Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Devil's Secrets ❯ Introduction ( Chapter 1 )
[ P - Pre-Teen ]
By: JayB 
The end at the beginning
Anime/Manga: Gundam Wing Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Adventure | Type: Alternate Universe | Uploaded On: 08.29.2001 | Pages: 3 | Words: 5.2K | Visits: 269 | Status: Completed
The end at the beginning
Anime/Manga: Gundam Wing Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Adventure | Type: Alternate Universe | Uploaded On: 08.29.2001 | Pages: 3 | Words: 5.2K | Visits: 269 | Status: Completed
Disclaimer Haiku:
I don't own Gundam
Can I buy it from you please
OK! Don't sue me...
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Dedication: I'll dedicate the entire story to Kony the Halfwit for being my continuos inspiration and managing to put up with me.. well, most of the time!
This is the end at the beginning, kinda weird but I wrote it so you can't expect anything too sane...
~*~*~*~
'Sure. I'm there.' I answered, running up to my friend. I blanked the thought from her mind.
With good weather, it only took us five minutes or so to reach the collection of main buildings.
I rarely saw my father, he made sure I was educated, I had a lot of books. I suppose he thought of that as good parenting. It wasn't. There was a hole inside of me that books couldn't fill, I ignored it. If I didn't like something I just ignored it, I was such a spoilt brat.
It was perfect. Life was perfect. I was so happy. Until then. My strongest memory, the one thing that comes back to me in moments of despair, are those doors. I had no idea who it was, just visitors. It didn't matter until I opened those doors.
They were mahogany, with black handles. They made the slightest squeak as I opened them, the noise that replays in all my nightmares. This is the worst moment in my life because it is the moment the nightmare began.
I opened the door.
Shin was there.
~*~*~*~
Kaita picks herself up and leaves the deserted landscape of her awakening and heads for the industrial comfort of her city. As she walks, looking like a cat saved from drowning, she gives the murky sky an unforgiving glance, as if it should have fallen by now:
-
The sun's rising, very beautiful. Although it's hard to see through the cloud... CLOUD?!
-
Sobering her minds sleepy haze, an ice-bucket of paranoia rushes through her body. It starts with the nerves in her feet, then her knee begins to wobble, then the sick feeling as it hits the weak spots in her stomach and finally her shoulders shrug violently making her head work sharply to the left, leaving only a little tingling in each hand to prove her shock. It is the first time Kaita has seen rainclouds anywhere near the city and yet another agonising time she has seen those telltale little black dots, moving towards her steadily.
She runs for the deep cover and security of her workplace. The city is too overshadowed, it has weird effects on her, weird effects on her mind. She feels as if there is some huge conference in her head, one where the members only vie for her attention and don't bother commmunicating with each other. With enough rest for a strong will, Kaita can listen to each voice, watch each thought and feel each emotion seperately. On a night like the last, she is forced to give up as physical exertion and mental trauma push her to the edge. The bridge was an error she could only make after something as disturbing as a "conversation" with WuFei Chang.
-
All I ever wanted was respect, all I ever got was kicks in the side and riddles. So that's all I'll ever give.
-
She sighs and looks at herself. Her clothes, after five hours asleep on sand while wet, have become uncomfortable and bedraggled. From the bay, her residence is about two miles inland so she'll run, it's sunrise and her country is being attacked. Might as well fight to the death, she was gonna do it until yesterday anyhow.
The plateau of the city confronts her, it's all one house, just lots of rooms. One huge metal structure with water and gas piped in, always dark, always unfriendly. The city is her country, the place of her birth, the second most important thing in her life and now she looks upon it with disgust. In her heart she knows that it /deserves/ to be destroyed
'Light? Dark? What's the difference? The sun's rising but I'm still shadow, yet another come to destroy you Talsin.' she says, a smile appearing on her lips
Then there is the voice behind her, 'I heard that.'
*******************
Heero had been up all night, typing long and complicated emails to Duo and Quatre. Neither of them were answering.
This planet freaked him out, he'd come because he believed it was his right. He was one of the famous Gundam pilots, the perfect soldier. If anyone was going to see some hushhush new planet, it would be him. As government didn't know a thing, himself and the other Gundam pilots had jetted off to "Talsin" without the slightest notice. And thus, he had developed this guilt, towards the two people he actually had feelings for.
Relena, he was ashamed but he missed her, it was nice to have someone to whom he ment something to. Now he was in the eccentric world of unhealed scars and cities made of steel.
Duo, well there was no doubting his feelings for the braided one a little orchestra went of every time they met, which wasn't much these days. Well, absense makes the heart grow fonder.
All of a sudden he began to type out his angst-
~~~
A place with cold-hearted bastards just like me.
There is no sunshine, nothing can get past the impossibly big wall of metal that /is/ the damn city. Even worse, the upper levels just soak in the light that the lower levels can't see, which explains the heat problem. Everyday is like an oven, it's ridiculous. What kind of stupid people settle on the equator of a tiny planet where all the rivers are near the temperate poles? That's Talsin's problem, it's all brawn with no brains. These days they just get Reeldians to do all the maths while they did the manual and Daegwon gets the cash, but that's just spread throughout the three planets anyway. Weird, but it works. Maths too, these people /speak/ with numbers and if they ever write anything down (which will probably never happen on Talsin) it would be in numbers.
It's all new and odd, but it's culture, you can forgive culture. The bit that really peeves me is their religion, half the time they can't decide what they're worshipping and the rest of the time, they're worshipping. In addition, their gods are numbers. People can't say "K" (21) in public, a little like 666. It gets confusing, /very/ confusing. Even Kaita refuses to speak Talsinian (Universal language or not) because it's so easy to be misunderstood. She's changed her surname to avoid being branded a "21ist" and no one is allowed to call her Kaita anymore because it means "Kill Me", weird parents, that's all I can say.
Well, apart from being disturbing, Talsin is cool... apart from the heat. Living in the lower levels, like everyone else, the world is dark and full of possibilities. There are about eight floors before the sun-baked surface. On the poles there is even some plant life, though it's spiky and some is rumoured to eat people from time to time. For a 10,000 year-old society Talsinians can come up with some intolerable crap. Anyway, the city almost covers half of the planet, which is about a third of the Earth's size, all eight floors. It isn't crowded, floors generally become ground when they've been around for a while. After the wars there was nothing but a few fighters left, the same story now really, just more of us. It's only been six years since everyone realised there was no point in fighting, and now that they're doing it again the city will fall into even more ruin. It's like ignorance and stupidity is the only reason these people wake up everyday, add Kaita to the list of "these people".
