OOC, Spoof. This is the third and final fic in the series of the Gundam Soapies.
*WARNING * WARNING : This is NOT a crossover fic. Characters' names, appearances and certain characteristics have been borrowed from other animes but they are being used as characters of the GW AU (Anime Universe)!
Disclaimer: Not for purchase or rental. Free Viewing.
Rating: PG-13
Heero sighed heavily again, drawing the uneasy attention of the other OZ pilots sitting in the room who were becoming increasingly nervous as they waited for their turn in the interview. They sneaked glances at him and then at each other and squirmed in their chairs as they wondered if he knew something about Mariemaia that they didn't. Heero heaved another sigh, not noticing that the pilot sitting nearest to him was starting to twitch every time he sighed and then he got up, worked over to the mirror on the wall and stared glumly at his reflection, then returned to his seat.
'Blue.' He thought mournfully to himself and sighed yet again. The pilot sitting across from him also started twitching.
'I can't believe that Une made me dye my hair blue!' Heero sighed, the other two pilots twitched. 'A simple undercover assignment she says. A chance for me to get away from those soap addicted morons she promised.' He stared sadly at Quatre who was sitting on the other side of the room, and sighed dismally as the light blue haired bishonen beamed widely at him and wriggled his fingers at him in greeting. Heero drooped his head and sighed yet again, driving the pilots sitting near him crazy with the spreading tension. Heero wished bitterly that he had been listening more carefully when Une was explaining the details of the assignment before agreeing to take it. At the time, he had been so delighted by her offer to let him go undercover, away from his fellow Gundam pilots who were smothering him with their attention and their incessant quarrelling that he hadn't really noticed the reserve in her eyes as she carefully pointed out that the assignment was strictly on volunteer basis. He looked again at Quatre who was staring at him with starry eyes and a blissful smile curved permanently on his face and sighed again.
- flashback sequence
'Look I already explained that you can't change your mind once you accepted the assignment Yuy.'
Sally glared at the frantic pilot of Wing Zero and folded her arms across her breasts.
'It's not my fault that you weren't paying attention when Une explained that you would have to change your appearance.'
'Change my appearance, yes!' Heero screeched, driven out of his usual stoic calm by the recent changes in his friends' behaviour (shameless plug time: read the two earlier fics: 'The Beautiful and the Restless' and 'The Young and the Bold'), 'but she didn't say anything about dying my hair blue! Why in the world do I have to dye my hair blue anyway? I thought that this was an infiltration assignment, to get accepted into the Oz Elite Pilot Program (OEPP). What has blue hair got to do with being a good pilot?' He slammed his hand on the desk belligerently.
Sally stared pointedly at the hand until Heero moved it off her desk, then she softened her voice as she tried to calm the agitated Japanese.
'You are right.' She started simply, 'But unfortunately Mariemaia, the new leader of Oz is a six year old girl and she happens to think that blue hair is really cool right now. So, she's insisted that one of the criteria for being accepted into the OEPP is that the pilot has blue hair.' Sally continued coolly as Heero's jaw slackened and his eyes widened. 'She has agreed to accept some colour variations like,' She looked at her notes, 'lilac, purple, and some shades of green,' she quizzed the notes again and shrugged, 'but doesn't specify the exact shades. So since we want you to get accepted, you go in with blue hair because she likes blue the best.'
Heero looked at her with defeated eyes. 'Blue.' He muttered sullenly. 'Got it. Any particular shade?' He asked sarcastically as he got to his feet.
'I suggest that you try for royal blue, Mariemaia likes bright colours.' Sally offered helpfully as she also got to her feet. She held the door open as Heero left and wisely ignored the nasty look he shot her as he left her office muttering 'royal blue', 'bright colours' and other indecipherable words under his breath. She took a deep breath before turning to the pilots sitting sulkily in front of her office.
'Okay Quatre and Wufei, Lady Une has approved your applications to act as backup for Heero on this mission.' She held up a hand as two of four pilots jumped to their feet with an indignant look on their faces. 'I'm sorry Duo but unless you are willing to dye your hair,' she continued dryly as the American clutched his heavy braid protectively, 'it's simply out of the question for you to join the mission.'
Duo wailed, 'but this is hair discrimination. I protest. We should sue Mariemaia! Do you have any idea what dying does to the condition of your hair cuticles? I can't risk it. Do you have any idea how long it took to grow my hair this long!' He shrieked and waved his chestnut braid in Sally's face.
Sally started to rub the temples of her forehead, she reminded herself to take the painkillers next time before she talked to Maxwell. She twitched involuntarily as Trowa spoke up, 'Don't pay any attention to Maxwell and his obsession with his hair. What about me? I said that I would be willing to dye my hair.'
Sally gritted her teeth as she prepared herself, 'Yes, you did,' she admitted grimly. Then taking a deep breath, she added gently, 'but when the lab tested your hair sample, they found that the styling mousse, gel and spray that you use to hold your fringe reacts adversely with the dye. Unless you are willing to forego the use of these products, instead of turning blue, you are going to end up bald.' She ended flatly, trying to ignore the muffled shrieks of laughter from the other pilots behind the shattered pilot of Heavyarms. She patted Trowa's arm consolingly as she said, 'I didn't think you'd want to risk going bald. That's why we couldn't accept you for this mission.'
