GW - Cloneness - chapter 13
My bad, I totally forgot to archive it here. Sorry sorry sorry.
I don't know if I'll start writing this again -- it's heavily based on a RP log, so it's not exactly difficult, but there are many holes to fill... but, hrrm, I don't know. I'll try, but no promises.
It was like an anthill. Kids running around, piling up stuff frantically, thoroughly getting in each other's way, and Duo too busy to smooth things out and calm them down. Hell, he was as excited and half-panicked as them.
The only one who wasn't running around was Heero, and that was because he was sitting in a corner drawing his map. Duo was kind of worried that he wouldn't be able to read it. He hoped Heero would think to include landmarks, but he wasn't sure the clone noticed those the way he did. And distances were all well and good, but he didn't see no one walking around with a measuring tape around these parts.
None of the kids owned a lot of personal things, so once all the stuff inside the hideout was piled up, he left Cathy, Nanashi and Sylvia to try stitching together a few more bags and shoes and all these things, and brought the rest of his kids out to check a few places. Heero had said they'd need wire, and thread would probably be good too -- and any kind of food they didn't have to take out of their reserves would be a godsend. Besides, he needed to show Alex and Mueller how to handle a gun, just in case.
They came back to the basement hideout in the evening, when Duo was tired of dealing with his littlest crying at the drop of a hat, Hildie and Milly running off at the slightest glimpse of a shiny thing, and Alex and Mueller begging him for bullets in between two bouts of pretend-shooting at each other.
He could smell food cooking; that helped him relax a little. He ordered his older brats to pack, carrying Lena and Quat on his hips to the kitchen. Leaving three children alone with the clone still made him a little uneasy, even though he had decided that he could trust Heero with them; at least none of them was the sort to bother Heero until the clone snapped.
Duo found Heero sitting at the table with Cathy and Nanashi, giving his whole concentration to stitching socks under Cathy's close supervision; Nanashi was watching them quietly, the puppy a lump of sleepy fur against his foot.
Nanashi looked up first, prompting Cathy to look too. Heero stayed concentrated on his stitches, only gracing the door with a quick glance; Duo assumed that he'd heard them come in.
"Oh, Duo, welcome back! We've packed half of the blankets already; they're folded and all. And I cooked stuff for the road, and --"
"Alright, alright. Everything I listed done?" he asked as confirmation.
She nodded vigorously, curls bobbing around her head. "Yeah. And then we went to help Triton and Sylvia with the stitching. Heero says it might be colder out here, 'cause of hu-mi-di-ty and stuff."
"Ah. And where's Syl?"
"In your bed. She got scared, so I told her to pack your clothes and then take a nap. It's alright, isn't it?"
Duo frowned a little. There were things he kept by his bed that he didn't really want his kids touching; weapons, and drugs he used to barter with outsiders. Sometimes it was the only currency they wanted. He still didn't want his kids to think he was a druggie; they knew better than to trust one of those. But if Syl needed a safe place, eh.
"Yeah, s'alright. What she got scared of this time?" he asked, putting Quatre down. The blond boy gravitated to Nanashi immediately, climbing on the bench and looking up at him, and started telling him all about his day. Duo watched them, a tired smile on his lip.
"Me," Heero commented calmly, not looking up.
Duo stopped smiling. "... Huh. And what were you doing?"
"Cleaning the guns."
It was a good thing Lena was asleep on him, because otherwise he would have reached out and slapped the back of Heero's head. Which was not a good idea, seeing the speed of the clone's reflexes.
"... Goddamn."
"I wasn't even looking at her."
The clone looked kind of at a loss; it defused any annoyance Duo was still feeling.
"Ah... S'alright. Syl... She got problems. Sometimes she's even scared of me. It's not even a matter of you being threatening, it's just a matter of you being an adult and taller than her and all. Just don't lean over her, and don't ever corner her, and we'll have no problem."
Duo sighed, glanced at Nanashi and Quat who were still whispering to each other. Nash was absently rubbing his bare foot on the puppy's flank; she nipped at him sleepily, but didn't protest any more than that. Cathy was looking up at him, frowning in worry.
"Uh, so, you been teaching Heero to stitch?" Duo asked with a chuckle, moving Lena up a little. She was getting heavy.
"He kinda knew, but he was making it all ugly and bunched up."
"I stitch wounds usually."
Duo grimaced faintly. He'd been forced to do that twice; the first time, he hadn't had anything to sterilize his needle and the kid had gotten a bad infection and almost died. (Not that it mattered in the long run; the cowardly little backstabber was probably dead by now, if he wasn't living on a gang's scraps.) The second time had left an ugly scar; luckily it was on Milly's back, not on his face or hand or anything that would have bothered the kid. "You got training as a medic?"
