Savior
Time Travel: Well, if I was going to be anywhere, this series is an interesting place for it.
Me: Space time travel, sure. It happens when one idea completely cannibalizes the other. Third generation usually calls for major AU when its not a bedground for depressing ship fics...Let's start by giving Kio a spine, then dialing back and revealing how he got it - and blowing every other character's mind along the way. Shall we?
Kio: Meep?!
Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam AGE. Clearly.
Prologue
"I'll be the savior that saves everyone from them!"
Flit watched as his grandson's expression suddenly snapped from wide-eyed, sorrowful and pleading to disappointment and rage.
"DECIL GALLETE IS DEAD, GRAMPA!" Kio roared, loud enough that he could be heard on board Second Moon, so loud the force of it shook his entire body. "HOW LONG ARE YOU GOING TO PROJECT YOUR GRUDGE AGAINST HIM ONTO COMPLETELY UNRELATED PEOPLE?!"
Flit choked and stepped back, staring wide eyed at the boy. Kio clenched his fists, twisting the edges of the bandages that covered his wrists, his eyes narrowed into slits, shoulders bent like a bull about to charge. Asemu regarded his son with a mixture of surprise and alarm.
"How long is his ghost going to dictate your attitude towards people who never even knew him?" Kio spat out. "How long are you going to try and punish him by killing people who were born years after his death? Here's the thing grampa! Even if he was still alive, he wouldn't care about what you've done! Nothing about Vagan mattered to him, not the plague, not the poverty, not the soul crushing, dehumanizing despair. All that mattered to him was winning! Killing people! He didn't even care about his brother, why would he care about you and your hatred of him?! If all of this...was some way of getting back at him...even if he were here to see it, it would be MEANINGLESS!"
"You think you were the only person who hated him?" The boy straightened to his full height, ocean blue eyes blazing. "When I was on Vagan, my guardian was Mister Zeheart. He was Decil's little brother. And you know what? HE HATED HIM! You want to know why? BECAUSE HE THREW HIS COMRADES LIVES AWAY OVER A GRUDGE AGAINST ONE MAN! Mister Zeheart...he hated Decil's lack of empathy. He hated his brother's selfishness and self-centered insubordination. He took over as commander after Decil was discharged from the post...FOR KILLING YURIN!"
He nodded sharply at Flit's expression. "Yes! He wasn't supposed to have hurt her! She was supposed to provide some technical support, but he threatened not to sortie against you if he didn't get his way – and that pretty much fixed that issue, since no one else stood a chance against you! None of them liked him! They were stuck with him because he was good at fighting, and if they didn't fight, they were all going to DIE!"
Kio spread his arms. "Saviour? Grampa, I used to see you as a saviour. You were a shining sentinel, a guardian...but now that I've seen the results of what you've built, I realized – you're NONE OF THESE THINGS! None of this has ANYTHING to do with saving people, and EVERYTHING to do with your psychotic, unreasoning hatred of everyone vaguely and distantly connected to that one fucker who had fun killing people! If one bastard was enough reason to wipe out an entire society, then all of humanity should be destroyed! Or are you really going to lie to my face and say that everything the Federation has done is just and righteous?"
"And I'm not talking about leaving millions of people to die a hundred and fifty years ago because they didn't want to admit an expensive project was a failure. I'm not talking about suppression of any information about their mistake, the convenient disappearance of anyone who protested that decision – and yes, it happened, I looked it up, and not even in a Vagan database. There were old records from a reporter who was 'disappeared', and gee, I fucking wonder why that was."
Asemu stared blankly at his son – his thirteen year old son – who's posture had completely changed. Kio wasn't speaking to family. He was arching his spine at an enemy, at someone who had hurt him in ways he didn't have words for.
"I'm talking about the deliberate escalation. The war of Bat Extermination? REALLY, Grampa? You know who else attacked civilian colonies with little to no provocation? You know who employed summary execution, leaving no survivors? Who's policy was no quarter and no mercy, because we've been injured, we've been hurt and it's UNFORGIVABLE?" Kio's lip curled.
