Gundam Pirates 7

Gundam Pirates Part 7

"So who is it?"

Miima smirked to herself. In the last month Wufei had been helping Erial learn to talk. Or at least speak better. He hadn't really told his teammates what he had been doing. Miima didn't know why exactly but she didn't really care either. Duo however was dying to know what his teammate was up to. Of course he was still trying to get Trowa to talk and for Quatre to just kiss Trowa and get it over with.

Miima sat down at their table. Wufei was ignoring Duo's question. Miima scanned the room. Fightra was sitting with her trainees across the room. Fightra had decided that Hilde was to stay as far away from Duo as possible. Miima looked back at the braided Feline. He was spending most of his time with Heero. Usually when Miima saw them they would just be sitting in silence. But even she knew there had to be more to it.

"Come on Wufei, who ya been seeing?" Duo asked or rather whined.

"I don't know what you're talking about, Maxwell." Wufei put his spoon down.

"Yeah right. Every night for a month you've been sneaking off somewhere."

"It is none of your concern."

"Must be someone special." Duo grinned.

"Duo," Miima spoke up. "If you upset him I won't save you."

"Do you know who he's seein'?"

"If I did, it wouldn't be my place to tell you."

"You're no fun, Miss Miima." Duo propped his head up on one hand.

"Of course I'm fun, just ask the Alliance Printono." Miima winked at him.

Duo blinked. "The who?"

"Gah! The Printono, the Quada's son."

"You know I never understood the whole Alliance thing. I mean who really is in charge and what not."

Miima closed her eyes. "I thought Fi was going to teach you that."

"Sorry teach but she didn't."

"Okay the Quada is the ruler. On some planets she would be called a queen. Her son is the Printono or a prince."

"So what's a princess?"

"Um... Prisa."

"A King?"

"Ingto. Can I continue now?"

"Yup!" Duo beamed.

"All right when the Alliance first started we elected rulers. Then we just elected families. Which then came to be royalty. However there are laws that state the people may reelect a ruling family. So if an Ingto or Quada are terribly cruel and the people hate them they can voted out and a new family voted in."

"So how long has the current family been in rule?" Quatre asked.

"Well let's see the Quada has been ruling for two hundred years and her father ruled for fifty.... I'd say three hundred years."

"The Quada is how old?" Duo asked.

"She is over two hundred. When our people left the home world we found we did not age like we did on the planet. No one knows why. Though my sister Shama thinks the Four Storms have something to do with. But that's another story and one I can't even begin to tell. Ask Shama."

"So why did the Alliance decide to form this big Alliance?" Wufei asked.

"Well see we knew there was an evil out there. Darkness or more precisely Darkstorm. He stands for all things evil and dark. He took over our planet with his army and then kept going. The Alliance had seen what it did to other planets and finally decided they weren't going to let it happen again. Or at least not without a fight.

"So with each system we came across we found individuals with a trace of Storm energy. We then train them to protect their system and move onto the next one. We set the system up into the Alliance. Plant trained individuals with the Storm energy into the government. This way the system is protected from the inside out."

"So who are the front lines?" Duo asked. Everyone looked at him.

"What?" He looked at Miima. "You don't mean us do you? Oh no, come on Miss Miima, we're kids. We can't do anything like that."

"Hence the training. Duo, all of you have Storm energy in you. You five boys will be the front line. By the time I'm done with you, you'll be able to fight and win."

"No way." Duo shook his head.

"Oh! Would you rather watch your world and this entire system be destroyed by Darkstorm? Because rest assured it will happen without you. We didn't come here to watch this place be destroyed. You will fight and you will win. Now when you boys are done I want you in the training room." Miima stood and walked away.

"What is your problem, Maxwell?" Wufei asked.

"I... I don't want to die." Duo mumbled.

"Miss Miima seems to think that we won't." Quatre said.

~*~

Miima stomped down the hallway and right past a certain short brown haired woman. The woman followed behind Miima, keeping her gray eyes locked onto the back of Miima's head. She was in uniform and her black knee high boots clicked with each step. Her short curly hair bounced along.

She finally came up beside Miima. "Is there a problem?"

Miima jumped; there was only one person who could sneak up one her. Firemind. "No problem at all, boss. Why do you ask?"

"You're stomping. It's not something you do. And then there's the fact that your eyes have the green tint to them. Only happens when you're upset. Means you don't have total control on your powers."

"I hate it when you do that."

"Do what?"

"Spout out how well you know us."

"You're my crew, and my family. I have to know. So what's the problem?"

"You know the Feline?"

"Which, boy or girl?"

"Boy."

"The orphan, Duo? What about him?"

"He doesn't want to fight."

"That's understandable. He's been fighting for his whole life. Now we want him to fight for people that he's been fighting off. I don't want to fight either."

"Firemind!!" Miima gasped. The Child of the Four Storms didn't want to fight. Impossible.

"What?" Firemind raised an eyebrow. "No one wants to fight Miima. We do it because we have to. I myself would much rather be doing something else than fighting. Duo is smart. He'll do what's right. Besides I'm sure Heero will convince him of the same thing." Firemind started to walk away.

