Payment on the Past

By Shadowed Seas

Author's Note: Exams are the bane of college existence. I could get along quite well if exams didn't exist. How am I supposed to remember over a month's worth of learning and apply it correctly at 9 am? I can barely remember what day it is at 9 in the morning, never mind what formula should be used to find the correct voltage of a driven circuit. Argh. Sorry. Rant done. Anyway, that is my excuse for taking so long with this chapter, I hope the length makes up a bit for the lateness. And just wanted to say thanks to Thursday's Dove and Sutoomu for reviewing. I am glad you enjoyed it, and to Thursday's Dove, yes all will be explained as the story goes on, although it may take awhile, and the other pilots will start coming in over the next few chapters.

Summary and Warning on previous chapters.

Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing. I also apparently don't own a working iron anymore. Excuse me for a moment while I beat my roommate over the head with my once working iron in an effort to explain the concept of respecting other people's property.

Chapter 3: Keepers and Kittens

Shinigami just gazed at him with his freaky eyes, his expression unchanging. After an endless moment of silence the God tilted his head and spoke almost tonelessly.

"Well little one, I need either your death, or your life."

Duo stared. He closed his eyes and tried to wake himself up. Hoping to be back in his apartment he opened his eyes. Nope. Nothing had changed. He was still in the weird mist world with the God of Death, who was looking at him with something like detached curiosity, only a great deal creepier. No matter how much he wished for it, somehow he really didn't think that Shinigami was gonna shout 'Gotcha!' anytime soon, thus removing the option of this being a really complex joke. As he couldn't wake himself up, he was left contemplating a possibility he reallydidn't want to think about. Unfortunately, a distinct lack of other options or distractions pretty much forced him to go along with the Death God. And since the god didn't look like he was going to start explaining anytime soon, it was up to him to do something.

"Uh…what?"

Yeah that was him, Mr. Articulate. Next he would try to form a complete sentence. 'Or maybe you could mimic Heero.' Yeah right, he didn't think he had deteriorated to communicating through grunts just yet, although it had worked for Heero…and dammit, now is really not the time to start having conversations with himself. He could have a schizophrenic breakdown later, right now he had to deal with his presently screwed situation.

"To pay your debt, you need to give me either your death or your life."

"But what the hell does that mean!" Duo definitely wanted to just wake up now and have this all be a really weird dream. He was way too close to completely freaking out, he didn't have anywhere to run or hide, and since he was pretty sure he wouldn't be able to take on the God of Death in a fistfight, all he had left to resort to was anger. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately considering who he was facing, Shinigami smiled very slightly and moved forward, almost flowing towards him.

"Don't worry little one, you will wake up soon. After all, you are only taking a little nap after a boring day of classes and a bad night's sleep." Shinigami's slight smile changed into a smirk that spread across his face, making Duo tense in unease. "But that doesn't make this any less real, and it certaintly doesn't save you from needing to choose."

Duo's increasing panic must have been clearly visible on his face, since the God of Death tilted his head and moved his hand in something that could have been meant to be soothing. As it was the god himself that was causing Duo's fear, the gesture was essentially useless.

"It's alright little one, I won't make you decide now." Shinigami continued to slowly move forward, his movements suddenly changing from gliding to almost like he was stalking prey.

Duo slowly edged backwards until he came up against the wall of mist, forcing him to stop. The god was definitely getting way too close, and since when had mist been able to become solid? Before Duo could try to move away, Shinigami placed a hand on his head, almost as if he was a priest giving a blessing. The other hand came up to Duo's chest and rested right over his heart. There was a flash of heat and Duo stiffened as...something…pulsed through him. "In three days we shall speak again, and you shall give me your answer. Until then, a keeper will come to aid you."

Something made Duo glance up, and now he was trapped in the emptiness of those eyes. They seemed to expand in his vision until all he could see was that terrible emptiness. He wanted to look away, he wanted to run, he wanted to scream and collapse into a little ball on the ground, but he couldn't move. Then Shinigami's original voice was back, echoing around him.

"You have three days my little one, three days. Now…AWAKE!"

