Okay, here is the first chapter of Road Trip that I promised. This is how things go on the space shuttle taking the two to earth. And of course, how they run into plenty of trouble. Enjoy! ;o

"Ignorance is mankind’s greatest enemy."-Anonymous

Disclaimer: The characters of Gundam Wing are not mine, but the story is so don’t copy it kay? ^_^’

* Indicates thought

Hilde and Duo stood in the spaceport waiting for their flight to arrive. When Duo started fidgeting in the seat Hilde had managed to get him in, she thought *Oh no, he’s starting to get impatient*. When he started to stand up, Hilde yanked on his braid and pulled him back into his seat. "Ouch! Hilde, let me up," he whined. "We’ve been sitting here for five whole minutes!"

"I know that it’s hard for you, but you’re doing a really good job. Just please don’t get up," she begged. Duo looked down at her pleading eyes, sighed then sat back down rolling his eyes and putting on a very recognizably bored look. As soon as he sat down, a voice came over the speakers announcing the arrival of the shuttle that would take Duo and Hilde to earth. Hilde suspired in relief and then gathered her belongings.

She and Duo stood up and started down the long walkway to the shuttle door. Hilde handed the attendant two tickets (she didn’t trust Duo with his own). The attendant gave Hilde a confused look and said, "I’m sorry, are you expecting someone else?"

Hilde gave the flight attendant a baffled look and said, "One is ticket for me, and one is for my friend," she said slowly. The attendant looked at her like she was crazy. Hilde’s eyes became wide realization. She whirled around and became sick, as she couldn’t see Duo anywhere in the throng of people gathering anxiously behind her.

Suddenly a voice was heard over the speakers. "Hey Hildey! Where are ya? Hey, what’re you doing…" Hilde slammed through the crowd behind her knocking anyone in her way down. She raced toward the desk by the boarding entry and saw Duo trying to wrestle a microphone away from another man. She caught a glimpse of the nametag on the man’s shirt with the word "Manager" in bold letters.

"Duo!" she shrieked. Duo looked over at Hilde, let go of the microphone, then bounded over to her. She glared at him then to the manager she said, "I’m so sorry."

The manager replied, "That’s…ur…quite all right. But you two had better leave if you want to catch your plane."

Hilde thanked the man, grabbed Duo and raced back to the almost closed boarding door and jumping in just in time." What were you doing?" she hissed angrily at him.

He looked innocently at her and said, "I got lost, and I thought if I just used the microphone…"

"Whatever, I don’t want to hear anymore," she cut him off. They made their way to the back of the shuttle and took the last two seats in the back. Hilde climbed in first next to the window, and Duo sat next to her nearest the aisle.

She started pulling out a magazine when Duo’s eyes lit up and he said, "Hilde, I’ll be right back." Before she could say anything, he got up and started walking toward a vacant bathroom. Hilde watched him very carefully making sure that he didn’t cause any trouble. Seeing that nothing happened, she went to reading her magazine. She didn’t hear the voice over the speaker say, "Buckle up, we are now preparing for take off." She did however hear the door where Duo had gone in open, and she also heard the shuttle start to power up preparing for its take off. She saw Duo strolling toward his seat. He was just about to turn to scoot into the seat, but he was suddenly thrown back as the shuttle blasted off. She heard him bang into the wall at the back of the shuttle. She shook her head slightly not knowing whether to laugh, or yell at him. She decided to just ignore him as he crawled back to his seat.

Duo remained in his seat for the next hour much to Hilde’s surprise. And even more surprisingly, he was entertaining himself by staring into space. But upon closer observation, she realized that he was watching the shuttle’s movie intently. "Duo, you’re supposed to put on the earphones so you can hear what’s going on."

He shrugged and said, "Don’t need ‘em." He was referring his ability to read lips, a skill he picked up training to become a Gundam pilot. She just sighed and decided not to push her luck.

The next time she looked up, he was asleep with his face pointing up towards the ceiling and his mouth hanging wide open. She cringed and thought *That looks like a painful way to sleep* But, she settled on not waking him. She felt a little tired herself. She started drifting off to sleep, but was brought back to conscious from a loud snore coming from somewhere. The snore came again, and Hilde conceived that Duo was making the terrible noise. She tried to ignore it, but couldn’t when the next one came (which was very much louder than the last ones) and everyone on the shuttle was turning to look at them, she shoved on of the travel pillows in his face and turned over to go to sleep.

A little while later Duo was awakened by one of the flight attendants. "Excuse me sir," she said, "would you and your wife like something to drink?" Duo gave her a dumfounded look, then noticed that Hilde was sleeping very comfortably on his shoulder. He smiled down at her. He had a strange new sensation as he watched her, one that he always felt, just never so strongly before. "Sir?" The attendant asked bringing him back to reality.

"No thanks," he told her.

