13) Heero & the Hacker

The five Gundams stood "inconspicuously" in a large clearing waiting for Phase Three to end so they could go pick Kaila, Yumi and Heero back up. Cheyenne wearily climbed out of Blizzard-Cry and sat on its foot. After a minute the rest of the pilots followed suit, each sitting at the foot of their respective Gundams.

"We're relatively safe for now," Quatre said for no reason. His mind was really on Yumi, wondering if she was okay and hoping that she hadn't met with any opposition.

Cheyenne glared at him and waved her hand around the clearing. "Are you kidding me? Are you trying to say that no-one is able to see our Gundams from air, ground or sea! Look at these things! They're like eight billion feet tall! Even a blind man would know we were here! Ya can't hide these things! Not even with your special leaf thing you did, Trowa! I don't care, but you can't make a Gundam invisible by piling leaves over it-"

"What's with you?" Wufei snapped. He glanced around the clearing and rested a hand on his sword. "Are you scared or something, Woman?"

"No! Just cautious is all."

"But Blizzard-Cry can cloak us all…did you forget?" Duo asked his cousin.

"Umm, oh yeah. Page 33," she began to recite it. "'One exciting feature of your new Gundam, Prototype B-23-C128-7 is the special cloaking device that can cloak either it or any friendly Gundam in the area'." She shrugged. "So?"

Wufei groaned. "Don't tell me you didn't turn the cloaking device on?"

Cheyenne only shrugged helplessly. All four guys clapped their hands to their foreheads as she quickly leapt up Blizzard-Cry to activate the cloaking device.

(*)

Kaila and Heero floated above the building after Yumi hit the gravitational switch.

Heero nodded to Kaila and began to swim as if he was in water. "Phase One and Two are complete. Phase Three is now beginning. Let's go. I'll cover you." He took his gun out and motioned for Kaila to proceed ahead of him.

Kaila nodded and side stroked in front of him, then down the stairway and towards the computer control room. She clearly remembered the way to go since Quatre had drilled her on maps of the place over and over again until she knew it like she knew her own bedroom. As she swam through the hallways, she was glad for his drilling though: now she didn't have to waste her time trying to figure out where to go.

Heero was right behind her, his eyes scanning the hallway left and right, watching Kaila's back as he did so. Just then, a young man passed underneath them and screamed.

"WHAAAT? It's the Gundam pilots! Everybody run for your-" He immediately stopped raving when Heero pointed his gun at him.

"Shut up. You never saw us. We were never here."

"R-r-r-r-right," the young man nodded. (Yumi would have recognized him as Treizster.)

Kaila ignored the two's conversation, concentrating instead on her goal. The next part of the mission was solely dependant on her.

(*)

"So now whatta we do?" Cheyenne asked. She was still sitting on Blizzard-Cry's foot with her hands on her cheeks, bored to tears.

"We sit and wait 'til it's time to pick everyone up," Duo explained.

"Are you kidding me? We just sit here and look at each other?"

The boys sat, looked at each other and shrugged. Cheyenne huffed and dragged her knees to her chest, shaking her head in incredulity. After several minutes of silence that was only broken by the occasional cough and/or sneeze, Duo suddenly piped up.

"All right! Fine!" He leapt up and began to dance around. "Duo Duo Bo Boo-oh, Banana Fanna Fo Foo-oh, Me My Mo Moo-oh, Duo!"

Quatre grinned and caught on to the Name Game song. "Quatre Quatre Bo Battra, Banana Fanna Fo Fattra, Me My Mo Mattra, Quatre!"

"Cheyenne, Cheyenne Bo Bye-Anne, Banana Fanna Fo Fy-Anne, Me My Mo My-Anne, Cheyenne!" Cheyenne grinned and added her name to the list.

Trowa shrugged and sang his name as well, in monotone of course. "Trowa Trowa Bo Boa, Banana Fanna Fo Foa, Me My Mo Moa, Trowa." When he was done, everyone turned expectantly to Wufei who glared at them with his arms crossed.

