DISCLAIMER: I do not own Gundam Wing or any song by the Smashing Pumpkins. I am simply an E5 in the USN, and thus have no money. So ha.
-BEGIN FIC-
Now we drive the night, to the ironies of peace
you can't help deny forever
the tragedies reside in you
the secret sights hide in you
the lonely nights divide you in two
Bodies
-- 23:47 --
"So that's what I know," the hazel-eyed man quietly finished, a slight nod of his head rustling long and uncontrolled hair that had not seen the touch of an elastic band in two weeks. Closing his eyes for but a moment, blocking his view of what was before him with the shielding curtain of his eyelashes, the lank figure let his tired sigh exude his thanks to the person who stood at ease in front of his figure. He shivered slightly as the cool night breeze caressed his tender, pulverized flesh, brushing over weeping scabs and barely-healing wounds.
"Hn. You should get to a hospital. With the extent of your injuries, you won't last long without professional medical attention."
A sharp bark of laughter escaped the worn man, his hazel eyes glistening coldly in the moon's pale white light. "Listen, boy. I know my own limits. I'll not be taking advice on what I should be doing with myself from a brat like yourself."
"Suit yourself," Heero gruffly said with a shrug. "If you fall dead in the streets, it's not my issue. Thank you for the information. You are certain you don't know where to find Trowa?"
"Positive. If I knew, I'd be going back myself. He probably has my weapons." A frown turned dried lips as the man Heero was addressing laid his hands lightly upon his jean-clad hips, temporarily forgetting the cold whispers of wind that clamored about his bare chest. "Little cock-fuck had better not be treating my babies roughly, or I'll rip his bang off."
An understanding nod was issued from Heero even as he crossed his leanly muscled arms over his own chest, clinging a bit more tightly to his loose button-up flannel shirt. "I understand that. Well. If you don't know where to find Trowa, I'll have to start searching on my own again. I was lucky enough to find you. Perhaps I will be lucky again."
"Start in Los Angeles," the man said quietly, his hazel eyes distant as he returned his gaze to the moon.
"Los Angeles? I thought you said you and he were bunking together in Barstow. As far as I know, it's a good two hour journey from one city to the other."
"Listen kid, just trust me on this one. LA would be the best place to start looking. I've got no freaking clue how you're going to start once you get there-"
"I'll figure something out," the ex-pilot said with a nod, letting his arms drop loosely to his sides. Wind stirring short, unruly brown bangs about furrowed brows, he frowned. "I would like a way to contact you again. Your ability for garnering information might be useful."
"Heh. You've yet to see me with a gun."
"Duo said you're a proficient torturer. I figure you're decent with any weapon you can get your hands on. But I'm more concerned about data reconnaissance."
Shaking his head slightly, his eyes closing once more even as his face remained directed to the brightest source of light in the night's dark curtain of blackness, he let his seemingly characteristic smirk fall lightly. "Nah. Can't help you out, kid. You know all that I've figured out that pertains to you. I've got to turn my eyes elsewhere."
Arching one brow, Heero stared with hard Prussian blue eyes. "You're going after him?"
"Yeah."
"Hn. I have two pieces of advice for you."
"Oh, this ought to be rich," the man huffed with his smirk instantly back in place, his hazel eyes glowering with unabashed cynicism at his young companion. "What?"
"First, get a gun."
"Easily enough accomplished," the tall man sighed with a shrug.
"Second, get a shirt."
A sweat drop lightly trickled down James Waverly's temple.
-- 06:15 --
Heero stared at the house that stood upon the street corner, one brow arched over a critical blue eye. He'd been on the surface of Earth for two days, and every clue he'd managed to dig from its unforgiving shadows had lead him here.
Four days ago, he'd found Duo so very near death that he'd feared the boy would perish before the ambulance he'd requested arrived. The braided ex-pilot of the Gundam Deathsythe had been locked in a closet-turned-cell within an abandoned manufacturing plant upon the Lunar Surface. Heero had experienced one hell of a time attempting to find him.
