Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Devil's Due ❯ - 59 - ( Chapter 59 )

— 59 —

March 24, A.C. 205. Zenica, Tanzania. 10:15 am

Xane rose instantly to his feet as Jordan entered the room, Judas only a heartbeat behind him. They were followed by Mario and the members of the swat team.

“You’re still babies,” Wil Reik protested as he also rose to his feet…then noticed the rank tag on Jordan’s chest and fell instantly into attention.

“You didn’t have a problem with us outranking you,” Xane protested at the guy, then fell into his own formal attention and saluted. “I’m sorry, lieutenant general.”

“Sure you are,” Jordan retorted, shoving at him as he looked to Leo Tozas.

“Sir,” Leo muttered with a salute.

“Zihrel is in the shower,” Judas muttered. “We only have one in the building, so we let them decide who went first.”

Jordan nodded, then offered his hand to Mario. “Your assistance was invaluable.”

“Stop with the posturing already,” Chance muttered, moving to drop into a chair.

“You’re going to wrinkle your suit,” Mario informed him pointedly. “Either sit up or go change.”

“Hahaha,” Chance muttered, though he did sit up and straighten the outfit.

“You want something to eat?” Xane asked.

“You could start by telling us what’s in the house,” Jordan noted pointedly.

“But I can do that while you’re eating,” Xane returned, nonplussed. “Then you can call Riley in and get Morgan and his crew over here so we have a solid core-force.”

“How long does it take?” Jor protested.

“Oh, call it fifteen minuets by foot,” Judas returned, grinning impishly at him. “I’m sure it could be more like ten by car…and possibly five with sirens.”

Jor gave him a look.

“We rescued people?” Judas asked curiously, sitting.

“You’re an ass, and you’re an ass,” Jordan retorted, pointing from one to the other, then back to Xane. “Get us something to eat.”

“Yes, sir,” Xane returned almost mockingly, bouncing toward the kitchen.

“I thought as much,” Leo muttered, looking to Wil.

“It was sort of slammed in our faces,” Wil returned, raising an eyebrow.

“Huh?” Jordan asked them blankly.

“You’re friends with your men…close to them,” Wil shrugged. “They can disrespect your rank as long as they don’t disobey it.”

“He gets away with more’n that,” Chance muttered, pointing at Xane, who was moving around the kitchen.

“Oh, like he doesn’t,” Judas retorted, pointing at Mario.

Mario grinned, moving around to help Xane wordlessly.

“Yeah, Mouthy’s his second,” Judas added to the two men. “And Mario is his second,” he indicated Chance. “One of the guys…” he trailed off, looking between the two men before looking back to the former gundam pilots.

“What?” Jordan asked blankly.

“Do…you know who they are?” Judas asked, focusing back on Wil.

Wil looked at him curiously a moment, but his gears were turning. It ended with his eyes going wide as he looked to Chance and Jordan in amazement.

“What?” Jordan demanded again, irritably.

“You used to have this really long braid,” Judas returned, indicating a length about to his waist. “And it was kind of telling.”

Jordan blinked at that, then looked back to the two men.

“Holy shit,” Leo muttered, looking back to his comrade.

“I should beat you,” Chance muttered tiredly to Judas. He didn’t move from where he’d flopped back again, but he was glaring daggers at the guy.

“Yeah…the guy Morgan is the second of Chang Wufei,” Judas noted, looking back to the former prisoners. “Why are you here, anyway?” he added to Chance.

Chance gave him a steady wordless look until he looked away.

“So,” Xane said happily, bringing back two plates of scrambled eggs as Mario buttered toast. “How was your flight?”

- -

March 24, A.C. 205. Zenica, Tanzania. 11 am

Stanly Turrell narrowed his eyes as his driver stopped the car in disbelief.

There was as swat van in front of his house…and the electronic gate was wide-open.

“Go,” he said darkly, glaring down the street. “Go now!”

The driver reversed, then turned and shot back into the street.

“Head to the garage,” Stan added. “With any luck they didn’t find that.”

There was something pleasant about knowing that the I.E.C. had destroyed most of their mobile suits. It made fights a helluva lot easier to win when your enemy didn’t have the same advanced technology as you.

- -

March 24, A.C. 205. Zenica, Tanzania. 11 am

“Right, there’s a warehouse downtown with that name on it,” Jordan noted to Chance. “Let’s go.”

“Lock this place down!” Chance ordered the men who were standing around. “No one in or out!”

“Yes, sir…” was the general consensus as he and Jordan slid into the already moving vehicle.

