Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Untitled ❯ Ch 1 The Lost Past of a Lonely Child ( Chapter 1 )

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing, or any of the characters from Gundam Wing. They are owned by Bandai and Sunrise. However, Nina (the yet unnamed little girl), Hana Mienai, and Karen are my original characters. And I'm not making any money, duh.

The year was After-Colony 184. Somewhere in the L2 colony cluster, two four-year-olds, a little boy and a little girl with identical hair and eyes, crawled out from under their kitchen table, where the had been hiding. The little girl is clutched a new stuffed dog in her arms. On the wall, there was a photograph of the two as toddlers, sitting on the kitchen floor in diapers, with an open cookie jar between them and mischievous, chocolate-smeared grins on their faces. Underneath the picture was the caption, "The Dynamic Duo." The two walked into the living room, where two adults lay still and limp on the floor. The little girl tried to shake one of them awake.

"Get up, Mommy!" When she received no response, she stood up, stared at her mother and the man lying next to her, and asked, "What's wrong with Mommy and Daddy?" The boy turned and looked at her.

"It got them," he said. She looked back at him quizzically.

"What got them?" There was silence for a moment as they both turned and stared down at their parents. Then the boy answered his sister's question.

"Death…" The two were then startled by two voices outside, in front of their house.

"What about the kids?"

"What kids?"

"Didn't you see all the pictures? There's a little boy, and a girl."

"Oh, yeah. But they could be anywhere! They may not even be home. They could be at a relative's, or the neighbors'…"

"Hmmm. Well, we can't ask the neighbors. It would look too suspicious. We should search the house and if we can't find them, we'll just wait until they come home."

"Yeah. We can't leave any evidence. It would look bad to the public if word got out that soldiers from the Federation Army murdered two people and left their children orphaned. However, if we get the kids out of the way, we could broadcast a statement over the radio that a private shuttle carrying this family blew up or something."

"Good idea. Let's look for those kids."

The two children look at each other.

"The bad men are coming back for us," the girl said.

"We gotta leave," the boy responded.

"But how? The bad men are outside."

"The back door?"

"So we can hide in the woods?"

"Yeah!"

"But Daddy put the new lock too high for us to reach."

"I'll get on my hands and knees and you can stand on my back."

"OK," the girl nodded. They opened the back door and ran to the edge of a forest that started where their backyard ended. They hid in the trees. The girl turned to her brother.

"What will happen to us now?"

"I don't know…"

Two soldiers came downstairs after searching the house for the children whose parents they had just murdered. One of the soldiers nudged the dead woman with the toe of his shoe.

"We really messed up big this time."

"You can say that again. Where could those kids be?"

"Hey, look! The back door's open!"

"They must have been hiding down here and went out when we weren't looking!" The soldiers ran out the open back door and headed towards the woods. The children saw them coming, and, afraid that they'd already been spotted, they left their hiding places and started running through the trees. The soldiers then spotted them and started after them. The children had a head start and knew the forest better than the soldiers did. They soon reached a wide river.

"There's no bridge!" the girl cried. "What do we do now?"

"We can cross on that log over there!" The boy pointed to a tall tree that had fallen across the river. "It's our only way across, and it's just wide enough for us. The bad men won't be able to cross on it."

"I'm scared, brudder."

"Me too." He took her hand and they started to cross. The log was wet and the girl slipped, pulling her brother with her. They fell into the river, and were forced to let go of each other. The current was strong, and took them far. Soon, they can no longer see each other. The little boy washed up on the opposite shore, on the side away from the residential areas. When he opened his eyes, a group of little boys was standing over him.

"Hey, kid, you alright?" one of the boys asked.

"Yeah, I think so."

"We're a group of orphans. You can join us if you want. You got any family?"

The little boy sat up and looked sadly at the river.

"No. The bad men killed my mommy and daddy. And my sister got drownded in the river."

"It's cold tonight," the little girl thought, shivering and pulling the stolen tablecloth around her. It wasn't really a blanket, but it would have to do. She felt guilty about taking it, but the restaurant had plenty more, and the waiters shouldn't have left the outdoor tables unsupervised anyway. It was getting dark, and the little girl was tired. She'd been sleeping in a different place every night so the bad men wouldn't find her.

"It's OK, Puppy, it's not that dark. You don't have to be afraid. Besides, the street lamps will come on soon. And look, the moon is out. It's just like a night light." The little girl hugged her dirty stuffed dog a little a little tighter. "That looks like a good place to sleep," she thought, noticing a cushioned bench near the restaurant that she had taken the tablecloth from earlier that day.

A young woman wiped her hands on her apron and shouted some orders to the busboys.

"Tables five, two, and eight need to be clean and set! Where are you boys?" A couple of busboys got to work right away. The woman sighed and shook her head. Good help is so hard to find these days. A waiter approached her nervously.

"Excuse me, miss, but many of the customers are complaining that someone is staring at them through the front window."

