SCHADENFREUDE
  by Ash Wednesday Lee

  The characters of Shin Kudoseki Gundam Wing belong to
  Sotsu Sunrise Agency.  I am sure they are wonderful
  people who I don't want to mess with ^.^.

  Genre: Drama, Angst, Fluff
  Pair: 1xR, 6x9 in this chapter
  Keywords: 1xR, non-yaoi, Sylvia Noventa, Quatre Winner
  Warnings: Just bad metaphors and characters under
  emotional torture.
  Rating: PG-13 for this bit.  And  beware of the evil repetitive words
  *lol*
  Summary: Heero and Relena learns what love is and what it represents.
  And in their education, experiences its painfully beautiful depths.

  CHAPTER 7: VICIOUS CYCLES

  The sky was naked blue, the sun scorching everything in
  an inferno of endless whites upon whites I had to squint
  against such immense brightness. But then, it could just be
  her, and everything else is  but the burning halo that envelops
  any path she chooses to take.  The path, in this case, happening to
  be eight floors above the ground.

  She was sitting on the edge of the building's rooftop,
  her back to me.  Looking ahead while the gales whipped
  her unbound hair this way and that.  We've been here
  before, not so long ago.  The circumstances slightly
  different, her reasons probably the same, though I can't
  seem to remember any of both.

  I watched her in the safety of that distance, memorizing
  her details before allowing my feet to nudge into motion
  towards her.  I've never been one to deny myself of her
  presence.  She has something that I crave, need and long
  for.  Something I've long refused to resist since I
  learned it was futile anyway.  And so I've let things be.
  Let her be, as I.

  I bent to pick up the discarded jacket that lay in a
  shapeless heap on the floor, mechanically folding it
  against my forearm while surveying the unsecured
  perimeters.  A habit I've never really grown out of.

  "I love you, Heero," she said.

  A habit she's never really grown out of.

  She was looking ahead.  Somewhere far and detached from
  where the wind was slapping against our skins.  Only I
  wasn't there with her.  And yet she couldn't be any more
  tangible than now.  Here.  She looked so real.
  Impossibly fragile in our nearness.  And like the truths
  I've long shut myself away from, I just let her be.

  Be impossible.

  Be whatever she wants.  So long as I satiate myself with
  my need of her without sacrificing her perfection.
  Without losing her in the process.

  She removed the shoes lying beside her and asked me to
  sit beside her.  Something clenched me from the inside at
  her request.  Her voice a brief but veritable reminder of
  my hunger for her.  My need to be with her, in every
  which way I can manage.  In every which way I am allowed
  to.

  I sat there, my arm brushing against hers, I allowed
  myself to close my eyes and bask in that nearness.  That
  warmth I deny myself just so I would yearn for more.  She
  was the light, I am the helpless moth.  Drawn in blind
  fascination of the conflicts and contradictions she
  carries with her.  The light with its shadows.  The
  pleasures of her warmth that are offered with the pain
  when you get burned.  My love and her hatred.  Her love
  and my hatred.

  "My father bought me these shoes when I was fifteen," she
  said, her fingers matching the delicacy of her voice as
  she smoothed over the satin surface, soiled with use and
  age.  Our eyes were traveling with her hands while I
  wonder in delicious dread what her fingers would feel
  like against my skin.  "I used to wear these when my
  father took me to balls and waltzed with him," she went
  on, the syllables vaguely making any sense to me.  Her
  voice, her scent, her hands... nothing else seemed to
  matter.

  With one swift motion she threw one shoe, then the other.
  I watched their quick plummet to the ground in surprise.
  When I looked at her, she was looking at the horizon
  again.  "Relena..." I began.

  "What purpose does a dance serve me now, Heero?"

  So simple.

  What clenched me from the inside was now a cold, gripping
  vise.  She now frightens me, just like how she frightens
  me every day with how much of me she held in her palm.
  And for a moment, I realized I wasn't breathing.  I
  realized I was looking in her eyes as they swam in tears.

  Something died inside her.

  Something was dying inside me.

  "What purpose do I serve you?" she asked, perhaps as
  frightened as I was.  Perhaps less.  She's always been
  stronger than any of us.

  Certainly stronger than me.

  "What?" I asked in a snap.  My defenses getting the
  better of me again.  My weakness more evident than ever.
  She went on, her eyes still had mine trapped, "I don't
  want to know.  I'm tired of the second, third and fourth
  guesses.  We can't do this anymore.  *I* can't do this
  anymore," she said, her voice impossibly steady despite
  the tears meandering down her cheeks.

