The Executioner Chronicles: Alternities

by Nightheart

Chapter 7: The longest chapter so far. Being manditorily enclosed in tight quarters with a man she is less than objective about makes Relena edgy, especially when he invades her space. The Executioner answers a challenge.

7. The Cage of Bonds

The tall and lanky ex-pilot Trowa Barton stood with his left shoulder leaning against the doorjamb.

"I heard," said Heero, indicating the stranger from the other Alternaty with a nod of his head.

Hunter Kylaran, the Executioner's partner, was wearing some kind of miniature head-piece and a set of gloves. The head-piece had a strange translucent shimmer glowing over his eyes attached to two small ear-pieces and a mouth-piece. The gloves were attached to the small keypads on his forearms by thin cords of bio-luminescent glowing wires. Well, they weren't wires in the traditional sense, more like flexible tubes that held some kind of glowing gel in them. The technology on their world was obviously very advanced, it looked like some kind of organic-based technology.

His hands were doing some kind of strange dance in the air, as if he were typing in a keyboard that only he could see.

Heero paused for a moment to listen in on what the stranger was saying to his absent partner.

"I've got the name of your next target, Nightheart. Lessee, Target 1739, Orin Gruder. Alias code-name, Lethal. Last known level, Sixth Circle. Specialties: Obsfucation, Volt-blasts, and dragons' breath. I don't believe we've encountered this one before, watch your back."

There was a slight pause and Hunter took the apparatus off from his head.

"She says she's just recently defeated Bane and is now going after her next Target, Lethal," Hunter reported.

Heero tuned out the rest of whatever it was that the too-handsome stranger was saying in favor of talking with Trowa about the Executioner and her capacity for finishing the job.

"Well, what was the level of her performance?" he asked.

"Sufficient," said Trowa. "She'll get the job done. After what I've seen now, I think we should be thankful that the Nightsider we encountered at Velsink's estate didn't see us as enough of a threat to go all out. I doubt all of us would have gotten out of there alive."

"That powerful?" Heero said, raising an eyebrow. All he had seen so far was an enhanced strength and a few tricks on the eyes.

"That and more. Those Nightsiders can do strange things…" And Trowa went on to give a full description, at least as full as he could understand based on his observations, of what he had seen during the Executioner's encounter with the Nightsider Bane.

Heero nodded when he was finished and said

"I suppose that the President in the other Alternity wasn't lying when he said our situation was more dangerous than we knew."

"I agree, but even so, I dislike hiding down here while those things attack up there. I do not like the idea that there may be nothing that I can do about the situation."

Heero nodded again in silent agreement. Even so, they had their orders and they both knew it. They were to stay at the safe-house with the Vice-Foreign Minister and the stranger from the other Alternity and let the strange Executioner do the job she'd been brought there to do. Une and the others would be doing all they could top-side.

Relena was yawning again, trying to cover it up as usual. Yawning wouldn't get the paperwork done after all, and she had a lot of paperwork to go through before her meeting tomorrow. She would be discussing the recent Planned Independence Act she wanted to get rammed through the Council and she wanted to have everything ready and perfect so that she wouldn't have any nasty surprises pop up on her in the middle of her speech. She was really getting to hate surprises. First she was surprised by the death of a close associate, then she was surprised again by the attack on Velsink's estate during the middle of a mourning ceremony and then she was surprised by Heero's sudden arrival back into her life.

Relena still wasn't entirely certain what she should think about that last one. Whenever she was around him her heart started beating harder, the air seemed to grow thick with something she couldn't put a name to. She grew flustered; flustered was not a state she was overly familiar with, and neither was awkward now that she thought about it. She just felt so confused now. She knew she was glad to see him, but at the same time she resented him. She resented the fact that he could have this kind of an effect on her, even after so long a time of separation. That in turn made her…querulous. Honestly, how was she supposed to get anything done if all she could think about was his eyes resting on her? And she could feel his eyes on her too, almost like a physical sensation. She tried to push it all out of her mind, but it kept popping up, oh damn! She was too young to feel this way, she didn't want to feel this way! She'd had everything going perfectly well and fine until he'd just breezed back into her life, saving it in the process and reminding her exactly why she'd fallen in love with him in the first place. Really, she should be above such school-girlish nonsense. She was a fully grown adult dammit!

All of this was souring her mood. She just wanted things back the way they were. Sure, sometimes it was a little lonely, but at least she didn't have all of these little voices from inside of her shouting at her. It made her want to pick a fight with Heero, just to see if she could chase him off and get things back to the way they had been. She hadn't been confused, everything had been exactly as she had expected it to be. She could live securely in the knowledge that her heart was devoted completely to the people.

A voice behind her startled her from her musings.

"So you're a politician eh?" said the australio-british accented voice of the new comer from the other dimension. "I'm not real big on politics myself. I tend to look on it more as a necessary evil."

Well, if she couldn't pick a fight with Heero, at least she could have a discussion from somebody!

"When you have a lot of people grouped in one place, naturally there will be differences of opinion in how things should be run. Lots of people mean lots of opinions. Someone has to be settle the differences and keep things running efficiently," she said reasonably. "I think politics and politicians in general have gotten a bad wrap throughout history. And while many of them probably live up to the reputation of being greedy and self-interested, there are those who are in politics, like myself, who only want to serve their people and make things a little better."

"Even so, I try to stay out of political arena's and snake pits for pretty much the same reasons…it's dark, it's scary, I'm uncertain of the mentality of the residents, and I'm almost certain to get bit." ((A.N. That's J Micheal Strazynski.))

Relena giggled a little as Hunter smiled openly, inviting her to share in on the joke.

"Oh it's not that bad now, at least it's not as bad as the Romafeller Foundation was. Now if there were ever a hot bed for political intrigue that would be it. They had it all: charismatic mad-men, political assassinations, powerful armies and the sword in the smile."

"You sound like you know from personal experience," said Hunter, inviting a tale. One of the reasons why he was Nightheart partner was because he had the skills at interacting with people that she, by every observation, lacked. Her capacity for self-sacrifice was nothing short of astounding sometimes, but she wasn't exactly a people person.

"I reigned briefly as their queen once during the wars…" she said. "It had been my intention to unify Earth and disarm the standing army before making peaceful overtures to the citizens and governments out in space but…well, some people had other ideas."

Hunter did not miss the way her eyes flickered over to her brother briefly, nor did he miss the tone in her voice, she sounded briefly hurt.

"Anyway, I'm much happier being the Vice Foreign Minister. I feel I get a lot more accomplished this way. By peaceful discussion, both parties come out feeling the winner…at least that's the ideal. It's long, it's tiring, but I feel that it's also very rewarding."

"I imagine it is," he said warmly. It was nice to actually hold a conversation with someone for a change. Hunter spent a good deal of his time as Nightheart's partner in the cockpit of their Salamander-class ship the Artemis. Usually he was by himself waiting for Nightheart to check in with him. When Nightheart was aboard the ship, she was usually asleep or in a trance healing herself. And when they actually had (gasp!) free time in between assignments, Nightheart wasn't the most talkative person. Sure, he could get her to converse on some things, get her to listen to him (she was better at listening than talking) but Nightheart didn't often volunteer information about herself. Her favorite line being 'it's a secret.'

"You know Miss Darlian, you look rather tired. You should get some sleep you know. Me Mum once said, when you rest well, you work better."

"It's very sweet of you to be concerned Mister Kylaran-"

"Just call me Hunter. Everyone does."

"Hunter then, but I really have to finish perfecting this document for the Council Meeting tomorrow."

"Council meeting? But I thought you were going to stay here," said Hunter frowning in perplexity. That would make his job quite a bit more difficult. Granted, moving targets were often harder to hit, but when it came down to ground fighting, Nightsiders had normal Humans out matched and outclassed on every level. He knew that from experience.

"She is going to stay here," said Heero, entering the conversation for the first time in his blunt, 'no-comprimises' manner. That preemptory tone of his made Relena's figurative hackles raise.

Relena shot him a rebuking glance and said

"I'll thank you to not answer for me Heero. And for the information of the both of you, I do not intend to hide away in here like some princess in a tower while there are things out there that require my presence. I'm sorry if this makes your job more difficult, but you'll just have to learn to live with it."

There! Stick that in your pipe and smoke it! she thought.

"Relena. This matter is not up for debate. You're staying here. End of discussion," said Heero standing up and forcing her to tilt her head upwards to look at him. That was an age-old intimidation tactic and Relena recognized it the moment she saw it…and refused to let it work on her.

"No I am not, Heero," she said firmly. "If you like it here so much, you may stay here… but as for me, I have more important things to do in my life than hide here and wait for the assassins to come and get me."

"It's not safe for you to be moving about out there. You'll be putting yourself and others at risk."

