1x2 and a ferret
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Pets
1x2
"Looks like they're long gone," Duo sighed as he kicked a stack of
empty crates. He undid the top collar of his flack jacket and turned to Heero.
"I hate when we get old info."
"It might not have been that old," Heero replied as he cautiously entered a room, gun nosing for a target. "I think they left a pet behind."
"Is that what that smell is?" Duo wrinkled his nose as he continued to scan the building, taking up a position near the door of the room where Heero had gone. "What is it and is it alive?"
"A ferret," Heero replied. "Very much alive and healthy. It even has fresh food. If they left it was this morning."
"This place is empty, though," Duo pointed out. "They even unbolted shit from the floor."
"They could be ex military," Heero surmised."Packed and set up to move at any moment, they'd have the training to tear down an operation quickly and bug out of an area."
Duo scowled, looking even more nervous. "This was supposed to be a simple operation," he complained. "If I'd known we were dealing with ex military, I would have had fifty back up agents in place. This could have gone down real messy, if we had been in time to run into them."
"We'll need to review satellite feed," Heero said as he came out carrying a cage. "If they don't have scramblers, we should at least be able to follow them-"
"Of course they'll have scramblers," Duo retorted. "What morons would have an operation Earth side without them? Not people this good."
"Investigate all possibilities," Heero countered.
Duo rolled eyes at him, in irritation, before leaning forward to look into the cage. "White fur? He has pink eyes, too. That doesn't seem... natural."
"It's probably not," Heero replied as the ferret put a paw on the bars and eyed him.
Duo grimaced and moved away. "Let's get out of here. Leave 'It' for the clean up crew."
Heero shook his head. "It might take too much time. It's best if I take him to headquarters."
Duo turned and looked at him in surprise.
"What's wrong?" Heero asked.
"If seen you pass over baskets of kittens, and tottering, floppy eared puppies, cleaning out a terrorist cell," Duo replied. "Now you're worried about a ferret?"
"That was a tiger and two rottweilers, not puppies and kittens," Heero corrected him.
"Still..." Duo scratched his head in confusion and then shrugged. "All right, bring him along. Just keep him off my car seats."
As Duo led the way out of the building, behind him, looking into the cage, Heero smiled at the ferret looking back at him.
_______________________________
"Why is the ferret still on my desk, Heero?" Duo glared at the white animal who seemed to be looking back in all innocence. "I thought you took him to impound?"
"That's for vehicles, Duo, not for animals," Heero told him as he slipped parts of his lunch into the cage. The ferret sniffed with interest and then carefully picked out the meat parts and ate them.
"Animal control, then," Duo tried again, "Anywhere but on my desk." He watched Heero feed the animal for a moment and then asked, "Are you sure people food is good for it?"
Heero paused with a bit of sandwich in his fingers and frowned, considering. "I'll look up ferret food on the net."
"Let animal control take care of that," Duo insisted. "He stinks. My office now stinks. Une is going to wonder why my report discs stink...."
"I..." Heero began and then looked uncertain.
"Oh, God!" Duo exclaimed, "Here it comes. I knew it! You want that thing, don't you?"
Heero crossed arms over his chest tightly, looking very defensive and stubborn. "It's any of your business?"
A flicker of hurt crossed Duo's face before he turned away and viciously tossed his flack jacket onto the top of a file cabinet. "Of all the animals... Why not something more... normal?"
Heero's arms tightened as he replied, "Nothing else has caught my interest like Slinky."
"Slinky? You've freakin' named it already?" Duo groaned.
Heero was silent and Duo turned to face him again, one finger out to make his point. "We live in the same apartment, Heero. That animal stays in it's cage, in your room, at all times. It'd better not stink, either, once he gets cleaned up, or he goes. Got that?"
Heero looked relived, but Duo wasn't finished.
"They might not allow you to have it, have you considered that?" Duo wondered. "He may be 'evidence'"
"I'll clear it with Commander Peacecraft," Heero replied, "but he's already been scanned for any human DNA, or chemical tracers. He was clean."
"Meaning that our suspects weren't touchy feely with their own pet," Duo grunted sourly. "The thing could be vicious."
