Smells Like Teen Spirit
by Link Worshiper

(x) X (x)

Game 40
Where Boys Fear to Tread

(x) X (x)

“You guys played excellently tonight, despite having Duo leave in the middle of your set,” Trowa commented, his fingers wrapped tightly around Quatre’s hand.

“Well, I’m glad we decided to leave right after we finished. I can’t possibly imagine why Hilde and Dorothy would want to stay; it really makes me wonder what the big to-do about prom is anyway,” Quatre said, swinging one arm amicably as he and Trowa walked down the sidewalk, away from the school, Meilan and Wufei not far behind.

Meilan piped up from behind, “It’s only a big to-do if your name is Relena Peacecraft and your entire world revolves around being perfect and snotty.”

“Oh, don’t be so rough on her,” Quatre chided, twisting his head around in time to see Wufei pat Meilan’s shoulder in agreement. His mouth hardened as he said sternly, “She’s just a kid trying to live her life the best way she knows how.”

“Someone ‘ought to give her a few pointers, then,” Wufei grumbled with a dark glare off to the side. “She’s a very high-maintenance woman.”

“And you complain about me,” Meilan interjected Wufei’s musings, knocking him lightly on the arm. For a girl in a long dress, she packed a pretty solid punch.

All four of them, Trowa included, chuckled at Meilan’s and Wufei’s little spat. It was always interesting how the couples that got along the best weren’t always the ones that had seemingly flawless relationships, but rather the ones that weren’t afraid to disagree or quarrel every once in a while. When the laughter subsided, Wufei was the one to pick up the conversational thread again; “Say, does anyone know where Duo even went?” he asked.

Trowa shrugged, and though the motion seemed like a typical response for the tall, quiet boy, had Wufei been able to see the snarky grin on Trowa’s face, he might have thought otherwise.

“I think he went to hang out with Heero,” Quatre said, voicing almost exactly what Trowa was thinking through no particular intention of his own. “Though where the two of them snuck off to is anyone’s fair bet.”

Trowa sniggered to himself again.

Missing the green-eyed teen’s reaction to Quatre’s statement, Wufei just said tersely, “Well, it figures.”

“What figures?” Meilan asked, looping one of her slender, bronze-tanned arms around one of Wufei’s. “Do you think they’ll still manage to drop by?” She was referring to the small after-party she was throwing back at her place for her friends, to which Heero and Duo had obviously been invited to.

“Another fair bet,” Trowa said as casually as he could muster.

Wufei frowned, his sharp, black eyebrows melding in a crinkle over his nose. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he demanded, too caught up in his question to notice Meilan as she rolled her eyes hopelessly at him. “Are you suggesting that Heero would be the kind of person to blatantly turn down an invitation without even saying a word about why?!”

Trowa stopped and turned around, pulling a stumbling Quatre through the same motions as he did so. He said frankly, “Given a choice between us and Duo, which one do you think he’d pick?”

With that same agitated expression riddling his features, Wufei said bluntly, “Well, it’s not like he can’t bring Duo with him!” He dropped Meilan's arm and took a few angry steps towards Trowa and Quatre, a fist digging into each hip. “I would have never taken Heero for such an ill-mannered person....” Throwing his hands up over his head, he lamented, “You’d think that it would be Heero rubbing off on Maxwell, not the other way around!”

“Oh, Duo has good manners,” Quatre insisted in his friend’s defense. “He just chooses not to use them very often, that’s all.” The sad part about Quatre’s statement was that it was true.

“Negative,” Trowa spoke, answering to Wufei’s previous question as to why Heero wouldn’t just appear on Meilan’s doorstep with Duo in tow. “Last I heard, they were kissing in the parking lot. I really somehow doubt that whatever way they wandered would be in our general direction.” Trowa left it at that and started to walk again, Quatre’s hand still caught up in his. “They took the car,” he added with a smirk. Though he was glad that Heero was actually growing very close to someone, he couldn’t help but resent the fact that it left the rest of them walking.

Meilan let out another chuckle at Trowa’s comment, though Wufei seemed quite baffled by its ambiguity. He stood there with his arms crossed over his chest, thinking about it, as Meilan clicked off in her black high heels after Trowa and Quatre, and then turned bright red when he finally made the connection.

When he caught up with the other three, however, they were standing at the end of the block, unmoving. Across the street was a shadier region of the town, a few blocks of old, boarded-up buildings, which had been waiting to be destroyed for years. Wufei approached slowly, taking in the protective arm Trowa held out in front of Quatre and Meilan. “Why are we stopped?” he hissed into Meilan’s ear when he was right behind her, making the Chinese girl nearly jump out of her skin.

“I thought I saw someone dart into that alley across the street,” Trowa said in a low, cut tone. “It makes me feel like we’re being followed. We are not alone here.”

Having known Trowa for quite some time, Wufei was aware of his mutation and trusted Trowa’s keen senses very much. However, he couldn’t help but think that the green-eyed goalie was being a bit paranoid for Quatre’s sake. “Look, it’s late, and we’re all very tired,” Wufei reasoned, pushing his way past Quatre and Meilan so he could stand beside his taller friend. “We live in a generally safe area, and it was probably just a bum or something. Nothing to worry about.” Feeling confidence when he saw Trowa’s posture relax, he finished, “Now can we please just get to Nataku’s so we can snack and crash?”

