That's Childish, So Childish…
Chapter Two: You're Short of Breath—Is It a Heart Attack?
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Disclaimer: Don't own it. Only DVDs, CDs, comics, cards… I'm /quite/ sure "Birdhouse In Your Soul" is owned by They Might Be Giants. I've no clue who owns Barney or his show's music and I /don't WANT to/… There's such a thing as too much information.
Warnings: May get ugly here. Just ugly. Evil things (like torture and rape) are implied, but only that. Nothing too bad… Unless you can't stand sarcasm or bad singing or bashing Barney. I've rated things a bit higher, tho, just in case.
Pairings: None /yet/, tho I've one suggestion so far…
Synopsis: Either you read it in Chapter One, or you probably won't bother with it here, so why waste time? On to the show…
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
//Life is Hell…//
He'd forgotten how long he'd been here, in the care of Ugly, Nasty, and—Zechs couldn't hold back a shudder at the thought of the last, the leader of his team of captors—/Him/. It couldn't have been very long, though. It just felt that way. Passing out every now and then during the day and night had a tendency to screw up one's sense of time, so it couldn't be just the way that time was spent…
Right now, it was spent in the Hole.
//Original names for these things /are/ beyond the military, I suppose…//
The Hole was rather adequately self-descriptive. Someone took a stone- lined bunker and put a bracket at the top of one wall and a grate over the top. It was roughly ten feet by ten feet by ten feet, with a narrow ramp leading the way from the ground above to the floor of the "room". The bracket was for securing one's cuffs over one's head at a height that their feet didn't touch the ground. The grate above was for the weather to envelope you in its whims, and for those responsible for putting you there to begin with to check on you without having to clamber all the way to your level… It wasn't exactly comfortable, but then, that was the whole point—you weren't supposed to enjoy it.
It was raining…
//I like rain…//
Zechs lifted his head a bit so that the water running off his cracked mask and sodden bangs could reach his mouth. He was thirsty… and blessing the weather today. The cool dampness felt good on his battered body, and this was probably the best and longest chance he'd had at getting clean water in weeks. Definitely the closest he'd had to a /bath/ in that time. The most obvious of the bloodstains on his usually-impeccable clothes were diluting nicely…
//I'm glad I threw up on them today…// That was why they'd stuck him in here again.
Apparently it was bad form to retch your meager rations over the man trying to interrogate you, even if it's because his two underlings had played a bit too rough with you a few minutes beforehand. But the Hole was the least of the punishments he'd received for that…
Zechs's mind shuddered away from the memories of those /other/ punishments, unable to cope with them right now.
//I don't want to remember… I don't want to remember… No, please no…//
He shivered in the rain, as much as one could when hanging by just their wrists and arms with a hard wall against their back. The interrogation itself was always the same… though the punishments weren't. They kept becoming increasingly more… ugly… more demeaning, more painful, and not just physically. But the dialogues they had—they never changed.
*************************************************
"What do you know about the Gundam pilots? Answer me!"
"I told you… nothing Oz doesn't already know…"
"But you know something more! You were building that one for them!"
"I built it for me…" //It's true… I built it for a fair fight, for my own honor—the pilot, the cause, wouldn't have mattered…//
"How were you going to contact the pilot, hmmm? Tell me!"
"I wasn't going to bother with such foolishness…"
"You know who the pilot is!"
"I don't know him…"
"Who is he? You know!"
"I don't have to… He's too much like me…"
"Do you know where he is?"
"I know he's alive… That's all…"
"Where is he!"
"I don't know…"
"Where /is/ he!"
"It doesn't matter…"
"Tell me where he is, damn you!"
"Hiding…"
"Where /is/ he, damn it!"
"Recovering…"
"When was he to meet you!"
"He'd be a fool to…"
"You and he were going to meet, weren't you? Tell me!"
"No need to…"
"Explain! Explain, damn you!"
"He doesn't need it… to destroy all of you… and me… None of them do… They hate us all… I've already proven… hate is all you need…"
*************************************************
Zechs's wrists felt numb, and he licked the nose of his mask one final time before relaxing his head back down on his chest. Why they'd let him keep the mask on, he didn't know. Maybe it was a mockery to who he was, as they probably knew the truth of his identity. Dying in obscurity—yes, that would be something they'd find amusing for a former Prince of Sanc they hated. The abuse to his body had encompassed the headgear enough that it, too, was worn—or rather, cracked from the top through one of the glass eyecovers. Probably wouldn't last longer than the rest of him… though with the dried blood underneath it, it might refuse to come off until then anyway… Not that it mattered. They'd probably fling him into some unmarked hidden grave with it still stuck on.
