Disclaimer: Usually I write out a very specific disclaimer explaining exactly what it is I don't own but I find myself not really interested in doing so this time as it is very tedious. Suffice it to say I own nothing that was created by anyone else and I am not making any money off of this story or any of the other stories I have written.

AN: This story is self-beta'd; so there may be occasional grammatical or spelling errors that crop up every now and then and for those I apologize in advance.

Chapter 16: Revised Self-Destruct Sequence

Five months after the New Edwards Mission to rescue the delegates of the peace conference, roughly six weeks after Harry's birthday party, another urgent mission came through for all five pilots. OZ had built more of the Taurus mobile suits and was shipping them up to their facility in Siberia with the plans to upgrade their systems. According to the mission brief, they were sending the suits along one of two planned routes across the Arabian Peninsula; by train or by air with one route a decoy in order to throw the Gundams off target because they expected the shipments to be attacked.

After researching the new mission, it was decided that Heero and Trowa would go after the carriers, Duo and Quatre would attack the train, and Wufei would head to the Siberian base in the event that the shipment containing the suits managed to slip through. Originally, the five pilots had planned on leaving Harry behind at the estate in order to protect him. Harry, unfortunately, had other plans; which Heero discovered when he climbed up into Wing's cockpit to find Harry already dressed in his flight suit and strapped into the passenger seat that all five Gundams now sported.

"You're not supposed to be here," Heero stated the moment he saw Harry sitting there.

"I refuse to be left behind," Harry countered. "I'm not an idiot; I'm well aware that the decoy shipment is most likely a trap that OZ plans to spring in the hopes of capturing one or more of the Gundams. Quatre and Duo both have the Maganacs to back them up if anything goes wrong when they attack the train shipment while you and Trowa are left to your own devices. Which means the two of you could use an ace up your sleeve; which is exactly why I'm going with you. With both of your suits now protected by my wards I can potentially use my magic to disable enemy suits to reduce the numbers you are forced to face to more manageable levels; if necessary."

"You will do exactly what I say or this will be the last time you go with us on a mission," Heero instructed as he settled into his chair and began engaging Wing's systems.

"I always do exactly what you tell me, Heero; you left me little choice in the matter, remember?" Harry snorted in reply as he slipped on his radio headset and turned it on (studiously ignoring the handful of times when he'd rebelled against his oath and Heero's orders). "Although, if you insist on doing something incredibly stupid during the course of the mission in order to get out of keeping up your end of our deal; I will stun your ass and haul you back here for a thorough hexing."

"I see you located our wayward charge," Trowa's voice stated through the comm. unit as Heero turned on Wing's systems.

"Yeah, seems someone didn't take too kindly to the idea of being left behind," Heero replied as he triggered Wing's transformation into flight mode as he exited the underground hanger.

"He has been known ta be exceedin'ly stubborn," Duo interjected with a laugh.

"He is also listening," Harry dryly reminded Duo to the amusement of all five teenaged pilots and the Maganac that were listening in on the conversation.

"Be careful out there," Quatre admonished as the five Gundams split into three groups and headed to their assigned destinations.

Harry remained silent during the flight, his full attention focused on his laptop (which he'd stuck to the back of the pilot's chair with a sticking charm) as he read through the data that Wufei had collected regarding their mission. He'd just about finished when they caught up to the carrier transports that were potentially carrying the Taurus suits and Harry pulled his eyes from his laptop to read the information that Wing's scanners were displaying on the monitors. Even as they skimmed through the information being provided by the scanners, the carriers began disgorging a hundred Aries suits into the air.

"Zero-Two here; ground transport has been confirmed as da decoy," Duo announced as Heero began firing at the suits that were charging them.

"Negative, both transports were decoys," Trowa interjected as he joined in the fight, firing at the suits from the ground with the Beam Gatling Gun that doubled as a left arm.

"Damn it, they intended to separate us and pin us down with the two decoys while the true transport went undisclosed," Heero cursed as he corkscrewed in order to avoid getting hit even as he fired on the enemy in return.

