Gundam Wing isn’t mine; I’m just playing with them.

Because a certain sister of mine found out about Fox Goddess, I will be posting under this name.

The prologue had been revised. I will rechapter as I revise each chapter. If you are an old reader of mine, you can reread this and tell me if you like it better then the un-revised one. Yes, the prologue did somehow length to twice its old size. When I revise, I do more then spelling and grammar. I think I added an interesting plot twist in here if you have a good memory of a certain villain of mine’s characteristics.

Fly (used to be called leave) and was under the name Fox Goddess

Prologue

Each drop of tear like rain clanked against the metal makeshift shelter. It rattled Duo’s mind with the memories and thoughts best not remembered or thought of on a dark day like this one, or any day in what Duo now called his life. But even as he fought the memories and thoughts, they sneaked into his head. In his rain dreary head, the rain was the footfall of hungry for terror and blood Ziedian soldiers. The grinning faces of soldiers stared down at him from the metal roof above him. The faint wind became their rattling voices. And hail transformed into silver bullets meant to kill such outcasts such as him and Heero. He wanted to just curl up in a ball, ignore their taunts of ‘we won, you scum; come out to meet your award’. But he didn’t.

They weren’t there; they weren’t real. It was just his mind and the rain. Rain was just rain, he knew that. Maybe no longer like the polluted rain of its and everything human’s home earth, the rain made by the L2 colony’s weather system was still water: two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen in a liquid form. And this rain was clean rain, meant to keep the troublemakers at bay but not dull their minds with chemicals found in some rain, mostly Earth’s. It felt clean. Maybe no. They could have, they already started introducing those substances on this colony a few months ago, and usually used it on every chance they got. He truly doubted they would give up the chance to drug the colony’s people.

But it felt clean. It wasn’t not watery felling. It felt like the water he remembered from before Ziedian, as he called the easy times when all he and the other gundam pilots had to worry about was fighting for the colonies and all that junk like that. The rain—clear and just rain-like to him—was clean; he hoped, but whatever he hoped never seem true. And this rain must be tainted too, but how?

A new substance, maybe. They had switched drugs before. The drug or drugs could be seeking into his mind right now, making him docile and sweet: a good citizen to them. And he would never know. They were just too good. Them and their drugs. Curse them. Ziedian and their scientist. Couldn’t they die now or something? But they wouldn’t and Duo would just have to live like he had been: in secret and despair with his only still alive friend and only still just a friend: Heero.

Small drops of the said rain sprinkled through the cracks in the shelter. Maybe sprinkled wasn’t the right wood; flooded would fit it. A small system of puddles developed on the uneven ground, wetting the black rags he called his pants. He hardly noticed the slight wet chill against his somewhat bony legs butt, but the said parts they did. In curious, small shivers, almost convulsions but that word was too strong, they let him know their state. He didn’t take note. There was no hope to stop them. Ignorance was the only thing he could do. He was used to the cold and helplessness to stop the shivers of life.

And the rain showered on.

He was not worried about the drugs, much. He and Heero both took the then still available vaccines to all known drugs a half of a year ago. Almost still times then. The times when freedom fighting was still done, when hope was still alive, when his three other friends still walked freely in their own minds or just walked. But then, those three pilots disappeared during a fight, earth’s and space’s forces broke, and they, just heroes to earth and the colonies in the Mariemaia battles two years ago, were criminals with hefty rewards for capture, more for death.

This wet shelter was safe, he hoped. They had just gotten there the day before. The came during the morning rush when no one would notice two homeless teens: a girlfriend and boyfriend at the glance of even the unobservant eye. That was of course if one cared to look at the hundred poor that stared with desolate eyes at Ziedian uniformed, fatly fed men and women. Rich didn’t look at poor. Rich didn’t need to see poor. Rich were rich. Same as two years back, same as two hundred years back. Why would the rich look at something less then them when they didn’t have to? Why would the rich look at something they might have been, may have been in the future, or may have been in the childish past? They didn’t have to look at Duo, Heero, the little girl crying under a drain and calling for her ‘papa’ all day. The just didn’t want the memories and glimpses of poor life in them. It was easer for them to ignore them.

So, literally in the eyesight of the rich, but truly not, Duo and Heero had moved, drifted really, through those crowds of those poor ones, their eyes downcast, their shoulders slumped, their feet moving away from the informs, just like everyone else deemed insignificant for use by the Ziedian government. No one took not of them. No one noticed the boyish features of the ‘girlfriend’, or the intense, Prussian-blue eyes of the ‘boyfriend’. Why would they? So the ex-pilots had sifted through public without public notice. No one associated them with the two boys on the wanted pictures. Why would they? They wouldn’t; that was how the world, colony, now turned.

An especially large drop landed on their shelter--probably a collection of raindrops that slipped of the roof of the warehouse that made up their shelter’s sidewall. Another one fell—this one: bigger and sloppier then the other. The water poured through some cracks in the metal board ceiling, flopping onto Duo’s head and plastering his bangs to his head. His braid was safe; he had it in an old jacket that was almost as sorry as his pants. But it was safe and dry. Duo wouldn’t die of any colds because of his hair becoming a breeding ground for germs and viruses, and drugs. Though Heero’s hair was a different story. Currently, it was plaster to his head and covered the blue eyes that Duo wished would look at Duo for a change. But those eyes never did, not a single time in this godforsaken day.

These days those Prussian blue eyes hardly ever left the sight they wanted to behold, study: a small, ugly pink thing. Duo had never seen it up close, but he had seen its winking light whenever the sun glistened off its smooth, jewel surface. It was beautiful, and Duo hated it, and Doctor J for sending it, to death. It took Heero’s attention away form him and that would not do. Duo knew he and Heero would never have the relationship Duo wanted, but he at least deserved to be able to talk to Heero, see Heero smile. But no, that jewel took over Heero’s attention when he wanted comfort, someone to talk to. What made it worse: Duo didn’t even see what was so great about that jewel. He lost Heero to a jewel. My, he was pathetic.

So, he cowered in fair of imaginary footsteps while Heero stared half-wit-ly (1) at the stupid jewel clutched in his hands. Perfect picture: the perfect soldier Heero Yuy and the self-proclaimed Shinigami (1) Duo Maxwell huddling in a makeshift schedule during a truly fake shower and getting soaked; they were also probably getting slowly killed, but that was hardly noticeable. One would also probably not notice that the ‘girlfriend’ was a guy and the ‘boyfriend’ was not a gay guy.

Boyfriend, now that was an interesting word. Almost as interesting as that feeling that rushed around his body when he heard that word used by his ‘boyfriend’ in public. Duo banished the thoughts—Heero would not like his attentions—and scuttled next to the other boy. A hand clasped over the pink thing and a familiar glare was sent toward Duo. At least he looked at me, Duo thought as he prepared to speak to the silent boy.

Duo opened his mouth to speak, but a flood of water hit him and the clang of metal sheet hitting the flour interrupted him. Great, he thought, some drunk stumbled across our hiding the place. He turned his head to yell at the intruder who just wrecked the roof, and was caught dead with his eyes widen and his jaw almost unhinged.

Well, not literary, but that—dead—was how he would be soon if something magic or magically impossible didn’t happen soon. Thirty Ziedian soldiers stood around them. Two big bruisers of men kicked the flimsy sides away from the boys. No protection. Thirty guns raised, thirty barrels pointed at their two too skinny forms. Dead.

“Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell,” said the leader: a lanky man with a green hair spilling down his back and a satanic grin. Evil.

Duo wanted to hang his head in defeat. He didn’t. That would be defeat. He was a gundam pilot, not a broken child. He would die like a gundam pilot. And he would die like a gundam pilot in front of Heero, proud and defiant.

