Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing, it belongs to Bandai, Sotsu and associated parties. I just borrow the guys from time to time and return them a whole lot happier. I do own the plot and any other characters, especially the equines, that you will find in this fic. Please do not take them without permission. Written for pleasure not profit.
Pairing: 2x1x2, 3x4, 13x6, H+C
Warnings: Yaoi, lemon, sap, angst, vet themes, AU
Rating: NC 17
Archive: gundam-wing-diaries. foreverfandom .net & gundam-wing-diaries. 150m. com Anyone else please ask.
Betaed by Karina *snugs*
Summary: Set 2 years after Equus and Heero is doing so well in his own business that he's taken June on as a working pupil. The qualifying shows for the International teams are well underway and it looks like it will be a good year for Heero, his pupils and horses... until Mother Nature steps in.
AN: This fic, although a complete work of fiction is based partially on fact. I will add notes at the end of chapters where necessary to clarify events and provide links where needed.
Dedication: To Leslie and Karina. Leslie for giving me the original idea for Equinity and encouraging and supporting me through the writing of all the fics thus far in the arc. And Karina for not just taking over as my much needed beta, (poor woman needs a medal!), but for also poking and prodding Fred until he went on strike, refusing to work on anything at all until I let him start this. Needless to say, we managed to come to a compromise... Fred gets to write a chapter of this one week... the next week he has to write a chapter of 'Bound'... Did I ever tell you all I hate my muse? :-)
Fic 5 in the Equine Intervention Arc.
Commenced December 2013 – ShenLong
"Rival Riders"
Chapter 12
The goose-neck rumbled along, steadily eating up the miles as the day progressed. Since leaving the practice and stables, Heero had stopped twice on their journey thus far. The first had been mid morning to check on the horses, take them all off the goose-neck and give them a bit of a walk around to stretch their legs. They had left them all tied to the outside with a haynet each and bucket of water whilst the human element had partaken of some morning tea.
Having the living compartment in the goose-neck was certainly a bonus and Duo silently thanked his husband for buying the vehicle. It definitely made life on the road to shows much easier.
Having boiled the small kettle on the gas stove, Duo poured the water into their mugs and stirred the instant coffee around. Opening the tin of biscuits, he set them on the small table and reached for the milk just as Heero stepped inside.
"Horses all okay?" Duo asked, placing a mug in front of his partner who had sat on one side of the small table.
"All fine and not showing any ill effects from their trip so far," Heero reported and took a sip from his coffee. "Thanks."
"Welcome," Duo replied and sat opposite.
"You know, I'm so glad you talked me into installing a large water tank, it certainly helps a lot on trips like these." Heero took a biscuit.
After they had attended a two day show several months ago, Duo had suggested they install a large water tank into Drumstick. The goose-neck already had a small water tank for the kitchen to utilize, but as Duo had pointed out, having a large one installed separate to the kitchen one would mean they could have water available at all times for the horses when traveling.
Heero had agreed with the logic and looked further into it. The result had been taking the goose-neck into Salsbury and leaving it at a garage for a few days. The business proprietor had discussed in detail exactly what Heero had wanted and made a few suggestions of his own. In the end a large tank had been built and welded onto the outside of the feed compartment of the goose-neck. It was tall, shaped like an 'L' with part of it traveling the width of the roof in order to save space. A small tap had been fitted to the bottom, an inlet further up towards the edge of the roof and with gravity doing the 'feed' work, the water tank had been an instant hit.
Now Heero was glad he'd listened to Duo's suggestion. It certainly beat the hell out of carrying sealed water containers with them that were not only heavy and awkward to handle, but bulky too and took up a lot of space they didn't have to spare.
"How are we doing time wise?" Duo asked, nibbling on his own biscuit.
"Really good," Heero replied. "We're actually a little ahead of schedule, but that's a good thing, it means we will have more daylight to sort out the horses when we arrive in Corowa and find the showgrounds."
Once they had finished their break the horses were reloaded and the journey continued. Lunch consisted of a similar break to their earlier stop, Heero finding a large parking area off the side of the road where the horses could be unloaded and spend some time on solid ground relaxing, without having to worry about traffic or other things that might provide a problem.
Duo dozed on the afternoon leg of their trip, head resting against the side of the door, music playing softly in the background. Heero had brought along the trusty GPS and programmed their first stop into the contraption. Said contraption was now alerting him that he wasn't too far away from his destination.
Reaching across, Heero gently shook his partner's shoulder. "Duo? Duo, wake up," he called softly.
With a soft grunt, Duo began to blink open his eyes. Moments later he was stretching and yawning. "What's up?"
