Something to Lose

by Ancient Lady

Notes: I drew my plot from a song, "Roll On", by Alabama. This is not a songfic, as I believe eighteen-wheelers to be anachronistic to the GW universe ^_^. The lyrics sung in the story, in case you don't recognize them, are from the Brahms Lullaby.

Disclaimer: I don't own them. Don't I wish I did. I'm only using them as a way to communicate my ideas and themes in a common language to a community that loves the characters as much as I do.

AC 216, May 5 - 4:00am - Official Residence of the Earth Sphere Minister of Foreign Affairs, Brussels

Heero poured coffee beans into the coffemaker hopper as he half listened to the computer in his study as it marked its progress with a series of faint pings. The smell of fresh coffee surrounded him. The deprivation of his childhood - the years of single-minded training - made the smallest of pleasures precious.

A change in the pitch and tempo of the sound from his study caused him to drop the hopper on the counter and stride out of the kitchen. Small pleasures in life forgotten for the moment, he slid into the chair in front of his terminal and focused his attention on the screen in front of him.

The Intruder was back.

He was sniffing around the bait Heero had so carefully set at the edge of the Preventers' internal network. Like a mouse sniffing around the cheese on a trap. He was hiding his tracks well, and it was so very tempting to try and follow his trail back to the dark little hole he came out of. Heero waited, though. The Intruder, as he thought of his nameless, faceless quarry, was still wary - still cautious. A move against him now would send him scurrying away, and warn him that he was being watched. He'd be more careful next time. Best to get him in the trap first.

The Intruder slunk through the files around the bait, pushing here and there at the file permissions and passwords that guarded it. After a few moments he logged out of his stolen account and disappeared back into the anonymity of the public network. Only Heero, who had watched him, and Heero's single, very well hidden, nonstandard activity log, recorded his passing. The Intruder, as he left, had cleared all the standard network logs of his activity with a small bot which deleted itself when it had done its work.

Heero sat staring at the now empty screen for another second before he disengaged his mind from the hyper-concentration that always came when he was working. It was like switching gears. His internal time-sense told him that he'd watched the Intruder so long ,he'd have to hurry with the coffee.

Back in the kitchen, he placed the hopper of coffee beans down in the machine on the counter, and filled the water reservoir. The machine was a great brass monstrosity with at least a dozen knobs, valves and gauges. It ground and steamed and hissed and sputtered as it worked. Relena had bought the thing in what must have been a moment of insanity several years ago. Within a week, Cook had declared it the spawn of the Devil and refused to be in the room when it was operated. Relena, try as she might, hadn't convinced it to make anything other than coffee-colored mud.

Finally, Heero had taken charge of it. For some reason, the demon inhabiting its shiny brass tubing took a liking to him, and it operated perfectly. Since then, Heero had sole charge of coffee preparation. While the machine sputtered its way through producing a pot of coffee, he set out a china cup on a saucer and retrieved his mug. It was the only mug in the kitchen. A plain, thick, white ceramic, it was simple and durable. It suited him.

Heero added sugar and light cream to the china cup, and sat it and the mug close together by the coffee machine. He checked the time again, and started the toast. A few minutes later he poured the coffee. He buttered the toast, and put it together sandwich-style.

Precisely at 5:00, he picked up the china cup of coffee and the toast sandwich and stationed himself where the back staircase opened into the kitchen. A half-smile curled his lips. His timing was too good. He could hear her heels tapping down the stairs. She was talking on the phone.

"Yes, I've got the agenda. I'm looking at it right now. I'll be on the shuttle, don't worry. I've got to go - breakfast. Look, if I have to stay on the phone, I won't make that shuttle. Thank you. Goodbye."

Relena swung into view on the landing. The phone was pinned between her ear and shoulder. She held a thick sheaf of paper up in front of her eyes, and was stuffing her briefcase under that arm to free up a hand. As she reached the bottom of the stairs, she set the phone on a little table, took the toast and secured it between her teeth, and took her coffee.

She juggled the coffee, briefcase and papers over to the table. She dumped the briefcase, set down the cup, took the toast out of her mouth, and turned around to kiss Heero, who had followed her to the table, carrying his mug.

"Mmmm. You're so handy, I might just have to keep you around a while. You kiss good, too." She slid her arms up around his neck, still holding her papers, and smiled up at him.

