Chapter Twenty Four
I
He found Odin outside the base, standing at the edge of the ruined platform, his back to the world and his face to the sea. Zechs's approach was long preceded by the sound of his footsteps but Odin gave no sign that he heard.
The man's eyes were placidly closed and his face so calm that he seemed as though a standing corpse, and for a moment Zechs was more willing to turn around and leave than he was to interrupt.
"Marquise," Odin said when he neared him, not even blinking to see who had sought him. "To what do I owe the great honor of your visit?"
"I want to go to the Sanq Kingdom."
Though his eyes remained closed, a smile touched at the corners of his mouth. "What is it, Prince? Are you afraid your sister's trite words and petty speeches won't be enough to hold off an army? Are you afraid her trembling reassurances won't be enough to keep men from dying outside the luxury she's hidden herself in? Perhaps it is time, Prince, that the Queen learns these things for herself."
"The casualties are too high."
Odin opened his eyes, raised his brow. "Are they? And what do you propose to do about it, Prince? Are you going to march into the front lines brandishing your royal sword and with one word from your princely tongue frighten away those who would carry off the fair maiden?"
"The Epyon–"
"Is not yet needed."
"Then when are you going to employ the system?"
Odin glanced at him. "Are you referring to the one that would disable certain battalions of the Gemini?"
He gave a slight, impatient nod.
"It was discovered and deactivated."
How could he say it so calmly, so curtly? "Couldn't Rhyn–"
Odin shook his head. "Rhyn has officially disassociated himself from this war. He is already aware of the outcome. If you wish to say any farewells to him, Marquise, I would suggest you do it now. He will be returning with Marguerite to Paris soon."
"Then when will the Epyon be needed?" He found himself no longer able to conceal the graveled anger that rose in his voice, yet Odin seemed to give this no notice.
Odin withdrew from his coat pocket a pack of cigarettes, lit one as calmly as one in discussion of the weather. "Not until the final battle. There will be yet another, on the borders of Sanq, shortly following the death of Treize Kushrenada, ending with the announcement of his assassination."
He felt his eyes narrow. "What are you saying?"
"I'm saying that you are not going to the Sanq Kingdom. Thessaloníki is where you are needed most at the moment, fair Prince."
"There's nothing in Thessaloníki," he growled, and for the first time he wished sincerely that he could kill this man, this incorrigible devil, simply withdraw his pistol in one swift, graceful maneuver and fire a single bullet into his cryptic brain.
Odin nodded in agreement. "Precisely. There is nothing there to distract you from what you are doing."
"Which will be?"
"You will know when you get there you will go to the base–"
Before he could think to stop himself, Zechs lunged at him. Odin caught him instantly by the wrist as a father would a disobedient child and pushed him up against the wall.
"You will go to the base in Thessaloníki," he continued, unabated, "and you will find what you are needed for there. If you still retain a good stomach for this war after you've accomplished your errand there, you may then go to the kingdom. Your Gundam will be waiting for you there."
Zechs tried to pull away from him, could not.
"So you won't be too terribly surprised should you go into battle, the Zero system of the Epyon has been deactivated." He pulled Zechs away from the wall and shoved him forward. Zechs again ran at him and Odin prevented further assault with a single blow.
"You know better than this, Marquise," he said, calmly flicking the cigarette away. He turned his back, providing Zechs the perfect opportunity for assault.
He did not. Gathering his composure again, he rose to his feet and gave a brief, solemn nod. "Understood."
"Is it?"
"Yes."
Odin waved him away with a simple gesture of his scarred hand. "Then go. We don't have very much time left, Marquise."
Until what?
"Of course." He pivoted on the heels of his boots and walked toward the edge of the platform, slowly and deliberately as a man through a cemetery.
"You will understand when you get there," Odin called before he ducked into the forest.
Zechs, as though nothing more than a doll performing from mere routine, merely nodded and walked on.
II
The base, which he had not seen sine he had discovered the affair once held between Treize and his sister, was now but a ruined structure of stone and ash, and yet the sight of it strangely did not faze him. He thought nothing of its ruination as he approached it, carried onward not by his own force of will but rather from some great numbness that granted him the mercy of not thinking of these things, and all detail of these cold, ashen remains was lost upon him.
He entered the base not by way of a door but through a crevice that had been broken into a wall.
You will understand when you get there.
