The Perfect Soldier Arc

Book Two: Price

"I am not his father. Not in the biological sense. But he is my son and this is no joke." OC, Chapter Nine

Rated: R

Pairings: 3x4, 1+2

Warnings: angst, shounen-ai, violence, language, OOC

Arc Summary: Doctor J succeeded in making the Perfect Soldier, complete with genetic enhancement and a little fail safe known throughout the military as a "trigger". But he never counted on his comrades not following his example to the tee. The result? You read to find out! Eventual 1+2, 3+4. Far off 1x2, 3x4. Definitely AU. Told from various points of view. All characters are OOC, if only a little.

Book Two Summary: Heero has been liberated from his trigger, and the Gundam Boys have taken their leave of the scientists. But they have done so at a price. What price? And who is this hazel-eyed man?

Notes: Words in bold type are flashbacks, words in italics are emotions felt through Quatre's empathy.

Disclaimer: Take a good long look at me. Do I look rich to you? If I do then maybe you need glasses. If not, it's because I'M NOT! I don't own any of the Gundam characters or the "trigger" idea. Hell, I barely know what a trigger is. Everything I used in this fic is based on what I learned in Buffy the Vampire Slayer during season seven.

Prologue – Much ado about…something.

Duo P.O.V.

Sighing deeply I tuned out the conversation around me and looked out the window. It's raining once again. I swear on my scythe that every safe house Wu Fei chooses turns out to be smack dab in the middle of a rain forest. Okay, so maybe not an actual rain forest per say…but we ARE in a forest and it IS raining.

"Maxwell!" I jump and turn to grin sheepishly at the Chinese youth sitting in front of me. His arms are crossed and his eyes are narrowed. Oops.

"Sorry Fei. Got distracted again. What were you saying?" Wu Fei huffed irritably and Quatre, the blonde little angel that he is, took over for him in sympathy.

"We were talking about what we're going to do about Heero." I glanced upwards at the ceiling – and the floor above where Heero was sleeping deeply thanks to some heavy tranquilizers. "We need to remove the collar. But so far everything we've tried has failed. Nothing G has given us is useful." Poor Quatre look to be at a loss as he looked over the scattering of papers on the coffee table.

And it's no wonder; I'm actually surprised he hasn't broken down yet. It was three weeks ago today that we decided to liberate Heero from Doctor J and take our own leave from the scientists, and so far it has proven to be harder than expected.

Professor G is the only scientist out of the five that will even talk to us. The other four are still pissed at us for deciding to work on our own. And that has proven to be a problem for us because the damnable collar of Heero's is made of a special make of Gundanium. Professor G doesn't know how to break it, but J sure does the old bastard.

Add to that we haven't gotten our hands on many of Oz's plans. With our main hacker indisposed and our only other informants acting like children…. Missions would be impossible, if they had been at the forefront of our minds. Which they weren't. Heero was. And that damnable collar.

"We've tried pliers, we've tried bolt cutters, and we've tried metal scrappers..." Wu Fei muttered. "And all that before we woke Yuy long enough for him to tell us the blasted thing was Gundanium."

"It's actually amazing how strong a thin strip of that stuff can be." Quatre mused.

"Yeah, short of torching the thing with a ther…mal…." I paused. "Hey!" Quatre jumped at my shout and I grinned. "Why don't we try taking my thermal scythe to it?"

"Are you mental?! You can't control such a large object and make it cut so little!" Wu Fei spluttered. I blinked in confusion.

"I'm not talking about THAT one." I said. "I'm talking about the one up in my room." I got three blank looks and I could have hit myself. They didn't know about my hand-held scythe. I'd never used it before. "I'll be right back."

"Duo…!" I hopped up, ignored Quatre's startled cry, and bolted quietly up to my room. I peeked in on Heero as I went by, saw that he was curled up on his side, and moved on. I dove to the side of my bed and began digging around under it. Socks flew behind me and a pair of boxers flipped up to probably land on the fan above my bed. My fingers hit metal and I grinned in victory.

I pulled a long, thin, metal rod out from under my bed. Standing up I clenched the rubber hand-holds and twisted. A four inch thick beam shot out of one end and curved around until it was two feet long. Another twist had the curve straightened, and another had it shrinking to a manageable size.

I switched it off and took off back down the hall and down the stairs to crash into the couch. Quatre gave me a disapproving look and I shrugged it off. I held up my scythe with a proud grin. "Ta da!"

"It's a metal pole." Wu Fei snorted, eyeing it skeptically.

"Nyuh uh. It's my scythe. G-man made it for me years ago." And as if to demonstrate I twisted the pole and the beam shot out for the second time that day. Wu Fei cursed in surprise, Quatre jumped and squeaked, and Trowa merely cocked an eyebrow.

"Allah…it looks like an exact replica of your Gundam's scythe." Quatre said. "It actually works?"

"Want me to demonstrate?" I asked. Quatre shook his head frantically.

"No no, I believe you." I turned the weapon off and balanced it on my knee.

"Have you tested it?" Trowa asked. "On different metals?"

"Well yeah. It can cut through regular metal of any kind, no prob. I don't know about Gundanium though. I never found a scrap piece to use and I wasn't about to cut through my buddy out there." I said.

"I'm guessing you can control the beam itself?" Wu Fei asked.

"Yup! I can make it longer, shorter, thicker, thinner, curved, straight..." I trailed off as a thump sounded from upstairs.

"Did you wake him Maxwell?" Wu Fei asked as the sound of footsteps sounded in the hallway. I shook my head.

"He was sleeping like a baby when I checked in on him." But then again, he might have been faking it. He was obviously awake now at any point. And he was standing at the bottom of the stairs, watching us with an odd expression on his face.

TBC

I've finally been allowed to work on this! Shawnie bullied my muses into leaving and is helping me with it himself. Yay.

The scythe is mine btw…..I want one for myself.