Disclaimer - before I forget, I don't own GW and I'm not making any monetary profit from this story.

Note- many thanks to KS for editing, suggestions, and the brilliant title; to Snow and Alonzo for feeding my llama fetish; and to my loyal reviewers…

Flying Llamas and Other Fantasies:

In the end, I arranged to meet Heero at the Sanque Embassy; Noin had a chopper ready to take off, so it made sense for us to go straightaway. That still meant hanging around for fifteen minutes or so, until it had had had its final checks before take-off.

At my suggestion, Marlie took the two little girls to look out the window of the small café situated on the building's rooftop, and I drew Nat away to a corner table.

He'd known Ali; someone was going to have to tell him that another of his friends had been murdered.

'What the fuck is going on?' he demanded, as soon as we were out of earshot of the girls? 'You're kicking us back out on the street, aren't you? I knew I should never have trusted you.'

'No! Nat, I swear, I'll never let that happen to you, and nor will Heero. Just listen to me, OK?' I held his gaze until he nodded. 'We just have to move somewhere else for a while.'

'Why do we have to move? It's all right here?'

I smiled faintly at that. When I'd been thirteen, a warm, safe building, with regular meals laid on would have seemed like paradise too. If I'd ever allowed myself to dream about a place like that.

'We're going to stay with some friends of mine. You know one of them has been in hospital; well, he was discharged this morning and they've arranged for us to stay with them. I think you'll like it; they've got a big house with a garden and a swimming pool.'

'That sounds OK, I guess.' He glanced over at a hovering waiter. 'Can I have a beer, Duo? Marlie keeps getting us to drink milk and it's gross.'

'Dream on,' I grinned at him. 'Even if I let you drink alcohol, no way would they serve you alcohol here. You can have soda or juice.'

'I'll have a coke, please,' Nat managed to look hard done by as he gave the waiter his order. 'And a straw. And could I have a doughnut or something?'

'Coke for me as well, please.'

'Will Marlie be staying with us?' He blushed faintly. 'Not that I care, but the girls would miss her.'

'She's coming with us for now. I'm not sure how long she'll be able to stay; I'll have to check with her boss,' I hedged, struck by the realisation that Marlie might not actually want to stay with them. After all, she was a qualified agent, and I'd basically stuck her with a baby-sitting job.

'She's OK,' he admitted, clinking the ice cubes in his drink. 'She's kind of weird though; I mean, she knows you're with Heero and all, and she still has a thing for you. She was really upset when she heard you were missing, and Heero went totally apeshit. He rang Marlie and I could hear him yelling down the 'phone.' He set his glass down suddenly. 'He does know you're OK, right?'

'I've spoken to him,' I said, slightly irritated that everyone seemed to think I went out of my way to worry the life out of poor Heero. My own guilt complex was doing a quite efficient job of making me feel bad about that; external prodding was unnecessary.

Nat nodded. 'Good. Look, I don't mind going back to living by myself; it's just not right for Lily and Gem. Before my dad died, I promised I'd always look after them.'

'What happened to your dad, Nat?' I asked softly.

'He got real sick. It was called cancer. He was sick for months and he died when Lily was only two. We were on our own for a bit, and then Mom married this guy called Fred. He got a job on L4 so we moved here,' he blew bubbles down his straw and then took a long slurp. 'It was OK at the start; he was working on some satellite so we didn't see him much. Then he lost the job, and he was home all the time. He used to hit my Mom and when I tried to stop him, he hit me too. I said I wanted to kill him, and Mom said that was bad, that it was wrong to kill people.'

He fiddled with the straw for a moment. 'I don't think it's wrong to kill bad people. Anyway, Mom got hit by a car one day and they took her to the hospital but it wasn't a very good one and she died a week later. Then it was just us and Fred. These guys used to come by and he made me do stuff with them. He said I couldn't tell anyone 'cause no one would listen to a kid, and I'd just get in trouble and we'd all be sent to different orphanages and we'd never see each other again,' His voice sounded suddenly different, like he was mimicking someone. 'He said he'd taken us all in out of goodness, but I had to help out by earning money. And if I didn't do it, he'd have to try to make money out of the girls instead.'