"We're coming into the outskirts of Corowa," Heero explained. "If this thing is correct, we should arrive at the showgrounds in another ten minutes or so."
"Ah. Not bad timing either," Duo said with a look at his watch. They had aimed to arrive at their first stop over around six in the evening, right now it was five-twenty.
Following the instructions from the GPS, Heero navigated the streets of the town and soon came upon the showgrounds themselves.
"You have arrived," the GPS said helpfully.
"Thank you, Gerald," Duo replied.
Gerald? Heero raised an eyebrow. "You called the GPS, Gerald?" he questioned.
"Yeah. Got a problem with that?"
"No, not at all," Heero sighed. It could have been worse, he thought. Knowing how Duo had been led astray by the GPS on a couple of occasions due to him not having upgraded the maps, he guessed that naming it Gerald was better than naming it 'Useless Prick' – which he had overheard Duo call the thing a number of times.
"That looks like the entrance up ahead," Duo pointed out, distracting Heero from his thoughts about the GPS.
Slowing down and indicating, Heero turned the goose-neck off the road and through the gates that had been left open for him. Spotting the row of stables off to one side, he crawled along and brought the goose-neck to a stop just beside them and cut the engine.
"Guess we should check them out first and then get the horses unloaded and fed," he said to his partner as he undid his seat belt.
"Right with you Heero."
# # #
"Something smells good," Heero said as he entered the goose-neck.
"Nothing fancy, just some spaghetti on toast," Duo replied with a grin. "The horses all settled okay now?"
"Hai, they're all fine and eating their heads off. I'll check them all again later and top up their haynets before we go to bed. I'll also get you to check them all over in the morning before we reload if you don't mind?"
"I'd be happy to, Heero." Duo turned back to stirring the pot with the spaghetti in it.
With Duo finishing off their evening meal, Heero poured them both a drink and fetched the cutlery and condiments.
As they ate, they discussed the plan for the following day. Heero hoped to get away from Corowa by eight in the morning, that would give them plenty of time to drive to Seymore and find Duo's colleague, Simon, who had kindly agreed to allow them the use of his facilities for their second night.
"Did you call June or Quatre?" Duo asked, mopping up the last of the sauce from the spaghetti with a piece of toast.
"I did," Heero replied around a mouthful of toast. "Everything is fine with the horses."
"Good. I called Catherine too and let her know we'd made it this far without any problems. She said everything was running fine with the practice too and there's no need for either of us to worry about anything."
Heero placed his cutlery on his plate, sat back and rubbed his full stomach. "Thanks, Duo, that was very filling."
"You're welcome," Duo replied with a smile. "I'll get the dishes done and give you a hand with the horses if you like?"
"The horses can wait for a while, Duo. I'll help you with the dishes and then we can both relax for a bit. Oh, the secretary did say there was a small ablutions block just across from the stables. I think she said it had a shower in it too. What about we check it out after we've done the dishes?"
"Now that sounds like a great idea. I wouldn't mind a shower, wash off all the day's grime." That was the only drawback with the goose-neck; it didn't have a shower or toilet facilities. "I'll pop the kettle on to boil so we've got some hot water for the dishes and we can have a cuppa too."
Standing up, Heero managed to wrap his arms around his lover's waist and pressed a few kisses to that sweet neck. "I love you, Duo."
Leaning into the embrace, Duo closed his eyes and sighed softly. "Love you too, Heero."
After a few minutes of holding and being held, the pair separated and cleaned up the kitchen area from their meal. Once done, Duo grabbed a couple of towels and their toiletries whilst Heero carried a change of clothes for them both and the pair set off to locate the ablutions block.
Half an hour later they were walking back towards the stables, the block having had a small shower stall in it which both men made good use of. Heero put their dirty clothes in a bag in a cupboard whilst Duo hung their towels up to dry a bit and packed their toiletries away once more. With the goose-neck tidy, they went back out to the stables to check on the horses and top up their haynets.
Shinigami was relaxed and calm, dozing slightly in the corner of his stable. He was more than used to these sorts of trips by now and took them in his stride. Nataku was a little flighty and unsettled, but nothing that would cause concern. Orion had settled well, the black still finishing off his feed. Of them all, Jester was the only one that was still a bit on the excited side. He was still pacing around his stable from time to time, sniffing the scents of other horses that had obviously been stabled there before. He'd eaten about half of his dinner and drunk almost all his water so Heero wasn't too worried about him. He would settle soon enough – once he'd worn himself out.
With the haynets all topped up along with the water buckets, Heero gave each horse a few carrots and double checked each door was securely bolted shut. He slipped the clip of the lead rope through each bolt as an extra precaution and with one last glance over his charges, he followed Duo back to Drumstick.
