Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Garou ❯ Escape ( Chapter 22 )

Warnings for that chapter: Errr…. Angst? Shounen Ai, 1+2

My gosh! My Relena is nearly bearable! O.O (*snort * joking. Nah, really, she's kind of nice... In a way ^^; )

Escape

Heero stalked out of the infirmary and began to walk along the building toward the dormitories, so fast he could as well have been openly running. Duo followed, his expression closed up, frowning, Hilde just behind him. Relena stayed in front of the infirmary's entry a few seconds, surprised, then they heard her begin to walk after the Japanese pilot.

"K'so," hissed Heero between his clenched teeth.

Duo let loose a little snort, but it was more to mark his support than because he really found it funny. With a little effort, Hilde came back to their level and bent her head toward them.

"Hey, tell me, the girl, is she who I think she is?" she whispered.

"Yep," answered her friend.

Heero gritted his teeth, and Hilde grimaced when she smelled the wolf in his scent. He was furious, and it made the animal rise to the surface level. She hoped that he wouldn't have hairs growing everywhere… still, he was covered from head to toe in the school's uniform, collar tightly closed and sleeves…

She slowed down to let the two boys pass her, then stepped on the side and slid between them. Duo gave her a surprised look, but Heero didn't even seem to notice her existence… till she put her hand on his elbow and pulled on his sleeve.

"Nani?"

"Unroll your sleeves, dummy, you've got fur growing," she whispered with as much authority as she could muster.
He glared, annoyed at her, but unrolled his left sleeve while she was taking care of unbuttoning the right one to pull it toward his wrist. Watching him carefully in case his temper wanted to assert itself, she pulled on his shirt's collar to hide his nape where hairs were growing, then tapped him lightly on the shoulder.

"There you are! Try to relax anyway…"

"Hn" was the only response she got.

Hilde hid her smile. She knew it was his way of thanking her without having to admit out loud that he had needed her at all.

* * *

Behind them, several meters away, Relena's eyes widened when she saw this unknown girl put her hands on Heero's elbow, then on his neck… and Heero let her touch him. She would have ran to block their way and ask for an explanation, why this girl had the right to touch him, why Heero refused to talk to her, or even to wait for her, why SHE had the right to come and see them… but they were walking too fast, she would have had to run after them. It was not a well-groomed lady's way. Probably worthy of a tomboy like the brunette, though.

"Heero, wait for me!" she called finally, trying not to sound too plaintive.

But her feet hurt and she was too tired to run after him and she felt hurt and confused to be so visibly rejected, so she miserably failed at it.

The Japanese boy tensed when they caught the whining call, and walked a little faster, something Hilde and Duo hadn't thought possible. The two friends glanced at each other, then had an amused smile, trying not to get shook off.

"Fuck, she ain't abandoning," muttered Duo after having glanced back, where the long-haired girl was still trying to rejoin them without looking like she was chasing them.

"How much are you willing to bet she'll follow us, even into the dormitories?" Hilde shot back in an amused voice.

"I do not bet when I am sure I'll lose," Heero growled back between his clenched teeth.

"Girls aren't allowed there," remarked Duo.

A menacing glare from the other two made him chuckle.

"Ok, I know, that wouldn't stop her…"

Hilde made some fast thinking. They were nearly at the dormitories, only one turn and they would be at the main door.

"Heero, Heero," she whispered insistently.

"What?" he answered, rather violently.

"As long as I am on your territory, I'm part of your pack, yanno," she remembered him.

The two Gundam pilots stared at her, slowing down a little.

"You can order me to keep her back while you're taking your things and escaping by the window, I'll have to obey."

Heero blinked, then a devious little smile appeared on his face.

"If I order you to make her leave the area fast and to accompany her back to her house?"

"… You really need to?" asked the young ex-soldier, making a face.

"Why do you think she found us?" asked the American, sounding unconcerned.

"Dunno… she's really rich? She has good connections?"

