Disclaimer: This time... these characters ARE mine! So... yeah... Don't think I stole them, becuase if there are any creepy similarities, then it's really not my fault, or maybe it is, but its not whatever character you're thinking of, because Sha and I created these characters. And any characters that ARENT mine that are mentioned, aren't mine and are property of their rightful creators. -Love, Pip
- Fostered -
Spring, After Colony 217
Topeka, in those days, was a rather pleasant place to live after the ward had ended. The city had been pretty well preserved and the war had hardly touched it, so there wasn't too much rebuilding to be done. There were plenty of tall shade trees and little fruit-bearing trees that were engineered to produce wonderful fruits in the climate that Topeka was in. The houses all looked exactly the same, maybe a few with a different paint color on the outside, but otherwise every house had a shade tree, a bush lined face and a few flowers in their gardens. They were all two-storied and had a roof that was accessible with a nice flat area for star gazing. Each house had a mailbox at the street, almost all had their little red flags up signalling the arrival of letters and catalogues.
House number 3130 on SW Lane was a bit different from the rest around it. It didn't have an upstairs like it's neighbors and it was a very, very old house. All of the houses around it had been modified and updated to the fullest extent right around wartime ended, but this one had kept it's old glory. It was ranch-style and still proudly bore it's ancient rust colored paint underneath the huge tree that through shadows all over the front lawn and over quite a bit of the house itself. A very nice antique.
Out on the front lawn sat two people, inhabitants of the house obviously. They were teenagers, maybe 15 or 16 at the oldest. One, a girl, and the other, a boy, sat in the grass, reclined on their backs and looking up towards the sky, through the great big leaves that sprouted from the tree branches above.
"I don't know... I don't really like sports at all. All the guys were kinda shunning me after I didn't want to join the team like the rest of them..." The boy said, rubbing a spec of dust from his eye. His voice was deep-- very deep-- already and carried a rather soothing tone, a very familiar tone.
"Don't fall to peer pressure. If you don't want to play sports, then don't, Chase." Replied his sister. He didn't reply just yet.
Inside the house, someone had a TV on pretty loud, watching a news channel, as was a typical thing at this house. The female reporter went on... "A number of war orphans, waiting for homes ever since AfterColony 197 have finally been released to live on their own after reaching their nineteenth or, in some cases, twentieth birthday this year. Many have set out to locate their real parents and others have decided not to bother with the past. Here's what a few of them had to say..."
"Cameran?"
"What."
"Do you ever wonder if we're adopted?" Chase looked over at his platinum blonde sister just as she looked at him.
"Why do you ask that? You know we aren't." Her voice was unsure.
"Well... I mean, think about it. We don't look anything like our parents, or our grandparents or anybody related to us. When I applied for my permit back in November, mom wouldn't let me see my birth certificate, and when I asked her why she said that I could see it if I wanted, but we had to leave."
"That's just speculation, Chase. Don't be so paranoid."
"And look at us-- we don't look like twins! Not even fraternal twins." Chase sat up and flicked his long black hair behind his shoulder. He stared down at his sister with his piercing ice blue eyes, trying to dig deep into her mind and get her to side with him.
"So? Not all fraternal twins have similar traits."
"Why don't you believe me, Cami? I mean, I know I don't have much proof, but I just... I think I'm right. Mom and dad don't even seem like they're our own parents."
"You ALWAYS think you're right. Such an arrogant guy." She stared back up at him. Her eyes, though, were strikingly different than Chase, or anyone in her family's for that matter. Yes, other people had green eyes, but hers were almond-shaped. They had no Asian roots in their family anywhere, but she had the look. And her face was small and oval, her lips and her nose and her ears were all tiny and delicately shaped as opposed to her brother's chiseled good looks. Very European. She looked Asian.
"Come on, I've been right on things like this before! Remember when dad said that Ichabod had been hit by a car and had gone to birdie heaven? Well, remember how I thought that was a lie and it WAS!"
"That's way different."