"Because it wasn't Mister Zeheart, who has the charming moniker of 'Red Devil' even though he's the most moderate and compassionate general Vagan has. It isn't even Lord Ezelcant, who's decision following his son's...death...is still something I'm desperately trying to wrap my head around."
"That was the Federation. That was the good guys, the saviours -" He spat the word out like it was poison on his tongue. "-who wanted to protect people. It didn't matter that you became the first generation Vagan attackers in all but name, because you were on the righteous side of the conflict."
Kio shoved his hands in his pockets, glaring up at a speechless Flit. The way his expression was twisted emphasized a scar running across his forehead, near his hairline, that neither of them had noticed before – smooth and streamlined, like it had been made by machinery. When had he gotten that?
"When I was on Vagan, I met a girl named Lu Anon. She's thirteen. She's dying. She's been dying for two years. I held her in my arms as she convulsed and vomited blood and then forced herself to smile because she didn't want me or her brother or 'father' to worry about her. She was always smiling, kind, even when she cried. She told me how her parents died of starvation, because there weren't enough rations to feed a family of four in that district and they had saved precious little from a food riot – which happen all the damn time because the Mars Terraforming failed. The most beautiful thing she had ever seen...was a starving, decrepit city, from the top of a trash heap. She told me how she would dream about the ocean, about how she wished she could see it and you know what she asked me?"
Tears sprung at the corners of his eyes. Angry tears, frustrated tears, sorrowful tears. "She asked me – that if I return to Earth – if I would, if not bury her there, put a gravestone for her near the ocean. She's thirteen and she's calmly accepted that she's going to die, slowly, painfully, choking on her own blood as her body is poisoned by the Mars Rays."
"And you WANT HER TO DIE!" Blue eyes blazed. "You don't even consider her A HUMAN BEING! You would kill her yourself through your orders, even though she's just as much an innocent bystander, victim of circumstance, AS YURIN LE'CIEL!"
There were all kinds of people in the hallway now. Kio's screaming fit had drawn them from all over the ship – including the Captain, Seric Abis and the team, a terrified looking Wendy and Wootbit, workers, other soldiers. They all watched in stunned silence, enraptured...some were even in tears.
"Is that the trait of a saviour, grampa?" Kio asked with scathing sarcasm. "Or is that more like a bitter, self centered man who's only concern was his personal satisfaction, like a certain red haired, yellow eyed PSYCHOPATH?"
Flit took a step back. His eyes were beginning to water, flickering madly among his audience as if hoping someone would stand up for him.
"Do you really think Yurin – or Woolf – would have approved of genocide?" Kio continued, not letting up. "Does that fit their profiles? Think about it, without projecting Decil and what he did onto all your memories of them. Can you even do that anymore?" Without really waiting for an answer, he turned his head towards Asemu. "Dad? Is that what Woolf Enneacle was like?"
Asemu was so startled that he jumped and stared at his son for a long moment. But he rallied after a moment, seizing the sudden pause in the 'conversation' in hopes of turning it elsewhere and shook his head. "No! Woolf was..." He ignored the familiar, if distant, sorrow that was attached to the memory of his beloved mentor. "He wanted to get us all through the conflict, back home. It was never about killing Vagans, just protecting your friends and the people you cared about."
Kio hummed. Somehow, it seemed like he'd already known the answer to that question on a personal level, and was merely seeking a second voice to back him up. "I know neither of us knew Yurin. Maybe she would have been my grandma, if things had been...different." He paused, and contemplated that for a moment with an unreadable expression, before continuing with hardened eyes, "But think, grampa, really think – you imagine she's cheering, where ever she is, watching you plot the massacre of an entire people? Not just the commanders, or the rank and file, but every single one of them?"
He raised an eyebrow and regarded the speechless old man, who's mouth was opening and closing without any noise coming out. After a moment, it became plain that Kio really was waiting for an answer...but it seemed that Flit had none to give.