"Exactly. She has many people in her information net, some really very important people, and they're all loyal to her, that's why her information is much more sure than OZ's own, because OZ pays half of its informants and terrorizes the others, so it's bound to have some problems."

"OZ can't find you, but she can?"

"Yup," confirmed Duo. "In OZ's place, what would you do? Each time you spot a certain terrorist, there's this chick

that just arrived hours or even days before you."

"I'd follow the chick," finished the brunette, understanding the depth of the problem.

"Good, now you understand," the American congratulated her.

"This is why you have to have her clear from the area. OZ will be there very shortly and I want to be sure she is as far as possible from here. That they can't find her and arrest her for associating with terrorists, that she doesn't risk being on the battleground and that we can run away without her following."

"Roger, commandant!" saluted the German girl, lifting a hand to her cap.

She firmly took her position in front of the building's entryway while the two boys disappeared into the hall.

* * *

During that time, Quatre had contacted Trowa to warn him of the unfortunate arrival… And the clown had answered that they hadn't been wrong to react so strongly to her. From his sources, Lady Une had suddenly left her base and was en route to the little town the boys were currently in, with a whole squad of soldiers and two dozen Mobil Suits. Some of the troops were already spreading to block the routes leaving the town, in half an hour at the most they would close in and the pilots would have to fight their way out.

Wufei and Sally were making the traces of her researches on Weres disappear, Wufei putting in her bag everything Sally gave him and the rest being thrown out, while discussing an evasion plan for her. Wufei was thinking about giving her a ride in one of the Gundams, but she highlighted the fact that it would be too much of a problem in case there was a combat and she would barely fit anyway, and especially, that they weren't looking for her right now. She had been undercover as a doctor for a month already, it would hold under a superficial examination. If she disappeared at the same time as them, people would notice and she would be bumped from the "diverse protestant and activist groups" list to "Gundams supporter group," which was much more dangerous. She would just wait for the agitation to disappear and then calmly hand in her notice. Like that, at least, she could keep that false ID a little bit longer. After that, she would meet them at their next hangout to continue her study.

"Sally, are you sure?" asked Quatre thoughtfully, seeing that Wufei was annoyed at her utter confidence in her plan.

Smiling mysteriously, she took a wig out of her drawer, same color as her hair but much longer, and put it on her head, then showed them the gun hidden under the desk.

"Go away, I know how to defend myself, I'm a soldier too."

Conceding the point, they left the young woman in her infirmary and hurried to the teachers' parking lot.

"Quatre..." called Wufei once they were in the parking lot, "Can ask a favor of you?"

"Yes?"

"I want us to take the Lit. teacher's car."

The Arab teen blinked.

"Errrr… why?"

"He gave me a bad mark for a test," answered Wufei, gravely. "That is a very big injustice."

The lithe blond burst out laughing and walked to a dark and quite large car that he found practical and not too conspicuous, Wufei following with a satisfied smirk on his face. He had succeeded in making his comrade relax slightly. Quatre's brain was going into overdrive fast and it was not very good.

Quatre shook his head and leaned forward to verify the type of lock. And after that, people still thought Wufei didn't have a sense of humor.

* * *

When Relena turned the wall's corner, it was to bump nose to shoulder with the brunette with the cap, who was leaning against the door of the building. Heero and his comrade were nowhere in sight; they had to be inside. She went to walk past the girl…

… said girl shot a hand forward and caught her forearm, preventing her from getting any farther.

"Let me go! I have to go see Heero!" Relena protested, trying to make her understand to which point it was important.

The brunette had an impish smile.

"It's the boy's dormitories, miss, girls aren't allowed inside. You want so much to see him changing clothes?"

"But… But no, not at all!!!" protested the young princess, suddenly scarlet.

"No, my left butt cheek… If you don't want to, you're strange, there's nothing wrong with wanting to ogle young, well-formed males…"

The ex-soldier had a dreamy smile, then shook her head. Relena frowned. She didn't know how to take that girl. She was acting friendly, but somewhat crude and vulgar, plus she was preventing her from going to Heero… but Relena had to admit that she wasn't in the wrong in doing so. What sort of girl went running after a boy even into his bedroom, apart from a desperate one? And desperate, she wasn't yet.

