Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing, and I don't claim to own it or its
characters.
Internal Warfare
Chapter 3: Gage
By: Jenn Lynne
Relena put her hands over her mouth as she gasped. Another ESUN member had died of the Marburg virus. This was not looking good. And where had Heero gone? Her heart sank with the news of Starlen's death, he was a good man, with a wife, and a child on the way. His wife, Emmalynn and herself had gotten along quite well, and Relena had found herself, on several occasions looking for Emmalynn at parties trying to get away from the stuffy bureaucrats. Poor Emmalynn, she thought.
She moved back to her bed and sat down. Placing her hands on the crisp sheets beside her. Though only moments ago, those sheets had felt so warm and comforting, now they were cold and hard, and promised no warmth. She shook her head slowly, clearing her thoughts. Thinking clearly was important now. Think Relena think. Was there anything that President Richards and Kale Starlen where working on together? No matter how hard she thought, she seemed to only draw a blank. Milliardo stood before her, watching her every move closely. He knew she was trying to think of a connection, and he knew that if anyone could find one, it would be her. And Heero. What does his disappearance have to do with this? Does it have to do with this? She decided to put the disappearance of Heero and his team out of her mind, for the moment.
She looked up at Milliardo, "Has Lady Une or the other Gundam Pilots come up with any hypothesis yet?" Milliardo shook his head. Relena looked at the floor again. After a moment she sighed, and looked up at Milliardo once more. "Here's what's going to happen. First, I'm going to call up Emmalynn Starlen and convey my sorrow for the loss of her husband, and after that, you and I are going to Preventer Headquarters. We need to find a connection between Richards and Starlen before someone else winds up dead. Also, when is Vice President Montgomery having the other ESUN delegates debriefed?"
"At noon tomorrow." He paused to look at her, "We are going to have a panic on our hands. Especially with Heero and his team missing."
*******
Megan Thomson was an Army intern at USAMRIID, training to be a veterinarian. She drove down a Virginia highway, it was now about 12:15pm. She past a familiar sign, the road leading to Reston, home of the infamous Reston Monkey house, which once contained the Ebola strain Reston. There wasn't a soul at USAMRIID who didn't know about Reston. She passed the sign every morning on her long drive to Frederick, Maryland and Fort Detrick where The Institute as it was called, was located. The traffic began to get thicker as she drove through the lunch hour crowd. She glanced in her back seat. There, sitting quietly, almost deadly quiet in it's cage was her personal pet monkey Gage. She had gotten Gage last spring from one of USAMRIID's leading scientists Charles J. Yesterday, Gage had stopped eating, and started to look funny. She had called Dr. Charles J and told him of Gage's symptoms. His eyes half open and staring, his face drooping and the small amounts of blood from his nose. She was very worried for her pet, so she moved into the fast lane and picked up speed. He confused her, because Dr. J had just given Gage a check up just 10 days before and given him an injection of something. He shouldn't be sick. She slammed on her brakes suddenly as the car in front of her came to a quick stop. "Damn." She cursed aloud as her coffee spilled onto her hand. She looked back at Gage, he seemed completely unaffected. She shrugged it off and continued on her way to The Institute.
******
Heero finally decided to sit up. When he did Hews and Decon immediately became silent and moved over to sit with him. Carol Hews was older than him, but lower in rank, she was a lieutenant and was very good in a Chemturion Space Suit (Pressurized, heavy-duty biological space suit used in bio safety Level 4 containment areas. Also known as a blue suit because it is bright blue.). She has soft hazel eyes and ash colored hair. Her expressions were rarely harsh, and she usually took a motherly persona toward her younger commander. Constantly nagging him about the right way to handle any given situation. Sam Decon, on the other hand, was too jumpy in the cramped suits, and his hands were too quick. Heero rarely worked directly with Decon in space suits because Decon's quick hands made him nervous. But Decon was the best at using an Electron Microscope of his team, so Heero accepted him. Decon ranked one below Carol and was twice Heero's age. Decon's hair was black, or once was, now it had streaks of premature gray through it. He, on a job two years ago in Morocco, had seen the affects of Marburg first hand on its citizens. After that, he had never worked directly with it. Robert Kent, the man still asleep, was a bookworm who was really no use in the bio safety level four. However, his knowledge was astounding, even to Heero, and Heero knew, if there was ever something he didn't know, he was sure Kent would. Kent was Heero's second in command, he was a year younger than Heero and looked up to him. Heero had taken a liking to the young genius and had taken him under his wing when he first got his job at the institute. Kent had light brown hair and compassionate gray-green eyes. He kept his hair shortly trimmed, but not military looking. He and Heero got along very well, and Kent started to look at Heero as an older brother. Heero was always willing to get him out of trouble. As most older brothers would, or so he had heard.
