Gundam Wing Fan Fiction / Full Metal Panic Fan Fiction ❯ Perfect Soldiers ❯ Chapter 2

Forgive me please, Vice Foreign Minister Dorlian." Spoke the principle of Jadai High School. "Sousuke Sagara is one of our more, how shall I say, antisocial students in the school." The man glared over at Sousuke who looked him right back in the eye, yet remained silent.

"Please, sir, I am familiar with a personality type of Mr. Sagara here. In fact I admire his loyalty to protecting one that is dear to him. My bodyguard, Heero Yuy is very protective of me as well and one to also jump to action in regards to my safety, no matter how reckless it may be." She glared at Heero out of the corner of her eye, he did not react but remained as quiet and as stoic as Sousuke was being.

"I thank you for your understanding, but still I feel Mr. Sagara must be reprimanded in some way. I think scrubbing down the boys' locker rooms is a fit punishment for him. Don't you agree Mr. Sagara?"

"I do not apologize for my actions, yet I admit they may have been a bit hasty. But I cannot accept such punishment. I have a mission to escort and protect Kaname at the diplomatic gala this evening."

"I can get Kurz to go with me. So it's no problem."

Sousuke sunk his head slightly. "I will accept my punishment if that is what you see fit."

"Very well then, you can be dismissed."

"No, please, wait a moment." The retreating group halted, hearing Relena speak. "I think Heero as well needs to learn a lesson. If Sousuke Sagara must undergo a form of discipline then so should Mr. Yuy. In fact, I think Heero should assist Sousuke in the cleaning of the boys' locker room. Don't you agree, Heero?"

"I was only doing my job, Relena. You could have very well been in danger."

"Well, Sousuke was doing his job too, and for him to get into trouble for that just because he is a student here is very unfair, don't you think? And besides, we are technically students here as well for the next few months."

"But tonight you have diplomatic gala to attend. I cannot let you go without me."

"Duo is here, he can escort me."

"But…" With another glare from Relena, Heero lowered his gaze to the floor in sign of defeat. "Very well. I will accept the consequences along with Sousuke."

Duo literally had to clasp his hand over his mouth, though a chuckle still escaped him, gaining him a glare from Relena. "Do you wish to join him?"

Duo pursed his lips and shook his head.

"Besides," Relena added. "The both of you may very well finish in time for the party anyway, so you can simply join us then. Now I would really like my school day to begin. Kaname, can you please show me to my first class?"

"Of course, Relena, this way please."

Kaname, Relena and Duo exited the door first, Heero and Sousuke were the last to leave, though as they tried to go through the threshold at the same time, they became wedged shoulder to shoulder. Heero jerked forward and Sousuke jerked backward, breaking their contact.

"Learn to stay out of my way." Heero growled his threat, but Sousuke didn't back down.

"Take your own advice."

The men glared at one another briefly before continuing down the hall to catch up with their girlfriends.

~~Later That Afternoon~~

Duo sat on the sofa of the hotel room, one arm resting on the shoulder of the couch and the other stretched out over the back. His left foot was on the floor while his right was up and bent, its foot resting sideways on his left knee. He looked at his watch. "Man 'jouson, I've been ready for an hour, what's taking you so long?"

"Duo, I'm ready."

The longhaired man pushed himself to his feet and stretched briefly as he turned around to face Relena. "'Bout time little lady, I was thinking you, you, wow, Rel, you look, look gorgeous." Duo clamped his mouth shut to stop his stuttering, though his eyes still drank in the sight of his best friend's gal.

Clearing her throat, the young woman tried to force away the blush she knew was creeping up in her cheeks. "I know I've never worn this color before, but I wanted to try something different, ya know, and they say red is a quite a daring color, and, um sexy."

Duo threw Relena a leering gaze that went along perfectly with his smart-ass grin. "Sexy, daring, yep, I'd say." He slinked his way to the Vice Foreign Minister's side and placed his open hand on her upper back, sliding it down until it was cupping her bottom.

"Ya, know, Heero may show up tonight…" Relena cocked one of her eyebrows and wedged the ex-pilot of Deathscythe's hand off of her posterior. "And if he does show, and sees you with your hand there, it's liable to get broken. Now stop fooling around and let's get to the party."

Chuckling, Duo winked at her as he opened the door. "But 'jouson, 'fooling around' is one of the few things I'm good at."

With a dry half laugh and half sigh of mild amusement, the former Queen of the world rolled her eyes and stepped past him out the door. "You, Mr. Maxwell, are quite impossible."

~ At the front doors of the Hotel Regal~

"Ya know how these famous type people are, Kaname. They live to make fashionably late appearances."

Scowling her features, the blue haired, brown-eyed Chidori Kaname glared at Kurz. "She doesn't seem like that type of person to me. She's quite nice, a little too perfect maybe, but then she is a celebrity so I'm sure everyone feels a little inferior to her."

Kurz flicked his blonde bangs from his eyes and smirked. "Mmmm. Let's see, nice, perfect, and intimidating to others. Gee, I don't know any other girl who's like that."

Kaname's eyes grew somewhat large as her glare grew harder at the blue-eyed man that stood to her left, but before she could respond he merely chuckled and winked at her as he turned around to head inside of the hotel. "You look totally hot in red ya know, and I can always go for a woman in red."

The out-of the blue compliment from Kurz wasn't unexpected from a guy of his caliber, though Kaname still blushed, feeling somewhat flustered and uncharacteristically shy. Though as was her way, she repressed the feelings, telling him where, in fact, he could go. He merely chuckled, and took a step to leave her side, swatting her bottom playfully before disappearing through the glass doors. With a mild, exasperated sigh Kaname closed her eyes, only to open them back up suddenly when she heard a vehicle pulling up to the front steps.

