The knock on the door almost sent Duo to the roof. He'd been in the bathroom combing out his hair and wasn't expecting someone. According to Murphy's law there will always be someone at the door or at the phone when you decide to wash your hair but this time the bell had waited until after the shower at least. He first thought that it might be Heero since no one else had come to visit since that fateful day a month ago when Heero and the demon and the wizard and the werecat had trashed the office he'd been working in. It now seemed as if all the friends he'd had when Solo and he was still together were, in fact, Solo's friends because none of them had come visiting, or even called. Not even a letter or an e-mail had Duo received.

There was no Heero standing outside the door. Instead there was a slightly pale man of Chinese decent. It's always a feat to see people with coloured skin go pale, it does look strange.

"Do I know you?" Duo asked because he was sure he'd seen the man somewhere before. The severe ponytail, though Duo was sure that the man would never call the way he'd bound his hair a ponytail, and the loose pants seemed somehow familiar.

"I'm a friend of Heero's." He said. "Chang Wufei."

"Oh, I'm Duo Maxwell. We must've met in that strange room." Duo said, remembering that his was the supposed demon. Wufei, on the other hand, was contended to finally get to know the name of Heero's mysterious, so called master.

"What? Yes we did."

"Why are you here?"

"There was an accident and Heero was involved. We wondered if you wanted to meet him. It might help him come back to us faster." They'd been standing in the doorway during the whole conversation but Wufei suddenly found himself being pushed backwards.

"Heero's been hurt? What are you waiting for?" Duo had grabbed his coat and was out the door, that locked almost before being shut, in oh point seven seconds.

"Wait. You can't go there like that, you need this." Wufei handled him Duo a rather shiny piece of stone that looked related to diamonds but it was too large to be one. Duo could only just encase all of it in his hand.

"Okay, Wu-man this stone is very nice and all that but I don't think that a piece of jewellery is going to get me to Heero any faster."

"Maxwell!"

"Um, yes?"

"Never mind." Wufei sighed, "The crystal contains a transportation spell, break it and you will get to the house." Wufei wasn't in any condition to argue about the nick-name he'd just been given, he could feel what little there was left of his energy draining away quickly.

"Cool." Duo said and smashed the crystal against the wall. When he removed his hand, he was definitely not in his apartment any longer. A breathless 'Holy shit' escaped his lips.

He was standing outside two large wooden doors and, even more noticeable was the rather angry looking man pointing a gun at him.

"Take it easy man." Duo pleaded with his hands open trying to soothe the gun wielding man. The man in question did not want to take it easy, though. Someone had hurt master Quatre and they didn't know who, or in all honesty, even what. He wanted to take out his frustrations on someone and like magic this boy had appeared. Why waste a good opportunity?

"Maxwell!" Wufei had been taken by surprise when Duo had disappeared so quickly. He'd jumped as soon as he'd gotten his wits back but he realised that he was almost too late despite that. He silently vowed that he was never going to relax near the braided boy, ever again. It might prove unhealthy.

"Um, Wuffie, are you sure we are in the right place? There is a guy here with a very loaded gun which he's pointing at me."

"My name is Wufei!" The Chinese man said with an exasperated sigh. He didn't have time nor energy to handle both long haired menaces and jumpy Manguanacs. He turned towards the Manguanac. "It's all right Abdul, he's with me." Though Wufei couldn't understand the disappointed look on Abdul's face while the man lowered his gun.

Wufei led Duo trough the dark, winding corridors of the house. There were a lot of candle holders around, but not all of them held candles, on top of that, only one candle in five seemed to have been lit. There was no other source of light, no windows, as far as Duo could see and no electricity. Duo wondered about that last one, in this day and age, who didn't use electricity?

Most of corridors had carpets in dark red, blue or green covering the wooden floor. At regular intervals paintings or other pieces of art broke up the monotony of the walls. The walls were covered by panelling, in the same kind of wood as the floor, to about hip-height where it gave away to a mustard-yellow wallpaper.

