Chapter 3
Heero had found his "gift" shortly after Wufei, and, while he would not normally attempt to exterminate a comrade-in-arms, much less during the recent attacks and what they symbolized, he was sorely tempted. He very quietly walked to Duo's room, and knocked on the door.
"Hold on a sec! Be right there, man!"
Heero was greeted several seconds later by a pair of veritably glowing violet eyes. In a split second though, they had morphed, and Duo had eye sockets the size of manhole covers. He gave a startled yelp and slammed the door in Heero's face. Heero could hear slight whimpering as Duo raced around his quarters, looking for a means of escape. Then, just as suddenly, the whimpers stopped, and so did the footsteps.
Heero gave up patience and forced the door a minute later. He looked inside Duo's closets, under his bed, in every conceivable place that baka could have hidden his pestilential person. Finally, after ten minutes of searching, he gave up and walked out on Duo's balcony.
'Where the hell could that idiot have gone?' he thought as he looked out over Duo's view. He'd looked everywhere, and there was no trace of that braided baka. That guy's major must have been fleeing. He did'nt think someone could get away from him in an enclosed area, much less one with only on exit, except for the balcony he was standing on, and that was a good six stories up.
Wait a minute.
Heero looked over to his right, and noticed a very narrow, maybe two or three inches, ledge that wrapped around the building. If he had been desperate enough, and those noises he was making indicated that he was, he would have had no choice in his mind but to try something so stupid. It was a good twenty feet to the next balcony, and that one was…….Hilde's. Great. Now he had to deal with a guy he could not trust and his conspirator girlfriend. That moron, in his desperation, had walked a ledge on the side of a building six stories up to get away from him. He felt slight amusement that Duo was that afraid of him. He hadn't even come there to kill him.
He turned around and walked back out of the room. Duo was long gone by now, and not even he would be able to find him until he wanted to be found.
Loud laughter resounded from Quatre's room. He had found his present, and had opened it much less suspiciously and with much more enthusiasm than the other two that had already received theirs. He had laughed harder than he had in recent memory at the image of Heero descending on Duo like a hawk on a sand rat. The opening scene had not particularly surprised him, he had picked up that those two were more than friends quite some time ago. He had been momentarily concerned that Duo was worse than just stunned, but had laughed even harder when he realized he was still moving. After he calmed down, he headed down to the cafeteria for breakfast, his morning repast of an omelet, some coffee, and a doughnut.
On the way down, he passed Wufei and Sally, Wufei looking outright happy. He never looked like that. He wrote it off as a quirk that he and his fellow pilots had so many of, and kept walking, somewhat confused, if a little relieved that Wufei would probably not be his usual loud self today.
Duo decided it was okay to move a little, and stretched in his very confining hiding place. He had chosen an air duct inside the security room for his retreat, and was becoming claustrophobic. He kicked the grate off the duct again, and crawled out into the darkened room. He decided to check back up on Relena on the security cams, and brought up the image. Same as last time. Still using the punching bag. She was already getting better than she was the last time he saw her, and he had to commend her for it. He grinned at the prospect of a pacifist princess kicking someone's ass.
He checked on the other systems to pass some time while he waited for Heero to calm down a little. He checked the incoming shuttles, and one was unmarked. He hailed it, and the answer came back, in a female, though thoroughly disciplined, voice,
" This is Janai Yuy. Requesting permission to dock at Preventer Headquarters."
Duo's violet eyes almost popped out of his head. 'YUY?! Well, so much for hiding! I gotta go tell Heero! I wonder if he's married or something! Ha HA!'
"You have the permission of lieutenant Duo Maxwell to land at docking bay seven. Proceed." He could hardly contain himself. 'Heero is going to actually react to something! Other than me!'
He immediately got on the P.A. system and called, "Heero Yuy, report to docking bay seven. Immediately." 'Ohhh, man, that's gonna piss him off even more. It'll get him there fast, though.'
Heero looked up as Duo called him over the P.A.
'That baka is SO going to get it.' He envisioned himself garroting Duo with his microphone wire, and allowed himself another one of his small smiles, and he thought it was a little strange that braided village idiot's discomfort could add to everyone else's enjoyment of a situation. He headed toward docking bay seven, where Duo likely had some sort of prank planned for him. He knew he was walking right into the jaws of the dragon, but this was too good a chance to pass up. Duo knew better than to order him around, just like he knew that Duo wouldn't obey any order from him that didn't have some sort of threat attached to it.
