"If you love somebody, let them go. If they return, they were always yours. If they don't, they never were."

-Unknown

A violent explosion awoke Eve. She sat up in her queen-sized bed and looked around the room. She recalled that General Grievous came into her room, they talked, they laughed, they danced for a bit to a song she had recorded (but with better quality and she actually knew what it was called this time; "Moonlight Serenade" it was called by some dead guy who played music; or so Grievous said that's who it was), they sat on the bed, they kissed and then they slept. Was there anything sexual that happened? She thought. She went through her memories of a few hours back; no, they just fell asleep on the same bed; the first time she had ever done that with a male. But waking up to an explosion to find the male she fell asleep with; that never happened before. Did he leave her or did this attack happen while she was asleep and he left to take care of it? Another explosion shook her room again; judging from the shockwave, she deemed that he left to handle to problem. She looked out her window and, to her shock, saw 4 Republic Battle Cruisers. They looked fierce and powerful. She looked at the side expecting for some Confederate battleships to be assisting but there wasn't one. She got out of her bed, threw on her cloak Grievous made for her and made her way out in a hurried hover, grabbing onto the walls to support herself whenever the ship shook. She made her way to the other side and looked out the window; nothing there. Eve realized what was going on now: the Malevolence was all alone against 4 Republic Battle Cruisers.

"Status report!" yelled out General Grievous angrily.

"Shields are down and they've hit our long-wave transmitters. If this keeps up; we'll be sitting ducks! We have to retr-"the Droid officer never finished, Grievous forced his hand into the droid's chest and forcefully tore out its core and crushed it in his hands in frustration.

"Like the Burning Sands of Arahas we will! I will not give our enemy the benefit of having me as their prisoner! Send out as many battle crafts as you can! Forward all firepower at their communicators! I will not have my name be made a mockery out of!" he yelled out, all the officers nodded and quickly got to work giving out their orders.

But in reality, Grievous was frightened. This was only the 15th time he had run into this sort of problem where the enemy outnumbered his army. Each time he was able to find a strategy to force the enemy to retreat; but this time he had real problems. First, he was already on his way to a Confederate outpost to refuel and collect more battle droids for war when the Republic Battle Ships came out of hyperspace and surprised him. Second, he had no back-up; in space battles, he heavily relied on war ships to provide cover fire and keep those pesky Republic ships off but now all he had to keep them away was a limited number of pilots and many ships that were still being repaired. Even the Ace Pilots he had on his ship had found themselves swarmed by numerous Republic star ships. Thirdly and foremost: Eve. Apart from her powerful weapon she contained on her; his emotions for her was affecting his mind to think of a strategy. He couldn't risk her being harmed, she was precious to him, and she was in danger of being captured.

He knew he had to take one thing out of the equation of all his problems; from all the violence happening, he knew he had to do something about Eve; if she was taken by the enemy, he would thrust his own laser sword into his heart to stop the pain. He thought hard about what to do…

"G-General! We've lost forward shielding!" an officer yelled in a panicked state, it snapped him back to reality as he punch the officer hard enough in the face that it crushed the officer's face like a beer can. General Grievous had an idea.

"Intensify the forward fire power! Send word to the ships out there to make their way towards the engines of the battle cruisers and fire at the engines. Stall them long enough for us to make a proper counter-attack! I'm going to the Turrent Defense System to get those 'soldiers' to keep those damned Republic scum off us!" he ordered. As a "yes sir" came from the remaining officers, he rushed out the command bridge and was about to enter the elevator when, to his luck, there was Eve.

"General! What's going o-"Eve tried to say, Grievous grabbed her arm and forced her back into the elevator where he pushed the down button and entered a number. He let go of her and turned to face her, putting his hands on her arms.

"The Republic intercepted us at 2200 hours, we've been fight against them for nearly two and a half hours but we're getting nowhere…" Grievous answered what she was trying to say. Then his head hung low as he continued, "I-I fear I may have to surrender…" Eve gasped as she reached up and put her hand up to his cheek and looked into his haunting yellow eyes with a look of concern. She recalled how she always shuddered whenever she saw his eyes but after all this time she spent with him, his yellow eyes showed something else entirely. His eyes seemed to reveal a past of harsh abuse, horrible scarring to his body and his lost Kalee-nity.

"Grievous; don't say that! You've never given up before! You must have some sort of plan…"

"as a matter of fact, I do..." he said with a hint of sadness in his voice. The elevator doors opened, his head looked up, and he took her hand in his and took her to an emergency escape pod. He opened up the door for one pod and they went inside as Grievous turned and looked back at Eve, putting his hand boney-like hand on her 'cheek' as he stared into her for a moment and then he let go of her and left the escape pod. Eve grabbed his hand before he could exit and showed a look of concern.

"Eve…"

"Grievous…why?"

"Because surrendering will be the only thing that will keep their focus on me and away from following you as your escape pod floats away. Once you're safe, I want you to find your way home." He spoke, his tone was sad and he seemed to be trying to avoid looking at directly at Eve.

"No…Grievous you don't have to do this. We-"

"Eve, it's the only way to make sure you stay safe…please, I beg you…don't make this any harder for me…" Eve stared at him until she finally let go of his long fingered hand and hovered back into the pod but kept staring at him.

