A/N: Thank you for the words of encouragement, Pokeyonekenobie - I needed that; I'm trying to not let the lack of feedback get to me, and press on with the story! This is the longest chapter yet, and I sincerely hope you all enjoy, and hopefully those of you following along will get some answers to some question you may have had - enjoy!
"Now entering Earth's atmosphere; steady on, everyone." Wufei announced, activating his mecha's stabilizers and cooling systems - they had made good time back to the planet they for the moment called home; no need to muck things up now by breaking up before they had managed to breach the atmosphere.
It was rough going as always - one would think a man would get used to the experience after so many re-entries, but anyone who felt that to be so was sadly mistaken; the violent vibrations through every joint, every muscle...the intensity of the heat, even in spite of the cooling systems was damn near unbearable and had they all not been properly trained to endure such conditions, there was no doubt that any one of them if not all could potentially lose consciousness during the endeavor.
Just as they entered the stratosphere, a transmission from the rebel base on the blue planet was raised on all the communication hub of all five pilots - a code blue; a code blue meant that it was extremely urgent that they respond as soon as was physically possible - the only higher code color being red.
Without hesitation, Wufei opened his hailing frequencies to respond, "This is Chang Wufei of Gundam Shenlong - state your business."
"This is Sergeant Forester of the rebel base at the EURO point," The voice answered, sounding incredibly tense; all the pilots were listening in at this point and knew that tone to mean that there was bad news and that the owner of the voice was silently praying that they wouldn't kill the messenger, "I've received word from Lieutenant Baudin that the charge you assigned him to deliver and collect from Skyview wasn't there upon his arrival."
No one uttered a word, left in a stunned silence - they knew far better by now than to even consider the idea of Sidra running off; she had no where to go, and not many, if any, would be willing to harbor a teenage runaway.
"He went on to say that he checked the school, but that it closed early due to massive flooding of the first floor and sports fields, and he considered that maybe she had simply walked home." the sergeant continued slowly, measuring his words carefully under the intense stares of the five pilots on screen; their lips pursed, jaws set, eyes fixed ahead, they waited for the final blow to rain down, "However...when he arrived at the safe house, there was no response...the door was still locked and the lights were off as well...so...I'm afraid she's either gone AWOL...or been abduct-!"
The pilots closed the connection before the poor man had a chance to finish his sentence and changed course to the high school; all of them were on the same train of thought - Peter White had made his move, and there was no time for idle chatter.
"Damn it." Wufei cursed, grinding his teeth as he increased Shenlong's speed to its maximum, "Damn it all...we should have just left her on base where she would have been safe. Damn it all."
"She had better be alive." Quatre's voice cut through the apprehensive silence, startling them all with the iciness in his voice; on the view screen, his eyes had frozen over sending a wave of unease down the spines of his fellow pilots, "On Allah's name, woe betide him if she's dead."
"Don't worry." Duo replied coldly, his devil may care smile replaced by deep frown, his eyes flashing with rage, "He'll have a date with his maker if she's hurt."
"...since when have you two started caring for her so much?" Wufei remarked, raising an eyebrow in surprise; he knew all too well that Quatre and Duo were two men to not be crossed and what earning their anger meant - they both had such a good handle on their emotions that when they were well and truly enraged that even demons would quake before them.
However, he hadn't really noticed any changes in their behavior towards her...but then again, pilot's 2 and 4 had always been the most warm and accepting; perhaps that is what wound up forsaking them - that because they were who they were, that they had already accepted her into their hearts as a friend and that's why they were so outraged.
"Don't pretend as though you don't." came Trowa's matter of fact reply, "I don't know about you Wufei, but I consider her a ally if nothing else - you can only spend so much time with a person before you begin to care about them and take their welfare into consideration."
"I agree." Heero interjected, his tone as even and unreadable as ever, his expression on the monitor the only thing betraying him, "Even if we didn't care for her, its also a direct assault on my pride as a soldier that someone may have potentially abducted her out from under us - on our home front no less."
"Well when he puts it like that..." Wufei thought to himself, feeling the heat of slowly building anger rising in his chest, as they approached the school at breakneck speeds, "...then I definitely can't let this slide - regardless of how useless that girl may be, I can not let this stand; it would leave such a ugly stain on my record."
"Let's move." Trowa commanded, taking charge of the situation and giving orders to his fellow pilots, "Quatre and Wufei, go check the school – inside and out; be as thorough as you can and move quickly. Duo and Heero, check her usually walking route – look for any side paths, parks, anywhere she could have potentially wandered. I'm going to check the house – reconvene there in seventeen hundred hours whether she's been found or not."