He glared at the almost too cheerful man and grinned. He nodded his, just to confuse the man. Yes, he was Duo Maxwell, the formally dreaded Gundam pilot.

The green-haired leader nodded and signaled to his lackeys. The safeties clicked off each soldier’s gun. Duo closed his eyes and swallowed; the end was to come. And he would be in Heero’s arms for it, he must. Duo snapped his eyes open and lounged into Heero, wrapping his arms around the precious and soon to be dead boy. They would both be dead, soon. Together, at least they would be together.

Fear shone in Heero’s eyes as it probably shone in Duo’s. But something else was there: a faint wish and affection for Duo. It was small but it was there. Laying his head on the warm chest in front of him, Duo closed his eyes from the truth of the gaze and snuggled up to Heero. A snake of warmth enfolded him as Heero wrapped his around Duo. They were one.

A soft press of lips brushed his cheek; and a small whisper reached his ear, but he knew not what it meant as the grinning soldiers fired their cold metal guns at the warm souls freezing. The bullets, death, came but did not reach. Shinigami would not have these souls today. They were for somewhere else.

A soft, comforting light--like a flashlight’s straight light that lights the way home for a wary traveler--came down from the sky and engulfed the two in its brilliant fire. It wasn’t strange; it wasn’t death. It was life and life forever come to take life away to more life. And pink life, light shone through Heero’s still closed hands. Heero had his eyes closed and was clutching Duo; Duo felt and saw that as he opened up his eyes to see why he wasn’t to meet his role model Shinigami today.

Duo got to smirk this time. The formally grinning soldiers stared at the spot on the ground where the pilots had been. There was no blood, only spent, but black, bullets on the uneven and wet ground.

Duo snuggled, still grinning, into Heero’s embrace, drifting to sleep in the comforting presences of Heero and the light of Heero’s.

Things would be all right.

1) half-wit-ly – dumbly; stupidly.Yes, I know it’s not a word, but I like it.

2) God of Death (Japanese) You should know this.

Chapter 1

Duo yawned and snuggled into his firm pillow. A bump in the mattress hit his side, causing him to squirm away. It didn’t help; stupid knotty mattresses. Might as well get up, he thought. He lifted his head off the green pillow. Wait a second, Green? He blinked, but the pillow was still green and curved upwards.

Memory hit him and he scuttled back. He looked up the ‘pillow’ and to Heero’s still slumbering face. He breathed a sigh of relief; Heero had neither felt nor seen him and his scuttle back. Heero’s head seemed to be buried among green grass stalks. They were so green, not like the stalks of earth were because of the pollutant substance in the rain turned them a red colour. But how then could green grass be?

He looked up and stared, and stared some more. Tree branches stretched across the sky. Little leaves, green leaves, clung to those branches. He asked himself how again; the substance had affected the trees, too. Internal fall, they called it. Everything sickly shades of red and orange, even houses not painted after the affected rain. That was why everyone, mostly, fled to the colonies, and to direct Ziedian rule.

The moon shun through a slight cover of branches. Huh, he thought, why does there appear to be covering part of it. He squinted up and the cloud lazily revealed its hiding surprise.

“Heero!” Duo strangled out. He repeated himself over and over, stronger every time, pointing at the blue orb in front of the moon. Relishing that Heero was not responding, he squatted next to Heero and presided to grab those perfectly slumbering shoulders and shake them as fast as he could.

“I am up,” barked Heero in his normal monotone. Duo pointed up at the sky like a little kid seeing his favorite ride and wants mommy to take him on it, well, except for the expression of otter terror and amazement with an undertone of relief.

Heero raised his head and grunted, but he was unable to hide the slight widening of his eyes. Duo knew that Heero was also surprised, but he convinced himself that by Heero’s calm everything would be fine.

“What should we do know Heero? Try to find a town or something? But wait; there might not be humans on this world. What can we do! I’m hungry.” Duo rambled on, taking two breaths for minute’s worth of talk.

“We will go to town. This is not our world; we don’t know what’s safe.” Heero said, right before Duo went into hysterics. Duo nodded his head. They did what they said they would, and headed toward the faint scent of sea air that wafted in the air. Duo alternated in babbling and looking up at the sky. After his fifth near fall of Duo’s, Heero made him stop looking up.

He did, but not before looking one more time up, one more time at the moons: the graveyard look-alike, and the blue one, the blue one that they both recognized as the Earth.

“So, should I be like a girl or a boy?” Duo asked. They found their town, but it was a bit more then that; a city, probably—no skyscrapers, nothing built high, buildings of brick and wood, freaky. The city sprawled on a half plain, the sea surrounding it on one part, a curved cliff on the other side. The breeze tasted of salt and cleanness.

“No, I think we’re safe being ourselves,” Heero said, his eyes never leaving the city. The bushes hid their faces from any casual observers how happened to look up at the top of the cliff. “It feels safe.” Heero pointed the way down, a half a mile away it looked.

Night closed around them as the walked there. When the got to the road into the city, no one else traveled on it. The road was dirt but well kept and showed signs of use. When he guessed it was safe, Duo started to whistle. He stumbled a few times from lack of practice. It felt so good and carefree.

The gates even looked old-fashioned, Duo thought as they reached the city entrance. Two mailed—mailed! —guards came to meet them. And they talked. And Duo, and Heero by his expression, had no idea what they said. It was gibberish; didn’t even sound like an earth language.

The guards shared a look and stepped foreword. They’re going to kill us, Duo thought. He was not going to let that happen. He pushed the closest guard away from him and scatted, right to the city gate without relishing it. A bulging guard stepped out the guardhouse and grabbed him around the rest. He wiggled, but the guard was an expert. A hand came down on his head. He blanked out.

He awoke to a cell. And Heero’s worried face. Heero opened his mouth but snapped it shout when the sound of footsteps shouted at them. The watched the new arrivals arrive.

A black haired, blue-eyed man came first. He could be called a boy, but carried the presence of one much over. A woman came right behind him, whispering to a little blond haired, blue-eyed teen. She had blue eyes and light brown, mid back length hair. The man said something as the woman glided up to him. Then the boy said something, gibberish to the former pilots.

The woman came right up to them and said, “Ossu.”

Heero looked right at her and said the exact same thing. And it was then Duo noticed the pink jewel that the woman wore.

Ch2

“Heero, what’s she saying?” Duo asked in what was almost the most annoying voice Heero had ever heard, almost. He meant what the light brown haired lady was saying, in twentieth century Japanese.

When the woman heard Heero speak Japanese, and saw his facial features, she thought he was from Tokyo in the Mystic Moon, or least from she said, she thought that. Heero let her keep her false theory; there was no way to make him try to teach her about the colonies.

The boy, Chid, ordered his guards to let them out, or something like that. The guards protested a bit, until Chid went into a yelling match with one; actually the guard yelled, Chid stayed calm and composed. The guard finally withered and stepped aside. Chid, himself, unlocked the cage with a key borrowed from a guard and a warming smile.

The woman and the dark haired man escorted them up to an eating hall, a giant eating hall. They sat down at the side of the table, Heero facing the Japanese speaker and Dou the quiet man.

As they were waiting for someone or some people, Heero studied the couple. The woman laid her hand gently on the man. A gold ring encircled her ring finger, matching the one the man had. So, they’re husband and wife, Heero thought. The husband glared at Heero when he saw Heero staring at the woman.

The woman looked at her husband and said the comment that inspired Duo to ask the question. “So, what are you guys named? My name is Hitomi, my husband here is named Van.”

Heero, ignoring Duo’s question, and said, “Me: Heero, he: Duo.”

“Is Dou American?” Hitomi asked. Heero grunted a yes. She turned to face Duo and said in halting English, “Heero say you is Duo. I am named Hitomi.”

