Eternal Promises /1

[Eden]

This is the first part to a fic that I've started writing. It might be a little rough around the edges, but I hope you all can find it in your heart to give it a try!

Couple : 1xR
Warnings : Spoilers if you haven't already seen the series or endless waltz.
Gener : Romance/Sap/Suspence(?)
Disclamer : Standard apply. It's not mine, and never will be. (Damn)


Part 1

It was a beautiful morning in the Sanc kingdom. The sun was shinning brightly, melting away the last remnants of the snow, and chased away the chill that was left in air.

Vice foreign minister Darlian could see that the sky was also devoid of any clouds by looking through the window behind the dignitary sent to inform the counsel of changes in the colonies. While she listened, only half interested in what was being said, Relena looked out the window and sighed.

To be inside in such a beautiful day seemed cruel punishment. But sit there she did, and listened to the discussions go on.

Ever since the Eve war, there hadn’t been any major problems keeping the peace between earth and the colonies. The Preventers had been able to disarm any minor threats before they had become anything major to worry about. They had succeeded in destroying all mobile suits, and found that most earth nations and colonies were in favor of complete demilitarization to preserve the peace they had fought to protect. But of course, there were still those who refused to give up their violent ideals, which was to be expected.

Relena found herself constantly working along side the Preventers in many of these instances to try and resolve the problems through peace talks and negations, before any other drastic measures needed to be taken. Between all of that and worrying about general concerns that nations and colonies had she was kept extremely busy, with hardly a free moment to herself.

The dignitary had stopped talking, and opened the floor for discussion and questions. All the important questions were asked, all the things that needed to be said were, and every one in the room came to a general understanding about the state of affairs.

Finally, after the good-byes from all the dignitaries, Relena was outside. She was able to discover how good the warm sun felt on her face, and what wonders it was able to accomplish in rejuvenating her soul. A smile came to her lips as she stood outside on the sidewalk waiting for her car, it seemed to her that because of the peace she was able to help maintain, humans were able to enjoy simple things like feeling the sun.

A sigh escaped her lips as she waited for her car to come around and pick her up. Even though she was happy about being able to help nations come to an understanding with one another; and found her work fulfilling, Relena constantly felt the need for something more. This need came whenever she was by herself, like now, and then as soon as people surrounded her again, the feeling disappeared.

As she stood there by the street her car pulled around and stopped to let her in. Relena took one last look around the street. She had the strangest sensation that someone was watching her. Not that it was strange for people to be looking at her, they usually did, but it felt like whoever was watching her was trying not to be seen.

It was slightly unnerving to feel as thought your being watched, but not to know where the person is watching from is even worse.

Relena shivered a little, and climbed into the car. Fortunately, once she got into the car where her assistant was waiting with her new schedule, she was swept away with work. It was easy to bury her uneasiness in her work. Going through proposals and having vid conferences took the rest of the morning, and then she spent the afternoon in another meeting with representatives from the earth sphere unified nation.

It wasn’t until late that night that Relena even had a chance to think. The day had been busy, like they all were now. Full of listening to problems from other nations and trying to help them come to a consciences within themselves. She was usually so wrapped up in the problems of nations around the earth sphere, that she didn’t have anytime to think abut things that might be bothering her.

On most nights she was so tired that by the time she made it to her room she didn’t want to do anything but go the sleep. Tonight though, Relena felt strangely awake, and didn’t feel like going to sleep right away. Instead, she put on her pajamas, and grabbed a thick robe from her closet and went out onto her balcony.

The nights out in the country were cooler in the early spring than in the city, so as she made her way over to the railing, she pulled the robe tightly around herself. Leaning her elbows on the rail, and her chin in her hands put her eyes in a good position to look up at the stars coming out brighter and brighter, the darker the sky got.

Relena’s mind began to wander as she looked up at the sky. It had been two years since their had been any war on the earth or in the colonies. Two years of negotiations, and new policies to approve. The memories of war were still fresh in everyone’s mind, and no one, except for the odd rebellious group, made any move to take up arms.

Two years, Relena’s eyes moved up to gaze at the moon. Two years ago had been the last time she had seen him.

He had rescued her from Mariemaia, and them had passed out in her arms. The last time she had seen him had been when she had waited by his bed in the hospital. He had looked so peaceful, lying in the sterile, stiff bed. Relena had never seen him look that way before.

She only left for a minute, just to the hallway coffee machine, but before she left she had squeezed his hand to reassure her, even if he was sleeping, that she would come back. The strangest and most surprising thing happened then, Relena could’ve sworn that he returned the pressure to her hand. She looked down at his face, the normally somber facial expression was surprisingly relaxed, and his eye lids hid what Relena know were startling Prussian blue eyes. Not a move. He hadn’t made a move. Perhaps she had imagined it.

When she came back from the coffee machine, a steaming cup in her hands, an empty bed greeted her. He was no longer in it.

At first Relena stood there in the doorway, dumbfounded. Then all of a sudden she had snapped to life, rushing out of the empty room to the nurses’ station. They hadn’t taken him anywhere, and an announcement was put over the intercom.

