This turned out to be a rather longer chapter than I expected. Thank you for all the reviews so far, each one is much appreciated and thank you to everyone who has taken time out to read this. I hope this chapter doesn't disappoint.

xxxxxxx

"You can't mean that," Ruth choked out quietly through her tears, hardly able to believe the words he was saying to her, "you can't really think that after all of this? She said, her voice starting to raise slightly.

He turned round from the window he'd been staring out of slowly, as the words she was saying started to slowly penetrate through his psyche. "I can't mean or think what Ruth...?"

"That this... us," she indicated between the two of them with her hand, "that this is the end, that we're over."

"We're not over Ruth," he said quietly, "we never really began... you never let us have that chance." He moved to sit back down at the table, "I thought this was what you wanted?"

She shook her head futilely as she tried to compose herself, "No, I don't know what I want... but I don't want this," she stuttered, not even making sense to herself, but knowing that she had to say something, do something before Harry disappeared from her life altogether.

Belatedly he realised she had tears in her eyes and clearly quite a number had escaped to run down her cheeks; he took a deep breath, leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. How the hell had they come to be having a conversation like this so early in the morning, especially given that she seemed to be functioning on only a few hours sleep, was obviously feeling very emotional after the events of yesterday and he probably still had most of the contents of a very good single malt running through his bloodstream - 'we really pick our times,' he thought to himself. Opening his eyes and seeing her become ever more distressed, he stood up again and moved to a cupboard to take out a box of tissues which he handed to her. "Here, take these," he said softly, one of his hands coming to rest on her shoulder which he rubbed slightly awkwardly; women crying always made him feel incredibly uncomfortable, especially if he was the one that had caused it... which had often been the case for much of his life.

She plucked a couple out, wiped her eyes and blew her nose, "thank you," she said, her voice unsteady

"How about I make us both another cup of tea?" Harry said awkwardly, "give you a couple of minutes to yourself. The downstairs toilet is just through there," he indicated to a door leading off the hallway, "or you can use the bigger bathroom upstairs if the sink in there isn't big enough."

She stood up carefully, "Thanks, I found them both last night," she indicated back to the living room, "after I decided to stay. I will take you up on that if that's okay." she said, moving towards the open door, intent on washing her face and praying that her eyes and nose hadn't become red and swollen which was often the case after she'd been crying.

Harry turned his attention to filling the kettle and switching it back on. He hadn't expected her response if he was honest with himself. He'd known that she'd still cared for him, even through all her frostiness towards him over the last few months but he'd thought that after what he'd just said to her, that she'd have left, slightly relieved that he'd taken the decision to try and let her go. He thought back over the last few months; there had been the occasional moment, where what he felt was the real Ruth had shone through momentarily, when he'd caught her off-guard, only for the walls to go back up when she realised who it was she was bantering with and talking too. Even her recent reaction, moments ago, had him doubting himself; was she really upset that he was effectively consigning them to the history books, or was it more of a gut reaction that he'd no longer be around as her safety net. And even it was the former, who was to say that she wouldn't change her mind again as she'd had a tendency to do so in the past, once she'd had a chance to think things through and start to pick her feelings apart and over analyse the situation.


He was just setting the mugs down on the table when she came back in, "you okay?" he asked kindly, she had washed her face and the residue of the tears had disappeared although her eyes still retained a red tinge to them.

She nodded, "I'm fine... sorry for bursting into tears on you," she added, "I just didn't expect all this."

"All what?"

"This," she indicated between the two of them; "Us... finally having a conversation about all this." She hesitated, "the other day when you said that neither of us was emotionally forthright... was that about you and me as well?"

"Everything seems to be about you and me," Harry sighed. "I don't know what I was referring to in all honesty, whether it was us, or about the boy... Nico. I just wanted to let you know that I cared... that I was there for you and I'd do what it took to try and protect you, that I wouldn't let anything like the Cotterdam incident happen to you again."

"Maybe that's where we've been going wrong all these years," Ruth took a sip of her tea, pulling back as she realised how hot it still was. "Me giving up everything to try and save you over Cotterdam, you doing the same for me over Albany." She paused, "I know I haven't treated you especially fairly over the last few months... or since my return really, but particularly since Ros's funeral but..."

"It was a difficult time for you," Harry interrupted, "I do understand at least some of what you've been going through."

"I know you do," Ruth reached over the table and took his hand, "and I'm sorry it's come to this, that I've pushed you to this; but what I wanted to say to you, was sorry."

Harry looked up at her with a slightly bemused expression, "sorry for what?" he asked as he turned his hand over to grip her fingers softly.