“One track mind,” Meilan grumbled, her tense posture also fading away when Trowa’s did.

Wufei chose to candidly ignore her and instead took up the lead, marching across the street, towards the boardwalk, which was only about four more blocks away, past the dark cluster of forgotten townhouses. Warily, Trowa followed with Quatre still in tow and Meilan bringing up the rear. Despite Wufei’s reassurance, Trowa’s bristled moment had set them all on edge, and the feeling was hard to dispel. Trowa’s eyes were still darting all over the place, through shadows and beyond the light cast from the safety of the streets, constantly on the watch for something that might endanger their little party. Meilan was carefully eyeing Quatre, who kept his focus glued on the proud, confident swagger of Wufei as he strode on ahead.

A sharp giggle from somewhere in the blackness snagged Trowa’s attention. He paused again, jerking Quatre to a stop, poised like a frightened kitten as he looked carefully around. “Now I’m certain someone’s hanging around here,” he whispered harshly.

Wufei’s halt was very begrudging, and he turned around to face his friends with a severely irritated expression riddling his features. “What now?” he demanded, tugging at his black bow tie. “It’s not like no one else is allowed to walk around here. Besides, it just sounds like some girl. That scares you?” Once again, Wufei missed the glare Meilan shot in his direction.

“I still don’t like it,” Trowa answered, standing his ground. “Something in the air smells wrong.”

Meilan stepped forward, tapping Trowa’s shoulder. “Well,” she said, “I think the best thing we can do in any case is get home as quickly as possible.”

Just as Trowa was nodding in agreement, the laughter came out again, melded with another, deeper tone, like there was someone else with the merry female. Trowa dropped Quatre’s hand, and with a determined look glinting his eyes, he stalked over towards the old, abandoned buildings that lined the block they were walking down. Using his enhanced senses, he neared the steeply inclined, concrete stoop of one house, his eyes flickering up and down the worn, brick townhouse, its tall, plywood-covered windows and its eerie turret. Carefully stepping on the first step of the old, crumbled stoop, Trowa crept up to the porch and peered through the crack between the frame and the door hanging off its rusty hinges.

“Trowa....” Quatre’s voice was warning as he slowly approached Trowa from behind.

“Quiet, Q,” Trowa said, reaching behind him to make a silencing motion with one hand as he continued to poke just inside the charred door. “There’s someone here,” he hissed to himself. “Someone who isn’t supposed to be....”

The female, who Trowa had now determined was somewhere inside the condemned house, called out loud to whoever she was with, “Where are we going?”

Quatre’s eyes grew wide when he heard the voice. Flying up the stairs, he wrenched Trowa’s shoulder back and whispered harshly into his ear, “Christ, Trowa! That’s Relena!”

“Relena?” Meilan wondered. From her position back on the sidewalk with Wufei, she hadn’t heard the voice as clearly as Trowa and Quatre had.

Quatre motioned for Meilan and Wufei to ascend the tall stair and join them on the tiny, paint-peeled porch. “Trowa, what if she’s still with that Solo character?” he asked in a worried voice as Wufei and Meilan came up from behind. “She might get in trouble... or get hurt!”

“Quatre’s right. Maybe we should go get help,” said Meilan, tugging nervously at one of the cord-twisted button that fastened her Chinese-style dress together.

Wufei gripped the handrail of the stoop, staring intently forward. “It would be too late by the time they came if Solo’s up to something,” he said in a grim tone. “If she’s in trouble, the only help that would come quick enough would be from us.”

Then, as if to confirm their fears, Solo’s rasping voice creaked from somewhere deep inside the old house. “Don’t worry, kiddo,” he said in a voice that reeked with danger. “We’re gonna go find a nice, quiet place where no one will bother us. We can talk about whatever you like, okay?” The sound of shuffling feet and something like a table being shoved aside reverberated throughout the empty house.

Quatre, in a bout of worry and courage, roughly shoved Trowa aside with an arm of hidden strength and threw the door open. “She’s going to get herself... raped or something!” he cried to the other three, who were watching with shocked eyes.

Meilan reached forward tentatively, aiming to grab the sleeve of Quatre’s tuxedo jacket. “Quatre....”

Meilan jumped back in alarm when, suddenly, the small blond boy whirled around, his eyes flaming with a light that none of them had ever seen before. “No, no, no! You don’t understand,” he hissed, slamming his fist into the door so hard, blood oozed from his knuckles. “I can feel it,” he growled low.

“Quatre, take it easy,” Trowa said in an even tone, wrapping an arm around the shuddering boy in an effort to calm him down. “That’s it. Steady, there,” he said as Quatre started breath more evenly.

“Hey, cut that out!” Relena’s voice cut sharply through the heavy silence, jarring Quatre’s newfound calm.

