Dangers of watching too much Daytime soaps!

OOC, AU, Humour (parody)

Rating: PG-13

‘The Beautiful and the Restless’

By Katana Rey

‘Heero! Have you seen Duo?’

‘Huh.’ Came the soft grunt from the boy sitting at the table, not even bothering to look up from his laptop as he busily scanned the glowing monitor.

Quatre sighed and went to look for the braided pilot on his own. He had been waiting for Duo to return from his last mission for over an hour and he was beginning to get a little worried. What could be keeping him? He worried, gnawing on his lower lip anxiously as he went from dorm room to dorm room, trying to catch a glimpse of a thick brown braid. At last he came to the rec room and brightened up when he saw the untidily sprawled figure in front of the television.

‘Duo. You’re back. Why didn’t you tell me?’ Quatre chirped happily as he slumped next to Duo whose eyes remained glued on the screen.

‘Later Q. Don’t disturb me right now. Wait till the commercial break.’ Duo stared intently on the screen as a blond woman started screeching at a tall handsome man, chewing absently on the end of his braid.

Quatre blinked, puzzled by his friend’s behaviour as he looked between the television and the hypnotized pilot in confusion.

‘Uh. Sure. Commercial break. I’ll wait.’ The blond muttered disconsolately, blushing furiously as the American gave him a withering glare before turning back to his obsessive contemplation of the noisy couple on screen. As he waited patiently for the commercial break, Quatre found himself also being drawn to the screen as well, in fascinated horror, until he resolutely tore his eyes away from the pathologically dysfunctional relational behaviour on display and ran.

Duo turned away from the screen as a commercial flashed on and stretched luxuriously, then remembering the annoying interruption he started to look for Quatre but found the room empty save for a few fellow daytime soap addicts lounging nearby. He shrugged carelessly and turned back to the screen, confident that if it had been important, Quatre would contact him later.

* * * * *

‘Heero! Heero!’

The dark haired boy looked up from his typing with a startled expression as a blond whirlwind burst into his room.

‘Heero! You’ve got to do something! This is terrible. Duo’s in trouble.’

Heero jumped to his feet, a look of concern flashing briefly on his face. Then as Quatre smashed into him and clutched at his shoulders, he was thrown off his feet and staggered back onto his bed with an agitated blond clutching desperately to his arms.

Quatre started to shake the stoic Japanese as he began talking. ‘It’s Duo. He’s totally addicted to television. He didn’t even bother to report in after his last mission. Heero do something. Make him stop. Heero!’

Heero glared crossly at the distraught blond as he squirmed in his grip. Till now he had been reasonably confident that he could rely on Quatre, though the guy had a tendency to get all emotional every now and then, but this display was definitely making him rethink his original evaluation. ‘Quartre. Let… me… go. Now.’ He snapped coldly as the blond showed no sign of relinquishing his hold, or moving from his awkward position on his lap.

Quatre blinked at the icy tones and started to blush as he realized that he was practically sitting on Heero. Sheepishly he got off the annoyed Japanese and muttered an apology as he backed off from the fierce glare.

Heero stood up and returned to his desk, feeling severely annoyed by the ridiculous intrusion. He resumed typing, deliberately ignoring the embarrassed boy still standing near him. After a moment, he turned his head and asked pointedly, ‘Are you still here?’

Quatre reddened furiously before taking to his heels. ‘He’ll be sorry he didn’t listen to me.’ The blond muttered sulkily to himself as he returned to his room. He brightened as he entered his room and saw Trowa reading quietly. ‘Wait till you hear what’s going on with Duo!’

* * * * *

‘Wufei, have you noticed anything strange about Duo lately?’

The beautiful Chinese pilot frowned as he gave careful thought to Sally’s question. ‘In particular or in general?’

Sally groaned. ‘I mean recently. He’s been a bit erratic on his missions, and he’s become awfully choosy about the timing too. He’s flat out refused to go on any mission during the mid day and he keeps on giving Heero these really funny looks. Haven’t you noticed?’

Wufei shrugged, ‘not really… no.’ He wrinkled his brow as he tried to remember if he had noticed any irregularities in the volatile pilot’s behaviour, then gave up as he decided that everything about the noisy pilot was out of the ordinary. Still, he hesitated, there was that time….

‘I did notice that he started referring to Quatre’s evil twin every now and then but I just thought it was a joke between them.’ He offered tentatively.

Sally rubbed her temple, trying to calm the throbbing ache as she remembered the screaming match that had taken place between Duo and Quatre on their last mission, resulting with Lady Une’s firm order to keep them separated in any future missions. Was it just her, she wondered looking at the large black eyes staring at her with concern, or was Wufei very, very slow on the uptake? ‘Never mind.’ She sighed, with a rueful smile. ‘I’m sure it wasn’t important.’

* * * * *

‘Heero!’

Heero winced as a shrill voice cut through the humming of the crowd. His expression remained blank as a blond girl determined pushed her way through the startled students and stomped her feet at him when she finally reached him.

