With sincere thanks to everyone who has followed this story so far, and particularly to all those who have reviewed!

Chapter One

Lady Une picked up the stack of folders she had sorted from her desk and tucked them neatly under her left arm, knowing Treize was not going to be pleased to see her when he saw she was carrying more work for him to do – most of which would have to be done tonight.

It had been the pattern of their lives almost from the moment they had returned from their weekend break in Sweden. Treize would arrive in his office early in the morning to deal with the day-to-day administration of the base, issuing instructions to watch officers and counter-signing authorisations. By the time Une arrived, several hours later – generally fetching the breakfast he hadn't taken the time to eat – he would just be finishing dealing with the last of his eyes-only communications from the Alliance, or other bodies. Just in time to begin tackling the sheer mountains of work generated by the expanding organisation he was in command of.

Lunch had become a thing of the past for both of them. It took the pair of them working together till the early afternoon to wade their way through that – akin to running a single base, but on a much grander scale – moving resources and personnel, designing missions, filtering intelligence reports and mission reviews. Une had become adept at forging Treize's signature, and she knew Zechs – when he was available to help them – was just as skilled.

The afternoons were taken up with meetings, either with outside dignitaries or with Specials officers, or with inspections, or with the very occasional hour or two of training time.

Une sighed as she rapped on his office door, wishing she didn't have to consign him to another evening of work instead of rest, of half-cold commissary food that he wouldn't really touch instead of the relaxed dinner she knew – through Noin – that Zechs had been planning to take him to. Much as she wanted the blond out of their lives, and away from Treize, this was one occasion she'd rather been hoping the pilot would get his way.

The general's honey-smooth tenor bade her enter, and she opened the door in time to see him grimace as he caught sight of her, and the files she held. The expression was gone as quickly as it came, and then he was smiling at her ruefully, coming to his feet and holding out his hands for the pile of folders.

"I'm sorry about this, sir," she began, and he cut her off mid-sentence with the wave of one of those hands.

"Lady, please. It's hardly your fault."

"I know, but…"

He smiled at her, the genuine warmth in his eyes almost enough to erase the strain tiredness had set into his face. "Une, stop it. This is what comes of wanting to change things. It won't last forever – another month or two and we'll have the officers we need in place and they'll be able to handle most of this."

"Yes, sir," she agreed, wincing at the thought of another month of the life they'd been leading lately.

"And," he continued, "it will be better when we return to Luxembourg. This place leaves a lot to be desired." He gestured absently at his office as he spoke, silently inviting her to compare it, not for the first time, to the one he normally occupied in Luxembourg. As she had mentioned to Noin in the car ride on Christmas Eve, the Dover base was sadly lacking, even after several months of heavy renovations. "I suppose I should be grateful," he murmured. "At least it isn't leaking anymore – which is more than can be said of some of the junior officers' accommodations. Did you know Noin has moved in with Zechs?"

Une raised an eyebrow. "No, I didn't know that."

Treize opened his mouth to say something further then seemed to pause as he shook his head. "Forgive me, my Lady. I'm being a terrible host. Do sit down."

Moving to obey out of habit, she cast him a questioning look, wondering what had prompted Noin to move in with her classmate, and why her horribly overworked commander seemed to be turning her folder-dropping run into a social visit. As she watched, Treize rooted in a chest tucked almost out of sight under the dusty hangings covering the windows and emerged with two glasses and a bottle of wine. A few practiced gestures with a corkscrew liberated from one of his desk drawers saw him pouring the liquid – oddly enough, clear in colour rather then the rich red she had expected – into the glasses, and then handing one to her as he sat down on the other end of the small sofa that seemed to be a feature of every office he ever occupied.

He took a sip of the wine, swallowed slowly and leaned back against the cushions.

Une held herself still as his eyes shut, wondering if he was so tired that he would fall asleep where he was sitting, but just as she was considering how to make him comfortable without waking him, he opened his eyes again and looked at her, his little smile returning.

"Sorry, Une." He shook his head. "Noin, yes. She knocked Zechs up about two o'clock this morning, demanding he let her sleep on his couch. Apparently when she got off duty it was to find her room had three inches of water in it. The roof had given up its valiant resistance to the weather, finally. This morning, maintenance told her it's going to be at least a week before the room is habitable again, so she gathered up her things and moved in with Zechs."

"I'm sure he's thrilled. I'll keep an eye on her – if she's sleeping on his couch, she won't be resting properly…" she trailed off as Treize began to laugh at her. "What?"

"I know you don't like Zechs much, Une, but give him that much credit. She's not sleeping on his couch – he is."

"Oh. Well, I'll watch him then."

"Don't worry about it. I told him he could borrow my bed, if it came to that. He only got back from Egypt yesterday; he's dead on his feet, and… I'm not exactly seeing much of it at the moment."

Une scowled, both at the fact that Zechs seemed to have moved in with their commander – she was perfectly aware that they would be sharing that bed when Treize had the chance – and at the fact that he was telling nothing but the simple truth when he said he wasn't using it much. The general had been averaging just under four hours of sleep a night for the past three weeks, she knew. She'd been counting.

