Part Six

"So what was Little Miss Mariemaia doing at the apartment?" Sally queried, as expected, from the driver's seat.

"I don't know," Wufei confessed, leaning back against his headrest. The meeting at Une's had taken longer than he'd realized, and the sun was starting to sink in the sky, staining the clouds red and gold. "She said she'd wanted to see me, but didn't get much farther than that." He paused and then added, "That girl worries me."

He saw Sally's frown from the corner of one eye. "What for?" she asked.

Wufei shrugged. She has her father's eyes. "She puts on too good a show. That child has issues; if you ask me, Une hasn't done enough to get her sorted out properly."

"Oh, but Duo hasn't a mental problem in the world, hmm?" The edge in her voice let Wufei know that Sally hadn't quite let him off the hook yet, and he regretted his previous words instantly for the reminder they provoked. "Anyway," continued Sally, "I don't see you stepping up to lend a hand with Mariemaia's upbringing. You avoid her at every turn!"

Wufei didn't have anything to respond to that with, so he dropped his chin to his fist and glared broodingly out the window, watching the sun dip behind the roofs of Strasbourg, determined not to say another word until they were home.

Beside him, however, Sally suddenly burst out laughing. "Where have I seen that pose before?" she teased. "You look just like a cranky teenager when you do that. Come on, Wufei, don't be stubborn; I'm only pointing out the truth." After a moment of awkward silence she went on: "I'm glad you're home, you know. Safe and sound. I was worried about you."

Half of Wufei was glad that he was home as well; the other half was more rebellious in its feelings, tied up in thoughts about Duo Maxwell and his actions and whereabouts -- and now about Mariemaia Barton as well. He tried to concentrate on Sally's warm form lying beside him -- having decided to sit up half the night talking with him, she had then gone on to fall asleep on the sofa bed she had set up for his use -- but his efforts at distracting himself simply were not working.

Wufei knew perfectly well why he disliked meeting with Mariemaia; his dislike and mistrust were perfectly natural and had a root which he and anyone else who cared to could trace entirely too easily. For over a year, he had devoted himself entirely to the cause of war against OZ -- more specifically, he had concentrated on his personal vendetta against its leader, Treize Khushrenada. Having achieved his ultimate goal of killing the man, less than a year later he ironically turned himself into the service of Khushrenada's illegitimate daughter, Mariemaia, and fought a war very similar to the one he had just completed, but on the opposite side. He had lost, in more ways than one. And now, was it wrong that the sight of that child should provoke in him the same keen sense of shame that accompanied most of his memories of that second war? Of course it wasn't.

But -- of course, the dreaded 'but' -- the problem of right and wrong was much more difficult to answer in connection to whether it was wrong of him to avoid Mariemaia (especially when, as she had made perfectly clear to him that afternoon, she had a very strong desire to see him) simply to avoid facing up to that feeling of shame. He wanted to know what she had been about to say about Treize before Sally had arrived, interrupting their encounter.

And Duo…

Wufei shivered a little, recalling in connection to his friend the idea that he had fixed on at Une's. This was the thought he both dreaded encountering again and found impossible to avoid while lying there in the dark. This idea was dangerous; thinking about it was playing with fire. Perhaps Wufei knew this because he knew what the foregone conclusion would be. Was.

This wasn't what I fought for…

The thought resonated. Surely he wasn't just imagining that. He shivered again, and bent impulsively over Sally, pressing a kiss to her lips, protectively. They were pliable in sleep, yielding gently to him. Wufei kissed her again, more passionately. If he could just forget that thought and be with her, everything would be all right. And it wasn't as if he didn't want her -- he desperately wanted to, for once, give up the strict control he always kept on his more hormonal desires with Sally. He wanted to kiss her and touch her and just…just…fuck her. And if he could only lose himself in that experience, it would surely be more overpowering than anything else that was leaping around in his brain at that moment -- This wasn't what I fought for!

But there it was again, that thought, and of course that was exactly why he couldn't wake Sally up and tell her he had changed his mind about waiting until they were married to have sex. He couldn't spoil it with ulterior motives, however tempting. He couldn't take advantage of Sally like that. Wufei could control his desires, but he couldn't control that one thought; before anything else could happen, he needed to confront that idea and deal with it.

Duo had said it first, but so what? They could be talking about two completely different things, for all Wufei knew… But Wufei did know: they weren't. They couldn't be, not really. Duo spoke in terms of liberating the colonies; Wufei in terms of he didn't know quite what -- perhaps that same intangible justice he'd been searching for ever since Meiran…all throughout the war. Perhaps it was that he was referring to now. Because this peace…this peace that they had all worked so hard to build, and build properly so that it wouldn't collapse, so that it would be what they all fought so hard for…this wasn't it.

'Hilde said you wanted another war…'

'Well maybe I do.'

But that was Duo speaking again. Did Wufei want another war? A third, after everything that he had been through with the first two? And was another war really a viable solution to what it was they had managed to create…whatever 'it' was…? By destroying this peace could they actually create something better? Now at least they had a start -- surely this was at least a step in the right direction. It had to be, for all their trouble with it.

