Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ After Colony 198 ❯ Why Are You Here? ( Chapter 9 )

After Colony 198

chapter nine

by Iris Anthe

"I've got it! The master hacker has done it again." Hilde rolled her eyes as her partner in crime displayed his usual level of modesty and reserve. She had to admit, however, that he was good--very, very good. She could see as she rolled her chair over to Duo's side, that he'd already managed to hack into the main security network for their home colony at L2. All they had to do now was sit there watching security footage for Lord knew how long, until somebody managed to spot the incognito Relena Peacecraft boarding a shuttle, or whatever else she might have done.

"Well, don't get cocky Duo. We've still got a lot of work ahead of us."

Duo smirked grimly to himself before quickly erasing the negative facial expression and instead beginning to leer suggestively at his newfound girlfriend. "Just let me know when you need to take a break hot stuff. I noticed a cushy looking supply closet in the corner when we came in." With that said, he gave her an elaborate wink and laughed his way through the repeated slapping of his head with his own braid.

He knew they had a lot of work to do. He knew he couldn't afford to let Heero down again. He knew their chances of finding Relena on these vid files were not good, but he was going to try anyway. Hilde's presence gave the endeavor the feeling of possible hope that he otherwise might not have felt. Hilde had given him the elusive peace that they'd all fought so hard for in the wars, but only because he'd finally accepted what she gave so easily. If the God of Death could finally embrace the living, then somehow or other, so could the Suicide King.

"OK Hilde, let's start with the day Relena arrived at the space dock on L2, and work forward from there. I'll take docks one through fourteen; you take docks fifteen to twenty-eight. First one to find her arrival gets a backrub!"

"Hmph! You might as well get started on the massage now, Duo. I'm definitely going to spot the Princess first!"

With a competitive gleam in their eyes, Duo and Hilde, occasionally joined by a strangely unnerved Trowa, set to work reviewing all of the security footage from the spaceports of the L2 colony in the hopes of finding something that Heero had managed to miss in his search for Relena.

*****

What do I hope to achieve, Noin? What am I doing here? Zechs ran a cold, damp hand across his face. The hand, at least was steady. Zechs sat in the pilot's chair, staring disinterestedly past the protective shield of the window into the cold vacuum of space--so easy to die in space. It wouldn't take much, just the strength to finally end this twisted, wasted life.

In the past month, the only thing that could ease him from suicidal bouts of apathy was either the delirium of a drunken stupor or fits of violent rage. It was now the sixth day out from the remote colony near Mars in this cramped cargo shuttle with nothing but the bare animosity of a self-serving, ugly man for company. There was apparently not a drop of alcohol on the shuttle, and the six-hour work rotations left him with an unwelcome amount of time for sober reflection. He'd found himself talking out loud to his wife more than once, even when he was not under the delusion that she was actually with him in the room. Perhaps he simply could not escape the accusation of her hands gripping her elbows between her swollen abdomen and her swollen breasts as he turned away from her, in a stupor of obedience, to board the cargo shuttle bound for Colony L2. His mind, his soul was caught ricocheting around in the gray chambers of memory.

"I've never been so ashamed of you in all the years I've known you."

He recalled his wife targeting and shooting every bottle of homebrew whiskey in his room before deliberately removing the cartridge and placing the gun on the counter.

"That girl has given you the best she can of exactly what she thinks you wanted from her, what we all wanted from her. She has become THE Peacecraft. I have loved you for as long as I have known you, even through your pain; and I have tried to give you what you needed to be whole. I thought you needed someone to protect; I thought that your own child would be enough. I realize now that I was wrong. I will tell you now, Zechs, Relena needs you more than she's ever needed you before, and all you can think to do is sit in this stinking hole of a room and drink yourself into an early grave. This child will not be your child until you find Relena and beg her to forgive you."

And now here he was, headed for her last known location... to Heero Yuy, the bastard his sister had turned to in her hour of need instead of her own family--the bastard who obviously had disappointed her just as could have been predicted. But then again, what right did he have to claim superiority over Heero Yuy; at least Relena had wanted to see his enemy.

After soaking himself in the filth and blood of war since the day they were separated; after protecting her, and keeping her clean enough to take his place as the heir of the Peacecraft line; after sacrificing everything his father taught him to hold dear to keep his little sister pure, she turned away from him, from her destiny as the leader of a peaceful era, and ran to the one man who had been able to kill him, but chose to humiliate him instead. With death running cold through his veins, Zechs focused on a new target for his anger.

