A/N: I'm so sorry for the delay, I've had paper after paper due recently and now it's exam time but I'll still try to get updates in :) I hope you like it.

Disclaimer: I DO NOT OWN GOSSIP GIRL

Rated: T mostly for language.

Thanks so much to my lovely reviewers for your constant support: odyjha, Juicyxoxocharm16, smartin555, ana-12, chairlovforver, CarolinaGirl21, EZ11, roonilwazlib93, and tvrox12

Marcus was panicking. He couldn't be more thankful that he had arranged with airport security to meet Blair at the gate upon her arrival. With the current chaos he was unsure that even his level of clearance would have been enough to get him inside of the terminal. As it was he was freaking out all the same. He saw Roland rushing over and searched the man's face for some sign of what he had found out. His own emotions were too overpowering for the observation to be any good so he had to ask. "What did you learn?" He had sent Roland to the head of security in an attempt to discover what plane had gone down.

Roland simply shook his head. "Nothing. The head of security wouldn't speak with me."

"Damn it." Marcus roared causing nearby people to turn and stare even more than they already were. "I practically own this bloody country, why can't I find out the simple fact of what bloody plane went down." Everyone around him backed up, his security was well aware of Marcus's temper when it came to something he was passionate about and he had never been more passionate about anything than he was about Blair. They were all scared of what he would do if it had been Blair's plane that had crashed twenty minutes ago. "Hand me the phone." He said to Roland through gritted teeth.

Marcus dialed quickly and waited impatiently for the answer. "Hello, yes, this is Marcus Beaton Rhoades. I need to know the number of the flight that crashed." After a pause he replied. "I don't care how classified the information is, I'm the bloody Prince and it is imperative that I know. So if I am not informed of the flight information and passenger list of the flight that went down in the next five minutes, I will have every employee of this airport fired." With that he hung up and sighed, if that didn't get him the information that he needed, nothing would.

Roland reached over and placed a hand on Marcus's shoulder in an attempt to turn him around but Marcus shrugged him off. Roland replaced his hand once more. "Sir."

Marcus immediately jerked around furious. "WHAT?" But his rage halted as he saw the direction that Roland was pointing; Blair. He immediately started walking towards her, attracting her attention. She nodded slightly in his direction, looking frazzled which was completely understandable as she had just survived a near death experience. Marcus smiled in her direction as he picked up his pace but something else had drawn her attention away from him and her eyes had widened in shock or fear he didn't know. Either way he started to run towards her.

Chuck sat in his seat, absolutely terrified. He didn't know what he was going to do if that was Blair's plane. Or maybe he did know what he was going to do and that's what made sitting here doing nothing so difficult. He was aware that they were supposed to remain calmly seated but he couldn't know that Blair could be dead. He spotted a nearby flight attendant and motioned her over. As she approached, he spoke. "You know who I am?" He said as more of a statement than a question.

The flight attendant nodded. Of course she knew who Chuck Bass was; every airline attendant knew he was and not just because he was famous for his money. It used to be the case that if Chuck Bass was on your flight, he was going to invite you back to his room later, but that had changed as of late; it was rumored that he had fallen in love.

Good, this would be a lot easier if there was no explanation involved of what exactly the phrase 'I'm Chuck Bass' meant. "Then you know that I am serious when I say that I need to be the first one off this plane and that needs to happen as soon as we get to the gate."

The flight attendant knew that it would be breaking protocol to allow him off the flight but she also knew better than to say no to Chuck Bass. "Of course. As soon as we approach the gate, I'll come by and escort you out."

Chuck nodded his thanks and made a note of the girl's name. He would need to let the airline company know that she had served them well; after all, a recommendation from Chuck Bass was golden. Moments later when she approached him once more and gave him a nod, he immediately got up and followed her. As soon as she led him through the door he started running because as much as he didn't want it to be true, he had to know; he had to know if Blair was still alive. It barely registered in his head that due to the emergency landing, the plane had had to land in the same terminal as Blair's should have. In his mind, it only made his job of finding her easier; Marcus be damned.

