Disclaimer: Don't own any of the characters. ::sighs with
disappointment:: The song used here is called "Willie
McBride," and it's by Eric Bogle

Warnings: Shounen ai, 1+2, deathfic, AU?

Ramblings and other notes: Ever since I first started
watching Gundam Wing, I've thought that this song would
make a good songfic because of its antiwar message.
However, I don't remember this song because of the antiwar
message. It is very appropriate that I write this fic in
May, not only because the AP tests are over and I have more
free time, but because Memorial Day is in May.

Now, for some people, Memorial Day is simply a day off from
school/work. I've always spent it working out at the
Renaissance Pleasure Faire, like I do every weekend in
spring. Memorial Day weekend is special to Faire
participants because they work three days instead of two.
Lots of parties get held, and people generally celebrate.

However, there are more serous rituals held on that
weekend. One of them is the Clan McColin memorial service,
held the Sunday night before Memorial Day. I rarely attend,
because I can't stand being around that many depressed
people. That, and because afterwards they tend to start
drinking, and then things get really scary. But I'm
forbidden to leave camp, and so I have a general idea of
how things go. Every year, they stand in a big circle in
the middle of the camp. And every year, they sing this
song. And every year, they read names off of a list of
people they knew who have died.

And every year, that list gets a little longer.

I've come to associate this song not so much with war as
with death in general. That, and the fact that my author
friend M.E., who loves angst, has been leaning on me to
write this, prompted this fic.

Memory Enshrined
By Rapunzel
(rapunzel800@hotmail.com)

   [How do you do, Private William McBride?
   Do you mind if I sit down here by your graveside]

It was a warm and sunny day in the graveyard. Spring had
arrived, and the month of May had brought her promised
flowers. They burst up from the grass in small clusters of
yellow and pink. The setting seemed too cheerful to really
be a graveyard.

The gloomiest thing in the landscape was the figure that
walked in it. He plodded along slowly, eyes flicking over
the gravestones as if looking for one in particular. His
dark brown hair fell into his blue eyes, making it
difficult to see, but he didn't try to brush it back. It
was a battle he knew he would lose anyway, and he didn't
even make the attempt.

   [While I rest for a while in the warm summer sun?
   I've been walking all day, and I'm nearly done.]

The young man didn't look at the names on the stones as he
passed. Instead, he looked at the dates. Whenever he saw
one that ended with the date AC 195, he noted it. He gave
no outward sign of doing so, but his mind was asking how
many of the people in those graves were dead because of
him. He continued looking at the stones as he turned off
the main path. His pace never slowed, and he didn't look
where he was going. He already knew where he was headed.
The headstones around him were becoming less and less
frequent. Lacking anything else to look at, he lowered his
eyes to the ground. This was helpful, as he was at that
time passing through a small grove of yew trees. On the
other side of the trees were a few more scattered graves.
The walker approached one of these and sat down next to it.

   [And I see by your gravestone you were only 19
   When you joined the dead heroes in 1915.]

The dates on the headstone read 180-196.

"Sixteen years," the young man mused quietly. "Not nearly
long enough. Not long enough for you or me."

He sat silent for a moment, as though waiting for and
answer, but the only response was the sound of the wind in
the yew trees.

   [Well, I hope you died quick and I hope you died clean
   Or, Willie McBride, was it slow and obscene?]

"All quiet huh?" said the man. "That's a real rarity for
you." He sighed. "Figures it took death to shut you up. And
now, I wish I could hear you prattling away again."

There were a few more moments of quiet, then he burst out,
"Damn it, Duo! I survived death! I blew myself up and
lived! But you! You… you…" His voice trailed off and his
shoulders shook. When he spoke again, his voice was quiet
and subdued.

"Did it hurt, Duo? I'm not trying to suggest that you
weren't strong enough to handle it; you could always handle
physical pain. I… I just hope it didn't hurt."

   [Did they beat the drum slowly?
   Did they sound the fife lowly?
   Did the rifles fire o'er you as they lowered you down?
   Did the bugle sing the Last Post and Chorus?
   Did the pipes play The Flowers of the Forest?]

"Maybe it only hurts if you live," Heero went on. "You're
dead now, you can't feel anymore pain anyway. You left all
the feeling to me, for once. I'm not mad at you for that;
it wasn't like that was something you could have
controlled. But it does hurt. That's why I couldn't come to
your burial; it hurt too much. I'm sorry about that. Quatre
said it would have been better if I'd been there. Look at
you, a Gundam pilot, a hero to the people now. But there
was so much dying going on that no one cared to honor your
death properly. I guess that's how it is in a war.

   [And did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind?
   In some faithful heart is your memory enshrined?
   And though you died back in 1915,
   To some faithful heart, are you forever 19?]

"I'll bet you're wondering why I'm here today. It's a
little early for my next visit. I didn't bring you flowers
or anything fancy. Unfortunately, no one has come up with a
way to grow black roses yet, and red roses are too cliché.
You know me and how I dislike clichés."

Heero paused in his little explanation and drifted into
thought and memory. Duo had always understood his distaste
for clichés in a relationship. He had never expected Heero
to bring him flowers or chocolate (the latter being mostly
intended for women anyway) or take him out on dates. Those
were things that normal teenagers did, and both of them
would have been quick to admit that they weren't normal.
Relena had never seemed to understand that, and that was
one of the reasons Heero insisted that they were
incompatible.

