Author: Sparkle Itamashii
Title: Inheritance
Warnings: Respect the rating. Please see my profile.
Disclaimer: Gundam Wing A/C is NOT MINE.
Chapter Twenty Eight
The place was deserted by the time I reached it. The doors were unlocked but it was clear that they hadn't been left unlocked by Trowa; the keypad tile (and in fact the rest of the keypad) was missing, replaced by a scorched hole in the wall. I dawdled across the street, watching down the alley from the deli window across the street but there was not a breath of movement. No one came in or out and I didn't catch sight of anyone that stayed in one place for longer than a few minutes.
Eventually I meandered my way over and investigated, but there was no way I was getting the doors open. I picked and pried and shocked myself twice before I took a step back from the situation. Why would they have blasted the keypad? They were designed to lock irreversibly if the keypad was simply destroyed; most ship-bound mechanisms were like that. Frustrated, I tugged at the bare ends of the wiring, watching the sparks jump as nothing really productive happened.
My skin jumped and I just barely kept myself from shouting in surprise when someone pounded on the door from the interior. "Joe, that you?" The voice was low and muffled to near incoherency.
Indecision seized my insides. Should I answer affirmatively and risk the chance of them having a way to open the doors? What would they do if I answered negatively? How had they known I was there and, more importantly, would they know if I just walked away now?
"I can't get in," I answered gruffly, soft enough that my voice would be muffled past recognition. I hoped. My hand drifted to settle on my gun; they obviously couldn't see me if they had to ask who I was.
"That's because you're an idiot," the voice responded. "You've got to use the 24th street entrance; this one blew itself earlier today when Marcus was mucking around on the computers. If you'd gotten back on time today you might not have missed it."
"What else have I missed?" It was a risky question and not one that was likely to get answered, but it was worth a shot. Information, should he choose to give it to me, could save my life later. I knew that all too well.
"The L2 boys caught them all together but they scattered. Smith radioed yesterday to say they were following one of them, but we haven't heard from any of them since. You catch wind of the explosions over that way?"
"No," I said, still keeping quiet. "Anyone hurt?"
"Don't know. Bossman said he's moving us out when you get back, so get your ass inside. I'll let them know you're here."
"Okay," I said, trying to keep the panic out of my voice.
Shit. If he went in and told everyone that 'Joe' was here and then Joe didn't show up at the 24th street entrance, they were going to know something was fishy. Very, very fishy. I took myself out of that alley as fast as possible and all but ran down the street in the opposite direction of 24th. All of the colonies had the same basic setup, so everyone would be able to get around no matter which colony they were visiting.
My first thought was to visit the spaceport, but it was late at fake night and the number of shuttles would be few. If that group was moving out then the spaceport would be where they were headed and if they were not moving out then the spaceport would be the first place they headed to surround to stop me. I scratched the idea and headed for the 'inner city' area of the colony instead. It was a quiet and unassuming place as well as being nowhere near anyplace they would reckon I'd want to be. Sure, I would be safe until dawn, but then people would start showing up for work.
It's strange, how the small things, the things that seem so insignificant, are the things that make a difference. As I trailed along the side of an eight foot fence, walking around it so as to get into the city, a part of me read the sign to the building. A part of me took note of the fact that it was an incinerator like the one where Trowa had dumped the bloody remains of my hospital visit. It was a newer building than the ones around it, having been built less than three years ago, but it was an eerie place. It was abandoned as only a new building could be; like everyone had vanished. The place looked like it should have been in use, although I knew that wasn't the case in the least.
A few years back, someone had decided to put to use the idea of flash-incineration. A flash like that on a camera but a million times brighter and harsher- harsh enough to practically vaporize anything put in close proximity. It was a great idea; the trash from the entire colony could be turned to particles of dust that was easy to fan out and let the ventilation of the colony take care of afterwards. They had decommissioned every last one of them two years ago, when people began to get sick because the fumes did not dissipate fast enough.
Skirting around the last edge of the Roys Co. building, I continued into the heart of the city. I let myself into one of the nicer looking office buildings, courtesy of a few lock-picks and a good bit of almost forgotten talent. As soon as I was safely inside and up a few flights of stairs, I pulled out my cell phone and rang Heero. The phone buzzed obnoxiously, telling me that my connection was crap. I'd expected as much, with the building's make and the amount of electrical equipment I'd see on the few floors I'd passed. It didn't really matter; I wouldn't need one for long.
