By The Roadway…

Mid-may... New stuff WILL be added to this...

(((I have posted (and by now finished Act 1 of) the Gundam Wing / Cowboy Bebop crossover Sequel to By The Roadway! The Night Grinned Viciously Back

There's a whole intro that explains the title... Never mind that it's out of order ITS MORE ACTION, and Vicious action at that! SO go read it or I'll cry! LoL)))

Originally CH1, due to popularity former CH7 has been moved in front of this... AND THEN KICKED OUT! because it really goes before ch1 of TPoYI so yay! THIS is chapter one again! And so it begins….Trieze Khushrenada, the infamous and mysterious leader too wrapped up in honor to defend his good heart secretly imprisoned to be used by Dermail to gain world domination, he has broken free and is ready to fight back, along with the Gundam Pilots, to fulfill his father's vow to King Peacecraft & bring an end to Earth's war addiction in this dramatic action packed epic rewriting of the hit series Gundam Wing. May the waltz never end…!

Note, if you get to a part...and however interesting, it starts feeling tedious Just Wait... There's a lot of explaining I gotta do before you can see the beauty of the conflicts I try staging... and then I'm just gonna try and put as much action into the plot as I can... Also I'm officially thinking that both Noin and Zechs are probably closer to 20-22 then a solid 19 years old in this AU – just works out better...


"…with a fancy gun that has long lost the meaning of battle; I would feel no emotion, even if I were to shoot an enemy through the heart…" ~I Want To Be a Loser – Trieze Khushrenada.

...Set up for a New Future!...

The car engine hummed steadily along the road as Relena Peacecraft gazed out the window lost in her own thoughts. The Romefeller meeting had gone smoothly, yet terribly. They hadn't listened to a single word she had had to say and practically teased her position as merely ceremonial.

'Father, please if there's anything you could do to help me, I would appreciate it immensely. I just don't know what to do with them!' She sighed, and briefly doubted the dead could do anything.

They passed something and it was a second before Relena shrieked for Pagan to stop the car. He did so at once.

"What's the matter Miss…"

Relena had already jumped out of the car and was running back along the road. A body was laying face down as if the person had collapsed just as he had reached the edge of the pavement.

Her heart was pounding even though he had promised not to leave the Kingdom with out telling her first: crazily she almost knew it to be her personal savior, Heero Yuy. Pagan almost got out following but instead he put the car in reverse, carefully parked it near by and took his Remington pistol with him.

It was not Heero; the man was stripped to the waist and was covered in a mix of dried blood and caked earth. Even with this covering you could make out the long lacerations crisscrossing his back and other gashes on his arms and sides. His hair was also dirty and unruly but closer to a ginger or even dark blond then the dark moss brown of the younger pilot.

Relena hesitated briefly, disturbed by the stillness of the form in front of her. A chill ran up her back and made her shudder. If it was the thought, that the man might be dead or if it was the resemblance to her first encounter with Heero Yuy on the beach those months ago, she didn't know. Pagan came up beside her as she reached out and gently touched the man's shoulder. It was still warm, and he was probably even still alive.

"It would be impossible to get a medical team out here, even our stopping now may not be a very good idea Miss Relena." Relena repositioned and turned the man over to find herself staring into the face of the one person she had least expected to find. Instinctually she understood what had happened.

"We must get him in the car, right now. Help me Pagan." She looked pleadingly up at her personal assistant's face.

After a brief hesitation Pagan helped her lift the man into the backseat of the Pink limo. He gave up his own suit jacket to put around the man's shoulders as a makeshift blanket. By then he too had realized who it was and looked at Relena very seriously.

"I think we may have underestimated the dementia that Romefeller is suffering from." Relena slid into the back seat and gingerly supported Trieze Khushrenada's head in her lap.

"Let's just hope they have underestimated what they've thrown away." Trieze stirred then convulsed with a cough before his muscles relaxed. Lying on his back he was now breathing more easily and visibly.


A day before Relena in the car… Follow the light!

A searing pain caused whatever thread holding Trieze Khushrenada in a state of pleasant unconsciousness to snap, dropping him back into his aching body and a vicious pain in his lower hip. He twisted violently even before he recognized the feeling of tiny claws and probing teeth. A few just didn't seem to want to give up though and clung at his bare skin and what was left of his pants.

