Smells Like Teen Spirit
by Shannon the Twisted Link Worshiper

(x) X (x)

Game 19
What Is and What Should Never Be

(x) X (x)

“Give me something... anything,” Duo groaned to the bartender, slouching forward onto the bar, his braid and hands drooping over the inside edge, face smeared flat against the wooden bartop. By this point, he’d just about given up and dragged himself to a little club on one of the little streets the led down to the boardwalk, one of the few places he’d be sheltered, no questions asked. He let out a small, ironic chuckle; “Just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse. Humph! I’ve had the day from hell, Roy.”

Roy, the bartender and owner of the hip, little establishment, shook his head pulled out a large beer mug and held it under the tap, filling it up with the frothy, amber alcohol. He and Duo had been friends for a while, and he was willing to conveniently forget that Duo was only eighteen for such a trustworthy regular. “Things not working out for ya, Duo?” he said warmly, setting the tall mug next to the crumpled mess of long hair, pale skin and black cloth, which somehow amassed into one very beat and weary Duo. “What’s up?”

“The sky,” Duo deadpanned, lifting his head up from the bar and assuming a somewhat upright position. He reached for the beer and took a long draught, downing almost a third of it in one go. “Thank God for you, Roy,” Duo sighed wholeheartedly, setting the glass back down. “I don’t even know what to tell you. It’s just been a... well, I just don’t even know.” He took another long sip, staring over the thick glass rim of the mug at Roy, a lanky middle-aged man with curly blonde locks and thin, oval-shaped glasses. “I’ve been to hell and back today, and everywhere I go, I bring the Devil with me.”

“I thought you said you are the Devil,” Roy laughed, shining an empty glass, the purplish tinted glow of the black light illuminating his gaunt features in the darkened room. “I thought you had gotten things under control there, Duo!”

“Well, last time I came around, yeah, I did!” Duo snapped, his voice getting ragged, as it usually did whenever he got worked up. He finished the last third of his beer with another huge gulp and set it down with a loud clunk, breathing harshly as he tried to gather his scattered wits. “But then all this shit happened, I don’t know...” He wove his fingers into his hair and pulled at it nervously, finishing his statement; “...I don’t know what to do anymore, Roy....” He sagged there for a while, a wilted flower waiting for a refreshing new rain, before piping up out of the blue: “Yo, Roy, you got a light?”

“Sure,” Roy shrugged, digging around the large pocket on his apron before producing a crumpled pack of cigarettes. He flicked the box open, drew out one of the slender, cancerous sticks of nicotine, and handed it to Duo. “Ask that kid down there for his Zippo,” he said with a jerk of his head as he put the cigarette box away. “You might have to go and shake him a little though. He’s been sitting in a daze ever since he and his friends came in here.”

Duo was nodding his head in agreement as he turned it down the bar to see the boy that Roy was indicating. His smile washed away when his eyes finally came to rest on the person Roy had been talking about. The spinning, multi-coloured strobe lights of the club illuminated the rigid figure of none other than Heero Yuy, leaning forward on one elbow, a waning cigarette burning down to its last embers between two fingers near his lips. At a glance, it seemed like he was focused intently on something right behind the bar, but as the nicotine-hungry Duo scooted down a couple of stools closer, intent on getting his hands on that Zippo even if it meant stealing the damn thing, he was able to see that Heero’s unblinking stare was looking right through everything in front of him, watching without really seeing at all. By the time Duo was sitting on the stool next to Heero, Heero’s cigarette had burned all the way down to his fingers and still, the Japanese boy had yet to react or even bat an eyelash to the small, round burn blistering on his porcelain skin.

It was no wonder that Duo was shocked beyond all belief when he tried to make a pass at Heero’s Zippo, trapped underneath the hand he had pressed atop the bar, and was quickly halted in his thieving by a flashing streak of silver and flesh as Heero snatched up the lighter and jerked it as far from Duo as his arm could stretch. He then settled back into his dull, mannequin-like state, still unaware of the burn on his hand and blankly glaring right ahead. Duo was surprised that Heero had even noticed his presence at all, and was annoyed to find himself rather impressed at the swift reaction Heero had to his usually unnoticed hands.

Duo sighed in defeat, his fingers squeezing the cigarette tightly, almost trying to will the nicotine into his body through his fingers. “Heero, may I please use your Zippo?”

Heero slowly turned his head, but the glassy, forgone expression in his eyes acknowledged Duo as simply another nameless figure in the dimly lit club, like he had never seen him before. “Sure,” he grunted plainly, sliding the lighter down to Duo. His movements were smooth, despite his empty demeanor. It was like he was a puppet hanging on strings, soulless, but being pulled and manipulated in all kinds of directions without his knowing. “Be careful with it,” he added softly, turning back to face straight forward, blindly staring behind the bar again. “It’s old.”

Duo put the fag between his lips and sparked the lighter behind the protection of his cupped hands, lighting the slim roll of nicotine up. He took a deep, first drag, closing his eyes as he withdrew the cigarette and breathing out a brackish cloud into the already smoky air lingering inside the club. He ran his hand through the smoke, letting the atoms of his fingers jump up and mingle around, camouflaged within the thick, gray cloud as he glanced down at the lighter in his other hand. It was small and flat, and made of a heavy, silver-coloured material that made the little thing weighty in his palm. The edges were dulled, a set of large, deep scratches gored across the center of it, obscuring the inscription carved into the metal. Duo took another drag and lifted the Zippo up for closer inspection, barely able to make out the numbers ‘01’ underneath those claw-like marks across it.

“Are you finished with it?” Heero’s lofty voice flitted airily into Duo’s ears. Duo turned his head to look at Heero, who was still staring brainlessly forward. This golem-Heero was seriously frightening to Duo; he would almost rather be fighting with him and suffering all that cruel and cynical commentary than be with him like this. Angry and unfeeling, Heero seemed alive; now he was a dead corpse that was only still breathing. Duo wondered briefly if this was just another defense Heero had employed to hide something buried deep inside, but then quickly dispelled the notion in favour of the idea that this dull Heero was all there really was to him. Duo was not about to admit to himself that he might have actually had a sympathetic thought towards his hated rival.

