Janus-Faced

by AKA Anonymous

See part 1 for warnings, etc.

Feedback to: theanonymous12000@yahoo.com

Chapter Two

The cell, in size and shape, was like many others Heero had seen or been held in during his life. Smooth, gray concrete walls and floors, a door that looked like solid steel, and the itch on the back of his neck like someone was watching--which was very likely. However, the bareness of the cell went beyond that of a normal jail. No pallet-bunks were bolted to the wall, no holes were cut into the walls for plumbing for water to drink or wash, not even a window in the door for the guards to sneer through. An Isolation Room--only he wasn't alone. He shifted his head, scanning the room and it's other occupants once again.

Heero studied his comrades carefully, mentally updating his opinion of their probability ratings and change of mission perimeters in relation to the group's survival. His mind assessed their injuries and mental state with an unconscious, practiced ease that annoyed him, but also thankfully kept him from focusing totally on the failure of the mission thus far.

He was fighting a losing battle with himself, an internal war that threatened his self-control from the instant he had realized the gravity of their situation. Heero had been trained thoroughly to avoid sloppy work that led to capture. He didn't understand what had gone wrong, save for the possibility they had been betrayed.

It would have had to have been someone very close to them. Even within the Preventors very few people knew of the 'silent' colony. To not only have knowledge of the possible rebellion, but detailed information on the procedures to put down the uprising from the inside...

No one would have known about it but them. The two handcuffed and battered with him and their missing comrade.

That was the battleground for his psyche. In the years following his dehumanizing training from Dr. J by the brutal orders of Dekim Barton he had been able to find a precarious balance between himself and his training. Heero Yuy and the Perfect Soldier had meshed firmly together years before, but the conflicting emotions--a friend, a brother, a loved one, one of his own leading them to this?--was almost too much. He had let the walls of his defenses down and now he was captured. But not beaten.

Heero still held to hope as he allowed his mind to run all possible scenarios for the mole. Who was it?

He shook his head with a frown; all the assumptions and hypotheses he could churn out would only be guesses. What he needed was information. The threat to the peace was his first priority, everything else, even the welfare of his comrades and himself, was secondary.

What was going on here, anyway? No information had been available from the outside, all communications were lost weeks ago, and so their team had gone in blind. Getting in, it turned out, was the easy part.

They had infiltrated the colony through an emergency airlock that had been left to disrepair as the inhabitants fell into hard times. Upon entering their team had found the streets disturbingly empty except for the occasional bum sleeping in the ally ways. Quatre had taken point, guiding the way to what they thought to be the most likely place for the rebels to have set a base: the old government's parliament buildings. Heero followed close behind, ready to cover their path with bullets, should the enemy make an appearance. Wufei and Duo had the rear.

Heero's thoughts backtracked. It was had been surprising when Duo hadn't whined about being the last. The Deathscythe pilot usually demanded a scouting position, but he had seemed almost calmly agreeable to Quatre's plans. Not normal behavior for the braided thief, but in light of Quatre's own fiery determination, Heero had overlooked it.

And they were all Quatre's plans. The Winner heir had more of a tactical mind for groups than any of the others, so they automatically left the work to him. Normally the Sandrock and Heavyarms pilots would have bantered back and forth about the acceptable risks of Quatre's plan, airing out it's difficulties and set backs, then settling on something together, but that hadn't been the case this time.

When the L2 colony had first fallen 'silent'--a Preventor term for a colony whose communications have been cut off in a suspected coup d'etat--immediate action had been taken. In order to gain more information their superiors had sent in their best spy to infiltrate the new faction.

That was the last they had heard of Trowa Barton.

Heero's mind played back their capture in perfect detail; the sudden appearance of men, all dressed as if homeless beggars and hoodlums, the clicks of guns being loaded, the demand for their surrender... Heero's eyes narrowed as the memory progressed to the leader.

It was hate at first sight. He had known in a second that the greasy blonde was the leader of the cause, but how the man fit in with the situation was beyond Heero's grasp for the moment.

What cause was he leading? The men that had surrounded them, though they may have held their weapons well and definitely didn't look afraid to use them, weren't up to the normal standards of an army. He was beginning to believe that they actually were bums. They had no insignia, no means of identifying each other that he could discern- -not that he minded, it would only help in their escape--but how could they have gotten weapons if they didn't have the means for decent clothes? There was too much unknown and that was before he added the renegade Gundam pilot to the equation.