It was too late though. Relena knew it as soon as she made it back to the room. She hadn’t noticed it the first time she’d been the room, she had been too focused on the empty bed. When she came back she saw it. The window stood wide open, the curtains billowing in the wind.

His clothes, a pair of blue jeans, a green tank top and a black jacket, were gone.
Relena went to the window and leaned as far out as she could without falling. Looking down below, she scanned the ground. They were only three floors up, so she wasn’t worried about him getting hurt. He was a survivor, and always managed to get out of impossible situations in one piece. She just wanted to catch a glance of him, anything to show he was all right.

She thought she saw him, off by the road, a tousled brown head walking away from her. Without another thought she cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted out at him, trying to get his attention, “Heero!”

It didn’t surprise her when he didn’t turn around. He was so strong, and even though Relena knew he hurt like everyone else; he refused to show it.

That was the last time Relena saw Heero.

She had gone on with her life as part of the Earth Sphere Unified Nation, and had never had any idea what happened to the Gundam pilot Heero Yuy she had so admired.

Of course on occasion she had come across others from the war, and found that everyone was finding their own place in the new world.

Quatre Winner had taken over the family business, much to the relief of his sisters, and had been a huge supporter of the pacifism Relena herself promoted, staying true to her father’s beliefs. Relena had also had the pleasure to be involved in proposals for complete disarmament with him.

Chang Wufei, Sally Po and Lady Une were all still involved with the Preventers, an organization Relena worked very closely with to stop any little problem on earth or in the colonies before it became anything big. They had been very successful in stopping the minor uprisings from occurring while Relena had gone to find out why they had started, and diffused them with negotiations.

One person that she had never worked with or had any contact with personally was the pilot they called Trowa Barton. When she had spoken to Quatre, he had mentioned that he had gone back to the circus where he had been hiding during the war, and was now a main performance.

Duo Maxwell had been making a killing up in the colonies with his company. They were hired out to clean up space debris like space mines and parts from long destroyed mobile suits and space shuttles. His success was so well known that whenever Relena went to space she saw at least one or two billboards advertising Maxwell clean up. Of course he was also starting to earn a reputation as being one of the best shuttle repair places as well.

The only former Gundam pilot that Relena hadn’t heard anything about was Heero Yuy. Not a word, glance or anything for two whole years. She supposed that the other pilots had probably heard from him, but Relena herself had not.

A slight wind had come up, and began to blow Relena’s hair back from her forehead.

“Heero,” She spoke the name aloud to no one but the moon. The guards who were stationed around the estate probably wouldn’t be able to hear her, and even if they could, they most likely wouldn’t understand.

She didn’t care anyways. All that she could think about was the boy she had grown to admire during the war, the boy with the wild brown hair, amazing Prussian blue eyes, and serious expression.

With a smile, Relena remembered the first time she had met him. He ha been lying on the beach, and Relena had mistaken him for dead. After she’d called an ambulance, she had taken off his helmet, and was surprised to see that he was no older than she was.

When he had woken up, jumping to his feet and covering his face, she had been taken aback. It was not the sort of response that she had been expecting.

“Did you see-?” He didn’t finish his sentence before the paramedics arrived. Looking panicked, he took his free hand and punched a button on his suit. A small explosion, like a gunshot, went off and made him go flying backwards. He had obviously tried to commit suicide, and when he got off the ground more startled than before you couldn’t help but notice that things weren’t going the way that they had been planned. By this time the paramedics had started to run down the stairs towards where they were standing. He had taken off running then, knocking each of them down as he ran past them to the top of the stairs.

Relena just watched in awe as he knocked out the driver, and took off in the ambulance, the siren still wining.

She had rushed up the stairs as he drove off into the distance. She had admired his strength then, the way he had been able to plow through four grown men, twice the size of him, and leave in the stolen ambulance without looking back.

“My name,” she said holding out her hand towards the rapidly disappearing ambulance, “My name is Relena Darlian,” she spoke as if she was formally introducing herself. “What’s yours?”

The next day at school when he had shown up in her classroom, introducing himself as Heero Yuy, Relena knew that she wanted to know him. She had even gone to invite him to her birthday party.

To the shock of Relena and everyone else who had been a witness that day, Heero hadn’t even looked at the invitation before ripping it in half.

As Relena stood there in shock muttering “But why?” Heero walked by her, taking his finger a wiping a tear away from her eye. He moved to stand beside her; his eye caught hers for a brief moment. His voice spoke in low tones that only she could hear.

“I will kill you.”

The words themselves were enough to stun and shock her. He wanted to kill her? What on earth would anyone gain by doing something like that? Of course she figured it out on her way home from school that day. It was because she knew his secret.

She had felt important then, knowing something about Heero Yuy that would make him want to kill her. The thought made her more reckless. Heero wanted to kill her, why not give him his chance?

That’s what happened on her birthday, when she left to go after him, leaving behind all her friends at the party. She knew that she couldn’t let him do whatever he was planning to do, because whatever it was would probably make him leave.

