A/N: A few people thought that I was bored with this story and looking for a fast ending. Sorry, but no, that's quite incorrect I'm afraid. Enjoy!
"Fuck!" The word leapt from my mouth. My hand flew to the door handle and I pushed at it uselessly. It didn't open. Too late I realized that the stupid car had child safety locks that activated automatically when the car was in drive. If Relena chose to detonate that bomb, we would be trapped here. I had a moment to think about what that would feel like before she spoke.
"Did I frighten you? I'm sorry. I didn't bring it along to threaten you," Relena said. She turned her head and looked at Wufei, who was leaning as far back from her as he could get, and then to Trowa and Quatre in the front. "It's not active and I wasn't lying to you. This really is the path to where Heero is being kept, but there's also a lake through those trees over there. It's about a ten minute walk; I've seen it before the last time I was taken through here. I wanted to throw this inside of it. I found it in Une's office last night. I'm worried about what she might do with it."
"Quatre, unlock the doors," Wufei said very calmly. Too calmly. Quatre shifted the car into park. Wufei reached out and took the backpack carefully off of Relena's knees. I shuddered to think of how rough she had been with it while we were at the mansion. It could have gone off at any time and we wouldn't have been any the wiser. He pushed the door open and got out swiftly. Quatre jumped out to join him and the two of them took off through the trees in the direction that Relena had indicated.
"What the hell were you thinking?" I demanded, staring at her. For a moment there, I'd thought… well. It had definitely crossed my mind that Relena had fooled us all, and if I'd been holding a gun at the time I wouldn't have hesitated to put a bullet between her eyes, regardless of Heero. My heart was still pounding.
"I'm sorry," Relena repeated, brushing back a stray curl. There was a glitter in her eyes that told me she might not be as sorry as she was professing to be. If I hadn't known better, I would have said she was a little amused by our reactions. "I told you, I found it in Une's desk. She's supposed to be the goddess of peace but it worries me, the way she goes about getting what she wants. She'll do anything and it doesn't matter who gets in her way. All I could think about was getting it away from her before she had the chance to set it off and do damage. That could've destroyed a city."
"Did you think," Trowa said in a low, controlled tone, "that just throwing it into a lake without checking to see if it was active could have consequences?"
She shrugged, squirming a little. "I didn't know what else to do. That's why I thought I'd better show it to you first."
Trowa and I exchanged a long look of disbelief. Sometimes I couldn't believe how foolish Relena could be, if she really didn't know how dangerous her actions had been. It was good that she'd gotten the weapon away from Une, but she could have easily killed us and then fuck knows what would've happened to rest of the world. For all of her experience, for all of the things she had said and done during the war, she just didn't think about the consequences of what she was doing. I thought about saying as much to her, but I was still so angry I didn't even know if it would come out right. I settled for shaking my head in disbelief and pointedly turning away to watch for Wufei and Quatre.
They came back about fifteen minutes later, thankfully without the bomb in hand. Wufei was furious. He stormed over to the car and jerked the car open, reaching in to grab Relena's arm. "Onna," he hissed, "do you realize what you could've done? That bomb was real. It could have gone off if you'd dropped it or jostled it around too much." His hand tightened around her arm and I saw Relena wince. "Don't you ever be so foolish as to mess around with things you don't understand, got it?"
"Yes," Relena said quickly. "Yes, I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking. I just wanted to get it away from Une."
He just stared at her coldly before turning away and walking back over to Quatre. Relena wrapped her arms around her waist. I got out of the car and went over to the three of them. Wufei was still burning and even Quatre looked upset. I knew they were both thinking about how close we had come to dying without even knowing it and I didn't blame them, but now that the initial panic and adrenaline had passed through me I just wanted to keep going. Heero was the important thing here, not Relena.
Quatre was looking at me with narrowed eyes. "I've never known you to be so forgiving," he said in a questioning tone.
I laughed. "God you're getting good at that," I said. It was almost eerie, how he could understand what someone was thinking just from being able to feel their emotions. "Yes, you're right. She's stupid, what can I say?" I shrugged, not bothering to mention that she was possibly malicious as well. "We're not dead and we still need her help to get to Heero."
"You're right, of course," Quatre sighed. "Just - could someone examine her backpack and make sure she hasn't got any other weapons that we don't know about?"
