Trust is just a Five-Letter Word

Disclaimer: I don’t own this or any other anime. I do own any original character here.

Warning- From here to the rest of the story, there will be dark themes and some of the characters may be subjected to racism, sexist commentary, and bad language. There may be some OOC. But since you all waited so long to read this, you probably won’t care.

A/N: For all those who have been waiting, I had writer’s block, and I wasn’t very inspired for a while. I hope this chapter doesn’t disappoint. (It probably will. You might want to go back and read chapter nine again.)

Chapter Ten: Breaking

Back at GOA, Ikhny ran. She ran through the halls, through the long corridors, and knocked down a few rookie candidates as she ran. But she didn’t care, nor did she stop until she reached the Observatory and hid in the darkest corner. As she sat in the darkness with her knees brought up to her chest, her thoughts raced through her mind, all jumbled in a disorganized mess.

"What…is happening to me?" Ikhny whispered to herself. "Why am I acting this way?" But she couldn’t answer herself, not right away, anyhow. So she looked back on everything that happened and tried to sort things out.

"I get a stupid EX reaction and become GOA’s first female pilot candidate. I start having bad dreams where a guy that resembles Hiead attacks me. For some reason, I’m starting to be a little…standoffish with my friends. I almost killed Hiead today. Why am I doing all this?" Ikhny’s voice began to get louder and more hysterical with each word. "Why? Why?! WHY??!!"

After calming down, Ikhny began to cry. "I know why. Because—some voice in my head told me to." In the middle of the battle, in all of the events following her EX reaction, she had heard a voice in her head, a voice that kept telling her to do things that were...less than acceptable in her regular standards. What scared her was 1) the voice sounded exactly like the voice of the man in her dream and 2) she had no control over the voice. It had started out as nothing more than a whisper, but it grew louder as her EX grew stronger. If she succumbed to the voice, it went away. If she tried to resist it, like she had today, it grew louder and louder until it was screaming. She had hoped it would go away.

But it didn’t.

These events can’t be connected, Ikhny told herself. They can’t be. But the only other explanation would be that I was losing my sanity. And there is no way I’m going insane. Still…maybe I should talk to Tak about it. He always knows what to do…

____________________________________________________________________________________

"Way to lose to a girl…"

"Not such a hotshot after all, are you?"

"That’s what you get for treating Ikhny like crap!"

Everywhere Hiead went, people were snickering and throwing cruel comments at him. Damn it, even the new rookies were making fun of him!

And it’s all Reina’s fault, Hiead thought angrily. Even Allecto did a better job than she did.

Allecto. Hiead took his mind off of Reina for a minute to think about his former partner. As weak and clumsy as she was, she was the only one who understood the way he functioned. She "respected" him…if you could say fearing a person was the same as respecting them. And damn, she used to be the only person who believed he would become a Goddess pilot. Reina, on the other hand, didn’t give a damn if he was alive or dead. She wouldn’t even give him privacy! She was always there, talking her little head off. He couldn’t even think to himself…like he was doing now.

Hiead looked around, trying to catch a glimpse of a rainbow-colored head. But there was no one with a rainbow-colored head in the cafeteria. He was alone.

Something must have happened to Reina, Hiead thought to himself. He had been around Reina long enough to know that something was wrong if she was not trying to drive him insane every waking moment.

______________________________________________________________________________________

Gareas did not trust the Zion pilots. They were just too…different.

There were four members in the odd group. There was a man dressed in cowboy attire. His gray hair suggested he was in his late fifties, but his muscular build said otherwise. Also, there was a young boy hidden in the shadows. Gareas couldn’t see his face clearly, but he could tell that the boy didn’t look much older than Erts. There was a short, fat man who wore a turban and spoke in a "gypsy" accent, and there was a tall man with skin that was as black as the hair on Yuu’s head.

From these observations, Gareas decided that the Zion "pilots" were just too foreign, too relaxed, and way too rude. They could not be trusted, and the old man confirmed it the minute he opened his mouth.

"So," he said in a country-like accent, "you’re the whippersnappers who got your asses whooped by the STRIKERS. I had a feeling y’all would be young. And stupid."

Gareas felt a vein throb in his temple. "Stupid? Tell me gramps," he said with a hint of sarcasm in his voice, "who are you to tell us that we’re whippersnappers? In fact, who are you to say we got our asses whooped? Huh? Who are you to judge our performance in battle in the first place, huh? Tough guy?"

