Respect between Enemies – The BetanWerecat
Gundam Seed: "Descending Sword" and after. OCs with appearances by canon characters. The actions of Kira, Athrun, and the others have far reaching effects. Ah, interpersonal relationships! What joys they are. Rated T for language and off screen activity. (Reviews are welcomed but not required. This is written only for my own enjoyment. Flaming me will get you ignored.)
I love the works of Rudyard Kipling! Especially "Kim" and his ancient history poetry.
Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Seed.
Roland Ito glared at his daughter-in-law when she put the opened book down on top of the charts he was working on.
"What is this?" He gave it a quick once-over and was startled. "Poetry?"
"Instructions." Serin replied bluntly. "Read the middle two sections very carefully. Then I have a letter to show you. It will explain the poem."
"I don't have time for some silly game!"
"Make time, Roland." She ordered grimly. "All our calculations have been upset."
He gave her an odd look, then pulled the book into a better reading position before he began to recite it aloud.
"Rome never looks where she treads, Always her heavy hooves fall
On our stomachs, our hearts or our heads: And Rome never heeds when we bawl.
Her sentries pass on – that is all, And we gather behind them in hordes,
And plot to reconquer the Wall, With only our tongues for our swords.
We are the Little Folk – we! To little to love or to hate.
Leave us alone and you'll see How we can drag down the State!
We are the worm in the wood! We are the rot at the root!
We are the taint in the blood! We are the thorn in the foot!
Mistletoe killing an oak – Rats gnawing cables in two –
Moths making holes in a cloak – How they must love what they do!
Yes – and we Little Folk too. We are busy as they –
Working our works out of view – Watch and you'll see it some day!
No indeed! We are not strong. …………"
He stopped. "What is all this?"
"I told you, instructions. The actual title is "A Pict Song" by an English poet and writer from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, old dating, named Rudyard Kipling. He produced quite a number of very interesting pieces. Many of them are still quite useful." She dropped the poisonous letter on top of the book of verse. "Now read this."
He twitched it into position and read silently. Serin could follow where he was in the letter just by the tiny changes in his expression and the sudden tensions in his body. For a wonder, it looked very like he was going to understand the situation on the first pass this time. Using the old Kipling poem to get his mind started in the right direction had been a very good idea. His eyes were blazing by the time he reached the end.
"No!" Roland barked.
"No what? No you don't understand the letter or no, you're not going to admit what it means?" Serin demanded.
"I understand what he thinks he's doing perfectly well, damn it! But you're assuming he'll be all but invulnerable and that's idiocy!"
"I never said the man's invulnerable; now or when he finally steps forward to seize power." She said with an icy calm. "I am saying you are leaning toward being a mule-headed fool again though! We are not equipped to fight the war with him you want to fight. Read that letter again. Pay attention to the fourth paragraph from the bottom. Unless you have an answer for it, you'd better start planning a very different war from the one we've been intending to wage."
"Bah! We can handle Dee! He's not as smart as he thinks he is!"
Serin forced herself to count to ten rather than just scream in his face. This was precisely the attitude she'd been afraid he'd have. Normally she'd walk our and let him stew a while before trying again. Unfortunately, this time it wasn't practical. Dullindal had at least one well placed set of eyes and ears inside the Project itself for him to know as much as he'd put in that letter. She couldn't afford to let Roland show this kind of defiance where that unknown agent could report it back or they would never even be able to fight the Pict's way.
"First of all Roland, he has a name; use it! He sent you a letter old man! He's through pretending he doesn't remember you! It's a little late for pretending you've forgotten him!"
"Serin, what's the matter with you?" He sounded genuinely shocked this time.
"Fourth paragraph from the bottom; that's what happened." She replied savagely.
Reluctantly he picked it up and looked at it again. This time he took it very slowly, actively trying to understand just what had her so upset, so sure their plans had to change. She watched the color rise and fade in his face as the subtle threats finally sank in. Oh yes, this time he was getting the real message here.
