/I believe the sun should never set upon an argument
I believe we place our happiness in other people's hands/

Chapter Twenty One

A very peaceful, easy-going year passed after the Marauder incident caused such a scare. Everyone was tense for weeks afterwards but nothing happened. It was as though by imprisoning a few people the rogue band disintegrated- faded into the background where everyone forgot about them. The quiet was good news for the peace conferences Relena and Quatre were always wrapped up in holding. It had taken just a few weeks shy of a full for them to come to an agreement that everyone could live with. It was only a short matter of time before the entire human race united under Relena's guidance.

Unfortunately there were more pressing matters for me to deal with than the unity of our species. At the moment I was trying to maintain the unity of just two people- myself and Heero. Again.

"You haven't got to act like that, Heero!" I snapped angrily, biting back the urge to stomp my foot in a childish way. "It's not like I'm asking you to make speeches or anything. It's just a dinner. I told Quatre we could go and if you don't then what does that make me?"

He ignored my pleas, even though I knew very well he could hear me. I think that sometimes he thought if he just held his breath and stayed completely still that I wouldn't know where he was…

I growled, moving in his direction without thinking about it. "All I'm saying is that the human race is finally becoming a single nation and has a part of the human race and a potential member of this new nation I think you should attend the final meeting with the rest of us."

"No. I hate formal occasions." He responded at last, sounding very put out at the implication that he should be exactly where he was supposed to be.

"All you have to do is sit there!" I cried incredulously, fed up with fighting him on the issue. We were supposed to be attending the last peace conference in a few hours at Relena's manor and all he could do was argue with me about whether or not he was going to go. "You agreed over a month ago! You can't back out now!" I told him stubbornly.

With a growl I heard him yank his keys off the table. "I don't have to deal with this."

I groaned, rolling my eyes as I followed him toward the door. "Loki!" I called, hoping she was close enough to take out if I had to follow him. "Heero, come on, wait. Where are you going? You can't just leave. Even if you're not going I still need a ride there."

"I'm going for a walk. Call a cab." He snapped, stomping angrily down the front walk. "You can still use the phone."

I gaped, not believing what I had just heard. Over the past year we'd had our tiffs but he'd never been an asshole about it before. "That was low." I told him, sounding more hurt than I'd intended. "Are you really going to walk away like that?" I didn't even know if he could hear me or not- I couldn't hear his footsteps but I couldn't tell if that was because he had stopped walking or if he had walked away. "What if something happens? You might get hit by a car or I could get into an accident or choke on a piece of food at dinner… Then how will you feel?"

I heard him sigh from a few yards away and his feet scuffed on the pavement as he turned. That trick worked every time. He couldn't take being guilt tripped and he knew how much I hated leaving his company while we were still fighting. I didn't honestly expect him to get hit by a car and I certainly didn't plan on dying any time soon, but letting someone leave thinking you are angry with them is the worst feeling.

"Duo I love you, I do, but I'm not going to the dinner. End of discussion. If you want to go that's fine- I won't stop you. I'm going to go for a walk. I'll drive you there when I get back."

I relaxed, knowing that he couldn't possibly be as mad as he had been acting moments ago. More than anything, mention of something going wrong seemed to affect the two of us. I knew it was because of our pasts, all the time we had spent with uncertain futures. The thought of losing the other now, after everything we'd done to get here… well, there weren't many other things that scared me that much. I made sure neither of us left angry, just in case.

"Be careful, okay?" I told him gently, the tips of my fingers brushing Loki's fur. I listened to him turn around again and walk down the driveway. "Wait, Heero?" I called, taking a hesitant step forward. He stopped again and I let out the breath I had taken. "I love you too. Hurry home."

He didn't respond, only resumed walking, shoes tapping much more gently on the pavement now. Sighing I turned around and headed back indoors, Loki trailing after me. Her claws were clicking unusually on the ground, reminding me that she was overdue for having her nails trimmed. It was usually my responsibility because I had learned the path to the dog-groomer's down the street. I promised myself I would take her tomorrow, if it was still open.

