The hoverbike slowly settled down in the ruins of an old city, blowing dust and old pieces of newspaper in every direction as the gravity deflection field pushed them away. He helped Ciel in the direction she indicated, and found a large warehouse in their way.
"In there." Ciel said quietly, obviously being somewhat drained from the 3 hours of flight on the motorcycle with an open, infected wound. Zero opened a side door to the warehouse, and walked into the dim, disused storage area. Ciel directed him to a pile of boxes, and had him slide them away for her. She stumbled over to a spot on the ground, and slid back a panel that perfectly matched itself with the dusty concrete around it. She punched in a quick password, and closed the panel as a crack appeared in a perfect circle in the ground around her, about wide enough for five men to stand abreast across. Zero stepped on to the circle, and helped Ciel up as the floor that had just become an elevator slid downwards. Zero felt Ciel fall against him as they descended, and decided to go ahead and pick her up.
The elevator slowly became lit as a doorway a door materialized from the bottom of it, and quickly sliding entirely into view. The elevator stopped at the doorway, and Zero stepped into a long, dirty hallway, doors lining the sides. He looked to his left and saw a dead end, and so headed to his right. The elevator zipped back up the long tube behind him. He walked quickly down the hallway, looking for anyone who could help Ciel. He started running, still finding no one in the halls at all. Finally, he saw a large room ahead that seemed to have people in it. Zero slowed his pace a little as he neared it, and found that there were many people in the room, and they were bustling about doing something Zero could not figure out. He stepped into the room, trying to find someone to help. For a few seconds, none took notice of him, but soon, a short, extremely thin man in a green uniform and hat, obviously no older than sixteen, turned and dropped his jaw in surprise. His buddy (who was probably quite a bit older) standing next to him turned to find out what was so fascinating. For a moment, his jaw dropped as well, but he quickly composed himself, and started to say something, but before he could begin, His smaller friend started to yell.
"It's Zer-!" He began, but a hand flew across his face, instantly stifling him. The older one looked around, and hastily pushed Zero out into the hall, the younger one trailing behind. Out in the hall, the soldier pushed Zero against the wall, and stared at him.
"I can't believe it! You're back!" He whispered. "This is incredible! Do you have any idea what you mean! You're back, you're finally back!"
"If I'm so special, then why did you push me out here?" Zero replied, disliking his being pushed out of his first chance to get Ciel some help.
"Because if you stayed in there, you'd get mobbed, and Ciel needs help. I'll take her in there, and get her to Cerveau, then you can get mobbed." He took Ciel very gingerly from Zero's arms, and returned to the large room. Zero heard his voice yelling, "Ciel's back, and she's hurt, someone get Cerveau!" The buzz of noise became more furious as a few new recruits began to scream frantically, and the rest tried to orchestrate getting Ciel to whoever this Cerveau was entirely separately. The noise became louder and louder, until finally the room fell silent as a voice yelled;
"Calm down, calm down, I'm here. Bring her to me and I'll fix her up in the medical lab." There was a final little rumble of conversation and movement, the whirr of an elevator shaft powering up. The room began to immediately roar with suspicion and speculation as the man left.
The soldier came out, and grabbed Zero by the shoulder, "Come on, get in there!" he pushed Zero through the doorway, and started to shout. "Zero! It's Zero! Ciel found him! Zero's back, He's finally back!" Zero stood with a dumb, blank expression on his face, not knowing precisely what to do after having his name called out in such a momentous manner. Every voice immediately went silent, every head turned, every jaw dropped. There was a momentary silence. People were staring dumbly forward for several seconds before a lone recruit shouted.
"Yeeeeaaaaaahhhhh!" He was soon joined by a roar of a thousand or so raucous voices screaming at the top of their lungs and raising fists in the air in triumph. Zero was grabbed by a soldier, and passed through the crowd as if he were some trophy that an underdog team had finally won. Some of the people leapt on him, others merely wanted to lay a hand on him. Hundreds of voices welcomed him, congratulated him, yelled at him, thanked him, and a million other things that Zero couldn't comprehend because of the confusion those voices made by smashing so often into one another, turning into a loud jumble of indecipherable noise. Zero was dumbfounded by the sudden onslaught of adoration, and simply allowed himself to be pushed along, not doing anything for himself.
