Smells Like Teen Spirit
by Shannon the Twisted Link Worshiper

(x) X (x)

Game 31
Happiness is a Warm Gun

(x) X (x)

Slipping out of her heels, Relena sneaked into her house through the back door, carrying her shoes so she could pad quietly up to her room, undetected. She and Catherine had been out late at a house party a few streets away. It had been a good time, even if she had found herself coming home a bit more tipsy than she’d intended to. Almost everybody worth seeing in the Romefeller High community had been there: the lacrosse team, the baseball team, the track team and many, many others. However, despite the fact that the entire lacrosse team had been invited, she hadn’t seen Heero among the drunken bodies dancing up a storm through the music-filled house. She was well aware that Heero wasn’t a fan of those kinds of social get-togethers, but she couldn’t help but dream that she’d run into him at one of those parties someday; she even had an elaborate fantasy about how they would hook up recorded in her mind. Sometimes it made her really frustrated that Heero was so reclusive and private. Of course, the more elusive they were, the more fun it was to catch them.

Still, it had been fun enough to make it worth staying out far longer than she’d promised her parents she would be. When she had confirmed that Heero wasn’t there and wasn’t planning on showing up, she’d snagged some other faceless boy on the lacrosse team and spent the evening with him. Her reasoning was that if Milliardo was allowed to stay at school nearly all night working on editing his precious school paper, The Peacemillion, then she could certainly be allowed a few late nights of her own.

She glided in her stocking feet towards the stairs, careful not to step on the third step on her way up because it creaked noisily. Her silent mission was proceeding just as planned until she was about halfway up the staircase, where she tripped over a large, drooling mound of fur that was lying sprawled in the middle of the square landing, asleep.

“Marquise, you stupid, mangy piece of flea-bait!” she hissed as she stumbled over the huge, white dog, falling to her knees with far too much noise to be safe. Tucking a piece of blonde hair behind her ear, she listened intently for any sounds from her sleeping family or the large mutt behind her. “Dumb dog,” Relena growled, giving Marquise a small kick in the stomach as she stood up again.

Apparently that was too much disturbance for Marquise, and he awoke in a flurry of slobber and low yips when he realized that his mistress was home. She may not have liked Marquise very much, but the dog was a lover, not a fighter, and was fond of Milliardo’s step-sister anways. He lumbered up to her and started trying to lick her hands.

“Shut up!” Relena hissed as she grabbed the railing to keep her hands out of the range of Marquise’s rough tongue. She quickly jumped up the next two steps as she tried to ward Marquise off with her foot. “Go away! Go back to sleep, dumb dog!”

A creak from upstairs rang in Relena’s ear, loud enough to worry her that one of her parents had woken up. “Shhh!” she commanded the dog, pressing a finger to her lips as she scampered up the stairs, Marquise trotting gleefully after her. Obviously, the dog seemed to think that Relena had come up with some new kind of game and was too excited to notice things like the fact that it was past midnight and that Relena never played with him.

She ran up the stairs and down the hall to her room. She winced at all the noise she was making, especially with Marquise bounding after her, his long, red tongue lolling over his furry, white jaw. “Why can’t you go shed in Milliardo’s room?” she complained as she reached her bedroom door at last, grabbing the handle and pushing it open. Unfortunately for Relena, just as she was closing the door, Marquise somehow managed to slip in after her. Relena grumbled under her breath as she watched the large dog trot merrily around the rug, shedding hair all over the place. But she didn’t dare try and do any more to get rid of him; that risked making far too much noise, way more than she already had. It was a miracle she had made it so far undetected. “Go away!” she ordered the dog again when he decided to settle in the middle of her carpet to finish his snooze.

“Go away? I thought you liked me!”

Relena was suddenly tense, Marquise now the last thing on her mind. She looked warily around her room, realizing for the first time that the window was wide open, her pink curtains billowing in pink puffs of cotton. She quickly stepped over Marquise and slammed it shut, her eyes vainly adjusting to the dark to find where that familiar voice had come from. Trembling fingers reached to her nearby desk, groping in the shadows for the lamp sitting atop it. She brushed the little switch on the base of the lamp, casting the room in a heavy, yellow glow.

At first, she noticed nothing out of place. The only dishevled thing was the wrinkled, rose-coloured rug in the middle of the floor, where Marquise had gone merrily trotting about. Otherwise, everything else in the pink and white room was just as she’d left it, not a single frill out of line. But when she turned to her large, white-painted-wood sleigh bed, she found the owner of the voice.