"Yeah, right," Wufei rolled his black eyes. "There's no justice in singing that ridiculous song."

"Sure there is!" Duo grinned. "Wufei Wufei Bo Boofay, Banana Fanna Fo Foo-fay, Me My Mo Moo-fay, Wufei!" Then he fell onto his back in laughter. The rest of the group laughed too…except for Wufei who didn't find his name slandered funny at all.

"Oh, lighten up, Wufei!" Cheyenne said.

Wufei shook his head but moved to sit next to her. "At least sing a song with a little more respect!" he snapped.

"Like what? The Macarena?" Duo asked.

Wufei snorted. "No…like…like, "This is the song that never ends, it just goes on and on, my friend-"

Duo laughed and joined him. "Some people started singing it not knowing what it was-"

"And they'll just keep on singing it forever just because this is the song that never ends-" Trowa added.

"It just goes on and on, my friend!" Quatre began to harmonize. "Some people started singing it not knowing what it was-"

"And they'll just keep on singing it forever just because this is the song that never ends-" Wufei picked it back up.

"Stop it, stop it, stop it!" Cheyenne yelled, covering her ears. "I absolutely hate that song! It has got to be the most pointless song in the world!"

"Awww," Duo pouted.

"We are some bored souls," Trowa shook his head. Quatre smiled and began to sing in words that were foreign to Cheyenne's ears. She looked at him curiously.

"What's that?" she asked.

"An Arabic folk song," Quatre answered, still smiling.

Cheyenne blinked. "You're Arab?"

"He's an Arabian prince," Duo corrected her.

Cheyenne's eyes widened. "Really? That's SO unexpected! And cool!"

"It's not really that big a deal," Quatre shrugged.

"No, it really isn't," Wufei added.

Cheyenne frowned. "Oh…okay, then."

Silence.

Cricket, cricket.

"So…" Duo began.

Cricket, cricket.

Cheyenne sighed and lay on her back, looking up at the sky. "Let's just sit here and enjoy nature."

The boys appeared to heed her suggested and were quiet for a few minutes…at least until Wufei grinned evilly at her.

"This is the song that never ends…"

(*)

Kaila sat at a computer terminal typing furiously into it. Heero had managed to somehow keep the gravity level down in their room, allowing them to walk on the floor instead of float above it. He was standing by the door, monitoring the hallway outside for any intruders as she worked. The room was dark and the computer and chair were the only objects inside it with the gleam from the computer screen being her only light.

She continued to type until the computer beeped. Immediately a screen came up asking for a password and she sighed heavily. "Okay, here goes everything. Heero, quick, give me five one-digit numbers."

"One, two, three, four and five," Heero answered without turning from the door.

"You are so creative." She punched the numbers in. "Now, give me a letter. Actually, give me two."

"G and W."

She shook her head and typed the letters in. When the computer started to process the password she immediately knocked on the screen three times and then typed her name in on the keyboard. The screen turned neon green. "Huh?"

Heero finally turned to her. "It's not working?"

Kaila shook her head, baffled. "I…I don't get it. It's…"

He came to her side and leant against the desk, facing her with his arms crossed. "What's the problem?"

"The screen," she gestured to it. "It's not supposed to turn neon green! It's supposed to turn black!"

"So this is bad."

"Yeah, I-" She cut herself off when she heard several voices shouting down the hall. "Crap! They know we're here!"

"They've known we were here for a quite a while, they just didn't know where," he replied calmly. He turned the safety off his gun and walked back to the door.

Kaila allowed her rarely seen vulnerable side to surface as she looked at his back. "Heero, what am I supposed to do?"

"You're the hacker in this mission, not me." He crouched down and aimed his gun down the hall. "Figure it out."

