Disclaimer: I don't own GS/GSD. Please R&R, make my day, so go on.

Chapter 3

Whatever happened had been four months ago. It was over and done with, and the soldiers were waiting for him to visit the camp again.

With a sigh, he moved into the car with a bit of drowsiness still attached to him, but in a few minutes, it would clear. Athrun had woken up half an hour earlier just to get ready, and it had pained him physically and emotionally to leave her there while he had to get down to business. But it didn't matter because Cagalli would wake and start the morning meeting in a matter of an hour's time.

And they were tied to their work as tightly as before, but somehow, they always found time to be together. More often than not, they ended up arguing, but it was the playful, cheerful sort of disputes that they chose to talk about, and Cagalli would persist long after he wanted to give up, because at work, she had been trained to argue until the ministers all unanimously supported her decision and gave their utmost cooperation to her. And so he was in the same position as them where Cagalli was concerned.

She was starting to settle down, he thought distractedly passing a road that would have led straight into the remains of a beach where they had last left it, but her temper was as quick as ever and her eyes would flash fire even when she wasn't particularly upset or angry about anything. It was her character to be passionate about everything, whatever a normal person felt or did; she did it with zeal and heart with three-fold the normal expectation. And that had been the exact reason why Athrun had been determined to win her at all costs and prevent her from becoming a stranger with very little light in her amber eyes left.

Cagalli Yula Atha was difficult to control, a wild horse and reckless, and fury would whip in her face and bewitch him entirely. But she had lost a little of the recklessness quite inevitable with her coming of age, and he accepted that she had mellowed for and because of him.

It was terrible trying to handle both her and work at the same time, because she was ORB, and ORB was her. He exhaled deeply, opening the car windows so the morning breeze would cool the interior a bit as the vehicle sped towards the area the ministers had allocated to the ZAFT soldiers stationed there.

"You realise don't you," she had said wistfully a while ago, "That if this arrangement doesn't work out, ZAFT will be moved out of ORB and you will be recalled back to PLANT which you were originally stationed at?"

"It will work out," Athrun had cut in confidently, gazing at Cagalli and searching her face to look for traces of worry which he eventually found, "But even if it doesn't, what makes you think I have to leave?"

She snorted and rolled on her back and threw some papers up in the air, watching them glide down like wings, and he waited patiently for her to respond.

Cagalli looked at him from the corner of her eyes and offered softly, "You're the chairman of PLANT's ETERNITY, and a year ago, you were allowed to come here because of the agreement ORB made with PLANT cornering ZAFT and the bilateral defence system we agreed to test and carry out. If ZAFT goes, logically, so will you."

"That's different," he said seriously, "That was before the PLANT Supreme Council knew that I was going to marry you and I don't suppose they'll make me leave ORB where you are even if ZAFT does."

"Are you sure?" she questioned, doubt flickering in her eyes, and he nodded and said with conviction surging through his voice, "They wouldn't be so merciless as to keep us apart, would they? Besides, if I do leave for PLANT in the worst case scenario if the exercise isn't carried out well enough for it o be sustained for the next few years, then it will only be a period of time to sort things out I suppose, then I'll probably be allowed to return to ORB to be with you."

"B-but," she had tried to say, and Athrun had smiled and cut her off, saying briefly, "And we're going off tangent too much, we can't assume the exercise won't go well."

And Cagalli had stared at him with her eyes wide with surprise, and a bit disconcerted, he had asked, "Why are you looking at me like that?"

She began to laugh helplessly and she rolled back on her side to face him and then she nuzzled against him, appreciating the warmth he returned to her and remarked offhandedly, "You've become more of an optimist than I ever expected you, or myself, to be, in fact."

"That's true," he admitted quite readily, "But being desperate for this to work can make miracles happen in a very short period of time."

Now he got out of the car, recalling the conversation she had held with him a while ago, and he squinted slightly and saw that the troops were assembling for their training and Athrun sighed and strode forward. He noted from the corner of his eye, that some were pausing and standing at attention to salute him and he did the same. Business was business, work was work, Cagalli was, Cagalli was another issue altogether.

