Gundam Wing Fan Fiction / Sailor Moon Fan Fiction ❯ Mended Wing ❯ Mended Wing - Prologue ( Prologue )

Authors Notes: Welcome all to a brand new story in the Wing Trilogy. As you all know, Broken Wing was the first story in this set of three, and now we have moved on to the second: Mended Wing. Mended Wing will reverse the roles and take the GBoys from their time and plunk them down in Usagi's. It is seven years after Broken Wing for Usagi, and eight for the five pilots (that way they'll all be the same age, except Trowa, who will now be one year older than Usagi). In this story you will find the answers to some of your questions left over from Broken Wing, and may even find some new hope for a broken heart. But no promises. My thanks go out to Marika Webster, who has stuck by me in some of the most difficult and trying times of my life and, like Duo, will run and hide but will never lie, even if the truth will hurt. Thanks to Girl-chama (aka Sailorgundam), whose rigid and totally unattainable expectations for fanfiction will make me strive for a greater level of excellence in Mended Wing. Thanks to Rashaka-chan, who has disappeared to parts unknown, but to whom I still owe a great debt for helping me to finish Broken Wing. Thanks to someone who may not be reading this, but to whom I owe a debt for showing me how strong I really am, even if they did it by being a completely heartless human being. And thanks to the rest of you who are coming back to read this, if you are, if you've been patient through Wayward.

Disclaimer: Oy, here we go again. Neither Gundam Wing nor Sailormoon belong to me. ARE YOU HAPPY NOW?!? ::sobs::

Mended Wing - Prologue

Time. Time had no meaning. Time slid by in ever confusing tendrils. No longer could she read them like a book, cover to cover and with knowledge of every smallest word. That ability had long been stripped from her by this cold, dark, and misty place. Oh, she was used to darkness and mist, but the cold . . . the cold drained her. Even with the protection provided her by her station, the cold still managed to seep under her flesh. A chill had carved its way underneath her flimsy protection of skin and curled there for a long sleep, settled for a stay. After so long in the cold, in the darkness and mist with no hope of ever leaving, even the diaphanous fog became hostile. White fingers caressed her face in deceptively gentle arcs, and the iciness held within formed itself into chips of sharp chill, cold made solid. She could feel the blood arching down over her cheeks and wanted to scream against the injustice done to her, to this once proud Guardian.

Wait . . . that wasn't blood. No. Just her tears.

~~**~~**~~**~~**~~**~~

Meioh Setsuna shuffled her bags from one arm to the other, her newly freed hand fumbling with her keys. Her stern face wrinkled just the slightest as those jangling pieces of metal fell to the ground. She sighed and bent her knees carefully, trying to pick them up both without spilling the contents of her bags and without giving the street a flash show of what lay beneath her mauve skirt. Her foot banged against the door and in a moment it opened, a pair of socked feet sliding into view.

"Having trouble?" the laughing voice of Tenoh Haruka glided down to her, and Setsuna scowled tightly.

"Just a little. Do you think you could exert yourself enough to help me?"

"I guess," the woman chuckled and bent down, having no skirts to worry about or bags. A deft hand grabbed up the keys as Setsuna straightened herself. Groaning as her back complained, Setsuna reached out a hand for her keys and glanced up with annoyed maroon eyes.

A skull face stared back at her. Black-boned, grinning, blue fire literally burning in empty sockets, the skull chuckled in Haruka's voice. Setsuna stumbled backwards, right foot dangling from the edge of the top step, eyes wide. As she looked on, the ocular fire flared, spreading out and over the entire skull-face. Engulfed in blue-tinged flame, the skull floated towards her, no longer connected to Haruka's body. Setsuna gave a cry and flung her arms in front of her, discarding her precious shopping bags.

"Ssssetssssunaaaaa . . ."

Horrible. Corny. Something out of an old B movie at best. Yet somehow that keening, calling voice, hissing out her name, terrified the Guardian like nothing else in her long, long life ever had. There was a promise there, a promise and a threat, so closely related they intertwined, became indistinguishable from each other. The voice called to her again, called through the blackness zooming in over her eyes, calling through the hum of something else, something faintly familiar but infinitely unrecognizable. Hands grabbed at her and she fought, kicking, clawing, pounding with closed fists. She screamed as loud as she could for no other reason than that by some miracle her screams might force this evil away.

"Setsuna-san!"

