Chapter 5

Humming cheerfully, I flipped the pancakes. Quatre was gone on a mission, and since we all concurred that he was the best cook of us all, with me in a far second, though Trowa was swiftly catching up under Quatre's tutelage, cooking was left to me. Trowa made a mean omelet, though, and generally we let him cook breakfast. Of course, he was gone on a mission too, so I was the one waking up early to stir up something up that was safe to eat. I shuddered. It was a small price to pay to keep Wufei or Heero from getting near the stove. They were terrible. They just didn't have it.

It'd been one month since those taxing missions from hell, and we'd just gotten back into things a week and a half ago.

Those two weeks and a half of rest had been paradise for five weary pilots. We'd done nothing, really, but sit and talk and laugh and sleep. And eat. Quatre was there the whole time; his command of the culinary arts was becoming legendary among us. Yum.

We'd all pretty much gained back the weight we'd lost, and the rings under our eyes had disappeared until they were nothing but a bad dream.

My collarbone still ached from time to time, but it was just a tiny twinge that I couldn't care less about.

Wufei trooped into the kitchen and stared hungrily at the pancakes. It was a freakin' miracle that Wufei and I got on as well as we do now, considering our former animosity, but, I shrugged, remembering my first encounter with Heero. He hasn't killed me. Yet.

I sighed. We really are a bunch of screw-ups, aren't we? I shook my head and turned off the stove, then divided the stack. Let's see, five for Wufei, he looks really hungry, four for Heero, and the last two for me. I wasn't really a breakfast person.

Wufei already had syrup out. I grinned at him and he smiled back. He really was a pretty great person. I have to admit that.

Of course, he could be damned annoying, and he never passed up a chance to laugh at me. But, I consoled myself, at least it's not mocking, like it was before that last mission.

Heero walked in just as I was placing the pancakes in front of a ravenous Wufei, who smothered them with syrup. I winced.

"Good morning, Heero," I turned to give him his plate, then snagged mine and we all sat down to breakfast. I'd toned down my obvious enjoyment with eating to something more...bearable, especially since every single time Wufei had seen me eating too happily, he'd started that stupid laugh. I would do almost anything to get that laugh to go away.

I'd finally got my personal mission back on track, and was back to tapping and light caresses.

It took me three days to realize that he was perfectly comfortable with them, and then another four to get over that fact.

I wasn't sure what to do next, though. Handholding was a given. Perhaps a few light punches, and maybe I could ruffle his hair.

My hands have been itching to tousle his hair for the longest time. I can't help it. It's just so ruffle-able.

His eye-smiles hadn't disappeared, for which I was really grateful, and though he didn't smile half as often as I wanted him to, I was glad he felt safe enough to four of us to actually do it at all.

He'd even progressed onto a rare mouth-smile every once in a while.

I watched him covertly, hoping to catch a glimpse of another one.

He cut up his pancakes efficiently, like he does everything else, and was done before I'd touched my second pancake.

Wufei had finally slowed down a little bit, and was using his last pancake to mop up the remaining syrup.

"We have missions."

I sighed. Our happy idyll had to end sometime. This would be my first mission since...well, you know since when.

"Wufei, J wants you to investigate a warehouse on L3. You'll get your mission details later." See, there was another difference. Heero was actually calling us by our names instead of numbers.

"Duo and I are going to go undercover in a high school. It's near an Oz building, where they reportedly hold one of our generals captive. We're supposed to break him out."

Bummer. A hard mission.

Pretending to be high school students is sort of fun, I suppose. It's just a little strange seeing people your age acting so much younger.

I'd never gone undercover with Heero, though. I wondered how he acted. I stifled a smile. Probably like a freaky, silent lump.

Wufei's final click of fork against plate signaled the end of breakfast and I grinned at Heero. "You're turn to wash dishes," I suggested.

He sighed, but collected the plates and utensils together resignedly and headed for the sink.

Wufei stood up and said unenthusiastically, "I suppose I'll go prepare for my mission, then."

He had such a kicked-puppy look that I said comfortingly, "At least when you get back, Quatre'll be able to cook for you."

He brightened up almost immediately.

I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. Wufei has such a weakness for good food. And way too much syrup.

I enrolled under the name Solo Wellings, and Heero under Max Lowe. I felt kind of touched, actually, that he'd obviously gotten his first name from my last, and couldn't help grinning at him.

If he weren't Heero Yuy, he would've been blushing, and I delighted over the fact, but didn't push it.

