Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Duo's Dilemma ❯ Chapter 11 ( Chapter 11 )

Disclaimer - It’s not mine. Never was. The only character I own is Bella. She’s all mine. So don’t steal!

A/N - Special thanks to the following people for hanging in there and keeping me wanting to write: Miss Crazy, Ryla, Ahanchan, and silversilence0. I really am sorry for taking so long to update, but I’m getting back into the swing of things now. The updates should be a little more often from now on.

-...-

Duo’s Dilemma

Chapter 11

Back on Home Turf

-...-

“Yuy, report to my office immediately. And bring Chang and Maxwell with you.” came Lady Une’s voice over the intercom. Heero just looked up from the paperwork he had been working on and glared at the little box, more than likely wishing he could shoot the thing into oblivion.

The Preventors and Vice Foreign Minister had returned to Europe just the day before, leaving the meetings in New Orleans before they had ever finished. Relena had been none too happy about it, but with both Heero and Une pressuring her to get back, she hadn’t had that much of a choice.

“We’re on our way.” Heero answered, standing up and throwing on his jacket. Across the cluttered desk, Duo yawned and stretched his arms. He still hadn’t quite gotten over the jet lag.

“What does she want now?” he asked his partner. “The reports from the trip aren’t due until this evening.” Heero said nothing, and Duo just ignored him as usual.

“Get Chang and meet me in her office.” the stoic man said.

“Yes, sir.” Duo saluted, walking out the office behind him. “We’ll be there just as soon as I can get him away from Sally.”

Fifteen minutes later, after Duo had pulled the justice bound, ex-Gundam pilot from the grips of his quite angry girlfriend, the two walked into the office of Preventor’s coordinator, Anne Une.

“I’m glad you all decided to join me.” she said, shuffling some papers on her desk and gesturing for them to sit down. The three men in front of her waited for their orders, not knowing what the woman wanted them to do now.

“Sorry it took so long, colonel.” Duo said cheekily. “Wufei was…busy.”

“Shut it, Maxwell.” Wufei snapped.

“I’ll get right to business, gentlemen.” Une said. “It has come to my attention that the three of you have not used up any of your vacation time this year.”

“So?” Heero asked.

“You’re going to loose it at the end of next month if you don’t use it up.” Une said.

“I don’t need a vacation.” Heero said flatly.

“I bet Princess would disagree with that.” Duo commented easily.

“Maxwell?” Heero asked.

“Yeah?”

“Shut up.” Duo just smiled and leaned back into his chair. Taking some vacation time didn’t sound like such a bad idea to him. Hell, he’d barely taken a day off in the last eight months. And it wouldn’t be too bad to get away from Heero for a little while. The quite man was a good guy, but he really needed to lighten up a bit more.

“I’ve arranged for you three to have the next four weeks off, if you wish it.” Une said, handing them each a paper that explained how and when their vacation time had accumulated, along with how much of it they had already used. “Well?”

“Sounds good to me.” Duo said. “I could use a vacation.”

“Your life is a permanent vacation, Maxwell.” Wufei said.

“Hey! I resent that!” Duo exclaimed, acting hurt.

“Do we have to take this time off?” Heero asked, leveling his unblinking gaze at Une.

“It’s not mandatory, Heero.” she said. “But I do suggest you take some time off. You’ve been overworking yourself lately, all of you have. And I don’t need my three best officers working themselves to death.”

“Yeah, just think how happy Princess will be when you tell her you’re going to be off for a while.” Duo said happily. “I remember her telling you that you needed to lay off work for a while.” Heero leveled a glare at his partner, but after all the time Duo had been around the Wing Zero pilot, Duo had become immune to it.

“So gentlemen, what are your answers?” Une asked.

“I game.” Duo said happily. “I mean, no offense there Heero, but…..”

“Don’t even start cracking jokes, Maxwell.” Heero said. Duo promptly shut up, and Heero turned back towards Une with a curt nod. “Fine. I’ll take the time off.”

“Wufei?”

“Fine by me.” he answered.

“Excellent.” Une said. “You are free to go after you finish the reports on the Summit meetings and hand them in to me.”

“Anything else?” Wufei asked.

“No.” Une said, waving her hand as she pulled out another lot of paperwork. “You’re dismissed.”