Heero slid his free hand up her back. Even after three children, she was nearly as slim as when they first met. And she fit so perfectly in the crook of his arm. This morning, though, he could feel the cramped muscles in her mid-back, and the tenseness in her spine. He brushed his lips across her forehead, then tilted his head back to indicate the agenda in her hand that was brushing the back of his neck.

"Are you attached to that thing, or are you willing to let it go for a minute?"

She laughed, and he felt her relax a little. The worry lines between her brows eased and her mouth curved in a wicked smile as she tossed the agenda carelessly over one shoulder.

"Business can wait a minute. I wish it could just wait forever." She wrapped both arms around his waist and pressed her cheek to his shirt front. "I wish you could come with me."

Heero closed his eyes and ran his hand up and down her back. He wanted to try and talk her out of making the trip. He wanted to go with her. As always, he would do what he needed to do, and not what he wanted to do.

If it weren't for that damn Intruder, he and the kids would be going with her as they usually did on any trip that lasted more than a day or two. He couldn't leave that wretch skulking around in his networks. It was too dangerous. There was no telling what mischief he might make if he had the run of the network. Unfortunately, Heero thought, he and Relena were stuck with being separated for a week.

"I don't like the idea of you going to so many places in so short a time without me there. It's not a good security decision."

He could feel her smile against his chest. Although some of her colleagues accused him of being overprotective, he knew Relena appreciated it. "I have to make an appearance at each colony," she said, "if I took any longer than a week to do it, you'd say that a trip that long was a bad security decision."

"It is. Don't go."

"You know I have to." She leaned back in his arm, and traced his jawline with a soft fingertip. "You can make it a week around here without me. You're a big boy."

"I can manage the days, maybe...."

Relena was about to say something when she stopped, and her eyes widened. "Oh shoot!" She ducked under his arm and turned back toward the table.

He looked back over his shoulder, and saw what had shoved her back into harried-politician-mode. The kitchen clock read one minute past five.

She took one generous bite of the toast and drained the coffee in a single gulp. After retrieving the agenda from where it had landed under a chair, she stuffed it in her briefcase.

Heero followed her to the door. She paused for one intense and lingering kiss that curled his toes and was guaranteed to keep him up nights, then strode swiftly down to the waiting limo. He watched until the car disappeared around the broad curve of the driveway.

---

Two hours later, Heero was on his third cup of coffee, and had finished typing up the security audit report for Greumler Industries that he'd been working on for the past two weeks. Greumler was one of the key technology suppliers for the Mars Terraforming Project, and they were nervous about the safety of their research into extracting CO2 from the regolith. It was, potentially, a very lucrative process. There were other corporations that would love to get access to their data.

Heero had designed a three tier security system, integrating factory, administrative and computer security. He was confident that Greumler executives would approve. He had just finished submitting the report through the network when he heard a stumbling step on the back stairs.

It had to be Aisha bumbling her way into the morning. If there were anything that made him wonder about his only inheritance from his unknown parents, his genes, it was his firstborn daughter, Aisha. That she took after him was clear enough. Her hair was exactly the same shade of dark brown, although not as coarse and wavy as his own. Instead of springing out in all directions, it hung long and fine and straight like Relena's, falling in a gleaming sheet over her shoulders and down her back. Looking in her eyes was like looking in the mirror at a set of his features slightly altered for femininity.

In the fifteen years since her birth, he had constantly wondered at her. In many ways, she was like him, but in others.... Through her toddler years and childhood, she was always active, curious and cheerful. She was into everything, taking things apart, emptying cabinets and desks - and always with an ear-to-ear grin. He wondered if he had been that way, before his conscious memories began. She had been like one of those wind-up child's toys. She ran and ran until she finally collapsed. More than once he'd found her standing, leaning against a wall, fast asleep. And she was not a morning person.

He knew that even now she was feeling her way down the stairs, eyes shut tight against the light. He logged out of his terminal and returned to the kitchen to greet his daughter. Her morning incapacity was a mystery. Neither he nor Relena had trouble jumping right into the day. Perhaps it was something he'd been trained to do that wasn't truly in his nature.

Heero couldn't separate himself from his training. In a way, he looked to his children to see what he might have been, had his life been different. It wasn't, he knew, a logical way to analyze that. The kids were Relena's as much as his and the circumstances in which they were raised were entirely different. But still, he caught himself watching them sometimes, and wondering.

