Author: Sparkle Itamashii

Title: Inheritance

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

Disclaimer: Gundam Wing AC is NOT MINE.


Chapter Twelve

Though the front door creaked open quietly enough, it woke me instantly. I couldn't help but be alert, even though I knew it was probably only Heero. He was the only one Artemis never barked at during the night. For a moment I waited to hear the tell-tale thump of his briefcase on the floor before I remembered he'd left it here that morning. I relaxed when I heard his soft voice praising Artemis for not making a fuss at him.

"You're late!" I called, smiling at the way my voice still sounded so drowsy. I loved drowsy voices.

Muffled footsteps padded down the hall and he stuck his head into the door of our room to get a look at me. "Wu Fei was waiting for me when I got out of work." His tone clearly implied that he thought it was my fault.

"Don't look at me." I defended, rolling languidly out of bed. Higher brain functions seemed to shut down while I was napping and all I wanted to do was go back to sleep. But I wanted to see Heero, too, and that desire always won out over any others. "I was accosted by a couple of Maguanacs, Trowa, Hilde, and Catherine at nine this morning. They only left about an hour ago."

"Wow, long day." He loosened the tie around his neck and began undoing the buttons on his shirt to get ready for bed.

"Tell me about it," I murmured, wrapping my arms around him and burying my nose in the crook of his neck. He smelled really nice, like smoke and aftershave and something just a little bit sweet. 'Fei had probably taken him to a bar so that he wouldn't be lording around the house causing trouble. "How was it with 'Fei?"

"I'd forgotten what an ass Wu Fei is," he said mournfully, running feather light fingers over my back and hips. I would have purred if I could have. "You?"

I chuckled. "I'd forgotten what an ass Trowa has." That actually drew a laugh from him. God I loved when he laughed.

"So you… finished the room?" He asked quietly, nuzzling the hair just above my ear.

"We actually childproofed the whole house. Found your briefcase in the front closet when we were stashing things, by the way." I grinned tiredly when I heard him mumble something about having seen it when he came in just now. "Catherine and Hilde locked themselves in the guest bedroom and left us to fix the rest."

He made a face, reluctantly releasing me as I pulled back a little. "It's staying in the guest bedroom?" he asked, sounding a bit put out at the idea.

"Yes, she is." I gave him a hard glare, though it was softened somewhat by the fact that I was too tired to argue much. I would have kept going, but he interrupted, obviously trying to avoid being chided.

"And what do you mean by childproofed?"

What did he think I meant? "You know, making it safe for a kid." I said, trying to sound nonchalant because I knew he was probably going to chuck a fit about a number of things. Like the cupboards. And his guns. And… well, let's just say I was going to be slaughtered when he saw the backyard.

He glanced suspiciously around our room, seeming to notice that something was different. His eyes settled back on me and I swallowed, offering him a nervous smile. "Where are my guns?" His tone was almost warning me to say they were safe or else.

"Locked in the closet so no one accidentally gets into them."

"My knives?"

"It's all in our closet." I said patiently, yawning deeply. "It really should have been put away in the closet to begin with so it's not a big deal."

"It was perfectly fine where it was. We could have closed the door."

"Heero…" I warned, eyes narrowing.

"So how does the room look?" He asked, clearly not willing to get into a fight.

I sighed, allowing him to change the subject because I wasn't up to bickering either. It was just too much effort for nothing. Maybe I could discuss it with him tomorrow; or later today if you wanted to get technical.

"It's kind of… actually, I haven't seen it yet," I responded, a little miffed. In getting everyone out and cleaning up the main rooms, I'd forgotten to open the door to the guest bedroom and have a look for myself. "Let's go see, shall we?"

Ignoring his groan, I grabbed his hand and lead him down the hall. He dragged his feet the entire way, grumbling. I refused to smile at his antics, however, because I did not want to encourage poor behavior like that. He was enough trouble already, without any help from me. The door clicked open and I reached inside to flick on the light.

My initial action was to recoil and take a step backward, but Heero was in the way. Beside me he had stiffened, staring at the interior as though it were going to jump out and bite him. Everything was so… pink. And purple. And was that… baby blue? I bit back a groan and forced a smile onto my lips.

"Tada," I said weakly, turning to allow Heero access to the room.

"What happened to the stuff… that was in here?" He sounded hesitant and I knew that he was trying very hard to be okay with all of this.

"Some of it is in the basement and the rest is in the garage. I think." I brushed the backs of my fingers against his forearm in reassurance.

He motioned to the toy chest and the rack of brightly colored tubs beside it that were brimming with toys. "Is all of that… necessary?"

"Wait till you see the video collection…" I muttered, hiding my grin.

"The what?"

I shrugged, remembering the boxes of video tapes we'd had to find places for earlier. "Apparently little kids watch a lot of television."

"Then the two of you ought to get along," he said dryly. The initial shock of seeing all that… pastel was wearing off now and he was almost visibly forcing himself to relax.

I snorted and took his hand in my own, switching off the light. "Come on. You can check out the rest of the house tomorrow."