"There are another twelve carries closing on our location from the south," Harry added as he tapped into Wing's long range scanners through his laptop since Heero was too busy fighting to monitor the rest of the sky. "There's also sign of fifty Leos and a dozen heavy tanks moving in on ground level, Zero-Three."

"They intend to box us in and shoot us down," Heero surmised as he dropped into a nose dive and before pulling up and making a hard right to bring him around to face the next wave of Aries that were hounding them.

"They won't have an easy time knocking us out of the sky," Harry murmured after muzzling the microphone on his radio. "I added protective spells to all of the suits I've warded to date; the underlying properties of the Gundams making the spells woven into the armor especially effective. Unless they have something more powerful than your beam cannon, than we should be fine; no matter what they hit us with."

"Zero-Five, be advised that the shipment will be heading your way unimpeded since they are trying to overwhelm us here in order to prevent us from intervening there," Harry stated as he returned to his self given job of keeping all five pilots updated with everything that is going on. "Zero-Four and Zero-Two; satellite feeds indicate an additional eight carriers in route to your location along with a second train that is potentially holding more enemy suits."

"Zero-One, my scanners indicate a fast approaching object larger than an Aries and headed directly for you," Trowa announced from the ground as he moved to intercept the Leos and tanks that were pouring out of the wood work.

"Roger that, Zero-Three," Heero replied as he dropped down and switched Wing over to suit form so he could bring the beam cannon into play. "Half-Pint, lock the scanners onto the new player and give me a read out."

"That code-name is going to have to go or someone is going to get hurt," Harry groused even as he complied with the order and quickly began analyzing their new opponent. "Merlin's rotten crotch… I gotta bad feeling about this… that thing is at least a meter taller than Wing, weighs over a ton more, and is packing some serious fire power. It's also faster and shit… it's already here."

Even as Harry finished his rather short and unprofessional report, the larger suit plowed into them and before they even had time to employ any counter measures they were driven into the ground from the sheer force of the impact. Harry's head ended up slamming into the monitor of his laptop before they came to a stop and Harry briefly wished he'd worn his helmet as he sat back and wiped blood out of his eyes from the cut across his brow as he eyed the now ruined laptop through cracked lenses; the screen and his glasses having been cracked when he smacked his skull on it because Harry had only warded the outer case not the inside (an oversight on his part) and he'd not thought to protect his glasses.

"You alright back there, kid?" Heero asked as he maneuvered the mobile suit up onto its feet and began running the internal diagnostics to determine how much damage that suit had taken when they crashed while watching the monitors for any sign of their enemy; the larger suit having disengaged before they'd recovered from the jolt of being slammed into the ground.

"Yeah… I'll be fine but both my glasses and my laptop are busted."

"The laptop and the glasses can be replaced, brat," Heero barked out. "Brace yourself!"

They were slammed back a second time as the large suit dropped down on them from above for a second time and the beam cannon was lost as the other suit ripped it from Wing's right hand and tossed it away. The other suit then activated a beam saber and settled into the ready position as if the pilot of the other suit wished to have a fencing competition instead of a battle.

"We have no need for beam rifles or cannons between us,*" the pilot of the other suit declared loudly.

"Oh, wow, and to think Snivellus used to say I was an arrogant prick," Harry drawled loud enough for Wing's communications system to pick up his voice and relay it to the outside speakers. "I don't know which is bigger, your ego or your need to compensate for that which you lack, mate." Harry then leaned around the chair as he watched Heero activating Wing's beam saber before whispering, "You aren't seriously going to give him what he wants, are you?"

"I don't have much of a choice; he's faster in the air than Wing and in order to face him on the ground I have to use what weapons I have available since he stripped Wing of the beam cannon," Heero murmured back as he settled Wing into a defensive stance. "Just hang on tight and try not to taunt him again."

"Brave words from a pilot whose inferiority complex appears to be just as large as the one you claim I have," the other pilot mockingly called back. "Let's see if you can face me any better than you did the first time we crossed paths several months back. I must say, I was shocked when I learned you'd survived that plunge into the ocean."

