Chapter 7

She could hear startled screams and men shouting, but shock made it hard to focus on what was happening anywhere but beneath her feet, where the floor had once been. The podium disappeared into the hole opening rapidly beneath her, leaving her suspended above a Nothing that hungered to drag her down.

Her weightlessness lasted only long enough for one startled inhale, her body sucked swiftly down into that black maw, before something solid collided with her and sent her careening sideways instead of downward. She felt an arm, hard as iron and covered in fabric, band around her torso and pull her against a familiar chest as the artificial gravity resumed its pull. The momentum of that intervention threw them at the far edge of the widening sinkhole, the fingers of a calloused hand catching the ledge with a bone-jarring jerk for one reckless, hope-filled second before that, too, crumbled.

They fell in earnest then, the light above shrinking from a distance of ten, twenty, thirty… she caught sight of Heero's face as the light disappeared. He curled himself around her a breath before they smashed into a sloped, jagged surface, tucking her head against his chest and tangling her legs between his just as the impact forced the breath from their bodies. Objects crashed around them, filling the empty space with noise and chaos as they tumbled down the slope. They rolled, fast, faster, blurring with speed that made her sick and had the distantly conscious part of her thoughts wondering how Heero could still maintain his grip around her. Debris tumbled around them: splintered wood and tortured metal and broken rock that had come down into the abyss when the world swallowed them whole. Her body lit with fire as a thousand tiny shards pierced through her clothes and left scalpel incisions with their passing, and then they HIT—

The impact was so great she heard Heero's growl of pain when his back hit the wall, his arms forced open from the sheer power of their aborted inertia so that she flew backward away from the safety of his body—

Hands clamped her, clenching her back down to his chest with a ferocity that both scared and reassured her. They rolled again, but now the slope was so steep they may as well have been falling. Their bodies bounced over the rock, once, twice, and then the weightlessness returned as though they were floating, cradling them in that hungry nothing for endless seconds...

Pain exploded through her as they hit solid ground.

Heero beneath her, Relena's lungs struggled to draw in breath as her mind grasped after the fact that they were no longer moving. Debris rained around them, and a second later she was thrown onto her back and covered as the rest of the world finally caught up and crashed down around them. Awareness grew distant as crushing weight settled over her, more than just the weight of a man, but she had no time to understand it as she lost her grasp on consciousness.

It was hard to breathe.

Relena opened grit-filled eyes to find blackness, her chest feeling as though all of Europe were resting on her breastbone. Her face was pressed against the fabric of Heero's jacket, her head and back cradled by his hands. His body covered hers, but she was trapped by more than just the man above her. Fire consumed the right side of her chest. Everything hurt. As she tried to see in the utter darkness, she realized that a warm liquid covered the right side of her face. Heero was silent above her.

Inhaling was agony, but she drew in the breath it took to say his name. Trying to move her hands was useless—both were pinned between their bodies, trapped by the same weight that held her down. The sound of her voice was small and gravelly. When he did not stir, she tried again.

"Heero, wake up!"

She could not see his face, but she felt the instant the tension returned to his body. His fingers flexed in her hair, tightening subtly before slipping from their place against her head. How he could move at all, she would never know.

She felt the muscles in his shoulders contract as he planted his palms on either side of her head and pushed, felt him tremble with the effort to lift the weight that held them both down. Slowly, inch by inch, he rose away from her, until she felt no part of him against her save where their knees touched. Free from the weight, pain pulsed viciously in her side. Gritting her teeth against the pain, she pulled herself out from under him and rose sluggishly to her feet. She waited as he shrugged off whatever object had fallen on them, the sound of something incomprehensibly heavy shifting to settle on the ground before the sound was swallowed up by the air around them.

"Are you okay?" He asked, so close that she jumped. Like her own, his voice sounded rough and low, as though he had eaten gravel.

"I…" His hands found her body in the dark, fingers tracing over her face and side. "I'm not sure. I—" He stopped when he found the wet area on her face. She could practically hear his scowl.

"Are you bleeding?" He probed the area gently, but there was no pain except for what felt like superficial scrapes.

"No, it feels fine. I don't think it's from me. Are you—ah!" She gasped as his other hand grazed her ribs, nausea and agony rolling through her without warning. He stepped into her, catching her when her knees threatened to buckle and lowering her slowly to the ground. Once seated, those hands returned, lifting her blouse and camisole with a light touch that nevertheless made her want to vomit when it hit the same spot again. Tears sprang unbidden to her eyes, and for a few minutes after Heero let her just sit and breathe slowly through the hurt.

