Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Wild Wings ❯ Chapter 15

Princess, Pheonix, Jess - So many questions I just can't tell you the answers to! We're back to the supernatural in this chapter so I'm sure a few of them will be solved.

 

Thank you, as always, to everyone who continues to read!

 

 

 

Chapter 15

 

Duo drove the dunetruck slowly down the ramp of the Maguanac base, not at all surprised to find many of the soldiers anxiously awaiting their return. What he didn't expect was Rashid's frowning face and a plasma screen slapped into his hands before he even had a chance to park.

 

The pilot blinked. His own face stared back. In the bottom corner a looping video clip of him taking out the OZ troops Quatre had run across caught his eye. "What in the hell?"

 

"I'd like to be asking you the same question." Rashid glowered. "I do believe Master Quatre said something about laying low for a while."

 

Quatre took the screen from Duo's lax fingers. "What's going on Rashid?" Then, "Oh..!"

 

"This doesn't make any sense. How are we news already?"

 

"You." Rashid corrected. "Just you." And he looked none to happy at having the object of said news in his hanger.

 

Quatre was shaking his head. "No, no. This is all wrong." He scrolled through the news report, frowning. "Duo it says you're wanted for questioning in the assault of three OZ troops and possible connection with the colonies. They think you might be some kind of spy or something."

 

"Is there any mention of the Gundams?"

 

"...no. there doesn't seem to be any suggestion of them."

 

"Well thank God for small mercies."

 

"I'd like to know why you're going around attacking OZ soldiers without warning."

 

"Hey!" Duo snapped at the Maguanac, "Why don't you find out the story first, big guy. I didn't jump anyone who wasn't asking for it."

 

"This article says differently!" Rashid barked back. There was a murmer of agreement through the ranks.

 

"Rashid! Soldiers!" Quatre reprimanded them all with a glare. "You should know better than to believe anything you read in the news, especially now that we're at war. Those three were after me, if Duo hadn't been there I wouldn't be here now. He saved my life."

 

They backed off. Rashid made a face as if the facts were hard to swallow or perhaps he was blaming himself for not being there. Duo couldn't tell. He was trying not to make his own set of faces. Saved Quatre's life? Hardly. Saved him from a beating maybe, or being taken for a few questions. Duo doubted his life was ever in danger.

 

"He deserves your praise. Not your contempt." Quatre finished. "It's the truth. More than this load of crap." He slapped the vid screen into a solder's hand and turned to look past Duo at Rashid. "The colonies have made no announcement in response to OZ's declaration of war, correct?"

 

Rashid nodded once.

 

"Than I think this is just terrible coincidence." Quatre concluded.

 

Duo raised an eyebrow, "How do you figure that?"

 

"Any territories OZ controls, which is most of them these days, are currently under the rules of war. It gives OZ a lot more leeway when it comes to troop movement and husbandry. Since the colonies haven't made any response the people are looking for a scapegoat and because the Gundams have all gone to ground they're getting desperate for someone to put up on a screen and say 'look, here's your enemy.'" He looked at Duo. "Stay out of sight for a week and they'll have another poor sap on the front page instead of you."

 

Duo blinked. Packfem...

 

Rashid cleared his throat. "It seems I owe you an apology, Duo. I am sorry for doubting your devotion to Master Quatre."

 

"Ah...yeah, no problem." He rubbed the back of his head, "Forget it ever came up."

 

Quatre waved the man off. "Now give us a bit of room, guys so we can park the hopper and get some food."

 

A voice called; "Park the what?"

 

Duo stuck his head out the window. "The dune hopper! You guys really need to work on your naming skills, this baby is no truck. Trish is a regular jackrabbit out on the sand."

 

"Trish...?" someone muttered as they cruised forward. Quatre just rolled his eyes.

 

--//--

 

Lay low. Keep quiet. Duo knew how to do both and was quite good at it. He cleaned out Deathscythe from top to bottom, filled the fuel tanks and found some bits and bobs to rig himself a few interesting bombs. He investigated the Maguanac base from end to end and raided the kitchen whenever the fancy passed him by. He would have given Trish some fine tuning but at Quatre's insistence the hanger doors were closed. Just in case.

 

And for a while things were fine. Duo's legs healed completely, his spirits were mostly up, and he'd encountered no more resistance from Rashid or any of Quatre's guys. But for the last three days his nerves were singing.