"So?"
Cameran sighed and got up, walking inside away from her brother and his abstract ideas.
"You'll be sorry when I'm right, Cameran Thackleberry!"
She just ignored her slightly younger brother and went past the living room into her room. It was hardly decorated at all, especially for a teenage girl. It was all blindingly clean white with just a few nick-naks on her dresser and desk. There were three photos hanging on her walls, all framed in white frames and the glass was shining clean. There were a few articles on her desk cut out from recent issues of the newspaper. She was really into the history of the Eve Wars and had kept many, many articles on the subject, especially on the infamous Gundam pilots. She studied books about the era and watched every news special, PBS program and any movie or mini-series she could get her hands on.
She knew about every battle and every one of the leaders of the era. She knew all the basic stats on such people as Treize Khushrenada, Relena Peacecraft and her mysterious brother Milliardo Peacecraft. She knew, also, all the stats about the eight Gundam pilots and their suits. The mystery around them, the scandal and the romance of their journeys and their lives intrigued her. Sometimes she wished that she had lived back then and had been a pilot in the Alliance, or a right-hand man at the Gundams' side. But then again.. She loved to daydream.
"Cameran, what was your brother yelling about, now?" Her mother knocked briefly on the doorjamb and came right into the white room. She was a short woman, with curly brown hair and thin, hollow hazel eyes. She was a bit round in her build but had a heavenly face.
"Oh, he's up to one of his crazy theories again, mama." She sat down at her desk and sifted through her articles. Her mother gave her another to add to her collection.
"This was in today's paper-- it's about the battle in Antarctic. I thought you might like it."
"Thanks..." She browsed through the article.
"What's his new theory now?" Her mother was at bit prying, though. She was a gossip.
Cameran set down the article and rested her hands on her desk, folding them, then unfolding them. She swiveled in her chair to face her mother, who had just sit down on the white bed. "He thinks... Uh, well... Mama, I have a question for you."
"Alright, what is it honey?"
She knew she was going to sound like her brother on this one, but Cameran really just wanted to find out. She didn't want to let him know that she agreed with his thought, but it was all too often that Chase and Cameran had the same thoughts and ideas. She, too at one point, had wondered if she was adopted. She really didn't like siding with her brother on things like that, so she would hold them in until such an idea or question could prove useful in their rather fancy-free sibling rivalry. "Are Chase and I adopted?" There, she just said it plain and true. She wanted to know now. No lolly-gagging this time.
Her mother was shocked at the question and gasped a little, putting her hand to her chest and trying to formulate a response to her daughter's question. Cameran stared at her mother, blinking only when needed as she waited for the response. She was dead serious about this, and she looked the part. After her mother had thought for just a few seconds her expression turned sad and he couldn't look at her daughter. She looked down and away from Cameran, ashamed.
"Mama?"
"Cameran..." She swayed her glance back up to the girl, on the verge of tears.
"Mama, no... It can't be true! I just... That's what... I didn't..." Cameran now regretted asking her mother this. She didn't want to know this.
"I didn't know when to tell you guys-- I didn't know if to were old enough yet, and your father told me never to tell you guys, but I..." She looked deep into the girl's green eyes. "I'm sorry for not telling you, Cameran, I really am, and--"
"No... Mama, it's fine..." Cameran, the steel-willed warrior-wannabe girl now felt tears in her own eyes. Sometimes she could be just so abrupt that it hurt herself. They were adopted. Chase and Cameran Thackleberry, grade 9 at Topeka High School, at the top of their class, were adopted. Members of the forensics teams as well as avid drama doobies, were adopted.
"Cameran, are you okay?" Her mother held strong her own iron will.
"I'll be fine... Just... Leave me be for a while, please."
Without words she left, closing the white for behind her to give her only daughter privacy. She was alone for a few hours, just sitting at her desk and looked at the years of articles she had collected, about the war, the warriors and the war orphans. Was she a war orphan? Was she actually four years older than what her mother had told her? She was often told that she looked older and much too tall to be 15. No, she knew she was 15. The doctor told her so and so did her conscious.
