Episode 2: The Gundam Called Death

“I heard all about it, Relena,” a girl, with bleached blond hair, stated as she sauntered up to Relena, who was watching the boys fencing practice with no real interest. “Saying ‘no’ to Heero’s invitation in front of a group of people like that. I invited you up here to ask why would you do such a stupid thing? It’s the biggest party of the year and Heero invited you. Are you brain-dead or something?”

Relena made no reply, but simply gave the annoying girl a deaths eye glare, wondering how much trouble it would cause if she smashed the girls skull against the wall. Deciding it would be more trouble than it was worth, and would bring too much attention, she simply continued glaring.

“As a classmate I hardly think it was appropriate,” the girl informed her, taking a step closer. “He is the most popular guy in school. What were you thinking declining his invitation?”

Faster than the eye could see Relena’s hand flew through the air, halting less than and inch from the other girl’s face. Her cold eyes bore into the annoying girl whose knees could no longer seem to keep her upright.

Glowering at the girl now crumpled shakily on the floor, Relena replied in a low, even voice, “Next time, tell me ahead of time. I’ll decline your invitation instead.”

Several girls let out loud gasps as they hovered over to the lump on the floor.

Relena simply turned on her heels, giving a last glare, and walked out of the viewing gallery.

“Was that Relena?” a boy asked, watching as the blond girl disappeared from sight.

The boys, who had been fencing, had gotten curios when the chatter from the girls in the gallery had stopped. Most of them turned just in time to see Relena take a swing at the chattering Marie, and watched the chattering girl fall to the floor.

“She’s pretty enough,” another boy commented, “but absolutely no personality.”

Heero simply stared, watching the sway of Relena’s hair as she exited. He vaguely feared he was becoming obsessed with a girl he knew nothing about.

The ocean was peaceful. Blue as far as the eye could see, reflecting a near cloudless day. The aircraft carriers parted the waves, sending underwater suit after underwater suit off the side of the ship.

“What are they doing?” the commander of the carriers snarled as he glared out at the mobile suits adorning the deck. “This aircraft carrier is not designed to carry mobile suits. It takes time to unload them all. Just throw them into the water as quickly as possible; all of them.”

As he waved his hand in exaggeration the communication officer piped up, “Commander, there is a call from Lt. Noin of the Specials Unit.”

“What does Une’s pet want?” the commander wondered in a low snarl.

“It seems you’re having some difficultly with the off-loading,” Noin’s image on the communication screen commented without being acknowledged.

“That’s none of your concern,” the ship’s commander snapped angrily, clenching his fist.

“I know it’s none of my concern,” Noin agreed with a wave of her hand. “I’m just afraid, for your sake, that if you waste too much time here it’ll affect your next evaluation.”

“Don’t threaten me!” the commander snapped, his wide eyes holding an insane glint.

“To tell you the truth, we too, are having some trouble down here,” Noin explained, ignoring the commander’s anger. “Our new undersea carrier has some engine trouble.”

“I told them not to waste money on that piece of crap,” the commander snorted with a laugh.

“So, I’d like to ask you a favor,” Noin said with a slight appeasing smile on her face. “Can we repair our ship on your deck?”

“On top of my aircraft carrier?” the commander repeated as if he hadn’t heard right.

“Yes,” Noin nodded. “In return, we will let you use our state of the art undersea mobile suits, Pisces and Cancer.”

“I see,” the commander nodded dumbfounded. “You’re trying to bribe me, for not telling the higher ups about your engine troubles, is that it?”

“So what do you say?” Noin asked in a non-committal fashion.

“Deal,” the commander agreed greedily. “Come aboard.”

“Yes, sir,” Noin said as she snapped off the communication and turned to a confused ensign who had wisely remained silent.

“Lt. Noin, what engine trouble are you talking about?” he asked, shrugging his shoulders in confusion.

“All it takes is a humble offer to get him to cooperate with us seriously,” Noin replied in place of a real answer. “Let’s give him the tools; we’ll take the treasure.”

Marie pulled on her white glove securing it in place, as she looked out the window of the dressing room she heard a wild neigh. Seconds later a beautiful white mare jumped over a low fence and galloped past. Marie noted the rider to be Relena, still wearing her school uniform, and riding quite unladylike, especially for wearing a skirt. Still her control of the horse was impressive.