He didn't know if he had cried out, but just as he had managed to dislodge the last two, light flooded the world around him. He was completely blinded. Shadows, people, hoisted him up and he heard a distinct metallic click of shackles behind him. His arms fell limply to his sides.

Another shadow was in front of him now and spoke. Trieze understood none of it. His own lips moved and he spoke his own tongue at the man in return. The man might have sneered and chuckled. It was an old phrase that he had heard once when his family had gone to visit his father's family in Eastern Europe. It translated to: If only your blood could be mine to kill you with. In his drained state it seemed a fitting curse.

There was laughter, the men dropped him and turned to leave, the light still flooding the room. Trieze had no say in what happened next for his mind simply recoiled as his entire body screamed with pain. He threw himself forward with both arms extended to the sides and knocked all three men in front of him off of their feet. He didn't stop to kill them or take their guns; he wouldn't know what to do with a gun if he did have it right then.

Trieze ran and followed a fresh wind he almost thought he could feel pulling him on ward. There were shouts; shots ricocheted off the walls and floor but his feet moved forward with each pound of the heart in his chest. He lunged and rolled before slamming a man full force into the wall next to a door. The card panel was smashed by a careless shot from the guards. Due to lack of funds for such a secretive location, the door slid smoothly open in response to the damage.

Trieze stumbled out into broad daylight. There were more noises, people, shooting, but he still managed to hit a chain link fence. His head was roaring like a rushing river as he scrambled up the chain like fence and then heaved his body up and over. The wiring caught what remained of his shirt and tore it off as he tumbled over; briefly he caught the links on the other side of the fence with the other arm. The gouges left on his torso seemed like nothing then.

As soon as he felt ground he threw him self away from the fence. The rushing river had not been a figment of his mind, and the water enveloped him completely and swept him down stream. He felt himself being propelled past jutting rocks under the surface grazing his skin. He fought away from that place; kicking off what ever he could until he felt the earth bank on the other side.

Trieze Khushrenada ran with blood pounding through his vision.


Recovery part 1

Sally Po stood a second and sighed just after she had finished shooing everyone out of the medical lab. She picked up the sponge and began to gently wash the caked earth and blood off of Trieze's torso. She hadn't expected anywhere near as much damage as she found underneath. Most of it was already infected and had dirt ground in. It looked almost as though a large cat had decided to use him for a scratching post, but as she cleaned the individual wounds she found that a few, especially on his sides, were in fact burns.

'Looks like somebody definitely pissed off the wrong people.'

Sally couldn't help but blush slightly remembering several gossiping conversations about Trieze as she turned professionally to remove the remains of his pants. Sally found a laceration on his right lower hip that looked like something had taken a few bites out of him.

All of this didn't set well with Sally, not just because of the fact that there was no doubt that these wounds had been intentionally inflicted on a human being, but the man lying immobile on the table in front of her only a month or more ago had been the devil himself as far as she was concerned.

Apparently something bigger lurked in the darkness and the future waiting the supporters of the 'Trieze' Faction or pacifism could only be worse. She pulled out stitching materials and started assessing which wounds could be stitched closed, and which might need more attention.


Recovery part 2

He had always liked roses, so when the scent crept in through his senses, he followed it back out into a medium sized room with a pale décor. It was not as nice as the comforting nothingness that he had come from. He was attached to an aching weight he slowly came to recognize as his own body, but there were roses near by and that almost made it better.

For a moment he had an urgent craving to know where he was, what had happened, how many had died while he had been away. Even as the weight of his former responsibilities tried to take their usual places, his mind gave way beneath and he was left emptily staring after what had been himself tumbling slowly away. He stifled a low moan and tired to force himself back into that nothingness.

There was a shifting near by. He opened his eyes and let his head drop to the side. A man much younger then him sat with a gun leveled at him. This was a surprisingly comforting thought to him; his lips twitched ever so slightly towards a smile. He drifted back to sleep.

"Anything yet?" Sally Po walked in and busied herself with the medical supplies.

"He moved." Sally wasn't looking at Heero and silently laughed to herself at his little-as-possible manner.

"Did he regain consciousness?" Sally came over and looked Trieze over carefully.

"Yeah, then went out again."

"Well it's good he's finally coming around." She looked at the gun in his hand. "You are trying NOT to use that right?" a blank stare was all that replied.

Sally sighed.

"Whatever suits you Heero." Sally knew the boy wouldn't act against Relena's wishes, and probably knew the importance of finding out what Colonel Khushrenada knew.


