Chapter 15: Mouse Trap
A pretty long chapter. However expect me to NOT post
anything new until after April 1, because I've got three projects to get done
by then and only one of them's been finished(almost), alright? ^_^ August 1, UC 0087. 0900 hours Zulu. Headquarters 16th Mobile Battalion. Saigon, Vietnam. Dear God... not another one so soon, Lt. Colonel Natalie
Dolvich thought as her staff tried to piece together the bits and pieces of
information coming from New Guinea. As far as they could tell, the base had
been attacked, and by all accounts, destroyed by an AEUG force whose size was undetermined.
She had just finished writing dozens of letters to the families of all the men
that had died in her quest to hunt down the renegade U-class, and the prospect
of losing even more men in her already badly diminished battalion was making
her knees feel weak... "Mam, we may have something..." Hawkins reported
just as he finished reading through a message fragment, "It seems that the
Hover Battalion stationed in Port Moresby had defected in the middle of the
battle. Also, the base commander was desperate enough to start demolishing some
of the ships under construction there, so we must assume the garrison has been
overwhelmed." "Anybody willing to bring some reinforcements for
us?" Natalie asked tiredly as she scanned her battalion's current
available strength. Barely two companies of effectives now, "Especially my
request for advanced Mobile Suits." "Colonel Wilkins has responded and is sending a
battalion of regular Federal troops to support us from Peking," Hawkins
reported, "Including a company of brand new Marasais. He seems to be
pleased of our performance so far." Sure... Natalie thought, after all, he's been getting most
of the credit... "When do they arrive?" "Eight hours," Hawkins reported, "Plus we'll
need another four hours after that for preparation and maintenance, and ten for
transit. A total of twenty two hours." "Cut that to eighteen," Natalie ordered, "I
don't think we'll be finding anybody left if we wait for that long." --------------- August 1, UC 0087. 1500 hours Zulu. Former Titans Cruiser Shigure. Dock Area, New Guinea Base. "How bad?" Yoko asked as she looked over Scott's
shoulder. "The Shigure is the only one that's not a total lost,
and it'd take the rest of the night to make her ready for launching,"
Scott replied as he growled at the reactor controls, "God damn it,
couldn't you have stopped those Titans from demolishing the reactor controls on
the ships? The Roma and the Canberra could probably have been salvaged if we
had gotten here sooner." "Just tell your crews to start stripping everything
they can get from the other two ships and blow them up once done," Yoko
ordered, "Sorry, but we had to secure other, equally valuable
assets." "One murdering woman isn't worth losing a Magellan Kai
and a Salamis Kai, Yoko," Ming added acidly as he deliberately kept his
head turned away from Yoko, "You should've just let me fight with her and
ended that little political argument sooner." "One who isn't privy to the Flanagan Agency's files
during the war shouldn't be so sure Ming," Yoko replied. Unlike Ming who
was just another common soldier ace pilot, Yoko was involved in all things
black in the former Principality of Zeon, and the capabilities of Newtypes(and
at a time, even testing herself to see if she was one) was just one of her many
understudies, "We can use her for the long term. As long as we can make
her cooperate that is." "You heard what she said," Ming countered,
"She won't cooperate. We might as well kill her already." "That comes last Ming," Yoko replied firmly,
"There are other ways Ming. There are other ways..." --------------- John sneezed as he finished reading through Sylvie's medical
report. Somebody must be talking about him, he thought in a vain attempt to
humor himself, as he finished going through the report. Christ, she'd survived
ALL this? If he had known she'd suffered so much, he wouldn't have asked her to
make that promise anymore, or that she had really died as they had reported,
because the amount of torture and mental anguish she had to go through... "John?" Sylvie asked her eye finally fluttered
open, "What...? I thought..." "It was just exhaustion Sylvie, you should rest a bit
more..." John suggested as he looked over his old friend, "The doc
says you've been kept awake for almost three days now, and you were running on
pure adrenaline. You'd better get some rest while..." "No... I can't," Sylvie protested as she rose up
from her bed and noticed that she was in a medical tent, and she was in
handcuffs... "What are these?" "Sorry, Yoko insisted on precautions," John
explained, "But I can just call the guard outside to..." "No, I must leave now," Sylvie declared, "I
have business to attend to, but I need to..." "Sylvie, forget about that ***hole Ming for a
while," John replied, and made a mental note to punch Ming a couple of
times when the two of them finally had a proper talk, "You need to rest.
