or maybe AC (this is after all really my favorite one) or KL--or maybe an Yzak fanart... :rattles on:
Actually :perks up: I'm already done with a (sort of) DearkaMiriallia fanart—I just need to scan and upload it in my personal website, so please look forward to it! :D

Finally! The whole chapter! Sorry for the long wait!

5.

I stared at my alarm clock on the nightstand next to my bed with squinted eyes.

4:49 AM, it flashed mockingly back at me.

Groaning, I rolled to the other side of my bed and curled uo, fisting the pillows. It's way too early to -be- up. It's too early to get up. It's way too early... I kept up the mantra for a few more seconds, waiting for sleep to take over.

But instead of going back to sleep I found myself staring unfocused at my room's built-in closet within the opposite wall.

Sighing, I turned to lie on my back. I realized my heart had eventually calmed down from whatever shock it had received while I slept. Absently resting a hand on top of my chest, I felt the dull but rhythmic thuds of the heart against my palm, and stared up at the ceiling.

There's really something wrong with this heart. I wasn't quite sure what exactly was the reason for this heart to act so strangely. It was as if it had a mind of its own.

Scary. Reminded me of what creators of science fiction and horror movies would do—a heart with a visible brain somewhere on top. Add a pair of eyes (or glasses, which ever), some limbs and—GYAH! A disturbing mental picture.

The point was my heart would pound differently at odd times of the day. Sometimes it would pound crazily as if I was getting an adrenaline rush and then eventually calm down as if nothing had happened.

I couldn't even have control over it. Stubborn thing.

... maybe the heart was seeking for its real owner? Maybe the heart had recognized the previous owner's wandering ghost and started pounding uncontrollably? Maybe it had been the heart of someone inhuman, a serial killer perhaps, and it's searching for a new host to aid his next killings?

I felt something cold crawl across my spine. The aliens were at it again.

The cold feeling didn't disappear entirely when I left home for school around 6. Thoughts of looking around for any suspicious specimen that might set my heart a flare had crossed my mind several times already, but I'd squashed every one of them.

"What's with the look on your face?"

I blinked at Yzak, who had somehow popped out of nowhere, walking beside me. "Huh? Where did you come from?"

"From home, where else?" Yzak pointed out dryly and gave me a once-a-look-over before nodding to himself for some reason. "You have trouble sleeping?"

As if on cue, my eyes started stinging and my vision swam.

"Yeah," I rubbed my eyes. "I had a strange dream. Something about school. Do you think it's an omen?"

Yzak eyed me coolly and snorted. "If it were about school, the only omen will be forgetting to do your Literature homework,"

"No, it's not abou—Literature homework?" I stopped walking and glared at Yzak. "We have Literature homework! Since when?"

He rolled his eyes at me. "I knew you were going to forget, Dearka. Just be glad it's due Monday,"

I thought I was going to have another heart attack.

"God! Yzak! You just gave me a stroke." I remarked, while grabbing the front of my uniform.

He sent me once over look and smirked. "You'll live,"

I found myself smirking along. "Thanks, Yzak. For reminding me, that is. I need high marks on my Literature analysis,"

Yzak nodded absently and took another once over look at me.

"What? What are you looking at?"

"—Dearka, explain to me why you are wearing your mother's kitty slippers and not your sneakers," he pointed nonchalantly down at my feet.

"Huh?" Looking down at my feet I found mother's kitty slippers 'grinning' innocently back at me. What the-? I had been so fixed on my dazed state that I thoroughly forgot to put on my sneakers. My face heat up from embarrassment.

I turned on my heels and broke onto a run.

"You have five minutes before the school bell rings!" Yzak called out after me.

Maybe that's the omen of the day. I barely made it on time for my first class -Biology-; much less pay any attention to the class, since sleep was calling to me.

Nodding off, the last thing I remembered was my head dropping face first on my notebook.

"Are you sure you are all right, Dearka?"

I did not have to life my head from the lunch table to see Nicol giving me worried looks; everyone round the table was giving me the same looks anyway.

"'m fine," I mumbled.

Lunch period came and so far, I had failed catching my much-needed sleep in any of my previous three classes. Not to mention failing to pay attention to my classes. The teachers had, of course, reprimanded me several times about my inattentiveness but somehow I managed to escape getting detentions and being called upon by either the principal or one of the vice-principals.

"You should go ask for an absent permit. I heard from Yzak about the unhealthy state in which he had found you this morning," Nicol pressed on.

"—maybe, but I'm fine," I mumbled yet again, my voice sounding tired and forced.

"Dearka, go take your leave. I'll just tell the teacher you're unwell, and bring you my notes," Yzak cut in.

