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.

A/N#4: I want to give credit to Cuzo for suggesting Heero's powers be Storm-like. It saved me from the terrible mistake of giving him super lame powers, and I'm glad that so many of you have enjoyed her recommendation as well. Thank you for saving Heero!

Deviant

Deviant Chapter 6

The girl's dark hair felt like silk in Hilde's fingers, and the press of her strong, slender body, so soft and smooth, felt like heaven.

They kissed, and Hilde felt like the world could end and she wouldn't notice, or care.

The girl moaned in pleasure when Hilde nipped at her earlobe and ran her hands down to explore her body.

Hilde finally realized that the sound of the girl moaning sounded less like moaning and more like... her alarm going off.

With a groan, Hilde rolled out of bed and glared at her phone, wishing it would just fly into her hand. Telekinesis, now that would have been a handy power. Not like her sporadic visions of the future. Which, so far, had saved her best friend's life, but had been useful for little else.

Aside from giving her fodder for sexual fantasies involving a beautiful Chinese girl.

Hilde groaned. She had had the vision last week while in the middle of making lasagna for dinner, and it had stayed with her ever since, fueling her dreams and making her act, she knew, a little crazy.

The vision wasn't very detailed or explicit - although Hilde's dreams had certainly made it very explicit - just the glimpse and feel of a petite, gorgeous Chinese girl in Hilde's arms, kissing her as though her life depended on it.

She forced herself to get up and put the vision, and her dreams, out of her mind.

After taking a shower and dressing, she knocked on Duo's closed door.

"I'm going to make breakfast – get your lazy ass up!" She shouted and listened for a response.

Hearing nothing – not even a cranky, mumbled 'go to hell' – his usual morning greeting – Hilde opened the door.

The room was empty.

She sighed. It was the third time this week that Duo hadn't spent the night in his own bed.

Part of her was happy that he seemed to have found someone to screw all night long, but part of her was also insanely jealous. She wanted to get laid, too – she needed to. At least, when both of them were without partners, they could be miserable and cranky together. But now Duo had apparently hooked up with someone, and hadn't even bothered to tell her anything about it.

She went to the kitchen and started to prepare a frittata, allowing herself to silently fume as she went through the familiar and comforting motions of cooking.

Being a lesbian in Clarkson was only a very small step up from being gay. While Duo struggled to find anyone to date, Hilde had to actually fend off offers every once in a while from drunken college girls in the mood for experimentation. She didn't have Duo's issues with Clarkson students, but she did not enjoy fooling around with a girl only to have her freak out as she started to sober up. So she, too, avoided Clarkson students.

Which meant she pretty much avoided her entire pool of available dates. There was, of course, Susan at the nursing home. But Susan was an older, matronly woman who Hilde just could not see herself ever going down on. There was also Beth, at the bank, but Beth… Beth was smooth and polished and while she clearly found Hilde interesting she also clearly found her to be a little uncouth – and she hated pot, an opinion she had voiced on several occasions.

So Hilde, like Duo, had become accustomed to long dry spells between her few opportunities for relationships.

"Morning!"

Hilde had been so wrapped up in her thoughts that she hadn't heard Duo come in.

He joined her in the kitchen, dropping a kiss on her forehead, and grinning like a madman.

Or like someone who had just had a night of amazing sex.

"Morning," she growled in irritation.

"Smells great," Duo said before sitting down on a stool across from the counter.

"I take it the sex was good?"

Duo chuckled.

"I'm sure it will be, but we aren't there yet."

Somehow that was even more frustrating to her. She turned on him.

"Are you finally going to tell me about him?"

Duo opened his mouth to say something, and then looked sheepish.

"It's… Hilde, I -"

Duo didn't normally stumble over words. He usually said whatever he wanted to and always had a witty comeback for whatever was flung in his direction. Seeing him hesitate now made her suspicious.

"Duo. Spit it out. Who is he?"

"It's not anything big or –"

"Bullshit, Duo Maxwell. I call bullshit. You've spent three nights with this guy – and I know what kind of intimacy issues you have. You hate sleeping with people – screwing them you're fine with, but cuddling scares the shit out of you. So do not sit there and tell me that spending three nights cuddling with some guy isn't anything big. I know you."

"So you haven't seen anything? About me and him?" he asked casually, and Hilde suddenly realized why he was being cautious.

"No, or I wouldn't have to ask. Duo, this isn't something I can really control. It just kind of comes and goes." She thought of the Chinese girl and wished, not for the first time, that she could just see more – feel more. She had been on pins and needles for all of her shifts at the Ice Cream Shop – every time anyone entered the shop she looked up to see if it was her dream girl, but it hadn't been.

