Author's Note: Lately, I have just not been in the mood to write. Call it lack of motivation or just plain laziness or maybe something else, I don't know what's up. Fortunately for everybody, I already have several chapters ready to be released at my discretion in case something like this were to happen. Do not fret, I should get my urge to write back but until then just expect weekly updates. Without further ado, enjoy.

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing

Warning: language, shounen ai

In Pursuit of Happiness

As he awoke from blissful sleep, Duo's face scrunched up, as if disgusted with the entire world around him. His mind overcoming the last hurdle to cruel consciousness, his jaw cracked audibly as an enormous yawn tore its way out of the dark cavern. Raising a hand up, he used the back of the appendage to clear the grittiness that was the gunk in his eyes before opening them and blinking owlishly as the world around him slowly transformed from fuzzy colors to solid shapes.

Once his vision focused some more, he planted the side of his head back into the soft pillows that had been comforting it all throughout the night. It was the weekend for Christ's sake! What was he doing…oh, it was morning already. Never mind.

Huh. Not that it was an odd occurrence but Duo noticed that he was still in his clothes from yesterday, having forgotten to take them off. It was funny, really. He thought he was going to be getting some nookie yesterday and ended up with squat except Solo making him horny as hell and then just stopping for no reason whatsoever.

He was probably trying to get some sort of twisted payback or something for all those questions he was asking about his father.

Speaking of his personnel human furnace, the guy was snuggled right up into him, still in the midst of sleep and probably not having an exciting dream of any kind. Yeah, he would know if the blond was but since nothing was poking into him, it had to be tame or something or whatever Solo considered to be unexciting.

It was at this point that Duo wanted to get up and out of bed, something highly unusual for him. However, somebody just happened to have their arms around him and was holding him tightly up against their self, the selfish bastard. Well, he certainly knew how to change this.

Without preamble, he lifted his hand up and flicked Solo on his nose.

The blond's face scrunched up cutely with eyelids squeezing tightly before relaxing and opening slowly, revealing the green eyes once covered by the sliding pieces of skin. A sleepy smile slowly curved the lips on the teens face, completing the look started by the half-lidded, cloudy eyes.

"Was it as good for you as it was me?" Solo asked, his expression not changing for even a second.

"Sorry Charlie," Duo said. "Still have clothes on and if I recall right, you didn't get past second base, I think."

"Aww," Solo whined. The smile he had on then turned to a more perverse one. "Think we could catch up on lost time?" he suggested, completely serious despite not looking a bit like it.

"Not in the mood," Duo told him. "Now, can ya let me go? I wanna get up."

"But I don't want to!" Solo complained childishly, tightening his embrace on the braided one.

"C'mon, let go!" Duo commanded in an equally childish voice.

"Don't wanna!" Solo retaliated.

"But Solo!" Duo whined. "I wanna get up!"

"Why do you wanna get up?" Solo demanded.

"I wanna do something!" Duo answered.

"Like what?"

Without warning, Duo's hand returned and flicked the blond's nose once again. In response, Solo's face scrunched up cutely again and a hand moved itself to hover over the abuse part of his face. Seizing the opportunity, Duo squirmed out of the one arm embrace and was at the bedroom door before Solo was able to comprehend it.

"I wanna play a game," Duo said earnestly, "and you're it."

With that, the braided one was gone.

Solo blinked at the door before an amused smile crept out.

So that was how he wanted to play it, huh?

Well, the pleasure in a hunt was always in the chase…

--

Ezekiel stood in front of his brother's home, standing regally at the front doors as the limo pulled up in front.

Normally, Ezekiel was a timid sort of man, he didn't like being in the position of responsibility or having every single thing depend on him when it counted most. However, when it came to his job as head of the electronics and technologies branch of WEI, he was the complete opposite, nearly an identical duplicate of his more commanding older brother.

When it all came down to it, he took his turn and settled things. However, the man that he was about to greet was no ordinary visitor to the Winner Estate.

This particular visitor was the chosen representative of the Romafellor Corporation, the Winner's main competitor and rival on the international market, here today to discuss and negotiate Romafellor's unprecedented offer to form an international trust.

It was business, pure and simple, and since Raberba was in charge of everything, it would be him who would handle this.

Ezekiel eyed the Romafellor rep with disdain as the burly man exited his limousine. He was quite tall, his face not pretty to look at with all those facial wrinkles and whatnot. Then there was the long, shoulder-length, mousy-colored hair that stood out of place on the man, something that screamed out to Ezekiel like he had seen something like it before. Rich clothing completed the image that the beauty deprived man was trying to project and judging by the finery, he was obviously Romafellor material, no doubt about it.

