(P.S. Dorothy kicks ass.)
"Intuition tells me how to live
my day
Intuition tells me when to walk
away
Could have turned left
Could have turned right
But I ended up here
Bang in the middle of real life
"
-Natalie Imbruglia, Intuition
Stumbling Towards Destiny
Chapter Two-A
As Quatre glanced
about, he came to realize that there was something strange about his surroundings.
It was all gray. Everything, like a thick, dense, fog that swallowed anything
that walked into it. Maybe that was what it really was. But the absence
of cold. The absence of moisture. It was like he was walking through nothing.
A void. Maybe...he was alone...
'But...I;m dreaming,
aren't I?'
And he was, for
Quatre could feel himself moving throughout the gray, but without control
of his actions of his destination. He found moving to be impossible, and
even as the fog dissipated , and sunlight began to pierce through, Quatre
could feel a haze surrounding his vision which made it hard to focus. And
now, he was in a vast field, that seemed to stretch on forever. Green and
blue met at the horizon, a cloudless sky blankented the fields below. It
was simply perfect.
Almost perfect.
Even with the
more pleasant surroundings, it was still exactly like the gray. There was...nothing.
Now winds blew the tall grass out of place, not a blade moving or twisting
a bit. No birds called to each other, and filled the air with their song.
It was as if he was standing in a snapshot, a moment forever frozen in
time. There was only a faint, steady rhythm continuing in the back of his
mind. So unobtrusive was the sound, that he managed to push it away all
together. Quatre could feel himself floating now, high above the field,
the vast expanses of light green stretching out below him.
And something
moved.
Curious, Quatre
willed himself towards the movement. It happened without effort, and he
wondered vaguely if it had not been the intention of the dream all along.
He concluded that it had, but the sight of what he found shocked him so
deeply, that he questioned if his conclusion was accurate.
Lying in the
field was Hiiro, and he was....with....a girl, no, a woman. Her eyes were
closed, and he could not see their color, and she smiled as if she held
a well kept secret. Her otherwise pale skin was colored with a rosy blush
probably from her...activities...with Hiiro. Her long, silken gold hair
was undone and fanned out below her in the grass. Her hands stroked over
Hiiro's exposed flesh, ran through his hair, intertwined with his fingers...
Hiiro, kissed
the blonde gently and let his head fall into the crook of her shoulder.
They simply stayed that way, as their breathing slowed. Quatre was almost
trapped in a permanent blush, from spying on such a private moment. Frustrated,
Quatre found he still couldn't turn away. But now...something odd was happening.
The sky was darkening. Winds were beginning to chase through the field.
Time jumped.
Hiiro was gone.
Now the woman
was left in the felt alone, eyes gazing out at the sky but seeing nothing.
The passage of time was tangible, and the the blonde's body grew, her stomach
swelling with life. The rhythm in the back of his head grew louder, and
Quatre had trouble ignoring it. It was speeding up as well, and the sound
was so familiar that he had a hard time concentrating on all the events
unfolding around him.
Time jumped.
The woman was giving birth. Faceless shadows swarmed around her, attending
to
her as she screamed without sound. For a moment, it seemed like the dream
was simulating a broken record for a moment, as the scene skipped from
moment to moment. Until everything melted away from the woman, and all
was dark but her and the bundle she held in her arms.
The world.
'She is...the mother of Earth?'
The rhythm in
the back of his head grew louder, until he could no longer ignore it. The
world the woman cradled in her arms pulsed along, until Quatre finally
recognized the sound for what it was. The beating of his heart. The heartbeat
of the world. It was everything. Slow and steady, growing louder in his
ears. The woman smiled sadly, as the planet slipped from her grasp and
suddenly everything changed.
Caught by invisible
string, the woman was lifted to her feet, into the air, struggling as the
wire cut into her flesh. It pulled and tugged, as she was forced with her
arms spread and her feet bound together. His heart beat faster, like an
oncoming train, it was all consuming as he watched the scene unfold before
him. Now bound crucified, the girl look at him with deep blue eyes.
'Find her.' the command echoed around
him, deep into his soul.
And she smiled.
And the strings
pulled tighter, ripping her body to pieces, falling in a rain of blood
and limbs.
And his heartbeat
stopped.
"Ah!" Quatre bolted
upright in bed, breathing heavily. That dream had disturbed him greatly,
and something told him it was more than just that. There was something
important about it, like a premonition.