"Sorry for everything really," she squeezed his fingers as she willed herself to keep looking at his face rather than taking the easy way out and look down at the table instead. "The way I've treated you, the way I've spoken to you, the way I've been. I'm not saying that I understand it fully myself, because I don't and I don't want to start making any more excuses... But the main thing I'm sorry about, was telling you yesterday that it was wrong for you to love me, when you'd given up Albany to save my life."

Harry pursed his lips slightly, "you were angry," he stated in a matter of fact manner.

"I was angry, about what you'd given up... and I still struggling to get my head around it all in all honesty." She rubbed her thumb against his hand, deriving some comfort from the fact that he was listening to her, letting her try to explain her muddled thought process; "but the why you gave it up I understand - as a spy I know you shouldn't have done it, but as a man, made of flesh and blood, I do understand." She took another sip of her tea, "I thought about it a lot after you took yourself up to bed last night, and I realised that you were only doing what I'd have done in the same position... but maybe , completely unfairly, I thought that you would be stronger than me, expected you to be stronger than me."

"You don't know what you'd have done in that position." Harry said, slightly disconcerted by what she'd just told him.

"Yes," Ruth smiled sadly, "I do."

"You gave up your life to save me a few years ago, I was just returning the favour," Harry said with a wry smile.

"Is that all it was?" she asked, completely missing the irony and the depth of feeling behind his words, so focused was she on the table in front of her and their two hands linked across it.

"Of course it wasn't," he replied quickly, "I just couldn't let you die like that, not when I had the opportunity to save you. Of course, if things had gone to plan I'd have kept Albany and saved you too." He shrugged, " but the best laid plans of mice and men..."

"But what you gave up to save me, Harry... that's what I had.. have issues with," Ruth pulled her hand away from him before standing up and moving to the same place Harry had stood earlier, her arms around her body as she hugged herself. She did her level best to keep her voice steady and blameless, it wasn't what he'd done that she was struggling with , more what the ultimate consequences could be. "You gave up a genetic weapon... something that could wipe out millions... could wipe out nations..."

"I know," Harry replied quietly, "believe me, its been playing on my mind a bit too over the last few hours."

"Yet you seem to be more uneffec... hang on!" She spun around quickly as a thread of the conversation from the previous night came back to her, "last night, you said something about this too."

"I did?" Harry cast his mind back, he couldn't recall saying much at all. He winced internally knowing that when Ruth had hold of some thread in her brain, she was like a dog with a bone. It was what made her so good at her job.

"Yes..." Ruth cast her mind back trying to recall the exact words he'd used. "You were speaking to yourself as you left the room and you said something along the lines of, 'that it wasn't as if it worked anyway'".

Harry looked up, his face that had been open a moment ago, had suddenly turned into a granite mask. "Did I?"

"Yes you did. What did you mean?" She pushed, suddenly sensing there was more to this than she'd been told.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Don't be so bloody obtuse Harry!" She snapped suddenly, "this is something I have to live with hanging over me for the rest of my life."

"And I don't?"

"That's not what I meant and you know it..." She quietened suddenly, "how do you think I'll feel, listening to the news one day and suddenly hearing about a 'mystery disease' in China or Russia or Japan that's killing millions and knowing that I'm alive because of it while all these people are dying."

Seeing the anguish and pain on her face put a chink in his armour. "That won't happen..."

"You've said that a couple of time along with the cryptic comments... will you just tell me what is going on Harry... Please," she uttered softly at the end.

It was the final word that was the undoing of him, not the actual word, but more the way she said it. "What I'm going to tell you now, never leaves this room... do you understand?" he said firmly.

She nodded slowly, "I promise."

He indicated towards the table that she should sit down again and she did so, choosing this time to take a seat to the right of him, at the head of the table, rather than taking the chair she had earlier been occupying opposite him. "Until this afternoon what I'm about to tell you was known by less than 10 people on the planet," he began slowly, "that number has multiplied rather quickly since then but..."

"Go on Harry," she urged softly, once more taking one of his hands in hers, thinking that they'd both need the strength of the other for what he was about to tell her.

"Albany isn't quite the threat everyone believes it to be. As a pure biological weapon, it's actually harmless."

Ruth looked up at him in shock... "But?"

"But nothing, it was realised very early on that building such a genetic weapon was, fortunately," he added wryly, "an impossible task. There are far too many variables."

"But..."

"Word that Britain was working on such a capability in the 1980's somehow got leaked and despite the scientists realising pretty early on that it was never going to work, my predecessor realised that when it came down to it, it didn't really matter if it worked or not... it was the threat that was the important element. It was something that could never be used, but the threat of it, combined with the rumours that circulated around about it, was enough to use it as a strong deterrent. Don't attack the UK, because if it comes down to it, we could wipe out half your population without you even realising that such a thing had been released until it was too late." Harry grimaced in distaste at the politics and game-playing that happened in international espionage. It was a part of the job description that he was well versed in, but it always left him with a slightly dirty taste in his mouth.