You can't..." "Why are you here?" Sylvie asked, not really
listening to John's suggestions, "I thought you and Cynthia have just had
a second boy. Why are you foolish enough to risk your life in a war once
again?" "You can thank Yoko for that..." John replied,
"She pretty much kidnapped me into fighting for AEUG, but that's going to
end soon. I'm going back to Manila once this battle is done, and I want you to
come with me." "No, I will be a threat to your safety," Sylvie
protested, "The only reason I did not continue the fight was because your
life would have been in danger. I... do not want to cause any more grief to the
people I know." "Sylvie, thank you for your concern, but I... I know
what they've been doing to you," John replied as he showed her the medical
report, "You've... you've already gone through enough. It's time for you
to finally leave that life behind and..." "Do not say anything more of what is contained in this
report," Sylvie replied forcefully as she grabbed the report and tore it
to pieces, "No one else must know." "But... Sylvie... If what's written here is true then
that's probably the reason why..." John started. "I said not to talk about it," Sylvie repeated,
"And as I said, I fought for the Titans willingly. AEUG will not be so
forgiving to a spacenoid Titans pet, no matter her motives." "Look, Sylvie, I can probably..." John started
again. "No John, I'm sorry, but I'm not giving you a
choice..." Sylvie replied as she suddenly grabbed John by the throat and
pulled him near her. All John felt next was a well-placed head butt that almost
cracked his skull, followed by something hard hitting the back of his neck. He
was down on the floor almost instantly. "Forgive me John..." Sylvie whispered to the
unconscious John, "But this is something I must do, even if it means my
death." --------------- Gina moaned as she finally regained consciousness. Her body
was aching all over, especially her forehead, and now... We're under attack! Gina suddenly remembered as she sat
straight up from her hospital bed, and quickly found herself face to face with
a handsome young man who had a quizzical look on his face. She visibly recoiled
as she noticed the man was wearing an AEUG uniform, and that he was carrying an
assault rifle with him... "Umm... Are you... alright?" O'Connor asked nervously
as he his eyes wandered around, hoping the doctor would finally come back. The
doc had asked him to watch over her for a while, mainly it was because it was
he who had brought her in... and because he really had nothing to do... but now
that she was awake, he had NO idea what to do... "The doctor will be back
shortly, but maybe you should lie down while I call..." "You're one of those rebels!" Gina shouted outloud
as she pointed an accusing finger at O'Connor. She'd been captured, she realized.
They had been defeated and now... "You... I won't let you... I
won't..." "Umm... Mam, we're not going to do anything to you,
okay?" O'Connor replied nervously as he felt some red creeping up on his
face. Oh great, if she goes crazy, what was HE supposed to do? Wrestle her to
the ground? Shoot her? While she was UNARMED? What now? "You're currently
a prisoner, but I can tell you that we don't plan to shoot you..." "Oh yeah, you murdered everybody I know and you're not
going to shoot me?!" Gina shouted back as she tried to get up, before
realizing one of her hands had been handcuffed to the bed, "Why? So you
could have a little fun with me you perverted freaks?!" "No! God no! We don't do anything like that!"
O'Connor replied panicaly as his face turned into a bright red tomato, and
wished that doctor would get back here REALLY soon. Enemy troopers he could
handle, a panicking, unarmed woman he could not... "Look, calm down. We
have rules like you do, and we don't shoot or do anything bad to our prisoners..." "Liar!" Gina screamed back and frantically worked
on her chains, wishing she could just rip her hand off and get away, "Just
kill me and get it over with! I..." "Look! We won't do anything to you alright?!"
O'Connor shouted back, "In fact we've got a few more prisoners held up in
the brig right now, but not many of them. I... I'm sorry but I think you were
the only MS pilot to survive..." "Because you killed them all one by one you
monsters!" Gina screamed back as she felt her eyes start filling with
tears, just wanting it to end. She couldn't save any of her friends... and in
her cowardice she'd allowed herself to live and... She felt afraid. In fact, she felt terrified. At least
before, she could've fought back. But now, she was helpless and at their mercy,
and all those who could've helped her were gone. Dead because she had failed
them. And now they were going to put her through an even more horrible fate for
surviving... She fought the tears but couldn't stop them from coming out... Oh God... how the hell could somebody like this ended up
with the Titans? O'Connor thought but resisted the urge to try to physically
comfort her as he saw her tears, "I... I'm sorry, but we had to do this.