It had begun when, three days before the fateful evening upon which he'd found his dear friend, he'd been stricken with the urge to see him once more.
Every call that Heero had made, every lead that would typically carry him to the braided child who'd ridden in his Gundam at his side during the conflicts that had shaped the current Earth Sphere, had lead to dead ends and frustration. Even Hilde, Duo's live-in, had turned up empty of information. A quick jaunt around L2's exterior with a procured shuttle had turned up no trace of the young man, no sign of him sitting upon his home's metal exterior and staring at the lunar surface with wide violet eyes reflecting its dead light.
That started brewing worry in Heero's heart.
It wasn't often that the Perfect Soldier truly experienced anything – his mentor, Odin Lowe, had told him with his last dying breaths that the only life worth living was one lived by one's own emotions. Heero had passed that knowledge on to Trowa during those tremulous times after Wing spread its arms to the colonies and showed them its refusal to submit, exploding violently and completely as its pilot wished. It was wisdom Heero himself attempted vainly to live by; years of training, of harsh experience, of the guilt of murder repressed by necessity within a heart steadily killed by such actions, made it difficult at best for him to truly experience that 'life worth living' his mentor had breathed about with his final exhalations. Odin Lowe had taught him the value of emotional capacity from the moment they'd first shared coffee together during those bygone days when the boy who had no name barely came up to the adult's knee. Those who followed Odin Lowe had taught him that the venerable assassin was right in the fact that emotions could be channeled into powerful rage, creating an unstoppable machine that would persevere over all in the name of avenging those who'd been wronged, in the hope of destroying those who perpetrated the influx of unhappiness and misery that plagued those he called his own.
Those emotions that couldn't be channeled directly into anger and hate, those emotions that would make his resolve crumble and whither, were a liability to be disposed of. As time continued its steady march, most of the young terrorist's emotions followed those liabilities into the darkest recesses of his heart, buried and forgotten, threatened with eternal death.
During that conflict, he'd met a few who'd managed to rip the cover from the coffin those emotions he'd been taught to banish had been pressed into, routing through the grave he'd crafted within his soul to store them. The strategic mind behind Gundam 04 had shown him friendship without judgment and true, selfless bravery at the exclusion of one's own safety. The warrior who directed Gundam 05's jaws had shown him the depths to which blind dedication could drive a man, but had also revealed the fashion by which emotional power and mental fortitude could harness and drive the Zero system more effectively than Heero with his battle-driven training could ever accomplish. The enigmatic pilot of Gundam 03 was one of the first Heero might have actually called a 'friend,' rescuing him from his own self-destructive attempts and nursing him back to health in the safety of his home, placing all around him at risk by harboring the fallen pilot of Wing.
Relena befuddled his mind completely at first, her capacity for drawing those emotions and memories he'd dutifully buried in his attempts to perfect himself before coming to the blue Earth surface for his missions of terror and vengeance driving him completely insane. He'd wanted to kill her. He'd wanted to protect her. His second wanting had won over the first even as she revealed herself as being key to the desired peace he was fighting for. He saw his opportunity in her to create the peace that would last after his era of bloodshed had finally come to an end. He saw his opportunity in her to rectify the mistakes of the past, to apologize to that girl so similar to Relena that he'd inadvertently murdered for his grievous error. He saw his opportunity in her to protect an innocent spirit as he'd failed to do before, to provide salvation for her even as he'd stolen it from the young girl that had been out walking her puppy Merry in the park outside of the base he'd rigged to explode so very long ago. He saw in her his opportunity to revive those emotions he'd been forced to discard, to relive what he'd buried away, to find what those nagging urging in his heart meant and perhaps have those burgeoning emotional longings reciprocated to him in turn.
Perhaps in her he could find a path to experience that elusive emotion called 'love,' and he could be loved in turn.
Finally, Duo….
Duo.
