Disclaimers: I don't own Gundam Wing or any of its characters. I'm just borrowing them. The story and the idea are mine.
Notes: This was inspired by a story I read. I don't remember what it was called, I don't know who wrote it, all I know is that it was a well-written fic and a certain part of it stuck in my head. Thank you to that nameless author! I bow before your excellence! ^_^
Warnings: Angst, death, perhaps a small cut of reality??
Perfection
Misty H
I guess none of us really knew how much he meant to us. And I don't mean as just another pilot to help us out. I mean as our hope and faith in one another, in us. With him we were invincible. Immortal even. We were the unstoppable five, the force of justice and truth and life and peace in this universe. But we just didn't realize...how much we meant to each other. How afraid we were. How tightly we held onto each other during fights, desperate to live, even more desperate to make sure that the others would too. So that we would not be alone. We didn't want to be alone again.
We all looked to one another for certain things. They sought me out as a way of visualizing peace when their troubled minds couldn't comprehend what we were fighting for. When visions of what it would be like without war was clouded over with doubt. I could show them, in some way, how life would be like after the war. I was the image of peace. I was the embodiment of their happiness.
To Trowa we looked for calm and assurance. His silent confidence would give us the peace of mind that we needed when nerves were shaky, when things were looking shadowed. He could restore to us our fragile grip of sanity.
In Wufei we found our strength. His legendary rants of justice and integrity held us in reality, kept us moving. His anger helped us all find a focus in what we did--in what we still do.
Duo would seek out our worries. He would shoulder them gladly, easing up tense situations with a single glance. His smile would annihilate fears and doubts and for a few moments we would be able to laugh, be normal. His steely determination in all of us kept us five going long after any others would have collapsed under the strain.
And Heero...he's so hard to describe. How do you tell what this single boy has done? He gave us trust. He gave us a vision. He made seem possible to attain that vision. He gently nudged each of us into an awareness we hadn't realized existed. We became braver, bolder, stronger, and greater because of him. He gave us hope.
Hope. There's a word you hear so much in common times. But who actually says it and understands its meaning? Hope is the future. Hope is getting up each morning, knowing that you are going to kill. You know that in that day, hundreds of families will suddenly be bereft of fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, sons and daughters, grandfathers and grandmothers and aunts and uncles, all because of you...but you still get up. Because you know that if you don't do it, Hope will die. The future will die. And you sit at the breakfast table and eat and laugh with your friends, knowing that in the next hour thousands will be dead. But you take one long deep look into a pair of hard, cold, steel cobalt blue eyes--and you just know. Things will be okay. That these people are going to die so that Hope can exist. And it's all gonna work out in the end.
That doesn't make it okay. It never makes what we are doing right. I know that Heero tried to make sure that we understood that. We aren't always doing the right thing. Killing people is not acceptable. We understand that. But this way, we have a chance at the future. If they don't die, then our hope cannot exist. And our hope is the only thing that keeps us going.
He gave us our image. And just as suddenly as he built us up on it, just as soon as we soared high on the wings of victory--he stripped it away. And we were suddenly just a bunch of teenagers with some skills that allowed us to pilot big, smashing robots. We all had a vague thought in our head that we were going to be forever. That because of what we were doing, because we pushed a few buttons in the cockpit of a weapon of war, we couldn't be brought down. Oh yes, we knew the risks. We knew we could get captured. We knew we could die. We were all prepared to die at any given time...or so we thought. The idea of death wasn't foreign to us. Far from it. We stared death in the face every second of every day. But we taunted it, we teased it. We thought we controlled it.
We were wrong.
Deadly wrong.
And now he is gone.
But I'm getting ahead of myself, aren't I? I do believe I am. It's so hard to write this, you see. Because I believed in him. I believed in us. There is no us, anymore. Not the us we used to be. We'll never be 'us' again. It burns me deep inside to know that. What makes it worse is that I thought I knew him. I thought I understood him. I was wrong again. I think we all were, all but Trowa. He grasped the fractured image that the rest of us missed. I wish I had seen it in time. God, I wish I had seen it. Then maybe things would be all right, and the sorrow that burns my heart and torments my soul wouldn't exist right now.