We had to stop the tyranny that's..." "That your glorious Zeon tried to impose on
humanity?" Gina asked angrily as she fought the tears that were welling
up, wanting to show that she was still strong, but failing miserably as her
voice cracked with every word, "Do... do you... even know how many you
killed? How many did you for your stupid countr..." "I don't know. But I'm really a former Federal Forces
officer," O'Connor corrected, and began to wonder just how naive this lady
really was. Probably too naive for her own good, and now he was shattering her
little world... "And I also fought Zeon for their excesses during the
Delaz Fleet incident in 83'. But ever since Bunch 30, a lot of us have been
forced to..." "You... you're lying..." Gina replied as she
finally started losing wind, "I... I..." "I'm not lying," O'Connor replied firmly,
"And there are far more of us in AEUG who are former Federal troops that
your propaganda machine cares to tell. I... I don't want to shatter all of your
beliefs, but I'm afraid you haven't been told of the whole truth about us, and
of how we were formed because of the 30 Bunch incident... Maybe if I were
to..." "Wha... what?" Gina asked as she looked around,
now more confused than anything else, "I... I..." "O'Connor, the patient has regained
consciousness?" the doctor asked as he reentered the room, until he
noticed the woman was horribly distraught and in near shock, "Dear God,
what have you been doing to her?" "I... I didn't do anything!" O'Connor protested,
"She woke up and started panicking and I had no idea how to..." "Now, now, calm down, you'd better sleep for a while
longer..." the doctor suggested as he went over to Gina's IV and added a
mild sedative to the solution. Gina seemed too shocked to react, but she seemed
to calm down after the drugs began to take effect, before eventually lying back
on her bed and eventually began to wander back to her slumber. The doctor then
angrily grabbed O'Connor and dragged him off to a more secluded corner of the
room, "Alright, why didn't you call me when she woke up? I TOLD you to
watch over her and call me if anything happens, why did you disobey my
orders?" "I tried to, but she was panicking..." O'Connor
started. "And you should've just left her and found me as soon
as you could," the doctor admonished. Though he was working for AEUG, his
oath was a doctor was more important to him, and it just pissed him off that so
many soldiers were so damn ignorant about the simplest of things... "I
mean, look at you. You're carrying a GUN for Pete's sake and as far as I can
tell she's already been traumatized. Don't you think THAT would have scared her
right away?" Oh ****! My gun! O'Connor remembered and wished he had
remembered to stow it away as the doc had told him, but he had let himself get
so distracted looking at her that... "Look... doc, I'm sorry..."
O'Connor started as he wished that he could find some way to make up for this
little fiasco, "I was kinda..." "Just let me handle it already, alright
Lieutenant?" the doctor suggested, "And one of your Sergeants wants
to discuss something with you. Something about some of the men not reporting
back in time." O'Connor merely nodded as he headed for the door, before
taking one last look at Gina. He gave out a sigh of relief as he saw her face
return to its peaceful state before she had awoken, before stepping out the
door. He wondered, as he had when he first saw her, how could someone like her
be on the other side? --------------- "Yoko, I have to talk to you..." Jean started as
he found Yoko on her way to Sylvie's tent, "About Sylvie..." "She's staying with us and she's going to fight whether
she like it or not," Yoko replied dryly before Jean could continue,
"End of discussion." "If we don't have to kill her first," Ming added
rather cruelly, "I don't think she can be convinced, unless you plan on
handing me over to her." "I won't," Yoko promised, slightly piqued that
Ming had actually thought she'd trade HIM over her, "But I have
authorization from high command to do anything else necessary to convince her,
and that includes detaining her." "Yoko, I agree with John," Jean argued,
"Sylvie... wasn't like this during the war, and he sure as hell knows her
more than I do. She's become mentally unstable and if we keep her in
combat..." "I said end of discussion Jean," Yoko reminded,
"And once I'm through with her, she'll be singing the party line and
begging us to keep her in the frontlines to fight for AEUG." "Yoko, I already told you..." Jean started again. "End of discussion," Yoko repeated for the third
time, "Just follow me and watch. You'll see I'll be proven right
soon..." --------------- Oh great... O'Connor thought. He'd REALLY done it now. The
guard he had posted outside of Sylvie's tent was now sprawled on the floor,
unconscious but alive, while inside neither Sylvie nor John were anywhere to be
seen. Yoko had given him PRETTY stringent orders on keeping Sylvie under guard,
but since he had known Sylvie in Bunch 7 and of John's request... "Lieutenant, this had better be good..." Major
Anderson declared as he arrived on the scene, before noticing the guard on the
floor who was now being revived by a medic, "Oh ****... Don't tell me,
Sylvie has..." "I... I'm sorry sir," O'Connor replied, "I'm
already ordering my men to go on a full scale search to..." "Sir! One of our Mobile Suits are missing!" an