As he moved through the halls, he strangely gave no thought either to what had happened here or to the battle that was currently being waged within the borders of his kingdom. He did not think of Odin's cryptic words or the strange sense that had overcome him after that encounter, the sense that he would perhaps never see the man again after that; he did not think of the pilot whom he knew was in Sanq, using a weapon perhaps greater than any cockpit system designed for this to combat an army that now seemed almost unlimited in strength. He did not think of the boy he had known briefly during this conflict whom he had only now begun to comprehend or of Rhyn's sudden decision to withdraw from this war. Even Lucrezia did not enter his thoughts. Perhaps this was all for the best.
He turned a corner and was immediately halted by the sight of another man standing at the opposite end of the hall. Treize turned and smiled when he saw him. "I was beginning to believe you would neglect to fulfill this part of your role, Milliardo," he called, and Zechs, as though entranced by his devil's voice, began walking toward him.
You will understand when you get there.
Treize's hands moved from behind his back, one holding nothing and the other curled around an elegant pistol.
Quickly though without thought, Zechs withdrew his own gun from his coat, aiming it at the man's head. His finger tightened on the trigger. At the last moment something within him — some damnable trace of loyalty flickering within his heart like a dying flame, perhaps — protested and his hand pulled downward, firing the shot into Treize's abdomen.
Treize took a step back, another. His hand went to the wound. He coughed gently into his other hand — simply coughed — and when that hand fell away, it was covered in blood. "Thank you, Milliardo," he said, then he collapsed. The gun fell from Zechs's hand and he went to where the many lay, his fallen opponent, his fallen friend.
You will understand when you get there.
Indeed, perhaps he did.
Treize was sprawled gracefully over the floor, his blood flowing between his fingers, pooling on the marble beneath him; another thin stream of blood poured over the side of his mouth. He looked up at Zechs with piercing, unglazed, alive eyes, eyes that suddenly seemed to hold some dire knowledge Zechs was not sure he wanted.
"Thank you," he said again. "It can end now."
Zechs tried to speak, could not. He knelt at Treize's side and examined the wound he had inflicted.
Treize laughed softly. "What is it, Milliardo? You look like death warmed over, and unless my nervous system has failed me already, you're trembling. It was not a well-placed shot, I admit, but it will serve as a good start. Finish it, Milliardo. Go on. Finish it, and then stand over my body victoriously like the hero you are. This is what you wanted, Milliardo, what you've wanted since Odin Lowe informed you of my survival. My death. Take it now."
"I–" He began, then stopped. He looked back down at his hands. They were not covered in Treize's blood but rather soaked in it.
"Do you like to examine the blood that stains your hands, Milliardo? Was that your vice in battle, in murder, just as I liked to know the names of those I killed? Did you want to see their blood?" His voice — amused in spite of the pain — was piercing, and what cut Zechs the most to hear it was that there was no malice in it; rather, he spoke endearingly as though to a friend.
Zechs looked at him. Treize stared directly into his eyes and smiled, and the smile was warm, commiserating, understanding.
"I was never your enemy, Milliardo," he said. "I was never your opponent. I never meant you — any of you — any harm. I was never going to remove your sister from power. I was never going to allow your arrest or execution, just as I was never going to allow the execution of that soldier who stayed in the palace after his escape. I was the one who released him. I was never going to harm you, Milliardo. How could I, after all that the two of us had withstood together? We truly have endured, Milliardo. We have endured as so few human beings before us have." He paused, studying the skeptical expression on Zechs's face, and again he laughed. "Of course, some had to die. That is inevitable in any kind of war. There must always be a sacrifice. This kind of war requires a sacrifice of life. Many have died, and before this battle truly ends many more will. Most of those needed to die were not to be great leaders but rather nameless soldiers, for it is they for whom the hearts of the people cry. However, as in any great war, one of the leaders must die. Odin Lowe is to remain alive, if this war will have the most beneficial outcome."
"The most beneficial outcome," Zechs repeated numbly.
"But to achieve that, there has always been the necessity for a sacrifice. The choice for this great sacrifice I had narrowed down to only you or myself, Milliardo." He coughed again, a soft, dry rasp coated by blood. "You've served your purpose well. I expected nothing less of you, and I thank you for all you've done to bring about this end."
Zechs started to speak, could not. It would have been a sign of weakness if he covered his ears to deafen himself to what he knew Treize was about to say but he was almost willing to display such a sign for once, had not some part of him, the part that had always remained Treize's friend throughout it all, forbidden it.
