They were state of the art in every way - the beautiful silver-gray metal
of the Titan Tomcat IV fighter plane glimmered in the pale purple light of dawn
as the sun began to peek over the horizon.
Heero ran a hand over the sleek surface near the cockpit – so similar and
yet so unlike his gundam.
There’s no place in this new world of peace for weapons, he
thought bitterly. Until someone
realizes how much money is to be made from manufacturing weapons, maintaining
weapons, and advancing new weapons.
Even Quatre was no exception.
No, he hadn’t built them, but he sold the metal, the base materials, the
resources to the company knowing full well what they would do with them. It was only luck that had caused Boyd
Aeronautical to go belly-up before paying the Winner heir, and that the
Maguanacs were not so forgiving as to not repossess the goods.
Heero had almost laughed when
he hacked the warehouse database and found five pristine fighter planes sitting
in storage, just begging to wreak havoc and destruction. It had taken no time at all to give them
a thorough check over, and run the necessary test flights before loading them up
on the massive shuttle the four battle hardened soldiers took to Earth. Quatre had agreed to let them have
whatever they needed, but couldn’t reconcile his conscience to go with
them. He believed that they should
wait and see how the legal battle turned out. Heero sneered at the optimism and
naiveté of such an idea.
A heavy hand clamped down on
his shoulder and he turned to face his former enemy, now comrade on this grave
mission that stirred Earth’s fiercest warriors out from under their welcome
blankets of peace.
“Promise me you’ll take care
of her. I can live with never
seeing her again as long as I know she’s safe.”
Heero nodded and met his
sober gaze. “I
will.”
The hand was lifted from his
back and Heero saw platinum blonde hair whip around as the older man walked
away, towards his own craft. He was
already dressed in his black flight suit, and under the crook of his arm he
carried the vengeful mask of Zechs Marquise once again.
*
*
*
*
*
*
Heero reached up to flip the
switch to the air controls and then went back to running down the
checklist. He paid extra attention
to his communications link as it was the key to Operation Decoy. Tap tap tap, the information he needed
appeared onscreen – the wiretaps were in place and appeared to be functioning
normally. He should be able to
seize control of all comlinks leading from the Cromwell base using the computer
he had installed especially for the mission.
Trowa pressed the green
button down and heard the engines roar to life. He took a deep breath and
worked to mentally prepare himself for his part in this very precisely planned
operation. He and Heero had worked out all the details with some input from
Zechs, but when it came down to it, Operation Breakout rested on his shoulders
alone. He bowed his head
and said a silent prayer to a God he wasn’t convinced existed.
Suddenly a shrill beeping
sound interrupted his meditation and he fumbled for his pager. It’s Catherine, she’s uploaded
something to the server. Worry
creased his face in fine lines about his eyes and mouth. I hope that she’s all
right.
Duo paused briefly to listen
to the mechanical thunder of the engines in the hangar before donning his helmet
and programming the first part of the flight course into the plane’s navigation
system. “Warning, adjust altitude,”
it screamed at him in bold red letters. He entered the override command
and with a last warning blink, it accepted the flight path, with an altitude
setting far below what was considered safe or even sane. But they had to stay low, below 1000
feet, so as to avoid detection by radar devices. Operations Decoy and Break Out relied
heavily on the element of surprise being on their side. An arrogant smirk appeared on his lips,
Stealth operations – my specialty.
36% chance of success might as well be 100. We’re on our way,
Relena…
Milliardo lifted the mask to
stare into its empty, hollow eyes – the eyes of man bent solely on revenge. It had served him well all those years
he had sought to avenge the deaths of his family at the hands of the
Alliance. He once foolishly
believed that he could live in peace like the rest of the universe and never
again have to wear the cold metallic prison of vengeance around his heart and
obscuring his face. Relena, I
swore I’d protect you, my dear sister…
Without another thought, he
settled it on the crown of his silken hair, his head bowed with the weight of a
responsibility greater than himself.
Slowly, he raised his regal head, the familiar pain and determination
flashing in his ice blue eyes hidden from the world beneath his mask. She wears the crown of peace, and I
must wear the one of death…
Heero’s icy monotone
crackled in over the comlink device.
