The Chibi Files

By Cat

Copyright © Cat 2002

Disclaimer: The Gundam Boys and friends don't belong to me. More's the pity. ~sigh~

This story may not be reproduced or archived elsewhere without expression of the author Cat. Skippyscatt@aol.com

AN: Thank you's go out to Rogue11, bb and Fujimiya Jai for the wonderful reviews they left for me at FF.net. Rogue we will learn about Treize down the road. I can only say that I am following the series and movie to a certain amount and inserting some differences here and there. Fujimiya Jai ~grin~ you can adopt your very own chibi Quatre at the Heero is not Toast website. The link is on the adoptions page in the Bishounen Garden Section of Cats Corners. And I promise this is not the end in fact it may go on until the men in white coats finally do come to collect me. ~LOL~

~*~*~*~*~*~

Chapter Two – Chibi Shopping

An hour and a half later I stood in the living room with my hands on my hips. All the boys were dressed fairly well for our afternoon shopping trip except for Heero. It was a warm afternoon for the end of January, almost sixty degrees. Not unusual for Denver, surprisingly enough. But I just didn’t think it was warm enough for my chibi Perfect Soldier.

“I really will be okay,” Heero sighed looking up at me. “I’m a lot tougher than I may look.”

“My brain knows that, it really does,” I answered as I squatted down in front of him. “But still I worry. I just don’t have anything that would fit without getting in your way when you walk. I guess we’ll just have to go, but as soon as we find something you like that’s warmer it’s getting paid for and you’re changing. At least for whatever reason your clothes actually shrank along with you to begin with, thank goodness.”

He nodded in acceptance. I grabbed my fanny pack and ushered them all outside. They stood in the little alcove in front of my apartment while I locked the door. Then I led them all over to my car. I looked at it and realized that it wasn’t really suitable for hauling around six childlike Chibis. I sighed realizing that my savings account was probably about to take a major beating. At least they were probably all big enough that they didn’t need the child safety seats. I might have a real problem on my hands if I had to try and enforce that. And as it was looking at Quatre and Duo I wasn’t all that sure.

“Hmm, Quatre, Duo lets put you two in the back in the middle. Trowa, Heero do you two mind sitting in the back too on either side of them by the doors?” I asked trying to arrange them all for the most safety. I knew that Heero could handle the rambunctious Duo better than anyone could. And watching Trowa, I knew it wouldn’t be easy to separate him from Quatre. Otherwise I would put Trowa and Zechs on the outside edges of the backseat.

“No, that’s fine,” Trowa nodded.

He opened the back door and Heero got in sliding all the way across the seat. Then the slightly taller Heavy Arms pilot helped Duo up onto the seat so he could slide over close to Heero, before helping Quatre.

I smiled watching. They really were so good about taking care of each other. “Miro, you and Wufei will have to share the front seat. Is that okay?”

I watched them look at each other and slowly nod. I’d noticed over breakfast that they avoided each other. I was going to have to get to the bottom of that eventually. I opened the door for them and they slid in.

Once they were settled I peered into the back and chuckled. Between them Trowa and Heero had buckled Duo and Quatre in using the center seatbelt for both of them. They looked a little squashed, but it didn’t seem to have dampened their spirits over the outing we were about to take.

“Don’t worry boys, if Dr. J thinks it will take more than a few weeks to come up with a solution for this then we’ll go and take a look at some Minivans,” I told them.

Zechs looked up at me as I buckled myself in. “They weren’t very encouraging when we all talked about the options after it happened. It’s one of the reasons why they were looking for someone to unload us onto,” he grumbled.

“I had a feeling that might be the case,” I replied starting the car. “Since the device did something they weren’t even expecting they may have trouble figuring out how to counteract it. Especially if it’s not as simple as merely reversing the settings on the machine.”

“It wasn’t,” Heero said from the backseat. “They used it on a cat and then reversed the settings and tried again. It didn’t do anything at all.”

I nodded in understanding as I pulled out of the apartment complex and headed down the street. “Did they give you any kind of idea how long they thought it might be? I know you probably aren’t happy being children again.” I didn’t want them to get the impression that I wanted to get rid of them. They’d already had too much of that in their lives.

