It might finally get interesting! Things start coming together, I know that the first couple of chapters seemed kinda random but look! Action, finally! Quatre's such a cutey, you think I'm talking about his cuteness a lot here, wait until Duo shows up! Maybe now this fic will finally get some reviews…

Dudes! I also just remembered, for the last 5 chapters I haven't written a disclaimer, this counts for those past five, k? I don't own Gundam Wing, hell, I don't even own my OC, Claudine, she owns herself. Gundam belongs to Bandai and a bunch of rich ppl in japan, not me :pout: neway, enjoy.

Dragon Wars part 6
Quatre smiled at his familiar surroundings. The city marketplace was even more desert-like that the land that surrounded his father's castle. He walked down a set of sandstone stairs that led toward the center of the marketplace, the fountain. Some of the people he hadn't seen for a long time and who hadn't even noticed he was missing were taking a break in the shade under one of the overpasses made out of a stone bridge. The city-marketplace was one of his favorite places to go, he liked being surrounded by people and seeing the new fashions, the latest imports of food, and hearing the latest gossip.
Quatre leaned against the inside wall of the bridge near a group of some old women wrapped in light green and beige cloak talking rapidly in the holy language no longer used in the area officially, but still used by those who remembered it. Quatre, coming from a rich family as he did, understood the language fluently and could speak it almost as fluently. It was a language that died about fifty years ago that used to be used only in the mid-states in the desert like in Cuatrica.
Cuatrica had an interesting history; before the language ended up dwindling down in the mid-states is was a language that spread all across the human lands of Aldaraania. Back when mages were the rulers of Aldaraania and used their powers to form a religious and just government is was the official language of humans. But most humans broke away from the mages during the War of All, when they discovered that mages were no longer needed to defend the human lands and weapons were developed that had never before been needed. As strong as mages were, they still did not compare with Dragons, however, a good spike catapulted into the heart did wonders.
After centuries of rule the mages had become corrupt, some of them, for they had a lot of power individually as both government officials and mages with powers. The people raged against the central government in the east and the war lasted for years, when the casualties rose the people started executing any mages seen on the spot, the uncorrupted mages who wandered around the countryside trying to fulfill their purpose as mages by doing good and did not agree with the government went into hiding and escaped to the west, now the mid-states.
Mage identities were never revealed so the way of mages, and their religion disappeared. Without a religion to support it, and with the end of the rebellion, which the people won, the language of mages was replaced by the basic trade language that had been used only by traders between the human lands and the dwarf lands to the north. It only survived in the mid-states, which were nowhere near the northern trade lands or the new government forming in the East.
The east was turned into an imperialist kingdom, ruled by a hierarchy, which turned into the Zodiac Kingdom. The middle-states divided themselves up among clans, but the land was fought over endlessly until the formation of the Sanc Kingdom. The Sank Kingdom was formed by a family of pacifists that chose to be governed separate than the Mage government and were closely allied with nymphs and unicorns, the strong magickal powers of the creatures allowed the Peacecrafts to defend against the mage government when they tried to take away the kingdom.
With the mages fell, the Sanc Kingdom had expanded from the mid-north farther south into a half moon shape and ran into the conflicts of the mid-states. However, instead of getting involved with the wars going on, the Sanc Kingdom sent out their best ambassador to stop the fighting. They were not the strongest military power that gave them that advantage, but they did have an impenetrable defense, the majick users that protected their Kingdom made the Kingdom impenetrable to both the mages and the weapons of the mid-states.
Heero Yuy, a true genius at peace negotiations saved the nations from complete destruction. He spent his entire life trying to stop the fighting and it still wasn't enough, the south states and the north states that bordered each other still broke out into battles every year, it only stopped when a common enemy was presented, and Heero Yuy was assassinated by the newly formed Northern Kingdom.
The thankful mid-states were willing to war with the northern Kingdom for the Sanc Kingdom or at least defend it by using military force but the Sanc Kingdom allowed none of it. The Northern Kingdom were allied and still remained allied with races in the far north of Aldaraania and were able to use black majick to take down the defenses of the Sanc Kingdom, from there it was all over. The Sanc Kingdom fell quickly and harshly and none of the Peacecraft royal family survived.
