Part: 2

Standard Disclaimer about me not owning Gundam Wing or it's characters. They belong to Sunrise, Sotsu and Bandai.

Hilde could tell that someone had been trying to hack into her systems but had so far been unsuccessful. She couldn't deal with that right now though, her new opponent was quite fierce and more than her equal. She swung to the right narrowly avoiding the blade that popped out of Heavy Arms' right arm, and found herself boxed in with the battling Wufei and Heero above her, Heavy Arms in front of her and the damaged but still functional Sandrock behind her. Hilde's eyes strayed to the self-detonation device.

Aya screamed in frustration, "It was a trap! They were waiting for us!" Again she looked at the ship's sensor readouts, hoping the data had changed. The mobile doll units were down to only 20% functioning and dropping. The manned Leos and Taurus's had almost completely been destroyed or captured, and her two Gundams hadn't even come close to the UN headquarters before they were engaged in battle. Aya lowered her head in defeat. They weren't going to win this one. She barked at one of her officers, "Signal the retreat!"

Heero brought Wing Zero's beam saber down heavily on Altron but Wufei brought up his trident in time to block. "You're lost your edge Heero! Your attack time is too slow." Heero's face remained blank, and his voice emotionless at Wufei's taunting, "I haven't lost anything. I'm simply giving you time to come to your senses. It would be a shame to have to kill you." Wing Zero thrustered backward and aimed it's beam cannon at Altron. Suddenly Deathscythe blasted into Wing Zero knocking him backwards and Hilde's face popped up on Wufei's Comm link. "We've received the retreat order. We have to fall back to space to cover the commander's retreat. Wufei growled in frustration but followed Deathscythe's ascent into space, with Wing Zero, Sandrock, and Heavy Arms close behind.

Heero tapped in to the other two pilots, "Quatre you're suit is damaged, fall back. Duo we can't play around with them anymore, the Preventer shuttles will be moving in, it's time to finish this." Duo frowned slightly, barely beating back the wave of emotion that hit him with Heero's words. Much to his surprise it was Quatre who offered Hilde and himself one last chance at salvation. "Heero, Duo has almost completed hacking into Deathscythe and then he can immobilize her without loss of life. I'm not falling back, I'll continue to stall for time." Heero didn't argue with Quatre, instead he opened a vid link to Duo to personally gauge his friend's state of mind, "Can you do this? There is no point in risking Quatre's life if you can't." Duo looked uncertain and his eyes flashed in triumph, "I can do it Heero, just give me a little time." Heero nodded his agreement, "You won't have long. If you aren't successful immediately take her out." Heero terminated the link as he caught up with Wufei.

'She's communicating with Wufei, if I can tap into his systems, I can get to her.' Duo thought desperately, as once again Quatre took Hilde on. This time he took her on full force, with Sandrock damaged, he didn't have much choice. Quatre powered up Sandrock's remaining sickle blade and fired. Deathscythe spun out of the way, but still managed to get the blade lodged into its left arm. Quatre continued his attack with a barrage of missiles. Deathscythe provided Hilde with an instant damage report as she dodged Quatre's attack, "Hmm, left arm down to 60% mobility and the Heavy Arms Gundam doesn't seem to be doing anything." Deathscythe dodged behind Heavy Arms and dislodged the blade.

****

Why are you doing this Wufei? You're not after power, and I can't believe you'd be so interested in colony politics after Sally's death." Wufei didn't pause in his continued attack but his voice lowered dangerously as he growled, "That's because you have no honor, and have become weak. You're so afraid of fighting that you'll call any cease fire a lasting peace." Heero ignored Wufei's taunt, "I know you don't believe that, you're not stupid. This is about Sally. Her death and your sudden dissatisfaction with peace seem too close to be coincidental. I can't imagine how you feel, but this isn't the way. Sally wouldn't want this." Something in Wufei snapped and he screamed, "Leave Sally out of this!", while redoubling his attack. His anger threw him off balance and Heero brought Zero's beam saber down slicing Altron's trident in two. Altron opened fire as Wufei started firing almost erratically. Wing Zero easily dodged all of these attacks. Heero fired Zero's beam cannon and knocked Altron's cannon into space. Finally, disarmed and disabled Altron was still. Wufei was confused, "I've lost but I'm still alive. Heero you coward! Finish me!" Heero's answer was final, "No." Wufei screamed and was about to hit his self detonation device when someone else's screaming grabbed his attention.