//Stop depressing yourself, Merquise… It's not like you're a prince anymore anyway. You sold your life and soul long ago for Relena and Sanc and revenge… Surely you weren't expecting a refund?// The rain's weight slid a lock of his long hair down to slap his cheek gently. //Your hands are too bloody, your soul too blackened, your body too—// That train of thought broke as he shied away sharply from their destination, shuddering again. //Stop it, stop it! Before you drive yourself mad… Keep that little dignity, /that/ much pride, that you keep your sanity to the end.//
He closed his eyes and listened to the rhythm of the rain hitting his head. And managed to smile sadly to himself.
//Back to Plan A…//
//Time and circumstances have called for a little music… If I don't drown in the process, but if I do, who'd care? It's a faster and kinder death than this…//
"I'm your only friend but not your only friend but I'm a little glowing friend, but really I'm not actually your friend but I am…"
Okay, so the song was higher key and his naturally low voice was off. And his voice was rusty from voicing frequent involuntary cries of pain recently. And it was definitely not a song suited for his vocal range. And he felt half tone-deaf from all the beatings about the head. And on top of it all, it was annoyingly /cheerful/…
That was the point.
"Who watches over you! Make a little birdhouse in your soul…"
Once he got going, Zechs had to admit that it really was an uplifting way to commit suicide. By the second time he started the song over, his spirits had risen the highest since his arrival—somewhere in his knees. The lightheartedness of the song was simply too intoxicating—or the adrenaline of taunting his captors was carrying him on a nice wave… He didn't care. By the tenth round, he was belting it out on the top of his lungs with all the glee of a brand-new 5-year-old Barney fan with /that/ show's infamous song.
***Author's Note: There's suicidal, and then there's just plain evil… He's feeling suicidal now, not evil. There's just some things you can't do, even to those you fear and hate with every atom in your body… It's just too inhuman.***
"Not to put too fine a point on it: say I'm the only bee in your bonnet—make a little birdhouse in your soul…"
Predictably, Ugly and Nasty came to shut him up. They endured his singing for a lot longer than he expected, though—a fact that drew just the faintest hint of admiration from him, though on second thought, they /were/ sadists and probably enjoyed the pain he was giving others in this rundown old base…
Their individual reactions were equally predictable. The hulking member of the pair—Ugly, as Zechs titled him—tried to shut him up. By knocking the wind out of him. The tactic couldn't have been more effective: can't breathe, can't sing. Nasty—a shorter, weasel-like man who reminded Zechs sharply of Acht—merely called out suggestions for how Ugly should continue this discourse on music theory…
By writing it in Morse Code on Zechs's ribs, it seemed.
At least the rain felt nice and cool today…
A welcome darkness tickled the edges of the former Colonel's vision, slowly wrapping over his eyes in a narrowing spiral, simply because he couldn't breathe with this rate of being bludgeoned. Especially when he had a wall behind his back for him to be bludgeoned against. Such a nice haze, a pleasant darkness, the ringing in his ears heralding that the end he desired was almost within his grasp…
But then, abruptly… it stopped.
//Wh-what…?// His graying vision was… steadying? He could hear wheezing breaths reflexively begin to deny him the escape of a lifetime. //No! Hey! Wait! I was nearly there!!!//
"…He can be useful elsewhere…" someone was saying, distantly.
//No no no no no! I don't /want/ to be useful…!//
"…Space in the experimental trials on humans…"
//The… /what/?// With the retreating darkness, so was the pain-smothering haze in his mind evaporating. ///Experiments/? What do I look like, a white lab rat? I've had enough 'experimenting' from this bunch!//
"…Keep him still…"
Lifting his head slightly, Zechs struggled to focus his blurry eyes on this new danger. A glimpse of a short, stern-faced woman tromping over with a syringe in hand drew a faint puzzled frown to his face. Granted, he /was/ hanging from the bracket so his long legs rested a foot off the ground, but she only came to his hips. Ugly towered over her like a castle over an outhouse, putting a meaty paw on Zechs's chest to keep him firmly against the wall.