~~~
He questions sending it, but, even though technology allows it, his concience won't. Relena wouldn't appreciate a load of moaning. With his usual depression, Heero stops typing and leans back on his chair to half-stare at the rising sun live on his monitor, it looks so big from Talsin, and so different. Who would've thought? It was only another star. But the picture is out of context with its background-
Heero's chair falls to the ground with a clatter and he furiously types an email to each of the Gundam pilots
*******************
Duo had been working at a nearby club till three in the morning, as soon as he had arrived back in his little room he fallen fast asleep. Prices are high on Talsin, especially if you're trying to get an "education". Duo works flat out, it surprises people how he can be so determined, and they surprise him with their laid back lifestyles. Of course he's still fun-loving Duo, it's just that he's grown up a little and is taking control of his responsibilities. He's always worked as a mechanic, and he works with some of Talsin's leading scientists during the day. At night he serves a bunch of personalised cocktails behind the bar of the Haunted Gallery, the "Shinigami" now being one of the city's favourites. People flock to the Great Destroyer with his pent up humor (something that happens when you work with old people) and charisma.
The money gets saved up for even better loudspeakers or filtered away on grocery's. Walking around the underworld suburbia, Maxwell finds no wonder in the amount of citizens who are barely skin and bones, then again, there are still Kahta addicts around. That infamous drug that takes any hunger out of the system, it was used during the wars when food couldn't get into the city. The worst cases in the orphanages where young children were brought up on the stuff, a fate worse than death in Duo's view. The young man with the yard long braid (which he still hasn't cut) does well for himself, the only problems he has with his new home are the neverending darkness and his lack of sleep. The whole sleep thing comes back to getting in at three in the morning and having to wake up at (what would be) sunrise.
So now it's six am and the electronic beep of Duo's email alert is filtering into his dreamless snooze. Bleary eyed and wincing with the memories of a "Shinigami" he made for yours truly last night, Duo lifts himself from his matress so that he's staring intently at his pillow, trying to get it into focus. He shoots an unforgiving glance at his laptop and throws a little red devil toy that he won with a game of darts at the plasma screen, it shows a few drug-enhanced waves of colour and returns to its previous form, "You Have Mail". Duo sighs and runs his hand through slightly greasy bangs, slumped sideways over his office chair he checks out his inbox. He emits another sigh as sees the amount of mail he can get in 24 hours. Luckily half is junk, and there is at least one from Kaita demanding that he marry Soli because she can't stand her constant slush-talk, that makes Duo smile a little, but not as much as around ten email from "perfectsoldier@jagelti.tal". Heero got himself the address out of spite for Talsin (who hate the Jagelti for all their worth, and that kind of depends how much a metal skeleton and elbows that can cut you in half scare you). Duo appreciated the humor because Heero refused to take Talsinian war seriously, whereas he wouldn't even talk about Earth anymore.
'Start from the top and work down.' mutters the young man with a smirk on his face. He plans to exterminate the email that woke him from precious sleep, even if he secretly uses Heero's neverending stream of mail as an alarm clock. An example of his lack of sleep would be that he sleeps through all of the other "You Have Mail" beepings, and there seem to have been twelve through the night. A quick glance of the summaries only adds confusion, "READ THIS OR DIE FROM SEVERAL GUNSHOTS TO THE HEAD", and yes, it's from Heero. With grudging acceptance, the email is opened:
~~~~
Wake up!
Look to the bay with your monitor and tell yourself what's wrong with the weather! Then write back telling me what's wrong with those little black dots coming towards us, creating all too familiar shapes. Get my point?!
Email back or meet me in the central square,
Heero Yuy
Ps. Forward this to anyone and everyone
~~~~
Duo frowns, he has questions and only investigations out of his dark little hole will tell him answers. He taps the address "www.livebayview.tal" and waits for response. The screen comes on and reveals nothing but a grey fuzz.
The camera's out.
*******************
Trowa is making his way to the central square, he's just got an email from Heero and he doesn't know what's up. The elevator through the levels of habitation is out of sight because so many are fighting to get on for a quick lift to what can only be more trouble. Calmly Trowa takes to the stairs, which are filled to the brim and then overflowing with men and women, most his age. They all carry some sort of weaponry and seem, like the people on the lift, to not sport a Talsinian crest on their arms. No one here is from the Military Training Centre of Talsin, there /has/ to be something up on Level One. People are climbing over each other in desperation to get out, a few are screaming, there's even someone crying on the stairs. It's chaos and it makes no sense, there are over 500 staircases to the upper world, so if this one is in pandemonium, then the rest must be too.
A violent shake knocks Trowa from his thoughts and knocks him into one of many metal walls. For a second he is paralysed, but he regains his-self and stands with a bleeding forehead. Just to wait for the drama to end is not enough, he's got to be another one struggling to get to Level One, it's demeaning but a course of action that must be taken. Trowa runs and jumps, clearing the first flight of stairs and landing on someone with a sickening crunch. Oops. Just another person to join in with the screaming and shouting. Trowa moves with his incredible agility, occasionally getting crushed by those forced to the side by some heavily overweight man with arms like bricks. Then there is another shudder, stronger this time and the lights begin to flicker as Trowa struggles to even stand.
Darkness falls over the panicked corridor and the gunshots start. Trowa runs blindly and /fast/, he's dodging badly aimed bullets now. He forgets where he is, the amount of flights he's climbed, how many bodies he's trodden over, the pain in his arm and the pain in his head, all he thinks about is reaching sunlight. His breathing shallows, it gets faster and faster. It only takes one more thrust into the unforgiving wall before he gets his own gun from his pocket and shoots the huge man, whose immense shadow he can still see. The shape falls to the floor, and there is even a little cheer, from a voice he knows,
'Trowa?!'
Breathless and shaky he answers back, 'Grab my hand, Soli'
She takes his sweaty, shivering hand and pulls on it hard as more people push and pull in the endless uphill climb.
