"Duo!" Hilde ran to catch up with him as he strode across the garage floor, his whole being intent on getting to Heero now. "Please wait� Duo!" She grabbed hold of his arm, digging in her heels and yanking him to a halt by main force.
"Damn it Hilde, let go," Duo growled, trying to wrench himself free, but she held on grimly.
"Just fucking well wait a minute, Duo!" she yelled up into his face, angrier than he'd ever seen her. "Wu Fei and Sally are coming with us, they're on their way and so's Dorothy, if you'll just hold on a second we'll take an MPV!"
What?" Duo frowned in puzzlement. "'Us'? I thought�"
"Une ordered it," Hilde rushed on impatiently, hauling him back in the other direction towards the official Preventer vehicles. "You were right; they're in space and we need to be able to face them there. You can't just rush off alone and get yourself killed!"
"The hell I will," he retorted sharply, already turning to continue to his car. "You'll just get in my way, Hil."
"Damn it, Duo!" she shouted, infuriated and looking like she was about to deck him one. He never found out because at that moment Wu Fei's voice rose above the clatter of the safety barriers rising.
"Maxwell! Get over here now!"
Duo wheeled, yanking free of Hilde's grip to find Wu Fei and Dorothy scrambling into one of the larger unmarked people-carriers. Sally was kneeling in the trunk space, buckling safety-webbing around two large cases. Medical stuff? What�? Duo's immediate fear was that they had heard something new, and he broke into a violent sprint across the empty concrete floor to the vehicle.
"Chang? What the hell?" he panted, out of breath and feeling the creeping tendrils of fear beginning to twine their way around his stomach and heart.
Wu Fei spared him a single glance, already buckling himself into the front passenger seat. "You're driving. The sooner we get to the spaceport, the more likely it is that our departure will go unnoticed, but if you endanger my wife by careless driving I will gut you, understood?"
Hilde had already scrambled into the back row of seats, helping Sally to climb back over the luggage partition and strap down. Duo blinked in confusion, trying to formulate a question, then shrugged and gave up, swinging into place behind the wheel. Obviously they were going to be coming with him; he remembered the unthinking words he'd thrown at Une, trying to get her to see that space was going to be their highest priority, with a slight shock of amazement. "Ladies and gentleman, fasten your seatbelts," he announced in a chilling tone that snapped him back to the war years as he started the vehicle and opened up the accelerator, heading for the exit ramp. "This is going to be a bumpy ride."
"Shit, Duo," Hilde muttered behind him as he took a corner at fifteen over the speed limit, gripping the wheel tightly and keeping his eyes fixed on the road. Midmorning, the rush hour traffic had died down and there was plenty of room in the fast lane. Duo swung the MPV out to overtake a car-full of middle-aged women, not bothering to take his foot off the gas as he pulled ahead of them. He checked the mirror; Hilde was staring worriedly at the back of his head while Sally seemed perfectly comfortable. Dorothy, in the middle set of seats, had Heero's laptop connected to a datareader and was tapping away. He didn't need to look to know that Wu Fei was giving him a death glare.
"We've got emergency launch clearance," Dorothy announced suddenly as Duo eased off the accelerator before they passed one hundred miles per hour. "They're fuelling a shuttle right now."
"Right." Duo tried to ease the set of his shoulders, but something in his chest felt too tight. A Preventer shuttle would do to get to Quatre's; once they had come up with a plan of attack he would be able to retrieve his own ship if necessary.
"Hmph." Wu Fei twisted in his seat to address the blonde Agent. "Call L4-W4B25 Port Authority as well, we don't have time to file proper flight plans or get docking clearance."
"I'll do that from Spacenet." Dorothy was packing her equipment away into carry-bags as Duo swerved hard left to make the turn into the spaceport, the tall grey buildings of the inner city giving way to scrubby vacant lots and the high spike of the launch ramp in the distance, glittering against blue sky.
"Good weather for a launch anyway," Duo muttered to himself, already calculating wind shears and exit windows as he swung the car into the nearest parking space and shut off the engine. Slamming his way out of the vehicle, he stalked across the dusty parking lot towards the commercial port entrance and the Preventer hangars, leaving the others to catch up with him.