Frowning, the woman of indeterminate age pulled the cap off the syringe, and peered up at Zechs through the rain.
//Damn…!// He couldn't help but be awestruck by her face. //She'd scare /Tseuberov/ into early retirement! Ugly, you've just been outclassed and need a new name if we're to continue this relationship…//
Then she jabbed the needle deep into his thigh.
Zechs politely returned the favor by coughing a splattering of blood onto her face.
He had to look away then. //I didn't know she could make herself look /worse/…// The needle scraped against bone in her revenge, and whatever she was injecting burned, but those pains were nothing compared to his broken ribs right now. Ugly was increasing the pressure and it /hurt/.
"…Him down and inside and cleaned up…"
Oh, the needle was gone? Strange, but things were going blurry again somehow—more in a whirling sense than dark. Color… now that was new. //Is this what they mean by dying with style…? But style surely means it will resolve into a Monet painting, won't it? I like "Water Lilies"…//
He could still hear and feel things, though that was… distanced now. Ugly had unfastened the cuffs somehow without dropping him—another unusual event, though Zechs's thoughts were starting to drift too freely for him to appreciate it fully.
"…Least he stopped that damn singing…"
Ugly flung the prisoner over one shoulder like a sack of wheat. Zechs couldn't bite back a faint cough and groan as his stomach churned, shutting his eyes swiftly. //Not again… I'm going to be sick… I'm going to be sick if things don't stop spinning… Do I have anything to be sick with? Ohhh… I'm not sure that's going to matter…//
Something grabbed him by sodden hair and hauled his head up a bit, a hand moving under his chin and giving him a firm shake. Zechs cracked his eyes open again, to find too close for comfort a blurry thing that /could/ have been an ugly face he'd seen a short while ago, if it didn't keep rippling and swirling like disturbed water.
"I'm going to enjoy your next song," the woman growled, inches away.
Woozily, Zechs couldn't summon enough concern past the rising nausea to care. "Goodie… a fan," he half-choked.
//What's a little bile and water between friends?//
The stranger's resulting loud cry of disgust and protest penetrated the whirling haze, though, proving that, even incapacitated and ill, the former Lightening Count had good aim.
As Ugly carried him off to some new—and likely equally Hellish—destination, Zechs smiled faintly to himself. The haze was actually pleasant, though it felt rather like diffused fire spreading throughout his body and mind, drowning the ache of broken bones… and growing warmer. It left his vision whirling, and the colors were kindly distracting at the moment…
//Pretty colors…//
//Blue there… Green there…//
//Is that yellow? Doesn't matter… Gold there…//
//Did I just say 'Goodie' to her?!?//
//Pretty colors…//
//Fiery colors…//
//Where's all the green and blue…?//
//Fiery…//
//Fire…//
//Fire…?!//
The colors weren't pretty anymore. They were disturbing, frightening, dangerous, painful… and familiar.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
One thing Treize never enjoyed was being kept in the dark.
//Someone's going to pay when I find out…// he mused, walking into his office through the veranda doors, leaving them open to the pleasantly-warm weather. There was no anger—it was mere fact. Whoever was behind this would be punished. Simple. Just how he would decide later… once he understood the full magnitude of this crime.
//Not so much as a toilette-paper requisition filed in the past month by him… And yet the Nairobi Base denies that he's there anymore. I /know/ he's there! Or /was/… Who /else/ sends a requisition form for shampoo and silver polish in this organization?//
Frowning pensively, the General of Oz looked down at a stack of papers on his tidy desk, resting a single finger on the top.
//Something happened at Nairobi… Zechs would have notified me, at least, somehow, if he changed his mind and intended to leave. But this silence isn't like him.// His eyes hardened. //Not like him at all…//
In a flurry of movement, Treize scooped up the file he's been idly poking, sharp eyes narrowing. //This should reveal something… It's the Nairobi Base's report of recent events…//
But the report began with routine information about drills, requisitions made, minor incidents between military personnel. The General was not amused. There wasn't even mention of Zechs's arrival there, though that should have stirred up things in the hangars, at least. It /did/ mention the re-stationing of a number of men who Treize was certain had been working on those monstrous machines for Zechs…
Then something caught his eye.
