Update: Tweaked/rewritten July 2020

True Intentions

Everyone just stared at MR, not really sure how to respond. Going into the military meant that this kind of thing was bound to happen, but as they watched MR sitting there shaking and on the verge of tears, none of them were eager for the experience. They paused as each of them digested what was going on, but that digestion was short lived.

"How?"

"Who?"

"Why?"

All three asked at once, feeling no remorse for bombarding him with questions until his violet eyes quivered with the memory. Only then did they pause and finally realize what visions those questions must've stirred. "If it hurts you so much, don't tell us," Eclipse was the first to say, knowing that FS and Stray were thinking the same thing, but if one of them didn't speak up soon MR would break down right there. MR didn't respond, just looked away and nodded. Pushing past them he slowly ascended up to the top bunk.

Another silence passed until Stray decided to reach over and grab his rubrics cube. The sight of him completing all four sides in the matter of seconds and then mixing it up to try again made FS and Eclipse a little nervous, but MR's condition still took priority.

Eclipse thought of leaving after watching Stray finish the cube four more times, knowing that there was nothing more that she could do to help MR. If anything, whatever she said probably would've upset him even more. "I think I should—"

"Codename Lunar Eclipse, here you are. Out of all the places I expected you to be, in a guy's dorm was not one of them."

Eclipse couldn't stifle a gasp as well as the full body twitch that accompanied it when she heard the officer's voice. She turned to the door along with FS and Stray who were finally settling down from MR's disturbing entrance. Shit! she thought, remembering her curfew and the consequences that most likely went along with it. "Really sir, I have a good reason for—"

"I'm not here to listen to your pathetic excuses, recruit" the soldier interrupted. He looked confident as he stood in the doorway, brandishing the weapon over his shoulder whenever he deemed necessary. The green ZAFT uniform seemed to make him feel even more secure, but Eclipse knew that if he wasn't wearing it, the officer probably wouldn't be so cocky. "I'm sure that you went through the rules considering your stay here with the other recruits." Eclipse nodded sadly. "Well then, you have nothing to blame but your stupidity. Now, back to your quarters, soldier. Your punishment will be decided in the morning."

The redhead sighed and got to her feet, saluting briefly after nodding a farewell to her friends. The guard followed her down to her room and then locked the door after she entered. Eclipse showered a few choice words as he walked away, wishing that some of those insults would sneak through the walls and catch his attention, but then dreading the punishment if they did.

After calming down a little and finally changing into sweatpants and a t-shirt for bed, she grabbed her journal and began another entry.

Something happened tonight that I'm not really sure I can put into words, but I feel like I need to try. I think I made some friends, but that's not the news I'm trying to digest. One of my new friends, MR, came back to his room pale as bleach. I've… never witnessed something like that before. His face was so pale and his hands shaking so bad that I could've sworn he'd just lived through the most horrid thing imaginable.

He told us that he killed someone. Can doing that really have that much of an effect on a person? Maybe I just never realized it. I always thought that it was a little more—what's the word… heroic. You know, like the first time I'd kill someone was to save a friend of mine and it wouldn't be so bad because they wanted to hurt someone I loved. I guess… that would make me have a rational reason for killing the person and that's okay, but the way MR looked—the way he acted—it seemed as if he didn't have anything rational to back him up. That makes me very curious. No, curious isn't the right word. …Suspicious?

Eclipse shook her head and decided to end the entry there, signing her name at the bottom and closing the leather book before tucking it away in her desk drawer. She twisted to turn off the desk lamp buy didn't sleep. It surprised her that she had forgotten about the curfew. She was worried about MR. She wondered what type of punishment was in store for her. And, despite the exhaustion she had felt earlier, her brain had extended beyond being tired and was just replaying the day's events over and over in her head.

The last thing she recalled before finally falling asleep was MR's eyes.

As soon as the guard and Eclipse left, FS and Stray finished up getting ready and crawled into their beds. Much like Eclipse, they weren't able to go to sleep immediately, a number of concerns forcing amnesia. MR had been silent as soon as he jumped into his bed, but he didn't seem asleep, even though that was almost 45 minutes ago. A look between FS and Stray showed that they wanted to ask MR about what had really happened, but both of them also didn't want to ask anything too soon and not give MR a chance to process.