"No. I just stitch mine."
Shaking his head, Duo turned away from the table and went to check on Sylvia. She was asleep, tucked in a corner with the t-shirt full of rags he used as a pillow over her; only her hair and a bony leg peeked out.
He put Lena down on the mattress in silence, covering her with his pullover, then started packing the rest of his things quickly. He could hear Cathy giving Heero pointers, and more kids moving around in the other rooms. Everything seemed to be going okay; a welcome change from the nervous agitation he had dealt with all day long.
Of course, the second he finished thinking that, Quat started sobbing his little heart out.
"What's going on?" he demanded as he burst into the room. Quatre was sitting on the ground, with Nash patting his head awkwardly, and seemed to be working himself up into one of his rare temper tantrums.
"Otto said -- Otto said -- CAN'T BRING BLANKIE!"
Duo cringed and picked Quat up quickly, patting his back and rocking him in an attempt to calm him down. The little boy was starting to swing his fists around, howling. Otto looked panicked, mumbling denials and giving him horrified looks.
"Duo, I never said--"
"NOOO! WANT MY BLANKIE!"
Duo rolled his eyes, teeth clenched together as he kept trying to calm Quatre. Mueller was wincing and giving the kid dirty looks, and Nash, as unemotional as he usually was, nonetheless looked like he was seriously contemplating the virtues of crying in sympathy. Otto seemed utterly crushed.
"Otto, what did you say?"
"I was talking to Hilde! Just said we had to pack light, couldn't take stuff we wouldn't need--"
Behind them, Lena screamed and dove for the corner where she had stashed her rag doll. Then she curled around it and started crying hard enough to cover Quat's howls.
Quat rose to the challenge. Duo wondered if he was going to turn deaf.
"ENOUGH."
Silence fell on the room, only broken by Lena's sniffles. Quat was totally silent, watching Duo with wide eyes.
"You be quiet now. What's all this screaming business?" he said; maybe a little more sternly than he had intended.
Apparently some of the noise had been from Heero's puppy, because she started up again as Duo moved to go to Lena. The clone dived for the dog, snatched her up, and wrapped a hand around her muzzle. Duo wished his own kids could be quieted down that easily.
"We're not leaving your blankie behind. Promise. Now shush. Yeah, that means your dollie too, Lena. So calm down, everything's alright -- you're gonna nap a bit and then I'll wake you up to eat. Alright? And you can pack your bags and make sure you leave a space for your things."
He whispered at them for almost fifteen minutes, calming them down. Behind him, the older kids had gone back to their tasks, whispering amongst themselves. He carried the two babies back to his corner and settled them down.
Sylvia was watching him with wide eyes, still not quite awake. He smiled at her, patted her hair quickly, then went back to police the rest. If the twins threw a tantrum, he didn't know what he'd do. Prolly have Cathy cook them for dinner.
+
Heero retreated to the table, his dog tucked under his arm to make sure that it wasn't going to run in Duo's path. It was easy enough to keep a hold on its muzzle, even though it was squirming and whimpering enough to make the curly-haired girl give it a concerned look.
"Aren't you holding her too tight?" she demanded, frowning.
Heero blinked, a bit surprised. He'd been aware that Cathy had relaxed around him since he had asked to practice stitching, but that she would feel comfortable enough to berate him was... unexpected. She was still so small, so easy to hurt.
"No."
"But she's whining!"
"It doesn't like being held."
"Because you're holding too tight. Honestly!" she huffed, prying his fingers loose. Stunned, he didn't resist.
Predictably, the dog nipped at them in frustration, its teeth pinching the girl's fingers.
"Ow! Hey, I'm trying to help you, stupid!"
"She's just an animal, she doesn't know that," Nanashi commented quietly, and reached slowly for the dog. Heero started to move it out of reach, but Nanashi stopped on his own, just a few inches too far for the puppy to bite, palm open. In a few seconds, it was sniffing at his hand cautiously. Heero blinked; the little boy looked up at him solemnly. "If you trap them or move too fast, they think it's an attack. And if you're angry or excited, they can smell it and it makes them afraid. But if you're calm and slow, they're okay."
Heero blinked again, slowly. "...Ah." Well, that was good advice, if he ever planned on trying to get wild animals to come to him.
