*Just because IIIIIIIIIIIeIIIIIIIII will always loooooooooooove you*
*IIIIIIIIIIIIIeIIIIIIIII can't help but love you*
(Pause for effect. Volume fades.)
*How wonderful I feel now that you're in the (split) wooooooooorld*
Uh oh, new song. *Takes breath.*
*Never known I could feel like this, like I've never seen the sky before*
*SLAP*
Thanks Mara. I think I needed that if I'm going to get more than half an hour of sleep. Must remember that I have a job tomorrow . . .
(Part XIII) "One Breath"
Someone was calling her name. Distant, a gentile deep smooth voice, a voice filled with fear and longing and worry. It drew harmonies out of the nothingness that she'd never known existed. It made her want to cry— if only she could figure out how. She saw stars, millions of them, glittering like jewels among the spectrum colors of the Milky Way and other galaxies. His voice seemed to echo against the stars, giving the universe a crystalline quality. He pleaded, "Don't go Marie, please . . ." over and over again.
She opened her eyes and the pain struck. Her side was on fire, and had no water. The outcry was involuntary— as was the spasm that made it hurt worse. It felt like she'd been paralyzed and connected to a live wire. "Why can't I just die?" she moaned. "Be merciful for once!" There were so many people she missed. Her lover was dead, her father haunting her, and Fortuna was worse than gone.
"Don't go. You've got so much ahead of you in life. Don't throw it all away tempting fate, as I did." The voice was still resonant, but now it drew tones from the wreckage and stagnant water settling around in the wreckage of the ship. There was his face, hovering in the night with an electric-blue aura.
He really was quite handsome, she observed with a light head, unable to distract herself. She looked like him. The red in her hair resulted from the combination of his orange and her mother's chestnut-brown. The thought flicked by in less than a second, but for that instant the pain had lessened. That was a little thing to be grateful for, at least.
"My child," he started, looking as though he was about to cry.
"Don't call me that," she managed brokenly aloud.
"No!" The outburst was sudden, accompanied by a blast of chilly, biting wind. "I've kept this to myself long enough, and you have to know. I won't let you be torn away from me by dying!"
She could see a front rolling in from the east; the colors of the rising sun were spreading over them. She could feel her pulse racing through her, bringing with it a feeling of intense fear and desire. Her abdominal muscles clenched again, but she was unable to curl up, her arm pinned under a scrap of debris. It throbbed, too. It was just the stab wound that burned, though. Her throat closed up entirely and she had nowhere to apply her thoughts.
Then, there was a blessed relief, a cold that after a moment was wonderfully numbing. She realized that he was pressing his ghostly hands against her charred flesh. He caught her eyes before she could look away and it finally came to her just how sad he seemed.
"You were so young," he said, the first to break her gaze. "Seven times I tried, seven! A con artist would have been proud at my plans, and yet Dekim managed to get you back every time. I remember our only Christmas. You were five. Tell me you remember, Marie."
She wanted to say no, she didn't remember, but as soon as he touched her forehead with an icy palm she felt the memories flooding back, finally freed after so long. He had been so kind and gentile, caring and attentive like she'd never known among the Bartons, and it had only been for three days that they were together in a small cabin deep in the snowy woods. When Dekim had come for her with his bodyguards, she hadn't wanted to go.
"Everything was for you. I hoped that if I could overpower Dekim I could take you back. I resigned from the counsel hoping that Dekim would be too distracted to care for you closely. He called and taunted me after he poisoned your mother. I tried to hang him with that, but he had hidden the evidence well.
"You were the most beautiful little baby, Marie," he continued wistfully. "I remember I got to hold you once, right before Dekim caught me. It was so amazing . . . I'd never realized that babies were so tiny and helpless. My arms have ached ever since then, and not even your grandfather could stop me from trying to get close to you."
Every late-night visit had left the little girl wondering who he was.
"And then, snooping around in Dekim's records, I cam across Fortuna and Ihminen. I was the first to realize what you so accurately called the Inimicus Paradox, but before I could tell anyone, I was killed. This whole time, my only thoughts have been on letting you know when the time came. Little did I realize you'd figure it out on your own."
"I thought you'd come to ask my forgiveness for everything you've done," Marie said. That was what had been so unforgivable, but he hadn't mentioned it at all. Her voice seemed clearer now, stronger. She knew he was lending her all his residual energy. His image was fading, the sky growing brighter behind him.
