Hi!!!  Well, I'm back to 3x4 for a bit.  This fic has been sitting on my drive for a while.  I decided I really needed to get it finished before I start anything else.  Let me know what you think.

Warnings:  Weirdness, Yaoi, Lemon (eventually)  Some OOC for the supporting characters.

Dedicated to *kelley*!  Such a wonderful friend!  Thanks for betaing this oh so long ago and I'll send you more soon!

Gestalt 1

By Caer

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"He checked himself in?"

"I know it's hard to believe."  The pudgy guard opened yet another security door, sliding his access card and waiting for the lock to give with a thick "cachunk".  Trowa jumped slightly and felt a little ill at the unfamiliar yet sickening sound of the heavy security locks echoing through the bland white hallways as they made their way around a corner to yet another door.

'Is there no end to these doors?' he wondered as he had lost count of the amount of times he had heard the same heavy thunk of a new security lock.  'Maybe this is my hell.' He thought.  'My own unending tesseract of pristine hallways and ugly white doors with this rotund and overly cliché guard.' 

As if the guard sensed his thoughts, he interrupted them to continue his bland iterations.

"Weird kid from the start.  But everybody loves him."

"What happened?"  Trowa ventured.

"Well, no one's quite sure."  The man pulled a rather flat, disturbingly curved candy bar from his back pocket and ripped it open with his teeth as he ran his card through yet another access pad to yet another door.  Trowa blanched at the increasingly sickening sound.  It didn't help that the guard offered to share his butt-sculpted chocolate, holding it up with grubby, chubby fingers.  Trowa shook his head.  They continued.

"Best guess is he couldn't handle his old man's fortune.  Poor kid's heir to the whole damn mess.  The sisters, the fortune, the blood-sucking lawyers, the media leech-balls.  Figured he couldn't take it.  I sure as hell couldn't."

Another door.

"So, he up and left.  Left a nice letter for his daddy and popped in here with a good old fashioned 'multiple personality disorder'."

"You mean he's faking it?"

"Heh!  Oh god no.  He's a genuine head case all right.  We've got the reports to prove it.  Damn beaurocracy.  Swear to god, more of old man Winner's money's spent on the paperwork than his own son."

Trowa sighed in relief as they reached a gate to take them underground and to the next building.  As long as there were no more damn doors for a while.  He raised an eyebrow as he saw some of the chocolate that coated the man's fingers, transfer to the gate.  'Funny, everything is so clean.  There's no one around, but someone must be cleaning it up.' He thought.

"Is he dangerous at all?"

"What?  Oh no, no, no."  The man chuckled as they made their way along the gray sub-hall.  "He's a pacifist ya know.  That boy's the gentlest soul you'll ever meet.  It's probably better that he's here than out there.  Wouldn't hurt a fly although…"

"Although?"  Trowa pressed.

The guard shook his head and laughed.

"Nah.  Better that you find out yourself.  He's safe.  We don't let the psych students work with the dangerous ones."

They entered a building that was a bit homier than the research center they had just left.  Trowa looked around as they passed through an open area.  There were various activity centers around the walls.  Some were simple and child-like games like felt boards and puppets, but they were contrasted by incredibly challenging games and activities as well.  There was an old tattered and overrun bookshelf with every thing from "The Pokey Little Puppy" and "Winnie the Pooh" all the way to "Tartuffe" and "Don Quixote." 

 

Trowa smiled.  'Maybe they understand his windmills'

"This is the dorm compound."  The guard handed him a folder he had gotten from the nurse at the desk. 

"That's a Quatre Raberba Winner's file.  For this month anyway.  Anything else, you can access online."

Trowa nodded.  The guard continued as he took them down a hall to the elevator.   

"You are allowed to address your patient and your patient only.  If you talk to any of the others, we'll have to ask you to leave.  If they talk to you, don't ignore 'em.  Just dismiss them politely.  Not like we don't trust you, but the doctor's here don't want you to disturb the balance.  Tends to set back their work."

Trowa nodded again  "Right."

"One more thing, kid.  The patients here are not too wild, but they can be unpredictable.  Just watch your back.  Probably unnecessary, but you never know, you know?"