 

It started with being a bit snappish. At first Duo had chocked it up to being trapped in a single place for so long, without even the ability to go outside and burn off some of the anxiety. When he snapped at Quatre for something pathetically insignificant Duo decided something wasn't quite right and he confined himself to his room and the kitchen at staggered intervals.

 

But it wasn't going away.

 

Duo tossed the bed sheets aside and began pacing again. Between counting the width of his room and rolling around in the sheets he was not only bored out of his skull, but tense over reasons he couldn't identify.

 

True to Quatre's word it took less than a week for Duo's 'assault' on OZ troops to become old news. Since that hype died down there hadn't been a whisper of activity surrounding the Gundam pilots. There was nothing at all for him to be stressing over.

 

In fact, the last time he'd felt like this was... just before he shifted.

 

Oh.

 

Well, shit. There wasn't much he could do about it here.

 

He pulled the door open with a resigned sigh and headed for the hanger. If nothing else there was more room. The last full moon had been torturous until the shift actually took place. He also was in moonlight when that happened. If he couldn't get to light, would he still shift? Or would he run about in agony until he convinced one of the Maguanacs to open the hanger door?

 

He never got to find out. Entering the hanger proved the ramp to be open and waiting. Duo broke into a jog, then a full sprint past Deathscythe and toward that siren moonlight. It was against every precaution Quatre repeated for the past... however long they'd been here. Duo didn't care.

 

He touched the light and the shift came over him in a rush. He hit the ramp hard, one shoulder digging into the metal and his mind consumed in a brief flare of pain. He knew better than to fight it. Fighting had done no good last time.

 

So he let the shift come and tried to relax. Some of the pain eased and when he could finally breathe again the world was a shifting mass of blue-purple.

 

And red-yellow! What is that!? He jumped to his paws and nearly collapsed a second time. A streak of flame orange dove out of the sky. It dropped in front of him, backwinged to stall in the air and landed delicately on the metal ramp.

 

Predatorbird. The wolf's word was less a piece of language than a series of impressions. Duo understood. It was a raptor of some kind, the hook beak was an obvious clue. The question was why it was flame red when nothing else was.

 

The bird chirped. Cried. Hopped once or twice and took off again. The wolf followed before Duo could make sense of it. He raced up the ramp and soared over the same dune the hopper had jumped so many days ago. He ran nose-first into a thermal.

 

Without warning Duo found himself forty feet above the sand and rapidly climbing. His wings seemed to know what to do without his help. He banked left and found the bird again, a glorious beacon even higher up. Duo circled a dune with a thermal that carried him higher still. Suddenly the raptor was beside, now under, now above him.

 

"Kekerii!" It shouted and turned.

 

Duo barked and gave chase.

 

Learning to fly while he was only half in control was a lot harder than letting the wolf do what he wanted but Duo wasn't about to let this thing... ability, whatever, take control of him again. He folded his wings slightly and let himself drop toward the earth. The raptor careened past him then shot back up again with a loud cry. Duo snapped his wings open and caught the same thermal, let it assist him up, high, higher.

 

He should probably start paying attention to the moon phases, then, if this was going to be his life from now on. Being forced to transform once a month was not an appealing prospect but if the alternative was debilitating pain he'd take the lesser of two evils.

 

He circled the wave of dunes. His companion bird circled him in several looping sweeps. It wasn't all bad, he decided. No one else on earth could fly... Duo barked and chased the bird in earnest this time.

 

--//--

 

Duo woke, sand encrusted, just outside the den ramp. His shoulder throbbed. "Uhhg." He garbled and managed to roll to his hands and knees. "Did anyone get the license plate of the gundam that stepped on me?" He muttered.

 

Now that he was taking stock things didn't feel so bad, but it was still a shitty way to start the morning.

 

"No-"

 

The voice made him start and loose his balance. Duo dropped his hip into unforgiving sand then gave in and sat there.

 

Quatre's eyes were sharp but his smile was apologetic. "But I think I recognized the pilot."

 

Duo rubbed at his face. "Well make sure he's on latrine duty for a week." He accepted the blonde's hand and pulled himself to his feet. "What're you doing out here at... five thirty in the morning?"

 

Quatre blanched. He covered it so quickly Duo almost missed it. But he knew without a doubt whatever came out of that kid's mouth next was going to be a blatant lie. He could almost taste it.

 

"I couldn't sleep so I came out to the hanger to tinker with Sandrock. I saw the ramp door open and you out here."

