To Angel, MissBug, Limerick, and Chibi Tsuki - Thank you, both for what you've given us in your own fics, and what you've given me in acknowledging mine.
-o-O-o-
Annealed.
-o-O-o-
"State your orders, Soldier."
"Sir. Detain and protect you, Sir."
"Against what threat?"
"Unspecified."
"Hardly."
"Sir, my orders-"
"Dorothy..."
"Sir?"
Ignoring the guards perplexed expression, Zechs fell into an oversized seat. His days-old clothing, save for a slightly newer shirt, clung to his body and quickly became hopelessly rumpled. His voice was steady, eyes glassy and distant, but his hands continued to tremble.
It had taken all four posted guards nearly half an hour to calm his frenzy. Beneath his clothing, his body ached from a myriad of bruises and cuts he refused to admit to. He'd given each of them more than one reason to reiterate their displeasure with his outburst. As his mind strove to tie his attention to any possible matter other than what he had seen, he quietly evaluated each soldier's techniques and approach. Not one of them had gone beyond the utmost need to restrain or subdue him. They were too soft-hearted, too sympathetic to his plight, he decided. Obviously, these soldiers were not ready for war. They were as mentally ill-prepared for it as he had once been.
"Why is my wife being taken down there again?"
Silence.
"Answer me, Soldier."
"Same as before, Sir. We don't know."
Silence.
"Have you ever been in love, Soldier?"
"I respectfully decline response, Sir, due to the personal nature of the inquiry."
"It wasn't a question, Fool, not unless you're admitting you possibly haven't. We all have. Each of you has watched your life weighed on the scale of a woman's gaze. Your career, your accomplishments, your talents, your goals, your past... she looks in her hand and chooses what she'll accept and what she'll discard. Never take it for granted, Soldiers. I've seen a battalion of trained soldiers sacrificed in an hour, and how often was that merely a decoy. I can look back at what happened on those days and tell you it was duty. I can show you the map and tell you the purpose it served..."
He stood and walked towards the door heedless of the guards blocking it. His gaze passed through them to the floor where he'd seen her pass.
"...But what i saw there... had no purpose. ...That was a sacrifice with no meaning."
The nearest soldier to him held his silence till he could no longer. His soft intonation betrayed his heartfelt concern for the mournful officer husband.
"Sir, I have to ask you to step back."
"Of course you do."
Zechs turned and approached the chair once more, gripping its armrest and gazing towards the guarded window. None of his movements kept in synch, his legs wanting to keep walking, his arms wanting to hold something tightly, his back wanting to buck free of the very real-feeling weight on his shoulders. The moment of stillness only reverberated to sudden launch back into pacing the room.
"What are they doing to her?"
"Sir, we don't-"
"No! I mean... just think about what we saw. I know she has a spineguard now... so she at least injured her back, but anyone gets those today till they are certain the spinal cord isn't pinched by a crushed vertebra. But all that machinery... Any of you have cybernetics?"
One door guard and one window guard nodded.
"How much?"
Door guard responded, "Five percent, knee joints, leg enhancement."
Window guard, "Twenty percent, right shoulder, some internal organs."
Zechs turned and walked towards the window guard completely ignoring the first. He stopped his approach the moment the guard's eyes betrayed the imaginary line. He narrowed his gaze at the soldier for a long moment reading anything he desired to see from the less-than-full-human's soul.
"You were shocked to see that fortress of wires and nodes as well. That was more than you'd ever seen before, wasn't it. You saw something there, didn't you. You were muttering a number under your breath."
"Forty-seven, Sir."
"Forty-seven what..."
"The last node on the left calf was labeled #47. My shoulder only required three. A liver, collapsed lung, and a kidney took twenty-two. I've never seen more than thirty-one at a time on a single patient in my life. And..."
He tried to fade the last word before being noticed. He turned back to the window a bit too quickly. Zechs remained there clenching his fists, gaze boring into the metal-shouldered freak.
