Ryoko-onee: sorry for freaking you out!  Don't worry, everything turns out well in the end…I hope :)  there's some torture coming up, so be prepared. Chapter Thirteen

The roar of engines pierced the air, startling Quatre from his sleep and immediately halting the friendly soccer game he was "watching."  The players on the field flung themselves to the ground, putting arms over their heads to protect themselves as a wing of the Preventor Academy burst into an explosion.  Quatre's eyes adjusted to the bright flames in time to see a transport break from Duo's repair hangar and take off. 

Smoke billowed from the wing, and from his position, Quatre could feel the intense heat of the explosion.  Catherine moaned underneath him.  He didn't remember throwing himself on top of her, but his body must have reacted faster than his mind, for once, and covered her to protect her.  Quatre glanced aside, assessing the status of everyone outside.

Roddy was on the ground next to him and Catherine, stirring to get up and search the survivors as well.  He eased off of Cathy and made his way to the field.  Most of the cadets were getting up slowly as well.  Luke held Mei in his arms, soothing her while Hayden held a t-shirt to her head.  Apparently Mei hit her head on something.  He'd check on her in a moment, her injuries didn't seem too serious and she already had the Maxwell boys looking after her.  Duo was holding Natalie in his lap.  The poor girl was crying and Duo was doing the best that he could to comfort her. 

"Where's Kaori?" Roddy asked from behind him.  He turned around to see Roddy holding Catherine in her arms.  Cathy was crying.  Quatre was suddenly thankful that Roddy hadn't asked where Quatre Jr. was.  His poor wife probably wouldn't be able to keep it together if Roddy had asked that. 

"Keep a look out here, I'm going inside," he told Roddy, giving at Catherine a kiss on the forehead as he ran to the Academy building. 

Smoke choked him as he entered the same doors his son had just passed through not five minutes ago.  Quatre took off his uniform shirt and held it over his mouth and nose to cut down on the amount of smoke he inhaled.  The t-shirt he wore beneath did little to protect his shoulders and back from the heat of the explosion.  He saw flames from the hallway on his right and started to head that direction. 

Something brushed his leg from behind.  Hayden was there, crouching beside Quatre with an extra t-shirt over his own mouth and nose.  He nodded at Quatre.

"Where is Kaori?"  He heard Hayden's voice muffled through the shirt. 

"She went in here after Quatre Junior," Quatre answered.  "Where should we look for them?"

"Wherever the action is," Hayden said. 

Together they crawled along the floor, making their way through the heated halls.  Debris rained from above as sections of the ceiling caught fire and fell.  Smoke caused their eyes to water and tremendous heat made them sweat as they moved closer and closer to the hangar.  It became too much.  Hayden was tugging on Quatre's pant leg, trying to get his attention.  Quatre looked back.  He was motioning for them to go back.  And as much as Quatre wanted to continue and search for his son, the smoke was too thick, the heat too intense, and the situation becoming more and more dangerous as wreckage fell around them.

They hurried and made their way back to the field, coughing and sputtering as they graciously fed clean air back into their lungs.  Catherine ran to Quatre, hugging him close and not minding his dirty sweaty body. 

"He's gone, isn't he Quatre?" she sobbed into his shoulder. 

"I don't know, Cathy.  I don't know."  Quatre just held her close. 

*   *   *   *   *   *   *

Kaori blinked as she regained consciousness.  Her head ached from where she'd hit it against a bulkhead in the transport.  Stretching her weary shoulders, she found out that her wrists were bound behind her with handcuffs.  Frowning, she took in her surroundings.

Lying in the back of the transport, Kaori had barely thrown herself into the departing air transport before it took off and left the Academy.  The sudden burst of thrust had flung her against a wall division and knocked her unconscious.  Apparently in her state of unaware, someone had decided to detain her.  She could feel the dried blood under her hair, where she had cut her head against the wall.  And her previously injured hand ached.  Rolling off her shoulder and onto her stomach, she alleviated some of the pain on her hand. 

Where was Little Quat? she wondered, looking around the transport.  She saw no one and briefly thought that perhaps the whole ship was on autopilot and she the only passenger.  But she was wrong.  Whimpering to her left caught her attention and she rolled over to get a look.  Little Quat was there, sniffing as he struggled against his own set of wristcuffs. 

"Hey there," Kaori said quietly, not wanting to startle him.  His head jerked up at the sound of her voice.

