Trick riding
                             Chapter IX : Booh!
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

                    Quatre let himself fall back on the vast bed thoughtfully, staring at the ceiling for answers that just wouldn't come. The last days had simply broughth way too much information to digest, and he was still hestitating between worrying about the fact that, somewhere, some unknown organization firmly intented to 'save' the world with a Gundam containing both Wing and Sandrock's data, or worrying -even more- about Dorothy's immediate future. Maybe he didn't have the answers, after all, and he was starting to wonder if he shouldn't just imitate Shaolin or Duo. Just fling himself into the mess and think later.

He was lost in those confused thoughts -That and also a growing interest for the forbidden contents of a seductive and unexplored minibar- and eventually sat up abruptly, deciding to talk it out with Trowa. He didn't usually go to people to spread his dilemmas, it was generally the complete opposite, actually, but he felt that tonight would be the exception that proves the rule. Anyway, he needed something to occupy his mind before he gave in to beverages that Allah condemned strongly.
 
 

"Guess how much I love you?" Duo slurred, sprawled on his bed, making childish and amorous faces at a slowly awakening Hilde.*

The pale and wary young girl on the screen managed a tired smile, before resting her head on her pillow. "I don't know... Like that?" She replied softly, attempting to spread her arms wide.

"More." He grinned.

"Duo... When are you coming back?" She suddenly ask, her voice cracking ever so slightly.

"Soon."

"Unharmed?" She whispered.

"..."
 
 

Midii's grey T-shirt joined Trowa's shirt on the floor in the space of a second and all she could do was whimper and sigh happily in the warm and passionate embrace surrounding her. She managed to roll them until she was sitting proudly on his stomach and bent her head brushing his lips softly with her and giving tentative licks at the hungry mouth seeking hers.

"I never thought you to be so cuddly..." She purred, toying with the button of his pants.

"That's the 'Midii effect'." He gasped between kisses and desperate noises.

"Humor now?" She giggled softly.

At the same moment, the button finally gave in, along with the zipper, and a low and contented sigh filled the dark room.
 
 

Quatre raised his hand and knock softly at Trowa's door, only to be welcomed by silence. He knocked again as softly, not daring to disturb anybody in other rooms. Now, was his friend deaf or something??
He raised his hand once again, and, before it made contact with the white surface, he heard another knocking sound. He stared at his hand in wonder briefly, before thinking, and realizing that somebody was actually knocking at his door. He turned, and his eyes widened for an instant, but he regained quickly his composure.

"Did you want something, Miss Hao?" He asked softly, studying her guilty and uneasy features.

"Ye... No! I was... Just..." She stuttered, trying to glare to hide her rapidly blushing cheeks.

"Maybe you came to thank me." He grinned, feeling in control, for once.

"Nooooooooo!" She defended herself, backing away from his door.

"Really?" He smiled lopsidedly.

"What are you doing here anyway?!" She snapped uncomfortably.

"I wanted to talk with Trowa, but I guess he's either gone or asleep so I-"

"The best way to know is to enter." She stated, regaining a bit of her confidence.

"Maybe..."

"Just let me work." She replied, attacking the helpless electronic lock.

"I wasn't exactly planning to break in his room!" He squeaked, attempting to shove her away from the door.

The little wrestle didn't last, however, and, as the door opened, they both toppled forward in the dark hotel room.

There was along silence and seven eyes, plus an hidden one, widened progressively. Quatre thanked Allah or whoever was in charge that Trowa still had his pants on, because this was already embarassing enough. Shaolin's squeal snapped him out of his shame, though.

"MIDII?? Bweeeeeeeeh!"

Midii quickly left her 'perch' and wrapped herself in the sheets at lightning speed, under the belwidered and reprobative stares of the newcomers.
 

Twenty minutes later

"So you're back?" Duo asked Midii lazily, eyeing Trowa with suspicious and otherwise unreadable eyes.

"I guess so." She answered sheepishly.

Heero's gaze shifted successively from Trowa and Middi's well hidden embarassment, to Quatre's blue gaze, who -obviously- knew more than he should have, and to Shaolin's disappointed and contemptuous stare. "If I get your meaning, Trowa, you were just hanging around and you found her, then, being the ever loyal agent we know, you immediatly took her back here?"

Trowa nodded, while Midii strategically hid her pale features behind her platinum bangs. Duo, in his corner, couldn't quite understand what had taken place earlier, but Quatre's panicked face at Heero's doubtful glare was enough to make him smirk. Heero crossed the short distance separating him from Midii and Trowa, and offered them a long, self-explanatory and warning glare. The two waited for any reaction, and almost fell off the couch, when Heero talked.

"I'm tired. Let's admit that this is the naked truth. I don't even want to know, anyway." With that, he left the room silently, followed by a grinning and winking Duo.