She made a sudden decision. "Let me go through those folders for you, sir," she offered quietly. "Most of them only need reading and signing. I can do that for you, and give you a summary of the information tomorrow over breakfast."

Treize's eyes widened for a moment. "Thank you," he murmured, and she thought he was going to accept, then he reached out and brushed back a lock of her hair that had come loose from her braids. "I can't let you do that, Une. I promised you the evening off, remember?"

"Yes, but that doesn't matter. Please, sir…"

"No. You're just as tired as I am, Une. What will I do if you make yourself ill with exhaustion? Go, enjoy yourself. Go to bed early, or round Noin up and go out. Have fun. Zechs will give me a hand with all this if I ask him nicely enough, and he can forge my signature even better than you can – he's been doing it since we were children."

Une knew when to concede defeat. Slowly, she nodded and got to her feet. "Good night, then, sir."

Treize stood up as she did, walking her to the door and holding it for her. "Good night, my Lady."

She smiled at him, softening the harsh lines created by her hairstyle and her glasses and felt herself warm as he smiled back before shutting the door very firmly.

Suddenly free from work for the first time in what seemed a very long time, she wandered leisurely throughout the dilapidated corridors towards her rooms. A few paces from her door, she turned on her heels and retraced her steps until she came to the flight of stairs that would take her to the entrance of the building, crossing the courtyard swiftly.

If Treize wanted Zechs' company this evening, he would have it, even if she had to make it an order.

And, maybe, Noin would be free as well, and would like to spend the evening with her.

*******************************

The last thing Zechs had expected when the knock had come at his door was to see Lady Une. Even less had he expected the summons from Treize she had issued when not fifteen minutes before the man himself had contacted him and told him he had to cancel their planned dinner because of work, and that he would either see the pilot at some ungodly hour of the morning when he crawled into bed – should Zechs choose to take him up on his offer of sharing whilst Noin got her room fixed – or at the debriefing they had scheduled for the next afternoon.

Une's asking Noin if she had plans for the evening took him even more by surprise, and Noin agreeing quite happily had been a greater shock still – since when had those two been friends? Granted, they'd spent quite a lot of time together in Sweden, but…

Zechs shook his head as he smoothed the wrinkles out of his jacket and left the two women talking.

**************************

Zechs nodded a silent greeting to the officers he passed as he walked, unconsciously emulating his commanding officer, and quickened his pace as the door to Treize's office came into view.

As he drew nearer, the hastily repressed smiles he could see on the faces of the sentries sitting at their guard post were explained. If one had good hearing – and every member of the Specials had excellent hearing – then the music seeping through the badly fitting door was quite clear.

Zechs fought off a grin. Treize might have had to work late, but he was obviously in a good mood regardless and had clearly decided to be comfortable whilst he did so.

The bemused expressions of the soldiers were, no doubt, prompted by the fact that pre-Colony blues was not the musical preference one expected of Treize Khushrenada.

Knowing it would be useless to knock – he wouldn't be heard over the music – Zechs opened the door and stuck his head through the gap, waiting until Treize looked up, gave him a surprised smile and waved him in.

"Good evening, Zechs. I wasn't expecting to see you tonight. I thought I'd called you to cancel dinner?"

The younger man judged his friend's level of tiredness by the fact that there was a genuine question in those words. If Treize couldn't remember a conversation he'd had not an hour before, he needed to stop working and go to bed.

"You did. Une told me you wanted my help with something?"

Treize stared at him for a moment, and then put his pen down and began to laugh. "That scheming, little…! I love Une, sometimes, I really do."

"Really, Treize?" Zechs asked, voice dry.

"Not like that! I told her she had to take the evening off, but she wouldn't go. She insisted that she had to stay here and help me with all this paperwork – and she wouldn't go until I told her I'd get you to help me instead. She obviously knows me better than I thought if she came to get you herself and made it sound like I'd sent her to. I had no intention of asking for your help."

"I see. Would you like me to go, then?"

Treize shook his head. "Not unless you had other plans for the evening. Now that you're here I find I wouldn't mind your company after all." Treize smiled at the younger man. "I won't ask you to work, but you can stay and talk to me if you'd like?"

Zechs settled himself onto the sofa in much the same place Une had earlier and shrugged. "I'll make you a deal – I'll help you with your work if you turn that…" He nodded towards the computer that was the source of the music. "…down."

Treize smiled. "You have some objection to my choice of music?"

"I do when it's playing at that volume. Don't be surprised if you get a few strange looks tomorrow – I take it you forgot that this office door isn't perfectly fitted and soundproofed?"

Treize's fingers – hovering over the volume key – froze as the general realised he'd done exactly that. "Oh dear," he murmured with a raised eyebrow and a wry grin as he turned the music down. "Do you think my reputation will ever recover?"

Zechs shook his head, and got to his feet to retrieve some of the folders from the over-full desk. "I imagine it will if you glare hard enough at anyone who dares to giggle at you."