"Kaori!  You're alive!"

"Of course, little one.  I'm alive," she replied, wondering why he was so surprised to hear her voice.  She had been laying in plain view.  What would have him scared like that?

"You won't be for long," a menacing voice said from behind her.  Little Quat's eyes widened in fear as he shrank back from the form that stood over Kaori.  She didn't need to turn around to see who that was. 

"Daniel," she hissed. 

"Oh, don't act so surprised, Kaori.  You knew it was me all along, didn't you?  And now you feel like even more of a failure for not listening to that fear tugging at your heart weeks ago.  You are a complete failure, Yuy.  Lt. Commander West had it right from the beginning."

"Was she in on this?"

"You give her too much credit, Yuy.  Way too much credit.  No, she's not in on this little operation that I have going here.  There are much bigger fish who would like to see you fry," he chuckled.

"You butchered that cliché," she retorted.  The swift kick to her head stopped the rest of her insults, and her consciousness.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *

Heero's eyes grew wide at Quatre's smeared and sweaty face.  The man seemed as if he'd run through a burning building, and his chest was still heaving as he panted to regain his breath.

"What is it, Quatre?"

"Junior's gone."

Heero's mouth dropped.  Jin's hand gripped his tightly, with bone-crushing force.  He didn't tell her to let go though.  The shock of Quatre's appearance and announcement was more than enough to render Heero useless for the next few moments.  Luckily, Wufei and Trowa were there.

"Natalie?" Trowa asked, instantly afraid for his own daughter.  He knew that his family had low priority for this hit list, but that wasn't going to stop a father from worrying. 

"She's with Duo.  Scared, but ok," Quatre said, keeping his eyes down.  That meant he was holding back.  He wasn't telling them everything, and most likely, they didn't want to know.  But they had to.

"Yuy," Wufei hissed.  He didn't know whether he was angry at her failure to save Quatre Junior or worried about her personal safety.  Without a doubt, the girl most likely threw herself in the line of fire in an attempt to save the boy.

"She's gone," Quatre answered.

Heero and Jin both let out a gasp of emotional pain.  Kaori was gone too?  Their daughter had been kidnapped with Quatre's son?  Heero bit the inside of his cheek, struggling to keep his soldier's mask in place.  His wife needed his strength now. 

"Gone?" Jin echoed, her eyes seeming distant.  "Gone?"

"I'm sorry," Quatre said, still not looking up at the vidscreen.  Hearing the pain in his friends' voices was enough to make him sick.  Looking at them would only break his resolve to not throw up there in Noin's office.  "We're searching all we can, but even in the rubble, it's obvious that the children were taken.  I'm sorry." 

"Me too, Quat.  Me too," Heero said with a small voice as he leaned forward and clicked off the transmission.  No doubt, Quatre was feeling as much pain as he was.  As any parent would.  The fear of your own child in danger…he shuddered.  Blood filled his mouth as his biting ruptured the skin on the inside of his cheek. 

Trowa and Wufei left quietly.  Their own children were safe, for the moment.  Heero and Jin had more than their hands full with trying to overcome this dread.  And for those two, the previously least emotional couple of the group, this would prove to be a very trying time.

Heero swallowed the blood in his mouth, turning to look at his wife, his beloved Jin.  Her eyes were still distant as she looked past the monitor and past the wall of the room.  The normally bright crimson depths of her eyes seemed dark and dead.  He pulled her close, ignoring the pain of his hand for the time being.  Holding her was much more important than the status of the bones in his left hand. 

She sighed in his arms, resting her head in that comfortable place between his neck and shoulder.  Her free arm snaked around his torso, also wrapping around him with bone-crushing force.  If he didn't watch it, he was going to get more than just a few bones broken.  Breathing warmth into her hair, he nuzzled his chin against her soft dark hair. 

"Don't worry," he said, trying to soothe her.  "I know that Kaori can take care of herself, and Little Quat."

Jin sniffed.  "I know."  Her grip on Heero's hand and around his ribs lessened, and Heero took a deep breath of air, thankful to be rid of her iron latch.  "I feel as if it is my fault…"

"Don't say that," Heero said shortly.  "Kaori agreed to protecting Quatre Jr.  She knew what she was getting into when I asked her to be his bodyguard."

"That's not what I meant, Heero.  I feel like I could have stopped all this.  Perhaps if I had worked harder, I could have figured out who was behind this earlier.  This all could have been prevented." 