“They told us to enjoy our second childhood’s,” Quatre replied quietly from the backseat.

“So they really aren’t even certain that they can reverse this are they?” I asked as I turned on to a side street and cut through a nearby subdivision.

I decided against taking the main roads to Wal-Mart. I really didn’t need the ticket I would get if I was noticed and stopped, especially if any of the boys were considered too small to be out of a car seat. So instead I took the back route, which truly was safer anyway as it was less traveled and the speed limit was slower.

“No,” Wufei muttered unhappily.

“Well then it looks like you boys will be helping me find a Minivan this weekend. And it might be a good idea if we start house hunting next week,” I stated smiling so they would understand that I wasn’t unhappy even if I was a little worried.

These were fairly big steps for me and there was no guarantee that two days after getting settled in a house that they would still be there. I realized I needed to talk to Dr. J and the other scientists as soon as I could.

“It may take a while before we can move in once we find a place. So the sooner the process gets started the better,” I finished, shaking off my worries for the time being.

I pulled into the parking lot of Wal-Mart and found a parking space a little away from the doors so that we were out of the heaviest traffic area. I knew that I wasn’t really dealing with children. But they were so small it was hard not to think that way.

“Okay guys, do you mind holding hands in pairs. I know it may not really be necessary but this store tends to be pretty busy. I would hate to lose one of you in the crowd,” I said looking down at them.

I smiled as Trowa immediately took hold of Quatre’s little hand and held it tight. Heero sighed and took Duo’s, but I saw a small twitch of his lips that told me he wasn’t all that unhappy and the sigh was probably more for the braided Chibi’s benefit than mine. Zechs and Wufei glared at each other for a moment and finally clasped hands. Again I realized I was going to have to get to the bottom of this pretty darn quickly before there was real trouble.

I ushered them ahead of me so that I could keep them all in my line of sight as well as the traffic. I chuckled when I watched both Quatre and Duo try to hurry their respective escorts. But neither of the stoic young soldiers gave an inch, keeping a steady pace so that we stayed in a group.

“Oh what cute, polite little boys,” the elderly woman who manned the front door exclaimed as we walked into the store. “Would you all like a sticker?” she asked showing them the smiley stickers on the roll in her hand.

“No, thank you though,” Quatre smiled up at her answering for everyone.

Unfortunately it didn’t quite cover the growl of annoyance from Wufei and the grandmotherly lady looked at him shocked. Taking his hand I led him a little away from the others who stayed obligingly right where I left them.

“Wufei, she wasn’t trying to insult you or hurt your feelings,” I told him gently understanding why he was angry. “Remember she doesn’t know you and only knows what she’s sees. Actually she was giving you a complement. I know it will be hard but you need to remember that most people see you as children. It’s only going to be people like me who recognize you that may treat you like the soldiers you are. Okay?”

He sighed sadly and nodded. Then he slipped his hand out of mine and walked back over to the older lady. I saw him bow and say something to her, then she smiled back at him and said something in return. He bowed again, then went back to take Miro’s hand.

I shook my head realizing this was not going to be as easy as I’d hoped it would be. There would be more problems like this as time went on. And though my pilots might be fairly grown up in their behavior, at least three of them weren’t socially oriented. It would take some time to help them develop those skills. But then it was also something that was fairly normal in someone the age they appeared to be so with luck it would be overlooked most of the time.

I took the cart that another Wal-Mart helper passed me and led the boys down the wide aisle towards the children’s clothing department. I had a feeling that my cart wasn’t going to be anywhere near big enough for everything we needed. In fact I was hoping that the trunk of my car would be big enough.

“Okay, here we are,” I said parking the cart at the end of a set of shelving. “You can look around, but don’t leave the area okay?”

They all nodded and began to move around looking at the clothes. At least this wouldn’t be too difficult. The boys were more than capable of picking their own clothing, as long as they could find things they liked. I was glad to see that most of the little boy’s clothes didn’t look too babyish. And they were all avoiding anything with appliques or pictures.

