Just for the sake of pretending like we have a legal leg to stand on, we wanted to mention here that we did not create Gundam Wing, that we have no rights to the series and that we mean no disrespect whatsoever to the creators, nor is this story meant to be taken as a claim to either the characters or the situations which were not created by us. Also, we have no money, we're not going to make one red cent off of this story, and suing us would be pretty durn pointless since there wouldn't be anything to gain by it. You'd be more likely to get blood from a turnip ^_~

Veiled Paradox - by Yoiko and Tzigane

Part One

{and the ringing of the bells, bells, bells} Quatre dreamed, dancing bells all around him as he stalked through the land of a fairy-tale forest, white tights occasionally snagging on thorns as he sought to rescue the fair Princess Trowa from a fate worse than death - marriage to the dastardly sorcerer, Heero, who had the poor Princess captured in a tower where a wicked black dragon named Wufei guarded Trowa with the full intent of running everyone through who came near enough for him to do so.

*RINGRINGRING!*

{Damn those insistent bells!} Quatre thought grouchily as a tiny Duo dressed as a rabbit ran past, chanting, "Time, the time, running, racing, flowing over the steps of never-ending...". Duo, he noted, even had a fluffy bunny rabbit sort of tail.

*RINGRINGRING!!*

...and with that, the world changed. /I open my eyes and the stars are so bright and clear overhead that it seems as though they're white pinpricks in construction paper. The smell of wet earth is all around and then I hear a raw sound of agony breaking from my own throat as I feel the hair on my head {but my hair's not that long!} being wrenched painfully, the quick strike of a fist coming down. I try to wince away but it hits my temple even as my neck is bent at the strangest angle, forced over an opening in the clay and those hands are thrusting me down, down, down into blood-filled depths that seem never-ending and I scream because, above all, above everything else, I don't want to be deep in that hole alone..../

*RINGRINGRING!!!*

One tourmaline eye gummed with sleep finally managed to pull itself open. He'd been up until all hours of the night working and had only gotten to bed around midnight. The clock's red digits read 3:05 as he fumbled for the phone that continued to ring.

*RINGRINGRI* "Hello?" His sleep-fuzzed mind took a moment to recognize the voice. "Wait. Repeat that, please?" The second time, he was awake, sitting up on the edge of the bed, warm golden skin glowing in the moonlight. "Right. But why didn't you call Lady Anne? Oh. Yes. I see. I can see where that would upset her, of course. Right. I'll get right on it. Yes. Goodbye, Zechs."

"Quatre?" The soft sound of Trowa's voice made him turn and smile, the glimmer of a green eye tempting him as he leaned over and gently kissed his lover's forehead. "What's going on?"

Quatre paused for a moment, his brow knit in confusion. "I'm not really sure, Trowa." He could feel the quick emphatic beat of his ucchu no kokoro deep inside of him, singing to him of truths and necessities. {No. I'm not really sure.}

With a sigh, Zechs lowered the phone to the cradle, frowning. He had hated to wake Quatre and Trowa like that, in the middle of the night, but there hadn't been anything else to do about it. There wasn't anyone else who could help...

"Zechs? What did Quatre say?" Noin asked, gently patting the back of their golden-haired babe until the child burped in a quiet sort of way and settled his head sleepily on her shoulder. Dusk-violet eyes looked at them both with warmth and love, love that he was glad to have. Love that he wouldn't throw away for a delusion, unlike some people he could name. "Quatre's going to pull some strings and see if he can take care of the matter."

"Oh, good," Noin sighed. "Sally's already been out to see him. They won't let her past the front desk, just keep talking about how dangerous he is, how crazy. Even after she told them that she was his physician they wouldn't let her talk to anyone, even the admissions nurse."

Gently, he gathered her into his arms, the babe between them, her head on his shoulder. "Don't let it worry you, Noin. Quatre will see to it that he's released and that everything works out properly. It will be all right." {It had better be.}

Laying back down, Quatre wrapped an arm about Trowa, sighing with quiet inflection as the other boy buried his head against his shoulder, a thigh pressing over his. Golden lashes swept down slowly, caressing cheeks that had slimmed in the three years since he'd first set foot into Sandrock, and he was gone again in a slow drift of dream and there was that Duo bunny again only this time it was more human than bunny aside from its tail. {This is just insane....}