'What's going on, Trowa?! I got an email from Kaita and the next thing I know-'
'Please.. don't ask, you won't get.. answers!' he winces, taking her hand fully, as if it's a life line
She answers in a voice so quiet it is almost drowned out, 'Trowa?' she gets no answer, so she follows his forward stare. The light at the end of the tunnel is... blocked by men with emerald green armor and swords.
'Tun.' Trowa whispers, above the city seagulls and enemy aircraft block out the sky and the "light" is the faint glow struggling to get through. All the screams behind them are amplified by the screams in the street. Trowa grits his teeth and barges past the still and petrified crowd by the doors, a hand takes his shoulder and pulls him back,
'Trowa! They're /elite/!'
The young man turns to the raven haired girl, 'Soli? So are we.'
The pair are at the front of the crowd and already one of the soldiers is advancing with a sneer on his face. Soli turns towards the crowd,
'Any MTCTs?' she shouts. There is instant quiet but no response, they're are few MTCTs still in the staircase, these are just citizens. Soli glares, 'Well, what the hell are you doing?!-'
She is interrupted by a wail of despair from a man whose head, now detached, was the target of a leaping Trowa's knife.
'-I /know/ there isn't a single peron here without some kind of fighting experience! You were /born/ here! What do you think you trained for?! And what does it matter if you die?! At least you'll die for Talsin-'
There is a murmur from deep in the crowd
'I don't care if you're not Talsinian!! Listen to your superiors and KICK SOME BUTT!!'
Trowa taps Soli's shoulder, making her turn away from an alert crowd. The corpses of ten dead Tuns are lying lifelessly on the ground. He smiles proudly and in return she gives a nod of complete gratitude. There is a silent pause where she sees the scars on his forehead and he sees the bruise covering her upper-arm where the fabric's torn, and then Trowa leaves her gaze to turn to the waiting crowd.
'Sort yourselves into rank and move into the streets, we need to unblock the staircase before we lose more fighters. Ta to the left, Ai to the right and any Ah with Soli and myself. GO!' he shouts
*******************
Quatre has been in the great hall with his sister, she had come to him first and they had desperately tried to bring some order, working with their tutors and city officials to organise. Kaita has shouted and screamed and whacked people over the head in her desperation for attention, however much their paranoia grew. Luckily the MTCTs are on their many ways and discipline is gradually sweeping over chaos. They all wear black, in war it's custom. A little sick considering, the planet engages in battle so often that they have a uniform for war. Quatre would have hated this... once, these are new times and if he has to do it, he will and he can.
His "discussion" with a messenger from the palace is interrupted by a steaming sheet of steel falling by his foot. It comes from the small roof of the square, positioned at such an agle that it blocks out the sun. The grey and black spiked warships are coming now, shooting down everything and everyone in their path. More screams pierce the now organised calm of the immense plaza, they sweep across the miles of people and terrain as shrapnel and laser flies. Quatre stands in shock.
'The Gundam Pilots are grouped over there, join them in commanding the air fleets. You're all elite. I've got my own little mission.'
Quatre looks at Kaita, 'Are you Ok?'
She is looking... weird, there is a smug determination in her face, as if she's about to kill WuFei at last. Since the whole fight thing, Quatre's wishing that they'd finish the whole petty argument once and for all. Of course stubborn little Kaita doesn't want to even look at him, talking of little, she seems older right now.
'How old are you, Laima?' he says, as she's about to answer his last question
'Erm.. eighteen.'
'I thought you were younger than me!'
She coughs, 'This is kinda the wrong time, but I.. er, lied. I'll see you in a couple of days, Ok?' the woman turns to a small, and seemingly harmless girl beside her, 'Coming with me, Talsin?'
The girl, with golden curls in her hair and olive green eyes, looks up at Kaita and silently runs with her to the aircraft hanger.
Quatre follows suit, dodging metal. Positively ignoring the fact that he is in danger of being killed and that there are a couple of royal messengers following closely behind him, Quatre worries about his family. His mother had two children and committed suicide and his father was practically a pimp! Has this affected him? Of course not, he just has a little pent up hatred for them, his closest sister included. She is his complete opposite, such an over-violent, sulky, moody woman who keeps secrets as some kind of protection. He doesn't know how they manage to get along, but they do.
The messengers were telling him to come to the palace with "great urgency" or at least send troups to protect it, Quatre happily ignored them and met the other pilots,
'Are our suits ready?'
'Of course.'
'Where's Chang?'
'He must have his own mission or something.'
'Then let's go!'
*******************
WuFei had been working out all night, he feels no need to sleep, or at least any that he wants to make known. The war has come as no surprise, only that Tun had trained its soldiers faster. He was attempting to punch the life out of a punchbag (although it was leather), when the authorities drag him, kicking and screaming, to one of the lock-ups.
Now he sits in a dark dirt-stenched cell. Part of the official's "organising" is to lock up any relatives of the former King of Tun, ie: Chang. Wearing a dark blue vest and dirt-covered white shorts that go to his knees, WuFei sits in the shadow of shadow, absolutely no light can get to him. Outside he can hear the screeches of Talsin's native creatures, the bastards won't even save animals. He knows it's wrong, but Talsin should win, he hates Tun for taking his brother from him. A little alike to the hate he holds for Risan, or whatever she calls herself these days.
A conversation begins between the dark eyed guards that have been put in charge of staying up to make sure that nothing happens to any of the hostages, they've been small talking since the early morning, mostly rubbish. Now that one of them's come back from an urgent call and the conversation's picked up,
'What's going on?'
'Trouble at the palace. They've taken it by storm, luckily the emperor's gone. Well, apparently, they could just be covering up his death.'
'I wouldn't worry, the sod never did anything for me. What I'd do for that palace..' says the one with the lumpy nose listfully, 'So where do we come in?'
'All guards and soldiers with a rank higher than Das have been informed of the new political changes-' replies the one with rings in his eyebrow.
'Woah! Wait a second, /we're/ being treated like Das level /and higher/?'
'Yes, and if you'd shut up for a second I'd tell you. Don't smile either, it's nasty.'
'Go ahead.'
