More Than Anything
Disclaimer: Gundam SEED and Gundam SEED Destiny are not my property; I do not own them or anything affiliated with the series.
Chapter Three
"How could you not tell me this?" Cagalli buried her face in her hands, her golden locks falling between her fingers. Her face was hidden, but one could hear the forced back tears in her voice. "How—why was this not mentioned earlier? Now people think we have something to hide, now—"
Shiho's heart broke at the sight of her friend's anguish. "Cagalli—I didn't know, you know I've only been here for a year, I've only been a part of the team for one year of testing—"
"I've worked so hard, I've tried so hard to keep this hospital's reputation up, but this, this ruins everything!" She couldn't help but think about Athrun's cold demeanor, revealing nothing, sparing her no kindness at all. 'And to think that he is the one I have to face... how did this week get this bad?'
xxxxx
The press conference had ended quite abruptly with the sudden news. The news reporters had clamoured all over this new information, crowding the podium at which Cagalli stood behind so confidently only moments before. She glanced at Uzumi pleadingly, and he stepped in.
"We will not be answering any further questions at this time until we have sorted out…"
Cagalli did not even care how Uzumi would handle the problem. She headed for the door desperately, Kisaka blocking anyone who got too close to her. Escaping the room, she glanced to her left, and saw the familiar blue hair she was looking for.
"Athrun."
He stopped mid-stride, and she noticed he gripped his briefcase just a little tad tighter. "Cagalli." He turned around, and it took everything she had to not avert her eyes.
"Athr—" At a loss for words, she couldn't even think of what to say. "I-it's been a while."
This was clearly not what he was expecting, and she was so glad she chose not to avoid that steady emerald gaze, for they softened just slightly. "Yes."
That dark blue hair looked as soft as ever. His jawline was more developed, she noted, and his posture seemed more confident, more secure than she had remembered. His voice, so deep and soft yet… so much colder than she had ever heard it.
"W-why are you doing this?" 'Don't tremble. You are the director of this hospital. You cannot show your weaknesses, not even to him.'
Athrun simply stared at her. "I have clients I need to represent. Nothing more."
"But…"
"I cannot make exceptions just because… of the past, Cagalli." He offered a bitter smile that cut at her chest. "This is my job…" he paused, and she felt the guilt she had been suppressing for years beginning to overwhelm her.
"… my duty."
xxxxx
"Cagalli, this is not your fault," Uzumi broke the tense silence that had followed her last outburst. "This is the fault of the researchers, they are to be held accountabl—"
"But I am the one that is responsible for them," the CEO snapped, standing up. Her face was red, but no tears have been shed. "I have to deal with them, I have to make the right decisions regarding this fiasco. One wrong move, and I will lose the hospital!"
Kisaka and Uzumi shared a look. "We are here for you, Cagalli, we will not let you lose this hospital." Kisaka's voice was firm, determined; "We know how much this place means to you and we know how much you have done for this place… how much you have given up. This hospital will not see you go."
"Shinn! What are you doing here?" Kira asked, as he saw his junior walk into the office. "Don't you have a date tonight?"
"She cancelled," the black-haired youth replied, shrugging. "Cagalli sounded really upset and I'm no good at comforting ladies…"
"Is that why Lunamaria broke up with you?" His boss inquired dryly, giving his employee a dirty look.
"Hey, I have no idea why, still. She just cried a lot and the only thing I understood was 'we need to break up'."
Kira had to try really hard not to throw something at the incredibly dense Shinn. "Alright, well, might as well get some work done while you're here."
"Planning on it," whistling some off-tune song, Shinn strolled into his office, leaving Kira alone in the office.
"I wonder why she cancelled," he muttered, before picking up his phone.
Dialing a very familiar phone number, he was interrupted by an incoming call. "Dearka?"
"Things just kaploded man. Cagalli's fucked, big time."
"What? Who slept with my sister? Did she find a guy already?"
"Shut up, you over-protective geek of a brother, that's not what I meant. And wait, why is that even the first thing you think of?" Kira could basically hear the headshake from the blonde. "Our firm has clients who are suing her company, big time, and Athrun is the one representing them. He's going to screw her over, no sexual innuendos whatsoever because this is not going to be a sexy affair."
Kira fell silent, his grip on his phone loosening. "That asshole."