Duo bolted up from the couch, staring at nothing. His heart was pounding and his breath was coming as hard as if he had just run a marathon, but he felt like ice. Slowly coming to himself he looked around the room.

It was still light out, not much time had passed. A glance at the clock had him staring in disbelief at the fact that only about half an hour had gone by since he had gotten home. It had felt like he had spent a lot more time in his dream than that.

Ugh. He grimaced slightly at the thought of the dream. That had been entirely too creepy for him to deal with right now. Too creepy and too real. Maybe it was stress, though what he would be stressed about was beyond him. His classes were almost too easy. His training for becoming a Gundam pilot and working with the Sweepers had covered more science and engineering than was taught at most universities, never mind in any single course, allowing him to breeze through with A's.

Well, whatever had caused the dream could go and off itself, he was going to take a hot shower, eat food that was in no way good for him, and then watch some really bad movies without thinking about freaky dreams or payment of a deal made with the God of Death. Nope, not thinking about that at all. His mind was completely blanking out all freakiness.

Shit. He needed a drink.

Standing up from the couch Duo absently stretched and made a detour to the kitchen to grab a beer from the fridge before heading into the shower. He snapped opened the can and took a long swallow before setting down the drink on the bathroom counter and stripping off his shirt. He dropped the shirt on the floor behind him and as turned back around to reach for the beer, absently glancing up at the mirror above the counter before freezing with his hand outstretched towards the can.

He stared blankly at his reflection, barely noticing his hand hovering in midair. There, on his chest directly above his heart, was what appeared to be something very much like a tattoo. A ring of black symbols that looked like a mix of kanji and hieroglyphics, it was about the size of his palm and seemed like it had been done a while ago. The only problem with it was that Duo had never gotten a tattoo…ever.

He moved his hand to his chest, still staring at the mirror, and when the tattoo didn't disappear, he stared down, poking lightly at the black symbols. Black symbols that were directly on the spot where Shinigami had placed his hand in the dream.

"How the hell did I get a tattoo in a dream! It was a dream!"

'Well maybe it wasn't a dream.' It had to have been a dream, he had been asleep. 'Being asleep doesn't really prove that it was a dream. You just don't want it to be anything else.' Damn. He hated getting into debates with himself. Especially because he did it so often.

"Nope, not even gonna think about that possibility."

'You would rather be hallucinating a tattoo on your chest after a very strange "dream" involving the God of Death discussing you paying a debt with, and I quote, "Your death or your life"?'

"Yes. Yes I would. Cause then I'm just crazy, and I can deal with crazy. Hell, crazy is normal for me!"

'Especially during arguments with yourself, right?'

"Shove it."

Duo stumbled out of the bathroom, forgetting both the shower and the beer in favor of just collapsing back on the couch.

"It was just a dream, had to have been a dream. It couldn't be real cause…cause…uhm…just cause."

'Yeah. That was a brilliant argument right there. It couldn't be real "just cause". Wow. How can anyone possibly refute that.'

"I thought I told you to shove it."

"Do you always talk to yourself? Cause that's not exactly healthy you know."

"AAAAHHH!"

Duo jumped and tried to spin around as someone spoke directly behind him, his throwing knife from the wrist sheath already in hand. But unfortunately he had forgotten about the fact that his current position had very little room to maneuver, and ended up in a tangled heap between the couch and the coffee table. As he tried to figure out exactly how he had ended up on the floor, he found himself staring up at a grinning upside-down face.

"A little jumpy aren't you? That's okay, most people are after meeting Death." The directionally challenged face suddenly turned thoughtful. "Although some tend more towards the whole I-must-be-insane-so-you're-not-real thing, and you won't believe how annoying that is. I much prefer jumpy to someone thinking that I am a deranged figment of their imagination. Jumpy tends to be more amusing at the very least."

The face, now positively identified as a she due to general appearance and voice, tilted slightly in consideration of Duo's persisting sprawled state.

"Are you in shock or just stuck? I can't tell until you at least try to move a little."

