Gundam Wing/AC 1. Pirate

Gundam Girl: Well, here it is. My pirate fic. I promise, I did do the research for this! But a lot of the knowledge came from my uncle, who's really into the 1800's and stuff, so thanks Uncle Doug!  
  
Disclaimer: I be not claiming to own Gundam Wing, ye scallywags. Yargh!  
  
Raonaid: She's a bit more into it than I imagined. . .  
  
Warnings: R. A bit of couple confusion, no doubt some cursing violence. Drinking, attempted rape, tall tales, sexual innuendo. I think I covered it all.  
  
*~Upper Class~*  
  
He fancied it, for many reasons. The texture, the thickness, the gold swirling in red if the light hit it just right. But he was far from being obsessed with it, nor drunk with it. More, it seemed that his companion would be in a very short time, thanks to the favored red wine he had bought for him.  
  
Treize Khushrenada chuckled into his goblet. If it was a mistake to give the young Governor Quatre Raberba Winner such a generous amount of alcohol the very day his engagement had been announced, then it was the young master himself who would pay for it, not he. His golden hair had been mussed with trembling hands before he had sipped the wine, however, and his original intention was to calm him, not intoxicate him.  
  
Although, Treize though with amusement, Master Winner was certainly making no complaints about being taken far from his usual sober, clear-thinking state of mind.  
  
"She's a fine lady, Quatre. She's beautiful, intelligent, obedient, well endowed. . ." The duke halted his list of positive adjectives when Quatre's face turned a deeper shade of scarlet not caused by the wine. "And, well, she's your fiance, and I would not expect less than a dagger to pierce both of my eyes for speaking of her quite obviously tempting appearance."  
  
Quatre slid his goblet across the table. "You give your drink too freely, my lord. It has me wanting to voice my agreement."  
  
Treize laughed wholeheartedly. "And so you should! It is not every day a man is told he will marry the sister of a nobleman such as Milliardo Peacecraft, a fine baron and friend of mine."  
  
"I do not question her loveliness, Treize, for her face can be likened to an angel." Quatre pressed a hand to his forehead and decided he would leave soon and make for an early nightcap. "And yet with only a painting of her sent to my library it is difficult to really know the spirit inside her angelic body."  
  
"The spirit is an angel's as well."  
  
"So you have met Miss Relena then?"  
  
Treize set his hands flat-palmed on the table clothed in pristine white lace. "I have met her once. Yet it was three years ago that I did, when she was a lady barely having stepped into womanhood. She's one of good manners, and fiery independence. She'll not depend on you for her emotional pleasure, I fear. If it is a question of yours, I do not doubt that she has been not tarnished, Quatre. She will come to you untouched, Milliardo would have seen to that."  
  
Quatre shot to his feet, stumbled for a moment, and then stared at his longtime friend with wide blue eyes that had dimmed a bit of its bright intelligence. He looked as though he would very much like to slide to the floor with fled consciousness. "It was not a question of mine, Treize!" he exclaimed, startled, his face pink to his neck now. "I've not thought for a moment of Miss Relena's. . . Of her. . . Of our wedding night!" he sputtered.  
  
"Come now, my friend, of course you have. You are a man."  
  
Yes, he was a man, and yes, admittedly, he had given a thought to possible - more than probable - lovemaking between Miss Peacecraft and himself. "Your attention flatters me," he said sarcastically.  
  
Oh, what an influence of drink could do to a man, Treize thought. Particularly those of supreme manners such as the one wobbling on his feet right now; he realized it may have been an evil to intoxicate Raberba Winner and chase away his politeness.  
  
"Do not worry yourself, Quatre. God shall not send you to heat and flame for such thoughts." Treize took another sip from his own goblet. "Miss Relena is to do that for you."  
  
Quatre shook his head. "Your speech flows nicely from your groin, Treize. I'm certain if my lady Anne knew of your talk-"  
  
"She would demonstrate my meaning," Khushrenada interrupted, sending more color to Quatre's cheeks. "You will not be on your feet much longer, friend. Do go home and rest yourself from your exerting day."  
  
"I shall, thanks not to you, Duke. This is an accursed drink."  
  
Treize smiled. "I shall see to it that it flows merrily on the day you wed the child, Master Winner. Good night to you."  
  
"And you as well." Proudly stumbling one time alone, Quatre left the dining room and made to the door where his carriage waited in the rain outside.  
  
Once the sound of hoof-beats had faded from Treize's ears, he turned to the doorway of the dining room. "Anne," he said softly, and a woman with long brown hair that fell neatly about her shoulders entered at his call. "Would you finish Master Winner's cup, dearest?"  
  
"I shall, my lord." Lady Anne Khushrenada sat gracefully down by his side and proceeded to sip from the abandoned goblet. "And then, my darling?"  
  
Treize's smile, which had not failed to stay in place, widened. "And then, perhaps you could carry out the meaning I was trying to make clear to Master Winner."  
  
***  
  
A gold richer than any coin touched his face with the faintest of chills brought on by the newly-begun morning. Overhead stars still twinkled, a pale full moon was dissipating between them, and the sun continued to steadily raising, making the gold stretch further and further across the vast ocean the color of a thousand sapphires.  
  
He could prove that, even, because there was no doubt a thousand sapphires and more in his cargo hold.  
  
"A satisfying view this morning is it, Captain?"  
  
Wufei Chang, a man dressed in loose tan trousers and a matching vest over a white shirt squinted at the stretch of land that had been spotted almost thirty minutes earlier. "I expect we shall arrive at Kent in near sixty minutes, sir."  
  
"Aye, Dover will be an opportune choice of location to harbor. Prep the crew to weight anchor in an hour, Mr. Chang."  
  
"Aye, sir."  
  
His crew was not large, nor was his ship. But Captain Heero Yuy did not need excessive materials; they would be but a hindrance to him.  
  
Trowa Barton, his sister Catherine, Duo Maxwell, his wife Hilde, Wufei, and his wife Sally were enough to raid any small island or other ship. They did not often weight anchor. Duo had once claimed it too heavy to take the trouble to lower it only to lift it again later. That was one of the reasons they stayed cast out away from the shore. Another was merely because it was home.  
  
"Trowa!" Heero heard the fair, redheaded Catherine call from below deck, most likely from the kitchen. "Bring me another sack of potatoes or you'll not get any breakfast this morning!"  
  
There was a scurrying from the cabin Heero knew was beneath where he stood on deck, and he could hear Trowa hurry to do his sister's bidding. Barton had struggled for almost a year now, anxious to do whatever would please Catherine, who was the widow of Michael Bloom, a man who had served in the king of England's court. He had been against the instant execution of pirates and once he'd died, Trowa could not bare to leave his sister by herself in Bloom's gigantic mansion in Berkshire. And so Catherine had joined the crew and worked as a cook and fellow pillager of anything that fetched a pretty penny.  
  
Old sailors' tales declared it poor fortune to bring any female on board a ship, yet Heero had always dismissed that as cowardly superstition, and thus he had gained three women on his vessel, the Ivory Damsel. Female they were, and as sinful and coarse-tongued as any men. Heero valued all three of them as much as he did his males.  
  
Because pirates were pirates, and nary a soul could change who they were.  
  
"Captain Yuy." A light-haired, tan-skinned lass with parted hair tied in two twists stood on the top step of the staircase that led below deck. Sally Chang smiled. "Good morning to you, sir. Cathy's just said your breakfast is coolin' and I s'pose you'll be wanting a bite of vittles before we get to shore. Why don't you come and eat now?"  
  
Heero nodded, his dark brown hair swaying gently in the salt-scented breeze. "I'll do so, Sally, and go and wake-"  
  
"Damn you, Duo, you yella' coward!" screamed a raging, female voice from beneath them. "I'll not threaten to slice your hair this time, nay! I'll have your whole head, and toss it to the asses you were born with!"  
  
Sally laughed and led him down the stairs. "It seems the Maxwells are already awake, sir."  
  
Heero's own mouth smirked. "All right. Instead, let them know we approach Dover, and have Duo calm his wife before all the folk of Kent wake too early for my liking."  
  
***  
  
The beat of hoofs clopping on a dirt road. Birds singing. The creaking of carriage wheels.  
  
The vehicle hit a bump in the road, and Relena Peacecraft startled from her sleep. Beside her, two of her maids stirred.  
  
"Forgiveness, please, Miss Relena!" shouted the voice of the carriage's driver, Walker.  
  
Relena drew back the curtain of the door's window and bright late morning sunlight filtered in from outside, and she craned her neck out to look at Walker. "Where are we?" she called up to him, her voice a little hoarse from having not spoken yet.  
  
"Only about a quarter of an hour from Dover, my lady. You should carry on if you wish to freshen a bit before we arrive. I'll stop in a minute or two that you may dress, Miss."  
  
"Thank you." When Relena turned, both of her maids, Christine and Marietta, had woken and were digging through kerchiefs looking for supplies to primp their mistress's appearance for the day.  
  
As soon as a comb began to ease to the snarls in her long hair the color of the setting sun, Relena remembered why she had been traveling in this carriage since yesterday morn.  
  
Lord Quatre Raberba, the newly elected governor of Kent was established in Dover. As it were, he had just arrived back from a month-long trip to Sussex and would be home just long enough for her to wed him: a grand total of five days.  
  
She sighed as Walker held true to his vow and the carriage stopped. She, Christine and Marietta stood and Walker quickly handed in one of Relena's trunks before shutting the door again.  
  
It was difficult enough, Relena thought in irritation, to put on a corset at all, let alone do it slightly bent so her head would not hit the roof on of the carriage. Christine was also kneeling on the seat of the carriage because Relena's feet and her trunk took up the room on the floor. Marietta slipped her into a lovely lavender gown after Christine had seen to it that the tight material that efficiently prohibited her diaphragm from expanding disrupted her breathing. Her hair was quickly and elegantly piled on her head and the correct amount of makeup and jewelry was applied before the carriage continued into Dover.  
  
Relena waited to put on her shoes until Walker opened the door of the carriage to assist her in stepping out. It would be painful to wear the small, pointy-toed pieces of leather all day, but she had been taught the importance of first impressions; and the impression Governor Winner received was to last both of them the rest of her life.  
  
Upon being greeted by a butler who went by the name of Peygan, Relena discovered that her groom-to-be was not presently at home. A small measure of annoyance was paramount before the surprise. For some reason, it was not at all news that the governor was not inside the expansive mansion, and Relena was unaffected when she entered the house that would be her home from this day forth.  
  
Her belongings were carried inside and upstairs a chamber separate from Master Winner's until Sunday, when they would recite the vows Relena could think of as only a decree of her imprisonment. Whether Winner felt this way or didn't was to be found out - provided he returned relatively soon.  
  
And alas, that was not to be. After Relena had sat straight-backed and prim in a decorative parlor for nearly an hour, doing naught but sipping tea, fanning herself from the heat, and causing her body to long for movement, Peygan returned and announced that Master Winner would not be able to arrive home again until five o' clock, precisely three hours and forty-seven minutes. Relena knew, for she had made a poor attempt to chase away boredom for the past sixty by staring at the slowly moving hands of the grandfather clock in the foyer beside the door.  
  
"But my lord feared that you would not be entertained, Miss Relena," Peygan told her, "and he requested that I escort you through the village and buy you something you like as a welcoming present."  
  
Relena smiled; Walker, however, moved forward from his position by the window. "Peygan, sir, I must protest against such an idea. I am sure his honor the governor wishes well for Miss Relena, but Master Peacecraft trusted me with his sibling's protection. Surely a common village street is no place for a noble young woman such as Miss Relena."  
  
Peygan's smile only grew warmer. "No need to fret, young man," he assured him, "no need to fret. Master Winner knows Dover very well, and the people in the village are as courteous as any aristocrat."  
  
"But I do not think it wise-"  
  
"Come now, Walker," Relena chided, fanning herself a bit more energetically now. "My brother trusts you with my life, yes. But my brother must also trust Peygan with it now that he is to be in my service."  
  
Walker looked as though he very badly wanted to further his reasons for her not to leave the mansion, but his position forbade it, and so he kept his tongue still. "Yes, of course, Miss Relena. I shall not intrude."  
  
"Thank you very much." She nodded to him and accepted Peygan's arm. Together they walked out of the house and into the bright sunlight of the afternoon. "Is there anywhere particularly interesting?" she asked.  
  
Peygan chuckled. "I'm afraid there are no balls or parties on Master Winner's agenda until the day of your wedding, Miss Relena. Do stay patient with him."  
  
"Forgive me, I did not specify. I meant is there anywhere in the village - that is public - that would amuse me?"  
  
"Oh, gracious, Miss! If it is restaurants you speak of, it is not in my place to accompany you to one. But here, other - establishment - are quite questionable. Pubs and diners, Miss, I would advise against getting too near those areas."  
  
She supposed she should have heeded the old man. He knew this city well, and she knew nothing of it except that it smelled of salt and sweat and sunlight and that its governor would be her husband in less than one week. Yet when Peygan's back was turned as he counted out shillings to pay for the bracelet she claimed she wanted as the welcoming present from Master Winner, she carefully lifted her skirts and slipped away, darting into the nearest pub in quest of something to quench her parched throat.  
  
The pub was noisy with the music played by a mandarin player with a goatee in the corner and the yells and catcalls of the patrons that filled the tables and bar. Relena felt the slightest bit queasy with the overbearing scent of smoke and whiskey that attacked her nostrils. Suddenly. . .this place did not seem the ideal location for entertainment. However, she thought with a wave of enthusiasm rushing through her, she felt it was the ideal place for excitement.  
  
She wanted to feel herself of a part of it, but that was quite impossible; dressed in an expensive day gown, carrying a parasol trimmed in lace, and carrying a purse filled with several more shillings than the average worker received in three years, there was no way she could feel at place with this lower class.  
  
Relena was brought out of her silent meditation by the feeling of chilled liquid on her back. With a scream, she whirled, and pressed a hand to her heart.  
  
"Damn you, Trowa, you've gone and made me waste half my glass," said a man whose back was to her while he cursed another man who seemed less than completely sober. "None would guess you're clumsy drunk. Now what've we done?" The man turned, and Relena met eyes of a most extraordinary blue.  
  
He was dressed in trousers of a brown a shade or two lighter than his hair, and a sheathed saber was strapped to his waist; his skin, rich and rough and tan, set off his blue loose-sleeved shirt against his vest the same brown as his pants, and forced his eyes to be impossibly more noticeable than they would have been had he been with no shirt at all.  
  
The idea sent pink to Relena's cheeks, and she lowered her gaze to the filthy floor beneath her costly shoes. She was suddenly very aware how unfitting it was for her to be here. Here, standing before a. . .a man who, she realized now, was no more than a pirate.  
  
"Well now." While the lass he'd soiled with his drink scrutinized his face, Heero allowed himself a generous sweep of her whole self. A small woman she was, though not as small as Hilde, and quite fortunate in the giving of appearance. Her tiny waist flared into nicely curved hips underneath that lovely skirt, and the bodice he was certain he'd ruined stretched across ample breasts. Her hair, secured tightly on her head seemed to be spun of pure gold, and he was an excellent judge of gold. However, he realized with a bit of a smirk, he suddenly wouldn't have minded seeing that golden-spun hair cascade down her shoulders and back.  
  
Heero returned his eyes to her face again, which only lifted from the floor when he spoke.  
  
"Apologies, milady. Things so fine as yourself are seen scarce in places such as this, and if I had seen you visible in this mad house, I would have been convinced you weren't real and would have stumbled into you and spilled in any case."  
  
Relena blinked. She couldn't grasp what this pirate meant to tell her. Was he saying he wished for forgiveness, that he didn't think her important, or that he saw her as lovely? "You. . ." She paused when she realized her voice would need to be forced from her mouth. "It was an accident," she gasped out. "This will wash out if I leave quickly. . ."  
  
Heero smirked. He would have a little fun the short time he had to himself. Lifting a hand, he carelessly settled it on her shoulder and slid a finger down the length of her bare arm to her wrist. The finger continued to circle on the back of her hand. "Nay, woman. You wander this pub with no man, and as well dressed as you are, and so beautiful. . ." He raised his finger, this time, to her cheek and falsely caressed it. "One may think you had hoped to bump into me, or any other man with a coin on him."  
  
Relena scrambled to figure the meaning of that assumption. Once she did, her eyes narrowed. "How dare you!" she exclaimed and didn't notice Heero's mounting amusement. "Dare you insult me! Dare you take me so commonly, sir!"  
  
"Hush, darling, they'll hear you over the din."  
  
She didn't want to hush, she wanted to grow louder. The foolish commoner, to so blatantly presume she had intended to catch his eye like one of the many wench's who strutted round the pub.  
  
"Miss Relena!"  
  
Relena gasped, her eyes leaving Heero and focusing on Peygan, who had just entered the pub looking positively frazzled.  
  
Peyan, seeing Heero, drew a pistol from his jacket pocket. "Unhand her!" he commanded sharply, his bushy eyebrows lowering.  
  
Heero's mouth fell open, then grinned. "Relax, good fellow. It's only her face I'm touching. It isn't as though I'm doing this." With a quick move of his arm, he had her pressed up against him, breasts flattening against his chest.  
  
"Scoundrel!" Relena exclaimed in reaction, though her face warmed.  
  
Peygan shook with rage. "Release her!" he demanded again, cocking the small gun. "Or this shot will have your head!"  
  
"Well then, all right." Heero let go of her waist and raised his hands, stepping back. "She's all yours, mate."  
  
"Miss Relena, stand behind me."  
  
Relena did, but only because she feared the old man would die of a heart attack if she did not.  
  
"We will leave now," Peygan said evenly. "And we shall not again speak of this incident."  
  
Relena nodded, then spoke because he could not see her head. "Yes. And this sir-"  
  
"For your information!" Peygan whirled around and looked at her darkly. "He is not a sir."  
  
The smirk dropped from Heero's face.  
  
"He is a pirate, Miss Relena, and unworthy of so much as a glance from you, let alone your regard."  
  
Heero watched her, intrigued, as her expression grew stern.  
  
"Enough, Peygan. It is I whole will decide whom is worthy of my glance and regard, and I ask that you do not interfere, especially in situations I have well under my control. And for heaven's sake, put that gun away!"  
  
Relena took a breath. "You ask that I leave, and so I shall." Her eyes, burning with a blue flame, flicked to Heero's. Her heart skipped two beats when she realized he had been watching her the entire time. "Good day, sir."  
  
Heero raised what was left in his glass. "Good day, milady. I pray this won't stain."  
  
Relena hesitated, then smiled a little. "As do I." And she swept out of the pub so quickly, that Peygan had to fight to keep up with her.  
  
"Miss Relena, please wait!"  
  
Once the old man was gone, Heero murmured almost unconsciously, "Relena. . ."  
  
"Relena has a very charming smile, hasn't she?"  
  
Heero turned. He had forgotten that Trowa was behind him. "Aye," he answered slowly.  
  
A glint of humor appeared in Trowa's one visible eye. "Dare I tell you I see desire in your eyes, mate?"  
  
Heero snarled back, "Dare I tell you Catherine has a charming smile and I haven't once desired to bed her?"  
  
Trowa nodded. "As it should be, captain. I'd better go find her. She was last with Duo, and who knows what trouble that could lead to."  
  
Yuy nodded. "Remind them we meet at the ship before we set our plan to action."  
  
Trowa inclined his head in acknowledgement before striding out.  
  
Heero tilted his head in thought. Maybe once, he decided. Maybe once he had desired to bed Catherine.  
  
Relena. It wasn't likely she was married, otherwise she would not be strolling around with her servant who addressed her so formally. Nay, but what woman of such obvious nobility would voluntarily enter a place so shady as this pub?  
  
Heero shrugged the thought away. His time with her was over, and it was unlikely he would meet her again.  
  
But he would soon discover that fate had an odd way of allowing people to seen each other again.  
  
***  
  
Relena sighed once a new gown, blue this time, had been put on her. She had ignored the looks from Marietta and Christine, though she did not doubt that they wondered why their mistress had managed to have whiskey spilled on her.  
  
She had just finished freshening the powder on her face when she heard the massive front door being opened and Peygan's voice from downstairs:  
  
"Welcome home, Master Winner. Your fiance arrived this afternoon."  
  
"Excellent," a soft voice replied. "Ask her to please wait in my library, and I will meet with her there."  
  
**********************************************************************  
  
Gundam Girl: There you go, guys! This is for Raonaid. Thanks for posting such a wonderful challenge. Part two will be along. Feedback is always appreciated, so please review! Love, GG 


	2. Kidnapping

Gundam Girl: Thanks to everybody who reviewed with such enthusiasm. I was THRILLED. It means so much to me to get a positive reply to my stories. If you reviewed at FF.Net, I have responses to you down at the end. (I replied to all you ML readers already.)  
  
I won't keep anyone waiting, so here's part two!  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing. Simple, ne?  
  
*~Upper Class~* Part Two  
  
Relena was sipping from a glass of water. Sitting in the library as Master Winner had requested, she kept tipping the glass back and forth in her nervousness. Glancing around, she took note of all books  
  
He was sure to be kind, as London society said. Surely Milliardo would not betroth her to a man that was cruel or wicked. Milliardo himself was a gentle soul and he would know, before all others, if such feelings would not be passed to her, would he not?  
  
"Will you be taking dinner early this evening, sir?"  
  
"I don't believe that will be necessary tonight, Peygan. Unless, of course, Miss Relena said she was hungry?"  
  
"No, she said nothing, sir. I was only wondering."  
  
Relena tensed a bit at the sudden tightness in the butler's voice.  
  
"Very well. Treize and Anne will be arriving in an hour or so; come six o' clock, we will dine. Thank you, Peygan." Relena barely had time to straighten her posture before a tall, fair-skinned man with sun-colored hair strode in, a nervous-looking smile stretching a handsome face that bore eyes that had the look of the sea. The smile and eyes turned to Relena, and she drew a long breath.  
  
But the smile only increased in its nervousness. "Good afternoon, Miss Relena." Before she could stand, he had taken a seat on the small couch next to her. She realized it might have been a good idea to start things off more relaxed than was usual upon meeting a person, but her upbringing forced her to raise her hand. Winner, it seemed, was also reflexive when he gently took it and pressed a close-mouthed kiss to her knuckles that lasted but a half-second.  
  
"Lovely" was the word Quatre first thought of when he stepped into the library. But that adjective was soon replaced with another form of flattery until he decided that no word could describe her. Her face, angelic and healthy-looking had been enhanced with but the slightest amount of makeup. Her mouth was small and full and immediately enticing, he realized. Her golden hair was secured above her neck, and for an instant, he imagined what it would look like fallen about her shoulders, tousled and free, spread on a pillow, tangled in his own fingers. . . He halted his train of thought, and felt himself automatically smile over his mental embarrassment at catching himself thinking such things. It was with a soft tongue that he greeted her, and it suddenly felt only right to ignore the formal English self-introduction and lowered himself right next to her on the furniture. But he could not help the gentleman act his breeding called for when she lifted her hand. As he passed his lips over the back of it, he wondered briefly what it would feel like to kiss the bare flesh underneath of the glove on her hand, beneath the dress on her body. . .  
  
For heaven's sake, he was thinking like Treize! With a gulp, Quatre lifted his face. "Do I find you well, Miss Relena? That is a lovely bracelet."  
  
"I am fine," she answered politely. "And thank you, Master Winner, it was what I found at the bazaar today."  
  
"You were safe?" he prompted gently, and she quickly nodded. As his butler had said, the governor need not know about the pirate in the pub.  
  
Relena was now more than a little worried. Though she had never met the man before this moment, she had been raised to live up to expectation, and doing less could mean a ruined reputation for her and shame from Milliardo.  
  
"Peygan was a very good escort," she told him, forcing herself to smile. Before he could inquire further, she made a show of sweeping her gaze around the room again and changed the subject. "You have a nice collection of books."  
  
Quatre felt his heart ease its frantic pace. "Thank you. I always feel very comfortable here, in a chair reading. I'm quite fond of adventure novels." He paused and his eyes widened. "Forgive me, my thoughts have led astray."  
  
Relena shook her head. Although the governor looked as though a disturbance of any kind would put him in distaste, his voice was sincere. "I appreciate the genre as well. Although I have always enjoyed Shakespeare."  
  
"Do you? I don't blame you. The man was a genius; a master of his art." Quatre started and gave a half-laugh. "Mentioning art, I was sent this last Thursday." Standing, he walked to an area behind the spacious desk that was placed in front of a window and lifted a massive framed portrait. "I haven't had the time to think of where to hang it yet, but now that I see you here beside it, the artist really did you no justice." He turned the frame and let her see the painting.  
  
She was sitting in an antique rosewood chair, gloved hands clasped in her lap over the skirt of an expensive teal dress. Sapphires hung at her ears and throat, and her hair was up in a style much like the won she currently wore.  
  
Relena rested a hand over her heart. "Oh! Yes, Monsieur Weyridge painted that about a month ago. I was never told why it was done, but I am glad to know why now, for I sat in that chair longer than three hours." Like Quatre had, she paused and looked alarmed. "Your forgiveness, sir, please. It is best of me not to complain."  
  
"Well, I would hardly describe those words as complaining." Displaying it as well as he could for now, he leaned the portrait against the desk. Straightening, he nodded his head at her. "I would not enjoy spending three hours in a chair either, madam."  
  
They shared a laugh, and Quatre could only think of how pleased he was that he and his bride-to-be had started on so well.  
  
"Miss Relena, I should tell you. . ." But the Peacecraft woman raised a hand and his halted mid-revelation.  
  
"Please don't think me rude, Master Winner." A soft smile shaped her lips. "But if I am to marry you, I suppose we should drop such a formality as 'Miss'."  
  
At first he was shocked at the notion. They had, after all, just met. But then the thought was processed and he realized how reasonable it was. Oh, he thought with a grin, how dark his late father's frown would be if he knew that a lady was charming him instead of he charming a lady. "Very well, Relena." And he liked how it sounded on tongue, closer, more intimate. Non-intimidating. "I shall be Quatre, then."  
  
Her smile widened, and Quatre felt his heart jump and his blood stir at how utterly radiant she was.  
  
He realized, so abruptly, and so terrifyingly, that he wanted her.  
  
"What were you going to tell me, Quatre?"  
  
He started at her voice, spoken so suddenly, and he scrambled to remember what it was he had begun to inform her of before their formalities were dropped. When he did, he struggled to regain his composure over his brief frantic state.  
  
"I-ah-yes. Duke Khushrenada and his wife will be joining us for dinner. They looked so forward to meeting you, so I invited them. I believe Lord Treize and you have met before?"  
  
A bit of the smile dropped from Relena's face. "Treize and my brother are good friends. Yes, I was introduced to him a few years ago, but he and Milliardo maintain correspondence more than anything. To be truthful, I. . ."  
  
When she trailed off, Quatre encouraged her. "You can tell me."  
  
"Well, it's just that. . ." She lifted her head with bit of a smirk. "I found Lord Treize to be quite the informal man."  
  
Quatre paused, and then burst out laughing. Once he had regained his breath, he met Relena's wide eyes with his own. "Yes, I do suppose he is," he agreed, wiping tears of mirth from his face. "But in all the years I've known him and heard gossip of him, never once have I heard him described so negatively. Oh, please don't fret!" he exclaimed upon her expression moving to the floor. "It was not at all rude. It's only that everyone to come into contact with Treize has only spoke of him as a being more wonderful than God's angels." Walking forward, he took both of her hand in his. "Please. I want you to feel relaxed here, Relena. I want you to be happy. And I hope that in time, you will like living here with me."  
  
Relena blinked up at him, undecided over whether she was thrilled by his words or the touch of his hands. A slow smile crossed her face, and she inclined her head respectfully. "To be honest, Quatre, I am not sure if I do not like it already."  
  
Quatre's cheeks warmed, and he damned his easy blush. But he released his irritation as her face only grew more pleasant to look at. "I'm glad of it. Now, if you wish to prepare for dinner. . ."  
  
Relena nodded and, saying nothing, she walked by him and disappeared from the room. The sound of her shoes on the marble stairs faded, and Quatre found himself wishing for her quick return.  
  
His gaze landed on the portrait. "Monsieur Weyridge is the worst painter I've ever seen the work of," he said to himself and walked off to supervise dinner preparations.  
  
***  
  
"Well, that was nice," Hilde commented.  
  
"Agreed," said Duo. "And I am an expert on telling if a meal is good or not."  
  
Trowa frowned a bit. "We did spend quite the sum, though."  
  
"Oh, don't be a bad sport, Trowa!" Catherine ordered. "After all, we can always earn back what we spent."  
  
Wufei paused. "You call it earning?"  
  
"Shhh!" Sally hissed. Her eyes moved to her left. "Oh for goodness sake! Look at you, Heero. Trowa may have his sister hanging on his arm, but you've thin air. When are you going to stop buying the whores and actually marry one of them."  
  
Heero's brows lowered. "The day you and Wufei settle down on land."  
  
Sally wrinkled her nose. "Perish the thought of such foul living arrangements. I can hardly stand being on this spit of earth for a day. And why not, I've a mind to ask you? You can put a ring on a girl's finger just as well as Wufei and Duo can." She paused a moment, then sighed. "Actually, my husband didn't, did you, Wufei? He just. . .held it out to me and suggested I put it on my hand. You bastard."  
  
"You had egg yoke on your hands!"  
  
"I'd've sword I've heard this argument before," chuckled Duo before turning to Yuy. "Well, then, Captain? It be a long trek to the Governor's mansion. We could steal some horses-"  
  
"Too much time wasted," Heero told him. "We'll walk."  
  
"Oh, that does sound delightful, Captain, to be sure," Hilde said slowly. "But I'm sure we women would just be in the way if we came along. All the walking. . .we'd only take up time."  
  
"Liar, Hilde, you three can keep up," Wufei snarled.  
  
"Perhaps," Catherine admitted, "but our time here would be much more well- spent if we used it to catch a chicken or two, eh, ladies?"  
  
Sally and Hilde nodded.  
  
"It sounds promising to my stomach." Duo rubbed said stomach with a grin. "I say 'aye,' but I'm not the only account. Boys?"  
  
"I don't want them alone," Trowa began but his sister hushed him by revealing a handful of daggers from the depths of her skirt.  
  
"Don't fret yourself, darling brother mine. We won't be caught by none alive." She winked and the three women stalked off.  
  
"Temptresses," Wufei muttered, thinking of Sally's grin.  
  
Duo chuckled. "Vixens, more like. What woman volunteers to bring our meat?"  
  
"Them," Heero answered. He tilted his head back to get a view of the hill on which Govenor Winner's mansion stood. "We best start the hike if we're to get there before seven."  
  
And so Heero, Duo, Trowa, and Wufei started their bothersome walk to the mansion.  
  
*** Quatre emerged from the dining room into the foyer in order to check the time on his tall grandfather clock. Having just changed into a clean black suit, he saw five-fifty-eight on the clock.  
  
At the sound of footfalls, he turned to the stairs and felt every muscle in him tighten at the sight of his fiancée. Unconsciously, his mouth fell open much like the way schoolboys' in town did.  
  
Relena was dressed in a brilliant green evening gown. The billowing skirt and the corset she probably wore beneath the dress accentuated her waist and hips. She was adorned magnificently with emeralds that sparkled against her throat and ears. Her hair had even been changed to hang in a long, loose French braid, and her high-heeled white shoes clicked pleasantly against marble.  
  
"You look. . ." he began, but again, Quatre had trouble finding a proper adjective. "Radiant," he finished, although the word seemed unsatisfactory.  
  
Relena smiled, and a blush stained the flesh covering her high, slashing cheekbones. When she reached the bottom of the stairs, he took her hand and kissed it again.  
  
"Treize and his wife, Anne, should be arriving any minute. But just a moment." He began to reach into his jacket pocket. "Before they come, I want to give you this." From the pocket, he pulled a very simple, very lovely gold ring displaying a pink diamond.  
  
Awestruck, Relena lifted her hand and allowed him to slip in onto her finger. Once he had, she held her hand up to see the jewel sparkle in the light of the lamps around them.  
  
"I thought it only right," Quatre explained hastily. "Even though we are betrothed, I have always been a bit traditional, and I want you to know how much I appreciate you, Relena. I couldn't help but think. . ." The babbling governor trailed off when her eyes met his. For a moment, all he could do was stare; stare at the color in her face, the blue in her eyes, the ring on her hand.  
  
"Thank you, Quatre," she said softly, and his heart gave a tremendous leap. "It's beautiful. . .and so kind of you."  
  
