Things Are Not as They Seem7
The Year was After Colony 200
General Cameron Blackwell of the Pegasus organization has made a move against the Preventers claiming that they cannot resolve all nations and colony problems. He put forth that the nations and the colonies should have their own standing army. World Peace leader Relena Darlian disagrees with General Blackwell's notion saying that standing armies will bring back war.
Chapter 7
There was a peace when sitting inside of a mobile suit, or in this case my Heavyarms. Everything is quiet, the cockpit is dark, and there is nothing. Just for a few seconds, everything is lost and forgotten, no names, no war, no battle, no memory.
Nothing.
Then the ultra compact fusion reactor starts going and there is a light humming noise. Then the screens blink on one at a time, first my front, then my far left and right, then the closer left and right. I open my eyes as stats flare up across my screens. Telling me my ammo - how much I have left, the thruster power, my power out put, how cool or hot the core is. I hear my weapons start up, even when not firing my Heavyarms keeps the weapons systems on. Then the sounds from outside.
Cries of battle, blasts from rocket launchers, explosions on either side of me and my comrades.
"Get that thing up and moving No-name!" called a man to my left. I know that voice. That was Commander's voice, when I was still in the mercenaries.
"Yes Commander," I replied. This was odd, this was Heavyarms, but why was I still in the mercenaries, and my name, wasn't it Trowa?
I worked the controls of my Gundam and got the thing up. The first thing I heard was my Commander on the com. "Good lord, that's a," there was a pause. Then an explosion. It knocked me forward in my seat as I turned to look.
"Gundam!" someone yelled. "It's a Gundam!" I know this place. This is a Colony… I look around and I see Duo standing in the street looking up. I don't understand.
"Trowa…" I see Duo's mouth move in my name. I cant control myself, I lift up my Beam Gatling and start firing on an L2 colony. I saw Duo screaming, I don't know what he was saying. God, what was I doing? This didn't happen, this wasn't part of my past…
I am lost.
Space.
Cold. Alone. Dead.
Trowa….
Is that Duo calling me? Is he the God of Death?
Trowa…
He blinked his green eyes open. What he saw was a worried expression turn into a smile. Duo was propped up on one arm looking over him, his hair loose and falling around his shoulders. Trowa brought one hand up and placed it against his face.
"Headache?" Duo asked. Trowa let out a small groan of a noise and turned on his side. Duo placed a hand on his shoulder and shook it slightly. "Comeon, a shower will do wonders."
"So will staying in bed," Trowa said under his breath as he reached for a pillow. Duo laughed, shaking his head he moved to get up. Trowa grabbed Duo's wrist. Duo blinked and looked at the hand that held him in place. "Stay."
"Oh I wish I could Tro," Duo replied smoothly as he leaned down, his lips just over Trowa's. "But see, I have this thing about my hair…"
Trowa ran his free hand through Duo's hair and made a pleased sound in his throat. Duo chuckled, Trowa went to kiss him when the door bell rang. Turning over Trowa grabbed the phone and flipped it open. Eleven thirty in the morning… had they slept that late? Or were they up to who knows when and just got a few hours…
"Never getting drunk again," Trowa said and stood up. He put on a pair of sleeping pants and made sure he was clean enough to answer the door while Duo took the shower first. The door bell rang for a third time as he reached it, unlocked it and opened it to Nicola. Who blinked at his, near nakedness.
"Was I…interrupting something?" she asked.
Trowa didn't say anything as he opened the door for her and went to the kitchen to start some coffee.
"Maybe I should call next time," she said, Trowa nodded his head. She looked around slowly, Trowa kept his eyes on her as she reached one of Duo's duffle bag. She reached over and took out a picture frame, she showed it to him. "What's this?"
Trowa looked at the picture. It was just after the eve war. Une had allowed them a picture each with their Gundams, and one together. Duo was standing between Heero and Wufei, o Heero's left, and he was standing between Heero and Quatre on Heero's right, behind them their Gundams, standing the same way. Trowa looked at it for a long minute.
"A picture," he answered.
"I can see that, who are the others?" she asked.
"Come on, don't think for a second that we think you're stupid," Duo said from the bathroom door. "Left ya plenty of hot water Tro," he said as Trowa nodded and walked into the bathroom. "You know who they are."
"I know that they are Gundam pilots, but I don't know their names," Nicola said, she walked over to the wall and hung the picture up. "I think it looks nice, if everyone looks a little warn and tired."
"We just got done with a war," Duo replied. "We were worn and tired." Nicola took a step back and looked at the picture on the wall.
"Is that the reason why you still carry weapons? Because of the war?"
"I have fought through two wars, at the time I wanted nothing but peace," Duo said.
"And now?"
Duo shrugged. "Pickin up junk and scrap in space is nice an all, but, its not the same as being in a machine. In a Gundam or mobile suit."
"You liked to pilot."
"Hell yea, still love it, though now all I can pilot is shuttles, and planes."
"You don't think Blackwell will let you pilot?"
Duo waved that question off easily. "Too mush of a risk to let me or Tro pilot. We were Gundam pilots after all."
"I don't think so," Nicola said and clasped her hands before her. "You all look sad and happy at the some time if that is possible." Duo looked at the picture and then to her doing his best to look confused. She laughed. "I think you are all happy that you got to fight and bring a kind of peace to the word, but sad that you have to give up what you have come to know and love. When you fight for what you have with what you have it has a special place inside you, that you don't want to let go. I bet you were really sad when Deathscythe was destroyed."
