oOo
Chapter Twenty
Rebuff
Governments stand because people sit; if people stand, governments will sit. – Mhemet Murat Ildan
If someone pushes you, you push right back. – Sara Farizan
oOo
Bullying is a problem at every strata of society, but the way you respond to it - that's what makes you who you are. Call and answer, give and take... sometimes the best defense is an offense, and just because politics is a lot of talk doesn't mean it isn't a battlefield.
oOo
Notes:
I can't even begin to say how overdue this chapter is, and my excuses all suck. Anyway, I'm back, and with a good amount of steam. My apologies – I've missed this story like mad.
If you're reading this off of , then you might not realize that a good chunk of last year was spent running an edit of Recast Steel in an attempt to get over writer's block that was only partially successful at the time. Said edit was largely grammatical, but there are a number of instances where new background information was added in – nothing critical, but more politics and background information on a handful of characters has been added, particularly the Winner family, the Treize/Leia/Mariemaia/David/Jake, and a few plot holes have been smoothed over. Marie's early scenes match the rest of her a bit better, etc. It should also be noted that the chapter count is different because in the edit, it made sense to break Ch 14 into two chapters – and this is the main reason the edit has only gone onto now. I didn't want to make it look like there was a new chapter when it was just increased organization to help me get around my block.
Again, none of that information is necessary, but it's there now, both on and Archive of Our own (I'm listed under Niko_Nightwind there, since the site takes issues with a space in the username). Every chapter that received more than a grammar edit has a note at the start of it, if you wanted to skim back through just for those parts. The most dramatic shifts are in Atia Winner's scene in Ch. 4 Survival, and the cluster covering Marie's introduction through becoming Heero's foundling in Survival chapters 18 through 22. Almost everything else is purely added lead-up to the politics Noin started introducing a few chapters back when she was talking over goals with Odin.
I would recommend going back at least one chapter before starting this one, if not two. Sorry again about all the delays… and expect the next chapter inside two weeks. It only has one scene left before it's ready to post.
oOo
November 6th 198 – Wednesday – Munich, Germany – Dorothy's Townhouse
"We need to talk."
"Jesus fuck!" BJ swore, wheeling away from the man he'd have sworn hadn't been there a moment ago. Miller. Of course it's fucking Miller. He mostly believed now that the man's attack on Mitchell back in July hadn't been unprovoked, but that didn't make him not intimidating as all hell. "We need to put a bell on you," he groused, trying to calm his heart rate back down.
The fact that he looked like he shouldn't be taken seriously – small and almost pretty, clothes chosen to mask the muscle mass BJ knew he must carry – just made it worse.
The colonel smirked, kind enough to relax back against the wall and cross his arms, hands plainly visible. "My uncle used to do that, actually."
…What? He gave him a skeptical look. "How'd that go?"
His slouch became more pronounced as the smirk deepened. "He'd add a few more until I figured out how to move without setting them off too." He tipped his head, considering. "I haven't tried since I was, like… six, though."
"Right – hence the creeping through walls routine," BJ groused, running a hand over his face. "Look, I didn't realize you were here, and Dorothy's out, which I figure you already know. Can I help you?"
He stood up straight again and shrugged, considering the hallway. "It's been almost six months. You haven't run, you haven't stopped, haven't let Dave pressure you, and if anything, you've done your damndest to sink roots into Relena's infrastructure instead of sidelining or sabotaging it. Ideally, I would have left you alone to make your own advances for a full year, but we're out of time; six months makes for a decent enough entrance interview, I suppose." He met his eyes squarely. "You pass. Now I need to either bring you in or cut you loose, so tell me." He raised one brow. "Why should I let you stay?"
BJ's mouth was dry. He'd suspected – strongly suspected, even – but at the same time, it had seemed less and less likely as time went by. "You knew all along, then."
"Mm." He tipped one hand in a 'so-so' gesture. "By degrees. I was the one who found Nan, which gave Dave the edge to find the rest of you, but the ball wasn't in my court. I needed Munich neutralized before I brought Relena here – he's the one who decided the recruitment potential was there, and set you up where we could triage the problem if it went awry… But Dave's always had good instincts, so here we are."
Not about you, though. Unfortunately, he was nearly as sure that Miller was a permanent fixture in Relena's life as Dorothy, so this was a shark he needed to learn to not just depend on, but trust. He'd known this was coming, had said as much the other day, but be hadn't expected the route.
Which, he imagined, was exactly why the colonel had chosen this approach.
He appreciated the honesty of it, though. Mitchell had only ever given them scraps before wandering off, ever the middleman, for all that BJ hadn't been entirely sure who was at the top of the pyramid. If Miller was trying to set precedent here, he could get on board with that. "David brought you up to speed recently, then?"
A short laugh. "Dave doesn't realize exactly how little he knows, which is why we're having this talk at all. If you'd actually looped him in, that would make you as much double agent as he is, however accidentally, and I quit that game last December."
He tipped his head again, gaze intense. "I'm not asking you to trust me, or to tell me all your secrets, Ballard; I'm not sure I could respect you enough to make this offer if you were willing to. But your history speaks pretty damn well for your motives, and you've proven that you didn't lose your edge while you were out. I'm not sure when you became a player again, but I can recognize a kindred spirit."
…He hadn't used the name Ballard since 194, and even then, not openly. Strangely though, the call-out was… comforting.
He felt like he was finally getting solid footing with the other man. And the implications…
"We've stumbled across each other before," he realized, mind racing. If Miller knew him from before the war, then he had a reputation to live up to – a reputation he had been struggling to rebuild since the Fall, and he had wanted the princess to recognize, so this was a bonus step closer to his goals.
Miller's smile was slight, but there. "Why do you think you never made any inroads into OZ? Treize liked you, but with what we were up to, it was better to keep you at arm's reach. If you hadn't set the house on fire and run, though? He might've tried to grab you before Operation Daybreak went down."
BJ grit his teeth in something approximating a smile. "I would never have willingly worked for Treize." Part of staying alive in his line of work was knowing when you were outmatched, and even in retrospect? He wasn't entirely sure if Khushrenada had been honest about his motives for the first time in his fucking life at Libra or if it was just the latest hypnosis he'd put everyone under.
"Which is why it's a good thing you didn't open up to David. Treize is family and he can ask for favors, but he's not my boss; hasn't been since I left OZ." He grimaced. "Sometimes we agree, so it might look like I'm working for him, but that's the lot of allies, really. I was already in a good position investigating White Fang when Zechs joined up, enough that it made sense to try to keep a handle on things there, for all that it all went to hell. Then with the rise of the Regime, reminding our resident dictator of 'the good old days' was too good of an opportunity to waste – but Treize was the only person I had access to who was set up to do something about it." He snapped his fingers as though remembering something. "If Nan is using that loophole into the Regime database, he should know that the twits in IT finally found the damn thing. Hoffman is good enough that I know they wouldn't be able to track him through it, but they're likely to start a ploy for misinformation."
He… should probably feel more surprised or upset about Treize's survival, but honestly? It was closer to resigned. Doesn't it just figure. And if Miller was actually being honest, then he was either the best kind of agent to have on your payroll, or the worst.
David… He'd expected some kind of catch, but despite the lack of actual surprise… it being Treize was a nasty dig. "That's what you fought about in July." Double agent, and 'I quit that game back in December.' After the riot, no doubt. Literally everyone had heard the way the princess screamed when it looked like her colonel was dead, and she'd practically moved mountains to get him back to safety, getting cooperation out of a mob like that. You didn't come out of that kind of experience unchanged.
And if he really saw Khushrenada as family? Mitchell's only explanation for the fight was that everyone had a breaking point, and that he should have realized how close his friend was to it.
It was no wonder the man had been such a moody bastard, if he'd been facing that kind of push and pull.
Miller winced, reaching up to tug a hand through his hair. "I was scared I'd lose Lena when she found out, so I was intent on living in denial as long as I could. Dave was trying to push me out of my funk and then we realized she was eavesdropping, and he'd said my code name, and I…" He grimaced. "If there was just one thing I could change about myself, it would be my fucking temper. I thought I'd gotten a handle on it as a teenager, but this last year has been a roller coaster."
BJ considered that. "She knows now?" he confirmed.
Another face. "She'd already known for a month – the princess keeps her own aces, come to find out. But yeah, we're all on the same page now." An expectant look. "But this is your interview, not mine."
"That's debatable," BJ countered, spreading his hands. "I'm in this for a future led by Relena, not you. I don't know anything about you beyond the fact that I can't trust anything Nan was able to dig up and that you're dangerous as fuck."
"But not to Relena," Miller argued calmly. "Quid pro quo: I was raised as an assassin, but the more I saw of the world, the more I couldn't stand it. Treize wanted to end the corruption of the Alliance, kill the problem at the root, and I thought maybe he was right, so I helped. Then the only family I gave a damn about died in a clash OZ got involved in, and it got a lot less black and white – so I started finding other ways too. Everything I've done for the past ten years has been to try to turn the tide so we're killing each other a little less. Maybe fewer kids are just lost in the damn street these days, and Relena's the closest I've ever come to a large-scale, lasting solution in that direction. I'd still be backing her even if she had tossed me out on my ass."
BJ raised his brows, refusing to be impressed by the monologue. "You already know my story." If he knew the name Ballard, and with what he'd implied about OZ's awareness – possibly even support – of ARM's movements?
Jacob Miller had held a slew of different ranks and positions over the years, both legitimately and under cover, but the most solid fact they had ever gotten about him was that he was one of Treize's favorite chess pieces – or at least, he was when the asshole was in the mood. There were too many spaces in Treize's dirty laundry that could have been minimized or avoided entirely if Miller had been at hand and willing, the kinds of gaps that wouldn't exist with a truly obedient soldier. And Treize…
Treize never truly stopped playing the game, did he?
Miller nodded slightly in concession. "Relena won't condone espionage that lacks core morality; your history is what makes you a candidate in the first place. On top of that, you're not starting from scratch. I could theoretically build a network from what I have, but yours is efficient and you've triple the experience. I've never tried to work on this scale before, and if we succeed it needs to be stable, with a solid administrator."
"So you need me."
"You're ideal," Miller corrected. "I can pull something else together if I have to." An expectant look, now. "But you want this, or you'd have tried slipping Dave's net by now." He smirked. "Or made less of an effort to endear yourselves to Dorothy. She's rather taken with how well you facilitate her projects."
He snorted. "Fair enough." Leaning back against the opposite wall, he admitted, "I'd been wondering when we'd be approached more directly, but I assumed it would be through her."
"I'm trying to turn over a new leaf and be a little more direct," the other man returned in a wry tone. "Dorothy would imply we still want you at arm's length; we had something else in mind."
"Oh?"
"What would you say to Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs?"
oOo
oOo
Antwerp, Belgium
"Mmmm… Yeah. This, I can work with."
Priya fought to keep a straight face and was mostly sure she didn't manage it. Tay was standing on the sidewalk next to her, hands jammed into his pockets. With his eyes at half mast and entire posture indolent, the air he put off was almost indecent. "You look high."
"When he feels like this, my baby uncle might as well be a drug," Tay admitted, breathing deep and resettling his shoulders before really looking at her. "It's not happy, exactly, more… swagger."
She frowned, considering the bank for a moment before hooking her arm through Taylor's and leading him in the direction of the coffee shop next door. "That's a strong enough emotion to pick up?" He'd said the Amsterdam impression was probably the way it was because Quatre had been high strung.
"Shouldn't be," Tay mused, tapping at his thigh with two fingers. "But he likes breaking rules, I guess."
Naturally. She really shouldn't be surprised. Still, while she hadn't expected the flag for Jack Lowe to lead to something on Quatre, this was a boon. "Any idea why?"
He made another of his inane little gestures. "It's the same as last time; he's filtering through someone else. There's this… duality? Not discordant, but still distinct. Same person as Amsterdam – Lowe, I'd guess, with how we found the place." He waved a hand at the scenery in a general way – at something Priya couldn't sense. "This might be, like… a side effect of whatever the fuck they're doing empathically. It…" He pursed his lips, blinking furiously for a moment. "It resonates. If I had to guess, he's running some kind of feedback loop through his friend, using him as a filter over and over until the effect builds and compounds." He shook his head. "I can't even imagine, but I'm starting to really want to meet this guy. He's got to be something else."
She wasn't so sure that was a good basis for recommendation. Sometimes Tay forgot how easy it could be to sway most with the Talent, since he was functionally immune. Opening the door to the café, she let go of his arm so he could go ahead of her. "You don't think Lowe's using him, do you?"
Quatre had let his empathy lead him in bad directions before.
"Hm?" He looked confused for a moment, then frowned and shook his head as he got in line for coffee and she joined him. "That's… no. Both here and before, I can feel them both, simultaneously. Distinct, but on the same frequency, woven together; I can tell whose emotions are whose, but I can't feel one without the other. There's no hiding on that level. And if-" His eyes flicked over the crowded room in annoyance before he lowered his already quiet voice into something barely audible. "If Katriel, the one powering this psychosis, couldn't tell the emotions apart, it ought to be all balled together, confused." Grimacing, he looked pointedly at their surroundings again. "Why are we in here?"
Priya scowled. "It's cold, and I'm thirsty."
"It's either too quiet or too noisy to talk here," he said pointedly. "And we've gone out of range."
"We walked by here earlier and you were fine," she argued.
"We didn't come in, though," Tay mused, looking thoughtful.
"That doesn't make sense. It's a range, and it goes a lot further than here," she hissed back.
"I make analogies that come close to approximating how this works, Priya," he returned, looking annoyed. "It's not physics, and no one knows all the rules yet. At this rate, I'm not even sure if there are any hard rules, and how much of our limits and abilities are literally in our heads – just something we make up to keep from going crazy." He shook his head, plucking briefly at her sleeve, mouth firming up. "Can you get me something? I'll meet you back outside; I need to think, and it was helping."
It was only after he'd walked back out that it occurred to her that a busy, high end coffee shop in the middle of downtown, where tempers tended to run high, might develop an impression the same way Tay said hospitals and police stations would.
Damn it. She really ought to know better by now.
It was maybe ten minutes later, with an absurdly complicated confection disguised as coffee for an apology that she joined Taylor on a park bench near the bank. "Okay," she murmured, brushing one gloved hand against his bare one as she handed the thing over, nodding to herself as she saw some of the tension melt out of his shoulders. "Can we try that again?"
He took a long moment sipping from his cup and considering the taste before answering. "He's either in control, or they're on equal terms," he decided firmly. "Maybe Lowe has the Talent too and that's why this is happening, but I can't come up with something that makes any sense unless Quatre has full agency."
She nodded, trusting the expert here. "Okay."
"And that's without even going into the emotions themselves," he added after another long sip.
Her eyes narrowed. "Which are what?"
"Here? Lowe was mostly curious, amused… almost confused, but determined too. He wasn't too different in Amsterdam, though that was more… laugh and roll his eyes, and this is more like 'huh, that's interesting, let's play with it.' Quatre was worried in Amsterdam, but… annoyed more than worried? Exasperated, maybe, where he'd been upset before realizing he was overreacting."
"And he's all cat got the canary here," Priya reiterated, thinking it over.
"Total power trip and loving it," Tay confirmed. "Lowe's subdued but game while Quatre's leading, at least while they were in Antwerp." He shrugged a little. "Well, right here, at least. I want to keep going, see where else they walked, if it changes." He grinned broadly at her, eyes bright as he stood. "The coffee shop is a clue, I think; I have a theory to test. Come on."
oOo
oOo
Shalkar, Kazakhstan
"No. Our mission statement is clear – it's not negotiable."
This was the fourth call like this that the colonel had had to field today, to say nothing of all the shit that had been flying since the start of the Italian debacle. It had been too much to hope that the Regime would stick by the letter of the law and take the word 'no' at face value, but that didn't make the increasing pressure anything short of exhausting, even just to watch. David was ready to tear his damn hair out.
"That's bullshit and you know it."
With Robby, Razo had usually been able to find a way to draw the other man out a bit, lessen the stress when it pent up like this, but this wasn't the lawless desert. There were rules that he wasn't even close to understanding, and he held no power or sway at all unless he was following direct orders from Dave. The politics surrounding opinions about the Cambyses survivors were still rocky at best… though he was in the highest regard among the factions that were settling out, having been both part of Robby's negotiating group and now a respectable member of the Strike Force.
And Robby… He had to be using a different name by now, but the press was turning him into one hell of a martyr: a good man in a bad world that brought salvation. It wasn't exactly wrong on any front, but seeing as he wasn't actually dead? That had to be getting uncomfortable. Razo'd had a front row seat to the younger man's self-loathing that he was so careful to hide from the rest of the group – the self-loathing he was starting to think Robby had somehow made the rest of them feel a little less, when they were near to him.
