CLUE: a Night in Winner's Mansion

Chapter Two - The Night Has Just Begun...

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Miss Crescent sighed, the final guest had shown up.

It was Quatre Winner. Funny, he was late for his own party. Oddly enough, considering the fact that it was his party. His party. Miss Crescent wondered if he had a girlfriend. Afterall, who was better to marry than him? He practically owned Europe, he was a multi-millionaire, only 21 and had 29 sisters. From different mothers, of course.

Her chances were high enough, sure she had to worry about Miss Venus flirting with him all the time but other than that she just had to make sure not to drool or trip over her own two feet. She'd done a pretty good job of that so far.

And dinner was in one word: delicious!

Due to freaky stares from the little Mistress 9, a.k.a. Hotaru she'd managed to eat slowly. Well, slow for her. Wufei had been unfortunate. He sat across from her as she was slowly eating her food.

The cook, a young woman with semi-long brown hair pulled up in a pony-tail came in offering drinks, Usagi taking a bottle of soda. Of course, being Usagi she ended up dropping the bottle, she bent down under the table to pick it up and bumped her head on the table. When she sat up she missed Zero's evil eyes.

"He heh, oops!" she said nervously, scratching the back of her head. She began to unscrew the cap and Relena was the one who noticed a ton of fizz gathering at the top.

"Miss Crescent! You shook up the-"

And with a pop! the cap of the bottle went flying. And with a little spot of pain, Wufei had his first soda of the night. It would probably be his last too. The liquid had hit him right on, and he sat there sputtering.

"Sorry! I am so sorry!" cried Miss Crescent. Relena sent a sympathetic look towards the girl.

'She's a bit clumsy,'

Quatre looked over at the chinese man, he could tell he was getting pretty ticked off. 'This is turning out nicely,'

Nataku grabbed his napkin and wiped his face dry. Setting the napkin slowly down he stood up. Col. Nataku clenched his fists, yes he was angry. Angry for having to meet her, for driving her to the stupid party, and now he had a nice red spot on his forehead where the cap had once been. (it now resided on his plate)

"You stupid, insolent brat! What is wrong with you? You act like a child! And a mentally ill one at that!" he glared down at her. She stared up at him with wide, hurt eyes.

And with that Miss Crescent ran from the room before they could see her crying. Col. Nataku shortly after, heading in a different direction. Kaolinite glared at his retreating back. Well, she glared at everything so that didn't really matter.

Little Mistress Nine looked helplessly at the other adults at the table. Relena's head was bowed, she looked ready to bolt too. Zero's plate was clean and he merely sat, waiting for whatever was to happen next. Miss Venus had resumed eating, as if she really caredabout the girl! Mister Winner slowly got up.

'At least he's nice enough to go find her. At least, I hope he's going to find her.' she thought. She herself wanted to look for her new friend but had been taught that it was rude to leave the table until everyone was done eating. The last thing Mistress Nine needed was Kaolinite on her back.

--+--

Quatre wandered through the hall that connected to several of the rooms, he was hoping she had stayed downstairs. The hall was semi-long and wide. When walking in you would probably first see the large staircase at the end of the hall. The lounge, where everyone had once resided was the first room on the right, the kitchen on the far left.

The library was in-between the lounge and the "petal's room". The "Petal's Room" was nicknamed by one of his sisters (her name happened to be Lily), and connected to the greenhouse, many beautiful and exotic plants grew there. It was alsohis cook's favorite room.

The "honcho" of Winner Corp. looked there first. Walking passed some of the weirdest flowers you could imagine he heard a voice. A voice that made him want to reach out and hug whoever it belonged to.

"...is so right! I am stupid!" he rounded a corner and saw her balled up on one of the window sills.

His heart went out to her. He walked up to her, bending down to her level. Miss Crescent saw somone coming up to her. She turned her head away from the young man.

"Go away! I don't need your pity!"

The young man frowned, she didn't seem like the stubborn type. Oh well, they never really do.

"I came to apologize, Col. Nataku isn't a very patient person."

"Yeah, and he's also rude, arrogant, stupid, mean, obnoxious, and he's probably rich too!" she said angrily standing up, after that incident she didn't want to go back, she wanted to leave.

She walked briskly past Quatre and passed several of the odd-looking plants before Quatre stopped her.

"Mistress Nine won't like being all alone here. You, I'm sure, have the makings of being her friend. Surely you wouldn't leave the little girl to fend for herself here?"

Usagi paused, he was right. And she knew it was his way of manipulating her. 'Stupid jerk! So what if he's hot and rich? There's no way he would go out with me anyway.'

"Fine." she said without turning around. "I'll stay, but if he tries anything again I won't be held responsible for whatever killings I commit!" and with that Miss Crescent headed back to the dining hall, ignoring everyone as she walked in with her head held high.

Quatre watched her leave. "It's a pity I expect you to Miss Tsukino."

--+--

Miss Crescent sat down next to Relena. The two had started up a nice conversation back in the dining hall and were now back in the lounge. The two occupied the couch until little Hotaru walked by, Miss Crescent lifting the surprised little girl right into her lap. Hotaru looked up questioningly while Miss Crescent only smiled.