"Good day," the man greeted, his voice gruff.

"Same to you," Ezekiel replied. "If you'll follow me, we can get this meeting underway."

"By all means," the man said, gesturing for him to go ahead.

Ezekiel didn't like him. There was something about this man that just wasn't right. But what could it be? Looks aside, he didn't seem like the type that would be capable of doing horrendous actions. So what was it?

Long ago, Ezekiel had learned to go with his gut and his gut was screaming at him that something was not right about this man, whoever he was. Still, he knew it was useless to try and figure it out by himself. He didn't even know him for Christ's sake!

"This is a mighty fine place you have here," the man commented, obviously envious of the Winners' home.

"It's been in the family for generations," Ezekiel said stiffly.

"You don't say," the man said, eyes darting to and fro. "My, what I wouldn't give to live in a place like this."

"You're not the only one," Ezekiel muttered under his breath so that the man didn't hear him.

Stopping in front of Raberba's study, he knocked on the door. It was more just for etiquette than anything else, plus he didn't want to give the man from Romafellor any ideas, if any could be taken from some such an action.

Immediately the door opened, Raberba Winner standing there in all his effortless presence and glory, eyes stern as they landed on the representative from Romafellor.

"You must be Raberba Winner, if I'm not mistaken," the man said, holding out a large hand.

"You would be correct," Raberba replied, taking the offered hand and giving it a shake. "We have been expecting you, Mister…?"

"Dmitri Tsubarov," the man introduced himself.

Ezekiel kept his surprise hidden as he saw his brother's eyes narrow. It seemed as if his brother knew or had heard of this man before. Perhaps his gut instinct from earlier had some merit after all.

"I believe you have met my brother, Ezekiel," Raberba continued. "I hope you don't mind that he will be sitting in with us today."

"Oh not at all," Tsubarov said. "Say, you wouldn't happen to have something to drink around here, do you?"

"I'm sure we can find something," Raberba answered with a hint of disdain in his voice, something that this Tsubarov clearly missed.

--

In order to hunt properly, a certain finesse was needed.

Patience was more than just required, it was a necessity.

Fortunately for Solo, he had both of these. Well, maybe not the patience unless the situation required it, such as this one. Otherwise, he had all that was needed in order to hunt down his elusive quarry who had thus far led him outside the mansion.

This wasn't good. It was wide open out here and he would be easy to spot from wherever Duo had hidden himself. Then again, there weren't many places to hide outside, which limited the area of where Duo was potentially hiding. He wondered briefly what his reward would be if he did manage to find and catch the braided one. Hopefully it would be something good, something worth his while…heh heh…

"Oh Short Stuff," he called out sweetly. "Come out, come out wherever you are!"

Huh, well that produced nothing. But maybe it was for the best. If it was easy then it would be too boring.

Damn, where was he? They'd been playing around like this for a few hours already and he had yet to have breakfast. At this rate, he would have to forget about that first meal of the day and start thinking about lunch since he was not going to throw in the towel until he got his hands on his Duo.

Checking around the patio, he continued to speak. "You can't hide from me forever. You're going to have to come out some time. So why don't you save us some grief and come on out? I'm gonna find you no matter what so you might as well end this right now…"

Just as he expected: nothing. So it was going to the hard way, huh? Well, as that Roman guy once said, "The die is cast."

But enough of that crap. First thing was first. Find Duo and then he could inflict whatever punishment he wanted on the unsuspected guy.

It was more than enough to make his mouth water…

It would be these thoughts that would motivate him to continue his pursuit for the next hour and a half. He had probably gone around the place two times by now when he caught the sound of something snapping, most likely a twig. He froze his body immediately, his eyes darting from side to side, looking for the origin of the sound.

There!

If he hadn't been looking for it, he would have missed it. Flickering through the shade was a small dark figure. Intense scrutiny allowed his to catch sight of a flash of chestnut, the same color of a certain braid that belonged to the very person he was hunting.

Bingo.

Crouching as low to the ground as he possibly could, he resembled a green eyed panther, his body frozen in preparation of a lunge that would capture his prey in an inescapable embrace. He could hardly wait.

He was giddy with anticipation as Duo peeked out of hiding warily, searching for any sign of his blond pursuer. Oh, this was getting better and better. The guy was fully out in the open and unknowingly heading towards him. In another minute, he would be on top of him.