Like a thousand whispers suddenly clamouring all at once inside his mind, Quatre gripped his head in pain. Falling to the creaky, wood-planked floor, he grabbed his head again and started beating his hands against it, as if trying to dispel the strange and painful sensation ripping through his skull. Amid the many voices in his head, some louder than others, he could distinctly hear Trowa’s, Meilan’s and Wufei’s thoughts as if they were his own.

“Quatre, snap out of it!”

“Oh God, Q, stop scaring me!”

“What’s wrong, Quatre!?”

And then there was a rebel thought spoken in Relena’s voice, of all people. Though softer than those of the other three, it was distinct enough for Quatre to make it out, and it did nothing to ease his crumbling nerves. “I wasn’t kidding, Solo! Cut that out!”

Despite that, there was nothing Quatre felt he could do about the throbbing or the mass of thoughts that were overtaking his mind and screaming louder than even his own thinking. He squeezed his eyes shut and kept pounding the sides of his head with the heals of his hands, hardly aware that he was screaming.

Then, it all came to a crashing halt as two large, rough hands grabbed him by the shoulders and almost rudely jerked him to his feet. The hands started shaking him frantically, rocking his body this way and that, and then finally punctuated with a very hard smack across the side of the face. It was that contact that brought Quatre’s mind reeling back to a state of coherence, the chorus of alien thoughts nothing more than a soft din in the back of his mind. Slowly, he opened his eyes and found himself staring up into a pair of worried, tear-dotted, emerald eyes. No sooner had he registered it was Trowa that he was staring at, then was he engulfed in a warm, almost possessive embrace. Quatre could feel Trowa’s sleek muscles shaking uncontrollably as he held him close and buried his nose in Quatre’s blond hair. In his ear, Trowa was whispering words of worry and consolation.

The tender moment was shattered by a piercing scream from somewhere deep in the belly of the house. The quartet looked up in unison, and without even having to consult one another, knew that it was up to them to pull Relena out of the mess she’d created for herself. They burst in past the door and found themselves standing in a wide, open room that had probably once been many before the walls had been ripped out; all that remained were the wooden structures, mazes of ruined wiring and a lot of crumbled plaster. A heavy wooden staircase that wrapped up in circles within the house’s turret was the most intact structure in the sawdust-coated expanse, its steps and railing still of heavy, strong wood.

“Upstairs,” Trowa said simply, already moving hurriedly in that direction. They flew up the dizzying staircase with a stampede of dress shoes that clitter-clattered on the wood as they ran. Reaching the second floor landing, Trowa grabbed the first person he could, who happened to be Meilan, and pulled her off the stairs. “We’ll check this floor. You two keep going,” he ordered in a voice that meant business, and no one argued.

Quatre and Wufei wasted no time in continuing up the stairs towards the third floor. The fruits of Trowa’s consolation were starting to wear off on Quatre, and the strange attack of thoughts was starting to grow louder in his head again, but not wanting to worry Wufei, Quatre simply clutched his temple and pressed onwards.

The top landing was a long platform bent into three sections to fit the shape of the wall. In the middle section was a small, closed door, to which the pair made a beeline for. The maddening sound of their fists beating on the door and their harsh breathing bounced throughout the stairwell, disturbing a family of bats from the beams crisscrossed across the hollow, pointed roof overhead. Quatre and Wufei hardly had time to throw their arms over their heads as the flurry of leathery-winged creatures assailed them from the dark eves and then swooped further down the empty center of the tower.

Rattling the loose, locked handle of the door, Quatre kept shouting, “She’s in there! She’s in there!”

The fact that the door was locked was enough to confirm to Wufei that there was something happening on the other side. “Step aside,” he said to Quatre, shoving him out of the way as he spoke. Backing all the way up to the guard rail, Wufei crouched into a low martial arts stance. It looked a little surreal seeing a young man done up in a very nice, three-piece tuxedo, complete with a corsage pinned on his lapel, stooped like he was about to attack. Then he charged at the door and landed a flying kick on the ancient door, the wood splintering under his scuffed leather shoe. Another fierce kick into the door cracked, his foot caved through. Pulling at the ruined wood, both Wufei and Quatre fought to rip their way into the next room.

But when they got into the other room, neither could quite believe what they saw. The place was a low-ceilinged attic, with dusty dormer windows and a sloped ceiling. All the furniture that was missing from the rest of the house seemed to have been congregated up there; everything from old dressers, tables, chairs and whatnot were cluttered amid boxes of all different sizes. But what had captured Wufei’s and Quatre’s attention was the sight beside a little, rickety, iron bed, where Solo was holding Relena by the wrists with one powerful hand as his other ripped savagely at her blue dress. The screeching tear of fabric filled the air as Solo ripped one fluttering sleeve clean off the dress, yanking a chunk of the bodice with it, which revealed an ample amount of lacy, white bra, much to Relena’s shame.

“Trowa! Meilan! Get up here!” Wufei yelled at the top of his lungs, his eyes already twitching with anger at the atrocious act they had arrived just in the nick of time to stop.

Relena turned her crystal blue eyes towards Wufei and Quatre; for the first time in either of their lives, Wufei and Quatre saw genuine fear in those usually cool and haughty eyes. This was a different young woman than the Relena either of them had met before. This Relena was afraid.