  I dared not let go of her in our locked gazes, my hands
  were closed in fists spasmodically clenching and
  unclenching.  Again, she has stripped me naked, leaving
  me with nothing but my anger to hold on to.  "I'm
  letting go, Heero," she said, her eyes briefly staring at
  where her shoes now lay.

  "I give up.  You win."

  I looked away, not wanting the tears to come.

  But they did anyway.

  A few more breaths and I felt the beginnings of
  consciousness.

  ---------------------------------------------------------------------
  --------------------------------

  She watched the slow cascade of water down the sharp
  edges on the rocky protrusions, seeming as fangs emerging
  from the pebbled ground.  The harsh harmony of rain
  lapping at the rocks and the ravaging winds flirting in
  abandon with the few and proud oriental plants served
  none of the Zen garden's promised peace.  A glittering
  curtain of water dripping with the sound of soft giggles
  from the tiled roof sheltered her from the tempest that
  seemed to feed its fury with the deepening night.  And
  she would've been safe if not for what she saw.  What she
  knew.  As the storm feasted on the austerity of the naked
  land beneath, as the small droplets of rain pooled in the
  yielding crevices of the earth, so did her anger feast on
  her.  So did her fears and nightmares pool into one
  united hatred for that one person that gives her reason
  to hate still.

  Sylvia blinked, the faint hiss of steam escaping from the
  kettle's lips rousing her from stupor.  She gingerly
  relieved the stove of the tea-filled burden, careful not
  to spill any of the concoction onto the pristine white
  tiles of the quaint kitchen.  The room was silent, save
  for the demure clink of porcelain against porcelain as
  she began to prepare tea for two people, and the steady
  and regular breaths of the an unconscious occupant.

  As she poured the scalding content of the kettle into the
  waiting mouth of the smaller porcelain pot, she can't
  help but bask in the calming sound of his breath.  A
  welcome balm after an extremely frantic day.  With a
  grace that can only be inculcated by blood-borne
  aristocracy, she lifted the tray and made her way back to
  his waiting room.  She set the light burden on a bedside
  table and invited herself to sit on the bed and watch him
  sleep.

  She glanced at the clock across the room, reading the
  time as quarter past nine.  It's been five hours since
  Sally Po left Heero to her care.  Much to Sylvia's own
  insistence and the young doctor's evident confusion.  But
  it was a trivial detail she's not too keen on mulling
  over.  Her mind has already been overworked as it is.
  The scenes of the past day have been playing back with
  painful clarity and life.  She remembers everything.

  How lifeless he looked against the rubble.  The smell of
  explosives gone spent, choking her.  The deafening
  screams of frantic paramedics, observers,
  investigators... all of them ignorant of what just
  happened in that explosion.  It was a political issue, a
  gossip to pass time with over lunch at the cafeteria...
  to her, it was her firm grasp on happiness being
  snatched back.  Cold fear gripping her by the heart like
  she never knew it could.  Its talons tightening as the
  questions poured in, not wanting to stop.

  Even until now.

  Fragile hands reached for the sleeping man's cheeks.
  Seeking comfort, reassurance.  Blood rushing in livid
  enthusiasm, warmth suffusing  her skin.
  She gave out a sigh of contentment, "you give me so much,
  Heero," her hands wandered to his forehead, smoothing the
  stray locks away, "this life.  This love.  This reason."
  Her lips were a breath away from his temple, her whispers
  meant to permeate the barriers of sleep, "I've spent a
  lifetime looking for you.  I've sold my soul to hell just
  to hold you this way.  Feel your skin against mine,"
  nimble fingers traveled from his bandaged abdomen to
  his bare chest, in an attempt to succeed where words
  failed her.  "No one will take you from me."

  As if in answer, his naked shoulders twitched, his closed
  lids trembled, his mouth formed the syllables of a name
  that wasn't hers.

  "Relena."

  Something began to poke behind her eyes.  Something she
  can't seem to ignore.  She blinked it off and felt a tear
  slowly slide from her cheek to his own.  "No, Heero.  Not
  her.  Not Relena," she kissed her shed tear away from his
  cheek, "Never Relena."