"You guys are scaring me. I'm okay," Sighing, I pushed my head from the table and stood up."I'll go wash my face,"

It felt great to have such 'sincere' friends around for it wasn't my every day to have them concerned about me of such a small thing. Sleeplessness is common and is easier to overcome by just resting for hours.

Besides, I could hardly call them sincere—they were far from it.

Nicol could be just as evil as Yzak whenever he wanted to. Luckily, I hope, he was more on the mellow side compared to both Yzak and I. That's probably because of his passion for classical music and preference to subtle manipulation that rivaled, perhaps, both Yzak and Athrun's own skills.

Heh.

I could still remember the way he manipulated the whole Ice of Prince game when he came over to play some time ago. My character, Akutsu Jin, could barely win a whole set without getting ridiculously beaten up by Nicol's Echizen Ryoma's 'smash-in-the-face ball'. Before I knew it, Nicol 'had turned' into a ferocious animal of sorts in the middle of the game and viciously used dangerous moves against my character that would have been life-threatening if those moves were ever real.

And they say, we should watch out for the silent types. Snort. I'd say we should watch out for the innocent types! Man, they're truly like shape shifters of sorts. To appear innocent and then suddenly turn into a beast. Gyah! But of course, Nicol, like mentioned before, was the mellow one—in other words, he's actually harmless in a way.

Speaking of Yzak—it's difficult to use sincere and Yzak in the same sentence without cracking up or making a frowning face. Sure, Yzak was the first to visit me after my hospitalization. Sure, he was the first one attempting to ease the uneasiness in our friendship, and of course, he was the one who started our playing-videogames routine.

Coming back to the evil point, Yzak was, perhaps, more on the sophisticated side. He has always been one to regard rules higher than his opinions. Everything in his world is by the book. By the rules. Which usually resulted to Yzak not really voicing his real concerns.

But when his opinions do cross paths with the 'holy' rules and exceed them, he wouldn't know what to do exactly. That's when he would start acting awkward like, one time he was all nice in a un-Yzak way and then cold in the next.

Both Nicol and Yzak suddenly stood up, but before they could step away from their seats, I waved them away.

"No need to hover behind m-," I yawned lightly, holding a hand automatically in front of my mouth. "-me. I'm a big boy. Ugh. You guys are really scaring me with your looks,"

Shifting uncomfortably on my feet, I sent them a half grin before sprinting off in search for the men's room.

On my way down the halls I ran into Athrun, who was busy doing some imaginary calculations, using his index finger as a pen in the air and murmuring random answers to himself before scribbling down something in a small notebook.

I raised my eyebrows. "Athrun, what are you doing?"

Athrun blinked at me.

"Dearka-," He nodded a greeting before answering me, "Just counting how much costs I should cover. Lacus has asked me to watch over today's expenses and it seems we have to extract some extra subsidies,"

I hardly understood his line of thought. Was it something about his father's accounts? What's the relation with Lacus and Mr. Zala's accounts? What expenses? Were they having some business losses? Extracting subsidies to what exactly?

"I see-," I failed to sound nonchalant, sadly.

Athrun smiled sadly (sadly?) at me, "Are you going to attend it too?"

"What do you mean?" I felt I had missed something vital in this conversation.

"Didn't Lacus ask you to bring the orders over?" Athrun pressed.

"Yes, she did. But what does that have to do with wherever you thought I would be attending?"

"Everything! Today is his birthday and we're trying to make the best out of it for Miss Haww," Athrun paused for a moment. "Oh by the way, if you can't find a ride, just call me, okay? Lacus was worried about whether or not your boss would lend you his car. Okay, I better finish this before Cagalli decapitates me. Good day, Dearka,"

With a quick wave Athrun left my side hastily, and resumed doing his imaginary calculations. He should really buy a calculator for his own sake. That way he wouldn't have to worry about how many numbers before and after the comma existed.

I stared at his retreating back.

Miss Haww? I thought today's birthday is that guy's—Lacus' new guy friend. And who's Cagalli? The name gives a pretty ring in the ears, almost sweet. From Athrun's brief mention, that Cagalli-person probably has quite a temper.

Shaking my head ruefully, I continued my way to the men's room. The rest of my classes went by like a breeze.

"Good afte-,"

I scrunched my nose as soon as I opened the door to Flavorite's Ice Cream parlor's dressing room. A foul smell entered my nostrils; pricking, tingling and making my stomach recoil.

"What's that awful smell?"

"—onion ice cream," the only one, Clotho, in the dressing room answered me nonchalantly, pinching his nose closed with his index finger and thumb to ward off the smell.

