To Trowa and Middie on the Road . . .
Trowa stopped the truck as Middie got out. He would call the guys back in a second, but this wouldn't be stopped. Middie had been patting his hand in a panic as he was reading on his side of the tablet. While he had been doing that she saw a curious tab called 'recommendations'. She clicked it and a small amount of messages popped out on the side of the screen.
When she got out, he could see more clearly what 'recommendations' was referring to. Trowa got out of the truck and tried to approach her steadily. "Middie." He couldn't tell whether she threw up. She might in a second after he said this, but she couldn't bury things forever. "Did you recognize a recommendation?" He was rewarded with a rock being thrown at him. Not a big rock, just the nearest thing her body could fling to silence him. That wasn't very like her. "We can't waste time here, lives are at stake. We either need to talk this out, or get back in the truck."
She looked appalled at either idea. She turned and faced away. Clearly he was going to have to look at the recommendations again. "I'm going back to the truck to finish giving information. The longer we wait to move, the less chance of success. Be aware of that."
Trowa went back to the truck and started to download information to the phone. They needed to get to that woman with the help needed for Dorothy Catalonia, or Quatre would be sad. As he did that, he looked back at the recommendations. There was something that triggered her in there. He scrolled through it. Was it the sensation it gave? A certain message? It was messages that recommended different ways to embellish death, or different ways for the mothers to suffer and die.
Most were really general, some just said poison or stab, while some were more structured with things like 'In A Mass Burning!'. He scrolled back upwards, studying the area she had probably seen.
He found it and a page associated with it. "Middie." He got back out and went on the side of the truck. She was sitting on the ground with her head half covered up. He went over toward her. This wouldn't be easy, so he did it the best way he could think of. He went to the recommendation he thought triggered her and pointed to it. He saw her react by digging her head away deeper with a slight involuntary squeal. He laid the device down and sat beside her. He heard her crying and he didn't say anything this time. When it was clear she got herself under control, he knew he would have to start it off but this wasn't easy. The recommendations referenced some torture, but then it went and actually gave a page of instructions. He didn't know how far down they had gone in those instructions until Duo had saved her. "Are you going to live?"
She nodded.
Okay, so they didn't finish. "Did they get to the injections?"
She shook her head. No, they didn't get that far.
Trowa thought back to the list. He didn't want to guess where they left off, but just like Duo said, Middie had to share at some point. "Did they brand you?"
"Next." She finally spoke.
Okay then. That made it clear where they left off. "When you are ready, we need to talk." If she wasn't going to talk to Cathy, then she needed to talk to someone.
"Let's just go." She pulled herself off the ground.
"Ignoring this won't make it better," he said as he stood up.
"Nothing makes it better, and you can't tell me anything!" she went off on him. "Look at you, I mean, if anyone needs help, it's the former gundam pilots, okay?! I hardly did much, there's a lot worse off than me!" She started to cry again.
He gave her time. This wouldn't be something solved over night. "Cathy helped me. A lot." More than anyone could ever know. "We have all had someone help us. We've dealt with our own tragedies, in our own ways. Talks with people we trust. Time spent with those we love. Life isn't perfect, no one lives it perfectly, but we can't bottle everything up inside."
"Why do you hardly talk, and when you do, it's like only the most prophetic things come from your mouth?" she asked him offhandedly, trying to change the subject.
"Usually, words aren't how I talk," he answered, not losing his direction.
She was quiet for a little while. "They don't even have a way for me to die yet, and all that's still waiting out there for me if they get me again."
"They won't get you again." He wouldn't let anyone take her again. No one was getting her again. It took so long to retrieve her once when she fell away from his grasp, and he wouldn't let anyone get their hands on her again.
"Talk doesn't have to be with words." She seemed to be thinking about what he said.
"You already know that, you speak with your brushes," Trowa reminded her. "You give your all to the ugliness of the world, and release it out of your grasp to the elements." Yes, now she'd know he followed her. "I can talk, if you want to talk. I can hug, if you want to hug. I can just be here, if you need me to be here."
There. He saw her run into his arms and start to hug him. Hugging wasn't the form of talking he was the best at. Cathy was much better at that form. Eventually, Cathy could probably really help her better.
But he spoke as well as he could by tightening the hug.
Quatre and Wufei's Hiding Spot . . .
Mei-Lin cracked an eye open toward Wufei. "Your phone."
Wufei was quiet.
"It is constantly ringing," she said to him. "It's distracting."
He still didn't answer.
Absolutely ignoring her to meditate, while his phone rang, blocking her from meditating. "I will silence your phone if you don't answer." No answer. She left her spot to look at it. "Someone is urgently trying to find Quatre."
Now, Wufei cracked his eye open.