‘Dorothy.’ He nodded coolly, wondering why she was glaring at him and wishing that she had chosen a more private place, he hated people gawking at him.

‘What the hell do you think you’re doing!’ She screamed, waving a fist clenching a piece of paper in front of his nose. ‘I demand that you answer me, you arrogant pig.’

Heero turned his most piercing glare at the blond harpy, though it didn’t seem to affect the enraged girl in the slightest, and spoke in a calm voice, deliberately pitching it low to force her to listen. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t know what that is. And I would like you to leave. Now.’

Dorothy practically foamed at the mouth as she thrust the piece of paper in her hand at Heero’s chest and she snarled, ‘Look I don’t care what you and your sick friend get up to in your private time.’ She continued loudly, totally ignoring the sudden hush that fell in the cafeteria as stunned onlookers listened avidly, and Heero who had stiffened to a stone statue at her words. ‘But you better warn your braided paramour that he can’t try to blackmail Relena-sama and get away with it. Got that!’

She stalked off in fury, leaving behind Heero who remained frozen, numbly clutching the offending paper in his hands.

‘My god. What a horrible woman!’ Wufei snorted scornfully as he appeared at Heero side, carrying a generously loaded tray in his hands. ‘I don’t know what she was babbling on about. Do you have any idea Yuy?’ He stared curiously at Heero, noticing with mild interest that the dark haired boy was looking paler than usual, as he slowly opened the crumpled paper in his hand and began reading.

Heero spoke with a deceptively soft voice as he looked up from the paper. ‘Where is Duo?’

Wufei looked blank as he shrugged carelessly. ‘How do I know where he is? You know that he hasn’t been in to lunch at the proper time for ages now. Why don’t you ask Quatre? They’ve been talking a lot lately.’

Heero ground his teeth as he glared at the indifferent Chinese. ‘They haven’t been talking. They’ve been screaming at each other. How could you possibly have missed all the shouting that went on during the last mission?’

Wufei shrugged again as he sat down the heavy tray and pulled out his seat. ‘But Maxwell’s always screaming. I didn’t think that it was anything special. You haven’t finished your lunch, why don’t you just sit down and forget about that stupid woman.’ He added comfortingly as he patted the vacated chair next to him.

Heero flashed a nasty look at Wufei before dumping the contents of his remaining lunch in the nearby wastebin. ‘I lost my appetite.’ He snapped crossly as he stomped out of the cafetaria, trying to ignore the whispers and glances directed at him from the other diners.

‘When I get my hands on that idiot, that braided dummy masquerading as a pilot, I’ll make him eat this,’ Heero muttered under his breath as he crunched the paper in his hand, ‘then I’ll make him really sorry.’

* * * * *

‘Quatre, you are not being reasonable.’

Trowa sighed deeply as he waited for a response from the implacable black Gundam. ‘Quatre, please come out. We can talk about this. Quatre, I’m not going to wait out here forever. Quatre…’ He coughed roughly, not accustomed to talking so loudly. Damn. He backed off hurriedly as Sandrock started to hum and started to shout frantically. ‘Quatre, no! Please! You don’t have to do this. Don’t attack Duo. Please! Quatre!’ Trowa screamed at last, futilely as the large Gundam started to stride away.

With a despairing look he turned and ran towards his own Gundam standing nearby. He hoped that he could stop Quatre before the enraged blond went too far. He swore softly when he noticed that Gundam Shenlong and Wing Zero were also missing from the hanger. Of all the times for Wufei and Heero to be on a mission… the tall pilot felt an urge to scream out his frustration as he swung himself into the cockpit. It looked like he was going to have to do this on his own.

* * * * *

‘Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow! That hurts! Owww! Ouch. Hey, be careful, that’s a sensitive area, hey! Owwwwww!’

Heero tightened his lips grimly as he continued to approach the noisy sickbay. He had been dragged off to see Lady Une on his return from the last mission and given a thorough scolding about his lack of discretion and his promiscuous behaviour, then warned that his amorous liaisons… he ground his teeth as he muttered the words under his breath… would no longer be allowed to disrupt the Preventer activities. Then, he had to stomach being given a lecture on safe sex practice!

Heero unconsciously flexed his fingers, as he remembered the way Sally Po waylaid him outside Une’s office, and the little sample that she insisted he take. Heero had dropped the sample into the nearest bin as soon as Sally was out of sight. He wiped his hands on his jeans once again at the thought of the slippery little plastic packet, and swore to himself that someone was going to pay. And pay dearly. After that lovely encounter, he had been called to answer two phone calls. The first from a hysterical Relena who wept loudly as she blubbered on about being forced to give him up to save her honour, then another from Hilde who had abused him thoroughly before telling him to treat Duo kindly. To top it all off, he had to endure yet another ridiculous interview, this time with Zechs, that windbag, Heero thought spitefully, who had insisted on warning him about the legal ramifications of slander and blackmail.