“Yeah,” Duo said quickly, snapping back to attention and discarding the lighter like it was suddenly hot as a flaming coal. He pushed it back at Heero with a swipe of his knuckles. “Thanks,” he muttered. He watched from the corner of his eye as Heero quickly snatched up his lighter, giving it a rather obsessive-compulsive once-over, as if Duo’s fingerprints could be enough to scald the metallic lighter. It was the most emotion Heero had shown all night, which was actually a little distressing to Duo. He took another long drag of his cigarette, trying to lose himself in the comfort of his nicotine and to ignore the placid boy beside him. They sat side by side in total silence for a while, Duo smoking in morbid quietude, Heero still flat and mute.

“Give me another!” Heero suddenly barked at Roy, lifting an empty glass and shaking it expectantly at the bartender.

The sudden noise and movement from the stoic Japanese boy startled Duo into full alertness, causing him to choke on a lung-full of smoke. Coughing and beating his chest repeatedly, Duo extinguished the remains of his fag in a nearby ashtray and swigged the last of his beer in an effort to purge his mouth of that unwanted smoke. He was well aware of how gross the habit of smoking was, and was glad that he had managed to cut down big time on his addiction to nicotine, now only needing to light up when he was either drinking or depressed.

“I don’t know,” Roy was saying to Heero as Duo reverted his attention to them. “You’ve had quite a few of those already. I don’t mind indulging you a beer here and there, kid, but I’m not out to get you totally smashed, especially since you’re just a teenager.” He sighed, before throwing on a guilty tag to his little speech: “I wouldn’t want to be the one responsible for you getting into some kind of accident on your way home. I’d.... It’s not something I want to think about, you know?” Roy seemed a little detached as he said that last bit, like there was some memory he would rather not talk about.

“Life is cheap; especially mine,” Heero answered darkly, his dark blue eyes glimmering devilishly, glowing like the flashing strobe lights that streaked through the dark club. “I said I want another drink,” he went on plainly, his voice dangerously calm as he dropped a of couple dollars onto the counter-top. “As a paying customer, I’m sure you’ll see your error and fill my glass again.” That strange shimmer flew around Heero’s irises again. “Got it, my friend?”

Roy was trembling a little bit, frightened by this sudden and scary change in Heero’s personality, feeling like he had just met Dr. Jekyll’s other half in the most unwanted way possible. Still, he stuck to his guns and restated firmly: “I’m sorry, but I don’t think you should have any more alcohol. Would you like a root beer, perhaps?” As he was speaking, he reached down and opened a mini-fridge underneath the bar, removing a bottle of the mentioned soda. He held it out like a peace-offering to Heero, who was staring at it like it was a jar of poison. “Come on, I’ll even let you have this one on the house.”

“I want a fucking real beer, dammit!” Heero blew up, knocking Roy’s hand away.

The bottle of root beer almost flew from Roy’s slippery fingers, but the bartender managed to juggle it and save it from falling, though it inexplicably still ended up crashing and exploding on the bartop, a spattered mess of brown glass and fizzy liquid splashing all over the place. Duo was pretty sure he had not seen the bottle hit anything that would make it break. He figured he must have just chugged his drink too fast and was seeing things. A rush like that tended to make his senses muddled.

“You sound like a five-year-old demanding extra dessert,” Duo muttered sarcastically, immediately wishing he hadn’t when that dastardly glare was turned on him, Roy forgotten and left to pick up the pieces of the smashed bottle. “You go from silent, moody asshole to bitchy, screaming asshole faster than a chick with PMS,” Duo went on snidely, as was his usual way, particularly when dealing with Heero. “You sure you’re really a dude?”

“I’m a ‘dude’ just as much as you are,” Heero said, a strange and out-of-place little smirk quirking his pretty, rosy lips. Heero’s eyes swept up and down Duo’s form, giving the braided mechanic the feeling like he was being, tested, searched and evaluated by the world’s most merciless critic, all at one time, which, in a frighteningly real sense, was quite true. “Do you have a problem with that?” Heero asked, his voice suddenly soft with that mysterious purr of his that seemed to twang his speech every now and then. It made Duo shiver.

“You’re... you’re weird,” Duo managed to sputter in a hoarse whisper, distracted by Heero’s eyes. While it wasn’t the first time that Duo had found himself admiring the exotic Japanese boy’s godly looks, specifically those gorgeous eyes of his, it was certainly the first time that Duo had been truly lost in that gaze. His eyes were coloured like bruises, a different shade of blue for his every mood. It enchanted Duo to think that those eyes could change so easily from blank and empty circles to deep, wavering pools that seemed to almost be begging someone to look at them. With his words, Duo could see Heero’s expressive irises darken subtly, and Duo felt like he had just backhanded the guy. He almost felt...

...bad....

“Hey, kid, where’re your friends?” Roy piped up, breaking the trance Heero had locked Duo under. Said violet-eyed boy shook with a very physical spasm that ran down his spine and out along his limbs, which he punctuated with a rough slap across his own cheek, like he was trying to wake himself out of a really bad dream. Only this time, Duo couldn’t say for sure that the dream was all that horrible.

Ah! Can’t be thinking like that, Maxwell! Danger, danger, DANGER!

“Who cares? Obviously not them,” Heero spat bitterly, watching Roy in rapt fascination as he gingerly picked up the jagged shards of bottle still littering the bar. “And why do you?”

“I was just going to suggest that--oh hey!” Roy raised his free hand and waved it about, trying to flag down someone he’d just glimpsed. Duo swerved around on his stool to try and catch who Roy was after, and didn’t have to look hard, because Trowa was soon weaving his way through the crowd towards them, Quatre not far behind.

“Duo!” Quatre exclaimed, bouncing around Trowa and over to his longhaired friend, rambling in a way that was far more characterized by Duo than the usually calm, little blonde boy. “I was beginning to worry about you! I mean, I came over to your place after the game and you weren’t there, so I went off to look for you and then when I got over to Trowa’s place, because I figured that you might have wanted to play with Heero’s Cooper, Trowa said that you had disappeared before the OZ game had even started, which scared me even more and I didn’t even know where to begin looking for you!” He stopped, gasping for a much needed breath.

“Well, here I am,” Duo said plainly, a crooked smile in place upon his features. He looked Trowa up and down, his face wearing the grim expression of an overprotective father letting his child out with a person he didn’t trust. “Trowa, nice to see you,” he ground out as warmly as he could muster, though there were still rough edges of forced friendliness that had yet to be sanded down.

“You too, Duo,” Trowa answered in his quiet and minimally worded way. He turned from Duo and addressed Roy: “What’s up, Mister?”