Pulling him into the hall, I closed the door behind us. Before we could get back to the bedroom, however, the phone rang. My first inclination was to ignore it, but no one called so late without a good reason. I released Heero's hand and gave him a reassuring smile.

"Don't worry, I'll get it. You change." I dashed down the hall and into the front room, snatching up the phone on the fourth ring, just before the answering machine. "Hello?"

"Duo?" It was Quatre. "Sorry to call so late. Is Trowa still there?"

"No?" I wondered why he would even ask. Why would Trowa still be here? He'd told me that he was staying the night with Quatre. "He should be there. He left a little over an hour ago."

"Oh. He's not." He sounded a little disappointed. "He's not answering his phone, either. I called to tell him I was going to bed and that someone would let him in, but…"

"But he didn't answer?" That was strange. Trowa always answered his phone. I didn't even know what his voicemail sounded like.

"No, it switches right to voice mail." He made a sort of stressed noise. "It's just not like him, and with what happened to Relena…

"It's odd," I said, "but maybe the battery just died, you know?" That was the only explanation I could think of. Obviously Trowa had turned the phone off somehow, but there wasn't a reason for him to do that willingly.

"I doubt it would…" There was a moment of silence and then he seemed to remember something. "Wait, was he driving Hilde and Catherine?"

"Yeah, he was." That had to be it. They were probably just talking and he didn't want to interrupt so he'd turned it off to prevent that. Easy. I took a seat on the couch, fumbling around in the cushions for the TV remote control.

He sighed. "That's probably it then. I really should have remembered that before bothering you."

"It's fine, but you know," I said absently, "that he might stay with Catherine for a bit longer so he might have just turned it off while he was there. He's rather particular about alone time with family, isn't he?"

"That's true…" He chuckled. "I'd almost forgotten she was staying planet-side while Trowa is here."

"Me too, until she showed up here this morning." I smiled, flipping on the television and muting it before clicking on the closed captions. I'd missed the news all day because we'd been working and I hated to get behind on what was happening. They were reporting some kind of storm quite a ways away; nothing that would affect me. "You know if he doesn't come back tonight that Cathy probably kidnapped him. I wouldn't worry too much. Just give her a call tomorrow morning and ask, right?"

"Yeah, I'll do that. I hope it was all right that they all came by today," he said sheepishly.

"Oh, it was great!" I flicked through the channels to my other favorite news channel. It looked like they were on one of the colonies. "We actually got everything in place…" I trailed off, realizing that it was a follow up of the reports they'd been doing about investigating the doctors' labs.

"Duo?"

I shook my head, pulling my attention away again. "Sorry. Anyhow, we're probably going to be shifting things around for a few days. Maybe weeks."

"Are you ready to take her?" He sounded very eager. "The paperwork all went through really fast and they said you can pick her up any time. All you have to do is call the manor and let them know you're coming."

That was perfect. If I went tomorrow afternoon, Heero would be at work so he wouldn't be given time to talk himself out of it. She could be here by the time he got home. He had always been better at doing things on the fly; I had a feeling that if I tossed the kid into his life quick enough he would treat the situation better than if he was given time to think. Unless…

"Heero doesn't have to go with me, does he?" That would ruin the whole idea pretty fast.

"I don't think so. Both of you were cited in the Will, so either of you should be able to take her home."

"Oh good." I grinned. The less Heero had to do, the happier he would be- which reminded me. "By the way, good job calling Wu Fei to keep Heero out of the way today."

"What?"

"Calling Wu Fei," I repeated, thinking maybe he didn't remember calling. "He showed up at Heero's work and kept him out all day so he wouldn't interfere here."

"He did?" Quatre asked, puzzled. "When I called he said he had things he had to do today so he wouldn't be able to go."

What? Why would Wu Fei lie to Quatre and then go anyway? "Well, maybe he just changed his mind and didn't call. Or maybe he just didn't want anyone to know he was being nice."

To that, Quatre snickered. "Yeah, that… sounds like him."

"Hey, are you watching the news?" I had let my attention drift back to the television again.

"Mm." He agreed, and I heard things being shuffled around on his end. "I had it playing, but I wasn't watching it. What's happening?"

"Well, they've been doing reports on the labs lately, you know?" I was actually kind of concerned about that. Heero wasn't exactly the sentimental type but Quatre might actually understand me. "Does it bother you?"

"Bother me?"

"Yeah." I paused, trying to think of how to put it into words. Finally I sighed. "Our pasts are kinda wrapped up with the docs. There's probably not a whole lot involving me, since I joined the game kind of late, but…" I trailed off for a second before continuing quietly. "Heero's whole life was there. From what I understand, J got him when he was a little kid. You spent a lot of time with Doctor H, didn't you?"

"Not at the labs," Quatre said, though I could hear that he was thinking about it now as well. "Although I can imagine that he would have brought information back there, wouldn't he…"

"If they open those places up," I said gently, "what are they gonna find? It could be anything. It could be nothing! They could have taken everything out when the war was over, right? But they could have left everything, too. They could have left things we don't even know about; things we don't want to know about."