They stopped at a door.  The Guard knocked twice on a door that was, by the sound, metal painted to look like wood, and opened the door.  Trowa's brow furrowed as he realized that the room wasn't locked, though there was a large heavy lock on all of the doors in this hall.  He looked questioningly at the guard.

"No.  No locks for this one.  He likes to flirt with the nurses when he's bored.  Like I said, he's gentle as a lamb.  Not to mention he's talented with uh… opening closed doors so there's really no point."

They walked into the room and Trowa got the first glimpse of the boy he would be studying for the next three days.

The boy's back was to them and he had stopped mid activity, only turning his head slightly, but not looking at them, waiting.  He had the most amazing blond hair Trowa had ever seen on a boy.  It was baby white-blond all the way to the roots and clipped short at the back, with long thick bangs.  It shone with a green highlight under the bright fluorescents.  He was dressed in simple black sweats and he seemed quite slender and pale.

"Quatre…" The guard smiled kindly, wiping his chocolaty hands on his navy uniform as if he felt suddenly self-conscious around the blond.  Trowa couldn't help but feel that way himself.  Quatre was… otherworldly.   Quatre, however, did not move.  Trowa couldn't quite tell from this angle, but he was pretty sure that the boy had a scowl on his face.  The guard took a step forward.

"Come on angel.  There's someone here to see you."

Trowa was a bit taken back by the guard calling a boy "angel" though somehow, it seemed a fitting title.  It must have done something, because the boy turned his chair toward them.   He was indeed scowling at them, but the guard seemed unruffled.

"This young lad is here to work with you for the rest of the week.  Come and meet him."

"Hn." 

The boy got up and approached them, hands at his sides.  When he came to what he thought was close enough, he stopped and regarded Trowa with crossed arms.  Trowa shrugged his shoulders to rid himself of the trance-like state he had fallen into since walking in.  He held out his hand.

"My name is Trowa.  Trowa Barton."

The boy regarded Trowa's slender hand as if it might explode if he touched it.  Endless seconds passed and Trowa was beginning to feel uncomfortable under the cold gaze, his hand out in unreciprocated greeting, when the boy broke into the sunniest smile Trowa had ever seen.  The boy straightened and grasped his hand tightly, pumping it with unchecked zeal. 

"It's wonderful to meet you!  My name is Quatre Raberba Winner."  He said it with pride, and a voice that seemed the epitome of kindness and gentility.

The guard left them and Quatre invited his guest to sit with him at the round table at which he had been when they arrived.  As Trowa approached the table, he looked down to see a laptop and what looked painfully similar to security camera pictures of this very building.  Some of them were pictures of the same sterile white halls he himself had been passing through earlier, though he couldn't tell.  Quatre looked at the tall boy's furtive stare and smiled, reaching over and shutting down the program.

"Sorry.  That's Heero's.  He gets bored and he likes to hack the system."

Trowa scrutinized the boy closely, but the golden smile remained.

"They let you have a laptop?"

"Well, I can't stab myself with it and I can't choke on it so they said it was ok!"  Quatre shot back with a grin.  Trowa didn't smile, but his eyes glittered with amusement.

"Do you think you should be messing with security?  I mean, do they know?"  Trowa asked blandly.

Quatre nodded avidly.  "Oh yes.  Actually, they're quite appreciative.  Heero's fixed the database countless times.  He's practically a free System Admin.  He's better than any of the contractors they bring in.  He's wonderful."

Quatre smiled, reflecting.  Trowa stared at him.  'So one of him is named Heero is he?'

"Where's Heero now?"

Quatre frowned. 

"Oh, he left when you came in.  He doesn't warm to strangers… ever.  He did say that he thought you were interesting.  From Heero, that's a pretty good sign."

"I'm glad.  Does he stay here with you?"

They sat down.

"Mm Hmm.  Uh… he and Wufei usually sleep on the floor.  I offer to sleep there once in a while, but they won't let me.  They say I'm too bony."  He rolled his eyes.  "Like they aren't."

"Wufei too?"

"Yep!  He's Chinese.  Heero's Japanese.  They're both really quiet.  I'm the talkative one."