"The people must be made weary of fighting," Treize continued hoarsely. "So weary that they would rather work for some compromise than engage in another war. Mankind has seen enough wars, and most of the time those wars came down to being only with one's self, not some tangible enemy. Everything is a war, everything within a man. It's when those personal wars are directed at an outside force that a technical battle is begun. Man fights with himself and eventually comes to some conclusion, whether it is what he originally set out to find or not. But these technical wars, these battles that go down in history as such, they have no conclusion. Soldiers die and a new force comes into power, only to be defeated and replaced with another in a few years' time. Men walk away from these battlefields without knowing why they were there in the first place. It is this kind of war that must be prevented. Simply fighting while the people look on is ineffectual. We both learned that early on. The people must be placed down amongst the dead of wars past, and they must have their hands and minds forever tainted by the blood shed for their ideals. You've already accomplished that, Milliardo. I cannot commend you enough for the path you took with the White Fang.
"The people walked away from that battle with the horror of it branded into their memories. Both Earth and space lived in peace for some time, but then that peace was turned into a sense of false security. Such falsities are a breeding ground for new battles."
Zechs nodded as a child would.
"It was a shared misconception that the people's new hatred of war would be enough to prevent another one. Peace would indeed last for some time following the end of the war, but unless more desperate measures were taken, their will to fight would become strong again. They had already been horrified, but the necessary complement was to add anger and weariness to their horror."
"Put them through one war and then hit them with additional battles they didn't want," Zechs affirmed.
Treize favored him with a weak smile. "I began making preparations for the next battle immediately after the Eve Wars. Odin Lowe met with me once, after hearing rumors of what I was doing. It would probably be more accurate to say that he made himself known to me. He needed no propositions or offers or requests. He understood what I meant to do immediately, and I was rather surprised to discover later that he would rise as my opponent in this war."
"You…you…" The words refused to leave his damnable mouth.
"The first stage of this war was to occur within one year of the Eve Wars, but those plans were made null and void when someone else took my place."
"Mariemaia," he whispered dumbly, and Treize gave what he could muster of a warm smile.
"Yes. And ultimately it was your own child who influenced my decision of which of us was to be the great sacrifice in this war."
Zechs's eyes narrowed in confusion.
"Mariemaia will not become, as you previously feared, another Milliardo Peacecraft, and I will not make one of you and Miss Noin's child." He fell silent and his eyes momentarily closed. "I did all that was needed, didn't I, Milliardo?" Again Treize bestowed him with a gracious smile. "I corrupted those who could be corrupted and made enemies of those who could not be. I have blemished the great virginal Queen of Sanq. I personally orchestrated the bombing of the train in Austria, as well as the attack in Luxembourg. I did everything I could to become the great antagonist of this war, to represent all that was foul about war as you briefly did in the Eve Wars. And you" —he reached up and a trembling hand touched the side of Zechs's face— "you did everything you could to oppose me. I thank you, Milliardo Peacecraft, my eternal friend."
Zechs was too stunned to speak.
Another thin trickle of blood spilled over the side of Treize's mouth.
"Take off your gloves, Milliardo," he said through the pooling blood. "I want to see something."
Zechs, obediently as he had when Treize had requested something of him when they were children, nodded and did so.
Treize stared wonderingly at his bared hands for several minutes, examining them and smiling as though he saw something truly miraculous in them. "Your hands aren't stained by blood at all, Milliardo," he said, and again he coughed.
"Finish it, Milliardo," he choked. "Finish this and then finish the war that continues beyond this place. I have no use in the path the world is taking. Send me to my grave in peace."
He swallowed. "I…no….I cannot…" And yet there emerged another part of his conscience, perhaps the part that understood this faltering, unfinished speech the most, and he found himself rising, retrieving the gun Treize had dropped when he had fallen.
Treize smiled. "You eternally have my love for this, Milliardo."
He cocked the gun.
"You have to finish it, Milliardo. If this is not properly finished, the world learns nothing from it. Please, Prince…do it. Everything is a war, Milliardo. These paltry battles are only a small part of it all. This war will end with my death. This war ends now, Milliardo." He closed his eyes and waited with a small, placid smile.
His finger tightened on the trigger. At the last moment something within him — some damnable trace of loyalty flickering within his heart like a dying flame, perhaps — protested and—
He squeezed the trigger, firing the bullet into Treize's brain and thus ending his life, thus facilitating the end of this war.