“T minus three minutes and twenty-two seconds ‘til takeoff. 03 will go first, Zechs will follow,
then 02. I’ll bring up the
rear. Flight paths have been
programmed into the navigation system at an altitude not greater than 900
feet. Keep your eyes open for subs
and enemy aircraft. Zechs must
reach Hidelburg completely undetected in order for Operation Decoy to
succeed.”
Trowa’s face blinked
onscreen, green eyes glittering in the electric light as he seemed to look
through the panel at Heero himself.
“The penalty for a failed mission is death,” he said in a voice that was
eerily quiet.
Heero scowled fiercely at the
image. “Just bring her back,” he replied coldly. He had no intention of killing
anyone.
He wasn’t supposed to have to
anymore.
Trowa’s hand came up in a smart motion, and rested on his forehead in salute. “Understood,” he said in a clipped tone, like a soldier given an order by a commanding officer.
He held Heero’s gaze a
moment longer through the wonders of technology, and in the depths of the
turbulent sapphire eyes staring back at him, Trowa could see the question, and
the fear.
I’ll fight for her, Heero, if it costs me my life. But I do not envy the one you will be fighting the rest of yours.
Today is not a good day
to die.
*
*
*
*
*
*
The powerful engines sang in
deadly harmony as the four men prepared for takeoff into an unknown future. Trowa finished his last inspection of
the instruments and double-checked his flight path directly to Preventer
headquarters in Luxembourg, again at an altitude below 1000 feet. He placed the helmet onto his head and
gave the appropriate hand signal to Heero before grabbing the thruster bar and
easing it forward. The pitch of the
engine changed and the Tomcat started forward slowly. He drove it into position on
the abandoned runway of an old Oz base that the men had commandeered for the
mission. Then with a last
deep breath and a nervous tug at the collar on his old Preventer uniform, he
pushed the bar to tip the engines into high gear and shot down the stretch of
concrete at amazing speed before launching into the brightening sky to the
east.
The other three men took off
in quick succession, and the four conspirators rocketed expertly through the air
towards their destinations, Trowa and Zechs in the lead, Duo and Heero following
behind, flying in loose formation.
“Trowa, I’m counting on you,” Heero said quietly just before the former Heavyarms pilot reached the breakoff point, his sleek fighter falling out of formation and turning at a thirty degree angle as it rocketed off towards Luxembourg and Preventer Headquarters. His friend’s words echoed in his mind, The penalty for a failed mission is death. “We cannot fail. It is not our own death that will be the penalty if we don’t succeed.”
His train of thought was interrupted suddenly by a loud beeping noise coming from his navigation system. They had reached the first checkpoint over the Western European airspace – somewhere over what had once been Italy. His voice crackled over the comlink as he put his fighter on autopilot in order to begin remote hacking the Cromwell base’s master communications controls. “Radio silence commencing. You know what to do,” he said in a commanding tone, then immediately set to work cracking the necessary codes and bypassing encryptions to seize control of the security cameras on base. After a few more minutes, the picture of the main structure appeared on his computer screen.
Plink plink plink. Windows with images from each camera feed quickly opened in succession, overlapping one another as the desktop on his monitor was flooded with pictures. First objective achieved. He thought grimly, but it brought no cleansing relief to the anxiety in the pit of his stomach. He looked up from the active matrix screen and took the flight controls back as the mechanical wonder continued to slice through the smoggy atmosphere at breakneck speed towards its destination. Up ahead, Heero saw Zechs’s fighter fall out and break hard to the right, leaving the telltale white streak behind in the sky. Second checkpoint acquired. Mission proceeding, he told himself and cut back on his speed. He and Duo were coming up on Cromwell airspace, and they couldn’t reach that point too soon. Timing for this part of the plan was of the essence.