“Your friend here,” Roy said, jabbing a thumb in Heero’s direction just as the Japanese boy was settling his head in the comforting nest of his folded arms for a little rest, “could probably do with a trip home and a bed to sleep in. He’s had a few too many drinks since he sat down here, and I don’t think that it would be in his best interests to stay here, snoozing on a barstool.”

Quatre frowned, distraught by Heero’s need to drink himself away like that. As he turned to the slumbering, mahogany-haired teen beside Duo, he noticed the ashtray sitting beside him, filled with what seemed like almost half a pack of burnt-out cigarettes; he knew he had seen Heero smoking over at the bar whenever he took a glance, but he hadn’t realized that he’d been through so many! If his nicotine habits were anything like Duo’s, then Quatre figured that Heero needed a comforting hand about then; Duo’s depression could be measured in the number of fags he’d been through in a given period of time. He felt an odd constriction in his Sense, and it took him a couple moments to realize that it was Heero’s heavily-weighted emotions raining down nearby. Quatre placed a sympathetic hand on Heero’s back and patted it gently. “Maybe we should go home,” Quatre said, looking back at Trowa, who had a very strange, neutral expression on his face.

However, Quatre barely had time to notice that look Trowa was giving him, because as his palm fell flat against Heero’s back, he felt a sudden, riveting shock that sparked up his arm and lit up his brain like an electric storm. It felt like a secret passage had just been unlocked within his brain, allowing a torrent of alien thoughts to sneak inside, like they had been standing outside and pounding on the door, waiting to get in. Heero’s drowsy voice was the only thing he could hear now, the sounds of the club drowned out into silence for a few odd, brief seconds. It felt like the world had come to a complete and total stop as his Sense tapped into Heero’s mind.

Just shut up, shut up! Heero’s voice whispered for Quatre’s mind alone, though it seemed like Heero was not aware that Quatre was listening in on his thoughts and half-awake dreaming. Can’t you all just go away and leave me alone? Or just let him take me home, so I don’t have to be here, with all these goddamned people! I just want to be--

“Why?” The tall, slim goalie’s timbre voice cut off the connection, bringing Quatre startling back to reality. Trowa’s stunning, emerald eyes focused like lasers on Quatre’s hand, lying soothingly on Heero’s curved back and rubbing it softly, and realizing this, the blonde boy quickly jerked it away. He can do that for Heero, Trowa thought darkly to himself, but he’ll hardly even hold my hand! What’s his infatuation with Heero? What’s everyone’s infatuation with goddamned Heero!? He soon roped in his jealousy, figuring that Heero needed Quatre’s comfort more than he did right then.

“Because Heero’s not looking so hot, don’t you think?” Quatre said, his free hand grabbing his chest as a painful arrow shot right through his ribcage, embedding itself in his sensitive heart. “I don’t think he’s feeling very good right now. You... you can tell that by just looking at him, can’t you?” Quatre spilled his last sentence out quickly, stumbling over the words a little, afraid that he might phrase something in a way he really shouldn’t.

“Hey, if Trowa’s not ready to go, maybe Duo can bring him back for you two?” Roy said to Quatre, trying to helpful, but ending up with a very angry stare from Duo instead. “They seem to know each other, at any rate,” Roy went on digging his own grave, still not quite sure why Duo’s eye was twitching. “I mean, you seem to be having a good time yourself. Why put a stop to it?”

“And what about me!?” Duo interjected. He hated it when people plotted things about him when he was right there. He’d always been of the opinion that if someone wanted to talk about him, fine, but just not while he was there to hear it. All the same complaints got a little redundant after a while. “Maybe I’m having fun too! But do we think about that?” Duo threw both his hands up defensively, “Noooooooooo. Of course not. What would Maxwell know about his own feelings?” He said the last part with a spiteful-sounding hiss.

“Not a damn thing,” Quatre snapped with a surprising show of sarcasm. “You’re one to talk, Mr. I-Know-Everything-About-Everything-Except-Myself.”

“And just what are we trying to say, Quatre, dearest?” Duo said, his sweetened voice dripping with cynicism as he stood up, holding his back straight so he towered that whole extra four inches he held over Quatre. “Maybe I want to stay here. Maybe I was having a good time plastering myself and drowning my crappy-ass day out with a few good glasses of beer?”

“Even if that’s true, I refuse to sit back and let my most pigheaded friend get totally trashed and then try to drive home,” Quatre shot back fiercely. He raised himself up on his tip-toes and suddenly flung his arms around a surprised Trowa’s neck, pulling the much taller boy down to his level, cradling his head against his shoulder. “Now I intend to stay here and enjoy myself with Trowa here, while you take his poor brother home. It’s the least you could do after being such a jackass to him!”

“I am not!” Duo stammered, his jaw hanging open, flabbergasted that Quatre would turn on him like that. “You’re such a rat, Q!”

But Quatre wasn’t listening. Instead, he was dragging Trowa back to the dance floor on the other side of the club, talking over his shoulder in one of those scary, “don’t-fuck-with-me” tones that seemed to possess him every once in a while, “I want a good report that Heero got home safely, Duo, because if I find out that you dumped him on the side of the road somewhere, I’ll kill you.”

“Think the blonde kid means business,” Roy commented in his usual conversational manner, wiping the bar near Heero’s drooping head. “Better take the boy home before he comes back and kicks your ass, Duo.”

“Quatre’s the kinda guy who’d stop his car to let a caterpillar cross the street instead of just plowing the stupid thing over,” Duo said plainly, resuming his spot on the stool next to Heero, giving the knocked-out boy a look of distaste. “There’s no way he’d lay a finger on me. That’s all talk. He does it all the time.”

“Maybe so, but what about that tall guy with him? He might get pissed if something happens to his brother,” Roy suggested with a quick look over Duo’s shoulder, where he could just make out Quatre and Trowa on the dance floor, moving along to the music nearby one another. (It seemed that neither had worked up the courage to actually ask the other one to dance with him.)

“And that’s a problem for me, why?” Duo asked with an incredulous look on his face. “Let the jerk sleep. It’s his fault for drinking too much in the first place.”

“What’s the big deal, Duo?” Roy wondered, flipping his towel over one shoulder and focusing all his attention on the conversation. “Is it really so hard to do something nice for another person now and then, especially when your best friend asks you to do it for his... uhh... crush....” Roy flustered as he stammered towards the end of his sentence, unsure of how else to phrase it, the images his mind was conjuring up making him flush.

