Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ The Matchmaker ❯ Caught Red-Handed ( Chapter 11 )

Title: The Matchmaker 11/15?
Author: Makoto Sagara
Series: Gundam Wing
Archive: fanfiction .net, afallenangel .net/makotosagara/, mediaminer .org, adultfanfiction .net, makochanupdates .livejournal .com; anywhere else, please ask first.
Category: Supernatural, Angst, Romance, Sap

Pairings: Eventual 2x5x2, 3x4x3, and 1xRx1
Rating: T
Warnings: Shonen ai, language, angst, sap, het, supernatural dealings
Disclaimers: Yeah, like I own Gundam Wing. (Goes off to cry, but not before turning out pockets) I am poor as well. Flames will be used to amuse my muses. They are easily entertained, but highly obnoxious.

A/N: I received a comment about how the plot to kill Duo seems to be tacked on at the end of the ninth chapter. Sorry, this isn't true, and hopefully this chapter will clear up why you missed some of the signs, just like the pilots did.

Chapter Eleven - Caught Red-Handed

“So, you two expect me to believe that since this accident that Maxwell can hear our thoughts?” Wufei asked, not bothering to check his tone of voice at contempt.

Heero and Trowa exchanged glances and the banged man shrugged in defeat. “It isn't that far-fetched when one considers Quatre's ability.”

The black-haired man looked around the crowded restaurant before leaning into his lunch companions. “Excuse me if I have issues with Winner's paranormal capabilities.” He scowled fiercely. “However, that is unlikely to make me believe that Maxwell has somehow gained… What? Telepathy?”

“I would assume so,” Heero answered coolly. While he understood Wufei's resistance to this odd situation, he also knew that Duo knew things that he really shouldn't, and believed that his friend would never lie to any of them. Especially not about something as strange as this. “Let me ask you a question, Chang, and you'll answer truthfully.” Wufei nodded. “Has Duo ever lied for as long as any of us has known him?”

“Not to my knowledge…” Wufei sounded confused and unsure as to where their conversation was going.

“Duo has confirmed his new condition with me, Heero and Quatre,” Trowa replied carefully. “While I did not need his confirmation - I figured out what was going on when he woke up, to be honest - it was nice to receive it. Also, it made it infinitely easier to talk to him about the topic he chose to discuss.”

“And what topic was that, Barton?” Wufei asked with his black eyes narrowed suspiciously.

“It was personal, Wufei.”

“I can imagine. I am aware of the topic of conversation that he had with Yuy, so I assume that it was of the same vein as that, but with Winner as the object?” Trowa's silence seemed to confirm something for the Chinese man. “Fine, tell me why Maxwell is acting as some psychic matchmaker?”

“What would you do if all you heard was the thoughts and desires of everyone around you?”

That seemed to sink in, and then the Chinese face began to turn red before blanching entirely. “So, all of us, since he woke up?”

“As far as anyone can tell,” Heero added, nodding as Wufei's look turned thoughtful. “If you're worried about the way he found your feelings, I wouldn't.”

Trowa snorted before shaking his head. “With him, I think the only one who didn't have some idea of what he felt for you was yourself, Wufei.”

“And none of you felt that you needed to tell me this?” Wufei's thin lips were even thinner as he pulled them into a grimace.

“It is a personal issue, and I doubt Duo would have forgiven us if we'd told you before he could.” Trowa speared his friend with his eyes, willing him to see the logic in what he was saying. “It would have been a different story if the doctors hadn't been so sure he'd wake up. Quatre or I might have told you then, but it was made redundant by his nearly miraculous recovery.”

“How in the world can you believe any of this, Yuy?” Wufei asked, ignoring the European pilot for the moment. “It's absolutely ludicrous.”

“I will admit that I find it illogical, Wufei, but there is no logical answer for this. Just as there is no logical explanation for Quatre's unusual ability.”

