"I don't fucking know!" I scream down my radio, trying desperately to exit the compound before the second charge, that did blow, brings the whole thing down on my head. "Maybe the fact that I was about to get my head shot off distracted me?"

"I don't have time for your excuses, Maxwell! You fudged your execution, now we've got the whole damn security force bearing down on us!"

"Well, what do you want me to do?" I retort, a plan already forming in my head. "Go back and do it right?"

"No!" comes the reply, distorted by static and gunfire but still recognizable as my lover. "But we need a distraction out here. Just do something!"

I hate my partner sometimes. Really, I do. He constantly requires me to take whatever plan I have formed in my head, smash it into tiny pieces and put them all back together in a different order. Unfortunately, he's usually right, too. Whatever he comes up with will most probably be more agreeable with Preventer regulations than my bodged, seat-of-your-pants method. But, then again, that's just Heero. It's in his genes.

"Johnson's down!"

Shit, agents are starting to drop like flies. Things must be bad down there, meaning I should really get my ass moving. Even Heero ain't made of gundanium. In fact, he's more like Humpty Dumpty; every so often, he needs someone to pick him up and stick him back together again and this King's Man will do that any day of the week.

I get to the stairwell, look down and, lo and behold, I see a load of soldiers running up to greet me. Motherfuckers. I suppose my little stunt alerted them to my presence, but at least they're stupid enough not to have looked up and seen me. The only way is up, but I'll have to be fast, or they'll corner me on the roof like last time and I really don't want a repeat of last week on my hands.

The door to the roof is unlocked, not that it would have posed much of a challenge if it had been, and I can finally see what's going on below. The car park is littered with agents, bad-guys, dead, injured and still alive and kicking. I catch sight of Heero straight away, crouched behind a van, but I don't try and attract his attention. If this were the good old days, I would just lob a grenade into the middle of the enemy and wait for the body parts to fall to the ground, but my superior wouldn't be happy with that. No, she'd probably scalp me and wear it as a victory wig, and after last week's fluff-up... Say hello to night shifts for the next millennium.

"Winters' down!"

Fuck, it looks bad down there. At last count, there were four dead agents and a couple of injured, but that chart's rackin' up tallies every second that goes by. I'm only lightly armoured, just a flak vest, because clanky armour doesn't do much good for stealth, so it's not in my best interests to get down there myself. They'd spot me and shoot me dead before I reached the bottom of the ladder. I'm also not heavily armed enough to hold up a good sniper position up here. Add that to the fact that I don't particularly want to stay on this roof for much longer, since those goons from downstairs are eventually going to realise I've flown the coop and things aren't looking great. It's time for one of those snap decisions that I'm famous for. Hopefully, it'll be remembered as the 'Duo saved our lives' kind, instead of 'Fuck, Duo, you just went and killed us all'. It'll alert every soldier in the surrounding area that I'm here, but hell, I always liked a grand entrance.

I chuck a smoke grenade into the middle of the bad-guys on the ground and wait for it to activate before pulling the pins on two flashbangs, one of which I throw down the stairwell behind me, which is singing the sound of boots on stairs, and the other into the smoke. When it blows, it looks like a cloud with a lightning storm inside it, and I can tell from the yells that the uglies inside are both blinded and disorientated. Even better, backup has finally arrived on the scene and I can see Wufei, leading the charge. Good old Wuffers, even if he is late.

Unfortunately, since I was too busy admiring Wufei's shiny new helmet and wondering where I could get one, I failed to realise that one of the stairwell soldiers might have had the sense to put his hands over his eyes, and therefore was not prepared when he clubbed me over the head with the butt of his rifle.

"Duo Maxwell, what on earth possessed you?"

Okay, so maybe I didn't kill them all, but my plan wasn't exactly of Heero standard, either. It caused a lot of confusion for the backup squadlings, which Wuffles has already given me an earful for, and I left myself open to an attack from behind -- thus explaining why I'm sporting a hat o' nine stitches on my head. And I got an earful from Heero for that, too. Bless him, sitting through Medical with me and lecturing me the whole way through. It's just his way of saying 'I love you, you stupid idiot'.

So, now I'm in Une's office, practically strapped to my chair with that look she's giving me, and I'm not alone. Heero's here with me, so I know that this meeting isn't just about me. No matter how much Heero loves me, Une would still never let him sit in on a confidential debriefing.

"Couldn't you have waited for backup to arrive? They were just around the corner, you must have seen them."

"Uh, nope," I reply, flashing what I hope is a disarming smile at her. "Too wrapped up in being a show-off?"

"Clearly." Her tone is droll for the moment, but I sense things will turn frosty soon enough. "But this meeting isn't about your unorthodox wrap-up. It's about the outcome as a whole."

Bingo.

"Seven agents are dead as a result of that mission and four are too seriously injured to work in the field again, not including another five in the hospital right now. You two were in charge and are responsible for those fatalities. I'm afraid that, since this is the latest in a string of poor exercises, action must be taken."

Heero is holding his breath next to me and I realise I am too. I let it out in a whoosh that sounds too loud.

"After the incident last week, I feared something like this would happen but gave you the benefit of the doubt. Now I can only see one sensible course of action. I have come to the conclusion that you are not working together as well as you used to. I don't know what it is, but it is clear you are not achieving the results I have come to expect from you."

"...No..." My whispered protest is either too quiet or she pretends not to hear me. I know that it is probably the latter.

"I have decided to separate you indefinitely. You will be assigned new partners tomorrow, but I warn you, if this poor record continues, it will lead to suspension, demotion and possible discharge from the Preventers. Do I make myself clear?"

I hear Heero say, in this horrible robotic voice, "Perfectly clear," before he moves for the door, though I don't remember Une dismissing us. He holds it open for me, but I'm still transfixed to my chair. Une decides for me.

"You may go, Yuy," she says in that no-nonsense tone of hers. "You're needed in Forensics and I want to have a word with Maxwell."