"I thought so," The young boy – no, the young man – said with a heavy sigh, crossing his arms. "That leaves Grodeck Anioa, doesn't it? So he avenged his wife and daughter...and in the same breath, inflicted his sorrow on somebody else, a young boy, completely tangential to his goal." Kio shook his head before swinging his head around, making it clear he knew he had an audience, and calmly asked, "would everyone like to know the full story of how the famous 'Anioa' died?"
Uncertain mumbles, gazes averted. There was shame. Confusion. Fear. "The Federation government itself contacted a young man. His mother had wasted away from the Mars Ray sickness for three years before dying. His father took him with him to a military operation. His father was not a good man by any stretch; he caused the destruction of a colony among other things. Perhaps he deserved to die. But his father was his whole world, and said world was shot to death in front of him." Kio clicked his tongue. "What wrong had the boy done up to that point in his life? What pain had he sworn on the Federation and its citizens? Nothing. None. He went along with his father because he was in no position not to, and what child doesn't? However...when his father was shot to death...that changed."
"Arabel Zoi wasn't thinking about Vagan when he stabbed Grodeck Anoia in the back. There was nothing in his motives that related to saving any friends he might have had from lingering, wasting deaths to the Mars Rays, or about rescuing fellow pilots slated for the execution block, or securing territory that they would be able to live in without a death sentence preordained. It. Was. About. Personal. Revenge. Just like the killing of his father had been for Anoia himself."
Kio eyed his grandfather cynically. "Just so, were any moderates from the government purged in the aftermath. Just so, were they replaced by people who screamed 'no mercy' as the new policy – as if it were the new policy, and not what the man in charge had intended from the beginning. Not because he wanted to protect anyone. But because he wanted to get payback on a couple of people who were already dead."
Kio then turned in a circle and regarded his audience with a sarcastic smile. "That's who you've put in charge, everyone," He said in a nearly sing-song way. "That's what you'll be dying for, if you die out there – revenge on a man who's been dead for twenty years."
"...But what about the strafing at Olivernotes?" Some brave voice in the crowd managed. "Should we forget that?"
"Oh?" Kio blinked. "You mean that thing Lieutenant Xanald went behind his SO's back to order, which would have got him shot in the head if Commander Gallete had had permission to do so? The man who did get shot in the head later on for trying to kill me, after Commander Gallete ordered that I wasn't to be harmed in any way after being captured and brought aboard his ship?" The young man shrugged again. "Joint sub-commanders Leil and Fram Nara didn't even give a damn when it happened right in front of them, said his body should get spaced with the rest of the garbage. Some rank and file soldier I walked past said 'and nothing of value was lost' in regards to him. Later, Commander Gallete apologized that he was unable to turn Xanald over to the Federation himself. Apologized. To his hostage." Kio looked momentarily amused at the reminder.
"But..." The voice faltered and fell silent.
"But what?" Kio asked, putting one hand on his hip. No response. "But what? Surprised the monstrous enemy has standards? Surprised that they're not all cackling, pitiless, bloodthirsty monsters crawled from the shadows? It's an odd thought, but there it is. I wonder what might have happened, had it been a Federation ship with a Vagan prisoner – oh, right. "Summary execution is recommended". The subject wouldn't have even come up."
Flit blinked rapidly. "Kio..." He croaked, finally able to speak. "Everything I did, I did to provide you with a world without our greatest enemy..."
"Really?" Kio snapped, spinning back around. "Really? Is that what was running through your mind when you gave me a battle simulator when I was five years old?! Is that why you groomed me to be your replacement, told me to treat this horrible, disgusting war like a game? Is that what you were thinking when you directed me to kill people? When you tainted my childhood so you could have a weapon now that you're getting older?! I was THIRTEEN! I came crying to you when I stepped on worms washed onto the pavement by the rain!"
His voice broke; now there was agony there, a deep, raw betrayal. "Did you even THINK about what KILING people might mean to me?! Would you care about the nightmares I've had, the blood I see that I can't wash off my hands?! Do you care about the spectres I sometimes see when I'm alone, just for an instant, but reminding me of what has happened and what I've done in my sweet ignorance?! Maybe you've killed so many you don't care any more. BUT I AM NOT YOU! IT HURTS, Grampa! I WANT IT OUT OF MY HEAD!"
