A New Ally (1) Chapter 6: Table Talk
Aly and Skye talked most of the way to the cafeteria. They talked about random things, such as favorite foods, favorite activities, and the like. They were not really in the mood to talk about the current politics or the recently failed mission. Eventually, the conversation led to Duo.
"So how do you know Duo, Quatre, and...what's the one with the long bangs...Trowa, so well? All you've really told me about them is that they're old friends and you explained who was who." Skye said.
"Well. I lived near them all at one point. Quatre's father worked with my father for a while. And Trowa, I ran in to-literally on the street one day. As for Duo, I've known him since we were little." Aly said. She did not really feel like going into great detail. She knew she and Skye were getting very close in a short time, but Aly still did not know Skye well enough to share many personal things about her life. That, and Aly was not in the mood to be talkative in general. Skye sensed Aly's lack of desire to talk about it at the moment, so she dropped the subject. They had reached the cafeteria by then, so it did not matter too much anyway.
Aly and the rest of the gundam pilots usually ate in the cafeteria on the Peacemillion along with the rest of the MS tech crew, Howard, Noin, and every other worker on the Peacemillion. No body except Skye, Noin, and Howard really recognized them as the gundam pilots. So, they did not worry too much about blending in and sat together in one corner of the cafeteria.
Skye pushed the button for the sliding airlock door. The door slid open and the noise from the plethora of people conversing in the cafeteria rushed towards her. She and Aly drifted through the door. The door slid shut as soon as they were inside.
Aly looked around. The cafeteria always gave her a cozy feeling. It was so full of life. It was a nice change from the quiet she usually had throughout the day. Aly spotted Duo waving from the table in the far-left corner of the room. She pointed him out to Skye and led the way over.
When Skye and Aly reached the table, they saw Trowa, and Quatre were already sitting and had gotten their food.
"Hey Skye, hey Aly." Duo greeted. They both smiled and said their hellos.
"Well, I'm starving. You guys ready to go through the line?" Duo asked. Aly and Skye both nodded and they drifted over to the line together.
A few minutes later, Aly, Duo, and Skye returned to the table to find the others had gone through the line and were seated at the table. Heero and Wufei both stared at Skye, sizing her up. She simply quirked an eyebrow at them. She knew they weren't very social people from what Aly and Duo had told her in the dinner line.
"Uhm, this is Skye, Aly and Noin's roommate. She's also one of the MS techs here. I invited her to sit with us." Duo said, introducing Skye and trying to get Heero and Wufei to stop glaring at her. Heero and Wufei lowered their gazes to their plates.
"First Tayeari and Noin...now another one..." Wufei muttered under his breath. Everyone pretended not to hear him. The gundam pilots, Noin, and Howard usually sat together, but it was more so because they were the few people they could all semi-trust rather than a social matter. It had taken the gundam pilots a long time to learn to trust each other. Trusting Howard and Noin had been tough too. Skye was a totally new person, whom was not even a pilot, so Wufei and Heero were a bit tense around her. They still did not even know Aly well enough to form concrete opinions of her.
Quatre, Trowa, and Howard were all right with Skye sitting with them though. They were a lot friendlier- more accepting people than Heero and Wufei. Skye and Aly were happy they were sitting across from them. Although, directly in front of Aly was Heero, but he seemed more interested in his food at the moment.
Aly leaned around Skye to talk to Duo who was to Skye's right.
"Do you have any extra sugar packets? I forgot to get some in the line." Aly asked. Duo nodded. He grabbed a packet of sugar from the large stack on his tray. He handed it to Skye who in turn passed it to Aly.
"Thanks." Aly ripped open the sugar packet and poured some over her bowl of strawberries. Skye glanced curiously at Duo's tray.
"Why do you have so many packets of sugar?" Skye asked. Duo shrugged.
"I got extra to save for later. I have a collection of ketchup, sugar, salt, and pepper packets. You never know when you may need some condiments." Duo said wisely.
"Oh. I see." Skye glanced at Aly and they both suppressed giggles. Aly went back to eating her dinner. The meal that evening was white rice and an option of either sweet and sour tofu or chicken to go with it. Aly had gotten the sweet and sour tofu, and Skye and Duo had gotten the chicken. They all thoroughly enjoyed their food. The cooks on the Peacemillion were very good.
"So Aly, did your father tell you how long you will be staying here on the Peacemillion?" Quatre asked from his seat across from Skye.
"No. I'm assuming until after the war is over. Or, however long I feel I can be helpful." Aly replied. Quatre nodded, then turned his attention to Skye.
