by Ashura
The inside of a Jaguar E-type was not built for comfortable lovemaking. Still, a tipsy Quatre and unfathomably flexible Trowa managed to make the most of what they had. Sleepy and sated, they curled drowsily around each other, partially covered by Quatre's wrinkled shirt.
Trowa's fingers stroked absently through Quatre's damp hair. "I suppose we should head back."
Quatre made a small, half-conscious noise and roused himself, if not to movement then at least to speech. "I guess so...if we have to....This was a good night," he observed, wriggling against Trowa, who shifted beneath him.
"It was," his lover agreed, with an affectionate kiss to his temple. "But you're getting heavy, love, and I'm getting stiff."
"Oh, all right..." Quatre pretended to pout, but crawled off Trowa and into the driver's seat, fumbling for his clothes. "You don't think the others are worried about us, do you?"
Trowa shook his head, stretching as much as the small car allowed to tug on his jeans. "I'm sure they figured it out."
"I suppose you're right," Quatre agreed, squirming into the other seat. Trowa climbed over him to take the wheel, and however reluctantly, they sped away from the deserted road it had taken them so many hours to find, and back to the hotel.
All the lights were off when they reached the suite, and they did their best to stay silent as they crept in. It was a good deal easier for Trowa, who was not only conditioned to it, but completely sober. Quatre giggled as his knees bumped the couch and he almost lost his balance--flailed, and caught Trowa's arm just in time to keep from tumbling onto the body stretched out asleep there.
The body grumbled sleepily and pushed herself blearily onto her arms. "Wha--Quatre--??"
Quatre, clinging to Trowa, giggled his apology. "Cathy? Sorry...what're you doing out here?"
She shrugged, snuggling back into the cushions, a little disoriented herself. "I guess I fell asleep...Heero must've left the blanket. Now go 'way, Quatre, I'm sleeping. Trowa, take him away and put him to bed, will you?"
Trowa chuckled. "With pleasure," he assured her, as his sister's head vanished under the duvet like a turtle into its shell. He scooped the blonde into his arms, to prevent any possible damage to the furniture. Quatre tipsy wasn't normally a problem--Quatre tipsy, tired, and glowing could definitely present one. "Come on, it's late, let's go to bed."
"Okay," the smaller boy agreed easily enough, snuggling into his lover's chest. And by the time Trowa had laid him out on the bed, still in his rumpled clothes and untied shoes, he was already snoring gently.
"Hey, Heero!" The hiss came from entirely too close to his ear, and he pulled his pillow over his head in a vain attempt to escape it and get back to what was just starting to be a very promising dream. It was only Duo, after all. If it was important he'd keep talking, and if it wasn't--well, chances were he'd still keep talking, but there was always the slightest possibility he'd leave Heero alone and go back to bed.
"Heero! C'mon, it's 7:15, I know you're awake. You're always awake."
No such luck, then. Reluctantly, Heero extracted his head from beneath the pillow and blinked sleepy blue eyes at Duo--
Who was fully dressed, though his hair was unbraided and hanging around his shoulders. What was he doing up already?
"Duo? What the hell do you want? When did you get home?"
The former God of Death gave him an entirely too-perky-for-seven-in-the-morning grin. "Just now. Why aren't you up?"
Heero surrendered to forced wakefulness and sat up. "Because I didn't go to bed until three this morning, and I was having a good dream. What about you? Where have you been all night?"
"Met somebody," his roommate returned with another grin, and Heero groaned.
"Duo, if you woke me up to tell me you had sex...."
Duo pouted. It was an expression he must have been practicing since infancy, and it never failed to reduce Heero to malleable mush. "Aw...if a guy can't share good news with his best friend, then what's the point? Anyway, I didn't wake you up for that. I was just telling you I was home--I really did think you'd be up."
Heero did his best to turn a yawn into an exasperated sigh. "All right, who is she? Or is it a he this time?"
Duo flopped carelessly onto his bed. "Librarian. You'd like her, she's Japanese and smart. Anyway she helped me find a bunch of stuff on our little mystery."
"That's useful at least," Heero admitted, wincing as his bare feet touched the cold floor. He really was getting soft. "Do you plan on seeing her again, or does one of the rest of us need to take the library from now on?"
Duo made a face at him, for all it was half-hidden by hair. "It's not like that. Just a casual thing, like. We kinda left it open. Anyway I'm not avoiding her."
"That's good." Heero swallowed his sigh of relief that the teams would not be split up further--all of which brought him around to remembering just what /he'd/ intended to ask Duo about this morning. "Hey...can I ask you something?"
"Is it important?" Duo's voice was muffled, his face buried in his pillow. Heero yanked it out from under him.
"You woke me up, remember? Don't even think you're going back to sleep. Yes, it's important, baka, I'm asking you for advice. Doesn't that mean the world's about to end?"