And his dreams changed once again. /Here I sit amongst these people who once recognized me as their own. They won't now, of course, because I've been found doing something that is so terribly unimaginable to them. Their eyes all shift away from me as though I make them uncomfortable. Well, good. If I must be uncomfortable, there is a grim enjoyment in knowing that those around me are as miserable as I, as well. The feel of dirt on my face and hands, in my hair where they shoved me down into that hole.../ Quatre shuddered in his sleep and tossed his head to the side upon the pillow, whimpering. /Gods, to know such terror from a simple hole in the ground... but it's more than that, isn't it? It's the thought of what may be in there... and what might not be. It's an aperture in my heart and being buried in it is worse than death. I have to get help or they'll lock me in this hole forever, deep down where no one ever gets out again. I should know, I've sent men there myself more often than I can count. No matter how clean they say it is, no matter how well-kept they claim their patients to be..../

With a slight sigh, Quatre gave in to the dream and relaxed against Trowa momentarily, tugging him closer in that moment. /The knot on my temple where the arresting officer struck me aches fiercely. How ridiculous and needless, to strike a man unarmed save for the shovel he has left at the bottom of the hole he has dug!/ Quatre could almost feel his own face drawing into a scowl, his own temple throbbing with a fierce, stabbing pain. /The entire production is preposterous./ The sight of a woman with a bulldog's face closing in upon him with a needle sent quivers of shame and fear through him. /Don't! Oh, gods, don't, you don't need to drug me, I'm not violent even though perhaps I am mad, they'd all think me so if they realized what I know deep in my heart! Don't! Oh, don't!/ The pinprick slide of a needle going deep... and then the dream blurred away, soft and slow and Quatre slept again, untroubled save for wizards and rabbits.

"This is unbelievable," Trowa whispered into Quatre's ear as the monstrous steel doors of the entrance clanged shut behind them. Quatre nodded silently, one hand raising to unconsciously rub against his chest as his ucchu no kokoro throbbed with sympathetic pain. Oh, but it hurt him...

"Just sign these, and Mr. Peacecraft will come down to escort you inside," said the guard, his expression stiff and wary. Quatre and Trowa signed in, receiving their plastic visitors passes, and had just submitted to a weapons scan when Zechs stepped through the guarded door.

"I'm glad to see you," the long-haired man said, and Quatre couldn't help but feel another stab of sympathy. Zechs's eyes were shadowed from lack of sleep and the ghost of old pain, but there was nothing Quatre could do about that. Noin and their infant son would do far more to heal Zechs's wounds than anything Quatre was capable of doing.

"Is it... can we see him?"

"This way," Zechs answered, and ushered them through a series of high-security doorways. They hurried through the main part of the prison, ignoring the frenzied catcalls and suggestive remarks the prisoners chose to toss their way. Quatre's posture was stiff, and his impassive expression would have done either Heero or Trowa proud. Trowa appeared not to notice the prisoners or their threats at all, his green eyes staring resolutely at the doorway ahead of them. Zechs walked the slightest bit faster, his nervousness jangling along Quatre's spine. Quatre sneaked a look at the silent man, and was not surprised in the least to see that none of that nervousness showed in his demeanor.

Quatre stifled a relieved sigh as the door closed behind them, shutting out the noise of the prisoners' voices. Of course, Zechs had helped to put a great many of those men in this place, in his work as a Preventer. And those men who had recognized Quatre and Trowa had been doubly incensed - the prisoners here were largely rebels against the current government, and Quatre and Trowa had been among the pilots who set the current regime in its place.

There were two more security checkpoints to pass through - there was no chance of escaping this particular part of the building, and that security was as much to protect the prisoners here from the rest of the prison population as it was to protect the rest of the outside world from these particular high-security prisoners.

The psych ward echoed with the lamentations of the insane, men young and old who were damned to live in their own minds... Quatre shuddered violently, grateful for the subtle pressure of Trowa's hand on his shoulder as they passed down the hallway, that simple human touch the only hint of cleanness in this realm of the criminally insane.

"He's at the end of the hallway," Zechs said quietly. "You may be surprised when you see him..."

"How bad is it?" Trowa wanted to know.

"Physically, he's fine," Zechs answered uncomfortably. "Mentally... They found him in the graveyard, hip-deep in the hole he'd dug. He was clawing at the grave with his bare hands! And ranting and raving about how not even death could stop him... And they said he was laughing..." Zechs shuddered expressively, and Quatre echoed the motion. Whether he was picking up the image of what had really happened or just filling things in with his imagination, he had a horribly clear picture of it, his fellow pilot's face smeared with grime and spittle, his hands raw and bloody from clawing at the cold, hard earth, his eyes gleaming with unholy delight as he laughed and laughed...