There was silence for a long moment between them, father and daughter sharing a secret, sacred moment. Marie realized that she was afraid to die now. She didn't want to lose this moment where everything seemed so perfect.
"One breath, Mariemaia," he whispered. "If I could have one breath, one moment to spend in this world, it would be to tell you how proud I am and how much I love you. It is a privilege to be a father to a woman like you. I just wish I could have been there for you. I tried so hard, but I guess it wasn't nearly hard enough."
He was fading fast, and somehow she knew he wouldn't be coming back. All his energy was being used to keep her alive. "Don't—" she started, but he held up one almost invisible hand.
"To perish for my beautiful daughter, there is no greater gift I could give," he told her.
"I'd rather you stayed," she said, controlling clenched muscles enough to grab his arm.
It took her a long minute to realize that she shouldn't have been able to grip him. The look on his face said that he was just as surprised as she. Marie realized that his skin was growing more solid, warmer.
All things being energy, indestructible, nothing ever truly dies.
A piece of wreckage broke under his knee, and Treize staggered with a look of astonishment, staring at his own hands. He looked back at his daughter, and they shared a moment of unbelieving before Marie shuddered with the return of the burning in her side.
"Hey, can anyone hear me?" Wasting no time, he shoved his hands under the debris crushing Marie's arm and most of her shoulder. "Hello?" He called again, straining against the weight. "Hold on, sweetheart. We'll get you out of here."
But his image, instead of fading, blurred with everything around him. Mostly out of multiple layers of shock, Marie blacked out again.
~~@[~*,~]@~~
"No . . ." Cam shoved his way through the wreckage. He could see people congregating up ahead. He just hoped they hadn't found someone dead. It felt like years since he'd seen Marie. He'd sat up late every night aboard the ship watching her pretty face worry and fret, knowing that, behind her words, she was grieving for he who was not dead. He'd wanted to scream that Beliv had been too much of a coward to kill him, but too devious to tell her. He spotted Dennis and ran for him.
"Cam, you haven't found Marie, have you?" They'd all seen her fall.
"I was hoping you had." Cam rubbed his head, which felt as if it were in a vice.
Dennis tossed him a flashlight. "It'll be quicker if we split up."
Cam nodded and started back the way he'd came.
The dawn was eerie and filled with shadows. Cam winced every time something crunched underfoot, trying not to think about what it might have been. He strained his ears to their fullest (his jaw was starting to ache), but he heard nothing.
A loud, warbly crash echoed through the rubble, accompanied by a very human yell. Cam jumped and broke into a run.
A man's figure emerged from a pit of distorted metal, holding in his arms a body Cam recognized immediately, feeling his stomach drop. "Marie!" he choked, staggering.
"Hey, you there, go find a medical personnel now! She's hurt!" The voice was commanding and edged with panic. "What are you standing around for?"
"I— is she bad?" Cam whispered, trying his best to keep calm.
"Fairly, and she needs help!" He was angry now, more urgent. Cam found himself obeying without thinking.
"Bring her over here," he called, motioning back to the gathering of people. He'd seen ambulance lights there. The man was murmuring gently to Mariemaia, and she was replying, muffled by his shirt. He dropped back a few paces so he could listen.
"Hold on, sweetheart. We'll get you to a hospital. You'll be all right."
" . . . Father . . . "
"Sh, now, don't talk."
Marie fell silent, and Cam glanced back at them, knowing she must have been delirious. She was clutching at his shirt and nuzzling him like a child.
They got back, and the strange man handed Marie over to a leaving emergency vehicle with a hint of reluctance. Cam inquired everywhere about her condition, but the meds had just given him exasperated "I don't know"s and told him off.
"D'you . . . think she's gonna live?" he asked the man who'd carried her in.
Standing beside him, he brushed a stray carrot-blonde hair out of his eyes, yellow sun rising behind him. He put a hand on the other's shoulder gently. "She'll be all right, Cam."
~~@[~*,~]@~~
Forgotten in the wastelands of the desert, Pennes Nulles drifted down among the ancient Pyramids on the Nile River in Egypt, the Land of Eternal life. It had once so been called by its ancient people. He felt like crying, beneath his mask. It had been a long time since he'd felt that way, and that was no accident. Fortuna stirred, hugging his neck tightly and drifting in and out of consciousness alongside Mariemaia. He could do nothing for her pain.