Ruth's shoulders sagged in relief as his words started to sink in, "and you knew all this yesterday? You knew what Albany really was before you exchanged it with Luc.. John Bateman?"

Harry nodded in the affirmative. "Yes," he said gently, "when my predecessor retired, he passed the information onto me. Only a very select group of people knew the truth about it."

"Who else?" Ruth said, partly out of shock; her mind was whirling and a wave of relief had travelled through her entire body. The feeling of guilt and nausea that had been gnawing away at her, started to ebb away.

"Myself, the DG, M over at Six, the PM and his 3 living predecessors and the two Chief Scientists over at Portland Down." Harry counted them all down methodically.

"That's it?"

"Yes. It was decided early on to keep it on a need to know basis only. The Home Secretary obviously found out yesterday as well, as did the Foreign Secretary. Neither of them were particularly happy to realise that they'd been kept in the dark." Harry looked at her with a disdainful look on his face, meant for the politicians, not her. "No doubt half of Whitehall knows all about it by now."

"Why didn't you tell me before?"

"That it wasn't real?"

"Yes."

"When?" He asked sadly, "I hardly got a chance to speak with you alone after we'd located you and you were hardly in the mood for a tete a tete."

Ruth looked down shamefacedly, "I wasn't fair on you Harry, even when..."

"Let's not keep going over this," he said gently, "It doesn't matter. If I'm being honest, I hadn't planned to tell you, I wasn't really allowed to tell you."

"But surely..."

"But nothing Ruth. The Chinese realised very quickly that they'd been sold a dud, negotiations between London and Beijing have essentially concluded that both sides are going to keep their mouths closed about this. It's known that the Chinese stole Albany in the international community, it's not known that it's a fake. We've agreed to keep our mouths closed that it doesn't work and they've agreed to not let it be known that it was attained with the assistance of 2 British traitors... plus I think there's another few clauses added to that."

"Two British traitors?" Ruth looked puzzled for a moment before realising who else he was referring too... "Oh Harry, they can't class you and that.. that.. bastard," she spat out the last word viciously, "as the same?"

"Unfortunately it appears to be that way, and I did give it to him to pass onto the Chinese."

"But you never meant it to..."

"What I meant to happen is rather a moot point now. I made a decision and I misjudged it, I thought I would be able to stop him one way or the other."He looked own at the table pensively, "it sounds stupid I know; but even after he'd taken you, even after he'd threatened to let you die, there was still a small part of me that thought he'd come to his senses, that the old Lucas would suddenly reappear and realise what he was doing."

"And he didn't." Ruth said quietly, "don't blame yourself for that Harry, I thought exactly the same thing when he had me."

"I guess it's difficult to believe that someone you thought you knew and trusted could do an about face and be someone completely different." Harry sighed heavily, "though why I'm still shocked by human nature surprises me... the number of people over the years that haven't been who they seemed to be and have betrayed me is getting to be rather a long list, Connie, Tessa, Mace, Blake. Christ even Adam and Ros both dabbled in it..."

"I suppose I can be grouped in with that list," Ruth replied sadly.

"What? No," Harry looked at her confused, "we may have had a number of issues on the personal front over the years, but professionally you've never let me down."

"Not even when I was spying for GCHQ when I first arrived," Ruth joked lightly, a small smile on her face.

"Bloody hell, I'd clean forgotten about that..." He laughed quickly, "Fortunately your 'double agent' status lasted about 5 minutes, you were much easier to read in those days," he added.

"I've changed, we've both changed, but the core of us hasn't." Ruth spoke confidently as if she'd finally worked out what to say to him. "I know I've been incredibly difficult to be around the last few months, it's just, I don't know... I always thought that if we could keep our distance from each other, then it wouldn't hurt as much if something did happen to you. When you asked me to marry you, I don't think I explained myself very well."

"I don't think you explained yourself at all." Harry said softly, but not unkindly.

"I know, I panicked, and then I tried to explain again but made things a hundred times worse. What I think I was trying to say, what I really felt, was that I didn't want to go through the pain I felt when I left you for the first time, so I tried to switch myself off... I also thought that if we were together then I'd be targeted as your weak spot and people would try and use me against you like they did a few years ago."

"Ruth, I know..."

"Please Harry, let me finish." She took a deep breath before continuing, "What I'm trying to say, is that yesterday.. well last night really, I realised that all I'd been doing was hurting myself... and you, because when it came down to it, Lucas targeted me anyway to get to you and it hurt like hell when I thought he'd killed you... me trying to lock myself down achieved exactly nothing."

"Ruth, what are you saying?"

"When Lucas captured me, I told him that you'd asked me to marry you and that I'd turned you down, I was trying to convince him that you wouldn't give up Albany for me, that we were nothing..."

