"War Dogs"

Written By: Honor

Disclaimers: Roses are red, violets are blue, the GW boys are mine, and that’s the truth!

Shigeki: You can’t rhyme worth a darn. And they aren’t yours.

Honor:…remind me. Why did I think getting a muse was a good idea?

Warnings: yaoi, some sexy scenes, romance, my odd humor, bit of language, bit of violence

Rating: NC-17

Betas: Velvet and Caitilin

Author’s Insane notes: Inspired by a story that actually happened to my mom. She told it to me often as I was growing up, so she can legitimately be blamed for the entire idea. And Wingnut requested a 2x3, which makes two people to blame. ^_^ I love having someone in mind to blame.

=thought= *emphasized*

"War Dogs "

Chapter Eight: Yankees

Even Southern babies know that "Gimme some sugar" is not a request for the white, granular sweet substance that sits in a pretty little bowl in the middle of the table.

Glenn Maxwell wasn’t sure about his reception in going over to Trowa’s house for dinner. He knew that Duo and Trowa would welcome him, but he wasn’t sure about these Yankee friends of Trowa’s. Still, he liked Trowa well enough, and from what he could see the boy had good taste in friends. Odds were it would be a pleasant evening. In the end, he went, driving the twenty miles to Trowa’s house.

When he knocked, it was the dog that let him in, sniffing at his hand and barking in greeting. It surprised Glenn that the dog was smart enough to open the door, but he patted him and smiled. “Hello. Where’s your master, eh?”

Barking again, King turned and led him further into the house. Glenn absently shut the door before following his furry guide. The house looked good—much better than all that pink there’d been before.

“Who is it King?” A blond man came out of the living room, eyes quickly taking in Glenn. “Hello. I’m Quatre Winner. I assume you’re a friend, otherwise King wouldn’t have let you in.”

“Glenn Maxwell,” Glenn answered easily while shaking hands. Well, this boy seemed friendly enough.

“Ah, Duo’s father! I should have realized since you have the same smile. Come in and get comfortable. Trowa and Duo ran to get drinks. Apparently my absent minded friend forgot them when he went grocery shopping earlier.” Smiling good naturedly, he waved towards the open living room.

Glenn stepped into the room, eyes taking in the overstuffed furniture and the overall masculine color scheme. But mostly he noticed the other man comfortably settled on the couch. He was at least part Asian, if the slant of his eyes was anything to go by, and darkly handsome.

Quatre decided to do the introductions, saving another self introduction. “Mr. Maxwell, this is my lover Heero Yuy. Heero, Glenn Maxwell, Duo’s father.”

Glenn nearly choked—these two were also involved? Was the whole world turning gay?—but managed to smile and nod. “Hello.”

Heero inclined his head in return, a slight smile tugging at his mouth. “Yoroshiku onegaishimasu. Please make yourself comfortable.”

Seeing his uncertain glance, Quatre played nice. “That meant, very roughly, ‘nice to meet you’. After five years of knowing him, I’ve picked up a great deal of Japanese. Heero, try not to bombard the nice man with sporadic phrases.”

“English is too limiting,” Heero responded with a brief frown. “And if he raised Duo, then I have doubts on how nice he is.”

Glenn chuckled as he sank into a couch. Actually, this wasn’t as awkward as he feared. It was hard to feel out of place, watching these two banter. “I can proudly say that everything Duo’s learned is from me.”

“I’ll take that as a warning,” Quatre laughed as he snuggled in next to Heero. He kept a careful eye on Glenn to make sure that the older man was not offended by his behavior and relaxed when he saw nothing more than a twinkle of amusement in the older man’s eyes.

King was feeling a little left out on the floor, and since the new person was nice and had lots of empty room next to him on the couch, he jumped up and settled himself comfortably with his head on Glenn's leg. A wrinkled hand started scratching right under his chin, and King's tail thumped happily.

"He is a beautiful dog," Glenn remarked with a slight smile on his face.

"Trowa tells me that we'll get puppies pretty soon. Apparently he bred King to another German Shepherd up here." Quatre was going to make sure that he got one of those puppies too.

Glenn looked up in slight surprise. "Really? Do you know who's?"