Recovery Part 3

Around 3:40 am Sally was awoken to the sound of the monitor going off. She found the room where they had put Trieze empty. 'At least he's not dead.' She thought as she walked over to the open glass door and found her patient.

Trieze was sitting half cross-legged between two of the large stone pillars that were part of the balcony railing. His entire torso was wrapped in bandages that were already turning red with fresh blood. She had changed them just that evening. Sally couldn't help but look back to judge the distance between his current position and the bed (she had been a doctor for too long) it was an impressive distance considering his condition.

"Sorry to wake you, Major Po." Sally almost jumped half at the sound of his smooth deep voice and half at what it had said, but she relaxed.

"I'm surprised you would call me a Major, Colonel Trieze." As Trieze gazed up towards space he replied.

"A rank is something you earn. It describes your capabilities as a commander to make the right decisions. It's not a matter of who is in control." He paused briefly – you could hear the wind stirring the roses below. "If I remember correctly, you are a good commander. You backed down from General Septum's orders to use unethical methods to destroy a rather small rebellion in space. It's why you transferred to the earth Medical teams if I'm not mistaken." Sally blinked and rubbed a bit more of the sleep out of her eyes.

"You remember that?" She was in a bit of disbelief and still waking up, though somehow it seemed to explain a lot at once about this man she'd never met before.

"I remember everything. Well… except how I got here." Sally moved up beside him and leaned against the balcony.

"What do you last remember?" There was a long silence; his answer came as no more then a light raspy breath on the wind.

"Hell."

Sally just stared at him. It struck her as odd for the man who took over the world to seem like so much of a child, but then again soldiers these days were never very old. She knelt down next to him.

"Princess Relena found you lying next to the road and brought you back with her." Sally couldn't help but smirk a bit. "You're lucky there's no one around to say she can't keep a mutt as mangy as you, especially with as much trouble as it is likely to bring."

"Relena Peacecraft… I owe her my life it seems, I will have to thank her as soon as I can." After a pause that made it apparent Trieze didn't have any more to say, Sally spoke once more.

"You should go back to bed." She could have been fooling herself but she almost saw him flinch.

"I've slept too much already." His voice was stronger. The moon moved out from a cloud and she finally could read the pained look on his face.

"Don't make me make this an order, Colonel. Didn't you just say something about my abilities to make the right decisions?" The manner in which she said it caused Trieze to let out a short pained laugh.

"Fine, so be it..." Trieze started moving to get up and Sally immediately took over.

"Sleep." She said after she'd rewrapped his bandages and got him settled into the bed again. She injected a small dose of pain killer into his arm. As she was walking away she heard Trieze mutter something behind her.


Back in 195…. Recovery 4

There were few complaints from Sally's new patient from that point on. He continued to sleep and was beginning to be able to take down food. Heero lurked around the recovery wing like a ghost, Quatre and Noin debated if it was more to catch any spies or to make sure Trieze didn't escape.

Relena's peace talks were going well with every national leader, except the Romefeller foundation. With her next appointment looming she felt it was time to talk to the only person who might have an answer for her.

Relena left her office and headed to her personal rooms. Her maid was just polishing the silver frame of the full-length mirror when she arrived.

"Ms. Cassie I need to meet with an important person, is my ambassadorial uniform ready?"

The woman curtsied as she replied with a simple "No, my lady." Relena thought for a moment.

"The blue dress my mother made then." Ms. Cassie laid the dress out and excused herself from the room with another curtsy.


Relena took a deep breath before she opened the door. Trieze was sitting up in bed reading a book. Sally and Noin had refused to allow him a computer that connected to the network. They felt it was too dangerous a chance that he might attempt to contact his followers to obtain reports, inadvertently alerting Romefeller to his location.

"Miss Relena, I was hoping to have a chance to extend, to you personally, my gratitude for saving my life."

"It was the least I could do for you… even though I was nearly killed by Lt. Colonel Une twice, wearing this very dress in fact." Relena crossed the room and sat lightly on the edge of Trieze's bed. "Admittedly the last occasion was due to my own bold actions, but you cannot deny that the other two attempts were the doing of your own orders. Did you give up? Or was it really something else? Noin claimed that you had sent her personally, but I really can't see why."

Trieze closed the book and set it on the nightstand. He didn't need bookmarks or cornered pages to remember his place.