'Reelda have broken the treaty, we have to evacuate the city by sundown.'
There is a shocked silence from the guy with an irritating nose. When he answers, it's a whisper,
'I've got family there.'
'We all have!'
'The Tun's can do their work, they won't lose out. Swago, we have the best fighters in the world. We /never/ lose, we're too strong!'
'You're forgetting already, knowledge and strength make the power. We're yin and yang, we live in complete harmony /together/ we've always co-existed like that. Why? Why would they do this? Your having me on.'
'I wouldn't joke about something like this. Do you want to know the rest?'
'More?!'
'Of course. They've taken the final talks and we have results!' he says drammatically, 'The sides have been taken. Tun have Reelda, Vol, and Inutile.'
'Erm.. aren't they that huge planet that can't fight for peanuts?'
'Yeah, you won't catch me there. Oh, and us, we have... Daegwon, Bet and Inutile are with us too.'
'How?'
'I dunno, they've got people everywhere! Have you seen their colonies? They stretch as far as the third eye can see! Weirdos if you ask me, we've got some pilots of theirs.'
'Oh dear.'
'Let's get to the headquarters now, they're expecting us.'
The guards disappear from WuFei's view, their exit is followed by a pregnant pause until, with the clink of a door, the corridor of cells burst into noise. Not shouting and cheering, but a collection of conversations, between and inside cells. WuFei slumps against his dirt covered wall, a few insects fall to the ground with the disturbance. He gives the locked door a savage look and rests his eyes, a voice opens them.
'There's carvings back here.'
The speaker is behind him, young and very inquisitive. Without the dark he would be sandy haired and violet eyed, with the dark he is a grey blob on WuFei's sleepy vision. He keeps talking as he runs a finger underneath the writing,
'R-rys... Eets Rys KAhTa Sis KAiTa... XIn. Oh, I'd heard they'd turned the orphanages into prisons.'
WuFei, after watching the boy with interest, moves himself to sit next to him,
'What does it mean?'
'You don't know? Well, "Eets Rys" is a change, "KAhTa" means "hurt me", "Sis" is a connection between one or two things, "KAiTa means kill me and "Xin", well unknown, I guess.'
WuFei looked blank.
'Work it out with me, Ok? I think there are two meanings,' he pauses for thought, 'It's like their maths: unknown changes hurt me to kill me. You have to look at it like that.'
WuFei placed a hand to his head, 'Something changed pain to destruction?'
'It kills.'
'So where's the orphanage?'
'You see the mention of KAhTa? It's the drug they gave to the starving during the great war, millions died.'
'I see now, what's the other meaning?'
'I just thought that KAhTa was the devil some talk of, do you know the religion around here? Kahta Risan was that bitch who went around killing innocent people for no reason.'
'An original bad-guy, huh? I know a girl called Risan, she's a bitch.'
Through the murk two pairs of eyes connect, as one they speak,
'Kaita.'
WuFei tries to make out the shape of the boy more clearly, 'Tell me everything you know.'
'She came to us one summer, she was about 15 years old. She wouldn't talk, but was a brilliant student. She came to my family for training, and she was perfect, she learnt quickly and was completely obediant. For months she was like that, she learnt more and more, until one day. My sister asked her if she could see some kind of shadow behind her and she went nuts. She started to have these emotional fits where she would get completely wound up and angry. Her eyes would change colour, she would float above the ground, sometimes there would even be walls of flames. She'd end by collapsing in a heap of tears.
By three months our land was scorched by the fire, our livestock slaughtered and our windows blown from their panes. She was ill, unable to eat with depression, but we kept tutoring her. Taught her to keep her emotions and temper inside, but nothing worked until we took the Journal.'
' Of numbers?'
'That's the one, Talsin's bible in Inutile words. She read it effortlessly, hardly moved from the book for days. When she finished, she took to the gym sat down without moving for hours. I was the one to try and talk to her, I asked about the shadow...'
'What happened?'
'I thought I was going to die. She just turned on me, stared me straight in the eyes until her irises changed from sky blue, to ice, almost grey. Then she rose into the air in a sudden, but she didn't scream. Just stopped, still looking at my eyes. Flames licked around her, but they were controlled. It was about 15 minutes until she landed, then she smiled and hugged me tightly. She said she wanted to send money home, but we wouldn't let her. In a way we loved her, but she's the devil, no doubt about it. How do you know her?'
'She married my older brother through an arrangement, she killed him last year.'
'Shin?'
'Yeah, did she ever talk about him?'
'She cursed him in fits, I never found out who he was. Think about the inscription, though.'
WuFei pauses, 'Unknown changes Kahta Risan to Kaita Risan? What's the connection?'
'They're mother and daughter. It may sound ridiculous but I've met both and they share things, did you know that Kahta could control any element? It gave her power, but she self-destucted. Suicide, couldn't have happened to a nicer person, I'm kidding of course.'
'It makes a mother a daughter?'
'What does? You're almost there.'
'Time? Shouldn't it be the other way round... leaving a child?'
'That's all I can think of, that or another generation, which would mean she has inherited the power.'
'She has an older brother, that's impossible. I still can't believe the fire stuff.'
'Never mind. You realise we're going to die here?'
'No, I can't see them letting us go, though. I suppose you're right.'
'How did you get in here?'
'I'm the younger brother of the previous King of Tun, second in line to the throne. You?'
'I am now the Emperor of Talsin.'
*******************
'You'll take the F12 to the Tun palace, there will be no fighting, just return with the King. Clear?'
Kaita looks at the line of four, it should be three. Two guys, Ah level. The tall one keeps glaring at her. It's disturbing when everyone seems to know your secret. She doesn't know how he knows, but secrets circulate like that.
'Risan?' her commander says, 'What are you doing?'
She looks the middle-aged Ai level straight in the eyes. The woman's head snaps so that her eyes are level with the speaker, the shades of her irises swim and her voice, when, she speaks, is as cool as ice.
'I would like to.. /borrow/ the F12 jet.'
'Miss Kaita?!'
'If you want me to kill you, I will. I will fly to Tun and bring back the emperor.'
The temperature drops and the meager Th level's hair swivels, as if there's a wind blowing across the great square. Talsin tries to pull on Kaita's arm but fails as her hand whips her away.