"Chang Wufei," Heero answered.

"Ah. Well if it’s a cross between Nataku and King, the puppies are going to be exceptional." Glenn was secretly plotting a way to get one of those puppies, if they lived up to expectation.

Quatre's interest was peaked. "You know them, I take it?"

"Hell, boy, I've been on this mountain my entire life. I know everybody, especially Wufei. He and Duo have been best friends since high school. If there was mischief happening, those two were bound to be involved somehow." A few memories rose to the surface and he grinned. "Truth to tell, I was probably in more than a few of them too."

"Some things are apparently genetic," Quatre noted with a mischievous grin.

Heero just sighed. It was a bad idea to let these two get together, what with Glenn Maxwell being a long-standing prankster and Quatre a natural born pest. He just hoped that he wouldn't be the focus of too many pranks.

"We're back!" Duo's voice called from the front door. He appeared a second later, grinning at his sire. "Hi Dad. Are you playing nice, or do I have to worry about putting the nice Yankees through therapy?"

Glenn looked back over his shoulder, giving his son a perfectly innocent look. "Who, me?"

Duo wasn't fooled for a second. "Yup, you."

"Of course I was. King can vouch for me, can't you boy?"

King, still prone and getting a good scratch, thumped his tail happily.

"He'd vouch for you as long as you kept scratching, and you damn well know it." Duo waved away his father's (fake) wounded look and headed back for the kitchen. "Anyway, let's eat!"

Quatre easily vaulted over the couch and sprinted for the kitchen. "Lasagna, here I come!"

Dinner was relaxed and filled with easy banter. They were down to just a few bites and second helpings when Duo snapped his fingers. "I almost forgot. Quatre, Heero, do you know what jug fishing is?"

They both shook their heads.

"Well that won't do." Duo exchanged a smirk with his sire. "Why don’t we do that tomorrow night? My boat can fit everyone."

"Its fun," Trowa assured his friends with a slight smile. "I think it might be effective too, but I'm not sure. Duo and I got a little…sidetracked before we could catch anything last time."

"I'm game," Quatre assured him brightly. "And I want to go pickin' too at some point."

"That happens Friday," Glenn offered after swallowing another bite of very good lasagna. "Do you play anything?"

"Violin and piano," Quatre answered readily. "I didn't bring my violin because Trowa said there's a piano where you play."

"Sure is. Do you play by ear?"

"I can read music, but if you're jamming I can keep up."

"He means that," Heero agreed with a proud smile at his lover. "I've seen him do it."

Quatre flushed a little under the praise. Clearing his throat slightly he changed the subject. "So when am I going to meet this Wufei that Trowa mentioned?"

"You know, that's a good idea." Duo looked at his boyfriend with a smile. "I think Wufei's off tomorrow, why don’t we invite him to go with us?"

Trowa shrugged, he didn't mind. The few times that he'd met Wufei he'd liked the man. "Go ahead."

Duo glanced around the table and only got approving nods, so he popped up from the table and picked up the kitchen table on the bar nearby and called Wufei up. Cold beer, a boat, fishing, six men and a dog—could life get better?

If there was one thing in the South that was completely unpredictable, it was the weather. Having ice storms in late May was not unheard of, and the mountain people especially tried to prepare for those freak storms so they wouldn't be caught with their breeches down.

As luck would have it, Mother Nature decided to throw a temper tantrum three days into Quatre's and Heero's visit, freezing everything in a thick sheet of ice with little warning. Everything was down—telephone lines, water pipes frozen, tree limbs and sometimes trees themselves littering the road.

The yanks were all staring out of the window in amazement, unable to believe that ice could happen this late into spring—and with such devastating results, at that. Duo, standing next to Trowa, just gave the area a resigned glance. “We haven’t had a storm like this in twenty years. I guess we were about due.”

“This happens every twenty years?” Heero asked incredulously.

“About that,” Duo acknowledged with a slight shrug. “It’s not set in granite or anything, but that’s about right. I better call up Wufei.”

Trowa quirked an eyebrow at him. “Why?”

“He’s probably going to need some help,” Duo commented cryptically. Pulling out his cell phone he called up his friend. “Hey, Wu.”

