"Mariemaia's missing."
Duo was fairly sure his mouth dropped open. "What? How?! Since when?" He pushed himself to his feet, taking a couple of steps toward Dorothy without really realising it.
"Last night; she went to a party and never came back." Dorothy ran a shaking hand through her hair, tugging sweaty blonde strands away from her face. She seemed to have lost her customary headband, Duo saw.
"But surely you've got people to�" Duo waved his hand vaguely. "Bodyguards! You can't have just misplaced her!"
"Her bodyguard is also missing." The woman drew a shuddering breath. "We checked her out thoroughly; she's been with us from the start and it's very unlikely she'd�" Dorothy trailed off, biting her lip.
"Nothing's impossible." Duo sighed, feeling as though the four years since the end of the last war were weighing on him, an invisible burden. Mariemaia had been the unwitting catalyst for violence then; what if she had fallen into hands more ruthless than Dekim Barton's? "What timeframe are we working with?"
Hilde picked up another disk and slotted it into the reader, setting the playback to double speed. "She and Katrin left the Anstrom-Vieces' house on foot at approximately nine PM, but never returned home. It's only a few streets away, we've got people going door-to-door and I'm checking security footage."
"Katrin's the bodyguard?" Duo didn't pause for a response. "That's a pretty damn upscale neighbourhood, so the likelihood of their running into plain thugs is pretty small. So we have the possibility that they were attacked or abducted by unknown elements, and the smaller possibility that Katrin was in on it."
Dorothy winced. "Une wants Heero to run a thorough check on her, as well as monitoring for intelligence."
"Oh." Duo blinked, having relegated his partner's curious absence to the back of his mind. "Well that would be a problem, since I haven't heard from him since Friday. He's not answering his phone or his door; I thought he might be here."
Both female Agents shook their heads. "No," Hilde stated. "He's not in the building, or on assignment."
"Fuck." Duo tugged distractedly at his braid. "I'd better get back over to his apartment, he might be sick."
"Heero Yuy?" Dorothy snorted tiredly. "Somehow I just can't imagine that."
"Yeah, whatever." Duo waved a hand absently as he strode back out of the office. "I'll see you later, ladies."
Inwardly, as he strode back to the elevators and punched the button for the garages, he was fuming. What the fuck was Heero playing at, staying out of contact for so long? It figured that the one time he took off for somewhere an emergency came up. And God only knew what Heero was up to�
Duo broke several speed limits getting back to Heero's apartment building, stomping on the accelerator with a force derived from extreme irritation. He strode up the stairs � not bothering with the lifts � like one possessed, barely even breathing hard as he reached top of the twelfth flight. OK, maybe I'm not as out of shape as I thought, even after all this peace�
Duo knocked rather violently on Heero's door. "Yuy! Open the fuck up, we've got a damn emergency!" Heero had just better be working on tracing Mariemaia already, for his own hide's sake. Duo rarely became angry with his partner, preferring to keep their working relationship on a good-natured keel, but for breaking a promise and ignoring his calls� Damned if he wasn't going to take his frustrations out on Heero for this one.
"Yuy!" Duo slammed his fist once more against the door, all but yelling through the thick wood panel. "Oh, fuck this," he muttered, dropping to his knees and pulling his lockpick roll out of a pocket. When Heero had originally moved into this apartment, back when they'd just finished Basic Training, he'd offered Duo a spare key in case of emergency. Duo had given it back to him, pointing out that the day he couldn't get through even Heero's fancy lock was the day he'd volunteer to work with Wu Fei. Permanently. In the end, all Heero had given him was the code to his electronic lock.
Twirling the pick gently in the lock, Duo found the tumblers with ease and manipulated them until the lock snicked open, then pocketed his tools again and hastily tapped Heero's code into the keypad. The door swung open easily, and Duo pushed through it, calling out again for his partner.
"Hey, Heero! Where the fuck are you?"
