lavandarlizard2 | I really hate inventories...

...and the idiots who control them...

But I managed to escape early. And next year, I am going to ask for the time off between christmas and new year's. If I have to sit, staring at the cubicle walls, for three days next year, I will absolutely disembowel someone.

Because I am thrilled to finally be out of that concrete box, another early bit.

BFB - 084c - Strange Days II

I didn’t get to put any real clothes on – contamination of evidence, Q muttered – but Heero wrapped me in a long cloak. Then Q put a hand on each of our shoulders, and in a blink, we were there.

*Not* the main lobby of the hospital, thanks be, but a hallway in a non-public area. There was a counter and a man sitting at a computer, but he never so much as glanced at us, for which I was pathetically grateful. Also in the little — I don’t know — waiting area were a couple of chairs and a small table with a coffee pot sitting on it.

An instant after we arrived, a woman popped in. Dr French, I assumed, and sighed heavily.

Heero’s arm dropped to my waist protectively. I made myself drift away then; the insistent voice in the back of my head was trying again to tell me things I didn’t want to hear. I came back with a start when two men entered the area.

Heero rumbled threateningly and even before they were introduced I knew they were the cops.

Q took the point in the ensuing conversation. I barely listened. And then, way too soon, the doctor was directing me to a small examining room. She may have spoken to me before that, but honestly, I didn’t hear. I was still in ‘drift’ mode.

That kind of changed with six of us crowded into that tiny room. I took one look at the examining table, at the… things sticking out of it, and just… went down. My knees didn’t just wobble, they fuckin’ disappeared.

Once again, things were a little confused for a while. I don’t know what was going on with everyone else, but I was in a wrestling match with that damned voice in my head. It wanted, in the worst way, to tell me things I did *not* want to hear. By the time I’d managed to strangle it into submission, Heero had morphed and was holding me protectively; the doctor was squashed against the counter; the cops were a heartbeat away from total mayhem and Q was glaring hard enough to strip the stainless off of steel.

Into that charming scene, I inserted my pathetic little self. “S-sorry…” I gasped, still trying to catch my breath. “I just…” What, I don’t know.

Dr French stepped forward then. “It’s all right, Duo,” she assured me gently. “I’ll try to be as quick as possible. I know you want to go home.” She looked at the others in the room. “If you gentlemen will step into the hall…”

The cops – who, by the way, looked like they’d been ordered from Central Casting; “two gorillas, shaved” – looked at her, but didn’t move.

“Sorry, Dr French” – was that a sneer I heard, or just my hypersensitive imagination? – “But this is a homicide investigation.” He stood there like a damn rock, looking as if that said it all.

Dr French glared at him narrowly, one eyebrow arched as if she had been just itching for a good fight all day. “Sergeant Wilkowski,” she began in a dangerously gentle tone, “Are you about to accuse me of something?”

The guy actually blushed. Heero snarled.

“I am not leaving my Chosen alone with *them*!”

I was just getting… wobbly in the knees again.

“Please…” I whimpered and hated myself.

Q gave a derisive snort and touched the two cops. All three vanished.

The doctor smirked. “Well! That’s much better!” Then she lifted a brow at Heero. He rumbled, but grudgingly shifted back to his more manageable form.

The woman smiled reassuringly, and took my arm.

...tbc...