Inez Stanton was very obviously spaceborn, and in hindsight… a lot of little things added up really neatly with an ability that only ever showed up in the spaceborn. Robby had known the moment Razo had recognized his persona was a mask. He'd been able to follow Roshan's mood swings and react with perfect timing, push the sick bastard's buttons just the right way to get them out of each situation with the man without escalating it beyond all means of hope. There had been evenings where he played the men's morale from despair into hope like a master pianist, layer upon layer weaving until they all settled into a good night's sleep and missed how tired their leader looked, hands shaking as he dropped his head against Cory's shoulder, breathing hard.
He'd done a little research since getting accepted into the colonel's fold, and while he couldn't find anything about an empath exerting influence instead of just taking it in, the snap awareness he'd seen Robby do over and over, the style of exhaustion, the coping mechanisms… those were textbook.
Razo was from Marseille, and to the best of his knowledge he'd never met a space heart before Cambyses. He hadn't known what to look for or ever thought of it as more than 'there's people out there who can read your moods, so don't be rude, in case you meet one'.
"We both know what really happened down there. Even if you weren't lying, this is a precedent that we don't want to set. I'm saving you from burning the God damn house down around our ears, Lee."
Robby had never been wrong about someone he decided to bring into the fold. Not once. And he'd always known when one of their own was riding the edge of a breakdown.
…He always killed quickly, cleanly, minimizing suffering. He'd never shied away from it. They'd taken it as some kind of efficient ruthlessness, though everyone had also known it was mercy… but it must have been for sanity as well. If he had been altering their emotions, it had been to keep them all stable, and if that fed back to him too?
Shit, but he couldn't begrudge him that. The enormity of the whole concept made him sick. If anything, now he was putting off talking to the guy again until he could stop feeling guilty for whatever he had put Robby through those months.
Well, that and Dave. Ten more days. Maybe sooner, if he was reading Mitchell's push back at the Regime right, but… he didn't want to start talking to Robby again until his new commander knew about that little white lie at the start. Doing it in reverse was a great way to open up a lot of feelings of betrayal, and as much as he owed Robby, Razo didn't want to go back to that life. He liked where he stood with Dave, and what he was making of the monster the desert had twisted him into. Absolution was something he'd get here, and he wanted it. He wanted his friend back too, because he had known the man under all his masks and wanted to see more of him, but he needed to find his own foundation before he was ready to pour the old back on top of the new.
Robby would get that. Dave would too – he'd figured out after the second week with him that Dave didn't give a shit about the letter of the law, just the spirit. The guy was all about hard work and gut instinct and tried and true friendships, and he'd get why Razo had held back until now, especially what with all the shit he'd heard about Miller. He'd understand, and he'd leave it alone if Razo asked, and there was no reason to make the sort of drama Miller was drenched in.
"Well it's a good thing you're technically not in my chain of command then, isn't it? It was drafted like that for a reason, and you can't strong arm me into this without signatures from three Ministries including Foreign Affairs, so good luck with that," David informed the general, tone biting. "And even if you somehow pulled it off? I'd resign like I did from OZ after they went off the deep end, and you know damn well that I'm the glue holding this team together. If I go, it all falls to pieces, and then you can eat the backlash. I won't be a part of it! End of discussion."
This cold snarl was a new aspect of the colonel for Razo – an actual spike of fury, instead of exasperation. Dave's temper was slow enough to build that the situation had to be epic. A lot of what he liked about the man wasn't so much about how he had a strong sense of right and wrong, but how he possessed an absurd level of common sense wrapped around a core of altruism. It was easy to see that he had left OZ to immigrate to Sanc in 195, for all that the kingdom's rise had been doomed from the start. He had no sense of black and white, or even really grey, which is what made him so interesting.
Instead, he lived by a unique mix of realism, blinding hope, and the absolute resolve.
This wasn't the first time that he thought David Mitchell might mirror Robby, only without the tragedy – the Robby that existed underneath all the masks, at least, that only Razo and maybe Cory had ever caught glimpses of. They'd like each other. His old leader had said from the start that he trusted Mitchell for his word – just not his employers. Which, well… he was getting a front row seat for that conflict right now.
The difference, he supposed, is that if Robby'd resigned, we would have all died. You couldn't be too fierce about your morals with a knife held to your throat.
Dave disconnected the call and tossed it hard onto the bed, watching it bounce across the mattress for a long moment before turning away and burying his face in his hands. "Son of a bitch actually thinks he can bully me back into the fife I only ever pretended to march to," he growled. "He's in for a reality check."
Interesting. "Oh?"
"He didn't even have any meaningful leverage, just intimidation tactics!" the other man protested, throwing his hands up. "The archaic asshole! I grew up with people who thought the Nuremberg defense was hilarious! We are responsible for our own damn actions, good and bad! We are the ones who have to live with what we do, and no one is worth passing my sense of self on to!" He shook his head, breathing hard. "I've done some really shitty things in my career, Razo, but I believed they needed to be done, and that's on me. I'll make my own peace with that. Never believe that following an order absolves you of responsibility, because it's a lie. Whoever charged you is just as guilty, but it doesn't mean you didn't do it." Sighing, he dropped down on the edge of the bed next to his phone. "It's one of the most important things I ever learned from an assassin, for all that it makes command as heavy as a fucking mountain some days."
Razo shook his head a little, crossing his arms. "You open your mouth, and Robby's philosophies pour out," he admitted. It was the damndest thing, really.
Dave grimaced. "Damn. Not the usual recruitment speech."
"He didn't recruit us so much as steal," Razo reminded him. "Or bribe. He actually tossed over a week's worth of rations to get Felix – another week in the camp that had him and they probably would have staked him, the soft soul. Not really sure how he made it out of the Iron Ghetto to start with, really. Sagan tried to argue, then bitched about it for weeks until he realized we'd gotten ourselves someone who had the magic to make just about anything taste half decent."
He shook his head. Felix had more than repaid the food back in the first month, in his opinion, but he didn't think that had anything to do with why Robby'd done it.
It just… That was how the other man was. Even in the aftermath of razing an American settlement down to nothing, he'd gone out of his way to save the one person he could and refused to hear the opinion of anyone who thought otherwise. Everyone had decided he'd heard that Felix was a decent cook and that was why he'd pushed, but Razo knew – Robby hadn't ever heard a thing about Felix before that day when they came back from the raid. And he hadn't said a word to him before throwing one of their new bags of supplies down at Quincy's feet and demanding the man.
One more stick on the pile of evidence. He'd felt something in each of them that no one else could.
"Felix…" David mumbled, eyes distant, before sighing because he didn't recognize it. "You lose him that day we came, or before?"
…How much difference would another ten days make? Razo wondered. Am I being arbitrary, or sensible? "He was with us until the last," he admitted after a moment, considering the colonel before sitting down next to him on the bed. Felix was one of the ones who had chosen to trust Robby over the Regime and left. "But that's something I've been meaning to talk to you about." He eyed his friend's tired body language. "If you're up for it, at least. No rush."
David shrugged, leaning back on his hands. "We probably won't get a decent chance for a truly private conversation again for a while," he returned. "This room is secure, so if it's sensitive, I'd rather get it over with." Sharp brown eyes focused on him. "It wasn't a surprise attack that morning, was it?"
"Mm." Razo shrugged, looking away. "Not everyone trusted the Regime. And not everyone was clear of independent bounties either. Your pardon only covered Cambyses, and I might have avoided the battlefields during the last war, but most of my age group didn't." He licked his lips. "Cory is practically Robby's son. I should've realized he'd run straight back to him after we got the bad news about his parents. And Charlie was on the fence about staying in the first place; I should've realized he'd only stayed to give the kid an out."
Jalee's wording had made it clear that it was planned that way from the start, but that Razo's poker face was shit enough that they kept him out of the loop.
Dave sighed. "I'd wondered, when the only live veterans in your camp were OZ or Alliance. It felt too neat." He shook his head. "Makes too much sense; we had you all between a rock and a damn hard place. I'm surprised you tried negotiating in the first place, really. We never saw that kind of trust again, even when they'd heard we were coming."
They hadn't. Relief, yes, but no trust that they had a chance of the same terms, or that it would be followed through on. Hope in the Sahara had been… expensive. Priceless, and dangerous; the majority the sane survivors were a lot closer to Cory's blankness than the balance most of Robby's people had managed.
Cory'd been on his own for too long before Robby found him.
"We lived because we trusted Robby," he pointed out. "He sheltered us, and… We could see it destroy him, a little more every time he couldn't help but let us down. He was practically our god. He said to trust you… but he also said he couldn't let the Regime get a good look at his face, or they might renege on the deal."
The other man frowned, eyes cutting over to him again. "I wasn't active in the war; I don't have a reputation for him to have known."
"When it came to people, Robby was never wrong. He watched you when you met with me, and he said you were honest." And he hit the nail on the head once again, or we wouldn't be having this conversation.
David pursed his lips. "You're talking space heart shit, aren't you?"
Well, at least I'm not the only one whose brain went there. "Maybe. It's the best theory I've come up with so far, at least."
"Shit." He sat forward again and bowed his head. "That's…".
"Big?" Razo asked wryly. "Yeah. He has that effect on people."
The bigger man chuffed out a laugh. "Wouldn't mind meeting him."
Razo made a face. "I'd have to find him, first." That would be as easy as asking Jovi, probably, but sometimes it was better to move slow. "The guy moves like a ghost… and his mask was cracking, at the end. He wanted a do-over as bad as Nick." He might want to forget he was ever in Cambyses… and if he doesn't want to talk about it, I'm not going to push. We can just pretend we're old college buddies or something.
If you told yourself a lie enough times over, for long enough, even you started to believe it.
Sometimes, it was better that way. Personally, he'd always preferred an eyes wide open approach, but, well… he was pretty sure Cambyses wasn't Robby's first hard break. And if he was right about the empath thing?
He needed to be sure he knew how he felt about the guy before seeing him again, because Robby might know if there was any pity or disgust lurking in him. And knee jerk reactions could burn, burn for years, even when they turned out to be bullshit.
Dave shrugged. "The press is painting him like a war hero for a reason; the lot of you were a kind of POW. As far as I'm concerned, he's more than earned retirement." Another half hidden, sideway glance. "But if staying in the game is still on the table? You should know that I've never been loyal to Marquise. The Regime's come a long way since 196, and it was a long way from being all bad even then… But I've known Zechs for ten years now, and even before the Fall? I didn't think there was much there to salvage."
"I think I picked up on that," Razo admitted, though he was surprised the other man was actually saying it. Fair's fair, I guess. "Pro-Princess, though."
"Mm, yeah." He bit at the inside of his cheek for a moment. "So are the space factions."
That… "Are you shitting me?" he hissed.
"Mm…" Dave tipped his head from side to side. "Drawing Zechs off-world may have been a gambit to solidify Relena's power base?"
Mother of God, he's serious.
His friend stood, straightening his shirt. "Think about it, alright? I meant what I said before; I wouldn't begrudge you retirement, and I know you have friends. If you're not interested, it's as simple as that. But I thought you should know." Not looking back, he moved for the exit. "I trust you."
Razo stared, long after the door shut behind him, turning that over in his mind.
oOo
oOo
Antwerp, Belgium
Tay's grin was bright, but he hadn't said anything yet. "Well?"
"Ten points for science, but maybe only one for our goal," he decided cheerfully. "He feels like the aftermath of a mob or concert, but he's still just one person. Well, no, it's two, but this is cool, Priya. The area effect thing isn't continuous. It just disappeared into thin air in that business area on Eighth, then pops back up all happy and concern without any lead-in in the third floor of the hotel you pinged Jack Lowe for, and then it's solid again in a big range to the bank… but only in places they actually went."
Priya frowned. "So, either it's intentional, or it only happens when he's with Lowe?"
He nodded energetically. "And with how persistent it is, I'm going to bank on it being accidental, or at least some sort of unknown side effect. They've both been too good at hiding their tracks to leave something out there like this if they're aware of it; Quatre probably doesn't know it's happening. I'm a rare type, but I was also the strongest empath we knew growing up. His abilities have always been direct, and until he up and decided to be the exception to prove the rule, you needed a hundred or more people to leave marks like this."
A hundred or more people reacting all at once, or in the same way over and over for an extended time; a strong attachment to an object, either by time or sentiment. That was always how Courtney had defined the 'hot zones' that upset her firstborn's sensitivities. If Tay was right about the new boundaries, though, it meant this trick would only work when Lowe was with Quatre… and the paper trail said the two had split off again.
She was beginning to think she had absolutely the worst luck. They'd gotten into the hotel room Lowe had paid for here in Antwerp and Tay said Quatre had definitely been the plus one that wasn't registered by name, but neither man had left anything behind with a strong enough sense Tay to anchor on… and the area effect issue was apparently big enough to turn ambiguous quickly.
Biting back an aggravated sigh, she tried to focus on Tay's little riddle instead. "Why was the coffee shop a clue?"
His eyes danced. "It was a negative inside the positive field; I'm not sure which way they were going without context, but they'd never been in that shop, so the feelings faded as soon as we went in."
"So you can prove a negative."
Tay's grin was self-deprecating enough to show he saw the problem. "With a whole lot of time to walk in and out of every shop and alley, maybe. And only when they don't split up at all; Eighth Avenue is a couple blocks off a slew of different business and shopping centers. My guess is that they split up to get something done faster, then met back up at the hotel room. It gives us the basics of a story, but not enough detail to do anything with it beyond the mood I caught outside the bank." He shrugged. "So we've figured out a lot of the mechanics of how it's working, but it's not actually helpful." He chewed at his lower lip. "Your best bet is probably to just go back to tracking Lowe and see what you can pick up in the meantime."
And that was what else she was dreading. "You want to go home."
"I don't think I'm going to be any more help than I already have been unless it's dumb luck," he corrected, tone easygoing but expression patronizing. "We've confirmed it's him, he's being careful, and you've gotten a few new leads that are promising if you keep doing things the old-fashioned way. Relying on me when you've got something more solid to work with would be sloppy." He shrugged a little. "And let's face it, we've had a couple of near misses. Catching a stranger's trauma in the name of making sure my baby uncle is okay is one thing, but there'd be no point now that we know. If you wanted, you could probably just hand over what you've got to Tricia and Julianne and they could finish it up."
Priya held in an urge to groan. She'd wanted to prove to Tricia that she could manage this. With the new leads, Permilla would probably be able to narrow it down faster, which meant Julianne could too, since she had more time to spare than her mom, but…
Ugh. All I have to do from here is hunt down Lowe, right? She had a solid name and a few resources left that she hadn't wanted to tap until she was sure her lead was worthwhile, but now she could use them and then she could finally meet the family heir and claim a success before she started Tricia's next test. She really wanted to prove to her mom that she could do this. Maybe she still didn't really know what she wanted to do like Ailané or Taylor, but she liked business, and… Well, she liked adventure. If Torie's invitation to run with the Coalition hadn't meant going to space she probably would have gone that way and never picked up Tricia's challenge – after all, the last one to succeed in all of Tricia's challenges had been Quatre, talk about intimidating – but…
It was tempting, but no.
She smiled and pulled Tay into a hug. "You're not going straight home, are you?"
He returned the hug warmly. "Eh, I promised Rita I'd at least swing through; she keeps telling me her vineyards are one of the most relaxing places she's ever been, even after she ripped almost half of them out for food crops. She brought both of her boys the last time she visited, before the war, and I guess they got all excited when she said I'd be coming by. I'm not sure if Madison actually remembers me, but he's family, so why not."
"He might," Priya noted. "I remember being four, and he would have been… five? He's sharp – top of the advance track and inclined towards maths. He might want to pick your brain."
"That would explain Rita mentioning him wanting to show me the amplifier on their property," Tay mused as he started to let her go. "Fifty bucks says the little scamp wants help reverse engineering it."
"No bet." She'd grown up changing Madison and Arturo's diapers, and that sounded exactly like something her little nephew would plan. "Make sure he doesn't take it apart. Rita only barely just qualified to get one; if she abuses it, her contract gives the Regime rights to claim ownership of the portion of the property growing foodstuffs." The problem with overly intelligent nine-year-olds was just that they thought they could manage to still do what they wanted but avoid being caught.
"Ah, great." He settled his hands on her forearms and smiled. "So probably a week or so there, especially if Lilianna visits too. After that I might swing by your place if Aunt Nell says Aila's got a minute to breathe and drink some lemonade or something, then back to space so long as Torie says I'm clear… Maybe see if I can drop by Camille's before I'm due back for class again."
Priya fought back a grimace. Camille was the rarest breed of all – empath therapist. Probably a good thing, though – god knows we need at least one in house. "I'm sorry."
"Hey, no." He pulled her close, petting at her hair the way he knew she liked. "I wanted to get out a little, and I was happier doing something useful at the same time instead of playing tourist where the locals are maybe starving. I probably would've wanted to touch base with her even if I really had only gone on a walking tour like I told Dad. Therapy's just part of growing up with an extra sense for people to trample on without realizing."
