The sound of the door pulling shut behind him seemed to echo with a forlorn finality. Sitting in the middle of the big bed, she doubted that she had ever felt so alone in her life. Reaching down, she rubbed her hands softly against her still flat stomach, wishing she could have told him, wishing she could have stayed with him. “Just a little while longer,” she whispered to the life she carried inside. “A little longer and your daddy will take us all home.”

She knew she should get up. Shower, change her clothes, hide the T-shirt she now wore. She didn’t want to give up even that small piece of him, and with a sigh she decided not to. Not now, not for a little while at least. She could grant herself that much reprieve. Curling up in a small ball, she pulled the covers about her and tried to lose herself in the heady scent of him that still clung to her skin and clothes. Closing her eyes, she sought sleep, secure in the knowledge that he would come to her in her dreams. He would always come to her.

John stood in the hallway, unable to move. Even being this far away from her hurt and he could not imagine that days must pass before he would see her again. Before he would touch her again. The sound of boots echoed down the hall, and without giving it a second thought he stepped across the hall and wrenched open the door to Dimera’s room. Sidling into the darkened room, he pulled the door shut and listened to the footsteps as they marched past his hiding place.

“Who’s there?” a familiar voice called sharply.

“The tooth fairy, who do you think?” he shot back, somehow comforted by the old man’s presence. If there was anyone who could understand how he felt about leaving Marlena, it would be Stefano.

“Alexander?” a woman’s voice muttered groggily, causing John to freeze in his tracks.

“Uh, Vivian. I wasn’t expecting...” John trailed off awkwardly as Stefano flipped on the bedside lamp to reveal Vivian’s slender form curled possessively in his arms.

“Didn’t you teach the boy any manners?” Vivian asked peevishly, closing her eyes and resting her head on Stefano’s bare chest.

With a start, Stefano noted the time. Sitting up abruptly, he slapped a meaty hand against the ample rump that was barely covered by the thin white sheet. “Vivian, you have to go. It’s late, people will be about.”

Disentangling himself from her arms, he rose naked from the bed and crossed to the chair where his dressing gown had been carelessly tossed the night before.

“Five more minutes,” she muttered, snuggling against the pillow as he shrugged into the quilted gown and turned to face John.

“You should not be here, John. You should have been gone hours ago,” Stefano noted, shooting John a worried look.

Still standing before the closed door, John was finding it difficult to rip his eyes from the woman in the bed. “Uh...,” he muttered uncomfortably.

“It’s not like this is the first time you saw me with a woman in my bed,” Stefano noted dryly, moving to pour a glass of water from a pitcher on the table.

“Well I guess it was never my aunt before,” John replied, finally managing a shrug. “And she is a bit older than your usual.”

“Excuse me?” an irritated voice cut in, as Vivian finally cracked her eyelids open.

“What he meant was that, like fine wine, true beauty and complexity come to a woman only with the passage of time,” Stefano filled in smoothly, shooting a glare in John’s direction.

“Yea. That’s what I meant,” John said, blushing as he faced his aunt.

“Well, in that case...,” Vivian muttered, rising from the bed and wrapping the sheet around her, “You are forgiven.”

John watched as she stalked past him to the bathroom, slamming the door in a way that suggested he was far from forgiven. With a rueful shrug, he glanced back at Dimera. “Sorry. Just wasn’t expecting...”

Waving his hand dismissively, Stefano sank down into one of the chairs at the small table. “She will get over it. Come sit down. Tell me what went wrong. I’ll assume you weren’t discovered or I would have heard the alarms by now?”

Moving to the chair opposite Dimera, John rubbed a hand across his tired eyes. “She wouldn’t leave. When she found out Mikos still had the children, she wouldn’t leave.”

“I told you she wouldn’t leave without the children. You should know her better than that,” was the unsympathetic response.

“Thank you. ‘I told you so,’ is such a helpful analysis,” John answered in irritation. When Stefano only cocked one eyebrow and waited for him to continue, he let loose a small sigh. “I did not plan on giving her a choice, Stefano. My primary concern was not her preference on the matter.”

“So what stopped you?”

“I’m not very good at saying ‘no’ to her,” was the rueful answer.

