Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Past Meets Present ❯ Chapter 26 ( Chapter 27 )

The group of seven was squashed into the booth. It was an old-fashioned diner that they had chosen, the kind with large, oversized booths for large groups of people, like teens for instance. But six adults and one child were definitely not the same as a group of teenagers.

Heero had managed to grab one of the ends, Quatre the other. To Heero’s left was Xin Xin, her mother on her other side. Trowa was across from the child, Wufei on his other side. This left Duo squashed in the very center. Shinigami complained loudly for several minutes before Quatre suggested that he and Xin Xin trade places. This would allow her to be between both her parents and he would be next to Heero who was the best at getting Duo to shut up. Of course, the blond knew better than to say that to his friend’s face. But that didn’t mean that the thought did not pass through the other ex-pilots’ heads either.

Soon, food was in front of the group though, so that distracted them. Well, for the most part.

Trowa picked at the food on his plate, feeling sickened by the thought of eating. Seeing her had driven all thoughts of hunger away. All he could do now was remember her betrayal that had caused the Captain, the man who had decided that they, the mercenary troop that is, would raise him instead of killing him. He had later learned that when the Captain had been younger, he had been married. His wife and their infant son had died many years before because their home had been bombed.

The Captain had made sure that he had been fed that he had a place to sleep. The Captain had been the one who made sure that Trowa, or No-name as he had been called then, received the proper training for a mercenary in an array of subjects, from battling in a mobile suit to weapon maintenance, as well as in math, reading, and writing.

He had a tough life with the mercenaries, and not necessarily the happiest and definitely not the best for a child to grow up around, but it had been the only life he’d known. Life had been stable, or at least as stable as a battlefield. They had enough money for supplies, most of the time and when they didn’t have enough money, it was simple enough to just catch dinner. Trowa had even had his own mobile suit and could fight in it. He had been fighting in it since he had been a very young boy at the tender age of six. For four years, until he had been ten and met her, his life had revolved around the battlefield. Even after he had been about ten and gone into space to work on the Heavyarms’, he had ended up back on the battlefield.

Of course, it was a complete fluke that he had been chosen to be sent to Earth in the Gundam. The real Trowa Barton had been killed by one of Dokter S’s assistants while the boy with no name had been working nearby on the mechanical wonder. For some reason, the real Trowa had even doted on the clown.

Trowa Barton, Mariemaia’s uncle, had been fond of him, often saying that the young man was like his little brother. He had told the boy who would later take his place much personal info. So much in fact, that the imposter Trowa could probably been able to keep the Barton family believing that their only son was alive.

He did not realize it but, he, the Trowa that we all know and love, was fingering the broken cross that hung around his neck. The cross that had been both a curse and a blessing. On one hand, it had saved his life. On the other, it was also a symbol of a betrayal that had cut deep into him though he had never allowed it to show.

“Hey, Tro, what’s with that thing anyways? I never knew you were religious,” Duo suddenly broke into his thoughts from across the table. “You always seem to have it though.”

Trowa didn’t answer, rather, let his fingers drop away from the thing like it had burnt him.

Heero coughed, which caused the other pilots to look at him. Anyone else would have though that there was no change in Trowa’s facial expression, but to any one of the other four men, the look he sent towards Heero was one that said ‘Thank you’, if only for a few seconds. But the other pilots, well except Heero, did not notice the look on their friend’s face.

At the other end of the table, Xin Xin yawned. Looking up at her mother, she asked when would they be going home. Meiran, in turn, locked eyes with Wufei, asking him the same question.

“We won’t be going back to that house,” Heero announced. “It will be watched.”

“Then, what about my toys and stuff? And what about school and my friends?” Xin Xin asked, her small legs thumping against the seat.

“You’ll have to go to a new school and you can make new friends,” Quatre told her. “And, you can get new things.”

She nodded, very swiftly. Meiran was watching her daughter, noticing tears were being held back. The young girl whispered something in her mother’s ear, who nodded. Xin Xin slipped down under the table and headed towards area marked Bathrooms.

“How much longer will we be dragged around?” Meiran wondered aloud, very quietly, but enough so that every single one of the guys heard her clearly. She, somehow, managed to follow her daughter.

In the bathroom, Meiran found that Xin Xin had taken one of the stalls and was sniffling. The Chinese woman knocked lightly on the stall door. “Xin, open up, it’s me.”

After a few moments, the door opened and revealed a small girl appeared. Meiran picked up the child, who was only seven, and carried her over to the sink counter. She set the girl down there and moistened a paper towel. Using it to clean her daughter’s face, Meiran couldn’t answer the question her daughter wanted answered. She couldn’t answer the question she so dearly wanted to know.

“Niáng, I don’t wanna go anywhere else. I just wanna go to school and have friends and be normal,” Xin Xin sniffled. “I wanna have a home again.”

Meiran pulled her daughter close, hugging the girl. “I know, baby, I know,” the young mother murmured to her daughter. “Even if we have to leave your die and uncles, I’ll get us a home.”

The young girl pulled back and looked her mother in the eyes. “Would I still get to see them?” She asked, eyes wide.

Meiran sighed. “Sometimes, but it may not be too often.”

A knock on the door alerted the females to the fact that they were not there alone. Meiran looked at her daughter. “Are you ready to go back out there?”

“Yeah,” came the girl’s small voice. The taller, older female lifted her child and set the girl onto the ground. Xin Xin stuck close to her mother. Outside the door was her father.

But, let us rewind the clock a little to when Meiran had left the table after asking her question. The five men felt pangs of guilt at hearing those few words, but none more than one Wufei.

He had not noticed that ever since he and his wife had been reunited that they were in constant motion. The only real peace they’d had was when the group had been at the mansion while they’d been recovering from injuries.

The man had then left the table and headed towards the bathrooms. He stood outside the womens’ room. On the other side of the door, he could hear Meiran comforting Xin Xin. Even more pangs of guilt hit him as he heard what his wife had had to say. But he also felt anger when he heard her say that they might leave him. That made him especially angry and guilty. Xin Xin was his daughter, too. She deserved peace, but he wanted to be there.

He’d only known the child for a short time but he had definitely grown attached to her. There was something about that little girl. He knew that if it were needed, he would give up his own life for her. That scared him.

He had been prepared to die in the war. He had come face to face with death several times. Even in Mariemaia’s uprising, in his battle with Heero, death was always a possibility. As a Preventor, he had been in dangerous situations where he had looked death in the eyes.

But, that had been part of the mission, part of the job. This was something much more personal. And he did not feel comfortable with the fact that people who wanted to hurt him might end up hurting his girls.

Wufei blinked. Had he just called Meiran and Xin Xin his girls? When had that happened? True, the two were his wife and daughter, but still, calling them his girls, if even just in his head where no one else was privy to his thoughts, felt like a large step that he’d passed. Shaking his head as if to clear all the confusing thoughts, he knocked.

A/N: Oh my god. Is this an update? It is. That’s two within a week. I’m on a roll! Woo hoo!

Okay, the last part, where it deals with Meiran and Xin Xin wondering when they’ll get a home, well that just hit me on the bus this, that is Thursday, morning. I was wondering what I would do next when I suddenly realized that the two girls and everyone else had been pretty much on the move. The girls aren’t used to moving around, whereas it doesn’t bother the guys who are pretty much used to it.

I do not own anyone or thing that appears in this work of fanfiction except for the young girl named Xin Xin.