Only silence greeted him, and he sighed in exasperation, making his way through the darkened apartment towards the single bedroom. Momentarily he had the urge to pull up the blinds on the huge picture windows in the living room, but there wasn't really any need; even if it had been fully dark Duo had good night vision.
"Heero?" Duo stuck his head into the bedroom, but he could already tell that no one was home. There was a silence to the place that was more telling than the neatly made futon or the lack of shoes by the door. Narrowing his eyes, Duo wandered into Heero's office in search of something, some clue that might point to his friend's location, only to freeze in shock.
Heero's laptop was sitting dead-centre on the far-too-tidy desk, its 'hibernate' light blinking greenly.
"Shit." Duo moved towards the setup without even thinking, reaching out to touch the power button and restart the machine. A few status bars ran, and then an empty desktop blinked at him. Duo just stared at it.
Why would Heero go somewhere without this? He's practically welded to it, the only time he leaves it here is when he goes out! Almost without his willing it, his eyes went to the tear-off desk calendar he had bought Heero for Christmas this year. It was something of a joke gift between them, the gummed pages bearing colourful cartoons of bumbling police officers. Heero hadn't appreciated it, but then he never did, and he'd thanked Duo very seriously anyway.
Friday 28th March, 204AC.
"Shit," Duo repeated. Turning back to the laptop with the vague hope that Heero might just have forgotten about the date, he tapped out a quick query about user sessions. And there it was. Last login, four fifty-two PM, March the twenty-eighth.
Duo stared at the screen for a few minutes, even his customary expletives deserting him. Then, acting purely on instinct, he shut down the computer and loaded it into its carrying case, hurrying out of Heero's apartment as though the fiends of Hell were after him and speeding all the way back to HQ.
***
"Commander!"
Une looked up in startlement as Duo barrelled through the briefing-room door at high speed, laptop case under one arm and the other clutching his braid violently. He regretted his abrupt entrance almost immediately as he saw the hope in her red-rimmed eyes. Sally and Wu Fei, sitting on either side of the Director, also looked up at him as he dumped the computer onto the table.
"I can't find Heero." Duo decided it was probably best to get straight to the point. "He hasn't been home since Friday and he's not answering his messages."
There was silence for a long-draw-out moment, then Wu Fei broke into a round of soft Mandarin cursing, apparently recognising the laptop case.
"Last confirmed sighting?" Sally was more pragmatic, though she looked almost as drawn as Une.
Duo shrugged in exasperation. "About five AM Friday morning. He was supposed to be going to dinner with Relena that night, but I don't have her number."
"Okay." Sally reached for the vidphone unit just as it rang; with a resigned expression she picked up the handset. "Po." She listened for a moment � "right" � then passed the handset across to Une.
"Hello?" Une seemed to visibly slump as the tinny voice babbled into her ear. Duo couldn't make out the words any more than he could see the image on the screen from this angle.
Wu Fei gave their Commander an assessing look, then leaned back in his chair, reaching around behind her to tap Sally on the shoulder. They exchanged a long, speaking glance, then Wu Fei rose, beckoning to Duo as he exited the room. "We'll call from my office so they can get on with the search."
"Right." Duo lengthened his strides to catch up with the Chinese Agent, Heero's laptop case swinging at his fingertips. "Have you put out a general on Mariemaia?"
"No, we want to keep it as quiet as possible for the moment." Wu Fei frowned. "There's still a lot of feeling against her from the Eve War, despite the fact that she was only a child."
"If you're searching door-to-door, it's bound to get back to the press sooner or later," Duo observed, tucking his free hand into his jacket pocket. "What's the probs on some disgruntled relative of Barton's wanting to repeat history?"
"Almost nil." Wu Fei unlocked his office door and entered without ceremony, holding the door for Duo. "Heero checked; there are no more living relatives." He sat himself down behind his desk, reaching for the vidphone and leaving Duo to wander around the small corner office restlessly. It was barer than his own, which was decorated with amusing 'motivational' posters that Heero deplored, and pictures of the two of them with their friends. Duo made a face; that almost made them sound like a couple. They were friends, and they had friends in common; that was all.