"Sir do you have any idea what's going on?" Hews asked.
Heero looked around the room a moment. "Your guess is as good as mine. I'd say we are being contained to stop our research." he lied. He knew they wouldn't understand the truth. Only he and Kent knew the truth, and then again, Kent didn't know the whole truth. Besides, he had more important things to worry about.
At that very moment Kent awoke with a start, sitting straight up with his eyes wide open. "Where… what… how…?" He mumbled nearly incoherently. He looked around, then made eye contact with Heero. For some reason this calmed him greatly and he slowly moved to sit beside the other three. He nodded to Heero and a silent understanding passed between the two.
"I thought so." Heero replied back to Kent's nonverbal message. Kent's eyes moved around the room.
"The only way out of the room is through the main door. The hall is white, lined with nothing. It goes down to the left only about eight or nine feet before turning right. It goes down to the right a lot longer, I've never been down that way. They used to take me down the left corridor, to the right then down another long hallway into a room with big metal doors. That is where the leader, as I knew him, stayed." Kent replied with a strange kind of accuracy. It had been nearly a year since he had been in this place, and his memory was astounding. Hews and Decon looked at him strangely. A thousand and one questions could be seen swirling behind their eyes. Heero chose to ignore them and addressed Kent.
"And when they let you go, where did they take you then?" Heero asked searching the room with his eyes.
"Out of that room through a back door to an elevator. Up three floors and then we were in what appeared to be some sort of old hanger. There I was put into a jeep. Outside the hanger was a sloppy looking runway that had been overrun with plants. We turned right onto a small bumpy dirt road into woods. That's when they rendered me unconscious." He stated the whole thing very matter-of-factly, it was as though he had told the story a million times and this was just another normal occasion.
"Would someone please tell US what's going on." Decon asked, finally speaking up.
Kent's eyes flickered to him momentarily. But he said nothing. Heero spoke however, without turning to them, "Let's just say Kent has been captive here once before and I was instrumental in his release. That's all you need to know right now."
Hews turned to Kent, "Why were you being held here?"
Kent shrugged his shoulders, "They never told me. They wanted something from Heero, I assume he gave it to them because they let me go." It appeared as though Kent did not share Heero's thoughts on not telling the others about this. He sighed.
"What did they want?" Hews asked, suddenly very superior.
Heero shrunk at the question, she was definitely a dominant person and when she got angry, even he knew to stay away. "They wanted a sample of Marburg blood from the emergence in southern Morocco two years ago."
The room was silent, not even Kent had known about that. Hews looked as though she was going to be sick, Decon looked as though he was going to faint and Kent just looked sad.
"It was my sin that caused everything that's going on now. I forgot about the need of the many and put the world in danger. Listen I know this is a lot to take in and you all probably hate me now, but I'm going to need all of you to help me stop Montgomery." Heero said, finally letting out that final lump in his heart from what he had done. And now a new one formed, one that dreaded failure.
"You mean Vice President of the ESUN Montgomery?" Hews said with a gulp of air.
"Yeah." Heero said quietly.
"The investigation… that's why…" Kent said mostly to himself.
"What investigation, what are you talking about?" Heero asked confused.
*********
General Kenneth Powl looked through the file on Vice President Charles Montgomery again. He could either be defined as a hero or a murderer, and it was General Powl's job to decide which. Kenneth Powl was the commanding officer at Fort Detrick and hadn't left his office in two days, studying this file non-stop, but still this investigation was going painfully slow. Especially now the Richards was dead.
There was a soft knock on his office door. "Come in." His base voice boomed in the large office. It was strained with lack of sleep and frustration. The door opened slowly and in walked Megan Thompson, his niece. In her hand was a cage carrying her pet monkey Gage.
"Uncle Kenny, can you watch Gage for me while I go find Dr. J. Gage has been acting funny and I don't want to leave him in my car while I go into a level 3 containment area to find the doctor." She asked sweetly.