"You must have broken a rib during the fall," he explained, letting her feel the glide of his fingers before he started to probe the offending area again. It took everything in her not to jerk away from the pain. "I can feel swelling, but the skin is intact; The bone doesn't appear to be puncturing through. I know it hurts but keep taking deep breaths when you can."

"Shouldn't I wrap it?"

"No," he said flatly, "we don't know how long we'll be down here and restricting your breathing is more likely to cause pneumonia." His words left her feeling cold, both physically and emotionally, reminding her that they were far below the surface of a piece of space rock that was slowly being converted for human habitation. Relena realized abruptly that they were fortunate the artificial gravity and atmosphere were reaching them this far down into Coranis.

It was impossible to tell how big of a space they had fallen into, but now that she was aware of their prison, she realized just how cold it was. Despite the three layers she wore, it felt as though they were outside on a winter day. The artificial atmosphere, although powerful enough to provide oxygen (at least for the time being) was not strong enough to heat the entirety of the satellite this early in development. If they did not find a way out quickly, it was highly likely they would freeze to death.

He checked the rest of her body in the darkness, fingers finding the small cuts and various bruises left behind by the debris that had accompanied them when they fell but ultimately concluding that everything else was sound. When he finished, she felt the heavy material of his Preventer jacket drape over her shoulders.

"I can't take this, you'll freeze!" she protested, moving to return the coat before hands settled on her shoulders, stubbornly refusing to let her remove it.

"Take it."

She tried to glare at him through the darkness; felt his own steady gaze looking back at her, unwavering in the silence. She tugged belligerently at the fabric, but his hands remained firm until she sighed in exasperation and let go.

"Heero, you'll get hypothermia. Even you aren't immune to the cold. I have a jacket; you need yours."

She heard the rustle of fabric as he stood up, his voice moving away from her as he spoke. "We need to find out how big this cavern is. If there is a way out, we need to use it to get help. I'll be moving and likely climbing. My body will naturally be producing more heat due to the increased activity. You need to stay still because of your ribs, which means you'll be losing core heat more rapidly. You need the jacket more than I do, Relena." By the time he was done, it was as though he were talking from across a great hall, the sound small and distant. She was not foolish enough, nor proud enough, to discard the jacket that he would not allow her to give back, nor could she chase him across the sightless expanse, so instead Relena tucked herself further into the warmth, surrounded by his scent, and pretended she could see him moving in the dark. Anxiety boiled low in her chest as she acknowledged that he was literally walking blind in what was revealing itself to be an enormous cavern.

"How are you going to keep track of where you started? It's pitch black."

"I'll mark the stone as I go. Stay there," he answered, voice muffled as though he had slipped behind a barrier. The anxiety kicked up a notch in her chest, tightening her breathing and making the pain from her ribs worse. Truly, how big was this cavern?

Long moments stretched without words. She strained to hear traces of his movements in the dark. It was difficult, as her own breathing was loud in her ears, and Heero's version of 'loud' was the same as another man's whisper. Furthermore, the cavern seemed to swallow sound as soon as it was produced, so she did not know if hearing him was even possible. As endless minutes passed—an hour? More?—she knew fear was getting the better of her, but it was hard to push it down while she sat alone in utter darkness, body aching with every breath, wondering if the one person she could trust above all things had fallen into another hole she would never know about.

He had jumped in after her.

The thought chewed quietly at the back of her mind; it had started the moment she woke. No hesitation. No thought for his own life. He had simply jumped and caught her as the sinkhole pulled them down, probably preventing her from breaking her neck in the process. Risking his own neck, his spine, his legs, his… she still did not know what had landed on them initially, but it was massive enough to make moving all but impossible until Heero had shifted it.

…He had just jumped.

It was not the first time.

Relena knew there must already be people working up above to find them; David would be losing his mind. Every bad thing he had imagined about her coming up to Coranis had come true today. She did not doubt that her husband was currently in full-blown CEO mode: voice raised, words short, while he whipped any idle bodies into motion and ensured that everyone was doing everything they could to find her. He had been across the room when the floor gave out, watching from behind the cameras like the civilian that he was, unable to help her from so far away when Coranis had swallowed her whole. Had he been closer, he would have grabbed for her or tried to pull her back; would have failed because the collapse had happened too quickly for normal human reflexes. Even with superhuman reflexes, at best he would have been able to keep himself from getting caught in the collapse.