It was starting to get late and the pair enjoyed a hot chocolate and a couple of games of cards before the stress of the day began to catch up with Heero. Stifling a yawn, he agreed with his partner to call it a night and get some rest themselves.
# # #
It was seven-forty five when Heero pulled out of the Corowa showgrounds and began to navigate his way towards Seymore – their planned stop for their second night. The horses had all cleaned their feed bins from their breakfasts and were showing no ill effects of their trip so far. Duo had checked each horse from ears to hooves and reported each one was fit and well.
Heero had cleaned all the stables, placing the manure in a bin designated for that use. While the horses finished their breakfasts, Heero had cleaned the stables and gone to have his own breakfast with Duo. With both equine and human bellies full, Heero had raked over each stable, emptied water buckets and put full haynets into the goose-neck while Duo checked each horse. Floating boots were put on and the horses loaded up for the second leg of their journey.
The time passed fairly quickly, stops being made for morning tea and lunch like they had the previous day. The horses had once again been off loaded and allowed to stretch their legs. Duo drove after lunch to give Heero a much needed break and after a few hesitant kilometers, he'd settled into the driving with ease.
The goose-neck was easy to drive, similar to towing the float, but with everything in the one unit. Just as long as he remembered to slow right down for cornering, accelerate and decelerate steadily, there was nothing to it.
Heero dozed for a while, Duo turned the radio over to a channel that was playing easy listening music and concentrated on his driving. He was glad they had planned the trip so they would be driving in the daylight hours and especially not during dusk or dawn. The main problem they would have during their trip would be kangaroos on the road. Given the day temperatures were usually quite warm, kangaroos and other wildlife tended to seek out shade during the day and move around as little as possible, thereby keeping themselves cool.
'Roos were most active at dawn and dusk, the temperatures suiting them far better for feeding, plus there were fewer predators around then. Most accidents with 'Roos occurred during these times. The goose-neck did have a 'roo-bar fitted which would save some serious damage in the event of a collision with one, but even with a 'roo-bar, serious accidents had and still did occur.
The problem was, one never knew which way a kangaroo was going to hop. Many a driver had been injured, kangaroo killed and car a write off from an unfortunate collision. The natural reaction when meeting a 'Roo in the middle of the road was to swerve to avoid it – usually the 'Roo would hop in the direction of the swerve so evasive action became null and void.
Aside from the kangaroo problem, a driver could also encounter wombats and sometimes the odd emu – although emus very rarely strayed near roads. Sometimes one would come across a sheep or two or maybe the odd cow that had managed to escape a field, but these were few and far between. Duo was thankful they weren't driving more in the center of Australia or the top end as feral camels were known to wander the roads there!
Having dozed for a couple of hours, Heero stretched and yawned, turning to look at his partner who gave him a smile in return.
"Feel better?" Duo asked.
"Yeah, thanks. How much further?"
We should be about an hour and a half to two hours away," Duo replied.
"I'll be glad to get the horses off and give them a good rest. You sure your friend doesn't mind having the horses to stay?"
"Nah, Simon was quite pleased to hear from me. We haven't seen each other in ages." Duo gave a small grin. "We used to hang out together at vet college, go out on double dates, things like that."
"Does he know you're gay?" Heero had to ask, he didn't want to put his foot in it or say the wrong thing so he figured it would be best to ask now and see what was permissible.
"No, he doesn't know I'm gay."
"Do you plan on telling him or shall we play it safe?" Heero wasn't bothered either way, he was simply grateful to have somewhere to put the horses overnight and if Duo's friend was a homophobe or something like it, then Heero wasn't about to upset the apple cart and cause his husband any distress.
"I think we should play it safe and keep our relationship to ourselves. I honestly don't think he would be bothered by it, but I'm not about to take that risk. Do you mind?"
"No, I don't mind. I don't want to cause any upsets so I'm happy to stick with being best friends, business partners or whatever you're comfortable with."
"Thanks, Heero. I'll see how it goes and if I think it will be okay to tell him I'll let him know, okay?"
"I'll follow your lead then." Heero reached across and gave Duo's thigh a squeeze. "All that matters to me is that it's me you come home to every day, my bed that you share every night."
"I wouldn't want it any other way. I love you, Heero."
"Ditto, Duo. Ditto."
#
"Should be just up here," Duo said and slowed down as his eyes scanned the road ahead.
"Is that it?" Heero asked and pointed to a sign coming up on their right.