"Ah, well. That shouldn't be a problem then."

Zechs grinned at his commander's blithe certainty – it was nice to know Treize was aware of his effect on people – and turned his attention to the first of the folders he had picked up.

Treize's voice hours later tore him from his focus on the papers in front of him and he looked up.

"This is the second time tonight I've forgotten my manners," Treize murmured. "Here you are doing my work for me and I haven't even had the courtesy to offer you a drink!"

Zechs smiled up at him and shrugged. "I shouldn't worry. I would have asked you if I'd wanted one, or just got it myself." He glanced down, and then up again. "Can I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"This folder…" Zechs tapped the base of his pen against the file he was holding in his lap. "…is about a mission plan. A possible assault against the port of Aden in Yemen…"

Treize grimaced. "That thing. Give it here. I have the overwhelming urge to stamp FUBAR on it and send it back to whatever tactical 'genius' devised it in the first place."

Zechs frowned. "…Fubar?" he asked, wondering if either he was hearing things, or if Treize had started babbling nonsense.

The older man chuckled. "Old military term, Zechs. It stands for Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition… which that plan most definitely is." Zechs was staring at him with a blank expression and wide eyes, and Treize found himself giving into laughter. "Sorry," he murmured eventually.

"That's… quite all right." The pilot hesitated for a moment then continued, "I'm not sure I understand why it's such a bad plan…"

Treize looked at him for a moment, then got to his feet, came round his desk and sat on the sofa next to his friend. "It's part of the Alliance's plan to break the Arab Independent States – much like your mission in Egypt was. We aren't getting anywhere trying to push our border that way, so they've decided that we should try and split their forces by attacking from the south as well. Aden is the major port for the region – the only one they have that isn't on the Red Sea and therefore hampered by our forces from Africa – and is just a short hop across the Arabian Gulf from Somalia, an easy jump for Aries suits and ship-based Leos."

"So, this is the first move in a bigger campaign?"

"Theoretically, yes, but it's one I'm having nothing to do with. There's no way on this Earth that I'm sending any mobile suit company into Aden."

"Why?"

"Have you looked at the reconnaissance shots?" Treize flipped to the back of the folder and showed the younger man a series of photos of a sun-drenched bay port with street after street of close-packed, multi-level buildings behind it, flanked by sheer cliffs. "That's why. The streets are too narrow for the Leos to manoeuvre, Aries would be far too vulnerable to shoulder launched anti-aircraft fire from the buildings, and even if the suits manage to fight their way through they have nowhere to go except up the cliffs or back into the sea. We couldn't hold the ground, even if we could take it without the cost being horrendous." He shook his head. "It's not a job for the Specials."

"Fair enough – I can certainly see why you're saying that."

"I would hope so." Treize leaned back into the sofa and frowned. "To be honest, I think the whole plan needs to be scrapped. The only way to take Aden would be to fight street to street with infantry. I haven't looked at the casualty predictions for that, but I can take a good guess – in terms of troop loss it doesn't really bear thinking about, even if one discounts collateral damage."

Zechs glanced down at the photos again and tried to imagine fighting in the pictured streets in light body armour with a rifle. Trained as he was to do so if necessary, it wasn't an idea he relished. "Air strike?" he suggested.

"If the idea were to obliterate the port completely, then yes. But the intention is to leave it relatively intact so that we can use it. Air strikes in that scenario just leave the infantry fighting through piles of rubble and unstable buildings and remove any possibility of heavy support." Treize reached out as he spoke, took the folder from Zechs' hand and tossed it onto the floor at the side of the couch. "It's a classic military conundrum, I'm afraid. Strategically, taking Aden makes perfect sense – could even be viewed as essential – but tactically it's a disaster in the making."

Zechs nodded. "Could you do it if you had to?" he asked, wondering as he spoke what had prompted him to.

The older man closed his eyes and sighed. "If I had to, yes. It wouldn't be pretty, and I'd have to break every convention of modern warfare to do it, but it could be done."

"How?"

Treize shot Zechs a cold look. "How did they take Newport city? I'd assume everyone living in the city was hostile, and go in with Tragos-mounted artillery and borrowed Alliance sweep teams. Attack from the port in a street by street advance, destroying every building in the process and searching the rubble before moving on. The civilian casualties would be near to a hundred percent. Hopefully the city would surrender before I had to advance too far, but the port would be intact even if the city wasn't."

Zechs swallowed. "Oh."

"Quite. Fortunately, I don't have to take Aden… this is one mission I can simply say no to, thank God."

"Do you think anyone else from the Alliance will come up with that plan?"

Again Treize closed his eyes. "Come up with it, or use it? They might develop it, but they'd have to be mad to use it. In the colonies, maybe, but not on Earth. Something like that would create havoc in the member countries – the political backlash would be tremendous." He forced a smile. "Grim topic for a Friday evening, isn't it?" There was distant rumble. "And, it's starting to storm again."

Zechs froze. "Treize, that wasn't…!" He caught the older man by the waist and flung them both to the floor as the second explosion tore through the room.