Author: Sparkle Itamashii

Title: Inhertiance

Warnings: Respect the rating. Please see my profile for details.

Disclaimer: Gundam Wing AC is NOT MINE.


Chapter Nine

I moved forward as he slowly drew open the door. At first I thought it had to be one of our neighbors but I certainly didn't recognize the small, nervous lady fidgeting on our doorstep. She was dressed in a clean white blouse and a riveted blue skirt that hung just past her knees. Perched on her nose was a pair of thick rimmed glasses with one of those decorated bead chains attached to the arms so that she could take them off and let them hand around her neck. She was too… pristine to be one of our neighbors here for a casual visit. As soon as she saw us she snapped to attention and smiled.

"Hello, my name is- oh my!" She exclaimed, interrupting herself as her mind caught up with the rest of her senses. I suppose we did make quite a sight- I could feel blood still seeping into my shirt from my shoulder and Heero was idly trying to stop his palm from bleeding while he listened to her. "Are you all right?"

"Fine." Heero clipped out, his jaw twitching as he clenched it against being nasty without reason. He hated unexpected company. "Can we help you?"

Her eyes widened a little bit more at his short tone so that the whites showed all the way 'round. I followed her gaze to my shoulder before covering the tear with one hand and forcing her attention back to my face. "Well I- I mean, that looks rather- I hope you'll excuse me-"

With a wave of my hand I quieted her and glanced to Heero. "Have you got the keys?" He nodded and I turned back to the lady. "I'm sorry, what did you say your name was?"

"Linda…" She sounded as though she was on a different planet. Shaking her head, she turned her confused attention to me.

Smiling, I kept my left arm close to my body so I wouldn't move it and shook her hand. "Pleasure to meet you, Linda." She gave our hands a very confused look as though she'd never seen a handshake before. "Is there any chance this can wait?"

"Well I-"

"Maybe we can buy something later?" I smiled in Heero's direction and he rolled his eyes. I was taking too long for his tastes and I knew if I didn't wrap it up soon he was going to do it for me. "We were just on our way to the emergency room, weren't we Heero?" He gave me a sulky look before nodding in agreement. Turning back to her, I offered an apologetic look.

"Sir, I'm not selling-" She cut herself off and almost tangibly switched into a more serious mode. "I'm here about Mara. I'm looking for Duo Maxwell, sir. He's registered with the agency and-"

Without waiting for her to finish or allowing me to say anything, Heero grabbed me around the arm and stepped outside. "Find someone else." He hissed angrily at her as he passed.

"Someone else- but, sir-" The lady backed away as the door slammed and Heero began to haul me down the front walk. Aw, shit. He must have forgotten about Mara for a minute and that stupid lady had to go and remind him…

"We don't want it here." He called over his shoulder as we left.

"Don't want….?" She sounded as though the concept was completely foreign.

"We do!" I contradicted, the last word coming out a little strangled as it turned into a noise of pain. "Heero, let go; you're hurting me!" I snapped, yanking my arm away from him. "I'll call!" I clambered into the car just as Heero was pulling the keys from his pocket. "What's your problem today?"

"You just don't get it, do you…" He growled, shoving the keys roughly into the ignition and starting the car. "You just…" The lady was still standing a bit dumbfounded on our front porch. "You registered? With them?" He said the last word with so much disgust I was almost afraid to answer affirmatively.

"Of course I did; I couldn't have gotten an interview if I hadn't!" I said defensively after a moment, though I made sure to keep any sort of anger out of my voice. I didn't want another fight- not now. "I didn't think they would come to the house unless I told them it was okay."

We backed down the driveway and I glanced back toward the house, unsure if it was really okay to just leave that lady standing there. I was sure she would report it to the agency if nothing else and we hadn't locked the door. If she left there was no one there so someone could break in very easily… but then again we lived in a safe enough neighborhood. Hell, Mrs. Patterson from across the street had reported me when I'd come home late one night, saying there was 'some suspicious guy' trying to get into our house.

Settling back and pressing my hand over my still throbbing shoulder, I sighed. "Where are we going?"

"Emergency room on Third." He said thoughtfully after a moment.

"Wha- we're still going?" I asked almost sitting up in surprise. I'd thought for sure… but I wasn't about to protest. "I mean, that's good. I'm glad." I sank back into the seat again. "My shoulder does hurt." Shifting so I could glance over, I gave him a curious look. "Did you sharpen those knives or something?"

I saw the corner of his mouth twitch and I rolled my eyes. Why did I even bother asking? Of course he'd sharpened the knives. He'd probably cleaned all the guns recently, too, even though we hadn't touched them for real in quite a while.

The suburbs flickered by outside my window, my forehead resting gently against the glass. My brain rattled around in my head as we drove and the glass moved but I didn't really care. It kept me from thinking about any one thing for too long. There was just too much of everything; Relena and her kid, fighting with Heero, keeping everything together properly while trying to live life… I guess I just needed to take a time out for a while and organize the facts so I could understand everything.

I think the biggest problem at the moment was that a part of me felt that Heero was lying, leaving something out; that he was only telling partial truths. While he wasn't as extreme as I was in not outright lying, he still didn't like to do it and if he could avoid it, he did. The problem with not lying like that is that you have to figure out how to be creative with the truth. There are always ways around telling people the whole truth; the truth they are looking for. It's human nature to assume what seems most likely, given the information they have. Or at least… the information they think they have.

Implication was one of the best tools and Heero had used it shamelessly in the past. I'd watched him do it to people on more than one occasion. Humans want to make sense of their world. They rationalize and always try to figure out what's between the lines, instead of taking things at face value.

