Chapter Three

I

Zechs boarded the shuttle silently and without incident, speaking neither to the pilot who greeted him nor to the subordinate who escorted him to his seat. They all seemed too cheery for him, too enthusiastic for men who had spent at least the past months of their lives preparing for a war that would only bring about the very same kind of tyranny most of them had fought against during Mariemaia Kushrenada's short-lived attempt at ascension to a nonexistent global throne. He knew that some members of Alsirae's nameless organization had fought with OZ or the Treize Faction and most of those had fought in the Eve Wars, but these soldiers were completely without any real combat experience, and this was why Alsirae had sent them specifically for this mission. Anyone who really knew what it was to be in a war would not have smiled so warmly upon meeting him; anyone who had experienced those moments of complete anarchy in the Eve Wars, when to destroy the enemy one had to kill half of his own unit, would not have seen him into the empty passenger compartment as though he were a messenger of God but simply as a superior officer who, in all honesty, they did not give a damn about.

However, he did not question the reason behind these fledgling soldiers' strange reverence of him. To them he was a war hero, the 'top soldier' OZ had made him out to be in every way. Their leader had sent them to bring him to Earth and —whether Alsirae had planted this idea in their heads or not— they believed he was going to win a war for them. None of them had to say it. They did not even have to be aware that they were thinking it. Zechs had been a new soldier once and he still remembered hearing those around him talking about the generals under whom they would fight. These people thought that he would be their army's great hero and that when the time to fight came, their sole responsibility would be to stand behind him as he magically vanquished all enemies who rose against them. How naïve they were. How very naïve, and how very wrong.

Did he feel sorry for them? Knowing that he would be one of the enemies they faced, should he not feel the slightest remorse for them? Perhaps he should, but somehow, he did not.

One of the soldiers entered the passenger compartment once the shuttle had taken off, holding a thin black box. As he neared the box proved to be a folded laptop computer.

"Former Colonel Zechs," he said with a thick British accent that was immediately identifiable as Liverpudlian, balancing the slender computer with one hand and saluting.

Zechs visibly cringed at the title. He looked up at the man and said calmly, "Soldier, my name is Zechs Marquise. You may address me by either or both of those, but after I say this, if you dare use a title in front of it I will put a bullet in your head for your stupidity."

The soldier blinked and stepped back.

Zechs raised an eyebrow and waited.

"Here," the younger man said finally, thrusting the computer forward. "Mr. Alsirae requested that you personally notify him when you're in the air."

Zechs nodded and took the computer out of the soldier's unsteady hands. "Thank you."

"Is there anything else we can do for you, F–…Mr. Marquise?"

"Yes."

"What might that be, sir?"

"You can leave me alone until we enter the Earth's atmosphere."

Again, blinking from his subordinate. "Very well, sir," he said curtly, then made as if to leave.

Zechs opened the laptop. As he waited for it to boot up, he made the mistake of pushing back a few strands of his hair, further exposing one side of his face.

The soldier uttered the start of a small gasp and caught himself. Zechs looked up at him and he averted his eyes to some other point in the room.

"Is something wrong?" Zechs asked as though he did not know what the young man had seen.

"No, sir," the soldier responded, then promptly pivoted on his heels and left the passenger compartment, firmly shutting the door behind him.

Zechs's hand went to his face. It was not sore exactly, but even at the lightest touch a burning ache flared within his jaw.

Had she hit him that hard? It had happened hours ago and still that side of his face was sensitive, yet when she had hit him he had barely even felt it. Had he even blinked when she had done it? Yes, of course, he had blinked, that was only natural human reflex, but other than that had he even moved?

She was strong; that had always been undeniable, strong even in her weakness, which he knew was none other than himself. Strong both physically and emotionally. Strong enough to wait all these years for him, to tell him that she loved him and at the same time deliver a punch that would, apparently, mark him.

He strangely found himself smiling, pressing his hand deeper into the firm flesh of his jaw. The pain deepened with his fingertips; it throbbed and pulsated and bloomed out across his entire head like a malignant living flower. He enjoyed this pain —he hissed once and inhaled sharply as the pain became dizzying— but still he was reveling in it. He deserved this pain and so much more, an infinite amount of pain for what he had done to her.

It was only now striking him, how he had given no argument to her this time, how she had begged him the night before not to leave and he had persisted. He had done nothing more than desert her after leading her to believe that he actually wanted this. And she believed him. She truly thought he had chosen something over his peaceful life on Mars —his life with her— and she had raged against it, then at the very moment he wanted her to rage, she, in her incessant love for him, had simply hit him and kissed him, then turned her back and waited for him to leave.