David never would have jumped.

Relena sighed and buried her face in her hands, pain lancing through her at the gesture.

It was not a fair comparison. It had never been a fair comparison.

The cold bit at her, forcing a shiver despite the Preventer coat around her shoulders. She curled in tighter to the fabric, her broken ribs screaming obscenities while the scent of gunmetal and motor oil wafted up to her. Where was Heero?

Sitting alone in the dark cavern, thoughts of her husband and the Gundam pilot running through her mind, Relena itched to hear a voice other than the one in her head.

"Heero?" she called, words quickly swallowed by the vastness of the space, "Is everything ok? Did you find anything?"

Silence greeted her questions. It stretched, deep and ominous, even after she called again, louder. How long had he been gone now? It felt like an age. Fear bit down hard across her spine.

With effort, she rose to her feet but dared not step forward, knowing that it was foolish to move away from where he had left her. Heero was a hunter in many ways; he was far better equipped to find his way back to her than she was to him. Still, she longed to chase after him, to make sure he had not slipped away and left her behind. What if something had happened?

"Heero?"

…Nothing.

Could he not hear her? Could he not answer? Could she not hear him? How far away had he wandered? Was he lost? Had he fallen? Hurt himself?

"Heero!" Her voice sounded high and panicked., loud enough to finally force an echo from somewhere deep within the expanse. Her breathing came in shallow pants, fear a vice around her chest that squeezed so hard the agony flooded her until her fingers tingled with it.

What could she do? She could try to retrace his steps, but she had no idea which direction he went beyond the approximation of where his voice had been. She could see nothing, so it was far more likely she would injure herself trying to chase him, especially knowing there was debris that littered the ground around where they fell. If he was calling to her, she could not hear it. She could continue to stay where she was, but if he was hurt and more time passed, there would be a lower chance she could help him. She could not climb the way he could, and she did not know whether the wrong step would break the fragile atmosphere that allowed them to breathe right now.

Her options were few and feeble, and all of them felt useless. There were many times in her life where Relena felt helpless, but this was a different level than in the past. She could influence war with her words and sway the minds of men who yearned for destruction, but in the pitch black of an unknown space she could only make the situation worse. If she left to find him and he swung back to where she had been, they might never find one another. If he was hurt and she did nothing, he might die. If he was lost and could not find a way out, she may lose him to the cold even when rescue came.

Fear made her angry. And belligerent. Her hands curled into fists at her side. Why did he always think he had to do everything on his own? Why did he always leave her behind as though it were for her own good? How could he have jumped in after her like that?

The weight of his jacket around her shoulders was a reminder of how easily he exposed himself to danger for the sake of protecting her. She thought of their conversation before the press conference, of the unguarded expression she saw in his eyes when she looked up at him. She wanted to find him and hit him for every time he made her afraid for him in the name of her safety, for every time he withheld information from her because he thought she would be better off without it. What if he couldn't find her? What if she never knew the truth? What if this was the time the fear was right?

Why did he always jump in after her … when all he did was leave the next moment?

She took a step forward into the dark, fury burning through her chest even as tears slipped over her cheeks. God help her, she would find him in the dark, even if it meant getting lost herself.

"If you can't find me, I'll find you," she muttered as she took another step.

"I'll always find you, Relena."

Relena jumped, heart in her throat, as his voice rumbled inches away in the pitch black. Alarm and relief flooded her body immediately. Her mind struggled to process that he was there beside her, close enough to touch. She reached out blindly and met warm, damp fabric and hard muscle. His hand caught hers briefly, enveloping icy fingers in comforting heat. She could not help the strangled, hysterical half-laugh that escaped her throat.

She stepped into the frame of his body without permission and wrapped her arms around him, burying her face in the crook of his neck. The smell of iron and that same sticky substance lingered on him as her skin touched his, but she only cared about the solid figure of his body against hers. A beat passed before his arms rose to wrap around her in response, one hand stroking her hair.

"Stop leaving me behind."

It was a plea as much as a command. His response was the flex of his hand in her hair.

He held her for a long minute, until calm settled over her shoulders and eased the tension, then slowly loosened his hold until only the tips of his fingers lingered against her.

"Where were you?" she demanded, the anger and fear still evident in her voice. "I called out to you."

