Chapter 87: Redundancies

"Maxwell?"

Duo perked up and looked to the nurse. He recognized her from before, which was good because he had no idea where Heero was at the moment, and he wanted to find him before anyone else.

"Carla, right?"

She nodded.

"He'll be out a lil while. Hadta sedate 'em again. Went nuts an' tried to leave durin a scan. Givem 'nother half."

He nodded and conjured a small smile for her before asking "They give 'em a room?"

For all her abrasiveness before, she looked at him sweetly now. He wondered if Elise had words with her. There was a change in the atmosphere over the last couple hours and on L2 that meant something happened. His reputation changed, or something changed.

"403."

"Thanks."

He got in a few steps before he heard her voice once more.

"Y'all get them bastards?"

Duo stopped cold. He didn't turn.

"What?"

"Them bastards. The ones who hurt them kids. Attacked our own. You get 'em?"

He slowly turned to face her. She looked fiery, threatening and stern, but non-threatening to him. She looked angry in that way people get when their community is attacked.

"Yes'm, we got them bastards. Home grown, I'm 'fraid."

Rage filled her eyes.

"Heard you're home grown, too."

"Yes'm."

"Good."

He eyed her funny, but she didn't let him remain confused for long.

"Bout time Preventers gotta home grown leader. You know we ain't trash. You protectus no different from rich scum."

Emotion Duo couldn't place swirled inside him, and he felt his face grow a bit hot.

"Folks 'ere are good people with bad breaks."

The L2 attitude she used as a front dropped, and the warmth of her smile surprised him.

"Damn right."

"But for the record, one'a them on my crew's born rich. An' he ain't scum. Lotta 'em are, 'specially on L2, yain't wrong there. But he's as good as they come. He'll protect ya over himself any ol' day."

Her head titled a little as she took him in like she was attempting to memorize him. "Kay. I gotcha."

When he nodded at her as a way of saying goodbye, she spoke again.

"Mr Yuy was real concerned 'bout you. Quite a handful, that one, hardly ever seen a man like 'im so devoted t'anyone. We treated 'im extra nice after Elise told us what y'all did an' how he got 'ere. Ain't let anyone not a nurse or doc know where's his room. Got a watch on 'im, too. In case. Get on to 403, dear. They know who y'are."

She turned down the hall and he watched her go. Hours ago he'd bet Heero would get worse care if they found out he was a Preventer, and he wasn't sure what to make of her or this development. For now it didn't really matter. He just wanted to be with Heero again.

It didn't take terribly long to find him once he actually knew where to look. Outside room 403 he saw two young women chatting in the hall. As he approached they perked up, watching him and drawing slightly closer to the door. One of them was glaring at him, the other smiled a little.

"Hey now! Where'dja think you're goin?"

The surly one reminded him a bit of Carla, and the other one smacked her friend on the arm.

"Can it, don'tcha remember what Needles told us? Lookit that hair! He's good."

Amused, Duo asked "Needles?"

The kinder girl blushed while the other looked defiant.

"Yeah, Carla gave us our shots as kids. Hated it! But she held us down like a hellcat an' made sure we got 'em."

He smiled, glad to hear they'd gotten medical attention when they were younger. On L2 that was hit or miss when he was a kid. They weren't that much younger, maybe twenty. If in a little less than a decade things changed enough for them to have medical care, maybe things were going in the right direction. Maybe L2, though still rough and tumble, was progressing silently where it counted.

"I got watch," he said. "Thanks for lookin out."

"Y'sure?"

"Mm sure."

"Ya look rough. Carla check ya?"

"Nah, I'm good." Duo noticed one of the girls was staring at the dried blood on his hand, and let her know it wasn't his. They seemed to understand that well enough with no further questions.

The girls nodded and headed down the hall. He let himself into Heero's room.

Wufei was incredibly worried.

Duo managed to sneak away from everyone when they got to the hospital and it was difficult to find information about where Heero was. No one seemed to want to tell him, and everyone gave a different room number. He simply needed to find Duo. Nothing was okay. And until he saw his friend with his own eyes he couldn't help assuming the worst. While he knew Duo wouldn't disappear again, he couldn't prevent the nagging voice that asked what if this broke him?

Only when he found the surly nurse from before did he get a real answer. She recognized him, and directed him to room 403, apologizing for all the subterfuge and expressing a concern for Heero's safety.

The biggest relief was when she told him that his friend with the long hair should be there already. He texted the room number to their companions.