How many times had he done this in the past, had he left her like this? There were three times of which he was truly aware now, but occasions that went unspoken of often seemed to outnumber those deliberate ones. How many times had she watched him leave a base with OZ for a mission from which he probably would not return?

He could not even estimate the number of times he had done this, but —and this very thought shamed him— he was sure that if asked, Lucrezia could provide an exact amount.

Why did it seem, all throughout their years together, that he had done nothing but cause her even more pain? How could he hurt her so badly when all he wanted to do was protect her?

Always betraying something.

Lucrezia, he thought, momentarily closing his eyes, Luca, I'm so sorry.

If he truly wanted to keep her safe, he had to go through with what he was involved in, which started with sending notification of the shuttle's takeoff to Alsirae.

Zechs was fully aware of the reason he had been ordered to notify his superior of every move he made. Even when he had first begun his military career, one of the first things a soldier was taught was that the best time for an enemy to take him out was during transportation of some kind, making him simply disappear rather than kill him officially in the field. This had hardly been knowledge restricted to the military; this was proven to an entirely new extent when the Gundam 05, piloted by L5's Chang Wufei, attacked the soldier barracks at Lake Victoria three years ago the night before they were supposed to transport their own suits off base, in mockery of army notification regulations. Zechs, without every really having done anything for the organization, was nonetheless considered one of its top soldiers, and it was only natural that Alsirae should request notification that no incident whatsoever had occurred and that the shuttle was safely in outer space.

The consequences of ignorance of the request were dire enough to make Zechs not even briefly consider not following it just so Alsirae would sweat a little. If something were to happen to him or even be suspected of happening, a crew of experienced soldiers would be sent to the Sanq Kingdom and Mars immediately, the former to take into custody Relena Peacecraft, the other to do so of Lucrezia Noin. This was to occur in the event that any attack on Zechs could involve similar attacks on those closest to him, and it was practically common knowledge that the closest to him were his sister and the woman he lived with.

However, this was not why Alsirae would order their immediate apprehension, despite whatever lie he fed his soldiers. He did not really care what happened to either Relena or Lucrezia, but he knew how very much Zechs did care, and the threat of their apprehension was his weapon to insure that Zechs followed his orders to the letter.

He quickly typed up the notification but did not immediately send it. From a concealed pocket inside his long black overcoat, the pocket beside the one that held his gun, he withdrew a disk, which he inserted into the computer. He sent the message to Alsirae, and the disk was promptly activated. The same moment Alsirae received the message it would be sent to Odin Lowe's computer, via the heavily encrypted rerouting program on the disk. Any outgoing material sent after the disk was placed in the computer would instantly be copied and the copy would be sent to the encrypted location. It was an untraceable effort; thanks to the wonders of modern technology, the program performed an instant 'clean-up' of itself, eradicating every trace of itself from the host computer. The program had been conceived and designed by one of Odin's other higher subordinates, one whose computer skills, Zechs knew for an absolute fact, were nothing less than astonishing.

He slipped the disk back into his pocket and set the computer aside. His head fell back against the seat and his eyes fell shut. Resting his elbows on either armrest, he clasped his hands over his abdomen. He was only sometimes aware that he did this, but often after remembering he immediately moved into some other position.

This was a posture he had often, in his youth, seen his father fall into when he was thinking heavily on something. He had never tried to emulate it; it was not until years after his father's assassination that he realized he himself often sat like this.

Leaving Lucrezia for the Earth. Leaving space for the Earth. Of that last one neither seemed much of importance; they were both all but falling apart right now, and had been for months.

The Earth had changed so much in the past fourteen months, since Dekim Barton's misguided soldiers were vanquished and Zechs and Lucrezia had gone to Mars. Space had changed, too, but not as much, and nowhere near as drastically. Governed by the restored autonomy of each colony, without the Earth's involvement, space could probably go years without a war. This was something Zechs had said to rally the troops of the White Fang once, and as much as it pained him to admit it, it was something he did believe, at least partly.

The nations of Earth had experienced complete governmental reforms after the great 'Mariemaia incident,' as it was called to now, and for the first few months of AC 197 the entire world had gone through a very subdued, very calm breed of chaos. The colonies had suffered for a while because of this as well, for they were, ultimately, reliant upon Earth's economic support. The Martian terraforming project, however, had managed to continue until it was inhabitable, and then was inexplicably financially forced to a screeching halt.

