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Gundam Wing and its characters are copyrighted to Sunrise, etc.
Mirror MirrorBy Katanashi (Inazuma@cephiro.com)
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Quatre watched them-- all four. Not for a short amount of time, but for extended periods.
Watching wasn't an action he was accustomed to. He didn't consider himself shy, nor cautious. He was outwardly a kind soul, and certainly looked the part with wide, trusting eyes and an endearing sweetness to him.
So why was he so on the guard every time he looked at anyone? Was he afraid that they would see into the cerulean depths and find that the sweetness, the eyes, everything was all a mask? A mask to hide the scars of war, of the terrible times that he'd seen and that he'd never bestow upon anyone, no matter how terrible.
He avoided mirrors whenever he could, without seeming to act too oddly. Mirrors frightened him; they alone, it seemed, were the only ones who could truly see him for who he was. They could see the inner demons that he harbored within, the regretful sadness that threatened to eat him alive every mission that he went on, for he knew ahead of time that somebody's soul would be on the way to heaven or hell, if either one existed, when he headed back on that same path.
Privately he wondered who made him this way. Who gave him this power. The obvious answer was Dr. H; after all, he had designed and built Sandrock, and Quatre was more than willing to admit that his power would be close to zilch without Sandrock compared to now. It was Sandrock's explosive capabilities for combat and flight that made him so powerful, that gave him the lives-- the very fate-- of thousands of people every day. But he also knew that there was more to that answer, much more. He also had a feeling that even if he did know, he'd never understand it.
It was the same with all four of the others. All five of them. They all had their own ways of keeping their inner demons reasonably appeased.
His eyes strayed to Trowa. To Quatre, Trowa was the ultimate enigma, an incredible puzzle that would never be fully put together, yet was intriguing enough so that the perosn would be compelled to keep trying for an infinete amount of time. Trowa Barton was not even his real name, but one that had been assumed. The identity of Trowa Barton had shifted along with the assimilation until "Trowa Barton" now referred to the slender Heavyarms pilot with gravity-defying hair. Tall, quiet, and always exuding a mysterious air about him, Trowa seemed to never smile. It was rare whenever his face changed expression at all, so thoroughly were his expressionless faces perfected. But underneath, Trowa was still a person, a human being. It would take time for that person to be revealed. Quatre was content to be patient and let time do the work for him. It would be for the best, for time was the gentlest method.
A chuckle escaped his lips as he watched Duo scampering away from a drenched Heero. From the latter's controlled movement and set expression, it was easy to imagine what kind of person Heero was. The creativeness came from trying to determine who Heero could have been, had he not been raised as a machine and as a child instead. Heero Yuy, again, was not Heero's true name, but the name had become attatched to his identity. But unlike Trowa, Heero had never had a name. In a way, Quatre found that to be the saddest aspect of war. Heero had lost so much already, far more than anyone else in the war. What could possibly compare to losing your soul, your very self? There was not a flicker of life apparent in anything, not even in his neat, precise handwriting-- it would be difficult to tell Heero's handwriting apart from a computer at times. But Quatre could see that Heero had changed as well; sparks sometimes appeared in his eyes, a distinct, malevolently playful glint that wasn't quite cruel, but something gentler.
Quatre's train of thought was broken by a sudden splash of water, a muffled curse and laugh mixed into one, and the pattering of feet running away.
"Kisama! Maxwell, get back over here!" Wufei bellowed, chasing after Duo. Water had thoroughly drenched his shirt, making the dark blue fabric seem black in every way. Several wet sploches also marked his pants. Despite himself, Quatre found Wufei's ability to keep his mostly white clothes clean absolutely fascinating. Day after day, his clothes were stain free and spotless. Quatre would have loved to find out what kind of detergent Wufei used.
Wufei was different than all of them. He was seventeen like the rest of them, but he seemed so much older, like a man. The war had hardened them all, but Wufei had entered the war hardened. He remembered the day they had been tricked into starting the war against the colonies, when they had shot down the OZ shuttle. Five different reactions with a variety of emotions mixed in-- shock, disbelief, anger, indigation, just to name a few-- but Wufei's acrid response had driven itself into Quatre's mind permanently. Heero was cold and unfeeling, but Wufei was driven by a bitter ice-like rage.