Nanashi just looked up at him with eyes Heero was used to seeing in his own face; serious? Solemn? Empty? Something like that. Then he turned away. It was something of a relief not to be expected to interact any more than that; Heero looked back at Cathy to check that her finger was okay, but there was just a red mark there. From her expression, he'd been expecting blood.
"You're fine," he commented.
"...Yes, well. She's STUPID."
Huffing, Cathy stomped off.
Heero blinked again, puzzled, then turned away and went to put down the dog in an empty crate. It was excited enough as it was, and he wasn't going to hold it all evening just to make sure it wouldn't get in everyone's legs. Predictably, it whined and tried to climb back up, dull claws scratching the wood, but he had better things to do than coddle it. "Stay," he said, catching its muzzle to quiet it and force it to sit. "Stay." Maybe if he repeated it often enough, it would understand.
"Scritch her," Duo commented as he passed by with a cooking pot in his hands. "You gotta reward her when she does a good thing, not only punish her when she's been bad. Makes her want to be good."
"... Scritch?"
"Pet. Look for the spots that feel good." With that, Duo was gone again.
Heero gave the puppy a perplexed look. It was squirming and whining again. "Stay," he said, holding it in place again; when it stopped squirming, he caressed its head awkwardly. "... Good dog."
"She's gonna think her name is Dog if you never call her Dachi. You don't like it?"
Duo was back again, this time with a drawer full of random little things -- buttons, reels of white, black and pink thread, pencils, a rusty nail-cutter...
"I forget, that's all. Good Dachi," he added dutifully, petting the dog again a last time before abandoning it in its crate. It started whining almost right away, but he didn't want it to think that it just had to be noisy for him to rush back. He followed Duo to the table, where the other man put down his drawer and started separating his finds. Some things went in a pile on the table, some were negligently thrown at the rubble and forgotten, some went in his pockets.
"I'm almost done with the map," Heero informed him. "What should I do next?"
"... Uhh. Lemme think -- count up everything Cathy piled up and start trimming a bit?"
"Ryoukai. How much can a child carry? I could attempt to calculate how to share the load."
Duo scratched his head, added another rubber band to the end of his braid. "Depends how tiny they are."
"They should all carry their own change of clothes and some water and food, in case we are separated. I will check we have enough bottles," he said, moving to leave.
Duo's shake of the head made him pause. The scavenger was smiling. "Heero... They'll get tired in under five hours, we'll have to carry them and the packs with 'em. Just make sure everyone else got some space left in their pack so we can share the loads."
"... Alright," Heero accepted. Duo was the expert in children.
"The littlest ones'll carry their blankie or dolly or whatever -- Hildie's got a plastic pony, but it squishes alright, shouldn't take up too much space. Lena and Quat are too tiny for much more. A few clothes, okay, but I'm not sure even 'bout the water."
Duo was the expert in children, and from the tantrum he'd just witnessed, these... blankies might be more important than they looked, but still, Heero couldn't see how they were directly needed for survival. He didn't understand.
He could accept that they were, though, and that they were here to stay. "Alright. It's better to take too much and to unload on the way than to take too little, anyway."
Duo grinned at him. "An' if worse comes to worse, we can always use you as a pack mule."
Heero blinked. "You're... teasing me."
Duo's grin softened. "Sorta, yeah. We're counting on you for a lot of things. Like carrying the stuff we're too lazy to," he added with another teasing grin. "Heero the Amazing Human Swiss Knife."
"I'm not a -- oh. Multi-usage?" For a second, Heero felt a little proud that he'd understood; then he shook his head. He was wasting time taking social interaction lessons from Duo. He was supposed to be making an inventory. His socialization could wait.
"You're getting the hang of it," Duo congratulated him, as he picked the empty drawer and went to put it up against the wall.
"Does your brain ever work in straight lines?" Heero asked as he finished noting down a few landmarks on his map; though it wasn't really a question for which he expected an answer. It was more -- more of a pointing out Duo's relative weirdness...
"... Did you just tease me back?"
Heero blinked up at him, shrugged, and folded the map. "I think I did."
He went to put the map in Duo's backpack, ending the conversation. He had things to do now, and no time to waste chatting. Still, the memory of Duo's surprised look stayed at the edge of his mind.
+
Duo stayed with the little ones that night. They were excited and nervous and he spent most of his night soothing nightmares. The rest of the time he spent having visions of all the many, many problems they might encounter in his head, and tormenting himself for being unable to imagine everything. The way his luck went, it was an unforeseen problem that would do them in. When Heero came back from the sentinel spot to wake him up, he was already wide awake.