***

Duo ignored Heero and Wufei's ongoing conversation and continued his mission. Wufei was either too distracted or didn't care that Duo was breaching his systems. He typed in one last command and let out a howl of victory as "Connection Established" blinked on his screen. His smile vanished as he looked up just in time to see Quatre take Deathscythe's hand thermal weapon head on, knocking Sandrock back into Earth's atmosphere gravity took hold of him. "Quatre!" Duo called out, "I'm OK Duo! You'll have to do the rest!" Duo turned from Sandrock's plummeting form and saw Deathscythe taking off to attack the Preventer shuttles that had arrived to take Aya's ship into custody.

Hilde slashed through the few mobile suits that came towards her and continued her pursuit of the shuttles when Duo made contact. "Hilde stop this! Why are you doing this?"

A part of Hilde's mind that she had thought long dead cried out, 'We have to stop!' It was a weak voice, 'No, we have the mission, nothing is more important.'

Duo watched as Deathscythe showed no signs of slowing down, "Hilde Please! Don't make me do this!"

The voice was growing strength, 'Listen to him, don't you know who that is?' Hilde clenched her jaw as she fought herself and increased her race towards the shuttles, 'No I don't. Shut up!'

Still no reaction from Hilde, and he was too far away to stop her, and Heero was still busy with Wufei. Duo's voice softened, "I can't let you hurt anymore people. I don't know why you're doing this, or what you think you have to prove. Hilde…I'm sorry." Duo keyed in the command to activate Deathscythe's self-detonation device and hit enter. Just then Deathscythe froze and spun around to face him. 'That voice, I know who that is don't I?' Hilde thought. The cockpit opened and a small pilot stepped out upon the hatch. A timid hesitant voice asked, "D..Duo?" Duo pressed himself up against the vid screen and screamed "Hilde! Get out of there!"

***

Wufei took in the scene at a glance and knew he was closest. He fired up Altron's thrusters and pushed Hilde just as a bright light enveloped everything. Duo saw Altron's approach, but a split second later his eyes involuntarily closed as a blinding light burned his eyes. He screamed inarticulately and tears streamed out of his eyes as he turned his head away.

****

When Quatre had told Duo he was OK he hadn't been being heroic, he really thought he was OK, but Sandrock wasn't responding since they had reentered the atmosphere and the earth was flying towards him. "Come on Sandrock, we need to slow down. We can do this. Fire breaking thrusters, come on Sandrock." He couldn't even steer away from land, he was heading towards the earth at incredible speed and who knew what was going to be beneath him when he hit. He was running out of time as desperately he flicked switches and punched buttons, "Come on Sandrock! We can't let it end this way, we have too much to do. I have too much. Come on Sandrock for me! For Cathy!" Sandrock was still showing no response and now Quatre could make out the land formation he was heading for, 'At least it's not heavily populated.' he thought while still trying to pull back and fire the breaking thrusters. Out loud he sighed, "I'm sorry Cathy." Sandrock came back online, but it was too late, land was too close. Quatre did what he could, but he still hit fast and hard. The last thing he saw was the ground rushing up to meet him.

***

Duo's face was coursing with tears, but he wouldn't look up. He fumbled with Heavy Arms' controls, "Hilde, what have you done to us?" He called up the self-detonation commands, "Hilde what did I do to you? I've killed you! I kill everything I touch!" Duo couldn't see and hastily wiped his tears away so he could finish things when Heero contacted him, "Duo." He ignored him, Heero wasn't important now, only one thing was important, but Heero's voice was so insistent as he continued, "Duo, look." Reluctantly Duo looked up. The space in front him was littered with Gundanium scrap, and floating amidst it was a limp lifeless body. Duo gasped, "Heero you bastard, why would I want to see that!" Suddenly he wanted to kill Heero that heartless son of a bitch, but before he could take action Heero continued, "She might be alive Duo, we need to get her out of here." All thoughts of death and killing fled Duo's mind as he headed towards Hilde to pick her up, and hopefully bring her back alive.

Heero watched Duo go after Hilde, but he had finished his work. There was no sign of Wufei, nor did he think there would be. He could pick out the scrap of Altron and Deathscythe intermingled. He recognized the piece of cockpit that floated past him. Wufei was for better or worse, dead.

AN: Hi, I'm almost finished, just one more piece to go. Please send feedback, good, bad and ugly at jaimelynn1978@yahoo.com

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