Chapter 15

Mutual Memories

Treize had warned Zechs prior to meeting her that she had received the promotion and position that Zechs had been vying for. It had not been the graduation present he had hoped for from his old friend. In fact he remembered it was down right hard not to resent her right off the bat for taking what he had been promised long ago, the position of chief aid to his Excellency. His first thought was that she must be sleeping with him, even though it wasn't like Treize to be so smitten with a girl that he would make her part of his inner cabinet. Perhaps she was especially talented in the bedroom, a good whore, but a whore nonetheless.

The moment he got a good look at her he knew that couldn't be the case. She was too cold for any breathing man, even Treize, to take. One might feel chilled simply by meeting her gaze and so, Zechs did not look long, and wearing a mask made it easy to avert his eyes without seeming rude. Definitely not sleeping with Treize, but all the same, she was likely to be a novelty to him, perhaps an effective one. Zechs didn't doubt that most of the men in OZ would do her bidding.

She hung back from the crowd a short but reachable distance from her commander, her arms folds behind her back as she glanced warily from one face to the next. She was wearing the black uniform of a Specials lieutenant. Her new uniform must have been on order, for lieutenant colonels did not wear such common clothes as a soldier or visa versa, unless the soldier had been granted special honors, as Zechs had been. He and Lucretzia Noin along with four other graduates had been allowed this dispensation because of their high achievement at the academy. This occasion was the first in which he donned his red jacket uniform. He felt quite overdressed when he learned he would only be making lieutenant while this unknown took his promised place.

"Please understand, my friend. You are only just graduated and it would be unseemly for you to receive such a promotion even with the accolades you have earned at Victoria." Treize tried to comfort his disappointment with half truths. Though it was rare for a recent graduate to receive that level of promotion, it was certainly nothing Treize couldn't pull off, regardless of how seemly it would be.

"I understand, Your Excellency. Would you tell me something about my vanquisher?" Zechs couldn't keep the disappointment from his comment. Treize brushed it off easily.

"She is well qualified. Her family were members of Romafellar. German, you know. The rebels did away with the rest of them, but she enlisted and fought well enough to make a high rank. She personally led the attack on the rebel headquarters. Somewhat fitting, I think. There is nothing I appreciate more than good justice."

"Perhaps only a fine set of legs and a willing mind." Zechs said under his breath earning him a sardonic glance from Treize.

"Her devotion has its limits, my friend, as does yours."

Zechs never fully understood the meaning of those words and he had thought on them many times over the course of years. But still he was ever unsure.

Treize called over his new second after Zechs' bitterness had been soothed somewhat. The woman came at his bidding, standing rigidly in front of them both. Treize made the formal introduction, but Lady Une never made any movement beyond a small nod of her head in acknowledgement of Zechs. In that instant Zechs knew he would not like her.

"Have you been long in the field, Lady Une" Zechs asked her, wanting to see if there was a voice behind the figure of ice. He wondered briefly if the particular question had struck a nerve, for she looked at him with a deeper, cold intensity before she spoke in a roughened voice.

"Long enough"

"Do not let her frost fool you, Zechs. Lady Une is no older than you are. Her training was just a tad more informal than your own" asserted Treize. Zechs immediately wondered at the truth of that claim because Lady Une snapped her eyes at Treize, who returned her look until she backed down. If anything Treize had said was untrue, this woman was not going to contest it.

"Informal you say?" Zechs asked her more than Treize.

"He says informal. I say practical" she answered while surveying her surroundings. It was odd behavior to be so on guard while in a gathering of allies. The woman behaved as if any moment the ground might shift and swallow everything. Deciding it wasn't worth it to pursue conversation with the young lady, Zechs addressed Treize instead "Your underling appears serious for so few years."

"Youth and appearance are sometimes incongruent, as you well know, and war ages us so" Treize turned away from his aide and began walking the length of the lawn close to the stage where the graduates had stood a half hour before. Zechs walked beside him, Lady Une followed a few feet behind. It was a warm day but the wind wiped across the savanna and blew in their ears. The grass bent willingly beneath its touch.

"You've accomplished the first part of your plan perfectly. No one can question your rise in rank now that you have graduated the top of your class, and the top of all classes at Lake Victoria."