Not entirely, she admitted to herself with a tired sigh.

"Well, I'll wait for him here," she sighed, stopping on the other side of the girl.

Hilde grimaced. From what Duo had said, she had expected a bizarre and totally obsessed with Heero type of girl, and she was, but… There was such a need in her eyes, she seemed so vulnerable… Hilde could feel toward her something akin to sympathy. She resolved to present things to her in a softer way than she had first intended to.

After all Relena had will and was used to always having the last say, if she dug her heels over that, Hilde would have to transport her thrown across her shoulders, because she couldn't make her change her decision. And that would undoubtedly make things harder. She so didn't want to have to knock her out.

"Precisely, miss… He gave me a mission about you."

Relena spun toward her.

"… A mission…?" she repeated slowly, trying to understand if this word had been used by hazard or if the brunette was really aware of Heero's true identity.

"There's gonna be some heat, they have to confront OZ troops, he put me in charge of taking you to a shelter," she whispered, verifying that no one could hear them with a glance. "He can't take the liberty of losing time or attracting attention to himself by protecting you in person, it's too dangerous. We have to get away, fast."

The princess froze, staring at her with her eyes slowly widening.

"But… No one knows that they're here! I know, I verified before I came! I even verified that there wasn't too much activity… well, that they weren't doing anything special, just hiding … And there is nothing of interest for their adversaries here… So how did they know?" she asked, referring to OZ.

"Relena… You are a princess. Do you really think that, as discreet as you can be, you can walk around without being recognized? OZ knows that you know Heero, they know that you like him. So when you leave your house without any reason, without having an official meeting, without having announced that you were taking a vacation… What do you think they believe?"

The longhaired girl slowly lifter a hand to her mouth, horrified.

"They think you're going to meet Heero," Hilde hammered it home. "And they are nearly always right."

The young girl shook her head.

"But I verified… Nobody was following me!!"

"They're trained for filature work, you're not. And having one beacon on your car is enough."

"Oh my God… Oh my God…"

Hilde put a hand on her arm, compassionate.

"Yeah, I know… You didn't know, babe. But now we havta get moving and fast, before it turns bad and they give us problems. Where's your car?"

"A parking place a few streets away from the campus…" answered the princess, still all dazed by the shock.

"Ok, here we go," announced the short-haired girl, taking her by the arm to drag her in the direction she had indicated.

* * *

After having changed his uniform pants for black jeans, Duo slid a dagger in each boot, and tiny blades and lock picks in his braid, just against his nape, before taking off his uniform vest to put on his holster. He slid his gun under his arm, verified in a few moves that it was accessible but didn't risk falling, then slipped on his priest garb over it, leaving it half buttoned and sleeves unrolled to take some attention off its strangeness. Falling on his knees to peer under his bed, he grabbed his "essentials" bag, containing his laptop, a change of clothes and his weapons, and after having secured it on his back, turned toward Heero.

The werewolf was verifying the munitions in his own weapon, his legs already in a pair of jogging pants, his torso only adorned with his holster. It was a different model than Duo's. From the front, you only saw two leather straps around his shoulders. The weapon's sheath was situated at the small of his back, just over his waistband. Duo had to admit that his back was arched enough for it to work. When he was wearing a t-shirt or one of his green tanktops, the cloth fell just like it should to completely hide the weapon and the holster.

The two pilots finished equipping themselves with their weapons and turned in synch to the bags they had filled with their things and their comrades'. Fortunately, they were all used to leaving the important stuff packed, to be able to leave in a hurry and not have to lose time searching for their possessions, and it hadn't been too long to find the "important" bags to shrug them on, and the fill the "less important" bags, that they would keep in hand to be able to abandon them without losing anything irreplaceable if they had to run or fight. As for the things they had bought for this school, uniforms, books, they were leaving them behind with no problems.

"Do you think Hilde will be able to handle Relena?" asked Heero, wedging a bag under his arm.