In her collection there were a few wartime articles her parents had saved, or she had found them in old papers in antique shops or collectors shops. She loved those the most, 'Gundam Pilots Hit Victoria in Victory', 'Cinq Kingdom No Longer Cinq-tuary', 'Princess Relena Dubbed Queen of World', Identities of Eight Pilots Revealed to World; Not What You'd Expect', '8-year-old Khushrenada Heiress Follows Father's Lead'.
"Cami?" Came a voice from behind her door. Chase stood outside, hands in pockets, waiting for his sister to answer to his call.
"Come in." He did just that and went straight to her side, watching her read her favorite articles.
"Mom told me you asked."
"I'm sorry..."
"For what?"
"For lying to you, and saying that I didn't believe you." She looked up at him. "I shouldn't had said that-- I shouldn't have even asked her."
"Well... At least now we know. Did she tell you anything else?"
"No, I couldn't even look at her less ask anything else."
"I know who our parents-- our REAL parents are." Chase sat on her bed and folded his big hands, looking at the floor, then the ceiling, then over at Cameran, who didn't even look over at him.
"You asked?"
"Of course I did-- why wouldn't I?"
"Chase...--"
"I think you'll be surprised, Cami. I wouldn't have told you unless I knew you'd be interested."
"I don't want to know..."
"I know you do, Cameran. If you want me to leave you alone, I can come back later when you want--"
"Tell me." She looked at him, turning around in her chair to face him fully. Did she really want to know though? Oh well, she knew Chase wouldn't lie to her about this. He got up and went to her desk, sifting through her articles and pointed at on in particular.
"There's our father." He moved around the articles more and picked up a newer one, just from last year, and looked at the picture of a few people. The photo was wartime, but the article was new. He looked at it for a minute and tried to remember which one it was from history class. "And... There's our mother." He pointed at a woman.
"Chase... That's not even funny."
"I'm not lying, Cameran, go ask mom and dad."
She sat there for a moment and let it set in. She looked in her brother's blue eyes and dug deep, trying to find his real motive. There wasn't anything there but what he said he was doing. Tell her who her parents were. She looked down at the pictures she had pointed out and stared in disbelief. Those two people were two of her idols, how could she be their child? Was this real? Were her parents mistaken? No, they couldn't have been. This was all for real.
"I can't believe it either, Cami. Who would had known... Milliardo Peacecraft and Pippa Kari..."
"This can't be right...."
"Hmm... you're right, that's not her real name.... I don't know it, though. But you know who I mean."
"Chase! That's not what I meant, and you know it! How could they be our parents??"
"Don't ask me, I'm just the messenger."
Cameran looked at her brother with at it of contempt before she got out of her chair and went to the living room where her parents were, sitting together at a table with the TV off now. They both stood at the entrance of their daughter, followed soon by their son.
"Cameran, baby, I'm sorry--" Her father approached her, but was soon intercepted by Cameran's blocking arm and and interruption.
"Dad, I don't need an apology. I just want you to tell me the truth."
"You... And Chase are adopted. We adopted you two all the way from Nagoya, Japan when we were students down there..."
"Is Chase right, about our parents?"
"..." He looked at his wife, and she nodded, "Yes."
Cameran had to take a minute to let it all sink in. Her childhood idols were her parents. She was the child of two great warriors from their time. But she couldn't think why she would have been given up for adoption and ended up here. Why would they just through those twins out like that for anyone to grab? It was all too much. Her whole life so far was a lie. Grandma Thora and Eloise, Grandpa Justin and Auntie Laurellen weren't hers. Mama and dad weren't hers. Topeka wasn't where she was born, and deffinatly not where she was rooted. She was from Japan and Cinq Kingdom Royalty and a member of the great power in Russia, the Khushrenadas, somewhere down the line.
"Cameran, are you alright?" Her father asked.
