“Primarily your missions. The death of the security guard in Eastbourne really was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Ever since then, I’ve been keeping track of any deaths and killings involving cutting weapons, especially large cutting weapons. I concentrated myself on your mission details, and searched and hunted for information from years prior. I’ve been digging myself into libraries, I’ve spoken to witnesses -none from at the actual killings, unfortunately-, and bought information, anything that could help me find this killer. I don’t want this killer to be Duo any more than you want it, Heero.”
I swallow the last gulp of the water, my mind processing the information. “Why the protection? Why did no one told me this… why wasn’t I informed, just why?”
Wufei looks around and spots his plastic chair, pulling it towards him before he sits down. “Nobody believed it at first. No one thought about Duo at first, until we identified the weapon. Originally, ESUN was going to issue missions to each and any of us to find the killer, at all costs. People, never mind them being criminals or on the blacklist seeing what they were involved in, don’t deserve to die in this way. ESUN has always been very reluctant in issuing missions wherein the target has to be killed. Only if there really isn’t any other way, ESUN will decide to give the execution order.”
“I know,” I say, resting my left arm on the covers of the bed. The IV is bugging me, but I leave it in, for now. “We wouldn’t be any better if we just went around killing everyone who’s involved in dirty business, and every criminal has a right to a fair trial, no matter how frustrating it sometimes is.”
“No details from the kills ever matched up to any existing ones from psychopaths, serial murderers, opportunity killers… we just didn’t understand, and the choice of weapon baffled us for a long time.”
“Who is ‘us’?” I ask, too late to catch the irritated suspicion in my voice.
“Me and the team who worked on it,” Wufei answers. “All selected professionals, and our team has disbanded ever since we determined the murder weapon. They all think they’ve been working on a test case. Every piece of information has been carefully classified, Heero. No one can ever connect the results of our work to Duo or anyone of us in particular. We used one of your coding scripts.”
“Fine,” I mumble, leaning back in the massed amount of pillows, feeling strangely flattered. He looks at me with his examining eyes, trying to determine my mood. For all that it’s worth, and for all that it matters that he calls us our friends, Wufei isn’t exactly close to us. He’s always been a loner, and we’ve respected that, but that also means that we’re not going to be buddy-buddy even in the most stressful situation. We’ve been in a war together, you can’t get a situation more stressful than that.
He continues, after a few seconds of silence. “I had - and still have to - report my findings to Une, and so I did. Trust me Heero, Duo wasn’t the first one she thought of when she read through my report and noticed the word ‘scythe’. It’s been a process, a process of months, years... until the net started to close itself.”
“It just can’t be,” I shake my head. “Duo can account for everything; where he was, what he did. You have his mission reports. I admit that the Eastbourne mission still doesn’t feel right to me, but that’s the only thing that I can think of.”
“It’s not about your missions, but more the aftermath,” Wufei objects. “The people in Prague, the guard in Eastbourne. Lots of people you’ve arrested have ended up dead, and the reason why Masterson’s still alive, is probably because of his public exposure.”
“The man won charm points even after he’s been exposed.” I shake my head again, and it’s making me feel dizzy. I lean back some more in the pillows; I just can’t accept it.
“Why did no one ever ask Duo about this? Or me, only years after?”
“People with Disassociative Identity Disorder are most often not aware of their other personality, Heero. Do you volunteer to walk up to Duo and say “Hey Duo, can I talk to the other one in your head?” I don’t think so.”
“Don’t mock him,” I bark.
“I’m not,” Wufei shoots back. “I have respect for him, and I don’t like what’s going on any more than you. If anything, I also want to prove he has nothing to do with it. That’s why I’m working on the case and that’s why I’m protecting you both. Une wanted to apprehend Duo immediately after another kill.”
When I don’t answer, he continues. “She knew she’d lose two extremely good agents if she chose that direction, so she left it to me to solve it, so to speak. Because of our past and because of what we survived together.”
“This isn’t the time for friendship talk,” I say dryly. “You chose to be on the sidelines.”