'I heard him talking to this guy one night; the guy offered him a whole lot of money if he could do stuff to Gemma, and Fred said OK, so I waited 'til Fred was asleep that night, and I took his wallet and the three of us ran.

'We met Kyle. He was great; he used to let us sleep in his place if he wasn't working, and he told me stuff about going with guys, and stuff' He fiddled with his straw. 'I had to do something, you know and I was too young to get a job anywhere else. 'He told me all about protection and shit, stuff Fred never cared about.'

Oh, God. I made a mental note to have a doctor give Nat a check-up, just in case. He'd spoken hesitantly at the start; now it was like he couldn't get the words out fast enough. 'I had to do something, Duo. I know it was wrong but we needed money and I didn't know what else to do.'

'I know. You only did it to help them.' I took a deep breath. 'A friend of mine used to say that the first rule was to look after the younger ones.' Damn, was it ever not going to hurt; talking about Solo? 'That keeping them safe was the important thing.'

'Kyle was like that. Sometimes he used to buy us food when I didn't have any money. He used to help people all the time, if he could. I really miss him.'

'I know,' I said softly, thinking of Solo, and then of another boy on another colony who'd also tried to help lost children, and who'd died for it. I couldn't help wondering if Quatre knew his rescuer was dead; if he'd tried to help him. 'Nat, do you remember the first day I met you? There was another boy with you?'

'Ali, yeah, I remember.' Nat noisily slurped up the rest of his soda and I motioned the waiter to bring another one.

'Was he a good friend of yours?'

'He was all right, I guess. I didn't know him that well; he was Kyle's friend, really. Sometimes he used to give the girls sweets and stuff.' He shrugged, biting into his doughnut and wiping his hand across his mouth. 'He was always mouthing off about this rich guy he went with, who bought him everything he wanted. He'd bought Ali his own apartment in a nice part of town, but he used to call by to see Kyle sometimes. They were pretty tight, those two. Why d'you want to know, anyway?'

'He's dead. The Preventers found his body yesterday. Someone hurt him really badly.'

The boy didn't say anything at first, picking up his glass and swirling the ice cubes around. 'D'you know why?'

'I don't think anyone knows yet,' I prevaricated. Sure, no one actually knew, but I had a pretty damn good suspicion. 'The Preventers are investigating it. You said he didn't live around there, Nat. Was it normal for him to call to see Kyle so early in the morning?'

Nathan shrugged. 'Dunno. We weren't always around but I think it was mostly at night that he called by. David was married and Ali said he liked to go home in the evenings; read his kids stories and stuff.'

'David?' I tried to sound casual. Dear God; it couldn't be. 'Did Ali tell you his boyfriend's other name.'

'Yeah. Can I get another doughnut? Marlie likes all these stupid eat salads and shit.' I summoned the waiter and ordered a basket of pastries. 'He was called David Souhef. He was OK, actually.'

'You've met him? When?'

'We went to his house about a month ago; me and Ali and Kyle. His wife was away and I guess he wanted to have a little party for himself. He got the three of us to do stuff with each other, and then he took Ali upstairs. Kyle and me got to sleep for a bit on this huge couch, and then he drove us home. I saw Ali a couple of weeks after and he was bragging about how lucky he was to have this rich boyfriend who was crazy about him, and how David had this big scheme that he was gonna end up running the colony.'

'Really?' I tried to sound all casual, tried to calm my heart rate. 'Did he tell you anything about it?'

'Nah. Kyle said he was just making it all up and Ali got really pissed off. They started to fight about it, and I took Lily and Gem off for a bit; then I didn't see Ali 'til the day we met you.'