Chuckling, Stefano leaned back in his seat and studied the man before him. All of that training, all of those years of death and destruction, and never a hint of remorse. All of that destroyed by the simple touch of a woman’s hand. “I have noticed that flaw in you,” he finally replied.

Rolling his eyes at the patronizing response, John said simply, “She was right, and you know it. With her gone, Mikos probably would have taken it out on the children. I knew it, I just.... Stefano, Mikos worries me. The longer she is left with him.... I don’t know what I would do if something happened to her. She is my life, Stefano.”

“I know she is,” Stefano said softly. “But.... The children. What did Marlena tell you of her children?” Dark eyes searched John’s face, looking for some hint that he knew of Marlena’s pregnancy. Some hint that he knew that she carried his child.

The broad shoulders merely shrugged. “She knew less than Vivian. She didn’t even realize that Mikos still had the kids until I told her. Last she heard, Mikos had shipped them off to parts unknown.”

“Mmm,” Dimera grunted, nodding sympathetically. Marlena was no fool. She recognized what the news of the pregnancy would do to John. She knew he would have never let her return to Mikos carrying such a fragile little life within her. Briefly, Stefano wondered what John would have done to protect all of his children if he had known Marlena was pregnant. He already knew the answer to that. The man would have stormed the castle and he wouldn’t have stopped until Mikos lay cold and lifeless at his feet. That he would have succeeded, Dimera had no doubt. That he would have died in the effort would have been beside the point to him. With a small grin, Stefano gave homage to the wisdom of the woman he had so long coveted.

“So what do you do now?” Dimera asked, his attention again shifting to John.

“I wait,” was the muted response. “Marlena thinks we will have our chance at the masked ball this weekend. She’s certain that Mikos will bring the children back for it, if only to ensure her cooperation in the announcement of their ‘wedding’,” he concluded, spitting the word out like a curse.

“She’s probably right, you know,” Stefano replied, trying to temper the anger that flashed behind those blue eyes.

“Yea, I know she’s right. She usually is,” John answered, softening his tone. “It’s just...”

He trailed off as Vivian swept back into the bedroom, her hair and make-up the image of perfection and only the wrinkles in her dress giving the slightest hint that she was still wearing the same clothes from the night before.

“Stefano, it was a lovely evening until we were so rudely interrupted,” she said, shooting a nasty look in John’s direction.

“It was my pleasure, truly,” he responded with a smile, giving her a brief nod of his head.

Vivian ignored John completely, holding herself very straight as she made her way out the door. Her nephew might be a bit of a pig, but she wanted to make certain that he did not delude himself into believing he had chased her out of Dimera’s room.

As the door pulled softly shut, Stefano gave into a soft chuckle. “Your aunt is a very intriguing woman, John.”

With a shrug, John dismissed her. “I’m not interested in my aunt, Stefano. I’m interested in my brother,” he stated flatly.

Watching him closely, Stefano knew there was more that he wanted to say. It was almost as if he were ashamed, or even afraid, to do so. In all of the years Dimera had known the man, he had never known him to be phased by anything. Only Marlena had managed to crack that thick shell, only she had been able to drive John to uncertainty or hesitation. On the eve of the coming war, it was not a trait he wished to see emerge. “What about your brother, John?” he prodded, intent on making John face any issues he had with his family now rather than in the heat of battle.

Irritated by Dimera’s intrusion into a subject he would just as soon ignore, John gave vent to a long sigh and rubbed his hands against the back of his neck. He needed Stefano’s insight, even if he didn’t like the fact. Dimera had met the man, that he would have dissected his personality was a certainty. Shaking his head in frustration, he approached the issue obliquely. “I saw a picture of him. In Marlena’s room, there’s a painting of him. He looks like me, a lot like me,” he said, watching Stefano from beneath his brow.

Uncertain of John’s point, Dimera simply nodded. “There is a family resemblance, yes.”

Shrugging uncomfortable, John rose to his feet and began slowly pacing the floor. “Marlena said, she said we were nothing alike. But… I could see it.... What do you think would have happened to me if I had never met you?” He asked, coming to a sudden halt in the center of the room and fixing his eyes on Dimera’s face.

