Sometimes Time Doesn't Matter
Chapter One
Heero listened to the steady seconds being spun as his fingers spilled page after page onto the screen before him. It was almost due date for the annual Colbridge Report, and Heaven forbid anyone but him wrote the damn thing. The Colbridge Report was a document every business had to submit to the E.S.U.N. Chamber of Commerce each year, in order to remain on the List. And, of course, remaining on the List was imperative to getting worldwide business. It was named after the humanitarian Emmanuel Colbridge, who had lectured on the benefits of World Assistance and how everyone should help everyone else live a better life. While most had considered him childish and naive, certain departments of the government had agreed with him strongly, and the Colbridge Report -- an oh-so-important paper documenting what any particular institution had done for the good of the general public -- was submitted every year without fail.
And Heero? Working on Preventer's top management was fun, he would certainly admit. Unfortunately, when the Report had first been issued, he and all his compatriots had fought amongst themselves so to NOT write the report. When said compatriots found out Heero'd once had the chance to kill Emmanuel Colbridge, the Report became his responsibility. For what they deemed "obvious reasons."
And obvious they were, though that didn't help the fact that he had to write the damn thing.
But Heero always put 125 into everything, and he wouldn't kill his track record just because he thought the Report was a piece of loaded bull. He'd write it, and he'd write it well, because the off chance of someone reading it was still not a negative number.
So he sat, and he wrote, attempting to make the pseudo-military organization that was Preventer sound like merely an armed Peace Corps. If he were lucky, no one would remember what the Peace Corps had been, anyway.
But the report was a pain in the ass, and generally took him several hours to write, so once a year, always the same day, Heero Yuy was at Preventer Headquarters well past midnight.
And so it was that Heero was the only soul residing in the big, concrete building at two forty-three a.m., December 27th, After Colony 223, when time itself broke down and admitted defeat to the ingenuity that was the human mind. Or, from a more pessimistic standpoint, the day the greatest never-recorded cosmic fluke found its way into being, arriving with a bang and a whir.
Unfortunately, its bang and whir were not metaphorical, and when the Preventer security system went off, Heero nearly jumped out of his skin.
Being the only one in the building, and thus the only one on duty, Heero groaned audibly as he swung his jacket on, stuffing his gun into the back of his pants for good measure. The alarms turned themselves off before he even made it out of his office, but it was his sworn duty to serve and protect, including that fine-print stuff outlining the disallowance of sitting on your ass when the alarm has gone off, even if silence reigns seconds later.
As he wandered the halls, subconsciously wary, he wondered if there might be a glitch in the system, and how much paperwork that would entail him submitting. Just as his brain was sighing over Article IV, section III, he turned the corner from the staff wing to the training wing and stopped dead in his tracks.
Standing -- arguing, even -- before him, spread out marginally in the waiting room for the fourth training center, were eight kids, all looking to be between the ages of seventeen and twenty-five. Three of them were bickering heatedly while two others were trying to mediate. The last three were watching the five combatants with expressions varying from amusement to exasperation. They were dressed plainly, though in good attire for undercover and nondescript work, and had no possessions on them, save for a black duffle one of the "combatants" was waving around.
It took Heero a surprisingly long time to get a hold of himself, taking into account his confusion and borderline amusement. When he finally did, he surveyed the group for apparent weapons -- there was nothing beyond a not-so-carefully concealed handgun on the lot of them, though he supposed there could be more.
Heero allowed his lips to quirk faintly as their argument reached a decibel high enough for him to hear clearly, and realized they were almost as confused as he was.
"How the hell should I know!" the one with the duffle, a boy in his early twenties with long-ish auburn hair up in a ponytail, yelled, gesturing his duffle violently enough to cause one of the anti-combatants, a girl with close-cut blonde hair, to jump out of the way.
She shrieked, "Evan!" just as a girl with shaggy red-blonde hair screeched her reply at duffle-boy, now recognized as "Evan."
"You programmed the fucking thing! That's how you should know!" she yelled, gesturing as avidly as Evan, but less indignant. "You said we were going to America, not fucking Europe! If you shot the continent this far off, imagine how many years we might be off!"