"I answered. You didn't hear me." He stepped back, out of reach, his voice turning away briefly in the direction from which he must have approached. His words were as monotone as ever, all business.

Ever the soldier.

"The cavern is like a maze. The walls are open at the top, but everything is separated by chambers. The rock is thick and domed. The areas higher up that I could reach curve too sharply for me to find a ledge. We're lucky we landed in an open area instead of on the edge of a wall."

She could feel him studying her, even without sight. Obstinately, she pulled her composure around her like a shield, wiping away her tears and squaring her shoulders. If he wanted to be the soldier, she would be the politician.

Relena frowned as she absorbed his words, trying to picture the space in her head. She forced herself to inhale deeply and release her breath slowly, steadying herself against the emotions that kept threatening to drown her in the inky dark. "So, what do we do?"

"We wait."

The frown deepened. "Wait?"

His voice redirected itself toward her again, drawing closer until she could feel the heat radiate from his body. "Our best chance is to stay where we are. The engineers will be able to track the fissures in the rock, so it's likely they will find this space when they try following the path we fell through. Litz will put all of his resources into finding you."

Relena was surprised by his words, eyebrows rising in curiosity. "For someone who is convinced Cecil is evil, you're certainly confident in his dedication to help us."

"He'll want to find your body."

"Heero!"

The heat of him shifted closer again. His breath ghosted over her as he spoke, voice low and steady. "Litz is not a friend, Relena. He is documenting everything, including the image of you falling into a sinkhole amidst a speech about the merits of the Mars Project. He broadcast that image to the entirety of space and the Earth Sphere. His goal is to show everyone that the Mars Project is too dangerous to pursue; that the best solution is to abandon the project before it goes any further. The simplest way to do that is for you to die as a direct result of managing the project, which is why he was so eager to offer Coranis to you. This was his intention."

Disbelief warred with alarm as she measured Heero's words against what she knew of Cecil Litz. His tone was sincere, grave. Heero did not question his statement as anything but fact. But Cecil had always been chivalrous. Benevolent. He was intelligent, well-spoken, almost fatherly. He ensured his employees were supported and well cared-for. He was adored.

Her mind flashed to the expression on Cecil's face earlier that day when they had been alone together. His words had been a compliment, there was no threat or malice in his expression, but there had been an instinct set off by his demeanor and his eyes that shouted at her to run far away from him in that moment. He had frightened her in a manner so insidiously subtle that she had immediately questioned her own instincts.

All at once, she realized that she needed to know what Heero knew. She needed him to tell her, to let her know that her doubt about Cecil was not wrong.

"How do you know?" she asked him quietly, chilled once again by the memory running through her mind of a colleague that was supposed to be her ally. She was not sure anymore.

Silence met her question, hesitation lingering in the air. Relena knew he was wearing that inscrutable expression on his face, weighing his words, prepared to shut her out. Desperation gripped her suddenly, violently, without warning, as she felt her chance to know the truth slipping away between the absence of his words.

"Tell me, Heero, please," she pleaded, hands reaching to clutch the fabric of his shirt. She noted again how one side of the cloth felt damp and sticky, tacky where she grasped it. What had he climbed through? Was there more about the cavern he was not telling her about? Was he withholding more information from her? She felt her fingers tremble against him, realizing that, although she was trying to keep herself calm, her emotions were a thread shy of spinning out of control. So much was happening around her lately, but she felt as though no one was willing to tell her exactly what was at stake. She needed him to speak plainly for her own sake, because she could not continue in the constant dark, wondering what dangers he was facing in her name, without her knowledge. She needed him to make her part of those decisions.

She forced herself to exhale, took her emotions and clamped them into a vice that shut out the dark and the cold and the pain. She forced her fists to relax, raised her chin toward what she thought was his face; hoping she was looking him in the eyes; hoping he could feel her sincerity.

"Please stop trying to protect me; not like this. I need to protect myself. I can't do that if no one will be honest with me about what's going on. You're suspicious of Cecil for a reason, and I know you have evidence to support it if you're serious enough to accuse him of attempted murder. You told me about his company, but what are you not saying? Everyone wants me to be safe, but no one wants to give me the tools to help myself. Do you think I'm too weak? Do you think if I know the truth that I'll ruin whatever you have planned to expose the people who want to hurt me? If you want me to understand, you need to talk to me. You need to give me more than just cryptic warnings. I trust you, Heero. I believe in you, but I can't keep waiting for you to drop crumbs for me to follow. I need you to believe in me, too." His entire body had gone still. "Please, Heero."

