Title: In Blood and Fire
Author: Karina
Rating: PG
Pairing: Wu Fei + Huán Hu, Heero, Duo
Notes: Challenge 186. Baby Series 4 #15. Takes place immediately after We Can Not Go Back.
Spoilers: None
Warnings:
Many thanks to ShenLong Deb for her work betaing this set of fics.
Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing or the Characters from the series but the baby is mine.
Title: In Blood and Fire
He knew the answer would be no.
It had to be, because in his own wanderings during the year after the war ended and for a time after he had set his ghosts to rest with the downfall of Dekim Barton, he had looked. He had not known what it was he was seeking, but he knew now, and he had found no place where he or the Clan might settle and found a colony in isolation from the world at large.
It was the very reason why their ancestors had forged out into space in the first place, because they objected to an open culture, to losing the isolated, rigid structure of their old traditions. The move had brought the clan some time, but it had ultimately led to the Elders detonating the colony.
"How is it preservation of a culture, a society, if one detonates both the people and their home? I have struggled to understand their logic, to understand why they did it. Whilst there is life there is hope. In death there is nothing."
The old man stood frozen, not even a tremble as he stared at the younger man. Wu Fei shook his head slightly, dark eyes intense and it seemed to Heero that he was hoping the Elder might answer him; might give him an answer that he could understand if not accept.
"Resurrection is not what we need. It is all well and good to rebuild everything exactly as it was, but it will be a copy, a false image. We are not as we were then. Our Clan is not as it was, losing everything has changed us, and ignoring what has happened will serve no purpose."
"We are Chang!" The old man spat out. "Chang! We are of an ancient bloodline, an ancient culture. We were refined…"
"In blood and fire. China was reformed and reformed again and again before the Chang and the Long rose to power and then faded into obscurity because they would not condone the changes taking place around them. It happened to all of those who ruled in China throughout the ages. I have learned that nothing lasts forever, not even hate. We mutate, we change, or we fade into obscurity. If you wish to keep our culture alive then this is the best I can do. Keep us together, remember the old ways and write it down. Adapt to the new world, learn to live by rules in truth not so different to our own. I have no intention of forgetting the culture into which I was born. I want to preserve it even if I do not wish to be restricted by it until I can no longer breathe! I want those who follow me to have a place to call home, to be able to understand where they came from, their history and their future laid out before them. Sanc has offered us that chance."
"You think to Westernise us!"
End
Karina Robertson 2012