Startled by the abrupt change in topic, Stefano took a moment to gather his thoughts. To try to figure out the reason behind John’s question. “Well, you were very young to be out on your own,” he said carefully. “I’m not sure you would have survived. If you had, most likely you would have spent some time in jail. You are just a little too… proud. On the streets, by yourself… that would have caused you trouble.”

“So you think I would have ended up some low level hood?” John asked, no hint of insult in his voice.

Stefano chuckled. “No, not you. If you had managed to grow up on your own, I have no doubt you would have become a powerful force in whatever you chose to do. It’s very likely you would have eventually ended up as one of my competitors!” With a fond smile, he looked over the man who for so long had been his strong right arm. He would not have wanted to face him as a rival. Few men would. One of the smartest moves he had ever made was to bring the boy home with him, and he hadn’t even known it at the time.

As he watched, Dimera again thought he saw a flicker of shame in those blue eyes.

“So, you don’t think I might have grown up to be a lawyer or an accountant or a cop or something?”

He could not help the spasm of laughter that erupted at John’s question, even though he knew it was the exact wrong thing to do at this point. Shaking his head ruefully, he gave an honest response. “Do you think that, John? Do you really?”

His fists clenched in irritation, but John forced himself to walk back over and sit opposite Dimera. Finding himself unable to meet Stefano’s gaze, he dropped his eyes to study the top of the table. Very softly, he said, “I’ve always been… angry. You know that. Know how my temper is, or maybe just my temperament. Always. Always it has burned inside me, this need to fight. To destroy. I thought it was because of how I grew up. First my… my foster father. Then you...”

“John,” Stefano tried to cut in.

“No! No, jeesh, I’m not blaming you, Stefano. Really. I was already screwed up before I ever met you. Just, well, you didn’t exactly expose me to much that would have ‘gentled’ those existing tendencies, shall we say,” he finished, finally managing to shoot Stefano a reassuring grin, even if it was half-hearted.

With a grudging nod, Stefano acknowledged the accuracy of the statement. “You’ve never discussed your childhood, John. But no, no one would ever accuse me of doing much more than curbing your wildest excesses.”

“Yea, well there’s nothing you need to know about my childhood. Just that, I thought it might make sense of who I am. Of how I am. But Mikos.... Mikos is just like me, isn’t he? It’s something in the blood.”

Ah, there it was, Dimera thought. Ever since Marlena’s intrusion in his life, John had been confronted with the difference between the man he had been as Roman Brady and the man he truly was. Apparently it was a difference he was uncomfortable with. “Why do you even care, John?” Dimera asked in a cold voice. “What difference could it possibly make if you were born to be a warrior of if you were taught to be one?”

Almost as if ashamed, John again dropped his eyes. “I thought I could change,” he said softly. “I thought if I wanted to bad enough, I could change.”

“Change? Into what?!” Dimera exploded, completely surprised by the comment. “You are not going to sit there, wearing my ring, may I add, and tell me that you want to run off and become an accountant!”

“Fuck you!” John spat, jerking back from the table. “I knew you would never understand this! Why the hell do I bother...”

He watched the tense man pace, anger evident in every long stride he took. Dimera had no doubt that if he approached him, John would swing on him. “Yes, this is most definitely the reaction of an ‘accountant’,” he retorted dryly.

John merely shot him an ugly look and allowed his suddenly tired body to sink back against the bed.

“I asked her to marry me,” he finally stated, staring Dimera in the eye. Daring him to make an issue of it.

Stefano shrugged. “And I assume she said ‘yes’. So what?”

“So I thought we could go home. I thought I could give her some kind of normal life. A few guards, a good security system, but basically a life like we used to have. A life with a normal guy for a husband. A guy who isn’t constantly about to snap, to lash out, to hurt people. A guy who would never hurt the people he loves. I thought I could give her a husband who is nothing like Mikos Alamain!”

And there it was, the fear that lay beneath the anger. A fear that Dimera could understand. For a long moment, Stefano simply studied the man who sat on the bed. John had put his life on the line for him, too many times to count. The least he could do was give him some peace of mind. And so Dimera told him what he needed to hear. “You are nothing like Mikos, John. Marlena was right. There is nothing of him in you, nothing you need to fear. You act. You do what needs to be done. But there is nothing of cruelty, nothing of spite in what you do.”