Wufei smiled as he approached his destination. Room 403 was in the maternity ward. It wasn't a bad place to stick an injured man with a gunshot wound who they wanted hidden. He found Duo already at Heero's side, head ducked and hands fiddling behind his neck at the base of his braid. The room was plain but nicer than he expected, and private, which surprised him. Overall, it was a far cry from when they stuck him indefinitely in the recovery room. Though he really didn't have any particular expectations from an L2 hospital, he was impressed.

"How's he doing?"

Duo looked up, and his hands slid down from his neck, pausing to pat his chest in a gesture Wufei recognized from their youth. He was idly making sure his cross was still there. It made sense to him, after they day they had and the memories it undoubtedly forced to the surface. Duo's hands then dropped closer to his lap, stopping at the edge of the hospital bed. He reached out and held one of Heero's hands between his own.

"He'll be out for a little while. Meds and all."

With a nod, Wufei took up residence in the chair on the opposite side of the bed and did his best to sink into it. Duo might still have energy to be preoccupied with Heero, but he was exhausted. None of them slept since they got to L2 and he was tired. Between physically running all over and being emotionally drained, Wufei wanted to teleport home and fall asleep on his couch next to Sally. He couldn't imagine how tired Duo must be. They sat in silence for a few minutes before Quatre stepped through the door.

"I'm heading to the cafeteria. They're starting to make breakfast. Who wants what?"

Wufei yawned, slurring his words as he asked. "They'll let us bring it here?"

"The nurse station assured me anyone here for Mr Yuy gets special treatment."

"I know enough about hospital food not to make any specific request. Just bring me whatever you feel looks decent."

They waited for Duo to say something, but he just stared at Heero. His thumb ran across the back of his partner's hand as he held it. Duo looked awful. His hair was a mess, his eyes had dark circles under them, and he had an aura of running on empty. It made breakfast seem all the more urgent.

"Duo? What about you? What can I bring you?"

"Mm not hungry."

Quatre's eyes glanced to Wufei's. In some small way it felt like when they stole glances above Duo's head as he cried in the chapel hours earlier.

"You should eat something. How about I get you whatever I find for Wufei?"

"Whatever you wanna do, Quat. I'm fine, honest."

Before Quatre or Wufei could protest his reply, Duo's pocket vibrated, and he reached to check his phone. The DM he was waiting for finally came in, and Duo logged into the cyber security system. His phone erupted with texts from the group chat, vibrating again and again, furiously sounding alarm as though in protest of the amount of incoming messages finally registering.

Santiago's in trouble, who's online?

Hey, what's up?

What do you mean?

Santiago? How can I help?

Yeah, what can I do?

SAN-TEE-AAAH-GO!

Shut it, Renaud, this is serious. He's in the field. And OFF PLANET.

Are you for real?

Yes! He needs a fuck ton of data analyzed quickly. Content doesn't matter, we're looking for evidence a Preventer's phone data was compromised.

I'm in.

Same.

I called Edwards, she's got a bunch of people's phone numbers and can wake up anyone in a time zone where they'd be sleeping. She'll sound the alarm before jumping in herself.

Fuck. After all he's done to help us out? I'd be fired if not for him. Yeah, where's this data?

My cases can wait, link me.

Same.

Fuckin' same.

Yo, Edwards just called what can I do?

Aren't you on vacation, Dominic?

Who gives a shit about vacation? Santiago's in trouble.

The texts went on and on, scrolling beyond what Duo had time to read. The gist of it was that his entire unit, regardless of time zones and caseloads, all rallied together to blaze through Trowa's data. Two members on vacation logged into the system to help, citing loyalty to him.

It was a lot for Duo to process. He chose to delay that until later.

Ultimately, they'd found what Duo hoped they would, and provided solid evidence Trowa was a victim, not an accessory. It appeared that his personal security was just fine. Duo would later learn that he'd gotten Heero to set that up for him, which was why there was nothing compromised on that end. Heero used proxies to transfer data, then destroyed the proxies and redundancies along the way to ensure an inability to trace where backup data was finally stored. But at some point, Trowa also used security provided by Winner Enterprises. And their method of data protection was glaringly flawed in a way that so many corporate entities overlooked.

The large and public company used continuous backups over a remote connection. Duo's team told him this was the source of the breach. It was easy for anyone with moderate skill and determination to exploit the system Winner Enterprises used and trace the backups of Trowa's data to a server. And someone, somewhere, had illegally gained access to that server.

