Hello everyone! 3 days 3 updates. I am impressed with myself!
I wanted to thank Kaliko the Cat and ZmajGoddess for their lovely reviews. They fuel the fire that let me write quickly! (plus they make me feel special)
Now on with the fic!
CH27
The rain was hitting the roof loudly as it cascaded down heavily. Wufei sat alone on the porch staring out into the wooded area surrounding him just listening. He wasn't expecting anyone, just listening to the sounds around him. Trying to make sense of the world and forget everything about it at the same time. There was nothing for him to do this far north and chances of people finding him, when he didn't want to be found were remote. He established this safe house in the northern territories of Russia long ago, and kept it hidden from the other pilots. He did not doubt that they in turn had their own independent hovels to go to when needing to escape.
The cabin wasn't built out like one of Winners fancy mansions, but it had all he needed and was fully stocked in case of a situation where he had to spend up to a year inside the confines of such a house. The sound of the rain hitting the ground was relaxing on such a lazy day. He for some time had thought he would not have seen green trees or experienced things like this again. He hadn't had time to enjoy it. Not ever really. On his colony it was all simulated. During the war he had very rare opportunities, after the war was Preventers, jail, and hunting for revenge.
And now he could simply sit and wait and try to see what life could offer.
Not much as far as he could tell. At least that was the conclusion he kept drawing. He was lonely and had been betrayed and had no one. Donovan had been made to suffer; the Preventers had been impacted so heavily there were several violent and bloody uprising happening daily. He kept tabs on it despite his own conclusive popular thought and opinion that he shouldn't. The more he though on it the more regret he could feel seeping in.
Not his own, but thinking of what his ancestors would be thinking of him. He had been able to ignore it for so long, but they would be angry. Meiran would be furious. But his own soul could not let him be deceived again. Not by anyone, especially by those he trusted most.
So he hid in this shelter. Not knowing what to do. Only listening to the rain.
He stood up from the porch and dropped the blanket that he had wrapped around him to the floor. He stepped out into the rain and let the water slowly begin to soak through his clothes. It was cold, but felt good on his skin.
Heat was slowly being removed from his skin, vapors coming out into the cold air when he exhaled. It felt good.
When the rain began to fall heavier, he turned and walked back to the porch and grabbed the blanket to go inside.
There were several fully stocked shelved of food in the pantry and the book shelves were lined with novels he had always wanted to read and would have if he ever was stuck here long term. He might be at this point. He had no one to avenge. He was allied with no force in the ESUN. He was on the most wanted list and had been undoubtedly bumped up the list, he was sure, now that Donovan's entire gang had been dismantled by himself. That moment had been one of pure catharsis. The sound of the man's ribs breaking and shoulder popping out its socket. The oozing of blood as he ran his sword along the man's belly, letting his insides emerge.
He had deserved it; there was no doubt in his mind. Wufei had been able to track down one survivor out of what could have been hundreds from his colony and she had been strung out on whatever poppers her pimp had for her to keep her in line. The life had long gone out of her eyes and mind. The rest were gods know where or dead.
He shook his head and recalled his trip to Mars. Zechs had been a pleasant surprise during his stay Mars. They had established some sort of a rapport. It felt nice to have someone to chat with and the end result had gone over well. It had been a while since he'd slept with anyone… not since...
Sneaking in after he had left had not been his favorite idea, but Zechs had mentioned emails and he had been curious as to what he would find. Wufei had been furious with himself at first, how could he have let this weakness assail him? How could he have allowed himself to be tempted by the idea that something went wrong and the other pilots really were sorry?
But the anger slowly faded when he took the latest logs from Zechs's email, promising he would go over them later on the privacy of his own computer. Not when he was so wound up by some futile emotions he would sooner have lobotomized from his cranium the give into. He didn't want to even entertain the possibility that the pilots were in fact regretting their decision. That he had been wrong to hide for so long. Wrong to help Marcus and Trent when they had invited him into the fold.
He hadn't been wrong.
But he didn't know what to do.
The rain kept his attention as his thoughts ran in circles hounding after each other returning to the same pointless conclusions, the lack of a plan and the beginning to feel like he made a mistake somewhere along the line. He rarely second guessed himself, both before and after the war, but he didn't know what to do.
