Warnings: Angst, violence, language, drug use, abuse, supernatural things, sex, yaoi, yuri, het. If you desperately need to know who is paired with who send me a message and I can tell you, but I'd rather you get to experience the evolution of the characters first.
A/N: Based on Misfits, but draws from X-Men, Smallville, and Heroes as well. These kids aren't the complete burnouts that the Misfits are, but they are NOT perfect angels. Be warned.
A/N #2: Thanks to the always amazing Cuzo, more than a beta and no less than a friend.
A/N#3: A special thanks to Snowdragonct, who has been so encouraging and supportive since I first started writing here. Thank you for your advice, conversation, and general brilliance. Also, you are a badass AND a classy lady.
Deviant
Chapter Three
Heero couldn't decide what to wear.
It made him feel like a complete idiot, standing there in front of his closet, staring at the clothes, waiting for something. Anything to tell him what to do.
Self-doubt was new for Heero. Regret, he was long familiar with. Shame he knew, anger was an old friend, and despair visited fairly often. But self-doubt was a very unwelcome addition to his negative emotions.
He prided himself on few things, but determination and commitment to his goals was one of them. When he decided to do something – he did it. He did not back down, he did not change the course just because some other way might be easier. If he accepted a challenge then he completed it.
And life had handed him plenty of challenges. He had risen to meet them all, and his survival could be attributed to the fact that he did not doubt himself. Until now.
Specifically, until that night last week when his third client of the night had shoved him into a puddle and ran away at the sight of Duo Maxwell.
It was bad enough that Heero was in community service, working off his debt to society after being stupid and arrogant enough to accept a job just outside Clarkson town limits instead of going to the city. Heero's rule, since he had started Clarkson last fall, had been to keep his work as far away from his education as possible. But, six weeks ago, he had agreed to meet a john at his boat, and as he was leaving, an off-duty cop had watched the john pay him and send him on his way with a slap to the ass.
Not only had he not gotten paid, but he now had a criminal record.
Now someone else in Clarkson knew about his job, and that someone was a townie who, by all indications, hated Clarkson College, its students, and had a temper and foul mouth that could be set off at any minute.
Heero didn't like his odds of keeping his work or his crime a secret from his peers, not with Duo around.
So he had begun to doubt himself.
His prostitution had kept him safe, fed, and out of the foster care system since he was fourteen. While he might regret certain aspects of the job, Heero had never doubted it to be the right choice – the money he earned paid for his education at Clarkson and he was saving as much as he could to pay for his graduate school. He had made himself a promise, last year, that as soon as he had enough to go to graduate school and start a new life he would be done. He was close to that goal – he calculated that by next summer he would have enough and would finally be able to walk away from the past.
But now he was starting to realize that that simply wasn't possible. His past would never leave him behind, and even thinking that it would had been fanciful. He had committed to this course, and this course would follow him forever now.
That knowledge wasn't especially helpful, and he still had no idea what to do about it, or Duo. Or what to wear.
It wasn't that Heero cared all that much for his appearance – even on the job the most effort he put into his looks was to finger comb his hair and make sure he wore clothes that were easy to put back on quickly – but he was trying to anticipate the weather.
For the last two weeks the weather in Clarkson had been wilder than any summer he could remember in his life. One moment it would be sunny and hot and the next freezing rain would start pelting the earth like knives. It didn't help that the weather seemed to mirror Heero's moods recently. Whenever he started to feel depressed, sure enough, it started to rain and the sky became a dark, violent maelstrom.
He was grateful that the two days this past week when he had been in a good mood the weather had cooperated. But with his current mood, he doubted the weather would be anything short of foul.
Sure enough, he looked outside his window and saw that there was a slow, steady drizzle.
At least there would not be a drought anytime soon.
He pulled on sneakers, jeans, a t-shirt, and a raincoat.
As he dressed he tried to shove all of his concerns to the back of his mind and gear himself up for the ordeal that was community service.
Getting struck by lightning the first week had been a freakish, unbelievable experience, but Heero would almost rather have it happen again than have to be faced with Duo's smirking, taunting face as he had been last week.