Stray broke the glance first by shaking his head and rolling over onto the other side. FS got the hint and moved onto his back to stare at the bottom of MR's bed above his head.

"Guys, I don't want to be here anymore."

Stray and FS instantly sat up, FS having to rub the top of his head after because he hit it on the bottom of the top bunk. "MR?" FS asked, making sure that it was really him who had spoken up though, in retrospect, there was really no other alternative.

"Just wait until you have to do it."

"Do what?" Stray asked.

"Kill someone." Neither roommate knew what to say, but MR continued despite the silence. "What they'll do is pull you from class and take you to the other side of the facility. They'll sit you down and tell you that you'll get used to it, but never really tell you what you have to get used to. The next thing you know, you're pulling the trigger of a pistol and killing a person."

MR paused and his roommates could hear a soft sniffle. "The worst thing is that you don't even know who they are, what they look like, or even what they did. That man could've had a family and a home, but I killed him. I'm not even sure if it was a man. I killed someone that meant the world to someone else."

"MR, I—" FS began, but was silenced a second later.

"All they kept telling me was that I'd get used to it. That's all that mattered to them."

Eclipse awoke the next morning a little groggier than normal. She figured it was probably from a combination of worry and nightmares, but either way, a slow start to the morning was not a good idea given her predicament. The clock switched over to 0515 when she finally jumped out of bed to get ready. Throwing on some clothes for running, she grabbed a sweatshirt and her running shoes before heading out the door.

She saw FS and Stray in the hallway, but no MR. She was about to go over to ask how he was doing when the officer from last night pulled her aside. "Your punishment has been decided."

Well, that line was a little lame, she thought, but was in no place to either argue or mock.

"You will be running an additional hour this morning on top of our regular exercises." Eclipse blinked, knowing that they would bleed into her breakfast time and she was mentally doing the math when the guard interjected. "No, you probably won't have time for breakfast." He walked away to join the other officers. Eclipse gritted her teeth and started doing some warm-up stretches, waiting for the command to start their training.

"I'm sorry that you had to do all of that," FS apologized in self-defense class. He threw a punch at Eclipse, which she barely managed to push out wide, and came around in a roundhouse kick that sent her flying back.

Yeah right, she thought, rubbing her throbbing side and wincing when her weight fell onto a new welt that was forming on her thigh. Now only was she required to run an hour longer, she was also "fortunate" to be at the other end of a few batons. You can't just say you're sorry and then do a kick like that. She coughed a little before getting back into her defense stance. "It wasn't all that bad," she lied.

"Right…" He threw a punch with his left hand, but it didn't have the same amount of power he typically used. It was either a pity punch or he was distracted. Either way, Eclipse wasn't about to ignore the opportunity to pay him back. FS's punch landed harmlessly in the pocket of her left hand and she shifted her weight to pull him forward into her right elbow. FS caught on faster than she had anticipated and was able to dodge the counterattack quickly enough to not catch it square in the nose, but he did grunt loudly when the bone brushed across his cheekbone. He staggered backwards and blinked his eyes a little to get them clear again before going back into his own defensive stance. "That was pretty good. Either I made you mad or something else did."

"You just got lazy." She smirked and he gave a small shrug. "Hey, I've been meaning to ask you. How was MR this morning?"

FS took a deep breath and began a sequence of attacks, the two falling into a dance of kicks, blocks, and counterattacks. It continued for a minute or so until Eclipse broke the contact, stepping back and regaining her footing for the next round.

"He actually wasn't in the room," FS explained between breaths. "All of his stuff was there, but for some reason he his bed was empty."

"Do you think he left?"

"I didn't think he could leave. I mean they lock our doors after curfew, so where could he have gone?"