"Roger that." Quatre replied sharply, nodding at Wufei as the pair took off towards the school.
"Seventeen hundred hours – copy that." Wufei responded, struggling to keep up with Gundam Sandrock.
"Understood." Heero murmured, redirecting his mecha towards the well beaten path he had watched the Heavyarms pilot walk with their red-headed roommate.
"Over and out." Duo said, in a far more officious tone than anyone was used to him evoking, following close behind Wing Zero.
"…alright…where did you wander off to, girl?" Trowa murmured, taking to the skies in the direction of the safe house they called home, hoping that maybe Lieutenant Baudin had made a careless oversight and that Sidra was just asleep somewhere in the house, even though his intuition told him otherwise.
"How much longer..." Peter rasped, his fingers digging painfully into my shoulders; I bit my lip to keep from crying out in pain, "How much longer do you intend to haunt me, Sidra? How much longer do you intend to torment me with the guilt of killing the only woman I ever truly loved?"
The tension fled from my jaw as I reflexively unclenched my teeth from pure shock, "...what did you just?"
"Years, Sidra...I liked you - loved you...for years...since we were eight and nine years old." Peter...no...Daniel hissed furiously, grey eyes flashing with rage, his grip growing even tighter, "When we were kids, I knew that I liked you - your smile, your laugh, your curiosity, your kindness, your cute face - everything. I thought that you may have liked me too, and after a few years of watching you, I grew certain of it, but for whatever reason, you never came forward so...I decided to give you a little push."
Realization flooded my mind; months of torment - the taunting, the teasing, the endless stream of notes in my locker, backpack and desk, "It was you...you're the one that started the rumor that I-!"
"Yes." he replied curtly, his eyes boring painfully into mine at an uncomfortably close distance, "I thought that maybe once the rumor reached your friends, that they would coax you into confessing to me and that we would finally be together - I never thought things would escalate the way they did...never dreamed that the entire student body would get involved...that you would completely retreat within yourself and away from me."
A smile, completely devoid of any warmth crossed his face, sending another pang of fear through my chest; he was insane...completely and utterly mad - how could I have been so blind?
"That was my first glimpse into the depths of the true ugliness within our school." Daniel murmured, mouth twisting into a cruel grin, moving away from me just long enough to remove his glasses and tuck them in his shirt pocket, "I found out sometime later that my own girlfriend had been one of the ring leaders of the entire affair; jealousy can be such an ugly thing, my dear...and then I found myself thinking...wouldn't it be good to purge the entire place of such vile creatures?"
My mind was blank, entirely incapable of making a single word reach my mouth; why was he telling me all of this - what did he intend to do?
"I planned it out for months." Daniel said softly, releasing his grip on my left shoulder to start running his fingers gently through my hair; it took everything I possessed not to flinch away in utter disgust, "The day I so foolishly spread those careless whispers through the hallowed halls of that school was just perfect - I decided I would start from up top and work my way down; I'm ashamed to admit, how thoroughly caught up in the affair I became - I never knew before that time how easy it was...killing."
I could scarcely breath from terror; he not only killed our classmates, our friends...but he had enjoyed it? I had to continuously swallow now to keep the vomit from rising in my throat - how? When had this gentle boy whom I'd adored so much become such a twisted soul?
"The last classroom...I was so enthralled with what I was doing, I completely forgot it was yours." he remarked, his eyes clouding, "By the time I'd realized whom I had aimed my gun at...it was too late - your cute face...your sweet, adorable face...splattered across the tile floor - your remaining eye staring at me in disbelief and fear; I couldn't believe what I had done."
Daniel was no longer looking into my eyes, but rather the earth just beside my head, his hand returning to my shoulder in its achingly tight grip as I will myself not to move, not to scream; nothing that would potentially set him off as he continued with his monologue.
"I couldn't live with myself knowing I had murdered you...so before trial, I hung myself in my holding cell." Daniel spoke, locking his eyes with mine once more, "For whatever reason, I didn't die...for a few brief moments I thought that perhaps I had been discovered before my makeshift noose could do its work and had been cut down and revived...but when I regained consciousness, in a manner of speaking, I discovered that either everyone around me had grown several feet within minutes...or I had shrunk."
Confusion filled me momentarily before shattering realization hit me face first; he had been reborn into this universe!