The Agent on duty looked up as he strode through the door of the facility, paling significantly as the expression on Duo's face registered. Duo felt an echo of the old grin stealing over his features as he showed the man his badge, and by the time the others had arrived at a run, trailing equipment bags and medical lockers which Wu Fei insisted on carrying, he had the shuttle's registration details and their launch slot confirmed. By the expression on the young man's face as Duo left the desk, he was very glad to see the back of him.
Young man�? That strange mental annotation stalled him for a minute; he frowned, calling up the Agent's face in his memory and realising that he himself was in all probability a good five or six years younger. He just felt ancient, these days.
Leaving the others to get settled in the main cabin, Duo took possession of the cockpit, his hands automatically beginning the pre-flight check sequence, running over the boards with practised ease. He had no co-pilot to take the pressure off, but he didn't actually need one, and right now he didn't feel like entrusting vital safety checks to others. He could work with the other guys � and had, in tight situations, like when Heero'd had his head bashed in by that Mafia hitman and couldn't see straight � but in his present mood it wasn't an option he felt he could take. And none of them were the pilot Heero was.
Damn, Heero. How the hell had he gotten himself into this mess, anyway? The image of his partner's furious eyes, deep-ice blue above duct tape holding him silent as he struggled in vain to free himself, kept recurring. It swam in his head, nudging all the wrong buttons. Something that could take Heero Yuy down. Something he couldn't escape by himself� It was a situation neither of them had been in since the war, and that in itself was telling.
Just what kind of force do these people have? And what the fuck do they want? Damn it, I understand Mariemaia, twisted as it is, but Heero? What do they think� Sudden icy clarity pierced his mind, bringing together two otherwise barely noticeable details. The tabloid gossip stories about Heero and Relena, and the words of the kidnapper in the vid. Your boyfriend�
"Oh, hell." Duo forced his mind back to the present, surprised to find that he had already completed the checklist without realising it, the boards under his hands showing green and yellow and red in all the right places.
"What is it?" Hilde moved up behind him, the cockpit door swishing shut behind her. This was a small shuttle, designed for speed rather than payload. There were only two passenger cabins, each having seating for five, and a small pressurised cargo hold reachable by trapdoor and ladder. Most of the mass of the craft was made up of fuel, which affected the speed and inertia calculations. Duo squinted at the forward viewscreen, working out their flight plan in his head and then running it through the nav computer for verification.
"They think Heero 'n Relena are an item," he murmured, inspecting the dizzying array of vectors and time-graphs displayed for him. All correct. "That's why they took him."
"Huh." Hilde touched his shoulder gently, then moved to the co-pilot's chair, strapping herself in. "Oh relax," she chided as Duo shot her a black look. "I'm just sitting is all. Doro's in a panic, or as close as she gets, and Chang's fussing over Sally so much I'm surprised she hasn't clocked him one." She frowned, slipping a datareader from her jacket pocket and plugging it into the secondary console. "Did you call Winner yet?"
"No." The radio crackled to life and Duo hastily slipped the headset over his ears, hearing the Tower announcer informing him that he had clearance to head to the front of the flight queue. "I'll call once we're out of orbit."
"Well, I've got reactivation authorisation for him from the Commander." She frowned down at the pad as Duo engaged the tertiary engines, beginning to taxi down the strip to the head of the launch ramp. "I didn't know he was ever an Agent. It says here he was active in 199�"
"Classified," Duo murmured, the memories bringing a smile to his lips. It had been good to work as a team again two years ago, as they hadn't since those final battles for Libra. And again now � but it wouldn't be the same without his Heero. Not the same at all.
"Would it have something to do with that 'G5 Team' you mentioned to Une, perhaps?" she asked so sweetly that he knew she was pissed off. He eased up on the throttle as the small shuttle coasted to the foot of the ramp, feeling the vibrating clang as the accelerator chain locked on to the craft's belly and took its weight. Automatically his fingers adjusted the mass-balance readings, retracting the landing gear and rotating the shields into place. The tinny voice in his ear gave him the five-minute warning and Duo toggled the warning lights for the cabin.