Duo did not seem to think so -- and Duo was the one who was supposedly, if Wufei was really to believe him as sane as he claimed to be, involved in a one-on-one communication with some sort of divine being.

Come on…You don't really believe that, do you? Wufei questioned himself skeptically. It was really just too much. But unfortunately, there did not seem to be any middle ground to take between the two issues -- either Duo was, in fact, being spoken to by what he referred to as God and was therefore sane; or, the conversations were entirely figments of his delusional imagination, and he was therefore, as the rest of the world chose to believe, mentally ill. And regardless of which Wufei chose to believe, if it came down to it, which of those two choices would he prefer to be the case? Certainly, the first option saved his friend, but at the same time it placed an enormous burden upon their shoulders and held the possibility to break inconceivable stretches of human thought and modern philosophy.

How on Earth could he be expected to come up with an answer of that sort without some proof either one way or the other? Wufei was simply not capable of it -- wild leaps of faith were simply not things he could bring himself to very easily; in spite of the fairly traditional beliefs he held about divinity and the afterlife, he relied more on what he could see and touch. After all, it was not every day that something otherworldly came and bit him on the nose.

Then suddenly, quite out of the blue, Wufei was struck with an idea that could, possibly, provide him with his answers. He was rather surprised he hadn't thought of doing this earlier, but put it down to the fact that it was rather too obvious, as well as a dreadful longshot and something that was bound to make him feel quite silly whether it worked or not. He certainly felt a bit surprised at himself as he got up to carry it out, worming his way carefully around Sally.

The floor was cool against his bare feet, but not as cool as the cement steps leading outside from Sally's kitchen to her back garden. In comparison, the earth beneath the dew was quite warm. Wufei dug his toes into the rich soil. He walked out into the middle of the yard and planted himself there, stretching, raising his arms up slowly into the humid night air. The noises of the city surrounded him, but Wufei easily tuned those out, slipping quietly into meditation.

Nothing happened.

Talk to me, he whispered in his mind, filtering his consciousness into that thought.

Nothing happened.

Talk to me, he asked again, placing all the religious faith he had behind the request.

But nothing happened.

Wufei's eyes opened. He stared around the garden, from the ivy creeping its way up Sally's rear wall to the vegetable patch nestled in the back of her fenced-in yard. He was starting to feel agitated. He wanted an answer to his question, and receiving nothing was really making him feel foolish. He was standing in his girlfriend's backyard in the dead of night wearing only his pajamas…and to top it all off, he was trying to converse with some possibly nonexistent higher entity.

"Talk to me," he demanded, aloud this time, and with a little bit of anger beginning to color his tone. "Damn it, you talked to him, why won't you talk to me? I'm on Duo's side!"

Nothing.

"Talk to me why won't you?!" Wufei kicked at the ground to vent his rage at being ignored by the world and his unanswerable confusion.

No matter what he did that night, his answers wouldn't come, and finally, with the first light of dawn touching the sky, Wufei crept back inside to bed, defeated. He had found no proof, and was left only with a decision to make about whether blind faith was enough.

Sally was at work. It was just past noon, so it was the natural place for her to be. Wufei, on the other hand, was on probation and therefore not at work. He was, instead, morosely making himself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for breakfast. He ate it in the living room, with the television turned to the news. They were playing the story on him and Duo, and although he knew it could be considered masochistic Wufei wanted to watch. As Une had warned him they would, they were informing the public of all the gory details of his punishment.

Some punishment… There was no one around; Wufei could easily just get up and leave. Nobody cared; nobody would stop him if he tried. It was a tempting idea, just to show them that he could do it, but he had nowhere to go and didn't know if he even wanted to. No, if he was ever going to leave, Wufei would at least wait until he knew what he was going to do once he had gone and had some definite reason for going.

He stared at the television screen numbly as it replayed, for what felt to him like the millionth time, the scene of Duo being brought to the asylum. It was followed by some grainy footage taken from the security cameras at the institute, first of him punching the attendant in the face, then of him and Duo moving toward the lobby doors.

It had been so long, Wufei realized, since the last time he had been portrayed to the public as a villain that he had almost forgotten what it felt like. I wonder what Heero would have to say in response to this… The thought twisted Wufei's lips into a sneer and a surprising wave of dislike towards the man swept over him. Wufei imagined that Heero would be terribly angry; after all, he had wanted Duo put in the hospital and now his work was undone. That was most satisfying to realize. But…

What now? Wufei wondered. He had gotten Duo out of his prison, turned Heero's cruel ideas upside down, and had accepted the light sentences Une had given him for his work. Now he was stuck on the Earth as Duo was stuck on L-2. Duo, fighting for his survival and freedom and ideals while Wufei sat in the relative lap of luxury and did nothing except wonder what his ideals were.