Walking out Marie heard the instructor ask if everyone was there and announce the day’s lesson to be the ‘pirouette’.

“Uh… where’s Relena?” a particularly helpful girl asked, looking around.

“Why do you care?” another girl asked, shaking her head.

“She doesn’t need equestrian lessons,” Marie replied haughtily, walking toward the two girls as Heero looked over his shoulder at the chatterboxes.

Marie winked and Heero rolled his eyes.

The white mare grazed leisurely on grass below the open third story window.

In the computer lab Relena clacked on the keyboard, eyes never leaving the screen, as she pulled top-secret information on military bases and weaponry, from supposedly un-hackable sources.

Her eyes narrowed as she found what she was looking for.

“This’ll do it,” she quietly informed the room as she pulled up more information. “Anti-undersea-carrier torpedo… Radio control/heat seeking systems… The naval arsenal… That’s not to far from here…”

She allowed herself a small, almost indistinguishable, smile as she took the diskette, with the saved information, out and tucked it into her uniforms pocket.

Looking back at the computer she hacked into the schools files and began the mundane task of forging records. “Relena Darlian: Tuition: paid. Boarding Expenses: paid. Admission Fee: paid. Parent’s Financial Background: No problem.”

“So, Heero, we’ll see you at your house in a few hours,” Rick said, leaning into the window of Heero’s chauffeured, black limo. Noting the dark haired boy wasn’t paying attention to him and looked rather focused he asked, “Heero?”

“Huh?” Heero said as if just realizing the other boy was there. “Sorry, what?”

“Is something wrong?” Rick asked. “It’s your birthday; you should be happier. Besides there’ll be lots of cute girls at your party tonight. Who knows maybe even that Relena chick will show up.”

Heero gave a little half smile and snorted.

At the same time a green tarped military truck buzzed over a bridge at high speeds.

Underneath Relena, dressed in black spandex shorts and a green tank top, held on tight. Watching the passing road she waited for the bridge and let go. Dropping to the asphalt, miraculously unharmed, she rolled to the side of the road and began running.

In the limo Heero frowned as he watched the landscape pass.

Yesterday that girl, Relena, had informed him she would kill him, and today she had not even given him a second look. It was a very odd situation; especially since she had looked dead serious when she said ‘I will kill you’.

“But why kill me,” he wondered aloud. “A girl with secrets, many secrets. And I know too much? Even thought I don’t know anything about her? Is that why, I’m going to be killed?”

The driver let out a little chuckle and asked, “A new suspense novel?”

Heero blinked. He hadn’t realized he was talking out loud. And he vaguely wondered when he’d ever been known to read a suspense novel.

“Uh, yeah,” he agreed with the driver as he thought back to Relena. He would have to do some digging on her background. He wanted to, at least, know why he was going to be killed.

Inside the navel arsenal, far bellow street level, Relena knelt beside several torpedoes and rewired the insides for her purpose.

“If some of these hit the Gundam directly, that’ll trigger the self-destruction system,” she murmured to herself as she pulled at a blue wire.

“I have to destroy it before it falls into the OZ’s hands,” she said, narrowing her eyes as if to convince herself of the necessity. “I have to do it…”

Deep in the sea, the undersea carrier floated around the deep trench, carefully watching its monitors for the slightest sign of the downed mobile suits.

“Lt. Noin,” one of the carrier’s pilots jumped, as finally one of the monitors showed good news. “We’ve got a metallic response at 180,000 ft. below the surface.”

“All right then,” Noin began to order as she leaned on the back of the pilot’s chair. “Launch Cancer and Pisces.”

“Sir, please let me go,” the brown haired pilot behind her requested, jumping from his chair.

“Are you sure?” Noin asked, slightly turning her masked head. “Underwater is even tougher than up in space.”

“I understand. But I’d like to do this by myself,” the brown haired pilot nodded, and Noin got the distinct notion he was trying to impress her.

“All right then,” she nodded in assent as she turned her head back to the monitors. “Good luck.”