His eyes strayed to the laughing culprit of all the wasted water. Apparently Duo didn't realize what a precious commodity water was in the desert. Then again, Quatre reflected, he didn't really need to worry about it, since he was wealthy enough to do just about anything he wanted. Duo didn't seem to have any masks. Flippant, easy-going, and cheerful to the point of fault, Duo's eyes were always dancing with laughter. He made a joke out of everything, even fighting with his Gundam. With a smile on his face, he'd call, "Shinigami's back from hell!". But that was only scraping the surface. Duo turned everything into a joke to escape the harsh reality. He knew it, he accepted it, but he didn't have to like it. Naturally Duo was a jokester and as lively as anyone, but to hide himself from people, that part was expanded so that the light-hearted part of him was all that showed. Sometimes, Quatre could see the shadows in Duo's eyes, through the flippantness. Mixed with grief and confusion, Duo's eyes were a mirror reflection of himself.
Quatre's face twisted into a slight frown. Who was he? Who was the person who stared back at him every morning in the mirror? Of course he could see the shadows lurking in the back of his eyes, but that was because he knew himself. He couldn't always see them in the other pilot's eyes-- then again, did Heero ever see them?
No, Dr. H did not give him the power to kill, to destroy, to wreak havoc as he saw fit. He gave himself that power. If he hadn't wanted to fight in the first place, would he have? He was a trained assassin, a person who knew how to fight and kill efficiently. You didn't kill if you didn't want to, unless it was due to self-defense. Was there something weighing on his heart every morning? Was there guilt lingering in his mind? Some, perhaps. He could find no way to truly justify the bloodshed. And he could feel the blood of the people who had died by his hand corroding his heart.
Children of war. He'd heard that term before. People born in a place of constant warfare, of intrigue and death surrounding them like smoke in a fire. It had been said that being in that situation scarred them forever.
But they're wrong, he thought. He shook his head slightly. True children of war weren't born in a war, but of a war. People such as themselves. They were still children; he readily admitted that. Not even adults by human standards, they had seen far more and been through so much more than an ordinary person would have. Children born in a war had no choice on the matter, but they had. They could have chosen not to fight. But they fought anyway.
Quatre's eyes closed in pain. They had burned all the bridges behind them already. There was no turning back. They were Gundam pilots with incredible mechanisms, but when it came right down to the truth, all they were were murderers. They might be called soldiers, the true victims of the war, but what would explain the blood that covered their hands, the terrible suffering they inflicted upon others? To Quatre, there was nothing more precious than human life-- his mother's death to bring him into the world only strengthened what he had originally believed in-- but he took lives almost without abandon, determined only to fulfill the mission and bring peace.
Then again, what peace could war bring? Quatre shook his head again, desperately wanting to stop his brooding. It wouldn't help him; it would only weigh him down with grief, grief that could easily result in death for him, and for his friends, if he allowed to affect him to the point of carelessness in the next mission.
If and when they died, no one would weep for them. The five doctors could care less; the five pilots were mere tools to them. Certainly the remaining OZ would rejoice. Relena would probably mourn over Heero, but Quatre could tell that it was a simple infatuation, a curiosity, that Relena called love. Relena was terribly inexperienced and naïve. She had never had much outside exposure, and her fascination with Heero was because he was something completely different than anything she'd ever known.
No, when they died, no human would be there to genuinely mourn their passing. Only Mother Nature, with rain as her tears, would cry for them. Even if one or more of them survived, they were incapable of crying over a death when they were the very executors of the taking of life.
To Quatre, that was the worst aspect of the war. They were lost. They had lost even themselves. He had once heard a quote that said, "Those who are truly lost have lost everything, including themselves." He knew, without a doubt, that it applied directly to them. When one couldn't look into a mirror without dread, or tried to close himself or herself off from the rest of the world, then they were lost.
Quatre buried his face in his hands. He had once thought that fighting to protect his loved ones was enough justification for the war. But war only brought sorrow, and in doing so he had taken other people's loved ones away from them. Now, he knew he had lost something even more-- he had lost himself. What was the justification in war?
Quatre could find none.
It wasn't the mirror that frightened him. It was what he saw in the mirror that caused him to shiver everytime he looked.
Author's notes: Hmm…that doesn't really sound like Quatre, does it? Sorry.
Comments and feedback are greatly appreciated.
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