"Thank you, Your Excellency" Zechs said graciously. Treize assumed a more discreet tone as they walked.

"Academia will take you only so far, as will talent. More is needed to achieve your objective. Diplomacy is what is required now and I think you are well suited for it. I have a more prosperous position for you than that of my Personal Aide. But this position will require an even keel, my friend. You will need to earn the respect of the Specials beyond your Lake Victoria performance. You will need to be political, and you will need to rise on your own accord. Any position I honor you with will only hurt your career now. You must find your own advancement. As my Personal Aide you would not be in that kind of position."

Zechs couldn't resist a small, cynical grunt. "I suppose you have briefed your Lady Colonel on the possibility of advancement in her position." Treize gave him an uncharacteristic hard look. Most definitely a look of warning that was strange to see on what was normally a placid face. Treize lowered his discreet tone even more. "She is no concern of yours or you of hers." The curt response ensured no more visitations on the subject of Lady Une.

Ahead of them stood Lucretzia Noin, Zechs fellow graduate and friend, the only one he had made during his time at the Academy. There was soreness in Zechs' heart at having to give up that friendship now that they were graduated and would be separated by different career paths. Noin was a good soldier and an understanding woman, but not too understanding, which he preferred. Zechs didn't care for anyone understanding him too well. It was difficult enough that Treize did and consistently seemed to use it to his advantage. But after all, Treize had been there from the beginning. He had his excuse.

Noin turned and lightened when she saw the group. Zechs could see the glint in her eye and even back then he suspected what he hoped was not the true case. The way Treize had explained the female sex (a subject he was fond of researching) made Zechs feel that women must always be mysterious and unknowable. And so when he looked at the glint in Lucretzia's eye, he knew it couldn't be what it seemed and would write it off as something he couldn't understand. Not love. Definitely not love. Love was too obvious and Zechs was aware that he was ignorant in the matter of women. No, most definitely not love; he knew that much. Something else, but it couldn't be love. Love wouldn't work.

"Your Excellency" Noin bowed with perfect courtesy and Treize did likewise, brandishing the smile he reserved for the opposite sex, tempered with professionalism. They exchanged pleasantries and congratulations. Zechs noted that Noin changed positions and now stood next to Zechs, as if he had been with her the whole time and Treize had been the one to join the group.

"So, when does the new Chief Aide to His Excellency begin duties?" Noin asked with a smile on her face and laced in her voice. She wasn't dismayed by the quiet that answered her question. "Did I speak too soon, hasn't he offered it yet?"

Zechs shifted uncomfortably, preparing to speak. But Treize saved him in the last moment.

"Zechs' new duties will be taking him to La Grange Point. He will have a small accord of men, I understand, and will be guarding the interests of the Specials from a higher elevation as a lieutenant."

Noin's face fell a little and she tried to recover herself quickly so as not to seem rude. Zechs say her eyebrows fall from a distressed look into a curious look and a small smile. "Oh, I see. New plans" she answered, nodding.

"Worry not, Lieutenant Noin, Zechs will prosper in any setting we place him. I'm sure you know that. You will have your own challenges ahead. Teaching cadets is no easy task. When I was a cadet, I drove my instructors to distraction" Treize laid on his charisma thickly and Zechs could see that even a sharp woman like Lucretzia was no match for it. She fell into the generic smile of a woman who is elated to have the attention of a man like Treize Khushrenada.

"Having been a student, I know all the tricks, Excellency. So they won't be able to fool me as easily as you did your instructors"

"Yes, and that is precisely why we need people such you teaching the future of the Specials. I have every confidence that your skill and sharpness will mold them into superior soldiers" spoke Treize as he leaned up against the corner of the stage. Noin let out a flattered chuckle, something rather uncharacteristic. But Zechs gave silent thanks to Treize. The man knew how to attract attention to himself, and away from Zechs. Noin would be distracted from pressing the matter of his promotion, or lack thereof. And perhaps it was all just as Treize said, for the best. Lady Une might very well be better suited for the position for having been in actual combat. And as Treize said, it was a position with no real chance of advancement and-

She caught his eye then. Zechs had turned slightly to glance at her while Noin and Treize exchanged flattery. Lady Une's eyes were closed and she was standing sideways with her hands in front of her ear. She did this for close to a minute and then began to move, walking forward toward the stage very slowly. Her hands went on the stage floor and she knocked on the wood twice. Stranger still, she began to creep away from the group, along the stage edge, sideways, her eyes open but her hand still against the left ear.