If I were Heero, I would hesitate and perhaps even make a bit of a scene as to why I was being told, none too subtly, to go away, but instead I'm frozen like a ready-meal and Heero is still the regulation-fearing ironing board he always had been. He closes the door with a quiet 'click', whereas I would have slammed it.

"Duo?"

I am startled out of my reverie by her use of my first name. She's only done that once before -- it followed a painful incident and preceded an agonising one.

"Duo, is everything all right?"

Again with the name. What is with you, Une? Isn't it enough that you're separating me from my lover and long-time partner of four years because you don't think we're working together as well as we used to? Do you have to try and dredge it all up again in a painful reliving of the past, made even more so by the fact that you're a stern woman not much older than me and I'm a guy that likes talking about his most hidden feelings about as much as getting a root canal without anaesthetic? Don't you remember how hard it was last time? Or have you conveniently forgotten?

It's so tempting to lie. To just say 'Yes, everything's fine', but I don't do that. Run, hide, never lie and all that jazz. So I try to sidestep her question and hope she doesn't notice, though I know she will.

"I don't understand."

Utter truth. I can't say I have no idea where she's coming from, 'cause that would be another lie, but I still don't understand why.

"I have to, Duo."

There you go. There's Une, right there. Anyone else, I can guarantee you, would have asked, 'Understand what?'. Une doesn't do that, she's too clever. She knows full well I just danced a pretty jig around her too-close-to-home question, and yet also knows, instantly, exactly what I'm talking about. That's why she's such a powerful woman; nothing fazes her.

"But why?" I'm desperate and we can both hear it in my voice. It's pathetic, really. "Heero and I have worked together for years, why split us now?"

"Have you not been listening?" I look up from where I'm been examining my shoelaces. She's got that voice on -- the one that promises a good bollocking. "You are not the same. It's plain to see, Duo! You always used to be this incredible team and now you're not! Something happened to change that and either you figure what that is or you will not work with Heero ever again. You are too much of a danger to your co-workers."

I am dismissed from the meeting soon after, because I am unresponsive after that last statement. I don't go and see Heero in Forensics like I usually would. I get a lift home with Wufei because I know he won't pick my brain apart like Quatre would and I fill the car ride with inane chatter about his new helmet and the billboard about Bosch washing machines. I take the elevator for the first time in months and stumble into the apartment, remembering feed the fish and I stare at them for long minutes.

A danger to my co-workers. I have killed people, sure. Two wars and a career trying to keep a planet from blowing itself up don't exactly leave my hands clean of blood, but having my partner taken away and threatened with discharge for being responsible for a fluffed mission record that killed dozens?

Yeah, dozens. Things haven't been peachy for a while now, and the numbers are starting to pile up along with the bodies. Really, it's no wonder Une did what she did. If I were my superior, I would be sending me back to basic training. The only thing stopping me from dropping ranks like a stone in a bathtub is my status as a Gundam Pilot, and even that doesn't grant me automatic safety. There are plenty of Pilot Haters out there, even in my own organisation. My own corridor, even. Lots of Preventers are ex-Oz officers and most of them find it embarrassing that they lost so many troops to teenagers in the wars.

There were a blissful couple of weeks when we first started and no one knew who we were. We were just some high-achieving kids transferred in by The Higher Powers That Be. There was some initial friction -- my hair wasn't regulation length, we were immediately placed in higher ranking positions, we were sixteen and we knew more and got better results than people double our age. Then someone with an interest in Gundam Pilots put two and two together, trawled up the few, blurred CCTV photos of us there were in the world and spread the word. I had never before, and have never since, experienced so many people go from friendly to disgusted at the sight of me. I think they find it offensive when they see how short we are. Thankfully, back then, me and Heero only did two-men missions. We didn't have teams to suffer with. Or kill.

That whole 'world peace' thing didn't work out, either. Total disarmament? You've got to be joking. I'm not the only one who doesn't feel safe without a gun in the bedside cabinet and a knife under my pillow. Yeah, the borders are starting to creep up again; we couldn't even make three years without trying to kill each other. That's why I'm in the Preventers, trying to 'prevent' Italy from deciding that it can govern itself very well, thank you very much, and 'preventing' a bunch of Gobian warlords from wiping each other out. The island nations went first. Tahiti is now the most heavily fortified island in the world and, thanks to it being in the middle of fucking nowhere and the rest of French Polynesia hopping on the bandwagon, we can't do a thing about it.

I don't blame them, no siree. Dissolving the borders did nothing good for the economy, that's for sure. Some people are still stinkin' rich and others are still dirt poor. It's just that half of the dirt poor ones are cluttering up space and the others are still stuck in Africa. That's a messed up continent, Africa. I swear, if it merged itself into one huge super-country, nothing could touch it. Bits of Europe got the idea instead and formed the largest Socialist nation there has ever been, Northern Ireland resumed its segregation of Protestant and Catholic, and you still don't want to walk around without a bulletproof vest in the Middle East. You can't take down the fences and expect Israel to make up with itself, that's just stupid.

But Relena's still trying to make things work, bless her, and her loyal band of Preventers, that would much rather go home for a night of uninterrupted sleep than track a wayward minister through the back streets of Cairo, are there to help her achieve that goal. Honestly, I haven't had a holiday in years and, since the Shanghai Drugs Outburst, I haven't had an entire weekend to myself either. It's enough to drive a gun-toting teenage maniac to tears, only this time I have to fill out a bucket load of paperwork every time I shoot someone.