'Duo?' Marlie interrupted him, arriving at the table with the two girls and a huge duffle bag. 'We're ready to take off,

'What's in here? Rocks?' I teased, relieving her of the bag.

She grinned back. 'Not quite. Heero bought the kids some clothes and things; I didn't want to leave them behind.'

Oh. I hadn't even noticed that they were all wearing new clothes. Damn, I should have thought of that myself.

The helicopter pilot turned out to be a friend of Marlie's; a young agent called Gabriella Santini who was quite happy to set Nat sit in front beside her and answer all his questions.

Gemma sat with her face pressed into Marlie's shoulder, but Lily would have hung out of the window if she could, looking so she told us, for flying llamas.

'They only live on Earth,' her older sister informed her. 'Isn't that right, Duo?'

It was the first thing she'd ever said to me, and I found myself nodding before I'd realised what I'd committed myself too.

Oops. It was too late to back-track, what with Lily's huge eyes gazing up at me. 'Wow! I wish I could see one. Maybe I will, if I wish really hard.'

Damn. Maybe I could ask Trowa to buy me a llama and train it to use a hang-glider? Or a parachute?

There was quite the reception committee waiting when we arrived at the Embassy; Heero, Wufei, Relena and Dorothy, the ambassador's wife, and a couple of Sanque guards hovering around.

I stepped out of the helicopter and straight into Heero's arms, burying my face in his shoulders and letting him hold me as tightly as he wanted. By the time I finally looked up, Mrs. Ambassador, whose name I couldn't for the life of me remember, was shepherding the others toward the house, and only Wufei was standing by us.

The really odd thing was, he didn't look like he was sizing up Heero to decide where best to hit/shoot/skewer him first. He looked oddly approving.

It was seriously weird.

Heero let me go and Wufei took over; wrapping me in his arms.

'We've been so worried about you. What the hell happened?'

'It's sort of a long story.' I fished out the piece of paper I'd written everything down on during the flight, and thrust it into his hand. 'You really need to read this, 'Fei. Those guys you shot, they did attack you, so you can stop worrying about what you did. Where's Tro?'

'On his way here,' Wufei told me. 'He'll be another hour or so. Duo, you look like hell. Are you sure you're all right?'

'I guess. Look, can I tell you everything when Tro gets here? He'll need to hear it and I don't want to have to go over the same stuff twice.' I took a deep breath. 'Please, guys, I'm really sorry you were worried, and I will tell you what happened, I swear. I just - need a minute to myself. Is there somewhere I can take a quick shower?'

OK, there obviously was no way in hell they were going to let me off that lightly; Wufei actually tightened his grip on my arm in case I took off and Heero opened his mouth to say something. Then the really freaky thing happened. They both exchanged this - indescribable look, as it they'd suddenly acquired the ability to read each other's thoughts.

'Of course,' Wufei said gently. 'Heero, why don't you take him up to your room? I'll call Trowa and tell him to hurry.' He released me and Heero immediately took my hand and led me towards the house, starting to feel like we were playing some bizarre pass-the-parcel game.

I hadn't wanted to talk, but it seemed even stranger just to walk like that without saying anything. 'Where is Tro? I thought he'd be here with you guys.'

'He's out looking for you,' Heero said quietly. 'When we found out you were missing, we checked the security cameras outside the hospital. There was a blue SUV following you; we traced the registration and Trowa went to the owner's house. He called just before you got here to say that he was on his way back.'

'OK.' God, they all must have panicked, when I'd suddenly dropped off radar. One more thing for my overloaded brain to have to deal with. Much easier just to think about flying llamas.

'What?' Heero stopped suddenly, staring at me like I'd said something weird. Oh. Then it dawned on me that maybe I'd said that last bit aloud.

'Nothing,' I said quickly. ''Ro, could you maybe check up on the kids for me? I keep bringing them to new places and dumping them on total strangers.'

'Of course I will. But they've got Marlie, and Diana will look after them. You know that.'

