Disclaimer: I do not own anything to do with Mobile Suit Gundam

Author"s Note: It"s been a good ten years since I last published. I was originally going to continue the first version of this story but after some thought I decided to do a rewrite. It"ll follow the same path as the original but I decided to add in some extra bits. I also decided to publish it in two parts as it will no longer follow a proper triple crossover storyline.

Enjoy.

Italics=thought

Chapter 1

AC 196

It had been just over three months since the defeat of White Fang. The world had started its journey to total pacifism thanks to the reformed Earth Sphere Unified Nation. Relena Peacecraft had been named Vice-foreign minister like her adoptive father, a job that she threw herself into heart and soul, for she truly believed in world peace.

All around the world people were starting to put away their weapons, even the Gundam pilots had retired. Duo Maxwell had returned to his colony with his girlfriend Hilde where they run a junk yard. Nothing pleased the former God of Death more than tinkering away with old bits and pieces. Trowa Barton had returned to the circus and travels the colonies and Earth performing. Quatre Raberba Winner returned to his family business and was using his wealth and resources to help ESUN rebuild after the war. Zechs Merquise was still missing, presumed dead, after no trace was found after the destruction of the Libra battleship.

The only exceptions were Heero Yuy and Chang Wufei. The latter had disappeared not long after the fighting had ended, and the other pilots had not heard from him. Heero on the other hand had taken it upon himself to be the unofficial guardian of the new peace. Not long after being appointed Vice-foreign minister, Relena asked Heero to be her personal bodyguard. At first he wanted to take the job but decided to turn it down. The look in Relena's eyes as she offered Heero the position told him all he needed to know. That by being together every day they would let their feelings for each other bring them together.

And that's why he couldn't do it. He could tell by the look in her eyes that she was hurt by his rejection. When she asked why he wanted to tell her the truth. That his hands were too bloodstained to be with the Princess of Peace, as the media had dubbed her, no matter how much he wanted it. That he didn't deserve her and that she deserved better than him.

And even though no one knew the identity of the Gundam pilots, he was worried that if it got out, that Relena Peacecraft was in a relationship with a killer, even if he was the saviour of the Earth, then her standing and influence would disappear, and all of her hopes and dreams for peace would die. Even though he knew she would stubbornly say that he was being stupid and that she didn't care. But he did.

He decided to give a blunt reply. "I'm a soldier, you're a pacifist. It would never work." He knew he was lying to himself and to her, and he knew those words would crush her, but he believed it to be the easiest path for both of them. Now she would be able to marry someone important and influential from the colonies that valued peace as much as she did, to show how united space and Earth truly was.

It was this line of thinking that lead to a media blitz. Due to their positions, both Relena and Quatre were constantly seen together as they coordinated on building projects and charity drives between the colonies and Earth. This led the media to make up stories about dating, marriage, pregnancies etc. Hearing these rumours made Heero feel a twinge of jealousy, even though he knew they were idol gossip. That they were spending so much time together made Heero realise what he had given up.

But Heero couldn't keep himself away. Unbeknown to Relena, he joined the Preventers, ESUN's secret force that was used to prevent further wars from beginning. Due to his skills, Heero was given autonomy to act as he saw fit. He used this position, and his hacking ability, to access Relena's schedule so he could keep an eye on her. Heero considered himself a man of honour and he had vowed to keep Relena safe, even if it meant his life. And it was during one of these "missions", as he dubbed them, that our story starts.

Relena and Quatre were holding a press conference to talk about their latest project, but before they could get into the important issues the press attacked them.
"Is it true you are getting married?"

The pair had been expecting this. It was the first live interview since all the rumours had started.
Relena took charge to answer first as she saw that Quatre was lost for words.

"No, we are not. Mr Winner and I are good friends. We both share the same ideals and are using each other"s resources to help ensure peace and safety for all. I also have too much to do and am far too young to settle down yet."

"I concur with the Vice-foreign minister's statement. Also, I am currently in a relationship," said Quatre as he snuck a quick look over his shoulder and gave a small smile to Dorothy Catalonia, Relena's personal assistant, before finishing his answer. "As well as that, I enjoy living."