"He's right in here," Zechs said, and one of the psych ward's staff led them into the windowless room. The bright light glared off the too-white walls and the chrome frame of the hospital bed, and Quatre unconsciously gasped as he took in the sight of Wufei strapped to the gleaming frame with soft restraints. The Chinese pilot's face was unnaturally calm, his mouth slackened by the drugged stupor that held him. Tears had trickled down his round cheeks, leaving clear tracks in the grime still smeared across his bronze skin. The patient's hands had been carefully cleaned and bandaged, and someone had taken the time to loosen Wufei's hair, presumably to make him more comfortable. The long strands fanned out around him on the pillow, like a curtain of fine black silk.

"They've tried to do everything they could for him," Zechs murmured quietly. Quatre nodded and pulled up a chair by the bedside. Trowa stepped away for a minute, and when he returned he held a warm, wet washcloth. Quatre smiled sweetly at him - honestly, sometimes he had to think that Trowa was the one with the psychic powers - and began gently wiping the grime from Wufei's face.

"Nnn-" Wufei mumbled, his ebony eyes slitting open. "Not even death..."

"Shh, Wufei, it's only me," Quatre whispered, carefully wiping off as much of the dirt as he could.

"Quatre? Quatre, you have to save him!" Wufei shouted.

"Mr. Chang, you have to remain calm," the brawny man said. "Or I'll have to give you another shot." The words made Wufei shiver and struggle in his bonds, but the orderly's expression was compassionate, and his tone of voice was gentle. Quatre suspected that this man must have undone Wufei's hair and tried to clean him up, and he was grateful that at least Wufei had a kind caretaker in this horrible place.

"Please, Wufei, please calm down," Quatre whispered urgently, resting his hand lightly on Wufei's shoulder. "Please... if they have to drug you, you'll never be able to tell me what's so important!"

"You won't believe me!" Wufei cried and thrashed in an effort to pull his arms free. "I have to get out of here!"

"We've come all this way to help," Trowa said, stepping up to place a calming hand on Quatre's shoulder. "Tell us and we'll believe you."

"HE doesn't believe!" Wufei snarled, glaring at Zechs through the wisps of his hair. "And he should! You, of all people, Zechs!"

"Zechs, could you wait for us outside?" Quatre asked with an apologetic shrug. "Please?" Azure eyes met his, cloudy with grief and pain, and then Zechs turned without a word and left. Quatre sighed. Zechs had been Wufei's comrade, had shared his worst grief... what could possibly make Wufei distrust him?

Soft hitching breaths, almost whimpers, came from the Chinese pilot's chest as he tossed his head slightly to the side. "I can hear it. Can't you hear it? He's calling me, pulling at me... Can't you hear it?"

Tenderly, Quatre pushed strands of damp black hair behind Wufei's ears, looking directly into wide ebony eyes fuzzy with drugs and what seemed too obviously to be madness. A cold chill filled him. "Who is calling, Wufei? Who is 'he'?" he asked, frowning. Surely he didn't mean...

"Treize," Wufei breathed in a shiver of air. "Treize Khushrenada."

"Yes. Yes, ma'am. Yes, I understand perfectly. Of course. But.... Yes. Yes, Lade Anne. I understand. Of course. Of course. I'm sorry to have bothered you with... yes. Of course. Goodb..." Quatre frowned as the phone on the other end of the line was hung up violently, blond brows knitting in consternation. Really! Quatre would have expected the woman to be more concerned with the current state of being of one of her few Preventers and instead she had been coldly furious that anyone would dare suggest such a thing as he had called to propose. Though he supposed he could understand why...

He chewed thoughtfully at his lip for a moment, tourmaline eyes darkening. It was odd, wasn't it, that Lady Anne of the Preventers was the person who had to give permission for the rather gruesome task he desired to be performed? Still, he supposed it was no more strange than Wufei's absolute conviction that the former Oz general was alive.

The entire situation was distinctly disturbing. It would take so little to put Wufei's mind at ease, a quick exhumation of the man's body and the former Gundam pilot could at least rest with some measure of peace in his small bed at the madhouse to which he'd been deeply and eternally committed. It seemed that despite all of the strings Quatre could pull, had pulled, he would be unable to get the other man released. After the first visit, security around him had tightened and was utterly impenetrable. Visitors were no longer allowed; even the butter cookies that Trowa had made and sent had been inspected and tested so thoroughly that Quatre had a feeling none of them had actually made it to Wufei... and they'd only been *COOKIES*, for gods' sakes! With a sigh, he scribbled a quick note on his deskpad to contact the President of the Earth Sphere Unified Nation. Perhaps he could help in getting Wufei released or at the very least they might receive assistance for the legal processes surrounding the disentombment of Khushrenada's body...