"How'd it go?" Heero asked quietly as soon as the noise cut. Apparently I didn't merit a proper hello at that moment, which said to me that he was not in the safest of areas.
"They blast sealed the front door and were guarding the back too well for me to assess the interior," I said quietly as well. "They surrounded the spaceport, so you might not want to head over any time soon."
"It'll be a while, anyhow. They didn't see you?"
"No," I said truthfully. "They'll leave soon, unless they figure out I'm here. Either way they'll control it for a while."
"Okay. Find a safe place, stay put, and don't call back. I'll call when I can."
"Good luck." I hung up the phone before I heard his response.
I hated hanging up on Heero. It was a rare enough occasion to get him on the phone that it just felt wrong, despite that I knew it was better for both of us. I got up off the staircase landing I had sat down on and pushed through the doors to the fifth floor. The security lights were dim and grey, just barely enough light to see where I was walking and no security system stirred. Empty buildings, ones that were clearly full of life normally, always creeped me out a bit. No matter what time of day or night is was, I always felt like everyone had just vanished without a trace in the middle of what they were doing and a part of me always suggested that it could happen to me, too, if I stayed.
Plunking down in one of the swiveling office chairs, I flicked on the closest computer and relished in the sounds it made as it booted to life. Any sound to ward off the silence. May as well see if there was a live news feed while I was grounded as well, I thought. Maybe I could learn something worthwhile. I leaned back in the chair and it tilted back obligingly, just enough to be comfortable but not enough to feel like it might tip. The monitor dimmed in front of me and a box flickered into view asking for a username and password. I must have chosen the right computer because its owner was properly lazy enough to leave both saved.
I let it continue and took a glance out the huge window that made up most of the wall to my left. There was a gap between the buildings across the street right about where I was sitting and through it I could see the rest of the colony floor curving away from me. There were a few of the taller office buildings which gave way to shorter, stouter buildings like that fenced in incineration building I'd passed on the way. The city pattered out after about a mile and stretched into a lazy looking suburb. The haze from the mist that fell nightly to maintain the limited plant-life obscured must past the first couple rows of houses, but it was still comforting to see.
It reminded me of Home.
My eyelids drooped as I gently rocked the office chair, watching the flicker of the street lamps against the mist of night. The suburbs looked so peaceful from here I could almost imagine I was back on Earth, watching over our street. Sure, I couldn't see the stars but then, I was in the stars. Even so, even knowing those obvious differences, the two places weren't all that different. The Earth was humanity's starting line and the colonies were more an extension of the prosperity of Earth's people than they were a separate world. I had lived in both places and felt that either could have been a home. Both were, in a sense. Earth became a home more every day I lived there, despite that I had been born and raised in the L2 cluster.
My breath caught on the memory of my first home. I thought of all the people I had left behind in my seemingly short time there. I thought of Father Maxwell and Sister Helen at the church and the way they both had taught me so many lessons about life. They taught me to forgive those that hurt me. They taught me to handle the loss of friends and family to the war. They left me, in the end, the way Solo had. The war killed them like it killed Solo. It had killed them like it was preparing to do now, even after the fighting had stopped.
I closed my eyes and leaned back in the chair, swallowing thickly. The plague that had swept my home colony was by far the worst act of destruction I had seen in the war. There were thousands of people on that colony, thousands of civilians, of families and friends. All of them were sacrificed for the sake of perfecting the coding that now rode beneath my skin, the virus that ran in my blood. Solo, my best friend, my co-conspirator, my mentor… dying in my arms because the war had gotten a little too bloodthirsty.
It was starting again.
The computer bleeped, drawing me from my heavy thoughts. I shook my head to clear it and pulled up the only browser in the system tray. I clicked my way into a few Earth-based news sites and accessed their live feeds. They were discussing trivial things; trivial things that lasted for over half an hour without interruption. I sighed. Either they hadn't heard about the trouble we'd been causing or they were doing a damn fine job covering it up for the citizens of Earth. I would have placed money on the former.
Though I watched for a little longer, nothing of interest came onscreen. Bored and antsy, I switched to a new window and pulled up the two colony-based news sites I knew. Both of them were relating the same story; an underground maintenance facility near a hospital had been attacked by an unknown terrorist group whom they believed to be related to Relena's assassination. Several people near the blast site had lost their lives and many more were injured when the shock wave shattered storefront glass or caused accidents. Flashes of the gaping hole in the colony's wall-floor peppered the reports on both stations.
Well, no one ever said Heero wasn't thorough.