He left his dorm room and walked the half mile to the police station, his mood growing darker every step of the way. He hated bullies and he hated that he was actually AFRAID of what Duo would do with his information.
It wasn't as though he had any kind of social life, or even friends. But he had acquaintances, classmates, and professors who he respected. He had been a social pariah all of his life, but academe was his sanctuary and Duo Maxwell had the power to make it his worst nightmare.
By the time he reached the police station the drizzle of rain had turned into a steady downpour. That didn't seem to bother Duo and his friend, however. The two of them were sitting on a bench in front of the police station, casually lounging against the wet surface and acting as though they were enjoying a sunny day by the lake.
Duo had his head back, catching rain in his mouth, and the girl was stretched out, her feet across his lap and her eyes closed, as though she was napping.
They looked so at ease, so comfortable with each other and without a care in the world.
Heero quickly squashed his feeling of envy. Bad enough that Duo could ruin his life, he wasn't about to start envying the burnout his life. Maybe he had a friend, and maybe he had an amazing sense of equilibrium that just allowed him to take anything in stride, but he was still an asshole.
He watched as Duo checked his watch and reacted to the time. He sat up, upsetting the girl's balance. Remarkably, as the girl started to fall off the bench, Duo managed to catch her, moving quicker than Heero would have thought possible, and deposited her on her feet.
"Thanks," she said to him.
"No problem, Hilde my love," he draped an arm around her shoulders. "But we should get inside before Une goes psycho on me again – unless, have you seen anything I should know about?"
Heero wondered at the strange conversation, but they walked further away before he could hear Hilde's response.
When he stepped into the locker room a few moments later he wasn't surprised to see most of the other delinquents assembled and in the process of changing. He exchanged a nod of greeting with Wufei before walking to his own locker to change.
It seemed that Duo had decided to avoid any proximity to Trant and he abandoned his old locker and moved to one on the back row, a few feet away from the corner locker that Heero had claimed.
Duo looked completely soaked by the rain, and Heero allowed himself a moment of smug satisfaction when the other man pulled off his t-shirt and threw it into the locker with a solid, wet smack.
The moment ended, however, when Duo started to pull off the rest of his clothes.
Heero had spent a fair amount of time around naked men, and it had been relatively easy to train himself to not judge their bodies or care one way or another how attractive they were. But when Duo pulled off his jeans and stood beside Heero in nothing more than a pair of thin, clingy boxer briefs, all of that training went out of the window.
Duo's skin was lightly tanned and the golden color showed off his lean frame. He had faint, wiry muscle definition and a firm, sculpted ass that made Heero momentarily forget to breathe. It seemed ridiculously cruel for someone that annoying to be that handsome.
There was a tattoo just above his heart, two lines of black text that were hard for Heero to decipher while trying to look inconspicuous.
As Duo stepped into his jumpsuit and started to zip it up he turned and caught Heero staring.
Instead of calling him on it, Duo just arched and eyebrow and then slowly unzipped the jumpsuit back down to his waist. He pulled it open, displaying his chest for Heero's perusal.
He used the opportunity to read the words over Duo's heart. Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine. He made a mental note to look up the phrase.
"Enjoying the show?" Duo asked, his voice neutral.
Heero summoned an angry glare and Duo chuckled as he zipped the jumpsuit up to his throat.
Duo shoved his hands in his pocket and casually leaned one shoulder against Heero's locker.
"You know, maybe I was kinda rude the other night. After all, I could always use more friends." He winked at Heero and he couldn't help but flinch.
Duo was a townie, and while it was clear that he cared little for interacting with the students at Clarkson, Heero wouldn't put it past him, or anyone, to threaten to tell his peers about Heero's extracurricular activities. He just needed to make it through two more years, and then he could leave his past behind, go to grad school, and make a new life for himself. But if people knew how he paid for his education – he would never be able to escape it.
At the same time, he refused to give in and be cowed by the other man. If he wanted to harass him, then Heero would gladly return the favor.