Kaila bit her lip and continued to stare at the screen. Then in frustration, she balled her hand into a fist and rapped the top of the computer three times. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGH!" she screamed. Immediately, the computer lit back up and she was ready to roll. "Hah, just like my old TV at school…"

"Good job, unfortunately, we're short for time," Heero remarked from his corner as the voices got closer. "Do your worst, and hurry."

She nodded and rapidly typed into the colony's computer. As she typed, her light brown eyes scanned over the folders, trying to find the right one. Finally she just used her mouse to hit the "Explore files" button. Immediately a box appeared saying "Password needed" and since she didn't have a password for this part of the job, the box quickly switched to say "Logging off."

She hastily reached into her leather pocket and pulled out the only gadget she had: her Hacker's Aid5009. She grimaced and reached behind the CPU, placing the Hacker's Aid5009 into a plug there. Immediately several beeps sounded and the object countered the log-off function.

Heero tensed as the voices became ever louder and turned his head to monitor Kaila's work. With a frown, he shook his head. "What are you doing? Releasing the virus from there would take too long. Go to the server," he ordered.

Kaila narrowed her eyes. "All right, all right. I was just doing a little back-up."

"No time for that."

"Hey, I'm the hacker here, remember?" she retorted. Still, she clicked on the "Find" button, typed in "Server" and was immediately led to the mainframe. She grunted as the hard part began. Everything she typed into the server came up as "Command not found." Beads of sweat began to form on her forehead as she outsmarted the computer's locking codes left and right. It was almost a battle of wills until finally...

"Bingo. Access Granted. I'm in the Mobile Suit Starter Files..." Kaila smiled grimly. "Say bye-bye." She typed in the numbers five, zero, zero and nine which activated the Hacker's Aid5009. "Virus initiated. It'll crash in two minutes," she murmured as the screen started to blink and a dancing fish with a hammer ran back and forth in the background. "Now that's creative." Her part of the mission was almost done.

"Done?" Heero grunted from the door.

She was about to respond when she remembered the "Explore files" window she'd seen before. With a satisfied grin, she brought it up and scanned the folders. She saw one called "Gundam" and nodded, pleased with herself. "I knew this would come in handy," she murmured. "Don't want them having any more info on us then they need." She erased file after file of documents as well as profiles, pictures and any other information Colony Twelve had on the Gundams, Medora University and their organization. By the time that was done, Heero was shooting at people from the door.

"Let's go, Kaila," he grunted as bullets whizzed past his head.

"Just let me…" Kaila quickly tried to find anything else that had to do with their school. She noticed a file entitled "Spies" and clicked on it. Immediately Dorothy's information came up. "Dorothy was that Shadow Walker spy, right. But this file says there are two spies in Medora University? Who's-"

Before she could read anything about the second spy, the dancing fish on the screen began to laugh and swing its hammer. The computer shut down, "VIRUS COMPLETE" came up and Heero ran into the room, slamming the door behind him.

"Done?" he asked again, looking around the room quickly.

"Um...yes, done," Kaila answered, storing the spy info in her mind for later contemplation. She retrieved her Hacker's Aid5009, stuffed it in her pocket and took her machine gun rifle off her back. "Are we going to retaliate?"

"No time for that. We've got to get out of here."

"Um…but the path we were supposed to leave by-"

"-Is no good." He shook his head.

"How about the air vent?"

"Don't be an idiot." He went over to the one window in the room. "This will have to do."

She trailed him to the window, looked down, gulped and pulled back. "Now you're kidding! We're like ten stories up!" Heero only shrugged, put his gun back into its holster and stepped onto the windowsill as he opened the window itself. "Heero, I am so not following you," Kaila huffed.

"You got a better idea?"

"Give me a few minutes. I'm bound to come up with something."

"We don't have a few minutes."

As if to prove his point, three bullets suddenly flew through the door. Kaila shrieked and ducked.

Heero nodded. "Now, do you trust me?"

"What?"

"Do you trust me?" He held out a hand to her.

She looked at it curiously but finally put a hand on her hips. "Trust you with my precious life and a ten story drop? Heck no!"