"G5 is what they called the five of us together," he told her absently, figuring that security could go to hell at this point. "We only ever had a few missions, but it was serious stuff. Une retired us when things stabilised." He pushed the intercom button. "Three minute warning. Strap down, and hold on." It crossed his mind to wonder how safe an assisted shuttle launch was for a pregnant woman, but Sally must know the risks. Wu Fei's hovering couldn't be making her happy, though. The thought made him grin.
"You really think this is that serious?" Hilde scooted back in her seat, tightening the safety belts and docking the datareader into a slot on the arm.
"Mm. Two minutes." He engaged secondary engines, hearing the muted roar reverberating through the hull. "If it's not now, it's gonna be � consider the amount of weapons they're shipping out, for one thing. Whatever they're planning, I'd bet money this is only the first stage." His fingers danced over the boards, finding everything green to go as the automated announcer began the sixty-second countdown in his ear. Planetary liftoff wasn't quite as dangerous as re-entry, but it came close. He toggled the intercom again. "Thirty seconds until launch." He checked the course calculations one more time, then pressed the input button to lock them into the navigation computer.
Duo took a deep breath, flexing his hands around the controls, and began the countdown in synch with the tower. "Five, four, three, two�" his finger stabbed down on the primary ignition button and the deep roar of interplanetary engines filled his ears as the forward thrust began and the launch-assist chain engaged.
Pressed back into his seat by G-forces as the shuttle began to accelerate up the ramp, Duo grinned breathlessly, his heartbeat echoing in his ears. He felt more than noticed the angle change as liftoff began, his eyes fixed on the vector displays in front of him. Speed and inertia were good�
The catapult flung them off the end of the launch ramp with a deafening roar, the primary engines kicking into higher gear to compensate. Pressed back into his seat by the acceleration, Duo grinned breathlessly, holding the control shaft steady with both hands as the little craft fought its way free of Earth's atmosphere. It seemed to take forever, yet when the stresses abruptly eased and he could glance at the clock, no more than five minutes had passed.
"Whew," he muttered to himself, wiping the sweat from his brow with the back of a hand. "Ladies and Chang, we have achieved launch with no problems. It'll be about six hours to L4 at top speed." Switching off the intercom, he absently tugged his tie away from his neck, then gave in and pulled it off, undoing the top two buttons of his shirt. Damn, I really should have put some more thought into this and at least brought a change of clothes�
Hilde was sniggering at the crack at Wu Fei, undogging her safety harness and stretching her arms. "Pity this thing's too small to have a grav-gen," she murmured, pushing off from her seat and hovering just above floor level. Duo noticed that like most of the Colony-born, she still moved very deliberately in freefall, without the instinctive grace he and the other pilots had. He had loved to watch Heero in zero-G because he seemed so at home without gravity dragging him down. Maybe it was the training they'd had, or perhaps just a byproduct of feeling so at home in the cramped cockpit of a Gundam, whatever the environment.
"You gonna call Winner?" Hilde asked gently, breaking into his musings. Duo bit his lip, remembering exactly where Heero was right now.
"Yeah." He reached for the com and toggled it on, linking the ship into the encrypted Spacenet system and tapping out Quatre's personal number from memory. Almost one PM GMT, that meant it was approximately six on L4, which synched to the Arab nations of Earth. Hopefully, Quatre would be home.
The line rang three times before being picked up by a harassed-looking Trowa. "Duo," he greeted with a nod, showing no surprise at all. "Did you want Quatre? He's tied up in a meeting at the moment."
"Get him here. This is an emergency." His voice was hard and cold; as Trowa disappeared off the screen his head filled with the images from the vid, pictures of Heero duct-taped and handcuffed to a chair, subjected to God know what. The phrase 'we do not negotiate with terrorists' kept running through his mind, and he prayed that Une and Relena would be able to deal with the situation. It was a risk, dividing their command�
Trowa had returned, a communicator in his hand, his eyes hard. "He's on his way. What's the problem?"