Trowa sat down numbly next to Duo who alternated between scowling at the gloating Quatre and sniggering whenever he looked at Trowa. 'Bald.' Trowa thought emptily and then shuddered as he thought of the alternative, of trying to deal with his fringe without the aid of his style mousse. To try to cope without the gel. Or the spray. His eyes welled over as he realized that he was going to have to let Heero go on this mission without him.
Quatre smirked when Sally gave back the dyed hair sample to him and Wufei, and the Chinese pilot stared at his hair sample and then swore loudly. He examined the light blue hair in his hand smugly and sniggered softly as Wufei continued to shout at Sally, waving the tuft of dark sage green hair in his hands.
'I bet that Wufei's not accepted into the OEPP.' Quatre whispered to Duo who started to giggle as he too stared at the green hair in Wufei's hands.
- end flashback sequence
Mariemaia stared intently at the ten pilots who had been chosen to be the core group of the OEPP and beamed with satisfaction, and kicked her dangling feet happily as she waited to be introduced.
The first pilot was a tall blue haired bishonen, who had on a blue headband to keep the fringe of his short hair out of his face. He snapped to attention as Grandpa Barton pointed to him and stepped forward smartly.
'Rowen, of Gundam Strata.' (1)
Mariemaia inclined her head proudly and smiled happily. She really liked him. He even had blue eyes! She turned her attention to the graceful girl who had stepped forward, her straight light blue hair fanning out behind her as she moved.
Quatre stared jealously at the long, shimmering light blue hair of the female pilot who introduced herself as Umi, of Gundam Selece. (2) He glared at Heero who had been looking admiringly at the slender girl and decided that he was going to make sure that she stayed far, far away from Heero, one way or another.
'Maximilian.' The gentle looking bishonen stepped forward with a shy smile on his face, pushing the soft strands of his blue hair away from his face. 'Gundam Valkyrie'. (3)
Mariemaia hid her yawn behind her hand as one after another, the pilots introduced themselves and tried not to fidget in her chair. Until her attention was caught by the green haired pilot standing timidly in front of her. She sat up and blinked as she stared hard at the pretty boy with the mid waist length wavy hair.
'Shun'. He offered apologetically to the little girl who stared at his hair with disapproval. 'Of Gundam Andromeda.' (4) Shun stepped back nervously as the pixie-faced girl nodded coldly to him. Shun prayed silently that Mariemaia wasn't going to insist that he dye his hair blue.
She narrowed her eyes as yet another pilot came forward, this time with dark sage green hair that had been pulled away from his face and tied at the neck. She glared at the silent boy who stared back at her with inscrutable black eyes. Mariemaia pouted and pulled at the sleeve of the General standing at attention next to her chair. She whispered softly to him and scowled at his whispered answer, then she nodded at the pilot who had identified himself as Fei, of Gundam Ryu, to return to his position.
When the last pilot in the line came forward, she jumped off her chair and walked towards the elfin girl with light blue hair that fell softly around her face and fascinated by her large red eyes and drawn by her ethereal, fragile beauty.
'Rei.' The pilot offered in a muted voice. 'Of Gundam Evangelion.' (5)
Duo stared sulkily at the screen as he and Trowa waited in their Gundams, wishing that he had been with Heero instead.
Trowa stared at the heavy fringe in front of his eyes worriedly, was it him or did it seem that he had less hair today? Maybe he should cut back on the mousse a little, he decided uneasily as he continued to finger the stiff hair.
'Heerooooo.uh.shi!' Quatre added hastily as the Japanese glared in his direction, 'Hiroshi!' He yelled again, as he skidded to a stop next to his friend, almost upsetting the overloaded tray in his arms. 'Let's sit together at lunch.' He beamed happily at Heero who rolled his eyes and marched off, as Quatre trotted hurriedly behind him.
The two pilots sat down at an empty table, Quatre chattering cheerfully and Heero eating silently as usual.
Rowen looked at the two curiously, feeling that he had seen them somewhere before, particularly Heero. He found himself blushing involuntarily every time he looked at Heero's intense eyes and wondered why he felt his heart hammering wildly. He looked up with a smile as Max put down his tray beside him.
'Look over there.' Max whispered as he indicated the table near the entrance with his head. 'The silent twins are at it again.'
Rowen craned his head slightly, trying not to stare too obviously at the two girls sitting together and eating in complete silence, their eyes never leaving each other's eyes.
'I'm telling you, they have to be a couple.' Max hissed excitedly as he bit into his sandwich. 'Otherwise, what's with the staring contest they do every lunch time?' He mumbled as he chewed.
Rowen sighed regretfully. 'Maybe you're right. It's a shame though. We only have 3 female pilots in the OEPP as it is. I can't believe that they are interested in each other.'
'Don't tell me that you were interested in one of them.' Max choked, his eyes widening with surprise as he stared from Rowen to the two girls. 'I thought that you had a thing for Hiroshi.' It was Rowen's turn to choke frantically. Max shrugged as Rowen glared at him helplessly with a purple face. 'Oh, come on. Everyone in OEPP thinks that. I thought you knew. Why do you think that Hiroshi's boyfriend hates your guts?'