John simply looked down, watching his hands as they formed into fists. Seeing the blood that had stained them, time after time after time. Remembering the feelings as he had ended men’s lives, snuffing them out as if they were mere annoyances. His head began to pound, the pain causing him to clench his eyes tight shut. Softly, he replied, “We both know that’s a lie, don’t we.”

“John...,” Stefano tried to interject. John cut him off with a shake of his head.

“Look, I’m going to crash out here today” he said tiredly, changing the subject. “I just want to be near her and there are too damn many guards floating around to leave now anyway. Tonight I’ll go back to the cavern and contact Bo. See if there is any word on the children, start making arrangements for the night of the ball. I want to be certain that there are no mistakes this time. This time, everybody gets out. Everybody goes home.”

With a brief nod, Dimera let the issue drop. “We all go home. That’s all that matters, John. Remember that.”

Two days. Two whole days since Mikos had locked her away in this room. Almost that long since she had last seen John, since she had last seen anybody. She wondered how long it would take for such isolation to drive a person mad. In her case, she would guess not long at all.

Pacing the floor for what seemed the millionth time, she tried to ignore the rumbling in her stomach. Tried to ignore the fact that it had been two days since she had eaten. Tried to ignore what that could do to her unborn child.

When she heard the key rattle in the lock, she almost dismissed it as a hallucination. By the time she recognized that it was real, he was already standing there. She had thought anyone’s company, even Mikos’, would be preferable to being alone. Seeing him standing in the doorway, watching her with those possessive eyes, she realized that she had been wrong.

“Did you miss me?” He asked, that familiar mocking smile curving his lips.

She bit back the retort that sprang to her lips. Now was not the time to inflame him. Now was the time to set him up. Allowing the fear she felt to show in her eyes, she hesitantly replied. “I… I don’t want to be alone anymore, Mikos. Please? I promise I won’t do anything more to… to displease you. Maybe I could come down for dinner with you tonight? Please?”

He chuckled lightly, pleased at this sign that he knew her so very well. She might not have been banging on the door, begging for him to release her, but this was not far from it. “If I had known how much you missed me, I would have come for you sooner, Marlena. And yes, I would be delighted with your presence at dinner,” he responded with false gallantry.

Stepping close, he took her cool hand in his own. Studying her face, he noted the hollows around her eyes, the quiver in her body. Oh yes, now was most definitely the time. She would do whatever he told her to do. Raising her hand slowly to his lips, he planted a dry kiss on the back of her hand. “We have to finalize the plans for our engagement party, after all. I am certain that you will have many ideas of how we make the evening… special.”

He felt her stiffen in his grip and for a moment wondered if she could still muster the strength to resist him. And then his question was answered.

“Of course, Mikos,” she replied faintly. “Though I am sure that whatever you have planned will be more than I could ever hope for.”

He could not help the triumphant smile that split his face. She was no different from any other woman. Perhaps a little stronger, a little more intelligent, but in the end, she was no match for him. With a half bow, he said smoothly, “Then I will see you for dinner in one hour. Formal dress, of course.”

His confidence would have been severely shaken had he seen the look in her eyes as he turned and walked away. Marlena was very careful that he didn’t.

“Bo, I need those men here and I need them now!” John snapped into the mike of the two-way radio.

“John, the roads are still blocked from that snowstorm last night. It’s too damn far to take the snowmobiles from here. They don’t have the fuel capacity to make it in, and we don’t have the room or the equipment to carry extra fuel. Look, we’ve got plows clearing the road now. I have bribed every official I can find and the road through the mountains is their first priority. That’s all we can do, dammit!” Bo’s voice cracked out, his frustration evident.

With a muted sigh John shook his head and tried to reign in his impatience. “How long till you get here?” he asked more calmly.

“ETA to the cave is 12 hours. That puts us in sometime after four a.m. if we bust our asses and nothing else goes wrong. John, you need to hold off until we get there! Do you read me?”

“Bo, the ball starts in less than four hours. There is no way I can wait for you. I already explained this! Vivian brought word from Marlena, she forced him into bringing the children back, but only for a brief appearance. He’s planning on spiriting them off the premises at the end of the ball. That means midnight at the latest and there is no way you will be here by then. I’m not losing this opportunity, Bo. I go in with or without you, you’ll just have to get here as fast as you can.”

