After War Gundam X

Quand La Lune est Haute

[When the Moon is High]

He cradled the man's heavy form in his arms, the dying man, his body riddled with bullet holes, and his heart felt like it would shatter from the weight of it all.

Hang on, he cried, the tears staining his cheeks, dripping onto the dying man's face, and the bullets were still coming, and he could not stop them.

A broken whisper, a sigh of breath, and he leaned over desperately, trying to catch the words coming from the ruined throat, under the crack of gunshots and screams of men dying, all dying, just like the man in his arms, and he wished he had never come here.

Do not repeat the mistakes…of the past…

But how could he hope to accomplish that? He was just a child, caught up in this senseless conflict engineered by adults who thought only of their own needs and selfish desires, and he did not want to be here any longer, wanted to go away, just away, to where there was no more war, no more killing, no more death.

Gundam X…activate!

-sous les nuages de la nuit, je marche vers la clairière-

under the clouds of the night, i walk towards the clearing.

The rushing of the blue waves past the railings of the ship was a song. He clasped the cool steel bars with both hands, squinting his eyes against the salty wind, but all that he could see was waves and sky, and then more waves and more sky. Even the sight of a seabird would be welcome, but they were too far from land, and seabirds did not venture out where they could not find a resting place for the night.

Two weeks. It had been two weeks since he had left home, left the life he had known for the past two years, left a piece of his heart there with the girl who was the first girl he had ever loved and would probably be the only one.

That's why I don't think you should stay here any longer, Tifa had said, and Garrod could lie to himself and pretend that she was wrong. He could tell himself that she had betrayed his love for her, that she didn't understand him and that she did not want him anymore. He could even think, if he dared to go that far, that Shagia Frost had turned her against him, and that now she was trapped under his spell.

But he knew that was not true. Tifa was right, as always.

In the end, there were only three things that mattered: Tifa, the rest of the crew of the Frieden, and the moon. Tifa because he loved her, that much was obvious. The crew of the Frieden, for being the first and only friends he had ever known in this world when he had thought that friendship would never be something he would know. And then the moon.

He did not fear the moon, nor did he love it or hate it. But there were nights when he wished it would not hang in the sky like that, and when the moon was full and he would go to sleep with it burning cold and white outside the window, he would dream of the Gundam X and the satellite cannon, and somehow the light from the cannon and the light from the moon were one and the same, blurring together streaking towards him too fast for him to see, and he would hear the words incessantly in the background, Katokk's dying voice.

Do not repeat the mistakes of the past...do not repeat…do not repeat…

The ship from Durnham had docked at one of the bigger ports around the coast of old Italy a week ago, and Garrod had disembarked, wandered the town aimlessly all afternoon and ended up in one of the many bars lining the wharf area around early evening. He had not gotten drunk. In fact, he hadn't drunk anything at all, simply wanting to sit at the back of the bar and watch the patrons entering and leaving, listening to the rowdy, raucous conversation of drunken voices in the background, wanted to fade away into the woodwork until there was nothing left of him, and then maybe he could escape.

He had been brooding, staring at the dark stain spots on the table on which he was leaning, when he'd heard the word. There were certain words that made his hair stand on end, made him turn around involuntarily wherever they were spoken, and this was one of them.

"As long as they don't start a third war," the man two booths over proclaimed, "I don't care whatever the hell the New Federation does. None of my business. Them and their damn Newtypes."

"Newtypes didn't win the last war," someone else said quietly. "Men did. Men like you and me."

"They're all dead, anyway," the first man snorted, downing a huge mug of some vile-looking yellow liquid, sounding very pleased with himself. "All of them Newtypes…nothing more to worry about, hey."

Newtypes.

Garrod had sat very still, suddenly feeling conspicuous in spite of the fact that the corner he sat in was a dark one and he was wearing a blue jacket and black pants. Did it show on his face, he wondered, who he was? Did his eyes reflect the fact that he was not just another lowly traveler, that he had seen and faced things that no one should ever have faced? When people looked at him, did they see a seventeen-year-old boy, or did they see a man haunted by the specters of the past?

He would leave them all behind if he could, but it had been so long, and they seemed to want to stay.