'Boyfriend?' Rowen blinked blankly.
Max shook his head sadly, 'to think that I'm the one wearing glasses.' He sighed dramatically.
Rowen twitched. 'Don't.' He shuddered. 'I don't ever want to hear anyone sighing again after the way Hiroshi kept sighing in the waiting room. I'm surprised that Suoh managed to restrain himself. Did you see the way he kept on twitching every time Hiroshi sighed? Do you think that maybe Hiroshi has a medical problem?'
Max grinned. 'So you do care. Ow!' He yelped as Rowen kicked his feet under the table. 'Okay, okay. Sheesh. If you don't want to spread rumours that you have a thing for Hiroshi, stop blushing whenever you make eye contact with him.' Rowen looked over at Heero who looked puzzled when he blushed furiously and ducked his head.
Max raised an eyebrow, 'I rest my case.'
'It's not like that.' Rowen muttered, his face reddening with embarrassment. 'I like girls. No.' He added frantically, waving his hands as Max started to look towards the two female pilots again, 'not them. I don't like them.' He lowered his voice as Shun turned around with a curious look on his face from the table behind him. 'There's someone else. I met her. well.' he amended reluctantly, as he toyed with his salad. 'I saw her once.' He sighed and rested his face on his hand as his eyes turned dreamy. 'She was so beautiful. Just like a fairy princess.'
Shun listened intently from his seat, not noticing the disapproving look on his table mates' faces as they continued to eat silently. Wufei debated silently on whether he should tell Shun that eavesdropping was not an honourable act. Suoh continued to eat serenely, determined to be resist being drawn in by the petty behaviour of the other pilots in the OEPP. He couldn't help wishing that he could have received his Gundam Shinobi without having to endure the company of such unworthy personages but sternly quelled his impulse to complain, reminding himself that duty must be accepted, completely and selflessly. He couldn't help twitching briefly as he heard yet another sigh from Hiroshi who was sitting two tables from them. He wondered if the pilot of Gundam Tenshi had a medical problem. Either that or a mental problem, he thought sourly as he dug his fork forcefully into the lasagne. Suoh continued to put away his lasagne as he reminded himself to pick up the additional set of earplugs that he had ordered yesterday from supplies.
Max listened to Rowen with avid interest, as did Umi and Shun from their respective tables. Umi had joined Max and Rowen at their table when she had finally arrived in the lunch hall. She had given Rei's table a doubtful look when she had first come in, then encountering hostile gazes from Quatre and Wufei at their tables, had made her way to Max's.
Rowen continued happily, his salad totally forgotten as he cast his mind back to the ball, one month ago. 'She has beautiful dark hair and dazzling blue eyes. I think I fell in love at first sight, when she floated down the stairs in her white dress.' He ignored Umi who made a face and muttered 'what is she, a balloon? How can she float?' Rowen's eyes were starry as he concluded, 'I knew that she was someone special when I picked up her slipper that night.' He sighed happily, remaining blissfully unaware of the loud clash that drew the attention of the other pilots as Heero dropped his glass from his nerveless fingers.
Umi wrinkled her brow doubtfully as she stared at the blissful oblivion in Rowen's eyes. 'So. like. you've got her slipper.' She stated flatly. Rowen beamed as he nodded eagerly, not hearing the sudden choking at the table behind him as Shun and Suoh turned to Wufei in alarm. Umi ignored the noises coming behind her and continued, 'You don't know her name.' Rowen nodded obediently. 'You don't have her number.' Rowen nodded again, sagging his shoulders slightly. 'But you do have her slipper.' Umi concluded firmly, shaking her head sadly as Rowen nodded again and his expression brightened.
Max gave Rowen a look of silent sympathy as he reached over to grasp his hand, 'that's so romantic. It's just like Cinderella.' He sighed happily.
There was another clang as Suoh suddenly lost his grip on his fork. Max gave the table behind him a disapproving look. They were such noisy eaters, he tsked reprovingly.
'And that's why I keep blushing when I see Hiroshi.' Rowen added shyly.
Umi's eyes rounded with shock. 'Huh?' She managed. 'What has got to do with this dream girl?'
'He. his eyes, for some reason, they remind me of the beautiful girl at the ball last month.' Rowen explained patiently. Then he glanced over at Heero's table worriedly as Quatre started to his feet angrily, only to be pulled down again by a pale looking Heero. 'Apparently his boyfriend doesn't like me looking at Hiroshi.' He confided in Umi in a carrying whisper.
Umi examined the two bishonens who had started to argue, with interest. 'I didn't know they were together.' She waved happily at Heero and Quatre who simply glared in her direction. 'I thought that it was Fei who liked Hiroshi.' She giggled softly as she looked over at the green haired boy at the other table. 'He got all touchy and irritable the other way when we were practicing our manoeuvres together. So I thought he was jealous but maybe,' she brightened and smiled at the scowling boy who was wondering why she kept on smirking at him, 'he was jealous. Not of Hiroshi, but of me.'