Yup, that's what I'll be doing on Monday morning. Filling out reams of paperwork dealing with today, yesterday, last week and, of course, my new partner. Not looking forward to that. I haven't worked without Heero since I gatecrashed this joint back in AC 196, a beat-up kid with a whole load of issues, no money and only a vague idea about where I lived. I did try other stuff at first, don't get me wrong. That scrap yard thing was so boring I could have died under an aviation engine and it wouldn't have made the place more interesting. Plus, Hilde suddenly got all touchy-feely and that got me out of there quicker than if she told me there was a skunk in our bathroom. My r?um wasn't exactly encouraging -- 'occupation: part-time terrorist, past two years spent intermittently blowing up and saving the world' -- so no one was in a particular rush to recruit me. Apart from the Preventers. Apparently, Heero's not that easy to work with. I've never seen eye to eye with the kind of people who think that, but it was clear he was going through partners quicker than supermarket bread. Then, I bounced into the scene and everything was hunk-dory again. We clicked just like that; we already knew exactly how the other worked and previous experience told us our combination was a deadly one. The Perfect Soldier and Shinigami. The perfect team. The best of the best.

So what went wrong? Why are Heero and I suddenly unable to keep the body count low, let alone get decent results?

During this lengthy inner monologue, the fish have eaten my liberal sprinkling of dead skin cells, or whatever fish-food actually is, and are pressed against the glass in a bid for more food. Stupid fish. I go to bed but lie awake for a long time. Heero doesn't come home before I fall asleep and I worry that he's avoiding me.

He's not there when I wake up, either, and I wonder briefly if he came home at all, but there's a note next to Winston on the kitchen counter that allays my fears.

Work called. I'll be stuck in Forensics until late. Don't wait up. 01. x

He thought hard about putting that kiss at the end. I can tell by the way the ink has pooled slightly around the top left arm where he hesitated. Heero always thinks too hard about such trivial things. I bet he dithered for at least two seconds about where to put the note before sitting it near Winston, too.

Before anyone is led astray and thinks I have a picture of an old-age pensioner on my countertop, I'll explain. Winston is large ceramic hippopotamus that I picked up on my travels. He's been carted through space, too many countries to count and spent the Eve Wars, wrapped in bubble-wrap, in a compartment under my seat in Deathscythe. I named him Winston after a guy named Churchill who was involved somehow in one of the World Wars in the early 20th century, because all I can remember from that long-ago history lesson is a photo of the man himself. Winston has that same grumpy, grizzled, jowly look as his namesake and he scowls at me as I make coffee every morning. Heero hates him. Says he creeps him out.

I make coffee whilst Winston scowls at me and turn on the radio with a well-practised thump. I catch the end of the news -- something about a celebrity divorce -- before a generic song comes on. I sing along and Winston looks even grumpier. It's like Heero's here with me.

I dress, unhurried, but still manage to wear mismatched socks. I promise you, I don't own a complete pair of socks any more. I think people just give me singles. I opt for the ever-graceful method of hopping on one foot to put my boots on and it is only as I grab my jacket that I remember Heero will have taken the car, leaving me without transport. I tinker briefly with the idea of calling Wufei, but convince myself he's already left and decide to take the Metro.

I don't like the Metro. It's got a set course, it's easy to access the tracks and you're lined up like sardines just waiting to be blown up. Plus, Preventers don't usually take public transport to work, so any unfortunate user will be stared at. A lot. But now, peace (?) is here and I must not expect to be assassinated until I get to work, not on the journey there.

It's a short walk to the station and I nearly buy a newspaper, but then I remember that I probably won't get a seat and it's very hard to read a paper standing up. My train is very busy, but I do manage to elbow my way to a seat and I curse myself for not buying one.

When I get to the office that Heero and I share, I find it's not 'our' office any longer. Of the two desks in the centre, pushed to face one another, his is already cleared, making my half look even more cluttered and haphazard. I sit with a sigh and try to ignore his absence, but it's hard when the first thing I see is a note giving the time my new partner will arrive. I am grateful to know I'll have an hour to collect myself before having to take the plunge.

That hour goes quicker than I expected, as if the harder I resist, the faster it passes. There's a knock at the door and it opens before I can say anything.

"Captain Maxwell?"

She's too young. Early twenties, maybe and even though that's much older than me, I know she's nowhere near as good as me. But, then again, I haven't been all that good of late, so that's all relative. She's pretty, blonde and altogether normal looking. I've never seen her before, so I assume she's been transferred from somewhere. Une must really be desperate.

"That's me!" Innocuous grin firmly in place, I stand up and shake her hand. "What did I do to deserve such a pretty young thing like you, eh? What's your name, sweetheart?"

She smiles and lowers her eyes modestly, though she does not blush, which leads me to believe she already knows about my sexual preferences. I wonder how much she knows about me and who told her.

"I'm Lieutenant Georgia Harris, your new partner?"

Why have they sent me a partner who's lower in rank than me? The word partner implies equality. Heero and I are equals and it showed in our work -- what am I going to do with a Lieutenant for a partner? Unless, of course, it's some misguided attempt to teach me leadership skills, as if I don't have them anyway.

"Of course you are, Georgia. May I call you Georgia? Sit down and set up your things and tell me a bit about yourself."

"Yes, you may, sir." She sets a box, which seems to have come from nowhere, on the desk. Heero's desk.

"Then," I say as I sit down and prop my feet up on the wastepaper basket, "I insist that you call me Duo."

She grins at me. "Deal."

She is very efficient; she's like Heero in that respect. She's already filled out her half of the paperwork, which makes my job much easier, and has taken the time to research the case I'm working on, which means I don't have to bore us both with an explanation of the Shanghai smuggling rings. She's much more open to discussion than Heero was, though my relationship with him was so close, I didn't need him to say anything most of the time. It's what made us such a good team.

"Sir? I mean, Duo?"

I look up at her question and catch sight of a pot-plant over her shoulder. Heero's Venus Flycatcher is still standing proud in the corner, at the moment digesting a large cranefly that must've flown through the window. I gave him it after the previous green leafy thing died during a long absence from the office. Why didn't he take it with him? I know it might be strictly regulation, but is his new partner that much of a rules-whore? Oh God, maybe he's been transferred! Maybe they swapped him with Georgia! No...I would have been told, surely...