He went back to the top of the page and started the entire thing over, reading it all with that same care and probing study. It took him almost half an hour. When he was done, he set it down with the kind of care an explosives expert might give to a corroded, home-built booby-trap. In it's own way, it was just as dangerous even if the explosion it would make didn't send physical shrapnel through the air. Political shrapnel could also kill, something too many chose to ignore. For a good while he just sat there, an oddly blank look on his face that told her he was considering something with his full attention. Finally he shook his head and returned his attention to the larger world.
"He holds quite a hand of cards." Roland said quietly.
"Yes. I wish we'd understood his relationship with Patrick. There are a few moves I wouldn't have made if I'd know about it. I suspect there are some you regret now too."
"Doesn't matter." The old man dismissed it. "The past can't be changed. We did what we did and he learned what he's learned from it. The new trick will be to control what else he learns from now on."
"We need to find that traitor. Then we can come up with a sound reason to dismiss them."
Roland snorted at her. "Now who's being the fool? Yes, we need to identify them but we don't dismiss them. We use them to feed Gilbert the information we want him to have. If we toss one out, he'll just suborn another that we haven't identified. No, we will leave his agents in place once we find them. We may have to move one or two around inside the Project if they are too dangerously placed but we don't get rid of them and we don't demote anyone without an ironclad reason!"
He leaned forward, resting his arms on his desk. "In a way, the problems we had during most of the war may turn out to be one of the best disguised blessings around. We are just now beginning to see a real hope that Kayla's idea will work. I've buried myself here since Bloody Valentine. So have you pretty much too. I know the staff generally thinks this Project is my be-and-end-all reason for continuing to exist. The spy or spies here should mostly think that too. It shouldn't be all that hard to keep up that impression."
"Work and your grandson as your only reasons left for living?" Serin asked thoughtfully.
"Yes, that's right. When you consider our outside-the-Project moves lately, they were all about Adrian weren't they? So they would actually reinforce the image here."
"Where are you going with this Roland?"
"Mistletoe killing an oak – Rats gnawing cables in two –
Moths making holes in a cloak – How they must love what they do!
Yes - and we Little Folk too. We are as busy as they –
Working our works out of view - Watch and you'll see it someday."
"I believe you called those instructions earlier and under the circumstances, they're good ones. So that's the screen we will hide behind. Let Gilbert think I've become obsessed with my drive to establish us as a secure and soundly reproductive population. He understands obsessions; he's been working on his for decades after all. And if I appear to have no other interest, he'll believe it. After all, with Mai gone, all I am is a pathetic, lonely old man. He never did understand that I could live on my own; that I did before Mai and I have since she's been gone."
He looked away. "I miss her more than that bastard will ever know but that doesn't mean I'm helpless without her. Still, back when we were all connected to Hibiki's project, Mai was my go-between with the outside world. Not because I couldn't handle it but because it was easier to let her do it. She was always much better with people in everyday situations than I was. It was our division of labor you see. But that isn't what Dullindal saw. He saw dependency. He chided me about it more than once."
He turned back to her, a rather ugly little smile on his face. "So you see, that's how he will remember me. And that's what I'll give him now. An obsessed old man who uses his daughter-in-law to face the world for him in place of his lost wife while he lives in his lab. Think you can deal with that?"
She sat back and thought about it. It had much to be said for it really. It wouldn't involve much if any change in their behavior for one thing. That would be important with unknown eyes watching. It would let Roland growl at Gilbert toothlessly and accept his largess at the same time to benefit the Project. It would give that man a reason to feel smug around them. And you rarely paid close enough attention to those who let you feel smug.
Very importantly, it would give her primary control of when and how outside contact was made. She had professional society meetings she went to regularly and people she interacted with beyond the Project on a normal basis. She was the one who rode herd on Adrian as well. When the babies were born, it would not be out of line if she became something of a doting grandmother and visited often. Yes, this had many possibilities.
"I like this." She told him honestly.
"Heh, thought you would." He grinned mirthlessly.
"But you will need some reason to go out occasionally yourself. You must not be so bottled up here that to leave is automatically suspicious. It might be vital to have you be able to meet someone or pick something up instead of me sometime. What besides genetics and Adrian could you use as a reason to go out?"
