CH 25

The light red haze of dust particles was bad today in sector eight. One of the filtration units to the dome must have decided to stop functioning after its constant operation to purify the air. It would take a while to be fixed again, not a lot of parts were available this far out in space. Only certain shuttles had the ability to access Mars and terraforming equipment was difficult to get a hold of at times. Many pieces of equipment to keep the dome in tact were held together by gum and duct tape. And that wasn't an exaggeration, it was fact.

Mars was an interesting place to work as a Preventer's officer. They didn't really have much policing work to actually do, despite the area being slightly over-run by what the government deemed undesirables'. Actually most of the Preventer officers out this far were undesirables themselves. The main job was to look for key rebels or terrorists and do intelligence gathering. General policing was occasionally done, but not often. Not this far out of the ESUN.

Most of the people realized on some level that if they went out of line and stirred up trouble here they would have nowhere to go. And almost everyone was carrying weaponry, including the scientists. they usually had the scariest weapons on them. You could heal from a bullet wound as long as it wasn't a head shot. You can't necessarily heal from an injection of unknown chemicals. Even the simplest potassium phosphate mainlined could kill you. Or they could just shut off the production lines to the oxygen producing bacteria within the dome and kill everyone.

So generally the Preventers weren't frowned upon out here, but they were not necessarily welcomed either. And most outlaws out here were on their last strings anyways. Everything was based on alliances or friendships. If you pissed one person off that could be twenty people that would no longer assist you in any way and that is a lot when each of the twenty established sectors had between two to twenty-three thousand people. Huge chunks of the populations could up and turn on you. If someone happened to turn up dead after a situation like that it was not much of a surprise and there was never much of an investigation into it either.

That happened to be a rare occurrence though. One that Zechs felt was ironic. There was less crime on Mars then there was anywhere else in the ESUN. Less murder, less robberies, less…everything really. Zechs sighed pulled his scarf down over his face further. It wouldn't due to breath in the fine red dust. You could end up sick for a long time. Red lung they called it. He walked into the bar that was his usual haunt and nodded to the bartender, who nodded in return and poured him a whiskey on the rocks. That was something that was not in short supply on this red dirt ball - booze. One advantage to having thieves be your neighbors is that they made sure contraband routes were always running. And while alcohol wasn't contraband, the government refused to add it to their 'necessary cargo' list.

Zechs took his usual spot at the bar and removed his scarf and jacket. It was beginning to heat up again now that the planet's long night cycle was over. Despite the engineers best efforts the temperature controls seemed to always not quite be able to keep up. That was fine though. He would prefer to keep breathing then worry about bundling up or sweating a little. Taking a pull from the glass that had been generously poured and placed in front of him, Zechs paused and looked around the bar. There were several small clusters. Some playing darts and cars. Other's watching the news feeds. Most of the faces seemed familiar, until his eyes landed on a man in a jacket at the far end of bar. He sat quietly by himself barely moving. Jacket still on with a high collar, high enough to block Zechs from seeing the man.

He caught the bartender's attention and nodded towards the stranger. The bartender glanced in the direction indicated turned back and shrugged his shoulder. Didn't recognize him, so he wasn't a regular, just here on a new shift.

Hiding within your jacket was not unusual, so that was not what Zechs fixated on at all. It was that on the bar next to the man's drink was a respirator. Most of the times when you were in the domes you simply wore a mask or a scarf, to keep the dust out, respirators were for travel outside the dome. They usually had oxygen hookups you wore in a back with liquid oxygen and heavy duty filtration. The person had a set of goggles up on his forehead, resting and the jacket had a very thick coating of red ground.

He had to be traveling between the domes. The only ones who did that were engineers, transport workers, and occasionally scientists that were studying the world outside of the dome. To see that here was unexpected and set Zechs's nerves alight.' He sipped his drink again and carefully scanned the crowd in a different direction, trying to not be to blatant in his interest in observing the new stranger in the bar.

That's when he felt something at his shoulder and turned in his seat rapidly. There was a blade pressing close to his neck and black eyes staring into his own where he was sitting, "Hello Marquise."

Zechs's breath caught in his throat, before he slowly inhaled and recovered, stating as calm as he could muster, "Hello Wufei." When he didn't move an inch away from where he had planted himself, Zechs cleared his throat quietly and asked, "Would you care to have a drink with me?"

A smirk appeared on the young Asian's face as he stepped back and shook his head, tucking the small blade somewhere beneath his coat. "No. What I would like is to leave this bar and not have you follow me." He finished off his drink and placed the glass gently on the bar chucking ten credits beside it. "If you do I will not hesitate to kill you in the street. Is that clear?"

"Shiny." Wufei frowned and Zechs cursed his binge of old television shows. There was not much to do on Mars sometimes. "I'll stay here." Wufei pulled his goggles down and put his mask on the lower half of his face. He left.

Zechs was left starring at the bar for a good twenty minutes, before he swallowed the rest of his drink and headed back to his living quarters. As soon as he arrived he booted up his computer and sent out a message.

—

Une -

Wufei on Mars. Sighted twenty minutes ago.

—

Zechs always forgot to check the time difference between Earth and Mars. It would take a while to get through depending on the data streams the scientist may have been accessing anyways. Zechs removed his boots and coat, shook out his hair and stripped heading towards the shower.

