Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Broken Wing ❯ Broken Wing - Chapter Twelve ( Chapter 12 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Broken Wing - Chapter Twelve



Authors Note: I've got a special treat in store for those of you who've been wondering when I'm going to include the other Senshi. Nope, I'm not going to tell you which one, you'll just have to read! Luckily, you won't have to read very long before you find out. So read! Thankies to Marika Webster, VeeBees, and the genius of Trenchcoat Man. And much massive thankies to all of you who have remained patient with me even though I've gone back to posting very slowly. Or at least refrained from cutting of my head just yet.

Disclaimer: GW and SM don't belong to me dangit so stop asking!



Broken Wing - Chapter Twelve


Setsuna's shaking fingers tightened around her staff. She'd been watching the portals, and knew that it was time to pick up Usagi and the three pilots and transport them to Sanch. She had to calm herself, however, so she could keep her ever growing secret well hidden from them.
The darkness she felt was growing not only stronger, but more curious. It reached into her realm more often and with more tenacity with each passing attempt. The Guardian could not help but feel she was being baited. It wanted her to come looking for it. And a dark entity that confident was not something to go chasing after.
Setsuna shook her head and passed a deep breath through her lungs. Calm rushed through her in familiar waves, an old friend she was used to and had been missing lately. She shook out the last remaining vestiges of panic and tapped her staff against the ground, willing her Time Gate to open to the proper Time and place. It did so almost too willingly, and she couldn't help but think of it as the gaping maw of a creature waiting to devour her. A ridiculous thought she knew, and forced herself to step into the swirling, psychedelic void that was the Time Warp.
Setsuna was the most adept walker between Times, and it was barely a moment, or perhaps an eternity, until she came upon the glittering white gate that matched the one opened to the Realm. This one would lead her to the base and through that to the three pilots left behind and their very precious charge. She waved it open with her staff and stepped through, green-black fuku and hair suddenly fluttering in the Earth's breeze. With a brief thought she erected an invisibility shield about her and set off into the trees to find her young friends.
It didn't take her long, because the pilots were smart enough to stay in the area in case she should show up with more information. The boys may not completely trust her yet, but they desperately wanted to know the secrets she refused to tell them, and that's what kept them following her orders. For now.
"Hello," she let the shield drop and peered over the four people sitting in the clearing, "I've come to take you to Sanch. Hiiro and Quatre have won political asylum for you."
The four tossed a glance between themselves and all finally just shrugged and stood. Apparently the pilots had all given up on trying to get more answers from her. They walked over to her peacefully and quietly.
At last something is going my way.
"Place your hands on the staff, please." Setsuna saw the grin spreading on Duo's face and thrust her Time Key out before her, "I mean the Time staff!"
Usagi snickered, and Trowa colored a bit. Wufei growled and simply put his hand forward. Setsuna glared at the other three until they too placed their hands on the giant key. Her mind cleared, the Guardian concentrated on the Sanch Palace and in moments they were standing inside the building itself. Not only that, but they were inside the princess's office, standing directly in front of her desk with Hiiro and Quatre beside them.
"Relena?!?" Duo's mouth fell wide open as he saw the girl sitting serenely behind the great mahogany monstrosity. Usagi discreetly reached over and snapped it shut with a CLICK resounding from his teeth.
"Hello, Duo." Relena smiled in that annoyingly calm way she had about her, her hands clasped together and resting on the table counter. She tilted her head forward in a very regal bow, and Setsuna was glad to see all five pilots and Usagi return the gesture. "Well, since you are here, I will assume that you all know that you are welcome here in Sanch under my protection. That offer is extended to you as well." The young princess turned her eyes to Setsuna, who shook her head.
"I cannot stay, Your Majesty. I have duties elsewhere."
"I understand," Relena smiled, and the Guardian knew that when this girl said she understood, it was not merely a figure of speech, "I will let you be gone to your business then."
Setsuna bowed. She did not have to, for the only princess she truly felt loyalty towards was Serenity. But she had been watching this girl for some time, and knew that Relena was a strong and determined individual, capable of running a country and worthy of respect. When the woman straightened she saw a knowing glimmer in the girl's eyes.
"Behave, Duo." Setsuna grumbled before vanishing. She didn't want to hear the cheerful 'No problem!' that would no doubt follow.