"Good morning Vice-Minister." Wu Fei had his 'polite' voice on, Duo thought with amusement; the man had never been very good at dealing with bureaucracy. "I'm sorry to interrupt you," now that was a lie, "but I need to ask you some questions." A pause. "When did you last have contact with Heero Yuy?" Duo winced at the phrasing; that wasn't something he wanted to think about.
"What time was that? �And you haven't seen or heard from him since?" Silence. "No, as far as we can tell he hasn't been home since; did anything happen between you which might have upset him? No? Very well. I'm afraid there is another matter; Mariemaia Khushrenada is missing as of last night. Yes, we've got everyone working on it� I appreciate that, Vice-Minister; I'll pass it on. Thank you very much for your time." Wu Fei disconnected the call with a sigh.
"Fuck," Duo muttered.
Wu Fei was silent for a long moment. Then: "There is at least one possibility we can discard. I cannot believe that Yuy would have anything to do with �"
Duo whirled. "Don't even say it!" He advanced a step toward Wu Fei, fists clenched. "You know as well as I do that Heero would never do anything to hurt that little girl!"
"We have to consider it!" Wu Fei shouted back, losing his temper. "It's our duty to protect her � we've failed already, we can't make it worse by refusing to consider possibilities!"
"I told you, it's not possible!" Reining in his own temper with an effort, Duo folded his arms across his chest and turned, deliberately presenting his back to Wu Fei as he left the room. "I won't argue this with you, Chang. I'm gonna go help Hilde with the security records, and we'll work from there."
He stalked his way down the hall to Hilde's office in a fuming temper, eyes narrowed to slits. Several agents passed him, including Mark and Ryou with arms full of papers and discs, but Duo ignored their startled greetings. Somewhere in there a thought occurred to him: I should call Quatre. Heero might have contacted him� the possibility managed to perk him up a bit, but Hilde still flinched at his expression as he marched back into her office.
"Heero's missing too."
Hilde stared at him, then slumped. "Well shit."
"Yeah." Duo appropriated Dorothy's desk chair, since she seemed to have vanished. "Found anything yet?"
"Nope." Hilde picked up a box of vid-discs and tossed it at him. "Here, run these through since you're here anyway. Doro went off to supervise the house-to-house."
"K." Duo woke up the computer and opened the surveillance programs, inserting the first disc. A gloomy street washed in sodium yellow appeared before him, the occasional car moving along the roadway. He set up the motion capture fields on the pavement areas and let the program cycle through, reaching for the vidphone.
He didn't need to look to dial the number, but the wait while the network connected to L4 made him chafe with impatience. The computer beeped at him, slowing the program as a single male figure got out of a car and crossed the pavement, going into a house, then started to run forwards again.
"Quatre Winner� Duo?" Quatre looked tired and surprised.
"Hey, Q. Hope I didn't interrupt anything important." Duo kept one eye on the monitor, grinning distractedly at his friend.
"I always have time for my friends, Duo, what's wrong?" He sounded faintly reproving; Duo thought with irritation that it was just typical of the guy to be able to read him so well.
"We've got kind of an emergency � two emergencies, really. Have you heard from Heero at all?" Duo resisted the impulse to cross his fingers.
"Heero?" Quatre blinked at him in surprise. "No, not since we met last week, why?"
"Damn." Duo slumped in his seat, closing his eyes briefly. "He's missing, Q. No contact with anyone since Friday evening, and he's not answering messages."
"Heero's missing?" Quatre stared.
"Yeah." Duo gave a short laugh, then sobered abruptly. "So's Mariemaia, as of yesterday evening."
"Shit." Quatre almost dropped the phone. "This is bad, Duo. Do you need us there?"
