Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ II. Mirror Maze ❯ Modefied Agenda ( Chapter 3 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Modified Agenda

Trowa drummed his fingertips on the desktop as he studied his laptop’s screen. Something was wrong with the locator on Wufei’s machine, which meant there was no point in trying to track it. Wufei had probably figured some little trick out to override it or make it read wrong.

So where was he?

The airport had turned back nothing…the car rentals had turned back nothing…but maybe, just…

Trowa focused his search on the helicopter rental places. There were enough people with money that you could rent almost anything for a few hours for a handsome fee. If Wufei had wanted to keep himself from being tracked, he could have done that easily.

“Trowa?” Heero asked from the other room, moving to stand in the door. “What are you doing?”

“Hacking,” Trowa replied distantly, studying the information flashing across the screen. “You need something?”

“I’m bored,” Heero returned.

“Lonely, huh, dumbass?” Trowa asked sweetly. “Maybe you shouldn’t have beat the shit out of Duo, probably would a stayed around longer.”

Heero stared at the pilot in disbelief as his stomach churned.

“Get away from me, Heero,” Trowa added, glancing briefly at him. “I’m busy.”

“Shit, fuck you,” Heero muttered, turning to wander off down the hall.

“I’m not the one who needs the company,” Trowa retorted.

A door slammed.

Trowa smirked, focusing back on what he was doing.

- -

I sighed as I set my pencil down, looking at my list of London people. I had this feeling that Duo’d just changed his name…this list was ridiculously long, and basically left me at the very beginning…still.

Shouldn’t there have been some better way to do this?

I sighed in frustration, looking toward the screen as it showed the Sphere Government gathering for a session. I watched a long moment as it showed the various military heads of the greater Europe area moving toward the building…and it focused on Hilde.

Hilde Splieker, little miss ideals, little miss greater good…little miss in-contact-with-Duo.

I stared at her in disbelief before rising to my feet. I darted across the room to see if I’d brought my uniform or not, because I took it out of my travel bag occasionally…it was there.

Ha!

I went about changing quickly.

“We have some matters that have been hanging over our heads,” Hilde’s voice came in response to someone’s question. “Its due time we settled a few arguments, so we’ll see what we can accomplish before lunch.” The reporter mumbled something else and Hilde started laughing happily. “I love pizza, what can I say? I always try to talk them into serving it for lunch…I like the nice greasy messy stuff…and they get us gourmet. Nothing against the gourmet, but…come on, what’s the point of pizza if it’s healthy for you?”

I started laughing as I looked back to the screen again. She was laughing and talking to another reporter at that point, but then someone stepped up and touched her shoulder. She spoke with him briefly, then nodded and turned back to her little circus of people. “I gotta go…I hope you all,” she looked to the camera, “have a wonderful day…and do me one favor…smile.”

Yes, miss in-charge-of-a-continent.

Hilde’d risen through the ranks like a surfacing whale before settling in a comfortable cruising speed that had her on the surface until she’d come up for air. For some reason she’d gotten beached as the European Sphere Leader. She was in charge of working with the various European nations, and had a very simplistic view to express to the people: smile, laugh, enjoy…and eat pizza.

I had a feeling she got the things delivered to her as gifts every time she made one of her speeches like that.

It would be hard for just about anyone to get in to see her, but like our phone calls, the five of us pilots had instant access to her no matter what…even if we just wanted to shoot the breeze.

I’d done that before…it’s really hard to aim…

I smiled more, the idea of seeing the energetic woman already making me feel better.

Sure, my life was hell. Sure, I lived with psychopath control freaks and apathetic bastards…but I was still alive, and the people were still free.

Maybe that’s all that I should ask for.

- -

I took a bite of my slice off pizza, studying it with interest as the office door opened, looking up over the thing to meet Hilde’s eyes. “What’s better? Pizza or sex?”

She stared at me in surprise a moment before her eyes started sparkling. “Both.”

“I think that’d get messy.”

She laughed more, tossing her formal jacket on top of mine on the small table against the far wall. “I think it could be managed.”

“If it were hot, it’d get complicated,” I countered, shoving the box at her.

She laughed again, dropping into her chair and selecting her own slice. “You must love me.”

