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"Defying Gravity"A Romance in Three PartsWritten By: Kaeru Shisho Disclaimer: I don't own any part of Gundam Wing
or its characters, nor do I make any monetary profit off this story. Rating: NC 17 Warnings: AU, yaoi, some language Summary: A multi part story of romance starting
with a turning point vacation, developing throughout a dangerous UC
mission, and moving ahead through the unexpected challenges of a summer
vacation. "Part Two: It's Back to Work"
Chapter 24
Heero's POV "What?!" Zechs shouted into his cell phone. His hair was loose from the sleek, metal tieback he commonly wore, a long satin curtain reflecting the sulfurous light from the passing street lamps. "What was that again? Absolutely not. I know a club by that name." He leaned toward the limousine driver, Rashid, and said, "Sackgasse. Nightclub on Westside of New Germany." The leader of the Maguanac corps nodded dutifully, enough to acknowledge the man not pay-rolling him. He knew, however, that his young charge, who was seated in the back with the other ex-Gundam pilots, depended on him. "Take the next left, then right on 3rd to Hastor St. then right again." Rashid nodded, bared his teeth, and accelerated to ninety in the next minute. Tires screeched and horns blasted as the car threaded its path toward the other side of town. Luckily it was too late at night for traffic snarls. Zechs had returned to his phone conversation, which was heating up. "Of course you couldn't locate a club called Dead End! Fools! German is the primary language! Sackgasse! What? This is New Germany!" Zechs slammed his cell phone shut and pocketed it. "Duo called the local Preventers agency and gave them his location. Because he used his headquarters ID code, and gave his location as a club translated into English, they transferred the information back to the Sanc office. They've been fucking around in circles trying to look up clubs! In English! Back there! God damn it! Local incompetents! Maxwell was right about them." "Duo's safe!?" Winner cried out. "He called them...from the club?" I repeated, feeling foolish doing so, stultified by the information. "Do the agents have him then?" "No! They called me to find out if that was a code name for a safe house!" Zechs pounded the armrest and groaned in frustration. "You are joking," Chang said. His voice was taut with strain from too little sleep and too much travel. "We notified everyone here of the possibility of his escape before we left headquarters. We have had to fly here from Sanc and they still haven't located him and he even managed to call them and tell them where to pick him up?!" "Heads would roll, but that would leave the agency devoid of employees," Barton muttered. The limo swayed as they took a corner too fast and swayed dangerously in the other direction as they swerved around the next. Chang grumbled beneath his breath about never having the chance to see his offspring. Barton latched onto Winner, protecting the smaller man from becoming 'minced' meat in the Heero/ Barton sandwich. "My apologies, gentlemen, but we are here," Rashid said. We all jumped out of the car probably looking like overeager young men from an all-male private military college on their first night out as we descended onto the club. Steamy, lithe males undulating to the music, clouds of nicotine-infused haze from never-extinguished chain smokers, brain-numbing music in rising crescendos of ear-splitting guitar riffs and discordant synthesizer— I wondered if Duo would like to come back here sometime. Barton tugged on my jacket sleeve. Chang and I had left directly from the office and were dressed in our Preventer's uniforms. He and Winner had been resting back at the dorms and dressed hurriedly in jeans and their Preventer's leather jackets. I noticed he was enough taller than I, so that he could see over a few more heads. I let him drag me to the center of the dance floor, where I saw him. My Duo. He was dancing with an attractive Latino. Barton smoothly inserted himself in the Latino's face, giving me space to pull Duo into my arms. "Hey," I said in his ear. I saw tears tracks on his cheeks. "Hey," he said with a deep sigh. "What took you so long?" "Traffic." Duo rolled his eyes. "Wanna split?" he asked me. "Yeah, sure." "After this dance, though," Duo added, "Never gotta dance with you." We danced together. I melted with him in my arms, grinding against me until I nearly came in my pants. "Ugh," I moaned, humping him while standing there. We might have stayed that way, forgetting everything going on around us, until gentle but firm hands pushed through the throngs, past the door, and to the waiting limousine, this time surrounded by police and faceless Preventer's agents. "By the way," Duo