Heero Yuy was very unaccustomed to eating barbecued chicken. In fact he’d never seen the stuff in his life. Across from him Zechs Merquise, for once, actually looked like he was as hesitant as Heero. Heero decided to cease this opportunity and after a few seconds of staring his old opponent down he popped a piece of chicken into his mouth. He chewed and swallowed. It was actually quite tasty. "Try it," Heero challenged gamely, "It’s absolutely horrible."

Zechs grinned and put a piece in his mouth also. "Not a chance, but you get points for trying."

They had gotten some food at a snack stand and were leaning against the same fence looking at the airport beyond. Heero was just trying to pick out a good plane and try to find some clever way of getting information out of Zechs at the same time when Duo walked over. He recognized the situation immediately.

"Oh, hi ya Zechs!" Duo waved benignly. "Are you our ‘informant’? Man, I feel more like a cop than ever."

"Yes, unfortunately that seems to be the most important job for me."

"So do your job," Heero folded his arms, "inform us."

Abruptly Zechs sat down against the fence. He took off his hat, revealing a very large amount of silver blond hair that was pulled back loosely. He took out a laptop from his jacket. "It’s all entered into this computer."

Heero followed suit and also sat down. He just wanted to get the information (and get out of Texas) as soon as possible. He took the laptop from Zechs and turned it on.

Duo decided to sit down opposite of them. He stole some of Heero’s chicken. "Wow, Zechs buddy, that was a really hard job."

Zechs glowered at Duo before speaking. "It’s in the laptop but protected by heavy security and a series of passwords that you’ll never be able to figure out."

"I doubt that," Heero arched an eyebrow.

"Doubt and try all you want it will only waste time," Zechs sighed. "This mission…is really kind of complicated, especially since you won’t really understand it until the very end. We need you five pilots to find something for us. Unfortunately all we know about it is that it’s somewhere on Earth. So Noin and Sally’s bright idea was to send you around the globe, but not only for that reason."

"What exactly do you need us to find?" Heero asked critically.

"Several things," Zechs seemed very annoyed by something. "I’d like to just tell you but then that’d probably get you killed. Nothing new but others have a lot less faith in your boys’ ability to take care of yourself."

"Continue. If you need it you never told us anything."

"I might. You know the Preventers are the prime organization keeping the armistice together. Every single day we stop groups trying to overthrow the government. Well, we need you to go find…people that want to destroy us."

Duo started laugh and Heero looked shocked. He stared at Zechs, who now seemed extremely annoyed. "What do you mean?"

"There’s an organization after the Preventers, normally we’d handle it quickly and quietly except that this organization is very…integrated into society today. If we tried to handle it the government would stop funding us immediately. We’d be accomplishing their mission, so we’ve got to do things their way, in utter secrecy. They have a lot people watching us right now."

"Oh," Heero tried to make it sound like he understood. "So tell me again why we can’t just hack into their database and get all of the info we need."

"They’d get us the next day."

Duo blinked, suddenly understanding something. "They have something really big on the Preventers, don’t they?"

Zechs sighed again, this time very deeply. "Yeah. Huge."

"We’re being…blackmailed?"

"No, because we aren’t guilty of what they could accuse us of. But they could make it look extremely convincing."

"They could make what look extremely convincing?"

"Can’t say."

Heero took the opportunity to look down at the laptop. There was one icon on screen and it was a video from Sally. "This explain things more?"

"If you listen to her message I guarantee you you’ll be even more confused. The point is: next stop for you boys is San Francisco, California. You’ll catch a boat there out to the Pacific. Be on the lookout for people trying to break the armistice. That’s the only clue I can give you."

"Well then," Duo grinned eagerly. "Just call me Indiana Maxwell. Or double 02. Or something like that."

"Are you sure there’s something serious going on here?" Heero was still very critical of the whole thing.

"Yes, believe it or not there is," Zechs nodded and stood up. "Someone else will be meeting you in California and there they’ll tell you exactly what’s going on. Although by then I’d put my money on you boys having already figured it out," Zechs rooted around in his jacket pocket until he pulled out a set of keys. "Here, take these and find the plane that matches them. I’m sure you’ll like it, Noin picked it out. One last thing."

"What?"

"Anyone who’s tailing you is a part of the organization you’re looking for. Remember that."

Just as Zechs started walking away Wufei appeared out of no where looking extremely grumpy and dragging Trowa and Quatre behind him. Quatre was holding a big trophy. "Look guys," he called, "my chickens won first prize!"

They saw Zechs and stared for a moment. Zechs just tipped his hat and kept walking. Duo stood up and waved to the others. "Come on, we’re out of here!"

"It’s about time," Wufei complained as he dusted off his white pants. "There is absolutely no justice in hanging out at a place like this. None. No sane mission would ever take place-"

"This isn’t a sane mission," Heero muttered mostly to himself.

"Why not?" Trowa asked curiously.

"It’s just…I’ll explain on the way."