engineer suddenly screamed over the radio net, "I've got five unconscious
engineers here and one missing Barzam! I need help now!" Oh great, now the **** really hits the ceiling, O'Connor
thought angrily to himself. Damn it! I should've made sure she was secure,
especially with that little vendetta of hers, "Alright! Order everyone to
check in! Make sure she hasn't taken anything else and..." "O'Connor, what the hell is happening?" a new,
very, very, pissed off sounding voice asked from behind O'Connor, "Don't
tell me that you let Subject V get away, did you?" "I'm afraid so, mam," O'Connor as he turned to
Yoko, who seemed to be at the point of wanting to kill him then and there right
now, "She... she seems to have taken the Barzam AND Mr. Recto with her,
we're not sure where..." "Told you this wasn't going to work Yoko..." Jean
side commented while Yoko impatiently tapped her feet, wanting to vent out her
anger as the other officers reacted disapprovingly of her decisions. Ming was
giving her the "We should've killed her and gotten it over with"
look, while Anderson merely tried to suppress a frown. She gave out a low growl
in annoyance before deciding to speak. "I was given complete authority on Subject V, and I
still believe we will be able to use her as long as we capture her alive,"
Yoko declared as she started heading for her Mobile Suit, "She has a head
start now, so we'd better get moving." "Yoko, maybe we should just let her..." Jean
started. "The object of her hatred is here, she'll be attacking
us soon," Yoko interrupted as she looked over Ming, "And when she
does, we'll catch her." "Yoko, I WILL not risk my men's lives to capture
one..." Anderson started. "Their lives will not be put at risk," Yoko
replied as she took a glance at the now being revived guard, "I'm sure of
it." "And if they are?" Jean asked doubtfully. "Then her life is forfeit." --------------- They are boarding their Mobile Suits now... Sylvie thought
as she watched everything without moving a muscle. Six GM IIs, Yoko's Zugock,
and a new GM type she hadn't been familiarized with. But no orange Mobile suit
belonging to Ming. Well, she'd fix that... She pressed the trigger and let loose a single beam that
went right over the heads of three of the GM IIs. She had deliberately aimed
high, but this was just to show them she could kill them all at a moment's
notice. And it was also her official challenge to them, she thought, as she
began to move her Mobile Suit to a different spot in the jungle. "Sylvie! Are you there?! Do you read me?!" a voice
suddenly shouted over the radio, one that Sylvie was quick to identify as Yoko.
Sylvie hesitated before answering, knowing she might be traced, but decided to
take the risk. "Yoko, let Ming and me fight, and nobody else will get
hurt," Sylvie declared coldly, "And I have John with me, so don't try
to blackmail me by taking him hostage," Before Yoko could answer, Sylvie
quickly turned off the radio and settled into another sniping position. ****... Yoko thought to herself. Damn *****, so she'd seen
through my idea to use John, eh? "Did you get a trace on her?" "No, not yet mam..." a technician reported,
"But she may be monitoring our conversations and..." "Just let me fight her Yoko," Ming interrupted,
"I've beaten her before, and I can beat her again. It's time for her
obsession of killing me to end." "Ming... I'd hate to say this..." Jean added from
his own GM II, "But if what she says is true, then she really does have
good reasons for hating you... Especially since if you killed Max..." "And who the HELL is Max anyway?!" Ming shouted
back impatiently, "She keeps talking about this, but I still don't know
what the crazy ***** is talking about! As far as I can tell she's just one sick
lady who..." "Ming, Max was..." Jean started. "Jean, keep quiet, this is no time for a distracting
history lesson," Yoko interrupted as she ordered her men to start moving
towards the jungle, "Ming, just stay in the tunnels like I told you and
only come out if we need some covering fire, alright?!." "Fine..." Ming replied grumpily, but nevertheless
began preparing himself to move. Sylvie was a crafty sniper, as he'd found, and
if he figured it out correctly... --------------- Fools... Sylvie thought as she saw the AEUG Mobile Suits
advance into the jungle. Yoko had wisely split her forces up to maximize the
search area, but she'd faced these kinds of odds before while she was a Titans
slave, and now she was going to put that skill to use once again... She quickly decided to make the new GM type her first
target, one that seemed to belong to Ming's old comrade. She wondered if the
******* was going to like the next round of tortures she had in store for
him... --------------- Yun had just taken a few steps into the jungle when a beam
came out of nowhere and struck his Nemo. The shot, to his surprise, didn't hit
any vital systems, but instead had ripped a neat hole in the Mobile Suit's
knee. Before he could take another step, his Nemo collapsed on him, and he
hurriedly announced over the radio that he was down. Yoko grimaced as she heard Yun's report, but she
concentrated on trying to search for Sylvie's firing perch, who she knew Sylvie
must be abandoning by now. Yoko failed to spot her however, and Erich found
himself getting hit by a beam that took off his newly repaired GM II's foot.