Duo’s laugh caused two confused faces to appear opposite the pilots. “Well, if Heero says I am Duo, then I must be it. Can’t have the perfect soldier being wrong.” The expressions just got more confused after Hitomi whispered something to her husband. “Yes, I am Duo. I may run but I never tell a lie.”

“Hello, Duo. It is good to,” she mumbled something that Heero could not understand; probably the local language but it seemed different. “That’s it. It is good to meet you.”

Finding a person other then Heero to talk to in this world, Duo started rambling every which way. Hitomi answered every question that was a question in ill-used English with the occasional Japanese and that other language.

“So, Hitomi, how can your husband understand you when you’re speaking Japanese?” Duo asked after telling Hitomi about his favorite food—pineapple and sugar pizza.

“What are you talking about? I speak his language when I talk with him.” Hitomi replayed with a frown.

“No, you speak Japanese and sometimes another language.”

Hitomi put her hand on hanging open mouth and glanced at her husband. Then, she reached down and grasped the pendent around her neck with the other. “It allowed me to understand Atlantain. So maybe…” She took the pendent off and showed it to them.

Heero gasped; the pendent looked actually like the one Dr. J sent him with that mysterious note, the one that said ‘keep it with you always.’ He slipped his hand into his pocket and brought out the matching pendant.

Heero was right; the pendants looked the same, right down to a scratch on the ring that joined the necklace and the pendant. The married pair gasped when they saw Heero’s, losing their colour. They shared a veiled look and Hitomi leaned forward and touched Heero’s pendent.

And everything went white. It seemed the sun decided the room was a fine place to live and moved in, or something like it. The light that filled the room was pure white, the kind not retrievable by anything. No shadow tainted the room.

Dou’s braid rose, followed by everyone else’s hair, and then their limbs, and then their body. As the last foot left the ground, Chid and the two hosts finally arrived. They saw as the four floated to the middle, and disappeared. The light faded and Chid groaned.

“What?” asked Millerna.

“Not again. I hope there won’t be a war”

“Me too, Me too.”

Ch 3.

The blinding light finally faded, or, at-least, that was what Duo thought, since his vision was gray like it got after looking at the sun for too long. Then, that gray slowly faded and faded, and faded to red.

Well, that was the main colour scheme to be seen. The red of soldiers’ blood flooded the field before him. It seemed a dam had broken and let the blood out. Like twigs, limbs reached out of the river of blood, reaching for the sky. Pieces of mobile suits sent shadows on some of those limbs. They were different from the mobile suits he knew. Five suits still fought on the battlefield. Four to one were the odds.

One of the four was nearly defeated. Its light gray and sandy colour made it seem a dust ball in Miss Clean’s front entrance. A curved sword, grasped in one hand, was bent at an odd angle. Another like sword stuck out from the red far from its origin suit and that was only half of the sword. The arm that held the sword was the suit’s only arm left. One leg caused the pilot to walk weird because it was missing a leg. Two slashes crossed the suits front.

Another suit seemed to protect the almost defeated one. Its sole colour: dull orange. It stood in front of the injured suit and through various knifes and other weapons at the enemy suit. Since it didn’t go directly into the fight, the only scrapes it sported were a thin scratch down one leg and a dent in one shoulder piece. That seemed fair to Duo; not a single one of its throws hit their target.

Another stayed away from the fight, but not from injuries. It protected a group of foot soldiers and a hurt suit from death. The soldiers were either hurt or helping the hurt and the hurt suit. The protecting suit almost blended with the blood; it was a dark red color. It had one sword out and another still unused. Only a few scratches mired it and sometimes it would walk foreword as if to help but then retreat to protect the hurt when the enemy started attaching them.

The one receiving and caring out the attack actually seemed like it was meant to be there. Even to its metal bats’ wing like wings, it was black, pure and deadly black. The blood and its blackness made it into the god of death Duo always claimed to be. Only a single slash on the arm mired it. One weapon it used; a black staffed, steel bladed scythe. The suit swung it with deadly precision at the enemy.

The enemy, now that one was scary. Like an angel sent from heaven, it looked. Except for the blood smeared feet and blood splattered rest, It was white, a more pure white then the black one’s black. To add further to the angel appearance, twin angel wings sprouted from its back, above the sword sheaths that belonged to the swords the suit held. The wings did not hinder the suits performance; in fact it seemed to help the suit move. The suit sported no scratches, not even a nick. The reason for the lack of scratches was its skill. One minute it was one place, the next minute another place. It went under the four’s guards easily, well except for the black one. That was the one it concerted its attack on, the black one.

There fight was fierce and mean with them trading blows like wind. For some reason, they seemed a bit hesitant in their attacks. But they still attached like daemons to each other. The white one led the fight and was clearly the best fighter, but the black one had spirit. A fight against the light and dark, but with the colours mixed up; Duo felt for some reason that the four were the good ones.

For a minute, the dark one seemed to be winning, but then it happened. The white one flung one of its swords right at the orange one. It bared itself in the chest of the orange suit. A pained screech echoed out. The black one lowered its guard and swung its scythe. The weapon hits it mark and bare itself meters deep in the suit. And so did the remanding sword of the white one.

The cockpits opened and two bloody forms tumbled out of their suits. The stumbled to each other and hugged. The man from the black one collapsed in the others arms and their tears mingled. With a ripping sound, angel wings shout out of the boy from the angel suit’s back. The winged boy tightened his hands around the other boy’s waist and flew away.

The blinding light came right after Duo saw the winged boy’s face, right after he saw Heero’s crying face.

And then they were back in the eating hall, but without Heero and the second pendent.

Ch 4—

They were back in the eating hall. True. Chid and two others were there. True. Heero was not there. True.

The gray spots had vanished from their eyes after the white light took them from the vision. As soon as he was set down, Duo had looked around for Heero. Heero was not there. He craned his neck and called out, but Heero did not come out the woodwork and smirk knowingly.

He was gone, gone! Did the dream, vision hold him? Was he even there at the vision? Duo had been too fascinated by the fight. Heero, where are you? He growled. He would find Heero, and He better be okay or else someone would be hurting, bad. But who would know? Who could help Duo? The woman, she seemed to know something

Duo stormed over to her. She was talking to her husband, but when he saw Duo coming he stepped in front of his wife, blocking Dou’s path.

“Move over buddy. I just have a few questions to ask your wife,” Dou growled. The man looked once at Duo and shocked his head.

“I just need to ask her a few questions,” he wined this time. The man sent a guilty grimace at his wife and stepped aside.

Duo smirked and strode right up to Hitomi’s toes. “Look lady, I don’t know what happened but I do know Heero is not here, which he was a few minutes ago, and you know a hell of a lot more information then I do. So speak and do it fast.”

Hitomi sighed and plopped into the nearest seat. “Okay, get comfortable; this might take awhile.”

“Not to long, I hope” Duo said while getting comfortable in the chair he chose, the chair that Heero sat in before the light took them and him away.

“Okay. It all started when my grandmother. No, no, it started when a beam of light brought Van, my husband, to the earth, which is called the Mystic moon in this land. Another light brought a ferocious dragon. They fought and Van killed the dragon, which caused another beam of light to come down and pick van, with me, up and take us to his world. Here we fought against the Zaiback Empire with his gamelif and my visions granted by the power of the pendent.”

“That pendant, why does Heero have one?”

“I do not know. But I am afraid that I recognize it. It is my pendant. I do not know how your, ah, friend got a copy, but I sensed when the pendants touched that your friend’s one was a bit older.”

“And that vision, that vision where Heero… Is that the type of vision that you were talking about earlier?”

“Yes, but I never shared with so many a vision before. But…”

“Wings, why did Heero have wings?”

“He may be a descendant of Atlantis.”

