So, after this chapter, there's sort of one more regular chapter, and then an epilogue, and then sort of a secondary epilogue for our second-part narrative. I've decided to paste all three over the course of next weekend. That will leave me the last few weeks of December to update another outstanding story.
But come January, the new crossover will begin going up. Yes, it's more Gundam Wing, but in much more epic fashion. Check back here and join me on a new journey in a new world, and a new AU that, as far as I can tell has a) never been done, and b) has endless potential. I'm totally excited. Please come see what you think!
In the meantime, enjoy!
Duo sped through the hallways, no longer bothering to engage the guards he found, simply rushing past them and, if they attempted to follow him, either losing them in his mad chase or leading them into bands of Maganacs and Royal Guards who were all too eager to occupy them. He had a very specific goal in mind, and if he spared even a moment to slow down he would start thinking about Quatre and Heero and what might be happening right now and he would turn back.
He remembered what Quatre had said.
"No one will be expecting us. If we attack just at the start of the ceremony, all the plans set in motion by Zechs and Treize will fall apart and we won't give them time to regroup. Zechs will have to secure both Heero and Princess Relena quickly, which means probably just putting them in nearby rooms and posting guards. I'll find Heero – I can follow his heart to the ends of the earth – but you'll have to locate the princess as quickly as you can. You have to get to her before Zechs thinks to use her against us."
"I'm on it, Kitty Cat," Duo muttered to himself. He'd checked the princess's rooms and all the likely spots nearest the chapel, but she was nowhere to be found. With a sudden lurch of inspiration, Duo skidded around a corner and towards the bedchamber of the late king.
Sure enough, five guards stood outside a room no one should have any reason to enter.
His blood up, Shinigami didn't even bother with stealth. He simply charged them, cackling like a banshee, his talwar in one hand, a scythe with an eerie green sheen in the other. It was his signature weapon, but impractical to travel with on land; Rashid of the Maganacs had thought to bring it for him and Shinigami was thrilled.
He hit the guards like a hurricane, spinning and slicing. He slit the throat of one guard even as the scythe separated another's leg at the knee from his body. Another turn and the sword was through the eye of the third and the scythe had torn out the jaw out of the fourth. The fifth man managed a single swing of his own broadsword, which Shinigami caught between his blades.
"And this is why I am the God of Death," he smiled creepily. The guard didn't even have time to flinch before the two blades snapped to the weak point between the chainmail shirt and the helm, removing head from body like shears snapping the blossom from a flower's stem.
He stood, grinning more than a little madly, until he had passed several breaths. Then Duo could stow his sword at his hip and return to himself. He knocked on the door.
"Princess? Are you in there?"
"Who are you?" demanded a voice, high with fear but firm nonetheless.
"My name is Duo. I'm a friend of Heero's."
"Heero said you would come! I'm so glad! Please, the door is locked!" Princess Relena sounded relieved. Duo spared one moment to be grateful that Heero had warned her about him in advance. He bent to pick the lock, the work of a moment.
"It's pretty ugly out here, princess," he said when he had the door ready to open. "You might not want to look."
To his surprise, the door swung open and Princess Relena stepped forward. She looked at the bodies, gave a visible shudder, but swallowed thickly and raised her chin. Her whole body radiated fragile courage and stubborn pride.
"Thank you for rescuing me," she said, meeting his eyes with a calmness beyond her years. "I place myself in your care. Please bring me to where the royal ministers have retreated that I might address them myself."
Duo smiled a real smile and gave her his flashiest, swashbuckling bow. "It would be my genuine pleasure, princess. My name's Duo, and I run and hide but I never tell a lie. I'll take you to those old guys and we'll make them see reason together."
Then, hearing more yelling not far off, Duo offered her a hand. When she took it, he swung her up onto his back. "Going to be a lot easier this way," he told her. "Just hold on and don't let go!"
Trowa happened to round the corner just in time to see Duo's braid flapping on the back of the princess as he set off at a dead run, and he nodded to himself, turning back to head down another corridor when he found himself face to face with a girl with extremely long, pale hair.
"Out of my way, now," she grinned at him. "I've got to go make sure Princess Relena is safe."
"No, you don't. She's fine, but," Trowa drew two of his little daggers, "I think you need to go elsewhere."
"I'm right where I should be. Right where we both should be, of course," she tipped her head at him and batted her eyelashes. "Or have you forgotten so quickly, my dear?"
Trowa narrowed his eyes but said nothing.
"Oh, of course, Your last round through Zero left you a little empty inside, didn't it, darling? Well, you'll just have to take my word for it, then. My name is Dorothy and we were on the same side for quite some time."
"I don't believe you," Trowa managed coldly.