One of the reasons for such an extensive review of the effectiveness of all the current governments was the outrage that indeed another battle had taken place, and mainly, how easily Mariemaia had been able to gain power. Was it likely that another such takeover could occur? At the moment it had not been, perhaps because the people, still enraged and feeling empowered by their own role in overthrowing Mariemaia and Dekim, would simply have led a worldwide revolt. But later, in years to come, was it likely? Of course it was, for one of the primary things that history has taught human beings is that they are doomed to repeat themselves. And such a repetition was to be avoided at all costs.

It was globally decided that one of the factors leading to Mariemaia's hasty ascension to power was an imbalance of the powers to begin with. Had so much power not been given to the Vice Foreign Minister, the removal of Relena Darlian would not have facilitated such a quick takeover. Therefore, it was decided mutually —among the melange of national governments and the Vice Foreign Minister herself— that some power should be removed from the office and placed elsewhere. A surprising development occurred once this decision was made: although she had agreed with the necessity of a slight shift in certain areas of power, Relena Darlian had resigned from her position in all of Earth's government. She gave no explanation for it, nor any apology. Her sudden apathy was the only thing that had shocked Zechs about it, but he had made no attempt to question her personally about her motives, and likewise she had not tried to speak to him about it.

Shortly after Relena's resignation, Zechs, quite unwillingly, had made his first appearance in the news since the Eve Wars. Relena was suddenly out of every picture she could possibly be in, and the vultures of the press had suddenly decided to release the fact that Her Grace Relena's brother, Milliardo, had reportedly lived through the Eve Wars and had reemerged to fight Mariemaia's tyranny. The question that was supposedly on the mind of the people but was really only a concern of the news networks was where Milliardo was while Her Grace went through this 'crisis' (they apparently had forgotten that she had not been removed from power but had resigned). Many believed that the media's newfound concern over the disappearance of the prince was a desperate attempt to create some kind of mystery or intrigue surrounding Relena's resignation, because despite all their efforts, Relena had spoken not a word to them following her decision, and now she, like her brother before her, had vanished.

The governmental review conferences continued without Relena at the head table. The media was not allowed anywhere inside the building in which the conferences were held, but if it had been, even then it would have been believed that Relena was now exempting herself from all governmental affairs.

Relena had attended those conferences, however, not missing a single one, even during her resignation. Those who looked for her there expected to find her sitting near the front, where she would be closest to the great tables were the governing political leaders were. Because of this assumption, only one person, to Zechs's knowledge, had seen her there.

He was often darkly amused by comparisons between his two superiors. Alsirae's soldiers and subordinates were either inexperienced boys who were sore because they had never been given the chance to fight in a war or those who had been given that chance and were now so badly hardened that they no longer possessed souls and merely wanted to see how much damage they could do before their hearts' wish was granted and battle finally took with it their lives as it had their souls. Even living in anonymity, Alsirae carried the very aura of elegance, of eloquence, of grace and power and wealth. Odin Lowe seemed to many people upon their first meeting to be the chain-smoking, grinning devil incarnate, and his subordinates were in some way all contacts to something.

One such subordinate (Zechs did not know his name and probably never would) held some position of power and therefore was given a seat at one of the tables at the head of the grand auditorium, and once when he looked out into the crowd the dim lights in the back caught his eye in such a way that he noticed a strange shadow that fell between them. The balcony had been closed off for these conferences but that was where the shadow fell from, and when he looked up he was barely able to make out the shape of a person in the darkness of the upper level. At some point during the conference (Zechs had not been told when or how), this man realized that the person illegally watching from the balcony was none other than the self-exiled Relena Peacecraft.

Zechs had learned this from Odin, and afterward he had felt a strange sense of pride in his sister. Even now he did not know why these actions of hers made him proud, but nor did he want to know.

The conferences, which had previously relied somewhat on Relena for her bright optimism, her ideals, and simply because she inspired such strong emotions in anyone who had contact with her, went on, its attendees unaware of her observant presence in the balcony. Colonial leaders began to attend, ideas were proposed, agreements were reached, and at long last a stack of paperwork was brought out, ready to be signed. The conferences did take time and for a while the entire body of governments across the world were put on hold as much as possible, but every second of the time spent on the reforms was imperatively necessary. Such political meetings of the past, of even one year ago, had been tainted by the bullshit of nationalist greed or self-empowering propaganda; these had been desperate, so desperate that for once (and perhaps only this once), self had become a secondary priority, and all seemed willing to sacrifice to prevent another war. This century, more than any other in human history, had been filled with almost nothing except warfare; all had lost someone or something, all had been scarred in some way, and all knew this could not be allowed to go on.

So pure, it had all been. So pure and so clean and so blessedly and truly great.