Duo tore his eyes away from their contemplation of the arch of his comrade's back and answered, shrugging:

"Of course, Hilde is very competent, we can trust her. She's stubborn like a mule, Relena will have to fight hard with her, and contrary to me, she can even act vaguely diplomatic when she wants to … She'll take care of Relena ok, don't worry."

"She deserted OZ because of you. If she is caught, she will have problems," remarked the Japanese, seemingly unconcerned. His heart beat a little harder at the thought, and he wondered if he was really that scared that Duo would decide to go help Hilde finally.

Duo began to laugh heartily.

"If I turned back, if I put my life in danger to go hold her hand, as if she was a moron unable to get by alone, she would kick my ass to Indonesia and back. She knows how to take care of herself, no problem. She knows the risks. I trust her."

Heero 'hn'ned to show that he was listening and counting the argument. After all Duo knew her better than he did. And if she had been a soldier, it was not as if they were implicating an innocent civilian.

But still, he nearly felt as if he was refusing protection to one of his packmates… Even if she was not really one of his. She had said that it was as if… And she was a female, it was hard to leave her behind.
But she was a warrior and a huntress, not a mother.

Heero shrugged and chased that problem from his brain. Any way he thought about it, he couldn't find a way to do anything else, other than hope for the best.

Their two comrades were waiting for them, the car parked on the sidewalk in a street that followed the campus, not that frequented by cars. Wufei, hair unbound and glasses on his nose, was at the wheel, Quatre standing beside the open boot. Half-hidden by a tree that was growing close to the wire fence, Heero and Duo threw the bags to Quatre for him to put in the car, then Heero helped his friend to jump over the fence before following. The fence pitched with his weight, but he was able to pass before it broke and landed on the sidewalk.

Duo pushed himself at the other end of the vehicle then slid on his knees on the floor behind the front seat, his torso half leaning on the backseat, and Heero imitated him, crouching low so as not to be seen from the outside. Wufei drove away, just slowly and carefully enough not to attract attention. The north of the town was still free of police roadblocks; they would try to pass there, then would go southeast to take the Gundams.

Trying to find a comfortable position, Heero turned on his side, and fell nose to nose with Duo who had curled up in a ball, on his knees, and was now in a position that slightly reminded Heero of a cat. He had a heavy leather vest over his head, hiding him from the outside. Thinking that it was a good idea to make sure that passerby didn't get curious, Heero dragged one half-empty bag and blocked it over his head, hedging it between the seat and the back of the front seat.

"It's just like a tent," snickered the American, dragging a corner of cloth to fill a hole over his head.

The light was soft, the floor vibrating softly. It felt like a small cave, a den. It reminded him of the times where Odin would hide him in a nest of covers at the back of his truck, between two boxes, when they were moving from one job to the next, and he fell asleep, rocked by the car's movements, hidden in his own little world. Heero smiled at Duo, feeling comfortable and vaguely nostalgic.

Duo smiled back, first without thinking about it. Then the fact that they were nose to nose in that small hiding place and that their breaths were mingling and caressing each other's face slowly penetrated his thoughts, until he was conscious only of the face in front of him, so close, enough to feel the warmth radiating from it.

The smile on Heero's face slowly disappeared right along with Duo's, gradually, imperceptibly, until they were just staring into each other's eyes, without saying a word.

And then Duo lowered his eyes, jaws clenched, muscles shifting under his skin, and slightly turned his head away. His lips were moving, barely, without a sound escaping from them, apparently without him even realizing what he was doing.

But Heero knew how to read lips, and the darkness wasn't really a problem.

Without saying a word, he reached out and put his hand on his comrade's forearm. Duo looked up and glanced at him, uncharacteristically expressionless. Heero gave him a pitifully weak smile, trying to make him understand that he could understand his sudden case of the blues, because he was feeling the same thing. Then he closed his eyes and lowered his head on his arm, trying to get some rest, trying to forget what Duo had said, trying to forget the echo that his silent words had awakened.

'I want to kiss you, too.'