"Time to go?" he whispered; the clone nodded. "Alright, I'll wake up the babies. Go wake up the big kids."
His whispering had Alex and Hilde stirring already. He concentrated on waking up the twins first, watching Heero from the corner of his eye. The Soldier tapped Mueller and Otto's shoulders; when he loomed over Alex, the blond teen jumped into a sitting position. Shaking his head, Duo went back to his kids.
"We go today?" Meiran demanded as she rubbed at her eyes with both hands. When he nodded, she put both hands on her brother's chest and started shaking him. "Fei, Fei, wake up, wake up! We're going to the FARM today!"
"Hey! 'm awake!" And he shoved her back. Duo sighed; the day was starting well.
Meiran's excitation was contagious -- that or she was simply noisy. In a few minutes, everyone was on their feet and getting dressed. The blankets got folded up as tightly as possible and attached to Duo, Heero and the teenagers' packs. Cathy cooked up twice as much meat as she usually did; it was that or leaving it there and besides they would need their strength anyway.
Breakfast came and went in a curious atmosphere, a mix of sleepiness, wariness and exhilaration. The last preparations were surprisingly few, and Duo tried to soothe his nerves by checking everyone's pack, how well it held and if it would cause painful rubbing or soreness later in the day. It was only when Otto gave him an amused look that he realized he was manhandling even the older kids and wasting time. Sheepish, he let go of the boy's backpack straps and straightened up.
"Well then. Everyone ready?"
"Yeah!" Hildie and Mei exclaimed together. Heh, his little firecrackers. They wouldn't be as enthusiastic tonight, or the day after, or for as long as it took them to arrive.
"You're missing one," Heero remarked quietly, and everyone froze.
"What -- who -- Sylvia!"
The kids exploded through the shelter, looking all over for the little girl. Duo checked his partitioned corner first; nothing. Milly and Alex had galloped upstairs and were looking through the ruined rooms.
"Oh damn, what if she went outside?" Duo ran to the exit; Heero stopped him.
"I would have seen her. Unless she went through a window, she's inside."
"Why can't your dog find her?!" Duo exclaimed as he tore through the ground floor. "Dogs do that, don't they--"
"I'll teach it. Check the staircase."
... The staircase, the one he had used to stash weapons. It was blocked by so many planks that even Heero's dog would have a hard time wriggling through... except that one of the planks was pushed a little aside. Heero crouched, peeked through, and nodded.
"She's in here. I'll call off the search, you get her out."
Duo closed his eyes briefly, shoulders sagging in relief, and went to work on the barricade. Sylvia was wedged on the highest possible step, watching him with terrified eyes. She was curled around her backpack, a dirty pink thing that must have been sparkly at some point in its past.
"Well, what are you doing here, baby? Don't you want to come to the farm with everyone?" he said soothingly as he stepped up toward her.
She started shaking. It was dark in here, and all the light came from behind him; she probably couldn't see his face. Duo sat down against one of the walls and tried not to think about how unstable the rubble over their heads probably was.
"It's going to be great, you'll see. With fields to play in, and no one around to bug us, and -- and fruit. Just like there was in the can, you remember? There will be trees with tons of fruit, and lots of yummy food, and a good roof over our heads. And animals everywhere -- but not like the rats, kinda like -- birds, lots of birds. And a river -- you remember what I said? It's kind of like a big open sewer, but all clean, and you can play in it, and there's fish. It will be awesome, you'll see."
Sylvia was giving him a look that said she didn't know if she could trust him and that half of what he was saying went over her head, but when he reached out, she didn't try to avoid him. Not that there was enough space left for that, but it was still progress.
"Come on, let's go."
He started to climb down, hand still held up for her; when he was halfway there, he felt her take it.
After that, things went more smoothly. A few kids muttered about Sylvia, but he glared them into silence. Heero went forward to scout; Duo gave his oldest kids a gun safety talk again, and set them to guard the little troupe. He had explained to them that they should be as quiet as possible, and to only shoot if there was no other solution; still, Alex and Mueller looked all too happy with their shiny new guns. It worried him a bit.
They sneaked past a few smaller groups' territories. Duo kept expecting to be caught, and the children, feeling his tension, walked without a word. A few times, Heero signaled them to change paths, and they had to cross a field of broken glass and rusted nails, and squirm through several narrow alleys, but apart from a few scrapes, no one got hurt or made too much noise.
Heero was silent as he guided them through the suburbs, and then out of the city entirely; Duo was so relieved that they hadn't been attacked that he decided to ignore the damp red spot on Heero's shirt. He was pretty sure it wasn't Heero's blood and that was all he wanted to know.
