"Report, Aisha?" he asked, joining her side in front of the tinted windows of a balcony overlooking a comprehensively-medical equipped room.
She straightened up from leaning on the railings behind the panes, saluted, and replied, "His mental activity is still fluctuating randomly...Looks like he's having a war inside. Poor boy, he was in a lot of pain just now, trashing around like a madman, but he seemed to have calmed down for now, physically at least"
Waltfeld's facial expression remained worried as he watched the brown-hair sweating and his eyeballs moving rapidly under his eyelids.
Aisha approached the computer on the right side of room, sat down, and brought up images, statistics and texts, before explaining, "We found some traces of Hypnochronomorphine in his blood system. This recently utilized drug penetrates and disables, or in worst cases, erases, the thinking-sense part of the brain, therefore sending the victim into a so-called 'dummy' state. This liquid agent is most commonly transferred by mouth, or in Kira's case, that and sexual intercourse. We had been having reports of the usage of this hazardous biological agent by both ZAFT and EAF, but it's the first time that one of our guys fell prey to it. None of the victims known have managed to regain their personality and was always in constant pain when deprived of further use, even with a small dosage. From the calculation of the drug's discharge rate from the body and the present status, we concluded that Kira's contamination level was 3 times the normal level, and that alone would have killed him but he held out and retained his sense, although some of his memory might have been erased, except…" Aisha paused, "when we probed into his mind, some of his memory cells have been wiped out except for a rather obvious one which surfaced quite clearly. He stored a memory of the target, Lacus Clyne, in that part where his common sense remained…That was unexpected"
Waltfeld started to rub his unshaven chin. "…I wonder…If our mission was only a dud, and whoever is behind this is actually targeting us. Not knowing the truth, Athrun packed Kira hard when he realized Clyne was affected by the knowledge about Kira sleeping with Allster, who was, at the time, made use of by someone. Then Attha seemed to be concerned by Athrun's caring to Clyne, and Kira kept Clyne in his mind to keep himself sane…complicated but we can use this affection factor to lure this guy in…convince him that we are unaware of his act…hmmm…" he said, raising his left eyebrow.
Aisha jumped up from her seat. "Andy, you don't mean to get those two involved, do you? Our mission is to protect them, not throw them in. Are you also saying that Lord Uzumi and Mr. Clyne intent to expose us? If so, then those two would betray them, not help them-" Waltfeld closed her lips with his index finger.
"I don't think Uzumi and Siegel are behind this. They are not the type that would afflict their precious daughters in this affair. They contacted me earlier on, stating their concern about the current flow of the mission, with Kira being out. So, I sent DaCosta to sub for him during their Davos snow activity in Graubünden, Switzerland," he looked back down towards the brown-haired boy still struggling in his sleep on the bed in the middle of the room, surrounded by various medical monitoring devices, "There's another entity that's aware of our existence and they succeeded in luring our best agent and almost infiltrated our mainframe. I intent to lure that sneaky slime back using this opportunity which has surfaced so conveniently. Aisha, our priority is to sustain the integrity of DARTH. We had made enemies throughout these years by operating against and for EAF and ZAFT. If they were to realize us, we would have no means of defense and our allies within the enemy will be prosecuted"
"But, Athrun and Kira cannot afford to fall in love…they would be bogged down by that burden or even worse" she complained again, only to be held around the waist and drawn close to the Commander.
"It's too late, don't you think? Our boys already had feelings for one or both of them. Besides, they're about that right age for relationships. If anything happens, I believe their judgments to handle it. The only problem now is whether Kira's mind is damaged in anyway…" he whispered into her ears, sending shivers down her spine as she forced an answer, "he…should be waking up…18 hours…you can check…later…"
Irregular Consequence
"Come in" said the headmistress upon hearing the knocks on her door.
She waited for a moment but no one opened the door. Then the knocks resumed. She bade the person in again, but still no response came until another series of knocks continued. She grew annoyed and shouted, "Come in and settle whatever rubbish you have with me! If not, get lost! I'm busy!" The door suddenly flung open and a blond man walked in, apologizing profusely.
"I should have known it was you. Your pranks were never funny" she remarked, looking at him with irritation and continued upon seeing him sit down, "I didn't offer you seat, Mr. Flaga"
He stood back up and whined, "give me a break, Headmistress. I was desperately bored. My highschoolers have been gone for 4 days now. Why can't the school send me? I could use the vacation"
"Don't ask me. Ask the Superintendent. He worked it out with Dublin Schoolboard regarding this elementary school through college Christmas activity…sit down" she finally offered, "personally, this matter was quite strange. He announced the plan right before the day three students were simultaneously gone. The Yamatos requested for their son's temporary leave, while the Allsters and the Argyles withdrew their kids; all this happened on the same day. We never had this incident before"
Flaga, who was looking at the pencil he had been twirling around his fingers, glanced briefly at her before saying, "I'm sure that's just a coincidence. Besides, that set a new record for our school, right? Don't think too much into it…Anyway, so I can't go to visit them, even for a little while?"