Chance looked out the window as his friend called the driver of the second van. He’d given the driver the piece of paper that either had a map drawn on it or the address. He hadn’t gotten the chance to look…and he felt almost useless, just another set of stars. He knew it wasn’t even remotely Jor’s intent…but Jordan was doing what he needed to do to get his guy, and that didn’t include sending Chance to play.

They flew through the city as Jordan made call after call…and pulled to a screetching stop outside a large warehouse.

It was strange for Chance to follow his comrade instantly with only his handgun. He was used to entering buildings of any sort…in full body armor, not his uniform with full stars…

Jordan stopped short as they broke into the building, his attention instantly moving up…

To a giant fucking buster riffle.

“Fall back!” Chance shouted, turning on his heel as he heard the telltale sounds of the machine about to fire. “Fall back!” He grabbed Jordan by the arm and pulled him…as the shots hit just inside the door.

“Mother fucker!” Jordan shouted as the various men who’d been following started to fall back. “Get us some suits!” he shouted to the commanding officer of the local unit. “Two at least!”

“There are none!” the man returned.

“Warning shots,” Chance noted, looking back to the building…aside from the smoke billowing out of it…there was no movement and no sound.

Jordan turned to look as well, then looked to chance. “How many did you see?”

“Only the one,” Chance admitted, making the gesture for the men to fall behind the trucks. “How many did you see?”

“One row of four for sure,” Jordan returned, “but I couldn’t tell how deep it was.”

Chance’s stomach sank.

“What’s the likelihood of him having anyone who could fly?” Jor muttered.

“Pretty good,” Chance admitted. “We had this war fought by fliers.”

“You weren’t supposed to say that,” Jordan accused. “How could you say that?”

Chance turned back to the men. “Get us the shields! And get us some suits!”

“I told you there are none,” the main man protested.

Chance moved up to him, grabbing him by the collar and pulling him in close. “Then find some.”

The guy blinked, then dropped his eyes. “Sir.”

Chance turned irritably to Jordan. “Call Trowa…ten hours is better than never.”

Jordan hit the three on his cell.

- -

March 24, A.C. 205. Zenica, Tanzania. 12 pm

Xane wasn’t overly surprised that there were suits in the warehouse…and he wasn’t overly surprised that there didn’t seem to be any other on the entire African continent.

He moved into the protected area around the warehouse and up behind his superior. He moved to lean against the man’s back and set a bag in his lap.

“Mm, Mouthy,” Jordan greeted, turning his head to see his second’s face. Xane was half-tempted to kiss him, but a moment of lucidity reminded him that was very much not what the set of actions entailed.

Jordan seemed to follow that thought process himself and flashed his second a grin. “We’re in public.”

Xane moved away instantly, grinning slightly. “I come bearing food.”

“That’s good, doesn’t seem like we’re going anywhere any time soon,” Jordan muttered, looking up to the shielding that had been placed across the front of the building. “Why isn’t he attacking? They could just take out the roof and fly off.”

“Were they Aries?” Xane asked blankly.

“Taurus,” Jordan returned, shaking his head as he started into the bag.

“You hate me, don’t you?” Chance accused, moving to sit next to them since he’d been standing a few feet off. “I didn’t think you really did.”

“Oh hush, I got you both some,” Xane waved toward the bag and moved to drop in front of them.

“…And it depends on how many people he has who can run them,” Chance noted, taking a wrapped sandwich from Jordan. “The Taurus, I mean. If he has enough men to do it, he could march them out and take off…but we don’t know how many there are. You said he had five guys? We got one of them…so that’s four that we know he had, and we’ve got people looking into how many people who worked here were here today. As soon as we get that number we can have a reasonable estimate on the real numbers.”

“And then its nine hours for Trowa to arrive with his machines that he doesn’t know if will work.”

“It’s more like five,” Jordan muttered, taking another bite. “You know, we should just tear down that door,” he pointed at the main entrance.

“So they can come out and kill everyone?” Chance retorted.

“We found some!” the man in charge muttered, moving into the area. “There are two over the river…we had to pardon the people who’d bought them.”

Chance and Jordan looked to him in disbelief.

“They were his,” the guy explained, pointing at the building. He grinned a bit impishly. “We have some men trained to fight in them…”

“Oh, no,” Chance muttered, rising to his feet. “I’m in one. He’s in the other.”

Jordan shrugged, eating happily.

“So you’re gonna take on twenty machines?” the man snapped.

“Sure,” Chance returned nonchalantly, sitting down to eat himself. “Wouldn’t be the first time.”