I know you get up at night when the moon is full…

"Tifa," he mouthed silently, his eyes trained on the man who had uttered that word, who seemed entirely oblivious to the world and was downing yet another beer.

"Haven't changed a bit, have you," his companion chuckled, clapping him on the shoulder. Garrod winced as the other man nearly choked on his drink, coughing and spitting it all over the table. "Ah…shame I must leave so soon."

"Going back already?"

"Business is business," the second man said, and Garrod moved his intent gaze to him. He was an older man with graying hair and the beginnings of wrinkles on his face, looked at least somewhat sober, unlike his drinking companion, dressed all in flowing black with a golden earring in one ear and large golden rings on both hands. "I've got contacts waiting for me, and you know a deal's a deal. The new capital's no shabby place to be, either, I'll admit."

He was talking about the new Federation capital, Garrod realized. Witz had mentioned it some, and Jamil had written several letters to all of them over the course of the past two years, detailing construction of an Earth-based capital to where all the Federation government buildings would be moved. He sounded excited about it, but Garrod had never been too comfortable in large cities, and he hadn't thought he would be traveling again so soon.

Jamil.

The image came unbidden to his mind, the picture of the tall, silent man in the long blue coat, a man who he had at first hated and then grown to respect and later, almost to love as the father he'd never had. He wondered if Jamil had the answer, or at least some answers. Jamil had surely suffered the dreams too, a long time ago during the first war. If he was to ask Jamil, would Jamil listen?

Do not repeat the mistakes of the past.

If he were to ask Jamil, and he listened, what would the former captain of the Frieden say?

He narrowed his eyes at the second man, once again noting the choice of clothing, the earring in the man's right ear. As he watched, the man rose from his chair, and Garrod observed his movements, smooth and fluid, as if he was simply an extension of the bar's smoky air currents, floating like ghosts past him to the door.

Something clicked in his mind and he stood so quickly that he almost knocked his chair over. Grabbing his bag, he jostled his way through the crowd to the door that was still swinging slightly on its hinges, pushed through the entrance and into the cool night air outside.

The man was strolling away, turning down a small street to the left, and Garrod hesitated for just a moment, and then picked up his pace, hurrying silently after him. There had once been a time where he would have shouted out down the street, stop! wait! not caring who was there to hear him, not realizing that sometimes, silence was an ally.

But that had been before the war.

The moon was bright, but it was not yet full, and he paid it no mind, keeping the man in his sights as the stranger made his way slowly but steadily through two alleyways and another side street. An afternoon excursion through the city might do the common pedestrian little good, but he had learned through long practice how to memorize his surroundings. The winding passages were leading towards the city's docks, Garrod knew, but he had yet to determine to which part of the docks the man was headed.

The man did not stop, did not alter his pace, and if he realized he was being followed, he was being surprisingly nonchalant about it. Garrod followed slowly but steadily, pausing in shadows of buildings and trash bins and crumbling stone steps as the surrounding city turned from storefronts to tired-looking two-and three-story buildings and then to boarded up windows, abandoned houses, heaps of garbage. Once or twice, Garrod thought he saw a rat scurry across the path in front of him.

There were a few times when he swore he heard waves, but the next turn was yet another alleyway, another side street. His shoulder was getting tired from where his pack was slung across it, and he debated with himself. Should he keep on? Should he turn back? What if he was wrong…?

And then just as he had promised himself that if the man did not emerge into some kind of open area within the next five minutes, he would turn back, the stranger stopped.

Garrod stopped too, melting into the shadows puddled at the side of a crumbling brick wall. Waited.

"All right," the man said, though he did not turn around, the words ringing loud and brassy in the silent alley. "Whoever you are who has been following me through the city, what do you want?"

"I need a ride," Garrod said, straightening and taking a step forward, out of the shadows. Just a single step. "I thought you might be able to give me one."

The man made a noise that might have been a chuckle. "You're a strange one," he said. "You followed me all the way here just to ask for a ride?"

"I knew I wouldn't find one any other way," Garrod said. "And I think I can trust you. I need a ride to the new Federation capital, and I heard you were going that way."

"They offer rides up at the other end of the harbor. Not too expensive. They'll get you to the capital faster, too."

"It's not about the money," Garrod said. "I wanted to ride with a friend. That's all."

