To Vwolf Youjutsu- Yup. Update. I own the Rowan, Damia, and Damia's Children, and I'm trying to convince my aunt to give me Lyon's Pride. I tried reading To Ride Pegasus, but I couldn't get into it. But don't let me get started on books, or I'll type for a page and a half.
To Nikkler- Okay! I won't cry! And thanks for the tissues. The Gift, huh? That's actually a pretty good suggestion…. I'll think about it. Thanks. Yesh, Dekim needs to die, slowly and painfully. Very slowly, and very painfully.
A ping akin to the sound of submarine sonar went off to Beki's left, and she turned automatically towards it. In the milling crowd on the sidewalk not two feet away, it was hard to pick out who had set off her Talent radar at first. Then her target obligingly stepped onto the café terrace, and she immediately fell in love.
Before her stood a slim, slightly tanned blond with large aqua eyes and the strongest empathy she'd ever felt, looking lost, confused, and a little sad.
"Hey, cutie, take a seat." She said before he could pass her, gesturing towards the empty chair across her small table. "I'll buy you a soda and you can tell me what's got you down."
He hesitated for a moment before smiling shyly and taking the proffered seat.
"Thank you. I'm in need of a sympathetic ear at the moment."
"One of my many jobs." She assured him with a grin. "The name's Beki. What's your poison?"
"Water should be fine, Beki." He said with another small smile. "I'm Quatre. Quatre Reberba Winner."
"Nice to meetcha, Mr. Winner. Oi, Bill! Refill my soda and get my lovely tablemate some water! Now, mind telling me what's got you so sad?"
"Just…. problems. I may be loosing my son because of my particular lifestyle." Quatre explained evasively.
"Look, Mr. Winner, you don't have to hide things from me. Whatever it is that's going on, it's not because you're a bad person. No one with empathy as strong as yours could do anything to harm someone else unless he was so twisted as to be completely insane, which you're obviously not."
"H-how did-"
"As a friend of mine is fond of putting it, I'm a 'living, breathing Talent radar.' You're a level 1 empath, beyond question, and if you were twisted enough to enjoy causing pain, your Talent would feed that back onto everybody within five miles. I know, because I met an empath like that once. It's an encounter I've been trying my best to forget."
"I see." Quatre fell silent, accepting his water from Bill the waiter with an absent nod. After a minute or so, he sighed. "Beki, what's your view on homosexuality?"
"I have no problem with it." She said, shrugging. "You can't help who you love, so why bother trying? If you want to play bedroom games with another guy, that's nobody's business but yours. Why, is some homophobe jackass trying to steal your kid?"
"Something like that. He's actually the son of a friend who passed away last year. He's only been living with us eight or nine months, but it still feels like we're a family."
"In that case, Mr. Winner, to hell with that jerk. If you ever find yourself in a tight spot, call on me. My friend's uncle's probably the best lawyer on the continent, and he's got a soft spot for cases like yours. Here's my number and e-mail, okay?" She tore a piece of paper out of her notebook and scribbled both bits of contact info on it before handing it to him. "Just think positive, and maybe it'll all solve itself."
It didn't take an empath to figure out that Wufei was pissed.
Actually, scratch that; he was beyond pissed. Maybe if he killed a few people, he would calm down enough to qualify as pissed, and Duo idly wondered if his study partner might pick him as a target of his rage.
"'Fei, if you don't want to do this, we can call it a day." Duo said finally, closing the heavy book in front of him. "We're ahead of schedule anyway, and I'm surprised you can concentrate at all, with the way you're acting."
"No." Wufei said shortly. "I can't go home, so I might as well work."
"Okay, okay, I get the message…." Duo grumbled, feeling hurt. He reached across the library table, snagged one of the reference books scattered across the hardwood surface, and immediately dropped it.
"'Fei, you seriously need to curb your emotion." Duo said slowly, shaking his head in an effort to clear the lights dancing in front of his eyes. "You just totally demolished my shields like they didn't even exist!"
"What are you babbling about?"