Aisha had made it to the table, and was fumbling with a glass and a pitcher of juice. He itched to simply do it for her, but he knew his help wasn't wanted. Finally, she managed to fill the glass without spilling or breaking anything. Pretty good, considering as her eyes were still closed. Heero watched as she drained the glass in three big gulps, blinked a half dozen times, then focused on him.

"Morning, Daddy." She yawned. "Mom left already?"

"She did, a little after five." Heero set his mug in the sink and sat down at the table across from his daughter.

Aisha nodded and yawned again. "I think I'll make oatmeal and toast. Do you want some?" she asked, standing up.

Heero shook his head, then said, "Make sure you make enough for your brother. I'm going to go wake him."

"Do you have to?" she mumbled.

Heero was just starting up the stairs when a towheaded cannonball rounded the corner on the landing and flew down the stairs. Quick reflexes kept him from getting mowed down. He shook his head fondly as William accosted his sister.

"Dearest sister mine, what makest thou for to break our fast?"

"If you don't shut up, I'm going to break your head." She turned to Heero, holding her spoon like a weapon. "Will you make him stop talking like that?"

"If you don't respond to it, he'll get bored and quit. Will, can we please use present day speech?"

"You guys are no fun," Will muttered, as he slumped into a chair. His subdued mood didn't last for long, though. Within a minute spitballs were flying in Aisha's direction.

"If you keep that up, I'm going to let her kill you."

"Dad, you're a spoilsport," Will said, but he did wad up the paper towel that had been providing ammunition and pitch it in the general direction of the trash can..

"Send him to live with Uncle Duo and his hellions." The smoky smell of burned oatmeal drifted through the kitchen as Aisha took her frustration out on breakfast, slopping it out of the pot and onto the burner.

"At least there aren't any stupid big sisters there. Uncle Duo's kids are cool. Unlike some siblings I could name."

They were just getting into the groove of a companionable sibling quarrel when the baby monitor on the counter woke with a cooing sound. Heero left the brewing war behind and trotted up the stairs to bring down his youngest child, Felicia. Lici was sitting up in her crib as sunlight gilded her blond curls. She blinked pretty blue eyes up at her daddy, and lifted her arms to be picked up.

---

Monday, 7:58pm

Aisha was curled up on the couch, trying to look nonchalant. But she'd checked the clock three times in the last minute. Will, too, was hiding his anticipation, but if he'd thought he'd fooled his father, he underestimated the former soldier. Heero's eyes had immediately picked out the red indicator light and time on Will's personal disc player, proving that the alarm for the unit was set for 7:59.

Sure enough, as soon as the clock clicked over to that time, Will woke out of his decibel-induced haze, and his attention snapped to the phone on the desk.

Lisi was too young to pretend. She'd been asking, "Mum-mum?" every few minutes for the last hour.

"Mum-mum?" Right on schedule.

"Just a minute to go, Lisi." Heero stroked his youngest daughter's fine gold hair, letting it curl around his index finger.

At eight o' clock, exactly, the screen on the phone flared to life. Heero and the kids crowded around to talk to Relena. Aisha and Will forgot their pose of unconcern as soon as they saw her face.

"Mama! I'm so glad you made it there okay." Aisha wormed under Heero's arm to get in the camera's view.

"Where are you right now? Do you have a window where you can see space?" Will's toes scrabbled on the back of the chair as he hefted himself over Heero's shoulder.

Lisi's reaction was a totally predictable, "Mum-mum!" as she lunged at the screen.

Relena laughed. "Of course I made it fine. I'm on L1, Will, we're going by the numbers this time. I'll be headed home after we visit L5. There aren't any windows in this room, I'm sorry to say. Don't worry, you'll see space again soon enough."

"How's everything going, Relena?"

She gave Heero a speaking look. "It could be better. Really, it just feels like the same conflicts come up year after year, and they just change the names and the jargon."

"Hang in there. We'll be waiting here for you when you get home."

"I can hardly wait. I'll be there Friday. I just keep reminding myself that it's only four more days. Are you ready for your lullaby, Lisi?"

Lisi beamed at the screen, displaying two bottom teeth. "Mum-mum sthing!"

"Okay, one song then off to bed for Mommy's angel, huh?"

Heero sat with his two older children draped around him, his youngest curled against his chest, and closed his eyes as he listened to Relena sing. Her voice was sweet and clear, even over the tight-beam microwave connection. Or maybe he only imagined that she was close enough to touch...

