Eternally Yours

Chapter nine: Succumbing to The End

"Freeze!" The single word, which broke their silence, immobilized her immediately. It was strange, how in times of danger, you ended up yielding to the enemy's orders.

Lafeia suddenly felt strong hands grasp her diminutive, weak body, tearing her away from the man that she loved and shoving her to cruelly the ground. She closed her eyes in resignation to the pain that embraced her drained body; she just found that she couldn't muster the strength to fight it off.

"Be careful with her, you idiots, just get the boy," a familiarly deep voice beckoned to his men amidst the chaos.

Lafeia opened her eyes once again, to see Heero, standing on guard, his stance completely aware and ready to attack, and several soldiers enfolding his space, positioned for assault.

"Make sure you bring him down, I need him captured properly, there must be no mistakes." The deep voice called out again, Lafeia twisted her head slightly, to see Michael Cromer, standing at the door, a gun hoisted across his back and yelling orders abruptly to his men, who were following them with a haste respect.

The several men that had circled Heero, advanced somewhat slowly, but in a sudden blur, a few of them dashed out of the group and towards him, only to be quickly knocked to the ground again by Heero's rapid hands.

The attack continued with a strange haziness. All of the men moved with such agility and haste that it was hard to tell what was really happening, but none of their abilities came close to Heero's. He was moving with the experience that only a Gundam pilot was capable of, knocking men quickly to the ground with a rapid kick to the abdomen or strike to the head.

Heero slammed his fist into the jaw of a rather burly man whilst avoiding the attack of one of his partners. Spinning around quickly, he grabbed hold of the soldiers of one man and threw him violently into another, striking them both to the ground and rendering one unconscious. If Heero had the time, he would have stopped to smirk at his dexterity and talent, but as it happened, several more men were appearing at the door and approaching him at an alarming pace.

Crashing his foot against one man's crotch, the man stumbled away from him, and throughout the brutal music of the room, Heero heard him whimper in pain and collapse to the ground.

Chancing a quick look towards Lafeia, before the men around him reconciled from their injuries, he saw her grimacing in pain as a large man hovered dangerously over her, looking extremely pissed off, and quickly closing the proximity between them.

Anger flowed readily through his veins at the state of her, and he took it out on the next unknowing guard to come flying at him.

Lafeia swung her leg backwards, kicking the guy behind her in the crotch, and causing him to momentarily loosen his grasp. She used the moment to her advantage, struggling out of his hold and throwing her fist at the other, whacking him vehemently across the chin.

The second man didn't take too well to the abuse, as when he looked to his friend, moaning, in agony, on the ground, a sadistic grin braced his features and he immediately slammed a solid fist into her stomach, winding her and sending her flying a few feet, only to land, callously, on the cold polished flooring.

He then walked over to her again, looking irritated and yet pleased at the same time, and lifting his hand into the air again, Lafeia grimaced and prepared herself for another assault of excruciating pain.

Somehow, though, the pain never came; opening her eyes cautiously, she was met with concerned Prussian blue eyes.

"Heero!" she cried, warningly, as a strong hand made it's way around Heero's neck, strangling his breath and pulling him away from her.

She looked up at the man behind him, only to find herself staggering away from the two of them in shock.

"Adam, let go of him!" She screamed, staring at them with wide eyes whilst her cry echoed resoundingly against the cold walls of the medical room.

The two staggered aggressively into a machine, sending it crashing to the floor with a deafening thunder of heavy machinery and solid granite colliding.

Neither of them noticed, however, as Heero struggled to remove himself from Adam, and Adam avoided each of his rebounding moves, shrewdly.

Heero gasped for air as the hand across his neck tightened, straining his infrequent breaths, and obscuring the views in front of him, as the lack of oxygen rendered his brain inactive.

Choking, coughing and spluttering, he felt Lafeia's small feeble hands try to pry the other's strong hands away from his neck, helping his own useless attempts. But it seemed that the person holding him, had a vengeance towards him, and was using this anger to bring him down.

Unfortunately for Heero, it was working.

"NO!" He heard Lafeia cry, sobs interrupting her fearful screams, "stop it!"

Heero opened his eyes to stare at her, capturing her pale, delicate features in an effort to etch them, eternally, into his mind, in fear that he may not see her again.

