Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing
A/N: Happy Halloween!
I started this story off of a dialogue prompt I was privy to, and as I worked on it, I gladly turned for support to a person who knows the supernatural far better than I: Stormy Monday, my beloved beta. I really want to say thank you for helping me work out what I could and fill in the blanks where I couldn't. You're awesome.
For the readers: Enjoy!
The hair on the back of Duo's neck stood on end as he and Relena descended the narrow stairwell that led to the interior of the long abandoned structure. There were many rumors as to its purpose, but concrete evidence remained elusive. Whatever the reason for its existence Duo didn't care, he just knew this was one of the last places he wanted to be. His rational mind told him there was nothing to worry about, but he couldn't help remember what Father Maxwell and Sister Helen had taught him and the other kids who lived at the orphanage about demons; that while wars raged and peace treaties were brokered in the world of humans, Legion never rested.
Still, duty had called them here when a terrorist nearly succeeded in taking down the electrical grid. So, he took a deep breath and focused on the task at hand.
He couldn't help but hesitate, though, when he heard three metallic knocks further down, explaining it away as the distant clanking of pipes expanding and echoing through the tunnel. He pushed forward, rubbing his hands up and down his arm to smooth out the goosebumps, hoping his companion wouldn't take notice.
The creepiness was all in his head, he reminded himself.
"It's this way," he mumbled, opening a door to a new corridor.
"Quite the labyrinth, isn't it?" Relena commented.
"Yeah, well. Some abandoned secret base of some kind. 'Men of Notes'? 'Men of Documents'? 'Men of the Alphabet'? I don't know. Some such thing. Looks like it was a bomb shelter before that, but they have quite the living and working space. We each have something to enjoy. I love the kitchen. Trowa and Quatre like it for the library. Heero must like it for the ambiance." The last phrase came out with a tinge of amused sarcasm.
Relena's step faltered as they turned a corner. Something writhed across the wall, deep in the darkness, but it moved too quickly for her to make out its form. All she could be sure of was its enormous size. "May want to call in an exterminator," she commented, trying to shake off the overwhelming sense of dread that grew with the words.
"Yeah, we might want to take a look at the temp control, too," he droned, not really paying too much mind to the conversation. "Air circulation's bad. It keeps getting cold." He shivered, but kept moving.
The blonde offered him a passive smile as he moved in front of her with his flashlight. "Lucky about finding that emergency kit near the entrance," she said. "It's like they planned for a massive power outage."
He let out a soft chuckle. "Well, that's the way of secret bases, isn't it? Be prepared for anything?"
"You boys do like your covert sites." The comment dissolved quickly into the increasingly heavy air as she felt a tug on her hair, but when she spun on her heel, fully expecting someone to be standing behind her there was no one. She shined her lamplight into the darkness, searching earnestly but still finding nothing. She thought, perhaps, she'd been standing too close to the wall and caught it on a tiny crack or protrusion that had slipped her notice.
"Can you blame us? Besides. I'm no boy. I'm eighteen-I think." The last two words fell out in a mumble as Duo turned his face from her.
Relena smiled. For a moment she felt light headed, and her vision began to blur. There was a strange sensation, like the voices of a thousand whispers filling her mind, slipping in past her ringing ears, and her thoughts were lost in the confusion.
"Hey."
Duo's voice broke the trance as suddenly as it had started. She could see and hear him clearly, though she felt like the last few minutes had been wiped from her memory.
He turned and pressed some translucent buttons on a keypad in front of him, gesturing toward the door as the device lit up green. "He's in here."
It was the aforementioned library. A fairly large library, in fact. The orange tint of the dim lighting, and a torch in the distance implied that the room was running on the minimal backup generator. The flashlight she saw in the distance reflected off of the excessively polished wooden table. Relena stepped into the room, taking the lead toward the covert associate she'd come to meet.
"We need your help," she said as she approached.
"Hn." There was a distinctly unmoved air about the man whenever she'd seek him out. He always seemed to know she was coming and he always seemed to know why. "The outage originated in the Watercourse sector of town. I've already dispatched Wufei and Po to investigate. If my calculations are correct-"
The radio beside him lit with noise. "Red One, this is Preventer Water. Over?"
Heero raised his head slightly and shot the radio a lazy glance.
Duo rolled his eyes and pressed the button on the side of the antiquated tech. "Go for Red One."
"We've apprehended Johnson. He was prepping to get out of Dodge, but it looks like we got here before he could make a break for it. You were right about the virus, too. This appears to be the point of origin, but I'm not sure how to reverse it."
Heero reached for the comm, patching through an answer. "I'll send Duo your way ASAP. Link that computer to the network and I'll work from here to reverse the process. We've got to get the city back on the grid or Central's power supply will go into meltdown. It will destroy dozens of city blocks."
He released the button without bothering to so much as glance up at Duo's dramatic salute. "The reason they built their city so close to the Central system eludes me. It's a foolish risk," he mumbled to himself.
As Duo reached for the door, three loud beats were heard in the dark aisles at the group's backs. He spun on his heel, looking more than a little frazzled. Relena could swear she heard Heero sigh in frustration when the pilots' eyes met.
