Trowa enters the workroom quietly. Heero does not appreciate distractions. But then, neither does Heero like to be surprised. So Trowa allows his shoes to make a tiny bit of noise against the cement floor. He ducks under a pipe and navigates around a large stack of boxes. It's fairly dark, but he knows his way around this basement. They've been working out of it for three weeks now. Besides, he is not the type to trip over things.

Heero is seated at a computer, facing away from Trowa, bathed in bluish light from the screen. He is slumped, though, and still. The incessant clicking of keys has stopped after nearly twenty-four hours.

Trowa soundlessly approaches him, walking around so that he can see his face.

Heero's head is tilted, and his unruly hair obscures his face. Trowa drops down on one knee to look under the hair. Heero's eyes are shut, and his face is relaxed in sleep. He breathes slowly and evenly. His lips are barely parted, and occasionally he exhales through them. One arm is angled across a narrow armrest, and the other lies in his lap, the fingers curled. Trowa's gaze shifts from his face to his bare arms, soft-looking without the tension that usually fills the slight body. His eyes linger on the curve of the shoulders and the complexity of the hands. Heero looks eerily beautiful in the blue artificial light of the computer screen. Like something out of an old black and white TV movie.

Abruptly the light winks out as a screen saver kicks in. Trowa stands up. What should he do? Heero would get a better rest lying in bed, but if awakened he'll insist on forcing himself to continue working. After all, the mission is scheduled to begin at noon tomorrow. If Trowa tries to carry Heero to bed, surely he'll wake up immediately. But Heero must be exhausted after twenty-four hours of this. He has to get some sleep or the mission will be jeopardized.

Trowa gently presses a button on the front of the computer and the disk ejects with a barely perceptible click. Slowly, silently, he pulls it out and carries it across the room, where he hides it by shoving it under a stack of newspapers. Then he returns to Heero. He slides one arm under Heero's arm and behind his back. His other arm slips under his knees. Trowa lifts him from the chair cautiously but easily. He is used to supporting his own weight on one hand for his circus tricks, and Heero doesn't weigh as much as he does.

He stands, holding Heero and looking down at him. It seems incredible that Heero, with his reflexes and his survival instinct and his lifetime of training, does not wake up. But his chest continues to rise and fall in slow rhythm, his muscles do not tense up, and his eyelashes do not so much as flutter. Is he faking it, for some reason? Or does he subconsciously recognize Trowa? Does he trust him this much?

Trowa carries him over to the bed, actually just a stained mattress on the dirty floor. They haven't gone to the trouble of putting sheets on it. He lowers Heero gently and places him on the mattress. Still Heero doesn't open his eyes. Trowa thinks that he would really like to see those eyes right now. But all he does is pull an old quilt up to cover the bare arms and legs. Now he is sure those blue eyes will snap open. But they don't. Heero must be truly exhausted.

Well, as long as he's not going to wake up, thinks Trowa, kissing Heero on the mouth.

It's a short kiss, light and almost businesslike. He sinks to his knees. Suddenly he can't even support his own weight. What has he done? Heero's eyes are still shut, but his head turns slightly. Trowa leans back over him, hands sinking into the mattress on either side of his head, and touches his mouth to Heero's again. He's trying to analyze what just happened.

This time he does not pull away, and neither does Heero, though he must be awake by now. Heero moves slightly, and makes a little noise between a sigh and a moan. Trowa kisses his lower lip and then his upper one. He touches them with the tip of his tongue. He takes his mouth away and lays a finger in the center of Heero's bottom lip, denting it. He licks the ball of his thumb, then traces Heero's mouth with it.

"Heero," he whispers.

Heero blinks, looking dazed. After a moment, he pushes himself up to a sitting position and his eyes turn warily on Trowa, who backs off the mattress. Heero shoves the quilt aside.

"How much time do we have left?"

"Thirteen hours," replies Trowa.

"I'm going to finish configuring the new-"

Trowa shoves him back down onto the mattress and holds him there, his hands on Heero's chest. He can feel warmth through the tank top. Does that mean his hands feel cold to Heero? "You've done enough. If you don't rest, you'll be a wreck for the mission."

Heero regards him with an iron stare. "Get off me."

"I hid the disk."

Heero brings his arm back and Trowa does not duck away. His hand smacks hard and loud across Trowa's face. A warning.

"Get off me," he repeats in his low, quiet voice.

The side of Trowa's face is hot. It's like he can feel Heero's hand on his cheek even though Heero isn't touching him any more. He moves suddenly to fall down on top of Heero and wrap his arms around him. Heero fights back, bucking and twisting and trying to get his arms free. He has become a wild animal. Trowa closes his eyes and concentrates on the feel of Heero's body moving against his own. It feels much better than he imagined it would. He lets his guard down a little. Now one arm has gotten loose and Heero curls his fingers into a fist. Trowa grabs Heero's wrist and kisses the clenched fingers and the knuckles with the skin stretched tightly across them. The fist relaxes into just a hand again. Heero is staring up at Trowa.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"I don't know," says Trowa, following Heero's words back to their source and kissing his mouth as if that would explain it to both of them.

