Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Deadly Beautiful ❯ Don't Forget to Mingle ( Chapter 6 )

A/N: Here we go again. More Trowa. Some plot advancement. Please review, because I love reviews. Feedback makes the story better.

Disclaimer: If I had a boyfriend, the sure way to my heart on Valentine's Day would be to give me sole ownership of Gundam Wing. Unfortunately, I don't have a boyfriend. I don't own Gundam Wing, either. I'm not even making any money off of this.

Deadly Beautiful - Chapter 6

By danse

Trowa straightened his suit jacket nervously as he approached the gigantic double doors that led to the banquet hall of the Royal Arabian Hilton. Two bored, but well-armed Saudi security guards leaned against white-and-pink marble pillars on either side of the doorway, ready to check security passes on their computer as conference attendees arrived. Neither one was paying attention to him, as they were both currently engaged in a conversation meant to pass the time.

Neither guard saw the young man in the navy suit stop momentarily, to take a deep breath and briefly clasp his security pass like a good luck charm, before he continued to the door. When he got close enough for them to see the whites of his eyes, they stopped talking and smiled tolerantly at him while he came closer. He stopped when he reached them, and one of the guards, whose nametag said Hassan, used a device that looked like a grocery store UPC scanner to scan the bar code of the pass on his lapel.

Trowa sweated bullets while the scanner hummed, half expecting to be caught with the false pass and having to answer for it. The computer seemed to take forever to analyze the code, and he got increasingly nervous every second. Finally, it beeped happily and a reproduction of the pass showed up on the computer screen, displaying his unsmiling face and scribbled signature.

"Have a good day, Mr. Blume." Hassan smiled and gestured through the doorway for Trowa. Trowa sighed inaudibly with relief and followed the outstretched arm through the door, passing through the metal detector unhindered, since he wasn't armed. Of course it had worked; it always worked. S paid highly trained experts to create these things. He never had a reason to worry. But he invariably did, anyway.

He walked inside the hall and had to stop and stare at the opulence. The walls were a soft pink and covered in large, gilt-framed oil paintings of deserts and sixteenth-century Europeans who looked pale and austere. Rich tapestries adorned a few places. The cavernous room was big enough to hold five hundred people, seated, and had a vaulted ceiling supported by ten marble pillars, swirled with pink and white like the ones outside. He saw angels painted on the ceiling, dancing around the tops of the pillars in painted beams of glimmering golden light. It was mind-boggling.

Finally, he realized that gawking at the decor was not part of the impression he wanted to make, so he made his way through crowds of dignitaries to the clusters of round tables draped with pink tablecloths, checking the nameplates for his own. He found it in the corner to the right of the door, and pulled out his chair to set his briefcase on. That done, he looked to see whom he would be sitting with. Treize Kushrenada, Abdul Mohabi, Dekim Barton, and… Trowa Barton! His elation at being seated at Kushrenada's table was lost in confusion and panic. His heart thumped in his chest and he fought the urge to hyperventilate. Was this some kind of joke?

He moved his briefcase off of his chair quickly and sat down with his face in his hands, elbows propped on the table, trying to keep control. He had felt nervous all day, and this was the last straw. A few moments later, when he felt calmer, he got up smoothly and promptly started acting like nothing had happened. If anyone had been watching, his normal behaviour would probably make the observer wonder if they'd actually seen him panicking. Eventually, they would forget what they had seen.

Trowa checked to make sure that there were business cards in the pocket of his jacket, then made his way purposefully towards the nearest group of men. He then started working on his façade as a representative of Cinq Enterprises, Incorporated.

At supper that night, Trowa found himself sitting at the pink table, face-to-face with the other four men for the first time. Treize sat on his left side, and the man called Trowa Barton was seated at his right. He was tall and powerfully built, with shaggy, untamable blond hair and sideburns. Dekim Barton looked like an older, wiser version of his son, and was currently chatting amiably with Kushrenada and Mohabi, who was a dark-complexioned, good-natured Saudi Arabian oil magnate.

The younger Barton leaned over towards Trowa and whispered conspiratorially, "So what are you in for?"

Trowa smiled thinly and offered his right hand. "I'm Tristan Blume, and I'm here to do some business for Cinq Enterprises."