Athrun simply couldn't steal time away to gaze at her while she was curled up into a ball under the covers no matter how much he wanted to stay there forever; it wasn't fair to shirk his duties. But he wished that he could, every, single, hour of every single day when he tore himself away and left. And when he left to get home, he was aware that he would try to hurry while maintaining the calm, composed façade he was meant to keep up for work's sake.

Back at the office, Cagalli moved through the doors of the office and tried not to feel nauseous when she looked at the pile of work waiting for her. If she played her cards right and managed her time, she would return in time to try and make something for dinner and not have excess to unload back at home with Athrun to balance as well. He wasn't a selfish lover, he was far too generous and gave so much, demanding so little, and that made her more gulty than ever.

So she stared at the pile in a pregnant form of silence and knew that Kisaka was shaking his head a little form the corner of her eye.

"Not too much, I hope," Kisaka was saying offhandedly and quite sympathetically, and Cagalli shook her head and grinned ruefully, then she sat down and proceeded to chop her way through the pile the way she would have done like it was an almost-impenetratable forest.

At noon, she took a break and checked her personal mailbox where Kira had proudly sent a few pictures of Lacus. She was five months pregnant and her stomach had started swelling significantly, but Lacus looked radiant, and to Cagalli, she had probably never looked more beautiful.

Sighing, she flipped over the letters that had came attached to them and sieved out some information here and there. They were going to name the child Leon after Athrun's mother, and she smiled gently and imagined a child with Kira's brow hair and possibly, violet eyes. With any luck, she would have a nephew the spitting image of his father, and if Kira didn't spoil his son too much, Cagalli would try to. Athrun had agreed that Leon would surely turn out to be a gifted child, either way it went, or possibly both, if Mozart and Mathematics were to be played during Lacus' naps everyday.

The week after their honeymoon, Cagalli had gotten home into her house, technically it belonged only to her since her father had left it for her and Athrun didn't have anything to do with the piece of property they lived on. But he didn't seem to mind, he had produced a piece of document for her to sign one day and she had thought it was some signature required for acceptance of the ORB/PLANT military exercise she had already signed, so she waved him away impatiently. And then he had smiled enigmatically and then she had signed it and seen that it was a house deed he had obtained in his name but under both their ownership in PLANT.

"Who's going to live there then?" Cagalli had demanded while he folded the deed up nicely and placed it carefully into his briefcase, and then he had smiled that same smile and replied, "The owners are prepared to hand over the property if we want to go there."

And no matter how she egged him on to reveal more, his lips were firmly pressed together and Cagalli had secretly sent Kisaka to find out more about the property's name she had caught a glimpse of.

Eventually she had found out that the house was really his from the start, left behind by his parents, and that he had bequeathed it to her when it was really his to own.

That evening, she had found him dozing in an armchair in the house, tied out from all the word of the day, and she had tried to creep past him and not disturb his sleep, but then he had stirred and awoken, then saw her and smiled softly, and Cagalli had crossed the distance in a few bounds and leapt at him, and then he caught her effortlessly and she had whispered, fighting back some prickling of tears behind her eyes which were there for no reason at all, "You fool."

And his next words, so quiet and serious, were almost lost in the crackling of the fire, but Cagalli had heard Athrun murmur, "I don't mind being one."

Now as she was going to sink into her reverie, Kisaka appeared almost magically out of nowhere and said urgently, "We've got a problem. There's been a fight that broke out in a school, and the principal refuses to say anything s of yet, but she requests to meet someone from the government who can speak directly to you. It doesn't seem like an ordinary, run-of-the-mill, childish dispute to me."

"Neither does it sound that way to me," she replied instantly, standing up quickly and ruefully thinking that her break was being cut short, but she didn't mind, she would have spent the rest of the time gazing with glazed eyes out of the window in any case.