~Quatre-sama?~ the intercom on his phone asked hesitantly.

He reached forward, pressed the button. "Yes, Apu?"

~The gentleman you requested to speak with has arrived.~

"Oh! Yes! Please send him in!" Quatre quickly straightened a few of the piles on his desk and flicked blond bangs back out of his face. Everything had been in such disarray lately between the problems with Wufei and trying to run Winner, Inc., that he'd given up on keeping everything neatly put away. A soft knock sounded upon the doorway and he called, "Come in!"

In response, a slender young man with hazelnut hair and golden eyes moved into the room, his stride confident. He had the mark of a former soldier, the carriage of a man who held deep convictions concerning right and wrong. It would explain his line of work, Quatre thought, smiling to put the waves of apprehension coming off of the man at ease. "Lieutenant Soushiro. Please. Have a seat, won't you?"

"Thank you, Winner-san."

"I'm given to understand that you were the one who located Chang Wufei on the night he was arrested?"

"Yes, sir, that's correct."

"I realize you must have repeated this many times before but I'd appreciate it if you'd tell me what happened, in your own words."

"It's all in my report, sir..."

"Yes, but please indulge me," Quatre said with the bland smile of an eccentric rich man.

"Well, sir, we got the report that there was some kind of disturbance at the cemetery, so my partner Hoshiro and I went out there. We found Mr. Chang IN the grave, digging it with his bare hands. He was giggling up a storm, and when he saw us he... grinned at us, sir, and started laughing. Hoshiro walked up to him really carefully, trying not to excite him, and that nutcase - begging your pardon, sir - jumped him. He kicked, scratched and tried to bite. Hoshiro and I used the minimum force necessary to subdue the man and brought him straightaway to the psych ward."

"I see," Quatre said, steepling his fingers and adopting a troubled, thoughtful expression. "And did he say anything during this time?"

"He kept saying, 'Not even death', sir," Soushiro answered.

"Aa. Now, please indulge me for one more question. Am I correct in thinking that the usual procedure for handling an incident like this would be to lock the prisoner into a lone cell until he could be examined?"

"Yes, sir, but luckily we were able to get Mr. Chang to the psych ward without delay."

"I see. Well, yes, that was fortunate. Thank you very much for your time, Lieutenant." The man nodded and left, and Trowa slowly stepped out of the shadows that had concealed him.

"What do you think?" the slender boy asked, as he laid a hand softly on Quatre's shoulder.

"There was something... he's lying about something," Quatre answered, frowning thoughtfully. "But... I just don't know." Quatre sighed deeply, shaking his head as his thoughts started to circle back on themselves.

"Any luck with the exhumation?"

"None. Lady Anne will not allow it." Quatre's shoulders sagged, and he raised one hand to rub at his right temple, where a steady ache was growing.

"There may be other legal means of doing this."

"Yes. I'll contact the President of the Earth Nation, and see if anything can be done..."

"I have a few leads to follow up on," Trowa said solemnly. "I want to know what really happened the night Wufei was arrested."

"Aa. I'd like to know that as well."

"And if there aren't any legal means..."

"Then we'll settle for illegal means," Quatre said, straightening in his chair. "If Wufei has to be locked in that place for the rest of his life, I at least want to put this one thought to rest for him." Trowa didn't answer, but no words were necessary. With one fond pat on Quatre's shoulder, he silently left the office to pursue his own investigation.

"Naaah, Heero, tell me why we're doing this again."

"Be quiet."

"Aw, man, who's gonna hear? The ghosts? You think Khushrenada's gonna sit up in his coffin?"

"Shut up," Heero said, turning to glare at his partner before leading the way to Treize's grave. It was easy to spot it even in the dead of night - in the whole cemetery, this was the only grave where the earth had recently been turned.

"So now what?" Duo asked, a little too cheerfully. Heero glared at him again. He would have expected Duo to whine and complain about this whole caper...

"Why are you so happy?"

"I'm not exactly happy," Duo answered. "But what would Shinigami have to fear in a graveyard, man?"

"Hn." Heero's reply was, as always, eloquent. He tossed a shovel at the grinning violet-eyed boy and hefted another one. "Dig."

"Yeah, whatever," Duo said, and pushed the shovel into the soft earth easily. "You know, it's gonna stink when we open that thing up."

"Shut up."

"I'm just sayin', you know, 'cause he's been in there a long time..."

"Shut up and dig."

"I'm diggin', I'm diggin'. But I don't see how we're supposed to get this done in just a few hours."