"Okay. But if I tell you, then you might start to think about it and then –"

"Duo, what are you babbling about?"

"I don't want to know the future," he snapped and then looked immediately guilty. "I'm sorry. That's not – Hilde, you have this amazing gift. And it's saved my life – at least twice – and I'm really, really grateful for that." He sighed. "But I don't… I can't know what happens to us."

Hilde frowned and then she saw the fear in Duo's eyes.

"Duo, not everyone you care about is going to die on you! How many times have we talked about this?"

He shook his head.

"No, I know, but, Hilde –"

"Duo! Stop it! You have got to stop going around convinced that the world is going to go to shit at any minute!"

Duo sighed.

"He tried to kill himself, okay? Last year he took a razor to his throat and –" Duo swallowed hard. "And I like him. A lot. So this isn't about my egocentric belief that everyone I love is going to die. This is different. And if you see me in the future – if you see me and you don't see him– I don't want to know. If something's going to happen to him, to us – I just want it to happen. I cannot sit here and look for signs or clues or whatever. I can't."

Hilde drew in a deep breath and forced herself not to start yelling at him.

She knew Duo's brother had killed himself, and she knew how much Duo blamed himself for it – for not seeing a sign or anything – and she knew that despite his carefree exterior, Duo got all too easily attached to people.

"Who is he?" She asked softly.

"It's Trowa."

Hilde frowned, trying to place the name. It took her a moment.

"Creepy quiet guy? You're dating creepy quiet guy?" She had coined the term months ago, when Duo first described the "tall, ridiculously handsome, quiet" guy who came in to get coffee from him every morning. When Duo had pointed Trowa out to her during their first day of community service – as he had stood and stared listlessly at the duck pond at the park – her theory that he was creepy and not Duo's type had been cemented.

Learning that he had attempted suicide did nothing to endear him to her.

"He is not creepy!" Duo snapped.

Hilde shook her head but turned back to breakfast before it was ruined.

When she finally set his plate in front of him, Duo looked up at her, and it was clear that he was torn.

"He's a great guy, Hil. Really funny, and really, insanely hot. And he does this thing with his tongue when we –"

"Duo, what happens when he kills himself and you're left all alone again?" It was harsh, but it was exactly the future that Hilde envisioned – only without actually having a vision of it.

"Hilde, we've been dating for two weeks. I'm not picking out fucking engagement rings. And he promised he wouldn't do it again. He –"

"Duo Maxwell! You are not a moron! He promised? Duo, that is – why are you doing this to yourself? I know you're lonely, but –"

"Hilde. I like him. I'm dating him. That's all there is to it." Duo's voice was firm, and his eyes held a fair amount of ice in them when he looked at her.

"Fine. Fine. I'm sorry, I just –" she stopped, thinking back to what he had said. "Why don't you want me to tell you, if I do see you with him in the future?"

"I don't want to jinx it," he muttered self-consciously. "I mean, what if you do see us together and I start to get complacent – because you saw it happen, right? And then, what if it doesn't? What if I somehow do something to change the future, just by knowing?" He shook his head. "You telling me every time you see me dying in the future – that I'm totally fine with. Please, please tell me that. But everything else… I just want it to happen."

She sighed.

"What if I… what if I see him killing himself?"

Duo swallowed hard and looked away.

"Yeah, okay. That one you can tell me about."

She reached out and ruffled his bangs.

"I just want you to be happy," she said.

He caught her hand and squeezed it.

"I know." He sighed and looked at his watch. "Shit. I gotta run or I'm going to be late opening the coffee shop. We still on for the Watchmen tonight when you get home?"

She nodded.

"Definitely."

"Good. It's been too long since I got to ogle giant blue cock."

Hilde rolled her eyes at that, but Duo grinned and pushed back from the counter.

She watched him walk to his bedroom to change into fresh clothes and resisted the urge to sigh.

It was Duo's life. Not hers.

When Hilde's shift at the nursing home ended that afternoon she decided to visit Duo at Joe's before heading over to the Ice Cream Shop for her evening shift.

It was mid afternoon, so the coffee shop was filled with Clarkson students scribbling away in notebooks oR typing on laptops while indulging in overpriced coffee.

As Hilde walked in she spotted Duo, not behind the counter, but leaning against a café table near the back wall of the shop. Seated at the table was none other than creepy quiet guy.

Hilde sighed.

It was clear that Duo was enjoying his conversation with Trowa, and Hilde could actually see Trowa smile, ever so slightly, when Duo laughed.

So maybe he was funny. And she could admit that he looked like he had stepped off the cover of a GQ magazine – but he was still creepy and he was still quiet. And suicidal.