“A what?”

“Descendent of Atlantis, a Draconian (1) in other words. Atlantis was a real place and the Atlantians were real people. They had great power, enough to sprout wings on their back with their will. They made this world, Gaea and all moved here with that will. The pendant is theirs too. The Draconian are mostly gone except for my husband, me(2), and a few others, and you can recognize us by our wings when we unfold them.”

“Then how can Heero be a Drec… Draconian? He is from our world, not here.”

“I do not know.” A silence settled over the room with that. Duo started listing in his mind what could have happened to Heero.

Van, the man, frowned and whispered something in Hitomi’s ear. She furrowed her brows and shook her head.

“Duo,” she said, “Did you see a weird guymeluf watching the battle from afar?” Duo shook his head. “Van said he saw one with a triangle shape symbol on its chest.”

Duo lost all his already faded colour and said, “Was it, the symbol, made of bloody swords with hearts as corner pieces, and a dove of piece stretching its wings in the middle of the triangle.”

Upon translation, Van shook his head yes with a widening of the eyes.

“You know it!” Hitomi said with almost the same reaction of her husband.

“Yes, I know all to while. They took over my world and were about to kill us before we came here. Ziedian, that’s their name, Ziedian.” Duo lowered his head and wept.

Author notes

1-Droconian means sever, cruel according to www.m-w.com.

2-Her being Draconian will be discussed later in this story, might be another story altogether.

Ch 5- A/n- Just wondering, would anyone mind if I put a lemon in later chapters or would it ruin this work. I haven’t decided yet.

His back hurt, no, pained like a million knifes slashing in and out of him with the preciousness of the late Wing 0’s beam cannon. His soldier’s skill took over and his sobbing brain started to check for injuries, locking the pain away with all his other pain—emotional and mental pain.

No broken bones, he figured, only bruises obtained from a fall. By the pain and exact placement of the pains, the fall was from eight stories up and he landed on the side of the back. Pain shot through him as he tried to sit up. Scratch that.

At first, when he opened his eyes, everything was a gray blur. He grunted. The light most of done that, he thought, that mysterious light that picked him up and did what? The gray blur faded away to gray.

He had been captured, the Ziedian had captured him, he thought. A tear almost escaped his eyes, but he stopped it; closed his eyes from the reality of cold stone, gray walls, and a bar enhanced, key-locked door.

Duo! Had He been captured? Was He sitting in a cell like his waiting for someone or something? Did He fall with him and, instead of living with pain, die on the contact, spine broken, sprit and body dead? No, He is alive, the caged boy thought, He is fine. Please let Him be fine.

He had to know what happened to Duo. He had to know if Duo was alive, living. He could not stand it alone. As long as Duo was all right, he would be fine. So he had to know. But how, how could he know?

The boy, man noticed the cold touch on his hand, a pinprick of cold in the heat of pain. He looked down; it was the jewel. It created the light, he thought, so maybe it can do what I want it to do.

Like a precious child-fairy, he cradled the pendant next to his chest. The image of his… Duo formed in his mind, braid swinging as Duo smiled and laughed after a joke.

“Duo,” he whispered. “Are you okay? Please, please be okay. Duo!”

“Heero!” It was Duo’s voice, and the image of the dinning room, a worried Duo, the Husband and wife, Chid, and two others. “Heero, is that you?” Duo widened his eyes and walke dforeword, until being stopped by an ill placed grand table that Duo bumped into and sprawled foreword on.

“Duo no Baka (1),” Heero said with a slight smile.

“Hey what is that supposed to mean. Unfair calling me something I don’t have any idea on its meaning. Japaness.” Duo picked himself up and gathered his proud, sticking his head in the air. Of course, he didn’t see Hitomi’s punch in the jaw that sent him back flat onto the table.

“Do not even sound like you’re making fun of Japeness, Duo.” She said in her defiance. “We are sometimes more touchy then Chinese.”

“More touchy then Wu Fei is, was? I doubt.” Duo frowned at the memory and loss of his friend.

“No one can be more touchy about their honor then Chang.” The tear almost escaped Heero with thoughts of his loss friends.

“Wu Fei?” Said a long brown haired man, the host presumably. “I heard of a Chang Wu Fei before that is really touchy about his honor and Justice. And a Nat… Nataka, no Nata...”

The cell door swung opened, sending Heero back to the cell. A man stood there, blocking the light. He slowly walked in. As he did so, the light illuminated him.

He had long, straight, and spiky hair that puffed out from his hair and settled down on his shirt. It was dark, and after a bit, Heero could see that it was a midnight forest green. The shirt was blood red, and going greatly with the surroundings with its blood red color. The pants were so dark that they blended with the cell’s darkness. The light that did shine on it showed that the pants were black and made of tight leather. Twin red belts draped themselves off one hip and down the opposite thigh. As he face came clear, Heero saw that he was as Asian as he was.

The man strode right up to the padlocked Heero and Their eyes met. He had red eyes, as red as a shoulders blood after the neck was slashed. The man smiled and leaned down to so his eyes were mere inches from Heero’s.

“Hello, my name is Kuroi.” His hands came up and cupped Heero’s face. “And I will be your Master, your Ziedian master today.” He kissed Heero’s unwilling mouth and forced his tongue in.

And Heero was truly scared.

1-Dou you stupid (I think)

2-Kuroi—black, Japanese

Ch 6—Spelling Corrections are welcomed and grammar too and plot holes and…

“Heero!” Duo screamed, almost as Relena used to scream for Heero but only almost; it held the quality of heart scattering pain and grief beyond the edge of the universe. Heero had been there, somehow, only moments before and then, then he disappeared, sucked back into the gray walls behind him

Duo closed his eyes and brought the image of Heero to his mind. There hardly been any light in that cell. The darkness shadowed his face and body, but not enough for Duo not to see the slouched from pain soldiers and the bruises slithered down Heero’s arms and legs.

Manacles and shackles kept the former pilot down. They were glossy black and thick, and for some reason Duo doubted they were for restraining only. He growled and smashed his fist into the nearest thing he found: the table.

Hands grabbed him. He struggled against them, but their grip was tight as two lovers on their wedding night. A man’s voice said, “Calm down, Duo. We shall find your-ah- friend. Calm Down. And stop biting me.”

Duo stopped struggling; struggling was not going to help him find Heero. The man let him go and apologized.

“No prob…” A thought came to him as he turned to face the man, Van. (1) “How do I understand you?”

Van glanced at his wife, no, at his wife’s pendants. He was the first but the no the last. Soon, everyone was looking at her pendant. Hitomi blushed and coughed to remind the people of manners. Chid was the first to avert his eyes but soon most were blushing and apologizing.

“Well it lets me understand everyone so maybe when your friend called for you a connection was made.” Hitomi said. “Ah… I don’t really know. I am no expert and I’m….”

The banging on the eating hall’s doorway saved her from the scrutiny. A messenger hoped in robbing his knuckles.

“I was sent from the landing place to report the Crusade arrived carrying Mr. and Mrs. Allen Schezar (2), their son, and Mr. Schezar’s ranting, crazy, uncontrollable, crazy student, Mr. Chang.”

“What happened at the landing bay?” said Hitomi.

“Mr. Chang had a slight misunderstanding with a landsman.”

“Slight?”

“Because of the weather, Mr. Chang had his hair down. A sailor, thinking he was a hot piece of arse, called out to Mr. Chang by saying, ‘Hey, woman, wantta….’ He had to stop his call when Mr. Chang bared the proof of him being able to call himself Mr. Mr. Chang then attaked the sailor calling him a weak woman.”

“How’s the sailor?” Van asked.

“I don’t know. I left to tell you my massage when the fighting happened.” The messenger bowed and left.