At the far side of the little dining room, completely oblivious to the ruckus of the other pilots, Rei stared silently at her partner. No. 4. She couldn't believe that she was partnered with someone who had a number for a name. Still, she did concede that it was a little better than Hiroshi's partner, who had introduced himself simply as Q. A letter of the Alphabet! Come on. Rei continued to stare at No. 4, determined that she wasn't going to allow this strange girl to intimidate her. She wasn't sure why No. 4 always insisted to sitting at her table and staring at her but Rei had no intention of backing away from a challenge.
No. 4 stared at the quiet girl in front of her and wondered why Rei was staring at her. She continued to stare into the beautiful red eyes, determined not to be the first one to break, even if she did end up with a killer migraine afterwards. No. 4 reminded herself to collect her painkillers after lunch as usual. She sighed heavily, unconsciously mimicking Rei who had sighed first. Both girls remained immobile as Suoh dropped his second fork with yet another loud clang.
'Why do you think they're staring at each other like that?' Quatre asked Heero curiously as they left the dining room.
Heero shrugged silently.
'I miss Heero.' Duo muttered sulkily.
Trowa ignored him, he was carefully reading a magazine article on how to take care of your hair so that it stays shiny and silky.
'I even miss Wufei.' Duo added crossly as he kicked the lounge table.
'I can't believe I'm not allowed to watch any more television during mission breaks.' Duo sulked, as he started to pace around the lounge table, occasionally kicking the table and casting longing glances at the silent television.
Trowa continued to ignore him, he focused his attention on the part where the article was advising the use of natural products. Eggs. Milk. Hmmmm. He was pretty sure that the fridge was well stocked since they had gone shopping the prior week. Trowa fingered his fringe again, he was getting more and more certain that his hair was coming out, one strand at a time.
Duo stomped around the room some more then finally admitted sadly. 'I think I miss Quatre too.' He glared at Trowa who was talking under his breath as he read the article intently and occasionally fingering his hair, then tossing his braid with a sudden grin he threw himself on the sofa next to Trowa and peeked over his shoulder. 'Let me read it as well. We can take care of our hair together.'
Trowa silently pointed out the part that he was reading and shortly afterwards the two disappeared into the kitchen, then into the bathroom, holding lots of eggs and milk cartoons in their hands.
'What do we do when we don't have assignments?'
Shun shrugged and snuggled down in the common room sofa with his book. 'I don't know. Whatever we want I guess.'
Quatre looked around the small common room and frowned as he took in the titles on the bookshelf. He brightened as he noticed the large screen television hanging on the side wall and grinned delightedly when he realized that it was cable. Quatre turned on the television and surfed the channels till he found the soap channel then made himself comfortable on the large sofa as he lost himself once more in daytime dramas.
Wufei glared at Quatre and whispered, 'you know that Une forbade us from watching any more daytime soaps. Forever.'
Quatre grinned back at him, 'Relax Fei. This is a part of our assignment. Remember? Besides which I'm dying to find out if Brooke will take Thorne away from Macy for good.'
Wufei hesitated briefly, wrestling with his conscience, then as the opening sequence of 'The Bold and the Beautiful' flashed on screen, he found his eyes turning magnetically to what was happening.
No. 4 walked into the common room and stopped as she took in the sight of Q and Fei sitting companionably together, their eyes glued to the television. She wondered what was happening that was so interesting and quietly took a seat behind them.
Forty-five minutes later,
Shun looked up from his book with a slight frown as the other three pilots in the room started to sob loudly. He walked over to them to complain and sat down indignantly to wait as they waved him away from the screen and into silence. He turned to the television and .
'Okay Heero. I want to hear exactly what happened.' Sally turned to Quatre and Wufei who had started to open their mouths. 'As for you two. You are confined to headquarters until further notice and absolutely no more television.' She added grimly looking at Duo then at Trowa, whose hair still looked limp and lifeless. 'No more magazines either.' Heero shuddered as he remembered his frantic calls for assistance earlier. Sally had definitely not been amused at having to retrieve the three pilots from the OEPP base, or rather, he amended, what was left of the OEPP base.
'This is all Quatre's fault' He started succinctly, ignoring the mournful green stare from Quatre who looked at him sadly, wounded by his betrayal. 'And Wufei as well.' He added, as Wufei flushed guiltily and hung his head. 'They started watching those stupid soaps again during our off time.' He paused as Duo and Trowa started screaming abuse at Quatre and Wufei and waited politely for Sally to scream at them to fall silent. 'And this time, they got the pilots on the OEPP addicted to those damn soaps and well,' he shrugged and heaved a dramatic sigh, 'after 3 weeks, the contagion had spread all over the base.'
Sally groaned out loud, suddenly understanding how the OEPP base turned into a disaster area in a month.
'It still doesn't explain how or why the base was blown up.' Une interrupted suddenly, 'or why you felt that you had to be extracted from a very promising undercover operation. We had never been successful in infiltrating OZ at the top echelon and this was our one chance. Why did you call for extraction Heero?'
Heero started to sweat slightly as he avoided Une's keen gaze. He wondered whether he would be able to cover up exactly what had happened. Unfortunately, he had forgotten momentarily that he had not been alone on that mission.
'It wasn't Heero's fault.' Quatre spoke up defensively and Heero cringed. 'His cover was blown and so was ours. We had to leave.'
Lady Une narrowed her eyes as she looked at Heero, who refused to meet her eyes and then at Quatre who was glaring at her as he stood protectively near Heero, then finally at Wufei, who had gone red, and dropped his eyes.