"Really? That's weird. Last time when someone ordered it, the ice cream didn't smell -this- bad," I inquired, opening my locker—the third from my left—and unbuttoned my most-favored khaki-colored jacket. "Were the onions rotten or something?"

Which seemed unlikely.

"No. I was the one buying the onions and I'm very sure none of them were within the rotting process. One of those b(beep-beep) must have screwed up the preserving process the other day. Heh. F(beep-beep) b(beep-beep)!"

Clotho started mumbling strings of colorful curses, put on his Flavorite cap and waited for me to finish up dressing.

I nodded. "Done. Let's go,"

I was the first one to reach out to the handle that led to the main working area behind the order counter. A wave of fresh onions being cut entered my nostrils. Scrunching my nose, I tried to blink away the sudden tears in my eyes.

"You two there! Freeze!" Someone suddenly ordered with a booming voice.

My body automatically stiffened. My feet hovering in mid-step. From the corner of my eye, Clotho was glaring and chose to cross his arms over his chest.

"What's the occasion, -uncle-?" He grumbled, purposefully emphasizing the last word and shot a glare in boss' direction.

They weren't exactly related from what I have heard. They were sort of linked together by someone. It was claimed that Clotho grew up under the care of boss' girlfriend and Clotho was blaming boss for someone's death. It's rather vaguely said, though, that's all the information I could gain from my female gossip colleagues.

Man! How do these women get to know these sort of inside stuff? Clotho surely didn't tell them about his life, did he? Or—was it because one of them had stalked and spied on Clotho's life at home?

Boss did not bat an eyelash when he handed both of us two large badges promoting—onion ice cream.

Ha?

An onion head on a small piece of ice cream was grinning back at me, wearing a banner saying "EAT HEALTHY" in capital letters, and "then eat me!" in tiny letters. Any other day I would have laughed out loud if this badge were ever given to me.

I stared at my badge. What's this for?

"What the f(beep) is this for?" Couldn't have said it better.

Boss did not answer immediately as he was busy rummaging in this black plastic sack for something and then pulled out what looked like a sleeveless jacket. A—bright—yellow—cotton—jacket.

"We're celebrating the two years existence of onion ice cream and promoting healthy eating among our ice cream customers. Everyone's now busy cutting the onions," Which explained why there was onion smells in the air. "So you two better wear them before starting with your shifts. Am I clear?"

"What makes you so sure this promotion will get people to eat our onion ice cream?" I wondered while staring at the hideous jacket. The logo was the same as the badge. But...is that a real onion sewn in the middle?

"I said promoting health, not ice cream," Boss corrected and adjusted the many badges on his shirt.

–many? I just realized boss was not in his right mind. He had so many badges clipped on his shirt that it wasn't even funny. If he could, he would probably pin more on his body.

"Now get back to work. Our customers are getting impatient," Nonchalantly pointing over his shoulder for a moment before Boss stepped aside to let us pass.

I looked at Clotho, who looked back at me with a disgusted look on his face. I wouldn't be surprised if my face was mirroring his expression.

"I'm not wearing the stupid jacket," he snarled at last.

"Neither am I," The color of the jacket was breaking my eyes. Period.

"Come on guys. If we are wearing them, you two should too," one random colleague pointed out. Gah! It's that face! "Besides, you should understand that boss is helping out with this promoting of healthy eating. Nowadays, everyone is hogging junk food like there's no tomorrow. According to yearly statistics, the amount of junk food people consume every day has tripled compared to twenty years ago. Researchers have predicted that over a few years no one will reach the age of 50 peacefully without getting several attacks from constant heart failures, cancer, internal bleeding-,"

My eyes twitched when the random colleague continued rambling about non-existent, I suppose, untruthful workings of how seizures were caused by aliens outer space that ate Earthlings' junk food. Or did that guy say it the other way around? It was hard to tell with his excited and yet rapid speech.

"FINE! Shut up already, you m(beep-beep) f(beep-beep)!" Clotho ground out, stuffed a crumpled paper into the rambler's mouth none-too-gently as he stomped past and slid on the horrible-looking jacket. No way am I going to wear it.

"I shouldn't have asked for this stupid job. Damn persistent wusses!" were Clotho's last words before he went off in his own 'merry way'.

Boss raised an expectant eyebrow at me. "Tell you what, I'll lend you my mini-van to deliver Miss Clyne's stuff at 5, if you wear this, Elthman. IF you wear this, Elthman,"

Dammit. That's unfair!