As he exited the gangplank still running, he received several looks of confusion and worry from the gate attendants. No one should have been coming off the plane yet so the senior attendant walked over, "I'm sorry sir, but you shouldn't have exited the plane yet. I'm going to have to ask you to wait right here until emergency personal have calmed down the airport."

Chuck could see the chaos swirling around him, but he couldn't see Blair. He looked to her gate, the door was closed, no one had exited. It was of course a possibility that her plane had landed at another gate or that they were holding the passengers on her plane as well; but either way he didn't have time to deal with the gate attendant. So he turned to her and said in a no-nonsense voice. "I'm Chuck Bass; even Europeans must know what that means."

The woman's eyebrows rose. The boy was correct, she did know what that meant; but at the same time she could be fired for this. "Chuck Bass or not, I can't let you run around the airport right now; I'll lose my job."

Chuck shook his head frustrated. "If you lose your job, I'll hire you, now please step out of my way." Just as he spoke he spotted her across the terminal, looking flustered as she exited gate B-27 looking in the opposite direction. Chuck couldn't withhold a gasp as his heart soared; she was alive. He immediately moved around the gate attendant and started walking towards Blair as though it was a dream. His eyes didn't leave her face and it took only moments for her eyes to meet his. The only thing that confused Chuck was the fact that instead of relief in her eyes he saw fear.

Blair had gotten off the plane as quickly as she could once they were given the all-clear to disembark. In fact she wasn't entirely sure how she had managed to avoid Sergio but she knew that she had to get off immediately; she had to know that Chuck was okay. She practically ran into the terminal and immediately began looking around. After only moments her eyes caught Marcus's, damn it, that wasn't who she was looking for.

As she was contemplating the likelihood that she would manage to get away if she ran she felt something. It was the same feeling that she had every time Chuck stepped into a room; something down in her gut told her that he was with her. Blair followed her instinct and turned her head, her eyes immediately meeting Chuck's. She immediately felt relief wash through her; he was alive. But only seconds later she remembered who else was walking towards her and fear crashed down upon her.

Blair's eyes immediately switched back to focus on Marcus. She knew that they must betray too much because he had picked up his pace and was clearly trying to figure out where she had been looking. He was craning his neck to see over crowds exactly in Chuck's direction. Shit, what was she going to do? Marcus was about to see Chuck! With no alternative options coming to her mind Blair did the only thing she could think of to distract Marcus; she fainted.

As soon as Chuck saw Blair collapse, he broke into a run. What the hell had just happened? As he got close to her he fell to his knees and cradled her in his arms, "Blair, Blair! Are you okay? Wake up and answer me God damn it!" Had she been on the plane and somehow made it off only to collapse?

At first Marcus thought he had completely lost it. Everything happened so fast. Blair collapsed and fear completely seized his body causing him to run faster than he thought possible. That feeling lasted only a millisecond because almost before she hit the ground Chuck materialized seemingly out of thin air and anger began to rush through his veins. How was it possible? Was he sleeping; was this some kind of nightmare? Upon reaching them Marcus realized that Chuck was truly there even though Chuck seemed not to even notice him. Marcus turned to his security guards and with one quick flick of his head he gave them the order to grab Chuck.

When Chuck felt the first hand close over his arm, he looked up almost in shock. "Who the hell do you think you are? Unhand me before I call airport security."

Marcus smirked and even in his fear for Blair at the moment, he knew she was breathing and had a suspicion that she hadn't actually fainted at all. With another glance at Blair and her poor attempts not to react to what was going on around her, he looked back to Chuck. "I believe my personal security trumps airport security Bass."