"Sir?"

I give a start at the sound of her voice and mask my vacancy with a charismatic smile. "It's Duo, honey. Would you like some coffee?"

"Um, yes, please." She looks surprised and I don't blame her. It's not often that you ask a question about drugs rings and are answered with an offer for coffee. "Milk, one sugar, please."

"Hey, snap!" I call over my shoulder as I leave. The coffee maker is sat right next to Wufei's office and I always drop in and say hi. We don't work together very often, so I have to grab any nanosecond of time with him I can. I would eat lunch with him, but usually one of us is too busy to eat, let alone trudge all the way down to the cafeteria. Anyway, we try and avoid the place whenever we can because the food is always unidentifiable. Last year, we sent a sample to one of the labs for testing. It came back: 'inconclusive'.

I boil the communal kettle and, because I'm a cheapskate, dump a few spoonfuls of instant coffee into two mugs. I can't tell the difference; I try and drink decaf when not doing an all-nighter. I wrinkle my nose at the motley selection of mugs that haunt the draining board. They all either have corporate logos or children's television characters on them. My favourite, that has been dubbed 'Duo's mug', has a load of brightly coloured shapes on it. It's my favourite, because the shapes have googly eyes that I like to rattle. Small things amuse small minds, I know.

Coffee made, I make the traditional drop-in. Wufei's door is closed, but it always is. A post-it note proudly displays the details of his 'open door policy', but since his door is never open, it doesn't apply. I ignore the note, as always, and march in.

"Good morning, Wuffers! Will you ever realise that the notice is totally redunda..."

I trail to a halt because Wufei, the best solo agent I know, is not alone in his office. The room, which once had been spacious, is now slightly cramped because of the second desk that has been moved in there. Heero is seated at it, his things already set out neatly and he looks at me bemusedly, as if he's not sure why I'm here.

"Hi Heero! I didn't expect to see you here!"

I grin easily to mask the fact that inside, the cogs in my brain have slipped a few teeth. What is Heero doing here? No, scratch that, I already know why. He's here because Wufei is his new partner. What is Une thinking? Has she been consulting some whacked-out psychologist, because I can see no other reason why she would separate the best team in the business and pair one with someone completely new and the other with an old friend who works better on his own.

"Wufei is my new partner," says Heero, as if I can't have worked that out for myself by that fact that they now share an office.

"Oh, cool," I reply, already subtly moving towards the door. "I've got a new girl, name's Georgia. I'd better go give her this coffee before it gets cold. Drop in some time?"

A nod, then I'm out of the door before my hands shake so bad they spill cooling coffee all over the carpet.

I am worried, and not because of the stabbings of jealousy in the pit of my stomach. Heero always notices when I'm covering up surprise or discomfort with good-natured rambling. He always gets this distinctive frown, like he's frowning with his eyes, not his brows. This time, as I frantically backtracked, he looked at Wufei with something like self-satisfaction. But Heero never looks self-satisfied, so what was it, really?

I freeze in the doorway to my office, hit by a thought so terrifying that the carpet might not be safe from coffee stains any more.

"S -- er, Duo? Are you okay?"

Mine and Georgia's office.

"Sure, sweetheart. Here's your coffee. Didya miss me while I was gone?"

She replies, but I'm not really listening. I don't drink my coffee either and it sits, neglected, on the corner of my desk.

Are Heero and I losing our ability to read each other? Is that why things went wrong?

I couldn't tell what Heero was thinking just then and took it for self-satisfaction, when reason and commonsense tell me that he wouldn't do that. I masked my discomfort really badly and I know it, but I also know that Wufei picked up on it much more than Heero.

No, I must be wrong. This isn't happening. Heero and I aren't losing touch with each other; I'm just imagining it.

"So, Georgia, any luck on getting through to Surveillance on that footage?"

I get home before Heero because he's working late with Wufei on something and he lets me take the car, saying he'll take the Metro back. I have a mild moment of worry about him taking public transport so late at night, afraid that he'll be mugged or stabbed. Usually, commonsense would kick in and tell me he's a capable Gundam Pilot, but instead it is smothered by a wave of envy at Wufei. I know that I should be working late with Heero and that we should be driving home together.

I don't bother with dinner; I can't be bothered and it'll be cold by the time Heero gets home. I settle for a banana and a yoghurt that may or may not be safe to eat, having lived in the back of the fridge for far too long. Winston disapproves, but I ignore him. I watch something terrible on the television before deciding it is beyond me. I go to bed, not bothering to hang up my clothes.

I am asleep when Heero comes home and he wakes me in his favourite way, with his lips on the back of my neck.

"I missed you today," he mumbles, his arms tight around me.

"Oh, really?" I grin tiredly as his hands start to roam. I have an urge to bring up the pot-plant that he left behind, but I'm distracted by his lips on mine. I think dimly that he might be seducing me in an attempt to make me forget today, but then I realise that it's working and surrender without so much as a glance at the clock.

I grow used to sleeping and waking without Heero. I always knew Wufei ran a busy schedule, but somehow I didn't fit Heero into that equation. I convince myself that this is all Une's doing and try not to think the horrible thought that he may be avoiding me.

In contrast to Heero and Wufei's constant stream of work, I haven't had a sniff of a decent mission in weeks. I constantly find little notes on my desk asking for 'small jobs' and 'minor things'. I haven't had a drawn-out campaign since I was split from Heero and things are getting boring. Fieldwork is less frequent and more often with large groups, not partner missions. Not that I have a problem with leading teams; it's just that I miss the feel of a two-man-mission. Made even more depressing because Georgia is, unforgettably, a woman and works in distinct womanly ways.

Georgia has this irritating ability to make me feel inadequate, as if I'm trailing along in her wake. In reality, it's the other way around. Georgia is not skilled in practical operations, being fresh out of training and new to working in anything but a large team. She always seems puzzled at my expertise at all things violent and my impatience with paperwork. Like now.

