Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing or any of the characters, although I do wish someone would give them to me for my birthday. Too bad that's not likely to happen sigh

A.N. - I'm sorry, I meant to update sooner, but then the whole maintenance thing was going on, and I didn't want to try uploading in case it got messed up. And I've been having problems with inspiration. I'm sad though. Not as many people are reviewing. Does that mean you don't like my story anymore? pouts

Last Chapter:

"But for now, both of you are coming to the medical room with me," ordered Sally. "I can't believe you're standing around talking when you both have bullet wounds. I'm going to treat you right now."

"Yes Sally," they chorused. Noone argued with Sally when she took that tone.

"Zechs, could you and Duo take care of the ship? The rest of you, go get some sleep," Heero commanded before following Sally to get his bullet wound taken care of.

Chapter 15:

When the team touched down on the Preventers base that evening, there was a whole team waiting for them, Une at their head. The medics immediately rushed Trowa off for full treatment of his wounds, but Heero elected to talk to Commander Une instead of having his bullet wound looked at. He judged the field dressing that Sally had put on it to be sufficient.

"Duo, you and Wufei take care of putting away the Gundams," he ordered. "Quatre, you go with Trowa. Sally, you too. You know his medical history better than any of the doctors here. Noin and Zechs, you look after your own suits."

"Did the mission go well?" Une asked.

"All considered, yes. We didn't have too many problems, although they did spot us. That base won't be a problem anymore. Duo went a little overboard with the explosions."

Une smiled, knowing Duo well enough to know exactly how much of the base would be left after he went 'overboard' with explosives. "Did you manage to retrieve any data before the base got turned into gravel?" she asked.

"Yes, a couple disks worth. I haven't looked at it yet, but it's not encoded well so it shouldn't take me very long. I'll have a full report for you in a few days."

"Good job. Go get some rest before starting work on those disks though. You look exhausted, and whatever's on them should be able to wait a few hours."

"Thank you Commander. I didn't get any real sleep on this mission, and it's been awhile since I've done that. Did you need to talk to me about anything else?"

"It can wait. I'll see you when your report's done then."

Heero gave her a brief salute and turned to help unload the Gundams. That done, they collected Trowa and Quatre from the base hospital and went to their shared house.

Heero's room was the first at the very top of the stairs to the second floor. He had automatically placed himself to be the first to deal with any threats to the house and it's inhabitants. It was simply decorated, with tan walls, a chair, desk, dresser and bed all of unfinished pine. What little colour there was in the room consisted of the curtains and bedspread, both forest green. Heero collapsed on the bed, feeling too tired to do anything but sleep. Despite his exhaustion however, Heero couldn't fall asleep so easily.

"I might as well start decrypting those disks," he thought to himself. He booted up his old battered laptop and started work on the first. The encryption on it was so poor it only took him five minutes to break through and start looking at the data. The first disk was just personnel records for the base, but Heero made a mental note to get Duo to help him check those against criminal and military records. The second disk was blueprints for mobile suits, mostly just variations of the Leo and Aries models that the Alliance used. That was of a little more concern, but nothing unexpected. They had had mobile suits on the base after all. Reassured, Heero turned off the laptop and went back to bed. This time he had no difficulty sleeping.

In the morning, he woke to the scent of bacon and eggs cooking downstairs. Wandering down, he found Quatre in the kitchen cooking. Absently wondering where someone like Quatre, with servants and houses around the world, had learned to cook; he sat and had a leisurely breakfast with the other pilots as they came to eat. They could afford to take their time, Une had given them the rest of the week off from official work.

Once breakfast was over, Heero pulled Duo aside.

"I started decrypting those disks last night, and found the personnel records for the base. I'd like you to run a check on them when you have a chance, see if we got all of them, and if any have connections to known military or criminal groups."

Duo groaned. Slinging an arm casually around Heero's shoulders, he commented, "you've got to learn to relax man. We just got home from the mission last night and you started working on those files?"

Heero desperately fought down the blush rising in his cheeks at the casual contact from the other pilot. "Duo does this to everyone. It doesn't mean anything," he thought to himself. Shrugging noncomittally, he absently commented, "couldn't sleep."

