A special thanks to Kalen! I'll try and remember that in Spanish next year so that I can show my teacher I learned something. ^_^ The joys of grade 10 Spanish: learning only 2 verb tenses. :(
~~~~
Mobile suits surrounded Milliardo and Noin as they tried to force their way towards the base where Milliardo's sister was being held captive in. Explosions lit up the sky in a dazzling, but dangerous, show. The two fought back to back, covering each other as they shot up the bad guy.
Noin smiled wryly. Milliardo was being one hundred percent true to her word. He had stayed by her side since a few nights ago when she had asked him too. He had stopped putting the moves on her, and was there for her to lean on. More then than that, she was also there for him. Last night, she had found him lying her guest bed, staring up at the ceiling. He said that he couldn't sleep.
~~~~~~
"Why not?" Noin questioned, taking a small sip from her steaming hot chocolate.
"I can't stop thinking of Relena." he ran a hand through his bangs, ruffling his already bed-tousled hair even more. Noin had figured out that Milliardo had developed a habit of doing that since his "death". "My little sister is being held hostage, and we are starting a war to get her back. I'm so proud of her, that everybody would want to protect her this much, but... sometimes I feel myself thinking that maybe I should just tell Mariemeia to go ahead and shoot Relena, that we uphold her laws of pacifism enough to make her a martyr."
She looked at him, shocked by his thoughts. "Milliardo..."
"Don't worry, Lucrezia. It only lasts for a few seconds, but I'm ashamed that I'm having those thoughts at all."
Putting her hot chocolate down on the night stand, Noin sat down beside him on the bed. She looked down at Milliardo, brushing his hair back into looking decent. She smiled impishly, feeling his silky hair between her fingers. "Look Millie, everyone has their times of doubts. Our doubts are part of what makes us human."
He smiled up at her. "Millie?" he asked, before realizing that she was only pulling his ear for calling her by her first name. "Noin, what are your doubts?"
Noin continued stroking his beach-blond hair, thinking thoughtfully. "Every once in awhile, I used to doubt that you'd come back to me. That maybe you really had died blowing up the Battleship Libra. It used to leave me feeling hollow inside, and sick to my stomach." her blue eyes clouded over, thinking back to those awful moments.
"What did you do when you had these doubts?"
"I told myself that I knew you were still alive because I'd know it in my heart if you were truly dead."
Milliardo clasped her hand, bringing it down to his chest, where he laid it over his heart. "Noin, we're going to war tomorrow." he reminded her, his voice almost childlike. She nodded in response. "Noin, I..."
"You don't need to say anything, I feel the same way." She slid her hand out from under his and pulled at the covers. Noin crawled inside her guest bed, into his waiting arms. They pulled each other close. "Years ago, we felt that we'd hung up our weapons for good, and now we have to clean them off and use them again. A soldier's job is never done, is it?"
"Soldiers are the pawns of the world. We are nothing but a quick fix." he paused, sighing. "We can only hope that there will be less people hurt by this battle then the others."
"Hope..." Noin repeated, slowly. "Hope is something I can always rely on. She'll never let me down."
"Don't be so foolish, Noin. Yes, there is hope and always will be, however, you can't believe that it will be in your favour all the time, Noin." Milliardo told her, fearful that she might hurt. "You have no proof that hope will never let you down..."
"Yes, I do!" Noin interrupted. "Hope brought you back to me... And I don't want to lose you again! Please, be careful tomorrow!" Noin begged.
He leaned his head down and kissed her gently, leaving her blue eyes wide with... with what? He couldn't tell. "You'll never lose me Noin. I'm always here..." Milliardo pointed to her mind. "And here..." he pointed to her heart. "Even in death, you'll never lose me."
Milliardo was fearful she might start crying when he saw her reaction. She didn't look like the 21 year old Noin now, but more like the young girl he'd met more then six years ago. The girl he would sometimes see crying when nobody else was watching, her tears being shed for people who fought and died in wars hundreds of years old.
She buried her head in his pajamas, trying to stop tears from fallin. Did he even realize what he had said to her? What those words meant to her? She pressed herself closer to him, wanting to feel him protect her from all the injustices and inhumanities of the world outside her house. "I wish we could stay like this, and not fight."
"Then we will stay like this, until we have to fight..."
~~~~~
Noin blasted the laser cannon on the Taurus suit repeatedly. She watched her enemy fall, and she pulled back the gear sticks, shooting another incoming suit. She could see Milliardo fighting out of the corner of her eye, from the little vid-screen in the bottom front panel.