Hilde moved to the front counter, hoping to attract Duo's attention without having to actually go over and talk to Trowa, but she was bumped out of the way by a dark haired girl who was headed in the same direction.

"Sorry," Hilde said, instinctively stepping aside.

The other girl turned to glare at her, and Hilde momentarily forgot how to breathe.

It was the Chinese girl, from her vision.

Of course, in Hilde's vision her eyes had been filled with heat and passion – not narrowed in irritation like they were now.

The girl moved past Hilde and stepped up to the counter.

Hilde could only stare at her, entranced.

She was maybe an inch or two shorter than Hilde, but their frames were similar. The girl's hair was chin length, cut in a sharp, asymmetrical bob that left the right side of her hair almost three inches longer than the left.

Hilde stepped up behind her and listened as she gave her order to Duo.

The girl was dressed like a Clarkson student – from her red and black Clarkson t-shirt down to her short khaki shorts, her TOMS shoes, and her Vera Bradley purse.

It should have been off-putting – her attitude and attire – but Hilde found it strangely attractive.

"One Chai tea," Duo chirped as he handed the girl the drink.

"Thanks," the girl said.

Hilde prayed that she paid for the drink with a credit card so that she could pester Duo to see her name – and then caught herself. What was wrong with her?

Nothing. Nothing except the fact that this was literally the girl of her dreams. It had been a while since Hilde had been in a relationship, but even so – the kiss she had experienced in her vision had been amazing. Definitely worth being a little stalkerish.

Unfortunately, the girl paid with cash.

She turned and before Hilde could move out of her way, the two girls collided again.

Hilde felt the burn of hot liquid immediately seep into her shirt and scald her skin.

"Shit!" she couldn't help but cry.

"Fuck!" the other girl said at the exact moment.

They stood there staring at each other for a moment, both liberally doused in tea, both clearly miserable.

Hilde started to apologize, taking in the look of complete anger on the girl's face.

"I'm so –"

"Stop it. It was an accident," the girl snapped and then drew in a deep breath. She plucked at her shirt, trying to pull it away from her body, and that drew Hilde's attention to her chest.

Hilde liked boobs – always had, always would. She wasn't necessarily a fan of large breasts. Her own were, she had always felt, a little on the small side, but in proportion to her frame. The girl's however, were divine. Absolutely perfect looking – and with her shirt plastered to her as it was, Hilde could even –

"You ladies okay?" Duo's voice interrupted her leering. He was smirking.

Hilde looked away, flushing red.

"Soaked in tea," she pointed out.

Duo frowned.

"Damn. That you are. Here," he reached back behind the counter and grabbed two garishly bright Java Joe's t-shirts and passed them to Hilde. "Bathroom's in the back if you want to clean up and put these on instead."

"Thank you," the girl said. She looked at Hilde. "Shall we?"

Hilde nodded and led the way.

They passed by Trowa's table and she caught the amused twinkle in his eye and glared at him. Maybe it was funny, but he was creepy quiet guy – he didn't get to laugh at her.

"You go first," Hilde said and handed the girl a shirt before directing her to the single occupancy bathroom.

She rolled her eyes.

"We can share the bathroom – unless you needed to use it? – I'm not going to make you wait just to get out of a wet shirt." The girl gestured and Hilde stepped in.

The girl locked the door behind them and immediately pulled off her shirt.

Hilde forced herself to look at the wall and focused on the poster of Mt. Everest.

She pulled off her shirt and winced. Her bra was also completely soaked through.

"Damn, I got you good," the girl said.

Hilde looked over at her and instantly regretted it.

The girl had pulled off her shirt and now stood in only her shorts and a black, lacy bra that was just this side of see-thru.

Hilde swallowed hard.

"Yeah," she agreed.

She didn't have enough time to go home and get a new bra, but it would be hell to work for the next six hours with a wet bra. She sighed.

"It's not ruined," the girl spoke up. "Is it?"

"What? No." Hilde was insanely glad that she had worn her Victoria's Secret sports bra. She had purchased it during their semi-annual sale for seven dollars. It was, pathetically, her favorite bra. Despite the fact that it was bright pink.

"Good."

The girl smirked at her, and Hilde was reminded of her vision. This girl was a lesbian – and she clearly thought that Hilde was attractive.

"I'm Hilde," she said and stuck out her hand.

"Meilin," the girl said and accepted it, shaking it lightly before letting go.

Hilde smiled.

"So, this isn't my normal method of asking girls on dates, but is there any chance you would let me buy you another tea sometime?"

Meilin blinked at her and then her face seemed to freeze. She shook her head.

"No. No, um, I'm not –" she ran a hand through her hair uneasily. "How did you know?"

Hilde scowled.

"What are you talking about?"

Meilin glared at her.

