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"Lasting Impressions"Written By: Dragonmistress_7 Disclaimer: I don't own the Gundam Wing Boys.
Lasting Impressions
Lasting Impression 17 They sat in the dark corner of the room, nursing drinks and minding their own business. In a place like this, everyone minded their own business and that was just how they liked it. They hadn't spoken in some time, but the blonde Ryuanan's ears kept twitching. Finally, he had to say something. "I can't take this, Heero! I don't know how you can just sit there so calmly." Heero too had heard the story of why the Ansirians were so interested in Trowa. As far as he could tell, there was no motivation but malice and anger that Trowa had escaped his fate. Quatre hadn't said as much, but it had become obvious through his story that his family had wealth and influence. It was folly to risk tangling with a pack of pissed off Ryunans by doing Trowa harm and he told Quatre as much. "I'm more worried about settling this in a timely manner. I'm hoping that they'll have picked up on the fact that Duo's papers were fakes by now. If they figure out who he is that should expedite the process." Heero kept his voice calm and even, so Quatre wouldn't pick up on the fact that he was lying through his teeth. He was exceedingly worried about both Trowa and Duo, and he wouldn't put it past the Ansirian government to `accidentally' do permanent harm to one or both of them. He was working on finding a way to locate them and get them out of wherever they were, but he wasn't doing so well. Every idea he had created more problems instead of more solutions. Out of their view, the door opened. There were soft voices that spoke of trivial things, so they ignored the newcomers. At least, until two forms separated themselves from the others and made their way over to the table. Both wore long, light-weight coats in the Ansirian fashion. One had on large, dark sunglasses that obscured most of his face. The other was just the opposite. He had his hair pulled back and covered with a hat. His face was unmarked, except for a scar that ran from his brow upward into his hairline. Heero was about to ask what they wanted when recognition flared. The look on Quatre's face said he recognized them too. "Budge over," Trowa told an astonished Heero before guiding Duo into the seat beside him. "Be careful. He broke his left arm saving my life." "What? How?" Quatre exclaimed, his hand moving of its own volition to touch Trowa, to reassure himself that his mate was alive and safe. "Ansirian weapons release a weighted chain or wire. Around the legs, they trip you up and stop you. Around the neck, they crush your windpipe." "I heard that thing coming a mile away. My hearing is quite good at the moment," Duo explained. "He shoved me out of the way, but one of the weights hit him in the arm. I heard it snap. We were lucky to get away. Then we broke into a theater and borrowed these clothes and the makeup on my face. After that, we came looking for you." "But how did you find us?" Heero asked. Trowa shrugged and gestured at Duo, who had taken off his sunglasses. "Duo! What did you do?" Quatre gasped. Duo turned and gave Heero the full effect of his unnerving, golden-yellow eyes. "Something stupid that I will probably never be forgiven for." He gave Heero an uneasy smile. "If you're going to hit me, I'd like a little warning. I'm stone blind at the moment. I couldn't tell you where anything or anyone but Quatre is." "Me?" Quatre asked, surprised. Trowa nodded. "He said he could find you, and then his eyes turned all blue. Then they looked like that. Apparently, you're the same color as his eyes are right now. I'm green. I have no idea what that means." Heero remembered Duo's description of Impression and was pretty sure that he did. "Duo! You didn't! Stop doing that this instant!" "I can't. I've been trying since I figured out where you guys were. The most I can do is keep it focused on Quatre." Heero thought about that. This was far too dangerous to be allowed to continue. "Can you Impress while you're unconscious? " Duo sighed. He thought he knew where this was going. "No. That's okay. I was going to be uselessly ill once I suppressed it anyway." "Sorry." Trowa and Quatre watched in shocked silence as Heero pressed his fingertips into the side of Duo's neck until yellow eyes closed and his whole body slumped forward. "Help me get him up. That won't last for more than a few minutes and we'll need something else in place by then. The idiot!" Heero grouched to cover just how afraid he had been. Trowa came through for them. A few minutes later he wordlessly handed Heero some chloroform, a bottle of narcotics and a temporary splint for Duo's arm. He didn't say where he got them and Heero didn't ask. He assumed that it had something to with the females hanging around outside a house down the street. They kept blowing him kisses and telling him to come back and see them sometime. "I can't make you tell me, but I want to know why I just did that. The only reason I went along was because Duo seemed to expect it. How was Duo endangering himself with- whatever the hell it was he was doing?" "Can this wait until we're safely off planet?" Heero asked, shifting Duo's weight. "I'm not belittling your concerns, but it isn't my secret to tell." Trowa leveled a look at him that plainly said that he did not like that answer. Heero scrubbed his free hand through his hair, frustrated. "I'm just the delivery boy, you know? It's my job to get Duo from point A to point B. That's all this was supposed to be. Go to work, get paid. I do it all the time." He shot a mildly annoyed look at his comatose comrade, who was starting to make his arm fall asleep. "For some reason, ever since I met Duo everything has been turned upside down. Now, I have to keep my client and my friend, if there is any doubt, unconscious for his own protection. Am I surprised? HELL NO. Welcome to life with Duo. Here, if you're so worried about him, you carry him for a while." Heero passed the unconscious Nachi to Trowa and handed the rest to Quatre, stalking away. He halted before he reached the end of the block and stood there, seething. He wasn't mad at Trowa or Quatre or Duo. He was mad at that little bitch Discord, who kept lobbing her little golden apples into the middle of his dinner party. He snorted at a reference that only he would get. He seriously needed to get more human friends, smart ones like Sally. With a sigh, he wondered when he'd started caring about having friends at all. He supposed that it, like everything else, had started with Duo. Duo could be friends with anything that held still long enough. Hilde, Trowa and Quatre had seemed like a natural extension of that. Duo's unique gift meant that he had loved them all on sight and they had responded to that. In a shockingly short time, they had come to mean something to Heero, too. As for Wufei, nobody knew anything about him yet, but Heero could tell it would be more of the same. Wufei was an old soul, calm, rich and resonant. At the same time, Heero saw himself in Wufei, the same kind of isolated hunger. An outstretched hand of friendship with no strings attached was a heady offering to someone such as them. If they dared to take it, the results would be a bond for the history books. Impression be damned; that was the kind of bond Heero wanted. He noted an advertisement for a play on a rundown theater halfway down the next block. What was it with this place and the theaters everywhere? He knew that Ansirians were vain, but this bordered on ridiculous. Still, it gave him an idea. Turning back to where the others stood, he motioned them forward and pointed toward the theater. Then he went on ahead to get the tickets. |
