Duo Maxwell, feared ex-pilot of Deathsythe, Preventer agent Death and street rat of L2, was no longer smiling. It had been four months as of today that Heero Yuy, his partner and soul mate, had disappeared. He had gotten an email from the doctors asking him to come to some base to get most of his enhancements undone, become ‘normal’. Heero had gone with his blessing; if he wanted that then he would have all the support he wanted. But his lover had never come back.

He was walking with the rest of his team of six, including Wufei, Quatre, and Trowa. They were coming back from a simple questioning mission, taking the alleyways of Seattle. The ‘mission’ had gone well enough, they had their answers from the sources. The answers they got were confusing and often backtracked on themselves, giving no real truth. For the past month or so there have been sightings of people who carried swords and another group who fought in city streets then fled before any peace keeping force could make it to them.

The team parted ways once they were inside of the building, Duo going up to his office, the one he use to share with his eternal partner. He sat heavily and stared at the pictures on the desk, tracing the face of a young man of oriental descent.

“I miss you so much, koi. It hurts to breathe without you here…” The braided Preventer dropped his head onto his arms, trying not to give in to sobs. He lifted his head sometime later to noises in the hallway, getting up he walked outside and promptly had to grab the doorframe to keep from fainting.

An achingly familiar person was standing in the hallway a little ways down dressed in tight leather pants, tank top, and duster, being lead in by another agent. A woman was at his side, also handcuffed, dressed in /short/ shorts, knee high boot and a black tank top; they looked like sin themselves. Lady Une was walking towards them.

“What is going on?! Agent Rift, why are these people in handcuffs? Explain IMMEDIATELY!”

Rift lifted his head, “These two were attacking someone in the streets when we came upon them. The person has been sent to the med wing already. I’m taking these two down to questioning.”

The woman started laughing, leaning against a smirking Heero. “Oh, GODS! You think that thing is /human/?” Lady Une turned to her, “What are you talking about?” The blue-eyed male answered with a smirk. “In thirty seconds that ‘person’ that you put so kindly in your medical wing will be running down this hallway with the intent of killing us. It is programmed with the sole intention of killing the ‘projects’. Ie: J’s pet experiments.”

Une blinked and turned, just as the elevator opened, and a figured dressed in black, and masked, stepped out, heading right towards the captives. “Surrender or be terminated.”

Heero laughed, almost bitterly. “Great choices there…” Moving quickly he slipped out of his cuffs and pulled a long dagger knife from somewhere. “My answer, go to hell.”

Duo pulled his gun and pointed it at the figure. “Freeze.” It ignored him and ran at Heero, who dodged back then forward, sweeping with the knife and taking some skin off. The figure moved back again.

“Project 01596321 put down the weapon and surrender. Resistance is futile.”

Heero, did the most predictable thing, he spat at the figure. “Hunters, you never do get that we won’t ever surrender to slim covered nasties.” He had to dodge back quickly to miss getting gutted with a knife by the ‘Hunter’ for that comment. They exchanged blows for a few moments longer before the Preventers gathered back their wits and pulled their weapons, shouting for the two to stop immediately or be shot. Heero and the Hunter ignored them and kept fighting. The agent holding the female’s cuffs having pulled his own weapon, she was free to move about. As a few agents lost there cool and fired four things happened, most centered around the male’s walking wet dream. One, the blonde woman ran toward the fight, moving quickly in between the fighters. Two, a sound of metal cutting metal was hurt and the girl was free. Three, the bullets hit the girl in the chest, her body crumbling to the now bloody floor of the hallway. Four, an anguish filled scream that was probably heard to the ends of the earth was started.

“/KIA!!!!!!/”

The body hit the floor with a thud, Heero throwing the knife, racing to her side, just in time to catch her head. “Kia…. No…” The Hunter bowed to the Preventers and ran. No one moved for a handbreadth after it disappeared then things exploded, Une screaming orders to the Preventers, curses at them and orders to go and fetch Sally. Duo, running to his soul’s side, just kneeling next to his grieving form. He was hesitant to touch him, to find out that this was a twisted dream, which his lover really wasn’t sitting next to him. In a few seconds the decision to touch or not to touch was no longer his.

Heero lifted his head and turned his face to Duo, eyes wide and still shedding tears. “Koi?”