"You are?" Duo blinked rapidly and put on his best "stunned" face as he rolled onto his back. "I'm sure it at least means Hell's weather report is changing. What's on your mind?"
Ah, now that was a very good question--and now that Heero had the opportunity, he was no longer sure exactly what it was he needed to ask. Duo waited patiently for all of eight seconds while he stumbled over his tongue, til he finally let out an exasperated laugh.
"This is about a girl, isn't it?"
Heero shot him an accusing glare.
Duo raised his arms in surrender, still laughing. "Well, come on--I can't think of anything else that would make you stutter and ask me--me--for advice! You're sure not after my impeccable fashion sense, or worried about the latest in incendiary technology!" He rolled upright, crossing his legs and propping his chin on his hands, ignoring his friend's normally potent glare. Then again, he'd been immune to that look for quite some time. "So who is she? Or am I wrong? Is it a boy?"
"No," Heero admitted, suddenly reluctant to part with the information. Maybe asking Duo hadn't been such a good idea after all. "Girl."
"Well?" Duo prompted, a flash of impatience in his violet eyes. "Who--oh!" An entirely wicked grin spread across his fair face, and Heero was certain there were horns growing out of his head. "Catherine Bloom, of course. You haven't talked to any other women lately, after all. So does she like you too?"
Heero did not need words to communicate. Expressions, especially with someone who knew him as well as Duo Maxwell, generally worked just fine--and this one said 'How should I know, moron? I'm asking you for help, aren't I?'
Duo, in return, rolled his eyes. "Just ask her on a date, Heero. Hell, you could even double with Quatre and Trowa--provided he didn't kill you--just to make it less intimidating."
Heero looked skeptical. "You think so?"
"Won't know til you try!" Duo chirped, flopping backward onto his bed again. "What can it hurt? Now what time are we all meeting to discuss results?"
Heero frowned, not entirely happy with the resolution of the former line of conversation. "Relena's coming over at eleven."
"Well then," Duo said, pulling back the blankets and snuggling beneath them, "I have a good...two and a half hours to nap yet. Three if my best, dearest friend in the whole entire world agrees to braid my hair for me," he added, batting his eyes hopefully at Heero, who threw up his hands and nodded. "Thanks! Night!"
And just like that, Duo was asleep and Heero was not, and he knew there was /no/ way he'd ever get back to the exact same dream.
Relena Darlien had picked up something of strategy during her political career. She arrived promptly at eleven, and she'd borrowed Dorothy's car. While not the same yellow monstrosity she'd driven during the war, Miss Catalonia did seem to retain an affinity for vehicles that could adequately house and feed entire an entire army. ("It's to make up for not getting a mobile suit," Duo had explained once, while safely out of earshot--they may have uncovered a heart inside that fair shell after all, but he didn't want to press his luck now that he no longer had a Gundam within easy reach.)
It meant, of course, that there was no reason to take more than one car, and poor Trowa was denied the opportunity to wreak havoc on the streets for one morning. Relena shot him a smug, triumphant look--and winked at him. He pouted at her, and Quatre patted his hand.
"Where we goin'...?" Duo asked blearily, his nap not having been quite so restful as he'd hoped--mainly because Heero had insisted on making just enough noise to keep him from falling completely asleep.
"Breakfast," his utterly unapologetic roommate answered, tugging his braid.
"Oh! Food!" Everything was all right then. Duo was a man of simple tastes. "Pancakes?"
"If that's what you want," said Relena agreeably.
It was a longer, but inherently safer journey than it would have been had any one of the pilots been driving. Duo cajoled Relena into finding a pancake house, and by the time they got there and found a parking place big enough for Dorothy's car, all of their bellies were growling.
"We would have gotten here faster if you let me drive," Trowa began. Relena threw her sweater over his head, and he subsided into barely-audible, good-natured grumbling.
Fortunately, the rest of the workaday world had already had their breakfast, and the place wasn't busy--within a matter of minutes they were seated, caffeinated, and well on their way to being fed. Things were looking up indeed.
"So," Relena began, "I've got some idea of how everything goes together, but I'll ask this first--what did everyone find?"
"Somebody give me your water, I finished mine," moaned Quatre, who couldn't understand how the tiny, teensy bit he'd had to drink the night before could make him wake up with such a headache. How come he was always the one to be hung over? Trowa slid his glass over with an affectionate smile. Much as he hated seeing Quatre miserable, he was an awfully cute drunk.
"Take the damn water, I want COFFEE," Catherine growled, sliding him her glass as well and reaching for the pot. Duo was too busy staring sleepily at it, utterly fascinated by the way the lid went up and down.
Heero looked at Relena and shrugged. "I emailed it to you this morning."
"We were with you," Trowa said simply. "So you know we didn't find anything."
"Which only leaves Duo," Relena said pointedly.
