Chapter 17
"Hey, Qat, what time is it?"
"'Round five. We better be getting back. Remember, you guys promised to try one of those five star restaurants."
"But," Trowa said soulfully, "your cooking is better than theirs."
Quatre elbowed him, and said, "Don't be silly. Just try it."
We all sighed in unison, but when Quatre wants to do something, it's a given that we will. After all, it's not a good idea to spurn our best cook in any way.
"Hey…" I suddenly remembered something I'd read about five star restaurants. "We don't have to dress up or anything, do we?"
"No," Quatre said, "some people still do, but it hasn't been a requirement for ages."
"Oh. Okay."
We got back to the hotel, and cleaned ourselves up pretty decently. Heero, of course, wore spandex shorts and a tank top. The very embodiment of informal.
He's never going to get over his infatuation with spandex, is he?
The rest of us all wore an assortment of T-shirts and shorts, and Quatre called a cab to take us to wherever the hell we were going to eat.
Its name was some incomprehensible gibberish, and the inside was just crazy. Trees everywhere, waterfall fountains trickling to give the music a pleasant counterpoint, and even though I bet there were more people in there that could fit in a square mile, it still seemed spacious.
Quatre had a reservation, of course. A waiter smiled at us engagingly as he took us to our booth. At least he wasn't like one of those uppity nose-in-the-air waiters I'd been afraid we might have.
We got seated smack dab in the middle of the restaurant, next to some kind of giant aquarium.
I was totally fascinated by the thing, and didn't even register the waiter leaving us some menus.
"Duo." Wufei nudged me. "Pick something."
I took a desultory glance at the menu, tried to understand what the hell they were talking about, and then just looked up helplessly.
"Quatre," I said decisively, "you can choose for me. Anything that you think is good." I hesitated. "Not something really spicy, though."
I wasn't really used to the whole burning-up-your-mouth thing.
Then I slammed my face right back onto the glass of the aquarium, and watched, wide-eyed, as two vibrant-colored fishes swam by.
The thing was like this column of water swirling up to the ceiling, and the glass was so clear, that for a moment, I actually thought the water was standing by itself, defying the force of gravity.
It was a little creepy, though, 'cause a little part of your mind kept screaming at you that the whole thing was going to just disintegrate onto your head.
Almost all the fishes in there were the weirdest fishes I've ever seen. Not that I've seen many. This trip was actually the first time I'd really gotten to see a live fish up close. Besides on TV.
Some tiny, graceful looking fishes dressed in an amazing myriad of glossy blues and greens came to nose curiously at my part of the glass, and I guess they thought I was part of the exhibit too.
I jerked back inadvertently. I really thought they were going to nip at my nose or something.
"Isn't this cool?" I grinned at the other guys exuberantly, and they kind of rolled their eyes, kind of exchanged affectionate, long-suffering looks.
I dove right back to my fish-watching.
A…thing flapped by a few feet ahead of me, and I nearly shouted in surprise. It was…disturbing beyond belief.
It looked like a mat with a devil's tail. And its mouth…gods, that part was scary.
"Shit…what was that thing?"
Somehow, without knowing it, I'd grabbed hold of Heero's arm, and I stared at the others.
"That," Quatre imparted, "was a ray."
"A ray…right," I said distantly.
I eyed the column warily, wondering what else it was going to spit out and shock the life out of me.
But then I was captivated again by all the variegated kinds of sea creatures, and found myself somehow plastered to the glass once more.
My awed silence was marked only by excited exclamations to the other guys, who probably weren't listening.
For once, Other Duo and I were in complete agreement. This was beyond fantastic.
I dragged my eyes long enough to inquire, "Did we order yet?"
"Ten minutes ago," Trowa informed me good-naturedly.
"Okay, how long till the food?" I asked distractedly.
"You probably have another ten minutes to stare at the fish, Duo," Quatre said, laughing.
"Oh good."