He saw the man's shoulders stiffen in the blue moonlight. "And how do you know," he questioned, softly, silkily, his voice the edge of a knife-blade, "that I am a friend?"

"Because you're a Vulture," Garrod said. "And so am I."

-d'un éclat argenté je la vois, la lune-

in a silver burst, i see her, the moon

The man's name was Cryant d'Argent, a Vulture's name if Garrod had ever heard one, and he was the captain of the Mirage. He had heard of Jamil, of course, though he'd never met him, and had a great deal to say about the former Frieden captain, most of which was good and some of which Garrod disagreed with but did not take offense to. Everyone had a right to their own opinions, and Jamil was not perfect.

None of them had been.

Cryant claimed he'd heard of Garrod too, through channels. It was the first battle against the Frost brothers that did it, he said, where the Vultures had come to Jamil's aid. Garrod winced a bit at the memory but did not comment. He was, instead, grateful that the battle had come to pass, because there was little dispute that Garrod was actually who he said he was, and Cryant had agreed to take him on as a passenger, provided he pulled his weight.

Cryant did not ask him what he was doing there or what he planned to do in the Federation city, though Garrod was sure he had guessed his desire to see Jamil again. But the captain was a true Vulture, providing Garrod with a room, three meals a day and the right to be left alone, and Garrod was grateful. Cryant himself was no great conversationalist, and when he did see the captain, it was usually on the ship's bridge or in the mess hall, where they would exchange pleasantries and perhaps one or two comments on the movements of the ship and other standard, safe topics. He was silent, like Jamil, but in a different way – calmer, looser, more nonchalant, but at the same time alert.

The Mirage was, in most appearances, similar to the Frieden in design, and for the first two days Garrod would wake up in the middle of the night with a weird sense of déjà vu, as if the past two years had never happened and he was still on the Frieden, and if he walked out of the room and down the hall, there would be Tifa's room and then the bridge where Toniya and Shingo and Sara were still working the controls through the night, and Jamil would be sitting in his captain's chair. Once or twice the feeling was so eerie and so strong that he would get out of bed, turn on the lights, and sit there with the window open listening to the pounding of the waves on the sides of the ship and the hiss of the ocean wind whipping through the window as the Mirage cut through the dark waves almost silently.

He still did not quite understand why he had followed the Vulture, only that he had somehow known the man was a Vulture and that he had suddenly, there in the smoky bar, felt a fierce longing for the old days. The past could not be returned to, but he could pretend, and that was enough.

He helped out in the hangar during the day, welding and repairing parts, and when he was not in the hangar he was on the upper deck, leaning over the railing and watching the water flash by. Cryant's exec had asked him once why he stared so intently at the waves, to which Garrod had replied that he was watching for dolphins.

There aren't any dolphins in these parts, the exec had replied, sounding puzzled, and Garrod had shrugged.

That's okay.

He got along well enough with the rest of the crew, and if they seemed just a little wary around him, it was understandable. Garrod remembered the life of a Vulture well enough – trust no one, answer to no one. Disobeying that creed had landed the Frieden in trouble more than once, but then again, Jamil was no ordinary Vulture. Jamil had a big heart.

Was it better, Garrod wondered, to trust no one and live the rest of your life in solitude, or to have a big heart and know that you might be hurt for it, but trusting all the same?

He had not come to an answer, and today was the last day of the journey, the last day where he would be able to stand up on the deck and feel the ocean breeze in his hair and see the sun sparkling on the water, which, even though there were no dolphins, was just as blue and beautiful as it was the day he had seen Tifa dive in to swim with them. The thought of her squeezed his heart painfully, but he caught it, held it, not wanting to let the memory go so soon, even though it hurt him.

The waves rushed past, foaming whitecaps turning into rolling billows which were left behind in the ship's wake, which would soon turn to lapping tongues of water and then would subside once again to the rhythm of the sea. He sighed, turned to lean with his back against the railing. There was a black mass ahead – land, he thought – and he could faintly see the glint of sun on metal, the skyscrapers, most likely, of the capital's skyline.

"Garrod?"

He straightened, gave the Mirage captain an easy grin as the man emerged up on deck, shielding his eyes with one hand to gaze out at the horizon. "Morning, Cryant."

The gold earring wavered a bit in the wind, and the captain lifted a hand in greeting. "You'll be leaving us shortly, won't you?"