“What do you think?” Duo came bouncing up with a pair of black jeans and a little black turtleneck.

“Very Shinigami,” I smiled at him as I took them and put them in the buggy. I’d already watched him check to make sure they fit. He beamed up at me and bounced away to keep looking.

Trying to watch six little bodies as they flitted around in the area that held their sized clothing was not easy, even if three of them didn’t really flit. So it wasn’t surprising when I lost track of one — Heero.

~*~*~*~

“I can’t believe she brought that child out in that skimpy little outfit.”

Heero paused from looking at the pair of jeans in his hand and tilted his head listening. There was no question that he was the topic of conversation for the two women he’d passed a moment before.

“Do you think she’s his mother?” the other asked her companion.

“I don’t know, it looks like all six of them belong to her somehow. But it’s obvious if they are they’re all the same age or close to it. And if they are supposed to be quintuplets and maybe a friend they certainly don’t look alike. They might be adopted or foster children I guess,” the first woman answered. “I just honestly think she ought to be reported for bringing them out not dressed properly for the weather.”

“Oh I don’t think that’s necessary,” the other woman said her voice showing her uneasiness with that idea. “They seem happy and well behaved.”

“Well of course they are. She’s letting them run wild and pick whatever they want. She’s not even trying to help or control what they’re doing. I’m calling Social Services,” the first woman replied pulling a cellphone out of her purse. “Someone should take this in hand before one of those children gets hurt. Why that little boy in nothing but a tank top and those little shorts could have pneumonia by the time they get home.”

Clutching the pair of pale blue denims in his hands Heero turned and stalked over to the two women. They looked down at him in surprise as he glared up at them. “Not that it’s any of your business, but this is the way we were left on her doorstep this morning. She brought us out so that we could get the right things to wear. And she knows that most of us have never gotten to choose what we want. That’s why she’s letting us pick. She didn’t want to bring me out like this but it was all I had. If you do anything to make us have to leave her, I’ll kill you.”

Still clutching the jeans so tightly that his hands hurt. Heero turned and marched away from the stunned women to where Cat was laughing and talking to Zechs. He was showing off a little white suit that he’d found trying to convince her that he just had to have it. Dropping the jeans as he got closer the perfect soldier wrapped his arms around the person that had taken him in without a complaint, or asking anything from them in return and held on tight.

~*~*~*~

When I felt the little arms go around me, at first I thought it was Duo or Quatre. I had discovered over the course of the morning that they had a habit of hugging, just because. But when Miro’s eyes got big, I looked down and realized why.

“Heero, what’s the matter?” I could feel my little Wing chibi shaking like a leaf and stunned was too mild a term to explain my feelings. This was the last thing I’d ever expected from Heero.

Not getting an answer I loosened his arms enough that I could kneel down on his level then wrapped one arm around him. Looking into his face, I gasped. His eyes were shocky, almost lifeless. The way I remembered them looking when he self-detonated or that final moment during the second war when he’d pulled the trigger on the empty gun and proclaimed he’d just killed Mariemaia before collapsing.

“Heero, honey, what’s wrong?” I asked brushing the hair back from his face knowing it wouldn’t stay. “Please, honey I can’t help if you don’t talk to me.”

“Why?” he whispered looking at me. “Why won’t it stop?”

I could feel the others standing around me. I looked to Quatre and saw him clutching his chest, his eyes bright with tears. I’d known I’d be able to gauge how bad this was from his reaction to Heero’s emotions.

“What won’t stop, Heero?” I caressed his cheek trying to keep him in the present and talking.

“The hurting, why won’t people stop hurting each other, hurting the kind people?” A single tear spilled over and I knew for him that it was the equivalent of a flood. “I don’t want to fight anymore. I don’t want to kill anymore.”

Sinking the rest of the way to the floor, I pulled him down into my lap and rocked him. It scared me that he didn’t even resist a little. Duo sat close to me and put a hand on his friend’s leg. His big eyes were wet with the tears Heero wouldn’t cry. The others all sat down around us.

“You don’t have to fight anymore, honey. I promise. What’s brought all this on?”