"We'll get it done because that's the mission," Heero said stoically, and for a long time there was no sound but the soft patter of earth being tossed to the side, and the occasional muffled curse from Duo as Heero's aim went a little wide, sending a shower of loose dirt over the end of his braid. In spite of the chill of the evening and the inevitable goose bumps at what they were doing - desecrating a grave was not comfortable work - the boys had both broken out in a sweat by the time they got a few feet down.

"Man, I can't believe Wu did this with his bare hands," Duo said quietly, continuing to dig.

"It's not like him to be ill-prepared," Heero said with a slight grunt as he tossed a shovelful of dirt over his shoulder.

"Yeah, well this whole thing is not like him. And for Q to ask us to do this on the sly..."

"They tried every legal means."

"And then they resorted to calling us bad boys to get the job done."

"Hn."

"How long has Wu been in there?"

"Almost a month now."

"Man, I'd be going nuts. I mean, you know, if he wasn't already."

"TREIZE!!!!!!!!!"

*thunk*

"Oi, Heero, sounds like you hit coffin."

"Shut up and keep digging."

"Yeah, yeah." The two boys carefully cleared the last layer of earth, trying to ignore the blisters rising up on their hands and to minimize the noise their shovels were making on the solid, once-glossy wood of Treize's casket.

"Now what?" Duo whispered. "Man, I'm telling you it's gonna stink in there."

"We open it and jump out really quick until the air clears a little."

"I can't believe this..." Duo said, but hunkered down to grab his end of the coffin lid, waiting on Heero's signal. They'd be lucky if the smell didn't knock them out. Duo had a bizarre image of himself and Heero passed out by the grave in full daylight, with guards surrounding them and Treize rotting away in his coffin. In spite of all his bravado, Duo wasn't eager to get his first glimpse of a long-dead corpse. He'd seen more than his share of death, of course, but digging up a grave... well, this was a first.

"Now," Heero said, and Duo lurched into action. Within a blink of an eye, the casket was open and both boys were on the surface, lying in the sweet grass and waiting for the smell to dissipate...

"Heero?"

"Hn."

"I don't smell anything, do you?"

"Nh."

"Maybe he's rotted past the point of stinking?"

"Hn."

"Or he could be a vampire. They don't rot."

"There is no such thing as vampires."

"Just wanted to see if you were listening," Duo said, but Heero was already perched at the edge of the hole they'd dug, his muscles bunched up and rigid under the thin covering of his tank top as he stared down into the darkness.

"What is it?" Duo asked. He never would have thought that the sight of a rotting corpse would upset the Perfect Soldier...

"It's empty," Heero answered.

"It was empty?" Quatre asked again.

"Aa." Quatre couldn't help but note that Heero was articulate as always.

"Totally empty, and you could tell there hadn't ever been anyone in there," Duo filled in. "What gets me is, why would anyone bury an empty casket? I mean, you know?"

"Yes..." Quatre mused.

"Because they didn't have a body to put in it," Heero said in a reasonable, matter-of-fact tone.

"Yes, but..." Quatre paused a moment, his thoughts racing as he struggled to catch up. "Is there any way Treize could have... could anyone have survived that explosion?"

"No," Heero said flatly.

"Not even you?" Duo asked with a grin, backing off as Heero turned an icy blue glare on him.

"Not even me."

"Then why would there be no body-"

"Maybe there weren't enough pieces to pick up," Duo suggested.

Trowa shook his head. "They found all the pieces of Tallgeese II. There would have been something in it, even if it was only a handful of blood and bone. They would have buried something. Lady Anne would have seen to that."

Duo made a face as Quatre shuddered with the vivid imagery. "Maaa, did you hafta go and say that, Trowa? Ugh. I just ate lunch..."

Intense Prussian eyes narrowed. "Hn. Looking in the coffin guarantees nothing. They could have been expecting desecration and buried him somewhere else using that site for show."

Flicking blond strands of hair back out of his eyes, Quatre gnawed on his lower lip. "We've been going about this all wrong," he announced, pursing his mouth in thought. "We've been haphazard because we've all assumed that Wufei is as mad as they say he is."

"Sane men don't go diggin' up graves in the middle of the night, Q," Duo shrugged. "I mean, it's been three years. We saw the end of the war and fought through Mariemaya's attempted coup and all went our separate ways. He coulda been fallin' apart for the past year and a half and none of us would ever have known. Believing in him would be asking a lot under the circumstances, even if we were all a team once... I mean, we all saw Khushrenada's mech explode."

"But..." Quatre spoke slowly as a revelation struggled to come to light. "Do we even know for certain that Treize was IN that mech?"

"The answers will be in Tallgeese," Heero asserted, crossing his arms over his chest.