'That's her name. Diana!' I exclaimed. I'd been thinking Dana or Delia or something. 'It's so stupid; I've met her a bunch of times and I couldn't think of her name. Yeah, they'll be OK with her; she's got kids of her own though they're all grown up now. They're going to love it here'

Heero let me ramble on as we walked up the marble staircase and found his room. I think he'd planned to come into the bathroom with me, but I made it in first, and got the door closed.

Just in time, actually. I turned the shower on full blast and then collapsed over the toilet bowl, throwing up the breakfast I'd shared with Heero that morning.

Oh, God. I really hoped Heero wasn't listening at the door; he'd looked worried enough about me already.

After I'd got to the dry-heaving stage, I undressed a bit shakily, leaving my clothes in a heap on the floor, the violet boxers I'd worn for Heero a making a vivid splash of colour against the dark fabric of the suit.

I had the shower on its hottest possible setting, but nothing was going to able to wash the guilt away.

The words on the coroner's report were skittering through my brain; I kept seeing Ali's poor, broken body on the metal trolley.

Another one to join the list of my dead.

If I hadn't met Ali; or if I'd realised earlier that he might be in danger, he might still be alive.

My fault.

Again.

'I'm so sorry.' I wasn't sure if I was speaking to Ali, or Solo, or some younger version of myself.

I hadn't managed to save Solo either.

There had been vaccines for the plague on L2, but they'd cost money. No one was going to waste expensive medicines on worthless street kids. Not when there were people who actually thought that maybe it was nature's way of getting rid of some of the refuse on the streets.

By the time I'd finally psyched myself up to go and earn the money we needed, it was too late. Maybe if I hadn't taken so long to get it, they'd still be alive. But I hadn't realised it would hurt so much, how long it would take just to be able to move afterwards or how much blood there would be. Solo had said it wouldn't be too bad. I'd never been able to work out why he'd lied; whether he just hadn't known, or whether he'd known and said it anyway.

In the end, it hadn't mattered.

I'd been too late; they were too far gone by the time I got back. Or maybe I hadn't even given them the right stuff. I couldn't have gone to an official clinic or they'd have thought I'd stolen the money, so I'd bought the vaccine off some guy hawking stuff on the street. He'd claimed to have stolen it from an official medical shipment but he'd probably lied.

I hadn't been able to save the Maxwell Church either; I'd been too late then.

Too late.

Wasn't that just the story of my whole fucking life?

God, I'd even watched Heero self-destruct; I'd been so sure he was dead at first. Another victim for Shinigami. Deep down, after the War, I'd sometimes wondered how long it would take for that curse to catch up with me, with Heero. I'd watched him go off on every mission and wonder if this would be the one he wouldn't return from, just because I was in love with him.

'Oh my love. That's enough.' The water supply stopped abruptly and Heero appeared through the billowing clouds of steam, sliding the doors open. He had a massive towel wrapped around me before I could do anything, gently uncurling my fingers from the brush I'd been using to scrub my skin raw.

'You're clean, sweetheart. I promise. Now, let's get you dry, hmmm?'

I gave him a jerky little nod; God, I'd probably laugh at myself for being such a wuss later on, but it was the easiest thing in the world to let him dry me off, and wrap me in one of those big Turkish towel robes. I was starting to think he carried a supply of nightwear in his pocket, and then I had a vision of him going around with underwear and pyjamas trailing behind and heard myself give this really weird little giggle.

'Duo!' His fingers grasped my chin, hard, and made me look up at him. 'It's all right. I promise. Just breathe, OK?'

I wasn't sure how long it took to calm down; I'd been teetering the edge of a panic attack ever since I'd gone to the morgue, and my little conversation with Nat hadn't helped at all. There were way, way too many old memories stirring inside my head, clamouring to be taken out of their box and played with.

'OK,' I said finally, rather proud that my voice sounded more or less normal. 'Sorry about that. I didn't mean just to lose it.'