Eclipse thought it over briefly and was awarded with a well-aimed kick to her stomach. She was able to get a block down in time to redirect the kick toward her left hip, but her left foot was planted too firmly to completely dilute the force of the blow. She grunted and buckled at the contact, bending to one knee. FS followed through with the momentum from the kick but hesitated, which put too much of his weight on his right side and his leg dangerously close to her. Eclipse noticed the mistake and recovered quickly, kicking out at his right ankle and sweeping her foot around to knock him off balance. He didn't lose his footing, however, dipping into a roll and then returning to his feet a safe distance away. She didn't pursue. They both returned to their defensive stances.

"Maybe they took him again," Eclipse huffed.

"They better not have." Her sparring partner scowled, beginning the next round of attacks by throwing a punch that the redhead blocked cleanly.

"There's nothing we could do if they did though."

"Lunar Eclipse?"

FS and Eclipse shared a look before they disengaged and she walked over to the instructor. "Captain Vindur would like to meet with you."

"Now?" Eclipse asked, fumbling a moment before she added the "ma'am" at the end of her query.

"Yes, now," she responded. Even though the instructor seemed to be just as stoic as the rest of the teachers, at that moment, something in her golden eyes gave her away. There was pity in those eyes.

"Right away, ma'am." Eclipse saluted, nodded to FS and then followed the nearby greencoat out the door.

This is a long hallway, Eclipse thought as they turned around yet another corner. The alarm in her head was going off rapidly, but she was trying to ignore it, swallow whatever panic was attempting to rise in her chest. Another corner welcomed yet another hallway, but this time the walls had changed. They were no longer cemented, but old, green-colored tiles. Somehow, she didn't think this area of the compound was used very often.

"Ah, Lunar Eclipse, glad you could come." Captain Vindur was leaning against the wall a few paces down the tiled hallway. He adorned his ZAFT captain uniform and medals with a cigarette lying on corner of his lips. A dismissed hand gesture sent her original escort on his way back to the training rooms and he turned his full attention on her once the footsteps had quieted.

"What did you wish to speak to me about, sir?" Eclipse asked and saluted.

Vindur smirked quickly, but Eclipse didn't miss it. The alarms sounded again and this time she didn't ignore it, but there was no way out of the situation now. "Follow me please, Lunar Eclipse."

"Sir."

She tagged close behind, noting that any of the other guards they passed were walking toward the opposite direction. Her heart began to race then when she passed a bunch of steel doors, but other then their feet there was no other sound. For such a large area, it seemed like there should've been some sort of sound echoing throughout the halls or through the doors.

"Sir, where are we—"

"Hush, you are not to ask questions, recruit. I figured by now you'd know that."

"I'm sorry sir." She bit her tongue and remained a few feet behind him.

They walked a few more paces down the hall and finally stopped at one of the steel doors before the hallway turned to continue its trek. He flipped open a keypad and punched in a sequence of numbers. "Go inside," he ordered as soon as the door slid open.

Eclipse nodded slowly and walked through the opening, withholding a gasp when she saw a figure tied up in the corner with a black bag over his head. The person's hands were tied roughly behind his back, Eclipse noting a red rash stretching up his forearms. She couldn't tell for sure whether it was a male or female in that chair, but based on the chest and build, the subject appeared to be male. It took her a moment longer to digest the putrid smells and raspy breathing, but only once those realizations hit her did her brain finally connect the dots. The image of MR as he walked into his room last night flashed across her mind's eye.

It was her turn.

"Take this." He reached to the back of his belt and handed her his pistol, even cocking it for her.

She took it gingerly, looking at it dumbly and then up at him. "What do you want me to do with it, sir?" she asked, knowing that it would probably get her a slap on the side of the head, but she didn't want to jump to conclusions just yet. Perhaps she wasn't here to kill him, but then again that should have been obvious as soon as the captain gave her the pistol.

"This, Lunar Eclipse, is an execution and you are the executioner."

Eclipse heard the prisoner mumble something from his perch. His attempt at language came out in a gurgled mess. If he wasn't gagged, she probably could've understood. "You want me to kill him?" Vindur nodded. "But who is he? What has he done?"

"That is no concern of yours. The judgement has been passed and I have given you the command. Your duty is to carry it out." He left the room without another word. Only then did Eclipse notice the large window on the wall and her breath quickened. The captain had moved into the other room behind that window and was standing there.

