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"Standing Outside the Fire"Written By: Honor Disclaimers: Mine! Mine! Mine! Pairings: 2x5, 3x4 Warnings: AU, language, twisted humor, lime, lemon,
some angst, significant OC, brief moments of sap, romance, a bit of
violence Archived: On Gundam Wing Diaries Betas: Velvet *huggles* Author’s Notes: You know those dreams that
you keep dreaming over and over again for weeks? The ones that don’t
go away until you write them down? Yeah, that’s exactly what
happened. I passed the idea by one of my betas, to see if it was worth
putting on paper. Her response was “Write it. NOW.” So I
wrote it. The rest is…ah, what follows after my insane notes.
Feedback is my diet…and I’m getting
pretty lean so send me something to munch on, okay? Flames will result in me tormenting you for your
inability to read warnings. And I’m good at tormenting. Just
ask the boys. *emphasized* /thought/ //phone// "Standing Outside the Fire"
Chapter Ten: They’re Loose There are two kinds of pedestrians—the quick and the dead.
Teenagers were crawling around the campus, mostly asleep on their feet as they shuffled—oh so generally—in the direction of either classrooms or lockers. Their lassitude slowly dissipated as the music reached their ears, and they looked around to see who had dared to leave their stereos blaring as they came into the school parking lot. Then they just stared. The cars gleamed in the early morning light as they pulled into the school parking lot. Duo led the way, purposefully choosing a parking space that had two empty ones next to it. Wufei was hiding a smirk as he saw his fellow student’s reaction to the cars. So was Quatre, but his wasn’t hidden very well. Trowa pulled in next to Duo, and Heero in on the other side of the Corvette. When they turned the cars off, the three brothers oh-so-casually got out, picking their backpacks up from the backseat. Someone from the yearbook and school newspaper ran up, panting hard with camera in hand. She was taking in the sight eagerly, no doubt sensing great pictures for the yearbook, and an interesting article for the newspaper to boot. She elbowed her way through the crowd that had gathered. “Excuse me. I said EXCUSE me! Thank you, jeez, move people! Hi, I’m Mariemaia.” She stopped in front of the five unsure on who to home in on for her story. Since Duo smiled back, she focused all of her energies on him. “Can I get pictures of you guys with your cars? And the full story on where and why you got them?” Duo was in a very good mood. He had a new toy, and the chance to show it off. And he was milking it for all it was worth. “Of course. ‘Ro, Tro, come on.” He didn’t need to try too hard, for the other boys were feeling a little boastful as well. The redhead eagerly went around them, snapping off shots. As she worked she was asking questions, trusting that her tape recorder in her pocket to catch everything. “So, when did you get them?” “Saturday,” Trowa answered quietly. “Yeah, our mom got ‘em for our birthday. Isn’t that cool?” Mariemaia paused and glowered at him briefly. “What are you, rich kids or something?” Duo, remembering his question to Jamie when she had first found him, laughed. “Or something. We had no idea we’d get them, though. In fact, I’m still not sure how she knew what we wanted.” “That would be our doing.” Wufei had stopped trying to hide his amusement at this scene. He cocked a brow at Quatre, letting the blond explain. He was fairly bursting with the need to do so. “Jamie asked us to find out what you wanted,” Quatre confirmed. “I found Trowa’s out almost by accident, but it was much harder to figure out what Heero wanted.” Heero gave him an odd look. “Is that why you wanted to watch Gone in 60 Seconds with me?” “I had to start the conversation *somehow*…” The journalist was thrilled. She was finding out information faster by letting them talk amongst themselves than she would have just asking questions. “So what about your Corvette, Duo?” “He was my mission,” Wufei told her. “And it was rather easy. Maxwell will talk about anything under the sun with no provocation. The trick is getting him to shut up.” “I resent that!” Duo wrinkled his nose at Wufei and stuck his tongue out for good measure. “I can be quiet.” Wufei started ticking off items on his hand. “Yes, when you’re sleeping, eating… Have I missed one?” Duo thought about this. “Underwater.” Wufei granted him the point and lifted a third finger. “Naturally, we must count that.” “Mother Goose was certainly impressed,” Quatre remembered. “She asked us to help her figure it out, and we were able to tell her later that day.” “ ‘Mother Goose’?” Mariemaia repeated blankly. “Ah…we were kinda playing around and gave each other codenames. We called Jamie ‘Mother Goose’. I was 04 and Wufei was 05.” Not wanting to dwell on the subject he quickly added “Anyway, we got the cars through a friend of mine named Howard. If any of you guys need work done on your cars, he’s the man to go to.” “*WHAT*” an icy voice demanded “is going on here?” Every student there recognized the voice instantly. Heiner. He was the disciplinary arm of the school, and no one—not even the good students—had escaped from being the recipient of his glare of warning at one time or another. The crowd quickly dispersed, melting back into the campus buildings before he could recognize them. Six people weren’t so lucky. Mariemaia was somewhat lucky in the fact that she was there