“That’s exactly the problem!” Duo snapped back. “I don’t do anything for guys like them.” He referred to Heero with a knock against his shoulder, jarring the snoozing lacrosse player slightly.

“Nnng, don’ wan’ any ice cream, thanks,” Heero mumbled lazily against his forearm, readjusting his position on his stool, his movements causing one of his untied, yellow sneakers to drop off its sock-clad foot. “Jus’ wanna... sleep, yeah....”

“Oh come on, Duo,” Roy rolled his eyes, exasperated with Duo’s stubbornness. “Look at the poor guy! He’s practically falling off his stool. Just take him home, if not for Quatre, then for me.”

“What have you ever done for....” Duo trailed off, knowing even without the questioning stare Roy was sending to his half-empty beer that it was a stupid argument.

He looked up at Roy, and then glanced back at the dance floor at Trowa and Quatre, who were no longer dancing, but standing amid the writhing mass of bodies, just talking to each other. Quatre kept taking wary looks back over to the bar, his eyes mixed with something that schmered his seriousness towards Duo about taking Heero home and his own nervousness of being alone and so close to Trowa. Standing with them was Trowa’s sister, who had appeared out of nowhere with her queen-bee mistress, Relena. The two of them were airily partaking in Trowa’s and Quatre’s conversation, though Relena’s gaze kept wandering from whoever was speaking at the moment, as if she was looking for someone more worth her time. It was pretty obvious that she suspected and was very disgusted about how Trowa and Quatre felt about one another, even though it was apparent that neither one had the guts to actually admit their feelings to each other.

Duo could tell that Relena really only put up with Trowa, and even Catherine, just for the sake of getting a foot in the door of the house where Heero lived. He ducked back around to face Roy when she started following Quatre’s gaze towards them, her eyes locked on Heero’s slumped-over form. Peeking over his shoulder, he noticed that she was excusing herself from Trowa, Quatre and Catherine, starting over towards them. He spun back around and stood up stiffly, his face set in a firm frown. As much as he disliked Heero, there were still certain kinds of people that Duo cared even less for, one such kind being the leeching, bland, boy-crazed girls, like the one that was heading over towards them right then.

“You’re so lucky I’ve got half a conscience still alive and kicking in here,” Duo told Roy, patting his chest right over his heart as he moved over towards Heero, grabbing him rather roughly by the back of his shirt and jerking him into an upright position. He hauled the half-sleeping boy to his feet, muttering, “Get your feet moving, pal. There’s worse shit on the way than riding in the car with me.”

“Damn straight,” Heero mumbled almost incoherently as Duo steered him towards the door, a guiding hands pressed firmly on his hip and his shoulder. Heero looked back at the stool where he had just been sitting, passed out and noticed Relena as she came to a stop beside it, glaring at it as if it had been the one to make Heero disappear. The frustrated look on her face flourished for a second, making her look bluer than even the brightest strobes swinging across the dance floor. Then she finally got some sense in her head and flagged down Roy; though her words were inaudible to Heero as Duo pushed him out the front door, he heard alarms whirring between his ears to get away as Roy lifted a finger to indicate to Relena where he had gone. “Walk faster. Where’s your damn machine?” Heero growled, the drowsiness of the alcohol still impairing his movements and thought process, despite his sudden gruffness.

“Just here, my God,” Duo sighed as he rooted through his pocket for Deathscythe Hell’s key, wondering for a brief second why he was doing this at all. Why should he care if Relena decided to follow Heero around and try to woo him with her petty sweet-nothings. It wasn’t his problem, and yet he was getting himself involved anyway, despite the fact that he had learned the hard way that one should never get caught up in situations that didn’t concern him, else he get burned. It’s because I just want to give her the good, old middle-fingered salute, Duo told himself firmly, his hands leaving Heero to unlock the little, black coupe’s door.

No longer having Duo to support himself on, Heero stumbled and fell back into a tangled heap on the sidewalk. He scowled and tried to stand up, but to no avail, falling back down again. He soon gave up and laid himself down on his back on the hard concrete, spread-eagled as he stared up at the inky, black, star-splattered sky overhead.

Meanwhile, Duo, totally forgetting Heero’s inebriated and helpless state, had slid into the driver’s seat of his car, ramming the key into the ignition and gunning the engine to life, radio on and lights glowing dimly in the growing darkness.

Duo growled in annoyance again, but it wasn’t because of Heero’s inability to move on his own. Rather, it was because he had just seen Relena walk outside, conveniently deciding that it was time for her to go, right when they were on their way home. That immature, stalker-ish mentality was making him crazy, and he decided right then and there, even if it meant being Heero’s best friend for the night, that he would piss her off. She wanted Heero? No way in hell she was going to get her honey-crusted paws on him if Duo Maxwell had anything to do with it!

{I think.... it’s getting to the point
Where I can be myself again.
It’s getting to the point
Where we have almost made amends.
I think.... it’s getting to the point
That is the hardest part.}

Gentle acoustic guitar riffs playing over Deathscythe Hell’s sound system, Duo clambered out of the Thunderbird and darted over towards the sidewalk like a streaking, black shadow. Kneeling, he helped Heero sit up and got him to his feet, hurrying the dimly-aware lacrosse champion to his car and folding him comfortably into the passenger seat. Feeling oddly like a chauffeur, Duo slammed the door, ran around the front of the car and leapt inside, giving a quick sneer in Relena’s direction as he pulled out of his parking space.

“I don’ wanna to go home,” Heero’s tired, slightly marred voice spoke over the radio, distracting Duo from the road for a moment. But recounting the SUV incident, Duo’s eyes shot back to the road, trying to ignore the vulnerable, almost innocent way that Heero was slumped in the seat beside him.
“What are you talking about?” Duo asked, his voice, though still sarcastic, more subdued than the bite it usually carried when he spoke to Heero. “Of course you want to go home!”

“No, no I don’t,” Heero persisted adamantly. Another quick glance at Heero saw him lazily slouched in the seat, his hand gripping the door’s handle tightly, cheeks and nose flushed with the pink tint of too much drink. “S’boring there, an’ the only ones who ever notice me are Trowa an’ O-kaa-san, sometimes O-tou-san....” He trailed off, his eyes wandering to the street speeding by outside his window.

“You just don’t like your sister, but let’s get something straight, who does?” Duo answered resolutely, his fingers wrapped tightly around the wheel, his knuckles white with tension as they came to a stop at a red light, the crimson signal bathing them both in its bright, reddened hue. “You’re going home, Heero Yuy, so you can lie down and sleep off all that alcohol before your sister and her stupid friends come back.”