The braided boy who'd greeted him with a glower and a grin and a pull of a trigger, a bullet intended to disable but not to kill. The pilot who'd been salvaging his own Wing for scrap material to provide extra parts for repairs to his 'partner.' The child who'd stolen aboard the carrier he'd procured for his fateful trip to New Edwards. The aggravating smiling fool who refused to leave his side no matter how furious the battles became, who proved himself to be surprisingly skilled and incredibly dangerous even though he lived with full emotional capability and frequently showed it.
The smiling jester of Death was another who boggled Heero's logical mind. He'd always been taught that emotions were a liability and likely to reduce the efficiency of a soldier. Yet Duo was one who harnessed them completely, living every moment of his life by whatever his heart bled to his mind, and was in every way his equivalent in battle if not his superior.
To say that Heero wasn't ever jealous of Duo's ability to live life so freely, to exist without the restraints that had been placed over him by his dedicated training program, would be to lie.
Heero was jealous.
He'd attempted to keep his distance from the braided babbling idiot, but found that he could not avoid the boy. Instead, the harder he tried to stay away, the more persistent the 02 pilot became.
It hadn't been long before Heero came to expect that presence to be with him. It wasn't long before he'd secretly come to enjoy it.
He felt for the boy. What it was he was actually feeling, he couldn't explain, but the fact that he felt was enough to justify his attraction and his growing need for the braided pilot.
He'd come to look for those glowing violet eyes, to let himself be absorbed in the laughing amethyst orbs and the wild smile of madness, to let himself be carried away by the manic laugh and the flailing craziness that emanated from the death-plagued youth. He'd started to enjoy it.
Then, when the war came to an end, he found his loyalties split.
Part of him drew him towards Relena, towards the promise of the touch of innocence in his tainted life, towards the hope for eternal redemption for his crimes against humanity by service to the new peace.
Part of him called him to turn to the waiting arms of the boy who enchanted him, who'd stolen light touches and tender smiles during their last moments together upon Peacemillion before their ill-fated charge into the Eve War's terrifying battlefield, who drew curious attraction from the depth of his soul.
Part of him beckoned towards the Lunar Base and the newly forming Preventers organization, towards the promise of the feeling of belonging, towards the stability of an organization he'd be easily assimilated into, a place where his abilities would be put to use for the benefit of humanity.
So torn by his longings, Heero did the only thing he thought he could.
He ran.
He'd regretted running after a time, slowly easing from his pace and remaining for days on end in the same location. When his urge to contact his braided friend overcame him, the fact that he'd failed miserably in every attempt to locate the boy upset him to no end.
The boy who'd drawn such extreme emotions that he himself could not begin to harness, control or even describe them was missing.
It was pure luck that led to Heero's first clue, the flicker of lights in a building he knew to be abandoned drawing his attention as he roamed through the Lunar surface's city streets for the simulated evening. When he'd snuck inside, he'd overheard two men quietly conversing.
-- 01:20, 5 Days Ago --
"Right. Apparently when my dear little Quatre contacted him, he failed to reveal where he could be found or even give the kid a contact number to reach him back at. Very disappointing results, if you ask me. A complete waste of my time."
"Hmph. Well, this is simply peachy. In other words, he brought us nothing new."
"Exactly, boss."
Heero remained calmly hidden around the hall's corner, pressed firmly to the wall. He regulated his breathing, keeping his inhalations and exhalations as silent as humanly possible even as he focused his hearing. 'They're conversing about Quatre?' his brain questioned.
As the two who conversed stirred, Heero decided that it would be wise to leave rather than press a meeting between himself and those who stood outside of the peculiarly secured hallway door. After all, he wasn't armed. The more slender of the two men, as unassuming as inexperienced eyes would lead a person to believe, appeared to be more than capable to Heero's apt gaze.
Lank and tall, yes, but underneath that t-shirt and those jeans was a battle-trained machine experienced in combat. The shortly cropped hair lent no easy handle to grab in battle. The brown eyes were exceptionally sharp and cunning. The smile upon the thin lips told of unspeakable cruelty even as he lightly laughed.