She squeezed her eyes shut and just rested her weight against him, breathing deep. "I'm going to miss you."
"Me too. It's been pretty fun, even with the stress. Let me know when you're free again and we'll do something a little more laid back, yeah? There's at least two guys in my class that you'd probably have fun playing with while they compete for your attention."
"I'm not dating your frat buddies," she grumbled for what felt like the hundredth time. "I have standards."
"You say that, but every year they grow up more and get less embarrassing to bring home. If you never try, you'll never know if they actually measure up, hm?"
"Whatever." She didn't have any interest in settling down yet, and she didn't think, despite whatever he said, that Tay would appreciate her going through his friends like tissue paper; that seemed to happen more often than not, anymore. "At least have lunch with me before you start looking up flights."
oOo
oOo
Amsterdam, Netherlands – Devil's Quarter
"However, Princess Relena arrived unexpectedly during the conference in rebuttal, stating that in her brother's absence, the remaining military troops are overstepping.
"'As detestable as the situation in Italy was, expanding the military presence on a domestic scale is entirely inappropriate. Additionally, I fail to see how such action could prevent another such incident. The revolutionaries who attempted to take the country, while independent of the Insurgence, were a large, organized group who planned their coup meticulously. They had spies and access to inside information. Having additional troops stationed in the cities near the bases would have only changed the enemy's tactics, not their actions, and in all likelihood, given the armaments this particular group of rebels quickly gained access to? It is very likely they would have opted to shell any town that might harbor a serious threat before they became aware of the shift in power.'"
Ooh, low blow, Katrien thought with a grin, taking another sip from her beer. Not surprising, though. In her experience, Relena only minced words when her position absolutely required it – and even then, never over something she felt passionately about.
"'The temporary loss of northern Italy was due almost entirely to a lack of intelligence.'"
She gasped, and was glad she wasn't in the middle of swallowing. Nearby, someone did choke, while another started laughing.
"'All of this would have been preventable if we had a closer relationship with our troops,'" the princess continued. "'The fact of the matter is that the loyal men and women holding the country's perimeter either failed to recognize or chose to dismiss suspicious behavior from those who later betrayed them. Many were killed in their sleep or knifed in the back; there was very little in the way of a battle until well after dawn. They had no reason to distrust their comrades until it was too late, because we, yet again, failed to watch for treachery.
"It was the same with the attack on Brussels last year, as well as a slew of other incidents. Nearly every time Sally Po's Insurgence wins a skirmish against the Regime, it is because she has superior information. The Alliance fell to OZ by way of the same tactics. We are repeating the same mistakes over and over, and every time, the response has been to increase our firepower instead of addressing the problem!"'
Katrien blinked, then nodded a little, following the statement… and feeling a little silly. As amusing as it was, apparently Relena hadn't actually been trying to say the Italians were stupid.
…Even if they were. Trust had to be earned, not assumed.
Also, English was stupid.
"So what would you suggest we do, Princess?" a reporter asked quickly before another Regime representative could cut in. "Administration could argue that even if this is not a direct solution, it's still long overdue in our efforts to repel the Insurgence."
"'Unless Regime soldiers have undergone new training I am unaware of, then it's still inappropriate,'" Relena argued. "'Soldiers have no place patrolling civilians. Police and military were separated for good reason – one detains, while the other employs lethal force. Police can recognize strange faces and suspicious behavior and will react in defense of their homes; the military forces are stationed, distrusted by the locals, and rarely integrate fully. Patrolmen are preventative; soldiers are for responding to threats.'"
That… made more sense than Katrien had ever tried to put to it. But at the same time, her hometown had gone to hell because the police couldn't handle the refugees with military training who started taking over organized crime after OZ crushed the Alliance in April of 195, let alone the masses that came after Libra's Fall. The police had been held back by the same laws and training the princess was pushing for.
There were reasons locals like her had had to band together and take justice into their own hands, in their own gangs, to stand against people like the Slingers, Beale, and a handful of the smaller, more dangerous groups that thankfully hadn't had the organization to last through that first year of winter.
If nothing else, at least that attitude of most of those has-beens meant they didn't play well with others.
"What about everything that falls between the two?" another reporter asked. The question was too well thought out, too obviously planned, for the earnestness of her voice to be genuine, but it was a good show all the same. "It may not be as bad as two years ago, but you can't say there aren't gaps."
"'That was the logic behind the creation of the Militia,'" Relena answered firmly. "'Our government is still young, and we've learned through harsh experience that no system is perfect. Ideally we would have an additional police force with military experience to handle our more complex domestic issues. But frankly, our population has been decimated, and many survivors of the Eve War and Fall are displaced and distrustful of authority. I cannot blame them; the last decade or more has been a long series of treachery, sabotage, and destruction. Our memories don't begin with the conception of the Regime. We came to it with the heavy burden of history and all its associated fears and grudges.
"'The purpose of the Militia has always been threefold. On the surface, it has helped to bring order to the chaos, and make our streets safer. It stimulated the economy in struggling areas where the demands of the populace far exceeded the job market as well. However, the long-term dream of the organization is union. A union of ideas, of goals, and of people. It's a testing ground both for the Regime and the people to foster something precious: trust.
"'We have all witnessed the abuse of power. All of us have felt the blade of unjust rule in our lives. That is the primary reason I designed the Militia to keep so much self-autonomy. We needed less chaos in the streets, but it needed to be a choice, not just another restriction. We needed a way to bring those we've lost back into the fold, with the promises that we will do better this time. The Militia is a police force for the people, run and on a local level by its own people, because they know better what they need than an aristocracy two countries away.'"
The Regime representatives she shared the stage with were clearly beginning to fray at the edges, not having expected the sentiments the princess was pushing. Most royalty don't imply that they think aristocracy is silly, Katrien thought, smirking as the reporter who had asked the last question, who still had Relena's focus – and therefore the camera's – frowned. Meanwhile, the nobles with the misfortune of also being in view struggled not to breathe. "Your Highness?"
Princess Relena gave her a wryly amused look. "'I'm hardly omniscient, nor can I be everywhere I need to be. Romefeller has a long history of corruption and mismanagement alongside its good years of competent leaders. Before turning fifteen, I thought myself a Darlian – the daughter of an elected official that, in spite of popular vote, never accomplished anything but his own grudging obedience to orders from Alliance military heads. My father worked eighteen hour days, struggling to be more than the simple role Romefeller assigned his office: a nod to appease the public's demand for democracy, without relinquishing any power at all.'" Her mouth tightened, eyes hardening. "'He failed. And when he continued to meddle despite knowing he could do nothing to change the situation, the assassins came.
"'If we cannot back democracy in truth, I will not tolerate the lie of one. I am a Princess of Sanc as well as a Darlian, and my people deserve the truth as much as a say in their future. In a perfect world, peace through pacifism and a true majority rule would work – but we don't live there. We have homes and loved ones to protect, and we are surrounded by those that would take them from us. If I cannot give the people everything they deserve, I will offer what is in my power – and for now, that is the compromise of the Militia. We have the right to protect ourselves, and I will not take that from anyone. Civil war in one region of a single country in our vast republic does not make martial law reasonable.'"
Whatever anyone thinks about her, Katrien mused, smiling as she took another long pull of her beer. No one can say Princess Relena is afraid to grab a bull by the horns.
oOo
oOo
November 8th 198 – Friday – Near Galati, Romania
Xu shot her a genuinely exasperated look, body language practically screaming 'God, why' even as he flowed three steps back to give her the boost she was calling for. Somehow, he still managed to spin the momentum she took into another offensive maneuver that clearly knocked one of his opponents out of the fight.
She let loose a laugh as she slammed an elbow into the skull of the last of the morons who'd come up behind them and loosed a wild spray of gunfire out the bay doors, in case there were any taking cover beyond. The sound felt wrong, pitched too high and frankly crass besides, but it was close enough to suit her purposes, especially as Xutao started muttering something darkly in Mandarin that she bet would make Sally smirk. Their workflow was smooth – though not because they partnered together so much as the fact that most of her drills with Xu were all about improv.
If it weren't for the fact that this was Hilde she was trying to impersonate, Lucrezia would worry that she was laying it on a little too thick.
Except Hilde had actually run a series of missions over the course of two days wearing sunglasses last March because she was too hungover to have functioned otherwise. Her firecracker of a student was just that much like Dave sometimes, and whatever theories the Regime made of that stunt the last time, it set a useful precedent. Hilde's taste in shades ran more sports streamline, but it was a believable progression of behavior for her to wear a pair of movie star frames that practically covered half of her face; ergo, between this and the sabotage mission she'd run solo yesterday – one that ought to take them a week or so to realize had signs Hilde often left to suggest guilt – this should lay out Schbeiker's alibi.
Because unfortunately, Hilde was in Ferrara – and Ferrara was inside Lee's renegade quarantine. She'd reported feeling reasonably safe in her cover before cutting traceable ties to wait it out, but the sooner Lee thought the girl had slipped his net, the safer her protégé would be. Whatever game Lee thought he was running with his rebel detainment scheme, she couldn't see it lasting longer than a month at worst; he just didn't have the resources to waste.
Noe was old guard, and while he wasn't stupid, Lucrezia had actively cultivated the vendetta he leveled at Schbeiker, harrying his lines and pulling off one stunt after another – sometimes even letting Hilde be the one to tweak his nose, just to keep the waters muddy. He might actually have started this longer lockdown because he'd caught a rumor of Hilde being in Italy, and the sooner he decided she'd outsmarted him again the sooner he'd give chase. And while General Noe Lee was a competent old war hawk worthy of his position, the Regime regulars didn't have the mindless, steadfast obedience the Alliance had demanded of their troops. Without Lee breathing directly down their necks, they'd relax enough for the more adventurous smugglers to get through, and then the new borders would get reviewed and dismissed not long after.
The man was also one of those generals who thought leading at the front was the height of stupidity, listing Dermail and Treize as leading examples for why. But given Treize's latest games, and Lucrezia's own front row seat to Dorothy's ability to blackmail someone while simultaneously convincing her target that he was the one springing a reverse ambush? She couldn't decide if the Catalonias had always been that far ahead of the pack despite their eccentricities, or if they'd successfully culled the rest of the herd over the centuries.
It spoke well of her own ancestors, she thought, that they had deliberately consolidated their fortunes and entered the merchant class just before the end of the first century A.C.
However proud he might be of the Khushrenada name, Treize had never known his father; the man had died before his son was out of diapers. He'd truthfully been raised all Catalonia, with all his mother's sweet cunning and his uncle's ruthless poise. Lee may have been part of the power block during General Demetri Catalonia's height, but that didn't make an equal.
And while she wasn't on that level either, she'd been the favored protégé of Treize for years, back when Zechs was too proud to be seen as subservient to someone so directly. She hadn't always agreed with her old instructor, but she'd listened, and she'd learned as much from what he didn't say as what he did. She'd come out of the academy honed sharper than most swords… for all that she'd been foolishly optimistic enough to believe she could change the world a little bit at a time, teaching, and avoid the kind of tragedy that haunted both Zechs and Jake.
Foolish, but also prideful. Over and over again, everything that had happened in 195 had been proof of just how damning of a weapon your pride was in your enemy's hands, and Jake was right again – objective lessons stuck.
And damn, but it felt good to be the one wielding the knife for once. Sally had her back now, keeping them on an even keel and planning for the future, and Lucrezia knew exactly how overwhelming, how demanding, that job was. She made damn sure the woman was recognized for it.
Maybe if she'd been a little more like Hilde before, and refused to work behind the scenes, demanded to be seen, things would have turned out differently.
But you know what? She didn't try to hide her smirk. Regrets just make you stupid. She wasn't dead yet, and as screwed up as things were, they still were. Your mistakes only ruined your life if you let them, and there was still plenty left to be happy about. There was something absolutely fantastic about doing whatever ridiculous thing she felt like just because she could. The fact that Hilde would happily take credit for anything she didn't want hitting her personal reputation just made it funnier.
So she finished her little show while doing something at least vaguely productive at the same time, and it wasn't until after they'd made their escape that she checked her phone and found a handful of texts waiting for her.
'What's the usual method of deescalating a defensive woman with a can of mace?'
'Omg these guys srsly.'
'Anything better 4 pepper spray than trying to drown in soapy water? Srsly kinda rude.'
Oh no… She covered her mouth with one hand to hide a horrified smile as she considered Yasa's question. Seeing as Odin was well enough to be texting too, Adam was likely the one with a face full of capsicum.
'Milk can help the pain; base to counter the acid.' It was really hit or miss if he would get the text in time to be helpful, but she might as well try.
A few moments later, her phone vibrated. 'Yeah no ppl are way trigger happy about their cows and kill for powdered. Your guys badass cool. If adam kills him will bring back body.'
She couldn't help but laugh helplessly at that.
oOo
oOo
November 9th 198 – Saturday – Forbach, France
"No, this was great, thank-you," Relena dismissed happily, waving off the other woman's concerns. "I came to talk and touch base, not criticize – neither of us expected to have the chance to review our options again for another three months, but it seemed silly not to, once I was here."
"I just," Calia stuttered. "I'm behind the projections, I know – and it's not by much, but-"
"They're called 'projections' for a reason," Relena reassured her. "Plans are all very well and good, but when it comes down to it, no one gets a perfect score." Offering her a smile, she added, "Sometimes it just rains." And in any case, whatever Calia thought she had failed to deliver on, it was still a good twenty percent higher than what she and Jake had personally agreed was an acceptable average from the housing construction project they'd left her in charge of their last time through here.
Honestly, she wasn't entirely clear on what the woman thought she'd failed at. Maybe she's just nervous? Sometimes, she had found, people didn't handle unexpected visits very well.
"I just, I said…" She sniffed hard. "I mean, I know, it's fine, but I meant it, and I know we're nowhere near deadline yet, but then I burned the-"
"Calia," she cut in, entirely exasperated that they were doing this again, but aware that getting annoyed about it would only set the woman off again. Absolutely nerves, she groused, feeling a little helpless when the woman ten years her senior hid her face in her hands to hide tears… before just giving in to instinct and striding back to throw her arms around her. This is absolutely ridiculous.
For a moment, Calia stayed ramrod stiff – and Relena began to wonder if she was going to begin crying tears of pure frustration – but then arms came up around her in response… and the tears become true sobs.
God, what now? For lack of any better ideas – in for a penny, in for a pound – she tried rubbing small circles on the other woman's back with a vague hope of waiting it out. She could think of three things she really needed to be doing – she was already tired far too early in the day, damn it – but it wasn't as though another ten minutes would really change anything. That and she was self-aware enough to recognize that she was… probably being catty. At least a little bit. She was hardly exempt from the occasional wave of tears over silly things.
That didn't make this situation less irritating though, and she couldn't help but wonder where exactly Calia was on her cycle…
…and then debate where she was on hers, because realistically, she was only annoyed because she'd only ever been on the opposite side of this equation. Evidently, my mood is wretched this morning.
Suppressing a sigh, she continued to rub the older woman's back, but looked over her shoulder to meet Jake's eyes. It was still so strange to see him in a suit instead of his uniform – grey linen, instead of heavyweight black ripstop. He certainly looks good, though.
As well as he cleaned up, however, he was still Jake, and his eyes only lit up in amusement at her predicament as he mouthed the word 'karma'.
Touché. Unfortunately, that didn't mean she was any better equipped for handling this just because she could acknowledge Jake had managed it. She gave good speeches, she knew, but that was either a product of preparation or stress to the point where she wasn't entirely clear on what words were coming out of her mouth until she had to deal with the consequences of what she'd just said – and while the latter version usually went well, it didn't always, and she was feeling far too irritated to risk it.
Smiling slightly, Jake made one of his 'wait' signs that could pass as an idle gesture, hand kept low for more subtlety… before tucking that same hand back behind his back to sign something to the others.
Well, it was nice that he had a plan, but in the meantime… "Calia, it's perfectly fine. I'm glad that you take your work so seriously, but if you're too harsh on yourself for every setback, you'll never make any progress at all." I certainly had to figure that one out for myself at one point. But maybe she can listen and avoid learning that the hard way. Listening to the other woman continue sniffling for another long moment or two, though… Or maybe not, but it was worth a try.
Just as she was thinking she needed to begin trying extricate herself and repair their working relationship later when they'd both had time to be a little more rational, Relena's phone began to ring and the cheerful jingle got through where words had failed. A moment later Calia was pulling away, wiping at her eyes and giving her a rueful smile. "Ah, I'm sorry, I don't know what's gotten into me… I hope I haven't made you late."
"Not just yet, no," Relena returned cheerfully, holding out a hand and shaking firmly when Calia reciprocated. "I'll wait to hear from you through the regular channels, yes? Let's just stay on the same update schedule, and we'll address any problems if they become apparent. I'm not worried about it, truly."
"Yes, of course, I… Of course, Minister."