The boy in question looked up from watching the sugar dissolve in his coffee mug. "Oh. Right. I found a lot of stuff, actually." A snicker--which only Heero understood and everyone ignored--and he pulled a stack of photocopied papers from his jacket pocket. "Here," he announced, shoving it toward Relena and Quatre. "This explains a lot."
"So my father and the Qu--my mother's--brother were schoolmates," Quatre said, rubbing at his eyes. He didn't care for the way the letters liked to move around on the pages. Letters ought to remain in the same order, all the time, or how was one supposed to read them?
"Philip Cressida," Relena confirmed, bent over the pages as well. "Heero and Catherine found that last night. And he was killed in a duel with Louis Catalonia."
Quatre winced. "Figures," he grumbled, then caught himself and tried to look apologetic.
"There's pictures of them, too," Duo said, stretching across the table to point out some of the pages. "Good looks run in the family, apparently. Anyway that issue is after the duel. It's got mini-bios on just about everybody, and statements from the family members after the whole thing was over."
"I found some of the same things," Heero agreed, glancing over the copies. "Louis Catalonia was adamant that the Peacecrafts' policies of total pacifism were outdated and useless. He thought they'd change their opinion after the duel, but both the King and Queen go on record saying that it only strengthened their ideals...as does Haroun Winner."
"The funeral was the first time he and Katrina met," Duo continued. "And that was only a year or so before Relena was born...whatever happened, it happened fast."
"Here's a picture of them together," Quatre interrupted, a curious tightness to his voice that prompted Heero to shoot him an uncharacteristically gentle look, and Trowa to squeeze his hand under the table.
It was the only picture of his parents together that he'd ever seen.
"I wondered when you would come back, child," he said warmly, reaching out a hand to draw her near. Relena approached Peygan's chair and dropped to her knees beside it, clasping his cold hand in her own. "What questions have you for me then tonight?"
Relena slipped a folded paper from her pocket--one of the copies Duo had made of the magazine spread detailing the aftermath of Philip Cressida's death. "Did you know him?" she asked.
A long sigh left his lips, an exhalation of pain and regret and sorrow. "Yes, of course...." His hand strayed over the surface of the grainy print, as if history were almost within his withered fingers' grasp. "Where did you find this?"
"Duo found it. At the library." Relena rocked back on her heels, waiting, patient, til he could look up and meet her eyes without the sting of tears at their edges. "This was why Sanq was crumbling, wasn't it? Peygan...please, tell me what happened."
The old man merely nodded, closing his eyes briefly, as if to shield his mind against the onslaught of painful memories. Relena curled at his feet, the fire warming her back, til at last he began to weave the tale.
"When your mother first came to marry your father," he explained, "she was accompanied by her elder brother--a dashing, handsome, energetic young man who charmed the entire court as easily as she did. His head was full of fancies and adventures, and one of his fondest dreams was to leave earth and aid his friend and former schoolmate in running a resource satellite in the L-4 cluster.
"But he never did go...he was too attached to her, and to Sanq itself, and his duty would never allow him to leave. He was a very public person, the way Katrina was not--she never was comfortable with people prying into her affairs, poor thing. And pry they would, because she was the Queen, and the world seemed to believe that made her life public property. But Philip didn't mind the spotlight at all, and he directed it away from her and onto himself whenever he could."
"Is that why Louis challenged him?" Relena asked, enthralled.
Peygan shook his head sadly. "No...you've heard wrong, I'm afraid. It was Philip who challenged Louis. You see, Louis Catalonia had been a snake in the nest for a long time--he undermined the King's wishes, spread his poison through the court, told anyone who would listen how outdated and obsolete the wish for total peace was. He said the King and Queen were clinging to a crumbling hope and leading the nation to its own destruction. At first Philip wanted to try him for treason, but there was no concrete evidence. So he did the only thing he could think of, stupid as it was. He challenged him to a duel. And he was killed."
The firelight glinted off the telltale shine of tears in the old man's eyes, and Relena reached up to lay her hand across his arm. He patted it comfortingly. "It was a long time ago," he whispered, though she wasn't sure if he meant it to her, or to himself.
"Louis thought he had proved his cause when he won the duel," he continued, lost once more in the past. "But there he had miscalculated--the nation, indeed the world, was in love with Philip, and they were too deep in mourning for him to listen to anything the man who killed him had to say. The funeral was held in the courtyard at the mansion, child, and it was as full as the laws of physics allowed for. For days, people sat vigil with candles outside the gates." He flicked a hand surreptitiously across his eyes, as if she wouldn't notice he wiped away tears. "The funeral was the first time any of us met Haroun Winner. He stood by your parents and grieved with them, and added his speech to theirs when they reaffirmed their devotion to pacifism. And he made your mother promise to ask him for help or sanctuary should she ever feel threatened or need protection.
