Hereafter

CHAPTER 10

March Madness Prompt #7

"I Keep Getting Your Mail"

Duo was used to walking through landfills of construction debris, but it was different when the waste represented a whole building that had been intact that morning.

The ash from the explosion had mostly settled but pieces of gray papery specks still swirled around the air as first responders moved back and forth between the trucks and ambulances lined up on along the street and the site of the collapse. The first order of business had been to shore up the remaining bits of structure to make it safe for workers. Equipment was being used to lift and shift debris in the search for bodies.

Duo found Hilde across the street from the disaster zone. She stood with deceptive casualness on the sidewalk next to a white truck. She wore a light purple sweater and a pair of ankle-cut jeans that clove spectacularly to her curves. He knew she carried a gun on her person but if she had showed it when first confronting the suspect, she had put it away since.

As Duo neared, Hilde's head popped up as if she could sense him coming. That was impossible of course. He was much too stealthy. But she turned her head in his direction, her short pixie haircut framing a delicate face that looked sadder than he liked.

"Duo," she said. "I just can't believe any of this."

Duo wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close. She was short, the top of her head barely reaching his upper chest, but she clung to him with a grip that made him grunt.

"I am so thankful you didn't come today," he whispered into her ear.

They had argued about it actually. Duo had wanted Hilde to come because he wanted the other Gundam Pilots to get to know her better, but Hilde didn't see the point. They knew who she was and just because they had met once during the war didn't exactly make them friends. Besides which, most of the other Gundam Pilots were a bit too… taciturn for her taste.

Duo had to concede this point. Although Hilde was a field trained soldier, she was different from the others. It turned out that her greatest strength was in recruiting. She was attractive, talkative, easy going, and relentless when it came to building relationships. She had gotten hundreds of people to sign up for Preventer information sessions in just a few months.

To see her looking so somber smote his heart.

"So who is he?" Duo asked, rubbing her back. "Our terrorist?"

"That's just it," Hilde said, pulling free. "He's just like one of you. He's not a soldier, but…" She bit her lip. "He's like any young person I would recruit to join the Preventers. I just can't help thinking... what if I had met him yesterday?"

"It's not your fault, Hilde," Duo said. "Don't do that to yourself."

"He's working alone," Hilde said. "He says so anyway and I believe him. If this was a larger thing—something planned—I think we would have heard about it. He said he opposes the unification of Earth and the Colonies, that it was the old Alliance that led to the war. But… It just doesn't seem like enough."

Duo scrubbed a hand through his hair, fingers catching in the weaves of his braid. "Yeah, that doesn't make much sense," he muttered. "A lot of people are unsure about unification, but to blow up your own representatives?"

"I know! He's from Earth too. If anyone opposed unification, it should be people from the Colonies. I just can't understand it. I expected someone angry, or at least defiant at being caught, but he was just sitting there. He'd already pulled over. He watched the building collapse from across the street. He didn't even try to get away."

"Where'd he get the explosives?"

"We didn't get that far, but the truck is registered to a fertilizer plant. I think he works there. I didn't want to question him too much without backup."

"Good thinking," Duo said. "It looks like we're about to get some."

Duo gestured. Heero and Wufei were approaching from the explosion site. Wufei showed no hint of emotion, all calculations hidden behind a smooth face and dark, glittering eyes. In contrast, Heero looked like he was about to erupt. From twenty paces away, Duo could tell that he was as tense as a coiled spring.

"Heero," he called. "It's been a while. You don't return my calls. I've been trying to get in touch."

Heero didn't answer.

"I keep getting your mail," Duo told him. "Can you please stop registering your address as my address? Actually, can you also stop using my name or pretending to be me in general?"

Duo meant it as a joke, a reminder of days gone by intended to diffuse some of the tension that was spiking out from the pilot, but Heero turned those blazing Prussian blue eyes on him with a ferocity that made Duo take a step back.

"Okay," Duo said, waving his hands. "Never mind. Do what you want. I just thought maybe you'd be getting your own place soon, somewhere near Relena since—"

He tried to call the words back, but it was too late. The thought had escaped his lips before he'd worked all the way through it.

The look Heero shot him could have melted rock into slab. But then Heero's gaze flickered to the truck. Without another word, he launched himself passed Duo, moving so quickly he startled Wufei.

Heero flung open the driver side door. He pulled a gun from somewhere beneath his jacket and pointed it at the boy behind the wheel.