"Sir, may I ask you a question?"

"Only if you call me Duo," I sigh. She still hasn't caught on and still calls me sir, particularly when she's nervous.

"A personal one?"

"Fire away," I say, whilst wondering what she will ask.

"Well, I was wondering..." She looks uncomfortable and keeps her eyes fixed on the document in front of her. "How old are you, exactly?"

Oh. She's wondering why I'm so short, have such long hair, a distinct inability to grow a beard and, at the same time, be her commanding officer. I thought this would come up soon.

"I'm nineteen, Miss Georgia." I put my feet up on the desk in anticipation of more questions. "I can't tell you exactly 'cause I don't know when I was born."

"_Nineteen_?" Her eyes are big. "But that's so..."

"Young?" I finish. "Yeah, it is."

She's quiet for a minute, probably having trouble processing the information. "May I ask you another question, sir?"

"These things usually come together." And they do. Conversations usually go: Age? How? Oh.

"Well, if you don't mind me asking... how is it that you're a Captain? Trainees aren't even allowed into the Academy until they're eighteen."

"I didn't go to the academy. I was made a Captain when I joined the Preventers, three years ago."

I wait for her to do the math.

"Three years ago? You were sixteen?"

"Uh huh." Come on, girl, didn't you ever watch the news when you were younger? "Just after the Eve Wars."

She's still not getting it. I've given her all the hints I can and then some. She's seen my doodles of Deathscythe that are pinned to my notice board -- damn good ones, I think -- and even asked me about them. I even dropped the big one about the Eve Wars. Granted, my name isn't shouted through the halls with 'is a Gundam Pilot' following straight after, but surely she took the time to find out who I am before she took the job. Surely.

Unless, of course, she wouldn't have taken the job if she knew. Yes, if she's the daughter of some Oz officer I killed in the name of peace, then that would cause a problem, one that wherever she was transferred from would know about and try to divert. Maybe I should just take the plunge and tell her. If she doesn't like it, then she can get herself transferred and I'll have a new partner shipped in that doesn't mind Gundam Pilots so much.

"Uh, Georgia?"

"Yes, sir?" I let the 'sir' go this time.

"Were you...around for the Eve Wars?"

She nods and looks at me like I'm insane. I'd think so too. Not a lot of people missed the Eve Wars, due to all the war paraphernalia floating around.

"Well, do you remember what they were about?"

Again, she looks bewildered and understandably so. It's not everyday you get a history lesson in the Preventers. I nod in what I hope is an encouraging way and she answers.

"One of the colonies tried for independence and to take over the Earth Sphere."

"Very good. And how did we stop it?"

"The Preventers took action and overthrew MariaMaia."

"Anything else...?" Come on girl, who taught you this bullshit? "Who couldn't they have done it without...?"

She looks blank for a moment, then: "Oh, the Gundam Pilots!"

"Well done." Got there in the end, didn't we? "And what do you remember about these Gundam Pilots?"

She sitting there, wracking her brains. Honestly, Georgia, I thought you were intelligent. If you can't put two and two together and come up with the words: 'you're a Gundam Pilot', I will lose the will to live.

"They were trained fighters, the best in the Earth Sphere --" Technically wrong; we're from the colonies, but I have no doubt we were better than anyone else on Earth, too. "-- They were terrorists in AC195 and rallied to save Relena Peacecraft in the Eve Wars."

"Yes, good, good, but do you remember who they were? What were their names? What did they look like?" I'm trying, desperately, to tell her what she should already know without saying the words.

"I didn't see a lot of it, so I don't know much..." That much is clear, dollface. "But I remember Heero Yuy! He has the same name as that pacifist that was assassinated! And I remember Quatre Winner because he's so famous in Winner Enterprises. I think his partner, Trowa-something might have something to do with it too..."

"Didn't you ever see the news?" I always tried my best to stay out of the media and usually succeeded, but they frequently turned the camera on Heero, the star of the show, and I was invariably standing next to him. "They were on there quite a bit last time I checked."

"Oh yeah!" she cries with a click of her fingers. "I remember -- there was another guy. He had a funny name, I can't remember what it was, but he had really long hair..."

I blow my gum into a bubble and it pops in a satisfying sort of way into the silence. Georgia, it seems, has finally got the picture. I immediately decide that anyone who comes into my office should have no doubts about my identity and take a mental note to ask Quatre for all his photos from the wars. They would look good as a collage on my noticeboard.

Georgia does not leave in the face of working with an ex-terrorist. Instead, she gets injured in our next field mission, develops blood poisoning from a nasty bullet wound and is declared unfit to work for the next three months. I am slightly sorry to see her go, but much more sorry when I see who replaces her.

After another tense meeting with Une, involving much first-name-calling and 'I'm disappointed in you' speeches, I go back to my office to recuperate. This time, however, I am not spared a few hours to ready myself for the arrival of my new partner. Instead, I enter my office to find a guy clearing Georgia's stuff into a box, declaring rudely that he is her replacement.

Major Travers -- he never tells me his first name -- is tall, loud and brash, coupled with a desire for perfection and he has a stick up his ass that rivals Wufei. He is my superior in rank, Human Resources having decided I need direction and it'll be harder for me to kill off someone who ranks me, and he insists that I address him with 'Major'. It is hardly surprising that we clash rather strongly and he doesn't even last a week. Partly due to my deliberate misbehaviour and partly to a very bad field mission in which I 'accidentally' break his radio, he requests transfer himself. I am not sorry to see him go.

Une decides to punish my wickedness with suspension. The previous week, I had been angry because of Travers and I am sad to say I may have taken it out on Heero. Now, I'm restless because I'm stuck in the house all day on my own with no one but Winston for company and nothing but the thought of the look on Travers' face as he stormed out of the office to comfort me.