"Umm… my Talent? Touchreading? Remember it? You just told me a whole hell of a lot more about yourself than I ever wanted to know, including some seriously painful plans for the vice principal, through shields that are supposed to be impenetrable. Either curb your emotion or go home."
"I can't go home, Maxwell," Wufei snapped angrily, slamming his book shut. "I live with an empath, and the last thing he needs right now is me."
"Okay, then, do whatever. I need to go see Beki about getting my shields replaced, or I'm gonna start picking up intimate secrets every time I touch somebody's jacket. You can come if you want, just make sure you don't touch me."
The entire walk from the library to Beki's, Wufei tried to think of a way to apologize that wouldn't come off either pompous or idiotic, and that didn't actually involve the words 'I'm sorry.' He didn't do things he regretted for the most part, so apologizing was obviously not his forte. By the time they'd climbed the rickety metal staircase outside Beki's room, the only thing he'd been able to think of was a wildly inappropriate box of chocolates.
"Come in!" Beki called in response to Duo's knock, and the door opened on chaos.
Beki, hair pulled back and covered with a bandana, was busily stacking books in the middle of a large clear space on the floor. Most of the chairs had somehow become visible, the bed was made, and the large pile of laundry in the corner had disappeared.
"Don't mind the mess, come on in. Sit somewhere. Dammit, Trowa, Why do I have to separate the hardcovers and the paperbacks?"
"Because," The young man calmly placing books on the bookcase explained, "You'll be able to fit more on each shelf that way. It's also more organized."
"You're obsessed with organization!" Beki accused sullenly. "Why are you even here?"
"You're paying me. Hand me the other stack of Anne McCaffery paperbacks, please."
"I hate you."
"What's going on here?" Duo asked, bewildered.
"We're cleaning my room." Beki said. "I'm hyper, and I need to burn off the excess energy. Sit. And never drink grape soda; it'll make you insanely hyper. They put way too much sugar in it, I swear."
"Yet you still drink it." Trowa interrupted. "Duo, what happened to your shields?"
"'Fei trashed 'em. By the way…. Trowa, Wufei the firestarter. Wufei, Trowa the farseer and shield-maker extraordinaire."
Trowa rolled his eyes, put the last book in its place, and stood up. His hair fell over half his face, obscuring one eye and giving him a slightly mysterious look.
"Break time, Rebbekha; we're going down to my room."
"You look happy." Heero commented, dropping his briefcase on the table and planting a small kiss on Quatre's cheek.
"I received reassurance." Quatre explained, smiling. "From a complete stranger, too."
"Really." Heero prompted, sitting down and digging into the bowl of stew Quatre placed in front of him.
"Really. She could sense that I'm an empath, and assured me that as such, I couldn't consciously do anything to harm Wufei, and probably nothing unconsciously, either. It made my day."
"Not that I'm not glad to see you happy, but do you think it's wise to tell complete strangers about yourself?" Heero asked with a sigh and a slight smile.
"She was no danger to me." Quatre assured his lover with a tolerant smile of his own. "She's as innocent and open as…. as Duo."
"Who, despite the fact that he tells only the unvarnished truth, is one of the most devious and world-wise creatures we know."
"Creatures?" Quatre repeated, wondering if he should be offended on Duo's behalf.
"The cat's slightly more devious. Lucrezia sends her love, and wants you to check out the new night secretary in the front lobby."
"Sacked Annette, did you?" Quatre asked, sighing. "I really was hoping you could keep her around; she'd be good for you."
"She wasn't flexible enough to work with us." Heero countered, shaking his head. "She plays strictly by the rule book, no exceptions allowed, and I couldn't see that changing in a reasonable length of time. We can't afford someone as rigid as her on staff."
"Is something brewing I should know about?" Quatre asked, suddenly very serious.
"Maybe. You know Khushrenada's niece, the foreseer? She's getting glimpses of something big. The only details she can get so far are that it involves Talents, a water Talent and a fire Talent specifically, and that it's not going to be good."
"Yikes."
"So watch which strangers you talk to from now on; we need to be alert to threats. Dorothy's the best foreseer on the continent, and when she says it'll happen, it'll happen."
Whee.