“S’not only that,” Heero whispered to himself, and had Duo not been keeping an ear out for any response from Heero, he probably would have missed it. The Japanese boy turned his head, his oriental eyes glazed with a glassy, drunken film, glinting that eerie, exotic blue in the reddened light as he surveyed Duo. “You gotta good profile,” he drawled slowly, his word interrupted by an inconvenient hiccup. He twisted around in his seat as much as his buckled seatbelt would allow, reaching between the seats with an extended finger, which he laid upon Duo’s forehead and drew downwards. Duo’s eyes were frozen wide with shock as that rough-padded fingertip ran over his pert nose and across his surprised, parted lips, around his chin and slipping down his neck, before he slowly drew it away. “Kirei da,” Heero purred softly, eyes slipping closed as he ran that finger over his own lips. “Totemo kirei da....”

{And if you call, I will answer.
And if you fall, I’ll pick you up.
And if you call this disaster,
I’ll point you home.
I’ll point you home.}

“I am... so... taking you... back!” Duo choked out, his head drooping down between his arms, his wide as he gasped desperately for air. He felt like a cold hand had smacked him hard across the face, a line of white, hot fire blazing down his face where Heero’s finger had touched him. “How much did Roy let you have!?”

“Dunno,” Heero slurred, stretching out like a cat, arms over his head. “Seven... eight, maybe? Gotta few shots’a tequila too.” He paused for a second, thinking to himself, before adding: “Maybe more’n that. Can’t remember.” He yawned and curled his arms up against the side of the car, cuddling his head against the crude pillow they formed. “Th’ bartender thought I was older’n I am.”

“Wha-at!? You’re, like, this big!” Duo exclaimed, holding his thumb and index finger about an inch apart.

“Trowa’s real tall,” Heero answered plainly. “An’ people tell me that my deep voice throws ‘em off to my age sometimes.” He started to yawn again, another hiccup cutting the stretch short. “He said I looked like I needed th’ escape ‘neways.” He giggled after that; actually giggled.

{You think.... I only think about you
When we’re both in the same room.
You think I’m only here to witness
The remains of love exhumed.
You think.... we’re here to play
A game of who-loves-more-than-whom.}

Duo was distracted from Heero for a moment as the red glow of the traffic light flicked green; he set his foot down on the gas pedal, surging the car forward at a questionable speed, the engine’s turbo whistling faintly underneath the radio’s music. “I don’t quite see what’s going on here, Yuy, but cut it out,” Duo said once they were going again. He wasn’t really driving with a destination in mind, deciding that he was going to take a long, roundabout route to Heero’s house, unsure as to why he wasn’t in such a rush to ditch the drunken boy. There was something in the back of his mind that kept him from doing that, and knew that Duo had been lying to himself yet again, when he said that his excuse for helping Heero was to keep him away from Relena. “You’re dead drunk, don’t you know that? You don’t even know what the hell you’re saying.”

“Shut up, Maxwell! Yeah I do!” Heero huffed, swaying a little bit, dizzy. “I ‘member you borrowed m’lighter an’ I said that you were pretty.” His cheeks got pinker than they already were. “I meant it. Glad Mr. Treize gotcha t’be our model.”

{And if you call, I will answer.
And if you fall, I’ll pick you up.
And if you call this disaster....}

“You really did have too much to drink,” Duo said firmly, turning onto a quiet side street and pulling into an empty parking space, the few, scattered streetlights along the lonely sidewalk bathing them in a pale, golden shade of yellow, softer than the harsh scarlet glare of the traffic lights. He couldn’t drive safely and talk to Heero like this; he was too distracting when he was spouting all these strange, out-of-character things and looked too adorable with that dazed look in his eyes and that red flush splashed across his cheeks and nose. He hiccuped once more, which just drove Duo even more insane, and he tried his hardest to ignore Heero, turning the key in the ignition to quiet the engine but still leaving the accessories, like the radio and the AC, on. “Listen to me, Yuy, and listen up good,” he said in a rather unkind, blunt tone. “You’re drunk off your ass and talking like a fool. You’re going to go home, puke your brains out and then drop off to sleep. Then you’re gonna wake up tomorrow morning and you’re not gonna remember a damn thing. You’re not gonna remember lending me your lighter or saying that I’m--”

“Yes! Yes, I will!” Heero interrupted suddenly, turning to look at Duo with a desperate look riddling his glazed, bloodshot eyes. “I said you were beautiful an’ I meant it, I swear! I like watchin’ you, an’ I watch you all th’time! You move like a cat, like a panther; a black panther thunderin’ gracefully along like a dartin’ shadow! Your hair swishes ‘round like a tail when you move in a teasin’ kinda way.” He stopped for a second, his eyes wandering from Duo’s, jumping about, searching, until they rested upon Duo’s long rope of braided hair, coiled up on his thigh. He reached across to Duo and picked it up delicately in his hands, running curious fingers through the tufted puff at the braid’s end and along the tight pleats of shiny, chestnut hair.

{You think ... it’s only fair to do what’s best for
You and you alone;
You think it’s only fair to do the same
To me when you’re not home.
I think.... it’s time to make this something
That is more than only fair.}

Meanwhile, Duo was too flabbergasted to move or say anything, a wild barrage of thoughts and reactions assaulting his mind at a speed boggling enough to make him lightheaded. He just gripped the steering wheel tighter, his skin rubbing with painful friction against the leather-covered metal, making it blister and bleed a little. He had been through a lot of things in his life, and yet, he didn’t think he could think of a time that was more frightening than this one, right now.

Heero’s hands were climbing up the braid, tugging Duo’s head closer to his. Soon, they were nose-to-nose with each other, Duo’s hair wrapped up around Heero’s wrist. Heero had that strange, little half-grin on his face as he whispered softly into Duo’s ear. “Y’smell like toffee,” he said, nuzzling the still-shocked Duo’s cheek with his nose. “Real good toffee. I haven’t had toffee since I was ‘bout five years old. I can remember what it smells like though, and you definitely smell like it....” He trailed off, his smile becoming more ambiguous than drunken, which just managed to confuse Duo even more. “Funny, I can’t quite remember how it tastes. Do you know if you taste like toffee too?”

“Heero, please stop this right now,” Duo commanded firmly, though his voice was clearly laced with the panic that surged through his entire being.