"Zechs, what is that woman doing?" Noin asked amusedly when she saw Lady Une's behavior. Treize said nothing and Zechs did not answer. The three of them just stood there, quietly watching her, Zechs in fascination, Noin in amusement, and Treize what seemed like suspicion.

Lady Une reached mid-stage and placed both her palms on the wooden floor. Her eyes closed again and Zechs thought crazily that perhaps she was praying, because he knees were buckling and she was sinking to the ground. Then, with a sharp movement, Lady Une was down on all fours, sticking a hand beneath the stage. Zechs could see her arm moving back and forth searchingly, and the hairs on the back of his neck rose. She stopped and her eyes snapped open. She felt around again and again and then looked into the crowd for a moment, homing in on something. Then she looked back toward them.

Zechs remembered hearing the dull click of metal somewhere between the time Lady Une rose to her knees and when she barreled in to the three of them at a full run. She went for Treize primarily, knocking him the farthest, covering his head and shielding his body with her own when the stage exploded. They had been standing too close and a piece of the decking pierced through her leather boot, lodging itself in her upper calf. In other places along the stage, people were killed instantly by the explosion. It hit hardest on the opposite side from Treize and Zechs. People, seemingly out of nowhere, arrived immediately to insure the safety of His Excellency. They pulled Treize out from underneath his Aide and away from the fire. Zechs did the same for Noin and would have done so for Lady Une, but she was already standing by that time. She had hobbled out from the smoke and, breathing hard, was still searching among the fleeing crowd. In the chaos, Zechs could hear gunshots being fired, but not returned. A boy, not more than fourteen, went down some fifteen yards away. Lady Une did not waste time. Zechs watched as she crossed that distance between herself and the fallen boy. Once there, she fired her pistol once into his face at close range. He saw the blood leap up to her waist and fall back down to the ground.

The fire engines were approaching; the sirens rang clear from the base. His Excellency was a safe distance away and completely unharmed. Survivors were being pulled out of the wreckage and assessed or treated for wounds. It made Zechs sick to his stomach and angry. He knew many of these people as fellow soldiers and graduates. But even with his anger he hadn't moved much beyond pulling himself and Noin out of harms way.

"Fucking terrorists" Treize muttered as Zechs observed him wiping the dirt and grass off his uniform. He then started surveying the crowd and didn't look away when he found his Aide amongst the smoke and debris. She was limping toward the group from the shattered and burning stage. In her hand, Lady Une held what looked like a thick branch, but as she drew closer Zechs recognized it as a severed arm. Soot-faced and steely-eyed, Lady Une dropped it before His Excellency, the trigger mechanism stuck out from its tightly clenched fist. Treize looked at it a while and then at his Second. She wasn't looking at anything.

"When you are shot, your hands will involuntarily clench, very tightly. So hard your nails may puncture your palm; you can't drop anything you are holding. Someone has to remove it for you. The body is too focused on the wound." After Lady Une said this, she seemed to realize her own wound and winced, sitting down on the grass nearby and with excruciating slowness, removing the sharp piece of wood debris that stuck out from her right calf and boot.

"Remarkable" Noin remarked. "Did you hear them? The explosive devices?"

Lady Une was holding the wound and removing her jacket. With some effort she tore the sleeve apart and tied it around her calf. "They have a high pitch sound, like when there is change of pressure in your middle ear. They are cheap explosives. I've seen my share of them."

"Who was the boy?" He asked.

"I saw him sitting on the stage earlier watching Mr. Treize. He looked out of place. When I found the bombs he was some feet away, still watching. He was too scared to trigger the bombs before, but once he was found out, he likely had no choice. Doesn't matter . . ." She paused, and flicked her wrist hard; little flecks of blood from her hand wet the grass in front of her. "Dead now."

That was all she would say. Noin asked a few more questions that she ignored. Zechs still wondered at why she held her hand against her ear. Had she been trying to block out the wind coming in off the Savanna so she could hear clearly. Or was she testing her middle ear to be sure her senses weren't deceiving her. Even so, she had known what it was, and had gone straight for Treize. Even today, Zechs did not know if he would have done the same.