  She will not succumb to the illusion that is Relena
  Peacecraft, like the rest of the galaxy had.  And
  certainly not to the clueless and the indomitably selfish
  Relena Darlian herself.

  She fell asleep repeating those words in her lips.  A
  frantic lullaby.  The plea of a love-hungered soul
  refusing defeat.  The calm beat of his heart against her
  ears, her hands gripping his arm in desperation.

  'Never letting go.'

  And she wanted nothing more than to be in his dreams as
  he was in hers.

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  -------------------------------

  Noin watched his footsteps mirrored in the small ripples
  they create on the forgotten cups of coffee on the table
  before her.  She would have had a fresh batch prepared,
  but she knew that it too would go ignored.  She would ask
  him to sit down and have a try for at least some sleep,
  but she knew he would get up and pace listlessly again
  after a few minutes.  And so she did what six years of
  marriage taught her about her husband and watched him in
  silent understanding.

  Understanding.  It is hard to grasp such a concept
  when one is searching for it as well.  When one seeks for
  the validation and absolution the other is looking for as
  well.  But it wasn't hard for her to fall in love.  And
  falling in love is just as good as a sedative being shot
  directly into your bloodstream, devouring all emotions,
  until nothing more is left but that all-consuming love.

  Not sparing pain.  Not sparing doubt.  Not sparing your
  own needs.

  She cast him a brief glance.  His grace unerring in his
  unmeasured steps.  She almost felt sorry the moon
  wasn't out that night.  If there'd been a moon, its
  beams would be caught in a tangle in the lustrous fall of
  silver behind him.  It would've shone on his face and
  caught the perfection of his skin, his bones, his flesh.
  If there'd been a moon, he'd be as beautiful and perfect
  as she has etched him in her mind's eye.

  And more.

  But his eyes were troubled, his hair tousled by frequent
  encounters with his rash fingers pushing it away.  He
  was a mess.  He has been since they got here, a good
  nine hours ago.  And she wished for nothing more than to
  gather him in her arms and offer him more than the
  understanding he's bargained for when she agreed to marry
  him.  But she knew he wanted none of it.  He only asks
  for her to be in the shores after he has battled with the
  maelstrom plaguing him to the core of what is left of his
  soul.  There'd be wars waged with the demons of his past,
  of the present and of where both coalesce.  An anchor to
  pull him back, a beacon to give him directions after the
  turbulence has settled... he didn't need her as a weapon
  to aid him to conquest.  He needed her as a wife.

  And thus is their love.

  The sound of the door creaking open then shutting
  closed seemed impossibly loud despite the angry stabs
  of rain and occasional slaps of wind against the window's
  glass.  Zechs covered the distance between him and the
  doctor in three anxious steps.  Noin followed close.

  "Sally?" she asked, speaking out words that were choked
  out of her husband by fear.  The young doctor smiled,
  fine lines of fatigue marring the corners of her mouth,
  "she's doing fine," she began, "just some minor trauma to
  the left shoulder and a bruised rib.  Her arm will have
  to be in a sling for the next two days or so.  Nothing
  broken.  Just sore with, what I think was an attempt to
  break their fall."

  Their.

  Zechs tensed at the mute meaning that single word
  conveyed, but nodded in understanding.  "I'll come by the
  day after tomorrow to have the sling removed and check on
  her myself," Sally reassured, rummaging through her bag
  for a prescription, "she might have some attacks of
  headache, but there's nothing to fret over really," she
  handed the small paper to Noin then turned solemn, "she's
  very lucky."

  Noin smiled nervously, realizing Zechs had no interest in
  replying to that after a moment of unsettling silence and
  had his eyes trained instead on the fall of water against
  the windows.  She couldn't help but notice how much
  danger he exudes.  The thin line that was his lips, the
  pensive intensity of his eyes, the slight crease on his
  brow... it takes one random act of insanity to drive him,
  again, to the edges of reason.  One unfounded need to
  exact unnecessary revenge, to lose him again to the
  shadows he refuses her to see.
  The silence grew heavier and Sally began to sense that
  this was not like any of the past services she rendered
  for the Peacecrafts.  She's been in this situation, in
  this room with Zechs and Noin, far too often for her not
  to know that something was amiss.  Something was
  different.  That what happened in that room was more than
  the mishap that it was.  That it was already something
  beyond the grasp of their understanding.  Like the
  ramblings of dead philosophers falling on the ears of the
  inept.

  And maybe that was why they were all afraid.

