An Interlude
    “Uh, Duo, what is Hilde doing out there with Zechs?”
    Duo moved up behind Quatre, peaking through the curtain with him–all he could really see was the back of Hilde's head and some hands. He shut the curtain so Quatre couldn't look out, sniggering. “She's in-fucking-sane,” he muttered, meeting Quatre's eyes a moment. “Not to mention him.”
    “Please tell me I wasn't right in my assumption,” Quatre muttered.
    Duo made a face. “I suggest we forget we saw that, and have no clue how long they were parked out front.”
    Quatre groaned, moving back to the couch and plopping down to stare at his homework again. Duo moved into the kitchen, pouring Quatre and himself drinks. “Thank you,” Quatre muttered when he set the glass down in front of him.
    Hilde appeared a moment later, looking flushed as the car engine started out front–and staring at Duo and Quatre.
    “What?” Duo asked curiously, blinking innocently at her.
    “You've been here…the entire time?” she demanded, staring at them even more.
    “What entire time?” Quatre returned, glancing at Duo. “Did you need a ride?”
    “No, I didn't…I was…” she moved toward them, gesturing behind herself as she talked without thinking. “With Zechs…”
    “Yeah, you went with he, Relena, and Lucratzia to the movies,” Duo spoke up before she could say anything more, meeting eyes with Quatre. “Wufei, Heero, and Trowa had a lecture over at the college, and Quatre and I…” he nodded encouragingly at her.
    “Were supposed to go with them,” she muttered, biting her lip as she looked between the pair.
    “We aren't going to tell Lucratzia,” Quatre informed her finally, rolling his eyes since she didn't seem to get it.
    “But you were supposed to go!” she protested.
    “No, Quatre and I never had to go,” Duo replied, shrugging. “Quatre suggested that he and I go, but I have no interest what-so-ever, and he had a shit load of homework.”
    She seemed to connect something in her mind. “You're not telling?” she demanded.
    Duo grinned at her, setting his cup down with a thud and sloshing a bit of water over the edge–he'd been about to take a drink. “I don't care if you're sleeping with Zechs, Hilde. You're my friend, and Lucratzia isn't.”
    “And…you?” she asked Quatre, her mind flashing back to how pissed he'd gotten at Duo for kissing her, and how much he'd ignored her after it had happened.
    Quatre pursed his lips, chewing on the lower one a moment and shrugging. “I stand by Duo's decision,” he muttered finally.
    “You're a doll!” she cooed at him, rushing forward to throw her arms around his neck. “Lucratzia would kill me…”
    “Hey! He's standing by my decision!” Duo interjected, grinning slightly.
    Hilde laughed, giving him a look. “I'll give you your reward later,” she announced, starting for the kitchen.
    Quatre thought about that for a third of a second, pulling his eyes away from the table slower than his body was moving. “I really don't like the sound of that, Hilde.”
    Hilde started laughing.

- -

    “Where the hell did you get cinnamon rolls?” Heero demanded of Duo, who was munching happily over the sink.
    Duo turned to look at him, his eyes sparkling. “If there were any left, I'd love to share them with you, Heero, but unfortunately…” he shrugged, cramming the last bite into his mouth.
    The house smelled deliciously like the pastry, which annoyed Trowa, Wufei, and Heero, because there had been nothing to snack on during their little lecture, and they hadn't eaten before they left.
    Wufei frowned, moving further into the kitchen and digging into the fridge as Duo finished munching down his mouthful, meeting eyes with Heero and smirking. Swallowing obviously and winking as he passed back into the living room.
    Heero watched after him with a slight frown.
    “All right, Perfect Soldier,” Trowa muttered, stepping next to him, “make us the perfect dinner?”
    Heero turned to meet Trowa's eyes and raised an eyebrow before moving to the kitchen phone and hitting the auto-dial.
    “Which perfect dinner is it tonight?” Wufei asked, moving away from the fridge and digging out his wallet.
    “The one of the pizza persuasion,” Heero replied, stepping out the door and looking to Duo's room. “Duo, are you eating with us or not?” he called.
    Duo popped his head out.
    “Good evening, Parry's Pizza on Wheels, how can we help you?”
    “Just a second,” Heero replied, giving Duo a pointed look.
    “Yeah,” Duo replied. “We will.”
    Heero nodded, raising the phone to his mouth again. “Sorry about that.”
    “No problem, sir, ready when you are.”
    “One king supreme, one king pepperoni, and one king…”
    “Cheese!” Hilde's voice came from somewhere down the hall.
    “Hawaiian!” Quatre countered at the same moment.
    “Half Hawaiian, half cheese,” Heero finished easily. “A cube of…”