“I’m sorry, it’s our fault,” a new voice spoke up.

My Chibis and I looked up to see a dark haired woman a little older than me looking down at us. I felt my little chibi soldier tense and snuggled him closer, kissing his forehead before looking back up.

“I’m afraid we jumped to some conclusions and my friend got a bit carried away.” She jerked her head in the direction of her friend who was standing several feet away looking extremely uncomfortable. “We had no idea he heard us. We thought they were being neglected…. I’m sorry we never meant to frighten or upset him.”

“What did you do to upset him like this?” I kept my voice as calm as I could though I was so angry I wanted to rant.

“My friend was getting ready to call Social Services….”

She broke off as Duo and Quatre gasped, staring at her in horror and shock. Zechs and Trowa grabbed Wufei and held him as he started to jump up. The uni-banged pilot frowned and shook his head at his teammate indicating this wasn’t the time for his kind of action.

I didn’t know what those words meant to them in their version of this Twilight Zone I’d found myself in. But they obviously understood the term. And in their current circumstances possibly being scattered to the four winds was the worst thing that could happen to them.

“Please leave,” I requested quietly, surprising myself with how calm I sounded. I curled more protectively around my chibi and continued to rock him, talking to him softly, trying to reassure him that everything would be okay.

I couldn’t be certain, but I thought I could imagine what it was that had finally been more than my Perfect Soldier could stand. After what he had been put through in his training, isolated and alone. The idea of perhaps being separated from his friends, in essence his only family, had pushed him to consider an action he’d thought he’d been able to put behind him.

He was soul tired, and heart-sore, like Trowa. Trying to be strong, because that was what he had been trained to do. But he’d also been taught to act on his emotions whereas my little Heavy Arms chibi had always been trained to bury his feelings. The emotion called up by the two women was the need to fight, to protect at all costs, something he thought he’d put behind him.

I knew that at the end of the barely started second war he’d finally collapsed from the strain. With all they had been through recently and the added strain of the more volatile chibi reactions he’d been pushed too far much faster. And I couldn’t even be certain that anything had been resolved or healed since the breakdown. I didn’t even know how much time had passed. It could have been only days for them. But I intended to make sure that he got the support and refuge he needed to heal while he was with me.

“Go on everybody, keep looking around. Heero and I are just going to have a little rest here, okay?” I said looking up at the others with as reassuring a smile as I could muster. Slowly they nodded and drifted away but I could tell they were keeping one eye on their teammate.

“I promise honey, no one is going to come and take you guys away from me until Dr J comes to say he can fix you,” I murmured and felt a shuddering sigh run through him. “And you don’t have to fight or kill anymore. The war is over.” ‘In your world anyway,” I added silently. “We still can’t stop stupid people from doing stupid things, but this is only the little stuff that can be fixed without bloodshed.”

There was another deep shuddering sigh as I stopped speaking and my Wing chibi tightened his grip around my waist and just settled in against me. I rocked slow and easy and stayed silent knowing he’d appreciate the quiet. I noticed that the others were bringing things over to us every now and then and lying them beside me. But they were taking others and putting them in the basket. I finally smiled and shook my head as I realized what they were doing.

Quite a stack of things had grown beside me when I finally felt Heero really stir, trying to sit up. I helped him and looked down into his amazingly deep blue eyes and smiled to see that he was more relaxed and the lost look was gone.

“You promise?” he asked not clarifying his question.

“I promise ‘almost’ anything you want me to honey,” I replied with a small smile.

His lips twitched at my emphasis on almost and he leaned into me again for just a moment before sitting back up. “Will you help me find some things? I’ve only done this shopping thing a couple of times.”

“Well lets go through these first,” I told him indicating the stack beside me.

“What’s this?”

I chuckled. “Every time one of the boys found something they thought you’d like they brought it over.” He shook his head and chuckled with me as we started going through the pile of clothes.

Almost everything looked like it would fit. Some were laid aside because of things like color or style. But in the end we had kept more than half. And the others seeing Heero finally recovered had made small forays over to us. They usually came bearing some new item for the Wing Pilot’s approval, but never left without a word, a touch or smile for their friend. Both Duo and Quatre had actually sat down and given opinions on things when they’d come over, as if unwilling to leave the other chibi alone until they were satisfied he was okay.

