Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ VIVA ❯ Chapter 4

Notes from the author: ok, to answer a few q's. Yes, I have a massive musical background. To put it nice a simply…um…well. Lol. I have sung since I could talk. I began learning piano when I was five. I began learning flute when I was ten. I learnt clarinet for two years when I was eleven but I didn't really like it, so at twelve I began learning the piccolo. Yes, my flute is a deford-elkhart, and it's a gem! Um…I wrote my first song when I was fourteen. I began learning guitar when I was fourteen. At sixteen I went on youth exchange to Finland and attended an arts specialized school, where I was in the music class (Seeing some similarities here? lol) I did in depth studies in the origins of Finnish Folk, music of the Renaissance period and sacred music of europe (iow, Choir music). I also did three dance studies: Greek, Russian and Latin (though I never really paid enough attention, I still passed! Heh) When I came back I became the cantor for the district Cathedral Choir and basically joined every other choir available including the Olympic choir! Haha! Now I am in my third year of a four year course at University that will give me a bachelor of Contemporary Music (and a Bachelor of Education). I stared learning the Harp two years ago. So yes, I have a musical life. My other loves include acting (I have an odd obsession with the later half of the macabre, only I lean toward the spanish rather than the French) I love art, I love history, I love dance. I think you get the idea. I hope that answers all your q's about the origin's of this story!

5: rehearsals in C# Aeolian

Dorothy fiddled with the hairs on the bow and tried not to frown as she realized she was going to need to get it restrung soon. She always ended up paying a small fortune for the best hair, but it was worth it and it wasn't like she didn't have the money. She shared a knowing glance with Quatre as he inspected his own bow. Maybe they could go together. She hated trying to get supplies out of Une, but the tyrant seemed to like Quatre.

"What time's he coming?" She whispered as he moved over to tune to the Cello.

"Dunno. He said he had a tutorial with Noin, but that he should finish in about an hour. He just wanted to come listen…"

Dorothy nodded in understanding. He wasn't accepting any offers that didn't come from the whole group. Smart boy.

Hilde rushed through the door, a huge smile on her face that had even Heero taking a worried step back. Dorothy's eyes lit up at the prospect of finally having some good gossip. She could always rely on Hilde to make life interesting.

"Well, out with it!" Dorothy snapped as Hilde ignored them all in favour of plugging in her bass to the amp and tuning up.

Sighing heavily, as if wronged, Hilde waved her hand in a generally southern direction. Everyone looked completely stumped, except Dorothy, who of course knew that the garage was that way, and hence so too was the rather hunky mechanic, Solo Maxwell. Dorothy had only been at the Wing colledge a day before she met Hilde. It had only taken Hilde an hour to spill her guts on the crush she had developed, in less than a day, for said mechanic. It had been a running joke ever since and while Hilde's crush was not nearly as marked as it had been last semester, Dorothy was still planning ways to seduce Solo to keep Hilde on her toes. After all, wasn't that what friends were for?

The entire band was glaring at them both but were easily ignored as Dorothy strategically placed her set of mic's around the cello and began tuning. Relena sat behind her kit and started adjusting the snare. Apparently she had been having some trouble with it, but then…Dorothy thought Relena was always having trouble with it. And who wouldn't, when Heero seemed to be the only when who knew how to properly fix it? Oh yes, Dorothy was on to Relena.

"Alright, I think we should go over last year's material since I Wufei and I need to work on the stuff for this year," Trowa said softly, turning on the mic near his flute and adjusting the amp at this back to be heard over the guitar. "If we can get back to the standard we were at before the break by the end of the week, I'll be a happy man."

They all agreed and Dorothy nodded to Quatre's inquisitive brow as she steadied her right hand above the strings and waited for Relena to count her in. Dorothy was delighted as she heard a violin mimic her perfectly on the first try, the low cello stabs echoing briefly through the short delay pedal Heero had hook up while they were waiting, anticipating what Trowa had wanted them to work on. Quatre had no such effect, but was making up for it by slurring each note and jumping the bow on the strings to make two notes meld into one, the second softer than the first just as if there were delay. Then the bass started.

Hilde was an interesting musician. To begin with, she was left handed. There is just something about left handed guitarists…and that something is even more pronounced in bass players. It has nothing to do with talent, there's just something about the way the left hand works in comparison to the right that alters the feel of the music. It had not taken the electric orchestra long to realize they liked that something…and since they had a right handed guitarist it balances perfectly.