“Let her go,” Wufei growled dangerously, his fists clenching and unclenching at his sides. Behind Wufei, Trowa was climbing through the hole in the door and helping Meilan come after him.

“Well, well, well, what’ve we gots here?” Solo asked in a mocking tone as he turned his attention to the four intruders, his hands still clamped firmly around the whimpering Relena’s wrists. “Looks like the Justice League of America to me,” he sneered, running a hand through his wispy, chin-length blond locks. He looked nothing like the illusion of a refined young man that he had appeared to be hardly hours ago at the prom.

“Solo, what the hell do you think gives you the right to touch a lady like that?” Meilan snarled, looking like a femme fatale from a combat video game in her Chinese dress and heels.

Solo gave the pearl necklace around Relena’s neck a hard tug, snapping the string that held it together and sending the little, white stones scattering. “I don’t recall givin’ you permission t’use my name, bitch,” he said, looking her up and down with disdain in his eyes. He flung the handful of pearls still caught in his hand at Meilan, showering her with the hard spheres.

“I’ll call you whatever the hell I want to!” Meilan roared back in retaliation as she stomped one foot viciously against the floor.

“Look, you lil’ China fuck,” Solo spat at Meilan, “this is between me ‘n’ the lady, so just bugger off, okay? She’s more’n’ capable of taking care of her own messes without any help from th’ likes o’ you.”

Solo swore degradingly as he flung Relena back onto the small bed ruthlessly and took a menacing step towards Meilan and Trowa as Wufei quickly rushed to make sure Relena was okay. The second she was free of Solo’s bruising grip, Relena curled up in a fetal position on the bed and hid her face, even as Wufei put a comforting hand on her back. To tell the truth, she was ashamed to look any of them in the face.

“Meilan, cool it,” Trowa whispered harshly into Meilan’s ear, worried that she would say something to really set the highly-dangerous Solo off. He grabbed her hand and quickly jerked her to his side, ready to make a move if Solo should try something unexpected.

Standing a little off to the side and watching with large, frightened eyes, Quatre found himself frozen in place and unable to move to help either Relena and Wufei or Trowa and Meilan. The noise bouncing throughout his skull was growing in volume as the tenseness of the situation increased, and it was starting to set Quatre off again.

Speaking up in a hushed, fearful voice, Relena whimpered, “Solo, please stop this. Please....” All she got for that was a another fierce tug on her dress, which came with a loud rip.

Meanwhile, Meilan was having trouble keeping her tongue. “You big coward! All you do is talk big and do nothing! Enough with your fucking idle threats to Duo and using girls!” she cried, despite the almost painful grip Trowa set on her fingers every time she threatened Solo.

As the voices in Quatre’s head was reaching its pinnacle, he heard clearly a thread of thought from Solo: “I’ll show you none of my threats are idle, China fuck!” Quatre barely had time to yell as Solo produced a large switch knife from somewhere in his tuxedo jacket and flipped it open to reveal a huge sickle-shaped blade, before charging at Trowa and Meilan. Quatre stumbled forward a few fear-biten steps as Solo whipped the blade back, preparing to strike. Just as Solo started to bring the blade downwards, its target somewhere deep in Meilan’s slim body, Quatre found himself sick to his stomach, and he was forced to close his eyes as bile started churning around in his stomach.

There was a female scream and Wufei’s terrified yell of Meilan’s name, the chaos of shuffling feet, and then pure silence. Quatre slowly reopened his eyes to find Trowa standing between Meilan and Solo, one hand holding Solo’s knife away from Meilan and the other shoving the Chinese girl as far away from the blond maniac as possible.

“Don’t ever... fucking assault a... a girl in my presence,” Trowa panted, obviously a bit winded from the lightning speed at which he’d moved to avert the disaster. Even with his super-sharp reflexes, there was quite a bit of strain that could be put on him after so much time or effort, and given the bare half second that everything transpired in, it was no wonder Trowa looked like he was about to faint.

Solo glared at Trowa, who just returned the expression with a stare just as dirty. Without warning, Solo wheeled back his free hand and knocked Trowa hard across the side of the face with his fist. Only after he’d had that satisfaction did Solo back off, relaxing his attacking arm, though that deadly blade still remained out in the open, glinting in the dim light streaming in through the dirty windows. “Bastard,” he growled with a curling snarl as Trowa gripped his bruised cheek, resentment bristling throughout his entire body.

Quatre quickly glanced in the other direction to see how Wufei and Relena were doing. Wufei had retrieved Relena’s purse from somewhere on the floor and had emptied the contents of it on the bed, though at the moment, the only things that interested him were the pack of tissues he was using to dry Relena’s eyes and the safety pins he was planning to use to fix up her dress so she could have at least a little dignity. Relena didn’t meet anyone’s eyes still, and instead focused on the obnoxious, pink cell phone she cradled in one hand, staring at it as if she didn’t know what it was for.

