"Bad Company"

Written By: Clara Barton & Kangofu_CB

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing. The following is an intellectual exercise with no intention of profit. That said, these characterizations, words, and situations are mine. Please ask before reprinting.

Rating: NC 17

Warnings: Post-Canon, Undercover Missions, Undercover as a Couple, Implied/Referenced Torture, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Human Trafficking, Gang Violence

Pairings: 3x2

Summary: "The only hell and the only paradise are the ones we build ourselves." - Unknown

This fic is dark. It explores the way the lines between good and bad, black and white are blurred, for those who work from the inside to bring down the bad guys. Clara and I do not, at any point, get graphic in our descriptions, but there is a lot of sensitive subject matter. We have tagged as clearly as possible, and individual chapters will contain individual warnings. As a general rule this fic contains: implied torture, death, description of a human trafficking organization and its methods, the surrounding implications of human trafficking including forced prostitution and what amounts to slavery, drug and alcohol use, and drug trafficking. We understand that these subjects are not for everyone. We have made every effort to be respectful and accurate without being gratuitous or disturbing. The bad guys are bad. The good guys are, sometimes, not much better.

We use a liberal sprinkling of Spanish and Russian in this fic, and neither of us are native speakers of either. We’ve relied heavily on the internet, and so we apologize for any mistakes. We have also included translations at the end of each chapter in the form of footnotes.

"Bad Company"

Chapter 4: The Man Comes Around

And I looked, and behold a pale horse

And his name that sat on him was Death,

and hell followed with him.

- Johnny Cash

 

 

Duo was in Howard's office when the call from Sinaloa came in, due to absolute, sheer coincidence.

He'd known, of course, that the call was coming.  Had expected it. Had told Howard to expect it, when he'd turned up on his ship like a bad penny, asking for his help with yet another job, asking him to put his neck out and stake his reputation and help Duo again, like he'd done during the war, had done for years since.

Howard had just shaken his head, peering at him over his sunglasses.

"Gonna get yourself killed one of these days, kid.  Especially playing in the sandbox with the likes of her ."

But he'd let Duo in, had given him the usual bunk, the usual jobs, and the usual courtesy.  

There was no love lost between Mike Howard and Alessandra Vasiliev.  It wasn't common knowledge, exactly, but Howard avoided dealing with her if he could, and since they didn't have many overlapping ventures, it wasn't usually an issue.  He'd avoided her predecessor as well, for the most part.

But now Duo was asking him to make himself available to her, and he would do it, strictly for love of Duo.  

And Trowa.

But Duo wasn't ready to contemplate that just yet.

He was in Howard's office upgrading the security protecting his electronic network when the vidphone rang.  Instinctively, Duo moved himself and his laptop - custom and battered and Frankensteined together to Duo's exact specifications - to an unseen corner of the room, still mostly focused on his project.

Until he heard the crisp, dulcet tones of a barely-there Russian accent.

His head snapped up in attention, but Howard didn't even cut his eyes in Duo's direction.

The call was even a bit earlier than he'd anticipated.

Certainly, Zechs had given Trowa a two-week timeframe, but Duo knew that even in the best of circumstances, manipulating the players this deep in the long game was nothing at all like moving chess pieces, that they required coaxing and soothing and sideways problem-solving, and he'd frankly expected to hang around Howard's waiting long after the deadline.

It had only been 9 days.

Duo was begrudgingly impressed.

"Mr. Howard," she greeted, and Duo could almost hear the smirk on her face.  

"Good afternoon," Howard responded, and Duo was impressed at how fast the man had done the time change calculation in his head.  "How can I be of assistance to Sinaloa, Gospozha Vasiliev?"

It took all of Duo's self-control not to snort.  He went back to his electronic tinkering, not wanting to be anything of a distraction to the other man.  Howard was an expert negotiator, had been running the Sweeper group for years before Duo had even come along, and he didn't need Duo's help or his commentary to do it now.  He knew what they were after, and he knew how to make it work. Duo just had to stay out of his way.

