For the Good of the Gundams

Chapter 5: Reunions of Old Comrades

(Part 1)

By Spyff92

The prison was darker than he liked, but in his situation, he was able to be very picky about it. Now, all he had to do was wait for the guards to leave the area and ask for Hilde. The guard turned and glared at prisoners, then locked the door behind him. Duo took this opportunity.

"I was wondering if any of you saw a young woman, named Hilde come in here." Some of the men shifted uncomfortably. Others mumbled obscenities.

"Yeah, she was here, but none of us can be given a million dollars to go near that dame." The voice came from the other side of the prison. "She may be in a separate cell, but her tongue is just as dangerous." Duo laughed right out. That sounded like the Hilde he knew.

"Where is she?" he asked. They all refused to say anything, but by the threats Duo was throwing them, one of them finally spoke up.

"They took her to be interrogated." Duo didn't see the big deal; he knew they wouldn't be able to get anything out of her.

"So? What's the big deal?" He saw the men in the cell next to him exchange looks that made him feel very uncomfortable.

"Uh, here, pal, the interrogator is not known to be the nicest guy. Some of the men have come back pretty beaten up. One of them died the other day because of the wounds." Duo felt a sudden jolt as in to what had just been said. Hilde was going to be beaten for her answers and he knew she wouldn't give them. That meant, she was helpless. He had promised that she would never be helpless again, but now, he found that he had broken that promise. He knew what she would be thinking about as she was hit, her father and the days of her childhood.

The pain of his failure hurt so much, he couldn't stand it. He had made a promise and he always managed to keep his promise, despite the odds. He had failed her.

He didn't know how long he sat there until the door to the prisons opened and light flooded the rooms. Duo shadowed his eyes with his hands and saw that someone was returning. They had to be dragged and carried half way there. Duo couldn't stand the way the person sagged like a dead body.

The person was dropped in a cell across from him. They stood there, amazingly, and watched the guards lock the door once again. Then, they walked forward and whispered something to the guard. The guard stiffened and became very angry and started raving.

"You little bitch!" He hit the door with such a force it shook. The prisoner didn't seem the least bit phased. Instead they laughed merrily. The guard growled an obscenity and immediately left. The prisoner stood there for another minute and then suddenly turned and walked to the wall, collapsing in a heap of exhaustion.

By now, Duo knew who it was and crawled over to the bars that kept him in.

"Hi, Duo. Didn't expect to see you here," she whispered with her eyes closed. Duo smiled.

"I see you've made yourself comfortable."

"Of course, I always make myself comfortable. Never been better than right now." Duo heard the weakness in her voice and cursed himself yet again.

"Hey, Filly, who's the guy? You're lover?" asked a guy from the other side of the prison. He said it in a cruel kind of way, but Hilde didn't retaliate. Instead, she spoke very calmly.

"Yes, jackass, he's my lover. The best I've had in years too. Though I'm sure you wouldn't be able to tell the difference if it bit you in the butt." Duo raised his eyebrows. He hadn't heard this side of her before and strangely; he liked it and found it amusing.

"You been hitting on my girl, Jackass?" asked Duo with a sneer. He decided to go along with Hilde's game. The other man on the other side of the prison seemed to be nervous.

"Actually, I did and you know what? She's not that bad when she's really hot." Duo felt an unexplainable anger fill him. He may have not understood it, but he was going to sure as hell act on it.

"Hey, Jackass, you want me to come over there and make you a eunuch?" The man laughed nervously.

"And how are you planning on doing that?" Duo smiled and pulled out of his pocket a needle. It was all he required to pick the lock and casually walk down the rows of prison cells. Men backed up away from him as he passed to the man further down, who was cowering in the corner of his cell. Hilde had a wry look on her lips and she smiled with her eyes in an amused kind of way.

"Jackass, you don't know what you got yourself into," she mumbled with a smile. Duo smiled evilly as he came closer to the bars of the man's prison, which continued to back up into the shadows. He put his face up the bars and the man saw death staring at him.

"Hey, I didn't mean it man. I was just fooling around. Ya' know?"

"Just fooling? Well, from where I was, it sounded pretty serious. Did you have some fun before I came?"