Miima followed behind her. "What exactly do you know about Heero?"

"A lot more than you."

"Oh come on Fire, I want to know."

Firemind stopped and looked at Miima. "He's seen a lot of things, Mii. And... and it's hard to explain. But I can tell you he has an awful lot of Storm energy in him. Followed closely by Duo. Mii, just don't worry about it. You can't force them to do anything. They have to want to protect this system."

"Yeah but what if one of Darkstorm's ops gets to one of them?"

"Then I'll take care of it. Mii, have faith. I know that's hard for you, but try okay?"

Miima nodded. "So you want to teach a class?"

"Not really. Why?"

"They have a lot of questions I can't answer. You know classified stuff and all."

"Yes that reminds me. You took them out on Destiny's kid about a month ago. You let them have access to classified information. You shouldn't do that without Note's approval or mine. We have laws you know."

"Ah but since when did pirates follow the laws?"

"Since we started fighting for the universe." Firemind smiled. "I have paperwork to do. And a husband that hasn't seen me in a few days."

"Yeah, where's he been?"

"On tour with Terressa, checking out how the government is folding into the Alliance."

"Sounds like a good plan."

"Yes. I'll be in my quarters if you'll need me. But you won't will you." Firemind narrowed her eyes.

"Of course not." Miima smirked and walked away.

~*~

"Wukay?"

Wufei groaned, Erial was a fast learner but she refused to learn to say Wufei's name correctly. Wufei thought she got a kick out of it. "What is it, Erial?"

"What word?" She pointed to a word in a book she was reading.

Wufei looked at the word. "The word it is 'love'."

"What 'love'?"

Wufei looked at her. If she had been anyone else he may have been upset. But some how Erial had wormed her way into his life. She looked at him with big brown doe like eyes. Her chocolate brown hair hung in waves around her face and down her back.

"Wukay, what love?" She asked again. Her eyes narrowed in annoyance.

"It's a feeling. An emotion."

"Which?"

"It's what you feel for a person. Um someone you'd like to spend all your time with."

"Oh like now, with you."

Wufei blinked. "No." He said quickly.

Erial blinked. "Why?"

"It... that's just the way it is. Why do you ask such silly questions?"

Erial looked at Wufei. His words had hurt and she didn't know why. "Sorry, I go." She got up and left the room. Once she was out of sight, she headed towards the medlaps. She hadn't meant to upset Wufei, in fact she liked to spend her time with him. He had lots of information that she loved to learn about.

Wufei sat in the room and looked at the door. He really hadn't meant to upset Erial. It was just he didn't know how to deal with her. Well that wasn't completely true. He knew how to deal with how he felt about her. He just didn't know how she would react. It's not like she had a lot of dealings with other people.

Wufei slumped down on in his chair. He had a headache. Not to mention Miima had been particularly rough with training that morning. In fact he was sporting a few bruises and cuts. He would have complained but before he opened his mouth Miima had informed them that their enemy would not be kind.

~*~

Duo sat at the window looking out. Night had fallen and everyone was tired. He himself had almost twisted his ankle in training that morning. It really wasn't his fault. He slipped on one of the tentacles that Miima was found of using. Though none of the boys understood why.

The night sky was cloudy and he couldn't see the stars very well. Duo glanced at the other boys. He wondered if they blamed him for the harsh workout they had. After all it was him who said he didn't want to fight. He figured Miima was mad at him and then took out on all of them. He sighed. How did he get himself into this mess? He was sick of fighting that was all he had ever done.

Heero sat on his bed and watched Duo. He knew the braided boy blamed himself for the harsh training. But Heero agreed with Miima. The enemy would be a lot rougher than Miima had been training them. She had only upped the difficultly. He looked at Quatre and Trowa. They were sitting on Quatre's bed. Both of them leaning against the wall and reading from the same book. It was a cute scene. Until you realized they were reading a history book. And they only reason for them both reading at the same time was they were doing homework.

Heero looked back at Duo. If Quatre and Trowa hadn't been there he would have gone over and talked to the neko boy. Heero looked down at his book. History was boring to him. He had already learned most of it. Not to mention the scientist had made sure he had some first hand memories. Or had least to watch some of it happen. He didn't know how they did it. But he watched some of the most important events in history.

The one that stuck out at the moment was the day that the Alliance had come to the system. A huge ship surrounded by smaller ships. There had to have been hundreds of ships. Ships of all sizes and shape. He watched as a small ship that he now know as the M.H. Destiny's kid.

That day a woman that looked like Feline stepped out. He knew now that it was Fightra, and on her left arm was a shield with a flame on it. Beside her was Note, he had a large sword in hand and a gun strapped to his leg. Behind him stood another woman with her hair up in a braid even longer than Duo's. Heero only knew as the Guild. Firemind stood just behind her. Next to Firemind was a woman who whole aura screamed royalty. She had a crown and long cape. In her right hand was a large specter. It was a little shorter than she was.