"No need to butter me up with my new titles," Relena answered playfully as she waved and turned away, pulling her phone out as she made for the doors. "We'll talk later!" The caller ID said Marsden, and she smiled broadly and hit connect as Lin stepped ahead to open the door for her. "Hello?"
"Hey, Princess," Mars greeted in his typical slow molasses drawl. "I have absolutely no idea why I'm calling."
"Ah, yes," she returned, aware of potential eavesdroppers as she waited for the others to clear the rest of the way to the car. "Naturally. I'm going to need a few more details on that, however."
A delighted little laugh came through the line. "Aw, damn, we're playing that game?" There was a rustling sound, or maybe wind noise, before he added, "I've got Verhoeven and Lefevre ahead of us at the little shindig you're heading to next, and they say everything looks straight and clean so far. We ready to head that way yet?"
"Yes, we're on our way now," she agreed, stepping through the door when Jake gestured for her. "Where are you?"
"Outside with Duchamps and today's temp, Strasburg, watching other angles on the building. Ah, there's Sobrie. Alright. You need to keep talking, or should I get ready to gather my people up and follow Vaughn?"
She hummed, glancing back down the hallway. "No, thank-you. I should be there soon."
"Alright, see you."
As soon as she ended the call, Jake was murmuring over her shoulder almost inaudibly. "I hadn't realized that would fluster you. You do well enough with kids."
"She's not a child," Relena answered, voice kept low and lips still in the same way. "I can't treat her like one and still expect her to respect me."
"It's not too different, in the end of the day," he argued easily. "We never outgrow the need for comfort – we just get taller."
She resisted the urge to roll her eyes, instead asking, "Is that how you thought of me, last year? A little girl?"
"Mm, maybe a little, the first time? Mostly I was trying to remember what Lu used to do when I turned into a wreck." He shifted his weight a little as they walked, adding on, "Or, well, Des… But mostly Lu. She's always had a way of leveling people out, no matter how messy it feels. Last month, with Mu… I think I really got it for the first time, maybe? That balance she always gave us."
Noin always has had an ability to mellow everything out in a happy way, hasn't she? Smiling a little, she glanced over at him. "So what you're saying is: next time, try to be like Noin?"
He rolled his eyes. "It's a decent framing device, if nothing else."
"Just a minute here," Mai announced, stopping them from walking any closer to the outermost door of the complex while tipping her head in a gesture to let them know she was listening to her earpiece. "Though as an aside, I really want to meet this woman one of these days."
Jake laughed, his grin bright as he casually shifted his weight… and now that Relena was intimately aware of exactly where he kept all his weapons, she understood how much of a ready stance it truly was. "The two of you will get on like a house on fire, Marakesh."
"It's a compelling image," Relena agreed quickly, because good God, that was… both breathtaking and terrifying. Smirking, she added, "Just do me the favor of a two day waiting period before you decide to try taking over a country together, mm?"
The grey in the other woman's eyes almost disappeared as the green turned bright. "Ooh. That good, huh?"
"Now I almost regret that I've facilitated this," Jake admitted wryly.
"It hasn't happened yet," she pointed out mildly, smiling at the 'almost'.
"Lu's coming back eventually, and the Typhoon's not going anywhere," he negated, blandly ignoring the major's proud grin. "The only question is when, and I don't have a say in that either."
She let out a theatrical sigh, stress she hadn't even recognized falling away from her shoulders. "Nothing for it, then."
"I can't even think of a way to prepare," he agreed cheerfully.
Mai nodded sagely, though her eyes still sparked. "It's an invasion," she agreed. "Too late now." Straightening her shoulders, she gestured towards the door before striding forward to open it. "The boys are ready to roll."
"Delay?" Jake asked curiously, touching Relena's elbow for a moment so she'd walk ahead of him.
"Stalker walk," Mai explained, holding the door open. "Kansas caught it, but the guy bounced out at a waitress coming out for break and she kissed him before dragging him over to sit at the bar, so not a problem." Jogging ahead a few steps once they were through, she lead the way to the car. "Shia stepped in for a coffee to keep an eye out, but it seems innocent."
"Fair enough." Mai got the car door, and as she slid in she felt a burst of relief the dark interior… which didn't make any sense at all until she realized her head was buzzing.
How long has that been there? Grimacing, she wrapped a hand over her eyes as she listened to the others slide in after her and shut the door… then let herself fall bonelessly against Jake's side when he wrapped an arm around her. "Ugh."
"I was wondering about that," he muttered. "We've got a good forty minutes in the car now, though – Ibu and nap?"
"Probably," she groused, closing her eyes entirely and dropping her hand to rest bonelessly in his lap. "I didn't even notice. How-"
"You've been squinting for the last thirty or so," he explained, body shifting as he reached across the aisle to… get a water bottle from someone, apparently. "Just in the temples? Thanks, Lin." A moment later, there was the rattle of a pill bottle being tossed… and the engine starting. "Smooth over speed, Recine," he called quietly. "If you can swing both, great, but better to be a few minutes late, I think."
"Right," Vaughn called back, voice only just loud enough to carry… and meanwhile, someone else pressed a few small tabs into her hand.
"Thank-you," she murmured, jamming them into her mouth unceremoniously and taking the bottle Jake pressed on her without opening her eyes. She already had a long day ahead of her still, and this wasn't like her. "Poor Calia," she decided ruefully. I'll probably feel rather badly about that later.
"I'm pretty sure Ms. Haszlauer's mood swings had nothing to do with yours," Jake argued dismissively. "She started panicking hours before we arrived, if not days." He took the water back and shifted into a better position for her to lean against him, pulling her closer with a hand against her thigh. "No need to worry. I'll wake you up with time to run through your checklist, alright?"
"Okay," she agreed, snuggling deeper into the warmth of him, feeling safe…
oOo
oOo
En route from Forbach, France to Metz, France
Lin raised his brows at just how quickly Lena's breathing evened back out, and Jake resisted the urge to sigh. Damn. She'd gotten very good at quickly dropping herself into a trance to catch catnaps over the past year and a half, but that had been fast even for her. She's getting even less sleep than I thought.
"Looping you in," his earpiece announced, the voice entirely toneless, but still close enough to Sobrie's to be recognizable through the subvocal mic – based more of recorded profile than anything the technology could pick out. '-e okay?' Making a face, Lin briefly pressed the mic closer against the skin of his neck before repeating, more clearly, 'Is she okay?'
He'd initially refused to let them use this kind of tech as a crutch, but now that they all had a solid foundation in other methods, being able to hold a more complete conversation than sign over a distance was only a boon. The sooner they were comfortable with subvocalizing, the sooner they could do it without moving their jaws, and the benefits would only increase.
They were doing better with the learning curve of the damn things than he and Dave had, at any rate, despite the major's impatience with his limited precision. And holding a full conversation without talking out loud here is good practice anyway.
Wrinkling his nose briefly to show annoyance, he answered, 'She keeps staying up too late.' And waking up before their alarms too, as far as he could tell, even if she didn't get out of bed any earlier… and he was pretty sure it was because of him, which made him really want to grimace. For all that they'd been comfortable napping in each other's space for the past year, they weren't used to sharing a bed. And however amazing it was, that they could and that she was there, the adjustment period was taking longer than either of them had expected.
Being back on tour, might actually help. He was in no way complaining, but Lena… had proven to have a heart-stoppingly opportunistic streak that neither of them would be comfortable indulging in without a wall between them and the majors.
…or at least, he wasn't comfortable, and had made it clear that distracting him before he could remember to have a panic attack about how the new intimacy in his life was being accompanied by an equally severe lack of privacy wasn't going to make him magically stop having issues within the space of a month.
…Probably. He hadn't actually lost his mind yet, and… yeah. He really didn't need to think about the fact that so far, it seemed to be working.
Mai was giving him a slow, smug grin now, and he thought about exactly what he'd just said – and resisted the urge to groan. Lin was pointedly looking out the window trying to not be part of the conversation, which Jake really appreciated, and to all appearances Cassidy and Vaughn were too busy with their own low conversation off comm to have noticed.
He narrowed his eyes at Mai warningly, brushing his fingertips idly over Lena's leg – thigh, he needed to make sure he did not do this in public, shit. At this rate he was going to just have to make sure he never touched her if there was a chance of paparazzi around the corner, because he didn't seem to think about how he was touching, damn it… But he pointedly didn't pull away because they weren't in public right now, and changed the subject. 'Any trouble today?'
The first few times they tried to let Lin take the wheel back at Sarracenia had been hopeless because as soon as Lin brushed over something Jake had just handled it without thinking… which was counter to the entire point. Unfortunately, given how tight of a balancing act they were once again doing with the Ministry move and rewriting the tour around Italy? While this was better than running the entire damn department themselves, there was still plenty of stress to go around.
Thankfully, they'd sorted out what looked like a stable compromise: Jake kept his mic and earpiece, but wasn't part of the main channel. He was technically only present as a civilian guest now – the same as Dorothy – but in practice, he was on call. In the short term, it meant that Lin and Mai could problem solve on their own, but he was still there if they got stuck, and for now they were reviewing the day's events each evening. Then the long-term version wouldn't change much: he'd still be on call, but the two majors should only need his input in emergency situations.
Enough support to not feel exposed, but not enough oversight to micromanage.
Lin looked just as happy about the subject change as he was, so they dove into the details of the morning so they'd have one less thing to cover that night, then started running scenarios for the hell of it. If nothing else, Lin's practice with the mic had helped his precision by the time he was nudging Lena awake again.
"Any better?" he asked, watching her stretch.
"I think so," she agreed, looking around, then reaching past him to pick up the water bottle she'd been drinking from earlier. "How long do we have?"
"The panel doesn't start for another twenty minutes," Lin noted, checking his watch. "Vaughn?"
"I'd like to say we're ten out, but we're starting to hit lunch traffic, so I'd bank closer to fifteen," the sergeant major called back. "'Tano and Emma sound pretty bored, but they also said Dorothy disappeared almost ten minutes ago, so they're debating who gets to go look for her."
Well, that could be nothing or anything. Pulling out his phone, Jake asked, "They try her phone yet?"
"Text, maybe three minutes ago," Cassidy agreed.
Nowhere worrying yet. Between the shift in team leadership and the political hotbed warming back up, they'd increased security parameters back up to the levels he'd demanded on their very first tour. It was possible Dorothy was chafing under that, but-
He grinned fiercely as his phone vibrated, screen lighting up with an incoming call from the girl. "Got her." He tapped the direct connect instead of for his earpiece and held it out, in case Lena wanted to listen in. "Morning, Thea. Was just thinking about calling you."
She let out an amused huff. "I know."
Of course she does. Dorothy thought the increased paranoia this trip was fun more than anything. "Shouldn't you be calling Lin instead?"
"No," she argued firmly. "Not for this. I just finished a very illuminating conversation with a representative whose proposal I believe Relena would be interested in hearing."
Relena cut him an intrigued look, and he did her the same favor before she started mouthing her question. "Is this about one of the old friends you were trying to get in touch with last February?" he repeated, keeping his tone light even as he narrowed his eyes. What were they up to in February? They'd all still been based out of Brussels at the time, and Zechs had been keeping him and Lena on a leash short enough to feel like a fucking noose, when they could talk him into letting them out at all.
Dorothy'd had more leeway, though, being a free agent by then and also not truly involved in the nightmare the Amsterdam speech had become. And, well… considering how he'd still been too damn busy navel-gazing to look her in the eye, evidently Relena hadn't squandered what resources she did have access to, which was great.
But damn it, he'd thought he'd finished playing catch-up. I'm going to have to fix that tonight, he promised himself. Getting caught flat-footed would do them no favors.
"That's the one!" Dorothy returned cheerfully. "Alejandra Harding managed to catch my attention while everyone was doing the set-up for the panel, and we got to talking."
Harding was… a West American Romefeller House, with few Fall survivors and virtually no power beyond the old prestige of name. Most of the Hardings that were left had been out of the country at school or on vacation, and the only way they would hold any sway now would be if they were taken under wing by a more powerful European House.
He thought the only ones left were women, like so much of the rest of the world… and given the way Romefeller tended to run and how hadn't heard much about them since the Fall, he hadn't been sure if they'd slipped into the anonymity of the middle class masses or quietly married themselves into a stronger House.
"That's great to hear," he returned warmly, mind racing. "Which party has she fallen in with, then?"
"Oh, not so much a party as another old friend of Relena's from August 195," Dorothy returned, sounding actively amused and only just barely making an effort to hide it. "You know, who she visited right before she took that trip south?"
August 195… He had to think about that for a moment. He'd been in the middle of fucking nowhere out near L3 most of that summer prepping for the upcoming OZ campaign into space, and had only just been wrapping up when news of the mobile doll testing came out. By August, though, Treize had managed to smash most of Operation M's plans into complete disarray. Their colonial enemies had been scattered and ripe for the picking, but despite the success of Operation Daybreak, Romefeller had still been standing stronger than any of them had been happy about.
Lu had handed in her resignation in… in May, and was trying to keep Lena out of trouble while doing odd jobs for… Zechs…
Fuck, August 195 had been that machismo bullshit in Antarctica.
Down south, indeed. He hadn't heard about the details on that until Treize got a secure line to him while bored out of his skull a week into his house arrest in October, but just about everything about the Antarctica debacle had been stupid. Zechs'd been having inadequacy issues and Lu'd thought that enabling his stupid once or twice would help him get it out of his system. Then Relena had shown up with her brother's brand of reckless that he was so glad she'd mostly outgrown with a letter for a gundam pilot as her excuse… And then Lu had been pressed just to get Lena and their 'guests' the fuck out of there while Treize ran damage control to stop Romefeller from directly executing their 'war hero'.
His childhood friend had always had a talent for pushing the right buttons so his opponents thought they were the clever ones. Hence convincing the higher ups into creating a more politically tenable situation for Zechs' demise while conveniently forgetting the talents the Lightning Count was literally named for.
It had worked out, but seriously? Looking back, how much of the bullshit they'd had to wing had been caused by Zechs having identity issues? He'd always been a bit of a diva, but the stress of the war had had him pulling out all the stops.
And then, you know, losing his fucking mind. Jake had told Treize when he forwarded the intel and arranged materials that the Zero System looked like a clusterfuck waiting to happen. Epyon had been important for enough shit before Libra that he couldn't regret funding its construction any more than he did the new, thankfully Zero-free Aequitas gundam Treize was leading his Coalition with, but in his defense? He'd also thought Treize would see if he could actually handle Zero in a simulation before building it as an integral part of his fancy new suit.
That had been a real slap, when his usual 'I will succeed because I must' philosophy got laughed at in the face of reality. He'd earned that rebuke, without a doubt.
…He couldn't remember who Relena's letter had been from. All he could call up was something about how it would supposedly help absolve Yuy of his insanely suicidal guilt crisis following the entrapment Treize had wound him up in at New Edwards – and/or something to soothe any trauma leftover from Une's attempt to make the entirety of humanity want to lynch them. Granted, the kid had stopped handing guns to people like party favors after Antarctica – but Lu said he'd already claimed he was done with that before she dragged him and Not-Trowa Barton 'down south', so he doubted it had much to do with Relena's early successes in being exactly where no one wanted her to be.
It was one of her more endearing talents, really.
So he looked to her for a cue again to find her eyes wide but glinting with determination, mouthing 'do it' as soon as she could tell he was looking at her, so okay. "Nice," he told Dorothy, thinking over their schedule. "We won't really have time for a meet before the panel, but maybe after? Or was Alejandra just passing along an invite?"
"She's already gone," Dorothy confirmed. "I have a number to try to correlate something sooner than later."
"You know the schedule," Relena said aloud, now that she knew the other woman wasn't listening. "Neutral setting, high respect, and private, but as relaxed as we can." She hesitated for a moment, before adding, "Very private, Dorothy. Talk with the crew about how they want security, but… Thea, is this Regina or Sylvia?"
Sylvia? His first thought was reflexively of Lu's mother, but of course that was wrong. Who else carried the same name?
"The scion, not the dowager," Dorothy clarified. "And based on what I've seen of Alejandra over the past year or two, I'm starting to doubt how absolute Sylvia's seclusion has been since the Fall. Ventai took a practical wife, not a trophy; I don't know the details of your experiences with Regina, but the old woman is more than capable of playing puppet master to cover her granddaughter's back. Given their recent fall due to treachery, they would certainly have motive to stay behind the scenes until circumstances forced an open move."
…Oh, shit. The upside of Yuy's spiral of regret had been that it kept him out of the game months longer than they could have otherwise expected. But the downside was that he blew Treize's cover about just who had kicked off hostilities with the Alliance to literally everyone who might have held a grudge about it.
"Use your judgement, talk to the boys, and arrange it," Relena repeated. "And ride with us after this meet so I can get more details. Regina was level-headed and kind, and while I didn't talk more than a few minutes with Sylvia, I can't see her goals altering so dramatically from before that we'd be at an impasse."