Heero bent down to the look at the ferret more closely. "I don't think he is."
"He? How can you even tell?" Duo wondered in exasperation.
Heero gave him a meaningful look and Duo flung up his hands in defeat.
"Okay! Take HIM out of my office," Duo told Heero irritably, "But remember what I said, he stays in his cage and he doesn't stink."
Heero nodded and then gave Duo an intense look from under his fall of dark hair. "Thank you, Duo."
Duo blushed a little, and wished that he could tell Heero that his frustration and irritation had very little to do with the animal. He had been trying to get closer to Heero, wanting the man to know that he was interested in being more than just roommates. He could hardly believe that the man, that he had found as dense as a wall to his attempts,had opened up so completely with the last animal Duo would have considered for a pet. Watching Heero's lips form a rare smile,as he picked up the ferret cage, and took it away, Duo could only see the unfairness of the whole situation.
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The door was closed... again, and Duo could hear sounds that made him frown with puzzlement. For an entire week, they had followed the same pattern. While they were at work, they had enjoyed the same camaraderie as ever, but, once home, it was as if he were minus his room mate. Preventer uniforms were cast off for comfortable clothes, they each at their dinners, and then Heero would go to his room and Duo wouldn't see him again until breakfast the next morning. The Thing, as Duo had come to call it, had all of his partner's attention.
Duo trashed the remains of his freeze dried dinner, scowling. Heero's protein/vitamin packed dinner was already finished and disposed of. The man hadn't even waited long enough to make small talk, just bolted his food down and gone into his room. Their two dinner packages mated in the garbage. Duo looked down at them and a fleeting thought, that they were the only things ever going to mate in that place, made his face burn with embarrassment in the next instant. It was stupid to even have thoughts like that, he knew, when Heero was so clearly not interested in him that way.
Duo's eyes focused lower down into the garbage. Other discarded packages puzzled him and he gingerly pulled them out. Stuck with food now, he tried to decipher the lettering. "Ferret hammock... ferret sticks... ferret shampoo... ferret nail clippers..."
Dropping the packaging back into the garbage, Duo snagged a beer from the refrigerator and went into the living room, feeling even more resentful of the animal. As he sipped at his beer and channel surfed for some sports, he tried to tell himself that he was being an idiot. He never had a chance with Heero Yuy. He couldn't ever come out and say, 'Hey, you know what? I'm gay. I think that you are sex on two legs, so, if you're gay, too, let's do it like there's no tomorrow, and then spend the rest of our lives together, okay?" Heero, and the ferret, he imagined, would be out of the apartment within the hour after a conversation like that one, and he wouldn't have blamed Heero, one bit. It would have been the same if he had been rooming with Hilde, and the girl had said, 'Duo, let's boink, get married, and have five kids, okay?' There would have been skid marks on the floor from his running feet. He would never have been able to look her in the eye again, either, and that was something that he never wanted to happen with Heero.
Duo stood and sauntered to Heero's door, beer bottled dangling from his hand. he leaned against the door and said, loudly, "Hey, Heero? The Greens and the Colonials are playing, wanna come watch with me?"
"No, thanks, busy," Heero replied without opening the door.
Duo resisted the urge to kick it in frustration. He pushed away with a silent curse, and went back to sit on the couch. "Why couldn't forensics have decided that the Thing needed to be dissected?" Duo grumbled under his breath.
The game made Duo forget his troubles for a little while, but, when it was time to go to his room, and he had to pass Heero's door again, he couldn't help feeling the bite of loneliness. Things had been easier when they had at least spent their time together as friends.
Give him time, Duo told himself as he flopped onto his bed and turned out the light on the side table. Heero would get tired of the animal, he thought, when the novelty wore off. He had probably been just as obsessed, when he had bought his antique sports car, and had spent every waking moment at a rented garage, working on it. That had gotten old, after a few months, and the car had been sold off, and the garage let go. Obsessions often went by the wayside, when they became constant work, without much reward. The car had turned out to be hopeless. The ferret would turn out to be too much work, as well. As Duo fell asleep, he comforted himself by considering how to help Heero get rid of the thing, when that happened.
