Surviving Death

This is the last one for now. The next one should be up within the week. Review with any questions.

~*~

Quatre could feel the waves of anguish pour off the Citizen girl as they turned away from her brother and raced off, twisting through the streets. His empathic heart ached in reflection. Despite the threat to his life, Quatre wasn’t unduly worried. He could feel no true malice from either of the Citizens and knew he would not be mistreated if he co-operated.

Besides, if he attempted to jump off the bike now, the Winner Prince would end up as a smear on the pavement.

Was it just him, or was the Fanta going even faster than it had been? Quatre lifted his head slightly, trying to get a look at the girl. Her crimson goggles were back up, and her mouth was drawn in a thin line. There was a mask of ice pulled over her face but Quatre could feel despair well up inside her like a black hole.

They drove for several minutes, taking so many turn Quatre had no idea where they were in the city. Finally, by the time they slowed, the prince’s skin was chapped by the wind and his body wracked with shivers.

Stopping, the girl unzipped her coat, pulling out a small remote from an inside pocket and waving at an unassuming steel wall. A section of the wall slid back and she drove inside, the door sliding closed behind her.

Total darkness swamped them from all sides. There was a shifting and Quatre felt the girl get off the bike and dropped his arms that had been around her. A moment later, a dim light flicked on, flooding the garage with a yellowish light.

It was small garage, fitting the Fanta comfortably with only enough room for another if need be. The walls were lined with tools and mechanic clutter, giving it a very lived-in feeling.

The prince took a good look around, stiffly getting off the Fanta, and realized that he was alone. The girl was gone.

Moments later, a panel on the wall slid back and the girl stepped out. The wall slid back into place behind her, though Quatre caught a glimpse of a gun rack.

The weapons room, he realized, watching the girl as she studied him from behind her goggles.

“Come on,” she said finally, beckoning as she turned back to the wall.

Quatre went, forcing his freezing limbs into action as she girl lifted a pegboard to reveal a hidden number pad. She pulled off a thick glove and her fingers danced over the pad in what Quatre thought to be an automatic gesture. The device beeped quietly (seven digit password, he noted), and another part of the wall slid open.

The Noble followed the Citizen in and the door slid closed behind them just as the light came on.

It was a small place, but well equipped. They were in what looked like the living room that opened into a small kitchen straight ahead. There was a metallic, sliding door to his left that he was sure led to that weapons’ storage and an old fashioned door (with hinges) to his right, which would probably be the bedroom.

Everything (besides the weapons’ room door) was pre-war. It was like being in a history textbook. The rooms were smaller than what the norm had been, but it was all the same non-techno style. Nothing looked automatic. Even the kitchen was old fashioned, with a breakfast bar partially separating it from the living room.

He must have looked pretty awed because the girl spoke up after a glance at his expression.

“You probably don’t know how to work half this stuff, do you?” she asked, sounding partially curious and partially mocking.

“Er, no. I was told that these kinds of appliances didn’t exist anymore,” Quatre replied after a moment, watching her make her way to the kitchen and shedding her snow gear as she went.

Her goggles, amazingly, landed on the bedroom door’s knob without her even looking in that direction. She shimmied out of her snow leggings easily, throwing them over the back of the vivid emerald green couch. Her boots had already been left at the door. Her coat hit Quatre in the face.

“Put that on for a bit. You must be freezing. Take your shoes off at the door there and I’ll find you some slippers.”

The girl pulled open the door to the right as Quatre toed off his shoes, slipping the coat on gratefully and gingerly sitting down on the couch, immediately sinking into the cushions. The entire couch was fuzzy and soft, seemingly swallowing the prince as he leaned back into the warmth.

It was the same vivid but dark green color of the other boy’s goggles, Quatre noticed idly.

The girl re-appeared, tossing her hostage a pair of insanely fluffy slippers in neon orange, and headed into the kitchen, unbraiding her waist-length white hair as she went. Quatre put the slippers on silently, watching the girl vanish behind a cupboard. He had been a little surprised at how he, a prisoner, was being treated, but all thoughts drifted away as a warm and comforting sleep claimed his mind.

He woke to the smell of food and a gentle hand on his shoulder.

“Hey, come on, have something to eat. I need to keep you alive for a little while longer.”

The girl’s voice was calm and comforting, but there was still sadness gnawing at her heart. Quatre’s eyes opened and he found himself staring into deep, wine red eyes. Her white hair was loosely braided over her shoulder and she was offering him a bowl of something orange and faintly smelling of cheese.

