Still, these were ships funded and built by the Winner corporation. That meant quality for the rebels and bad news for Earth. Which was why Heero had to stop them now before they got any farther.
"All fighters, power up laser rifles and prepare to make runs on the battleships," a commander's voice filled Heero's headset. "Squad Red, take the first ship. Squad Blue, the second. Stay in formation."
Heero echoed his acknowledgement along with the rest of the fighter pilots. He knew that the other pilots were probably all former OZ or Alliance members. He was fighting with the people he had called his enemies only a couple years ago. How times change.
Heero took the fighter on a course towards the 2nd battleship, following the formation that the other pilots had naturally fallen into. Old habits die hard.
The battleship started firing immediately. Heero managed to work his ship around the blasts to close in on the large battleship. If he could disable it's engines, then it would be dead in space and would have no hope of reaching Earth. That was Heero's goal.
A lucky shot grazed his fighter. His controls fizzled for a bit, but only the outgoing comm system had been brought down. He wouldn't be able to send messages out to anybody, but he could still hear orders. He couldn't afford another hit like that, though.
He approached the battleship quickly, following the rest of Squad Blue. These pilots had never trained together, never fought together, and didn't even know each other's names. It was fairly obvious that Earth's defense was rather meager.
The fighter in front of him exploded as a shot hit it. Heero flew around the explosion. The movies always made it look cool to fly through an explosion, but at that close a range, the debris and heat would have damaged Heero's fighter.
Heero armed his torpedoes as he approached the engines of the ship. He locked on, getting as close as he could while risking fire from the rebel ship. Then he fired. The torpedo shot out of the fighter and towards the massive engines...and missed. Heero cursed to himself. The targeting sensors must be off in the ship.
A shot came near his port side. Heero pulled up quickly to avoid it, but his systems locked out at the sudden movement. Another shot hit his ship full on. Heero ducked his head as the fighter shuddered around him. He didn't think it would hold together, but it did.
Heero checked his status. Not good. That last hit had damaged his sensors so he was pretty much blind to the outside world. For all he knew, he could be heading straight for one of the battleships. His engines were out. Heero tried a bit of mechanical magic to get them working, but they remained dead. What Heero wouldn't give for his Gundam at that moment.
"All units fall back. Enemy is retreating. Do not pursue. Fall back to Earth," a voice crackled over his headset. Too bad he couldn't send them a message, but his comm unit had been screwed up early on.
Heero frowned. The Earth side must have gotten beaten pretty badly if they weren't pursuing. Heero didn't hold out much hope for somebody picking him up. He probably looked like just another piece of debris floating in space. He had enough air for 20 hours. After that...
Heero sat back, knowing there wasn't much he could do. He didn't have a spacesuit, so he couldn't get out of the fighter. And he couldn't do any repairwork from the cockpit. He took advantage of about the only working system he had and turned on his monitor. There was a news update. Heero's eyes widened. The rebellion had managed to take over the Earth government.
That meant that the Preventers would have to be on the run, without the resources that they had before. And that also meant that the retreating fleet would meet with some problems when they went back to Earth.
Things were not looking good.
****
"Duo."
Duo slapped lightly at whoever was shaking him. He was running on practically no sleep at the moment, and he didn't think it was too much to ask that he get a nap before they reach Earth.
"Duo, this is kind of important!" Hilde sounded slightly panicked.
Duo reluctantly opened his eyes and looked around, "What's going on?" He looked out the window, "Isn't Earth the other way?"
"We aren't going to Earth," Sally said.
"But I thought - "
"News just came on. Earth's been taken over by the rebellion. They have a force surrounding the Earth. There's no chance that we'd be able to get through."
"So where are we headed now?"
"To meet up with Earth's fleet."
Duo saw Wufei turn around and give him a scrutinizing look. Then he turned to Sally, "We don't have to. We can go to Earth now."
"What? But - " Sally turned around to look at Duo and a look of understanding filled her eyes. "I see."
Duo looked down at himself to see if somebody had written the answer on him while he was asleep. "Uh...guys?"
"Duo, how are your acting skills?" Sally asked.
"Er..."
****
"Hey there. Got a couple of Preventers agents for ya."
Wufei cringed. He couldn't see what was going on, but he could hear Duo's voice loud and clear. He was in back with Sally and that girl, letting Duo put on his little act. Duo truly was not an actor.
"Huh? Well, it took me a while to think things over. But I decided that you all are right. L2 has been poorly underrepresented and some changes need to be made. So I guess I am supporting you now."
Wufei couldn't hear the other side of the conversation, but he could only imagine the disbelief. Maybe the rebel was real gullible.
"Really? Thanks. Got the coordinates. See ya planetside."
It worked?
"Hey, you all can come out now! We have a ship to crash!"
Wufei entered the front of the small ship. Duo was already preparing the engines to explode. A barely controlled crash would get them on Earth and away from the rebels. They'd work from there to take care of the rebellion from Earth. If they could get them contained to the L2 colonies, it would be easier to take them out.
Of course, they'd have to get the leader, who, so far, hadn't shown himself. Wufei knew that taking away the leader of this rebellion would cause the supporters to fall apart. But it would also take something more than just that. The people needed to be shown that fighting wasn't the answer. And Wufei didn't know if anybody could do that.
The ship lurched and Wufei caught Hilde as she was thrown against the side. "Hold onto something," he told her while grabbing onto a support. She nodded and sat down, holding on to a console.
Sally had taken the copilot's seat, and Wufei let her and Duo work on their descent.
"Ya got a landing spot in mind?" Duo asked, keeping both hands at the controls.