I was ecstatically babbling about this black and white striped fish with lots and lots and lots of weird little fins, when, out of the blue, another thing comes and smashes its ugly face right against mine. Well…it would've been right against mine if there hadn't been glass.
I caught a glimpse of lots of lethal looking pointy teeth as I shot backwards, yelling, "Holy shit!" Other Duo screaming just as loudly inside my head.
Hammer-head shark, I remembered, from a pretty damn terrifying movie I'd seen with the other guys, and decided that the real thing was much, much freakier.
It stuck to the side for a few more seconds, then turned, glaring sinisterly at me from one beady looking eye, and swam away.
I looked at the others, who were staring at me, a little white, and I said shakily, "Okay, that was kinda scary."
"You should have seen it from our point of view," Wufei said just as unsteadily. "It looked like you missed having your head bit off by less than an inch."
This time, it was Heero who was holding my arm as if he would crush it.
I suddenly realized that we were the center of attention of the whole damn room, and every damn person was gawking at the crazy guy who unexpectedly screamed a curse in the middle of a nice, peaceful dinner.
I wanted to sink into the floor, but said valiantly, "Sorry, people. A shark just decided it wanted a bite of my head and shoved its mouth into my face. It was…a little surprising."
A chuckle kind of rolled around the room, and everyone got back to their meals, though not without a few more strange looks directed our way. I wondered what they thought of us, five obviously young guys, and eating in one of the best places of the house.
I released a trembling breath, and said, "Okay, I think I'm done with staring at the fish."
"Duo," Trowa said, and his eyes were wide behind that fringe of hair, "How the hell do you manage to get into life-threatening situations in the middle of a freakin' five-star restaurant?"
"That wasn't life-threatening," I protested, "that was just really, really weird."
Then our dinner arrived. The waiter kind of grinned at me, and said, "I take it you had a meeting with our notorious hammerhead?"
"Head on," I agreed in what I thought was a frighteningly accurate turn of phrase.
"It's a rather frightening experience…and it's almost worse watching it," he said, giving the others a wink. "Trust me, you haven't been scared till you've seen him try to rip off a five-year old girl's head pressed up in the glass right in front of you."
I blanched. "He does this often?"
"Every chance he gets, when he's not sleeping," the waiter chuckled.
"Oh good," I said in relief, "I was afraid it was just me."
He laughed and passed out our meals.
Quatre had ordered some kind of fried fish for me – well, duh, we were in the middle of an ocean, and it had a tangy, brown sauce smeared all over it. That was delicious.
I poked my fork suspiciously into this heap of straggly yellow things, and looked to Quatre for help.
"Just try it," he urged, watching me with a playful gleam in his eyes that I totally did not trust.
I looped one over my fork, and inspected it, making sure it did not move.
"If this is a worm, little brother," I threatened, "you'll be in a big trouble when I get my hands on you."
"It's not a worm," he said, grinning.
After nibbling at a piece, I contemplated it heavily. It was kind of…bouncy, and chewy, but it wasn't altogether unpleasant.
"It's not too bad," I admitted to Quatre, then asked, "So…what is it?"
"Jellyfish tentacles," he said impishly.
"Jellyfish tentacles?" I stared at him.
"C'mon," he wheedled, "you didn't think it was so bad when you didn't know what it was."
"Jellyfish tentacles," I grumped.
I took another bite, and mulled over it thoughtfully.
"So?" Quatre said a bit impatiently.
I gave him a grudging, "I guess it's okay."
"See, I told you!" He beamed at me. "Can I have one?"
"Take your pick." I pushed the plate across the table.
He masticated on one with the most interesting expression on his face. "It's kind of springy…is that the way it's supposed to be?" He looked at me for an answer.
"How am I supposed to know? You're the expert!"
"Well," Quatre said defensively, "I've never had jellyfish tentacles before."
"You've never had them before?" I asked him in disbelief. "So what was I? Your test subject?"
"Yes," he said shamelessly.
I just gaped at him.
