11-Jan-2006
Title: Launch 6/?
Author: TB
Archive: GWA
Category: Yaoi, action(ish)
Pairing: 3x4
Disclaimer: The characters and storyline of Gundam Wing are used here
without permission. I do not profit from their use.
Rating: PG13
Spoilers: This story occurs three years after EW and references it and
the series.
Notes: This story was inspired by reruns of seaQuest: DSV. It is not
a crossover with that series. As for any technology referenced in the
story, I can barely adjust the tracking on a VHS tape, so most of it is
talking out my you-know-what. I apologise to anyone who might know how much I'm
getting wrong.
Trowa propped his rake against the thick trunk of the willow, and unhooked the pruning shears from his tool belt. He climbed his little step ladder, and set to work on a particularly hoary branch. He paused to wipe sweat from his forehead, then crammed his cap low over his sunglasses.
He was aware that he had company long before he acknowledged it. He let a cut twig fall nearly on top of the small girl who had joined him under the tree, and sensed her irritation before he looked down and 'happened' to see her there. He descended the ladder, locking the shears and hooking them back into his belt, and nodded to her.
The young lady folded her hands in her lap, the kind of consciously elegant gesture common to aristocratic matrons, not ten year old girls. Her round, bright eyes rested unblinking on his face. She sat, maturely composed, in her wheelchair as if it were a banquet table, and he a visiting diplomat, not posing as the gardener.
'Mr Barton,' she said, only a trace of irony audible in her tone. 'I appreciate you finding the time to visit me.'
'I am very rarely interested in exchanging pleasantries,' he told her flatly. He used the rake to gather the twigs he'd cut, and crouched to stuff the small pile into his waste bag. He paid her little mind, or at least did not appear to, as he went about his work. 'I assume you've received the most recent information,' he added after a minute.
She was frostier this time, though he didn't bother to match her voice to her expression. 'I have reviewed it. I confess the implementation is not what I had hoped, given our earlier conversations.'
'I told you exactly how I was going to do it, and that's what I've done,' he disagreed. He tied off the bag and tossed it into the nearby wheelbarrow, removing the clippers from his belt and settling at the roots of the willow to work on the grass he hadn't been able to reach with the mower. 'This is Stage One. You can't start a war overnight.'
Her silence was his answer. He reached the wheel of her chair, and waited; she made him wait longer, before she unlocked her brakes and backed up several feet. He didn't look up or thank her as he attended to the long grass where her chair had sat.
She said, 'I am reluctant to leave so much of the preparation in your hands. I have no way of personally ensuring the loyalty of your people. No way of judging for myself our progress.' Her hands shifted along the wheels of the chair, before she forced them into stillness on the white lap of her skirt. 'They keep me confined in this prison like a dangerous beast,' she murmured bitterly.
'Be glad they didn't execute you. I would have.' He'd gone all the way around the tree, and stretched, releasing cramped muscles in his back. 'You'll be watched for the rest of your life.'
'For the rest of theirs,' she countered, and he did look at her this time. Her sea-blue eyes weren't on him, but looking into some bloody future. Her slender child's hands were clenched and white-knuckled. There was a fever in the set of her shoulders.
'Yes,' he said. He stood still, waiting more patiently now for her attention to return to him. When it did, he inclined his head to her. 'It will be difficult for me to see you again,' he told her. 'For further communication you should rely on Chang.'
She turned her head up to look at him. 'Perhaps I should find it strange to have two Gundam pilots in my flock again,' she said. She pursed her small lips. 'But we who are bred for battle must go where soldiers are appreciated.'
That settled hard and heavy in his gut, and he wished it hadn't. 'Yes,' he found himself repeating. 'I suppose we must.'
She smiled for the first time since Wufei had introduced them four months earlier. 'We will give them such a war,' she whispered.
He watched Mariemaia Khushrenada roll her chair away from him, back onto the cobbled garden walk. She never so much as glanced away from her determined path. It was a moment before he shook himself awake, and grasped the handles of his wheelbarrow.
An hour later, he dropped his fake ID, spirit-gummed moustache, cap and coveralls into an empty oil drum outside the ESA maximum security compound and its single prisoner. He followed it all with a match, and left when he was sure he'd burned it all to cinders.
It was quite early, not much past dawn when Quatre let himself onto the bridge. They were doing nothing more than maintaining position over the Nova Scotia reef forest, surveying the effects of a century of carefully protected regrowth. The submersibles had been going out since their arrival, and Quatre had joined a group of divers the day before, operating an underwater video line so the scientists could do the real work. Any time the science crew was busy, however, the ship's crew was far less likely to be. Only O'Callaghan and Traore were on for the morning shift, and Traore was slumped low in his chair with his bare feet propped on his console. Quatre murmured a sleepy hello, and helped himself to the coffee brewing in the hardware cabinet.
O'Callaghan grinned at him when he took a seat nearby, planning to gaze out the forward windows until he woke up all the way. 'You look like shit,' the mate told him companionably.