_____________________
Heero wasn't home. He had stayed late, to finish up paper work. That fact, had Duo pulling his gun, when he heard the noise in the apartment.
Duo had just come through the doorway, and had been in the act of pulling off his tie, when the rattle in the kitchen had sounded loud in the silence. His mind told him that the door had been locked, that a climb up to a window was impossible, and that only someone with a key, the maintenance man, perhaps, could have breached that door without obvious damage.
"Mr. Olsen?" Duo tried, gun still aiming and hoping that the little, old man had decided to come in and check... something...and that he wouldn't end his day in a fire fight with a thief.
No one replied.
Scowling, Duo edged cautiously to the door to the kitchen, and then leaned in to get a quick look, before ducking back. When his mind registered what he had seen, he cursed and walked into the kitchen, gun slamming into its holster under his arm. "I knew you were going to be trouble, you goddamn animal!"
The ferret regarded him, calmly, with pink eyes and then went back to trying to open a small bag of treats with claws and teeth. Heero had been filling the space under the sink with food, treats, and cat litter, and the animal had easily found them. The cabinet door was wide open, things spilled out, and a few items had been opened, already, and discarded.
"You are supposed to be in a cage," Duo growled.
The ferret managed to open the package and began eating, watching Duo as if he were an amusing floor show to go along with his treats. Heero had already mentioned that the creatures could bite hard, though his 'Slinky' hadn't done so, so far. It was a warning that Duo wasn't going to ignore, but he wasn't about to allow the thing to roam the house until Heero returned either.
"You like treats, huh?" Duo asked. "Maybe enough to go into your cage after them?"
Duo didn't like invading Heero's privacy. It was something that they had agreed on when they had become roommates. Their rooms were off limits. Duo had only been in Heero's room twice, that he recalled, since they had moved in together, and that had been at Heero's invitation. It felt wrong, to go in their now, but Duo was certain that Heero wouldn't want his pet wandering either, and maybe getting hurt.
"Shit!" Duo exclaimed when he flicked on the light and saw that the room had been filled with a seemingly endless configuration of tubing and plastic boxes. The tubes lined the walls, and arched along the ceiling, each box that they fed into, filled with toys, bedding, or places for a ferret to hide away from it all. The last tube terminated into a very large cage, with levels, hammocks, a water bottle, and another collection of toys.
"You have officially lost your mind, Yuy," Duo muttered in disgust, knowing that Heero had taken his condition, for the thing to stay in it's cage, to an extreme interpretation.
Duo could see where one of the tubes had come loose. He fixed that first, and then detached the cage from the rest. Carrying the cage into the kitchen, he put it onto the floor and then filled the small bowl, inside, with more treats.
"Go for it, rat," Duo urged and stepped back.
The ferret had finished it's package of treats, sniffed the air, and then ignored the cage to go back to the cabinet. Duo raced to get ahead of it and closed it with his foot. The ferret appeared to glare at him. It pulled at the cabinet with it's small paws, and then seemed to consider the problem, when it wouldn't open.
"The cage," Duo grumbled. "There's treats in the damned cage."
The ferret twitched a nose at him and then suddenly scampered into the living room.
"Son of a...!" Duo followed.
The ferret searched the carpet until it reached a corner, backed up into it, and did it's business.
"No!" Duo couldn't help a reflexive grab for the animal. The deposit for the apartment had been a hefty one, the landlord having anticipated trouble from two young men. Duo wasn't about to lose it, because of Heero's pet.
The ferret made a noise, like a stepped on squeak toy, as Duo lifted it by the scruff like a cat, and gingerly tried to hurry with it back to the cage. His hold seemed secure, the animal docile, and the distance a short one. Duo wasn't prepared for the ferret to curl around and bury needle sharp teeth into his hand.
It didn't let go. Hanging from Duo's hand, it seemed determined to hold on until death, ignoring Duo's shouts of pain and anger and his attempt to get it off. Instinct shouted for Duo to slam it against something, to brain the damn creature, and to end the agony, but the thought of Heero's reaction to finding his pet dead at Duo's hands, kept Duo from following through with it. Instead, panting and hissing with pain, as the thing actually gnawed on him, he lowered it to the floor. It took an agonizing long minute, before the ferret finally let go and scampered under the couch.