Heero was about to tell her, again, to not say such things. But something she'd said caught his attention.  "Figured it out earlier?" he asked.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *

Little Quat's mind raced as they dragged Kaori out of the transport.  He had to find a way to get out of there.  Self-preservation was foremost on his mind, but he couldn't just leave Kaori.  His heart beat a thousand times a minute as he looked around at the big scary, scruffy soldiers who came in and talked to Daniel.  Daniel, the boy who'd seemed like his friend.  Quatre glared at him as he spoke to the soldiers, waving with his hand in the direction they'd taken Kaori.  The soldiers motioned in his direction, obviously asking what should be done with him. 

Quatre couldn't hear them, due to the ringing in his ears and their distance from him.  But he wasn't going to wait around for an answer.  With a burst of energy he didn't know he had, he scuttled out of the ship and onto the ground, pumping his legs fast in the direction he'd seen them take Kaori.  He wasn't going to let his only friend out of his sight.  He ran into the building, unafraid of the soldiers who were now pursuing him, grabbing for him as he ran past their posts in the hallways.  Kaori!! his mind screamed as he ran. 

Lil' Quat? he heard a faint voice call to him.  Is that you?

Kaori! his mind screamed again as he turned and ran down another hall.  He'd heard of his father's empathic abilities, his space heart, but he'd never really believed it.  Not until now.  He could feel Kaori's worry for him.  He was aware of the anger of the soldiers pursuing him.  And he followed the trail of concern that led him to his only friend in this horrible compound.

He burst through the door suddenly, smacking directly into Kaori's kneeling form.  But she didn't seem surprised at his unexpected entrance, unlike the others present in the room.  Even with her hands secured firmly behind her back, she accepted his small arms around her neck and embraced him as well as she could.  He was thankful that Daniel had cuffed his hands in front of him, or else he wouldn't have been able to latch onto Kaori like this. 

Kaori's stern looks deterred any of the surrounding soldiers in the interrogation room from approaching her and taking the little blonde from around her neck.  And Little Quat's head just remained buried in her neck as he held onto her for dear life.  She could hear his little whimpers and sniffs as he tried to bite back the tears. 

It's ok, little one, she said to him.  I am here with you.

Promise me you won't leave? he asked.  He didn't care how he was able to communicate with her like this, just as long as he could hear her voice in his head.  And hear her promises.

I promise that I'll do everything I can to stay with you, Quatre.  Everything

The tender moment was broken when the steel door flew open, slamming against the steel walls of the interrogation room with a loud clang.  Quatre jumped a little, but didn't move his face from its place in her neck.  Kaori didn't want him to.  Daniel stood in the doorway, red-faced from his recent running after Quatre or embarrassment at having the boy escape him.  Or both.  In his hands, Kaori saw the metal pipe.  Two more large soldiers appeared behind him as he stepped in the room.  Kaori resisted the urge to shudder.  They looked vicious. 

Quatre trembled against her.  Damn, he probably felt the shudder of fear through her.  She'd have to be more careful to keep her thoughts and feelings hidden from him from now own.  Especially with the torture about to begin. 

The two large soldiers behind Daniel walked around him and each grabbed her upper arm fiercely.  She hissed in pain at their strong grips, and she regretted even more when they jerked her unceremoniously to her feet.  Poor Little Quat was too short to reach the ground when his wrists were linked in cuffs behind Kaori's neck.  He gave her a pleading look to not let him go, but Kaori bent her head down regardless, letting his arms slip from around her neck.  Quatre landed with a light thud on the floor, standing in front of her as the soldiers uncuffed her hands and brought them to the front of her body.  They resecured the cuffs about her wrists in front of her body.  She knew where this was leading.  Unable to control her instincts, she glanced up, seeing the hook that swung on a chain seven feet above the ground. 

Don't worry, Quat, she said to him.  Don't pay attention to the things they do to me.  You're too valuable for them to hurt you.

I'm not worried about me, he replied, his eyes watering over again with unshed tears.

Don't worry, she said again, wincing as the firm grip on her arm jarred her healing knuckles.  Her arms were lifted above her head, the chain of the cuffs slung over the hook.  Her feet couldn't reach the ground, and she swung wildly as she tried to reach the floor.  Shoulders wrenched at an impossible angle as her heavy body pulled down on them with too much force. 

Don't worry, Kaori repeated.