“Are you made of toffee, then?” Heero continued in that low, soft whisper; it seemed like he had not heard a single word he had just said. As Duo tried to pull away, Heero tugged his braid towards him, pulling Duo closer again. Duo’s lips curled back into a very distraught shape, his eyes growing even wider than they had been before, if that were at all possible. “Wonder if you....” Suddenly, in a motion that Duo could never have anticipated had his entire existence depended on it, Heero dropped Duo’s braid and pressed his left hand behind Duo’s head, bringing Duo’s lips closer to his as he leaned forward and kissed them. Simultaneously, his right hand reached over towards the radio, twisting up the volume as if to drown out any reaction Duo might try to voice.

{So if you call, I will answer.
And if you fall, I’ll pick you up.
And if you call this disaster,
I’ll point you home.}

Duo’s half-parted lips, though too frozen with confusion and fear to work against Heero’s, were still quivering slightly as Heero’s wet tongue tasted them greedily. The kiss was flavoured with the dry taste of tequila and vanilla, tinged with the lingering aftertaste of nicotine. Duo could smell the alcohol and smoke from the bar lingering in Heero’s hair and on his clothes, smeared into his skin, the scents making the usually stoic boy even more alive than he already seemed at this moment. One of the cynical demons living in Duo’s head spoke up, saying that it was a little ironic that it was now Duo who was being the ice-prince, rather than Heero, who was instead flaming with passion and zeal.

Heero had risen up in his seat, sitting on his knees now, so he could lean closer to Duo, his other hand finding its way into Duo’s thick, soft hair. The kiss was heated, but sloppy and cumbersome due to Heero’s inebriation and Duo’s drained reaction... or lack thereof. Lethargically, Heero drew away, his eyes full of dumb, puppy-love as he looked lazily at the boy he’d just kissed. The yellowish light from the street lights outside shone down into the car, blending its pastel tint into the bright, red flush that had darkened upon Heero’s face. “You do taste like toffee, I think,” Heero finally assessed his experiment with Duo’s mouth. “It’s better than I remember it being.” He slipped his hands from Duo’s head and crept back into his seat, rearranging himself in a natural sitting position, leaning on the door handle and staring out the window, a private, pleased little smile reflected in the translucent glass.

“C-Come on now,” Duo stuttered shakily, the effects of that surprise kiss finally settling in as he reached around the wheel and twisted the key, roaring the engine back to life. “I’ll take you home.”

Heero glanced back at him briefly, that same mysterious smile of his pasted on his flushed, drunken face.

{But I’m warning you,
Don’t ever do
Those crazy messed-up things that you do.
If you ever do,
I promise you,
I’ll be the first to crucify you.
Now it’s time to prove
That you’ve come back here to rebuild.
Rebuild; rebuild....}

(x) X (x)

Relena stood just outside the club door, watching as that braided villain escorted Heero into his car and motored off. She frowned, annoyed that her quarry had gotten away yet again. “You got away again,” she grumbled to herself, leaning against the wall behind her. She could still hear the music inside the club thundering loudly, the vibrating of the bass undulating through the wall underneath her back. She didn’t want to go back inside though; the entire reason for going to the club in the first place had just been driven off in a drunken mess. “Why don’t you want to be my boyfriend, Heero?” she wondered aloud, folding her arms over her pink shirt. “I was the first person who was nice to you when you first transferred into my school, and I’m still nice to you now! What am I doing wrong?”

“Ever think to ask him?” a low, masculine voice asked from behind, causing Relena to let out a strangled squeal and jump with a start. The speaker continued as he walked outside of the club; “Calling his name down empty streets and out of open windows only works in girlie romances. Guys can’t hear that kind of stuff in real life.”

“Dear God, Milliardo, don’t do that!” Relena huffed, gripping her chest with a shaky hand. When she finally got it together, she stood up straight, a tight frown directed at her longhaired brother as he pulled a new package of cigarettes out of his jacket pocket and banged them against his knee nonchalantly. ”And don’t go nosing into my social life either. What are you even doing here? I thought you had a date with Lucrezia.”

“I do. We came here,” Milliardo explained, his voice carrying an annoyingly cheerful note, twanged to a perfection that would never fail to drive the hell out of his little stepsister.

“Then go hang out with her!” Relena snapped. She really had no patience for Milliardo and his odd, beatnik sort of style. She sighed, turning away from him and staring down the road where she’d seen that braided kid drive off with Heero. That bothered her; she’d hoped that Heero would drive home with her, at least, for starters anyway. But he’s always got something to do, somewhere to go, running all the time, and always away from me. She heaved out another sigh, shaking her head, long honey-gold locks falling over her shoulders as she looked down at her strappy, white sandals. Her face hardened as she replayed the scene of Heero slumping off with the longhaired, hippie-punk weirdo who had suddenly started hanging out with the lacrosse team. He’s treading on someone else’s turf, she thought to herself darkly. He doesn’t belong around people like Heero, especially since he keeps stealing him away from me!

“Oh come on, ‘Lena,” Milliardo drawled in that low baritone of his as he shoved his cigarette box back into his jacket pocket and lit up the one he had taken out. He sauntered over towards his dark blonde sister, taking a long drag from the fag, “Give the boy some air to breathe, for crying out loud! Heero’s allowed to have a couple friends here and there. Underneath all that loudness and bravado, Duo’s a pretty nice kid, a little scared and a little lonely. Heero’ll be okay with him.”

“Stop that!” Relena snapped, crossing her arms and taking a few childish stomps away from Milliardo. She paused, adding on an afterthought: “And that Duo, or whoever, is just a bad influence on Heero. He doesn’t need to hang out with people like... like that!”

“Like what?” Milliardo asked, his voice dipping into a dangerous, flat monotone. He stared at Relena for a moment, and then finally spoke up again, to fill up her bigoted silence. “You don’t know that he’s gay, Relena. You hardly even know his name!”

“And don’t do that either!” Relena snarled back, spinning around, the little braids woven into her long, blonde hair whipping about her face.

“Do what?” Milliardo responded, his voice still serious and dulled to a blunt point. He archedb ,vm his eyebrows and took another long drag of his cigarette, the very expression on his face a challenge. Though it was good sport to simply toy with Relena, sometimes she said things that really got him on edge. He knew she was sheltered and naive, and had prejudices against things she didn’t know a thing about. He hated that.