“Who wants to go?” asked Hitomi. Everyone chorused their yeses, except Duo.

“Who are you people?” Duo asked.

“What?” Hitomi said.

“I said, who are you people? I know some of your names but only your first name to begin with. So, who are you?”

Hitomi was the first to speak. “I am Hitomi Slanzar de Fanel, Queen of Fenal and wife to Van Slanzar de Fanel. Our country rests in the quiet forests where dragons travel and live freely except at the time of a king’s test where a king to be must kill a dragon to ascend the throne. The youngest one of us here is of Chid, that blonde. He is the Duke of Freid. The woman is Queen of this country, Asturia, Millerna Sara Aston Fassa and her husband, King Dryden Fassa. Their lovely abode is where we are. ”

As she named the people off, Duo looked at each one. Van: the warrior. For some reason, Van reminded him of his lost Heero. Chid: the innocent prince with great boredoms on his shoulders. Chid even looked like Quatra (sp?). Millerna seemed ditzy but had a knowledge look about her; sort of like Relena on her good days but smarter. Dryden looked a player and a rich one too. Maybe he was like Treize. Or was it Zecks?

Duo turned his head as she finished to hide the freed tears. Because of that, he was the first to see the door again fly open. And he was the first one to see that almost forgotten man stride into the room with thunderclouds as eyes.

“Wufei?”

“Duo!”

1—Van with a soft A as in lawn.

2—is that his name?

Ch 7- I only got one review for my last chapter, *grumble*

Wufei couldn’t stop staring at the man adjunctive to him. Duo, he was here; that braided annoyance was back in his life. There he was, blabbing like always with that all so fake happy grin on his face.

Something was wrong. The man was certainly more grown up and a ghost of permanent sadness marked him, but times with Ziedian rule would do that. Something else was wrong. Something more recent. Wufei shrugged his shoulder and dismissed it for the time.

“So, are you going to answer?” asked Duo.

“What? I’m sorry, I missed what you said.” Wufei said.

“What! You weren’t listening to me. Don’t you think that what I say is important? We just re-met and you already ignored me. I’m so sad.”

“Maxwell, shut up.”

“Okay okay. Now, how did you get here from where we were from?”

Wufei looked around. No one else was in sight. All of them had left to leave the friends alone after they had scraped their jaws off the floor. Good. He hadn’t told them about the Colonies and neither had Duo. Wufei looked into Duo’s eye and started.

+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_++_*

Wufei hit the busters, sending his mobile suit into flight. The suits still on the ground by the half destroyed Ziedian base shot missals at the retreating Wufei, Trowa, and Quatra. Trowa showered misals down to distract the troops. They would get away, no prob.

Wufei turned his suit around, toward the open space. But space wasn’t open then. Rank after rank of dolls uncloaked and stood in the pilot’s path. Wufei cursed the worst Chinese curse he knew. They were not supposed to be there. The base was supposed to be heavily guarded but not this heavily.

Natauku, his suit, would receive quite a sacrifice in blood by the time this was over. The pilots blood probably. He screamed attacked the unjust suits with all he had.

The fight lasted forever but ended too soon. He destroyed twenty dolls before he was defeated. Two dolls had attacked him from each side. No problem, he thought. Then another attacked him from the front.

It was tough; his mobile suit hadn’t been updated from the last wars blue prints. But the Ziedian, the Ziedian had done it. They had bought out or kidnapped the smartest scientist and convinced them to help them. The dolls were as superior as a gundam without the Zero system on it. But the Zero system had been installed in all the remaining gundams.

Just when he thought he had the upper hand and was going to beat them, another attacked and in the back to. He whipped his suit’s hand back, but it was too late. The doll stabbed into his main energy supply pack.

The pack burst; the other liquids in his suit burst. The pack exploded. The doll behind it exploded. The explosions sent his suit sprawling foreword through the doll’s lines. It also caused his head to jerk around. The back of his hit the counsel hard.

He didn’t lose consciousness, but only by a little. He watched as his suit drifted and drifted away from the fight and his still fighting friends. Even if he could move, he wouldn’t have been able to stoop the wandering path of his. The path that led him into the not traveled areas.

If he had been able to move, he could have looked back and see that two others followed him in two other broken suits. And he would have seen the colony and mobile suit free space.

Gravity caught him, the gravity of a planet, a planet strangely like earth.

+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_++_*

“So, how did you get here?” Wufei returned Duo’s earlier question.

“Heero brought me here in a light, a bright light.”

“Heero is here?”

“On this planet: I hope. In this building or any other place I know: no. Nowhere I know, nowhere I know…” Duo sniffed and wiped at his eyes.

Wufei turned away to let his friend have some privacy. So that was what was wrong.

Ch8—(now for commercials—I need a beta reader, I need a beta reader, I need…)

He was back. There he stood in front of the door that was slightly ajar to tease him with a glance of freedom. He carried something in his arm; ugly red and black clothing it looked like. Hopefully it was clothing.

He didn’t care what it looked like; he just wanted clothing, any clothing, even if it was a Ziedian uniform. His old clothing was scrapes now. They served as a pillow now, a constantly flaking dried blood pillow. He didn’t mind the blood; he was used to leaving in blood in this once gray, now red walled cell.

The scrapes and bite marks on his neck almost registered hurt to him as he looked up at the man. He looked up because if he hadn’t, the price would pain that registered extreme pain even for him. That was why he sat with only feet on the floor; they hurt the least.

The man smirked as he walked over to the prisoner. He reached out his hand and pressed it against the prisoner’s side, making him gasp.

“Heero, the perfect soldier who beat them all but us, can you walk?” He smirked as he jabbed against Heero’s stomach. Heero yelped and toppled into Kuroi. Kuroi took the opportunity to bite and kiss against the sore neck. His hands traveled around the waist to pinch at the back.

Heero felt the stirring in his groan whenever he received pleasure, or pain. Kuroi had trained him good in the past two weeks. He no longer felt the deep shame that he felt earlier; now only helplessness he felt.

“Not now, my tasty treat. Get up; my superiors want to see us out now.”

Heero used his master as leverage, and pushed himself up. He swayed and had to grab the wall. The man smirked and put his arm back around the waist.

“Grab the clothing. You can wear them after the shower.”

Glad that he would be able to wash away the dirt from his very own body, Heero reached down to quickly when grabbing the clothing. His feet lost their balance. He pitched forward and hung like a towel from Kuroi’s arms, arms on one side, and legs on the other. Kuroi chuckled and swept him in to a bear hug.

Kuroi ended up retrieving the clothing. They left the cell, Heero clearly Kuroi’s possession. Heero felt every single person starring at him. Some looked with indifference, others with shad, and others with lust. He actually welcomed the shield of Kuroi’s body. No one would hurt him while he was with his master.

They went into what must have been the soldiers’ barracks. The must people there looked with lust. As Heero walked around one corner, he saw a Ziedian soldier with brown bangs covering one eye. Trowa, he thought. No, it couldn’t have been; Trowa died and was buried long ago.

The showers came too soon and too late. A giant soldier with high-ranking badges on his already stripped jacket eyed Heero lustfully.

“Who is this, lieutenant torture?” He said as he walked to the prisoner and master. He reached up and twisted Heero’s left nipple. Heero moaned and almost collapsed against the man. Seeing the various reactions, the man got bold and reached down to play with other things.

Kuroi stopped the man with a hand around the wrist. “A prison and future soldier that needs to be in the meeting room in ten minutes dressed and showered.”

The man glared at Kuroi before storming away to take his shower. “Beware of that one,” Kuroi said before dragging Heero to a shower as far away from the one that the man went to.