"So when's the wedding?" she asked Relena as she showed her the ring. Silver band, a sapphire sat in the middle surrounded by diamonds.

"Several more months. It's killing me!" she said laughingly. Miss Venus glanced at them with a disgusted look. Of all people to befriend. Relena Peacecraft, her father was one of the most respected politicians in Europe! She knew, being from London, and had even met the man. She hoped that she could impress him by becoming friends with his daughter but the woman found Relena too appalling to attempt such a feat.

The young woman acted like some schoolgirl. Miss Venus' lip curled. Like little Miss Crescent. The girl was no adult, that much was for sure. And her new friend Mistress Nine, the skinny little brat, was kind of weird.

Zero rolled his eyes, females will be females. His fiancé was too nice. Too trusting. He was the owner of Yui Inc.! And his future bride acted like she was some... poor person. Why the hell did he let himself fall in love with her? Oh god, he hoped she didn't invite that pig-tailed big-mouth to the wedding or something...

Hiiro Yui knew Wufei Chang. Afterall Wufei worked at Yui Inc. the man was good with computers and electronics, so yes, Wufei's boss was Hiiro himself. And the two had known eachother since high school. Best grades, best athletes, just the best.

Then Wufei met Rei and they 'fell in love'. He got her pregnant, she got an abortion, they split up, she comes back after a few years, he rejects her, and then the woman goes psycho. Now, he knew Wufei was interested in the pig-tailed brat.

As for how he knew, well, back when Wufei and Rei met they instantly hated eachother. Zero didn't know that Wufei had driven the girl over, but seeing him yell at her like that... he was pretty sure his friend's actions would come back and bite him in the ass. Hard.

Payback's a bitch you know.

And why the hell did his fiancé have to be so nice? It was going to drive him mad, like at parties when asked to dance he would ignore the person (unless they were Relena) and she would always say yes. Or when asked a favor, he would scare them away and she would say yes.

'Why not just call the damn wedding off Yui?' he thought bitterly. He glanced at Wufei. The man had come back, he'd been outside smoking. 'I wonder if he's still pissed.'

Nope, he wasn't. It was easy to tell when Miss Crescent actually walked up to him smiling. Not one of those Hiiro smiles, but a nice genuine one.

"You're really a nice person Wufei." she said quietly, the other's in the room ignoring them. Except Zero who stood right next to the young man. Wufei blinked. Nice? The last person to say that was his mother, and she died over ten years ago.

"Excuse me?"

"You're nice. You just pretend to be mean and stuff. I'll find out why, you know." and with that the young woman went back to her previous seat, Zero saw his fiancé smiling one of those knowing smiles. 'Don't tell me you're going to go all goddess of love on me now?' he thought. What was wrong with women?

"What the hell..." his friend muttered. He didn't have that angry look on his face anymore. He looked calmer, but confusion was in his onyx eyes.

Usagi beamed, Relena was right, it did feel better to be nice to someone who was just mean to you. Moreso than going off and holding a grudge or socking them in the nose.

"Told you so," Relena chimed.

Kaolinite stepped in, that rather evil look still on her face.

"Please follow me to the ballroom." was all she said as she turned on her heel. Relena and Usagi looked at eachother, shrugging, the older woman stood up and Usagi set Hotaru down (the girl climbed willingly into her lap the second time she sat down) to follow Kaolinite.

Quatre stood in the middle of the large room, old music played out of the large stereo system on the far side of it. Quatre liked swing music apparently. Usagi liked dancing, even if she was as clumsy as a bull in a china - or possibly glass - shop.

Kaolinite left them all standing there and she closed the double doors behind her. The song ended and a waltz played. Relena smiled, she grabbed Zero's hand and just about dragged him off in Quatre's direction. The two started dancing and Usagi couldn't hold in her giggles.

It was so cute, Zero looked nervous. He felt uncomfortable dancing in front of them, seeing as they were the only ones. Quatre swayed to the music a bit too, Miss Venus seized her chance and headed towards him. The two danced as well and Zero's face became impassive again.

Usagi glanced over at Wufei. Then down at Hotaru. She wanted to dance too, but it wouldn't be very nice to leave the little girl all by herself. She felt the girl tug on her dress and heard the girl whisper.

"You should go dance Usagi. I can tell he wants to ask you! I'll just play with Mr. Teddy." holding her bear up like the others did, the girl started twirling around, while making her way to the others. (at the same time, as faraway from Venus as possible)

Miss Crescent smiled, that girl was so... sweet. Clasping her hands behind her back she stepped over to Wufei and stood next to him without saying anything. If Hotaru was right...

"Would you like to dance, Miss Crescent?" came his smooth voice. 'Yes!' she screamed inwardly. Instead of showing it outside, she only smiled coolly.

"Well... I didn't think that you of all people would be asking me to dance, are you sure you want to Col. Nataku?" she asked, placing a hand on her hip.

"If I didn't want to, I wouldn't have asked."

"Well then, prepare yourself, because I'm no ballerina." she said grinning, he took her hand.

"I believe that."

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