For Adel, Dansu, and Tucker. Because I went on an adventure

Set pre-show, no spoilers

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Lost and Found

5/18/19

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Chris knocked on the hotel room door. "It's me," she called.

There was movement on the other side and a moment later, the door swung open.

"Hey, Chris," Lasse nodded in greeting. "Feldt. You want to come in?" he asked, opening the door further and flattening himself against it to let them pass.

Instead of answering, Chris stepped forward enough to poke her head inside the room. "Hey, is Miss Sumeragi in here?"

"No?" Lasse said, glancing back.

Everyone was in the common area – Lockon sat on the couch, long legs stretched in front of him as he looked to the door in interest, Tieria alone at the two person table, terminal in hand, while Allelujah stared out the window, watching the passing traffic below.

But no Miss Sumeragi.

"Why did you think she'd be in here?" he asked, closing the door behind them.

"Oh, it's just…" Chris began, craning her neck around to scan the room again as if that would change its occupants.

"She hasn't come to our room yet," Feldt explained quietly from the doorway.

"So we were just sort of wondering if she'd come here first," Chris said as she drew back, disappointed.

"Huh," Lasse said. "That's weird."

"Yeah," Chris sighed.

"Yeah, she hasn't been in here," Lasse said, scratched the back of his head. "But you check with the others yet? Ian and Doctor Moreno are the ones on babysitting duty, so maybe she stopped by there first."

Chris pulled out her terminal, fingers flying across they keypad. "That could be…" she said, sending off a message to the other half of the team.

Lockon pushed off the couch to join them. "What's going on?" he asked, looking between them.

"We haven't seen Miss Sumeragi yet," Feldt said.

"And… neither have the others," Chris added once her terminal pinged with their reply.

"Well, didn't she say she had some things to do before she got here?" Lockon asked, voice warm and reassuring. "Some errands to run or something?"

Tieria's snort from the table was the first sign that he had been paying attention to their conversation. "Right. Errands," he said, sneering doubt dripping from the words. "You know why she arranged a meeting on the surface now. She's drained her supply at Krung Thep and is probably raiding the first liquor store she comes across."

Lasse and Lockon looked at each other. "Well, that could take her all night," Lasse observed.

Feldt's face fell in concern.

"Oh, but I'm sure she'll be here soon, though," Lasse said, trying to undo the damage.

Lockon joined in, a gloved hand landing softly on her shoulder. "Definitely. After all," he added, "She was the one who said to meet up here."

"Yeah," Chris said, although she wasn't entirely convinced. "But we were supposed to meet up here…" she checked the clock on her terminal, "almost an hour ago. So where is she?"

Tieria sniffed as he continued to scroll down his own terminal's screen. "As to be expected from Sumeragi Lee Noriega. That woman's not fit to be a forecaster if she can't even manage to show up at her own briefings at the scheduled time, let alone the tactical forecaster for the strike team of Cele-"

"Alright, that's enough," Lockon waved him off mid-tirade. Then, turning to Chris and Feldt, he asked, "Have you heard from her recently?"

"No. I sent her our room numbers after we all checked in. And an hour ago I asked where she was and she said she was coming. But nothing since then."

"Alright," Lockon said, briefly glancing up at Lasse. "You… want to send out a search party? We can go downstairs and check the lobby. Maybe she's waiting for us there instead of coming up to the rooms."

"Or perhaps she was waylaid at the hotel bar," Tieria chimed in acidly.

Lockon pointedly ignored him, looking to Chris and Feldt for an answer.

They nodded to each other and then Chris answered for the both them. "Yeah, okay," she said, as Feldt opened the door and they stepped back out into the hallway. "I'll let everyone else know we're going down."

"Good idea. Might want to text Miss Sumeragi again, while you're at it," Lockon suggested.

"Alright," Lasse called back into the room. "You heard them. Everybody up!"

Allelujah jolted to attention, staring at them wide-eyed as he pointed to himself. "Me?" he asked, sounding surprised at being addressed.

"Yes, you," Lockon said and Allelujah stiffly made his way to the door.

"You too, Tieria," he added when he made no effort to get up from the table. "Come on, everyone's coming."

Tieria finally looked up at that. "I see no reason why I should need to—"

"Because you're a Gundam meister," Lockon said, "And we have our mission."

"Well, it's not like it's an official mission," Tieria pointed out, lip quirking. "When it hasn't come from our tactical forecaster."

Lasse pinched the bridge of his nose as Allelujah joined the girls in the hallway, but Lockon just sighed. "It's a mission to retrieve our tactical forecaster," he said. "Surely, you can understand that without one, we don't really stand much of a chance?"

"We don't stand much of a chance with our current one, either," Tieria snapped. "I highly doubt she's actually gone but if she is, then perhaps it's a good riddance."