Duo was sitting on that couch when Heero finally returned home. Duo's hot glare, in response to Heero's welcome, made the man pause in the act of taking off his uniform coat.
"What's wrong, Duo?"
Duo put his bandaged hand in his lap and said, "We have to talk."
"Duo! What happened? You were fine at work," Heero exclaimed and Duo felt a flutter of pleasure as Heero bent over him anxiously, hands moving as if he longed to check the wrapped hand personally.
"Your ferret is what happened!" Duo snapped back, and tried not to regret it as Heero straightened as if he'd been slapped, and blushed. "He escaped his cage... or should I say, his ferret mansion. What the hell are you doing in your room? Making it one giant ferret cage?"
Heero was definitely embarrassed. He swallowed hard, looking like a little boy caught with his hand in a cookie jar. "Slinky was bored in just his small cage. They are very active pets." His eyes became anxious again. "Did you put your hand in his cage? Did he hurt you?"
"No, I didn't put my hand in his cage, Heero," Duo snarled, finding his temper again. "He was loose and stealing food from the kitchen, when I came home. He bit me when I tried to keep him from taking a dump on the carpet."
Heero's hands clenched reflexively. "Is it... bad?"
"Bad enough to go to the clinic tomorrow," Duo replied. "I'm not taking any chances. We don't know the history of that thing. It could have rabies, for all we know."
Heero seemed to bite down on an instant denial. He nodded, instead, knowing that Duo was right. "I'm sorry, Duo. I'll... get rid of him... find him a new home." He ducked to hide behind his unruly hair, but Duo could see the sadness in every line of his body.
Duo's hand was throbbing with pain. He could imagine infection, rabies, and possible scars in his near future. He had a right to be furious. He had a perfect right to demand that Heero get rid of the killer ferret.
"What's in the bag?" Duo wanted to know, catching sight of the small package clutched in Heero's hand.
Heero opened it slowly and took out a leash attached to tiny harness. A little tag tinkled. Duo could just read "Slinky" imprinted on it.
Duo sighed, cradled his throbbing hand against him, and said, "Let's just chalk this up to 'live and learn', okay, Heero? You know now that your ferret mansion isn't working out, and I know not to get anywhere near your rabid, furry killer."
Heero's head came up, his expression cautious, as if he could hardly believe it. "I can keep him?"
Duo sighed again, "I'm just your room mate, Heero. I can't tell you what to do. If I don't like something, I can just move out."
Heero's expression changed with startling suddenness. He was anxious, almost pale, as he asked, "You're not moving out, are you?"
It was on Duo's tongue to ask if Heero would choose to keep him over Slinky, if he said, yes, but he didn't really want to know. He wasn't that sure of the answer. "No, not yet," he tempered. "Not as long as you respect my space and my feelings about all of this. I mean, I'm not sticking an elephant in the living room and expecting you to live with it, so don't ask me to live with an animal that you can't control, okay?"
Heero nodded, the harness twisting in his hands. "I'll make sure that he can't get out, again."
"Okay," Duo replied, but then added, "and when you let him run around your room, make sure that you have the damned door closed so that he doesn't get out into here."
Heero flinched and looked guilty.
Duo rolled his eyes. "Come on, Heero! I don't expect you to have a pet and never touch the damned thing. Just... secure it."
Heero was obviously relieved. "I'm sorry about your hand. I will be more careful with Slinky."
"Good," Duo replied, and then, when Heero didn't make any move, he said, "Go on! I know that you want to see him to make sure he's okay."
Heero blushed again and hurried to his room.
Duo sank into the couch, confused about his feelings, and wondering how he had ever allowed himself to get in that situation. He was living with a man that he had strong feelings for, knowing that he didn't share them. He was living with a man who was now devoted to a furry sausage with legs, that had taken out a Gundam pilot with one bite.
"I'm in a love triangle with a ferret," Duo muttered and it was made worse by his belief that the ferret was winning Heero hands... or paws... down.
_______________________________
"Ferret sit?" Duo scowled as he held the flyer loosely in one hand.