His chest moved, breathing steadily, the subtle scent of iron drifting toward her again. It reminded her that he was a man who had grown up wrapped in secrets and lies, fighting a losing war while eluding death by a hair's breadth. Heero had lived his life in the shadows. He had learned to survive by never revealing more than was necessary. Even years later, that way of life was all he knew. But she needed him to give her more, and if he couldn't…

She sighed, crumpling against him in resignation, hiding herself in the frame of his body despite the fact that he could not see the tears starting to roll down her face again. There was a wall between them, one that had been built thicker and higher the longer they knew each other. Now she knew that he would never breach it, no matter how much she—

"Preventer has been watching Litz for years."

Her breath caught in her throat.

"Part of what Preventer does is catalogue and track disasters linked to man-made enterprises: structural collapse, system failure, biological warfare, data breeches. Analysts started to notice trends across a wide variety of structures being implemented within the Colonies. L-4 almost lost an entire sector because an air filtration system malfunctioned. Several new bridges on L-5 collapsed, causing mass casualty. L-3 saw an outbreak of disease because a hazardous materials chamber failed overnight. After each investigation, the cause of the failure was determined to be a direct result of human error when executing the construction of the design."

She had heard the news on each of those stories: faulty construction, sloppy craftsmanship… In the past several years, there were a handful of Colony-based private companies that had shut their doors because their work was on those failed devices, where the same plans had flourished in other locations. She remembered particularly, because some of those companies had expressed interest in the Mars Project.

"Usually, incidents like these are not connected by any common thread. In fact, neither the Colonies nor Earth see them as holding any relation to each other. But Preventer was formed in the aftermath of the war; it was established to maintain the peace across both Earth and space, so it looks through a much wider lens when investigating connections between both bodies. That's why Une is so successful as a leader: she's capable of feeling out the thinnest threads and following them back to the source. She traced back each design linked to these disasters to Litz. Once she found the thread, it led to the discovery of over 150 Colony-based incidents in the past decade stemming from his designs.

"Litz creates engineering archetypes across a wide spectrum, primarily for the ecological benefits of the environments within which they're utilized. His designs are originated for Earth use, but the Colonies inevitably adopt them at exorbitant prices because their implementation is too valuable to ignore. Most of the designs are like skeletons, creating a foundation upon which the rest of the work is constructed, so the companies that purchase them for use have to pay to fill in the rest of the design elements based on their individual projects. Litz provides very specific instructions on how to ensure the designs are successful when expanded upon.

"However, although the blueprints and materials are adjusted to accommodate the physics of space, and models that are constructed by Litz's personal companies are executed flawlessly using these same specifications, 34% of Litz's designs suffer some degree of failure upon implementation in space when the construction is performed by a secondary company. Almost none of his designs executed on Earth have exhibited the same problems, no matter the construction company."

Relena frowned, leaning away from him as though he might see her incredulous expression in the black. "But if there is such strong statistical evidence that it's dangerous to use them, why would the Colonies continue to buy his designs?"

"They don't know about it," Heero explained, his voice grim. "The statistics are only evident when you look at all the incidences across all five Colonies over the past ten years and compare them to his Earth projects. Most of the failed projects don't even connect to Litz until you look deeper. Litz did not operate outside of Earth before that time, and the Colonies are reluctant to share information between themselves, especially regarding catastrophes that appear to occur because of the inadequacies of their own engineers. They're quietly buying blueprints from an Earth-based businessman, then failing to execute those blueprints properly despite strict guidelines written into the blueprints, leading to the injuries and deaths of their own citizens. None of the Colonies would publicize that information."

It was a vicious, diabolical scheme, but it was also an ingenious one. Relena understood exactly how hard the Colonies would work to discredit any rumors that they were inferior to Earth-based businesses. As she considered the implications of everything Heero had said, she felt her brow furrow even further. "But how could Cecil even guarantee that only the Colony-based companies would make these mistakes if the blueprints are the same?"

His silence was long in response to her question, his body tense beneath her hands.

"…We don't know." It was as close to anger as Relena had ever heard in his voice.