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


Down the corridors, through the palace, avoiding the crowds of people who wanted to get a glimpse of Hiiro Yui, the pilots followed Relena as she led them towards their quarters. Quatre kept his hands clenched together just under his chin; he was afraid to touch anything for fear that he would break some priceless vase or other such item. The fear was not unfounded, for he had broken a valuable Winner family heirloom when he was young, and the reaction of his father had instilled in him a deep respect for anything that looking overly expensive.
"How are we gonna get our Gundams?" Duo leaned over and whispered into the blonde's ear.
"Don't worry, Relena is taking care of it." Quatre caught the indigo look that clearly betrayed Duo's wariness of letting the Sanch princess know where their Gundams were located. "She's trustworthy." The boy didn't bother to mention that Relena would never do anything to endanger Hiiro's life. Quatre clearly felt from her the emanations of strong love, directed at Hiiro.
He can't feel the same for you, Sanch princess . . . it isn't part of his program. I feel so sorry for you both, and wonder where this road is going to lead you.


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


From the rear of the group, Trowa watched his pale-haired Quatre speak to Duo. He couldn't hear what they were saying, but that didn't matter. What mattered was he had Quatre in constant sight, ready to protect him from any danger in the vicinity. True, the most dangerous thing in Sanch was a wild rabbit, but that was no reason to let his guard down. Why, one of those wild rabbits could rush in at any moment and bite Quatre and tear a finger off, or . . .
What are you thinking? This is stupid. Quatre CAN take care of himself.
Yes, Trowa replied to the rational voice in his mind, but he just seems so fragile. I can't help feeling like I need to protect him. I want to make certain he is safe and . . . and happy . . .
"He IS kawaii, isn't he?"
Trowa jumped, his green eye moving to look at Usagi, the owner of the sudden hushed voice. She had a goofy, knowing grin plastered on her face and her eyes glittered with a very annoying mischievousness.
"W-What?"
"Quatre-kun," she stole a glance at said pilot, "He's kawaii, downright adorable. I know you've noticed."
To his eternal humiliation, Trowa felt heat rising to his cheeks and knew that he was coloring a deep shade of red. What was worse, however, was the surge of bile-black jealousy that rose in his throat. Usagi had noticed Quatre?!? What business did she have noticing HIS Quatre?!? None!
"-tell him."
"Huh?" Trowa blinked, realizing that he had missed the last part of her statement.
"I said that with the war and everything, you don't know what could happen next. Before someone gets hurt, or worse, if you love him, you need to tell him."
"But . . . I . . there . . . I can't . . ."
"Yes you can," she turned those deep, swirling blue yes on him again, this time filled with concern and solemnity, "You have to. Trowa-kun, you're in a war. You could be killed in the next battle. HE could be killed. Do you really want that to happen without him knowing how you feel?"
Do I? Could I handle that?
The tight ball of anxiety that formed in his stomach was answer enough. Trowa released a sigh and nodded to Usagi. He felt the gentle touch of her hand on his arm, and the comforting squeeze, and somehow knew that whatever else happened, anything that Usagi told him to do concerning Quatre was right.
"But," he looked down on her, confusion flowing through him, "how did you know?"
"Know what? That you're in love with Quatre-kun?" Usagi's eyes were soft, and her laugh kind, "Trowa-kun, it isn't that hard to see. You two are always together; you've practically attached yourself to his hip even though you know that he is as highly trained and capable of protecting himself as you are. It's easy to see. We always want to protect the ones we love." Her gaze took on a far away look, and Trowa knew that she was seeing a distant face, the visage of the one she wanted to protect.
"But, Quatre has to know too," Trowa continued, only partly to take her mind off of whoever it was she missed so much, "He can sense feelings. If he knows, why hasn't he said anything?"
"Sometimes even the most perceptive of us can be blinded when it comes to those we truly care about."