"I know she has told you about Milliardo. Do I seem so honor-less for an old friendship to not be enough? Unfortunately your brother has never been able to trust anyone to know where you went after the down fall of your family. It took a while before Noin was finally able to get him to confess and pass the information on to me. Just in time too – it is a lovely dress."

Relena blushed unexpectedly at the complement, she remembered Trieze flirting with the other noble women at the Romefeller dinner party she'd attended and suddenly could sympathize with how taken they were with this man. He was lying beaten in bed covered in bandages and still had a power over another using such simple words.

"It's not very fitting for a high commander to betray his own army."

"Would your death really have done any good for MY army?"

Relena dropped her head and closed her eyes. She had started off more offensive then she really felt towards the man right now.

"I thought Oz was your army. Now I can see that I was wrong to think you were the ultimate villain pupating this worldwide massacre. You have a following quite dedicated to fighting for your ideals, but your still almost as helpless as I am in trying to change the times now, whatever your powers were before." Trieze frowned at this.

"Princess… Please do not tell me you consider yourself helpless. That would be a terrible thing right now." Relena stared into his pleading blue eyes at a loss for what to say.

Trieze reached out haltingly and took a light hold of Relena's nearest hand.

"I remember how proud Milliardo was to have a sister to look after when you were born. He was convinced that you were much more then just a little girl. When you stood up on stage after my…well, pompous speech… and spoke so surly and boldly, I was convinced he had a true premonition of the times to come; you are anything but helpless right now. You just have to realize that your ways of acting differently are exactly why you have all the power in the world right now."

"It certainly doesn't seem that way with how many people continue to die in this pointless conflict you started. Romefeller continues to laugh at my urgings. No matter how much I convince national leaders to embrace Pacifism, they refuse to organize and speak out against the foundation. It's said it would be crippling to the world economy to halt military productions. Yet it's crippling that so many are starving because they have been cut off from vital resources!" Trieze's hand tightened around Relena's.

"It is not pointless what men are dying for right now. It's very important for humanity fight, for people to stand up and die for what they believe in. How else is one supposed to know what is worth living for? I do regret Marshal Noventa's death as well as Minister Dorlain… They were indeed men of peace that might have been able to lead mankind into an era of stability. It's even more important now for this battle to continue till it is finished, till humanity can finally see itself for what it is and move on towards even higher goals."

"Are you sure that's really what this is all about?" Relena snatched her hand back and stood up giving Trieze an incredulous look. "Maybe it works out so neatly in YOUR mind, but I doubt anyone else sees it that way! Besides, LOOK at you! Your own side imprisoned and tortured you! How can you be so sure that all this blood-shed will come to a good end?"

"…Because Relena Peacecraft would never stand for the world to come to a bad end. We all have our own parts to play."

Relena was at a loss for words again, she sighed and sat. "I have another meeting with the Foundation in a week and a half, their Board of Directors invited me to meet with them and hear about my country's philosophies… what would you tell me I should do?"

"Cancel it."

"What?"

"You should not trust them. The Board of Directors has a difficult time returning results to maintain support for their decisions. If they have not quelled the pilot rebellion yet they will be hard pressed to have something to show for all the money nobles are investing in them. I doubt they will act with any semblance of honor towards their biggest threat & competitor for power."

Relena stood once more; she had enough to think about.

"It's not an option for the Sank Kingdom to throw away its one chance to try and get through to the very people insisting on destroying this world. I'm not going to hide and wait for them to invade my country." Relena headed out the door.

"You may not have to wait long…" Trieze was unsure if she heard his last words.


Back on your feet: Fall of 195…

Trieze was deeply disturbed by Relena's unwillingness to heed his warning. It was more then a week from now but he couldn't relax to fall asleep even with the drugs Sally had carefully been administering to him. Not being able to check on the remote servers he had gathering worldwide intelligence didn't help either.

Remembering the dark haired boy that had greeted him on his first awakening, a Gundam pilot if he wasn't mistaken, Trieze had an idea of whom he should bring his concerns to.

He rolled over and carefully reached out for the plug to the monitoring machines and tugged it out of its socket, the mistake he had overlooked the last time. He made quick work of disengaging the different attachments to himself, this wasn't the first nurse he'd snuck out on, and gently eased himself down onto his feet.