The shower was good. It cleaned Heero of more then his layers of caked blood and semen. It almost cleaned his soul, his broken soul. From the shower came not the shattered prisoner who livid in blood and pain, but a man, a man ready to be free and to Duo no matter the costs, except Duo death. He stepped out of the shower and shock out the hair that somehow grew to his waist (1). An almost crazy grin he plastered on his face.

Kuroi gasped and took a step back. He has seen the difference. Heero strode to him and said, “the main hall you said.”

“Correct, let us go.” They left and headed to the main hall. They didn’t make it to the main hall. A sweating soldier met them in the hall.

“Lieutenant torture, you are to report to Zaids’ room now.”

“Take care of this prisoner.” Kuroi growled and stalked away.

The soldier turned and looked at Heero. His one visible eye widened.

“My god, Heero, what…”

“Trowa, you work for Ziedian now?”

1--I like Heero with long hair.

Ch9

Wufei leaned back in his chair. Though it was a simple chair, it was comfortable. The back was made of one solid slice of oak that curved to fit the body of one marginally bigger then him, but all could sit in it as comfortable as he. The seat of the chair had no cushions to make it feel like he was sinking. It was no weak chair for woman. It was a strong chair for men, and Allen’s wife.

The scratches on his back rubbed against the chair. Last week he learned the words for weak woman, and last week he had learned never to call a cat-woman with claws sharper then his sword a weak woman and then turn his back. He missed his black training shirt; he wasn’t able to get the blood out and mend all the tears.

Duo sat across from him. Duo’s mouth seemed never to close as he ate the dinner before them and talked aimlessly and waved his hands about. He switched back and forth from English to Earth standard (1) every few minutes, yet the Gaea people understood him. It was an injustice. He had spent almost a half-year here and the language still troubled him. A total injustice.

Of course, Duo had in the bad. Heero had brought him here, and now Heero was gone. And, of course, Duo also loved Heero, even if he didn’t know it. Wufei knew it. Trowa had indicated he did back in the times before he came here, the old times as Wufei called them. Even Quatra knew it. Poor, poor Duo.

Somehow, Duo was able to hide it behind his well-used mask. But masks slip and show the person behind as it had after Wufei had told his story. The mask was back on and well enforced.

A spoon drooped, breaking Wufei’s thoughts. It was Merlin, Merle and Allen’s son. He had finished his meal and wanted to go out and play. For brief moments, he actually drowned Duo’s jabbering. His blonde haired tale wagged and his thick blonde haired arms waved about as he begged his wife. Wufei also had learned never to call cat-boys’ mothers weak women and leave legs as perfect targets for young claws.

Merle finally waved her son out with a chuckle and roll of her eyes. As he passed Duo, Duo petted his partially covered by his waist length hair shoulder and whispered in his ears. Both giggled and Merlin tried to grin evilly, causing many moans and glares at Duo.

“What? I didn’t do nothing.” Duo looked an angel. He was an angel trickster in disguised, most likely. What did Duo always say? Ah, ‘I may run, but I never lie.’ Since he said that in English, the language where double negatives were a math problem and balanced each other out, he could of meant ‘I did do something.’ Still the same Duo, a trickster with the crafty mind. Just like Merlin, just like Merlin. Wufei shook his head; his piece of mind would never be totally sane with those two in the same house.

After the evilly grinning boy left, the table got a bit quieter, until Duo started blabbing again. Wufei just rolled his eyes and went back to eating. The food here was good with none of the manufactured quality produced on earth and absolutely none of the horrible genetically produced fakeness of the colonies’ food. Each had the uniqueness of hand-cooked food and old kitchens token care of by loving hands. He liked the food, but the food saddened him by reminding him how alien he was in this world that looked like earth yet didn’t speak its language or have its rhythm.

Someone screamed and screamed in the tenor of the youth. Merle sprung up, flew over the table, and started running as soon as she hit the floor. Wufei grabbed his ever-present sword and dashed out of the room with the others on his tale. Allen reached the door first, his hair so like Zecks’ lifting up in the draft. Everyone bumped into Merlin’s father after he stopped for no reason at all.

After dislodging his sheathed sword from a windowpane, Wufei looked up from his place between the door and Allen’s feet and the doorframe leading to the outside. A guymeluf scoped up Merlin in its metal fist and closed his hands around him. It, black and gold coloured, was not a guymeluf he had ever seen or heard of before. Yet it seemed so familiar and known in his eyes, but how?

As everyone scrambled to its feet, the guymeluf waved at them in its suit and took of into the air, still with Merlin in his grasp.

“Wufei?” Duo said.

“What?”

“Ziedain, it is here. And I think they have Heero.”

Mwahahahahaha… I am evil.

1-- I do not know the national language in GW, so I made the name up.

Merle is a cat-woman—i.e. fur, tail, and stuff but with a body of a woman.

By the way, Merle and Allen. Anybody see how I got Merlin’s name.

Now, I will go work on Paint. I think Heero’s father shall make an angry appearance.

Ch10

Duo was there. He stood so near but yet Heero could not even indicate that he was all right, not dead, alive. Duo seemed to gap and glare at him, but he wasn’t. He was gapping at the mobile suit, no, guymeluf that he operated, the guymeluf with an acquaintance of Duo’s grasped in its hand. And at the pilot unknown to him that took the child heedless of the screams ripping out of the child’s throat.

Heero wiped at a tear trying to escape. There was nothing he could do, nothing at all. Then two ideas came to him. The first was clearly suicidal. But hey, Duo had always called him suicidal. He could do suicidal. All he had to do was press the ejection switch and pop out of the guymeluf. Yeah, and then be immediately killed by a lurking near Trowa or some of the other Ziedian soldiers that must be near him. Yeah, leave to tell Duo you’re all right and then get killed, perfect plan, perfect soldier, Heero thought.

The agreement, if it could be called that, came back. If he didn’t fail the mission, Duo would not be purposely assassinated. So, that plan was useless; he would not, could not put his Duo in danger.

The other plan he could do easily without anyone but Duo the wiser. But he had to rely on Duo’s memory and commonish senses. He had to make only one gesture and Duo had only to recognize it.

He raised his guymeluf’s hand up and waved ounce. It wasn’t a regular wave, but it looked that way to a casual observer and most not casual observers. The hand’s middle finger bent at a ninety-degree angle. The pinky touched none of the other fingers.

Duo should know it; they only used it for the past five months on the street. It meant ‘help, Ziedian,’ basically in their complex hand signals developed on the street after Wing and Deathscythe H destroyed themselves in a battle. They only used it once before—a false alarm—but practiced it every day, well, almost everyday.

Now, where was that bottom to fly? There it was. He pressed the bottom. The guymeluf’s legs sucked together and it lifted up a few feet. He turned the guymeluf around and shoot out of there with only one more stolen glance at his angry lo… Duo.

A few of the country’s guymelufs made to get him, but he didn’t even bother to fight them; he just left them behind in their old and outdated suites. Weaklings, they were, and he had to rely on them to beat Ziedain. This world was going to fly into Ziedain’s rule like candy from a baby’s hands when no one was the baby: it might cry, but nothing it did would save the candy.

Or maybe not. Well walking through the soldier barracks, he had two people talking about a war fought here against an enemy with almost modern to Heero scientist helping them, or something like that. And there was magic here, great magic. He felt it in his bones and knew it to be true and even more then the powers he felt in his friends’ auras.

Like Trowa’s auras. His was silent and deadly. And tricky. Heero hardly noticed it these days; only a few times had he felt the goodness and powerfulness of the aura, and that was when they were alone in the hallway after their meeting. Heero wondered if Trowa, if any of his friends, knew about their auras. Probably not.

So, this world had some hope, but not in the suite area. Knowledge of fighting and spirit could win the battles to come. And that woman, Hitomi, that powerful woman who shun brighter then the light that brought him to Ziedain hands. She could win the war to come if she harnessed her full power.