The city of Cairo stretched before them, millions of people pausing at the sight of the two winged gundams among the eternal sands of Egypt. Zero laid her gently among the dunes, shining brightly in the morning sun. Mariemaia had been safe hours ago in a hospital not far from them, but Fortuna was still dying. She would use all her energy trying to heal, and she would run out. Once that happened, she would never reawaken as he was able to two years ago.
He knelt over her, spreading golden wings to shade her from the scalding sun. Weakly, she reached up with a slender arm to push aside his armored mask. "Show me your face, Nulles. Let me see your eyes," she whispered. "Don't . . . be afraid . . ."
He reached up and slid it up into his helmet, realizing he had been afraid to show her an indifferent face, one that would hurt her. She smiled, though, never fearful when she knew more than he could even guess. "Don't leave me," he pleaded. They'd both come too far to lose everything now. "Please . . . I love you."
She closed her eyes as if in ecstasy, though he knew he'd lose her if she drifted. "You've no idea . . . how long I've waited . . . to hear that."
"We take it for granted," he told her, shaking her shoulder. "Open your eyes!"
"I'm . . . so tired," she muttered, grasping at his hand.
"You can't sleep," he cried desperately. She only moaned in response, and out of his frustrations, he hit her across the face.
She whimpered, but her eyes opened. They gazed at him in anger, as no doubt her face stung, but it would have been minor as compared to the gaping hole in her side. "Now is the time you won't leave me alone, when all I've wanted for years is to be by your side."
"And I'm sorry I haven't been there for you," he said, "but the past cannot be undone. Tell me I have a future to make up for it in!"
"I'm dying, Nulles." One black-feathered wing brushed lightly against his leg, where if she could not lift an arm to touch his pale face she could still caress him with affection and sadness. "I love you, and I will always love you, but I can't simply undo this!"
Something clicked in the back of his head suddenly, and looked at her with newfound hope. "No . . . there is a way," he said excitedly.
"You're ready to make that sacrifice?" she asked, sensing his thoughts. "I thought you had always been opposed."
He stroked her face, meeting Fortuna's dark hazel eyes with no sign of regret. "I've finally found a reason for wanting to give it all up. I'm tired of fighting. I'm tired of fearing for your life. If it means I can continue to be with you, why would I pass it up before it's too late?"
She smiled, ebony features lighting up with a happiness that words would never describe, even in their own romantic tongue. Suddenly the world seemed alive again.
Zero took her gently back into his arms and closed his eyes, digging through files in his head until he found the initiation sequence that would place an irreversible new life within them both. He enfolded them both in shimmering golden feathers, awash with the light of a bright day.
~~@[~*,~]@~~
Two weeks and a day later in the dry air of Cairo General, the doctor declared Mariemaia healthy enough to have visitors. Again and again she related the story of her stay on the Laiva and all she'd learned there, cradled in Cam's unresisting arms, silent tears of joy rolling down her face. None of the pilots present related much surprise to the fact that Treize was alive once more, and agreed to keep the secret safe, so long as he promised not to interfere with the workings of the world anymore. "I'm perfectly content just being with my daughter," he assured them all, laughing.
"I don't understand how," Duo, an admitted witness of the very same kind of miracle.
"I think maybe I was causing them too much trouble in the afterlife, too," Treize jested, though secretly he was as stumped as the rest. Marie was allowed to finish her story then, and Akiko beamed at being right about the energy of thought, sitting at Marie's feet.
"That might just be it, that something caused his existential energy to be incarnated back into a material body," Quatre said, and every except Marie and Treize looked at him in puzzlement. The blonde shook his head, just as little Quatre sneezed in Noin's arms. "Anyway, I found out what was up with Wufei when he just ran off."
No one had heard a word from the Chinese man in weeks. "What happened?" Trowa asked curiously.
"He's down in Thailand with Phailin and his daughter. He said he'd probably be up here in a few days, but he didn't want to put the baby at risk by moving around too much." Quatre carefully hid a smile at the other's faces. So many pairs of wide eyes was comical.
"Tell him not to worry about it," Marie said, first to recover. "He doesn't have to come up here. Let him enjoy the little one."