The second the door closed, Midii got up and lunged at Shaolin and Quatre. "You bunch of little voyeurs!! You weren't even going to defend us!" She hissed, glaring at the pair trying unsuccessfully to hide behind the holy minibar.

"Who went on a midnight rendez-vous with that randy devil, in the first place?!" Shaolin retorted, narrowing her eyes.

"Yeah! Nobody forced you to breed like rabbits!" Quatre shrieked, feeling the injustice Wufei talked so often about in her words.

Midii's cheeks turned a pretty shade of pink, while Trowa's visible eye glared daggers at the traitors. "What were you doing here anyway?" He asked coldly.

"Nothing  reprehensible, if you want to know." Quatre huffed, "I wanted to talk about some personnal matters with you, and Miss Hao was about to apologize abjectly and thank m..."

"You liar! I wasn't there to thank you!" Shaolin bawled before Trowa had a chance to ask anything.

"Ungrateful child."

"Dribbling slug!"

"Allons, allons!**" The heated discussion was cut short by Midii banging her fist against the door, in an attempt to obtain silence. "Lets sum up. You were there not to apologize or thank or anything," She said, turning to her irate partner, "And you were there to chat?" She finished, glancing at a pouting Quatre.

"Well..."

Anything Quatre was about to say was interrupted by the sound of the phone ringing insistently. Trowa extended a hand to answer, and quickly stopped, gesturing to quatre that it was his phone. The blonde arabian picked up and listened to the voice with dubitative eyes, while all the others were more or less discretly trying to know what it could be about.

"Do you know what time it is?" He suddenly replied, looking annoyed, "Who's this person, anyway?"

The last question was followed by a thick silence, broken only by the sound of the phone falling on the carpeted floor. The clear blue eyes darkened with an undefinable emotion, and he dashed out the room, vaguely gesturing to Trowa to forget it.

Shaolin gazed at his departing form, before turning to the pair's interrogative stares. "Stop looking at me! How could I know?! I'm going to let you finish alone!" She whined, before disappearing too, leaving Trowa and Midii relieved and quite clueless.
 

Quatre walked slowly in the dim room. A single light still flickered faintly at a table, lighting faintly the sheet-covered piano and the silent bar. She was bold to come here and wait for him. But she knew him so well, she knew he wouldn't call anybody.

"Dorothy..."

"Is it too late?" She whispered, and he couldn't tell if she was talking about that strange encounter or them.

He sat warily in a comfortable armchair, facing her with a seeking gaze. What was it that he had to reach, this time? he had been aware that war would always be a part of her life, it had been for so long, but he had ruly believed they could try to overcome this. What was it that he had missed?

"Where you unhappy?" He asked quietly, trying to read in her lavender eyes what she wouldn't say.

"No. Why?"

"Then why seeking refuge in this, again, Dorothy?"

"This is not a refuge, it is-"

"Your belief? Will you need a war each time something is wrong?" He asked, anger rising in his tone.

"No! You don't understand."

"Understand what? I want to! But you shut me out!" He almost shouted.

"Can't you just stop thinking with your heart and using your head?! This has nothing to do with feelings, this is about politic, future!"

"If I admit this... If I am just logical and professional... Then I just get up and kill you Dorothy. And you know I can't."

"The don't get involved." She sighed sadly.

"You involved me. You're involving me." He retorted sternly.

"Stop treating me like a child you would be responsible of!" She hissed, avoided the bright and scolding aquamarine gaze.

"Stop acting like one. If you decide to forget all this right now and help us, I'll smooth the rough angles and defend you." He explained.

"And if I don't?" She asked.

He leaned back in the armchair and sighed, a pained look crossing his face, "Then I don't know... I don't know how to keep you anymore..."

She bowed her head and fought the tears that were threatening to roll, "I love you... But I believe in this. I need this. And you've already moved on, anyway..." She murmured, her voice cracking.

"No... No I... Please, stay! I'll find something, it's not too late." He said, reaching to graze a silver strand of glossy silk.

"Mrs Winner needs you." She stated bitterly.

His eyes darkened momentarily. "I don't know how you found, but don't give me this. You're old enough and clever enough to guess it's a mere arrangement." He said calmly.

"And how do I know?" She spat angrily.

"Stop it! You always told me that you didn't want pity! Then don't indulge in self-pity! Trust me or leave me, but don't play!" He suddenly blurted out.

"You... You just can't understand!" She sobbed, getting up swiftly.

He grabbed her hand, only to have her slid out of his grasp and she backed slowly towards the doors. He only watched. It was a form of betrayal, but he just couldn't having her arrested, it hurt too much. When he found himself alone in the dark, he swallowed softly, looking at the ground. "And you knew I wouldn't stop you..."