The three young men stood, saluted, and walked out the door of Une’s office and past her secretary. The entered into the elevator, and Duo pressed the button for them to go to the thirteenth floor.

“So, what are you guys gonna do with your time off?” Duo asked.

“Nothing to concern yourself with, Maxwell.” Wufei said, exiting out the door.

“You’d think he’d removed that stick up his ass when he started dating Sally.” Duo commented easily, watching his friend as he maneuvered his way back to the office he shared with Sally.

“Hn.” Heero answered.

“Vocal as ever, I see.” Duo muttered, following behind his own partner as they entered into their own shared office. Heero picked up the small pile of papers on his side and tapped them into place, then placed them in a folder. “Where you going now?”

“Turning the report in, and leaving.” Heero said simply.

“You’re already finished with that thing?” Duo questioned. Truth be told, he hadn’t even started on the blasted report yet. “Already?”

“Yep.”

“Okay.” Duo said, pulling himself up straight in his desk. “You leaving after you turn it in?”

“Yep.”

“Is that the only word in your vocabulary today?”

“No.”

“Didn’t think so.” Duo muttered. “Well, have a good vacation. Tell Princess I said hello.” Heero just grunted and walked out of the office, folder of papers in hand. Duo rolled his eyes and got to work on his own report from the trip to the States. If he wanted to get out of that building anytime soon, he’d better get to work.

Fortunately, he didn’t have any disruptions until five minutes after he was finished. The vid-cam on his desk beeped, and he absently hit the button to accept the call.

“Duo Maxwell, here.” he said, tapping the papers into a neat stack.

“Duo, it’s Quatre.” the voice said. “I hope I’m not interrupting anything.” Duo looked up at the screen and saw the blonde pilot, tie undone, and a stack of papers on each side of him. Apparently Quatre was still at the office himself.

“Hey, Q-man! What’s up? How ya’ been?” Duo asked, a grin on his face.

“I’m fine, Duo.” he said with a sigh. “But I need to ask you a favor.”

“I’m all ears.”

“I need to know if you have Belladonna Saucier’s phone number.” Quatre said.

“Bella?” Duo asked. “Yeah, I got it. Hold on a second.” Duo fished his cell phone out of his pocket and after a few taps of the keys, found Bella’s number when she had called him over a week ago. He gave the numbers to Quatre, who just smiled in relief.

“Thanks.” he said. “I just met with her yesterday, but I forgot to get her to sign one of the legal documents. I tried calling her at her office number, but the vice-president said that she wouldn’t be back for a few more weeks.”

“Yeah, she was supposed to meet up with you, wasn’t she?” Duo said. “Everything go okay?”

“Fine.” Quatre said. “She knows her stuff as well, which is a relief, let me tell you. Half the CEO’s I deal with don’t even know what’s going on with their own companies. It’s really nice to work with someone who keeps on top of things. She’s a wonderful person.”

“Tell me about it.” Duo muttered. He had been thinking about the woman since he’d gotten back to Preventor Headquarters the day before. The little bit of time he’d spent with her during the trip to the States had been a breath of fresh air for him. A welcome reprieve from the overshadowing of depression caused by Hilde. Now, he was a little perturbed knowing he was more than likely not going to get to see her again. “She’s a nice lady.”

“She seems to have taken an interest in you, believe it or not.” Quatre said with a grin.

“Say what!” Duo asked, not sure he had heard the blonde man right.

“Yeah, she was telling me all about how you two wound up having a food fight in the kitchen while she was at her father’s house.” Quatre said absently. “Told me it was the most fun she’d had in a long time.”

“Really?” Duo asked. “Do tell.” The braided man leaned back in his chair, eager to know what Bella had told Quatre about him.

“Yes. She was especially impressed with how you fixed the computer network at her company building.” Quatre said. “What happened? She wouldn’t tell me any details.”

“Someone hacked in and deleted some of her paperwork and stuff.” Duo said, shrugging. “I fixed it, and set up some extra security measures.”

“You planted another virus, didn’t you?” Quatre clarified, knowing how Duo liked to leave little bugs for any would-be hackers. It was one of the man’s specialties, and Quatre often wondered where he came up with the ideas for the things he created.