Lady Une glanced at Zechs again, eyebrows hooding the glare.

Whenever he thought of her after that, it was always with that look, and the suddenly snap of her wrist, flicking the excess off of her hand; he didn't know why.

"General Senorat" He would say

And the good General would die, usually in some private, accidental looking way

"Magda Orumtellique, not so quiet this time. I prefer you to see the rewards of your work"

We watched it on the news together. He smiled and breathed with tired ease. I still hear that sound in my sleep. It's the kind of noise a man makes after very fulfilling sex. It was like serial killing, only I did the deed and he got the pleasure from it. Later I understood that he felt them properly sacrificed to a coming age. He mourned them in his own way. There really was no pleasure, only the satisfaction that he had done what he was meant to do to bring the new era to fruition.

For me, these things were easy. I just went blind at the proper moment and then it was as simple as clipping the thorns off roses. I had no stake in their lives and killing them would insure my own survival. It was, to be trite, self-defense. Look forward! That's what I did, every time. Look past their heads, past the running of the red and look to the horizon, even if it's just a wallpapered room or a poorly kept park bench. Just keeping looking out there. That's where you are going.

Nothing has changed.

I suppose you want to know about how it was with he and I, and you probably want to know about her, when she came into it. I feel confident enough now that you understand that I was here first and that anything else is secondary and incidental. If you don't see it that way then you should stop right where you are. You are likely one of them, and I have no time for you.

It is the enlightened that I attend now.

I slept with him, many times. I enjoyed it on many of those times as well. But only a handful those times involved sex. Even fewer involved love, on either part. My devotion to him, so often noted by others, was born out of the horizon that I constantly sought. After you fixate on something for a long period, and that something is a focal point on which you can hang your sanity, you require renovation. Eventually, looking toward the future meant nothing. Then was the same as now and where I was became the same as where I had come from. It wasn't enough. I was right back where I was. So I started listening.

He told me what he told everyone else, really. But the way he spoke, as if I was the only confidant he could bring himself to take, was what stirred me to finally listen.

But our beginning wasn't easy. I admit that I tried to escape, twice. The first time was after the first assassination I had committed. I simply walked out of his house and off his estate in some kind of trance-like state, nothing to do with my illness. I was just a little in shock at the course of my life. I remember thinking back to that night in Lyon when he had told me I could have anything I wanted and that I could have choices if I would just stay with him. How foolish I was, how trusting and stupid! It was some time before I realized how far I had gone and I had the idea to stay gone.

Of course, he found me, or his agents did, two days later, thirteen miles away. I was given a stern lesson, in which it was once again impressed upon me how my life was now his because I had bargained my breath away. I would have to stay with him until he would release me. The second time I was more careful. Since Treize had failed to decide when to release me, I made the decision myself. I'll never know how he caught me, or how he had known. But he was there, waiting for me in the garage, completely alone.

I don't think I ever understood the superior physical strength of men until that night when he forcibly dragged me back into the house. Every inch of the way I screeched and cursed him.

"You must have killed your mother with that mouth of yours"

"And you must have killed your wife with your--"

"Do not ever speak to me of Leah!" he shouted at me. Leah had died sometime before I came into his service. Though a strong and tall man, Treize had a hard time dragging me back inside, calling me a disobedient cow and an assortment of other "gentlemanly" insults. He was angry, which as I have explained was not only rare, but a difficult emotion for Treize to have, being seldom aroused to anything but that constant calm euphoria. After a good ten minutes of struggle, it actually came down to blows. Zechs I know would never believe Treize to be capable of hitting a woman, but I knew better. He belted me good a few times, and he would have some cuts and bruises to hide in the morning himself.

"It is time you and I came to a proper understanding"

I was flung down in a chair, too battered to really resist anymore. So I managed, with a very embittered heart, to listen.

"You have no idea how glorious you are when you fight back." Treize situated himself adjacent to me and spoke between gasps for air. We had well tired each other out.

"It is my understanding, that life has no greater beauty than the struggle you just exhibited. Your resistance is marvelous and it is that which continues to bind you to this place and to me. Humans are capable of extremes and to achieve the kind of beauty that you have is rare and must be treasured by whomever recognizes it. Do you understand what I mean?"

