The storage room where Heero is being held is barely illuminated. Wufei digs out his flashlight, and we’re granted access from the guards in front of his door. Heero Yuy is also awake and well; he backs away from the door when it swings open, and immediately takes stock of the situation.
“Who are you people and what do you want from us?”
I do the introduction once again, only to receive icy silence when I’m finished. He directs a heated glare at me, and I’m almost forced to my knees by the intensity of his gaze. Wufei is less impressed, and keeps a watchful eye. When Sally begins to approach our prisoner, he stops her.
“No, Sally, wait. I will check him.”
“Don’t you dare touch me.” Heero snarls, and takes a defensive stance.
“Let him be,” I say. “Apparently the darts didn’t do him any harm.”
“No thanks to you,” he snarls again.
Sally taps Wufei on the shoulder to let him know she’s leaving the room. He’s also taken a stance, and he measures Heero. The tension is tangible; as if they value their chance to fight.
“Don’t even think about it, or you’ll get pumped with a shit-full of tranquilizers again,” I threaten him.
He doesn’t back off. “What are you planning to do with us? How’s Relena?”
“Your girlfriend is doing just fine. She asked for a phone call.”
He snorts. “She is not my girlfriend. Of course, she wants to make a call. Her father is likely worried sick about her. I don’t know what you are trying to accomplish, but with kidnapping her, you took a step in the wrong direction. Earth won’t be too happy with the abduction of the daughter of the Vice Foreign Minister.”
“That’s why we did it. As soon as the government pays attention to us, we’ll make our intentions clear, and show the whole universe what the Alliance is doing to us.”
“The Alliance has every right to do what they want to do. Apparently it’s necessary to have strong military forces on L2 with all these gangs running around, kidnapping people.”
“Watch your mouth, you ignorant fool,” Wufei seethes.
My anger flares. “We refuse to let anybody stomp on us! Just because we don’t fucking well ‘behave’ like all other colonies, we get punished, and smacked around like this!”
“And why don’t you just behave?” The intensity of his eyes seems to grow stronger with each passing minute. “Every colony gets good treatment. The Alliance provides food and medication.”
“It isn’t freedom! It’s strict control!” Wufei cuts in. “The authority of the Alliance is imposed with military force. Every shred of independence or autonomy is suppressed in the name of justice, and peace.”
“Why do you even want to be independent from the Alliance?” Heero looks at me. That’s all I need, political crap discussion with... with him.
“The colonies were formed by backbreaking labor in outer space, to provide new homes for the overpopulated Earth. However, all the colonists ended up being regarded as second class citizens. We were good enough to build the colonies, to die for the colonies! When the first signs of wealth on the colonies reached Earth, the Alliance didn’t hesitate one single second to seize control with military power! What’s your problem?”
“What’s yours?” He asks in return.
“What?”
His eyes are dark blue pits, and they are spitting sparks of lightning at me. “I asked you what your problem is.”
“You are,” I blurt.
Silence falls, and I ignore the strange look I receive from Wufei. I clench my fists so hard that my leather gloves crackle.
“There isn’t any life in having to fear constantly, or in being controlled by powers who are only interested in expanding their own influence, and not in the colony and the colonists themselves.”
“So you have a better life here in this godforsaken place, wherever we are, and kidnap people! If you let us go right now, maybe the government will be more lenient in your punishment.”
“As if we would get a fair trial anyway,” Wufei snorts. He opens his mouth to continue, but I yank his arm. I want to get out of this room, as soon as possible. Heero’s just a few meters away from me, and I can see him trembling with anger. I can’t summon the energy to tell him the same as Relena, and I twist the doorknob to leave the room. I hardly notice Wufei trailing behind me and wandering off. I’m left in the hallway. The windowsills are empty; a little girl won’t be waiting there for me today. I feel cold and.... sad.
Unlike the Alliance, we take care of our prisoners. I ask Sally if she can arrange with the food patrol for the two extra mouths that have to be fed. She grimaces, but agrees. It’s going to be tight- the Underground population fortunately stays mostly at the same level, but with the upcoming births, there are going to be more hungry mouths to feed. The children are born in illegality, as with all things dealing with The Underground. We have to be careful with our stocks. We’re completely dependent on food from various sources, from the black market to forged food stamps, and government issued ration packages.