  Because they couldn't understand.

  Because they'll never understand.

  It was Noin who bridged the yawning chasm between them
  and asked if they could see Relena.  Sally nodded then
  favored both of them with a smile, "she was awake
  when I left her.  She needs to rest but I can't see any
  detriment to her health if you'd like to say hello."
  Her eyes fell on the impassive features of the former
  Zechs Merquise and wondered what blow this new act of
  violence had dealt him.  She remembered his
  almost mad insistence that his sister be brought to
  Peacecraft Mansion and nowhere else.  Not to the
  hospital.  Not to Sally's clinic.  Relena's life had
  been more than a sumptuous temptation for both
  assassins and traitors during her tenure.  Her lifeless
  body more than a motivational trophy for power-hungry
  politicians.  This new development seemed to
  complicate the equation now that she was no longer in
  office.  And Sally can't help but wonder if she'll be
  back in the same room with the same people for the same
  purpose.

  Or if the next time she won't be needed at all.

  She blinked once, realizing Zechs had just thanked her
  and offered assistance on her way back to Preventers
  Headquarters.  She smiled, "thank you," both began to
  walk her to the door, "I'll check on her again tomorrow.
  I'd be back anyway to check on Heero's injuries."  Noin's
  hands missed a beat as she began to turn the door's knob
  and Sally knew she shouldn't have made any mention of the
  former pilot.  "We are very grateful of your aid, Sally."
  Noin said instead and opened the door to the hallway,
  revealing a waiting manservant.

  "Forgive me, sir but three gentlemen just arrived,
  requesting your presence," he said, the words sounding
  clipped with his accent.  Zechs' blank expression gave
  way to a slight frown, evidently irked.  "I'm going to
  see my sister first," he said tersely, " in the
  meantime, please have Dr. Po escorted back to
  Preventers Headquarters or wherever else she would like
  to go," he made a motion of turning back to the room when
  the manservant caused him to stop.

  "Certainly, sir," he said, giving a brief bow as he took
  Sally's medical bag, "but Minister Petrov did say matters
  were urgent and needed to be attended to
  immediately."  Zechs' carefully controlled impatience
  seemed to slip slightly, "what could possibly be more
  important than my sister?" he snapped.

  "I'm sorry, sir, but he mentioned something about the
  bombing this morning," he answered.  Bombing.  Bomb.  It
  sounded so ugly being spoken so freely with the sound of
  rain pounding on in the background.  Both Sally and
  Noin tensed at the unknowing servant's words, their
  attention completely focused on Zechs whose expression
  had turned biting.  Noin lifted a hand to her husband's
  shoulder, her eyes never leaving him, "thank you,
  Nikolai.  Tell them Milliardo will be with them
  shortly."  A final bow from Nikolai and both he and
  Sally left. Zechs pressed his eyes shut, his throat 
  constricting then  relaxing.  "I'll go and see your 
  guests," Noin whispered, her other hand smoothing his 
  back, "you go see Relena." He caught her by the elbow 
  as she made a move to leave, "no," he said, his face 
  once more impassive, his eyes again unreadable.  "Go see 
  Relena," he said, "I'll be with you in a while."

  For a moment she held his eyes in hers.  Yearning for him
  and longing to love him in a way she could but he didn't
  want her to.  For a moment she wanted to ask him to let
  her in.  To let her touch a piece of his soul.  To fight
  his demons with him.  Just like old times.  But his eyes
  told her she shouldn't.  That he won't.  And so she
  smiled, just like how she did countless times before,
  just like how he needs her to.  He kissed her briefly on
  the temple and he was gone.  She's always equated the
  gesture with gratitude.  Perhaps a validation of what she
  is to him.

  She walked to the door leading to Relena's quarters,
  ruminating on her husband, the frenetic day's events,
  her previous conversation with Relena.  Suddenly she
  realized this was her first time to actually face her
  after that not-so-pleasant exchange in the kitchen.  She
  smiled and wondered if she should make any mention of it
  and try to apologize.  'No,' she thought, 'Relena won't
  have any apology brought out by the melancholy of a
  moment.'  But she did feel a certain sense of remorse
  for some of the words she'd said.  She may claim to
  understand Zechs, but Relena is a complexity of her
  own.  She may have been a property of the entire universe
  she once played mother to, but not one could really claim
  to know her.  Maybe because it was how she wanted it to
  be.  Or nobody really bothered to.