"But Louis still wanted a revolution, still craved war. He wanted the Sanq kingdom to be a military power, claimed the King could unite all the earth's nations under a single government if he only tried. But there would never be any moving your father, Relena, he was too committed. So Louis took his case to the Queen instead. I don't know why--she hated him as much as she was capable of hating anyone, I can't imagine she was civil, let alone receptive to his ideas. But she did...change, after that. I can only imagine she fought with your father, because they were never so close again."
"I remember that." The hard, tight voice from the doorway startled them both, as Zechs padded toward them in a loose shirt and trousers, his eyes all but hidden behind a mask of platinum hair. "I heard them arguing," he explained, never quite meeting their eyes. "You were a baby then, Relena. That was part of it--she wanted to kill him, you know. She asked Father too, and he refused. He said he was a pacifist and couldn't murder any man, even an evil one. Mother said it was only survival to kill a snake lying in your bed."
He took position against the wall, his arms crossed protectively across his chest. "She told him he must fight, whether he would or not, to protect his children. He said he could not, because of those same children. She ran out of the room crying, and I have never forgotten it." Finally, sorrowful ice-blue orbs flickered to meet Relena's gaze. "And maybe, little sister, that is why I am the soldier and you are not."
"Quatre, you've read that same page twelve times. Please, just put it down. I'm hungry." Trowa flopped onto the sofa Catherine had only recently vacated, throwing his hands in the air. It had always been Trowa's policy, after all, not to just say something if it was possible to use his entire body to express it.
Quatre, stretched out on the floor with one of Duo's copies, just shot him a wry look. "How is it that you stay so scrawny? You must eat twice your body weight in any given day."
Trowa, rather than return fire with one of any number of remarks, merely arched an eyebrow, and Quatre rolled his eyes. "All right, all right. We'll go eat."
"Somebody say food?" Catherine poked her head out of the bathroom door, her hair wrapped in a fluffy white hotel towel. "Don't go without me, okay? I'll just be a minute. I'm starving."
Quatre made an exasperated noise, and Trowa stifled a snicker.
The blonde looked up, eyeing Duo and Heero both suspiciously. "Well? Two is coincidence, three is a conspiracy, or so I'm told. Which is this going to be? Are you coming to?"
Duo, who was playing some noisy video-game on Heero's everpresent computer, just shook his head. "I'll stay here and have a sandwich. Kinda waiting in case I get a call....Heero?"
Heero looked torn. "No, I'll--ow! Duo!" he growled, massaging his leg where his unapologetic roommate had just kicked it. "I'll come with you," he finished lamely.
"Conspiracy," Quatre repeated.
Duo grinned at him. "Definately."
Catherine chose that moment to emerge from the bathroom. Wet hair coiled like rivulets of dark fire around her shoulders, and a black silk shirt clung to damp curves, hanging loose over her jeans. "So where are we going?"
Heero let out a yelp as Duo kicked him again. 'Your mouth was hanging open,' the braided boy mouthed, mimicking the face he claimed the other had been making.
It was probabl y best that these antics were lost on the rest of the room. "We had Italian last night," said Quatre dryly, "which means tonight it's Chinese or more breakfast. Wouldn't want to force Trowa to introduce some variety to his diet, after all."
Catherine shrugged, and Trowa made a face at Quatre behind her back. Heero, efficient as ever, was already tossing them their coats, and Duo made shooing motions with his hands. "Get out. All of you. Go. Leave me to play Planet Blasters in peace, will you?"
"Sure you don't want to come along, Duo?" Quatre asked, tossing Trowa the car keys. Catherine intercepted them mid-flight and shot her brother a glare.
"He's waiting for a girl to call," Heero explained, deadpan, ushering them all out the door.
"Cathy," Trowa was whining, "give me the keys...Quatre was passing them to me..!"
She twirled them on her finger and took off running. "Well I caught 'em! And I've never driven a Jag before...."
Heero wondered what he'd gotten himself into.
Finally, the last eggroll was boxed up for later, a substantial amount of leftovers would be taken back to Duo, all fortune-cookies had been accounted for, and the sated diners left the restaurant, rubbing their bellies in satisfaction.
"I was thinking," Quatre suggested hesitantly, "that we could go for a walk along the waterfront before we head back? I mean, none of us get here all that often, it seems a shame to spend the whole time cooped up in the hotel."
Heero shrugged. "I don't mind," said Catherine, and Trowa just nodded and reached for his lover's hand. The waterfront was really a boardwalk, all but abandoned after dark, that stretched along the half-circle edge of the bay. They scrambled down the rocks, leaving the boardwalk behind, picking their way carefully along the crusty beach.
Heero felt a tug on his elbow as he landed, and turned--it was Catherine, and he thought at first she'd lost her balance, but she shook her head and motioned to the pair of boys ahead of them.
"Drop back a bit," she said softly. "Let them have some time alone."
"Oh," Heero said intelligently, pausing next to her until Trowa and Quatre's shadowed silhouettes disappeared behind the rocks.