Trowa nodded solemnly. "Aa. The truth of the mech will be inescapable."

"What I want to know is why the hell Wufei would want to drag up Khushrenada again," Duo grumbled. "Aren't we all better off without him, man? I mean, c'mon, admittedly the guy wasn't all that bad but wouldn't it just start up the same old shit again?"

"We have to know," Quatre said. "For Wufei, if no one else. And if Treize Khushrenada is really alive... well, we just have to know, don't we?"

"I want to know what really happened," Heero said quietly, glaring as everyone turned to look at him.

All eyes turned again to Quatre as he stood, a firm look of resolution upon his face. "Then the mission is to discover what really did happen. If we split into teams, two of us can try to find Tallgeese II while the other two trace Khushrenada's last days. Do all of you accept?"

Three voices answered back in solemn unison. "Ninmu ryoukai."

Quatre tossed restlessly on the bed, unaware of Trowa's sleepy grunt as he flung an arm over his slender partner's face. "Time, running out of time," he sighed...

/Running out of time because my little dark angel surely needs me. I pace the dark confines of that which has become my whole world, my ragged breath tightening my throat as I struggle to swallow the panic, the sheer terror of being locked away (can't get out can't get out), the roiling frustration and hopeless, desperate longing for my precious one, for his sweet tenor voice crying out in passion, his slender arms, the dark silk of his hair, the light in his eyes that was surely a gift from Heaven.../

Quatre sobbed, and the overwhelming loneliness and loss woke him enough that he burrowed into the comforting warmth of Trowa's side, thankful that Trowa was warm and solid and real. The melancholy atmosphere of the dream colored the rest of his night, but if he dreamed again he had no recollection of it.

"Um... Heero?" Duo asked, glancing down at the lights of cars disappearing beneath the bridge they were crossing and appearing once again on the other side as if by some deep and cryptic magic. {Commonly known as concrete,} he thought. His frown deepened as they passed by the interstate's exit and Heero gunned the engine.

"Hn?"

The breeze from the open window lashed chestnut bangs into confused violet eyes. "Hey, man, weren't we supposed to turn left there?" he asked, glancing back at the on-ramp. "You missed the turn!"

"Aa."

"Communicative as ever, I see! And we didn't turn left becaaaaaauuuuuse?"

"Because I'm going this way."

"Oh," Duo answered. "You're going this way. I see. Heero?"

"What?"

"Why are you going this way?"

With a sigh, Heero scowled and pulled into a Texaco station, bringing the ancient dark-green convertible to a halt. "Because the answers don't match up."

Duo groaned. "Of COURSE the answers don't match up! Otherwise, why in hell would Wu be so obsessed with digging up a dead man who was responsible for starting a war!? This is all crazy," he muttered as Heero hit the little red button that automatically pulled down the top. "So what kinds of answers are we gonna get by going this way?"

"You'll see," Yuy replied in that mysteriously tacit way of his as they pulled out of the gas station again, Duo's braid whipping back out of the car.

"Yeah, that's what you said LAST time!" Duo shouted over the roar of the wind in his ears before settling down and closing his eyes, the cool fall wind chilling his face. Might as well get a little shut-eye while Heero the Machine drove to hell... or wherever they were going!

Soushiro Izumi sighed and attempted to turn over in bed, blinking an eye at the sudden blinding light that seemed to be just outside of his eyelids.

It was.

"AAAAHHHHH!!!!!!"

"Hey, man. No worries. It's just us, the Ghosts of Halloween Present, here to party and maybe chat with you a while. You'd like that, right? I suggest you say you would, 'cause otherwise my partner over there is going to blow us all to hell and back with the neat little dynamite trick he set up while you were sleeping." Glowing like brightly lit argon, violet eyes shone out of a ghostly pale face that was lit up in the bright wash of a flashlight and, to be frank, it scared the hell out of him.

It was almost enough to make Soushiro wet the bed before he got control of himself again. "What do you want?" he asked, voice low, threatening.

"Ahhh, that's the question. Look, it's a simple thing, I wanna know what happened that night in the cemetery. You know the one, when you picked up the Chinese guy? The nutball who was digging up the..."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Soushiro denied, glaring at the two humanesque forms clad in paisley printed sheets from his linen closet.

"Let me blow him up."

"Naahh, man, you can't blow him up yet. I don't have the information..."

So let's blow him up and hunt down his partner."

"Well, now, what you say makes sense, but..."

"Let me blow him up," Heero demanded, waving a paisley clad arm.

"Not yet, man. Not just yet..." Duo paused. "Well, then again, maybe you're right. Maybe if we kill this one, his partner will talk, ne?"