"Thanks, Joe. Would you please watch the cash register for me?"

"Of course, ma'am."

The woman hurried out the front door to find a little girl standing with her nose pressed against the window of the restaurant. She has chestnut-colored hair and looks very dirty and hungry.

"Little girl, are you lost?" the woman asked her. The little girl shook her head no.

"My mommy used to take me here with my daddy and my brudder."

"And where are your mommy and daddy now?" The woman looked around for adults who looked like they could be with her.

"My brudder said Death got them." The little girl looked sad. The woman is shocked and sad as well.

"Well, ah, where is your brother then?"

"He fell in the river when we ran from the bad men and he never got out. I waited and waited, but he never got out." The little girl looked at her feet and her eyes filled with tears. The woman hugged her and held her tight.

"Little one, if you don't have anywhere to go, you can stay here with me as long as you like. However, we still haven't been properly introduced. I'm Hana Mienai." The woman smiled down at the little girl. "What's your name?"

"I'm… I'm… I… I don't know!" The little girl cried in panic. It had been so long since she has heard her own name, she couldn't remember what it was. (A/N: I'm relying on the hope that four-year-olds have very selective, very random, very limited memories.)

"Don't cry, child, don't cry, please don't cry, little one. We'll figure it out in time. Until then, we'll think of a new name for you, and we'll do it together, OK?"

"OK." The little girl sniffed and dried her eyes.

"It's going to be OK. I'll take care of you, OK? Are you hungry? Come inside, and we'll eat." The two went inside the restaurant and the little girl ate.

"If I'm gonna stay here with you, does that make you my new mommy?"

"No, child. A child can only have one mother, and I don't want you to ever forget yours. It is true that I will be acting like a mother to you, and I will care for you and love you as though you were my own daughter, but the name 'Mommy' can be reserved for only one woman in each child's life, and I can never take her place."

"Well, I can't call you 'Miss Mienai.' It's too formal," the little girl said thoughtfully. "So what will I call you?" Hana thought for a moment.

"Well, like I said, I can't replace your real mother. I feel too young to be a mother or an aunt anyway. So how about just Hana, like a sister?"

"Like a sister…" the little girl repeated thoughtfully. Then she smiled. "I like that."

"I'm thirsty, Puppy. Let's go see if Hana will give us a glass of water." The little girl tiptoed down the hall with her freshly washed dog to Hana's room and opened the door, but the bed was empty and the room was dark.

"Hana?" the little girl whispered. "Where are you?" She was suddenly very afraid. The little girl crept down the stairs toward the kitchen. On her way, she passed an open door and heard men's voices.

"If this escalates any further, it will be too late to strike. We'll have missed our opportunity to end this war once and for all," a gruff voice said.

"We simply don't have the resources to bring down the Earth's forces right now. We have to find a way to contact the other colonies and gather support before we can move," another voice chimed in. Then, a soft, familiar, female voice started to speak, gentle to start, but rising in strength and power.

"Obviously, gentlemen, we don't have the resources, weaponry, or manpower for an all-out assault. However, we do have enough equipment and operatives for a covert operation. Sabotage may be a less "honorable" means of attack, but it is just as efficient. Maybe it's not a permanent solution, but sabotage will delay the army's operations and give us time to obtain weapons and men."

The little girl snuck across the room, careful to stay in the shadows where she would be unnoticed. When she reached Hana, she crept forward and tugged on the woman's skirt. Hana jumped and spun quickly around.

"Oh! Hello, little one. You startled me. You're awfully quiet on your feet."

"Hana, who are these strange men?" the little girl asked suspiciously. They didn't look like the bad men who had hurt her mommy and daddy… those men were wearing uniforms. But they talked a little like the mean men did. "Are they bad men?" she whispered softly.

"No, child. These are my friends. They are going to help me get rid of the bad men. My friends and I just need time to get more friends to help us," Hana replied. The little girl frowned thoughtfully at this.

"Well, I wanna help too. What can I do?" The men snickered at the tiny creature who wanted to help fight an army, but they were silence by a stern glance from Hana.

"Very well, child. You are very stealthy. Maybe one day when you're older, you can be our little spy."

"I don't wanna wait 'til I'm older. The bad men hurt my mommy and daddy. I wanna help now. And what does 'stealthy' mean?" the little girl persisted.

Hana smiled. "It means you're very quiet when you walk, so people don't notice you and you can get around easily. And if you want to help now, you're going to need a codename, like my friends and I all have."

"What's a codename?" the little girl puzzled.

"It's kind of like a nickname, only no one is supposed to know or call you that unless you're on a mission."

"OK. Will you help me choose one?"

"Of course. How about 'Panther,' because you're so sneaky?"

"I like that. But what will everyone call me when I'm not being sneaky?"

"Hmm. How about 'Nina?' It was exactly what Hana had always wanted to call her first daughter.

"That's a pretty name. I like it! Can I have a glass of water now?"