"My parents were not my parents...when I finally managed to find a mirror, I saw to my astonishment, the face of an unfamiliar child staring back at me." he breathed, lowering himself so that our foreheads touched and that looking away was no longer possible, "I thought that perhaps the forces that be were offering me a chance of redemption. I lived under the name that my new parents gave me, walked the straight and narrow, and tried my best to live a good life; I was finally starting to move on from what I had done...to atone for my crimes...and then you went and reappeared again - like a nightmare to remind me of all that I had done!"
Daniel's face was contorted with rage, the heat of his anger radiating off of him burning my face, "I couldn't understand it - why were you here? Was I hallucinating? That couldn't be so since it would mean the entire school was as well - no matter how I looked at it, it was you - just as you had been before I inadvertently killed you." he spat, his hand whipping off my shoulders to grip my neck, choking my air off and sending panic shooting through every nerve at the sudden lack of oxygen, "I hate to do this Sid...but I can't live with the guilt - not again...so please be a dear and just die, okay? I'm sorry - I love you."
Any thoughts of not setting him off fled my mind as I began to twist and thrash beneath him in a violent effort to save my own life; this only caused his grip to tighten even moreso and I felt the strength begin to leave me as my vision tunneled on his face; my brain had somehow managed to zero in on his eyes and with one last remaining burst of strength, I drove my fingers into them.
He howled in pain and instinctively released his hold on me to cover his injured organs, giving me my only opportunity to signal for help; my throat tight and swollen, I drew in a deep breath...and screamed louder than I ever knew I was capable of - it echoed off the trees and high into the sky and I could only hope to god that some passerby had managed to hear me since as soon as I'd loosed it, Daniel had stumbled back to me and kicked me hard in the face.
Quatre shoved his bangs out of his eyes and wiped beads of anxious sweat from his brow - he and Wufei had scoured the school top to bottom without seeing a single soul; it was unnervingly quiet, to the point where the pair's footsteps echoed off the walls and ceilings - they were truly alone in the building so staying inside made no sense.
It didn't take long for the pair to regroup and agree to start searching the grounds, and no sooner than they had set foot outside the structure that a long,, loud, desperate, terrified scream cut the air; the anguish in it was not lost on the pair, nor was how suddenly it cut off and after sharing a fleeting look of panic, Quatre and Wufei raced off towards its source - a copse of trees on the edge of the property.
Quatre couldn't remember the last time he had run so fast, nor did he care to at the moment; the two skidded to a stop just before the end of the tree line to prevent themselves from running off the top of a very steep hill - there she was, being kicked and stomped on by a wild-eyed Peter White.
What happened next was a bit of a blur to him, a bit of an out of body experience; Quatre wasn't certain how he had reached the boy so quickly, when he'd started raining down on him with his fists - but he was certain that he heard someone screaming at him to stop...a familiar voice...Sidra.
"Quatre - stop!" Sidra's frightened, petrified voice broke through the haze; he turned to look at her - bruises were already forming on her neck and face, blood was running down her chin and dripping out of her nose, her green eyes were shining with fear and incredible sadness as a stunned Wufei held her upright, looking dumbfounded as to the words leaving her swollen, colorless lips, "Stop it Quatre! No more - please...no more!"
"He's beaten you within an inch of your life...almost kills you...and you want him to stop?" Wufei asked, looking at Sidra as though she was completely out of her mind, "I've heard of Stockholm Syndrome, but this is just...I don't know what this is."
"It's not going to fix anything!" she rasped painfully, shaking Wufei off her and collapsing almost instantly to the ground; she dug her fingers into the soft soil before her, "It's not going to change anything if you kill him - it wont bring back anyone he's killed, it wont bring me back to life in my own present...nothing will change other than one more life that will stain your hands and haunt you."
"Sidra..." Quatre murmured, a feeling of dread creeping into his stomach as she dragged herself over to them; he wasn't moving from atop his current perch on Peter's stomach - the odds were too high of him attempting to harm her again...but then what Sidra said hit him, "Wait a minute...he's killed before? ...what do you mean bring you back to li-"
"There is no way...no freaking way." Wufei muttered, his eyes bigger than anyone present believed them to be capable of becoming as the illogical, impossible reality of the situation struck him, "Are you really expecting us to believe that this kid is...that he's-"
"Daniel..." Sidra said softly, unable to bring herself to look at any of them, leaving the pilots in a shocked silence; Quatre remembered that name all too well - reading that name on his laptop screen far too well...was he really and truly pinning her murderer to the ground?