Garrod gave him another grin. "As much as I'd love to hang around with you guys, yeah, I've got an errand or two to run, and it might take a while."

Cryant gave him an unreadable look, and Garrod frowned, but the captain did not say anything, simply made his way over to the railing and leaned his elbows against it, staring down into the water.

"As long as I've been doing this," he said, "I never get tired of looking down into the ocean. There's something new to see every time, something to discover."

Garrod stared past the bulky form of the man standing beside him, past the opposite railing, into the distance where there was no land, just an endless sea of sparkling blue in the morning sunlight. "I've been sitting for two years," he said, "pretending that I didn't want to see anything new. I thought I'd had my fill of traveling. I guess it took a kick to the head for me to realize I wasn't as happy as I thought I was."

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Cryant gave him a long, searching look. "I don't know you," the captain said finally, "and far be it from me to question why you chose to board my ship and why you're taking this journey. But I'd like to think I've seen my share of people in my days as a Vulture, and I'll say that you are a good man, Garrod Ran. Jamil was right to have chosen you."

Garrod smiled tightly. "Thanks. I'd like to think so too, though sometimes I don't know about that. Jamil saw something in me, I guess, and I owe him pretty much everything."

"Jamil," Cryant said, "is a better man than most. He puts me to shame, I know, but life is not about competing with the goodness of another. That would reduce everything to the misery of always trying to be better than the next man, and that is no way to live. All of us live and die, and all that's left to do before death is to do something that touches the lives of others."

"You're a good man too," Garrod said. "Better than most."

Cryant smiled. "I'm just doing my duty."

"There is someone I left behind," Garrod said slowly, not sure why he was telling the Vulture captain this, only that he needed to tell someone, and it felt right. "A girl who I love very much, who touched my life in the way you mean, I think, and I didn't realize it until too late."

Cryant's dark eyes offered no answers, but Garrod realized also that Cryant knew exactly who the girl was that he was talking about, and perhaps Cryant also knew a little bit more about the war and Newtypes and Jamil Neate than he had let on. But that was all right, because all Vultures had their own secrets.

"She'll understand," Cryant said, a rare smile crinkling the corners of his eyes. "I think you know that."

"How do you go on?" Garrod said suddenly, fumbling for the words, not quite sure even what he wanted to ask. "How do you…"

"Survive?"

Garrod supposed that was as good a word as any. He nodded slowly.

Cryant tapped one gloved finger against his chin, staring thoughtfully out to sea. "When I was young," he said at last, "just after the first war, it was difficult. It was difficult for everyone, but much more difficult for all of us who had been pilots in the war, who had nothing left."

For some reason, Garrod was not surprised. It was natural that Cryant should have been a pilot, just like Jamil had been a Newtype.

"The first year was the hardest. I would wake up in the middle of the night and see the moon shining outside my window, and I would be afraid." The Vulture captain turned to look at Garrod for an instant, before gazing back out to sea. "I hated the moon."

"I don't hate the moon," Garrod murmured, "but I don't love it, either." Turning his head to regard Cryant's profile against the side of the ship. "There's so much mysticism about the moon…so much that the moon represents, and yet whenever I look at it, I think of death."

"Jamil once told me," Cryant said softly, "that the hardest thing for a pilot to conquer is his apathy towards death. Because we, as pilots, don't think about killing. We sit in a protected cockpit, fighting others sitting in their own protective cockpits, and we never see our enemy's face. Death is a brief flash, an explosion, melted metal. It is not the sacrifice of a human life, but instead it is reduced to the destruction of technology."

Garrod hesitated, not sure how the question would be received. "Did you see the last battle? Were you there? With-"

"With Jamil?" Cryant smiled like a wolf. "Yes, I was there. I saw everything." One hand tightened on the metal railing. "It was only then I realized how much killing and how much death I had been responsible for as a pilot. I was just doing my duty, I thought."

"There's nothing wrong with doing your duty," he said desperately. "Is there?"

Cryant chuckled softly. "No. There is nothing wrong with that. It is only when that duty begins to consume you, begins to haunt you, that it's time to break away. I never broke away. I hung on to the very end, along with Jamil, along with all of those who could not admit that they had been wrong and that things had gone too far."