Noin watched over the pilot’s shoulders as they carefully inputted the launch procedures. As they hit the final sequence, which let the suits out of the ship, Noin flipped on the communication to listen to the mobile suits pilots.

“After Pisces, Cancer will be launched. I’ll be in charge,” she recognized the brown haired pilots voice as it crackled on the radio.

“Roger,” another pilot answered.

“Lt. Noin, it’s the Navy’s mobile suits,” the ensign sitting at the radar called her attention away from the radio.

Walking over she leaned behind the pilot, “that damned commander! Did he read my mind?” Looking closer she noticed something else on the screen, “an explosion?”

“The mobile suits behind us are being destroyed one after another,” the radar ensign announced, eyebrows arching in worry as he looked at Noin.

“Stop the ship,” Noin ordered, straightening.

“What about the Pisces and Cancer?” the radar ensign asked, gesturing to the green beeping screen.

“We’ll let them go ahead,” Noin ordered as she took another look at the radar. “What’s happening?”

Behind them a Pisces was cut in two and exploded in a blast of light and bubbles. As the explosion began to clear a giant silhouette, holding a scythe plowed through, slicing another Pisces with a swift swing.

“Enemy attack!” one of the remaining Pisces screamed over his radio. “An unidentified enemy has…”

He trailed off in a scream as the black mobile suit lunged for him, tearing off one of his arms and pounding a heavy hand through the glass of the cockpit.

Above, the aircraft carrier prepared for battle.

“We lost contact with all the mobile suits,” the communication officer yelled over the general disarray of the room

“Drop all the depth charges into the area,” the commander snapped, clenching both his fists.

“But Lt. Noin’s undersea carrier is also down there,” another officer reminded the enraged commander.

“Come on! That bitch might be the one responsible for this mess,” the commander snapped, unconcerned as the insane glint relit in is eyes. With and exaggerated gesture he ordered, “Fire!”

As he did the prepared depth charges, from the three ships, shot forth from their silos and arched into the water.

“The fleet has opened fire,” the pilot of the undersea carrier announced the obvious as the carrier rocked and the emergency lights flashed red. Noin grabbed hold of the pilot’s seat to keep from being flung across the ship.

“What is he doing?” she growled, severely annoyed.

“I hear explosions,” the brown haired pilot in Cancer said as he image appeared on the communication screen. “What’s going on?”

“Be careful,” Noin said leaning so her face was inches away from the screen. “The enemy seems to be in the area.”

“You mean…” the brown haired pilot choked. “The Gundam is still functional?”

“It can’t be,” Noin disagreed. “But, watch out.”

The commander of the aircraft carriers laughed with an almost insane hint in his voice, as he leaned over the monitors and saw no unusual readings.

“Nothing could have survived that massive attack,” he said as a large, blinding flash was seen through the window.

Looking out he watched as both the other carries were cut in half, right through their engines, causing brilliant explosions and sinking all hands.

Blinking back after the last explosion the commander watched as the sea swirled up in a dome that split apart to reveal a large, unknown, black mobile suit. The suit rocketed up from the water and landed, with surprising grace, on the deck. As it did the mobile suit turned its head and looked right at the commander. And the commander knew he had just looked into the face of death itself.

With a slight step back the suit swung its scythe through the ships observation tower. As the scythe cleared its target, the top half slipped along the cut line before exploding into a red flower of sparks and smoke.

A helicopter lifted off and tried desperately to flee the scene. The black mobile suit turned with all ease and raised its left arm. Mounted atop the arm was an energy spear centered between two pincers. The pincers shot off and destroyed the helicopter completely.

The black, deathlike, mobile suit stood on the deck of the flaming carrier admiring its work, the scythe held in a lazy grip at its side.

Inside the pilot took a couple deep breaths as she leaned onto her harness.

“Die,” she said with a smile on her face and a maniacal gleam in her light blue eyes. “Anyone who sees me dies!”

Fireworks exploded uselessly in the daylight over the white, red trimmed mansion.

In an outdoor courtyard, populated by servants dressed in black and white, a birthday party was being thrown. The many adult visitors mingled among themselves, sipping champagne.