I don't know if I'll start writing this again -- it's heavily based on a RP log, so it's not exactly difficult, but there are many holes to fill... but, hrrm, I don't know. I'll try, but no promises.
It was like an anthill. Kids running around, piling up stuff frantically, thoroughly getting in each other's way, and Duo too busy to smooth things out and calm them down. Hell, he was as excited and half-panicked as them.
The only one who wasn't running around was Heero, and that was because he was sitting in a corner drawing his map. Duo was kind of worried that he wouldn't be able to read it. He hoped Heero would think to include landmarks, but he wasn't sure the clone noticed those the way he did. And distances were all well and good, but he didn't see no one walking around with a measuring tape around these parts.
None of the kids owned a lot of personal things, so once all the stuff inside the hideout was piled up, he left Cathy, Nanashi and Sylvia to try stitching together a few more bags and shoes and all these things, and brought the rest of his kids out to check a few places. Heero had said they'd need wire, and thread would probably be good too -- and any kind of food they didn't have to take out of their reserves would be a godsend. Besides, he needed to show Alex and Mueller how to handle a gun, just in case.
They came back to the basement hideout in the evening, when Duo was tired of dealing with his littlest crying at the drop of a hat, Hildie and Milly running off at the slightest glimpse of a shiny thing, and Alex and Mueller begging him for bullets in between two bouts of pretend-shooting at each other.
He could smell food cooking; that helped him relax a little. He ordered his older brats to pack, carrying Lena and Quat on his hips to the kitchen. Leaving three children alone with the clone still made him a little uneasy, even though he had decided that he could trust Heero with them; at least none of them was the sort to bother Heero until the clone snapped.
Duo found Heero sitting at the table with Cathy and Nanashi, giving his whole concentration to stitching socks under Cathy's close supervision; Nanashi was watching them quietly, the puppy a lump of sleepy fur against his foot.
Nanashi looked up first, prompting Cathy to look too. Heero stayed concentrated on his stitches, only gracing the door with a quick glance; Duo assumed that he'd heard them come in.
"Oh, Duo, welcome back! We've packed half of the blankets already; they're folded and all. And I cooked stuff for the road, and --"
"Alright, alright. Everything I listed done?" he asked as confirmation.
She nodded vigorously, curls bobbing around her head. "Yeah. And then we went to help Triton and Sylvia with the stitching. Heero says it might be colder out here, 'cause of hu-mi-di-ty and stuff."
"Ah. And where's Syl?"
"In your bed. She got scared, so I told her to pack your clothes and then take a nap. It's alright, isn't it?"
Duo frowned a little. There were things he kept by his bed that he didn't really want his kids touching; weapons, and drugs he used to barter with outsiders. Sometimes it was the only currency they wanted. He still didn't want his kids to think he was a druggie; they knew better than to trust one of those. But if Syl needed a safe place, eh.
"Yeah, s'alright. What she got scared of this time?" he asked, putting Quatre down. The blond boy gravitated to Nanashi immediately, climbing on the bench and looking up at him, and started telling him all about his day. Duo watched them, a tired smile on his lip.
"Me," Heero commented calmly, not looking up.
Duo stopped smiling. "... Huh. And what were you doing?"
"Cleaning the guns."
It was a good thing Lena was asleep on him, because otherwise he would have reached out and slapped the back of Heero's head. Which was not a good idea, seeing the speed of the clone's reflexes.
"... Goddamn."
"I wasn't even looking at her."
The clone looked kind of at a loss; it defused any annoyance Duo was still feeling.
"Ah... S'alright. Syl... She got problems. Sometimes she's even scared of me. It's not even a matter of you being threatening, it's just a matter of you being an adult and taller than her and all. Just don't lean over her, and don't ever corner her, and we'll have no problem."
Duo sighed, glanced at Nanashi and Quat who were still whispering to each other. Nash was absently rubbing his bare foot on the puppy's flank; she nipped at him sleepily, but didn't protest any more than that. Cathy was looking up at him, frowning in worry.
"Uh, so, you been teaching Heero to stitch?" Duo asked with a chuckle, moving Lena up a little. She was getting heavy.
"He kinda knew, but he was making it all ugly and bunched up."
"I stitch wounds usually."
Duo grimaced faintly. He'd been forced to do that twice; the first time, he hadn't had anything to sterilize his needle and the kid had gotten a bad infection and almost died. (Not that it mattered in the long run; the cowardly little backstabber was probably dead by now, if he wasn't living on a gang's scraps.) The second time had left an ugly scar; luckily it was on Milly's back, not on his face or hand or anything that would have bothered the kid. "You got training as a medic?"