Trowa picked up the backpack. Wufei had thrown it on the ground when he came out of the forest. He searched through it quickly. "Nothing else that's dangerous," he said at last. He looked tired. "Let's just get back in the car and go. I don't think she's got any other surprises waiting for us."
"Not here, anyway," Wufei muttered. I knew his trust in Relena, small as it had been, was now non-existent. I couldn't blame him for that. It had occurred to me too that we might be walking into some kind of trap. But there was no choice. I was going through with this no matter what the cost; if I was going to die I wanted it to be with Heero.
"Relena," I said, turning around. She was standing beside the car, her hands loosely wrapped across her stomach. For a split second she looked so young and vulnerable that I actually paused, but I pushed on. "We're going to get back into the car. You're going to give us the directions to find Heero. And then you're going to fuck off and never contact or bother any of us again."
My voice must have come out harsher than I'd intended because Relena flinched, but she nodded. I walked back over to the car and waited for her to get in. This time Trowa got into the back with us while Wufei sat up front with Quatre. Relena's voice was subdued when she began issuing directions. I took a quick look at her and noticed that she was still wearing my cross around her neck. The chain was just visible above the collar of her sweatshirt. That, at least, was a good thing. I knew she wasn't operating under Une's control.
Her directions led us to a summer house on the edge of the lake. It was just one more cabin in a long line of them had bordered the waterfront. It looked so ordinary that at first I doubted Relena had led us to the right place, though I wasn't sure she'd be stupid enough to try and cross us a second time around. "This is it?" I said, just to be sure. It made sense - no one would ever suspect anything - but at the same time it didn't seem... enough. I was going to be pissed if Heero really had been here all this time, just waiting for someone to walk in and break him out.
"Yes, this is it," Relena confirmed, leaning forward a little to get a better look. "This cabin... it belonged to Treize Khushrenada." She spoke the name hesitantly. "Milliardo said that when he died he left almost everything he had to Une. Apparently they used to come here sometimes in the summer. It's somewhere that Une feels safe, so she wouldn't hesitate to hide Heero here. No one else knows about it, I don't think."
"Does she keep guards here?" I asked briskly, my hand already opening the door. I got out and Relena jumped out behind me.
"I don't know. I've only been here a few times, when I insisted that she bring me to see Heero. Most of the time I was far enough under her spell that I wasn't paying attention." Relena's fingers brushed against the necklace she was still wearing. In a move that surprised me, she started to take it off. I flung out a hand instinctively and stopped her.
"What are you doing?" I demanded. "That's keeping you from becoming Une's puppet."
"This is your weapon, isn't it?" Relena said. "I can tell, I can feel the power coming off of it. You're going to need it, Maxwell. I have no idea what she has down there. Get out of the car and then lock me in. Better yet, knock me unconscious." Her eyes wandered to each of us and her jaw tightened at whatever she was seeing in our faces. "I want you to. You said it yourself, I'm not of any use to you." Her smile was brittle at the edges. In one smooth move, she pulled the necklace off and grabbed my wrist, forcing it into my hand. I knew that as long as we were touching Une's power would be held at bay, but as soon as one of us let go Relena would be even more of a danger to all of us.
"I'm sorry about this," I told her. It was the truth. She just nodded and kept her eyes on me while Wufei moved up behind her. Quick as lightening, his hand flashed out and he curved his fingers over her collarbone, searching for the right combination of pressure points that would ensure she couldn't be used against us. A moment later, Relena's eyes rolled up in her head and she collapsed. Wufei caught her and lowered her to the ground.
"We'll lock her in the car. She'll be safe that way," Quatre said. Trowa and Wufei picked her up and placed her across the backseat. Quatre locked the doors. I put my chain around my neck. The cross felt warm against my chest and I felt a low thrum of power running through me as Shinigami stirred with interest. He wasn't happy that Heero had been taken; he missed his partner and he had been equally determined to see Heero returned to us all. I squared my shoulders and walked unflinchingly towards the cabin, bolstered by his renewed presence.