The gun slipped from his grip. For a moment he could only stare at the bloody, graceful thing that had only moments ago been Treize Kushrenada, then he fell against the still-warm body, closing his own eyes in grief as a single warm droplet rolled down his face.
III
"Mr. Marquise, are you sure you want to do this?"
He shrugged past the soldier, proceeded toward the hangar where he knew the Gundam was concealed.
The soldier followed him, managed to get in front of him. "Mr. Marquise, you don't look so–"
"Get the hell out of my way." He shoved at the man, pushed him against the wall.
The imbecile seemed possessed of enough sense to remain there.
He entered the hangar; his eyes immediately through the their bloodshot sheen went to the great crimson monolith restrained against the wall.
My refuge, my defeat.
Somewhere within the back of his mind he realized that the restraints next to those of the Epyon, too large and formidable to have been used for a mere mobile suit, were empty.
He walked, dazed, numbly as though held within some unearthly trance toward the great machine, unaware of the soldiers around him watching. For a brief moment there was hesitation, a realization of what he was doing and that he could not do it, a realization that he was truly at this very moment losing his mind as surely as he would if he did this, and then again there was numbness, and he ascended into the cockpit.
What have I done, what have I done, how could I how could I not have known this how—
Treize—
The darkness within the cockpit was cold and empty and inviting, and it eased his sanity away from his troubled mind as not even the numbness had yet been able to do. He collapsed weakly into the seat, shuddering as his moist face was again streaked by the tears that had constantly assaulted his eyes since he had pulled the trigger a second and final time. Treize—
Your hands aren't stained with blood at all, Milliardo.
Seraphs and saints with one great voice welcomed that soul that knew not fear—
"Mr. Marquise."
A voice, dull and disembodied as though spoken by the air itself. After a stunned moment he realized that it had come from the central communications device.
"What," he said, attempting futilely to sound like the stern soldier he was reputed to be and failing miserably.
There was a perplexed silence, and audible note of wonder that the former Lightning Count should before battle sound more like a frightened child than a fierce warrior.
"You'll want your flight course twenty degrees more to the north."
"Thank you," he mumbled, and without being fully aware of what he was doing he switched off the communication line.
This war ends now, Milliardo.
This war ends now.
"Then let it, damn you," he growled to nothing and to no one, to the air, to a memory, to a specter that would perhaps haunt him until he became as it was.
He lifted the helmet onto his head and activated the machine.
IV
His hands tightened on the controls, loosened. Another suit exploded before him, another. The movement of the gundam was, at his numb command, not graceful but grace itself, grace and fluidity, silk upon water, a caress upon a lover's flesh. It was not the deaths that played out before his eyes that so held his childish fascination but the sheer ease with which he manipulated the god-like machine. And was it indeed this that they saw, all of them, in those tremulous moment before their deaths: a crimson god, merciless and silent, bestowing upon them harsh judgement for their ignorant transgressions? Was this how he seemed to them as he cut them down? A god without divinity?
No matter. What was it all but more blood spilt upon his trembling hands, more lives in whose taking he would be surely damned into Hell? Become part of the gundam, not its pilot but another one of its components. Become that grace and fluidity, become the soldier, the beast, the monster stained in blood—
He shouted a curse at them all and swung the machine to the right, bisecting another opposing suit. More blood upon his hands, more souls sent prematurely to their graves, and strangely it did not matter to him. He had already slain so many; these could not make a difference.
Treize I am so sorry Treize please forgive me please forgive me I—
"Zechs, that's the last one."
He halted, shivering, drenched in his own perspiration, and his eyes drifted to the viewing portal.
The Wing Zero. The only machine that could ever play an angel to his god. The only pilot who could ever truly battle against him.
"Pull back, Zechs. That was the last one." Such a dull, monotonous voice. He realized that when he had shut off the main communication device, he had neglected to in turn shut off the one that served as a line between suits.
"Zechs."
Oh God Treize what have I done what am I doing—
The gundam before him, unmoving, waiting.
Please I cannot do this anymore.
He felt his hands, as though acting on a will apart from what remained of his own, move toward the control that would activate the system. He did not understand then why he employed the system, nor would he ever. After that moment he, in the dazed, horror-stricken state that had held him since what he had done in Thessaloniki, would have no memory of succumbing.
I cannot do this.
Zero system activated
The gundam before him, a formidable figure of metallic alloys that had made it into a being from Hell itself. Was the pilot truly waiting for him? Why should that matter? Their battle would be finished in some way eventually.