"Daniel...what you've done...is dreadful..." she whispered hoarsely, eyes still fixed on the ground, "Horrendous...I should hate you with all of my being...but I don't."
"You...what?" the pale boy croaked, grey eyes widening in surprise as he twisted beneath the blond boy restraining him to peer at her; all three men stared at her incredulously as tears began to run down her cheeks.
"You and I...we were children...we were afraid." Sidra breathed, choking slightly on her words as she bit back a sob, "Look at us, Daniel...this is where the path of fear has led us...all because two stupid kids were too scared of the judgement of our classmates, our friends, and one another to say three simple words."
The three men watched in dumbfounded silence as she lifted her head to look at Daniel, tears quietly falling down her face, "Your own fear guided you to do stupid, twisted things in an attempt to make me move first...from their your fear transformed to anger upon the failure of your plan...your fear caused people to die, Daniel...caused me to die, at your hand...but I forgive you."
Quatre couldn't believe what he was hearing, and Wufei was for once in his life at a total loss for words or any sarcastic comeback.
"Even if the world doesn't forgive you...I forgive you...so please...please forgive yourself." Sidra murmured, her eyes growing wide as she watched Daniel's face slacken, his eyes roll back in his head as he fell back on the ground apparently unconscious, "Daniel?"
Quatre tore his eyes away from the girl and climbed off the boy he had been restraining; it looked as though he had fainted from shock, but as soon as it had happened, he regained consciousness, a strange look of bewilderment filling his pale face.
"Wh-whaa? ...where is this? ...where are my glasses?" the boy asked, patting the ground next to him before fumbling with his shirt pocket; the pilots watched quietly as he put on the wire rim frames and adjusted them on the bridge of his nose before noticing the battered red-head to his left, "Baker? Oh my god, what happened to you?! ...and for that matter,, where are we exactly?"
Wufei opened his mouth to speak only to be immediately silenced by a violent wave of Sidra's hand, urging him to stay quiet, "P-Peter? We...uh...we were getting some last minute supplies for that science project in Professor Knowles class, and you tripped and...I tried to grab you and it only made things worse and we both wound up falling down here."
"Ohhh, okay...umm...and who are those two exactly?" he asked, nodding towards Wufei and Quatre, an inquisitive look on his face as he peered at them; appearing as though he'd never seen them before in his life.
"My adopted brothers - you must have seen them pick me up from school every now and then." She replied smoothly, glancing at the pilots in a way that screamed, 'Just play along', "I screamed for help since I couldn't carry you and they heard me and...well...here we are."
"Oh yeah!" the boy smiled brightly, seemingly oblivious as to what had just transpired moments before, "Now I remember - good thing they were close by. Do you think you'll be able to make it home okay?"
"...I think I'll manage, Peter." Sidra murmured, giving the pale boy a strained smile as he climbed to his feet and dusted the dirt off himself; Quatre shot her a look that she chose to ignore, "What on earth is happening right now?" he thought to himself, sharing an equally bewildered look with Wufei.
"Alright then - I'll see you later then, Baker!" he responded with a grin and a hearty wave over his shoulder as he jogged up the hill and out of sight.
When the pilots were certain the boy was out of earshot, they both advanced on Sidra and asked the obvious question that was on both of their minds, "Okay, what the hell was that about?"
"Daniel's gone." she answered, her voice tight and laced with exhaustion, "Who left just now wasn't the person who murdered me in my time, tried to kill me moments ago, nor were they the person who terrorized me these last few weeks."
"Oh really, now?" Wufei barked, grabbing her by her shirt front and dragging her so close that they were nose to nose, "Then who pray tell just ran up that hill and left you here? The Easter Bunny?"
"No...who left just now was...well...Peter...the real Peter." Sidra mumbled, forcing herself to look Wufei directly in the eyes, "The Peter who belongs in this world. Daniel just...I dunno...moved on, I guess...The fear that filled me whenever he was close vanished in an instant - Daniel doesn't exist in this world anymore."
"I see..." Quatre said, his voice laced with doubt - the situation with Sidra just got more and more unbelievable, "Did you at least find out why he was threatening you?"
"Guilt." She replied as a grumbling Wufei walked a few feet away to contact the other pilots, muttering to himself that she was completely out of her mind, "He loved me, but was too afraid to tell me, just like I was too afraid to tell him...things got out of control, and after accidentally killing me, he lost himself to despair and committed suicide, only to be reborn in this world...he tried so hard to atone and come to terms with what he'd done when...I reappeared and all of his guilt came crashing down on him and he couldn't take it so..."