"Looks like it could be." The sign came into view; 'Seymore Veterinary Clinic' was written in bold, black letters. Duo indicated and turned into the drive, following it along a short way until he came to a car parking area where the clinic building sat. Bringing the goose-neck to a stop, Duo put it into neutral and looked across to Heero. "I'm not sure exactly where I should park or go. If you're okay to wait here for a moment I'll go see if the surgery is open and find Simon."
"No problem."
Duo exited the goose-neck and strolled across to the clinic door and knocked, Heero watched from his seat inside Drumstick. Moments later Duo was walking back towards him, a tall, slender man beside him. Heero opened his door and stepped out.
"Heero, I'd like you to meet Doctor Simon Carvell, a colleague and old friend of mine. Simon, this is my very good friend and business partner, Heero Yuy."
"A pleasure to meet you, Doctor Carvell and thank you so much for allowing me to put the horses on your property overnight." Heero shook the other vet's hand and smiled.
"A pleasure to meet you too, Mr. Yuy. Call me Simon, no need for formalities, we're all friends here. And it's no trouble to have your horses here overnight, it's a pleasure."
"Thank you. You must call me Heero."
"Heero it is then." Simon gave the pair a warm smile. "No doubt you will want to get those horses off and into a paddock as soon as possible?"
"If you don't mind, that would be appreciated. They've been traveling all day and are bound to be a bit stiff," Heero replied.
"Duo, if you drive around the back of the practice you'll see a stable block. There's a small drive to the side, if you go down that it will take you around the back of the stables where you can park up. There's a few walk in – walk out stables and yards there I thought might be better for you to utilize than either a stable or paddock by itself. The house is just off to the side as well so if you need power at all for that contraption you can hook an extension lead to the house."
"Thanks, Simon, that sounds perfect."
"Yes, thank you. Yards with a stable attached would be ideal, your offer is very much appreciated," Heero said quietly, touched that this man whom he didn't know from a bar of soap would be so thoughtful.
"Right then, I'll head on down and meet you there." With a nod, Simon left the pair to drive the goose-neck down to the stable area.
#
The horses had all been unloaded and each placed in a stable and yard. Water buckets waited in each stable, already filled so all Heero had to do was place the feeds in the bins, remove the floating boots, change the four rugs and check each animal over. Duo gave him a hand and even Simon offered to help. With the three of them doing the work it didn't take long at all to have each horse settled.
"I have to say, they are all fine looking animals, Heero. You certainly know how to look after them," Simon commented as Heero stepped out of Shini's yard and bolted the gate behind him.
"Thank you, but only one of these four is actually mine. The black, Orion, belongs to my working pupil, the bay mare, Nataku and the bay stallion, Jester, both belong to clients. Mine is the gray stallion, Shinigami."
"I've heard that name somewhere before," Simon replied, his brow furrowing as he tried to recall where he'd heard Shini's name from.
Duo grinned at his friend. "I'm pretty sure you would have, Shini's very well known now."
"I wouldn't go that far," Heero began to protest.
"Now I remember. Wasn't he the horse that was in our Olympic team in London?" Simon asked, looking from one man to the other.
"Yup, he sure was. He took two gold medals too," Duo replied proudly. Heero simply blushed.
"I thought it sounded familiar, and your name too, Heero. Well shit! The missus is going to have a fit when she knows who is staying with us. We've never had a celebrity around here before." Simon smiled widely.
"I'm no celebrity," Heero muttered, his cheeks still red.
Duo opted to snicker at his partner's discomfort. "He hates the limelight," he said to Simon.
"From what I recall, you did pretty well for yourself too, Duo." Simon stated with a sly grin.
"Huh?"
"Last I heard you were the team vet for the games, weren't you?"
"Ah, yeah." It was Duo's turn to go red.
Simon laughed and clapped Duo on the back. "Good for you. You always did say you would make something of yourself out there in the sticks, although none of us believed you at the time. Guess we should bow down to you now?"
"Cut it out, Simon," Duo muttered and shook his head.
"If we're finished out here I suggest you come on inside and meet my wife and the vet student I currently have here. Jill's gonna have a fit when she knows we have 'The Heero Yuy' and his famous horse staying with us."
Duo rolled his eyes and gave a grin. Heero wondered if he would ever get rid of the blush.
#
Having met Jill, Simon's wife and Darryl the current vet student, the two guests took their places at the table ready for dinner. Jill had made a beef pie with mashed potatoes and vegetables and it smelled delicious. During the course of dinner, Simon filled his wife and student in on Heero's achievements in the showjumping world, much to Heero's embarrassment.
After suffering through the many questions and managing to overcome his discomfort with the entire 'celebrity' thing, Heero began to relax. Simon and Jill were a lovely couple, down to earth and generous. Darryl seemed a little on the quiet side and whether that was due to Heero's so called 'celebrity' status or the fact that he was a naturally shy person, Heero didn't know.