"I know I'm not the only target on their list, so that says that they are at risk whether I am there or not. And besides, no one ever said I was going to live to a ripe old age, I accepted the risks when I accepted my post. I'm going to be there tomorrow and nothing you or anyone else says is going to make me change my mind."

And she was wearing her infamous Relena Peacecraft Determined Face, that look that Heero and many others knew all to well. She'd worn it during meetings as princess of the Sanc Kingdom, she'd worn it while she'd been heading up Romafeller, she'd worn it when she'd refused to go anywhere until she'd made her brother see reason. She wasn't going to change her mind, not without a damned good reason. And since she'd already shot down the two best ones, well, things could get ugly.

"I don't have to change your mind," said Heero. If she could be stubborn then so could he. He hadn't survived two wars by giving up at the first sign of opposition. "I can just make you stay here."

"And what are you going to do Heero? Lock me in my room?"

"If necessary."

"You wouldn't dare," she said.

"Watch me."

The two stood there glaring at each other, or more accurately, Heero was glaring, and Relena was meeting his gaze wit a stubborn look of her own. Out of the entire room, Millirado was the only one who looked delighted.

"Children, children…come now. There's no need to fight. We can settle this peacefully, I'm sure," said Hunter disarmingly.

Heero glared at the interloper and said

"Stay out of this."

"Heero, you be nice. Hunter is our guest," Relena reprimanded him.

Heero was seized by the sudden and inexplicable urge to say that he didn't want to be nice to him, in fact the less he saw of too-handsome stranger the happier that would make him. And why was she taking his part anyway?

"That's right Heero, you be nice. I'm your guest," said Hunter. He knew he was pushing his luck. The man already didn't like him, and antagonizing him like this was probably not very good for Hunter's health (or his life expectancy), but his mother had always told him that he'd never known when to leave well enough alone. And Nightheart had once said that Guardians, as a rule, did not have a very high life expectancy. So antagonize he would!

Heero transferred his glare to the smart-ass from the next world over and said in none-too-friendly a tone

"This is none of your concern, get lost."

"Of course it's my concern. Besides, you two shouldn't be fighting at a time like this."

"Could you perhaps name a better time? I'll be sure to schedule it in," said Relena sweetly. "Besides, he started it, no one asked him to butt in."

"You're not going to the meeting tomorrow Relena," Heero said, putting a note of finality in his voice.

"And who, precisely, requested your opinion?" she said shooting a cool glance at Heero. She'd noted that anger tended to melt away all of the confusion she felt around him. If she just kept him engaged in argument, then she could handle this stuff.

"It's not an opinion, it's a fact. You're staying here until this Executioner gets rid of those Nightsiders. Period," he said. There, that should do it. ((A.N. Yeah, right!))

"Enough you two," said Noin, finally cutting in before the situation could get out of hand. "Or three, or whatever. Miss Relena, I'm sorry but you have to stay here-"

"But the Council meeting-!"

"I know that it's important to you, but you're just going to have to miss it."

"I can't miss it. If I miss it, then Cerrid Velsink will get an unfair advantage over me in the council. I can't allow that, this act simply has to be passed through. I can't just hide here like some frightened helpless damsel while others are out there taking all of the risks, it's just not right. I'm not afraid of what will happen, as long as I can make the world a little better that's all I care about. But that can't happen if I'm hiding away in here."

It was at this point that Quatre entered the discussion.

"I understand how you feel Miss Relena," he said. "But you won't be helping anyone by going out there and dying needlessly."

Relena looked at him with swimming eyes and quivering lips. She was obviously feeling torn.

"But I-"

"Don't worry, the others on the list are currently being notified of an emergency that will require them to enter the protective custody of the Preventors. Lady Une has seen to it," Quatre soothed.

Hunter glanced at him sharply for a moment, frowned in concentration, then dismissed whatever it was he'd been thinking of.

"Please stay here and be safe," said Quatre kindly. Then he treated Relena to the full effect of those baby blue eyes of his. Naturally all resistance crumbled in the face of such an onslaught.

"Okay. I will," she said. Quatre beamed. Relena beamed, general assembly beamed. With the possible exception of Heero who seemed to be glaring at Quatre now.

* * *

Nightheart was hit by waves of pain and a little weakness as she cleaned the still-warm blood from her blade. Lethal had really done a number on her. Nightheart's reservoir of life-energies she'd used during her fight with Lethal had been replenished by that same kill, but she hesitated to waste the precious resource on Healing herself.  She was very conservative in her use of power, she used it primarily for those battles where using her Nightsider Powers was absolutely necessary, and for the limited amount of self-healing she allowed herself.

Ribs broken, left forearm snapped in two, collarbone shattered, no damage to my spine, right ankle badly sprained, right kneecap slipped, fibula snapped, left shoulder dislocated…I think that takes care of the bones, now the flesh, she thought taking an inventory of the injuries she'd accumulated this evening. After her mental damage report, Nightheart decided that she had no choice but to head back the Headquarters and get a full healing there. She would use her powers to heal the worst of the damage before limping back to the base and the med-fac awaiting her. There were burns, lacerations, gouges, slices and subcutaneous hemorrhages all over her body.

Damn, there goes another uniform. I hope they don't take it out of my pay.

Nightheart sent the energies spiraling out along her body, flowing through the flesh and sinking it into the bone. She could've, if she had wanted to expend the energy, heal herself completely but that would have been using an unnecessary amount of a limited resource and she needed every extra ounce of power to fight the Nightsiders. The medical facilities of Doctor Ishora would have to be enough.

Bone knitting, even temporary bone knitting, was probably the most difficult Healing to perform as it required a great deal of concentration and will in order to do it properly. Nightheart usually used only enough Power for the bare minimum to keep her mobile and waited for the doc (or Hunter as was more often the case) to patch her up back at base.

First, the kneecap. The break was a clean one, fortunately for her, but reknitting the bone back together was still relatively difficult and required a lot of concentration. She gritted her teeth more out of habit as she wreched the kneecap back into place and sent precious healing life-energies into the bone. Slowly, carefully, she encouraged the bone to regrow itself, to fuse itself together again, calcium-silicate bit by calcium-silicate bit. Finally, agonizing minutes later, Nightheart was able to stop working on the break. As a final touch she slapped a soothing layer of balming energies on her sprain and levered herself to her feet. Her flesh could be taken care of back at Med-fac along with the wounds of her torso and arms. But the scent of scorched and burning flesh emanating from her left side really bothered her.

I need to report in, Hunter might just get tired of waiting around for me and come to check the mandate status himself. The stubborn fool had been known to do that on more than one occasion. She was always on his case about staying someplace safe and out of the way, but Hunter always insisted on being right by her side when she needed him. She sometimes got the feeling that he could see right through her gruff treatment of him and had divined that she was trying to protect him.

"How's our favorite Executioner doing this fine evening?" Hunter's cheery voice sounded through her earpiece. "All's quiet on this front."

"Mandate status: Subject terminated," she reported. "I'm badly injured so I'm returning to the base Hunter. Is everything ready?"

"Ready and waiting for you," he agreed. "Do you want me to come and help you back?"

"No, I'll be fine."

"I sometimes wonder why I keep asking you that since that's the exact same answer you always give me," he said. Nightheart could see in her mind's eye the look he was most probably giving her. The one that said "you're being the same stubborn ass you always are and you should learn to accept help graciously." She smiled softly into the darkness, he would be waiting there when she got in.

…

Nightheart staggered back to the place in which the base had been housed at. Hunter was waiting for her at the gate, Nightheart tried to give him a reassuring look through the blood running down her head. Doctor Ishora ordered her onto one of the floating stretchers and Nightheart was taken to the med-fac that had been set up on this world. It came complete with a goop-tank and vibe-unit, and oh look, there was the scanner couch.

She wouldn't be leaving for several hours yet, she knew that. And she was likely to get read another lecture by the good Doctor for being careless with her body. Well why should she be careful? Her Symbiont would take care of any injuries, including wounds that would most likely kill any normal person. She was here to execute those Nightsiders as fast as possible, damage to her person was irrelevant as long as Nightheart was fulfilling her duties.

She was also likely to be scolded again by Hunter for being so reckless. She didn't know why he persisted in bawling her out about it, he certainly didn't have any room to throw stones at her about reckless behavior. He should know by now that Nightheart was capable of taking care of herself, as far as she was concerned she was the one protecting him, not the other way around. She knew deep down that seeing someone he considered a friend come home Mandate after Mandate covered in blood with bones sticking out of her skin really bothered him, but… this was the only way she could think of to protect people and the only way she could think of to make enough money to rebuild her Homeland. No sacrifice was too great for her people.