“John, if we can’t get in, they can’t get out. You need to wait or you’re going to blow this!”

Gritting his teeth in frustration, John gave an irritated shake of his head. “They’re landing choppers in a field near the town. The snow on the ground isn’t going to make a bit of difference to them Bo. I’m not waiting, and that’s final. Dimera’s here if I need backup. That will have to be enough.”

“Yea! Dimera! That’s very comforting, John!” Even through the crackle of the static, Bo’s sarcasm still managed to come through, loud and clear. “Look, if they are landing choppers, why don’t we?”

“Then we are back to a frontal assault, Bo. The whole point of this exercise was to avoid that! Shit, if there was another way don’t you think I would take it! Look, I got the equipment you dropped yesterday. The tunnels are already wired. All I have to do is get Marlena and the kids down to the cave and then I’ll blow the tunnels. Once we are all down here, there is no way in hell Mikos can reach us. We’ll soak our bunions in the hot springs and wait for your sorry ass to show. Now unless you’ve got any better idea, I’ve got work to do!”

“Um, we could hold off, John. Wait for a better chance? Try to track the kids when Mikos sends them away?”

“She’s not staying here another night, Bo. It’s been too long as it is. I won’t let her put herself at risk any longer. The discussion is closed,” John stated flatly, his tone brooking no dissent.

For a long moment, the only sound from the radio was the white noise of the static. Finally, Bo’s voice cracked out faintly across the airwaves. “Roger that. We’ll be there when we get there. John… be careful.”

“See you soon,” was the tight reply. “Over and out.”

For long moments he simply stood, staring at the radio and trying to resist the urge to smash it. Finally, he allowed the mouthpiece to fall from his hand. Damn! He needed Bo, he needed his men. The plan could not be carried out with just him and Dimera, there was no way in hell. The masked ball would have provided ample opportunity to sneak his people in among the revelers, blanketing Marlena and the children with a protective wall and rushing them out of the hall before Mikos and his security team even knew what had hit them. Two men simply couldn’t do it. Two men would have to do it.

Turning his mind from problems he couldn’t solve, he tried to focus on the night ahead. Digging through the stack of equipment, he finally found the package Jensen had included for him in the airdrop the night before. He distractedly pulled the costume from the confines of the dry bag, willing the minutes to tick by faster. Waiting was too damn hard. Waiting while she was left to deal with the desires of a madman. A man who wanted nothing more than to possess her. God, he should never let her return to the castle. He should have found some other way to reach the children. His failure put her at risk, and if any wrong was done her, the fault would be his. He should have never let her go.

He could feel the hollow thud of his heart against his ribs, and forced himself to be patient. There was no point in hurrying, he had hours before the start of the ball. An hour at least before he could begin to pick his way down the long tunnel, checking the wiring on the C4 explosives as he went. He doubted the blast would bring down the castle itself, but it would sure as hell collapse the tunnels. Mikos would definitely know his brother had come calling, not that John planned on leaving him alive to contemplate the issue.

His thoughts elsewhere, he shook out the rolled up clothes, wondering how on earth Jensen came up with this stuff. He had sent word to Marlena that he would be dressed as a hunter, a bird’s mask covering his face. He had left the details up to Jensen’s imagination, requesting only that he include a cape. He could hide an arsenal beneath the flowing material of a full-length cape, and it would fit right in with the medieval theme. With a smile at the thought, John considered the wisdom of carrying a sawed off shotgun strapped to his back when he went in. His internal debate over weaponry died as the clothes unrolled themselves and a bundled mound of feathers fell to the floor. For a moment, John simply stood, staring at the garment in his hands. A pair of black leather pants stared back at him. A pair of black leather pants that looked really tight. Holy Jesus, he was going to look like a pimp. The knee-high black riding boots that had dropped to the floor were no improvement. Muttering a curse, he decided to put out a contract on Jensen at the next available opportunity.

What was Marlena going to think when she saw him like this? A grin crept across his face and he couldn’t help a faint chuckle. Who was he kidding, she was going to love this. With an exasperated sigh, he sat down and began trying to tug the pants up past his knees. With a grim irony, he decided that maybe this was a good sign. No way in hell was he going to die dressed like this- not even the Gods could be so cruel.

-----