'Exactly how was your cover blown?' She asked calmly, 'Are you sure that it was impossible for you to continue the mission?' She ended with an ominous glare at the three pilots.
Heero still stayed silent.
Quatre bit his lips as he tried to think of reasons to justify their decision.
Une turned to Wufei who continued to stare at his feet and prompted, her voice sharpened slightly with impatience. 'Well?'
Wufei gulped nervously, then spurted out. 'One of the pilots, Ryu, remembered Heero from our last mission. The ball. And then he also remembered seeing me and Quatre there as well. If you remember, Quatre was firing his bazooka at the Oz officers at the time.' He concluded miserably. 'So Rowen ummm. guessed that we weren't really Oz pilots.' Une pursed her lips tightly. 'And how did he recognise Heero? Wasn't he dressed as a girl that time?' She demanded with flashing eyes.
'Apparently, Rowen fell madly in love with Heero that night.' Wufei spoke shakily, avoiding Heero's accusing glare, 'So he kept the slipper that Heero had dropped when we fled the ball. He discovered that it was Heero when they went on the date and Heero lost his wig.' He concluded in haste.
'Date!' Screeched Duo loudly.
'Wig?' Sally queried looking puzzled.
'It was Quatre's idea.'
'That's right Fei. Blame me as usual.'
'Well, it was.' Wufei muttered lamely, 'we thought that we should try to get the slipper away from Rowen and.'
Une held up a hand, 'don't tell me.' She glared at Heero who wilted visibly, 'they talked you into dressing up as a girl again so that you could seduce this Rowen into giving back your slipper. I gather that during the date, somehow you lost your wig and Rowen recognised you.'
Heero nodded numbly, feeling tears pricking his eyes.
'So what has this date to do with the base being blown up?' Une tapped the table with her pen impatiently.
'Nothing at all.' Heero answered hastily. 'It just happened on the same day.' Une shook her head in silent resignation. 'I'm afraid to ask what happened. Do you know why and how the base exploded?'
Heero, Quatre and Wufei looked at each other warily before nodding reluctantly.
'Never mind the base! What happened on the date?'
Everyone turned to Duo who blushed under the force of their combined frowns and sank back to his chair. 'It's important to me.' He whimpered disconsolately.
Une stared firmly at Wufei, who began shaking.
'It wasn't us.' He offered with a pleading glance at Heero who sighed heavily. 'And would you please stop sighing!' Wufei suddenly shrieked. 'I can't take it any more. I don't blame Suoh for going crazy.' He stopped and turned a weak grin at Une who was staring at them in blank astonishment. 'Heh. Sorry.' Wufei muttered.
Heero sighed again. 'It was Suoh. The pilot of Gundam Shinobi. I'm pretty sure that he wasn't too stable to begin with.' He explained. 'And well. Maybe No. 4 had a little to do with it as well. Shun was kind of involved also.' He added cryptically.
'No. 4?' Trowa broke in.
'That's the name of the pilot.' Heero shrugged. 'Don't ask me. Maybe it's an alias like Q for Quatre.'
'Q?' Duo shrieked as he burst out laughing, 'talk about original. That was your secret identity? So what about the others?'
'Hiroshi and Fei.' Wufei offered absently before Heero could stop him.
Duo burst out laughing again and rolled around the floor.
Une pointed to Sally who picked up the pilot and shook him roughly before depositing him back on his chair, still giggling and chortling to himself as he started to mutter to himself. 'What would I have been then? Solo? Nah too obvious. D? Worse than Q. Heh heh. What about Max? Nah, too boring. ...' She ignored the giggled pilot and turned back to the three still standing in front of her desk.
'Why did this Suoh and,' Une looked dubious, 'No. 4 blow up the base?'
'Oh it wasn't on purpose.' Quatre piped in. 'It just happened by accident while they were fighting in their Gundams, Shinobi and Psyche. It was a love fight.'
Une looked at Heero who backed away shaking his head quickly in denial. 'Uh uh. Not me. I wasn't involved.' Then at Quatre who smiled beatifically at her, and despite her better judgement, she asked, 'So what was the fight about?'
Quatre grinned. 'Well Suoh was in love with Rei, the pilot of Gundam Evangelion but he was too shy to tell her. So he asked Shun to pass a message to Rei. Except it turned out that Shun had been secretly in love with Rei as well so he changed it to make it look like it was to Fei.' He sniggered as Wufei blushed deeply. 'So when Fei-chan, instead of Rei-chan, got the note, he immediately went to Suoh and challenged him to a duel. Since Wufei didn't explain why he was challenging him to a duel, Suoh reahed his own conclusion that Fei was in love with Rei as well and he accepted.'
'Excuse me.' Une interrupted sharply, not noticing that the others in the room, except for Heero who still looked very unhappy, were totally enthralled by Quatre's narrative. 'But what has all this to do with the base?'