Against his mind's judgment, emotions caused him to raise his hand and touch her cheek with his own gloved hand. "Relena. . . I haven't ever met someone like you. . . I don't know you well. . . But I really didn't expect-"  
  
The door was knocked on, and a deep voice was heard booming jovially: "Let us in, Quatre Winner, that I may set my own eyes on your bride!"  
  
Quatre's hand dropped to his side, and with a bit of a blush, humor lit his eyes. "Quite the informal man."  
  
Relena silently chuckled.  
  
"I'll get it, Peygan," Quatre told the old man who had bustled in. He grasped a door handle and pulled the large slab of oak open.  
  
Duke Treize Khushrenada and his Lady Anne smiled at him.  
  
"You're looking well, Governor Winner." Behind Treize's pleasantry's intended sincerity lay a certain tone of amusement. Leaning in close, he whispered into Quatre's ear, "The red in your cheeks goes well with your suit. What have you been thinking?"  
  
"Nothing that concerns you," he replied evenly as he shook his hand. He drew away and said in a louder voice, "Treize, Anne, do come in. I'd like you to meet my fiancée, Miss Relena Peacecraft of London."  
  
"Miss Relena, it's lovely to meet you," Anne spoke up with a smile. Relena could only think that her smile had more cunning than most women's did. "The travel from London to Dover must have been just exhausting."  
  
"It's good to meet you as well, Madam. I slept quite a bit of the way, so I was not very tired upon my arrival," Relena told her.  
  
Treize took in the sight of her for just a moment, then bowed low. "My dear Miss Relena, what a pleasure to see you again after such long years. My, but my good friend Milliardo certainly did raise a fine and beautiful woman." He straightened and kissed her hand. "Tell me, dear, how if your brother? I hope his health is good."  
  
"He is splendid, my lord. His second child will be born in less than four months." At the thought of Milliardo, her sister-in-law Luchrezia, and her little niece Agatha, Relena smiled. "He sends his regards to you."  
  
"Excellent, excellent," Treize acknowledged. "I'm glad to hear of such joy. If no other man deserves as much, Milliardo certainly does. Dear me, look at both of you together!" he exclaimed. "Your light hair, your eyes. . . You are sure to have beautiful children," he predicted, making the pair blush deeper. "Now." He turned his handsome grin to the host. "Where is this dinner you spoke of?"  
  
"Right this way, Lord Khushrenada," Peygan said from the corridor and led them to the dining room.  
  
Relena had not been in this room yet, and took note of the exquisite crystal chandelier hanging on the high ceiling above the long table that appeared able to seat at least forty people. Quatre pulled out a chair, and motioned her to sit. When she did, she made sure to send him a smile before he sat down himself.  
  
Quatre's eyebrows went up as he picked up a rather expensive bottle and couldn't help his own grin back at her. "Wine for our guest of honor?"  
  
***  
  
"Is there others who think this the time?"  
  
"Oh, lovely moment for a disturbance, I'd say," agreed Duo to Trowa's suggestion. He grinned at the sigh through the window. "Rather a shame, though, while the governor likes his eyes on that lass across from him. Poor bloke. She must be his fiancée. Rumor on the street says she came today. Betrothed." He turned to his comrades. "Think we should rescue her, mate? That swine of a duke looks lecherous this night."  
  
Heero frowned. That sun-haired woman whose back was to them not far in front of the window blocked the sight of the other woman, but no doubt was in him of her being the duke's wife. "A lucky find; the Khushrenadas are with Winner. Perhaps we should double the work."  
  
Wufei nodded once. "I'd agree to that. Our last opportunity like this was a year past; we should seize the chance."  
  
"We should seize the girl," Duo insisted, shoving his braid over his shoulder in irritation at being ignored. "Winner is obviously sensitive of her, by the way he watches her. You're classy, Yuy, think of something." At his captain's silence, he grinned wickedly. "We could always make a profit of her in Barbados. Auctions are quite prominent this time of year."  
  
Heero directed a glare cold as ice in whiskey at him. "I'll not be selling any woman to slavery."  
  
"It's not always slavery," Trowa pointed out. "Sometimes they're made into private treasures. But still." He narrowed his eyebrows at Duo. "My stomach disagrees with that. Why do you think this way, Maxwell, when you've a gentle wife that loves you?"  
  
"Gentle?" Duo instinctively gripped his braid in protection. "Nay, she be not that. Loves me she does, however. And I was merely trying to motivate Heero into something."  
  
Heero did not reply.  
  
"You want to," Duo coaxed. "If not for yourself, than for gold."  
  
"Ransom is quite profitable," Wufei suggested. "And we've never tried her."  
  
"I wouldn't kill her so needlessly. We aren't ruthless, Wufei," Heero growled.  
  
"I have the feeling," Trowa murmured softly, "we won't have to." He paused a beat. "Does she look familiar to any of you?"  
  
"Probably strikes a look with a lass you bedded years back, Barton," Wufei offered.  
  
Trowa cast another glance at the back of the governor's fiancée's head. "Perhaps."  
  
"Come on." Moving away from the window, Heero stood from his crouched position on the ground. "It's your idea, so I'll leave the woman to you, Duo."  
  
"Aye, sir." Duo's grin grew wider. "As you wish it,"  
  
***  
  
"That was wonderful ham, Quatre," Anne complimented.  
  
"Yes," Treize agreed. "A nice dinner to favor Miss Relena's arrival. To add to the celebration, I propose a toast."  
  
With a blush, Relena the joined the others in raising her wine-filled goblet.  
  
"To Relena," Treize announced. "To Quatre. May you both have a happy wedding day and a life together full of love, eventually."  
  
Quatre's eyes narrowed. "Treize-"  
  
"Hear, hear!" called Anne, and with nothing else to say, they all drank.  
  
"I toast one more thing," said a voice that was not Treize's. The four turned to see a man with a cocky grin and a long, chestnut braid standing with a man who was obviously Asian. "How 'bout you raise your arms," he pointed a pistol, "and let that little lass," he nodded at Relena, "come this way?"  
  
Treize tilted his head in curiosity. "Pirates. You're pirates, and you only want the governor's fiancée?"  
  
The Asian one smirked. "Nay, think us that prideful, do you? Two more of us went off for your money."  
  
"Wait!" Quatre hissed when Relena started standing. "Hold on, Relena, you don't-"  
  
The sharpness of her eyes on him halted his speech. "I'll not have anyone harmed when it is possible for me to prevent it." She smiled lightly. "I'll see you again, Quatre. Wait for me."  
  
"Come on!" Wufei barked and took out his own pistol.  
  
Relena, chin up, posture straight, walked to Wufei. "And now what will you do?" she challenged.  
  
Wufei's lip curled. "Follow orders." Bending down, he hauled Relena over his shoulder, earning a cry of outrage. "I'll take her down to the ship. You keep watch while Heero and Trowa work."  
  
"Aye, I'll do so. Er," Duo said to the girl on Wufei's shoulder, "Don't bite him or anything. Please?"  
  
Relena was still astonished at the idea when Wufei carried her out the back door from which the four pirates had entered.  
  
A horse's whinny caused Wufei to look in the direction of the town. Hilde, Catherine, and Sally were riding toward the mansion. In Catherine's satchel were two dead hens.  
  
"Ahoy there, O man with a dame on his back!" Hilde called. Relena glared at her, and she laughed. "What are you doing with that lass?"  
  
Sally stared down her nose at him. "I'd like to know the same."  
  
"Take her from me." Ignoring Relena's protests, he easily shoved her on the horse behind Catherine.  
  
"This is despicable! Evil pirates, I'll have you know that once my brother knows I am not in the governor's home, he'll-"  
  
"Oh, shut up, girl." Ripping part of her apron, Catherine gagged her with the cloth, knowing that if the woman released her, she would fall from the horse. "What's happening, Wufei?"  
  
"Maxwell wanted to rescue her." Wufei lifted one shoulder. "We'll get gold from her somehow."  
  
"Go on ahead to the ship, Cathy," suggested Sally. "The others can ride with us. I'm sure we can fit three on these two horses."  
  
"Aye! Hold tight, girl." Once she felt the pressure on her shoulders tighten, Catherine ripped down the road back to the dock.  
  
Not much later, Trowa, Duo, and Heero emerged, carrying bags bulging heavily.  
  
"I see they lack one occupant at the dinner table," Trowa noted. "Did Cathy take her ahead?"  
  
"Aye, she did," Sally smiled. "Do not scowl, Trowa. Your sister is quite safe - and quite ready to make us a chicken dinner."  
  
Heero took his place with Wufei and Sally while Trowa joined Duo and Hilde. "To the docks then." He smirked. "I want to know what kind of regal woman Governor Winner found for his bed."  
  
***  
  
"Don't look so frightened, lass," Cathy suggested after pulling her onto the Ivory Damsel. "We are not born killers."  
  
"Why should I fear you?" Relena questioned, although her heart beat much too fast for her liking.  
  
Catherine grinned, her gray eyes dancing. "Because my captain may. . .'approve' of you upon his return. But you need not worry. Captain Yuy is not that sort of man."  
  
Captain Yuy, Relena thought. Let him return soon. Then she would see what sort of man he was.  
  
************************************************************************  
  
Gundam Girl: Yup, that's it for now, sorry guys! I didn't want to make a huge ole' cliffhanger. . .but I guess there are cliffhangers worse than this, right? Hope you enjoyed, and please review!  
  
The following is not necessary to the story. I'm just reply to all the wonderful review I got on FFN:  
  
Maxine: Hey! I agree, dearest. Heero without a shirt definitely matches up to Orlando Bloom in the hat. *sigh* Both are hot. Glad you like it, thanks!  
  
N: Yeah, sorry about that. . . FFN messed up.  
  
Angel Yuy: Hey, thanks for R&R'n! Yup, "Pirates" is like my fave movie now.  
  
Kat-Tastrophe: Wheee!  
  
Sweetangel4: Wow, hon, I'm really sorry this took so long. My Internet died, otherwise it would have been up a week ago.  
  
Vampire: Thank ye gentle one!  
  
Ka: Thanks. Don't worry about pushing my borders, we all need a good kick in the arse.  
  
Olly: You're like my new best friend. :)  
  
Noir de Soir: Heh, you have me just that kick. (see comment to Ka) Thank you!  
  
Spence: Ah, yes! Sinbad was awesome, though it never crossed my mind to think of it as I wrote this. *shrugs* Oh well, thanks!  
  
Kamira-ruki: Hon, you are awesome! I'm glad you think my works good enough to be on your fave AUTHOR'S list! You're great, thank you! 


	3. What To Do?

Gundam Girl: And I'm back with part three. Yay! The masses can't kill me now!  
  
BI girls: Not yet. . .  
  
-_-;  
  
Disclaimer: Don't own them, WELL. . . Nope. Don't own them.  
  
Warning: Sexual innuendo, a little bit of language.  
  
*~Upper Class~* Part Three  
  
Treize pressed his thumb and index finger to the bridge of his nose. Anne had gone into shock at the interesting turn of events. She did that sometimes, he wasn't sure why. It would be a good ten minutes or so before she spoke.  
  
Quatre, he observed, had wasted no time in responding to Miss Peacecraft's untimely abduction. It had been entertaining to watch, the Asian one carrying Milliardo's sister out of the house while Quatre could only grimace and watch.  
  
He was certain he'd advised the young governor to keep a pistol in his suit whilst the woman was not yet married to him - Dover was not the ideal place to keep an unmarried rich girl, with crooks and murderers everywhere. And pirates had harbored, it seemed.  
  
Treize sighed, reached into his pocket and glanced at his pocket-watch, which displayed the hour of nine. "It's late," he commented. "Come, Anne."  
  
Quatre stopped yelling at Peygan long enough to swivel on his heel and stare wide-eyed at him. "You're just going to leave, Trieze?"  
  
"I've a woman with me. She does not need this distress." Trieze took his wife's hand. "Obviously."  
  
"But Relena has. . . Oh, damn! Ignore them!" he barked at Peygan, who had turned a ghastly shade of white. The old butler had taken a quick liking to the spirited young fiancée of his master. "I want every officer scouring Dover, Peygan! Now!"  
  
Peygan had but set both feet out of the dining room, when Quatre collapsed into the chair Relena had occupied just twenty minutes before. Her sweet perfume still lingered with the sound of her laughter, and the young blonde buried his face in his hands.  
  
A letter needed to be sent to Baron Peacecraft. The wedding would have to be postponed.  
  
***  
  
Relena woke a headache and pain in her wrists. That woman - Catherine - had efficiently bound her hands behind her back, and the liquid running through her fingers was surely blood from the cut of the ropes. Looking around, disoriented because she did not remember drifting off, she sought what had woken her.  
  
The answer came quickly. A man, long-limbed and longhaired, his chestnut tresses running straight in a braid down his back, was bellowing.  
  
"Ho, Catherine! Where is the princess?"  
  
Princess?  
  
"She's there somewhere," came the voice of Catherine. "Do not howl at me, Duo. I prepare the ingredients I'll need for your breakfast in the morning!"  
  
Duo's eyes landed on her just as Catherine had finished her statement. "You speak truthful, cook. Here is our lass. Well, stand."  
  
Her knees had hardened to wood. Unable to move, Relena only lifted her chin and glared. "You will release me," she ordered, her voice coming out braver than she truly felt. "And then you shall return me to Governor Winner's mansion. Authorities will get word if you do not, and you shall be hanged!"  
  
The wrong thing to mention, Relena realized, was the gallows. Duo's eyes only sparkled with amusement.  
  
"Spirited, eh? Excellent. That's exactly how the captain takes his women. He loathes boring wenches."  
  
It was the second time in the day she'd been accused of being a whore. Her voice slid out like steel, cool and straight. "You insult me," she hissed. "Do not again."  
  
"Nay, lass," Duo replied, not the least bit affected by her command. "I cannot, honestly said. You are too sweet. Now come." Taking the necessary steps, he seized her elbow and tugged her effortlessly to her feet. "The crew his below, Captain Heero in his chambers. There I shall take you, and find myself what his plan is."  
  
"I will be returned!" she exclaimed.  
  
"Will you?" Duo turned her body to face the water. It spread endlessly to the horizon, black and unwelcoming. The harbor of Dover was nowhere to be seen, not on any side. "If you are returned," Duo continued, "it will not be by dawn's first light."  
  
Relena felt weakened further; her ankles were like lead, and it was the pirate's hand alone that kept her on her toes. She wanted to weep, but her own self-ingrained pride did not allow her. Not in the presence of her abductor, anyway.  
  
"Come." The pressure Duo had on her arm was painless but enough for her to know that resisting would be futile. Giving in, she allowed him (disdainfully) to lead her to the bowels of the ship. Halfway down the short staircase, he turned and opened a door that led into a rather expansive room.  
  
There was a bed, a table, chairs, a dresser. The room was decorated nicely, but not extravagantly. The bed was dressed with satin, the cheap kind, in a deep blue. The lamp burned brightly and bounced off the dull metal and glass of a mirror. At the table stood two men.  
  
The same men she had encountered at the pub hours earlier.  
  
The same pirates she had run into.  
  
"Duo. Time runs late, and I expected you ten minutes ago," said the very pirate who had spilled drink on her dress without looking up. He and the other tall, quiet one were inspecting a map.  
  
The one with his hair hung over his green eyes raised his head. A slow, small smile graced his lips and made him seem, for just a moment, a warm- hearted human being. "Well," he murmured. "If it isn't the lass from the pub."  
  
The blue-eyed one's head darted up so quickly it was a wonder his neck did not snap. He regarded her silently, not moving at all.  
  
The ship tilted as their eyes met, and the world seemed to quake with the power of his intense gaze. Relena was forced to lean against the doorframe for balance as the tall one spoke again.  
  
"Again we meet, Relena. How strange and mysterious life is, do not you agree? I am called Trowa Barton." His smile remaining, he lifted a bottle of rum and drank deeply. His eyes drifted to the other. "Well, don't be rude, Heero. Greet the lady."  
  
Heero's expression stayed grim and contrasted with the smirk Trowa's lips held. A brief moment showed a flash of concern in his eyes, and then his irises alighted with mischief and uncanny humor. "Fate chooses an odd waterway," he said lowly. Removing his hat, he bent at the waist sarcastically. "Welcome, my lady. I am Heero Yuy, captain of this Ivory Damsel. You said your name was Relena?"  
  
"It shall be Miss Peacecraft to you," Relena answered icily, ready to hold her own against the pirate leader.  
  
"Then Miss Peacecraft it is," answered Heero as he replaced his hat and stepped toward her. "A wise choice you made, Duo. She would surely fetch a fair price." Succumbing to a desire he hadn't been aware of, Heero reached out and cupped her chin, lightly smoothing the flesh of her cheek with his thumb, like he had earlier.  
  
The calluses were rough on her face and only intensified the flame in her head. "Whatever price is bargained for is not enough for me," she told him boldly. "I demand you change course back to Dover."  
  
"Demands." With a careless swagger, Heero circled her with his thumbs hooked in the pockets of his trousers. "It is a brave woman who makes a demand to me, Miss Peacecraft."  
  
"Then you realize I am a brave woman," she returned with a coat of menace thick over her tone.  
  
Heero did smirk now, and Trowa bowed his head to hide his grin. Duo cleared his throat.  
  
"Speaking of brave women, I best turn in, captain. Hilde will be irritable already. I'll send Wufei in."  
  
"Goodnight, Duo." Yuy spoke to his man, but his eyes stayed on Relena's. "Your wrists bleed, my lady. It should be taken care of." He held out a hand for them, but Relena backed away.  
  
"Do not touch me," she warned. Oh, how she wished for a weapon. A dagger would do, even a sharp comb. But her bound hands were useless to her.  
  
"I only wish to loose your arms."  
  
"I wish you not to come near me," she told him with a scowl.  
  
Heero shook his head. "Your request is difficult, lady. We are on a ship together in the middle of the ocean. On our way to Singapore, as it were."  
  
Relena's expression did not change, but her expression paled to a devastating white. "You lie."  
  
"I am a pirate, my lady, and a black one at that. I take what I want, when I want it. But I am no liar." Heero walked to the table and lifted his own bottle. Taking a swig, he swiped at his mouth with his sleeve.  
  
Relena noticed for the first time that the one called Trowa was gone. No sooner had she realized it did she feel a chill of metal brush her wrists. The next moment, her hands fell free at her sides. She winced from the sting but did not make a sound. Lifting her hands, she inspected her raw and bloody wrists. It was the first time she had been so seriously injured.  
  
"Maxwell sent me, captain."  
  
Relena started in surprise, and she turned to see the Asian pirate who had so graciously carried her out of the Winner mansion over his shoulder. He spared her one short, disinterested glance before turning his eyes to Heero.  
  
"Good evening, Wufei," Heero said mildly. "How is Sally?"  
  
"In a wonderful mood," Wufei answered, face straight. Only the crew and the captain knew that his wife's joy pleased him. Relena could not tell. "Did you seek me?"  
  
"This is Relena Peacecraft, Governor Winner's betrothed."  
  
The corners of Wufei's mouth turned up. "We've met - indirectly, sir."  
  
"Well, then." Heero watched her. The look she gave him was dark; her muscles had tensed to point that must have been painful. But even with her mean gaze and rumpled dress and disheveled hair, she was a beautiful woman. She smelled of red roses and passion, sweetening the room's scent of rum. "You will sell well in Singapore," he commented. Before Relena could open her mouth to deny it, he flicked his hand. "Her wrists are harmed, Wufei."  
  
Wufei dropped his gaze to Relena's hands. She clasped them in front of her to defend her pride the best she could. "So they are," he replied.  
  
"Take her to Sally and get them treated. Then prepare a room for our guest."  
  
Wufei eyed him narrowly. "Captain, you know as I do that we've no spare rooms. Catherine must share with Trowa for this reason."  
  
Trowa nodded, raising an eyebrow at the one whose orders he took.  
  
"Take her to Sally," Heero repeated. "And as for the second order, I amend it. Bring her back here. She shall stay with me this night."  
  
Relena's eyes widened and red filled her face from both rage and embarrassment. "I shan't!" she exclaimed.  
  
"You will, my lady, until I say otherwise. I'd give you the deck, but the weather seems well for rain, and I cannot bargain an ill woman in Singapore." Heero nodded at Wufei. "To your wife."  
  
"Aye, sir." Wufei gripped her arm. Like Duo's, his hold was not to be fought against. Relena could not think of a single remark to spit at the captain, and her wrists were bleeding harder now. When she got them treated at least, she could resist this horrible man.  
  
So with a deep glare and a flashing pair of eyes, she followed Wufei up the steps.  
  
"Interesting." Heero turned back to Trowa when his first mate spoke.  
  
"Aye, Trowa?"  
  
Trowa smiled wider now. "It is interesting, captain, that you threaten to sell this girl as a Singapore whore, and we sail away from there."  
  
Heero drank from his rum. "I've not yet decided what to do with her. Give me time to choose. She may prove useful."  
  
Trowa's expression remained unchanged but he was surprised. "I do believe she's not worked a day in her life."  
  
"If not for labor, then for another task. No human being was born useless." Heero waved his hand. "Go you, and rest. We shall spend the night led by the wind and its choice of direction."  
  
"Aye, captain. Fair dreams, then."  
  
"And you." As Trowa stepped out and shut his chamber door, Heero sniffed the air.  
  
Red roses and passion, he thought again, the passion strongest of the two. But how much passion, really, did Miss Peacecraft possess? Heero was not against finding out.  
  
***  
  
"Ah, here is the lovely princess again." Sally turned away from the bowl where she was peeling potatoes with Catherine for breakfast the next morning. "And how can I help Her Highness?" She raised an eyebrow at Wufei.  
  
"The captain orders her wrists healed." Wufei shoved her, not bothering to be gentle. Relena was caught at the shoulders by the platinum-haired medical woman.  
  
"Well, I should say so." With a tsk, the Asian man's wife set about gathering salve and bandages.  
  
"Take this cloth, dear." Catherine proffered it to her helpfully. Her eyes darted to Relena. "My goodness, girl," she hummed upon seeing her pale face and frightened eyes. "Do not be afraid. Sally will not hurt you."  
  
"And if I do, I now offer my sincerest of sorry's."  
  
Relena noted for the first time that the cook, Catherine, had better grammar than the others. She guessed that she had been schooled, which was rare for commoners, but there was the occasional educated pauper.  
  
"Catherine, fool, why did you bind her hands so wrongly? If you didn't fry my egg, I'd hit you with your own pan," Sally grumbled.  
  
"I imagined Captain Heero wouldn't want her gone. She's such a lovely thing. What did he say about you, dear?"  
  
Wufei smirked before Relena could gather enough of her wits to form a coherent reply. "She's staying in his chamber tonight."  
  
"Oh, lovely. Do tell me how it goes tomorrow."  
  
Relena found her voice, and it was loud. "Nothing will happen!" she exclaimed. "I shan't let it!"  
  
"Well, if you can manage it," Sally replied half-interestedly. She took one of Relena's hands and pressed the cloth to her wrist to clean it of the blood. The hot water stung, but she bit her lip to keep from whimpering. "Hold still now. This will probably hurt." She turned the small box of salve.  
  
It did hurt. Relena found she hadn't ever felt really felt pain, other than the damnable corset she was forced to be suffocated by. By the time Sally finished wrapping her wrists with the lines of bandages, she was blinking back tears - tears from the pain, and from shame that she really was as delicate as she made herself look.  
  
"There now, finished. They should heal nice, as long as we change the bandages. Was there anything else you needed?" Sally asked kindly.  
  
Relena sniffed once and shook her head. "Thank you, Miss. . ."  
  
"Sally. And just Sally. I've only been married a year, I have, wouldn't want to feel like an old woman now." When she winked at her husband, Wufei merely grunted. "You need rest," she told Relena, who immediately went pale again.  
  
Catherine sighed. Seeing her among a people whom she was commonly not familiar with, she felt a pang of sympathy for the prim sister of a baron. "Tell Captain Heero, lady, that he needs to rest as well. He cannot lead our crew without sleep, and I shan't feed a man who cannot lead." She smiled softly. "Sweet dreams."  
  
"Thank you," Relena said again, bowing her head. "I will do as you ask."  
  
"Follow me," Wufei growled before any of the women could again speak. "'Tis late, and we all want to sleep." He shot Sally a meaningful look, and she grinned at him. Relena lowered her eyes, feeling strangely obedient, and he escorted her from the kitchen.  
  
"Poor girl," Sally murmured the second they had gone. "What has Heero said to her, I wonder?"  
  
"You were not so kindhearted with her a minute ago," Cathy pointed out.  
  
"Nay, Heero's leading her on about something. T'wouldn't be my place to spoil his game." She shrugged her shoulders and replaced her tools. "Though I certainly hope it isn't too fun."  
  
***  
  
Milliardo was furious. Luchrezia could see that in the same moment she entered the parlor of her husband's grand, English house in London. There was little business of a husband that escaped a wife's attention, and it was no secret to Baroness Peacecraft that her spouse was upset - if the hunched shoulders and crumpled letter clenched in his fist was any indication.  
  
In addition, he had sent her an urgent summons.  
  
"My lord?" she called in the doorway to alert him of her presence.  
  
He turned and his eyes dropped to her stretched stomach before her face. It was a habit that had developed once she had informed him that she carried his second child, hopefully a son this time. When he did meet her eyes, his were troubled.  
  
"You are angry." She felt a need to voice it. "Whatever causes your distress, husband?"  
  
Milliardo felt calmer looking at her, but even the way the midnight moonlight slanted to beam into her hair did not quell his rage. "I want you to sit, Lu."  
  
The nickname he alone had given her allowed her to catch the frustration he held, and though she preferred to remain standing, she did not wish to burden him further. Submissively, for once, she sunk onto the low double- seating couch.  
  
For a minute he paced, not speaking, not looking at her. If not for having settled her two-year-old daughter Agatha down for the night, she would have been in a hurry to leave. Because she wasn't, she only folded her hands in her lap and crossed her swollen ankles in a posture of the utmost respect. Finally, her husband halted in his back-and-forth path and directed his gaze at her.  
  
"How to tell you this," he began and shook his blond head.  
  
Luchrezia had come from a high-class and respected family of aristocrats, but she had faced hardship, as her beloved was obviously facing it now. The Noin family had a long line of mysteries, most of which, she had gathered, led to affairs with foreign trading. "I am not made of glass, my love."  
  
Milliardo smiled then, the first time she had seen since he had taken breakfast with her that morning. "I know," he said softly, and then his features darkened again. Steeling himself with a deep breath, he plunged. "I've received terrible news from Governor Winner." Saying so, his faced splotched with red.  
  
A hand flew to her breast. "He wishes not to wed Relena?" She would not understand that, Luchrezia knew. How she loved her sister-in-law, and how wrong it would be for Quatre not to. For anyone not to.  
  
"Lu, if it were only that. There has been a raid of Quatre's home in Dover, darling. They've stolen only one third of his wealth, but. . ."  
  
The color quite simply slipped from his wife's face, and she gripped an arm of the couch. "But?" she questioned, though she already had a brief idea of what his news might be.  
  
"They were a good crew, of the Ivory Damsel, no less. They captured Relena in front of his nose. Duke Treize and Lady Anne were there with them."  
  
The baroness's hand was at her mouth now. The crew of the Ivory Damsel were not mere annoyances to London authorities. Soldiers on land and the navy had been hunting the said pirates for almost half a decade. Lu had a pirate cousin that she sometimes kept in secret contact with, and she had claimed to never have even seen the crew.  
  
"Quatre has alerted the Dover guard, of course, but there is not anything they can do. If they had the power to find and conquer the Ivory Damsel, they would have by now." Milliardo fell to the seat of the couch next to her and his hands covered his face in despair.  
  
"So we wait?" Luchrezia touched his arm and did her best to comfort him, though her voice quivered. "Unknown to whether your sister lives or has been killed, we wait for a result?" She was not sure she could do that to Relena.  
  
"Until there is more to act upon. . ." Milliardo raised his head to hers and kissed her forehead. He reached for her hands, and his trembled. "It is all that we can do for her."  
  
But we have done nothing for her. Lu did not say that to him, for through his tearing, ice blue eyes she could see his crumbling heart and did not wish to sadden him further, but the thought reigned in her mind.  
  
"I will return a letter to Quatre." He cleared his throat and stood, giving her fingers a final squeeze. "If I am needed, you shall find me in my study."  
  
"Would you like tea? Or coffee?" she asked. Or anything? her heart added. It was at times like these when she longed for her husband to use her for more support. He seemed to think her such a delicate woman, like the one he had raised his sister to be upon his parents' death. But Luchrezia was sturdy, and he did not seem to realize that. It was probably the fault of their arranged marriage. Although they had found love through the work of their fathers, it had not been their choice to wed. She only wished he wanted more of her.  
  
"No, my dear," he replied, walking away toward the stairs.  
  
She ran a hand through her elegant, short, dark hair and sighed deeply. She knew Baron Peacecraft loved her greatly. But in almost three years of their marriage, she had never heard the words she still yearned for.  
  
Relena.  
  
With the thought of her most necessary rescue - if there was still a Relena to be rescued - back in her mind, she walked to the small desk in the parlor and took a sheet of parchment and a quill from the drawer. Sitting, she began to scrawl a message to her pirate kinswoman.  
  
"To Dorothy Catalonia," she murmured lightly as she wrote. "I need your help, cousin."  
  
***  
  
Wait for me.  
  
Those were the last words she had spoken to him, and his ears - and the rest of him - had not been at ease since then. Why, Quatre wondered, did some people take years and years to fall in love, and he had in less than two hours?  
  
He had admitted it. He truly was in love with Relena Peacecraft, and that had fueled both his fury and his depression. At the moment, the depression held high rank, and that only succeeded in sickening his mind further.  
  
He was a flurry of emotion right now, and Quatre felt helpless with the confusion of it. Treize had mentioned once that it was natural for men to fear what they did not understand, and the governor certainly didn't understand love. Intimidated by it as he was, it also made him driven. The only thing that possibly surpassed the confusion and the fear and the uneasiness was the steadily growing hate; hate for crime, and greater, hate for those pirates whom had taken Relena away from him.  
  
He had not even seen the leader's face, that despicable captain who had given the order to Baron Peacecraft's sister to be kidnapped. He had not known sleep this night because of her absence and because she had not looked upon the man who had made it that way.  
  
Oh, but why was England's navy so useless when pitted against that ship? Why had God chosen to let the Ivory Damsel steal Relena away?  
  
The questions plagued him. They taunted and teased and forced him briefly to the edge of madness. He was a political figure, an important one. He had known little love from his mother, none from his father, and the countless sisters that were scattered around England and America hardly knew him.  
  
Why had Relena been the one to show him love, and make him show love in return?  
  
Why, he thought with his nose burning to forewarn the sudden and unwanted onslaught of tears, was she gone?  
  
Wait for me.  
  
Quatre shook his head at nothing as the drops trickled down his cheeks. I can't, Relena, he thought as she stood. I have to do something.  
  
And as soon as the response from Milliardo arrived, he would.  
  
"Peygan!" he called harshly as the grandfather clock chimed five-thirty in the morning. He had been callous with the man in the last seven hours since dinner, but he had yet to care and amend his way.  
  
The elderly man appeared in a wrinkled suit looking tired and worn and older than Quatre had ever noticed before. "Yes, sir?" he wheezed. He swayed, and he seemed to be fighting to keep on his feet.  
  
"Arrange for a carriage to take me to London tomorrow afternoon. Do it now," he ordered callously. The old butler blinked, bowed with a wince, and turned to do what as master bid.  
  
Quatre steeled himself. "And Peygan."  
  
The servant paused in the doorway. "Sir?" he called, not holding the energy to turn his head and praying he would not be rebuked.  
  
"After that, go to sleep. You need to," Winner said, even though he did not smile as he usually did when dismissing his butler for the night.  
  
He could not see his face, but by the way Peygan's posture slumped, Quatre supposed he was relieved.  
  
"Yes. Thank you, sir."  
  
Quatre clenched a fist once he had gone. Throwing himself into the nearest armchair, he pressed a palm to his head.  
  
He would go mad if she was not returned.  
  
***  
  
"The captain's quarters," Wufei intoned as though it was something Relena did not already know. "We've no nightclothes to offer ye, so just make do."  
  
Relena turned her nose up at him. Though her knees were shaking, she did not want the Asian pirate to see her fear, which seemed to increase with every passing minute.  
  
Wufei must have seen right through her act, however, because he snorted with a smirk. "I'll go to my bed, princess," he said with a cold look. "You go to yours."  
  
He left her by the door with a shocked look on her face. She knew well what went on in a bed that a man and woman shared. Praying, she begged God to protect her from these heathens, to return her to Dover, better yet, London. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply. There would be no running from it.  
  