"They're saying they haven't gotten inside yet," Quatre pointed out half-heartedly.

"How long do you think that's going to last?" I replied in that you-know-better voice. "It's only a matter of time."

"What do you want to do?" I winced at his hard tone. "Without knowing what's inside I can't justify extreme measure, especially when there could be nothing at all."

"What if it's not nothing?" I asked, trying to lead him to my train of thought. "Heero and I have been living peacefully. So has pretty much everyone else. Next thing you know they're breaking into the old labs and Relena ends up dead."

"You can't possibly connect the two, Duo. She never went near those labs and the doctors wouldn't have had anything on her anyway."

"I know." I sighed. "All I'm saying is that it's kind of… well, a large coincidence. You, me, Heero, Trowa, Wu Fei… all of us were connected. I never got to thoroughly explore anywhere in the lab and I guess I'm just worried that they'll find something dangerous enough to threaten us, or worse the peace. The doctors weren't idle- they designed our gundams and look what we did with them. We ended a huge war. We were the most advanced, powerful weapons on the battlefield and it was luck of the draw that we were on the good side. I can't shake the feeling that those gundams weren't the only thing they designed and I don't want to see what would happen if something fell into the wrong hands."

"You think they are going to find weapons?"

"I don't know what they're going to find, Quatre," I said finally. "I'm just saying… it's a possibility. A dangerous one."

I heard him take a breath and I waited patiently, letting him think over everything I'd given him. Quatre was good at this sort of thing; thinking on a grand scale. The only person I know who is possibly better is Heero. If Quatre thought that it wasn't going to be a problem then I would try to stop worrying. Try.

"Okay, look. I'll send Rashid up tomorrow to check out the lab in the L4 colonies. I think I still have the access codes somewhere."

"The L2 ones are long gone. G changed them obsessively."

"I'm sure that these people won't be able to get inside for a while yet. They haven't even found a real entrance. If Rashid finds anything out of the ordinary, I'll give you a ring, okay?"

"All right," I agreed grudgingly, knowing that was going to be the best I could get at the moment. It was not a bad arrangement, though, and Quatre was right. The idiots they had trying to break into the place on television were having a terrible time of it. They'd lost three people to traps set to keep people from doing exactly what they were attempting to do.

"Who are you talking to?"

I yelped, almost dropping the phone when I heard Heero's voice from just behind me. I hadn't even heard him approach. Glaring and trying to look completely innocent at the same time, I turned around to face him. "It's Quatre. He was looking for Trowa."

His eyes narrowed for a second and then he shook his head. "He went home, right?"

"Yeah, I know. I think he was dropping Hilde off, too."

"Oh. Well… okay."

I turned back to the phone and cleared my throat. "I'm going to let you go, Q. Give me a call if you find out anything new." About Trowa or the labs, I added silently, knowing he would get the message.

"Okay, goodnight." He paused. "And Duo? Try not to worry too much. I'm sure it'll be fine on both accounts."

Smiling, I agreed and hung up gently, rising. I stretched and smiled at Heero before walking over and herding him toward the bedroom. "Come on then, let's go."

He stopped me only when he reached the edge of the bed, turning to face me with a concerned look. "Are you going to pick up the kid tomorrow?"

Damn, caught. "Um… yeah." I mumbled, stripping off my shirt as I got ready for bed. I'd fallen asleep fully clothed earlier only because I hadn't meant to fall asleep at all. "I've got to go out to Relena's and get her."

Quietly he took a seat on the edge of the bed and scooted backward, eyes trained on me as I changed. "Would you… I mean… Can I go?"

I froze, eyes widening a little bit as I stared at him. "What?" I must have been mistaken. There was no way Heero Yuy just asked if he could skip work to pick up a little kid with me. No way.

He flushed, dropping his gaze and shaking his head. "Nevermind."

"No, Heero!" I said hastily, "I'd love if you came along!" Oh please don't let him back out of this. "I just didn't think you would want to, because you have work." He mumbled something under his breath and I raised an eyebrow. "What was that?"

"I said," He replied irritably, though with hardly any voice, "that I already told them I wouldn't… be in the rest of the week."

I think I opened and closed my mouth a few times before my voice began to work again. "Really? You really did?" I tried not to sound too excited, but really I failed miserably. I've never been very good at staying calm when I was happy.

"I really did." He chanced a glance back up at me. "I thought it would be a good idea."

"It's an excellent idea," I purred, climbing onto the bed on top of him, straddling his thighs as he leaned back. Tilting my head to one side, I gave him a soft smile. "You know, just when I begin to think you're completely hopeless, you go and do something like that."

His smile faltered for a second, as though he weren't quite sure if he was allowed to be smiling. When I leaned forward and pressed a kiss to his lip, though, he melted backwards, taking me with him. "Is that a bad thing?"

I slipped gently to the side and curled myself around him, closing my eyes. "Not at all." I murmured sleepily. "Not. At. All…"


/End Chapter Twelve, Inheritance/