END PART TWO BEGIN PART THREE

A dark room. Six voices called out, six guy voices, locating each other and expressing their inability to see nothing in the perfect dark.

"Ow! Wufei, you moron, you stepped on my foot!"

"You weak man. You have whined about every little boo-boo that you have received ever since I met you. You are a disgrace to the Gundams, Maxwell."

"Gee whiz, I wouldn't think it would be pleasant to you if…." Duo Maxwell, in his goofy way, stomped his foot at his more grumpy former comrade, Cheng Wufei."

"OW!"

"I'll do it again!"

Zechs Marquise was not a very jolly fellow, but he was willing to add comic relief to an otherwise grim story. He was the pilot of Gundam 06. He died in the war, then came back in his usual mysterious way. "You do it again, Duo."

THONK

"OWWW!"

Duo (Gundam 02) again hit Wufei (Gundam 05) right in the gut, so I would not have to admit I am taking this scene from a Buster Rhymes video. Zechs decided that this was enough. "Okay, Trowa let us use his circus tent to have a meeting. We have to behave and come out with no more bruises that we had when e came in."

Trowa Barton, of Gundam 03, nodded. "That is right." Since the war, he had spoken as many words as Duo says in one day. He had been in the circus, and in the decade-plus since then, he wound up with a circus of his own, half-manager with his sister.

"Hopefully, everyone is here."

Heero was not very talkative either, but his fiancee was in danger—he could tell. She sure was not acting like she used to. A doctor he knew by the name of Po declared her insane. "My God, Heero, get her to resign tomorrow. These delusions are _not_ going to be helped by stress." Besides, he was in the honor position. He was 01—the greatest of the pilots. The hardest to beat and the most indestructible.

Zechs lit a foot-long match, eerily illuminating his angular face and long white hair. He looked around. "Where is 04? Where is Quatre?"

"Oh—right here. He could not make it out of Arabia." Duo pulled out a cell phone. A voice shrilly called out, "Hey everyone. Sorry I couldn't be there but getting out of here is a _nightmare_. There have been sandstorms everyday this week."

"Ah," said Trowa.

"Okay, now lets begin." As he spoke Zechs looked for something to light, such as a lantern. "Sister is having some problems. She offended a colony governor about three weeks ago and it seems like he may have to become soldiers again."

"It is not good," said Heero. "She has been asking for mobile suit training. She speaks with herself all the time and I think that she has an imaginary friend, named Al. She says he tells her that fighting is the right thing to do, that there is no way to avoid it. She is actually creeping me out."

Everyone grimaced, except Trowa, who never changed expressions. It took much to scare Heero. "Jeez." Duo finally spoke up. "Relena going out to fight. Who wouldn't put cold hard cash on betting against that?"

"Exactly. Everything she has fought for in the last 12 years is falling apart. I think that she is schizophrenic. Those voices in her head are controlling her."

"What do we do?" A bit of static went though Quatre's voice as he spoke but all in the tent could understand him. "We can't just lock her up. And Wufei and Heero—we can't kill her, she is a hero."

"I don't want to kill my fiancee." Heero looked to Wufei. "And if you try you will must certainly will die."

"Oh, are you so sure?"

"Guys," began Zechs. "I think—ow!" The match had burned to its end and the tip of his fingers burned. He continued as he searched his pockets for another. "I think that we will not be able to stop her until she steps onto the battlefield and she sees the horror of war. Before then—all of us are to stand behind her. You all are, right?"

"Right," said Heero and Quatre. All others stayed silent.

"Well…I dunno." Heero began to change his mind.

"What? She is mad! She will not last. None of us would if we had what she has. Besides—we have trained all of our lives. She has had a crash course from Heero. Heero, I am sure that you are an excellent teacher but still—it has not been long, has it?

"Just a couple of weeks."

"She could not last in a battle unless this Al is as able in a Gundam as we are. She has not asked to get a Gundam to herself, has she? Or, is she going to steal yours?"

"No, she doesn't want her own. And I am keeping a close eye on 01, in case she does have her eye on it."

"Okay. But still, even if she makes it into a Gundam, she may not ever walk out of it. Why are all of you abandoning her?"

"We are all from the colonies." Wufei shrugged. "I mean, wouldn't you defend your home from an insane ruler, like Relena so obviously is? Look, I grew up in a colony. It was destroyed and I then vowed never again to let a colony-dweller to come to arm from the earth. It is a matter of home to me. What about you, Zechs? You were the leader of White Fang. You used that huge gun thing to shoot the earth itself. You should consider coming with us."

"Blood is thicker than wine. That is a good saying for you, Heero. I would think that your fiancee would mean a lot to you, but perhaps I am wrong."

"Hey."

"You won't stand by her? She could be hurt or killed during the war. Are you going to allow that? Wasn't your mission back during the war of 195 to protect her? And if you are a part of the colonies force, say you shoot at someone and kill them and its her. What then?"

