Chapter One

The soft sound of typing pervaded the tiny room. Heero's eyes focused carefully on the screen in front of him. Even when a pillow rose and nearly smacked him on the side of his head, he merely caught it and threw it back at Duo, his eyes never leaving the screen even for a moment.

"You are, of course, aware that it is after two in the morning," Duo grumbled.

Heero didn't answer.

"Not that you should be at all apologetic for keeping me up or anything."

"Either go back to sleep or help me," Heero replied.

With a resigned sigh Duo pulled over a chair from the other desk in their shared room and flopped down next to Heero. "So what are you doing?"

"I'm trying to get into H-Z-917784 again," Heero answered.

"You would have the file name memorized."

"It's the only one I haven't been able to access. I've already jumped three security barriers. I'm still not in the system."

"Why not just cut your way in?"

"I don't want them to know anyone's been in there."

Duo leaned over to peer at the glowing screen. "Picky-picky. Okay, let's try this." His fingers slid across the keys. The display flickered, then changed colors suddenly.

"We're in," Heero announced, sounding (for Heero) quite pleased.

"You're welcome," Duo muttered, and dropped his head down on his arms. He had almost dropped off to sleep when Heero jabbed him, hard. "What now?"

"Read this."

Duo looked at the part of the paragraph that Heero was pointing to.


01020101200120201002010021010211020001201012000021102010021112000020101201
10211121012010210021020101200120000201002102000021120101200121020001210120200020
1102102...

"I can't read it," he growled. Heero seemed to forget that the rest of them hadn't memorized all of the OZ codes.

"It has symptoms not unlike those of the plague..." Heero read.

Duo woke up with a jerk. "What does?"

"A man-made disease that OZ has decided to create."

Duo's eyes widened. "Are they insane?" he whispered.

Heero didn't answer the question. "Get Quatre and Trowa. They need to hear about this too. Then we can decide what to do."

"Should I see if I can contact Wufei? Annoying as he was, I'm starting to wish he hadn't decided to leave."

"Don't bother. There's nothing he can do about it. It would be a waste of time. Just get Quatre and Trowa."

Duo opened the door to find Quatre on the other side of it, one hand raised to knock.

"Hey, I was just coming to get you. We have a problem."

Quatre nodded. "I'll get Trowa," he replied.

Moments later the four of them were crowded into the tiny room Heero and Duo shared. The only light came from the glowing computer screen. It made them all seem paler than they really were, and it brought out the shadows under their eyes.

Heero gestured to the laptop. "Let me summarize. I haven't read it quite thoroughly yet, but enough to get the general idea." His fingers clenched and unclenched, as though searching for something to do.

"OZ has created their own disease in one of their satellite labs, H-Z-917784. It has a long gestation period, so it has lots of opportunity to spread before the victim realizes they're sick. It has symptoms similar to those of the plague: fever, vomiting, dehydration, fainting spells, and ganglia, frequently ending in death."

Duo decided not to ask what ganglia were. Instead he quietly addressed the floor as he asked, "So what do we do?"

"This isn't our area of expertise. We're soldiers, not doctors," Trowa commented.

Quatre bowed his head. "What little evil isn't already in existence, man takes it upon himself to create," he quoted dryly. He shook his head as though trying to clear it of this gloomy thought and asked, "Does it say what they plan to do with it? Was it just to see if they could, or are they actually going to use this?"

"They wouldn't have gone through this much expense and trouble if they didn't want to use it," Duo objected.

The Arabian nodded. "You're probably right, Duo. What I should have asked was if we knew where, when, and how."

"L2," Heero replied. "Two days from now, at noon. They're going to send in a shuttle with some of the disease on its cargo, to be released upon the population at that time. You all remember that L2 is one of the few colonies that has unwaveringly protested OZ's actions from the beginning. Perhaps OZ views this as a way to obliterate one of its larger political enemies without seeming to be involved."

Duo used a few of the less-attractive words from his vocabulary.

"I agree," Trowa murmured, "But we still haven't determined what our course of action should be."

"Stop them, of course!" Duo cried. "We go to L2, wipe out the shuttle before it ever gets in! We stop it before it ever starts."

"Not practical," Heero replied. "There will be several shuttles going in and out of L2 for the next few days. We can't destroy them all. Besides, the shuttle could already be there, for all we know. This didn't say when the shuttle would arrive, only when the cargo would be unloaded."