“Everyone loves you,” I retorted, taking another bite. “I just saw your interview before the session started…you know,” I added, tilting my head at her, “the assholes wouldn’t let me in.”

She stopped chewing, her expression turning concerned.

“They said that pizza boxes weren’t allowed in the session…it seemed to offend them…” she started laughing. “I told them it was for you, but they just…they wouldn’t concede.”

She laughed more, shaking her head at me. “What are you doing here?”

“Duo.”

The woman’s dark eyes turned upset as she frowned at me, obviously thinking about that.

“Yes, yes, yes,” I retorted, making a gesture of dismissal at her. “I know he ran off from us and sought sanctuary from the U.S. embassy in Salvador…but I gave him more than half the money that got him there…and I found him probably three months after he first took off living in some little basin village.”

“Wufei…”

“I was trying to get him out,” I hissed pointedly. “I spent almost three years trying to get him away before he managed it himself…and now that I want to find him, he’s gone. I can’t find any damn traces of him.”

“So you came to me?” she asked skeptically.

“No. I assumed he’d changed his first name, kept his last name, and stayed away from the Americas. London seems like the perfect place for him, but…” I looked down. “I thought I found him day before yesterday…went up to his apartment and knocked…and it was this blond guy who looked…he was blond…and when his kid got home, the boy was so beyond not native.”

She narrowed her eyes at me. “What were your search perimeters?”

“Married guy with a son?”

That made her snigger.

“What?” I protested.

“I can’t tell you, Wufei,” she noted, meeting my eyes sadly. “I know where he his, but I can’t tell you…its part of his sanctuary. I’m legally bound…I can’t tell anyone who asks for him…he tried to put you on the safe list…but you let Heero…I mean…” she looked away.

“You don’t know what it’s like living with them,” I muttered, dropping back in my chair. “You don’t know how they are anymore…Quatre’s gone damn-insane…and Heero’s just behind him.”

“So get him evaluated.”

“I can’t,” I retorted. “Heero would insist I was making shit up, and Quatre can act normal…so it’d be down to my word alone.”

“What about Trow?” she asked blankly.

“Trowa…” I looked across the room as I considered him. “Trowa…doesn’t care,” I met her eyes. “He only worries about his next pleasure, and stirs things up when he gets bored.”

She sighed, setting her pizza down.

“I can’t leave them there,” I noted quietly. “Heero hires on the locals to do cleaning and cooking…casual maintenance…and those locals are the basin natives…like Duo’s wife…at least, if he’s still got her,” I sighed. “They don’t know what legal processes could be followed…half the time I think Heero’s raping the poor servant girl who told him Duo was in her village.”

Hilde’s eyes snapped onto mine.

“I’ve told her before that I can get her out if she needs me to…and I told her family that if they suspect she’s scared of him…to tell me…but…Duo was with them for five months,” I picked at a piece of pepperoni. “And when she told Heero that Duo was there he took troops and swarmed the place over…hit around her mother and brother…and…it was…” I set the pizza down, wiping my hands off with a napkin. “If I leave, there’s no intervention, and the people he’ll abuse the most will be the people who know the least. They trust me more than they trust the others, but…” I sighed, then grinned as I met her eyes.

“What?”

“Heero’s insane, right? Right,” I agreed with myself before she could speak. “So he could order a village like this killed off and blame it on anything if it was ever found out…it’s the type of thing he’d do, the order, before realizing it could get him in trouble…so I did it for him.”

She sat up, her eyes going wide.

I made a gesture at her, picking up the pizza again. “He does the opposite of what I say on the simple level that he won't submit to me. I ordered the villagers killed, the damn song bird of his started freaking out, and he told me we couldn’t just kill them…like I would have let it end like that.”

That got me a look.

“Listen, Hilde,” I muttered, looking up to her. “I just want to find him.”

“I can’t tell you,” she reminded me quietly. “Even if he hadn’t told me what had been happening…how he didn’t know where he was…how he was terrified of Heero…even if he hadn’t told me that, the strictures of the law state that the information of his whereabouts cannot be disclosed to the parties causing concern and forcing him to seek sanctuary.”

“It wasn’t me,” I snapped.

“He didn’t have your name on the list, but they realized you’d been with him for all three damn years,” she cut me off. “Even he tried to insist you weren’t a danger, but…three years, Wufei.” Her eyes were slightly accusing.