Heero fights back some more, but it's different now. Maybe the purpose has changed. Maybe he too likes the way it feels to collide and rub against Trowa's body. They roll over, struggling, and Heero is now on top. They are still kissing. Trowa is startled to feel Heero's tongue inside his mouth. Then Heero sits back. He is kneeling with Trowa under him between his knees. Abruptly he sways, and collapses back onto the mattress.

Trowa strokes his cheek and feels for the pulse at his throat. "Are you alright?"

Heero rubs at his forehead. "I'm tired... Everything's buzzing. My head... my body... I feel dizzy."

He looks so vulnerable. Trowa kisses him again, and runs his hands lightly over his body. Heero just sighs. Trowa turns him over onto his stomach, pulls off the tank top, and massages his back. He's not very good at it, because he's never done it before, but he gives it his best attempt. Heero relaxes a little. Funny, thinks Trowa, if he weren't so dead tired, this would probably make him more tense, not less. He keeps rubbing Heero's back, and the back of his thighs, wondering if he can get him to go to sleep.

Instead, he seems to become more restless, shifting and stretching against the mattress, and against Trowa's hands.

"Just do it," says Heero.

"Do what?" asks Trowa, stopping his massage and turning Heero onto his back again. He can make out Heero's face in the darkness, frowning at him.

Heero takes Trowa's hand and pulls it down to touch the front of his shorts. "Rock me to sleep," he says.

Trowa gazes down at him a long moment, his breath coming faster, and then he nods.

*************

Noin checks her watch. Five to eleven. The mission isn't scheduled to start for an hour yet. But maybe there's some last minute work she can help with. She turns down the alley and drags a couple of garbage cans away from the entrance. She knows the combination to open the lock, having been here twice before. She opens the door and takes a few steps down the stairs towards the basement.

"Heero? Trowa?" she calls softly.

There's no reply. Strange. They must not be here. Noin locks the door behind her and makes her way down the rickety stairs. She walks through the little kitchen area and around some stacks of boxes. The computer is on, the chair before it empty. The screen is blank, but when she pushes a key, some schematics come up that she recognizes. Heero has overlaid his own data, and she nods in appreciation at his clever responses to the defense limitations of the Mobile Suits they are to pilot today.

Noin rounds another corner, and almost stumbles upon the mattress. She's startled, to say the least. Her eyes widen. She had thought no one was home, but here are Trowa and Heero lying together under a dirty quilt. They are tangled up in each other. Their faces and bare legs are washed in weak sunlight that has filtered through a grimy windowpane.

A lump rises in her throat. They look so sweet and peaceful together, Trowa sprawled across Heero with his fingers tangled in Heero's dark tousled hair, Heero's arm flung carelessly around Trowa's neck. She has worried about them so much, concerned that with their cold, solitary personalities and their violent lives, they'd never find happiness or even basic human comfort. But it seems that they have. She backs away, not wanting to intrude.

Heero must have heard her sharp intake of breath. He is suddenly sitting up, cold eyes fastened on her, holding a gun out at arm's length. The peaceful tableau is shattered. He recognizes her and lowers the gun slowly. Trowa untangles himself from Heero and sits up too.

"Noin," acknowledges Trowa, flashing his serious green eyes at her and running a hand through his hair to smooth it back into place. He glances at the little clock radio beside the mattress.

"I'm early. We have an hour yet." She aims her gaze at a crack in the wall, feeling awkward at intruding on their privacy.

Heero reaches for his clothes. "I have to finish configuring the Mobile Suit defenses."

Trowa closes his fingers around Heero's wrist. "You've done enough. Why do you care so much this time? I don't remember you ever caring about your own life before."

Heero shakes him off. "How do you know what I care about?" he asks angrily, blushing a little.

"You're concerned about me?" demands Trowa, seeming taken aback.

Noin smiles. "How about if I go make some lunch. Or breakfast, as the case may be." She leaves them to each other for a little while longer, and goes into the kitchen to start the coffee. She can hear their voices over her slight clattering.

"Just how bad a pilot do you think I am?" Trowa inquires.

"You're good, but you're not invulnerable."

There's no conversation for a while, but only the sound of clothes being pulled on. Or something. Noin takes three chipped coffee mugs down from a shelf.

"Did you sleep well?" Trowa asks. Noin detects a trace of suppressed humor in the question.

"Yes. Now where's the disk?" Heero demands.

There's a moment of silence, then the sounds of struggle.

"We don't have time for this," comes Heero's accusing voice.

Noin pulls out a mixing bowl and begins to stir up some pancake mix as the smell of freshly percolating coffee wafts pleasantly around the kitchen. She pauses a moment to listen. There appears to be another struggle going on around the corner, and unlikely as it seems, she could almost swear she hears Heero laughing.