"What's her name?" Relena asked.
"It's the most obvious one." Quatre chuckled.
"Merian," several of them said at once.
"I wonder why he didn't tell us," Heero mused.
"Claimed he had no idea Phailin was even pregnant when he left," Quatre answered. "That must've come as a nasty surprise."
"No doubt," Duo said, scanning the floor for his own son, who was babbling happily under the hospital bed with Raina. Sophie squeezed her husband's hand.
"Miss Khushrenada," called the nurse, sticking her head into the room. "You've got more guests."
"Send them in," said Marie, puzzled. Everyone seemed to be in the room already!
The moment the two women entered, however, she don't know how she could have forgotten them. No sooner had they both entered, though, then one backed out again, both hands over and open mouth, eyes wide in panic. Treize swore under his breath and chased Une out into the hallway. "Who was he?" Dorothy demanded, turning not to Marie but Quatre.
Quatre took her aside, grasping both her hands gently in a whispered conversation. Milliardo and Trowa glanced at each other with bemused expressions. Quatre generally didn't make gestures like that.
"It can't be true," Dorothy said aloud, loud enough for the rest of them to hear.
Out in the hall, Treize finally managed to pin Une against the wall long enough to get her to listen to him. As gently as he could manage while handling his frustrations. "How could you possibly—?" she glared at him with a sudden false rage, angry with her assumption that he was a fraud.
"You're name is April," he said quickly, managing to capture her attention. No one knew that Lady Une even had a first name except one person, who she had told after eliminating the records that had her registered under the aforementioned title. That person had been her lover Treize. "Not because it was the month that you were born in but because when you were born your eyes were the color of April flowers, though they changed a few days later." He paused for breath, watching her expression turn from anger to pain. "When you were shot, I found you, took you to my safe-house and cared for you there. You slept in my bed for that month, I in the armchair in the same room. One day while I was out . . . you got out of bed and discovered all my photos of Mariemaia. I . . . I told you everything that night, and you promised that you'd help me get her back, and we'd live together . . ."
"It really is you," she breathed, brown eyes filling with tears. Those were precious secrets between them, and there was no way anyone else could have known about those private moments. Every word of it was true. "God, Treize, what the hell are you doing here?"
He'd forgotten just how much he'd missed her, as she fell against him. "For the love of a daughter, one will do just about anything," he murmured, squeezing her waist. "Sometimes, the truth is harder to accept, and requires the most desperate measures."
~~@[~*,~]@~~
"Wufei, where's Merian?" Phailin opened the bedroom door, blinking sleepily and holding her robe closed with one hand.
Wufei looked up sharply, having been awoken from a nap after going out around noon for a long soak in the bathhouse. "I thought she was in there with you."
"She's was, but she's gone!"
The blood drained from Wufei's face. "Stay here," he ordered, looking around for his sword. He snatched it from the table and ran out, door slamming behind him.
It wasn't hard to track the infant's cries once she started. Wufei pursued her, grumbling to himself about moments of peace. It seemed strange that a kidnapper would stick to the main street, but once he rounded the corner in his bare feet, he understood.
A middle-aged monk with a bemused expression was listening to Phailin's mother testify that she was an unholy child.
"She is tainted with murderous blood, sir. I pray you will save her from her accursed name—"
"I have had just about enough of this!" Wufei roared, approaching the woman at a furious pace. "I don't know why you fear me so much, woman, but any person I ever killed was not because I desired to kill! Any pilot in my position would have done the same. As for your husband and your father, I'm sorry, but it's not as if I ordered their deaths. Jen is innocent, I have pleaded forgiveness day and night for the last decade, and still you persecute us for things we have not done. I have the right mind to leave this place right now and never return. I'm sure Phailin would support me, too!"
"Now, what is this, Charunee? Surely a man so angry at you speaks the truth? Is this your daughter, good sir?"
"She is," Wufei answered as politely as he could manage, reaching for the squalling baby in his orange-robed arms. "If I could be so good as to have her back . . ."
The monk's face twinkled merrily and he handed her over promptly. Merian started to calm down right away. He laughed as Phailin's mother sputtered. "You are Phailin's husband Wufei? She's spoken to me at great length about you. I was expecting to hear news of the child any day. This is her?"
"Y— yeah," Wufei said, a little startled. You don't usually get friendly with monastery monks.