“And that’s why I can keep a rather objective perspective. You’re in love with Duo, and it’s quite normal that you’re blind to any of his changes. I mentioned how his tone changed in the vid-mails in the course of the years. Quatre and Trowa have reported the same trend to me, and also observed that Duo has become quite different, more fickle in his behavior.”
“Duo has always been fickle,” I point out. He’s starting to bore me. Bore me and irritate me. I don’t want to hear the nonsense he’s spouting, the lies he’s been telling. I don’t want to hear him confirm the things I noticed myself, but shoved away under a thick layer of mental rationalization.
“There’s a difference between being indecisive, fickle or downright swinging from the left to the right,” Wufei answers, and he leans a little to the side, picking up a dark leather bag. For a moment I think he has brought my laptop, but I notice it’s his own as soon as he takes it out of the bag. “In short, Duo’s becoming more unbalanced, and you’re the only one who doesn’t want to see it, or just doesn’t see it in general. Nobody blames you, Heero. Quatre and Trowa were very reluctant to add their thoughts; they figured that Duo’s behavior was a bit off, but not… eh, ‘off’ enough to really see him in any different light.”
“Good for them,” I huff, and I’d love to cross my arms in an even more non-verbal gesture, but it’s hard to move my right arm with the gigantic cast.
Wufei boots up the laptop, fingers clicking at the keys. “I have written down the basic information on Disassociative Identity Disorder, and summarized...”
“DID is inherent to a very grave and radical event in a person’s life, when at that time the second, or even third or fourth, other personality is created by the person in question. We all experienced such events in our lives, and we didn’t create other personalities.”
“Trauma does different things to different persons,” Wufei softly says, something shimmering in his eyes. It’s not sadness, it’s remembrance. The only thing I can think of is the self-destruction of his colony, with him being the one and only survivor.
“I allowed hate and my thirst for justice and revenge to fuel me,” he continues, “to continue fighting. I didn’t understand how hard I was fighting against myself, and how I needed others so not to fall into the abyss because of the same mistakes and faults I loathed in any of my opponents. If I were susceptible, or let’s say instead, if my mind were susceptible and open, I could well have created another personality myself. It’s all a state of mind.. I could’ve put all that hate and vengeance into another personality. It’s also a method of survival, Heero. The other personality is used to distance oneself from the traumatic event.”
“A method of survival?” My fingers clutch at the blankets. This Santa Maria Nuova hospital is so very different from the bland, gray Prague hospital, where Duo was brought after having received that shot wound in his shoulder. The corn yellow colors of the blankets, the curtains and the walls are almost hurting my eyes. It breathes an air of comfort, nonetheless; it makes me want to feel relaxed and to get some sleep, if it weren’t for Wufei’s ominous words.
“Everyone deals differently with what life tosses at him or her. Put four people into one and the same situation and you’ll find them all reacting differently. DID is a common tactic for people dealing with traumatic events and it can be treated with medication and counseling.”
I don’t know whether to laugh or to cry. To laugh at the idea of Duo visiting a psychiatrist or a counselor and taking medication, or to cry at what Wufei thinks is a handy-dandy solution to a problem, as anyone would solve a math problem: Duo + strange behavior = DID.
“But why... why do you think of Shinigami? I thought you didn’t believe in superstition. What makes you think Duo would develop Shinigami as a second personality?”
Duo saw a church burn down in front of his eyes, his second family being killed by the Alliance, the people he cared for and loved being killed at the hand of Mobile Suits and soldiers. That’s all that I know and it’s too little.
“A god of Death is present in every mythology and every religion, Heero. Where’s there life, there’s death, and often it represents a change, a transition, another road to be taken, instead of the unavoidable end. Shinigami is nothing but a name, a denotation of a being, mythological or not. Like you’ve said yourself, Duo associated himself with that being at an impressionable age, under drastic circumstances like the ongoing war, and his fascination with what he calls Shinigami has transcended into something that has consumed his personality. He can’t clearly project his own beliefs and opinions anymore, can’t see through the fog that this alternate character has clouded his mind with, because he just can’t distinguish anymore. We all know that Shinigami was a vast part of him during the war.”