The prince dragged himself out of sleep, hiding his surprise at her eye and hair color and numbly taking the bowl. He had heard about people like this. During the war, nuclear weapons had turned the Earth into a toxic wasteland. Although the cold nuclear winter had killed the radiation off very quickly, some people were affected on a genetic level. When they gave birth to the next generation, some of the children were born with unusual features.

Eyes now came in every color imaginable, as did hair. It was very common among the Lower-class, Citizens, and very rare among the Upper-class. If any Nobles did have any unusual features, they hid it to conform to Society.

Still, seeing someone with crimson eyes and bright white hair in real life was a little shocking.

The girl smiled slightly, trying hiding her exhaustion behind amusement.

“I suppose this situation, along with me in general, is rather shocking. My hair is dyed, to help with hiding my identity, though my eyes are real. I was wearing contacts but took them out because I hate wearing them. So relax. Just eat. With any luck, you’ll be out of my hands in a few days.”

Quatre nodded slightly, lifting the spoon and popping some of the stuff in his mouth. His eyes widened slightly.

The girl broke out laughing. She laughed, and laughed, and nearly fell of the couch laughing.

“The look on your face, Winner! Like it was the best thing you’ve ever tasted when you expected it to be awful.”

“It is. I love it. What is it?” Quatre answered honestly, taking another spoonful.

“KD. Kraft Dinner. It’s an easy to make lunch that was very popular pre-war. It’s noodles and powdered cheese sauce. Pretty common among Citizens, but I guess you don’t eat packaged stuff like this very often, Winner,” she responded calmly with a sad smile.

“Please, call me Quatre. You’re very friendly with your hostages,” he said after a moment of uneasy silence.

She shrugged, pulling up her legs so she was sitting cross-legged. “The only person I’m really used to being with is my brother. And you’re rather calm for a hostage yourself, you know.”

Quatre’s heart throbbed with pain as sadness clawed at the girl with the mention of her brother.

“I know you won’t hurt me if I don’t try anything stupid. I can just tell.”

The prince hadn’t ever told anyone about his empathic abilities. It would cloud his name with suspicion and doubt, which he did not at all need on top of his reputation of throwing unusual parties.

The girl smiled back sadly.

“You’re right, I won’t. I’m desperate, not cruel. Just finish your KD and sleep for a while. I’ll wake you up when I have a plan,” she murmured, getting up and heading for the sliding metal door.

Quatre watched her vanish into the weapons’ room with small smile of his own. He could tell she already had a plan. In only took a minute for him to finish the KD, and by then he was getting rather sleepy.

The prince set the empty bowl on the low metal coffee table and stretched out on the very comfortable, brightly colored sofa. He was asleep in minutes.


xXx


The Citizen wouldn’t talk. He wouldn’t say a word. He didn’t respond to questions, accusations, taunts, or even violence. The uni-banged teen was sporting a black eye along with the ugly purple bruise on his temple, a dried cut on his cheekbone and another bruise along his jaw in addition to the 1st degree burn on the back of one hand. He had not uttered a single word.

And most infuriatingly, he was calm.

Heero was watching the prisoner through the one-way mirror with a scowl. Both he and Chang had tried their hand already. The prisoner was cuffed to a metal chair on the other side of a plain steel table. His emerald eyes were clear and untroubled. Heero could tell that his raven black hair was probably dyed, but he could only see that under the bright lighting.

Chang came up behind him wordlessly, handing the stoic Sweeper a cup of coffee: one of the few foods to survive the war.

They didn’t have to rush in any way, because they ran their own show. They had no boss, besides Empire in general. Other Sweepers were the only ones who had the authority to counter anything they did. Of course, to avoid problems, they operated on a ‘first come, first served’ basis. This case was completely under their command. Anything pertaining to or relevant to this case was Heero Yuy and Chang Wufei’s turf.

“I was thinking of calling in Maxwell.”

Chang choked on his coffee.

“You what!?

“I was thinking of calling in Maxwell,” Heero repeated absently, taking a careful sip of his scorching coffee.

“And since when do you call in that fiend unless it’s absolutely necessary?” Chang shot back, recovering from him split-second panic attack.

His reluctance was completely reasonable. Duo Maxwell was a Zero, with Fanta 02 ‘Deathscythe’. He was the only known Zero that the Sweepers couldn’t catch. No cell could hold him and no jail could keep him. He was infuriatingly cheerful and insanely talkative. He was the last person on Earth that Heero would ask for help. But he was the only person on Earth that could help them at all.