Heero was closing up the garbage, in the kitchen, and getting ready to take it downstairs. He had a thoughtful frown on his face. He hadn't refused to go with Duo to the ballistics demonstration, but he was finding the logistics difficult."We'll be gone for three days. I can't just leave Slinky alone all of that time."
Duo slapped the flyer against one leg in exasperation. "What were you going to do when we had a mission?"
"The same," Heero replied as he pulled the garbage out of the waste bin and held it gingerly."I need someone who's reliable."
"Just give it a few days worth of food and water," Duo suggested. "Angelo does that with his cats."
"Slinky is not a cat," Heero headed for the front door and Duo followed. "They're more intelligent, more prone to-"
"Make trouble," Duo finished for him and waved his still bandaged hand at Heero. "I know that already."
"Some hotels allow pets," Heero began, his hand on the door knob.
"Oh, no! I'm not taking musky shark with us!" Duo exclaimed angrily.
Heero looked disappointed and then he suggested reluctantly,"Maybe I shouldn't go?"
"You are determined to let that long rat rule your life, aren't you?" Duo exploded. "Why don't you just quit Preventers, buy a weasel farm, and become one of those weird old ladies that keeps a hundred cats?"
Heero frowned. "It's not like that. I have to be responsible."
"Prove it's not like that," Duo dared him. "Prove you're not the crazy weasel man, find a sitter, and go with me."
"He's a ferret," Heero corrected him.
"Weasel man!" Duo taunted again.
Heero made an exasperated sound. "All right! I'll find a sitter. I'll go."
"Good!" Duo snorted.
"Are the other guys going as well?" Heero wanted to know.
"No, just you and me," Duo replied, "So you have some people to trick, er, convince into weasel sitting."
Heero nodded thoughtfully and then left with the garbage. When the door was firmly closed, Duo slapped his forehead with the flyer, and sighed in relief. He hadn't been sure that things would go his way. It looked like it had been a very near thing. If he had lost out to a ferret trying to get Heero on their very first date... but Heero wouldn't know that. To him, they were just friends on a trip to enjoy people shooting things with new weapons. Duo was hoping to work up to at least feeling Heero out, verbally, to see if anything was actually possible with the man.
Duo sighed and turned away from the door. "You are such a wimp, Maxwell," he muttered."Why can't you just come out and say, 'I'm gay, you're gay, I think, hopefully. Let's be something together?' My luck, if he is gay, he only likes tall dark Italians from L3, or something dumb like that."
Duo's resolve was shaky, at best. He had a very strong feeling that he probably wouldn't say anything to Heero. The man could be damned daunting with that strength of his. Duo had been on the receiving end of that fist, and even though Heero had pulled his punch, it had still hurt and knocked him cold. It would end very badly if Heero turned out to be a complete homophobe, or just pissed as hell, to find out that Duo had been lusting after him and letting him walk around in his skivvies.
"Way to be girly, Maxwell," Duo grumbled to himself as he snatched a beer out of the refrigerator and popped the top. "Why don't you write to Dear Abby next? I'll be worrying about whether my nails are attractive to him, or I'm too fat, or some dumb shit like that, soon. Just say it and get it over with. So, you get punched, or have to find a new room mate. At least the lease is in your name..."
Duo scowled. "Now I'm talking to myself. Great."
Shaking his head in frustration, Duo went to make a few threats...phone calls, himself. He was going to find a sitter for the ferret, even if he had to pull in favors from before the war.
____________________________________
"It bit me!" Quatre complained angrily.
"Told you not to touch it!" Duo said over the noise of the range. With one finger in his ear, and the cell phone on the other, he was watching Heero impress the crowd with his shooting skill.The man looked deadly, handsome, every moving muscle an art of grace and power. "I've got it soooo bad." Duo muttered.
"What?" Quatre asked.
"Nothing!" Duo told him and turned a little away to concentrate. "Look, he bites, I told you that. Keep the little mother in his cage and just shove things through the bars."
"He bit Trowa and Abdul, as well," Quatre went on. "Why does Heero keep such a vicious animal?"