It was as if his strength suddenly gave out. Kio crumbled to his knees. "I want...I want..." He let out a great, heaving sob. "I want...I want it out of my head...I wanted to be good. I'm trying to be good now. Please. I want it out of my head. I want...w-want it to wash away..."
Asemu hurried, knelt by Kio's side and pulled him into his chest, murmuring compassionate nonsense while stroking his son's hair. He spared a moment to glare dangerously at the crowd, daring anyone to interfere.
Seric bowed his head in silent acceptance. Naotora was crying quietly, her eyes unable to break from Kio's tiny form. Wendy was crying herself, openly, while Wootbit stared at the broken form of his best friend for the longest time before haltingly stepping forward as if to join them. At Asemu's brief nod, he walked over, knelt down and brushed his hand along Kio's back.
"He forgave me, daddy," Kio whispered; in the silence of the hallway, it carried like a gunshot.
"What?" Asemu asked softly, tender and worried.
"Mister Zeheart." Kio said, hushed, hushed, like a secret. "I killed a whole bunch of his men...he thinks he's responsible for all of them, you know. If any of them die, it's his fault, his mistake. I think he knows them all by name. All the ones I killed, too." He took a deep, heaving breath. "I cried. He held me, like this. He said it was okay. He said he forgave me. Why did he forgive me, daddy? I t-treated it...like shooting fish in a barrel. None of it meant anything to me u-until Shanalua died. I was proud of it." He sobbed. "He forgave me. Why, daddy?"
"Oh Kio," Asemu whispered, kissing the top of his head. "He forgave you because he knew it wasn't your choice to make." He gently pulled back and tilted Kio's chin up so his son was looking at him. "You said it yourself...life is what he wants too. What all of them want. They understand."
Kio shivered and leaned against him for a long moment. Suddenly – all too rapidly to be normal, really – his sobs ceased and he nodded slowly. Wootbit squeezed his shoulder; after a second, Kio nodded thankfully, again, at him, and made to stand up. Asemu stood with him, keeping one hand on his back, worry etched somehow even more firmly across his face than ever before.
"People ask why the war has gone on this long." His voice was steady and even again. In less than a minute. It was eerie. "Said the war's gone on longer than reason. That's because reason has nothing to do with it. You know what's really funny? Decades ago, Anoia accused Zoi of fighting a war of retribution - as if that wasn't his own motivation! Zoi said that wasn't what this was about...when at this point it's ALL that this is about, with a handful of people in between struggling to do damage control." He snorted. "There are no saviours here. Not anywhere that matters, at least."
He tilted his head and pulled at his sleeve, still fully recomposing himself and glancing back towards Flit. Wootbit realized that the bandages on his wrists went all the way up to his elbows. He'd been wearing them for weeks, why?
"I don't even recognize you," Kio said, his voice suddenly flat, with devastating finality. "I wonder if the kind, loving grampa I knew even existed, or if he was just a thin mask over a void of hatred and obsession."
Flit's expression cracked into devastation. "Kio...you don't mean that..."
Asemu blinked and turned to look at his son with renewed alarm. "Kio, you shouldn't make these choices while you're upset-"
Kio waved his father off, gently pushing his hand aside, and went on as though he hadn't been interrupted. "I will not let you make me into a butcher, and I thank god that some people were there to save me from that. I'll fly the Gundam FX if I have to...but understand this – attempt to destroy Second Moon, and you will have to kill me first." His lip curled.
"But hey...whatever it takes. Right?"
His piece said, he turned on his heel and walked through the crowd, which parted in front of him like the red sea. He made eye contact with no one, his head raised and defiant.
**~Line Break~**
Kio had a pretty good lid on top of his sorrow, and his anger. Not his emotions in general – he was too honest, to sensitive, to suppress them or use a facade. However, when it was necessary he was very good at compartmentalizing his own needs. It was easy to do when there were other people who needed help – people who were hurting, people trapped in something they couldn't get themselves out of. He didn't quite provide serious thought to it but at some point it simply didn't matter what happened to him. He could push himself further than anyone else, and whatever happened to him, it was worth it. Because the others would be alright. Because things would get better.