That was only fifteen years ago, when the government of the east became stable and had started trading to both sides of the feuds over the land in the middle-states, the bastards, the language changed. There should have been a long lasting resistance to the Zodiac Kingdom for continuing the war by selling weapons but now the council was giving in to them. The fact that the old ladies were talking in that language signified that they must have resistance against the council's decisions. Quatre smiled, good, he listened in.
"The council just had a meeting with Mr. Winner, the only noble in this damn government that still upholds the old ways of Yuy peace-"
"Hagar, Yuy's dead, and if we don't take the right side so will we be, if we don't join a winning side before the war starts then we'll end up like the Sanc Kingdom. Who knew a war would be so close at hand after a peace?" The woman in draped green robes asked in a raspy voice.
The other sounded younger and more determined than she looked, "The Zodiac, that's who. They won't keep us safe, you think that give a damn about us? The people? As soon as the Sanc Kingdom fell this government has been going down hill, if it wasn't for Mr. Winner I swear we would already have gone back to war fighting over petty land, and the Zodiac would sit back and watch us destroy each other, and when we ran out of things to destroy each other with, they would profit off it."
"Old bat, if we don't join them then we'll have a four sided war on our hands. The Northern Kingdom, the Southern republic, the Zodiac Kingdom and other mid-states who are being supplied by the Zodiac Kingdom that decide they want another try at our land!"
"Who are you calling a bat? And old, if that isn't the pot calling the kettle black!?" The woman dressed in beige canvas whacked her cane over the other's head.
"Ow! That hurt you son of a mage!" The woman in green grappled and pulled at the others face as she began to whack her again.
Whack! Whack! Whack!
Quatre tried to keep a straight face but was failing miserable, her turned around the corner to laugh away from them. He turned and walked right into the sun, temporarily blinded, to get on the other side of the bridge and laugh. He couldn't see though and bumped into a basket made of rope, apologized and stumbled backwards into the walk, doubling over with laughter when something ran into him so hard he and it fell to the sand in a mess of tangled cloth and appendages.
They rolled away from each other simultaneously, the other held her head and Quatre, who could not yet see blinked so that he could see this time to what he was apologizing. His vision began to clear and before him he saw a girl, sitting on her but holding her head saying "Ow."
Quatre jumped to her side and put a hand on her shoulder, "I'm so sorry, are you okay?!"
The girl looked up and smiled, "It's okay, I have a hard head."
Quatre laughed a little and looked to see if she was hurt. She had dark brown eyes that looked perpetually happy and sparkled in half moons. Her thick, black hair was tied back tightly in a purple velvet tie and flourished out in a curly bundle behind her head that reached her chin. She wore a course, poofy but light blouse and wet sand colored canvas pants held up with brick colored suspenders. She wore brown, elflike shoes on her feet that still managed to look of Cuatrican design. That might make sense considering long ago, before the war of All, Cuatrica had been close in trade (and kin) with elves.
Ahem, well, she was dirty, but not hurt, he concluded. She bounced back up to her feet and actually offered a hand to him. He took it in awe but after they had stood up she let go to wipe the sand off her pants and he followed suit. As they dusted themselves off Quatre stole another glance at her, she didn't look like a normal Cuatrican, her skin was much darker than any he had seen and, like him, she was pretty short.
She looked him up and down as well he noticed, before their eyes met. Again she offered her hand, but this time to shake it. "Hi, I'm Claudine," she smiled widely with her bright straight teeth. Quatre stood there, shaking her hand kind of dumbly, well, actually, it was dumbly since he wasn't saying anything. "And you are…?"
Quatre jerked his head a little, "Oh, I'm Quatre, hi, nice to meet you." That was in the wrong order,,, he realized.
Claudine gave him a sideways glance, "Right… may I ask, why were you laughing?" she tilted her head to the side cutely.
After Quatre stared at her another second, he finally answered, "Oh," he laughed in between, "These two old ladies-"
"Goat head!"
"Chicken butt!"
