Disclaimer: Gundam Wing isn't mine. This is fandom material that does not infringe upon the copyrights set by the GW creators.
Disconnect - part3
By Zero's Wings
A white curtain billowed in the wind. It gave way, spread back like a cloak, and exposed to the harsh African sun and sands a figure of brutally constructed metal projections. With a flexing movement, the white curtain enveloped the metal structure once more; all except the head, with its gold crest and gleaming, green crystal eyes.
Heat gave the horizon a wavering consistency. A large mobile suit, known as a Gundam because of its rare Gundanium composition, rushed through the gritty desert sea. Its eyes flashed suddenly, and then it drew back its cloak and the thrusters on its backpack. The internal coolers shut down and it soared away in a tornado of sand and dust from thirsty traveler's bones.
The Gundam touched down in the middle of a small village. There was a battle going on in the distance between two mobile suits. They are of no concern to me, Quatre thought. He looked at the small village around him. But I can't let innocent civilians suffer because of their rivalry.
Quatre removed his goggles and sat back in his Gundam's cockpit. It was an incredible piece of machinery; more often than not, it made him feel helpless and unworthy. However, its power also gave him a vicarious sense of invincibility. It was an odd, yet comforting balance; the suit made him feel alive.
Quatre had decided that he would use this gift to defend those who could not defend themselves. He had known much suffering, of an emotional kind, and felt that no one deserved to feel that kind of emotion during their lives. Of course, the people of the poor village around him had known a totally different kind of suffering, but it was all derived from the same emotions. It was the same awful feelings that Quatre felt, the lingering poison, the darkness, the sickness, the elusive and indescribable pall covering his soul and welling up disquieting sensations in his gut.
The battle on the horizon began to die down. One of the mobile suits was a customized Leo with a desert cloak, and the other was more difficult to see and identify. Quatre got an overwhelming impression of size and explosive power, long, twisting limbs like whips, and a coating of shiny black armor. The overall shape of the mobile suit was lost to him, as it whirled around so quickly, and with such bewildering movements. It gripped the Leo in its many lashing arms and claws, and seemed to envelope the mobile suit. Moments later, it was gone, leaving only small dust clouds and a few jagged tracks in the sand.
Seeing that any threat to the village had vanished, Quatre flew his Gundam up over a ridge of sand dunes and landed it. He entered the village alone; knowing the Gundam would draw too much attention and questioning toward him.
Quatre looked at the people who called this wasteland home. They stared back, with as much curiosity and interest as they could muster; it was difficult to do anything when you are starving and caught on the edge of a war zone. Their faces were all calling out to him with different expressions and features, but there was one constant amongst them: an impermeable wall of sadness. They were all so full of longing, so desperate. It was as though their lives were just paused, waiting for something, anything to happen and deliver them from this living hell. Children had swelled stomachs from malnutrition. Their parents could hardly see because of their dysentery, the surrounding filth, dust, and the clouds of flies.
The young pilot was emotionally unprepared for all of this. Tears welled up in his eyes as he passed by the crowd of starving onlookers. He had always thought that his own emotions were strong enough to be comparable to any other suffering in the world, and no matter what his condition or lifestyle, those emotions allowed him to be disgusted and happy with his own life. Such thoughts were blasted from his head at the speed of light when he saw these people. His own emotional ruminations seemed so petty and child-like now; he was just lucky to be alive, and even luckier in that he had lived comfortably. His anger with his father, his self-loathing, he viewed it now as truly pathetic.
There was a half-collapsed metal shack in the dead center of the village. It seemed to have been constructed as part of an alliance outpost, but it was now a crude shell that housed these unfortunate people.
As Quatre walked toward the shack, he tried to shake his feelings of disbelief. The fact that there were still starving people, on a world that had conquered and colonized space and made incredible leaps in technology, seemed like pure absurdity to him.