He hadn't started out knowing very much. It was an accident that gave him the time, and the friends – family – he needed to gain the perspective he needed to make it through this war.
However, even his patience had limits.
He was so goddamned tired!
His head was still spinning from being in close contact with Renia/Girard Spriggan. The last time he had Run Wild, he hadn't been effectively psychically linked to someone else. It had taken him back there...the overwhelming pain, the lack of something in his chest, and in the end feeling himself slipping, fading...she had felt it too, he remembered her screaming, trying to pull away from him. Grimly he noted that if she had really thought about it, she would have known – perhaps even sensed – that she wasn't the only one who'd had a knife driven into her by this war. She shouldn't have come too close. Maybe he still could have talked her down somehow, until she had triggered that...then he knew what he needed to do...
Kio raised one hand over his head, imagined his fingertips soaked with red, the hot sticky liquid dripping down on him.
He hadn't wanted to kill her. He would rather she had found a way to absolution without wanton destruction and violence. But the loss of her fiance had torn something irreparably inside her...whatever happened to her now, he hoped that she found some peace...
He had emphasized in the hallway to get his point across...but Boss had taught him something important about killing in battle...and that was that, sometimes, there were people who didn't want to go back.
Like Decil Gallete.
It had been hard to learn. Devastating. If anyone other than Boss or Nii-san – if it hadn't been for both of them, really – had caused him to realize that, what would he have done with it? Would he have fallen apart...like Mister Ezelcant?
Kio shut his eyes. Tears dripped from them again, soft, heaving sobs leaving his lips. He was tired god damn it he was tired, it was like he had been walking on coals without sleep for years. And god in his heaven, Mister Ezelcant's plan scared the life out of him. Not just in the mechanics, (as if they weren't morbid enough), but where he must have gone to see this as the only option...
...And he could escape the frightening feeling that, at some point before his safety net, he would have accepted it, even agreed to it and gone along with it. Shouldn't people who are unwilling to be kind to one another be removed?
Why? Why had he gone into this mess of a conflict so damn naive?
Rage shot through him again, mixed with helpless grief, anger towards everyone in his life – against Flit for forcing this role on him, against his father for disappearing and letting him grieve for years, against his mother for never telling him about father's friendship with a Vagan which would have given him desperately needed perspective, against his aunt for defending his grandfather after the man vocally disowned his son and leading Kio to believe he was still a good man in the face of everything, against Zeheart for being so broken and willing to follow Ezelcant without knowing what the man really wanted, and most of all against himself for still being seemingly powerless to provide some sort of alternative to the ending that was staring them all in the face.
Kio punched the wall once, sending a sharp prickle through his muscles. Then he punched it again, again and again until his knuckles bruised and ached.
The anger melted. Not into sorrow, but into exhaustion. He just couldn't – couldn't keep this up by himself. Damn it, he thought he had been prepared. He was worn out, wrung out like an ancient dish cloth. He dropped his head against the pillow and closed his eyes, hoping he was to exhausted to dream.
**~Line Break~**
Kio wandered between sleep and wakefulness, never fully collapsing into one or the other. His dreams were chaotic and bloody, he could see Lu dying in one moment and the Earth turning to ash in another. Colonies erupting in nuclear fire. Sometimes he could sleep peacefully, but it was fewer and far in between right now.
At one point, he lay there half awake when he heard the door slide open. His X Rounder sense didn't perk up, so it wasn't Flit. Good. He had no intention of seeing him just yet. There was a moment's pause before the bed creaked and he felt a hand on his shoulder.
"Kio?" Asemu asked softly. "Are you awake?"
Kio didn't respond. Perhaps he should have expected it, expected his son to be tired and worn out. Indeed, for the first couple of days after he realized that Kio was certainly the pilot of the new Gundam he'd spent his time vacillating between sheer panic, sorrow for his son's loss of innocence, anger towards his father, and pride that Kio was managing to keep his head despite the incredible odds. The 'test' in the neutral zone had been just as much about trying to ascertain how well Kio was keeping together then about seeing if the Diva could finally end this war...Kio had seemed together then, if unsurprisingly lacking in strategy. However, something had changed significantly...