He was lonely and the idea of sitting in a cabin reading alone for the remainder of his life was not one he wanted to entertain at the moment. He could though. Just live alone in his cabin. The idea was certainly not as palatable as he wished it could be, but he could do it if needed...
Returning to Marcus's organization could be a possibility. They were still attempting to contact him since he left to hunt down Donovan's crew. That had been part of his deal working with them. If he helped get their stocks back up by hitting the Preventers they would help locate Donovan. It worked out for the majority of the situation... but the idea of becoming a gun runner was not too appealing. He could do it just to further destabilize the Preventers... but the body count for agents and politicians with the occasional civvies thrown in were getting higher. And if he had to go back he would have to face the situation that he ran into when he came back early from raiding the Preventer warehouse the last time. It could be unpleasant.
No returning to that life was not an option. If he went to live a normal life anywhere in the ESUN he could easily be tracked down. He was after all a criminal that was strongly desired to be caught. That wouldn't suit either. He would never be going back to prison. That he was sure of. He would rather kill everyone coming at him or die trying then rot in a closed place never to be free again.
Which left staying here or seeing what the pilots and Preventers wanted from him, the ones who betrayed him and left him alone for so long. They couldn't be trusted. The effect it would have on his psyche was much more damaging.
Treize should have killed him in that last battle. He was not supposed to have lived. Or Heero could have had the decency to shoot him out of the sky instead of denying him a warrior's death. Then he would have been fulfilled, have never been disappointed in the feeble bonds he had thought to be so strong, and never gone down a path of destruction that surely had Meiran cursing and attempting to kill him from the afterlife. That was still how he imagined her to be. A small smile flitted across his lips again.
Yes, Treize should have just done it.
An hour passed of watching the rain from inside the house once he stripped off his wet clothes and was wrapped up in the blanket again. He had been holed up in this place for two weeks and the relaxing portion had dropped into monotony. He had not cracked his laptop open to check the files he had stolen from Zechs. Or to see if there were any more emails from Trent. But it was poking at the back of his mind. Willing him to get out of his mopey state and make some form of a decision. To either get himself out or to dive in completely.
He got up off the chair and went to retrieve his laptop and loaded the files he had taken when Zechs went to discover his handy work. There were the recent updates from Mars. As he had predicted the Preventers had no clue as to the fact that Donovan had been on Mars. It was only through his tracking and tips from Marcus that he was able to find the man in the first place. Some interesting information gathering techniques with the lower peons before he killed them were also involved. The files he had taken had no mention of the man's whereabouts. Not that it mattered since he was dead now of course.
He popped open the first series of emails. Une spoke about getting closer to him to try and flip him. Wufei closed that email quickly. Zechs was only chatting with him under orders. If it had said to arrest him he probably would have tried, not that he would have been very effective.
The next series were from the other pilots asking what his fitness level was like, what Wufei's plans were, if he could get him to come back.
That's all they cared about. That was it. There was nothing else. There were several emails, but most contained the same thing. Asking about his situation, what he had been doing, if he could be convinced to come back to them. They wanted intel gathered on him. They wanted to know what his plans were, where he stayed, who he worked with...
They could just be worried.
Wufei shook his head trying to remove the errant thought from the back of his brain. That was not what they wanted and he knew it. There was a mention of an investigation into the prisons, but Wufei skimmed past it. He didn't want to see explanations for what he went through. He wanted that time to not exist.
It wasn't fair.
Skimming through the email logs there was one email that caught his attention. It was from Duo. Nothing in it asked for him or about him. It was to Zechs of course.
Can you ask him to check his war-time email?
-Duo
There was no explanation. There were no questions. There were no other messages from him at all, simply a short request to Zechs.
Wufei had not checked that messaging system anymore. It was the most secure he knew, but still the only ones who knew it were the pilots and he had no reason to communicate with them since they had placed him in prison to appease the government.
He closed the laptop and set it on the floor next to his chair and continued to stare out into the rain and the coming dark. He needed to make a decision soon. He just didn't know what to do.
TBC...
well there you have it I hope you enjoyed! Wow I have been productive with the chapters this week. I think that deserves some reviews ;)
-Ciao for now
Silverserpent