“He was fifteen and I object to that ‘impressionable age’ thing you just said. Duo isn’t the one to be affected over something that easily. Maybe he has a little morbid fascination with the God of Death, but Trowa was obsessed with knives and I with self-destruction, remember?”
A small smile cracks Wufei’s lips, but he quickly covers it. “You don’t know what Duo’s been through in his younger years. We were all around fifteen when we met- do you know what happened to him in his earlier, fourteen years?”
Only the church, as far as traumatic events go, and once again I’m left baffled. Duo talks so much, his voice singing to me, he talks and talks and I still don’t know a thing about him. Aren’t his words holding any substance, or am I just not listening well enough?
“Seeing the grave nature of his... second personality,” he continues, hesitantly, “Une wants him under some sort of special custody until we find out what really is going on. Of course, Duo has every right to speak for himself and every right to defend himself.”
“Oh, has he?” I don’t bother keeping the sarcasm out of my voice. “You haven’t asked him one single thing, Wufei. For all the objectivity you claim to have, you’re pretty damn determined to pump him full of medication and deliver him to the very first shrink you see.”
He bows his head a little, not to me, but to look at the small computer screen in front of him. “I want the best for everyone involved, and if that involves Duo taking medication and talking to a professional counselor to keep these horrible killings from happening, then so be it. Once again, I’m not enjoying this, Heero. I’ve been on your side, on both your sides, from the beginning. If the case were in any other’s hands but mine, neither you nor Duo would be walking around freely now.”
“I don’t take kindly to threats,” I say. I move my head, focusing my eyes on him. “I really thought you were my friend, our friend, but I guess I was wrong.”
He doesn’t answer that, as a soft sound distracts us both. Wufei puts his hand in his pocket and retrieves a small buzzer. “I have to call headquarters,” he announces after reading the code. I grumble. He can take his precious headquarters to a place where the sun doesn’t shine for a few millennia to come. Wufei rises, picking up his jacket from the chair and flinging it over his shoulder.
“I’ll leave this here,” he says, pointing at the laptop before moving the mobile table to me, so I can look at it without much difficulty. “Information on DID and my report on… the progress of the case. I also have a world map...” - he taps with his fingers on the keyboard, pulling up an impressive world map, covered with black dots- “I’ve systematically entered the data about the killings, and the black dots represent the victims.”
My curiosity gets the better of me and I turn my head a little. The world map focuses mostly on Europe, as Wufei has set the zoom factor rather high. The black dots overlap each other, forming a dark blob. Czech Republic, England, our missions in other countries all over Europe.
“I’ll see you shortly, Heero,” Wufei tells me, but I don’t hear him. My eyes are fixed on the black dots, the blobs on the world map. They’re not blobs, they’re more like... clouds. Dark clouds. Storm clouds. Storm clouds over Europe. I want to throw up.
---------------
I wake up, feeling a weight on my left hand. My mind recoils in horror, asking itself in the few seconds of disorientation if my hand has been injured as well- the IV? Before I realize it, I groan, rather loudly. My ribs hurt and the few hours of sleep I had -how many?- haven’t made the large cast magically disappear.
Opening my eyes, I spot Duo lying with his head on my hand. It must be an incredibly uncomfortable position; he’s half-sitting half on the hard plastic chair, and also leaning half with his upper body on my bed, with his head on my hand. The large chestnut tresses pool over the corn flower blanket, catching a little sunlight from what’s been filtered through the thick curtain. He’s breathing, face a little scrunched up, and looks absolutely relaxed. He’s so… perfect when he sleeps, as if nothing is bothering him. His lips are parted and I long to kiss them, to capture them with my lips, to taste him and whisper against them how he’s mine.