//No wonder they put the routine stuff first… I'd have tossed this aside early on and missed this if I weren't already suspicious…// A single line, trying to downplay an important event—or, rather, important visitor.
//Inspector Acht visited, I see…//
Romefeller's snake. Intent on finding trouble and stirring up all the things Treize had finally managed to precariously balance both on Earth and in Space. Treize didn't like the man, nor trust him as far as he could throw his personal ship. And he knew that Acht had been sniffling about Zechs's activities of late…
//All the more proof that Zechs was there. Acht wouldn't have visited, otherwise! But it seems Acht had a few words with the base commander…// He had to stop and put the file down on his desk as a chill swept along his spine. //This doesn't look good at all…//
Then a sudden thought hit him, and he grabbed another couple files that had been underneath the first, hastily scanning them. //Noin? Where is /she/ at? If anyone knows… Aaahhh, Corsica Base… then left with a large massing of supplies and a single transporter, without other personnel. Wise move, Noin—I suspect you heard of his disappearance before I did, and have gone into hiding… Good girl.//
With a faint sigh of relief, Treize set those two files aside, and glared at the lonely one from Nairobi.
Had anyone who knew the General well entered right then, they would have found the young man's glare a mixture of anger and worry, the latter growing to swamp the former.
//What have they done to you, Zechs?//
Sharp eyes narrowed abruptly to slits, and Treize picked up the Nairobi file again, slapping it firmly once against the desktop as if to teach the inoffensive wood a lesson. "I think it's time I paid a little personal attention to the Nairobi Base," he mused, calm voice carrying a powerful undercurrent of danger.
The General was not pleased.
The Hunt had begun. And woe to any who stood in his way!
///Nobody/ harms my friends and lives…//
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
To be continued.
So far, someone suggested tossing a bit more of Treize into this, so, thus this end bit. Hey, personally I think that if the series is followed to the letter, the likelihood is strongest for 6x9, but I'm /not/ following the series, here. I like any relationship with 6 in it, and can imagine possibilities for almost any situation thrown to me, and I like reading ANY 6 pairing as long as it is well-written (*Wink* I just don't review diddley, but give me time and I'll add some of you to my Favorites list). I don't write sex, tho. Just not my thing.
Chapter Two: You're Short of Breath—Is It a Heart Attack?
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Disclaimer: Don't own it. Only DVDs, CDs, comics, cards… I'm /quite/ sure "Birdhouse In Your Soul" is owned by They Might Be Giants. I've no clue who owns Barney or his show's music and I /don't WANT to/… There's such a thing as too much information.
Warnings: May get ugly here. Just ugly. Evil things (like torture and rape) are implied, but only that. Nothing too bad… Unless you can't stand sarcasm or bad singing or bashing Barney. I've rated things a bit higher, tho, just in case.
Pairings: None /yet/, tho I've one suggestion so far…
Synopsis: Either you read it in Chapter One, or you probably won't bother with it here, so why waste time? On to the show…
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
//Life is Hell…//
He'd forgotten how long he'd been here, in the care of Ugly, Nasty, and—Zechs couldn't hold back a shudder at the thought of the last, the leader of his team of captors—/Him/. It couldn't have been very long, though. It just felt that way. Passing out every now and then during the day and night had a tendency to screw up one's sense of time, so it couldn't be just the way that time was spent…
Right now, it was spent in the Hole.
//Original names for these things /are/ beyond the military, I suppose…//
The Hole was rather adequately self-descriptive. Someone took a stone- lined bunker and put a bracket at the top of one wall and a grate over the top. It was roughly ten feet by ten feet by ten feet, with a narrow ramp leading the way from the ground above to the floor of the "room". The bracket was for securing one's cuffs over one's head at a height that their feet didn't touch the ground. The grate above was for the weather to envelope you in its whims, and for those responsible for putting you there to begin with to check on you without having to clamber all the way to your level… It wasn't exactly comfortable, but then, that was the whole point—you weren't supposed to enjoy it.
It was raining…
//I like rain…//
Zechs lifted his head a bit so that the water running off his cracked mask and sodden bangs could reach his mouth. He was thirsty… and blessing the weather today. The cool dampness felt good on his battered body, and this was probably the best and longest chance he'd had at getting clean water in weeks. Definitely the closest he'd had to a /bath/ in that time. The most obvious of the bloodstains on his usually-impeccable clothes were diluting nicely…
//I'm glad I threw up on them today…// That was why they'd stuck him in here again.