 

Duo chased sleep weariness from his brain with a jaw-cracking yawn. "And you didn't run to get someone?"

 

"You woke up just as I figured it out."

 

"Ah." Then before Quatre could return the favor with questions of his own, Duo escaped the packfem's too-accurate eyes. A shower was most definitely in order.

 

--//--

 

"Food, glorious food..." He sang under his breath.

 

"Duo! Come have a seat!" Quatre waved from the opposite end of the mess hall. It was packed.

 

It had been a while since he dared to take a meal with the rest of the soldiers but they didn't seem to begrudge him any absence. He took a seat next to the blonde and made a pointed effort to grab his utensils first. For the next few minutes things got a little hazy. He shoveled anything that would fit down his throat and washed it down with whatever happened to be in his glass at the time. Neither cup nor plate were empty for long.

 

If anyone thought it strange, no one commented. After a moment the urge to devour everything in his path eased and he even managed to join the conversation. He didn't leave the table, though, until platters were being cleared and the last pitcher of juice was empty.

 

Quatre, he noticed, didn't seem inclined to leave either. While the blonde certainly engaged in more conversation, he sampled from every plate he could reach and never let a bowl be taken away less than perfectly empty.

 

The seed of an idea rooted itself. Duo set his glass down slowly and watched Quatre for a long moment. Eventually the blonde turned to look at him with sudden hawk-like intensity.

 

"Is something wrong?"

 

Words leapt to his throat before he could stop them. "What do you call this place, again?"

 

"An eyrie... oh!" Quatre slapped his hand over his mouth and spluttered, "That is, I mean—"

 

"Stop trying to lie, you're not very good at it, Q." He didn't expect relief to ripple over the blonde's face.

 

"Oh, I'm sorry Duo. You just didn't seem to understand what happened—"

 

"I'm sure I don't." Duo interrupted, "But that raptor last night... that was you wasn't it?" Quatre nodded, biting his lip. Duo sat back in his chair with a sigh, "Which means I'm either in the strangest coma dream known to man, or this really isn't going away."

 

"Going away!? Why in the world would you want that?"

 

"Oh I don't know, maybe I never asked for this, Quatre! Maybe I want my life to be normal, or what passed for normal back on L2. I don't want—"

 

Quatre frowned, "Well we don't always get what we want, Duo. Sometimes we just get what we're given." His expression relaxed, "Besides, this is a gift! To be able to—"

 

"Don't say it." Duo stood. He couldn't handle this conversation anymore.

 

"I was going to say 'fly' but if you're worried about the Maguanac corps finding out, they already know."

 

"What?!"

 

"They knew about me at any rate. After that stunt we pulled last night I'm sure they know about you."

 

Duo felt his knees tremble. "I... and they haven't run away screaming?"

 

Quatre's laugh was bark-like. "Why should they?" He crossed his arms, "I vouched for you and you proved yourself to them. That's all the assurance they need."

 

"Q, we turn into animals! You can't be telling me this is natural!?"

 

The blond shook his head, "No, it's not. We were tampered with and for that if not other crimes the scientists we're getting our orders from will die in the end."

 

That simple, quiet assurance was almost frightening. Packfem... Duo shook his head and growled.

 

Quatre pressed on, "But that won't change what's already happened. It can't be undone, Duo."

 

The pilot turned away and stalked down the length of the mess hall.

 

"Duo!"

 

He growled again but turned to listen. As much as he hated this situation, hated G for putting him here, and hated Quatre for being so damned reasonable about it, the kid was still packfem and whatever the packfem said he needed to take to heart.

 

"Do you want to go flying?"

 

That was unexpected, though. Duo blinked. "What? I mean—I don't have my wings at the moment..."

 

"Sure you do." Quatre was smiling. A crown of feathers sprouted elegantly around his brow with apparently no effort at all. "They're inside, all you have to do is search for them" The transformation took him then. His head rocked back and a cry, half bird and half scream, issued from a mutating voice box. He shrunk and a massive explosion of feathers obscured any shape change for a while.

 

Then a raptor waddle-hopped from under the table. Quatre jumped onto a chair, then to its back to be closer to eye level. His head twisted to one side. Duo floundered. "But I—"

 

"Kirii!!" the raptor's scream made Duo jump.

 

"But—"

 

"Kirkeriii!"