  'Or maybe the one she wants to never did,' Noin thought
  in sadness, immediately gone as
  she opened the door and was met by the disturbing picture
  of Relena's empty bed.

  ---------------------------------------------------------------------

  ---------------------------

  It's not as if he had any choice.  The small pinpoints of
  light have begun to grow in intensity, slowly eating
  away the remnants of his drug-induced sleep.  There was a
  chill creeping from somewhere, brushing against his damp
  skin like straws caressing the breeze.  Rousing him to
  the melancholic patter of raindrops against the roof,
  sliding until finally rewarding the soaked earth with
  kisses.

  But if he did have a choice, he would have kept his eyes
  shut.  Away from a reality that vouched nothing but empty
  promises and failed dreams.  He blinked against the
  painfully white ceiling glaring back at him.  'Failed
  dreams,' he thought to himself, 'empty promises.'  He
  found himself smiling bitterly against those words trying
  not to remember when he started to learn of such things.
  He's done too much remembering for his own good.

  A slight shift in the stillness of the room's air
  informed him of another's presence in the room.  His eyes
  zeroed in on the mobile outline of a woman attending to
  something, at a distance that failed his still
  adjusting eyes.  His brow furrowed as the light did
  nothing to improve his hazy faculties.  Slowly, his hands
  began to make a path to under his pillow where he usually
  keeps a gun as he continues to size up the potential
  threat.  He paused when her motions led the
  light to be caught in a tangle of golden hair.
  Something began to thrum from within him.  Like the faint
  echoes of a distant stampede.  "Relena."  His voice came
  out cracked with oversleep and ill-pitched with his
  attempt while being cold.

  He sounded like a beggar pleading for alms.

  "No, colonel.  But you'd be pleased to know that she's
  recovering well."  The unfamiliar voice droned on but
  Heero was far too lost in the deluge of memories to
  understand a word she was saying. The anonymous phone
  call bearing the warning.  His attempt to confirm.  That first
  exchange of  words with Relena in months.  The explosion.
  The tears.

  His tears.

  No.  Memories never really did him any good.

  "... the Vice Foreign Minister insisted that dinner be
  brought to you in the case you wake up while she..."  the
  young maid stopped the fuss she was making at the bowl of
  soup and fresh pot of tea by the bedside and held him
  back by the shoulders, "please, colonel, don't move!  Dr.
  Po strictly instructed that you be kept immobile for the
  next three days and..."

  "Where is she?" he growled.  The veritable spasm he was
  feeling a while ago in his lower back shot up through
  his spine, exploding in his skull.  Causing him to pause
  in his attempts to get up.  Whatever Sally had given
  him for the pain has abated, making him fully aware of
  which muscle he has just overexerted and which he has
  torn in his sudden movement.  The blanket that has been
  covering him from chin to toe shed to a pool on his lap
  and the teasing coolness that roused him to wakefulness
  progressed to a biting cold that latched onto him with
  its sharp fangs sinking into his bare skin.  Contrasting
  with the growing warmth beneath the bandages wound
  around his torso.

  "Colonel, please!  Don't move anymore than you have!" the
  maid's voice trembled as soon as she saw the growing
  spot of red against the immaculate bandages.  "I'm going
  to go and get something to stop the bleeding and some
  fresh ban--" the maid gasped as soon as she felt her
  wrist being gripped tightly forcing her to look into
  Heero Yuy's cruel eyes.

  'Bleeding?  Something to stop the bleeding?' he gave a
  mental bark of laughter.  How he longed to tell the woman
  he's been bleeding for the past six years and nothing
  could ever stop it.  He'd had to learn that the hard
  way, but learned it nonetheless.  "I need to see her."

  Need.

  He winced at the taste of the word against his tongue.
  Tinged with an unnamable bitterness that threatens to
  eat him from the inside.  Threatening to make him need
  incarnate.

  Needing some warmth.

  "Sir?"

  Needing some light.

  "Sir?"

  Needing her.

  "Colonel Yuy?"

  Needing all of her.

  His mind went clear at the small tugs the frail young
  maid was attempting to get her wrist free.  Her eyes were
  wide with fear, rimmed with tears threatening to be shed.

