Gundam Wing Fan Fiction / Mobile Suit Gundam Fan Fiction / Gundam 08th MS Team Fan Fiction ❯ Silent Requiem ❯ Epilogue ( Chapter 23 )

Author's Note:

Sorry, Constant Reader, but the whole alternate ending thing just sort of petered out. I had such high hopes! A whole new ending where Hilde dies and Duo and Gene slug it out! An alternate ending sequence where Alex and Michelle end up together! Delightful iconoclasm at its best!

But, Reader, unfortunately such endeavours take work…

Anyway: I just found this kickass poem by Stevenson that fit so well with the story that I thought I'd add in this epilogue I'd been kicking around in me head for a while. It isn't the extravaganza of an alternate ending, but, what the hell, ya know? OK, on with the curtain-call!

Supplemental Transmission:

The Epilogue

Artificial raindrops splattered on the grass of Side 3's Xian Lo Colony. Anavel Gato hugged his trench-coat tighter about him fearing that he had come during the middle of the bi-monthly hydration cycle. Still, this was something that had to be done today, rain or shine; Delaz had only given him seventy-two hours to fulfil this expression of nostalgic whimsy, and that was only because he was Anavel Gato, The Nightmare of Solomon.

The grave before him, like so many others in the Elysium Cemetery for Zeonic soldiers, was marked by a simple grey headstone. Cirrus O'Reilly had never been one for doing anything flashy, so it seemed only fitting that her final resting place should reflect her Spartan lifestyle. There was no body below the stone, nor was there even a casket. The grave was purely symbolic. A gesture to honour a fallen champion.

Cirrus.

Tears flooded Gato's eyes, and soon were mingling with the raindrops as they slid down his cheeks. He was trembling and the bouquet of Lotus blossoms he had bough rustled in their plastic wrapping.

"Why did you leave me?" he shouted at the headstone, bitterly, accusingly. "I wanted to be with you! To help you start over again. You didn't have to die! You shouldn't have died!"

Gato wanted to throw down the Lotuses, but something stopped him from doing so. Some force, unseen and unheard, but felt in the gooseflesh that ran up his arms and down his back.

"I'm sorry," he said, demurely. He reached for his handkerchief and did the best he could to dry his eyes. "I just…I don't know what I'm supposed to do, Cirrus! You told me great things were waiting for me in the future, but what can I do? Who am I but a simple soldier? All I can do is the very best I can to help the cause of colonial independence…but, without you…"

A stirring in the bushes along the path caused him to look up sharply and drop his hand to his sidearm. Who else would seek this grave? Or was it someone seeking him? If they wanted him, he would not go down easily.

Terry Sanders walked down the gravel walkway of the cemetery wishing he had brought a jacket like Karen had suggested. She had nagged the whole way from the hotel to the cemetery about how this was "such a watse" and "treason" and things of that ilk, so he had tried to tune her out. Unfortunately in doing so he missed her complaints about the rain that had been scheduled for today, and so, found himself walking down the road in a cemetery full of the remains of enemy soldiers (or, as was the case for Cirrus and many others who had died in the vacuum, the headstones and markers of the graves of enemy soldiers) in his dress uniform and getting thoroughly soaked.

He was just thinking that things couldn't possibly get any worse when he walked around the bend to find himself staring down the barrel of a standard-issue Zeonic officer's sidearm.

"Holy shit!" he exclaimed, dropping the bouquet he had brought and throwing up his hands.

"Who are you?" a commanding voice said from the other side of the gaping maw of the pistol. "What business have you here?"

"Take it easy," Sanders said, his voice sounding much more calm than he felt. "I'm just here to leave some flowers on the grave."

"This grave?" the Zeek holstered the weapon and gestured to the simple grey marker that was inscribed Cirrus Hikari O'Reilly. He was about three or four years older than the Zeek, but the other man carried himself in a manner that said in no uncertain terms that he was a soldier of the highest calibre.

`Christ on His Cross!' Sanders' eyes widened a little in recognition. `The Nightmare of Solomon!'