Quatre stopped in the entrance of the small building. The open doorway had been covered with a tapestry, woven beautifully and covered with bold colors and spindly, archaic designs. He removed his goggles and winced at the stinging dirt and sand that was immediately thrown into his eyes. Everything was so dry and hot, he wished sorely that he had the foresight to bring some water along.
Quatre stepped inside the small building, it was more like a military bunker actually, and saw a group of men sitting cross-legged in front of a small, central hub, a computer mainframe that had been stripped bare and smashed. These men were rail-thin, with flesh darker than a starless night, and shriveled yet observant complexions. They were older than anyone else in the village by at least twenty years, yet their voices were youthful and soft as silk.
"Wie gaan dit met u?" one of the elders asked in a clipped, guttural tongue.
Quatre shook his head, confused.
"I'm sorry," he said politely, "I don't speak your language. Do you speak English?"
He was met with silence and questioning stares. He tried again in all the other languages he knew: French, German, and Spanish.
"Parlez-vous francais?"
"Sprechen Sie Deutsch?"
"Usted habla espanol?"
His attempts seemed to be in vain, and then the very oldest of the group finally responded.
"I speak English. Je parle francais. Ich spreche das Deutsch. Hablo espanol." He made each response incredibly clearly and with only a subtle trace of accent.
"English is OK," Quatre said. The withered, old man nodded and smiled kindly.
"You are very young," the elder observed, "where did you come from, and how did you travel so far?" His English was impeccable and unwavering.
"My family lives in the deserts," the young man replied. "I ran away from them." What he said was not technically a lie, but it made him feel uncomfortable nonetheless.
"You are quite welcome here, but I must ask, why did you come? Most travelers want to leave as soon as possible." Quatre hesitated, then thought of the fight he saw between those two mobile suits.
"Leave! I could never just leave you people to suffer," Quatre exclaimed.
"We do not suffer, we simply live. Our lives may not be as comfortable as yours, but it is the life that we were chosen for. I am curious though, tell me why you came to our village."
"There was a battle near the town. I was curious. I...have always held a fascination for mobile suits."
"You speak of the demons," the elder said softly, rubbing his left temple. "They fight often. We leave them alone, but they have ventured closer and closer to the town. We fear that they may lay waste to the town, but we cannot leave. We have no place to go, most of us are to weak from age or hunger to travel, and our ancestors and gods still reside in this place."
Demons, Quatre mused. These people must have had no contact with mobile suits for their entire lives. The thought alone seemed incredible to him. Even before the Maguanac, he had always lived around the giant machines. They swept over his father's oil fields on the resource satellites and barren colonies, they scraped the edge of the city skylines in the urban areas of L-4, and they could be seen trundling through the fields by his house like enormous beetles.
"One demon has plagued our villages for some time, and we fear it may come to take our lives one day. It has no name, it is death."
"Has any demon ever defeated it in combat?"
"No, it is unstoppable." The elder spoke with fear in his voice, and Quatre knew that whatever that thing was, it posed far more of a threat than local superstitions and a veil of myths led on. It posed a very real danger to these people, but he was confident that his Gundam could stop it.
Quatre didn't want to trouble these people, so he spent the night in his Gundam's cockpit. It was probably more comfortable than any bed these forsaken people could provide him with anyway.
As morning rose, Quatre could once again see two mobile suits fighting on the horizon. And once again, the mysterious, black form swallowed up a weaker, smaller mobile suit. This time, however, things did not go so smoothly. The suit opposing that black nightmare was one of the Alliance's newest models, an Aries. Better equipped for flight in battle, it engaged its thrusters while still in the grasp of the larger suit's grappling arms and pincers. It almost seemed to free itself from the monster when a huge, black, revolving cannon swiveled out from one of the larger suit's arms. The gun roared as it spat out a hail of laser fire. The blasts tore apart the thin walls of makeshift homes and beat the Aries into a smoking pulp. It fell away and crushed a few onlookers as it landed in the middle of the town. Quatre watched, frozen in horror. His tears flashed with orange and yellow flame, reflected off the burning roofs of houses.