"No, man, I was just jokin' with you. Come on take a joke." The man gave a nervous laugh and stood up to face Duo. He came closer to the bars.

"Yeah, yeah, sure I can take a joke, but I'm not sure about how, Filly? Is that what you called her? Well, I don't think that, Filly, is very happy about the comments you are making. In fact," Duo reached through the bars and grabbed hold of the man's neck and smiled viciously. "I really don't think I liked any of it myself." The man had pure fear in his eyes as he gagged from the death grip on his throat. "Do you understand what I'm saying, man?" He nodded quickly.

"Yes, I know. I know."

"Good, I'll just make sure you know what I'm talking about." Duo pulled back his hand and knocked the man out with one punch. He pulled his hands out of the cell and wiped his hands lightly, as if cleaning a dirty shelf. Then, he turned back around and walked casually back to his cell, with men staring after him. To their surprise, he walked right in and shut it behind him. Hilde was smiling at him from her cell.

"Well, nice touch, Duo." Just then, a guard came running into the cells.

"What's going on here?" He looked and saw the unconscious man lying on the ground of his cell and looked up to everyone else. "Who did this?" All the men were silent, not wanting to end up in the same way as the man Duo had just dealt with. The soldier glanced at all the cells and saw that they were all locked just as before. "I don't want anymore problems. When that man wakes up, tell him that."

After the door shut, Duo turned his gaze to Hilde, who was sitting on the floor of her cell against the wall.

"You doing alright over there, Hilde?" She nodded, but didn't answer. After several moments of silence, she turned and lay down on her side and curled up into a ball. To him, she looked as if she were hurting. He could feel it as well. Finally, he couldn't stand it any longer and he got up and picked the lock once again, then headed for her cell. She lifted her head tiredly as she saw him open the door and she smiled.

"Hey, what are you doing?"

"Just coming to keep you company." Ignoring the strange looks he got from the other prisoners, he turned and sat down next to Hilde. He placed an arm over her shoulder and let her fall asleep, leaning on him. He glared at the other prisoners and they all immediately turned away, acting as if nothing was happening. Smiling, Duo fell asleep once again with Hilde next to him. For some reason, he was completely content with this.

Duo woke up to a loud commotion. The door to Hilde's cell was flying open and he saw one of the soldiers yelling at him. He was instantly awake and standing over Hilde, who was just beginning to wake up. The guard was saying things like; "What are you doing here?' "How did you get out of your cell?' "Get up! Now!' Duo stood calmly and faced the raving soldier. He simply got sick of his yelling and just turned and decked him down.

"Shut up," he mumbled. The guard didn't get up. Duo turned and got a good look at Hilde, with more light coming in and gasped. She was covered in bruises. She smiled weakly and a cut on her lip split open once again and began to bleed. She winced, but started to stand, despite the pain she must have been feeling. Duo shook the image from his mind and concentrated on carrying Hilde out of the prison. He came forward and picked her up and stepped over the guard as he headed out of the cell. The other men begged him to let them out as well, but he just kept going, not acknowledging them at all. He reached the door and hesitated, but then continued with Hilde in his arms. She didn't resist his insistence that she should be carried out of the building.

They easily made their way across the docking base, heading for the planes on Hilde's insistence. Even with her injuries, she still insisted on finishing what she had come there for before. Duo thought she was crazy anyway, but he decided it would be the easiest way to get the place they had last known where the homeless rebels had been. The planes came into sight and Hilde insisted that they split up and prepare to take their way out of the base easily. Duo moved ahead to clear up the path a little and they were soon on the plane, preparing to leave.

"Step away from the controls." The voice came from a soldier and they both turned to find a handgun pointed at them both. Duo and Hilde put up their hands in a signal of surrender and then stepped away from the seats.

"Hey, we just want to leave," Hilde started, but was cut off when the gun was pointed at her.

"Be quiet. I'm taking you in." Duo glared at the soldier.

"I'm afraid you don't have much of a choice of that." Duo spun around and kicked the gun from the man's hand, then grabbed the shocked soldier by the neck and led him to the door and threw him out.

"Hilde, get this thing going!" Hilde was already there, preparing the engines for the run to the rebels. They took off with ease.