"I don't know why he took it," Dearka continued, his panic evident even through the phone. "You have to understand, I would never have taken the case, I wouldn't have, it's Cagalli, how could I? But I don't know what's going on through his head lately. The sudden engagement, the taking of this case… I can't stop him, Kira, he's the boss."
The brunette was a loss for words. He knew his sister and Athrun's relationship did not end well, and Athrun had been hurt—heck, Kira was hurt as well from the decisions his twin chose to make. But was Athrun, the long-time sweetheart, actually angry enough to ruin everything for an ex-girlfriend?
"He's not the kind of person to do this," Kira sighed, brushing his bangs out of his face. "What the heck is going on here?"
"He's not the kind of person to leap into marriage either," agreed Dearka, "we would probably all have like seven kids before he even thinks about proposing."
"Can you talk to him?"
There was a pause on the other line. "I don't know, Kira, I haven't seen him in a couple of weeks myself. He's been busy, or avoiding me, I don't know."
"Can you please try? I'll give him a call, although I doubt he'll talk to me."
"I'll try. Good luck, Kira."
"Thanks for calling me, Dearka, I really appreciate it." Hanging up, Kira turned around and sat down in his office chair, contemplating what Dearka had told him.
The mystery of his sister's cancellation made sense, now, although he wished there had been a better reason.
He looked back down at his phone, at the number he had originally thought of dialing. He stared at it, before erasing it and typing in a new number.
Lacus was about to knock on her friend's office when she spotted very familiar brown hair. "Miriallia!"
The journalist slash photographer looked exhausted, her hair in need of some refreshening and her eyes dull with an ache for sleep. "Lacus, what are you doing here?"
"I heard about what happened between Cagalli and Athrun…" she bit her lip, hesitating. She glanced back at her friend's door before whispering to Miriallia, "Kira told me what had happened, I just want to check on her."
Miriallia sighed, her fatigue wearing her features down. "I talked to him. Cornered him, actually; he just told me to go away unless I wanted to be sued for harassment."
The pink-haired songstress suppressed a giggle. "I don't know if cornering him was the best approach, to be fair, you two are supposed to be friends!"
That got a roll of blue-green eyes. "Well, he's doing a great job proving otherwise. He's not supposed to be a complete turd either, otherwise he wouldn't be suing Cagalli's hospital."
"I can hear you two idiots, just come in!" Said hospital owner's voice shocked the two who were standing outside her door, and they went in, laughing. "What are you two doing here?"
"Kira made you some kebabs, he said you needed to stay healthy and alive." Lacus placed the box on the mahogany desk in front of the blonde, smiling sweetly. "If you don't eat it, I'll make sure Kira keeps making more and you'll have an entire mountain sitting here before long."
"Don't smile like that and then threaten me," grumbled Cagalli, opening the box. The heavenly smell of the kebabs made her stomach growl and she noted she probably hadn't eaten in quite some hours. Or days.
"You know Lacus," teased their friend, "she'll totally sing you to sleep with no guilt at all. She has absolutely no problems with threatening you for your sake."
Cagalli shook her head, kebab bits flying around. She was about to start talking when Lacus calmly shoved more kebab in her mouth, effectively rendering the blonde silent.
"That was easy," remarked Miriallia, watching the hospital CEO struggle to swallow. "We should do that more often, maybe she'd actually eat more than once a day."
"Kira would be the first to sign up for 'feeding Cagalli' duties." Lacus chirped, giving her eating friend a wink.
"You're not an angel," rasped the blonde, "you're a demon in disguise. No one should be that innocent and gentle-looking and have the stubbornness and will of a cow."
Lacus let out a small giggle, watching her friend carefully.
Cagalli looked even more tired than Miriallia. Her usually bright, amber eyes were duller, and she looked more like she was 30 than her usual 20.
Sighing, Lacus wished things hadn't gone this way. "Have you talked to Athrun recently at all?"
Miriallia glanced at the blue-eyed singer, raising an eyebrow. Cagalli shook her head slowly, frowning. "I haven't talked to him at all since we broke up. Well, until this afternoon."
"Hm…" Lacus frowned as well, her lips turning down as she tried to think of what Kira meant when he said, "Athrun's mad, Lacus. He says she'd deserve it. That she doesn't deserve to run the hospital because of what she let slip under her nose. That's not her fault, and he knows it, but he's blaming her anyways."