Compared to his companion, a broad and somewhat stocky man with blonde hair wearing a black trench coat and exuding no battle-experience whatsoever, Heero knew where the trouble would lie. He also knew that he might not live through such an encounter – the man with his scar-laced hands and large knuckles from many fist-driven battles likely knew how to kill with those rough instruments, and those dark eyes told of a soul dark enough to enjoy spilling more blood than had already been sacrificed to Death.
No, it was wiser to return later. Much later, when the two who conversed about Quatre would be gone.
-- 21:50, 4 Days Ago --
Heero let his lips turn in a light grimace, his hand sliding yet another remote detonator into his jean-jacket pocket. He'd just finished rigging his tenth explosive device. 'Hopefully that will be enough of a distraction to allow me to make a clean getaway.'
Glancing left and right quickly, he lay his hand upon the haft of the pistol he kept tucked in the waistband of his jeans. Taking some comfort in the feel of black plastic grips, he lifted his fingers slightly from the Glock 9mm and lay them instead upon the cool metal of the hallway he was occupying. He kept his footfalls as silent as possible – a difficult task, considering the fact that he was wearing heavily built steel-toed construction boots with heavy treads.
Reaching the end of the hallway, he leaned slightly towards the foreboding corner, laying his hand once again upon his gun's handle. A glance down the next dimly lit hallway verified that it was indeed unoccupied. Apparently the lank man with his dangerous hands and his blond companion were meeting elsewhere.
He had his window of opportunity. Heero wasn't about to waste it.
He made his way immediately for the closet door he'd noted the two hovering about the day before, his hand releasing the pistol and instead reaching for the miniature led flashlight he kept on his person at all times in his foremost right pocket.
Heero turned on the small flashlight once he'd finally reached the door and set his eyes to learning every microscopic detail they could absorb about the lock that held it shut.
'Hn. High quality deadbolt. If I use my gun, I can just blast the door open. However, that would attract attention.'
He started as he heard a soft, grating voice simper from within the space beyond the door he stood before. "How many times do I have to say it? I know nothing… please… just let me die."
'Duo….'
Heero grit his teeth as he in his left pocket, searching for his multitool. Flipping the small flathead screwdriver out of it, he shoved it into the keyhole and experimentally felt its interior.
'Been awhile since I picked a deadbolt.' Cautiously turning his gaze to both his right and his left, he snarled in soft frustration even as he continued to worry at the lock.
After a few more moments of baleful tinkering, the thick deadbolt that held the cell's door shut clicked solidly as it slid into its housing, releasing its death grip on the door jamb. A loud squeal accompanied the opening of the portal as it grated along its rusty hinges.
Heero scowled as he saw the violet eyes squint at him from their bloody face framed by red-stained chestnut hair. The beaten boy, dazed and confused, was staring at him without recognition registering in his gaze.
Construction boots, tops covered by denim jeans, softly tapped against the tile as the thin person with the ragged hair made his way to Duo's side. A tanned hand reached with almost ridiculous slowness to lightly brush heavily calloused fingertips over the beaten boy's cheek.
Duo's voice finally rasped out of his days-dry throat. "Heero?"
Heero silently nodded, rustling dark brown bangs that hung wildly about his thin face. Dark Prussian blue eyes swiftly swept their gaze over the entirety of the sprawled bloodstained body that lay upon the cold floor, and slender lips curled slightly at the corners towards the collar of the loose denim jacket that rested over thin shoulders. "Can you stand?" his voice softly whispered, gently caressing the braided youth's ears.
"Nope," Duo groaned, lifting a finger to point at his feet. "Did quite a number."
Another small nod acknowledged Duo's answer. "Then just be quiet."
Duo had to bite his lip to keep from screaming as Heero lifted him as gently as he possibly could into his arms. He tasted copper even as he was cradled against the other boy's strong chest.
"It'll be alright," Heero softly said, pressing his nose against chestnut bangs. "I'll get you out of here."
"Always counting on you… rescuin' me."
"Be quiet. We'll talk when we're clear."
Being quiet wasn't at all a problem for Duo. He fell into the dark swirling waters of unconsciousness the moment Heero's running gait jarred his beaten body, the Perfect Soldier's attempts to keep his swift sprint as smooth as possible for the benefit of the one he carried in his arms completely in vain.