"Chatchom!" Phailin's voice was filled with relief. "I suppose you're at the middle of this, aren't you?"
"Ah, Phailin, it's good to see you. You look quite fit for a new mother!"
Phailin laughed and took his offered hands. "You flatter me, uncle. It was good of you to come all this way. What happened?"
"The usual Chang paranoia from your mother, I think," Chatchom said as if was nothing at all to worry about. "She was insisting on me holding a purification ceremony, but I hardly think that's necessary."
Phailin scowled at the round woman. "What would she need to be cleansed for? Wufei's been pulling so much of the burden these past weeks that I'm surprised he isn't sleeping as much as I am! He's done nothing wrong." Turning away from her bashed mother, she nodded to her husband. "Oh, Wu, this is my father's brother Chatchom. Surely you remember my stories."
"Oh, that uncle!" Wufei bowed awkwardly with Merian clinging to his shirt. "I never get tired of those exploits, do I?"
"It is finally good to meet the man who won my niece's heart," chuckled Chatchom brightly. "Buddha knows, that isn't an easy task!"
"Can we offer something to eat, uncle?" Phailin relieved her husband of the sleeping Merian and shook a piece of loose blue-black hair from her shoulder.
"Rice and water would be much obliged after this long journey," Chatchom sighed.
~~@[~*,~]@~~
"What do you think will happen to the other gundams?" Duo asked quietly, looking pensive. "I suppose we should let them decide, huh?"
Heero shook his head. "They were never able to achieve what Zero and Fortuna have in the way of intellect. They still run on conventional fuel. We just didn't have the technology that our interstellar friends had. I don't know how useful they'll be as time goes by. You're probably right, though, Duo. We should let them decide for themselves. I don't think it would be wise to destroy them again. Not only would some people call it murder, but it would only tempt someone else to bring them back."
"A very strong point," Duo admitted.
"So what's happened to Fortuna? I can sense that she's not dead, but I can't communicate with her either." Marie finally found an opening in the discussion and wedged herself into it.
Heero looked at her, a somewhat mischievous grin on his normally solemn face. Before he could answer, though, Trowa reached over and opened the curtains on her window. "They haven't moved since they got here," he told her, motioning outside.
The hospital was high-rise, and if she leaned over (much to Cam's anxiety) she could see out into the desert. There, on the border to the city, were two forms locked in an embrace, bathed in a luminous green light.
"Fortuna told me about it," Treize told them all. "It was a small snippet of conversation I almost forgot, but when the Laiva and her sister ship the Gesakyre created the gundams, they built some kind of transformation into the machinery. The gundams can translate their programming into DNA. The process is irreversible once initiated, and when complete they will no longer be able to host a pilot. The best way to describe it is like a very fast adolescence. They were children, now they have grown up, as children tend to do. They will be living creatures, but they will not consume natural resources the same way we do. They will still be able to live in space, but I think those two might prefer to live on Earth."
"What do you mean by that?" Trowa asked. Marie noted with some satisfaction that her foster uncle finally seemed to be getting over the twinges of jealousy he'd been trying to hide since he'd met her father. She'd had to remind him a few days ago, before he'd left with the others, that she still loved him, too.
Treize shrugged. "Well, both their lifebonded will be here— yes, the bonds will hold even through the transformation— and I would assume they'll want to start a family of their own."
Everyone gave him disbelieving looks.
"I mean it. Once they become creatures like us, they'll be able to reproduce just like any other animal. It was built in."
"Will their children be able to host pilots?" Quatre asked, sounding intrigued. His hand was still on Dorothy's shoulder.
"I believe so. You'll have to ask them when they come around," Treize answered.
As if he'd said some kind of password, Marie gestured wildly back to the window, where she could see something strange happening to the egg-like green shell. With the rest of the room gaping, the light fizzed once, then faded gently. Even from their vantage point miles away, they saw Pennes Nulles blink the palest blue eyes and shake his head to flick long strands of white-blonde hair over one magnificently sculpted, cream-colored shoulder. His shimmering gold wings settled in his lap (as even gundams have some modesty), covering Fortuna as well. The female gundam awoke more slowly, as if from a deep sleep. She contrasted to Zero completely, ebony arms flung around her love's neck, black hair draping down against her own wings, spread out upon the sand like a fallen eagle's. Even from this distance Mariemaia could see the curve of shallow breasts before they disappeared beneath Nulles' protective feathers, long slender calves sprawled on the ground.