Hunter probably thinks I'm just greedy, always insisting on being paid a full bounty for each Nightsider I eliminate, she thought. But she couldn't afford tell him the reason why either. It was one of the basic tenets of Homeland and her people, an iron-clad law that is drilled into all of The People since the time of their birth...no Outworlder is to know anything about Homeland or The People. Ever. So her reason for the sheer greed she displayed would have to remain a secret.

"Okay Executioner," said Doctor Ishora, cheerfully. "Let's see how much damage you did to yourself tonight."

"I did not damage myself doctor," Nightheart corrected. "The other Nightsider did."

"Well, you could still be more careful Executioner. Now, are you in any pain? Does it hurt anywhere?"

"What? You mean besides everywhere?" was her dry retort.

*

Doctor Ishora looked over at her new assistant, a very pleasant woman named Sally Po who made her living as not only a doctor but also as a field-agent with the Guardians on this world who called themselves Preventors.

The doctor explained what she was doing to the woman who looked interestedly over her shoulder. She was going to send the scanners at her to get a full picture of the damage done to Nighthearts body this time.

The scanner globe floated over towards Nightheart and she eyed them antagonistically. They spun around her emitting small beams of light here and there. Nightheart looked over at the holo-screen to see her current skeletal system displayed broken bones were highlighted in blue with the stats scrolling on a screen beside them, cuts sprains, lacerations, burns and other minor fleshly injuries showed up a second later.

"Structural damage report complete," the chirpy voice of the med-fac computer reported a moment later.

Doctor Ishora and Doctor Po were in deep discussion about the unusual bone and cellular composition of the Nightsiders as Ishora set up the special bone-grow unit for Nightheart. Doctor Ishora breifly explained what a Symbiont was and how it worked.

"Symbionts are a non-corporeal energy carbono-based lifeform developed by the Committee. The original development project was begun by a bio-organic technology corporation searching for a way to facilitate the habitation and colonization of Class H and below worlds," the doctor said. "Once the experiments were deemed too hazardous to be continued further research was officially banned. The Committee however saw an opportunity to create stable telekinetics, something that happens only in only one out of three thousand telepaths, and telepaths themselves only occur strongly in about three in two hundred people."

"So telepaths in your society aren't precisely common then," said sally. "You know, I've never met a person with any real telepathic ability before, it's considered a myth on this world."

"The Telepath Gene is the result of experiments done hundreds of years ago, when our people were just starting to reach out into the stars, but enough history. As I was saying about the Symbiont... The Symbiont invades the cellular nuclei of the host, most specifically the DNA/RNA patterns. Physiological and bio-chemical changes then ensue. Senses are heightened, for example visual and audio acuity is enhanced as is tactile sensation and memory retention."

"Yes," said Nightheart from where she waited on the scanner couch. "I have the blessing of being able to recall in minute detail all of the people I have killed. How grand."

Doctor Ishora was well accustomed to one of her most difficult yet fascinating patient's moods.

"The Symbiont's Host's skeletal structure is changed from a weak calcium to a carbonocalcium-silicate mix, making them much harder to break. In the original designs for the Symbiont, this was to compensate for the extreme G-Forces on higher G worlds. Muscle capacity is increased, as are reflexes, the result of gaining full use of the brains pathways, synapses and so on."

"The regenerative capabilities of the Nightsiders are something that I'm vitally interested in, as a doctor. The body is already a wonderful machine, but the enhanced capabilities granted by the Symbiont is something I think many people could benefit greatly from. People who have suffered from accidents leaving them paralyzed and so forth, the only thing standing in the way is that damned requirement for life energies."

"Wouldn't any kind of energy do?" questioned Sally. "I mean, energy is enegy whether it comes from a socket, a dog, or a Human being, right?"

"That would be true; but the sadists of the Committee developed this Symbiont for the purpose of taking Human lives, and so, that is the only kind of life energy the Symbiont will accept. I have developed a sort of nutrient bath that the Symbiont uses in order to repair its host, but it won't accept the energies as a substitute for the kind it feeds off to live."

Doctor Ishora tapped a few keys on the pad and the gel-hands of the resetters descended on its patient, and began to set each bone in place.

"I'm still investigating the phenomenon that allows these Nightsiders to manipulate that life energy the way they do. The Executioner here is a very good sport for submitting to all of the tests and light experiments I run on her," said Doctor Ishora, riffling the girls' hair while Nightheart shot her a dour look.

I'm certainly glad my Symbiont grants me a higher pain threshold than Normals, Nightheart thought. Even so, she knew it would still hurt. Badly. Nightheart gritted her teeth as the bones were reset and all but sighed in relief as the needles injected themselves into her skin and the wonderful paste begin to harden and solidify along the cracks of the breaks.

A few minutes later the scanner-globes were hovering around her once more. The new image hovering above the holo-display showed several thick patches on the bones that had just been set.

Nightheart knew from experience that the bone-grow would take several-hours to re-grow the break. It was not instantaneous like her own Healings.

"Alright Executioner, you know the drill," said Doctor Ishora. "Into the tank." Nightheart gave the doctor a look that bordered on recalcitrant, (she hated the "goop-tank," as she had dubbed it) but stripped off her garments anyway. While she was doing so Ishora explained to the new lady (whom Nightheart took to be another doctor) precisely what the goop-tank was for.

"Because of the Executioner's unusual cellular make-up, we have a special kind of fluid filled with energies that her Symbiont can use in place of the ones in her Reservoir, a reservoir is the accumulation pool of energies she stores up as a result of her kills, to heal her flesh and bones. Once everything is ready, she'll slip into a healing trance and her Symbiont will do the rest."

Nightheart fastened the breather mask to her face and stepped up onto the platform, naked of course.

"Are you ready?" questioned Doctor Ishora.

"Yes. Proceed please," was Nightheart's answer.

From a ring at the edge of the platform a round wall of plas-glass shot up, surrounding Nigheart and forming a tube. Shortly thereafter a spot in the floor opened up and began pumping in the energy rich fluid. The tube began to fill with the slimy, viscous, slightly glowing, clearish-blue-green goop that Nightheart would heal in. It didn't take very long to fill in over her head and she was soon floating in it like a body part stored in formaldehyde in a mad scientists lab.

Nightheart closed her eyes and went into deep-trance.

*

"What's up doc?" asked Hunter, strolling into the med-fac. He usually dropped by to check on his partner at the earliest opportunity. He knew he wouldn't be able to do anything for her if something did go wrong, but being able to visually confirm that she was on her way to a recovery did wonders for his sanity. Seeing her come home that badly beaten night after night really bothered him. "How's the patient?"

"Same as usual, floating in the tank," was the doctor's absent reply as she and her new associate went over in finer detail the patients medical status. Ishora had been expecting Hunter to show up about then. He always did.

"How're her injuries? Nothing too serious?"

"About the same as ever, gashes, lacerations, a few broken bones, her left side is charred. She should be fine in a few hours. However, I don't want her going after any more Nightsiders for at least seven hours...that paste has to set. Regular activity is fine, but no working. Preferably I'd like to see her off her feet, but I think pigs would fly first."

"You know Nightheart's only going to say that executions are her regular activities," was Hunter's reply.

"Whoa! Hey check it out! A dead body!" said the voice of Duo peeking his head into med-fac. "And it's a chick too! Hey doctor, whatcha doing with the dead chick?"

"She isn't dead Duo," said Sally.

"Sure could've fooled me," Duo said going in for a closer look at the naked woman floating in the glowing tank. "Look at those wounds, she's sliced open clean to her rib bones! I can see them, count them even. And her left side is burnt to a crisp, eew."

"The Executioner is obviously out of commission for several days if not weeks," said the voice of Heero Yuy dispassionately from the doorway.

"Is she going to get better doctor?" asked Relena peeking in from behind Heero as well as sending him an admonishing look for his callousness. "Hunter said that she'd be fine, but how could anyone survive that?"

"Yeah, she's practically barbecue," chimed in Duo. "She come in original or extra crispy?"

Relena glared at Duo and said

"Have some respect for the girl's privacy, can't you see she doesn't have any clothing on?"

"Whoa!! No way! Hey guy's you've got to come see this!" said Duo, ignoring Relena's concern over the tank-girl's state of dress. Doctors Ishora and Po exchanged a suffering glance.

"Check it out, the wounds are closing all by themselves. Freaky!"

Duo watched in fascination and amazement as the charred flesh started turning pinkish around the edges, then finally smoothing out into white scar tissue which faded into her normal golden-bronze skin. The continents of scorched flesh gradually became islands, dissappearing altogether in some spots.

"Wow Heero, she's even weirder than you are."