"Heero and Mariemaia have been kidnapped." Duo figured it was best to keep it short and simple to start with.
Trowa's jaw dropped. "Foda a chreach stronttoren!" It was the most reaction Duo had ever seen out of the tall man, even when Cathy had been caught up in the weapons bust in Chicago.
"Yeah, whatever." He didn't know the exact meaning of the words � Trowa had grown up speaking a polyglot mixture of a dozen languages amongst the mercenary corps � but from the tone, they seemed appropriate. "Une and Relena received the ransom demand; it's political. There are traces leading to Ibsen."
"Geiteneukeren mierdos," Trowa muttered before taking a deep breath and squaring his shoulders. "You're in transit?"
"Yeah, we'll be there in six hours or so. Can you get us clearance at the private port? Less likely to be noticed that way."
"Sure. Trowa turned his head to one side, sweeping his hair out of his eyes for a moment. "Here's Quatre." And indeed his blond lover dashed onscreen after a moment, breathing hard and adjusting his shirt. He was wearing the bottom half of a business suit, but appeared to have lost the jacket and tie.
"Trowa? Duo?" Quatre turned to face the camera, and the look on Duo's face seemed to give him pause. "What is it? What's happened?"
"Heero and Mariemaia have been abducted for ransom by parties connected to Ibsen," Trowa summarised neatly, saving Duo from having to repeat himself. The tall acrobat wore a grim expression as he laid a hand carefully on his lover's shoulder.
"What?" Quatre whispered, one hand going momentarily to his heart as his complexion paled, then flushed, a furious glint coming into his eyes. "Branleurs et enculeurs de porcs, surmayye a'raasac yela'an shifit hifit darabzeen kaskoos immak!" he ground out between his teeth. Trowa's jaw dropped again; if he hadn't been so knotted up with tension and fear Duo would have found it funny. Apparently Quatre had said something truly offensive this time around. He smirked humourlessly; the blond ex-pilot always seemed so innocent and charming, but hurt the people he cared for and he could be fucking scary.
"Yeah, whatever." Duo stared into the lens until Quatre's furious gaze returned to him. "The team's reformed as of now. Expect us at nineteen-hundred GMT."
"Acknowledged," Quatre replied crisply, a hard glint coming into his sea-blue eyes. "I'll recall the Maguanacs immediately."
"Right." Duo flexed his fingers, cracking the knuckles and settling his hands about the shuttle controls again. "We're gonna get the fucking bastards, Q."
"Of course we are." Quatre gave a thin smile that had absolutely no humour. "Who've you got with you?"
"Fei, Sally, Hilde 'n Dorothy. We'll brief you properly when we get there; I have no idea how secure this line actually is."
"Right." The other man gave a brisk nod. "I'll have everything prepared by the time you get here, Duo."
"Thanks," Duo whispered, suddenly overcome with fatigue and helplessness. He dropped his head, shielding his eyes from the viewscreen as he reached for the control panel. "I have to go, Q, got a burn comin' up," he murmured, and shut down the connection without waiting for acknowledgement as he tried to suppress the tears that were eating at the edges of his awareness. Damn it, I need to be strong! He smashed one fist on the edge of the console, the brief flash of dull pain helping to steady and centre him. He had to be strong for Heero�
"Duo." Suddenly there was a hand on his shoulder, and he looked up into Hilde's compassionate eyes. She smiled reassuringly at him. "It's nearly time for the burn," she murmured quietly before turning and slipping out through the cockpit door into the main cabin.
Fuck. Duo scrubbed at his eyes, refusing to acknowledge the dampness that met his fingers, then turned to the nav computer, programming in the necessary course correction. The engines cut in exactly on time, vibrations rumbling through the hull as the small craft turned and accelerated on its new course. Duo watched the velocity-time graphs carefully, flipping off the engines as soon as the optimum speed had been reached � the speed that would allow them to reach L4 in the minimum timeframe while still matching speed with the colony and braking safely.