Meilan’s darting black eyes jumped from Trowa’s stooped, drained form to Solo’s smug one, and in that moment, she made a decision. With a wild cry of justice, she flew at Solo with her fist poised to attack, tearing Quatre’s attention away from Relena and Wufei. Not about to sit back and watch this time, Quatre thundered over towards the fray, but was too late. No sooner had Meilan laid her punch on Solo’s cheek, then did Solo grab her cruelly by the dress and fling her like a rag doll into a large vanity table that sat nearby. Time seemed to drag on forever as Meilan sailed through the air and crashed into the broken mirror on the vanity table, the spikes of glass shattering even more and cutting into Meilan’s body. She was unconscious by the time she hit the floor.

Relena heard the crystalline smashing of the mirror and her head snapped up just in time to see Meilan’s limp body crash through the bottom of the vanity table. A series of whimpers emitted from the back of her throat as she watched Meilan roll from the broken, wood wreckage in a torn mess of bloody scrapes and bruises. It took a while for her to register that the figure wrapped in the torn dress was actually Meilan, but when she finally did, she let out another loud scream.

“You shut the fuck up!” Solo snapped irately over his shoulder at Relena. Wufei bristled at the comment, just an inch away from leaping off the bed and pouncing on Solo.

Meanwhile, Trowa had swept down to the floor to tend to Meilan. Crouched on the floor beside her prone body, he shook her, but got no response. Rolling her onto her back, Trowa frantically shook her shoulders again, growing more and more fearful when even his most jerky motions refused to waken her. He snatched up her wrist in one hand and fumbled frantically to find a pulse, which, when he came across it, was extremely weak. Tipping her body into an upright position, Trowa cradled Meilan against his shoulder and glared darkly at Solo.

“All upset about the poor, little China fuck,” Solo spoke condescendingly at Trowa as he gripped Meilan’s limp body tightly. He rubbed one eye, sneering, “Oh boo hoo. Cry me a river.”

Stepping cautiously forward, Quatre kept watching the scene unfold with calculating eyes. His head was roaring with the rising volume of millions of voices, and he was using all his power to keep himself focused on the present moment. His state of fright was steadily rising with the sounds beating the inside of his skull, and the quivering of his hands was evidence to his nervous fear. There was Solo, slowly approaching Meilan and Trowa, brandishing that giant, curved knife threateningly. Amid the arguing din of thoughts assaulting his mind, Quatre heard his own voice screaming, “Don’t touch Trowa. Don’t touch Trowa. Don’t touch Trowa or Meilan!”

Then, suddenly, something in Quatre’s unstable brain snapped, and the voices reaching an unbearable decibel, screaming and chanting like a demonic chorus in his head, crying out woes and angers that were convulsing through Quatre’s brain as if those thoughts were his own. His fingers clenched tightly against his forehead, pulling roughly at his hair as he gritted his teeth and tried to contain the violent, unyielding pain that was biting his entire body. The wild, primal scream that escaped the usually sweet and friendly Quatre’s mouth seemed to freeze the entire world. Dull, flat aquamarine flooded Quatre’s usually bright and expressive eyes, transforming the kind young man into a strange monster they hardly recognized.

“Eh?” Solo paused to look over his shoulder, knife poised over his head.

Just as he turned his eyes to Quatre, he saw the blonde charging towards him with a ferocity that actually made his heart constrict. Before anyone had realized it, Quatre had grabbed Solo’s arm, his nails digging into Solo’s wrist and actually drawing tiny crescents of crimson blood. “Don’t you fucking lay a finger on either of them,” Quatre growled dangerously, his voice deep and unemotional, nothing like his usual, sunny lilt. “I’ll kill you if you do.”

Solo let out a tiny huff of disregard. “Hmph, like a lil’ pansy flower like you could even begin ta be much more threatenin’ than a bumblebee.”

“Even a bee can sting,” Quatre snarled, tightening his grip around Solo’s wrist. With a deafening crack , Quatre’s fist wrenched Solo’s wrist in such a sickening way, it rendered Solo’s entire hand useless. The knife slipped from Solo’s crumpled hand, almost slicing the bruised skin of his now-broken wrist as it plummeted to the floor. Coldly, Quatre released Solo’s hand and scooped the knife up in one hand, holding its pointed end at Solo threateningly.

It took Solo’s brain a couple moments to figure out just what had happened. At first, his hand was only numb, and then seemed like none of the nerves inside of it were working. But as he stared blankly at the limb, his vision obscured by clumped strands of chin-length blond hair, something registered the crushed bones and the searing pain such an injury caused, and he opened his mouth to let out a scream of shock and agony. “You damn FUCK!” he yelled, gripping his hurting wrist with his good hand to support it. “You shittin’, crazy, lil’ FUCK!”

Quatre seemed indifferent to Solo’s foul language, and instead of reacting with a scathing insult of his own, he simply nudged the blade closer to Solo and asked, “Do you believe in the threefold rule?”

Tears bubbling between his lower lashes, Solo managed to snarl, “The fuck is that?”

“It’s something I highly suggest you familiarize yourself with,” Quatre answered with that same, calculated calm. “The idea basically states that whatever your actions are, they will come back to you threefold.”

“So?” Solo snapped, obviously not making the connection. To his credit, it would be kind of hard for one to be philosophical when one’s wrist had just been snapped in half.