"Une saw the connection between it all but could find no evidence that Litz had tampered with either the blueprints or the materials that were sold to the Colony-based companies. Preventer has been quietly dissecting all of Litz's work in the past year, hoping to find the answer. So far, they've found nothing. When Une realized that Litz had turned his attention to the Mars Project, she suspected that you might be the next target and pulled me in from the field. That was six months ago."

Her hands clenched against him subconsciously at his words. Six months? Cecil had first contacted her about Coranis five months ago, barely two months before Heero had appeared in her office at the ESUN building. How much had he already known then?

"Initially Une asked me to dig into the past of the Litz Corporation, and that of the family, in hopes that I could find how Litz manipulates the construction process. Much of their background is tied to geology and structural engineering, which is the foundation for Litz's expertise. They operate within the realm of ecological development, but politics have always remained a close but quiet association. The family carries a positive reputation within their social circles and in the public eye, but there were rumors and a particular undertone regarding Cecil Litz even before Preventer became aware of his connection to the Colony disasters."

"What kind of undertone?" she found herself asking. Cecil's expression from earlier flashed in her mind again. Heero must have noticed this time because he paused, his scrutiny palpable even without sight.

"Relena?" She heard the query in his voice. She winced inwardly, not ready yet to admit out loud that Cecil had scared her. Her fingers curled back into the fabric of his shirt, noting in the back of her mind that he felt cold beneath her hands.

"Please just answer the question."

"…Fear. Intimidation. Nothing overt, but an undercurrent of wariness about him. So, I dug deeper." Her muscles tightened as she listened, so much so that one of his palms came to rest lightly against her back in reassurance. Where his body felt cold, his hand felt like fire despite the fabric between them.

"…What did you find?"

"Murder."

The word was a physical reaction through her body, jolting her. Surely…

"Surely, Cecil is not…"

"He waits months or years, so that his association is long forgotten," Heero explained calmly. "Most of it is accomplished through third parties, but there are a few instances where it was most likely by his own hand. So far, I've found 23 cases that I can trace back to his influence, at least 3 of which he most likely killed himself. Faulty shuttles, muggings, suicides, sudden illnesses… He's intelligent and meticulous. Just as it is with his structural designs, there is no solid evidence in these cases. Most of the deaths are not even classified as homicides. There is no manner by which to convict him, and the people he chooses are the most vital to the projects he wants shut down, but not necessarily the ones he associated with directly. It makes it hard to point fingers when you can't even prove association. Usually his victims are people whom are seen to be on the same side of the argument as Litz. Most humans struggle to accept that someone would kill a person they've never met, who shares their ideals, in order to destroy an associate's business dealings."

Relena felt cold in a manner that had nothing to do with their surroundings. "But Cecil will."

"Hn."

She stepped slowly away from him, just far enough so that his fingers lingered lightly at her waist. She forced her breathing to stay measured and steady.

"Heero, why didn't you tell me in the first place?"

He paused, weighing his words. She could feel him considering her through the dark.

"Telling you a man is a murderer will not keep you away from him, Relena; it will aim you right at him."

She opened her mouth to refute him, to be indignant, but Relena tried very hard not to lie to herself anymore.

"…You're right."

"Litz knows that your death is the quickest way to destroy the Mars Project. Compared to his normal methods, he is acting rashly in trying to dispose of you while you're on the satellite with him, which means that he will be even more focused on eliminating you once we're found. The benefit is that now it will be harder to make your death accidental, which means he will either have to wait years while the project continues to expand and gain support, or he will have to kill you himself away from the public eye. I don't think he'll wait. The Mars Project is a hydra: once it has enough individual branches working together, no single act will be enough to stop its completion. His best bet is to cripple the project in its infancy; He'll try again."

She scrutinized his words, feeling her limbs finally relax as understanding flooded through her. Knowing she was a target for someone she was supposed to be able to trust was nothing new; it was the story of her life. Knowing that Cecil Litz was skilled and determined enough to fool herself and so many others so completely was another matter. Heero had known Cecil's true nature since before he had joined her on Earth. He was here, protecting her, risking his life to save her own. Like always.

Jumping in after her.

"…You knew this would happen, didn't you? That he would try to use the faults of the satellite to kill me?" she asked quietly. She wished again that she could see his face, study his expression.

"It was one possibility."

She wanted to be angry at him, but now her anger felt empty.

"…You still could have told me the truth."

He sighed, the sound surprising in the quiet of the space they shared. So subtle that she was not sure he meant to, the hand at her waist drew her closer to him. Without thinking, she wrapped her arms around him and hugged him, trying to warm him with her shared heat. His voice drew down toward her.