She knocked thrice. For a moment, there was silence. Then the captain's deep voice boomed out, "Come in, and shut the door."  
  
Relena did, slowly. She saw that Captain Yuy was already dressed for bed, or at least shirtless. His chest was sculpted, and admittedly more magnificent than she had imagined upon first seeing him in the pub that day. She colored instantly. Was there no sleeping wardrobe on this ship?  
  
"Well. Forward." Heero beckoned her with a curved hand. Not knowing what else to do, Relena walked as close as she dared. He reached out, and she tensed, but he only grabbed one of her elbows and drew her closer to inspect her wrapped wrist.  
  
"Good, Sally fixed you up. She did a fine job." Looking at her wrist, Heero also noticed the hand it led to. Her fingers were long, her nails trim and neat. Her palms were small, making her seem delicate, and he could suddenly imagine her hands touching him, caressing him.  
  
He dropped her arm abruptly. Better to clear thoughts of such a kind if he decided to sell this girl off as a virgin.  
  
Heero sat down on the large bed and slipped under the covers. "Well?" he said again and raised an eyebrow at her. "Come."  
  
Relena's eyes widened.  
  
************************************************************************  
  
GG: Mwahahaha! I've cliffhanged again. . .  
  
Maxine: Please don't say you're beginning to like to leave us hanging.  
  
GG: ^_~ That depends on if you all review or not. Tell me how you liked/did not like it! Pleeeease? 


	4. Action

GG: Hey, all! I know it's been SOOO long and I apologize sincerely. Really. However, I hope you enjoy part four and thanks for keeping up with this. Your reviews inspire me, so keep them coming!  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own GW...and for the record, I don't own the 1800s either. :P  
  
Upper Class Chapter Four  
  
By Gundam Girl  
  
Heero watched Relena's shocked eyes for a minute, and then smirked at her and slid from the bed. "At ease, madam. I'm a pirate, but I have some honor. I told you I wanted to sell you a virgin, don't you recall?" He grabbed one of the numerous pillows and swept a blanket from somewhere on the floor and settled down on the hard wood at the foot of the bed.  
  
Relena was still shocked, but this time at the ounce of propriety, even nobility, in the captain's actions. "You won't... I mean," she stammered, face still pale, "you're not going to—"  
  
"Bed you? That's our most polite way of putting it," he added from the floor. "Nay, madam. Lie down now. Rest yourself and let me do the same." When Relena still did not move, Heero raised his head from the pillow. "Afraid I don't have much to offer you in the way of sleeping garments."  
  
"I..." Her cheeks went from white to almost fuchsia. "I cannot... This corset, you see..."  
  
Heero grinned, understanding. "Shall I remove it for you, madam?"  
  
Her chin tipped upward. "Certainly not."  
  
"Well then. If you don't want help, there's no point in your complainin', is there?"  
  
Frustrated, Relena lowered herself to the bed while Heero turned his back to her. Accursed things, corsets. Perhaps they were a work of the devil and not of God. Noin's gesture had been indeed kind, but impractical.  
  
"Woman, I asked you to be quiet. I hear your thoughts too loudly. You think your bloody waist constraint a terrible invention; I agree, miss." Though he wasn't facing her, he didn't resist a smug look. "It cuts down time of undressing the female."  
  
"You people are pigs!" she exclaimed.  
  
"Madam, if you want to survive this voyage with us, you let your thoughts get a bit dusty. 'Tisn't healthy to get so surprised all the hours of day."  
  
Relena sent his spine a fierce look. "If you and your crew abandoned their crudeness, I'd not be so surprised."  
  
"Maybe if you abandoned your virginity," Heero retorted, "the result would be the same and keep us from changing who we are. Your kind is always doing that. It makes one wonder why they should think hanging a pirate is going to inspire sympathy in another pirate. Go to sleep."  
  
Relena wasn't quite sure, but had there been a slight wave of grief in Captain Yuy's voice?  
  
No, she corrected herself. A monster like that could never feel pain; greed and lust, perhaps, but never true aching of the heart.  
  
She was exhausted and forced herself to lay down. The corset's tight edge dug into her lower back. Extremely uncomfortable, she closed her eyes in hopes of sleeping from the pain.  
  
But of course, that was prevented by the loud moans and other night noises made by the Maxwells in the next room.  
  
Dorothy Catalonia was seriously considering anchoring for good. She was young, aye, and still a looker. And she could still man a helm with the skill of one twice her age. But there was a happy image of marrying into money that somehow pleased her. She could float from affair to affair; parties, banquets, the theater, or whatever else she chose to amuse her.  
  
The sea was good; it was cool, refreshing, and far more interesting than any brown and yellow dirt she might walk upon. But the truth was there were very little people to see, or at least to keep contact with (because if there were few people, who on earth would she raid?). And Dorothy liked people. She liked to study them, their strengths, their weaknesses, their good points and their bad. She liked to know who was a kind heart, who would rather spit on the poor or offer their hand. Who was charming? Who was sincere with their charm?  
  
Yes, she very much enjoyed the human emotions and the effects of them. Did love hurt, or did it heal? Did being hated really bother anyone?  
  
The last rhetorical question made her chuckle lightly into her thick mug of beer in the second-rate pub in Nice. It was slightly risky to be a pirate, and a female one no less, in France. The French didn't like pirates and had very few of their own. They preferred riches to be stolen from other countries by land rather than sea. Amateurs.  
  
But she would keep her guard up, even as she pulled out the letter from her cousin. Alex and Muller would keep their eyes on the door. They were a ragged threesome, but they worked well together.  
  
What she read widened her smile until she looked positively feline – provided the cat kept a dagger hidden in its fur. "Luchrezia Peacecraft's little sister-in-law has been captured by the Ivory Damsel," she murmured to the man next to her. "How quaint."  
  
Mueller laughed, and ran a hand through his black hair. "Really? That must be a change for the London area."  
  
"Dover actually," she corrected. "She was to be married to Governor Quatre Winner and was stolen from him the night of her arrival. They'd only just met."  
  
Alex leaned over to peer at the letter. "She wants you to help? She's a noblewoman, though, Dorothy. Even her handwriting is elegant! Are you going to say yes?"  
  
"I don't know what to say quite yet." Dorothy tapped well-trimmed nails on the bar and crossed her britches-clad legs. "She is a noblewoman, yes, and surely has never needed help with anything before. But she is a good person, Alex. In fact, she holds a rather surprising respect for, ah..." She glanced at the bartender and various people in the pub. "Those of our business."  
  
Mueller nodded. "And now for the most important question; what penny has she to offer us?"  
  
"Well, as Baron Milliardo Peacecraft's wife..." Dorothy grinned slyly. "Ten- thousand pounds."  
  
The amount wasn't enough to make either man's eyebrows rise, but they both appreciated the number just the same.  
  
"A generous soul," Mueller commented.  
  
"She loves her little sister-in-law quite a bit. Luchrezia was the only child her parents relented to have. They didn't love each other, as you can suppose. Arranged marriages tend to falsify any affection." Dorothy ran her long fingers through her bangs. "Gentlemen, I'll not lie to you. This proposition intrigues me."  
  
"Near everything intrigues you," said Alex.  
  
"Aye, and it does. But the chance to look the crew of the Ivory Damsel in the eyes sends my blood thumping." Smacking a hand down, Dorothy whirled on her stood and slipped onto her feet. "Settled then, mates. Get the others. We haul anchor tonight, no later than half-six. I'll meet you there by then."  
  
"And where are you to be, Dorothy?" asked Mueller, already feeling her contagious enthusiasm for any challenge.  
  
"Not playing the kind rescuer, by any means." With a flick of her hand, she manipulated her hair so that it rain across her back in a sleek curtain of sunshine. "I'll be at the post office writing to my dear cousin. Don't want our provider worrying her pretty pampered head."  
  
Life on land be damned, she thought. Settling down wasn't an open option. Not yet. Not until she'd tasted more of the salt-flavored adventure she so hungered for.  
  
Alex and Mueller laughed as she swaggered in her feminine way out of the pub.  
  
Relena was woken by the light pattering of rain above her head. Upon opening her eyes, she realized the room she had been previously sleeping in was illuminated by a dull, gray light. Switching her gaze from the ceiling to the wall, she saw the tiny window, the spots of water on the glass, and she heard the wind rushing against the pane.  
  
She hadn't forgotten where she was; she didn't in a rush remember her being kidnapped. She had dreamed of it; Duo carrying her out of the governor's mansion, Quatre's outraged and fearful eyes following her own, Duke Treize's contemplative expression, Lady Anne's shocked gape. She remembered Wufei's scowl, the women Hilde, Catherine, and Sally and their banter. She could recall Trowa's quiet eyes, his soft voice.  
  
However, most of all, she remembered Captain Heero Yuy and his growling tones, his sea-swept gaze. And his kind retreat to the floor, leaving her the bed.  
  
Tensing, she quickly leaned over to the foot of the bed to check if...no, Yuy had gone, and she was alone in the room.  
  
Alone, she realized, and free from the confines of her treacherous corset. In fact, the front of her gown, which was held up with ribbons and buttons, was open and gaping, her breasts bared to all who may enter at any moment.  
  
Mortified, Relena flew from the mattress and searched for her undergarment. Failing in her quest, she hurriedly closed her bodice, for the dearest mercy of God. Why was it...?  
  
Yuy.  
  
No, Relena thought, her eyes sharpening as temper and embarrassment flushed her cheeks and heated her blood. No mercy from God for him. No mercy from anyone for him.  
  
Completely angry, as she had rarely been in her whole lifetime, Relena flew barefoot from the bedchamber, over wooden floors to the deck.  
  
"I'd not recommend ye go that way." Turning, Relena saw Hilde who was watching her with interest. "'Tis raining. You'll be wet'ed, and that high-priced dress of yours ruined. Come this way, Mrs. Winner." She jerked her shoulder in a motion for her to follow, which Relena did.  
  
"I demand to speak with Captain Yuy immediately. And I am not yet the governor's wife," Relena reminded the darker woman with a voice of the most bitter of sea winds.  
  
"Aye, miss. The captain is taking his breakfast, if you care to join him. Of course, you'll have an audience."  
  
"I would rather I speak with him in private," Relena told her, deciding just after she spoke that it wasn't what she wanted at all, but it was little matter anyway.  
  
"Forgive me, miss," said Hilde, who didn't sound the least remorseful at all, "but the crew of the Ivory Damsel is one of mind. You speak to Heero, you speak to us all." She grinned like a feisty cat. "Although, I can't guarantee us not to make uncalled-for remarks."  
  
She was most certainly Duo's wife, Relena thought as they walked into the kitchen she had been led to the night before.  
  
"Well, Miss Relena," Catherine said to her as soon as she entered. She was rolling dough on the counter. "I must say I'm very surprised. Heero tells me he did not touch you this past night."  
  
"That remains questionable," Relena replied tartly, her eyes shooting to where the captain leaned against a wall and shoveled eggs into his mouth. "Where is my corset?"  
  
There was a hoot of laughter from Duo and the slightest of snickers from Wufei, but both wore grins of utter amusement. "Lost her underwear, did she?" hollered the braided pirate. "And was a little too busy to remember where it landed. Poor princess."  
  
Heero watched the deep red blast into the baron's sister's face and took a small bit of pity by giving her a direct answer: "I tossed the useless thing overboard."  
  
"You what?!" she half-screeched, thinking of the expensive – if detested – clothing article. "How dare you? It was mine!"  
  
"I thought it might embarrass you less than to auction it off at the next port." Heero lifted his glass of ale and splashed it down his throat. "Fetch a pretty penny, it would have indeed, though. Now I find myself regretting it, thinking of it too much."  
  
"It's disgusting of you, having your way with such a personal item."  
  
"Is it then?" The corner of Heero's mouth tipped up in that enraging-yet- captivating smirk. "And here I thought I be doing you a favor by ridding of it for you. You turned so much last night, Miss Peacecraft, it seemed you had a fool hard time making yourself comfortable. And that, milady, is the last thing we would want you to suffer."  
  
"We acknowledge our guests' comfort greatly on the Ivory Damsel," informed Trowa quietly, and the others chuckled with good nature.  
  
Relena, however, grew only angrier. "More, Captain, it was dishonoring of you to take the right to remove my corset. The nerve you have, to simple rip open my gown—"  
  
"No button is popped, no frilly ribbon torn," Heero pointed out. "Had I ripped it open, its condition would be worse'n you see, milady. As for my right..." He stood from his chair and walked closer to her. Relena gripped the edge of the counter beside her so that she would not back away. "I am captain of the ship you sail on. If you require a harsher term, I am your kidnapper." But she winced slightly at the word, so Heero softened his voice, startling himself with his own behavior. "I don't understand why 'tis you've been so upset anyhow. Rightly shaped enough, you are. What need have you for a foolish restraint such as that?" He turned away to return to his ale, trying not to think how sorely tempted he had been to take her flesh last night.  
  
"It was a gift from my sister-in-law."  
  
The words did nothing to make him halt in his stride across the kitchen, but the tone she used to say them froze his limbs – and his libido. He angled his head so he could look at her from the corner of his eye. "Aye," he said lightly as his crew looked upon them, their faces a bit more sober as well. "The Baroness Peacecraft. And what significance does something so slight as underwear hold for you, madam? Would you not have rather settled for a pretty bauble?"  
  
Relena despised the tears that rose as far as her throat, but her pride did not allow them any further up. "My marriage, and thus the rest of my life, was arranged, Captain Yuy." When her voice threatened to break, she hardened with steel as cool as the knife Heero wore at his hip. "As a last- minute offering of strength, she packed something away for me. The form her gift took is not important. The feeling of the emotion in it, worn right over my stomach and my heart..." She pressed her fist to her heart now, as thought to guard it from him, his ship, and his crew. "It gave me courage."  
  
Heero stared at her for a half-minute, then shrugged his shoulders. "Any other woman in your place would prefer a bauble, she would."  
  
She lifted her wrist, and the ring of diamonds around it gleamed in the light of the adjacent fireplace. "Any other woman in my place would be able to realize she was to soon receive one from Quatre Winner." Eyes flashing, Relena jerked her head to the side to deny him her gaze.  
  
Feeling the tension thicken nearly to hanging soup, Catherine hurried to say, "Would you like some porridge, Miss Relena? I guarantee it is not spiced with poisonous powder."  
  
"No, thank you, Miss Catherine." Relena gave her back to them all and hurried for the door. "Captain Yuy might suppose I would prefer to dine rather than to stay in my prison." Her hands clenched on the folds of her wrinkled gown as she lifted the skirt. "And there he would also be wrong."  
  
As she swept out of the room, Heero turned fully to watch the last tips of her hair fly away.  
  
"Well." Clearing his throat, Trowa downed the rest of his own ale and strode for the door. "I would like fish for lunch, so Catherine, I'll be out to catch my own."  
  
"Thank you, Trowa. We'll all have some." Catherine folded her arms as Trowa, too, walked out.  
  
"Chores," Sally said promptly. "I need to, ah... wash the deck! Wash it, I shall!"  
  
"'Tis raining, you fool of a woman," Wufei frowned, following her.  
  
"We mean to find something to do," Duo said vaguely, tugging on Hilde's arm and pulling her out.  
  
When Cathy and Heero were alone, she glared at him. "Oh, a fine one, you are, Heero Yuy."  
  
Heero titled his head at her. "What reasons have you to be scowling at me, Catherine?"  
  
"She's different from us, Heero, I know. I was like her once." Catherine sighed, and scratched her temple. "Oh, the ache you give me. The girl is tender, you brute, and upsetting her will only make the rest of us ill."  
  
Heero narrowed his eyes. "A point, Catherine, is what I require."  
  
"My point is just what you don't require. A low crew, and you'll get one."  
  
"Not usually are hostages the happiest of people." He reached for the dough she was rolling, and she smacked her hand.  
  
"Nor will you be if things don't brighten up today. You're blessed with a moody crew, Heero."  
  
"'Blessed' be not the word I'd have chosen, Catherine." At her bad- tempered look, he shot out: "You know, we can be in Singapore in two days."  
  
"No, Heero. No. I'll not have it on my head that we took a lady of a status I once possessed to be a whoring slave."  
  
Heero didn't want to say that he would not have it on his head either.  
  
"Well, then," he said instead. "I s'pose I should try to think of something to soothe her."  
  
Catherine grinned; an arrogant, often-clueless bastard Heero was, but a good one. "Assuring her you've no intention of selling her off may be a very good start." She wagged a finger. "Be nice, as you can. If you are, I promise to take extra care with your fish. If not," and her eyes went stern at this, "it will be very raw or very burned, depending on my mood."  
  
Heero chuckled as he left the kitchen. "Such a gentleman I will be."  
  
Treize was certain, very certain, that Quatre was close to dying. Oh, he didn't at all look like it any longer; the color was back in his face, the gleam had returned to his eyes.  
  
But the young Winner heir had preferred Dover over London any day, and here he was, about to just race into the city over a girl he'd known for less than three days.  
  
Oh yes, he was dying. And Treize was very suspicious; what could have possibly passed between Relena Peacecraft and Quatre to make him so determined to have her returned?  
  
Well, there was that one possibility, but it was very unlikely. Quatre was a supreme gentleman, and Relena a lady. But yet. He grinned slightly. He had seen Quatre look at Relena and there had been more than simple fondness for her. A man's need for flesh was sometimes achingly evident.  
  
He returned to his grim expression as Quatre turned at the carriage door and extended his hand. Treize took it. "God go with you, my friend," he offered dutifully. Part of him meant it, at least.  
  
"If He ever decides to return to me, I shall accept Him." Quatre set a hand on Anne's arm. She had been at Treize's side, quiet as a church mouse, all morning. He kissed her cheek and climbed into the carriage closing the door before his footmen could do it for him. "Thank you both for you help."  
  
"Nonsense, Quatre. Don't you worry." Treize smiled. "If anyone comes for a wedding, we'll give them tea and send them on there merry way – straight back home."  
  
"That's good of you." Quatre did his best to smile himself, but only managed a poor grimace. "I'm sorry for this trouble."  
  
"My darling governor, we're troublemakers ourselves," said Anne and lifted a gloved hand to wave. "Safe trip." She took Trieze's arm as the carriage started away, leaving behind it clouds of light brown dust. "Will he even survive the journey to London, Quatre?"  
  
"It is questionable, my dear. Yet nothing disrupts a man with a quest." Trieze lightly kissed her forehead. "I would hate to be the one obligated to meet Milliardo at this time." He shook his head, clicked his tongue. "The man must be furious."  
  
"He was very polite in his letter," Anne pointed out.  
  
"Exactly." Treize laughed as they began to walk to their own carriage. "That's why I suppose he is livid."  
  
Livid Milliardo was. When Quatre finally arrived at the Peacecraft manor many hours later, his immediate greeting was a cold glare from Milliardo and a sympathetic glance from the pregnant mistress as he stepped into their parlor.  
  
"Ah, and he comes with an apologetic face and a desperate plea for forgiveness," muttered Milliardo before Quatre could offer any sort of condolence.  
  
"I come with the first," Quatre pointed out, "but have not yet said anything to imply the second."  
  
Luchrezia, though her expanded waist made it difficult, crossed to take Quatre's hand and kiss his cheek. "Welcome, Quatre. My husband and I thank you for coming so quickly. We did not expect you until tomorrow, at the very earliest."  
  
"I expected him an hour ago," ground out Milliardo. "With answers."  
  
"This matter is extremely important to me," Quatre assured Luchrezia. "As well it should be. The fate of your sister was mine to attend to, and I did poorly."  
  
"Quatre," began the baroness. "The fault is—"  
  
"With him," finished Milliardo. "Hardly a day, Quatre – hardly! – and then Relena is gone completely, stolen by sea scum! Would you not think it was difficult enough having her out of London?!"  
  
"I imagine," said Quatre quietly, "that it was ill-adjustable for you, Baron Peacecraft, and for that I can hardly begin to express the sincerity in my regret."  
  
"It is not regret I require from you. It is action," seethed the Peacecraft heir. "And so far you've taken very little!"  
  
"Hush, darling, you'll wake Agatha," warned Lu softly.  
  
Milliardo acquiesced and lowered his voice but not his anger. "The navy is out scouring, but we are at home." His eyes narrowed and burned with fury bared in check. "It will not remain so."  
  
Luchrezia knew before she voiced her thought. "We?"  
  
Milliardo's gaze fixed on her, and it softened slightly. "If I could stay, you know I would, Lu. But Relena—"  
  
"I do no more than bear a child, something I have already endured," said Luchrezia. She held out her hand and when her husband took it, she pressed his to her cheek. "The light will burn for you when you return, my love." She smiled. "With your sister."  
  
They shared one meaningful look for several seconds before Zechs nodded firmly once. "We'll be off in the morning then. Quatre." He waited until Winner's eyes were fixed solely on him. "I refrain from judgment as of now. When I pass it, I do so as a brother." His brows lowered. "Not a friend."  
  
"I understand that you are both, Milliardo," returned Quatre. "When I receive your judgment, I will accept it as a fiancée."  
  
Pleased with the governor's reply, Milliardo set a hand on his wife's waist and led her from the room, declaring that they would set out tomorrow. A butler entered at their leave to escort Quatre to a guest bedchamber.  
  
Filled with apprehension, Quatre could only prepare for a second night that would hold complete wakefulness.  
  
They left in the afternoon the next day. The morning had been spent making arrangements for the use of a prestigious English ship, the Redeemer. Going by the word of fisherman in Dover, they followed the Ivory Damsel's supposed direction across the Atlantic.  
  
Luchrezia saw them off with a smile, fighting back the tears. Even as they stood on the dock, even as Quatre went aboard ahead of Milliardo, her husband did not say that he loved her. It swept through her, shone tenderly in his eyes, but the words were not given. As much as she wanted them, he would not offer them to her.  
  
Returning with a hand pressed caringly to her abdomen, Luchrezia found that Dorothy Catalonia had already replied to her letter, which it seemed had been received in Nice by the grace of God alone. With a somewhat critical eye, she read:  
  
Dear Luchrezia,  
  
My, but a surprise your letter was to me! Surely we have not written since we were but fourteen. In fact, it was very much like being written to by a stranger; yet, nevertheless, a stranger in need of my services. And as we are kin, I am inclined to help in whatever way I can.  
  
I warn you, Luchrezia, that though my crew and I accept your offer of ten thousand pounds ("no more, no less," as you have said), our expertise lies in plunder, as you well know. I cannot guarantee that it will be I to return your sister-in-law, for rescuing is a motive I am not accustomed to. However, I can promise you that we have a better chance than any crew Baron Peacecraft or that silly governor hires.  
  
I will work for you, Luchrezia, and I shall keep you informed of any news of interest. Careful not to worry quite so much; you've a second child coming is the word. I will say no more in case this letter is received by those with ill intent, but know that we are heading toward the Caribbean, should by chance we encounter Captain Heero Yuy.  
  
With due respect,  
  
Dorothy Catalonia, Captain of the Belladonna.  
  
The baroness passed her hand over her eyes for just a moment. The Belladonna, was it? A Spanish ship then. Dorothy would not be singled out in the Caribbean.  
  
It surprised her greatly that she would accept the assignment. As her cousin had duly noted, they had not made contact for many years. She did not know well Dorothy's current personality as a woman, yet she was very certain that she had no intent of rescuing Relena for family loyalty. Loyalty to her fortune was sure to be the case.  
  
It mattered not. Relena was a joy to Lu's life, as dear to her as Milliardo or Agatha. She missed her so much that her heart constricted.  
  
With a sigh, Luchrezia rose and began the struggled walk up the stairs. Agatha needed to be fed.  
  
Yeah, crappy stopping point, but I wanted to touch on Zechs' and Noin's – excuse me, Milliardo and Luchrezia's – relationship.  
  
I hope you guys liked this chapter! I'm VERY, VERY sorry for taking so long to update. I hope all my readers are still with me because you guys have been fantastic with previous chapters! Review and let me know if you still are with me! Comments are always very welcome!  
  
-GG 


	5. Revelations

Thanks for reading, crew! It's been almost a year already since I started this fic, so those who have stayed with me on this from the beginning, I LOVE YOU. I hope you continue to read, no matter how slowly I update.

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Upper Class Part Five

By Gundam Girl

Standing on the starboard side of her ship, looking out at the clear afternoon sea, Dorothy was very pleased with herself.  She had been able to conjure up good manners from years and years ago, and had written a decent letter to her cousin.  No doubt Luchrezia had been surprised.  Dorothy was a rough-necked pirate, wasn't she?  She grinned; the Catalonias had been a shamed branch of the Noins by society, but Dorothy enjoyed it dearly.  How often was it that a woman became captain of a highly respected crew?

Not often, and Dorothy was known for being one. They had been sailing for a day now.  With the _Belladonna_ being notably smaller than the _Ivory_ _Damsel_, it was also faster.  In a day or two, they would be caught up with Captain Heero Yuy.  Aye, she was looking forward to it.  The rumor, the legend that Yuy was would be a challenge, which was a thing Dorothy never had been known to turned down.

Milliardo would have set out by now as well, Dorothy mused.  But he would undoubtedly be using one of those enormous, painfully slow vessels.  Yet between his and Governor Winner's money, they would remain stocked of fresh water and food and unlike Dorothy or Heero, they would not require stopping at civilized islands or countries for supplies.

The odds were indeed interesting.  And Dorothy had no qualms about racing Milliardo Peacecraft, be he distant relative or not.  He wasn't her blood, but his wife was.  And it was Luchrezia she was serving.  Still, if Peacecraft got to Relena before she did, Dorothy was certain that Milliardo would dissuade his wife against even an attempt salary.

Dorothy just couldn't have that.  Smiling, she closed her eyes and felt the wind against her face.  _May it blow clean and strong_, she thought.

---

"How long have we been sailing?" Milliardo asked his ship captain, Quinze.

"Six hours, Mr. Peacecraft."  Quinze smiled at his employer between thin lips.  Baron Milliardo Peacecraft was indeed the best client he had ever had.  And Governor Quatre Winner was indeed the richest.

Irritated, Milliardo continued, "How far away from England are we?  You better tell me we have made good distance."

"I am a Christian man, Baron Peacecraft, and God wishes us all not to lie."  Quinze looked over his helm out to the water-lined horizon.  "Our time is ill.  But my navigator believes that, from what the Dover fisherman said, the _Ivory Damsel _could be heading up the North Sea, possibly to Scotland."

"Possibly," Milliardo growled. 

"Another scenario is that they intend to sail over the country and go toward the Caribbean, or possibly the United States."  Quinze folded his arms.  "The trouble, sir, is that the _Ivory Damsel _makes little and brief contact with anyone in countries.  They're said to supply from small islands, which makes it close to impossible to trace their whereabouts.  Chances are they were just sailing by Dover and decided to see if the governor had anything of interest to them."

Joining them, Quatre scowled, an expression that was seldom seen on him usually, but was slowly becoming his only one.  "My butler claims to have seen a pirate in Dover the afternoon Miss Peacecraft arrived.  The _Ivory Damsel _was the only strange ship recorded to be in the harbor that day, though they signed under a different ship name and alias of course.  My butler also claims that Miss Peacecraft spoke to the pirate he saw, and my instincts tell me that he, the pirate, was surely a member of the _Ivory Damsel_."  His frown deepened.  "The crew could not possibly know that the butler, as Miss Peacecraft's escort, was mine, Mr. Quinze, nor that Miss Peacecraft was staying in my house.  How could they have thought to kidnap her in such a short time when it was not yet even public knowledge that she and I were engaged?"

"It was most likely a common matter of chance, Governor," Quinze replied steadily.

"_Common_?" Quatre seethed.  "It is no more common than it is to see snow in June!"

"Quatre, calm yourself."  Milliardo's own blood heated with rage, however.  "Are you at least aware of Yuy's previous actions, Mr. Quinze?"

"Yes, sir, of course.  All sailors know of Heero Yuy.  He plunders sailing ships normally, preferring to keep his work over water, but he now and then takes from a grounded house, as is obvious."

"So his next task would likely be a proceeding vessel, correct?" queried Quatre.

Quinze nodded, his light blue eyes surveying the weather again.  "It is the higher chance.  To my knowledge, there are currently three English ships off dock.  In these waters, I would otherwise expect Scottish and French vessels.  The Scottish are not to be taken lightly, as they are largely warriors, and the French are cunning.  But both are wealthy and either could be threat or benefit to any pirate.  My suggestion would be to continue on our current course north.  We can continue this speculation once we reach the top of Scotland."

Nodding, Quatre moved away, down a short set of stairs.  Milliardo followed him and both men leaned against the sturdy side of their rented ship, the _Epyonis_. 

"I don't even care to guess what they intend to do with her, Milliardo," said Quatre grimly.  "This is the first time in my life I've had the misfortune of dealing with piracy."

"The same is true for me," Milliardo told him, staring at a fluffy cloud above them.  It was still grayish; the rain had not stopped for even two hours yet.  "I never counted on experiencing it.  But now…Relena.  We could be completely wrong.  They could be hiding in France.  They could be halfway to America!"

"It is my fault.  Damn it, the baron's sister!"  Quatre let out a short, cold chuckle.  "What a fool I was to not have had guard's posted around my house.  Anyone who had a mind to shoot out at you could have somehow gained knowledge of her arrival and have taken her before I even saw her."  Balling up a fist, he bashed it on the smooth wood.  "Blast!"

"You need to stop this before you drive yourself mad," Milliardo said calmly.

"I _am _mad!" Quatre exclaimed, loudly now.  "I'm bloody insane, Milliardo!  They took her!  They took her from me!  And I did _nothing, _absolutely _nothing _to stop them as they came, grabbed her, and went."

"We will regain her," the baron assured him fiercely.  "I will kill myself before I let Relena stay in the hands of pirates such as the_ Ivory Damsel_'s."

"I shall do so before you," Quatre countered.  Swiveling on his heel, he called over his shoulder: "I'm going to see if this hell of a ship won't go any faster."

Milliardo sighed, and lifted his hand to run his fingers through the length of his pale hair.  _This wrong is grave.  What could Heero Yuy possibly want with Relena?  Would they not have ransomed her by now?_

Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the only thing his wife always insisted he keep with him at all time—a dark red rosary.  And, knowing nothing else to do, he prayed.

---

Relena closed her eyes to shield them from the glare of the sun, but she did not turn away.  It was the first time in the two days she had been on this ship that the sun had shone, sparkling over the water.  She sat in a small chair beside the window now, as she had done whenever she had not been sleeping.  None of the crew had prompted her to come out but for once, when the woman named Hilde had cheerfully suggested she come up on deck to see the ocean.  Relena had politely told her that she could see it very well from where she was sitting.  Catherine had silently been bringing her meals on a tray, of which Relena only ate small portions.  The idea of becoming a slave had quelled much of her basic need for food, and depression was slowly setting in.  She also figured that she looked – and smelled – atrocious.  But that fit with the pirate atmosphere, didn't it?

Captain Yuy had not come to her.  She had not seen him since the scene in the kitchen the morning before.  Relena didn't know where he was sleeping, but the room had been left to her, at least as long as he wished it.  A small part of her wondered what specifically he had planned for her; how long she would be on this ship, who she would be sold to, what she would have to go through.

Slowly, Relena opened her eyes.  Semi-restless, she stood gracefully from her chair and roamed casually about the chamber.  She had not really explored the area, had merely surveyed it with her eyes.  Without any hurry, she walked to the dresser she had noticed the first time she had come in here.  She glanced quickly in the mirror and winced.  Her hair was matted; her face was paler than usual, and there was some crust in the inner corners of her eyes.  Reaching into the small washing basin on top of the dresser, Relena grabbed the cloth and quickly washed her face.  Her cheeks were now pinker from the chill of the water, but her hair…  Sliding open the top drawer, she hunted for a comb.

What she found was a shaving blade.  The sunlight crossed the metal, and it winked at her welcomingly.  In half-wonder, Relena lifted it, testing its weight.  How odd, she thought absently, that such a small, light object could be so deadly.  That it could cause the death of a person if a someone slipped in its use. 

Or, she amended, intended such a thing. 

The blade was sharp; Relena could see that just by looking at it.  Here, she mused, was the weapon she had so longed for when she had first met Yuy.  It would not take much pressure.  The slightest of touches would slide through flesh as though it were butter. 

As she held the object in one hand, Relena inspected her fingers; they were small, soft, and elegant.  Such fingers would do tedious work, when she was a slave, and would probably do it poorly.  The fault of that, if it was a fault, was in her upbringing.  Would she be whipped, she wondered, as the dark-skinned folk in the United States were whipped?