Apparently it was bad form to retch your meager rations over the man trying to interrogate you, even if it's because his two underlings had played a bit too rough with you a few minutes beforehand. But the Hole was the least of the punishments he'd received for that…
Zechs's mind shuddered away from the memories of those /other/ punishments, unable to cope with them right now.
//I don't want to remember… I don't want to remember… No, please no…//
He shivered in the rain, as much as one could when hanging by just their wrists and arms with a hard wall against their back. The interrogation itself was always the same… though the punishments weren't. They kept becoming increasingly more… ugly… more demeaning, more painful, and not just physically. But the dialogues they had—they never changed.
*************************************************
"What do you know about the Gundam pilots? Answer me!"
"I told you… nothing Oz doesn't already know…"
"But you know something more! You were building that one for them!"
"I built it for me…" //It's true… I built it for a fair fight, for my own honor—the pilot, the cause, wouldn't have mattered…//
"How were you going to contact the pilot, hmmm? Tell me!"
"I wasn't going to bother with such foolishness…"
"You know who the pilot is!"
"I don't know him…"
"Who is he? You know!"
"I don't have to… He's too much like me…"
"Do you know where he is?"
"I know he's alive… That's all…"
"Where is he!"
"I don't know…"
"Where /is/ he!"
"It doesn't matter…"
"Tell me where he is, damn you!"
"Hiding…"
"Where /is/ he, damn it!"
"Recovering…"
"When was he to meet you!"
"He'd be a fool to…"
"You and he were going to meet, weren't you? Tell me!"
"No need to…"
"Explain! Explain, damn you!"
"He doesn't need it… to destroy all of you… and me… None of them do… They hate us all… I've already proven… hate is all you need…"
*************************************************
Zechs's wrists felt numb, and he licked the nose of his mask one final time before relaxing his head back down on his chest. Why they'd let him keep the mask on, he didn't know. Maybe it was a mockery to who he was, as they probably knew the truth of his identity. Dying in obscurity—yes, that would be something they'd find amusing for a former Prince of Sanc they hated. The abuse to his body had encompassed the headgear enough that it, too, was worn—or rather, cracked from the top through one of the glass eyecovers. Probably wouldn't last longer than the rest of him… though with the dried blood underneath it, it might refuse to come off until then anyway… Not that it mattered. They'd probably fling him into some unmarked hidden grave with it still stuck on.
//Stop depressing yourself, Merquise… It's not like you're a prince anymore anyway. You sold your life and soul long ago for Relena and Sanc and revenge… Surely you weren't expecting a refund?// The rain's weight slid a lock of his long hair down to slap his cheek gently. //Your hands are too bloody, your soul too blackened, your body too—// That train of thought broke as he shied away sharply from their destination, shuddering again. //Stop it, stop it! Before you drive yourself mad… Keep that little dignity, /that/ much pride, that you keep your sanity to the end.//
He closed his eyes and listened to the rhythm of the rain hitting his head. And managed to smile sadly to himself.
//Back to Plan A…//
//Time and circumstances have called for a little music… If I don't drown in the process, but if I do, who'd care? It's a faster and kinder death than this…//
"I'm your only friend but not your only friend but I'm a little glowing friend, but really I'm not actually your friend but I am…"
Okay, so the song was higher key and his naturally low voice was off. And his voice was rusty from voicing frequent involuntary cries of pain recently. And it was definitely not a song suited for his vocal range. And he felt half tone-deaf from all the beatings about the head. And on top of it all, it was annoyingly /cheerful/…
That was the point.
"Who watches over you! Make a little birdhouse in your soul…"
Once he got going, Zechs had to admit that it really was an uplifting way to commit suicide. By the second time he started the song over, his spirits had risen the highest since his arrival—somewhere in his knees. The lightheartedness of the song was simply too intoxicating—or the adrenaline of taunting his captors was carrying him on a nice wave… He didn't care. By the tenth round, he was belting it out on the top of his lungs with all the glee of a brand-new 5-year-old Barney fan with /that/ show's infamous song.
