He groggily walked down the stairs of the unfamiliar house, led by the hand of the unfamiliar little girl who claimed to be his daughter, and just then noticed that he was wearing a VERY unfamiliar set of flannel pajamas. Out there in the living room, a huge Christmas tree was decked out, gift-wrapped boxes piled underneath in a haphazard way.
"Please tell me this isn't one of those 'Scrooge' epiphanies," he thought to himself as he came into full vision of the room. And was just about ready to face-fault at what he saw.
"Oi, Zechs, how's it going, buddy?" a tall, somewhat stocky fellow with fiery red hair and a goatee greeted, just as he gave a flick of the wrist to the cast-iron pan that he was holding over the coals of the wood-burning fireplace. Milliardo cringed inwardly at the choice of name… one which he hadn't used ever since leaving Mars.
Beside the fireplace, two armchairs were occupied by a couple in their mid-fifties, the lady with similarly-coloured hair, left loose as though to accentuate her Celtic features, and the gentleman, with a slightly balding head of grayish-black hair, and a rather scholarly, yet friendly aura. The young man and the couple looked eerily familiar, although he could not say exactly how or why. His head searched frantically for any plausible reasons that would reveal how he was related to these people, then quickly rejected the one image that his mind presented as a possible explanation.
"Oh, God… What if in this life I'm…? No! No no no no… nu-uh, no-way, not a chance in hell, I am definitely not gay. Not in this life, not in any other life. And, whoever this guy is, he is most definitely NOT my… my… Ugh, I think I'm
getting a migraine…"
"Uncle Lorenzo's gonna teach me how to make chestnut stuffing for the turkey," the little girl pointed out proudly as she went and settled by the Celtic-looking young man, wanting to peer into the pan to see if the chestnuts had begun to expand out of their skins yet. Inwardly, Milliardo breathed the heaviest sigh of relief since the Gundam pilots saved the day in 196 A.C.
"Patience, Vic, it'll be another… oh, I'd say about 5 minutes," the supposed Uncle Lorenzo instructed. Milliardo figured that, at least, now he knew two things. One, he was still very much a straight man. Two, his daughter's name was most likely Victoria, and that put him at least marginally ahead of whatever sick and twisted game he had been thrown into.
With that knowledge, he waved everyone good morning, and proceeded to make his way into the kitchen… wherever that happened to be. Whatever this place was, he figured, they must have coffee… He peered inside, scanning for the coffee-maker, when his eyes fell on two ladies intent on whipping up pancakes by the stove, of which he could only see the back. One was petite, with long, curly red hair, much like the young man and the middle-aged lady out in the living room, though she looked like she could be no older than seventeen. He had to grab hold of the door frame, lest his knees falter when he focused on the other. She was taller, with short, midnight-black hair, falling softly in wispy strands about her neck and chin, and was holding a VERY blonde toddler.
The baby noticed his presence first, being as his chin was propped up against the dark-haired woman's shoulder. His bright indigo eyes lit up as he reached out a pudgy hand, and squealed,
"Da-da-daaaa!"
Milliardo silently panicked again at the though that this one, too, must be his own.
"So much for not knocking anyone up," he realized, feeling the full irony of his earlier sneer at Treize's expense.
Just then, the dark-haired woman turned around, her lips opening up into a glorious smile, and he recognized her beyond the shadow of a doubt as his once-best friend and love, Lucrezia Noin.
"Daddy's up," she cheered, talking to the toddler in her arms, "Let's go say hi!" and with that, walked, or rather, danced over to the doorframe that Milliardo was still clutching for dear life, and planted a full kiss on his lips.
"Merry Christmas, sleepy-head," she teased as she mussed his hair, and he began feeling dizzy once again.
"Merry Ho-Ho," the redhead girl greeted cheerfully as she ducked to explore the contents of the fridge, no doubt to avoid witnessing any kissy-smoochy scenes, "Lu, what the heck do I do with this goopy mess over here?"
"Uh… I believe that's Lorenzo's goopy mess, for the stuffing. Don't ask, I haven't the slightest clue as to what he's up to… Zechs, do you mind holding Ben while Elisa and I finish up in here?" And before he knew it, he had a bouncing one-year-old in his arms, whose name he now presumed must be Benjamin, like his own late father, little oatmeal-smeared hands painfully tugging at his long hair as one thought flashed in his mind,
"This… is not… my life. What the hell happened to my life?"
*******
Well, he was determined to find out, that was for damn sure, although he had the most disconcerting feeling that this was neither a dream, nor a prank… He quickly parked the baby on the middle-aged Irish lady's lap, whom he now recognized as Noin's stepmother, and ran upstairs to throw on some clothes. It came to him as no surprise that all his designer suits had been replaced with jeans, khakis, and sweaters, as though, in this parallel universe that he had been tossed into, he had no need whatsoever for any formal or business wear. He finally threw on a pair of black cords, a white crew-neck tee shirt, and a grayish-blue V-neck sweater before dashing back down the stairs.
If his suspicions were accurate, right about this moment, his counterpart, who should have been right here in this life, was waking up to the life of Milliardo Peacecraft… and was probably in for one heck of a bumpy ride, too.
"The bugger had better not be drinking my Wild Turkey," he grumbled to himself as he bypassed his daughter and in-laws who, no doubt, had no clue as to why he wasn't going to open up presents with them. Rather, he made a dash for the car keys.
