DDDDD

Duo flashed ahead of Heero. He always had been the fastest of them all, and he put that to good use. Left and left, Heero had said. The first split and the second were taken full speed. The flashlight in his hand bounced a beam of light across the wall and three small figures ahead. As he got closer he could see that one was Kane lying limply, trussed up on the floor. Solaris leaned up against the wall, and a little girl sat in front of her with a phone cradled in her hands like a lifeline.

"Sis!"

The girl started violently.

"Hi there, kiddo. I'm here to help," Duo said automatically, his full attention on his wounded sister. He searched for the pulse in her neck. It beat strong against his fingers. He sighed with a bit of relief.

"Will she be okay?" the girl asked, worried.

"Of course! She always is. Solaris is not that easy to beat."

"Good."

Heero caught up. "How is she?"

"I think it's just her ears. Something is really wrong with them." Duo wrapped an arm around his sister to pull her close. Wetness on her side made his heart clench. "Maybe not." He quickly rolled up her shirt. Blood coated her right side. A furrow four inches long ran over her ribs.

"It's a deep graze. Just needs stitches. A lot of them."

The medics and Wufei arrived. One went to tend to Kane's shattered knee and get him on a stretcher.

"Sir, we only brought one stretcher down. Do you want us to go back and get another?"

Heero shook his head. "I will carry Solaris. Get gauze on her side first. She needs a hospital."

"Quatre's going to flip when he realizes we didn't tell him what was going on and just left. So's Trowa, for that matter." Duo muttered.

Wufei pulled his worried attention away from Solaris, trusting his brothers to help her, and knelt in front of the little girl. "Hey there, Mikesha. Are you hurt at all?"

"My arm hurts a little from where I fell, but it's okay. Can we leave now?" Tears left dirty streaks down the girl's pale cheeks.

"Yes, we can leave now. Would you like me to carry you?"

She thought about it for a moment, still curled in a scared ball, before nodding and lifting her arms. Wufei picked her up tucking her on a hip.

"How old are you?" he asked trying to keep her distracted.

"Five."

Inwardly, he raged at the injustice, outwardly he smiled and began walking back out of the tunnels. "Five is a good age. You did very well."

Wufei carried Mikesha all the way upstairs and gave her over to the Preventer team in charge of taking care of the other children. "These guys are my friends. They will help you find your family, okay?"

"What about Solaris?" the girl asked desperately. "I want her to be okay! She saved me."

Wufei thought for a minute. "Tell you what, you keep her phone for right now, and then when she's all better, she can come and get it back."

"Okay."

"Good girl." he tucked a stray strand of blond hair behind her ear.

Duo claimed the single spot in the ambulance with Solaris before the others could even think about it. "Call Sally and have her meet us there! She's the only doc who's worked on Solaris before. The other's haven't read her charts yet!"

As they were senior, leading officers, it was a couple of hours before they could all leave the scene with the others. Duo was still pacing the waiting room when they entered.

"Do we know anything yet?" Quatre asked first, rubbing at his chest from the shared stress.

"Nothing was life threatening. It's just whether or not they can save her hearing." Duo informed, jitterly bouncing around.

About twenty minutes later, Sally wearily joined them and sat down. "We did the best we could to put her eardrums back together. Only time will tell if it worked. She will have to remain fairly still during recovery, or she will get dizzy and ill again as her ears try and fail to adjust with her balance."

SSSS

Solaris woke to almost complete silence; only hearing her own heartbeat. Heaviness weighed down her head. Turning to look around took much longer then it should have. She surmised there were a lot of drugs in her system. They were the only things that could make her feel so sluggish. A concussion didn't normally have this much affect, and she'd had plenty enough to know.

Solaris noticed someone sitting in the chair beside her. "Hey," she said, or tried to.

It got Trowa's immediate attention anyway. "Hi, how are you feeling?" he spoke slowly, giving her time to read his lips.

"Drugged."

"You are. Now that you are awake, Sally will take you off of some of them, so you'll feel clearer soon."

"My hearing?"

"We don't know. They have your ears covered so that the damaged drums don't vibrate and undo everything they've done."

"Sis!" Duo's beaming face popped into view before he hugged her for all he was worth. She managed to bring up the arm he wasn't pinning and hug him back.

As soon as Duo moved away, Quatre was right there to claim one, too. "Hey, missed you. I'm glad you are back."