At the sound of Marcus's voice, Chuck looked up startled. He hadn't even noticed his presence. As he did, another guard appeared on his other side, grabbing his arms and pulling him to his feet. Chuck immediately started to struggle, "I said get your hands off of me! I haven't done anything that garners arrest. And Blair needs help."

"What an unpleasant surprise finding you here. I suppose it couldn't be a simple coincidence could it?" Marcus shook his head, still smirking. "But Blair doesn't need help, do you sweetheart?" Marcus said in almost a sickly sweet voice as he leaned down by Blair. Then his voice turned harsh. "Stop faking and get up before I have Chuck arrested on actual charges." When he got no reaction from Blair, Marcus stood straight and looked Chuck in the eye. "Hold him." He hissed at his security guards before pulling back and slamming his fist into Chuck's face. He was seething and he knew it and his temper had reached a boiling point."If you ever lay a hand on my wife again, I'll do worst than have you arrested." Marcus threatened before bringing his fist back to accentuate the statement with another punch.

The gasps of the crowd followed by the sound of someone getting punched was enough to make Blair stop faking and shoot up from her spot on the floor. She jumped between Marcus and Chuck without thinking; all she knew was that she wasn't going to let Marcus hurt Chuck.

Marcus almost didn't react fast enough to stop himself from punching Blair as she appeared between him and Chuck; but he somehow managed. "Bloody hell Blair, what were you thinking jumping in front of my fist?"

"I wasn't going to let you punch him. It isn't his fault that we just happened to be in the same airport." Blair snapped.

Marcus scoffed, he didn't believe that Chuck being there was any kind of coincidence but he wasn't quite ready to address that just yet and would be willing to forget about it if she would just forgive him for what happened in France. Instead he found his voice softening. "I could have hurt you." He didn't give a damn about Chuck, he wanted to pull Blair into his arms and know that everything was going to be okay. He was just glad that she was alive; he wanted to erase their fight in France and go back to when things with them were getting better.

Blair noticed Marcus soften so she toned down her voice as well, even though she knew that what she was about to say was going to hurt him. "Hurting Chuck hurts me." As she spoke, she saw his face fall and lowered her voice. "So think about that before you carry out any of those threats you were just making."

Marcus could feel his breath quickening but tried to remain calm as he asked a question that he didn't really want the answer to. "Why is he here? What did you two do?"

Blair shook her head. "Nothing Marcus, we did nothing. I haven't seen him; remember you've had watch dogs on me twenty four/seven. As for why he's here you'll have to ask him." As if on cue Sergio rushed up dumbfounded by the situation at hand.

Marcus glared at Sergio before speaking. "Do you really think I believe that?" Marcus asked, temper rising once more. No matter how happy he was that Blair was alive, he could clearly see that she hadn't forgiven him for what happened in France and if she wasn't going to forgive him, he wasn't going to just let this little situation go. "I had already figured out that you had won Roland over and now it appears you've won over Sergio as well. I didn't even believe that to be possible."

This time it was Chuck who interrupted the conversation. "Drop it Marcus, it's not her fault. I spent Christmas in Monaco like I always do. I was changing planes here on the way to New York and spotted Blair across the terminal. When I saw her pass out I . . . I ran over here." Chuck didn't want to admit the fact that Blair passing out had completely terrified him. When Marcus looked at him skeptically Chuck tried to jerk his arms out of the hold the guards had. "IF you would have these buffoons release me, I'd get out my tickets and show you."

"Fine." Marcus said stiffly. "Release him." The second the command was uttered, the guards freed Chuck's arms and took a step backwards.

Chuck immediately straightened out his suit and shot a dirty glance at the guards upon being let go. But then he reached into his suit pocket and pulled out the tickets that he had feared would come in handy.

Marcus glanced over the boarding passes, hardly believing that it could be possible that this was just a coincidence. He looked back up, glancing between Chuck and Blair. "So you didn't know that Blair was in France?"

Chuck arranged his face in the perfect look of surprise. "You were in France?" He asked Blair, sounding completely awestruck.