"Winner has a truly devious streak," Wufei laughed. "Let me try one." He stole a tentacle off my plate.
"Yes," he agreed, after chewing on one for a minute, "it is most interesting. But not distasteful." He reached out and filched another one.
I recovered from my shock. "Hey! How would you like it if I went and started taking your food?"
Grabbing some of his crabmeat, I munched on it and said, "Hey…not bad."
I eyed everybody else's plate slyly.
"Is that raw?" I prodded a thin slab of fish on Heero's dish.
"Yes," he said.
"Is it good?" I asked dubiously.
"Not bad."
"Can I try some?"
"If you want."
I gnawed on a piece. "…Chewy."
My eyes lighted upon Trowa's plate. He had these huge shrimp creatures on it.
Quick as a flash, my fork shot out and nabbed one.
"Duo, that's my prawn," Trowa said evenly.
I examined it, paying no heed to his indignation, and said, "Gross! Look at the eyes…it's staring at me. That's what I've never liked about shrimp. People never take their heads off. Actually, sometimes, people never even take the heads off the fish," I continued, gesturing wildly, "and then the eyes stare at you the whole time you're ripping the flesh off their bones. It's totally morbid, man."
"Well, then eat the eyes," Wufei said in a reasonable tone.
"What? No way, then they're watching the half-digested pieces of their body come down and settle into your stomach! I feel like we're torturing the things." I stared back at the shrimp, uh, prawn, sadly.
"Then," Wufei said, rolling his eyes, "cut off the heads-"
"Cut off their heads!" I affected a great expression of horror.
"-and," he pressed on calmly, "cover their heads with a napkin so they don't have to watch the desecration of their bodies."
Ponderously, I thought it over. "Can we bury their heads on the beach?"
Trowa groaned. "If walking all over to the beach, digging a stupid hole, and burying the damn heads puts your sensibilities to rest, then by all means, do it."
"Or," Heero said, obviously not expecting me to listen to him, "just eat the thing already."
I considered that. "All right," I said, and popped the whole thing in my mouth.
Heero, Wufei, and Trowa looked a little startled, and Quatre burst out with, "I thought you said eating their eyes was like torturing the things!"
"Well," I said musingly, "I don't really feel up to being as silly as you need to be to be burying shrimp heads in the beach, so I thought I'd just make it as fast as I could."
They gaped at me, and I speared another prawn.
"Yum." Licking my lips, I devoured another one.
Wufei started grinning. "Maxwell," he said, "you are, without a doubt, the oddest person I have ever met."
"Mm."
"Hear, hear," Trowa said, raising a cup to salute him. Then he switched his attentions to me. "Take another prawn and you are dead."
"I am dead," I repeated dutifully as I reached out to swipe another of Trowa's juicy, giant prawns.
He locked his fork with mine, and said warningly, "Don't make me do anything I don't want to."
"Trowa…"
"These prawns are mine," he said inflexibly.
Sulkily, I said, "Alright," not really wanting to get into a food fight with Trowa.
I looked down to my plate, and saw, aghast, that someone had finished all my jellyfish!
"Wufeeeii," I looked up, intent on revenging my stolen tentacles.
"It wasn't just me," Wufei said with a martyred look. "Your boyfriend had some too."
"Heero?"
He looked at me a little guiltily, and said, "I'm sorry. They were good, and you said you could share anything with me." He gave me a hopeful eye-smile.
I melted. Just melted right then and there. Gods, am I in trouble or what?
"It's all right, Heero, I was getting pretty full anyway." I smiled at him, and only kept it from becoming an adoring smile by all the force of my stubborn will.
I leaned back into my chair, realizing that I was pretty sated, actually, and looked at Quatre.
"So, little brother, what're we doing tomorrow?"
"One more day at the beach, and then the day after that, we're going to take a boat out to the ocean. They've promised to show us some dolphins."
"Dolphins?" Seeing a dolphin was practically my childhood dream. It was impossible to find them on L2, since they didn't exist there, and even on Earth, the only planet on which they could actually live, they were rare.