"And?... What happened to Mr. Thirty-one, Soldier."
"I don't re-"
"ANSWER ME, SOLDIER!"
"She Didn't Make It! Okay, Sir! Thirty-Six Percent Chance Of Survival And She DIDN'T MAKE IT! HAPPY NOW, SIR! Is THAT What You Just HAD To KNOW, SIR!"
Protocol required that any situation had to be subdued without opening an escape route. It was actually one of the door guards who had to cross the room to restrain the shouting window guard. Zechs had stumbled back several paces and collapsed into the seat swept away in new tide of grieving and agonized howling.
Time passed.
The conjoined questions of love, loss, and humanity lay bared, clear, and silent.
Sitting on the floor laying his head on the seat cushion, Zechs stared at the ceiling unblinking, a silent shell of the man drained of so much emotion.
At the furthest end of the hall, the elevator dinged.
"Time?"
"Just passed oh-three-hundred, Sir."
"How long has it been?"
"Guess about... six hours, Sir."
"Someone look and tell me who that is."
One door guard looked to the other, received a nod of agreement, and leaned out into the hall.
"Not your wife, Sir. Never seen this one before. Must be a new patient."
"How comforting."
His deep melancholy made the brief response the most discomforting thing the guards had heard the entire time.
"Room 5's ready."
All five heads turned to see the nurse Elsie calling down the hall to the approaching patient's escort. She had just left the room across the hall, but now approached them with a warm smile.
"Would any of your gentleman care for any drinks or snacks? I'm afraid I only have patient food to offer..."
The four mumbled dishearteningly about duty restrictions during high alert, but Zechs drew himself up to respond.
"Orders prohibit me from leaving this room, Madam. However, within this room I am the ranking officer. Gentleman, I am lifting the duty prohibition clause 4.213A. Feel free to accept her good graces."
Elsie hesitated looking from guard to guard for their acquiescence. As a general agreement was reached, she smiled and nodded and turned back to the nurse station to gather up packaged drinks. The patient-bearing gurney had only traversed two thirds of the long hall by the time she returned and offered the packets to the guards at the door. They shook their heads at her suggestion of entering, and instead took the remaining sealed packages and tossed them across the room to the other three inhabitants.
For the moment, between the thoughtfulness of the detainee, and the kindness of the nurse, the atmosphere had softened immensely.
"Is there anything else you gentlemen need? crackers? popsicles? jello?"
"There is one thing, Madam..."
The four guards each felt a shiver course down their spines at the silvery opportunism in Zechs' voice.
"...Would you be so kind as to tell me about the patient moving in to room 5."
His disarmingly calm demeanor was convincing to her, but most unnerving to the men.
"Oh? Well let me see." She turned to the side and needed only to take a handful of steps towards the approaching gurney. "She's a beautiful blonde lady. Just returned from a transplant surgery. She-"
"DOROTHY!"
The chair even fell back with the abruptness of his leap. Drink flung aside, He wildly dove towards the entrance. The two door guards freed their hands and formed an impenetrable wall of muscle for Zech's weary body to slam harmlessly against. His head and neck strained between the massive shoulders to glimpse the Desecrater herself.
"WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY WIFE! TELL ME! WHAT DID YOU DO TO LUC!"
The nurses rushed the gurney, and its unconscious burden, towards its destination. The guards grappled with the sobbing, screaming maniac. His rage soon became as strong and unyielding as ever. His pitched screams split the air in a constant painful assault to everyone's ears and minds.
And through it all, the patient blissfully slept.
And each guard, and both nurses, would gladly attest that one oddity surpassed every other feature of the slumbering patient.
For weeks to come, only on nights filled with sleeping pills or alcohol would the vision leave their minds in peace.
As Zechs' accusations assaulted her ears...
...the sleeping woman smiled.
-o-O-o-
to be continued...
-o-O-o-
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