Heero's answering snort was the oddest little fusion of affection and scorn and indulgence. 'You are the strongest, most compassionate person I have ever met. Don't you dare apologise for being affected by a child's death. I'm the one who's sorry,' he gasped into my hair. 'I never meant for you to go to the morgue alone. I knew you'd want to see the body, and I wanted to be there with you.'

'I - I just wanted to get it over with.' I'd known all along that he'd meant to be there with me, but it wouldn't have helped. It would probably just have upset him. 'You…saw him, didn't you?'

His chin ducked in a quick gesture of assent. 'I threw up too.' Damn, so he had heard. I flushed, imagining him listening at the bathroom door, forcing himself to give me that little piece of privacy. 'Oh, Duo. What can I do?'

'Find the bastards who did that to him,' I whispered fiercely. 'I want them to pay, Heero. I saw him; I read the coroner's report. God, 'Ro, make me stop thinking about it. Please. I keep seeing stuff in my head; imagining what it must have been like for him.'

His hands ghosted up my arms, slid the robe back from my shoulders, impossibly gentle. 'No more thinking,' he promised.

'Sorry it's not Kevlar,' I muttered, trying to get a grip on my emotions. I felt horribly vulnerable, half naked and with all my defences crumbling about me, but there was need and desire and arousal in there too, feeling his touch on my skin. 'Like in your fantasy, you know?'

'Kevlar's over-rated.' His voice was a low whisper, raising goose-bumps on my skin. 'Besides your underwear's already off so it doesn't count.'

'What's that supposed to mean?' I managed to tease. 'That you don't like me naked in your fantasies?'

'Let me show you,' his fingers found the belt and undid the knot, 'just how much I like you naked.'

Somehow we were both naked by the time we'd taken the few paces to reach the bed; an easy matter for me as he'd only had to slide my arms out of the robe, and let it fall on the floor.

What we'd done that morning had a been a slow, careful ballet of sweet kisses and soft caresses. I'd wanted it then, wanted that tender, almost reverent contact, but it wasn't what I needed right now.

Oh, he tried to keep it gentle, cradling me against him like some fragile thing, and brushing kisses across my face. Ephemeral touches that weren't enough. Instead, I craned my neck and nipped at the strong pulse of life in his neck, hard enough to make him gasp, and then grasped his earlobe between my teeth, biting down on the soft, pliant little piece of flesh

'Oh, God, Duo.' His whole body shuddered; that had always been of one his more sensitive places.

'You did all the work last time, 'Ro. My turn, OK?'

I felt ridiculously happy that he didn't just let me roll on top of him, but indulged me in a little wrestling match first. OK, it was pretty obvious that he'd let me win; I mean the guy can make origami out of sheets of refined steel, but it still felt good.

I worked my way down his chest slowly, pausing here and there to taste a particular patch of skin, or tease a nipple with teeth and tongue, licked along the sharp angles of his hipbones, and then kissed my way that little bit lower down. I've never been able to deep-throat, unless I'm incredibly relaxed, or very drunk, so instead I gave him the Duo Maxwell version of a blowjob. I kissed the very head of his shaft, sucking the head gently, and then spitting on my right hand and then sliding it up and down his cock.

God, he was incredible; all silken skin lying over steely muscles, that smooth heat between his legs thrusting up into my touch, and soft little sighs when I touched him in certain places.

So very warm and responsive and alive.

There was nothing more to reality than this; his moan when I squeezed a little harder than before, and then let him go to touch his balls, and lick up the hard ridge of his shaft. When I curled my tongue around his head, dotting the petal-soft skin with tiny kisses, his hands tightened in my hair and when I swirled my tongue around his entrance, his whole body jerked backwards, whacking his head against the headboard with a loud crack.

'God, Duo!'

'Shit, Blue, I'm sorry.'

'My fault,' he said quickly, and then chuckled. 'I'll be sorry if you stop doing that.'