Just grinned madly at him every single time I caught his eye.

Their school principal greeted us at the door, and he looked like a total pushover. Owlish glasses, a weak chin, thin nose, and large, limpid eyes. He was balding too, though he couldn't have been a day over thirty-five. I felt like I was towering over him even if he must've been a foot taller. He just kind of slumped into himself and hunched his back. Yep, here's the rabbit of human beings. Okay, so that thought was kind of mean, but c'mon...the guy looked like a stiff breeze could knock him over.

His one redeeming feature was his voice, a powerful baritone. It was almost hypnotic, and I understood after that how he could run a school.

It did look damn strange, though, hearing that voice that should've been a talk show host's issue from a mouth that wobbled between a twitching nose and trembling chin.

In fact, I was so fascinated on comparing the two that I didn't hear a single word he said. I wondered if this was a common problem when people listened to him.

Our room was...nice. Plain, austere, and neat. It had a big window. And a bunk bed. A really low bunk bed. There was only about a yard's difference between the top and the bottom. I called the top bunk and Heero sent me a mournful look.

By the time we'd gotten settled down, it was night, and we were tired, so we decided to skip exploring in favor of doing it the next day.

I fell asleep with my braid dangling over the edge of my bunk. Just in case Heero wanted to hold on to it. He does sometimes, you know, when we're sleeping near each other. It's like his security blanket or something. It's really cute, actually. Of course I don't tell him that.

I woke up, perilously close to dropping off the edge of my bunk. I flailed wildly, for a second, trying to edge backwards, but my head was just stuck. I spent a frozen moment wondering if I was paralyzed or something, when I realized I could move forward, just not back. Peering downwards, I took in the situation, and sighed.

Heero was latched onto my braid, and I can only assume he'd rolled over or something, dragging the end of my braid with him. Hence my precarious position. It was cute, really. Just damned inconvenient right now. No way I was going to get back to sleep with my head hanging over empty air like this.

Okay...now what was I supposed to do? Trying to get Heero to let go of something he didn't want to was kind of like trying to pry open a bulldog's jaws: worse than impossible.

That meant I'd have to get Heero to want to let go. I felt sort of bad about that, but we both needed the sleep. We'd be spending some sleepless nights soon snooping around the Oz base.

"Psst. Heero," I hissed.

There was a moment of silence, and then, "Duo?"

"Um...would you mind letting go of my braid? I'm about to fall off the bed here."

He let go of my hair so suddenly I felt myself spring back a little, and I could just tell he felt guilty as hell.

"It's all right," I whispered to him. "It wasn't that bad."

He didn't answer and we both settled back into our bunks to get some sleep.

After hearing him shift uncomfortably for the fifth time, I was feeling real guilty for making him let go of my hair.

He was never going to get to sleep. And neither was I, listening to him.

That left me only one choice.

I vaulted off my bunk, and stood in front of his for a moment. I could see his eyes glinting at me from the moonlight that filtered between the curtains, and I knew he was wondering what the hell I was doing.

I smiled at him, hoping he could see it.

It was warm enough I didn't really need any sheets, so I just crawled on top of Heero's bed, careful to make sure I wasn't touching him. He might be comfortable with touches centered on one area of his body, but it was kind of scary imagining his reaction if I went and snuggled up into him.

Still, he went stiff as a board, and hissed, "What are you doing?"

"Well," I said, trying to sound as placating and logical as possible, "this way you can hold onto my braid and we can both get to sleep."

The room was silent as a tomb. I don't think he was even breathing.

"Don't worry," I said reassuringly, "the bed's big enough that we'll both be fine."

Slowly, he relaxed, and I felt him seize my braid again. I took that as his acceptance of our...uh, location.

Then he said, "Talk to me? In that voice?"

Whoa. "Uh...sure," I said, totally amazed. I talked for practically half an hour, and he fell asleep sometimes between my comments on how low the bunk bed was and how Wufei was addicted to syrup.

I just stared at his sleeping face for a moment, and felt something stir inside of me.

"Goodnight Heero," I murmured, and closed my eyes.

It's strange, really, that he likes my hair so much, but I guess he doesn't really see it as alive (dead hair cells, maybe), and it can't hurt him...whatever makes him happy, I guess.

Oh well. It was pretty nice, actually, lying here with Heero's warmth drifting into my body.

I fell asleep with his breathing acting as a lullaby.