It was this dead pan, dry humour answer that caused the crowd of reporters to fall silent. Relena had to cover her mouth to stifle a giggle as she knew what he meant, even though it hurt to think of it. Even Dorothy and Noin had trouble suppressing their laughter. All over the world fits of laughter broke out for those that got that joke. Duo sprayed the tv with the drink in his mouth as he fell on the floor laughing. Even Heero expressed a sign of amusement, as he looked on from his hiding spot, and started to feel stupid for feeling jealous of his former comrade.

"What do you mean by that Mr Winner?"

Quatre refused to elaborate, instead moving on to the reason for the meeting.

Several hours after the conference ended, Relena arrived at the spaceport, ready to catch a flight back to Earth. She was alone as Dorothy was staying to spend time with Quatre, and Noin had some Preventer business to take care of on another colony.

"Vice-foreign minister Darlian?" came the voice of a dignitary as Relena was heading to the shuttle.

"Yes?" replied Relena.

"Are you leaving so soon?"

"Afraid so, I have to get this terraforming proposal to the head of the Earth Sphere Unified Nations as soon as possible."

"That's too bad, we were thinking of celebrating your birthday while you were here."

"I'm so sorry," finished Relena with a smile as she headed down the stairs.

As she boarded the shuttle, a crewman bumped into her.

"Pardon me," said the man.

"It's fine," she replied as he made his way out.

When she got to a seat she noticed a small bear with a card. After reading the card, Relena quickly looked out the window and noticed a mess of brown hair walking away.

"Heero," she called out.

Heero turned to look at the shuttle, as he did he saw Relena rip the card in half.

"Next time deliver it to me in person."

Heero merely nodded his head with a small smile as he kept walking while Relena gave a smile of her own.

"Three months since I've seen or spoken to him, yet this token shows that he does care for me," she thought to herself as she sat down and held the bear. It still hurt to think about the time he rejected her but knowing who he is she knew it was for good reason.

The shuttle took off and headed for Earth. Relena had closed her eyes and was enjoying the flight when the ship was rocked.
"What was that?" she asked.

"Looks like we're under attack," came the pilots reply as he sent out an emergency signal.

Outside, a couple of small crafts had surrounded the shuttle and were boxing it in. A number of men in space suits then launched from their ships and landed on the shuttle, they then started forcing a maintenance hatch open at the back. Once open, the ship came to an emergency stop as the attackers made their way inside.

"No one do anything stupid," said one of the assailants as he produced a weapon. "We're here for Relena Peacecraft."

"That would be me," replied Relena as she stood up to protect the rest of the ships occupants. "What do you want?"

"Come with us quietly and no one gets hurt."

"Understood," she replied calmly.

"Now the rest of you, into the escape pod quickly," ordered the leader as the pilots, crew and handful of passengers made their way out.

Once the pod was launched, one of the group jumped in the cockpit and started to fly off with the rest of the ships following. Even though they were aware a signal had been sent, they knew that they were too far from anywhere for help to arrive in time.

Unlucky for them, they didn't notice a red, white and blue jet hovering nearby. As soon as the attack started Heero sent a message to Lady Une, the leader of the Preventers, informing her of what was occurring and he was going to rescue Relena by himself. Une sighed in relief as she didn't have to start a mass investigation and waste countless resources. Heero stealthily followed the small band of outlaws as they made their way to an abandoned mining colony on an asteroid. Doing a quick survey of the area with search-eye, Heero deduced there were no mobile suits around which would make his job easy if not somewhat boring.

The terrorists were doing their best to try and scare Relena as they hunted her off the shuttle with a gun to her back. As they were making their way from the hanger, they were knocked off balance as a large object smashed its way through the doors. The kidnappers aimed their guns at entrance shakily while Relena allowed herself a smile as Wing Zero made its appearance. At the sight of the mighty Gundam, the would-be terrorists dropped their weapons and ran off hoping not to lose their lives. Relena couldn't help but smile at the cowardliness of her attackers, while Heero also smiled with amusement. Truth-be told he would have loved to have smashed through a squadron of mobile dolls to make his victory feel worthwhile, but in these times of peace you take what you can get.

