24 Aug 2000
Action! Suspense! Underwater Gundams! (Can you believe it? something actually HAPPENS!)
/Lights down, we drown
And I know
Beauty has her way/
They took out the refueling station that night, as scheduled, but they fought in deadly silence. Swooping low over the cylindrical tanks, Wing sent a barrage into the fuel exchange system, so that the underground tanks would detonate first. Meanwhile, on the main level of the station, Deathscythe took out wave after wave of hapless Leos before they could get their anti-aircraft guns trained on the airborne suit. It was all going according to plan, until Heero's warning indicators started beeping frantically -- somewhere in the conduits below the station, a valve that should have been closed was still open. The fuel burning underground was moving up through level after level much faster than they had estimated, and the fireball would be at the surface in seconds. Where Deathscythe was still swinging its eerie green blade through the last twenty or so of Oz's defenders.
"Duo, get out of there!" No answer, not even a blinking light to indicate an open connection. His comlink was off-line.
He knew he was too far away to make it to him in time, even if Wing could have lifted the other Gundam to safety. But he put Wing into a steep dive anyway, even as the whole top level lifted off the station on an angry red-orange cloud of flame and quickly-burning fuel vapor. No way to lift him up -- but at that speed, Wing's mass was more than enough to bowl Deathscythe right off the edge of the station and into the deep water.
They seemed to have evaded the flames, but they had a new problem: unlike Deathscythe, Wing was almost immobile under water.1 It would be up to Maxwell to get them out of here, and he still wasn't responding. On the vidlink, the black mobile suit hung motionless from Wing's grip on its metal wrist. No way to tell if he'd been injured in their collision -- and if his hatch had been damaged, he might be drowning in there.
He considered alternate possibilities: Wing's thrusters couldn't move both of them, especially underwater, and if the worst was happening inside the other pilot's compartment, walking toward the shore on the bottom would take too long. But it was the fastest thing he could do, and it beat waiting here until his own oxygen ran out.
He'd made it about a hundred feet when the comlink crackled to life.
"Dammit, Yuy -- couldn't you come up with a <slower> way to get us out of here?"
No vidlink yet, so it was safe to close his eyes in silent thanks. "About time you woke up in there. Your thrusters working?"
"Always." He managed to make even the one-word reply sound provocative. Then he ruined the effect by coughing. "Hit my head, I think. Out for a minute. Tell me again why we don't wear helmets?"
"We're not usually playing football in these things, Duo."
"If I didn't know you better, I'd think you just attempted a joke. Okay. Thrusters on-line. If you're done with your swim, shall we go see if there's still air up there?"
"Aa."
They broke the surface some distance from shore, and then Wing released its grip and rose gratefully into the air while Deathscythe moved smoothly through the water to the beach. The mission was a success, as far as the station was concerned -- absolutely nothing remained of its platform, and only a few curved pieces of metal on the waves showed that there had ever been tanks there.
The homeward flight behind them, their suits safely hidden among the trees, they walked silently together past the sleeping buildings to their dormitory. Only when they were back in the dimly-lit hallway did he have a chance to get a good look at Duo, his eyes narrowing at the purpling bruise on Duo's forehead. Out for a little bit -- if he'd cracked his head a few centimeters farther up the temple, he might have been out for good. But he hadn't. And he wasn't. One more time, Death hadn't died.
But something had changed, between the fire and the water. And there were things he needed to say.
"Sorry. About your head."
"I wouldn't even have a head if you hadn't tackled me."
Unsure how to answer, he hesitated. He didn't have words for this, either, but it didn't seem to matter. "Duo. What I said -- I was wrong. You do know me." <Everything that's worth knowing.>
"Not yet. But I will, if you'll let me."
End of Part 10
[1] I don't think this is actually true -- Wing has trouble underwater early on in the series, but only because it's damaged. But I needed them to rescue each other, so...
(:./lilias/beauty10)
