Chapter 4: Confrontation

A/N: coughs Ok ... so a year and a half has passed ... I'm probably the worst author ever on updates. A lot happened in real life, and I forgot about this fic, but recently watching some old Megas episodes on YouTube, I decided to pick up the pen and start writing once again :-). I do have it all plotted out (did when I started it two years ago), so its really just a matter of writing it

---

The minutes ticked by, slowing denoting the passage of time. A drunken snore emitted from the blond, and it was only with great effort that Kiva managed to drag him upstairs to his room, a place rarely ventured into by the redhead.

The walls were painted a light blue, with several bookcases, a large beaten bed in the corner, and a desk. Models of various cars, and robot models sat on the shelves, and a large poster with some unknown muscle car adored the the wall. Everything however seemed in disarray, and several models lay on the ground, and in pieces; quite possibly destroyed in a drunken rant. Dust covered everything, and it seemed that Coop hadn't properly paid attention to this room in quite some time. On the desk however was a model robot that Coop had purchased a few days; the first one he had attempted to assemble in over a year; it had been a clear sign of his road to recovery.

'Ugh ...'

With one heavy heave, Kiva managed to deposit Coop on the bed, where he promptly rolled over onto his side. She watched him intently, seeing a peace on his face that was often missing these days and vaguely wondered if she looked so peaceful in her sleep ...

In retrospect, maybe inviting Jamine over wasn't the best idea ever; she didn't know what had happened on that cold September night so long ago, and she didn't know what had occurred involved her ...

The lights flickered as lighting struck once again. Kiva held a hot cup of chai tea and continued to listen to the pouring rain. It was an old military tradition to stay up through the night, and attack at dawn when the enemy was likely to still be asleep. She knew that sooner or later, Coop would wake up, he'd try to brush it off, she'd get upset, they'd shout, the unease silence would set in, and that was that.

'Why do I even bother ...'

A voice deep inside her told her that she still needed Coop if they ever found a way to the 31st century, but a second voice simply stated that she cared and left it at that. She looked into her reflection in the tea, but found no answers within its murky depths. Her mind drifted back to the past, her past specifically.

'Ice cold bitch, that's what Stevenson said ... wish he could see me now ...'

Frank Stevenson, Lt. Commander of Epsilon-Three had been Kiva's commanding officer for a year. After the fall of the outer colony's, the Earth Coalition resorted to hit and run tactics against Glorft targets using troops and mechs deployed from orbit, nicknamed Helljumpers; their mission being to break down the hypothetical door and destroy the anti-orbital guns to allow for planetary bombardment, a job considered by many to be completely suidical.

Shortly after joining the Coalition (or more promptly put, the remains of the Coalition), Kiva, then just a Lieutenant (age 17, given a military commission under special circumstances) had led men into battle, and found herself being one of the few who came back from such missions alive. It unnerved her commanding officers her complete lack of emotion, and focus on the job; she had seen death, and she had personally experienced the horrors of the war, and the Glorft first hand, and never seemingly showed anything beside irritation and anger. She kept to herself, only talked when spoken to, or when a circumstance required it, ate, drank, and lived alone. A machine more then human, it was this ice cold persona which had earned her nicknames like 'The Icy Devil', and 'Ice Bitch' to name a few. She never bonded with any of the solders under her command, and never seemed to care when someoitne expired. While many would say that this would end up demoralizing a unit, and leading to poorer results, her service record said otherwise; she had never failed a mission, and while high loses were to be expected, the number of line of duty deaths under her command were shockingly below average.

Stevenson had watched her return from missions where solders with decades more of experience had broken, the sons and daughters of Earth being killed left and right, and she had been in the middle with it, uncaring, and unchanged. It was unnatural, inhuman, it scared and frightened him, and it infuriated him.

"Lieutenant, take a seat.",

"I prefer to stand, sir.",

"Lieutenant, take a seat. I'll make it an order if I have to.",

She hesitated for a moment, before finally sitting.

"Do you know why you are here, Lieutenant Andru?"

"No, sir."

"How many men did you loose on the Landelle mission?",

"Sir?",

"How many men did you loose on the Landelle mission?",

"291, sir.",

"You lost 80 percent of your unit, Lieutenant ..."

A moment of silence passed tensely ...

"Lieutenant, how do you do it?",

"Sir?",

"How can you tell me 291 good men and women died, and not show one single shred of emotion! Time and again, I've debriefed you after each mission. You never show any emotion, you don't care ... it's not natural, no normal human can just switch off their emotions like you can, its like your a machine, Lieutenant. Uncaring, unfeeling, unemotional ... Tell me, Lieutenant, how do you do it?",

A long silence followed ...

"Man, the rumours are true. 'Ice Cold Bitch', indeed. Your not human Kiva, not the way you go, you can't be ...",

"Sir, with all due respect, I am human, and just because I can control my emotions doesn't I am not. I would appreciate it if you didn't say I wasn't ...",

"Ah, seems I finally hit a nerve ... Tell me Kiva, why is it so important I call you human?, Tell me why",

The female solder looked Stevesons straight in the eye with a look that would paralyze even the strongest of men.

"Because in the camps, that's all we had left ..."

A long silence followed after this. The fact that Kiva had actually said something about her life was shocking enough, but to know she had survived the camps ...

"Am I dismissed, sir?",

Stevenson hadn't apparently recovered from Kiva's previous statement ...

"Huh ... yeah, go."

The murky water and steam hadn't proved the guidance she had hoped it would, but succeed in derging up memories long forgotten. Memories of loss, of pain, of lonelyness, of horror, of death; memories long supressed had now risen to the surface. She forced her mind to fight for control, to regain the semi-balance of peace she had, to push down those horrors in her mind. She needed to clear her mind, she needed to do something ...

The rain was pounding hard, lighting flashed, and thunder shook all around. Any sane person would have buried themselves under serveral heavy blankets, and forgotten that the outside world existed. However, if any of them had looked out the window, they would have seen a red-headed women running down the street, trying to run and hide from the horrors that haunt her from within.

A/N: Well ... another chapter done. Maybe I'll update again before '08 :-). This fic is going differently then I planned, but I always wanted a chance to explore the human physche :-). It's definitely darker then most Megas fan fiction I've read, which sets the theme and mood for future chapters, and don't worry, there will be more action, and more explanations coming up. Hopefully the next chapter, or the one after it. I do apologize to my readers (if any of them are left) on the delay on updating. If anyone wants to reach me via AIM or email, I always respond. As always please note any spelling or grammer errors.