Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Burning Water ❯ Burning Water Chapter 1 ( Chapter 1 )

Title: Burning Water (1/?)

Author: care

Archive: http://www.fanfiction.net (when it's working =_=) If you'd like to archive my fic (aka my precious baby), please leave your e-mail and a note in a review and I'll get back ta ya.

Category: Light romance, general, humor?

Rating: PG-13

Warnings: language. Much language. And OOC Hee-chan. And bitchy Duo. Oh yeah… beware of the rabid run-on sentences. And the slightly evil fragments.

Spoilers: none really.

Obligatory disclaimer: not mine. Except for the annoying professor. And Hee-chan's aerosol paint can.

Notes: College fic. Disgustingly somewhat OOC Hee-chan fic. Light 1 + 2 (right now. I hold no responsibility if 05 wanders into the picture). I promise nothin' more than leering and smoochies.

Feedback: yes please… but try to refrain from one word "great" reviews, ne?

Duo Maxwell, approximately age 17, knew that life wasn't fair.

He knew that it just never quite seemed to turn out the way that he would hope; and he already had an alarming abundance of emotional and physical scars to prove just how contrary Fate enjoys being.

At age 5 (or at least that was what he figured, give or take a few years) he had stolen his first loaf of bread (stale). At 8, he lost his best friend, who had died in his very arms, had already resorted to selling his body, had become a druggie and quit after 2 weeks, and was already jaded beyond emotional repair. By age 11, Duo had already killed four would-be-rapists with a dagger he had stolen off of a blind man who had finally died, alone and of starvation on a filthy street corner in L2. Oh. And at age 12 he began his piloting training… which was not as simple as the other fly-boys might have thought it was. Age fourteen had marked the receiving of his diploma in Terrorism 101 and had been a turning point. On his self-appointed birthday, he shed the form of the little boy who was both able to believe that he could survive being a prostitute as well as dare to actually hope to live and see age twenty and picked up a new, self-appointed title; Shinigami.

Or perhaps he never really was a child… just an adult stuck in a little kid's body with the audacity to believe that he could actually survive all that life could dish him.

And really, it wasn't so bad - if it were, he would have pressed the self-destruct button a few more times during his time as a Gundam pilot.

Okay… so maybe he did press it, but it was only when he had no other choice…

Okay… so maybe there was that one time when he pressed it to see if G had ever hooked it up right…

Actually, he recalled, after that test, he manually connected the two wires together. Needless to say, G was never too happy with the tweaks that Duo made to his 'masterpiece.'

Though if he were still alive, and here Duo's smile is rather rueful, he would never admit that it was Duo who gifted his black-several-ton-partner with all those wonderful stealth capabilities…

Anyway - wow we veered off track - Duo knew that life basically sucked.

But honestly, why did it only have to seem to have to suck for him and him only?

So here's the background information:

Duo Maxwell, in an attempt to be a - quote - "normal teenage, hormonal boy who has an ass-long braid and the ability to kill people with his bare hands, himself included, in thirty ways," had recently enrolled in… yup, you guessed it, college.

Well, actually, he had started off at the local high school but had found that experience to be… depressing to say the least. (Thus the "life sucks" tirade.)

God, how Wufei had laughed at that misfortune.

+++

"'Fei…"

"Yes, Maxwell?"

"Y'know how I said that I'm currently attending high school, right?"

"Yes?"

"Well… I don't think I'll be going here much longer…"

<a sigh>

"What did you do, Maxwell?"

"… I kinda sorta pulled a gun on the dean…"

<a failed attempt at repressing a smirk>

"And why did you do that?"

"…"

"Maxwell?"

"He walked into me having one of those… 'dreams.'"

<instantaneous abandonment of previous smirk>

"Damn."

<a sad nod>

"Who was it this time?"

"… Sister Helen."

"Double damn."

<another sad nod>

"And what's worse is the fact that Mr. Head Pancho had tried to sneak in…"

"Why'd he do that?"

"…He said he heard a lot of crying and shouting. Thought I was getting beaten up…"

<a chuckle>

"Shuttup. It's not funny. Anyway… we sort of had a quote 'long discussion.'"

"And how did that go?"

"Well… I told him that I had been a pilot and if he told anyone I would have to…"

"You didn't!"

<a nod>

"Kill him?"
"… eh heh heh… um… yea."

<amusement> "And how did he handle that?"

"…"

"Well?"