The second anti-combatant, a boy resembling his female counterpart rather closely, carrying also the close-cropped blond hair and sprite-ish figure, said, almost quietly, "Sari, calm down. There's no way Evan could have known. We knew we were taking a risk. There's nothing we can do to fix this until we ascertain exactly what happened. All right?"
"No!" the girl -- Sari -- yelled, spinning to face the blond boy. "He told us it'd work! That he'd tested it!"
"Exactly!" the third combatant, a petite but somehow menacing boy with dark hair and eyes, agreed. "If Evan wasn't sure, he shouldn't have said anything about the machine at all." This boy, however, did not direct his rage at the blond anti-combatants. Instead, he spun to face a boy with shaggy, rust-colored hair who was sitting and smirking against the wall behind Evan. "And you," he said, directing his anger at the boy whose smirk was only growing, "you're his partner, you idiot! You should have been paying attention to his experiments and their accuracy!" The boy just continued to smirk. "Mike!" the small, frightening boy yelled once more.
The red-headed boy, Mike, just shrugged. "I knew the accuracy of Evan's plans. I helped him conduct the experiments." Then he dropped his smirk and looked up at the dark-haired boy. "But it was a plan, and that was better than nothing. The accuracy peaked out at 85, Cole. That was good enough. We're on the planet, aren't we?"
Cole, the small dark-haired boy, fumed, but said nothing, spinning instead to face the other two watchers. "And you two: did you know anything?"
The female of the two, a beautiful, busty girl with wavy dark hair, shrugged magnificently. "Maybe we did, maybe we didn't. I see no difference." She looked at the boy next to her.
He paled in comparison. A tall, broad boy with wide, unintelligent features and a square physiognomy framed by dirty blond locks, he seemed freakishly out-of-place in this group of unique characters. "Who cares who knew, and who cares how it happened?" he asked. "We're here now, wherever here is, and we're not going to get anywhere sitting around and arguing. I say we find out where we are, and move on from there."
Heero understood the sensibility in that, and decided to announce his presence in acceptance of its adeptness. "You're in the waiting room for Preventer Headquarters' fourth training center, and I'm sure I don't know how you got here, but you'll probably want to tell me," he said, barely refraining from smiling when all eight kids turned, a variety of shocked expressions on their faces, to look at him.
The boy with the duffle, Evan, was the first to recover. "Who the fuck are you!" he demanded, holding his prop away from Heero and glaring with well-practiced ease.
Heero raised an eyebrow patiently. "I believe that's what I should be asking you," he said. "Considering it's three in the morning and people don't generally just show up in HQ, three a.m. or otherwise, setting off the alarm one minute and then deactivating it the next."
"We didn't deactivate it," the boy with blond hair, the attempted peacemaker, said. "It turned off on its own. I promise."
Heero shrugged. "Either way, it's rather unusual to have eight strange kids show up in the middle of the night uninvited." He pulled his gun genially out of his pants and spun it casually in his hand. "Please, introduce yourselves before I have to press the panic button, okay?" he asked, allowing for the obvious inferences.
The partner, Mike, was the only one to answer him. "We're lost and confused, and you're about as intimidating as a math teacher," he said sarcastically, slowly pulling himself to his feet. "But, aside from that, we're just as you said: a bunch of strange kids." He grinned. "Some stranger than others, I'll admit." He took a few steps forward, leaving about four feet between himself and Heero. "Further even from that, I'm Michael Connelly, twenty-two year old super genius." He put out his hand.
"Nice to meet you," Heero said, tucking the gun away in a motion that caused Mike's eyes to fall to his waist briefly. He closed the last steps between them and took Mike's hand in his own, firmly, and shook it. "Now I'll help you out." He surveyed the group. "Would you care to go somewhere a little more comfortable?" he asked, releasing Mike's hand.
"Sure," Evan said, answering for his partner, but remaining where he stood. "But aren't you going to return the favor? Tell us who you are," he said, repeating his demand.
"How rude of me," Heero said sarcastically, allowing prussian eyes to train on the boy before him. "Heero Yuy, Preventer 5, working the late shift." He made a jaunty salute before gesturing with his salute-hand and saying, "How about we all go this way, hm?" and walking off down the hallway towards the conference room without waiting for a reaction from the group.