"I find myself in need of replacement phones."  There was a pause. "It seems that la policia -" the word came out derisively, "-have discovered how to trace our tracking system.  We would like some that are... significantly more difficult to manipulate."

Howard made a considering noise.  "How many?"

The cartel used smartphones to communicate with and track their victims.  Handlers were assigned a fair number of phones and workers, and the girls (or, less often, boys) were sent out with a smartphone while on jobs.  They served multiple purposes - the phones could be used to track the merchandise and make sure they weren't anywhere they weren't supposed to be, like a police station, but apps also made it easy to set up meetings, locations, and exchange payment.  Cash was old school, and no one used it anymore. The workers could keep it, squirrel it away, say they'd been underpaid or not paid at all, stealing from the Cartel and funding their own escape.

"Five hundred, to start with.  If they meet our needs, you can expect a request for more."

Howard shrugged.  It was small potatoes for him, but keeping the head of a large, violent organization happy with him and his work was always to his advantage, and they both knew it.

Duo suspected if he hadn't been asking for Howard's help, he'd have declined the job anyway.

"How soon do you need them?"

Howard's tech guys could crack and reconfigure a cellphone in minutes.  

"At your leisure, Mr. Howard.  We are not so vulnerable as to be undermined by cellphones.  They are simply convenient."

Duo smirked again.  He doubted that was the case.  Still. It didn't do to show any weaknesses to outsiders.   

It often didn't do to show weakness to insiders.  He'd read what Vasiliev had done to the previous Cartel leader.

And what Salome had done to his remaining supporters.

Duo listened with half an ear as they negotiated pricing, Howard reassuring her that he could easily accommodate her needs by the time the week was out, if she were willing to pay a bit more for the rush.

She was.

Duo let out a silent sigh of relief.

"I think we can come to a mutually beneficial arrangement, señora , if there's nothing else?"

There was another, pregnant pause.  "I suppose, while the opportunity is available to me, it would behoove me to ask you for a recommendation."

"Oh?"

Tense with anticipation, Duo gave up all pretense of fiddling with the computer, staring blankly at the wall ahead of him, careful not to draw Howard's attention.  It wouldn't behoove them to let Alessandra Vasiliev know that someone else was in the room, listening to their conversation.

"There is an employment opportunity that has recently become available within our ranks."  Another moment of silence, and Duo pictured the calculating look on her face. "We find ourselves in need of an electronic security expert.  Our last candidate was... lacking."

Howard looked at her in mock surprise.  Duo had told him exactly what to expect Sinaloa to request, and this was it.

"I wouldn't expect someone of your position to put up with a less than ideal employee for long."

"Yes, well.  It has been resolved."  The way she said resolved put Duo in mind of truck batteries and waterboarding.  "I was given to understand that your technicians are excellent."

They were, because Howard expected them to be, and because one of Duo's tasks, when he was hanging around on jobs, was to make sure they stayed that way.

In front of the vidphone, Howard grinned.

The negotiations after that were somewhat different, Howard leading Vasiliev around to what he wanted to offer her, subtle and roundabout, asking her what sort of security she needed done, if it were temporary or permanent, ensuring that, in the end, he only had one viable candidate.

Duo.

"Well, I've got a guy here, real good.  I think he'll suit you. Gets seasick like you wouldn't believe - he'd probably be happy to come give your beachside resort a look, see what you've got to offer.  He's a little rough around the edges, but he knows his way around a mainframe. I can have him deliver your new toys, and you can see what you think?"

"Yes, send him.  We will see how well he suits us."

His relief was so intense, Duo felt lightheaded with it.

He was going to get to Trowa, and god help every fucker that got in his way.

*

Duo was lounging on a surprisingly comfortable white leather chaise in the front room of the hacienda when Alessandra Vasiliev walked in with her entourage.

Their stunned surprise gave him plenty of opportunity to observe them at will, and his gaze skipped over them quickly, cataloging impressions. Vasiliev was dressed in a flowing, grey silk dress, looking for all the world like she belonged in a cabana at one of her high-end resorts, except for the cruel edge to her smile and the look in her eyes. To her right was Salome, in leather and fishnets, and the contrast was jarring. There were Goons 1 and 2, and Duo gave them barely a glance, just noting the sure way they held themselves, the aborted motions they made that indicated they were armed, and dismissed them just as quickly.  He recognized the first one from the briefing - Anhil. Vasiliev's favorite muscle.