"He tried to send me to the counselor's office. Said I was wacko -kindly, mind you- and that I had been studying too hard."

<full out laughter>

<still more laughter>

<and more…>

<and more…>

"Damnit, 'Fei - Stop laughing already!"

"Fine, fine."

"… 'Fei?"

"Yes?"

"I really don't think this education thing is working. I dunno, maybe during the war because it was a live-or-die thing and because I didn't care about my grades I could fit in. But now? It's not working. I mean, I know more than the teachers, I keep on threatening the deans… I freaked everyone out in my PE class yesterday… I think it's time to give up this 'dream of education'… Anne was right. I'll be coming by the Preventers office tomor-"

"No."

"S'cuse me?"

"You heard me, Maxwell. No."

<a sigh>

"Yeah yeah yeah… I know… "Gundam pilots don't know how to quit," right?"
<a firm nod>

"Sheesh. Fine. Then what should I do? It's obvious high school isn't cutting it for me."

"College."

"Aa…"

<a fierce look>

"Oookay… college it is."

+++

And so here he was.

His first college class.

He remembered the dread that he had felt, entering this… sanctuary for learning.

…

He'd been talking to 'Fei too long.

Anyway, he remembered his first glimpse of his dorm room - roomie soon to be provided - remembered walking to his first class, remembered how the building had stood in front of him, tall and proud.

He remembered how he had swallowed down a lump in his throat, remembered how he slung his backpack over one shoulder, remembered how he had braved his first step… all the while idly calculating how much explosive power it would take to blow the building up.

He guessed that there was just some part of him that just could never be un-trained out of him.

Eh.

+++

…

Duo Maxwell had just formed his four hundred and sixteenth conclusion about college. Like the previous four hundred and fifteen, he firmly decided that college was perhaps worse than high school.

He mentally ticked off the top three complaints in his head, imagining telling them to Heero using his best Hee-chan~!-I'm-bored-and-feeling-whiney-so-you-better-listen-to-me-and-if-y ou-don't-listen-to-my-bitching-I'll-smack-you-upside-the-head-and-you-can't -do-nothing-cause-I'm-your-bestest-pally-right?-and-by-the-way-where-the-fu ck-are-you-coing-and-you-better-not-be-going-where-I-think-you're-going-hn- why-aren't-I-surprised-that-you're-going-to-get-what-you-shouldn't-get-if-y ou-really-value-your-health-I-mean-it-buddy-and-believe-you-me-that-I'll-go -Shinigami-on-your-ass-if-you-come-near-my-braid-with-those-scissors -glare-glare-smirk-grin-grin-look-like-an-idiot-smirk-smirk-cocky-grin-smir k-voice. [0]

Hn, he reflected, even mentally it sounds effing annoying…

Anyway -hn… we veered off subject again- the self-proclaimed Shinigami felt college to be even more unnerving, mainly because of three things:

Numero uno of the Things That Pissed Him Off/Freaked Him Out about college: The people. A closet introvert, a nature supplied by his soldier training but hidden very well by his smile, Duo found the sheer amount of people to be slowly but surely freaking him out. He found himself reaching for his absent gun as they jostled him, smiled at him, had newspapers that read 'Gundam Pilot Rumored to be Going to College' and suspiciously looked at him. His patience for the stupidity of the common college-r was fraying at the threads. And it Did Not help that that one scum-girl, and this he spat contemptuously enough to rival one of Wufei's "Onna Rants," who sat one row behind him and bloody four seats away, touched, or rather yanked, his braid.

No one touches the hair.

He wished he had had enough caffeine in the morning to manage a nice tirade involving phrases like 'Fuck off!' and "You goddamn nitwit!"

But he hadn't. So instead, he looked at her, which was almost (well, maybe more) effective considering that his eyes were always expressive except when they looked at you, and then they looked like a soldier's eyes, a killer's eyes. And… well, not a lot of people survived being looked at anyway because usually when he looked at someone, it meant that Shinigami was -what was the term? Oh yes, - in the fucking-house, man!

Oh yeah… it also usually meant that someone was about to die.

To wrap it up, the girl scurried off to the ladies room and Duo stormed off to the nearest pay phone to bitch at Wufei, never mind the fact that he knew that his Chinese friend was at work.

+++

"'Fei I swear that if another one of them touches my hair again, you'll be coming over to wipe up some of their blood."

"Uh huh." <insert shot of Wufei nodding absently while writing up a mission report>

"You're not listening to me, are you?"