* * * * * *
Mission control
Luxembourg
Preventer Headquarters
The communications officer blinked at the anomaly and gave the unit a ‘friendly’ tap, but the light would not come back on. He figured it was just a burnt out bulb, or shorted fuse, but his job was to check to make sure everything was all right. He pulled on his headphones and tried to contact the Cromwell military installation located in the center of the Western European Region. “Cromwell, we’ve lost contact, come in.” There was no response. He tried again. “Cromwell, come in, Cromwell.” But there was still no answer. Fighting down the feeling of panic that ran through his veins, the junior officer punched a few buttons trying to bring up the security camera feeds. It took a few moments, the connection seemed sluggish, but finally, the live feed of the main building appeared on screen. Everything looked quiet and normal, which brought a calming feeling of relief. He needed to check all the cameras, though, and see if he couldn’t find out why radio contact had been lost. He knew he would also have to report the outage to the colonel. Taking a deep breath, he set about his duties.
Hidelburg Airspace
West European Region
Unmanned former Alliance base
Zechs swooped down, surveying the old relic of a military base once in a wide arc around its perimeter. It was abandoned, left over from the former Alliance military, and untouched for several years. Its twin, the Cromwell military installation, built by the Earth Sphere Unified Nation in AC 198 lay not even 100 miles away. And if the other members of his team were in proper position, then it was about to bear witness to a most interesting battle.
Zechs checked the clock on the navigation system. Two minutes and twenty-two seconds, he thought grimly, and turned the fighter around to make another wide pass around the base. He flicked a few switches and watched the greenish glow of the artillery control panel come to life.
One minute and fifty-three seconds, he continued the countdown, as he selected the Geiger-one missiles, and felt the panels open in the underside of the wing. Mean looking streamlined shells dropped down, appearing to dangle from the either side of the metallic bird, like prey caught in the merciless talons of the predator.
One minute and sixteen seconds. The red light came on, indicating that the system was checking the missiles for operability. It quickly changed to green, indicating the instruments of destruction were armed and all was ready.
Forty-seven seconds. Zechs flipped open the top on the joystick-like flight control, gaining access to the firing button. He placed his gloved thumb on top of it, as he flicked his wrist to make the last adjustment in flight path, shoved the throttle forward, and dipped the nose of his plane to make a viciously fast run at the main building on the Hidelburg base. He had to make this look good, but it was Yuy’s job to cross the signals of the security cameras and make it appear as though he was attacking the manned base.
Five, four, three, two,
one… He pressed his thumb into the red plastic and released the missiles,
while pulling up on the controls to miss the top of the building. It erupted underneath him in a cloud of
billowing white smoke. Zechs
changed course, making a wide arc in the sky in order to get back into position
and do it all again. Here we
are, Preventers. Come get
us.
Mission control
Luxembourg
Preventer Headquarters
The junior communications officer finished checking through most of the security camera live feeds coming from the Cromwell base, then made the call to Colonel Une.
“Colonel, we seem to have lost radio contact with Cromwell. I have done a thorough check of all security camera feeds, and everything appears to be quiet. Perhaps it is a malfunction of some sort on their end.”
Lady Une frowned at her officer. She didn’t like the sound of that. If the Cromwell base had been having problems with their main control system, there should be some back up battery-powered radios or some other way of contacting Preventer Headquarters to apprise them of the situation. “You’ve tried calling?”
“Affirmative. We can not get through on any lines.”
“Keep watching the security cameras for now. I’m on my way.”
“Yes, Colonel,” he replied and terminated the connection. With a slight yawn, he switched back to the feed of the main building. Everything looked so quiet, he wondered if anyone was up and about. He was about to flip to the next feed when a strange shadow appeared on the face of the stone structure. The shadow loomed larger and separated, becoming two distinct shapes. His jaw dropped in horror as he helplessly watched missiles materialize from amidst the dark shapes just an instant before the large stone and steel building exploded in a fiery cloud of dust and debris. Without thinking, he stood up and cried out. “Oh my God!” as he flew into a panicked flurry of activity trying to call the Colonel again.
Lady Une appeared annoyed at the interruption, but annoyance was quickly replaced by an ice-cold feeling of dread as she took in the look on her officer’s face. The pale, shocked young man finally managed to stutter out.
“C-c-colonel. Cromwell base….Cromwell base is under attack!”