Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Heero PoV. Very different take on Duo. Language in this part.
Spoilers: Just Duo and Heero jumping from school to school
Notes: This fic is the reason I am not a member of the SDDI. And despite my full support of the SDDI, I'm not ashamed of that. :)
"==========" - scene change
*blah* - emphasis ALL CAPS - shouting, very loud shouting
"Heero?" Duo's voice was unusually thick, a combination of sleep and, I guessed, a little confusion. "Not that I'm particularly ungrateful, but why'd you let me sleep?"
I kept working as Duo rolled off his makeshift cot. The day before I had removed our records from the school, and we'd shifted from the dorms to the condemned warehouse where our Gundams were stored. Tonight was the mission. "No reason to wake you."
Duo snorted. "No reason? Heero, we've got under an hour to get this show on the road. Let me run the preflight on Deathscythe, and I'll check the rosters."
"No changes since yesterday. Less than a fifth of base personell will be on duty when we come in. Roughly five percent are on excused leave. Not a significant difference."
There was a moment of silence. "You checked already?"
"Aa. Weather reports as well. The storm is coming early, so we'll have good cloud cover, but expect heavy winds."
"Right." The heavy, almost sarcastic tone in Duo's voice was unexpected. "Ammo checks? Target review?"
"Personal weapons are cleaned and fully armed. I made some adjustments to the placement maps. Review them once your preflight's finished."
"What about the bombs?"
"Just the detonators to set." I nodded towards the cluster of explosive devises in front of me, not taking my gaze off the one in my hands. A flash of movement caught my eye, and Duo had one of the devises. "I've got it, Duo."
He shrugged, handling the explosive with a casualness that made my skin crawl. "Sooner it's done, sooner we can get going."
I took the devise from him before he could blow us both up. "I said I've got it."
For a long moment we glared at each other, though there was something in his eyes besides anger. Hurt, I realized. He was hurt over this. I couldn't imagine why, and I couldn't afford to care. His delicate feelings weren't worth both our lives.
"Fine," he finally spat. "Bring them when you're done. I'll be in Deathscythe." He stalked away, his braid snapping behind him like the tail of an angry cat. It was tempting to call him back, find out what was wrong, but there was a mission to complete. I let it go.
The base was a large one, heavily armed, a tough target even for two Gundams working together. Since we needed as much of an advantage as possible, the plan was for Duo to sneak in first with Deathscythe, plant explosives around the MS hangars and command center, and start the attack when the explosives went off. I estimated with the supplies available we could eliminate nearly a third of the base's force with that tactic.
The forty-five minutes from when Deathscythe dropped to stealth mode and the first explosion were quite possibly the longest of my life. All I could think about was how many things could go wrong. One careless slip, one mistimed step, and Duo was done for. I was safe at least, outside the base, and nothing Oz had could have caught Wing, but that wasn't much comfort.
The explosions went off in a fast, precise series, and I put Wing in action. I made a quick inventory of damages as I entered the fray, and cursed. He'd misappropriated the explosives! Nearly half of the MS hangars were so much rubble, but the command center still stood, which meant it could still direct the defense of the base and call for backup. There were two bases close enough to have troops here before we were done. All that careful planning had just been wasted.
Duo's face appeared on one of my screens, devil-may-care grin in full force. "Hey Heero, looks like the party's gunna be really wild tonight!"
"Baka!" I snap. "You didn't take out the command center. Reinforcements are less than an hour away."
"Damn, Yuy, give me a little credit.." His grin faded into that tight, angry look of earlier. "I blew the radio tower and the control room. They won't be talking to anyone for a while." Our link was abruptly cut, and since Deathscythe was in no apparent danger of going down, I had to take that to me we wouldn't be talking for a while, either.
Twenty-three minutes into the battle, I managed to target the command center with my beam cannon. Part of me realized the futility of the action; if Duo hadn't knocked out their communications, reinforcements were already on their way. But training demanded I be thorough, and it was grimly satisfying to see the building blown away properly.