'W-what's that shadow?'
*******************
As the base Tun warship blows to smithereens, Heero looks at the MTCT-filled square. It's so huge, that even from such a height it still makes a strange impression on the landscape.
The sound of an incoming message buzzes in three gundanium suits,
'Guys? There's fire in the plaza!'
I don't own Gundam
Can I buy it from you please
OK! Don't sue me...
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Dedication: I'll dedicate the entire story to Kony the Halfwit for being my continuos inspiration and managing to put up with me.. well, most of the time!
This is the end at the beginning, kinda weird but I wrote it so you can't expect anything too sane...
~*~*~*~
'Sure. I'm there.' I answered, running up to my friend. I blanked the thought from her mind.
With good weather, it only took us five minutes or so to reach the collection of main buildings.
I rarely saw my father, he made sure I was educated, I had a lot of books. I suppose he thought of that as good parenting. It wasn't. There was a hole inside of me that books couldn't fill, I ignored it. If I didn't like something I just ignored it, I was such a spoilt brat.
It was perfect. Life was perfect. I was so happy. Until then. My strongest memory, the one thing that comes back to me in moments of despair, are those doors. I had no idea who it was, just visitors. It didn't matter until I opened those doors.
They were mahogany, with black handles. They made the slightest squeak as I opened them, the noise that replays in all my nightmares. This is the worst moment in my life because it is the moment the nightmare began.
I opened the door.
Shin was there.
~*~*~*~
Kaita picks herself up and leaves the deserted landscape of her awakening and heads for the industrial comfort of her city. As she walks, looking like a cat saved from drowning, she gives the murky sky an unforgiving glance, as if it should have fallen by now:
-
The sun's rising, very beautiful. Although it's hard to see through the cloud... CLOUD?!
-
Sobering her minds sleepy haze, an ice-bucket of paranoia rushes through her body. It starts with the nerves in her feet, then her knee begins to wobble, then the sick feeling as it hits the weak spots in her stomach and finally her shoulders shrug violently making her head work sharply to the left, leaving only a little tingling in each hand to prove her shock. It is the first time Kaita has seen rainclouds anywhere near the city and yet another agonising time she has seen those telltale little black dots, moving towards her steadily.
She runs for the deep cover and security of her workplace. The city is too overshadowed, it has weird effects on her, weird effects on her mind. She feels as if there is some huge conference in her head, one where the members only vie for her attention and don't bother commmunicating with each other. With enough rest for a strong will, Kaita can listen to each voice, watch each thought and feel each emotion seperately. On a night like the last, she is forced to give up as physical exertion and mental trauma push her to the edge. The bridge was an error she could only make after something as disturbing as a "conversation" with WuFei Chang.
-
All I ever wanted was respect, all I ever got was kicks in the side and riddles. So that's all I'll ever give.
-
She sighs and looks at herself. Her clothes, after five hours asleep on sand while wet, have become uncomfortable and bedraggled. From the bay, her residence is about two miles inland so she'll run, it's sunrise and her country is being attacked. Might as well fight to the death, she was gonna do it until yesterday anyhow.
The plateau of the city confronts her, it's all one house, just lots of rooms. One huge metal structure with water and gas piped in, always dark, always unfriendly. The city is her country, the place of her birth, the second most important thing in her life and now she looks upon it with disgust. In her heart she knows that it /deserves/ to be destroyed
'Light? Dark? What's the difference? The sun's rising but I'm still shadow, yet another come to destroy you Talsin.' she says, a smile appearing on her lips
Then there is the voice behind her, 'I heard that.'
*******************
Heero had been up all night, typing long and complicated emails to Duo and Quatre. Neither of them were answering.
This planet freaked him out, he'd come because he believed it was his right. He was one of the famous Gundam pilots, the perfect soldier. If anyone was going to see some hushhush new planet, it would be him. As government didn't know a thing, himself and the other Gundam pilots had jetted off to "Talsin" without the slightest notice. And thus, he had developed this guilt, towards the two people he actually had feelings for.
Relena, he was ashamed but he missed her, it was nice to have someone to whom he ment something to. Now he was in the eccentric world of unhealed scars and cities made of steel.
Duo, well there was no doubting his feelings for the braided one a little orchestra went of every time they met, which wasn't much these days. Well, absense makes the heart grow fonder.
All of a sudden he began to type out his angst-
~~~
A place with cold-hearted bastards just like me.
There is no sunshine, nothing can get past the impossibly big wall of metal that /is/ the damn city. Even worse, the upper levels just soak in the light that the lower levels can't see, which explains the heat problem. Everyday is like an oven, it's ridiculous. What kind of stupid people settle on the equator of a tiny planet where all the rivers are near the temperate poles? That's Talsin's problem, it's all brawn with no brains. These days they just get Reeldians to do all the maths while they did the manual and Daegwon gets the cash, but that's just spread throughout the three planets anyway. Weird, but it works. Maths too, these people /speak/ with numbers and if they ever write anything down (which will probably never happen on Talsin) it would be in numbers.
It's all new and odd, but it's culture, you can forgive culture. The bit that really peeves me is their religion, half the time they can't decide what they're worshipping and the rest of the time, they're worshipping. In addition, their gods are numbers. People can't say "K" (21) in public, a little like 666. It gets confusing, /very/ confusing. Even Kaita refuses to speak Talsinian (Universal language or not) because it's so easy to be misunderstood. She's changed her surname to avoid being branded a "21ist" and no one is allowed to call her Kaita anymore because it means "Kill Me", weird parents, that's all I can say.
Well, apart from being disturbing, Talsin is cool... apart from the heat. Living in the lower levels, like everyone else, the world is dark and full of possibilities. There are about eight floors before the sun-baked surface. On the poles there is even some plant life, though it's spiky and some is rumoured to eat people from time to time. For a 10,000 year-old society Talsinians can come up with some intolerable crap. Anyway, the city almost covers half of the planet, which is about a third of the Earth's size, all eight floors. It isn't crowded, floors generally become ground when they've been around for a while. After the wars there was nothing but a few fighters left, the same story now really, just more of us. It's only been six years since everyone realised there was no point in fighting, and now that they're doing it again the city will fall into even more ruin. It's like ignorance and stupidity is the only reason these people wake up everyday, add Kaita to the list of "these people".