"How did you know I was a lesbian? Oh God – what classes do you take? What year are you? You can't say a word to –"

"Whoa, whoa." Hilde held up her hands in a nonthreatening gesture. "Take it easy. I don't go to Clarkson. And as for you being a lesbian… you are kind of staring at my tits a lot to be a straight girl."

Meilin flushed.

"Well, I'm not interested." She pulled on the Java Joe's shirt and stormed past Hilde, out of the bathroom, and slammed the door behind her.

Hilde cursed and glared at the door for a long moment before finally pulling off her wet bra and then putting on the new shirt, grateful that the tie-dye pattern and loose fit didn't draw attention to the fact that she wasn't wearing a bra.

When Hilde finally came out of the bathroom, Meilin was long gone, and Duo had resumed flirting with Trowa.

Hilde passed them on her way, and Duo abandoned Trowa to catch up to her.

"Hey, you okay?" he asked.

"Fine," she snapped.

He arched an eyebrow and she sighed.

"You're right about the whole jinxing thing," she said. "I think I just did that."

"Um… how?"

"That girl? Meilin? Last week I had a vision of me kissing her… so I just asked her out and she went totally crazy on me and stormed out."

Duo shrugged and smirked.

"Maybe that's supposed to happen?" he offered.

Hilde glared at him.

"Sorry," he said, and then frowned at her. "Do you have time to run home and grab dinner before your shift?"

She shook her head.

"Here," he went behind the counter and came back a moment later with a rice crispy treat.

"Seriously?" Hilde accepted it with a roll of her eyes. "How much do I owe you for the shirt?"

"Nothing. Your girlfriend paid for them."

Hilde glared at him.

"Hey – this is good. You should tell Mitch that."

"Tell him what? That I staged an impromptu wet t-shirt contest here?" Mitch was her usual co-worker for the evening shifts at the Ice Cream Shop and he had shown remarkable, and disturbing, persistence in trying to woo her. She had, on multiple occasions, told him that she was gay and that she was not interested. Which, perversely, only seemed to make him more interested in her. It had gotten to the point where she had thought about requesting a shift change - but that would mean working nightshift at the nursing home, and while that paid more, it was also much more depressing. Hilde had worked the night shift only three times, and all three times she had been a wreck when she came home to Duo. She just could NOT handle it when the old, sometimes slightly senile patients woke up, calling for dead loved ones or crying in confusion about where they were.

"That guy is a creep. Be careful." Duo warned her.

Hilde rolled her eyes.

"He's a creep but he's harmless. I swear - all he does is stare at me and drool a little. I'm fine," she insisted when he still looked uncertain.

She loved Duo, and loved the feeling of having someone who cared about her, but sometimes he got a little too overprotective.

"Alright, catch you later."

Hilde waved and then left.

On her way out, she noticed Trowa watching her, a calculating look in his green gaze.

Despite the fact that Mitch, once again, couldn't stop staring at her ass or breasts all night, Hilde actually had a pleasant shift at the Ice Cream Shop.

There was only one family with small children who came in - mercifully well behaved and not accident prone - and the rest of the customers were elderly locals and a few college students on dates.

Hilde loved the elderly couples who came in. She liked listening to their small, petty arguments and loved the way they would order for each other or even just look at each other. She thought it was remarkable that two people could spend so much of their lives together - and it gave her hope for having that, one day, herself.

The college couples she liked FAR less. They usually tipped horribly and were, in her experience, completely self-absorbed and very snotty.

After the shop closed and Hilde counted out the register she helped Mitch take the trash out to the dumpster.

Hilde had to climb up a rickety set of stairs to reach the lip of the dumpster, and as she hefted the last bag of trash over the edge, Mitch came up behind her and put one hand on her waist.

She immediately jerked away from his touch in surprise and almost fell off the stairs. He caught her, both hands now firmly holding her in place, and smirked at her.

"Careful," he cautioned her.

"I'm fine. You can let me go."

He just continued to hold her.

"Don't think I didn't notice you flirting with me tonight," he said. "I saw you smiling and laughing - usually you just scowl all night. You're finally ready to admit you like me, huh? That you want my cock?"

"Ew, Mitch, no!" She pushed at him, furious, not for the first time in her life, that her diminutive size, at 5'3 and barely one hundred pounds, meant that she was shorter and smaller than almost everyone but children.

"Come on. Kiss me. You know you want to." He leaned in and she shoved him backwards with enough force that they both fell from the steps and landed on the pavement.

She tried to push him off her, but he rolled them until he was straddling her and started to feel her breasts through her shirt.

"Stop!" She shouted at him and struggled against him.