"She wants to discuss 'mutual goals' and there were enough lures about 'expanding horizons' that she's either spooked hard by the East or is behind the push for the Pacific Reclamation," Dorothy returned. "We can comb over the details later – I need to finish what I was in the middle of when Harding displayed enough subtle craft in my peripheral vision to draw me out."
"Later, then," Relena agreed, reaching out and disconnecting the line… and blowing out a breath. Looking back up at him, she let out a little laugh. "Well, I'm awake now."
I should hope. "And we're going to treat with the Noventas," he said by way of agreement, mind struggling to build contingency plans despite not having nearly enough detail to start.
"They're not so bad," she cajoled.
"Ventai made Lee look like a charming little kitten sharpening his claws," he returned wryly. "He was jaded enough to want peace in in his later years, but he was still at the top of Treize's hit list for damn good reason, whatever he said in the last hour before he died. Sylvia's parents died when she was five, he raised her, and the only reason the Noventas haven't been a concern before now is because they refused to say a damn word." If they had been quietly raising support the whole while instead…
"Hence treating with them; it's long overdue." She leaned back away from him, resettling her hair. "She wouldn't be coming to me unless she wanted something, love. She has a good head on her shoulders and the nerve to tear Heero a new one and walk off with his gun as a souvenir. I can work with that."
"…What." His brain was trying to stall out, damn it.
"What he said," Lin decided.
"I wanna hear this story!" Vaughn called boisterously from up front.
Relena smirked, giving him a sideways glance before canting her voice forward to be sure everyone could hear her. "Yelling at Heero wasn't exactly hard," she admitted. "It was more about getting him to do something other than walk away. But I also never called him a coward for trying to find forgiveness he didn't earn instead of doing something to fix the problem."
"Damn." Cassidy was looking back at them now. "She doesn't pull punches, does she?"
"Not from what I saw." Her grin turned impish. "Then again, she never did see him again, which means she didn't get past the apathy Heero wore like a coat of arms… and he kept doing the same thing anyway, so I doubt it bothered him overmuch." Laughing a little, she added, "But he did make sure she was out of the house before going to Regina later with the same song and dance, so maybe she did leave an impression."
"So what you're saying," Mai concluded happily, "is that you just asked Thea to set you up a play date."
"With a kindred soul," Lin agreed. "Someone elbow the billionaire before he passes out."
"Go fuck yourself," Jake answered brightly, stretching his arms across the back of the seat. Whatever jokes they made, he didn't do that that often.
"What, like… right here?"
…Well, at least Lin finished getting over his shock and awe about RLTT, he supposed.
oOo
oOo
November 11th 198 – Monday – Szczecin, Poland
Cory considered the lines of code for a moment before focusing back on the diagram; it was easier to see there was a purpose, there. "So it's like interlocking puzzle pieces."
Marlé made a face without looking up from where she was tapping an eraser against the table. "It's supposed to be," she agreed. "Eventually, at least. It's not quite right yet." She bit at her lip, eyes narrowed, before turning back to her computer screen and eying some sort of simulator. "Maybe…" she trailed off, starting to type again and either forgetting he was sitting there or ignoring him.
That was okay. He was still trying to make sense of what she was doing, and it figured that the how would be distracting. She'd said she didn't mind him hanging out while she worked, but she was barely there, the same way Quatre would get when he was working out something tricky.
It was nice. And he'd figure out the details eventually, if he kept trying.
"What's wrong with it now?"
"Well, nothing, really," she mumbled, tipping her head to one side before reaching out and tapping the screen to highlight a line. "It just won't work. It's too small, it needs… stuff. Mm." Opening a new window, she started typing out more code cheerfully. "Locking stuff, it'll be great, just… a few more links. The idea's good, the nexus just needs to be expanded." She scrunched up her nose again. "I… might need to redraw it from scratch again."
It would start making sense eventually.
"Hey, take-out's here," Jon called, leaning in the doorway. "How goes it?"
"Uh… uninspiringly," Marlé decided, not looking up from her screen.
"And food?"
She was squinting now. "Irritatingly intelligent."
Jon snorted, shaking his head. "Maybe do something about that, then?"
"In a minute…"
"Wow." Rolling his eyes, he focused on Cory and gestured. "Come on, Cor, help me make her a plate."
That was probably a good idea; Jon didn't really know Marlé yet beyond how to recognize her, and Cory did. "Okay." Glancing back to his friend as he stood, he added, "We'll be back in a minute."
"Uh huh…"
"English, Cor," Jon reminded, gesturing again and starting to walk away.
Huh? He'd…. Oh. He'd been slipping into Italian more and more lately without realizing it, but- "She's fluent," he argued as he followed.
"And you're not," the man pointed out. "It's a lazy habit, especially because she is fluent and your age, and it's a good opportunity to pick up English slang." He snickered. "At least, I'm pretty sure she's where Odin keeps getting shit from. It's either her, or he's reading really weird phrasebooks for fun."
Odin didn't talk that weird… though he didn't get it sometimes, and Cat's reactions were funny when it happened, so what did it matter? "It's nice, though."
"Yeah, but you're going to have to start talking to other kids sooner or later, and one of the big reasons you aren't already is because they don't speak Italian," Jon argued patiently.
He frowned. "My English is fine." He'd only used English in Africa, and he'd gotten a lot better at it.
"Only so long as you stay in practice with it," Jon warned as he led them into the kitchen where the others were. "Falling behind sucks. You've got enough catch-up ahead of you already; no reason to add to it."
He huffed out a groan. "You too?"
"Kid," Trisin announced, turning to meet his eyes squarely. "If Cat wasn't trying to get you back in school, I'd be giving him so much hell."
It wasn't like anything he'd learned in school had made Africa easier. More than anything, it had hurt. "Why can't I learn on the go like Marlé?"
"Who?"
"Audi," Jon corrected, messing up his hair in a way he knew Cory hated.
"Whatever," he argued, grabbing his wrist and shoving before Jon could pull away.
"It's not whatever," Trisin insisted.
"It's what she said to call her."
"Yeah," MJ announced dryly. "But do you still forget and call Cat Robby?"
He frowned. "That's different." Robby wasn't the same person, but Marlé hadn't changed more than her hair.
"It is," Trisin agreed, coming closer and crouching a little so they were eye to eye. "But do you really think she would've done that if she didn't have a good reason, Cor? She and her brother didn't explain much, but she's been caught crying about it, and the fact that they won't say says a lot too."
…Oh. He hadn't known that.
"And you can't do it like Audi because nobody ever taught you how to work like she and Odin do, because she got to go to school for longer than you," Trisin explained. "And that part of school was long enough ago for the rest of us that we don't remember how we figured it out.
"Cor… I know it's annoying, but you…" He rubbed his face with both hands and took a deep breath before trying again. "You were in sixth grade when your world went upside down, and it's really hard to explain how much you missed without letting you walk it yourself, okay? You learned a lot of stuff out of order, and we don't even know where to look for the holes. So we have to start back at the start and work our way through."
"But why does that even matter? If we find a hole later, we can fix it then, if it's even a problem."
His voice was… being weird again. He remembered it, but he didn't remember it hurting when it did this, just how it's make Mama roll her eyes and… and Papa… Papa had…
No.
He didn't want… He… He couldn't…
He wanted Cat. Where was Cat? He was sorry, he wouldn't… He hadn't… No, he didn't want to do that again, it-
Where was Cat? This didn't happen with Cat, he didn't… No, he couldn't-
"Cor, kid, I need you to listen to me, okay? You're okay. You're here, and that's better than we really hoped we'd get, and I'm sorry… But kid, we've got to work on this, alright?" Tris clapped a hand around the back of his neck and pulled to bring their foreheads together, because at some point he'd dropped to his knees instead of stooping. "We're going to figure it out, and it'll be fine, and you'll get past all this annoying bullshit and grow up to be awesome because what else would you be, to get here? We're all here… So just breathe, okay? There's nothing you need to stress about here. We've got time."
"I c… c-can't…"
Whining. That was… He couldn't just sit back and wait and whine about… It wouldn't… He'd said he couldn't whine, not when- Not… not when…
He hadn't looked. It'd just been another… things were bad enough, Papa had said, without corpse sicknesses. So he hadn't looked. If he didn't look, then maybe he'd just… gotten locked in a different part of the Ghetto. He'd been… He'd been whining, and he couldn't do that anymore, or… so maybe he'd just tried to walk it off and hit a section change, that happened sometimes, he….
He hadn't looked, and he hadn't… hadn't seen… And Colonel Mitchell said they were dead, so… if he'd looked…
Why was he still whining, when it wasn't even important anymore?
"I want Cat." The words were like sand in his throat and he wanted to choke on them, but he couldn't. He wouldn't, it was the only… The only thing that mattered when…
When what? This wasn't… it wasn't even real, was it?
Not that it had ever mattered, whether it was real or not. Real wasn't… it just was, and making it not real didn't mean he didn't have to still do it.
He swallowed it down, let the fuzz smooth everything over, and…
…what? There'd been… Why was he on the ground? That was… dumb.
No reason to get up, though.
"Where's Cat?" The words were easy this time.
Tris sighed, wrapping an arm tight around his shoulders. "Jon's getting him."
"Oh. Good." Jon was fast. Long legs, all speed… You didn't need to hit half as hard, when you could run like that.
He wished he could run like that. Then maybe…
…No. He didn't have to do that anymore, Cat had said. Even if everyone else who stayed was going to, even if their new friends were… he didn't have to do that anymore.
Cat had promised. He wouldn't…
It wasn't real.
Everything was okay.
"Cor?"
"Yeah?"
He liked Tris. He'd always been nice to him, even when he shouldn't've, before Robby found them. He'd never been anything like Cat, but he'd never said stuff. That first day there'd been the hat, 'to keep you nose from burning right off', and he'd always shared songs, when things got… got long.
"I'm sorry."
That didn't make any sense. "Oh."
"I didn't mean to do that."
Oh… this was more familiar, though he wasn't sure what Tris meant.
It was better to not ask.
"You had to, right?"
A deep breath shook through him, and he wrapped his other arm around Cory's shoulders too, pulling him in closer. "Fuck, I… I don't know, Cor. Maybe? You're… You've been doing so much better lately."
That was true. Real even when everything else… slipped. "I like it here."
"…Yeah. Yeah, me too."
Trisin's face was wet when he dropped it against his neck, but he didn't mind. Tris got that way sometimes, the same as Robby had, and… it was almost nice, somehow. He didn't mean anything bad about it, the way it had been when-
No. That hadn't happened. It was about to, and he'd… It wouldn't have been real if it'd happened, he could fix that much, but then Tris had come and…
The blood had taken weeks to scrub out, after Tris took care of it, but it hadn't happened.
He'd been… happy, that it hadn't. That would've been… bad. He'd been trying, but before Tris had come, he hadn't been sure it would stay fake – he'd already screamed, and… making sound usually broke it. And he'd known better, but…
He hadn't really figured out how to talk again, until after Robby found them.
Talking was… Talking was awesome, though. "Hey, Tris?"
"Yeah?"
How would Mar- How would Audi say it? Maybe… "D'you think I could learn how to run like Jon?"
Another shake, but the sound was a laugh this time, which was nice. "Kid, I think we could teach you how to do just about anything you wanted. Even if we didn't know how, we'd figure it out, okay?"
Tris was awesome too. "I helped build a shed once." He'd been tired the whole way through, and it had been hot, before he really understood what hot was like, but… "It… it was good. It took all day, and then we still had to paint it later, but… It was cool. Pa-" No. "We needed somewhere to put the tools, because the garage was getting turned into an apartment."
Tris sighed out another laugh. "You know… I probably should've guessed that. Your shelters always held up better, and it took me the longest time to figure out it was because you were doing the joinery different."
He wrinkled his nose, turning his head so his cheek was pressed against his friend's chest. "The other way was stupid."
Tris snorted. "No kidding. The problem was that nobody else knew any better." He started running one hand up and down his back. "You ever work on any models?"
…What? "I don't know that word," he decided. Or at least, he was pretty sure that meant, uh… girls?
"Ah, they're these miniature versions of cool stuff, like cars, or ships, or suits," MJ explained, sounding like he was right next to them on the floor too. "Only they come all in tiny pieces, and you have to put them together right, like they're the real thing."
"And paint them," Grant added, sounding further away. "God only knows how many hours I burned away working up Warhammer shit…" He snorted. "But my friends were jealous when we played, and I can't say I didn't enjoy myself."
"You played with models?"
"It's what you do, it's not… you know, never mind, I'm not having this conversation. Go look it up if you're curious."
"Warhammer was great," Raph added. "I… don't think I ever want to play it again, especially with, ah… the party I liked to run. Not and not have it be…"
"Yeah, shit got a little too real," Grant agreed. "Still, it was great before, and… Hey, did they ever make any of the gundams, or was that too controversial? I kinda want to leave a little Sandrock somewhere just to see the face Cat'd make."
Oh, that… That could be fun. "Can we get some?"
oOo
oOo
November 12th 198 – Tuesday – Cardiff, Wales
"Hey! Long day?"
Blinking, Nick looked around and… yeah, he was being talked to. "Uh…" Put on the spot, he scrambled for a decent answer. Somehow, 'Not really but I'm trying stupid hard to not freak out' didn't feel all that socially acceptable. Go figure.
Apparently he looked like shit enough for someone to notice, though, which… Well, he wasn't exactly surprised, ugh. But hey, an opening? So he turned to face the guy more full-on without falling into a defensive stance, letting out a sheepish smile. "Something like that," he admitted.
He was younger than Nick, with fair hair and dark eyes, and he practically bounced as he grinned, moving closer. "Well, you made it to the rally anyway," he offered happily. "So kudos to you, I guess." Pulling a face, he added, "I had to tell my mom I was going to Leslie's study group to get out, how lame is that?" Sticking out a hand, he added, "I'm Eric."
Rally? "Nick." For a second he thought about just rolling with it, but… the whole point of going out like this was to be honest. Well, no. His therapist had said a bunch of stuff about 'finding your baseline', and acceptance, and learning to drop his masks – but it basically boiled down to not lying just to scrape by unnoticed. To other people or himself.
So instead he asked, "Someone's holding a rally tonight?"
"Yeah, over in Alexandra Gardens – it's supposed to be past the library?" It was Eric's turn to look sheepish, now. "I've never been on campus before, and you look old enough to be an upperclassman, so I figured it couldn't hurt to try."
He grinned a little, reading between the lines. "I read 'broke uni student' that bad, huh?"
Eric snickered. "Well, more that you've got the whole thousand yard 'I've just sat enough exams to go vegetable' look, but I'm not picky. I've yet to graduate, but I'm due to start up at Trinity come January."
It was dumb, but his heart stuttered a little, hearing that. Maybe this'll be a real connection, instead of just practice. "Nice. I'm due back at the same time, actually." He licked his lips, trying not to stumble over the next part. "I, ah, started before the Fall, but ended up needing to take a break." Grimacing, he admitted, "It's been long enough now that I wouldn't be surprised if we end up in some of the same classes, between switching majors and what I'll need to retake."
"Nice! Or, well," he made a funny face, backpedaling. "I mean… It sucks that they're going to make you redo stuff. But hey, none of my friends are going to the same school, so it'll be good to know someone?"
"Silver linings," Nick agreed, jamming his hands deeper into his pockets. "And it's not too bad, just… I was really focused, before? So I skipped a few steps, but now I'm not a traditional student, and with a different career path…" He shrugged.
"Eh, I guess? What did you switch to?"
"Just… undecided." God, but this was always embarrassing. Still, honesty, whenever he could, to make up for when he just couldn't. His therapist kept telling him that right now, the most important goal he should have was to push through his issues instead of hiding from them, even when it left him haggard… because every single time, when he looked back the next day? It wasn't so bad, really. And that made it easier to do next time, and…
He really wanted to have himself under at least a little more control before he went back to Dublin and wasn't doing therapy twice a week.
So he took a deep breath and forced a shrug, trying his damndest to ignore the image of Robby visibly changing his body language from threatening to casual – because damn it, he had enough to deal with without thinking about how he'd been adding onto the issues of someone he'd been delusional enough to think he hated – and tried to explain. "I was studying journalism, before. Like… mostly, I just wanted to do photography? Make it into the big leagues. And everyone says I'm good enough to get there but you need a standby, and with photojournalism, you can travel a lot."
God, but it hurt to remember thinking that way. Wanting to travel, to get out and see something was what had gotten him a one-way ticket to hell. He'd figured he could get some good opportunities for shots of the reconstruction; do something charitable in the wake of the fuck-all of the Americas going down and line his CV a little at the same time. He'd never worked with that kind of natural full lighting, and the Sahara had sounded exotic when he'd first been looking at the pamphlet.