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


Usagi looked up into Trowa's green eye and was pleased to see the signs of confusion there. She was proud of her cryptic statement and had no plans to clarify it at all. Trowa was smart; he could figure it out.
"Princess Relena!"
Usagi stopped. That voice, it was so familiar. She knew she shouldn't know anyone here, and the voice was certainly not one she thought she should recognize . . . but something about it nevertheless struck a chord in her. It made her homesick.
She walked around the pilots, towards the front of the group where Relena stood talking with a woman not much taller than the princess. Wire-rimmed glasses perched on her tiny nose, almost hiding the blue-black eyes. Her face was framed by gently layered strands of blue hair and she wore a white lab coat. Underneath that she had on a long blue business dress, which could be seen because it came down to mid-calf while the lab coat was only knee-length. In her hand she held several sheets of paper, what looked like print-outs of documents or some other such important legal nonsense. But she was not a lawyer. No, she looked more like a . . . like a doctor.
"Ami-chan?"
Those dark eyes jerked from Relena to land on Usagi's face and an instant joy filled them. The woman, this time's version of Mizuno Ami, forgot all about the princess of Sanch as she saw her true princess standing before her.
"Usagi-chan!"
The two ran forward and flung their thin arms about each other in a tight and tearful hug. No words were spoken in the next few moments; Usagi and Ami didn't need them, and the onlookers were at a loss for them. When at last the two separated themselves and began talking, it made no sense to Relena or the five Gundam pilots.
"I can't believe this! I didn't think I was going to see any of you here!"
"What, did you think we'd just disappear?"
"No, of course not! But I thought . . . I don't know . . . you'd be on Mercury or something!"
"Ah, those days are long past us, Usagi-chan. The others are living on colonies, but I chose to stay on Earth and serve the Family."
"You mean . . .?" Usagi's eyes drifted to Relena, who stood in shocked silence, unaware of what was going on or what Usagi and Ami were talking about. The blue-haired woman nodded with a smile.
"Yes, that's what I mean."
Usagi squealed in delight and pounced on Relena, giving her the same tight hug that she and Ami had shared only a moment ago. Of course no one else understood why she suddenly had affected such a familiar attitude towards the Sanch princess. None of them could have understood.
"Usagi-chan," Ami's gentle voice reached through her happy trance, "you're making a scene."
"Oh, yes, eh, sorry, Relena-chan."
She saw eyebrows rise all over the room and instantly knew her mistake. By now the pilots understood enough of her personality to know that she normally would have called the princess 'Relena-sama,' not 'Relena-chan.' Now they were most definitely suspicious.
Way to go, Usagi.
"You were showing us to our quarters, weren't you?" Usagi grinned at Relena and turned to give a too cheerful wave goodbye to Ami. Hidden in that wave was the signal for the woman to meet her later. Ami nodded, and Usagi turned away again, satisfied.


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


The five pilots all gathered in Duo's room to discuss Usagi's odd behavior. Duo sat cross-legged on the bed while Hiiro and Trowa leaned on separate walls. Quatre sat primly in the only chair in the room and Wufei paced back and forth, one arm draped over his stomach, the other hand perched on his chin.
"She certainly is an odd girl in general," the Chinese boy offered after a moment of silence.
"She isn't a danger," Quatre tossed in with a quick glance to Duo. No doubt he was remembering the insult they'd all gotten after Usagi's capture, and rightly so, "She's perfectly safe."
"I agree with Quatre," Trowa never moved his eyes from the ground at Quatre's feet, "She's good. And I trust her."
"Yeah, but we've all put our trust in people who didn't deserve it before, now haven't we?" Duo was acting especially serious, which had an effect on the other four. If Duo put aside his trademark mantle of jokes and a laidback nature, then the situation was more severe than even they had realized.
"I think I understand."
All eyes turned to Hiiro, who balanced with one foot against the wall, the other his only anchor to the floor. He too stared at the carpet, but this time it was with a sense of deep, intelligent thought. No one spoke as they watched him, and they could almost see the gears turning in that perfectly programmed mind of his. At long last, after a pause that seemed like agonizing hours, Hiiro opened his mouth and spoke again.
"Usagi isn't from our time."
"What are you talkin' about, Hiiro?"
"I'm talking, Duo, about the fact that our mysterious benefactor turned out to be the Guardian of Time. If her story is true, then she has access to all of the powers and privileges of Time itself. She claims that she saw a horrible future for us unless she moved to prevent it, and brought someone to help us. If she can see into the future, who's to say that she couldn't bring help from the past if there was no one in this time she thought was worthy?"
The silence that followed was drenched in thoughtful deliberation as the four pondered what Hiiro had said. Eyes lit up as they all came to the same conclusion as him, all except for Duo.
"Just because Setsuna's the Guardian of Time or whatever, doesn't mean that Usagi came from the past. Why do you say the past, anyway? Why couldn't it be the future? Or why not the present?"
"It does make sense, Duo, more now than ever." Quatre turned his blue eyes to the braided one, a gentle excitement moving him to almost bounce up and down in his seat, "It didn't make sense before, but now it does! I went looking for some of the odd expressions that she uses when she speaks Japanese. I thought maybe it was a very remote dialect of the language used in some secluded part of the country. But I found out that Usagi-san speaks a version Japanese that was spoken four thousand years ago!"
Even Hiiro's eyes widen at that. Apparently he hadn't believed that she was from so ancient a place in the stream of Time.
"F-four thousand years?" Duo tried to make his mouth work, but only ended up with a stutter.
"It does make sense," Wufei mused, his head tilted backwards, dark eyes trained on the ceiling as if it answered all of his questions, "but it still doesn't answer two other questions. One, how does she know this Ami person? Two, why did she react like that towards Relena?"
"I don't know about Ami, but I do have a theory about Relena," Quatre stood up, straightening his vest and shirt as though he were about to make speech in front of a large audience, "What if Relena is Usagi's descendant?" He raised his hands to stop their protesting before it even began, "No, listen. I . . . had a dream. In it I saw a princess commit suicide over the death of her fiancée. I thought it was just a coincidence, but then . . . that was the night I visited you, Duo, asking about the goddess of the moon."
"I remember. You were particularly interested in Selene."
"Right, because the name of the princess in my dream was Serenity. And her fiancée . . ."
"Endymion." Duo's eyes narrowed as Quatre nodded.
"Right."
"What does this have to do with Usagi-san? Or Relena for that matter?" Wufei looked on the two of them, eager to get through the theory and see if had merit.
"I believe that Usagi-san WAS that princess in the dream, that the events I saw really happened. More importantly, I believe that she was reborn in a later time. I think Usagi-san is the reincarnation of that princess, and Sanch is the remnants of her kingdom."
"You're nuts," Wufei shook his head, obviously dismissing the theory entirely, "It's too unbelievable. It's insane."
"Is it more unbelievable than having our futures changed by the Guardian of Time?" Trowa walked to stand beside Quatre, offering his support both silently and verbally. Wufei's dark eyes shifted back and forth between the two, and some small light of realization dawned in them. He admitted his defeat in silence. It wasn't that his point was beaten, he simply couldn't stand against Trowa and Quatre.
"Well, this is all great theory and all, and I'd love to keep babbling, but believe it or not I'm tired," Duo punctuated his statement with a loud and rather over done yawn, "So I'd appreciate it if you guys would leave. Now." The Deathscythe pilot then herded the other four very surprised pilots through the door and shut it behind them.
With them gone, Duo was free to think over the things said for himself. He spent a good hour lying awake on the bed pondering the possibility that Usagi might not be from his time, but in fact four thousand years in the past. It was such a vast concept that his mind, as bright as it was, could barely comprehend it.
Usagi can't be from the past. At least, not that far back. She can't be. Because if she is . . .
Because if she was, then when this was all over, she would have to go back. And he would never see her again.