"Miss Skye, you have been here about as long as Aly. Correct?" Quatre inquired.
"Yes, and it's just Skye."
"Alright, Skye, how do you like the Peacemillion so far?"
"I think it's great. I really love MS mechanics. Getting to work on the gundams has been really fun. I am glad that I have something to do that I enjoy. Although, I wish I were not repairing MS's after battles, but after something different; something less harsh." Skye replied.
"How did you learn how to do gundam mechanics?" Heero asked, breaking the silent streak he had had for that entire meal. The rest of the people at the table brought their attention to Skye as well.
"Well, I had to teach myself really. I had never really had a gundam to practice on." Skye said. Heero did not respond; he just continued to stare at Skye with a look of suspicion evident on his face. He finally looked away and the others did too.
Aly could hear Duo talking up a storm with Skye and Quatre, but she did not pay much attention to what they were saying. She was busy with her own world of thought. Aly still had a sinking feeling in her stomach. Why had L7 of all the colonies been attacked? It made no sense to her.
Everyone was being extremely silent, so Aly looked up briefly. Her gaze was met with Heero's. Aly was somewhat weirded out. She was not sure if they had simply looked up at the same time or he had been staring. She offered a smile to him when she saw the haunted look that his always seemed to hold. Heero made no change in expression. He simply looked back down at his food. Aly shrugged it off and went back to eating.
No one seemed to notice that Aly was being silent. Perhaps they were all too used to Wufei's, Trowa's, and Heero's quiet natures. It was not until Duo got up to go get another drink that Skye turned to Aly and spoke.
"Thanks for letting me sit in between you guys instead of just next to him. I'd feel a bit uncomfortable if I was." Skye said loud enough for only Aly to hear over the noise of the cafeteria. Aly nodded.
"No problem, I know Duo can be a bit...well, extremely overbearing at times." Aly replied.
"I've gathered that." Skye smiled at her.
About ten minutes later, the pilots, Noin, Howard, and Skye had all finished eating. Duo, Skye, and Aly were among the few people still in the cafeteria after the kitchen had been closed up. They finally decided to leave after noticing how many people were gone already.
Duo offered to walk the girls back to their room. The girls had accepted which brought a big smile to Duo's face.
Once they got to the girls' room, the trio went inside. They had decided on the way there to play cards. Aly and Duo sat on the floor while Skye got a deck of cards out of one of the desk drawers. She joined Aly and Duo on the floor and began shuffling the cards.
"So? What're we playing?" Skye asked as she bridged the cards.
"How about hearts?" Duo suggested. Skye shrugged and divvied out the deck of cards. The trio all picked up their cards and passed their three cards to the left. Duo, who had been sitting on Skye's left, placed down the first card: a two of spades.
"Duo! Why'd you start w/ spades! You just gave me all the high ones!" Aly said as she glared at Duo. Duo smiled sheepishly.
"Did I?"
"Don't worry, I gave him some FUN ones too." Skye said with an evil smirk.
About two hours later, Noin walked into the room. She noticed the trio playing cards and quickly apologized for interrupting the game.
"It's alright. We just got done playing anyway." Duo said with a smile.
"Said like a true loser." Skye said. Duo gave her a pretend glare and stuck his tongue out at her. Had they been playing for money, Duo would have been bankrupt and it debt for about five years. The girls had started out losing the first game, but after that, they had murdered Duo's pride by winning every single time.
Noin smiled.
"They give you a hard time, Duo?" Noin asked with a twinkle in her eyes.
"Nope, I just decided to be chivalrous and let them beat me." Duo said with a grin.
"Sure...all fifteen times..." Skye said quietly. She, Aly, and Noin all laughed. Quatre and Howard, whom had been drifting by the open doorway stopped and glanced in.
"What're we missing?" Howard asked.
"Nothing much. Just a friendly game of cards." Aly replied. Howard's eyebrow raised a little when he noticed Duo mouthing "they're EVIL!" behind the girls' backs.
"Who's evil?" Quatre asked. The girls all turned to give Duo accusing looks. He turned a pale shade of red.
"Uhm...no one." Duo said with an angelic smile. He jumped up from his seat on the floor.
"I think it's time I went back to my own room. It's getting pretty late. And, we don't know what may come up tomorrow." Duo said. The group all nodded in agreement. Duo drifted out of the room, dragging Howard and Quatre along with him.
"Night Aly! Night Skye! Night Noin!" Duo called before he shut the door. The three girls shared a look.
"What was that all about?" Noin asked, "It's not like we were going to kill him or anything..." Noin smiled mischievously.