He nodded.
"Quatre…" I could've cried. Almost did. Other Duo pulled up a nonexistent chair and sat down abruptly. Dolphins…he said.
"That's…that's great," I said softly.
The others ate silently for a moment, before Wufei called the waiter over. "Excuse me, where is the restroom?"
"Here, I'll take you," the waiter bowed dashingly, letting Wufei out first.
I noticed him staring attentively at Wufei's butt, and started grinning. "'Fei's ass takes another victim," I whispered to the others.
When Wufei got back, he was doubtless a little troubled by all the smirking that was going his way, but he didn't ask. Probably afraid of our answer.
We finished our meal, and the waiter took Quatre's check.
Going out the door, he said winningly, "Please come again. We'll welcome you anytime."
I stifled my chuckles until we were well out of hearing distance, and then nudged Wufei playfully. "Tone down your hotness, 'Fei. You had him swooning as we left."
"Don't be ridiculous, Maxwell," he said haughtily.
"He was totally besotted with you." Especially your butt.
Wufei scoffed incredulously. "Me? You're the one who had every person in the room infatuated with you."
"As if."
"It's true," he insisted, looking at the other guys for support. "Didn't that guy two tables away from us just stare at you the whole time?"
"Because he thought I was a freak." I stuck in.
"And then there was the girl who nearly fainted every single time you smiled."
I laughed at him. "You noticed all that and didn't catch the waiter ogling your butt?"
"What?" He twitched.
"The whole way to the bathroom," I said, giving him a puckish grin.
"He did not!" Wufei was looking a little horrified now.
"You were wiggling your ass right in front of him. It was the perfect view."
He stopped walking.
I wrapped an arm around his shoulders and said, "Don't worry. It wasn't a bad view at all. He couldn't keep his eyes off of it. Of course," I reflected, "neither could the rest of the room. And you said I had people infatuated with me. Your butt could inspire armies, 'Fei."
"Maxwell…" There was a truly ominous tone to his voice.
I danced away, cackling a little manically. That felt good.
Later, that evening, Trowa shocked me into speechlessness.
I was preparing to go to bed, yawning loudly, when he walked by me, and paused long enough to say six words. "Not perfect. But pretty damn close."
My yawn stopped halfway past my throat, and I tripped over a chair.
Well, if Trowa had heard it, that meant Heero and Quatre had too. Shit.
I was really thinking of just resigning my post as Gundam pilot and applying for a job as an ostrich. They were kind of stupid, just to stick their heads in the sand, but, I vowed, I would become the first ostrich who could dig up a six feet hole in five seconds flat and dive in it.
The next day, guess what they decided to do? You got it, surfing. They were addicted to the sport, I'm serious. It did look kind of fun, being able to whiz around the waves like that and laugh at one of nature's great powers…but not even being able to flip the bird at the ocean could get me out there to become the object of another damn fan club. No way in hell.
I just walked along the beach for a while, enjoying the almost soothing roaring of the waves, and letting the sand sift between my toes.
Then something really, really strange happened. Just for a change, I'd decided to walk in the water. The water barely went up to my ankle. I was looking up at the sky, the wind playing giddily with my hair, when I put my foot down, and the heel squished. I looked down, hoping I hadn't stepped on a fish, when this really agonizing tingly feeling penetrated my foot.
It kind of eddied upwards to my legs, and I stumbled back from whatever the hell I'd stepped on. Something grabbed hold of my chest and squeezed. Then I blacked out. Just like that.
I'm not really sure how long I was out, but when I woke up, there was somebody pounding my chest. Hard.
Ouch.
"Ian?"
"Duo, thank Gods!" He grabbed me, and held me against him, limp as a rag doll.
"What the hell happened?" My mouth felt a little unwieldy.
"You stepped on a fucking jellyfish. A fucking Portuguese man-of-war."
Groggily, I said, "A jellyfish? I thought they were only supposed to sting."