She looked up with a jolt and stared straight into her father's dull brown eyes. "I want to meet my parents."
...TSUZUKU...
- Please Review! Part Four Coming Soon! -
- Fostered -
Spring, After Colony 217
Topeka, in those days, was a rather pleasant place to live after the ward had ended. The city had been pretty well preserved and the war had hardly touched it, so there wasn't too much rebuilding to be done. There were plenty of tall shade trees and little fruit-bearing trees that were engineered to produce wonderful fruits in the climate that Topeka was in. The houses all looked exactly the same, maybe a few with a different paint color on the outside, but otherwise every house had a shade tree, a bush lined face and a few flowers in their gardens. They were all two-storied and had a roof that was accessible with a nice flat area for star gazing. Each house had a mailbox at the street, almost all had their little red flags up signalling the arrival of letters and catalogues.
House number 3130 on SW Lane was a bit different from the rest around it. It didn't have an upstairs like it's neighbors and it was a very, very old house. All of the houses around it had been modified and updated to the fullest extent right around wartime ended, but this one had kept it's old glory. It was ranch-style and still proudly bore it's ancient rust colored paint underneath the huge tree that through shadows all over the front lawn and over quite a bit of the house itself. A very nice antique.
Out on the front lawn sat two people, inhabitants of the house obviously. They were teenagers, maybe 15 or 16 at the oldest. One, a girl, and the other, a boy, sat in the grass, reclined on their backs and looking up towards the sky, through the great big leaves that sprouted from the tree branches above.
"I don't know... I don't really like sports at all. All the guys were kinda shunning me after I didn't want to join the team like the rest of them..." The boy said, rubbing a spec of dust from his eye. His voice was deep-- very deep-- already and carried a rather soothing tone, a very familiar tone.
"Don't fall to peer pressure. If you don't want to play sports, then don't, Chase." Replied his sister. He didn't reply just yet.
Inside the house, someone had a TV on pretty loud, watching a news channel, as was a typical thing at this house. The female reporter went on... "A number of war orphans, waiting for homes ever since AfterColony 197 have finally been released to live on their own after reaching their nineteenth or, in some cases, twentieth birthday this year. Many have set out to locate their real parents and others have decided not to bother with the past. Here's what a few of them had to say..."
"Cameran?"
"What."
"Do you ever wonder if we're adopted?" Chase looked over at his platinum blonde sister just as she looked at him.
"Why do you ask that? You know we aren't." Her voice was unsure.
"Well... I mean, think about it. We don't look anything like our parents, or our grandparents or anybody related to us. When I applied for my permit back in November, mom wouldn't let me see my birth certificate, and when I asked her why she said that I could see it if I wanted, but we had to leave."
"That's just speculation, Chase. Don't be so paranoid."
"And look at us-- we don't look like twins! Not even fraternal twins." Chase sat up and flicked his long black hair behind his shoulder. He stared down at his sister with his piercing ice blue eyes, trying to dig deep into her mind and get her to side with him.
"So? Not all fraternal twins have similar traits."
"Why don't you believe me, Cami? I mean, I know I don't have much proof, but I just... I think I'm right. Mom and dad don't even seem like they're our own parents."
"You ALWAYS think you're right. Such an arrogant guy." She stared back up at him. Her eyes, though, were strikingly different than Chase, or anyone in her family's for that matter. Yes, other people had green eyes, but hers were almond-shaped. They had no Asian roots in their family anywhere, but she had the look. And her face was small and oval, her lips and her nose and her ears were all tiny and delicately shaped as opposed to her brother's chiseled good looks. Very European. She looked Asian.
"Come on, I've been right on things like this before! Remember when dad said that Ichabod had been hit by a car and had gone to birdie heaven? Well, remember how I thought that was a lie and it WAS!"
"That's way different."
"So?"
Cameran sighed and got up, walking inside away from her brother and his abstract ideas.
"You'll be sorry when I'm right, Cameran Thackleberry!"