I am very grumpy throughout my suspension -- daytime TV is beyond boring -- and this is reflected in my attitude to Heero. Aware of my bad-temper during Travers' stint as my partner, I try to be nicer to him, but it comes out decidedly forced. Heero starts coming home later and later after I purposefully stay awake. I realise that he is avoiding my strained demeanour and I don't blame him. I wonder why I sound so stilted and put-on, and then understand that I am putting it on.

When I come off my suspension, I am summoned to Une's office again and I drag my feet through the corridors. I am not looking forward to another meeting filled with disappointed stares and disapproving glances. It's like being back in school again, being punished for bad behaviour, only it's much more serious. Just as if I were in danger of being expelled, I can tell that Une is seriously thinking about whether it's worth keeping me around. A danger to my colleagues. Nothing happened to Travers during his short stay, but Georgia's accident, while technically not my fault, could be attributed to me, as benefit of the doubt is conspicuously thin on the ground these days. It makes me wonder how Heero's doing, cooped up in an office with Wufei. If anything, I envy him. Even working with Wuffers The Woman Hater has got to be better than struggling through boatloads of kids and old people.

I plan to skulk outside of her office door for a while, but Une catches sight of me somehow through her closed blinds, leading me to believe that she has x-ray vision. If this turns out to be true, it would explain a number of things.

"Come in."

The commanding voice today, the one she uses to remind us she is Lady of All She Surveys. I notice she skirts over using my name, first or last, and wonder whether it's a sign.

"Sit."

She looks tired and not in the missed-night's-sleep tired. I'm fed up of seeing that world-weary look on young people everywhere. It's all around the office, in all those that lived through the war with a few more scars than others and it flits across Quatre's face every so often when I visit him. I particularly resent its presence when I look in the bathroom mirror every morning.

She looks at me, waiting for me to speak first. Since I never do anything I am ordered to do, unless threatened with being picked for the departmental basketball squad, I stare straight back and say nothing.

She sighs deeply. "I'm tired of having these conversations with you."

I nod slowly. I wonder briefly whether she's had similar conversations with Heero.

"You're being transferred to the Academy," she says, without preamble.

"Huh?" I'm surprised, having expected anything but that. "I'm going back to basic training?"

"No," she replies. "You'll instruct."

The only thing worse than basic training is having to teach it, just the sort of move I should have expected from Une. It can be disguised as an attempt at teaching me humility and responsibility, but really I know that it is another punishment. Une knows I will hate this, and she makes it very clear that this is a soft option, one that I am never comfortable in. I don't do stuff by halves and that includes my work. I don't want to be put in an obscure, out of the way job like instructing and Une knows it.

I am waved back to my office with the order to clear it. Never before have I had to clear my desk. I have stayed in the same office ever since I joined the Preventers and there's several years worth of Duo Crap in there. It takes some time to shift all the miscellaneous rubbish into boxes and I am ferried through the city to the Academy in an official car that makes me feel very small, seated behind the driver and clutching a box filled with papers, photos and pens that I am sure I won't need in my new job.

It is only when I get there that I realise that I didn't tell Heero that I've been transferred.

I come home surprising late and surprisingly satisfied. After a morning of bureacracy involving paperwork and an interview with my superior, the day turned out better than I had expected. Sure, it was still shit and nothing like the good old days, but it was definitely better than listening to Major Travers bitch at me.

I'm meant to be instructing practical exercises, as theory isn't one of my strong points, but they seem to think I'm not up to it. With my track record, I'm not surprised that they made me spend the afternoon teaching bomb disposal to a room of too-eager kids, armed with a whiteboard, a pen and my own questionable drawing skills. Thankfully, I'm charged with recruits that are as green as can be, they've only been in the Academy for a few weeks, and most of them are marginally younger than me. I try not to think about teaching the more advanced classes: I feel slightly ill whenever I do.

Despite how late I am, Heero isn't back. I wonder briefly what kind of party he's having with Wufei and I'm seized by a surge of jealousy. What I wouldn't give for a drawn out mission, faulty intelligence and life-threatening situations...

I am suddenly starving and realise I haven't eaten a proper meal in days. Having not been shopping, there is nothing in the cupboards and, in a fit of inspiration, I make pancakes. I make too much mixture, but I make as many as I can anyway. I eat until stuffed and put the extra in the fridge with the vague idea that Heero may want some when he comes home.

I go to bed and, after what seems like days of restless sleep, I get up in the middle of the night, Heero's side of the bed still empty, and duct tape over the bathroom mirror.

Heero reappears into my life later in the week. He arrives early in the morning as I make my morning coffee, looking terrible. I decide that he should know this.

"You look like shit," I remark casually. "Bad day at the office, dear?"

I receive a withering glare in return that glances off me in the face of my newly caffeinated visage. I bounce after him into the bedroom where he is unpacking a duffle bag. Funny, I didn't notice some of his clothes were gone...

"So, what'cha been up to? You manage to convince Wufei to go to an orgy yet?"

Another stony silence. He is pointedly ignoring me, something I do not take kindly to.

"Come on, Heero," I say, giving him a hug. "What's the matter? Aren't you happy to see me?"

He doesn't shrug me off, but he doesn't lean into me either, making the experience something like hugging a tree. When he speaks, his voice is hardened with anger.

"I came by your office when I got in this morning, but there was some girl at your desk."

Oh.

"She said you'd been transferred."

"Yeah!" I attempt to be cheerful, to put a good spin on things. "I'm teaching the trainees how to save their skins. It's great fun, seriously."

"Teaching?"

"Uh huh." I decide that the tightening of muscles I can feel is not a good thing and disengage the hug, wandering back into the kitchen. "My punishment for making Travers lose his rag."

"You mean...?" He snorts and waves his hand, shaking his head.

"What?" I ask, fighting the temptation to flare my nostrils. "What do I mean? Come on, Heero, if you've got something to say, then say it. I thought we didn't keep things locked up any more. Did bad stuff to our insides, right?"