Watching.

Eclipse's head spun. She was trying to think of some way—any way to get out of the situation. She remembered her journal entry the night before and realized that her first kill might not be as heroic as she had pictured. She mentally slapped herself then for even thinking that she might kill the man. She didn't know anything about him, and he obviously never did anything to hurt her so why should she kill him? She looked down at the pistol before looking up and staring Vindur in the eye. He was smiling—the bastard was smiling, and also not planning on leaving until the job was done, she assumed. The redhead then remembered hearing the door lock and knew that there was no way out.

She turned back to the prisoner. He was wearing a puke green, baggy shirt that looked to be a rag at one point in time. His pants were nothing special and he wore no shoes with ropes around his ankles, the familiar red rash scratching up under his pant legs. His head was upright on his shoulders, as if looking through the black hood to Eclipse across the room. Her breath caught.

He could see her.

He started shaking his head, but she couldn't understand what it meant. Maybe he was just trying to tell her not to shoot him. "What did you do?" She asked as calmly as she could muster, wishing that she could understand the loud mumble that left his mouth. A part of her wanted to go over and take off the hood, but she didn't even have the guts to look this man in the eyes. She figured that was another reason Vindur stood watch. He was ready to come in and stop her from doing anything he considered against protocol. But wasn't this man's life important? If she could keep him from dying shouldn't she try?

"Who are you?" she asked instead, getting a little closer, but kept the pistol low to the ground. "Why are you here? Did you do some kind of crime or did you kill someone? Perhaps you're from the Earth Forces and were trying to assassinate the chairman." Only mumbles came in reply.

She wanted so much to understand.

Tears threatened her eyes, but she refused to let them fall. Something inside of her was keeping her from crying. It must've been the same thing that kept her from taking off his hood and was driving her feet towards the bound man in the corner. If this man killed someone, shouldn't he have the same punishment? He should; you're right, something in her mind was telling her. He deserves to die. "Are you a murderer? A criminal?"

Mumbles.

She could feel Vindur's stare behind her, egging her on. Both provoking and threatening her at the same time.

"Answer me!" she shouted, lifting the pistol up and aiming it at the man's head. "Why are you here!"

Eclipse didn't know what had come over her. Was she in shock? Panic? No… anger? It was as if something inside had snapped and there was nothing she could do to keep her from approaching this man. It was obvious he could not communicate. Why did she keep asking questions? Some kind of bloodlust had escaped and was clouding her vision. It was taking over her mind even as she stood there. Perhaps the scariest part though, was that she liked the feeling.

She was starting to enjoy it.

"Why don't you answer me? Can't you see that I hold your life in my hands? If my finger was to twitch, you'd be dead. I've given you all of this time to reconcile what you've done, and all you can do is mumble?" Eclipse thought about MR again, but now she was angry with him and confused. She just couldn't figure out how it had taken him hours to kill a prisoner. She hadn't been in here for long and she was already ready to pull the trigger. This prisoner was nothing—no one. Just like MR's prisoner had been.

"He was weak," she announced, convinced that what she was doing was the right thing. "You're a criminal and deserve to die." The bloodlust boiled again in the back of her mind drowning out the alarm that continued to buzz in its futile attempt to reclaim her consciousness.

She walked up to the man and rested the barrel at his temple, or at least where she thought it should be. The alarm screamed in one last attempt to regain her sanity, but it went unnoticed. She pulled the trigger and watched as the man fell off the chair and onto the floor. Only then did she finally see a strand of pink hair fall out of the hood.

Vindur smiled.

A/N: Hey, sorry this one took a while, but it's a little longer than the others so that's kind of cool. It actually surprised me the way it turned out, but I'm pretty happy with it. It'll help me for the later chapters. I haven't really decided on how many chapters she'll be in the facility, but I really don't want to make it too long 'cause I want to bring in the original SEED characters, but I don't just want to say "After two years" kind of thing. Well, I'll figure it out somehow. Oh, I've been going through the chapters and found some mistakes that people were bringing up so I'm working on fixing them.

I hope you like this chapter and thank you all for your reviews!

Strata