"So you decrypted some disks? We have got to get you a hobby."

"Hacking is a hobby."

"Yeah, but you don't do any of the fun hacking anymore."

"I'm a Preventer now. If I did any of the 'fun' hacking, I'd have to arrest myself," Heero remarked dryly, surprising a laugh out of Duo.

"I'd like to see that." Then, abruptly changing gears he said, "if you give me that disk, I'll start work on it now." Heero grinned.

"You don't have anything to do either, huh?"

"Oh shut up. I'm just looking to see if there's another base for me to blow up."

They both laughed as Duo followed the Japanese pilot to retrieve the disk. Once Duo left with that, Heero once again booted up his laptop and pulled up the files from the disk with mobile suit information. He wanted to look at some of the modifications listed. In the end, there wasn't anything he could apply to his own suit, but some of the ideas he'd suggest to Noin and Zechs.

Pulling out the last two disks, he again swiftly decrypted the first, but what he found froze him in shock for a moment. It was a list of bio-warfare agents that the scientists working with the group had begun creating. Fortunately there had been none at the base they had destroyed, but there were several other bases with labs working on the project.

He opened another file simply labelled 'subjects' and could feel the gorge rising in his throat. The word 'subjects' had been referring to the test subjects of the bio-warfare agents and the folder was filled with pictures of what the diseases did to people. Heero had been raised an assassin, and dealt with death for as long as he could remember, but this was something that he hadn't experienced often. Certainly he'd never seen it on this scale.

He must have broadcasted his shock and disgust mentally, because in a few seconds all the other pilots burst into his room asking what was wrong. Quatre took one look at the pictures scrolling across Heero's screen and was promptly sick into the garbage can. Trowa and Wufei paled, and Duo began to shake. Flashes of his thoughts raced through Heero's mind he was thinking so hard. The words 'not again, it can't be happening again,' and pictures of a pale blonde boy covered in lesions made up most of what Heero 'heard' from Duo. He immediately shut down the image file and helped Duo to sit on his bed. The other pilot was obviously remembering something that had happened in his life.

Suddenly the image of Duo in Deathscythe that he had Seen reappeared in his mind, and Heero had a feeling he knew exactly what it was of.

"It won't happen again," he reassured the shaking pilot. "We'll stop it before it gets that far." Duo looked up at him, surprised. "You're projecting your thoughts a bit. I could somewhat hear your reaction to those pictures." Snapping back into commander mode, Heero began issuing orders. "Trowa, you look after Quatre. Duo, I want you to continue with cross-referencing the list on the disk I gave you. Wufei, you help him. I'll finish looking at this disk and the last one."

"Right," the others chorused. As soon as they were out of the room, Heero reopened the pictures file which also included detailed records of dosages, symptoms, and the name of the drug. He compiled a list of these, along with the listed potential cures of the disease. There were about fifteen different agents being developed.

Once that was done, he checked the final disk. On it was the names, locations, and personnel of the other bases the group had taken over. He quickly compiled those before heading to check on the progress Duo and Wufei had made. They were working quickly, but there was a lot of information to get through. They had even networked their laptops to make it go faster.

"I've finished what I needed to look at. I'm going to call Noin, Zechs, and Sally, then head to headquarters. We're going to need a big team on this one. Bring the information when you're done, as well as Trowa and Quatre.

"Should Trowa really be participating in a mission so soon?" asked Wufei.

"We've all done missions in worse shape. I'm going to have him coordinating the attacks and providing backup only if absolutely necessary. But do you think I could make him sit it out in any case?"

"...good point."

Leaving the room, Heero quickly walked to the vidphone downstairs. He called Zechs and Noin first, greeted by a rumpled looking Zechs with pillow marks on his face.

"This better be important, Yuy," he growled into the screen.

"It is Zechs. I can't explain over the phone, but you and Noin need to meet me at Preventers headquarters as soon as possible. I'll probably be in Une's office."

"But we just got back from the mission last night!"

"Trust me, this is important. I need you both there."

"Alright, I'll see you soon then."

"Thank you." As soon as he hung up with Zechs, he called Sally. He was greeted by Sally in a bathrobe, wet hair hanging over her shoulder, not in the usual braids.