Do not repeat the mistakes of the past.

"It's a new world, Garrod Ran. A new era, a new Federation, a new peace. Don't let anyone take that away."

"I- Garrod began, and Cryant stepped back.

"We should dock soon," he said, and Garrod knew the conversation was over as quickly and strangely as it had begun. He wanted to say something, to thank Cryant for trusting him, but the words stuck in his throat. It didn't seem appropriate to thank someone for something like that. It was something that should remain unsaid and simply felt, received from one soul to another.

The city was silver and black against the sky now, the hilly coastline resolving from dark landmass into green coastline, and the ship's whistle blew once, twice, three times, signaling pre-dock procedures initiated.

"I'd better go get my stuff," Garrod said instead. He pushed himself away from the railing, catching Cryant's gaze and holding it. "Thank you. For…the lift."

"One Vulture is always glad to help another," Cryant said. "We may never see each other again, and there are many things I still do not know, but good luck, Garrod Ran. And thank you."

-elle porte les voiles de l'éternité-

she wears the veils of eternity

It was almost noon when Garrod disembarked the Vulture ship and took the main road leading from the harbor into the city. He had been in only a few cities, but the capital was definitely unlike any other he had ever set foot in before. It was a city in the true sense of the word, from the steel and glass skyscrapers that formed the majority of the skyline to the hot rush of automobile traffic in the streets to the masses of pedestrians crowding the sidewalks. The sheer number of people here was staggering. The city had only been in existence for less than a year, and already it was larger than any city he'd ever been in.

It took a few false starts, three people from whom he asked directions, and a ragged city map, but all in all, finding his way to the capitol building was not that difficult. It did require him to ride the streetcar, which he had never done so and was a novel experience in itself. He hadn't been sure exactly what to do, so he'd imitated the old lady who had boarded the car before him, had accidentally dropped his money under the driver's seat, and spent about a minute, picking it up off the ground and apologizing to the irate passengers.

The capitol building was enormous, a monstrous construction of marble and limestone and brick and glass, and Garrod paused outside the massive gates with some trepidation, wondering if there was some policy against letting the common public into the grounds. But the gates were open, and the sign on the side proclaimed that public viewing hours were between 7 AM and 4 PM, and there didn't seem to be any policemen or guards around to say otherwise.

Taking a deep breath, he stepped inside.

A large modern sculpture of what looked like metal birds flying around some kind of silver globe graced the center of the capitol's courtyard, but there was no other decoration except the manicured lawns bordering the white stone pathways leading to the main building. There were other visitors, Garrod saw, families, couples strolling hand in hand, people posing for pictures, little children running along the grass to be picked up by scolding parents.

If he tried hard enough, he could almost pretend the war had never happened.

He forced himself to keep walking, watching the stone steps leading up to the capitol's main entrance grow steadily nearer. The building seemed even more imposing, great and frightening and larger than life, glowing white in the sunlight with its sharp, crisp corners and delicate sculpture work, and Garrod felt his heartbeat speed up.

Jamil probably wasn't even there. Maybe Jamil worked somewhere else, or maybe he wasn't even on Earth. He might be up in space in the colonies. Besides, who would listen to him, a mere boy who had nothing to do with the Federation government?

He had thought he could just walk up to the door and say he wanted to see Jamil, and they would let him in. Now, he realized it might not be that easy.

What am I doing here?

His feet were like lead and the pack on his shoulder seemed like the weight of the world, and he would have stopped walking if he could. But he could not, simply watched, felt like a spectator in his own body as his feet carried him closer and closer, and then he was taking the steps up, one at a time, toddling forward into the shadow of the great entrance, and the doors stood open.

He stopped.

NO VISITORS BEYOND THIS POINT, the sign read, a few meters from where he was standing, and beyond the rope barrier that prohibited entrance, the entrance hall stretched out grand and vast, like a palace, Garrod thought. He craned his neck to look up at the ceiling and felt dizzy. An enormous skylight spanned most of the length of the hall, and the beams of sun were warm on his neck and his back, but he felt cold.