***Author's Note: There's suicidal, and then there's just plain evil… He's feeling suicidal now, not evil. There's just some things you can't do, even to those you fear and hate with every atom in your body… It's just too inhuman.***
"Not to put too fine a point on it: say I'm the only bee in your bonnet—make a little birdhouse in your soul…"
Predictably, Ugly and Nasty came to shut him up. They endured his singing for a lot longer than he expected, though—a fact that drew just the faintest hint of admiration from him, though on second thought, they /were/ sadists and probably enjoyed the pain he was giving others in this rundown old base…
Their individual reactions were equally predictable. The hulking member of the pair—Ugly, as Zechs titled him—tried to shut him up. By knocking the wind out of him. The tactic couldn't have been more effective: can't breathe, can't sing. Nasty—a shorter, weasel-like man who reminded Zechs sharply of Acht—merely called out suggestions for how Ugly should continue this discourse on music theory…
By writing it in Morse Code on Zechs's ribs, it seemed.
At least the rain felt nice and cool today…
A welcome darkness tickled the edges of the former Colonel's vision, slowly wrapping over his eyes in a narrowing spiral, simply because he couldn't breathe with this rate of being bludgeoned. Especially when he had a wall behind his back for him to be bludgeoned against. Such a nice haze, a pleasant darkness, the ringing in his ears heralding that the end he desired was almost within his grasp…
But then, abruptly… it stopped.
//Wh-what…?// His graying vision was… steadying? He could hear wheezing breaths reflexively begin to deny him the escape of a lifetime. //No! Hey! Wait! I was nearly there!!!//
"…He can be useful elsewhere…" someone was saying, distantly.
//No no no no no! I don't /want/ to be useful…!//
"…Space in the experimental trials on humans…"
//The… /what/?// With the retreating darkness, so was the pain-smothering haze in his mind evaporating. ///Experiments/? What do I look like, a white lab rat? I've had enough 'experimenting' from this bunch!//
"…Keep him still…"
Lifting his head slightly, Zechs struggled to focus his blurry eyes on this new danger. A glimpse of a short, stern-faced woman tromping over with a syringe in hand drew a faint puzzled frown to his face. Granted, he /was/ hanging from the bracket so his long legs rested a foot off the ground, but she only came to his hips. Ugly towered over her like a castle over an outhouse, putting a meaty paw on Zechs's chest to keep him firmly against the wall.
Frowning, the woman of indeterminate age pulled the cap off the syringe, and peered up at Zechs through the rain.
//Damn…!// He couldn't help but be awestruck by her face. //She'd scare /Tseuberov/ into early retirement! Ugly, you've just been outclassed and need a new name if we're to continue this relationship…//
Then she jabbed the needle deep into his thigh.
Zechs politely returned the favor by coughing a splattering of blood onto her face.
He had to look away then. //I didn't know she could make herself look /worse/…// The needle scraped against bone in her revenge, and whatever she was injecting burned, but those pains were nothing compared to his broken ribs right now. Ugly was increasing the pressure and it /hurt/.
"…Him down and inside and cleaned up…"
Oh, the needle was gone? Strange, but things were going blurry again somehow—more in a whirling sense than dark. Color… now that was new. //Is this what they mean by dying with style…? But style surely means it will resolve into a Monet painting, won't it? I like "Water Lilies"…//
He could still hear and feel things, though that was… distanced now. Ugly had unfastened the cuffs somehow without dropping him—another unusual event, though Zechs's thoughts were starting to drift too freely for him to appreciate it fully.
"…Least he stopped that damn singing…"
Ugly flung the prisoner over one shoulder like a sack of wheat. Zechs couldn't bite back a faint cough and groan as his stomach churned, shutting his eyes swiftly. //Not again… I'm going to be sick… I'm going to be sick if things don't stop spinning… Do I have anything to be sick with? Ohhh… I'm not sure that's going to matter…//
Something grabbed him by sodden hair and hauled his head up a bit, a hand moving under his chin and giving him a firm shake. Zechs cracked his eyes open again, to find too close for comfort a blurry thing that /could/ have been an ugly face he'd seen a short while ago, if it didn't keep rippling and swirling like disturbed water.
"I'm going to enjoy your next song," the woman growled, inches away.
Woozily, Zechs couldn't summon enough concern past the rising nausea to care. "Goodie… a fan," he half-choked.
//What's a little bile and water between friends?//
The stranger's resulting loud cry of disgust and protest penetrated the whirling haze, though, proving that, even incapacitated and ill, the former Lightening Count had good aim.