Sighing, I resigned myself to my fate, slid on the hideous neon-yellow jacket before dragging myself to the counter and taking over the morning cashier's shift. Surprisingly, a lot of people seemed to be quite taken with boss' advertising and asked for onion ice cream, more than usual. Were they health-freaks too?

As promised, boss handed over his mini-van around 5.

I couldn't shake off the awful onion smell that clung to my Flavorite uniform, when I turned on boss' mini-van's air-conditioning full blast. Even boss' car's interior was starting to smell like an onion hell.

Ugh!

Lacus was holding a formal party—someone's birthday party, a banquet for all I know! I couldn't just go in and hand over her stuff smelling like I had taken a swim within a sea of onions—which didn't stray far too much from the real truth, though.

To make myself at least a bit presentable for a delivery guy, I had taken my clothes along. At least they still smell fresh.

----

The area in, which Lacus' party was located, was very crowded.

There was almost no free space to be found on the sidewalks. Cars were parked everywhere. Street patrollers were having their hands full trying to let incoming guests park their cars somewhere empty and keeping their eyes on the rest of the traffic-users who weren't going to attend the party. People were swarming slowly through some grand entrance gate.

For a birthday party, the Yama-guy really knew a lot of people. Or maybe they were just Lacus' guests.

I just noticed everyone was dressed in either black or any dark color. From nightdresses to hair bands. So gloomy. Did that guy set up some sort of theme for his birthday?

Raising my eyebrows, I looked around for the dangling signs on the tall lampposts that might tell me if I had gotten the right address. All I got was one large white cloth banner with red colored letters written on.

"Happy birthday, Tolle, please be happy," it said. Who's Tolle? And what kind of birthday wish is that?

Suddenly I found a smiling Lacus waving at me, while sitting on the large brick wall next to the entrance gate. She gestured for me to move the mini-van away from the queue and disappeared behind the brick wall as soon as she climbed down.

She re-appeared after dodging several guests, opened the door to the seat beside the mine and climbed in, a broad smile in place.

"Dearka! I'm quite glad you could make it! I was so worried that you wouldn't find the place. That's why I'd decided to keep watch while sitting on the wall," She let out an excited laugh of sorts.

"Isn't that dangerous?" I looked at her curiously, grinning.

"Oh no. Kira was there for me. There's no need to worry. Now let's get this car parked somewhere. It's getting crowded here by the minute,"

"Who are these people?"

Lacus chuckled, "Tolle's many, many friends and many, many relatives,"

"Uhm—who exactly is Tolle, Lacus?"

She stared at me, looking both incredulous and sad.

"He was one of Kira's closest friends and Miriallia's boyfriend," Lacus answered softly before tearing her eyes from me to watch the people passing the mini-van.

Was it something I said?

- END 5 -

TheNekoTalks:

1) I'm not sure about everyone, but Senior High begins at 7 o' clock sharp here in my country. I wake up at 6 on school days and leave the house at 6:30 AM. Literature homework—hn, it's a lot of homework. Reading several books, analyzing the plot lines, writing down opinions on several aspects handled in the stories and doing some other side stuff that are related to Literature. Doing Literature homework a day before the deadline is mind numbing and very exhausting and not doing it means loss of extra credits. Hence the reason why Dearka would panic. (I'm not sure if other countries have such classes though...)
2) Bow down to the kitty slippers! Long live Neko-love! Hehehehe, sorry, I couldn't resist adding that one.
3) I think I must have messed up something... because I think it's suppose to be GARLIC ice cream, not ONION ice cream. Oh well, I'll just stick to Onion. Oh well, I'll just stick to Onion. I'm sorry for dragging that section like that—it seems useless, but it definitely isn't. :points at a future scene:
4) I hope everyone has noticed I've made quite a big deal about their given names (Cagalli) and their family names (Haww, Yamato and some more later). Poor Dearka isn't good at remembering names.

I like to thank (and bow down to): Orahiko (2 times; one for the previous chapter and the other for the teaser), Gauri92, tennisprincess15, Ayome, ailiricxxz, Ray Ludi Crous, Ongaku Neko, Kiyoko-San, An1391 (2 times; one for the previous chapter and the other for the teaser), Komillia (for the teaser) and C-town Chika (for the teaser).
I was actually about to reply to everyone's reviews, when I suddenly received few warnings from my other writer friends about "getting banned because the writer had replied to reviewers' reviews". Just to be safe, I'd deleted the section where I was about to reply to you wonderful reviewers. T.T Please don't be mad. Everyone's review responses will be posted on my website—some time later :sweatdrops:

Thank you for reading! I admit I was desperate to end the chapter so it has probably rushed too fast towards the end. :sweatdrops:

.:Nekocin:.