End of part3
Disconnect - part3
By Zero's Wings
A white curtain billowed in the wind. It gave way, spread back like a cloak, and exposed to the harsh African sun and sands a figure of brutally constructed metal projections. With a flexing movement, the white curtain enveloped the metal structure once more; all except the head, with its gold crest and gleaming, green crystal eyes.
Heat gave the horizon a wavering consistency. A large mobile suit, known as a Gundam because of its rare Gundanium composition, rushed through the gritty desert sea. Its eyes flashed suddenly, and then it drew back its cloak and the thrusters on its backpack. The internal coolers shut down and it soared away in a tornado of sand and dust from thirsty traveler's bones.
The Gundam touched down in the middle of a small village. There was a battle going on in the distance between two mobile suits. They are of no concern to me, Quatre thought. He looked at the small village around him. But I can't let innocent civilians suffer because of their rivalry.
Quatre removed his goggles and sat back in his Gundam's cockpit. It was an incredible piece of machinery; more often than not, it made him feel helpless and unworthy. However, its power also gave him a vicarious sense of invincibility. It was an odd, yet comforting balance; the suit made him feel alive.
Quatre had decided that he would use this gift to defend those who could not defend themselves. He had known much suffering, of an emotional kind, and felt that no one deserved to feel that kind of emotion during their lives. Of course, the people of the poor village around him had known a totally different kind of suffering, but it was all derived from the same emotions. It was the same awful feelings that Quatre felt, the lingering poison, the darkness, the sickness, the elusive and indescribable pall covering his soul and welling up disquieting sensations in his gut.
The battle on the horizon began to die down. One of the mobile suits was a customized Leo with a desert cloak, and the other was more difficult to see and identify. Quatre got an overwhelming impression of size and explosive power, long, twisting limbs like whips, and a coating of shiny black armor. The overall shape of the mobile suit was lost to him, as it whirled around so quickly, and with such bewildering movements. It gripped the Leo in its many lashing arms and claws, and seemed to envelope the mobile suit. Moments later, it was gone, leaving only small dust clouds and a few jagged tracks in the sand.
Seeing that any threat to the village had vanished, Quatre flew his Gundam up over a ridge of sand dunes and landed it. He entered the village alone; knowing the Gundam would draw too much attention and questioning toward him.
Quatre looked at the people who called this wasteland home. They stared back, with as much curiosity and interest as they could muster; it was difficult to do anything when you are starving and caught on the edge of a war zone. Their faces were all calling out to him with different expressions and features, but there was one constant amongst them: an impermeable wall of sadness. They were all so full of longing, so desperate. It was as though their lives were just paused, waiting for something, anything to happen and deliver them from this living hell. Children had swelled stomachs from malnutrition. Their parents could hardly see because of their dysentery, the surrounding filth, dust, and the clouds of flies.
The young pilot was emotionally unprepared for all of this. Tears welled up in his eyes as he passed by the crowd of starving onlookers. He had always thought that his own emotions were strong enough to be comparable to any other suffering in the world, and no matter what his condition or lifestyle, those emotions allowed him to be disgusted and happy with his own life. Such thoughts were blasted from his head at the speed of light when he saw these people. His own emotional ruminations seemed so petty and child-like now; he was just lucky to be alive, and even luckier in that he had lived comfortably. His anger with his father, his self-loathing, he viewed it now as truly pathetic.
There was a half-collapsed metal shack in the dead center of the village. It seemed to have been constructed as part of an alliance outpost, but it was now a crude shell that housed these unfortunate people.
As Quatre walked toward the shack, he tried to shake his feelings of disbelief. The fact that there were still starving people, on a world that had conquered and colonized space and made incredible leaps in technology, seemed like pure absurdity to him.
Quatre stopped in the entrance of the small building. The open doorway had been covered with a tapestry, woven beautifully and covered with bold colors and spindly, archaic designs. He removed his goggles and winced at the stinging dirt and sand that was immediately thrown into his eyes. Everything was so dry and hot, he wished sorely that he had the foresight to bring some water along.