His Mobile Suit, likewise, collapsed on the ground, and just like that, a
quarter of Yoko's Mobile Suits were out of action. "Yoko, we have to pull back," Jean suggested as he
began to order his squad to move out of the jungle, and were not shot at for
their trouble, "If this goes on, we'll lose our Mobile Suits and..." "We can't do that..." Yoko started before she
spotted a missile heading for HER, and managed to roll right to evade. She
fired back to no avail, but thought she spotted something moving, "I
spotted something on my 'three! Major! Get some of your tanks to flank around
her!" --------------- She's not there Yoko... Ming thought as he advanced on his
on the other side of the base. No... she's already coming around here and she's
going to try to attack me and the base directly. Yoko would kill him if she had
known he had gone out without telling her, but he KNEW that Sylvie was smart
enough to be monitoring the radio, and this was the only way to make sure.
Besides which, Sylvie had always been exclusively his problem, and not Yoko or
any others, and he was finally going to get the chance to end what he should've
finished four years ago... Unbeknownst to him, Sylvie had actually moved much faster
than he had thought, and was already aiming her weapon at Ming, and was now so
glad that Ming had decided to be a hero and go off on his own. Now he would be
all hers... She could finally bring him all the pain that he'd caused her, and
be able to make him beg for his crimes before he died a most horrible death.
Yes, that was the only thing that would suffice now. No longer his mere death,
but the absolute destruction of his being... That was the only thing that would
satisfy her now... Because that was exactly how he had left her after he had
taken him away... Ming was caught completely off guard when a beam suddenly
streaked towards his Mobile Suit, and he quickly found himself losing an arm on
his Rick Dias. Managing to recover and get himself moving however, he managed
to evade the second beam aimed for his leg, before firing a round from his Clay
Bazooka in return. He threw up a small cloud of dirt, but Sylvie wasn't there
as expected, and Ming quickly began to squint his eyes around as he moved,
searching for his adversary... --------------- "Something is wrong..." Yoko said outloud as she
heard all of the reports coming in. Her men were still under fire, but either
Sylvie was blind firing those missiles or taking her for a fool, "Ming,
are you there?" There was no response. "Ming! I repeat! Are you there?!" Yoko shouted
into the radio and began to look around. No Ming answered. No Rick Dias
appeared, and she found herself feeling great anxiety. She couldn't have...
Because if she did... --------------- She's gotten better... Ming thought as he breathed in hard.
MUCH better. She was a lot smarter now, in addition to being incredibly
skilled. And she was toying him even more. In addition to the loss of an arm,
his Rick Dias's chest was now scorched by a pair of beams that had hit some
non-vital systems. He had barely completed his train of thoughts when yet
ANOTHER beam streaked towards him, and this time it almost took off his head. ****! Ming thought as he quickly moved out of the way, and
found a second beam coming towards him, this time the shot grazing his Rick
Dias's head. He tried to roll away from the incoming fire, but then his Mobile
Suit was hit again, this time in the leg. Sylvie hadn't sliced it off as she
had done to Yun, but it greatly reduced Ming's mobility. And he knew that
without mobility, he'd quickly end up dead... And that was exactly what Sylvie wanted. Here was Ming, now
completely helpless and at her mercy. And with one more shot, he'd be her own
little plaything for a little while... And once she sent Ming back to Yoko in
pieces, the pieces of him that she'd slice off while she kept him alive for her
own perverse pleasure anyway, she wondered just how far Yoko's deceitful
patience would go... Have to call Yoko... Ming admitted to himself as he failed
to find Sylvie once again, and knowing the ***** was aiming at him already and
was planning something ugly. Damn ghost, if he didn't get help he'd most
certainly end up dead, and there was no telling what Sylvie would do next...
"Yoko! Ming here! I've found Sylvie and I need help!" he quickly
announced over the radio, "Repeat! I need help!" Nobody responded. Nobody could have. Ming tried it again and
again, but the result was the same. Ming would be alone against Sylvie this
time... Because of the many "non vital" systems Sylvie had
taken out, one of them had been Ming's radio... --------------- Notice: This fic and all its contents are copyrighted by Thomas E. "Zinegata" Ting. No part of this work may be taken by any other person without permission from the author. Gundam and all related trademarks are owned by Bandai and their respective companies. |