"So he tried to eliminate the source." Quatre finished, a bit unnerved at the amount of sense this normally preposterous dialogue made, "And by forgiving him, you allowed him to finally forgive himself and pass on...which in turn allowed the Peter of this world to establish control with the memories Daniel made intact."
"I'm sure that to the real Peter, it felt like a long dream." Sidra sighed, not resisting as Quatre lifted her on to his back, letting her head fall against his shoulder, "I'm just glad Daniel took those more violent moments with him - the last thing I want is another guilty soul."
The two of us quickly caught up to joined Wufei and made our way back up the hill, through the soggy, mud-covered fields and down the road towards the safe house in an exhausted silence; my head rested on the crook of Quatre's neck, arms hanging listlessly over his shoulders, the boy in question shifting my weight slightly every so often - Wufei lead the way, looking a combination of frazzled and lost in thought.
"What will you guys do with me...if the doctors can't send me back?" I asked softly, too tired to bother with raising my head; Quatre fell back a few steps and slowed his stride a bit - it was funny, now that I was so close, I got a first hand account of his thinking noises.
"Well, in the event of that happening, you still wouldn't have to worry." he finally answered, resuming his normal pace, "We wouldn't just abandon you after all this. If push comes to shove, we'll make sure you're well taken care of."
"Don't presume to speak for everyone." Wufei mumbled under his breath from up ahead, his tone was enough to make me raise my eyes ever so slightly to look at him; I'm fairly certain he didn't think I could hear him as the moment he caught my eyes, he quickly looked away.
"Fine then - I would take care of you." Quatre shot back a bit louder than necessary, making sure that the boy in front of us knew we'd heard him; I couldn't help but smirk a bit as Wufei blushed for the first time I could recall - it was funny since I didn't know he was the type to go red all the way to his ears, "You would be more than welcome to stay with my family in the Winner Resource Colony - goodness knows my sisters would adore someone new to fuss over...my father mayyy have something to say about it, but never mind him."
I'm glad he couldn't see my face at the moment as it was currently filled with surprise - he had inadvertently told me where exactly in the series I had wound up - if his father and sisters were still alive, then that meant that I was somewhere in the middle of the OZ arc before the private outpost had turned its cannons on the Winner Resource Satellite, decimating most [if not all] of his family.
I wasn't sure what to do with this particular tidbit of information - I wanted to let him and the other pilots know of what was to come, but I wondered what exactly would happen if I did; goodness knows that my existence there most certainly had caused things to drift in directions it shouldn't, and even though it pained me...I knew I couldn't say a single thing without disrupting the course of this Universe's grander design more than I already had.
I loosed a shuddering sigh into Quatre's shoulder as the safe house loomed into view - the remaining three pilots, looking exhausted but relieved, waiting on the stoop for our arrival; Duo [surprise, surprise] was the first to jog over, meeting us before we made it halfway up the walk, "Good to see you, girly - you sure do have a penchant for scaring people, yknow that?"
"Sorry." I murmured, raising my head to smile sluggishly at him, wincing as a sharp pain shot through my neck as I turned to look at him; it wasn't lost on the Deathscythe pilot as he reached out and moved a section of overgrown curls away from my neck, loosing a low whistle at the sight of the choke bruises I was certain had risen to the surface.
"That kid did a real number on you." Trowa remarked, opening the door and holding it open to allow Quatre to enter unobstructed, "I'll go prepare some vinegar compresses - it wont help with the pain, but it will cause the marks to fade exponentially faster."
"Delightful." I mumbled, nose scrunching up at the thought of the horrible smell that was soon to envelop my person as Quatre set me down carefully on the couch.
"We'll have to come up with a believable alibi to have you excused for the rest of the week." Heero mused as his fellow pilots began to disperse to their quarters to finally start getting settled back in after the stress-filled week.
"Bronchitis." I replied quietly, Heero's eyebrow raising slightly at the unprompted suggestion, "One of my friends at school...she has it...its real contagious."
"Good thinking." Duo replied with a smile as he re-emerged from his room and descending the stairs in a oversized sweater and sweats, "For now though, hold your breath - I do believe Trowa's finished making those compresses."
I made a face and did just that; the day had been dreadful - I was achy, sore, emotionally drained, and being turned into a human sized pickle...but in spite of all that, I was just grateful that they were finally home.
A/N: Sidra recovers, orders for a new mission involving none other than Relena Peacecraft come in from headquarters, and someone makes an unexpected housecall