"The Advancement Society." He replied immediately. "Not only are there meetings to go to if the topic looks interesting, there are labs to visit and even gardens, farms or release events. I've been a member for sixty-eight years, I do go to some of those events, and I have continued to do so even through the war. It's really been my only outside activity so it's the one we have to go with."
"Ah, yes. I tend to forget them."
"You don't like them." He pointed out calmly. "They're actively engaged in major genetic alteration of just about every kind of living thing there is. But that's exactly why it is so logical that I would keep contact with them, now isn't it?"
Serin grimaced. "Yes, I can't argue about that."
"Besides, Gilbert is also a member. Makes it easy for him to meet me if he wants a small talk sometime. And if he's going to be issuing threats like this, he'll want the occasional chat too. He's always been too damn sure he could read me."
"Are you sure he's wrong?" She asked, deadly serious.
He looked over at her flatly. "Yes. To this day, he has no idea how much I knew of what went on at Mendel. I wouldn't be here if he did. Mind, one of the things I've learned from the few sections of Joel's old data I've been able to open yet is how much more was going on that I hadn't a clue about too. We're going to need to get someone over there to strip that place and we need to do it soon."
"One crisis at a time please." Serin said firmly.
He shook his head. "We don't have that luxury. Gilbert or someone else who was part of that hellspawned project is going to get the same idea before long if they haven't already. We can't wait. I need you to get in touch with your Junk Guild friend again. We can't do this ourselves and, for obvious reasons, we can't involve any Plant resources. The only other people we could trust would be the Aube but they're just too tied up in the critical initial rebuilding phase. It'll have to be the Guild again."
"That won't come cheap!"
"It never does when it really matters dear."
"How do we pay for something that large?"
He grinned, an expression that wouldn't have looked out-of-place on a weasel. "When we were there, I checked a few things. Blue Cosmos never found the cash vaults and no one's been back to empty them. We'll just let the Hibiki Project pay for most of it."
She stared at him helplessly. It was moments like this that reminded her he really was a genius. And that Kayla Grayhawk was wrong. When he wanted to, Roland Ito could do very well indeed outside his chosen field. He just didn't want to very often.
"Very well, just what do you mean by 'strip the place'? I will need to understand what services I'm negotiating for."
"Just what it sounds like." He answered. "I want every scrap of paper with anything at all written on it. I want every data storage unit they can find that isn't completely slagged. I want anything else they find that strikes them as interestingly different that they can move out of there. And then I want them to destroy what they can't move. Most specifically, I want all of the artificial wombs reduced to unrecognizable scrap and the dead in them cremated completely."
"Roland?" She asked uncertainly.
He stared at nothing. "One of Joel's records suggests pretty clearly that there were more than two clones made for Al Flaga. How many, it didn't say. Nor did it tell me where they are stored. Another noted that there were 'other' products of the Ultimate Coordinator project. They were considered failures but they were born alive and the notes did not indicate they had been disposed of. Again, no record of how many or where they went. I told Kira Yamato he was the only live one. I told him he was unique. I lied to the boy."
"You did not lie. You gave him the truth as you knew it when you spoke to him." Serin studied her hands. "Now you have to decide if you are going to give him this new truth."
"No. I can't. I don't have enough data to give him. All I can do at this point is upset him. I can't even tell him enough to help him defend himself if one of them comes looking for him. That's why we have to strip Mendel as soon as possible though. Or the data will be gone for good."
"Yes I see. We will need very secure storage facilities as well. The records recovered could be quite voluminous."
He shook his head. "We will have them copied on site on a Probex System. That way the data will be compacted and the originals can be destroyed with everything else right there at Mendel. I would love to save them but it's just too dangerous to try. Because you're right, there'll be a lot of them. And that much stuff in storage, no matter where we put it, will attract someone's attention. It wouldn't even have to be Gilbert either. Even another Junk Guilder who was looking for information to sell could be a disaster. We're going to have a hard enough time just keeping the data storage units safe. We'd never manage to secure the paper."
She frowned. "Are you sure? Copies are never as good as the originals. Details are lost."