His team took it upon themselves to anonymously contact Winner Enterprises, and apparently sent the corporate cyber security department into a frenzy when their bosses had their own private texts emailed to them with a note about properly securing data. Apparently, the data breech would be in the news cycle soon, because it wasn't just Trowa whose information leaked.

Whoever gained access to the servers where Trowa's phone was set to continuously backup was selling information online. And that was likely how Chevalier got his information.

In the end, Trowa didn't knowingly compromise his friends. The company he trusted his data with fumbled their promise to secure his information, and that was how Chevalier knew so much about Duo. Trowa was a man who texted as his primary form of communication. And Chevalier was able to read everything he'd texted for months.

The thought was unnerving. It was beyond violating.

But it also meant that Trowa was innocent. And while he didn't doubt his innocence, confirmation was necessary to get him released from custody.

Duo quickly wrote back.

Thank you, everyone. I'm forwarding this to Une right now. If there's backlash, you didn't help me. And if there's praise, every one of you is getting credit for quickly clearing a high-ranking Preventer's agent from the charges against him.

The energy Duo gained while reading was not missed.

Wufei and Quatre stared at him as his eyes zoomed across the screen, his hands scrolled, and his entire being lit up. Duo's posture straightened as he read, too. While this was going on, Zechs entered the room. Any words he planned to say died on his tongue when he saw the intensity radiating off his braided friend. He looked to the others in question and received only shrugs. By the time Duo typed his response he was physically bouncing in his seat.

"Duo, what is it? What's going on?" Zechs took a step closer. "Hey, you're too hyper for your level of exhaustion. You need to relax."

His concern was not masked. The former Deathscythe pilot was vibrating with pent up energy when by all means he should be crashing. At the very least they were expecting him to fall into another emotional void while waiting for Heero to awaken, like he did hours earlier when Wufei dragged him from the burning church. They didn't want him to be caught in another void, but that would be understandable. An emotional void was logical. This burst of energy was not.

Quatre silently wondered, not for the first time, what source of energy powered his friend and kept him upright and functional. He and Wufei had at least gotten some food from a vending machine during their first stay at the hospital, but he had no idea when Duo last ate, drank, or slept.

"Will you at least tell us what's so important that you're glued to your screen?"

Though he didn't look up, Duo answered.

"I just got the most fascinating news. Heero's gonna be so happy to hear it when he wakes up." Duo turned to Quatre. "And you're gonna be happy to hear it right now."

Quatre held his breath. There was only one thing that could mean, and he didn't want to get his hopes up.

With purpose, Duo stood and walked towards him, a soft smile on his face. He held out his hands and placed them on each of Quatre's shoulders, giving a squeeze when he did. Then, without warning, he pulled his friend into a hug and whispered into his ear.

"We got the evidence to exonerate Trowa."

For an eternal second Quatre didn't react, and then his arms were around Duo, tightly hugging him back. He shook and began to cry, all of his tension finally releasing at once. Wufei and Zechs were on high alert, not understanding what was happening until the blonde choked out "You really cleared his name?"

"Not me. My team did. You wouldn't believe how those idiots pulled together for him. I sent their findings to Une. She'll process it soon. Tro will be halfway to free and clear before they even dock Earthside with him."

Quatre's knees started to give way, but Duo held him firmly upright. Wufei and Zechs got out of their stupors and flanked their friends, also helping to brace Quatre, who was badly shaken.

"I'm sorry I'm such a mess. I shouldn't be reacting like this! I'm being so weak, but I don't know what—"

"It's okay, Quat." Duo's voice was soothing and gentle. He ran one hand through his friend's hair, petting those strands to comfort him. "You aren't being weak, you're just overwhelmed. You were so damn strong for me. Thank you, for that. Even when you were hurting, you comforted me, and you pulled it together to help plan our next moves. You did enough, and you were strong enough, Quatre. More than enough. It's my turn to be strong for you. I got ya. It's okay. You're okay, buddy."

Wufei listened and watched, in awe. He was still unsure when Duo and Quatre began to build bridges, but seeing the two of them each cry into the other's shoulder, all within the same day, confused him as much as it delighted him. Heero would wake up soon. Trowa didn't betray them, though just what the evidence was to prove it, he still didn't know. And Quatre and Duo were willingly embracing one another.

For the first time in years, it felt like their group of five might eventually be okay.