Disclaimer: Gundam Wing is not mine. I make no money from this. Please don't sue.

Author's Notes: Yes, another one. I can't help it. If anyone knows any good Mariemaia fics, point me towards them!

Unredeemable

by Bryony

Mariemaia walked to school every day. It was a point with her. It was a matter of power, and she made sure to settle matters of power in her favor whenever possible. She was not, as some had feared she would be, a bully. Nor was she a weakling. She was sixteen -- the same age as those pilots when they had defeated her, humiliating and ruining her in the process. She was old enough, now, to understand that and many other things, although she had been acting on this understanding since well before she knew it.

No one had ever punished her for what she did. She had been too young to be accountable, had been the consensus of the governors. Manipulated by her grandfather. A foolish little girl, a child, practically still an infant. Shot and nearly crippled, her life was bound to be difficult enough without sentencing from them, they had decided. For the angry civilians who had lost in her war, who kept vengeful watch for her first mistake, Mariemaia funded charities, showed off her rehabilitation into polite society, and played at the young royal that she once almost was. No one was satisfied: even when younger, her classmates had sensed her difference from them and were afraid; now old enough to know what separated them, it was considered unseemly to approach her. Her professors and tutors were intimidated by her very presence. Aloof and alone and apart, she thought she understood how the great soldiers felt in their war, ten short-long years ago. And she would be sure to pull through with at least as much grace as they had done.

There were no eyes these days on nameless soldiers; those men were free to thrive or succumb to their crimes with all their privacy intact. But she was one of those the world would always watch, and so she gave herself no choice, no freedom. Resentment might prickle along her spine at the suspicious, frightened eyes, but it never showed in her cold, proud face, which never failed to meet the world.

But Mariemaia dreamed as she walked. She imagined herself scuffing her feet against the ground and kicking up clouds of sand and dust. She imagined that dirt settling against the polish of her shiny black shoes and against her pristine white stockings. Grimy, dirty, imperfect. Filth clinging to her, coating her hair and her skin, crawling up her nose and down her throat. This was unacceptable, of course, but it was her daydream, although she would never let it come true. Khushrenada blood flowed in her veins; their lineage was hers. She was old enough, now, to understand that and everything. She would hold her head high and bear herself proudly in this world that dared not forget and dared not forgive; she would not disgrace the dead. Never again.

Please Father, she prayed, do not be ashamed of me.

She dared not say the name, not even in her thoughts, but he was with her always, all knowing and all powerful. He bound her to her course. At sixteen, Mariemaia was old enough at last to be repentant and held punishable for her sins. She was, in fact, determined to be so. That was why she clung so closely to the two people who demanded her responsibility, even if one was only in her thoughts. It was by the one that she knew what she had to do, and it would be by the other that she would know when she had done enough.

In a way, Mariemaia knew that she was surrounded by others pursuing the same path. The Preventers was clogged with people determined to forge their futures out of the bitter stuff of their pasts and their dead. Despite this, there was a certain strangeness for Mariemaia even here. People were hesitant to recognize their similarities. She accepted this as she accepted most things, by attempting to focus even more sharply on those things she knew to be important. And, in fact, her presence at the Preventers served to help her in this.

The process began early, almost immediately after the war -- her war -- ended. Following the gunshot wound that injured her spine, the rehabilitation process dragged by slowly, and there were days, awful torturous days, when her back and legs pained her so much that they refused to function altogether. Those were the days Mariemaia kept to her wheelchair and first began to skulk around the Preventer headquarters. Those were the days when she began again to catch rare glimpses of him.

Chang Wufei.

The young soldier with a quiet, severe personality and understated good looks. His hair was slicked back from his face and tied firmly at the nape of his neck. His skin was bronze and well toned with muscle. His charcoal eyes were curiously expressive and, she imagined, smoldered when they chanced to see her.

He was one of the few who had stood in her ranks from the beginning. In the days when she had stared out across a vast sea of faces, his had been one of them. He had been fighting for her. He had also been the one to kill her father, the man she revered more highly than any god, but this dichotomy did not matter to her; it meant they were connected, all three of them, bound by an unbreakable thread. She understood that his guilt was hers, and vice versa, and as such, only he could be the one to set her free.

Chang Wufei.

If ever Mariemaia was to love a man, it was him. Over the years, as she watched him and then began to actively seek him out, she realized this. She did not, however, delude herself into thinking that any feelings of affection from her would ever be returned. That could never be; neither he nor she would want that. But if anything, that knowledge merely drove her passion to connect with him to more frenzied heights. After all, the harder she struggled the closer she might come to redemption. Her struggle was her punishment.

And beyond that, Wufei was fascinating. Mariemaia had never seen a person so desperate for control. During her long days at the Preventers, later only afternoons, she began to follow him, watch him. Like a ghost, when Wufei went to the lounge for coffee, she was there. When he was training new recruits, she was there. The effect of her presence was curious. She was tolerated but never acknowledged. Wufei's eyes never strayed from his business, but she could tell he knew she was there by the way they burned.