"Maybe another time. Right now, I'm tired, I want to just go to sleep." Aly said. Noin and Skye agreed, so they all got ready for bed.
Fire, everywhere fire. Aly looked around with half-closed eyelids. The heat was intense and the fires all around her made it hard to see clearly.
"AMÌ! Am� where are you?" Aly called. She cupped her hands around her mouth to amplify her voice projection. She had been talking to her friends Am� and Kenichi in the gundam lab when there had been a giant explosion.
Aly had been knocked backwards and found herself buried under a pile of rubble. After she had dug herself out from the debris, Aly had begun searching for Am� and Kenichi. She began to feel frantic; as she could not see them anywhere.
"Kenichi! Am�! Where are you? Can you hear me?" Aly walked towards the smoldering heap of metal that used to be a gundam. She could not believe how it had been destroyed in one explosion. She kicked over a small piece of sheet metal and found shattered glass from the "eyes" of the gundam. Part of the metal catwalk above Aly crashed down at her feet. She jumped backwards in fright.
'Damnit. This lab is falling apart! Where the hell are they?' Aly thought, fear creeping into her heart. Aly continued her search. Sweat was rolling down her forehead from the heat of the flames. She wiped at her brow.
"Aly!" Aly turned towards the sound of the voice. She felt very relieved when she saw her friend Am� running towards her. Am� looked about as bruised and beat up as Aly felt. Her dark blonde hair was singed and her face was smudged with soot.
"I need your help I found Kenichi. He's stuck under a metal lab table. I can't lift it by myself." Am� said in a rush, her dark brown eyes flashing. Aly nodded and followed Am� as she ran towards the front of the gundam lab. Aly saw Kenichi lying pinned under the table and hurried to grip one side.
"What the hell happened?" Aly asked as she and Am� strained to lift up the table. They pulled it aside and Kenichi scrambled to his feet. He was limping slightly, but he was more worried about getting out of there than feeling pain.
"Who knows, but we need to get the hell out of here before this entire lab collapses!" Kenichi said as he glanced quickly at the metal ceiling panels. Aly and Am� followed him as he led the way to the exit.
When they reached the exit, Kenichi, Am�, and Aly all worked together to move the debris out of the way and pry the heavy, thick lead door open. They shoved the door open just as the lab began to shake again. Am� was the first to rush out. Kenichi was close behind her. Aly had started out the door, but glanced back behind herself at the collapsing, burning gundam lab. She watched as the last of the catwalk collapsed and the metal ceiling panel began to fall.
Aly was fear-struck. She could not make her feet move. She felt as though her legs were made of cement. Kenichi and Am� had noticed Aly was not behind them, so they rushed back in.
"Aly we need to get out of here!" Am� shouted. Aly nodded, but still could not move. More and more ceiling tiles began to drop. They made a loud crashing thud as they hit piles of debris. Am� went back out the door and Kenichi pushed Aly through. Aly snapped from her daze as soon as she was outside. She saw Kenichi fleeing out the door as the last huge metal ceiling panel dropped. Aly grabbed Kenichi's hand and tried to pull him out with her.
"Kenichi! Aly! Come on!" Am� shouted. There was another explosion and Kenichi's hand was jerked from Aly's grasp. She saw his face right before she had too look away from the power of the explosion. A look of absolute horror was on his face. Aly was knocked away from the doorway. The large metal door was pulled shut by the shockwave. Aly reached blindly for Kenichi, but only grasped empty air.
"Kenichi! Kenichi!" Aly heard Am�'s screams and she knew; he had just been trapped inside.
Aly jerked awake. She looked around frantically. Her brain relaxed the slightest bit when she realized where she was, the room she shared with Noin and Skye. Aly was shaking badly. She felt far too hot. She kicked her covers down and sat up. Her hands were shaking badly. She brought her left hand in front of her face and studied it.
'Why am I still having this dream? It was two years ago!' Aly tried to calm her breathing. She remembered the factory explosion well, but she had tried so hard to forget. The guilt still haunted her, tormenting her in her dreams.
'I should have held on tighter...' Aly shook her head and punched her pillow in anger. She fell back against her pillow and tried to forget her dream. Glancing at the clock, she discovered that it was five am. She knew that everyone else would be getting up in the next hour.
Aly rolled onto her side and fell back asleep without pulling even a sheet up. She hoped that the cool of the room would calm her fiery memories.
-End of Chapter 6-
Please R&R! I need feedback/suggestions! I got writer's block so bad! Gomen nasai minna-san. Reviews fuel inspiration...so review! Arigatou!
-AlyRain