“I’ll meet you at dinner,” she says, and that leaves me some time. I retreat to my room to work out my next plans. More medication, as always. I fold my hands. I want to thank God for bringing Trowa back safely. I want to thank God for everyone still alive. At times like these I feel the golden crucifix burn under my black shirt. The last gift of my two, three years spent in bliss at the Church. I’m so sorry, Father. I should pray and be thankful that we’re all alive and relatively well. I should pray and ask for forgiveness and find hope and comfort in your words. I can’t say the prayer. The price of my trust in other people was too high. I started to really believe in the God Father Maxwell preached about, when everything was taken away, and Shinigami laughed like a loon on my shoulder.
I flick my braid over my shoulder. We’ve succeeded in the first stage of the plan. We have to wait for the reaction of the Alliance, and the news broadcast. I sit cross-legged on my bed and slowly drop my head on my chest. I look silently for my wonderland. The perfect place in my mind.
A firm rapping on the door brings me out of my daydreaming, and I notice I’ve been out for two hours. My hands clutch my disheveled braid.
“Are you coming, Duo?” I recognize Quatre’s voice.
“Okay! Jus’ a minute!”
We eat in silence in the cafeteria, and Sally reminds me of two extra plates, waiting to be taken to our prisoners.
“Our temporary guests,” Quatre suggests. We snicker a bit, but he is dead serious. After I told him the short gist of the conversations I had with both Relena and Heero, he offers to accompany me to deliver the food. After our dinner, trays in our hands, we go visit the girl first. On our way, I express my gratitude for Trowa’s safe return.
“It was pretty scary at one point.” He eyes me. “Now I understand even less why you keep insisting on doing that all alone. The tension was enough to lose weight on the spot. I was sweating like a pig down there. I trusted my ability to tell me he was coming back. It felt good.”
I understand he refers to his emotional sixth sense, as I have come to call it.
“You handled the planning very well, as you did on every mission before.”
“I know. The place was crawling with Alliance officers, though. We didn’t count on that many reinforcements. They were pretty quick to respond.”
“We’ll watch the news later on,” I remind him. He nods, and we arrive at the girl’s room.
Quatre and I step in simultaneously, and Relena Darlian rises immediately from her makeshift bed.
“Do you have news from my father? Where is Heero?”
“We’ve already told you that Heero is safe and sound.”
“I want to see him,” she pouts.
“He is fine, Miss Relena,” Quatre answers courteously, and puts the plate on the little rickety table. He pulls away the cloth covering it.
“We brought you something to eat.”
She eyes it for a second, and I know what she’s going to do. She raises her arm.
“I am not going to eat that.” Her arm comes down in a wild movement. “It’s gross!”
I manage to catch the plate before it hits the ground, and I place it on the table once again.
“Whatever you want,” I inform her coldly. “There are lots of other people who need the food more than you do, and who will be happy to eat it.”
“It’s disgusting. You don’t even have vegetables!”
“Those are hard to acquire around here, Miss Relena,” Quatre speaks up, polite as ever. In situations like these, he demonstrates his diplomatic skills, learned from his father, out of his past, ages ago. “Unfortunately there is nothing else we can offer you. It’s either this or nothing.”
She gawks at Quatre, then at me.
“Wha...?”
“He said it right,” I shrug, not in the least interested in her antics. For a moment I’m convinced she will yank the plate out of my hands to throw it in my face, but she picks up the spoon, and starts eating. I shrug again, and turn around to leave the room. I have lots of work to do. Quatre prepares to leave also, but we’re both stopped by her voice, sounding puzzled.
“We had steak, green beans, and stuffed potatoes for dinner at the hotel.” She speaks in a soft, but resolute tone. Relena isn’t used to being denied, and her voice sounds wondering, and questioning. Quatre’s already turned the doorknob, but nonetheless spins around to answer her.