"No. I just stitch mine."
Shaking his head, Duo turned away from the table and went to check on Sylvia. She was asleep, tucked in a corner with the t-shirt full of rags he used as a pillow over her; only her hair and a bony leg peeked out.
He put Lena down on the mattress in silence, covering her with his pullover, then started packing the rest of his things quickly. He could hear Cathy giving Heero pointers, and more kids moving around in the other rooms. Everything seemed to be going okay; a welcome change from the nervous agitation he had dealt with all day long.
Of course, the second he finished thinking that, Quat started sobbing his little heart out.
"What's going on?" he demanded as he burst into the room. Quatre was sitting on the ground, with Nash patting his head awkwardly, and seemed to be working himself up into one of his rare temper tantrums.
"Otto said -- Otto said -- CAN'T BRING BLANKIE!"
Duo cringed and picked Quat up quickly, patting his back and rocking him in an attempt to calm him down. The little boy was starting to swing his fists around, howling. Otto looked panicked, mumbling denials and giving him horrified looks.
"Duo, I never said--"
"NOOO! WANT MY BLANKIE!"
Duo rolled his eyes, teeth clenched together as he kept trying to calm Quatre. Mueller was wincing and giving the kid dirty looks, and Nash, as unemotional as he usually was, nonetheless looked like he was seriously contemplating the virtues of crying in sympathy. Otto seemed utterly crushed.
"Otto, what did you say?"
"I was talking to Hilde! Just said we had to pack light, couldn't take stuff we wouldn't need--"
Behind them, Lena screamed and dove for the corner where she had stashed her rag doll. Then she curled around it and started crying hard enough to cover Quat's howls.
Quat rose to the challenge. Duo wondered if he was going to turn deaf.
"ENOUGH."
Silence fell on the room, only broken by Lena's sniffles. Quat was totally silent, watching Duo with wide eyes.
"You be quiet now. What's all this screaming business?" he said; maybe a little more sternly than he had intended.
Apparently some of the noise had been from Heero's puppy, because she started up again as Duo moved to go to Lena. The clone dived for the dog, snatched her up, and wrapped a hand around her muzzle. Duo wished his own kids could be quieted down that easily.
"We're not leaving your blankie behind. Promise. Now shush. Yeah, that means your dollie too, Lena. So calm down, everything's alright -- you're gonna nap a bit and then I'll wake you up to eat. Alright? And you can pack your bags and make sure you leave a space for your things."
He whispered at them for almost fifteen minutes, calming them down. Behind him, the older kids had gone back to their tasks, whispering amongst themselves. He carried the two babies back to his corner and settled them down.
Sylvia was watching him with wide eyes, still not quite awake. He smiled at her, patted her hair quickly, then went back to police the rest. If the twins threw a tantrum, he didn't know what he'd do. Prolly have Cathy cook them for dinner.
+
Heero retreated to the table, his dog tucked under his arm to make sure that it wasn't going to run in Duo's path. It was easy enough to keep a hold on its muzzle, even though it was squirming and whimpering enough to make the curly-haired girl give it a concerned look.
"Aren't you holding her too tight?" she demanded, frowning.
Heero blinked, a bit surprised. He'd been aware that Cathy had relaxed around him since he had asked to practice stitching, but that she would feel comfortable enough to berate him was... unexpected. She was still so small, so easy to hurt.
"No."
"But she's whining!"
"It doesn't like being held."
"Because you're holding too tight. Honestly!" she huffed, prying his fingers loose. Stunned, he didn't resist.
Predictably, the dog nipped at them in frustration, its teeth pinching the girl's fingers.
"Ow! Hey, I'm trying to help you, stupid!"
"She's just an animal, she doesn't know that," Nanashi commented quietly, and reached slowly for the dog. Heero started to move it out of reach, but Nanashi stopped on his own, just a few inches too far for the puppy to bite, palm open. In a few seconds, it was sniffing at his hand cautiously. Heero blinked; the little boy looked up at him solemnly. "If you trap them or move too fast, they think it's an attack. And if you're angry or excited, they can smell it and it makes them afraid. But if you're calm and slow, they're okay."
Heero blinked again, slowly. "...Ah." Well, that was good advice, if he ever planned on trying to get wild animals to come to him.