"As I recall, you turned tail the moment it became clear that you were outclassed; just what one could expect from a coward like you," Heero countered as the other pilot attacked. Heero's blade easily intercepted the enemy's blade and the two enormous suits began dancing back and forth as their swords clashed again and again.

"I thought the idea was not to taunt him?" Harry groused as he braced both hands against Heero's seat in order to prevent his head from hitting his ruined laptop a second time.

Heero didn't bother to respond, leaving Harry to mutter several uncomplimentary remarks under his breath as he was bounced around throughout the battle; all the while wondering if maybe he shouldn't have joined Trowa in Heavyarms instead since it seemed like Heero's luck was about as good as Harry's own when it came to finding trouble. At least he'd had the opportunity to add the protective wards and spells to the suits otherwise Harry was certain this battle would have been far riskier. He considered attempting to short out the other suit with his wand but because of the way he was being tossed about, he feared that his wand would be snapped before he could fire off a powerful enough spell that would pass through Wing's armor and still retain enough power to shut down the other suit.

A glance up at the long range scanners showed Trowa continuing to deal with the smaller ground units in addition to the Aries suits that were no longer targeting Wing. Even as he watched, Heavyarms took several hard hits from behind and Harry's heart rose up in his throat as the Gundam disappeared beneath the explosions until the air cleared and Heavyarms reappeared looking virtually unharmed aside from a few scotch marks.

Letting out a sigh of relief, Harry turned his attention back to the front three monitor where Heero's opponent was pictured in time to see the taller suit jump backwards before unexpectedly stopping as a news broadcast was suddenly playing across the right monitor. All battles ceased as the Gundams listened to the woman on the screen announcing OZ's successful seizure of the Alliance's missile satellites spread throughout the galaxy, revealing that the weapon satellites were now targeting all five Colonies in addition to several space stations. She then ordered the pilots to immediately stand down and surrender while threatening to destroy the Colonies should the pilots refuse.

"Damn it, what a dirty, rotten underhanded trick," Duo proclaimed irately across the radio.

"It sounds like one of their usual bluffs," Trowa commented next.

"It's no bluff this time," Wufei interjected as he patched through the feed from a remote satellites that showed the missile satellites arming their missiles and preparing to launch an attack.

"They intend to hold the Colonies hostage to buy our cooperation," Quatre added in a shaky voice filled with both worry and disgust.

There were only a few minutes of grim silence after the woman announced her ultimatum when the broadcast was suddenly taken over by an old man with long gray hair and a huge mustache that was wearing odd robotic glasses and had a robotic hook for his left hand. Harry took one look at the man and shuddered as he felt dread pool in his belly. He gasped softly when Heero muttered out a soft, "Dr. J," in recognition of the man. Harry looked at the man with new understanding as he immediately realized that the man appearing on the screen was the scientist that had sent Heero to Earth once Heero had named the man (Harry having previously only heard the names of the five scientists and not seen any videos or pictures of them – an attempt by the pilots to protect the wizard from the scientists).

Harry listened as the man called OZ heartless for threatening the Colonies who were not actually fighting against OZ before declaring that he had no choice but to surrender in order to protect the Colonies from OZ. The man went on to say that he would surrender but that he'd never hand over the Gundams. Heero immediately began unbuckling his harness and the knot of dread in Harry's stomach grew larger as he glanced between the old man on the monitor and Heero.

"Harry, do you have your broom and that fancy cloak of yours that makes you invisible with you?" Heero asked as he turned around to face Harry with determined and regretful blue eyes.

"Yeah… but what do I need them for, Heero? What are you going to do?"

"I want you to climb on your broom and throw that cloak over your body. When I open the door you are to fly out of here and get to Barton. He will take care of you."

"Heero… what are you going to do?" Harry demanded a second time as he clutched at his harness and stared up at Heero with uncertainty.

"I have one last mission to complete and I promised I would never let anything happen to you," Heero replied as he stepped forward and unbuckled Harry's harness despite Harry's attempts to stop him. Harry then watched as Heero began reconnecting the wiring to what he knew was the Gundam's self-destruct device (thanks to all of the lessons he'd been given about the inner workings of the Gundams) and he suddenly knew exactly what Heero was going to do.