"Missed you too, Quat." Quatre grinned and stepped aside to let Heero in.

Heero leaned over, making sure she could read him. "Mission complete. Stand down. You're home."

Something she hadn't realized was tense and waiting inside relaxed abruptly. "Roger that," she said.

Heero hugged her and offered her a sip of water. Trowa elbowed him out of the way when she was done drinking and embraced her as well. When he stepped away as well, she realized Wufei hadn't stood within her line of sight, and then there he was. She cringed inwardly, remembering their last meeting; the bruise was barely gone.

"Solaris," Wufei said somberly, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have hit you. Not like that. For those reasons. I was... upset, but not unhappy to see you. I am truly pleased you are home."

Solaris almost laughed. It was stupid, but that contrite look just didn't fit him. And she had a feeling the drugs were making her loopy. But he truly was sorry, she could tell, and so she barely stifled the humor from bubbling forth.

"How about we just both forgive each other and you come here and give me a hug too, you baka."

Wufei smiled softly and bent over the bed and pulled her close. Tears pricked at her eyes. Yes, the drugs had to be spacing her out. She hid her face in his shoulder and clung as tight as she could until the urge to cry eased off. When she let him up, he brushed the sole escaped tear off with his thumb before the others could see it.

"I'm happy you are home."

"It's good to be here."

Epilogue

Four months later:

The stadium was packed with waiting fans. None of the racers in the pits paid them the least bit of attention. That was reserved for the final touches on their motorcycles.

One little girl and her mother sat with the waiting pit crew, watching as all six of the racers on this team tinkered with their bikes. Solaris had the whole front of hers blocked up and lay underneath it, checking that nothing had been damaged during its storage and transfer.

It had taken a week for her to be able to sit up without wanting to vomit, and a further two months before she could walk straight. It took three months for Cordelone's trial to be pushed through to court and subsequently sentenced to life imprisioned without appeal. Another month passed away before she could convince her boys, particularly Duo, that she could actually do something like racing again.

"Hey, sis, I thought your racing bike was white?" Duo asked, confused.

"Where did you get that idea?" she wondered from beneath her dark purple motorcycle edged with pale green. A silver tiger prowled over the tank.

"Well, you won the First World Free Race, didn't you?"

"Umm, no, I came in eighth. I didn't want you to actually notice me yet. I just wanted to see you; even from a distance. Darkpeace won. Her bike is white. I race as Phantom. "

"But she's not a Gundam pilot!" Duo whined.

"So?"

"She totally broke our winning streak! If it had been you it would still be whole and untouchable!" Duo cried, waving his arms in the air in exasperation.

"Sorry," Solaris shrugged, uncaring.

"So who is Darkpeace, then? Why does she hide?" Wufei asked.

"When I asked, she said her family wouldn't approve of her racing career, so she was hiding until she could stand completely on her own two feet and it wouldn't matter what they did."

"Wait, that means she's just a kid, too!" Duo yelled.

"Hmhm, seventeen."

"D—arn it!" Duo caught himself just in time with a sheepish glance towards Mikesha and her mother.

Solaris snickering, slid out from under her bike. "She's just that good, brother love." She lifted the motorcycle by the handlebars and rolled it backwards off of the blocks. Leaning close to Duo on her way by, she whispered, "But guess what? I'm better. And now, I'm not trying to hide from you boys."

Heero laughed, "The look on your face, Duo."

Solaris deemed her bike race-ready and went to wash her hands and suit up. Wufei was sitting on a bench, already half-dressed with only his jacket and helmet left to put on. On her way to the sink, he reached out and snagged her around the hips.

"Hey, there," he said softly.

"Hmm…hi." Solaris smiled and leaned down to kiss him, threading her fingers through his yet unbound hair.

"Are you sure you are ready to do this?" he asked one last time.

"More than," she answered, touched by the careful concern.

"Okay, " Wufei said, trusting her and letting her go.

"I'm going to kick your butts too!" Solaris proclaimed and prowled away to get ready to do just that.

THE END

For now, anyway...I have no plans to work on more fanfiction in the near future, but that doesn't mean I won't. LOL

I hoped you enjoyed, and for those of you who have stuck with me all the way, thank you! ^-^ And for all the newcomers, HI, and thanks for reading to the end too!

I'm off to finish writing my own characters and their story.

This has been a blast. Bye for now!

Knyghtshade Wolf