And then Trowa.

Duo drank him in, as much as he was able, greedy eyes taking in every detail.

He looked awful.

Well, physically, he looked good. Great. Trowa always looked amazing.

But his eyes were flat and dead, his face impassive.

Duo knew the look. Recognized it.

Hated it.

"What the fuck are you doing here?"

Duo smirked at him. Trowa always did know how to make an entrance.

"Nice to see you too, asshole." He stood languidly and stretched. "Howard sends his regards."

Vasiliev watched them, the barest hint of a smirk on her lips. "Howard sent you, hmm? Can you prove it?"

"I'm here, aren't I? Your security sucks, by the way." He eyeballed her pretty boy bodyguards with disdain. He nudged the large shipping crate at his feet.  "I brought your merchandise, as promised."

She seemed to find him vaguely amusing. That was good. It was always better to be entertaining in addition to being useful.  It kept him alive longer, usually.

"Search him," she murmured to Goon 2.

He only made it a few steps before a razor-sharp blade was embedded in the floor between his feet. He froze.

"Yeah... put your hands on me, and you'll be learning to jerk off with your elbows."

He turned back to Vasiliev, fingering a second blade. "In the interest of full disclosure, I am, in fact, armed and dangerous, and I don't play well with others."

"Ah, but lisichka , surely you understand our caution. You could be wearing a wire - you could be anyone.  Naturally, we need to be reassured."

Duo stared her down just for a moment, long enough to make it clear the acquiescence was his choice, his concession.  Then he jerked his chin towards Trowa.

"I'll let him pat me down."

"I take it you two know each other.  Are you friends?" She made the words sound obscene in a way that caused Duo's stomach to churn unpleasantly.

"No."  The word was flat, final when Trowa answered, though Duo wasn't entirely sure if he was answering her question or responding to Duo's demand.

Duo shrugged, gave that 'aw shucks' look that came so naturally to him. The one that said he was harmlessly fun, easygoing and relaxed, when he was in fact none of those; never was, but especially not in enemy territory. "Yeah, we know each other.  Piloted together, you could say. Isn't that right, 03?" Trowa flinched. "But no, we're not what I'd call friends ."

They'd been coworkers, and partners, and fuckbuddies, and lovers, but they weren't friends.

Alessandra was looking at him more speculatively now, eyes glittering in anticipation.  She nodded towards Trowa.

Obviously frustrated, Trowa stalked over to Duo, jerking to a stop in front of him and refusing to meet his eyes.  

Up close, he looked even worse, haunted and gaunt, as he checked Duo over roughly, no effort made for his comfort.

He was just as pissed as Duo had expected him to be.  He very carefully didn't sigh in exasperation. Duo didn't really give a shit if Trowa was happyto see him, but he was going to drag the other man out of this clusterfuck alive, kicking and screaming if need be, and there wasn't a damn thing Trowa could do about it.

So he simply stood there, passively, his body swaying slightly from the force behind Trowa's grip, staring at Alessandra, who looked mildly bored and a lot dangerous.  And Salome, whose face reflected a disconcerting sort of excitement over all the banked violence in the room.

Duo was willing to play along, at least for now, submitting to this ridiculous humiliation, this effort to show him who was boss.  As if it weren't obvious that Alessandra held all the cards. As though he needed to be reminded who was going to order their deaths if they fucked even one thing up. Likely their drawn-out, excruciatingly painful deaths. He remained complacent, the picture of serene boredom.

Until Trowa got a little too frisky, and not a bit gentle, in his search, and Duo figured that, even just for appearances' sake, he couldn't let that slide.

Trowa took the knee to his chest gracelessly, falling back onto his heels, giving Duo a dark look even as he swept a leg out to trip him up, sending Duo tumbling to the floor beside him.

