Title: Gravity
Chapter 3: The Storm Can Come
Chapter Summary: Lady Une seeks to correct her error, and Sylvia does some deep thinking.
Characters are not mine. I am just borrowing.
F/F content.

Lady Une sat at her desk with her eyes shut and her hands bridged together in a manor that reminded Sally of photos she had seen of Treize Khushrenada. She understood that at times Une liked to imagine what her former mentor would have done if he had been in her situation, and generally all exercises like that ended with Une saying, "He wouldn't have let himself get caught in this sort of corner."

Sally shut the door and Lady Une opened her eyes. She did not mutter the familiar phrase. Instead she looked at Sally and said, "I took it too personally."

"You were trying to make sure Sylvia had the protection she needed," Sally stated as a reassurance.

"No." Une said firmly. "I took the task of protecting her too personally. I shouldn't have. As your dear friend would say...I was weak."

Sally took a deep breath and stepped further into the office. She crossed her arms over her chest and said, "It's not weakness to want to protect someone you care about, even if that person has no idea how you feel, or why." She paused and asked, "You didn't know it was a trap for Heero?"

"I did not. If I'd have been more concerned with why Sylvia was a target I might have found...something. A clue." She shook her head. "I shouldn't have sent him."

"But you did."

"He asked me." Une took in a deep breath. "He knew, and didn't tell me. Why would he do that?"

Sally shrugged. "Technically, he isn't your subordinate. He only comes in if we absolutely need him." She frowned, which was an almost completely foreign expression to cross her features. "You may need to ask Sylvia. Perhaps, it has to do with their past."

"Yes, perhaps." Une stood up and put her hands on her desk. "Sally...Never mind. I'll see to it myself."

"Good."

Sylvia Noventa had retreated to her grandmother's estate in Sicily. She sought solace in the familiarity of the place, but found only further disruption. The scandal following the Noventa Foundation had been wrapped up neatly. The papers screamed of her heroic escape from death as she sought to make things right. She hated it all. It was all inconsequential, because Heero Yuy had been taken captive by some unknown group, Heero who had been there to protect her, but was apparently the real target.

She spent some time going over her memories of their only meeting. It was brief and to the point. She was too riddled with grief to do anything more than yell at him. She didn't understand him, or his comment that war was all he knew. She couldn't understand it, because she was always kept so far from conflicts. All she knew of war was that it brought loss, and the war had brought her plenty of that.

She'd lost her grandfather, some close friends who either joined OZ or the rebellious remnants of the Alliance, and a brother who defied the family to fight. And now it was taking something else from her, something indiscernible and transcendent.

She had sent a card up to Hans to thank him for all he had done, and for letting her borrow one of the Une family books. She promised its safe return as soon as she was finished with it. She wondered if he was the type of man to send a reply.

Sally had not been in contact like she had promised, which was curious since Sally was the type to send a reply, and give some sort of answer even if she couldn't give full details. It was curious.

After about a week a card came to announce that a member of the Preventers would arrive that afternoon to ask Sylvia some questions. It was an extremely formal announcement, but it was not printed on the standard Preventer card stock. It was a better grade of paper and the embossing was particularly striking.

She shook her head at the subtle clues, mostly because she was tired of the subtlety. It was bothersome that so many felt she need to be treated like an innocent when she wasn't. Though there seemed to be something more in the hints she had been gathering. There was a great deal of caution, protection that wasn't really meant for her benefit, and once she realized that she had to take a long walk to think it all over.

Sylvia made it back from her walk with just enough time to change into something more fitting a meeting with a Preventer inquiry. She decided on a blue and black suit with a skirt, and extremely practical dress shoes.

She waited in the sitting room which was filled with an array of memories for her. She had played in that room when she was little. Hidden in the corners to read and get away from her brothers and cousins.

One of the maids announced the arrival of Lady Une and Sylvia found herself standing almost involuntarily to receive her. They sat and Une went immediately into business.

"I need you to tell me about your connection to Heero Yuy," Une said. "Whatever it was or is, no matter how minute the detail, anything you can tell me might help us figure out who is after him."

Sylvia nodded and then told Lady Une the entire story of how she met Heero Yuy. Une listened intently and then nodded at the end.

"You hadn't seen him at all since that day in the cemetery?"

"No. Not since he came to your estate to help protect me." Sylvia bit her lip and then said, "Maybe it was a question of who he would come to aid."

"You're thinking you and Relena were both in danger he would choose the woman he wanted to save, or felt more obligated to," Une asked and then said, "An interesting theory, but we had everything concerning Relena wrapped up well before he was sent your way. And he wasn't actually sent."

"What?"

"He contacted me and asked to go."

Sylvia took a deep breath. "Oh Heero, you aren't."

"I'm missing something."

"Don't you see. He left me and then went to see my grandmother. He was going to go to each member of the family to see if they would seek retribution." She brought her hand over her mouth. "But, you see...My grandmother, like my grandfather firmly believed in peace, and the pacifist ideals that OZ had sought to wipe out. She would have sent word to everyone else. She would have told them to leave him alone."

Une saw a thought forming in Sylvia's mind, and it was not a pleasant one. She had done her research, but she needed the second opinion. She felt horrid for putting Sylvia through it.

Sylvia felt herself begin to tremble. "I had a brother. He left to fight in the war. I'm not even sure which side he took, but he left against the family's wishes. The reports said he was dead, but-"

"There were so many, and some were wrong." Une said completing the thought. "Where would he go if he were still alive?" She stood up and put a hand on Sylvia's shoulder. "I am...sorry."

Sylvia shut her eyes and then steadied herself. She tried to hold on to everything she believed in, everything she had been taught, and all she had forgiven and had learned to forgive. "There's an abandoned farm on Corsica. It's still there. He- My brother loved it there, because grandfather taught him...taught him..." And her resolve broke and she started to weep.

Une pulled her close. "I am sorry, Sylvia, but I will try to get them both out alive."

Snipers were in position. Only one had a clear shot, and the order was given to fire. The sniper did her job, and Heero Yuy managed the rest quite well on his own.

Lady Une gave him a rueful look as he approached her, bandaged and bruised.

"He has symptoms of-" Heero stopped and then said, "a split."

Une arched an eyebrow.

"Hard to say if he's really her brother," Heero remarked. "But I figure you lot can figure that out. May I leave?"

"I have only one question for you Mr. Yuy," Une said. "Why did you allow it to go this far?"

His brow furrowed and he said, "I wanted to make sure she hadn't changed her mind since she was a kid. If she told you where to go she obviously hadn't. She...She forgives me." He started to walk away and then stopped and looked at Lady Une curiously. "That was a close shot you took. I thought you might try and take out your perceived competition."

Une's eyes flashed behind the lenses of her glasses. "If the sniper had mortally wounded either of you, she'd never forgive me."

Heero nodded and walked off.

To be continued…