"Somewhere far enough away not to attract attention, but close enough to get somewhere from," Sally replied.
Duo paused, "Gotcha." Wufei could feel the shuttle start to get hotter. It was shaking, getting out of control. "Hold on," Duo yelled unnecessarily. "This isn't gonna be pretty!"
Faster than he expected, Wufei was thrown forward as the ship hit the ground. He heard Hilde give out a strangled cry, but concentrated on keeping himself from hitting his head on anything. Finally, they were still.
Wufei looked up and glanced around to see how everybody was. Sally and Duo looked as if they had just come in for a perfectly normal landing, and they were working some things out in the systems, making it look like an accident. Hilde seemed okay.
"So," Hilde sat up, holding her head. "Where are we?"
Duo stood up and smiled, "Never mind. Let's move out before they come to investigate."
****
Noin's shuttle was hit hard by another blast. Her piloting skills were good, but it was hard to cut through the battle. She had no idea where she was going, either. Earth had been taken by the rebellion, so there was no chance she could go there. Her cover had effectively been blown the moment she blew up the ship.
Her scanners beeped at her. She looked down and saw that the force from Earth had arrived. That would help a little. The Pax organization didn't seem to be firing on the Earth force.
Noin sent a call to the Earth force. One battleship and 2 dozen small fighters. Well, with the Pax organization helping out, it might be enough.
"This is Lieutenant Noin of the Preventers. I have information pertaining to the rebellion, but I could use a little help here," she waited for Earth to respond.
Zech's face came up on her screen.
"Zechs!" She exclaimed. She had thought that he was still with Heero.
"Noin, you can come aboard. They're looking for some more people to pilot the fighters."
Noin nodded. The ship she had now wasn't well-suited for fighting. "What about you?" She asked.
"I'm fighting, too."
Noin nodded while looking down at her readouts. "Zechs, one of the Pax ships is moving away."
"I see it. Nothing we can do about it. We have to win this battle, Noin."
Noin looked back up at the screen, at Zechs. She gave a quick nod. "Understood."
****
Perhaps the idea had been a mistake. Quatre hadn't thought it out very well because he was still a bit distraught over what was happening at his home. They had decided to head back to L2. Surely the rebellion would have left some of their people on the colony. If he and Trowa could find them, they could gather some information. Quatre wished they knew where the other pilots were, but Trowa didn't know, and Quatre hadn't heard anything about them. He assumed that they were all alright.
"Quatre, how's your arm feeling?" Trowa asked as they walked down the street. They had gathered from some of the people that there was a meeting house for the rebels in one of the apartment complexes in the grungy part of the colony.
Quatre put a hand on his right arm, moving it back and forth a bit to see if it was okay. "Better. Still a little stiff. What about your leg?"
Trowa looked surprised that he'd noticed. Quatre knew that he wasn't limping very badly, but it was there. Trowa shook his head, "Should be okay."
Quatre nodded, interpreting that to mean that he was fine walking on it, but it could be a weakness if they got into a fight.
"Excuse me," a voice from behind them said.
Trowa and Quatre turned around. A group of men stood behind them, one man standing in front of the others.
"You two looking for the rebellion?" The man asked.
"Perhaps. Why does it concern you?" Trowa replied. Quatre let him talk. Trowa was better at this sort of conversation.
"Two former Gundam pilots...snooping around. Kinda suspicious. Which side are you on?"
Quatre noticed that the men didn't seem to have any weapons. They might be part of the rebellion, but they seemed to have been sent out to get information, much like what Quatre and Trowa were trying to do.
"The side of peace," Trowa said, walking forward a few paces, raising his hands to show that he wasn't reaching for his weapon. Quatre stayed back.
"And which side is that?"
Quatre heard it before he saw it. A small shot, a gun with a silencer on. He turned his head to look behind him and saw a figure in the window of the apartment complex behind them, gun pointed straight at Trowa's back. It had been a setup.
"Trowa!" Quatre yelled and ran in between the shot and Trowa. He saw Trowa turn quickly, a surprised expression on his face, just as he felt the shot hit him square in the back.
****
Instinct took over as Trowa caught Quatre before he collapsed. Trowa already had his gun out and had sent a shot towards the window, but the gunman had already disappeared. He turned back to the group of men who had acted as a distraction, gun raised with one hand.
"Why?" He asked.
The men truly didn't have any weapons. The lead man spoke, "Because we don't want you all interfering."
"This isn't the way to get me out of your way," Trowa stated. He backed away slowly, gun still trained on the group of men. It was hard to move quickly as Quatre was a dead weight. Trowa could feel the warmth of the blood from Quatre's back soaking through his sleeve. Damn. He couldn't let his guard down to do anything right now. Trowa backed up, turning the corner. He'd have to get off L2. He knew a place that he could take Quatre to help him. But it would require some work to get off the colony.
Trowa looked down at the boy slumped over, supported only by his arm wrapped tight around his waist. Quatre's body felt cold, and Trowa knew that he was losing a lot of blood. He shook his head. Quatre couldn't die like this. Especially not because of a tactical error on Trowa's part. He shouldn't have stayed out in the open.
It was that moment that Trowa decided that after this was all over, he'd be staying with Quatre. Even if it meant leaving the circus. He didn't want to be separated from him again. But first, he had to make sure that Quatre stayed alive.
****
"Gone?"
"We were securing the area, per orders. This is the room that Miss Relena had assigned to her, but it's empty."
"She was in a coma. People in a coma don't just get up and walk out of the hospital. Especially when we have people stationed all around the city!"
"I'm just reporting what I saw, sir."
"Impossible!"