I guess it all started when we each first met him. He was so...dominating. I'm not even sure if that's the correct word for him. He drew attention, not just because of his looks, but there was an air about him, a ruthless air, that said he would get things done using whatever means possible. He would bring peace. He would sacrifice himself--body, mind, and soul, in order to save humanity. That's what he did. And the sad part is, we let him.
Now each one of us has our own separate stories about him. I'm not going to start in on them, because that's not my point. The whole deal is how he was to us. We thought he would live forever. We believed he was immortal! Why couldn't it be true? Why did he have to die alone? Why? Why couldn't I have understood him, and been his friend? I always believed that I was his friend, until this happened. Now I realize just how much I lacked. He died alone, alone and misunderstood. They say the thing most people fear the most is never being understood, never having a person to talk to, never being loved for who and what you are. I despair at the thought that his last moments were spent in agony because he thought he was alone. I know what it's like to be alone.
Let's be serious. We've all tried to commit suicide at one time or another. Each one of us has failed for our separate reasons. Trowa because of Catherine, Duo because his self-destruct system was disabled, Wufei when his colony was destroyed, and myself before we left the Earth the first time. Heero--he was always seeking Death. In every battle he threw himself into the most dangerous part of the fray, hoping that by some off chance a shot would bring down his Gundam.
Well, Heero, it finally happened. Are you happy now?
He left early one afternoon approximately seven months ago. I can remember it clearly. Rainy weather had driven Duo and myself indoors. Trowa was in the kitchen fixing hot chocolate for the four of us, and Wufei was expected back any minute from a solo mission. Heero was sitting in the corner of the room, using a highly polished end table for a desk. His face was as unreadable as ever as he scrolled down the screen, doing whatever Heero does. I recall glancing up at him for a moment, a small, disturbed feeling in the back of my mind, before shaking it off and hanging my dripping shirt by the door. Duo was already at the small bar, chattering away at Trowa, who most likely wasn't listening to a word he was saying. But then again, you never know with Trowa.
I picked my way over to the other barstool, carefully avoiding Duo's sopping clothes that he had flung carelessly to the floor. I think back now about how my thoughts strayed to the American's untidiness. I didn't give another thought to the small figure in the darkest corner of the room, even when I heard the sharp intake of breath and the slight hesitancy as keys were pushed at a slower pace than normal. I probably just passed it off as a sign of his annoyance at the American's loudness interrupting his work.
Trowa noticed though, and he looked up sharply, his green eyes pinning sharp daggers on Heero's face. Whether the Perfect Soldier knew or not, I have no clue. I continued on my merry little way, sliding over to my seat and grinning at Trowa and Duo as I eagerly sipped at my hot chocolate. Heero had left the room by this time, and our self-appointed cook was "talking" with Duo about Earth and it's climates. Talking included nodding every five seconds, occasionally making eye contact, and inserting three worded sentences every time our enthusiastic Shinigami paused for a breath, which wasn't very often. I got involved in the conversation, and again took no notice when Heero appeared again in the room, closed his laptop with a soft click, and headed toward the door. He held his gun in one hand, computer in another. I somehow didn't even seem to notice this fact. I don't know why, but for some reason many things escaped me that day. Like the blanker than usual look in his eyes, the somewhat heavier steps he used, and the way he carried nothing--not even extra explosives--with him.
Trowa's own blank eyes followed the thin figure to the door. Heero never looked back once. Never looked at us. Didn't speak one word. Then he was gone, brushing past Wufei just as he stepped in the door. Wufei raised an eyebrow at him, but he too did not comment.
We still argued over climates.
Two weeks later after moving to three different other safehouses, it struck me that Heero hadn't returned yet. He also hadn't tried to get in touch with us at all. There were no new transmissions from the doctors, which was odd. And I remembered that the young Japanese hadn't carried anything with him through that door. I still didn't panic, and neither did the others. Duo was still as bouncy as ever, not particularly concerned that the Wing pilot hadn't showed up. Wufei was constantly out meditating and walking, and doing whatever Wufei does. He didn't voice any concerns.
