Twisted Destiny
Episode 6:
by Masamune
Shadow sat on a bench outside of a small grocery store. He was in a small little town in the Great Plains region. He had heard that one of the Gundam scientists would be here, no such luck. Now he sat watching the poor kicks of the town go about their morning customs. Milking cows, opening up the shop.
/If it were only so simple for all of us/, he thought. Sitting in broad daylight was a thing Shadow did rarely. But now that he was simply wearing a beat up pair of jeans and a loose fitting T-shirt he looked like a normal person. The only feature a passerby might find strange would be he fact that his baseball hat was pulled down almost completely hiding his face.
"Got to get to Oakland before that Alliance meeting starts," he said to himself. "Mirage is at the bottom of the bay, it's safe there but I might cut it a little close time wise. I'm sure those Gundam pilots have all heard that OZ officials are meeting at Edwards. Too bad it's all peace oriented Alliance officials."
He thought of his four partners, the other Mirage pilots.
/If I'm not there/ he thought /Then they won't be either/
Morning light shined down on the barren landscape. Nothing but road and cracked plains for the eye to behold. Smoke sputtered as Alex Vendetta stubbed out his cigarette. He didn't smoke often, but he had been driving for more then twelve hours. He almost wished that Trowa would wake up, the brown haired pilot had came out of his drug induced sleep but was still curled up in the passenger seat of the truck. His hair was rumbled and out of order, showing definite lack of gel. Alex got back into the truck and started up the engine. Then he noticed Trowa.
"Damn, poor guy," he sympathetically said. "He's having one hell of a bad dream. But troubled sleep is better then no sleep."
The emerald eyes were rapidly moving under Trowa's eyelids. He was shaking now and sweating profusely. With a sigh Alex decided to wake him up. Knowing his friend wouldn't be happy with Alex's actions the night before.
Duo slammed his fist into the alarm clock on his nightstand.
"Too fucking early," he whined as he put a pillow over his head and tried to block out the morning light.
His head hurt like hell. Him and Quatre had ended up playing a drinking game with the bartender, Maurice his name was. The rest of the night was now a fuzzy blur of shot glasses, joking around and throwing up on the lobby floor. A sharp pain ran through Duo's head, apparently he had lost the drinking game.
Just then the door to his room opened. He heard someone walk in.
"That you Quatre?" he asked, the pillow still covering his head.
"Of course it is," the blonde pilot responded, pulling the pillow off of Duo's head. "It's almost noon. By Allah what have you been doing all this time? Jerking off?"
"Yeah, about fifty times," the American said cynically. "Could you just give me back my pillow?" It hit him on the back of his head. "What have you been doing all morning anyway?"
"You know walking around, scouting the New Edwards base, cruising for guys. You know."
Duo sat up. This wasn't the nice, well-mannered guy he had met last night. Quatre had seemed to be a well-raised kid and all. Now he was sorta wired or.
"What's up with you?" Duo asked as he got off of the bed and walked to the bathroom.
Quatre pulled a small plastic bag out of his jacket pocket. Duo didn't need to ask what was in it.
/It's always the quiet guys/ he thought as he shut the bathroom door and began to change.
"Maurice; you know the bartender. He sold it to me last night after you passed out. It's really pretty good. I think I could get used to this stuff."
Duo yelled from the bathroom, "I sorta had you figured as the nice, momma's boy kind of guy."
"Really?" Quatre responded as Duo turned on the shower. "Well as of yesterday that was pretty much the way it was. Guess sometimes you have to go out and do something like this ya know? Mix things up a bit."
"Whatever. Ack the water is hot! Whatever, it's impossible to talk a person reasonably when they're high. So just come back in a few hours or whenever you come back down to Earth Ok partner?"
"Is Lt. Zechs there?"
"Yes of course Col. Treize, I'll put him on the line right away."
Treize frowned; he was not looking forward to telling his old friend that Relena was dead. He had known all along that Zechs, the Lightning Count and loyal knight of the Romafeller Foundation was really Miliardo Peacecraft. Now he was the last living Peacecraft and rightful ruler of the Sanq kingdom. Relena had been his sister, and although Relena had been taken by the Darlian family years ago Zechs had always hoped to restore the Sanq kingdom to Relena's rule. Now that was impossible.
"Hello Commander Treize," Zechs was on the intercom now.
"I take it you know already, about Relena," the OZ commander softly said.
Zechs nodded. "I know that as an OZ soldier I must keep the priorities of OZ in mind first and always foremost. Casualties are always going to happen. It is because war has no heart, it knows not old nor young nor noble nor rich nor beautiful nor poor."
Treize nodded. Briefly the list of soldiers flashed through his mind. All of the people that had died under his command. "Yes," he agreed closing his eyes. "Wars truly are heartless indeed." He looked at the video screen again. The masked face betrayed no emotion. "I knew you would understand Zechs, you always do."
"Thank you sir."
"But what I really wanted to do was apologize to you, Miliardo. I'm sorry for the loss you are feeling now. I knew how much she meant to you, how you hoped that someday she would…"
"Hopes of the past have no place in this world," Zechs responded coldly, cutting off Treize for probably only the fourth time in his life. "Relena…was a good girl, she was a true Peacecraft. Treize my friend, you know that I no longer am justified to be of that noble name. When I put on this mask and betrayed everything my father ever held dear, I became a soldier, and soldiers need not have any hopes. They simply must follow orders."
"Miliardo, please, you know that you mean more to me then that."
"Treize. Sometimes I wish you would stop following me around."
The man in the blue uniform chuckled. "And sometimes I wish I never had met you. You are always acting out of order."