"Where is the principal?" she demanded shortly, throwing on her jacket and brushing some lint off her skirt, "I might as well she the principal myself. Something tells me things aren't as simple as two children fighting over some sweets."

"No," Kisaka agreed, and she briefly thought how burly he looked standing next to the footstool at the side, it was like putting a rabbit next to a giraffe, really, and she shook her head from all the strange thoughts and hurried out.

Along the way, Cagalli thought for a split second that she had seen Vino Dupre waiting at the staircase of the extensive parliament office, and then she saw that it was really him and knew Rainie would be around somewhere, but she had to force herself to hurry by them and move to the waiting lounge, allowing herself only a brief smile and wave that she flashed at the two.

The principal was waiting by the side, and he stood up and bowed very respectfully, and she did likewise but quickly butted in by saying warmly, "Please skip the formalities, Mr-?"

"I'm Harold Smithers," the strapping man with dark brown, almost black hair said quickly, "And I didn't except that the chairman herself would address this matter."

"No worry about it," she said instantly, gesturing for him to sit, and then she settled herself across him and gazed intently at the principal, "What is it about the dispute between children that caused such worry?"

"I'll have to start at the beginning," Smithers was saying somewhat apologetically, but Cagalli shook her head and gestured fro him to do so, and the man said, suddenly curtly, "There were two children who started beating each other during a class. One was a Natural, born in ORB, and the other was a ZAFT soldier's child who came over here with his parents."

"The military exercise," she breathed, her chest suddenly constricted and very tight, and when he nodded grimly, her heart plummeted towards her stomach, but Cagalli closed her eyes, reopened them and forced herself to refocus at the topic at hand.

"It's been almost a year and a half since it started," she continued steadily, thinking fast and thinking very nard, "And there haven't been issues like this so far in the camps. Could it be that this particular fight was a petty one with two children who happened to be from different backgrounds that puts some question and strain onto the decision made before?"

"Possibly," Smithers replied absently, running a hand through his dark hair which reminded her of Shiho Hahenfuss' for some odd reason, "But the outrage it started sparking off tends to suggest otherwise."

"Elaborate," she ordered, feeling disconcerted and terribly at the edge of things, and Smithers looked straight at her, a good sign, really, and then he said bluntly, "If you don't mind me saying this, Chairman, the school's in an entire fiasco after this incident broke out. The ZAFT soldier's child, a girl, was answering a question in class, and apparently, the teacher called on her because she wasn't paying attention, o of course she got the question wrong."

And pausing for breath, he continued quickly, keen to get the weight off his shoulders, quite forgetting that the weight he was transferring them to were able, strong shoulders, no doubt of that, but young shoulders all the same.

"Then the other child, a boy, jeered at her and said that the ZAFT Coordinators were obviously more stupid than any other coordinators, and then some other ORB Coordinators joined in the teasing and hurled unkind comments at her. The teacher would have stopped them, but the girl was so upset that she launched herself straight at them and hit one of the boys at his jaw, and he pushed her in self-defence and she fell backwards and struck her head quite badly. Then the other ZAFT Coordinators' children rushed in to protect her, and you can imagine what happened after that.

The teacher had to call for help from other classes, and everybody got to see the fiasco they were creating and worse still, some teachers pulled the children apart and took sides with the children. Of course it was hushed down and the children were made to apologise, but this incident won't be forgotten so quickly. And some parents have found out about it from their children, and quite inevitably other parents of other schools know this as well, and now they're asking question whether their children are safe in school with ZAFT Coordinator children around as intruders in the already determined balance of Naturals and Coordinators in the schools."

She had been listening in grim silence, but his last sentence caused Cagalli to sit up straighter and breathe in terrible realisation of the situation.

"My word, that's-," she breathed, her eyes wide and her lips parted in horror.

"Exactly what the Second War was about," Smithers confirmed mirthlessly, "I was unsettled by the whole issue and couldn't approach it in a way that wouldn't offend either side, so I decided to seek help from the government itself."