- -

    “You need to flesh out the bit about Lucifer falling,” Wufei muttered, passing Quatre back the sheet of paper as he munched down some pizza. “That's the only part that needs work…”
    “The way you say that reminds me of the Bible,” Quatre muttered with a slightly flushed face.
    Wufei ruffled his hair before grabbing his soda. “You're the one who picked the subject.”
    “Stop…” Quatre snapped, moving away.
    Wufei started laughing.
    “Here, do mine now,” Trowa muttered, passing Wufei his stack of paper before turning back to his drink.
    Wufei took the papers and started reading through it, skimming with one finger.
    Average week before summer… Heero thought to himself as Wufei bobbed to the music that had been blaring for the past few hours, he was sitting on the arm of the recliner with his feet in it. He turned to Trowa, indicating something as they started talking quietly.
    Heero looked back to his own work, then glanced sidelong at Duo, who was sitting on the end of the couch nearer him. Hilde was sitting between the braided teen and Quatre, and the pair were looking over a huge book.
    Heero cleared his throat, licking his lips–he'd always found it hard to join in the socializing that seemed to happen during the homework time, and though he could now focus through the music, he hadn't been able to when he'd first moved in.
    “Duo?” Heero started quietly, hoping not to draw himself attention.
    He wasn't actually surprised when it didn't work.
    Everyone had turned to him.
    “Can you…” he started, offering his stack of paper as he met eyes with Wufei a moment.
    Duo looked extremely taken aback–seeing as Heero never asked for help, so he took the paper wordlessly, sliding down to sit on the couch. Hilde made some kind of comment about a big ass when he shoved her out of his way, but went back to studying.
    Heero watched Duo's expression as his eyes flew down the lines Heero had written. Seeing as he'd never done this, he had no idea what Duo might say to him. He knew Wufei would always just state the problems he'd found, but Duo had a tendency to discuss the problems. Heero knew this had helped Trowa once or twice, and who knew how many times he and Quatre had done such things…
    “So how was the movie?” Wufei asked Hilde suddenly, looking up to her.
    Hilde shrugged. “It was all right.”
    Quatre busied himself quickly with erasing something.
    “Should we all go see it?” Wufei pressed. “Maybe just take Zechs along?” his face broke into a smirk.
    Quatre was writing even faster, but Hilde had blushed.
    “You're such a pain in the ass,” Duo informed the Chinese teen. “Honestly, the guy is hot; you have to know that.”
    Wufei frowned at Duo, losing the teasing air as Duo passed the papers back to Heero. “Actually, I don't. He's, you know…male.”
    “So are you, and you're hot,” Duo replied, raising an eyebrow.
    That flustered Wufei into silence.
    “All right, Heero,” Duo muttered, turning back to him and starting to gesture at something with the hand the pizza was in–and managed to smack him in the nose.
    Hilde broke into giggles as Quatre looked up and blinked, Wufei and Trowa both had just stopped.
    Heero didn't know what to do…
    Duo was starting to snigger, moving the pizza away. “…you'll wanna…wipe…your nose off,” he muttered, blushing himself, seeing as he'd been on something of a high horse and managed to make an ass of himself.
    Heero gave Duo a look, leaning over and snatching up a napkin, wiping his nose.
    “Sorry,” Duo muttered, cracking a grin.
    Heero couldn't help it, he grinned back.