This statement finally managed to work its way past the shock and into Duo's consciousness, and he went into a swift scramble to right himself, bringing him face to face with the girl. Well, it was actually closer to face to forehead, as he had finally found someone shorter than he was. She was a few inches over four and a half feet, slender without being too thin, with straight auburn hair that brushed her shoulders. Grayish-green eyes sparkled at him from a freckled face as the decently well endowed -not a girl with that figure, but not really a woman yet either- smiled at him. He ignored the friendly image in favor of interrogating this person who had invaded his home.

"Who the hell are you and how the fuck did you get in here!"

"Well, looks like it was just shock. I am Kiri and I will be your keeper for however long you are in service to Death. And I came in through the front door, you really shouldn't leave it unlocked like that, it's just asking to be robbed."

Duo responded absently to one part of her statement, calming quickly at her tone despite himself, before he managed to actually process the rest of it in his mind. "I usually don't, I must have forgotten because I was…wait a minute, did you say I was in service to Death! And what do you mean with the 'you are my keeper' thing!"

She frowned as she studied him for a moment before speaking. "Yes, you are in service to Death, or you will be as soon as you agree to the terms of payment, and by saying that I am your keeper I was stating that I am the keeper who is assigned to you as long as you are paying off your debt to Death. What are you so worked up about? I would have thought that this would have already been covered when you met with Shinigami."

"No way, no way in hell, that was a fucking dream and that's it! It wasn't real, it can't be real. It was just…a fucking…DREAM!" Duo was panting slightly when he finished, from emotion more than anything else.

The girl, 'Kiri' his mind supplied, was watching him closely as he tried to get himself back under control. "If it was just a dream, then did you have that tattoo before?" She said as she pointed at the black marks on his chest.

He blinked at her and then sheathed his knife as he sat down on the coffee table behind him, his mind not quite able to keep up with the amount of weird shit that had happened to him in a too short period of time.

Kiri sighed and moved around the couch to sit across from him as he propped his arms on his knees and buried his face in his hands.

"Alright, for now let's just act on the assumption that what you saw was real, that you actually talked to the God of Death, that I am your keeper, and that you have to pay off a debt that doesn't involve money in any form. Okay?" At the slight nod from his bowed head she continued. "I was told that you are in debt because Shinigami bound himself to you in order to aid you in revenge against those who killed the people you loved, right?" He glanced up from his hands and nodded again. "When you spoke to him, what did he say about payment?"

Duo thought back to the not-a-dream that he had been trying so hard to forget just minutes before and dropped his hands to his lap as he raised his head slightly to answer. "He kept saying 'it is time to complete the deal', and that he needed 'my death or my life.'"

"Yeah, I'd figured it was probably a 'death or life' payment situation considering his end of the bargain. He didn't explain it, right?" She spoke in a tone that was part resignation, part irritation and then looked at Duo expectantly when she finished. At Duo quick head shake she snorted slightly and stood up in order to start pacing, her expression one of pure irritation. "Of course not. Why would the God of Death bother to explain anything as trivial as a debt payment for a soul-sharing. I should have indebted myself to Inari, at least he has a somewhat decent sense of responsibility. I mean, I would have been bored out of my mind dealing with babies and rice, and I probably would have ended up in a fox form, that wouldn't have been the best, but I could deal. But noooooo, I had to go and get myself stuck serving Shinigami with his little games and…and…GAH!"

Duo jumped slightly, wide eyed as Kiri's rant degenerated into irate muttering. He could no longer make any proper sense of the words, and he was pretty sure that she wasn't speaking in any language he knew. From her tone he kinda thought that his ignorance was probably for the best, especially if he wanted to retain anywhere near his previous state of mental health. After several minutes of inaudible muttering the keeper abruptly stopped mid-stride as she suddenly realized that she had left her explanation halfway done and sighed before turning back to him.

"Anyway, the deal is simple. Shinigami heard your request and responded with his aid, the request was completed in full, so you now have to repay the debt through some service to Shinigami. As it is, his part of the deal was completed through a soul-share with you." Kiri sighed at Duo blank stare and slipped into a lecturing tone as she continued. "He took a small portion of his soul and bonded it to yours, allowing him to aid you when you called upon that part of your soul. The bonding can not be reversed or undone until you die and pass on to the secondary realm. Because of that the debt for soul-sharing is rather large. There are only two ways to pay back the debt."