Quatre stepped inside the small building, it was more like a military bunker actually, and saw a group of men sitting cross-legged in front of a small, central hub, a computer mainframe that had been stripped bare and smashed. These men were rail-thin, with flesh darker than a starless night, and shriveled yet observant complexions. They were older than anyone else in the village by at least twenty years, yet their voices were youthful and soft as silk.
"Wie gaan dit met u?" one of the elders asked in a clipped, guttural tongue.
Quatre shook his head, confused.
"I'm sorry," he said politely, "I don't speak your language. Do you speak English?"
He was met with silence and questioning stares. He tried again in all the other languages he knew: French, German, and Spanish.
"Parlez-vous francais?"
"Sprechen Sie Deutsch?"
"Usted habla espanol?"
His attempts seemed to be in vain, and then the very oldest of the group finally responded.
"I speak English. Je parle francais. Ich spreche das Deutsch. Hablo espanol." He made each response incredibly clearly and with only a subtle trace of accent.
"English is OK," Quatre said. The withered, old man nodded and smiled kindly.
"You are very young," the elder observed, "where did you come from, and how did you travel so far?" His English was impeccable and unwavering.
"My family lives in the deserts," the young man replied. "I ran away from them." What he said was not technically a lie, but it made him feel uncomfortable nonetheless.
"You are quite welcome here, but I must ask, why did you come? Most travelers want to leave as soon as possible." Quatre hesitated, then thought of the fight he saw between those two mobile suits.
"Leave! I could never just leave you people to suffer," Quatre exclaimed.
"We do not suffer, we simply live. Our lives may not be as comfortable as yours, but it is the life that we were chosen for. I am curious though, tell me why you came to our village."
"There was a battle near the town. I was curious. I...have always held a fascination for mobile suits."
"You speak of the demons," the elder said softly, rubbing his left temple. "They fight often. We leave them alone, but they have ventured closer and closer to the town. We fear that they may lay waste to the town, but we cannot leave. We have no place to go, most of us are to weak from age or hunger to travel, and our ancestors and gods still reside in this place."
Demons, Quatre mused. These people must have had no contact with mobile suits for their entire lives. The thought alone seemed incredible to him. Even before the Maguanac, he had always lived around the giant machines. They swept over his father's oil fields on the resource satellites and barren colonies, they scraped the edge of the city skylines in the urban areas of L-4, and they could be seen trundling through the fields by his house like enormous beetles.
"One demon has plagued our villages for some time, and we fear it may come to take our lives one day. It has no name, it is death."
"Has any demon ever defeated it in combat?"
"No, it is unstoppable." The elder spoke with fear in his voice, and Quatre knew that whatever that thing was, it posed far more of a threat than local superstitions and a veil of myths led on. It posed a very real danger to these people, but he was confident that his Gundam could stop it.
Quatre didn't want to trouble these people, so he spent the night in his Gundam's cockpit. It was probably more comfortable than any bed these forsaken people could provide him with anyway.
As morning rose, Quatre could once again see two mobile suits fighting on the horizon. And once again, the mysterious, black form swallowed up a weaker, smaller mobile suit. This time, however, things did not go so smoothly. The suit opposing that black nightmare was one of the Alliance's newest models, an Aries. Better equipped for flight in battle, it engaged its thrusters while still in the grasp of the larger suit's grappling arms and pincers. It almost seemed to free itself from the monster when a huge, black, revolving cannon swiveled out from one of the larger suit's arms. The gun roared as it spat out a hail of laser fire. The blasts tore apart the thin walls of makeshift homes and beat the Aries into a smoking pulp. It fell away and crushed a few onlookers as it landed in the middle of the town. Quatre watched, frozen in horror. His tears flashed with orange and yellow flame, reflected off the burning roofs of houses.
End of part3