Heero paused and took a deep breath before entering the sickbay. The one thing that the pilot of Wing Zero was certain about was that the cause of all his problems was a certain pilot of Shinigami. And as soon as he finished telling the idiot what he thought of him, he was going to take that annoying long chestnut braid and wrap it around the even more annoying neck and slowly throttle the idiot until he promised never to bother him again. Heero’s satisfied smirk melted away when he reached the open doorway of the sickbay.

He stopped at the doorway, mouth dropping open as he took in the sight of two boys, one blond, the other with a long braid, wearing identical blue striped pajamas, their arms and legs covered in bandages, throwing everything in reach at each other. Then he broke into a cold sweat as the two opponents stopped and stared in his direction. He started to back away slowly only to stop as he walked into another body behind him. He looked back to find Trowa who gave him an unpleasant grin and shoved him back inside, noticing as he stumbled through that Trowa was on clutches.

‘This is all your fault Heero.’

Heero blinked in confusion, was it him or did everyone seem to say that to him recently? He stared blankly as Trowa pointed one of his clutches at him accusingly.

‘If you hadn’t been cheating on Duo, none of this would have happened.’

Heero felt like screaming in frustration. What were they all talking about?

‘Trowa, how many time do I have to tell you? I’m not having an affair with Heero.’

Heero turned to the fuming blond in silent gratitude, so he wasn’t the only sane person.

‘I can’t help it if he’s interested in me.’

Heero choked as he mentally scratched Quatre’s name off the list of sane people. What the hell was going on here?

‘That’s only because you’re throwing yourself at him, you blond floozy!’ Duo screeched loudly, as he reached for another object to throw. ‘Heero belongs with me, do you hear? We were meant to be together! We have a destiny.’

Heero felt a throbbing ache in his temples as he listened to the meaningless drivel. He turned imploring eyes on Trowa who was still glaring at him accusingly and wondered if he had passed through a temporal anomaly or had been kidnapped to a parallel universe. He started to carefully shuffle his way away from the angry combatants who seemed so intent on continuing their fight that they weren’t really paying that much attention to him and measured the distance to the door with his eyes, confident that if worst came to worst, he could simply make a run for it.

‘That’s not true. Heero and I care about each other. We have special moments, like the time when we were together on the run from Oz. And we have common interests. I’m good for Heero. I can give him love. I understand him. I have a lot of money.’ Quatre finished triumphantly, waving his pillow defiantly.

Duo sniffed loudly, ‘you also have an evil twin who almost destroyed the Colonies in Wing Zero. You aren’t mentally stable. You’d probably end up trying to kill Heero. I’m not going to lose him to you. Not now. Not when I fought so hard for him.’

‘The only thing you can offer Heero is sex.’ Quatre snarled, as he slid to the edge of his bed. ‘I can offer Heero intellectual companionship. I can give him a better life. If you really loved Heero, you’d let him go, for his sake.’

As soon as he heard the word ‘sex’, Heero shrank back and started to inch towards the door, wondering if it was too late to change his mind about being a test subject for the research into developing invisible force fields.

Duo started to sob loudly into his pillow, alarming Heero who had almost managed to reach the door and bringing a sympathetic Trowa hobbling to his bedside. ‘I can offer Heero true love. You only want him for his body.’

Unable to bear listening any further Heero promptly fled the insane trio and ran down the corridor, slamming into Wufei as he dashed around the corner.

‘Watch where you’re going Yuy!’ Wufei protested as they collapsed into an ungraceful pile on the floor.

‘They’re all crazy!’ Heero’s eyes glittered with excitement and he peeked around the corner and sighed with relief when he saw the closed sickbay door.

‘Who?’ Wufei asked indifferently as he helped Heero to untangle their limbs and get back on their feet.

‘Duo, Quatre. Even Trowa. All of them. Stark raving mad.’ Heero shuddered as he thought back to the horrible scene he had witnessed.

Wufei eyed the normally taciturn pilot with interest, noticing the sweat beads on his forehead. Then he leaned towards the perturbed Japanese and blew softly into his ear.

‘Why don’t you just forget about Maxwell and Winner and spend your time with someone who’s more worthy?’ He purred creamily, his lips brushing lightly against Heero’s hair as he spoke. Then he blinked as the Japanese pilot whitened dramatically and fled. ‘Playing hard to get eh.’ He smirked as he broke into a jaunty jog, after the desperately fleeing figure.

* * * * *

‘So Mr Yuy. What did you say was the cause of your friends acting in an unusual manner?’

The doctor looked at the shaking boy lying on his couch, an ice bag sitting on his head, with sympathy and concern. It was a pity that someone so young and so beautiful suffered from delusional paranoia. Still, he was going to do all he could to help the young pilot recover his sense of perspective and reality.

‘Well doc,’ Heero sighed deeply, ‘it all began when one of my fellow pilots started watching daytime soaps….’

Tbc…