I think that Trowa was the only one of us worried. If you looked closely enough, you could see it in his stance, the set of his shoulders, and his eyes. I didn't look closely enough. Looking back though, I can clearly see the concern he felt as he stood by the window, gazing thoughtfully at the distant mountains, silently calculating possibilities. I brushed it off. Heero was always on the go; it was never anything new for him to be gone a few weeks.
One month passed, then two. The three of us dimly recognized the fact that the door hadn't opened to admit the lanky form of Heero Yuy. Trowa drove off a lot then. He went to surrounding towns, asking if people had seen our friend. We all thought this was kinda foolish of him; Heero could take care of himself. He was the Perfect Soldier. No matter what happened, Heero always came back.
This time he didn't come back.
It was three and a half months later when we discovered what Fate had bestowed upon one Heero Yuy.
Duo was washing the dishes and humming loudly from the kitchen, which was directly behind the living room. There was a large opening above the sink, allowing him to see us as we sat around. No missions had come in since Heero had gone missing, and we looked for ways to pass the time. I was sitting in front of the TV, at the coffee table to be exact, playing chess with Wufei. This was a way to improve our strategic levels. The screen above us was turned to the news, and we listened attentively as we played. Trowa, too, was in the room, having just returned from what Wufei had dubbed his "Heero Searches." I was momentarily distracted by the game, missing part of the broadcast. There was a loud crashing in the kitchen, the sound of glass breaking. My head shot up, along with my Chinese partner, and we saw Duo crouching on the floor from where he had presumably jumped through the hole in the wall. His legs visibly shook as he stood, and his color was of ash as he leaned heavily against a chair. The three of us glanced at what his suddenly horrified eyes were staring at.
A young boy leaned against the wall of a building. His face was a mass of purple, black, green, and yellow bruises, making him unrecognizable to me. Doing a quick once-over, it was obvious that one leg was broken in at least three places. His clothes were nothing but shreds, and they were soaked in blood. His hair was gone, some shaved off, and some ripped out. One eye was swollen shut due to his bruises. His body was painted red in his own blood. His hands were mangled wrecks; the fingernails had been ripped off. He stood, barefoot and broken, a ragged doll. I felt a tearing sensation in my heart when I looked at him. OZ was going to "set an example" again. My fists clenched in anger. Wufei was growling low in his throat.
The boy could hardly stand. Blood was still falling out of various wounds, forming a small puddle on the ground. Duo made a strangled noise in his throat. On camera, the reporter was silent, moving out of the way to allow a better view. I could feel tears filling my eyes; they fill my eyes now as I recall this moment. The thin hands clutched at outcroppings in the stone wall, seeking to keep himself upright. Eight OZ soldiers filed into the small plaza and stood in a straight line. Their eyes stared mockingly at the poor fool who had gotten in their way. What could he have done that had made him deserve death?
Trowa was suddenly at the screen, his long fingers touching the outline of the boy's body and face. I couldn't for the life of me understand why then, but I do now. Zechs Merquise walked out gracefully in front of the soldiers, standing proudly in front of his subordinates. His hand lightly rested on the sword at his side as he began to speak.
"You have been charged with disrupting peace, the murder of OZ and Alliance officers, and participation in a rebel group that seeks the downfall of our government. For your crimes and treason, the punishment is death. Do you want a blindfold, 01?" he asked calmly. I thought I detected a hint of sadness in his voice, but at the time I was distracted by his last words.
"He doesn't mean Heero, does he?" I whispered to the others as I sat in the room, my heart pounding. I can remember this so clearly, like I'm living it all over again. I can see Duo sagging on the couch, his eyes wide, not breathing, just staring. I can see Wufei as he jumps up and kicks over the table in his haste. I can see my hands tremble with fear and feel my respiration getting shallow. I can see Trowa, and the tear streak along his left cheek, his fingers caressing the outline of the pitiful boy's face.