"Calm down," he insisted. "You'd like it if only -"

Suddenly Mitch was flying through the air and landed against the dumpster, his head hitting the corner with a sickening crack.

Hilde scrambled to her feet.

She had no idea what had just happened. It was almost as if some invisible force had thrown Mitch off of her. Which was both crazy and impossible.

Cautiously, she approached Mitch's body. He wasn't moving, and there was a dark, wet trail of what could only be blood down the side of the dumpster leading down to his head.

"Shit, fucking, fucking, shit," she muttered and steeled herself for the worst as she reached out and felt for a pulse.

"Fuck me, no, no, no, no!" She could feel absolutely nothing from his neck or his wrist.

"Is he dead?"

Hilde spun around at the sound of a male voice.

Trowa Barton was standing behind her.

"What - where did you come from?" she demanded.

"I saw him attack you," Trowa said with a frown. "I -"

"Holy shit please don't tell me you can turn invisible."

Trowa arched an eyebrow at her.

"Okay. I can't turn invisible," he said sardonically.

"Oh fuck this is so bad." She backed away from his body. "Why did you do anything?" she demanded.

"Because he was going to rape you," Trowa said, still frowning and now looking at her as though she were crazy.

"You killed him!" she shrieked.

"I saved you," he pointed out. "I didn't know he'd hit the dumpster like that." He scowled. "I thought you could see the future?"

"Yeah. So?"

He gestured to Mitch's body.

"You didn't see him trying this on you? Or this happening?"

"No! It isn't like the Weather Channel – I can't just tune in whenever I want. I just get visions."

"You should work on that," Trowa told her. "Learn to control it."

She glared at him.

"I'll get right the fuck on that. As soon as I've figured out what the hell to do with this corpse!"

"Calm down," Trowa said and approached the body. He reached towards it and started to go through Mitch's pockets.

"What are you doing?" Hilde hissed at him when he pulled out his wallet and cellphone.

"Making it look like he was mugged," Trowa said without sparing a look at her.

"Oh my God. This is so not happening!" She struggled to keep from hyperventilating.

Trowa stood up and pocketed the wallet and phone.

"Are you finished closing up?" he asked and nodded towards the Ice Cream Shop.

"I just need to lock up," Hilde found herself saying. She was starting to feel very numb. This whole thing was surreal.

"I'll walk you home," Trowa said.

Hilde turned to him, already shaking her head in the negative.

"No. I don't –"

"You're in shock," he told her. "You're pale and shaky."

"Because I was just an accessory to murder!"

He rolled his eyes.

"It was self-defense."

"Then why don't we call the cops?"

"You want to explain to them how two people in community service – one for possession – had to kill someone in self defense? And one of them can turn invisible?"

"We wouldn't have to tell them that part," Hilde grumbled, but she could see his point. It wasn't as if the cops had any reason to trust either of them.

She frowned.

"I thought you were quiet?"

He shrugged.

"I thought you were a bitch."

"I am not!"

"No," he agreed. "But Duo told me to steer clear of you – he said you didn't think much of me."

"So you decided to stalk me invisibly?"

"I just wanted to try to figure you out." He looked at the body. "We should go."

Hilde wanted to argue with him, but even more, she wanted to get away from Mitch's body.

She turned on her heel and went back into the Ice Cream Shop. She locked up and grabbed her bag before joining Trowa back outside.

Hilde started walking towards the apartment she and Duo shared, and Trowa fell in step beside her.

"I don't think much of you," she said after a moment, thinking that talking would be better than silence. Silence made her think about the sound of Mitch's skull hitting the dumpster.

"Okay," Trowa said. He had his hands shoved in his pockets. Hilde couldn't tell if he didn't care about having just killed someone or was simply as freaked out as she was and trying to hide it.

"He said you tried to kill yourself."

Trowa flinched, but nodded.

"His brother –"

"He told me."

Hilde frowned at that. Duo didn't tell anyone about Solo.

"He's my best friend," Hilde said. "If you hurt him in any way – and that includes offing yourself – I will fucking kill you."

His lips twitched but he refrained from saying anything. Instead, he nodded.

Which left Hilde without any topics of conversation. Because what did you talk about to the suicidal, creepy quiet guy dating your best friend who had just killed a guy trying to rape you?

"No one knows – about me," Trowa said into the silence. "What I can do."

"Why?"

"No reason for anyone to."

Which sounded exactly like what a creepy quiet guy would say, Hilde thought.

"So Duo doesn't know?"

"No. I'd rather tell him… later."

"Have you been following him?"

"No." Trowa shook his head emphatically. "I don't want to."

Hilde thought that didn't make much sense, and her thoughts must have shown on her face.

"I don't want to be invisible to him. I want to be with him. Following him… no. It would be too much."