Heero muttered another couple of muffled curses under his breath, and continued on his way. What was that moron going to try on him NOW? Dump a bucket of slime on him? Had he set a trap door into the ground? And Duo would likely have about two dozen cameras trained on him, so he could publicly humiliate him again. He was going to chop off that baka's braid and put it on his wall as a trophy. Or maybe he'd just flush it down Duo's toilet. Damn thing probably contained Duo's actual brain or whatever Duo had, slither off his wall, open his door, and relocate Duo to reattach itself.
He'd settle for killing Duo himself. His mind was coming up with stuff that would give other people nightmares. That cretin would pay for this. He was losing his mind. Now, if he DID put Duo's braid on his wall, he'd never get any sleep. He'd sit there all night staring at it, never blinking lest it come alive and strangle him.
He came to the door to bay seven, took a deep breath, and pressed the button to open the door. He stepped inside, his eyes darting around, searching for traps that Duo might have set for him.
"Hey, Heero! Just in time! Over here!" Duo called from the control room about two stories up.
Heero quickly got on the elevator and rode it up to Duo, wondering what the hell Duo was doing. If this was a prank, he was going to throw Duo off his perch, and try to shoot him on the way down.
He reached the top, and stepped into the room. Duo was watching a monitor, which produced a picture of a carrier shuttle.
"Duo? What the hell is going on?"
"Ask her. Whoever she is."
Heero held down the button on the com and said, "This is Lieutenant Heero Yuy. Identify yourself."
"HEERO?!"
"JAI?!"
Duo knew that at least those two knew each other, even if he didn't know how. He knew they were related, but how? He hadn't seen her yet.
"Jai! What the hell are you doing here?"
"Coming to see you, what the hell else would I be doing?"
"………"
A somewhat startled Duo asked, "Well? Who is she?"
"She's my sister. Janai Yuy. Underwent a lot of the same training I did, though much less vigorously. She was meant to be backup should I be killed."
Duo was reeling. His SISTER? Oh, Christ, another perpetually happy face to contend with, he
thought sarcastically. Duo caught a happy gleam in Heero's eyes, and nothing else. He guessed there was probably not a lot of sibling rivalry there. At the very least was happy to see her.
"Here comes the shuttle." Said Heero, unable to keep a slight edge of excitement out of his voice, and he hoped Duo hadn't heard it. The shuttle came in through the huge bay doors, and was docked shortly. Both Duo and Heero were waiting outside the exit when it opened. A slim, though muscled, young woman of 21 years walked out with a duffel bag over her shoulder. She had eyes the same color as Heero's, and Duo's laughing eyes and braid. She walked down the stairs to greet them, and when she got about three feet from them, she immediately dropped her duffel bag and gave Duo a slight bow. Then she turned to Heero and hugged him. Heero looked as surprised as Duo, though he made himself return the hug.
Duo watched for a minute, and then, after they broke apart, he looked at Heero for a second, and then turned to Jai, held out his arms, and said "What, no hug for me?" Earning himself a hard punch in the shoulder from Heero. "Ow!" he exclaimed, rubbing his shoulder, "A little overprotective, aren't we?" That earned another punch in the other shoulder. "Ow! Fine! Fine! Geez! I'll just go tell everyone, and set you up some quarters, OK? Damn! Right next to Heero's, I think it's safe to presume? See ya." He turned and walked out of the room, waving over his shoulder at the pair.
Both Heero and Jai stared at Duo's retreating form until the door closed behind him, and then turned to each other. Jai grabbed Heero again, and they both hugged each other in earnest.
When they let go for the second time, and Jai looked Heero up and down, and nodded her approval. "How long has it been, Heero? Since I last saw you?"
"Six years. Eight months. Twenty seven days. Damn, I missed you. Now, what are you doing here? You know as well as I do that you never would have come here unless you had a better reason than you wanted to see me."
"It's a good enough reason in itself, but you're right. I have a better one. I am becoming a preventer. The only reason I didn't come sooner is that I was having THIS built." She waved at the shuttle. "Then, when I saw that battle yesterday, It had just been finished, and I thought I'd come to help you."
"You were having WHAT built? The shuttle? Or don't I want to know what's inside?"
Jai gave him a grin. "Definitely what's inside. Come on. I'll show you." She headed back toward the shuttle. Heero shrugged and followed her.