"Do you always glomp people who hate you?"

He turned abruptly, and discerned a form, leaning against the bar. He couldn't see the features, but the voice and the curls were enough to guess.

"What are you doing here? Did you..."

"Listen? Part of. I'll shut up, if that's what you're worried about." She replied quietly, the usual vehemence or irony gone from her voice.

"I...."

"I don't wanna hear it. I'm not judging you. You fell, that's all. It's human, she's a real lady, after all." She sighed, before leaving as silently as she had appeared, leaving him alone with his bewilderment.
 

Midii fingered the small paper in her hands gingerly, hesitating to no end. Trowa had eventually fallen asleep, and his head was currently resting on her lap. She caressed his brown bangs absently, lingering on his ear, before deciding herself. That was the only place she knew where suspect equipment could be stocked with complete impunity, so it deserved a little exploration. She couldn't just leave him like this, she somehow felt that the fragile and unique  bond they shared wouldn't resist another betrayal. She finally opted for 'mild-security' : She would go alone, and if she was lucky, she would be back before he even woke up, but still, she was going to let a message telling them where she was.
 

Wufei glared at the TV set, before turning it off and throwing the remote in a corner of the room. Injustice. was it possible to watch something else than "Huntin', fishin' and nature" or "Dough 'n chicks" at 2 o'clock in the morning? He crossed his arms, waiting for a sleep that just wouldn't come, when his ears caught a rustle, barely audible, in the corridor. He got up quietly, and peer in the dark space.

Great. He would be bodyguard tonight. Injustice.
 

Midii shivered slightly as she entered the dark and deserted cold storage plant. Charming. She would rather had stayed and cuddled her unibanged creampuff. She eyed the ageless ruins with a twinge of sadness, making out broken windows and collapsed walls here and there. She let her gaze follow the path of ancient rails, which stopped brutally, letting place to a wreckage of stones and metal. She felt a cold sweat in her back and hurriedly passed the sight, certain that she didn't want to know what sort of disaster had occured there. Could it be possible that they were gosts in such a place??

She  continued, observing the crumbling buildings and the desolate area, her heart jumping in her chest at each tiny noise. She kept repeating herself, as a mantra, 'It's a mouse. Only a mouse. A big one?!'

Eventually, she gathered all her strenghth, and entered one of the dark building, groping her way along rusty, damp pipes. The flashlight did little to ease her terror and she knew that if she only imagined seeing something move, she would run away as fast as possible. She rpressed a scream, as her foot crushed an unknown object, and finally ended in a vast warehouse, empty from what it seemed. The wall were stained with something dark and most likely disgusting and she almost wanted to close her eyes as, the circle of light ran along the dirty walls. Suddenly, she stopped and stared. A tarpolin? Which look quite recent, at that.  She decided to be brave and attempted to climb on a quivering pipe, to reach the gloomy platform where she had spotted it.

After a few hazardous tries, she managed to land on the hard surface, and grazed the rough fabric with hesitant fingers. A bit of dirt. Some damp, but no mildew, like in the rest of the ruins, something that had been put there recently, then, she assessed, as she tried to lift the tarpolin a bit to peer under it.

Her eyes widened slightly, as the flashlight lit the object of her curiosity. Maybe she was mistaken, but if she wasn't, she was dying to know what those caissons where doing here. Her finger linger on an inscription on the side of the first ones. "Norway Tech Labs... Well, we keep seeing them everywhere..." she sighed.

Now, to open one of those... A sharp noise made her blood run cold. She tried to climb down, desesperatly wanting to escape whatever was aproaching, and almost cried in anguish as the flashlight fell. She heard the sickening noise of her only source of light crashing on the concrete, a few meters below. And then silence. She thought the whisper of the cold wind and the sound of drops of water were going to make her crazy. She froze. Somebody was walking. Closer. Closer. Her own heartbeat became unbearable. She waited in the dark. Closer.

The pipe. It was climbing, as she had a few moments ago. Her throat constricted. Closer. She crawled awkwardly, trying to hide. Where to hide, in a pitch-black space?
Suddenly, an ear splitting scream ecaped her lips, as something grabbed her shoulder. She fumbled to free herself, yelling even louder. A ghost? A werewolf? A vampire?!

"Wufei??"

There was a long silence, as she stared, dazed, at the flashlight blinding her and the onyx eyes gazing at her in faint amusement.
 
 
 
 
 
 

*Know the cute book that inspired me?
** Means "There, there..."
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Moleman - (heart-attack) x_x

Lg - MWUAHAHAHAH!!! You were scared, eh?

Moleman - o_O;

Lg - Read and Review, or fear the come back of Wufei the were-ghost-vampire!!