said in my ear. "I left Raul tied up outside the building I'd been trapped in. They should pick him up before he gets away." "Raul?" I froze. "They found him dead in a shuttle compartment." I struggled to recall what it was that Barton had said about Raul. I realized that I'd been distracted by worry at the time, instead of listening to what he'd said. "A body might have been ID'd under his other name." "I know who I saw and pounded. I may be pretty messed up with drugs, but that guy was unmistakably Raul, the same Raul that cold-cocked me in Marrakech. I do not forget a face, 'Ro." I grabbed the first agent I saw and passed on the information with a stat code. He looked at me then Duo, eyes widening with recognition. "Agent Yuy? Maxwell? Is that you? Hey, Ramir, get over here. Here they are. Man, I'm sure glad it was you and not me that got put on the case. Um, I'm Agent Williams. Ramir and I were originally picked to share extraction duty with you and Agent Chang." I registered both their faces now. I had seen them every day at headquarters. "Yes, I know. You are responsible for the data stream analysis from the collars. Duo, this man helped locate you." "Thanks?" Duo smiled faintly. He was fading as the adrenalin wore off. I suspected he'd been running on empty for some time. "So, ah, that's your undercover look, eh, Duo?" Duo smiled and looked over his skimpy clothes, hair swaying loose past his knees. "Yeah, um. 'Ro? It's cold. What time is it anyway?" "Late." Winner had been waiting his chance to greet his friend. His hug was brief without a lingering touch. I was not sorry to have killed that intimate contact they'd shared in the past. "Duo, we are all here and the car is over there, waiting. It's warm inside." No sooner had the words passed his lips, than we heard shouting in the opposite direction. Duo stopped in his tracks. I turned at the noise of a disturbance coming our way. Two men wearing Preventer's uniforms embellished with New Germany insignia pushed through the swelling crowd. I had only seen one of their faces before. If the Preventer's Agent in Charge, Klaus Bauer, thought he could start pushing his weight around now, he was mistaken. Winner recognized him, too, and moved in front of Duo. "Where's that boy? I wanna look at him before you drag his ass off to headquarters!" The other agent in tow was red-faced and looked like a nervous stutterer to me. I guessed that to be junior agent Prior. Winner and I were ready for a fight. Duo did not deserve a dressing down from these bastards. "Okay, which one's Scythe, the one with the eagle-eye and impossibly accurate shot? I wanna thank you for taking that man out without barely a scratch. That was one hellava shot, I gotta tellya!" Bauer raved on. Duo stuck out a hand, "Yeah?" "Shit, boy. You're not at all what I thought you'd look like." "Undercover?" Duo said. "Right, gotcha. And which is that Wing-man calling the shots?" "I was an intermediary," I said. "Sand handled strategy." Winner stepped forward and said something thoughtful. I remembered why we had a pressing need to get out of there. "Have you been part of the arresting forces over at Jade Pharmaceuticals?" I asked. "Yes, got that Alric Gunter carted off and the place is crawling with CI and DEA men. Why?" "Did you pick up a man outside... where was that?" I asked Duo. "Back loading dock next to a freight elevator." Bauer questioned Agent Prior, but the answer was "no." "That man's dangerous. Name's Raul," I said, my anger ramping up. "Race you there!" Duo shouted. His fingers gripped my jacket and he yanked me around, hauling me through the crowd to the alley. I didn't waste breath asking what he was doing; I could guess. "Nice ride. Where you get this?" I asked as I climbed onto the motorcycle behind him and wrapped my arms around his waist. "Chemical plant parking lot. We'll return it in a minute." He grinned as if that would make stealing it okay. Guess it did, all things considered. "Babe, that's a great way to warm me up. Just keep on holding me tight!" Somehow he wound his crazy way through alleys and side streets, back tracking the path he must have taken earlier. I smiled into his back, wondering how others might see this rash act of ours. Maybe I was a fool to listen to my lover's drug-induced words, words that propelled us through New Germany on a stolen bike hell-bent on finding a man I already knew was dead hundreds of miles away. Was madness catching? No, but I bet the active agents from the drugs now seeping from my lover's skin to mine through our close contact were. I found I didn't care. He actually did drive straight for the parking lot first and parked the bike where he'd found it. He said so and I believed him. Together, Duo and I jogged around to the loading area. The light