She sighed, "I was going to keep this a secret, but the teachers are scheduled to join them on Christmas Eve, 3 days from now"
"Whoohoo, yes!" he cheered before leaning towards Murrue and holding her hands, "I can imagine us taking a romantic stroll around the Davoser See"
Murrue quickly retracted her hands and said, "That lake is frozen, idiot. Besides, I would never go out with a teacher" to which Flaga replied, "Good, that's fine by me."
She looks at him in surprise, "Are you telling me you don't want your job? Cause I can fire you right now"
The colors drained out of Flaga's face as he pleaded, "Ehh? No no no no no! I was just kidding"
Shouts of fun could be heard throughout the valley of Davos. Though the sun rarely appears during cold winter seasons, that low temperatures hardly deprive people of all ages from enjoying the hard but beautiful snow. Some students are ice skating on the frozen lake to the east of the Davos resort, some are enjoying the snowy mountain slope to the north, some are having fun at the mountain feet, and some are simply staying indoors beside the fire's warmth.
"Athrun, watch out!" warned Cagalli, as a snowball homed in on the blue-hair.
Athrun ducked behind the snow wall stretching across his front. On the other side 20ft away stood another wall which serves as a shield for the opposing team. They were having a high school vs. college snowball last-team-standing fight, not for fun, but for a bet; the loser will have to play a rude prank on the teachers who will be coming later in the afternoon and risk getting punished. The high school team has been faring pretty well under Yzak's and Athrun's fierce competition, therefore fueling the others to perform as well, until Athrun was distracted by a pink-colored figure and felt a cold blow to his forehead, causing him to fall backwards.
"Ha! Sucker!" taunted Yzak, but his words fell onto deaf ears as Athrun ignored him and instead recalled Waltfeld's words, about Kira's plight, about the threat on DARTH, about Clyne's and Athha's feeling towards each boy, and about what sustained Kira's mind.
Lacus smiled as she sat and watched the small number of the younger elementary kids waving at her and playing on the snowy area near the snowball battleground. She enjoys being around them as much as they enjoy being around her. During school days, only college students can select a course which involves children and since Lacus is still in high school, she and the kids can only meet during certain times of the year such as vacations like this. Therefore, they would stick around her whenever opportunity arises.
"Mr. DaCosta, I know my father send you to watch over me, but I don't feel too comfortable being followed around even though he told you declare yourself as my bodyguard" Lacus said to the person behind her as she stood up.
"Pardon me, Ms. Clyne, but it's my job and to tell you the truth…if anything happens to you, I won't get paid" he replied, to which Lacus chuckled at his quickness at twisting the conversation.
She started walking towards the playing area and asked the children, "does anyone wants to ride the cable cars?"
They started running towards her and shouted in agreement.
"Please leave us alone for a while" she said back to DaCosta, who nodded but kept following them a few cars behind up to the near summit of the mountain, until the electricity current suddenly stops, followed by the darkening of the sky.
Waltfeld and Aisha stared in shock at the brown-hair as he blinked and moved his head about.
"…why…all dark…?" he asked.
"Aisha, what happened?" Waltfeld asked in succession.
She approached Kira and waved her hand in front of his eyes. "Can you see this?" she asked to which Kira shook his head. She told him to close his eyes before she pressed on them gently and asked whether he could feel it, and he replied yes. She went on to shine a lab flashlight into his pupils. "How about now?" she asked again but Kira replied negatively.
Suddenly, a transmission interrupted them, "Commander, pardon the intrusion but Father Malchio has arrived on the base and is on his way to your position. Err…he should be there already"
At the same time he finished, the door slid open and in walked the pale, black-haired man holding a walking stick in his right hand. Waltfeld and Aisha quickly straightened up and saluted.
"Founder, I apologize. I didn't expect to see you here now" Waltfeld said.
"Don't worry about it" he replied, before walking towards Kira, "I wish to speak to him privately for a while"
The two left and, at Malchio's request, dimmed the lights of the room.
"Can you tell me your name?" asked Malchio, taking a seat on the chair beside the bed.
Kira replied satisfactorily.