...Did it have something to do with the implosion at Rostolam?
Asemu sighed softly, wondering where to start. "Hey. Things got a little intense there... ...You've grown into such a wise, compassionate young man." Gently his fingers brushed against Kio's hair. "I...I'm so sorry I never got to see you grow." His voice was heavy. "I know that's pathetic given how long it's been, but...I am sorry. More than that, I'm sorry you've had to handle this by yourself."
Kio's eyes opened into slits. There were still visible tear tracks on his face. Gently Asemu reached up and brushed them away. "I'm so sorry I couldn't protect you from this, love."
"...Was it like this for you?" His son whispered. His voice was hoarse and cracked. "Grampa, grampa was always all about getting back at them. What did you think, going in?"
Asemu kept brushing his hair, pausing for a moment. "Well...I was hotheaded when I was younger." He smiled wryly. "However, what I remember was admiring my father. I wanted to impress him, emulate him...so I was involved with mobile suits long before I was eligible to enter. But...really, I got jaded even before the guns came out, though I can't say I handled it particularly gracefully at first."
He paused. "You said Zeheart watched you while you were a hostage at Second Moon. Did he...talk to you about anything personal?"
"...Yes." Kio closed his eyes. "...He said you were his closest friend. You know, I can...feel a lot, now, because my sixth sense...sometimes I get impressions on other people." He bit his lip. "I think he loved you. I think he still loves you."
For a second, Asemu couldn't breathe. He felt like he'd been hit in the stomach, winded.
"He doesn't ever say anything," Kio murmured, eyes half closed, "because the only things he's ever really wanted are in conflict with the people he swore he'd save. So he locks it up, tries not to think about it, constantly rationalizes it so its secondary to his cause. It's been hurting him for so long, he doesn't know how much damage he's done to himself. I think if he knew...knew what Mister Ezelcant had told us, he'd fall apart. That isn't what he'd want, but if he doesn't finish the mission, what will he say to the people who died under his command? He holds them all so close. Its like holding burning coals, but if he lets go, he's betrayed them."
Asemu shook his head. The corners of his eyes were burning. "Yeah. That sounds just like him." He let out a sad, fond yet frustrated sigh. "He was – is – my best friend. Even when he drove me mad. So much of who I am only exists because I knew him. He was a spy, when I was sixteen and a year from graduation, though I never knew that. He got close to me as a means to determine where the Gundam – my Gundam – was, at the time. But after that fell through...he stuck around. Took me a while to guess why after I found out where he came from." He smiled. "Those were some of the happiest times of my life, before you."
"Did you love him?" Kio asked. He didn't seem upset at all by the revelation; just honest, perhaps academic even, curiosity pervaded his voice.
Asemu chuckled weakly. "You know...I do. Maybe I always did, frankly I think I fell fast and hard and never moved past it. But back then, I had a very particular image in my head about who I was and what I needed to become – all based on father. It helped that he was never around. I didn't know what made him do what he did until much later in my career. I didn't know how to handle it. The...feelings I had to deal with when Zeheart told me who he was should have been a big hint, but then I was so mixed up with that and new feelings of betrayal that I couldn't make sense of it all until some time afterwards."
"Why'd you get together with mom?"
Asemu paused, wondering how best to frame this. "She was my friend, and she still is. She confessed, mother raised the idea of us getting married, and the whole time I wondered why I wasn't as happy as I should have been. It hit me in the middle of the night some time later. God, it seemed crazy, but there it was."
"...so caring about Lu isn't weird. Or wrong." Kio let out a small, relieved noise.
"Of course not." Asemu reassured him. He'd had a suspicion when the girl Kio had befriended came up multiple times – both on the journey back to the Lunar Base and during his rant – and this just confirmed it. "You got that from me."
Kio gave him a weak smile. "So mom and I wasn't a mistake?"