"I know it seems like they haven't been apart this whole time," the girl continued, finally beginning light, careful steps along the shore, "and it's true, I guess. But they usually don't see each other for months at a time...they're enjoying themselves, and I'm glad they have a chance to."
"Oh," said Heero again, a step or two behind her--far too conscious of the slender knife-thrower in front of him to pass judgement on the lovelife of his other friends.
She shot a wry, crooked smile over her shoulder at him. "Still, I'm glad you're around to keep me company. Usually I'm trying to stay out of the way by myself."
Heero felt his face get abruptly warmer, and decided he was grateful for the lack of any light but the twinkle of the stars. "I'm sorry--I'm not very good company."
A chuckle, then. "Don't worry, you're here, and that at least means I don't look like I'm talking to myself. Ah--here. Come sit with me." She had found a tall, flat boulder protruding from the side of a bulkhead, and climbed spryly atop it. "Well--ew, it's a bit wet. Just to warn you."
Heero followed her, prepared for the slippery damp of the boulder's surface, shedding his coat and spreading it across like a blanket. "There," he said with a shrug, settling next to her.
Silence fell. Companionable at first, it stretched between them like taut rubber, ever more awkward, waiting for the right moment to snap.
Catherine laughed, light and unashamed. "Now I'm the one who's not very good company."
Heero shook his head, leaning back on his hands. "No, it's me. I'm not good at conversation, I just don't have the knack for it."
Catherine's delicately-arched eyebrow was barely visible in the darkness, but expressed only too clearly in her voice. "It doesn't bother me. I'm used to men who don't say much, Heero. You've met my brother?"
"Hn," Heero conceded.
"That's about right," she nodded, amused.
Silence again--but easier this time, freed from the strain of awkward attempts at conversation. And this time it was Heero who broke it.
"I was wondering--"
She turned her gaze from the water, glanced at him, and he faltered. Just ask her, Duo said. As if it were something easy. I ought to kill him on principle alone.
"I wondered--"
She was still looking at him, expectant, glints of light reflected in her grey eyes. He swallowed. How is it that fighting a war can be so easy compared to asking a girl--
"Would you go on a date with me sometime?"
It was childish, remedial, and entirely devoid of any sophistication or charm, but a quick glance downward revealed that jumping would not be a nearly sufficient method of self-destruction. Was it possible to simply fall over and die of embarrassment? And if it was, could it please happen quick?
A smile quirked the corners of Catherine's lips, visible even in the shadows. "Sure," she said casually. "I'd love to."
Heero's body--the pride of genetic engineering and product of years' worth of intensive training--finally remembered how to breathe.
Duo had just beaten the thirty-seventh bonus level of Planet Blasters when the vidphone buzzed to life. A quick check at his watch revealed that it wasn't nearly as late as he'd thought it was--only nine-thirty. He hurried across the room, Heero's laptop beeping protest at being so quickly abandoned. "Hello?"
He suffered a moment of disappointment--the face on the vidscreen belonged not to Akane, the librarian, but Iria Winner. "Hi, Duo. Is Quatre around?"
He shook his head, braid swinging. "Nope. They all went to dinner. I can probably find 'em if it's important."
"No, that's all right." Her blue eyes were ringed by weary shadows, and her entire face looked tired. "It's after three here, I'm heading to bed. But tell him and Relena--I've found something I think they need to see."
Duo rested is weary head against the cold metal framing the shuttle's porthole, hugging the end of his braid to his chest like a favourite toy. Wisps of matted hair protruded from his head, and shadows ringed his violet eyes, dark against his pasty skin. "Explain to me again," he moaned, "why this couldn't have waited til after we slept?"
"Because," Quatre answered logically, "if we waited til morning, we'd be hitting lagrange-four at about three in the morning. This way we get in at dinnertime, and don't wake up my sisters."
"You can sleep on the trip over, Duo," Heero added sourly.
Duo grumbled under his breath, and Relena smiled at him sympathetically. "You don't have to come along unless you want to," she reminded him gently. "It's really only Quatre and I--and Trowa, I suppose--who have any real investment in this."
Duo summoned a sleepy, faded version of his best indignant glare. "Excuse me? Who here found half your answers while certain other folks were busy flirting?" he demanded, focusing the glare on the rest of the group. "I'm gonna see this through to the end too. I'll just be tired while seeing it!" He crossed his arms defiantly across his chest.
Relena stifled a laugh. "I wasn't telling you not to come. Just giving you an out if you wanted one." She covered a yawn of her own, her head drooping against Quatre's shoulder. "Besides, none of the rest of us have slept yet either."
"I'm not tired," said Trowa softly, his lips twisting into a smile as Quatre snuggled up against his shoulder. "Fortunately I'm not planning on moving, either," he added dryly, wrapping an arm around his lover as Relena made herself comfortable against Quatre's other side.