Peace, he had said. Peace had been his ideal. But they had peace, and now he was saying it was unsatisfactory. He had also said freedom. Liberate the colonies, he had once screamed. And hadn't he? Weren't they free to do as they pleased under this new, unsatisfactory peace? He couldn't say they weren't. And he simply could not bring himself to declare, even to himself, that he wanted another war to solve things. Even if he was unhappy with how certain things had turned out, Wufei did not want another war. And that was what mattered, more than his satisfaction -- his desire to keep the peace and work with the system to change it if it was necessary. That was where he and Duo differed in their ideas, and that was why they could not work together. One was happy to resort to violence, the other no longer was. No, in this case, blind faith was not enough.

Wufei sighed in relief, he was so pleased with that conclusion. The guilt that had been plaguing him since he left L-2 was finally subsiding. He and Duo had agreed to part ways with the chance of next meeting supporting two different philosophies, and he was happy to do that now.

Wufei was, in fact, so satisfied with this conclusion that he was now quite ready to confront Une with his other concerns, about his punishment -- and even, if he was brave, about her adopted daughter. He switched off the television and picked up the telephone instead. Fortunately, he had Une's direct extension so he could call her directly instead of going through the office secretaries, and when she answered Wufei confronted her point-blank with his challenge.

Une was surprisingly understanding of his concern and quite willing to justify herself. "I can't fire you, Wufei," she explained. "That was my original dilemma, you see. Naturally, yes, it is the most obvious standard procedure when an agent shows such a flagrant disregard for the laws as you did -- but I need you on this force, Wufei."

Wufei curled the telephone wire around his finger, listening intently to what Une had to say. "But you understand my concern for equal treatment, don't you?" he asked. "Just because I was a Gundam pilot in the war does not mean that I should be considered above the law!"

"Yes, Wufei, I understand that. But you must also understand that at this point in time I have no other agent on your par. Your level of skill surpasses all other Preventer agents, myself included. Look, if every other person in this organization were your equal I would not have hesitated to dole out a much harsher treatment, perhaps even fire you, in spite of our acquaintance, it's true. But that's not the case. And I know you, Wufei. I know you believe in the principles that the Prevention Organization was founded on -- you were one of our first agents, after all. That, in combination with your superior skills, makes you a vital part of the Preventers, and as such I could not afford to lose you to a harsher sentence. I emphasize that the reasoning behind my decision extends far beyond mere favoritism. Now does that set your mind at ease?"

"Marginally, yes. Thank you, Une."

"My pleasure, believe me. I don't want you beginning to question my motives. Now may I presume I shall be seeing you back at work in two months and that you will not be causing me any other problems until then?"

"Yes. Oh -- Une, one other thing…" Wufei drew a deep breath. This was it, by far the more difficult part of the conversation.

"Yes?" she asked, curiosity coloring her voice.

"I wanted to talk to you about Mariemaia. I am…concerned about her. She stopped by here yesterday before we went to see you, as you know. And I want to know the extent of the therapy she received since her attempted coup. Yesterday convinced me that she may still have some lingering issues to sort out, especially now that enough time has passed that she must begin to independently deal with the consequences of her choices."

There was a pause on the other end of the line as Une digested this. Finally she said, "I understand your concern, Wufei, but may I ask what specifically has brought this on? You've never taken an active interest before, after all."

Wufei was not below noticing the edge to Une's voice in her last statement and shifted uncomfortably. He had, in fact, avoided taking an active interest, but that didn't mean he was blind when the necessity of it hit him in the face! "It has to do with some issues she began voicing to me yesterday. I am not comfortable disclosing the specifics at this time -- I hope you understand -- but it was what she began telling me yesterday which sparked my concerns."

"Well. I'll look into it and discuss things with her. If I find something I feel needs addressing I will look into finding her more professional help -- but, if I feel that there may be a more direct method I will certainly do my best to use it."

Une's words sounded to Wufei rather like a veiled threat. Did she suspect that Mariemaia's issues were his responsibility to deal with? He harrumphed quietly to himself and couldn't resist a bit of "friendly" advice to close the conversation. "Just tread carefully with her; she's at that age where parents and other adults are enemies to be avoided more than anything else."

Wufei could practically feel Une stiffen on the other end of the line at his patronizing words. You're telling ME how to raise this child? he could hear her thinking, and suppressed a snort of laughter at his success. "I'll keep that in mind," she said sharply. "Good day, Wufei."

"Goodbye," he replied cheerfully before hanging up, relieved that he had settled not only his doubts and concerns within himself but within his job and with Mariemaia as well. His suspension from work was beginning to seem not quite so dreadful as he had anticipated.

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::winces:: Yes, I know: I'm a very bad person. Anyway, I have part 7 written as well, and some revisions to make on parts 8 and 9 before they come up, and then this story will be up to date. Sorry -- I go through long periods of simply forgetting that certain places on the Internet exist. And if anyone reading this is also waiting for some of Winners and Losers…I'm afraid I don't know when the next chapter's going to be up. The last I checked it seemed like it was mostly finished, but I've been distracted by this one for the past several months. And school. And college applications (twelve of the darn things!). And your basic real life issues. Anyway, I'll return focus to it eventually, honest I will! ::big, fat, wet sweatdrop::