Her early warning alarm flashed and beeped, making Noin turn to see what was wrong. Incoming missiles from behind! Noin was harshly shoved forward, being held in place only be her seat-straps. She felt blood trickled from a cut on the side of her head. That'd hurt later.
Spinning her Taurus around, Noin fired her laser again. "Damn you! I already shot you! I don't want to kill you, can't you PLAY DEAD!?" she screamed at the pilot, who couldn't hear her.
Milliardo's voice was oddly calm as he talked to her through their com system. "Noin, these people as soldiers, just like us. They are out here fighting for a cause they believe in. Even if you don't want to kill them, they will continue fighting until you do."
"But we had peace!" Noin yelled at him angrily. "Everybody wants peace, so why can't they let it be?!"
"Noin, honey, calm down. You'll get yourself injured if you lose control of your anger." he told her softly, making her stare at the vid-screen. "I'm usually the one who keeps a hot head in these conditions. Usually, you let all your emotions go until after you are fighting."
"But... they...." she wiped a bit of blood of her face and sighed. "I still think that they shouldn't be fighting, but I'll try not to get angry again." She told Milliardo calmly as she hit down another enemy suit.
"Good. I know that I may not be able to stop you from fighting, but please don't get hurt Noin." He told her sternly, more of an order then a request. 'If I knew it would work, I would have tied you to the bed this morning to keep you from fighting.'
'How long as it been? How long as it been since we lost fought back to back?' Noin tried to remember as she attempted to push and shoot her way forward. 'Oh, God, not since the Academy days, during the practices. True, Milliardo and I have fought on the same side before, but not back to back like this. Nope, it wasn't like this since I was sixteen when we started practising in actual mobile dolls equipped with targeting programs.'
'Actually,' Noin realized with a bit of excitement. 'This is the first time he's been my partner as Milliardo Peacecraft. Before, he was Zechs Marquise. He only became Milliardo Peacecraft, stopping being Zechs Marquise totally after becoming the leader of the White Fang. That was when he was trying to destroy the Earth... making him my enemy at the time.'
~~~~~
In the Tallgeese III, Milliardo was thinking the exact same thing as her. Tallgeese's arm swung down with the beam saber, slicing an attacking enemy into half before it exploded. 'We were both very stupid to be fighting each other. I was stupid because I was trying to destroy the Earth. Noin was stupid for risking her life to go up against a madman.'
Noin hand't done it just once either, but twice. Twice she had stood up against him, not knowing wether or not he'd fight her to get what he wanted. She was either incredibly stupid, incredible trustworthy, or incredibly hopeful. And he knew she wasn't stupid.
Even though it had been two years ago, Milliardo could still remember everything. Although he wanted to forget a lot about that time, he didn't want to forget his confrontation with Noin.
~~~~~
The colony layed directly in the line of fire from Barge's beam cannon. Milliardo couldn't believe how stupid they were. He ripped through the mobile dolls guarding Barge, Epyon slicing them like cheese. The Zero system flashed around him as he stopped, directly in front of Gundams 02 and 04, and a white Taurus suit. The Gundams may also be trying to protect the colony, but they were his enemies as well.
Millardo could hear their conversation over his com system. He didn't know if they knew he listening or not, but he could give a shit if they did or not. The Pilots spoke for a moment, before the Gundam 02, Deathscythe, began attacking, using his beam-scythe. Epyon blocked it easily.
"It's so fast!" Duo exclaimed over the system. Deathscythe backed quickly away, aided by Epyon.
'Yes, it is fast. Faster then any of you could ever be.' Milliardo gloated to himself, slightly over confident. 'You other Gundams have no hope of beating me, you are too slow.'
Sandrock attacked next. Milliardo seemed to watch him in slow motion. Sandrock was a bit slower then Deathscythe, but when his weapons hit, Milliardo felt the connection all the way to his bones. Sandrock may not have been as fast as Deathscythe, but it had more force behind the attacks.
"It's so strong!" The pilot of 04 stated quietly.
'Stronger then any of you ever will be!' Milliardo watched Sandrock back off as well, and wondered why the third pilot suit wasn't attacking. He had heard that one of the Gundam pilots had amnesia, and fought in a white Taurus suit because they had no Gundam. This had to be the Gundam pilot with the amnesia then. Strange how the one with the least amount of memories was the smartest among them.
"Barge's beam cannon is almost ready to fire again!" somebody yelled at the Gundam pilots. Everybody turned to look.
'No! I can't let the Gundams do it! They aren't strong enough! They are too slow! Too weak!' he was almost frantic with anger, but he felt oddly calm even though his mind was spinning out if control.