"Got ya," he whispered.

Perhaps he shouldn't have done that. He had thought he had spoken quietly enough that he wasn't heard but he was sadly mistaken. Apparently, it had been loud enough that Duo had caught it. From where he was, Solo could see those violet eyes widen in an "Oh shit!" look.

In the next second, Duo had turned tail and was running from the hills, trying to get away from Solo as he possibly could. As if Solo was going to let this chance get away from him. In another split second, Solo was chasing after the fleeing teen. He took ruthless advantage of his height, which included long legs, to catch up to the vertically-challenged braided one.

He was close, so close, that braid of Duo's just within his grasp when Duo took a sudden sharp turn, causing the blond to shoot straight pass him.

"Shit!" Solo swore and he stopped his running, his feet skidding as he sought to stop himself. Using his hips to take the strain, he jerked them in the direction he wanted to go in, namely straight towards Duo who was still escaping, and was off again, closing the distance between himself and Duo.

He couldn't help it but there was a grin on his face. He was even breathing hard, sweating like no tomorrow, and hadn't had a single thing to eat yet he was having the time of his life.

Oh hell no. Duo was heading back to the house. Aided again by the inside maze, it would take hours once again to track him down. He was not going to let that happen, no way, no how. He had been denied for too long and would not be denied any longer.

Crap, he just took another sharp turn. He wouldn't get him with that move this time. Holy shit! He almost hit that goddamn tree! That was pretty clever of Duo, faking him with a right then going left. Oh he was going to pay for that. Lucky for him, Duo wasn't heading towards the patio. He was heading around to the side of the house. What was he heading for, the front door? Didn't matter to Solo since he was sure he could catch up to him before them.

And he was doing good too, catching up with him that is. In fact, he was probably twenty feet away from Duo when the braided one turned the corner and headed straight to the front.

This was going to be tight.

He had to tilt his running body and squeeze around the corner, just barely scrapping his forehead against the brick and mortar of the house as he made the turn…

And nearly collided with the back of his prey.

Well damn, he must be getting pretty fast or something. Maybe he could try out for the cross country team or something.

"Got ya!" he proclaimed, wrapping his arms securely around Duo.

It was only then that he noticed how tense and stiff Duo was.

Whoa, that was a drastic change from this morning. Was something wrong?

Looking up from Duo, he finally noticed that they had a spectator, a very big and ugly spectator. A spectator with little eyes that were eyeing Duo in a way that Solo didn't like. It kinda reminded him of one of those child molesters for some reason.

Duo's face was impassive, no emotions whatsoever giving away what he could possibly be thinking.

The man before them grunted. "What are you doing here?" he asked.

"I live here now, no thanks to you," Duo stated, barely contained anger gnawing at him.

Slowly, Solo dislodged himself from Duo and took a step back. Something was going on here, of that he was certain. He just didn't know what.

The man chuckled and shook his head, glancing back at the Winner Estate once more before turning his attention back to Duo. "It seems I underestimated you," he said. "You've done well for yourself. Better than I thought you ever would. So how did you do it? Are you putting out for that kid behind you or something?"

"Leave him out of this," Duo growled.

"Feisty," the man commented, dark eyes sparkling maliciously. "For a moment, you almost reminded me of—"

"Don't you say another word," Duo hissed.

"And what are you going to do about it?" the man taunted. "What have you ever done with your life? You might as well go into the business that spawned you. Yet, I think I can still salvage something from you. Tell you what, why don't you give me a call sometime and we can have lunch. Discuss your future prospects, that kind of thing."

"I'd rather vomit," Duo seethed.

"Eh, you can't say I didn't try," the man shrugged. "Still, call me if you have a change of heart, heh heh heh."

Duo continued to glare after the man as he got into his ride and left. Now that Solo had a good look at him, he noticed Duo was shaking with barely suppressed fury. He had never seen Duo like this before, not even when he took on Wufei.

So, cautiously, he asked, "Who was that? You know him?"

Duo continued to seethe, not answering for what seemed like an hour but what probably only a few minutes. When he finally did, his voice was bitter and harsh with the negative emotions that he was now visibly projecting.

"That was Dmitri Tsubarov," he said. "Once upon a time, he picked up a prostitute and got her pregnant. I was the result."

Solo's eyes began to widen. "You mean that guy is—"

"You are correct," Duo cut off. "You just met my most favorite person in the world. My father."