Trowa smiled nervously.  The blond kept catching his eyes, and Trowa found it disconcerting as hell.  He wasn't too keen about eye contact, but his natural indolence betrayed him, allowing the shorter boy to look up under the concealing curtain of bangs and straight into his soul. He seemed to like what he found there, whatever it was.  The blond smiled sweetly.  Trowa decided to relax a bit in his professionalism.  This boy obviously wanted to be friends and the point of the whole project was to establish a good communication with the patient.

"Are there any more of you?"

Quatre shook his head cheerfully, standing up and retrieving what appeared to be a small plug-in teapot and two cups from his little bookshelf.

 "Nope, it's just us.  One big happy family of three.  Though…sometimes we do get lonely."

He paused for a moment, reflecting, but he brightened before Trowa could question him. 

"Would you like some tea Mr. Barton?"

"Call me Trowa.  Yes please.  Although we should get to work.  I only have 3 hours a day to get to know you." 

"Get to know me huh?  I like you already."

"I'm glad."

Their eyes met and both froze for a moment before looking away.  Flustered, Trowa opened his notebook.  He watched the blond happily go about fixing tea for them both.  He had, in fact, been thinking about afternoon tea since getting to the facility.  He wondered if Quatre was empathic.  Many empaths eventually wound up in these places.

"Ready Quatre?"

"Sure."  Quatre nodded, filling the pot with water and plugging it in.  "Though you do seem to be a little young to be my new shrink."

Trowa began making preliminary notes in his book as he talked.

"I'm not.  I'm a student.  This is my field time."

Quatre smiled, or rather, his smile changed to slightly more pleased.  As far as Trowa could tell, he never really stopped smiling, even when he was frowning.  The Quatre part of him anyway.

"That's wonderful.  I haven't seen many students lately.  Heero got mad at the last one, so we got our 'visitor' privilege taken away for a while."

Trowa looked up.

"Why.  What did yo… What did Heero do?"

Quatre smiled, acknowledging the slip, but dismissing it.

"Nothing harmful.  He has a very skillful knowledge of joint locks.  Causes pain, but doesn't damage anything permanently.  He just forcefully showed the guy the door."

"Why?"

"He um.. insulted our sexual preference.  Stupid really.  He got himself kicked out of the program for that.  Still, we're not allowed to be violent and that was, though harmless, cause enough for punishment."

"I see."

Trowa mentally kicked himself for being hopeful when Quatre voiced his sexuality.  The boy was absolutely intoxicating and Trowa found himself wondering how that beautiful hair smelled.    He shook himself and tried to concentrate.  He settled for chastising himself with inner monologue.  'No chance Trowa'. You don't have relations with patients.  First rule.  No matter what.  You have to be objective.  Not that this was a real psychiatric session.  Still, Trowa was sure there would be rules against relationships with patients. 'He keeps looking at me though.'

Quatre got up and poured the tea, putting milk in Trowa's without having to ask.  Guess that affirmed his telepathy.  Trowa worried at how sensitive Quatre might be to thought, thinking that Quatre might sense his attraction to him.  Quatre smiled as he set the tea down.

"I get images once in a while, in case you're wondering.  I can sense emotions, but that's about all.  It's not good for much except catching glimpses of things like you putting milk in your tea.  Was I right?"

"Yes." Trowa found that he had been staring again, and he hastily looked down marking this in his notebook.  He put the pen down and pulled the tea to him, reaching for a spoon.

"Although I like sugar in it too."

Quatre smiled and shrugged and leaned back in his chair.

"Like I said.  It doesn't really work very well."

They stared at each other for a moment, Quatre's eyes sparkling with all his emotion.  Trowa's eyes hiding his.  Trowa decided to start off with something simple.

"Why don't you start off  by telling me about your father?"

The boy's body language changed immediately.  He sat up straight and put his hands on his lap so that they were facing outward, one on each leg.

"That's a rather textbook approach isn't it?"

Well, how weird is this?  Do you like it so far?  I got the idea from a really short little GW oneshot I read months ago.  I wouldn't even know where to find it now, but it stuck in my head.   This thing will only get stranger.  Send me feedback!