"Makes sense," Eric was agreeing, looking thoughtful. "I mean, if you can do it, why not?"
"Because it's not… It doesn't really mean anything?" He'd missed his camera more than he'd really missed his mom – being able to put something in perspective and appreciate it for what it really was, good or bad – but… that wasn't okay. It wasn't okay that after some time in the cages, he hadn't been able to remember how to do that without the lens between him and the rest of the world.
It was a crutch. Without it, he'd almost died more times than he could count, done things he hated himself for, things he didn't think he could ever stop hating himself for… all because he couldn't see the facts through his own fucking eyes. The angle on everything had tilted, and he'd… he'd…
Fuck, I do not need to flip my shit right now. The whole point of coming out tonight had been another try at getting used to the real version of normal, even if it included half a dozen things that made him want to go become a fucking hermit just so he didn't have to talk to anyone ever again. Because he didn't actually want to be a hermit – and it wasn't an option anyway – and that meant he needed to step up.
It was just ironic, how the issue these days was how he couldn't stop seeing the Sahara laid over everything. He'd… God, but he'd been a fucking demon before Robby showed up and snapped a leash around his neck to reel him back to sanity, all because he couldn't remember the world outside of what was in front of his face. And now? Now he had his life back, and all he could see was the horror he'd left behind.
PTSD is such shit. All he wanted was to move on.
"I'm not really sure I like people anymore," he decided aloud. Then his brain caught up with his mouth and he winced. "I mean, not enough to write about them, at least." Maybe photography on its own could have been enough once, but…
He wouldn't have cared if he was doing anything worthwhile for the world so long as he could make enough money to get by, before Cambyses. He'd never minded doing a good turn for someone else if he had the time, but he'd never really seen much point to it either. It wasn't like anything changed. Even when Libra came down, it had just been the most recent way the world went to shit in new and interesting ways. His home hadn't been wrecked, and what was the difference between one dictator and another, anyway? He'd figured so long as he made sure he stayed on that margin of 'too unimportant to bother with' on the grand scale of things, he could do whatever. The world had problems, but they didn't have to be his problems.
Until, you know, suddenly they were his problems, only a hundred times worse than what he'd been hearing about. And now, despite how much he wanted to detach, to just drift and make sure he never fell back out of his comfortable margin again, it felt wrong. Panic started clawing up his throat whenever he realized he'd stopped paying attention to everything around him for a few minutes, and he didn't think he would ever really stop waiting for the next ambush. So now the world had his problems instead of him denying the other way around, and scraping by felt like tempting fate into repeating itself. But on the other end, diving back in like Razo and so many others had would be dropping right back into the abyss.
No thanks. But that didn't mean he didn't want to do something meaningful, and his old ideas for how his life should go just weren't enough anymore.
Find a middle way. He'd lost track of how many times Vaska had repeated that to him, and it hadn't stopped being good advice just because he couldn't talk to the man anymore. The panic usually happened when he realized he'd missed something – it hadn't taken too much thought to shift some of that need to pay attention into things like listening to the news. The reading that Kenneth assigned him helped too. He was catching up on what had happened while he was away, on what he hadn't bothered noticing before going to Africa, and most days, it made him feel a little more steady.
But at the same time… He was starting to get a decent picture of the world as a whole, and it was almost as ugly as what he'd just left behind. More and more articles were coming out now about what had led to Cambyses happening in the first place that pretty soon someone would try their hand at a full book, and just…
Out of maybe twenty different things people had been able to dig up so far that had contributed to the nightmare in the Sahara? Maybe one couldn't be pinned down as a result of Libra's aftermath. So why the fuck is Peacecraft running our world, exactly?
Cambyses wasn't the only reason he didn't have a lot of faith left in humanity, these days. People sucked.
Unfortunately, he was a people too – and if he wanted to live with himself, he needed to remember how to be one again. And part of that was having standards, principles, and holding to them even when they were inconvenient. Because whatever he did with his life from here on, he needed to know it was worth something.
He didn't know if Robby had taught him that on purpose or not, but… you couldn't always pick what happened to you. What you could do was decide how you were going to respond, and just because he'd fucked it up a few times already didn't mean he couldn't figure out a good way eventually.
"I could probably get into the right scene to do just photography," he admitted aloud. He had the eye for it, and the pictures he'd posted since getting back home were getting good reception, despite how casual they were. "But it's just not enough on its own, you know?"
The kind of work he could expect to get if he kept just at that would always be superficial, and his career didn't have to revolve around his favorite hobby.
"Eh, okay," Eric agreed dubiously. "Seems a little harsh, but if you feel that way, you're probably right about not doing it?"
He let out a surprised laugh at that. Huh. Let's hear it for surprisingly wise, energetic strangers. "I'm in the middle of a crisis," he returned – flippantly, for all that it was true. He forced another casual shrug, ignoring the memory of Robby swaying as he pivoted on one heel, bonelessly relaxed as he half danced back, playful as he tried to get Nick to race him. "Don't mind my angst."
He'd never bothered to appreciate the way the other man wouldn't let him brood.
"Definitely part of the upperclassman vibe," Eric decided, cheerfully oblivious. He started looking around again. "Any guesses which way the library is?" Gesturing to a large building off to their right, he asked, "Could that be it?"
Nick smirked. "I've never gone to classes here, but I can already tell you got crap directions." He'd run around enough down here with his own crowd before moving out to know that much.
Eric frowned. "How's that?"
He considered the building a long moment. "Well… that might be a library."
His new friend was quiet for a long moment, before he groaned. "How many are there?"
"Mm, at least three. I think maybe five or six, though."
He whined in the back of his throat, like a puppy. "Aw, fuck my life! I didn't even think of that!"
He found himself laughing again before he could help it, and that was… nice. This was going better than he'd hoped. "Come on," he said, starting towards the thing. "If it's not the right place, maybe it'll have a directory out front."
oOo
oOo
Szczecin, Poland
"I'm not complaining," Ardith began, absolutely laced with amusement. "But I feel as though I should ask precisely when we started taking orders from a little girl."
Quatre laughed a little helplessly. The advantage of his empathy was that he knew his friend wasn't even being sarcastic – that he was happily amused without an ounce of resentment – but… "Sometime while you were galivanting around Norway?" he suggested.
"More than just Norway," the older man returned happily. "And I came back with presents, you can't be so annoyed as all that."
His smile stretched hard enough that his face ached. Presents. Ardith had set off 'just for a week or so' at the same time as everyone else, claiming a need to touch base with a few old associates while also insisting he would be back. Ten days later, he'd started sending vague messages about extensions and how he was still coming back the following week… 'Well, no, another few days…' 'Two weeks…' 'Just two more days, can I get anything for you while I'm out here, I swear I'm really almost back…'
And now here he was, five weeks later with a bounce in his step and a king's ransom of blackmail material on… Well, Quatre hadn't read through it all yet, but the number of politicians and business magnates they suddenly had leverage against was a little obscene.
Presents. Tricia was going to adopt him. If she didn't, it would only be because she was urging any number of their sisters or nieces to cross the man's path and attempt to make a more intimate familial claim.
He still had too much to do before he considered finding his sisters, but the thought made him smile. Rashid first. That was going to be hard enough.
"Where did you find her, anyway? She's a brilliant little thing."
He slouched back in his chair. "I don't get any credit there; her brother's an old friend, and you missed seeing him by a week or so." He started laughing again as he considered the parallels. "And we're doing what she says because she is brilliant and wants to give us nice things."
"She wants us to go play with satellites," Ardith protested, slouching. "I've never done that."
"You've never been to space," Quatre agreed. "Though I am a little lost on why so many of you are getting stuck on that part. It makes perfect sense."
The other man rolled his eyes with all the drama of the thirteen-year-old they were talking about. "You're usually so reasonable that sometimes I manage to forget how insane the spaceborn are. You all have the collective survival instincts of a lemming."
"…I think you really need to meet Odin."
"I said instinct, not ability."
Quatre laughed again, unable to come up with a decent counterargument. He had missed Ardith, and either he'd forgotten just how good his friend was at spinning words, or the man had gotten even funnier as he settled further back into his own skin. Probably both. "Why lemmings?"
"No concept of their own mortality," Ardith answered immediately. "Or gravity. They'll jump right off cliffs."
He wasn't sure he believed that, but he couldn't pass up on the joke he'd set up there. "Gravity is relative."
His friend snorted, waving a hand. "Not in my world, it's not. I think I'll stay on the ground; I have every faith that it will catch me, should I test the theory."
"Only if you lose your nerve and pull back before reaching the stars," he argued back happily. A thought occurred to him. "I just remembered – technically, Odin is earthborn, from California."
"Same exact problem," Ardith immediately denied. "Possibly even worse." He tapped his lips as though thinking deeply. "That unholy combination might explain everything, actually."
Quatre snickered, shaking his head. "Right, of course, my mistake." He'd heard enough from all the American survivors transplanted into Africa to follow the commentary about California apparently being both lovely and insane, but he didn't have the frame of reference to gauge how serious they were. The only time he'd ever been to the place was during the New Edwards assault, and that experience had been both limited and downright wretched for a multitude of reasons.
Ardith grinned in an entirely self-satisfied way, relaxing even further into his chair. "Do you know when Josh is due back?"
"He said Thursday, though he was a little rough about time zones, so it might be Friday." Sprawling back in his chair, he added, "He sounds like he had a great time, and they got the drive, but Darren's sent a few ranting texts about machetes, so I'm looking forward to hearing about it."
A snort. "You think someone went after them with a machete?"
"No, they said they didn't see a soul." He grimaced. "It's like Odin described South America – completely abandoned." Shrugging, he added, "Or at least, it was in the areas they've been. Japan isn't a large country, but they didn't go exploring either."
Ardith nodded, looking thoughtful. "Well, I'd like to stay long enough to see Josh, at least, but if you want me to run some of the girl's legwork, I'd rather stay on land."
Quatre waved a hand. "You don't have to do anything, I'm just glad to see you again. Cliff already volunteered to handle the northeast, and Sio's going to back him up. Preston's going to meet up with Charlie and Grant and play up being a tourist in the west to cover that part, and Lance and Lionell offered to go south. I think the far south is going to wait for Odin to come back, the same as with the satellites." Darren was the only one besides himself, Audi, and the other ex-pilots comfortable with zero-G, and given how leery everyone was acting about the idea, he had no interest in taking them up into space for a practical lesson.
They would probably go if he asked them to, but they didn't want to, and bringing a bunch of spooked men up into orbit sounded like a great start for bedlam and accidents. He had no wish to cause anyone misery.
Besides, Audi's plans were on the delicate side, and would need finesse. Either he should do it himself with her watching to learn, or for the sake of speed, he should wait until Odin and Tr- …and Adam could lend a hand.
"Preston?" Ardith visibly perked up, a shock of delight singing out from him. "When did he get back in touch?"
Quatre felt the same, really. Jovi and Jalee had made contact again almost immediately, but Preston was one of the ones who left with Colonel Mitchell that he hadn't thought he would ever see again. "Just last week," he admitted, tossing one leg over the arm of his chair and relaxing more, feeling… content. "He said he'd meant to sooner, but his aunts took some time off work to help him reacclimate, and he didn't want to be distracted while they were on vacation."
Every time someone came back just… floored him, a little. He hadn't realistically imagined that anyone except maybe Cory would ever want to see him again. Hell, he hadn't thought he would ever want to see himself again after he was out, hadn't entirely dismissed the idea of suicide until after realizing Cory would need him for years to come, and yet… Evidence was mounting.
Clearly he'd made a massive error somewhere in all his calculations, but he couldn't help but be grateful for it.
He had cast himself as a monster in Cambyses. He had owned the role completely, thoroughly, because being an insane megalomaniac was their best bet at remaining undiscovered, and it wasn't a switch he could flip easily. Even if he could have, making a mistake in front of someone like Roshan would have been the end of everything. And so he had been… that. Cruel for no reason, visibly delighted with his own callous ferocity on the field, he had actively cultivated a reputation for enjoying collateral because he had to sell the persona. He'd sunk so deep into it he'd forgotten which way was up half the time, satisfied so long as he kept his primary goals in sight…
…and yet, they kept… coming back. He hadn't yet been brave enough to ask why after the first time the men who followed him to Adashia refused to leave.
Maybe Rashid will be able to explain. Rashid had a talent for straightening out the knots he tangled his mind and heart into after a crisis. Just being near the older man had always calmed something in him… and he was self-aware enough now to realize it was likely as much to do with what he could pick up of the older man's emotions as it was his wisdom. His empathy before facing the Ghetto hadn't even been a third of what it had become, but looking back, he could see how each of his companions had influenced him. It had been stronger even then than he had ever given been willing to credit.
I'll see him soon, and then I'll know, he reminded himself, mentally shelving his anxiety and focusing back on Ardith. "Honestly," he continued, "I'd rather you stay for a while and help me piece together the finances and your counterpoint blackmail a little better. Your mind works differently enough from mine that I think you'll see avenues I'm missing, and you've been out of touch – our reach has turned out far more extensive than we anticipated."
"Sounds like fun." Sitting up straight again, he braced his elbows on the table and leaned forward, a shrewd glint in his eyes. "Where do we start?"
oOo
oOo
Cardiff, Wales
I should have realized this was a bad idea as soon as Eric said the word 'rally', Nick decided, stalking away at a pace that was dangerously close to a run. He'd forgotten that the word could have political implications. The fact that the kid had point blank said he'd had to sneak out in order to go really should have made him sit up and think instead of going 'oh, party', because even the more innocent kind of rally was more focused than that, meant to raise money or tout a good cause.
He could have handled having some charity or other pushed at him along with a beer, even if it was about something he didn't really agree with. He probably would have even bought some last minute raffle tickets or something just for conversation's sake; he'd come out tonight to try to talk to people, after all.
But nope. Instead, he'd walked into the next best thing to a public policy debate. A really charged one, where the majority of the crowd was actually for increased militarization. You know, for defense against the country's homegrown revolutionaries – like what was still going down in Italy.
Because zealously ramping up everyone's levels of paranoia and aggression before pointing them at their neighbors was a great idea. Even better, they were going to use people with military training for it. He knew firsthand just how much more dangerous a soldier was even compared to a fucking berserker.
Robby had gotten so much territory and leeway because he was a damn good teacher as well as field commander, after all.
Thankfully the door to the union was unlocked – he wasn't sure what he would have done if it wasn't, but breaking in before he really thought about it wasn't not a possibility – and he tried to focus on his breathing exercises as he slowed down a little, heading for the far wall. There were a handful of people around, but not many, and that suited him just great. He'd already written off the idea of making friends tonight, but that was alright; he could try again later.
Eric would be either put off by the crazy, or not realize he'd left, he figured; though he was torn about whether he felt down or relieved that they hadn't swapped numbers yet. The kid had wanted to go to that, after all.
Oh well. It was what it was. Better luck next time, and all that.
He reached the far end of the complex and slapped his hand on the wall next to a flyer showing a picture of an empty horizon, then turned around and started off towards the next furthest away thing that wasn't the door he'd come in. It led around a corner to a set of bathrooms, so he slapped the placard for that before heading back, breathing and stepping in rhythm, tossing away any thoughts that tried to break up the pattern.
By his third lap, his head was quiet enough that he felt like he could relax a little, slumping into a more relaxed walk instead of a march.
After the fifth, he tried to think about it again.
All the pro-Regime arguments were stupid, but that was just opinion. People got stupid about things all the time, especially if you spooked them first. It'd been irritating, but really not worth freaking out over; he eavesdropped on that kind of talk all the time without turning into a wreck.
Another circuit, and he could admit to himself that he was only so upset about that as he was because he hadn't expected it and got caught wrong-footed.
No… What made him need to get the fuck out was the crowd, not the talk. The longer he'd stood there, the more riled up they'd gotten, and… he'd felt it. That group energy, where everybody starts acting the same and agreeing, doing things none of them ever would alone, just because everyone else was. Pack mentality. 'The Hot Blood', Aemon had called it.
He clenched his teeth and picked the march back up. Fuck Aemon. Charismatic, soul-stealing asshole… Aemon had been the reason he'd ever for fallen for the shit Cambyses was preaching, started to believe and have pride in 'the revolution'. Kenneth had him reading enough about cults and psychology for homework that he knew he'd only bought into it because he was exhausted and alienated and vulnerable, that he'd fallen into that pit because he was human and everybody broke eventually, but that didn't mean he couldn't fucking hate the man who'd indoctrinated him.
Standing outside the fence, the heat waves pouring off the metal of the links had given the man an almost unearthly glow, and… he'd thought his mom might be onto something after all, with all her horseshit about saints. Maybe the world was awful because it needed to change, and you had to tear a house down before you could rebuild it stronger, right?
So yeah, fuck Aemon, and religion too while he was at it. He'd ask Kenneth what the real world term for the crowd thing the next time he saw him.