Gareas gave the old man a rough push that would have made even Azuma stumble. But surprisingly, the guy stood his ground, and looked over his shoulders to his comrades.

"Hey, lookee here, fellas," he said, "the kid’s trying to push me! Me! Ain’t that cute?" He turned back to Gareas and stuck out his chest. "Come on kid, " he said, patting his chest. "Punch me right there. I dare ya."

"Look old man," Gareas said, "you’re pushing it."

"Come on, kid! Or are ya scared? In fact, ya friends can try it too. Hey you!" He yelled, pointing at Rioroute, "Come over here! Come on! Show your friend what he’s dealing with! Come on!"

As the old man continued to rant, the boy came out of the shadows, revealing his shaggy brown hair and gray eyes. He made his way over to the repairers and the other Ingrid pilots and bowed his head apologetically. "I’m sorry for Thomas’s attitude," he said in a perfect British accent. "He can be a bit of a blowhard if his wife isn’t here to keep him in check." He turned to Leena. "Please tell your partner that."

"Uh…thank you," Leena replied in an uneasy manner. For some reason, the kid reminded her of Erts. "Uh…how did you know that Gareas was my partner?"

"Hmm? Oh, I saw…um, what was his name…uh…Gareas right? Anyway, I saw Gareas leave the cockpit of that mobile suit, and I saw you do some repair jobs on the same suit. So I assumed you were partners."

"Oh. How very observant of you."

"Thank you. I’m Kensou, by the way. Kensou Hitoshi."

"Leena Fujimura."

"Nice name. Um…listen, I know that you and your friends are wondering why we are here. Well, we were hoping to meet the guy in charge of the goddess program. Dr. Crow Revord is his name, I think—"

This caught Teela’s attention. "What about Dr. Revord?" She asked sharply.

The tone in her voice made Kensou jump slightly. "Um…well, you’ll have to ask Thomas over there, I really don’t know—"

"What do you want with him? Don’t you know he is sick? He cannot be disturbed."

"Well—"

"I’M TIRED OF YOU, YOU GODDAMNED GEEZER!" Gareas’s voice bellowed across the room. "GET OUT OF MY SIGHT!"

"YA STUPID, WANNABE PILOT!" Thomas bellowed back. "YA DON’T KNOW THE FIRST THING ABOUT FIGHNTIN’! IT’S NO WONDER WHY THE STRIKERS KICKED YOUR ASS!"

"THAT’S IT, YOU DIE!"

Rioroute, Yuu and the tall black man had to interfere at this point, for Thomas and Gareas were about to jump at each other’s throats.

"DON’T YOU HOLD ME BACK!" Gareas screamed as Rioroute and Yuu dragged him away. "DAMMIT, LET ME GO!"

Thomas was having an equally hard time trying to escape. "AMADOU, DON’T YOU STOP ME! I’M GONNA TEACH THAT WHIPPERSNAPPER A LESSON!"

This would have gone on for some time if someone hadn’t intervened by his cry of…

"Quiet!"

Well, that shut everyone up. Heads turned slowly to meet the annoyed, yet tired eyes of Dr. Crow Revord. He looked horrible. His hair was disheveled, his face was unshaven, and his pajama legs stuck out from the bottom of his robes.

"Can someone please tell me what is going on here? And you people--" he turned to the Zion pilots "—who are you? I don’t believe you had authorization to be here." Then his eyes fell on Thomas, and his jaw slightly dropped.

"Reynolds?" He whispered.

Thomas broke away from Amadou’s stranglehold and grinned sheepishly at Dr. Revord. "How ya doing Crow?" Thomas greeted.

"Thomas Michael Reynolds…" Dr. Revord said again and smiled. "How are you my old friend?"

"Friend?!" Gareas cried out in disbelief. "This blowhard is your friend?"

Dr. Revord ignored him and went on. "What brings you here? Is something wrong?"

Thomas’s grin disappeared and his face grew serious. "There is," he said, "but I’d rather not say it here. Can we go someplace more private?"

"Of course," Dr. Revord said, and pointed to his room. "We can talk in there. Teela, see that we are not disturbed."

"But sir," Teela protested, "Are you sure these…people…can be trusted?"

"Of course," he said. "Now if you please…"

Teela nodded and helped Dr. Revord to his room. Thomas followed shortly after, but as Teela passed him, she shot him a very cold look before joining the others. Like Gareas, she did not trust these newcomers at all.

______________________________________________________________________________________

End of chapter ten.