She just ignored her slightly younger brother and went past the living room into her room. It was hardly decorated at all, especially for a teenage girl. It was all blindingly clean white with just a few nick-naks on her dresser and desk. There were three photos hanging on her walls, all framed in white frames and the glass was shining clean. There were a few articles on her desk cut out from recent issues of the newspaper. She was really into the history of the Eve Wars and had kept many, many articles on the subject, especially on the infamous Gundam pilots. She studied books about the era and watched every news special, PBS program and any movie or mini-series she could get her hands on.
She knew about every battle and every one of the leaders of the era. She knew all the basic stats on such people as Treize Khushrenada, Relena Peacecraft and her mysterious brother Milliardo Peacecraft. She knew, also, all the stats about the eight Gundam pilots and their suits. The mystery around them, the scandal and the romance of their journeys and their lives intrigued her. Sometimes she wished that she had lived back then and had been a pilot in the Alliance, or a right-hand man at the Gundams' side. But then again.. She loved to daydream.
"Cameran, what was your brother yelling about, now?" Her mother knocked briefly on the doorjamb and came right into the white room. She was a short woman, with curly brown hair and thin, hollow hazel eyes. She was a bit round in her build but had a heavenly face.
"Oh, he's up to one of his crazy theories again, mama." She sat down at her desk and sifted through her articles. Her mother gave her another to add to her collection.
"This was in today's paper-- it's about the battle in Antarctic. I thought you might like it."
"Thanks..." She browsed through the article.
"What's his new theory now?" Her mother was at bit prying, though. She was a gossip.
Cameran set down the article and rested her hands on her desk, folding them, then unfolding them. She swiveled in her chair to face her mother, who had just sit down on the white bed. "He thinks... Uh, well... Mama, I have a question for you."
"Alright, what is it honey?"
She knew she was going to sound like her brother on this one, but Cameran really just wanted to find out. She didn't want to let him know that she agreed with his thought, but it was all too often that Chase and Cameran had the same thoughts and ideas. She, too at one point, had wondered if she was adopted. She really didn't like siding with her brother on things like that, so she would hold them in until such an idea or question could prove useful in their rather fancy-free sibling rivalry. "Are Chase and I adopted?" There, she just said it plain and true. She wanted to know now. No lolly-gagging this time.
Her mother was shocked at the question and gasped a little, putting her hand to her chest and trying to formulate a response to her daughter's question. Cameran stared at her mother, blinking only when needed as she waited for the response. She was dead serious about this, and she looked the part. After her mother had thought for just a few seconds her expression turned sad and he couldn't look at her daughter. She looked down and away from Cameran, ashamed.
"Mama?"
"Cameran..." She swayed her glance back up to the girl, on the verge of tears.
"Mama, no... It can't be true! I just... That's what... I didn't..." Cameran now regretted asking her mother this. She didn't want to know this.
"I didn't know when to tell you guys-- I didn't know if to were old enough yet, and your father told me never to tell you guys, but I..." She looked deep into the girl's green eyes. "I'm sorry for not telling you, Cameran, I really am, and--"
"No... Mama, it's fine..." Cameran, the steel-willed warrior-wannabe girl now felt tears in her own eyes. Sometimes she could be just so abrupt that it hurt herself. They were adopted. Chase and Cameran Thackleberry, grade 9 at Topeka High School, at the top of their class, were adopted. Members of the forensics teams as well as avid drama doobies, were adopted.
"Cameran, are you okay?" Her mother held strong her own iron will.
"I'll be fine... Just... Leave me be for a while, please."
Without words she left, closing the white for behind her to give her only daughter privacy. She was alone for a few hours, just sitting at her desk and looked at the years of articles she had collected, about the war, the warriors and the war orphans. Was she a war orphan? Was she actually four years older than what her mother had told her? She was often told that she looked older and much too tall to be 15. No, she knew she was 15. The doctor told her so and so did her conscious.