He slammed Duo back against the locker, and the other man's indigo eyes widened in surprise.
"Go to hell," Heero hissed before storming away.
He took a seat at the back of the briefing hall and waited, silently fuming, for the rest to join him.
When Duo walked in, right as the clock struck nine, a smirk on his face, and winked at Heero again, he felt like punching the other man.
Une started to explain their work detail for the day – something about painting a fence somewhere – but was interrupted almost immediately by Dorothy, the front desk officer, who burst into the room.
"I'm sorry, Sergeant, but there's an emergency – Chief Winner needs you on the radio and –"
"Yes, fine," Une snapped. She surveyed them with a glare. "Do not move."
She stalked from the room and slammed the door behind her.
As soon as Une was out of sight, Relena got up from her seat and sat down beside Heero.
"This is such a waste of time, isn't it?"
He looked over at her, wondering why she was talking to him.
"I mean, we could be on the lake, having such a great time, but no, we're stuck here, with these people."
"It's raining," Heero pointed out.
Relena was in his Humanities course this semester, but hadn't spoken to him inside or outside of class before now. He wondered if she had heard of his academic reputation and was angling for tutoring or help cheating on tests. It certainly wouldn't be the first time he had been approached.
"But it's already wet at the lake anyway." She inexplicably licked her lips. "And there's nothing like swimming in the rain."
He fought the urge to move to a different seat. This was not what he needed.
He had Duo taunting him with his secret and Relena – one of the most popular girls at Clarkson – hitting on him.
Une burst back into the room, her face pale.
"I will not be able to supervise your community service today. Dorothy will be in charge of you. Do not do anything that will cause a reprimand. Please." Her voice had gone soft, to that strange, almost polite and sympathetic tone she had used last week after hauling off and slapping Duo.
Heero didn't understand Une's wild mood swings, but he much preferred the angry, sullen Une to this strange, Mother Theresa version.
Une left as quickly as she had entered and a moment later Dorothy came into the room.
"You will spend the morning cleaning out the bathrooms," she instructed with a sneer. "Here." She dumped a bucket of gloves and another one of cleaning materials on the desk at the front of the room. "Do not bother me."
She left the room after giving each of them a stern glare.
"Fuck that," Duo said and put his sandaled feet up on the desk.
"Fuck you," Trant muttered, and Heero rolled his eyes. He had no idea why Trant was so fixated on Duo – although after watching the other man strip he could certainly understand being attracted to him. But Trant's interest in Duo was more sociopathic than anything else.
"Stupid of me to think that you'd mind your own damn business and leave me the hell alone," Duo muttered as he laced his fingers behind his head and sneered at Trant.
"Not the only stupid thing about you," Trant assured him.
"Jesus, what is it with you?" Duo demanded. "Get yourself a new obsession, will you, this is boring."
"Listen, you piece of shit –" Trant jumped up from his chair and leaned over to haul Duo to his feet by the collar of his jumpsuit. "You need to learn a lesson and start respecting people better than you. You're nothing but a –"
"Stop it!" Quatre interrupted Trant. "If Dorothy walks in and sees this we'll all be in trouble."
"Quit your whining, princess," Trant muttered, but he released Duo and shoved him back towards his chair. Duo shoved him back, and rage clouded Trant's eyes.
Before either man could do anything else, however, Relena groaned loudly and got up from her chair.
"This is boring," she said. She walked over and grabbed Trant's hand. "Come on, you can help me break into the computer system and we can have a little fun."
Trant scowled at her for a moment, but she tugged on his hand and smiled and he shrugged.
"What the hell. He can wait."
"Oh get the fuck over yourself," Duo snapped.
"You can't break into the computers! It's a crime!" Quatre tried to stop Trant and Relena before they left the room.
"We're already in trouble, and no one is here anyway. If you really want, you can go clean the toilets while the rest of us have some fun." She smirked. "After all, I'm just dying to see what kind of files they have on us – don't you want to know why everyone else is in here?"