"..."
"Listen I'm sorry Ok? Just give me a goddamn break will ya?" The truck had been silent since Trowa had woken up. "You almost killed me when I woke you up."
"Sorry," was all that Trowa had to say.
Alex sighed and faced his friend. "Listen, you needed sleep. You were a wreck yesterday. Knocking you out with that medicine was the only way I could get you to become better."
"You at least could have warned me."
Alex laughed. "But then you never would have gotten any rest. I hate to deceive you but everything I do IS for a good cause, just keep that in mind." For another 10 minutes noone spoke.
"I have a question for you Alex," Trowa finally said.
/Huh? He's trying to actually talk to me? / Alex wondered. "Sure go ahead," he replied.
"What are you going to do Alex? " Trowa reluctantly asked. "I mean what are you going to do after all this over? After there are no more battles?"
Alex looked at Trowa. For a second he wondered what to tell him. Then finally he said, "Trowa, no matter what I've learnt that there will always be battle. Sometimes it's in space or Earth or within a family. But no matter what there is always a battleground, there are just different battles for each place and time."
"But truly there is some time where soldiers like us are going to become worthless."
"Yeah, I'm sure of that. One day there will be peace in the world, and then wars fought with blood and mobile suits won't be around anymore. But people are always going to be fighting, whether against each other, their past or their destiny. It's a long endless waltz I guess. And you just can't stop dancing."
"Very poetically put," Trowa scoffed.
"Hey I thought you were interested in my thoughts!" his friend shot back.
"I was but I wasn't expecting a sermon from you."
Alex sighed. "Well if it makes any difference to you," he began. "I'm going back home, to space, when this whole thing blows over. I used to lead a sorta normal life. I worked in a colony mobile suit hangar. Sort of like a dockworker. How about you? What'll you do after this is over?"
Trowa looked at Alex. "I think I'll join the circus."
/Damn my head hurts/
/Where am I anyway? /
/That guy. Am I captured again? /
Ice cold water hit Wufei in the face. He gasped and jumped up nearly knocking over a young boy that was standing over him. Even though it was dark Wufei could make out a semi-muscular build and blazing cobalt eyes.
"You're finally up," the stranger said. "You're lucky I didn't kill you earlier."
Wufei stood up; he was in a thicket presumably still in the woods outside of the Lake Victoria base. The sun was barley coming up, near him he saw Nataku and next to that was another Gundam. The other boy was staring threateningly at him. He was obviously the pilot of the other mobile suit.
"Hurry up," the boy with moss green hair said. "It's amazing that the OZ forces haven't found us yet. Get into your Shen-long and follow me. We have to get to New Edwards base in another four hours."
"Another mission huh?" Wufei asked. "Makes sense. I really screwed up here." He looked at Nataku. "But I can't fly the Shen-long all the way to America. I'm going to need a carrier."
The other boy stared for a second. He considered his options for a moment then said, "It's your problem. I'm going to New Edwards, maybe you can borrow a carrier from the Victoria base."
Wufei shook his head. "I'm not going to be able to pull it off without your help."
Heero stared at the Chinese pilot for a minute, then finally he spoke, "Hurry up and get into your Gundam. We'll make this as quick as possible."
"No Instructor Noin, there isn't anything to report."
"I didn't raise incompetent soldiers!" Noin yelled. "Those terrorists are still in the area. They couldn't have gotten away without some mobile suit of some type. Search the entire area until you find them!"
"Shit!" the radar officer, yelled. "The transport bay is under heavy fire from the enemy! It's the Gundams. Both of them!"
Noin got out of her seat and went to the intercom. "Listen up!" she yelled over the loudspeakers. "The enemy is attempting to capture a transport ship. All capable personnel get over to the hangar now. Mobile suit units B-T81 get to the hangar. We need all the help we can get."
The Shen-long ripped its Dragon Fang through a Leo unit. The fire from Wing's rifle destroying most of the Aries. The Leo troops kept coming. A shot from a Dober Gun made Wufei cringe as the Shen-long staggered. As he attempted to steady himself a Leo came charging at him Beam Saber drawn. Wufei tried to bring his shield up, knowing he was too late already. Then the Leo was knocked back as Wing's shield jabbed into its side. The Beam Saber fell and within seconds the Leo was a smoldering heap of metal.
"Load your Gundam onto the transport plane," Heero said to Wufei. "I'll hold the rest off."
Wing turned around and fired his Mounted Vulcans sending a squad of Aries scattering.
"A transmission came in from Zechs."
Noin swore under her breath as she got into her Aries. "Tell Colonel Zechs that I will be unable to make our rendezvous. Tell him also that the situation her is under control and that the Gundams will be gone within the hour."
Wing fired his Buster Rifle for the third time. The gun was warm now, Heero figured five minutes for it to cool down. Quickly he pulled out his Beam Saber and hacked through an incoming Aries. Nearby he saw four more appear.
/Wish that guy would hurry up/ he thought.
The Aries leader fired as Wing thrusted back barley missing the bullets. Turning he fired shooting down two of the Aries, the leader rushed at him but Heero quickly ducked and knocked the Aries away with wing's shield. The fourth Aries considered it's options, then turned and fled back away from Wing. Heero smiled at the retreating unit. Then blew it out of the sky with his machine cannon.
"Coward," the voice came from his intercom. He picked it up.
"Do you have your Gundam loaded yet?" he asked his Chinese comrade.
A white transport ship flew out of the hangar and sped off towards the northwest in response to Heero's question. Wing turned into Bird mode and sped off following the shuttle.
Go to Episode 7!!!
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