He was well on his way into that dark, inviting silence when he heard on the edge of his ears the reverberating blast of an explosion.
Heero didn't stick around to observe the effectiveness of his actions. He knew those individuals who'd done this to Duo would be along shortly to investigate, and he had no intention of meeting them at that moment in time.
Not with Duo clinging so very faintly to life as it was.
Of course, fate would forever be battling against Heero's best intentions. Even as he barreled around a corner, he had to swiftly sidestep to avoid running into another individual who'd been racing towards the explosion's site, gun drawn and eyes focused to murder.
They both stopped and turned to stare at one another.
Heero let Duo's feet fall for a moment, gripping his gun and swiftly drawing it. Seeing his motion, the man mimicked his move, lifting his weapon's barrel and gripping the trigger.
Bright gunpowder flashes lit the hallway.
Heero snorted as his opponent fell, the bullet's entry wound in the center of his forehead verifying his state.
Looping his arm back under Duo's legs, his gun remaining in his hands, he raced down the hallway once more.
Twisting and turning hallways eventually dumped him onto the streets. A curt glance to his duffel bag then back to the boy in his arms motivated him to continue his fleeing run and simply return for the remainder of his materials later.
Long minutes passed before he found a working payphone. Laying Duo delicately at his feet, he set his fingertips upon the unconscious boy's throat.
Heero's heart nearly skipped a beat as he felt the faint pulse beneath those sensitive tips. He wasted no more time in hefting the payphone's handle into his hand and hurriedly dialing the local emergency number.
"I need an ambulance immediately. My friend is dying."
-- 06:28 --
Heero lifted his hand to rest before his eyes, focusing on the small house that rose from the landscape surrounding it. White walls stood in stark contrast to a surreal green lawn with pastel flowers edging their way along that house's foot. A pristine driveway stretched from a brown garage door. A brown door stood closed, its brass knob glittering in the early cresting sunlight. A nicely maintained brown-painted fence surrounded the backyard of the house, blocking it from view. A dilapidated truck was parked before the house, its paintjob a faint blue flecked with rust and speckles of white primer and silver metal that shined through as well as it could.
This was the last location the forest green Ford Taurus Duo had so thoroughly described during his few lucid moments between doctoral visits and morphine drips had been sited.
'Forest green Fort Taurus with a dent in its left fender three inches behind the wheel hub, with five spoke hubcaps and dark gray fabric interior, license plate number GTF4108. Cracked windshield wipers, too, along with a slightly scratched passenger-side mirror casing. Exactly as Duo said, down to the cracked windshield wipers.'
Heero had been tracing the car for the last two days using his laptop and his satellite connection, hacking into the LAPD's GPS system to track the vehicle with license plate number GTF4108. Easy enough trick, easy enough to not get caught doing it. For two days he'd relentlessly tracked the vehicle, his small stolen dirt bike getting more wear and tear than it was designed to receive. He'd gone without sleep, relying on adrenaline and the caffeine in that confounded Coca Cola that Duo had relentlessly shoved in his face until he'd grown a slight addiction to the substance to remain conscious.
He wasn't quite at the top of his game, but he was aware enough of his surroundings to note the significance of his target, the smiling and jovial man with his dangerous hands and many a weapon in his forest green passenger sedan, stopping at a remote house in the city of Riverside far removed from the hot-spots Duo had told him about. He also found it significant that he took a peculiarly long time dwelling in that house as his target hadn't made a habit of such at any other location.
Something of relevance was there, and Heero intended to find out what it was. After all, if it was of importance to the man known as Xavier Johnson, then it had a strong possibility of having something to do with the missing Quatre Raberba Winner and Trowa Barton.
He wouldn't dare face Xavier Johnson alone, especially as deprived of rest as he was at that moment, but somehow he would make the man pay for the harm he'd caused Duo.
He'd see to that – whether it was through killing the man directly or inconveniencing him by stealing away whatever was important to him, it would be accomplished.