"Lullaby, and good night,
You're your mother's delight,
Shining angels beside
My darling abide... "

Lisi snuffled against Heero's shirt, and allowed her thumb to slip in her mouth. She blinked and rubbed her eyes with a little fist. He looked toward the other two, and saw that their eyes were glued to the screen, where Relena sang, and studied each face, as though to fix them in her mind.

"Sleepyhead, close your eyes.
Mother's right here beside you.
I'll protect you from harm,
You will wake in my arms. "

A few minutes later, the song was over, and the connection broken. While it was late evening in Brussels, it was early afternoon on L1, and there were people knocking on her door all through the call. She had smiled sadly as she said goodbye, and blew them a kiss.

Aisha headed toward her homework and Will clicked the television on, now that Relena's nightly call was over. They were both subdued. Heero took the sleeping Lisi up to her crib, then returned downstairs to settle beside Will in front of the television.

He ignored the tight feeling in his chest, and the prickly sensation at the corners of his eyes. In political life, separations were a fact of life.

---

Tuesday 4:00pm

There was something wrong about the Intruder's actions today, Heero thought. They just seemed... too rote. A lot of hackers were methodical, but he had an uneasy sense of deja-vu about what he was seeing. It was just too familiar, somehow.

Following a hunch, he typed a command that opened a hole in the security of his bait big enough to walk a Gundam through.

The Intruder didn't take advantage. It kept poking about like it had been doing for the last two hours.

He used file permissions to pen it up, and traced it. It came from a corporate system. A few minutes sleuthing revealed the truth. It wasn't a person, it was a very complex, AI bot. A decoy.

Damn! Damn! DAMN!

Heero cursed the Intruder and cursed his blindness and cursed the universe in general as his fingers flew across the keyboard. Damage control.

He'd been played like a violin. All that poking around his "honey pot" lure was a ruse, not even done by the hacker him or herself. It was a bot. It was a damn decoy, keeping him occupied at a sensitive military target while the hacker who wrote it snuck in somewhere else.

Heero went through log after log. If the Preventers weren't the target, then who? Ministry of Economics? No. Nor was Internal Affairs, Foreign Affairs, the Exchequer... There was too much for him to check manually. He wrote queries to scan for suspicious behavior. What had his opponent been up to while Heero had been watching a simple little program pretend to be gullible?

He had seriously underestimated his quarry.

---

Wednesday, 6:00pm

There! A file with the wrong checksum. Finally, after more than twenty-four hours of parsing and scanning and searching, there was the crumb of a trail. What was it? His heart sank to the pit of his stomach when he realized that the log belonged to the transportation ministry, and that the file was a shuttle flight plan template. One that was read into the navigation control memory and set with the appropriate times and destinations with each shuttle flight.

And it had been altered.

He didn't waste time trying to figure out what the alteration was. That was secondary. First priority was to get in touch with Geoffrey Rhodes. He'd been an assistant Vice Minister at Transportation when Relena was Vice Foreign Minister. Like her, he was young and ambitious. And like her, he'd achieved much. He was Minister of Transportation now.

Hacking skills come in handy in emergencies. A fake priority code, and a reroute around the secretary, and his call rang directly in the Minister's office within seconds. There was no time to go through bureaucratic hoops.

"Good after... Heero? What is it?" Geoff's smile dropped off his face once he got a good look at his screen.

"Ground the shuttles, all of them."

Geoff didn't stop to ask why Heero wanted him to halt transportation that carried tens of thousands of people a day, with flights leaving almost every minute. His face disappeared from the screen, then returned, scarcely a minute later.

"Done. Now can you tell me why I just shut down all Earth/colony and intercolony transportation?"

"The flight plan templates aren't to be trusted. They've been altered. There's no way to tell which flights it will affect. You'll need to copy a new one from a trusted backup," he paused and considered, then continued with nausea rising at the thought, "it'll have to be a 'grandfather' backup, from at least a month ago. I can't guarantee the security of any later than that. And it will still have to be checked manually before it's used. It's possible that the security breach was earlier than that."

How he hated to admit that. Fooled, for weeks. A voice in his brain was shouting "Failure!" at him, but he had to ignore it. There was too much to do right now.

"I've got somebody on it," Geoff said, "Is there anything else you need me to do?"