"No" I spat. He waited until his breath was under control and his calmness was back in place.

"This is all a stage, you know. Everything you see in life, our words, our expressions, our rages and our tears, all pretenses. None of it is genuine. It is our conditioned response to certain stimuli. If you cut your finger and feel pain, your instinct is to become upset, though becoming upset does not soothe the pain. It is the same with laughter and affection. You have been taught from day one what you should find funny, and what you should hold dear. That is not just true for you, Lady Une. It is so for everyone, and in that truth, or rather, the faithful obscuring of it, the world is barren and ugly."

I just stared while he waited for his preamble to sink in.

"But fighting, and the will behind it, that is pure, unrefined, unadulterated truth. It is truth in its most human and raw form. A true rarity. So often we see fear and call it fighting. So rarely do we see people really standing in the way of bullets because of their will and for no other reason. Beauty is found only in the true spirit of battle, when a man or woman raises themselves up, clothed only in their ideal and challenges the universe to put them down. They take on destiny, grasping it and defying it at the same time. They see clearer than anyone else, not blindfolded by fear, or obligation, or hatred. They are prepared to survive at any cost and also willing to die for their beliefs, it is like martyrdom and yet not, it is the true meaning of humanity, to fight and die, to finally be truthful to oneself"

"I have seen that so often in you, many times peaking out from behind your family's shadow. You accepted my offer and killed your own father because you were embracing this beauty, though you didn't know it. You have never backed down even when you had no chance of victory. I saw it when you burned down the school and I carried you away from that place so you would not be caught. I saw it when you lay in that cell at the base where my men were holding you. I saw it ten minutes ago when you tried to run away. You are like Zechs, rare and precious, and infinitely important to the world that is coming."

"You are still on that." I laced my voice with impatience. Treize shifted.

"I asked you what you wanted, and you told me you wanted to live. I've given you life. Now you must repay the world for the chance to live again"

"By killing others! By doing your dirty work! I repay my life by taking the lives of those you want dead."

"They are necessary sacrifices."

"You said I had choices. Why have you taken them all away from me now? I trusted you that last night in Lyon! I believed what you said, that I could stay with you and that I would be free to do as I wished. You lied to me. You've made me a slave." He was very affected by those words. Perhaps he hadn't expected me to be so forthcoming.

"I keep you any way I can"

I just shook my head at him and buried my face in my hands

"I want to give back everything your family took away"

"You took away my family. That was all I had"

"Where we are going the whole world will be your family."

"You will learn about OZ, about Romafellar, about our ideals and our plans. I want you to listen, because you owe me that much."

He was right; I owed him that much, and more. I'll never repay him for it. I listened, and listened, and considered. I will never disclose the things he said to me; I will remember them only in the deepest part of myself where they can't touch anyone else. Those words were for me and I won't give them to anyone else. Eventually, what he explained made sense, even as it seemed like nonsense the first time he told it. Treize's ideal was like a three-dimensional picture. One could look and see nothing, then suddenly the images shift and you can see the design and its profound beauty. He of course didn't convince me in that one sitting, but it wasn't long before I understood his reasons for the assassinations completely. Treize showed me how they stood in the way of this beautiful thing called war and why they had to be eliminated, sacrificed so that the world could have its supreme moment in the sun. It was something to be excited about, and in time it was what gave my life meaning.

I still feel that meaning today, so many years separated from him.

Treize treated me much gentler than. He behaved toward me as if I was an honored guest and a great lady whom had his total admiration. My respect for his ideal turned into a very deep love within a year. But please, all should note that it was the ideal I loved, not the man. Treize, in that first year, became like my father. He mentored me in every way that I wish Merrick had. Treize wasn't so petty as to dote on me as if I were a small child, but he protected me and kept me in a state of reverence, as one does with their lord father. The best way to describe my feelings for Treize at that time would be Mary Magdalene to Jesus, a woman serving a dream, by serving the dreamer.

My commitment was total by the time I was nineteen. I did everything for his Excellency, standing guard at his baths, overseeing his travel arrangements, providing his protections, taking care of his adversaries, studying under his tutelage so that I would better understand the goals we strove to achieve.

