Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Stolen Memories ❯ Chapter 14 ( Chapter 14 )

Chapter Fourteen

Relena was floating, peaceful and serene. Her eyelids were too heavy to open, but that was alright. She could hear voices murmuring around her and they felt comforting and friendly. She was happy to stay in this safe, warm place. The voices came nearer and Relena found she could pick out some words, someone was calling her name softly and she could feel her hair being stroked with such gentleness.

"…..Relena…." the voice called to her again. Deep, masculine, almost sensual. Relena felt her lips twitch into a half smile. Her body reacted as she concentrated on the voice, she could feel a tingle run down her spine and felt her heart begin to beat faster.

"Relena, open your eyes." The voice encouraged her, and she tried again to comply. She felt almost drunk, euphoric and sleepy at the same time. She breathed deeply and began to stretch her stiff limbs. Her eyes slowly began to open. Relena needed to blink a few times before the blurring was banished.

"….where…?" she asked, her throat was sore and she had difficulty swallowing. As her vision focused she found herself looking into Prussian blue eyes that looked very familiar and safe. A hand was holding hers, whilst another was smoothing back her hair. As Relena gazed into those eyes another feeling welled up inside her - panic. Those eyes were not safe, they were dangerous and cold. The eyes of a killer. The eyes of her fathers killer - Heero Yuy. Relena gasped and sat upright, her hand holding her head, which was throbbing with the pain of a severe headache. Her other hand was still being held and she pulled it out of Heero's grip.

Heero gazed at her, his eyes narrowing. "She's awake." He announced and stood up from the bed on which he had been sitting. He folded his arms and watched her coldly. At his announcement other people approached the bed. Relena saw that Trowa and Duo were still with her, but now there were a number of new people. Quatre Winner she recognised instantly as a delegate that she had had lots of dealings with in the past. He was, however, also a Gundam pilot. Wufei Chang was also in the room. He was looking through some papers which she recognised to be the press release that she had intended to give which detailed the identities of the pilots and their crimes. A woman came forward and sat beside her and offered her a glass of clear liquid.

"Here, drink it." Sally ordered. "Its water. You are dehydrated, that is why you have a headache. Get your fluids up and your headache should go."

Relena took the glass and looked at it suspiciously. She sipped the water carefully, and could detect no taste that would indicate anything being added. Relena gulped the water down. "Who are you?" she asked.

Sally raised an eyebrow at the question "Dr Sally Po." She responded. "You don't remember me?"

Relena looked at her carefully "I never forget a face." She said, "It wouldn't pay to in my profession. I would swear that I have never met you before." Relena switched her attention to Wufei, who was still looking through papers "Those are classified." Relena said coolly "Please stop reading and return them to my bag at once."

"No." Wufei answered her, and turned his back on her continuing to read.

"Miss Relena" Sally said calmly "You and I do know each other. I was your personal physician for several years before being reassigned by Lady Une. Dr Holt replaced me only a couple of months ago."

Relena snorted "Don't be ridiculous - if you were my doctor only a couple of months ago I would remember it."

"Who was your doctor before Dr Holt?" Sally asked.

"My doctor was…." Relena frowned trying to remember the name. Her headache intensified and she held her hand up to her head again. "I'm afraid his name escapes me at this moment, but it definitely wasn't you. My memory isn't normally this poor, it is probably due to the shock of what has happened today." Relena glared at the pilots.

"Ok, you have forgotten the name." Sally continued, watching Relena closely. "You remember what he looked like." Relena nodded "Can you describe him to me?" Relena frowned in thought but made no response "Was he tall, short, fat, thin?" Sally prompted.

Relena's headache grew even more severe. She screwed up her eyes against the artificial light of the station as it became unbearable, and shielded her eyes with her hand. How could she not remember, she thought desperately. She shook her head to indicate that she couldn't respond.

"How long were you with your previous doctor?" Sally's voice seemed to come from a great distance. Relena began to see spots in front of her eyes as she desperately tried to remember times, dates, anything. She tried to speak but her mouth was dry, her heart seemed to be racing and a feeling a panic was washing over her. Before blackness overcame her she heard a crash of glass splintering and someone swearing.

The glass had slipped from Relena's hand and had smashed on the floor. Heero cursed as he caught Relena as she toppled backwards her face pale and sweating. "Enough!" he growled as Sally.

Sally nodded in agreement and quickly assessed Relena's condition. Her breathing was accelerated, she was having palpitations, and she was perspiring and felt cold. Sally quickly administered a sedative and watched as Relena's heart rate and breathing returned to normal. She squeezed Relena's hand and murmured sorry to her, but she was aware that Relena could not hear her.

"Well?" Quatre asked.

"As we suspected, Relena's nanobot is more sophisticated than yours. Hers is also controlling the beating of her heart. As just demonstrated, when Relena is put under the stress of trying to recall a history that isn't within her grasp, the bot acts to shut her down - render her unconscious." Sally said grimly.

"The purpose?" Trowa asked.

"I would suppose that the bot has only a limited amount of memory available. Great chunks of her memories are not there and I guess that if she is asked too many questions that would reveal her missing memories the bot acts to prevent more questions being asked." Sally hypothesised.

"She would be seen to faint, questions would be forgotten, and Holt would step in to explain that Relena was suffering from stress." Wufei finished.

Sally nodded in agreement. "But the worrying thing is that if the bot has the facility to do that -"

"Then it probably has a fail safe switch." Heero interrupted "If the bot renders her unconscious for unanswerable questions, it probably does something more extreme if it is interfered with."

"More extreme than that?" Duo questioned pointed at the unconscious Relena.

"More extreme as in dead." Heero clenched his fist in anger. Duo wisely said no more.

Lady Une sat in her office. She was agitated and was biting an elegant fingernail. Across the room from her a man was looking out her office window. His tall figure was silhouetted by the sunshine pouring in making it impossible for her to discern his facial expression. Dr Holt sat opposite her looking at his palm top computer.

"Interesting readings coming through." He advised, "Elevated pulse and respiration. I should imagine that Relena has been undergoing a questioning."

"So…. she isn't dead yet." The man at the window said softly

"No, but based on the readings I'm getting, its just a matter of time." Dr Holt smiled.

"It had better happened soon." The man said sharply as he span around and strode over to the Dr. He placed a hand on the doctors shoulder and squeezed it firmly causing the Dr to wince "We cannot easily proceed until she is out of the way." Holt nodded his agreement and began to mumble about it being a certainty.

Lady Une held up her hand with a now ragged nail. "Sir, everything is ready." she said "As soon as Relena is dead the press conference will go ahead, the pilots will be confirmed as the murderers of our beloved minister and ESUN will announce war against all who supported the pilots. The colonies will seek the protection of ESUN and will join once again with us and you will step forward as the new leader of the earth and colonies." Lady Une smiled at the man, who tossed his long blond hair over his shoulder and smiled coolly back.

"Yes, I will take my sister's place and lead the Earth to greatness." Said Millardo Peacecraft.