I shouldn't have come, he thought, and somewhere in the back of his mind, a weird little laugh began to worm its way up between the threads of his consciousness, sniggering at the back of his throat and threatening to burst out from between his lips. He clamped his mouth shut and gritted his teeth, wondering if he should just go back the way he had come, back to the Mirage, and ask Cryant for help. He doubted the Vulture captain could get far, but at least Cryant had connections, unlike Garrod, who was just a nameless boy in the shadow of the great cogs of the governmental machine.

I was the pilot of the Gundam X, he imagined himself saying, imagined himself bursting into the assembly hall, and I need to see Jamil Neate.

"Sir? Sir?"

With a start, he looked down, realized he was leaning against the rope barrier, had somehow made his way across the floor and was reaching forward as if trying to catch something in his hand. The rope barrier tensed under his weight, and he tried to step back, but his balance was off, and before he had even fully realized what was happening, he was toppling forward, taking the barrier with him, hitting the ground with a thud and a flash of white pain and the crash that was the sound of the sign hitting the floor next to him.

"Sir? Are you all right?"

Garrod grunted.

Hands turned him over and he blinked the stars out of his eyes, finding himself staring directly into the sunlight streaming down from the skylight, and he groaned, gave his head a shake. There would be a bump on his head by this evening for sure.
"Can you hear me, sir?"

A face came into view, a pretty girl, dressed in a uniform with a blue nametag that read SHERRY. Garrod attempted to flash a smile and wasn't sure how well he succeeded, as the pretty girl did not smile back, simply sat back on her heels and stared at him.

"Uh…" he said. "Sorry."

"Need a hand sir?" she said, and he winced, nodded and took her outstretched hand, pulled himself back up. He glanced ruefully at the sign, but she was already kneeling down, picking it off the ground and replacing it, straightening the rope barrier.

"Can you-" he began, but she looked back at him and smiled a polite smile.

"I'm sorry sir, but there are no visitors allowed in the actual building itself. You'll have to leave, I'm afraid."

He clutched his pack, feeling rather desperate, and he figured there was no real way he could embarrass himself further in front of her anyway.

"I need to see Jamil Neate," he burst out.

She frowned at him. "Do you have an appointment?"

"No, but I-"

"You'll have to leave," she said again firmly. "Thank you for coming."

"No!" he shouted, wrenching his arm free as she tried to take it and tow him back across the line. "Wait I-"

"Sir, please!"

"You don't understand!" he pleaded, trying unsuccessfully to halt her pushing of him towards the door. "You don't-"

There was the sound of a door opening, boots clicking on the marble floor, and then a man's voice.

"What is the commotion out here?"

The pretty girl let go of him so hurriedly that Garrod yelped, tried to regain his balance, failed, and crashed to the ground yet a second time, managing to avoid bumping his head this time, but landing no more gracefully as the top of his pack came undone and the contents of it came spilling, scattering over the floor.

"I'm sorry sir," the girl gasped, and Garrod was amazed at the change in her voice from bossy to almost simpering, and he rolled his eyes. "But this man was trying to come in, and there are no visitors allowed, so I-"

"Be a little quieter about it," the man admonished, and Garrod, who was in the process of picking himself up from the floor, with a compass in his hand that had formerly belonged inside his pack, froze.

The compass fell from his hand with a metallic clang, rolling unsteadily across two tiles before it stopped.

"It can't be," he whispered, and slowly, almost afraid of what he would see, he brought his head up, towards where the man was standing, holding a sheaf of papers in his hand. "It can't be. You're dead."

There was a slight hiccup in time, as if everything suddenly stopped, and then with a jerk, it started again, and the papers fluttered to the ground from a suddenly limp hand, wafting gently downward like leaves in the wind.

A new era, a new Federation, a new peace. Don't let anyone take that away.

"…Garrod Ran?"

The man was Olba Frost.

-son auréole embrasse les étoiles-

her halo embraces the stars

You can't understand the pain of those who were not needed!

You are just selfish! he cried. Selfish! That's the most selfish reason I've ever heard!

The moon was as large as the world, dazzling with a light that froze the blood and made the tears start to his eyes, but there was nothing else he could do as he brought the gun up to the monsters streaking through empty space, because they wanted to kill him, and it was either kill or be killed.

He did not want to kill anymore.

And then he fired, and the blue light was the arrow of truth against the backdrop of the screaming moon, screaming and bleeding and dying, everything was dying, and then there was silence.