Sharp, not hissing. Hands shaking, but not grabbing. Blackness because her eyes were closed. The hum became that of passing cars. Setsuna dared to open her gaze and found Haruka staring at her, intense worry blazing n the other woman's eyes. Those strong hands grasped her shoulders. Behind the blonde stood a wide-eyed Michiru and behind her still, Hotaru, clinging to Michiru's skirts as she had done when a second child.

"H-Haruka-san?"

"What happened?"

"I . . . I don't know . . ."

~~**~~**~~**~~**~~**~~

Quatre tugged at his sleeves. He ran a hand through his hair, mussing the perfectly styled white-blonde strands. He played with the pen that should have been signing form after form after form. Still the uneasiness, that strange cloud of anxiety, hung over him and refused to let him continue with his day or his work. At last he gave in to it and pushed away his stack of papers, rising from the mahogany desk and shaking his head.

What's wrong? he asked himself as he approached the window. Outside a sheet of rain formed a grey curtain between him and the capitol of L4. Quatre stuffed his hands in his pockets and unfocused his gaze, purposefully letting himself sink into that place between reality and dreams, where sanity is only a cloak and the insane is easily deciphered. In that in-between place he found only more confusion, more anxiety, and a bleak darkness hovering about everything. Pulsating, clawing, waiting, reaching out for the perfect time to strike, the darkness paused to feel him watching. Quatre fully expected an attack. He received only the dismal cackling of an amused . . . thing? Entity . . . .

With a blink he found himself snapped back into full reality, staring into the reflection of his wide, fear-filled eyes. His own face, the hard-lined face of a grown man, gazed out at him with a stricken expression.

Quatre turned away from the window and its water trails. Within his pockets his fingers clenched into fists.

Setsuna, for the first time in eight years I wish you were here.

Eight years since the war, since he and his friends had met Usagi and that mysterious Guardian of Time, Setsuna. Quatre sighed and smiled a bit as he remembered, not for the first time, the great smiling face of Tsukino Usagi. They all owed her for the bond of friendship that saved their lives, and in smaller, individual ways as well. He owed her for restoring Trowa's memories, without which the taller boy might never have remembered Quatre, and they would not know the love they now shared. Trowa thanked her every day for bringing him back from death in time to confess that love and share a life with his koi. Quatre's face flushed as he thought on that, even though he was alone in his office.

Hiiro owed her for his looser emotions, and the close bond he shared with Vice Foreign Minister Darlian. The Arabian, no longer so little, pondered that relationship and wondered exactly how much there was there.

A similar debt hounded Wufei, who would never admit to owing anything to a "baka onna" as he had taken to calling women not long after pulling the phrase from Hiiro. Nor would he admit to what they all knew; he had cradled a small crush for Usagi up until at least a year after she left. Married now, to the former Alliance Major Sally Po, Wufei also owed to the bright blonde girl a debt for softer emotions.

Duo. Quatre sighed as his thoughts turned to the braided one. Unlike the Chinese man, Duo's feeling for her had been much stronger. Still are, the CEO reminded himself. Once the ladies man, Duo still flirted with women, but never took any of them seriously. He seemed in constant wait for the one girl he'd loved, but could never have. Destiny deprived him of that happiness, but Duo clung to a desperate, unspoken hope that perhaps one day his wish might come true if he only prayed enough. He owed that to Usagi: stronger faith.

He blinked himself from contemplation as the old fashioned audio phone rang. Polished shoes made no sound against the carpet as he returned to the desk and deftly picked up the receiver he took so much pleasure in.

"Quatre Raberba Winner."

"Quatre."

He smiled at the sound of Trowa's voice on the other end. The leather chair squeaked beneath his weight as he settled into it and prepared to answer.

"Quaaaaatreeeee . . ."

Mist seeped from the tiny holes dotted over the mouthpiece, flowed around him and formed a gossamer spiderweb. Quatre choked and pushed at the fog with both hands. Darkness rose from his stomach, a fear born from that deep anxiety and the terrible knowledge that what he dreaded was coming to pass. The misty web closed in, tightening about him and for something so airy it felt like solid fire against his skin and he screamed for Trowa, for Rassid, for anyone to hear him but none did. Around his retrained body the web spread and created a thin cocoon. Then it vanished. Quatre with it.

"Quatre?" Trowa's voice filtered from the dropped phone. "Quatre?!? QU-"

End Mended Wing Prologue.