Heero cocked his head to one side and studied the phenomenon with an air of detachment. Useful. He'd be willing to bet Doctor J would give his eye teeth to get a hold of something like this. It was this kind of effect that he'd been trying to achieve with many of his experiments and even in Heero's own training.

Relena hit him over his head with the nearest clip board.

"All males out of the vicinity," she said, having had enough of that poor girl's maidenly modesty being offended by a bunch of strange men gawking at her. "Out out out out out! Go on! shoo!" she said chasing them all out with a brandished clipboard.

"And especially you!" she said shoving Duo out of the medical facilities.

"I saw her wounds start closing and healing over by themselves. You can't tell me that isn't weird," Duo said as Relena conducted him forcibly down the hall.

"I don't care. That doesn't give either of you the right to stare at her when she's not properly dressed or even conscious enough to beat you up for it. Besides, this isn't a carnival freak show. Miss Nightheart is being kind enough to help us out of a difficult situation and I won't have either of you being rude or indecent towards her."

"Sheesh, you sound like someones nagging mother."

"Good. Now scat."

* * *

Relena made her way back to her quarters with a protective Heero trailing afterward. She was grateful to all of them for their concern but she was starting to wish that everyone would just leave her alone already! There was still a smoldering bit of anger towards Heero for his incredible high-handedness earlier. Honestly! He seemed to think he could show up when ever he damned well pleased and just start ordering her about, the sheer cheek! But the lingering bit of anger and resentment she was feeling towards the man who still showed up in her dreams (more often than she was comfortable with) was swallowed up by the tumultuous ocean that was her other feelings.

No matter how desperately she tried to shove them aside, they just kept popping up to stare her in the face. Why couldn't things ever be simple for her anymore? Putting aside the fact that her daily life was never far from complicated, things hadn't been nearly so bad before he'd showed up. Now she couldn't seem to concentrate on anything. It just wasn't fair! She couldn't help the strange connection she felt between them…she knew when he was unhappy because she felt it too. Like for instance, earlier today she'd felt a sharp pang of jealousy just at the time when that new boy Hunter had been paying attention to her, and then it was there again later when Quatre had convinced her to stay there in the safe-house when every other attempt he'd made to do so had failed.

She'd always known when Heero was nearby, it was like she could sense him or something. In the past few years since the close of the Barton Conflict she had known he was alive….somewhere. She just had this feeling that if anything were to happen to him, she'd know. Right now she could almost feel his body heat from the other side of the door, it was like sunlight on her skin or a buzzing along her spine. She didn't know what this strange connection was between them, and part of her (the part of her that shied away from becoming too deeply involved with others) was reluctant to go probing at it.

I just need to get out of here for a while, that's all she thought. This being enclosed so suddenly and with so many people around me all the time is making me claustrophobic. I'd feel better if I could go for a walk in the open air by myself.

It wasn't likely to happen however, Heero had made it quite clear that he intended to mew her up in this place like a precious jewel until the current crisis was over with. He was correct when he'd pointed out that Relena had no way of defending herself, not even against the common garden-variety attackers. She'd been a normal girl before she'd become the Vice Foreign Minister and the martial arts had never been a part of her regimen. She wouldn't know what to do if she were attacked and there wasn't anyone nearby to help her.

An imp of mischief whispered in her ear that she should simply sneak out on her own and damn the consequences, but her own common sense quickly asserted itself. For one thing, she had a responsibility to the people who cared about her, if she ran off and something happened to her she knew that they would only blame themselves for her actions. For another thing, it was unlikely that she would get very far even supposing she was to try sneaking away, the safe-house grounds were rigged out with very sensitive security equipment which would do just as good a job of keeping her in as it would of keeping others out. So she was stuck here in this house crowded with people that weren't likely to leave her completely alone (she knew that Heero was waiting just outside her only partially closed door listening for the merest hint of danger). She was stuck here until some girl floating in a tank of glowing slime could finish killing off a bunch of powerful assassins from another world.

I almost wish I were powerful like her, Relena thought wistfully. Commanding that kind of strength and prowess was something completely beyond Relena's experience, she didn't know the first thing about fighting or any of that kind of thing. I bet I could go wherever I wanted and no one would ever think of telling me that I was too helpless to do anything; that I needed to be guarded and watched over.

Relena sighed and flopped down onto her bed. She was bored. Normally she would be hip-deep in political matters and meetings right now and she found the sudden lack of activity depressing. It was hard to look on it as a surprise vacation when the people around her were dressed to wage a small scale war. She stared at the ceiling for a minute, and got back up. She didn't have anything else better to do, perhaps she could find a good book or something.

Relena walked out of her room and down the hall only to realize that she was being followed by her not so discrete bodyguard. It was yet one more thing adding to the general feeling of being too crowded. Relena was accustomed to solitude, she'd been solitary as a child and was still that way to a degree as an adult. Certainly in her political dealings there were people surrounding her every minute; but her dealings with them were all business and once they were done with one another they parted ways until circumstances required interaction with one another once more. But here in this safe-house things were different. Relena got the feeling of being constantly watched and it was more than a little irritating. Add to that the fact she was certain she had other places she could be and better things she could be doing with her time and it was enough to make anyone start dreaming about biting the heads off chickens!

"Heero," she said as he continued to escort her down the hall.

"Hm?" he said, making an inquisitive noise in her throat.

"Could you possibly not follow me around like this? I'm certain that I'm reasonably safe inside these walls and being followed around only makes me nervous."

"No," he answered promptly.

Relena shrugged. She hadn't really thought he'd go for it anyway and so wasn't surprised by his blunt refusal. She continued on down the hallway, doing her best to ignore her unwanted companion.

"Why?" he asked suddenly, grabbing her elbow to stop her. Relena turned to look at him and felt a vague tugging at her heart. Then, as if the words were being dragged from his mouth against his will he said

"Why don't you want me to guard you?"

"It's nothing personal against you at all Heero," she amended quickly. "Its just that I'm more accustomed to taking care of myself and making my own decisions like the full grown woman I am and not having everything taken out of my hands. This new situation is not sitting well with me, and being followed by you is just the straw that broke the camels back so to speak. Being threatened with death is bad enough, but being locked up because I'm too helpless to defend myself and having someone taking all decisions from my hands…I don't like that at all."

After a pause to consider her words, Heero finally nodded. Relena felt a small bit of tension leave the air as his gaze no longer bore into hers. It was replaced by that almost mystical bond-feeling again, as if some kind of invisible thread tied them together.

Huh, she thought vaguely. There's that strange feeling of connection again. Like if I reached out to him there would be something strange and wonderful there. I can almost guess what he's thinking now. This strange bond between us, it's telling me things about him. I wonder if he can feel it too? Maybe I'm just imagining it… It makes no sense…

Her thoughts trailed off as she was drawn into his eyes. The eyes that were like two fine sapphires, held something more than predatory sharpness for once. The focus on the here-and-now was gone and in its place there was a different kind of intensity. Instead of making her shrink back it made her lean forward in anticipation. What it was she was anticipating, she didn't know precisely.

What is this strange connection I have to him… Why do I feel as though every eternity has existed waiting for this one moment? What is this?

The air was humming with something, some indefinable pulse that made her body feel as if it were one giant harp string next to a tuning fork.

Then, with a feeling like a rubber band finally breaking from constant pressure, something finally snapped into place. The strange feeling of being bonded intensified and Relena found that she didn't have to search into his eyes to see what he was feeling. She knew, knew his every hidden emotion as surely as she knew her own. With a flash of dazzling light she felt the last link snap into place and a line of pure communication opened up between them.

It was like some greater force, undeniable and outside the both of them, was trying to bring them together, trying to show them one another without the barriers that they normally kept between them. Relena suddenly felt light, as thought her essence was separating from her physical shell and joining his. The world froze, time stopped and in between one breath and the next she SAW him. She was with him.

The inside of his heart was sharp and jagged, like ice crystals. In the facets of the crystals she could see scenes from his life.

Indeed she could sense more things waiting under the surface of the ice, like flowers waiting for spring, or the sun hidden behind the clouds. His heart wasn't dead, merely hidden behind his intense focus on the objective set before him. He'd been trained as a warrior, yes but he'd undertaken the training of his own free will, because he'd thought that it was the right thing to do at the moment. His training had been rigorous, his instructor had tried to bury his humanity, making him into the perfect weapon. His kindness, his compassion had been buried, but not eradicated. During the course of his missions, it had popped up at the oddest times making him do things that seemed foreign to his nature.

Is that why you saved me? Is that why you're here now? Heero, I still want to see you.

Get lost.

Heero…

Before all of her questions could be answered though, they were interrupted…by Noin of all people.

"Oh, sorry to interrupt," she said glancing back and forth between the two of them.

Relena was acutely aware of his grip in her elbow and how close they were standing to one another.