with a camera and could honestly say that she was just capturing a shot for the school’s records. The boys, since they had gathered the crowd in the first place, weren’t so lucky. Heiner was not quite six feet tall, but of solid build. You felt his presence even before he got close to you, and you especially felt it if he loomed over you. He made his presence known then, taking in the three cars with frigidity, then their drivers. “New toys?” Duo recognized the moment when he fell into trouble, but he couldn’t resist giving the man a maniac grin. “Yup. Pretty sexy, huh?” “Trouble-magnets, more like it.” Duo turned to Heero thoughtfully. “Isn’t that what the lady at the DMV office said?” “Her exact words were ‘you have too much money to spend’.” Heero’s face was neutral as he replied, but his eyes flickered to his brother’s and they were a little worried. “She was right,” Heiner bit off. “I don’t want to see these things on campus again. Either take the bus, or have your parents drop you off.” “There is a church parking lot across the street,” Wufei intervened quietly. “You can park there.” “I don’t want these cars driven around here, Chang.” Heiner was not happy to have his authority circumvented. “You have no say in what students can drive, Heiner. They have a license, the cars are theirs…they can drive them anywhere they damn well please. If it threatens you in such a way that you do not want them on campus, then they can park in front of the church.” Wufei was silently daring him to press the matter forward. Heiner recognized his limits, such as they were, and jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Get them out of here. And I’d better not see them again.” + Heiner’s intervention had rather spoiled the mood for the rest of the day, but neither Duo nor Quatre would allow them to fall into a funk. When they got back to the house that afternoon an immediate battle was set up in the playroom. This time they chose one where at least four people were playing constantly. Mario Kart. “HEERO! If you bump into me one more time, you’re waking up in the pool!” From the door to the playroom, a camera lens inched into view. None of the room’s occupants noticed this spying eye, and innocently continued to battle it out. The camera panned the area in front of the television, taking in all five boys as they sprawled in different positions over the lovesacks. From right to left it was Wufei, Trowa, Quatre, Duo and Heero. Everyone but Wufei had a control in their hands, eyes glued to the screen as they tried to beat their competitors to the finish line. A lightning bolt went off, and everyone—but Luigi—turned into chibi size. Groans emitted through the other three players, and several dirty looks were shot in Duo’s direction. He soared through and went into the second lap, leaving everyone else flagging in his cybernetic dust. With a pop the players returned to normal size. Mario almost immediately gained three red turtle shells and used them to ruthless advantage. Luigi—or more accurately, Duo—went spiraling into the air. Then Bowser (which Heero was not happy about). Then Toad. “Trowaaaaa~!” Quatre gave his boyfriend a dark glare. “All’s fair in love and…Mario kart.” Trowa’s defense fell on steaming ears. “You do that one more time, and you’re sleeping alone tonight.” Trowa considered this possibility for a weighted moment, even as he turned Mario around a sharp corner. “Ah…Wufei? Don’t you want to have a go?” Wufei snorted. “Coward.” “Prudence,” Trowa corrected loftily. Wufei seized the controls during a straight stretch of road and quickly gained whatever momentum he had lost during the exchange. Jamie chuckled to herself, stealthily withdrawing to avoid detection. As she left the room, she looked down at the files in her camcorder and grinned. This Christmas, she planned on showing the boys her Home Videos. She had managed to capture quite a few interesting…moments. Victory music started playing, Toad doing his typical victory cry. “FEI! That was mean!” “It’s not my fault if you’re slow.” “Luigi isn’t slow!” “Is too.” “IS NOT!” “I beat him, didn’t I?” “…! So I’ll beat you next time!” Jamie rolled her eyes. “Teenagers.” + [Time: 7:05 pm, Same Day] “Aw come on, Wuffikins! Y’know you wanna.” Wufei groaned. Actually, he *did* want to stay. But he *needed* to get his English paper done. “I can’t Duo. I’ll see you tomorrow at school.” “Boooring! Stay.” Wufei shook his head. “I can’t.” Duo sprinted out of the back patio and beside the pool. Taking a set of keys out of his pocket, he dangled them over the edge. “Stay, or in they go!” Wufei recognized the key ring and rolled his eyes. How and when had the wily American grabbed his keys? “Even if you toss them in, I can borrow Jamie’s dryer and be home in a half hour.” Duo leered. It was the only word for it. “Not if I mess with the dryer!” Wufei shook his head, meaning to argue against it. Duo took this as disbelief that he would do such a thing and tossed the keys into the deep end. Wufei ran uselessly to the pool’s edge, staring as the keys sank quickly to the bottom. “Duo…” “Yeah?” Duo was bouncing up and down on his toes, grinning from ear to ear. “You don’t fight fair.” “Two hours.” Duo countered. “Just stay two more hours.” “…no. Really, I can’t.” “Then I guess it’s the hard way~!” + [Four hours later] “WHO UNPLUGGED THE DRYER?!” “Oooops…” ~*~*~*~ Honor: Okay, I admit that chapter didn’t really
do anything. I was just playing. |
