Chapter 4
While the display of Starfire's power was an inspiration, Heero was beginning to wonder if a suit that powerful wouldn't be singled out for a bombing, or a surprise attack with something like a space laser. If the Starfire were the greater threat, the logical course of action would be to try to destroy it first. The only smart way to counteract this was to make the other Gundams more powerful. The dumb way was to make the Starfire less powerful, and while that was more economical, it was also stupid, and a waste of power.
Now, how to improve them. Heavyarms naturally needed a new weapon of some sort. He could not defend himself when he ran out of ammunition. Almost the exact opposite, with Sandrock. He had no long range weapon, and that was a major shortcoming. Deathscythe was well balanced, but still needed a long range weapon capable of attacking more than one suit at a time. Altron had a long range weapon, but it needed to retract it to do anything again. That needed to be modified. Wing Zero, while it had a short and long range weapon, needed to be able to use them in conjunction, like Starfire. All of them did. He'd have to ask Jai the best way to do that. She designed Starfire, and likely had specs and blueprints of the rest of the Gundams.
Jai had come to the same conclusion by herself, and had resolved to discuss it with Heero while her quarters were being prepared. She would have to keep her vital luggage with her, that went without saying. She was a spy, after all, and anything she kept with her was either for vital security, or was of extreme sentimental value. She had only a few personal belongings, and every single one of them had a long string of memories tied to it. Some good, some bad, but they were memories, things she hoped to share with Heero someday. Many of the memories and experiences in question involved him in some way, but had been brutally beaten out of him in the quest to create the perfect soldier. All emotion had been erased from his mind, and his body had been programmed to have the highest pain tolerance ever documented. He had not been trained. He had been programmed, down to the last thought. He was only now regaining his lost humanity, and she hoped it would be enough of a help that she was here with things from their past.
When they returned to headquarters, Starfire resting with the other Gundams, Heero decided to introduce Jai, inasmuch as several of the gundam pilots had very confused looks on their faces.
Heero stood from the conference table, instantly silencing all conversation, and drawing all eyes to him. Duo had to wonder how he did that without so much as glaring at anyone. Air of power, he supposed. Anyone who could do that so effortlessly was a born leader.
Heero began with, "This is my sister. Janai Yuy."
Subtle as always, Duo thought, treating himself to amazed expressions from the other pilots. Trowa was surprised, but naturally, being Trowa, he did not show it. Quatre and Wufei, however, not being quite so restrained as Trowa, had to pick up their jaws with both hands.
Duo, trying not to laugh, was making sounds like half a dozen whales surfacing simultaneously. He wished he had his camera NOW. This was better than Heero and Relena, and was less likely to get him killed. Pretty much anything, including setting off the self-detonation device on his Gundam while he was inside, was less likely to get him killed. Besides, those two were so stunned, and Quatre looked something other than stunned, Duo noted, it would be ten minutes before either of them realized he had taken a picture, let alone that he was gone.
Trowa, his usual self, calm and in control, asked, "When did she get here? And where did she get that suit?"
"She designed the Gundam Starfire from the ground up. And she arrived about two hours ago. I was expecting her even less than you, and you didn't know she existed."
"And I wouldn't be more surprised if I woke up tomorrow with my head sewn to the carpet." Duo stated, earning a smack on the shoulder from Hilde, who was also attending the meeting. "Ow! Quit doing that!"
"Now, keep quiet, or you WILL wake up tomorrow with your head sewn to the carpet."
"Smack him again. He needs it." Said Jai, and Hilde gave Duo another whack on the arm.
"Ow! The first time you've even heard her voice, and you do exactly what she says?! What kind of a friend ARE you?" he said, smiling, and giving Hilde a slight shove, which she returned.
"Shut up! I don't need to hear you two bakas bickering for ten minutes!" Wufei returned his attention to Jai and said "How did you make that suit so powerful? Without draining the generator or overheating? I'd like to apply design elements from your Gundam to Nataku."
Jai smiled warmly, exercising her ability to put others at ease. "Actually, that's what I was thinking. Your gundams need new design elements. You are designed to be able to take on any suit in single combat, but you lack the ability to attack large numbers of opponents individually. The latter is exactly what any enemy will throw at you. I would like to help. With your permission, of course, I will give new weapons or features to each of your Gundams to help them adjust to the tactics that have come into use by our enemies."