He gave a kind of hysterical chuckle. "Not this one. This one fucking kills, sometimes. You were lucky, you barely stepped on it. And, on top of that," his voice rose, "you had a fucking strange allergic reaction."
"Ugh." I shook my head a little blearily. "Help me up, would you?"
"Your heart almost stopped," he said, a hitch in his voice, "there's no fucking way I'm going to let you walk anywhere."
"I don't need to go to the hospital, do I?" I asked warily.
"No," he sighed, finally seeming to relax, "usually, if you wake up after a sting, and don't start vomiting or anything, you're alright. I already cleaned off your foot with salt water. I'll need to put some more stuff on it later. You just need to keep your foot still for at least a couple hours."
"As long as you don't drag me to the hospital."
"I'll take you to where we play volleyball. You can just sit and rest for a while, okay? No moving." He looked at me sternly.
"All right," I acquiesced. That had scared me a little. Okay, more than a little. Who knew that something I'd just eaten for dinner could be so deadly?
Maybe, I thought, still kind of unfocused, it was their kind of twisted, soft-bodied revenge for consuming one of their brethren's tentacles.
When Ian got back to the others, still carrying me, he shouted at them about a jellyfish sting, and there was a whole flurry of movement.
A towel was laid out, rubbing alcohol and some kind of powder produced, and before I knew it, they had the alcohol poured over my foot, and I was staring up at the sky from the towel.
Then they rubbed that weird powder on my foot, and told me to, quoting their words, "stay the hell still."
I guess jellyfish stings weren't all that uncommon. Of course, there was the part about my heart nearly just went and quit on me…that had them a little nervous, I could tell.
I sighed. Maybe the guys were right. Maybe I should have some watchdog guarding me all the time. It seemed like I couldn't go for a damn walk without nearly killing myself. Heero was going to have a coronary when he heard of this. It wasn't like I could hide it with half the beach already talking about it.
An hour passed before they heard of the 'guy who nearly died from a jellyfish shock' and I was up and walking. Okay, so there was a tiny little hobble. Just a tiny one. But the stinging sensation was totally gone, and I wasn't going to laze about so people could stare at me, morbidly fascinated, and whisper gruesome little stories about how many people had died just strolling on the beach.
Well, actually, I think the other guys didn't actually know it was me, and were just coming to make sure I hadn't disappeared. They knew some poor dude had stupidly stepped on a wet jellyfish, but, well, it was a total shock when they learned that that poor dude went by the name of Duo Maxwell.
See, this is how it happened. They kind of amble over, carrying their surfboards, and then, they see me, limping, with at least four or five people anxiously running around me, asking me if I needed help or something.
Yep, that gets them on the alert.
And then they get some people circling them, apprehensively assuring them of my good health, and Heero's face starts darkening like a thundercloud.
I wasn't sure if I wanted to bang my head into a wall or go looking for that ostrich job.
So, I walk towards them with just the barest difficulty, and they all begin to brew up a storm like you've never seen.
"You were the one who got stung by a jellyfish?" Quatre asked fearfully.
"Yeah." I tried to grin, to put on my soothing act for them, but they were having none of it.
"You almost died?" Heero demanded.
"Uh…" Okay, this was a pretty sticky situation. How do you lie about things like this without lying?
"My foot is fine. It was just a small shock, that's all."
"Then…all that talk about the guy nearly dying…" Heero crinkled his brow.
"They're true. His heart damn near stopped."
Shit! That was not how I wanted to break it to them!
I glared at Ian, who had somehow come up without me noticing.
"Just a small shock?" Wufei asked, a little angrily.
"It was," Ian said, "it was the damn allergic reaction that nearly got him."
"Allergic reaction?" They looked at me.
I shrugged. Hell if I know what caused it.
"What the hell were you doing in the water?" Wufei glared at me.
"For your information," I bit out, "I was two inches in the water, the jellyfish was damn near impossible to see, and I barely touched it."
"And you almost died." Heero said flatly.