'Stop doing what? This?' I lowered my head back down between his legs, ignoring his cock for a change, and sucking at a little patch of skin on his left thigh, hard enough to leave a mark.

He spread his legs a little wider and lifted his hips, just a little but an obvious invitation nonetheless.

'No. Not like this.'

Not like this, with my mind fighting so hard to keep my demons locked up. I'd probably end up hurting him and I didn't want the first time we made love after so many years to be so - haunted.

'Come here then,' he urged me up beside him, gasping as my erection slid over his on the way, a jolt of electricity that surged through us both in a current of fire. The kiss was hard because that was how I wanted it; we ravaged each others' mouths, as we writhed together.

'Like this?' he demanded.

'Yes!' No room for thought anymore; no room for anything but pure sensation; his tongue battling mine as our bodies rolled and writhed together. Nothing but that indescribable movement of his erection gliding against mine. I had both hands clenched around his shoulders, my little anchor to the world, while the rest of my body was moving of its own accord. Heero was trying to find a rhythm for us both; he had one arm wrapped around my waist, and the other tangled in my hair.

I came first, hard against his belly and then just hung on while his body surged against mine, inexorable as an ocean tide, gasping my name, how much he wanted me….

'I love you,' he murmured gently after he'd found his own release, tucking me against his side in a tangle of limbs. My body had done that weird thing of simultaneously turning my bones to liquid goo, and also managing to pour molten lead in my veins.

I couldn't have moved if the entire world media had burst into the room and started filming us.

Mr. Organised, on the other hand, reached over for a box of tissues, and got us both cleaned up. Then he held me even tighter, and just talked to me. I lost track of what he was saying after a few moments; he could have been reciting Shakespeare or a bus timetable, but I just concentrated on his voice, letting it thread into my consciousness, letting me follow it until I could feel my heartbeat slow down.

He'd always been able to do that, ever since the night he'd rescued me from that OZ base, where I'd almost been raped. I'd woken for weeks afterwards with nightmares, and he'd pulled me out of them, made me feel safe and loved and home.

The first time we'd made love properly, I'd managed to let him take me by listening to his voice, and keeping my eyes firmly fixed on his. I'd steeled myself before for how much it would hurt, no matter how careful he tried to be, and the miracle was that it hadn't, that after the first stinging, inevitable pain, there had been joy and joining and that sudden swirl of ecstasy.

'That was…incredible,' I whispered, and then managed to tease him a little. 'And your stamina's improved a bit. I was wondering what had happened to that perfect self control of yours.'

'You happened,' he told me. 'Like always. You're smiling,' he whispered, brushing a kiss across my lips.

'So are you.' I could feel his mouth curve under mine, and caught his bottom lip between my teeth, nipping at the slick softness of it. 'I was just thinking, about our first time. Remember?'

I couldn't help wondering if anyone would ever do that for Nat; would ever show him how it could be.

'Always.' He propped himself up on one elbow, looking down at me. 'How could I ever forget? I remember everything about it.' His blue eyes searched my face, and I tried so hard to smile up at him; knew I wasn't doing a particularly good job of it.

'Tell me love,' he invited, settling me against him.

'It's just been…a royally shitty day, you know,' I muttered, pressing my lips across that tiny, faint scar on his arm. The place where I'd shot him the first time we'd met.

'I know,' he whispered back. Damn, of course he did. 'I was…so scared, love.' His voice was so low I could only just hear him. 'At first, I thought it was maybe something I'd done; that you'd wanted to get away, and then we found out what that stupid excuse for an agent had done. God, I thought I'd lost you again.'

'I'm here. Always. What you said about never letting me go, that goes for me too, I promise.'

'Oh, Duo.' He pulled me down into a deep, devouring kiss.

'We really should have stayed in bed this morning, you know,' I offered after I'd got my breath back. 'It would have solved a whole lot of trouble.'