“So which ones do you want to go and change into right now?” I asked finally.

Heero looked through the stack and pulled out a pair of brushed cotton, blue jeans, a blue and black striped, flannel, button down shirt and a black turtleneck. “These.”

I smiled. The shirt had been a find of Quatre’s. The turtleneck matched the ones that Trowa and Duo had picked up. The jeans had been brought over by Wufei and had a pair of wings embroidered on the back pockets. One of the few concessions to the “no applique” rule that I’d noticed.

“And the Jacket?” he asked holding up the jean jacket that Zechs had found. It apparently matched the one that Heero had lost when they’d been zapped, since he’d taken it off and laid it over a chair.

“Perfect choices,” I grinned down at him as I stood up and stretched my legs. The others came over as I stood up. “Boys, Heero and I are going right over there to the jewelry station to pay for these so he can change. I think we’ve found plenty of clothes, I do need you to pick some pajamas, socks, that sort of thing and I want each of you to find a real coat while they still have some. Winter is has only just started here, so I want you to have something warm.”

They all nodded and went to find the last items while Heero and I walked hand in hand to the jewelry counter. The lady at the cash register rang us up and cut the tags off the clothes. I watched as my chibi ran to the dressing room with the clothes to change.

“Is he okay?” she asked and I turned to look at her in surprise. “I couldn’t help seeing what happened,” she explained.

“I think he’s okay for now. The women scared him, reminded him of things that should best be left forgotten,” I replied shaking my head.

I was still angry and would have loved nothing better than to rip them both women up one side and down the other for jumping to conclusions without proof and without even speaking to me first. But with luck no permanent harm had been done and the less ugliness around my Chibis the better.

“They certainly are a cute bunch. And awfully well behaved, you should be very proud. Are they all yours?” she asked leaning on the counter and watching my boys as they put Heero’s selections in the basket with their own and put away the ones he’d discarded.

I smiled. “I wish I could take the credit, but you know they developed a lot of those manners all on their own. And yes, they’re all mine, for now anyway.”

“For now?”

“I’m their temporary Guardian, until some problems are ironed out. Unfortunately it was rather a spur of the moment situation for all of us. Which is one of the reasons we’re here doing some clothes shopping,” I stated.

I smiled as I saw Heero come out of the dressing room several minutes later in his new clothes with his green tank top and spandex shorts rolled up under his arm. He might look like a five-year-old, but he was an awfully cute five-year-old. The others had been standing around the doorway waiting for him and I was sure I saw my chibi blush. I couldn’t wait to find out why.

“Here are my other things,” he said solemnly as he handed up the clothes he’d been wearing to the sales person.

The cashier put them into a bag and then rolled the top and stapled the receipt and tags for his current outfit on the outside of it. She handed it down to him with smile. “There you go young man. Enjoy the rest of your shopping trip.”

“Thank you,” he nodded at her then allowed himself to be dragged off by Quatre and Duo to pick a winter coat, boots and the other few items he needed.

As I walked with the other three, I looked down at Trowa. “Did I actually see our Heero blush?” I asked the uni-banged pilot.

Zechs snickered and Wufei actually chuckled. The tiny Mona Lisa smile that sometimes graced the acrobat’s face appeared as well. “Duo wolf whistled at him,” he answered.

I laughed and shook my head. One of these days the braided pilot was going to find him self on the receiving end of the teasing and I almost couldn’t wait to see how he handled it.

~*~*~*~

Just before we left the children’s department, I spotted the car seats and booster seats. The boys stared up at me as I stood still weighing all of my options and how likely it would be for Heero or Wufei to kill me if I suggested them. Finally, I decided that their safety and my peace of mind was more than worth the risk.

“Boys we need to go and take a look at those booster seats for the car,” I told them calmly and watched as their eyes got big with alarm.

“You wouldn’t?” Wufei moaned and glared at me.

“Aren’t we too big?” Duo asked puzzled. “Aren’t those supposed to be for babies?”