It was like a flipped switch, and then they were on each other, punches thrown and elbows checked. Trowa was obviously furious and Duo darkly determined, neither of them willing to cede ground. Belatedly, laughter broke through the haze of fury and punishment, leaving them sprawled, bloodied and panting, looking up at Vasiliev.

"Welcome to Sinaloa." She paused, waiting on Duo to introduce himself.

"Duo," he reached up to wipe the blood from his nose, "Duo Maxwell."

She hummed thoughtfully.  "Welcome, Pilot 02. When Howard says he will send the best, he does not exaggerate.  You reputation precedes you."

He grinned fiercely as he stood, ignoring Trowa as the taller man climbed to his feet beside him.

*

It didn't take long for Duo to fall into a routine at the compound. Well, what passed for routine there, where the hacienda was sleepy and sluggish between shipments, and then a buzzing nest of hornets whenever anything important happened.

There was an initial settling in period where Duo dumped all of Marco's handiwork in a loud fit of disgust, replacing it with his own system, easing up on the restrictions Marco had placed on the computer usage, preferring instead to monitor it all from his position at the top of the network.

In one fell swoop, he drew attention, improved the process, and engendered himself to the others, all by just doing more than a half-assed job.

Well, except for Matvei. It was hard to get in the good graces of a man you'd once hurled a knife at.

But overall, it was a tactic he excelled at.

Trowa blended. That was his specialty. He fell in with the group and chameleoned his way into positions of importance but not authority, then disappeared when the shit hit the fan.

Duo was all showmanship and sleight of hand, distracting the crowd while he performed the subterfuge. Or everything blew up. Literally.

They were an excellent team.

Or should have been, but Trowa was encased in ice, ignoring him in a rage of dark fury and bruised hurt.

That was fine. He was in Duo's sight and within touching range, and that was good enough.

For now.

Once the networking had been sorted - all under the watchful eye of Salome, who knew a bit more about what she was looking at than she liked to let on - it was time for some reconnaissance.

He started working out in the mornings, on whatever part of the grounds appealed to him that day.

It was a trick he'd picked up from Heero, of all people, though Duo had adapted the habit to his purposes.

Heero actually did it to keep in shape, for example, whereas Duo used it as a spying tactic.

It was amazing, really, how people ignored a man doing an intense exercise routine as though he didn't have eyes and ears. It was like being part of the landscape. Duo had learned any number of things just from being in the right place at the right time while doing sit-ups. Regular runs around the grounds revealed holes in the perimeter, patrol schedules and guard rotations.

And not one single person seemed to think anything about Duo's near-religious devotion to physical exertion.  It was almost too easy.

Not that Duo was stupid enough to think anything about this assignment was easy.  

There was a recent stain on the floor of a certain shed at the edges of the property that told him everything he needed to know about how things went down in Sinaloa.

He was sitting at his desk, reviewing data packets from the night before, when Salome appeared, as she often did, with no warning, like a particularly venomous snake perched on the edge of his workstation.  Today, she was garbed in a leather mini skirt, gold coin belt, and a mesh shirt with nothing underneath.

If Duo were the type to be interested, she'd have made a very attractive picture.  Except for the cold look in her eyes, the one that said she was thinking of your especially-painful death.

Duo took off his headphones and looked up at her, eyebrow raised in query.  He hadn't quite figured out his play with her. Was beginning to suspect there might not be one.

"What are you doing, lisichka ?"

He gestured at the screen.  "Data in, data out. I gave everyone a network ID, so now I see what they do with their time.  Most of it's shitty porn." To his right, one of the other enforcers snorted to himself, and across the room, Trowa's shoulders stiffened.

Duo had already heard the rumors of what he apparently liked to get up to in his spare time, mentioned to him in snickering whispers, Duo rolling his eyes the entire time.  He was more than familiar with Trowa's preferences, and he recognized some dumbshit Preventers' idea of a fucking joke.