"Well I am. Tired, that is. Be my pillow, will you Heero?" Duo whined, cuddling up to his roommate without waiting for an answer.
"Do I have a choice?" Heero muttered under his breath, but he did let the braided boy nestle into his chest.
Catherine, on Heero's other side, chuckled. "Doesn't look like it." Watching the others drift off to sleep, she began digging through her pack for a book. "By the way--what is it Iria found?"
"It sounded like letters," Trowa answered, absently stroking Quatre's hair. "She started going through all Quatre's father's things when this all started; apparently she came across some things they'd never noticed before."
Catherine finally extricated The Pirate Prince from her bag. "And that doesn't seem a little strange?"
Trowa shrugged his unoccupied shoulder. "They weren't really looking before."
"That's true," his sister agreed indifferently, flipping open her book. "By the way--if either of you want something to read, I've got extras."
Trowa donned a superior expression. "No thanks. I already know what happens in your books. There's a beautiful orphaned heroine sent off to live with rich relatives. Then there's a Mr Tall, Dark and Dangerous, and a Mr Boy-next-door. She falls for the first one, but he ends up being the same evil bastard responsible for killing her parents all those years ago, despite the fact he was ten years old at the time. Then the blonde fellow saves her just in time to live happily ever after."
Heero's amused eyes flickered from one sibling to the other as Trowa finished his summary of the romance-novel world and Catherine wrinkled her nose.
"You forgot the part about escaping arranged marriages," she informed him flatly. "Besides, this is about pirates."
It was amasing how much expression Trowa could fit into a gently-arched eyebrow. "Let me guess. She's running away from the arranged marriage and the pirate captures her? Then falls in love with her, of course. And let's see...does he end up being the estranged younger son of some hideously wealthy nobleman?"
"You know," Catherine stated calmly, "you should really be nice to me, Trowa...you never know just when my perfect aim might start to go, and then where would you be?"
Somehow, Trowa didn't look intimidated.
"Actually," said Heero, almost meekly--and not exactly thrilled by the prospect of several more boring, wakeful hours either--"pirates sounds kind of interesting. Is there fighting in it?"
Catherine shot her brother a triumphant look. "Swordfights galore!"
Trowa rolled his eyes. "Heero, you're turning pathetic, you know that?"
Heero glared at him. Trowa just winked, and turned his attention to braiding miniature plaits in Quatre's silky hair.
"I told you so," Trowa hissed to Heero under his breath as Iria led the small procession through the maze of hallways that made up the house she shared with Quatre and two of their remaining single sisters.
Heero glared back at him, but his once-feared Death Glare was but a shadow of its former potency. "I didn't know it was a kissing book," he growled. "I just wanted to read the swordfights!"
"Do you mind?" Quatre snapped irritably over his shoulder, and the boys subsided with muttered apologies. Since waking up--just before entering the colony--the blonde had been high-strung and antsy, a condition which only seemed to increase the closer they got to the study where Iria had stored her newly-discovered secrets. Relena, by contrast, had gotten quieter, staring pensively at her hands until her attention was forced away.
Trowa, Heero, Duo and Catherine were only along for the ride.
"Here we are." Iria ushered them into a study, scattered with old shoeboxes and files and scraps of nostalgia. "It's the box on the chair you want to look at...." She shifted awkwardly, then sighed. "I'll get out of your way."
"Thanks...." Quatre barely responded, dropping to his knees next to the indicated chair and lifting the box reverently. "Wow," he said after a long moment of silence. "I'm--I'm nervous now."
Relena swallowed. "I am too, a little. I don't know why--it's silly, isn't it? I mean, it's not like we can do anything to change it--but--" She sagged, and Quatre twisted to scan the line his friends formed against the wall.
"Trowa--will you--?"
"Of course." Trowa strode forward, kneeling next to his lover, lifting the lid from the box and rubbing his nose against the assault of dust and age that tickled his allergies. "Do you want me to just pick something and read it, or..?"
Quatre and Relena nodded, and he complied--drew a folded, yellowed letter from the box, opened it, and began to read.
The story that had formed was simple enough, if heartrending. As Peygan had already explained, the Sanq kingdom was crumbling under the weight of its own beliefs, with Louis Catalonia doing everything he could do speed its fall. His faction, while it had lost some power after the duel with the world's darling Philip, was never completely eradicated, and its members dissipated into the Romafeller foundation after the kingdom's fall.
Haroun Winner had first met Katrina Cressida Peacecraft at her brother's funeral. They had fallen immediately, tempestuously in love, but according to their own letters, nothing had ever come of it but words. Still he extracted a promise from her--to come to him for help, or protection, if she ever needed it. When the foundation of the Sanq court began to crumble beneath her, he urged her to join him--"Come to me," he had written. "Come to where I can keep you safe. I can live without touching you, as long as I know you live."