‘Great, Dad invited all his business acquaintances,’ Heero noted as he walked across the balcony to join the party. He was dressed in a tuxedo his mother had bought especially for the occasion and requested profusely he wear.

Stopping at the top of the stairs, fully aware everyone was looking at him, he let out a sigh and said what his mother had ordered him to, “Everyone, thank you all for coming to my party today. I am pleased to see you all.”

“Heero, Happy Birthday,” a girl from school smiled as he walked down the stairs. The two girls with her joined in the cheer and Heero smiled in acknowledgement, partly wishing them to be quiet.

“Dear, do you really have to leave now?” Heero heard his mother ask and looked down to see her leaning toward his father.

“Yes,” he nodded sincerely.

“Can’t you stay just a bit longer,” his wife pleaded, “for Heero?”

“Dad,” Heero said, stopping on the stairs just above his parents.

“Heero,” his father acknowledged, turning to him. “I’m sorry Heero…”

“Don’t worry about it dad,” Heero shrugged, noting that this was the longest his father had stayed at any of his parties. “I understand; it’s your job. I’ll see you later.”

His father smiled and gave his son a nod, accidentally spilling the contents of the file folder he was carrying. As he bent to pick them up Heero got a good look at the pictures. They were both of objects streaking like a meteor but at odd angles. Heero recognized it as the thing he’d seen re-entering earth’s atmosphere the day before yesterday.

“…next: According to a Defense Department spokesman, the five meteors expected to hit the earth have apparently all burned up during entry to the atmosphere,” a radio on the beverage table piped on the edge of Heero’s hearing. “Also the conspiracy theory regarding the colony alliance turned out to be just a false rumor…”

Heero watched his father leave and thought about the object he’d seen. How it had splintered apart its outside shell and continued to earth.

‘A bunch of lies,’ he thought as he looked over at the radio. ‘It must have been Relena on that falling object. But then… what is Relena doing here?’

Relena drove the ambulance at full speed along the highway, the torpedoes securely stored in back. Her mind cleared of all else but her objective.

In a car ahead of her Marie complained at her brother to go faster.

“Dammit,” she cursed, crossing her arms. “I’m late for Heero’s party.”

Looking out the passenger window she watched as an ambulance rushed past and did a double take as she noticed the driver looked like Relena.

‘Maybe she took my advice after all’, Marie hummed triumphantly.

Inside the ambulance Relena’s cold blue eyes focused on the road as she pressed her foot down harder on the gas peddle.

“OZ is already on the way,” she said to herself. “Can I make it?”

At a circus the audience applauded the performers in the center ring. The ringmaster was in the back with the lions, waiting to announce the next performance.

“What?” the ringmaster asked as he turned to a girl wearing jeans and a black sweatshirt. “You wanna join us?”

A large lion roared in the girl’s direction as it stalked around its cage.

“You got any experience,” he asked as the girl produced a resume, which he snatched from her. “This doesn’t tell me anything.”

Catherine walked past him to the lion’s cage and gently put her hand in, palm open. The lion roared at her. Her eyes softened a bit and her lips twitched in a smile.

“Hi there,” she said quietly as her as the lion calmed its growling and walked to the bars of the cage and plopped down like a little kitty waiting for attention.

“H…hey!” the ringmaster shouted in astonishment. While the lion’s trainers watched with jaws slack as she petted the lion behind the ears and it purred loudly.

“How did you do that?” the ringmaster asked still in shock.

“They never attack anyone who’s not a threat,” Catherine explained as the lion pushed it’s head against her hand for more attention. “Animals are very straightforward.”

Above them standing on the stairs was a boy, dressed as a clown, with spiky brown bangs covering half his face and green eyes. He blinked at the scene and commented, “what a mysterious girl.”

Outside, in the snow, was parked a truck covered with a tarp; which hid the Gundam Heavyarms.

Somewhere, in a desert-like area, several mobile suits stood at attention; their pilots’ eyes carefully scanning the horizon for any sign of trouble.

In the center of the troupe were set a few tents.

Inside a girl lay on her stomach scanning the horizon with binoculars.

“Miss Dorothy, I brought you something to drink,” a gray haired servant announced.

