28. Part 4: Chapter 4 (1/2)

heero could not remember a time in his life that he'd felt guiltier than when duo maxwell had stormed out of the room during the

iefing. it seemed that heero had said something to set him off, but heero didn't know what it had been, and neither did anyone else. whatever it was, duo was more manic now than he'd been at any time in the past, and if anyone thought he'd been too quiet and too focused before, he now acknowledged no one at all with even so much as a look.

no one was pleased with the development, but no one could blame him either. heero had given hours of thought to what duo had said about calling upon the colonists to fight back, and the implications troubled him. on one hand, if the colonists backed down without violence there would be no need to ramp up military presence and therefore no need to increase mobile suit production. the profiteers would be crippled. but on the other hand, heero couldn't honestly expect the colonists to sit back and take the current level of oppression lying down. he certainly wouldn't if he was in their shoes.

still, what duo had said had been radical, militant, and oddly out of character. he was a soldier above all things, yes, but duo maxwell had always been a relatively gentle soul, and whatever need for vengeance he'd felt over past events in his life had been overruled by compassion and optimism. his had settled to the point that maxwell never spoke of such feelings, and if he ever felt them he removed himself to his bunk to deal with them privately. but that was before he'd been captured, before he'd destroyed the colony, before hilde had been wounded. heero wondered if it had all been too much. perhaps duo had been damaged beyond repair.

as he lay in bed the night of the

iefing his mind raced. he thought of what howard had said when he'd

ought heero the plans for the glass cannon mobile suit: let it never be said that duo maxwell doesn't know how to have a

eakdown. but heero wondered if duo truly did know how to

eak down. he wondered if duo was self-aware enough to realize what a sorry state he'd fallen into.

or was it a sorry state?

heero had never seen such productivity out of one man before, not even during war time. to have two mobile suits almost completely dismantled in two weeks bordered on inhuman. to have begun assembling those salvaged parts into an entirely new frame in the few short hours since was absolutely insane. heero wondered how long the pace could keep up before duo collapsed from exhaustion. certainly he wouldn't sleep on his own; likely he wouldn't eat or rest either.

and atop all of the drama with maxwell, relena had been a stressed out wreck since the

iefing as well, worrying about her colleagues in the cabinet and what she might say to the press. once in the privacy of their bedroom, heero had watched her cry for near an hour over the thought of calling unarmed civilians to war, and even now that she was asleep her body gave the occasional uneasy shudder. he'd thought to wake her up once or twice, but he couldn't

ing himself to do so. better for her to sleep fitfully than stay up half the night sobbing. only one of the two of them could be a tired mess the next day, and heero had always been better at handling that.

not a single person aboard the peacemillion had gone unaffected by the meeting. quatre, though he remained outwardly focused on hilde's deteriorating health, seemed more distressed than ever. no doubt he had spent too much time blaming himself for all that had gone wrong as he was so apt to do. sally, aside from troubling herself with heero's care, had spent almost all of her time beside wufei. they resolved themselves to combing through more paperwork to locate the misallocated funds wufei had come across in the initial checks, reasoning that if they could find a paper trail it would solidify evidence against the corrupt. noin and milliardo had clammed up in their own quarters, and only milliardo had been present at the

iefing, explaining that noin was under the weather. through all his apparent cheerfulness, howard had a look of utter despondency about him, particularly since duo had stormed out, but this was not altogether unexpected considering the closeness of howard and duo's relationship. then there was relena, and heero had seen enough of her reaction first hand to know she still harbored irrational fear about the assassination attempt made against her, though he could not be certain if she was more afraid for her own safety or his. even heero himself had felt off. if all was well in his own mind he knew that he would not be up so late, listening to relena's shuddering

eaths.

the only person who seemed in a normal state of mind was trowa, but his inhuman detachment from matters such as these almost mandated that to be the case. in fact, aside from heero, trowa had been the most well-reasoned among the lot, explaining that everyone at one point or another had experienced something similar, if less severe, than what maxwell was currently going through. all of them had lost people they loved to war and many of them were responsible for the deaths of civilians, though quatre had been quick to point out that himself and duo were the only two to fully destroy a colony. trowa suggested that the best course of action at this point would be to leave duo well enough alone and allow him to go about his grieving in his own way. after all, it was only through duo's own efforts that he would be able to overcome his apparent madness.

by the time heero settled to sleep relena had begun to stir. she rolled to face him and grinned sleepily, but when he returned her gaze the smile faded. "what time is it?" she asked quietly.

"six thirty."

"you've been up all night?"

heero nodded curtly. "yeah."

relena propped herself on her elbow, her

ow furrowed in what heero might at another time have called anger. "why?"

heero draped his arm over his eyes. "thinking."

"oh," relena replied, and he could tell that her expression had softened by the tone of her voice. "i'm sorry."

"don't apologize," heero said

usquely. "you didn't do anything to apologize for."

"i kept you awake."

"you were asleep before midnight. that's not keeping me awake."

they went quiet, and though heero began to nod off he felt relena shift. then her arm was around his middle, and her head was on his shoulder, and he knew he wouldn't sleep.

"what did you come up with?" relena asked, her voice scarcely a whisper. heero noted the tiniest hint of desperation creeping back in.

"i'm going to talk to maxwell later today about it."

"what are you going to say?"

"i haven't gotten that far yet."

"i think he should do it."

heero's eyes popped open again and he dropped his arm to his chest. he grimaced when his elbow hit his ribs, and then stared at relena indignantly. "what?"