"At Daddy's Vineyard." She replied, amazed by Chuck's performance. "And you went to Monaco just like you always do? I thought that you would spend the Holidays at home with your family."

Chuck nodded and looked away from her. He couldn't believe that this was working so well. "Yeah, I wanted Nate to come but he refused to be away from Jenny for the Holidays."

At the mention of Nate, Marcus's head popped up. "Ha, there it is. You had to have known Blair was in France. Nate knew and he certainly would have said something. He's your best friend. Or if not him, one of the others who visited for New Year's most definitely would have told you." Marcus said sounding victoriously vindicated.

Almost thrown for a loop, it took Chuck a moment to respond. "Nate being my best friend is the exact reason he wouldn't have told me that Blair was spending the Holiday's away from you. He knows me well enough to know that I would have tried to see her and he knows me well enough to know that that would have been a bad idea; they all do." Just as Chuck finished he heard Blair gasp.

Blair was hardly paying attention to the back and forth between the guys anymore. Her gaze had wandered to a nearby television as it reported on the airplane crash. As she saw raw coverage of the plane getting hit by lightening, the instant explosion of flames, and the impending crash, she gasped. It was almost as though she couldn't get enough oxygen. Watching that crash made her feel physically ill, that could easily have been her plane or Chuck's.

Upon hearing Blair gasp, Chuck followed her gaze; not paying attention as Marcus continued to argue that Chuck had to have known that Blair was in France. He took in the sight of the plane and began to read the horrifying words scrolling at the bottom of the screen. There were thought to be no survivors of the 120 person flight, but of course with a crash like that how could anyone survive? That's when he saw the next words, so small and seemingly insignificant, yet so tremendously important. 'Eleanor Waldorf and design team reportedly on flight.' Holy shit, Blair. With one look at her face he could tell she hadn't seen it and immediately turned her to him. What was he going to say, what was he going to do? Her mom was dead and no matter how much he might loathe Eleanor Waldorf, Blair loved her mother and needed her acceptance even though she had never seemed to get it. He knew if it was his father who died, he would still be crushed.

"What are you doing Chuck?" Blair asked bemused. "I was watching the coverage of the plane crash." When Chuck looked at her sadly, she kept talking. "What if that had been one of our planes?"

Marcus, fed up with their show of affection, interrupted. "Did you not hear me Chuck? I want you on the next available plane to New York." But he saw the look of terror on Chuck's face and stopped. He might hate Chuck Bass, but Chuck Bass did not scare easily, it was one thing that Marcus found bearable about him. So when Chuck grabbed his collar and pulled Marcus's ear towards him, he didn't fight it.

Chuck knew Blair thought he was insane but right now he didn't care; she couldn't find out about her mom from a television screen. So he pulled Marcus towards him and spoke through gritted teeth. "Get Blair out of here, somewhere private, right now."

Confused Marcus had no idea what Chuck was talking about and pulled away only to see the television screen that Chuck had turned Blair away from. His eyes immediately sought the words on the bottom of the screen to find out just what was going on, but when he saw his heart plummeted and he understood Chuck's fear. However much he despised Chuck he knew that Chuck loved Blair and knew that Chuck was right, Blair couldn't see this. Mere seconds later, his phone rang and as he answered and listened as the words on the screen were being confirmed by the airport security whom he was hassling only minutes ago. "Yes I am aware." He spoke into the phone before hanging up and nodding at Chuck, for once both of them were on the same level, they had to do what was best for Blair, and if that meant working together then they would. "Follow me." He said softly to Chuck.

Chuck took Blair's hand in his and followed Marcus, putting his faith in the man he hated the most. As they walked Chuck had a strange realization, as he surprisingly discovered that the one thing that he trusted about Marcus was the fact that he loved Blair.