“That is because, Miss Relena, the government didn’t want you to be confronted with the real life on L2, out here, and saved the best for you. Thanks to all their corrupt manipulation, people like you have been lured into a false view of the situation here.”
We leave the room.
“One down, one to go,” I say wryly. Quatre smiles at me.
“She’s afraid, Duo, afraid, and alone. She doesn’t know how else to react. Relena can’t rely on her boyfriend or her father now. She finds herself in a complete different situation than she could ever imagine. She cannot cope, and this is the only way she knows how to react, however bad or spoiled it may seem to us.”
“Uh-huh,” I answer, a little bit irritated. I try to put myself in her situation, but I guess being practically born, and raised on streets and running through the slums of L2 beats any trace of fear out of you, because I can’t imagine her feelings. The only situation I can compare with, is the time when I held Solo dead in my arms. That feeling of being totally lost... of not knowing what to do... however, I wouldn’t vent it on food, but that’s just me.
When we reach Heero’s room, the two guards look grim.
“We had to give him a black eye to keep him from escaping. He was a handful to subdue. Duo, be careful.”
“I will.” You will guard me, won’t you, Shinigami?
Quatre shows the guard the dart gun. “If he attacks one of us, I’ll pump him full with this.”
“Shocking,” I reply when I see Quatre’s determined look. People don’t mess with me, but certainly not with Quatre either. It’s just the blond hair and those big blue eyes of his’- that give people the wrong impression. When we enter, Heero turns around, and faces us with a forceful glare, unlike any other glare he’s directed at me before, even with his left eye swollen and bruised.
“Who are you?” He barks at Quatre.
“My name is Quatre Raberba Winner. We haven’t met before. Please excuse me for not shaking hands.”
“Finally, someone with manners, and comprehensible speech.” He snorts, looking in my direction. I decide it’s not worth fighting over, and I dump the plate on the floor.
“Here’s your food. By the way, your girlfriend is annoying the hell out of everyone. “
“She is not my girlfriend.” He turns his eyes from the plate to look at me. Furious blue eyes. I just can’t come up with a description that fits. They search me, strip me, and examine me. Suddenly he takes the spoon and starts eating.
A second later, he throws the cutlery away. “Bah! What is this foul concoction?”
“What?”
“The food,” he snarls, “what’s wrong with the food?”
I blink. “It’s what we eat around here.”
Quatre throws me a look. “I think our culinary standards leave much to be desired. Relena was complaining about it too.”
“What are you trying to do, poison us?”
“Shut up!” I clench my fists. “We do our best here to keep you reasonably comfortable during your stay, and that’s more than your precious Alliance will do! We have people here who almost starved to death when they were arrested for a mere walk in the park!”
Quatre addresses Heero more politely. “I suggest you watch your mouth. You are not aware of the situation, which I am happy to explain to you. We are trying to make a stand for ourselves...”
“You have only to thank yourselves for this situation.” Heero comments, and I register that he holds the spoon as if it’s a weapon. He’s a fucking one-man-army. I realize the implications of his remark, and I open my mouth and let it flood out.
“You’re a damn pampered Earthboy, who has no idea how life on the colonies is! Your fucking peachy girlfriend and her fucking preachy father may be top of the hill on your fucking Earth, but here you’re nothing! Nothing but dirt on their shoes, those sons of bitches controlling our lives! Tell me, which world is so great that it needs military power to uphold its ideals?”
“You are so stubborn,” he says, “why don’t you just conform to what the Earth Nations wants? I can assure you that they don’t want this to happen. I lived on the L1 colony the first five years of my life. When Earth gave me the opportunity to study there, I jumped at the opportunity. I was never misjudged or mistreated. Earth people are kind, and nice.”
“I’m not talking about Earth. I can’t judge them because I’ve never met them. I’m talking about the Alliance, and its oppression. We fight for freedom and independence!”
Heero doesn’t realize he’s bending the spoon like some... piece of paper being crumpled.
“You seem to forget you have to thank your hated Alliance for your existence! It was the Earth Nations who expanded, and went out into new frontiers, building colonies to provide people better lives, and opportunities.”