That would be worse, she mused, then death.  Not seeing her brother again would be worse.  Never being happy again…  Next to that, Relena found she would _prefer_ death.

Holding the shaving knife up, Relena saw it was more brilliant than ever now, landing a strip of light across her clear blue eyes.  Turning her other hand palm-up, Relena closed her eyes.  She sent the point of the knife flying downward to her wrist.

The felt something warm and liquid against her neck, but did not feel the pain she had expected.  Confused, Relena's eyes shot open and stared into the dark blue ones of Heero Yuy. 

Heero's glare was blackening as the blade dropped from Relena's slack grip and clattered to the wood floor beneath them.  Blood continued to slip from the wound on Heero's palm as Relena's lower lip trembled and she stepped away from him and collapsed onto the bed.

"Heero," she breathed, eyes wide.  She was too shocked to realize she had used his first name.

His eyes did not leave hers as she stared at him.  "Did you think it would be beneficial for you to slice through your hand?"

Relena's tongue was floored to the bottom of her mouth, and could only emit short, low noises of distress.  "Why," she whispered when she remembered what words were, "why would you—"

She had terrified him, Heero thought.  Standing in the doorway, watching her point a knife at herself with obvious intent to harm, Heero had sprung without a second thought and took the blow for her.  Now, he had absolutely no idea as to why he had.  And his hand was throbbing wickedly.

"God," she murmured, seeing the crimson puddle of the floor grow.  Hastily, she ripped the biggest piece of cloth she could from her dress.  Rising on shaking ankles, she wrapped the makeshift bandage around his hand.  "You may need stitches."

"I'll not."  Fascinated, he momentarily forgot the pain as her cool fingers touched him.  "I still want to know why you sought to detach your arm."

Her eyes bolted to his, her light-colored brows lowered slightly.  Heero swallowed, effected in a way he did not wish to be.  "If one down not have an arm, how can she be of use to a slave-master?"

Heero's own brows drew together severely.  Disgusted with himself for not having the courage to come see her sooner, he wrenched away from her.  "With only one arm," he told her lowly, "she will have all the more trouble resisting any unwanted advances."

Relena's breath caught in her throat, and she turned away from him, hating the tears that involuntarily came to her eyes.  "I see."

He inwardly cursed.  "Anyway, my lady."  He cleared his throat.  "What I came to tell you, before you gave me the trouble of stopping your foolish action, is that we will not be taking you to Singapore."

Without thinking, Relena whirled around, too surprised to try to hide her tears again.  Heero clenched his uninjured fist at the shine of them on her lashes.  "You won't?"

"Aye.  I have discussed it with my crew, and we have agreed to go to Mexico.  There, we will see just how dearly the governor and baron wish for your return."

Temper rising, Relena spoke too soon to see the strange expression on the captain's face.  "They will come for me.  They will make you _pay _for kidnapping me."

"That," Heero said, forcing himself to smirk when all he wanted to do was frown, "could be.  But I'm thinking the only paying that will take place is the amount I receive from your lover."

Relena's cheeks burned, and she was too embarrassed to detect the cold that had entered his voice.  "He is not my lover."

"You are marrying him."

"That hardly means I love him!" she exclaimed, then gasped, lifting a hand to rest on her chest.  "I mean," she continued hurriedly, "that I…"

He had to work harder to keep his expression light.  "If you figure out what you really mean to say, let me know.  You're baffled state intrigues me."  He turned on his heel and went for the door.

"Captain Yuy."

Heero paused but did not turn around.  "My lady?"  He didn't think he could manage to smirk again.

Relena folded her hands together.  "May I come up to the deck later?"

Heero shrugged his shoulders, more to relieve the tension that had been building up continuously ever since he had stepped into the room.  "The only person keeping you in here," he said, "is you."

Relena watched him leave, then sat back down on the bed again.  Heero Yuy, she thought, turning her head to look out the window again.  He was a pirate.  She placed her fingers against her neck, and a droplet of his blood came off on her thumb.

He was a pirate who would hurt himself to help a woman he had taken hostage.  But, Relena wondered, wasn't he just a man as well?  Milliardo had told her once that those who stole and lied were no more men than she could ever be.  She was still sure that Milliardo would do the same as Heero Yuy had for her just now, appreciated or not.

Dear God.  Pressing a hand tightly against the flesh over her heart, she leaned against once of the tall bedposts.  If she kept thinking this way, she thought in attempt to lighten her heard, she might turn her favor to the pirates' side.

Relena's frown stayed on her lips.  She thought of Sally's kind smile, Hilde's nice words, Duo's obvious gentleness, Trowa's subtle politeness, and Wufei's…well, Wufei.  None of them seemed like bad people.  They just…liked to steal…

Relena's head met the wood of the bedpost as well.  All of them would be hung within an hour if they were ever caught on English or American soil.  And they were going to Mexico, a place closed enough to the U.S. to present threat.

It…didn't matter, Relena told herself, trying hard to believe it.  She did not care for these people.  They had kidnapped her!  Taken her from her familiar life…her fiancée…whom she had been very fond of upon first speaking with him.  _Quatre _was a man she could trust, who would protect her.  If the situation had not held him at a disadvantage, she was certain…

Relena looked up as Heero marched into the room again.  Bending over, he picked up the shaving knife she had dropped.  "This stays not," he declared gruffly and marched out again, leaving Relena baffled by the abrupt encounter.

---

Luchrezia had Agatha balanced against her chest by sitting the child partially on her pregnant stomach.  Needing to move around, she waved away the maid who would normally answer the door when it was knocked upon and opened it herself.

She was both surprised and not to see Duke Treize Khushrenada and his wife on her doorstep.  She had known both of them since her younger years, and they were, like Milliardo and Lu, proof that an arranged marriage could turn out happily.  They were also frequent visitors at the baron's home.

"Treize," she murmured, and the dashing aristocrat grinned, taking off his navy blue top hat. 

"Lu, how wonderful to see you!  And little Aggy."  Expression remaining, Treize held his arms out to Agatha.  Agatha cuddled closer to her mother's body.  Luchrezia laughed but couldn't yet manage to freely make the sound.

"My daughter knows better than to attend to rogues like you, Treize.  Please come in."  She stepped back so the couple could enter.  "Should I send for drinks?"

"Do not trouble yourself, Luchrezia," Anne fussed politely as they all entered the quaint parlor Lu had sat in with her husband just the previous day.  "We'll not be here long."

Treize folded his long body down to the low sofa as Lu chose the loveseat.  "Where is Milliardo?  And I know Quatre was to be here as well."

"They both went this morning."

"Went?" further inquired Anne, her auburn hair catching complimentary rays of sun through the window.

"Out," continued Lu.  "Out on a ship of their own, to hunt the _Ivory Damsel_."  She would, of course, be wise and not mention Dorothy's own partake in the chase.  "Both my husband and the governor refused to sit still and depend on the navy."

Treize nodded slowly.  "That is probably a wise decision.  But would not the navy be the safer option for them?"

Noin bounced Agatha lightly on her knee.  "Safety for himself, Duke, has never been Milliardo's first thought when something involves Relena."

"I see.  Of course, I remember that now.  The last time I was in this house, that baby was still in your stomach and my friend would not stop speaking of his sister, even when she was in the room."  Treize smiled and stood up.  "If you hear from him, you will certainly inform us, won't you?"

"I shall, naturally," Luchrezia said as her guests both bowed.  "Where will you be staying while you are here, and how long?"

"We are staying in the inn two blocks down, and we shall remain in London as long as it takes for Relena to either be returned or her death confirmed."  Treize worked to gentle his voice when the baroness winced.  Anne spoke for him.

"But of course, we expect the former."

"Of…course."  Lu set Agatha against her hip and scooted forward on the loveseat.

"No need to stand, we'll see ourselves out."  Treize returned his hat to his head with the same grin.  "Rest easy, my dear.  Your second child depends on it."

"Goodbye, Luchrezia," Anne called gaily.

"Goodbye," replied the baroness weakly, brushing her fingers through the white-blond curls on her daughter's hair.  When the door closed, she leaned back and returned Agatha to her lap.  "Sweetie, do you know?"  She bent over to press her lips to the soft forehead.  "I miss your father so much already.  But Relena…"  She bit her lip.  "Let us wait devotedly for your aunt to return, Agatha."

---

"You were very suave inside, Treize," Anne told her husband later, feeling smug.  They were inside their rented room, the lights burning low.

"And, as always, you play the demure wife with such believability."  Treize tilted his head back so Anne could pull the cravat away from his neck.  He then gripped her chin and met her deep, brown eyes.  "I am the only one who knows the true you."

"That is how I want it.  I care not for society.  Only for you," she sighed as his lips fluttered over her skin as he parted the frontal buttons of her gown.  "Treize…"

He took her hand and kissed each of her fingers.  "I gave the order today," he informed her and his shit was peeled away, his muscled rippling involuntarily beneath his wife's roaming hand.  "They leave in the morning.  They should be past Milliardo and Quatre tomorrow evening."

"Tell me something," Anne whispered as they half-stumbled onto the bed.  "Why do you want Relena returned so much that you would send the advanced navy after her?"

Treize grinned once again, but it was too dim for Anne to detect the wicked gleam in his eyes.  "My friendship with Quatre is dear.  What kind of friend would I be if I did not do what I could to return the person he so cares for?"

"I was just curious."  Saying so, Anne closed her mouth, only to open it against to Treize's lips as their passion spiked.

_I too am curious, Anne._  Treize ran a hand down his wife's bare hip.  _Will Relena feel as this good when I finally get her?  _Hearing Anne moan beneath him, Treize took her swiftly, imagining golden hair and sky-blue eyes and skin as pale as queen's lace. 

_I think she will be better._              

---

Relena came up onto the deck feeling the best she had since her involuntarily arrival on the _Ivory Damsel.  _She had made good use of the water-filled basin in the captain's quarters, and was now fully clean, thanks to a sponge bath.  Her dress could have used a good washing, but she would be lenient for the time being.  At least her body was no longer as oily as it had been.

The night was brilliant.  Being able to see it in full view as compared to the small window Relena had watching it from put a smile on her face.  Stars dazzled the ebony sky, and the crescent slip of the moon shone magnificently.  And beneath it all waved miles and mile of dark green ocean.

She leaned against the side of the ship to watch a silver-scaled fish jump out of the sea and dance briefly in the cold air before diving in once again.  A shame, she thought momentarily, to think she had eaten such a beautiful looking creature for lunch.

When she felt a blanket slip over her shoulders, Relena started and nearly crashed backwards into Heero.  "My God!" she exclaimed softly, still half-dazed by the sight of nature all around her.

"God wouldn't want you to be frozen, I'd think."  He had been standing there for the better half of five minutes, Heero assumed.  In her somewhat wrinkled evening gown, which was the color of the sea itself, she had looked like some sort of mermaid siren that had miraculously sprouted legs and come aboard his ship.  He would, Heero knew, have foolishly succumbed to her calling were she to give it. "There's a treacherous chill to the air.  You'd be sick by the morning, and I can't afford a sick hostage now."

Relena wrapped herself up in the thick wool, but eyed him warily.  "Have you come to mock me for finally coming out of your bedroom?"

Heero smirked.  It would be a delight, getting her riled up.  But the ocean was too lovely to disturb the peace it brought to him, and instead he shrugged.  "I came to ask how you like the view."

He hadn't mocked her, but Relena felt foolish anyway, and her cheeks glowed lightly.  "It is gorgeous," she admitted, her voice low.  "It is a shame to think this is my first time out at sea."

Heero's eyebrows rose.  "That _is _a shame.  A crime, I'd have to say."

"You have to say everything," Relena retorted, turning away from him to look at the moon again.  When small hairs on her neck stood up, she whirled around, hand lifted – but Heero caught her wrist mid-assault and wrenched it down to her side, dashing any hope of slapping his grinning face.  She stared up at him defiantly, but his smile made her waver.  His eyes made her break completely.

He had such eyes that were…effecting.  Relena had seen the eyes of several pirates and public London hangings, and none had ever possessed the gaze that Heero Yuy held.  She felt her shoulders slack and she stiffened, looking to the side and staring at the nearby mast.  "You also know much about crime."  She wanted nearly to curse, knowing her voice didn't have half the frost it required to be menacing.

Heero's brow contracted a bit.  "I do," he said tolerantly.  "And you have judged me, Miss Peacecraft?"

Relena recalled the blood she had scrubbed away from her throat and her fingers tightened on the blanket.  Heero noticed her white knuckles and stayed quiet.

"If I have judged you," she told him softly, "I do not yet know the verdict.  You surprised me today, Heero Yuy."

"I don't suppose nobles much like surprises."

"I care to know what is coming," Relena confessed.  "With you, I find that I am not possibly able to."  Completely throwing him off guard, she inclined her head respectfully, and he was unable to speak even when she slipped off the blanket and handed it back to him.  The fingers he took it with were stiff.  His silence fueled Relena's desire to be away from him even more.  Without another word, she moved away to the stairs that led below deck.  She gave him a last glance, saw his body framed by the starry night, then disappeared back to his room.

Heero stared at the opening in the wood long after she had gone.  When he moved again, his skin was frozen to the touch.  Sleeping on the floor in the stove-warmed kitchen would actually be beneficial tonight.

Relena Peacecraft.  She was of noble blood and, it seemed, of noble mind.  Little be little, she was revealing herself to be more brave a woman than he had initially thought her to be.

Heero smiled.  As long as he could, he wished to learn more of her.

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

Review please!


	6. Musings

Thanks for reading, friends. Please review and let me know how I'm doing!

Disclaimer: I disclaim the ownership of Gundam Wing and all characters, storylines, etc. So Bandai, keep your distance, please.

Note: Because of a lack of characters, and my disinclination to make an original one, I have put Gaulron from "Full Metal Panic!" in this fic. So now it has small cross-over elements. I don't own "FMP!" either. Also, Gaulron's first name is probably not Petrov, but it's easier if he has a first name. So I gave him one.

Upper Class – Chapter Six

By Gundam Girl

Heero dreamt of hair the color of the sun, and eyes tinted by the light of the moon.  The comparison was romantic but not exaggerated.  He was sitting in the kitchen with Trowa, peeling carrots and potatoes for Catherine, dreaming when he shouldn't be.  He'd cut himself three times already.

"Trowa, put another log on the fire, this water won't boil in time if you don't."  Cathy smiled and wiped her brow as her brother followed the order.  To think she used to have cooks of her own to fix her food for her.  Now she couldn't imagine ever neglecting the chore she had come to love.  Heero had given her that opportunity when Michael died.

Heero, she mused with a smirk.  Captain Yuy of the _Ivory Damsel_.  Knave and thief, and most recently a brave kidnapper with no decided course of action.  Her silly friend and confused hostage-holder.

That Relena Peacecraft had really done a job on Heero.  He rarely was completely silent and these days that's all he ever was.  When asked about it, he had been always saying, "I'm considering what to do with Miss Peacecraft."

Catherine shook her head as she cut a loaf of bread.  She and every other crew member knew exactly what Heero wanted to do with Miss Peacecraft, or rather, to her.  But let no inappropriate suggestion be made, not while there was a lady on board.  Heavens no.

It made her ponder.  What was life like in London these days?  Catherine couldn't claim to miss it, the bustle of city life with people up and roaming at the most cursed of hours or the never ending social struggle or the politics or the gossip.  She had left that behind in the house she had lived in with Michael, and now that she was on the _Ivory Damsel_, she had no interest in any part of it any longer.

Relena probably enjoyed every brainwashing, soul-swiping word.  That didn't make her a bad person of course, but it made her…stereotypical.  Cathy wasn't sure how fond she could be of a stereotype, no matter how well she could connect with her.

Hearing a curse, she grinned and turned to see Heero sucking at his thumb.  "Four cuts," she declared.  "You're doing it wrong.  Cut away from yourself, not toward.  Foolish dolt."

"Dolt," Heero scoffed.  "I'm planning."

"Planning what?" smiled Trowa knowingly.

"Miss Peacecraft's ransom."

"So now we'll be ransoming her?" Cathy asked. "I was wondering."

"I don't know if we'll random her or not."  Heero scowled. 

"But you said you're planning it," Trowa pointed out.

Heero admitted, "She would fetch a pretty price.  But she'd do the same in Singapore."

"Not another word of that place," said Catherine sharply.  "You should be ashamed to think of it.  Enslaving a living human."  She paused.  "Although I suppose that isn't new, is it?"  She thought of the African American slaves she had seen in England and her heart tore at the seams.  She shook her head to clear it.  Some things weren't the concern of pirates.

"You seem very fond of Winner's fiancée," Trowa commented mildly.  "She seems to please more than your eyes."

Heero cast a frown at Trowa.  Perhaps the two of them had been friends for too long now.  He didn't like feeling as though people could read him.  Captain Heero Yuy preferred to play the role of the solid emotionless entity.  He'd leave the easily-angered dramas to Wufei and the part of the poor clown to Duo.  "She is intriguing," he answered shortly.

"Aye, she was that from the beginning," the green-eyed pirate said.  "I've no doubt of that.  But you won't refocus off of her long enough to make a definite plan.  Usually, we'd have moved on to our next action by now."

Heero resented him for saying the truth, but, because it _was_ the truth, he couldn't bring himself to attempt to argue with it.  Such a thing would be pointless and make him a fool.  If he could just adjust himself to being indifferent to Relena, then he could continue on as he always had – committed to his ship and chosen lifestyle.  He wouldn't be dawdling over the meager distraction of a silly girl.

Instead, he merely shrugged.  "You're right." 

Trowa sighed lightly as he reached for another potato.  "I want you to know, I'm getting restless, and I'm sure not the only one.  Being the subordinate here, I say that with as much respect as a man like me musters."

"Hn."  Heero paused in his task to drink from a small flask, not wincing at the bitter bourbon's taste.  "We'll most likely be stopping for supplies soon.  I want another chicken."

Catherine laughed.  "You need to get Relena something else to wear as well.  That frilly gown of hers must be like an oven.  It's not useful at all."

"That it's not," Heero agreed.  "I'll wager you'll not have her go naked either, Cathy?"

Cathy shot him a dangerous look over her shoulder.  "Never one to be gentlemanly, are you, Yuy?"

"I don't recollect any gentleman ever living in me."  His grin was quick.

"Harumph," said Catherine.  "At this point, I wish Trowa would be smitten with Relena.  Then at least she would be treated more appropriately."

Heero lifted a brow at Trowa.  "Any intentions that I should know of?"

Trowa smirked.  "Not yet."

"Good.  Because if I decide to," Heero teased, "I'll have her before we're rid of her."

---

Petrov Gualron was Russian, and his blood was good.  The entirety of the Royal Navy knew this and, though many were disagreeable to having a man from Moscow on an English ship, it could not be denied that he was needed.  Duke Treize Khushrenada had hired him after all.

As good as his blood were his navigational skills.  Gualron had a small faction back in Russia, all devoted to him and his goal.  What that was, he hadn't quite figured out yet.  When he did…  Gualron smiled and reclined on his small cabin bed, hands beneath his head.  No one would keep it from him.

He preferred the dim and cramped cabin to the wide and open deck.  He wasn't like the homey, dreaming weaklings that infested the Navy ship _Jessenta.  _In places that light could not reach, plans were made and schemes were forged.  Mercenaries had to be very good at that, and Gualron was the best there was. 

He did it now, staring at the ugly brown ceiling, and thinking of tactics.  They were heading on a deliberately Northern course.  In three or four hours, they could pass Milliardo Peacecraft and Quatre Winner's ship.  They were not nearly as much a threat, with their seamen mediocre at best, as the other rumored ship after the _Ivory Damsel_.  Gualron, although he had only been in England for a year and a half, knew of the Italian ship _Belladonna_, and its captain, the cunning Dorothy Catalonia.  Because she was a woman, she and her crew did not go unnoticed, however common their style of plunder was.  They invaded, they ransacked, and then they escaped, leaving the attacked ship poor and forced to return home, clearing the ocean of one less boat.

Gaulron admired Catalonia for her always-stretching ambitions.  She was a woman who often wanted what only men got; treasures and riches, and, one day perhaps, land of her own.  But that, he suspected, would be in an area that was warm, relaxing, and very far from the police.  And the present day of course.

Yes, Dorothy was a threat, but if the time to meet her came – and it had to – Gualron was not overly worried about it.  She may be a good pirate, but she was still a woman.  And women fell quickly no matter what kind of person they were.

As for the Baron and Governor's ship, well…  Gaulron chuckled, his voice deep.  The only thing that secured their chance at getting to the _Damsel _first was the funding they had put in for that Quinze's ship.  And Victor Quinze was a joke through both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans (Quinze had never been to the others).  But the rage that no doubt filled both aristocrats could fuel any man.  And rage worked well on the ocean, which was nothing but rage itself.  Oh, it could be calm and quiet sometimes, Gaulron mused, but always, beneath the shimmering surface that lied, there was always anger ready to turn up and toss aside whatever ship it could reach first.  With that rage, Peacecraft and Winner just might be able to harness the energy needed to get back the Baron's little sister.

Yes, Gaulron knew of Relena Peacecraft.  Anyone who had ever lived in England in the past year knew who she was.  She had been the most impressive debutante in London, possibly all of Britain, the year she had come out.  The Queen herself had invited her to tea, or so Gaulron had heard.  And her engagement to Governor Quatre Winner…

He was forced to applaud Captain Yuy.  If there were a maid to swindle away, Relena Peacecraft would be the best choice.   

Of course, that didn't make it right.  No, no.  Treize Khushrenada had seemingly thought that, anyhow, and Gaulron had learned from the Duke himself that he was a friend of Quatre's.  _And when one has the resources, _Treize had smirked, _one must use them to aid others, correct? _

Treize would be aiding him as well, Gaulron thought.  With the large fee he had charged for this operation, he would be able to get back to Russia and do something with his organization.

Perhaps by the time this "adventure," was over, he would know exactly what that would be.

---

It was a race.  Even though Milliardo knew of no other participants but him and Quatre and Heero Yuy, it was still a race, one that would, if he were to lose, cost him his sister.

He didn't like the thought of Relena being considered a prize to be won by the greatest man, but if that were going to be the case, then he would be sure to be the greatest.  He had lost his parents at a young age.  He would not suffer the same fate with Relena.

He had practically raised her, he mused.  Even he had to admit that he had been over-protective, but because of that, her manners were immaculate, earning her the role of most eligible woman in the country.  And Quatre had been the lucky man to be blessed with her in marriage.

Quatre was beginning to worry Milliardo.  The young Governor was closing in on himself.  He barely spoke unless it was to Quinze about their distance from the _Ivory Damsel_ or to Milliardo himself about Relena.  He refused food more times than he accepted it, and spent the majority of the time leaning over the side of the deck and brooding while he stared at the waters below.

Sometimes Winner seemed to merely break down.  As though, while he despaired, he built up pressure and every now and then, that pressure forced outward.  Quatre would kick or punch the wood of the mast or deck, muttering vulgar curses unrivaled by even the lower-class sailors.  At these points, Milliardo was usually inclined to add in a choice oath of his own.

But Relena did that to people, Milliardo thought as he sat on the small set of steps on deck.  She reached into people and rearranged their emotions, molding them into better citizens.  Milliardo had known that his whole life, and Quatre was still unused to it.  Both of them were missing it.

He nearly sighed.  He was far better at containing his feels than the governor and so he remained silent.  Part of him felt a bit guilty, focusing so much on Relena, when Luchrezia, Agatha, and his nameless and sexless child were at home, worrying.  Lu's eyes had been so tired when he had last looked at them, and somehow, so very, very sad.

Of course she was sad, Milliardo reminded himself.  Her beloved sister-in-law has been kidnapped by a band of ruthless pirates.  Yet, he still felt as though that had not been all to trouble his wife.

Milliardo was shaken out of his reverie by a tension-filled hand on his shoulder.  Looking up, he met the currently quiet, green-blue eyes of Quatre Winner.  Taking a deep yet subtle breath through his nose, the baron prepared for another declaration of how he could not understand how she was gone.

What Quatre said was very different from his prediction.  With both yellow eyebrows narrowed seriously, his hair mussed and signifying he had been scooping his hands through it again, he sat beside Milliardo.  He did not hurry to speak, but waited patiently for Milliardo to give him his undivided attention.  When he had that, Quatre opened his mouth and told him softly, "I intend to have him die."

Milliardo's reaction to this was shock and utter surprise, even some suspicion, but that was only revealed inside of him.  His face remained smooth and expressionless.  "Are you?" he queried in return, not entirely certain what it was she wished to say.  This was not Quatre's normal behavior at all.

The governor nodded once in a quick, curt way.  His jaw line was as firm as the wood on which they sat.  "Heero Yuy came into my house and robbed me of money that was rightfully earned by myself, and of a woman that was legally engaged to me – by you."

Milliardo's fingers clenched into twin fists of swift irritation.  "And?"

"I will not allow for him to have the slightest chance.  Yes, we could have him chained and locked up to be later hung for the entertainment of whole London.  But his kind has a way of the tricksters.  By black magic he could escape and I refuse to permit such a thing."  Quatre glared at the setting sun.  "Whether by my hands or another's, I will see him dead before I ever return to England."

Baron Peacecraft tipped his head forward, blond hair falling into his face and hiding every feature except for the tight jaw line.  "In that case, I ask one thing."

"Of course."  Quatre watched his friend, waiting.  "What is it?"

Milliardo looked up at him, and his blue eyes glinted dangerously.  "I want to kill Yuy."

Both of them were silent, but then Quatre nodded a few times.  "Your request is justifiable.  Who am I to deny you anything?"  He held out his hand.

Milliardo took it and they shook, sealing the promise. 

"Then the duty – no the _privilege_," Quatre corrected, "will be yours."

Peacecraft stood and stared out at the golden sky.  "I accept it with no hesitance."

He swore as the first star shimmered into view that he would catch the pirates of the _Ivory Damsel_ and gain Relena back.

And then he would have his, Quatre's, and Relena's revenge. 

---

"There is a challenge in the air tonight," Mueller said to Dorothy as he brought her the nightly glass of wine his captain preferred.  Being Italian, it was red, and she tossed back the first few gulps like water.

Dorothy smiled at his words, relishing the taste of her drink.  "I feel it as well, and here it is welcomed.  I'll bet the Navy's out by now.  Milliardo wouldn't trust them, but the government always manages to get involved in everything somehow or other."  She mocked a sigh.  "They crowd the water."

"Yet they make for interesting competition," an underling named Otto pointed out.  "However unimpressive they are."

"And they are unimpressive.  That's why I dislike them so much," said Dorothy matter-of-factly.  "They bore me to tears.  I scarcely understand _why _a soldier is so desirable in society.  Status is important, I'll say, but a man should never be dull if you're going to spend the rest of your life with him."

"Well-said, Dorothy," grinned Alex.  "You can marry me instead."

The pirates of the _Belladonna _laughed and snorted.  Dorothy joined them, but she raised a brow at Alex.  "I would have you become a very rich gentleman first, and then I'd kill you in the night and be your rich widow."

"Sounds tempting," Alex joked.  "Baptist or Catholic church?"

More laughing roared around and Dorothy shook her head.  "Arguing with you makes my head hurt.  Mueller, have we neared Yuy's ship?"

"Two days," Mueller said, emphasizing with his index and middle fingers held up.  "Only that, and we shall be upon them.  To get your cousin's princess and get our booty."

"A very pretty booty."  Dorothy tilted her head to the side.  "I hope they haven't killed her.  I don't s'pose I'd be very patient with a pampered little doll like Peacecraft.  Can't figure Yuy has been either."

"Have you ever met him?" someone asked.

"Heard the stories from a friend o' his.  A long time ago, in Barbados.  It was a passing moment, when he paid for my drink."  She held up her wine glass in salute to the pleasant memory.  "I respect him for that.  Free drinks taste much better."

"That means are your drinks are like heaven!"

Dorothy grinned.  "Indeed."  She loved her ship.  She loved her crew.  And she loved her wine.

Two days, she thought.  Then she would meet Heero Yuy and the gall-full crew of the _Ivory Damsel_.  She would have to see how Italian hearts fared against British ones.

She wasn't worried at bit.

---

Heero was just spreading out his two blankets for the night when Relena came into the kitchen.  He paused just as he was pulling the top blanket over his bare-chested self.  "Good evening," he said.  He hadn't seen her all day.  After the previous night, he'd needed a break from her again.

Relena stared.  In front of the small glowing fire, he looked so…vulnerable.  She was surprised.  He couldn't have stayed very warm, lying there.  The polite lady inside her felt apologetic for taking his bed, whether he had insisted on it or not.

"I was looking for Catherine," she told him, altering the truth slightly.

Heero smirked.  "You were looking for dinner, were you not?"

Relena's cheeks tinted with pink that couldn't be blamed on the fire.  "I didn't come because I…was watching the sunset."

He blinked, interested.  She'd either taken dinner early or late because she had wanted to watch the sunset.  It was as though she was obsessed with them.  Just how much of nature's glory was blocked off from her in London life?

"You've not seen a sun go to sleep before?" he questioned slowly.

She scowled at him for the insinuating tone in his voice.  She wasn't daft.  "Of course I've seen it, but in the city…  It's not like it is here."

"It can't be," Heero stated.  "In the city, you've your buildings and your people.  They hide the beauty of it."

She wrapped her arms around her waist.  "It is beautiful."

"Aye."  He stood up again and ignored how it made him just a little nervous to see her eyes move to the contours of his bared stomach.  She brought them back of to his face quickly, however, and he relaxed.  "I'll heat you your stew," he said.  Cathy had left it for her on the table.  Taking the bowl, he placed it on the floor close to the fire.

"Thank you," Relena murmured.  "I wanted to ask you.  When my brother comes for me…will you hurt him?"

Heero met her eyes quickly.  The question had set him off guard.  Sure this woman knew nothing of violence.  "If he attempts to hurt me," he answered bluntly.  "Will he?"

Her eyes lowered and she folded her hands over the skirt of her ridiculously thick dress.  "I do not know.  He is not a normally ill-intentional person.  If he does…it would be because he only wants me back."

"He'll get you back," Heero assured her.  "For the right price."

Her eyes narrowed.  "It is truly despicable that you believe when can be priced."

He shrugged. "Not just women.  I could have kidnapped that bony fiancée of yours and gotten much more money from all of England.  That scale was just too large for my liking."  It was a lie, but at least she wouldn't be able to tell the difference.  People didn't lie to her often enough.

Relena took a deep breath.  So what if he looked vulnerable there before the fire?  That wouldn't make her like him any more.  "I think my judgment of you is progressing," she informed him.

He scoffed as thought she had told a joke.  "When you make the decision, I hope you'll tell me what it is.  Ruthless barbarian or humble pirate?"  He scowled at the flames.

She hesitated.  He had said the first two words with such bitterness.  It suddenly reoccurred to her that Yuy was Asian.  Had that had any unappealing affects on him before?  How curious…

She suddenly felt something warm shoved into her hands and jumped.  The stew steamed invitingly, a cool-handled fork provoking her touch as it protruded from the broth.  "Thank you," she said again. 

Manners, Heero noted.  Manners very close to perfect.  "Drink up.  In my chamber, right?"

Stubborn and disliking his tone, Relena spun on her heel, prepared to take her meal back to his rooms, but then she stopped.  "What you did is not easily forgivable," she told him.  "You took me from a place I did not wish to be taken from."

"I did." 

Relena sighed.  "Your honesty is not particularly admirable."

Heero grinned.  "Neither is your modesty."

She glared.  "Goodnight, Captain Yuy."

"Goodnight, Miss Peacecraft."  As he listened to her footsteps storm out, he lay down and pretended her chilling tone didn't freeze him.

Back in his bedroom, Relena shook her head at him behavior.  His kidnapping of her was not easily forgivable by any means.  But…

Her shoulders sagged.  Why did she feel like she was starting to forgive him anyway?


	7. What Coincidence Can Bring

Chap 7, whee! I hope you guys are enjoying this. Let me know!

Disclaimer: I do not own GW, FMP!, or anything else that gets tossed into this fic. No profit is being made.

Upper Class – Chapter Seven

By Gundam Girl

Relena was just tying the end of the braid she worked her hair into the next morning when Heero unceremoniously burst inside her – his – bedroom. "You have five minutes," he declared.

Relena's gave him a slanted look. "Five minutes before what? Have you decided what price I am worth?"

He might have winced had her tone been any colder. "I might have," he said evenly, his eyes giving away nothing, "but it isn't the time yet for me to tell it. We're getting you new clothes."

"You—" Surprise dwelled on her face for a moment, followed by wariness. "I don't believe I can trust you enough for that."