“So,” Quatre continued, not pleased with Solo’s attitude, broken wrist or no, “I think you had better start thinking about what the hell you do from now on, because it’ll just come right back around and bite you in the ass.”

“Oh, yeah right,” Solo brushed it off with a sneer. “What’d I do ta deserve this?” The answer probably should have been apparent, and in retrospect, to ask such a taunting question was probably a bad idea, given Quatre’s current frame of mind, but it wasn’t something that occurred to Solo at the time. Unfortunately for him, it was a shameful thing that he didn’t.

Quatre’s eyes flashed with a true, unbridled hate as he jabbed the knife dangerously close to Solo’s stomach, the sharp tip wearing at the fabric of his oxford as Quatre growled, “Don’t even make me fucking answer that question.”

“Bet’cha don’t have an answer,” Solo said snidely, a smug grin on his face. “You should just learn not ta in’erfere.”

“Well, now I know where Duo gets his charming sense of humour from,” Quatre said with a very dangerous smile on his pale, pink lips to mirror Solo’s. He chuckled darkly, but when Solo tried to join in nervously, the smile evaporated, and Solo felt the sharp prick of the knife-tip dotting his flesh with a pinprick of blood. It was only a prod, but the scarlet rim on the little rip in Solo’s shirt was enough of warning. “Don’t fucking tempt me,” Quatre bit, his eyes honing in on the bloodstain like some kind of carnivore.

Meanwhile, beside Relena, Wufei was absolutely shocked by Quatre’s sudden flip in behaviour. He had never seen anything remotely like it, even when Quatre was in the absolute worst of moods. Glancing quickly at Relena, Wufei could tell that similar thoughts were running through her mind, and that if she had been scared before, it was nothing compared to what she was feeling now. From there, Wufei’s onyx eyes shifted down to the floor behind Solo, where Trowa was still crouched, holding Meilan’s unconscious body as he too watched the frightening scene unfold. He desperately wanted to go over there and take Trowa’s place as Meilan’s caretaker, but instinct told him that moving would be dangerous at that moment. Steeling his nerves as best he could, Wufei swallowed and told himself to be strong until everything was over.

As for Trowa, he was pretty sure he knew what was going on. Unlike Wufei, who didn’t have quite the same perspective on mutants as Trowa did, the fact that Quatre was lost in the insanity of a Zero level shift, similar to what Heero had undergone the year before at championships, was plain as day. Something in Quatre’s mind, combined with the sight of seeing Meilan knocked into a near-death state, must have triggered some chemical that affected Quatre’s mutation and set him off, or so Trowa deduced. Hopefully, there would be some way to reach Quatre before he did something drastic, but at the moment, making sure nothing more happened to Meilan took priority. And to be perfectly frank, anything that Quatre dished out to Solo was probably deserved anyway.

“You know, for a ratty, lil’ mutant, you sure talk big,” Solo snarled at Quatre, relaxing a bit and concentrating all his tenseness on his broken wrist, which he was squeezing far too tightly. “You poke ‘n’ jab ‘n’ taunt, but you ain’t got nothin’ to show for it, do ya?”

Quatre just gritted his teeth and brandished the knife again, as if to dare him to make another comment like that again.

Solo wasn’t paying attention to the fierce glow in Quatre’s greenish-blue eyes, and instead cheated his body away from Quatre. Tossing his chin-length blond hair so it fell all in his face, he used his good hand to make a loose fist. He cracked his knuckles against his thigh and sent Quatre a smart-ass grin as he took a step toward Trowa and Meilan, saying, “Bet if I roughed these two up a bit, ya might get some real bite in ya.” He turned his back to Quatre and smiled devilishly down at the crouched pair. “Would ya like to be roughed up a bit?” he asked Trowa.

Now Trowa found himself caught between a rock and a hard place; in his arms, one of his best friends laid comatose, while above him, one of the most dangerous people he’d ever come across was threatening to beat him within an inch of his life. (The fact that Solo had an injured hand didn’t console Trowa one bit, as he considered Solo to be just as capable with his left hand as his right.) So Trowa, having no other real option, did the best he could, and pulled Meilan close to his chest and curled himself around her, like a turtle crawling into its shell for protection. Then he closed his eyes and prayed for the first time in years.

Never one to make idle threats, Solo had his good hand poised and ready to strike down on Trowa’s vulnerable head, when he suddenly felt a hand claw at his waistcoat and wrench him around. Suddenly, Solo was faced with the horrific image of Quatre, eyes blazing, as he thrust the sickle-like knife forward. As if in slow motion, the deadly blade slit through Solo’s rumpled, white oxford and then penetrated the quivering flesh stretched over his stomach. With agonizing lethargy, Quatre’s hand pushed the knife deeper and deeper into Solo’s abdomen, dragging the blade in a diagonal, carnage-laced line downwards, towards Solo’s hip. Blood founted behind the knife like a crimson wake churned up by some kind of demonic ship as the knife became embedded to its handle. Solo’s wide, surprised, jade-studded eyes watched in sickening fascination as Quatre’s blood-smeared hand slipped off the gore-covered switchblade, leaving it stuck in Solo’s gut as their separate gazes slowly rose to meet one another.