"No," Wufei spoke up. "I don't, and neither should you. We only committed misdemeanors and most of our records will be expunged in a few years. There's no reason to go messing around with this."
"Nah, she's right, this should be good," Duo spoke up, his smirk making Heero's blood boil. "Never know what you can learn about your friends."
He shouldered his way past Trant and Relena, not missing the chance to shove Trant to one side as he did so, and was out of the door before anyone else could argue.
Trant, Relena, Hilde, and Wufei instantly followed him.
"This is such a bad idea," Quatre muttered before he too followed them.
Heero looked to the side to see Trowa Barton, another student at Clarkson, still sitting in his chair, looking completely uninterested in anything.
"We might as well join them," Heero said, trying to keep his voice neutral. He was terrified of Duo telling the others about him – but even more terrified of not being there when he did so.
Trowa shrugged but he stood up and walked with Heero out of the room.
It took them a moment to find the others, but Trowa spotted them crammed into Une's office.
Heero rolled his eyes at their antics. Trant was typing away at her computer, while the others were going through the filing cabinets and checking the papers littered on her desk.
"This is such a waste of time," Trowa muttered, but he opened the door and stepped in. Heero followed and then closed the door.
He followed Trowa's example and joined the other man leaning against one wall of the office and watched the others continue their search.
It took at least half an hour, but eventually Relena squealed in delight and held up a file folder labeled 'Community Service Participants.'
"Found it! Now we get to know everyone's dirty little secrets. Let's see –"
Duo snatched the file away from Relena just as she started to open it.
"I have a better reading voice," he assured her with a smirk.
She opened her mouth to argue, but Duo just waved her away before sitting down on Une's desk.
"Now, let us see here, what have you devious criminals done to warrant community service…" he opened the file and started to run his finger over, presumably, the list of their crimes.
Heero forced himself to breathe normally and kept a steady glare on Duo.
"Trowa Barton…" Duo looked up with a frown and scanned the room. Heero rolled his eyes when he noticed the others doing so as well.
At least Duo and Hilde had the excuse of not attending Clarkson – but Heero was irritated that Relena, Wufei, Trant, and Quatre didn't know their own classmate. Heero had taken two courses with Trowa, and a few of the others had been in each of those classes.
"OH. You're Trowa!" Relena finally exclaimed, her eyes landing on the tall man at the back of the room.
"Are you sure?" Trowa asked, his soft voice nevertheless managing to convey his sarcasm. Heero smirked when Relena started to frown.
"Anyway," Duo continued, "Trowa Barton. Convicted of not paying an… impressive number of parking tickets. Eighteen? How do you even still have a license after that many?"
Trowa remained silent, and Duo shrugged.
"Up next we have… hm, well, yeah, obviously. And then there's –"
"Wait. You can't just skip over someone. If you get to see the information we should all get to," Wufei jumped in.
Duo shrugged.
"Alright. Fine by me." He looked over at Trant, a sneer twisting his lips. "Disorderly conduct for ass face over there, which is a nice way of –"
"Without the editorializing," Wufei snapped when Trant started towards Duo.
"Whatever. Moving on. Possession for my girl here, arson for the guy with a stick up his ass – what did you burn down?"
Heero followed Duo's gaze over to Wufei, surprised to see the Chinese man actually looking embarrassed.
"It wasn't – it was a protest rally and things got out of hand."
"Okay, but what did you burn?"
"An effigy," Wufei bit out through gritted teeth.
"An effigy?" Duo repeated.
"It's a likeness of –"
"I know what an effigy is, Sherlock. Who was it?"
"Thomas Clarkson."
Duo arched an eyebrow.
"Thomas Clarkson as in the guy who founded the town of Clarkson, Clarkson College, Clarkson Library, Clarkson –"
"Yes, yes. That Thomas Clarkson. Who also happened to own one of the largest plantations in the state and owned more slaves than –"
"Yeah, okay. Now I see. Boring. Moving on again. Ah… what is this? Public indecency? Must be me – oh, nope, hang on. It's Junior Deputy himself!"
