The young Vice-foreign Minister leaned back in her cushioned desk chair and rubbed her tired, aching eyes. The day had been long and tedious; and, as usual, nothing had been accomplished. For being a unified nation, the earth and the colonies had an amazing amount of disagreements.
Yawning, she stretched and wondered if she should take a nap in her office.... again. While she decided, she leaned back even more and... flipped her chair over. She found herself staring up at the ceiling and noticing the amount of cracks in the paint.
"Ow." The brief sound was all she made; and, too tired to even pick herself off the floor, she continued her study of the peeling paint. Finally, finding nothing more of interest on the ceiling and her back beginning to cramp from her unusual position, she pulled herself to her feet.
She yawned again, righted her chair, and grabbed a folder full of paperwork she hadn't managed to finish. Shrugging her coat on, she walked out of her posh office and past her secretary's empty desk. The young woman must have left hours ago, while Relena was still buried beneath a pile of documents.
With a rare feeling of cruelty, Relena considered giving her secretary more work, so she did not always manage to leave at closing, but she dismissed the idea. The bubbly woman would simply manage to finish both her regular and her added workload and still leave before closing. Relena herself seemed like the only one who could not get anything done.
As she headed for the stairs, she realized the distinct lack of guards. However long she stayed, there were always those who stayed even longer than they were requested to to protect her. They always escorted her to her car, making sure she was neither kidnapped nor assassinated. Now they were suddenly.... not there.
Relena had been in enough situations similar to this one to know that something was not right. Her ears straining to hear the slightest unusual sound, she crept down the stairs and into the lobby, bumping into a guard as she entered.
She shook her head and silently berated herself for her overactive imagination. As she continued, she noticed that there were no other guards- strange, since they normally traveled in pairs. She suddenly realized something about the guard now following her. He seemed familiar, yet she knew he wasn't one of the regulars. And all the guards that filled in for the regulars were shy and would often clear their throats noisily in a poor attempt to start conversation.
This man was silent.
She persued her train of thought, not coming to any conclusions about the guard's identity and not overly concerned with safety, until she reached the doors at the front of the office building. The glass doors.
Catching her reflection in them, she also saw that of the guard's. Then it hit her like a ton of bricks why he had seemed so familiar. From his unibang to the single, visible emerald eye, she knew that face.
Whirling around, she gasped, "Trowa Barton!"
The former gundam pilot leapt forward and covered her mouth and nose with a strange-smelling rag. Relena instinctively pulled away, but not before she had inhaled enough of the chloraform to send her into unconsciousness.
Relena woke to the annoying, whining sound of a drill and simply rolled over, hoping she had no meetings for the day. Then she remembered the events of the previous night and jumped to her feet, searching for a weapon. Alertness gave way to embarrassment; the most threatening object in the room was a slowly rotating ceiling fan.
She tested the door and, finding it unlocked, opened it a crack and peeked out. She almost laughed. Not only did these kidnappers leave the door unlocked, they also left no one to watch her. They must not know what they were doing, but then she recalled who exactly had kidnapped her and re-thought her situation.
She crept into the hall and realized that the drilling had stopped and had been replaced with arguing voices. She headed towards the noise and entered a large hangar, quickly hiding behind a piece of machinery.
"She's still alive?! You were supposed to kill her!"
"Excuse me! But unlike some people in this room, I don't kill pacifists!"
"Maxwell, this is a totally pathetic dispute! You're going to kill her!"
In hiding, Relena's eyes widened. Maxwell? Duo Maxwell?
"You know what's pathetic, Wufei? It's that we're bending over backwards to kiss our asses for a shithead that's bent on destroying the peace we worked so hard for! That's what's pathetic!"
Relena gaped in astonishment. There were three gundam pilots working for her kidnappers?! And the more she heard, the more it sounded like they were working independently. She began to back away, but bumped into a group of chains, causing a very loud clanging.
Wufei and Duo whipped around and spotted Relena who stood frozen for a moment. She quickly regained her wits and raced away from the rapidly approaching men, ducking around machinery and jumping over boxes. She tripped on her skirt and fell against the edge of a metal crate. The metal cut through her blouse and slashed a deep gash in her abdomen.
Biting back a cry of pain and blinking away tears, Relena staggered up and ran once more, somehow eluding her pursuers. However, the loss of blood made her light-headed; and, as her legs collapsed beneath her, she distantly felt herself being caught and cradled by strong arms.