Scene Six thru Ten: Gundam Wing After Dekim | By : shini0angel Category: Gundam Wing/AC > General Views: 361 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0 |
Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing/AC, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story. |
Lying For A Friend
Mark Twain: A
lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its
shoes.
Sophocles: Truly
to tell lies is not honorable; but when the truth entails tremendous ruin, to
speak dishonorably is pardonable.
Hilde Schbeiker was crammed into the tiny musty room
she called an office going through paperwork and bills for the first half of
the month. Her shoulders, neck and back
were sore from all the leaning over in the dim light to read the words and
figures on the paper. She would have
rather been out in the scrap yard doing manual labor instead of being stuck in
a stuffy office for the entire day. Hilde
knew she had to stay on top of the papers or her pride and joy; her scrap yard
might be shut down.
She was
open nearly all year round, her only vacation taken a week after the Dekim
Barton uprising had been put down so that she could help the Preventers
interrogate the enemy soldiers. She was
good at interrogation, good at getting into people’s heads and confusing them a
bit. OZ had taught her well, she knew
almost all the buttons to push to get someone to crack and spill their guts,
without the use of torture either. There
were very few people that Hilde could not read and that was only because they
had been trained to withstand people like her.
Although over time she would observe things about them that might help
her.
For
example, she knew that Trowa Barton could not be broken. He had been a soldier for too long, he knew
all the tricks and he could block all emotion that he felt. Having him reveal any information would be
near to impossible. People like Trowa
never gave up any ground and they never lost any either, making them
frustrating subjects to question.
Quatre
Raberba Winner on the other hand was polite and diplomatic. He was a dangerous person to interrogate
because he appeared to be the easiest person to crack and read. He might even start to feel sorry for his
interrogator but any information he gives would never be useful and the
interrogator ran the risk of believing that he had actually told them something
helpful. By the time it was discovered
to be useless chatter Quatre would have been released. Failing this he would begin to make the
interrogator doubt that he was even dangerous or he would turn into Trowa and
give nothing.
Chang Wufei
was another person who was a nightmare to interrogate. He was quick to make the interrogator feel
inferior and guilty, as though they were on the wrong side and he was in the
right. He would answer questions but
only in terms of justice, or he managed to confuse the hell out of whoever was
interrogating him. His mind was too
quick, too logical and philosophical.
The polar
opposite had to be Heero Yuy. He was
dangerous to be in the same room with the interrogator. He intimidated his interrogators and ended up
breaking them instead of the other way around.
The interrogator was afraid of Heero after one session.
And Duo
Maxwell, the self proclaimed Shinigami, would only make jokes and harass his
interrogator. He exasperated and annoyed
people until they wanted nothing to do with him. Duo was better than any interrogator known to
man; he could make anyone feel anything he wanted them to feel given enough
time.
Perhaps that made him the most dangerous Gundam Pilot. Hilde had gotten close to knowing him a few
times but every time she got close Duo shut her out fast.
The office phone
rang with a loud beep causing her to yelp in surprise and come crashing out of
her thoughts. Expectantly she reached
for the phone thinking it would be Duo until she remembered at the last minute
that he had told her he was staying on Earth for a few months.
“Hilde
Schbeiker,” She answered automatically.
“Hello Ms.
Schbeiker,” Wufei’s face appeared on the vid-screen a moment later. “This is Preventer Chang Wufei.”
“What can I
do for you Preventer Chang?” Hilde asked her brow furrowing. “And please call me Hilde; Ms. Schbeiker
makes me feel old.”
“Very well,
Hilde,” Wufei made an effort not to say onna.
“This is more of a personal call.
Have you heard from Duo in the past two weeks? Anything at all, a letter or phone call?”
“No I haven’t,”
She frowned, her eyes narrowing.
“Why? Is something wrong, is he
ok?”
“We don’t
know where he is,” Wufei sighed. “He
disappeared about a week ago. Heero also
disappeared the same day but several hours earlier. We think that possibly Duo went to track
Heero down but no one knows for sure. If
you hear anything can you contact me?
You have my numbers still, correct?”
“Yeah, I’ve
got your numbers,” Hilde nodded. “I’ll
be sure to call you if I hear anything from Duo.”
“Thank
you,” Wufei bowed his head slightly.
“You do
realize that if Duo doesn’t want to be found he won’t be,” Hilde informed
him. “He had more connections than
Relena Peacecraft. There’s no records or
anything to track him with, nothing.”
“You mean
he’d be harder to find than Heero?” Wufei frowned.
“Yep that’s
about the size of it,” Hilde shook her head.
“Heero can’t blend in very well with people but Duo can blend in with
anyone. College people, old people, army
people, art people, anyone. Heero will
slip up sometimes but he’ll know it and move on. With Duo, he won’t ever slip up unless it’s
intentional and my guess is that would be to keep people like you guessing what
he’s up to and what he’s doing. Another
thing is that people instinctively want to protect Duo even though he doesn’t
need it and they trust him. It would be
easier to search for Noah’s Ark
than Duo Maxwell.”
“That’s
almost exactly what Quatre said to me this morning,” Wufei told her. “Just contact me right away if you hear
anything, ok?”
“I will but
I think you’re wasting your time,” Hilde warned the Chinese youth.
They said
goodbye and Hilde disconnected the link.
She felt
like she should be worried but she just could not bring herself to be. She had thought that Duo might pull something
like this, go away without telling anyone.