"No, there's enough people running about this place right now and we don't have any leads yet." Duo swallowed. "You might not want to rule it out though � I'm trying not to think what this might turn into if we can't sort it out quickly."
"Yeah." Quatre groaned, scrubbing one hand through his hair. "I can call Rashid and have him tell the guys to be on the lookout for trouble, if you want. They're fairly spread out right now."
"That'd be a godsend, Quat," Duo sighed in relief; he'd been wondering how to ask that. "Give them my cell number; I've got no idea whether I'm even gonna be in the office this week."
"Understood." Quatre smiled at him. "I'll let you get on with it; good luck, Duo."
We're gonna need it. Duo winced as he disconnected and turned back to the computer, which had flagged three more sections of footage for him to analyse. The first two were fairly similar, just people arriving home from work, but the third�
Duo watched intently as a dark-coloured van drew up to the kerb, a black-clad man jumping out and opening the side door. He looked up and down the street carefully, then drew something out of his jacket pocket � it looked like a cloth, an impression that seemed to be verified as he carefully soaked it with liquid from a small bottle. Duo narrowed his eyes, his heart sinking as two figures entered the camera's field of vision from the top, walking down the pavement slowly.
Even at the distance and angle of the picture, it was easy to tell that both figures were female, one shorter and slighter than the other. As they passed the van, the loitering man surreptitiously handed the soaked cloth over to the older woman, who grabbed the younger suddenly and forced it over her face. The girl struggled � Duo could see the glint of street lights off red hair as she twisted � then suddenly slumped to the pavement, limp. Working quickly, the man and woman lifted her into the van, slamming the doors and taking off at easily twice the speed limit.
"Got them." Duo slowed the footage, rewinding and then pausing on a frame that held just a single glimpse of the dark-coloured vehicle's license plate. "Abduction, Hil." He pointed to the screen as she came to stand behind him, then ejected the drive, popping the disc out and tucking it into his pocket. "Let's go."
They found Une and Dorothy in the small conference room on the top floor, sitting around the table and arguing with agents from the legal and public relations departments. They didn't look to be getting on very well; from what Duo could gather the others wanted to formally declare Mariemaia missing, while Une and Dorothy wanted to keep a hold on the news in the hopes of getting the girl back without needing to cause a fuss. Duo didn't even bother to knock but strode straight into the room, plucking Une's datareader out of her hand and inserting the disk.
"Charlton Street, nine-fifteen PM," Hilde stated loudly, quieting the outraged babble of the lawyers and PRs. "Mariemaia was abducted by an unknown man with the assistance of her bodyguard, Katrin Williams."
Une all but snatched the datareader from Duo, her face paling as she watched the inevitable progression of events across the screen. "Oh God�" Dorothy had sunk down in her chair with one hand over her heart.
There was a single moment of deathly silence, and then the room filled with the urgent voices of the aides, all trying to shout louder than each other.
"Enough!" Une had pulled herself together, bracing both fists on the table and glaring at the suited men and women. "If they know who she is, then we have to assume that they are holding her for some sort of ransom. Maxwell, go and run a full check on Katrin � I'm hereby authorising you to hack any private systems you need to. I want every organisation she could be even remotely connected with. Schbeiker, go through the vehicle registry database for the van � background checks for all owners and other vehicles, then get onto traffic control and get them tracked. Dorothy, recall the house-to-house and call in all agents."
"Ma'am." Duo flipped an absent-minded salute, then turned and left the room at a jog, making for the elevator.
"Hey, wait up!" Hilde called, sprinting to catch him up. They caught the lift down to the ground floor in somewhat grim silence, neither really sure what to say. They had dealt with their share of emergencies in the past, but nothing on this scale. There had been abductions before, two high-profile kidnapping cases a few months after the end of the uprising, but this was the first time it had hit quite so close to home.
"Aren't you worried about Heero?" Hilde asked as they exited the car on the ground floor, heading down the ramp to IT.