"Wow," Akiko said, looking back at Mariemaia. "Now they really do look like angels."
Nobody chuckled at the cute remark made by the eight year-old girl, because they were all thinking exactly the same thing. Marie felt herself shudder, and realized with a start that she could feel Fortuna fully again. She quickly shielded herself— she didn't want to pry into a personal moment.
Angels they were— angels in the model of Earth. Marie remembered one of Ihminen's many conversations with her. "We have been watching, listening, and appreciating the human race for many, many years," he had said. We all— my people especially— think that you are the most beautiful of all. That is why, underneath their armor, we designed the gundams to look human. They are supposed to represent everything we appreciate and respect, and every time I remember that, studying our creations with pride, it makes me shiver. Fortuna and even Inimicus are like the daughters I never had. They are that way to all of us."
A great sigh seemed to pass through the world, certainly the city, a sigh that summed up every beauty, every strength and every conviction that two people could ever hold. People going about their daily activities in the streets stopped, glancing in awe at their guests. Cam kissed her gently, feeling her shake. Behind the others, Quatre and Dorothy reached for each other's hands. Marie had finally been told the story of the Sanc Kingdom's latest rise and fall, and she wondered if Quatre hadn't found a little more out there than he claimed. She didn't say anything about it.
Une had rushed out of the city early that morning to wrap up some new little spark, leaving Treize alone once he'd finally began to feel at home again. He'd complained about it a little before he realized he sounded selfish, but none of them had blamed him in the slightest. Everyone present knew what it was like to miss someone. Everyone present knew how hard the complications of life were to accept.
Marie lay back against Cam's shoulder, trying to share the gratifying moment with him as best she could without straining her healing wound too much. The heavy painkillers made her drowsy, but she'd fought sleep with everything to spend moments with him, making up for their months of separation. He'd promised her that once she was released, he'd take her back to his home in southern France among the endless miles of vineyards and farms. She could meet his mother and his dog, and they'd sit out in the clear dark nights and watch the stars until they fell asleep in the gently swaying hammock on his porch. It had all sounded so nice to her when he'd told her about it that she'd fallen asleep listening to his lulling voice.
In fact, thinking about it now just made her want to draw the next day nearer.
After a while, Trowa nudged the others and gestured to his niece. "I think we should call it a day," he suggested softly. One by one, they filed out of the room, still chatting happily, still in good spirits now that the press of war had been taken off their minds.
Treize rolled his chair back into its corner and glanced at Cam. "You're not coming?" he asked.
Cam shrugged, moving Marie over until she was lying on her bed and not him. "Right now the only thing I want is to be with her. Besides, I don't really have any other place to be."
"Nonsense," Treize said, sticking out a hand. "It's been a long time since I've talked to any of my old friends. I should have known not to tell stories about my precious little daughter to a scamp like you."
"It took me forever to convince her you were really all right, as a human being," Cam admitted, accepting the tug up from his sitting position. He stretched a little, for the first time realizing that he'd been sitting for way too long. "Don't think she would believe that you had a thing for kids, as much of a politician as you were."
"Once a parent, always a parent," Treize sighed, leaning over to kiss Mariemaia's forehead gently. "There's bound to be a good lunch somewhere around here. I'd like a chance to sit around and catch up on current events."
"I'm not exactly your best person for news. Heero would probably know more than me," Cam admitted, brushing sandy-blonde hair out of his face. "I've been out of the loop for a couple of years, running around with rogues of my own kind."
Treize punched him lightly in the arm and shut the door (not noticing the faint smile on his daughter's supposedly sleeping face). "I think anything in the last decade will suffice for the moment!"
~~@[~*,~]@~~
"Welcome back into the world, my love," Nulles said, rubbing Fortuna's side with a grin on his pale features. Fortuna looked up at him in surprise, noticing the drastic differences with a new eye. Nothing felt different, except that her abdomen no longer was hollow, but it was so strange to see Zero without armor. The pain was gone, too, with not even a scar. Everything had gone exactly how Laiva had described . . . only words could never describe the way the world felt completely new.