Suddenly, the extent of his concern and affection for the young girl in front of him, hit him with a significant velocity. His love for her, had brought him to this downfall of his, it had blinded him of all targets, and the enemy had burrowed into this weakness of his, expanding the flaw and using it to their advantage.

Yet, he wasn't regretful; he couldn't fully understand it, but he wasn't regretful about falling for her. It was still, to him, the greatest thing to have ever happened, there was only one thing that he was regretful of, and that was; if he were to give in to the greater power, he would leave Lafeia on her own here. Leave her to deal with this by herself, and as much as this annoyed him, he still couldn't draw the power from within him to resume this battle for life.

The vision in front of him wavered and distorted into a darkness that was consuming his body and mind, blanking out his thoughts, hearing and sight.

Lafeia watched him fall with anxiety tugging at her closest heartstrings. A few men had already gotten hold of her, and dragged her to the opposite side of the room, away from Heero, in order to enable her from restraining Adam from doing his job.

He collapsed to his knees, Adam's arm still tangled around his neck, his eyes closing and his head spinning violently.

"No!" She screamed, but the guard beside her, who effectively whacked her across the head, silenced her. Stilling her screams as a thundering pain echoed in her head, blurring the view in front of her.

Two pairs of hands grabbed Heero from the ground, dragging him towards the door with little care.

"Well done Adam, I'm proud of the way you handled that," Michael told him pompously, tapping him on the back with the palm of his hand, but Adam merely glared at his friend, coldly.

"Why didn't you let me in on this?" He asked fiercely, an angry fire enflaming in his light eyes as he pushed his disorderly hair out of his eyes.

Michael glanced wearily towards Alex, who shrugged helplessly back at him.

"You know, Adam, as well as I do, that I couldn't have any mistakes."

"Well, you made quite a few here. To start with, you left this job up to these useless idiots," he gestured to the many men, lying in agony on the shimmering floor, "and secondly, you underestimated the abilities of the Gundam pilots." Michael grimaced at him, knowing his words were the truth, "Lucky you had me, eh?" Adam pushed past him, not waiting for a reply, and with a last concerned glance thrown towards the raven-haired girl in the corner of the room - who was coughing and spluttering, blood spilling from her pale lips – he left the room, escorting Heero with another few men.

"How did he find us down here?" Michael spun around angrily glaring at Alex.

"Some guy came up looking for him, saying something about how half the men were on the ground and that he knew that nobody could handle the situation as well as he could. However, Adam's right, you're lucky you had him." Alex retorted before staring at the young girl in the corner, "Is that the girl?"

"Yes," Michael sighed, turning his attention towards the sick girl, "could you call the medical staff? Tell them it's another critical emergency."

As soon as Alex had darted out of the door, he turned, warily, to the men holding the young girl down.

"You idiots, did you not hear me?" he asked, "I told you to be careful with her. She's in a critical condition, and I can't have her dying on me now!"

Lafeia turned her head up towards him, glowering at him venomously, "Thanks!" She spat, sardonically.

"Get her back onto the bed, and strap her down tightly," Michael ordered, ignoring her remarks completely.

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Heero grunted in pain as he was thrown against a wall. He slid down it weakly, slamming his head against the hard concrete in the process.

"You think that she loves you?" Adam asked him, a brutal rage, blinding him with a furious fire.

Heero glanced quickly towards the exit of the cell, only to find two large, burly men, standing guard and smirking callously. He was too weak right now to fight them all off.

"Yes," Heero retorted, emotionlessly. He wasn't going to let his captor have the pleasure of knowing that he was in pain; he had too much pride for that.

The anger in Adam was flared further and Heero was punished by being, once again thrown against the cold concrete walls with a deafening crash and a loud, ringing triggering in his ears.

"She doesn't, why would she love somebody like you?" Adam snarled, blindly hitting his target across the jaw, his fist colliding maliciously with Heero's bloody face.

Heero's head lolled, drooping slightly to his neck, but he shot it back up again, staring at Adam aimlessly. "I don't know," he replied, shrugging his shoulders and trying to prevent himself from flinching in pain, "why don't you ask her?"

Another collision of flesh and knuckles, and blood was soon pouring endlessly from Heero's nose. This time he winced as he drew his hands up to his face, one trying to stop the blood from flowing and the other pinching the bridge.