Good hand hovering around the knife, Solo gaped at Quatre, still in shock as to what had just happened. “W-What’d you...?” His fingers tried to grip the handle, but because of his rapid loss of blood as it seeped out of the six-inch gash, he was hardly able to grip the slippery handle.

Eyes narrowing, Quatre growled, “Don’t ever threaten my friends like that again.”

Then, in a show of power like no one in that cramped, unused attic had ever seen before, Quatre let out a hiss, and the knife removed itself at lightning speed from Solo’s body, as if by magic. It floated in the air above the cut for hardly a millisecond, and then flipped about, sailed straight up and flew right back into Solo’s body, dragging itself downwards in another diagonal slash that mirrored the first one without Quatre even laying a finger on it. Quatre watched with grim satisfaction as some bits of Solo’s mutilated insides fell out and hung limply from the sucking wound; Quatre hardly even blinked at the gruesome sight.

Sometime during this violent show, Trowa had looked up and was utterly shocked by what he saw. In his field of vision, just behind Quatre and Solo, Trowa could tell that the same things were running through the minds of both Wufei and Relena. Even Heero’s Zero phase hadn’t been this gruesome, and not to sound unkind, but Heero was more prone to violence than Quatre. Besides, the boy Heero had been responsible for killing had died because of intense injuries that had been incurred accidentally during Heero’s mad fit, not a direct assault. What had happened at championships the year before couldn’t even begin to compare to this murderous scene, and even though Trowa cared for Quatre dearly, he wondered what would become of the poor little blonde because of it.

Frantically, as if it could help, Solo was scooping at his bleeding gut and the bowels of his stomach, trying to force them back inside of his body. His eyes were pained and bloodshot, and a trickle of red-dyed saliva was trickling from the corner of his mouth as he sunk to his knees. He looked slowly over his shoulder, and his gaze locked with Trowa’s, who kept his features well-schooled even though he was surprised by the sad, human expression in Solo’s expression. An explosion of blood and bile shot from Solo’s mouth as he coughed and doubled over, breaking the trancelike moment he’d just shared with Trowa.

Then Solo slumped over to the side, his blond hair falling like a star burst around his head as it hit the floor a few inches from where Meilan and Trowa were. Jade eyes stared blankly at the ceiling as more blood poured from both wound and mouth, giving him the appearance of a battered vampire. For the first time in what seemed like forever, Solo’s anger-twisted features relaxed, making his face seem almost kind and his scars not so intimidating, even with all the blood. He c coughed again, more blood and vomit expelling from his throat as his fingers started to reach up at some unknown object hovering above him, lips moving as if of their own accord. Faintly, Trowa thought he heard Solo whisper “Duo,” before his head lolled to the side and his eyes became empty with death.

Tearing his eyes away from the blood-soaked scene before him, Trowa stared up at Quatre, who was spattered with blood, like an art project from hell. “Quatre....”

Quatre stood indifferently, just examining Solo’s lifeless body with flat eyes, like he didn’t quite understand what he was looking at.

“Quatre,” Trowa tried again. “You killed him.”

Quatre was mute and still stood dumbly in place, not registering anything or anyone around him.

“Quatre, he’s dead.”

Still no response from Quatre.

“QUATRE!!” Trowa yelled, tears dripping from his eyes as he tried to get his love’s attention. It was like talking to a well-sculpted statue that would never respond no matter how long one sat and coaxed it to speak. “Quatre, you just murdered someone! Doesn’t that mean anything to you!?”

Without warning, Quatre spun a little, as if he was dizzy. “Wha...?” he yawned in a confused voice as he gripped his head and tried to steady himself. He glanced around strangely and asked the general populace of the room, “What’s going on? Where are we?” His eyes dropped down to Meilan, and they grew to the size of dinner plates when he saw her limp body hanging in Trowa’s arms. “What happened to Meilan!” he cried, on his knees beside Trowa before anyone had a chance to blink.

“She’s the reason you just killed Solo,” Trowa said, his voice grave as Quatre tentatively reached out to pet one of Meilan’s spiky, black pigtails. “You flew into a rage and the Zero System took effect” He paused for a moment and quirked a brow at Quatre; “You... do remember what I told you about the Zero System, don’t you?”

Quatre scratched the top of his head. “Kind of, yeah.” Then his fingers stopped raking through his short waves of blonde hair as he noticed something he hadn’t before: the blood drying all over his body. A chill ran down his spine as he rewound in his head what Trowa had just said. “Excuse me,” he whispered in a haunted voice, “but what did you just say I did?”

“I said,” Trowa cleared his throat, “you just killed Solo.” Seeing the blank, disbelieving glimmer in Quatre’s eyes, he clarified with another loud swallow, “You know, that gang leader who’s always giving Duo a hard time. White Fang? You remember them?”

“I know who you’re talking about,” Quatre answered, nodding dumbly. “The part I don’t remember, is this stuff about this killing of....” Quatre trailed off as Trowa merely lifted one finger and pointed to something behind Quatre. Slowly, Quatre turned his head to look and let out a gasp of horror when he saw the mangled corpse lying in its pool of blood, the red ooze staining the old, wood floors as it continued to flow leisurely from the gaping wound. “Oh my God!” Quatre yelped, covering his mouth with both hands. “I did that?”