Mariemaia longed to speak to him. Questions bubbled on her lips. There were things he could tell her, things to put her mind at rest, about why he fought and whom he killed. And she in turn could help him find his closure. They could help each other, but instead were doomed to perpetuate the other's suffering and guilt through silence. With the insight of her years of observation, Mariemaia understood that.

There was only one time that he spoke to her. One.

Every year on Christmas Eve the Preventers had a ball, a slightly fancier version of an office party. Every year, despite her discomfort there, Mariemaia accompanied Une and put in her expected appearance. It was strange, attending an event that celebrated her downfall, but she did not suppose that others necessarily saw it in this same light. Presumably many people saw the festivities primarily as a commemoration of the peace and the holiday, and did not think too long on the winners and losers in the war. But for Mariemaia, and for Wufei too, it was not so simple.

That night she diligently donned her green velvet dress, the same one she'd worn on Christmas Eve since entering high school, despite the fact that it was now getting a little out of style. Being by far the youngest person at the event, and having been so for many years, Mariemaia had long ceased to be concerned with trying to impress the other partygoers with the latest winter trends. Most of her evening was spent in avoidance of the other guests, anyway, as this was one of the few affairs at which she was not required to preen and simper for the benefit of the public.

Precisely the same course of events began to unfold that night as they had on so many others. Following her expected circuit of the party and polite greetings to any influential guests, Mariemaia discreetly retired from the lavishly decked out Preventer gymnasium with its air of tastelessness and cheap institutionalism. She sat in the atrium just beyond the swinging double doors, listening to the loud music of the overzealous brass band waft out and waiting for Une to come collect her so that they might go home. Every so often a flushed, cheerful couple would stumble out, slightly tipsy and blinking in the bright lights, but they always failed to notice her as they made their exits toward better things.

And then -- her heart leaped into her throat and stuck -- Wufei thrust open one of the doors and stalked out. Stopping short just a step outside, he seemed unsure of which way to turn, until his gaze landed on her and his face turned even darker.

His breath hissed over his teeth as he sucked in a surprised breath and choked out an accusatory, "You." Just as quickly, his jaw snapped shut with an audible click and he turned hurriedly away from her, making Mariemaia suspect his exclamation had been involuntary. She could understand. He had not expected to see her sitting here, had not expected an observer to see him so uncomposed, and his surprise had caused him to lash out.

Mariemaia stared at him curiously but did not speak. As she watched, Wufei seemed to suddenly sag, as if surrendering his last reserves of strength. When he turned back to her, she had never seen him looking so wretched. "You," he repeated, his feet bringing him silently closer to her. "I might have guessed."

In front of her now, Wufei went suddenly down on his knees, unexpectedly grabbing her by the shoulders and bringing her face close to his. Giving her a violent shake he shouted at her, "Why do you persist in haunting me? I can see you. I can see you! Why don't you fight me?" His head dropped and he moaned, "Treize…"

The sound of her father's name was too much. Her eyes squeezed shut, Mariemaia's hand came up almost despite herself and, trembling, cracked across Wufei's cheek, cutting short whatever else he might have had to say. In her mind's eye she could still see the way he looked at her, the smoldering quality she had always noticed in his eyes flaring up and beyond what she was accustomed to, becoming a raging furnace with flames beating against his dilated pupils. Their intensity was frightening. She understood then why he never looked at her.

Her adrenaline-fueled blow had been flimsy but efficient. Mariemaia sat rigid as Wufei twisted away from her and staggered hurriedly back across the room, shaking his head as he went.

Then there was silence, apart from the music spilling out of the gymnasium. No more to fear from Chang Wufei.

Calm again, Mariemaia continued to watch Wufei as he braced himself against the wall opposite her, jagged lines of tension lacing his back and arms, straight down to his fingertips splayed out against the cinderblock. He was trembling, Mariemaia could see through the cloth of his suit jacket, and panting as if he'd just been running sprints. She wondered what could have brought on his outburst, if perhaps he was ill or slightly drunk…but no, she decided, after examining him thoroughly, he wasn't. He was just, like her, a man on the brink.

She could go over to him. She could see herself doing so, going over to him and placing a hand gently, ever so gently, on his arm. Wrapping her other hand around his waist. Pressing her face against his back. A gesture of comfort for them both. A moment of connection and release, when they could say to each other: "Yes. You are forgiven."

Wufei straightened suddenly, dropping his hands down to his sides and raising his head up again. Mariemaia could not see his face. When he spoke, his voice was calm again, but so low she almost couldn't hear it, although the words were meant for her. "You and I," he said slowly, a proclamation. "We're unredeemable."

Then, without waiting for a response from her, without once looking in her direction, he walked away.

Mariemaia stared down at her hands clasped gently in her lap. She had no response to what Wufei had said. It was nothing she did not already know.

-end-