Quatre suppresses a coughing fit.. “So this is what they use as propaganda slogans.”
“Heero, listen to me.” I have his full attention, two blue eyes and a tight drawn mouth. I want him to understand me. “Building the colonies was essential for your Earth Nations, because there was overpopulation, disputes, and war. People died during and for the building of the first, and the next colonies. After completion, the conflicts of Earth continued on the colonies. We have come to mirror Earth warfare. We became the playground for your rivalries, increasing military strength with every cry for independence. Thanks to the mobile suits, the Alliance took the reigns over from the previously installed governments, and replaced them with Alliance-minded officials. We don’t agree with their control. We want freedom. Independence. We don’t want to walk in line with what the Alliance says. We’d rather die.”
“You are Shinigami.”
I don’t answer, surprised as I am by his remark. It’s like he looks straight through me, delving into my mind and soul. For a moment, when he looks at me, I think there’s more to his face than he thinks he’s showing. A flicker of... understanding, maybe?
“So what if I am?”
“You’re quite famous. We were warned on Earth about you.”
I don’t know how the Alliance, or people, for that matter got wind of my nickname. I do know how I got it, and why I loved it; but I certainly don’t spread it around anymore. When I stayed at the Maxwell Church, Father used to teach me the basics of religion, and he also taught me about foreign cultures, and religions. He talked about God, Mohammed and Buddha. After ancient Greek and Roman mythology, he told me about the Shinto religion- and there I found my counterpart, Shinigami, God of Death. The name stuck for one reason, and in my younger years I spread it whenever I liked; yelling like a madman on the run for the military, stealing, hacking, and slashing my way through street life. I never guessed it would be used later to describe me. It seems it will always be there to haunt me. As Shinigami will always stand by my side, hovering to kill the one close to me, laughing to bring out the darkness in me.
Quatre crosses his arms. I’m startled by his move, I have totally forgotten about him.
“What do you mean, you were warned on Earth about him?”
Heero seems to deflate a little. “When we were leaving for L2, some bodyguards at the minister’s office told me about rebellious gangs on the colony, and one gang in particular- Shinigami.”
“Actually, the name is Maxwell’s Demon gang, though ‘gang’ sounds so degrading,” Quatre answers, and he looks at me as if I am his damn favorite elder brother. “It’s a name we are proud to wear.”
“The great Shinigami.” A snort. “An ignorant rebel with a handy three foot braid, out to create as much chaos around him as possible.”
“Look who you are calling ignorant. You don’t know a thing about politics. You just do your work and bring home your money. You don’t have to wonder what you will eat next, where you will sleep next- under a roof or under the sky. You don’t have to wait eight hours in a fucking line to get some rotten potatoes. You can get everything you want.”
“The Alliance will bring the same benefits to you once you succumb to them,” he says again.
“Right, succumb. Where is the freedom? We refuse to swallow the control of the Alliance. They send us up here to develop technology, to build new worlds; their fucking new worlds, and all we get in return is oppression, and violence! It cost us hundreds of years to settle here, and we are paid back with suspicion, and hatred! Let the colonies swallow their pride and own beliefs; let them crawl at the knees for their superior Earth oppressor. We have a rebellious name here, because we’re the only ones standing up against their imposed regime!”
“The Alliance is perhaps wrong in using military power, but you are mistaken in the way you handle things, yourself. By abducting us, you also use violence.” He is stubborn, the bastard.
“So tell me why L5 self-detonated then,” I ask him in my sweetest tone of voice. I falter, and it comes out really smug.
He frowns at me. “L5? Self-detonated?”
After a while he continues: “They suffered problems with the outside hull. Decompression. Everybody knows it was an engineering fault.”
I cannot help it, and I start to laugh- hard, and completely off-key.
“An engineering fault? Wufei was fucking right! That’s what... that’s what the Alliance reported? They self-detonated, because they didn’t yield to Alliance control. L5 was targeted for termination when it became clear that they wouldn’t give up their traditions and culture, no matter what.”
“Impossible.” He frowns, but won’t let go. “The Alliance would never do that.”