This particular bass line was identical to the cello line, only while Dorothy started on the first beat in the bar, Hilde came in one the `2 and' beat, creating the most insane round of syncopation any of them had encountered. Add to that the fact that four bars later Heero started the same riff only an octave higher and starting on the third beat of the bar, followed quickly by Trowa yet another octave higher on the `4 and' beat and you basically had a composition major's idea of bliss and anyone else's idea of insanity. But it sounded…like war. It sung in Dorothy's veins.

The violin suddenly broke away from the rest of the music, taking the Aeolian scale they were working in and soloing over the top with a flattened 7th note added to create a middle eastern feel. Dorothy saw Heero narrow his eyes from the corner of her vision and smirked, knowing what was to come.

Sure enough, Heero broke away from his original part and started a small battle against the violin. As they seemed rather matched, Heero broke away from the Aeolian scale and moved into a Japanese scale with several half tones that he used to fill thirty-second notes between phrases that had the auditorium ringing with a vibration instead of sound. It went straight through the players, driving them on. Hilde broke off from the original riff and followed Heero's lead, bending the strings to force her perfectly tuned instrument out of tune to match the scales Heero was employing. Not to be left out, Trowa followed Quatre, though he switched from Aeolian to Lydian mode, highlighting the fourth interval at every opportunity.

Dorothy spared a quick glance at Relena who looked annoyed at being left out of the fun and winked, mouthing her own little countdown as she prepared to switch with Relena as her backup.

Relena nodded in understanding a beat before Dorothy smacked the bow down on the lowest of the strings before sliding her fingers down the whole neck of the Cello, the bow following slightly ahead, a scandalous screech drowning out the others as Relena switched from 5/4 to 9/8 rhythm and gave up on the snare she still wasn't happy with to favour the toms. Dorothy didn't hesitate for a moment as her fingers locked on the higher register of the neck and began plucking madly, the bow slamming down at intermittent moments in a perfect rendition of variations of a theme. Paganini would have rolled in his grave, or got up and joined in, Dorothy was not really sure which.

All she was sure of was that someone was watching. Looking to the side, she noticed Heero was not watching her but something off the stage and he did not look pleased. In fact, he looked rather furious. Intrigued, Dorothy turned her attention to Relena who was staring at Heero and subsequently was no real help at all, as he was paying absolutely no attention to the beat she was bashing out. As for Trowa and Quatre…well…not even as axe could have sliced through the rope binding their gazes on each other's instruments, perfectly following each other's fingers. And Hilde…well, Hilde was, as usual, flirting with her guitar. So Dorothy found herself was nothing to do except follow Heero's gaze down the whole length of the auditorium to where a slight shadowed silhouette was standing in the doorway. The light from the world outside made it impossible to see anything distinct about their appearance, but Dorothy knew. She would know that braid anywhere, ridiculous as it was. Not that she could talk…

Stopping suddenly and without warning, Dorothy waited for the others to follow suit. As Heero had already stopped, Relena gave in and placed her sticks carefully on the snare, leaning back in her chair to wait and see what was about to happen. Wihtout a rhythm section, Quatre and Trowa abruptly ended their `duet' and turned to the door, which just left Hilde leaping around the stage, still flirting with her guitar. With an exasperated huff, Heero switched her amp off and all that could be heard was the soft thump thumping of her thumb pad hitting the silenced strings.

"You made it!" Quatre beamed at the silhouette in the doorway, recognizing him as easily as Dorothy had. Dorothy would have gone with Quatre to meet Duo at the door, but she really couldn't be bothered getting out from under the cello, then maneuvering her way around all those mic's only to have to skip over all the leads and probably just fall off the edge of the stage anyway…No, Dorothy liked sitting right where she was.

Heero, on the other hand…

"You!" Heero leapt off the front of the stage and stormed past Quatre the welcoming committee, eyes blazing as he grabbed the front of Duo's shirt and hauled him bodily into the air.

Dorothy was going to tell Heero to put the boy down, but she never got the chance. In less than a second Heero was lying flat on his back and the only sign of Duo was the flash of shadow left by his braid as he disappeared from the building. The entire band gaped.

"How…How did he do that!" Dorothy was in awe. He spared a glance for Hilde and saw the other girl was likewise gaping a the empty doorway. No one had ever bested Heero Yuy, and while you couldn't exactly call what had just happened a fight…What had just happened?

"Heero, what is your problem?" Quatre screamed at the boy, leaning over him where he still lay, thoroughly winded, on the floor.

"That…rat…sent me flying and nearly smashed my guitar! He didn't even stop to give an apology!"