"Trusting a person has nothing to do with letting them spend their money instead of yours."

Her eyes flashed. "The money you spend is _not_ yours."

Heero merely grinned at her. "There's one point of view."

Like a bullet from a pistol, Relena longed to shoot out a retort, but the ship suddenly jolted horribly, and she was knocked backwards straight towards the wall. Heero, who was holding onto one of the nailed-down chairs, grabbed her around the waist and held her closely to him as the ship righted again. In those brief few moments, something akin to a lightning bolt shot through Heero to Relena and both tensed from the impact.

He released her before she could begin to struggle and snorted. She only continued to glare at him.

With a small sigh, he clicked his tongue once and started up the stairs that led onto the deck. "Rather graceless docking, wasn't that, Trowa?"

Relena pressed hand to her chest in hopes of slowing the race her heart was running. The heat had risen in her stomach again and her cheeks were flushed. She was so dazed by the memory of being pressed to the pirate captain's chest that she did not notice right away when Wufei paused in the doorway.

"Are you coming?" he questioned, his dark eyebrows arched in expectancy. "I'd have thought you'd want to get off this ship for awhile."

Relena blinked at him. "Yes," she murmured.

"Well then," the Chinaman huffed, "get your ladyship out here."

---

The island the _Ivory Damsel _had chosen for its port was virtually unknown to all but those who required its services – namely, pirates, gypsies, and other criminals. It was hidden from view of the usual courses by large rocks that jutted out far enough away from the island to completely block it. Only a sixty-five foot space allowed passage. Known simply as Diablo from the Spanish thieves that had first opened business on the spit of land nearly fifty years ago, it really was a devil.

Duo hefted the large sack full of the better items of their recent plunders and grinned. "I'm off to see G," he called out to them. "We should get plenty for these." Jewels and expensive lamps, fine cloths and fabrics filled the sack. "How about I meet you later at the normal place?"

"Sounds fine," Heero nodded. As Duo walked off, he turned to Hilde, Sally, and Catherine. "I have a special assignment for the three of you. I want you to take our lady here and get her something more suitable than that fluff of silk."

"No joke," Hilde smiled. "Another day or two, it simply would fall off her."

Sally looked a bit more disappointed. "Shame such a nice thing's been wasted, though. Sure we can't sew it?"

"It's finished," Cathy announced, shaking her head at the mistreated threading and stains on the dress as Relena blushed darkly under their scrutiny. "But don't worry!" she said cheerfully. She directed Relena away from the men with an arm around the lady's waist. "We'll buy something just as nice!"

"Do you want me to go with them?" asked Trowa. "It's seemed the girls are a bit too fond of Miss Peacecraft if they're going to be proper captors."

"Wouldn't that go for you?" Heero returned, nearly snapping. He watched Trowa move in a way that would have been a squirm if done by anyone else. Irritated, he shoved hand through his hair. He honestly wanted to follow them himself. There was an odd feeling of wanting to protect Relena that he didn't much care for. He told himself it was nothing more than wanting to defend what was his. The truth was, he couldn't expect himself to be a proper captor either – not anymore.

Damn, he really hoped she didn't try to pull anything over him. He wasn't sure he'd be able to keep from falling for any tricks. After this morning with Relena flush up against him, he hadn't been able to stop a flame from flaring inside him, heating him like the kitchen furnace.

"Let's get a drink," Heero suggested. Anything to cool the burning that was going full-force again as he watched Relena disappear into the crowds. Wufei and Trowa agreed and they headed off.

The hut with the long, oak bar was far cooler than beneath the sun outside where multitudes of connivers stumbled along on the sandy beach to the various huts and stands. There, they could buy and sell anything from seashells to real estate to a person's virginity, and, if one was suspicious enough, human souls. Relena was no doubt jittery, Heero thought as a server woman clad in fishnet stockings brought him and his companions their beer. The server, a tall girl with her shocking red hair caught up in a bundle on her head with strands of hair falling here and their, shot him a slick smile.

"Hungry?" she asked in an accent that sounded French – fake French.

"It's too early for my appetite," Wufei said quickly. Trowa merely gave his full attention to his drink.

"How about you?" the woman said to Heero. "Surely a tough guy like you can take something this morning." Her green eyes flashed invitingly.

Heero realized with some surprise that the cute dimples at the corners of her mouth had absolutely no effect on him. "I'm good with my beer for now, honey." The words came out so easily that he thought for a moment some other guy had said them. But no, he'd definitely been the one to speak because the redhead's look changed from sultry to annoyed.

"Well then," she huffed, setting her hands on her hips. "I hope I can at least expect a good tip from you gents." Turning on the high heel of her boot, she stalked off.

Wufei spoke first. "Odd, Yuy. Wouldn't normally turn one like that down, would you?" He narrowed his eyes. "Or ones worse than that one."

Trowa, on the other hand, was more understanding. "It seems we'll have to suffer the service of a scorned worker. There's nothing more disappointing than getting turned down from a job." He added with a small smirk, "Now don't you just feel terrible, Captain?"

"I'm trying to cool down," Heero defended sharply, "not heat things up even more. I'll leave that to the sun outside."

"It certainly is blazing today. I bet your lady hostage was cooking like Trowa's sister's chicken in that English dress." Wufei drained the rest of his beer in two fast gulps. "I suppose the girls will take care of that. But now." His voice grew serious again, in true Wufei nature. The man could be amusing and grave in one breath. "How long do you think it'll be before one of her loyal friends catch up to us?"

"I'd say we still have at least another day," Heero said. "The Governor and the Baron have quite enough money for a fast ship. And that Navy's already out. They're too difficult to predict, but they won't be upon us too quickly. Full of morons is that group."

"Then there's our everyday bounty lovers," Trowa added. "It's a joke to even think they'll catch us, however. If my head's worth money, I want to be the one who has it…the head and the money."

"Your head's too pretty, too," Heero mocked. "I'm sure there'd be a lady who'd rescue you from your hanging."

The words were just out of his mouth when the hut's doors opened and the girls returned with Relena in front of them like a convict going to jail. With her face as red as it was, some could have thought her one. But it was the clothes that might have made them sure.

Her hair, long and brushed, was loose around her shoulders. She wore a long skirt dyed burgundy that began at her hips and ended at her ankles. On either side of the skirt were long slits in the fabric, leaving a tempting view of strips of flesh. Her shirt, if it could be called that, covered her well as the cut hid any cleavage, but it had no straps, and if Heero presently had the ability to think, he'd have presumed it clasped or zipped in the back. The slimness of her neck was emphasized by a ribbon the color of her skirt and from it hung a gold medallion with a plain circle engraved it on. Smaller, matching medallions hung at her ears. Lastly, Heero noticed with a shocking cloud of temper, that she still wore the Governor's ring. Yet it didn't diminish her beauty in any way, despite its symbolism. If Quatre had called her radiant in the gown she had been wearing, Heero would say the same in these island peasant's clothes.

And now, he couldn't deny the way his heart beat even as his libido heated.

"If I am to be rescued," Trowa said lowly, "I'd like it much to be her who does it."

Though Heero was stony-faced, Wufei took pity on him and gave him a few seconds to recover by greeting the women first. "I see you've got business taken care of." He tipped his empty glass toward Relena. "As I man, I admit you clean up well, Miss Peacecraft." His smirk was successful when she blushed even more brightly.

"And you're probably thirsty," Trowa added, enjoying the game as well. There really was nothing more fun than poking fun at a lady. He'd been able to do it to Catherine for years before she finally broke out of her sociality. "Sit, girls, and get a drink. I don't s'pose you'll have beer, Miss Peacecraft?"

"I shall!" Hilde declared. Sally and Catherine ordered rum, but Relena murmured out a request for water to the same redhead who had served them before.

The server sneered at Relena's clothes. "I smell rich blood," she said, her thinly-shaped eyebrows lowered. "And this one colors far too easily."

Heero snapped out of his daze at that comment and glared at the redhead. "I believe I dealt with you before," he said to her.

The redhead jutted her chin into the air. "Dealt nothing. I think I found the little wench ya refused me for, didn't I, Cap'n?" In her irritation, her false accent slipped and revealed Southern United States.

Relena set her eyes downcast, but Heero rose from his chair to tower above the waistress. _Calm, _he told himself. _Keep the hell calm. _"Ma'am," he said warningly, "if you still are gonna be wantin' your tip before we leave, I make the suggestion you get your tail-end outta here and get us our drinks. Or we'll leave you nothing."

She gave an enraged exhalation, and her cheeks puffed out unbecomingly. She turned.

"And remember one thing," Heero added. "The only wench in this place right now is you, sugar." He sat down again as the redhead gave him one last incredulous look before leaving them alone.

"Bitch," Wufei finished coldly. Sally smacked his shoulder.

"Soooooo, Heero," Hilde said after a moment to break the ice that had settled over the table. "What d'ya of Relena's new look? Sexy little thing, isn't she?"

Catherine grinned. "We found out that she has legs."

Heero forced himself to keep his eyes on Relena head instead of flicking down to her skirt again. In the chair beside him, she was staring at the table very determinedly. "So I see," he replied. "Nice ones too."

As he'd hoped, her eyes shot up into his, flames behind them. "If you think I'm going to be flattered by such a…an _impertinent _observation, then you—"

"You seem to think that everything I say has intent to flatter you, milady." He didn't like to think about it just now, but she had burned him a bit with her dangerous fire. "If you'd prefer, I'll just ignore you the whole time." When Relena only continued to scowl at him, he went on. "Besides, I _wasn't _trying to flatter you. All you little British girls have scrawny figures. Which is why you're going to have a steak. Bring meat!" he called out, overpowering Relena's instant protest.

Relena crossed her arms and gave Heero a sidelong look, although he was now in conversation with Hilde about where they had bought her clothes and for how much money. English manners prevented her from interrupting.

She blushed again, recalling the redhead's words, but she pushed them out of her mind. She was who she was, after all. Relena Peacecraft of the easy blush.

Relena Peacecraft who actually _had _been flattered by Heero's comment – and would die before she told him so.

---

"Listen, Dorothy." Alex smiled as they pulled into a port. "Although you know I'd never doubt you…why Diablo? If they're going to ransom the Baron's sister, don't you think they'd try to avoid public places? And wouldn't Singapore be the better choice if they meant to sell her off?"

"The tale is Heero Yuy's a good pirate," Dorothy told him. "And every good pirate knows that if you want something sold at a high price and still have it bought, the first place you try it on is Diablo. You should know this, we've done it countless times." So many times in fact, Dorothy thought now, that it was of supreme coincidence that she had never run into Yuy himself yet. "D'you think we should try to bargain while we're there?"

"If nothing else," said Alex, "let's at least get a drink. You've no idea how restless the men are getting. They need something with a bit of a punch, ya know?"

Dorothy chuckled. "Go ahead and say you want a woman, Alex. I'll not take offense at it. _I'm _not the foolish girl spreading her legs instead of taking up a gun." Her ice-blue eyes laughed coldly. "I'd take up the gun _as _I spread my legs, naturally."

"I daresay no man would want you in his bed ever again."

"All the more handy then, as I'd get their money without the work." She grinned as the ship docked. "Let's go, Alex. I'll buy you your first drink."

The two led the crew of the _Belladonna _to land and Dorothy shook her head and laughed as all of them made a clumsy path on the sand up to the paved brick walks. A man was either good on the land or on the water, and the same held true for a woman.

Most of the men scattered to go trade in trinkets or see friends that worked on Diablo, but a few stayed with Dorothy and entered the pub. They chose a table near the door, and Dorothy called for beer and food as loud as her men. With an amused face, she scanned the other people taking advantage of the afternoon hour.

She saw an old colleague, an ebony-skinned man who went by the name Ragere. In his fifties, he was in piracy retirement and now ran a tattoo parlor here on the island. His form of advertisement was the hundreds of designs and pierces that covered his body. When her drink came, she rose her glass to him and smiled. She'd gotten a letter from him not too long ago that business was getting shaky. Perhaps she'd convince one of her men to get a little ring in his nose or the like – while she looted the shop next to Ragere's.

She was listening to a joke told by Otto when the hut's door opened again and a single man walked in, a broad smile all over his face that looked as if he had been born wearing it. She wondered briefly what had made _him _so happy and would not have bothered thinking about it for another moment…if she had gone without seeing the long, brown braid that swished behind his back.

Duo Maxwell. The name entered her mind in an instant and stuck there like a seal. She'd met the fellow once in her lifetime, but he'd been so entertaining that she'd scarcely forgotten him. And hadn't she mentioned him just last night?

She had come upon Duo when he and has wife were celebrating their first wedding anniversary in Barbados almost nine months before. She'd been at a bar early for breakfast. He had come in with intention to bring some food back to the inn before his lady woke up. They had taken time to talk, pirate to pirate, for a while about how nice Barbados was at that time of the year. She'd told him she was captain of a newer ship, and Duo admitted he had recently become first mate of the _Ivory Damsel_. He had described a man of supposedly great valor, and Dorothy learned later that it was Heero Yuy himself. She could still recall laughing at how she'd never made the connection.

Aye, she remembered Duo well. She ducked her head a bit as she drank from her glass of wine and followed the grinning man with her eyes. Those eyes narrowed when he stopped at a table occupied by seven other people. She took note of the Chinese man, the almond-eyed woman beside him, the brunette man and the auburn haired girl with identical British chins, the slim shorthaired woman with amused eyes, the Japanese figure with the tanned skin…and the golden haired beauty who looked like the most delicate person on Diablo.

Slowly, she stood up as Duo was sitting down. She left her wine with Mueller, warning him to guard it with his life – for if the glass was gone, so would be the life – and made her way to the large table that so held her attention.

Plastering a smile on her face, she opened her mouth. "Crew of the _Ivory Damsel_," she said, standing next to Relena's chair and seeing Duo's jaw drop out of the corner of her eye. In a way that was almost casual, she slipped a dagger out of a scabbard at her thigh and set it just above Relena's necklace. She felt the blond's throat tighten against her hand, and several of the pirate jerked. "Hold your hands by your head and move away from Miss Peacecraft. And I _promise_," she looked into Heero's cold Prussian eyes, "she shall not be hurt."

Dorothy grinned to herself. _"I hope you have that reward ready, cousin."_

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Review please!


	8. Catching Up

Wow, this has been out of action for a while, hasn't it? And I know I left you all at a cliffhanger last night, something I'm deeply sorry for. Things are definitely getting hectic with the holidays coming up, but I hope you all can manage to stick with me. You're such wonderful readers, and, as you know, there's always room for a little GW fiction.

Note: More "Full Metal Panic!" sightings. Kurz made supporting character!

Disclaimer: Ah, the necessary "me no own." Oh, look, there it was.

Upper Class – Chapter Eight

By Gundam Girl

Heero was furious. Since when on the planet God had made did _his _guard leave him? Never, not even in his sleep. There was always a pistol under his bloody pillow. There was one in his back pocket now, but with his palms pressed to the back of his skull, there was no way he could reach it.

When the woman with the long, yellow hair had looked at him with her dagger held to Relena's throat, the first thing he had felt was instant loathing; the next was coldhearted fear for the woman being threatened at this very second, and the third was desperation for any kind of plan that could be accessible to him. Since he couldn't think of anything, he went back to loathing.

"Who," he said lowly, "in the seven seas are you?" His voice could have scratched the heads of diamonds.

The woman smiled, but it was Duo that spoke up from his chair beside Heero's. "Dorothy Catalonia," he murmured, "Captain of the _Belladonna_. She's from Italy."

"Well, _obviously_," Trowa gritted out between his teeth. Like the rest, his hands were also to his head, as Dorothy had commanded, but his arms were so long that he was having trouble not hitting Cathy in the head with his elbow.

"Come for the lady, eh, _Captain_?" Wufei snarled. "With dishonorable methods, no less."

Dorothy tossed her hair over her shoulder, but her weapon-occupied hand remained steady. "Well, Mr. Chang, I decided that since bargaining was probably not an option, a surprise assault would be best. Besides, are you going to be a hypocrite and tell me that your way of taking her from Governor Winner's house was any less dishonorable?"

Wufei's eyes were slits as he glared at her. "I do so despise sarcastic women."

"Fortunately," the Italian pirate said, "I don't give a damn what you may despise." She smiled cordially at Relena. "Shall we be off then, Miss Peacecraft? I've an agenda, you understand."

Relena was suddenly forced to her feet by a tug Dorothy gave on her arm. Her other arm was suddenly seized by a man with short, brown hair, and she reflectively attempted to yank herself away to no avail. She noted that there were several other men moving in around the _Ivory Damsel_'s crew's table, all of them holding revolvers out, aiming at one of them. One of them, a blond who wore glasses, looked particularly ready to shoot, given the chance.

She jerked her head around to face Dorothy. "Just what do you intend to do with me?"

Dorothy's smile was cunning. "You, Miss Relena, are just like a beautiful gem – a diamond, a pearl, or maybe, in this case," she said, spying Quatre's ring on her finger, "an emerald. My job is to take you back to your original owner. So, there is no hope of me selling you."

"To the governor?" gasped Hilde from her seat. "After we just spent _all this time_—"

"Not Winner," grinned Dorothy. "But if I told you who, then where would the mystery be in this little adventure? Past adventure," she corrected. "For it seems the story is closing." She began to back away, Relena in tow. But she stopped near the door of the pub.

"And one more thing. Captain Yuy," she called. Heero's eyes had never left them, and she nodded in recognition. "I must thank you for taking care of the future governor's wife for me. I do hope you won't miss her too much." Dorothy had already figured out that the man was completely dumbstruck by the girl.

"I will chase you," Heero growled out. "And when I catch you, you will pay for this treachery."

"Sticks and stones, Captain. From one pirate to another, let me just tell you." Dorothy motioned to another man, and he and Muller carried Relena out ahead of her. "You're going to need some new sails. Just some advice."

"Damn you!" Trowa exclaimed, but he was only responded to with a bubbly little laugh as the female sea captain followed her men outside. When the rest of Dorothy's crew had gone, and the rest of the land men that she had hired to aim at Heero's crew had run out and away, he stood up. "Well, let's go after her, straightaway!"

"You heard her, didn't you?" grumbled Wufei. "They've destroyed our sails. Probably tore the bitch out of them with their bloody daggers."

"So we're just going to sit here?" demanded Trowa, who was never for just sitting. "We're going to make no plan at all?" He looked toward his captain. "Heero!"

Heero was staring at the door and continued to do so more the course of nearly ten seconds. Then the Japanese man surged to his feet and grabbed his beer mug. He hurled it against the wall, listening to the shattering of glass and then did the same to Hilde's. He paced, fisting his hair, while his crew and half the pub's guests watched in awe. The cool, collected Heero Yuy, captain of the _Ivory Damsel, _was throwing a fit.

"God damn it! Damn _me_!" He kicked over a chair. "Why did I just— How the hell did they— Argh! Relena!" He threw aside a table, startling a group of waitresses in the corner.

"Calm down, Heero!" exclaimed Catherine, hurrying to his side and laying her hands on his shoulders to massage them and encourage him to relax. It didn't really work, but at least he stopped the destruction. "We'll get her back! We will!"

"But our sails," Duo began, silencing when Hilde sent him a withering look.

"We can replace the sails in four hours," Sally offered. "We just made good money today, we'll buy sails here and—"

"The sails here are shit," Heero growled, "and you know it. And in four hours they'll be long gone."

"With _that _attitude," Catherine reprimanded, "they're already gone. No, right now, they're barely out of port. What if a few of us sneak onto their ship?"

"It'll never work," spoke up Wufei. "It's not like they won't be expecting something like that."

Hilde looked sadly at her fingers, interlocked on top of the table in front of her. "Where…where d'you think they'll be goin'?" she asked quietly. "With Relena? They just refreshed here, so they won't really be needing to for awhile. And we at least know they're heading back for England."

"At lot of good that does us," Trowa sighed. "Considering all of the routes back to England. They'd never have been able to lock onto us if we didn't stop here at Diablo."

Duo shook his head, rising. "Well, for now, Heero." He looked out the nearest window. "It looks like we're going to have to settle for shit sails until we can get somewhere that has better-than-shit sails." He looked at his best friend in a way a dog might look at his owner who had just tripped and fallen down. "If Catalonia does take Relena back to Winner," he said, "would it really be all that horrible? I mean, I know we could've gotten a ransom for her and everything, but honestly…she wasn't really the ransom type, ya know? Okay, so she's a soft-foot, but I really think that was changing. Maybe she'd be better off with the governor, because, well," he finished in a whisper, "she would never have been able to stay with us."

Heero gazed at the candle on their table, but instead of seeing the flickering light, he saw Relena's face; the smile she had been wearing as she had looked out over the moon-covered sea with him. How he had stood there on his deck, watching her as she had reveled in the moonlight as much as he had reveled on her beauty under it. He had seen that expression on so many people; sea-lovers, his crew, people that were simply _born _to live on the sea—

But she wasn't. She couldn't possibly be, he reminded himself. She was a noblewoman, and not just by birth. How could Relena ever bring herself to stay with him? With them, he mentally corrected himself. With…on the sea. Damn.

"Heero," voiced Sally quietly, "you don't… I mean, you really _don't_…"

Not being able to stand being in anyone's company, least of all his friends, the people that knew him, Heero broke away from the group. With the thought of not seeing Relena smile again like that fresh in his mind, he ached horrible. He hated it; the aching, the fact that she was gone.

The fact that he might very well be in love with her.

---

Gaulron stood on deck with a glass of port in one hand, a map in the other, and several thoughts scurrying through his high-browed head. They were making quite good time. They had passed the baron's and governor's ship almost a full day ago, and they were approaching Diablo quickly (however, Gaulron himself did not know this, as no one in the Navy was aware of it and Gaulron himself was not familiar with the Caribbean). The pleasure was that he could enjoy strikingly good British wine while he went on this too-easy operation.

What on earth had Khushrenada so hyped-up about finding Governor's fiancée anyway? The more he thought about it, the more Gaulron rejected the possibility of Treize being simply concerned about Winner's pride. He wouldn't send the whole Navy out for something like that. There was more, he was sure of it.

But, he thought with a small sigh, that wasn't exactly his place to stick his nose in. With any luck, he'd find out from Khushrenada when he returned with Relena or would figure it out on his own before then. For now, Gualron was satisfied with the hunt.

Within the hour, he was one his second glass of port and was looking at a very peculiar line of rocks. How could there be a formation like that in such deep water? There would have to be a shore _somewhere_ nearby, but there were no islands on the map or in Gaulron's vision.

Scratching at his scalp below his dark hair, he called out to the captain of the ship. "I want to see what that is," he pointed.

The captain, a grumpy man name Septum with quite the dry attitude, snorted at him. "I have no intention of veering off the course you set for me, _Mr._ Gaulron." The formal title gave away the contempt the Englishman held for the Russian.

"Heh." With a smile that could have been cut from sin itself, Gaulron used his swinging gait to walk slowly to Captain Septum. When close to him, he held up his empty wineglass. "Isn't it funny, though, Captain?" He tipped the glass back and forth, letting the sunlight reflect from it in different ways. "That Mr. Khushrenada hired _me _to plan this course, which implies that he also has given me the freedom to alter it in any way I may see necessary." Without a flinch, he gripped the wineglass harder and harder until it shattered, sprinkling in bits of what looked like broken light to the ship deck. "Wouldn't you agree?" he asked, grinning.

Septum's eyes narrowed. "Very well," he admitted, undeniably intimidated by the Russian mercenary. "We shall detour for now. Swing starboard!" he called to the helm man. "You have an hour, Mr. Gaulron."

As Septum moved away again, Gaulron smirked at his back. "Thank you," he said in Russian, "_Captain_."

---

"Sir, are you sure you don't want to rest?" A servant brought onto the ship for the single purpose of seeing to Quatre Raberba Winner's comfort glanced worriedly at the governor. "You haven't gotten a proper amount of sleep in three days. Even the baron has managed to—"

"No," Quatre said to him tersely, then amended with a gentler, "No, thank you. I'm quite well."

The servant could have disagreed easily, but wisely held his tongue and gave a simple bow before moving away to safety from the concerned aristocrat's rage, which he knew could swell and boil at any moment, as he had proved numerous times throughout this "voyage."

"No change, I see," Milliardo said as he came to Quatre and sat with him. Quatre interpreted his words as meaning their situation on finding Relena (the thought of which made his fingers clench the smooth wood of the ship), but was actually referring to his friend's state of mind. "Shall you stay awake for the whole of our time here?"

"I may. Sleeping makes me feel guilty," he admitted. "Sitting around on a sea ship just doesn't make me think we're really searching as hard as we can for her."

Milliardo frowned, running his fingers through his long, light hair. "But when she was captured and taken by see—"

"I understand my reasoning is mistaken," Quatre said softly, glancing out at the water that just kept on rushing by them from below. "Perhaps I've gone mad, my friend."

"Perhaps you have." Relena's older brother shrugged. "I'll not blame you. But if I do have to have you locked up, your fortune will already be Relena's. Fight the insanity, will you? She'd never have any idea what to do with all that money."

His attempt at lightening Quatre's mind did not work, and the governor seemed even gloomier. "We'd have to actually be _married _for that to happen. As things stand right now, I don't think that's ever going to happen."

"All right." Shoveling his hands through his hair, Milliardo stomped a foot. "I have had it with this. With your sniveling – for Christ's sake, Quatre! Relena's a big girl! I am her brother, and my worry for her pains me more than words describe, but you're a fool!" He turned and paced, only to come back and glare at the younger man. "You love her?"

Quatre's brows lowered. "Yes."

"Then stop thinking so negatively. Think, instead, how nicely you'll treat her when we get her back. And we _will_. I just…" Weariness creeping up on him like dawn creeps up on the night, he leaned against the mast adjacent to them. "I just don't know _how_. There's been no signs of the _Ivory Damsel_. We can't kill Yuy if we can't bloody find him!"

The governor and the baron stared each other down, two desperate men fretting over the well-being of the same woman, their point of views different, but their love identical. They barely noticed the tall man that approached them in the moments of silence.

"My lords?"

Quatre glanced to his right and saw a man who appeared to be about twenty, not far younger than Quatre. His respectful attitude did not fit his appearance; he looked on the wild side, even in the expensive clothes he wore. His hair was dark blond; it reached his shoulders and was tied back in a short ponytail that fell between his shoulder blades. His eyes were bright and blue and told a joke without saying any words. What words he might have had would come from the perfectly straight, white-toothed mouth that was currently grinning at the two of them.

"I could not but help overhear how troubled the two of you seem to be," the youth continued. "If I am to make myself useful, it should be by attending the men in charge of this operation, should it not?" He chuckled lightly; obviously, a secret was being kept, and the young man enjoyed keeping it.

Quatre looked disdainfully at him; he looked very informal, whether he was well-dressed and well-mannered or not. "What could you do to help us?"

"First," cut in Milliardo, "perhaps you can tell us who you are, exactly, sir, and why you have come to be on this particular ship."

"Of course! Excuse me," he apologized. "My name is Kurz Webber," he said with a bow. "I hope you'll not think me too forward for speaking out of place like this."

"I'm afraid out of the sea, there's no one to gossip to about you," Quatre muttered.

"Well, then, all the better! Kurz Webber," he repeated, his voice shaking the slightest bit with nervousness, "and I'm training to be a Naval soldier. I was suggested to come here with you gentlemen, prove my worth. If we succeed, there will be very good words said for me." He bowed to them.

"Webber," said Quatre, trying the unfamiliar surname. "You are called as a German is, yet your accent is quite British."

"Yes, sir. When my parents immigrated to England, I had not yet been born. I was about two months from it, in fact."

"I know of you," Milliardo said, his face now filled with recognition. "The Webbers of Stratford. They're the richest non-British people in the country."

"Well," Kurz laughed, "they moved to London a few weeks ago, actually, but yes. I was lucky to have a wealthy upbringing."

"All right, enough," Quatre interrupted shortly, his patience dulling. "You were bold enough to imply that we have a need of you. Now, please tell us what that need could be, precisely."

"Very well. I suppose I should be quite forward then?" At the aristocrats' permitting nods, Kurz went on, "My bloodline dates back many, many generations, sirs. In the very late 1600s, my however-many-greats-grandfather was a successful pirate around Europe. My father has kept his journals, for his wrote often on his ship." Kurz's grin had returned now that his nerves had settled. "He spoke of an island, my lords, one for business and commerce just between pirates and thieves. By the Spanish it is called Diablo, or 'demon.' It is supposedly quite near here. Captain Yuy has been sailing for a long while now," Kurz suggested, "and would it be completely naïve to think that this island my grandfather spoke of is not a myth?"

At their skeptical looks, Kurz rushed on, "I could show you where it is, sirs! It is uncharted, naturally, but even if I had a regular map, I could show you what coordinates it would be located at."

"Are you saying we should believe in a fairytale?" asked Milliardo irritable, although his tone was not entirely mistrustful.

"I'm asking you to open your minds, my lords," Kurz replied. "Just…a chance. This military could praise me for the rest of my life for this!" he exclaimed.

Quatre stared at Webber through bleary eyes. "At this point," he said to Milliardo, "I'm quite willing to try anything."

Milliardo sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "Very well. Mr. Webber, you may tell Mr. Quinze exactly what you have told us. Even he has any objects, tell him I order him to speak with me." With a wave of his hand, he dismissed the German man, and he rushed off. They could hear his loud whoop of delight when he thought they were not in earshot.

"Is this wise?" Quatre asked rhetorically.

Probably not, Milliardo thought. But this was the limit. If this "plan" didn't bear fruit…it was quite possible that they would be returning to England empty-handed; Quatre without a wife, but he without a sister.

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Review please!


	9. Assault

And by now, you must all be like, "Enough of this 'pass around the Relena'! Do something with plot!" Well, I promise to next chapter. Right now, the occurrences going on are necessary for later things. So, in the mean time, I hope you'll find it in your hearts to suffer through another one of these boring lead-ups. Please?

Disclaimer: GW is not mine. But SOMEDAY, Batman…!

Upper Class – Chapter 9

By Gundam Girl

Relena stood on the deck of the _Belladonna_, hands flat on the side of the ship, looking out over the water that glistened in the evening sun. Dorothy had ordered she not be kept below; the captain wanted to keep an eye on her. They had left Diablo close to three hours ago, and the first shimmers of stars were beginning to appear. She inhaled slowly, then sighed. How had she never noticed the grace of nature in London?

"Beautiful, isn't it?" Relena didn't react as Dorothy came to lean against the ship beside her with her long, blonder hair waving in the breeze. "I've always thought so, anyway. Especially just when the sun is setting."

Relena recalled how much more beautiful she had thought it was from the deck of the _Ivory Damsel_, with Heero standing with her.

"You resent me, I see," said Dorothy, her voice carrying no insult, "but I assure you, I bear you no ill will or intend to harm you in any way. You'll thank me once you realize where we're going."

"Why don't you just tell me?" Relena asked sharply, her aristocratic influence evident in her voice. "It would surely change my opinion of you, if what you claim is true."

Dorothy let out a brief, airy chuckle. "That isn't necessary, because I honestly take no care for what your opinion of me is, Miss Relena. I do this because someone has asked me to. It is a favor."

"I do not find it favorable," the baron's sister told the captain. "Do you enjoy confusing people?"

"Actually, yes. I think of strategy as an art, Miss Relena." She turned her face upward, watching the same stars Relena watched. "I consider art important, as, I'm sure, you do."

"Well, naturally—"

"Then, naturally, I must do what I must for my art, and that involves your kidnapping. Who knows?" Dorothy smiled. "With so much drama in your life, perhaps your own art can be theater someday."

Hearing of art, Relena thought of the painting in Quatre's library. Most likely, it was still sitting against the governor's desk. He had spoken of it so fondly. Glancing down, she looked at the emerald that glinted on her finger.

"A gift from Mr. Winner?" Dorothy smiled at the questioning in Relena's eyes. "It is on your left hand, my dear. T'was no difficult guess. Do you long for him?"

Relena's hands shook. "No," she answered honestly.

"No?" There was genuine surprise in the Italian woman's voice. "Well. Why, then, do you have such a problem with being here on my ship? If you do not long for your fiancée, then who _do _you long to be with? Your brother, is it, or perhaps…" A slow, sassy smile curled Dorothy's lips. "A secret lover? Someone you could never have?" She leaned in close, pressed her hand to Relena's arm, and whispered in the younger woman's ear: "Captain Yuy of the _Ivory Damsel_?"

"Poppycock!" Relena exclaimed, her face glowing suddenly bright with embarrassment. "The very thought of wanting to be with _him_, with that wretched, boorish man…" Who had saved her from a cruel fate as a one-handed woman, she remembered, by using his own hand to protect her. His concern for her, whether he had realized it was concern or not, was proved by a fresh wound on Heero's palm, a wound she had wrapped herself.