She looked down at herself, never having really seen a female body without clothes on before. How strange it was! Nulles, too, was different in a way that was startling. He had handsome, powerful features,. Fortuna suddenly realized just how much clothes can hide. It was so hard to tell exactly what anyone looked like under bundles of cloth.
"Everything seems so unreal," she answered, glancing around. Everything was exactly how it had been before . . . except that it wasn't.
"The war is over," he explained. "The people know it, and rejoice even still. It's amazing how joy outlasts despair."
"Like how love outlasts hate? And frustration? And time?" There were a thousand different examples she could have used to punctuate her words, but Nulles would have known them already. "For a human, it takes many more muscles to frown than to smile. Why go for the choice that is only more effort?"
He nodded. "Exactly."
Fortuna wrapped her wings around herself like a cloak, knowing that in this kind of environment especially clothes served more protection than merely against the elements, and stood, testing her new legs, her new arms and new eyes. "You know," she observed, "I think perhaps in truth we were more limited as machines than as animals."
"Oh?" He draped an arm across her shoulders, following her gaze into the city. "And why would you say that?"
"As a machine, I could only see the features of others as they went about all the things that made up their little lives. I always ended up having to remind myself why I existed."
"I gave up on that after a while," Nulles said. "After I stopped feeling. There was nothing left. I wanted to die."
"But now," Fortuna continued, scanning the activities of the bustling outskirts of Cairo with fulfillment, "now I can see inside myself. I can consider myself one of this vast community of beings that has no gigantic, heroic purpose to complete. We no longer have to believe we are better out of necessity, but only part of the whole that weaves the threads of the universe itself. There is something out there that, be it God or be it only a figment of my thoughts, all consciousness has created and supports. It is neither good nor evil, and it demands nothing more of us than to continue living our lives, and to be happy with what we have, how little or how much that means for us to be satisfied."
"All I need to be satisfied right now is you by my side and a little privacy," Zero murmured in her ear.
She laughed, a laugh that, too, surprised her. It wasn't a strange laugh, or one you'd necessarily pick out of a crowd. It was a laugh that was full of satisfaction, a laugh that said that she had seen the darkest side of the mind and had emerged from the brambles scratched but ultimately victorious. It was the laugh that made people think of bridle bells and reminded children of snow and a warm fire to curl up beside. It was a laugh that washed away sadness, and the world seemed to stop to listen and enjoy it.
Blocks away, she spied her great friend Treize and Marie's lover Cam Nolon wave to them, grins on their faces. She and Nulles both waved back, and Fortuna knew why Mariemaia had suddenly seemed so devoid of mourning. All had been forgiven, and the thing she had feared had not in fact taken place, just as Fate had suspected. The pilots and their families and companions had already spread around, and as water forms puddles or makes round blotches in cloth they would spread their happiness to those around them. Soon the small problems would be put aside and a peace restored.
"I can't help but feel that it may have been worth it after all," she told Nulles quietly.
"Worth what?" he inquired.
"Every sacrifice we've made . . . every life that was taken— and given . . . every person who lost a home or family or anything else will grieve now, but when tears are dried, I think this may be one war the human race will not regret."
"Why? It is a curious thing, not to regret something so devastating to so many people."
"Because it has taught us so many things." Fortuna slipped an arm around his warm waist, watching the people move, watching the sun climb higher in the sky, and watching the sparse clouds drift overhead in an endless, random waltz.
The gundams were truly everything that symbolized hope on Earth, she thought, because they were able to see it in everything and help others see it in themselves.
We do not breathe, but we are as alive as anyone. We contribute to the community of minds that supports everyone and helps them grow. Our hearts beat strong for our friends and for ourselves. That is what counts in this world of conflicts and confusion.
*****************************************
Whoo . . .
*Come what may, come what may*
*I will love you until my dyyyyyyying day!*
*Suddenly the world seems like such a perfect place*
*Suddenly moves with such a perfect grace*
*Suddenly my life doesn't seem such a waste . . .*
and ultimately so on.
So what happens now? Seems like such a good ending, but I had another chapter to fill. So here's what's up next: the epilogue! Ten years after, is yet another war brewing or have this one's lessons finally stuck? Beautifully set to the translation of TWO~MIX's "Last Impression" (slightly modified for comprehension purposes), you're just a few clicks away from AC 208: The Search for Truth (Part XIV): "Prologue: AC 218; Resiliance."