"Thank you so much!" rang in his ears. "It's so wonderful to have you here!" echoed through his mind. He couldn't take it, he was stifled under a million thanks and praises. He was beginning to drown in the sea of grabbing hands and loving words. His eyes stared blankly forward, his mouth hung slightly open, the limpness of his body went unnoticed as he passed through the crowd, riding gently along the passing hands, feeling five grab him at once as soon as the five before just reached the end of their range. The fools noticed nothing. They were like a three-year old first seeing a cute little kitten; squeezing it to death, but only with the best intentions, of course. The impromptu celebration continued for what seemed like hours, though Zero knew not how long it truly had been. A pair of hands fought through the forest that the others created, pushing them laboriously aside, and slowly making their way to Zero. A man followed behind the hands, wearing a technologically advanced visor and a long, pale green robe. His half grey, scraggly hair swayed back and forth as he turned to either side, yelling at the many bodies around him. He reached a pair of white gloved hands forward, lifting Zero's limp form from the practically rioting mob around him. Zero was lifted over the shoulder of the man who saved him, and was carried out of the room.
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Zero came back to himself shortly after leaving the crowd; he was in a small medical lab in a cot along one side of the room. He sat up very quickly, and was sent reeling back in pain as he felt his head hit a very hard, invisible something. He looked to the outside of the cot, and saw a white reflection of a light outside pass through. The cot's fiberglass covering was closed. He heard a set of muffled gasps pass through the covering, and looked to see a large crowd of people looking intently into the small chamber, obviously waiting to ask if he was alright, or if he needed anything, or perhaps if he felt well enough to shake their hand again. The onlookers infuriated Zero, and he frowned as he fell back and tried to look like he had shut down again. Zero listened to the murmurs of the truly stupid crowd, and found that most of them thought that he had knocked his systems loose when he hit his head, and had temporarily shut down. Zero laughed to himself, not letting them see anything, naturally. He squinted very lightly to see the people turning to each other to find out what his neighbor thought about it. The man that had rescued Zero from the mob slid through to the front of the crowd, turned, and addressed them. Zero listened intently, as his voice was deeply muffled by the fiberglass.
"People, please!" He was trying to calm them, "you almost literally scared this man to death earlier. You've got him so terrified that he's trying to trick you into thinking he's asleep. Now please, leave the poor soul in peace for a moment." Some of the soldiers left immediately, but several obstinately hung about. "Go on! Get!" the man snapped, reaching into his coat pocket, and pulled out a tazer-like object, and prodded a few out with it. The rest quickly took the point, and left grumpily. He closed and locked the door behind them, punching in the locking code rather furiously.
"Sorry about them," He said, apparently to Zero, as he walked over to the cot and punched the button that slid the covering away. Zero sat up safely this time, rubbing his head to diminish the last remnants of the pain. "They get a little stupid when their excited in such large numbers."
"What were they doing?" Zero asked, wondering who this man was, and why he was being so considerate of him.
"Being idiots. They've never had such a massive victory like you, and went a little crazy. My name is Doctor Cerveau, I'm the chief mechanic and medical doctor for this facility. It's an honor to meet you Zero." He held out his hand.
"What is it that makes me so special?" Zero asked as he shook the doctor's hand.
"What do you mean? You're Zero, the Zero! You've obviously heard of your name before."
"I have, but I still don't know what's so special about it." Zero replied.
"You're a legend!"
"Was a legend." Zero corrected, "I have no idea what I'm doing here."
"You saved Ciel from the most intensely guarded facility on the planet, that's proof enough for me."
Zero gasped, suddenly remembering. "Ciel, where is she?" he asked, looking around frantically.
"She's on a bed over there. Thanks to you she's fine. That bullet must've been hell, the wound was so infected that I had to cut out nearly two pounds of dead and dying flesh." Zero looked over to a traditional hospital bed, and saw Ciel, lying next to a heart monitor and an IV hookup. "Yep, I don't doubt if she had been a few hours later, she would have lost a considerable chunk of her side, and if she had gone a few days without treatment, she would've died." Zero was surprised; he hadn't expected it to have been nearly that serious. "If you can do that, you have to be something special."
"But I'm not!" Zero said impatiently, "I have no idea what I did, I just did it. And now everybody's acclaiming me as this massive hero, when I have no idea how to be a hero!"
"But you do. You know nothing of your past?" Zero shook his head, "according to records, you were quite the lady's man, a glory hog, and a bit of a showoff. You may not know what you're doing, but your body sure does."
"And yet somehow, I don't find this very comforting." Zero stood angrily as he said this, and stormed over to the door. Since it had been locked from the inside, it opened for Zero, and he found himself staring down a very large crowd of would-be onlookers. At the opening of the door, a pair of them stepped back; they had apparently been trying to listen in on the conversation. However, they had either not heard much, or were far stupider than Zero had once taken them to be, as the mobbing process tried to begin again. Zero felt himself grabbed by a soldier, but before he could be pulled into the crowd, he raised his fist, and smashed it into the soldiers face with such force as to send him into the supportive grip of one of his buddies. There was a collective gasp and murmur as everybody in the crowd took a couple steps back. Zero stormed forward, and the recruit he had hit cowered in fear, but Zero walked straight past him, pushing the people aside. Soon, they stepped away out of fear, and let him pass through a long hall they made for him. Zero broke into a run, not looking back.