  ** 'You don't fail if I die, Heero.' **

  The world shrunk into his mind and the memory of those
  words.  And those tears.  Tears he thought she was
  never capable of having. She has always been the stronger
  one.  The one who is needed.  Never needing.  Since he met her, he
  never thought her capable of being anything but that.  To
  be strong for everyone.  To be strong for him.  He's
  always believed that it was her strength that gave him
  this need.  That taught him how to need.  And the joys
  and the beautiful pain that comes along with it.  Maybe
  even happiness.  Things they don't teach you when you
  were only ever meant to be a weapon.  She would come
  to him and she'd teach him how to take a piece of the
  idyll she brings, how to cling at each word aimed at him
  as though air to his lungs.  He learned to yearn for each
  breath, each second, each day... because she taught him
  to believe in her.  Believe that she'd be there for him
  each breath, each second, each day while he tries to
  trace back the whereabouts of happiness.  And his lost
  soul.

  He believed her as she believed in him.

  And now, those tears...

  **'You always come to me for answers.  I don't have them
  anymore'**

  The yearning has long grown into something else.
  Something that made him feel wretched.  Something that
  made him feel an urgency that was so foreign to him, he
  couldn't be anything but  afraid.  Something
  that made those tears feel as though they were leaving
  their searing tracks on his own cheeks.  Burning him to
  the flesh, to the soul he has substituted for the one
  he lost in the war.  The soul she's always believed was
  beautiful.

  She's always believed he was beautiful.

  "Colonel, please," the voice came as pleading mingled
  with ill-concealed sobs.  Finally, he let her go.
  Dismissing everything as but fragments of a bad dream.
  His hunger for her.  His need to consume her down to the
  very last shred of her soul.  All his beliefs, all her
  promises, all the false hopes she roused in him.

  All lies.

  And she was a liar.

  He thought it'd always be easier to turn back to the
  anger, to the hate.  Trace back the steps and learn how
  to unlearn the concept of "her".  Forget.

  Turn to hate.

  'Hate her for crippling you with your needs.  Hate her
  for what you have deteriorated to.

 'Hate her because you can do nothing else in your
  weakness. Where the weak turns when they find no
  other way...

  'Hate her because its all you've been taught to do.'

  "Heero."

  He turned his head to her painfully familiar voice
  calling for him, seeing her stand in the doorway, a
  reality on her own, apart and beyond everything that
  existed within his senses.  Her hair was wet and stuck
  flatly against her back.  She looked pale, her lips
  trembling at the cold suffusing from the outside, the
  rain a far echo in the background, her eyes not leaving
  his.  Already his heart began to slow to a beat in tune
  with the play of mist escaping her mouth.

  "Miss Relena!"  cried the maid, rushing to her side,
  already fussing with the thin fabric of the gown made for
  her to wear within the confines of her warm room.
  Certainly not for an impulsive stroll to the nearby
  quarters of the temperamental former pilot.  "Gods!
  You're all wet!" she began to deftly run worried fingers
  against the sodden bandage that held her left arm in a
  dressed sling.  Not knowing which to attend to first, she
  took one look at each of them then grabbed a yukata
  hanging from a hook on the wall and threw it over
  Relena's shoulders.  "Please, don't go anywhere else,
  Miss Relena.  I'm going to go back to the house and fetch
  both you and the colonel some fresh bandages."  She kept
  still.  Neither agreeing nor disagreeing.  The maid left
  reluctantly, sliding the shoji shut with a deafening
  finality.

  In their distance, flickering candles tamed by the rice
  paper panels that separated his room from the next played
  with her features.  Her soulful eyes, the warmth she
  brings starting to extend as though fingers wont on
  grazing his skin.  He closed his eyes briefly, focusing
  on the pain in his side, the thrumming headache of
  his head... just not the melodious promise her nearing
  presence was bringing.  Just not this need.

  **'Let's stop hurting each other'**

  His eyes flew open and found her sitting close.  The
  yukata, discarded several steps away.  She was watching
  him.

        *      *      *      *

  Relena watched Heero's stern features come alive as his
  cold, calculated glare settled against her own.  She
  threw a silent curse both for her lousy timing and the
  young maid who left her with him.  Maybe another for her
  own stupidity.

  And perhaps another for him for doing what he just did.

  She braved the rain expecting him to be sedated.
  Momentarily soothed by the balm of drug-induced sleep.
  She meant to watch him in that state, while he was far
  and beyond the day's cruel realities.  Her last memory of
  his face close to hers while he shielded her frail body
  with his own has been played back in her mind far too
  often.  She wanted a new memory of him.  One where he was
  not looking at her with those eyes accusing her of things
  she could not read in his silence.  One where she doesn't
  have to confront the truth of just how he had complicated
  matters with what he just did.

