Treize strode away from the hangar, stripping off his stained gloves as he moved, not wanting the feel of cooling blood against his skin any longer. They would have to be destroyed, he knew - nothing was going to pull this amount of blood from silk. He sighed under his breath, wondering yet again how it was that someone as neat as himself managed to ruin so many pairs of gloves.
He supposed he should be grateful that it was only his gloves that had been exposed; from what he had been told, Zechs had helped in retrieving the girl's body from the cockpit. If that were the case, it was no wonder that he had described his jacket as being saturated. For all that the Specials had designed their uniforms to be hard-wearing, as well as decorative, that quantity of blood was never going to come out without damaging the fabric.
Though the general doubted Zechs would ever want to wear that particular jacket again, regardless.
That thought shattered his attempt to distract himself with minutiae, and he found his heart beating a little faster as his mind flashed back to the sight of his fallen pilots. He could only thank God that one of them hadn't been Zechs, and curse again the necessity of putting people so young into the path of such danger.
"Sir? Is something wrong?"
Treize looked up from the soggy material in his hands and winced. Lady Une was standing in the middle of the corridor in front of him and he'd come within an inch of walking into her in his distraction. "Lady! No, nothing wrong – I was merely… thinking."
She lifted her perfectly shaped eyebrows. "About what, sir, if I may ask?"
"The pilots who died this afternoon. One of them was… very young."
She appeared unsurprised by the news that pilots had died that day; rumours travelled very quickly. "No younger than any of us were when we went on our first missions," she pointed out, her face impassive. "They knew the risks when they joined up, sir. We are a military organisation, after all."
"That hardly makes it right that pilots barely out of childhood should die so horribly…"
Une frowned to herself, taken aback by this new twist to her commanding officer. There had been times in her career when she had a felt a pang of guilt for sending the men and women under her command out to die – she would have been worried by any officer who never felt such – but she accepted it as necessary to accomplish her missions. Until now, she had thought that Treize regarded it the same way: unfortunate that a pilot-cadet could only be trained to their full potential in early adolescence, when their reflexes were lightning fast and their minds were as malleable as their changing bodies, but there it was. It was necessary, and that was the end of it.
That didn't seem to be the case now.
"Sir? Is there anything I can do for you?" she asked gently.
Treize looked up at her, away from whatever he was holding, and smiled. "Indeed, Lady, there is. Would you go down to the medical wing for me and enquire about the pilots that were injured? I'd like to know how they're doing, and if the doctors need anything they haven't got."
Une nodded her head. "Of course, sir. Is there anything else?"
"No, I don't believe so. Shouldn't you be off duty now?"
"So should you, sir," she pointed out and he laughed his agreement.
Une smiled back, pleased that she had been able to draw Treize out of whatever had been disturbing him so.
"Very true, Lady, very true. An agreement, then? I will go to bed if you do?"
"Yes, sir."
"Done. Good night, my Lady."
"Good night, Mr Treize," she murmured as he brushed past her and then turned to watch as he continued down the passageway.
Still smiling, she made her way to the medical wing, hurrying to obey her orders.
Treize smiled to himself for a little while, but by the time he had reached his rooms, the momentary cheer his encounter with his Aide had engendered had faded away, leaving him feeling tired, a little depressed and somewhat unwell.
He threw his gloves into the bin, slung his cloak over the back of a chair and crossed to his kitchen, searching for something to drink that wasn't either alcoholic or horribly caffeinated. Long experience with drinking potent spirits in large quantities had taught him that he always felt the worse for wear when their effect began to fade, and tonight that feeling was going to be compounded by the fact that he hadn't eaten since breakfast, and by the events of the last half hour.
To his surprise, he found bottled fruit juice stored in his fridge, and silently blessed whomever it was that knew him well enough to have ordered it placed there by his maid. Twisting off the cap, he began to sip at the contents as he made his way through to the bathroom and began running water into his bathtub. A second later, however, he switched the taps off and turned on the shower instead.
Unsurprisingly, touching the dead had left Treize with the need to scrub himself clean, and though he would have preferred to soak in his bath for hours, he knew he didn't have the time if he wanted to see Zechs before the younger man retired for the night. The pilot would most likely be worn out and Treize didn't like the idea of him being left alone to try to sleep.
The days they had spent together over Christmas had taught the general a lesson about his companion he hadn't ever considered he would need to learn.