Duo shrugged. "Yeah, but he's Heero. He knows how to take care of himself, and I can't imagine anyone trying anything on him. Mariemaia's just a kid." He just couldn't see Heero being bested in an attack � it was far more likely that he had simply seen fit to go off again without thinking to tell anyone. Damned idiot.
Hilde raised her eyebrows when Duo stopped outside Heero's door, but didn't say anything. It was the work of a moment to tap in the code and unlock the door. "C'mon in, Hil. You can use the spare PC," he pointed to the side desk, "it's not passworded below the network level."
"Sure." She dragged a chair across the room, settling herself in to work. Duo took the main desk, booting up Heero's array and inputting the complex passwords to gain access to the main system. He grinned in delight as the highly modified machine purred to life beneath his fingertips, then blinked in shock as the desktops faded into being. Quite without his volition his fingers reached out to touch the image that graced the central screen. I remember this� it was the day after peace was declared, Quatre decided he wanted pictures of all of us� I didn't even know Heero had this!
He stared at the image of his own smiling sixteen-year-old face for a long moment, then abruptly shook his head, setting up the web connection and buffers. He might not be quite up to Heero's level of skill � at least, not any more � but he could still crack firewalls with the best of them. Flexing his fingers, he started out with the official information, slipping into the government databases and lifting Katrin Williams' files. There were several cross-references leading to family members, and he tagged those too, then began the arduous task of running a search on the woman's ID number.
Within minutes the usual information had come up � address, employment history, education. That gave him a college enrolment number, so he searched that too, running the retrievals simultaneously. A few moments of backtracking around the data protection measures and he had the names of every roommate she'd had, and several mentions of her in online yearbooks. Duo noted a few names and moved on, running the rest of the Williams family through the same checks.
The computer beeped, reminding Duo that it had found several bank accounts listed for the woman � he ran quickly through the transactions, but none were any later than noon the previous day. He did find his first inconsistency, though � several thousand credits had been deposited in one otherwise little-used account, and then immediately withdrawn as a lump sum several days later. Duo frowned at that, trying to dig deeper. The deposit had been made in cash, at the local branch of the bank, but the withdrawal had been from L1. With barely two days in between� Duo noted the date to query Une about later.
Another soft beep, and the computer had brought up the education and employment records of Katrin's family. Everything seemed to be perfectly in order; her father deceased in the war and her mother an invalid on state benefits, two elder brothers in steady engineering jobs and a younger�
"Holy shit." Suddenly, an awful lot of pieces were coming together in Duo's mind. Please, God, tell me this is not what it looks like�
"Hey, Duo?" Hilde's voice held a sudden urgency. "You'll never guess who the van's registered to � a Jean-Marie Devries, formerly employed by a certain shipping company we're investigating�"
"Ibsen," Duo finished grimly. "The bodyguard's brother is a delivery driver for them."
"Well shit." Hilde swivelled in her chair, staring at him.
"Yeah." Duo gave a short bark of a laugh, setting the computers to correlate results between Katrin and Andrew Williams.
"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"
"If it involves us being pretty well fucked, I'd say so," Duo muttered grimly. God, they've been running weapons, and now they have Mariemaia � what is it that they want? I'd have put them down as middlemen, just in it for profit, but with this� this could get really fucking nasty.
"That's about the gist of it." Hilde shook her head, abandoning her own chair and already halfway out of the door as Duo hastily linked the laptop � Heero's laptop � up to the array and downloaded the data he needed. By the time he made it back up to the top floor, she and Une had their heads together urgently in one corner of the conference room. Duo sauntered across to join them feeling decidedly grim.
"Commander," he acknowledged quietly.
"Maxwell." Une looked even more drawn than earlier. "There's definitely a connection to the Ibsen weapon-smuggling ring?"
"It looks a lot like it." Duo sighed. "What we don't know yet is whether the entire company was involved, or whether someone high up in the chain of command was ordering the 'extra' shipments." He shrugged.