How did the rebels know they were there? A spy. How did they know the betrayer? Unknown. What did they have on a Gundam pilot that would make him turn? Unknown. Who was it?

There was only one person Heero ruled out, 05. Wufei had betrayed them once before, but his methods had been brutally open. And when their differences had been cleared away, the Shelong pilot had attached himself to the Preventors with a loyalty that rivaled only his connections to the other four pilots.

He had given each of them a chance of exacting justice for his actions directly after the Barton Incident, as a sign of repentance and sorrow for his betrayal. Heero had almost laughed at the Chinese when he had handed over a pistol and await the judgement; it was too much like his own methods.

He knew Wufei would die by his own hand before speaking against them again. That left only three possibilities, all of which were far- fetched, but remotely feasible, though hard for Heero to process:

Quarte and Trowa could have been working together with the rebels, for some reason unknown.

Quatre had sold them out for Trowa's benefit--though that was highly unlikely, judging by the Arabian's sense of protection to them all...and the fact that he was trussed up like a turkey at the moment.

Or Duo had given them to the enemy; reason unknown. Location unknown, for that matter. That worried him more than he'd like to admit and, from the dangerous look in Wufei's black eyes, he wasn't alone in his fear.

A groan sounded from his left, 04's head bobbed a bit as he fought for consciousness. "Where are we? Is everyone all right?"

Heero and Wufei flashed their companion similar, reassuring hand signals. The blonde smiled apologetically as he realized they were trying to remain silent. It didn't matter, though.

Whether the enemy guards had heard Quatre or they were on orders to check the prisoners, the solid metal door jerked open, letting a bright beam of light flood into the dim cell. Five men stepped in, guns leveled, and motioned for the pilots to get to their feet. Wufei and Quatre did so only after Heero had.

Even with his shoulder dislocated, one arm sagging lower than the other, Heero raised himself up and faced the rebels with his usual emotionless calm. The last guard produced more chains, which were linked to their handcuffs, down to their feet where ankle-cuffs were added. Lastly, the man grinned as white sacks were held up.

The remaining Gundam pilots stood still as their heads were covered, only shuffling forward as the point of the guard's guns prodded their backs.

~*~*~*~*~

Trowa's eyes had been bound again. He no longer had any sense of day or night, no sounds could penetrate the room's thick walls and no sensations were there to link his sanity to besides the pain that rolled through his body whenever he moved.

The isolation mixed with the on-and-off interrogations was slowly stripping his mind of its bearings, so when he heard the door open, he tensed. When he heard the jingling of chains he cringed, but when he heard the soft tenor voice that had kept his mind intact, he almost lost it.

"Trowa!" The Heavyarms pilot let a moan of despair pass from his lips, not wanting to believe or hope that the voice was real. His mind wanted to believe Quatre was there, but his heart hoped that he wasn't. If he was, he had been captured as well. Trowa didn't have to wait long to find out which was right.

Fingers tore at his blindfold, yanking it off in near desperation and Trowa fought the heaviness of his eyelids as he felt slim fingers stroking his cheek. Even before his eyes could focus, his nose brought him a familiar scent, his ears caught the well known whimpers of distress and his memories of the light touches left no doubt in his mind. "Quatre."

His blood-shot eyes caught a wave of sea-blue concern. The blonde's eyes were filled with unshed tears, the thin eyebrows were lift in worry, but Trowa caught the sharply down turned mouth before Quatre could hide it. Shifting his eyes right and left he saw the same frowns in the eyes of the others.

"Duo," Trowa bowed his head, "what have you done?"

"02?" Heero's tone was harsh. Trowa looked up and saw the 'Perfect Soldier' staring back at him. "Are you sure?"

Quatre paused in his examinations of Trowa's injuries to see the shadow of pain flicker across his features. "Yes. He...he was the one who...interrogated me."

Horror. The word for the looks on Quatre's and Wufei's faces was that of horror. Wufei backed away from them, glancing from Trowa to Heero and back, as if he was trying not to comprehend the statement. The blonde pilot shook his head violently at his partner, the blue- green eyes a wide and unblinking for several silent moments.

"But--but why?"

Trowa shook his head, awakening stiff muscles that bit into his neck like piranhas. "I don't know. He didn't ask for much information, just kept whispering things to me. Nonsense things and accusations sometimes, apologies the next day...he changed..."

The European wavered off for a moment in painful recollection, but his voice returned in full force as he brought his head up to face his comrades. "I think--I think he's gone insane."