Arabian Nights Part 4
The Not-So-Innocents Abroad
"Uh-unh, Quatre, no way in hell am I getting on that thing!" Duo yelped, balking as the camel Quatre had fetched for him took a menacing--menacing in Duo's mind, anyway--step towards him.
"Would you rather walk through the desert, Duo?" Quatre replied drily, mounting his camel with ease. "It's not hard, Duo. Just think of it as a really ugly horse."
"You have got to be kidding. The damned thing spat at me, Quatre!"
Quatre sighed, lifted his leg over the hump of his camel without so much as touching it, and slipped off the animal in a single liquid movement. He walked over to where Duo stared warily at his mount. Quatre reached up and patted the beast's jowl, making soft clucking noises to calm it. "Stand easy, now." He ran his hand down the side of the animal. The camel, meanwhile, snorted amiably, as if to say he would stand easy all day, if that was what Quatre required.
Quatre looked back at Duo, almost scornfully. "Duo, he's gentle. You won't be hurt unless you're loud and move too quickly." // Like you always do, // Quatre thought, with an inward groan.
"Quatre, it ain't that easy," Duo said, with painstaking sincerity. "I've never been up this close to any animal bigger than a dog before."
Quatre sighed, then smiled at him. "Well, now you'll learn. He won't hurt you, Duo. You only have to show him who is boss." Quatre grinned mischievously. "That is, unless the God of Death is afraid to master a stupid animal?"
Heero, who was standing alongside to see them off, muffled a rare laugh, and Duo was immediately indignant, embarrassed at being shamed in front of Heero; the taunt was enough to get the American pilot on top of the camel, albeit with Quatre's help and still somewhat unsteady on the patient beast. They set out for Khamis Mushayt, leaving Wufei to follow along a different route to avoid detection; Heero and Trowa would prepare their troops and head for the mobile suit base to provoke OZ into action the next day, to set the major spin of their mission into operation.
~*~
After about half an hour of blissful silence under the searing Arabian sun, Duo obviously couldn't handle it any longer. "It's pretty hot, huh?" the American pilot piped up, his voice muffled under a thick layer of gauzy robes protecting his face from the sun. Only his eyes, flashing brilliantly bright as amethysts, showed beneath the black garment. Quatre wore a similar white djellaba over his battle fatigues.
"...Yes, Duo."
"Damned hot. Hotter than L2, even."
"You're the one who wanted to wear black, Duo," Quatre chided.
"How come I got stuck with the camel that doesn't have air-conditioning?" Quatre gritted his teeth.
"Oh?" he said, as amiably as he could manage, trying to keep the irony out of his voice. "If you're hot, Duo, maybe you should pray to Allah for snow."
Silence for an instant, then: "Is that insane statement supposed to cool me off?"
"No, Duo--"
"Because it isn't--"
"For Allah's sake, Duo, will you... just shut up?" Quatre asked in an exasperated laugh, urging his camel on faster to get a breeze. "We're on our way to assault the dictator of Khamis Mushayt, and all you can think about is getting a camel with air-conditioning."
"You have to admit, this sort of transportation would be a lot more appealing with air-conditioning. And if the camels didn't smell so bad, either. No air-conditioning and no air fresheners. Plus, there isn't a McDonald's in sight. This is a very backwards country, Quatre."
"Duo..."
"Hey, look, Quatre! A mirage of Trowa in Speedos!"
"Duo!!!"
~*~
Finally, after hours of a blazing sun added to by Duo's incessant and seeming unrelated topics of discussion (including why Quatre blushed every time Trowa walked into the room, how Quatre thought Heero hid a pistol in his spandex, how much wood a woodchuck could chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood, and other such nonsensical riddles and tongue twisters that strained Quatre's English), they finally arrived in Khamis Mushayt, passing through its gates easily as two Bedouin nomads coming in to buy supplies. In the end, the tedious journey had had its purpose. Quatre had eventually talked Duo into leaving off the missionary bit, and hiding his cross beneath his clothing. A Christian in Saudi Arabia was in a very dangerous position.
Duo was desperate to look through the city, but Quatre reined him in as they slid unobtrusively through the bustling market. Quatre watched carefully, noting the squadrons of armed uniformed OZ soldiers roaming the streets. For Duo's part, he seemed particularly disturbed by the child beggars. Quatre had to stop more than once for him to drop a good amount of money into the small, dirty hands of the orphans. In hushed English as they made their way, Quatre explained that the children were orphans of the Occupation, which had killed many of their parents.
The streets were dusty, but Duo was amazed. The young Arab orphans sang in voices that somehow managed to be both eerie and strangely sweet at the same time. They walked on their hands with tambourines held in their toes. They juggled, they put all the American frisbee jocks Duo had ever heard of to shame by spinning two and three of the plastic disks at the same time, on fingers, thumbs, noses. They did amazing acrobatic feats that Quatre was sure even Trowa would be envious of.
There were women, too, nomadic performers of all kinds, young men, women, children. To Duo they looked just like the orphans back on L2; bright, alive, and always dangerous. Some of the older ones wore semiautomatic rifles and submachine guns slung as casually over their shoulders as purses. The same kind of weapons Duo and Quatre themselves hid under their robes.