"Uh huh." <insert shot of Wufei nodding absently while finishing up his mission report and waiting for it to print out>

"And a caterpillar just bit me and now I have five-feet-wide butterfly wings sprouting from my back…"

"Uh huh." <insert shot of Wufei still nodding absently while looking around for a stapler>

"And the gummy bear that I dropped while eating them for breakfast decided to take over the world…"

"Uh huh." <insert shot of Wufei still nodding absently while now looking for his hole puncher>

"And I'm currently wearing a metallic purple g-string…"

"!!!" <insert shot of Wufei suddenly paying attention and now looking for some tissues>

"And nothing else and grinding with my hot boytoy-"

"Gak." <insert shot of Wufei with eyes glazed over and blood spurting from his nose>

"'Fei? Are you listening yet? I finished my rant fifteen minutes ago and I'm going to be late for my next class if I don't hurry up…"

Silence. <insert shot of still eyes-glazed Wufei>

"… <a sigh> Been fun talking to you. Call you later."

<click>

<Wufei is startled out of his day-dreaming>

"What? …Maxwell?"

+++

Um… where were we? Oh yes.

Numero dos of the Things That Pissed Him Off about college: The science and math department chairmen. I mean, it was all pretty obvious that Duo Maxwell did not need to take the general education courses. Actually, he had wanted to jump right in and try to get his Ph.D. and was about to. That is, until those S.O.Bs, as Duo liked to call the old and rather balding school board, decided that there was no possible way that a seventeen-year old - never mind his IQ and his… um… previous 'career' - was intelligent enough to accomplish the task. Ha! Ha! Duo laughed. Ha! He'd show them. Thus, he had hacked into the school systems <insert scene of Duo picking at his fingernails, yawning, and saying that 'apples' isn't exactly the best password>, changed all of his courses to suit his wants, and then created mass chaos within the student directory and information base. That had been fun.

Really, really fun.

However, despite the fact that "justice was served," Duo couldn't help but feel as if he'd very muchly like to pull out his thermal blade and swish-swish the math and science building.

After all, he reasoned, he wasn't asking for much, he just wanted to see their expressions as their precious building crumbled to bits. And he really did miss the thrill of cutting large buildings in half and cackling afterwards.

+++

He slipped into his seat just as the professor stood up from his desk and wandered over to the smart board [1].

Numero tres of the Things That Pissed Him Off about college: his Psychology professor.

"Today we will be studying the possible reasons for the Gundam pilots' dedication towards mass mayhem. If you'd turn to page seventy-three…"

Well… it seemed that his professor really seemed to like to bitch about him and his friends… especially him.

This did not bode well.

No, not well at all.

"Please look at figure 3-3 on the left-hand corner. Here is a rare back shot of Gundam pilot 02. Notice the long braid…"

That guy just never shut up about what was wrong with 02. Or why 02 was the most emotionally unbalanced. Or why 02 got caught the most (hell, it was only twice, god damn it. And it wasn't his fault - he just had bad luck and a gundam that wouldn't self-destruct properly). Or 02's shady history. Or 02's braid. God, that guy must have really hated braids in general or something…

"it indicates 02's obvious lack of discipline and how unprofessional this pilot is. Pilot 02 is best known for his mood-swings and his obsession with Death in general…"

Oh god, not this speech…

"02's fascination with death causes many to believe that he was perhaps the only Gundam pilot who enjoyed his profession. While the other pilots have, at times, been observed to show regret, pilot 02 has never been seen without a smile…"

Not the smile. Not the smile….

"While some believe that the smile was incorporated as an emotional shield, I disagree. It is obvious that pilot 02 really did enjoy the mass murder that came with his actions. It is also obvious that pilot 02 is the most emotionally and mentally unbalanced of the Gundam pilots. Note his posture - the slouch and the inclination of his head bear the disarming look of an innocent but notice the look of his eyes in figure 3-4…"

Well duh you'd feel pretty pissed off too if you were taken prisoner, beaten and tortured and then dragged off to take a picture…

Bleh.

Suddenly remembering that he hadn't tucked his hair into the back of his shirt, he cleared his throat and warily scanned the expressions of the people around him.

Shit.

They were starting to give him weird looks.

Looks like it was time to leave.

Out of his sleeves he drew out a smoke bomb and flashed out. [2]

+++

"'Fei…"

"Maxwell."

"I'm currently banned from my psychology class."

