Okay, here it is - the long awaited part 5A of my Gundam Wing/X-Men crossover!
Title: Heart of Darkness
Parts: 5A
Author: Stormy
Warnings: Angst
Pairings: implied 1x2
Shinigami snorted as Sinister chuckled over the small vial he handed him before adding it to a small tray of similar ones inside a small cooling unit.
" You've done well, my boy," Sinister said, red eyes gleaming. " I am impressed indeed."
Shinigami acknowledged the praise with a curt nod. He felt itchy, eager to move, to do something. The attack on the woman had filled a craving inside of him, like a battle on some small scale within himself had been won. He liked that feeling - the feeling of rightness, the feeling of satisfaction for doing something correctly. On one level, he wondered whether or not he should feel so happy about doing such a thing to a woman but he brushed it off as a momentary lapse. Women were not as weak as society liked to portray them. He had a brief mental image of a woman with short blue-black hair with a gun next to a woman with blond hair that curled at the sides. Blinking, he frowned - where had THAT come from? He shrugged. Sinister noticed his twitching and tapped a key on the panel thoughtfully.
" It's not enough, is it?" he said, the low dark tones sending a shiver down Duo's back. " You feel the need to fight. To hunt. To go to war. It's inside you - a part of you. Can you feel it?"
Shinigami closed his eyes at the words the dark man spoke, and subconsciously, his fingers tightened around the metal scythe he still held in his hands.
" Yes."
" Good," Sinister said, turning back to the screen. " Because I have another mission for you. Soon. One that will suit you much more then the last. Be ready."
Shinigami nodded briefly and then exited the room. Forearm and Harpoon exchanged looks.
" What's up Boss?" Harpoon asked curiously. " We goin' wih the kid?"
" No," Sinister replied flatly. " It's time for me to make the first move in this little game."
Harpoon shrugged and Forearm looked bored. Sinister chuckled.
It was simple really. If there was one thing that that was sure to draw the X-Men out, it was the murder of innocent mutants. The murder of humans would have the government up in arms and Sinister really didn't want to have to contend with the combined forces of the Avengers AND X-Factor at this juncture - both teams which would be utilized to bring him to justice if he attacked the human populace. No. The trick was to draw out his specific enemy. His Shinigami was the key to his retrieval of backup information, sir Beast was sure to have in that wonderfully protected mansion of theirs. And they would bargain. Oh yes. Of that there was no question - they would give him the information he so desperately wanted and in return, he would give them the boy. But.....
Sinister flicked another button and a view of a small warehouse opened up on the screen. It was small, cramped, dingy - the perfect breeding ground for less-then-perfect species of the mutant race. Sinister's lips curled in a contemplative sneer.
Street rats. All of them. Mucking up his gene pool - they could not be allowed to grow up and reproduce, further diluting the species. Death would have to pay them a little visit.
He knew his subordinates were curious as to why he was even bothering to use the boy - it wasn't normal behaviour from their boss. Sinister snorted.
" They couldn't grasp the brilliancy," he murmered thoughtfully as he watched the urchins sleep in huddled piles, the homeless and the deformed crouching together to conserve body heat in the cool night. Some of the mutants were painfully obvious - Sinister sneered at a ragged woman with lupine ears and a black nose. Outcasts. Forever doomed to be on the outside of society because their mutant abilities were too apparent for them to pass as humans. He remembered another such group that had once dwelled beneath the surface in an attempt to hide from human eyes - and he recalled the fate that befelled them.
" I believe such a rousing performance deserves an encore," he laughed coldly, turning off the monitor. Shingami would go and pass HIS judgement on them. And then the fun would begin - the X-Men and the boy's teammates would be desperate to stop the carnage from happening again and then he would win the round. He laughed as he envisioned what would happen with his protege when he was finally reverted to normal.
He had thoroughly scanned the boy's mind, leaving no mental rock unturned. He knew how deeply the boy cared for others - and how he hated his enemies just as deeply. Within Shinigami's mind was a deep-rooted, unbridled hatred for those who took his life, his family, his home, his CHILDHOOD away. The bug merely changed the targets from that OZ organization to whomever Sinister saw fit to send him against. Sinister laughed again.
" Harpoon and Forearm wouldn't understand why I'm not physically torturing the boy," he said, surveying his laboratory with an even satisfaction. The mental agony the boy would go through when he regained his normal mental faculties would be exquiste! Most likely the boy would be broken, driven to self-destruction. Oh yes. Sinister's eyes narrowed in anticipation. Beating Shinigami to a bloody pulp would be satisfying for the short term - but implant or not, he was still a fragile human. Now, mind torture....Sinister threw back his head and laughed harshly, the cruel sounds echoing off the silent sentries standing guard in their glass prisons, the only witnesses to a madman's insanity.
Hank rubbed his eyes wearily as he watched the cab leave with Cecilia. The fiery Latino had assured him she was fine the minute she was conscious and as soon as she'd been able to get up, she had called a cab.
" I know you're worried," she had told him. " But I need to go home - my work doesn't wait for anyone - do you realize how few people will willingly treat sick and injured mutants?"
Even the argument that she'd been through an ordeal hadn't changed her mind. She'd been through enough attacks as an X-men to develop a thick skin about such things - and the added security Cyclops had promised to install in her home later that day was an added bonus. Beast sighed - there were times he truly loved that woman, even when he wanted to shake her soundly for not taking her own health as seriously as she took others.