* * * * * *

Hilde dragged Relena to the campus's east entry, holding her by her hand, and the young lady had no other choice than to let the brunette manhandle her, a little embarrassed.

"Say…!"
"Yeah?"
"What are we going to do?" she asked. "If someone recognize us and stops us before we arrive to the car? They'll know I came to see Heero in the area and they'll continue to search there…"

The brunette stopped, squinting her eyelids, thinking as fast as she could.

"Ok, we're gonna make you a little less recognizable already," she told the other girl, dragging her in a corner.

Going behind the princess, she began to unwind her little braids.

"Hey…!"

"Your hairdo is too recognizable, Rel', sorry. Get out of your vest."

"W-what?" stammered the blonde feeling her hair slowly slide free on her shoulders.

She obeyed, a little disconcerted. Under the vest she had a white blouse.

"Hmm, will do," mused the brunette while looking at her from head to toe.

She put her fingers on the waist of her skirt, and this time Relena balked, frowning.

"We haven't got the time…"sighed Hilde, "Roll your skirt waist inside so that it looks shorter."

Blushing about showing her nude legs higher than knee level with a skirt that was light enough to fly around, the princess arranged her plaited skirt the best she could, while the cap-wearing black-haired girl was lifting her hair in a high ponytail and disheveled her bangs on the sides.

"It's too easy to see," murmured Relena, pointing to her waist, where the skirt was too visibly messed up.

Hilde helped her to rectify the problem the best way available then grabbed the vest and in an ample gesture circled her waist with it, hiding the upper part of the skirt. She knelt before Relena, making her blush even more, and dragged the socks so respectably pulled up down on her patent-leathered shoes, bunching the socks up.

"There we go!" Hilde exclaimed, looking up at her. "You're already looking less like a cute little doll. True, if someone looks too insistently…but at least they shouldn't stop us on sight."

She got up and after having pushed Relena in front of the entrance to help dissimulate her from an eventual passerby's glance, took off her T-shirt and put it in her hands. The princess blushed even more and turned her eyes away.

"What are you doing?

She had a large band around her belly, like those wrist bands sportsmen wear, approximately fifteen centimeters wide. She pushed it up on her chest, adjusting it so that her small breasts were flattened as much as they could be, then took the T-shirt back and put it on again, without this time tucking the ends into her waistband. It fell low on her thighs, hiding her curves. She slipped on the jeans vest she had around her waist, then pulled her cap much lower, half-hiding her face.

"Finished," she announced in a deep voice, and Relena started even as she was being dragged by the hand once again.

Her body language had suddenly totally changed. She didn't walk anymore with grace, subtly rolling her hips, but with big, nonchalant steps, and slightly squaring her shoulders. When you looked at her with attention, you could tell that she was a girl, Relena supposed… But she knew already that she was. Yes, if she succeeded in acting like she should all the way, they might not look at it more attentively.

"By the way, Rel'…" drawled the black-haired girl.

"Err… Yes?"

"Nice panties," the short-haired girl shot back in a malicious voice, dashing off.

Relena stayed frozen a few seconds, then, slowly turning red, ran after her.

"Ooooh you!!!"

Still laughing, Hilde caught her hand and dragged the princess after herself.

"You are impossible," pouted the longhaired girl.

"And proud of it!" said back her comrade.

"And there is no way to have the last word with you, is there?"

"Nope, there isn't."

Grumbling in a very unladylike way, the princess abandoned the idea of gain back some points for the moment.

There were three soldiers in the following street, who were marching toward the campus in a falsely nonchalant way. Relena tensed.

"You're gonna break my hand, sweetie," whispered Hilde.

"Sorry," answered Relena nervously, lowering her head.

She made as if looking into a shop window while they were walking past them, then sighed once they were far enough.

"Hey…?" she called softly once they were out of sight.

"Hm?"

"What if they recognize my car and they arrest us?"

"Good point. Do you have a cell phone?"

"Yes."

"Call your chauffeur and tell him to go back to your house, making the largest detour he can. Tell him to go north. We'll find another way."