"What happened this time? First you're banned from your math and sciences, classes you need for your major because of hacking - you really spent too much time with Yuy - and now you're banned from your psychology class?"

"Six words: Gundam hating professor and smoke bomb."

"Ah. Wait… a smoke bomb!?!"

+++

Having been subjected to a bunch of ignorant chairmen, a braid-pulling idjit, and a couple of massive headaches from dealing with the need to assure everyone that 'no, the smoke bombs weren't poisonous, and yes, I'll try to refrain from threatening poor (ignorant) and innocent (ass-wipey) professors with sharp pointy things,' Duo decided that he needed to unwind.

Merrily he slipped into a local club, with the age minimum of twenty-one but the bouncer took one look at him and let him in anyway, and sallied forth directly to the bar.

Twirling a slender knife in one hand, he deliberately met the eyes of the bartender and motioned for something strong.

Wisely the man gave him a drink and ignored the fact that his customer couldn't possibly be older than his own teenage daughter.

He was met with a happy grunt.

The guy promised himself to make up for his slip-up by making sure the boy with the ridiculously long braid wouldn't drink too much.

Casually holding his drink in one hand and still twirling his knife with the other, Duo twisted around a bit on his bar stool until he felt wondrously disturbingly comfortable with the grimy thing and gulped the alcohol down. Uninterestingly he mumbled a bit for another one. The bartender, now impressed and relieved that the boy would be able to handle himself, smiled and handed him some more and watched as Duo took another massive swig. It seemed that the slender boy-man in front of him was hell-bent on being drunk. And hey, who was he to argue as long as he got tipped? Well, that is if the long-haired boy in front of him was sober enough to remember to pay him (at all).

He suddenly decided to renew his previous decision about watching how much his customer drank.

Duo Maxwell secretly smiled.

He knew exactly what was going through the bartender's mind and he found it to be horribly funny that other people thought that Gundam pilots could get drunk. Well, he had to admit that the bartender didn't know that he was an ex-Gundam pilot, but for those who did and treated him with caution whenever he was near anything alcoholic… He stifled some laughter.

A drunk G-boy? Sorry to burst your bubbles but… it just didn't happen. After all, if that were possible then the Ozzies and their interrogators would have just asked their little terrorist drinking buddies to pull up a bar stool and grab a beer. The very idea was ludicrous and abso-effing-lutely hilarious. Well, at least it was funny to Duo. And well… despite his intelligence, a lot of things were funny to Duo. Take for instance Mr. Self-Destructo's spandex. And snapping it. And then seeing his expression. Although that was something that usually led to "I will kill you"s and "Mwuahahaha Shinigami lives~!"s.

Anyway, back to the topic: a drunk Gundam boy equals an impossibility. Unfortunately however, despite being assured that he would never drunkenly spew out mission secrets or tell embarrassing stories of his little escapades at the Maxwell orphanage, it also meant that Duo Maxwell, cackling evil happyhappyjoyjoy Death-boy, could never, ever get drunk.

And that, to put it frankly, sucked.

He sighed and downed another glass.

Well, at least he could pretend to still have a normal human's internal systems and while the alcohol proved to have no physical effect, Duo did find that mentally it allowed him to relax a bit, feel more free, not have to guard his precious mask so desperately. The ability to relax some probably came with the façade of a drunkard… and either way, Duo firmly believed that if it were possible for him to get drunk, he would have been a sad drunk anyway.

After about ten more glasses and a healthy tip, Duo bounced back to his dorms sixty credits poorer.

He left behind a bewildered tapster who spent the rest of the night wondering why his customer didn't so much as sway when he bounced out.

+++

Heero Yuy adjusted his backpack strap and looked up at the math and science building.

He "hn"ed.

Shaking his aerosol paint can he looked up once more and grinned. (Which really was more of a lopsided smirk, but we all know that if Duo saw it he'd go and rant and rave about going into cardiac arrest out of surprise.)

Seventeen minutes and forty-two seconds later, in neat block letters, quite possibly the worst insults that pilot 01 could come up with, and a few that he learned from Duo, adorned every single square inch of the north wall. The list included: 'foolish,' 'weak,' 'incompetent,' 'unorganized,' 'batfuckers [3],' 'you can stick your "incoming freshmen schedule" here (crude drawings included),' 'onnas!' (courtesy of Wufei), 'insufficient' and a few 'omaeo o korosu's.

It was very complete.