"For example," Duo drawled, "user TM167 - that's Tomas, by the way -" the man in question flinched from his position on the couch, one of the ever-present palomniks lounging with her feet in his lap, "has a near-devout dedication to 'Backdoor Babes', which has already subjected my firewall to no less than four poorly-designed malware viruses."  He paused. "You should probably add subscriptions to their benefit packages."

Salome snorted in what passed for amusement from her.  "Alessandra wants to see you."

Duo stood to follow her, ignoring the eyes on his back, certain that at least one of the stares boring into him was Trowa's.

Alessandra's office was sumptuous and imposing, and exactly what he'd expected from a woman of her reputation.  She was seated behind an enormous desk, reclining back in her chair and watching him when he walked in.

Always, there was the contrast between her and Salome, dark to light, businesswoman to, well, whatever Salome was, Alessandra wearing a sleeveless white blouse so thin it was nearly sheer, tucked into wide-legged trousers.  The look of a powerful CEO, compared to Salome's hedonism. Duo wondered how much of it was for effect.

Probably all of it.

He stood, waiting for an invitation to sit.

Duo had learned that lesson the hard way, once, on another op.  Better to stand and wait.

Salome draped herself over one of the plush, leather chairs next to him.

"Ah, lisichka, how are you enjoying our accommodations?"

"Better than the bunk on the Sweeper ship I'd been hugging the toilet in," he answered easily.  They'd assigned him a room on the second floor, a few doors down from Trowa, with a single bed and a small table.  He couldn't quite see the coast from his window, but he could hear it, if he left the window open at night. Which he did, because the heat was oppressive.

Alessandra's lips quirked, minutely, at his response.  "And the work? Is it to your liking?"

Duo shrugged.  "It's fine, now that I got the network straightened out.  Nothin' out of the ordinary."

Other than the data worm he'd buried at the very bottom of the code, covered in security protocols and data packets and network IDs and a sophisticated rootkit, which was collecting every shred of information in the system for later delivery to Preventers.  Even if Duo and Trowa died on this op - and Duo ruthlessly quashed that thought - Preventers would be able to obtain the information. If Duo wasn't around to input the routine coding, the virus was setup to automatically deliver whatever data it had collected to Preventers for review.

He was rather proud of it.

"I have a... task for you."  Her dark eyes were challenging as she gazed at him over the expansive glass desktop.

Duo had already been tested several times since he'd arrived at the compound.  Salome hovering over his shoulder as he established the network and programmed the security features had been the mildest of them.

He'd been questioned and scrutinized, and he'd had no less than three fist fights - though that could have been due to his reputation rather than any sort of subterfuge. One of the younger enforcers had even tried to hack the system, which Duo had found endlessly amusing.

But this, whatever it was, was the final goal post - the thing that had Alessandra deciding whether he was worth the trouble, or sending him packing back to Howard's ship.

Or worse.

He was rather attached to his digits, and he had no doubt she'd relieve him of them if he screwed up.

Duo forced himself to look eager. This was his opportunity, his chance to make inroads with Alessandra. His time to shine.  Any idiot could set up a relatively secure network.

Marco had, after all.

Not that it had ended well for him.  Duo'd heard those stories as well.  That he'd dropped the ball, allowed some sort of malware into the system, that another cartel had gotten a peek at the delivery schedule and fucked the intake. A leak that had allowed the L3 police to raid the Cartel's cargo shuttle, pulling 167 colonials and hundreds of thousands of dollars in drugs off the ship.

Alessandra had not been pleased.

Then, they'd reviewed the system and found his emergency fund squirreled away, along with a dozen other all-too-convenient holes in the system that had allowed rival gangs easy access to Sinaloa's money, schedule, and electronic network.

Duo wondered how much of it had been manufactured by Trowa.

Marco's death had been bad by even Cartel standards.

"You are familiar with the Snakeheads?"

Duo nodded.  They were a rapidly-expanding rival organization, originally based out of L5 but looking to gain territory, and Sinaloa had had a few run-ins with them already, before the clusterfuck on L3.

"I owe them recompense for the insult they have issued.  There are many means of destroying such arrogance, but I plan to repay them in kind for their audacity."

"What do you need me to do?"

