The sky glowed an angry red. Flames, smoke, and dust billowed up into the sky. The fire that had earlier consumed everything was now reduced to glowing coals, and a few stubbornly flickering flames.
Trowa watched and was angry. They had their revenge, but it did not sate the degradation he felt of being used like he had been. He felt like they had stolen something; only now did he have some idea of what that thing was. Trowa saw that and was filled with anger. Anger that he could be manipulated like that; that he had been so weak. Anger that someone could even think of doing to a person what it had been done to him and his friends. And anger that they had been stronger that him, for not one of them gave in as he had done.
The strike against Erlking and his supporters had solidified Trowa to a point. The actions that were so familiar to Trowa, and Trowa alone. Erik had never participated in those types of strikes, though now he knew that Erik never existed anywhere but in his own mind. Heero had shown him the room, shown him the films of his training situations. He saw that first day when he woke within the VR as no one, and Erlking offered him a personality. He knew now who Erik was. Erik was someone created for Erlking, and Erlking alone. Now that man was dead. So where was he left?
It hadn't been extraordinarily difficult to destroy the base. It was almost therapeutic for Trowa. Familiar movements. Set the bombs, activate the timers, move on. Thought wasn't needed. It was something engrained into his very bones. It was who he was. Fighting. The only way he knew how to live his life. He was like Heero in that, he realized. Remembering that day so long ago, it seemed while they were still fighting the war against OZ. He lived for the battle, and when he had lost track of whom he was fighting against he lost himself.
He looked over to Heero, who was now sitting by their camp, preparing it for the night. They had agreed to remain at the base until the fire had burnt itself out; until the flames of their comrades' pyre had faded away. They had held their own funeral for the three of their group that wouldn't be returning with them. It was all they could do.
He smiled sadly. It was all they could do, but the pyre had been a fitting tribute. Lighting up the sky for two full days, living on stubbornly for days after that. A few explosions, a kind of a 21-gun salute, had been created when the flames met up with the munitions dump.
They didn't have any pretty words to give but then flowers and cards meant little to their friends. They had been people who had lived their lives in constant struggle. They had, however, built a monument when the rubble had cooled enough. They needed something to mark the place; they didn't want this spot to turn into an insignificant field. This was the battleground where their friends finally fell; this was the final resting-place of the unknown harbingers of peace. Their sacrifice, their battles would be remembered after their deaths.
The monument was a simple thing, just a cairn made out of rocks and metal; whatever they could find. Into one side they carved a simple inscription:
Chang Wufei,
Quatre Rababa Winner,
Duo Maxwell.
Continue.
Heero approached, finished with his tasks. He sat down beside Trowa.
"How're you doing?"
Trowa looked up then. One of Heero's eyes was still black and Trowa felt a twinge of guilt, and of gratitude. He still didn't know why Heero had kept trying to help him, especially after all he had done to him. He didn't know why the Perfect Soldier had even bothered. After they had escaped, and even for a few days after their attack, Trowa didn't quite know who he was. He remembered lashing out on Heero a few times, really just wanting confirmation that he was alive, that he was who he thought he was but not knowing how to ask. Just wanting to purge himself of the anger. But he had no idea who to direct it against. Every time Heero had taken it, and had given what was needed. Every time Trowa faltered Heero was there, but he still left time for Trowa to think, to find himself again within the confusion of whom he had been. In his mind he had been a living contradiction. He killed his friends, trusted his enemies. He was able to play both sides at once, feeling nothing… Nothing until now, when the tried to reconcile parts within himself. When he tried to find the real person in amongst the lies. And he found no one, just a cavern full of contradictions.
But then Heero was there. And even if Trowa didn't know who Trowa was, Heero did. It was that unwavering confidence that Trowa had clung to. Heero knew, and Heero was the unchanging constant that Trowa needed to base himself off of.
But now he could hear the concern in Heero's voice. Trowa looked out across the fields again, off at the sun now sinking low beneath the horizon.
"Erik has died."
Heero nodded, accepting the statement as truth. He offered a small smile; perhaps one of congratulations but in the fading light Trowa couldn't quite be sure, then went of to his bedroll.
Heero smiled to himself as he lay down. That was what he had been waiting for. Some confirmation that Trowa had managed to destroy the demons that had been following him. Now that Trowa had found his certainty of self again, and it would only be a short journey back to the Trowa from before. The confidant warrior that faced death so many times, relying on nothing but his own skill to keep him alive. There would still be problems; there would still be restless nights filled with nightmares. Heero knew that things couldn't be perfect right away, but the worst was over.
Lying there he watched Trowa, still sitting on the ridge of the hill.
*****
Trowa waited until the sun had disappeared completely beneath the horizon, till the last of its glow faded away and darkness surrounded them. It was the first night since the attack that it was dark enough to see the stars, and once again the two men were amazed at how many there were, at how bright they shone.
I don't know what happened that night, but seeing the stars reminded me of when I first saw them, when I realized that I had a name; that I was someone. I remembered all the battles fought with my friends among those very stars. I remembered.
***end***
