A/N: Updated
Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing
"Sonomi?" Relena called out, as she tied the terry cloth robe around her waist.
There was no answer.
"Sonomi?" She hailed a little louder.
Still there came no response.
Relena grabbed the towel from beside the pool, and began squeezing water from her hair. "Sonomi," she said, again, as she emerged. "I was just going to as-"
Relena was met by dark brown eyes. "Suguru!" She pulled the towel down and to her chest, to obscure any exposed skin he might catch a glimpse of.
He gave her a bashful smile.
"What are you doing here?" Relena's neck and ears flushed.
"I apologize. I asked Sonomi to leave us for a moment. I wanted to see you-to talk to you."
Relena's lips grew thin. "I think you might want to-"
"Please, Relena. You can't do this," he gushed, cutting her off. "You've never even met this man. He could be a psychotic killer for all you know." He moved to take her hand, gazing tenderly into her eyes. "-For all we know. This is absolute madness. You must reconsider."
Relena pulled her hand back in and looked away.
"What about us?" He urged. "Give me a chance. I can make you so happy. I'm sure of it. Please, come with me."
"Excuse me?" She had tried to stop this from happening, but now that it was unfolding she looked and felt positively indignant.
He stepped toward her. "Relena. I feel like we have a connection. I know you feel it, too. Let's just walk away from this whole thing. Forget about this; this town, these people. We'll go wherever you want."
Relena was surprised by her own sensation of offense at his disloyalty to the family she'd just agreed to protect, but she suppressed it to focus on deescalating the situation. She nodded slowly, never shifting her gaze to his eyes. "I think you're confused," she said as intentionally and softly as she could. "You're sweet. You are. But you and I are not-" She reached out, again, and touched his arm. "Well, this isn't going to happen between us."
Suguru looked down and nodded. "You're sure you want to go through with this, then?"
"It's best for everyone," she whispered. She'd given more thought on the issue than she could ever express; but he lacked the intimacy with her to even warrant an explanation, whatever he may think of their relationship.
He stared at her a long while before he spoke, again. "Then I can't say this was your idea." He seized her wrist.
Relena released a small gasp as his pistol came into view. She frowned. "You fool. Don't do this, Suguru. I am not someone whose life you should gamble with."
"You leave me no choice."
She pulled powerlessly in his grasp. "There's always a choice and you're making the wrong one."
Suguru yanked her, spinning her body and locking her into a submissive pose in front of him. "No. Your choices have run out."
:::
"She changed her story," Wufei announced as he exited the office where Sonomi was being kept.
Heero and Milliardo met his stare from mirrored stances against opposite ends of the table.
"Now she's claiming that Relena asked her to lie, saying that the Foreign Minister backed out of her agreement and ran off."
Milliardo's shoulder dropped and he looked away.
Heero's response, however, was instant. "She's lying."
Milliardo met Heero's challenging glare.
The Japanese man was frustrated. "I can't believe you think your sister would do something like that."
"I didn't say that she did." Milliardo straightened and moved away from the table.
"But you are entertaining the possibility."
Milliardo shook his head. "It's-conceivable is all."
"No, it's not," her former guard insisted as he adjusted his posture to a more militant one.
"Heero. This is a high pressure environment. This situation is absolutely ridiculous. It made no sense for her to agree in the first place. It's clear she's being manipulated, and maybe she's come to her senses."
Heero moved to defend his teacher against the indirect accusation, but was interrupted.
"Then why the ruse?" Wufei asked.
Milliardo shrugged. He'd determined her running away was a hopeful scenario, and he didn't care to question it.
"Relena would never go back on her word," Heero insisted, still taking the suggestion very personally.
Milliardo sat, facing him. "We have to ask ourselves why she agreed to this in the first place. Of course it makes sense that she'd have second thoughts."
"Some people," Heero bit out, "may go back on their agreements. Political agreements. Family agreements. Socially, or in just about any other way. Some even try to kill those they once called friend-"
Milliardo creased his lips in offense.
"-But Relena Darlian is not one of those people. She would not break her word about something as serious as this."
The blond man coughed and looked away.
"He knows her better than you," Wufei commented offhandedly.
The former prince eyed him with a venomous glare.
"I'm going to bet with Heero on this one," the second pilot added to his previous remark. "The woman is lying."
"Something's off, today, though," Heero said. After several moments, he put his hands on the table, slowly standing. "Daimyo?" He called. Moving swiftly from the room, he found his Master in the main hall. "Where is Suguru Jinsuke?"
The old man rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "He asked a leave of absence for a few days to take care of some personal business in Tokyo."