" She's gone already?"
Hank looked at the brown-haired boy who stood behind him, blue eyes piercing his.
" Cecilia takes her medical career very seriously - too seriously," he grumbled. " Why? Did you need something? I am certain that while not as attractive as the lovely Dr. Reese, I am no less medically inclined to answer your questions."
Heero hesitated. The blue doctor's speech reminded him of Duo's - fast and incoherant. He shook it off. " I wanted to speak to her about Du-Shinigami."
Hank nodded thoughtfully, noticing the slight lapse. " It may not be your friend-"
"It is," Heero cut him off smoothly. " Who else would call themselves Shinigami?"
"Sinister could have sent anyone out and told them to call themselves Shinigami," Beast said. "He does so enjoy playing little mind games."
" It's not a game," Heero said quietly, deadly. " My...Our Duo would never attack an innocent woman."
" Unless he's being controlled."
Heero blinked at that and his eyes narrowed. " But..." his voice trailed off. Hank looked at him sympathetically.
" You may have to face the fact that in the near future, you may have to battle your own comrade."
Heero's eyes blazed at him. " You think I can't handle it? If Duo has become a liability then...he must be eliminated."
That last part was said with such a resigned air that it shook the Beast to the core. He looked at the young man - no, young boy who stood there, calmly discussing his willingness to kill someone who obviously meant a lot to him.
" How can one with a face so young, be so eager to extinguish the life of one he cares about?" he murmered. " You all have the hearts of warriors...but in the end you are only children."
" We were never children," Heero said blankly. " It was not allowed." He bit his lip but then he shrugged and decided to enlighten the furred man.
" We fight in a bloody war that never seems to resolve anything. We are five who were chosen to represent our homes against an overwheling force. All of us were subjected to training, to block out emotions, to be able to kill our enemies who sometimes were not much older then ourselves. We are the best." His tone turned dry. " And we all know the risks of war."
Hank watched the youth struggle with his emotions. " What of the risks to your souls?" he asked softly.
" What soul?" Heero barked with a short laugh. " No soul could do what I have done and be pure. Maybe Quatre has a pure soul, or even Trowa or Wufei. Duo for sure. But not me."
" Then why be so willing to sacrifice your friend."
Heero went silent for a minute, weighing his thoughts with the seriousness of one who had the fate of the world in his hands. Hank began to think he'd never get an answer when Heero's voice spoke up softly, his eyes staring off at an unseen objective.
" I had the chance once before. I hadn't known him long - he was captured and taken to a military base to be 'debriefed'." Heero licked his suddenly dry lips. " I went after him."
" To rescue him?"
" To silence the leak."
A poignant silence fell over them. Hank's sensitive ears vaguely registered the chirping of crickets in the lush grass before them. Heero chuckled softly as he raised his eyes.
" Duo loves the night - he says that crickets are heard more at night because the glow of the moon draws them out and makes them sing its praises."
Hank closed his eyes for a minute and when he opened them, the open look on Heero's face had reverted to its blank mask. He sighed.
" We will get him back," Hank promised solemnly. " Sinister is using him for something - and based on how that madman has acted in the past, we can safely assume that sooner or later he will contact us."
" Before or after he destroys Duo?" Heero asked quietly.
" He doesn't seem to have harmed him yet--"
" I didn't mean his body," Heero cut him off again. Throwing one last glance at the moon, Heero turned and went back into the mansion. Hank watched him leave silently. A low chuckle sounded in the darkness and the Beast whirled around to see Logan materialize by the side of the house.
" You heard, Logan?"
" Yup."
" And yet you laugh."
" 'Cause Sinister's gonna be gettin' more then he bargained for," Logan said as he leaned against the wall, crossing one leg over the over at the ankles. " That kid is mad. And scared. When he blows, it's gonna be all she wrote for whoever's in his way. Including his friend."
Hank stared at him. " Wolverine, that boy just informed me that he intends to kill his best friend if he deems him an enemy. We both know that Duo is merely under Sinister's control - if we can get the boy, we can break the influence."
Logan blew out a column of smoke before raising a single eyebrow in Beast's direction.
" So?"
" SO?" Beast was nearly in apoplexy. " SO?"
" If the kid's already broken, why the hell would ya break the influence? 'Side's - in that boys mind, there's no room for traitors. It'd get 'em killed in their war."
" But.....but.."
" Oh, I'm gonna help all I can - been itchin' fer a good fight against tweedledum and dumber," Logan chuckled at his names for Sinister's henchmen. "But I ain't gonna get involved in what's gonna happen between the two of them. If Heero spared the kid's life, it'll be 'cause there's somethin' worth savin'. He may not get the chance to." He shook his head. " What amazes me is that Heero knows it - and accepts it."
Hank shook his head sadly. " What kind of world raises its children to be terrorists?"
" Probably similar to one that raises people to be bigot politicians like Graydon Creed," Logan shrugged, tossing his cigarrette to the ground and stubbing it out with his toe. Hank threw him a wry look at the mention of the anti-mutant activist before going back into the house. Logan looked up at the moon.
" Damn, I'm starting to like that kid."
End Part 5A
Okay - this was rough. Very rough - but SOME peopl were anxious for this part...*waits five seconds before collapsing* Okay, okay - no one forced me. But I am appreciative of the emailed kick-in-the-butts I've been getting - makes me work harder! Part 5B is in the works - look for it today or tomorrow.
Stormy
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