"At least my butt ain't as wide as a cow!"
"My face? I'd bet men would rather kiss a scorpion than you!" They were yelling in basic now. The woman draped in green ran out from behind the bridge towards the fountain and close on her tail was the other, trying to beat her with a cane.
As they ran past Quatre simply pointed, "That," he stated simply.
Claudine sweatdropped and followed them with her gaze, the green lady had jumped on the others back while she tried to whack her with the cane and sometimes missed and whacked both of them. The whole time they yelled out strange insults. After that pause, they both started laughing again at the same time. "That was pretty funny," Claudine stammered. "So what are you doing here?" she asked.
Quatre smirked, "I'm trying to pick up the latest gossip on the council conference, what about you?"
"Well why didn't you go to the meeting yourself, it was open to the public," she stated like she was trying to make an argument.
Quatre got a little defensive, "Well, I don't need to. I want the people's opinion."
This time Claudine smirked, "Oh, I see," she said mischievously.
Quatre got even more defensive, "What do you see?" he took a step back.
She looked around from side to side and reached into the pocket at her side, then paused. "I can't tell you out in the open, come on." With that flippant remark she started walking past the bridge, towards the fountain. Quatre caught up with her and tried to stay side by side through the crowds. They past someone selling eggs that tried to sell to them to them and that restarted their conversation. He was feeling a bit awkward, being carried off by this girl randomly.
"You don't like eggs?" Quatre asked, he wanted to know something, anything about this girl and possibly what she was thinking.
"Of course I like eggs, I just don't have the time or money for eggs."
"You had time for me…" Quatre said softly.
"There are several reasons," Claudine began, thoroughly enjoying the random topic of conversation. They weaved through crowds to the left to get into a back ally. They passed a quasi-stage that had belly dancers on it. Quatre glanced over but was much more interested in the egg conversation. "First, talking to you doesn't cost money, despite your unique charm of knocking people over-"
"I'm really sorry about that… Would you like me to buy you an egg?"
"-second, you amuse me," she said as she laughed at his response. "Third, you are cuter and most likely taste better than eggs," At that she turned and made snapping sounds with her teeth, Quatre took this as her answer and blushed. Claudine, in turn laughed at his adorable reaction.
The crowd began thinning out as they weaved to the left until they walked down a straight sub-ally that had only a few people walking down it towards the fountain. In between two buildings Claudine led Quatre into a very narrow ally. He looked suspiciously at her. Although he doubted that she was going to try to hurt him she could try to rob him or… Quatre blushed. He really didn't know her that well at all.
"Um, Claudine?" He asked before entering the extremely narrow alley with her. It was rather dark so that the shadow had already covered and hidden her body.
She stepped out briefly only to grab Quatre's hand and drag him back into the alley with her. Quatre swallowed and tried to fight her off… sort of, when she turned to face him. "As unlikely as it is that you are from the east," Before Quatre could even see Claudine pulled a small dagger from her side pouch and held it pointing at his throat, "I cannot trust a stranger that talks like a spy," her voice lowered dangerously and Quatre tried to take a step back.
Claudine lunged a little and brought the dagger to the side of his throat, preventing further movement. Quatre started to stammer a question when Claudine cut in, "No excuses, who are you… mage?!"
His mouth clamped shut and his eyed widened, Quatre succeeded in taking a shocked step back, it was enough movement to draw a thin line of red on the side of his throat. The pain was forgotten by Quatre, he looked at Claudine in confusion and asked in an unbelieving whisper, "M-…Mage?"
After glancing at the cut she had made on Quatre's neck Claudine got close to him again, regained her threatening position easily and answered with an affirmative, "Mn," deep in her throat.


I will leave you in suspense there. I forgot to yell, REVIEW ME!!!!!!!!! It makes me so happy. Is Quatre really a mage? Who is Claudine? Why didn't I make this a lemon? (Claudine'd get mad… maybe. Yes, she's a real person. :waves: HI CLAUDINE!) Will I ever regain my sanity? (Claudine: No. And if you ever put me in a lemon I'll-) Hope your enjoying, bai -MaraJadeblu