“Thank you,” the girl replied setting down the binoculars and turning toward the servant, sending her blond ponytail swinging. “Put it over there, please.”

“How do you like Earth so far?” the servant asked as he set down the drink.

“Nice, very nice,” Dorothy answered with a small smile as she looked through her binoculars to where she had set her Sandrock to rest. The Gundam was positioned in a comfortable way with it’s arm resting on it’s leg as it lay back, as if admiring the sun or the few indigenous birds that had chosen to perch on its arm.

“The earth,” Dorothy mused, resting her chin on her arms. Her blue eyes darkened as she wondered, “it’s so beautiful, so why…?”

The horn honked loudly to announce the driver’s presence as he drove past the trees and into the clearing.

A girl with serious eyes and long blond curls, dressed in red tank top and white pants, opened a briefcase displaying the money fastened securely inside. Clicking it shut again she handed it over to the tall man with short cut, dark hair.

As she did the truck pulled up and the driver stuck his head out asking the other man, “where do you want me to unload the stuff?”

Sally’s eyes shifted to pin the man in the truck with a glare.

“Here’s good,” the man with the short cut hair replied.

“Right here?” the driver asked a little shocked. “Are you sure you want to leave such a large amount of explosives with a girl that age?”

“Don’t ask any question,” the other man snapped. “We’ve got our money.”

He turned back to Sally and gave her a snap salute, “good luck.”

“Thank you,” Sally nodded.

Not far away in a lake was the Gundam Shenlong standing regally, as if it owned the lake and all its living organisms.

Heero stared at the cake wondering who had decided that it should be pink and white. With a sigh he supposed it was his mother.

“Heero, blow out the candles,” a girl cooed, leaning over Heero’s shoulder.

“Yes, yes,” another girl agreed as a couple boys made comments on Heero having all the luck.

“I guess I made the main event,” Marie said as she walked over to Heero’s table and set her gift down. “Happy Birthday Heero.”

“Thank you,” Heero said, trying to make his voice sincere, though he was certain his boredom showed through.

Marie looked around the room as if looking for someone, “so, Relena isn’t here after all? Maybe it wasn’t really her, then.”

“Relena?” Heero said perking up a bit. “You saw Relena?”

“Yeah,” Marie nodded. “On the Bayside Highway. But, listen to this; she was driving an ambulance. I bet the real Relena has a much better vehicle.”

‘An ambulance,’ Heero thought, remembering Relena’s crazy stunt that day on the beach.

“Which way was the ambulance heading?” Heero asked, standing up from his chair.

“I guess it was heading toward the military port…” Marie said with slight confusion at Heero’s sudden interest.

With that Heero began to move toward the exit.

‘To hell with this boring party,’ he thought. ‘Finding out what a crazy girl, who wants to kill me, is doing at a military port sounds much more interesting.’

“Where are you going Heero?” a boy asked as Heero moved past him.

Heero turned to his guests and mustered his best fake smile, “you all enjoy the party. I just remembered a previous engagement. I’ll be back later.”

“If you’re going to the port I’ll go with you,” Marie offered as several other girls chimed in, as well as a couple exceedingly bored guys.

“No,” Heero snapped, plain tired of being polite. “I’m going alone.”

That shut up everyone and Heero used the silence to beat a hastily retreat.

“Hold it, Heero!” his mother yelled just as he made it out the door. “What’s wrong with him? He’s never exploded like that before.”

Pushing past the underwater currents, the searchlights and monitors frantic to find the downed mobile suit, the Cancer came upon the Leo.

“That’s the Leo,” the brown haired pilot said to himself. “But the Gundam… where’s the Gundam? It’s strange… there’s no other metallic response.”

“I found it!” an excited voice piped over the radio. “I can see it over here.”

Maneuvering the Cancer, he placed his searchlight on the Gundam, lying face down in the trench.

“Great,” he said with genuine cheer in his voice. “Let’s report to Lt. Noin.”

Back on the undersea craft Noin leaned over the communications console waiting for news from her search team or the carriers above. Though all three of the carriers had mysteriously disappeared from radar.

“They found it?” she asked the officer manning the post as he confirmed the search teams last transmission.