I decide to not wake him up and instead feel content with merely watching him. His right hand lies on the covers, probably slipped from my arm, and his other hand must be dangling between bed and chair, I can’t see it from here.
It must be pretty early; there’s no clock visible in the room and the curtain is blocking my view from the window, so I can’t determine the time from the sun. I shift a little, stifling a yawn. Maybe it’s for the best to doze off again, getting as much rest as possible. This cast on my arm isn’t going to keep me from any work if I can help it. I don’t fancy desk work, especially when Duo’s still active in the field. Come to think of it... will they allow him to be an active agent? Wasn’t this a test case... the mission? I have to ask Wufei when I see him; he said he would be seeing me soon, and we still have to have that heart-to-heart talk… even though we cleared a lot already yesterday. Was it yesterday?
“I can hear you think, you now.”
“One Eurocent for what I’m thinking?” I quip.
He doesn’t move, still lying with his head on my hand, smiling at me. “‘What time is it?’ ‘How soon can I leave here?’ ‘Duo lies in an uncomfortable position.’”
“You should market yourself as a psychic.”
“I just know you.”
And do I know you? Wufei’s laptop is on my left, the world map with the black dots prominently open in the window. I suck in my breath- did he read it? Did Duo take a look at the laptop when he entered the room? Why didn’t I shut it down after Wufei left? I wasn’t about to read his summary on the DID thing at all…
“How are you feeling?” He asks, moving his head up and rubbing at his cheek. He turns his head towards me, and his braid slips from his shoulder. There’s a black scarf woven into it. Is this Duo or Shinigami? I shiver. No, not again. Wufei isn’t going to make me doubt, just as Une has done before. The mission’s over now- with this broken arm I’ve a right to sick leave, and I will use every minute of free time to put an end to this situation.
“It could be worse,” I say, keeping my voice fairly neutral. I refuse to see him with different eyes; he’s still my Duo, and no matter how much others think he might’ve changed, he’s still my Duo, and no one, not even Shinigami, can come between us. “I hate being in a hospital.”
He pats my hand and smiles. “You don’t have to stay here long. They want to keep you a few nights for observation, but that’s all. You haven’t broken anything but your arm, and your ribs are cracked- they’ll need some time to heal.”
I nod, looking at him, searching for anything out of place. Stop it, I tell myself. Duo looks content somehow, like a cat who just had a bowl of cream.
“I’m so glad you’re safe. I couldn’t find you… I was so afraid...” He shifts closer to me, fingers traipsing over my left arm with the IV. His eyes seem to ask me for permission, as if he’s some kind of stranger; some minutes have passed and he still hasn’t kissed me.
“I thought the same about you,” I answer, meeting his gaze. “The office was in shambles, but I could make my way out of there. I was worried that you died…”
Duo smiles, warmly and charmingly. “I was already safe and sound outside… nothing to worry about.”
“What made the explosions go off?”
The expression in his eyes changes rapidly from searching into irritation, and he narrows them to boot, all in a flash of a mere second. “I’d set the charges according to our mission details. I don’t know why they went off prematurely, but if the short-circuiting is true, it could’ve sparked the ignition, literally. There were open cans of Mobile Suit fuel, and if the electronics were set off and blew them sky high, the amount of fuel was enough to take the factory with it- and with the fuel exploding, it took the rest of the explosives with it.”
“The light in Benedetti’s office was on,” I say.
He shrugs. “Maybe the cleaner left it on, or Benedetti simply forgot to turn it off.”
“We cut the power to the alarm system.”
“Alarm systems are often connected to a separate circuit from the regular power,” Duo says, shrugging again. His eyes are violet, slightly darker tinted, but not that dark enough. Besides, he doesn’t change personality with his eyes; he’s not some kind of… freak, damn it. “What is it, Heero? Do you doubt my assessment of the mission?”
Again with the quick defense. “I’m not attacking you,” I voice out loud. “If anything, I’m the one responsible for the explosion. I was working in Benedetti’s office when the desk lamp short-circuited. It could be coincidence, or it could be because I was overcharging the system when plugging my own laptop in to hack his computer.”