As he walked, a scamper of footsteps assured him they were following, and a quick twist of his key opened the conference room door, automated lights flickering on as he walked towards the back of the room. "Feel free to sit wherever you like," he said genially, "as I get refreshments." He flicked on the coffee pot that rested on the back counter, checking first for grounds, and pulled out a plastic bag of Styrofoam cups, wincing at the Styrofoam. Fucking world-friendly report he had yet to finish. Colbridge would have had an aneurysm at such a "commendable agency" using something so environmentally unfriendly as Styrofoam.
When he turned around again, the group was seated around the table, the look-alike blondes closest to the door, followed by the busty girl and the square boy, Mike, Evan, the yelling girl -- Sari -- and the menacing boy -- Cole.
"So, I've introduced myself. Now it's your turn," Heero said, pulling out a chair at the opposite end of the table.
Evan smirked. "There's one of you, and eight of us. You swapped your name for Mike's. What if you have to answer a question every time you want a name?" he asked, mockingly.
"All right," Heero said agreeably. He resisted a smirk at seeing Evan's scowl. "You supply a name, and I'll answer a question. After names, we'll figure something else out."
Evan's smirk barely faltered. "Fine. I'm Evan Cashman, twenty-four years old and the impromptu leader of this little faction." The busty girl snorted, but Evan ignored her. "Where is this Preventer HQ located?" he asked, saying 'Preventer HQ' in such a way as to claim he didn't believe that was truly where he was.
"Brussels, Belgium, capital of the Earth Sphere Unified Nation," Heero answered diligently, propping his legs up on a chair kitty-corner from where he was seated.
"Okay," Sari said, assuming her turn. "I'm Sariann Colder, twenty-three-years-old and disagreeing immensely with Evan's proclamation of group leader." She crossed her arms in front of her. "What year is it? Or the exact date, if you want."
Heero remained casual. Something about three o'clock in the morning combined with the security system's actions was telling him that this was either A) a really bizarre dream, or B) a really bizarre reality. Either way, he'd seen his share of strange things -- been quite a few of them, actually -- and wasn't feeling particularly restless to get back to his report. "December twenty-seventh, After Colony 223." He paused. "Three-oh-two a.m.," he concluded, looking at his watch.
"Uh, lovely," the anti-action blond boy said slowly. He exchanged a quick look with the busty girl across the table from him before clearing his throat and turning back to Heero. "I'm Bertram Lawrence, nineteen-years-old, and you can please call me Tram." He gave Heero a lopsided grin before continuing. "You wouldn't happen to know the latest big thing that's happened in the news, would you? Like, astronomically big." He made a wide gesture with his arms, which his female look-alike ducked easily.
Heero pursed his lips briefly and considered. "We had the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Mars settlement program last week, the twenty-eighth anniversary of the Eve War two and a half days ago, and Cameron Spitzak was just elected Chairman of the Board of the E.S.U.N. Is that what you're looking for? Nothing specific?"
The group paused, and the blonde girl picked up. "To be fair, I'm Marjorie Lawrence, also nineteen, and called Ren, if you please." She paused. "If, uh, my brain is still working properly, an agency called The Foundation for Human Well-Being just opened up, didn't it?"
"About six years ago, now," Heero said, unable to keep the contempt from his voice. "I was working on the damn Colbridge Report when the alarm went off." He grinned crookedly at the group. "You saved me from a bit of insanity."
Busty nodded. "We can work off that. I'm Caitlin Regent, twenty-one years old and resident realist." She inclined her head to Heero, who replied in kind. "You mentioned the Eve War," she said casually, "what do you know of it?"
Heero coughed slightly. "Uhm, I was in it, if that helps you any." She kept her green eyes trailed on him, unblinking, and Heero went on. "I know most of the intimate details of it, really, seeing as I was rather deeply invested in the war during its course, and am now upper management of the Preventer organization." He paused. "You have heard of the Preventer organization, correct?"
Caitlin scowled. "We're not idiots."