"In other words, we can't detain Read without risking the rest of them going to ground." Une tugged at her uniform jacket in frustration.
"Pretty much." Duo gave her a sympathetic grimace, wishing he could summon up some cheer. "They're holding all the cards at the moment, as far as I can see. We need to get onto tracking that van."
"Maybe�" Hilde frowned. "Saturday night, Dorothy said something about Read being well-meaning but rather easily confused. She said the VP was the real power as far as she could see�"
"John Collins?" Une frowned. "I think I met him once at one of those blasted Romefeller dinners � he's the second cousin of the late Comte de Laressy, or something like that. Slimy man." She shuddered, then nodded purposefully. "Get onto him too, Maxwell � we can't afford to overlook anything at this stage."
"Right." Duo dumped the laptop down on the conference table, sweeping aside papers, and reopened the web connection, setting up another search program. He was busy sifting through the myriad results generated on such a prominent person when a commotion outside the door caught his attention.
"Huh?" Duo looked up; it sounded like a swarm of angry bees were coming down the hallway. He heard a lot of voices clamouring protests, and then a very familiar tone made his eyes widen.
"Get out of the way! I have to see the Commander immediately!" Oh God�
Une looked up from her murmured conversation with Agent Chivers just as one of the legal aides in the outer room opened the door with an apologetic expression. "The Vice-Foreign Minister, Commander." Relena pushed past the startled man without a word, her face set and deadly pale.
"Une." She glanced around the room quickly, her gaze flicking over the uniformed agents and lingering for just a moment on Duo. "Have you checked your private email?"
"No, why?" Lady Une frowned, but she was already heading towards the nearest computer, which happened to be the laptop Duo had rather unilaterally commandeered. He justified it to himself with the rationale that Heero wouldn't have minded, if he was there, and since he wasn't it was just tough on him if he wanted to complain.
"Just do it." Relena looked to be practically swaying; Duo relinquished his place to his commanding officer, hurrying to take her arm and lead her to a chair. He gave her a worried grin, which only seemed to make her lip tremble.
"You okay there?" He didn't really know what possessed him to ask that; the uncharitable portion of his mind was trying to insist that the girl was simply wound up over her precious Heero's vanishing, but the rest of him knew better.
Before she had any chance to reply, though, Une gasped, paling, and an unfamiliar voice issued from the laptop's speakers.
"Your Highness; my Lady Von Kinzig. I am sure you recognise these people. I am equally sure you understand that we know they are dear to you. Let me assure you that I regret the lengths to which you have forced us, and that we will do everything in our power to ensure that they are returned to you alive. However, the degree of harm to which they come will be determined in its entirety by your actions. You will comply with our demands, or I cannot vouch for their safe return.
"Our requirements are these: first, that you will not attempt to discover our whereabouts or reclaim the hostages. We are watching you, and we will know. Second, that you, Commander, will immediately withdraw your investigators from the L1 Colony Sector C. Otherwise we may be forced to terminate them, as well as the hostages." The man paused, and Duo could faintly hear a soft, urgent grunting noise that was obviously almost below the threshold of the microphone. That word 'hostages' was giving him chills, but it was Une's message and he couldn't get a look at it without being obvious�
"Thirdly," the quiet-voiced man continued, "that you, Princess, will immediately put into motion measures to veto the tabled Land Allotment Reform bill, and permanently cease all efforts to change the inheritance laws of the former Earth Nations or bring them into line with Colonial law. And finally, that you will both give up your pretensions to government office at the end of the next Parliamentary term and retire in comfort to your estates. I hope that this is clear.
"You have twenty-four hours to consider your position. You will be contacted at 1000 hours GMT tomorrow, on Preventer line 863-291-558 for your answer, and if you do not at that time give us your word to meet our demands in full, you may find that unpleasant things begin to happen to Mr Yuy and the young Contessa." There was the sound of a muffled laugh, and the grunting noises became more urgent.