“That... that weird... mind thing that you do!” Relena tried to explain with a flourish of her hands, her voice cracked and whiny. She looked like she was just an extremely tall four-year-old girl who hadn’t gotten her way. “Keep out of my business!”

“What mind thing...?” Milliardo tried act like he didn’t know what she was talking about as he started prodding into her mind again. “Oh, you mean this mind thing?” He grinned lopsidedly as Relena’s thoughts started playing in his head, like the receiver of a bugging device that was rolling its live recordings for the rest of his curious brain to hear.

As a young boy, he had always had a sixth sense that could feel moods and spirits around him. Eventually, this gift developed into what was called an L3PSY by doctors who had dedicated their lives to mutant research, this system being a means to classify the potency of a mutant’s particular skill. Instead of simply being able to feel emotions and thoughts, now he could actually read them too, and was able to put up mental mind-blocks to keep unwanted visitors out. Most mutant psychics started out around the low L8PSY in their childhood, normally climbing up to L5PSY as they grew older and hovering around there for the rest of their lives. It was an accepted theory in the scientific world that an average human being was an L10PSY, meaning that the Sense was there, but the person just didn’t have the genetic capabilities to hone and use the gift. Milliardo, however, was a bit more powerful than the average psychic mutant, but he knew there was still a small, elite handful out there who he hoped he would never have the chance to meet.

Both of his parents were well aware of his mutation, and though a little creeped out by Milliardo’s power, they’d never made a huge production out of it and instead chose to just ignore it indifferently. Unlike her guardians, Relena was a bit more vocal about her very unfair opinions about her stepbrother. It drove her up the wall when he’d get into her head and then make fun of her for pining after Heero. She was convinced that he just didn’t get it, and told herself repeatedly that she felt bad for poor Lucrezia. She often tried to drive Lucrezia off, telling her that there were better men than her brother, and that he was a rotten choice for a boyfriend. Lucrezia would always laugh and bonk Relena on the nose, telling her that maybe, one day, she’d find some idiot who she’d fall all over no matter what kind of person that turned out to be.

After another moment of silence, Milliardo laughed, saying aloud: “Oh ‘Lena, please! You make it sound like a big brother looking out for his baby sister is a crime! Just because I’m trying to introduce the concept of reality to you doesn’t mean you have to make me out to be the bad guy!”

“You’re a freak, Milliardo,” Relena spat, her voice venomous and disgusting, not at all becoming of the young woman who was meant to act as the school’s student leader. “You’re almost as freakish as Catherine’s brother! At least you don’t have the Winner boy glued to your hip like some kind of simpering pet!”

Milliardo’s hand crumpled tightly around his cigarette, his fingers pressing together so tightly that the paper casing started to tear and fall apart. He moodily flung the ruined cigarette into the street, his eyes burning a ghostly, fiery blue as he spoke, his tone even more menacing than it had been before. “What are you insinuating, Relena?

“What do you think, Mr. Mind-Reader?” Relena shot back. She was putting on her little girl airs again. It worked around her drone-like friends and some of the lesser wits who she tended to hang around with, but Milliardo had never been one to find the act very tactful, and therefore remained immune to her complaints. She liked having her way no matter what, no matter what it took to get there, which was what drove her dislike of Milliardo and her pursuit of Heero’s affections. “All you... you mutant freaks run around like you’re so much better than the rest of us! Well I’ve got news for you, Milliardo! You’re just a scar on the rest of us; a disgusting welt that’s gonna get cut off and thrown away before it contaminates the rest of the world!”

“That’s the most idiotic thing I’ve ever heard,” Milliardo snarled back, looking like a completely different person than the easy-going guy he’d been moments before. “But that’s not what I’m talking about, ‘Lena. What I’m talking about is what you said about Barton and Winner.” He paused and stared hard at his defiant, ignorant sister, and shook his head as he took a glimpse at her thoughts again, knowing already what she was going to say. “You know what? Forget it,” Milliardo said finally, throwing his hands up in the air, tired of the useless debate that seemed to end up being a part of every conversation he ever had with Relena. He turned on his heel and started to stalk back towards the club, putting Relena out of mind and focusing on finding Lucrezia again. Just as he was about to walk back inside, he leaned back and said to Relena in a taunting voice, “If you want Heero so bad, why don’t you go and do something about it instead of standing here and moaning like a wounded animal. It’s damn stressful on the ears, for Christ’s sake!” She could have sworn she heard him mutter; “No wonder he keeps the fuck away from you....”

“Bastard,” Relena grumbled under her breath, turning her back on the club and starting down the sidewalk. “He thinks he knows so damn much about me.”

It seemed like another world outside of Roy’s, where it was loud and full of life; here, on the street, it seemed almost too quiet, making things seem extremely surreal, particularly when the obscure sound infiltrated the silence. She looked up at the loud sound of a passing car, its radio blasting music out its open windows as it sailed by her, whipping her hair and skirt around her body and chilling her pale skin.

{‘Cause it’s a bitter-sweet
Symphony that’s li~ike
Trying to make ends meet;
You’re a slave to money,
Then you di~ie....}

The car roared off into the darkness ahead, leaving her in solitude again. “Wait!” she called feebly, long after the car had become a memory. She held out her hand; “I wanted to ask you if you’d seen a black car, maybe even for a ride too....” She frowned, knowing that there was no one who was going to do something like that for her at this hour. Everyone she could have mooched such a service out of was still partying back at Roy’s. She couldn’t go back there empty-handed without Heero; it would make her look like a fool, possibly ruining her status as the most popular and well-liked girl in all of Romefeller High. The fact that Heero had rejected her yet again could not be made public! Surely, it would ruin her entire social life forever!

She absently kicked a loose pebble by her foot and painfully stubbed her toe. She dragged herself in a self-pitying slump down the sidewalk with no real destination prominently on her mind, her only real wish being that she wanted to find Heero. She was still kind of annoyed at Milliardo from before, and decided that he was as good a target as any to direct her frustrations at, whether they had anything to do with him or not. She just let her feet carry her wherever they felt like going, not paying attention to her surroundings at all.

Suddenly, a glaring, bright light whitened her vision, rendering her blind for a moment, She shielded her eyes with the back of her hand, raising them above the steady beam of light emanating from the glowing headlights of the car parked down the street she had just wandered down. Her dainty fingers still curled over her brow, she took a few clumsy, backward steps into the shadows that loomed up against the sides of the dark, decrepit buildings that ran along the run-down, little, backwater street she had stumbled upon.