The demon had first thought of leaving Duo to a Manguanac but Wufei had soon changed his mind when he remembered Abdul's reaction to the boy. Wufei's own room was in this direction after all.

"Wuffie you are bleeding, a lot." Duo sounded, and was concerned. He'd never seen anyone loose this much blood and still be standing. Hell, before last month he hadn't seen anyone get anything worse than a paper cut. Much less bleeding through his shirt in the way Wufei was currently doing. Whatever had happened it couldn't have been comfortable. He hadn't seen Wufei getting hurt which meant that it must have happened before he came to get him.

"My name is Wufei. And I'm aware of my current condition, yes."

"You really ought to let someone look at it. I'm pretty sure humans aren't supposed to stand up after loosing that much blood."

"Lucky me I'm not human then, and let me remind you that me bleeding or not is none of your business." They continued in silence until they reached a pair of richly decorated doors. They were carved to a likeness of a forest so real Duo swore that he'd seen a deer walk trough the trees and peer at him before it reached the doorframe and got out of sight.

"This is Heero's room." Was all Wufei said as before leaving the bewildered Duo behind while he continued to his own quarters.

Duo stood still, his brain still didn't want to believe in this, the man, the trip, the house and now these doors. He only needed to open them to get to Heero, but did he want to? They hadn't really met a lot, at total of two times and a short note, as a matter of fact and yet… and yet. Heero was one of life's great mysteries, why had he even agreed to come with Wufei today? Maybe it was Heero's unsettling use of the honorific 'master, or the total lack of flat Heero when he left windows on the twentieth floor, or was there something else? And there was that nagging feeling in the back of his mind that told Duo that there was something familiar about Heero. Something Duo ought to know. When his inner monologue had gone on long enough Duo threw caution to the winds and entered the room.
It looked like a home office of sorts. There was a big desk and filled bookcases but there were also two stuffed chairs and a small table in front of fireplace in which a fire was burning happily. Now Duo was faced with a choice, there was one door straight ahead and two doors to the left. Which one to choose? He went for the one straight ahead, if nothing else it ought to be easier to find his way out of there if something happened.

Luck had been on his side, the room he entered was Heero's bedroom. There were no windows here, like the office room and the hallways. How could they live like this and not see daylight at all? The large four-poster bed dominated the whole room. Heero lay still as death on the pristine white sheets in the middle of the bed. Duo rushed forward halting only a couple of steps from the edge. Heero had seemed to be a very private person; Duo couldn't help but to feel that he was intruding. When Heero didn't move or otherwise react to Duo's presence he inched closer.

Duo had to climb into the bed to get close enough to the still form to see that his eyes were open but non-responding. He looked deep into those blue eyes, and deeper yet.

He found himself standing in a field of short cropped grass. There was nothing except the never-ending field and a deep blue sky that looked real but felt faked. There were no trees or bushes, no water, not even a flower. Duo could have sworn that each individual straw of grass grew at the exact same distance from the other ones. He looked around once more but still couldn't figure out where he was. Had he touched something like that captured spell that had brought him to the house or was there another explanation to this strange place?

"Master?"

"Wha… Heero?" And there stood Heero, where there had recently been only empty field. "Where are we?"

"Inside my mind. Though I'm not really sure how you got here."

"Wuffie came and got me, he had some cool transportation-jewel-thingy and we came here and some guy pointed a gun at me until Wu-man told him not to and then he showed me to your room despite his injuries he bled a lot and it didn't even look as if he noticed." The words poured from Duo's mouth. Heero broke the speech down to manageable pieces adding punctuation where needed.

"I'm sorry." Duo ended his impromptu speech with.

"For what?"

"Entering your room without permission but Wu-man said that you needed help so I figured that it might be excused. I just wanted you to know that I wouldn't have done it if you had been able to say no."

"What happened?"

"I don't know and Wufei didn't say. You're just lying still on your bed looking at nothing." Heero looked slightly shocked.

