A/N: I'm sorry. I am NOT trying to kill my readers. In fact, I still don't know if it was better to post this chapter right away or not, but… What's done is done. I made everyone wait for so long, it was the least I could do. Also, after I posted the last chapter I was on a role, so…

Yzak rounded the corner and tried not to bite his lip. He was going to make himself bleed, for crying out loud. He had to keep his head about him. This stretch of road was the last place he'd seen Dearka before he'd lost sight of the quick blonde. The silver head paused and sucked in some much-needed air. He had so many questions to ask — What was Dearka running toward? Did he know Yzak was on the PLANTs? — but if he didn't fight the questions back he'd likely keel over in agony.

The realization that he needed to see Dearka at that very instant hit him like a drop into gravity. He'd been floating in space, careful not to let his mind stray too far into distracting zones, but he simply couldn't muster the strength to remain in safe orbit any longer. He'd come too far. He couldn't lose Dearka Elsman now. Not when Dearka was the only thing in his world worth chasing after. Yzak took a resolute step forward. If he had to burn up in atmospheric re-entry, he didn't care so long as it would reunite him with that stupid blonde.

And then Yzak located him, standing mere yards away on the other side of the nearest warehouse building. The silver-haired male went weak at the sight.

Dearka was standing defensively, and his back was turned. Sweat had soaked into his thin T-shirt, and the cloth had clung to the tanned male's muscled back and shoulders like wet leaves to a windshield. Yzak wanted to run his hands over those smooth, toned curves. He wanted to kiss the back of Dearka's bared neck, slip his fingers through those flaxen locks, anything – just so long as it would prove to him that the vision before him was real.

Yzak held his breath, cursing himself for daring to give in to relief too early. Facing Dearka were three unarmed men, and one with a gun aimed directly at Dearka's heart. They had to be Blue Cosmos. They were far enough away that the blonde might break off and run, but laid out before them was naught but open space. The Buster pilot had nowhere to flee to.

"Why don't you give up already?" One of the men was smirking.

Yzak watched the terrifying scene unfold as colorful specks of something illusionary danced before his sight. He fought to hold on. He ordered himself to think before acting. It didn't work.

"Elsman," Yzak nearly bellowed, his tone frothy and angry as the name left his lips. What a crime it felt to speak with such fury, when all he wanted to do was collapse into the blonde's steady grip. Still, he dared not drop his natural front.

His shout had the desired effect. Dearka turned despite himself, disbelief plastered over his stricken features. The three unarmed men shifted uncomfortably at the appearance of a second foe. The one with the gun brought his weapon to a neutral position when he saw Yzak carried no weapon.

"You must be Jule," the armed man decided. He studied Yzak as the Duel pilot neared. "You're sure lookin' woozy. Supposedly that gas is even worse when it's leaving your system." There were a few scattered cackles.

Yzak was not going to give them the satisfaction of knowing they were right. He shot Dearka a look meant to silence him before fixing the speaker with a glare dipped in vice.

"I have your god damned access code."

"Yzak, wait a sec—"

He didn't want to hear Dearka's voice. It would make him break. "If you say one more word, Elsman, I'll…" But the rest of his threat never came.

A fifth man joined the others just then, dragging in his grasp a screeching, thrashing figure. The man spat and landed his captive a sharp blow to the face, which brought silence, but no relief from the kicking and scratching.

"Can't we fuckin' do something about her?" came the yelp, and at once the nearest man from the group in front of Dearka moved to help still the captive.

Yzak closed his eyes and tilted his head back, an ironic, bitter smile threatening to break loose. And he'd been so close…

"Miriallia," came Dearka's desperate utterance, and the name was like a bullet through Yzak's heart.

"I'm sorry," came the strangled plea from the Natural girl. But the apology was not for Dearka. "Yzak, I'm so sorry!"

The silver head merely sent her a stare brimming with hatred. He could have maneuvered them out of harm's way. Now Miriallia Haww was the added factor he had not accounted for. She was the Wild Card. With her there, Yzak Jule could not predict what Dearka Elsman would do. It wasn't a matter of whom Dearka cared for more. It was simply a matter of game over, because there were certain things that couldn't be weighed into the plan and successfully controlled.

"Yzak, listen to me," the Natural female cried out, straining against the grimy hands that held her back. "Don't give up! I don't care what happens to me – I don't care!"

Yzak heard Dearka's sharp intake of breath at the words that left his hysteric girlfriend's lips. The blonde turned to him at once, but Yzak didn't bother to meet the male's violet gaze.

"What were you thinking when you brought her with you, Yzak?" It was almost an accusation.

The tinge of blame in the blonde's voice set him off, but he ached inside. "Don't be dense, you idiot! She came with me on her own."

"Dearka," Miriallia's plea sought the Buster pilot now. "He's telling the truth. It-It's my fault."

The blonde's face softened. "Mir…"

"That's just about enough," said the man with the gun. He nodded at the two holding the Natural. "Let her go with those two Coordinators. They're all as good as dead anyway."

Within an instant the orders were carried out and Miriallia stood at Dearka's other side. Then the gun was raised again.

