Part Seven
It appears I may have miscalculated. We have had the Gundams for almost two weeks, and there has been no sign of the pilots coming to retrieve them. I’m intrigued by this failure to guess correctly what would happen. That doesn’t happen to me very often. I can’t imagine the pilots simply not being aware that their Gundams are missing. Therefore they must have decided that coming to get them wasn’t an acceptable risk.
I wish they would come. It would be quite advantageous if we could convince them to work for us.
Lady Une has begun peaceful negotiations with the colonies. She’s taken to using the name Lady Anne recently, however. The people seem quite taken with her. I myself am fairly taken with this new personality. I find myself wondering why she couldn’t be like this her entire life. Although I suppose there were uses for her more . . . ruthless personality. Still, I’m considering taking those troublesome glasses away, or at least forbidding her to wear them while in my presence.
I was thinking about how to lure the Gundam pilots in, if simply having their Gundams is not enough. All I could come up with was using them in some way that the Gundam pilots would not approve of. Of course, since we’re in diplomatic relations with the colonies, we certainly couldn’t use them in OZ’s name. However, no one would have to know that the original pilots weren’t the ones in the cockpit . . .The problem is that, in order for it to be believable, we would have to destroy one of our own bases. I’m not very pleased with this idea.
Zechs seems to think it’s plausible. He’s gotten fairly good at piloting Gundam 01, once we adjusted the cockpit for his height.
That, of all things, puzzled most of the engineers. The pilot of Gundam 01 was small. I, having been the only one who has yet met a Gundam pilot, was not surprised by this. If the pilot of Gundam 05 was a teenager, it would stand to reason that the rest would be. It’s kind of mind-boggling that they put someone that young in so powerful a weapon. OZ recruits have to be at least sixteen; nobody gets a mobile suit until they reach eighteen unless they show exceptional skill.
What puzzles me about this is that I can’t imagine who organized the Gundam pilots. Why put a child in charge of a weapon? The only answer that I can come up with is that a child is more easily manipulated than an adult.
Not that I believe these children are. Not for an instant.
Not only do they have perfect control over their Gundams, but at least one of them has an excellent grasp of strategy. Their strikes were well-planned and well-timed, and in general, the targets were not expected. They certainly had all of OZ on its toes for a while.
And now they have simply disappeared, and I just don’t understand.
It shows intelligence that they know when to retreat, or at least back off to regroup. But the fact that they haven’t yet reentered the scene confuses me, especially since we have two of their Gundams.
There’s something that I’m missing. I know that. I just can’t figure out what it is.
****
“Why is he screaming?” Quinze asked. “We haven’t even touched him yet.”
The man he was talking to glanced over at where Quatre was clutching his chest and gasping for breath. “I don’t know. If you’ll allow me to try something.” He turned and walked out of the room. Quinze waited, blinking. A moment later, Quatre let out another shriek, nearly doubling over.
The other man walked back in. “Did it work?”
“Yes,” Quinze said. “What did you do?”
“Something unpleasant,” the man said, “to your other captive.”
“How fascinating,” Quinze said, eyeing Quatre. “I’ll have to . . . do some research.”
The other man regarded him. “Why are you bothering with torture? You know they won’t tell you.”
“I’m irritated with them and this relieves tension. They’ve made the past few weeks hell and I claim the right to take it out on them. Now what are you doing about locating the other three pilots?”
The man shrugged. “The same thing I’ve been doing. I just haven’t had any luck yet.”
“I’d think with all the resources of OZ behind you, you’d make a little more progress than two pilots,” Quinze snapped.
“They’re very clever,” the other man said, sounding just a bit irritated. “You should know; you had supervision over their training.”
Quinze made a disgusted noise in the back of his throat. “Get back to work. I’m going to stay here with them a little while longer.”
The other man glared for a long minute, then nodded briefly and left the room.
****
G had no sooner walked into his office than he found himself pinned to the wall with a gun at his temple. “Oh, I was wondering when you were going to show up,” he said calmly. “Can you let me go?”
Duo glared, then reluctantly let go and backed away a step. “Where are Quatre and Wufei?”