“They used to be,” I answered looking down at them. “But they’ve done a lot of studies and found that children under a certain height and weight are still better protected when the seats are used.”

“Noin would laugh her ass off at me if she knew I had to use one of those,” Zechs muttered unhappily.

“Actually I think that you and Trowa are the only two that don’t need one,” I stated with apologetic looks at the other four. “I’m almost positive that Duo and Quatre will have to use them. Guys, honest I don’t want to do this, but it’s for your protection and my peace of mind. I’d never be able forgive myself to have you six make it all the way through the war with the Alliance and OZ and the Rebels and the Bartons only to have you die in some accident. And remember we don’t want anyone taking you guys away from me for neglect.”

“That’s hittin below the belt,” Duo groused scuffing his boot clad foot on the tile floor.

“But she’s right,” Quatre sighed. “If it’s the law that children under a certain size use the special seats then that is what we will have to do. We don’t want to get Cat in trouble.”

“Thanks Quatre.” I smiled down at him, relieved to have at least one of the boys on my side. “Stay here a moment.”

I walked back over to the jewelry counter and talked to the cashier that I’d been talking with earlier. I quickly explained what I needed and why and she smiled and waved another clerk over to man her station. We went back over to the boys and she led us all through the layaway section and back into the warehouse. A large scale sat against one wall and she took us over to it.

“This is a very accurate scale and should give us a good idea of how much each of you weighs,” she said to the boys with a smile.

One by one they each stood on the big scale and let her weigh them. I was jotting the weights down, as she called them out and nodding. Finally we were all done and I thanked her profusely for all the help she’d given us. As we all walked out of the warehouse the boys looked at me expectantly.

“So?” Wufei asked anxiously, looking up at me.

I sighed. “Well I have good news and I have bad news. Miro, I was right. You and Trowa won’t even need the booster seats. But Trowa you barely squeaked in under the wire because of your height. You are right on the cutoff weight at forty-seven pounds.”

Both boys sighed in relief and I was actually a little surprised by the show of emotion from my Heavy Arms Chibi. Seeing my look he shrugged and gave me an embarrassed version of his Mona Lisa smile.

“Cat, the rest please,” Wufei insisted dragging my attention back to the rest of them.

“Well, the good news is that you and Heero are both over the cutoff weight at 50 pounds apiece. But I’m still afraid you’re under the height cutoff. We’ll see when we look at the booster seats,” I paused and looked sadly at Duo and Quatre who were already wearing long faces. “Hey it’s not so bad,” I said trying to be positive and cheer them up. “You don’t need the car seats, just the booster seats. And your both only a few pounds from the cutoff weight. They’ve increased the weight recently otherwise you would have passed too.”

“Think of it this way,” my Wing chibi told them solemnly. “You’ll be able to see out the windows better than the rest of us.”

Duo grinned and Quatre laughed slightly. “That’s true, I hadn’t thought of that,” the braided chibi answered and skipped over to where the displays of seats were set up.

I couldn’t help chuckling at how easy it was to cheer the smallest pilots back up. Though I hoped that the novelty wouldn’t wear off too fast or it could be miserable. And who knew how fast my Chibis would grow. Duo and Quatre had been small at fifteen and I didn’t think it was very likely that that would change. The other boys had already followed Duo over to the display of booster seats and were reading the boxes. Pushing the cart carefully between the racks of baby clothes I made my way over to join them.

In the end we only needed the two booster seats and I slid them onto the rack underneath the cart. “Okay boys lets go take a look at stuff for bedtime,” I told them and watched them clasp hands again with their partners. I sighed glad that yet another crisis had passed without tantrums, tears or trouble. If only they could all go so smoothly.

~*~*~*~

As I suspected, by the time we got to the check out the buggy was over flowing. There were pillows and blankets and clothes and air mattresses and sleeping bags. There was children’s medication in case I should need it. There were three different kinds of shampoo and conditioner. One for Duo, one for Zechs and one for the other four who hadn’t cared. There was bubble bath for Zechs and Quatre. And a big package of cotton wrapped elastic hair bands for Duo and Wufei. An all black package, Duo had insisted on it.