"Oh, hell no, you aren't," Harry hissed venomously as he whipped out his wand and stunned Heero in the back. "I told you that you aren't allowed to die for me and that means you aren't allowed to die for the Colonies either. Not like this… not by committing suicide because of some stupid manipulative old geezer."

Angry now, Harry levitated Heero back into the pilot's chair and strapped him in before digging out his cloak and covering the unconscious pilot with it so that he wouldn't be seen. He took a moment to disengage the beam sword and after a brief moment of consideration released the suit's shield so that it fell on the ground at the suit's feet. He then pulled out his broom and returned it to full size before using the disillusionment charm that he'd recently learned to hide it from view.

He glared at Heero's unseen body one last time before he turned and opened the door to the cockpit and stepped out onto the ramp with his hidden Firebolt held firmly at his left side and his wand hidden behind his right leg. He glared across the distance at the pilot in the other suit, even though he couldn't see the man's face, before he peered around towards where Trowa was shifting Heavyarms around so he could look in the direction of Wing and Harry guessed that someone had just thrown his face up on the view screens via satellite camera.

"Mission accepted," Harry declared loudly before muttering a soft, "not," under his breath as he slashed his wand upwards and snapped his wrist sharply as he poured his magic into the wand while incanting, "Lumos Solem Maxima!"

Bright white light erupted from Harry's wand with the power of a small sun and completely obliterated Wing from view. Harry then silenced the Gundam's engines before casting one final spell on the suit; turning the Gundam into a portkey that would take Heero back to the underground hanger on the Winner Estate. Before the light from his spell could begin fading, Harry jumped on his broom and activated the portkey even as he threw one of his knives so that it would hit the button to close the door hilt first.

He then cast three rapid and powerful Finite Incantatem Charms at the shield that had been left behind to remove the protective spells that had been added to the shield. Now that Wing was no longer in the way and he had an adequate decoy, Harry cast an Engorgement Charm on the shield and gathered his magic for one last spectacular spell. The light from his powerful illumination spell had only just begun fading as Harry cried out one last incantation, "Deprimo Maxima!"

Like the day he demonstrated the powerful blasting curse to Heero, Harry poured all of his hate and anger into the spell as it left his wand. Unlike that day, he poured far more power into the spell (his current reserves no where near as depleted as they had been on that long ago day) and as it struck the enlarged shield it shattered the Gundanium construct into millions of pieces and tore through several dozen meters of earth as well. The blast sent out a shockwave of debris that covered a forty mile radius even as the force of the blast buffeted Harry upon his tiny broom. The outward backlash of uncontrolled magic that followed on the heels of the blast short circuited the suit that Heero had been fighting in addition to dozens of the suits, tanks, and airplanes that Trowa had been facing as it swept outwards and upwards (those caught in midair crashing down to the ground and in a few cases exploding on impact).

Exhaustion set in immediately and Harry slipped sideways off his broom, barely managing to keep one hand on the handle as he fumbled to tuck away his wand before he dropped it and lost it forever or worse broke it. With his magical core drained, Harry retained no control over his broom or the flight charms that normally would have kept it in the air despite his precarious grasp on the handle and only the small amount of wind resistance the broom and his body created slowed his downward plunge.

Even though he'd not been that far up in the air, Harry still hit the ground hard; breaking his left leg in two places, breaking his left elbow and splitting the humorous half lengthwise for several inches, and dislocating his left shoulder before he tumbled further down into the crater he'd created just seconds earlier (the teen foolishly protecting the broom his godfather had given him instead of himself). He also ended up with a concussion as the back of his head hit more than one rock as he rolled down to the bottom of the crater. Harry groaned weakly as he finally came to a stop and he closed his eyes as his entire body exploded with pain on top of the dizziness and nausea he felt due to the concussion.