"Apparently the thing loves Heero," Duo sighed. "Or, in Heero's opinion, we just don't know how to handle him."
"I suppose, being with strangers, unsettles Slinky, but still..." Quatre worked up to anger again. "I did have to employ an insured professional to care for him, Duo. I will be on the other end of a lawsuit if he bites one of my staff. I couldn't risk it."
"There's professional ferret people?" Duo wondered.
"Professional animal handlers," Quatre corrected.
"Being a lion tamer slash circus man, you would think that Trowa could handle a fuzzy hotdog with legs," Duo snickered.
"When a former Gundam pilot of Deathscythe failed?" Quatre replied archly.
"I didn't fail!" Duo retorted. "I just... I just gotta go." Duo said as he saw Heero turn with a smile, to give him a turn with the sleek looking new gun. "I owe you one, Quat."
Quatre's reply was lost as he closed and pocketed his cell and took the gun Heero handed him. Their fingers touched, briefly, and Duo felt a moment of warmth and a small startled look in Heero's eyes... or he imagined it, he wasn't sure. Heero did stand very close to his back as he took position and aimed at the targets.
Duo hit every target, dead center and Heero said appreciatively. "You always were the best."
Duo felt a rush of heat travel the length of his body and it was hard to put on a cocky grin and say, as he turned, "You're not bad, yourself, and you know it."
"I have two bullet scars that tell me just how good you are," Heero insisted as Duo handed off the gun to the next man and they walked down a line of shooting booths to the large convention hall.
The reference to their past made Duo blush. "How do you figure that?" Duo wondered.
"I'm not dead and no major arteries were hit," Heero pointed out. "You knew, even then, what you were doing with a gun."
"Ah, you're getting me all embarrassed," Duo laughed. "You could have done the same, back then." He frowned, thinking back. "I always wondered why you just didn't shoot me... or Relena for that matter. You were such a stone cold guy back then."
"I was?" Heero gave him a thoughtful look and Duo had to rethink the past.
"I guess not," Duo ammended. "I'm being stupid. You saved my life. You didn't shoot me dead. I just thought it was payback for saving your ass when you were captured."
"That shouldn't have mattered when you needed to be silenced," Heero replied, but he looked pained. The past wasn't a good thing to revisit for either of them. He said, so softly, that it was almost lost in the noise of the convention, "Your eyes... When I looked into them...It made all the difference. I couldn't, then."
Duo looked sideways at him, almost daring to believe that Heero was confessing something to him, there, in the middle of hundreds of people, but then the man was shrugging and saying, "I was only a boy, and despite everything, I didn't want to be a killer, especially of people who were fighting on the same side."
"Oh," Duo worked on that, feeling a bite of disappointment as he said, "So, it wouldn't have mattered if I was Quat, or Trowa, or even Chang?"
There was a pause and then Heero said, jokingly, "Maybe Chang."
Duo found a laugh. "He would have ordered you to kill him, in that angry snotty voice he gets when he's being superior to bugs."
Heero laughed and nodded in agreement.
Duo caught Heero's eyes and held them. He dared to say, with as much meaning as he could put into it, "It still means a lot to me, that you saved me, that we were together a few times back then. It means a lot to me, now, that we're friends. I feel closer to you more than anyone else."
There, it was said. Duo blushed and kept searching Heero's eyes, wanting him to understand that he was talking about more than being friends.
A man plowed into Heero from behind. Heero staggered and there were apologies and confusion for a moment. When they had sorted themselves out, and Heero was facing Duo again, the conversation had already been left behind. "Should we get lunch now?" he asked.
Duo sighed, inwardly. "Yeah," he replied, "Pizza, chicken, hamburger, or fish?"
"Chicken," Heero replied and they turned their steps to the long line of vendors selling food.
"Fried or fried?" Duo asked.
"Fried," Heero replied with a chuckle. "With tea."
"Pony up," Duo said as he held out a hand.
Heero gave him some credits and Duo bought their lunch. When they were settled at a table, Duo watched Heero over the top of the fried chicken he was eating, wondering how he could get them back to the previous conversation. In the end, he decided that it was the wrong place and the wrong time. He needed to wait until they were back at the hotel room.
TBC