"No, I'll keep looking, but that's all I've found so far." Heero was reaching to close the connection when a connection of a different sort clicked in his head with a toll of finality. "Geoff, can you check and see where Relena is right now? She was heading to L3 this evening."

"From where?" Geoff's face stilled into a set expression.

"L2"

"One minute." He turned away so fast, Heero almost didn't see the frown.

When Geoff came back, his carefully neutral expression was set in stone. "Her flight left a half hour before the shuttles were grounded. She's on the passenger list. They've gotten a message to go manual and make an emergency landing, but we won't know for a while."

"I see." And he did see. His failure was complete. It was not some faceless group of travelers in danger from his lack of foresight, it was Relena. He willed his face to the same neutral mask that Geoff showed.

"She'll probably be okay, Heero. We don't know how the template was altered, do we? The listed pilot on that flight is very good; I know him personally. Heero, are you going to be all right?"

"I'm fine. Thanks, Geoff. Keep me informed."

"I will, Heero, I will."

The screen went black.

Heero spun to his terminal. There was a criminal to find. They say that the man who has nothing left to lose is the most dangerous. They're wrong. The one who is most dangerous and implacable is the one who has something precious to lose. Something precious that is in danger....

---

It took Heero five minutes to pick up the trail. He snorted. Typical genius. Spends a incredible amount of work on making an almost perfect decoy bot - Heero winced at the memory - then fails to take basic precautions at his real target. Sloppy, but to Heero's benefit. Time was of the essence.

The Intruder had allowed his computer's processor ID to be recorded, and didn't erase it.

One half-hour later, he had the Intruder tracked to the Mediterranean. By 7:45, Preventers had him and his friends in custody in southern Italy.

All this was caused by a group of teenagers, manipulated in their idealism by men who thought to profit from conflict. Heero had a sudden insight into how the officers of OZ must have felt as he and the other Gundam pilots systematically destroyed the Specials troops. It was frightening that children not much older than Aisha could cause that kind of damage.

He found the kids huddled on the couch in the living room. He hadn't told them, specifically, but somehow they'd found out. Aisha was pale and Will was fidgety. Lisi looked from her brother to her sister from her spot on the floor, and chewed on her thumb. Her blue eyes were wide and uncertain as she used the couch to pull herself up to her feet, and toddled toward Heero.

He lifted her in his arms, and tried to muster a smile. He didn't fool her. Her lower lip stuck out, and she whimpered. She may not know what was amiss, but the grave atmosphere dampened her sunny nature. He dropped a kiss on the top of her head, and half-fell into the desk chair to stare at the phone screen and wait. And hope. There hadn't been a problem yet... Geoff would have called already.

8:00 came. Then 8:10. The call tone sounded and the screen lit up. And Heero felt punched in the gut when the face that resolved was that of Geoffrey Rhodes, and not Relena.

"Heero," he began. There was a breathless quality to Geoff's voice.

"What happened?" The words felt dragged out of his throat.

"The shuttle, well, they found out about the problem before the autopilot shut off and the navigation shut down, so they were prepared..." Geoff scrubbed a hand across his forehead, "But, you know, they were halfway to L3 - there's really not much choice of where to go."

"They reentered?"

"Yeah, they had time to make the calculations. The last transmission from the pilot said they were going to try reentry, and an emergency landing. He's a really good pilot, and the copilot's good too - lots of experience."

Heero forced the words past the boulder in his throat. "The last transmission?"

"The shuttle, it was an intercolony one. It hadn't been... hadn't been inspected to reentry specs... the shielding, that is. We think the antenna was probably damaged during reentry, and the emergency beacon doesn't seem to be working, at least, we haven't picked it up yet. We're still working on it, though."

The shields... reentry... "Did..." Heero took a second to slow his heartbeat and pace his breathing, "did it burn up on reentry?"

"We don't know, Heero, but we think it made it. The glide path would put it over South America for the landing. We've got every tracking station in the western hemisphere checking their radar logs for an artifact that could be the shuttle. A couple have come back with possibilities. If it is the shuttle, then it made it down... essentially intact."

"Essentially intact," Heero croaked, then cleared his throat. "Can you get me a shuttle?" He was cold - so cold. Ice was creeping down his arms and covering his fingers where he clutched the arms of his chair. He couldn't feel the chair. He only knew he was in contact with it because he saw his fingers clamped around the armrests, turning a sickly yellow-white from the force of his grip.