"Duo!" Quatre shouted behind me. I knew I was doing something stupid and possibly dangerous by going in alone, but I didn't care. I walked right up onto the front step and took hold of the doorknob. It twisted easily under my hand and I pushed the door open, stepping into what appeared to be a kitchen. Everything was coated with a thick layer of dust and the smell of musk was heavy in the air. I didn't see anything out of place but the hair on the back of my neck rose with the feeling that something wasn't quite right. I was on high alert as I took another step into the room.
Behind me, Quatre pushed his way in. He was panting and glaring at me. I ignored him and pulled my gun out of its holster. I wanted to draw upon my scythe but that would set Shinigami free and some instinct told me not to do that yet. I gestured to Quatre and moved ahead into the next room, which had only an old fireplace and a couch and a set of stairs that led to another level. Quatre walked over and knelt in front of the fireplace, looking at the remains of what had been burned. A frown crossed his face and he looked up at me with a bleak expression. Whatever he had found didn't sit well with him, but I didn't stop to ask. I went over to the stairs and jogged up them, highly aware of every creak beneath my feet.
I wanted to call out to Heero but I didn't dare. There didn't seem to be anyone else in the cabin but that didn't mean we were alone. The air had an unnatural stillness that was troubling me. Besides, as it turned out, I didn't have to. The upstairs was pitifully small, containing only two bedrooms and a bathroom, and I found Heero in the second bedroom. It was tiny, with just enough space for a single bed, and even with only that for furniture it only left the room with enough space for the door to open. There wasn't even a closet. I stepped inside and stared down at him, my heart in my throat. He was lying on old, grimy gray sheets, eyes shut, looking oddly peaceful considering everything that we'd been through. He looked good, though he had – unsurprisingly – lost a lot of his tan, leaving his skin with an oddly pale, almost waxy appearance. It was immensely reassuring to see the way his chest rose and fell with every breath.
"Heero," I whispered, and my knees buckled. I staggered forward and fell against the bed, sitting down hard. After all this time, here he was, just inches away from me. I wanted to dance around the room, I wanted to laugh, I wanted to cry. I wanted to throw myself down on top of him and never let go. All of this flooded through me in a heady rush, leaving me breathless, and in the end all I could do was reach out a shaking hand to touch his cheek.
His skin was cool beneath my fingers, and I double-checked to be sure that he really was breathing. It was like touching my hand to a cold radiator; the deep chill was enough to make me shiver. I wondered what Une had done to him and how she had kept the god of War at bay. I brushed a strand of hair off of his forehead and leaned forward, pressing my cheek against his. Shinigami was railing inside of me, furious at seeing our lover in this state, and I was having a hard time keeping him from coming out. I needed this moment with Heero, to know that he was still here, unharmed, before we sought revenge.
The door creaked behind me and Quatre sighed with relief. "Thank god," he murmured, a single step bringing him close enough to touch me. He was so warm that I couldn't help leaning into him a little, though I didn't take my hand away from Heero. I never wanted to lose contact with him again.
"Where are Trowa and Wufei?" I asked. My voice broke midway through my question and I flushed, glad that he couldn't see my face. Though considering that he could likely feel everything I was feeling, that was pointless. His hand came down and landed on my head, and then he stroked my hair gently, just once. It helped. I felt the tension slowly draining from my body and I was able to sit up and twist to look around at him. He was staring down at Heero.
"They're downstairs," Quatre said without look at me. "Making sure that no one sneaks up on us. I don't think they expected that Heero would actually be here."
That wasn't surprising; after everything Relena had put us through I hadn't really been expecting it, either. I turned back to look at Heero again. I had the feeling that shaking him wasn't going to be enough to wake him up. "What did she do to him?"
"I don't know, Duo," he replied softly. "But we're going to find out and then we're going to make sure that Une knows she can't just do whatever she pleases. It will be alright, I promise." He squeezed my shoulder and then moved away. I heard him calling down the stairs for Wufei and Trowa and I knew that he'd already figured out that the two of us might not be strong enough to move Heero's dead weight by ourselves. In a matter of seconds the three of them would be in the room with me and I didn't know when I'd be alone with Heero again.
I took my chance. Quickly I leaned down and kissed him, moving my lips briefly across his unresponsive mouth. It was nothing at all like the passionate, loving kisses I was used to but it was enough. "I promise you, Heero," I whispered to him. I took his hand and intertwined our fingers, pressing the back of his hand against my cheek. "We'll fix this. I swear."
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