"Then we need to go there, alert the civilian population and evacuate-"

"Duo, do you really think they'd listen to you? Just because L2 didn't side with OZ doesn't mean they're siding with us. Besides, where could they go? No colony would welcome them for fear of the disease. In addition, OZ controls most of the shuttles. Without OZ's cooperation, they're trapped."

Duo put his head in his hands and began a wordless moan.

Quatre put an arm around him, saying, "Don't worry. We'll think of something. We won't let them get hurt."

The other pilot didn't answer.

"He has friends on L2, you know," Quatre said quietly to Heero. His tone wasn't in the least accusing. It was a just a gentle reminder. You may not be personally affected, but he is. Don't forget it.

"I'll continue to look this over. Maybe I'll turn up something." Heero's voice didn't seem to hold much hope.

"If worst comes to worst..." Trowa began, but left his sentence unfinished.

"No." Quatre spoke the single syllable with a force that startled the taller pilot.

"It would be a last alternative," he said mildly.

"It shouldn't even be considered a choice. We are going to protect the colonies, not destroy them. I refuse to do OZ's work for them."

Heero was typing once more on the laptop. "You'll do whatever is needed, Quatre. If it's what is necessary to stop this artificial epidemic from spreading, you'll be there with us if or when we blow the colony up."

Duo flinched slightly.

"We don't have the right to do that," Quatre said.

"We have the ability. The gives us responsibility. And, if OZ goes through with this, and if we're unable to stop it, we have the obligation."

As though he was merely thinking aloud, Quatre replied "The power of death is too much power. No one should have that much power, but here it is, and they have it, and we have it too." He stood up to look over Heero's shoulder.

Heero glanced up briefly at him. "All we can do with it is try to use it for the best; to do what is best for the people."

Quatre shuddered slightly, pulling away from Heero as he asked. "Who are we to say what is best for the people? What gives us that right to decide? Our power?"

"If we don't decide, OZ will. We just have to hope that our having the best interests at heart for the colonies will help us make the right decisions for them."

"I don't think our consciences can handle problems of this magnitude."

"Which is why the perfect soldier has no conscience. He gives it to the people."

"Which is why the perfect soldier should never exist in the first place. There's nothing there to even try stopping him from making a mistake of horrific proportions."

"But there's also nothing stopping him from doing what he knows has to be done."

"I hate to interrupt this," Trowa said suddenly. "But did either of you see where Duo went? Or even when he left?"

Heero and Quatre looked at the empty bed where Duo had been sitting only a few moment earlier and dropped their discussion instantly.

"You don't think that he..."Quatre trailed off uncertainly.

"He's probably already taken off space and is on his way to L2," Heero said grimly, rising to his feet. "The fool. This makes things far more complicated. I'd better go after him." He folded his laptop under his arm and ran out the door, leaving Quatre staring after him.

"What did him mean, this makes things far more complicated?" Quatre asked. "If he's going to blow it up, what's one more life?" To his great annoyance, his voice trembled slightly on the last few words.

"I would suspect that Heero's not worried about Duo as a person. He's far more concerned about losing him as a soldier."

Quatre chewed his lower lip as his mind turned the problem over in his head. "I think I may have an idea." He sat down on the chair in front of the desk and faced Trowa. "OZ wouldn't do something like this if they didn't think they could undo it, would they?"

"They might...you know how they can be."

"But it could easily backfire on them, escape and hurt their own people, run rampant on earth. They can't be unaware of that danger."

"Go on." Trowa's inexpressive eyes focused carefully on his companion's.

"Since they created it artificially, they have more information about this disease than we've had about most other diseases we've had to deal with in history. Do you see what I'm leading up to?"

"They almost certainly would have created a vaccine as well," Trowa breathed.

"That's my suspicion."

"It would make sense."

"If I'm right, it makes our next move obvious. We have to try and procure some of the vaccine, get it to the colony, and vaccinate as many people as possible, all within the next two days."

"And we're not even sure if they have any vaccine, much less where it will be if they do," Trowa said glumly.

"Well, we do know where the virus itself was manufactured," Quatre pointed out. "It was made in that lab, H-Z-917784."

Trowa raised a questioning eyebrow.

"Heero isn't the only one who pokes around with OZ files. He's just more successful than I am. I could never get into that one."

Trowa smiled very slightly. "I wonder what the school will think when they wake up to find all four of us gone?" he mused.

"Well, we won't hear a thing. We should long since be in orbit by the time they notice. Please tell me that clock is wrong and it isn't 2:30."

"The clock is wrong. It's closer to 2:45."

Quatre groaned. "And it feels like it too. Oh well. Let's get a move on. The sooner the start, the more people we can save, I hope."