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A New Future
Chapter Two: Old friends
Three days after the night Solo had come to say goodbye it was Saturday, the
first day of a two weeks vacation. Duo was rather glad it was vacation now. He
hadn't been very active with his schoolwork lately because everytime he found
himself thinking about Solo. He had said he would clear his name, find a job,
get an apartement and stuff, but he wondered how Solo was going to get all that
done. He knew the boy could survive on the streets, but could he also survive
off the streets and in an apartement? Could he keep the job? Could he take care
of himself now that he didn't have to worry about other poeple anymore?
Duo just hoped the boy was alright, wherever he was.
All that thinking brought him to another problem, how were the kids doing? Were
they together or had they ended up in different orphanages? Did they like it
there? Could they find their turn? But most of all, were they treated right?
Miss Noin had told Duo that the orphanage he used to live in was closed down
after they found out the children were being abused, physically as well as
sexually. Slowly, Duo was starting to trust the woman more and more, but not yet
to an extent where he could tell her what had happened to him. Besides the fact
that he just didn't want to talk about it, he also seemed to have forgotten most
of it. He didn't mind that, though. The nightmares had stopped a long time ago,
shortly after he'd met Solo and for a moment he had been afraid they would
return now that he was here in this orphanage, but they never had. It was just a
part of a past that no longer existed and therefor seemed so unimportant. Duo
did his best not to remember.
Anyway, today was Saturday and on Saturday Duo was never awake and out of bed
before at least noon. Though today he was. He woke up before 9 o'clock and for
some reason couldn't get back to sleep anymore. And damn did he hate that. No
matter how much he wanted to turn around, close his eyes and drift off to sleep
again, it didn't work. After half an hour he decided to get up.
He glanced at the other bed in the room and was surprised to see Heero's
sleeping figure still in there. Now that was a rare thing."Damn it,"
he muttered, "this is embarrassing. Even HE is still asleep."
He yawned and got up to shower and get dressed. He silently left the room and
headed downstairs to see if he could get something to eat. Three tables were set
for breakfast and a few kids were eating some. One table had been reserved for
the basketball team of the orphanage, but they'd left already and the table was
now being cleaned. They had a game today and it was a two- hour drive by bus, so
they'd left early. Two hours wasn't exactly around the corner, but the team was
pretty good and they played in a pretty high competition.
Duo, not feeling like sitting down all by himself to have breakfast -he never
had breakfast on Saturdays, his weekend always started with lunch- snatched
something to eat and headed for the gym while eating his breakfast. He didn't
know where else to go so he thought that maybe he could do. . . something,
anything there. When he passed the front door on his way to the gym, the door
opened and three soaked figures, two grown ups and a kid, walked in. Duo glanced
outside and saw it was raining. He looked at whoever was stupid enough to walk
trough this rain. The first one he recognized was the female grown up.
'Miss Noin? What is she doing here on a Saturday?'
He glanced at other adult, a man somewhere in his early twenties with long
blonde hair and a strict face. Miss Noin's boyfriend perhaps? The third person
had a cap over the head so Duo couldn't see whether it was a boy or a girl. The
trio took their coats off and now Duo could see whom it was Miss Noin had
brought here.
Duo's eyes grew wide as he recognised the brown haired girl. She hadn't seen him
yet but now she looked in his direction. A bewildered glance met his eyes but
then recognition on her side kicked in too.
"Duo?" She whispered as if she wasn't ready to believe it.
"Saria!"
"Duo!" The girl now ran towards Duo. He saw the man reaching out for
her, but Miss Noin stopped him with a gesture of her hand. But Duo didn't care
about them right now as he concentrated on the girl. She flung her arms around
his neck, causing them both to fall down, Duo on his butt and Saria right on top
of him. Duo tried to put up a painful face, but as their eyes met again he
couldn't help but grinning at her, causing her to smile too at the embarrassing
pose. She climbed off him and the two got up.
"Saria, what'ya doin' here?"
She blinked at him. The she started telling. "Duo, it was so scary! They
were everywhere! The cops! We all got arrested and and only Solo got away
because he wasn't there in the first place and then we all got separated and now
miss Noin says I have to live here. I was so scared, Duo!" Then she was
silent for a moment, searching for comfort in the elder boy's eyes. Then she
suddenly hugged him and buried her wet face in his chest. "Oh Duo, We were
so worried about you! All of us got out that night and then Solo came and we ran
but you never came to find us and we had no idea what happened to you!"
That was when Duo's protective instincts kicked in. He hugged the sobbing girl
back in a comforting embrace in an attempt to calm her down. And it was working.
"Ssh, it's alright, I'm here now and you're safe." She looked up at
him and he gently brushed her tears away.
"Duo, Solo was nowhere and he never came back for us!" Saria said.