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


Outside the palace two figures spoke under cover of night. One was short, with layered hair and white lab coat. The other was taller, with long dark hair, and was dressed in sailor fuku.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes, Ami-chan. It has not be this way."
"But why? Why do we have to help add to her pain? I don't understand!"
"It's destiny. You should know better than any of the others that this has to happen. You built it, remember?"
"I didn't build it, I only created the damn thing," Ami snarled, turning her slender, adult face to stare into the night horizon. Silence passed as she studied that plane, beautiful with the dottings of trees. These were real, not the horribly fake things that they installed in the colonies to try and give them a homey sense. "I created it, not knowing at the time why Serenity insisted that I make something so . . . destructive. I'm still not quite sure. It seems a completely pointless endeavor; not only was it a waste of my time back then, but it is a serious threat to Usagi-chan now. I won't let you lead her to that fate, Setsuna-san."
"It isn't something you can stop. Even without you or me to lead her, Usagi-chan would find this destiny on her own. We might as well be there to comfort her. In all of her forms."
"What do you mean?"
Setsuna shifted, lowering her maroon gaze to the ground before she replied.
"Just know this: after you take Usagi-chan to it, then you must leave on one of your annual visits." The Guardian raised her hand to stop a protesting Ami, "No questions. You will know when you get there why I'm asking you now to go."
Ami gave a sigh and stared at Setsuna for a long moment. Blue-black met maroon, and the wills in the battle were both strong. Finally, however, it was blue that looked away.
"Setsuna-san, you're one of the most irritating people I know. But you've never once led me or any of the others in the wrong direction. So will trust you in this, as we all have trusted you many times before. But I swear that if this goes wrong, I'll find you no matter how much Time may be changed, and make sure that you're sorry for this mistake."
Even Setsuna, the stern and stoic Guardian of Time, was shocked by these words from the woman who had always been the kindest and most understanding of all the Senshi. She stepped away from Ami, eyes wide as the short-haired woman turned.
Setsuna-san, I know you want what is best for these boys and their futures, but you're taking too many risks with the past! You can't forget that without Usagi four thousand years ago, the boys would have lived very different lives, if they lived at all!
Ami shook her head to herself, angry that she hadn't thought to say those words to Setsuna while she had actually had the woman in front of her. But as she stalked into the palace, and saw the bright lights within, her mind was taken back in time to the days of Crystal Tokyo, when Serenity had been a strong and gentle ruler, tempered by her many odd and painful experiences.
That was when she knew Setsuna was right, no matter what else.
Usagi would have only more pain to face in the next few days . . . more pain than she had felt in either of her lives so far.


End Chapter Twelve.