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Zero soon found himself standing on a balcony in the early evening. He felt safer out in the open like this, and the sunset was beautiful. The golden-orange sun sank low, entangling itself in the thick, heavy clouds that seemed always to linger around in this world. He was free. He didn't ever want to go back. He had only been involved in this war for matter of days, and yet it had already nearly killed him on several occasions, and created multiple disillusions about him. He wanted to run away, never come back, find somewhere outside of this war that so strongly vied for his addition to their side. Somewhere where nobody would know him and everybody would like him. Somewhere he could just have fun. His dreaming was interrupted when he felt a pull on his long golden hair. He looked around, not knowing what to expect, and saw a young girl with dark blonde hair carrying a tattered stuffed rabbit. She looked to be no more that six years old.
"Are you mister Zero?" she asked him in a truly innocent tone.
"That depends." Zero replied shortly.
"On what?" the girl asked. She was obviously quite intelligent for her age.
"On whether you want to tackle and thank and hug me until I die." Zero was being intentionally cold toward her. He didn't care if she was young, he wanted to be alone.
"Oh, no. Well, I did want to say thank you for helping us, but I also just wanted you to meet my friend mister bun-bun." She held out the torn up rabbit, which Zero took very gingerly.
"Well then yes, I am Zero." He replied, "Thank you for introducing me to mister bun-bun, I'm sure we'll be good friends."
The girl giggled, "He can also help you beat up the bad guys; you can keep him."
"Well thank you very much, I'm sure he'll be a big help." Zero, for the umpteenth time, hardly knew what he was saying, but he felt an odd soft spot for the girl, and apparently, he used to like kids quite a bit.
"Allouette? Allouette, where are you?" Zero heard a voice calling from inside the dark building. A young woman emerged in the doorway, and saw Zero standing next to the little girl, "Oh, Allouette, there you are, come on, it's time for dinner!"
"But momma," the girl replied, "I don't eat dinner!"
"I don't either, but it's polite to sit with your guests, and the refugees are eating too. Now come on!" She walked forward, revealing herself to be a woman no older than eighteen, but by the mention of the two not eating dinner, Zero could only assume they were reploids. But that was instantly swept form Zero's mind after he studied the woman a bit longer: She was beautiful, absolutely stunning, with long, wavy brown hair, and sky blue eyes. She wore a red tech suit trimmed with blue, and a light grey undertech beneath it. Zero slid off of the balcony railing, and stooped to say good bye to Allouette.
"You be good now. I'll see you later." He smiled and ruffled her hair.
She didn't reply at first, but instead tackled him in such a crushing hug as a six-year old's body can give, and said, "Take care of mister bun-bun!", And ran off to the warehouse next door to enter the resistance base.
"I hope she didn't give you too much trouble." Her apparent mother spoke in a British accent, giggled, and stepped forward again to see who it was that her daughter had befriended. She staggered back in a mix of terror and surprise as the blackness of a silhouette removed itself from Zero. "Z- Zero? Bloody hell! b-but, but it's been… and- but… I-I," She stumbled over her own words, bringing out only fragments of them.
"What's wrong?" Zero asked, as he stepped forward, but as soon as he did, she stepped back again, not wanting the distance between them to close at all.
"Y-you, you don-, bu-but I…" She turned and darted back trough the house and headed very quickly back to the resistance base. Zero was entirely taken aback by her reaction, and assumed that he had been passed off as a very unkind person by those who saw the young man whom Zero had "assaulted" as they were sure to put it. He took one last look at the beautiful sunset before he headed towards the warehouse himself.
He soon realized, however, that he did not know the password, and was entirely unable to get in. He sat on a box and pondered. He could try password after password until he got it, but that would take entirely too long, and the password probably changed every few minutes anyway. He could look for another way in, but the entire base was most likely very well sealed off; too well for him to find a way in. His energy levels were still over fifty percent, so he decided to look around the area with mister bun-bun before he tried to get in so desperately. He walked through the ruinous streets, looking at the dead, gutted buildings around him. He realized that there was almost no vegetation around, and definitely no wildlife. The remains of what looked like a large power plant loomed in the distance, attracting thick stormclouds and many a lightning strike, most probably due to a lingering static charge from the few wires and systems left about. He wandered for hours through the streets, not finding much exciting to do, although he wasn't bored; he actually quite enjoyed the peacefulness. Nothing happened, just the broken buildings, spilled and almost entirely deteriorated trash piles, and dark clouds. Finally, a voice sounded behind him. "Zero!" it yelled.