Kiri turned to look at Duo. Her expression was serious, the irritation and sarcasm of earlier forgotten in the gravity of the situation.

"The first option is to choose to die now, sending your soul to the immortal plane and pay off your debt by serving him for as long as your natural life would have lasted had you not gained a portion of a god's soul. The other option is to stay alive and do trouble-shooting for him on the mortal plane, but due to the nature of the soul-sharing you will live for quite a bit longer."

Duo finally managed to find his voice, though the majority of his mind seemed to have gotten stuck back at the start of the conversation. "A bit longer…how much of a bit?"

Kiri sighed. "Since the bonding happened when you were still a child, at best guess you'll live for roughly 100 cycles of your natural lifespan, give or take a decade or two."

Duo choked and stared at her in shock. "W…wh…WHAT!"

Kiri winced a little at the volume of his shout before answering. "You will live for approximately 100 cycles of what your natural lifespan would have been. As long as you aren't killed of course."

"Of course…" He murmured, still in shock. 100 cycles, that meant if he would have lived to be 80 he would end up living until he was 8,000 years old. Eight. Thousand. Years. He had barely expected to live to be old enough to legally drink and now he was going to live longer than most nations lasted. He suddenly realized that Kiri had started talking again and tried to focus on what she was saying in order to avoid thinking about thousands of years of being alone.

"Gods don't often soul-share. It's not looked down on or anything, and practically every deity has done it at least once, but it is a very rare occurrence because it weakens the god. Not a lot of course, a mortal simply can't handle enough power to significantly lower a god's energies, but still, it is a piece of an immortal's soul that is elsewhere. Gods do it because it allows them to view the mortal world freely and in a first person viewpoint. There are all sorts of rules about gods staying away from the mortals because of all the shit that used to happen when immortals did live on the mortal plane. It just caused way too many problems. So in order to do anything within the mortal realm now, they have to send underlings, use portal mirrors to watch the world, or soul-share. Of course they still meddle hopelessly, but at least they aren't going and starting wars anymore just because they are bored." She gave him a look of what he supposed was meant to be shared exasperation over the whims of gods, but the fact that he apparently had a piece of a god in him had finally filtered into his brain and was currently taking up most of his attention. Her look of shared exasperation became one that was directed solely at him before she continued.

"No matter what your choice of payment, due to the fact that you are part of a soul-share, you will have a great deal of status in the other realms. You will also have a great deal of power, and your full markings will display that rather obviously."

"Full markings? What is that and why do I need one?" He had finally managed to work past the repeated shock and was a little nervous that the answer to his question might not be very conducive towards returning to stable mental ground, but he might as well get all the information he could.

She poked absently at the mark on his chest. "This right here is a basic marking that shows you are in service to Death and that he accepts you as his, well…vassal, for lack of a better term. A full marking is the same kind of thing, except it is usually bigger and has more components. It is made to reflect your status and power as a being associated with the secondary realm. Whatever version of payment you choose, he will end up giving you a full marking of some kind. Its design and function will depend on whether you choose to pay the debt in life or in death."

So he was going to get another tattoo, only bigger. Great. Maybe he should ask if they did piercings too.

Duo decided that he needed to talk about something that did not involve him getting marked as a servant to the God of Death, but what else could he talk about with someone sent to him by the God of Death? She might not even have been in this – what was she calling it – …realm, for the past few centuries. What could he bring up as something they could talk about if it wasn't his current dealings with Death? Well, if all else fails, try small talk. Since he didn't know if she could talk about anything recent, he decided to ask about her past.

"So…how do you become a keeper? Is it another way to do the whole payment thing or something?"

Kiri didn't look all that surprised that he had asked that. She had probably been expecting him to ask about something unrelated to their previous conversation, although this wasn't technically unrelated. "Not really. It's not payment, well…at least not in the way you mean. It's more like a recruitment kind of deal. At the moment of death some of us are given a choice. We can either die and have our souls travel on as normal, or we can serve a god as a keeper instead. There are benefits to becoming a keeper, and no penalties if you refuse, and after we fulfill the original agreement we can leave the post and do the whole after-death thing, so it's a pretty good deal all in all."