Quatre waved his hand, 'it gets there, believe me.' He rubbed his hands gleefully. 'So Suoh and Fei had a duel and ended up in sickbay together. Where Suoh finally learned that Fei had been given his letter to Rei and saw how the letter had been altered. Then he went to Shun and confronted him about the letter. He probably would have challenged him to a duel as well, only Shun broke down and confessed that he was also in love with Rei. Meanwhile No. 4 had fallen in love with Shun apparently and she was outside the sickbay listening to his confession to Suoh. She ran away from the Sickybay crying and into Umi and told her what was going on and then asked how she could get Shun to pay attention to her instead. Unfortunately at the same time, Suoh decided that the noble thing for him to do is to tell Rei how both he and Shun are in love with her and find out how she feels about them. When he did though, Rei just looked at him like he was crazy and told him and Shun to get lost.'
Heero interrupted briefly. 'She's the only one who's immune apart from me.'
Une blinked, as she suddenly realized that she was getting drawn in as well. But she was unable to stop herself from asking, 'so what happened after that.'
Heero sighed mournfully as Quatre continued his tale, revelling in the attention that he was getting. He thought wistfully of the girl with the striking red eyes and wished that he had been able to stay with her to help her with the continuing madness.
'So both Shun and Suoh decided to give up on Rei. At which point they then turned to each other for comfort.' Quatre continued excitedly, 'Umi had advised No. 4 to let Shun get over Rei first before telling him of her own feelings. The problem was that Umi was in love as well, with Rowen.' Quatre added thoughtfully, 'which none of us knew till the day when the base blew up. She knew that he had fallen in love with Heero.' He amended swiftly as Heero choked, 'that is the girl that he thought Heero was at the ball. What she didn't know was that we were plotting to get them together on a date so that Heero could sweet talk Rowen into giving back his slipper.' Quatre shook his head, 'you wouldn't believe how hard it was to get Heero to agree to going on the date with Rowen. Or the fuss he made over his wardrobe. To help out, Wufei also got dressed up as a girl.'
All eyes turned as one to Wufei who went red.
'Heero said that he wouldn't go alone this time.' Wufei protested faintly.
'So,' Quatre added with a grin, 'they both got dressed up and went on a double date with Rowen and Max. You should have seen the grins on those guys' faces when they saw Heero and Wufei as girls.' He chuckled briefly. 'What we didn't know was that Umi was also following them. Basically, Umi totally lost it when she saw Rowen gushing all over Heero at the café and she attacked Heero and ended up ripping his wig off.' Quatre sniggered as he remembered the scene fondly. 'I started to dash over, when Umi turned around and ripped Wufei's wig off. You should have heard Wufei swearing! Rowen and Heero were just standing there, staring at each other until Rowen must have finally realized that Heero had been in drag at the ball as well and that was when he started shouting out 'spy', 'terrorist' and things like that. Wufei and I tried to silence him but it was a mistake because that only made him remember that we had been there as well. So, we gave up and ran for it. Once we were back at the base, we debated what we should do before Rowen, Max and Umi returned. Since Max fainted when Wufei lost his wig and had remained unconscious throughout the debacle, we figured that waking him up and filling him in would probably delay the others a little bit.'
Une fought the urge to strangle the smiling boy as she added urgently. 'What about the base?'
'The base.' Quatre added weakly. 'Well by the time we were back, there was a lot of noise, the alarms had gone off and there were 3 Gundams in the air. I grabbed hold of Rei who was the only one on the ground and asked her what happened. So according to her, when No. 4 had gone to console Shun after he had been rejected by Rei, she had found him in Suoh's arms and she snapped. No. 4 and Suoh started fighting barehanded at first but then they went to their Gundams, which was just before we returned to the base. Shun also went up in his Gundam to try to stop them. During their fight, Suho went berserk and Gundam Shinobi fired his beam rifle at Gundam Psyche who ducked out of the way of the beam, unfortunately totalling half the base that was behind her. At which point, Shun in Gundam Andromeda started screaming about how he was going to make sure that no one else was going to be hurt and fired his beam riftle at Gundam Shinobi who also got out of the way, leaving the rest of the base to wiped out in stead. By which time, we decided that it was probably not too safe to stay anywhere close them and especially not with Rowen and co. about to return, so we called in for extraction.'
Une looked at Quatre in appalled fascination and said, 'it only took 3 weeks to effect those elite pilots? I mean I knew that you guys got addicted in about the same amount of time but I thought that you were naturally inclined. eh. disposed' she substituted, 'towards that sort of behaviour.'
Quatre was staring at her indignantly. 'I don't know how you can compare the obsessive and pathological behaviour of the Oz pilots to us.'
'Yeah.' Duo added, as Trowa and Wufei also nodded their silent agreement.
'Uh... right.' Une laughed uneasily. She glanced at Heero who seemed to be breathing rather laboriously. 'Are you okay?' She asked quietly.
Heero nodded, 'I'm just trying out some breathing exercises that Rei recommended. She said that it helped to keep her stay calm even when surrounded by totally irrational and overly emotional people.'
Une nodded back automatically, thinking that it sounded like a good advice. She looked at Heero in pity as he started to breath even louder as Duo and Quatre grabbed his arms firmly and glared at each other. She didn't really believe that it would help him to adjust to his situation, she sighed heavily as the two pilots started to drag Heero out of her office, arguing all the while about where they were going to go. Wufei started to follow after them, grabbing Trowa's arm as he went, he trotted hastily after the other three, dragging the tall boy who started to play with his fringe again.