"Yeah, but ya'know it was for the better at the time."
"Maybe," Nicola said and smiled. Trowa walked out of he bathroom then, adjusting his shirt before looking at the two of them. "Ready for some more shopping?" she asked cheerfully.
"No," Trowa said and walked over to get some coffee. Nicola placed a hand over her mouth and laughed lightly.
"Hangover headache?" Trowa ignored her and drank his coffee. It had been a long time since he got drunk like that, and he did not want a repeat, not to mention that dream. Duo looked at Trowa and walked over to him.
"You gonna be okay buddy?" he asked.
"Yeah, go shopping without me."
"Oh we cant do that," Nicola complained.
"Yes you can."
"Come on Nicola," Duo said cheerfully. "We'll go shopping and have fun for Tro. It'll be a blast!"
And what a blast! We were walkin down the street, when this guy decided then and there was a good time to try and rob the store we were walking by. I mean come on, who robs stores money these days its all done in credits, no cash is ever used anymore. Nicola and I both stop in the door way and just stare that this guy in a ski mask waving his gun around at the clerk. Everyone was afraid of this nutcase, well yeah he was waving a loaded gun around threatening to shoot people if the money wasn't placed in the bag.
Nicola started first, laughing at the sight before us. Then I started to laugh. The clerk and the armed robber turned to us.
"What's so funny?" the ski-masked robber yelled.
"You," I answered. "Whatcha think ya gonna get out of him? Aint nothing done in paper anymore, not for years, turned it all ta credits."
The ski-masked man tried to glare at me, but oh I have endured Heero's glare, this guy had nothing on Heero's glare. He turned tail and ran out the back I am guessing. Nicola was holding her sides.
"That was like out of a Before Colony movie," she said.
I didn't know what she was talking about, seeing as I lived on the streets of L2, had no home, and worked on a sweepers ship, got mixed up in a war, got mixed up in another war, and started my own scrap yard and now getting mixed up in another war. I didn't have the luxury of watching Before Colony movies, they required special movie players and televisions. I learned from that two things, Nicola has had some real military training not to go runnin off when a crazy man is waving a gun, or she's really stupid but I don't think that's it. Two, she came from a semi rich to really rich family.
"You don't know what a Before Colony movie is?" she asked me.
"I heard of em, never seen one," I answered honestly.
She got real quiet for a while as we left the store and went to do our everyday shopping. Soaps, cleaners, and stuff like that. I pushed the cart as we went isle by isle, we even got food at the store to bring home. No more beer though, I had a feeling Tro wouldn't like seeing that so soon.
"Are you from a colony?" Nicola asked.
"Yep, L2 cluster, V08744," I replied. She stopped and looked at me. "What about you?"
"L3, V05322," she replied.
"That colony was decommissioned in 193 wasn't it?" I asked.
"Yep."
"Ever been to Earth?"
"No, but I hope to, when General Blackwell starts the official attack on Preventers."
And my alerts went up. This wasn't about nations and colonies getting back their right to have a military, this was some man trying to start another war. A war against the preventers, and if the preventers pull out of all the colonies and nations that get a standing military… they would be an easy target to go down and eliminate easily.
"Have any idea when that will be?" I asked her as we walked down an isle of canned goods.
"Honestly no, are you looking forward to it too?"
"Yes," I said excitedly. By now it was easy to fake my excitement and smile, I had done it so often and for so many reasons.
We then talked about different foods and how to cook some meals. Normal things. Things I had been talking to Hilde with up until some odd weeks ago when I joined Trowa for this mission.
"Where is Trowa from?" Nicola asked as he slowly made our way through the clothing department. I was looking at slippers with lion heads thinking of Trowa.
"Don't know, Earth I think."
"Is it pretty?" she asked over her shoulder.
"Yeah, everything is, the sunrise and set, the moon and stars, it all looks so different. The air is different too, not cycled air like on the colony, and at night when its dark its dark, no after glow effects from lights of the colony," I informed her. She smiled,
"Sounds like a dream."
"When I first landed on Earth, I was stumbling over myself, nearly coughed up a lung too."
"I bet that was a sight to see."
"Yeah nearly got shot too."
"I wonder why… the great and powerful Gundams land on earth and destroy five bases all at once, and there is Duo, stumbling around his own two feet, cant figure out which way is up…"
Walking inside the apartment with bags the first thing I see is an empty room. I set my bags down and check the rooms. I see nothing.
"Where is Trowa?" Nicola asked as she sat her bags down.
"Not here," I answered.
"Oh, well, it was fun, remind me to take you and Trowa to see a Before Colony movie sometime," Nicola said and left me to put away our spoils. I set Trowa's new house slippers on the table for him to see when he comes home.
Oh I waited for a good two hours before the door finally opens and Trowa walks in. I go to open my mouth but close it when I see him place a finger to his lips. I blink and then see what he had been doing.
In his arms was the most adorable little kitten. It was black with the tip of its right ear white. Trowa sat down a couple of bags and hands me the really small kitten. She couldn't be more then a couple of weeks old. He made it a litter box and bed.
"Where?" I asked.
"She was on the street when I went for a walk. In a box with three other dead kittens, I couldn't leave her, so I took her to a vet to get her looked at," Trowa whispered.
I was excited. We had a pet.