"Oh good, you're up."

"Oh, hi Heero. Did you want to talk to me about something?"

"Yes, but I don't have time to tell you over the phone. Meet me at the Preventers as soon as possible. I'll explain everything there. You should be able to find me in Une's office."

"This sounds important. I'll be there shortly." He nodded in response, hanging up quickly. He grabbed the disks and the information he'd gathered, and, grabbing his jacket, rushed out the door. He took his motorcycle to Preventers headquarters, weaving recklessly in and out of traffic in an effort to get there faster. Once at the building, he strode swiftly through the corridors, making a straight line for Une's office. Again people practically dove out of the halls to make room for him to come through.

He knocked briefly on the Commander's door, but didn't wait for her response. He just walked straight in.

"Heero!" she exclaimed. "What are you doing here? I gave you all the week off."

"I'm afraid that's going to have to be cancelled, Commander. I started looking through the files on the disks I collected from the last mission, and it turns out the rebels are far more dangerous than we thought."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, first of all, that wasn't their only base. They have several more. All with labs developing biological warfare agents to be used against the government, the Preventers in particular. They are very close to making those diseases immune to almost everything we could throw at them, so we have to act quickly. I've called in my team, but we're not going to be enough for this."

"You're right. Did you have an idea about how to go about this?"

Heero raised an eyebrow. "Don't I always?"

"Yes, and they're normally good ones. That's why I asked."

"Thank you, Commander. I would advise putting Sally in charge of researching the diseases and potential cures, and trying to develop an antidote. Each of the pilots, along with Zechs and Noin can be in charge of a unit of regular Preventers. Except for Trowa. I'd like to have him in charge of coordinating the attacks.

"The regular Preventers and the team leader would go in, isolate the lab and destroy or quarantine the bio-warfare agents, and subdue any resistance. Once the base was under control, the team leader would use their mobile suit to destroy the base completely. If the diseases can't be destroyed on location, they'd have to be brought back to headquarters for disposal."

"Excellent plan. I'll recommend the best units to send, but I'm placing you in ultimate command of this mission. Do whatever you feel is necessary, we need to quickly eliminate any group that likes using biological warfare."

"Thank you Commander. How quickly do you think the units you want to send can get here?"

"I'd say about two hours."

"Then tell them to meet with me in the main briefing room at 16:00. I'll prepare all the information they need by then. We may need some supplementary units depending on what information Duo and Wufei find, but I'll let you know about that later."

"If you don't have anything else you need to tell me, you'd better go get started."

"Yeah." Turning to leave, he was greeted by Sally, Noin and Zechs just outside the door.

"Why did you call us here, Heero?" asked Noin.

"I'll tell you in my office." The other three made faces at the thought of having to wait even longer to find out, but followed him to his office anyways.

When they all filed into Heero's office, he locked the door behind them before turning and saying, "the group that the base we destroyed belonged to is developing bio-weapons for use."

A.N. - I know, I'm evil for ending it there. I didn't want to have too much in this chapter though.

shinigami88220 - I'm glad you liked it.

Clarobell - No work on powers yet, it will be coming up soon though. I hope you like this chapter though.

Windy River - ;)

Melahel - Here's that chapter you've been waiting for!

Griffen - Yes, Quatre on Zero certainly is scary. And chaos certainly is fun. :) Look for more explosions in future chapters.

The Chaotic Ones

Chaos - Heeey, I want a Duo plushie. I'm the authoress. :( Camping with your dad must me insane. And did you mean disciple or discipline? I wasn't sure.

Angel - Thank you. They just didn't have enough Duo being Shinigami in the series.

Aaries - I'm glad you like the way I wrote Duo and Trowa. What do you mean what happened to poor Quatre? Lol. You think the Zero system thing was over the top?

Jef - At least someone liked the way I wrote Quatre 'smirks evilly'

PR - Nooooo! Not the G-Boys! I need them to continue this fic! If you don't give them back I won't be able to write more!

RikoRishodeathangeloflight - I'm glad you like my fic so far, and I hope you'll keep reading and reviewing (hint, hint) The pairings will be 1×2 and 3×4. I haven't decided on who to pair 5 with yet. I might just keep him the lone dragon.