He fell in love with me first. Though, he never once told me he loved me, he didn't need to. Love was something Treize did, not something he said. Our romance was very casual at first. A sudden tight grasp of my hand, a light touch, a breath against my ear. I was very unsure of myself at first, not knowing why he was behaving that way toward me. Treize had plenty of women to dally with, why would he flirt with me?

On May Day, in AC 194, he and Zechs came home extremely drunk. I found them trying vainly to duel on the front lawn. Zechs was on his back with his mask half off and his sword nearby. Treize was trying to get his sword out of a tree and cursing tremendously at the old oak for not giving the blade back. They were both hysterical.

"You fucking conifer. . . I'll cut you down tomorrow!"

"It iiiiiiiz tomorrow" Zechs laughed at him from the ground.

"You stay there!" Treize yelled behind him at Zechs, almost falling backwards as he did so "I'll run you through momentarily"

"Lemme get up! Let me get up CHRIST" Zechs answered "so, I . . . can face you." He was rolling around trying get on his knees. I'm sure it would be funny to anyone that didn't have to clean it all up. Treize lost grip of the sword and finally fell over about ten feet away from Zechs. The sprinklers came on just then and both men began to holler.

"Fucking rain! Damnit!"

"Stop whining, Shut up."

"Kill you Zechs"

"Shut up"

Treize had finally seen me and was crawling on his hands and knees toward me, trying to get up on his legs. "Why is my Lady just standing there, watching me get wet?" I began walking toward him.

"No no, I'll come to you. juss. juss gimee a moment" more shabby attempts at rising. I was sure alcohol poisoning was in the cards

"You, I've been waiting to tell you something" Zechs slurred his words at me, trying to fix his mask. He was quicker to rise than Treize, and he stumbled his way over to me, pointing his finger. "You are a damn bitch and everybody thinks so. I didn't just make it up, ya know. Everybody thinks that"

Excellent, then all was right with the world.

Zechs tripped on the walkway and passed out. He apparently had never been drunk before. Treize was the seasoned professional and Zechs the rookie under his wing. They were like that in everything back then.

I called the night guard to have Zechs driven back to the barracks. He was barely able to get in the car without getting sick. By that time Treize had already crawled inside the house. I found him in his bedroom trying to pry off his boots without success.

"This was very easy this morning" he muttered.

"You should not do this, sir. You will be ill in the morning" I didn't want to cross the threshold of his room.

"And so what! I can spare the time on occasion. I can have a single day off my feet where the world doesn't require me to keep it spinning. A single bloody day!" He was struggling so with his boots that I cringed. I saw his eyebrows draw together and his shoulders went tense with the frustration.

"Are you just going to stand there and let me take all night with these things?"

I was at his side immediately trying to undo the laces. Treize slumped back on his bed with his arm over his eyes. He was falling asleep as I worked to take off his boots, and then his pristine jacket. When I began work on his cravat I saw that he was starting to cry.

"My mother is dead" Thus explaining his condition tonight.

My pity was instant. Arcardia was the kind of person who was rare in life and who had yearned only for her sons' happiness rather than their success. If there had been one person who Treize could love individually, it was his mother. Everyone else in the world was all pooled together. But Arcardia had held keys to Treize that no one else could. With her would die the last threads of Treize's restraint.

A man in tears is not much different than a wounded cat. They are insecure and ravenous for assurance. I stayed with Treize for the rest of the night stroking his hair as I would an injured while he moaned and cried about home. I slept curled around him with my forehead pressed against the back of his neck. The next morning he was ill, and did not report for any duties, neither did Zechs of course, and neither did I. I stayed with Treize all the following day; most of our time was passed in silence. There was a single kiss, from me to him, chaste.

People talked when I returned to duty beside him the next morning. People talked. But then, they always do

Author's note:

It has been 10 months since I updated and I'm sure most of you aren't even reading anymore (I wouldn't blame you). Life picks up speed and as I read this fic, I begin to feel that I have written it to death and killed the story by writing too much. However, I have come too far to let it all hang in space for the rest of time and I will finish this. You will likely notice that things will become brief and glossed over so that this installment can FINALLY end and we can move on to where we all really want to be, back in the present where the actual story is. Look for more regular updates with smaller more concise chapters. Thanks to everyone who has and still does read this. -kiss kiss-

A.