“This is all beyond the point, Wufei. You know it, and so do we.” Trowa sounded so calm, but inside he was upset for Duo. No matter what was said, Wufei was just trying to ignore the issue. “The question now is what are you going to do with this information? Are you still going to take him back to Paris with you to recuperate?” His visible eye grew hard and cold. “Or should I let Quatre know that you're a coward and that the rest of us should step up to help our friend?”

“I am no coward, Barton, and if you even try to suggest that, I'll gut you.”

“Good to know,” Heero said with a twist of his lips that could have been a smile but was too scary to be called that. “Duo is the first friend I ever had, and I don't want to see him unhappy.”

“Are you charging me with a mission, Yuy?”

“Oh, you could say that. Of course, failure means that I kill you.” The Japanese man shrugged as he stood from the table. “I have to go get Relena. Evidently, I am taking her shopping before we return to Geneva.”

“Good luck with that, Heero,” Trowa said with a huge smile. “I don't envy you. The only thing worse would be if Quatre and Duo decided to go with you.” Heero's blue eyes grew big momentarily before his face shut down completely. “Although, what's the probability of that occurring?”

“Fairly high,” Heero snarled. “If Wufei's attitude is any indication, Duo is upset and the other two may feel the need for `shopping therapy'?” Trowa and Heero both shuddered. “I'll leave you now, but, Trowa,” the green-eyed man looked up, “leave your phone on.”

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

“I don't feel comfortable leaving him alone,” Relena told Quatre as they left Duo's hotel room after lunch. “I wish he'd come out with us for more than just lunch, even for a little bit.”

Quatre sighed and closed his eyes before reaching out to try and understand Duo's emotions. “He's tired, physically and emotionally right now. I think the best thing we can do is let him sleep.”

“Wrong,” the young woman said. “The best thing we can do is to wring Chang Wufei's stupid neck for being so stupid.” Her pretty face was turned into a snarl that left Quatre both impressed and worried.

“Relena, hurting Wufei will only make Duo unhappier. Besides, the man is our friend as well, if I'm not mistaken.” They turned to walk down the hall to the elevator. Heero was supposedly waiting for them in the lobby before they went shopping.

“Well, we're not besties, but I suppose that we are more than just passing acquaintances now.”

“And if it wasn't for the problem between him and Duo, you'd have no real issue with him?”

“I don't know. I hate how he calls me `woman' like I'm some lower life form.”

“And the last time he did that?”

“Two days before Duo woke up, thank you very much!”

“What were you doing?”

She flushed a bit before running a hand through her perfectly coiffed hair. “Well, I happened to be fluffing Duo's pillows… and his head hit the bed a bit too hard.”

“So, you could have been seen as trying to hurt his love interest at the time, yes?”

“God, Quatre, don't you be logical too! I require you and Duo to keep me from going insane from all the rational thoughts of the others!”

“I thought you got enough bullshit from working with politicians?” They both began laughing as they boarded the waiting elevator car. Neither saw the man who slunk around the corner and started heading towards the room where they'd just left Duo.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Trowa decided, after talking to Quatre on his cell, to follow Wufei back up to his hotel room to check on Duo. He knew from the quick discussion with his… friend that the American was tired and relatively well, but he felt the need to make sure that nothing untoward happened when Wufei saw the other ex-pilot again.

He was surprised when he looked down the hall to find someone crouched in front of the door to their room, obviously trying to break in. “Wufei… Do you have your gun?”

“Yes,” his friend responded quickly, looking at the stranger before his room while moving to retrieve his weapon. “Stay here,” he growled.

Trowa leaned against the nearest wall, more than willing to let the Preventer to do what he felt was his job. Since the Chinese man was actually legally armed, something Trowa wasn't, and the stranger was an unknown, it was the wisest thing for the European man to do. And if he was able to get some humor out of the situation as well, who could blame him, right?