  She could only be certain that his visit to her new
  office was not meant to play gun-pointing with her.  Nor
  was it intended for wordplay.  He was being himself
  again.  As if nothing happened.  As if what she gave up
  meant nothing to him and his mission.

  Mission.

  "I-" she stammered, his unsettling stare in their
  distance making words difficult for her to construe.  He
  looked painfully thin.  Whatever sinewy heft he gained in
  his age seemed to hang from his obvious frame.  Cuts and
  scratches adorned his chest and arms.  A bruise has just
  began to swell on his arm.

  All this for her.

  'You were supposed to let me die, you know?' she screamed
  in muted desperation.  'I wasn't supposed to have any
  worth for you now, remember?'

  But he'd done it.  He'd saved her again.  Only now, he
  wasn't supposed to.

  "How do you feel?" she asked.

        *      *      *      *

  'How do I feel?' he thought in well-masked anger.  'I'm
  in pain, Relena.  I'm in pain of you.  For you.  Because
  you did this to me.  Because you turned me into the
  mockery of a man I am now.'  He watched her play with the
  ends of her gown then turned to her transparently anxious
  face.  'But would you understand it?  No.  And you know
  why, Relena?  Because you choose not to see through
  anyone's eyes but your own.  Because you only wish to
  believe your beliefs.  Your truths as your own truths.
  You build things with your hands without knowing what it
  is you create.'

  'Because you run away'

  'Because you promised to fight the monsters in my mind
  but you only made more for me to fight each time I sleep
  (1).  I am in pain because you make me regret who I am
  and make me wish I was somebody better for you.  Only I 
  can't.'

  "What do you want?" he spat out instead, again turning to
  the familiar arms of anger.

  'I can't be better for you.'

        *      *      *      *

  Relena flinched at the sharpness of his words.  As though
  they were right at the beginning.  At the beach.  Her
  asking for his name.  Him covering his face from her.

  Nothing changed.

  She calmly accepted the contempt at his words and focused
  on her intent of seeing him the moment she regained
  consciousness.  "I just... I," she paused abruptly,
  seeing the now blood-soaked bandages covering his
  abdomen.  "Your wound," she muttered, reaching to feel
  just how much blood he lost, only to have her wrist
  gripped harshly.  "Don't touch me," he snapped.

  She regarded him with a level stare, weighing his anger
  through his eyes.  Then calmly, she easily freed her hand
  from his hold.  She could feel his blank stare watching
  her ministrations.  Slowly she began to peel away the
  wet gauze.

        *      *      *      *

  He fought the urge to close his eyes and kept his stare
  steady at the gentle dance her hand was making and away
  from the soft, small contacts her fingers had with his
  burning skin.  Her touch.  Her smell.  Her warmth.

  She was getting too close.

  And he was growing more and more weak from his restraints
  as she drew closer and closer.  Shoving him near the
  edges of his sanity.  He swatted her hand away, "I said
  leave it, Relena."  The force was enough to have the rest
  of the flimsy cloth to drop on a loop around his lap,
  exposing an angry welt a protruding piece of sharp wood
  had penetrated in their fall.

        *      *      *      *

  The wound had pulled some stitches that already were
  causing him to lose more blood than he's allowed.
  "Already, you're losing so much blood," she started, her
  sole free hand already working to tear at the hemline of
  her gown despite the spiteful gaze he turned towards her.

  "Just leave, Relena.  I can take care of myself."

  She froze.  Remembering a bit too well just how unwanted
  she was.  How much of a nuisance and a necessary burden
  she is where he is concerned.  And before her usual
  bouts with self-pity and depression could sink in, the
  veritable finality in the sound of the shoji sliding once
  more saved her.

  Or perhaps finally killed her.

  "Heero!  Oh, gods," Sylvia's sharp eyes slid one second
  on Relena's frame before finally rushing to Heero's
  bedside, a tray of fresh bandages at hand.  "I'm so
  sorry, I've let this happen.  I shouldn't have left you
  in the room.  Gods, I shouldn't have left you here by
  yourself!  The maid told me..." she went on and on, words
  stabbing in the charged space between him and Relena who
  just watched in silent fascination at just how much
  pain she could withstand from being in one room with
  him... and her.  Her words were like obstinate hands
  pushing them away.  Pushing *her* away.