I looked away, shaking my head. “Fine.”

“I can tell him you’re looking for him, but I can’t do more than that,” she noted.

“So basically, you’re good for nothing,” I agreed, rising from her chair and moving to grab my uniform jacket. “Thanks, Hilde, I knew I could count on you.”

“Wufei, come on,” she protested, moving to follow me. “I told you, I can only do so much…”

“Just…go eat your pizza,” I ordered, giving her a look as I stormed from the office.

“Don’t get pissed at me,” she protested, darting to follow me through the halls of the building. She continued trying to persuade me as we went, but I’d just gotten one blow to the face too many and I was returning to my corner before I got blood on the mat and was disqualified.

“Wufei!” she snapped as we neared the stairs to the main entrance. Her tone was slightly different, and when I turned to look at her, her eyes were huge…

A minor cacophony broke out below us.

I turned to the circus of news stations who’d all spotted me and realized who I was…they waited at the bottom of the stairs, looking like it was a strain not to come running up at me as cameras flashed.

Hilde started giggling.

I had to grin at that, realizing I was still holding a half a piece of pizza and she had one with a bite or two out of it…the people were demanding questions of both of us…

Didn’t it figure?

- -

Duo stared at the screen as the feed changed from the grinning reporters to Wufei holding a piece of pizza with Hilde a few steps behind him.

“They have pizza!” Vasu declared, starting to laugh at that. “Look, mom! They both have pizza!”

Nas moved to look at the screen herself…and stopped.

“I bet you he bought her the pizza!” Vasu added excitedly as Cam moved around to join the family in looking at the screen. He was holding two blocks in his hands, and hitting them together.

“I bet you he did,” Duo agreed in amusement, looking up to see Nas’ horrified look. “It’s all right,” he muttered. “She can’t tell him anything anyway…and it is him…”

“You were scared of him,” she accused.

Vasu looked at his father with a frown, and Duo wondered how much of that life his son actively remembered. A lot had happened during the two years, aside from his little brother being born, so it was hard to know what he remembered and what he didn’t. He’d been going to school since they first arrived in London, and was completely fluent in English…even had the British accent.

Duo hoped he didn’t remember the initial leaving, how Duo’d been scared.

“So what are you going to do?” Nas appealed to her husband. “Is he here alone?”

“I have no way of knowing,” Duo noted, looking back to the screen as he pulled Cam onto his lap. “I guess we’ll just…have to wait and see.”

- -

Trowa smirked as he stared at the television screen, wondering if it was some sort of almighty joke.

Wufei was in London.

All his searches, all his questions…even going to Manaus and asking around about the Chinese man had turned up nothing. The laptop’s tracker wasn’t working, there was no way to really find him…and he goes and gets himself caught on film in London, talking to Hilde Spleiker.

“Hey, Heero?” Trowa called, moving to the hall.

“What?” Heero demanded.

“Pack your bags, we’re going to London.”

“What?” Heero demanded, moving to look down the hall at him.

“We’re going to London,” Trowa repeated. “Where’s psycho-boy?”

“I don’t know,” Heero retorted. “Why would I know?”

“I thought you knew where we all were all the time,” Trowa noted. Sometimes when Heero was ranting, he’d make statements that were amusing to repeat.

Heero gave him a look, turning away.

“Quatre!” Trowa called, moving down the hall to the far end of the builing—once upon a time, Duo and Heero had shared a suite at that side of the building, but Heero’d gotten too lonely to be like that. He’d moved to the other wing, and abandoned the other side. “Quatre, where are you?”

“I’m not home,” Quatre’s voice came from that room. “I’m not here anymore.”

“You haven’t been here in years,” Trowa noted, moving into the suite and looking around…to focus on Duo’s old room. “What are you doing?”

“Nothing,” Quatre noted, looking out the window. “I’m not doing nothing.”

“No, you’re not,” Trowa muttered in amusement. “Want to go find Duo?”

Quatre focused on him sharply.

“Come on,” Trowa suggested, gesturing toward the hall. “We need to pack clothes for a few days.”

“Okay!” Quatre darted past him, running toward the main of the living area.

Heero gave Trowa a confused look. “How’d you get him to do it so fast?”

Trowa shrugged at him. “Don’t look at me, he’s your psycho.”