"What did he say?" Harry asked curiously. From the way Ruth had been acting and the things she'd been saying, he felt he was getting the first real glimpse of her, of her emotions that he'd seen in a long time, and if he'd have had to guess, he'd have thought that someone had said something to her... he hadn't expected it to be Lucas though.

"He just looked at me as though I was mad, and asked why, why would I turn you down because I loved you." Ruth looked over at him to see how he was taking her news, His face was the same as it had been, nothing was been given away, but his eyes had changed, become softer somehow.

"Lucas said that?:

She nodded, "I said it was because it was all so complicated between the two of us, but I think I'm realising that I've been the one that's actively been making it complicated, shutting you out when you've been trying to help or just be nice to me."

"Ruth..." he implored.

"No Harry, I've realised that everyone somehow realises that there's something between us, and we're always going to be targeted as each others weak points. Beth told me after you'd left, that when you received the phone call from Lucas, she and Dimitri both knew straightaway that you were going to make the swap, even when you told them it was out of the question, at the back of her mind there was something that made her disbelieve you...and her instincts were proved right." She squeezed his fingers tightly, "Ignoring you and being down right rude to you at times over the last few months hasn't made anyone see us differently, it's as if to the outside world that we're together a couple, regardless of how we act with each other."

"And the way I gave up Albany, has that made you see me differently?" Harry asked curiously.

"Yes... No..."

"Which is it Ruth?"

"I was angry when you gave up Albany, furious really. I didn't and still don't think I'm worth the lives of so many other people... but, if I'd have been in your position and it had been you that was taken... I'd have done the same thing you did... except I probably wouldn't have had a plan to get it back in backup."

"My plan B failed Ruth."

"I know." She smiled, "things would be a lot simpler from a work perspective if it had worked!"

"Do you feel differently now you know it was a fake?"

"No... Don't get me wrong, I'm unbelievably relieved that it's essentially harmless, but I didn't know it was a fake until a few minutes ago and when I was asking myself these questions last night, believing it to be real, I would still have handed it over for you... even though I know how wrong that would have been and I don't know how I would have lived with myself afterwards."

"Then why would you..."

"Why would I have done it."She interrupted him, "because I couldn't have bared to live, knowing that I'd been the cause of your death and could have saved you."

Harry nodded, "it was a similar thing for me," he admitted quietly, "though I had the luxury of knowing it didn't work and that you were worth far more that Albany ever would or could be... well in my eyes anyway. And you've already given up so much for this country."

"A better resource for the country," Ruth said softly, "is that why you did it?"

Harry shook his head, "you know it wasn't Ruth, don't go looking for hidden meanings in my words when there is none," he said firmly, "that's partially what's got us into this mess, talking at cross purposes half the time."

She nodded and squeezed his hand tightly, "sorry... God I seem to be saying that to you a lot at the moment."

"Well maybe you should stop," he said softly, "what's happened as happened, we should move on from this."

"Did you mean what you said earlier?" Ruth asked suddenly, as the words 'we move on from this' resonated with her. "Did you mean that we'd forfeited our chance and should move on from each other completely?" Tears welled in her eyes once again as she recalled their earlier words, before she brushed them away angrily, refusing to let herself cry again, "or are you willing to give us a second chance, give me a second chance...: she sniffed before emitting a huff of laughter, "well I say second chance... I should really say tenth chance or twentieth chance..."

"Is that what you really want Ruth, a second chance, or is this all just a reaction and you'll go back to pushing me away once you've had time to reflect and thing about things?" His heart suddenly felt like it was in his throat and he took a large mouthful of now stone cold tea to ease the sudden onset of nerves that had struck him.

Ruth shook her head vigorously, "that won't happen, I promise. I still don't know exactly what I do want..." as Harry went to interrupt her, she reached over and took hold of his other hand, squeezing them both with hers, willing him to understand where she was coming from. "But I do know that I can't bear for us to go back to the way we've been, I love you," she added softly, "and I want to give us a chance, see what we can do together, be like together if we give each other the chance to make each other happy." She looked over at him, "I know I don't really deserve this after what I've put you through, but I want to try and carve out some sort of future for us, something together, whether that means us staying in MI5 or leaving."

Harry looked her in the eye, his mind whirling. "Are you..."

"Yes I'm sure, if that's what you were going to say." Ruth said firmly, she felt lighter having said what she had and she couldn't believe that she'd been complicating things for no real reason for so long, when in truth, it was much easier to go in the direction she really wanted rather than trying to continuously swim against the tide. "It's over to you Harry... what do you want? Are you willing to forgive me for the way I've been these last few months?" She smiled across at him, her nerves showing on her face and in the tone of her voice, "Do you want a future with me... Together?"

TBC