Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ The Psionic Saga ❯ Chapter Fourteen ( Chapter 14 )

Chapter Fourteen

Heero woke warm. Heat radiated across his chest, down one leg, through one arm, hovered on his neck…It had a scent, and the scent a name. Duo.

A slight smile tinged the corner of Heero's lips as he disentangled himself from the lithe form, tucking the sheets tighter around Duo's form. It had taken three days to make Duo leave it behind, but Heero was sure he had done it. When the braided boy awoke he would be as much a baka as ever before, if not more.

Moving to his desk, Heero booted up his laptop. He went online and received his mail, pleased his friends from other schools had got his request. Sitting in his inbox were five very different, very unique and very believable assignments.

He had made the request after he himself had been attacked, knowing that if his own attention was on the Psionicists and not their work, then none of his four companions would be thinking of homework. Subsequently he had made contact with people he had not really spoken to since his arrival at the boarding school in year seven, and they had happily agreed to help him cheat by handing in their own assignments. No one would ever know, because private colleges had nothing to do with public schools. Especially not one's in different countries.

Reading through the file labelled Heero, he couldn't help but smile. It was perfect. All his usual idiosyncrasies had been included. He knew the others would be the same, each one uniquely tailored to mimic its supposed creator. Heero knew his friends would have had fun pretending to be the characters Heero had described. In particular, they seemed to have taken a great deal of pleasure in writing Wufei's…

There were multiple repeated words like honour and injustice where Heero would never have thought the topic could stray to such accolades, and then there was a lengthy tangent about how the kata related perfectly to the evolution of man…Heero was not sure how that worked, but the theory seemed sound, if a little baffling, so he didn't change it. Besides, he knew the lecture he would get if he dared to alter Iria's handiwork. He knew Wufei' had been written by Quatre's sister, who Heero had known much longer than he had Quatre, for some unexplainable reason.

A loud yawn was followed by a thunk. Heero turned to see Duo sprawled on the floor, blinking blearily at the ceiling, sheet wrapped about his torso so tightly Heero could see the lines of the boy's boxers pressed into the material, among other things. He quickly turned away.

"Good morning to you too, Heero," Duo mumbled as he fumbled his way under the bed, hands searching for much needed washing materials. Heero was willing to put up with a lot when it came to Duo, but when someone's hair was that filthy, and you had just spent the night breathing it in…It really didn't bear thinking about.

"What are you doing?"

Heero did his best to ignore the hot hand on his shoulder, the warm breath snaking down his neck as Duo leaned over him to stare at the computer screen.

"Is that our assignment? I haven't even started! Hang on…this sounds like…Have you been copying from Wufei's?!"

Heero glared over his shoulder and was rewarded with a sheepish expression. Duo even backed away a few steps. Heero loved his glare; not even Duo could stand up to it and Duo could take a lot.

"There is one for each of us. This one happens to be for Wufei."

"Oh…Then, that means….there's one for me…Did you write it?"

Heero paid no attention to the curiosity behind Duo's words, ignoring the odd light in Duo's eyes as he opened the file named Duo. The first thing Heero noticed was that he didn't know six out of the ten words used in the first sentence. The second thing he noticed were the odd drawings in the border and scattered throughout the paper. They looked like machinations of some kind, but what ,machines had to do with evolution Heero could not begin to contemplate. Apparently Iria and her friends had had equal amounts of fun with each of their papers. He would have to remember to thank them.

"Hey…they outlined the entire process of futuristic mechanical evolution and its respective relativity to man and annual complicity…that's cool!"

Heero had no idea what Duo had just said, but a lot of those words were in the first sentence. Heero decided to save a copy of the paper for later reading. If Duo found it interesting it probably had some logical use and there were pictures so it couldn't be that hard to read.

"You smell." Heero changed the subject.

"Really? How do you know I don't smell like this all the time?"

Heero almost fell into the trap of answering, barely holding back the whisper that dared to seep from his lips. Instead, he pressed them together hard and glared. When in doubt, glare…Heero decided it was a good motto.