Satisfied, he turned and headed for the administration building, tossing behind a "mission completed."

+++

Frowning, Heero glared at the computer.

Angrily he typed in a few more controls, hacking further into the university's database.

Incredulous he continued scrolling and reading.

And he paused, leaned back (which was really more of a five degree tilt backwards from his usual disgustingly good posture) and studied the screen on his laptop.

What the hell was this school doing, being listed under top universities of both the colonies and Earth? Their entire student directory and their cataloguing system was crap. Nothing made sense and everything was so random that it was obscene to the programmer's heart that resided in Heero's almost-gundanium chest.

There was something fishy…

Impulsively he clicked on an inconspicuous black text link.

Eyes widened marginly as his laptop instantly downloaded an appallingly large file without any confirmation or notification, something that Heero had studiously programmed his laptop to always do after its last encounter with a Braided Menace.

As far as Heero knew, the only person that he could consider matching his skill, and surpassing it if he actually tried, was The Baka.

Intrigued at the prospect of finally finding a prospective rival to duke out computer skills, he opened it to find any indication of a hacker trademark, something that all hackers were wont to do, even Heero.

He found one.

It was kind of hard to miss.

Furthermore, the irony did not go unnoticed by the Spandex Man.

His screen was now decorated with a huge gag shot of none other than pilot 02 with his tongue stuck out and a cheek pulled down by his middle finger.

And underneath the picture, in dark red letters were the words, "Shinigami wuz here, you effing dimwits."

Heero studied it for a while, got up, pushed his chair back, packed up his laptop, and sat down on the chair again.

People walking by looked with a touch of concern as they saw a handsome young man hunch over suddenly, his shoulders quivering-ly shaking.

If they had actually bothered to find out how the youth was doing - as in a "Are you okay?" considerate movement - they would have found that what they thought was a mental breakdown was only a half truth.

Because the Prussian blue-eyed boy was not going stark raving mad bonkers.

Rather, Heero Yuy, Perfect Soldier, Spandex Boy, heck, the pilot that made the sound "hn" into an entire bloody language, was actually encountering his first run-in with the action of cracking up. [4]

Hn. He reassessed his previous judgement of the college and its campus.

And smirked.

At least he now knew that he wasn't the only intelligent form of life on the campus.

Hn…

Okay, so maybe that was debatable.

+++

Whistling, Duo Maxwell strolled into his dorm room, his hands stuck in the pockets of his black jeans, a sloppy braid tickling the back of his thighs. Disregarding actually looking for the key to his room (which was supposed to be in one of the pockets of his jacket, but he wasn't exactly sure which one), he deftly grabbed a hairpin and jiggled the doorknob.

Unsurprisingly, he made it in in under a minute.

But something was different.

His soldier senses screamed that there was someone in his room.

He felt twitchy. And he knew for a fact that someone had broken in.

Maybe it was the way the air was settled, or maybe it was the slight difference in the lighting… or maybe it was because that someone was currently sitting on his bed, reading his textbook, drinking his beer and eating his turkey sandwich.

Leaning against the door he wearily shook his head and bowed grandly to the intruder.

"Howdy, Hee-chan."

Getting no response, but not bothered in the last, he resumed his lean, eyes studying pilot 01 curiously.

+++

Heero looked up from the sandwich that he was delicately demolishing.

Inclining his head towards Duo, he absently nodded and deliberately polished off the rest of the beer.

Finally, nodding his head (in approval, perhaps?), he stood up, with the aforementioned textbook in hand, ignored Duo, and walked over to Duo's laptop. Meticulously he started a search program in his old partner's systems. Foregoing small talk, he sat back on the rolly-chair and cracked the book open again.

Finally, after a few minutes, he looked up at the computer screen, found something lacking and therefore frowned.

Spandex Boy walked (stalked) over to the doorway where Duo was still leaning and still grinning, and "Hnnnnnnnnnn"ed.

The Braided Menace took to wearing his innocent 'it-couldn't-possibly-have-been-me' smile.

"Duo."

"Hai?"

"I would greatly appreciate it if you would find a way to delete a certain picture off of my laptop."

"Porn?"

"No. Much more morally corrupt."

"… Me?"

There was no answer.

…

Duo took that as an affirmative.

+++

"So… you're gonna be my roomie again?"

"Hn."

"Just like old times, ne buddy?"

"Hn."

"Yep. Just like old times."

"Hn."

"By the way, I got dibs on the bottom bunk."