“It wasn’t anything too bad, Q-man.” Duo said reassuringly, although the grin on his face belied his seriousness.

“Well, whatever you did, she was impressed.” he said, taking a group of papers from a nearby stack and sorting them as he talked to Duo. “And trust me, she’s a hard one to surprise. I’ve known her since she started Saucier Corp., and let me tell you, I’ve never seen her in such a good mood.”

“Well, I’m glad I could be of some entertainment.” Duo said, grinning even brighter. So, he’d impressed the pretty CEO. Well, that definitely gave his self-esteem a boost, whether he wanted to admit it or not.

“Yes, well, I do hope that she is able to get back to work soon.” Quatre said absently. “She was headed for her home, somewhere on the main colony of the L2 cluster, the last time I spoke with her. She didn’t seem to happy about it though. Whatever it is that is causing her problems is getting worse, at least from what I could tell.”

“Yeah.” Duo said. “Well, I’m kinda busy Q-man, not that I don’t like talkin’ with you, but I’ve got a report to go turn in to Une.”

“Oh, I’m sorry to keep you from your work, Duo.” Quatre said sincerely. “Thank you for the number. Bye.”

“Anytime, Q-man.” Duo said heartily. “Anytime. Later.” The connection was severed, and Duo laid the report on the side of his desk, away from the rest of the clutter.

‘So, I’ve impressed her, and she’s heading to L2?’ he thought, picking up a pencil and tapping it on the desktop. ‘This could prove interesting. Wonder if I can track down where she lives? See if she wants some company…’ He was seriously considering hopping a shuttle to L2 and seeing if he could track her down. It’s not like he had anything else to do for the next four weeks.

And besides, he’d been needing to get back to the colony. He hadn’t been to visit the graves of Sister Helen and Father Maxwell since his last visit to the main colony, and that had been over nine months ago. That was also the last time he’d stopped in and checked on things in the small apartment he kept near the main city in the colony. He’d used the cramped place the times he’d been assigned to cases in the area. It beat hotels any day of the week.

He flipped on his computer and headed straight for the database of residents that Preventors kept for each colony, his mind made up to go see if he could find where she lived on the main colony.

‘Hey, if I’ve got to take some time off, I might as well have some fun if I can.’ he thought, scanning through the listings on his screen. ‘And she’s about the best option at the moment. Besides, I need to go back home for a while. Earth isn’t bad, but it’s not my home.’

-...-

When Quatre severed the vid-cam connection with Duo, he immediately switched over to the line he had on hold. The patient face of Relena Peacecraft met his slight frown.

“Alright, I told him.” Quatre said with a frown. “He’s probably booking tickets to L2 as we speak.”

“Wonderful.” Relena said, smiling. “It’ll do him some good to get away from Headquarters for a while.”

“I hate deceiving him like that, though.” Quatre said. “I just don’t like it.”

“Quatre, please understand.” Relena said begged. “You said yourself that all Bella talked about at the meeting was Duo and his crazy antics. She was happy.”

“I have to agree with you on that.” he said.

“They compliment each other.” Relena said, smiling happily. “After what he’s been through with Hilde, he needs someone like Bella. It will help, I promise.”

“It just seems underhanded, baiting him with information like that.” Quatre said, shaking his head.

“He wasn’t going to find out any other way, and you know it.” Relena said firmly. “She wasn’t going to tell him, not in a million years.”

“I hope you’re right, Ms. Relena.” Quatre said.

“Of course I am.” she said firmly. Quatre heard a door open and shut in the background, and saw when the grin on Relena’s face turned into a sunny smile. That only meant one thing. “I’ve got to go, Quatre, but trust me on this.”

“I will, Ms. Relena.” Quatre said reluctantly. “And tell Heero I said hello.”

“I will. Bye.”

“Goodbye.” Quatre settled back into his chair and sighed. ‘Allah help us all if this does not work out.’ he thought. ‘And if it does, I beg you give us strength to endure the terror that Duo Maxwell and Belladonna Saucier will unleash on us all!’

-...-

Belladonna fumbled with the keys to her apartment and tried to balance out the two grocery bags full of food in her arms. She’d been on L2 for a couple days now, and it had become readily apparent that she had needed to go to the grocery store not long after she’d arrived. She had not been in the apartment for a while, and it had taken her most of the day just to air it out and get the dust off of everything. She finally managed to get the key into the lock and the door opened without dropping anything. She kicked her shoes off at the door, and headed straight for the kitchen.