Nanashi just looked up at him with eyes Heero was used to seeing in his own face; serious? Solemn? Empty? Something like that. Then he turned away. It was something of a relief not to be expected to interact any more than that; Heero looked back at Cathy to check that her finger was okay, but there was just a red mark there. From her expression, he'd been expecting blood.
"You're fine," he commented.
"...Yes, well. She's STUPID."
Huffing, Cathy stomped off.
Heero blinked again, puzzled, then turned away and went to put down the dog in an empty crate. It was excited enough as it was, and he wasn't going to hold it all evening just to make sure it wouldn't get in everyone's legs. Predictably, it whined and tried to climb back up, dull claws scratching the wood, but he had better things to do than coddle it. "Stay," he said, catching its muzzle to quiet it and force it to sit. "Stay." Maybe if he repeated it often enough, it would understand.
"Scritch her," Duo commented as he passed by with a cooking pot in his hands. "You gotta reward her when she does a good thing, not only punish her when she's been bad. Makes her want to be good."
"... Scritch?"
"Pet. Look for the spots that feel good." With that, Duo was gone again.
Heero gave the puppy a perplexed look. It was squirming and whining again. "Stay," he said, holding it in place again; when it stopped squirming, he caressed its head awkwardly. "... Good dog."
"She's gonna think her name is Dog if you never call her Dachi. You don't like it?"
Duo was back again, this time with a drawer full of random little things -- buttons, reels of white, black and pink thread, pencils, a rusty nail-cutter...
"I forget, that's all. Good Dachi," he added dutifully, petting the dog again a last time before abandoning it in its crate. It started whining almost right away, but he didn't want it to think that it just had to be noisy for him to rush back. He followed Duo to the table, where the other man put down his drawer and started separating his finds. Some things went in a pile on the table, some were negligently thrown at the rubble and forgotten, some went in his pockets.
"I'm almost done with the map," Heero informed him. "What should I do next?"
"... Uhh. Lemme think -- count up everything Cathy piled up and start trimming a bit?"
"Ryoukai. How much can a child carry? I could attempt to calculate how to share the load."
Duo scratched his head, added another rubber band to the end of his braid. "Depends how tiny they are."
"They should all carry their own change of clothes and some water and food, in case we are separated. I will check we have enough bottles," he said, moving to leave.
Duo's shake of the head made him pause. The scavenger was smiling. "Heero... They'll get tired in under five hours, we'll have to carry them and the packs with 'em. Just make sure everyone else got some space left in their pack so we can share the loads."
"... Alright," Heero accepted. Duo was the expert in children.
"The littlest ones'll carry their blankie or dolly or whatever -- Hildie's got a plastic pony, but it squishes alright, shouldn't take up too much space. Lena and Quat are too tiny for much more. A few clothes, okay, but I'm not sure even 'bout the water."
Duo was the expert in children, and from the tantrum he'd just witnessed, these... blankies might be more important than they looked, but still, Heero couldn't see how they were directly needed for survival. He didn't understand.
He could accept that they were, though, and that they were here to stay. "Alright. It's better to take too much and to unload on the way than to take too little, anyway."
Duo grinned at him. "An' if worse comes to worse, we can always use you as a pack mule."
Heero blinked. "You're... teasing me."
Duo's grin softened. "Sorta, yeah. We're counting on you for a lot of things. Like carrying the stuff we're too lazy to," he added with another teasing grin. "Heero the Amazing Human Swiss Knife."
"I'm not a -- oh. Multi-usage?" For a second, Heero felt a little proud that he'd understood; then he shook his head. He was wasting time taking social interaction lessons from Duo. He was supposed to be making an inventory. His socialization could wait.
"You're getting the hang of it," Duo congratulated him, as he picked the empty drawer and went to put it up against the wall.
"Does your brain ever work in straight lines?" Heero asked as he finished noting down a few landmarks on his map; though it wasn't really a question for which he expected an answer. It was more -- more of a pointing out Duo's relative weirdness...
"... Did you just tease me back?"
Heero blinked up at him, shrugged, and folded the map. "I think I did."
He went to put the map in Duo's backpack, ending the conversation. He had things to do now, and no time to waste chatting. Still, the memory of Duo's surprised look stayed at the edge of his mind.
+
Duo stayed with the little ones that night. They were excited and nervous and he spent most of his night soothing nightmares. The rest of the time he spent having visions of all the many, many problems they might encounter in his head, and tormenting himself for being unable to imagine everything. The way his luck went, it was an unforeseen problem that would do them in. When Heero came back from the sentinel spot to wake him up, he was already wide awake.
"Time to go?" he whispered; the clone nodded. "Alright, I'll wake up the babies. Go wake up the big kids."