"Maybe I should call Hiiro..." Hiiro
had been the only person he recognized in the dream. Maybe he'd met that
blonde girl somewhere, and they could go about finding her. And he was
pretty sure that was what he should do. It was the only thing spoken in
the entire episode, after all. But...it was one o'clock in the morning.
Quatre couldn't quite figure out the time distance to Hiiro's location
on Earth, but he was sure the stoic boy wouldn't appreciate it. And he
had a conference tomorrow with some fellow executives about acquiring another
company on L4. Tomorrow would be better. He'd just call Hiiro tomorrow...
^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>
"...yes." Quatre
was having trouble keeping his eyes open. Luckily, Dorothy had planned
to do most of the talking during this merger. She was always good at getting
what she wanted. But it was almost done with, and then he could go home,
call Hiiro and take a nice long nap...
"But now that the war is just ending,
doesn't it seem that the sudden merging of Catalonia and Winner industries,
followed by the number of corporate acquisitions would remind people too
much of the tactics of the Romefeller Foundation?" one executive asked.
"I assure you, we have no such intentions."
Quatre replied, quick to defend the recent business decisions of he and
his partner. "We only wish to assure the survival of you're company and
other companies in the current universal market. Which is why we should..."
Quatre paused.
He frowned, and rubbed his arm. Trying to decrease the sudden tension that
was building up there. Something was definitely wrong.
"We should..."
He couldn't concentrate.
His head was spinning, and it felt like he was burning up. His skin was
getting hot, and his vision blurred. All around him, concerned faces spun,
and one of the executives closer to him got up quickly from his seat. Quatre
silently cursed himself for getting sick now, of all times. This conference
was important. Not just to his company, but now more than ever they needed
to calm the worries of the people and prove that the war truly was over.
"Mr. Winner?"
he heard Dorothy from the other side of the table. She sounded so far away,
though. Like she was talking from the other side of a tunnel. Everything
felt thick, like treading through water. Suddenly, there was a sharp pain
in his head, and another stabbing at his chest. The pain was almost unbearable
and he stumbled to the floor. Vaguely, he was aware that people were crowding
around him, that Dorothy had moved close to his side, cradling his head
in her lap. Again, from somewhere far away he heard a voice he didn't recognize
shouting.
"Oh, god. Somebody call an ambulance
dammit! Hurry!"
He could still
hear them. But he didn't care. He couldn't understand why they needed to
shout, why they needed to be so loud. The pain had stopped now, and his
mind wandered. Dorothy was warm...it was funny to think of, but she was.
Warm and soft, and her hair felt silky as it brushed against his skin.
Quatre couldn't understand why he had never noticed it before. Everything
was getting farther and farther away, and suddenly it all made sense. He
finally felt free. As a sweet sense of darkness covered him, the last words
he would ever hear pierced into the remains of his consciousness.
"Find Her."
And then it was
perfect.
^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>
"In other news, the five young men
recently credited to putting an end to the Eve Wars died today. Reports
say they simultaneously suffered from massive heart failure. It has been
assumed they have been assassinated, from someone with a vendetta from
the war, and experts are currently looking for clues regarding the case.
A memorial for the pilots will be held at-"
Dorothy Catalonia
turned off the vidscreen and closed her eyes. She knew what had happened,
and would bet her fortune that they'd never catch the man who'd done this
to the pilots. Not the right one anyway. She sank back into the pillows
of her bed, reflecting on the situation as it was now. Dorothy had shut
herself into her bedroom the moment she'd come back from the hospital,
and warned all around her that she not be disturbed. And of course, all
around her knew that it was dangerous to disobey Dorothy Catalonia. She
supposed though, that in part they thought she was mourning.
'But why cry for someone who isn't
dead?'
Because she knew
they weren't. They had been like her, trapped in this worthless game. And
she had to admit, she'd enjoyed the company, and their willingness to participate
in her little war. No, that wasn't quite true. It had been HIS little way.
But still, she had gotten bored and he had provided her entertainment.
And no one was really getting hurt anyway. She reached up to rub her eyes,
but pulled her hand away quickly. Tears. She was...crying? But she hadn't
cried since...she didn't want to remember the last time she cried.
"Why?!" she demanded angrily.
Seething, she
grabbed a pillow and hurled it across the room. It fell to the ground with
an unsatisfying flop, and Dorothy reached for something more destructive.