When they got in, Heero was treated to a spectacle. It was a mobile suit, but it was covered in reflective Gundamium. It looked like a silver mirror. Other than that, it was very much like the Wing Zero. It even had the same angel wings, but even they were reflective.
"Allow me to introduce you to my mobile suit. The Gundam Starfire."
Heero noted the apparent absence of a short-range weapon. The outside, while reflective, was covered with small indents, and he had no idea what THOSE were.
"Heero! Over here! Hurry! WHOA! Cool! What the hell is THAT?" Duo, rushing into the shuttle, had stumbled onto the Gundam that Jai had brought with her. It was like looking into a shattered mirror. He could see himself in about forty-seven different places at the same time. "Man! Got enough chrome on that thing? …Oh yeah! Somebody sent out another squadron of dolls! They're on a collision course with Earth, and the tracking computer says that they'll be here in about three hours! Suit up!" And quickly ran back through the door, heading toward the suit hanger.
Once again, the siblings watched Duo scamper back out the door, then turned to each other. "Well, looks like you'll see the capabilities of this suit sooner than you thought. Think of this as my aptitude test to become a preventer." Jai said, a wry smile on her face."
Heero stared at her, wondering when she had become quite so impulsive. There was nothing he could do to stop her, of course, all he could do was try to prevent her from getting hurt when they joined the battle. He was the epitome of an over protective brother when he had the chance, and here was his chance.
"Well, for once, Duo's right. You'd better suit up. I'll do the same, and we'll meet in orbit. We'll try to engage the suits as far away from Earth as possible, or civilian shuttles will end up like you would have if you'd been a couple hours late." Heero headed back out the door, and turned toward the suit hangar.
Jai watched him go, and silently thanked whichever entity had given her patience enough to spend three months trying to hack through a minimum of seven firewalls and security systems into Heero's computer. She couldn't believe that he had been that careful guarding a personal computer. It was worth it, though. The training programs that he had designed for the Zero system had been very beneficial, and she was now at least as good a pilot as they were, though she suspected from the advanced training sessions that he was quickly and covertly upgrading his private system. The advanced sessions would have been enough to convert any normal human's brain into baked lasagna, and had been too well protected for her to do any more than analyze them from Heero's computer. She shook her head and hit the switch that controlled the conveyor belt Starfire was kneeling on, and it slowly rolled out, coming to rest on the floor in front of her. She opened the bay doors, climbed into the cockpit, and powered up the systems. She kicked in the main engines, and rocketed out the bay doors into full sunlight. The light glinted off the suit from every angle, illustrating one of the reasons the suit had been named Starfire. It looked like it was cast from molten illumination. She blasted into space, meeting the other five Gundams that were already waiting for her in orbit
"What in all hells is that?" came a bewildered voice over the com from Wufei.
"We don't have time to talk. We have to intercept those dolls." Stated Heero.
"Yeah, I know. Let's hurry." Jai said, having been warned of Wufei's dispositions.
"A woman? Now what the hell is going on? Last I heard, we were a team of five, not six. And all she's going to do is get in our way."
Jai laughed, and said, in a cheerily menacing voice, "Oh, really? Let's see who's the weaker. Whoever destroys more suits is the stronger. The others will fight, but there will be a little contest between you and me."
"Fine by me. Prepare to acknowledge your superior." Wufei shot back.
"I will. If you beat me. Which I assure you will not." Jai stated, and rocketed away toward the incoming mobile dolls.
Once the battle was engaged, all six suits had drawn their weapons and had been treated to the first display of Starfire's abilities. From a small indent above the right wrist, a white thermal blade was issued. It wielded this blade as an extension, and was ripping the dolls to ribbons. She raked the white halberd across another doll, and as several suits descended on hers, and the other five rushed to help her. They were stunned as silver light beamed from inside the tangled mass of suits, and suddenly, the dolls began to detonate. This allowed a clear view of Starfire, living up to it's name and casting deadly light rays at anything within range. These rays were fired from some three dozen small indents strewn all over the Gundam's armor.
"Holy crap! What IS that damn thing called? DiscoBall? " Duo laughed.
Jai began to rush through the battle, striking down any doll close enough with the fatal beams, still glowing like living Moonstone, and still slicing her halberd through any doll that survived her secondary weapon. The others watched the mesmerizing suit whenever they could, which was often, with the Starfire seeming the larger threat to the dolls, which had then grouped up to mount a full scale attack on it, only to be destroyed.
When the battle was finished, with the Gundams victorious, the six warriors congratulated Jai on her feats