"Wait, if you only have the option at 'the moment of death', that means…you're dead?"

"Well…deadish, sure."

"Deadish? How the hell can you be deadish? You're either dead or you're not, there's no real in-between."

"Sure there's an in-between, I mean, if the God of Death says that you are not dead while at the same time you're not alive, you would have to be something in-between. So I'm deadish."

"So you're a zombie?" He eyed her a bit, she didn't look like a zombie, then again movies were his only reference so how the hell would he know what a zombie looked like.

She shook her head in exasperation. "No, I am not a zombie, a ghost, a walking corpse, or any other horror story creature you are thinking of bringing up. I am basically a spirit, a soul. This form is how I looked when I was alive, but it is not my actual body. I had to create this shape out of latent energies on this plane when I came here."

"Sooo…that's not an actual body."

"No, it's not. It has all the appearance and attributes of a real body, I can touch, and taste and everything, but it is only made up of energy. I don't have to eat or drink or even breathe if I don't want to."

Duo forced an exaggerated look of horror onto his face and went into an indignant rant out of a lack of other response options. "You don't eat! That's horrible! Food is one of the best parts of being alive!"

She laughed, a bright bubbly laugh that was very infectious, before she responded. "I don't have to eat, but that doesn't mean I don't eat when I can."

Her laugh had made him smile, and her statement, said with a mischievous grin, only made that smile wider. "Then why don't we order some pizza, 'cause while you might only eat to enjoy it, I need to eat something before my stomach starts gnawing on my spine in desperation. And besides, it's a well known fact you can't make decisions on an empty stomach."

He ordered a pizza with everything on it and then split it down the middle with Kiri while watching reruns on TV. Kiri had apparently been on the mortal plane on and off for the past few centuries, so she knew enough pop culture to be able to comment on the various aspects of the shows. Duo was somewhat more occupied with trying to come to terms with what he had been told over the past few hours, leaving his side of the conversation much quieter than usual.

They had decided to call it a night when Duo began yawning every five minutes, and Kiri had taken the couch to sleep on, mainly because she didn't have to sleep at all, so any lack of sleep due to being on the couch instead of a bed wouldn't bother her in the slightest.

Duo had changed into the clothes he normally slept in and quickly brushed his teeth before collapsing on his bed, putting off his shower until tomorrow.

With nothing left to distract him, his thoughts turned to the choice he needed to make.

So he could die now and leave everyone behind, or he could live and watch everyone he knew die around him…again. God dammit. He just wasn't allowed to be normal, was he? He sighed, throwing his arm over his eyes.

"Well, looks like it's a no-brainer. Huzzah."

Before he drifted off into sleep he wondered what it felt like to live in terms of centuries instead of decades.

The night was warm without being humid, and the trees blocked out most of the city's lighting, so they could see the stars from their bench on the edge of the lake. Fireflies flickered in the air, and traffic noise was muted background static, barely noticed by either of the teenagers.

It was only their third formal date, although they had been going out for a few weeks now. He had come to her house, and her father had lectured him about treating his daughter right and coming back by curfew, while she applied a little too much eye makeup and ignored her mom's fussing. They had walked to the small pizzeria and had alternated between staring at each other and carefully looking elsewhere as they ate. He had lost track of time and they needed to hurry in order to catch the movie, but they managed to get there in time to sit down halfway through the previews.

The movie was a pointless pop-culture drama and neither of them could remember much of it. She had been concentrating on his arm around her shoulders and whether she had accidentally smudged her makeup or not, while he was completely distracted by the warmth of her body against his side and the sweet smell of her hair. It had still been early when the movie ended, so they both decided to go for a walk and ended up in the small park a short distance from her home.

They had been sitting there talking quietly and staring at the stars and each other for almost an hour, but neither of them was quite ready to go home yet.

It was when they were both just staring up at the sky that she decided to lay her head on his shoulder, and when he turned his head, they both stopped breathing as they stared at each other from only inches away. They edged forward into a kiss, and even though it was a little awkward with her nose at the wrong angle and his lips a bit too dry, to them it was perfect.