Heero tilted his head, staring momentarily at the tree that was stationed just outside of the house's eastern face, its branches rising to cast their figures across the span of the second floor's windows. The birds that'd been singing but moments before had fallen silent, then suddenly burst into flight, winging their way directly to the west.
Rubbing his forehead, Heero groaned. He needed to rig the house then orchestrate an infiltration.
He couldn't think straight enough as it was, seeing as how birds were startling him.
He'd return later.
-- 22:52 --
Heero slipped his multitool back into his jean jacket's pocket and turned the front door's brass knob. Eyes narrowed, he slid through the darkened house as silently as a shadow.
He'd finished setting the last of his explosives over two hours ago. Carefully laying everything out, he'd ensured that the house would implode rather than explode and endanger uninvolved civilians.
He'd made a mistake laying explosives once. It was one he'd never repeat again.
Heero had spent in excess of four hours designing his plan and building his small bombs, wiring his remote control and setting fuses and detonation boxes. Another four hours had passed while he carefully slid bomb after bomb into place, every one exact to the last centimeter with his carefully planned implosion pattern. Two hours had been spent watching the lights in the house, waiting for them all to go out.
He'd finally determined that, after an hour of darkness within the double-storied structure, that everyone would be asleep. He still kept his movements slow and cautious, though, as to not warrant any additional attention that he did not desire.
Slinking from room to room, Heero's eyes narrowed as he took inventory of the household his target had spent his time at. First was a kitchen. Three passes through the cabinetry and a stop in the fridge informed him that nothing was spectacular or out of the ordinary.
Living room. Dining room. Downstairs broom closet and bathroom. Downstairs guest bedroom. Each location had been poured through, resulting in no discernable items or information of pertinence to the plot Duo had been inadvertently immersed in.
Heero crept slowly up the stairs.
The first room's door that he opened revealed yet another bathroom. A quick search of its cabinets and all recesses he could locate resulted in the same disappointment as the rest of the house.
A frustrated snort escaped Heero's nose as he crept towards the second to last door.
His breath caught in his throat.
This room was occupied.
White walls, rimmed with wallpaper scrollwork running along the border between the walls themselves and the ceiling that featured sponge-painted forest green and golden brown leaves, were the seating place for a plain white ceiling and seated upon a hardwood pine floor, that junction also sporting identical wallpaper scrollwork. A torch lamp spread three fluorescent bulbs to shed light upon the room when energized – at that moment, the bulbs were dark. A wooden desk sat flush against the wall opposite of the room's sole window, its top bearing the weight of a computer and its keyboard. The student-chair before it was well worn, sagging from a furniture piece's life of use. The eastern-facing window was covered by thin, gauzy white drapes that sported the same sponge-paint styled leafs featured on the wallpaper boarders.
It wasn't those features that captured Heero's eye. Rather the large table in the room's center, crafted of roughly hewn wood with troughs cut coarsely along its edges, caught his attention.
Those troughs, their open ends terminating above bowls lined with what appeared in the slim lighting to be black splattered liquid, were stained with that same dark coloration along their entire path. Judging by the condition of the person tethered to that table's top, Heero had a sinking suspicion that he may have just come across a corpse that had bled dry.
Slipping to the edge of the makeshift rack, he cast critical Prussian blue eyes over the still form. Lacerations, many festering despite efforts taken to clean them, littered the man's skin. The jagged edge of a broken rib punctured the flesh, jutting into breathable air. Blood stained scraggly, unkempt hair that might have once been brown. Toes and fingers, curled slightly, were a pale blue in the faint light that issued through the room's window.
He was quite shocked with the still, long lips parted and a rough voice whispered, "It's 'bout damned time you got here, kiddo."
"Who are you?" Heero immediately answered, his eyes narrowed and his hand resting near the gun he had tucked in his jeans' waistband.
A harsh cough shook the prisoner's lungs. "Name's James Waverly. I'm certain the braided moron told you about me."
Lifting his gun, he cocked it and nodded. "Hai. Duo said you were involved in a plot against Quatre."