Engaging the auto-lock, Duo set the proximity and integrity alarms then leaned back in the pilot seat, feeling utterly drained. Had it really been only a few hours since he had arrived at HQ that morning? He felt as if the weight of days without sleep was gathering on his shoulders, mingling with the dull clench of fear around his heart. He knew he'd been abrupt to Quatre, but at the time he'd been unable to help it. Sitting and discussing Heero's imprisonment as though it were any other mission � no, he couldn't do that.
Mariemaia would've been bad enough, he thought dully, but did they have to take him too? What did they do to him � why didn't he fight? And what would they do to Heero, once they discovered that he and Relena were no more than friends? Would they count him worthless to them? Duo shuddered, the implications of that all too plain. He couldn't � they� No.
Enough, he told himself firmly. They would get Heero back, there was simply no other option. They had to.
Entirely unbidden, Hilde's words of the other night floated into his mind. You love him�
No. Duo gritted his teeth, forcing himself to remember that this wasn't only about Heero. He was just as concerned for Mariemaia; she was only a girl, scarcely out of childhood. Heero was his partner and his friend, and he had a right to be concerned about him. To care about him. Firming his jaw, Duo reached for the console and rechecked the vector calculations.
***
"So what have we got?" Quatre turned seemingly-calm blue-green eyes on Duo as he sat down at the table, hands spread invitingly.
Duo bit his lip, then turned to Wu Fei, jerking his head to indicate that the Chinese Agent should give the briefing. The Preventer team had appropriated one of the larger conference rooms in the 'business' wing of Winner House, spreading themselves and their equipment out around the table. Despite the late hour � it was past midnight in local time � Quatre had called up his sisters and delegated the operations of the company to them for the foreseeable future. As a result the corridors of the mansion were filled with scurrying people relocating files and offices, but hopefully everything would be organised by morning.
"Mariemaia was abducted by her bodyguard and an unknown man on Sunday night at approximately nine-fifteen PM Brussels time," Wu Fei began, folding his hands and addressing the room in general. Besides Quatre and Trowa at the head of the table, Rashid was leaning against the wall by the door, acting as both a guard and the Maguanacs' liaison.
"We had no further leads on her until this morning when the Commander and Vice-Foreign Minister received a recorded email message from the abductors demanding political concessions and their resignations in ransom." Wu Fei compressed his lips grimly, probably considering the injustice of such a manoeuvre, Duo thought with no humour at all.
"At that time we learned that Agent Yuy, who had not returned home from a dinner appointment with Minister Darlian on Friday evening, had also been kidnapped. As far as we can tell they are being held together." Wu Fei stated with a certain chill in his voice. Duo watched as Trowa's expression flattened and Quatre's eyes went cold and hard.
"What exactly were the demands?" Quatre asked quietly, glancing around the table. Dorothy pulled a datareader from her pocket, bringing up a file and passing it across.
"That's the full text of the ransom demand, with the accompanying images," she said quietly. Duo really looked at her for the first time since he had learned the news, and realised with a strange sense of unreality that she had pulled her usually loose hair back into a braid almost as long as his own. He'd never seen that before; she must be gearing up for action.
"I have these for you," Hilde interrupted, passing two items across the table to the blond man. Duo could easily see that one of them seemed to be a Preventer badge; the other looked like a data disk. Quatre nodded his thanks and slipped both into a pocket.
"Duo, what evidence do you have that Ibsen are involved?" Trowa asked quietly, shooting a look over Quatre's shoulder at the datareader and narrowing his eyes. Duo sighed, pushing himself into an upright position and flipping his hair back over his shoulder.
"There was surveillance footage of Mariemaia's kidnapping, and we ran the van they used through the VRD; the owner's a former employee. Also, the bodyguard � Katrin Williams � has a brother who works for them. It's not a definite connection, but we have to start somewhere."
"Another thing," Dorothy put in with a drawn voice, "I tracked the van to the shuttleport entrance, and the only non-passenger shuttle that launched within thirty minutes of that time was one of Ibsen's. A supply shuttle, I think."