Relena watched the sky and saw that it had been a full day and there was a possibility that OZ would find them among the coverage of trees. They wouldn't be able to wait much longer. She didn't know how Duo was planning on getting back, but she knew that he would accomplish his mission to kill Hilde, or bring her back. The reminder saddened her, but she refused to think about it. Besides, they were all expecting this to happen sooner or later. The next morning, they would leave the place, with or without Duo. She knew that it was required of her to make sure that he made it back alive and she knew that he could do that on his own, but she had to make sure.

A small flashing light caught her eye and she recognized the code that was being sent to her through the flashes. It was saying something about coming in soon and preparing for leaving that area. That meant that Duo had figured out a way out and managed to the last plane they required to take the people to his base. She smiled thankfully as the people saw the plane coming. She gave out an order to everyone that the plane was coming to take him or her to a new base. Everyone rushed to their planes and others to their suits so they could transport them to the new base as well. Relena watched as the plane came into better view. It was dark out so the outline of the plane was dim. It landed smoothly on the ground in a clearing and turned off all the engines as the people entered the cargo areas. Relena walked up into the cockpits and saw that two pilot chairs.

"Good job. I'm glad you made it back safely, Duo." His chair turned around and he smiled. "I only wish Hilde could have made it as well." The other chair turned to show Hilde smiling at her with a big grin. Relena felt shock wash over her. Hilde wasn't dead and she was right in front of her very eyes. Her eyes filled with tears and she saw herself rushing forward to give her friend a breathtaking hug.

"I thought you were dead." Hilde smiled warmly and pat her friend's head comfortingly.

"Don't write me off so quickly. I've gotten out of worse jams than that." Relena lifted her head and smiled up at her friend.

"Come on let's go to your base."

"Uh, Relena, there's something I forgot to mention about our base you might want to know." She turned to Duo.

"What is it?"

"Heero's staying there as well." Her face paled considerably.

"That's all right. Does he not want me to come, do you think?"

"No, that's not it, but I just wanted to let you know."

"It's all right. It doesn't matter one way or the other." Hilde threw her friend a worried look. Something was wrong with Relena and she didn't like it one bit.

It took several hours for the planes to get to the base where Hilde, Duo, and Heero resided. Evidently, the base rested under a civilian forest and they all had to unload the people above ground and take them below before OZ found out about any of this. There was much confusion at first, but Relena didn't seem affected by all the movement. She examined the people that were being unloaded from the planes. Her eyes landed on her mother who was getting out of the plane and shading her eyes while examining her surroundings. Relena's heart settled after she saw her mother safely at the base. Her gaze swept even further and saw her cousin directing people towards the base. He spotted her and waved his mobile suit arm and she waved back half-heartedly. Next was her brother who was one side of the chaos and then she saw Noin on the other side. It was then she realized that she hadn't given them the chance to see each other. Noin hadn't even found out yet how Zechs was doing. That was mistake on Relena's part because Noin's eyes were very empty as she gazed over the people.

As she continued to gaze around, she saw Heero standing on a hill farther off in the distance. He was staring at her in a hard look and she felt as if he were staring at her soul instead. Something shook her and she decided to give Heero's lip reading abilities a work out.

"I'm sorry," she mouthed. "I never meant for you to find out. We'll leave soon and you won't have to worry about any of this ever again. You can forget we were ever here." His gaze narrowed. Though she couldn't lip read, herself, she could tell exactly what he said.

"You're not leaving." The stare between the two intensified and neither would give.

"Hey, Relena. We need to talk about our mission." Relena nodded and they began to walk away, talking along the way. Heero's eyes narrowed in frustration and he caught Duo's eye and nodded towards the two girls that were walking away. Duo was confused for a moment, but soon knew what Heero was asking him to do. Immediately, he rushed over to Hilde's side.

"Hilde, I know you're tired and everything, but could you help us direct the people where to go?" Hilde hesitated and glanced at Relena, but finally walked off towards the crowds of people. Relena was very annoyed and looked at Duo with a fiery look.

"What are you doing?" Duo gave her an innocent look.

"I'm just following orders." Relena turned around and glared at where Heero used to be, but he was gone.