In her collection there were a few wartime articles her parents had saved, or she had found them in old papers in antique shops or collectors shops. She loved those the most, 'Gundam Pilots Hit Victoria in Victory', 'Cinq Kingdom No Longer Cinq-tuary', 'Princess Relena Dubbed Queen of World', Identities of Eight Pilots Revealed to World; Not What You'd Expect', '8-year-old Khushrenada Heiress Follows Father's Lead'.
"Cami?" Came a voice from behind her door. Chase stood outside, hands in pockets, waiting for his sister to answer to his call.
"Come in." He did just that and went straight to her side, watching her read her favorite articles.
"Mom told me you asked."
"I'm sorry..."
"For what?"
"For lying to you, and saying that I didn't believe you." She looked up at him. "I shouldn't had said that-- I shouldn't have even asked her."
"Well... At least now we know. Did she tell you anything else?"
"No, I couldn't even look at her less ask anything else."
"I know who our parents-- our REAL parents are." Chase sat on her bed and folded his big hands, looking at the floor, then the ceiling, then over at Cameran, who didn't even look over at him.
"You asked?"
"Of course I did-- why wouldn't I?"
"Chase...--"
"I think you'll be surprised, Cami. I wouldn't have told you unless I knew you'd be interested."
"I don't want to know..."
"I know you do, Cameran. If you want me to leave you alone, I can come back later when you want--"
"Tell me." She looked at him, turning around in her chair to face him fully. Did she really want to know though? Oh well, she knew Chase wouldn't lie to her about this. He got up and went to her desk, sifting through her articles and pointed at on in particular.
"There's our father." He moved around the articles more and picked up a newer one, just from last year, and looked at the picture of a few people. The photo was wartime, but the article was new. He looked at it for a minute and tried to remember which one it was from history class. "And... There's our mother." He pointed at a woman.
"Chase... That's not even funny."
"I'm not lying, Cameran, go ask mom and dad."
She sat there for a moment and let it set in. She looked in her brother's blue eyes and dug deep, trying to find his real motive. There wasn't anything there but what he said he was doing. Tell her who her parents were. She looked down at the pictures she had pointed out and stared in disbelief. Those two people were two of her idols, how could she be their child? Was this real? Were her parents mistaken? No, they couldn't have been. This was all for real.
"I can't believe it either, Cami. Who would had known... Milliardo Peacecraft and Pippa Kari..."
"This can't be right...."
"Hmm... you're right, that's not her real name.... I don't know it, though. But you know who I mean."
"Chase! That's not what I meant, and you know it! How could they be our parents??"
"Don't ask me, I'm just the messenger."
Cameran looked at her brother with at it of contempt before she got out of her chair and went to the living room where her parents were, sitting together at a table with the TV off now. They both stood at the entrance of their daughter, followed soon by their son.
"Cameran, baby, I'm sorry--" Her father approached her, but was soon intercepted by Cameran's blocking arm and and interruption.
"Dad, I don't need an apology. I just want you to tell me the truth."
"You... And Chase are adopted. We adopted you two all the way from Nagoya, Japan when we were students down there..."
"Is Chase right, about our parents?"
"..." He looked at his wife, and she nodded, "Yes."
Cameran had to take a minute to let it all sink in. Her childhood idols were her parents. She was the child of two great warriors from their time. But she couldn't think why she would have been given up for adoption and ended up here. Why would they just through those twins out like that for anyone to grab? It was all too much. Her whole life so far was a lie. Grandma Thora and Eloise, Grandpa Justin and Auntie Laurellen weren't hers. Mama and dad weren't hers. Topeka wasn't where she was born, and deffinatly not where she was rooted. She was from Japan and Cinq Kingdom Royalty and a member of the great power in Russia, the Khushrenadas, somewhere down the line.
"Cameran, are you alright?" Her father asked.
She looked up with a jolt and stared straight into her father's dull brown eyes. "I want to meet my parents."
...TSUZUKU...
- Please Review! Part Four Coming Soon! -