"It's a mistake," Duo whispered back to me. "They just mean that he's the first prisoner they've executed publicly. He wasn't referring to a Gundam pilot."
"He couldn't have been," Wufei said loudly, but his voice was unsteady and cracked, like he had not drank anything in weeks. "He's the Perfect Soldier. He can't get captured. He can't get hurt. Even if it is him, and it's not, they can't kill him. They'll shoot him and he'll dodge or stand there, and then when it's over, he'll walk off when they aren't looking." His voice trailed off until he was whispering like us. "He's the Perfect Soldier..."
The tall, thin form of pilot 03 stood quietly, his fingers never leaving the screen. It seemed like eternity before anyone spoke again, and when they did, Trowa was the one to break our silence. "It's Heero, and he's going to die." His voice was calm, soothing almost, like he was singing a lullaby. His face never showed any emotion, other than the tear streaks that kept appearing on his skin. "You never understood him, took time to know him. He's not invincible, or immortal. He's as human as you and I, and he's going to die."
I remember the sound of Duo anguished scream as he lunged across the room. He was supposedly Heero's best friend. I see clearly in my mind's eye Wufei moving a step or two over to catch him, keeping him away from Trowa. In slow motion they fell down to the floor, Wufei landing on the upturned table. Trowa seemed trapped in a world of his own, because he never moved from his position, never stopped caressing Heero's face. I could now see the resemblance to our Heero and the boy on the screen, although it was hard. I half-rose from my position on the floor, only to fall again when a quiet, thin voice said, "I am no coward."
That voice, that small voice had been Heero's. I had watched the lips move, I had seen the shoulder jerk, I had witnessed his now frail frame struggle to bring in air to form the words. He denied a blindfold.
Suddenly my trance was broken, and I saw Trowa slumped onto the viewing screen, his shoulders silently shaking. Duo and Wufei were beating each other, maybe hoping that the pain would bring them back to reality and Heero would be alive and well, pointing his gun at them and saying his famous "Omae o korosu" phrase. But he wasn't. And he would never again.
There was an explosion of gunfire as first one soldier squeezed the trigger, then another. And another. I heard my pitiful moan from a distant place. The boy's body jerked once, twice, and then as six more bullets found their way into his heart and lungs, he fell face-forward into the dust. There were bloodstains on the wall where he had stood, so much blood streaking the building and ground. Duo sat upon Wufei then, his head down, and his grief evident as loud sobs tore from his throat. Wufei had his face turned away from the rest of us, and he made no noise. I sat and rocked back and forth, unconscious of my actions, just staring at the screen. I know this now because Duo told me.
Trowa straightened as the crowd who had gathered to watch the shooting began to cheer. His hand calmly embedded a knife from who knows where into the screen. It went blank, leaving the imprint of Heero's body burned into my mind.
And now you know the story. We thought and assumed things we had no right to think and assume. If we hadn't, maybe our heart would still be alive. But he's not, and it's our fault. We didn't know him; we didn't understand him. We let him be the Perfect Soldier, and he paid for it with his life.
Yes, this is war. But this is also about friendship, about life. Just because he died in a war doesn't mean that it makes it all right. His murder was directly our faults, because we didn't pay enough attention to him and didn't take the time to understand him. Just one moment would have been all we needed. We would have seen what Trowa saw, and understood what Trowa did. But we didn't, and I will regret it until my death, and probably long afterwards.
I write this to tell you something. Everyone wants to be understood. There is not one person who wants to be alone for all his life. Are you assuming and thinking things about your friends without knowing if it's right? Can you honestly say that what you know about your friends is true? Do you understand them, or is there a part that you don't know? Is there a part that longs to be understood in them that you haven't uncovered?
Don't let your friends be alone. Don't let them be misunderstood.
Don't make the same mistake I did.
Make sure there is never another incident like Heero Yuy.