Sometimes it took a war to unite the people, to cause them all, even if only for one day, to put away their petty differences and setbacks. Sometimes talk and negotiations were all that was necessary to focus the people on a common goal, but those times were rare and quite often short-lived.

Sometimes, it took a war.

He hoped Relena had learned now what he had been trying to do with White Fang. He hoped she knew and that she understood.

The colonies were turned to the autonomic control they had for so many years tried to gain. The Martian colony had been among these and he and Lucrezia had watched from the window of their apartment the mass celebrations that were, for once in the history of warfare, not over defeat of an opponent or a murder but rather were over the supposed end of tyranny and bloodshed. Each colony was given freedom to choose their leadership, a first in colonial history, and though financial backing from Earth was still needed, no country could again lay claim to a colony.

The nations of the Earth were given much of that same freedom. Most formerly democratic countries returned to democracy; most former monarchies returned to monarchy. There were a few nations that had previously been governed democratically who embraced the concept of monarchy and bestowed that title upon their leader, and a handful of smaller monarchies fell to democracy. There was even talk of certain territories that had readopted lifestyles similar to the fiefdoms of the Medieval Age.

There was one major change in the governments of the Earth, however, decided upon by the governmental leaders in further hope of preventing another Mariemaia (another Milliardo Peacecraft) from coming into power. Regardless of differences in governmental systems, all nations were to receive final say on all new laws from a supreme governing High Council, which was set after brief discussion in Luxembourg. Twenty leaders were to be chosen to be the highest members of the Council, as well as an additional twenty as secondary members who held equal but less prominent power. The main purpose of the Council was to insure there could be no more tyrannical exploits such as the Alliance had tried to impose, and it soon became something like another branch of the Prevention Organization. All civil disputes and such dilemmas were to be taken before the Council if a solution could not be reached within the country and there was a possibility of combat; therefore, where the Prevention Organization worked to investigate evidence of possible conflicts and to do everything within its power to put a stop to any situation that could escalate into a war, the Council tried to settle affairs before they could get even that far.

The most recent governmental change —which had come shortly after the establishment of the Council, a few months short of a year ago— had occurred in the Sanq Kingdom. The throne of Sanq had remained empty since the heinous assassination of the Peacecrafts, the country run by whichever merciless military organization was in control at the time (how ironic, Zechs had often thought, that the great pacifist nation should be under military control), and had seemed destined to fall even lower into decadence even in this time of peace and prosperity until one of the former 'children of Sanq' returned from God-only-knew-where and laid claim to the throne.

Relena Peacecraft was crowned Queen of Sanq in the early spring of AC 197. The people accepted her without hesitation, and instantly the new Queen created plans to restore the war-torn country to its former glory.

Zechs had not spoken to his sister since his exodus to Mars, but he did not need to have to know that after the ordeal with Mariemaia she had changed drastically. It was obvious in everything she said or did, in the manner in which she performed her duties. Something in the past fourteen months had brought about in her an emotional maturity that Zechs had previously feared she would never acquire, and whatever it was, it had hardened her. Not so much that the press or the subjects of her newly gained kingdom would notice; it was something of which only those who had in the past been closest to her would be aware.

Zechs wondered if Heero Yuy had noticed the abrupt metamorphosis in her. He would probably never receive an answer to this question, however, for although he now knew where the former Gundam pilot was, there was very little chance that their paths would ever cross again. After all, were they not destined to be a hindrance to one another?

Relena's reign had begun well. Sanq, which had suffered in every way since its great fall, suddenly held promise for the future. All remaining symbols of warfare were destroyed as vehemently as were the pagan groves in the early days of Christianity. The economy again flourished and as trade and commerce became integrated with the native economics, a true culture began to develop.

The entire world had seemed, for the most part, at peace and finally reaping the rewards of its labors.

The welfare of the colonies, however, was a different story.

The Martian colony had, in the beginning, remained relatively untouched by the crisis that claimed many of the others in space, mostly because it had still retained some of the money gained from the government funding it had received before all construction had ceased. But when the money ran out they had been in the same situation as all the rest, inching closer to being on the verge of starvation and waiting for the Earth to intervene. Some of the colonists had gone to Earth and Une had sent the pacified Mariemaia to a private school in France, and Zechs had even once suggested to Lucrezia that they join those who had left, but she had refused, condemning departure as cowardice. This was true and he had never thought otherwise, but sometimes cowardice was the only remaining option.

The major factor in the economic collapse of the colonies was the sudden lack of money. The colonies had always needed Earth as their supplier of goods and money, and though autonomic control was highly successful in each one, without someone on Earth to act as a benefactor, the colonies would perish.