Suddenly, a blowing horn issued from the minaret tower at the southern edge of the city. Quatre automatically dropped to his knees in prayer, and he almost forgot about Duo.
The American pilot stood in awe, gaping at the sheer number of people that sank down to pray in the direction of Mecca.
He was jerked uncremoniously into the dirt, and Quatre hissed at him without looking up from the ground, "Litany, Duo. I suggest you pray that we get out of this country with our lives."
"... Right-o."
~*~
By the time the two of them reached their destination, it was twilight, darkening into evening. Killing first the heavyset security guards who prowled around the estate and then disabling the place's electronic surveillance system did not even amuse Duo enough to bring out the predatory smirk of Shinigami; Quatre thought perhaps that the importance of their work at hand in this country was too great for even Duo Maxwell to view as bloodsport.
With silenced pistols drawn, the two swept silently through the hosue, finally detecting signs of life in the master bedroom. (Duo whispered to Quatre before they entered that it sounded like Hamaar was "getting some"; Quatre was faintly relieved to see that Duo hadn't quite lost his sense of humor yet.)
As both Gundam pilots burst into the room, the sight of the strangely dressed and armed intruders was enough to send Hamaar's prostitutes screaming towards another room, into which Quatre promptly locked them after delivering a stern warning to be absolutely silent. The dictator attempted to grab a gun that was propped beside his bed, but Duo grabbed him, subdued him with a few blows, and dragged him into the center of the room, trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey with some drapery cord.
Quatre helped Duo prop the man up in a chair, then both pilots stood back a minute, assessing their dubious enemy. Behind all the soldiers and all the bluff, it seemed the dictator of Khamis Mushayt was quite a coward.
Hamaar shook his head nervously as the two soldiers stared at him, using his feet to try and cover his naked body with a sheet. "W-W-Who are you?" he managed to stutter in Arabic. "Do you work for the Iraqis? Are you with al' Babi?"
"The two most logical choices, I suppose," Quatre answered easily as he slipped his pistol back into his robs and pulled his semiautomatic from beneath his djellaba, straddling a chair opposite the dictator. Duo looked on in confusion, unable to understand the conversation, but Quatre merely gestured for him to sit and be quiet.
Glancing around, Quatre looked disgusted. "I admire your collection," he said, referring to the numerous weapons mounted on the wall. "Are they useful in your current line of work? Or are they trophies of your heroic service to your homeland?" he asked, his voice thick with sarcasm. "Speak English. I know you know it. How else would you speak with OZ generals?"
"I... I am a citizen of Saudi Arabia," Hamaar answered in English, cautiously.
"Yes," Quatre answered. "I'm amazed a man as low as you isn't begging in the dirt on your belly." He stood up and went to a wall, taking down a pistol and opening the cylinder. "Ah," he said, appreciatively. "Hollow-points." He began to point the gun around the room, then brought it to rest in Hamaar's direction.
Recoiling from Quatre, but trying to preserve some dignity, Hamaar answered. "I've been tortured before, by the Yemens!"
"Great," Quatre replied with a cheer that disturbed Duo just a little. "Then you know what to expect." Hamaar's dark face paled, and Quatre moved closer to him. "You are working with a man named Riyadh Sanaa, aren't you?"
Trying to give courage another shot, Hamaar replied, "Of course. Only a food would go against him." He looked at Quatre closer, trying to get a good look at him. "How old are you, boy?"
That brought the muzzle of the pistol to his temple, causing the dictator to whimper helplessly. "Since these are your weapons, you must know what they do," Quatre said quietly, a trace of his gentler voice coming back. "If I have to pull this trigger, there will not even be a chance for them to identify your body through dental records. I suggest you take this situation very seriously. Now... you maintain links with Sanaa through OZ forces. What are those nuclear weapons going to be used for?" Quatre cocked the gun.
"I--" The dictator shuddered with fear. "I would die for Saudi Arabia!"
"Correction. You will die for Saudi Arabia," Quatre assured him, somberly. "Unless you talk to me." Hamaar's fear grew more evident, causing Duo to suddenly cluck his tongue in sympathy. "Tsk, tsk, little man, you've never killed an armed man before, have you? The people you've murdered were tied up just like you are now. That's why you're afraid."
"They... they are going to be used as a deterrent!" Hamaar finally whimpered. "Put... put in the colonies... to threaten the terrorists. Operation Meteor! The ones from Operation Meteor! Colonies... going to be used as a sh-sh-shield!"
"And?" Quatre asked.
Duo pulled out his switchblade, a silver glimmer in the dim room. Violet eyes shone dangerously in the darkness. "And I think it's time for me to grab this guy by the throat, hold his head, and ram this switchblade through his eye, into his brain, and twist it around a little. Maybe do a little renovation upstairs. Whaddaya think, pal?" Shinigami remarked, almost casually. He took a menacing step forward.
"That's it! That's all! I don't know anything else! You hear me, you sick bastards?! I don't know anything else!" Hamaar broke in a shriek, sobbing uncontrollably. Duo looked back at Quatre, sardonic amusement twinkling in his jewel-colored eyes.
"You know what, buddy? I think the guy really doesn't know anything else."
TBC...
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