'Mmm. There's a moral in there somewhere, isn't there?' His fingers threaded slowly through my hair. 'When this is all over, I'm going to take you away somewhere without telling anyone where we're going, and we won't bring our 'phones and nothing is going to disturb us.'

'No 'phones,' I agreed and then grinned. 'Does that mean no laptops either? How will you survive?'

'You'll have to entertain me,' his eyes gleamed at the thought of it.

'I'd like that, 'Ro. I'd really like that. Just the two of us.' Well, the two of us, plus Honey and the kids and a whole herd of flying llama and God knows who else.

'I had a talk with Nat, while we were waiting for the heli to take off. He told me all about how they ended up on the streets.' He waited, just stroking my hair and letting me take my time. 'It was the usual shit. Mother died; stepfather was an abusive bastard who whored Nat out for beer money, and would have done the same thing with the girls if they hadn't run off on him.'

Oh, damn. I hadn't really meant to talk about that, not just yet. Not while I was still trying to deal with what I'd seen at the morgue. 'What's the point, 'Ro? What was the freaking point of us fighting a war when this shit keeps happening?'

'Things are getting better,' he said softly. 'The Colonies were isolated for all those years; the Alliance officials in charge were usually corrupt. There wasn't a proper legal system, and bad things happened.. I know you don't approve of a lot of what the ESUN is doing, but they have passed child protection laws; there are special protection agencies to enforce them on the other Colonies, but L4 claims the problem doesn't exist.'

'Tell that to Nat,' I muttered, 'or all those other kids out there.'

'I know, love. It isn't fair. The problem is that all the L4 members of the Assembly refuse to acknowledge that child abuse could happen on their colony. Most of the children affected are orphans, or their parents are immigrant workers trying to eke out a living, so no one reports it officially. And it doesn't help that so many of these perfect family men are involved themselves.'

'Yeah. Heero, did you ever hear of a guy called David Souhef?'

He nodded. 'Of course. He's one of the most influential men on L4, although he keeps a fairly low profile. What about him?'

'He was Ali's boyfriend, according to Nat. He had the two of them, and Kyle, over to his house about a month ago for a little private party.'

'He raped Nat?' Heero demanded.

'It's not rape if it's your choice,' I said dully. 'I'm not really sure what happened; Nat said that he wanted them to put on a show for him. Nat said Souhef didn't touch him.' I shrugged. 'Dunno if that's true or not. And Souhef knows Quat, 'Ro. We have to talk to the others, there's a bunch of stuff I need to tell you all.'

'In a minute,' Heero pulled me back down beside him. 'Stay with me a little longer. Please?'

'Isn't that supposed to be my line? '

'Five minutes?' he coaxed. 'Wufei said he'd call when Trowa arrived; we might as well wait for him.'

'Five minutes,' I murmured, lying back against the pillows and letting him settle against me, face tucked into the curve of my throat. His hair is the colour of dark chocolate swirled with cinnamon; growing out from the crown in crazy whorls and spirals. Impossible not to run my fingers through it; to try to coax it into some kind of order.

'I'm sorry,' I mumbled. 'About before. You know. I just want it to be special when we do that. Not when my head's all screwed up about other stuff.'

'It will be special,' he told me firmly, twisting just a little so he could look up at me. 'I promise. Everything you do is special.'

'You're such a total sap, Blue,' I accused.

He smirked wickedly. 'I think that's because you bring out the sap in me, my love.'

Oh, God. That was so like something Zechs would say to 'Fei; maybe those two might actually end up being friends.

'So, babe.' I grinned when he pulled a face at the nickname. 'Do you want to tell me what happened between you and 'Fei?'

The oddest expression ghosted over his face for just a second; something I couldn't quite put a name too. Something oddly like fear.

'I mean, you two haven't talked in years, and you're suddenly on the same side. What did I miss?'

'We both realised that you were missing,' he said quietly. 'And that the only important thing was finding you.'