"Thank you," Cagalli replied numbly, "For letting this not go unnoticed, I will hold a meeting and see if my decision holds water."

"No," the man said abruptly, standing up to shake her hand," Thank you for handling this so personally. Another reason why I brought this issue all the way up here was due to personal reasons, those of which might make it seem biased if I chose to handle the situation myself."

And Cagalli looked at the man and felt a pang of pity, and she asked hesitantly, afraid to learnt the truth "Forgive my intrusion into your privacy, but is someone you know part of the ZAFT troops there are stationed here?"

"Yes," he said very softly, and there was worry in his eyes, "My fiancé."

And she felt something in her heart soften, and the man in front of her saw that her eyes were sad, and he half-regretted putting weight onto her shoulders, shoulders that were possibly younger than his even. But she looked straight at him and promised softly, her eyes determined, "I'll get this solved, I promise you that."

She turned to leave and her heart was heavy, because Cagalli knew Athrun would find out about it soon enough even if she chose not to tell him. And what would she say to him?

For the rest of the day, she considered a few lines of actions and drew up some non-concrete plans which she decided to discuss with her ministers the very next day, and with a sigh, she tugged her jacket off roughly and flung it into a sofa. He wasn't back yet, he wouldn't be for another hour or so.

The newspapers were avoided in their house, because it reminded them of work which both of them neither desired nor required, and so she ignored the pile sitting neatly by the door where the service-people would slid it under each morning. But a photograph of Lacus caught her eye, but then nothing would if the pink of her hair didn't, and she grinned and allowed herself to pick up the papers slowly, gazing at the beautiful girl with her blue eyes and angelic features.

It was short interview, no more than five questions which Lacus had agreed to do,but then the company was smart, they knew an article on PLANT's mediator and idol would sell their newspapers like hotcakes, and the article had been in the very next page while the photograph of her was splashed on the front cover.

Crossing over to the fireplace, Cagalli lit the fire, enjoying the warmth she was washed in. ORB was becoming chillier, bit by bit, and even though there was electrical heating, she still preferred a fire and the orange glow it bathed the room in.

As usual, Lacus was photographed in such a manner one could not think to describe as anything but flawless. She was positively glowing, and her white skin was almost milky in texture, her maternity dress showing her stomach, rounded like a melon, but oh, the beam on her face, it would melt any woman or man's heart. Lacus, her heart-shaped face with its soft edges, was alight with an inexplicable beauty, her long, luxurious hair swept to the side in a careless yet creaseless manner that Cagalli was slightly envious of, and her hands slim and white, were placed neatly in her lap. Overall, Lacus made an exquisite picture of a woman at the pinnacle of her life.

"Nice isn't it," his voice said dryly over her shoulder, and Cagalli, startled terribly, jumped up from her stationary position and settled down almost instantly when she realised that Athrun was home.

"You're back," she murmured a bit needlessly, and then she proceeded to continue looking at the picture of Lacus printed on the papers.

"I am," Athrun replied gently, "And I thought you would have heard me coming in, but I found you absorbed in this, so that explains it rather well. Lacus takes a nice picture, that's certain."

He glanced towards the fireplace and threw in a piece of wood effortlessly, and the flames crackled and rose higher than ever.

"She does," Cagalli interrupted eagerly, nodding vigorously in her enthusiasm, "And she looks glorious, this picture does her and the baby justice. Kira will probably frame this picture or something and put it around in their house."

"He might," Athrun noted briefly, scanning over the page and seeing exactly what Cagalli had meant by 'glorious', there was no doubt about the serene, peaceful smile in Lacus' very eyes, "And we could do the same if you want, get a portrait to hang up or something like that for memory's sake."

She looked absently at him, but he wasn't looking at her, he was still standing form behind, peering over her shoulder to get a better look at the article, his features a light with a certain extent of interest.