"Yes," Ian said a little callously, "if I hadn't seen him collapse, you would be walking back to news of Duo's death." More than a little callously. I got the feeling he was kind of angry at them for not keeping me safe.
It was…chilling to imagine what would have happened if that little situation had occurred.
"I suppose it would be too much to ask if you guys could kind of not fuss over me?" I looked at them despondently.
Trowa chuckled. "Duo, you just found the one mission Yuy here could never accomplish."
The rest of the day I just lounged right in the middle of the sand, away from any jellyfish, and always under their watchful eyes.
Quatre'd brought my buckets, and they even let me make trips to the damper part of the sand so I could make a wall that wouldn't just fall apart on me.
I was hit – more like pummeled – with the urge to sigh at least twenty times.
After a while, I got a truly evil idea. This would take some time and preparation. First, I built up a dam, three feet tall, twenty-four feet long. That took about two hours. Hey, I had the time. Why not do something with it? Then, I hunted up a nice long stick, and set up a poll. On the protected side of my dam, I scratched these words:
Who do you think is hottest, or, Which do you like best?
Please place your tally mark beside his title (only one per person is allowed and no erasing of other people's marks is permitted).
The guy with the gorgeous ass and ponytail:
The guy with the green swim trunks who moves like silk:
The cute blonde guy with a smile that could outshine the sun:
The guy with the spiky brown hair and body like a god:
DO NOT BREAK THE RESTRICTIONS SET
Please form a line here. -
I smirked demonically. The guys weren't going to be able to really read this until they got up close…I couldn't wait to see their faces.
I sat back and let the scene play out.
For the first few minutes, I only got a couple people scratching their answers with the stick I'd left, but soon enough, a huge crowd developed.
They actually conformed, for the most part, to the rules, though the line was pretty strange looking.
Slowly, the line grew shorter as every beachgoer went and nicked in their opinions.
Late afternoon, the line was finally gone.
So, I went on over there and laboriously counted each and every tally mark.
It was kind of interesting, seeing how people scraped their marks in: some were deep gouges, some were penciled in lightly, some were crooked, some were a bit wiggly, some were perfectly straight.
I wondered if there was a way to identify a person from their tally marks.
When I finished, the results were as follows: Wufei, with a whopping 724, Trowa, 646, Quatre, 645, Heero, 682.
I grinned. Damn, they were popular. That would be how many votes? Around 2700. Whoa.
Were there actually that many people on the beach? Apparently so. Well…it was a big beach.
Barely minutes after I'd laid back on my towel, the others finished their surfing, and came on over.
"Hey guys!" I waved at them energetically. "There's something you gotta see."
They followed me a little cautiously to the survey. There was a moment of completely and utterly shocked silence.
Wufei's eyes almost bulged out. "Seven hundred and twenty four! Who the hell set this up?"
"Me," I said cheerfully.
"You! Why?" He looked at me accusingly.
"Because I was bored," I said nonchalantly.
"Wha…why me?"
"I told you your butt could inspire armies," I said, grinning madly.
"Moves like silk?" Trowa asked me, lifting an eyebrow.
"You're graceful as a dancer," I told him promptly.
"My smile doesn't…" Quatre stammered, embarrassed.
"C'mon little brother," I rolled my eyes, "you could make us do any damn thing with that smile of yours. And you know it."
Heero simply shook his head.
I laughed. "You guys are hell of popular."
"The injustice!"
Whoops. Got Wufei started again.
I grinned at them. "You made me stay in the same place all day. Stands to reason I'd try to find something to do. Reap what you sow, they say."
Then I lunged at them all, and gave them huge hugs. "C'mon, let's go back!" I trilled, hyper as a kid on sugar high.
"Duo," Heero warned, "you're not supposed to walk on that foot…"
"I'm fine, dammit! And if you try to pick me up, I'll run."
He sighed.
I waltzed effervescently back to the hotel, singing like I hadn't sung since the war began. Joyfully, without a hint of darkness.