Heero glared at Adam as blood from a gash on his head trickled into his left eye, rendering the vision from that eye with a wash of red.

"The question is; do you think that she loves you?" He asked viciously, his own pent up anger threatening to be released.

Adam stopped pacing up and down in front of him and stared down at him from above, silently.

"Why would she love somebody like you?" Heero asked icily, turning the conversation around, "Why would she love someone who kidnapped her, locked her up in a cell and then treated her like this? It doesn't really matter if you're a shadow from her past, the events that are happening right now will hinder any of her love for you. If you really love her, you wouldn't be acting the way you are now."

Adam stared at him distantly as the truth of Heero's words sunk in and stung him with a raw emotion, which was so strong, that he felt as though it was tearing him apart from the inside out. Guilt… the pure emotion was so intense and overpowering that it chilled him to the bone.

Slowly, he tore his eyes away from the bloody mess of a soldier in front of him and stared blankly at the wall.

"It's not too late you know," Heero told him in an almost incoherent whisper, he was losing energy and consciousness rapidly, but he needed to do something to prevent Lafeia from any more danger. He needed to get her out of here; there was only one way and that was to convince Adam – the one who claimed to love her – let his love for her overpower his respect for his organisation. "You can still help her…" His last thread of consciousness snapped swiftly, sending him into a dark abyss of unawareness and leaving his aching body behind.

Adam watched as Heero collapsed unsteadily into a heap on the cold floor, walking out the cell, he nodded to his comrades and made his way back to his apartment, Heero's last words still ringing raucously in his mind.

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Duo sat in the driver's seat of the car, aimlessly drumming his fingers on the dashboard and humming peacefully to a song on the radio.

He had just begun to get really into the song – using his fingers as drumsticks, drumming them harshly against the dashboard and banging his head jubilantly in the air, all in time to the rhythmic beat – when a loud beeping resonated throughout the car, alarming him and startling him out of his game.

The vibrations from his lower pocket danced up along his leg, giving him more reason to want to find the device more rapidly.

Once his strong hand had wrapped its fingers around the trembling device, he pulled it out of his pocket.

"All right, you stupid thing, I got a freaking message, now shut up, would ya?" he pressed a small black button on the side of the device, halting its aggravating dance and song.

Now… which button did Heero say I was to use to read it?

"Delete message?" The recorded message of a feminine voice called out to him.

Oh shit, no… not that… dammit!

Pressing another small black button beside the display, the screen suddenly went blank.

"You gotta be kidding me… dead battery?" Duo groaned, slamming his head into his fist in frustration.

"… If I message you at all, it means that you have to go and get the other pilots. I doubt that it will come to this, so it's just in case…"

Heero's stoic voice echoed in his mind, reminding him of his warning.

"Shit, get the pilots… could it be that?" Duo asked himself thoughtfully, then hastily shoved the keys into the ignition, and twisting them, the car roared to life.

Duo crashed his foot against the accelerator and skilfully made his way away from the 'Red claw' headquarters at a law-breaking speed.

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"She's come around now sir, the sedative's wearing off."

Michael looked up from his seat beside the young raven-haired girl's bed and nodded to the doctor, gratefully.

Lafeia groaned as the pain that she had left behind earlier, hit her at full force, causing her to shudder and wince at every slight movement of her body.

"Have you any anaesthetics?" Michael asked the doctor, who came strolling over quickly, a syringe in hand, and punctured Lafeia's pale skin with it's sharp edge, allowing the liquid to be pushed into her blood stream as he applied pressure upon the top.

"I thought that you were never going to wake up," Michael stated as the door slammed shut behind him, gesturing that they were once again alone.

Opening her teal eyes slowly, she immediately closed them again, cursing the lights for blinding her temporarily.

"How… long?" she asked coarsely.

"Two days, we gave you a sedative to calm you after the fight, but you were so drained that you ended up unconscious for the past few days."

Lafeia sat up slowly, opening her eyes again and allowing them to adjust to the brightness of the room. Rubbing her temples with her palms, she turned towards her captor.

"What do you want?" she asked bitterly as the memories of their last meeting flashed through her mind.

"To talk," he answered, looking her blatantly in the eyes.