"Iie."

"… Humph. Fine, be that way."

+++

"IIE!"

A loud thump followed the exclamation, except that it was from the other person in the room who had fallen, scared shitless, off the bed.

"What? Who? Where? When? Wha-?"
"I'm alright."

"Heero?"

"Hn."

"You okay?"

"Hn."

Duo looked at him. Noticing the Heero's pale face and the slight trembles, he warily got up off the floor that he had so comfortably smashed into. Slowly, he sat next to Heero on the bottom bunk.

"Do you want to… talk about it?

"…"

"I… I mean I know I talk a lot… but I'm a good listener too."

The short-haired boy shook his head and a breathy, weary "No." involuntarily made its way out.

"Ya sure?"

"Hn."

"Okay."

Creaking sounds followed. Incredulous, Heero stared as the self-proclaimed Shinigami laid down next to Heero's immobile form and slowly drew him into his arms.

"Look… don't hit me or anything but… I always feel better if I get a hug after one of those nightmares."

The other boy only went "Hn," but Duo noticed that he didn't pull back.

+++

Duo had always had his own beliefs when it came to Heero and emotions.

Instead of believing that Mr. I Will Kill You was devoid and emotionally demented, which really described Trowa best sometimes, Duo had always suspected that during the war, Heero had felt just as much despair and self-loathing and all those emotions that are generally associated with flames and brimstones and hell and all that other nicenice crap.

However, Heero just had a different way of coping. They all had.

Trowa fought because he didn't know anything else. He fought and withstood and clung onto all the guilt because it was all a defining factor for him. Without all the pain that he held on to, he would just be another common person. Another Nameless lost forever in the crowd. His pain gave him distinctiveness shared only with four others. He was his pain and his pain was him. Or so he told himself.

Quatre fought out of the hope for a better tomorrow for everyone. He never let the guilt get to him because his convictions were truly that strong. But now that he had time to reflect upon the horrors that he couldn't help but create, it came as no surprise that 04 had at least five charities to his name.

Wufei made it an honor issue. He derived his self-worth from being as strong as he could be, and so he was strong too in his admittance of that soul-crushing guilt. Yet he assuaged it by joining the Preventers and continuing his fight for Justice.

And about himself? Duo knew that he twisted his pain and funneled and tunneled it until it became a poisoning, condensed, and overwhelming desire for revenge. Any left over hatred was used to fuel a seemingly genki and overall hyperactive personality with a smile just a touch too big to be true.

And so they had coped.

However, Duo suspected that Heero never did cope until now.

He believed that Heero couldn't find a means of coping during the war and so he just filed all of that pain and grief away (maybe filed it all into that damnable laptop); and promised himself that he'd deal with all his emotional turmoil after the war and after he could finally stop fighting.

And it seemed that Heero had, somewhere, somehow, found - if not redemption - the ability to tolerate his own existence, which in itself was an inevitable road of self-discovery.

Thus, Duo wasn't too overly surprised at the nightmares that his new roommate finally allowed himself to have.

He was surprised, on the other hand, at the leering.

…

And the 'accidental' groping.

Notes:

Thanks especially to athame who was willing to ignore the 1 + 2ness and semi-beta.

I'm not sure when I can get the second chapter out (actually, it was supposed to be one of those horrendously long one-shots) - it all depends on my incredibly evil biology teacher. Remind me to never ever ever take a year course over the summer again.

x.X

[0] hn. that was rather obnoxious. Better have gotten the point across. =_=

[1] smart boards: I don't know the exact name for them, but that's what our school calls them. They're basically "white boards" (though ours are actually black o.O;) that are linked to a computer and have certain electronic uses such as printing and saving.

[2] my friend thought that it was rather weird that Duo-chan seemed to be carrying smoke bombs. But I thought, "Hey, considering his penchant for things going boom, he'd like fluffy clouds (mushroom clouds especially) that are involved with things going boom too, right?"

[3] waves at athame - yeah, it does seem like something Duo would say. Where'd you pick it up?

[4] yes, OOC here (and beyond -dang Hee-chan's hard to write!), but it has been a while (*coff*fewmonths*coff) since the wars, ne? and therefore he could have loosened up, ne? Come to think of it… have you noticed that when you write Duo anything goes because his psyche has that many problems (despite the fact that he's my favorite little fly-boi) while if you write anyone else with a different sort of manner than in the series, everyone points and hits you with the OOC stick?