Hilde knew that he was tired, knew that he was fed up with all the pomp
and glory of being a Gundam Pilot.
Truthfully she felt that he deserved his new found freedom, if that is
what he had.
Mechanically
she resumed going through the bills. She
finished just before lunch, something that surprised her since she usually was
never finished until the mid-afternoon.
Doing the bills always made her frustrated and gave her a shorter temper
than normal. She hated math even though
she was pretty good at it. Math
involving money she really hated because usually money was being lost
somewhere, a fact which annoyed her to no end.
Duo had always been better at doing the paperwork than she had.
A knock
came at the door and Jons quickly pushed it open.
Jons was a
big huge man of twenty-eight. He was six
foot three and weighed two hundred and forty pounds. Hilde had hired him about a month back to
replace Duo when he had sold his half of the business to her three months
ago. He was both the foreman and the
security guard. Jons loved the yard so
much that he lived in the two bedroom trailer inside the scrap yard to watch
over it at night. She honestly did not
know what she would do without him.
“What is it
Jons?” She asked with a smile.
“There’s a
visitor to see you,” He said. “Some guy
by the name of Marks. He says that he
knows you from before.”
“Bring him
up,” Hilde smiled, covering her nervousness and confusion. “I’ll see him.”
Jons nodded
and disappeared out the door.spanspan>A few
minutes later he opened the door again and ushered Mr. Marks in, before leaving
and closing the door behind him. Mr.
Marks removed his hat and sunglasses.
Hilde saw the large shining violet eyes and the braid cascading down his
back, a smile on the young man’s lips.
She quickly regained her composure knowing that if Duo was using an
alias there was probably a need for it.
“It’s nice
to see you again Mr. Marks,” Hilde stepped out from behind her to desk to give
him a hug which he returned. “Wufei
called this morning and said that no one knew where you’ve been. I’ll call him back right now and tell him the
good news.”
“No!” Duo
placed his hand possessively over the vid-phone to stop her from calling. “No,” He repeated again, less firmly. “I can’t let you do that Hilde. And it’s Shinigami now, not Duo or Mr.
Marks. You can’t tell Wufei or anyone
else about this little visit. My job
isn’t over Hilde, not by a long shot.”
Hilde gave
him a perplexed look clearly confused by his confession.
“I live in
the Shadows now Hil,” Duo explained gently.
“I’ve been on L2 for a little over a week now and during that time I’ve
been Shinigami, the one everyone’s talking about all over L2.”
“You’re the Shinigami?” Hilde sank down into her
chair, a hand brushing her hair behind her ear in a nervous gesture. “Why?”
“Someone
needs to watch the peace,” He shrugged confidently making her bristle at his
arrogance. “And a few people we might
need to bring back again should things start going to hell again. I’m tied to the Underworld and they’re tied
to me. This is how I chose to live my
life for now, Hilde. I won’t let another
Dekim slip past me if I can help it.”
“What about
your friends?” She asked with a frown.
“I’ll be checking
up on all of you from time to time,” Duo said with a grin but it did little to
reassure her. “But that depends on the
risk and if the person is in ‘hiding’.”
“Some of us
don’t care about the risk to ourselves,” Hilde folded her arms in annoyance at
his assumption. “We know how to handle
the risk.”
“I’m not
talking about risk to you,” Duo sighed shaking his head. “I’m talking about risk to myself and my
operations. There are certain people and
things I’ll be working on that aren’t legal but that need to be done. I’m not prepared to risk the peace. There’s this guy named Jenkins that you
should look into hiring to do your bills and stuff for you Hilde. He’s really good with figures.”
“How good
is he?” She looked up at him knowing that Duo would refuse to argue with her.
“He was my
accountant during the war and this past year,” Duo smiled. “He’s damn good. And if you casually advertise that the Viper
is on your pay roll the thieves will steer clear of this yard. He’s staying at the Hanson Motel a few blocks
from here if you want to look him up.
He’s in number five and then I’ll be able to pass messages to you
easily.”
“What do I
tell Wufei?” She asked. “It can’t be the
truth but is there some cover story you want me to use?”
“Lying is
easy Hilde,” He slipped a hand into a pocket.
“I just don’t like to do it.
Never think that means I can’t, cause I’m damn good at it. Just lie to Wuffie and failing that tell him
I called you but deleted the call log and have a jammer on my frequency. He’ll buy that.”
Duo spun
around and tucked his braid back into his leather coat. He slipped the glasses back on and perched
the hat on his head at a jaunty angle.
He gave her one last smile before walking to the door.
“Stay
safe,” She said as his hand hovered above the door handle.
“You know
me,” Duo grinned back over his shoulder at her.
“I go over all my options. Take
care.”
And then he
was gone again. She knew it was
pointless to get up and look out the doorway.
Sometimes
she really almost hated him. She hated
how he controlled everything that he showed to the world, how he never really
said what you wanted to know but left you thinking he had. She hated his mask that he always wore and
how he took everything onto himself.
Most of all she hated how he could leave and still be so calm about the
fact that he might never come back.
Hilde
understood that he was a soldier though, she was too. Duo was almost always in control. He was a young man who carried the hopes of
most of the people on his shoulders and he did it with a smile. That was something she would not have the
strength for.
She still
felt love for him, though loving him was not easy. She could have loved him if he had wanted her
to but he did not. Every attempt she
made at trying he killed. Every time she
tried to say the words he walked away.
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