"You never know," Heero replied honestly, "you did ask me the date, and where we are. Right about now, anything's possible." He laughed lightly. "For all I know, I fell asleep on my Report and am having a singularly unique dream."
"Please continue," the square boy next to Caitlin said, "about the war."
Heero nodded. "All right, there were two sides to the war at the onset, OZ -- the Organization of the Zodiac -- and the Alliance. OZ had the colonies in its hold, and the Alliance had the earth sphere. Both were actually led by the same man, Treize Khushrenada, who invested a lot of time and money into pulling off a double act, and tricking his enemies to kill off the upper Alliance officials, so OZ, his true organization, could take control.
"A few years before this, as the war took place in After Colony 195, a man named Heero Yuy had been assassinated by OZ, and another group, the Barton Foundation, wanted revenge for his death, so they hired five of the men from the team that had originally designed the colonies, and put them to work building a weapon that would destroy OZ, as well as half the world.
"Eventually they completed the weapon, in early 195, and found themselves pilots. The pilots weren't big fans of mass genocide, but neither were they tremendous fans of OZ, so they trucked off to the earth sphere with no intentions of destroying half the population, only the OZ organization. The Alliance was very quickly wiped out, due to the aforementioned slaughter of their officials, and OZ ruled with a shiningly iron fist for a few months before another colony organization, the White Fang, came along, ruled by a former member of OZ, Zechs Merquise." Heero paused. "Er, he's rather more well-known as Milliardo Peacecraft now, but I have problems with that, so you'll have to bear with me.
"He didn't like OZ anymore -- they smashed his mask or something like that -- and pulled together the remaining men from the Barton Foundation to pull off their original plan of mass genocide. The pilots of the weapons the Bartons created, more commonly known as the Gundams, weren't too fond of the plan anymore now than they had been before, and shifted their violence from OZ to the White Fang. Eventually, OZ threw itself into space and Treize and Zechs duked it out, both of them ending up the loser, and the earth settled itself into this peaceful thing we call the Earth Sphere Unified Nation.
"Exactly one year after that, Treize's illegitimate daughter, Mariemeia, decided she wanted to be even more of an annoying seven-year-old than usually comes standard, used yet more of the remaining Barton Foundation to attack the earth, and had to get her ass kicked." Heero took a moment to look properly chagrinned. "She sort of really did, and was in a wheelchair for a while. But, uh, she's fine now. Married and everything." He coughed lightly. "That's the Eve War -- both of them -- in a nutshell."
"Thanks," Caitlin said politely, then turned to her square friend.
"I'm Nathaniel Carpenter," the square boy said in a soft, calm voice that seemed frighteningly out of place on his massive bulk. "I'm twenty-three years old. I would like to ask what role you played during the war," he said politely, gray eyes tired-looking.
Heero had to admit to himself that looks could certainly be deceiving -- he himself looked like a scrawny Japanese man, which he was, but he could probably have handed 99 of the Preventer Agency's collective ass to its owners. Even at fourty-three. "I was a pilot," he said, opting for a cop-out.
Mike snorted, earning an elbow in the ribs from Evan, and the last member of their rack-shack group stepped up to the plate. "I'm Colton Pelovski, eighteen years old," the small, menacing boy said, face serious and eyes glaring. Heero was reminded eerily of himself, only more outright violent. "You dodged that question nicely. I won't make you be specific, either, but where did your alliances lie during the wars?"
"With myself, really," Heero said bluntly, standing up to pour the now-finished coffee, which was beeping to signal is completion. "Anyone care for a cup of coffee?" Meeting smile-for-glare with Cole, Heero laughed. "I'll answer your question, if that'll make you happy. I was sided with my friends, and they weren't OZ, the Alliance, or White Fang." He grinned. "Before you jump to any conclusions, please note that there were multitudes upon multitudes of smaller organizations putting their cards on the table during this time. Not just those three." He walked over to the coffee pot and poured himself a cup. "I'll repeat: coffee?"
Tram, Mike, and Nathaniel each accepted a cup of coffee while the rest of the group declined. Heero sat down with both his glass and the pot itself, sated, and waited for what they came up with next. When nothing seemed to be forthcoming, he initiated discussion himself. "Why the fascination with the Eve Wars, kids?"
