Setting: Just after the AC-195 war. Possibly AU, but it’s worked in so it doesn’t warp the TV storyline.

Pairings: 3x4, 1+2, Kreigan+5, 13x6

Rating: R

Warnings: Lots of sap in this chapter - you’ll see why I had to point that out. Several OCs but they don’t necessarily play a big part.

Disclaimers: The only characters here that I own are any alter egos, Kazimiriel, Machiavel, Sarrow and Malvad and a few other characters that’ll pop up. Characters I don’t own include: Heero, Duo, Trowa, Quatre, Wufei, Zechs, Treize and any other good ones in fact.

Also, I would like to note that I am not Christian - anybody that wants to know why can pick one of two courses of action, either accept the fact that I’m a Mahayanist or email me and prepare for a very complex credo - and I’d like to add that this is just a story. If anything in it offends anyone, I apologize very sincerely.

Rough Peace - Part 16

“Heero?”

The Wing pilot cringed at the sound of Relena’s voice. She’d just found out for getting back to the office after three days since Heero and Trowa’s return. He turned around, his stone expression not betraying his annoyance. “Hmm?”

The princess put a hand on his shoulder and bit her lip to stop the tears, “I’m so sorry about Quatre and Wufei, they were wonderful people,” she said quietly. “I know we don’t have any, um, remains. But we’ll give them a proper send off, I promise. I really do miss them… I only hope Quatre didn’t suffer.”

Heero nodded tensely and wiped a lone tear from the girl’s eye. The lone tear was soon followed by a stream of silent weeping. He put an arm around her shoulders kindly, knowing how much he himself would need comfort in this situation.

“Relena… there’s a chance that he’s alive. A small chance, but he might not be dead,” Heero said, wondering if this ‘sliver of hope’ would comfort her or just make her more anxious.

She pulled away as Trowa entered the room. “Heero, are you ready to go?” he asked quietly, the pain evident in his hazel eyes.

“Yeah, we’ll be going now,” Heero said to Relena. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

The two Gundam pilots left, Trowa having come back from looking after Duo to pick Heero up. Since Duo was basically unable to do anything for himself because of whatever the angel had injected him with, they were on shifts with each other through the day. Heero stayed at home with Duo in the mornings and worked at the Preventers offices in the afternoon and Trowa vice versa.

Back at home, Trowa lingered before going inside. “Heero… I’m going to take a walk,” he said hesitantly. “I’ll just be along the boardwalk if you need me.”

The Japanese boy smiled understandingly. “Sure Trowa. No need to hurry back if you don’t want to,” he said as he went back inside.

“Heero, that you?” Duo asked from inside the front room as his lover returned.

Heero sat beside the braided boy and put his arms around him, kissing him gently on the forehead. “How do you feel?” he said, brushing the violet-eyed boy’s bangs out of his face and resting Duo’s head on his shoulder.

“Okay,” Duo sighed. “Sleepy, but okay. What time is it? I can’t raise my wrist.”

Heero held him tighter, feeling more anxious about his lover by the second. “It’s seven thirty. Have you had dinner?”

Duo attempted to shake his head and could only just shift it. “No. God this is so humiliating…”

“You can’t embarrass yourself in front of me,” Heero said, stroking Duo’s face. “I don’t mind looking after you. Do you want to order in?”

“That’d be nice,” Duo said, nuzzling his lover’s neck. “I wonder how Wufei’s doing,” he commented after Heero had phoned in their order, “He seems happy with how things have worked out, which is more than can be said for Trowa.”

“I know…” Heero sighed. “The things he came out with last night worried me.”

Duo frowned. “What did he say?”

“He seemed a little upset, that’s an understatement but still… I just wanted to tell him that we’re both here and that Quatre will still love him. He said that Quatre was three hundred and seventy seven years old, that the two years he’d spent with him must have been fairly insignificant and that he was probably already forgetting him.”

The braided boy sighed and stared at the floor. ‘Poor guy, he must feel near suicidal. I know I would if I lost Heero like that.’ Duo shifted a little, trying to get closer to his lover.