Treize had known the younger man would return from his tour of duty on the L2 colonies exhausted and possibly injured, with the last of his childhood melted away into experience, and he had expected the pilot to be asleep on his feet and perhaps a little withdrawn.
He hadn't been prepared for Zechs to be as badly shaken as he was.
The younger man had been almost unbalanced – traumatised and depressed, and experiencing almost bipolar mood swings. The degree of melodramatic teenage angst that had resulted was something Treize had never thought he would have to deal with from his friend. Zechs was highly strung, yes – weren't they all? – but his behaviour had been alarming.
For the first few days, Treize hadn't, in fact, realised that anything was wrong. Even after their argument at his Christmas Night Ball he had mistakenly put his friend's uncharacteristic emotionality down to tiredness and the sudden progression of their physical relationship. Once it had dawned on him what the problem truly was, Treize had forced the younger man to talk to him, and then had changed his plans for the rest of their break, abandoning his plans for hours of horse-riding, shooting and hiking, and offering instead days of relaxation and gentle distraction. Out of his depth, the general had tried to be supportive until the pilot had regained his equilibrium.
When he did, it had been a relief, but that it had taken so much time after an event as minor as Zechs had experienced was worrying. Having a mission go wrong – especially when it resulted in the injury of one's men – was always upsetting, but if Zechs was going to fall apart like that every time things went badly, then his career had gone as far as it ever would. As Treize knew well from experience, no commander could afford to come un-glued every time a mission went wrong – they had to accept it and move on.
Still ruminating, Treize stripped out of his uniform and stepped under the hot spray. His eyes shut, he tipped his head back and allowed the water to soak into his thick hair and run down his body. Running soap over himself didn't take him very long and in a matter of minutes he was in his dressing room, pulling his brush through his hair and setting it back into place.
The soft, old jumper he drew over his head sparked more recent memories and he found himself smiling as he reflected that not everything about Christmas had been bad.
The hours spent in bed following Zechs's surprising admission of continued virginity on Christmas morning had been thoroughly enjoyable. His friend was a fast learner and a willing, if uncertain, partner, and had taken obvious pleasure in everything they'd done, from simply sleeping in the same bed on.
That morning had led to others of a similar pattern and if the general were honest with himself, there hadn't been many mornings that week that had found them out of bed before lunchtime.
Still smiling, Treize left his rooms and headed across the base to the younger man's. For practical reasons, officers' quarters at the Luxembourg base were scattered all over the complex, as were their offices. The inconvenience of having them working quite some distance apart was offset by the fact that, should a part of the base be destroyed, not every senior officer would be killed – as could very easily happen at some of the less modern stations – and someone would be left alive with enough authority to take command. It made for quite a walk now, though, and Treize took it at a brisk pace, only absently noting the salutes of the men and junior officers he passed as he went.
Three weeks had passed since Christmas – three weeks that had tested Treize's exemplary self-control almost to the limit. His partner was under the legal age of consent for just over another week, and until he turned eighteen on the twenty-third of January, the general couldn't, in fact, make love to him. The tricks he shown the boy – giving him pleasure by hand and with his mouth and having the same returned, somewhat clumsily, Treize had to admit, but with growing skill – were not, for the older man, adequate substitutes for what he truly wanted to do. The slow-burning need that had been triggered in the general on Christmas Eve, when the pilot had unwittingly drawn his body to release, was trying his patience to the limits. He was simply unused to letting it go unanswered like this. For a man in Treize's position, finding a willing partner for a night, or two, was no difficulty, despite how little free time he had. He had influence, charm and was relatively attractive. He also, on the one or two occasions it had come to it, had money to burn.
Still, in the five years since his affair with Leia, Treize hadn't had more than half a dozen partners and it had been quite some time since the last of those. He hated having to admit it, even to himself, but the few times he had managed to arrange anything between himself and the blond since their return to the base, Treize had been rather more aggressive than he should have been.
It didn't help that Zechs, despite being utterly unaware that he was doing so, had the knack of playing to some of his commander's more unusual tendencies.
Abruptly aware that he was about to walk right past the pilot's door, Treize pulled himself to a stop and raised one hand to sound the caller.
It took the blond almost a minute and a half to answer the door; long enough to cause the general to frown in worry.
"Sir?" Zechs looked surprised to see him.
"May I come in?"
The younger man looked him up and down for a moment, registering his lack of uniform with a scowl, before he stepped back and let the other pass.
Treize entered the neat, small rooms and sat himself gracefully in one of the two chairs, watching as the blond dropped into the other. "I didn't disturb you, did I?" he asked, looking at the pilot's rumpled t-shirt and bare feet.