~~~
He questions sending it, but, even though technology allows it, his concience won't. Relena wouldn't appreciate a load of moaning. With his usual depression, Heero stops typing and leans back on his chair to half-stare at the rising sun live on his monitor, it looks so big from Talsin, and so different. Who would've thought? It was only another star. But the picture is out of context with its background-
Heero's chair falls to the ground with a clatter and he furiously types an email to each of the Gundam pilots
*******************
Duo had been working at a nearby club till three in the morning, as soon as he had arrived back in his little room he fallen fast asleep. Prices are high on Talsin, especially if you're trying to get an "education". Duo works flat out, it surprises people how he can be so determined, and they surprise him with their laid back lifestyles. Of course he's still fun-loving Duo, it's just that he's grown up a little and is taking control of his responsibilities. He's always worked as a mechanic, and he works with some of Talsin's leading scientists during the day. At night he serves a bunch of personalised cocktails behind the bar of the Haunted Gallery, the "Shinigami" now being one of the city's favourites. People flock to the Great Destroyer with his pent up humor (something that happens when you work with old people) and charisma.
The money gets saved up for even better loudspeakers or filtered away on grocery's. Walking around the underworld suburbia, Maxwell finds no wonder in the amount of citizens who are barely skin and bones, then again, there are still Kahta addicts around. That infamous drug that takes any hunger out of the system, it was used during the wars when food couldn't get into the city. The worst cases in the orphanages where young children were brought up on the stuff, a fate worse than death in Duo's view. The young man with the yard long braid (which he still hasn't cut) does well for himself, the only problems he has with his new home are the neverending darkness and his lack of sleep. The whole sleep thing comes back to getting in at three in the morning and having to wake up at (what would be) sunrise.
So now it's six am and the electronic beep of Duo's email alert is filtering into his dreamless snooze. Bleary eyed and wincing with the memories of a "Shinigami" he made for yours truly last night, Duo lifts himself from his matress so that he's staring intently at his pillow, trying to get it into focus. He shoots an unforgiving glance at his laptop and throws a little red devil toy that he won with a game of darts at the plasma screen, it shows a few drug-enhanced waves of colour and returns to its previous form, "You Have Mail". Duo sighs and runs his hand through slightly greasy bangs, slumped sideways over his office chair he checks out his inbox. He emits another sigh as sees the amount of mail he can get in 24 hours. Luckily half is junk, and there is at least one from Kaita demanding that he marry Soli because she can't stand her constant slush-talk, that makes Duo smile a little, but not as much as around ten email from "perfectsoldier@jagelti.tal". Heero got himself the address out of spite for Talsin (who hate the Jagelti for all their worth, and that kind of depends how much a metal skeleton and elbows that can cut you in half scare you). Duo appreciated the humor because Heero refused to take Talsinian war seriously, whereas he wouldn't even talk about Earth anymore.
'Start from the top and work down.' mutters the young man with a smirk on his face. He plans to exterminate the email that woke him from precious sleep, even if he secretly uses Heero's neverending stream of mail as an alarm clock. An example of his lack of sleep would be that he sleeps through all of the other "You Have Mail" beepings, and there seem to have been twelve through the night. A quick glance of the summaries only adds confusion, "READ THIS OR DIE FROM SEVERAL GUNSHOTS TO THE HEAD", and yes, it's from Heero. With grudging acceptance, the email is opened:
~~~~
Wake up!
Look to the bay with your monitor and tell yourself what's wrong with the weather! Then write back telling me what's wrong with those little black dots coming towards us, creating all too familiar shapes. Get my point?!
Email back or meet me in the central square,
Heero Yuy
Ps. Forward this to anyone and everyone
~~~~
Duo frowns, he has questions and only investigations out of his dark little hole will tell him answers. He taps the address "www.livebayview.tal" and waits for response. The screen comes on and reveals nothing but a grey fuzz.
The camera's out.
*******************
Trowa is making his way to the central square, he's just got an email from Heero and he doesn't know what's up. The elevator through the levels of habitation is out of sight because so many are fighting to get on for a quick lift to what can only be more trouble. Calmly Trowa takes to the stairs, which are filled to the brim and then overflowing with men and women, most his age. They all carry some sort of weaponry and seem, like the people on the lift, to not sport a Talsinian crest on their arms. No one here is from the Military Training Centre of Talsin, there /has/ to be something up on Level One. People are climbing over each other in desperation to get out, a few are screaming, there's even someone crying on the stairs. It's chaos and it makes no sense, there are over 500 staircases to the upper world, so if this one is in pandemonium, then the rest must be too.
A violent shake knocks Trowa from his thoughts and knocks him into one of many metal walls. For a second he is paralysed, but he regains his-self and stands with a bleeding forehead. Just to wait for the drama to end is not enough, he's got to be another one struggling to get to Level One, it's demeaning but a course of action that must be taken. Trowa runs and jumps, clearing the first flight of stairs and landing on someone with a sickening crunch. Oops. Just another person to join in with the screaming and shouting. Trowa moves with his incredible agility, occasionally getting crushed by those forced to the side by some heavily overweight man with arms like bricks. Then there is another shudder, stronger this time and the lights begin to flicker as Trowa struggles to even stand.
Darkness falls over the panicked corridor and the gunshots start. Trowa runs blindly and /fast/, he's dodging badly aimed bullets now. He forgets where he is, the amount of flights he's climbed, how many bodies he's trodden over, the pain in his arm and the pain in his head, all he thinks about is reaching sunlight. His breathing shallows, it gets faster and faster. It only takes one more thrust into the unforgiving wall before he gets his own gun from his pocket and shoots the huge man, whose immense shadow he can still see. The shape falls to the floor, and there is even a little cheer, from a voice he knows,
'Trowa?!'
Breathless and shaky he answers back, 'Grab my hand, Soli'
She takes his sweaty, shivering hand and pulls on it hard as more people push and pull in the endless uphill climb.
'What's going on, Trowa?! I got an email from Kaita and the next thing I know-'
'Please.. don't ask, you won't get.. answers!' he winces, taking her hand fully, as if it's a life line
She answers in a voice so quiet it is almost drowned out, 'Trowa?' she gets no answer, so she follows his forward stare. The light at the end of the tunnel is... blocked by men with emerald green armor and swords.