"The access code?" Yzak reminded coolly, though he knew by now negotiation was futile.

"Nah. We'll get it from Ms. Ezalia like we originally planned. She said she didn't have it, but she was lyin' to protect you, most likely. You shouldn't have decided to hack our files that day. You might not have gotten into this mess."

The barrel of the gun found Dearka's chest again, but then the weapon's occupant thought better of it. With a flick of his wrist, the aim moved to Miriallia.

Miriallia didn't budge. She felt a void, a void that had struck her only once before, on the Archangel in JOSH-A. The ship had been targeted while she sat running the CIC. She'd watched the deadly beam of light near the bridge as if in slow motion. She had known that instant that she was going to die, and it was the same as the void she felt now. Time hung in suspension; feeling and emotion and reality ceased to exist.

In JOSH-A in Alaska, a twist of fate and Kira Yamato in his Freedom had reversed her destiny. She'd lived, but she had not forgotten that void. As she felt its presence this time, the brunette knew that surely she couldn't escape death twice. Well, this way she could at last see Tolle again.

Then Dearka moved in front of her. She wanted to laugh. No, Dearka – stay where you are. It was over, couldn't he see? She wished he'd step away, because… A bit of emotion pressed its way inside her void, and she sobbed aloud. He didn't even love her anymore. What the hell was he doing?

"You fool," she whispered, gripping Dearka by the arms and burying her face between his shoulder blades. "Why are you so stupid? Are you going to die too? Just like Tolle? I'd rather die myself than face that."

"If you think I can watch them kill you, Mir, you're wrong." The tanned Coordinator's jaw was set firmly.

His words bubbled through her and made her head spin. "Dearka Elsman," she said steadily. "You will not die here. If I wanted you dead because of me, I'd have finished the job myself while you were a prisoner on the Archangel." She felt him shake a bit, and with horror she realized he was chuckling.

"You surprise me more and more every day, Ms. Haww."

He'd said that to her in his apartment that time. She remembered feeling nervous as she waited for his explanation about why she'd had to watch him kissing his best friend. At once she decided it was a silly thing to recall when she might die at any instant.

"I'm not upset. I don't want you to explain. All I want you to do is tell me what you told Yzak in more detail. Why'd you kiss him?" There was a twinkle in her eye as she said it.

Dearka's mouth dropped open. "You really don't care that much at all, do you?"

She tisked and wagged her finger in front of his face. "Wrong. I do, but I'm giving you a chance to make a decent excuse before I fly off the handle. Don't blow it."

"You surprise me more and more everyday, Ms. Haww."

Dearka had promised her that day. He'd said he'd never leave her. It didn't matter that his feelings for her had become muddled since then, didn't matter that now he was changing his mind and insisting on dying for her sake. All that mattered was that they had those fond memories. A tear squeezed its way from her eye.

"You'll protect the girl?" asked the man with the gun. "No matter what?"

Miriallia squinted her eyes shut and clung to Dearka harder. She felt him nod at the same time she heard Yzak make a little sound. The breath of air from the silver head's lips said, Such is the inevitable.

The gun went off.

Too late, Dearka Elsman dove away from Miriallia and to his right, where Yzak Jule was standing. Too late, Miriallia Haww realized what the armed man must have been thinking all along.

Yzak Jule was going to die.

The bullet flew toward him slowly, sucked forward as if his body were a black hole. Is this what it felt like to watch life draw to a close? Yzak could have laughed, had he the gall to do so. A shame he was not dying on the battlefield instead. His pride might have been able to handle it if he had gone down like Nicol, or maybe Miguel.

No, wait – that was wrong. Yzak didn't want to die like them. The Strike had killed both of them. A wry smile curved his pale lips. With his grin in place, Yzak supposed that maybe dying this way was okay after all. Dearka and Miriallia could use the confusion afterward to escape. At least he'd been allowed to see that stupid blonde one last time, right? Besides, he had known this moment was coming all along. The moment the gun had been aimed at Miriallia, Yzak had seen it for the deception it was. They'd wait for the right moment and shoot at him.

Such was the inevitable. He hadn't protested, because he hadn't had the heart. A different Yzak Jule might have fought until his dying breath. But this Yzak Jule had died inside a good minute before the trigger had been pulled. The moment Dearka had stepped in front of Miriallia Haww, the choice had been made. But not just that.

Dearka Elsman was the sole human being that Yzak cared for enough to die for. It really was quite a simple explanation.

The bullet hit its mark.

A feminine shriek assaulted his ears, and at once Yzak's mind focused. He could feel the oxygen whooshing through his lungs. He… He was alive? But why?

Miriallia dropped to her knees, her head in her hands. Horror and fear and desperation screwed her face into a frightful display, and her cry tore the air as if the PLANTs themselves were ripping apart, all of them at once, like Bloody Valentine multiplied over and over.

"DEARKA!"

Yzak Jule was being sucked into the freezing, dead realm of outer space even though he still lived, just like those on Junius Seven that day. No, he thought vaguely, and then he couldn't bear to think any more. Dearka's dark blood stained the pavement.