Heero caught on and wrapped him up in his arms, brushing his lips against Duo’s ear. His heart pounded as he held him lovingly ‘Why is this so hard to say?’ Heero wondered ‘we’ve already said this to each other… but it’s not something I can take lightly, even with Duo. No, I can do this. I’ve said it before and I meant it then… how can I mean it *more* now?’

“I…” Heero cleared his throat and gulped viciously. “I love you Duo,” he said quietly, doubting whether his boyfriend had heard that.

Duo smiled as much as he could, “I love you too, honey,” he replied enthusiastically and tried to hug him in response. His strength deserted him again and he sighed, wondering how long it would be before he could return his lover’s affection. If he could ever return it.

But he knew that nothing could ever stop him from loving Heero and he knew that Heero felt the same. The absolute bottom line was that they could get through anything, as long as they had each other.

The gymnast stared with tear-filled hazel eyes out at the ocean waves. The sun had just ducked beneath the horizon, leaving the always-lonely beach bathed in a perfect purple twilight.

‘Quatre would love this,’ Trowa thought to himself, staring up at the first few stars to blink the tears away.

The secluded little lagoon that they’d found together had been the scene of almost every important point in their relationship. It had been where they’d first admitted their feelings for each other, where they’d shared their first kiss. And that one night they’d spent together, telling each other almost everything about their lives.

Unfortunately, Trowa had had no idea that Quatre had been omitting three hundred and sixty odd years of his own. He sat down at the water’s edge, tossing off his sandals and let the waves caress his feet as he lay back on the sand.

Trowa let the time tick past slowly, let the hours go by as the pain of loneliness ate away at him inside, it was entirely possible that after the length of time they’d spent running around in the eighth dimension, he was out like a light the second his head touched the floor.

He awoke later in the darkness, the streetlights in the distance were on and now the boardwalk was deserted too.

His ears pricked up at a noise coming from behind him, almost as if somebody had said his name. He’d been ‘hearing’ noises like that for two days now, hoping against hope that it was Quatre coming back to him. He dismissed it and angrily wiped the tears from his eyes, knowing that Quatre wouldn’t have wanted this, wouldn’t have wanted Trowa to feel so miserable and certainly wouldn’t have wanted to be locked away in another world.

‘Quatre wouldn’t…’ Trowa mused, ‘but can the same be said for Renfredriel? They’re almost like two different people…’ His opinion was certainly justified. There was Quatre, the sweet, innocent and trusting Sandrock pilot that he’d fallen in love with not more than a second after he’d laid eyes on him. But then there was Renfredriel a jaded, world-weary angel who he knew nothing about.

‘I wonder if he can hear me… he said he knew me before he came to Earth so that must mean he knows about *me* at least. All the same, I feel a little silly. But there’s no one around and it’s hardly a big price to pay for the possibility of speaking to him.’

He hesitated for a while and looked up at the sky. “Quatre… I don’t know if you can hear me, but I...” he trailed off and hesitated. “I feel so alone without you. I know you have some kind of family there… but with you so far away, I don’t have anyone. I’m not trying to make you feel guilty, but I do love you. I always will…”

“I love you too, Trowa.”

The gymnast looked up and around. ‘I know I heard something that time…’ He stood up and turned around to catch a flicker of light from the trees at the edge of the lagoon.

“Trowa?” the wind-like voice came again as the light slowly came together and Quatre stood there in it’s place.

The Heavyarms pilot padded tentatively over to his lover. Surely he wasn’t dreaming, his head was still pounding from keeping in his tears. He gazed at him in wonderment and reached out to touch him. His hand met Quatre’s cheek and he jumped at finding he was real, that he wasn’t imagining this at all.

“Quatre… how…” not for the first time since he’d been with the beautiful blond, Trowa was lost for words.

The Arabian boy smiled. “Do you remember,” he began, intertwining his fingers with his lover’s, “that night when we were here, in this exact same spot, and we promised each other that, no matter what, we would always love each other and we would always be together?”

Trowa nodded mutely and took hold of Quatre’s other hand.

“I’ve been living by the promises we made then. Your love has been all I ever needed to keep me going, and nothing, *nothing* in any world would make me forget what I pledged to you that night. My love, my body and my soul.”

The taller boy smiled for the first time in days and pulled him closer, kissing him tenderly as they slipped their arms around each other. Silently giving their lives to each other, now and forever.

~end~

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