While one of the news stations continued reporting on the explosion, the other switched to a broadcast about a shootout that had happened at a nearby park, involving what appeared to be civilians. Someone had turned over a tape to the station, containing footage of a firefight between the men that had caught us at the park, and Heero who was with Wu Fei still. They had gotten themselves holed up in an alleyway and were taking pot shots at their attackers. I smiled. Heero was definitely a better shot than anyone he was aiming for.
I would have stayed to watch the broadcasts until Heero called, but my leg began to bother me again and I forced myself to my feet. Both broadcasts were still playing, a tiny, metallic sound to break the fearsome silence of the office building. I needed something to stay awake and it wouldn't hurt to see if there was somewhere I might be able to make a pot of coffee.
There was a hallway back by the stairwell and sure enough when I walked to the end of it a breakroom opened and spread over quite a lot of space. The employees of this building seemed to very much appreciate their breaks. I edged around the room to the sink area and pawed my way through a basket containing what seemed like a million little packets of coffee grounds. French Vanilla, caramel crème, black roast… I made a face at all the flavors until I happened upon a single package of hazelnut. I liked hazelnut. Maybe not in coffee, but I couldn't imagine it being worse than caramel.
It took a while for the water to warm and the little black and glass maker to brew enough for even one cup. I spent the wait rummaging through their cupboards to find a spoon, some sugar and a couple of little creamer packages. It was a mindless task, something to keep my mind off the news reports; something to distract me from the fact that once again we had become killers for the sake of stopping a war.
When the coffee was done I made myself a cup and left the machine on in case I wanted another. Fishing around in my pocket, I pulled out the zedal-codine and took another one with my first, scalding sip of coffee. The news reports chattered in tinny voices as I reentered the office area and moved myself back to the window. I laid my head against the smooth glass and peered out over the city once more.
I sighed, wondering if the people down there, probably asleep in their nice warm beds, even knew what was going on at the moment. Did they know what sort of danger they were in? Did they know how quickly they would die if any of us took one wrong step? Somehow I doubted it. Somehow I doubted that they could see past the peace they were enjoying to see the war brewing on the horizon.
Good, I told myself grimly. I hope they never have to see it.
I remember so clearly the few minutes I was standing there at that window. I remember the buzz of the computer, the whir of the fans in the air conditioning ducts; even the rumble of the generators so far, far below in the basement. I remember how good that coffee seemed to taste and how much my leg was really bothering me now that the drugs were thinning. I remember the way my thoughts crawled over the fact that there could very well be another war coming and thinking that if there was just a way to stop it before it could begin… if there was just one way to end it so that this would never be a problem.
I remember thinking "If only I could disappear".
I remember the way my eyes fell upon the incineration building then.
I remember the way my heart stopped.
I could disappear completely.
I straightened a bit, pulling my forehead away from where it had started to stick to the glass. Of course I could disappear. Heero had said I couldn't die or that would be the end of it in a very bad way. Obviously I couldn't live or we'd be in the same sort of danger as we'd been for days now. But if I disappeared I wouldn't be dead or alive, I would be gone. The incinerators left behind nothing but dust and gasses. They-
But I stopped myself.
Could I really just die? Could I abandon everything I had come to love and cherish? If I disappeared, what would happen to Heero and Artemis and Mara? What about the others? Heero might understand sacrifice for the greater good, and Trowa might as well but Quatre wouldn't. Hilde wouldn't.
I swallowed thickly. No, I thought. No, it had to be done. Not quite yet, I knew as I took a seat back at the computer. There were records to delete and an existence to erase, but once I had disappeared from paper… once I had gotten that far… disappearing in the flesh was only half a block away from being a possibility.
I closed the news broadcasts in the middle of speculation about how many people would be brought to harm, should another war start, and began the process of getting into a few systems I had no right entering. It would take a while but then, I had nothing better to do all night. The methods were fuzzy at first, and the pathways had changed from the last time I had explored the insides of other people's computers, but it was a lot like riding a bike; once you've learned, you never forget. It became automatic- seek network, hunt files, destroy all traces, repeat.
When my phone rang, almost six hours later, I almost had a heart attack. The room had become entirely silent save for the rapping of my fingers against the keys and that had become only background static to my ears. I pulled my cell from my pocket and snapped it open like it was going to bite. The noise cut out instantly. "Heero?"
"I'm on my way over," he said, again not bothering with a greeting. I sighed.
"Don't," I told him quietly. "They're not cleared from the spaceport yet. You'll just be caught."