"When?" Heero pressed.
"This morning," the old man answered in a hesitant voice.
Heero turned to Milliardo and Wufei, who were already on his tail. "Sonomi will get us nowhere. We'll have to start at the baths."
:::
"So what was your plan?" Relena asked her captor, looking away from the sunset behind him for a moment.
He glanced at her, and turned his attention back to the pebbles at his feet.
"If I'd run away with you, I mean. You couldn't keep this honeymooner charade going forever, could you?"
There was a small smile playing at his lips.
"Were you really going to try to toy with my emotions until you'd heard that the Hayato situation had blown over, then? You were going to use me?"
"What do you want to know, Princess? There's something specific that you're after. Just ask."
"Would you really have taken advantage of me if I'd fallen for this?"
He huffed, looking up at her. "I don't know how far it would have gone. I mean, really, I just needed you out of town with me before I could ebb back on the passions display."
Relief filled her features. "You should let me go," she said softly.
"What?"
"Let me go back to the village."
"No," he scoffed. "You're not going anywhere until this has ended."
"Do you really think it's that simple? That he'll find out I'm not there, they'll call off the wedding, and life will go on as usual?"
The man looked away with a dejected expression. "Everything was fine before he showed up."
"He hasn't shown up," she commented, off handedly.
"Don't split hairs, Princess. He was dead a few weeks ago. Everything was smooth sailing."
"Sailing into what, exactly?"
Suguru looked at her with inquisitive eyes.
"Tell me, Suguru. What did you think was going to happen if Hayato hadn't been found?"
"Look. I've earned my privileges, Highness. I earned the Daimyo's respect."
"And you thought there was a reward in it for you?"
He showed his teeth with a sardonic sneer. "I was going to inherit everything." Suguru pursed his lips as he continued. "And I should. I know how this place works better than anyone. I know what's best for my people."
"You would inherit nothing," she scolded him. There was a gratification to contradicting his dreams with what she'd come to know.
"You don't know me," came a haughty reply. "You don't know the Daimyo. He trusts me. I would be the leader."
"A leader of chaos," she rebutted.
Suguru grimaced.
"Look," she said, feeling a little guilty for her spiteful attitude as she regained the conversation. "Let me go. They will kill you if you don't."
"Kill me? 'Princess Wind' and Preventer 'Woeful Chump'? Excuse me if I seem less than threatened."
"Preventer Wind and Wufei Chang are not the ones I would worry about if I were you. You do, after all, have your own head of security to answer to."
"Yuy?" His lips turned in, conveying annoyance.
"I know him personally-"
"What?"
There was a sort of satisfaction in knowing that her secrets still remained close, even in this small town. "Heero Yuy is going to kill you," she replied in a cool voice. "And I don't want that for him, so I'll ask you, again. Let. Me. Go."
"Heero Yuy," he seethed. "Nah. That kid doesn't stand a chance against me." He seemed more to be talking to himself than to her. "Proby couldn't put a dent in my armor."
She sighed sadly. "I can't tell if you're a total sociopath or if someone's been feeding your ego so much that it's consumed your senses." Relena's eyes widened as a thought filled her mind. "Where is Sonomi?"
"You leave her out of this," he snapped.
Relena snorted lightly. "Of course," she said. "I can't believe I fell for it. Sweet, innocent Sonomi. What has she been telling you about yourself? That you're so much smarter than him? Stronger, even?"
After hesitation, Suguru stumbled out a new argument. "I don't need anyone's approval. I've proven myself. I can stand on my own."
"No offense, Suguru," the Princess said as she met his gaze. "But you're simply not smart enough to."
"Amazing how any statement prefaced with 'no offense' is a total insult. Besides that, you don't even know me. You can't make a judgement on my intellect."
"Heero's coming," she reminded him, again. "He's going to kill you if he finds me here. You know him, and you know that what I'm saying is true."
"Heero Yuy has taken everything from me," he growled. "Except my succession-and now your boyfriend's going to take that." He eyed the dust beneath him, drawing aimlessly in it with a stick. "I'm going to have my inheritance."
"Fiancé," she corrected in a sharp tone. "And you're not going to inherit anything. In no scenario will this play out so you come into leadership of the village."
He scowled at her.
"Trust me on this. If I don't marry Hayato Isuma tomorrow morning, no one gets that property. Your people's lives will be ruined. If you truly want what's best for the village," she urged, "let me go. I can help protect them."