Heero silently admired Jai's tact. She had managed to make herself a necessity to the team already, and was on the good side of even the most irritable Gundam pilot. That in itself was no easy feat, made harder by Wufei's superiority complex. He was glad that Jai had made so much of a show of Starfire's power, and impressed Wufei while at the same time earning his respect. There were very few women who were able to get much of anything from Wufei, much less open respect. He had hoped that his statement about Jai's abilities as a mechanic and designer would earn appreciation of her as a teammate.
When all of the pilots had agreed to allow her access to their Gundams, Heero and Jai made their way to his quarters, Jai, as always, with her duffel bag over her shoulder. When they got in, Jai set down her stuff, and walked over to Heero's couch, positioned across the room from his T.V., and sat down.
"Oh, man, that feels good. This is the most comfortable I've been in almost a week. And it certainly feels the most like home." Heero cocked an eyebrow at her, and she grinned. "I mean with you here, you little….. Oh, god, let's not start that crap again," She laughed, "We've been doing that ever since we could talk. We don't need to start calling each other names already!"
Heero laughed with her. Jai wouldn't let it through, but she was relieved that he was able to laugh again.
"I need to go take a shower. Make yourself at home." He walked to the bathroom off his bedroom, and Jai heard the door click and the shower start. She took the remote off the table next to his couch, and turned on the T.V.
Midway through his shower, Heero heard loud laughter emanating from his living room. 'What the hell is she laughing at? It's not like I keep those weird movies that Duo likes around."
He walked out of the shower, and dried himself off. After he got dressed, Jai was still laughing, having slid halfway off his couch, and was about to fall on the floor. He walked over and helped her back onto the couch, looking at the T.V. after he sat down. Sure enough, there was an image of Heero latched to a falling Duo's waist in mid air frozen on the screen. She must have picked up his remote and hit the play button, and he had left the disc Duo had given him in the player. He himself had to smile a little at the image of him running Duo down.
When Jai stopped laughing long enough to recover her wits, she asked why exactly he had tackled Duo.
"I take it you still can't pry that far into me, huh?"
"Yes, my brother, we both know that you've always been able to repel my little mind probes. Now, answer the question."
"I further reason that you didn't watch the entire disc."
"Yes. Now, where is this going?"
"Here." Heero took the remote, and flipped the screen back to where Duo had begun recording.
"Ohhhhh, I get it. You're pretty close with Relena, right? I can sense that much radiating from you right now."
"Watch." He told her, and they both returned their attention to the screen. The scene with the flash played, and Jai suddenly knew what had happened.
"Oh, Jesus, you ran him down because he did that?"
"Yes." Heero stated flatly, "And that baka apparently almost immediately went to the security room, got the whole thing on discs, and distributed them among the rest of the pilots."
Jai snorted back another gasp of laughter, and simply shook for a moment until she noticed the look on Heero's face.
"Uh oh. They didn't know, right?"
"Not that much. Maxwell, curse his soul, has known almost as much as me for quite some time, and has been trying to expose it ever since. I don't think Relena cares whether everybody knows it or not, but I have my dignity, and not to mention the fact that while of course you, with your little mind tricks, knew almost immediately, the others don't care too much, and don't pay much attention to me, or anyone else."
"I suppose that's a good thing. Duo is at least good for a laugh, if only at your expense."
"He's little more than a huge pain in the ass. And while that's not much, it's enough. I'm seriously beginning to question his sanity. And if he keeps this kind of stuff up, I'm going to start to question mine. You would not believe the crap my head is coming up with when I think of what I'm going to do to him."
"Let me see."
"What?"
"Let me see. You know I'm a telepath, but you have somehow been able to resist any probe I've ever thrown at you. If you let me, I can see what you're thinking."
"Believe me, you don't want to. How about some breakfast? It's only ten o clock. "
"You want me to cook you breakfast?" Jai asked incredulously.
"No way! The last thing you cooked for me was an omelet, and that was six years ago, and I can STILL use that thing as a frisbee. God help us if it ever falls into the hands of the Earth Sphere defense department." He walked to his kitchen, and from there he called, "That damn thing could be used to deflect small arms fire, and has somehow managed to avoid decomposition."