"I don't want to talk about it," Quatre said, his pale skin flushing red.
"Don't worry, we'll have a long chat about it later," Duo promised with a wink before looking back at his list. "Let's see…" the humor abruptly left his face and he looked up, his eyes narrowed, at Relena.
"What?" She demanded after tossing her hair over one shoulder. "It's not any worse than anyone else's."
"It's a fucking DUI," Duo snapped. "So, yeah, that's worse than anyone else's."
"Please. Like no one else has ever driven home drunk before. And, anyway, didn't your girl friend get busted for possession? Doing drugs is a lot worse than drinking."
"Hilde had a bag of pot, which she intended to smoke at home or by the lake. Do you know how many people she endangers when she gets high? None. Maybe herself – maybe. But that's it. You decide to binge on Malibu and cranberries with your sorority sisters and then get behind the wheel of a four thousand pound steel death machine and you put a shit ton of other people at risk. So, yeah, it's fucking worse than everyone else's."
He snapped the folder open wider, ignoring Relena's open mouth.
As impressed as Heero was with Duo's tirade, he was also terrified of the fact that there were only two names left – his and Duo's – and he knew that as harsh as Duo's judgment of Relena had been, the judgment of Heero's peers on him would be even worse.
"So, after we get past our soon-to-be-murderer, we have… ah yes. Aggravated assault. Tsk tsk. You should really look into some anger management classes." Duo looked up at Heero, his gaze steady.
"I thought you were in here for assault," Hilde said.
Duo shrugged.
"What did you do?" Relena demanded, venom in her voice.
"My dad said someone was busted for –" Quatre caught himself and his face turned red again.
"Busted for what, princess?" Trant asked. "What did that faggot do to get sent here?"
"Maybe I heard wrong," Quatre said.
"Maybe," Duo agreed, "but then again, maybe not. C'mon, what did the old man divulge to you?"
Quatre drew in a deep breath.
"He said someone was busted for prostitution."
All eyes focused on Duo.
"I knew it," Trant said, a satisfied smirk on his face. "I knew you were just a –"
"Shut up," Hilde interrupted. She turned to Duo. "You told me you were convicted of assault, after that fight –"
"Yeah, well, I was embarrassed to tell you the truth," Duo said with an indifferent shrug. "'Sides, it was only supposed to be a joke but the cops seemed to disagree with me about my sense of humor."
"Disgusting," Wufei added. "Selling your body? How can you stand here and judge any of us? Even Relena –"
"What do you mean even Relena?" The girl in question interrupted, her voice shrill. "What I did was perfectly normal. Not like burning a straw replica of a dead guy. Or getting high all the time. Or climbing a building naked. Or being a prostitute."
"Wait, who climbed a building – Quatre?" Wufei turned to the blond man. "Is that what you did?"
"Nicely done!" Duo jumped in. "I didn't think you had it in you, Junior Deputy!"
"Stop calling me that!"
"Sure, just give me a few to think of a new name for you… something involving naked –"
"Get your mind out of the gutter!" Wufei snapped. "Clearly your profession has robbed you of the ability to think of anything besides sex."
Heero clenched his jaw. He had expected that kind of reaction. But Wufei, whom he considered to be almost a friend, he had never thought the other man would be so quick to judge.
He was baffled that Duo had taken the fall for him, and as the others continued to bicker he tried to figure out why. They were virtual strangers to each other, and their only conversations to date had ended in violence, or at least the attempt at violence. Duo had made it perfectly clear that he looked down on Heero, and yet here he was, switching crimes and taking abuse for something he hadn't even done.
"Listen, you cheap –"
"Shut up!" Trowa interrupted Trant.
Everyone immediately silenced and focused on the other man.
"What did you say to me?" Trant demanded.
"Dorothy's coming this way," Trowa said calmly. He jerked his head towards the door to the room.
Heero looked through the window, and sure enough, Dorothy was stalking down the hall, a scowl on her face.
"Shit." Duo closed the file and jumped off the desk. "Where did you find this?" he asked Relena.