At least Robby had always been up front about what they did. Even outside their camp, everyone had known that Robby thought raiding was a distasteful chore he had to slog through to keep an edge over the competition.
That said, no one besides Roshan ever tried fucking with him because however much he publicly disliked killing, he was damned good at it – and he didn't tolerate anything but the best from his people either. He'd maintained that the faster and more efficiently they could take resources, the more time they could spend consolidating and 'not wasting my time'.
The man's ambition had been well-respected in Cambyses, even as the outsiders muttered uneasily over how publicly and severely he controlled the men he claimed as his own. For the most part, if they thought about Robby at all, the other camps had been thankful that their own leaders didn't bother tightening the leash outside of active attacks. When their jealousy over the better standard Robby's garrison lived by showed, they had been quick to gripe that it still wasn't worth it, to have every minute dictated… but very few were ever stupid enough to say it within the man's hearing.
Not that he'd maimed anyone over it. Those were just the incidents that made even Razo question Robby's sanity, and left outsiders stuck between laughing at or pitying them for the next month or so. The asshole had never been shy about making examples of literally everyone around him, friend or foe, so long as he had an audience to reap benefits from.
The usual benefit of those incidents, in hindsight, being that they were left alone and unquestioned.
That was the rub, really. Literally every single thing the guy had done had had underlying motives and reaching effects. It was like he'd calculated every second of each day and executed every step with planned precision. The only thing Nick could remember him doing that hadn't benefitted someone in their group were those off days when he'd shut himself in somewhere dark and refuse to talk to anyone.
…He could relate to that a lot more, now.
He finished another lap and slumped against the wall by the posters, feeling drained. So much for socializing. Still, it could have gone a lot worse; he'd gotten away from a trigger without losing himself to it or doing something stupid, and now that he knew it was an issue…
You know what? He was tired, but he'd been tired before too, and the surprise had worn off. I can go back out. Maybe he'd even find Eric again.
Giving himself a few minutes to warm up to the idea, he turned to read the flyers on the board. There were a couple things listed for sale, someone looking for a roommate… some sort of volunteer psychology research trial for cognitive processing. I might look that up. He had no idea what that even meant. Someone had made up a nice, glossy poster for some sort of event on campus that was closer to what he thought Eric was dragging him to, set for next week. Maybe I'll come back for that.
The first one he'd noticed, though, the smaller blue one he'd marked as a relay, was interesting, though. Expand my horizons, huh? The art on it was pretty, but the colors made the words a little difficult to read. Explore your rights in the Pacific Reclamation.
…Huh. He smirked a little. Well, if I can't figure shit, out, I guess turning hermit really is an option.
oOo
oOo
November 13th 198 – Wednesday – Charleroi, Belgium
"You should understand," the young woman announced firmly as she steepled her fingers, "that I'm not exactly thrilled to be here."
Wow, rude. Wasn't she the one to arrange this little meet-up?
Relena, however, didn't appear to take any offense, and only quirked up her brows as she relaxed back in her chair. "Circumstances following potentially apocalyptic events tend to be chaotic by their very definition," she pointed out in a wry tone. "This certainly wasn't where I saw myself three years ago."
The look their lunch guest shot the princess absolutely dripped with scorn. "On the contrary – in five days, we'll reach the three year anniversary to your coronation."
…Point, okay. That had at least a little resemblance to the current political trends, but-
"Ooh," Lena intoned softly, the barest edge of a smirk belying her mock serious tone. "Was my sixteen days of reign as a puppet queen of an infant state an alarming precedent?" She tipped her head slightly in a conceding gesture she had picked up entirely from her colonel. "Really, Sylvia? I was a well-pedigreed hostage with little choice in the matter after Sanc's fall, and the World Nation didn't even last beyond six weeks. It was a wretched situation that I rather blatantly wriggled my way out of as quickly as I could… and honestly? The only reason I managed that much was because my brother got into a high temper and decided to start smashing things." She grimaced. "Which, unfortunately, was a firm precedent."
Don't laugh, don't smile… Crowd details were always so much easier because no one would notice if she hummed a little, but this was a closed meeting room, and the vast majority of nobles had long memories when it came to who laughed at them. She'd made a point of avoiding them right up until she'd accepted Jake's commission because life was funny, damn it, and her attitude had been a good part of why he'd sought her out in the first place… But sass in private was very different from sass in front of irate potential allies, and while apparently Lena had decided she could sass Noventa, they didn't know this girl and at the end of the day, Mai was just the hired help.
Still, it had been a while since she'd heard the political disaster of the last month or so leading up to the Fall summed up quite so succinctly. She'd been too busy dealing with the aftermath of Ansh's KIA notification to really give a shit beyond confirming that Alice Springs was outside out the immediate affected zones from the meteor storm and fallout that was Libra, but in hindsight?
It said things about their society that everything had managed to go so utterly to hell so damn quickly. And not nice things, or even fun things. That need for change was one of the bigger reasons she was proud to have a leg up in Relena's work; it was looking more and more like they'd actually manage to change at least a few things for the better before her niece and nephew got big enough to notice just how bad the grown-ups had done fucked up the past few decades.
Sylvia Noventa rolled her eyes at the princess' response, but she smiled a little too, which was probably a win. "You're just going to call out his behavior like that?" she asked, still derisive but at least a little warmer.
Relena's expression grew a few degrees colder. "I will never make excuses for Milliardo's behavior." She tilted her chin up ever so slightly. "He has made it clear that he has no interest in listening to anyone – not for anything less than a threat he cannot dismiss out of hand." Her smile shifted a few degrees sharper as well. "As he is so intent on making his bed alone, he can lie in it."
Noventa's mouth tightened. "He's not doing well enough to just leave it lie," she argued.
"Obviously," Lena retorted, rolling her eyes right back. "But he won't listen, so I've found ways to work around him instead of with." She raised a brow. "It's a tactic I've become quite familiar with. Your grandmother told me you had gone into seclusion and made it clear she only had interest in giving the bare minimum to keep the Regime out of Noventa business."
"The Regime has a history of taking and taking while only giving back the bare minimum in return, with no care for control or censure," Sylvia returned flatly. "If we had given Peacecraft an inch, he would have taken a yard and left us with no say as to where the assets were applied."
"Which is one more reason why I insist on Darlian-Peacecraft," Relena answered smoothly. "I am not the Regime, and despite refusing a political education after the age of six, Milliardo both prefers to forge his own way ahead and is remarkably bad at following the advice of those he surrounds himself with."
"A military dictator that refuses to adapt to peace?" Alejandra suggested, tone all innocence.
Relena gave an elegant little shrug. "I suspect that's at least part of the problem."
"He's not even doing that well," Sylvia harped, interweaving her fingers and clenching them together, visibly fighting to hold in her temper. "He's too focused to be effective."
I hope she plans on clarifying, Mai mused wryly. Because that was clear as mud and just about as helpful as the tantrum she was evidently trying not to throw. So far, this meeting was resembling more of a cat fight than the start of an alliance. Maybe Relena has spoiled me. Most of the time, it was remarkably easy to forget how very young the princess was in light of her maturity and circumstances.
She couldn't say the same about Sylvia.
In contrast, Lena was all cool poise again, the sarcastic bits of teenager that had been flaring throughout the conversation tucked neatly away again. "I'm not certain what you're implying, precisely," she ventured, "but in light of everything else you have said thus far? I feel I must point out that in order to succeed in politics, Sylvia, you must first be willing to play. My brother has been filling a dark role indeed, but he is a powerful player in this game, and if you want to castigate him openly, then you'd best have firm ground to stand on."
The other woman barked out a sharp laugh. "I am on a bedrock, Minister," she half-snarled, pushing herself all the way back upright in her chair. Taking a deep breath, she visibly calmed herself, sitting up straight and tucking a stray lock of her waist-long cinnamon hair back behind one ear. "I've been playing, thank-you very much, and successfully." She brought those smoldering green eyes back up to focus on the princess again. "I just did it outside the Regime's sphere of influence."
A hint of Relena's smile returned, touching just the corners of her lips. "I'm glad. That was an option I wasn't allowed," she admitted.
Sylvia scoffed. "You're certainly no worse off for it. At the end of the day, my problems have come down to poor timing." Her shoulders relaxed further, even as she grimaced. "You've taken up every position of power I might have aimed for before the power vacuums could finish establishing themselves – and I can't even regret it, not truly, because the consequences had I not acted as I had…"
She sighed, scowling. "I did what needed to be done, but it I couldn't handle two fronts at once without attracting the wrong kind of attention. Now I've fallen so far behind you that I've no hope of gaining the degree of power that I need to counter my enemies."
The scowl twisted into a smirk. "So I'm sharing."
Huh. Because that wasn't alarming or anything.
Relena looked amused, but mostly like she was already in on the joke. "Does that technically count when they were already my enemies too?"
Instead of getting irritable again, like Mai half expected, Sylvia laughed, more genuinely this time. "It does when you're learning how the pretty shield your brother set over you has really been mine for the past eighteen months."
…What?
"Mm, fair," Relena agreed, smile broadening. "My intel on the East has been limited, but there's enough gaps in between the horror stories for me to bite. Our best theory has been internal strife, or the same sort of many-faced brigade the Regime has faced over the last two years."
…That was a lot more honest than Lena usually is at these sorts of things. I've missed something. Tearing her attention away from their guests, she tried to meet Jake's eyes.
"The best way to not be targeted," Sylvia noted, voice dry as a desert, "is to paint one on someone else."
Okay, there's that ruthlessness Jake was worried about. The man himself was intent on the ladies sitting around him, but his faint smile carried the usual amount of danger, so there was that.
"Not my usual tactic, but I can't disagree with the notion," Relena decided amicably. "Italy is more than enough warning that they weren't as handled as everyone would like to believe."
"It was the final straw, as it were," Alejandra injected quietly. "Last call – they've outpaced our resources." She side-eyed Sylvia for a moment, and when she got a nod continued with, "The Regime handled the situation decisively enough to buy more time than we anticipated, which is a boon, but the fact that they were able to stir a full uprising in the first place without any warning is… alarming."
"Until now, we were sure we had successfully foiled all their attempts at alliances," Sylvia continued, leaning forward on her forearms. "Now I'm concerned about what else might have slipped through the net. Satellite surveillance is suspect globally, at this point – more groups than just Romefeller East are tinkering with those systems for their own gains, but I've picked up too much interference in the southeast in the past six months for it to be anything else. Monteith is…" She grimaced. "Significantly more capable than his predecessors."
"Predecessors?" Jake asked quietly.
Sylvia gusted out a sigh. "The rumors of internal conflict stymying them are exaggerated, not false," she noted.
"Exaggerated and aggravated," Alejandra chipped in, looking smug as a cat.
That level of satisfaction comes from getting your hands dirty, Mai mused. Right then. Girl's got Jake-levels of involvement with anything Noventa's running.
"It was the easiest way to stir the pot," Sylvia agreed. "So long as we could keep them chasing their own tails, they didn't threaten the rest of us." She made a face. "And at this point I've sabotaged enough of their attempts to lure China to the negotiation table that hopefully that bridge stays burned, but…"
"Someone arranged the deal with the Italian faction," Alejandra continued. "The enforced radio silence has always been questionable, but those sorts of deals usually require physical assurances, even between old friends." Her mouth pinched into a firm line as brown eyes turned hard. "They might have breached the neutral zone." Focusing on Relena, she asked, "How good, exactly, is your relationship with China? The incident in Sudan left us struggling with an interesting implication or two."
Now isn't that a loaded question?
Relena grimaced. "I don't know. Before Sudan, I would say it was limited and professional, though certainly amicable; immediately afterwards, I didn't think it had changed significantly. I was definitively their only contact at that point instead of their preference, but our interactions only revolved around the amplifier project. I lit a fire under the Regime during the battle, but I didn't actually do anything to resolve the situation beyond raise my voice and temper the fallout."
Sylvia's eyes narrowed. "You don't think their response was due to you?"
"I didn't," the princess emphasized. "Not until I learned that the primary concession they demanded from Milliardo for breaking treaty was my assignation to Minister of Foreign Affairs."
The other woman was nodding impatiently. "And?"
"And nothing," Relena persisted. "They sent their congratulations on my appointment, issued a statement that amounted to having no current grievances, and they've been quiet since."
"You haven't pursued that?" Sylvia's tone was disapproving.
"I've been too busy putting out all the fires I inherited with my shiny new office of government to poke a sleeping dragon," Lena returned sarcastically. "It's a matter of timing."
Alejandra snickered at that, shrugging unapologetically when her friend rolled her eyes.
Yeah, I could definitely warm up to Harding. Noventa might have to be an acquired taste, but she'd take what bonuses she could. Especially with, just… China.
It wasn't like they'd ruled any motives out, but the other women had dropped enough nuggets of information in this little introductory salvo to set off all sorts of alarm bells that Mai been privately hoping would never ring.
"You might know more than we do, on the Chinese front," Jake admitted, leaning forward with open body language. He tipped his head for a moment before shrugging in a careless motion. "I might be reaching, but you've likely got us on the entirety of both the Pacific and Indian theaters. Until very recently, our assets have been too deeply tied to the Regime to give expansion serious consideration."
Honest and direct, Mai mused. Whatever cue I missed, at least they're both in on it. And Lin was blinking a little too much, so at least she wasn't the only one who was a little late on the uptake? They were going to have to cover that later.
"Nice flattery, but you might have been better off with the silent approach," Sylvia asserted, eyes narrowing. "I remember your old sponsors, Miller, and I'm still not sure how to interpret the way you follow Peacecraft as close as a second skin."
"Darlian-Peacecraft," Relena interjected automatically.
Jake's lips twitched. "It's a little charming how you've fallen for my old cover's cover." He flipped out both hands in a playfully appeasing way. "Let's call it a redemption arc."
Alejandra laughed again, though she smothered it a moment later. Mai grinned at her.
Relena just rolled her eyes. "Give me a little credit, Sylvia. He's here because that's where I want him." Focusing on her lover, she raised her brows again. "Though that was a little thick, given how little she's yet to give us for proof."
He made a face. "I lost almost everything I'd placed in the Pacific with the Fall, and I never had the best anchors in southeast Asia – our scope never included them because my time was better spent where I could spin you advantages. If she has practically anything that far out, I'm not reaching."
She made a face back at him, but nodded. "And our friends?"
"Ballard has a few inroads into the Middle East, but they're isolated, and so far most of their intel has been anecdotal," Jake dismissed conversationally. "We need to set up a meet with a few of the others and actually pool knowledge soon because I've been out of the loop, but I don't think any of my old contacts have anything actionable in Asia, or I'd have heard from Mike." He cast a sidelong look at Noventa, gaze intense, as he continued with, "If she can deliver even a quarter of what she's implied, we want her."
Sylvia scowled. "I am not-"
"We have conditions," Alejandra interrupted firmly, elbowing the other woman. "The Regime is septic, and the Romefeller remnants are hardly any better." Her mouth went hard. "We're not here for the Regime, and we don't have any interest in bolstering old crusades."
Lena blinked once, slow and pointed. "I haven't heard anything I disagree with thus far."
"We're not here for you either," the little Hispanic woman continued, holding her ground. "We're not opposed, exactly, but that's not what this is about. Your man there is right – we have a lot to bring to the table, and we haven't come to you because we lack power, however dramatic Syl likes to talk."
"I-"
"Testing waters is important, I know," Alejandra agreed, cutting her off again without looking away from Relena. "You tested the majority of our bloc for loyalty with Catalonia last spring and found us wanting – but you need to realize that that was intentional, not disinterest. When the Regime falls, whether by internal decay or outside forces, our party will not be a power you can sneeze at. We may not rival what yours when the time comes, but we cannot be subsumed."
"Contrary to what everyone seems to think, I don't want to rule the world," Relena returned dryly. "I'm willing to step up if no one else can manage, but I would very much prefer to have allies willing do their share of the work." She scowled. "Despite the various responsibilities I found myself shouldering in 195, I've never found dictatorship to be sufficient for the wellbeing of the people, even the benevolent sort, and the concept of unilateral rule is moronic. No one is flexible enough to give that role justice."
"Then you will not be opposed to the notion of a partnership," Sylvia inserted smoothly, standing up and leaning her hands on the table. "An alliance of goodwill between nations, when the maps are drawn again."
"Okay, I tried, but I've got to ask, here," Lin announced, shifting his weight. "The Regime has problems, obviously, and they're deep. Power is shifting – great. I can agree that it won't last, because no one built it to last and everyone and their second cousin wants to take a chunk out of it. Fine. Relena's obviously positioned herself to take the lion's share of what's left, and that's if we don't pull a non-hostile takeover in the meantime and rebrand the damn thing. Eastern Romefeller is spooky shit that no one wants to see in power – but they're not exactly news. While I'm not arguing that they need to be dealt with one way or another, you've got a hell of a bee in your bonnet about countering them, and it sounds like you've kept your hands clean so far.