"Quatre."
Quatre was in his room, working on digging up any link he could find still. He didn't want to bother Wufei or Mei-Lin while they meditated. Wufei was calling for him at the door though and he didn't look well. In fact, something was very wrong. His eyes didn't hold the same stubborn spark in them, whatever he had to say wouldn't be good.
"Trowa got a hold of a tablet by the leader of Revenge of the Lost. The leader Crystalia was his mother."
Quatre heard the words Wufei spoke, picking up several things right away. Trowa's mother was hurting, Trowa was hurting, and Middie was hurting. He heard about Duo being captured and saved, meaning Duo and Hilde had got hurt. Everyone was hurting, everyone, and he knew before he even said it what was coming next.
"There's something wrong with Dorothy Catalonia. The guys are going to get something to help increase her chances." Wufei didn't look positive. "It's not a guarantee, but the sooner they get it, the better the chances."
Quatre didn't answer as he got up and peeked into Dorothy's room. She was asleep.
"I'm sorry, Quatre," Wufei said next to him.
That wasn't a comfort. There was no guarantees for her, no matter where he put her. "Since . . ."
"It sounds like since it was conceived," Wufei said to him. "I know that feeling. Leave if you need to, I will watch Dorothy for you."
Quatre blinked, feeling his eyes begin to water. "No. I. I want to stay near."
"Just give the word, and I'll watch her if you need me to." Wufei was being extra kind as he closed his eyes, gave him the phone, and walked away from the room's door.
Quatre took the phone to look at the data. It was a slow burning virus they gave her. A healthy body could fend it off better, and it usually went away in it's earliest phases if the person was on Earth. There were antibiotics for it. It was curable.
But the longer it stayed unnoticed, and the more stressed the individual had been? Dorothy was pregnant, which was a lot of stress on the body, and she'd been up in the colonies for a little while before they came to Earth. They had been on Earth a good while, so his chances were good there for her. But her being pregnant and going this long without any help? Months?
He noticed she had woken up, and her eyes looked dire. She already knew just by looking at him.
"It's okay," she said. "Remember. It's just a possible future."
He went over toward her. "The key thing is not to stress." He let her see the message, the less she knew, the more stressed she would be. "We got you to Earth really early, and the guys are actually out there and they are getting medicine for you to take. It'll be okay, you can pull through this."
"I have a fair chance. I'm supposed to be dead by month six without treatment." She took a deep breath. "I will do my best to hang on, Quatre. I don't give in easily, and I didn't go through holding a human being for four months to give in half way."
He couldn't help a smile. He moved some of the long hair out of her face. Her health had changed several things about her, including the normal flowing direction of her hair. "Right, Dorothy. It's too soon to throw in the towel. You're going to be okay."
"I hope the medicine doesn't taste too bad, I rather hate icky things." She was trying to distract him, but he could see she was doing that not to worry him. "I hate when people win against me, so I won't let them win. Start thinking up names, Quatre, for a boy. Make them wonderful and elegant, don't be plain. I'll think of names if it's a girl. Star blinding, wonderful names."
No one would win. She wouldn't give in easily.
"I want three good names within the hour and report them back to me," she demanded.
"Yes, Ma'am." She was distracting herself. Making her goal more solid. He left and tried to smile for her.
Goldie Marks Backyard . . .
"Make sure it matches up," Duo instructed Hilde as she took the flowers out of the garden. The lady who lived there played fake of course, so Duo took care of it. He wrapped her up like a hostage and then knocked her out. "All the petals."
"Yep, the same color too," Hilde said back to him. "This is it."
The cure were just some flowers growing out in her flower garden. Treatment was probably the better word, they were just some wild flowers that had special medical properties. Later on, Quatre would be able to even order them or the pills and have them come straight to him if he wanted.
In it's natural state, Quatre would know just what to do. Crush it up and make an herbal tea, three times a day. "I hope we were in time for Quatre."
"I hope so too. I got the roots as well," Hilde said to Duo. "Do you think I got enough soil?"
"Heero's car isn't going to hold a ton of flowers. I think Quatre's good just getting these to crush up, but just in case, it's good to be careful." They basically picked enough with plenty of soil to keep in a bucket, so Quatre could have a couple live specimens to keep on hand. The rest, they toiled straight up. There was plenty in that garden.
"These aren't that rare, I think I planted some," Hilde told Duo. "They didn't grow well."
"Yes, on the colony," he teased her. "With perfect temperatures and no natural weather. I wonder how that happened?"
"Oh, leave me be. They needed extra water," she confessed. "I was distracted."