It's not working. I can't play this off as happy any more. The look on Heero's face says it's not.

"You mean to say," he growls through gritted teeth, "that you have been in and out of easy jobs, lazing at home and now you're transferred to teach at the Academy, for God's sakes, and you don't even tell me?"

"You weren't around!" I retort, peeling an orange like it's done me a great personal wrong. "You were off having a whale of a time with Wufei, I wasn't gonna spoil your fun!"

"Fun?" He barks out this horrible laugh. "Fun? You think that's what I've been having? What do you think I do all day, Duo? Why do you think I haven't been home all week? Surely it can't be that I've been tracking an assassin who's trying to kill the Minister for Healthcare?"

"Well, it's not like I noticed you were gone." That throws him, and I take the opportunity to grab my bag and move for the door. "I have to go to work. I'm sick of hearing you bitch, Heero, so you'd better have stopped by the time I get home."

I slam the door as I leave and immediately feel childish for it. I realise I have left my Metro card at home, but my pride won't allow me to go back in there. It's a long walk to work and I am very nearly late, but I make it just in time for my first class. The kids seem a bit glum and I wonder if I'm rubbing off on them, or if my lecture on arrest procedure is suicide-inducing. I think it's a combination of both.

When I get home Heero is asleep, recharging from his mission. I don't bother making dinner (again) and think dimly that I must take a trip to the supermarket soon. I watch old films late into the night and fall asleep in front of the TV. Heero is gone when I wake up.

Weeks later, when my superiors have decided that I am not an immediate threat and can be trusted not to curse anyone I tough, I am allowed to teach Advanced classes. This means that the things we do are slightly more fun and I might get a whiff of a practical exercise, if I'm very lucky.

The first of my Advanced lessons takes place on a Mufti day. Everyone comes in their own clothes in aid of some obscure charity. I don't bother to find out which, I just throw my donation into the bucket held by a smiling girl at the door and make my way to classroom seven.

As I close the door behind me, I hear a couple of people say something about a new kid, but I pay no attention. It doesn't matter if there's someone new in this group -- they're all new to me.

I dump my bag on the front desk and rifle through it. I hear someone say, "Hey, newbie! What are you doing?" but I ignore it. Today I'm doing the Get In part of Get In, Blow Stuff Up, Get Out, and I need to find my memory stick with the floor plans on it.

"I said, what're you doing, newbie?"

A hand slams on the desk next to my bag and a body follows, standing offensively close. I look up slowly into a smirking face and curse my height. He's at least a head taller than me and it's hard to look intimidating when you're 5ft 7in and have long hair.

"I beg your pardon?" I say, feeling that an instructor of Advanced classes shouldn't say, 'You got a problem, asshole?'

"Ho, ho!" he grins, glancing back at his sniggering friends. "We got a joker, then? What are you gonna do, with that desk?"

"It's my desk," I state, knowing that if you have no idea what's going on, you should stick with what you know.

"It's your desk?" he asks incredulously. "You've got some nerve saying that. What's your name, kid?"

Always quick on the uptake, I finally cotton on. Dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, they have mistaken me for another recruit. I sigh and root around in my bag for my badge, feeling that this is not a good start to our working relationship.

"I'm Captain Duo Maxwell," I reply, holding up the badge. "I'm your new instructor. Sit down, please."

The rest of the lesson is conducted in awed silence; something I'm not sure is a good thing. Either they're all embarrassed because they mistook their teacher for a new student, or they all know who I am and are supremely intimidated. The latter option would be quite a change, as my previous classes had no idea or gave no indication of knowing.

After my last class, I am picked up in a Preventer car that ferries me to headquarters for a meeting with Une. She wants to discuss my progress and we do, with much approval and nodding. The meeting goes well and I think I may be in the running for practical missions again, when Une decides to bring up before.

"So, if things are going so well, what went wrong before?"

My first reaction would be to say, 'Shit, Une, don't bring that up again', but I was brought up not to curse in front of ladies. Instead, I fumble for more polite words and she jumps the gun again.

"It's clear that it's not work that's causing this deterioration, so what is it?" She looks at me with a concern that I am not used to seeing on her face, but I seem to be seeing quite a bit lately. "Is something going on at home?"

Who's she been talking to? No one else knows about home. I can't tell anyone -- I can't tell Wufei because he works with Heero, I can't tell Quatre because he'll go all sanctimonious on me and I can't tell Trowa because Quatre'll worm it out of him. Maybe she has mind-reading skills as well as x-ray eyes.

"What makes you say that?" I hedge, thinking of the night before last, when an argument we had escalated to throwing things. I've been sleeping on the sofa for the past week and there is now officially nothing in the cupboards, no shopping trip having been made.

"Duo," she says in this weird, consoling tone. "You've never let your personal life interfere with work before, so why now?"

"Because my personal life never got in the way before!"

There. It's out. I have come to realise, during extended talks to Winston, that I know why Heero and I couldn't work as well together. We don't communicate any more, we can't agree or even agree to disagree, and we can't even function in proper society any more. I haven't been to the supermarket for months and I stopped washing Heero's clothes long ago. In a horrible downward spiral, our bad relationship caused bad job performance that caused our relationship to get worse and the people we worked with started dying.

I don't think he loves me anymore and I'm pretty sure I don't love him.

I regret letting it out to Une, not two weeks later. She has Quatre on my case now, and he's very serious to have cancelled an entire day of meetings to come and see me. Heero isn't home and I am grateful for it, as I can't face having a 'serious' talk with Quatre when there's the possibility of him being there too. That would just make things too hard.

"Duo, I can't help if you won't tell me what's wrong."

I bite back the retort burning on my tongue, that I don't want or need his help. Instead, I wave my hand in resignation.