"I wonder who she hoped would survive that final battle of ours. I'd bet my life she was on your side."

*****

Heartbeat. Blood-beat. Pulse. Beat.

It was enough... enough weakness... enough of this helplessness. This had gone on long enough.

I will not be afraid of you!

With eyes shut and life's blood pulsing in her ears, she begins to build the fleshy wall that will encase her, enwomb her, protect her from the confusion around her, from the nothingness that eats her, from the voice that tries to control her.

My name is Relena Dorlian!

Breathing more and more strength into herself, concentrating her keen mind on this one task of self-preservation and defiance, she builds a barrier impenetrable. She is through the pain, and over with doubt. Loved or unloved, needed or unneeded... it makes no difference now. Standing taller than her mere physical stature would suggest, she closes the final gap, and with a will stronger than expected she prepares a world only for herself.

My name is Relena Dorlian, and I am NOT afraid!

*****

"Docking Bay Number Twelve!" Duo burst out of his swivel chair, sending it flying out behind him as he crowed triumphantly into the tic-tac-tapping-filled air of the computer room. Much to his annoyance, Hilde gave no hint of a reaction whatsoever.

"Hey Hilde! Didja hear me? I found the Princess. She arrived through docking bay twelve! Time for that backrub sweet stuff." Completely ignored yet again, Duo began his customary offensive attack of loud and random teasing and cajoling to try and get his partner to notice him.

"You awake there, Hilde? You haven't nodded off on me now, have you? I've been working away at this computer for three hours now and I haven't heard a peep out of you. This whole time I thought you were working too, but now I see that you were just letting me plug away while you caught up on your beauty sleep... not that you need it, babe. 'Cause you are looking mighty fine. I'll just have to try and let you sleep more at night..."

"Duo..."

"Huh?"

"Duo, come here for a minute will you?"

Once again discovering that even when not in stealth mode, he was at times practically invisible, apparently even when trying desperately to get some attention... Duo dutifully pulled his chair up besides Hilde's and peered over her shoulder.

"Don't tell me you've figured out where Relena is."

"Noooo... I just... Duo, look at this..."

Hilde backtracked the security log and paused it on a group of people arriving at docking bay 23, about two hours after Relena's arrival time. She then focused in on a particular face that was obscured by the brim of a large hat; only the lower half of a female face and a bit of hair could be seen. Clicking the touchpad, repeatedly, and manipulating the dithering software, Hilde enlarged and clarified the image of the partly obscured face.

"Well whadya know. I wonder what she's doing there."

*****

"Wake up."

It was a command that jolted Heero instantly into consciousness. Without a moment's hesitation he sprang to his feet and reached for the gun he generally kept tucked into the small of his back.

"Looking for this?"

He knew that voice. Out of the darkness stepped the tall, angular body and clashingly round face of the pale girl known as Dorothy Catalonia. In her outstretched palm lay his gun, and she offered it to him with that same teasing air she always saved for her adversaries. He despised her sense of playfulness in the realm of death and violence. Disregarding the smirk on her thin lips, he lunged for his gun only to find it had vanished. Trying to recover his balance and attack Dorothy by kicking her legs out from under her only left him unexpectedly on his back with the surprisingly nimble woman straddling him, a knife gently piercing his neck.

"My, my, Heero. What would Miss Relena say if she found you in such a compromising position?" In a sickeningly crude gesture, she began to grind herself into him, and flashed him a canine ridden smile. In a surge he knocked the knife away, and jumped up and back, out of her immediate physical vicinity.

"What are you doing here?"

She laughed in apparent delight before replying, "I could ask you the same thing, Mr. Yuy, but to be quite honest, I don't think you know the answer. In fact I don't think you even know exactly where HERE is."

"I'm looking for Relena."

"Well Heero, I think you've found her."

With a graceful flick of the wrist, Dorothy brought his attention to an area just behind him that glowed dimly with a slowly pulsing warmth. A familiar scent filtered around him and he found himself moving in a daze towards a wall of some pliant, translucent material that grew brighter as he approached. The hairs on the back of his neck rose up in an animal reaction to the strange sight before him. There, on the other side of this glowing wall of transparent flesh was a radiant figure, with her eyes squeezed tightly shut.

Reaching out one hand to gently caress the strange barrier between them, he felt awash with relief to have finally found her.

"Relena."