"But if they follow him?"

"They'll have found a chauffeur in a car, driving around. So what? It isn't suspicious. They'll know you were supposed to be inside, but they won't be able to prove it. Ok?"

While Relena was calling Pargan to explain the situation, Hilde was glancing right and left in the street. Another group advanced, this one casually clothed, slower, discreetly screening the people mulling around, staring at any male teenagers they happened to walk past. But soldiers to the end of their nails; she recognized their way of walking in a group, and they all were packing. Hilde caught Relena's hand, dragging her through the crowd, till they were under the bus shelter, and backed her up against a panel, putting one hand on each side of her head and leaning toward her. Confused, the teenager stared at her.

The soldiers were staring at the people waiting at the bus stop now, Hilde could see them in the glass's reflection.

"What are you doing?" whispered Relena, unnerved to see her lean so close and block her so totally.

"Did you call your grandfather?" asked Hilde in a totally normal tone, not answering.

"Err… Yes, yes."

"Ok then," she answered in a voice as low and as sensual she could make it while still sounding like a boy.

One of the disguised soldiers was very close now, Hilde could have kicked him if she had wanted to. He glanced at them, walked a little closer. Relena's eyes widened slightly when she saw the way he always kept a hand on a bulge in his vest, and she tensed. The soldier, noting her reaction, stared at her more attentively and tried to glance over Hilde's shoulder to see her whole face.

The brunette winked at her comrade to calm her down, then leaned closer and approached her face with hers till they were brushing noses against each other, effectively blocking his sight of the young woman.

Relena's eyes were sky blue, but her pupils were so dilated by her fear that they had nearly swallowed all of her irises. So close, her scent was invading the she-wolf's nostrils, and at this distance, she could hear her heart, ba-bom, ba-bom, faster and faster. She felt her tremble where Hilde's wrist touched her shoulder, not yet visible to the eye, but enough to be easily perceptible.

"Everything's alright," she murmured to reassure her charge.

The soldier had stopped walking toward them, he was continuing on his previous path now, but Hilde realized from the corner of her eye that he was still glancing regularly toward them, and soon he would be to an angle where he could see their profiles.

Slightly raising her arm to put her elbow on the glass and thus hide their chins, the German girl took the last two centimeters still separating their bodies and kissed the young princess.

* * * * * *

They had to abandon the car a small distance away from the little town. A road block was in place and they couldn't get past. The four pilots left on foot through the forest, hoping that the barrages weren't already reaching through.

They needed the better part of an hour to arrive at Gundams. They put away their things then climbed in their cockpits, not turning the motors on yet, verifying first the state of the engines.

A loud "SHIT!" rang through the com link.

"Duo? What's going on?"

"Doing a scan of the region... The military block is nothing, only control checkpoints on the roads, but we're between them and a deployment of mobile suits that's making another barrage. I'm counting at least three hundreds in the area, and there is no way we can get away by one of the holes in the formation, we'll get caught on visuals way before, there is not enough cover. Fucking bitch!"

"That is nothing ..." grunted Heero, his voice gone all cold and soldier-like. "Turn on the local TV."

They saw and heard with stupor Lady Une announcing that the town was now under martial law as long as the terrorists it housed weren't found. It also encompassed an interdiction to use vehicles without authorization and a curfew at six PM. In the background, they could already hear numerous phones ringing from the switchboards, no doubt a virulent protestation from the citizens.

"She was rocked too close to the wall as a baby, that psycho-bitch!" shouted Duo, totally flabbergasted. "She's gonna take the inhabitants hostages because we've been here?!?"

"It's aberrant," acquiesced Wufei.

"What are we going to do? If we try to escape anyway, we risk finding ourselves fighting above the town, and those bastards will refuse to let the civilians leave..."

"We wait," decided Quatre. "We try before all to break through the enemy line and then we get away, no engaging in combat. We're not at advantage here. The mobile suits will chase after us, the soldiers should leave the town once we're away. Gundams can go faster and farther than Aries with the same amount of fuel, so we should be able to escape."