"That's why it must be done with a Probex. It makes four copies of each page; natural light, x-ray, infrared, and ultraviolet. It's fast too. I reduced that journal Kayla found on Rau to Probex record in less than twenty minutes, including both covers. If I'd been willing to spread it across several files, I could have completed it in a couple of minutes. The Probex we have will do eight of those journals at a time. The one I want to send to Mendel will be able to handle twenty inputs at once."
"I see." She looked around. "I suppose we must store the data in here then too. This office has always been swept to keep out any sort of probe. I suggest we use it for all discussions of a sensitive nature as we have no excuse to establish a second such site within the Project. Not even my office is this secure."
"Agreed, and Serin, I want to borrow that book, the one that Morrison fella wrote. I think I need to understand where Gilbert is coming from there."
"I'll bring it over." She looked hard at him. "Are you going to let him give you those genetic samples?"
Roland nodded. "Oh yes, I most certainly am. I'm an obsessed old man, remember? All I care about is my genetics project and my grandson. Oh, and maybe the great-grandchildren but we'll have to see how that fits into the whole image thing as we go along. Or didn't you notice his implication that I don't care where I get my materials as long as they measure up to standards?"
"I saw it." She replied distastefully.
His eyes hardened to glittering gold. "I'll take his samples all right Serin. And if they're as good as he claims, I'll use them too. Because he's not completely wrong about me. I am somewhat obsessed you know. I do intend to live long enough to ensure there is a program up and running that will take us from being the creations of the lab to genuinely reproductive humans. And won't be done using Hibiki's soulless, inhuman way either! We may not become a true, separate species, but I will see us viable before I die! If Dullindal has the material I need for that, I'll take it if he's fool enough to offer it!"
Serin Chu Ito met those gold eyes with gem hard peridot eyes of her own as she nodded a slow agreement. Their mutual smiles were not something Gilbert would have found reassuring at all. But then, he had no child or grandchild of his own to protect either. He'd seriously underestimated the reaction his one page letter would get.
"LAWRENCE!" Howard Grayhawk roared. "Shut up!"
Kayla stopped snarling instantly. She hadn't realized Pop was there. It was pretty obvious Larry hadn't known he was either. She turned her head slightly to look, and swallowed hard. Oh, man oh man, he was mad!
Howard Grayhawk might be past sixty but those years had all been lived actively. He was still tall, rawboned, ruggedly handsome, and fully capable of taking his son's head off right at the shoulders. He was just about pissed enough to do it too.
"I've had it with you boy!" He snarled. "I don't care how stupid your sister's being, you don't talk like that in front of your mother or your brother's children! I've tried polite, I've tried father-to-son, I've tried straight up orders; you've stayed deaf. Well you better hear this! You let one more cuss word out of your mouth and I'm throwing you out! You can celebrate Thanksgiving with those Blue Cosmos friends of yours if you can't stay civil in my house! I'll not have your mother crying over your mouth one more time! Do you hear me?"
"ME!" Larry screamed. "Why are you threatening me Pop? I'm not the one who fucked some …."
"GET OUT!" Pop's shout rattled the windows. "THAT WAS YOUR LAST CUSS WORD RIGHT THERE BOY! PACK AND GET OUT NOW! AND DON'T COME BACK UNTIL YOU CAN KEEP A CIVIL TOUNGE IN YOUR HEAD! TWO WEEKS OF THIS IS TWO WEEKS TOO MANY! AT LEAST YOUR SISTER KEEPS HER MOUTH SHUT!"
Pop had an audience now. Maria, Jamie, Mom and both grandmothers appeared from the kitchen. Carol, Jamie's wife, and the kids along with Todd, Alys, Crystal, and Douglas came dashing in from the living room. Kayla knew the other two were out tending the stock so this was everyone in the house at the moment; all here to see Larry get humiliated. Oh, this was going to cause so much trouble!
"Mom!" Larry appealed to a higher authority.