Of course, his Ferrari was no longer there, either. He growled in exasperation, as all he had to choose from were a set of Nissan and Volkswagen keys. Figuring that the Nissan ones most likely belonged to a minivan or some other rather dull mommy-car, he decided right away that they must belong to practical, no-nonsense Lu. He pictured himself more likely to drive a Passat or a Jetta, or something along those lines. Something with at least some degree of kick. He grabbed the Volkswagen keys, and slid himself into the garage, all the while praying that Zechs Merquise would not get any ideas about taking his Ferrari for a spin. Ace pilot or not, there were just certain things that should not be messed with…
Ironically enough, his ride was no less than a cyber-green Beetle.
"A freaking Bug…" he grunted, hand slapping his forehead, "It's gotta be Noin's. I wouldn't be caught dead driving a Bug. A chartreuse one, to top it all off." He peered inside for a confirmation, which he promptly received upon seeing a daisy sticking out of the built-in flower vase, a baby seat in the back, and a parking sticker reading "MCSE Faculty". He quickly did an about-face, and decided that maybe he'd take the Nissan SUV instead. He was going to find out exactly where the hell he was, and how quickly he could get back home.
He drove around for what seemed like an eternity, trying to find any recognizable clues of his whereabouts. Yet nothing looked even vaguely familiar. From the looks of it, he was in a predominantly English-speaking country. Relatively close to either pole, judging by the –25 C degree temperature outside. He could be anywhere in the US, Canada, or the UK, to cite only a few possibilities, and he figured that he probably would not know for sure until he spoke to one of the locals.
He pulled into a gas station, and asked about the best way to get to the spaceport, and was quite mystified when three different attendants came to his aid, one with a heavy Scottish accent, one with a decidedly Texan one, and one who sounded an awful lot like a Quebecois, all three arguing quite loudly as to which was the fastest way to get there. He concluded that, whatever his place really was, it was definitely getting a bit too Dr. Seuss for his taste. Even more confused, and now nursing a headache, Milliardo paid the credits he owed, and drove on, not exactly sure whether he was going in the right direction.
He circled around the downtown core, noticing that it looked awfully underdeveloped for an Earth city, as though it were still very much in its infancy. Yet, he could not see any evidence of a weather control dome that would otherwise identify it as a space colony. Or, if there was one, its span must definitely be above and beyond anything that he had ever seen first-hand. He figured that he was most likely on a self-sustaining planet. But was it necessarily Earth, and at any rate, was it the Earth he knew?
*******
His suspicion was confirmed upon coming into view of the spaceport building.
"Damn," he thought, "how in the hell did I end up on Mars?"
He figured it mattered very little, since he would probably be on a shuttle home in a matter of hours. And yet, at the same time, he could not help but marvel at how much the Red Planet had changed since he last saw it. It was now a fully inhabitable and quite picturesque, if only slightly surreal land. Sure, he had seen reports and news updates on the progress of the Terraforming project since leaving. He had read statistics on the largest weather-controlled system ever implemented by humans, even watched documentaries on the up-and-coming organically grown super-crops from Mars. But never would he have imagined that, in just a decade, the Terraforming Team had turned things around in such a dramatic way, building futuristic cities and top-notch farmlands out of the hard, inhospitable red dirt and inhumane temperatures that he remembered all too well.
"Always knew Noin was in this for all the right reasons," he smiled as he walked into the spaceport terminal towards the ticket counter, "Unlike me… Now let's set things straight, and send her real husband back to her… Poor bugger probably won't know what to do with himself in my reality, all alone at Christmastime without his wife and kids…"
***********
Instead…
"I'm sorry, sir, but all the flights are booked solid right up until the 31st. The earliest that I can get you on a shuttle back to Earth would be an 8:30 AM flight into London Heathrow, arriving on January 1st at 9:00 AM local time…"
"Damn! Not nearly good enough," he thought. Figuring that arguing logistics with a rather powerless ticket agent would probably get him nowhere fast, Milliardo resorted to the next best thing: he called into his office, hoping to pull some strings to get a Preventer craft to take him home. As a diplomat, he had always had access to such privileges. In this case, he did not feel particularly guilty about taking full advantage of them, since this definitely classified as an emergency situation, at least in his book.
Instead, as soon as he got through to Lady Une's secretary and announced himself, the young girl, whom he recognized as
Eileen the intern, began to unabashedly laugh her head off over the phone. Finding her behaviour most disrespectful, he asked for an explanation, which she promptly and quite gladly returned, her voice now glaring with anger.
"Listen, you freak, I don't know who you are, or how you got this number in the first place, but you've obviously done your homework. Only, you could have chosen a more plausible name for yourself, since any idiot KNOWS that Milliardo Peacecraft died in the war. Now get the hell off of my phone line before I start tracing the call and send a patrol over to kick your ass! Lady Une's way too busy for this kind of crap and, quite frankly, so am I! Oh, and have yourself a merry Christmas!"
"Double damn," he cursed inwardly as he went to take a seat in the waiting lounge and dropped his head in his hands, "merry Christmas indeed. How the hell did my life just up and disappear into nothingness? What does it mean, that I'm now stuck being, or rather pretending to be Zechs Merquise, whether I like it or not? Aside from that, Lu is not that stupid, she'll know right away that I'm not the same man she married…" He figured whatever reason there was for all that mess, it didn't justify dragging her and her family into it because of some higher entity he must have ticked off…"
Life truly was the pits, he concluded, and for the first time in years, Milliardo felt that gut-wrenching fear again, the one that had pushed him to shun each and every personal attachment or friendship. He was again letting people down, simply by being
the emotionally inept, neurosis-ridden freak he was.