Trowa swung near to him as night fell on top of them along with those two moons that he had both visited and fought on. Trowa pointed down below them at a clearing by a river. Heero swung down and landed behind Trowa. He set the hand that held the kidnapped boy onto the ground but did not loosen it.

Trowa jumped down from his suit and went to the hand. Heero unclenched the hand at his nod. The boy started to scream before Trowa stuffed a rag in his mouth as the boy struggled in the bonds Trowa had just tied around him and a tree.

“You can come down now, Heero.” His voice was unemotional as Heero jumped down from the cockpit. From a bag slung over his shoulder, Trowa took out handcuffs. They were also part of the agreement.

Heero didn’t even mind handcuffs nowadays. He was used to the lessened mobility, and stares like the one the boy was giving him. Trowa slipped matches in his hand. Heero nodded in understanding and went over to start the fire.

Soon the fire was steadily burning but not enough to give away their position. Heero dragged some fallen twigs and made a shelter around the fire to supply them and the fire cover.

“Good job, prisoner,” Trowa said.

Huh, why did Trowa call him prisoner now? Heero thought. Through the whole mission before, they had call each other by close to old times; Heero was pilot Heero and Trowa was soldier Trowa(1).

Trowa walked over to Heero, right to Heero so they were touching. He wrapped his arms around Heero’s waist and nipped him on the neck. He then proceeded to untie Heero’s paints with deft, experienced fingers.

“I need to talk to you, Heero,” he said in Heero’s ear. “Go with the flow; people watch.”

Heero showed no outward appearance of shock. He was used to more things then the handcuffs, and Trowa would be kind.

It wasn’t really rape. Heero neither gave consent nor didn’t give constant. He just let it happen, screamed ever so often for effect, and imagined a braid falling over his shoulder and cushioning his head. Anyway, it felt sort of good, though Trowa was a bit big.

Soon Trowa finished and collapsed over Heero.

“The watchers in hearing and seeing range are busy now; we can talk.”

Heero almost chuckled at Trowa’s barb, but it reminded him what the other pilot, his maybe friend, had just done.

“Heero, I am on your side.”

“Then why are you working for them?” He thought Trowa told the truth from his aura.”

“I have to.”

“Why?”

1—What rank should Trowa be? I am not good with military turns.

I will probably rewrite the end at some point; I don’t like some parts.

Ch11—

Out in the frontcourt, a suit, no, a guy mall uff, no, a guymelef did its rounds with three other of its kind, eighty soldiers, and some concerned citizens and probably a few spies, or at least that was what he guessed there would be. Other guymelefs and soldiers fought each other in mock duels in the practice fields over the city; he saw them earlier when he walked to the outside eating-place that was now used for eating and was near the guymelefs. He preferred the dining hall but Merle showed her claws and Wufei insisted on it. A faint sheen of blurry air aroused from the smithy where every single one of the furnaces was on full heat as the blacksmiths mended all the way from chain mail links to the parts of a guymelef. Citizens supposed to be at work were instead either boarding up windows or teaching the little ones how to act in cases of attacks.

Yep, this city, and country, was preparing for work, and Heero was still missing or… He shook his head from the thoughts; Heero wouldn’t betray him; Heero just would not, or would he? No, he called for help, damn it, help, not anything else, just help. He is crafty; he could do, that inner, annoying voice told him. No he wouldn’t, he snarled back before reminding himself that the voice wasn’t real, just made up. Heero had asked for help.

He pulled himself away from those betraying thoughts and into less personal but almost as important thoughts: was this country able in any matter defeat the Ziedian? He thought not, especially with the fact that this country’s soldiers were lost over a horizon in two minutes. Heero and Ziedian together were just too much for this country to handle. But if Heero escaped, could they do it with three of the gundam pilots on their side? Maybe, depending if Ziedian had the same quality suits as in his world, and if he and the rest of the gundam pilots could get suits better then them; they had suits in that vision… and Heero had beat all them, including him. But if Heero could be brought or bought back… they could win; they could win.

Duo sighed and turned away from the window; he wasn’t helping anyone by worrying himself to yucky wrinkles. Anyway, he should try and share up Van, poor Van. Every single one of Van’s many, many advisors decided that they were needed in the important military discussions happening in Asturia, so they all packed their backs and came here. Ten, thirty-five-room inns were crowded to the attics with the ones the palace couldn’t find a room for, or said they couldn’t find rooms for.

Everyone wished they had not come; they just caused the discussions to be trice as long as they should have been and kept on going to the important people’s rooms to talk late at night, according to a grumpy Van who had been hiding in the kitchen earlier that morning when Duo came around for a slightly past midnight snack after prowling the yards. One night screaming in pleasure with two to three others (and keeping the house awake with those screams) and the next hiding inside a kitchen closet must make one mad in both senses of the word.

“Hey Hitomi, you fine?” Van said as he looked at the stomach halfway covered with her hand. Twin dark shadows mired under his reddish eyes and a scratch mark near one from when Merle decided he should come to the meeting and he declined. The whole house heard that yell as well as before.

Hitomi looked up and smiled like she had seen an injured bird that could not move let alone fly, and she was a hungry little kitty cat wanting to impress mommy. “Wrong?”

“You’re acting weird, more careful of your body, like you’re sick.”

“Remember the night before yesterday’s? Ya know, when we decided to chare up Merle.”

Van blushed almost as red as an apple. “Yes, I do recall that night.”

“You remember when you, and Allen a few times, stuck something many times in me and it burst.”

Almost everyone but the girls, and a grinning Duo who liked to see the torture on the girls was doing, was blushing almost as bad as Van. “Yeah, I remember that must well. Are you still sore?”

So Hitomi could blush. “No, it is just that I had a vision…”

“You had a vision while we did that?”

“No, I had a vision this morning. I am one hundred percent sure that I am pregnant.”

“By, by who?”

“Now, how am I supposed to know that?”

A silence fell across the room as Hitomi smirked and the advisors finally figured fully about the repeated screaming.

“But I do know what and who he will be.”

A space alien from outer space… not.

Ch12—This will not be 3x1 nor will it be 1x3

Trowa rolled off the boy he had somewhere hurt with that distraction for the perverted watching to check his loyalty and control over Heero. There might have been an easer for the mind way to get rid of the watchers’ eyes and, more importantly, their ears that could here betraying words spoken from both mouths with just one small listening in. But Trowa could not think of any other ways, and so he had to resort to the crime committed on Heero many times before by the bastard soldiers of Zeidain. so the people wouldn’t think it weird for them to talk to each other.

No matter how he tried to justify his actions, a little nagging voice in the front and center ring of his mind kept on disputing them, telling him he was wrong, that he could have thought of something different, something that didn’t involve taking a boy he had already been marginally attracted to, but only that, marginally, nowhere near the love he felt for his blond angel. But he could not still the voice, because it spoke what was almost truth, and truth enough to hurt and make him question himself. Was he, as it said, as bad as the soldiers who took Heero whenever and wherever they wanted? Or, as the voice alluded to, was he worse for trying to cover his actions with purpose, justice for them? Was he more corrupt then the ones who hid Quatre somewhere in the giant fortress that he and Heero would have to return to soon with the boy?

He couldn’t be. He had a good reason; he got rid of the watchers so he could get Heero’s help, not for any of the pleasure that came as a side effect. But would Heero now help him find and capture his love? He hoped after the tale Heero would somehow find it in his hurt to do it, but he truly doubted that would come to pass as he hoped it would and Heero had a distance heart for all but maybe Duo. Trowa would have to rely on Heero’s mind to find that he and his plan were the best way for them to escape and beat Ziedain here, and maybe in their own world if they could go back.