Sally sighed as well as she closed the office door.
'At least now Oz is having as much trouble as we are.' She said comfortingly.
Une looked at her aide and started to giggle much to Sally's surprise. 'Oh, I'd say that they were having a lot more trouble than us. At least our mob hasn't tried blowing up our headquarters. Yet.' She amended as Sally gave her a doubtful look.
'You know,' Une mused gently as she leaned into her chair, 'I think I almost feel sorry for Oz. Almost.' She finished with a wicked gleam in her eyes.
'What do you mean we lost 3 pilots!' Mariemaia shrieked in fury.
'We can't .ah. find them. They may have been lost when the base was destroyed.'
'But. but.' the little girl's face suddenly crumpled and she began to weep loudly, much to the discomfort of the surrounding Generals. 'I can't have only 8 pilots. 8 is not a good number. It has to be 3, or 5, or 7 or 10!' Mariemaia wailed. 'All the best shows always has good numbers. I don't want 8 pilots.'
'Ehhh.. We.. we could always send away one of the pilots?' One of the Generals offered hesitantly carefully avoiding the eyes of his peers.
'But I don't like 7.' Mariemaia pouted.
'What about recruiting 3 more pilots?' Offered another General cunningly.
Mariemaia brightened immediately. 'With blue hair?'
'I'm sure that can be arranged.' Said the General, who was a little faster on the uptake than his colleagues, with a smooth smile, wondering if it was too late to think about investing in the hairdye industry.
'Oh Hiroshi.' Rowen sighed mournfully, staring the delicate slipper in his hands. 'I wonder if I'll ever see you again.' He heaved another sigh.
'Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! For god's sake, stop that blasted sighing!'
Rowen winced as a very belligerent pair of gold eyes blazed in his face. 'Sorry Suoh.' He muttered meekly before leaving to find a more private place to contemplate his loss, clutching the slipper in his hands.
Big teardrops rolled out of Umi's eyes as she stared forlornly from the other side of the common room. 'Why doesn't he see that he can't trust that cross-dressing double timing rat?'
Max paced around the room impatiently, wishing that the base doctors hadn't forbidden all the pilots to watch any more television. He sulked as he continued to stalk around the small room, wishing that Fei and Q hadn't left. They had been a lot of fun to talk to, and always had really good gossip. Not like the boring group he was stuck with now. For some reason, he found that his memory of the last day at the old base a little blurry and Max knew that Fei and Q would have been happy to tell all about what had really happened. To his disgust, Rowen, Suoh, who had been demoted by two ranks, and Umi, all seemed very reluctant to talk about that day, and about why Hiroshi, Fei and Q had disappeared so inexplicably.
Shampoo (8) tossed her purple hair crossly, wishing that she had been assigned to the other team instead of Team Heart. Shampoo pouted as she looked at the little heart mark on her uniform. That was such a stupid name. The other team even had a better name! Though, she admitted, not by much. She glared at the team members that she was supposed to be working with and decided that the pilots on Team Angel couldn't possibly be this bad. She had been told that the others had caught a strange psychological ailment from overexposure to television and as a result they were not allowed to have a television at all. Shampoo went back to her magazine, at least she hadn't been banned from reading, and pored over the gossip column avidly. A little while later, Max wondered over to her side and offered to help her complete the questionnaire on 'how to tell if your lover is cheating on you'.
Rei closed her eyes and concentrated on breathing. She could still feel Shun staring at her from one side of the room and No. 4 staring first at Shun, then at her, then at Shun again. She told herself to relax and to breathe deeply, even as her skin continued to prickle from their combined attention. Rei began wondering whether she should have asked Hiroshi to take her with him when he ran away. At least then she wouldn't have been stuck in this stupid team with its stupid name and its stupid little angel logo that was stuck to her stupid new uniform. She told herself to relax as her breathing became more and more laboured.
From across the room, the two new pilots huddled together and spoke softly, trying not to be noticed.
'They give me the creeps.'
Ayeka whispered softly to her friend Ryoko (9 and 10). Ryoko snorted loudly, then spoke hastily as three sets of eyes locked in their direction.
'Can you believe that the stupid brat made me dye my hair? What was wrong with my hair colour anyway?
'It wasn't blue.'
'Neither is yours.'
'Yes but mine's a very pretty purple colour and Mariemaia liked it.'
'She has no taste.'
The two lowered their voices again as the other pilots returned to their contemplation of each other.
'Whew. That was close. I hate it when they do that.' Ryoko muttered, her face flushed with stress.
'Don't raise your voice. Haven't heard how quiet their voices are? Not that they talk much anyway. It's so unnatural.' Ayeka whispered softly, holding up a magazine to cover her mouth. 'And they don't even let us play music. Rei said that it disturbs her natural harmonics, or something like that.'
'Never mind about your silly music. I can't believe I'm not allowed to watch any television.' Ryoko growled sullenly, being careful to keep her voice as low as possible. 'The base commander kept on saying that we were going to rot our brains if we watch any television, do you believe that garbage?'
Ayeka shrugged as she stared intently at the magazine in front of her. Ryoko craned her neck to try to peek over her shoulder. 'What are you reading?'