"Top drawer – under the gun."
"Under the – fucking hell." Duo shoved the file into the drawer.
"Now what?" Hilde demanded. "We just pretend like we got lost and didn't know where the bathrooms were for the last hour?"
"You all go out the other door and get to the bathrooms," Quatre instructed. "I'll distract her."
"Thanks man," Duo said and clapped Quatre on the shoulder. He grabbed Hilde's hand and dragged her from the room, and a moment later everyone else started to follow.
Heero was the last to leave the room, and he looked over his shoulder to see Quatre sit down in Une's chair and put his feet on her desk. Heero winced. He couldn't imagine Dorothy NOT reacting badly to that.
He joined the others in the men's bathroom and ignored Relena's exclamations over the state of the urinals.
He looked for Duo and saw the other man actually adding to the graffiti on the stalls. He wanted to say something to him, but he wasn't sure if he wanted to thank him or yell at him. It wasn't HIS problem, after all, and it went against everything Heero thought about Duo for him to have made that sacrifice.
Duo looked up and caught him scowling in his direction. He winked and Heero turned away. Maybe just ignoring him would be the best solution.
A moment later the bathroom door slammed open and Quatre, followed immediately by Dorothy, entered.
"All of you are dismissed," Dorothy snapped.
"Uh, when you say dismissed, do you want us to clear out so you can screw Junior Deputy or –"
"I mean that you are dismissed for the day," she interrupted Duo. "Go home."
"Do we get credit for the full day?" Hilde asked.
Dorothy turned a glare in her direction.
"It's a fair question," Wufei said when it looked like Dorothy wouldn't respond.
"Yes. Fine. Just – get out of here."
"Don't have to tell me twice." Duo saluted her with the sharpie he had been using and held out one hand to Hilde. The girl regally accepted it and he tucked her hand around his elbow before the two strolled out of the room.
Dorothy rolled her eyes.
"Out!" She barked at the rest of them, and Heero followed the others out of the bathroom and back to the locker room.
"What's going on?" Wufei asked Quatre. "What happened?"
"I don't know. She didn't even yell at me for being in the office. She just said something about an emergency down at the lake and that she had to get down there."
"Leaving no one at the station? What kind of emergency could it be?"
Heero wondered the same thing, but didn't join in the conversation. He walked over to Duo's locker.
"Why did you do that?" he demanded.
Duo unzipped his jumpsuit and kicked it off.
"Told ya, I could always use more friends."
"I don't understand."
Duo shrugged and leaned against his locker, arms folded across his chest, completed unconcerned that he was naked except for his boxers.
"I was rude – and an asshole – and I shouldn't have been. You seem like an okay guy – even if you are a Clarkson student."
"I still –"
"Dude, just say thank you and let's move on."
Heero frowned and Duo rolled his eyes and started to pull on his still wet clothes.
"Thank you," he finally managed to say just as Duo stepped into his sandals.
"No prob." Duo winked at him. "See ya next week!" He waved and walked away, not even bothering to shout obscenities at Trant when the soccer player called him a cheap lay.
Heero dressed in a daze, unsure what exactly had just happened.
He wasn't sure, but it seemed like he finally, for the first time in his life, had a friend.
As he left the station he noticed that the weather had cleared, and sunlight was starting to peak through the clouds.
Dorothy was still at the front desk, frantically taking notes as someone on the dispatch radio yelled at her.
He stopped to listen for a moment.
"…everywhere. It's like the bodies were ripped apart by some kind of animal. Damnit. There's blood everywhere. We can't even tell how many are dead, there's just –"
Dorothy turned down the volume and glared at Heero.
"I said get out," she barked.
Heero frowned, but left the station, disturbed by the radio report.
Outside, he looked back over his shoulder and saw Dorothy turn the volume back on and start taking notes again.
He was distracted, however, by a shout of laughter.
Heero looked down the street to see Hilde and Duo walking away, side by side.
This time, as he looked at them, he didn't feel envy. He felt something that he tentatively labeled as hope.