Author's note: Ussual disclaimers: I don't own Gundam Wing or Gundam Seed. If I did they would not be nearly as cool (well, maybe Destiny, but we'll come to that at another time).

Anyway, enjoy!

Gundam Wing: Journey to a New Battlefield

Episode One: The Lonely Victor

It was early February in the year After Colony 196. Floating high above the blue and green gem that was the Earth, now finally at peace with its space colonies, was a large mobile suit. Its distinctive paint job, a white and blue base with a green circular sensor in the center of the chest, red trim on the shoulders and a golden head crest with a green sensor in the middle, along with two more emerald sensors where eyes would have been on a man, stood out in stark contrast to the blackness of space and the dull gray of nearby floating debris, near-indestructible Gundanium alloy glistening in the sunlight that crept over the planet's horizon. On its back were two large blue and white thruster pods. In its left hand was a giant twin barreled rifle while a red, white, and yellow shield was attached to its arm. Its right hand was empty, though it could if need be grab one of the beam sabers that were hidden away in its shoulder compartments. Also concealed on its shoulders were two heavy gatling cannons, ready to unleash rapid fire hell on unsuspecting foes.

The machine was Wing Gundam Zero, known simply as Wing Zero, the most powerful mobile suit ever built. The weapon that had saved the Earth from the falling battleship Libra, set on a collision course with the planet by Quinz, second in command of the colonist militant group White Fang, in a mad attempt to carry out the original Operation Meteor. Now the war was over, and the machine had found itself in an era where it did not belong.

The same could also be said of its pilot. Clad in a black spacesuit, helmet set aside for the moment, was a sixteen year old boy. With dark brown hair and Prussian blue eyes, his was certainly a face that many would consider handsome, but it had a cool edge to it, and within those eyes were traces of weariness brought on by a lifetime of battles. Heero Yuy, one of the five Gundam Pilots that had helped to bring about this new period of peace, perhaps the greatest soldier the world and colonies alike had ever seen, was at a loss.

All his life, he had known nothing but battles. Raised by an assassin, then taken in by a colonial resistance group, he had been taught from a very young age all aspects of the intricate art of war. War was what he had grown up with, and his becoming a Gundam Pilot was his crowning achievement, a sign of his mastery of combat. The revised Operation Meteor, where the five young men had descended to Earth to wage war against the United Earth Sphere Alliance and the secret society controlling it, OZ, had been the culmination of his training; all those long years coming together in that mission, which had shook the entire Earth Sphere in a spectacular year long conflagration.

The war, it had been said, to end all wars.

What Heero mused on now, drifting amidst the stars, was that he had never expected that to actually happen; that a true, lasting peace could in fact be achieved. He had simply fought for the independence of the colonies, and had never really thought about what might happen afterwards. Now, ironically, the colonies and the Earth were in fact closer than ever, forming the new Earth Sphere Unified Nation. Many of his friends had managed to settle down in the new nation, and Relena had even become the Vice Foreign Minister. Then again, he thought, she did once hold the title of Queen of the World Nation. Guess I shouldn't be too surprised. He let out a small chuckle. He, however, had been unable to really find a niche of his own. He had taken on freelance work for the government, keeping tabs on organizations that were suspected of attempting rearmament, but those assignments had been way too easy, and more to the point, unable to fulfill the void he now felt within. When he wasn't running an investigation, he would often just take Wing Zero out into space and drift, trying to meditate and come to some sort of conclusion as to where he was supposed to go.

Today was different though. Long range scans had shown that a large section of OZ's ruined space fortress Barge had drifted away from the main debris field and was heading towards the Earth. It was the main reactor containment block. Ironically, although Barge itself had been destroyed just before being able to fire a fully charged blast from its main cannon, the reactor was intact. This was due to a safety feature that had actually been designed to seal off the primary reactor from the rest of the station in the event of a coolant leak or partial meltdown. However, the system worked both ways, and the reactor had been sealed off the moment Epyon's enormous beam sword had sliced into Barge, igniting sub-systems and breaching the auxiliary reactors, which had destroyed the station, but the failsafe for the main reactor had activated, and the section, which was far more reinforced than the rest of Barge, had survived the explosion. It was currently the largest piece by far of the Barge debris field.

While its size alone wasn't enough to cause a lot of damage should the block fall to Earth, what had Heero worried was all the excess energy that was still encased within the reactor. After all this time, it's still fully charged for that final blast, mused Heero. He had to hand it to the Romefeller Foundation, the chief military-industrial organization that had backed OZ, they knew how to build their toys and make them last.