Things had calmed down since she’d been in space, at least according to her vice-president and tech specialist that she had left in charge of the company in her absence. They had emailed her daily with what was going on at the building, even going so far as to keep her up to date with the gossip circulating around the building as to why she was gone.

When she had asked how the investigation about who had broken into the building was going, neither of her employees had been able to tell her much. The police still had not been able to find any leads as to who had done it, let alone find any suspects.

Of course, the little tidbit of information that she had gotten from Duo about the virus on her dear sister’s computer had set her off on a rage. She’d called the Preventors in New Orleans and told Preventor Asher what had happened, and how the virus had wound up on her sister’s computer. He said he’d do what he could, but without the laptop as evidence, there was not much he could do. He did promise to have someone keep an eye on Marguerite, though. So not all was lost. It was all very nerve racking for her, but there was really nothing else she could do about it.

She’d had her suspicions that Marguerite was trying to sabotage her at every turn for a while, but it had really come full force since Relena’s visit to the States and the Summit meetings. In fact, she’d just talked to her father a few hours ago, and he’d told her that Marguerite had been moody ever since Relena had left a few days before.

She set the two bags of groceries down on the countertop, turned on the radio, and began to unload the bags, placing things where they went.

She had no doubts that Margie was more than upset about loosing her chance to jump Duo, as opposed to Relena leaving. Of course, she was still more than worried about Margie running around with Neil Fleck, her old security specialist. Bella’s suspicions had been raised when she had last called and talked to Relena, and Duo had told her that Margie was leaving with Fleck. She’d given Preventor Asher her suspicions, and he’d found them surprisingly valid. Of course, they were only suspicions, he’d told her. There was not any kind of action they could take unless their was some solid proof.

Of course, she had forgotten to mention the threats she’d gotten while still on Earth. There had been one waiting for her at the shuttle port, one at the hotel she’d stayed at on L4, and even one delivered to her during her dinner with Quatre Winner. Each and every one of them had warned her to stay away from Earth, and away from the Preventors. Of course, after the dinner with Quatre, when she’d signed the expansion papers to integrate part of Winner’s company with her own, the notes had stopped.

Now, she usually didn’t scare easily, but Bella was starting to worry about this nut. Whoever was sending her the notes apparently knew more about her than she was willing to admit to. And that only fueled her suspicion that her half sister had something to do with it. Of course, the paranoia was beginning to take it’s toll on her. She’d had the feeling all day that she was being followed, but anytime she’d turn around to see, there was no one behind her.

“You know, this building has a pathetic security system.” came an amused voice from the doorway. Bella, who had her head in the refrigerator, trying to sort through the food she’d just bought, stood up quickly, slamming her head into the top of it. She vaguely registered the sound of breaking glass as she cursed and spun around, only to find the very man she’d just been thinking about leaning against her doorframe, as if conjured up by her own overactive imagination. He had a huge grin on his face, and Bella had to hold back the tears of pain that were coursing through the back of her head.

“Damn you to hell, Maxwell!” she yelled, her hand on the back of her head where she had hit the fridge. “What are you doing here? And more importantly, why did you feel the need to scare the living shit out of me!”

“Comic relief?” he asked, shrugging, the grin still on his face. Bella rolled her eyes, willing her heartbeat to go back to normal as she sat down on the kitchen chair to steady herself.

“Damn, that hurts.” she whined, pulling her hand from her head to find a small splattering of blood on her hands. “Wonderful, I’m bleeding. Thanks, Maxwell.”

Duo grimaced and walked over to where she was sitting. He hadn’t meant to make her hurt herself. He just wanted to surprise her, not scare her to the point where she injured herself.

“You okay?” he asked, walking behind her and pulling her hair aside to see a cut on her scalp. He picked a few pieces of glass out of her hair carefully and threw them in the trash bin beside him.

“Just peachy.” she said sarcastically. “I usually make it a habit to ram my head into my refrigerator when I’m putting up groceries. Helps improve the circulation to my already over-wrought brain.”

“Sorry about that.” he said. “I didn’t mean to make you hurt yourself.”