Maxwell had an ongoing agreement with the Sweepers – particularity the Yuy-Chang team. He helped them when they needed it, and they didn’t continue to track him down and make life hell. The Citizen was an expert in stealth, infiltration and interrogation. If anyone could crack the silent prisoner, it was him.

Heero was reaching for his cell when it rang.

Chang shot him a dubious look, and Heero glanced at the CallerID. It was listed as ‘Unknown’. That just put the Sweeper on edge. A Sweeper’s cell phone, especially Heero Yuy’s cell phone, always knew who was calling.

He picked up with a terse “Hello?” and switched it to speakerphone.

“Ah, hello there my pretty little wolf.”

Both Sweepers bristled at the sound of the smug, calm girl.

“How did you get my number?” Heero asked sharply, feeling uneasy.

“Well now, I’d explain to you the mechanics of hacking but I’m sure you already them.”

She was unwilling to move the conversation any further, despite being the one who called, so Heero pushed on.

“Do you have Winner with you?”

The girl’s light, airy laugh was nerve grating.

“Of course, of course, what a silly question. He’s my meal ticket, I wouldn’t harm him. I’m afraid he can’t come to the phone right now, but I’ll send you a few second of video to prove that he’s still living.”

Sure enough, not a second later, a picture of the Winner Prince came onscreen. He looked remarkably comfortable, sleeping on a furry bright green couch. The feed lasted just long enough for the Sweepers to see the easy rise and fall of his chest before the screen went blank.

“I think the question should be ‘Do you have my brother?’”

Her voice was darkened with malice and threat, knowing that Sweepers had the legal power to do anything just about everyone.

“Yes,” Heero responded curtly, taking the phone with him and opening the door to the interrogation room.

The boy looked up, face expressionless.

“Your sister’s on the phone,” he said simply, gesturing that it was on speaker phone.

Heero’s words caused the first sign of emotion he had seen on the teen. He frowned sharply.

“Bro, are you alright? What did they do to you?” the girl’s sharp, accusing voice cut the silence.

The boy sighed. “I’m fine, just a few bruises. I guess you won’t take me advice and stop taking so many risks for me?”

“Hell no. Not until you stop risking your life for mine. Alright, Sweeper scum, let’s do this.”

The girl’s voice had hardened, moving onto business. Heero moved back out into the hall with his partner.

“I have the Winner Prince, as you know, and you have my bro, so this calls for a prisoner exchange. Tomorrow at six am, behind the abandoned ship factory. The one with the bull’s-eye painted over the garage. Bring my brother and no one else. I’ll have Winner. See you then.”

The call disconnected abruptly, leaving both Sweepers staring at the cell phone with twin expressions of annoyance.

“Six am. That gives us – just over seven hours,” Chang said after a while, glancing at his watch. “Call Maxwell and get him over here. See what he can pull out of the prisoner before morning. We can go over that call and see if we can to a trace or voice match.”

Heero nodded in agreement, dialing Maxwell’s number as the two Sweepers headed towards the lounge. As always, his answering machine picked up.

“Hey whoever-this-is, this is my work line, so leave me a message if you’ve got a job for me. If you’re trying to get a hold of me personally, use my cell number. If you don’t know my cell number, then I don’t know you enough to talk anything other than business. If you call my cell for a job, I’ll beat you into a bloody pulp. I may or may not ever get back to you, so leave a message after the scream.”

There was a second of silence before a screeching, painful shriek filled and line, followed by more silence.

“Maxwell, this is Yuy, I’ve got a prisoner for you to interrogate. I need you in as soon as you can get here. We’re in south HQ.”

Heero’s message was simple and to the point, and he hung up in time to catch Chang’s grimace.

“That was a new message tone, wasn’t it? I think it was an explosion last time we called,” The Chinese Sweeper asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Hn, he changes it every few weeks.”

The partners drifted into the lounge, shedding their jackets and throwing them over an armchair. Heero was about to ask Chang about what kind of ambush they should use for the prisoner exchange when something popped out from behind the couch. Both Sweepers went for their blasters before recognizing the familiar shit-eating grin.

“Heya Hee-chan, I just got your message. ‘S been a while since you called last.”