No longer impaired by the car’s brilliant headlights, Relena glanced over at the car again, now that she could actually see details without being blinded, and then did a double-take. There, sitting in the flickering, golden glow of the streetlight beside it, was none other than the black Thunderbird Heero and the braided weirdo had clambered into when they’d left the club! This is my big chance! Ah, there must be such a thing as fate! Relena thought to herself excitedly as she slunk a few steps further down the street towards the vehicle, dusting off her skirt and making sure she was fixed up nicely. If I play it nice, maybe I can get a ride with that Maxwell kid and I can make my move on Heero in the backseat on the way....

Her flirting plans were quickly ground to a halt when she got close enough to actually see inside the car. Still hidden in the darkness that shrouded the buildings, jaw slack, eyes wide and hands locked up tight in fists, she watched in grotesque horror as Heero passionately kissed Duo repeatedly, pausing every now and then to nuzzle Duo’s cheek and whisper something to him. “That... that little...!”

“...Slut?” an unfamiliar, new voice supplied from somewhere behind.

Relena jumped with fright for the second time that night, certain that her nerves would be unable to take anymore of this furtive sneaking around behind her back. Standing in the obsidian blackness shrouding the narrow alley running between two, nearby, boarded-up townhouses was a tall, young man with messy, chin-length blond hair. A tattered bandanna was wrapped around his head and a sly Cheshire’s grin adorned his face. Clothes that had definitely seen better days, with large patches and holes ragging them all over, hung loosely off his narrow body. The stranger’s eyes glittered hauntingly in the darkness, scaring Relena. Yet, she still found herself entranced under some strange spell by those eyes at the same time. “Who the hell are you!?” she demanded in a harsh whisper.

“Me? Oh, no one really,” he answered, beckoning her closer. She took a few more tentative steps towards him, still not fully trusting him yet. “I have some friends, but I usually like to work alone, so that’s what they call me.” He bowed low, like a Shakespearean actor; “Solo’s m’name an’ sly’s m’game!”

“Yes, well,” Relena said, wrinkling her nose at the ragamuffin before her. She straightened her posture and looked back over her shoulder, revolted to see Heero’s hands laced into that disgusting rat’s hair. The sight made her even angrier than she was before, and she had to bite her thumb to keep herself from screaming. “Tha’ ‘ore!” she spat around her finger.

“Yeah, that he is,” Solo commented, causing Relena to whirl around again. She frowned darkly at him, her brows melding into a solid gold bar across her nose as she scowled. Eyes focused more on the scene inside Deathscythe than on the cheerleader, Solo leaned on the brick building beside him, crossing his arms as he spoke nonchalantly, like he was commenting on the weather. “I would know. He’ll spread ‘em for anyone if ya know how to push his buttons right. But mmm, is it worth the fight!” Solo said with a lecherous look in his eye and a disquieting smile. Ignoring Relena’s obviously disgusted reaction to the remark, he went on, “So that your boyfriend with him or something? Is he looking for a little ass an’ you’re playin’ hard t’get?”

“No! Not at all!” Relena scoffed, insulted. She would never play hard to get for a boy like Heero! “He’s just not sure what he wants yet.”

“I’ll say,” Solo replied, licking his lips, still watching the two in the car. Heero soon pulled off of Duo, and the wide-eyed braided boy went to start the engine, soon driving off and leaving Relena alone with Solo on the deserted street. “An’ there goes th’ game! Too bad we’ll miss th’ real good show.”

“What’s that little slut going to do with my Heero?!” Relena squealed, panicked and angry. She would be damned before she lost Heero to anyone, particularly some punk boy! “What’s that whore have that I don’t!?”

“Maybe the Little Monster’s got another mutation he never told us about. Sure would explain why the whole gang would rather grab a piece of that little ass than have cash as payment for a win,” Solo quipped quietly to himself, not really intending Relena to hear, though she caught the muttering anyway.

“He’s... a mutant?” Relena asked, her eye twitching involuntarily. Suddenly she pounced on Solo, grabbing the leather lapels of his jacket and shaking him surprisingly hard, considering her size and build. Pale eyes blazing, she screamed at him: “Goddamit! You tell me how I can get him away from that freak and his manipulative little powers! You know a thing or two about that whore and his perverted little ways, don’t you!? You tell me what I should do, right now! Tell me how I can get my Heero!”

Solo turned his face away so he wouldn’t be sprayed by little flecks of spittle anymore. Calmly, he removed her hands from his jacket and wiped off his face, saying, “Well, I know this doctor....”

“Doctor!? What doctor!?” Relena demanded, trying to grab Solo again, though this time, he was ready for the assault and easily blocked her with an arm across her chest.

“This doctor I know, Doctor J,” Solo explained, trying to be patient. He was beginning to see a few ways to use this girl for his own personal gain, beginning with some very juicy revenge on Duo. “He’s really into mutant research, but he got kicked out of the MRP, the Mutant Research Project, because the other four on the team thought he was inhumane. Anyways, I know him now, and he’s alright,” Solo grinned almost wickedly as he started down the alley he had appeared from. Pausing, he turned around and asked Relena: “You got anywhere to be, girl?” When she shook her head, that smile curled upwards in an even more sadistic expression. “Excellent,” he said. “Follow me.”

He barely had to take four steps before Relena was hurrying after him down the hidden, little alleyway.

(x) X (x)

a/n: Hehe, happy, aren’t you? The name of the chapter is a Led Zeppelin song, one of my favourites in fact! The insert song on the radio is by the Bare Naked Ladies and the one Relena hears is by the Verve.

On another note, I just wanted to make a comment about a person pet-peeve of mine. I’ve been getting a lot of reviews that pretty much just dictate “Do this or write that.” Or “This story is taking to long; give me the action!” I’m sorry but let’s rewind and remember that this is my story with my name on it, which means that I get to decide what happens to who and how long it takes! To the first kind of note, I say that as the author, I know where this is going, not to mention that most of it has already been written and will not be changed because of what someone thinks should happen. (You can always write your own story.)

As for people complaining about legnth, well, just sit tight, because you’re in for a huge ride. I said in a note at the beginning that this story would be a long haul and realistically paced. Believe me, I want to have them snogging as bad as you do, but Duo’s got some issues to get over first, ne? I mean, come on guys! Heaven forbid that someone actually tries to make an enjoyable story with some heart in it!

Okay, I’m through; but please keep what I said in mind. Have fun! ^______^