“That’s very unoriginal dialogue, Duo. I’d think you could do better.”
“I don’t need to be original. I have a gun.”
“Good point.”
Duo hauled himself up to sit on G’s messy desk, though his gun didn’t lower for a second. “Then answer my question.”
G walked past him to the desk, shuffling around in the papers for a minute. After a while, he triumphantly came up with a folder and handed it over. “That should be everything you need to know. But you can’t get to them.”
Duo glared. “And why not?”
G sighed and explained slowly, as if he was talking to a three year old. “Because there are too many troops for you to get near. While Wing could do a long range strike and allow you to destroy the base entirely, you wouldn’t be able to get close enough to get in. It’s a simple matter of manpower. Which you don’t have.”
Duo scowled. “Don’t patronize me. I’m the one with the gun, remember?”
“You make it exceedingly difficult to forget. You’re touchy today.”
“Two of my friends were abducted and now you’re telling me I can’t go get them. Of course I’m touchy.”
“I’m merely telling you what’s possible. I’m sure you can find a way around it. I trained you better than this.”
Duo picked up the folder. “My mood has improved slightly.”
“By the way, three of the other doctors are missing.”
Duo resisted the urge to tell G to go jump off a cliff. “I’ll look into it.” With that, he turned and left.
****
To: 03@colony.net
From: 02@colony.net
Re: White Fang
Attachment: HQ
Hey, Trowa. I contacted G and got him to give me the plans for the base where Quatre and Wufei are being held. We won’t be able to get close enough without getting our asses kicked. They’ve got some serious firepower there and since it’s White Fang, they’ll know exactly what to expect from us. I didn’t know what to do about it, so look the plans over. Heero suggests we let OZ do a little ass-kicking for us to get the pilots, then you can rescue them from OZ. Think you can leak the info to the top cheese where you are and then scoop the guys up out from under OZ’s nose?
Duo
PS: Three of the other doctors are missing. G doesn’t know where they are. Any ideas?
****
To: 02@colony.net
From: 03@colony.net
Re: Re: White Fang
Ryoukai. And I have no idea where the doctors are and I don’t want to waste time looking.
****
From:
Re: Gundam pilots
Attachment: HQ
Two of the Gundam pilots are being held captive at a rebel base in outer space. If you are interested in finding them, the plans of the base are attached to this email. If you wish to validate this, the passcodes for the White Fang network are also attached. Feel free to check my information. I’m sure you can understand that I have to remain anonymous.
****
“Sir?”
“I’m a little busy, Lady, can it wait?”
“I’m afraid it can’t.”
Treize blinked. ‘A little busy’ was his way of conveying to Une that it really wasn’t a good time. If she was ignoring that, it really had to be important. “Come in, then.” He noted with relief that her hair was down and her glasses absent. “What is it?” he asked as she shut the door behind her.
She put a piece of paper on the desk in front of him. He read through it quickly. “When did you get this?”
“Around nine hundred hours this morning.”
“I assume you’ve tried to trace it?”
“Yes. No luck. They covered their tracks far too well, whoever they are.”
“Did you check the information?”
“Checked and double checked. It seems valid. White Fang is apparently the operation that has been organizing the Gundam pilots the entire time. It seems they defected, and White Fang is attempting to collect them.”
“How . . . intriguing,” Treize mused. “Would it be possible to . . . rescue them, so to speak?”
Une nodded. “There are a few vulnerable points in their defenses. It would require considerable force, but it would be possible.”
“Then by all means, assemble a force.” Treize leaned back in his chair. “I have to wonder who this message is from . . .”
Une hesitated. “It would stand to reason that it would be one of the other pilots.”
“Yes.” Treize tapped the piece of paper against the table. “It amuses me that they’re coming to us for help. And also alarms me.”
“Sir?”
“They certainly wouldn’t want us to have their comrades. If they’re unable to rescue them from White Fang, why ask us to do it? I can only assume that they have some plan to rescue them once they’re here. We’ll have to be very careful.”
Une nodded. “I always am.”
****