- -

    Duo had been waiting for Heero for five minutes when he dug his coin out. It was a small coin, old. He was semi-convinced that it was Chinese, but he'd never looked into it. The markings on the side had been rubbed off, so only the silhouette of some anal looking guy had remained. Small as it was, it was perfect for flipping.
    The lighting in the hall the way it was, the thing shone brightly, reflecting small dots of light on several bits of the walls–up and down…up and down…
    “What are you doing?” Heero was utterly shocked to see Duo standing there.
    Duo, of course, was so surprised that he missed the coin on its way down…and it started rolling away.
    “Shit!” he muttered, diving after it as it rolled near the small hole in the wall–the only place in the entire damn school that needed the molding replaced…
    Heero, picking up that the coin meant something to Duo, dived for it as well–nearly at the same time, even.
    They collided heavily, sliding slightly on the smooth floors, but Heero caught the thing before it could go under.
    Duo snorted. “Thanks,” he muttered, sitting up and brushing his hair back as he looked at Heero.
    “No problem,” Heero replied, sitting up as well, moving the coin closer to his face to study it. “What is this?”
    “A coin,” Duo replied shortly, snatching it from the other's hand.
    Heero gave him a shocked look.
    “Everyone else left with Zechs,” Duo muttered. “I'm going to need a ride.”
    Heero nodded, frowning. “Even Quatre?”
    “Yeah, he wanted to get home and finish his paper.”
    “Oh…” Heero stared a moment longer at the floor.
    “Why do I get the impression that I don't want to know?” Mr. Wilder asked as he shut the door to his classroom, looking from one teen to the other.
    Duo grinned at him. “Because you don't,” he muttered, appreciating the good looks of the guy.
    The man scratched his lip, looking from Duo's eyes to Heero. “I hear you gave him a hand with his paper?” he asked, glancing back to Duo.
    “Well…” Duo started, not sure if this was a good thing or not.
    The man laughed, moving around the boys and starting for the faculty room, whistling.
    “He's got a nice ass,” Duo noted, tilting his head as he watched.
    “And only you would notice,” Heero replied, picking himself up off the floor to offer a hand to Duo.
    “Just a minute…” Duo muttered, looking around Heero's legs–Heero moved over the extra step so Duo pulled back to look up at the guy with a frown before taking the offered hand. “Fine, then,” he muttered, starting to brush his clothing off. “How'd you do?”
    “The only one in the class who got the grade,” he replied seriously, his monotone implying nothing as he started in the opposite direction of his teacher. “Quatre won't appreciate that you’re checking out a teacher's ass.”
    “Oh, so you're going to tell him?” Duo demanded, rolling his eyes.
    Heero turned to look at him, wanting to comment that splitting them up would be in his benefit, or saying something flippant about friends and lies. He didn't have the gull, however, not when Duo'd been so genial to him.
    “That's what I thought,” Duo muttered, pinching Heero's ass and dodging out of arm's reach before Heero could recover the dignity to hit him–laughing, as they took off down the hall.