Heero had been able to watch them from the treaty for the system to join the Alliance and yet they still had a large bit of freedom. Heero closed his book. Why bother when you already know. He got up and walked over to the desk and sat down at his laptop. He was going to have to tell Firemind thank you for getting it for him.

He went in and started hacking into Doctor Blade's med files. Okay so he was bored but he wasn't going to tell anyone that. He couldn't find anything of interest. So he decided to go looking through other files of other people. He had a feeling it was going to be a long night.

"Duo?" Quatre broke the silence.

Duo looked over at him. "Yeah Q?"

"It's not your fault, you know. Miss Miima just thought that now was a good time to up the training."

"Quatre, please don't read my mind. And of course it's my fault. Everything is my fault."

"That's not true!" Quatre stood up. "Duo it was planed for many days. It's just fluke, Duo."

"Yeah, but if I hadn't said anything, she might have waited a day or so."

"Duo, that's a lame reason. Face it you're not to blame so stop blaming yourself. We're all fine. And what would happen...." Quatre stopped and stared at Heero who was standing next to Duo.

"What?" Duo asked. He knew Heero was standing next to him but he didn't know why Quatre had stopped talking. "Q, what's wrong?"

Trowa stood up and stepped next to Quatre. Quatre's eyes had a glassy look to them. Trowa then looked over at the other two boys. Duo stepped over and waved his hand in front of Quatre's face. Nothing happened. Heero had moved but Quatre's was still staring off at the same place.

"What's wrong with him?" Duo asked Trowa. Trowa only looked at Duo blankly.

"Look at whom I'm asking. You don't talk." Duo turned to Heero. "What's wrong with him?" Heero stared at him blankly.

Duo sighed. "Again look at whom I'm talkin' to. You only talk when we're alone." Duo walked over to the wall and hit the com button.

"Yeeesss?" Miima's voice came over.

"Uh... Miss Miima, ma'am um.... well..."

"Spit it out Duo, I don't have all night."

"Uh som'thin's wrong with Quatre."

"You want to tell me exactly what's wrong?"

"He's starin' off into space and his eyes have this glassy look to them."

"Okay, thanks Duo."

The connection was stopped and Duo stared at the wall unit. Why did he have the feeling that he wasn't being told something? He turned back around and saw Trowa still standing next to the blond and Heero had gone back to sit on his bed. Duo hugged himself. Why was it that everyone seemed to know more than him?

A knock came a few minutes later. Duo opened the door. He had expected Miima. But Blade was at the door. She walked in and right up to Quatre. She started taking his vitals and shined a light in his eyes. It took about ten minutes to do that and when she was done she put her stuff away and then looked at Duo.

"How long has he been like this?" She asked, she didn't sound worried.

"A few minutes before you got here."

"Ah, well I wouldn't worry."

"What's wrong with him?"

"Well I'm willing to bet he's having a vision of some sort. Some telepaths do that."

"So he'll be fine?"

Blade looked at Duo and smiled. "I think you're the only Feline I've ever met who worried so much. Yes, he'll be fine. I'm not sure how long he'll be like this but don't worry."

"Thank you, doctor."

"Nah don't worry about it. This is why I'm here. Well that and to scare the shit out of stupid people. It's amazing how much you can get away with when you're a doctor." Blade winked at Duo.

"Well goodnight." She walked out the door.

Duo yawned. It had been thirty minutes since Quatre went into his trance. Trowa sat on his bed and watched Quatre intently. Duo smiled, everyday Trowa seemed to become more and more part of the group. He was sure Quatre had a hand in that. Duo flopped back on his bed, he was tired. It had been a long day and now he just wanted to sleep. He pulled his blanket up around him and looked at Quatre. What a day.

Heero looked over and saw Duo was sleep. He couldn't blame Duo for wanting sleep. He himself was barely able to keep his eyes open. Heero laid back and closed his eyes. He felt like remembering tonight. He wondered if anyone else could decide what they wanted to dream about. Somehow he didn't think they could. Before drifting into sleep Heero heard Wufei come in.

Wufei looked around the room. Quatre was standing looking of into space and Trowa was sitting on his watching him. Heero and Duo had gone to sleep. There was no sense in asking Trowa what Quatre was doing so he said nothing. He went to his bed and fell on it.

He had just spent the last two hours looking for Erial. When he did find her she was talking with Dr. Blade and her sister Gaysie. Both of who glared at him. He did however manage to apologize to her. And then Blade yelled him at. One thing for sure the next time he can't explain a word properly to Erial he was going to send her to Gaysie. With a sigh he closed his eyes and went to sleep.

~*~

Out Lining Outpost 12

"Sir, we have a problem." Warning alarms began to sound.

"What do you mean 'we have a problem'?" The general walked up behind the first man.

"We have bogies coming in." He answered.

"From where?" The general leaned over to look at the screen.

"From outside the system, sir."

"Who are they?"

"I don't know sir. They ships aren't registered on file."

"That's impossible." The general gasped. "Inform the Alliance headquarters. Tell them what we found."

"Yes, sir. Message sent sir. But I don't know if it got through."

"What do you mean?"