Members of the party exchanged what they believed to be surreptitious glances before Mike clarified, "You are asking us this question as a continuation of our sharing-stuff game, aren't you?"
"Yes, to put it frankly. It's now three-thirty in the morning, I still have to finish my report, and the morning crew is going to be here in an hour and a half. That's sad even for me." Heero sipped his coffee, giving up on protocol and dumping his booted feet on the table. He chuckled into his cup. "That's assuming of course that this isn't an elaborate dream and I'm not going to wake up to a man in a gray suit laughing at the poor schmuck asleep at his desk."
"Right," Mike replied evenly. "We're interested because it's a rather taboo topic where we come from. And by taboo I mean that if you discuss it, you're likely to get thrown in jail or a questioning hall." He shrugged. "Why are you so free to discuss it?"
"Because it's my own life, and my own life story, and fuck if I won't disclose it to whomever I please." Heero smiled sweetly. "I worked pretty hard during that war, to be sure, but I've worked even harder since it ended. You can't change from a cold-hearted killer to a smiling, well-adjusted man overnight, nor should you. It's an arduous process, filled with lots of embarrassment and a plethora of awkward situations." He refilled his cup. "Where is it you guys are from? I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's probably not After Colony 123, despite how my brain laments that thought as even a possibility. At this point, I've been awake for twenty-four hours. You could probably tell me you were all robots playing a prank on me and I'd buy it."
Mike grinned. "We're from the far-off After Colony 297," he said, which somehow, strangely, managed to surprise Heero. He wasn't sure, but he suspected he'd been thinking a year even further off than that, somewhere in the still-ticking recesses of his mind. "Though we are from Europe; what used to be Germany, in fact, so not too far from here."
Evan picked up the discussion. "I'll be honest: I've heard your name. Whether it's you or yet another guy with your name, it circulates in circles that don't quite care about what the government thinks, and hope to change how things are now. It's usually associated with other names, too, but you haven't mentioned any of those." He exchanged a glance with Mike. "Hell, I'll be even more honest. We're a part of that not-so-secret community. There are about sixty of us, total, and the eight of us are part of the twenty-person field team. The government found out about us and started killing us off, thus the whole "sixty people" thing. Basically, we're fucked, so we started trying to think up ways to fix things, and I started fiddling with something my grandfather came up with about twenty-five years ago, before they killed him. It's something like a time machine, though it doesn't operate like the science fiction novels say it does. It uses physics and a whole lot of luck to operate, and only has an 85 success rate. Which is why we're in Brussels in 223 instead of New York in 216, like we tried for."
"We knew it was a risk, though, despite what our earlier argument seemed to be saying. You can't fiddle with time and space and assume you're going to end up exactly where you want to. That's just not realistic," Mike continued, breaking off to chuckle. "Not that time travel itself is realistic, but we didn't really have any other options available. So we hopped into a rusty old pile of crap and shot ourselves into oblivion, hoping to fuck and back that it worked, and apparently it has, just not as well as we'd hoped."
Sari cut him off with a glare. "Not nearly so well as we'd hoped, but half a plan is better than running from the F.E.C.s any longer." Sari noted the blank look on Heero's face and smirked. "Federally Employed Cops. Lackeys that are paid to hunt out dissenters and 'deal with them accordingly,' however they may interpret that."
"And they usually interpret it to mean skewed on a stick," Cole finished for her, still glaring. Heero was beginning to wonder whether or not he ever stopped. He never got a chance to ask, however, as his cell phone chose that moment to shock the group back into a non-expositional reality.
Heero pulled the silver phone out of his pocket, flipped it open, and greeted, "Yuy." He listened, pursing his lips, then said, "Okay," and hung up. Putting the phone away, he glanced back up at the group. "Lady Une, head of Preventer, just got the message that the alarm went off in the middle of the night, assumed that since I'd answered and didn't freak out that everything was fine, told me she'd be in at seven for a full report on it." He spun an index finger around in the air half-heartedly. "Whoopee."