"I won't forget you Grievous…I promise…" he finally looked back at her and stared into her eyes, his eyes seemed incredibly sad and depressed.

"As will I, Eve…you finally brought some light into my life…" said Grievous depressed. He eventually pushed the buttons and the pod closed and fired off into space. Eve put her hands to the glass as she stared at the ship while the pod flew off. If she had a heart, it would have sunk; if she had tear ducts, she would fill the pod with her tears. True, Grievous was an asshole when they first met but somewhere, or so he told her, he found reason and found fascination in her personality and wanted to know more about her. As they got more acquainted with each other, they began to become a bit closer until Grievous surprised her by exchanging their first kiss. She never forgot all the horrible things he did to her but learning about this whole secret side of grievous, made her completely forget everything bad about him as she found herself adoring his secret romantic side.

But now he had set her free and she began to regret it.

As the ship flew off farther, she couldn't help but notice the Confederate ships were flying near the engines. She knew this strategy; Grievous would sometimes engage in hours of a holographic strategy game that was stolen from the cloning faculties on a planet called Kamino. He always won since he had spent decades learning strategies but there was one case where she was close to winning that was in a case similar to this. Grievous had 3 holographic battle cruisers while Eve only had one; her strategy was to send a single battle ship on a bomber run and destroy the command bridges on all his ships, therefore causing the troops in the ships to become lost and confused and be forced into a retreat. But Grievous won that holographic simulation by destroying the bomber before it could destroy the final bridge. She lost but he wasn't too hard on her, he took her on a walk on a newly conquered planet so she wouldn't feel too cooped up in the ship.

This gave Eve a crazy idea. She knew it was risky and Grievous would probably never forgive her for this but she couldn't let him fall into Republic hands. Full of determination, she blasted a hole in the window and she flew out as fast as she can, leaving behind her cloak. She swiftly avoided numerous Republic star ships as she flew as close to the Republic battle cruisers as she could get, wanting to impress Grievous, she fired a Double Whammy shot at the Command Bridge, well, correction, what was LEFT of it. She decided to conserve on energy so she took a quick turn and fired a shot at a V-wing's engine, it caused the ship to fly out of control and land straight into the second bridge.

The Republic must have figured it out because soon laser started being blasted towards her but her artful dodging that she had been practicing with Grievous kept her from getting even a scratch. A homing missile was fired and began following her; but she was smarter than that. She flew DIRECTLY into the command bridge of the Republic ship, only to be given strange looks as they tried to hold on due to the air being sucked out. She only winked at them as she flew out of the way as the homing missile flew in and hit the bridge instead of her. She escaped with only a few minor black marks but she had one more ship left but the ships had figured out her strategy as battle ships began flying around the bridge. She had to re-think her plan now; luckily the tell-tale of a ship flying out of the hanger gave her an idea.

Flying a completely different direction, she surprised the Republic ships as she flew into the hanger, flying past the confused clone troops she flew into the core where all the clone technicians stopped working and all looked up at her in surprise. She only gave them a flirty grin.

"Hello boys. I have a message from my boyfriend, General Grievous…" well, he wasn't officially but she decided it was a good line to go out with. She turned her arm into a gun and charged it for another Double Whammy and pointed it at the glowing core. "He says; 'so long Jedi scum.'" She gave a flirty-like giggle as she fired at the core creating a huge explosion, which she was lucky to get out with only several burnt marks on her and feeling very pleased as she flew off. She turned and saw that her plan worked; Grievous' battle ships were eliminating the confused and lost Republic ships like they were flies; she then stopped in mid-air as she neared the Malevolence. This was the perfect and probably only opportunity she could get to escape now and go home…but, it was like the Malevolence was reeling her back. Before she could move, pain surged through her body as she saw that a stray V-Wing had shot at her before it was shot down by a Vulture droid. The pain was intense; her eyes began to close as she let the pain come over her…

Eventually, she found the strength to open her eyes as her vision became fuzzy but after some time of readjusting, she managed to see she was back in her room but Grievous was there, sitting on the edge of her bed, staring out the window. Was he waiting for her to wake up all this time?

"…grievous?..." she said weakly. He turned and looked at her.

"You came back…and you helped us to win…but I told you to leave while you could…" he said softly. He was trying to sound angry but he kept his tone down respectfully. She was sore, not in pain anymore but still, her body was sore.

"I had to…I couldn't stand the thought of them torturing you like you did to me but tenfold…I thought helping you would need some help…and I decided to send them a message…" she replied weakly.

"What message was that?" Grievous replied quietly, his face leaned forward so he could hear. She felt a bit shy to say it but she eventually worked up the courage and whispered.

"I told them…'Don't fuck with my boyfriend'…" she laughed weakly to herself; Grievous even laughed quietly as well with her. "Grievous…I'm sorry if I scared you…I-I just…I lo-"he put a finger to her 'mouth' and looked at her caringly.

"shhhhh…don't talk…" he said quietly, another hand moved to the pillow above her. She felt herself burning inside and logic slipping away as her eyes slowly closed and her hand moved up and touched Grievous' cheek. He leaned his head forward more as their faces were pressed up against one another. Passion burning between the two, they faces pressed together, despite the lack of 'lips' they didn't care at all; they felt only pure love and complete undying affection for each other. They didn't need to say anything, there was no need for that; it was just them and only them and nothing was going to take that away