"Fine! I'll go shower! Geesh, nothing like trying to wound a man. Next thing you know he'll tell me my hair looks like shit!"

Maybe Heero was feeling masochistic or maybe he just wanted revenge, whatever the reason he replied.

"Your hair looks like shit."

There was a strange gurgling sound Heero thought might have come from Duo. It sounded more like a turtle that had forgotten how to breathe underwater. It was followed by the slamming door. Heero glanced at the bedside table and noticed the Psion-bands were gone, so he did not worry. Duo knew how to use his own creations and after last time nothing would keep him from the switch. Hell, he probably already had them switched on.

Heero took the time to look through the rest of the assignments. Trowa's was noticeably short, but was the exact length required to pass. It also contained nothing pointless. It was to the point, to the point of being obscene, but it was typically Trowa. Heero wondered how much Quatre told Iria about his life and thought the paper was the perfect answer to his question. He didn't think Trowa would like to know.

Smirking, Heero scrabbled through the things in his draw and drew out a small box. He had had a spare moment with Quatre a few days ago to go shopping. He removed the small black mobile from its box and began taking it apart, careful to memorise exactly how it had gone together. He then removed its programming chip and replaced it with one of his own. It had only taken an hour while Duo was sleeping to alter an old program to do what he wanted. Heero thought even Wufei would be proud of this little device. After all, the Chinese man had paid for half.

Heero quickly put the phone back together and wrapped it in gold paper, placing the small parcel on Duo's bed with a tag that said thank you from Wufei. They had both agreed to omit the fact that Heero had paid for some of the phone, as Duo was already feeling guilty about taking Heero's radio. Not that Heero minded putting in money for this little venture. He hadn't even minded giving up his radio; it was for a good cause.

The shower down the hall stopped, the pipes shuddering to a halt and echoing through the walls of the room. Heero grinned and waited patiently, packing away all evidence of his handiwork and opening a random file on his computer. It was something from Iria….no doubt a `thank me now and you owe me one' e-mail. Heero was used to it and knew Iria expected him to endure a shopping trip. It was always her demanded payment.

The door opened and a familiar set of bottles flew across the room, hit the floor with a smack and rolled under Duo's bed, possibly never to be seen again. They were followed by a cursing towel-clad Duo who hopped into the room and glared around.

"Where are my clothes?"

Heero didn't reply. He had stashed the manga mountain in the bottom drawer of his own dresser, as it was the only free space, and all Duo's clothes were packed neatly away in the cupboard. The only time the room had been this tidy was before Duo arrived to live in it. It looked good, if a little strange.

Duo sighed heavily and marched to the cupboard. He stood in front of the open doors for several minutes before one quick hand snatched up a pair of black overalls and an equally black shirt.

"We have to go to class…"

Duo tossed the back clothing back in the cupboard and grabbed one of his uniforms, scowling deeply. Heero turned away to give him some privacy.

"What do we have? No wait, the assignment's due this morning, so it must be Bio…but that means…"

Heero had told Duo about the most recent incident last night. He nodded at the odd look on Duo's face, waiting to see what his reaction would be.

Duo grinned.

"Annual complicity…Old Professor J is gonna have a fit! And wait til he realises that whatever he's done to make those Psionicists I can do with machines!"

Duo was still chattering away wildly when Heero locked their room and hurried down the hallway. Whatever was in that paper had just become Heero's number one priority.

They met Trowa on the staircase at level four. Heero saw the tension on the other boy instantly and knew just as quickly what was wrong.

"How long?"

"Hours."

Duo looked from one to the other, thinking hard. Heero could almost see the thoughts flickering quickly through his mind, each discarded and the next brought forward. Finally one seemed to stick.

"Where's Quatre?"

Heero looked around, gathering himself. Something was missing, and it wasn't just Quatre. Something was not right.

"More importantly," Trowa said gloomily. "Where's Wufei?"

End Chapter Fourteen

Note from leth: Comments are extremely appreciated, especially at this point in the story, as everything coming after here is rather `out there' and your ideas and input are always welcome. I hope you have enjoyed Psionic Saga so far, and don't worry, I already have the next part done, you just have to beg. lol