<Duo, you know all those times you told me about that ice storm when you were four, and I was skeptical? I take it all back now. I can’t believe this! All the pipes in my house are frozen, I can’t even get my heat to work, and the phone lines are down.>

“I’ll refrain from telling you ‘I told you so’,” Duo laughed. “So you need some help getting out of there? Trowa’s house is still in pretty good shape, and it’s got the best location.”

“Yeah, I’m glad my mom insisted on buying me a set now. Pack a bag and hang tight, ‘Fei, we’ll come rescue you.”

<Thanks.>

Duo hung up and smiled at his confused audience. “Let me start at the top. See, we have a habit up here of helping out our neighbors. Most of the people in this neighborhood are in their sixties or older. We have a rope and pulley system that we can set up pretty quickly, which allows us to get food and wood to them. Either my house or Trowa’s is the best place to call headquarters. I’m going to go get Wufei—his house isn’t insulated enough and he’s freezing over there. It might take me a while to break in, apparently all of his doors are frozen shut.”

“I’ll go with you,” Heero told him firmly. “I served in the Artic for a few months, I know how to deal with ice.”

“Where are the ropes and pulleys?” Trowa asked, thinking rapidly.

“Back right corner in my basement,” Duo answered promptly. “You wanna set those up while I get ‘Fei?”

Trowa just nodded. “Quatre?”

“I’ll go with you,” Quatre answered Trowa with a smile. “I think it’s a bit much to set up that kind of pulley network without help. But I’m borrowing a coat first, I didn’t bring any kind of winter gear.”

They split up, each heading off in different directions. It was decided that King would go with Duo and Heero, and Trowa dug up a harness to put on him so that King could help pull things through the ice.

It took an hour to get the pulley system set up, and to dig Wufei out of his house. The Chinaman was swearing up and down that he was going to redo the pipes and heating system in his house so he’d never get caught in this situation again, which Duo found especially hilarious. Wufei was always funny when he was ranting, in Duo’s opinion.

As soon as the pulley network was hooked up, Duo and Trowa started visiting their nearest neighbors. Most of them were alright (they had lived on the mountain most of their lives, after all, and knew what to prepare for) but some of them had been caught unawares. To these people Trowa gave any firewood he could spare, and Duo dug out can goods from his food storage.

By the end of the day, they were five exhausted men—but content and rather pleased ones as well. They had helped quite a few people that day, and that sort of service to your fellow man always makes a person feel proud. Trowa built a fire in the living room fireplace, Duo and Heero managed to make dinner (mostly hot chocolate and hot dogs, as they were easy things to cook over an open fire) and they all made a huge nest of pillows and blankets right in front of the hearth. It was, after all, the warmest place in the house.

That was pretty much the routine for the next three days—until Mother Nature decided to cut them some slack and let the ice melt. They got up, ate anything that didn’t take much cooking, checked on all of their neighbors, helped in whatever way they could, then retreated back to the house.

It was on the third night that Heero was staring absently into the fire, his fingers idly twirling in the blond hair splayed over his lap. Everyone was asleep except Heero and Duo—and had been for at least a half hour. Quatre was curled comfortably around his lover (the better to use as a heat source) and Trowa was similarly arranged around Duo.

Duo was staring at Wufei, wondering how his friend could possibly sleep with his neck at that strange angle, when Heero murmured, “This is a good place, isn’t it?”

Blinking, he switched mental gears and looked at the other man. Heero was still propped up against the edge of the couch, staring at the fire, so Duo wasn’t sure if he was expecting an answer or not. Still, he gave him one regardless. “Yes, it is a good place to live.”

“You all take care of each other up here—even Trowa, who’s new.”

“It’s our way,” Duo answered with a soft smile. “The word neighbor actually means something here, my friend.”

“Yes,” Heero whispered with warm eyes, “I can see that. Think they can use a computer geek and an overactive musically inclined businessman?”

Duo’s smile grew. “I know we can.”

Heero finally turned his head to look at Duo, revealing the almost luminescent smile on his face. “You’re not just saying that?”

“No,” Duo assured him in heartfelt sincerity. “Welcome home, Heero.”

~*~*~*~

Chapter 9

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