Now he was aiming the Twin Buster Rifle at the block, from a respectable distance of course. If he could destroy it before it fell into the atmosphere, the planet's magnetic field and o-zone layer would protect it from all the built up energy that would suddenly be released upon the reactor's demise.

That's the idea, anyway. He knew that with all the energy stored in the reactor, plus the sheer power of Wing Zero's Twin Buster Rifle, it was impossible to approach this problem with complete certainty. He had no problem with this though. Every time he piloted the Gundam, he was aware that there would always be the chance that he could die. Why should now be any different?, he thought.

"Focus, Heero," he muttered to himself, "no sense in dying here." The reactor block was minutes away from reaching the upper atmosphere. Moving Wing Zero into an interception position, Heero brought his massive rifle to bear and began charging it. Soon the barrel tips were emanated with a yellow-gold glow as the incredibly powerful weapon, surpassed only by the primary cannons on Barge and the Libra, was primed at maximum firepower. I usually only use a fraction of this, Heero mused, I haven't fired the Twin Buster Rifle at full power since the Libra began its descent. Firing the gun at maximum repeatedly would rapidly drain the weapon's energy, which was recharged by the mobile suit's Gundanium alloy encased fusion reactor. Normally recharging wasn't an issue, but after repeated use on maximum power the weapon could only be recharged when the suit was grounded, and thus not using additional energy. Not to mention the sheer recoil from consecutive firing of the Twin Buster Rifle on that setting in the atmosphere would in all likelihood destroy the Gundam.

Now that it was fully charged, Heero made the appropriate adjustments to the weapon and prepared to fire. Glancing at a timer, he saw that the amount of time he had before the reactor block passed the point of no return was less than three minutes. In addition, his own position was in the upper atmosphere. If he wasn't careful, the slight difference between that and the vacuum of space could throw his shot off.

Confident that he had made all the necessary preparations, Heero took a deep breath, and pulled the trigger. A massive yellowish beam ripped forth, tore through space in a fraction of a second, and hit the reactor dead center. The block exploded, and all the pent up energy from Barge's would-be final blast was released. Crimson light spewed out in all directions, and the massive shockwave caused Wing Zero to shudder violently.

However, something was terribly wrong. These energy readings, Heero realized, are far greater than I expected. He was surprised to see that, at the epicenter of the explosion, a strange rift had opened. Within this strange hole was a confluence of light, in every spectrum imaginable. Heero might have found it beautiful, except for his sudden realization that Wing Zero had begun moving towards it.

Checking his sensors, he realized that it was not gravity, but the suit's own engines that were moving Zero towards the rift. "What are you doing, Zero?" snarled Heero as he fought to regain control of the Gundam. However, the Zero System, a combination between an extremely sophisticated tactical/strategic analysis program and an advanced A.I. that gave the pilot an unprecedented degree of awareness and interface ability with the Gundam, had taken complete control of the suit, and even Heero Yuy, one of only a few people to completely master the incredibly dangerous program, was powerless to stop it. As the Gundam continued to move towards the rift, Heero could feel the system communicating with him on a subconscious, almost telepathic level, something it tended to do during heated battles. "Are you saying my future is through there?"

Taking one last look behind him at the Earth, he then turned towards the gash in space/time that he had accidentally created. "Fine then," he said, the determination that had been characteristic of him during the war, and missing from him during the past month as he had drifted without purpose, finally returning to him, resonating in his voice, "Let's go." Before being swallowed by the light and losing consciousness from the increasing vibration and pressure being exerted, he gave a small smile.

"Farewell… my friends."

Then he was gone, passed out of the universe whose calendar marked the years after mankind's ascension towards its new life in space colonies, and had begun his journey to the one on the other side. One plagued by the same disease that the Earth Sphere in his realm had only just cured itself from.

War.

Preview for next time!

The destruction of Barge's reactor has flung Heero into another world. With only Wing Zero and limited supplies, can even the "Perfect Soldier" survive? Meanwhile, the Earth Alliance battleship Archangel is under attack, and Lieutenant Murrue Ramius is struggling just to keep herself and her crew alive. Can a new player on the scene change the outcome? Next time, on "Journey to a new Battlefield", Episode Two: Cosmic Era 71.

Author's note: Alright, first chapter up! I'll post chapter two soon too, after that the updates will be slower, I want to be careful before I release new chapters. Just to give you guys a heads up, the amount of forces available to factions like ZAFT (or anyone that has to go up against Heero, for that matter!) will be greatly increased from what they were in the show, in order to compensate for Heero's presence. Also, a lot of the dialogue from scenes from the show will, of course, be different, though I'll try to keep some of the original lines when possible.

Till next time everyone! Please review!