His whispering had Alex and Hilde stirring already. He concentrated on waking up the twins first, watching Heero from the corner of his eye. The Soldier tapped Mueller and Otto's shoulders; when he loomed over Alex, the blond teen jumped into a sitting position. Shaking his head, Duo went back to his kids.
"We go today?" Meiran demanded as she rubbed at her eyes with both hands. When he nodded, she put both hands on her brother's chest and started shaking him. "Fei, Fei, wake up, wake up! We're going to the FARM today!"
"Hey! 'm awake!" And he shoved her back. Duo sighed; the day was starting well.
Meiran's excitation was contagious -- that or she was simply noisy. In a few minutes, everyone was on their feet and getting dressed. The blankets got folded up as tightly as possible and attached to Duo, Heero and the teenagers' packs. Cathy cooked up twice as much meat as she usually did; it was that or leaving it there and besides they would need their strength anyway.
Breakfast came and went in a curious atmosphere, a mix of sleepiness, wariness and exhilaration. The last preparations were surprisingly few, and Duo tried to soothe his nerves by checking everyone's pack, how well it held and if it would cause painful rubbing or soreness later in the day. It was only when Otto gave him an amused look that he realized he was manhandling even the older kids and wasting time. Sheepish, he let go of the boy's backpack straps and straightened up.
"Well then. Everyone ready?"
"Yeah!" Hildie and Mei exclaimed together. Heh, his little firecrackers. They wouldn't be as enthusiastic tonight, or the day after, or for as long as it took them to arrive.
"You're missing one," Heero remarked quietly, and everyone froze.
"What -- who -- Sylvia!"
The kids exploded through the shelter, looking all over for the little girl. Duo checked his partitioned corner first; nothing. Milly and Alex had galloped upstairs and were looking through the ruined rooms.
"Oh damn, what if she went outside?" Duo ran to the exit; Heero stopped him.
"I would have seen her. Unless she went through a window, she's inside."
"Why can't your dog find her?!" Duo exclaimed as he tore through the ground floor. "Dogs do that, don't they--"
"I'll teach it. Check the staircase."
... The staircase, the one he had used to stash weapons. It was blocked by so many planks that even Heero's dog would have a hard time wriggling through... except that one of the planks was pushed a little aside. Heero crouched, peeked through, and nodded.
"She's in here. I'll call off the search, you get her out."
Duo closed his eyes briefly, shoulders sagging in relief, and went to work on the barricade. Sylvia was wedged on the highest possible step, watching him with terrified eyes. She was curled around her backpack, a dirty pink thing that must have been sparkly at some point in its past.
"Well, what are you doing here, baby? Don't you want to come to the farm with everyone?" he said soothingly as he stepped up toward her.
She started shaking. It was dark in here, and all the light came from behind him; she probably couldn't see his face. Duo sat down against one of the walls and tried not to think about how unstable the rubble over their heads probably was.
"It's going to be great, you'll see. With fields to play in, and no one around to bug us, and -- and fruit. Just like there was in the can, you remember? There will be trees with tons of fruit, and lots of yummy food, and a good roof over our heads. And animals everywhere -- but not like the rats, kinda like -- birds, lots of birds. And a river -- you remember what I said? It's kind of like a big open sewer, but all clean, and you can play in it, and there's fish. It will be awesome, you'll see."
Sylvia was giving him a look that said she didn't know if she could trust him and that half of what he was saying went over her head, but when he reached out, she didn't try to avoid him. Not that there was enough space left for that, but it was still progress.
"Come on, let's go."
He started to climb down, hand still held up for her; when he was halfway there, he felt her take it.
After that, things went more smoothly. A few kids muttered about Sylvia, but he glared them into silence. Heero went forward to scout; Duo gave his oldest kids a gun safety talk again, and set them to guard the little troupe. He had explained to them that they should be as quiet as possible, and to only shoot if there was no other solution; still, Alex and Mueller looked all too happy with their shiny new guns. It worried him a bit.
They sneaked past a few smaller groups' territories. Duo kept expecting to be caught, and the children, feeling his tension, walked without a word. A few times, Heero signaled them to change paths, and they had to cross a field of broken glass and rusted nails, and squirm through several narrow alleys, but apart from a few scrapes, no one got hurt or made too much noise.
Heero was silent as he guided them through the suburbs, and then out of the city entirely; Duo was so relieved that they hadn't been attacked that he decided to ignore the damp red spot on Heero's shirt. He was pretty sure it wasn't Heero's blood and that was all he wanted to know.