"Hier, Loki." I ordered as she began to wander away from me again. She whined nervously and licked my hand as I flopped onto the couch. "Platz." I ordered gently and she obeyed, laying down at my feet. Her tail thumped back and forth against the couch and floor.

Truth be told I was still a little upset that Heero was getting so bent out of shape over this whole dinner thing. Really, would it kill him to hop down to Quatre's for a while for the broadcast? Morale for everyone, everywhere would be high and seeing the five of us pilots alive and well and still protecting them couldn't hurt. There wasn't a television or vid-screen anywhere that was not tuned into the frequency that was to broadcast the last peace conference.

Of course, there were only a few people who knew that everything was already wrapped up nicely. The broadcast was only to make it publicly official. All separation between nations or the Colonies and Earth had already been dealt with. Aside from making it common knowledge the deal was already sealed.

Man, did it feel good to know that.

We had done that. We had helped make that unity possible.

Maybe that didn't mean as much to Heero as it did to me.

If that were the case it would be easier to forgive him for acting so nastily the whole day. He could be a real prick when he wanted to be, as I had discovered. Rarely, though, was that attitude ever directed at me or the other pilots. Not even Quatre got the third degree burn when he talked to Heero anymore. I think that since Heero and I had worked things out and gotten our lives pulled together properly he stopped seeing Quatre as any sort of threat to our relationship. Not that he could have possibly thought I would stay with Quatre and not him- It was glaringly obvious how much Quatre and Trowa wanted to get together.

Those two still confound me. After all this time those two have still not managed to cobble together a proper working relationship. A year it's been and still Trowa is gallivanting around with the circus instead of making his home with his lovely little Quatre. I must get a phone call at least once or twice a week from Quatre, having an attack over the situation. The poor thing is too nervous to do anything, though, and he has expressly asked me not to say anything about it to Trowa. Hey, I gave him my word and I'm not about to break it, even if staying quiet does go against every bit of common sense in me.

Just because I said I wouldn't say anything to Trowa doesn't mean I can't ask Heero to say something…

Sadly I know Heero wouldn't do it. On occasion I ask him if he's going to talk to Trowa about the whole Quatre situation but every time I speak up he just tells me that he's already had that discussion and it's really none of our business. It damn well is my business if I've got to listen to Quatre being upset over it. Heero always clams up about what exactly he and Trowa discussed before. That's one of the few things that he still goes silent about.

Really, he's gotten a lot better since the end of the war. He seemed to have decided that since our lives were no longer in danger if we spoke to others it was an acceptable behaviour. I think the Marauders had given him quite a scare in that he realized just how shitty things can turn in the blink of an eye. Some part of me is grateful to them for changing that in him, for making him open up like he did. It made him so much easier to handle.

Truthfully the Marauders were still a bit of a sore spot for the both of us. Everything had wrapped up far too nicely. The entire event was being regarded as a huge prank pulled by some wealthy upstarts who had only come to power because the larger leaders of OZ had been killed. Noin had the mobile suits gathered from the circus checked and the results had really warped everyone's views of the situation. The suits were basically walking tin cans; scraps and junk pulled together from older junked suits. They could walk and some of them could shoot but that was about it. Heero looked into their attack patterns and they had only been stirring up trouble in places where visibility was awful- giving them the effect that they were appearing and disappearing without being able to be detected. That also explained why they never stuck around to fight any real MS- they would have been found out almost immediately.

From the people Noin had taken captive she learned that the circus had only been under attack because that was the only location they knew. Trowa should have been there but Heero had called him away to pick up Loki, as I later discovered. The whole thing looked like sheer luck for both sides. We hadn't heard a peep from any sort of opposition since then.

I was not about to argue. Peace suited me just fine. After a few months of training with Loki and learning how to get around and do things without making a complete fool of myself I had taken a job with the Preventers. Five days a week I took a bus into town and headed for the training grounds. People were slowly trickling into the Preventers' force and they all needed training. For the most part I worked with an assistant and we worked the students through protocols and regulations. Every Friday they participated in a mock scenario where they would be tested in what they had learned earlier in the week. Loki especially loved those, as she got to be a part of more than one.