"Quatre wanted me to find you to invite you to the lounge for some tea."

"I-I was just on my way to the library," said Relena, more than a little unsettled. She suddenly found herself short of breath. "I was planning on staying there for a while. I like books."

"Oh. Well alright then," said Noin. She looked almost amused as she walked away.

Relena put her head in one hand. Great, just great. This was all she needed, as if she weren't smothered enough. Now with a small rumor of her becoming "involved" with someone, she'd never get any time to herself. She could just hear the badgering questions now, the innuendo. It was always fun to tease someone about an unspoken attraction but the joke swiftly became less funny when it was aimed at herself. Damn.

She continued on to the library. She could at least read a book in the quiet to get her mind off all those things she'd rather not think of right at the moment, things like her undeniable attraction to the stoic mussy-haired Gundam Pilot. The doctor that had come with Hunter and his strange partner The Executioner had said it would only be a few hours until the girl in the tank came out of her Healing-trance, perhaps they would get an opportunity to talk then and Relena would finally get some straight answers for a change.

* * *

Nightheart floated in the energy rich slickness that was the "goop-tank," just drifting for a few minutes before waking fully from her lethargy. It was so easy to just float there, drifting in a timeless void while the world spun round without her. It was one of the only times she ever felt at peace, that gentle time on the edge of waking and dreaming.

It's so nice here, she thought soporifically. So warm, so peaceful. If I close my eyes, I know I'll fall into full sleep…and I know I'd dream of Home.

She heaved an internal sigh and pulled herself half-unwillingly into full wakefulness. She didn't want to get up, but she knew she had to. There were people that needed her and she had to earn her paycheck. She punched a button on her breather mask and the luminescent fluids started slowly draining into its revitalizing tanks to be recycled and readied their next use. Once the water levels had lowered down past her mouth, she removed the breather mask and reached for the rim of the tank to haul herself out.

She stood on the tile floor of the emergency med-fac with the viscous fluid dripping and oozing off from her like radioactive slime.

"Yuck," she muttered as she always did. "It's going to take hours to vibe all this stuff off from me. What I wouldn't give for a real shower."

"Ah and the patient is awake I see," said a voice that Nightheart didn't recognize. She looked over to her left sharply to see if the new presence was a threat. She wasn't her best just out of the tank, still shaking off the effects of the healing trance and the slimy feeling radiant goop too. Blearily she recognized the golden haired woman as being the one who had assisted doctor Ishora earlier that day, (night?) Whatever.

"Who are you?" she asked bluntly. Never the height of subtlety even at her best, Nightheart didn't have the extra energy to spare for tap-dancing around now.

"Doctor Sally Po, Agent Water of the Preventors," said the woman. "Doctor Ishora stepped out for a breather, your partner went out to check on he status of your charge, Miss Relena. How are you feeling?"

"The same as I always do after a dip in the tank," said Nightheart. "Slimy. I'd give anything for a real hot water shower right now. I just got back from a stint in Space Nation, and water is too precious a resource to be used for daily showering unless you're very wealthy. (Outworlder barbarians)" she muttered under her breath and continued on. "I miss taking real showers, vibe-scrubs do not leave me feeling cleansed in the way water does. The strange Outworlder technology they use for cleaning oneself feels unnatural."

"There are showering facilities available to you if you wish to use them," said Sally as she handed Nightheart a towel and a robe to cover herself with.

"Thank-you. I will use them and return to the field immediately. I still have more Mandates to fulfill."

She suited actions to words and cleansed herself in the shower alcove placed nearby, glorying in the feel of real honest-to-the-Gods-of-her-Ancestors hot running water running down her skin and removing all trace of the slick viscosity from her skin. When she got out a generous twenty-five minutes later, Nightheart found her kit-bag already waiting for her near the towels. Obviously someone had anticipated her needs. Inside the bag, following an order as exact as any shamans medicine pouch, her pouch of toiletries, her clothing, a scaled down version of her armor and her beloved Longblades.

Twenty minutes later Nightheart had her pitch-black hair coiled up and out of her way and she had dressed herself in the matte black coverall the Alliance had designed for her as he working uniform. Nightheart had no idea what kind of material it was made out of (some kind of synthetic, that much she knew) but it was durable enough to withstand light attacks, which was to say it could stand up to some pretty heavy punishment. She slipped on her boots, putting a dagger in each of them, then her Longblades strapped across her back. The longblades were something she'd carried with her from Homeland, a legacy. Her people did not usually fight using weapons that were ineffective in tight environments, preferring the Kai'rrin Fighting Knife (or knives) or a distance weapon to a blade; but her family was peculiar and kept to a lot of the strange old ways. Light pectoral armor went on over the blade straps, mainly because she felt naked without it, and finally she slipped on her gauntlets with the small throwing knives sheathed in the fore arm and the retractable knuckle-blades at the back of the hand. She would don the rest of her armor (filled with strange Outworlder technology) later. Now she would meet with her partner and get her next Mandate.

As she had known he would be, Hunter was lounging nearby waiting for her to emerge.

"Ah! You're looking a far cry better than when you came in," he said cheerfully.

"Yes. I feel well enough to begin my work again. Tell me about my remaining Mandates."

"Well, it's the old fashioned good news and bad news scenario. The good news is that with three down you only have nine more to go and of those nine left, five are Tenth Circle or below. The bad news is, you have two Second Circle Nightsiders and worse yet, they're a team."

"Nightsiders rarely work in teams," the Executioner noted. "This isn't who I think it is, is it?"

"You guessed it," he said with false cheer. "Our old and dear friends Osiris and Isis. Only Nightsiders would walk around naming themselves after ancient gods of death, the ego."

"They still hate you Hunter. I now wish doubly that you had stayed behind," said Nightheart, worry creeping into her usually opaque eyes. Her old enemies had once tried to use her partner to get to her, and discovered that Hunter was far from a mere helpless Normal. Hunter, being quick and resourceful, had managed to lure the two of them into a trap that, at the very least had incapacitated the pair of Assassins for a few days. Ever since then, Osiris and Isis had pursued a vendetta of revenge against the erstwhile Normal for the sheer affront of daring to wound them. Nightheart felt that old urge of protectiveness rise up in her at the thought that those two would once again awaken their blood feud with her partner.

"Well what's locking them in a room and pouring liquid plasma over them between enemies? Don't tell me they're still sore about that?" He said, injecting even more facetiousness into his tone.

"I would imagine so. It's adding insult to injury that someone they consider weak and inferior to them in every way would damn near manage to kill them. Such has not been accomplished before. I will go and Hunt them down first so that I may get rid of their threat to both you and me once and finally."

"Just a minute Nightheart," Hunter called as she made to walk off. "Before you try the disappearing act again, Doctor Ishora wanted me to tell you that you aren't to do any official Executioner business for the next seven hours. She said normal movement is fine, but she doesn't want you jarring those breaks."

"My job is my normal movement," she said, just as Hunter had known she would.

"I knew you'd say that," he said. "But you know as well as I do that that paste has to set for at least five hours. So you're not to go off on any hunts, and if you do, I'll know and I'll be forced to tell the President you haven't been listening to your doctor, and he'll dock your pay."

Hunter and Ishora both had found that it was the only way to get Nightheart to mind the doctors orders.

"Very well," she grumbled, obviously not liking it. "I'll be good for the evening. I hope you don't expect me to stick around."

"What? Me? Ask you to be—gasp-- personable?" Hunter said sarcastically, raising his eyes in mock horror. "Never!"

"Good. I will remind you that there are still several Nightsiders out there running loose while I'm convalescing. Even if I am not able to operate at full strength there is still something I can do to prepare for when I am."

"Right, right," said Hunter. "Usually information gathering is my own forte, you lack the people skills for it."

"People skills are not required if you have the right financial backing," Nightheart pointed out. "I worry about this fortress however. Because it is so well guarded, it is sure to be a target."

"You worry about your charge being attacked while you are gone?" Hunter inquired archly. Nightheart was a bit of a stickler for honor and that honor demanded that she fulfill the letter and spirit of her contract. Relena would be safe, and the Nightsiders would be eradicated.

"Yes. I would recommend that she clear out. I won't be engaging enemy hostiles for a little while yet, that means that they will be building up their strength in preparation for an attack. This place is too obvious and too ill equipped to handle a Nightsider attack, I would like you to upgrade it with your technology. The security in this place would never be able to stand up to an attack by even a Twelfth Circle Nightsider, even against an army of their Servants it wouldn't hold up for long. "

"I'm well aware of that, I've been able to set up some of my equipment, but one or two of the people here have been a little leery of me. They don't understand the technology and so they don't know what it is that I'm doing. The one named Heero has taken an especial dislike to me," Hunter said, managing to sound aggrieved. Nightheart, knowing well her partners nature, smiled shrewdly up at him and said

"And I suppose you would not have done anything that might exacerbate that dislike, have you?"