He zoomed in on Relena as he went into deep thought. After his bought of jealousy, Heero knew that he had made a mistake when he left Relena that day. He now knew that he wanted to be with her, no matter what anyone had to say about his past. He had accepted his feelings for her after remembering the life mantra of his father, "The only way to live a good life is to act on your emotions." Heero knew what he was going to do, he was going to tell Relena the truth about how he felt, and ask for her forgiveness. He then opened the cockpit.

At the sound of the cockpit opening, Relena turned to face her Gundanium angel, as he lowered himself to the ground and walked towards her. She felt her heart flutter at the sight of his Prussian blue eyes, messy hair and handsome features, yet at the same time felt hurt and angry at past events.

"Three months with no contact and you just decide to show up on my birthday, leave a present without saying a word, and then rescue me, again. Is this your way of apologizing?"

Heero could see the pain in her ocean blue eyes, as he took in the beautiful features of her heart shaped face, framed by honey blonde hair. But he could also detect a hint of teasing in her voice.

"I am sorry," replied Heero with as much sincerity as possible. "I never truly left, I was always near. I told you that I would always protect you."

"So you can kill me yourself?" came her tart reply.

Heero could see the humour in her eyes at the mention of their private joke, even though she was trying to be serious.

"Yeah," he replied as always, allowing a hint of amusement to show.

Relena couldn't help but smile at his attempt to be funny.

"I missed you, Heero."

At hearing those words, Heero was about to make his confession when he realised they should leave the base. He mentally shook himself, saying there would be plenty of time for that later.

"We should probably leave before reinforcements arrive."

Heero made for the shuttle but noticed it was damaged from his arrival. "Looks like we'll have to leave in Zero."

"I'll get my bag," replied Relena as she quickly ran into the spacecraft and picked up her suitcase, along with the bear Heero gave her.
Heero allowed himself a small smile as he saw her carrying the toy. Knowing that she hadn't discarded it meant that she still had feelings for him.

"Ready to go?" asked Heero as he took her bag and threw the strap over his shoulder.

"Yes," replied Relena as she looked into his deep blue eyes.

Heero place his hand around Relena"s waist and pulled her close while grabbing a hold of the cable that would pull them up to the cockpit.

"Hold on," he said as Relena wrapped her arms around his neck.

The two then looked into each other"s eyes, and Heero was overcome by an overwhelming desire to lean down and kiss her. At the same time, Relena was secretly hoping he would, the months spent apart did nothing to weaken her feelings for the young pilot. After a few more moments Heero broke their gaze and pressed the button to start moving towards the cockpit. Once there, Relena stepped onto the platform and moved out of the way for Heero to access the cockpit. He placed Relena's bag behind the seat in the cargo net. It was then that he noticed a dilemma. The space behind the seat was now gone due to not only Relena's bag being stored there, but also his own, as well as the survival kit and rations that were always stored there. He resigned himself to his fate of where Relena was going to have to go.

He quickly got in his seat and strapped in, then signalled for Relena to hop in. It was as she was about to go behind the seat that she noticed what Heero had. She looked at him questionably as he motioned to his lap. Relena couldn't help but notice a small blush start to appear on his face as she made to sit on Heero's lap, a small blush of her own appearing. She decided Heero was still in need of punishment, so decided to wiggle back and forth, disguising it as an attempt to get comfortable.

"Sorry, just trying to find the right position," she said while looking at Heero's emotionless expression starting to crumble.

She giggled to herself as she could sense the young pilot"s awkwardness. Heero may be a battle hardened soldier, but underneath he was still a hormonal teenager, and he was currently fighting a losing battle to keep the blood from his face, and other areas. After a minute Relena finally settled, deciding that she had tortured him enough.

"Comfortable?" asked Heero as Relena settled into his chest with her head on his shoulder, back resting against his left arm and legs across his thighs.

"Very," answered Relena as she allowed herself to enjoy the sensation of being this close to the man she adored.

"Let's head out then," said Heero as he powered up his Gundam and headed for the exit, not at all oblivious to Relena snuggling into him as the thursters kicked in.