was poor, the only illumination streaming from a single lamp inside the partially open elevator. I grabbed hold of his mesh shirt and jerked him into the shadows, drawing my gun to cover us. "The belt I used to tie him up is there. Damn! He got away. I lost my cross, 'Ro. I gotta go look for it." I saw what he pointed to and nodded. "Be careful. He might still be lurking about." "Watch my back." "Always." I didn't like the fact that the elevator door was still open. I scanned the dark shapeless masses then patted my inner pocket feeling for the night scope glasses. Raul should have shut it to make it operational again. Unless he needed the light to see-- I didn't notice Duo's progress toward the dock until he had jumped up onto the raised landing. He stood silhouetted, using the elevator light to see by. "Get down!" I shouted. I reached into by pocket and was relieved to find my night vision glasses where I'd put them in a moment of clarity, which seemed few and far between lately. I had a moment to scan the darkness to one side. As I twisted around to look into the dark alleyway, I heard the sound of a heavy foot. I hoped Duo's reflexes were better than mine. I hoped he was flat on his belly as I dove toward the feet of the figure emerging from behind a row of barrels marked "NXC," noxious chemical storage containers. My thigh hit a loose piece of copper pipe hard as I rolled into position. Between the unexpected pain and the small amount of drugs from my contact with Duo's sweat, my concentration faded as I drew my gun, aimed and fired. Aiming for extremities, I corrected my aim and fired again and again, going for a maiming hit of any kind. I heard other shots coming from several directions, rolled into a crouch and found new targets. An alarm alerted my brain to pull up as I recognized the voices of agents identifying themselves. "Officers of the law! Put down your weapons!" With one more look back to see that the man in the alley was hunched over, gripping an arm and one of the Preventer agents stooped near, checking for other weapons, I stumbled to my feet to find Duo. Bauer reached him first and hauled him to his feet. "You okay, kid?" I heard the best sound I'd heard all night. "Yeah, found my chain, too." Duo looked around and spotted me limping over. His makeshift braid had come loose and his hair was everywhere. "You're hurt, Heero." "Nothing. Leg hit an obstruction on a roll." I removed the glasses so I could examine him in the light. He was gorgeous, wild-looking, pumped. "You?" "Fine. The bastard ripped this off when I nailed him and didn't have time to look for it in the dark. Thanks for covering me." Duo dangled his chain and cross in front of my face. I could hear another car pealing into loading area and sirens in the distance. Bauer's expression turned to one of awe. "Heero? He called you... Heero Yuy? Not that Heero Yuy!" "I'm just an agent from headquarters," I affirmed. The other agent was joined by a host of others and an ambulance backed into position near the downed man. "Is that Prior?" Duo asked, cocking his head toward the alley. Bauer nodded. "Hey, Prior!" Duo yelled. "You got the name off that dude's ID yet?" Agent Prior jogged over to join us, demanding, "Who made that shot?" "I did. It was a little high. I encountered a stray pipe and it unbalanced my arm. He's going to make it, isn't he?" I asked. "Damn, you guys up at headquarters are good," he said. "Yeah, you hit his hand and forearm, probably the gun too. I recovered it ten feet away. I think it had blast mark on a side. Let the investigators determine... What is it sir?" Prior paused and addressed his superior. "Damned right he's good. You know who he is? Heero Yuy! Oh, and don't let the clothes put you off this other one, I gotta feeling I know who he is now. " "Duo!" Winner's voice cried out over the din. The thunderous footfalls of several more men, including at least one of the Maguanacs, followed the voice. "You're all right!" Winner forced his way up to us and started patting Duo down, checking for new injuries, this time ignoring my "hands off" warning signals. "Why did you take off like that?" He turned on me next. "Why did you let him?! Heero, you've cut your forehead." Barton and Chang joined us, Chang demanding to know what was going on. "Hey, Quatre, chill out," Barton cooed, patting his back. "Things are okay." "CHILL! There is no chill!" Chang barked. "We just rescued Maxwell, had him and his nitwit boyfriend nearly in the car, when they took off. Do you know we nearly lost you AGAIN?!" "Not really, Chang," Barton put in. Chang leveled his obsidian eyes at Barton then looked askance to notice the other two agents on the scene. "Who the hell are you?" "These are agents Bauer and Prior. Bauer is in charge of the local