"That would be very unfortunate. But I think that will not happen. Like Wufei said, the colonies need protection and I am from the colonies. But I also fight against her to stop her. I hope that if we face ourselves in battle that I will stop her and I can get her back to normal without her being harmed."

"God do I hope you are right, Heero." Quatre's voice sounded loud and clear. "She may not come out in one piece, but if she is a fanatic, maybe she will be able to pull herself and keep on going if she is hurt. She is tough, standing around as St. Peter burned."

"Yes." Heero stood. "I must leave to make my flight, but I hope you are right, Quatre. If anything good comes out of her condition, may it be that."

Just outside of Rome, an old Taurus mobile suit was moving through the rye fields, its weapon out and ready to be used. Then all of a sudden it launched itself into the air, streaked through the sky toward the sea and paused a minute later, when it reached the coastline. It returned to its original spot not in a straight line but in a series of extremely sharp turns.

It always had been the Gundams that were the best pilots, and so assorted others from OZ like Zechs. But now, no one could beat Relena Darlian, thanks to Heero.

And Al.

*Hey, babe,* she heard suddenly. She landed to look at the dragon statue behind her seat. *You know, if you're gonna go to battle, then I want to have a better seat, you know? I mean, from here I'll just feel some vibrations and listen to you go at it.*

"Boo-hoo. You will have to deal with it, okay?"

*You know, Relena, you aren't as good today as you were yesterday. I think you are leveling off in your training.*

"Not much more for me to learn."

*Yeah—but you gotta be sure that you are as good as you can be. Don't you want to want to absolutely _vaporize_ some OZ dudes?*

"No. And OZ no longer exists. I just want peace."

The view around Relena changed from the interior of a mobile suit to the wreaked street of post-invasion St. Peter. "No," she gasped. "I don't want to se Heero die again."

Al had gotten more aggressive in the past week or two. He demanded to be obeyed by Relena, and images of her friends dying, or those of St. Peter, or even those of Hell. It was clear that Al didn't have much cares to keep up the peace, and was quite willing to torture Relena to get his way.

He put her right on the rubble of the old palace. He had learned that if he had put her on the intersection, like he had in the first time he came to her, she would have refused to move.

Heero's body was poking out of the rubble, just as gruesome as ever. This time, a couple of flies were circling the body. *Do you want to see your man to become the food for lower life? The flies are planing their eggs in him, and soon his body will burst out in maggots. You don't want that to happen to him, do you, Relena?*

"No." She thought a little too hard about Al's imagery and had to learn to control her gag impulse. "Why do you harm me so? I just want you to go away. I know—you were the one who got me drunk at that lunch, didn't you? You got the world into this mess!"

*But Relena, you were the one who poured champagne down your throat.*

"You are me. You don't shut up and you make me listen to your ravings twenty-four-seven. You do not allow me to get any sleep. I am haggard and just _desperate_ for a minute without having to see fire and smelling death." Relena's pitch raised until it came out as a shaky squeak.

*I am doing this to save you! Me and my friends can see what will happen if you do not go on with this. It will be a total war, to be sure. And the Earth of the future will have weak leaders, who bend like jellyfish, no one like you and the Preventers. You have a spine of steel, and will lead the Earth to victory to the colony beasts.*

"Please leave me alone. I just want to be a minister again, not a warlord."

*Too late now Relena, you are now mine and a servant of the future.*

"I am NOT!" With a swift fist she punched the dragon statue. It was made of ceramic, but her shot was fast enough to make it crack a considerable degree. It split after she pulled it apart a little. "There. Good bye and good riddance, Al." The smell of burning bodies relented and the screaming in her ears faded. She sighed and sat, putting her head on the front control board and instantly falling asleep.

She was put in the middle of a peculiar field, with no one around, like when she first met Al. "Oh my God, he is back." Instead of meeting her controller, though, she saw Heero walk out of some heather, a quizzical look on his face. "Uh, Relena, what are you doing here? I was napping on the couch and then I was here."

"Oh, Heero." She hugged him. Thank God you aren't Al."

"Who is he?"

"No matter. You are safe and now there are no more worries." Heero considered this for a second, and decided that he would ask later and hug now.

They stood there for a minute, then Relena said, "You know—no, no, NOOOOO!"

Heero's body was crawling with tiny white worms, which slithered in and out of his mouth and across their embrace to Relena. She dropped his now-cooling body and face the personification of Al. In his hand was a pistol. He cocked it and pointed it at her.

"You are a servant. And your master says you obey." He pulled the trigger.

She awoke with the sound of the gun in her ears. Then, as soon as she realized she was still in the mobile suit, she heard al say, "Now go back home and I'll let you get a bit of shut-eye. You will need your rest for the war."

END PART THREE BEGIN PART FOUR