“Did you find any important data?”
“Nothing that was worth it.”
“The factory was to be blown up anyway.”
“Yes, with us at a very, very safe distance.”
“Heero, we’ve been through worse.”
“I thought you were dead.”
“Heero…” Duo moves his hand to my face, and strokes my cheek. His touch is... lukewarm at most. “The line went dead. I yelled and screamed, but I didn’t get any response. The same went through my head; I was so worried about you. The building exploded right in front of my eyes, for a moment… I thought I lost everything again.”
Finally, his warm lips on mine. Yes, they’re warm, still as warm as I remember them. I part my lips, wanting to taste everything, needing his kiss, craving his attention. I want to wrap my arms around him, but I can’t reach higher than his shoulder with my left arm. He smiles against my lips.
“Take it easy…” He tilts his head slightly, deepening the kiss. “I love you…”
“I love you too,” I respond, whispering against his lips, sighing into the kiss. How I missed his touch, how I missed his attention. “I was so afraid...”
I don’t show this much vulnerability to anyone except for Duo. He knows he holds my heart, he knows he’s in control of my mind. I’m blinded; I admit it, by him. I can’t fight it. He’s the one I would die for- literally, he’s the one I’d do anything for. So be it… I don’t rely on facts and figures when it comes to my Duo, I rely on my heart and mind- but my heart only cares for Duo, and my mind has been clouded… poisoned… overtaken by the man who’s kissing me now, prying with his tongue at my lips.
I take great pride in being rational. I depend on my analytical mind during a mission. Because of the speed with which my mind processes information and situations, I’ve saved my own life and many others. I’ve always been able to keep that professional distance, that analyzing, objective distance. Not when it comes to Duo. I could do it- sure, I could approach him with the same distance. That’s not love, and love is something I certainly feel for him. It took me precious years to admit it, precious years to find myself and figure out what it was what I was feeling- about him, about myself. Ever since we’re together, ever since the night I made him mine, I knew -and still know- that I’d love him, come heaven or hell, come Death or come Life. I don’t need a bouquet of roses, I don’t need poems or epistles of love, I don’t need candy hearts. I only need Duo.
“Will you always love me?” He whispers, before slipping his tongue into my mouth. I can do nothing but nod, parting my lips even further. His fingers press against my cheek, cupping my face- his touch feels warmer, and I lean into it. God, how I want to ravage him silly, how I want to throw him on the bed and make him scream my name out loud, preferably more than once.
My left arm is more cooperative today and I wrap it around his shoulder, my fingers clenching at his black shirt. Closer, much closer. I want all of him. He wraps his other arm around my shoulders, mimicking the embrace, but he holds me too tight and I gasp. Stupid ribs!
Duo loosens his embrace immediately, but his lips don’t leave mine, and I put some more pressure into the kiss. I can smell the scent of his hair as some of his bangs slide over my other cheek; the heavenly scent of sunshine and cinnamon- how he manages to get that scent, I don’t care, but I love it.
Suddenly his body stiffens and he breaks up the kiss. Before I can protest, he takes a step to the side, breaking up the embrace as well. I certainly didn’t hear the nurse entering the room. She holds a tray with my breakfast and frowns a little when seeing the movable table already occupied by a laptop. I don’t even wonder that the battery is empty; Wufei probably has put one in with atom power or something.
“Let me get that for you,” Duo offers, and has lifted up the laptop to place it on the chair in no time; the nurse throws him a thankful look and puts the tray on the movable table, pushing it into my direction. If Duo hasn’t seen the information on the screen before, he now has seen it. The black dots on the world map are like an eyesore; sticking out and piquing interest. I see his eyes lingering on it for a few seconds, before he straightens himself and smiles at the nurse.
“Thank you,” her pretty voice reaches my ears and she turns around to leave the room. I lift up the cover of the tray; nothing really that much edible, I guess. A few sandwiches, something that passes for cereals, a glass of milk, fruit. I reach automatically for the orange, but Duo is faster.