“Solo!” she hissed. “What the hell are you doing here?” She frowned and glared as toughly as her pale, blue eyes would allow. He may have been a good ally to have against certain mutants, but she couldn’t deny that the fact he had crept into her room in the dead of night was a little creepy. She wondered what might have happened if she had been sleeping at home when he slipped inside her window.

Lounging amid the humungous heap of plush, pink and creme pillows, his dirty sneakers jammed into the messy pastel comforter, was none other than the infamous White Fang leader. He looked far more ragged than usual, his face crusted with more grime and dirt than she remembered seeing him. The bandanna around his head was stained with a red streak that looked suspiciously like blood. “What? No warm welcome?” he greeted with a sarcastic smile. “Aw, little lady, I though you were more polite than that!”

Relena swallowed any discomforts she might have had, knowing that her relationship with Solo had been one that she had gotten involved with on her own; it was up to her to deal with it. “Sorry. It’s just been a long night and I’m a bit tired,” she said with a small smile and a shrug. She narrowed her eyes a little. “What are you doing here so early in the morning?” A quick glance at the brightly glowing alarm clock by her bed told her that it was about 2:30 a.m.

“It’s been a long night for me too,” Solo answered nonchalantly, fingering the leather lapel of his jacket. He absently polished at one of the metal studs on it with his thumb. “I guess I just wanted to talk.”

“I’m a little too tired to talk, I’m afraid,” Relena said as politely as she could, considering the hour. “Can you please... get out of my bed? I want to go to sleep.” She covered her mouth to shield a convenient yawn.

A devious glint sharpened Solo’s jade-carved eyes as he grinned. “I don’t have to get out of bed for you to come and bed your pretty, blonde head down,” he said suggestively. “We could sort out both our long, hard days together, little lady.”

Relena couldn’t say she was especially fond of the innuendo in Solo’s voice. She frowned and strode across the room, kneeling on the large, wicker chest at the foot of her bed, her hands gripping the curled footboard tightly. “Solo, I really don’t have the time!” she complained. “Unless you’re going to help me do something about that Maxwell brat, I don’t want to hear it!”

“Mmm, Maxwell,” Solo sighed, glancing up at the ceiling as he brought a finger to his lips, sucking on the tip of it gently. “You know,” he said idly, those cold, green eyes of his flicking towards Relena again, “I was just talking to my good doctor friend about him. He’s ever so curious about him. Never had a teleporter to examine b’fore.” Solo chuckled darkly as he added, “Perhaps I could be helpful for the external examination....”

Relena looked at Solo, arching a confused brow. “What are you talking about?”

Solo sighed, folding his arms behind his head, long, stringy bits of blonde hair splayed across the pillows as he moved. “Well, you see, J is what’cha might call a mutant fanatic,” he said. “He’s so fascinated by ‘em and he loves to do tests and things on ‘em, to see what makes them tick, you know?” Solo tapped his chin thoughtfully. “Hmm, I’ve always wanted to know what makes that little monster tick....”

Relena groaned and got to her feet again, slowly pacing around her round carpet. She may have valued Solo’s aquaintance, but that didn’t mean that the kid didn’t creep her out. If it weren’t for the fact that he seemed to have a similar grudge against Duo Maxwell, for whatever reasons, she probably wouldn’t have even given Solo the benefit of her name. “Solo, please let me lay down,” she said, regretting that extra beer she’d gulped down before leaving the party.

“I ain’t stoppin’ ya, sweetheart,” Solo said, scooting over a little and patting the empty spot beside him on the double bed. “C’mon, I don’t bite too hard.”

Finally, fatigue won over and Relena sighed, walking over towards the bed and collapsing on the mattress. She hung halfway off the mattress though, turning inwards so she could keep her eyes on Solo and to keep as much space between her and Solo as possible. Alliances didn’t always include trust. “So why don’t you like mutants?” she asked warily, an endevour to try and learn more about Solo.