Dorothy couldn't blame Duo. After all, if Heero's face had looked anything like it looked ten seconds ago, well…she would have run away too.

"Quatre, who was that?" Wufei, who had been sitting quietly in the corner, finally stood, walked out the door and began looking in all directions to try and see where the boy had gone. Quatre sighed a he joined Wufei, but there was no sign of Duo.

"I had this idea that we could use a singer…but I thought, since you all want the best, I would try and find one that could dance as well. So I went and asked Miss Noin is there were any dance/vocal double majors. There was one. Dorothy and I met him last night and he's really nice! So we asked him to come see us play today and see what he thought…"

Wufei groaned. He had wanted the same damn thing, and there was only one? And Heero had scared him away. Wufei frowned down at the boy just pulling himself to his feet. Baka!

Trowa was looking at the door thoughtfully.

"A vocal major…and a dance major…" He was, of course, remembering a certain shoe that had passed through the music storeroom and taken a microphone. Without another word, he grabbed hold of Quatre's arm and stormed off toward the dance residence.

"Trowa, what about rehearsal!" Relena yelled after the pair.

"We'll catch up tomorrow. We're already perfect at that stuff anyway! I'm going to go find that singer!"

And then he was gone. Wufei grabbed his backpack and rushed after them, a very unsavory glint in his eyes.

Heero glared at the space they had just left before hurrying back to the stage and picking up his guitar. Hilde took in everything about him and smiled knowingly. Sure Heero was mad, but he knew his guitar was fine and no real harm had been done. He was just feeling a little down that his friends had yelled at him, and the no one, not once, had asked his opinion on anything.

"Wanna jam?"

A grunt was her first reply, followed by a heavy metal riff.

*

One minute he was standing in the doorway, eyes closed, enjoying the music, then next thing he knew he was standing in a room of silence with an all too familiar glare aimed straight at him. He didn't even have time to open his mouth before there were hands in the front of his shirt and he was off the ground. Not an unfamiliar feeling for Duo Maxwell. Which left only one option; run like hell.

Duo went limp, let his weight fall to his feet then kicked a leg behind one knee, tripping the other boy even as his hands came down on the other's wrists and turned them out, twisting the muscles enough to send a jarring pain through the bone yet cause no damage. Then he was skipping over the prone form flat on its back and rushing out the door, feet already rushing toward the garage, subconsciously seeking out familiarity.

Duo didn't need to be picked on, or bullied, or tossed about for any reason, even a valid one. He had had enough of that to make up for ten lifetimes. So when confronted with a very angry lead guitarist, who had a reputation of being the biggest hard arse at Wing College, Duo didn't hesitate to high tail it out of there.

He could hear them all yelling, their raised voices picked up by the microphones in the auditorium and echoing through every corner in the nearby vicinity. He ignored it all. He didn't need to join their perfect band. He only needed himself.

Solo was right where he always was; under the hood of a car, feet the only visible sign of his presence.

"Hey Kid."

"How'd you know it was me?"

"You kidding? I'd know your little mouse footsteps in a stampede!" Solo snorted loudly.

Duo sighed as he made his way to the stereo, turning on the radio and switching through the channels until he came across something he didn't recognize but had a good beat. 4/4, firm, driving, durable…Duo's feet began tapping out their aggravation. In less than a minute he was dancing around the car, feet tapping everything metal they could find. Solo senses his mood and stayed under the car, tucking his feet under so he wasn't accidentally trodden on.

After a time Duo finally stopped and turned down the volume. Solo unplugged his ears, frowning at the small scraps of greasy rag he had had to shove in his ears at the last minute, before extricating himself from beneath the vehicle. He thought he had finally fixed the horrid machine. Why Mitchell Standish didn't just sell it and buy something that didn't break down every five kilometers was beyond him.

"So, you gonna tell me what happened?"

Duo seemed to consider it before giving a firm, resounding "no".

Solo just shrugged knowing Duo knew he was there to talk to if he did ever need to. For now, that Duo could handle whatever was bothering him on his own was fine. After all, while Duo certainly had some trust issues, they ended with Solo. Duo would admit anything important. That he wasn't talking now just meant it wasn't important. Yet.

"I woulda thought you'd be practicing. Noin tells me that's all you do…" It maused him no end to hear Duo was working that hard. But Father had drilled it into all them that a hard day's work reaped its own rewards and Duo took anything that old coot took to heart, so Solo was not surprised.

"What do you think I was just doing?" Duo raised a knowing eyebrow and smirked. Solo just threw a rag at him.

"Help me polish this car and we'll go get some grub."

"Whatever you say, bro."