"I've just been my usual charming self," Hunter said innocently.

Nightheart gave a short sound somewhere between a laugh and a grunt. "No wonder he doesn't like you." Then she grinned and glanced sideways at him to show she'd been joking.

"Now that wasn't very nice," Hunter said in a light tone. He still had one or two more cards up his sleeve to play. Continuing on in his easy-going manner Hunter said

"If you're going to insist on being unpleasant company, I won't tell you what I know about where the Nightsiders have been forming their bases at. I've been able to keep my ear on the heartbeat of this place and as usual, I've pulled out the very information you need in record time. I am after all the best at intelligence gathering; I told you that you needed me with you."

"Your speed at intelligence gathering leaves me speechless," she said flatly, giving him a look that told him his skills were good but his ego needed work. Hunter grinned back at her and Nightheart understood; as usual he'd been goading her.

"Well, leaving you speechless isn't a very difficult task since you hardly ever make conversation in the first place."

"Do you have it or not?" she demanded shortly, certain that he was enjoying this. When she looked over at him from the corner of her eye, sure enough, she saw a small smug expression hovering about his face like a moth circling a flame. He knew something and it was something he knew she'd want to know. Her partner might have the most uncanny ability to sniff out information she required wherever it hid itself, but he could be the most annoying person to try to hold a conversation with. Despite his faults however, Nightheart wouldn't trust any other Outworlder to be her partner (and she was still trying to wrap her mind around this whole 'Outworlders are people too' idea). So far what she had mostly seen in the Outworlds was a lot of corruption, greed, death and pain. But Hunter was different, he was almost like one of The People… too bad he wasn't one.

"Of course," Hunter grinned gamely, making her work for it. Nightheart gritted her teeth.

"Well, what is it?" she ground out.

"What if I told you it was a secret?" he questioned, seeing if she'd take the bait.

"I'd have to nail your head to the wall and leave what was left of your body for the scavengers to pick at…partner. Now if you like I can be much more imaginative."

"Do tell," he replied.

"Oh yes," she said lightly with an all to bright glint in her eyes. It wasn't quite a joke, but it wasn't exactly a threat either. "For example did you know that there are exactly one hundred and seventy two ways to bring about excruciating pain using the first and last fingers on each hand alone?"

"I didn't know the exact number, no," he said, in that way he had of trying to draw her out.

"Would you get to the point?" she said bluntly.

"How about tea first?"

"How about not?"

"Lunch, dinner, a midnight snack?" he pursued relentlessly. Hunter was the tenacious sort and Nightheart wondered if it wouldn't be easier to simply humor the man and get it over with.

"Compromise," she stated finally. "I eat, you talk."

"Done. Sheesh, the lengths I have to go to just to get you to sit down and share a decent meal with me like a normal person. You do still eat food, don't you? Or are you above such mundane things?"

Nightheart frowned at his posh mockingly posh tone. He was goading her. Again.

She sighed and followed him to the common area reserved for eating. Stupid Outworlder, sometimes she wondered why she put up with his incessant chatter and teasing and his never ending quest to see just how much he could draw her out of her shell. But then, she already knew the answer to that. He reminded her of what it was to be a person, he was someone she cared aboutso much she would go to any lengths to protect him. Their bond might come from outside of both of them, and she might never want to tell him the truth about the soul-bond between them that she kept hidden from him with her Nightsider abilities… but sometimes, he was the only thing still keeping her sane in a life filled with torment and bloodshed.

* * *

Relena found herself quite unable to concentrate on the words in the pages of the book before her. Her mind kept wandering back to the incident in the hallway just a few short hours ago. She couldn't tell what Heero thought about it, but then, she could never tell what Heero thought about anything since he always seemed to have the same sullen expression on his face whether he was happy or sad. She'd seen him look angry, and she'd seen him look vaguely surprised, but that seemed to be the extent of his facial expression range. She supposed she could try using that funny intangible cord connecting them, the one she couldn't see or touch but knew was there just the same, but that would have felt like cheating. She didn't like it when people invaded her life and privacy (such as they were doing right now with well-meaning intentions) and she didn't believe it was right to go invading other peoples privacy. So despite her burning curiosity, his inner thoughts would just have to remain a mystery to her unless he invited her to share them.

He surprised her by making a throat-clearing noise to get her attention.

"Relena," he said. She suppressed a small shiver at the base of her spine when he said her name. Oh Lord, she really wasn't sure about this…maybe she should have taken Noin up on Quatre's offer of tea with the rest of the group, because-

"You've been staring at the same page for over forty minutes," he noted.

Relena wasn't sure how she should reply to that 'I like the page, it's pretty?' or perhaps 'I'm a very slow reader.' Neither of which he was likely to buy. So she settled for a

"Yes."

There was one of those long, drawn out pauses. Finally he said

"You're nervous."

"I don't have anything to be nervous about," she replied. Well, aside of the people who wanted to see her dead, and the assassins brought over to kill her and the fact that she was sitting alone in a room with a man she felt a feverish attraction to; she had nothing to worry about. She didn't even have the release of her work either, that fact galled at her with her inactivity, making her more restless and more unable to concentrate. She give about anything for a breath of fresh air and some time to herself right then, instead she was trapped in a room with a man who made her feel things she'd never thought herself capable of feeling and a jumbled knot of emotions making her feel even more restless. She resisted the urge to pace like a caged lioness.

Heero got up from the nearby wall he leaned against in order to guard her easily and walked over to her. Relena noted uneasily that he still moved with the soundless ease of a predator. So did that make her his prey? He took the book from her slack and nerveless fingers and closed it firmly, setting it on a nearby table. Then he just stood there in front of her chair, staring down at her as if she were some new breed of creature utterly unknown to man before this point.

After a full minute of intense scrutiny in which Relena refused to back down and they played the 'eye game' where he tried to make her make direct eye contact with him and she'd look at his face but keep herself from looking directly into his eyes, after a minute of that he slowly and deliberately leaned forward and rested his arms on either side of her chair, effectively pinning her there and bringing his face inches from hers. She suddenly felt trapped, his proximity to her was smothering her…

"Could you not stand so close please," she requested in a voice that came out surprisingly level instead of being the squeak she expected it.

"Why does it bother you?" he asked her, his tone betrayed nothing, not amusement, not offense not even curiosity. His gaze was intense as the sun at midday in the sahhara desert. Relena would have shrunk away from him but she refused to let him rattle her cage.

"It would bother anyone. People need personal distance. You of all people know what personal distance is."

"And why would you say that?"

Relena glanced quickly at him to see if she'd inadvertently offended him, but his face was as devoid of expression as it had been a moment earlier.

"Because you like it… lots of it," she answered honestly. That had been her observance of him at least; he was a person who liked his space. The fewer people there were around to bother him, the more content he was.

That humming vibrancy sparkled in the air around them both again. Relena didn't know what it was… it felt like a strange yet implacable force, invisible, intangible yet everywhere was pulling at her, pulling at the both of them like a pin to a magnet. She could sense his heart, the beautiful fountain of fire beneath a cool sheet of ice. She could feel it calling at her. It made her want to take her hesitant hand from her lap and touch his cheek, just to see what would happen… She slowly started gathering her courage when

"Hiya Buddy-boy!" Duo said exuberantly as he poked his head into the room. Heero looked over in annoyance at the sudden intruder and Duo grinned wickedly.

"Oops, I'm not interrupting nothin' am I?" he asked of her as Heero casually leaned against one arm of her chair in a guard position.

"Just my book," Relena answered in a voice that amazed her with its steadiness. "And I wasn't really reading it anyway."

"Oh, good. That crispy girl from the lab's all healed up. Oh, and her partner wants to talk with you Heero about the security net around this place. He said something about making a few modifications to help hold off some kind of attack by those assassins in case one comes before the weird chick with the swords can kill it. They're eating right now and they're almost done. Hunter said you could drop by anytime and the girl told us she'd be in her rooms with her blades."

"Maybe she needs some assistance, I'd be a pretty ungrateful host if I didn't see if she was alright," said Relena all but leaping out of her chair. "I'll just see if she's in her quarters then." And she was out the door faster than she could say Total Pacifism. Duo turned to his comrade in arms with a knowing look on his face.

"So, Heero buddy, I see it didn't take you long after being in the Princess's company once more to start putting the moves on her," he said with his customary innuendo. "Deny it all you like but I have eyes with which to see and its as plain as day. You risk your neck without a thought every time she's in trouble; if that isn't infatuation I don't know what is."

"You should speak," Heero muttered irately.

"What's that supposed to mean?!" Duo demanded.