"Zero, where in all of hell have you been?" Cerveau yelled, running up behind him, a panic slowly draining from his face. "The base is in an uproar!"
"Why so much?" Zero asked calmly.
"Because nobody even knew you weren't in the base until Allouette told somebody, do you have any idea how dangerous it is for us all for you to be out here? Neo Arcadia is looking all over for you. If anyone were to be caught outside, the entire base could be blown out of the water. Now come on, you have to get back now!" Zero saw no reason not to and followed Cerveau, though he still didn't quite get the problem with him simply taking a walk.
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It had just gotten dark. Allouette sat in the dining hall, not knowing entirely what to do. Everybody seemed frantic, yet after an hour and a half of it she still didn't know why. Cerveau had left three quarters of an hour ago while the rest of the base seemed to be combing repeatedly through every inch of the base. She pulled her legs up as a pair of soldiers flew between the long bench where Allouette sat and the one opposite her. She was hugging a new stuffed animal, one she very affectionately called "Bun-bun II", between her arms. She finally got up and ran to Cerveau's lab, which had been left open when he left, she wanted to see Ciel. The resistance leader had woken earlier that evening, instantly being greeted by a large crowd of onlookers.
"Ciel?" Alloutte said as she poked her head into the lab.
"What's up, sweetie?" Ciel asked, turning to see one of her best friends entering the lab.
"Ciel, I think I made everybody go crazy." Allouette hung her head.
"Why would you think that?" Her friend replied.
"Because I said that mister Zero had been outside, and then everybody started running around looking for him, I think I might have done something wrong."
"Oh, no." Ciel put her hand on the girl's shoulder. "They're just worried about mister Zero, you did the right thing. If nobody knew he was out there, then he might have been killed by the Arcadians." Allouette gasped at the mere mention of the 'bad guys'
"So, I might have saved mister Zero" Ciel nodded. "My momma might not like that, when she met mister Zero she got all scared of him."
"Oh, dear God…you- your mother met him?" Ciel had just finished putting the pieces of it together, "Um, Ally, baby, can you tell your mother to come here for a minute?"
"Ok!" Allouette gave Ciel a big hug, and ran out of the room. Ciel lay back on the bed, Her wound had nearly healed now, thanks to Cerveau's advanced medical technology she would be up an about by the next evening, or so the doctor said. Ciel had no idea how this situation would play out, though it most likely wouldn't be for the better. She wondered what could possibly unfold from the terrible match-up of events, but she knew it would almost definitely be entirely too much for Zero to take at the delicate stage his emersion into their world he was in. Ciel began to wonder how anything like that could be good for Zero in his condition, but it seemed that there was no way to avoid many things. This situation, however, Ciel was determined to put off until Zero would be okay with it. She didn't know, however, that it would even do anything, but given the incident with the blood, she wasn't about to take any chances.
"You wanted to see me?" Asked a voice from the door.
"Yes, come in." the silhouette in the doorway walked slowly into the darkened lab, and sat in a visiting chair next to her, it was Allouette's mother.
"What was it about?" She asked apprehensively.
"Don't worry, you aren't in trouble," Said Ciel, sensing the fear in her voice, "Actually, I wanted to talk to you about Zero."
"I thought you said I wasn't in trouble." The lady said quietly.
"Don't worry, Zero apparently hasn't remembered you yet, otherwise, you'd be quite elsewhere, and most definitely not so unhappy. And I'm hoping to keep it from getting to that point."
"How are we going to do that? His memories are bound to come back sooner or later, it's only a matter of time before he remembers me."
"Not necessarily." Ciel's voice was getting quieter, "I think his memories are activated by certain triggers. Like when he helped me stop the bloodflow on my wound, some blood leaked onto his hands, and he seemed to start remembering something terrible. I think your name might do the same, so please don't let him know it."
"I'd rather not, it'd only complicate my lovelife."
"I really don't care how, just be truly careful he doesn't hear it." Allouette's mother nodded, "Thank you, Iris."
Author's note: Betcha didn't see that comin', now didja? Major bombshell here, eh? Yes, I know it's nowhere near cannon, but when has anything I've written been entirely cannon, huh? There ren't any new terms in this chapter, therefore, no footnotes! Hoever, if anyone didn't understand anything, just mention it in a review, and I'll explain later. ((In cheesy announcer voice)This offer will expire when the next chapter is posted, no purchase necessary to enter, purchase will not increase your chances of winning, for details, see the mail-in rebate on the inside of this box.) Stay tuned, keep reading, and review.