'Thanks,' Quatre replied absently. 'I'll sign you up for keelhauling later.'
He got a lazy chuckle at that. 'Not sleeping well?'
'I think it's called 'under the weather.'' Quatre sighed, and sipped his coffee. He shuddered deeply, not having to fake it for effect. 'How long has this been out?'
'Tuesday.'
It was Thursday. Quatre shivered again, and tossed the entire cup into the waste bin, achieving a perfect arc and a satisfying swoosh of the flip lip without losing a drop. Not that it made a difference; they could have tarred the deck with it.
'I heard you're in the sub today,' Traore said, raising his head.
'0940,' Quatre replied. 'My first time,' he added, excited even through his weariness. He'd waited to be sure that everyone else who wanted to go had their chance, not wanting to take opportunities away from any of the students or crew who'd been about the marine business long before he had shown up as the surprise guest. 'I've been instructed to sit very still and not touch anything.'
He got another laugh from both men. They talked a little longer about the upcoming shore leave they were scheduled for in Canada; Traore had family in Quebec, though Quatre wasn't going to make it any farther than Toronto for a number of delayed meetings. Soon enough, they returned to sleepy silence. They sat that way for nearly an hour, thinking their own thoughts, before Quatre realised something was nagging him.
It took him another ten minutes to voice, and even then, it came out uncertain. 'Does either of you hear that noise?'
He woke Traore from a light doze. 'Wha' noise?'
O'Callaghan listened, then shrugged. 'No.'
'It's... like... a buzz,' Quatre decided. He stood, then felt foolish. Then decided that since he was already on his feet he might as well search. He moved closer to the row of consoles, not knowing he was frowning. 'A vibration,' he clarified a moment later. Maybe a loose coupling.'
'I don't hear anything,' Traore muttered, but he moved his legs when Quatre bent over his station.
Out of synch, Quatre thought, though what was out of synch he couldn't say. He wandered the length of the bridge, forgetting he looked like an idiot, trying to puzzle his way through the problem. By now he knew the difference in feel between the generators and the engines, the electric current and the surrounding water. A ship, however big, wasn't all that different from a Gundam, and Quatre had been more than sensitive to every sound and twitch in his Sandrock. The quandry was waking him up nicely, and he snapped his fingers when he remembered he had slipped on the rubber-soled shoes most of them wore when going top-side. He kicked them off, and planted his bare feet flat on the chilly metal floor. Then he went back over his path, pressing his hands against the walls, the counters, the consoles, trying to think with his skin as well as his eyes and ears.
When he slid his fingers along the back edge of the navigations computer, he found the bug. He tried not to show anything in his expression when he turned around again, tried to sound casual when he said, 'Mr Traore, I need you to get the captain.'
Traore blinked at him. 'What?'
'Please tell him it's important. If he's still asleep, wake him.' He said it firmly, but politely and without hurry, the same voice he often used during negotiations. It worked just as well now as it ever had before; the engineer rose, as if not sure he ought to, but he went without argument, disappearing out the door. Quatre waited until he heard the slap of shoes on the ladder and then the deck, and then he looked at O'Callaghan.
Who immediately came to his side. 'What did you find?' he demanded.
Quatre showed him how he'd found it, and watched while the mate felt it carefully for himself. When the man's arm tensed, Quatre stopped him quickly. 'Don't disturb it,' he cautioned.
'What is it? It's not a-- not a bomb?'
Quatre honestly hadn't considered that. 'I think it's just a bug,' he said. 'That's not the most effective place to stash explosives, and--' He reached behind the computer to feel again. 'It's connected. One of the ISB ports.'
'What the hell is it doing?'
'That's the question of the hour,' Quatre muttered. He was saved from answering by the arrival of the captain, a man who did not look pleased to be about early in the morning. O'Callaghan, clearly impressed by the seriousness of the situation, almost snapped out a salute. Quatre straightened as Mostyn joined them. Traore, he noticed, hadn't returned with the captain.
'We have a problem,' Quatre said shortly, and let O'Callaghan explain what they had found.
'I don't know how he felt it,' the mate finished. 'But it's right here. It's a little smaller than palm-size, and it's live.'
Mostyn let out a big breath. 'Let's approach this carefully,' he said, tying closed his short terrycloth robe with snappy little movements. Quatre had long suspected that Mostyn had a little military in him, and the take-charge attitude seemed to confirm his suspicions. For himself, Quatre attempted to stand exactly the same way he stood most of the time, looking nothing more than a little concerned.
'Security never detected it,' he offered diffidently. 'It's either a very recent plant or it's high-quality spyware.'
'Check the logs,' Mostyn ordered O'Callaghan. 'Let's see if they tell us anything about this.' Though he really wanted to see the screen, Quatre took care to stay back, only angling himself to get a view as the mate slipped into the chair and began typing. It didn't take long to see that the logs offered nothing unusual for the morning or night before. As O'Callaghan began to scroll back further, Quatre chewed the inside of his lip, trying to remember his own experience with black-market tech. He was several years out of date, however.
