A

A.N.~ Sorry this is late, everyone. Besides saying that just one more time for a good measure, I wanted to say that I refer to Relena as 'Mrs. Dorlian Peacecraft' in this chapter. Let's face it, Mrs. Dorlian Peacecraft Winner is just too long, and besides, many well-known officials, celebrities, etc. keep their original names when they get married. Plus, those two names hold a lot of history for her.

One last thing—I decided to add some more chapters to this story. Right now, I'm not sure how many more. This story is really making me think, though, so I want to see how far I can develop it. I'm going to work on a new outline this week, and the next chapter should be out sometime next week.

Trowa moved silently down the shadowed hall, pausing for a moment as a cloud brushed over the moon and bathed his path in blackness. Earlier he had stolen into the room of the two Preventers who had been assigned to guard Relena, waking them to tell them that he had arrived. Paul Kirchwood, codenamed Preventer Storm, had stared at him, blinking owlishly, before grunting an acknowledgement and flopping back down under his covers. His companion, an anonymous lump in the bed across the room, hadn't stirred.

The shadows fled from the cool light of the moon, and Trowa continued on, silent. Even his thoughts were quiet. The hall was lined with large windows, bordered with delicate, white frost that showed the mansions of the rich who lived in Moscow, while the tattered homes of the poor were barely visible on the horizon, seeming to move in a blurred wave under the moonlight. Light streamed in softly through the windows, so that the deep burgundy of the thick carpeting in the hall hadn't lost much of the splendor that it held in the daytime. Actually, Trowa thought, taking more notice of it as he walked, it might look better this way. Red had always been the color of power. Even among animals it was a universal symbol, the passion of war and love, the two scales of life. The red carpeting was meant to reflect the wealth of the occupants of the mansion and to awe visitors with its opulence. However, under the light of the moon, it was transformed into something more muted, something calmer. Under the moonlight, it reminded Trowa of soldiers laughing jovially around a campfire the night after a victory, instead of the blood and rage that came during battle. It reminded him of lovers talking in hushed voices with their arms around each other, instead of the heat of passion and burning touches. It was softer, safer. He felt out of place.

I wonder what they talk about at night… Another cloud cast a shadow in the hall, but Trowa didn't wait for it to pass. He had to make sure that Relena was all right. Moving as if he was part of the shadow himself, he came to her door.

Heero had been expecting a rebuke, and he had expected it to sting him for a while. He hadn't disappointed himself, but he had been surprised to find that, even after he had left her, he was still angry. The muscles in his back were tight. He wanted to get up and pace along the wall. The only way he could keep his fingers from moving restlessly was to clench them into fists. He had been sitting across from Relena's door for over two hours, and still he couldn't name the object that his anger was directed toward.

"Why do I feel this way when everything turned out according to plan?" he growled softly to himself. Relena and Quatre were married; Relena was happy again. Everything was perfect. He shouldn't have a problem—or rather, even if he did have a problem, it shouldn't matter. Everything is perfect for everyone except for me, he thought wonderingly. No—that still wasn't it. He could handle being unhappy; that was routine. He thought for a few more moments, the hallway on either side of him becoming a blur as he lost himself in feelings of anger that seemed to be directed everywhere at once: at Quatre, at himself, at the people in this city who were making his friends unhappy. However, under all the anger he found…concern.

Rising to his feet in one smooth motion, Heero crossed the hall and opened Relena's door silently. The room was dark, long blue curtains stopped the moonlight before it could illuminate Relena's bed. He could still make out her shadow-shrouded form lying under the covers, though, and he went to her, standing next to the bed and looking down at her peaceful face. She had one small hand tucked underneath her chin, and her body was twisted under the covers as though she had been thrown violently into slumber.

"Don't deny it, Heero," Duo said, watching his friend pace back and forth across the tiny room. "This is upsetting you more than you want to let on, but you can't afford to keep your mask on now."

"You're wrong, Duo," Heero said gruffly, his hands falling heavily to the counter top as he stopped pacing to look Duo in the eye. "I can't go. Do you know what that would do to everything that we accomplished?"

"Oh?" Duo said, his mouth twisted in a bitter smirk. "And what exactly did you accomplish by running away?"

Heero felt the anger rise and fall within him in a tide as familiar to him as breathing. "She's happy now. Would that have been possible with me there?"

Duo sighed, looking as if he was plagued by a problem that hadn't stopped gnawing at him for quiet some time. "I don't know. I don't know if you did the right thing or if we're all damned idiots, playing with something we don't understand. But, when I look at her, when I look at both of them, I think they're running without something that they need. It doesn't make sense," he said, his frustration bubbling to the surface. "They look so happy, but there's something that none of us are seeing. It's bugging the hell out of me."

Heero nodded wordlessly. He hadn't seen Relena for the past few months; he hadn't even watched the various news reports about her.

"Heero, go to Moscow. She needs you now. You can't harm anything, not unless you want to, and I know that's the last thing that you'd do."

Heero ran a hand lightly along Relena's forehead, brushing her wispy bangs out of her eyes and feeling calm, as if some part of him felt that everything made sense now and knew what to do. He had no hope of finding that part of himself, though, not tonight. Yet, he didn't want to find it, for that would change everything. He wouldn't be able to go back then, just forward, into a future that might hold more unhappiness than the past. So, he wouldn't move. Just being in that dark, peaceful room, standing over the woman that he had left months ago seemed to be enough for him at the moment.

And what happens when she wakes up? Will she remember this moment as it happened or as a dream that only reminds her of the pain that I caused. Will she still love Quatre? He knew the answer to the last question, of course. He couldn't take Quatre's place; he had been passed up for that job. Not a job, more like… What would it be? Peace? Love? Something that he had never fully known and could never name. Yuy, you're nothing but a traitorous soldier who's come back from suicide missions one too many times. Now that he was back once again, could he leave? Could he walk away from her again?

Relena's hand brushed against his, and he tore himself away from his thoughts and looked down at her in alarm, afraid that he had awakened her. Her eyes were still closed, though her lashes fluttered fitfully against her cheek. He drew his hand away from her, taking a step back. He stood there for a moment, watching closely as she stilled once more. No, I can't leave her again. I don't…want…to leave her again. His eyes hardened, and he scanned the room before turning to leave. But, I'm nothing more than a soldier.

"Heero," a voice called to him softly, grating harshly in his mind. He turned to see Trowa take two silent, panther-like steps across the room.

Fine tremors of anger ran down Trowa's arms as he opened Relena's door only to see Heero leaning over her as she slept. He strode carefully into the room, not wanting to have her awaken and be upset when she saw the two of them. Schooling his face into an impassive mask, he watched Heero come up to him, noting that the other's eyes shown with anger and his steps were violent. He looked as if he had barely managed to leash his fury. What's causing him to act this way? Trowa thought, bewildered. The signs weren't easy to see. Heero hadn't lost much of his edge from the war, but the anger was there, rippling under a thin surface of control. It intrigued Trowa that Quatre and Relena's union, brought about in peace, had started waves that none of them could have predicted.

But, what was he doing here tonight? How is he going to affect everything? It would be Heero who would cause changes, Trowa decided. He was too strong-willed, and if he wanted…

"Heero," Trowa whispered, a faint rumble of anger powering his words, as Heero started to brush past him. Heero continued out into the hall, not even throwing a glance over his shoulder in acknowledgement. Trowa eased the door shut and turned to see Heero leaning against the wall, staring at him, defiance on his face and in his posture.

"Why did you come here, Heero?"

I came as a guard, nothing more, Heero thought, addressing himself more than pondering what to say to Trowa. Trowa looked at him impassively, his arms crossed, waiting in silence for an answer. Or for my control to break. How close have I come to that?

"I came because Duo asked me to come," Heero said with steel in his voice, daring Trowa to challenge him and hoping that the other young man would not. Trowa bowed his head.

"Are you trying to seek her forgiveness?" Heero thought for a moment that he had imagined the question, but the reaction that it caused in him wasn't imagined. He fought to stand still and stay calm as he realized that Trowa had just named the source of his anger. Guilt. He could have stopped Relena's unhappiness long ago, but he left. He could have diffused this situation before Relena had to drag herself away from the happiness that she had just found, but he had been hiding. Then, he had come to her in the middle of the night, taking comfort from her, but it was only temporary because he hadn't made his confession to the light, to her face.