As Ugly carried him off to some new—and likely equally Hellish—destination, Zechs smiled faintly to himself. The haze was actually pleasant, though it felt rather like diffused fire spreading throughout his body and mind, drowning the ache of broken bones… and growing warmer. It left his vision whirling, and the colors were kindly distracting at the moment…
//Pretty colors…//
//Blue there… Green there…//
//Is that yellow? Doesn't matter… Gold there…//
//Did I just say 'Goodie' to her?!?//
//Pretty colors…//
//Fiery colors…//
//Where's all the green and blue…?//
//Fiery…//
//Fire…//
//Fire…?!//
The colors weren't pretty anymore. They were disturbing, frightening, dangerous, painful… and familiar.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
One thing Treize never enjoyed was being kept in the dark.
//Someone's going to pay when I find out…// he mused, walking into his office through the veranda doors, leaving them open to the pleasantly-warm weather. There was no anger—it was mere fact. Whoever was behind this would be punished. Simple. Just how he would decide later… once he understood the full magnitude of this crime.
//Not so much as a toilette-paper requisition filed in the past month by him… And yet the Nairobi Base denies that he's there anymore. I /know/ he's there! Or /was/… Who /else/ sends a requisition form for shampoo and silver polish in this organization?//
Frowning pensively, the General of Oz looked down at a stack of papers on his tidy desk, resting a single finger on the top.
//Something happened at Nairobi… Zechs would have notified me, at least, somehow, if he changed his mind and intended to leave. But this silence isn't like him.// His eyes hardened. //Not like him at all…//
In a flurry of movement, Treize scooped up the file he's been idly poking, sharp eyes narrowing. //This should reveal something… It's the Nairobi Base's report of recent events…//
But the report began with routine information about drills, requisitions made, minor incidents between military personnel. The General was not amused. There wasn't even mention of Zechs's arrival there, though that should have stirred up things in the hangars, at least. It /did/ mention the re-stationing of a number of men who Treize was certain had been working on those monstrous machines for Zechs…
Then something caught his eye.
//No wonder they put the routine stuff first… I'd have tossed this aside early on and missed this if I weren't already suspicious…// A single line, trying to downplay an important event—or, rather, important visitor.
//Inspector Acht visited, I see…//
Romefeller's snake. Intent on finding trouble and stirring up all the things Treize had finally managed to precariously balance both on Earth and in Space. Treize didn't like the man, nor trust him as far as he could throw his personal ship. And he knew that Acht had been sniffling about Zechs's activities of late…
//All the more proof that Zechs was there. Acht wouldn't have visited, otherwise! But it seems Acht had a few words with the base commander…// He had to stop and put the file down on his desk as a chill swept along his spine. //This doesn't look good at all…//
Then a sudden thought hit him, and he grabbed another couple files that had been underneath the first, hastily scanning them. //Noin? Where is /she/ at? If anyone knows… Aaahhh, Corsica Base… then left with a large massing of supplies and a single transporter, without other personnel. Wise move, Noin—I suspect you heard of his disappearance before I did, and have gone into hiding… Good girl.//
With a faint sigh of relief, Treize set those two files aside, and glared at the lonely one from Nairobi.
Had anyone who knew the General well entered right then, they would have found the young man's glare a mixture of anger and worry, the latter growing to swamp the former.
//What have they done to you, Zechs?//
Sharp eyes narrowed abruptly to slits, and Treize picked up the Nairobi file again, slapping it firmly once against the desktop as if to teach the inoffensive wood a lesson. "I think it's time I paid a little personal attention to the Nairobi Base," he mused, calm voice carrying a powerful undercurrent of danger.
The General was not pleased.
The Hunt had begun. And woe to any who stood in his way!
///Nobody/ harms my friends and lives…//
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To be continued.
So far, someone suggested tossing a bit more of Treize into this, so, thus this end bit. Hey, personally I think that if the series is followed to the letter, the likelihood is strongest for 6x9, but I'm /not/ following the series, here. I like any relationship with 6 in it, and can imagine possibilities for almost any situation thrown to me, and I like reading ANY 6 pairing as long as it is well-written (*Wink* I just don't review diddley, but give me time and I'll add some of you to my Favorites list). I don't write sex, tho. Just not my thing.