And Katrina had held out as long as she could. The end came when Louis himself discovered her secret, innocent as it still was, and showed Haroun's letters to the King. In delicate script she wrote of the confrontation with her husband when Louis had left--"I am on the verge of losing my kingdom," he had said. "Am I doomed to lose my queen as well?"
"No," Katrina had replied. "The queen will stand by you forever...it's the lover you've already lost."
The temperature rose in the court, and relations between the royal couple grew more strained. In public, they presented to the world a single face and a single mind, but Katrina wrote to Haroun of the storm that pervaded their more private moments, of arguments and tears and a widening gulf that no amount of reconciliatory words could breach.
Finally, the enthralled readers reached the culmination of their search: a short note, writtenhastily and stained with tears--
Three simple words: "I need you."
Quatre dragged a hand across his eyes as the letter drifted to the ground. Trowa sat next to him, still, an arm around his shoulder. Nearby, Heero did the same for Relena, a comforting presence even if he had no words, and Duo and Catherine looked on.
"So that's when she came here," Duo explained, flipping through the wornout pages of a musty scrapbook. "She started calling herself Quatrina Winner, but it looks like they weren't ever actually married. She stayed holed up in the house; hardly anybody outside ever saw her, and that was with a veil. Your dad doted on her, Quatre--I mean, look at all the stuff he kept. Must be everything she ever wrote to him, every picture anybody ever took...." He sighed, reaching across the motley pile to squeeze his friend's hand reassuringly. "And the rest you all know. She got pregnant, refused to have a test tube baby, and died having Quatre. There's only a couple more letters here. This one's from Giorgio--King Peacecraft--to his queen, and it's kinda bitter. I don't think he was dealing with it to well. And this one--"
Duo's violet eyes froze halfway down the page, and he swallowed. "Maybe one of you better read this," he said, slipping the paper from the booklet and thrusting it toward Quatre and Relena. "It kinda closes things up."
Relena took it from him, and Quatre eased from Trowa's embrace to lean over it with her. "Oh..." she whispered, and he began to read aloud.
My old friend--
Words cannot express the depth of my grief at your news, but then, you of all people in the world are in a position to understand it. I feel my very soul has been ripped away, and what shreds remain are now ashes in a colony burial urn.
I accept your apologies and condolences with the good will they were intended. The game is over, and we are both the losers of it. Such is ever the folly of arrogant men.
The boy is, and remains, yours. Raise him well, I beg. As I have lose my soul, I stand to lose my kingdom as well, and already find I must surrender my daughter to be raised by someone else's hand.
...And still I pray that both these children live to see the peace we sacrifice our lives to strive for.
My heart is with you.
Giorgia
His voice faltered, and silence fell. He turned his face into Trowa's chest, and his breathing ragged but controlled. Heero rested a hand comfortingly on Relena's shoulder, and her fingers sought out and twined around Quatre's hand.
"That's it, then," she said softly.
"We wanted answers," Quatre agreed, forcing a wan smile. "And we found them. I guess it's silly to get so worked up, isn't it?"
Duo shook his head, his customary grin flickering at the corners of his lips. "No it isn't. The rest of us all get teary over our pasts too, when we get to indulge in 'em."
Catherine nodded. "We've been there too," she reminded both Peacecraft siblings tenderly, "and got all emotional with a lot less proof, I promise you." She dropped a kiss on Quatre's forehead and winked at Trowa. "And didn't I promise a good ending?"
Two years later:
"I thought family reunions were usually reserved for...well, family," Duo Maxwell remarked, braid swinging as he ushered Hilde Schbeiker and her toddler son Will into the Merquise family's expansive garden. "And half the people here, including us, don't qualify."
Hilde laughed, deftly catching Will in time to prevent him from tumbling face-first onto the cobblestone walkway. "Family's more than ties of blood. You especially, 'Uncle Duo,' ought to know that!"
"Well, yeah..." the former God of Death caught his adopted nephew and swung him into the air, evoking a chorus of ecstatic squeals. "That's true I guess. C'mon, let's go find Heero and make him feel guilty for ditching us!"
"Heathen," Hilde chuckled. "Don't you think we should find our hosts first and say hello?"
"Well, if you want to be all polite about it and stuff," Duo grumbled, but changed his course for the tall form of Zechs Merquise standing in a solemn face-off with a barbecue. "Zechs looks like he could use a hand anyway."
"Don't offer," suggested a dry, lilting voice as Dorothy Catalonia appeared at his elbow. "He's been glaring at it like that since noon, and it's still not working. I think it's frustrating him." She grinned impishly. "You'd think that a party full of ex-Gundam pilots could at least get a hamburger to cook all the way, but no such luck."
"Let me guess," Hilde inserted smoothly. "You tried to help?"
Dorothy wrinkled her nose in the direction of the platinum-haired host. "Yeah. Like I said...don't."
"We'll just go say hello and nothing else," Duo promised. "Hey," he protested at her I-don't-trust-you look, "you know if anything that I have a healthy respect for my own hide. C'mon, Will. Coming Hilde?"