Trying to move his mobile suit forward, he found he couldn't. 'What?' He realized that the white Taurus suit had grabbed hold of him, keeping him from going after the Gundams. 'But I'm not going after the Gundams! I'm going after Barge!'
She began talking to him, and Milliardo lifted his visor to see her on the vid screen. He listened with dead ears, looking like stone. 'What am I going to do? I can't hurt her! Why can't I hurt her? She's in my way, I should just use Epyon to destroy here! Noin is getting in my way, and I can't let anybody keep me from my goals!'
He didn't even know what he said to her before hitting her mobile suit in one of the torso connecting pieces with the elbow of the Epyon. She backed off, distracted by the sudden blow. Epyon blared it's engines: Milliardo had to destroy that base!
~~~~~
Noin stood in his way again. She was back in her white Taurus suit, and Epyon already had the beam saber out. Milliardo's fingers itched to use it. Noin didn't have any weapon on her, she was defenceless, his attack would be swift and painless.
In his mind, he shifted the gears. He kept trying to move them, and he knew that his arms were getting the message, but what was it that was stopping him? The Zero system? Ha! He had conquered that system a long time ago.
Milliardo shivered. He was shocked to find that he was in a cold sweat, like he'd woken up from a nightmare. Why? Why couldn't he kill her? Why wouldn't Epyon respond?
"Noin!" he yelled, closing their connection. "You are a fucking idiot! I could kill you! I could slice you, blow you up, shot you, cut you in half!.... why are you standing there like a fucking idiot! Get out of my way! I don't want to hurt you, but I will!" He shifted the gears agin, but again they didn't move the Epyon an inch.
"What is going on? Why can't I kill you! By standing in my way, you are my enemy, and I must destroy my enemies!!" Milliardo clenched his fist. He was so frustrated with her that he was crying.
Him? Crying? Yes, the tears were streaking down his cheeks. The Lightning Count was bawling his eyes out. "I.... must destroy my enemy... I...." The lines and grid shifted in the Zero system. Was it for real, or just because he was crying? They shifted until he could see Noin.
She was back to wearing her military uniform. 'Noin, you've come to my side! I...' He watched in horror as the commands he'd given earlier to the Epyon responded, and he lunged forward with his beam saber.
It could right threw Noin, easier then it had threw the mobile dolls. He watched in horror at the carnage it caused. Her body had been shredded and burned by the intense heat of the beam. Blood, intestines, bones.... Noin was gone. Milliardo's tears came faster, and he slammed his fist down in the control panels of the Epyon.
"NO! Damn you Noin, why did you have to stand up against me? I didn't want to kill you! I never want to hurt you!" he screamed.
The grids stopped spinning and he saw that the Taurus suit was still standing defiantly against him. The Zero system again. He had never seen that before out of it.
But why couldn't he get Noin out of his way? 'Hell, I can't even push her out of my way. I am Milliardo Peacecraft... no, I am Zechs Marquise, I can't do it because I can't hurt someone I care about.... No. I am Milliardo Peacecraft, and anybody who tries to stop me from my goal is dead.... No. I am Zechs Marquise, and I love Noin....'
'Love? Love!? But Milliardo Peacecraft hardly even knows Noin... but I'm Zechs Marquise, and I do love her. Look at her, Milliardo. She is your equal, and everything you are not. She's trying to achieve pacifism like you should be doing, she is standing up to you because she's a soldier and she knows that you aren't a hundred percent all there. She's trying to help you, Milliardo. Because she loves you.'
'Noin loves me? She's too good for me, she's like an ancient war goddess: beautiful, innocent, and also know ledged in the ways of war. But... I....'
Something snapped inside of him, and he felt emotions he hadn't felt in along time. Pride, happiness... and love.
'I see now... I had it right so long ago.... I can't go switching between two faces believing that God takes away the sins I have done when I take off that mask. Because the wrongs are on your soul, and I cannot have two souls. I am both Zechs Marquise and Milliardo Peacecraft deep down on the inside, although they may look differently on the outside. As Zechs Marquise I love Noin with my mind, body, heart and soul... and so I love her now that way too.'
'No matter how well I have been trained for war, I can't kill the one I love. She really is the other half of me, not Zechs Marquise, because he is also me. Noin... I love you... I love you so much, and I'm not afraid to tell you know!... But I can't let me love for you get in the way of what I must do.'
Without another word, Milliardo and the Epyon took off, retreating.
"I'm so sorry Noin, for what I believe in, and what I must do. I love you, and one day when you are no longer mad at me, I will tell you that...."