Heero snorted. "Not half as much as you."

The bright green of Duo's hand-held thermal scythe flared in the room and he stepped closer to the bed, voice dropping to a husky whisper. "What was it those pilots used to yell before they committed suicide, Number One?" he asked. Those bright violet eyes seemed to expand and become incandescent, sending sharp shudders of terror through Soushiro. "Oh. Yeah. Banzai."

With that single dark whisper, the scythe flew and Soushiro cried out, flinching violently away. Seconds later, the realization that warm piss had gathered beneath him and he could feel it made him open his dazed hazel-gold eyes.

It was still standing there. "Tell me what I want to know, little man," It breathed darkly. "Otherwise, Shinigami will have to take you home."

Not a word came from the almost silent 'Number One' and Soushiro began to talk. "It was a quiet night. This is a pretty peaceful place so we don't get a lot of calls. This one, though... It was a doozy. This lady called, said that some psychopath had just run past her window, giggling and shrieking something about 'not even death' and that he went into the memorial cemetery near her house. We didn't get any more information than that -- she hung up and the number traced to a pay phone near that area. Still, we stay on the lookout for kids trying to decimate the cemetery, you know? So we went on over to check it out and sure enough, there he was, digging away..."

"But not laughing," the silent one spoke up. "And he had a shovel, didn't he." It wasn't a question.

The warm end of the still glowing thermal weapon nudged his jugular, the energy sputtering bare centimeters from his throat. He swallowed. "Yeah. He had a shovel, all right, and he'd got about chest deep when we found him. He was a little guy, you know? Don't know how he dug that deep by himself..." The scythe nudged him again, those wildly glittering eyes demanding more. "When we came up, he stopped digging. The guy didn't *look* crazy but, you know, homicidal maniacs never do. My partner told him to climb outta there and he did but then Hoshiro whapped him upside the head with his Maglight. The guy must've been pretty hard-headed because he went down but he was still conscious. He nearly fell in the hole he'd dug so I grabbed him and he started fighting. When he did that, Hoshiro whapped him upside the head again. The second time knocked him out cold."

"What made you have him committed instead of following the usual routine, though?" That nudge again. "He obviously wasn't nuts enough for that even if he *was* digging up a grave."

"It was when we found out who he was. A Preventer, a former Gundam pilot, digging up the grave of a man he'd killed? And when the Preventers called us..."

The one who'd wanted to blow him up interrupted him. "Someone from the Preventers called you?"

"Yeah," Soushiro answered. "Hoshiro talked to 'em. They said the little guy was seriously psychotically obsessed... talked about justice all the time, didn't think the head of Oz was really dead even though *he'd* been the one who killed him... Said the kid was really whacked out, needed help and that they'd make sure he got it. So we did what we were told to do and said what we were told to say. After all, those Preventers are all pretty close. They're all intermingled and married so they ought to know one another pretty well, right? You sure as hell can't get in without knowing one of 'em." That pronouncement was bitter.

"Oh-ho-ho!" the pasty-faced violet-eyed creature crowed. "So that's part of it, too! The Preventers rejected you, rightly, 'cause you're willing to falsify information, and you got the chance to get back at one of 'em... So you did. The way the cookie crumbles, right?"

"Fuck no! That's not it at all!" Soushiro snarled, fighting to get his wrists loose from where they were still tied to the remnants of the headboard.

"Number One, take him out," intoned the one Soushiro thought of as Shinigami.

"Ninmu... ryoukai."

"No! No, wait, PLEA~...!" The heavy thunk of Soushiro's own Maglight landed against his head, knocking him unconscious.

"Kanryu."

"Now let's go somewhere and burn these ugly fuckin' sheets of his and get this white paint stuff off," Duo said, already pulling at the sheet and wiping his face with it. "It itches like hell."

"I want to blow him up."

"Heero, my good man, it's better to leave him laying in his own piss. C'mon.... This little mission ain't over yet and I'm sure you'll get to blow *something* up before it's all said and done."

"Hn." With that, Heero cut Soushiro loose and tossed the hideous paisley sheet over his shoulder to stalk after the long-haired idiot. After all, completing a mission came before the pleasure of blasting a pathetic Preventer-wanna-be to kingdom come.

Zechs frowned sharply at Quatre, his pale brows drawing tightly together. "You're digging into too many old wounds, Quatre. Treize was very elegant, very effective. He could convince with a word, seduce with a glance. Even," he murmured with dark inflection, "his enemies could not resist the draw of him. You see it, Wufei's fascination, his obsession. Treize is dead." The certainty in that statement was almost chilling. "You should allow him to rest in peace."