 

Ok, no buts. He got the picture. Just how was he supposed to do this anyway? He looked down at his chest. Inside, where they? Well he couldn't just crack himself open, right? His cross glinted back at him, unhelpful. Duo twisted around to look over his shoulder. Nope. No wings.

 

"Kirii!"

 

"Hey! I'm working on it here, give a guy a break... would... you...? What are you doing?"

 

Quatre bobbed his feathered head and rocked from side to side on the chair. His wings came up in a circle. He ducked his head under them, then popped up again, duck, pop, duck, pop.

 

Duo came closer and bent to better see the strange movement.

 

Duck, pop, duck, pop, duck...

 

He leaned in, still confused.

 

Pop! "KIREII!"

 

"Ah!" He flinched backward and fell on his ass.

 

"Kek, kek, kek."

 

Oh, the bird was laughing at him, was he? Duo jumped to his feet and cast a frustrated line of awareness deep within himself. The wolf surged to the surface. Duo fell to the floor again, this time in pain. Note to self: kneel or lay down when transforming. Wings erupted from his shoulders. New muscle layered itself over his chest. His spine cracked, lengthened, fur rippled outward from his back. It was dark reddish gold, a bit paler under his belly and neck. A dorsal stripe split into several tiger-like markings down his legs. His blunt nails clicked on the cement.

 

Duo opened his eyes. The world was predictably purple-blue. Quatre posted on the back of the chair, flaming gold. "Kek, kek." He flapped his wings once and soared out the door of the mess hall.

 

Duo growled. He wasn't going to get away so easily. The wolf scrambled to his paws. Coordinating four legs was easier if he paid more attention to the fleeing raptor, he discovered. Quatre turned a corner with a piercing cry. Duo careened after him. His paws slipped on the smooth floor. Rather than crash into the opposite wall Duo opened his wings and for two full strides ran sidewise along the wall.

 

He was better prepared for the next turn. Rather than wait for the slip he flared a few feathers against the air and turned smoothly. He wasn't a Gundam pilot for nothing.

 

Quatre's cries helped clear their path of obstacles. By the time Duo surged around the corner after his prey any Maguanacs in the hall plastered themselves against the walls or dived into open rooms. Duo paid them no mind, only Quatre glowed in his purple-blue vision.

 

The raptor was tiring by the time they reached the hanger. Duo lengthened his stride and burst into the larger room with a flick of his wings. He didn't see the dunetruck until it was too late. Quatre started in the air and banked hard to the right. Duo's reaction wasn't as fast. He flared his wings but his claws slipped on the metal floor. No traction. He ducked instead, throwing his wings and paws over his head as he half-slid between the tiers.

 

The dunetruck jerked to a stop.

 

Duo lifted his paws and one wing rather slowly. He blinked. Was he dead?

 

"Keriieii!" Quatre landed roughly on the cement and blinked at him.

 

He wasn't dead? He was alive? He was alive! Duo jumped up. He was--! Owwwwie.. the wolf shook his head. He was under the dunetruck, apparently.

 

"Oh, Allah preserve us; Master Quatre are you alright?" A pair of booted feet landed in Duo's vision. Quatre posted and waddle-hopped to the side, still peering under the dunetruck.

 

The feet became a pair of knees and a startled Rashid stared. "Duo! Are you hurt?"

 

The pilot couldn't stop a cringe. He ducked his head but found Quatre's ice-blue eyes pinning him instead. He slunk out from under the truck, toward Rashid but away from those eyes that saw too much.

 

The Maguanac seemed to have none of the qualms Duo kept trying to apply to the man. Rather than hesitate Rashid was quick to run his fingers through rust-colored fur and feathers, checking for injuries that Duo, thankfully, didn't have. When the soldier ignored a half-hearted growl Duo let him do as he pleased. When the inspection began on his toes he finally pulled out of the man's grasp and shook himself. See? He was fine.

 

Quatre clacked his beak. Rashid ruffled the fur on Duo's head as a parting good bye. The pilot tried to look indignant. Rashid knelt and collected Quatre on his broad fist. The raptor posted, catching his balance when the solder stood, then leapt high with his help. The toss boosted him high in the air. He circled once and swooped out the hanger ramp.

 

"Duo, some of the solders have made adjustments to... what did you call it. Trish?" Rashid patted the dunetruck. "We were just about to take her out for a ride if you want to join us."

 

Hell yes! Duo wagged his tail and made a running leap onto the vehicle's bed. Another hop-flap had him on the roll cage and ready for action.

 

Rashid laughed and started the truck.