“You were in gundams before,” Xane noted, grabbing Jordan’s water bottle and flipping it open. “Taurus aren’t gundams.”

“If we had our gundams,” Chance retorted, “we would have been done an hour ago.”

Xane grinned at him, then shrugged and looked to the leader. “Get them,” he suggested. “How is the evac going?”

“We’re sweeping the near buildings and they’re getting the people out of the second ring.”

“You’ve had an hour,” Xane noted, raising an eyebrow. “Why are they only at the second ring?”

The man frowned at him, then shrugged.

“Get the machines,” Xane snapped. “We don’t have all day, while we speak Turrell could be in there gearing up the machines! Why are you still here?”

The man was gone that fast.

Xane sniggered, looking up to see if Jordan approved.

Jordan gave him an amused sort of look, then went back to eating.

- -

March 24, A.C. 205. Somewhere between North America and Africa.

Trowa shouted excitedly as he and Wufei flew in a tight spiral, around Quatre’s machine, hearing Wufei’s same laughter.

Quatre watched his screens carefully as they moved, wondering vaguely if they realized they weren’t just flying for fun.

The rest of Trowa’s men were in their suits behind, flying in formation like soldiers were supposed to be doing. They were over the ocean, and Trowa and Wufei had been playing since they’d first gotten out of shot of land.

Trowa had managed to test his machines through, and it had only been the one set of machines that had been corrupted. He’d traced it back to where the pieces had been gotten from, and found that those machines were not supposed to be pieced. They’d replaced the few parts, but the machines that had crashed were waiting at the base, not being flown on a genuine mission.

Quatre banked sharply as he saw his opening, and turned into the same spiral as his friends, which made them both laugh even harder…

It felt good to fly. Sandrock hadn’t ever really been a flier, and zero gravity was different enough to not really compare…but genuinely flying with no restrictions…

“I was pretty sure we weren’t doing a ballet,” Doug noted almost curiously from where he was at the front of the pack. “You gentlemen planning to regain dignity before landfall?”

“Oh hush,” Trowa muttered happily…and dropped.

“Trowa!” Doug’s call was alarmed.

Trowa laughed delightedly as he turned and shot upwards from the surface of the water. He hadn’t broken the surface.

“Stop,” Quatre reprimanded him, falling back into position.

Trowa laughed and regained his own position as Wufei resignedly joined them.

Quatre wasn’t fooled, he knew very well that the pair wouldn’t maintain the order…but maybe for a little while they could pretend to be disciplined.

- -

March 24, A.C. 205. Zenica, Tanzania. 1 pm

“I wanna fly,” Chance whined to Jordan as he walked the giant machine down a street.

“Baby,” Jordan retorted. “Deal with it. We aren’t in a situation to do that.”

Chance grinned, glancing at his comrade’s image. “You ready for this?”

“As ready as I’ll get,” Jordan agreed. “Remember, these machines aren’t nearly as agile as Deathscythe…or Wing.”

“Don’t be offensive,” Chance retorted.

Jordan made an amused noise.

“Why do I have a feeling we’re gonna have to cancel our Easter engagement?” Chance added.

“Oh hush,” Jordan muttered, frowning. “Damn…”

Chance laughed again, then flicked the loudspeaker on. “Move the shielding back to protect the surrounding buildings. Keep behind those shields.”

The trucks holding the large shields instantly started to move.

- -

Stanly stared out the window of the warehouse in horror as two Taurus made their way in front of his building, waiting for more…

But there weren’t anymore coming?

“What’s the news?” he demanded of one of his four guys.

“Two Taurus have been found,” the man replied instantly. “They’re coming here.”

“Only two?”

The guy’s face wasn’t happy as he looked away. “They’re gundam pilots.”

Stanly dropped back into his chair.

“We’re fucked, you realize that, don’t you?” another of his guys asked…the one who’d given the warning shot.

“What are you talking about?” Stanly retorted irritably. “They have two machines.”

“Yeah, and were trained since they were like…twelve,” the guy snapped. “You forget that it was the gundam pilots who won the wars?”

“What?”

“We have four,” the man muttered. “Four former mediocre soldiers who trained a handful of others.”

Stan turned to glare at him, then looked back out at the machines as the final of the shielding trucks moved.

“Stanly Turrell?” the same voice that’d ordered the trucks moved called. “I am Lieutenant General Yuy of the I.E.C., and in the name of the International Earthsphere Council, I order you lay down your arms. If you do not cooperate, we will be forced to take military action.”

“Let’s go to our machines,” Stan snapped, turning and heading to the garage.