Preventer's agency." I handled the introductions. "Which is fortunate, because by now they have figured out who we really are. Isn't that right?" Prior nodded. "H-Heero Yuy, Quatre W-winner, T-Trowa Barton, C-Chang Wufei, and D-Duo Maxwell." "Well, damn. I feel better knowing those hotshots I was cursing out really were hotshots. The five Gundam pilots, hot damn! And you all work at headquarters?" "Not for long," Duo muttered after a prolonged period of silence. "So, ah, the guy Heero shot, was that Raul Frolich?" Prior awoke from his stress-induced coma. "Yes, how did you know?" He and I gave him a quick report, enough to satisfy them for the night so we could leave. I didn't think either would be long in their jobs without putting in some re-training time, but that wasn't my job to take care of that night. Rashid opened the door to the limousine and we filed inside. "I hope I missed the excitement," Zechs said from the front seat. "I didn't move. Looked like you all had it covered." "You made the right decision," Chang said, sighing. "I should have remained also." "I just went after Quatre," Barton explained. "I, I have nothing to say," Winner said. "I give up." "It's okay, bud," Duo said kindly. "I appreciate you coming to pick us up. I had a Harley to return. Raul to catch, and he tried to take this," he held up the cross, "when he attacked me." "Raul? But--" Zechs began. "The dude with the dual identities rises from the dead. Some act," Barton said, yawning wide and adjusting Winner's position on his lap, drawing him into the nook of his lanky arm where it rested against the door. "Belongs in the circus." "A story," Duo said with a matching yawn, "which is not going to be discussed anymore tonight. I want to go home, shower, and sleep the sleep of the dead, only the living kind, not the dead-for-real-dead, ya know?" "You look so good, Duo." I leaned close and pulled him onto my lap. Chang didn't mind; it gave him extra room to spread out. I didn't care about what anyone else might think. "So do you, 'Ro. Been a while for you, huh?" He wiggled his butt and grinned mischievously. "Yes," I growled. "I'm pretty good looking myself, so finding sex isn't so much of a problem for me," he said, or Scythe did. He wasn't all Duo, not by a long shot. For a moment I wasn't sure if he was joking or not. He'd been through a lot. I didn't even know how much. I guess my expression said it all. "Hey, didn't mean nothing, 'Ro. So as not to torture you or anything. Gunter drugged me but, as far as I'm aware of, nothing serious happened. I had some confusion, shit, a lot of that, but... So the collar thing worked? He broke parts of it taking it off me. I fixed what I could. Damn, 'Fei? Do you have a hair tie I could use? Having this mess loose is like having a hairy Siamese twin on my back. I didn't have my tools so I had to improvise..." I stopped his rant with a kiss of passion. "Thank you," Chang said with a sigh. "Are we heading to the airport or a hotel, sir?" Rashid asked Winner, catching his eyes in the rearview mirror. "Hotel, please. I can't bear the thought of boarding another plane so soon, as much as I want to see my house, my room, my bed --" "Your boyfriend," Barton put in, hopefully. "Him, too. Him especially!" I let Duo come up for air. My bad. "I kept getting the UC jobs confused. I thought I was in Gunter's house and Mill? You were across the street, and I was stuck there, but I couldn't find any of the bugs I'd put around." "We got the formulas you downloaded," Chang said. "Then an audio feed for about an hour before it cut out for good." "Oh yeah? So, the stuff was good, right? You got Gunter shutdown? And he is locked up, isn't he?" "He is done hurting boys, but we came for you," Winner said. "The rest of Preventer's can do mop up." Zechs twisted around in his front seat. "I spoke to Commander Une. She says 'good job.'" "Tell her she can stick the job!" Duo shouted back. "Hear, hear!" Winner cheered. "Same goes for me, and I mean that in the nicest possible way." "There's a nice way?" Barton asked with a chuckle. "She also says they have Alric Gunter in custody. The fire department put out a kitchen fire in the cafeteria and he was treated for smoke inhalation. He was gasping for air and begging them to go back for his 'Scythe.' Fire chief said there weren't men enough to go hunting for some rich man's weapon collection. They had to restrain Gunter after that. He kept trying to talk with damaged lungs. The fire chief told him that 'Neither were they going in for some long-haired dog who probably had the sense to run for it anyway.'" Duo howled. Hell, it was good to laugh. It was good to hold Duo on my lap and feel him laugh. It was good to hold Duo, my Duo, and know he was whole and alive. He could survive a brutal