After a few unsteady steps he promptly fell and barely missed upending a cart full of medical equipment. Walking clearly wasn't going to work. Luckily there were a few wheelchairs folded up and tucked into a corner, so he propped one open, sat himself down and got moving down the hall.

He had hoped that his childhood running the halls of the Peacecraft home would mean the building would become familiar, but of course it had been burnt to the ground and the new structure didn't share its floor plan. None the less, he passed a doorway and recognized one of the boys inside by the piano to be the same dark-haired pilot from before.

Trieze set the breaks on the chair just past the doorway, hoping they hadn't spotted him, and hauled himself onto his feet again. Using the wall for support he walked quietly as he could through the doorway and leaned his back against the wall inside the room trying to dawn a casual pose to hide the fact his legs were barely able to hold him up.

"Well maybe we could bring him back… ya know? As an offering of peace and all? Hey look what we found, mind not destroying our country?"

Duo lying on the floor, was obviously reaching the limit of serious conversion he could handle. Quatre sighed.

"Giving Romefeller what it wants isn't about to change its mind about everything else its trying to accomplish, Duo. If anything we need to start making moves to secure and protect more allies like the Trieze Faction from their bulling tactics." Heero was staring out across the lush gardens while Quatre was lightly playing a tune on the piano.

He was the only one actually facing the doorway but too wrapped up in watching his own hands to see Trieze calmly leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. They were all surprised (if Heero is ever surprised) by the new voice in the room.

"Allowing your Princess to walk right into a trap certainly would not be protecting your allies." Duo shot up straight, Heero turned and Quatre stopped and looked up from his playing.

"Trieze!" Duo and Quatre chimed in unison.

"What trap?" Heero sensibly asked.

"It is suspicious that not a single country has been willing to openly support the Pacifistic ideals of the Sank Kingdom and yet the Romefeller Board of Directors would invite Relena to meet with them? They are not ones to yield unless they are forced to. I do not believe that could possibly be what is at work."

"Aren't you supposed to be in bed?" Duo really wasn't up for any more deep tactical analysis of the world crisis. Quatre had a better question.

"How could they move openly against Relena? She has so much support even if no one is willing to openly voice it, surely such a move would jeopardize their position rather then strengthen it?"

Trieze smirked and opened his arms to gesture to his own state, clad in white linen pants and torso wrapped in bandages.

"Is there not an active force fighting in my name? It was not hard for them to make me disappear from my exile despite a great deal of public attention and even a trained guard that was loyal to me. Relena said herself that the fighting has been cutting people off from vital resources and it is easy for crimes to go overlooked when people are more concerned with their own stomach. I am sure they have a plan to turn it to their complete advantage."

Heero Yuy took a few steps towards Trieze.

"And how do we know that letting you escape wasn't a part of that plan? I have my suspicions too, but, if Relena feels that the best course to promote pacifism is to meet with their Board of Directors, I would wonder how much they have to gain if she were to refuse."

Trieze bowed his head. Heero was an excellent soldier indeed. There was no doubt that he was the same pilot that had detonated his Gundam in Siberia. The same one Zechs / Milliardo, Trieze's life long friend, had betrayed his orders for a chance to duel in Antarctica.

"Maybe you are right… but I would hardly be showing my gratitude not to voice my concerns to you directly, Heero Yuy." Trieze raised his head again and locked eyes with the boy. The two other pilots in the room were hesitant to take any action to break the silence.

It was strange the memories that came to Trieze's mind were of the experimental training run he had taken with the Z-PLCs. These boys who had fought almost longer then any others in this conflict had grown up as experimental soldiers to lead the revolution. Every day living with that intense uncertainty of where you're self ended and your mission and machine begins. The toll it had taken was epitomized in those colorless grey eyes staring back at him.

What had he, Trieze Khushrenada, been doing lounging behind a desk playing parlor games with the demons that were laying the earth sphere to waste?

"YOU'RE EXCELLENCY!" Sally Po burst into the room with a furious look on her face. "Didn't we already have this conversation? I thought I was clear you weren't to leave the medical wing." She crossed her arms over her chest.

Trieze gave a sheepish smile to the boys and shrugged. The motion promptly overbalanced him and Sally caught him before he hit the ground.

"Whoops." He gave his rescuer the most charming smile he could manage, and was pleased to notice the spread of a red blush across the base of her throat before Sally had him into the chair again and was wheeling him back to his room.