In normal society that probably worked wonderfully but not when you were dealing with me and not when you were dealing with Heero. Neither of us, I think, felt badly about implying something when we knew our audience would assume something we didn't mean. I guess I kept hoping they'd learn their lesson. I'd learned mine; I knew when someone was trying to get me to think one thing while they meant another and I had that horrible gut feeling that Heero was trying to do just that.

I wouldn't have thought of it if that lady hadn't shown up and confronted us, however timidly. Lost in thought it finally occurred to me why I'd been feeling that sort of unease when talking to Heero about this whole situation. I began to understand something I had missed; or at least I thought I understood. If I was right, though, it would open up a whole new can of worms…

"Hey… Heero?" I asked quietly, not bothering to turn to face him because I didn't want to lose my nerve. "You want her, don't you?" I heard him open his mouth to protest and so I continued talking right over him. "You haven't said you don't want her, you know. You've just been saying that she 'can't stay here' or that you don't want her 'living with us' but I can't remember you saying you didn't want her."

He didn't respond to that and quite honestly I didn't expect him to. I was right and he knew it and I knew I'd just happened upon the real problem. For whatever reason he must really have wanted Mara but he had gotten the impression that she couldn't stay with us. As much as I wish I did, I didn't know what he was thinking and there was no way to ask that he would just up and tell me. He didn't do things like that; if he wanted me to know, or at least if he was going to let me know, he would have already told me.

I pushed those thoughts to the back of my head because they hurt. I felt like an ass, pushing the matter with him any further and if I continued thinking about it I knew I would say something stupid. I didn't want to have anything else to regret right now so I exercised what little good judgment I seemed to have and kept my mouth shut.

It wasn't much farther to the hospital so luckily the awkward silence following my out loud realization was short. When we got inside there was hardly anyone there. I motioned for Heero to take a seat and approached the counter. The secretary took down my and Heero's names and handed me a clipboard with a few pages attached. I nodded my thanks and snatched a pen from the cup by the window, taking a seat near Heero.

Slowly I filled out the forms I'd been given, glad that I'd injured my left shoulder so that I could still write. Beside me Heero had assumed a watch position, almost as if he were guarding the two of us from danger. Somehow I didn't think the knitting grandmother across the room or the little kid playing with a magazine on the floor were going to be much of a threat.

I turned my attention fully to the forms, feeling sad at the realization that half the questions had no answer. I didn't know my family's medical history and I didn't have medical records of my own. I know Heero didn't have either of those things, either, and as far as I knew neither of us had been afflicted with any sort of genetic disorder. There was actually precious little I knew about myself and I couldn't help feeling down about it.

Thankfully I wasn't permitted to dwell on it for very long. Less than five minutes after I sat we were beckoned into the back area. A little old lady with bifocal glasses and a sweet smile ushered us into a room. She disappeared after assuring us that someone would be in to help us in a few minutes. As soon as she was gone I hopped up on the tissue paper covered table and swung my feet like a little kid, glancing around the pristine room.

I'd forgotten how much I hated rooms like that; rooms that were clean and white and pure. Rooms that had forgotten what real blood and war and death were like. Rooms that made me feel dirty just being in them, as though I were going to irrevocably taint everything nearby just by existing in the same place at the same time. I could take a million showers and be the cleanest person on the face of the planet and walk into a room like this still feeling like I'd just been rolling in mud.

A doctor entered before I could resume the last bits of paperwork. He was a thickly built man with sharp green eyes and a perpetual scowl. His long white coat brushed against his calves and he held a clipboard similar to my own in his meaty hands. Giving both of us a cursory once over, he lay the clipboard on the table and approached me. I smiled when I heard Heero growl, but he let the doctor examine my shoulder.

"Can you tell me what happened, Mr. … Maxwell?" His eyes flickered to the pages I'd watched the secretary filling out a few minutes ago and I nodded.

"I was making chicken and I had an accident in the kitchen." I said politely.

"Both of you…?" I contained a wince at his tone. It was very clear that he didn't believe me for a second but he also seemed like he was willing to let it go if I was willing to keep up the act.

"Yes, sir. Both of us." Well it was an accident…

"I see." He said flatly, taking a step back. "Shirt off." He glanced to Heero, who was looking very much like a ruffled dog. "Please have a seat."

Smiling in reassurance to Heero, I stripped off my shirt and presented my shoulder to the doctor. He opened the cupboard over the sink and pulled out a couple of things, laying them beside me. I was surprised at how quickly he picked at the wounds and then swabbed them clean. I swallowed when I saw that both my shoulder and Heero's hand had begun to bleed again because he was being less than gentle. It was truly fascinating to see him apply the liquid stitches to the lacerations; he just squeezed it on and it smoothed out over my skin. I could feel it seeping into the cut, cold and soothing. He did the same for Heero, although he actually put Heero's hand in a strange semi-brace to keep him from bending it too much.

Thankfully I was able to convince Heero to go get the car from the parking lot and pull into the circle drive by the entrance while I paid for the visit. That gave me a chance to finish the paperwork and turn it in properly. The secretary was very helpful and she even gave me a sucker. I laughed and accepted it, feeling quite a bit like I was doing something I shouldn't.

I was just getting to the exit when my phone went off in my pocket. I scrambled to figure out just where I'd put it and after two rings managed to successfully produce it. The number wasn't one I recognized but then again payphones didn't register so I flipped it open anyhow.

"Hello?" I asked brightly, moving to the edge of the sidewalk, close to the street.

"Duo?" It was Quatre.

"Yo." I said cheerfully, scuffing my boot against the sidewalk and looking down the drive to see if Heero was on his way. What was taking him so long? "Howsit?"

"Well, I just… got a call." He said carefully, and all of my internal alarms went off like mad. My gaze became unfocused as I shifted my concentration completely to him.

"What's wrong? Did something happen?"

"…Are you sitting down…?"


/End Chapter Nine, Inheritance/


Notes: