Heero awoke early the next morning. The room was only barely lit up with early rays of sunlight and the shadows in the corners were still dark as night. He started to get up but was stopped by something weighing him down. He turned his head and froze upon seeing Trin asleep next to him. In *his* bed.

He was about to get up when he noticed she didn't look normal. Her skin was pale and her entire body was shaking. Her breathing was shallow and before his hand even touched her forehead he could feel the heat searing off of her body.

He nudged her gently and her eyes opened slowly. She winced; the light seemed bright and hurt her eyes. She squirmed as Heero lifted her and carried her to her own bed. He knew it was probably best not to move her, but the perfect soldier inside him won.

"Heero, I'm cold" she complained as he laid her down.

"You have a fever" he explained as he covered her with a blanket.

"Then why am I cold?"

Heero ignored her question and headed for the door.

"Where are you going?" she asked and pulled herself up onto one elbow.

"I'll be back. Stay awake" he said and softly closed the door behind him.



He returned in a few moments with a glass of water and two pills. He helped her sit up and handed her the pills. She took them with distaste and drank some water. Heero set the glass onto the table.

"Sleep," he instructed, and turned to go back to his bed.

Her hand on his arm was so light that he didn't feel it at first. "Heero," she whispered. "I don't want to be alone. I wouldn't be able to take it if I had another dream or vision, or whatever they are."

He stared at her for a moment, then pulled up a chair next to her bed.

"Go to sleep," he repeated his previous order.

This time she complied, and closed her tired eyes, immediately falling asleep.

As he watched her sleep, he recalled the day that she had teased him about being the perfect soldier. He wasn't perfect. He hadn't been, not since Relena, and not since he had met Trin. He knew Doctor J wouldn't like it and he wasn't sure if he himself did.

He remembered people telling him that no one could be perfect. But he was, he had to be. It was the only way to succeed in a war. He couldn't keep letting his guard down like this, it would get him killed; the others as well.

But on the inside, he wasn't perfect. In fact, he was so far from perfect that it was as if he had two different people living in the same body: the emotionless soldier, and the lost boy.

When Relena died, it was as if his only grip on the real world had been broken. He had retreated inside himself, hiding behind the mask of the soldier who never failed, the one everyone thought was perfect.

And then when he thought his human half was lost forever, Trin came. She wasn't like Relena, but perhaps, she was better. It scared him when something inside him began to stir, as if awakening from a deep sleep. He had been the perfect soldier for so long he wasn't sure he wanted to be anything else. Besides, he wasn't sure he could handle it if she died as well. He hated feeling helpless, just like she said in the wild nightmare he had had. But here she was, sick, maybe dying, and he couldn't do anything about it.

She cried out in her sleep once, and Heero reached to take her hand, to do anything to calm her, and yet the emotionless soldier stopped him again. He was so confused.

* * *

Trin awoke later in the afternoon, feeling hot and sticky. She kicked the blanket off of her. The door was opened barely an inch and upon seeing she was awake, swung open. Duo flew into the room, followed by Acire and almost everyone else.

"I'm not hungry" Trin said when she saw Quatre in the doorway with a tray of food. Her voice was rough and she coughed harshly. The Arabian sighed and turned back to the kitchen.

"Trin!" Acire shrieked. "You're alive!"

Trin visibly grimaced.

"Just a *little* softer"

"Sorry," she said with an embarrassed grin.

"So how you feelin', babe?" Duo asked as he leaned against the bedpost.

"Did someone get the license plate number of that gundam?" she grumbled.

The Deathscythe pilot chuckled.

"That bad, huh?"

"No," Trin snapped. "worse."

Duo winced. "Ow"

Trin sat up slowly. Her vision was fuzzy and she had trouble hearing.

"Did one of you poison me?" she demanded, glaring somewhere in the general direction of Wufei.

"Trin, don't be ridiculous" Quatre said as he reappeared in the doorway.

The brunette grumbled something incoherent as she tried to get comfortable. Trowa stuck around long enough to take her temperature and left soon after. Out in the hallway Heero leaned against the wall, hidden by the shadows.

"One hundred and four" he reported and Heero cursed angrily.

"What do you think?" he asked Trowa.

"I don't know" he replied thoughtfully "She was fine last night"

"That doesn't help" Heero told him icily "It's our mission to protect them, we can't let her die"

"We're not going to let her die, Heero," Trowa replied, logical as ever.

"Hn" the Wing Zero pilot replied "What are you gonna do about it?"

Trowa paused.

Heero glared at him.

"You don't know what to do, do you?" he accused angrily.

"Not yet" Trowa admitted.

Heero's eyes fell to the floor. "Neither do I."

He stared at the floor for a long moment. Finally, he looked past Trowa at the wall and said, "What now?"

Inside the room, they heard Trin yelling at Wufei despite her sore throat. He had picked a bad time to drop one of his 'weak onna' comments.

Heero entered the room, and Trowa could hear him yelling at the Shenlong pilot. Trin began yelling at Heero for interrupting her yelling at Wufei, and Quatre, Duo, and Acire quickly left the room. "Think we should stop them?" Trowa asked.

"Nah," Duo replied.

"I think it's cute" Acire added and received several strange glances.

"Yeah," Duo added with a sly grin. "It's like a lover's quarrel."

Suddenly Wufei was kicked out of the room as Trin broke into a cough.

"You should sleep" Heero told her as he shut the door.

"I don't want to sleep" she grumbled and folded her arms across her chest, once again attracting his attention to the ugly bruise on her shoulder.

Heero turned away slightly, averting his gaze from the wound. Trin's voice was scratchy from yelling as she asked, "Heero? Something wrong?"

"No," he replied quickly. "Does that hurt?" he asked quietly, indicating her shoulder.

"It's fine," she replied. It was a subject both of them avoided now.

"I'm sorry," he finally said, and then went to his side of the room.

She turned over onto her stomach so she could watch him. He felt her eyes on him and turned around.

"What?" he asked, reaching to open his laptop.

"What is it with you and that laptop?" she asked in annoyance. "It's like you're glued to it"

His hand paused. "That's classified," he finally said, unable to come up with anything else.

"You know," Trin began, as he started to type rapidly, "whenever you're not on that, you act like a completely different person. Do you like to be alone or something?"

"Hn."

"Fine, I'll shut up" She could understand if he did. She hated being around people sometimes as well.

Turning over onto her back she closed her eyes and began to drift asleep, listening to the rhythmic tapping of the keys.

* * *

Waking up was painful when she opened her eyes later that evening. Her head felt like it was going to split in half and she could swear the room was swaying slightly. Despite the headache she remembered why she woke up; she thought she had heard a noise. But as she strained her slightly ringing ears, she didn't hear anything.

Trin smoothed her somewhat sweaty hair out of her eyes. She hated this. It was unbearably hot in the small room and Heero hadn't opened a single window. It was becoming increasingly difficult to breathe; her throat felt clogged and her lungs seemed to shrink. The walls appeared to sway back and worth, as if threatening to collapse onto her. She had to get out of here, she suddenly realized.

Trin slowly crawled out from under the covers and tiptoed to the closet. She quickly changed into a pair of stretchy jeans and a blue tank top, also pulling on a pair of sneakers. Absentmindedly, she took the dragon blade Heero had given her, and slipped it under her jean leg; securing it with a bandana. Then carefully opening the door she peered out into the hallway. Thankfully there was no one there and after neatly closing the door after her, she crept down the hall, trying not to make any noise. She felt unsteady and had to hold onto the wall as she went down the stairway.

At the bottom of the stairs she looked around once again and after not spotting anyone snuck out of the front door. The light evening breeze felt good against her hot skin and it was a little easier to breathe outside. She continued down the dirt path as quickly as her aching body would let her, not realizing that she was taking the path toward the forest.

* * *

Acire sat near the open window in her and Duo's room, flipping through a magazine lazily. Their room was right over the front porch and she looked down upon hearing the door open and close. Her eyes widened with surprise and confusion as she saw Trin walk down the steps unsteadily and continue down the path toward the forest. There were a couple of things wrong with this picture. A, they weren't supposed to go anywhere without at least one of the pilots accompanying them. And B, Trin was incredibly sick; she shouldn't be wondering around outside.

Acire quickly jumped to her feet and ran down the hall. She knew she should tell the others, but it was either that or catching Trin. She chose Trin.

* * *

Trin continued down the path, not really realizing or caring where she was going. Suddenly strong hands grabbed her from behind and pinned her arms to her sides. She thrashed weakly, but was too delirious to put up much of a struggle. A hand clapped over her mouth and she was dragged deeper into the woods away from the path. There in the darkness, she made out a van. Its door slid open and she was handed to another pair arms. They pulled her inside and the door slammed shut. The last thing she felt before she past out were someone's rough lips on hers.

* * *

In the back, one of the men pushed Shane off of Trin harshly.

"You'll kill her! Can't you see she can hardly breathe as it is!" he hissed angrily at Shane. Shane didn't answer as he stroked her cheek. 'What did they do to you?' he thought.

Suddenly the driver turned to them.

"There's the other one," he said as he pointed to out the window. "Just like the Boss predicted"

The others looked where he pointed and saw Acire walking slowly down the path in the distance. Two of the men jumped out of the van and in a few moments came back with Acire unconscious in their arms.

"Let's get out of here" the driver said briskly as the door slid shut once more. He revved the engine and sped through the woods toward a jet hidden on the other side of the island.









A/N: Woo hoo! I've been itching to get to this part!! So tell me, like? Hate? OCC? Chapter 18 will be out soon, I promise! Also, HUGE thanks to Demon Faerie Aeryka!! I don't know what I'd do without you, thanks so much!!

But let me be serious for a moment. You know how it feels when your fic, or picture you've worked so hard on is copied by someone and posted as theirs? No? Well maybe you know someone who has. Please help prevent this and check out The Avengers (search under 'Author') or go to http://www.geocities.com/Avengers_Unite/ Ja!

Luv,

~Arion~