Everyone in the doorway began to protest at the same time.

"Now hold on a minute—"

"Look, Tieria," Lockon cut in. "Miss Sumeragi is the person Veda selected to lead us. If this is how highly you think of her, how much do you think you're going to like whoever isn't Veda's first choice?"

Tieria's eyes narrowed and his lips pressed into a thin line.

"Now come on," Lockon said with a jerk of his head, tone just short of an order. "We're all going to the lobby."

Silently, Tieria stood, pocketed his terminal, and stalked toward them.

Lockon heaved a sigh once he'd pushed past all of them with a scowl. "See?" he muttered to Lasse who returned his look. "Now how hard was that?"

Tieria continued on ahead of them, stepping into an elevator and hitting the close door button without waiting for any of them to join him. Lasse cursed and jogged down the last stretch of hallway, jabbing at the button in the hopes that it would force his elevator back to their floor before it could make it to the ground floor.

"Really?" he grumbled when it didn't. He continued to press the button with more force than entirely necessary.

Lockon shrugged. "We could always take the stairs," he offered when none of the elevators immediately appeared.

Chris watched Allelujah nervously shifting from side to side. "Let's do that," she said. "Don't want to lose Tieria and it looks like the elevators here are slow. Might be just as fast to take the stairs."

"Alright…" Lockon said, extending an arm and pointing them all toward the stairwell. They made the trip as quickly as they could, but Tieria was already out of sight by the time they emerged onto the ground floor.

A quick glance toward the elevators showed that he hadn't bothered to wait for them there.

"Really?" Lasse said again as they all turned to look for their missing meister.

Tieria appeared again before they could scatter too far in search of him. "I've already determined that she's not anywhere on this side of the floor," he said, voice clipped as he strode past the elevators and on toward the front doors.

"Uh… alright then," Lockon said, as they all turned to follow.

There was no one in the breakfast lounge and only one elderly gentleman in the lobby alcove, reading a newspaper in one of the overstuffed armchairs.

The hotel bar was lined with patrons in business suits, and it didn't take long to determine that Miss Sumeragi was not among them.

"Well, that's the answer to that, at least," Lasse said as Tieria started walking away again.

"Maybe she's on the other side of the lobby," Lockon suggested, ushering them to follow Tieria's lead.

A long line had formed in front of the registration desk, helped along as best as the two hotel employees could manage, but there was no reason for Miss Sumeragi to make a stop there since they'd already secured their rooms and keys and she was nowhere to be seen.

Instead of heading upstairs to their own rooms, the guests who had checked into the hotel made their way to the far side of the lobby, where a large crowd had begun to congregate. The buzz of conversation grew louder as small groups segregated to make small talk and introductions.

"Maybe she's… looking for us in that crowd?" Allelujah suggested hesitantly, voice raised loudly enough for them to hear above the people surrounding them.

"I don't think so," Lockon returned. "Looks like some sort of convention. There, see?" he said, pointing across the room to a sign beside the open doorway of the now quickly filling ballroom. Everyone except Allelujah had to squint to make it out between the swirling clusters of people. "The Asian Conference for Emerging Nations."

A line of newly registered guests in business attire pushed past them, threatening to pull them along into the crowd.

Lasse and Lockon managed to shepherd everyone back to the safety of a large potted plant by the external windows. Allelujah tucked himself into the corner behind Chris and Feldt, trying to take up as little room as possible, while Tieria stared at the crowd disapprovingly with arms crossed.

"Miss Sumeragi might have gotten pulled inside there with the crowd," Lasse said, scooting back as much as possible to let another line of people squeeze past them to join their colleagues on the other side of the lobby with boisterous greetings and loud laughter.

"True, and we wouldn't be able to see her from here."

"Maybe we should try shouting something," Lasse grinned.

"What, like 'Marco Polo?'" Chris asked.

"Seriously?" Lockon asked. "But why would she even respond to that? And what if the entire crowd wanted to play along instead?"

"What if we shouted 'Lockon?'" Lasse suggested.

"'Lockon?'" he laughed. "Why would she respond if you were yelling my name? And what would she reply with? 'Sumeragi?'"

"Well, no, then she would have to say it back in a slightly different tone," Chris said as if that explained things.

"'Lockon, Lockon?'" he repeated slowly, still not understanding why any of them thought that would work.

"It would be just like Haro," Feldt told him.

And while he finally understood what they were suggesting, he huffed a laugh that dismissed the idea without needing to say so. "Well," he said a little distantly as he pushed up on his toes to peer out over the crowd as far as he could. "I'm not seeing her. We can send someone over there to check if you want, but I doubt she'd be in there. Even if they do have refreshments."