'There,' he heard himself blurt suddenly, and realised once again that his subconscious had gone ahead of his forebrain. He pointed rather sheepishly as both crewmen turned on him. '1752 hours on the Monday,' he added. 'There's a double time signature.'
'What does that mean?' Mostyn asked.
'Signal overlay,' he guessed. 'A piggyback. It looks like the computer caught a little feedback from the secondary connection. It recorded the time from both our end and whoever's receiving from the bug.'
Two grim faces looked at him. Then Mostyn said, 'I want this thing unhooked immediately.'
'Actually,' Quatre interrupted again, and winced at himself. But Mostyn wore a little smile of understanding, and Quatre returned it. 'I think we should wait,' he finished.
'Why?' O'Callaghan said. 'Who knows what it's doing!'
'Not us,' Mostyn answered him, easily catching the train of Quatre's thoughts. 'He's right. Until we know what systems it's in and what it's done in there, it's too risky to pull it out.' He reached up to rub his moustaches, frowning behind his hand. 'We could try shutting down the nav,' he mused aloud.
'Maybe even a few other systems,' Quatre agreed. 'Routine maintenance check. It may not fool whoever's spying on us, but we ought to at least try.' He hesitated. 'I almost hate to bring this up,' he said, 'but this is just the only bug we've found. There could be a lot more.'
O'Callaghan groaned. 'Not good.'
'Keep this to yourself for the time being,' Mostyn ordered his mate. 'I'm going to think about what to do here. Leave the thing where it is and don't let anyone else know about it. I gather Traore wasn't included in the scavenger hunt?'
'I don't think he noticed anything wrong,' O'Callaghan replied, glowering at the computer. 'I'll tell him it wasn't any of his business anyway. Mum's the word until you say otherwise, Captain.'
'Good man.' Mostyn clapped the younger man on the shoulder, and then turned his eyes on Quatre. 'And now you and I are going to discuss everything you know about what that thing is,' he said.
They returned to the captain's quarters, an L-shaped room with a large port window accessible from the top deck. Quatre found that Mostyn was not overly concerned with neatness, but it was only the work of a moment to clear a chair at a small table before he had a seat, and Mostyn slumped down right on top of two shirts and a swimming suit opposite him. 'I don't know much more than what you heard in there,' Quatre told him, rubbing at the tension tightening the back of his neck.
'I'm disturbed by the notion that we may be under surveillance,' Mostyn confessed. 'There's a lot of equipment on this ship, and some of it is private technology not yet released to the general market.'
'I couldn't tell you why, but somehow this doesn't strike me as being a case of greed gone criminal,' Quatre answered. 'It just... doesn't fit.' He glanced up. 'What's standard procedure?'
'Report the incident to the oceanographic admin. They'll inform someone else-- the Security Bureau, probably.'
'How soon do you have to report?'
'If I wait much longer, they'll want to know why.' Mostyn's eyes were keen. 'Why?'
Quatre shrugged, then had to admit his seeming indifference wasn't sincere. He dropped it immediately. 'I could make a call. It might get us some information. But it might not.'
Mostyn didn't answer right away, and when he did, Quatre was half expecting it and half surprised. 'There are a number of things about you that make me wonder,' the captain said. 'You get a look about you, sometimes.'
Quatre met the man's eyes squarely. 'I don't know what you mean,' he replied, and knew that Mostyn would understand him exactly.
Mostyn considered him. 'I have to act now,' he said. 'But here's what I can offer you. I'm declaring total silence. Your little call will be unauthorised, but I'll go to bat for you when or if the time comes. That covers my ass and it gives you some time to make your contact.'
'How long?' Quatre asked quickly.
'Twenty minutes,' Mostyn answered. 'And then I have to make that report. If you get me anything I can use, I'll do my best to keep your name out of it.'
'Then I'll see you in twenty minutes,' Quatre said.
The announcement about mandatory silence went out just before Quatre reached his own cabin. There was no-one in his path to ask any questions about it, and Quatre could only hope that curious scientists wouldn't protest too much a half-hour break from computer use. Whoever was watching them might remark on a total cessation of all ship noise. He could only hope about that, too.
He sealed his door, and settled in front of his computer to do what he hadn't done in more than three years. He did a little piggybacking of his own, hacking onto a satellite signal and scrambling the data chasers behind him. When he was sure he couldn't be traced outgoing, he dialed a code he did not use very often-- not since three years ago, anyway, when it hadn't precisely worked.
But it worked today. The connection took a skin-crawling seven minutes, and then his blank screen resolved into a static-shot view of a startled face.
'Quatre,' Trowa said. 'What are you doing?'
'Funny,' Quatre answered, sitting back without relaxing at all. 'I was just about to ask you the same thing.'
End Part 6
(:./erin/launch6)