"So much for the Aladdin approach," he shrugged and grabbed her arm. "We're jumping."

(*)

Cheyenne looked up from her poker game with Duo and then at her watch. "Um, isn't it about that time to pick 'em up?" she asked hesitantly. All four guys looked at her with terrified looks on their faces.

"Oh CRAAAP!" Duo jumped up, making his poker cards fly everywhere in the process.

"I think that means you win," Trowa uttered from his place next to Cheyenne as he helped her up.

"Shy, why didn't you say something before?" Quatre complained, fretting about his teammates already.

Cheyenne motioned angrily. "I thought you all knew something I didn't. I mean, dang, is the newbie supposed to know EVERYTHING?"

"Of course not. They're slacking, that's all," Wufei replied from behind her.

She turned to him in surprise. It took a moment for her to register that he was actually agreeing with her for once. "Um…right…they're…they're slacking…"

Wufei tapped his watch. "C'mon woman, don't follow their example."

Cheyenne watched him run over to his Gundam in surprise. 'Now that was different,' she mused.

(*)

"LET ME GO!" Kaila struggled with Heero but he had her upper arm in a death grasp and once he stepped off the ledge, she did too.

"You are craaaaaaaaaaaaazyyyyyyyyyyyyy!" Kaila yelled. She began to pray fervently as she saw her life pass before her eyes. "Oh Lord, if you let me live through this, I promise to do all my homework and never look off of Naomi's notes ever again-"

"Roll!" Heero yelled.

"What?" She could barely hear him with all the wind rushing in her ears.

"Roll!" he repeated, letting go of her arm and tucking his knees to his chest.

Kaila whimpered and did the same as the world became a blur in her eyesight.

Immediately, Heero came out of his roll and took something from his pocket, pushing a button. A wire shot from the object, connecting to a building across for them. "Hand!" he ordered. Kaila barely had time to react and she flung a hand towards him. He grabbed it as they swung at an alarming rate towards a brick wall.

The impact hurt...a lot; but at least they weren't falling anymore. Kaila continued breathing heavily while looking up at Heero and then down to the ground. They were still too high to jump without breaking anything.

"Where the heck did you get that Batman thingie?" she asked. "And how come you and Yumi get all the cool gadgets and all I get is the Hacker's Aid5009?"

"This isn't quite the time or place to wonder this..." Heero replied.

Kaila looked down, clung closer to him, bit her lip and nodded. "Right." Her eyes widened when a soldier appeared at a window across from them with a gun. "He's gonna shoot!" she screamed. And shoot he did.

The first couple of shots were embarrassingly bad. One was so far off that Kaila had to laugh.

"Geez, where'd YOU learn how to shoot? The Guns for Goofs school?" she scoffed. "Hi, my name is DORKWAD, and I'm a stupid solider who can't shoot a gun! Oh look at me, I don't know what a bullet is! I have no AIM!"

The soldier glared at her and disappeared from view.

"You really shouldn't have done that," Heero murmured.

"And why not?" Kaila snapped. "Could things really get any worse?"

As if in answer, the soldier reappeared with a rocket launcher on his shoulder.

"HOLY CRAP!"

But the soldier got shot out of his perch and fell towards the ground himself. Kaila peered up as a large shadow covered both her and Heero. Duo's black Gundam Death-Scythe appeared between their two buildings.

"Miss me?" Duo's cheerful voice asked from Death-Scythe. He stretched the giant mobile suit's hand towards them so they could drop easily into it. When Kaila could stand on something solid again, she did something she'd never thought she would do: blow a kiss to Duo as Yumi had done to Quatre.

Duo laughed. "I'll take that as a yes, ya missed me. You guys okay?"

"Phases One through Three are completed. Yumi's working on Phase Four," Heero replied.

"Cool. Sit down guys; I'm talking y'all to safety. Good job!" Death-Scythe's hand closed over the two as the giant black Gundam flew back towards their makeshift camp.