~ Quatre Raberba Winner
A.C. 196
***
Many thanks to Maria-chan and all who read and respond. Your comments keep me going, and you have no idea how hyper I get after receiving them! ^_^****
Notes: This was inspired by a story I read. I don't remember what it was called, I don't know who wrote it, all I know is that it was a well-written fic and a certain part of it stuck in my head. Thank you to that nameless author! I bow before your excellence! ^_^
Warnings: Angst, death, perhaps a small cut of reality??
Perfection
Misty H
I guess none of us really knew how much he meant to us. And I don't mean as just another pilot to help us out. I mean as our hope and faith in one another, in us. With him we were invincible. Immortal even. We were the unstoppable five, the force of justice and truth and life and peace in this universe. But we just didn't realize...how much we meant to each other. How afraid we were. How tightly we held onto each other during fights, desperate to live, even more desperate to make sure that the others would too. So that we would not be alone. We didn't want to be alone again.
We all looked to one another for certain things. They sought me out as a way of visualizing peace when their troubled minds couldn't comprehend what we were fighting for. When visions of what it would be like without war was clouded over with doubt. I could show them, in some way, how life would be like after the war. I was the image of peace. I was the embodiment of their happiness.
To Trowa we looked for calm and assurance. His silent confidence would give us the peace of mind that we needed when nerves were shaky, when things were looking shadowed. He could restore to us our fragile grip of sanity.
In Wufei we found our strength. His legendary rants of justice and integrity held us in reality, kept us moving. His anger helped us all find a focus in what we did--in what we still do.
Duo would seek out our worries. He would shoulder them gladly, easing up tense situations with a single glance. His smile would annihilate fears and doubts and for a few moments we would be able to laugh, be normal. His steely determination in all of us kept us five going long after any others would have collapsed under the strain.
And Heero...he's so hard to describe. How do you tell what this single boy has done? He gave us trust. He gave us a vision. He made seem possible to attain that vision. He gently nudged each of us into an awareness we hadn't realized existed. We became braver, bolder, stronger, and greater because of him. He gave us hope.
Hope. There's a word you hear so much in common times. But who actually says it and understands its meaning? Hope is the future. Hope is getting up each morning, knowing that you are going to kill. You know that in that day, hundreds of families will suddenly be bereft of fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, sons and daughters, grandfathers and grandmothers and aunts and uncles, all because of you...but you still get up. Because you know that if you don't do it, Hope will die. The future will die. And you sit at the breakfast table and eat and laugh with your friends, knowing that in the next hour thousands will be dead. But you take one long deep look into a pair of hard, cold, steel cobalt blue eyes--and you just know. Things will be okay. That these people are going to die so that Hope can exist. And it's all gonna work out in the end.
That doesn't make it okay. It never makes what we are doing right. I know that Heero tried to make sure that we understood that. We aren't always doing the right thing. Killing people is not acceptable. We understand that. But this way, we have a chance at the future. If they don't die, then our hope cannot exist. And our hope is the only thing that keeps us going.
He gave us our image. And just as suddenly as he built us up on it, just as soon as we soared high on the wings of victory--he stripped it away. And we were suddenly just a bunch of teenagers with some skills that allowed us to pilot big, smashing robots. We all had a vague thought in our head that we were going to be forever. That because of what we were doing, because we pushed a few buttons in the cockpit of a weapon of war, we couldn't be brought down. Oh yes, we knew the risks. We knew we could get captured. We knew we could die. We were all prepared to die at any given time...or so we thought. The idea of death wasn't foreign to us. Far from it. We stared death in the face every second of every day. But we taunted it, we teased it. We thought we controlled it.
We were wrong.
Deadly wrong.
And now he is gone.
But I'm getting ahead of myself, aren't I? I do believe I am. It's so hard to write this, you see. Because I believed in him. I believed in us. There is no us, anymore. Not the us we used to be. We'll never be 'us' again. It burns me deep inside to know that. What makes it worse is that I thought I knew him. I thought I understood him. I was wrong again. I think we all were, all but Trowa. He grasped the fractured image that the rest of us missed. I wish I had seen it in time. God, I wish I had seen it. Then maybe things would be all right, and the sorrow that burns my heart and torments my soul wouldn't exist right now.