"Have you heard back from her yet?" Lasse asked over his shoulder.

"Oh, uh, hold on, let me check," Chris said, diving into over oversized pockets for her terminal. "Um…" she said, looking at the latest message, "she says she's here."

"Really?" Lasse asked, looking around for her again.

We don't see you, Feldt typed. Where are you?

Then: We're by one of the potted plants in the lobby

No response.

Hello?

"Uh, I don't know," Chris told them, glancing back down and waiting for Miss Sumeragi's reply. "She said she's here, but I don't…"

They all looked around again but couldn't see anyone that looked anything like her.

"Maybe we should go back to the other side of the lobby?" Lasse suggested. "Tieria might have missed her when we first came down."

Tieria instantly bristled, but before he could say anything, Lockon agreed. "It'll be easier for her to find us there, anyway, and at least we won't get sucked into the ACEN vortex."

Tieria was furious as they sidled their way against the crowd, but Allelujah and Feldt looked very grateful once they had escaped the densely packed crowd. The man reading the newspaper was gone, so they claimed the cluster of empty chairs closest to the doors and waited for Miss Sumeragi to make her way to them.

"Man, I'm glad we got here earlier," Lasse remarked as they watched newly arriving guests joining the ends of two now extremely long lines.

"Yeah, this wouldn't have been fun to sit through," Lockon said, leaning back on the arm of one of the chairs.

Chris was just checking her terminal for new messages when she caught a flash of bright color outside the window against the dark, muted suits milling all around them.

And she stared in disbelief as Miss Sumeragi walked past them on the sidewalk outside the window.

"Uhhhhhhh," she started eloquently as she followed their tactician's progress through the revolving doors until Miss Sumeragi rounded the corner nonchalantly, like she'd been waiting there the entire time.

"Well, there you are," Miss Sumeragi greeted, the heavy paper bag in her hand softly clinking as she came to a stop.

"Yes?" they turned in surprise.

"We've been here the whole time."

"What do you mean, 'here we are?' Where were you?"

"Oh me?" she asked, pulling her sunglasses onto the top of her head. "At the hotel next door."

"And… why were you there?" Lasse finally ventured.

"Because it looked a lot like this one," she replied airily.

"Hold on," Lockon said in disbelief as he pushed up off of the chair. "Hold on, are you saying that you went to the wrong hotel?"

"You got them mixed up?" Chris asked in alarm. "Have…" she lowered her voice, "have you been drinking?"

"No!" Miss Sumeragi replied immediately, before amending, "Well, no more than usual. I haven't even had a chance to dig into any of these yet," she said brightly, as if that were reassuring. The bottles inside clinked as she slightly raised the bag in her hands.

"Then how did you get lost?" Feldt asked and they all stared at her, awaiting some kind of explanation.

She grinned lopsidedly at them. "Well, what can I say? These hotels all look the same. They really shouldn't share an entrance. Or a parking garage," she said, waving a hand in front of her. "It's not my fault they don't have any exterior signage at eye level—"

While everyone stared at Miss Sumeragi, Tieria watched them all in turn with a thinly pressed mouth. "And this is the person you think is worthy to be—"

"Alright, alright," Lasse said at the same moment Lockon cut in with, "That's enough."

"Oh, there you all are," a familiar voice called from behind them.

Ian waved as Lichty bounded up to the group ahead of him. "You all took so long," he said, "we decided to send out a search party!"

"A search party for the search party?" Lasse raised an eyebrow.

"Eh," Ian shrugged. "Anyway, looks like you're all here, so what's the hold up? Let's get out of here and get some real food, huh? I haven't had anything to eat since the Elevator."

"Me either," Lichty said.

"What happened to all of the snacks you got?" Lasse asked him.

"Oh those!" Lichty rubbed the back of his neck. "Well, about those-"

"Never mind, I don't want to know," Lasse waved him off.

"Oh, okay."

"Well, we can go out to eat as soon as I take these upstairs," Miss Sumeragi said with a wink.

"Why don't you take Chris with you," Lockon suggested. "She can show you where your room is. And get Setsuna and Doc Moreno."

"And make sure you make it back down here soon," Lasse added.

Miss Sumeragi shot them amused glances but threaded her arm through Chris' anyway. "Alright," she agreed easily. "Meanwhile, you should all decide on where we'll go for dinner. I passed a couple worthwhile looking places on my way over that are within walking distance. If, of course, I can find them again, that is," she added, eyes twinkling. "And we don't get lost on our way to the room."

Tieria scoffed as they began walking away.

Ian scratched the back of his head. "What was that all about?"

"Nothing," Lasse sighed.

"So!" Lockon clapped his gloved hands together. "Where do we want to eat?"