Hilde had no idea how that made any kind of sense, but they had arrived at the apartment, and she had no desire to continue any conversation with him.

"Listen – speaking about things people don't know. Don't say anything about this, okay?"

He looked surprised.

"Duo?"

She shook her head.

"No. He's overprotective enough as it is. He doesn't need to know about this."

Trowa frowned.

"If you tell him – then I'll tell him about you," Hilde said, resorting to threatening him.

Trowa's green eyes turned hard.

He turned and walked away without saying anything, leaving Hilde feeling vaguely uneasy.

With a sigh, she went inside.

Duo was on the couch, watching baseball, but he jumped up when she entered.

"Hey!" he called. "I've got a pizza in the oven."

"Thanks, I'm just going to change." She eased past him and went into her bedroom.

She allowed herself a few minutes to freak out as soon as she closed her door.

She had almost been raped – she would have been, she was sure, if Trowa hadn't been stalking her – and then she had been part of a murder. Hours ago her day had turned to shit when the girl of her dreams walked away from her – but this was a whole new circle of hell.

Hilde had a sudden urge to be out of her clothes- the clothes that Mitch had touched – and pulled them off in a hurry and threw them into the trashcan in the corner of her room.

She fought back tears and forced herself to breathe evenly for a few minutes.

Once she was calm again, Hilde pulled on a pair of boxers she had liberated from Duo's laundry and her favorite t-shirt, an ancient, ripped Yoda shirt that she had found at a Goodwill years ago.

The clothes didn't comfort her nearly as much as she wanted them to, but she at least felt clean.

When she rejoined Duo he was cutting the pizza into slices.

"Hey – I've got Watchmen all cued up. Wanna grab us some beer?" he asked.

Hilde did as instructed and followed him out to the couch.

Duo deposited the pizza tray on the coffee table.

"You okay?" he asked suddenly.

She turned to find him studying her.

"Yeah," she said and forced a smile. "Just tired. God what a crazy day."

He nodded.

"Don't worry about it – seriously, maybe having that chick run out on you is part of some elaborate courtship plan."

Hilde choked on a laugh. She wished that Meilin was the cause for her concern.

"Maybe," she agreed. "Alright. Are you going to start this up or what? I could really do with getting to stare at Malin Ackerman for a while!"

Duo shuddered.

"Girls are so weird," he muttered but did as she commanded.

Hilde settled back against the couch, snacking on the pizza, and forcing her mind away from reality.

"Maybe we should get costumes?" she suggested with a dreamy sigh when Malin showed up in her skin tight black and yellow suit.

"We aren't superheroes," Duo reminded her. "But the Comedian's mask is totally badass."

Hilde smirked.

"Capes or no capes?"

"No capes! Didn't you pay attention at the beginning?" He grinned. "Bet Junior Deputy could pull it off though – okay. Maybe not." He snickered. "Heero, though. He could do a cape."

There was a look in his eyes when he said the other man's name that made Hilde curious.

"Heero? The hot angry guy?"

"Yep," Duo agreed. "I swear, I will get him to smile at me."

"He is really cute. You'd look good together."

Duo turned to glare at her.

"I look good with Trowa," he said.

She shrugged.

"You'd look good with anyone. I'm just wondering who will make you happy. Maybe Heero –" she caught herself as a golden mist filled her vision and suddenly she wasn't seeing Duo anymore.

Or at least, not just Duo.

Hilde was no longer on the couch, but seemed to be somewhere else in the room, and Duo, Heero, and Trowa were on the couch.

Heero sat in the middle, with Duo on one side, and Trowa on the other. The tall man had his legs stretched across the other two, and all three seemed to be watching something on television.

As Hilde stood there, completely frozen in shock, Duo started to tickle Trowa's feet, and the other man jerked away with an involuntary laugh.

Duo followed him, practically crawling over Heero to continue tickling him.

"Help me!" Trowa said, his voice tinged with laughter, and Heero joined in the fray, tickling Duo's sides until the other man was trying to fight his way free.

"So not fair," Duo groused when Heero had him pinned and Trowa was holding up his fingers threateningly. "You can't team up on me like this."

Trowa and Heero exchanged smirks before Trowa leaned down and kissed Duo.

Duo responded instantly and enthusiastically. His arms were still trapped by Heero, so he wrapped his legs around Trowa and pulled him close. Heero, meanwhile, started to kiss Duo's neck.

It distracted him and he broke free from Trowa to kiss Heero as well.

Hilde was finally able to look away when they started getting naked.

Her vision cleared, and suddenly it was just her and Duo, on their couch, alone.

"You okay?" Duo asked, looking a little concerned.