The other man looked impressed as he shook the proffered hand. "I'm Trowa Barton," he said amiably. "You look pretty young to be here with these bigwigs," he mused. "You must be pretty smart."

Trowa, who had already surmised the extent of this man's intelligence and personality, waved away the compliment and replied that he hadn't been in the business for very long, and that this was a low-risk venture probably meant to keep him occupied and away from the office for a while. He got the expected response: a laugh and a patronizing wink.

"You're one of the most interesting people I've ever met, Tristan," the older Trowa said with a soft chuckle. "Wise beyond your years. How old are you, anyway?"

"I'm eighteen," Trowa lied smoothly, missing the true mark by about two years. "I've been working for Cinq for about six months, now."

The blond Trowa nodded thoughtfully, and they continued their conversation for another twenty minutes over a meal of steak and lobster. 'Tristan' became somewhat engrossed in talking to the man who shared his name, and never noticed the strange, almost calculating looks that Treize Kushrenada gave him every few minutes, as if he could tell that something wasn't quite right with the boy who sat next to him.

It was nearly two-thirty in the morning when Trowa wandered sleepily up to his hotel room. After a few aggravating minutes of trying to get his keycard to fit in the slot on the door, the reader beeped obligingly and let him inside. He stumbled in, shut the door with a foot, dropped his briefcase, and flopped facedown onto the bed in his slightly rumpled suit.

He nearly fell asleep in that position, but he eventually forced himself to sit upright and slapped his cheeks lightly to stay awake. He loosened his tie and took off the jacket and shoes, then crawled to the edge of the bed to get at his luggage, which had been left there by a helpful bellboy earlier.

He picked up the silver case that held his laptop and took it out onto the small, private terrace through the back door of his room, flipping on the outside light as he went. There was just enough space on the terrace for a table and two chairs, and he pulled one out and sat down. He entered the combination on the latch of the case, popped open the lid, and within five minutes had the computer set up, with a wire trailing to the mini satellite receiver that was now attached to the terrace railing.

The tired spy sat and contemplated the empty 'Compose' window that hovered on the screen, trying to collect his scattered, sleepy thoughts. Finally, he typed the date and local time, and continued on to say that he had no useful information yet, but he had made an acquaintance with a prominent figure at the conference (he thought for a moment, then decided against revealing Trowa's name), and that the steak was excellent. More news would follow the next evening. Satisfied, he ran the encryption program, to be followed by the satellite transmission of the data, and leaned on the railing to look at the view while he waited.

He felt calm and happy as he stared at the moonlit desert stretching into the distance, while the cool night breeze ruffled his long bangs. The Hilton was on the outskirts of Hofuf, and the city stretched away from the other side of the hotel, so he had the wonders of nature all to himself. He sighed with happiness, forgetting himself and his mission for a moment, and then sighed for an entirely different reason when the laptop beeped to announce that it was done transmitting the message.

Trowa packed up the apparatus and went back inside his room, happy that he could finally go to bed. The other Trowa had insisted on buying him a drink at the hotel bar after the conference let out, and that had turned into two, while the elder Trowa talked about himself for a few hours. 'Tristan' had listened attentively, waiting for information that would be useful to his mission. He'd gotten almost nothing for all of his patience, except the other man's trust and more respect, which he hoped would amount to something useful eventually.

He vividly remembered one specific part of the conversation, though. It might have been the only potentially useful information he'd acquired, or it might have just been the other man's alcohol-sodden imaginings, made real by the telling.

'I've got something to show you. I've never shown it to anyone else before.' The blond Trowa pulled his wallet out of his pocket and removed a folded photograph, creased and worn. It showed a pretty young blonde woman and a happy little girl with flaming red hair.

He pointed at the girl. 'That's my niece, Mariemaia. Her mother--my sister--died a few years ago, in an earthquake. Marie was with her, and we thought she'd died for sure, 'cause she was so small, but she didn't. She survived.' He smiled wistfully, and looked at the young man with wild brown hair in front of him proudly. 'She survived, because she's strong. There's going to be a war, soon, and after it's over, Marie's going to be the one who picks up the pieces. She's going to lead us all. It's a promise we made.'