So she left, and found him at the military port loading torpedos from the base’s storage. He had seemed to ignore all her questions about what he was doing, but as soon as she stopped asking questions he turned around, his eyes softened for a moment.

“Relena,”

Relena was shocked, “Heero.”

Saying his name must’ve broken the spell. The soft blue of his eyes hardened again as he pulled out a gun and pointed it right at her.

While before she had been shocked at the change in his mannerism, now she was merely surprised.

Heero’s eyes had narrowed as he looked down the barrel of the gun at her.

But he hadn’t shot her. Everything had happened very quickly. Relena heard the shot and ducked down covering her head with her hands. When she noticed that she wasn’t shot she looked up and saw Heero laying on the ground, the gun having fallen from his hand when he was shot in the arm, and another boy. This one all dressed in black, stood at the end of the pier, holding a gun.

“Well it’s pretty obvious to anyone who the bad guy is hear. You alright lady?” The guy in black asked.

“Stop!” Relena shouted standing in front of Heero with her arms spread out to block the other boy from shooting again, “Why did you have to shoot him for?”

The boy was clearly confused, and tried to say so, but before he was able to finish, he took aim with his gun again and shot.

Relena turned around to see that Heero had been lunging for his gun when the guy in black had shot him in the thigh.

Heero sprawled on the ground again, looking at his thigh and holding his arm, not saying a word. Even though he had been shot twice, he hadn’t cried out in pain, or uttered a single sound.

Without saying a word herself, Relena had knelt down beside him. She ripped strips of fabric off of the bottom of her dress and used them as bandages to stop the bleeding where Heero had been shot.

Both boys watched her in awe, the boy in black muttering about saving the guy who tried to kill her.

She knew it was crazy. Relena knew that if he had the chance, Heero would try to kill her again, but for some reason she wasn’t afraid. She had seen that for the second time that night she had been able to startle him. He was unsure about her now, he didn’t know how to react to he. She knew that Heero was perfectly capable of killing her, but that didn’t bother her. If he wanted to kill her, she wouldn’t stop him.

Already she admired his strength, and found something else inside of him that made her want to learn more about him. Perhaps it was the mystery behind him that drew her, or the fact that she knew something about him that no one else knew.

Whatever it was about him that she found intriguing only made her understand him more once she met Doctor J.

Relena shivered a little bit inside of her robe as she thought back to when her foster father had been killed. She had thought that she would never feel safe again, that she would never be able to understand why this tragedy had happened. Once she spoke with Doctor J, and found out more about why Heero had been sent to space, she became more determined than ever to stay by him.

When she went back to Earth, and back to school on the night of a class party, her full intentions had been to let Heero know that he didn’t need to try and hide from her any more because she knew all about his mission. Relena had felt stronger than ever about being on the same side as he was, against OZ. It gave her a feeling of comradeship that he didn’t necessarily feel, but it made her want to be stronger.

That’s the thing that people didn’t quite understand about her feelings towards the Gundam pilot. They all assumed that she had a crush on him, and that she had followed him from place to place because of that crush, but they were wrong.

In the beginning, it had been curiosity about who he really was, and perhaps she had something like a crush then. But everything changed once her foster father was assinated. She stopped looking at Heero in the way that a girl with a crush would. Instead she began to look toward Heero as a pillar of strength, and as a way to deal with her problems.

She declared personal war on OZ, and had even gone as far as to try and assinate the former OZ official Lady Une. The attempt failed miserably, but some had commended her on her bravery. She had done it because she figured that it would be something Heero would do.

After that though, she was approached by Lucrezia Noin, who began to make her understand about her Peacecraft heritage, and about the importance of resolving things without war.

She grew up. She stopped needing to follow Heero around. Just knowing that he was fighting to keep the peace the same as she was kept her going.

The fact that he had saved her life on numerous occasions told her more than he had ever said with words. It told her that he believed in what she was trying to do. He supported her.

Near the end of the Eve war, she had begun to feel something unlike anything she had ever felt for anyone before. It was as if she felt stronger, yet weaker every time she was near Heero. Their faces seemed to move close together whenever they spoke, and it seemed to Relena that he caught her eye more often when they spoke, and that he spoke more softly to her.

Another thing that made her smile whenever she thought about Heero was the fact that he had stopped threatening to kill her. It was if his attitude towards her had completely changed.

A sigh escaped her lips, as she stood up straighter. Relena didn’t know why she was thinking about these things now. It had been two years since she had seen or heard from Heero, and the chance that she would actually see him again seemed so small that it was almost easier to try and forget him entirely. But how are you supposed to forget someone who, without even knowing, shaped the way you had become? Again Relena sighed. It was getting late. The moon, that had been lower in the sky and dim before, was now a bright white glowing disc in the sky.

“Oh Heero,” Relena said looking up at the moon, up to space where Heero most likely was, “I hope your well.”

A shiver shook her body and she wrapped her robe around her tighter. She took one last look up at the sky, “Good night, Heero.”