"Good. Just close your eyes for a moment…" he told him, "then try to tell me all the people you remember"
Kira did as told and mentioned Waltfeld's, Athrun's, Lacus', and Flay's names, leaving out Aisha's, Malchio's and the rest of the people he knew. The older man sighed in relief as he continued, "You are protected, boy. You cannot die yet. That's why you survived dangerous situations time and again, and that caught my attention. It's strange but I finally felt your Superior Evident Evolutionary Destined-factor manifests. That special thing is what sustained you, but it has a drawback if the danger to its Holder is so great that it could not handle on its own. In your case this time, it took some of your 'more dispensable' memory and sight to compensate…almost similar to what happened to me" he whispered that phrase to himself, "…Tell me, Kira, do you see flashes of scenes you have never seen before?"
Kira nodded.
"A violet rock breaks?"
Kira nodded.
"When you wake up, do you see a white screen, followed by gray, and then pitch black?"
Kira nodded again. "Open your eyes now and look around"
Malchio finally said.
He hesitantly lifts his eyelids and at once perceived his surroundings clearly even through the dim lighting.
"Glad your state is not as bad as mine. Your sight is temporary degraded, making you very sensitive to light, that's all. If the threat to your survival were any worst, you might have lost it" he said, standing up.
"But…how did you know all this?" Kira asked.
"I have experienced it before, my boy," Malchio paused for a moment while still facing him before continuing,
"I think it's no harm showing you, but this will only be between us, understand?" He waited for Kira's positive reply before proceeding to open his own eyes. Kira stared wide eyed at seeing his dilated black pupils.
Several soldiers bearing the OMNI emblem on the shoulder of their uniform stood ground while holding part of the Institute's students at gunpoint in the lobby of the resort's main building, while some other soldiers held various students hostage in different lodges of the valley. Outside, an unexpected blizzard raged on, covering tanks, helicopters, vehicles, and Strike Daggers in coats of snow.
Athrun kept himself low among the other students since the soldiers stormed their vacation place 5 hours ago. He tried transmitting to DaCosta, but the severe weather prevented any connection whatsoever, let alone trying to pinpoint his and Clyne's location. He didn't dare to take any action for fear of putting the other students in danger, and to make the situation more nerve-wreaking, the enemy still hasn't declared their purpose for the invasion, and all the teachers, who were seized for no apparent reason, hasn't returned.
"What is your motive for doing this?" demanded Murrue who, along with Flaga, Natarle, Mardock, and several school staff, was restrained onto a chair inside the cabin of a VTOL transport plane parked on the open space between the lake and the resort.
A blond, eccentrically-groomed man wearing a light-blue suit, who is seated on the other side of the cabin answered, "You have been running your mouth for 2 hours asking the same questions. Don't you feel tired at all?"
Flaga clenched his fist, which are tied to his back, so hard that his knuckles turned white when he heard this. Then, a cold gust of icy wind blew in when a soldier opened the door and stepped into the cabin. He approached the blond man and whispered something into his ears which clearly enraged the man as he stood up and hollered at the soldier, "Whatever were you doing, incompetent fool? Find them no matter what. Use those three if you have to. I don't want to hear useless report like that again. The next time you come in, I expect to hear good news. If not, off with your head!"
The soldier gulped and saluted before rushing back out. "erhm…I'm sorry for my behavior. It certainly is difficult having such stupid subordinates, wouldn't you agree?" he tidied his suit and sat back down.
Flaga and the others were by now convinced that they are dealing with a powerful but crazy nutcase.
Several tens of miles up the Davos Mountain, a section of the cable car line had collapsed, caused by strong, icy wind bending the support tower beam. To a certain degree of ironic coincidence, Lacus and the children are the ones trapped inside the fallen cable cars. Fortunately, she was able to calm the 10 kids in the same car as her down, while the other 12 children in the car behind are still panicking. She tried going to them but the winds made it impossible.
"I'm scared" said a little brown-haired girl, as she clutched onto Lacus' jacket sleeve.
"Don't be, Renee…Just think about your friends on the other car. They must be even terrified that we are. Be strong for me and for them, alright?" Lacus smiled at her and continued singing her 'Mizuno Akashi'.
"This is bad, really bad" DaCosta said, slamming the monitor of his standard issue DARTH's multifunction cell phone close, "no reception, no signal, no radar"
He then noticed the cracks on the window of the car he's in, "uh-oh…this thing's not gonna last in this weather…"
He scratched his head in puzzlement before recalling Waltfeld's briefing. Taking out a pocket map of the area from his pocket, he scanned it for the nearest strategic place to seek shelter in.