"You should, though. What Zero made you, before Count Khushrenada used it once too often, was a thing to behold. You were just a simple gypsy traveler, but you found your way to us and oh! What fun we had!" Dorothy rocked gleefully on her heels. "Once Zero had given you a much better purpose, you were better with it than even I. It was such a sad day when your turn in the machine left you somewhat...blank."
"If what you say is true, I'd rather not remember it."
"When Count Khushrenada finds you, I'm sure he'll be able to restore what you lost. He's so powerful that way. I mean, I expect you'll never get back what you were before Zero, but why would you want that? Boring! You didn't miss your life or your sister one bit with us!"
Trowa felt himself suddenly become incandescent with rage. Zero. Dorothy. Count Khushrenada. How much had they taken from him?! He didn't even know he'd let fly with one of his daggers until he found himself throwing the second and reaching for more. In the space of a breath he had sent four more through Dorothy's unresisting body.
Dorothy looked at the blood pouring from the gaping wounds in her stomach and chest. She looked up at Trowa even as her knees buckled and she dropped. She giggled until the blood choked her to silence, and Trowa could do nothing but watch.
"It's sad," he said as she fought to keep laughing as death called her. "A woman who cannot even cry as she dies."
When it was over, he retrieved his daggers and set off down the hallway, a new thought burning brightly in his mind.
"If Treize did this to me, perhaps Quatre really can fix it."
A sound drew Trowa to a broad stairway that led him to the great hall where the feast was laid out. The room should have been empty, but it was not.
Within, Wufei battled his greatest enemy.
"I am Chang Wufei, of the Long Clan. You killed my people. Prepare to die!"
"You first!" Treize lunged, his own sword scraping dangerously close to Wufei's throat before the black-haired warrior managed to dance out of the way. "You run well, but your skill is lacking."
"I will uphold the honor of the Long Clan if it costs me my life!"
"It will!" Treize spun, pulling an iron tong from the fire and flinging it with all his might. Wufei had not been expecting such a dishonorable attack and couldn't evade it. The burning metal struck his left shoulder, gouging and burning it, and he dropped, biting his tongue against the pain.
"You must be that little Chinese brat I left alive all those years ago. Simply incredible. Have you been chasing me your whole life, only to fail now? I think that's the worst thing I've ever heard. How marvelous." Even as he smirked, Treize felt that lashing out was all he could do to keep from retching at the wrongness of every breath without the influx of senses that had guided him his whole life.
"Why did you attack my Clan?" Wufei demanded, curling his left arm tightly against himself. "What did you want from us?"
"From you?" Treize tossed his head and laughed. "Nothing at all! No, dear boy, it was simply an experiment. I had been learning certain...interesting tricks from a master in your lands, and I wanted to know if I could turn the minds and hearts of some thugs to murder without any good reason. And it worked!" His cold blue eyes darkened. "Until that dirty pirate took my power from me. When I have killed you as I did your family, I will have to see about breaking his mind the old-fashioned way to regain what he stole from me."
Wufei closed his eyes and forced his mind into its rigid discipline. He had the fair duel he had always wanted. He could not let it end now. He could not let this man walk away unpunished. He began to stand up again.
"Good heavens. Are you still trying to win? You've got an overdeveloped sense of vengeance. It's going to get you into trouble someday." Treize readied his blade.
"I am Chang Wufei, of the Long Clan. You killed my people. Prepare to die."
Treize attacked without warning, but Wufei parried the blow and stabbed into the opening it left, digging the point of his blade into Treize's right arm.
"I am Chang Wufei, of the Long Clan. You killed my people. Prepare to die!"
"Stop saying that!" He lunged and managed a slight slice along Wufei's shoulder, but Wufei dropped low and used the momentum of his dodge to come up inside the count's defenses. He drew the length of his blade along the man's side.
"I am Chang Wufei, of the Long Clan. You killed my people. Prepare to die!" And he struck Treize's sword from his hand.
"Spare me and all that I have is yours," Treize said, his face utterly implacable. "Zechs is a fool. You are the one worthy of my loyalty."
"If you're going to attempt to bribe me, at least commit yourself with passion.. You are a dishonorable coward. I send you now to my family to be their slave for all time." Wufei stared into his opponent's eyes unblinkingly even as he slashed him through the heart.
As the light died in the count's eyes, Wufei let him fall. "Father. You are avenged," he whispered in his native tongue.
He might have stumbled as the sudden exhaustion and pain reached him at last, but a strong, thin arm caught him and held him. He looked with surprise at Trowa.
"You were doing fine," Trowa answered the unasked question, smiling faintly. "I was there if you needed me. You didn't."
-==OOO==-
"...Wufei stared into his opponent's eyes unblinkingly even as he slashed him through the heart..."
"YAY!"
"Indeed."