This matter was brought before all nations of the Earth and all were concerned, but no one wanted to step up as a responsible party. The new systems of government were efficient but none had the money to spare for the colonies, and another great concern was whether or not some colonial control would be granted to the nation paying to preserve lives in space.

The arguments spawned over the dilemma in space were settled when, after receiving permission and favor from the Council, Queen Relena of the Sanq Kingdom accepted the full duties of the colonial benefactor. Her kingdom was not the wealthiest in the world, having just recovered from a fifteen-year depression, but the Queen's actions were not questioned.

All had gone well for a while.

But it seemed that a good thing never lasted, and perhaps utopia did not really exist. The funding for the colonies had soon become lacking, for Queen Relena refused to raise taxes to support them. The colonies were not truly suffering yet and if there were a development in the near future they might never be, but the changes the sudden scarceness of money caused were evident.

The biggest changes, however, were in the Queen herself. The press did not speak of these things but that did little to prevent word of the Queen's strange behavior from reaching Zechs.

She was hardly the confident, happy young girl she had been when he left her. They said she spent much of her time alone now, hidden away in either her chambers or the library in the palace, sometimes in her vast gardens. Nothing seemed to hold her interest anymore; even discussions on the successes of her various treaties became lost on her, and when told about them, eventually her eyes glazed over and wandered to something only she could see. She rarely appeared before her subjects and though she remained warm to her servants, it was apparent that her warmth did not come without some effort. She refused to talk to anyone about what disturbed her so and fell into a profound silence whenever asked.

He wondered if she would maintain that silence with him.

"My dear Relena," he whispered aloud in the empty compartment, "will you have me back into your life?"

Not much time remained until he would receive an answer to his question. He would not go to Sanq immediately once he reached Earth. First he would be taken to Thessaloníki, where Alsirae waited for him. This meeting should not require much time, however, for the same reason that Alsirae was coming to Thessaloníki and leaving the base in Germany, where most of his organizations' actions occurred. He knew, as well as Odin Lowe did, that Zechs was going to Sanq, to Relena, and that personal matters were allowed precedence over any militaristic affairs of the moment. After all, was Sanq not one of the nations Alsirae intended to seize power over?

He finished the message to Alsirae and turned off the computer, setting it in the seat beside him. His thoughts threatened to turn to Lucrezia, then to Relena, and then at last he was able to clear his mind completely.

II

Dawn over Earth was much different than dawn over the distant planet Mars. He did not know this from experience but he had been told, and without ever having seen the sun rise over the horizon of the red planet, he knew it to be true. As the sun rose over the Earth, its light eventually caught all the signs man had put up of his own existence, the buildings that rose to touch the sky, the snaking roadways that cut through the true Earth, but on Mars it rose on nothing, nothing save for the translucent dome that guarded the one single colony. Beyond the incomplete colony, there was emptiness. A pure, dark emptiness that contained nothing of civilization, no thought or sound of war or pain. Nothing but a red sea that had yet to be parted by any man on a sacred mission from God.

He had been on Earth ever since that final battle with Mariemaia's soldiers. All the others had long since returned to the colonies they had once offered their lives to protect. The only one of whom he had heard any news was Quatre, and that had been around six months ago. But everyone, both on Earth and in the colonies, knew what had happened to Quatre; therefore his knowledge of the former Gundam pilot was no credit to his ability of attaining certain information.

After the wars Quatre had returned to what remained of his home colony, and there was legally named the sole heir to the Winner family's vast estate. To the surprise of the public —but none at all to those who really knew him— Quatre had soon restored his family's enterprises and hence restored their wealth, and he had reestablished the Winner name as one of prominence and dignity within the world of business and economics.

He supposed he had been glad that his former ally had, even if temporarily, found a niche in life outside of warfare. He personally would rather swallow a bullet than conform to such a life.

A few months following Quatre's ascension into wealth, he had been scheduled to meet with a group of other financial leaders on Earth to discuss something that sounded good but probably did not mean a thing, like so many such conferences did. Half an hour into its flight, his shuttle put out a distress call. A medical team was sent from his colony to the shuttle's location, only to find the shuttle half-engulfed in flames.

The cause of the explosion remained to this day unknown. There was much speculation regarding it —some believed it had been some kind of mechanical failure, others said it was an all-out terrorist attack— but he did not listen to any of it. Any events that may have led up to the explosion were only secondary to the real meaning behind it, and that was simply that bad things happened to good people.

Several people —mostly members of the Maganac Corps— had been rescued from the blaze but many others had perished. Quatre had always been surrounded by people and because of that a good deal of his non-Maganac servants had died.