- -

    “You're not nervous about that at all?” Hilde purred at Quatre, highly amused as she and Quatre watched Heero and Duo sparring in the back yard. “They've gotten rather friendly,” she added.
    Quatre shook his head, looking back to the book on his legs. He'd told Heero, after all, that if he could steal Duo away, he wouldn't argue it. He'd just have to get Duo's attention again later. “I don't know what you're talking about,” Quatre muttered. “For once there's no tension in the house. Why do you have to try and throw doubt at me?” Quatre actually met her eyes.
    Hilde blinked, looking away from him.
    “I know Duo…loves me,” Quatre muttered slowly, thinking about this. “Or something!” he amended quickly, jumping up and throwing his papers and books into a pile. “He's with me, and that's all that matters,” he turned and disappeared into his bedroom.
    Hilde blinked after him in shock a moment before focusing out the backdoor again as Heero started laughing. It wasn't the laugh he'd had when Quatre and Duo were fighting, either; it was a slightly naughty, slightly apologetic laugh.
    “Okay…that hurt…” Duo muttered, sounding in pain.
    Hilde moved to the backdoor, blinking out at Duo, who was sitting spread-legged in the grass. His head was back slightly and he was rubbing his inner thigh, his expression pained.
    “What did you do?” Hilde demanded, moving down the stairs as Duo opened his eyes a moment–they looked slightly teary.
    “I said I was sorry!” Heero almost shouted at her, disappearing into the kitchen.
    “Did you have to use that tone?” Duo snapped at her, frowning as he opened his eyes again. “Jesus, the guy has issues enough as it is…”
    Hilde stared at him, disbelieving.
    “What's going on?” Quatre asked, stepping onto the back-porch as Heero passed Duo a towel.
    “Thanks,” Duo muttered to Heero, who dropped beside him with a hurt expression. “He got me in the leg,” Duo explained, looking to Quatre.
    “The thigh, you mean?”
    “It would have been the balls if I hadn't realized what I was doing,” Heero muttered disconsolately, pouting more as he stared at the grass.
    “And no one appreciates that more than me,” Duo informed him, leaning over and smacking his knee lightly.
    Heero blinked at Duo.
    Quatre stared at Heero's expression as Duo grinned at the guy, shaking his head and laying back. “Hold the ice on, huh?” Duo asked.
    Heero'd started to do as asked before he realized where that would place his hand.
    Duo started laughing.
    “Duo,” Quatre muttered in slight reprimand, moving down the stairs to sit between his boyfriend's legs, obliging and holding the icepack on.
    “I like this view…” Duo muttered, tilting his head up to look at Quatre.
    Quatre nearly punched him in the balls before he realized what he was doing.
    Hilde went back inside, uncertain of how she was feeling about all that.
    Quatre readjusted his hand on the towel before letting his eyes drift to Heero again. Duo'd always been forgiving with things that drove everyone else insane. When Heero had complained about the music being too loud, Duo'd taken care to keep it at a level that didn't bother the Japanese teen. When Heero had been too nervous to go set up an appointment with the class councilor, Duo'd set it up so Wufei and Heero went in together. Even in the midst of Duo's attempted courting, Duo had been sincere in Heero's wants and needs. He'd done what he could and forgiven everything–every harsh word said to him.
    Well, almost.
    Quatre resituated his weight when Duo's knee rested against his back. “I could sleep like this,” Duo muttered.
    “And you would sleep like this, but I won't let you,” Quatre replied.
    “You're no fun, Q, you know that?”
    “No, I just don't want to get sun-burnt,” Quatre replied, “and neither of you two geniuses have put sunscreen on either, I'm sure.”
    “Who are you to lecture us if you're out here the same?” Heero muttered, studying Quatre carefully.
    “I hadn't planned to be out here,” Quatre replied.
    Duo sighed. “The word is about…there's something evolving…” he sang slowly. “Whatever may come, the world keeps revolving…” his rich tenor sounded perfect as he stretched the word. “They say the next big thing is here, that the revolution's near…but to me it seems quite clear that it's all just a little bit of history repeating…”
    “Where do you come up with this stuff?” Heero asked, staring in amazement.
    Duo, who'd at some point laid his arm over his eyes, moved it to look at Heero. “It's oldies music. They play it in the commons.”
    “Since we all know I spend time in the commons…” Heero muttered, looking away.
    Quatre snorted, letting his weight rest slowly against Duo's leg. “He plays it every night,” Quatre snorted. “I swear, half the time he breaks a kiss to sing with it…”
    Duo started to snigger, moving his knee to hush Quatre–who'd blushed.
    Heero lost whatever good humor he'd been in, frowning slightly as he stood before glancing at Duo–who wasn't paying attention, and glaring at Quatre, turning to disappear into the house.
    “You're the only one who hears it, Quatre,” Duo muttered after a moment, “because I keep it too low for anyone outside the room to hear.”
    Quatre smiled at Duo and shrugged, looking up into the sky. “I know.”
   