“I’m not engaging them in a battle for you,” the driver muttered. “I’m surrendering.”

“I’ll back you,” the one who’d shot said. “You have me.”

Stan looked the various people over in disgust, then turned and moved through the doors. Not everyone followed him, but several did.

“How do you expect to win?” one of the other guys muttered as he jumped at a tow-rope. “Do you want us to die for you?”

“Once we win clear of here,” he snapped, “then do as you will.”

- -

March 24, A.C. 205. Zenica, Tanzania. 1:20 pm

Stanly didn’t bother to open the door to the garage. He simply destroyed it.

Xane stared in amazement as the door melted from existence…at the same time as Jordan and Chance started to move.

The people waiting behind the shields stared up in amazement as the first of the enemy machines darted at Jordan…which quickly made his gun worthless. The towering machines grappled together a long moment before Jordan ejected his rifle to fight easily.

Meanwhile, two of the machines had moved at Chance. He was holding off the pair of them as two or three more machines tried to make it out of the building…

Xane jumped hard at the loud sound of metal crashing against the cement, focusing instantly back on the pair of machines nearer him. He stared at them in dismay as he tried to tell which was supposed to be Jordan or the other…as the machine started at the second machine attacking Chance. That machine fell as well, and Chance threw the other off…as another machine attacked both of them.

Xane shuddered where he stood as he saw something he hadn’t seen since he was a child. He’d never been so close to a mobile suit fight, and he wondered how terrifying it would have been if they hadn’t had the shields around them. The ground shook under the steps, and the sound of metal on metal made him feel cold inside.

It didn’t help that there was no difference between the machines…and the fact that the only noise was that made from impact.

The machine that he thought was Chance’s threw another machine back as one broke past him…and started to run up the road.

It was like an earthquake as car alarms went off in the distance…and then there was a loud sound…and the machine launched into the air.

“Holy shit…” one of the young soldiers muttered, looking around to Xane.

Xane nodded his agreement, turning to see one of the machines falling on top of another. After a moment, a different machine raised it’s gun…and that was when Xane realized the one that had fallen on top of the other was Jordan’s, because it didn’t have it’s gun. One of the other in the mix jumped at that machine as Jordan’s machine rose to it’s feet…and two more machines ran by…causing that same earthquake feeling before taking off. The first of that group to have fallen picked up as well…and ran off up the street…before also taking to the air.

Jordan was going to be pissed.

Of the remaining four machines, one was on the ground, and the one closest to the building wasn’t moving. Jordan’s machine, and the one Xane assumed to be Chance’s, moved toward that final machine…before both it’s arms raised in surrender and the cockpit opened to demonstrate the end of it’s threat.

The pair turned on the final enemy machine…and the thing took off into the sky.

Chance’s machine took off as well, causing all the people to cover their ears as Jor’s machine took the parked stance…and then men started coming from the building with their hands in the air.

Xane blinked as they reached about the legs of the remaining machine and tossed weapons at it’s feet…and laid down on the ground, face first and hands extended.

“Well, that’s my cue to go into action,” the man in charge muttered, looking grim…and then he started gesturing.

Xane looked around to Judas in disbelief, not sure what he thought about the action.

“Look,” Judas muttered, pointing into the garage. “There are only twelve suits in there.”

The second raised his head again to look…and see that. He stared at it in amazement, then looked back to Judas. “And there are thirty in a unit?”

Judas nodded, biting one lip as he looked back to Xane. “There’s the one the Chinese government grabbed,” he added. “The two they got,” he pointed at Jor’s machine. “That’s twenty-seven…plus this one here goes back to twenty-six.” He looked back toward the garage. “That’s fourteen left.”

They exchanged a long look.

“Move back!” Jordan’s voice came from the machine. “Everyone, back up!”

Everyone looked up to see Chance’s suit lowering back toward the area. People cleared it quickly, darting this way and that before the suit finally touched down with enough force to shake everything, then also take the parked stance.

“Featihl,” Jordan added, “Ifhera, come meet our flier.”

Xane darted around the shielding with Judas a step behind him, moving up to the feet of the very large machines.

“You there,” Jordan added. “Move down your tow to the waiting men. They have my permission to protect themselves fully.”

Xane pulled out his firearm, cocking it and aiming at the opening, then shifting it slightly so as not to actually aim it at the man who’d come down.

As the man lowered down into view, Judas spat a curse, looking around to Xane in amazement.

“You’re kidding me…” Xane whispered.

They wouldn’t have known it if Jordan hadn’t been sure that they see the picture of the man himself.

It was Stanly Turrell.