And Cagalli knew he kept photographs of people here and there, some of his friends in ZAFT, although she wasn't quite sure how many of them were alive now, and one of his mother, none of his father, and one of Kira and him laughing and smiling at the camera, and there was one he had taken with Lacus, a formal one, probably in preparation or memoriam of their engagement when it had still held true, and a few of those Cagalli had taken with him during their wedding.

Once, she had asked him why he collected those photographs and kept them so carefully, and Athrun had smiled and said it was almost inborn in every house of standing where PLANT was concerned. Every house, the Zala House inclusive too, had portraits of the heirs and their spouses and subsequently the children, and most houses had their portraits taken when they were three, and thirteen, then when they married. And Athrun had looked directly at her with his emerald eyes she had shied away from at that instant and said softly, "And the women are taken when they are halfway into their pregnancy as part of a tradition."

It was true, she reflected, she had asked Lacus whether it was true for all Houses in PLANT, and Lacus had said it was, although the first and last portrait of her own mother had been destroyed when she had died in childbirth.

"Athrun," Cagalli asked softly, watching him direct his eyes from the words to her slowly and searchingly, a question poised in them, "Why do you take photographs that are not portraits?"

He paused a little and straightened up, then he moved languidly in an arc around her and rested gracefully in the chair in front of her, and the fire was lighting up his features, illuminating the side of his face and casting mysterious shadows on the other side.

"Portraits are there for records and tradition's sake," he explained briefly, "But I don't want records, I want proof of memories."

Cagalli was silent, and the newspaper lay forgotten in her lap. Glancing at him, she said softly, "You know, I've seen the picture we took for the wedding, but I haven't seen a picture of us as a memory."

He closed his eyes briefly and then he stood up and went off somewhere and returned so quickly, she could barely realise that he had gone off to fetch something. And she looked up questioningly this time at him as he laid a folder in her lap and returned to his original resting position and smiled.

"I've been waiting for you to realise that," he said seriously enough, but she saw a teasing glint in his eyes and hesitantly poured the contents of the folder out.

And she saw pictures, no, memories of their wedding and something flooded in her mind and she realised through her incoherence and numbness, that it was joy.

"Those were taken by Kira," he said softly, pointing at the one she held, and her eyes were directed to herself, her hand taken by Athrun and running towards something in the distance, the flowers carelessly held behind her and the happiness in both their faces. And there was one where she was glaring at him with the veil already removed over her face, and she realised with a bit of a pang, that she had thrown it off herself in her flustered state when Athrun had requested for the minister to cut the ceremony short. And she saw that his expression was bemused but his eyes were very warm and gentle.

"This one here," she said quietly, lifting up a single picture with her fingertips and staring hard into it, "Who took it?"

"I did," he replied without a trace of hesitation, "I'm surprised you didn't realise how many pictures you didn't see of your own wedding that weren't taken for the sake of public relations and all that."

The flames in the fireplace flickered a little, and she saw a tiny spark jump hopefully up before it was mercilessly crushed by something invisible until it was rendered unseen by itself.

She gazed at the image of herself in the creamy white-green gown, her head lolling against the car seat and her eyes closed. She bore no smile in her sleep whatsoever and her lips were slightly parted, but there was something incredibly placid and peaceful about her face, and her hands, they were entwined with something she recognised immediately as one of Athrun's own, and he must have used his other hand to take the photograph of her sleeping, worn out from the excitement of the wedding and the preparations that had gone into it.

"Why did you take a photograph like that?" she asked, bewildered, simultaneously pleased at the image but disconcerted by the fact that he had captured her in her most vulnerable state, "It probably can't be used for newspapers nor a portrait."

"I told you already," Athrun said patiently, "I don't want records, I want memories."

And he stood up, towering over her and casting an elongated shadow over her, and she gazed up at him pitifully, wondering how she ought and if she ought to break the news to him, but all thoughts were lost as he bent down and captured her lips with his own and she surrendered, illuminated against the fire that was all-consuming.