"Duo!" He's got that hurt look on, the one that reminds me uncannily of a kicked puppy. "You can't pretend nothing's wrong! Une told me everything she could, but I want to hear it from you."

I sit resolutely silent, sipping my too-hot coffee.

"I could always just ask Heero."

"He won't tell you anything."

"Why not? Just because you're not talking to him doesn't mean he won't talk to me."

I look away and bite my lip. I notice that the room looks gloomy and realise it's because it's only lit by one lamp; Heero threw the other across the room in a fit of rage last week. I wonder if Quatre has seen it and feel quietly ashamed.

"I think you're jealous," says Quatre and I see his eyes flick to the empty end table and I know he's noticed.

"Jealous?" I snarl, dangerously close to spilling coffee on a sofa that's already stained with wine from the glass I smashed yesterday.

"Yes," he says smugly. "Jealous. You're all prickly because you got the rough end of the deal and Heero's working really well with Wufei. I'm not sure which one you're jealous of, though. Wufei for working with Heero or Heero for working with Wufei."

"It's not that!" I jump up in righteous anger. "He just thinks he's having a hard time, working so hard. He thinks I'm lazing around doing nothing, he can't spare a thought for how I must feel, cooped up inside lecturing a bunch of kids who, quite frankly, are better off working in a fast-food joint and not getting even a hint of some actual work!"

"I'm sure he --"

"He thinks he's so great, so good and so right. He thinks he's so big, putting up with so much work. Fucking King of the Impossible, that's what he thinks he is, looking down on me when it's not my fault I can't go out and work because Une thinks I'm too dangerous!"

"Duo, I think he --"

"He doesn't even know how awful it is, that I'm the one that shoulders all the blame, that they think I'm the one responsible for all those deaths! He can't even begin to understand how shameful it is to not be able to work properly because my superiors have decided that I'm the reason everything went wrong whilst he was completely innocent! Don't they understand that it's just as much his fault as mine?"

"But maybe they --"

"I mean, why should he be given a partner he can work with and I can't? If I had been paired with Wufei instead of him, things wouldn't have turned out this way."

"There," interrupts Quatre, pointing at me. "Jealousy. You're green with it."

I sit down abruptly. "Shit, Quat, I don't know what to do. I don't even know what started this in the first place. It can't have been something trivial, I should have seen it coming..."

"People change," he murmurs, coming to sit next to me. "They grow to like and do different things, become different people entirely. You and Heero connected in the wars and you did it really strongly, but now you're both grown up and you've both changed. Maybe that's why things are different."

"But why hasn't it happened to you and Trowa?" I reply, feeling the green rising up again. "You hit it off during the wars, just like us."

"I don't know," he sighs, putting an arm around me that is strangely uncomforting. "I hope it doesn't happen and our love is strong enough to overcome it."

"You mean Heero and I didn't love each other enough?" I am close to tears now, something I don't want to do. I have only cried in front of the guys once before and that was with Trowa, who has the decency to keep quiet about that sort of thing.

"I don't know, Duo. Only you know that." He looks at his watch and moves for the door. "I have to go, I've got an urgent meeting. Don't do anything stupid whilst I'm gone, okay?"

I nod dumbly, though I have no idea what his definition of 'stupid' is, and he leaves. Not five minutes after he's gone, Heero storms into the room like a vengeful hurricane.

"What was Quatre doing here?"

"I don't know," I reply, tiredly. I can't be bothered with this.

"You don't know?" Heero always repeats what I say when he's angry. "You must know: he was here talking to you!"

"Well, you obviously know why he was here, then. Why did you bother asking me?" Contrary to my weariness, I rise to his challenge and to his volume.

"To see whether you'd tell the truth or lie to me!"

"I don't lie," I grind out, my hands balling into fists and his follow soon after. "Have you never learned that?"

"How do I know you weren't lying about that, too? Going behind my back with Quatre, of all people! Don't you know what that'll do to Trowa?"

"Quatre!" I snort, disbelieving. "Quatre? You think I'd -- With Quatre? You've got to be more desperate than I thought to think I'd have an affair with Quatre!"

"Well, it's not so unbelievable, is it? You've been searching for a way to get back at me for ages, ever since you got made an instructor. It's just the kind of thing you'd do!"

"So this is what it's about!" I laugh derisively. "You're jealous! Are you jealous of Quatre or of me, sitting at home, safe and sound?"

Winston flies across the room and smashes on the wall. I'm not sure whose hand it comes from.

For some people, life is simple. I am one of those people. During the wars, life was about simple things -- saving the world, saving your own skin, feeling an aircraft soar like a homesick angel. Simplicity requires that you focus on the good things in life, and the best thing back then was the phenomenon of being alive. Now, life's still simple. I go to work, I come home and I fight with Heero. Things get broken. Food is mysteriously absent from the daily routine. Life is still simple.

Heero stormed out soon after things started getting thrown. I still don't know who threw Winston and I am strangely uncaring. I don't have to go into work today, but I wish I did. I find it ironic that my work has gotten marginally better whilst my personal life has dive-bombed.

I wonder if Une knows, whether Quatre told her. I bet he did. Quatre will tell Trowa, who will tell Wufei, who will tell Heero and then there'll be another argument, one about everybody knowing. More things will get broken. I have a vague memory of someone warning me not to start an argument in a kitchen and I worry about the knives in there.

Life is still simple. It's still clear what I have to do. I just can't believe it's come to this.

I fetch a shoebox and pick up the pieces of Winston, then I return to the bedroom and pack.

Heero comes back hours later and I am waiting for him. He smells faintly of cigarette smoke and I guess he's been in a bar. I push down the feelings of shame.

"Heero?" He looks at me, sitting quietly on the sofa, and for once he does not glare. I think he knows too.

"I'm sorry, but this isn't working out. I can't stay here any more, Heero."

And I pick up my box and my packed bag, leave my keys on the coffee table and let myself out. Heero says nothing as I close the door behind me.