"So if you're so powerful and irritated with our party, why not just keep in the shadows, wait to see who comes out on top weaker for it, and make your move either against or cozying up to the winner afterwards?"
Because something is critical, here, or she thinks it might be and can't afford to lose, Mai decided. Or-
"Because the East won't care about how they only turned their coat colors to appease Zechs while plotting their own vengeance," Jake answered, watching Sylvia again. "Western Romefeller cut off the East just as harshly as the Regime did, and were party to how Zechs cornered them into the trade deals that have kept Europe standing. They helped, and whatever blame they've managed to shade someone else with more recently? The actions taken immediately post-Fall were blatant." He smirked. "'I didn't want to' doesn't really fly when you get quite so explicit in how to destroy someone's ability to fight back, and that's without even touching on the old feuds between families on opposite sides."
Sylvia stared back silently for a long, tense moment before sighing and standing up straight. "There's no clear line," she agreed. "And Monteith wouldn't allow us to draw one even if he wasn't a toxic son of a bitch that makes Milliardo Peacecraft look a saint." She crossed her arms. "When he invades, he won't discriminate; and if we're not united by then, one way or another? He might actually succeed."
"And if he's successfully breaching the neutral zone, either discreetly or because of a backdoor deal with China," Alejandra added, "we have less time than we thought."
…Yeah, hearing it in terms of invasion made her blood run a little cold. She'd read enough of BJ's reports now to know that Noventa had hit the nail on the head – the society rising in the Middle East now was close enough to feudal totalitarian serfdom with just enough dystopian George Orwell for modernity's sake to make your skin crawl. And China…
Despite all of Relena's interactions with them being wildly successful, they knew next to nothing about China; the goals and motives of the massive territory's leaders were a mystery. Hell, the leaders themselves were a mystery, and so far as she knew, all attempts by literally everyone had hit a wall when they tried to pry. The series of events that had led to the current international political climate was complicated.
The armies of the surviving power blocs in Central Asia had been the most solidly intact in the world after the battle at Libra. Instead of making a move, however, they had isolated, presumably focused on their own disaster relief efforts in the face of flooding and volcanic activity – while maintaining their forces on the borders, wary of another assault that hadn't come.
Zechs' saving grace was how immediately post-Fall, he had poured Colonial and local manpower into rescue efforts in the Americas – while simultaneously crashing what was left of the World Nation's crumbling infrastructure and claiming it as his own, continuing to call out against the corruption he'd spouted off about while leading White Fang. With most of the troops in space, he'd bought time for himself by turning the most critical ports for returning space carriers into deathtraps, and as a consequence of the speed he was known for, he'd pulled off the initial European coup damn near bloodlessly.
Romefeller had responded by reactivating all of the doll troops that had recently been set aside for scheduled disarmament. At the same time, the Zechs was finishing parley with the troops now under Une's command in orbit. The Lightning Count had waxed poetically about how Treize had been right and automated warfare needed to end, swearing on whatever was holy to all these fucking nobles that he was about to go melt down what was left of the Virgo army he'd brought dirtside with him because the horror of the Americas had opened his eyes, or something.
By either plan or providence, he'd gotten the agreement televised right before the dolls swept down on Brussels.
The public outcry had been immense. The ports had been cleared and the troops already on approach home – to the average person, it felt as though a brand new, homegrown boogeyman had just risen up as the second stage of the fucking apocalypse. The assholes who programmed that initial strike hadn't even considered casualties in their determination to take down the genocidal psycho settling into his new roost, never mind that the man wasn't stupid enough to disregard his safety at that stage and wasn't in the building he'd claimed to occupy. So a wave of killing machines three times the size of Peacecraft's Virgo army with no concept for collateral damage or overkill were in the middle of thrashing the historical buildings that made up Brussels' military center when the troops came in for landing.
Given that Romefeller had expected resistance instead of an empty house, the dolls shot down the first carrier.
Then, as the other carriers scrambled to deploy their suits, Dorothy Catalonia had stepped up and proven that there was a very large difference between a programmed army and one actively run with the Zero System. Virgos came in from depots near the city boundaries that they had been stored in and a large contingent formed a barrier to shield the human troops while the rest began striking down their counterparts. By the time human combatants entered the fray, they said over a third of Romefeller's army had been destroyed by their own Heiress's dolls. By the time the battle was over, her own forces had only faced 10% losses – and other than that first carrier and all those souls Romefeller's dolls had slaughtered on the ground? Only two people had died.
The initial outcry became something of a witch hunt as the battle galvanized the long-held resentment Treize and his people had spent years fostering against the Alliance and Romefeller. Plans to dismantle the dolls had again been delayed in favor of using Catalonia's mastery of Zero to protect live soldiers moving against the factions that refused to surrender their troops and join the new collective. After the first few examples, most of the European nobles had started pointing fingers to escape blame and otherwise capitulating to the new world order, and the African contingent largely agreed without conflict.
The first true opposition to Zechs' sweeping new reign was in the eastern Mediterranean. Turkey's resistance was quickly flattened under the self-righteous fervor of Libra's survivors when faced with mobile dolls, even as the dolls they collected from each defeated opponent supplemented their own numbers. They swept southeast into heavier forces… and found the first active doll factory in Egypt.
After that, they let Dorothy take off the kid gloves and lead instead of sticking to guard detail.
Zechs held off on approaching what would become the new nation of China until after the sixth factory and the campaign had moved past the Caspian Sea, extending north again as well as south, but still far enough from their borders to be respectful. Instead of delivering his usual ultimatums, however, he drew attention to the worrying behavior cropping up in those much closer to their borders – and proposed a deal.
After joining forces with China, it had taken only six weeks to blitz the shit out of their mutual enemies in northwest and southern Asia and effectively dropkick the territory separating their strongholds out of the modern era. Anything with the potential to build suits or launch something into space was destroyed, and the means to recreate them limited with prejudice. Additionally, the final terms of the conditional surrender Romefeller recieved necessitated a strong resurgence towards agrarian society. A lot of those changes had, admittedly, already been in process due to efforts to react to the climate change and expected food shortages, but the terms' demands for exported crops were steep.
The terms of the treaty Zechs had violated last July in Sudan – the treaty that had officially created the two superpowers of the Peacecraft Regime and the rebranded China – were fairly simple. The area they were currently calling 'East Romefeller' – stretching from Saudi Arabia to Vietnam – retained their autonomy, so long as they didn't attempt to bridge the technology gap or cause trouble outside their borders. Further north, the steppe countries east of the Caspian Sea that had surrendered quickly and completely as soon as China joined the fray were pulled them back under the Regime's umbrella as a part of Europe. The Regime had publicly destroyed all the mobile dolls they possessed, and vowed to do so with any more they found.
The final condition had been the creation of the neutral zone – a problem area for the Regime that their new ally had accepted control of as a form of mutual insurance balanced against all three final factions. Starting with Turkey and moving south, the countries bordering first the eastern Mediterranean Sea then those on the west of the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, the neutral zone served three purposes.
First, it gave China a western foothold against either the Regime or Romefeller East, should hostilities arise again. Second, it formed a physical border between the conquered nations and their divorced cousins: Romefeller West. China, somehow claiming no Romefeller ties or associations post-Fall, had made it openly clear that they didn't trust the Regime to keep its ruling class in line without significant deterrent. But really, the third reason was the core of why the solution was suggested in the first place, and it was devastatingly simple:
There was no Romefeller left to oversee the neutral zone. Or at least, the families established there for the past two or more centuries were dead; those that hadn't gone down in the fighting had died in the following waves of disorder, mobs, and rising anarchy that followed in the wake of any collapsed government. Truthfully, it had been the first warning of what was to come.
Handing over the territory had been the cleanest solution, as well as a gesture of good faith that Peacecraft had likely hoped would turn into a stronger alliance with China – one with some basis in peace. Erecting a democracy without Romefeller overseers would have caused strife amongst the nobles he had only just barely bound together. Electing a series of displaced American Romefeller houses and reestablishing the same system as before would have stirred that same pot; there were too many to choose from, and no easy way to choose or deal with the backlash that would come from the friends of those not chosen. Additionally, at least some of the locals had actively overthrown said established system, and his fragile new government couldn't afford the ill will generated from either the people – if they called his revolution a farce – or the nobles, if he set it back up and the incident repeated itself.
So China, the ultimate outsider without the Romefeller ties the locals felt vindicated against, had taken custody of the neutral zone. However, instead of the expected large party of Chinese that the Regime could build relations with as they colonized and settled things down, enforcing their own laws that no one was entirely clear on the details of, a small group of surveyors arrived. They talked a great deal without saying much when pressed… and then, after a few days? Announced a system of office and initial nominations, wrote up a schedule for the new emergency elections, handed out copies of the barebones legislation the area had originally followed, and left.
Technically China was in charge, and the new bylaws included the right to step in if the situation warranted it, as well as strong incentives for free trade with the Regime. However, the term 'neutral zone' was something of a misnomer, as they didn't restrict the Regime from acting there any more than the British Isles or the Netherlands. People only called it neutral so you knew they weren't talking about the other democratic zone. Well, that and theoretically, China had a sword hanging over everyone's heads to protect it, but it had been over two years without a word beyond the fuss they kicked over the Sudan incident, so that was debatable.
So if Romefeller was breaking the border, it could just be because China had decided they didn't actually care enough to monitor the area beyond what their democrats reported. The amplifier project was the only thing that had drawn them outside their borders since they established themselves. They had shown every sign of being aggressively isolationist and self-sufficient. Alternately, their aggressive secrecy could, as Noventa and Harding were implying, hide a deal they had made more recently with Romefeller East.
It wouldn't even have to be a betrayal of stated ideals, a solemn part of her mused. We don't know anything about their leadership. The nation could have changed hands a dozen times, and we'd have no way of telling.
Or, you know. Maybe they hadn't actually breached the neutral zone. David was chasing anarchist groups and mafiosos around all the -stan countries east of the Caspian right now for a reason; plenty of shit had been slipping through the cracks there already.
Relena's face was stern as she nodded. "It's a solid point." Turning back to Jake, she decided, "Set up that conference for as soon as possible. I know we were waiting for things to be a little less chaotic on their end, but I'm not sure that's going to happen."
"Fair enough," he returned, pushing his chair back from the table. "It might still take longer than you'd like to coordinate, but I'll make it happen."
"We're on tour," she agreed, looking wry. "That's not a conversation I'm having outside Sarracenia's walls." Focusing back on their guests, the expression deepened. "Ideally I would say the same for the rest of this one, but-"
Later, Mai would be able to pick apart exactly what happened, cause and effect. Lin noticed first and reacted immediately, wrapping an arm around the woman closest to him, Harding, trying to drag her away. Noventa, already standing, flinched back and tried to run before tripping over a chair and dropping. Jake hollowed out into what the others had described as his serious face, and in hindsight, she saw it happen in slow motion, which was… something.
The way he launched himself on all fours across Lena's seat and wrenched it hard enough to flip it back his way, pulling her out of it midair and wrapping around her before they hit the floor, his back between her and the windows was something too. Would've been more impressive if he hadn't fucked up his shoulder on the landing, but Lena wasn't even bruised for it, and… Well, despite being firmly in Lin's camp with the whole Colonel Batman thing, she had a better sense for how the Spiderman jokes got started.
But she didn't really start thinking about the details until after the morphine. At the time, it was more flailing for a fucking handhold – because being airborne was only good when planned. Then the table gut checked her, but at least it wasn't her head and hey, wasn't the floor a pal for not moving again?
"Mai!"
She blinked a few times, tried to groan, and coughed instead, reaching out and grabbing onto the thick table leg because… Right, on the floor now, no reason. Still, it'd been good enough not to fall on her, and she started petting it in thanks.
"Mai!"
She frowned at the thing, then groaned, dropping her hand before croaking out, "What the fuck?"
There was noise off to either side and a few hisses of pain as the others took stock, and she closed her eyes for a moment, trying to take a steady breath around the ache in her belly. Relena was the one who'd called for her, so she wasn't too worried on that front, but- "Sobrie?"
"We're fine," Lin called back, though his voice was tight. "Clear." Shifting glass sounds. "The fucking windows blew out and I can't see shit outside, but that wasn't meant for us. Miller?"
"Bruising, probable sprain… We need to move." There was a pause, and a little emotion leaked back into his voice. "We're not supposed to be here; if we're collateral, response teams are on their way."
Another groan, and the sound of wood sliding on wood. "I can't afford to be seen with you right now," Sylvia agreed.
"Quick getaway," Alejandra added. "Just a… I'm calling Susan around, give me a minute." In a quieter, shaky voice, she added, "Thank-you."
Listening to Lin tell her it was nothing, Mai tried for a deeper breath now that she'd managed steady… and hit a snag. Shit. Trying to keep her cough quiet, she tried again…
Yeah, not so great. She started shaking before the wheezing passed, and her back felt hot and cold at the same time, which was… not amazing, as far as warning signs went.
"Mai?" Lin was closer now.
She grimaced. "I think I have a problem."
"You think-" He sighed, right behind her now, hesitating a long moment, then, "Yeah. That…" He hissed out a few choice words in German. "Lena, we're going to need to spin a story for being here. I can't tell how deep some of this goes."
"I can't-"
"You go," Lin cut off irritably. "Your girl Friday's already got an exit set – make it so you were never here." He let out an annoyed noise. "If we weren't in uniform and flashing our mugs all for the cameras through the area the last few days, I'd say you two should bolt too, but if she and I get recognized it'll raise a lot more attention than a 'wrong place at the wrong time' scenario."
"Agreed." Jake decided, sounding less cold and more resigned. "Recine has the take-out receipts, food for four or maybe five; we could maybe play it as time away from the press? At least a few tabloids have picked up on how we slip off sometimes."
"Not our usual setting, but they've never caught us before to know that," Lin mused, settling down behind her and resting a hand on her hip. More quietly, he asked, "Did you hit your head?"
"Don't think so," she wheezed.
"I'd offer you water," he went on, all casual. "But if there's any unspilled, I don't really want to think about what's in it."
She grinned, appreciating it. "I'll pass." An experimental wiggle of fingers and toes went well, at least; nothing was numb or tingly. "I think I can move."
"You've got a hunk of glass at least six centimeters long stuck in your ribs, and there's a few more big pieces closer to your spine." Lin's voice was still dryly amused, but absolute enough that she knew if she could see his eyes, they'd be rock solid. "So long as we're safe, you're not going anywhere."
"…Yeah, okay." That seemed pretty legit.
"No, we're rolling with it," Jake was muttering. "Who expects a terror attack across the damn street? Media's going to have a field day, but it was just lunch… No." A pause. "Yes. No, Marakesh. Go ahead and flag someone down."
Mai wrinkled her nose and let her eyes slip closed. "Sorry for dumping all the workload back on you." Hopefully she wouldn't be down for long, but back injuries were irritating, and she had a long history of ripping stitches.
"Oh, Batman'll step up," Lin dismissed happily. "He's crap at retirement anyway. And besides, we've only got a week before we're due home for the holiday." She grinned as Jake made an exasperated noise very much not directed at Vaughn, and he continued with, "I'll make you handle my half of logistics."
"Cruel," she protested half-heartedly.
"Fft, fine, a quarter."
She grinned again, knowing full well she'd take on as much of the non-physical as she could stand, but appreciating the banter. "Sure." She considered her breathing for a moment – getting better, definitely a good sign – before deciding yeah, why not. "Pet my hair?"
Lin groused, audibly rolling his eyes, but shifted to sit instead of crouching before reaching to run his nails along her scalp. "You're ridiculous."
"Thank-you," she returned pertly, both playfully and really meaning it. Lin was probably the best friend a girl could ever ask for, and she'd run off enough people over the years to know the sage twenty-something was a standout.
She'd really considered changing careers, after Ansh died. Even if nothing else had ever made her feel so right as when she stepped out on duty, sometimes… Well. She was glad she hadn't quit altogether, because she liked life even more these days, and not just because it was never boring. Even Raina-
She snapped her eyes back open as a few thoughts connected. "Next week?"
"Is Thanksgiving," he confirmed. "That, and whatever prank you and Batman keep giggling about and refusing to explain."
She couldn't help it; she giggled. It hurt, but whatever, it was gonna be grand. "It's not a prank!" she whined.
"And I still don't believe you."
"My life is not a prank!" she protested, trying not to start coughing again.
"That is… so very debatable."
"Mean!"
"The thing is?" Jake added, amusement heavy in his voice as he talked over their heads. "I'm not sure that either of them is wrong."
oOo
oOo
Rebuff
oOo
Welcome back to everyone who's stuck with me, and hello to anyone new. Let's see if I can actually keep up my own damn revival. Thoughts? Feedback adds a hell of a lot of inspiration, for the record.
Chapter 21 is nearly done, and I've frothing at the mouth to start 22. Catch you next time.