There were games and books and puzzles. There were even several stuffed animals. Two of which hadn’t been a real surprise. The other three on the other hand had been a big surprise when they’d been shyly set in the buggy. I’d had one bad moment when Heero had steered us in the direction of the electronics department. I was terrified the boys would find the Gundam Wing Videos and DVDs. I really didn’t want them asking about them. I wanted them to put that past behind them if they could. Luckily they had all been up high out of visual range of my Chibis and I’d made sure they stayed that way.

There were other things as well but I could barely remember them all now. And honestly I didn’t want to. I knew this was going to eat a huge chunk of my savings and we had barely skimmed the tip of the iceberg. But looking down at the six little Chibis in my care I couldn’t regret a penny of it.

There was one more person in line ahead of us when Quatre tapped me on the arm. I looked down and he motioned for me to come down closer.

I knelt down on the floor by him. “What’s the matter, honey?”

“This is for you. We knew we’d be expensive to take care of so we wanted to help out.” He put a plastic card in my hand and I stared at it. It was a Winner Foundation Gundanium credit card with my name on it. There was even a small 3D hologram of Sandrock down in one corner.

“Quatre, I can’t take this,” I told him. “I don’t mind the money.”

“We know. But we don’t want to be a burden on you either,” he said looking at me. “I mean we’re not going to be easy to take care of sometimes. And you’re already talking about a new car and a bigger place to live.”

“But honey we don’t even know if this would work even if I did want to use it,” I argued.

“It works, I checked mine as soon as I realized that things seemed different. It went through fine,” he told me. “I had this one done for you before we came. The Winner Corporation will pay the bill every month so this way if we need something right away there won’t be a problem. Please use it. It will make us feel better.” He reached out and touched my face. “You’re already giving us something money can’t buy anyway.”

I looked at him for a moment. I was beginning to wonder if I really was in an episode of the twilight zone. But if l were I’d play along until the men in the white coats came to take me away. I certainly wasn’t going to complain about the chance to spend time with my favorite Gundam boys even if they were Chibis.

“All right honey,” I hugged him in thanks. “For this first stuff, to get you all set up with me I’ll use it. But after that I only want to use it if we absolutely have to.”

He shook his head and smiled at me. “We knew Duo picked the right person when he showed us your website.”

I smiled and hugged him tighter. “I’m really tickled that out of all the people on the net that love the heck out of you, that you chose me. I’m sorry that we had to meet under these circumstances though.”

“It’s okay,” he whispered in my ear. “It’s a little inconvenient, but I think it’s kind of good too.”

I nodded at him in agreement and stood up seeing that we could start emptying the cart onto the conveyor belt for the cashier. I grabbed Duo just as he started to climb up onto it.

“Oh no you don’t young man. I can just see that braid getting caught in the belt,” I told him.

“I can wrap it around my neck,” he told me. “I was going to stand here so you could hand me things.” He frowned, his lower lip sticking out in a pout.

I tapped the pouty lip and laughed. “I appreciate it honey, but let me do this part, okay? You go down to the end when she starts ringing us up and every time she fills a bag and turns the rack you can take the full bag off and put it in the cart okay?”

He grinned. “Okay.”

I sighed and began to unload the buggy. None of the boys was really tall enough to reach and help me and I could tell they weren’t happy about that. But they stood quietly out of the way waiting for a moment when they could.

The lady at the register looked at the loaded conveyor belt as she began bringing my stuff forward and realized that I was only half done with emptying my cart.

“My, my,” she smiled at my Chibis. “I know some handsome young men who are getting spoiled today.”

I was surprised to see all my boys actually acknowledge the statement with varying degrees of smiles, running from Trowa’s tiny turn of the lips to Duo and Quatre’s huge grins.

“And we just started,” Duo laughed and hugged me tight.

Then he dashed down to the end of the register followed more sedately by Heero, Trowa, and Wufei. They all helped to load bags into a new cart, while Miro and Quatre stood in the now half full cart and helped me finish emptying the one we’d started with.

~*~*~*~*~*~

End Chapter 2