"Heero, I wouldn't recommend coming"

"Why not?"

"Well, I mean, we've got teams out. Good ones, with a lot of experience at this. And the right equipment. The interior of South America is mostly forest reserve, it's dense back in there. And the area we're searching is a big one, most of the interior. We don't have a whole lot of data on where it might have come down..." He'd stopped raking his hand across his forehead, and was now rubbing both temples. He closed his eyes, and pressed his fingers into the inner corners.

"You don't need me, in other words."

"Well, I think you might consider that it could be best you stay there. With the kids, you know... They're going to need you..."

It was true. They were all three were wound up together like a litter of kittens on the couch. Aisha was crying, and Will was patting her shoulder. His eyes were bleak and tearless. Lisi was sobbing and patting Aisha's face, "Sissy cwy..."

Heero was ripped in half. He wanted more than anything to run directly to South America. To personally search every inch of that continent until he found Relena. The sobs of his daughters raked across his ears. They needed him here, not off on the other side of the world. They may have just lost their mother, was he going to take their father too?

It was Will's tearless face that really made his heart ache. He was trying so hard to be strong for his sisters, stuffing his fear and grief down inside, and plastering a calm mask over his face. He shouldn't have to do that. He was a little boy, one who needed his mother. He needed to cry. Heero didn't want his son to deny his emotions.

"I've got to go now," he said to Geoff.

"I'll keep you informed, Heero, just as soon as we know something more. I've told Lady Une, already, she said she'd contact Zechs and Noin."

"Thanks, Geoff. That's one less call I have to make. Thank you."

"Hey, Yuy... you take care, all right? You and the kids..."

"I will. Goodbye"

"Goodbye"

He stumbled over to the couch, and collapsed on Aisha's other side. She lunged into his chest, and locked her arms around him, sobbing into the hollow of his shoulder. Lisi crawled over Aisha's legs and curled up like a kitten between them, the thumb of one hand stuck in her mouth, her other hand twisting in his shirt.

Will stayed where he was. He sat rigid, expressionless, his hands clenching and unclenching in the loose fabric of his jeans. He stared straight ahead.

"Will, " Heero said, softly. If he kept his voice low, maybe it wouldn't break, "come here."

He stood up, rigid, and walked over to Heero. The mask was breaking a little - he worried at his lower lip with his teeth. The hands were still clenching and unclenching.

Heero held out his right arm, the one not occupied by Aisha and Lisi, and Will broke. He threw himself at Heero, breaking into throat-tearing sobs, and pounding his fist into Heero's chest.

"It's not true! It can't be! They've made a mistake, Dad, can't you make them figure out that it was a mistake!?"

"It's not!" Aisha screamed at him, muffled by Heero's shirt, "Don't you see? It's not!"

"It is! It's got to be! Mama can't be.."

Heero shut his eyes, and wrapped his arms around his children, rocking back and forth as if they were babies again. In a rusty voice, he sang, "Lullaby, and goodnight..."

---

Wednesday, 11:50pm

Heero left the three kids curled up together on the couch. He walked and stood by the tall window that looked out over the garden. His eyes were still dry.

He felt squeezed dry, like someone had twisted and wrung him out. Then discarded him. His chest ached and his throat hurt, and a headache had been throbbing behind his eyes since he hung up the phone. He didn't take medicine for it. He deserved the pain.

It was his fault. His mistake. His oversight. He should have caught the bot earlier. Warned Geoff before Relena's shuttle took off. In what he recognized was a flaw in logic, he also wished he'd been there with her.

Aisha and Will had somehow found out about the danger the shuttle was in before he told them. He hadn't taken the time yet to trace how they did it, but now that knowledge sat like an anvil on his chest. How much did they know? Did they already know that he could have prevented the accident that may have taken Relena's life? Or was he going to have to tell them that, himself?

He wouldn't blame them for hating him - he hated himself. But what would they do, without a mother and despising their father? Had he destroyed his children's lives, too? He gripped the windowframe. It should have been a painfully tight grip, but he couldn't feel the pain. Except for the headache, he couldn't feel anything. It was like his whole being was concentrated up in his head, and the rest of his body was dead. Walking dead.

He stared out at the garden, a welter of dark shapes thrusting toward the house, surrounding it, smothering it. There were no stars, no moon. Just the faint glow of the city lights reflecting on the undersides of dark granite clouds. They hung low, huddling over the house in its little valley.