"It's got to be done." He spoke with such finality that I knew I wasn't going to convince him to stay away; the best I would manage was to be faster than him.
"I might have a better plan," I said solemnly.
"Let's hear it."
"There's… you said there are only three parts to the virus, right?" I clambered to my feet, leaving the computer behind as I wandered back to the window.
"Yes, why?"
"Can it be made with only two parts? If someone happened to get hold of yours and mine but not Mara's part, could they still make the virus? Or your part and Mara's?"
He scoffed. "No. You definitely need all three parts. Two parts won't give you anything; otherwise Mara would be a threat in a whole new way."
"There's no other way to produce it though, is there? Like if someone got two parts, could they create the third? Aren't there records somewhere?" The city stretched out beneath me once more; dawn was coming.
There was a long pause on the other end and I could almost see him going through the lists of possibilities. Finally he answered, albeit a little slowly- a little cautiously. "No. If I recall correctly, and I know I do, the doctors destroyed the method of creation and left only the method of cultivation. Anyone can make the virus if they have the parts but no one besides those five have the ability to recreate it from scratch."
"But someone else could figure it out?" I had to be sure before I did this. If there was any way for the virus to be made from two parts, then what I thought I could do would be useless.
"No; not any more so than if they were creating it for the first time, new. It would be like painting an entire picture when you only have half to go from; what's in the lost part can't be made again." It sounded like he was getting a little irritated with me.
"You can't make a whole from the parts," I clarified. That was good. That meant I was right. "Okay. And you and Mara each have the first part, right?"
"Yes…" he said, slower now. The suspicion was starting to creep into his voice.
"And… and Mara and Milliardo both have the second part, right?"
"Duo…"
I plowed onward before he could interrupt. "But I'm the only one with the third part, aren't I." It wasn't a question and he knew it. "So… if I'm gone, that negates the problem. The whole situation is null if they don't have my part, right?"
"Theoretically, but you can't do that," he said levelly. "Don't think you can just go off and die and save everyone, Duo. If anything of you remains they can still use it, right down to a drop of blood."
I ran my eyes over the top of the fenced-in building I stood observing- Roys Incineration Company. I sighed and dropped my gaze to the office floor again. "But if I could disappear entirely it would work, right?"
"You can't."
"But if I could?" I insisted.
He made an irritated noise on the other end. "If you could disappear entirely, which you can't, then it would probably be over, yes."
"There isn't another way to make the virus?" I asked hesitantly.
"Not that I know of," he replied, defeated. "Why?"
"I can disappear completely," I said quietly. "You remember a few years back when they built those flash incinerators; the ones that caused that big ruckus because of the dust and fumes?"
There was a silence on the other end that was deeper and more horrified than any silence I have ever experienced in my life. If I hadn't known better I would have thought my phone had dropped the call. I knew where his mind was; I knew the scenarios he was imagining. He made a strangled noise and my heart twisted. "Don't you fucking dare," he choked out at last.
"I love you, Heero," I said quietly. "I really do. That's why I have to do this."
It took every bit of willpower I had to pull the phone away from my ear and close it. The tinny sound of Heero's upset disappeared, leaving me in a silence that was nothing short of deafening. I knew what I had to do and while I wasn't quite sure of how I had to do it… I had a pretty good idea. My heartbeat fluttered against my skin, amplifying the sickening feeling of fear that had begun to well up within me. I didn't want to die. I didn't want to give up on everything in my life, not after coming so far. Not when I had come so close to the life I wanted, the people I loved.
We are not normal citizens now, Duo. We were never normal anything and we never will be.
"I know," I whispered to the past, to Heero's memory. I wanted normal, or I thought I did, but I knew it wasn't something suited to someone like me. Heero and I, the others… we had to be a certain sort of different so that everyone else could be normal. We had to lose so others wouldn't.
But that didn't mean we had to like it.
It didn't mean it didn't hurt.
With a heavy heart, I ignored the way my cell phone jangled beside me and opened a new browser window. There was still a lot to be done before I could disappear, but first… there was something more important. My mail server's page made a pleasantly welcoming sound as I clicked to compose a new letter. I set the delivery time for a few weeks ahead and, taking a deep breath, I splayed my fingers over the keyboard to begin to write.
Dear Heero,
By the time you read this, I will be gone…
/End Chapter Twenty Eight, Inheritance/
Notes:
Oh no? Ohhhh stay tuned because there is only one chapter and the epilogue left. Reviews are very welcome, especially those which contain speculations…