'Tun.' Trowa whispers, above the city seagulls and enemy aircraft block out the sky and the "light" is the faint glow struggling to get through. All the screams behind them are amplified by the screams in the street. Trowa grits his teeth and barges past the still and petrified crowd by the doors, a hand takes his shoulder and pulls him back,
'Trowa! They're /elite/!'
The young man turns to the raven haired girl, 'Soli? So are we.'
The pair are at the front of the crowd and already one of the soldiers is advancing with a sneer on his face. Soli turns towards the crowd,
'Any MTCTs?' she shouts. There is instant quiet but no response, they're are few MTCTs still in the staircase, these are just citizens. Soli glares, 'Well, what the hell are you doing?!-'
She is interrupted by a wail of despair from a man whose head, now detached, was the target of a leaping Trowa's knife.
'-I /know/ there isn't a single peron here without some kind of fighting experience! You were /born/ here! What do you think you trained for?! And what does it matter if you die?! At least you'll die for Talsin-'
There is a murmur from deep in the crowd
'I don't care if you're not Talsinian!! Listen to your superiors and KICK SOME BUTT!!'
Trowa taps Soli's shoulder, making her turn away from an alert crowd. The corpses of ten dead Tuns are lying lifelessly on the ground. He smiles proudly and in return she gives a nod of complete gratitude. There is a silent pause where she sees the scars on his forehead and he sees the bruise covering her upper-arm where the fabric's torn, and then Trowa leaves her gaze to turn to the waiting crowd.
'Sort yourselves into rank and move into the streets, we need to unblock the staircase before we lose more fighters. Ta to the left, Ai to the right and any Ah with Soli and myself. GO!' he shouts
*******************
Quatre has been in the great hall with his sister, she had come to him first and they had desperately tried to bring some order, working with their tutors and city officials to organise. Kaita has shouted and screamed and whacked people over the head in her desperation for attention, however much their paranoia grew. Luckily the MTCTs are on their many ways and discipline is gradually sweeping over chaos. They all wear black, in war it's custom. A little sick considering, the planet engages in battle so often that they have a uniform for war. Quatre would have hated this... once, these are new times and if he has to do it, he will and he can.
His "discussion" with a messenger from the palace is interrupted by a steaming sheet of steel falling by his foot. It comes from the small roof of the square, positioned at such an agle that it blocks out the sun. The grey and black spiked warships are coming now, shooting down everything and everyone in their path. More screams pierce the now organised calm of the immense plaza, they sweep across the miles of people and terrain as shrapnel and laser flies. Quatre stands in shock.
'The Gundam Pilots are grouped over there, join them in commanding the air fleets. You're all elite. I've got my own little mission.'
Quatre looks at Kaita, 'Are you Ok?'
She is looking... weird, there is a smug determination in her face, as if she's about to kill WuFei at last. Since the whole fight thing, Quatre's wishing that they'd finish the whole petty argument once and for all. Of course stubborn little Kaita doesn't want to even look at him, talking of little, she seems older right now.
'How old are you, Laima?' he says, as she's about to answer his last question
'Erm.. eighteen.'
'I thought you were younger than me!'
She coughs, 'This is kinda the wrong time, but I.. er, lied. I'll see you in a couple of days, Ok?' the woman turns to a small, and seemingly harmless girl beside her, 'Coming with me, Talsin?'
The girl, with golden curls in her hair and olive green eyes, looks up at Kaita and silently runs with her to the aircraft hanger.
Quatre follows suit, dodging metal. Positively ignoring the fact that he is in danger of being killed and that there are a couple of royal messengers following closely behind him, Quatre worries about his family. His mother had two children and committed suicide and his father was practically a pimp! Has this affected him? Of course not, he just has a little pent up hatred for them, his closest sister included. She is his complete opposite, such an over-violent, sulky, moody woman who keeps secrets as some kind of protection. He doesn't know how they manage to get along, but they do.
The messengers were telling him to come to the palace with "great urgency" or at least send troups to protect it, Quatre happily ignored them and met the other pilots,
'Are our suits ready?'
'Of course.'
'Where's Chang?'
'He must have his own mission or something.'
'Then let's go!'
*******************
WuFei had been working out all night, he feels no need to sleep, or at least any that he wants to make known. The war has come as no surprise, only that Tun had trained its soldiers faster. He was attempting to punch the life out of a punchbag (although it was leather), when the authorities drag him, kicking and screaming, to one of the lock-ups.
Now he sits in a dark dirt-stenched cell. Part of the official's "organising" is to lock up any relatives of the former King of Tun, ie: Chang. Wearing a dark blue vest and dirt-covered white shorts that go to his knees, WuFei sits in the shadow of shadow, absolutely no light can get to him. Outside he can hear the screeches of Talsin's native creatures, the bastards won't even save animals. He knows it's wrong, but Talsin should win, he hates Tun for taking his brother from him. A little alike to the hate he holds for Risan, or whatever she calls herself these days.
A conversation begins between the dark eyed guards that have been put in charge of staying up to make sure that nothing happens to any of the hostages, they've been small talking since the early morning, mostly rubbish. Now that one of them's come back from an urgent call and the conversation's picked up,
'What's going on?'
'Trouble at the palace. They've taken it by storm, luckily the emperor's gone. Well, apparently, they could just be covering up his death.'
'I wouldn't worry, the sod never did anything for me. What I'd do for that palace..' says the one with the lumpy nose listfully, 'So where do we come in?'
'All guards and soldiers with a rank higher than Das have been informed of the new political changes-' replies the one with rings in his eyebrow.
'Woah! Wait a second, /we're/ being treated like Das level /and higher/?'
'Yes, and if you'd shut up for a second I'd tell you. Don't smile either, it's nasty.'
'Go ahead.'
'Reelda have broken the treaty, we have to evacuate the city by sundown.'
There is a shocked silence from the guy with an irritating nose. When he answers, it's a whisper,
'I've got family there.'
'We all have!'
'The Tun's can do their work, they won't lose out. Swago, we have the best fighters in the world. We /never/ lose, we're too strong!'