"What Lawrence? Are you expecting me to change your father's mind?" Janet Grayhawk asked evenly. "Because I assure you that is not going to happen. I won't try. I'm fed up with your taking your failed marriage out on your sister. Yes, she made a very bad decision. But it isn't a uniquely bad one after all. Intelligent women have fallen for pretty male faces for centuries and landed in this same trouble for it. Nor is it your place to be her judge or the judge of the baby. But most of all, I'm disgusted with your complete lack of self control. I did not raise you to talk like that! I most certainly didn't give you leave to use such language in front of your niece and nephew! They are impressionable children! No, you are the one who refuses to behave Lawrence. Everyone else is being civil at the very least. Only you are raving and screaming and upsetting the peace. So you are the one who will leave. I will have quiet under this roof! Even if I have to evict my own son to achieve it!"
She turned and fixed a steely eye on her eldest surviving son. "Jamie, you and Douglas will supervise Lawrence. Make sure he is properly packed and that he leaves within the hour. I really don't care where he chooses to stay as long as it is off Double Hawk property. No one is to mention this again! Lawrence brought this on himself. He's the one who has gone out of his way to seek out his sister to badger and abuse her at every opportunity. She has tried to stay out of his way and to avoid offending him. Since he chooses to be offended just because she exists, he can do it somewhere else!"
"Kayla," her mother added without turning to look at her, "you will take Jamie's place helping your grandmother in the kitchen."
"Yes Mom." She agreed immediately.
"Is there some reason everyone's standin' round here with their thumbs up their butts?" Howard snapped.
"No sir!" Came the reply from just about everyone except the grandmothers and, of course, Larry.
The family scattered. Kayla whipped into the kitchen just as Larry exploded. She heard about three words before she heard her father's hard hand connect with Larry's face. This wasn't going to be good for anyone in the long run. He'd always been one to carry a grudge and to wait however long it took to get even. She hoped Pop remembered that. Because Larry was not going to forgive or forget this.
"This won't help much." First Kay muttered.
"He's your son, you tell him." Maria Spotted Horse replied quietly. "He's in no mood to hear reason from his mother-in-law."
"Howe's in no mood to hear reason from anyone." The elder Kayla Grayhawk replied flatly. "He's lost his temper and there'll be no reasoning with him until he finds it again."
"Dad's temper may matter a lot less than Larry's." Kayla pointed out to her grandmothers. "He's never going to forgive this, you know he won't. And Larry gets even. To the point of excess and way beyond."
"I know." First Kay replied. "And your parents have sent him off to play with that shiftless bunch that makes up the local Blue Cosmos group. Those five boys are all game for anything nasty that lets them act like they matter."
"Larry brings them up to six." Maria noted thoughtfully, absently tapping her cane on the floor. "Tell me Kay, have you seen any more of them in the smoke?"
"No, what have you seen in the water?"
"Same number."
"Interesting. And Charlie gave us six when we asked him too."
"So all the Spirits are agreed then."
"It would seem they are."
"And you get three for the Light?"
"Same as you and Charlie, yep."
"Then we must hope they are enough."
"Oh, they will be." The elder Kayla smiled grimly and turned to her namesake granddaughter. "Do you think you can start peeling those potatoes? They mash better with the skins off you know."
"Yes, of course." Kayla grabbed the potato peeler and a chair to settle in for a while.
She didn't understand all of what she'd just heard but the basics were clear enough. Both grandmothers, and Charlie Yellow Dog apparently, were expecting Larry and his Blue Cosmos friends to cause trouble. They saw three opponents in the family ready to stand against Larry.
Damn it! She hadn't come home to start something like this! Just being here was tearing her family apart. And now, now the Spirits were telling the Medicine people that there was going to be a fight. She had to leave before that could happen. She could not allow Larry to bring Blue Cosmos here, to attack the family over her presence.
Tomorrow was Thanksgiving. Friday was the twin's birthday. She would head for Aube on Saturday morning. She knew those lazy incompetents who made up the local Blue Cosmos; they wouldn't get an attack together before Tuesday at the earliest no matter how Larry prodded. Kayla nodded at the potato she was denuding; this would solve everything and keep everyone safe. She'd start packing tonight, right after dinner.