And as an unseen blade moved forward from the shadows into his heart, killing him instantly, his last thoughts were on how perfect this night had been. The girl screamed as her date stiffened in sudden shock and slid off the bench, his eyes already blank in death, blood spilling from the deep wound in his back. She screamed again as the shadowed figure standing behind the bench flicked his blade, blood scattering in drops from the edge. He moved his arm in a sweeping arc, the blade barely visible in the shadows, and the screams abruptly cut off in a startled cry as the girl fell to the ground besides the boy, blood draining from the slash across her neck.

Duo woke up staring at the ceiling, his eyes wide and unseeing, his face pale.

Just a dream, it had been just a dream. Just his subconscious taking creative liberties with his mind. It didn't mean anything, it was just a dream.

He kept that thought running through his head until his breathing slowed and his heart went back to beating at a normal pace. He closed his eyes and rolled onto his side, determined to ignore the dream the same way he had ignored his nightmares when he was younger. Despite his resolve, it was still over two hours before he managed to go back to sleep.

The next morningsaw the sun rising on what was guaranteed to be a gorgeous day. The air was crisp without being cold, the sky wasclear, and the breeze waslight. The birds were greeting the day in song, and their piping mixed with the quiet of the early morning was peaceful and calming to any who took a moment to listen. Unfortunately the two who were currently within Duo's apartment were disinclined to listen.

Duo stood outside the bathroom door in a pair of sleeping pants and a t-shirt, scowling as he hammered his fist against the door.

"Hey! What the hell are you doing in there?"

"What do you think? I'm taking a shower. Now leave me alone."

"A shower? You're a freakin' spirit-person! You don't even have a real body! Why the hell are you taking a shower?"

A yelled mishmash of profanity from several languages was his only answer, and with a lack of options, Duo stalked off to the kitchen, growling under his breath.

He slammed around the kitchen making his coffee, venting his early morning frustration on the cabinets. After almost a half an hour of growling and a cup and a half of coffee, he was finally feeling closer to normal, and was actually able to smile when Kiri walked into the kitchen with her damp hair sticking to her back and making the back of her shirt damp. She gave him a rueful smile and moved over to the counter to make herself a cup of coffee.

Pulling out a chair, she sat down at the table while she finished stirring in the sugar and then blew gently over the top of the liquid before taking a sip. A contented sigh followed. "I am still very much dependent on my old routine in the morning, even if I don't really need to do it. An early shower is still the only way I can make it through the day feeling normal." She gave him another smile, this one more apologetic. "So, sorry for taking your bathroom, and…ah…sorry about the swearing too."

He shook his head. "Don't worry about it, I feel the same way about mornings except I am more dependent on the coffee than the shower." He gave her a shit eating grin and then gulped down the remainder of his coffee before standing up. "I'm gonna take a shower, make yourself comfortable." Duo dropped his mug into the sink as he walked past it and then grabbed the end of his braid, unraveling it as he moved through the living room and into the bathroom. He planned on taking a long, hot, relaxing shower and giving his hair a full wash. To his mind, he more than deserved it. As he walked away he didn't glance back and so completely missed the speculative look on Kiri's face as she watched him head towards the bathroom.

"Shit! What the hell is that thing!"

Kiri sighed as Duo yelled…again. She liked the kid a lot, and he had handled the shock pretty well and had more than a fair share of power, but he was really uptight for someone who had played host to part of the God of Death's psyche. She ignored the memory of her own little shouting outburst that morning and put the book she had been flipping through back on the table. Glancing up as Duo did a stumbling charge into the room, she had to cover her mouth with her hands in order to keep herself from bursting out in laughter. Duo had his arms wrapped around his head, trying to protect his ears and face from the obviously otherworldly creature flitting around him. She supposed that Duo probably found the whole experience rather less humorous than she did, but the sight of him trying to run away from a little, black, flying kitten was just too much. Duo glared at her muffled giggles and flinched as the tiny cat tried to nuzzle at his ear.