"Do you think he's still angry that you two broke up and all?" Miriallia suggested, her eyes suddenly a little brighter. "Your breakup didn't end well, maybe he's getting revenge?"
"Athrun is not the kind of person to drag personal affairs into his job," Cagalli shot back immediately. "He's an honorable man, he wouldn't do that…" Yet even as she said that, she recalled the glare she thought she had seen him give her. Perhaps he was… harbouring resentment, but to go this far to ruin her?
"She's right," Lacus murmured quietly. "Athrun has very strong feelings about justice, he would not be so petty as to drag up the past into something like this."
"More likely he truly believed I, my hospital, was at fault," the blonde leaned back in her chair absentmindedly. "I wouldn't blame him for that, considering what a mess this whole Insuliphax affair has become."
"I can't believe your researchers would be so stupid," the brunette was pacing around the room, rubbing her chin. "Have you questioned them yet?"
The CEO shook her head again. "Kisaka said he would take care of them and interrogate them. I've only talked to Shiho, but by the time she joined the testing team, the deeds had already been done."
"So what are you going to do now?" Lacus' warm blue eyes met the blonde's amber ones.
"I need to prepare the necessary documents… I'll have to meet with the lawyers, see what I can do in this situation." She just wanted to sleep. It was a Sunday, tomorrow would see the regular chaos of a working weekday and she just wanted to curl up in her bed and hide from the world.
"We'll leave you be, then," Lacus walked towards the door, Miriallia following. "If there's anything we can help you with, Cagalli, just let us know."
"I will, Lacus. Thanks for coming over, and tell Kira thanks for the kebabs!" Cagalli watched them exit, before looking back down at her mostly finished food. 'I guess I'll finish you first before tackling those documents.'
Heine stared at his boss in shock. "You're kidding me. You took this case?"
The blue-haired partner ignored him. "Are you going to go do your work anytime soon? Or did you just come in extra early to badger me?"
"Athrun, what the heck is wrong with you? Why would you take this case when you are very likely to be influenced by your personal feelings?"
"Cagalli and I broke up seven years ago, Heine." Athrun did not look up, his eyes glued to his laptop screen. "I am simply representing my clients."
"Dearka and I would have backed the heck away from this case, not just because it's Cagalli, but because of our friends!" Heine had to restrain himself from grabbing his boss and shaking the sense back into him. "This is not going to end well."
"Not for her," finally granting the associate his time of day, Athrun leaned back, his eyes narrowed. "I took this case because it can be an easy win. The Mackenzies are big names in the business; if we successfully represent them, we will gain them as a powerful ally."
The orange-haired associate struggled not to throw his bag at his boss. "Are you actually that power-hungry? Zala Law is big enough now. You could have turned down this case and it would've been perfectly fine!"
"We can't just get lax just because we finally expanded."
"Is that what you tell yourself? Is that what you've ingrained into your head?" Heine understood the other man's dedication to the firm – no, his obsession. He had taken the failing firm and brought it back into the light, brushing off the dirt that his predecessor had smeared into the name. Now that was a whole other issue.
"It is the truth." Apparently no longer interested in conversing with Heine, the partner returned to the documents and the laptop on his desk.
The associate sighed. "Athrun. Let me say this as your friend, but… this is not just between you and Cagalli, or between your clients and Cagalli, whatever you believe. This is going to ruin your relationships with everyone. Do you even care about your friends anymore?"
Heine didn't bother waiting for the answer; he turned around and left the spacious but dark office. He didn't want to know.
Athrun stopped writing, his pen stopped mid-word. He gazed at the photo by his desk, before letting a sigh escape him.
'Cagalli.'
Oh goodness, it's been more than a year since I last updated this fic; I'm so sorry! I tend to wander, but I made my way back onto FF… and well.
I had most of this chapter written out already, probably from last year… I added some things here and there so sorry if it feels kind of weird; I'm pretty sure I don't write the same as I did last year.
More apologies for the lame ending and more uneventfulness; I'll try and pick it up next chapter (but I am alas, a very slow-paced person with too much love for details and little things). "orz Do not worry though, I am pretty determined to write more chapters for this fic (and rediscover my love for AsuCaga).
I didn't really proof-read through this, so if there are any holes in my writing, do let me know!
Hope you guys enjoyed this (despite my long wait and ramble-y writing), and thank you for reading!
Lavellia.