"Yeah, I'm fine." She shook her head. "Just really, really tired. Mind if we watch the end some other time?"

"Sure. I mean, we've already watched this eight or nine times… I think I can guess what happens next."

She smiled at him.

"Thanks."

"Are you sure you're okay?" he asked when she got up from the couch.

"I am," she assured him.

He looked doubtful, but let her go.

As Hilde buried herself under the covers on her bed she silently cursed whatever powers that be for giving her the ability to see into the future. Which only seemed to apply for seeing Duo's death or soft core porn.

"Thanks for nothing," she muttered, trying her hardest not to think about Mitch's body.

Community Service that Saturday found them under Dorothy's care. The policed still thought Une was missing, but as Hilde and Duo walked by a few of them, they heard them gossiping about the possibility of Une being a victim of the serial killer. Or of being the serial killer.

"Weird that shit only seems to happen on Saturdays," Duo remarked to Hilde when the cops radios started squawking and they all cleared out of the station.

"Maybe the crazy people are too busy working during the week?" Hilde mused.

They saw Dorothy sitting at the reception desk, glaring at them.

"Get dressed," she snapped. "I'm taking you delinquents to the highway to clean up road kill today."

The thought made Hilde feel slightly queasy.

She and Duo parted ways at the locker rooms, and Hilde found Relena inside, still getting changed.

"Hey," she said to the blonde girl.

She was freaked out by Relena's power, but last Saturday had proven her to be okay. Hot, self-centered, and whiny – but okay.

Relena smiled at her.

"Ready for another exciting day of craziness?" Relena joked.

"No," Hilde answered honestly. She pulled on her orange jumpsuit.

"Only three more to go," Relena said brightly. She reached out and squeezed Hilde's shoulder.

Hilde immediately shied away.

Relena frowned and then sighed.

"I'm sorry."

"No, I – sorry. I'm just a little freaked out by what you can do."

Relena gave her a watery smile.

"What I can do? Oh, if you only knew…" she shook her head. "I was on a date last night with this really nice guy. Roger – he's majoring in nuclear physics," she added, as if Hilde cared, "and we had a great dinner and he walked me to my dorm room and he held my hand. And I wanted him to kiss me so badly – and he did. And I – I really think I made him do it, just by wanting him to."

Hilde frowned.

"I thought you had to say it?"

Relena shook her head.

"I've been practicing. I can just think it now. And what if – what if I get so good at this that I don't have to touch people either? What if… what if everyone around me just starts doing exactly what I want them to? Then nothing will matter and nothing will be real anymore!"

Relena looked on the verge of tears and Hilde hugged her.

Relena stiffened in her arms.

"Did I make you do that?" she asked, her voice small.

"No," Hilde assured her – hoping it was the truth. "I just wanted an excuse to feel you up," she added quickly.

Relena laughed and hugged her back before releasing her.

"You really are pretty," Relena said as she wiped her eyes.

"Thanks?" Hilde didn't know if Relena was implying that lesbians were ugly.

"I just – I mean, I'm not interested, but if I was a lesbian, I'd find you really hot."

Hilde laughed and Relena smiled at her.

"C'mon, we should join the boys before Duo pisses someone off," Hilde said.

Relena rolled her eyes.

"Too late, I'm sure."

And of course, it was.

By the time they entered the briefing room, Duo was in a loud argument with both Wufei and Trant.

Hilde tried to listen to them, and it seemed that it wasn't even Duo they were mad at – they were blaming Quatre for what had happened last weekend, and Duo was defending him.

"Are you all insane?" Relena demanded, as she too figured out what they were fighting over. "We can't talk about this here!"

Wufei turned his glare on her.

"The cops think that Une was killed by the serial killer," Quatre jumped in before Wufei could speak. "We have to tell them the truth! It could confuse the entire investigation! More people could die!"

"Then you tell them that you killed the bitch," Trant growled. "I'm not going down for that shit."

"We can't tell the truth now," Wufei added, "it will only make us look guilty."

"We are guilty!" Quatre pointed out.

"Okay, Junior Deputy, chill out – we can't tell anyone," Duo said calmly before turning to glare at Wufei and Trant, "but we also have to stick together on this! You two assholes can't just wash your hands of this. We're all in this together."

Trant looked ready to argue, but Heero spoke up.

"He's right. Something happened to us when we were struck by lightning – to some of us," he added with a look over at Trowa, since the two of them were supposedly without powers, "and we are in this together. She would have killed all of us, or at least ruined our lives."

"We're a team," Quatre added. "And if we act like it, we can get through this and do some good!"

Duo groaned.

"We are not superheroes!" He repeated his statement from last night. "We are… we're fucking deviants who can do shit. And I, for one, want to keep that under wraps until this community service hell is over with. I'm not interested in being a team – but I'm not going to let some of you throw anyone to the wolves."