"Is not," Dorothy supplied, "so unbearable, eh?" She laughed again, and next to her, Relena felt oddly disgraceful and non-elegant. She felt like a fool. "Well, Miss Relena, I do grieve for your tragedy. As things stand now, I do indeed doubt that you will ever see Captain Yuy again. Although," she said in afterthought, "I wish it hadn't been necessary to cut up his ship's sails. They had been beautiful French sails."

Relena folded herself onto the floor of the deck as the sun drifted below the horizon. Whether she saw Heero again or not, it seemed she was bound to a fate that had long been out of her control, if it had ever been in her control.

She remembered the outraged look on Heero's face when she had been swept away from him and wondered how he was faring now.

---

Heero was, in fact, not faring well. He watched with glaring eyes as Trowa tied the final rope to the mast, securing the unreliable Diablo sails to his ship.

"That's the last of them, Captain!" the green-eyed pirate called down from his place on the lookout post. "We can set sail anytime you're ready!"

The captain nodded and turned away, wetting his finger and holding it up to the breeze. Following the wind's path, he winced. With their sails and the current wind, they'd smash right against Diablo's mostly surrounding rocks and be left with splinters of wood instead of a ship.

"Give it a half-hour!" he shouted to his crew, receiving several affirming calls. "Tell Cathy to stop worrying about dinner and get some rest. Once we're on the water, I'll be giving each of you hell."

Trowa slid down the mast as easily as if the wood was no rougher than ice. Level with Heero now, he grinned. "That's quite the honest statement, sir. It seems Relena's kidnapping from her original kidnappers has you being more confessional than you'd usually be."

Yuy sent his stare right into the slightly taller man's eyes. "Your restless tongue has me being more violent towards you than I'd usually be."

"Now, now, let the man alone, Trowa." Duo chuckled from a few feet away. "An angry pirate captain is no one to mess with. Especially since he can order you thrown overboard."

"He wouldn't order that while we're in port," Wufei told them. "He'd wait 'til we're out at sea."

"Why are you all joking?!" Heero demanded. "Don't you realize that our most valuable asset is in the hands of another who is taking _our _profit?"

The three shipmates instantly sobered. But it was Duo who refused to be silent.

"Valuable asset, Heero?" he queried lightly. "Or valued?"

With a grunt, Heero crossed his arms and walked to the side of the ship. "Certain things I do value, Duo. Not women. Relena was…" His brow furrowed and he struggled to find a phrase that wouldn't give him away. "She was a gateway to bigger things."

"By that do you mean money?" asked Wufei.

The captain snapped out, "What else would I mean?"

"Well." Wufei let his eyes slide over to Sally, who was speaking with Hilde about how the deck needed waxed. "There's other circumstances."

Heero raked his fingers through his already-mussed brown hair. With an impatient exhale, he walked toward the ramp leading to the beach.

"Where're you going, Captain?" Trowa called out.

"To buy some beer." Heero didn't look back as he walked toward the market. "I'll not be late."

When the Japanese man was out of earshot, Duo leaned against the mast and scratched his head. "By 'some,' do you think he means only one beer?" When his two comrades shook their heads, Duo sighed. "Me neither."

---

Five days after Quatre's and her husband's departure, Luchrezia was restless. Leaving Agatha with her staff, she went the post office herself by way of taxi carriage. She was anxious to hear from Milliardo, or at least Dorothy, and if a letter had been sent, it would arrive by now.

She handed the man in charge of the office her own letter addressed to Milliardo's ship and was handed various items such as bills and several party invitations. She bypassed them all for the letter on the bottom in a plain, yellow envelope addressed to The Baroness, Luchrezia Peacecraftfrom La Dorothy Catalonia.

It was kind of her, Lu thought with a small smile, to go out of her regular nature and pretend to be the aristocratic heiress again, at least in addresses. If her cousin had stayed with her family instead of gallivanting off with a sea vessel, she'd have quite the hefty sum now without stealing any of it.

Lu walked out of the office and into the cloudy London afternoon when she felt a gloved hand land on her bare forearm. Startled, she nearly dropped the bundle of mail, but instinct tightened her grip on it, and her rounded belly prevented a few enveloped from falling to the ground.

"Excuse me." Treize smiled widely. "I'm sorry for frightening you, Luchrezia. I saw you when I was coming out of the law office. Meeting with my attorney, establishing possible hangings…" He retracted her hand. "Business, you know."

Luchrezia forced herself to smile. Although there were often many things she liked about Treize, his always-casual way of treating every aspect of life was certainly not one of them. "I understand," she nodded. "The role of a Dover Duke cannot be an easy one."

The handsome man laughed. "No harder, my dear, than that of a London Baroness." He extended his arm. "Will the baby let you walk?"

This time, her pleasant expression was genuine and she took his arm with a soft chuckle. "I think so. Where is Anne?"

"At the inn. Cross-stitching, I believe. She mentioned she wanted to do something domestic today." He shook his head. "She is far from domestic. She mostly prefers the court." He gave her a sly, slanted look. "Not like you, who is talented enough to juggle both, with what will soon be two children. So tell me, any word from your husband on Relena's whereabouts?"

"I'm afraid not." It was the truth. If Dorothy knew something, than the likelihood of Milliardo knowing as well was not strong. "And the navy?"

"Nothing to report, I fear. My men are still hunting, of course," he told her smoothly. "The best in Europe, probably the world, are on the ship." A faint gleam holding something Lu couldn't identify came to his eye. She suddenly felt chilled by his expression. He seemed focused, but not on her; only on something he himself thought of. "I expect to receive news within the week."

"Well, that is…good," the baroness said at last. "At least we'll have _something_."

"Indeed. Well." Treize lifted his arm, and within ten seconds a carriage taxi pulled up in front of him. "My dear Luchrezia, this is wear I leave you." Bending slightly, he kissed the back of her hand. He helped her into the carriage and gave instructions to the driver to take the woman home, paying the fare himself. Like a true gentleman, Lu thought.

The carriage moved away, and she watched out the window as Treize strolled along the street back toward the inn he and Anne were staying at. Remembering that odd look in his eyes, Luchrezia shuddered.

And for the first time, she wondered if the reason Treize was so eager for Relena's safe return went beyond friendship to Governor Winner.

Something told her it did. And she shuddered again.

---

An hour was all Gualron needed, he was certain. The Russian man's warrior heart had jerked when he and the Naval officers had discovered the break in the seemingly-endless line of rock. And, just as he had suspected, an island dwelled in the middle of nowhere.

However, unlike he had suspected, it was filled to the brim with life, not at all deserted like he had originally thought. And by studying the flags of various ships ported at the expansive dock, he could tell that the place was swarmed with pirates.

Of course, a Navy fleet would be too easily identified, and Gualron had told Septum to back the ship out of the bay before they got too far in. Now, he and a virtually large group of men, dressed in regular citizens' clothing instead of Navy uniforms, rowed their way toward the island in three longboats.

It made sense, he thought shrewdly as they neared the beach, for the _Ivory Damsel _to be docked here. Descriptions from Dover of the ship suggested that it wasn't large enough to store supplies for especially long voyages. From the time they departed from Dover to recently, they would _have _restock soon. And, as this was obviously a pirate-friendly place, it would make even more sense yet for them to come here.

Unfortunately, no one knew the design of the _Ivory Damsel_'s flag and Gaulron was fairly certain that just because of its name, it would be printed with the figure of a woman. What lead they did have was knowing that both stories and Dover citizens had said that two of the crew members were Asian and the captain, Heero Yuy, was at least partially Japanese. Petrov Gaulron knew the different faces of the human race, and he could spot Japanese easily. The problem was whether the crew of the _Damsel _was here or not.

His group beached and pulled their boats in. It was necessary to explain more than a few times of why their ship was waiting beyond the rocks – they just meant to buy some oil for their rudder and then they would be on their way. He sent some men to do the falsely needed task, and he stayed to survey the ported ships himself.

There were a great many of them. Of course, in the middle of the summer when richer folk decided a brisk seafaring would be good for their health, it was a prosperous time for water bandits. Scouring the varying design of ships, prints of flags, and even the straightness of masts, Gualron frowned. Nothing seemed particularly unique.

And then, one thing did. Sails. While most of the ships in the port had painstakingly cared-for sails, crisply white and tightly bound, one ship's sails seemed less than serviceable. Rather than white, the color was cream – but dirty cream. The sails also seemed just a bit too short to fit correctly.

Gualron's dark eyes landed on a man walking toward this badly-sailed ship. Well, perhaps walking was not the appropriate word for what he was doing. _Staggering _worked better, even limping. His path tended to zig-zap, so the mercenary guessed that he was either crippled or drunk. And since there was no particular scarring of disfiguring that Gaulron could make out from looking at the man's legs, he supposed it was the latter that effected his gait.

Further inspection made the Russian stone still for a moment. While the (supposedly) drunk man was tall and had deep blue irises, there was a familiar slant to the shape of his eyes. Also, his hair was quite dark…dark enough to be Eastern.

Japanese. Not completely, not close to completely, but the ethnicity was readable. Walking further toward the man and the ship he had walked onto, a slow, nearly triumphant grin showed Gualron's gleaming teeth. Another man, one with a jet-black ponytail falling to the neck of his neck and almond eyes the color of coal, was addressing the staggering man with something like amused concern. There were other people on board, but it were these two that attracted Gualron's attention the most.

He motioned to a handful of men, beckoning them to follow him. Septum had said to report back if anything was discovered, but it were the successful moments like these that Gualron preferred to handle alone.

Leaving his assigned men standing on the sand, he walked onto the ramp that led to the ship's deck without invitation and smiled politely. A quick scan showed only vagabonds, with no signs of a rich-blooded woman anywhere. It wouldn't be hard to believe that they were keeping Relena below deck. "Good evening!" he called out jovially.

Another man looked up, this one with a chestnut-brown braid that streamed down his black and violet eyes that were currently featuring exasperation – no doubt for the half-Japanese man who, Gaulron confirmed now, was most definitely intoxicated. "Yeah, good," he replied in a voice that was very obviously American. "Or something like that."

A petite woman with ebony hair that was as short as a boy's joined the American's side. Her eyes were skeptical as she looked at Gualron. "Is there somethin' you want us to be doing for ya?" she asked, impatient like the American. She kept darting glances at their drunk companion.

"Indeed there is." Gaulron's smile widened. "Forgive my intrusion, but might this be the pirate ship the _Ivory Damsel_?"

"Aye," the Chinese man answered. "It's it, even though it lacks discipline at the moment." He scowled at the blue-eyed Asian he was currently holding up.

"I see." Slowly, Gaulron walked over to the drunk pirate. "Then that means you are Heero Yuy, the captain of this ship. Yes?"

Heero raised his head from its resting place with his chin to his chest and nodded briefly. "More or less," he admitted in a gruff tone. With determination, he pulled himself free of Wufei and attempted to straighten his posture. It didn't work that well, and he pressed a hand to the mast for support.

"Well then." Gaulron quickly placed his hands on either side of Heero's head and bashed his own skull against the pirate captain's. The unexpected assault sent the man careening backward until he lost balance three paces away and crashed to the hard wooden deck. The rest of the crew that was standing on the deck, which, Gaulron expected, was everyone, pulled out an assortment of weapons from guns to knives to short swords.

The Russian didn't flinch and, with a short snort, he thumbed his nose at the fallen Yuy. Then he raised his undaunted eyes to the other. "I'm looking for a certain woman. She's the sister of Baron Milliardo Peacecraft, and the young fiancée of Govenor Quatre Winner. Also the friend of Duke Treize Khushrenada. Dangerous circles to step into, I'm sure you'll agree." Gaulron grinned at each of them, his eyes reflecting the flash of their metal weapons. "I'm here to take her home."

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	10. Realization

Wow, chapter ten! mind boggles When I started this fic, well over a year ago now, I didn't know how long this would be, but something tells me I didn't expect it to be this long. And I _know _I didn't think people would like it that much, but it seems a lot of people do. Thanks so much, everyone. It means a lot to me, really.

Also, I'm very sorry for taking so long to update. Real life stuff has been happening, so it's great that you're back here reading.

And in this chapter, we actually get somewhere, so enjoy!

Disclaimer: Like I need one. Not mine.

Upper Class – Chapter 10

By Gundam Girl

Wufei's lip curled upward into a dark sneer as the big Russian man cast his greedy smile down at the _Ivory Damsel_'s fallen captain. Obviously, this was yet another person with a need for Relena's presence. But what business on Earth could a middle-class Russian have with the sister of a British baron?

"You're too late," Wufei called to him, his voice purposely condescending. "By about five hours, in fact." He and the others took some pride in knowing something their attacker did not, and he gripped his katana more tightly.

Gaulron's wide smile faltered, but only for a moment. Lies were common of pirates. They were like words of prayer to any of renounced goodness in themselves. "Oh yes?" he humored. "If that is the case, then where is she off to? Did she buy in for a ship here and go off on her own? I've heard the girl has strength, but no woman could hope to live by herself on the sea."

Duo thought of Dorothy. "Probably you're wrong there, mate." He cast a glance at Heero. His captain was still pale, but threat glinted in his eyes as the Japanese man stared up at Gaulron. It was that spirit that had first inspired Duo to become friends with the stubborn captain.

"Come now," Gualron said, voice testy, "there's no time for this. I've got things to do, rewards to collect."

Reward, thought Heero. How very aristocratic. Of course the governor and the baron would expect men to go off on a chase – if enough money was dangled in front of the right noses. "What's it, then?" he managed to pant out. "How much for Peacecraft's sister?"

"Oh, enough," the Russian replied smoothly, staring down at him. "It and the bounty on your heads would be enough to put up me, my children, and my children's children for life."

Hilde hissed at him. "As though someone would care enough to bear a child of yours!"

Gualron only smiled at her, though his eyes seemed a bit impatient now. "Try stinging me with words, girl. You'll find me impenetrable."

"Oh, I sincerely doubt that," retorted Cathy, inching her daggers higher.

"Knife-throwing?" Amused, Gaulron gave a deep chuckle. "I think you should go back to the circus. Or, if you want, we could treat you like the horses there." He waved his hand slightly. From the sand below, one soldier took out a pistol and aimed it at Catherine. With no time to react, he shot; the bullet grazed her shoulder, and she called out.

"Cathy!" exclaimed Trowa. He ran forward as her sister's knives clattered to the deck of the ship, and she slumped against him, clutching her arm. "You _bastard_!"

"Words again. All right, this is it." Gaulron held up his other hand, and the rest of the soldiers below readied there pistols. "Give me something I actually want to hear, or each of you will die here and now. Speak, and I'm prepared to let _most _of you live." His eyes darted between them. "Where is Relena Peacecraft!"

"You've probably never even heard of her," Heero muttered.

"Her?"

The captain continued, "Dorothy Catalonia, the captain of the _Belladonna_."

A flicker of recognition instantly came to Gaulron's eyes, and Heero's fists tightened. "Catalonia?" echoed the Russian. "Italian?"

Heero watched him very closely; from his crew, he sensed shock and disbelief. All were no doubt wondering why he was indulging the monstrous invader. "Yes."

"Oh. Ohoho." With the air of a cat who had just caught the canary, Gaulron chuckled deeply: "Oh, this is too much. Too much!" Quickly, swiveled on his heel. "Thank you very much, Captain Yuy. The tale you've told me has proved too amusing for me to just let you die. If we meet again, I do hope it will be under better circumstances."

With care not to seem urgent, Heero called after him, "You know of her then?"

"Know of her? Captain, I worked for her father, Arturo Catalonia. Oh, indeed, I watched her grow." Gaulron's grin was wide and he moved away from the _Ivory Damsel_, motioning to the men from the Navy to head back to their own ship. "Feel pleased you've met her, will you? She's caused what's probably the largest scandal in all of Italy. And now, to think that she's actually a pirate and kidnapped Baron Peacecraft's sister… When I meet, I shall have to partake in a bit of gossip, I think. Farewell, pirates."

As soon as Gaulron and his men were out of earshot, Heero grabbed onto the mast of his ship and dragged himself up its length until he was standing. His men and women wasted no time in hurling questions that were more like accusations at him.

"Heero, what the bloody hell's _wrong _with you!" demanded Hilde, his lively eyes currently sparking with rage.

Her husband seemed equally perturbed. "Was it your intention to sell Relena out to the British pride, buddy?" Duo punched the palm of his right hand with his left fist. "Or was that the blow to the head screwing with your judgment?"

Sally added, "How _could _you, Heero?"

"This is unjustifiable!" bellowed Wufei.

"No, it's _not_," Heero growled. "Sally." He lifted his eyes to the light-haired Asian woman. "I'm going to need some looking after. But see to Cathy first; dirty soldiers seemed to've done a number on her. Trowa, leave your sister with me and Sally, and get this ship moving. In the meantime, Cathy." He stumbled over to help Catherine walk with her own injury. "I need you to think back on old London gossip."

"Oh, Miss Relena, _please_!" Dorothy's voice was tipped with impatience as she held out the apple to her captive. "Eat. I can't have my charge starved half to death when we return to England."

Relena regarded the gleaming, red fruit with frosty indifference. "It's more than likely poisoned."

The sharper-tongued woman sneered, her elegant eyes narrowing into slits. "Don't flatter yourself. I'm not a wicked witch, and you are not Snow White, sister to a baron or not." When she saw that her words did not have the enraging effect Dorothy had desired, she tossed the apple over the side of the deck. "I don't understand why you're so distrusting, Miss Relena. Yes, I did kidnap you, but as of yet, I've allowed not a bit of harm to come to you, have I?"

"I think that may depend on what you see as harm." Keeping her gaze steady on the horizon, Relena continued, "You live as a free woman, Miss Catalonia, and yet you are quite intent on keeping me prisoner. Your way of life seems somehow hypocritical."

"Here you go, all high-nosed and aristocratic!" sighed Dorothy. "This is _exactly _why I became a free woman, Miss Relena. So I don't have to perform, so I don't have to think of what five-syllable word is going to suit my situation best. Don't you want the same?"

"I think we all do," murmured Relena, puzzled by the other woman's sudden outburst of honestly.

"Well, how in the world can you be free if you die of starvation?" Dorothy smiled coyly. "Or, if Heero Yuy comes to save you, do you really want to look like a near corpse?" Satisfied by the color that slowly seeped into Relena's cheeks, she went on. "I promise you; you'll be free again soon."

Relena finally turned to her. "What is it you want from me?"

"Nothing. This whole arrangement has very little to do with you, in fact. It's more about me," Dorothy replied honestly. "Well, me and money – but mostly me."

"Captain!" Mueller's voice dropped down from the lookout like a vertical wind. "There's a ship approaching us quickly!"

"What're its colors?" she called back.

"England! But it isn't the Navy! It's not even a traveling ship!"

"Really? That's a shame. I could've used a bit of fun." Dorothy stepped up to the platform by the helm. "On your guard, gentlemen! We've a mystery building up." She looked down at Relena. "Aren't you a little interested as well?"

"No," the baron's sister lied. There was plenty of curiosity inside of her.

It took all of twenty minutes for the passing ship to be in discernable distance. Dorothy glanced half-heartedly at the flag, then turned to find a glass of wine.

Three seconds later, she ripped around to look at the flag again. "God in heaven!" she exclaimed. "That's the baron himself!"

"What!" Relena burst from her seat on the floor of the ship to race across the deck to starboard. The flag of the approaching ship bore her family's crest – the white silhouette of a dove in flight on a crimson background. Her gaze drifted to the men on board, and her eye was instantly caught by a mane of long, platinum blond hair.

Her heart stopped; her brother!

"Milliardo!" she cried out in instinct. "_Milliardo_! _Mill_—"

Dorothy's long-fingered hand slapped over her mouth. "Silence!" she hissed menacingly. "It isn't he I'm working for!"

But the Italian woman's warning had come too late. For on the deck of the governor's and baron's ship, everyone's attention was drawn to the larger vessel.

"That's the _Belladonna_," informed Quinze from the helm. "An Italian."

"That," Milliardo cried out with terrible shock, "is _Relena_!"

Quatre's eyes were strapped to the pair of women on the side of the _Belladonna_ nearest them. One was tall and lean, with hair pale, pale yellow, the other slim and fair, her face half-covered by the first's hand. But he knew those wide, determined eyes in an instant. "Relena," he breathed. He forced himself to look at Milliardo. "What can we do?"

"Exactly what I paid these men for." Milliardo turned to Kurz Webber and seized him by collar of his jacket. "I'm putting you in charge. Get on that ship and bring my sister to me!"

"I—um—what?" stuttered the German youth. "You want _me _to lead?"

"Call it leading, call it anything, just do it!" barked Milliardo. "And do it now!"

"Well—aye, sir!" Running on instinct, Kurz motioned to three other soldiers, and the four of them climbed to the runner of the sails and grabbed loose ropes. On his hoarsely-voiced word, they jumped off and swung over to the deck of the _Belladonna_. Kurz figured he'd been praying hard enough for everyone to make it there.

"You," he gasped, fear squeezing his heart as he pulled a pistol from his belt and aimed it at Dorothy, "are under arrest for the capture and holding of a citizen of England." _I thought Heero Yuy had her_, Kurz thought with confusion.

Around them, the other three were aiming swords and pistols at the majority of the crew. With their captain in such a dangerous situation, there was no one on the _Belladonna _willing to retaliate.

Dorothy slowly smirked. "Well, would you look here, Miss Relena. Your help has arrived. And," she added with an intake of breath, "so has my defeat."

"Captain!" called Mueller in despair. "What should we—"

"Nothing," interrupted Dorothy pleasantly. "Take it like men. But really, sir," she asked Kurz, "your crew is small compared to mine. Do you really expect to hold all of us the rest of the way back to England?" When Kurz's stony expression faltered, she went on. "You only need me and the lass here. Why not leave my men to go on their way?"

"Because they're pirates," explained Kurz with the simplicity of someone unused to great trial.

"Aye," Dorothy said, "but they're pirates who can slit your throat in less than ten seconds, if need be."

Swallowing, Kurz nodded. "Fine then. Miss Peacecraft, please follow my man." He pointed to one of the others soldiers, who held a hand out to Relena. "As for you, Captain…"

"Catalonia," she smiled widely.

"Captain Catalonia," he nodded, "come with me." He closed his hand around her arm.

"Better be more secure than that, lad," laughed Dorothy. "Only difference in me and you is what we got or don't got. I could whip you any second."

Utterly embarrassed, Kurz changed his position and grabbed her around the waist. "Down we go, then." With her pressed to his side, he leapt from the side of the _Belladonna _back onto the governor's ship.

God, he hoped he'd never have to do anything like that again.

"Relena!" Milliardo rushed to where the soldier was carefully lowering her onto the deck and gathered her immediately into his arms. "Oh, I was so terrified! I'm so sorry, Relena, so sorry you went through this!"

"Milliardo," she murmured, her cheek pressed against his chest. "Thank you, brother. But I'm fine, honestly – I'm not hurt at all. I was treated well."

"Treated well?" he repeated incredulously. "By whom? Your kidnappers?"

She noted the sarcasm in his voice and retreated slightly. "They did nothing wrong to me. They gave me meals and even a bed."

"A bed," Milliardo said with coolness, suspicion etched deeply into his eyes. "Whose bed was it?"

Relena was sure she would have flushed if the sudden hand on her shoulder hadn't distracted her. Turning, she met a pair of emotional, aquamarine eyes. Golden bangs fluttered across a proud forehead, and her entire body went cold. "Quatre."

At first, it didn't seem that Quatre had any idea what to do with himself. He merely stood there, fingers pressed lightly into the shoulder of his fiancée, for nearly a full minute. Relena could do nothing but stare and wait. And then he surprised her deeply.

He surged forward and pressed her to him, dropping his mouth onto hers and kissing her with an almost mindless passion.

Relena froze; every muscle locked, every nerve spiked. She was defensive; her eyes were completely wide, although Quatre's were squeezed shut. She didn't move the slightest bit, afraid of responding.

And she realized…

Quatre hands were trembling on her upper arms, slick with perspiration and worry. She then felt a sudden deep and troubling sadness for him.

And she knew…

With relatively no speed, he pulled away from her, his eyes prying themselves open to meet her own. They were clear, nearly glassy. Relena could see herself reflected in them, and she looked shaken and calm at the same time.

And she was certain…

She didn't love him. More, she understood that she _couldn't _love him. But then, he looked so hopeless. Relena glanced down, anywhere that wasn't those eyes, those pleading, hopeful, kind eyes. She saw the emerald on her left hand.

Her stomach gave a little jolt and she realized something else.

She didn't want to be here, on this little ship with her brother and Quatre. She didn't want the city of London, with its tall buildings and its lamp-glowing streets. She didn't want this orange sunset that burned with such a fire, she felt she might be consumed by it for her current thoughts.

She wanted a starry, moonlit sky, a gentle sea, a soothing wind… She wanted to see it from the lulling deck of a rocking ship.

And, to her horror, she wanted one more thing.

She wanted Heero Yuy.

Review please!


	11. Unwanted Home

I get the feeling that the easy time I had writing this chapter will change when it comes time for me to write chapter 12. Please enjoy!

Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing, Full Metal Panic, or the 1800s.

Upper Class – Chapter 11

By Gundam Girl

A strong wind was carrying the _Ivory Maiden _quickly on a course that was deliberately separate from Gaulron's Navy ship. Trowa, Duo, Wufei, and Hilde manned their progress from the deck. Below, Sally was busy tending to Heero and Catherine.

Cathy's bullet would had bled savagely, but Sally assured them that bleeding was all it was. Stitches were completely unnecessary, and a bandage around her arm did the trick.

Heero's case differed somewhat. Although he had bled hardly at all, the skin of his jaw was badly split and strained apart whenever he spoke. Sally applied salve and a bandage and could only hope it wouldn't infect. She also found some satisfaction knowing that Gaulron must have certainly hurt his own hand in causing that much damage.

"I don't understand, Heero," Catherine was saying. "Why would city sputtering possibly interest _you_?"

"I don't want the whispers," Heero told her solemnly. "I need the truth behind them." He could only hope there was truth to be found. "What was the account of Dorothy Catalonia?"

"There wasn't one," she said, certain. "Pirates aren't the favorite topic of the rich. They prefer to think that no danger could ever befall them."

That didn't help. Heero pressed on. "The Russian mentioned someone when we told him of Dorothy. Something Catalonia. Antonio… Arumo…"

Catherine's eyes instantly grew as wide as her cooking pans. "Arturo!" she exclaimed. "Arturo Catalonia. Oh, of _course_… Who didn't know about that!"

"Know about what?" growled the captain. He had not enough patience for the slowness of dawning realization.

"It was all anyone spoke of for months. I amazed I've forgotten." As Sally left to go help on deck, she met Heero's eyes, her own very serious. "Arturo Catalonia is a count in Italy, and he was very influential to the royal family there. He lives in Venice, a widower. His wife died in the childbirth of his only heir – a daughter."

Heero's eyes narrowed. "Dorothy."

The British woman nodded. "I never knew him, but Michael saw him in court once. He described Arturo as cold. Cold and unkind. Apparently, this is true enough, because he engaged his daughter to a Russian figurehead prince.

"As the story goes, the daughter rebelled and took up piracy rather than being shipped to St. Petersburg. Arturo lives in his shame, still in Venice. Dorothy, as we know, captains the _Belladonna_."

She sat back in the kitchen chair and smiled. "We have a regular Italian legend on our hands. Italy and Russian were in hysterics about it when it first happened."

"Which explains why that Russian was so amused." Heero stood. "At least that provides _some _insight. We don't yet know _why _Dorothy would—"

"Wait!" cried Catherine, suddenly energetic. "I just recalled – the Catalonias. They are direct kin to the Noin family."

"Who are the Noins? And why the hell do they matter?"

"_Because_," she answered impatiently, "the Noin family married from Italy to England. They sent the youngest daughter, Luchrezia. And she's now a baroness. The wife," she told him, "of Baron Milliardo Peacecraft."

o0o

"I'm sorry." Quatre's voice was stiff and unfamiliar even to himself. "Please forgive me, Relena. But seeing you…" He shook his head. "It wasn't my place to—"

"Nonsense," Quatre!" exclaimed Milliardo in delight. "Whose place is it to be affectionate toward my sister if not her husband-to-be?"

Milliardo's hand was resting lightly on Relena's shoulder, an ever-present reminder of authority. She hadn't felt proper British treatment in so many days that she had nearly forgotten what it was to be a respectable woman of England; always silent, always obedient.

Sally, Hilde, and Catherine hadn't been that way. They had stood alongside their men, be him husband or brother, and had helped without discrimination of gender. She had begun to feel as though she, too, could possibly be like that. And that both surprised and dejected her.

From close-by, there was a cold laugh. "What's this?" Dorothy chuckled. "A proper welcoming to her ladyship – kisses she doesn't want and a man she doesn't need. She's quite well-spoken for herself."

"And unfortunately," Milliardo replied coolly, "so are you."

Unlike the baron, Quatre had actually heard Dorothy's words and cast a look at Relena. She was watching her brother, her hair fluttering along with the skirt of whatever island native she was dressed like. It appeared, at least, that Yuy's cruelty hadn't been great enough to keep her in the same clothes for so long. The governor had to be grateful for that.

_What the devil are you thinking, Winner?_ he demanded of himself. _Yuy kidnapped her! Stole her! From **you**!_

But, despite all of his earlier conceptions, she appeared to be safe and healthy, which was more than anyone expected from pirates.

His thoughts darkened as his eyes settled on Dorothy. Maybe she hadn't been safe after all. "What was the price?"

Dorothy swung her head to see him and realized he was talking to her. She smirked. "For what, governor?" she asked, her voice falsely sweet.

"For Relena Peacecraft's life. How much did they sell her to you for?"

He heard Relena gasp, but was more focused on Dorothy's sudden frown. "So," she muttered, "you think I bought her. For what purpose, do you imagine?"

"Heaven knows," countered Quatre," or maybe Hell."

Something deeper than normal anger flickered across her eyes. Winner felt it; even from a pirate, he could sense her pain. But it was nothing. He couldn't have wounded her much.

"For your honor's pleasure," she sneered, clenching her roped hands, "I _rescued _Princess Peacecraft from the _Ivory Damsel_." She turned to Milliardo. "At the request of Baroness Peacecraft." As the listeners reacted, she added, "And I daresay you'll want to speak with her before you toss me in prison."

Milliardo nearly sputtered. "I daresay I _do_!"

Relena's eyes were wide. "But why did you not just _tell _me that!" she cried, shocking her brother and fiancée with her outburst.

With the slowness of a clever cat stretching, Dorothy's smile returned. "Would you have come?"

Relena frowned. "Excuse me," she said primly, walking swiftly past the aristocrats to go below-deck. "I wish to spend the rest of the voyage alone."

"Relena!" she heard her brother protest before she slammed the door behind her. Finding an empty sleeping chamber, she sat down on the low cot, her eyes wet with involuntary tears.

Days ago, she had wanted nothing more than to return to London. Now, no other thought made her more miserable.

o0o

Gaulron was annoyed a day later when he saw the _Belladonna _en route to Italy, void of a captain and a baron's sister. Septum was half-way in hysterics – not only had they failed in their assignment to retrieve Relena, Gaulron refused to let them attempt an arrest of Dorothy's crew. Septum had balked, insisting that the British Royal Navy was disgraced.

Gaulron didn't honestly give a damn. He would still get his money – his doing or not, Relena would be back in England. And soon enough, _he _would be back in Russia. Away from petty sea pirates and fulfilling his own prided dream, whatever it was.

One thing was still a mystery; why Treize Khushrenada was so concerned for Miss Peacecraft's safety in the first place. He, a married man, was not a potential suitor. She was engaged to Quatre Raberba Winner. And the money the duke was paying was far too much for simple acts of friendship.

Gaulron knew evil when he sensed it. It took one to know one, yes? Too much money, too much ambition… Treize was one to stay away from.

He would have to make a note to restrain from terrorizing England.

Perhaps he would target Japan…

o0o

"Now, Catherine, you've confused me." Heero's jaw throbbed from straining his wound so much, but he ignored it well enough. "How strong could Italian ties be?"

"I don't think ties matter so much as money," replied Cathy. "Give her a good price, and I'd say Dorothy would go save a sister."

"And this Baroness, Relena's sister-in-law, hired Dorothy, her kinswoman of some sort, to find Relena and take her from us?"

"I'm only guessing. But yes, I don't believe the story differs much."