“But I’m surprised,” the brown haired pilot continued his report as the officer switched on the speakers. “It’s not damaged at all.”

“Our enemy has created an incredible monster,” Noin said, respect heavy in her voice. “But now we can capture one of these monsters and learn its secrets.”

“Watch out for the currents,” she warned the search party. “We’ll wait here.”

The Pisces shifted into a more mobile mode as the Cancer opened it’s pincers and descended slowly toward the Gundam.

“Ready the wires and floats,” the brown haired pilot ordered from the Cancer.

“Roger,” one of the Pisces replied, extending a grappling pole arm toward the gundam. As it inched closer an alarm began to sound from the Gundam.

“What is that?” one of the Pisces asked, halting the pole arms progress.

“A self destruct system?” the Cancer wondered out loud as he blinked down at the prone suit.

Seconds later a small metal object fell from above. As it came between the two Pisces and the Cancer it exploded, in a brilliantly blinding flash of light.

“What the…” the brown haired pilot yelled as he held his hand in front of his face to ward off the light. Trying to blink away the spots marring his vision, a shadow appeared in front of him; where the light was fading.

“What is that light?” one of the Pisces panicked seconds before it was sliced in two.

“Enemy attack! Enemy attack!” the other Pisces screamed. Unable to see the enemy he began to fire missiles in all directions. As his vision began to clear he saw a large black mobile suit move toward him and swing a blazing scythe. It was the last thing he saw.

“It can’t be,” the brown haired pilot gasped as he watched the Pisces destruction. “No thermal blade weapon can be used in water!”

“Damn you,” he screamed charging before the black suit had a chance to turn.

The Cancer slammed hard into the other suit and sent it falling backwards. The pincers opened and grabbed hold of the Gundam’s head; delivering several point blank missile shots to it. The Gundam’s grip of the scythe became lax, and it fell from it’s hand. The pincers released and the Gundam fell after it’s weapon, making no move to correct the plunge.

“I did it,” the brown haired pilot yelled excitedly. “I did it Lt. Noin!”

As he did the Gundam came alive again and the pincer spear located on the other arm activated, launching and plunging directly into the Cancer’s cockpit. It exploded, seemingly, from the inside out, sending debris in all directions.

“Ah damn,” Hilde moaned as she corrected Deathscythe’s balance and rubbed the bruise she was sure was forming on her head. “That’s OZ’s newest machine, huh? Pretty good.”

Ruffling her spiky black bangs she retrieved her scythe and noticed the still wailing alarm from the downed mobile suit.

“There’s another new design?” she asked rhetorically, her eyebrows cocking up in doubt. Maneuvering her Gundam over she looked down and noted the stats on one of her consoles.

“Self destruct system?” she said with surprise and looked closer. “That machine looks a lot like mine!” Instinctively her Gundam pinpointed the threatening system, “Even the self destruct system is located in the same place.”

Readjusting her scythe’s energy blade, she used it like a surgeon’s knife to disarm the destruct system.

“I guess I don’t have to destroy this one,” she said with a mischievous grin on her face. “It can be my back up machine.”

Lifting the prone suit she put her thrusters on full and launched away.

The military port was in chaos. Explosions destroyed buildings at random and there was no telling where the next blast would strike.

“Evacuate,” an officer yelled, swinging his arm in the general direction of and exit. “Take the wounded to the hospital.”

“Ambulance,” yelled another spotting the parked emergency vehicle. “What are you doing? Hurry up!”

“Hey, what happened to the ambulance?” another man yelled as he streaked by.

Across the port at the docks, where a submarine was docked, oblivious to the destruction around it another explosion rang out as the two men guarding the submarine were knocked unconscious by a concussion grenade.

On top of the submarine stood Relena, who was inputting instructions into the torpedoes hanging mere feet away.

“Relena,” Heero yelled as he walked down the ramp, amazed how easily he got into the military port. “Stop, Relena.”

Getting no response from Relena, who simply hunched over the console ignoring him, he walked closer taking a good look at the torpedoes.

“Relena, what are you doing here?” Heero asked the obvious, trying to provoke a response. “Who are you? I just want to know more about you. Talk to me here!”