As it was, Wufei snuck up behind the stranger on the balls of his silent feet and struck him with the side of his hand on the back of his neck, knocking him out. The man had nearly hit the floor before Wufei snatched at his collar and pulled up. Trowa took the time to join his friend with their captive and looked him over.

He was rather plain: straight, brown hair; small eyes of undetermined color since they were closed; button nose; thin lips; about 170cm, the same height as Wufei; and slim, like Duo. It could have been anyone really. He was the perfect choice as an assassin, if you didn't count the fact that he obviously needed to work on his lock picking skills. `Maybe he should take classes from Duo.'

“Do you recognize him?” Wufei asked as he shook the unconscious man.

“Wufei,” Trowa said quietly, “he looks like a normal guy. We need to get him out of this hallway, away from prying eyes, and restrained so we can ask why he's here.”

Wufei nodded, pulling out a pair of handcuffs from an inner pocket of his jacket. At Trowa's raised eyebrow, he shrugged nonchalantly, but his cavalier attitude was ruined by the blush that dusted his high cheekbones. “I thought you were off-duty?”

“I am, but I thought I'd need them to keep Duo in the hospital,” Wufei mumbled, his face getting redder by the second.

“Does Duo know you're so kinky?” He thought he heard something that sounded suspiciously like `Ai ma… yang gui zi… shi de'(1). He tried his best to remember what little Mandarin he'd learned when he went to China, and then smiled when he did. “And when did Duo learn this?”

“During the war… Moonbase… We thought we were dying.”

“Was that before or after you found the schematics for Deathscythe Hell and Altron?”

“How is that important, Barton?” Oh, boy, Wufei was pissed, he could tell. “Are you going to help me or not?”

Trowa reined in his amusement, leaving his face as blank as possible. “Of course, Wufei,” he replied, opening the hotel room with the key that his friend had dropped while retrieving his handcuffs. He pocketed it and then grabbed their prisoner's legs while Wufei lifted from the man's shoulders. It was an easy job of carrying him into the room and depositing him into one of the chairs around the small eating area.

Once he was secured, Trowa began searching his pockets. What he found made him extremely angry. The unknown man had been carrying a gun, a cloth with what smelled like chloroform, a stun gun, rope, and a knife. “No ID.”

“Of course not,” Wufei snarled, shaking the man until he woke up. The man's eyes snapped open, revealing an odd blue-green-gold combination that was the only characteristic that would have stood out, and he scowled. “Who are you?”

Silence.

“I asked you who you are,” Wufei repeated quietly. “If you're here with all this paraphernalia, you must know who we are and what we are capable of. Now, answer me.”

“You are 05 and 03 from the colonies.” His voice was a soft, high-pitched whisper.

Trowa frowned. If this man knew their codenames from Operation Meteor, he could only have been associated with a few redundant organizations - OZ, Romefeller, the Doctors, or the Alliance. However, another possibility came to mind that chilled his blood. “Wufei, come here for a moment,” he whispered in his friend's ear.

“What?” The Chinese man was as tense as a steel beam, but allowed Trowa to pull him to the other side of the room. “What is it, Barton?”

“I think we have a problem,” Trowa said quietly.

“That's rather obvious, I would think.”

“He's referring to us by our codenames. There aren't many people alive who have access to that information, right?” Wufei nodded. “I think we have to have Duo read his mind to get what we need from him. He's not going to talk. He's been trained to withstand interrogations and torture, most likely.”

Wufei eyed their captive carefully. He was holding his head stiffly, eyes staring straight ahead of him, and his jaw was set in what could only have been a stubborn clench. “He's not going to talk to us. You're right.”

“I think we need to have…”

“I heard you the first time, Barton, but I don't think he'd be up to doing this.”

“Call Heero and Quatre and let them know what's going on,” Trowa said resolutely. “I'll talk to Duo. I understand how you feel, Wufei, but I think we need answers.”

TBC

Notes: (1) Ai ma… yang gui zi… shi de - Mandarin, `fuck it, dammit… foreign devil/bastard… yes'

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