Heero just graced him with one of his Looks and proceeded out of the room to see what the newest thorn in his side wanted of him.

*

"Miss Nightheart," said Relena a little hesitantly from her doorway. Nightheart sat hunched over one of her fine Longblades, honing the edge. A good warrior took care of her weapons and Nightheart was conscientious about that. There came the musical shing, shing as she steadily worked the edge of the blade with her stone.

"I do not recall giving you permission to address me by my name. You may call me Executioner," Nightheart said in a voice colored with disapproval.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be rude; it's just that Hunter calls you by your name all the time."

"He is the only one that I allow to do so. Everyone else may call me by my title or not at all."

"Oh. I'm sorry if I offended you," Relena said apologetically.

"It's no offense. What is it that you wanted?"

"I came to see if you were comfortable, if there was anything you might need?" Relena said.

"I require nothing. I did, however, wish to speak with you about something."

Relena blinked in surprise. What would the woman before her, who obviously was strong enough and powerful enough to go where she wanted to and do what she wanted without anyone ever telling her no, or that she was too weak or too helpless to take care of herself without protection. What could she possibly want with Relena?

"What is it you wished to speak with me about?" Relena asked, watching the Executioner from another world as she methodically sharpened her blade with the unconscious ease of long practice.

"I had lunch with Hunter. At his recommendation I took a look around these grounds. I do not think they could have possibly chosen a worse place as a safe haven. The area, even with its outside wall, is far too open. I recommend that you be moved to a safer location and that proper security measures, ones designed to defend against Nightsiders, be put in place. However, you will be vulnerable to attack while you are in transit. Due to my injuries I find that I have been 'put on a leash' so to speak so I will stay here to guard you for the time being. Nightsider activity will not cease while I am not hunting them however. My guess is that they will be gathering their strength to either attack you as their primary target or draw me out and try to rid themselves of my threat."

Relena raised an eyebrow. That was probably the most she'd heard out of the Executioner since she had met her. The information she dropped was certainly useful, it had not occurred to Relena that Nightheart herself would be a target for the Assassins. It made sense, she did hunt the creatures after all, it was only natural that they'd have some hard feelings toward her.

"Where is this new safe-house likely to be?"

"I don't know, Hunter is discussing the matter with the rest of your security detail."

*

"…Not going anywhere," Heero said flatly, both his arms braced on the table facing off with the too-handsome interloper trying to tell him how to protect Relena.

"And I'm telling you that she's going to be vulnerable if she's kept here," Hunter countered, frowning. "I know you're pretty hot stuff when it comes to fighting enemies you're familiar with, but the Nightsider Assassins are in a league all of their own; and I mean that quite literally."

"I will not risk exposing her to attack by removing her from these grounds. I have already cased these grounds and checked the system. It's operating at maximum capacity and there have been no faults detected."

"It doesn't need faults Heero. Based on even our own technology, the security system you have installed in this place amounts to shoestring and bubblegum. No offense," he said over his shoulder at Quatre, who was also there at the meeting along with Noin, Sally, Duo, Trowa, Zechs, and Wufei.

"None taken," Quatre said nibbling on a scone. "However Heero… Mister Hunter may indeed have a point."

To his credit, Hunter showed no signs of being an unbearable winner when someone sided with him. He didn't even smirk. When Hunter got down to business he allowed nothing to distract him and was thorough and meticulous in his work. Right then, his job required that his charge be moved to another and better facility, and to do that he required the consent and/or cooperation of the team he'd been assigned to work with.

"How so?" Heero growled, not taking his gaze away from his unexpected new rival.

"These new predators or assassins or whatever aren't even from our world," Quatre said. "What's worse is that they aren't even normal for their own world. We have zero experience in dealing with them and their powers, so it would be wisest to follow the advice of someone who does have experience. The Executioner has been put on temporary sick-leave but that does not mean she's an invalid, in fact Doctor Ishora has assured me that all of her powers and abilities remain intact; and I'm quite certain she wouldn't have any problems with providing an escort service for Miss Relena when we take her to a new safe-house."

"When?" Heero said, turning to face his compatriot.

"Keep in mind that I am a strategic thinker," Quatre pointed out as both an answer to Heeros unspoken query 'why the hell wasn't I consulted about this when the decision was being made?' and as a preface to his next words. "And from a strictly strategic point of view, Hunter's argument is a valid one."

"Exposure of the target is a valid argument?" he stated. "Unacceptable."

"No, what he said about this place being too open is a valid argument. I chose this place as a safe-house because I wasn't certain what we were dealing with and I wanted a safe-house with a lot of exits, just in case. I also did not want Miss Relena feeling like a prisoner so I chose a place that would have pleasant surroundings so she would feel more comfortable and at home here. Now that I have a firmer grasp of the situation, I think that moving her to a fortress built for protection and defense is advisable."

"And with the Executioner herself to guard Miss Relena while she is vulnerable during transit, she's as safe as it's possible to make her," interjected Sally.

"We have no evidence that the other Nightsiders know where this place is," Heero pointed out. "Also, this safehouse was chosen for its close proximity to the Alternigate, so that access could be monitored and Relena could be taken across the gate in case things got out of hand here. It is dangerous to change strategies abruptly in the middle of a battle and risky to parade the target out under the noses of the ones after her life."

"There is also something to be said for the use of tactics and the discarding of unsound plans when situations do not meet expectations. You're a soldier, surely you have learned to be flexible in the heat of battle," Hunter said, appealing to Heero's sound soldier instincts in order to get the stubborn man to be more reasonable. Hunter had the sneaking suspicion that fully half of Heero's dislike of Hunter's plan stemmed from a dislike of Hunter himself. Heero's dislike was not entirely unfounded given that Hunter could be perverse and irritating with the mood moved him, but now was not the time for that. However emotions rarely responded to logic. Heero didn't like Hunter because he saw Hunter as a threat to him somehow.

"I have," Heero allowed. "And the defensive capabilities of this safe-house may indeed be inadequate; however there are no truly adequate ones nearby. We should consolidate our defenses here since our offensive approach to ridding ourselves of the threat is on temporary stand-by."

"I've seen the technology that these Nightsiders are accustomed to dealing with," Sally spoke up for the first time. "It is years, generations, far advanced from our own. I don't think that anything we consolidate in a poorly defensible area is going to do any good at all. Nightheart herself has told mentioned that Nightsiders have ways and ways of getting around their own Alternity's technology; I really don't think that our own will be any threat whatsoever to them."

"I won't allow you to endanger her life by dangling Relena out on the end of a line like fish bait," Heero gritted, the feeling of protectiveness rose from within him and his eyes flashed with dislike at the striking intruder from another world.

"It's not my intention to use the girl as bait, you bloody stubborn kresh'tak," Hunter snapped in annoyance. He was prevented from finishing saying 'and if you would haul your own bloody head out of your bloody ass you would realize this!' by the sound of a scream coming from another room.

"Relena!" Heero was on his feet and out the door in an instant the rest following hot on his heels.

*

Relena had interrupted Nighthearts woolgathering as she sharpened her Kai'rrin Longblade. The usual dilemmas and questions that always plagued her after a kill were chasing themselves around in her head.

Is what I do righteous? I hunt down other Nightsiders and use their life energies and the life energies they have gathered from others to feed my own Symbiont and bolster my own powers. If I don't they will continue to hunt down and kill other human beings because they need to live. It is not self defense, I need their energies to keep on living. I protect the weak because Normals are too weak to defend themselves against the predator they themselves created. Hunter tries to say he is my partner, that he wants to fight beside me, but to be honest he is only a Normal no matter how well he shoots and how expertly he pilots. I must protect him, but what gives me the right to defend the weak against the Nightsiders? Nightsiders are my enemies, but they are also the victims; like me, they did not ask to be made into what they are so what gives me the right to kill them?

"I don't know, Hunter is discussing the matter with the rest of your security detail," Nightheart said in answer to the query that Relena had just made, while still sharpening her blade. "I assume this means you will soon be leaving for a place that is vastly more defensible than this one."

"Leaving for a place that is vastly more like a prison you mean," Relena grumbled. Nightheart the Executioner looked up at her with her unreadable obsidian-dark eyes.

"If it is like a prison, you should be grateful that it is a place that is designed to protect you, and not to hold you in so that you can be used in experiments. However, I am well aware that feelings and emotions rarely ever respond to the word should."

Relena looked curiously at the warrior in black light-armor before her. Nightheart bent back over her blade, obviously dismissing Relena.

"How did you get turned into what you are now?" Relena asked. She had not been brought up to ask such impertinent questions (it was more than impertinent, it was downright intrusive!) but the matter was simply driving her mad. She'd gotten the explanation about what a Nightsider was and all of that, but how had Nightheart come to be hunting her own kind when all of the others lost their humanity?