"i think he should do it. the message to the colonists. i think duo should be the one to do it." she paused and watched him, and she must have sensed his misunderstanding. "a call to war coming from me would be disingenuous."

heero had not thought of this. "so what then?"

"i'll talk to the colonists. i'll tell them that i'm safe, and i'll tell them that all of you are innocent. i can explain that what the press has been releasing so far is only one side of the story and it's the wrong side to boot."

"so how does maxwell come into this?" heero stopped short and looked at the ceiling. he didn't want to be thinking about duo right now, not while in bed with his wife, not with her arm draped over him. "i mean, how are you going to get him to do it?"

she shrugged and flopped back on her pillow. "i can talk to him, if you want," she said. "i'll let him know what i think."

heero wasn't certain that was a good idea. he'd seen how duo had reacted to everyone else who wanted to talk. even heero himself had been met with a somewhat rude welcome when he'd gone in, and heero hadn't even required a response.

"he said he was going to lead the charge," relena continued thoughtfully. "and from the way all of you talk, there isn't a lot that's going to change his mind." she paused and rolled to the side again, her head propped on her hand. "he's going to go out anyway, right?"

"that's what it seems like."

"look at it this way. if you or i tell the colonists to fight, they're never going to see our faces out there, not in the real world. if we go that route we're just another pair of talking heads with personal interests in mind. but if duo tells them to fight, they'll see him out there. they'll see him on the front lines. if war is unavoidable at this point—and it may just be unavoidable—doesn't it make sense for the people to have someone real to rally behind?"

heero eyed relena appraisingly. everything she had just said would have made perfect sense coming from a war-minded person. but from her, the staunch pacifist she was, the words had been strangely fluid. he wondered for a moment if she'd been talking with her

other, but there could be no way. heero had been at relena's side since before the

iefing, and she and zechs had barely shared pleasantries in the last twenty-four hours.

"where's all this coming from?" heero asked at last.

relena shrugged and sat upright. "i'm just trying to do what makes the most sense," she said. "i've been around for too much conflict to really believe that it's inevitable. humans fight. it's in our nature. and while we can do everything in our power to stop fights from happening, i think we've got a duty to engage when it's called for."

"that's not how pacifism works."

"no, it's not," relena conceded. "but i'm not trying to be a pacifist here. i'm trying to be a pragmatist."

heero watched, impressed, as relena rose from the bed and dressed. a feeling of pride swelled in his chest. perhaps his bullheaded wife was loosening her iron hold on pacifistic thought.

"i'll talk to him after

eakfast," she said, tying her hair back. "i don't want you to worry about it." she came around to his side of the bed, bent low, and pecked him on the forehead. "you need to sleep, not to worry. you're still injured, you know, and as exhausted as you were last night i can't imagine how you managed to stay awake."

"it's a gift."

relena cast him a wry smile as she exited the room.

ф

duo had been single-minded since the moment he exited the conference room. he'd returned immediately to the hangar where he began assembling the mobile suit he'd designed from the ground up. at any other point he may have been daunted by the enormity of the task, but this was not the first time he'd built a suit from scratch. every one of the last seven builds in which he'd participated had come from designs of his own making. the only difference between then and now was that duo was working alone, and if he was truthful with himself he did not mind the solitude. he didn't even think it strange.

he'd decided to build around the skeleton of the detonated suit, the suit he'd built with heero, howard, and sally prior to blowing up the colony. as with all prototype machines, he'd drafted it with himself in mind, so the weighting and proportions felt comfortable and familiar every time. that suit's body paneling had been entirely removed in the wake of the colony, the parts discarded or salvaged in the month following its destruction, so building on top of its framework would be as simple as constructing a mobile suit could be. duo had already built one of the feet—a simple part in itself—but the progress was reassuring, and seeing a piece of the machine complete bolstered duo's spirit and drove him to continue.

duo needed that drive now more than ever. already fatigued from his prior salvages, duo's stamina was low, and he knew that without days of rest and proper nutrition he would never be able to work to full capacity. still, he reckoned that continuous work at eighty percent was better than several days at zero, so he persevered. his body would tell him in no uncertain terms when he had to rest, even if it meant collapsing on the spot. duo promised himself that he'd get back to the hangar no matter what, even if sally or quatre tried to stuff him in a bed. he doubted that would happen, though. the only person who'd entered the hangar since heero's

iefing had been howard, and duo had proceeded to offend him so thoroughly that he'd not since returned.

ignoring howard had been the most difficult thing duo had done since putting hilde in stasis. the old man had looked so downcast, so utterly concerned, that when duo initially cast eyes on him his first instinct was to drop the work and go talk. it had taken every ounce of his resolve to turn his attention back to the mobile suit and remain aloof to howard's presence. worse, howard had started talking even in the silence, practically begging duo to come out of the hangar and exchange words like a rational person. howard had said so many things that struck too close to home: you're acting insane and this isn't who you are. howard had asked if duo even knew what he was getting into. it wasn't until howard invoked sister helen's name that duo snapped back at him. duo remembered that exchange more clearly than any other, and he felt ashamed by it. howard had asked him what helen would've thought of his propagation of war, and in the heat of the moment duo had growled so low that he scarcely recognized his own voice: "what the hell could you possibly know about that?"

he'd spat the words like a curse, and howard had backed off immediately, silent as death. duo could remember the look on howard's face, a look of deepest hurt, a look of utter betrayal. but somewhere behind those usually understanding eyes had been concern and worry and genuine fear. of all the people aboard the peacemillion, duo had not yet scared howard away, but it seemed that such a visceral response to howard's genuine attempt at conversation had done the trick.