“You can’t peel that,” he says, winking at me. He picks up the blunt knife from the tray and cuts into the thick peel of the fruit. “Eat something else first. I’ll be finished in a minute.”
I don’t feel particularly hungry, so I just leave my hands where they are; my left hand on the covers, the right one hanging from the cast.
“You’ve been examined as well? Nothing wrong?”
Duo makes a noncommittal sound, almost blowing some of his bangs out of his face. “I don’t know what’s wrong with Wufei, but he insisted on having me checked from top to bottom, so I gave in. It wasn’t that much of a bother, though. I now have a very clean bill of health.”
Grinning, he starts cutting into the orange, again wielding the blunt knife as if it’s no trouble at all; the peel comes off rapidly.
“I also talked to someone who was apparently some kind of crisis expert. He kept on yakking on how difficult it was to have been through traumatic events and he wanted to know how I would hypothetically react to certain situations he explained to me.”
“What kind of situations?” I ask, feeling my stomach turning around. Goddamnit Wufei! Duo’s eyes darken a little. “Losing a partner. Losing a friend. Being assaulted. Becoming disabled. Watching an explosion.”
Duo and psychiatrists don’t mix. I mentioned our evaluations before; the people who talk with us during those evaluations are always doctors in some kind of psychology field, so as to assess if we’re really fit for the job and if we can still do our work. The mind is a powerful tool... acting with you, or against you. I don’t particularly care for those evaluations, but I guess you can discover some personal traits in it. I know mine have been very consistent, but Une claimed Duo’s to be very… different. Duo doesn’t pose himself to be any different to a psychologist, but I think he sometimes likes to mess with his evaluator a little. I don’t know how much of Duo is to be found back in those reports; those are all evaluations from that moment, not from a whole period of time.
“What an idiot,” I mutter, not really knowing if I’m referring to the doctor or to Wufei. Duo shrugs again, flicking the braid again over his shoulder and finishes peeling the orange.
“Here you are. Vitamin C in a nice package. Eat it all.”
“Thank you.” I accept the peeled fruit and start eating. I’m not really hungry, and I never eat much in the morning. Duo’s already opening the pre-packaged sandwich, and I let him be.
“So, what did you say to the expert?”
He doesn’t look at me, occupying himself with opening the package. “Heero, you know that I love you, right?”
I’m not really sure if he’s joking or serious; his voice is too neutral to clearly distinguish. He can turn something into a joke really quick really fast, and then I never know what he was originally intending.
“Of course I do. And I…”
“No matter what happens,” he interrupts me, smiling. “I just realize I don’t say it often enough.”
“You don’t have to say it to me,” I answer, “I already know and I see it in everything you do..”
“That’s sweet of you,” Duo grins, and he opens the package, taking out the sandwich. “It crossed my mind this morning. That I’ve never said it enough, while it’s so important.”
“You’re always next to me and being with me is more important than how many times you say it, Duo.”
“I think it’s the key to everything. Love, you know? The key to a good relationship. The key to better understanding. I think people don’t love enough... if they did, we didn’t have any need for wars or rebellions. If they did, there wouldn’t be any thirst for power and domination.”
“Even the greatest dictators had someone they loved, Duo.” I’m not really sure what he wants, or what he’s intending with his words. “I’m sure that a lot of problems would be solved if people just loved more, or just talked more… you can take away a lot of prejudice and misunderstandings if people just talked.”
“What good will it do,” he throws back at me, “when the urge to fight and kill is so innate to humankind that it can’t be taken away with all the love and understanding in the world?”
“Like Pandora’s box,” I answer, “there’s always hope left.”
“Left on the bottom of the stink pile,” Duo retorts and takes a bite from the sandwich. I’m without an answer, so I put another piece of orange into my mouth.
We don’t get another opportunity to continue the conversation, as Wufei enters the room, slightly surprised to see Duo, but quick enough to cover it up. He greets us and asks how we’re doing.