"All right, point taken. Now, lay off my cooking. And…….wait a minute. You still have the OMELET I gave you?!"
"It's one of only two memoirs I have of you. One's a picture on my desk, and the other is a six-year-old, ham and cheese omelet that is harder than rock and tougher than third world toilet paper. You wouldn't believe how easy it is to smuggle something so dangerous through customs."
"Heero, I always knew you were a little crazy, but this tops it off."
"You're one to talk. Giving me something that could be mistaken for a hubcap and expecting me to eat it."
Jai secretly relished this talk. It meant that Heero was at least learning to talk to people, if only to her. He was even funny, and was even managing to poke fun at her cooking. She had to admit, though, that wasn't too hard to do. The last time she cooked something, she almost melted the stove.
Ten minutes later, Heero came back out of the kitchen with two plates of food, eggs, sausage, and a glass of juice.
"Since when do you know how to cook?" asked jai, as she took a bite, and her eyes widened. "Hey, this isn't half bad. If you ever get tired of being a pilot, I'll hire you on as my chef." She turned back to her food, and resumed eating, and Heero followed her example. Using the Zero system always sapped everybody's strength, and food was a quick refuel. She took a sip of juice, and renewed the conversation.
"How have you been, anyway? You know what they assigned me to, after they sent you off?"
"No. Actually, I tried a couple of times since Marimeia's coup to locate or contact you, but never had any success. I figured they just kept you around."
"Gee, such confidence in my abilities," Jai said, a sardonic tint to her voice. "They made me a spy. I gathered intelligence for your missions during and after operation meteor. It was a bitch keeping up with you guys, you know that?"
Heero just stared at her. A spy? Yes, with her telepathic powers, that made sense. What better way to interrogate someone than not even really asking them anything? They knew Quatre was an empath, but that was nowhere near what Jai was. She could literally sift through someone's mind, while Quatre could only pick up on feelings or thoughts that were expressed at that moment. It took quite a bit of training from a large group of people who were, essentially, professional psychics to train her, and she was more powerful than any of them. He had been trained as a soldier and a pilot, and so had she, but she received special training while he was learning to pilot the Wing Gundam. Apparently she was being trained as a spy to gather intelligence on OZ bases and such. She was not exactly hard on the eyes, either, and that helped put her victims at ease, he supposed. In fact, he had caught Quatre staring, and while he couldn't blame him, he'd have to try to extinguish anything that was kindling in his mind.
The door opened, and Duo walked in a few steps. "Your quarters have been prepared, Miss Yuy." He said with a flourish and a bow, and Jai smiled at him. She then turned to Heero, who was giving Duo the nastiest death glare she had ever seen, and she had seen a lot of those, having been around the person who pioneered their use, but that only served to encourage Duo, and he grinned.
"You know, I think I'm beginning to like him."
Jai picked up her duffel bag, and walked toward the door.
"Carry your luggage, my lady?" said Duo, as he reached for her bag, only to have his arm struck with a swift chopping motion from Jai, and suddenly he couldn't feel or move his arm anymore.
"What the--?" Questioned Duo, as he stared at his arm with slight amusement.
"That should wear off in about ten minutes, and don't ever try to touch my stuff again." Jai cautioned, even as her smile grew even broader.
Duo nodded, amusement still in the lines of his eyes and mouth. He walked down the hall with Jai and Heero in tow, one arm hanging limply at his side, still refusing any command from his brain.
"I'll have to have you teach me how to do that," duo said to Jai. "It's a good move that disables the limb without pain."
They reached Jai's room, only about fifty feet down the hall from Heero's, and Duo opened the door and gestured inside with his good arm. When Both Heero and Jai had entered, he shook his head, and stole another glance at his currently useless arm. He had to hope Jai was right, and this would wear off soon, or he'd be counting on five fingers for the rest of his life. He shrugged, and was silently glad she hadn't chopped BOTH his arms, or he'd look like some sort of primate wandering the halls of preventer H.Q., and he'd have to pilot Deathscythe with his teeth, dramatically cutting down on his combat performance. Plus, he really didn't want to know what those control sticks tasted like.
The feeling was beginning to come back to his arm, though Duo still couldn't move it. He made his way to the shooting range, and he was a better shot using only one hand anyway.