"I was taken from the streets because I had no one who would miss me and sent to a secret Committee research facility called an 'Institute' on Mars," Nightheart said plainly. "That's where I was turned."

"Why do you hunt your own kind?"

"Nightsiders are not 'my kind.' They may have my same abilities but they will never be my kind. They are a threat and they need to be eradicated. All of them."

Relena looked over at the Executioner, afraid that she had offended her, but when she studied Nightheart's face staring down at the well honed blade cradled on her lap all she saw was a very young woman with a terrible burden. It was then that Relena realized that with these wonderful powers Nightheart had came the appalling price of being responsible for the deaths of what might be hundreds of people and also the protection and safeguarding of thousands more. Every vampire needed a victim, and every victim was an innocent life lost due to Nightheart not being there fast enough to save them.

"What about yourself?" Relena asked. "Is there any way to reverse the whatever-it-was they did to you?"  There was only the uncomfortable, hostile semi-silence of Nightheart sharpening the long curved blade on her lap.

"No. Not as yet, perhaps not ever," was Nighthearts response.

Scrape, scrape, scrape.

"Well what happens when you finally do kill them all?" Relena pursued.

"That depends. If there is a cure by then, I may seek it to rid myself of my condition. If not… Then I will naturally end my own life before I become a threat."

"You sound like you don't care whether you loose your life or not. Are all you warriors and soldiers all the same? Have you no value on your own life?! Don't any of you realize that there are people who find your life precious?!" Relena demanded passionately. Nightheart looked up in mild surprise at the young woman's outburst, but only said

"My people are warriors and it is in my blood to fight and to protect. I will defend the weak, even against myself."

Relena looked for a way to get past the woman's shield of apathy but decided she really didn't want to pick a fight with a perfect stranger; especially not one who was here to guard her life. Instead she said

"So what's the story with you and Hunter, huh? Are the two of you involved?"

"He is my partner. We work together."

"How long have you two been partners then? Do you dislike him?" Relena asked. She got the feeling from Hunter that his partner sometime saw him as an encumbrance. If Relena were given someone that cute to work with she certainly wouldn't be trying to push him away that was for damn certain.

"Among my people it is considered rude to ask personal questions," Nightheart said stiffly.

"Your people? You mean you come from a different culture than your partner does?" Relena asked.

Damnit, she was bored. There was nothing she could do about others deciding her own fortune, there was nothing she could do about this strange mess of emotions involving Heero, but she could at least try to get some small satisfaction out of life. Nightheart seemed like she could be a nice enough girl, once you got past the whole warrior persona.

"Hunter's and my own cultures are quite different," Nightheart said uneasily. She seemed a little nervous about discussing it. Relena got even more curious, as was her nature. It was a simple thing with her, her curiosity. Relena loved the walk the path that was hidden. If there was a mystery or an enigma that crossed her path Relena loved nothing more than to probe its depths. Nightheart was a mystery now.

"Really? How different?"

"Very different," was Nightheart's short reply. Then she chose to elaborate a little with

"I often do not understand Outworlders. Their patterns of thought are completely different from what I have grown up with."

"Who are your people then?"

"I could tell you, but then I would quite literally have to kill you. No Outworlders are to know anything about The People," said Nightheart.

That was one of the difficulties Nightheart had with her partner, he was possessed of all the curiosity and mischief of an entire sack full of raccoons. From the very first day they had met onward, he was constantly trying to crack her shell, get her to tell him everything about herself. What Hunter did not understand was that Nightheart was a closed-off individual for a reason. She did it to protect him; it was taboo in her culture (which had a severe aversion for Outworlders and anything having to do with them) to speak of The People or Homeland or the even hint at any of the secrets they protected. It would result not just in her own death, but in Hunter's as well. Generation after generation her people had fought and died to keep Homeland from being invaded by Outworlders (she had discovered that it wasn't all outworlders, but only a few who were called Pirates who had been attacking her precious homeland in order to gain the knowledge they kept secret). Whole families, even entire tribes could be and often were wiped out in a single pirate attack, either by the hands of the enemy, or they were given an honorable death by their family members or comrades to keep them from being captured and taken to the Outworlds where Homeland might be put in peril if they learned the secrets The People guarded. No, better that her partner see her as aloof, better for all concerned that he never learn where she came from. She would best protect him by pushing him away and thereby keeping him from the dangerous knowledge she protected.

But why would the Ki'Shai An'ah Ven tie us together like this? Why oh why am I Bonded to an Outworlder? Nightheart wondered, not for the first time. The girl Relena was still looking at her in curiosity. Nightheart did her best to ignore her in hopes she would go away, it worked with most others; all but the most determined eventually gave up on trying to get to know her. Hunter was still there, but he was a special case. He was always a special case.

"And The People are not Nightsiders, right?" Relena asked, deliberately trying to provoke a response. Now she knew what Dorothy saw in goading Relena, this was actually somewhat fun!

Nightheart looked insulted, so insulted she was surprised into an answer

"Of course not!" she said, offended. Then she realized that she had just inadvertently given away a small morsel of information by default. It was a trivial thing, but a lot of trivial things could mount up to some interesting conclusions sometimes.

"So now that I know that, you might just have to kill me," Relena said challengingly. Oh how she loved this game, this game within a game. Relena knew something she wasn't supposed to, Nightheart was a person who killed for a living who didn't want her knowing what she wasn't supposed to know.

"I have given my word to defend your life," Nightheart said awkwardly, frowning at the position she now found herself in with her oaths conflicting with each other. On one hand there was the fact that she'd given her word to protect the Outworlder girl's life, on the other hand there was the far more ingrained imperative to protect the lives of her people by destroying any and all persons who might hold any sort of knowledge about Homeland. Nightheart would simply have to erase all memory of this conversation from her pretty little blonde head.

"You are entirely too inquisitive for your own good," Nightheart warned.

"So I have been told," Relena said easily. "Besides, it doesn't matter whether I know or not. This isn't your dimension, and my knowledge couldn't possibly harm you. You could tell me anything and everything and it would make no impact upon your life or the lives of The People you evidently care so much about."

"I had not thought of that," she said after pondering for a bit. "I have had secrecy ingrained into me from before I could walk. No Outworlders are to know anything about Homeland or The People." Nightheart sounded a bit like she was reciting a litany. Then she said a long string of words in a language Relena did not understand, it wasn't Arabic, nor was it German or even any of the romance languages, it didn't sound Japanese either. It had an almost liquid smoky sound to it.

"What does that mean?" Relena asked.

"It means 'that strange Outworlder is too curious for her own good.' " Nightheart said. "I suggest that you go to your room and pack. Most likely they will be preparing to leave soon."

Relena sighed and decided that that was about as much as Nightheart was likely to put up with for the evening. She was sharpening a sword after all… Relena wandered out of the room but at the threshold she suddenly felt a small wave of dizziness sweep over her for a minute. She did not hear Nightheart murmur the word "forget" into the silence.

What had she been talking about with Nightheart just now? Oh yes, they'd been talking about Hunter and the others relocating to a different safe-house… Well, she'd better go and pack.

Nightheart looked regretfully at the departing figure of the young woman in her doorway. She felt bad about extracting their conversation from her memory like that, but it would not harm the girl and Nightheart felt that in the end it would do more good than harm for everyone. Like so much in her life she had to live with thing she might not necessarily like about her powers and ethics she might not agree completely with, but life did not always (or in Nighthearts life really even often) allow choices that were entirely ethical.

Relena walked down the hall to her own quarters, reveling in the feeling of going somewhere without being followed. She pushed open the faux-wood door to her room and froze there at the threshold. Her mouth worked silently as her eyes widened in horror and revulsion at what she saw and her mind tried to deny even seeing it. Time slowed down to a crawl as Relena felt the breath stolen from her body by the horror before her.

Blood. Blood everywhere. The salty-coppery smell of blood nearly overpowered her and made her want to retch. There were no body parts that she could see but that fact did not mitigate the horror of it all. Blood. Blood everywhere. Dripping down the walls and soaking the carpet. The wall had a message written on it in the deep crimson liquid, small trails of blood streaming down the walls at the ends of the letters. EXECUTIONER. I CHALLENGE YOU. WE WILL FIGHT AT THE SEASIDE IN FRONT OF THE GRETSTONE MONUMENT. MIDNIGHT. IF YOU CHOOSE NOT TO ATTEND, I SHALL RETURN TO DEVOUR THE TARGET. ~SLICER. And, sadistically there was a cheerful smiley face painted at the end of the 'note.'

 After what seemed like an eternal heartbeat, Relena was finally able to scream.

* * * * *

End chapter 7

Disclaimer: see chapter one.