Duo was never one to stay angry long, so I figured by the time we finished the base and secured our Gundams, he would have calmed down. Assuming incorrectly about Duo was becoming a disturbing habit. He was out of Deathscythe before I had finished powering Wing down, standing at the foot of my Gundam and shouting at the top of his lungs.
"JUST WHAT THE HELL IS YOUR PROBLEM, YUY?!?"
For the briefest instant, I was tempted to stay in Wing until he tired of his rant and left. I dismissed the thought as quickly as it came, and went out to meet him. "Do you have a specific concern, or is that a general question?"
He didn't appreciate my attempt to clarify the question. "How long have we been working together? FOUR MONTHS! And NOW you start questioning my judgement? Second guessing me? Taking my jobs? I THOUGHT WE WERE PAST YOUR PARANOID SHIT! I THOUGHT WE WERE FUCKING PARTNERS!"
Duo's language was a fairly accurate gage of his emotional levels; he almost never used profanities, and only when he was extraordinarily upset. Taking the most likely cause of his temper, I replied calmly, "The command center had to be destroyed."
"NOT WHILE WE WERE SWARMED WITH LEOS! First rule of fighting, take care of the immediate threat! You've told me that yourself! And I TOLD you it was out of commission! But no, you couldn't trust me to get something right, you had to do it yourself, not that it would have made any difference anyway, since by the time you put your two cents in they would have already called for help, except they couldn't because I'D ALREADY TAKEN CARE OF IT!"
He did, I aknowledged, have a point. Reinforcemnts had not arrived, which meant no alert had been issued. But he was already moving on before I could say anything. "And let's not forget setting up the damned explosives in the first place, huh? Who's supposed to rig the detonators? Who ALWAYS rigs the detonators? Me! Why? BECAUSE I'M THE ONE WHO HAS TO USE THEM! You've been screwing me over this WHOLE DAMNED MISSION, Yuy! Won't trust me, won't let me do my share of the work, won't even let me take care of my own goddamned equipment! If I find out you've been running diagnostics on Deathscythe behind my back so help me you're gunna find that thermal scythe rammed up your ass!"
"Duo!" The single, sharp word effectively cut off his rant, and I quickly answered the points of his argument before he could continue. "I give your Gundam the same respect I expect you to give mine, to wit, I do not touch it. As you did not blow yourself up setting the explosives, obviously I set the detonators correctly. And you're right, the command center could have waited, but I had a clear shot and I took it. As neither of us took heavy damage from the fight, obviously the delay involved was not critical, and therefore not worth arguing over."
"You just don't get it!" His volume, I noticed, had dropped significantly, though his fury was still obvious. "I'm not talking about what was and wasn't necessary. I'm talking about *trust*! As in me trusting you to be my partner, not my babysitter! You trusting me to do my job! Us trusting each other to cover our backs! I thought we were making progress, and then you pull this shit? I think I liked it better when you didn't give a damn what happened to me!"
That I *did* take offense to. Even when I hadn't appreciated having Duo around, I paid careful attention to what he did and how it might affect my mission. Now that we were working together, his well-being was as important as my own. "Baka. If I didn't care what happened to you I wouldn't have bothered finding classes on your level."
It was the wrong thing to say. I knew it the moment I spoke, and saw in his eyes the way the words registered with him.
"That's it, isn't it? This whole thing started with those damned placement tests. You saw my scores and figured I was too much of an idiot to tie my own shoes, much less pilot a Gundam, didn't you? Well I've got news for you, Yuy. The stuff on those tests doesn't have a damned thing to do with how well I do my job, and if you'd taken *two seconds* to think about it, you would have realized that for yourself!" He stepped closer, bare inches separating us, and I forced myself not to back up. "Howard'll pick us up tomorrow. Monday we have to be at the new school. That gives you three days to get your head screwed straight, or you can go on the next mission by yourself!"