A rustle behind Relena caught their attention. From the shadows, something white began to emerge. Suguru raised his pistol before Preventer Wind came into view. The blond man raised his hands in careless surrender, scanning the scene before him. Apparently satisfied with the headcount in front of him, he examined the Foreign Minister, but paid the cuffs on her arm no more attention than the rest of the scene.
"I'd heard rumor," he said in an oversized whisper designed to project, "that Relena had backed out of her arrangement, but (glad as I was for the news,) I thought it was an exaggeration. An impulsive tryst isn't generally her style."
"What?" Suguru was poised, obviously unsure what to expect from the European.
The man turned his back fully to his sister, his voice still raspy. "Well-to be honest, I don't really care if she follows through with the contract. I'm just here to keep the peace. And as an agent of the peace, I think it might have been best," he angled his shoulders so his glare could shoot back to hers for a split second, "if your rendezvous was a little more-out of the way. I mean, we don't want anyone-" He moved his hand only slightly, gesturing abstractly toward the woods. "-getting killed."
After a moment to consider, Relena released a breath she'd unconsciously been holding. "I love you," she sighed. (He was also giving the man a chance to withdraw before the conflict escalated any further.)
Cool blue eyes met hers, twinkling at her remark.
"No one's going to be killed, today," Suguru announced. "As long as you relax and wait this out nicely."
Milliardo didn't budge. He kept his gaze fixed on his sister.
"What he's saying," Relena clarified, "is don't put Heero in this position. Let us go."
Jinsuke frowned angrily. "Heero Yuy doesn't stand a chance facing me."
"I wouldn't bet on that," the Preventer answered, pivoting to face him. "Heero Yuy defeated me."
"I can't imagine that would be hard, Fairy Princess."
"Defeated you?" Relena's mumble came from a disjointed analysis. "No, you never had a winner. He'd had killed you. You would be dead."
Milliardo stopped and cleared his throat, his mouth half ajar. He only had a second to answer. "This really isn't the best time, Relena," he said much more quietly than before, intending the comment to be truly private.
The cool end of a metallic cylinder pushed through the clothes at his side. "Sit down," Suguru said. "Get comfortable."
Something frightening passed over Milliardo's face as the humanity seemed to evaporate from his eyes. He turned back to Relena's captor, his stature seemed to soar. He rose to his full height, well over six feet, and his shoulders broadened between Jinsuke and his prisoner.
"I am Zechs Marquise," he seemed to roar as he pushed into Suguru's personal space. The Japanese man stumbled back, but Milliardo continued forward, towering over him. "I am the Lightening Count. I am Milliardo Peacecraft, Crown Prince of the Sanc Kingdom. I am not to be trifled with, boy."
Suguru flinched as Milliardo's hand came over his face, fully blocking his vision.
"And no one," he said, balling a fist inches from the man's eyes, "no one pokes me."
His index finger came out, pushing into the center of Suguru's forehead. With a small jerk of his arm, Milliardo left the brown eyed man falling back onto his rear.
Milliardo seemed to fall back into a relaxed pose when he turned and walked casually back to his sister, lighting beside her on the bench.
Relena brought her attention back to their conversation as Suguru scurried to his feet, hustling into his corner, where he was distanced from them. "Why are you alive?" she inquired in a breathy voice.
The Preventer pulled his bottom lip between his teeth, leaning close to her. "Apparently," he answered, slowly, "I have a sister."
"You don't say," she groaned, rolling her eyes.
Zechs' mind went back to his moment on the battlefield, facing the unstoppable force that is Heero Yuy. Yuy could easily have beaten him earlier on, that night, but he had appeared to be waiting for the inflamed Lightning Count to yield. Refusing defeat, Zechs pressed on, until Heero finally took the arm of his Epyon Gundam, neutralizing him in the fight. It was, in retrospect, the time he needed to clear his head. It was also the glorious victory they'd each fought months to take. The time had come to finish the kill, but Heero never did.
"Apparently he didn't want to-" He stopped every couple words, as though hoping an interruption would come. "Be the reason that you cried."
Relena's impish grin melted and her cheeks began to burn. She was helpless against the aching warmth that began to swell in her belly. "What?" In the silence, she saw a decade of near misses and unfilled silences falling into place. Fifteen? He was fifteen when he abandoned the mission for her.
"Suguru," she called softly, turning her attention back to the man with the gun. "Suguru. You have to stop this. This is going to be a bloodbath."
The argument continued to irritate him.
"Suguru, I beg you. Don't make him do this."
A crackling sound came from just outside their peripheral, as Heero flexed his hands at his side.
"I really don't think he's going to hear reason, Foreign Minister," Wufei said, moving from Heero's side toward his charge.