There was Duo Maxwell in all his glory, completely draped over the pristine leather sofa. His amethyst eyes flashed in pleasure at having caught both Sweepers completely off guard. The long, very impractical rope-like braid still hung down his back. He was dressed all in black, nearly blending into the couch, and looked right at home in a place it was illegal for him to be.

Chang cursed in Mandarin under his breath, replacing his blaster and growling at the grinning fiend. Heero just grunted, sliding his blaster back into his holster. While they hadn’t completely gotten used to Maxwell appearing when he was least expected, they knew enough to just accept it. Despite his attitude, Maxwell was an asset to the Sweepers.

“How did you get here so fast? Wait, don’t bother answering that. You were obviously here already. So why were you here in the first place?” Chang asked, pulling open the laptop on the coffee table and taking a seat on the other sofa.

Maxwell shrugged and his grin became coy.

“When I found out about the huge Winner party fiasco, I knew you guys were dealing with something different. I wanted a piece of the action and showed up here. I knew you’d need me,” he taunted.

Heero frowned, leaning on the back of the sofa Chang was on.

“How did you hear about that so quickly? We had the place boarded up and the guests were all contained.”

The infamous Maxwell Grin was knowing and taunting at the same time. Heero decided he didn’t like the combination.

“I was there, Hee-chan. Surely you didn’t think I was going to pass up a masquerade party!” he answered with a huff. “I would have thought you’d know me better by now. My question is this: What were you two doing there?”

Heero’s gaze flickered to his partner, who was ignoring them and silently asking for Heero’s cell. He handed it over without a word, trying to remember exactly why they had gone to the party in the first place.

“It was Chang’s idea. He thought we deserved a break.”

Now it was Maxwell’s turn to look surprised.

“Really? Stick-up-his-ass Wuffers managing to drag Perfect-soldier Hee-chan to a party? Well I’ll be damned.”

Heero marveled Maxwell’s ability to fuck up people’s names and use tags they hated in the same sentence. Chang, however, was not impressed.

“Maxwell, if it weren’t illegal to kill Zeroes I’d have killed you the first time you called me ‘Wu-babe’. Too many more bastardizing nicknames and I just might forget that particular law.”

Chang didn’t even look up from the laptop, isolating the call and uploading it. He put a tracer on it first while the voice identification program warmed up.

Maxwell pouted, slapping his hands on his cheeks. “Poor, poor me. Having an angry and revenge-thirsty Wu-babe after my soul is just scaring me to death.”

There was utter silence for a few moments in which neither Heero or Chang responded. Finally, Heero broke the silence.

“Prisoner’s in interrogation room 704. Help yourself. Keep him alive, no limb loss and try not to make a mess. Get whatever you can from him.”

The grin Maxwell left with was not friendly in any respect.

The quiet seemed to echo in the room with Maxwell suddenly gone. The laptop was repeating the phone call several times over top of each other, making it not complete silence. A minute passed and the tracer results came up.

It was from somewhere in the city, but that was as specific as it could get. Someone had done some major scrambling on the call. Chang brought up another voice identification tab and ran the boy’s voice alongside his sister’s. The results from those would take several minutes.

Somewhere in that time, Heero’s cell rang.

“You’re popular today,” Chang muttered, unhooking it and tossing it over his shoulder to the other Sweeper.

Heero checked the CallerID and scowled.

“Maxwell, it is really necessary to call from within the building?” he growled into the phone.

Chang stifled a snicker.

“Well, ‘Ro, I just have a question. You did say interrogation room 704, right?” Maxwell’s curious voice was falsely innocent.

“Hai. Why?” Heero was in no mood to dance around.

“Are you sure he’s in room 704?” It sounded like Maxwell was holding back laughter.

“Of course I am. What’s this all about?” he snapped back, sharing an annoyed glance with Chang.

“Well, you see ‘Ro, interrogation room 704 is empty.”

Heero froze, mind racing. Not even Maxwell had slipped out from Sweeper HQ without tripping the alarm. There was no way the Citizen escaped on his own - breaking out required outside help. Realization hit Heero like an eighteen wheeler.

The girl had been inside the building the entire time! The clip of Winner had been pre-recorded. That was how she had gotten Heero’s number so easily, and it was why her call had been scrambled. No call made inside any Sweeper building was traceable.

But Maxwell was still talking.

“And…there is a very odd note pinned to the door. It reads, and I quote: ‘Wolf boy, go fuck yourself.’ End quote.”

Heero hung up as Maxwell dissolved into laughter.

Tbc, Ja ne!