“Never had a problem with ‘em ‘till Maxwell came along; we left them alone an’ they left us alone. He was the first one I ever met an’ hopefully the last. Serves me right for trying to let one into me gang. It’s that damn three-fold rule payin’ me back,” Solo growled, suddenly sounding extremely bitter. Relena wasn’t sure if this was a good change or not. “All of Cali gets hung over with that rotten disease and all the poor gotta show for it. Us street rats who’re too poor to afford fancy-shmancy meds get scarred and deformed. We all shoulda suffered t’gether... like a family who shares each other’s hardships an’ all. But not Maxwell. The little brat got outta it scott-free ‘cause he’s got some stupid mutated gene. The freak survives while most of me gang drops dead in the gutter!” A small trace of a teardrop was lingering in the corner of Solo’s eyes, surreal and out of place on his blemished, tough-featured face. “It’s not fucking fair. He’s no better’n the rest of us. We were all meant t’be equals and he screwed us over and sold us out!”

Relena swallowed. Though she had told Solo her grudge against Duo when they had first met, she suddenly felt like her reasons for disliking him were extremely petty. Certainly, she wouldn’t think about forgetting about the indecent act Duo had cornered Heero into, but she felt a pain in her chest at Solo’s story and her heart went out to him. She decided that she wanted to help Solo regain that equality that had been lost to him during the plague days. In that moment, Relena Darlian-Peacecraft had found a new mission. She told him so.

“Eh? What’s that? Little lady’s got a bigger fish to fry than just the slut who ‘napped her boyfriend?” Solo guffawed loudly, forcing Relena to quickly lean across the bed and clamp her hand on his mouth. She was a little uncomfortable being so much closer to Solo, given the circumstances, especially when she felt his tongue dart between her fingers and lick her palm. If he made too much noise and her parents came in and found a strange boy lying in her bed, clothed or not, the consequences would be even worse than if they’d caught her coming home at such an ungodly hour. She pressed a finger to her lip and silently warned him to keep more quiet.

“Don’t think I condone that behaviour,” Relena said, slowly removing her hands from Solo’s impishly grinning mouth. “But what you said about your gang, well, that’s just even worse. I won’t stand for something like that!”

“Nice words for such a fine young woman,” Solo said, rolling onto one side and propping his head up on a crooked elbow. “But since when did fine young women care about rag-tag street gangs?”

“I don’t know,” Relena admitted with a small shrug. “I suppose since you promised to help me out, it’s only fair I help you. Besides, doing so will get us both what we want: you get Maxwell for whatever you want him for and I get Heero. We’re both winners.” She smiled and fixed her mussed hair to rest behind her ears again.

“Heero...?” Solo squinted his eyes pensively before snapping his fingers with realization. “Ah, yes; Maxwell’s bitch. Didn’t quite get a good look at him that first time.” He grinned darkly, knowing full well what kind of seeds he was about to plant. “But I saw him good tonight, actually,” he drawled with that dark grin of his splitting his lips. “Messy brown hair, wild blue eyes? Real pretty Asian mutt, right?” His expression intensified when he saw Relena nod her head. “Mm, the bitch was with Maxwell when we raced earlier.”

“What do you mean by ‘Maxwell’s bitch’?” Relena wailed, almost forgetting her own warning about keeping her voice down. “Are you insinuating that there’e more that Maxwell’s managed to delude Heero with!?” She sounded very panicked.

“Calm, girl. It’s just a nickname me boys came up with Maxwell’s little guard dog, s’all,” Solo said, making a motion with his hand like he was suppressing the noise. “I have to admit, if you can find a way to rope that snarling beast in, t’will be better fer all parties concerned. That bitch can be a right pain in th’ass.”

“Don’t talk about Heero that way!” Relena admonished sternly, bunching her downy, floral-patterned comforter in her hands. “He’s just being used,” she sniffed. “I need to explain that to him... somehow.”

“Whatever you say, princess,” Solo shrugged. “But you really want Maxwell outta the way, you gotta be a bit more pushy. We got a real deal now, me lady?” He stuck out one grubby hand, his mouth quirking into a wry grin.

Relena regarded Solo’s outstretched hand for a few seconds, thinking to herself. She weighed up her dislike of mutants, plus her even greater dislike of Duo, and then had her answer. Her finely manicured hand shot out and snatched Solo’s, pumping it up and down in a rather unladylike handshake. “You bet,” she said with a determined smile.

(x) X (x)

a/n: Yes, I know it’s short, but it’s mostly here just to let you know that I haven’t died and that yes, this story does indeed keep going. Indefinitely. Besides, I bet when you all get to the next chappy, you’ll see--mmpfff--

*removes hand from mouth*

I mean, uh, the chapter title is a Beatles song.... Off the White Album, it is.... *whistles* >.>