I guess it all started when we each first met him. He was so...dominating. I'm not even sure if that's the correct word for him. He drew attention, not just because of his looks, but there was an air about him, a ruthless air, that said he would get things done using whatever means possible. He would bring peace. He would sacrifice himself--body, mind, and soul, in order to save humanity. That's what he did. And the sad part is, we let him.
Now each one of us has our own separate stories about him. I'm not going to start in on them, because that's not my point. The whole deal is how he was to us. We thought he would live forever. We believed he was immortal! Why couldn't it be true? Why did he have to die alone? Why? Why couldn't I have understood him, and been his friend? I always believed that I was his friend, until this happened. Now I realize just how much I lacked. He died alone, alone and misunderstood. They say the thing most people fear the most is never being understood, never having a person to talk to, never being loved for who and what you are. I despair at the thought that his last moments were spent in agony because he thought he was alone. I know what it's like to be alone.
Let's be serious. We've all tried to commit suicide at one time or another. Each one of us has failed for our separate reasons. Trowa because of Catherine, Duo because his self-destruct system was disabled, Wufei when his colony was destroyed, and myself before we left the Earth the first time. Heero--he was always seeking Death. In every battle he threw himself into the most dangerous part of the fray, hoping that by some off chance a shot would bring down his Gundam.
Well, Heero, it finally happened. Are you happy now?
He left early one afternoon approximately seven months ago. I can remember it clearly. Rainy weather had driven Duo and myself indoors. Trowa was in the kitchen fixing hot chocolate for the four of us, and Wufei was expected back any minute from a solo mission. Heero was sitting in the corner of the room, using a highly polished end table for a desk. His face was as unreadable as ever as he scrolled down the screen, doing whatever Heero does. I recall glancing up at him for a moment, a small, disturbed feeling in the back of my mind, before shaking it off and hanging my dripping shirt by the door. Duo was already at the small bar, chattering away at Trowa, who most likely wasn't listening to a word he was saying. But then again, you never know with Trowa.
I picked my way over to the other barstool, carefully avoiding Duo's sopping clothes that he had flung carelessly to the floor. I think back now about how my thoughts strayed to the American's untidiness. I didn't give another thought to the small figure in the darkest corner of the room, even when I heard the sharp intake of breath and the slight hesitancy as keys were pushed at a slower pace than normal. I probably just passed it off as a sign of his annoyance at the American's loudness interrupting his work.
Trowa noticed though, and he looked up sharply, his green eyes pinning sharp daggers on Heero's face. Whether the Perfect Soldier knew or not, I have no clue. I continued on my merry little way, sliding over to my seat and grinning at Trowa and Duo as I eagerly sipped at my hot chocolate. Heero had left the room by this time, and our self-appointed cook was "talking" with Duo about Earth and it's climates. Talking included nodding every five seconds, occasionally making eye contact, and inserting three worded sentences every time our enthusiastic Shinigami paused for a breath, which wasn't very often. I got involved in the conversation, and again took no notice when Heero appeared again in the room, closed his laptop with a soft click, and headed toward the door. He held his gun in one hand, computer in another. I somehow didn't even seem to notice this fact. I don't know why, but for some reason many things escaped me that day. Like the blanker than usual look in his eyes, the somewhat heavier steps he used, and the way he carried nothing--not even extra explosives--with him.
Trowa's own blank eyes followed the thin figure to the door. Heero never looked back once. Never looked at us. Didn't speak one word. Then he was gone, brushing past Wufei just as he stepped in the door. Wufei raised an eyebrow at him, but he too did not comment.
We still argued over climates.
Two weeks later after moving to three different other safehouses, it struck me that Heero hadn't returned yet. He also hadn't tried to get in touch with us at all. There were no new transmissions from the doctors, which was odd. And I remembered that the young Japanese hadn't carried anything with him through that door. I still didn't panic, and neither did the others. Duo was still as bouncy as ever, not particularly concerned that the Wing pilot hadn't showed up. Wufei was constantly out meditating and walking, and doing whatever Wufei does. He didn't voice any concerns.