"Okay, you had better get your stuff together, we will be landing soon."

Duo thanked her once more then put on an evil grin. He put his face real close to Hilde’s face and whispered, "Hildey, time to wake up!" She shook her head a bit before opening her sleepy eyes.

She focused on a pair of large cobalt eyes staring at her when she woke. She gave a small yelp and jumped back. Duo sat back down in his chair with a victorious grin on his face. Hilde glowered at him then blushed as she realized that the people on the shuttle had once again turned around to stare at the two. When everyone tuned around and faced the front, she gave Duo’s braid a hard yank.

They made their way down the stairs from the shuttle to the large asphalt run way. Hilde went in front of Duo and stood at the bottom waiting for him. He came down carrying a big suitcase full of junk that he hadn’t even bothered to use on the flight. The suitcase was in front of him, and blocked his vision of the stairs making him unfortunately miss the last step and land flat on his face. Hilde laughed as she helped him up. "That wasn’t funny," Duo whined.

"Yes it was. Besides, its your own fault, I told you to pack lightly," she replied as they walked toward the earth’s spaceport. After waiting for half an hour for their luggage, they left for the front part of the building. "Relena said there’d be someone here for us, but I don’t see anyone…"

"There," Duo said pointing to a man carrying a large sign that read: Duo and Hildey. Hilde blushed and Duo snickered at the sign. They started toward to man. "Here we are," Duo told the man holding the sign.

"Follow me," The man said. They followed him out to a taxi, and he put their luggage in the back.

When he got into the car, Duo said, "So, where’re we going?"

"I was told that I was tell you to go to the Palace Inn," the man told them. "That is, right after we go pick up your car."

"Our car?" Duo said. "Well I hardly know you, but thanks!"

"Duo you idiot, it’s being rented," Hilde snapped.

"I knew that," Duo told her matter-of-factly. All the way to the car rental place, Duo kept asking the driver stupid questions like what his favorite color was, where he first learned to drive, etc. Hilde kept trying to shut him up, but Duo ignored her every time. She finally gave up all together and decided to apologize to the man later.

"Are we there yet?" Duo asked for the zillionth time.

"Yes, we are here!" snapped the driver. Quickly ushering the two out of his car, speedily giving them their luggage and driving off before Hilde got the chance to apologize.

"Oh well," she sighed. After what seemed to be hours for Duo of waiting while Hilde filled out all the forms she had to, they where given their car.

"Duo, could you go get us some directions to this Palace Inn place?" Hilde asked filling out two more forms that had been forgotten to begin with.

"No," he replied bluntly.

"What? Why not?" Hilde asked crossly.

"Guys don’t ask for directions," he replied. Hilde rolled her eyes and finished the last paper.

"Fine, I’ll ask, you copy them down somewhere." He shrugged and picked up the pen on the counter to write it down.

With the car rented, and the directions written down, Duo and Hilde set off for the hotel. "Duo, were do we go now?" Hilde asked him. Duo pulled out the paper, and held it up. That was a big mistake as it flew out the open window. "Duo?"

He looked sheepishly over at her, "Um…sorry?" he said.

Between Hilde’s screams at him and whacking him on the head, he managed to remember enough of the directions to get them to the hotel. She walked into her room and sat heavily on her bed preparing on immediately falling asleep. That episode with Duo had tired her out. She lay back on the pillows not bothering to change, or even pull back the covers for that matter. She was about to fall asleep when the sound of an incoming call coming from the hotel’s vid-phone. She groaned in frustration, picked herself up, then walked over to the phone turning on the transmission.

Relena’s face appeared on the screen. "Oh, good, I was afraid that you got lost," she said letting out a sigh of relief.

"We were thanks to Duo," Hilde remarked smugly.

Relena’s eyes got wide. "I’m sorry to hear that."

"You have no idea," Hilde muttered. "So Relena, where do we go from here. I don’t remember where you said you live."

"Uh, well tomorrow, you’ll be going here," she said sending here a map over their vid-phone with an x indicating where they would go. "You’ll stay at the hotel there. I’ll send you the map now." She sent it via computer to Hilde.

"That’s fine, but that doesn’t answer my question. I asked where you live," Hilde objected.

Relena sweat dropped then said, "Listen Hilde, this is your vacation. Enjoy it and don’t worry about where you’re going. Just remember you’ll get there."

"Huh? What’s that supposed to mean?" Hilde asked genuinely confused.

"Um, never mind. Hey, you’ll be passing the Grand Canyon. I hear it’s beautiful. Why don’t you stop there, it is on your way." Relena suggested before ending the transmission.

"Wait! Relena!" Hilde yelled as Relena logged off. "Arggh!!" She yelled again in frustration. *That Relena!* she thought angrily. *What has she got up her sleeve?*

Flames? Comments? E-mail me at: slvrgirl@pacbell.net