Powl smiled at his niece, she was obviously worried about her pet. "Okay dear, I'll watch him. You go find Dr. J." Megan nodded her thanks and retreated from the room. Leaving Gage on the floor by the general's desk. General Powl got out of his seat and took a knee beside the cage. Gage's eyes didn't move at all, but the monkey stocked over to the door. It did it in a manner that was almost routine, automatic. Powl opened the cage door and picked up the small monkey in his right hand.
All of the sudden, the door swung open and banged against the wall. Powl jumped up, his grip on the small monkey tightening. Gage squealed at the sudden onset of pain, it was the first thing he had really reacted to in hours. His immediate reaction was to bite Powl as hard as he could. Powl yelled as blood streamed down his arm and Gage dropped to the floor. Once the monkey landed he slumped onto the ground, ceasing movement. The lieutenant at the door held his hand over his mouth. He rushed to the general and held his wrist firmly, putting pressure on the wound. Powl and the lieutenant looked down at Gage, he lay almost lifeless on the floor. A small puddle of blood was slowly spreading out around him, either from his biting or something else. The blood was very thin, and he twitched and trembled in his conscious unconsciousness.
Powl turned to the lieutenant and removed his hand from his wrist, replacing it with his own. "What did you want?" he asked.
The lieutenant was startled by the question, thinking the general's injury and the semi-conscious monkey lying on the ground would be more important. "Pardon my intrusion general," he said, remembering himself, "but Dr. McCormick asked me to get you. He said it was urgent."
Powl nodded, "I leave it up to you to get the nearest vet in here to look at my niece's pet. I will get a tetanus from Dr. McCormick just in case." The lieutenant nodded and left the room. Powl sighed, looking down at the monkey and leaning over him, stroking his fur lightly. "You'll be okay Gage, the vet is on his way."
((Author's note: ( Yes, and the plot continues to thicken. Gage is actually the name of my friend's dog, but I wanted to name the monkey after her Gage. If you have ever seen Outbreak, Gage is one of those kinds of monkeys. Anyway, Read and Review PLEASE! I Love to hear from you guys.))
Internal Warfare
Chapter 3: Gage
By: Jenn Lynne
Relena put her hands over her mouth as she gasped. Another ESUN member had died of the Marburg virus. This was not looking good. And where had Heero gone? Her heart sank with the news of Starlen's death, he was a good man, with a wife, and a child on the way. His wife, Emmalynn and herself had gotten along quite well, and Relena had found herself, on several occasions looking for Emmalynn at parties trying to get away from the stuffy bureaucrats. Poor Emmalynn, she thought.
She moved back to her bed and sat down. Placing her hands on the crisp sheets beside her. Though only moments ago, those sheets had felt so warm and comforting, now they were cold and hard, and promised no warmth. She shook her head slowly, clearing her thoughts. Thinking clearly was important now. Think Relena think. Was there anything that President Richards and Kale Starlen where working on together? No matter how hard she thought, she seemed to only draw a blank. Milliardo stood before her, watching her every move closely. He knew she was trying to think of a connection, and he knew that if anyone could find one, it would be her. And Heero. What does his disappearance have to do with this? Does it have to do with this? She decided to put the disappearance of Heero and his team out of her mind, for the moment.
She looked up at Milliardo, "Has Lady Une or the other Gundam Pilots come up with any hypothesis yet?" Milliardo shook his head. Relena looked at the floor again. After a moment she sighed, and looked up at Milliardo once more. "Here's what's going to happen. First, I'm going to call up Emmalynn Starlen and convey my sorrow for the loss of her husband, and after that, you and I are going to Preventer Headquarters. We need to find a connection between Richards and Starlen before someone else winds up dead. Also, when is Vice President Montgomery having the other ESUN delegates debriefed?"
"At noon tomorrow." He paused to look at her, "We are going to have a panic on our hands. Especially with Heero and his team missing."