"Which�" Quatre began, but Duo broke in, something suddenly fitting together in his mind.
"What model shuttle was it?" he demanded, staring into the space over the middle of the table.
"I don't know," Dorothy said, bewildered and staring at him. "They only use so many makes, don't they? It was one of the big supply ships."
"An FR-92?" Duo pictured that scene in his mind again, running it through in slow motion. Heero and Mariemaia in jump-seats, strapped down and struggling� behind them a blue-grey metal bulkhead wall� a wall bearing a stylised chevron design worked into the joint welds.
"Damn!" He opened his eyes to find the whole room staring at him, and sighed impatiently. "They were on an X-Tech shuttle, not an FR-92. It's in the design, look." He snatched the datareader from Quatre, bringing up one of the images and magnifying it so that the design stamped into the metal could be clearly seen.
"Damn the bastards," Wu Fei muttered, pounding his fist on the table.
"So either they changed shuttles mid-journey, which would be difficult and dangerous, or they were not on that Ibsen shuttle," Quatre concluded, folding his arms in exasperation. Duo knew how he felt. Damn the bastards, pulling the wool out from under us again. Or was that a mixed metaphor? Fuck, he must be more tired than he'd thought, or maybe it was the effort of trying not to think about Heero in a cell.
"Right," Quatre was saying, his tone brisk and organised. "Dorothy, Sally, go with the personnel and shuttle angles; it might be worth tracking that supply shipment anyway and see if it arrived on time." He glanced across the table at Duo. "I've ordered the computer room restocked for you. Set up what you'll need to trace Une and Relena's call tomorrow, and work on digging up as much as you can about this group."
"You don't think Ibsen are directly responsible?" Sally asked quietly, leaning back comfortably in her chair and keeping her eyes on Quatre. Although technically she outranked him in the Preventer hierarchy, it went without saying that Quatre was the brain of the G5 team, and Duo realised that by accepting his orders she was putting everyone on notice that he was effectively in charge.
"I doubt it," Quatre replied shortly, flicking a glance at Trowa, who nodded shortly. "All their accounts check out � I had some of my people go over their publicly accessible stuff earlier. There's no way they could fund an out-and-out coup attempt; they have to have a backer and it's far more likely that they're really only peripherally involved in the smuggling ring."
Sally nodded. "I'll give you that, but that means our first priority has to be locating the leader of this psychotic little bunch. After retrieving Mariemaia and Heero, I mean," she added hastily as Dorothy and Duo gave her evil looks.
"I'll be working on that angle," Quatre announced, "since whoever this group is they obviously have political aims. Hilde and Trowa, I need you to get in touch with your contacts in the Colonies; we have to have as much information as possible about what's happening where if we hope to detect these people."
"And myself?" Wu Fei cocked a sardonic eyebrow at Quatre, who smiled slightly.
"Liaison with Une and the Preventer stations in the Colonies; find out whatever you can about the current situation out there." He paused, brow furrowing slightly. Duo thought to himself that it was more than slightly unfair that someone so ruthlessly intelligent should look so angelically innocent. It wasn't as though Quatre was incapable of wrongdoing, either, it was just that no one ever suspected him of being the one to eat the last of the chocolate pudding or tie the bathroom door-handle to the opposite wall. No, it was always Duo's name that was shouted in fits of rage.
"I think you ought to check out your people as well," Trowa surprised them by saying into the slight pause.
"What?" Wu Fei's brows drew down angrily and he drew breath for what Duo was sure would be a rant about how carefully Preventer recruits were selected, but Quatre forestalled him.
"Of course! Thank you for reminding me, Trowa!" He turned a beaming smile on his lover, who merely raised an eyebrow. "It's not that I think there are likely to be any traitors among the Preventers," he explained earnestly, "but the ransom demand was sent to Une's and Relena's private email addresses, and those aren't available to the public."