Over dessert the topic changed to Duo and Simon's college days, and included a few interesting stories about what the pair had gotten up to as students themselves. Simon had them all in stitches with his recollection of the first time they had all had to pregnancy test a cow.
"Duo managed just fine, slipped his hand in and located the fetus easily; but then he always did have long arms," Simon recalled.
"You didn't have any problems either," Duo retaliated with a grin, "But Bernard..." Duo dissolved into fits of laughter as his memories came back.
Knowing where Duo was going with this, Simon also let fly with a loud laugh, much to the amusement of the rest of the group who weren't privy to the cause of the mirth at that point.
"Think you can share the joke with the rest of us?" Jill prompted with a wink at Heero who was also looking a little amused and lost at the same time. "Just who the heck is Bernard?"
Duo managed to rein in his laughter and looked at Simon.
"You tell them," the other vet said in answer to the unspoken question.
"Okay. Bernard, or to give him his full title; Bernard Smithington-Cartwright the Third, was pretty much the teacher's pet and college snob. His father and grandfather were both vets and so he was following the tradition, but boy was he stuck up. He used to look down on the rest of us mere mortals as if we were something that had crawled out from under a rock. "
"Especially you, Duo," Simon interrupted. "For some reason he took an instant dislike to Duo, called him the class clown and other unmentionable names. Might have had something to do with the hair, or the fact that Duo would fool around sometimes in class, but it never affected his grades in the exams. I think that really pissed him off."
"Yeah, he didn't like it one bit if anyone got a higher score than him," Duo replied, "but back to the story. I'd done my examination and it all went really well, some of the others also had no problems but a couple did find it a little harder to detect a pregnancy or not. Then it came to Bernard's turn."
"I hope these tests weren't all on the same cow," Jill said before Duo could get any further. "Could be a bit much for one cow to have around twenty students preg testing her." The woman shuddered.
"Nah, we each had our own cow to test. We'd gone out to a farm and the farmer had brought all the cows in for us to test. One cow at a time was brought from the yard and into the crush, one student would step forth and do the test on that cow. We had to tell the instructor what we'd found, a positive or negative and then the instructor would do the same test and let us know if we were right or wrong," Simon answered.
"Thank goodness for that," Heero muttered.
"Getting back to the cows," Duo started again. "It came to Bernard's turn and as Simon and I had already done our practical we were responsible for sending a cow through the chute and into the crush. We picked out a nice looking cow and got it into the crush for him. While Bernard was getting himself ready, Simon passed me a needle and syringe which I injected the cow with; all on the sly of course," Duo stated. "Well, it took a few minutes for Bernard to get set and then he started to do the deed, slowly inserting his arm into the cow."
"By the way, just in case you don't know, when doing a pregnancy test on a cow or horse, you need to insert your arm through the rectum of the animal, follow it along until you can feel the uterus of the animal," Simon clarified.
"Thanks for that useful information," Jill said and put her spoon down. "Not really dinner table conversation." Simon shrugged.
Duo picked the story back up. "Here's Bernard, just about up to his armpits inside the cow when the injection I'd given her started to work." Everyone looked at Duo expectantly. "It was a shot to make her empty her bowels," he clarified and started to snicker.
"Next thing, this cow starts to grunt and strain, trying to pass manure, only Bernard has his arm up her backside and there's no where for it to go," Simon said and joined Duo in the snickering department.
"Bernard didn't know what was going on, he hadn't a clue and continued on doing his examination, next thing, he starts to remove his arm. Well, the manure had been building up, the cow started to strain and next thing, Bernard's arm came shooting back out of the cow along with a healthy dose of cow dung. But that's not the worst of it. Before he had a chance to say or do anything, the cow cocked her tail and shot another load out. This time it was really runny and her aim was true. The jet stream hit Bernard square in the chest and splattered everywhere!" Duo collapsed into a laughing fit.
"Oh man, it was the best pay back anyone could have hoped for," Simon managed to get out around his laughter.
Meanwhile the rest of the group had all started to laugh with the two vets. "Did you get into trouble?" Heero asked.
"Nah," Duo shook his head. "They couldn't pin anything on us as cows do have a habit of cocking their tails at any given moment."
"If I recall correctly, the instructor did ask us later if we'd had anything to do with it; of course we denied any knowledge," Simon supplied.
"Bernard wasn't quite so stuck up after that," Duo finished.
"I can't imagine why," Jill said dryly. "Would anyone care for seconds?"
After that little tale Jill wasn't surprised at all when no one did.
tbc...