I think that Trowa was the only one of us worried. If you looked closely enough, you could see it in his stance, the set of his shoulders, and his eyes. I didn't look closely enough. Looking back though, I can clearly see the concern he felt as he stood by the window, gazing thoughtfully at the distant mountains, silently calculating possibilities. I brushed it off. Heero was always on the go; it was never anything new for him to be gone a few weeks.
One month passed, then two. The three of us dimly recognized the fact that the door hadn't opened to admit the lanky form of Heero Yuy. Trowa drove off a lot then. He went to surrounding towns, asking if people had seen our friend. We all thought this was kinda foolish of him; Heero could take care of himself. He was the Perfect Soldier. No matter what happened, Heero always came back.
This time he didn't come back.
It was three and a half months later when we discovered what Fate had bestowed upon one Heero Yuy.
Duo was washing the dishes and humming loudly from the kitchen, which was directly behind the living room. There was a large opening above the sink, allowing him to see us as we sat around. No missions had come in since Heero had gone missing, and we looked for ways to pass the time. I was sitting in front of the TV, at the coffee table to be exact, playing chess with Wufei. This was a way to improve our strategic levels. The screen above us was turned to the news, and we listened attentively as we played. Trowa, too, was in the room, having just returned from what Wufei had dubbed his "Heero Searches." I was momentarily distracted by the game, missing part of the broadcast. There was a loud crashing in the kitchen, the sound of glass breaking. My head shot up, along with my Chinese partner, and we saw Duo crouching on the floor from where he had presumably jumped through the hole in the wall. His legs visibly shook as he stood, and his color was of ash as he leaned heavily against a chair. The three of us glanced at what his suddenly horrified eyes were staring at.
A young boy leaned against the wall of a building. His face was a mass of purple, black, green, and yellow bruises, making him unrecognizable to me. Doing a quick once-over, it was obvious that one leg was broken in at least three places. His clothes were nothing but shreds, and they were soaked in blood. His hair was gone, some shaved off, and some ripped out. One eye was swollen shut due to his bruises. His body was painted red in his own blood. His hands were mangled wrecks; the fingernails had been ripped off. He stood, barefoot and broken, a ragged doll. I felt a tearing sensation in my heart when I looked at him. OZ was going to "set an example" again. My fists clenched in anger. Wufei was growling low in his throat.
The boy could hardly stand. Blood was still falling out of various wounds, forming a small puddle on the ground. Duo made a strangled noise in his throat. On camera, the reporter was silent, moving out of the way to allow a better view. I could feel tears filling my eyes; they fill my eyes now as I recall this moment. The thin hands clutched at outcroppings in the stone wall, seeking to keep himself upright. Eight OZ soldiers filed into the small plaza and stood in a straight line. Their eyes stared mockingly at the poor fool who had gotten in their way. What could he have done that had made him deserve death?
Trowa was suddenly at the screen, his long fingers touching the outline of the boy's body and face. I couldn't for the life of me understand why then, but I do now. Zechs Merquise walked out gracefully in front of the soldiers, standing proudly in front of his subordinates. His hand lightly rested on the sword at his side as he began to speak.
"You have been charged with disrupting peace, the murder of OZ and Alliance officers, and participation in a rebel group that seeks the downfall of our government. For your crimes and treason, the punishment is death. Do you want a blindfold, 01?" he asked calmly. I thought I detected a hint of sadness in his voice, but at the time I was distracted by his last words.
"He doesn't mean Heero, does he?" I whispered to the others as I sat in the room, my heart pounding. I can remember this so clearly, like I'm living it all over again. I can see Duo sagging on the couch, his eyes wide, not breathing, just staring. I can see Wufei as he jumps up and kicks over the table in his haste. I can see my hands tremble with fear and feel my respiration getting shallow. I can see Trowa, and the tear streak along his left cheek, his fingers caressing the outline of the pitiful boy's face.