Duo felt like the world had dropped out from under him. It echoed in his ears: Mr Yuy and the young Contessa� Mr Yuy� He had flung himself out of his chair and was staring over Une's shoulder at the screen before he even realised it, and what he saw made him think he was about to be sick.
The full-screen image showed what was obviously a ship interior; plain blank metal bulkhead walls and low lighting. It was quite clear enough, though, for him to make out the two slumped figures that were posed against the dull backdrop. Two people � two very familiar people. Duo clenched his teeth so hard that his jaw began to throb. Heero and Mariemaia were bound and handcuffed to ship jumpseats, their clothing wildly rumpled and their mouths covered in strips of dull silver duct tape. Heero's hair was matted with blood from a darkly bruised wound on his temple, and his eyes were filled with hot blue fury. He was rocking against the chair, trying to work himself free; that was what the grunting noise had been, but Duo could easily see that he wasn't really getting anywhere. Mariemaia � the poor child looked almost catatonic with fear, tears of fright and humiliation rolling down her cheeks and her eyes red-rimmed.
Duo stared. It was all he could do. There was nothing but white noise in his head as the voice continued from off-screen.
"Once we have your word, you will have one week to comply with all demands. If we do not see progress by that time � and I assure you, you are being watched more closely than you can imagine � I do not think I need to inform you, Princess, Lady, that you will never see your boyfriend or your charge again. It has been a pleasure doing business with you."
The screen went black with a crackle, then reverted to Une's inbox. The Lady herself had one hand pressed to her chest and seemed to be struggling not to hyperventilate. Duo knew how she felt. Things inside him that he had tried so hard to ignore for so long were screaming at him and his head seemed to be roiling with thought while beneath the surface he cowered in terror.
"Oh dear God. Master Treize�" Une whispered so softly that Duo barely caught the words. They seemed to release something in her, though; she took a deep breath and sat up straighter, putting on a professional mask over the obvious anguish.
"Chivers, get the HNT in the main briefing room with a projector. Dayell, get onto PR and have them draft a press announcement for me to look over. Schbeiker, find Catalonia immediately and brief her, then bring her here. Maxwell�"
"Wait a minute." Duo gently pushed her aside, tapping a swift query into the laptop. The results confirmed his suspicions. "The originating address was faked, but the message was sent from a specific point in the L3 Spacenet at exactly 1000 hours GMT. That tells us where they were�" he checked his watch quickly � "approximately an hour and a half ago."
"Right." Une was almost as pale as Relena; both their eyes seemed dead. "Then we need to lock down shuttleport security immediately. No one enters or leaves a port without ID until this is over, and all vehicles are to be searched."
Duo nodded grimly. Somewhere in the past few minutes, between stunned disbelief and sheer overarching terror, something had come clear. "Fine with me, but I'm not gonna be the one to do it. As of this minute the G5 team is back in action. I'm heading out to L4 to get Winner and Barton."
Commander Une frowned at him. "Duo, we can't spare you here."
The American Agent gave her a very level stare. "Lady, unless I miss my guess we are about to have a whole lot more than a kidnap case on our hands. You're gonna need all five of us out in space if you want a chance of fixing this mess before it spreads. Doro and Hil too � maybe even Sally. You know we're the best team you've got."
"Duo." Hilde was pulling urgently at his arm, and he turned, sparing her a cold glance. "You know you're not trained in hostage negotiation�"
"Q's the diplomat," he replied shortly, not even realising that he was already taking on a combative stance as Wu Fei and Dorothy both rushed through the door. Obviously the news had spread fast.
"But Duo�"
"But nothing, Hil, they've got Heero. And the kid," he added almost as an afterthought.
"Maxwell, you can't just go out there alone, we have no idea what kind of troop strength� firepower�" Une trailed off as Duo turned his glare on her.
"I really don't care," was all he said as he headed for the door, fully intent on commandeering the next available shuttle to L4. I'll follow him to the Gates of Hell if I have to.