"Trying to help the twerp. So, going to stand there all night, or are you going to untie me?"
"Why should I untie you?"
The weary eyes opened, hazel orbs focusing on the short-haired ex-pilot of Wing. "Because. You need the information I have, and I'm not telling you dick until I'm free. Plus you want to fuck Xavier over for what he did to your little buddy, don't'cha? Best way to do that is to get me out of Little Susie Homemaker's Nightmare Fantasy here."
Arching a brow, Heero calmly considered his options. He'd been spotted. Not only had he been spotted, but apparently he'd been expected. And somehow, this man knew exactly what was on his mind….
He could leave the man behind. After all, if this was James Waverly, what reason did he have to trust the man? According to Duo, while he was working with Quatre this time around, he'd made their lives a living hell during the war. A double agent was never to be relied upon. Turncoats couldn't be depended on to keep their loyalties straight.
However, leaving the man behind presented problems. He could readily identify him, and knew of his connection to Duo. He could possibly utilize that information against him. The man could also alert anyone else in the house to Heero's presence with something so simple as a shout.
Leaving a dead body upon that rack would alleviate him of that worry, but it would also demolish the information he claimed to have.
In a maneuver as risky as the one Heero was apparently on, he needed all the information he could get.
Information was something the imprisoned James Waverly claimed to have. And while the man would be a physical liability, he wasn't one Heero particularly cared about – after all, Duo had said he was competent. He would look after himself, or he would die. He wasn't any innocent Heero would sacrifice anything to protect.
Heero chose to free him.
Hastily taking his multitool out of his pocket, he slid his cocked and prepared gun back into his waistband even as he thumbed open the knife tucked away in the device resting in the palm of his hand. A swift slash freed the mangled man's wrists, a second took care of releasing his ankles. Tucking the knife away and slipping his tool back into his pocket, Heero hastily grabbed the pieces of rope that were holding the older man hostage and threw them aside. "You can stand?"
"Yeah," James grunted quietly as he slid his feet from the table and gingerly pressed his weight upon them. His face scrunching in pain, his brow dotting with sweat, he took a tender step forward and released the rack he'd been gripping. "Let's get out of here."
"Affirmative. The sooner we escape this location, the better. We risk-"
"Thought so," a new voice hissed.
"Detection?" James finished for the cringing ex-pilot. "Yeah."
The young woman frowned as she set her eyes upon the pair. The slight shuffle of shoes traveling down her hallway had awakened her – the clicks of her bathroom door then the guest bedroom door opening had clued her in to the fact that her imagination was not crafting demons in the night.
She was hardly surprised to find a rescuer in her prisoner's room.
What she was surprised about was her reluctance to do anything to stop them.
Lowering her gun's barrel slightly, she frowned.
"Lyssa, think about what you're doing," James softly pressed, his hazel eyes leaving their focus on Heero and turning to the woman who'd held him hostage.
"I am," she softly seethed, her eyes glaring fitfully at the floor, at the direction her gun's barrel was pointing.
"You can't stop this. You can't deny forever the ironies of the 'peace' you're attempting to establish for your people and the tragedies that'll rise if you and yours follow through."
Heero stared between the two, quite confused at the flow of the conversation. It occurred to him that, indeed, the man he released very likely did have information liable to assist him, seeing as how he was discussing some apparent plot that was coinciding with what Duo had involved the Wing's ex-pilot in. Concurrent plots he had no ideas about, no knowledge of, that might or might not affect him. Heero mentally cursed, wondering just how big this all was in that brief moment.
Lyssa paid the teenager no mind, shaking her head slightly. "Bastard. I hate you, you know?"
"But you don't. Rather funny how human nature can so easily divide itself along such opposing paths."
Nodding once, she took a step back even as she flicked the safety on her weapon. "Escape now. I never saw you."
Heero blinked entirely without comprehension as they were allowed to leave without a fight, his acquired information source hobbling lamely down the softly carpeted floors and the young woman who could have been a considerable obstacle standing with her head bowed and shoulders slightly shaking.
tbc...