"Yeah. Even if they did come up, we kind of left the junkyard," he admitted. That whole pregnancy scare definitely didn't do wonders for her flowers. "I think the easier it was to get cured, the more they wanted to make sure she didn't come back to Earth."
"Not in time. Even with these, Duo. I mean, she still has a chance." Hilde tried to stay positive. "The more the body is stressed out, the harder it is, and she's pregnant and hiding from a jail sentence."
"Just gotta hope for the best. She's pretty strong. She made it through the wars intact," Duo reminded her. "Month four isn't the best to give reassurance, but it's far from month six."
"Right. We just need to make sure she gets this as soon as possible. Hopefully she likes tea," Hilde teased.
"Oh yeah. She's going to be drinking it a bunch," Duo agreed. "I have a feeling Quatre will help keep her positive too." If Quatre could hide his anxiety about it all, and just reassure her, maybe it would work out? He went ahead and called up Heero. Heero didn't want to risk staying there with Relena longer than he had to. He was circling around until they were ready. "Hey Mister Eagle, we are ready for you to dock in about five minutes."
Support of the Loss Headquarters
Such a pain. Such a failure.
"Superior?"
They had Hilde. They had one of the mothers. They had a pilot actually yelling finally.
"Superior?"
Superior turned to see a member trying to give her something. She had lied it on the table for her. "Of course. What else is new?" It looked like Gold lost her stupid flowers, which meant the pilots knew about Dorothy. Which of course meant, they had the tablet.
Crystalia must have given her wretched son the tablet. She rubbed her eyes over her face. It was all compromised now. She couldn't send out alerts, she disbanded the group. No one was logging in, all accounts were frozen. The only active members were the thirty little mess ups that blew up the colony.
Not only that, but it would have real video footage of what happened. Everything had been with Crystalia, she was the first leader. All of that private information, all of their secrets had just been handed over! "When we find Chrystalia, we will kill her. We will kill her in a manner that will leave her screaming for her life for hours, knowing she will die. Get new phones. Connect with any old member you can physically, and have them call me with a new phone." They would have to start new attachments, and start the group physically. It would slow down what they could do, but this wasn't over.
Chrystalia would die slow and painfully for what she did, but Superior kept more than her own share of secrets. So the pilots were more aware of what was waiting for them? Fine, they knew. It wouldn't stop it, and they could throw in new twists.
Dorothy was still on the edge of help, there was still a good chance she might die, even if she had the proof she was innocent now. Nothing would change for her.
They would get a hold of Hilde, and they would get her pregnant. Knowing now how much she didn't want that, made it even better and more stressful for Duo Maxwell. They could still go with sepsis as the way she died, or they could change it to how Duo Maxwell's mother got it bad enough to get it in the first place. It would make the hurt constant each day. That might be funner, and more creative.
Right, creativity! Crystalia stifled that. A lot of members only wanted it to hurt as much as it had to, but the more the women hurt, the more it would hurt the pilots. Now, Superior had full reign.
Middie Une seeing what else was waiting for her, and knowing she'd probably die in a very painful way, that only made the results even better. No need to change anything there except the person who was hurting her. She had killed Duo Maxwell's father, but a different substitute could be made.
Relena had proof of her innocence, but Heero would still be keeping his eye on her. Even she didn't share with Crystalia how Relena would die, it wouldn't have anything but 'classified' on it. That was her own.
Mae-Lin wouldn't be hard either. All they had to do was recapture her, impregnate her and then just blow her up. She would change it now with something else several of the women had wanted. Classier plan even, they would choose the bunker area that Wufei Chang had once blown up that was full of soldiers around the first time he came to Earth. That would make it all the more sweet.
Poignant with screams. Each one would have such a sentimental value, that each pilot would want to end their own life afterward. That's what they all craved. Sure, those pilots would sacrifice their life any day in a battle, but no, they wanted it to be from just the act of living. Just knowing their existence did this to these women and unborn children.
Mae-Lin and Middie Une were supposed to be the toughest to create that sensation, but several wanted Middie Une to suffer anyway, so the choice made up for it. But, Mae-Lin. An unknown stranger to Wufei. With her whole colony and clan being taken away in an instant the same way he watched his own? Perhaps it drew them closer together. That's all she could hope for. If it did, then it would be perfect.
Everything would be perfect. Nothing was lost, everything could still happen. Without Crystalia, it could happen even better.
They just needed to get organized. Members would bring in members, and those members would bring in members. They could connect in different places, and they still had STL. They had all of STL. They had all of STL's billions of dollars. "This is all we need, this is all I need. After this, we don't need anymore." Use it, use it all. Use every single dollar of STL to support RTL.
Billions of dollars. Five women. Bribe. Make waves. She didn't care anymore, when it came down to it, this was all she needed! It was all anyone needed.