"That's obvious, but what about?" Lafeia grimaced as the anaesthetics started to work around her body, shooting painful shivers down her limbs rapidly, back and forth.

"I want to talk about what happened the other day; I feel that a few things need to be clarified."

Lafeia glared at him ruthlessly, her teal eyes glittering under the bright glow of the lights with a menacing appeal.

"Like how you lied to me… about how you broke your promise not to involve the gundam pilots," She spat with a disgusted tone to her croaky voice.

Michael quickly drew himself away with her, staring with an guiltless guise on his face. "Me? I broke my promise? I'm sorry, my dear Lafeia, but you must be mistaken… You broke your promise first."

"I did not!" Lafeia cried in frustration, she would have yelled had she had the strength. She felt like jumping off the bed she was on and strangling the liar in front of her.

"But you did, you were escaping, and bless my luck, with a gundam pilot, too," Michael told her, his voice irritatingly calm.

"But I didn't escape; therefore I did not break the promise-" Lafeia started, a blind rage growing inside of her.

"You were about to," Michael interrupted coolly, leaning back in his chair and staring back with blaming eyes targeting her small frame.

Lafeia growled in defeat, it had been true, she had forgotten about her end of the agreement, and she was going to escape with Heero.

"You used me though, you had this all planned, I heard all of the orders you were shouting to your men. You knew that this would happen." She accused, pointing a vicious finger at his smug, conceited face.

"That is true," he admitted without hesitation, as if he was proud of this statement, "I had planned it all, I'm just thankful that you were able to make it work according to plan."

"You bastard," Lafeia growled, gritting her teeth and clenching her fists to try to control her anger, "You used me…"

"All is fair in love and war," Michael rose of his seat slowly as Lafeia's gaunt and pale face twisted from a scowl to look of pure puzzlement.

"What- what do you mean?" Then when the true meaning dawned on her, she frowned again and shook her head, "never mind."

Michael chucked humorously, clearly amused by her antics and naivety.

"Where is he?" Lafeia questioned, asking the question that was blaring like a siren in her mind.

Michael looked thoughtful for a second before he answered, "Who?"

"You know who," Lafeia answered maliciously.

"No, I really don't, the way you asked was as If you were referring to the one you care about," Lafeia nodded her head slightly, "but who is that… Adam or the new soldier boy- Heero Yuy?"

Lafeia scowled at his remark, "Heero!"

Michael hung his head; as if in shame before lifting it slowly back up to the girl. His eyes were empty and almost sad, as if he was regretting something, and he looked as though he was debating whether to answer her question or not.

Lafeia's heart sunk in her chest, as though hiding and preparing itself for a major wound and she stared at Michael, urging him to continue, with her eyes.

"I'm sorry, but… Heero Yuy's dead."

His voice seemed empty as Lafeia heard the words that she least wanted to hear. Duo had once - in a moment of personal reveries - told her that death followed him wherever he went, like a plague, and this was the reason that he had always tried not to open up his heart to others, in fear that they too, would be struck by his curse.

Lafeia wondered, briefly, for a second, whether she too was followed by this curse, before the full impact of Michael's words hit her; smashing her heart pitilessly in her chest, until it had shattered into millions of little pieces… shards; like glass, that were broken beyond repair.

Her anguished cries and screams tore through the remote building, echoing piercingly off bland cold walls and shattering the aloof silence that had settled like a mist upon the grounds.

A/N - Sorry that it took so long to come out with this chapter, only recently have I found inspiration to continue it. But I'm back on track now, but unfortunately, as I have several other fics to keep up with, the updates won't be all that close together.

Oceanena – Thank you very much for the review.

10-Midnight-01 – Sorry I took so long with this chapter, but its here now, I hope the suspense hasn't worn off yet lol. Thanks for the review.

Saferia – And she finally updates again lol, thanks for the review.

charlie00 – I love you too lol! Don't worry bout the delays, I just hope that you find time to read them, whenever, that's all that matters to me. Thanks for the great review!

burgandy3721 – Yay, I'm glad you liked it. Also, remember to update yours soon too! Sorry, I'm not in the best talking mood right now, but good luck with your fic, and thanks for the review, love ya!

So… is it too much to ask for a few more reviews?

Love y'all

Allura