"You shouldn't be able to talk to me like this. Something, someone, attacked me and my mind must have shut down."

"Well I'm here now. Can I help you jumpstart your mind again?"

"It's already begun. You managed to get my sense of self together and it has already begun working on piecing the scattered remains together again."

"Um, this might sound like a stupid question but I'm going to ask anyways. How do I get out of here? I mean it's all right for you to be here, it's your mind, but I'd like to get back into mine."

"I'll help you, soon. I just have to be strong enough." And soon Heero did. He used force to expel everything that wasn't him from his mind and it caused Duo to slam back into his own body so fast it recoiled and he ended up sprawled on the floor. But there was also something else that was also expelled, something that had been stuck to Heero's mind for so long and so deep that he hadn't noticed it before. Truth to be told, he didn't notice it disappearing either but another man did, and he wasn't happy about it.

"Duo?" Heero's voice was weak but it carried far enough.

"Yeah." For a moment Heero thought he was hearing things, and then Duo's head popped up over the edge of the bed. His hair was ruffled and bangs stood out ever which way but he was unharmed.

"Thank you." Heero wasn't going to lie around all night now when he was awake again. Thanks to Duo he'd gotten an idea of how to get Quatre to snap out of it and he needed to go and see Wufei. The demon shouldn't have been out in the human world looking for Duo in the shape he was in now.

"Um, Heero?" Said person watched as Duo slowly backed away from the bed.

"What?"

"Your eyes… they are red… and glowing. But you already knew that didn't you?" The last came out in a bit of a rush. Heero thought some very nasty words. Of course the expulsion had cost a lot of energy; of course he had to replace it. But did his body really have to betray him like this?

"What are you Heero?" Heero sighed, here it comes, and the next thing he'd see was Duo running for the door.

"I'm a vampire." To his utter surprise Duo stopped backing and instead he leaned forward.

"The bloodsucking kind or the ones who fly into innocent virgins's windows but never gets a chance to do anything?"

"I need blood, human blood, to stay… well… alive. I don't do the virgin thing, though." Heero replied honestly, it didn't even cross his mind not to.

"Do you have fangs?"

"Yes."

"Cool." Heero suddenly had the feeling that he and Duo weren't participating in the same conversation. Duo's responses weren't what he'd expected. "So the glowing eyes are a part of being vampire?"

"Unfortunately."

"You're not going to snack on me, are you?"

"No I won't, master. And for the record: I don't snack on anyone."

"Well, see you later then." Heero looked surprised, he still hadn't gotten the script to this dialogue and things we're going a bit too fast for him.

"Are you leaving?"

"Not me, you are. You need to, um, eat something."

"I'll send a Manguanac in with something for you. Feel free to stay." With those words he did leave. Trough the door, Duo decided that it must have been a fluke, Heero always jumped out of windows when he left.

Duo energetically nosed trough all of Heero's rooms. He remembered that he'd said that he hadn't wanted to walk around in Heero's room without permission but he'd gotten it, right? Duo had just decided to see if the doors had as pretty carvings on the inside as on the outside when a giant of a man opened one of them. It was hard to tell who got most shocked. Duo, on one hand, hadn't expected such a large man (honestly he hadn't really known what to expect. Manguanac isn't a good description, really) and he definitely hadn't expect him to open the door when he stood in front of them himself. Rashid, on the other hand, had just been told to leave off food in Heero's room. Of course the vampire had failed to mention anything about anyone being in there and, courtesy of living with four different beings that didn't exist in the eyes of most men, he wasn't really sure how to treat whatever this man was. Heero hadn't said anything about any special diet though so it had to be mostly human.

"I'm sorry I scared you, master…?" Duo looked up… and then even further up, the man was huge, and then he looked some more just because the man was big.

"I'm Duo Maxwell. And you are a Mag Nack? Ooo! Is that food?" Rashid nodded. "You're my new best friend." Duo declared while dancing around the Manguanac and the tray and whatever furniture happened to be in the vicinity.