Once outside, Heero punched the buttons to turn back to Neo-bird mode, telling Relena to hold on as Wing Zero twisted bits and pieces around to again resemble a jet. Once he reached a comfortable travelling speed that wasn't going to turn Relena's brain to mush from the Gs, Heero hit the auto pilot button and patched into Une.

"Relena, so good to see you safe and sound," said the leader of the Preventers.

"Thank you Lady Une, lucky for me Heero was in the vicinity,"

"Yes, do you have any idea who they were?"

"I think they were remnants of White Fang, but they were very unorganized," replied Heero.

"I see," said Une, deep in thought. "I'll send a team to the area to investigate, can"t have rebels disrupting our work. Once you get Relena back to Earth, I would like you to come back here and help."

Heero looked to Relena to see if she would make any objections. She merely gave him a look that said "up to you".

Heero looked back to Une and gave his confirmation and ended the call after farewells.

As they cruised through space, the pair sat in comfortable silence, but it got too much for Relena so she spoke.

"Did you see the conference today?"

"Yeah," replied Heero.

"Quatre has a dry sense of humour," said Relena with a giggle.

The mention of Quatre made Heero feel jealous again, but he shook it off, telling himself he was stupid. But it made him want to tell Relena his feelings.

"He does, and to be honest, that whole rumour made me feel jealous, and it made me realise…"

When Relena heard Heero say he was jealous, she felt her heart beat faster. She gave her full attention to him as he continued on with what was starting to sound like a confession. But sadly they were interrupted by the alarms going off. Wing Zero"s sensors had picked up a large object moving at high speed towards Earth.

"What's that?" asked Relena in shock. The young dignitary had had enough stress for the day.

Heero zoomed Wing Zero's camera in and saw what looked like an asteroid. Only it seemed to have a propulsion system driving it.

"Looks like those rebels are trying to get revenge for me messing up their plans," replied Heero as he sent a quick message to all channels warning of the incoming danger.

"You have to stop it!" exclaimed Relena.

"Roger that. You better hold on, it's about to get rough," replied Heero as he disengaged the auto pilot and started to increase speed.

"Argh," screamed Relena as the Gs from the sudden increase in speed had her bury herself deeper into Heero's chest.

Heero looked at Relena in concern, hoping she would be alright, but knowing he couldn't slow down as millions of lives on Earth would be lost.

Once they reached the asteroid, Heero punched the buttons to go back to mobile suit mode. The sudden change in position made Relena feel like she was going to throw up. Heero manoeuvred Wing Zero so that it was between the asteroid and the blue planet. He had a sudden sense of déjà vu, as he remembered what happened only three months ago. He aimed the twin buster rifle at the target while trying to hold Wing Zero steady. As they started to hit the atmosphere, the electrics in the cockpit started to spark, causing Relena scream. He gritted his teeth as the targeting system struggled to lock on. Bits of armour started flaking off the Gundam as the temperature was getting too much. With one more grunt of determination, Heero managed to get Wing Zero to hold steady long enough to lock on. He fired instantly, the shot from the rifle was true and the asteroid blew up into millions of pieces.

"You did it," exclaimed Relena as she threw her arms around Heero's neck and hugged him in joy.

He didn't have time to react to the hug, or revel in his victory. A huge back blast from the explosion had mixed with a solar storm that happened to be passing by. The impact threw Wing Zero about and Heero let go of the controls to wrap his arms around Relena to stop her from getting thrown into the sides of the cockpit. This caused Wing Zero to go into an uncontrollable spin as the Gundam and its occupants were sucked into a giant vortex. The pair inside were getting thrown about and their heads clashed. Relena was knocked out instantly, while Heero noticed a flashing of colours and lights as he felt himself slip into unconsciousness.

To be continued…

And there it is. The first chapter of my rewrite. I honestly didn't expect it to be so long, but once I got typing I couldn't stop. I hope you like the new twist. I"m honestly liking this new version better already. I"m looking forward to seeing where this goes. Will the pair stay together? Will they be separated? Will they die? Who knows, but it"ll be one hell of a journey.

For now this story will stay in the Seed/Destiny section until finished and then I will place it in the Wing/Seed crossover section once finished.

Anyway, please review and let me know your thoughts.

Cheers,

Beer-man