    “What'd he say?” Wufei demanded quietly, having joined Hilde on the front porch.
    “Who? Quatre or Zechs?”
    “Both,” Wufei replied, moving to sit even closer to her, leaning forward so she'd meet his eyes.
    Hilde sniggered, grinning at him. “Zechs didn't say much of anything, Lucratzia never showed.”
    Wufei's chuckle was evil. “Oh yeah, I was supposed to tell her to meet you, wasn't I?” he snapped his fingers. “Damn, I forgot. We were wrapped up in studying.”
    “Studying what?” Hilde demanded, smirking at him.
    He gave her a level look, then looked back to the road. “What did Quatre say?”
    “He demanded why I was trying to cast doubt in his mind,” she replied. “Started to say that he knew Duo loved him, but I bet you Duo hasn't said it yet and he realized that.”
    “They looked rather comfortable out back,” Wufei countered, gesturing over his shoulder with his thumb.
    “Heero and Duo were sparring.”
    “I'm aware.”
    “Where is Trowa?”
    “I have no idea,” Wufei replied, staring off down the road. “What're the chances of Zechs coming and taking us swimming or something?”
    “Low. Lucratzia's hanging off him again,” her tone sounded vaguely disgusted.
    “Hm.”

- -

    Duo sighed, starting to flip his coin again. There was one day before summer vacation started, one more week before he and Quatre headed to Quatre's property in Italy. From there, they would join the others in Spain, where Cathy and Trowa would be.
    He was looking forward to two weeks alone with Quatre.
    Of course, he had his reservations. Quatre would have to attend meetings to catch up on what his company was doing without him, and then there were the twenty million some-odd siblings to add to this…
    But Italy? He could deal with all of that to be with Quatre in Italy.
    Hilde was heading with Relena to the colonies, and Wufei was going to a retraining course with Heero. Trowa was going to join the circus. All of them were spending the first week of summer together before heading out, and all of them were meeting in Spain. They'd spend a week in Spain before heading over to the Caribbean for two weeks on Quatre. Then they were all going “home” which meant to the colonies they'd originated from. They'd spend that week doing whatever they were told to do before taking a week to go on a colony-hopping tour with Relena. It left them just enough time to relax for one week before worrying about senior year of high school.
    Of course, what'd really happen would be two weeks of relaxation and fucking around before one week of insane school-shopping.
    Up…down…up…down.
    Duo was staring at nothing, thinking about the summer before him.
    “What are you doing this summer, then?”
    Duo turned to look at his chemistry partner, tucking the coin away and shrugging. “Not much. You?”
    The guy shrugged. “Hanging out. God what I wouldn't give to have something to do…”
    Duo chuckled. “So where are you going? What are you going to be doing?”
    The guy frowned at him. “I just said I wasn't doing anything.”
    Duo blinked a moment, digesting this, then grinned. “Okay, then my 'not much' was a lie.”
    “So what are you doing?” the guy was studying him in slight confusion.
    “Heading to Italy in a week, meeting up with my friends in Spain. Then we'll head to the Caribbean two weeks later before I go back to L-2 for damn speeches,” he sighed.
    “Oh yeah…you were…” the guy had been staring at him, but now blinked, focusing. “Italy? Spain? And you're saying…the Caribbean!”
    Duo laughed, choking slightly to stifle the sound. “Then I'm going to the colonies…colony hopping, and coming back.”
    “So you get…what, a week of nothing?” the guy was staring at him.
    Duo chuckled. “Three weeks here, two weeks with Quatre, one week in Spain, then two more in the Caribbean.”
    The man shook his head, tossing down the pencil he'd been holding. “That's just disgusting…I'd love to go do all of that…”
    “Yeah, protests are lovely,” Duo muttered glumly. “Being called a murdering lunatic is just great…”
    The guy actually thought about everything before looking to Duo's distant eyes again. “Hey…you have my support,” he shrugged. “For whatever good it does…”
    Nothing whatsoever. Duo thought silently, but grinned at the guy. “Thank you.”


"History Repeating" by Propeller Head