"Never," Asemu said firmly, leaning over and kissing his son's forehead. "I've loved you ever since I laid eyes on you. Nothing can change that." He hesitated. "You said she's dying?"
Kio's eyes grew remote again. "Yeah. From the Mars Rays."
"I'm sorry." It was still inadequate. But somebody should say it. Briefly he wondered how Zeheart had never gotten sick. Or if he was sick. Quickly he pushed the thoughts away.
"I asked her why she became a pilot. She said that, in the beginning, she just wanted someone to notice when she died. She had no one else."
Asemu let out a long sigh.
"Dad? What are we going to do about the EX-DB?"
He squeezed the boy's shoulder. "I'm working on it. Don't worry right now. Just focus on getting some rest."
Kio nodded and closed his eyes again. Asemu stayed with him for several minutes before leaving. He didn't notice how Kio's posture relaxed, like someone who had been given a potential out from a scenario that scared them.
**~Line Break~**
"They're going to start wondering how you knew all of that." A familiar voice said. It broke the silence when he woke several hours later. Kio started and sat up. "Are you sure you couldn't just tell your father?"
"How can I hear you from here?" Kio asked in turn, worry seeping into his voice. What was he doing all the way over here? "This...this isn't a good place for you to be seen. I couldn't explain it."
"I know." The other voice said, soft and willowy. "I'm under the invisible umbrella. Since I don't plan on shooting anything, there's really no downside to it."
"I still can't believe you're here," Kio said, standing up. "How did you even-?"
He could almost hear the half smile in the other's voice. "I was plugged into an ever-evolving machine for decades, remember? There are some things only I can do." A pause. "Everyone here misses you."
Kio closed his eyes. "I miss them too. I'd give anything to have Aniki and Nii-san here with me. I know I can do it alone, theoretically...but I'm just..." The sheer drain his rant and decision had provided seemed to sink in all at once, causing him to wince as a shiver went through his body. The muscle that controlled his X Rounder skill was tense. "I don't want to..."
"...Then ask us."
"What? No! I couldn't...you just ended a war that lasted years. You deserve to enjoy that peace and happiness. I don't want to interrupt that just to drag you into my problems."
"...You mean like you did, over and over, for us?"
Kio stalled for a couple of seconds, turning the words over in his head. Then he giggled, pressing one hand against his forehead. "I walked right into that one."
The other chuckled softly. "Yeah, you did."
"Alright." Kio tapped his foot against the ground. "Can you take me back to your world? With time dilatation, just to be sure. It's...about the medical nanotech."
"I can do that." The other said matter of factly. "As a matter of fact, I could take two. You could convince Lu to come with you, couldn't you?"
Kio smiled, his heart threatening to burst. It might work. It might work. It would probably work. "Y-Yeah, I think so. Figuring out how I'm gonna get out of here is the catch."
"Don't worry. I'll help."
Kio stepped out of his room. Immediately, all the lights went out, including the emergency ones. A surgical strike only a virus could pull off...supposedly. Kio didn't need his eyes. He merely reached out with his X Rounder sense again. The mechanics of the station – energy lines, power sources, the mobile suits – became perfectly visible behind his closed eyelids.
Doors locked everywhere – particularly across the quarters of the top brass. Communication systems were completely dark. No doubt this was taking a good chunk of his friend's concentration, so he better not dawdle. He had to get to the Gundam FX and prepare for time, again.
"Thanks, Romy."
Behind his eyelids, the green image of Romy Ezelcant's scarred face tilted his head and smiled in response.
End Prologue
That's a nice surprise to end the first chapter off with, isn't it?
As a quick note - yes, I dumped the responsibility for the city attack from episode 30 on Xanald because I don't think city strafing is consistent with Zeheart's established character (ie, that he's kind at heart), because he doesn't go completely nuts until Ezelcant reveals his crazy plan to him. Plus continuing to show a softer side to Vagan instead of largely apathy or malice outside him is a good sign. Plus Xaland is a one-note douche who would definitely order it and serves no purpose other than being diet-Decil. And we only needed one Decil.
Read and Review please!