He glared at Trant and Wufei.

Wufei looked ready to say something, but Dorothy came slamming into the room.

"Get on the bus now," she barked. "You've got road kill to clean up."

Obediently they filed from the room and boarded the bus.

Dorothy drove them to a stretch of highway that was usually very busy and also had a reputation of being a graveyard for deer.

"Oh, so gross," Relena muttered as they disembarked from the bus and surveyed the carnage.

It looked as though half the deer population had tried to run across the road and most had been smashed into bloody carcasses.

"This is not okay," Hilde said and gave Relena a sympathetic look.

"Get to work!" Dorothy snapped at them. She tossed work gloves and trashbags to each of them and then set up a lawn chair in the shade of the parked bus and pulled out a book.

Hilde watched as everyone started to spread out. Duo, instead of walking towards her or Trowa, followed Heero over to the closest, gruesome corpse.

She decided to let him enjoy that bonding time and looked for something smaller and less disgusting to pick up. Like the plastic bottles and other trash strewn on the grass.

"Are you okay?"

She looked up to see that Trowa had joined her, and he actually looked concerned.

"I'm fine," she snapped at him.

His eyes narrowed and he looked away.

"I'm sorry," she said with a sigh. "I'm not okay."

"I'm sorry too," he told her softly.

She looked up at him.

Okay, so he had stalked her and he had killed someone… but he was trying to protect her. Maybe he wasn't completely creepy.

They both looked up at the sound of Duo shouting.

He and Heero had managed to pry the head of a deer off the road and they looked equally disgusted as they tried to put it into Duo's trashbag.

Hilde looked back and noticed that Trowa looked a little… jealous.

"You don't like Heero?" she asked him.

Trowa frowned and shrugged.

"He's okay."

"He's hot," Hilde observed, earning a scowl from Trowa that quickly turned into a blank expression that nevertheless conveyed a sense of defeat.

Hilde immediately regretted teasing him.

"Duo really likes you," she said quickly.

Trowa remained silent.

Hilde sighed and contemplated telling him about her vision from last night. Duo didn't want to know the future he didn't want to risk jinxing it – and after yesterday, Hilde was inclined to agree with him. But what if knowing the truth wouldn't jinx it for Trowa? Or what if it did?

If it did, then Hilde was pretty sure Duo would move on and be better off – he did not need a suicidal guy in his life. And if it didn't' jinx it, well, then maybe Trowa should be in his life after all.

"I had this vision last night… about you and Duo…"

Trowa looked over at her.

"It was good," she assured him.

"What was it?" he asked after a moment, prompted, it seemed, by Duo shouting "fucking gross!" and then laughing.

So Hilde told him.

When they returned to the police station late that afternoon, whatever crisis had called the other police officers away was either still underway or something else had happened. The place was completely deserted, with the exception of two very tall, very well dressed, and very pissed looking people.

One was a woman with short, dark hair wearing a stylish and borderline sexy black skirt suit. The other was a man with long blonde hair, blue eyes, and a sneer that made it clear he didn't understand why the world wasn't working harder to do his bidding.

"Who are they?" Hilde asked Quatre.

"No idea," he said.

"Can I help you?" Dorothy demanded when she walked in, her irritation clear.

The man arched one elegant eyebrow at her.

"Do you work here?"

"Obviously." She gestured to her badge and uniform.

His sneer became even more pronounced, but the woman merely chuckled.

"We're Detectives Noin and Merquise. I believe Captain Winner is expecting us?"

Dorothy paled.

"Yes. I'm sorry. Yes. He's… still on site."

Noin and Merquise and exchanged dark looks.

"Take us there," Noin said, clearly a command.

Dorothy looked back at them.

"Get changed and go home," she barked at them.

"Such amazing people skills," Duo muttered, earning a glare from Dorothy and a chuckle from Merquise.

As Hilde and Duo walked out of the police station in their street clothes a few minutes later they watched Dorothy and the two detectives clamored into a squad car.

"That can't be good," Duo muttered as they sped away.

"No," Hilde agreed. "But as you said – we aren't superheroes. So it's not our problem."

He smirked and threw an arm around her shoulders.

"I did say that, didn't I?"

Hilde looked back to see Trowa watching them, a frown creasing his brow.

After Hilde had told him about her vision Trowa had drifted off and spent the rest of the day on his own, idly collecting trash and generally ignoring the rest of the world. He had even ignored Duo's invitation to join them for lunch, which had definitely hurt Duo more than Hilde wanted it to.

As they walked home Hilde couldn't shake the feeling that maybe she had made the wrong decision.