“I’ve had a good night,” I answer truthfully. “I feel better rested, and I can do without the IV.”
Wufei grimaces. “Doctor Catenacci will make his round soon enough, so you can ask him, all right? Leave it to him to decide whether you need the IV or not. What about you, Duo?”
“I’ve been examined enough,” Duo answers, turning around to face him. The black scarf in his braid is something that Wufei surely will notice, and now he’s turned around, I can see how far the piece of cloth reaches; down to his knees.
Wufei nods, expressing his appreciation for Duo’s cooperation. “It looks like we’ve come out of this rather unscathed, except for Heero’s broken arm. You’ll need surgery to remove the pins they had to nail into you to get the bones back together again.”
“Hopefully not for a while,” I state blankly. He approaches my bed.
“No, not for another six to eight weeks. It was a very complicated fracture.”
“Explosions will do that to you,” I say without a trace of humor and I catch his sideward glance to his laptop. The map is still plain in sight, and I know he’s just dying to ask me if Duo has seen it or not. He keeps his face neutral, looking back at Duo who starts eating the second sandwich.
“Any news?” I ask, to break the rather uncomfortable silence.
“No one will think of rebuilding Gundams or Mobile Suits for a while thanks to the leveling of Benedetti’s factory. We’ve given off a clear signal to criminal syndicates and opportunists in the world that there’s still a watchful eye out and that such abominations won’t ever be tolerated again. We don’t need any more of this threat to bring injustice to this world.”
He moves towards the laptop, casually. We can’t discuss it now Duo is present, and I stare unmoved at Wufei. No doubt, ever. I have entrusted my life so many times to Duo, and he’s never let me down. A good soldier is only as good as his backup; and Duo has proven more than once, more than anything, that I can count on him. I’ll solve this on my own. I don’t need Wufei to give me all this crap about disassociative personalities.
He decides to drop his little bomb. “Benedetti has disappeared.”
His eyes immediately flash to Duo, who stands at the movable table, plundering my breakfast tray. He’s eating the cereal, sticking the spoon into the cup. I remain silent, what’s there to say anyway?
Duo eats a spoonful of the cereal, not even looking up. “Well, he can’t fulfill his orders from his international customers now, and he’s sought after by us and probably every other law organization. If I were him, I’d keep a low profile myself for quite some while. If he’s really smart, he’s already cashed some of the prepayments of the orders, so he has some money to keep his profile low.”
It almost seems to amuse him, while he eats another spoonful. It’s a perfectly logical explanation to me, and I want to meet Wufei’s gaze, I want to see what he thinks. I want to prove him wrong so badly.
“It could be a possibility,” Wufei answers, but he doesn’t sound like he’s convinced. “That Adalberto guy has been arrested for his involvement in it all, and maybe he knows where his boss might run off to.”
“Maybe. He seemed pretty loyal to me.”
“We’ll see how loyal he is when I’m through with him.”
Duo smiles while he eats, and he puts down the spoon. “It’s been a while since I interrogated someone. Why don’t you leave him to me?”
It takes a few seconds for Wufei to register Duo’s offer. “Very well. If you really want to… have you finished with my laptop?” He abruptly asks me.
“I haven’t read it all,” I answer, “it wasn’t that interesting.”
Wufei scowls at me, taking up his laptop and slamming it shut. He picks up the bag and shoves it inside, as if an angry bee has stung him. I look up at Duo, who just takes a bite out of the apple, the last item on my breakfast tray. I don’t mind. Wasting food is a sin anyway.
“Do you want a ride? I can… excuse me.” Wufei pulls out his buzzer again, reading the display. He clicks it off, and turns around, facing the both of us. “That was a code 785-11.”
“Homicide pertaining to the mission,” Duo answers without skipping a beat. “Who was it?”
“I have to make a phone call,” Wufei tells him, posture stiffened. “I’ll be back soon.” He leaves the room, no, he stalks out of the room, carrying the laptop.
Chapter 11 | Chapter 13 |