beating, torture, even having his head shaved, but death, even Shinigami couldn't get by that. "You know what I want?" he asked me. "No, what?" "Sun. I want sunshine, but not heat. Sand and water, but more water than sand. I want the beach." "We can do that!" Winner chirped. "We all get time off for UC work and the beach house is ours if we want it." "Okay," I said. "Beach sounds good to me," Rashid said. "We will pack clothes for several weeks. Would the sirs like assistance packing?" "Maybe. That is very generous of you. I'll be in touch. I'm sure we won't be allowed time off until we've been interviewed by the commander and close out the mission. A week, maybe." Winner sighed. "I'm quitting, just so you all know that." I grunted. I wasn't sure what he meant. Time later. "I would like to see Sally," Wufei said. "There are several cottages. Why not ask her to join you? She'll be taking time off soon enough. I'll bet Commander Une will be very accommodating," Winner pressed. "Sally? Sally Po? She never takes time off," Duo said. "I mean, she'll need to stored that all up for later, right? What am I missing here?" Winner opened his mouth and was about to tell him the news, but Barton wisely covered it with his hand, quickly replacing the hand with his lips. "Mumrph!" I smiled waited for Chang to clear his throat. It was his news to break. "She has agreed to marry me." "Really? Hey, that's great, 'Fei! I don't know what you promised her. Must be your forked, I mean, charmed tongue... Hey!" Chang punched at him half-heartedly. "So while the rest of us are busting our butts on this assignment, you've been carrying on your romance long distance?" Duo said, eyes twinkling, baiting our friend. "Not exactly. I asked her when the rest of us got back. I had a pulled... muscle. We talked in the infirmary." "Yeah?" "None of us have been back to our house, Duo," Winner cut in. "We've all been staying in the dorms at headquarters." "Except for Chang, here, who had a pulled...what was it? Ass?" Barton asked, grinning a rare grin. "Groin," Chang said. "Ah, yes. So, he had to maintain a horizontal position in the medical unit." "I was hurt!" Change insisted. "I was at my desk, or your desk, 20 out of 24 hours a day for the past week. I rested in the infirmary to regain my health." "Uh, huh," Duo said with a sarcastic tone. "It's okay. Fei-man will need all the sleep and strength he can get, because in another seven months he'll be walking the halls all night crying, um, the baby and him doing the crying." Duo was teasing now. God, it was great to hear him just being himself again. Even Chang couldn't be his insufferable stuffy self. I buried my face in his hair and breathed him in. I hugged him hard and held back tears welling in my eyes. "I love you," I whispered, whether Duo could hear me or not. Chang turned away, speaking on his cell phone. Barton and Winner were whispering and kissing alternatively. Zechs was quiet. "Mill...iardo," I said, stumbling over the unfamiliar name. His head turned slowly until he and I could just meet eyes. "Yuy?" "I want to thank you for seeing this mission through. I know I wasn't particularly cooperative at the beginning, and I'd like to apologize for any disrespect I've shown." "Thank you, Heero. Although we may not be teamed again soon, I would be honored to working with you, or any of you again." "Me, too?" Duo asked. "Ah, everyone but Maxwell. You are too... intense for me. Professional, but too much." Milliardo smiled kindly and chuckled. Quatre separated from Trowa's embrace enough to talk. "You'll come stay at the beach house, won't you?" Quatre asked kindly. "Your wife and daughter are invited, of course. There's a cottage just for you. I'm sure they'd like to see you exclusively for awhile, but we've never met them. We wouldn't interfere--." "Okay!" Milliardo said, laughing. "You've convinced me. I will call her now. She's already moved into a temporary place near headquarters." "Why's that?' Duo asked. "Job change. I'll be relocating to Sanc headquarters permanently. Nothing's final yet. I've got several details yet to work out." He pulled out his cell phone and turned to face forward. Chang smiled, but didn't give up his caller. "Sally says that she'd love to join us and that she has accumulated enough time-off to tally a year's paid leave. Thank you, Quatre." Winner's eyes widened and then he smiled and nodded. I don't think I'd heard Chang call any of us by our first names before. A few minutes later, Milliardo contacted his family and secured their agreement to join us. "Thank you, Master Winner. I notified the Maguanacs of your plans. They will enjoy a rest at the beach," Rashid said. "A well deserved one," Milliardo said, "for us all."
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