*******
Megan Thomson was an Army intern at USAMRIID, training to be a veterinarian. She drove down a Virginia highway, it was now about 12:15pm. She past a familiar sign, the road leading to Reston, home of the infamous Reston Monkey house, which once contained the Ebola strain Reston. There wasn't a soul at USAMRIID who didn't know about Reston. She passed the sign every morning on her long drive to Frederick, Maryland and Fort Detrick where The Institute as it was called, was located. The traffic began to get thicker as she drove through the lunch hour crowd. She glanced in her back seat. There, sitting quietly, almost deadly quiet in it's cage was her personal pet monkey Gage. She had gotten Gage last spring from one of USAMRIID's leading scientists Charles J. Yesterday, Gage had stopped eating, and started to look funny. She had called Dr. Charles J and told him of Gage's symptoms. His eyes half open and staring, his face drooping and the small amounts of blood from his nose. She was very worried for her pet, so she moved into the fast lane and picked up speed. He confused her, because Dr. J had just given Gage a check up just 10 days before and given him an injection of something. He shouldn't be sick. She slammed on her brakes suddenly as the car in front of her came to a quick stop. "Damn." She cursed aloud as her coffee spilled onto her hand. She looked back at Gage, he seemed completely unaffected. She shrugged it off and continued on her way to The Institute.
******
Heero finally decided to sit up. When he did Hews and Decon immediately became silent and moved over to sit with him. Carol Hews was older than him, but lower in rank, she was a lieutenant and was very good in a Chemturion Space Suit (Pressurized, heavy-duty biological space suit used in bio safety Level 4 containment areas. Also known as a blue suit because it is bright blue.). She has soft hazel eyes and ash colored hair. Her expressions were rarely harsh, and she usually took a motherly persona toward her younger commander. Constantly nagging him about the right way to handle any given situation. Sam Decon, on the other hand, was too jumpy in the cramped suits, and his hands were too quick. Heero rarely worked directly with Decon in space suits because Decon's quick hands made him nervous. But Decon was the best at using an Electron Microscope of his team, so Heero accepted him. Decon ranked one below Carol and was twice Heero's age. Decon's hair was black, or once was, now it had streaks of premature gray through it. He, on a job two years ago in Morocco, had seen the affects of Marburg first hand on its citizens. After that, he had never worked directly with it. Robert Kent, the man still asleep, was a bookworm who was really no use in the bio safety level four. However, his knowledge was astounding, even to Heero, and Heero knew, if there was ever something he didn't know, he was sure Kent would. Kent was Heero's second in command, he was a year younger than Heero and looked up to him. Heero had taken a liking to the young genius and had taken him under his wing when he first got his job at the institute. Kent had light brown hair and compassionate gray-green eyes. He kept his hair shortly trimmed, but not military looking. He and Heero got along very well, and Kent started to look at Heero as an older brother. Heero was always willing to get him out of trouble. As most older brothers would, or so he had heard.
"Sir do you have any idea what's going on?" Hews asked.
Heero looked around the room a moment. "Your guess is as good as mine. I'd say we are being contained to stop our research." he lied. He knew they wouldn't understand the truth. Only he and Kent knew the truth, and then again, Kent didn't know the whole truth. Besides, he had more important things to worry about.
At that very moment Kent awoke with a start, sitting straight up with his eyes wide open. "Where… what… how…?" He mumbled nearly incoherently. He looked around, then made eye contact with Heero. For some reason this calmed him greatly and he slowly moved to sit beside the other three. He nodded to Heero and a silent understanding passed between the two.
"I thought so." Heero replied back to Kent's nonverbal message. Kent's eyes moved around the room.
"The only way out of the room is through the main door. The hall is white, lined with nothing. It goes down to the left only about eight or nine feet before turning right. It goes down to the right a lot longer, I've never been down that way. They used to take me down the left corridor, to the right then down another long hallway into a room with big metal doors. That is where the leader, as I knew him, stayed." Kent replied with a strange kind of accuracy. It had been nearly a year since he had been in this place, and his memory was astounding. Hews and Decon looked at him strangely. A thousand and one questions could be seen swirling behind their eyes. Heero chose to ignore them and addressed Kent.
"And when they let you go, where did they take you then?" Heero asked searching the room with his eyes.
"Out of that room through a back door to an elevator. Up three floors and then we were in what appeared to be some sort of old hanger. There I was put into a jeep. Outside the hanger was a sloppy looking runway that had been overrun with plants. We turned right onto a small bumpy dirt road into woods. That's when they rendered me unconscious." He stated the whole thing very matter-of-factly, it was as though he had told the story a million times and this was just another normal occasion.