*

Duo stopped by the kitchen on his way back to the main room, grabbing snacks he'd insisted on purchasing soon after his arrival.

He'd spent all of one week watching Trowa ghost around the place, avoiding him and unwilling to meet his eyes before he'd had enough of that.  Duo knew all of the other man's weaknesses, and if Trowa thought he was going to get off lightly, pretending Duo didn't exist and ducking under his radar, he was sadly mistaken.

"Hey, payaso ," Trowa glared up at him from the corner of the room he'd been sequestering himself in, obviously unwilling to leave until Duo came back, and simultaneously irritated about it.

Duo flung the object in his hands at him, hard enough to hurt if Trowa hadn't reached up and reflexively caught it before it hit him.

Sitting down at his desk, Duo pretended not to notice Trowa staring down at the perfect, shiny honeycrisp apple in his hands.

You couldn't hide from someone who knew everything about you.

He kept pretending not to notice as Trowa got up to follow Anhil out of the room, leaving to do whatever it was the two of them did all day, apple in hand, his face a thundercloud.  

Trowa didn't come back for the rest of the day, not even when he usually returned to the hacienda for dinner and a beer, and no one else spoke to Duo either, clearly concerned he'd been called to task and unwilling to be associated with him for fear of going down with the ship.

Which suited Duo just fine.

Later, much later, after the sun had gone down and the oppressive heat of the day had eased, Duo went out to the pool deck, looking to escape the equally-stifling atmosphere inside the house.  He'd changed into his shorts and snagged a towel on his way out, thinking that a cool glide through the water was probably exactly what he needed to ease the tension in his shoulders.

He wasn't expecting to find Trowa doing exactly the same thing, approaching the deck from the other direction, from somewhere on the dark edges of the property. He equally wasn't expecting for them to stumble onto Alessandra and Salome enjoying the pool more... intimately.

Duo didn't even notice them at first, he was so distracted by Trowa's appearance in the darkness, the two of them glaring at each other from where they'd come to a halt on opposite sides of the sundeck.

Trowa's eyes trailed over him belligerently, and it was everything Duo could do not to fire off some smart-assed remark, instead standing placidly, letting him look.

Maybe he was as starved for sight of Duo as Duo had been for a glance of him.

"There's literally nowhere I can go to get away from you, is there?"

Or maybe he was just an asshole.

" Payaso , I've been doing my job all day, in the house, where I always am. I'm not that hard to hide from."

Trowa's eyes tightened at the nickname, one Duo had been using for years, a reminder of their history together, one that he could use that would be meaningless to the others.  Or maybe he was flinching at Duo's jab, at his clear implication that Trowa would be hiding from him .

Either way, Duo was damned if he was going to let Trowa forget what he was here for.  

The taller man sneered at him.  "I'm not hiding, lisichka ." The word was bitterly sarcastic, rolling from Trowa's lips, his accent perfect. "I just don't like you."

"Yeah, well, feeling's mutual, pal," Duo muttered, ignoring the sharp bite of Trowa's words.  The other man had never pulled any of his punches, verbal or otherwise, and Duo didn't expect him to start now, when he was angry and hurting and miserable.

To his right came a deep sigh of disappointment, and both he and Trowa whirled reflexively to find their employer leaning on the edge of the pool, Salome tucked up against her side.

"If I wanted to listen to a lovers' spat, I would have turned on Telemundo , no?"

Disentangling herself from Salome, she glided over to the pool stairs and began climbing up, which was when Duo realized she was naked, sheets of water falling down her body with every step she took.

" Lisichka , a towel, if you please."  

Wordlessly, Duo held his out, carefully keeping his eyes above her collarbone.  Unsurprisingly, she seemed to find his discomfort amusing. Salome followed her out of the water, strolling across the deck with a complete lack of concern for her nakedness, and Duo didn't look at her at all .  

"Work out your differences, gentlemen.  Or we will work them out for you."

The two of them disappeared into the private entrance that led straight into the hacienda's large master bedroom.

Well.  That explained a lot.

When Duo turned back around, Trowa was gone.

Chapter 5

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