Remembering that the legendary Zeon war hero had asked him a question, Sanders nodded jerkily. "I met her once, and she made a very strong impression on me, you might say. I found out that this was where her headstone was, and I wanted to pay my last respects."

"You're a Federation soldier," the Zeonic officer accused. "How dare you come to this hallowed ground in that uniform!"

"Terry Sanders Jr. 431st Space GM, Federal Forces Cosmo-arma, retired." He saluted.

"Don't patronise me, Federation cur!" Gato exploded and made as to reach for the gun again.

"I don't think Cirrus would like it very much if you did that," Sanders said, quietly.

"Shut up!" Gato raged "Who in the hell are you to say what Cirrus would or wouldn't like? I ought to kill you where you stand! I…I…"

His hand dropped to his side. "Who in the fuck am I kidding?" he said in much more subdued tones. "Go. Go ahead and leave your flowers. I was just about to do the same."

The two men dropped their bouquets one on top of the other. A moment of silence passed between them and the only sound in the entire cemetery was the soft patter of raindrops on the grass.

"Oddly fitting," Sanders spoke at last, "that Cirrus O'Reilly should have flowers from both sides of the conflict."

Gato nodded.

"You want to say anything?" Sanders asked, "I'm no good at this sort of thing."

The other man paused and got a curious far-away look in his eyes, as if remembering something from the deepest recesses of his mind. When he finally spoke, it was in lyrical metre of a most touching nature, all the more so coming from one who had survived the ravages of the battlefield:

"Under the wide and starry sky

Dig the grave and let her lie

Glad did she live and gladly die

And she laid her down with a will.

This be the verse I grave for her:

Here she lies where she long'd to be;

Home is the sailor, home from the sea,

And the hunter home from the hill."

"That…" Sanders brushed below his eye, but stopped there.

"Robert Louis Stevenson," Gato said, equally misty. "I had to change some of the words…but you get the idea. The piece was called `Requiem,' I believe. Just as apropos as the flowers I think: Cirrus sings a Silent Requiem now for all to hear, Earther and Colonist alike. She touched a lot of people, and she was a damned good person. It was only too bad that the war took so much from her."

"Wars take from everyone," Sanders agreed. "It took her lovers from her, and it took her from you and me. Do you think people will ever learn from this madness? Do you think there will ever be a lasting peace between Us and You?"

Gato shrugged. "I doubt it. People are violent by their very nature. We will see more wars, especially as long as you Earthers keep trying to push us around. All we want is to be left alone."

"I've heard of many a revolutionary who's said that exact same thing," Sanders said with a small laugh. "Only trouble is, once they are left alone they always seem to want to try and get even for all the shit they had to go through to get the right to be left alone, and the circle begins anew."

He held up a hand to still the hot comment Gato was prepared to loose, "be that as it may, though, I'm just glad we have a peace for the time being. Perhaps, if you and I can find a common ground, Anavel Gato, then perhaps the Feddies and the Zeeks on a larger scale might be able to do the same thing. Maybe it's just wishful thinking, but I'd just as soon prevent another case like Cirrus O'Reilly from ever happening again, wouldn't you?"

Gato could only nod.

Sanders glanced at his watch. "I need to be going; my fiancée is waiting in the car back by the entrance and she'll tear me a new asshole if I keep her waiting long. Commander?" he stuck out his hand hesitantly.

Anavel Gato considered the proffered palm for a good while. Most of him wanted to reject the gesture of good will, but another part of him…well, he couldn't very well be disrespectful to the memory of Cirrus.

Gato shook his hand.

"Do not think this changes anything, Earther," he said when they let go. "It was your kind that drove Cirrus to this. It was your kind that cost the lives of so many other hundreds of thousands of colonists. Such transgressions will not be readily written off by a simple handshake."

Sanders looked at him for a long time before finally backing up a few paces. As he turned to walk back to the front of the cemetery where Karen waited impatiently, he called back over his shoulder, "But isn't that a good place to start?"