Her hand came across a silver picture frame, which she pitched with all
her might into a dresser mirror on the other side of the room. A much more
satisfying sound of shattering glass snapped her out of her momentary fury,
breath still coming in gasps from anger.
Shivering as
the adrenaline high ebbed away, Dorothy slowly got out of bed, and stooped
to pick up the picture frame. She ignored the shards of glass that cut
into her feet, and brushed away the debris left within the frame from its
abuse. Truthfully, she didn't care about the frame, but the picture inside
it.
Her and Quatre,
shaking hands and smiling politely for the camera. It was a publicity photo,
taken when the two companies had merged, after the Eve Wars had ended.
They had decided that together, they could expand and grow faster. Help
the colonies that had been torn apart in the fight the fight for freedom.
That had been his dream, and she found it a profitable business arrangement
but...
She missed them.
'I guess, just because they're alive
doesn't change the fact that they're gone.'
Sighing, Dorothy
felt her strength leave and she dropped to the ground, glass crunching
beneath her weight.
"Quatre...I hope you find Her. Otherwise,
your freedom will be as worthless as this game."
^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>
At the same time:
The room
was in absolute chaos. At first, it had been on computer to blank out,
while a repair crew tried to fix it. It hadn't especially phased anyone
in the room, and all resumed work as usual. But quickly after the first
computer, another went down, then another, and another, until all the other
systems simply turned off. Panic ensued. For fifteen minutes and thirty
seven seconds he had been yelling out orders, trying to keep his employees
under control.
"Re-route the power to the control
program! Keep an eye on those readings at all times! I want to find out
who responsible for this!"
In the midst of
it all, a woman stood, long auburn hair curled down her back. In the dim
light he was suddenly reminded of the color of blood. She stood, calm and
poised, amidst the scrambling assistants and experts desperately trying
to fix the mistake. To save their necks. From her. She grinned ferally,
discreetly slipping a foot out from her long purple dress, the low neckline
obscured by the lab coat she wore over it. A hapless computer analyst tripped
over her, spilling readings and repair instruments across the floor.
"Fool! Where were you looking?!"
the woman screamed in falsified rage.
The girl on the
floor reach for the glasses that had been knocked off her face. Blushing,
and reaching for papers that were now scattered about her on the ground,
she hurriedly picking up her belongings, nervous of the older woman's wrath.
"I-I'm so-so sorry, Beryl-sama. Please,
I'll be more careful next time, just...please..." she stammered and back
away, leaving the room quickly.
With a slow smirk,
Beryl turned to her "superior" and said, "Check. You're move."
His eyes narrowed.
"Pull them out of the system. Now!"
"But, sir! That will-"
"I know what it will do, dammit!
They're more useful to us alive than dead, though. Send them to get medical
treatment. And make not to the same facilities!" he closed his eyes and
rubbed his temple, mulling over the havoc his "assistant" had caused. But
now it was his move, and he'd have to resort to drastic measures to get
out of check.
"Beryl, proceed to secondary resource
plans. Target Tokyo."
Beryl mocked a
salute and purred, "Yes, sir. Excellent move. I'll begin damage control
as well."
The man sighed.
They didn't care about why they were doing what they were doing, or at
what the cost. All Beryl and her monsters cared about was the entertainment.
They were vicious, and exceedingly powerful. To powerful to resist. They
would be able to give him what he wanted. What they had agreed on when
the game began.
'Damn them all...but they'll keep
their end of it if I win...'
"And I won't fail her."
^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>^>
Hm, I like my
new separator. ^_^ Don't worry! Part 2b is coming very soon. But
I was getting restless typing up this chapter, and I wanted to post it
now. Plus, I'm totally sore from last night (Senior Prom ^_^;; ooohh..my
neck is killing me now) and I have TWO huge projects due in the span of
two weeks. I need to work on them. (Crossover fanfics have taken over my
life!! I need to get it back for another week, okay?)
Disclaimer: Bishoujo Senshi
Sailormoon belongs to Naoko Takeuchi, Nakayoshi, Kodansha, and Toei and
all it's holdings. Gundam Wing belongs to Sohei Entertainment (I thinkā¦)
and Sunrise. 'Intuition' belongs to Natalie Imbruglia. This story is written
without intent of copyright infringement. If one of the aforementioned
companies/individuals finds this, please don't sue. I will happily direct
you to people who abuse you're materials much worse than me. Thank you.
And always remember: Reviews
are the only payment fanfic writer get.