Quatre himself had lived, however, if the state in which he was left could be called 'living.' He had suffered tremendous injury in the explosion and had lain comatose in a hospital in Morocco almost ever since his useless body had been taken to Earth.

Bad things happen to good people. This was something he had learned several times in his life, and had first heard it from a man who had once made a living off of ensuring that such things happened. Did that mean Quatre deserved what had happened to him? Perhaps it did. Quatre was, after all, the closest thing to a good person he had ever known. Maybe this was a testament to his goodness.

Of the others, he had heard nothing. Duo had made an attempt to contact them all in light of what happened to Quatre, but to his knowledge no one had been located.

He started down the path, shoved his hands into the pockets of his jacket. The sun did not yet touch this corner of the Earth (though it soon would) and in the sky he could still see the faint crimson glimmer of Mars, the empty, dry sea that was the color of blood. The planet had often called him and many times he had come close to heeding that call. There was no one to miss him here on Earth. There were a select few who would be aware of his disappearance, but he doubted any of them would try to stop him from leaving. And no one would recognize him up there. The entire colony served as the chief residence of the Prevention Organization and the majority of its inhabitants were members of the organization. There were a few civilians, of course, and if he were to go there he would be seen simply as another one of them. He could go to Mars and live on the very edge of the colony, where the sun would rise on nothing. Nothing but the blessed emptiness.

He wanted to see that emptiness, where man could not go, where war could not touch and peace could not be claimed. An emptiness where the only sound could be the silent voice of God if indeed He existed, and if He did not, then silence.

He wanted nothing but that emptiness. He wanted to see it, to feel it, to be consumed by it, to surrender his very soul to it until he became a part of it himself. He wanted to be it.

The Earth had been empty once, he thought as he walked toward the docks. There had been a beginning somewhere —he personally had never thought about the when or the how or the why of it all— and before that there had been emptiness. Something had come from that great nothing and there had been Earth and eventually man. And man had had dominance over all the Earth in all its glorious emptiness. And what had he done? Ever since he had first possessed knowledge, man had made a continuous habit of screwing himself over. And for what? For what reasons had man relinquished all the emptiness he could have had? To etch his name upon the very dust of the Earth, to leave monuments to himself and become higher than his brothers. To claim pieces of the Earth for himself and to kill anyone who dared walk on it.

There was none of this in emptiness. There was nor war, no chaos, yet neither was there peace or stability. There was numbness and there was nothing, and then there was nothing beyond that.

He would not go to the Martian colony, however. He knew that, and knowing neither disturbed nor enlightened him. He felt nothing about it.

What did he feel about anything? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not even the emptiness.

The light of Mars in all its emptiness had faded by the time he reached the piers. The sun had risen, making visible all the signs of civilization recent man had erected. He saw no use in these cities, these great shadows of fallen empires. He never had. Buildings crumbled, paths grew over, history and all the names became lost and forgotten, and in the end what did it all matter?

That they for that one moment existed. He had heard this from the closest thing to a father he had ever known, the mentor who had come before Dr. J. This was the same man who had told him that the only way to live was by one's own emotions, and Heero disregarded both of these philosophies. Did it matter that such things existed? No, not when they could be destroyed so easily. He, perhaps more than any of the other Gundam pilots, had killed so many in the past, both those he was assigned to kill and all the innocents who had been in the vicinity as well. Sometimes he had killed simply because he felt like it.

And did he feel anything for them now, all those whose lives he had taken away? No. Yes. He did not know. He felt nothing. But there had been one who had mattered, hadn't there? One who, despite all his efforts not to, he still thought of, one whose face he saw and whose voice he heard every time he slept.

Are you lost?

The little girl, the child with the bright red hair and the puppy she had called Mary. How could he even for one moment forget her? The little girl who had given him the flower. What had he done with that flower? He remembered the feel of it in his hand as he walked along some ruined, ash-covered street, remembered crushing it beneath his fingers as he felt something hot and acidic rolling down his face, something with the unmistakable taste of salt. And the puppy, Mary, he remembered feeling the weight of her small, dead body in his arms, but what had he done with her? Why couldn't he remember!

And why the hell did it even matter?

But he could not remember.

He at last came to the piers. The shore was empty this morning, devoid of the usual workers and fishermen who made a living from its waters, blessedly empty. The sea was calm and dark but it would not be for long, it seemed, for overhead the clouds were gathering, and far in the distance could be heard the low rumbling of thunder.

He watched for a brief moment, calmly breathing in the salted sea air that was, this morning, also scented with ozone, another sign that a storm would soon arrive on the waves.