"What all do you know of the Foundation for Human Well-Being, other than who it's led by and what Reports it's caused?" Cole asked bluntly, not dropping his glare for a moment.
"It's a royal pain in the ass, the leader, Emmanuel Colbridge, is a dipshit who makes a lot of false promises and veiled threats, and isn't even liked by Relena. Unfortunately, most of the E.S.U.N. council think he's the best thing since sliced bread, and she doesn't have the power to dethrone him from his glory, even with her prestigious and impressive diplomatic arsenal." Heero sighed dramatically. "I'm the one stuck doing the Report every year since I had the chance to kill him during the war and didn't, since I'd already killed more people than the eight of you together probably know, and wasn't in the mood for wasteful slaughter." He paused. "That day, anyway. It's a running joke that his life is all my fault, so I'm stuck doing the damn Report every year."
Tram let out a hiss, which shocked Heero into looking over at him. "You really, really should have," the boy explained, scowling powerfully enough to give Cole a run for his money. "That stupid organization takes control of your blessed E.S.U.N. and turns it into a fucking dictatorship. He was leader of some pawn organization of the Barton Foundation's during the Eve Wars, and has a love of power. Fortunately for him, and unfortunately for the humanity he claims to love, world peace put the world entirely at his grasp. Everyone gets along, the world is united, and all he has to do to takeover is worm his way to the top of the food chain." Tram's eyes drifted to meet Heero's. "And, of course, kill a few well-placed officials who get in his way, posing their deaths as freak accidents."
Heero took this in stride, but couldn't help chuckling. "I believe you, but this is some pretty hefty, not to mention bizarre, news. Colbridge is an annoying piece of waste meat, not unlike chopped liver, but he scares me about as much as a particularly loud and arrogant mosquito. You're gonna have to do better than that, if you want me to help you rid the world of him." Heero smirked. "Which I'm assuming is your Plan B."
Mike shrugged. "It's a rather obvious Plan B, but it works, doesn't it? If he's dead, he won't be around in the future for us to deal with." Mike's ever-present smirk slipped slightly when Heero laughed.
"Fuck, if it were only that easy." Heero pulled his legs off the table and leaned forward, all in one motion, and said almost conspiratorially, "Unfortunately, with someone as non-charismatic as Mr. Colbridge, it's almost never that simple. He's just the best face to put on the line: the company figurehead. You have to take down the organization, not just the leader." He sat back again. "Conversely, when Treize died, OZ died with him. The same with Zechs -- when it looked like he'd died, the White Fang fell apart. But the Alliance didn't die because Noventa was killed, it was just thrown into chaos for a while, until they straightened themselves out and were taken over in a singularly embarrassing mishap." He took a long drink from his coffee cup. "If Colbridge is backed by the organization you say he is, he's replaceable. Killing him will do you no good," Heero advised, but broke off laughing. "But who am I to give out information on how to take down an organization? Especially to kids." He looked at his watch. "Now, if you don't want Une to find you here, I suggest you find yourself a hotel in the vicinity. I can let you out of the building, but that's as far as I'm taking you. I still have to finish my Colbridge Report, after all."
Heero stood, taking the coffee pot with him and dumping it into the sink placed conveniently next to the coffee maker, rinsing out and replacing the pot. "Come on," he said, ushering with his arms out of the conference room.
"All right," Mike said, standing first. "We'll go, and we'll remember what you've said." His voice was even, and a serious expression was playing across his features in an almost uncharacteristic way. "We'll look you up if we have any difficulty."
Heero nodded. "Sure. You kids have fun with that," he said, taking mental note of the serious tone and leading them out of the conference room to the front entrance, which he opened with a key code. The kids filed out without a word, until Ren, the last to exit, stopped suddenly to face Heero.
"One thing I didn't get to ask," she said, allowing her pale blue eyes to meet his darker ones. "Do you recognize the name 'Duo Maxwell'?"
Heero paused, allowing Ren to keep his eyes. "I do, but any further information, you'll have to find for yourself. That's not my story to tell."
Ren nodded, and continued walking out the door, calling, "Thanks," over her shoulder.
Heero didn't wait to watch them march off into the horizon; he went back inside, back to his office, and finished his report.