"So they're on the way to England." Heero paced. "So be we, then."

Catherine paused. "Heero…" She wasn't sure how to word her question, but settled on, "Why are you following this through? She's a noblewoman, a plain woman, even – someone you weren't even planning to ransom. Why are you so intent—"

"Cathy." Heero turned his head to look at her, and startled the cook. There was something in his eyes, something Catherine had never expected to see there. "I'm starting to think of things…things I'll do with the rest of my life. And every single one of them has _her_ there. Without her…I've nothing."

Catherine swallowed, and her eyes heated as she thought of Michael. "Aye, Heero." She smiled at him. "To England, then."

He nodded. "And when we get there…who knows?"

o0o

Luchrezia was once again entertaining Treize and Anne at Baron Peacecraft's estate. It had become a nearly daily ritual – the duke was vowing not to return to Dover without Quatre and Relena. And although she felt uneasy about it, Luchrezia played the gracious hostess with flair, keeping a sharp eye on Treize and his doings in London.

It wasn't that she didn't trust him. Indeed, he had been a very good friend of her husband's since before she had even known Milliardo, and the smiles Luchrezia gave him were sincere.

What she was concerned about was the sincerity of Treize's smiles – or lack of sincerity. When they spoke of Quatre, Treize was warm and willing to joke, often mentioning how much better he would be once he was finally settled down. Yet when they spoke of Relena, of how she would soon be Quatre's wife, the duke seemed to shadow, his demeanor more serious – not by much, but serious just the same.

So when Milliardo and Quatre walked into the parlor with Relena between them, Luchrezia had no idea what to think of his jubilant reaction.

"Relena!" she cried, flying from her chair to gather her younger sister-in-law into her arms. "Oh, my darling, thank God you're safe! I fretted so!"

"There was no need," said Relena quietly, returning the embrace. "I'm perfectly fine. I have been the entire time."

"But how were you ever found by your brother?" Her tearful eyes rose to meet her husband's sterner ones. Her gaze was caught by the smaller figure just behind him. "Oh, goodness. Dorothy!"

"Hello, cousin," greeted Dorothy in her sleek, calm voice. "I'm afraid there was a bit of confusion on the return trip."

Milliardo began, "Miss Catalonia tells me—"

"Captain," Dorothy corrected him.

The baron breathed in deeply through his nostrils, then exhaled slowly. "Captain Catalonia," he restarted, "tells me that you asked her to find Relena for us." His jaw was tight as he spoke. "Could you explain, Luchrezia?"

The baroness pulled away from Relena and crossed her arms, prepared. Milliardo rarely used her full first name, and she took it as a signal of his tension. "She speaks truthfully, Milliardo."

His eyebrows lowered. "Of course." He sounded partially exaggerated, partially insulted. "And you consulted her…because you doubted my reliability?"

"I thought it would be better – and faster – to have someone who knew the waters track Relena for us. Surely," she added patiently, "you have no intention of having your sister's rescuer thrown in the stocks?"

Treize appeared highly interested in the whole situation. "A woman, hanged for piracy crimes?" A slight smirk turned up the corners of his mouth. "It would be an event."

"Please, Treize," Milliardo beckoned him. "I suppose this will have to be discussed later, as we have company. Besides." He held out a hand to Relena, "I've just had my sister returned to me." He was looking at Relena too fondly to notice that Treize was looking at her in a different way altogether.

Quatre had an authoritative hand on Dorothy's wrist. "And what shall we do with Miss – _Captain _Catalonia?" he inquired tersely.

"Give her a guest room," answered Luchrezia kindly. "There is still an empty one on the second floor. If you wouldn't mind, Quatre, could you show her there?"

Impeccable manners instilled in him since birth prevented him from scowling. "Of course, Lu. I shall return shortly." His paused only briefly to cast a look at Relena, who was speaking without energy to Luchrezia and her brother. Then he led Dorothy from the parlor and started up the stairs.

"Hurts, does it?" the female pirate asked with humor-filled eyes. "That she's barely looked at you since your little reunion?"

"I don't need the emotional analysis of a pirate," he told her sharply.

"Nay, I think you need someone to tell you the truth." She stopped on the first landing and, with a sigh, Quatre did as well. "If she ever gave you happy eyes, it was infatuation. She's found another she wishes to look at. I may have my fair share of manliness, but I'm still a woman. And I can tell when another woman's feeling something more than girlish admiration."

Quatre's hand balled into a fist in the depths of his suit pocket. "What are you driving at, Catalonia?"

She had meant to cut the governor with vicious comments in return for the cruel insinuation he had made the evening before. She would be damned if he knew anything about true pain, he who had been both pampered and loved his entire life at least by _someone_. That he had dared to say she had _bought _a woman's life was…

But, as she truly stared at him now, his face angled downward to look at her from a couple steps above her, his blond hair falling into his face to partially obscure his aquamarine eyes, she saw he was hurting more than she had thought.

She shook her head, more to herself than to him. With a soft chuckle, she brushed ahead of him. "Don't worry, governor. You won't need _me _to tell you. If my guess if right, you'll soon be able to learn just what my meaning is. You mightn't like it," she admitted, "but it'll be better than living with a woman whose own life is a lie."

When he simply stood on the stairs, Dorothy wandered off without him. Quatre made no move to follow her. He made no move to do anything for nearly a full minute, until he sunk down on the polished wood stairs and buried his face in his hands.

Women's riddles, Relena's sudden disinterest, and the return to a London eager for the news about the lost sister of Baron Peacecraft…it was a bit too much for him to handle at one time. He longed to return to Dover with Relena, marry her quickly, get the whole ordeal over and done with.

But was he even worthy of her, now that he'd carelessly allowed her to be kidnapped? Milliardo might have said yes, but Quatre was unable to do the same easily.

_Had _Relena merely been infatuated? Had he been truly in love with her? Or was he, too, simply caught up in some boyish fondness for a lovely girl? God, his father would roll in his grave if he could hear his son's thoughts. How many times had he been told to be decisive, be sure, be a bloody _man_?

Many, many times. And, Quatre thought as he stood up and walked in heavy steps down the stairs to go back to the parlor, he was going to do his best to do as he had been told.

Whether she wanted it or not, the marriage had been arranged. The promise had been made. The wedding would go on as planned…

Even if Quatre himself didn't want it.

o0o

Review please!


	12. Reunion

Chapter 12 be here! Yargh! (I'm writing this as I go, so I'm still not sure how this fic is going to end or how long it will be. Craziness.) Big thank-you's to those reading this!

Also, I know this took forever in coming out, and I only have one excuse: _Princess Tutu_, courtesy of the magnificent 1xR writer, Gold Berry. (All those rumors about 1xR writers being allied in a group? Well, of course they're not true.) Now, I'm not too huge on shoujo anime, but this one I adored. When it hits stores, get your hands on it! It's great. (And Chris Patton is voicing Fakir!)

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing…or any pirates.

Upper Class – Chapter 12

By Gundam Girl

Treize was positively beside himself. However, as he sat on the loveseat in the Peacecraft's parlor next to Anne, not a soul would ever know about it. He calmly sipped his tea, like everyone else, playing the good guest with heavy participation in the current conversation, but his eyes – subtly, he was certain – kept drifting back to Relena.

She looked weary, he noted, exhausted. He couldn't blame her, of course, she had been kidnapped, then kidnapped again, and then rescued. And traveling made anyone tired. Of course, when Treize traveled, it was usually more for pleasure than business.

Like the trip from Dover to England. Most, including Anne, Luchrezia, even Milliardo, saw the long carriage ride as necessary business. Yes, he did hold a businesslike concern for Quatre. But his reason for coming to London and seeing Relena was completely for pleasure in his mind.

Pleasure that he would, when the time came, get.

The irritable part was that Milliardo seemingly had no intention of leaving his sister's side.

"Are you sure you are comfortable?" Milliardo queried fervently. "Would you like to go upstairs and change? I'm sure there are still a few things of yours here in the house."

The thought of putting on the large and constricting British gown made Relena clutch her teacup tighter. "I'm fine for now, Milliardo, thank you."

Luchrezia oddly wished that Relena would change her clothes as well. Although she also preferred loose-fitting garb to the constantly formal wear of the wealthy, what Relena was wearing was far less concealing. And it wasn't Milliardo Treize was watching with eager interest. "Darling, you look absolutely beaten. Why don't you come with me and I'll see you to bed in your old room?"

Relena cast her eyes about the parlor, remembering the countless hours she had spent in this room, in the very chair she currently sat it, whilst reading or stitching or doing some other such project. She suddenly wanted very much to be in that room again; especially if it meant being away from people and their sympathetic smiles, their pitying eyes.

"Thank you, Lu." She rose from her chair. "That would be lovely."

Relena could have bitten her tongue with how easily the practiced manners came back to her. Having neglected them for as long as she had, she thought they might be in need of some polishing, but that didn't appear to be the case.

"Shall I escort you?" Treize asked, practically jumping from the loveseat.

Luchrezia had to force her smile over the suspicion in her head. "What, up a flight of stairs, Treize? Don't be silly. Enjoy your tea, I shall return soon."

Treize suddenly wished he had accepted Lu's earlier offer to stay in the mansion rather than in the inn. He couldn't very well break into the house and invade Relena's quarters at night. But if he had been in the very house to begin with…

It couldn't be helped. He would have to wait for another opportunity to present itself. He nearly sighed as he resumed his seat.

Leaving the parlor, Relena stared at her sandaled feet as Luchrezia lead her to the stairs. She looked up when she heard movement on the wooden steps.

"Are you well, Quatre?" Noin asked as the young governor rose from his sitting position and pressing to the banister to allow them through. He looked ashen, his sandy hair clung to his brow with damp, but his eyes were startlingly focused.

"Quite," he replied tersely. His gaze shifted to Relena and lowered to the floor. "Are you?"

"I'm tired," said Relena honestly. "But I'm fine as well."

"Good. I was thinking—" He abruptly shook his head, cutting himself off. "I'm sorry. We won't discuss this now."

Relena's heart constricted. "You mean the wedding."

"I… Yes, the wedding."

Noin's eyes darted between the two, but neither of the blonds seemed to take special note of her presence.

Relena twisted her fingers together and felt the cold, reminding emerald on her left hand. "Quatre, I think I…" Trailing, she forced herself to smile. "You're right. We'll save this for later." How could she tell him right now that she had no desire any longer to marry him?

She couldn't, not now. But hopefully…soon. Before she completely hurt his heart.

"Come, darling," murmured Noin, starting both of them from their respective dazes of doubt. "You can rest now."

"I'm sorry for interrupting," Quatre said. "Good evening, Relena."

"Good evening, Quatre." She hurried up the stairs, Noin following.

Quatre watched the two women disappear onto the second floor, heard them go on to the third floor, and then sighed.

_Courage, man._He could tell himself that all he wanted, but Quatre figured that following the advice would be far more difficult.

o0o

London was expectedly dreary today, Gaulron thought the following morning when the Navy ship returned to its place on the docks. It had begun drizzling half-an-hour ago. The Russian man had been forced to stay at the docks for the past four hours since their arrival at five o' clock. Since Treize Khushrenada was not a London resident, intelligence was trying to find the documents stating that the duke had most certainly hired this Russian for rescue mission purposes or, betting yet, the duke himself. Because nothing was yet proven, Gaulron hadn't been allowed to leave the dock offices.

Staring down the scrawny desk boys, Gaulron was certain he could take all of them out in mere seconds and dash, but then he risked losing his money. So he sat in a hard wooden chair and kept his arms folded. It was intimidating enough to the workers, anyway.

His ears immediately when a eager young officer came in and hurriedly began speaking in hushed tones to the dock worker at the main desk.

"A ship's arrived that hasn't any proper identification."

"Bring the captain to me," the dock worker said, "so he can fill out the forms."

"I don't think it'll be that simple," the officer replied. "I recognize the ship from Naval descriptions. It's the Golden Wave; that crew that kidnapped the Baron Peacecraft's sister."

Gaulron nearly leapt from the chair to go to the window. Almost pressing to the glass, he narrowed his eyes at the familiar ship docked in the harbor. In the next instant, his lips curled upward in a pleasant, yet menacing smirk that made the junior workers quake in their polished boots.

_"So you're here for the girl, eh? Or is it Catalonia?" _Gaulron thought that finding out would be worth the long hours waiting around here. "I'm going outside!" he called to the desk men.

"But, sir," the main worker protested, "it's protocol that you—"

"When I care about your protocol," said Gaulron, opening the door and stepping out, "I'll be sure to shout it at you." He slammed the panel shut behind him.

o0o

"Back in England so soon," Hilde commented. "How long d'you think it's to be before we're recognized?"

They'd disguised themselves as best they could in the clothes they'd stolen from some well-to-dos along the way of their career. Though the women wore no makeup and the men wore their hair in their usual untidy habits, they passed well enough with Catherine's long-unused expertise.

Now they just had to find Relena.

That was, for the most part, Heero's only thought as they reached the end of the dock and tried getting past the documentation workers. Heero wasn't precisely certain what to do. Catherine was attempting to get by them by talking like a noble, but it wasn't working as well as hoped.

Out of the corner of his eye, Duo spotted a gruesomely-familiar figure. "Heero," he whispered, "it seems fate has led us again to our Russian buddy."

"Not my favorite kind of destiny," Wufei added.

Heero heard the booming voice before he turned to look at the man in question.

"Let it never be said that Yuy, captain of the _Ivory Damsel_, is a man who easily surrenders." Gaulron's eyes glowed with dark amusement as he studied the Japanese seafarer. "At least this time you seem not quite so full of drink."

Heero's eyes narrowed. "I won't make the mistake of saying that this time you look less hostile."

"Be at ease, Yuy. You've nothing I want. I could use the money from bringing all of you in, but I've really no interest in such petty gaining." He smiled widely. "What business could you possibly be doing in London, I wonder?"

"Probably something not quite separate from your own business," replied Heero evenly.

"Ah, so it's still the young Miss Peacecraft, is it?" Gaulron smirked, knowing that the captain glaring at him wasn't used to being so easily read. "Well, maybe I can help you there."

"We don't need your help," Trowa said with a withering look, touching his sister's arm as though to remind the Russian of the damage already done.

"On the contrary," said Gaulron, "I believe you could use any help you might manage to get."

But Heero wasn't about to openly admit that. "What can you do but lead us into traps?"

"I've a special respect for fellow seafarers. So I'll do everything I can." Without warning, Gaulron called out to one of the officers nearby. "Sir! I suggest you hurry and assist these charming folk. They have urgent business with Duke Treize Khushrenada."

Though the officer looked doubtful, he also lost several shades of color in his face. "And how would you know that, Russian?"

"If you people had been _listening_," Gaulron huffed impatiently, "you'd know that I am an employee of the Duke. I took have business with him, but these gentlemen and ladies are far more important than I. You wouldn't want the Duke bringing up the inadequacy of how this dock is run to the English Court, would you?"

Mentioning the word "court" and "Duke" in the same sentence made the officers spring into action. Not only did they hurriedly let Heero and his group pass, they also called for a carriage to take them to where the Duke was.

"Where precisely are you sending us?" Catherine asked the closest officer.

The officer tipped his hat in deep respect. "Madam, Duke Khushrenada has been in London for many days to see to the return of Baron Peacecraft's kidnapped sister on behalf of Governor Quatre Winner."

Heero immediately stiffened beside Catherine.

"I would imagine that, with Miss Peacecraft having been restored to the Baron just yesterday morning, the Duke would still be present at the Peacecraft estate."

"Thank you," said Catherine politely. "Proceed."

As the cab was pulled away from the dock, Heero caught a glance of Gaulron's smirking face. He looked away when Catherine set a hand on his shoulder.

"Smile," she commanded. "As a noble, you've not a care in the world."

Heero could only manage a slight upturn of lips, but Catherine accepted it. Soon, he thought. Soon they would be where Relena was.

o0o

Quatre was currently uncomfortable. And the reason for that was because he was eating a late breakfast with Dorothy Catalonia, whom he couldn't figure out. She _was _a pirate, wasn't she? Because she had been taken from her ship without a stitch of clothing besides those previously on her back, she had borrowed a dress of her cousin's. It was a simple gown – or at least, it was as simple a gown as the Baroness Peacecraft wore.

It was a satin of periwinkle blue that made her eyes stand out in ways unimaginable. To get it out of her way, Dorothy had gathered her hair into a borrowed black chiffon. She had washed that morning, out of Luchrezia's insistence. And her table manners were shockingly perfect.

Dorothy Catalonia seemed nothing like a pirate, or any other scoundrel, at this moment. Once Quatre reminded himself that the young Italian woman had been born into European nobility, as he had, it made sense. However…

The rather alarming feeling of attraction that had leapt into him when he'd first spotted her, looking as she did with her water goblet raised delicately to her lips, remained unexplained.

"You're very quiet this morning, Governor."

At least, Quatre thought with some relief, her voice still held a slight edge of contempt that gave him a fighting spirit. Not as much contempt as yesterday, he noted, but contempt nonetheless.

"Do you always begin your days in silence?" A smirk livened Dorothy's face. "Or are you just negative to the idea of conversation with me?"

He felt the need to reply, but he could hardly tell her that he was struck by her appearance. "I am used to spending my mornings alone," he told her in a brisk tone.

Dorothy didn't seem so eager to let the subject be dismissed. "Well, you'll have to release that attitude for when you marry your charming Relena, won't you?"

"Do you enjoy interrogating me?"

"It isn't so much an interrogation as opening your eyes to what your life will be like when you are wed," informed the female pirate with a logical way of speech. "Granted, it was _your _decision, so I'm sure you know what you're getting into."

"Just why are you so keen on seeing me sure of how my married life will be?" he demanded impatiently. "I've known you no more than two days."

"But we know the same lifestyles. I was once a prisoner of duty myself. As I'm certain you're aware, I broke my chains." She smiled and took another drink of water. "Do you lack the strength to do the same?"

Quatre felt enraged. Being emotionally dissected by this—this _woman _made him feel like a mere creature instead of an important man. He'd never been made to feel that way before. "I don't feel as thought I'm chained, Dorothy." He rose forcefully from his chair, ready to leave the room and her. The chair staggered off balance but swayed on the hardwood floor into straightness again rather than falling over.

Dorothy lifted one uniquely-shaped eyebrow questioningly. "How interesting," she murmured.

Unable to resist the genuine interest in her voice, he cast her an annoyed look. "What is?"

She shook her head slightly. A few strands of hair fell from the chiffon's hold and dangled in front of her eyes. Quatre had to stick his hands in his pockets in order to not reach out and push them from her face. "When you let yourself speak for you rather than your manners," she told him, her tone oddly gentle, "you're honestly quite appealing." Saying so, she turned back to her plate and ate the last of her omelet.

Quatre blinked once, twice, then turned on his heel and walked stiffly out of the dining room.

The morning had been full of oddities indeed.

o0o

In the parlor, Luchrezia was trying to get Relena to eat a few more biscuits or drink more tea. The younger woman had consumed hardly anything since returning to the estate. Treize and Milliardo were discussing the morning's London newspaper. Anne had stayed at the inn for the morning; a headache had apparently claimed her.

When Quatre joined them, he sat on the loveseat next to Relena, and poured a cup of tea for himself. He'd barely taken the first warm sip when the Peacecrafts' youngest housemaid, Sylvia, entered with a nervous curtsy.

"My lord," she addressed Milliardo, "there are people here to see Miss Relena."

"I wondered when the guests would start arriving to welcome her back." Milliardo shot Relena a sympathetic smile. "It can't be helped, sister. Show them in, Sylvia. But let them know that their time is limited."

A few seconds later, there was a collective tapping of feet as the small group shuffled into the doorway of the parlor. Everyone looked up to see who the visitors were.

There was an instant reaction from everyone but the Baron and Baroness, but none's was so great as Relena's. The blond girl burst from the loveseat in surprise.

Eyes she had wanted to see for nearly four days looked into hers with something Relena couldn't begin to define. Her breath heaved from her chest carrying one name:

"Heero…"

o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Review please! (Hope the progression was worth the wait. I'll try not to take so long with chapter 13. – GG)


	13. Confession

All right, I know it's been a month since I wrote for this fic. Here's the excuses: 1) I finished "Sea of Emotion." 2) I wrote chapter eleven of my Cowboy Bebop fic, "Kites Without Strings. 3) My computer crashed and I had to _rewrite _chapter eleven of "Kites Without Strings" because the file was deleted.

And now that I've given you places to direct your loathing, on with the chapter you came to read, yeah?

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing.

Upper Class – Chapter 13

By Gundam Girl

She had lost all sense of everything around her with one exception. Her muscles quivered, and she wasn't so dense that she tried to convince herself that they did so for any reason other than because she wanted to go to him.

She _did _want to go to him. She wanted to touch him, to know that he was real. That she wasn't just staring at the nephew of a marquis here to pay respects to her safe return or any other such thing. But no, the man standing before was most definitely Heero Yuy, captain of the _Ivory Damsel._ No other man had looked at her the same way he looked at her.

Heero's train of thought was closely similar to hers. He hadn't given up. He hadn't surrendered, not to Dorothy, not to Gaulron, not even to Winner himself, and now here he was. Relena stood not more than five feet from him, and if he took two strides he would be able to pass his hand over her cheek to inhale the fragrance of her perfume…

And yet neither of them found the ability to move.

No one in the room made a sound or a motion until, quite casually, Dorothy walked into the parlor. Her only display of being caught off guard was a lift of one eyebrow. "Why," she gasped. "Heero Yuy himself? Here?"

Her catty voice broke the silence spell over the room and Treize and Quatre both jumped to their feet. Milliardo rose more slowly, needing a minute to register Heero's identity.

"Yuy?" the Baron repeated.

"The scoundrel who stole Relena from my home!" Quatre exclaimed fiercely.

Treize's voice was just as dark. "He shall not leave here unshackled."

The three aristocrats started for Heero. The Japanese man's crew immediately reached for their concealed respective weapons. Yet one person was faster than any of the nine already in motion.

"Stop!" shouted Relena, throwing herself forward and pressing herself to Heero. Turning, she spread her arms and glared at her brother, fiancée, and the duke, shielding Heero with her own body. "Stop," she said again, her tone a warning.

"Relena," Milliardo began, taken aback.

"Relena…" Quatre voice's was more despondent. The fist he had balled in anger quickly laxed.

Treize wasn't as affected by the woman's actions and instead advanced, curling a palm around Relena's left wrist. "You know not what you do here," he said lowly. Outwardly he projected anger, but inside he felt delight at the simple act of feeling her cool flesh upon his.

"Oh, trust me," Relena replied dangerously, lifting her other hand and forcing Treize's away with one swift jerk. "I know precisely what I am doing. I am declaring that Heero Yuy is not an enemy to me or to any of you." Even without looking at him, Relena knew Heero was looking at her intensely.

"How…can you say that?" Quatre demanded without belief at what he was hearing. "He _kidnapped _you, Relena! He's a thief!"

"For the Lord's sake, Relena," furthered Milliardo, "he's a bloody _pirate_." He had no idea when his sister had gotten such a backbone and he couldn't decide how much he liked it.

"Miss Relena," Treize interjected with narrowed eyes, "I am a duke of England. I cannot merely disregard the law and keep this group of sea hunters free in the very streets London! The Queen herself knows that all pirates are to be jailed immediately and then—"

"If you need prisoners," Relena interrupted coldly, knowing fully well what was to happen to pirates after being jailed, "then take them. But, by God, you will take me with them. Throw me into a cell and lock me up, but put me with these people. These good, kind people…" At last, she turned around and met Heero's eyes. Their gazes, his confused and surprised, hers gentle but firm, remained locked as she spoke next. "I will accept no other conditions."

At first, Treize wanted to lash out and tell her what a fool she was. Even though he could help her if she was jailed, she should never…

But of course.

He _could _help her if she was jailed. And immediately afterward his character would improve in both the eyes of her brother and society. Relena would seemingly have gone temporarily mad from her unfortunate experience and he would be the one to bring her back to good health.

It was a plan made quickly – but it was fool-proof.

"Very well," he told the young woman, shocking everyone else in the room. Even Dorothy's surprise grew great. "I see I am in position to argue with you." He cast a look at Milliardo. "I must send for the guard at once, my friend."

"Now wait just a moment, Treize," Milliardo protested angrily. He swept a critical eye over Yuy and his crew. They were dressed well, though not well-kempt, and a couple of them (one of the long braid and the woman with shot black hair) had smudges on their faces. "You cannot just…" He paused when his wife sent a gentle hand on his arm. "Lu?"

Luchrezia just shook her head, her eyes pleading for her husband to understand her meaning: _Relena__ is not daft. She has a purpose for doing this. Trust her._

At length Milliardo turned his eyes to his sister, who could not seem to take hers from the dark-haired pirate. A week ago, the sight may have turned his stomach and boiled his blood, but now... "Relena," he murmured to her.

Relena gave him a quick smile. "Brother, please." That was all it took. Milliardo lost all will of fighting her spirit, which seemed to blossom from her entire being.

Quatre was not so ready to do the same, but nor could he find the courage to voice his thoughts. _You are leaving. You are leaving me of your own will to share a cell with those vagabonds._

Oh, and it hurt. It hurt in a way that he could scarcely describe. Surely he had never felt so ashamed, so embarrassed…but he noted faintly that none of his feelings could quite be attributed to heartbrokenness. And that shocked him enormously.

In a few minutes, several officers of the London police were inside the Peacecraft estate, seizing the pirate crew and, at Treize's order, Relena. The officers were obviously surprised, but duty overrode the natural emotion and they captured her as well.

"You're sure?" Milliardo said to his sister. "Because with a word, I could—"

"Farewell, Milliardo." With another of her soft smiles, Relena willingly followed the policeman out of the house.

Luchrezia, visibly upset, left the parlor in a hurry. Milliardo followed her upstairs. Treize stayed only long enough to gather his coat and hat and then left the property as well.

Once they were all gone, Quatre's knees trembled and then gave out. He expected to hit the carpet, but he felt himself caught under the arms by gentle yet strong hands and he looked up to see Dorothy staring down at him with somber fascination.

"How surprised I am," she told the governor as she helped him into a sitting position on the loveseat, "that you did not demand an alternative from Miss Relena."

"I was too stunned," he admitted. "The entire arrangement was made so quickly – I scarcely had time to gather my thoughts."

"No, I doubt that is the case. After all, Miss Relena and even Mr. Treize had moments to spare for their respective decisions." Dorothy's lips curled into a thoughtful smirk. "Perhaps you just had no desire to protest the situation?"

"That's absurd!" Quatre exclaimed. "Relena is going to be held at the jail! Have you any idea how dirty those places are? A woman such as her should never even have to visit, let alone stay there!"

"And yet it is perfectly fine for the women of Yuy's crew to be there? Despite the fact that one of them is even Catherine Bloom, wife of the late Michael Bloom?" Dorothy clicked her tongue admonishingly. "Your ideas confuse me, Governor. They confuse me deeply."

"Catherine Bloom?" Quatre had known Michael from the court, indeed, had spent several evening in his home in Berkshire. Quatre recalled the lady Catherine well, remembering her beauty as well as her kind temperament. "Was that her?"

"Aye. How easily the eye forgets those who look an ounce worse than themselves," observed Dorothy, her tone slightly harsh, making Quatre wince. "Well, what do you think now, Governor?"

"What do you mean?"

"Have you figured out my meaning yet? Do you know now what I meant when I told you that what Miss Relena felt for you was but infatuation?" Dorothy hesitated slightly before she spoke this next sentence, watching him carefully. "Whereas what she feels for Captain Heero Yuy…"

Quatre's eyes rocketed from the floor to hers, and they were wide as they bore into her. "You are not possibly suggesting…" He found himself unable to voice the rest of the thought.

"Governor." Dorothy's tone was reasonable and it killed him. "Do you honestly believe any woman would join a man in jail for anything else besides love?"

Quatre thought the entire earth might have dipped and rose, bobbing on the universe like a boat bobs on the sea. He certainly felt as though his consciousness was slipping.

Relena was in love with a pirate?

And yet, even as he considered this outrageous possibility, he realized that he felt no acute pain. Certainly he felt nothing as sharp as he had the night she had first been taken from Dover.

The most confounding thing, he realized, was that when he again felt the world was steady, his eyes sought Dorothy's. And he wanted nothing else than to keep his gave there for awhile.

o0o

Though the bailiff was greatly confused at Relena's presence when the policeman brought them all to the jail, he followed the orders from the duke and placed Relena, gown and all, in one of the cells with the _Ivory Damsel's _crew. Each cell was only big enough to hold two people at once, and Wufei and Duo stayed close enough to their wives that they were put in together. Trowa did the same with Catherine, leaving Heero and Relena a cell to themselves, further away from the others.

Heero couldn't get himself to stop scowling. The whole time at the Baron's house he had been unable to say a word, rendered completely speechless by his shock at Relena's actions. And now, here she was…here with him in a drafty jail, sitting on dirt and straw and God knew what else.

All at once his power of speech returned.

"Why?" He demanded it as soon as the bailiff had walked away after locking the door. "Why in God's name, Relena, have you done this to yourself? What could've possessed you to ever—" He was cut off by her hand, pressed gentle to his cheek, and his eyes fell to hers. He stopped scowling.

Her eyes were so peaceful. Bluer than any morning sky over the sea, he found himself completely void of thought. Until those eyes filled and overflowed in seconds, the tears hastening down her cheeks sorrowfully.

"Oh, Christ," he breathed. Her head fell forward onto his chest, and silent tremors racked her small body. In an attempt to comfort, he wrapped his arms around her and sighed. "Jesus, Relena, I just want to know why."

"I want to know why, too," she whispered, bringing her face up to look at him. Her cheeks were stained and damp and it tore Heero apart. "Why did you come after me when I was so sure I would never see you again? Why did you risk this? And now look what has happened! We're here in this jail—"

"And why is it that _we _are in this jail, Relena, when it should be I alone? As much as I loathe myself for getting my crew shut up here, it's not half as much as I hate seeing you here with me. So why?" He took her by the shoulders. "Why did you say that to the Duke and condemn yourself? Why have you joined a pirate in jail?"

Relena's lips trembled and she gasped in a sharp breath. "I fear I can only answer you with another question."

"Let me here it then," he told her, eyes burning like blue flame. "That we may come closer to answers." Heero couldn't explain why his heart began to gallop in his chest.

She rose to her knees so that their faces were level. Her entire body was frigid with nerves. "Why," she murmured, "do I love you?"

Heero hadn't realized he'd been holding his breath, but indeed he had, and it now came roaring out of his chest like a ball from a cannon. "You… Relena, you..." He couldn't manage the word at first. But then he closed his eyes and rested his head against the stone of the wall he was leaning against, holding her so closely to him. "Because I love you as well," he told her softly. "And I couldn't stop myself from coming for you anymore than I could stop the winds from leading my ship here, Relena. Somethin' led me to you. And if it wasn't God, it was my heart. Or maybe even yours."

The words slipped into her ears and dropped to her heart. More tears filled her eyes, alarming Heero, but she just pressed more tightly to him. "I've brought you here and I am so sorry," she whispered, half-sobbing into her shirt.

"Nay, Relena. Nay. This fault is mine alone this time." He didn't notice he was doing it, but before he could check himself, he pushed her away just far enough to see her face.

And he leaned in and kissed her.

Relena didn't freeze as she might have if he had kissed her a week earlier. Instead, she went as boneless as a wax candle and Heero held her only closer. She returned his kiss a minute later, and they shared hundreds of kisses then, as the cell grew darker and darker in the waning light. Finally, night settled completely on the city of London, casting both of them in shadows.

Relena's heart raced and Heero blood heated. In an almost mindless fervor, Heero glanced around. Because of who Relena was, the bailiff had placed a thin but clean blanket in the cell. He reached out and grabbed it, spreading it beneath them. The task done, he returned his attention to her, pressing his mouth to her neck, to her face.

Moving by feelings, he reached for the delicate buttons in the back of her gown, got half of them undone, but when he pressed his warm fingers to her cool back, he came up from his sea of lust to look into her eyes, shocked at himself.

"Relena," he began, half-formed apologies on his tongue, but Relena only surged upward and kissed him deeply. Heero responded immediately. He had never waited for an invitation before, but he was willing to wait with her. Now that he had one, he wasn't going to turn it down.

She welcomed him, he accepted the welcome. She loved him, and he had never felt happier in his life, even in the dank of this cell. Someone lit a lamppost outside, and the beam of golden light fell through the tiny window above them and onto Relena, highlighting her hair, making her bare shoulders glow, while her eyes glinted up at him and effected him in a way no woman he'd ever been with had.