"We thought he would come back for us and we waited but he didn't and then
the cops came and arrested us, it's not fair! What if he got hurt or something?
But no one would believe us! They didn't even care."
"I know that, Saria." Duo tried to comfort the smaller girl. "Don't
worry, Solo's fine."
"You know?" She asked confused. "But, how. . .?"
"He was here the night you got arrested." Duo explained in a soft
voice, feeling that he owed at least that to her. "He told me what happened
but he's alright."
That was when the blond boy spoke up. "So, he was here, was he? Tell me,
boy, where did he go?" He said in a demanding voice.
Duo blinked and looked up at the man. He recognised that voice. He glanced at
the man's face and his long blond hair and then started grinning, doing his best
not to burst out in laughter.
"No way, Zechs Marquise." He couldn't hold it anymore and burst out in
laughter. He had never seen that man's face, but now that he knew what it looked
like, it was far different from what he'd expected. And of course, this being
Zechs Marquise meant he was worth the mocking laugh. "Ha, I always wondered
what you looked like under that mask of yours!" He said as he finally got
his laughter under control.
Zechs glared at the youth and was about to yell at him when miss Noin came
walking up and grabbed his hand to calm him down. But the man could not let this
just pass by so eventually he muttered a 'blunt as ever, are we'. He kept
glaring at the youth.
"If you know more about Solo's whereabouts, tell me now boy!"
whoops. . .Busted! No way he was going to turn his friend in. Solo had made a
choice and damn all the world to hell if he was going to stand in the way. Good
thing he didn't let Solo tell him exactly where it was he went. At least now
Zech couldn't force it out of him either. So he decided to tell the cop just
that. "I don't know where he is, he just came by to tell me the others got
arrested."
But Marquise didn't buy it. "You know more than that!" He narrowed his
eyes on the youth as he brought himself to Duo's height. "You do know it is
illegal to keep information from an officer, don't you?"
Duo now glared back at him. "So, sue me. I told you he didn't say where
he'd go. He'd be stupid to say where he was going in case you came
looking for him!"
"You should've told me he was here when he was here, brat."
At that moment Sally stepped in. She glanced at Duo who had taken a protective
stance in front of Saria and then glanced at Marquise. "Mister Peacecraft,
with all do respect, I would prefer civilized use of language in this building.
Peacecraft? As in the Peacecraft? The richest and most powerful company
in the world, Peacecraft? But he decided to ignore that in order to piss Zechs peacecraft
off a little more. Duo gave Marquise a look of 'so there' but one glance at
Sally was enough to make him drop that look immediately.
Sally now turned to the girl behind Duo. "You must be Saria. I'm Sally Po,
the head master of this orphanage. I believe you already know Duo over there?"
The young girl nodded shy. "If you will follow me we can get you signed in
here."
Saria nervously glanced from Duo to Miss Noin, but after they both showed her it
was alright to go, she walked over to Sally, followed by Miss Noin and Marquise,
who couldn't resist glaring a warning look at the boy before he disappeared out
of view.
"That girl was one of your group?"
Duo spun around to see Wufei leaning against the wall, carrying a. . . Katana?
"Who you gonna kill this early in the morning, Wuffy?"
"I was going to the gym to train, Maxwell. But if you insist I don't mind
killing you."
"I didn't know you did sword fighting, but no thanks. You can kill Marquise
for me, though." Duo joked. "He went that way."
"Hm, you honestly didn't know that was Milliardo Peacecraft when you spoke
to him that way, did you?" Wufei started heading for the gym, followed by
Duo.
"Well, how was I supposed to know?"
"The news, perhaps?"
"I don't watch the news." Duo groaned as it seemed to get trough to
him who he had been cursing at all those times back in jail. It was just too
early for this. "Man, and to think I actually used to feel sorry for
whoever that Peacecraft-guy was. His parents must've been really obsessed with
their money, calling their son Milliardo. Even Wufei is a better name than that."
Wufei glared at him and held his katana up. "You wish to keep that braid of
yours or not?" Wufei said through gritted teeth.
Duo grinned and held his hand up. "Woah, keep that thing down, will ya. You
could actually hurt someone with that!" Wufei put his hand down again. And
for a moment the duo continued their way in silence.
"Hey Wufei," Duo broke the silence, "if that was Milliardo
Peacecraft and Milliardo Peacecraft is Zechs Marquise and Zechs Marquise is a
cop, then who's going to take over the company? I thought Milliardo was the heir?"
"You never pay attention to anything, do you?" The Chinese muttered.
"His sister Relena is the heir now. She'll take over."
"Relena? Yeah, I've heard of her! Didn't know she was a Peacecraft, though."
They had now reached the gym and Wufei opened the door and walked in. Duo wanted
to follow him, but Wufei blocked the way. "Where do you think you're going?"
"I'm gonna watch you, of course."
"No you're not. You will distract me."
