The door to the safe house hangar shut with an audible boom, ten times as loud as the average garage door. Five large mobile suits stood there, silent. But the silence was soon broken by the opening of a black, ominous-looking mech’s cockpit. Its pilot, Duo Maxwell, braid and all, climbed out and let out a stream of curses and complaints.

          “ Aw hell…That was probably the worst mission EVER!!! Why me??? Why is it always me?? Can’t they give a guy a break once in a while???” He stretched, analyzing the poor condition his sore body was, and turned to his equally battered mobile suit. Cursing again, he left the extensive repairs for later and waited for his the rest of his comrades to come out.

          Next, was Shenlong’s pilot, Chang Wufei, who jumped down and looked about,

          “ Injustice!!!! My Nataku…..” He had obviously caught sight of his dear mobile suit, in a wreck. And otherwise, the Chinese pilot was fine.

          Meanwhile, the fair-haired pilot of Sandrock sat utterly still in its cockpit, eyes wide, as he listened to a voice and concentrated on a pain. It was a voice and feeling that seemed to come from his uchuu no koroko…..

          hurts…pain…go away… Quatre took a deep breath and calmed down, to find out where the voice came from. But something else interrupted him…or rather, someone else.

          “ Quatre? Are you alright in there?” It was Trowa’s cool, calm voice, hinted with concern.

          “ Hai. Sorry to worry you,” Quatre replied and stepped out of the cockpit. He brushed off his clothing and looked around. He saw Trowa standing in front of him, Duo lingering around Deathscythe, Wufei running over every inch of his precious Nataku, but no Heero. In fact, Wing Zero had not moved since they had brought the mobile suits in. Perhaps it was Heero’s voice and pain that he had felt!

          But the seemingly still and unmoving Wing Zero was indeed active inside. An eerie yellow light bathed its silent and bleeding pilot, as it portrayed images to him.

          “ Stop it, Zero…” Heero’s strong voice commanded the mobile suit, while just the same, watching the images with fascination. As if saying that it was finished, the suits’ eyes flashed bright green for a minute, then opened its cockpit.

          Quatre stared as Heero jumped down, and walked calmly towards them. Then, his gaze shifted to the color of bright red: blood….. It was trickling down Heero’s limp right arm from a long jagged gash and down to the floor.

          “ Heero! Are you okay??!!

          In response, Heero turned his dead, emotionless eyes upon Quatre,

          “ Hn. Its nothing.” Sure his arm was throbbing with pain, but it could wait till later. Besides, he had mission reports to do. Heero continued walking and exited the hangar.

          Duo’s amethyst eyes followed Heero all the way to the door. Then, they narrowed in anger,

          ‘ That baka! Never once had he cared about himself! Its always the “mission”…’ With that, Duo ran after Heero, long braid trailing after him.

            By the time Duo got to his and Heero’s room, the Wing pilot was already sitting at the desk and typing away on his laptop. Duo snorted. Heero hadn’t even taken time to change before starting on the mission reports. But his features softened as he gazed at the gash the stoic pilot had running down his arm. He walked up towards Heero and spoke to him from behind,

          “ You should really look at that, Heero.”

          Heero’s eyes flicked towards him for a moment, but soon returned to the monitor, still typing as fast as he could.

          “ I’ll look at it after I’m done with these,” he stated. Duo sighed. All that he had done to soften his partner’s heart had done no good… It was always the same. No matter how much he cared for Heero and despite his efforts, the other boy had never shown one act of kindness towards him.

          So, Duo went and sat on his bed, waiting for Heero to finish.

          “ Quatre, what’s wrong?” Quatre looked up at the taller boy walking beside him to their room.

          “  Its nothing, Trowa. I just had a weird feeling about Heero back there,” he replied. Trowa looked at him in question.

          “ Oh? Do you think its anything to be worried about?”

          Quatre sighed tiredly,

          “ I don’t exactly know. I’ll have to sleep on it,” he said as he approached his bed. “ Good night Trowa.”

          “ Good night Quatre.”

          Heero looked over his back for a minute, then continued typing.

          ‘ Why is he still awake? He could be asleep by now? What exactly is he doing? Could he be waiting for me?……no way.” He dismissed the thought and finished off the last details to this mission reports. With a click, he sent them directly to Dr. J.

          “ You’re done then?” It was Duo’s voice.

          “ Hai,” Heero replied tersely and walked over to his bed. Stripping himself of his green tank top, he laid down and let out a sigh.

          “ Heero… You have got to bandage that arm,” Duo reminded him from across the room.

          Letting out a slight growl of annoyance, Heero leaned over and got out the med-kit under his bed. He took out some antiseptic and gauze, then began to look at it. Frowning, he tried to twist his arm to see the wound properly…but could not. He then heard Duo walking over to him,

          “ Let me help. Please, Heero.”

          Heero considered this.

          “ Hn.” He accepted Duo and held his arm out towards him. Duo let out a small smile and got to work. He peered into the wound, and wrinkled his face in disgust, seeing that it was deep.

          “ Heero, you have to be more careful with yourself, ya know. I mean, its bleeding and there’s a piece of metal in it-huh? Metal??” He immediately stopped his rambling when he saw the glint of metal deep in Heero’s skin. Duo got out a probe and poked at the hard, substance.

          “ What is this doing in here?” He wondered aloud.

          Heero frowned and watched as Duo poked around. Suddenly, a jolt of feeling, similar to when you hit your funny bone, ran up and down his arm. He wiggled his fingers and looked at his arm in curiosity.

          “ What did you do?” he asked Duo.

          Duo gulped and gave Heero a strange look,

          “ Um, Heero? I just tried to get that piece of metal out….. And it didn’t budge….”

          “ And?”

          “ Heero, I think that metal is attached to your arm….”