Heero realized that he had turned his eyes away from Trowa's and focused them on the floor only when Trowa had come up to him and spoke once more in a soft whisper. This time, though, the whisper wasn't the one of a hesitant question but one of warning. "Don't ruin the marriage, Heero. Let them heal. This isn't the time for war."

Trowa stepped back and leaned once more next to Relena's door. "I'll watch her for the rest of the night. Then, tomorrow, I'll find the people who are threatening her."

A flock of pigeons scuttled down the slanted stone roof and ducked around the gargoyles at the end before taking off in an ungainly flight and winging away toward the poorer districts of Moscow. Relena, clad in a heavy but elegant dress with a hat and gloves to ward off the cold, walked arm and arm with a Russian dignitary in the frigid shade under a covered colonnade. She had allowed herself a few moments to let her thoughts wander; the men and women with whom she walked now had focused their conversation on a festival that was to take place in the coming weeks.

"The decorations are already being assembled in the square in front of the embassy building where our meeting have been held. Perhaps you would like to go see them tomorrow, Mrs. Dorlian Peacecraft?" Relena nodded absently in the general direction of the man who addressed her. She had been captivated for the past few minutes by a tall shadow that seemed to be following her little party.

"Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen," she said, smoothly detaching her escort's arm from hers. "The governor and some of his council members were going to review some of the new documents from the city census with me this afternoon, and I'm afraid that I must leave you now."

The aristocrats graciously nodded to her, giving her their leave, with the exception of her escort who looked rather put out as he shuffled along in the wake of the group. As they once more resumed their conversation, Relena headed resolutely to the shadow, which had stopped behind one of the stone pillars of the colonnade. She rounded the pillar to see Heero, with his back toward her, staring out across the city.

"Heero," she said, gently touching him on the shoulder. He stiffened immediately and turned to face her. She sighed when she saw the wariness in his gaze.

"I hurt you," she said. "I'm sorry." He stared at her for a moment, and she wondered if he could see her apology in her eyes, and she wondered that, if she looked for it herself, would she be able to see it? He had hurt her, taken a huge chunk from her base of support, but now that she had stability under her feet once again, the hurt had dulled until she was able to handle it and analyze it. What she had found had allowed her to understand why Heero had left her. She saw why it had been necessary for him to leave, and though she didn't think it was right, she understood him now. Through his absence, she had come to understand him better than when she had chased him throughout the early parts of the war. He needs to be understood. We all do.

When he didn't answer her, Relena reached out and took his hand in her gloved one. She gasped as Heero's grip tightened around her fingers, and he pulled her toward him, letting her stop only a moment before she would have fallen against his chest.

"No," he said, his voice rumbling deep in his throat. "I'm sorry, for what I did to you."

You came back to me, Heero. And now I don't understand you at all.

"I owe you protection," he said softly, his gaze cast down at their intertwined fingers. Relena's eyes followed his, and she took her hand gently out of his, bringing up her other hand and pulling the glove off. She grabbed his hand just as it was falling. A tingle ran through her fingers when she felt how cold his hand was. She wrapped her own hand, still warm from being protected by the glove, around his and brought it slowly to rest upon her heart.

"You don't owe me anything, Heero," she said, her eyes on his own, which were hidden behind his lashes as he gazed down at their hands. She could feel his hand warming, but she could also feel tension running through it in fine tremors. "My heart's faltered a few times, but I've always been able to count on my friends. Even you…even when you would count yourself as a traitor. You've helped me be happy, Heero." His hand slipped from hers, so fast that she wasn't sure if she had let it go or if he had yanked it away. He whirled around to face the city. Relena backed up a step, bowing her head.

"Now that you've come back, Heero, let me help you."

Let me get to know you, because I don't think that anyone else does. Let me see the real you, so that you and everyone else knows just how much good you can do, how much good you've already done. I want you to know how much you've helped me, and I want a chance to return that favor.