Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Les Ombres Rebelles ❯ Chapter 2

Les Ombres Rebelles - Chapter Two

 

by danse

 

~*~

 

Quatre woke up the next morning to find that Duo's bed was already empty, the sheets rumpled everywhere. He looked at his alarm clock absently, and then frowned when he saw that it was only quarter to six. Duo didn't strike him as an early riser.

 

He turned over to get another hour of shut-eye before his first class, which was Weapons Training 315, but was interrupted ten minutes later by the door to his room banging open and shut. He sat bolt upright, his hand automatically reaching under his pillow for the butterfly knife he kept there, but saw that it was Duo, leaning hard against the door and panting as he fumbled with the lock. He was dressed from head to toe in black, including a toque with his hair tucked up inside.

 

Quatre just stared. Duo looked up from the door and gave him a weak smile. “I would get dressed, if I were you,” he said cheerfully. “And keep that knife out.” He gestured at the hand that was still under Quatre's pillow, even though Quatre's body blocked his view of it from the door.

 

“What the hell are you doing, out of bed and dressed like that at six in the morning?” Quatre asked, wide-eyed and incredulous.

 

Duo pulled off his toque, appearing not to hear. Quatre just glared at him until he couldn't feign ignorance anymore. He sighed finally, un-strapping a knife from each forearm and pulling another one out of his boot. “Playing Tag,” he muttered.

 

Silence fell on the room while Quatre considered this. “I thought Heero was the one playing Tag,” he said finally, suspiciously.

 

“It takes two people to play Tag, Quatre,” Duo said in a slow, I'm-talking-to-an-idiot voice.

 

The blond boy's determination wasn't going to be swayed by sarcasm, though. He gave Duo a shrewd look. “But you're usually on the defensive, I think,” he said. “Why the sudden effort on your part? I always thought you were allergic to work.”

 

Duo stuck out his tongue. “New year, fresh start....” He trailed off, gesturing randomly.

 

So that was it. “You're trying to win.” Quatre swung his legs out from under the sheets and stood up, stretching like a cat before dropping to the floor to do his fifty morning pushups in his boxers.

 

Duo spluttered for a minute as he changed into regular clothes, apparently at a rare loss for words. As Quatre grabbed his toiletries and marched off to the bathroom for a shower, Duo's voice followed him faintly. “You have no idea what you're talking about....”

 

On the way to the bathroom, Quatre saw Heero storming up the hallway towards him, and quailed a little before realizing that he was actually heading for the room. He was carrying a six-inch, serrated hunting knife. Shaking his head, Quatre opened the bathroom door. He really hoped that they weren't going to destroy everything in the room with their fighting. He was clearly going to have to lay down a few ground rules about what went on in Duo and Quatre's shared abode in relation to murder and wanton destruction.

 

I think I can see what everyone else's problem with living with Duo is, now, he thought as he turned on the shower.

 

***

 

When Quatre saw Duo again after lunch in Conversational German 346 (all WFI students were required to master at least one foreign language), he looked quite miffed. Quatre wasn't particularly surprised; Duo and Heero had ended up fighting in the hallway that morning, which was all well and good for Quatre's belongings, but they'd carved some interesting holes in the walls and floor and nearly managed to eviscerate a passerby in the process. The Enforcers had come along to sort it out before someone innocent died on the first day, and to dole out some punishments for property damage. Duo had one hell of a shiner over his left eye, and apparently, Heero had started a brawl with an Enforcer, nearly getting himself killed by Mr. Kushrenada when he intervened to break it up.

 

“Well,” said Quatre brightly, “at least you're a celebrity now!”

 

Duo gave him a pained look, completely clueless.

 

“The whole school's talking about it,” he explained. When Duo groaned, Professor G glared at them both and they had to continue their conversation in German.

 

Duo put his face in his hands, going easy on his eye. “I hate this fucking school,” he muttered.

 

Quatre patted his arm lightly. “Only eight months left,” he said, before going back to his drill book.

 

***

 

The buzz that restarted every year about Heero and Duo's overly intense Tag participation carried on for a few days before something better happened to gossip about.

 

Just after lunch on the fourth day of class, one of the frosh somehow managed to kill his shadow.

 

It was a freak accident, really—a total fluke. The victor had left his first Weapons Training class after learning some basic offenses with a knife, and had challenged his shadow in the hallway. The kid refused, and actually disarmed him (clearly he'd had some previous martial arts training), but made the mistake of giving back the knife after teaching his shadow a lesson.

 

After lunch, the aggressor had seen his shadow in the hallway right outside the auditorium and chucked the knife at him. It had gone right into his neck, piercing his throat. He had suffocated before anyone got to him in time.

 

It was one of those acts of God, more than anything; the frosh had no training whatsoever with knife throwing, and had done it on a whim, `because he saw it in a movie'. And it had worked.

 

That was to go down in history as the first Tag-related death since the new rule came into place. It was going to be far from the last, though.

 

Quatre and Duo discussed it over dinner that night, after Duo was done checking his food for `special presents' from Heero. “You know that snot-nosed little punk is an Enforcer now?” Quatre said, taking a bite of roast beef.

 

Duo looked up from his potatoes. “Seriously?”

 

Quatre nodded. “I guess that's another new rule. All the lone wolves get to become Enforcers. I guess the current Enforcer crew is gonna be phased out until they're all lone wolves. Must be hard anyway, to keep up that job while still going to class and having to worry about a shadow to boot.”

 

“No shit,” Duo said. “I know I could never handle it. Of course, that's not really my fault.” He sent a glare at Heero, who was taking a break from Tag for once. Considering how hard they'd been going at it for the last few days, a break was understandable. Duo hadn't had more than two hours of sleep a night all week, and it was bound to continue. “So not only do you get peace and quiet for the rest of your school career, but you also get the most badass power position available to the students. Just for killing one son of a bitch,” he mused.

 

Quatre took a sip of water. “Gonna be a lot of frosh and sophomores going at it now,” he said sagely. “The power's too good to turn down to those guys.”

 

Duo frowned. “Gonna be a lot more than five Enforcers, now, too. Things could be a fucking police state here before you know it.”

 

They gave each other a worried look. Then Duo started eating faster, noting that at this rate, Heero was going to be finished his dinner first.

 

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A/N: We're catching up to what I have already written now, which after the next chapter or so will start to mean you have to wait like normal. :P So sorry.