"Three," Duo whispered.
"I've told you before," Heero said in a tone that may well be as irritated as it sounded. "There are no such thing as spirits or demons. You're imagining it."
"Three, though, Heero. They're mocking the Trinity."
"You're superstitious. I would have hoped that you'd be past all this by now."
"But Heero-"
"Leave." There was a particularly sharp bite to Heero's final word. Duo glanced, worriedly, at Relena, but he turned and left.
In the silence of Duo's absence, Relena became acutely aware of two things. One, the shadows seemed to move around her, as if they had a life of their own. She could ignore that, she assured herself. Two, that Heero really did have a more brusque presence than she remembered. Perhaps it was more the adventure he represented that kept her coming back into alliances with him. Maybe she was more in love with the thrill of the chase than-
Relena's thoughts scattered into a blush and she moved away from him.
She turned her attention to a pair of old wooden boxes, certain she had seen them move of their own free will. Each was decorated with a pentagram and sealed with a bronze nameplate, but the light was too dim to read. Relena ran her thumb over the lettering of one, trying to ignore the layered whispers that once again began to creep back up into her consciousness. As she lifted back the lid her ears began to take on a heavy, low hum, and her head filled with inexplicable pressure.
Discounting the headache, she rifled through what appeared to be long forgotten personal effects. Pushing past an old pistol, she took in her left hand an aged, decorative talisman, apparently carved out of bone. With the other hand, she continued to file through the paper memories.
The politician tried to imagine the emotion tied to each worn photograph, as though her validation would appease-or at least in some way comfort-the dead. A vast lack of sentiment suddenly overtook her, though, causing her to only feel foolish for the effort.
Her senses were overcome by a strange scent creeping up on her. It was like a complex mixture of smells leaking in. There seemed to be the rich aroma of beef on the grill, and the tender juices of fat searing, but also a sweetness intermixed with it, and a sickening twist of too much iron, as though the beast had not been bled before frying. Underlying the odors was the distinct scent of sulfur, like someone had used it to fuel the flames to cook the mysterious body.
"Is someone else down here?" She asked Heero with a sense of surprise.
He shot her a scolding glare.
"You don't smell something cooking?"
He ground his teeth, looking more annoyed than anything, and went back to his work.
Relena had the passing thought that she, too, must be hallucinating. She returned her attention to her distractions.
The blonde sighed to herself, overlooking the abrupt and dramatic drop in temperature as well as the rapid clacking of computer keys behind her as she began to explore the fading, long forgotten notes. Handwritten scribble worn by years tested her vision still more in the cold, orange hue of mechanical lighting.
She shivered.
A faded floral card seemed to call to her in the quiet, crying out to be touched. The tone in her right ear slowly increased in pitch and volume, but aside from a slow wince, she ignored it. Relena lifted the firm paper delicately in her fingers, carefully pulling it open at the crease.
The words were as faded and jumbled as the noisy thoughts in her mind.
The thoughts grew louder, like voices from another world calling out over each other and echoing in her mind.
The letters melted into place before her. Two words repeated over and over.
The voices were screaming as the sound in her ear blared like a shriek.
Kill him. Kill him. Kill him. Kill him.
Relena blinked away the tears that had filled her right eye in response to the pain of the intense screeching.
The words drifted out of focus, again, along with the voices. When the ink's visibility was restored, there were only two words taking up the card. The message was loud and clear, and as real as any command she'd ever been given.
KILL HIM.
Relena watched her body move, trancelike, toward the revolver, taking it up in a trembling hand as she clung tighter to the bone carving with the other. She turned to face her old comrade, extending the barrel warily at the back of his head.
Kill him, the voices began to chant in unison, finally coherent. Kill him.
Still more tears ran down her face, though her soul felt nothing. The ringing was unbearable.
KILL HIM!
While Relena remained at the mercy of the dark energy that had taken control of her, the room hummed to life as the lights came on in clusters.
"Hn." Heero nodded slightly.
"Got power, down here," Duo's voice called out from the wireless. "Honestly, buddy, it was too easy. A joke!"
Heero came to his feet, pushing back the chair and turned to face his companion. "Relena."
The blonde stood statuesque, unable to respond as the commotion faded from her thoughts.
"Relena?"
The vision finally shattered when his hand closed over her shoulder. Relena was still facing away, staring, unfocused, at the old card. Her cheeks were streaked with tears as she gaped up at him.
Heero frowned, slowly raising his hand past her cheekbone. "You're bleeding." He carefully touched her tragus, and drew back his arm showing a fresh, crimson drop on his finger.
She blinked in surprise, replacing the note and necklace and closing the box. As the disembodied noise stopped, the room felt of an otherworldly silence.
"We'll get you a doctor," he said in a deadpan tone as he turned and moved away.
Relena came to herself, feeling as though a terrible nightmare had slipped away with the morning light. A burning on her left arm convinced her to pull back her sleeve. Three distinct scratches oozed with blood. The woman felt sick.
"Relena?"
She covered her arm, quickly before his eyes fell on her, again. She'd seen how Heero responded to Duo's suspicions. Clearly, it would be pointless to convince him that what had just taken place was much more than a simple case of pareidolia.