Ch 02

Wufei headed towards the L2 Preventer branch to meet with the other pilots the next morning. There was a slight hum in his veins. He was excited for the potential mission ahead. It had to be big if Une was calling in all of the Gundam pilots. He had been tired of waiting and gathering information on small gangs and drug traffickers. He wanted to go in to heavily armed situations and disarm them rapidly. It was one of the things he did best.

The run down cement building that was the Preventer's L2 branch was dirty and in no way where an upstanding peace keeping force should be residing. The only reason it was the Preventer branch on L2 was because it was one of the few buildings that was up to the standard fire code that was needed for government buildings. It had fire escapes on the exterior walls from the roof to the alley below.

Wufei strode quickly up the steps of the substandard building and into the main entrance with the very basic front desk check point. The secretary nodded to him, knowing who he was already from the few times he came in to do formal reports to superiors in the branch.

He started up to the third floor conference room when he heard thunderous running footsteps heading towards him rapidly. Wufei turned with seconds to spare before a full sized Duo Maxwell tackled him in a full body grip he liked to call the kamikaze hug. Duo stepped back before Wufei could push him away chirping, "Wu-man I've missed you so much! You are so talkative compared to He-chan."

Wufei shook his head in response and saw Quatre coming up the stairs behind him. "Hello Quatre. Good to see you again." Wufei stated, "What are the mission details that I should be looking forward to?"

Duo shrugged and went bolting up the stairs. Odd behavior for their co-pilot but not completely un-Maxwell like. Wufei looked at Quatre quizzically, who motioned towards the steps, "It will all be explained shortly. Trowa and Heero are already up at the third floor conference room. "

Wufei nodded and continued up the stairs as indicated, but something seemed slightly off. He shrugged. It was the excitement of the possible mission. He just wasn't thinking correctly. They may have said that the war was over, but he still had his killer instincts wired up to war-time levels and that was unlikely to change any time soon.

Up on the third floor Trowa and Heero nodded to him and Heero entered the room. Going to the right around by the second door Duo was already parked leaning against the door on the side wall. Wufei circled opposite them and settled close to the window. He was unsettled. Something did not seem right. When Trowa and Quatre came in and closed the door behind them he looked up and realized there was a pair of pilots at either door. Either escape route. He schooled his face to neutral despite growing feeling of wrongness within him.

Quatre turned to face him from his position at the end of the conference table, while Wufei subtly moved closer to the window at the far end of the room. "Where's Sally?" Wufei questioned. His partner was missing. Duo looked down at his feet. Guilt was scrawled across his face and he began fiddling with the end of his braid. A mark of worry for pilot zero two that Wufei had seen multiple times before. His eyes narrowed.

"There is no mission for all of us is there? Why are you all here?"

Trowa was silent behind Quatre unmoving and Wufei felt Heero's gaze itching all over. Both of them silently attentive. Apparently Quatre would be the spokesperson for this little gathering, but to what end? He had a prickling along his spine that told him he would not like the answer to that.

"We've come to bring you to earth." Quatre said simply.

"To what end?" He stated voice carefully controlled to neutral. Perhaps he was just imagining it. Maybe… just maybe…

"I'm very sorry Wufei, but the ESUN government has demanded your arrest and trial. We believe it will be fair and long from our understanding. Lady Une has assured me that she will be compiling a case for your defense. At most it should be three months in prison. Not that lon-"

"Three months in prison?" Wufei hissed eyes narrowing dangerously.

"I'm sorry, Wufei, I really am!. We've been fighting for your exemption even Relena has been-"

"So what is all of your job then? To come retrieve me? To take me in, because I would come quietly with all of you as opposed to fighting, which is what should be happening?"

Heero spoke up succinctly, "The blanket pardon was for the first war. It was your involvement with Mariemeia that is causing this."

"And what!" He raised his voice angrily, "That makes all of your betrayal here today okay?" He shook his head fiercely. "Look at me!" He yelled. He inched slightly closer to the window. Feeling trapped, mind skipping plans quickly. Duo's eyes shot up and he locked onto him. "You are alright with handing me over to rot in jail." Duo's eyes sunk to the floor and he kind of curled in on himself. Good.