Trowa sat up and warmed his hands by the fire. The fire warmed up his hands but not his that troubled soul inside him. He was going to hate what he had to ask of Heero now, but not as much as he already hated himself. “Heero.”

Trowa almost smiled at Heero’s familiar grunt, but them remembered what he had to do. “Put your head on my lap; face my chest. Watchers should be done now, and I don’t…”

Trowa quieted as Heero did what he asked. The watchers would now think something other then what was happening was happening. “Talk, Trowa,” Heero’s words came out slightly muffled.

Trowa nodded and started his tale.

“We were fighting, me, Quatre, and Wufei. It was just a regular mission; nothing was supposed to go wrong. But then Wufei got cornered and defeated. Something blew on his suit and he, with us trailing on the explosion’s shock wave, was thrown out of the fighting and to here, well, the space above here. It was so quiet there. And lightless: no colony light, no satellites, nothing. It was weird. I tried contacting Wufei, but my mobil suit was off, nothing worked.

“So, we drifted apart, Wufei way away, but Quatre close. This planet caught us and brought us done. We were separated…” Trowa drifted off as the memory took him, only telling Heero the outline.

Trowa mooned and opened his eyes. His eyes met with the front of his broken gundam’s front. The impact of his gundam on the ground had driven a dead oak’s pointed top through the gundam and an inch from his slightly bleeding cheek. He moved around, jiggling the worn sit belt--bad idea.

He fell down, the metal scratching him as he left the suit. Using his circus skills, he landed with nothing but a slightly twisted ankle on the uneven, forest ground. His clothes had been ripped off, except for a slightly ripped shirt that could be considered medieval fashioned.

Quatre was not there. Nor was he anywhere Trowa looked. But he searched on through mile stretches of oaks, along the path of small streams and rushing rivers, and even through the occasional field of weak, young trees and meadow grass. Quatre never turned up, but others did.

He was kneeling by a stream, drinking the unpolluted water there. He new some people were coming by the breaking twigs and swishing undergrowth, and the read and black uniforms they wore. He did not run; he had nowhere to run to without Quatre. They could know where the blond angel was.

“Who are you? Are you a spy from the accursed country of Fanilia?” one said when he saw the boy.

“Yeah. Of course, ya might be a little whore with that clothing on.” Another said as they surrounded him.

“Niether, but the first speaker was close. I defecated as a soldier from Fanilia. Ain’t liking the leadership.” Trowa said, calmly.

“That’s my boy,” said the first one. “Ya come with us, lad.”

They led him away, and two a fortress, the fortress that was now his home.

As he walked in, something caught his eyes, something big and metal, but not painted the colours of his suit. It was Quatre’s, broken and unusable, but still Quatre’s, and the cockpit was unbroken with someone still in it, someone with blond hair.

“I wasn’t able to see him leave, but he was in there. I know he was there. And I know he is somewhere in that fortress. Will you help me, Heero?”

NOOOOOOOO….. Of course not. Mwahahahahahahah.

Ch13

War. That word defined in a mortal dictionary: a state of usually open and declared armed hostile conflict between states or nations. But that was in a mortal dictionary; defined by a scholarly type person with glasses perched on his nose; a person that neither saw the blood flowing from a corpse clothed in a mangled uniform, nor heard the screams of one with a bullet or steel sword jabbed into him by a nameless soldier who was just doing his job and his duty for his country, just like the dead one had. The definition was a peacetime definition; it was neither simplifying nor complex enough to define that word that brought so much red blood and salty tears.

In the distant in time and space colonies, war sprung up through disputes and false beliefs. Moral mobile suits and later immoral dolls fought a seemingly endless waltz between the calm of ‘peace’, which is just a break for refreshments, and the tragedy of ‘war’ with its bloodstained hands and tear streaked children faces. It meant attacking a base, knowing that you may not see another day, that you could die even if you were the best. It meant the enemies and alias changed their masks, sometimes switching with each other, sometimes putting more scratches on their own masks.

In this world of green trees and greener grass, in this world of two bright moons dancing with each other in the sky, in the sometimes blue, sometimes nothingness black space above, war was war only slightly different from war in the colonies. People fought. People bled. People killed. People died. All nameless to those in the future they fought and killed and died for, every single one. More here then on the colonies; here had no photos, computers, technology. Only giant guymelefs powered by the remains of dead beasts. The guymelefs that fought against each other and weak soldiers that had only a weak sword to call their own. The guymelefs that were so like the gundams that even now were being suppressed under the power of Ziedian and Ziedian suits. The guymelefs that were so uncomfortable to one use to his gundam.

Duo sighed and squirmed in his seat and tried again to see out of the face guard. There just had to be a white bar right in front of his face, Duo grumbled in his thoughts. And Wufei just had to tell his friends that he himself and Duo probably knew how to polite mobile suits like the guymelefs. They didn’t. Well, almost didn’t. They could work them, but not as well as their now ruined gundams. The guymelefs were different, and light coloured. Duo wanted black, not these weak, standing out colours. He wanted black. And a scythe, not this weak sword gripped in his hand.

He snarled and blocked Wufei’s swing of his sword at Duo’s head. Wufei changed directions and tried to hit his head, but Duo ducked and tried for the middle of the suit that his friend operated. Wufei jumped up and to the side, trying again for Duo’s to low head.

By the time they were down and sweaty, the moon, no, moons were peaking out to lighten the blackened sky. Off duty soldiers and citizens hooted from the sidelines as if they never saw a fight like that. They probably hadn’t, judging by Hitomi’s and her husband’s faces, and Merle’s scowl.

Pretty girls with flowers greeted them as they jumped out of their prisons of discomfort. Duo smiled and took the flowers; Wufei scowled and muttered ‘ruo nu ren’ (1) when the girls tried to give him the flowers that eventually got batted to the floors. Same ol’ Wufei, same ol’ Wufei. Duo was about to flirt with the pretty ladies when the image of the guymelefs waving that symbol that Duo knew flashed in front of his face. Heero. He turned away, hugging the flowers.

Duo smiled and pretended he was fine to the girls and the world for the rest of the festivals. The face of the guymelef merged with the face of the lost Heero in his mind alone. The image flashed in his mind whenever his thoughts wandered away from the banquet.

And to the mission that Duo had put on himself to do that night. He would do it, even if it meant angry people cursing him for disappearing on them with a guymelef. But he needed to do. He needed to save his friend from those evil ones that made his friend still an innocent almost from mother’s arms without a thought. Heero had to be freed for life of them and that feeling enclosed in Duo’s heart.

Finally, the dancers drifted away, the drinkers poured away, and the musicians stooped the beat and left. Duo left, too. But not to his comfy, goose mattress and charming fire enclosed in his fancy room that was surrounded by the rooms of the last two visiting advisors of Van—the other advisors left when a war course was decided and the younger ones were threatened with threats of being recruited.

Duo went nowhere close to them. He took a walk, claming he needed fresh air. He walked like he said he would; he walked almost directly to the practice field where people forgot to put away his suit.

He waited at the seemingly deserted field as the black night darkened with the citizen’s curfew taking place, and then as it pitched with the palace candles all being snuffed. One light stayed on: Van’s. He couldn’t wait for that light to turn off; that light was always on.

As the thief he was and would be, Duo slipped into the field and to the light coloured guymelef. He climbed up the suit and strapped himself in.

Heero, I am coming, He thought before he shot himself into the air, I am coming for you.

Wufei sighed and waved at the light blur against the sky before turning back to Van to complete their planning.

“He is gone,” Hitomi said.

Wufei nodded.

“Good. And now, our plans shall start.”

1- ruo-weak nu ren- woman (Chinese) (I asked a Chinese) I don’t see why Wufei would speak Japanese; he is from a Chinese clan.