'Mmm? This is a synopsis of the daytime soaps.' Ayeka froze as two pairs of eyes suddenly turned in her direction. She felt her heart thudding in sudden panic as No. 4 and Shun walked over in her direction and asked if they could read the magazine after her. 'Oh sure.' She beamed, happy to have found a common interest area with 2 of the spooky pilots at last.
Rei debated with herself silently as the four pilots of Team Angel started to chat together, sharing the magazine between them. Should she report this to the base commander or not? Rei hesitated then decided that just reading about the soaps couldn't possibly be too bad. She returned to her mediation happily, now that she was free from the distracting presence of No. 4 and Shun.
'You know Fei?'
'What Q?' Wufei yawned sleepily.
'I kind of miss those guys back at OEPP. I heard that they are split into 2 groups now. Do you think that we'll ever run into them?' Quatre asked wistfully as he held out his secret stash of double chocolate fudge brownie to Wufei who accepted with alacrity.
'Who knows.' Wufei answered as he munched on the brownie. 'I just hope that I don't ever see Max again. I thought I was going to die of humiliation when he saw the wig in Umi's hand and fainted.'
Quatre giggled, 'I miss Max. He was so much fun.'
'Bet you don't miss Rowen.' Wufei added slyly as he held out his hand for a second brownie. He munched thoughtfully as he continued, 'it was interesting that he didn't turn us in. I thought for sure that he'd have blabbed about Heero at least but he didn't.'
Quatre glowered as he bit ferociously into his fourth brownie. 'I could have killed Umi when she grabbed Heero's wig. All that work, for nothing. I never liked her anyway. I'm sure she dyes her hair.'
Wufei held out his hand for another brownie. 'So did you. And me. Actually we all must have. I mean who has blue, purple and green hair naturally?'
'Are you sure this is going to work?' Trowa asked tentatively as he looked doubtfully at the bubbling, slimy mixture in the tub.
'Trust me. When it comes to hair, I'm your man.' Duo stated confidently as he started to pull on the rubber gloves.
'That's what you said when we tried the herbal shampoo that totally dried out my hair. It took 5 treatments before my hair recovered.' Trowa retorted as he started to edge away.
'Hey. All geniuses have at least one failure. This time, I'm positive I got the right ingredients. Who knew that one little mistake in the herbs made such a difference? Come on Trowa.'
'What about the time when you said that we should try using mudpacks and Sally almost killed us when we ruined the carpet getting that stuff to the bathroom?' Trowa shot back desperately as he was dragged to the stool.
'I'm sure that the mudpacks would have worked if we could have tried them. It was a real pity that Sally stopped us before we could try it out first.' Duo whistled happily as he started to scoop up the glop in his gloved hands. 'Now then, hold your hair above the basin.'
Trowa looked at the smelly green mess and shuddered, feeling very much like a sacrificial lamb, reluctantly offered his head to Duo who chortled gleefully before slopping it on.
'I love playing with hair. Maybe I should have been a hairdresser! Heeeey, maybe that's what I'll do when we retire from being Gundam pilots!'
Trowa burbled incoherently as Duo vigorously rubbed the green glop into his hair.
Heero held the delicate silver slipper in his hand and studied it thoughtfully for a moment then with a shrug he threw it away in the waste bin.
He adjusted the straps on his backpack firmly and looked back at the Preventer Headquarters. The only place that he had known as a home in the last few years. Then he turned away resolutely and started to walk away. After a while, he started to hum happily, and slightly off key.
All he had to do now was to avoid Sanc Kingdom, don't go near any Oz bases, try not to be seen by any Gundams and above all never, ever watch any daytime soaps. Heero's hopes soared. No problem.
The additional cast members were borrowed from the following animes (all personal favourites):
(1) Yoroiden Samurai Troopers
(2) Magic Knights Rayearth
(3) Macross
(4) Saint Seiya
(5) Neon Genesis Evangelion
(6) Clamp Campus Detectives
(7) Zeta Gundam
(8) Ranma ½
(9 and 10) Tenchi Muyo
Author's ramblings:
The Gundam Soapie is now officially over. (Katana breathes a sigh of relief.) It turned out to be almost as much about hair as about soaps in the end. This was also the longest single story that I've written so far but what can I say. the bishonens made me do it. I noticed that because I do all my writing at one sitting, I get a few bloopers (spelling, wrong word etc) every now and then. Please disregard them as much as possible since I'm too lazy to do proper proofreading.
It turned out to be more fun than I thought to add the other characters but since I did say that this was NOT a crossover, I didn't want to spend too much time on them. Also, I'm not sure why but I found Duo and Trowa were the funniest in this fic. I kind of wished that I had more of them in the fic but then I would have lost my plot! There are references to the above animes in the story but don't worry, I think that you can still follow the story without previous knowledge of the animes or the characters. (And if you haven't seen them yet, try them out, they are cool! Some of them are not translated into English, so my information either came off the net or from desperately staring at the pictures while listening to Japanese and willing myself to understand. I actually haven't seen the Samurai Troopers at all! Them I got to know on the net.)
I hope that everyone followed the convoluted explanation of Q, I found that I had to think very hard try to follow who was who and who liked who and I wrote it! But that's in the best tradition of all the soaps.