"Of all the times we fought together, all the mistakes we made in battle together. What makes this alright to you? How is this okay?" Trowa cast his eyes sideways unable to meet the narrowed black ones drilling through him into the wall. Heero started inching around the desk. He needed to move quicker, before he got any closer.

"And you Quatre. Hiding behind your politics, thinking this will be fair and just. I have lived through the same war you did. You know that the system will always be broken. And it's worse now, when good people like yourself are letting it continue on its path." Quatre's gaze focused inward. The words penetrating his façade. Wufei turned to Heero. "You would let them do this to your brother in arms?"

He tightened his jaw and inched forward half a step cautiously. "It is only three month."

"That does not make it okay. You know what we've sacrificed. You know what I am willing to do for this new government! And yet you are here like the perfect little soldier you are to turn in your fellow pilot. How is this right?" He yelled. Heero stopped his forward advance and evidence of concern crossed his face. "You are betraying me. You are letting me burn for things that should lay dead." He stepped back no longer in the ready position. One glance at Quatre, saw that he was coming to his moral conclusions in his head that would lead Wufei to a prison. It had to be now.

Instantly he threw his elbow back through the window that showered glass, cutting his bicep. Heero started moving so he shoved the nearest chair into his path and launched himself through the window out onto the fire escape. Grabbing the cement building edge he pulled himself up to the roof as he felt a swipe tear at his pant leg.

Rolling up he darted quickly across the roof hearing the clang of boot on metal behind him. He leapt clearing the three story drop below him, before sprinting to a large air duct on the neighboring building. Ripping off the covering he launched feet first down the vertical drop using his arms and legs to try to slow the descent. Till he hit the bottom grate and fell through to the first floor.

He felt his ankle go crunch below him and struggled to get up. Putting weight on it ended with searing pain, he focused momentarily trying to ignore it. Then hobbled towards what would be the back alley and away from the Preventer building as fast as he could. There was no way he was going to go rot in a prison cell. They were insane if they thought otherwise.

And it hurt. Not his ankle. He could ignore it he had been shot and finished missions before the ankle was nothing. But the fact that they could all so easily turn on him! His mind couldn't settle between glimpses of absolute rage and sadness that was being thrown at him. And betrayal.

He hobbled the four miles back to his safe-house studio and looked around the street for conformation of all clear. No one had caught up with him so far. He had the advantage.

Silently he eased to the cracked lock on went up the stairs to his apartment. He grabbed his med kit and two floor boards that were sitting around the condemned space and began making a splint for his ankle. It was most likely sprained, not broken. A good thing.

He began gathering his pack up when he heard it. The creak of movement in the hallway outside his room. Wufei drew his gun. Panic seeping into his conscience. He was not going down like this. He refused to be taken to prison. By his comrades, his s friends-

The door was kicked open and Heero entered gun drawn and Duo circled in around him. Wufei kept the gun trained on Heero and threw the bag up onto his shoulder edging directly across the carpet from them towards the window he always kept.

Duo eased into the room first hands up defensively showing he had no weapon on him. Wufei still didn't lower his. "I'm sorry Wufei, but this really will be the easiest way. We gotta take you in." Wufei glared hard and Duo kept inching forward across the room.

"I won't go willingly. You knew that when you took this assignment."

"We thought it would be better coming from your friends."

"You thought wrong."

Wufei quickly stepped back to kneel on the window ledge as Duo lunged forward and immediately fell through the carpet covered hole barely grabbing the board edges. Wufei threw his body backwards out the window and flipped to face the garbage bin he was to land on.

His eyes widened. Someone had closed the lid.

He slammed into the plastic lid hard jarring his shoulder on impact and rolling him to fall onto the concrete. Wufei felt dazed as his head cracked the concrete of the street. He lay there stunned for a moment and pushed himself one handed up into a standing position, beginning to limp slowly away.

A calm presence came behind him and a firm hand grabbed his uninjured shoulder. "Trowa."

"I'm sorry." Was all her whispered and Wufei felt a pinch at the base of his neck before falling into a deep unconsciousness.

TBC…