He felt absolutely miserable but was still far too angry with Heero over the other teen's plan to commit suicide by destroying the Gundam to allow the pain to cloud his mind. His mind was too busy raging over the fact that Heero had not bothered to consider how demoralized the other pilots would have been to lose him in such a way. Harry's anger, of course, had nothing to do with the fact that he'd grown to consider the other teen an annoying brother of sorts; helped in part by the charade that Heero had carried out while they were still in the company of Relena Darlian (and on a handful of other occasions) and the brotherly attitude the blue-eyed pilot had adopted at some point after he had woken up at the Winner Estate (especially when he was teaching Harry how to use a computer or pilot the mobile suits).

"Why?"

Wrenching his eyes opens with great difficulty, Harry looked up through his cracked lenses into the masked face of what he assumed must be the pilot of the other suit and he felt old anger and fears warring inside of him as he was sharply reminded of the masked Death Eaters he'd seen in the graveyard after Voldemort's rebirth. Determination filled Harry as he glared hard at the older man who'd sought to harm Heero to appease his ego and he tightened his hold on his unseen broom as he felt the ground shake lightly under the approach of what could only be a mobile suit.

"Someone like you couldn't possibly understand," Harry answered hoarsely as he coughed up a bit of blood.

Before the man could reply, Heavyarms reached down and lifted Harry from the ground as the masked pilot scrambled backwards to avoid being crushed. Harry closed his eyes as the comforting warmth of the Gundam engulfed him and he allowed himself to finally sink into oblivion to escape the pain as Trowa carried his broken body away from the battlefield.

Heero woke up with a start and stared at the ceiling above his bed in confusion for a long minute before he slowly sat up and glanced around his assigned room at the Winner Estate. He was utterly confused on how he'd gotten into bed since the last thing he remembered was working on reconnecting the self-destruct mechanism in Wing while ordering Harry to fly to Trowa. Everything after that was a complete blank and he had no idea if he'd managed to destroy the Gundam or what exactly had happened to Harry. The door to his room opened and Heero instinctively reached for his gun as he snapped his head around to identify the intruder only to abort the move before his hand reached his pistol as he recognized Quatre.

"Ah, good, you are awake," Quatre declared. "We were beginning to get worried since we had no idea just how long you had been unconscious when we first found you or even why you were unconscious in the first place since you didn't have any visible injuries and showed no signs of waking for the past two days."

"What happened? How did I get back here? What happened to my Gundam and where is Harry?"

"We don't know what happened exactly since as far as we knew you'd self-destructed in front of the entire world on the orders of Dr. J," Quatre replied as he stopped beside the bed and crossed his arms as he half glared down at Heero. "I'm half tempted to toss you out on your ear after that stunt you pulled. We all watched what we thought was your Gundam detonating and saw Harry caught in the backlash after he'd stepped out of the cockpit. I don't know why you had him pretend to be the pilot but you could have at least waited to do whatever it was you did that caused the explosion until he was clear. You can well imagine my surprise when we got back here and found your Gundam haphazardly sprawled inside of the hanger looking no worse for wear and you unresponsive, unhurt, and half hidden beneath Harry's invisibility cloak inside."

"That damned sneaky little… he knocked me out. I had told him to fly out under his cloak when I opened the door and get to Trowa so he would be safe and I was going to reconnect the self-destruct mechanism to carry out Dr. J's final order. Only, Harry must have hit me with a spell from behind because I can't remember anything after that," Heero growled as he reached up and pulled on his hair in frustration. "I would have never risked Harry getting hurt, not after… not again… whatever happened to cause whatever explosion you saw was all Harry's doing. Where is he? Why didn't you ask him what happened? You said he was caught in the explosion, is he alright?"

"I don't know where Trowa took him," Quatre answered after staring intently at Heero for several minutes. "Nor do I know the full extent of the injuries he suffered as a result of the explosion. We split up after we believed you to have self destructed and agreed to a radio silence for at least a month to avoid our locations being compromised. Trowa said he looked pretty bad and had lost a lot of blood though."

"Damn it… he wasn't supposed to get hurt."

"He was nearly captured by OZ after the explosion."

"What!?"

"That pilot you were fighting? It was Zechs Merquise and Trowa pulled Harry out from under the man's nose after he'd exited his suit in order to either capture or execute Harry. If the man's suit hadn't malfunctioned in the backlash that Harry released, which we thought was him trying to save himself from the explosion at the time, I'm not certain Trowa would have been able to stop Merquise from taking Harry first."