His numb body fell back against the seat and he sighed as though in surrender.
"Zechs, what are you doing."
His eyes opened; his hand tightened again on the controls. Another mobile suit — not the last one, after all — advanced upon him, momentarily obstructing his view of the gundam. Without consciousness of what he was doing, he brought the heat rod down, slicing the suit in half even as its pilot screamed at the sight of his oncoming death.
He advanced toward the gundam. Let it all end now, every battle. He cannot do this anymore.
The pilot's face before him, not as it was now but as it had been the first time he had seen it, set and without expression as he calmly pressed the button that would self-destruct his own Gundam. Only a boy, this pilot, only a mere boy, a child who should have known nothing of war or of destruction. Another Milliardo Peacecraft.
The pilot, almost too late, realized what was happening and drew back as the Epyon's heat rod came down in front of him.
So strong, this soldier. So much stronger than Zechs himself.
"I still…haven't acknowledged that…that I'm one of the…of the weak," he faltered, swinging at the Wing Zero again as the pilot moved to defend himself. "I will not acknowledge it."
A calm shout above the clamor of clashing metal: "What the hell are you doing."
Another war, another unfinished battle. He had come so close to being truly defeated by the boy, so strong was his opponent. Inhumanly strong and yet was it that strength that drove him onward in a fight? Was it that or was it all the scars that had given him this strength?
"Zechs."
He gave a soft laugh and assaulted the gundam again. The boy moved to block him and almost did not move quickly enough.
Another war, another battle, it was all happening too quickly. All of their faces before him: Lucrezia, the pilot, Treize, Odin, the woman in the photograph—
"I am not your enemy," he responded to the voice, shouting and lunging at the machine again. "I am not your enemy!"
"Zechs, stop this!"
Click click of the beads, the glimmer of silver in the candlelight.
I am not your enemy.
Odin's calm voice, his eyes turned away. A glance at a photograph and the momentary angered expression upon his face.
I am not your enemy.
The woman's eyes, her enigmatic face, her undoubtedly brutal death.
I am not your enemy.
The child in the woman's arms, the beautiful Asian boy with strangely blue eyes.
I am not your enemy please God I am not your enemy I am not your fucking enemy I can't be—
"I am not your enemy!" he shouted at the boy. He was suddenly aware of the inexplicable streams of blood that were running down his face. I am not your enemy. I am not. His hand found the self-destruct switch and hit it fiercely.
Treize—
This is the way the prince dies, not with a bow but a scream.
The Epyon did not respond. He pressed the switch again and still nothing happened.
He brought the heat rod down at the center of the Wing Zero, where the cockpit was located. The pilot gave further assault, forcing the Epyon, even in its resistance backward.
I am not your enemy.
This is the way that the prince dies—
A fresh trickle of blood ran into his eye. "Damn you, Yuy, let this end now."
This is the way the prince dies—
Heero brought his own weapon down and Zechs parried this move as though in refusal to be defeated.
This is the way that the prince dies—
At the last moment Zechs ceased his resistance and gave a soft smile as the arm of the Wing Zero again came down, filling the cockpit with an instantaneous heat as the fiery light began to slice through it.
Not with a scream but surrender.
He truly was no one's enemy, after all.
He weakly lifted the helmet from his head and felt the quietest laugh escape his lips as the burning darkness consumed him.
Author's Notes: I'm sure a good deal of you had already arrived at the conclusion presented in this chapter. Much in the same manner as Zechs when he headed the White Fang, Treize's uncharacteristic actions throughout this story have all been part of his plan to become the next great antagonist to peace. Odin has actually been his accomplice all this time, though he has continued to act on his own terms. Some of you may like this ending to the war while I'm sure some also hate it, but it is nonetheless the only ending I have ever conceived for it. Treize dies as a defamed gentleman and Zechs casts away one more opportunity to redeem himself by once again allowing himself to lose control. I wanted their final conversation to be rooted in their past friendship rather than their new rivalry, as I feel that even under these circumstances, they still do posses a very great love for each other.
On a lighter note before proceeding on to the epilogue, I once again referenced a T.S. Eliot poem in this chapter. I find that his work suits Zechs as well as John Davidson's A Ballad of Hell suits Heero for me. Perhaps someday I'll write another Zechs fic based on one of Eliot's poems. He was, quite simply, a literary genius.