'You're forgetting already, knowledge and strength make the power. We're yin and yang, we live in complete harmony /together/ we've always co-existed like that. Why? Why would they do this? Your having me on.'
'I wouldn't joke about something like this. Do you want to know the rest?'
'More?!'
'Of course. They've taken the final talks and we have results!' he says drammatically, 'The sides have been taken. Tun have Reelda, Vol, and Inutile.'
'Erm.. aren't they that huge planet that can't fight for peanuts?'
'Yeah, you won't catch me there. Oh, and us, we have... Daegwon, Bet and Inutile are with us too.'
'How?'
'I dunno, they've got people everywhere! Have you seen their colonies? They stretch as far as the third eye can see! Weirdos if you ask me, we've got some pilots of theirs.'
'Oh dear.'
'Let's get to the headquarters now, they're expecting us.'
The guards disappear from WuFei's view, their exit is followed by a pregnant pause until, with the clink of a door, the corridor of cells burst into noise. Not shouting and cheering, but a collection of conversations, between and inside cells. WuFei slumps against his dirt covered wall, a few insects fall to the ground with the disturbance. He gives the locked door a savage look and rests his eyes, a voice opens them.
'There's carvings back here.'
The speaker is behind him, young and very inquisitive. Without the dark he would be sandy haired and violet eyed, with the dark he is a grey blob on WuFei's sleepy vision. He keeps talking as he runs a finger underneath the writing,
'R-rys... Eets Rys KAhTa Sis KAiTa... XIn. Oh, I'd heard they'd turned the orphanages into prisons.'
WuFei, after watching the boy with interest, moves himself to sit next to him,
'What does it mean?'
'You don't know? Well, "Eets Rys" is a change, "KAhTa" means "hurt me", "Sis" is a connection between one or two things, "KAiTa means kill me and "Xin", well unknown, I guess.'
WuFei looked blank.
'Work it out with me, Ok? I think there are two meanings,' he pauses for thought, 'It's like their maths: unknown changes hurt me to kill me. You have to look at it like that.'
WuFei placed a hand to his head, 'Something changed pain to destruction?'
'It kills.'
'So where's the orphanage?'
'You see the mention of KAhTa? It's the drug they gave to the starving during the great war, millions died.'
'I see now, what's the other meaning?'
'I just thought that KAhTa was the devil some talk of, do you know the religion around here? Kahta Risan was that bitch who went around killing innocent people for no reason.'
'An original bad-guy, huh? I know a girl called Risan, she's a bitch.'
Through the murk two pairs of eyes connect, as one they speak,
'Kaita.'
WuFei tries to make out the shape of the boy more clearly, 'Tell me everything you know.'
'She came to us one summer, she was about 15 years old. She wouldn't talk, but was a brilliant student. She came to my family for training, and she was perfect, she learnt quickly and was completely obediant. For months she was like that, she learnt more and more, until one day. My sister asked her if she could see some kind of shadow behind her and she went nuts. She started to have these emotional fits where she would get completely wound up and angry. Her eyes would change colour, she would float above the ground, sometimes there would even be walls of flames. She'd end by collapsing in a heap of tears.
By three months our land was scorched by the fire, our livestock slaughtered and our windows blown from their panes. She was ill, unable to eat with depression, but we kept tutoring her. Taught her to keep her emotions and temper inside, but nothing worked until we took the Journal.'
' Of numbers?'
'That's the one, Talsin's bible in Inutile words. She read it effortlessly, hardly moved from the book for days. When she finished, she took to the gym sat down without moving for hours. I was the one to try and talk to her, I asked about the shadow...'
'What happened?'
'I thought I was going to die. She just turned on me, stared me straight in the eyes until her irises changed from sky blue, to ice, almost grey. Then she rose into the air in a sudden, but she didn't scream. Just stopped, still looking at my eyes. Flames licked around her, but they were controlled. It was about 15 minutes until she landed, then she smiled and hugged me tightly. She said she wanted to send money home, but we wouldn't let her. In a way we loved her, but she's the devil, no doubt about it. How do you know her?'
'She married my older brother through an arrangement, she killed him last year.'
'Shin?'
'Yeah, did she ever talk about him?'
'She cursed him in fits, I never found out who he was. Think about the inscription, though.'
WuFei pauses, 'Unknown changes Kahta Risan to Kaita Risan? What's the connection?'
'They're mother and daughter. It may sound ridiculous but I've met both and they share things, did you know that Kahta could control any element? It gave her power, but she self-destucted. Suicide, couldn't have happened to a nicer person, I'm kidding of course.'
'It makes a mother a daughter?'
'What does? You're almost there.'
'Time? Shouldn't it be the other way round... leaving a child?'
'That's all I can think of, that or another generation, which would mean she has inherited the power.'
'She has an older brother, that's impossible. I still can't believe the fire stuff.'
'Never mind. You realise we're going to die here?'
'No, I can't see them letting us go, though. I suppose you're right.'
'How did you get in here?'
'I'm the younger brother of the previous King of Tun, second in line to the throne. You?'
'I am now the Emperor of Talsin.'
*******************
'You'll take the F12 to the Tun palace, there will be no fighting, just return with the King. Clear?'
Kaita looks at the line of four, it should be three. Two guys, Ah level. The tall one keeps glaring at her. It's disturbing when everyone seems to know your secret. She doesn't know how he knows, but secrets circulate like that.
'Risan?' her commander says, 'What are you doing?'
She looks the middle-aged Ai level straight in the eyes. The woman's head snaps so that her eyes are level with the speaker, the shades of her irises swim and her voice, when, she speaks, is as cool as ice.
'I would like to.. /borrow/ the F12 jet.'
'Miss Kaita?!'
'If you want me to kill you, I will. I will fly to Tun and bring back the emperor.'
The temperature drops and the meager Th level's hair swivels, as if there's a wind blowing across the great square. Talsin tries to pull on Kaita's arm but fails as her hand whips her away.
'W-what's that shadow?'
*******************
As the base Tun warship blows to smithereens, Heero looks at the MTCT-filled square. It's so huge, that even from such a height it still makes a strange impression on the landscape.
The sound of an incoming message buzzes in three gundanium suits,
'Guys? There's fire in the plaza!'