Sad tourmaline eyes met the older man's dusky cool orbs. "Zechs. How can I let Treize rest in peace when Wufei can't? To set his mind at rest... To set *my* mind at rest. If Treize is really dead, he won't mind it. And if he's alive..."

"He's dead, damn you! Dead by his last lover's hand and if he weren't, he'd be dead by mine!" Zechs flamed, his frosty gaze heating with anger and frustration even as Quatre's eyes flew wide with shock.

The dreams... In the dreams! It seemed always that he could feel the longing, a never-ending yearning that burned and burned even at night when... A shudder broke through him as the possibility shimmered along his veins.

What if the dreams weren't dreams at all?

"I can't explain to you why I feel so strongly about this, Zechs. You wouldn't believe me," Quatre murmured softly.

A slow sad shake of Zechs's head set platinum locks in motion. "That's precisely what he said to me, Quatre. He's drawing you into his madness. You should stop before you hurt someone... me, you, Trowa. Stop before you hurt Lady Anne. She's sacrificed so much, first for Treize and his dream and afterwards for peace and his daughter. Don't make this any worse. Let it go."

"I have to know, regardless. Where is Tallgeese II?" Quatre asked solemnly.

The answer was distant and coated with frost. "I don't know... and I hope you never find it."

"So do we go after his partner, Hoshiro?" Duo asked, leaning back in the seat as the car sped down the highway. The cold wind blowing through the open window was irritating on his recently-scrubbed skin. He grimaced at the thought of what he had gone through trying to get that white gunk off. He probably should've just let Heero blow that loser up, and then they wouldn't have had to worry about hiding their identities...

"He's been sent out of the country," Heero answered. Duo's eyes widened in surprise, both because Heero had voluntarily spoken a whole sentence, and because of the import of what the stern-faced pilot was saying.

"So that means that someone had an awful lot of money handy," Duo mused.

"Aa."

"So where are we going, then?"

"Back to Winner, Inc."

"Oh." Duo closed his eyes and pulled the collar of his jacket up over his nose. The wind was cold and Heero was driving like a bat out of hell! {Well,} he decided, {might as well try an' go back to sleep while you can, Maxwell.}

Trowa stifled a sigh, grateful that his long bangs hid his discouraged expression from Quatre.

"...very much a waste of time," Quatre finished, rubbing at his temple as though his head ached. "I only succeeded in alienating Zechs."

"You tried," Trowa said, moving to embrace his beloved, his long fingers soothing the tightly bunched muscles of Quatre's neck and shoulders. "Now it's my turn."

"You have a lead?" Quatre backed up to gaze at him, and Trowa couldn't help but bask in that earnest blue-eyed adoration for a moment, his heart thudding with muted joy merely because Quatre existed, and loved him.

"I have an idea," Trowa answered, deliberately choosing not to raise Quatre's hopes again, because his golden lover seemed to take it so hard when leads didn't pan out. Trowa supposed that Quatre was taking it so personally because of their connection to Wufei...

"Why don't you finish your work here," Trowa suggested, smoothly guiding Quatre over to the desk and the papers piled there. "And I'll follow up on my idea. If anything comes of it, you'll be the first to know."

"Good luck," Quatre said, and sighed as he turned to his desk. How Trowa expected him to be able to concentrate on paperwork right now was beyond him...

"Yes, I went to see Wufei," Sally Po answered, meeting Trowa's gaze directly. "I couldn't get past the front door."

"But you're aware of the whole issue-"

"That he thinks Khushrenada's alive? Yes, he's talked about it for a while now. In a way, I really shouldn't be surprised that he tried to dig up the grave to prove Treize wasn't in it."

"He wasn't in it."

"WHAT?"

"The grave was empty," Trowa stated flatly, glad that they were alone in Sally's office. As briefly as possible, Trowa explained about the disinterment, carefully avoiding any mention of Heero and Duo's names, even though it was undoubtedly obvious to Sally who the culprits were.

"So what we need to do is find the pieces of Tallgeese II," Trowa finished. "If we can prove that Khushrenada was really in there when it exploded..."

"That still might not shake Wufei's delusion," Sally interrupted. "He destroyed that mech himself, yet he still chooses to believe Treize survived. I think the guilt was too much for him, and that's what made him seize on this idea with such...fervor. Though why he should feel more guilty over Treize than the other deaths he caused..."

"It might not shake his delusion," Trowa said. "But will you help us anyway?"

"Of course."

End Part One

Yoiko & Tzigane

Please send comments to: Yoiko

On to Part 2

Back to the Series Index

Back to Yoiko's page