"Aww, but Wufei, who else am I going to annoy at this hour?"
Wufei shrugged. "Bug Heero out of his bed for all I care."
Duo blinked but then he grinned. "Wuffy, that's the first good idea I've
heard you suggesting in a long while, actually, make that ever!" And with a
huge grin on his face the braided one walked away from the gym, throwing the
door shut in his excitement.
Less than ten minutes later the door to the gym opened and a just awoken and
enraged Heero stalked inside, breaking the Chinese boy's concentration.
"WUFEI!!!"
~*~
The next Tuesday afternoon Duo and Saria were to be found together in the game
room. They silently sat on the couch watching some other people play pool.
Duo had spent a great deal of the weekend and the Monday with Saria. She was
obviously scared of what was to come. She had been living on the streets for
nearly 3 years and it's hard to get used to life inside then. The girl had the
same problems Duo'd had to deal with, the feeling of being locked up, alone and
misunderstood. It had gone easier for her though, her roommate Karin, a cheerful
14-year-old girl, had been nice to her from the start. Even though it'd only
been three days since she arrived, they looked as if they could become good
friends and Duo was really glad for her. But that didn't stop him from watching
her, he kept having that same protective feeling over her because he of all
people knew that adjusting wasn't always easy. And she needed him around, if
only to feel safe.
Because he'd spent so much time with her he'd hardly seen his other friends.
Quatre had asked Duo over to his room a couple of times, but Duo had declined
all. He'd explained the situation to Quatre and he was sure the young blonde
understood why he was doing this. After all, when he needed it, he'd spent a lot
of time with him too.
They sat there quietly, shoulders touching as if to reassure each other's
presence, both lost in their own thoughts. Duo was thinking of Christmas.
Tomorrow night it would be Chrismas Eve. What was he supposed to do then? The
whole orphanage was decorated and everybody was cheerful. He knew they were
going to have a Christmas meal but would he have to dress formally? He sure
hoped not, he preferred his own usual, easy clothes. He wouldn't like wearing a
tuxedo or whatever formal they'd expect him to wear. He didn't even have formal
clothes!
He could try to ask someone, but whom? He wouldn't ask Wufei, that boy would say
tuxedo just for the fun of seeing the boy all dressed up in the middle of
plainly clothed poeple. Or the other way around, perhaps. Yeah, that was just
Wufei's kind of humor. He wouldn't be asking Heero either, for some reason he
felt too proud to do that. Or rather, he didn't want the perfect boy to know he
wasn't perfect.
'Guess Quatre is the only one left then, eh?'
Duo thought about it a moment. He wasn't sure Quatre could keep this to himself,
in his innocence he could accidentally tell the others, he was the kind of
person who did that. And Duo didn't want to ask him not to tell the others, that
would sound so stupid. So how was he going to prevent the others from finding
out?
But before he could think of that, the door to the game-room opened and two
girls strode in, heading straight for Saria. Duo recognised the blonde one as
Karin, Saria's roommate. The other one looked about thirteen, the girl with long
brown hair, tied together in a ponytail and skyblue eyes.
Karin spoke. "Hey Saria, wanna join me and Cathy to the mall? We're going
to rent a few movies and I thought you'd wanna come since we wanted to ask you
if you wanna watch them with us tonight."
Duo blinked at her high voice. He wondered if she always talked so fast, it was
hardly understandable. But obviously Saria had understood what she'd said as she
looked at Duo questioningly as if to ask his permession.
Duo grinned and threw his hands in the air. "Hey, don't look at me! They're
your friends, your fun!"
Saria smiled back and hugged him, whispering a 'thanks' before she got up.
The moment she was out of sight, Duo's smile vanished. He felt as if he
shouldn't have let her go, but who was he really to tell her not to go and have
fun? He wanted her to be happy, didn't he? Then why was he acting so...
overprotective? But he quickly shrugged it off as the door to the game room
opened once again, this time revealing the blonde Quatre. Duo put on a smile
again.
"Good, I figured you'd be here..." The younger one glanced around.
"Where's the girl?" he asked in an almost accusing voice.
"She's not here. So, what'cha want me for?" He asked, cheerful as
ever.
Quatre now looked back at him. He suddenly sounded a lot more cheerful. "Me
and Heero and Wufei are going out to get Christmas presents. Wanna come?"
Then his voice dropped again. "Or do you have a certain appointment?"
At that Duo got up and flung one arm around Quatre, slightly leaning on him.
"Q-man, you jealous?" he joked, realizing to his surprise that the
younger boy was indeed jealous. "You know you're my number one favorite
person, I'd never let you down!"
Apparently this did the youth some good as he passed him a warm smile. "So,
you're coming with us then?"
"Yeah, sure! Let's go!" Duo grinned, this time a real one.
'This saves me the trouble of asking them.'
~ T.B.C. ~