"Damn it."

"Yeah, that was pretty much our reaction as well. If they even suspect that he survived, you can bet they're going to be hunting for him now since his face has been linked to your Gundam in your stead."

"I should have kicked him out of my Gundam when I found him in the cockpit before we left."

"He probably would have followed us on his broom even if you had," Quatre tiredly pointed out as the last of his anger fled. "He was determined to go with us one way or another. Yu… Heero… why? Why were you willing to…?"

"To protect the Colonies," Heero replied. "If OZ had gotten a hold of even just one Gundam… especially considering the upgrades Harry added… bad enough that they've taken over the Alliance's resources in space and conquered more than half of Earth. When did things get turned all around, Quatre?"

"Long before we were born, I think," Quatre replied softly.

"What do we do now?"

"We wait. They've taken the Gundams out of the picture and tied our hands. There's nothing else we can do but be prepared for the day when we can take up arms again."

"You said the radio silence was just for a month, right?"

"At least a month… unless they run into problems during that time and are forced to dig themselves in deeper in order to escape pursuit. The others will most likely try to make their way here about that time instead of contacting us though; providing they don't end up in trouble."

Heero flopped back down onto his pillow and stared up at the ceiling, his mind running through everything that had happened and the possible scenarios that would play out as a result of Harry faking the destruction of Wing. He never noticed when Quatre left him alone as he was too wrapped up in his guilt and the frustration he felt over the way things had turned out.

Notes:

* Slightly edited quote by Zechs Merquise from the English subbed Japanese version of Gundam Wing Episode 10; Heero, Distracted by Defeat.

AN: A rather short chapter, I know, but I didn't want anything else to detract from the entire self-destruct sequence as this is a huge turning point for the entire story but especially for Harry and the pilots. Hopefully, I did justice to the rather short and furious battle as this chapter simply flowed from my keyboard like water from a glass when I first wrote it and other than cleaning up my grammar and spelling, I didn't really add much when I edited it.

So anyway, Harry has now gotten a glimpse of Une, Zechs, and Dr. J and his face has been thrown out to the world at large. He's also displayed his typical Gryffindorish behavior instead of allowing Heero to take the fall and we see that he still tends to place the lives and feelings of others above those of his own and that he is willing to protect his precious mementos from his past life at the expense of himself (something we'd already known because of how he'd reacted to Sirius's bike getting clipped a few chapters back).

Some of you might wonder why I didn't have Harry slip into Trowa's Gundam instead of Heero's since it was noted in the last chapter that Harry preferred to sleep in Heavyarms; there are three reasons for that. First, Harry feared that if he climbed into any other suit that Heero would order him out and then he'd be left behind while if he was in Heero's he could at least argue his right to go face to face. Secondly, Harry knows Wing is capable of flight and we all know how much Harry loves to fly; so really, it was the obvious choice even if he would have felt more comfortable in Heavyarms.

The last reason was more of a personal preference in that I didn't want Harry to have to suffer the emotional distress of seeing Heero self-destruct in front of him while he was unable to do anything about it; especially now that he's just starting to accept and trust the other teen.

That said, the next chapter will focus on Harry (and therefore on Trowa) and how his stunt will have affected him. I'll try to have it up before the end of the weekend since this chapter leaves things kind of hanging but I make no , and did you notice that Heero is finally on first name terms with someone other than Harry - he's been rather stubborn about that up to this point and he'll probably slip up a few times here and there.

For those of you who have not received answers to the questions you asked in your reviews; I'm not ignoring you. I didn't answer because the questions will be answered within the story over the next handful of chapters and I didn't want to give away any spoilers.

As a thank you to all my reviewers, I have three different kinds of cake here; chocolate, marble, and spice. I had pies too but a trio of sneaky individuals hit me with the forbidden pout technique combined with a compulsion spell and now I have no more pies. There is at least ice cream to go with the cake. Can't have cake without ice cream… I have plenty of different flavors so pick what you want. =) ENJOY! ~ Jenn