"Duo! Hilde! Glad you could make it! Goodness, Will, you're getting tall!" Lucrezia Merquise took her turn at swinging the toddler around in a wide circle, to his utter delight. "I want one," she confessed under her breath as she set the boy down.
"Want mine?" Hilde offered, the very picture of generosity.
Lucrezia considered. "Hmm...he's already out of the really messy stage...."
Not far away, Heero was glaring up at Trowa, one arm looped comfortably around Catherine's waist. "Hmph. You're just upset 'cause you're not needed anymore. I can stand still and not look scared just as well as you can."
Trowa did an admirable, if not completely successful, job of stifling a chuckle. "It's all right, Heero, you can have my job. There are plenty of other things I can do besides being a living target." He winked at Catherine, who looked like she might spit up her beer with laughing any second.
"Don't get too worried," she said dryly, leaning up to plant a kiss on Heero's temple. "As long as Trowa's been enjoying what was supposed to be a short vacation with Quatre, I don't think he's in any hurry to come back anyway."
"I hope not," Quatre chimed sunnily, approaching the trio from where he'd been socialising with Lady Une in some other part of the yard. "I rather like having him with me, I don't want to give him up yet."
Before another word could be spoken, a loud yell erupted from the garden door.
"KISAMA!!!!!!!!!!"
All eyes turned, all bodies spun, but the expected crisis proved to be nothing more than Wufei Chang, leaning casually against the motorcycle he'd drug in with him, wearing faded jeans and a shit-eating grin.
"Just wanted to remind you all how much you missed me," he said, nonchalant, abandoning the motorcycle to join Zechs at the barbecue. "Sally should be on her way...say, do you want a hand with that?"
"And I thought I liked to make an entrance," Trowa grumbled good-naturedly under his breath.
"He's loosened up a bit," Catherine remarked. "Then again, I guess all of you have."
"It's your fault," Trowa and Heero said at once. "Well--and yours," Trowa added to Quatre, who pretended to be quite offended until Trowa agreed to get him another wine cooler from the icebox.
Relena managed to escape the conversational clutches of a pair of admiring Preventers agents to join them. "I'm hungry," she admitted, with a glare toward her brother's fight with Wufei and the barbecue. "Wish they'd hurry up and get that thing going before we all starve."
"Eat chips," Catherine suggested, jerking a finger toward a table spread with all the things that would, eventually, be used on the hamburgers, as well as an extensive variety of snacks. "Lots of chips. They could be at it for a while."
"Good idea!" Relena laughed. "I'll go get some--want me to grab you something? Anybody?"
"Me," Quatre said firmly, just as his stomach growled loud enough to prompt a laugh from Trowa. "I'll go with you."
They made a beeline for the table, intent on finding enough food to tide themselves over til either Zechs or Wufei successfully killed the other, or brought in a more efficient means of lighting the barbecue. "So how you doing?" Quatre asked her when they were out of earshot.
Relena shrugged. "Behind a bit on the gossip. I heard Trowa was staying you finally, but that's about it. Catch me up?"
"Well," Quatre began, sorting through a vegetable tray in search of radishes, "you might have missed out on the part where your brother and Miss Noin got married...."
One of said radishes thumped against his nose. "Actually," Relena commented, trying to look innocent, "I was there for that one. Make yourself useful and tell me something I don't know."
Quatre shrugged, grinning. "All right, all right. Trowa moved in with me, because Heero was suddenly around to take his place. He moved to L3 about a year ago." He shot a conspiratorial glance over his shoulder toward the trio they'd so recently abandoned. "And let's just say there's a reason she's eating all those snacks."
Relena's eyes widened. "Is she--really?"
Quatre winked. "Would I lie to you?" He paused to pop an olive into his mouth before continuing. "Let's see...Hilde was pregnant when Duo and Heero got back to L2, but the guy didn't stick around. That's where the rather precocious little person our sister-in-law is holding comes from. Wufei is engaged to Sally Po, but we all saw that coming ages ago. And you see more of Dorothy than I do, so I won't hazard a guess as to what she's been up to. That help?"
Relena chuckled. "Immensely. I'm sorry I'm so behind on it all."
Quatre hugged her impulsively, almost capsizing the plate of edibles she'd spent the past several minutes stacking. "Don't worry about it. We love you anyway."
Relena wrinkled her nose. "A lot of good that does me...we're related, remember? Besides, Trowa'd kill me."
Quatre quelled a rather horrified expression and pocketed the remainder of the radishes. "Very witty. Come on, let's get back to the party."
And a burst of flame alerted them that the barbecue had finally been started successfully.
"I see Nataku has more domestic uses after all," a voice suspiciously like Zechs' said calmly.
"Nataku," another voice--Wufei--said solemnly, "can be the goddess of hamburgers if she wants to be."
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