It was amazing, what enough liquor could do to loosen lips. Trowa wasn't sure what to do with this strange revelation just yet, and he thought that the safest course of action would be to keep the news to himself until he could confirm that it was true.

Smothering a jaw-cracking yawn with his hand, Trowa undressed and fell into bed for the last time that night.

Trowa woke up sometime between eight-thirty and nine the next morning, sitting at the familiar round table with a plate of scrambled eggs and waffles in front of him. He couldn't remember dressing in his grey suit, or going down six floors in the elevator and passing the security checkpoint outside the banquet hall doors. He felt a bit sheepish, but quickly covered it up by digging into his breakfast. The other four men talked among themselves, unconcerned.

After his plate was clean, he had a few minutes to digest, as a lot of the people in the hall were still eating. He used the time to discreetly look around the hall some more from his seat. Now that he was used to the extravagant appearance, he could look at some of the minor details that were important only to those with nefarious purposes.

He noted the head table with its podium and slide projector screen, as well as the booths that were set up against the wall opposite the main doors, housing exhibits and companies. However, he was far more interested in the permanent features of the room, mostly the ones that could supply an escape route, should he need it. Besides the large main doors, there were three fire exits, one in each of the other three walls. A fire alarm was posted next to each door, as well as fire extinguishers. The closest of those doors was about ten yards from where he sat.

The walls were twenty feet high, and near where they met the ceiling, several vents were spaced evenly around the entire hall, painted the same shade of pink as the walls to make them inconspicuous. They were impossible to use for escape, though, unless one was capable of climbing up smooth, sheer surfaces without attracting attention.

Trowa frowned and looked back down at the table, just in time to catch Treize staring at him. Treize looked like he was about to say something, but evidently decided to let it be, because Mohabi was talking in his other ear.

Evidently, Trowa could have picked a better time to inspect his surroundings. He cursed himself inwardly for acting suspiciously near one of his targets, and breathed a great deal easier when someone stood up at the large head table to speak at the podium. The grey-haired man droned on for a few minutes, and when he was done, everybody clapped and then started to get up and move around. Trowa hadn't been paying attention to the address, and had no idea what was going on. Treize gave him a meaningful look and indicated the now-crowded booths with a nod of his head before walking away. Apparently, it was time to do business.

Trowa spent the afternoon wandering around the maze of booths, stopping to watch a few demonstrations, handing out some business cards, and mostly, trying to eavesdrop on the other delegates' conversations. Every once in a while, he would hear a few words that would set off warning bells in his head, but they would all turn out to be false alarms.

He was getting a bit frustrated and very tired by dinnertime, when he thought he heard the word, "merger," coming from somewhere to his left. The voice was masculine and sounded familiar. Pretending to be interested in the oil refinery cross-section at a booth nearby, he stood as inconspicuously as possible next to three men who were talking in subdued voices. As he picked up a glossy pamphlet and flipped through it, he discreetly checked the faces of the three men. Treize, whose back was to Trowa, was talking to Dekim Barton and another man who Trowa recognized from the photos.

Trowa pretended to scratch his chest while he turned on the tiny voice recorder hidden in his inside pocket. Trying to act natural, he stood and leafed innocently through pamphlets as he listened to their conversation.

"…be extremely beneficial for both parties if it goes through," Dekim was saying to Treize.

"I agree with you entirely, Dekim," Treize answered quietly. None of the men seemed to notice the young man standing barely three feet behind Treize, who was only half reading the brochure in his hands. "I believe that the unity of Romefeller and OZ will be the catalyst of a new age for mankind," he continued with a note of triumph.

The other man nodded and added, "I hear from my connections that the development of the Zodiac Militia is already beginning, on paper. That news makes me think that the merger is more than a sure thing…" He trailed off with a smile that the recorder could never hope to relate.

Figuring that he had heard enough to keep S busy, and feeling that he would be caught by Treize any moment, Trowa put down his small pile of brochures and wandered away. Absently, he scratched his chest just behind his lapel again, deftly turning off the voice recorder. There was one more full day of the conference left, and he finally had something to work with. He checked his gold-plated watch. There was still half an hour until dinner, and then another two hours of socializing before he could go back to his room and file his evening report. Hopefully, the other Trowa wouldn't keep him up again--he already felt tired enough to sleep for days.