"You're too honest," he said, low, intimate. "Your demeanor changes based on what you know. In the face of dangerous opponents, you become stronger, more forceful, more formidable. Litz can pick up on those subtle differences in a person's nature. He's met you when you've trusted him as a business associate. If I had told you before you saw him on Coranis, he would have perceived the difference and changed tack; or worse, he would have attacked you directly. Especially with me onboard."

Relena frowned. "Is that why you've been avoiding us this entire week?"

The pause he took this time was unnervingly long. She squeezed him subtly closer, as though their proximity would somehow make his unspoken thoughts clear to her.

"…He's already aware of Preventer's interest in his activities. He's been tracking me through Coranis all week. I don't think he knows for sure whether he has to be cautious when I'm around, but he suspects I know what he is. I haven't given him the opportunity to read me face-to-face."

"But wouldn't that make him less likely to act on it if he knows you're there?"

"Not if he thinks I'm more than a Preventer."

Relena thought back to her earlier conversation with Cecil yet again. He had expressed a distinct interest in Heero, but he had phrased it so that she thought it was because of his technical expertise. "You think he would be able to tell you were a Gundam pilot? Why would that matter?"

He said nothing, leaving her puzzling after his words. Why would his past as a pilot make Cecil more inclined to attack? She had known him since they were fifteen, she knew that the pilots were all formidable in their skills, but the Gundam Pilots had fought against OZ, the idea of war and corrupt government. They had fought for the independence of the Colonies. There would be no reason for a man like Cecil to think a Pilot would be a threat any more than a Preventer. Not unless his life was threatened—

"I will never kill anyone again. I don't have to anymore." Words from a ruined bunker rushed forward to fill her mind, Heero's body tumbling forward as she scrambled to catch him at the end of a long, bloody war.

"…If he thinks you're an assassin, you mean?"

His hand slid away from her. He stepped back, out of reach.

"You think that if he meets you, he'll suspect that Preventer sent you to kill him and he'll try to kill me first."

Heero said nothing, the space between them suddenly as cavernous as the stone around them.

Would it always come down to this idea that he was a danger to her?

"So what?"

The words were out before she even knew what she was saying.

"So what if he comes after me? Isn't that what he's going to do anyway? How many people have done the same before now? Isn't it better to be prepared, rather than wonder whether he's going to try to kill me now or five years later? You need to trust me, Heero. I would rather have you standing next to me when a killer looks me in the eye, than across a room where you have to jump in a hole to save me. I would rather have a murderer know that you're there with me, vigilant, than thinking he may have a moment alone with me in an empty hallway, where he can threaten me with a smile and a compliment while I stand there like an idiot and laugh it off!"

His hand was there suddenly, brushing back hair from her face and grazing over her cheek. His fingers were icy.

"I need to know that you're safe, too. I need to know that you're healthy, and present, and warm—damnit, wear your jacket, please!" She ignored the screaming in her ribs as she shrugged off his coat and all but clamped it around his shoulders. He was too cold. No matter how incredible his body, Heero was still human, still subject to the elements. She shivered without the extra protection of his coat but heard the rustle of fabric as he slipped his arms back into the sleeves; felt a prickle of satisfaction that, for once, he was listening to her and taking care of himself at her insistence.

"You have to stop protecting me at your own expense, Heero."

"No."

Her feet abruptly left the ground as he scooped her up into his arms, leaving her momentarily speechless in confusion and outrage. She opened her mouth to chastise him, to tell him to put her down, but found that she also did not want to do that.

"What are you doing?"

"Protecting you at my own expense."

Anger warred with helplessness and just a hint of mirth as he threw her words back at her, ultimately draining her to exhaustion at the chaos of emotion she had felt over the past few hours. She let him carry her.

He turned and walked in what she assumed was the direction he had emerged from when he reappeared, seeming to weave around debris that she felt more than saw. She steadied herself against him as he walked, feeling that tacky substance on the fabric of his shirt once again.

"Are you bleeding, Heero?"

"It's nothing."

"You are, aren't you?"

"It's already stopped."

He halted abruptly and sank to the ground, settling her in his lap while pulling the edges of his jacket around them both. Before she could protest, he zipped the jacket with her inside, effectively trapping her between his chest and the fabric. He leaned back into what must have been a wall, but it was impossible to grasp any sense of the space around them.