Wu Fei and Sally exhaled in tandem, and Duo quirked a half-smile at the concurrence. "Security leak," Sally muttered to herself as she lifted her laptop to the table and booted it up, obviously planning to start doing something about the situation immediately. "There goes my night's rest�"
"I don't think so," Wu Fei interrupted quietly, pulling the machine away from her gently. Sally glared at him and opened her mouth, but he looked at her steadily and after a moment she sighed.
"I guess it has been something of a long day," she murmured, touching her abdomen briefly and rising slowly to her feet. "Quatre, since my overbearing idiot of a husband is going to insist, would you mind showing me to a room?"
Quatre immediately leapt to his feet, taking her arm and escorting her out of the room. Duo smothered a laugh at the sight of Wu Fei, who had obviously prepared himself to have to argue extensively and now looked rather bewildered, shaking his head to himself. Dorothy and Hilde had started a conversation in low tones, their heads inclined towards each other over a datareader.
Duo lifted his arms, interlacing his fingers and cracking the joints one by one, stretching out tense muscles before pushing himself wearily to his feet. "Hey Tro, 's the computer room where I left it?" he asked quietly, rolling his shoulders and picking the bag containing Heero's laptop up from the floor. It wasn't that he was possessive of the thing, really, but he had felt a little uncomfortable earlier upon realising that Dorothy was using it. It was Heero's; sometimes he was more friendly to that damn machine than he was to Duo, and he felt a perverse need to safeguard it. Somehow he couldn't shake the feeling that so long as the laptop was whole and healthy, so would Heero be.
"Of course." Trowa nodded to him, rising to his own feet and tossing his long fringe of hair to one side of his face. "Do you need a guide?"
"Nah, I'm fine." Duo dismissed the offer with a negligent wave of his free hand. "Back down the stairs and third door on the left. You can come with if ya want, though," he added curiously as something in Trowa's eyes almost seemed to whisper of disappointment.
"OK." Trowa nodded to him again, leading the way out of the conference room and holding the door for Duo.
"Thanks," the American murmured quietly as they moved briskly down the corridor towards the staircase. This area of Quatre's childhood home was quite ornate, being intended for important meetings and guests, whereas other parts of the complex were fairly plain.
"So," Duo ventured after a small uncomfortable silence, "how're the circus folks doing?" While it was true that he and Trowa had perhaps the most in common out of the pilots as far as their childhoods went, the differences in their personalities sometimes caused difficulties for them. Or not personalities, really, Duo mused, it was more like coping mechanisms. His masks, and Trowa's silence. Usually they managed to understand each other fairly well, though.
"They're doing well," the taller man answered briefly, turning his head as they reached the stairs to look at Duo from out of one deep-green eye. "You need to relax."
"What?" Duo shook his head in bafflement, braid thumping his shoulders as it followed the motion. "How the fuck can I relax when they've got Heero, they might be doing anything to him and I�" He swallowed the rest of that, forcing the words down in his throat by main force and praying Trowa wouldn't follow up on it.
As was entirely usual in the life of Duo Maxwell, his prayers were most emphatically not answered.
"When are you going to admit that you care for him?" Trowa asked quietly as they reached the door of the IT room Quatre had set aside for 'mission' use years ago. "It's obvious to everyone but the two of you."
"Damn it, Trowa!" Duo shouted at the top of his lungs, whirling around in the doorway and throwing his hands in the air with the last shreds of his patience. "I'm not in lo�" The words wouldn't come out. They just simply would not, and he choked as his throat closed over, folding around himself in shock. Duo Maxwell, runs and hides�
"Like I said," Trowa murmured, inclining his head as he turned away towards the private quarters. "Relax."
Rough translations:
"Foda a chreach stronttoren" - Portuguese, Gaelic and Dutch, "goddamned fucking tower of shit."
"Geiteneukeren mierdos" - Dutch and Spanish, "goatfucking shits."
"Branleurs et enculeurs de porcs, surmayye a'raasac yela'an shifit hifit darabzeen kaskoos immak" - North African French and Arabic, "wankers and pig-fuckers, a shoe is on your head damn your mother's labia."
Um, yeah... ::hides::