The recent actions of the guys only increased Blair's bewilderment. "Chuck, what's going on?" Blair asked as she allowed him to lead her. She could tell by the look in his eyes that something was wrong. Not to mention, Marcus was allowing Chuck to hold her hand in public as they practically raced through the airport. People were staring and pointing making Blair begin to look around for some sign of what was going on. Sure she had gotten used to people looking at her, after all she had just married a prince, their prince, but there was something else in their gazes. The only word that she could find that would fit was pity; but why would crowds of people be pitying her?

Marcus sighed as they came to the VIP Lounge of the airport. It took the security placed at the door one look at who was before him to open the door. The least notable of the group was the daughter of a famous fashion designer who happened to be married to one of the English Princes who was also present and the third of the group was the heir to Bass Industries (the most successful corporation in the United States). Marcus immediately walked over and turned off the TV, after all the rush to get Blair here, he wasn't going to let her find out about her mother from a television now. As he turned around he saw Chuck sitting Blair down on one of the sofas and Chuck running a hand through his hair. Marcus couldn't help but think that he looked broken and wasn't sure what to do.

Blair looked to Chuck and noticed his distress. Why wasn't he answering her? So she turned to Marcus hoping that he would tell her why he and Chuck were seemingly getting along all of the sudden. So she repeated the same question she had asked Chuck earlier. "What's going on?"

Marcus exhaled and looked away, before looked back to Blair's now worried eyes. He began to walk towards her and sat down next to her on the sofa, Chuck still kneeling on the ground by her feet. How do you tell someone that their mother is dead? He looked to Chuck, who met his gaze. For a moment it was as though they communicated without words. Chuck knew Blair better, had known her longer, he would tell her.

Chuck sighed. He didn't want to do this, he didn't even know how; but he didn't have a choice. He knew that he had to be the one to tell Blair what had happened; it had to be him. "Blair"

The sound of her name drew Blair's attention back to Chuck and she had to hold back a gasp at the look of anguish in his eyes. What had happened to shake him up so badly? What could be so horrific?

"It's about the plane crash." Chuck said slowly, gently. His eyes tried to convey what words couldn't seem to and her eyes appeared to respond with some kind of understanding. There had always been that silent communication between them as though their souls were conversing.

Blair did her best to read him through his eyes, read his soul and along with his words, some sort of understanding began to come over her. Someone had been on that plane, someone important. "Who was it Chuck? Was it Jenny and Nate? Serena and Dan?" She knew her voice was getting shrill, she was panicking.

Chuck just shook his head slightly and opened his mouth to speak, dreading the words that he was about to bestow. "It was your mother, Blair."

Blair pulled back slightly. "What?" She spoke slowly, confused. "My mother is in New Yo . . ." She stopped speaking in the middle of her sentence, her mind flashing back to the plane ride and what Sergio had said. "He's arranged a surprise for you. Your mom is going to London to meet with a client and he's arranged a visit." She had been so calmed and subdued but the realization of the truth of Chuck's words, and Marcus's actions came together and woke her up. "No." She shouted. "No, that's not possible, it's not." But Blair didn't even get through the sentence without breaking down. Her tears were streaming down her face as she collapsed into Chuck's arms, simply repeating "no" over and over again to which Chuck could only respond. "I'm so sorry; I am so very sorry Blair."

Marcus stood up from his position on the couch. He wanted to do something for Blair, anything that would comfort her or help her but he knew that the only one who could do that right now was Chuck. So he walked quietly from the room, leaving them there to grieve; knowing he was helping her in the only way that he could.

Gossip Girl here with tragic news, reports have been streaming non-stop from London that there was a fiery plane crash at Heathrow. Lucky for us, our favorite Upper East Siders who have been frequenting that airport of late, are safe and sound, however, it seems that B's mom was on board the plane. Our condolences to our forever Queen.

xoxo
gossip girl

A/N: Hope you all enjoyed. Reviews are always appreciated.

xoxo
kate