“Yeah, you pointed one at me when I was seven.”

Heero blinked, looked down at the gun, and fought a grin.  “Good memory.  You’re going to learn how to fire one.  Come on,” he added, turning on his heel and heading towards the hallway, the girl following closely behind.

“Heero, what are you doing?” Relena called after him.

The man paused by the door.  “Teaching her how to shoot.”

“You’re going to teach a minor how to use a fire arm?  Are you crazy?”  She heard a muted bark of laughter from the other ex-pilots but ignored them.

“I was six when I learned how to fire a gun.  A rocket launcher before I was eight.”

“You’re an exception.”

Heero seemed to consider that for a moment.  Gesturing with the butt of his gun, he said, “Duo.  How old were you when you learned to shoot?”

“Hand guns or otherwise?”

“A hand gun.”

“Maybe seven, but not older than that.”

Heero turned to the other side of the room.  “Trowa?”

“Six.  Could pilot a mobile suit by nine.”

Cocking his head to the side, Heero looked expectantly at Relena.

“Times were different when we were young,” she said softly.

“Yeah,” Wufei added from the computer consol, “back then we didn’t have a ten-foot tall unknown species chasing us around.”

“An unknown species with sharp pointy teeth and bleeds acid,” Quatre added.

“Probably would’ve made our job a lot easier during the war, or at least would’ve garnered the same reaction that we did,” Trowa observed, rewrapping the bandage around his forearm.

“Yeah, panic,” Duo agreed.

“Do you know how to fire a gun?” Heero asked Relena, the slight edge to his voice betraying his growing impatience.

“Well yes, if need be, for self-defense.”

Taking a few steps towards her, he murmured so that the youngest of the group couldn’t hear, “That’s all I’m trying to give her.  In the worst case scenario, she needs to be able to defend herself until help gets here, and she can only hole up in one of the vents for so long.”

After a tense moment, Relena lowered her eyes and nodded, falling silent.  Turning around again, Heero led the girl out into the hallway to start her lesson.

*****

“Short and controlled.  We don’t have any ammunition to waste, so don’t ever spray bullets.  The only one who’s allowed to do that is Trowa, and that’s because his accuracy is damn good.”  He paused and looked down at the wide-eyed girl.  “So don’t get in his way, alright?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And don’t call me ‘sir.’”

“Why not?”  She tilted her head to the side.  “I thought you were all with the Preventers.”

“For the time being.  Not everyone in the organization has a military rank.  Wufei’s the only one among us that has any kind of authority.  The rest of us were contracted by Une for this mission and this mission alone.”

Her face seemed to fall.  “So you won’t be sticking around after this.”

Heero glanced sidelong at the girl.  “Not planning on it.  Why?”

She shook her head.  Pulling her attention back to the task at hand, she asked, “So how much practice do I get, if our supplies are so low?”

The Japanese man held is hand out and she gave him the gun back.  Checking the magazine he said, “The rest of this round.  That’s all.  So you better get your wits about you and concentrate.”

She nodded and took the gun back.  Straightening her posture and fixing her hand positions, she looked down the barrel of the gun and fired.