The piers that lined this beach were not privately owned and therefore sometimes cluttered with boats while other times without any sign of life at all. This strip had once, years ago, before OZ had begun its seizure of factories and warehouses for the production of mobile suits, been a business district, smothered by fishing and boating enterprises. It was slowly becoming that again but this morning it was desolate; gray and dirty and the very epitome of an area formerly controlled by a militaristic organization.

Heero proceeded to the large warehouses about thirty yards from where he had entered the beach. There were no signs of life anywhere near the facility, other than the enthusiastic seabirds, and the air around it was still and silent, but he knew it was bustling inside.

Before seizure by OZ, this building had once served as a development center for various kinds of automotive engines. It had, within the past three years, returned to that purpose, only now to a much greater extent. A good portion of those who worked there believed that they did indeed build engines and on occasion modify them, and in truth this was what they were doing, but they were misled in regard to what purpose these engines served. The current project was said to be the mass production of a highly advanced engine for a new kind of commercial jet. The workers were even shown images of the craft they were helping to create, and as yet none of them had ever bothered to question why they were never shown a true model of the jet. The lack of interaction with an actual machine was simple to explain: the jet did not exist. Those who had been recruited to build these engines had been chosen not only because of their knowledge of motive craft but also for their lack of knowledge of mobile suits, meaning they had no idea what they were building. The engines were a bit different than those of an aircraft but those differences had been explained, and despite the vast areas of the warehouse that were sealed off to them, it seemed that no suspicions were raised. There were only a few slight modifications that needed to be made once the basic engine was built before they could be completed, and the unaware designers were kept oblivious to this fact as well. Such modifications were left in the hands of the resident members of the counteroffensive.

Heero entered the building by way of a side door that opened into one of the many restricted areas. In other sections of the building the halls echoed with the sounds of metal clashing against metal, of whining drills and the low hum of the worker's conversations; here it was silent. The only lights were those coming from within the few rooms with open doors, and for the most part the corridors were dark and empty.

Without a pause he went to the first open room to his left. This room seemed to be empty as well, thought sometimes it could be found occupied by two or three members of the counteroffensive who had decided to impose a break on themselves, and he proceeded to the other side of the room, and from there through the opposite door. Beyond this threshold was another desolate corridor, which he entered after undergoing a computerized scan of his fingerprints.

There were no lighted rooms on this locked-off hallway. A dim overhead lamp shone every few yards or so, and by this light he found his way to the first room at the end of the corridor. There was another machine outside this door and he pressed his hand flat against it, waited until the lights on the screen faded and he heard the 'click' of the door being unlocked.

The door opened into a small office, dimly but still warmly lit, larger than what would have been expected yet at the same time remaining small. On one wall hung a great tapestry; on the other, an entire series of computers and screens. Faint music could be heard in the background, some mournful violin piece by Bach, it seemed.

The man who owned this office sat in a high-backed French chair at the center of the room. His head was up, his eyes were closed, and one thin hand lay flat atop each level knee. He was much older than Heero, this man, older even than the man who had collaborated to form the counteroffensive, and at first glance obviously of Chinese descent.

"Good morning, Takeru," the man said, his voice as calm and passive as it always was. To Heero's knowledge the man had never even batted an eyelash to see who had entered.

Heero waited, maintaining his silence.

Xing Yuan-Chen smiled at his silence. "The one and only, descended from the blossom."

He stifled any visible sign of disturbance. There were only two people other then Heero himself who knew what this meant, and at times they seemed to take some perverse enjoyment from reminding him of such things.

Yuan-Chen finally opened his eyes. "Never much for conversation, are you, Takeru?" He smiled again, warmly. There was never any malice in his smile, and there seemed to be none in his mind as well. He had always seemed an unlikely candidate for a secondary leader of a militaristic organization.

"I will notify the guard," he said when Heero withheld his voice. Yuan-Chen rose from the chair and went to an antique phone on the wall, a lone relic amidst a tower of monitors. He spoke briefly with the guard on the second subterranean floor, then turned and gave Heero another generous smile.

Heero nodded solemnly and left.

Back into the corridors, back into the darkness that was every so often pierced by an overhead lamp, back into the silence. There was nothing to be said or to be thought about these halls. They were all the same, each one almost exactly like the one before it.

At last he came to an elevator. He descended two floors beneath the earth, and from there he walked down another hall and a short flight of stairs. His eyes lingered briefly on the great black glass window that served as the top half of one of the floor's largest rooms. All was dark beyond the glass but he knew the guard was watching him. The entire section of the building he had gone through before coming to the elevator was heavily locked, but not as guarded as these subterranean rooms. The locks to the elevators were both computerized and manual and could not be disengaged unless one had either the correct code or a key. And there were only three people who had the keys and codes, and these three were also the only ones who could access the subterranean floors without first notifying the guard: the leader of the counteroffensive, Yuan-Chen, and Heero himself. Yuan-Chen had merely unlocked the elevator and notified the guard to save Heero a bit of time.