All in all… well, life was shaping up to be not such a bad thing. Sure, I mean I had my differences with people now and again but it was nothing at all as tough as my previous life. I had a good house (we had just finished remodeling it last month), a fantastic job, and I'd finally gotten the guy I'd wanted since the beginning.

If I could just make it past tonight things would be all that much better.

It was just before eleven. The dinner wasn't until eight tonight and the broadcast of everything was to be aired at nine. That left about ten more hours to get through before everything we had spent our lives working for would come to fruition.

Just ten more hours.

Even I could handle that.

I was sitting on that couch, contemplating everything that happened and everything that would happen as I waited for Heero to return from his walk.

That was when the phone call came.

Just as it started ringing Loki leapt to her feet and began barking. She so rarely barked that it startled me at first. Her barks were deep and throaty, completely unfitting for how sweet she normally was. I could hardly hear the phone ringing over all the noise she was making.

"Loki, lass es!" I called, reaching for the phone. "Shut up for a minute!" She didn't stop barking. I covered one ear with my free hand and pressed the receiver to the other. "Hello?" I nearly shouted, reaching for Loki's collar as she began to move away from me.

"Duo?! Oh thank Allah!" It was Quatre. I had expected him to sound a little nervous, with all whole conference going on and all, but he seemed almost frantic. I immediately began to worry a great deal. What was with everyone all of a sudden? "Duo, take Loki and get out of there NOW!"

"What? Quatre, calm down." I covered the mouth piece. "Loki, lass es! Hier!" I shouted, though it didn't make a difference. I began to make my way to her as I turned back to the phone. "What's going on?"

"Get out, Duo." A shiver of fear ran down my spine at his tone. "It's the Marauders, they-" His voice caught before he could continue.

"Marauders?" I questioned, confused. Why was he bringing them up at a time like this? They were last years news, he had better things to worry about now. "Quatre-"

"Relena is dead, Duo. Get. Out. NOW."

The connection crackled and I missed what he said next. Somehow I think that even if the line was crystal clear I wouldn't have heard him. Sound all around me had hollowed out, making me feel as though I were in a vacuum. Loki's ceaseless barking became distant, ringing in my ears.

Dead?

Relena was dead?

That couldn't be. I'd been talking to her just this morning. She couldn't be dead. We weren't in a war anymore, we weren't fighting or dying anymore. Why would Quatre say something like that?

"That's not funny…" I whispered, choking on my shock. It had to be a joke. There was no way something like that could be happening. Not now, not today. Any other day but today. Any other time.

"Duo?! Duo?!" Quatre was shouting for me on the other end.

There was nothing I wanted more than to be able to hang up that phone and pretend nothing had happened. That I could pretend everything was still all right and that Heero would come home and we would go to dinner and see Relena and everyone else just fine. That I could pretend Quatre was just pulling some sick joke on me for whatever reason.

Unfortunately there was nothing I could do less.

I knew, somewhere in my soldier's brain, that if what he was saying was true I was potentially in very serious danger. If there were people at the press conference killing there would be people other places ready to do the same. Right now whatever else had gone down I needed to get myself to safety and then worry about finding the others. I couldn't do anyone any good if I were dead.

"I'm here. Tell me what's happening!" I shouted back, unsure of whether or not he could hear me over Loki and through the static. I winced when I heard the phone respond with only a harsh crackle in my ear as Quatre tried to speak. "Cat, you're breaking up…" My voice trembled almost as much as my body and sounded far away, like I was speaking underwater.

A string of obscenities filtered through the phone, broken by angry white noise. I made a numb grab for Loki's collar. Quatre shouted something the instant before the line went dead. Dropping the useless device like it had bitten me, I secured my hold on the collar and began to drag the still barking canine across the room.

"Loki!" I cried, exasperated and scared. "Hier! Fuss! Come ON you stupid mutt! We have to leave!" She wouldn't stop barking, even as I hauled her bodily toward the door, away from the window.

She never barked like that; the scary sort of bark like she was going to attack something.

An icy pit of fear settled in my stomach as I realized I didn't have time to "get out."

They were already here.

/End Chapter Twenty One, Through the Storm/