"Would someone please tell US what's going on." Decon asked, finally speaking up.
Kent's eyes flickered to him momentarily. But he said nothing. Heero spoke however, without turning to them, "Let's just say Kent has been captive here once before and I was instrumental in his release. That's all you need to know right now."
Hews turned to Kent, "Why were you being held here?"
Kent shrugged his shoulders, "They never told me. They wanted something from Heero, I assume he gave it to them because they let me go." It appeared as though Kent did not share Heero's thoughts on not telling the others about this. He sighed.
"What did they want?" Hews asked, suddenly very superior.
Heero shrunk at the question, she was definitely a dominant person and when she got angry, even he knew to stay away. "They wanted a sample of Marburg blood from the emergence in southern Morocco two years ago."
The room was silent, not even Kent had known about that. Hews looked as though she was going to be sick, Decon looked as though he was going to faint and Kent just looked sad.
"It was my sin that caused everything that's going on now. I forgot about the need of the many and put the world in danger. Listen I know this is a lot to take in and you all probably hate me now, but I'm going to need all of you to help me stop Montgomery." Heero said, finally letting out that final lump in his heart from what he had done. And now a new one formed, one that dreaded failure.
"You mean Vice President of the ESUN Montgomery?" Hews said with a gulp of air.
"Yeah." Heero said quietly.
"The investigation… that's why…" Kent said mostly to himself.
"What investigation, what are you talking about?" Heero asked confused.
*********
General Kenneth Powl looked through the file on Vice President Charles Montgomery again. He could either be defined as a hero or a murderer, and it was General Powl's job to decide which. Kenneth Powl was the commanding officer at Fort Detrick and hadn't left his office in two days, studying this file non-stop, but still this investigation was going painfully slow. Especially now the Richards was dead.
There was a soft knock on his office door. "Come in." His base voice boomed in the large office. It was strained with lack of sleep and frustration. The door opened slowly and in walked Megan Thompson, his niece. In her hand was a cage carrying her pet monkey Gage.
"Uncle Kenny, can you watch Gage for me while I go find Dr. J. Gage has been acting funny and I don't want to leave him in my car while I go into a level 3 containment area to find the doctor." She asked sweetly.
Powl smiled at his niece, she was obviously worried about her pet. "Okay dear, I'll watch him. You go find Dr. J." Megan nodded her thanks and retreated from the room. Leaving Gage on the floor by the general's desk. General Powl got out of his seat and took a knee beside the cage. Gage's eyes didn't move at all, but the monkey stocked over to the door. It did it in a manner that was almost routine, automatic. Powl opened the cage door and picked up the small monkey in his right hand.
All of the sudden, the door swung open and banged against the wall. Powl jumped up, his grip on the small monkey tightening. Gage squealed at the sudden onset of pain, it was the first thing he had really reacted to in hours. His immediate reaction was to bite Powl as hard as he could. Powl yelled as blood streamed down his arm and Gage dropped to the floor. Once the monkey landed he slumped onto the ground, ceasing movement. The lieutenant at the door held his hand over his mouth. He rushed to the general and held his wrist firmly, putting pressure on the wound. Powl and the lieutenant looked down at Gage, he lay almost lifeless on the floor. A small puddle of blood was slowly spreading out around him, either from his biting or something else. The blood was very thin, and he twitched and trembled in his conscious unconsciousness.
Powl turned to the lieutenant and removed his hand from his wrist, replacing it with his own. "What did you want?" he asked.
The lieutenant was startled by the question, thinking the general's injury and the semi-conscious monkey lying on the ground would be more important. "Pardon my intrusion general," he said, remembering himself, "but Dr. McCormick asked me to get you. He said it was urgent."
Powl nodded, "I leave it up to you to get the nearest vet in here to look at my niece's pet. I will get a tetanus from Dr. McCormick just in case." The lieutenant nodded and left the room. Powl sighed, looking down at the monkey and leaning over him, stroking his fur lightly. "You'll be okay Gage, the vet is on his way."
((Author's note: ( Yes, and the plot continues to thicken. Gage is actually the name of my friend's dog, but I wanted to name the monkey after her Gage. If you have ever seen Outbreak, Gage is one of those kinds of monkeys. Anyway, Read and Review PLEASE! I Love to hear from you guys.))