"No, of course not. I was reading."
"Ah, good." Treize leaned back, crossing his legs. "I've been to the hangar…"
Zechs blinked – this wasn't the line of conversation he had been expecting – then shrugged. "I assumed you would – something of a mess, isn't it?"
"Yes, but the mechanics will fix that," the older man agreed. "I sent Une to the medical bay."
"I know, I saw her there."
"Oh?"
"I went after I left you," Zechs explained. "She arrived just as I was leaving. She told me she'd seen you. Actually, she seemed worried about you."
The general smiled. "I ran into her, almost literally, coming from the hangar. I was thinking and she surprised me. I assure you, there was nothing for her to be worried about."
"Good." The younger man got to his feet and went to a pot he had sitting on a table in a corner of the room. "Would you like some coffee?" he offered.
Treize shook his head. "No, thank you."
Zechs blinked again at this unusual response – Treize wasn't giving him the cues he was anticipating tonight – but said nothing, pouring himself a cup and then sitting down again. He took a sip from the liquid without adding either cream or sugar to it and Treize winced – how the boy could drink coffee without sweetening it was beyond him.
Zechs noticed his reaction and smiled. "You're actually my second visitor," he said, putting the cup down. "Noin came by."
"Oh? What did she want?" Treize was surprised – the captain had refused to speak to her friend on Boxing Day and had been rather cold with him for the first few days he had been back on the base. Whatever the offence, it seemed she had forgiven Zechs now since she was knocking on his door, but it was a puzzle to both men what the problem had been in the first place.
"The same thing you do, I would imagine. To see if I was alright. Rumour travels quickly."
"I thought the same thing when I was talking to Une. What did you tell her?"
"That I'm fine and she shouldn't worry about me."
Treize raised one eyebrow. "Was it the truth?" he asked softly.
"More or less," the blond allowed. "I'm not hurt, which is more than can be said for most of the pilots on that mission." He glanced away and swallowed.
Treize waited a moment. "It is," he agreed. "But then, I knew that already and it wasn't what I meant," he pointed out, his gaze gentle.
Zechs offered him a weak smile. "I know." He shrugged. "I've seen worse. If anything, I'm relieved I went – it would have been so much worse if I hadn't."
"More than likely, yes. I doubt any of them would have survived if you hadn't." The older man paused again, then gestured with one hand. "Forgive me for this but…"
"But you were wondering if I was reacting the way I did at Christmas?" Zechs interrupted, smiling slightly.
"Yes."
"I'm not. I have seen worse. Soldiers die, and mobile suit pilots aren't known for leaving pretty corpses."
"Are you sure?"
Zechs sighed and got to his feet. "Treize, what happened on L2 was… different, I promise you. I've never behaved like that before and I won't again. Yes, there were moments this evening that were unpleasant, but I can cope."
The older man gave him a genuine smile. "I'm glad. I've been worried about you."
"I know and I understand why." Zechs returned the smile. "Did you want anything else?"
Treize blinked. "No… that was really about it."
"Oh, then would you…"
"Do you want me to leave?" the general interrupted, surprised.
Zechs shook his head, not meeting the older man's eyes. "No… I'd like you to stay, but I need to go to bed. I have to be up early tomorrow morning."
Treize got to his feet at that, crossed the room and slid an arm around the pilot's waist, leaning in to kiss him lightly. "Come on, then. I'll come and talk to you until you fall asleep, if you'd like?"
"Would you mind?" Zechs asked as he led the way through into the small bedroom.
Treize shook his head. "Why would I mind?" He drew the pilot a little tighter against himself and then let him go so Zechs could pull back his sheets and climb into the wide bed, turning on his side to look up questioningly at his commanding officer.
Smiling gently in the dim light, Treize shook his head – he didn't trust himself to get into that bed with the blond. Right now, Zechs didn't need what would probably happen if Treize did, he needed to sleep. Glancing around, Treize pulled the chair from the dresser to the side of the bed, kicked off his boots and folded himself into it, crossing his legs. Propping one elbow on the arm of the chair, he rested his head on his left hand and reached out with the other to run his fingers through the bright fan of the younger officer's hair.
Zechs shifted into his touch, closing his eyes and drawing his covers more closely around himself.
Treize began to murmur quietly, telling his friend about the latest volume of pre-colony poetry he had been reading as the pilot's breathing steadied and he slid into sleep.