The short, wide stairwell led to an enormous storage room. It was almost completely empty now, but at the end of the day it would faintly echo with the beginnings of sparse greetings and conversations as the first groups of people were let in to continue their work for the counteroffensive. The prohibited areas of the facility were quite often empty until nightfall.

In the corner of the room, merely a towering outline of a figure in the shadows, stood the product of those men's labors, the prototype of the MS Sagittarius. The name had pried the vague start of a smirk from him when he had first read it in Odin's message. Such ridiculousness could be nothing less than expected from this kind of endeavor.

He passed the useless mobile suit without a further glance, heading for an isolated room at the end of the floor. He was given access immediately by the computerized locking system. This was, after all, the room the others all thought of as his.

The room was dark and cold and almost completely empty, devoid of any of the material or spiritual comforts of Yuan-Chen's office. In the corner of the western wall stood a slim table, atop which sat a simple computer. The chair in front of the table was the only other furnishing.

It was to the table that he went. He sat and waited for the computer to boot up, and he seemed completely oblivious to the series of disks strewn about around the monitor. These disks were, at the moment, perhaps the most vital thing to the counteroffensive.

There was a message waiting for him from Odin. The sender was not listed as such but he knew what it regarded.

The message was coded, for recent security reasons, as a weather forecast. He skimmed through the beginning of it, looking for anything else that might be of some importance, then returned to the end.

Severe lightning expected in the northeast, possibly moving in by tomorrow evening.

He stared at this line thoughtfully. There was only one thing this could possibly mean.

Odin had never said in so many words that Zechs Marquise was indeed working for the counteroffensive, but Heero had gathered such information from the more cryptic things Odin had said in regard to his third high subordinate. If one were to read this message and, having knowledge of OZ's former top soldier or at least a suspicion that he was involved with the underground workings of Odin's network, analyze that final sentence, they would undoubtedly realize that it was a roundabout notification that the infamous Lightning Count was on his way to Earth, first to meet with the enemy he was betraying in the east, then later to come to Odin, outside of the Sanq Kingdom.

"It's been a long time, Zechs," Heero said softly, and with thoughts of what the sudden necessity for Zechs to come to Earth meant calmly tormenting his mind, he switched off the computer and sat back in the cold emptiness of the room. The cold, blessed, damnable emptiness.

Author's Notes: Two original characters are introduced in this chapter. Remember the Liverpudlian soldier: he becomes something of an important character. Thus far people seem to like him; I certainly had fun writing his character, especially when imagining his voice . . . Liverpudlian accents are so wonderful. I wanted Zechs to be a bit testier in this chapter, and I also wanted to emphasize his hatred of his former identities. Zechs really doesn't like himself, I think, whether he is Milliardo Peacecraft, Zechs Marquise, or even Preventer Wind. Maybe that's why he was my favorite character in the series; he's intensely brutal on himself, and I think that he possesses a certain nobility for that. Yuan-Chen appears frequently in Ballad and in Remnants. I've always rather liked his character; he's a very classical guy.

I'm sure it's quite obvious by now that I do not like Relena. When I was first introduced to Gundam Wing, by my good friend and roommate, known on as Ceremonial Blood, I watched an episode in which Relena does something stupid every seventy-five seconds, and I must say that she left a rather bad impression on me. When I watched the entire series, my disdain for her character only worsened. I think she had some noble intentions, but ultimately, I think she is a selfish, opportunistic brat.

Heero makes his entrance in this chapter. Poor Heero . . . such a miserable little guy. Heero appeals to me for all the same reasons as Zechs does, and I will warn you that I am much harder on Heero later in this story than I am on Zechs. I went into my own perception of his character quite a bit in this chapter. There seem to be two camps when it comes to Heero: those who think he feels nothing, and those who think he feels everything. I rather straddle the fence on that issue. I think that he is a young man who has undergone such trauma in his short life, and who has been trained to feel nothing, to such a point that his natural emotions often conflict with his stoicism. I think he wants to feel nothing; he wants to be numb, and because he is human, he cannot be. I torture him quite a bit in later chapters, and in Remnants, I rather put him through hell, but his character is so interesting that I couldn't resist! Some of you might already understand what the whole "one and only" and "blossom" thing is about.

There is much more action in the next chapter, and Alsirae's identity is revealed.