  But his eyes held her.  Not letting her free from this
  cruel piece of reality fate has chosen to reward her
  with.  Trapping her to watch.  And as if on cue, Sylvia
  cast a brief regarding glare as she turned to take the
  warm cloth she had placed close to where Relena sat.

  Meeting her eyes, Relena felt she finally understood.
  Whatever she saw that morning… everything just
  became absolute.

  She thought that when she'd finally meet truth in the
  eye, when she'd finally be given the gift of
  understanding, it wouldn't hurt as much.  It wouldn't
  feel like air was burning her lungs as she took in
  each breath.  That when she'd find herself in this
  situation, she could even be generous enough to wish
  for happiness for him.  For them.

  She only had loneliness for what just died in that room.

  And love.  So much love that will forever be unspent.

        *      *      *      *

  'Sylvia.' Heero identified the sobbing figure throwing
  disfigured words and apologies at him.  Tears flowing
  freely from her face as she pried his attention from that
  of Relena's stoic expression.

  She was a new promise on her own.  Where it won't be so
  difficult.  Everything would be right.  The hurt will
  stop.  And it would be so easy to pretend if only for all
  their own selfish little causes.

  If only that too he could understand.

  He lifted a hand and wiped a tear from her eyes, her sobs
  intensifying at the contact as she desperately gripped at
  his hand.  Her words still kept unintelligible by the
  words of another.

  ** 'I give up, you win.' **

  When he turned back to where she was sitting, Heero
  realized she had gone.

  Again.

  Leaving him again.

        *      *      *      *

  She watched them in morbid fascination a little while
  longer before turning back to the door and the welcome
  embrace of the storm.  Basking in the sharp, cold
  needles piercing at her from all over as she made her way
  back to the house.  She felt nothing but the cold.  Not
  the gravel prodding at the pads of her bare feet.  Not
  the spasm in her slung arm.  She felt like she floated
  her way to their doorstep.  A house that held nothing for
  her but cold rooms and dreary nightmares of death and
  cries of mercy.

  Cries of people who were supposed to love her.

  For the first time, she felt anxious for those
  nightmares.  She longed for the cold embrace of the
  rooms.  The house never looked more inviting than it
  looked to her now.

  Her feet made their way to the stairs on their own
  volition.  Her mind drifting further, further...

  ... then suddenly grounded by the sound of angry voices
  echoing through the hall to the right of the stairs.  She
  blinked, her mind suddenly jerking to attention as she
  heard her brother's calm voice echoing from the room
  where he holds his office.  The heavy closed door was
  serving its purpose well and muffled whatever
  conversation was taking place in that room.  She walked
  to where the door stood and lifted her hand to the knob,
  hoping someone's misery will make her feel less wretched
  and piteous about herself.

  But the voices began to reach a crescendo, and soon as
  she began to turn the knob and tell the gentlemen she
  will not have unchecked tempers in her household, the
  door was yanked away from her reach.

  Her next breath went caught in her throat, as she found
  herself staring fully in the eyes of Quatre Raberba
  Winner.

  ---------------------------------------------------------------------   -------------------------

  1.  yukata (jp.) - the way fanfiction taught me, I
  believe this is some sort of thin garment made to be worn
  in sleep.

  2.  shoji (jp.) - the standard sliding door made with
  rice paper panels in traditional Japanese households

  3.  Vicious Cycle - its actually a medical term for when
  a certain part of the body undergoes certain processes it
  needs for survival, only these processes have turned
  against the very organ it supports, essentially killing
  it slowly.

  4.  (1) This would be in reference to a future scene of a
  past event.  Something Relena told him in the past.

  5.  Very bad cliffhanger?  Or has everyone's interest
  waned already?  :(  I hope someone's still reading.
  Apologies are in order to those I've  promised this
  chapter a week or two weeks ago --o.  Prelims for this
  semester is this coming week so, yeah, I've been tons
  busy.  As for  the still non-existent chapter 8, I could
  only beg for your   indulgence.  And your kind patience
  as well.  ^_~

  6.  That 4xCB vignette just refuses to get written --o.
  Maybe next post.

  7. Thanks to Iris for the beta (and the patience ^^)

  8. Additional: Yes, the first part of the fic is a dream
  sequence ^_^