Relena turned her head slightly, her face holding a slight innocence to it, as she spoke Heero’s name. Heero’s eyebrows twitched up as she did; hoping maybe he’d somehow reached her.

Instantly Relena’s face twisted back into her cold mask as she turned and raised a gun to Heero’s face. “You know to much,” she informed him coldly.

‘Oh, shit!’ Heero’s mind snapped and began to repeat over and over as he stared down the barrel of the gun in his face.

“Goodbye, Heero,” Relena said, no change in her facial expression as she began to pull the trigger.

A shot ran out from behind them; Relena turned to watch in anger as the bullet impacted, with a meaty thud, into her upper arm. Heero ducked instinctively as Relena lost her grip on the gun and went sprawling to the deck, doing a complete flip as she hit.

Relena’s head snapped up as she gripped her wound and growled at her attacker, “Who?”

From the direction the shot had come a girl, dressed in black, stood from her crouching position. Her gun still trained on Relena.

“Obviously you’re the bad guy here, aren’t you,” the girl said, her black cap and spiked bangs shadowing her eyes. “Though you’re not exactly a guy; but you get the drift. Are you okay man?”

“Are you okay, Relena?” Heero asked as if he’d not heard the dark girl’s query.

Relena pushed the pain out of her mind as she jumped for her gun.

Another shot rang out as Relena jumped; it grazed her leg and knocked the gun out of her reach. Hilde grasped the gun tightly in both hands, shocked the idiot girl had actually tried to make a grab for the gun.

“Don’t hurt yourself any further,” Hilde advised as she stepped closer to the girl struggling to her feet.

“That’s enough,” Heero snapped at the black dressed girl as he watched Relena drop back to the deck. “She’s down. She can’t do any more harm, you don’t have to hurt her anymore.”

“Hey now,” Hilde said confused at the outburst.

Heero knelt beside Relena and tore his cummerbund in half, carefully wrapping her wounds and draping his coat over her shoulders. Relena had bemused look on her face as she watched Heero closely.

“So I’m the bad guy now?” Hilde asked herself confused, and scratching her hat. She winced as her watch beeped by her ear. “Oops! Already here,” mumbled looking at the watch-like device and then out toward the ocean. “I may have miscalculated high tide…”

Across the horizon two mobile suits sped toward the docks, their features obscured in the sea spray.

“What… is that?” Heero wondered aloud as he squinted his eyes to get a better look. He turned away jerkily as a flare blinded his vision. Blinking fiercely he found that the person that held the flare was the black dressed girl.

“Man, I don’t know what’s going on here, but you better go home now,” Hilde warned her face shadowed by the bill of her cap. “I’m telling you this for your sake.”

Using the flare to her advantage Relena jumped, letting Heero’s jacket fall to the ground, onto the torpedoes.

“Hey, back off!” Hilde warned, firing two warning shots and wisely stopping before she hit the torpedoes.

“That’s my mobile suit,” Relena growled in possessive anger as she got a good look through the sea spray. She raised her hand and pounded the control device, sending the weapons jolting toward the suits. The impact of striking the water knocked the Relena into the air, throwing her in a head dive for the water.

“What are you doing you idiot!” Hilde screamed as the torpedoes flowed toward their target.

A slight smile crossed Relena’s face as she drifted toward the water.

“This is it, this is the end,” she said as she closed her eyes and went limp. “Mission complete.”

The torpedoes slammed into there intended target, sending both suits flailing backwards in a giant spray of water as they tumbled under. A huge upward spout of water the only testament they’d been there.

Hilde and Heero watched the spectacle in shock. Hilde’s shoulders slouched a bit forward and her jaw was slack

“That was my Gundam!” she said in shocked calmness as the blast died down and she turned toward the girl, face down, in the water. “She knew about the self destruction system. Is she the pilot of that mobile suit?”

“Who are these people?” Heero wondered in shock, looking from the black dressed girl to Relena’s prostrate form in the water.

“Lt. Noin, we can’t restore communications with either Cancer or Pisces,” the underwater carriers’ communication officer spouted.

“I see,” Noin nodded coming to a sickening realization. “No one who sees a Gundam ever gets away alive.” Looking up she informed no one in particular, “I will not accept that.”