Because Dandelions Are Pretty

"Aubrey!" Tom yelled as he and Bill sprang forward to aide her.

Aubrey mumbled lowly in the back of her throat, and Bill could've sworn it sounded like she was saying, 'Fuck.'

Bill grabbed her under the armpits and hauled her into his lap, cradling her head against his chest. His finger shook slightly as he stroked her cheek; he was so afraid that she had been seriously hurt…

"That really hurt," Aubrey commented, wincing a little as she tried shifting up further in Bill's lap.

"It looked like it did," Tom agreed, kneeling down next to her and looking at her, flabbergasted.

Noah rolled up the leg of her pants and inspected the prosthetic leg like he was a professional. He touched the metal and the wires gently before murmuring, "I think you'll be okay. You probably just strained it too far."

He gave her a look that clearly said, 'I told you so.'

Aubrey rolled her eyes and sat up further. Bill kept one arm supporting her back and the other wrapped around her stomach and her waist. He didn't want her to fall again.

"Leave it to you to nearly break yourself in half," Noah snorted.

"Leave it to you to be a killjoy," Aubrey retorted disdainfully as she stretched her legs out in front of her.

"Hey, I was right, wasn't I? That wasn't a very good idea."

"Piss up a rope."

Bill bit back the grin that started to form and instead pulled Aubrey's hair behind her shoulders soothingly. Aubrey turned to look at him and gave him a mega-watt smile before saying softly, "Did I scare you?"

He nodded vigorously. Trying to make his point clear, he pointed at her and then held his finger up to the side of his head, rotating it in circles, the universal signal for 'crazy.' Aubrey smacked him lightly on the chest, laughing.

"I'm not crazy. I'm ambitious," she argued with a grin.

Bill shrugged and stood up from the elevated strip. He took a long stride to reach Aubrey's side, and, before she could protest, he bent down and picked her up bridal style.

Aubrey gasped in surprise. "B-Bill! I can walk just fine!" she protested.

"Shut up and let the man carry you," Tom silenced her. "For all we know, you could've short circuited your kneecap."

"Done what to my where?" Aubrey asked.

Bill chuckled silently as he stepped down from the strip with Aubrey still tucked in his arms. He began to walk towards the side benches to set her down when they heard an all-too familiar voice: "Bill! What a surprise to see you here!"

Rolling his eyes dramatically, Bill slowly turned around to see Nicolas Dubont standing behind him, a smug look on his face.

Nicolas smirked. "I could have sworn you were left behind on that ferry boat."

"Yeah. By you," Tom spat angrily. A rush of curse words followed, spoken in German of course.

Nicolas ignored the angry Kaulitz twin and instead focused on Aubrey in Bill's arms. "Are you hurt?" he asked with mock concern.

Aubrey shrugged one shoulder. "I'm very warm where I am right now," she emphasized, making Bill's heart flutter and his grip on her tighten.

Nicolas made a face but quickly disguised it as he pretended to cough. "I am sorry about what happened last night. My leaving Mr. Kaulitz on the boat was not planned previously."

"So it was a totally spontaneous decision that led you to lock my brother in a storage closet?" Tom asked skeptically.

Nicolas merely smiled as a response. He glanced at Bill for a moment, as if sizing him up for something. After a minute's pause, he said, "Why don't you and I settle this the old fashioned way, huh little German boy?"

If not for Bill's curiosity at what Nicolas had in mind, the German comment would've inflamed him. Instead he cocked his head to the side and gave the Frenchie a weird look.

"What do you mean, the 'old fashioned way'?" Aubrey asked for Bill.

"With a swordfight, of course," Nicolas explained, and smirked.

---

"Now remember," Aubrey said to Bill, holding his fencing mask in her hands. "Parry four, disengage six. That's the outside of his body. He falls for that trick all the time. Oh, and you might want to try second intention. Basically just trick him and trip him up; that usually seems to work. Counter-parries work really well if you don't want to be too obvious about being defensive. If nothing else works, then do a bind or try to go out for a coupe. But whatever you do, don't get caught up in his blade because then he could hold you down and go for a straight attack. Got it?"

Bill's head spun around in circles. He had no idea how to interpret anything Aubrey just said. Sure, it probably made sense to her, but to Bill it was like she was speaking Indonesian.

He was dressed in the ridiculous fencing uniform that he had seen everyone else wear all day long. There was a chest protector constricting his breathing and a one-armed underarm protector to cushion any blows that fell on his blade arm. There were the starchy, stiff knickers that made him feel as though he belonged in 18th century Britain, and the heavy long-sleeved jacket with the silver metal lame over it. One glove donned his right hand and he had the electrical body cord running from the back of his jacket, around his waist, up through the sleeve of his right arm and coming out through a hole in the glove, where he was already plugged into the foil blade that Aubrey had lent him.

Somehow, Nicolas had managed to find an empty mini-gym in the building to use as a fencing area. Nicolas was on the other side, already prepared. His mask was under his arm and he had his hair swept back across his forehead so he had a clear vision of Bill stepping onto the gym floor.

The strip had been laid down with duct tape, with the en garde markings clearly labeled. Aubrey had given Bill a crash course on fencing footwork and then sent him off.

Somehow, as Bill stepped for the en garde line, the nervous feeling in his stomach worsened. What the hell was he doing here? He couldn't fence. He had no fucking idea what fencing was until about a month ago when he was watching a Junior Olympic advertisement on TV.

Before he could salute Nicolas, Aubrey ran onto the strip and handed him the mask.

"Remember," she whispered into his ear, sending shivers down his spine, "if all else fails, don't forget that his crotch is target area. Aim for the balls he doesn't have."

Bill smiled widely and nodded.

---

The first five touches went to Nicolas, obviously. He was the best foilist on the American boys' team. Bill got in one lucky shot, but it was pure chance that Nicolas had stumbled backwards and lost his footing, allowing Bill to hit him right in the chest.

They were still going at it, stepping back and forth across the strip. Because of Bill's lithe and lanky figure, he looked perfect while he moved. It was almost as if he was born to be a fencer…aside from the fact that he had no idea what the hell he was doing.

He soon began to notice Nicolas's blade straying further to the side, leaving his 'preferred target area' exposed. Bill abruptly lashed his blade out and caught him right in the…well, you know.

The blade arched beautifully as he hit right on target, and the target lights went off on the machine. Nicolas let out a yell of pain and collapsed onto his knees, clutching between his legs fitfully.

Tom and Noah, who had been watching from the sidelines, jumped up in unison and shouted, "Yes!"

Next to the machine at the side of the strip, Aubrey clapped wildly. "Now that's point control!" she giggled.

From his crouched position on the strip, Nicolas held up one hand and choked out, "Time out! Rest!"

Bill shrugged and took his mask off, relieved at the cool air that brushed against his face. Aubrey caught his eyes and flashed him a wide smile and a thumbs up.

Unbeknownst to them, Nicolas had turned his back to the strip for a reason. Still crouched on his knees, he took the tip of his blade with both hands and bent it hard until a full inch of blade snapped off. What was left was the jagged, sharp metal point, much like a real sword.

Nicolas smirked. He knew that the match was going too quickly for anyone to notice his little renovation to the blade; they wanted to leave as soon as possible anyway.

Nicolas promised himself that the next time he hit Bill, he would hit him hard enough that the point would go right through all of his protective padding and pierce his flesh.