Author: CleverYoungThief
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Mention of killing, internal angst, Duo POV
Pairing: None
Archive: Gundam Wing Addiction
Disclaimer: Don't own 'em. Don't sue. College kids are like L2 kids; we got nothin'.
Duo's Story
Jokes to Silence the Dead
Make up your eyes with laughter. Folks will be laughing with you in a little while. (1) An old Earth singer named Dean Martin said that once. Well, Dean-baby, I beg to differ. If you're too cheery in a war like this, people will start to think that you're a little crazy.
/ If that's the truth, I'm sure the guys would sign me off to a looney-bin in a heartbeat. /
It was bad in the last battle. Lots of civilian casualties. Of course, we took the responsibility, even though a lot of the casualties weren't our fault. Course, a few of them always are. That just goes with the territory.
/ Man, sounds almost like a job description if you think about it that way. Eliminating OZ bases, and meeting your daily quota of deaths. Reaping souls. /
There's a deep sadness running through everybody's lives in these times, and I guess I just kind of feel that out a little more than other people and take advantage of it. There's a thin line between laughing and crying.
/ Well, boys don't cry, so I guess that leaves me with the laughing bit. Even if there's not a lot to find about life that's really funny right now. /
I think I joke around because we need to hear them, even though they're not really funny. When I caught Quatre sobbing to himself after the last battle because Trowa wasn't around, I just told him, "Don't worry about it. We just saved about five hundred people from ever having to do their taxes again." You know how you can hold a firecracker in your hand and not get hurt if you throw it just before the fuse gets too short? This was kinda like that. Quatre took an instant from his crying to gape at me, and then we were both laughing, the hysterical kind of laughter that sounds like it wants to be screaming. And that made us feel better again. Sane again.
/ Is anybody really sane in times like these? Sometimes I doubt it. /
I'm looking at myself in the mirror. That's not me. Those sparkling eyes, that cheeky grin. That smirk that says I'm-alright-I-can-piss-vinegar-and-shit-cement-I'm-one-badass-motherfucker-and-I'm-not-scared-not-one-bit. That grin is a lie. My whole life is a lie. This isn't the real Duo Maxwell. The real Duo Maxwell died with Solo. The real Duo Maxwell, if he hadn't died, would probably be fucking for food on the mean streets of L2. This is only Shinigami, joking, cruel, and merciless. It looks great, but it's still just a lie. And no matter how hard you want a lie to be true, you still have to take the mask off before you go to bed at night. And that's when the real fun begins.
/ I wonder if Heero is really just a killing machine for accepting orders. Man, I wish I could be like that. If he feels bad about civilian casualties, he sure as hell acts like he treats them as casually as OZ does. /
When I think about who Duo Maxwell used to be, who I used to be, I think of a boy quick on his feet, running from the bad guys. I think of the kid who used to shadow Solo and be his lookout on shoplifts and car-stealing. I see a thin kid with a pale face that just looked all the paler because he dressed in black, a kid of the night who drew shadows around him like a blanket. When I think of Shinigami, I think of Solo reincarnated with a .98 mm automatic machine gun instead of a switchblade.
/ Well, no getting out of it now. This isn't a part-time job, this isn't school. I can't quit or drop out. This is war, be it ever so humble, and I fucking well know it. /
Eliminating enemy targets. Destroying OZ bases. Demolishing the centers of command. No matter what kind of pretty names you put on it, killing people is all it really is. And the best thing about it is, you don't have to worry too much about what you do today, because you're just going to have to go out and do the same damned thing tomorrow.
/ These people we kill are nameless. They don't have family, don't have friends. All I have to do is think about it that way, and I'm fine. No sweat. /
Well, it's off to another Mission. This time we're hitting a hardpoint underground shelter that is serving as a maintenance hangar for OZ mobile suits. It's hidden in a forest. It'll be hard to tell if we hit it hard enough, we gotta make a quick run and retreat before the troops arrive. But we'll have a ground lock with the track radar and the systems will all be tight. If we don't hit it hard enough, it sure as hell won't be for lack of trying. Of course, what we'll hit will probably be just a couple of acres of national forest that one of those jackass Docs thought we ought to bomb the hell out of.
/ It's the toothpick hypothesis. After we turn all the big trees into toothpicks, OZ'll have to surrender. /
Damn, I wish we had some decent targets. There has to be something on Earth that's worth coming all the way down here to blow up. Like everything else in my life, like what happened to Solo and everybody else, it's out of my control.
/ So what if we die in this? If we die, nothing can bring us back. We'll have died bombing a couple of mobile suits in a shitty little place in a big shitty war that we don't have a chance in hell of winning, and I won't even get an American flag for my goddamned coffin. Hell, I'll be lucky if I get a coffin. I can't help wishing that if I'm going to die in this war, I wanna die destroying a target that's gonna mean something for the good guys. /
Maybe we can make our lives--and deaths--mean something. We'll go and pick our own damned targets. Heero is a walking OZ military reference book, he could tell us exactly where we need to go. OZ can't follow me on radar, hell, maybe I'll just go and do it by myself. I can go anywhere I want to and attack any damned thing. I'll go destroy something that will really kick OZ in the balls.
/ That's it. I'm gonna tell Heero. From now on, we're not going to be testing the toothpick hypothesis. We're going to pick some damned good targets, targets that will make OZ bleed. Really make 'em bleed. Like they made Solo bleed. And Sister Helen... and me. /
OWARI
(1) This is really a part of a song by Dean Martin (30's swing music, I love it!) The song is called Powder Your Face With Sunshine.
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