"Better?"

She considered struggling. She considered freeing herself from the fabric and sitting beside him instead, but they were both warmer like this. It was inappropriate to be sitting this way, curled so intimately against the warmth of a man who was not her husband, but it was Heero's compromise to her demand. It had been inappropriate to throw herself at him when he had returned from the darkness, but they had known each other since they were teenagers. It had been inappropriate for him to jump into a gaping hole after her, but Relena knew that it was who he was. She was a married woman, a politician. He was technically her subordinate. But…

"…Yes, thank you."

For a moment she allowed herself the luxury of reclining against him while his heat and scent seeped into her. For a moment, she allowed herself to forget that there was a man above with a ring around his finger that was likely searching frantically for her. For a moment, she was fifteen again and Heero was here, protecting her, letting her stay close to him for a fleeting second. It was a dangerous fantasy to indulge, but for just a moment, trapped in the darkness of a freezing piece of space rock, Relena allowed herself to pacify the painful longing that had plagued her for so long in the absence of the stoic pilot.

"I'm glad you're here, Heero," she murmured, head tucked into the crook of his neck.

"Hn." She could feel the sound rumble through his chest, felt one of his hands rest against her back while the other lay innocently across her thigh, a thumb running absently over the fabric. Their combined body heat made the frigid air just a little more tolerable. Relena closed her eyes, sighed deeply, and allowed the tension to once again leak out of her body.

She loved him.

She had always loved him, since they were teenagers. Time and space and marriage had not dampened those emotions, but Relena had done her best to ignore them. She had done her best to push them aside. Because Heero did not share those feelings. He protected her, respected her, cared about her well-being, but time and again he proved to her that his own heart did not reach so far. He had always kept a careful wall between them. Relena had tried to force herself to give up the hope his sentiments might change when she met David. She had allowed herself to wander down another road and tried to forget the wishful thinking her feelings inspired. It was not fair to David. But she had never been able to completely stop the feelings she had for the taciturn Gundam Pilot.

It was a struggle that had been slowly breaking her down, especially with Heero in such close proximity. In the back of her mind, there was a part of her that wished they could stay like this.

"What did Litz say to you?"

She sighed. "It wasn't anything."

"Relena…"

She thought back to the hallway and the sound that had come from Cecil's throat. Her hand curled subconsciously into the fabric of his shirt at the memory. "He didn't actually say anything wrong. I told him I wouldn't let Alet's death be used to slander the Mars Project. He… laughed. Then he called me a 'masterpiece'. He said it like a compliment, but…"

"But it didn't feel that way."

"No. I felt like I had been sighted by a predator. That laugh… Heero, it scared me."

It made her wonder if she truly knew the man in that hallway. From what she had learned in this cavern, she realized she knew nothing of what Cecil Litz truly was. And if they were rescued, she would have to pretend she still knew nothing.

"Once we're out, don't let him get you alone. Keep David with you at all times until you leave," Heero instructed. She glanced up toward where his face should have been and rolled her eyes despite that fact that he could not see it.

"As if he'll let me out of his sight after this."

She could feel the movement in his cheek when his mouth kicked up briefly, forcing her to realize that his head was resting subtly against hers.

"Your husband is a good man."

Guilt flooded her. "Yes… Yes, he is."

"You'll be back with him soon. I'll protect you until then."

Relena stared into the inky black that consumed them both. Wrapped up in the warmth of the stoic Gundam Pilot, the irony was not lost on her. It was like the final nail being driven into the pine box.

She huffed out a small, sad laugh, and curled herself into him a little tighter. The words came out quietly, one last lament for a girl's unrequited crush, "You know, it's funny: I used to think, maybe… At one point, I thought you might have loved me. It's funny how we convince ourselves of things when we're kids, isn't it?"

"I do love you."

A hundred yards to her right, an explosion sent debris raining down, flooding the cavern with artificial light as the search party arrived.

Author Note: Hey guys, sorry it's been so long. For those that will read this, thank you for sticking with me. This was a very hard and very long chapter that took a lot of writing and rewriting to get it where I wanted it. The upside: it's almost literally twice as long as my normal chapters. Woohoo?

I have every intention of finishing this story. I don't know how quickly, I don't know whether it'll take me another decade, but it'll get finished.

Hope everyone is doing ok with all the madness going on this year! Stay healthy and take care!

-Sar