Somewhere out there, across an ocean, there were people looking for Relena. Here he stood, useless. They didn't need his help. Once they found out what he'd done, his children wouldn't need or want his help, either. With Relena gone, what was there for him?

He could work, but why? He could eat and drink and bathe and dress and walk around, but what was the point? He was useless, excess, fit only to be cast off.

God, he wanted her back. He wanted her to be alive so bad, his whole self was caught up in it. In an intense, wordless, "Please!".

He had never felt so helpless. So small. So insignificant. The most important person in his life, and there was nothing he could do to save her. He'd had his chance, and blown it.

He fell to his knees, and pressed his forehead into the windowsill. The moon drifted out from behind a cloud, and silver light washed over him, reflecting in a spark of pure white off the plain band that circled his left ring finger.

Without conscious direction, he clasped his hands against his chest, still leaning his head against the windowsill. Finally, the tears came.

They poured from his eyes, streaming down his cheeks. He couldn't breathe.

"I don't know if anybody's up there. God? Allah? Angels? But if anybody's there, if there's some presence beyond this world that's listening to me, please let her live. Bring her back to me.

"Relena is everything to me. She's my light, my life... the reason that I'm here. But I'm not selfish, if it were just me I could let her go. I don't have the right to ask for her for myself. I'm not worthy of that.

"God, whatever, if you're there, you've got to know that the world needs her too. The Earth, the colonies... They're not ready to make it without her yet.

"Aisha..." His voice cracked, "Aisha needs her mother. She's going to need her mother as she grows up. There's so much I don't know... and Will, he needs her too. I'm not... sensitive. I can't help them through hurts and crises like she can. I'm just not capable of being that kind of parent for them.

"Oh God, how can I tell Lisi that Mum-mum's gone and not coming back? How can I explain that to her? She doesn't understand death, that someone could go away and never return. She'd miss her mommy so bad. She's just a baby, God, she needs her mommy. She... she needs her mommy."

A rough sob tore from his throat and he looked up at the sky, pounding his fists against the cold marble of the windowsill.

"Is there anybody out there listening to me!?"

The strength left his body and he collapsed against the wall below his window.

Into the silence of mental and physical exhaustion, the call tone from the phone sounded like a siren. It echoed through his head, and as he stumbled toward the desk he heard a rustle from the couch.

His hand more fell on the button than pushed it, but the screen blared to life.

I'm dreaming.

Through a blur of tears, he saw Relena. Her hair was sticking out in all directions and there were smears of mud on her cheeks and nose. There was a twig caught in her hair just above her left ear. The area around her was dark, but it looked like a rough board wall, and a scrap of curtain.

"Heero? Heero, you don't know how good it feels to see your face. You and the kids are all I've been thinking of."

She was laughing and crying, and Heero vaguely realized he was too.

"Where are you? Are you okay?"

"Somewhere in South America. The people around here can't tell me exactly where we are, other than the name of their village. This is the only phone in the area. I was so scared it wouldn't work. It's a satellite unit they salvaged from an abandoned Alliance base. Can you trace my signal, and tell where we are?"

"We? Did the others make it out, too?"

She beamed, "Yes! There are some injuries, a few serious, but we worked together and we all made it out. I guess people have been looking for us?"

"You wouldn't believe.... I've got you traced, and I'm sending it to Geoff's people there in South America. You'll have help soon."

"Great! I can't wait to get back home, but I'm not going to leave until all the injured are out of here, okay? It wouldn't be fair."

"I wouldn't expect you to. You wouldn't be my Relena if you put yourself ahead of others. Stay there. Don't get on a shuttle. Me and the kids are coming after you."

"Are you sure?"

"Oh, yes. Just stay where you are, and I'll be there as soon as I can get there."

"Mommy!" There was a chorus of happy squeals in his ears. The more mature "Mom" was dropped as Aisha and Will seemed to revert back to early childhood in their joy.

Relena leaned close to the screen, almost as if she were trying to reach through the phone to embrace her children. She rubbed at the tears spilling out of her eyes.

"Oh, baby, it's so good to see you. I've missed you so much. Mommy will be home soon. I'll see you soon."

"Relena. Wait for us. We're leaving as soon as we can, and we'll all go home together."

"I'll wait, Heero. We'll all go home together."