~In the boy's locker room at Jadai High School~

Sousuke tossed his scrub brush in the bucket and rested back onto his haunches. "You're a former assassin and were one of the ex-gundam pilots, who operated the Wing, Wing Zero and Wing Zero Custom."

Heero's brush joined Sousuke's in the bucket as he leaned back on his knees as well. "Very few know who I am. Let alone which gundams I flew."

Sousuke forced himself not to avert his eyes from Heero's glare. Over the few hours his temper had died down and was replaced by curiosity, and a feeling of being connected to the other pilot in some way, as if a faded, long forgotten memory was fighting to revive itself.

"I follow every military operation closely and I've done research on you. It's necessary for me to know everything about the people who will be around Kaname."

Heero found his glare softening as he continued to stare at the other brunette young man across from him, a feeling of estranged familiarity washing over him as well, though he was not going to be outdone by this guy. "You're a former guerilla terrorist who is now with the mercenary group Mithril.

Sousuke narrowed his eyes. "You are now working as a high ranking Colonel in the Preventer organization and personal body guard of the now serving Vice Foreign Minister, who by this time next year hopes to become President of the ESUN."

Heero's glare returned as he countered. "Your rank is sergeant and you're an accomplished soldier and AS pilot, now working undercover at this high school to protect Kaname Chidori who happens to be a Whisper, and who's father and younger sister are living in America."

"Yuy. That's a Japanese name, a name of a former pacifist, so obviously not your own, though you are in fact Japanese."

"As if false names are foreign to you, Kashim. Your own ethnicity is Japanese, though growing up elsewhere and looking as you do you're about as Japanese as I am."

Extending a hand the soldier from Mithril tried his best to smile. "My name is Sousuke Sagara and it is an honor to meet you."

The action was very unexpected and confusing to Heero, there was only one other time he shook hands with anyone, and it was the man who had become his enemy during the wars. He found he had grasped the hand, regardless, and shook it back. "Heero Yuy, a pleasure as well."

"Well, then," Sousuke spoke as he raised himself to his feet and brushed off the knees of his slacks, "I would say we are finished in here. There is someplace else we both need to be."

Heero stood as well and grabbed the bucket to carry it over to the shower drain. "The gala. We've no doubt missed the opening ceremonies but it'll be a few hours before it's all over."

~At the gala~

Melissa Mao downed the last of her champagne and glared sideways at the brunette man with the long braid beside her, who for the last five minutes, had been unsuccessfully flirting with her.

"Look here, little boy," she began her speech somewhat slurred, "You're a bit too young for my tastes, and I'm not that drunk yet." She covered her mouth to conceal a hiccup as she rested her elbow on his shoulder, placing her lips very close to her ears. "But ya see the little silver haired girl over there? Her name is Tessa and I think she could really go for a guy like you."

Duo's eyes scanned the crowd briefly before resting on the young lady that Melissa had mentioned. He straightened the bow tie of his tux and smoothed back some stray hairs on his head. "Thanks for the head's up."

"No problem." She answered quickly, as she watched him surf through the sea of people to get to his new target. The Chinese American woman suddenly felt a presence behind her as she drained the last of champagne from its flute in one gulp.

"Ya know, this could get you a severe tongue lashing from Tessa later, then again, I could go for seeing that."

"You perverted jackass. Go to hell." Melissa snorted at the double meaning of Kurz's words.

"Heh, if I only had a dime for every time a woman told me that. Who is that guy anyway? He's part of the security team for the VMP right?"

"Duo Maxwell, my fellow American, though he's from L2 colony, he flew one of those gundam suits, the Deathscythe I believe he told me. He's quite the arrogant playboy or at least tries to be…you'd like him." Melissa blinked her eyes slowly and held her head. "I think I need to sit down somewhere."

Kurz placed an arm around his commander's waist, draping one of her arms over his shoulders. He helped her stumble to one of the rooms that he figured was the library due to the amount of books that lined the room's wall. He gingerly placed her on the couch, propping her head on the arm of the sofa and her feet at the bottom of it. During the process the slit in Melissa's navy blue dress hiked somewhat showing a good deal of her long, smooth legs.

The blonde male mercenary couldn't resist a wide, devious grin, or the urge to smooth his open hand up one of the woman's leg. His movement was brought to an abrupt halt however when he felt the tip of her high heel bash him in his left temple knocking it to the floor.

"Don't even think it, buster!"

Kurz was holding the side of his head, tears in his eyes as he his voice whined. "You don't have to hit me so hard!"

"Perverts! All of you!" Melissa's voice was raised in a drunken rant, but turned soft again as she felt her eyelids grow heavy, forcing her mind to sleep. The ace sniper however did manage to pick up the last of her sentence that fell from her lips. "He did have, the most beautiful lavender blue eyes…don't see that color…to…often."

Rising to his feet, Kurz once again cracked his back, taking his wallet out of his back pocket. Opening it up he pulled out of it an old faded picture of his father and a little boy, no more then three who sat on his lap, sporting auburn hair and lavender blue eyes, looking exactly like the man who held him. This is your little brother, Kurz, he remembered his father telling him. Maybe one day you'll meet him, course I've never even told your mom about his mother. I know I'm an ass for the way I treat her, but your mom knows I've never been a one-woman guy.

"But ya never told me his name, dad, yea, right, what are the odds?" He asked himself as he slipped the picture back in the wallet and then the wallet back into his slacks. Kurz then shrugged off his jacket and covered the top half of Melissa's body with it before leaving the room, his mind now focused more on finding the man she spoke of then on copping a cheap feel from the lady he'd just left behind.

TBC…