Finding his voice at last, Wufei spoke up from the bed, patting Relena’s back absently as she shivered uncontrollably. “Yes, you did do that, Quatre. We all witnessed the whole thing.”

“Oh my God,” Quatre whispered, rocking himself back and forth to try and soothe himself as he came to grips with the situation. “I’m going to hell for this,” he murmured so quietly, it was almost not spoken at all. “I’m going to hell, where I’ll rot and burn with all the devils.”

The sound of bed springs creaking and floorboards moaning filled the still air as Wufei stood up and made his way over to where the others were. He knelt beside them, joining their little circle and put a reassuring hand on Quatre’s back. “It’ll be okay,” he said with the smallest hint of a smile. “You can plead insane,” he said with a small chuckle, even though it was actually a very legit point. A smile from Wufei made a casual grin from Heero seem like an everyday, natural occurrence, and Quatre was easily able to detect the importance of such an expression, even more so with the pulsing feeling in his Sense.

But as he thought about his Sense, something strange happened: like a floodgate being pulled back, a torrent of Wufei’s thoughts came tumbling into his head. It wasn’t a confusing wash of voices as before, but merely Wufei, as he mused to himself about what would happen next, or if Meilan would be alright.

“She’ll be fine,” Quatre said out loud, smiling warmly at Wufei. He didn’t even realize what he had done until he caught the strange expression Wufei wore on his face.

Trowa saved Quatre from having to explain and said to Wufei, “I’m sure you’ve been able to figure out by now that Quatre is a psychic.”

Wufei nodded distractedly, trying to digest the information. Even if he had been totally aware of Quatre’s mutation, as he most certainly was now, he supposed he would have still been a little weirded out by hearing Quatre respond to things he was only thinking. In a way, he was somewhat annoyed to have his most private space invaded so easily, but the more he thought about it, the less he cared, because the only thing that truly mattered at that moment was Meilan. “Here, let me hold her,” he said to Trowa, opening his arms and settling down in a more comfortable position.

Carefully, Trowa eased Meilan’s unconscious body into Wufei’s waiting arms, watching sadly as the Chinese boy cradled his hardly-breathing girlfriend forlornly. Pressing her slim body to his chest, Wufei did something no one had ever seen him do before: he cried. There was simply no helping it. Meilan hadn’t done anything to deserve this, and she had even gotten hurt trying to protect everyone else without even thinking of what the consequences could be.

Despite the beauty of seeing Wufei express such a human trait, Trowa raised his hand to Wufei, signaling him to stop weeping. “She’s not dead,” he said plainly. “Don’t cry for her like she’s a ghost when she’s not.”

Quickly falling in step, Quatre added, “She’d kick your butt if she knew you were.”

“Yeah, she would, wouldn’t she?” Wufei sniffled a little and wiped his eyes dry, his other hand gently stroking Meilan’s hair. The little round bells she’d tied into her hair jangled merrily as he ran his fingers through her ink black pigtails.

The sound of Relena stirring behind them caused the group to cast their attention in her direction. She was still huddled on the cheap bed, her hands pressed against the side of her face and over her ears, her lips moving frantically, as if she was talking to herself.

It didn’t take long for Trowa to realize what she was doing, and he quickly leapt to his feet and darted over to the girl. “What the hell do you think you’re doing!?” he asked in a sharp tone as he smacked her hands away from her face.

The pink cell phone she’d been cradling close to her ear clattered to the floor, its buttons and display window glowing an eerie green. “I was just... well... look!” She gestured wildly at Solo’s mangled corpse. “Are you people telling me that... that is just okay!?” she shrieked, her finger quivering in Solo’s direction. “Someone should do something! He’s dead!”

This got Trowa very upset. Between Meilan and Quatre and Solo, the last thing he needed was an ungrateful, blond brat. Pouncing on the bed, he grabbed the rippling, blue fabric of her dress and hissed, “He tried to rape you! What would have happened if we hadn’t intervened?”

“Well, you didn’t have to kill him!” Relena cried, grabbing Trowa’s wrists and trying to pull them away. She looked away and blinked away a few small tears. “Solo was nice... but he... he just got a little carried away.”

Trowa kept his grip firm, though he did roll his eyes at her. “Are you really that naive?” he asked sharply. “Or just that stupid?”

For the first time in her life, before letting her impulsive emotions get the better of her, Relena thought about what had been said to her, and what she found frightened her. Maybe she wasn’t always as right as she was used to believing.

And as that idea grazed the surface of her brain, a voice crackled over the cell phone, shouting desperately for Relena’s name, as the numbers 9-1-1 glimmered in the shadows.

(x) X (x)

a/n: October 9th is a very important day! Why, you ask? It’s John Lennon’s birthday! This year, he would have been sixty-four. You know, like the song. He also met stupid Yoko Onno on the 9th of another month. And there are 9 letters in the word Liverpool!

Oh, and the chapter title this go around is from the Smashing Pumpkins.