"Mmyeah..." mumbled Duo, not convinced.

"I called Trowa, he's going to come help us and try to distract them, but he can't approach too close, he would get spotted too early ..."

"Ok," acknowledged Heero.

"We just have to wait, then?"

"Yes..."

"That sucks."

* * *

General Kushrenada was certainly not expected in the town where Une had taken control, so, the soldiers guarding the road by which he had come nearly prevented him from going any farther. Luckily, annoyed by the waiting, he had opened his tinted window, letting the men recognize him.

When he arrived at the building where colonel Une was directing the operation, she was waiting for him on the front steps, saluting, visibly warned in a hurry by some soldier.

"Your Excellency, I wasn't expecting you here..." began the woman, walking after him in the hall.

"And I will admit to you that I didn't intend on coming," Treize lashed back in a dry tone, drier than it had ever been with her. "But I see that I shouldn't have trusted you with such a situation, you are visibly unable to accomplish a mission in a way that doesn't endanger the greater plan from which it is only but a part."

Une tensed, mortified. Since 05's evasion, he had slowly become... she didn't know. Faster to annoy ... him who was usually so calm, controlled and charming, he happened now to get unexpected mood shifts, and often showed visibly what he was thinking, him who usually was a master in the art of hiding his opinions. It was abnormal... She forced herself to remember those circumstances not to feel too harshly hit by his loss of patience with her, when she had always been his protégée.

"I... pardon me, your Excellency," she murmured, lowering her head.

Treize's eyes softened slightly and he turned on his heels to face her.

"Lady... I do not fault your devotion, but the ways you are using. Certainly, to capture the Gundam pilots is a priority. But it ISN'T worth losing the people's support in our efforts to do so. If we let ourselves get complacent on this, soon thousands of rebellions will be born, and we will be forced to win obedience through terror, instead of receiving it because the citizen really believe in us. And here, we will be no better than the Alliance and Romafeller. Do you understand?"

She lowered her head.

"It is why we mustn't use such brutal means. We have to stay more discreet."

"I understand now, your Excellency. I beg your pardon."

He put his hand on her shoulder and gave her a smile, and she smiled back shyly, feeling like a child corrected by a benevolent parent.

"You don't need to, Lady. Let's just go and announce the end of the embargo. Some check points would have been probably better accepted, but now that the population is angry at us... I am afraid we don't have a choice."
"I am so sorry..."

"No, my Lady, it was my fault. I should have specified about what I was expecting of you. I gave you every means we had to complete your mission and you used them to the maximum, it was normal. I should have been more precise."

"Excellency..."

"Shh," he whispered, leaning a finger across her lips.

She blushed and lowered her head.

Half an hour later, in the command room, she was still blushing. Luckily, the General wasn't looking at her, his attention on the screen transmitting images coming from all around the town. He was observing the withdrawing of the troupes and their installation farther down the roads.

And suddenly, without one radar to warn the observers, an immense black, bat-winged shape jumped out of the trees covering the side of a small cliff, a gigantic scythe in hand.

"02!!" exclaimed Une, grabbing the micro. "Alert, alert, Gundam 02 sighted at the north-north-east of the town!!!"

But she had not finished her sentence that half of the closest unit had been destroyed before having caught on radar the Gundam. And then… Three other Gundams emerged from the trees after him to take care of the rest of the two closest units, and were then joined by yet another Gundam coming from BEHIND their lines, which showered with bullets the few MS that had not been damaged and could still fight. Then the Gundams turned heels and ran before the rest of the troops closed in on them.

"The reinforcement will never get here in time!!!" roared the young woman.

"Do not worry about that, my lady," answered Treize, a calm and amused little smile dancing on his lips.

***********************

Tadadadaaaaaaaam.... *ominous music can be heard in the distance*

And NO Relena isn't contaminated. Same as Treize. Dry kiss. No saliva, no contamination. ^__^ C'mon, Hilde has been a werewolf all her life, she knows what she can and can't do ^__^