"It's a mistake," Duo whispered back to me. "They just mean that he's the first prisoner they've executed publicly. He wasn't referring to a Gundam pilot."
"He couldn't have been," Wufei said loudly, but his voice was unsteady and cracked, like he had not drank anything in weeks. "He's the Perfect Soldier. He can't get captured. He can't get hurt. Even if it is him, and it's not, they can't kill him. They'll shoot him and he'll dodge or stand there, and then when it's over, he'll walk off when they aren't looking." His voice trailed off until he was whispering like us. "He's the Perfect Soldier..."
The tall, thin form of pilot 03 stood quietly, his fingers never leaving the screen. It seemed like eternity before anyone spoke again, and when they did, Trowa was the one to break our silence. "It's Heero, and he's going to die." His voice was calm, soothing almost, like he was singing a lullaby. His face never showed any emotion, other than the tear streaks that kept appearing on his skin. "You never understood him, took time to know him. He's not invincible, or immortal. He's as human as you and I, and he's going to die."
I remember the sound of Duo anguished scream as he lunged across the room. He was supposedly Heero's best friend. I see clearly in my mind's eye Wufei moving a step or two over to catch him, keeping him away from Trowa. In slow motion they fell down to the floor, Wufei landing on the upturned table. Trowa seemed trapped in a world of his own, because he never moved from his position, never stopped caressing Heero's face. I could now see the resemblance to our Heero and the boy on the screen, although it was hard. I half-rose from my position on the floor, only to fall again when a quiet, thin voice said, "I am no coward."
That voice, that small voice had been Heero's. I had watched the lips move, I had seen the shoulder jerk, I had witnessed his now frail frame struggle to bring in air to form the words. He denied a blindfold.
Suddenly my trance was broken, and I saw Trowa slumped onto the viewing screen, his shoulders silently shaking. Duo and Wufei were beating each other, maybe hoping that the pain would bring them back to reality and Heero would be alive and well, pointing his gun at them and saying his famous "Omae o korosu" phrase. But he wasn't. And he would never again.
There was an explosion of gunfire as first one soldier squeezed the trigger, then another. And another. I heard my pitiful moan from a distant place. The boy's body jerked once, twice, and then as six more bullets found their way into his heart and lungs, he fell face-forward into the dust. There were bloodstains on the wall where he had stood, so much blood streaking the building and ground. Duo sat upon Wufei then, his head down, and his grief evident as loud sobs tore from his throat. Wufei had his face turned away from the rest of us, and he made no noise. I sat and rocked back and forth, unconscious of my actions, just staring at the screen. I know this now because Duo told me.
Trowa straightened as the crowd who had gathered to watch the shooting began to cheer. His hand calmly embedded a knife from who knows where into the screen. It went blank, leaving the imprint of Heero's body burned into my mind.
And now you know the story. We thought and assumed things we had no right to think and assume. If we hadn't, maybe our heart would still be alive. But he's not, and it's our fault. We didn't know him; we didn't understand him. We let him be the Perfect Soldier, and he paid for it with his life.
Yes, this is war. But this is also about friendship, about life. Just because he died in a war doesn't mean that it makes it all right. His murder was directly our faults, because we didn't pay enough attention to him and didn't take the time to understand him. Just one moment would have been all we needed. We would have seen what Trowa saw, and understood what Trowa did. But we didn't, and I will regret it until my death, and probably long afterwards.
I write this to tell you something. Everyone wants to be understood. There is not one person who wants to be alone for all his life. Are you assuming and thinking things about your friends without knowing if it's right? Can you honestly say that what you know about your friends is true? Do you understand them, or is there a part that you don't know? Is there a part that longs to be understood in them that you haven't uncovered?
Don't let your friends be alone. Don't let them be misunderstood.
Don't make the same mistake I did.
Make sure there is never another incident like Heero Yuy.
~ Quatre Raberba Winner
A.C. 196
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Many thanks to Maria-chan and all who read and respond. Your comments keep me going, and you have no idea how hyper I get after receiving them! ^_^****