"What is it? How did it get in here? What does it want? And stop laughing dammit!"

Kiri managed to strangle back her giggles, although her response still held a rather amused tone. "It appears to be a flying cat, it most likely materialized from another plane, as to my knowledge flying cats are not normal here, and it seems to want you to pet it."

Duo winced as the ebony colored kitten pounced onto the top of his head, digging tiny claws into his scalp and pulling his hair. He quickly grabbed the creature before it could fly away again, and held it securely in both hands. The cat purred and rubbed its tiny nose against his fingers, its dark wings shifting against his palms as it moved.

"Why would it come here? I've never seen anything like it before." Duo marveled a bit at the soft fur and the tiny feathers, and then growled as the cat sank its very tiny, very sharp teeth into the side of his hand.

"You probably haven't seen any creatures from other realms before this because you didn't have Shinigami's sign on you. Now that a god has marked you, they are a little less worried about you eating them or something and will most likely start coming around you more often."

"Eating them? Why the hell would they think I would eat them?"

"How should I know? Outer plane creatures are just always really uneasy about anyone who doesn't have a god's markings. I think it's mainly because they don't want to risk dealing with anyone who doesn't have a god making them take responsibility for their actions." Kiri bent down and peered at the kitten's golden eyes.

"Well that's nice, now what do I do with it?"

"You loosen your grip before you strangle the poor thing, pet it, and then go find out if it likes tuna or not."

A ringing from the next room drew Duo attention from the conversation and interrupted his sarcastic response to Kiri's statement. He relaxed his hold on the wiggling feline just enough that it managed to squirm out of his grip. Falling from his hands, it only barely managed to keep itself from hitting the floor, and then resumed flying circles around the room.

Determined to ignore the antics of his newest intruder, Duo stomped into his tiny office, muttering under his breath about unnatural creatures. He went over to his cluttered desk and checked the vid screen, sighing at the familiar number blinking on the display. He briefly paused to calm himself down, glanced back to make sure that all the other occupants of his apartment had stayed in the living room, and then opened up the vid feed. Bright blue eyes and blonde hair popped up on the screen and Quatre gave a brilliant smile in greeting.

/Duo!/

Duo's smile grew broader and more relaxed at the excitement and happiness in the other ex-pilot's voice. He couldn't help but be caught up in Quatre's personality. "Hey Quat. What's up?"

/I just wanted to call and see what you were doing for your winter break. I had Trowa help me persuade the circus to come to L4 for a few weeks, so Trowa and Catherine are already going to be here, and Wufei is taking two weeks leave at the end of the year to visit as well. Sally said she would drop by some time if her schedule allowed it, and even Howard said he might come. We haven't gotten together in so long and I know all the others want to see you as much as I do…/

Duo laughed at the constant stream of words that Quatre had managed to produce. "Breathe, Kat, breathe. Save the convincing for someone who needs it. I don't have anything in the way of plans for break, and I wouldn't miss a reunion even if I did. Don't worry, I'll be there."

Quatre almost beamed happiness through the screen. /That's great Duo! We can all…all, uh…Duo?/

"Yeah Kat, what is it?" Duo was a little worried, Quatre looked surprised and a little stunned, almost as if he didn't believe what he was seeing. "Is something wrong?"

/Duo…is that a…kitten…above your head?/ Quatre spoke in almost a whisper, as if he were afraid of being overheard.

"What?" Duo looked up instinctively, already fearing that he knew what he was going to see. And sure enough, he was looking straight up at black fur and golden eyes held aloft by black wings. Only one thought came to mind as he glanced back at Quatre's shocked face.

'Oh shit.'

TBC...

Okay. First of all, I'm sorry about the whole second chapter update thing. I had done a little editing, mostly grammar, and was going to repost that chapter when I added this one, but my internet connection cut out when I tried to add this chapter too. I'm really sorry about that to anyone who got confused or annoyed by it. Anyway, I seem to have a weird fondness for cliff-hanger chapters with one line endings, though this one was more or less because I wasn't quite certain how I was going to play out the rest of the last scene. Oh well, I'll figure out something. 'Til next chapter, Sayonara.