"Phew…" he said, tucking the map back in and pulling out an insulated blanket from the car's emergency storage, "here goes!" he kicked open the door, which was jammed by the snow, and braved the chilling wind past 3 empty cars towards the 2 cars Lacus and the kids are in.
The occupants of the first car jumped when they suddenly heard knocks on their window.
"Ms. Clyne. Ope-the-oor-quick" came DaCosta's muffled voice from outside.
The moment Lacus opened the door, he jumped in and crowded the already stuffed car.
"We…cannot…stay in…here" he gasped before motioning towards his right, "I found a cave just a few meters to the southeast of here. We will have a better chance of survival there and this is the time to go as the wind seemed to be slowing down"
Lacus nodded and told the children to cover themselves with the blankets and stick to DaCosta. At first some of the kids hesitated at the cold, but Lacus assured them until all of them emptied the car and dared the weather and deep snow towards the secluded location at the direction DaCosta pointed out.
On the way back to the cave after getting the children from the 2nd car, however, a thin layer of ice which caved in under the weight of the train of people, resulting in a crevasse, caused the last person of the chain, Lacus, to slip into it. None realized that until they reached the cave and Renee asked where Lacus was. DaCosta's face went really pale as he attempted to go back out, but the drastic increase of the winds' speed, coupled by the cave's unique entrance design, formed an unusual barrier such as that of air path through the aileron of a plane, consequently repelling his exit from the cave, but also locking the cold away from the cave.
"EAF is getting tremendous pressure from ZAFT, but the former is still feigning ignorance, whether true or not, saying that they have no involvement in the occupation whatsoever. Still, if they are telling the truth, then we should take into consideration that a rogue faction is behind this. An extreme snowstorm prohibits any aerial, radar, or satellite surveillance, but our latest report before the weather change shows that the enemy had occupied the entire valley, stretching from the lodges to the lake to the bottom quarter of the mountain, and set up perimeter around the area. Since the blizzard hinders their movement, it should be safe to assume that they hadn't secured the most dangerous area, the summit, and it should be out of their radar coverage. That will be your insertion point" briefed Waltfeld over an audio feed, while showing visual materials, to 9 DARTH operatives who are gearing up in the dim-lighted cargo bay onboard a stealth transport plane, "upon insertion, split up into 3 groups and penetrate into the valley. Be aware of heavy-military hardware, including MSs. Your main objective is to confirm the identity of this group. Whether or not EAF is behind this, ZAFT and ORB will provide back-up the moment we receive your signal. Remain undetected if possible, restrain a commanding officer of the enemy, and prevent unnecessary civilian casualty, giving Ms. Clyne, and Ms. Athha the top priority. Bear in mind that we have two of our people in there. Locate them without compromising your infiltration. Take out hostile on sight discreetly. Got it?"
"Yes, sir!" all of the said, while still busy packing their equipment.
"Kira, I would like to speak privately with you" said Waltfeld again.
The brown-haired boy, who was strapping on his vest, stopped his preparation, put on a pair of sunglasses and walked into the empty cockpit, which is programmed on auto-pilot.
"Sir?" he asked.
"I know you are well-trained, but you just regained consciousness a few hours ago. Are you sure you are ready for this mission? An unhealthy operative will just burden the others down" Waltfeld taunted, sounding insulting but deep-down, he's concerned.
"I'm fine, sir. I sure Father Malchio has informed you that as long as I refrain from bright lights, I would be alright" replied Kira.
"Well, if you are so confident, then go ahead, but take care of yourself, I would feel bad sending a sick kid into a dangerous situation" Waltfeld finished and ended the transmission.
At the same moment, Kira remembered Malchio's words that he shouldn't strain himself further because his SEED hasn't recovered yet and in that state, it would feed on his body, both physically and mentally, to sustain the life of its Holder in case of danger. Kira shook his words off and returned to the cargo bay.
Meanwhile, Athrun is getting more impatient by the second he is kept suppressed. Trying to retaliate against the 10 fully armed soldiers would also be foolish since he only has a combat knife and a handgun, and the soldiers are strategically scattered, therefore preventing them to be taken out at once. He gritted his teeth and muttered silently, "Lacus…DaCosta…where are you?" Cagalli, who is seated next to him, watched him worriedly.
"Cold…someone…" she mumbled to herself amidst the dark, slippery, icy pit surrounding her cowering figure, "Kira…help…me"
A/N: That's my perspective of SEED power. I always believed that it has some side-effect to it, and Malchio lost his sight because of it. Feedbacks appreciated…