“What’d I cut myself on?” she asked, looking over at the still opened refrigerator door. Duo handed her a paper towel to clean up the blood and walked over to the door, peering in it.

Little shivers of glass were lying on the floor in front of it, and there was no light to illuminate what she had just put in there.

“Your head hit the light bulb and shattered it.” he said.

“Wonderful.” she said, rolling her eyes. “Light bulbs. The one thing I didn’t get while I was at the store.” Duo just grinned and shook his head.

“You didn’t hurt yourself to bad. The cut is small. It should have stopped bleeding by now.” he said, walking back behind her again. “Let me see.”

“You never did answer my question.” Bella said, tilting her head down so he could see the damage he’d caused. “What are you doing here? I figured you’d be back at Preventor’s Headquarters by now, with Yuy barking orders at you.”

“Vacation time.” Duo said, simply. “I figured I’d head back to my home colony for a while since I was off of work.” He took a seat across the table from Bella and leaned back. “Figured I’d stop by and harass you for a while.”

“How long do you have off?” she asked, dropping the spotted paper towel in the trash bin. “Two weeks?”

“Four.” he said.

“Your staying here the whole time?” she asked, standing up and moving back to the counter to finish unloading her grocery bags.

“Probably.”

“Do you have family around here?” she asked.

“Something like that.” he answered quietly, thinking of Father Maxwell’s and Sister Helen’s gravesites. “Here, let me give you a hand.”

“Yeah, it’s the least you could do, considering I’ve probably suffered a concussion thanks to you.” she teased, handing him a gallon of milk. He grinned and put it in the fridge. “So, what are you planning on doing for the rest of the day?”

“No plans.” he said. “I just got here earlier this morning.” Bella frowned and looked at the clock hanging on the wall nearby.

“It’s barely noon.” she said. “How long have you been here?”

“An hour or so.” he said, grinning. “Long enough to raid your stash of video games.”

“Find anything you like?” she asked. “Most of those are prototype games that friend of mine creates. I don’t think some of them have even been released to the public yet.”

“They’re great!” he said. “Especially Donark’s Rebellion! Killer graphics!”

“Blowing up Martians.” she said with a sigh. “That sounds right up your alley.”

“I like blowing things up.” Duo grinned. “Nothing wrong with that, is there?”

“I suppose not.” she said. “I was going to make some lunch before I got started on some work. You hungry?”

“Yeah, sure.” he said. Truth be told, he hadn’t eaten anything since he’d left Earth the night before, and his stomach was starting to complain quite loudly. “What kind of work you got to do?”

“Just some reports to look over.” she said, pulling out a large pot and pouring some rice into it, then filling it with water and sitting it on the stove.

“I thought you weren’t supposed to be working.” he said. “Vacation, remember?”

“It’s nothing big.” she said defensively. “Corey and Daniel have been keeping me up to date on what’s going on at the office. And Daniel sent me a few reports that he doesn’t know what to do with. It won’t take me long.”

“Any plans for the rest of the day?” he asked.

“I was just going to laze around here for the day, to be perfectly honest.” she said, shrugging. “I’ve got a few things I need to go do tomorrow, but that’s about it.”

“Nothing to do, huh?” Duo smiled. “Now aren’t you glad I decided to drop in? Word has it that I’m a really entertaining guy to be around.”

“And who told you that?” she teased, cocking an eyebrow and obviously trying to keep herself from laughing. “I do believe you’ve been misinformed.”

“Nah, my source is reliable.” he grinned. “And besides, we could always start another food fight if things get too boring.”

“Not in my apartment!” she said firmly. “I just got this place cleaned up.”

“Ahhh, come on…please?” he whined.

“Absolutely not.”

“Pretty, pretty, pretty please?” he begged.

“No.”

“I’ll do it anyways.” he threatened, grabbing a spray can of whipped cream and aiming it at her, wanting to see if she’d rise to the bait.

“I’ll lock my video games up.” she countered, her hands on her hips.

“I’ll pick the lock.”

“I’ll kick you out.”

“I’ll get back in.”

“I’ll set the security guards on you.”

“They’ll let me back in. I’m a Preventor.”

“I’ll tell them you’re a fake.”