"It's 'Manguanac' master Duo. And yes there is food but would you please stop eating from the tray until I can put it down." It's not nice to sic an excited Duo on an unprepared person. Rashid handled it pretty good all things considered.

Food eaten and nothing more to explore, Duo wasn't really up to leave the safety that was Heero's rooms, he crept into Heero's bed to sleep for a while. He'd been up almost all night, He didn't mean to sleep for long but he was still out when Heero returned. Heero took one hard long stare at the braided man and decided that he liked to find Duo in his bed. He also knew that there could never be anything between them. He couldn't let himself hope that it would be permitted, even if Duo, against all odds, would like him back. Heero lay on the bed, on top of the sheets. The bed was large enough not to scare Duo if he woke next to Heero.

Duo did wake up next to Heero. At first he just heard a slow even breathing close to his ear. With a second thought he realized that the breathing was a bit too slow. Heero, it had to be Heero. He liked it, he felt safe. A bit strange considering that the 'man' was a vampire and could quite possibly rip his throat out. He'd said that he wouldn't, though. Duo decided that it was him that was intruding on Heero's bed so it was only right that he got out. He didn't think that Heero would appreciate if he stayed in bed.

During his earlier explorations Duo had encountered a strangely lavish bathroom. Strange because the rest of the rooms were much more barren, the furniture old and well worn but there seemed to be nothing personal there. Not sterile but there wasn't a lot of personal stuff. He treated himself to a long hot bath. He thought he heard something so he threw one towel around his hair and one around his hips and went to investigate. It was Heero who'd been moving about. Duo suddenly felt stupid for realizing that the rooms' owner might, in fact, use them. He did also feel uneasy standing in front of Heero clad in only a pair of towels. Heero himself had discarded his shirt and presented a nice set of abs. They both decided that the other was wearing a little too little clothing to keep them comfortable and hurried back to where they'd come from.

Arif had been sent to Heero's rooms to leave some 'breakfast'. He couldn't understand why there seemed to be enough for two but he didn't care. He was too worried over Quatre. He was surprised to find rather a bouncy young man in Heero's office though.

"Are you also a Mack Nag?"

"A 'Manguanac'. Yes I am. And who might you be?" Heero choose this moment to enter the room.

"I'm Duo. Haven't you guys ever considered calling yourself something easier to pronounce?" Heero stood still for a moment before he decided not to bother to ask about what they were talking about. "You've brought more food!" Duo's face lit up with expectation. The food did keep up to the standards set the day before.

"I need to go and check up on Quatre and Wufei. Would you like to stay here or come with me?" Heero asked after Duo'd finished his meal. Heero himself didn't need much food having just fed the night before.

"I'd like to come with you. If that's all right with you." Duo added, blushing. Heero nodded and started down the corridor to Wufei's rooms.

Duo was impressed by Wufei's rooms. They had the same general size and placements as Heero's and at first glance they seemed as sterile. That was until you saw that the straight lines and clean cuts were there by personal choice. The demon simply preferred simplicity and he'd let the placement of the furniture speak what it, itself, did not.

"Heero?" Surprise was evident in his voice. The demon was pale and a thin coat of sweat covered what was visible of his skin. He lay in bed, for the time resigned to his lack of mobility and the fact that he had to show weakness.

"Hn."

"How?" Confusion melted away to be replaced with reluctant knowledge when he laid eyes on Duo who'd entered behind Heero. Heero saw Wufei flicker his eyes to Duo and nodded.

"Quatre?" Speaking hurt more than the stubborn dragon was willing to admit.

"Not yet but I've got an idea of how to do it."

"Good."

"Get better, soon."

"Yeah, and Wuffie, thanks for coming and fetching me."

"Maxwell, my name's Wufei!"

"Well, mine's Duo and I don't hear you calling me that." Duo said as he slunk out the door. Meanwhile Heero had a small smile playing on his lips as he followed Duo out the door. Someone out-speaking Wufei was a rare sight.