“We have a descendant of the L5 colony here. You have met him already, he was with me the first time I visited you. It’ll be my pleasure to send him to you, so you can exchange opinions.”
I have a slightly scary vision of Wufei sharing his opinion with him... with Heero and his false view of the Alliance, and its self-righteous holy goodness. He hasn’t grown up on the colonies, he was shipped off to Earth when he was five. He doesn’t know, he’s a standard, docile citizen of Earth on a leash. Wufei saw his colony self-detonate, while he was on the run with his sick wife. They would kill each other for sure. Quatre taps my shoulder.
“We have to get back in time for the broadcast,” he reminds me.
I nod, and turn around to leave the room.
“Funny,” Heero says, slashing the silence, “that a colony boy like you should choose a nickname like Shinigami. Do you even know what it means?”
“I do,” I confirm. “I’m not stupid. There’s something else I do, together with lots of other people. It’s called surviving, Heero Yuy. Just a reminder that you and your girlfriend won’t be sharing the same bed tonight.”
“She is not my girlfriend!” He raises his voice, without resorting to screaming. I shut up and look at him.
“She is not,” he repeats, slowly and softly.
“Well, it’s very nice to have that cleared up,” I answer, and hope he gets the sarcasm. From the confused look in his eyes, I guess not.
“How long will I... she... we be staying here?”
“As long as it takes to get our point across,” I answer.
“Don’t you realize that by kidnapping Relena you only confirm Earth opinions of the colonies?”
“Yes, and what began those opinions anyway? We didn’t ask to be trampled, Earthboy.”
“My name is Heero Yuy. You can address me with that or don’t talk to me at all.”
“Well, excuse me, Mr.-Heero-Earthboy-fucking-nose-in-the-air-Yuy,” I spit out. “My sincere apologies for not offering you room service, your own servant, a bath, a bed, and a massage!”
While swinging the door shut, I can clearly, albeit softly, hear him say: “Apology accepted,” with a damn smug tone in his voice.
“That went well,” Quatre thinks out loud when we are heading back to the conference room.
“What a jerk,” is my answer, and I stuff my hands in my pockets. I’m not upset- I’m irritated, because this whole conversation convinced me that everybody in the whole fucking universe has the wrong image of L2, thanks to the Alliance. They think we asked for this... this misery, the sons of bitches. I growl. Quatre remains silent.
Trowa has already hooked up the television to the cable, and is busy adjusting the antennae. I can’t remember how we got the TV in the first place. You can spend your money on every other colony cluster- but on L2, really everything is for sale if you offer the right price: from people’s conscience to morality, from flight plans to shoes. A really precious item is bottled, clean water- you have to do some really shitty stuff to be paid in bottled water. I know. I’ve done some of those ‘chores’ myself. Like I said before, there’s more than one reason why people call me Shinigami. I was born in a war, I lived throughout a war but all the Gods help me, I will not die in a war. I mumble, and G looks at me if I have lost my mind. Quatre makes a ‘silent’ motion, and we watch the news.
We watch it. If we had some device to tape it and see it again, we would watch it again.
Quatre’s blue eyes are as big as saucers. G fidgets with his sleeves. Trowa looks pensive. Sally doesn’t realize that her mouth is hanging open.
A ‘severely astounded and stunned looking reporter’ covers the biggest riot of the last months on the streets of L2, but not a word about Darlian or his daughter... or about the deploy of the mobile suits.
“By directly attacking one of the finest accommodations this colony has to offer, the so-called rebels have once again demonstrated their intentions to thwart any regulations the government has adopted to improve the structure of ssociety. As long as these rebels are wandering free in L2, and have the support of the citizens, this colony will never reach a future wherein...”
“Shut. It. Off..” I growl. Trowa leans forward, and severs the connection. We look at each other as if we are beaten with sticks. The surreal feeling of the situation slowly becomes clear, and I suddenly feel very tired. This is not good. I don’t have to voice it out loud. Everybody knows this stinks. We break up the meeting in complete silence.
Chapter 4 | Chapter 6