“You do realize you’re not going to win this argument, right?” Duo finally asked, knowing she was scraping the bottom of the barrel of threats. Bella just hissed at him and rolled her eyes.

“You’re infuriating sometimes.” she said.

“I know. Heero tells me that all the time.” he said, hopping up onto the counter next to the stove. “So does Lady Une, now that I think about it.”

“Maybe that’s why she gave you the vacation time.” Bella said, stirring the rice.

“I doubt it.” he said. “I think Princess had something to do with it.”

“Why do you say that?” Bella asked, pulling a pack of chicken from the refrigerator and placing it in the sink.

“Just a hunch.” he shrugged. “Heero hasn’t taken any time off lately, and I know for a fact that she’s got a slow month coming up. Not as many meetings and junk. So, she wants to spend it with him.”

“Makes sense, I guess.” Bella shrugged.

“Need some help?” Duo asked.

“Are you going to start a food fight in my kitchen?” she asked pointedly.

“Honestly, probably so.” he said, grinning. “But what you gonna do about it? We’ve already figured out that kicking me out of here won’t do any good.” Bella just laughed and shook her head, then nodded towards the cabinet door to her left.

“Well, if you think you can refrain from making it into some sort of warped projectile,” she said. “I think there is some brownie mix up there you can get to work on.”

“Hey, hey!” he said goofily. “Sweet stuff. I like!”

“I thought you would.” she said, grinning.

They wound up spending the rest of the evening bickering over food and video games, and having an all around good time. Duo was surprised to find that the pretty little lady at his side was quite good at blowing things to smithereens in her own right, at least as far as video games were concerned. And he seemed to surprise her with his little bit of talent to make edible brownies.

Only problem was, the brownies were a little burned on the bottom because the two of them were preoccupied arguing over what movie to watch, and forgot that they were in the oven.

“It’s getting late.” Duo yawned as the latest movie they were watching ended. Bella, who had been camped out on the couch beside him, mumbled something incoherent. He looked over, grinning stupidly when he saw that she had fallen asleep at some point. He got up and stretched, then cut the television off. He leaned over and shook Bella gently. “Time to wake up, sleeping beauty.”

“Hmmm…” she mumbled. “Go ‘way. I’m sleepin’”

“No kidding.” Duo chuckled. Fortunately for him, his voice seemed to rouse Bella up from her light slumber. She opened her eyes and blinked a few times.

“The movie’s over already?” she asked, yawning. “What time is it?”

“About three in the morning.” Duo said. She groaned and fell back onto the couch. “You okay?”

“Yeah.” she said, getting up slowly. “I’m going back to bed, though. Are you heading out, or do you want to camp out on the couch here?”

Duo weighed his options quickly. His place was a good thirty minute walk from there, and it was about to start raining outside. Besides, he could always head home in the morning, after a couple of hours sleep.”

“I’ll stay here, if you don’t mind.” he said. “My place is a ways from here.”

“Not a problem.” she said. “The couch folds out into a bed, but it’s comfortable either way. Give me a minute and I’ll get you a blanket.” She walked away, and came back a few minutes later with a coverlet. Duo took it and piled the pillows up at one end of the couch.

“Thanks for letting me crash here.” he said, yawning.

“Any time.” she answered, smiling slightly. “If you need anything, just come wake me up. My bedroom’s right down the hallway.”

Duo nodded as she shut the lights off. A moments later, he heard the mattress in her room squeak slightly as she climbed into bed. He just grinned and pulled the cover up over his head, ready to get a couple hours sleep.

He had planned on going to the Sister Helen’s and Father Maxwell’s graves later that day, and he needed some sleep to get through something like that. After his visit though, he wasn’t sure what he could do. He’d seen a sign on his way to Bella’s apartment advertising a circus in town for the week.

‘Wonder if she’d like to go.’ he thought sleepily. ‘Ought to be fun at least.’ It wasn’t much longer after that, he drifted into dream land, more content than he had been in a very long while.

...-

A/N - Things are looking up for our lovable pilot, aren’t they? Hope you guys enjoyed the chapter and I am profusely sorry for taking so long, but I can assure you that it won’t happen again.

Lots of love to you all, and please remember to review. Even if it is to chew me out for taking so long. I deserve to be reprimanded.

Later,

A.A.