After all this time and all the searching that the pilots had put in, Wufei was on Mars. It was eight months since Wufei's break out with the rest of the prison. He'd been in the top fifty of the Preventer's most wanted list ever since. And now he was here on Mars a mere five months since his last sighting in the warehouse by the pilots.

Zechs stopped thinking and let the warm shower wash off all of the dust and grime of the last three days. Showers were rationed tightly in all the domes as the recycling plants were under a lot of strain. If this was the only five minute shower he would get for another three days, he would enjoy it.

Zechs kept an eye out over after that initial meeting for the small form that was Wufei. He had put in word to the twenty seven other operatives that worked in the other nineteen domes to be on the look out for Wufei Chang. He didn't expect to find him, especially after a quick search of coming going ship's passenger manifests found no trace of the pilots arrival. Either he was using another name or he had found a way around the legal documented means of travels which was easy enough.

Still Zechs put in words to his usual contacts around sector dome eight and a few others in the other domes that he had made friends in to keep an eye out for Wufei.

Une's email had been to the point.

—Don't arrest him. Flip him.—

They wanted Wufei back and badly. He was an asset as far as Une was concerned, one that would turn the tide in the battle against rebel uprisings. New gun trade routes had been established with the guns that had been hijacked from the weapons depots; one or two mobile suits had been found operating and taken out with much effort. Drug trade was up as well. The only group from the leaders that had sprung free from the jail that seemed to be failing at every turn was the human trafficking one. Several men from his group had been found dead. A few hung, some executed single bullet to the back of the head. Most seemed to have simply vanished, including Donovan himself. Whether that meant that they had gone further underground or that they were simply getting sneakier was anyone's guess. Just that their routes seemed to have dried up a little.

Zechs had little to do over the week that followed after asking everyone to alert him if they saw the seventeen or eighteen year old that disappeared like smoke. Zechs had volunteered to assist some engineers on work crews to pass the time and engender more good will from the general populous. He was in the middle of the fourth day helping reintegrate electrical switch boards in the lighting systems of the dome when he received a call on his mobile. When he lifted the phone to his ear he heard the rough gravely, "He's here." Before saying a soft word of thanks and closing the phone.

He smiled at the guy he was helping and shrugged, "Sorry Mal, I need to go. My real job calls."

The nice engineer named Mallory shrugged and smiled, "It's fine. Duty does call occasionally." She turned away and began to fit a panel back into the unit. Zechs decided to take that as his leave. That had been the bartender on the phone, meaning that Wufei was back at the bar.

He picked up his pack and wiped the sweat from his brow. The temperature controls were doing their job today as it appeared to be around a nice twenty seven degrees Celsius despite the frost on the glass on the see through portions of the dome. It was always much colder outside the dome. He placed his respirator on over his mouth and carried his jacket. He had begun to wear his respirator instead of a scarf since he'd seen Wufei, in case he needed to go outside the dome.

Walking down the tight alleys between buildings to head to the bar was the only prep time to what he was about to say so he took his time. Honestly he had not expected to see Wufei again. He figured the boy would have left and never come back, so the call had come as a surprise.

By the time that he made it to the bar Zechs still had no idea what he was going to say to the undoubtedly un-trusting boy inside. He paused to think of an opening line before he decided to simply walk in. He spotted him easily at the bar, this time his jacket was off and placed on the chair he was sitting on, respirator and goggles sitting next to him on the bar. Zechs nodded at the bar keep who began pouring him a drink and he slung his pack on the floor next to Wufei's.

He put his jacket down over the seat and took the respirator off mimicking Wufei's easy posture on the barstool. He sipped his drink as Wufei did his and they were silent for quite some time. Wufei spoke up first, "I was wondering how long it would be until you showed up."

Zechs stated almost playfully, "Wouldn't want to disappoint you of course." He needed to disarm Wufei. He needed to get him to trust him.

Wufei half smirked half grimaced at that and Zechs internally cursed himself. Apparently that had been a wrong choice of words. This was like walking around a land mine. One that he didn't know how to navigate and never scene blueprints on. Hell the times he had met Wufei could be counted on one hand, most of his information was outdated from stories that Treize liked to regale for him about a young proud and honorable warrior that could do no wrong. The grown version of the child-warrior was next to him and he seemed to be far off shadow of the form he used to be.

They were silent for a spell, before Zechs tried again, "So how has life on the other side been?" Wufei froze and looked at him like he was an insane mental patient. Zechs thought about what he just said and started to slowly crack a smile. Here he was trying to chat up a criminal on the most wanted list of the ESUN and he just decided to ask the equivalent of 'What's up' Wufei smirked at him and Zechs couldn't help a small burst of laughter. Wufei followed shortly laughing, it sounded rough and gravely, almost unused but it was there.

When they both stopped about forty seconds after they had started they took a drinks and it was more of an easy silence then a strained one. At least Zechs thought so, until Wufei swallowed his drink and began picking up his stuff and getting ready to go. Zechs watched until Wufei began walking towards the door and he called out, "Why are you here Wufei?"

Wufei turned around with a smirk on his face and said, "Maybe I'll tell you next time."

TBC

- It's nanowrimo month So there will probably be a lot more updates where this came from. Yay for the readers!