He loved her, and he wanted nothing more out of life than for her to let him.

o0o

Quatre had taken to puzzling his feelings out on the great terrace of Milliardo's second floor. The expansive balcony led out from the upstairs hallway and hung over the quiet London streets.

There was a lovely sky tonight, he observed, but his appreciation was overcome by his confusion, and he could not see the stars.

What had happened to him in the past few days? He had gone from being obsessed to feeling little more than friendly toward Relena. The fire he had felt for her had been quenched to the warmth of ebbing coals, and companionable warmth at that. The change of mind was boggling.

Especially since, as he thought about it more and more, he felt as though he had no desire to marry Relena at all.

"My, but how troubled you look, Governor."

He had never expected to enjoy hearing that slow voice that always made him think a scheme was being formed. But as he turned around he couldn't help but give the face it came from a small smile. "Troubles are a part of my life."

Dorothy, framed by the light coming from the corridor, seemed to glow ethereally as she held up two glasses of white wine and offered him one. He took it with deft fingers, not even bothering to be careful that they didn't touch. Their fingers brushed together and Quatre felt it – a quick, urgent heat.

Dorothy did as well, but she did a better job of hiding it. "I don't imagine you often spend time outdoors."

"I prefer the sight of the moon to calm me," Quatre told her, sipping from his glass. "Although honestly I've never before mentioned that to anyone."

"Well, now, I must be special." Tapping a finger on the rim of her goblet, she smiled. "The stars are spectacular even on the land."

He gave her a sideways glance; her face was pointed upward. At some point in the day she had taken the chiffon from her hair and it now freely flowed down her back and tumbled over her shoulders, wavy from its previous style. Her long, dark lashes nearly touched her eyebrows.

Quatre felt is throat dry up and quickly drank his wine to wet it again. "I suppose you prefer the sight of them from the sea."

"Well, stars are stars, and they are beautiful anywhere. I feel no possessive attachment to the ocean, Governor. It simply gave me a home when I gave up my own."

"Please," he blurted before he scarcely knew what he was saying. "Call me Quatre, won't you, Miss Catalonia?" Remembering what Relena had said to the suggestion, he added, "If I call you merely Dorothy?"

Dorothy tilted her head a bit in thought, some stray strands of hair falling close to her eyes and making her irises glimmer. "Very well then, Quatre. I suppose it's about time I showed you some kind of particular kindness."

He smiled.

o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

I'm aware of just how unfinished this chapter seems, but it's as long as the others. Also, the second part of Quatre and Dorothy's conversation is very significant and I wanted to save some importance for chapter 14.

Please review!


	14. Swallowing Pride

Welcome to chapter 14 of "Upper Class!" This chapter begins a little differently, mainly because it takes off directly from where chapter 13 ended. So you may want to reread the last scene of 13 just to keep yourself up-to-date.

Thanks for reading and enjoy!

**WARNING**: Okay, so do you all remember that warning of attempted rape from chapter one? Well, this is the chapter where it finally kicks in, so brace yourself. It's the last scene of this chapter, so if you want to skip it because of comfort reasons, feel free to do so. I won't be offended.

Disclaimer: I do not own "Gundam Wing" or "Full Metal Panic!"

Upper Class – Chapter 14

By Gundam Girl

Quatre held up his glass. "But you brought me this."

For a moment, Dorothy's eyes seemed to lose their sharpness and instead of exuding guardedness, they were soft. "I did, yes. And you are quite welcome." She drew away from the balcony rail and from him, taking her glass and draining the rest in one small drink. She was acting more ladylike than she had in years. "I shall turn in now. Do you feel better yet?"

"I do," Quatre answered and realized that he wasn't lying. "I feel…very much better. Thank you."

"And your confusion over Miss Relena has eased, I assume?"

"It's not that I was uneasy. Well, I was," he admitted. "I am simply more curious than anything else. I never imagined anyone of Relena's status would prefer a commoner over someone of upper class. I always thought…"

Dorothy's eyes sharpened again in a heartbeat. "Careful your words and whom you say them to, Governor," she said, reverting back to propriety. "You seem to forget that I have lived in both common and noble worlds. If there is one thing I learned in my ventures of piracy, where I spent more time with peasants than you have in your entire life…seeing the differences…" Her hand had tightened on her glass. It was fortunate that it was now empty because in her anger she had turned it upside-down and seemed on the verge of tossing it to the floor and letting it shatter. "It is that there _is _no difference. In fact, you will often find peasants far nobler than aristocrats. As far as I am concerned, we are all _upper class_. "

With a hateful glare straight into his eyes, she turned on her heel and left. Her skirts made a harsh swishing noise as she departed.

Quatre felt stunned. He and Dorothy had shared what he would dare to call a pleasant moment, a peaceful moment even, and he had somehow ruined it by insulting her.

_"Governor,"_ he told himself. _"You are no man, but a fool."_

He truly felt like one.

o0o

The morning came, and Kurz Webber was almost deliriously happy. After his report had been given to his superiors, they had been quite impressed with his help in catching the _Belladonna _on its return trip to England and seizing Relena Peacecraft. He'd been told that they would have added the capture of Dorothy Catalonia to his list of accomplishments, and that would have been a very positive turn for him, but the Baron Peacecraft had commanded that the female pirate captain's presence in England be kept a secret. Kurz did not know it, but Milliardo had given this order at the vigorous request of his wife.

In payment for his deeds, Kurz was given the special privilege of helping to escort a group of pirates to another prison building where they would wait a night before their appointment at the gallows. He had been informed that these pirates were none other than the crew of the _Ivory Damsel_, whom had kidnapped the Baron's sister Relena.

So now things had come full circle. It must be the way of true justice, mused Kurz as he strode up to the cell holding the _Damsel_'s captain, Heero Yuy.

He was unable to hold back his shout of surprise when he saw Relena Peacecraft lying beside him beneath a coarse blanket wearing no visible stitch of clothing.

The noise woke Yuy instantly, along with the other males of the crew in adjacent cells. The women stirred and rose more slowly. When Relena's eyes finally opened, they widened to the size of saucers, and she clenched the blanket to her firmly.

"What," growled Yuy, his sapphire eyes flashing, "do you think you're doing?"

Kurz turned away from the sight, his cheeks flaming. He could hear both the captain and the lady hurry to dress, and he couldn't suppress the indecent thoughts that scurried across his brain. If his girl, Melissa, knew what he was thinking of, she would surely box his ears and render him incapable of producing children.

"Excuse me!" Kurz's voice cracked embarrassingly, and he coughed to clear it. "I am to escort the men of your crew to hangman's row." His superiors had left out that there were women in the group as well. Being female, they were spared from the noose, but often women of crime were sentenced to a lifetime of service as maids. He would have to return to the offices to get orders for their placement. And of course, he hadn't at all counted on Relena Peacecraft being with them!

The first one to respond to Kurz's mostly-mumbled declaration was a braided man, looking insulted. "Hangman's row? What, you have these people in bloody _lines_?" The petite woman sharing his cell hushed him with a fierce look.

"Don't think so highly of the British police, Maxwell," said an Asian man in another cell, one of his arms around the pigtailed woman beside him. "They're not organized enough for lines. They're probably packed in somewhere."

"Actually," answered another of the pirates, his green eye watching Kurz coolly, "they give the men numbers in order of their execution times." He too had a woman with him, but he comforted her in a less intimate way than the previous two. He was also much calmer, but his caution was apparent nonetheless.

Yuy was the last to speak, and his voice held the most contempt. "And so you plan to drop each man here to their deaths? Just when will this be, exactly?"

Something in the accusing way Yuy spoke had Kurz feeling terribly guilty. "I believe…Captain…tomorrow morning." He could scarcely believe he'd just addressed the pirate in so respectful a way, but he couldn't stop talking. "But it won't be me! I'm not the one—"

"So that makes it all right!" This time it was Relena that raised her voice, and of everyone in the room, she sounded the most terror-ridden. Her tones held utter panic and Kurz was caught off guard by the raw emotion. He couldn't help the wince that betrayed him. "Because _you're _not the one killing these men, it makes it perfectly fine for them to die! That's what you think, isn't it! That's what you're telling yourself right this instant!" Relena's eyes, filled with tears and grief, flashed straight into his soul. "Well, know this. Simple because you do not turn the blade doesn't mean the blood doesn't touch your hands!"

"Relena," Heero murmured. He hadn't been able to take his eyes from her since she had begun preaching to the pale, shuddery youth pretending to be a policeman. "Enough."

Relena turned to him, her lips trembling, and the tears spilled down her cheeks like drops of pain themselves. In the next few seconds, her eyes hardened along with her resolve. "I won't let it end like this," she swore determinedly. "You'll see."

Kurz had unlocked the cell door and now held it open. "Follow me, Heero Yuy." He wished to God his voice didn't sound so apologetic.

Relena rushed out of the cell in front of Heero and gave Kurz a final, scathing glare. "My anger does not go to you alone," she confessed, her voice no less harsh for the fact. "But though you will put these men into your 'hangman's row,' I vow that they will not truly be part of that wretched group." Without another syllable or even a goodbye to her companions, she hastened from the prison and fetched a cab, eager to be quickly back to her brother's house.

o0o

When she stormed into the dining room of the Peacecraft mansion, interrupting the end of breakfast and fixing her eyes on her brother, she at first didn't register the complete shock in Luchrezia's eyes.

"Relena!" her sister-in-law exclaimed. "Dear God, darling, but you do look a sight!" Indeed, there was dust all over her dress and bits of straw stuck in her hair.

"Nevermind," Relena waved it away. "Milliardo, I must speak with you." It was then she suddenly realized Treize's presence, along with Quatre and Dorothy, though they were no surprise. "You're still here, Duke? Perhaps you could be useful as well." She spoke more to herself than Treize, however.

"I, milady?" Treize's smile appeared like that of a cat catching the canary. "Give the word, Miss Relena, and I will hurry to fulfill it."

Relena's gaze returned to her sibling. Though Treize was more influencial, she felt more comfortable speaking to Milliardo. "I beg you, brother. The pirates of the _Ivory Damsel_ – you must save them! They are to be hanged with the morrow!"

Milliardo looked mildly surprised. "You say this like you did not expect it, Relena. They are pirates. The price of piracy is death by noose. Surely you know that."

Apparently her finishing school had left out that detail of the law. "I did not know it, brother. And now they will die unless you do something!"

"What the devil are you saying, my sister?" demanded Milliardo, rising from his chair to stand above the outspoken woman. "Are you expressing a wish for these ruffians' lives to actually continue? The notion is mad! First of all, it is impossible. Secondly, _why _would you ever feel such mercy toward those…_rats_?" The baron's words were crueler than anything Relena had ever heard him say, and she had the idea that he had never shown her his entire personality before.

All at once, she felt like she didn't know her brother at all.

Her eyes welling for the second time this morning, she cast them downward. Letting out one desperate sob, she turned away. "I could not bear to see any of them perish. They were good to me when I was with them, brother. They were not such monsters as you think." She turned her gaze upward again and forced it to be confident. "They are _good people_, not the rats you think of them as. I found more kindness in their small lot than I have ever known at a party with London's wealthiest!"

The passion of her words shook Milliardo but he only grew angrier when he realized his weakness. "You speak words of _sin_. Dare you cast your good judment to pirates rather than the words of your own brother!"

"I dare it." Relena's words were cool. "If I do not, then I will see them all die, whether by hanging or by misery."

Furious, Milliardo swept past her, stopping in the doorway of the room. "You shall see them die anyway." Saying so, he stomped out and up the stairs.

Shocked into silence, Luchrezia could do nothing but give Relena a sympathetic expression. In her lap, Agatha wailed, frightened by all of the yelling. Luchrezia gathered her into her arms and hurried after her husband, seeking to comfort.

Relena stood for a moment, shaking in her sorrow and rage. "I will be in my room," she told the others, her steps heavy and tense. She didn't object when Treize followed her out of the room. She didn't even notice him.

Quatre and Dorothy sat across from one another, the only ones remaining at the table. Dorothy was the one to say something first.

"I find it quite odd that she didn't even bother to ask you for help." Her eyes were sincere as she said this.

Quatre shook his head. "I no longer do. I think things are becoming clearer each moment." He lifted his gaze to Dorothy's. "She pleads quite vigorously for the life of those pirates – those people," he corrected himself at Dorothy's raised eyebrow.

"Yes," murmured the blond woman. "For would it not make more sense to—"

"Perhaps. However, people in love don't necessarily have a lot of sense." There was silence for a moment, as Dorothy was stunned by this observation, and Quatre hurriedly took his eyes from hers. "At least, it doesn't appear that way."

Standing, Quatre bowed to her, and promptly left the dining room, his gait stiff and formal.

Dorothy watched the place where he had just been with curiosity. "No," she responded to his words in a whisper. "It certainly doesn't."

o0o

Relena burst into her chamber, hair flying behind her. Her furiousness was practically tangible, and Treize did not bother to hide his smile of admiration as he followed her, a cup of tea in his hand.

"You spoke quite forcefully to Milliardo," remarked the duke. He was thankful she was so angry; she didn't at all notice when he shut the door behind them. "I was worried for a moment that he would strike you."

"He has never raised his hand to me, and I feared that not." Relena cast her burning blue eyes upon him, and Treize felt his blood warm. "Will you soften your heart for these pirates, Duke? I can't imagine you would and still I must ask."

Instead of responding, Treize offered her the tea. Relena drank it out of courtesy and it scalded her throat, but she welcomed the pain as a small reprieve from her feeling of rage.

Treize then spoke. "Miss Relena, you are young. And," he added with some amusement, "just a bit naïve. If you understood the true nature of pirates—"

"I spent two weeks on their ship!" she exclaimed passionately. "I slept in their hull and ate of their food. They were generous and even protective." She paused, remembering when Heero had taken the cut of the knife she had nearly used on herself. Her heart pounded at the memory. "Please believe me when I tell you they are worthy of living, Duke."

"Relena," he said slowly. As he spook, he took small, even steps nearer to her. "They are evil. Evil often disguises itself as good, I'm sure you realize." Saying so, he had backed her nearly to the wall, and Relena's fingertips were touching the plaster to brace her. Her eyes had grown wide at the indecency of his proximity. "The only thing I want to believe right now is that I finally get to do this."

He lowered his lips to hers.

Relena's eyes grew impossibly larger. The move had shocked the young woman into completely lack of mobility, and Treize took advantage of her stunned state to grip her hips and press her to him.

Relena made a protesting sound into his mouth. Her hands flew to his shoulders and she did her best to push him away, but the duke was strong and he held fast. When he finally took his mouth from hers, Relena gritted her teeth.

"Release me before I scream," she demanded.

"Your brother will only think your cry is because of sorrow for those sea wretches," Treize chided, speaking like a parent to a child. "Tell me, Relena, have you even realized how strikingly beautiful you are?" He lowered one of his hands to her skirt and started to pull it up.

"You're the wretch!" she shrieked, fighting the movement. Treize succeeded in penetrating the cloth's weak barrier and Relena let out a loud scream before he could cover her mouth. As soon as the sound was out, her knees buckled and she now was forced to grip his shoulder to keep from falling.

"The tea," she murmured. Her eyebrows lowered in outrage. "What in God's name have you done to me!"

"It's only something to relax you," Treize assured her, carrying her to her four-poster bed. "When you are relaxed, this experience is much more enjoyable." So pleased was he to finally be getting his way, the lecherous aristocrat did not hear the panicked footsteps on the stairs.

"I don't want…" But Relena's words were soft and slurred, and she felt herself getting drowsy. Tears of fear and sorrow leaked over her temples. She could no longer hear any sound, and so she didn't realized that ruckus that suddenly occurred in her bedroom. She was barely able to register that Treize was wrenched away from her, and she felt a cool hand on her head. She thought she saw a mass of unruly brown hair and deep blue eyes over her.

"Heero," she murmured. "I…love you…"

As she fell into unconsciousness, she couldn't realize that the brown hair was truly blond and the blue eyes were lighter than she'd thought.

Quatre Raberba Winner's frown was deep as Milliardo restrained Treize. The baron had begun a tangent, threatening the duke all sorts of hideous punishments in both this world and the next.

Dorothy drew her hand from Relena's head and gave Quatre a calculating look. "Well, Quatre?"

The governor flicked his eyes to the female pirate for a moment longer than necessary, then looked at Relena again. "Well," he replied. "I suppose this arises at some time for everyone."

"What would that be?" inquired Dorothy.

Quatre turned to her, his expression weary. "The swallowing of pride."

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Sorry for the slight shortness of this chapter, but guess what? There's only one more chapter left. Surprise!

Please review!


	15. Blessings

And now, here we are at the final chapter. I never expected this fic to take so long, but it's been just over two years. Thank you all, those of you who have been with me since the beginning of this story or if you you've just now discovered it. I appreciate your time to read this.

As always, I would love to hear (well, read) any thoughts, comments or criticism anyone has toward this story. Enjoy the ending and thanks again!

Disclaimer: As it goes for all of us, I do not own Gundam Wing, Full Metal Panic, or the even the bit of rope mentioned in this chapter. Broke high school student I am. ;

Upper Class – Chapter 15

By Gundam Girl

Relena's eyes opened millimeter by millimeter to the sound of voices out in the hall. She ignored these voices at first, feeling groggy and almost separate from her body as she brushed her hair and put on a clean dress the color of rubies. She couldn't recall just why she wore the same clothes she had donned yesterday, nor why they were so dirty. She felt a faint ache in her leg and wondered at its origin. Staring in the looking-glass of her bedroom vanity, she tried to figure out just why her mind was so blank.

And in a flash she remembered it all.

Her dress had not been from yesterday but rather the day before that. She had gone to the prison with Heero and the crew of the _Ivory Damsel_. She had lain with Heero on the very floor of a cell. A young German had told them all of the men of the crew's impending death by rope.

And she had raced home, begging her brother to let them be spared. Milliardo had balked, finding her shameful, and Treize had took advantage her lack of focus due to anger. He had tried to force himself on her, at one point squeezing her thigh too hard…

Everything after that was gone, but none of it mattered. Frantic, Relena gave a slight shout of distress and burst out of her room, the door flying back and banging against the wall.

In the corridor outside she found Quatre and Dorothy, their expressions grave. She rushed right up to Quatre and could see her own pale face in his clear aquamarine eyes.

"Quatre!" she cried. "In God's name, what time is it?"

Quatre's lips moved as though he was going to say something, but he only managed to give a quick study to his pocketwatch and say, "Nearly three quarters past eight, Relena."

She nearly swooned, feeling Dorothy's hand on her arm to steady her. "When do they…" She had to stop and swallow before she could finish her question. "When do executions occur?" she demanded weakly.

Quatre winced, his heart feeling blacker than the devil's. "Nine. Relena, I'm—"

She did not stop to hear him but pulled away and ran down the stairs, nearly tripping on the hem of her skirt. She was out of the manor in five seconds altogether, and God smiled a little, for there was a cab just now pulling up to her brother's front door.

"The gallows!" she ordered swiftly to the drive, rapping her knuckles on the ceiling of the carriage to demonstrate her urgency. The horse cantered through the London street, and Relena wished it would gallop. She suddenly remembered that it was Sunday and there were crowds of people coming to and from their respective church services. It could take an entire twenty minute to drive four blocks down.

Wanting to weep, Relena slumped back into the plush seats of the carriage. But instead of crying, she folded her hands together so tightly that her fingers blanched, and she prayed. Prayed to God that He would not take the man she loved, nor the friends she had so recently come to cherish.

o0o

From where he sat, leaning against a cold stone wall behind a heavy oak door with iron barring a tiny window, Duo could hear the shuffling of people coming into the courtyard where the wooden platform with the trap doors stood ready to showcase the death of him and his closest companions.

"I always knew I'd die in an entertainin' way," he joked, but no smile accompanied his words.

"I never thought I would," said Wufei. "I thought for sure I'd be buried by my children somewhere. Flowers and all that fuss."

Trowa lifted his shoulders and let them drop again. "I assumed we'd get hit by a cannon eventually and I'd go down with the ship."

"Oh hell, that'd only be because you'd give Catherine the last space in the rowboat." Duo allowed the corners of his mouth to turn up. "But it seems we've all considered our deaths this far along. Eh, Captain?"

Heero was standing by the door, his shackled wrists held in front of him while he stared distractedly out the window, the bars leaving criss-crossed shadows on his face. "I didn't expect to die."

His crewmen met this declaration with awkward silence for several seconds. Each man contemplated the idea Heero spoke of with equal amounts of wishful thinking and disbelief. At last, Trowa gave a small chuckle. "Well, you wouldn't, would you, Captain?"

"Heero Yuy," added Wufei, "man of the sea, never destroyed."

"Exactly," replied Heero, ignoring the surprised look sent his way. "I don't mean my body would continue living. The body wastes no matter how fit you are. Given any of those thing you all said, I'd want to die Trowa's way."

Duo's eyebrows were raised nearly to his hairline. "Why's that, Heero?"

"Because when your body is taken by the sea, it's as though your heart keeps beating with the pulse of the waves." Heero smiled a little at his men. "But sea or none – I'm glad to have you all as part of my crew. And I can only hope that the other parts fair well enough through the rest of their lives."

"Catherine's still known as a noble, sort of," Trowa noted. "Perhaps she'll fetch some gentleman and escape from servitude."

"Well, my Hilde won't remarry, damn her," said Duo fondly. "She'll complain about me the rest of her days and'll refuse to complain about anyone else."

"Sally won't complain," Wufei remarked. "But she is gonna to have to find someone else to argue with."

The three of them then realized at the same time that they had come back to Heero. The ship captain had reverted to staring out the window again, but this time his eyes were narrowed and sharp. His arms were folded tightly and his men felt like they could feel his dissatisfaction coming off of him like warmth from the sun. Except this feeling was anything but warm.

Finally, Heero looked at them all, his gaze fierce. "Relena," he said, "will be forced to marry that fair-faced Governor." In the next instant, his face softened and seemed to look sadder than his friends had ever seen it. "She'll be a good wife, she will. She'll do her duty well as a Governor's wife, and she'll have all these lovely children with blue eyes and light hair…" He paused, thinking of the beautiful woman. "And she'll love them each, and spoil them rotten, and they'll marry themselves and give her an expensive funeral when she dies an old, old woman."

Duo, Trowa, and Wufei could think of no words, no gestures that might soothe their friend. So each one of them kept to themselves, silently despondent in their ever shortening lives.

Before long, their door opened and two officers dressed in uniform lead them out into the mockingly bright day.

o0o

Relena finally arrived at the public execution courtyard, handing the driver her entire purse rather than bothering to count out coppers. She hastened into the courtyard, joining a group of aristocrats in the back on a rise that allowed her to see over the heads of the peasants that crowded the hanging platform.

Her despairing moan caught in her throat as she watched Wufei, Trowa, Duo, and Heero being marched out onto the horrible mimicry of a stage. Standing down by the edge of the platform were Sally, Catherine, and Hilde, watched closely by London police officers.

The officials in charge of the execution wasted no time. She felt her skin chill at the sight of the noose being slipped over Heero's head, felt her nails bite into the flesh of her palms as they tightened it on his neck. She watched his eyes rake over the crowd of people until, quite abruptly, they landed on her.

What did he see, she couldn't help but wonder. A woman practically dying herself, leaning as she was against a pillar in hope that she might stay on her feet. With his gaze so powerfully locked to hers, she could no longer hold in the well of emotion she'd been damming up inside.

Tears pooled quickly in her eyes and overflowed, dripping down her cold, pale cheeks in thin streams. She did not sob – indeed, she could make no sound at all – but she felt her lips form the only thought she could keep.

_I love you._

The announcer began to shout the facts from a roll of parchment; that these were the crewmen of the pirate ship the _Ivory Damsel_, that they were charged with the kidnapping of Governor Quatre Raberb Winner's fiancée, along with various other crimes,and that their names were….

But he, nor any of the other people present in this disturbingly well-gardened courtyard, did not know the souls behind those names. They did not know the hearts that beat inside those sea-faring bodies. Relena did. Relena knew them to be good souls and caring hearts, each of them loving and with something to protect.

And there they were, about to die but showing no fear. Each of them held their faces perfectly masked, exuding only bravery. A few of the women around Relena had already covered their eyes, but Trowa's sister and Duo and Wufei's wives continued to watch their loved ones, and Relena would do the same.

"May God accept your souls into Heaven," concluded the announcer. "Amen."

They were beginning with Heero. One officer took hold of the string that would drop the trap door beneath Heero's feet. With only a moment's pause that held no respect, the officer's arm tightened—

"_OBJECTION_!"

At the ejaculation, all of the officers around the officers around the platform looked up and toward the aristocrats' rise. The announcer dropped his roll of parchment.

"Objection!" Quatre repeated, this time more quietly. "My name is Governor Quatre Raberba Winner, and I demand that this hanging cease immediately."

Relena could scarcely believe what she was hearing; but then the thought came to her like the crashing of a wave.

What made more sense in attempting to get men freed than to ask help from _Quatre_?

The announcer stared, wide-eyed, as he bent to retrieve his paper. "Governor Winner, surely you jest. These men—"

"Are innocent as far as I am concerned." Quatre stepped forward, in front of anyone else on the rise. Relena saw his back as well as Dorothy, who stood fairly close to him. "The only specific crime you have in your list, Officer, is that which claims that these pirates kidnapped my fiancée, Relena Peacecraft. Thus, their crime is against me.

"Being both the man wronged and the Governor of England, it is my decision as to what their fate will be. Also, the specific crime in your list is recorded incorrectly. Relena Peacecraft—"

Relena tensed upon hearing herself being spoken of. Numerous pairs of eyes turned to her.

"—is not my fiancée. We shall not be married at any time, and she is a very eligible woman." At this, Quatre turned his head just enough to meet Relena's startled eyes. "I do hope she finds a good man." He turned back to the announcing officer. "So you see, Officer, I declare these men innocent. You may release them from their binds and set them free, along with the rest of Captain Yuy's crew. Am I quite understood?"

The announcing officer's voice cracked. "Quite, Governor!"

At once the officer who had been about to drop Heero to his death let go of the horrible rope and jumped up to the platform to instead free him. Three other officers hastened to do the same for Trowa, Wufei, and Duo. In an instant the latter three had leapt from the platform to hold their sister and wives, but Heero stayed on the elevated space, his expression revealing nothing. But he stared at Relena as though she had been the one to face death, had gone, and was now returned to life. Relena could only stand and return the look, feeling her heart pound and her breath tremble out from between her dry lips.

"I imagine you're pleased then."

Relena drew her eyes from the man she loved to see Quatre. Seeing his humble smile, she knew he wasn't referring to the pirates' spared lives, rather the development of their broken engagement. "Oh, Quatre," was all she could manage.

"I'll thank you not to pity me," the Governor replied, setting his hand on her slender shoulder. "For I've discovered for myself that I do love you very deeply, Relena. But not," he continued at her aggrieved expression, "as a possible husband. I love you as a very dear friend."

Overwhelmed, Relena's eyes watered again and she seized his hands. "Quatre, you are my _dearest _friend!" she exclaimed. "I shall thank God for you every moment for the rest of my life."

"Oh, posh. Not every moment, surely," Quatre said jokingly. "What time then will you have for Captain Yuy?" His eyes left hers to look over her shoulder, and Relena followed his gaze to see Heero standing right behind her.

She pulled away from the Governor and threw herself into the pirate's arms. "Heero," she murmured. "Heero, I was so frightened that…"

"Hush," he interposed, pressing his lips firmly to the top of her head. "It's all right. It's all right now." But he fingers shook slightly as he pressed her to him.

"Well," said another voice. Dorothy slid up next to them. "This has been an exciting day, hasn't it? Now I can understand why everyone wants to see all these public hangings."

"I'm afraid this is a rare occasion," Catherine told her as she, Trowa, Duo, Hilde, Wufei, and Sally joined them all.

"What will you do now, Miss Relena?" asked Dorothy, her smile sincere.

Relena looked up into Heero's eyes. "I want to be with you," she told him softly.

Heero stepped back from her just enough to grip her by the shoulders. "Relena…. You tasted a bit of the life we lead on the _Ivory Damsel_. Could you stand to live like that, day after day, with very little certainty about what the next turn will be?"

Everyone could detect worry in his voice, but Relena only smiled. "When I was on the ship with you – all of you," she said, looking at the rest of the crew, "it was the first time I think I was ever truly happy." She took his hands from her shoulders and held them in her own. "Take me with you, Heero. I could never be happier anywhere else." Gently she cupped his cheek. "My love."

He gave no verbal answer, but surged against her and fused his mouth to her own. That was response enough, for the rest of the crew cheered, and Quatre and Dorothy smiled appreciatively.

Heero pulled back and turned her around. In her haste to arrive, Relena had completely overlooked the gorgeous view of the sea, sparkling crystal blue in the afternoon sun. "To the sea then?" he said.

Relena shook her head, then set it on his shoulder. "To home."

o0o

It was just a little more than five years later that Milliardo Peacecraft, Baron of London died of tuberculosis. Upon the discovery of the disease's presence, the baron had begun to keep a record of his life so that his children might have something to know him by. Preserved by his loving wife, this entry was discovered by his daughter on her eighteenth birthday. It was the last passage he ever wrote.

_Despite this troubling concern of my health which they are calling the "black lung," I continue to find joy in my life through my daughter Agatha, who is soon to turn six years old, and my son Christopher, just turned four. Both children are beautiful, and I could not have wished for any better._

_Luchrezia__ spoils them, of course. I suppose one of us has to and, being the darling she is, I'm not at all surprised. They deserve something a little extra considering how oft I am away at court these days. It appears the older aristocrats get the more work they have to do, rather than the other way around. Were I the smallest bit kindly toward the scoundrel, I would say that Treize was fortunate to pass it by, though he is passing it by in the London prison._

_Concerning the latest news, Quatre has been happily married a year tomorrow. I still find it quite amusing that he wedded Dorothy Catalonia; I have never known a woman to go from high status, to lowest, to highest once more. Her tale I hope will be recorded by her hand so that she may inspire women everywhere – however, I do _not _hope my daughter is among that group. At any rate, it seems my friend is much better off with a former piratess than with my sister._

_These days my mind has often turned to the subject of Relena. Since the day she sailed off without a goodbye, she has always been in some distant corner of my mind somewhere. I do not blame her, of course, for going without word that time; for I do believe I brought that upon myself as a result of earlier actions. In a slightly sad way, I have seen her no more than three times this past half-decade. But each time she reassures me through more than just words that she is impeccably happy. Her husband, the pirate Heero Yuy whom captains the debatably successful ship the _Ivory Damsel_, is a better man than I ever imagined to find Relena married to, despite his profession and view to the everyday Londoner's eye. Their latest visit was to let Luchrezia and I see her newborn son, my nephew Odin. He is a gorgeous baby. His eyes are much like Heero's, but his hair is Relena's soft gold. And while I hope the boy grows with his mother's charming personality, something tells me he will be just as wild as his father (which, I have come to see over the years, is not a bad thing)._

_Her happiness is secure, and that is all I can hope for and probably all that God will grant me. I am perfectly fine with this illness as well, as long as my family and those I care for remain safe and satisfied._

_To my wife, son and daughter – you have the love from the very bottom of my heart. Luchrezia, my sweetest, the time I have had with you proves that a man can most definitely live to the fullest. I never once have told you, and I do not believe I ever shall. Please do not think this was because I did not feel so strongly for you. In fact you, more than anyone, have helped me make sense of my haphazard life. My most precious wife…I love you. _

_To Quatre and Dorothy – may the world shine brightly and may God smile warmly for you. I have never had dearer friends._

_To Heero and Relena – you are both very close parts of my own self. Without either of you, I am sure I would be a man incomplete. Thank you for showing me that there is indeed more to life than titles and society. And please, Heero, take care of my sister as you would your own life; for she is the blessing I have had longest, and she is the one I have always been willing to touch the very stars for._

_God bless you and the Queen,_

_Milliardo__ F. Peacecraft, Baron _

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I'm sure a lot of you are wondering at my different-y ending, and how Milliardo's character seemed to develop all at once, but I've honestly had this planned since chapter one. I wanted to try something bold and unique, and I look forward to the feedback, whether it agrees or disagrees.

Any reviews anyone cares to leave are much appreciated. Please feel free to check out my other fics; I have many Gundam Wing ones. Currently running is my Cowboy Bebop fic, "Kites Without Strings" and very very soon I shall premiere my first Harry Potter fic, "Secrets Untold" here on FFN.

I'd love to hear from you all at any of these review inboxes. Thanks again for reading!

--GG


End file.

Gundam Wing/AC, Adventure, Romance