   [Or are you a stranger without even a name
   Enshrined forever behind a glass frame
   In an old photograph torn and tattered and stained
   And fading to yellow in a bound leather frame?]

"Relena was never any threat to you." Heero brought his
musings into his one-sided conversation. "She's stopped
trying now. She's too busy. You see, the war is over now.
That's why I'm here.

"The war is over, and the Gundam pilots are heroes. All of
us but you. You died for the cause; you'd think you would
be the best remembered of all of us. But nobody cares.
Nobody remembers you but us. Instead of a hero's honoring,
you get a small secluded grave visited only by four of your
friends. But maybe that's how you prefer it, ne?"

   [While the sun's shining now on these green fields of
France
   A warm wind blows gently and the red poppies dance.
   The trenches have vanished under the plough.
   No gas and no barbed wire, no guns firing now.]

Heero paused in his monologue to gaze around the graveyard.
Then, with a sigh, he continued. "I'll bet you like it here.
It's quite, and pretty, and peaceful. Now the whole world is
like this. No more mobile suits, no more battleships, no
more Gundams. No more Gundam pilots. We all longed for
peace, and supposedly fought for it, but now that it's
here, I don't have a clue what to do.

"Quatre keeps talking about going into business. I guess he
can hardly avoid it, considering he's the heir to the Winner
estate. I don't know what Trowa will do, but I'm sure he has
plans. Probably plans that involve Quatre."

   [But here in this graveyard it is still no man's land.
   The countless white crosses in mute witness stand
   To man's blind indifference to his fellow man,
   To a whole generation who was butchered and damned.]

"Wufei has vanished. I don't know where he's gone, but I
think he left for the same reason I'm here babbling to you.
Neither one of us can handle peace. We just don't know what
to do with ourselves. We're useless now, and we always will
be because for us there will never be anything else besides
the firing of guns, the sound of explosions, and the cries
of the dying. That was what we were bred and trained for.

"People always wonder how we could stand doing such thing
to other people. I've lost count of the number of times
I've been asked, 'Didn't all that killing ever bother you?'
Well, maybe it did, but it was what I knew. I always hoped
that you'd be able to teach me something different. You
can't now. You're dead, and Odin Lowe is dead, and the
peace delegates are dead, and half the bloody world is dead
now, thanks to me. So it goes. (1)"

   [And I can't help but wonder, now, Willie McBride,
   Do all those who lie here know why they died?
   Did you really believe them when they told you the cause?
   Did you really believe that this war would end wars?
   Well, the suffering, the sorrow, the glory, the shame,
   The killing, the dying, it was all done in vain.
   For Willie McBride, it's all happened again
   And again, and again, and again, and again.]

"It's not the actual killing that can make me upset. I've
become immune to that. What hurts the most, aside from
losing you, is that there was no point to it. I never asked
for anyone to explain the reason I was fighting because I
never questioned why myself. But I listened when ever
someone gave one, and do you know what I noticed Duo? Do
you?!" His voice took on a slightly hysterical edge. "I
noticed that they were all lying! Every last one of them!
There is no cause, and no point. I especially hate the
people who claimed that we were fighting for peace. Peace
is just a temporary outcome. It lasts for a little while,
then a new generation is born, who have never seen a war
for themselves, and so they just have to go out and make
the same mistakes as their parents did!   I've read
history, I know what happened after 'the war to end all
wars.' (2)

"That's what really bothers me. Knowing that everything
I've ever done, and everything I was trained for, was
completely pointless and useless. You were the only
exception to that, and look what happened to you. So, I was
wondering, Duo, would you mind terribly if I came to join
you? I know, I know. I can almost hear you scolding me
about how suicide is a sin. But then, everything else I've
ever done in my life was technically considered a sin; no
sense in getting squeamish now. Look, I ever came prepared."

As he pulled the gun out of his waistband, Heero smiled for
the first time during his visit. He was still smiling as he
lay down next to the grave and put the barrel to his head.

*******

"Heero's been there an awfully long time, don't you think?"
Quatre asked, sounding worried.

"Hush," Trowa murmured. "Let him pay his respects in peace."

Quatre nodded in agreement, but continued to fidget in his
seat and glance alternately at his watch and out the window
of the car, searching for the familiar figure of his friend
walking back.

Trowa noticed his discomfort and finally asked, "What's the
matter? He's just gone to visit Duo for a while."

"I know," Quatre repeated. "But he's taking such a long
time. He didn't even have flowers or anything to leave at
the grave. It's just bothering me."

Trowa sighed in resignation. "Well, do you want to get out
and walk for a bit and see if we can't meet him on the way
back?"

"I think that would be a good idea," Quatre said.

The two young men climbed out of the car and walked through
the graveyard side by side. Quatre would stop every now and
then to read the headstones, but as they got farther and
farther away from the car, he got more and more nervous.
There was still no sign of Heero, and something was telling
Quatre to find his friend and find him soon.

His worst fears were confirmed as the sound of a gunshot
echoed through the quiet graveyard.

Both Quatre and Trowa looked up abruptly at the sound, then
at each other. Then they started to run in the direction
they knew Heero had gone. Quatre was woefully sure he knew
what he would find there, and the scene that met his eyes
when he arrived, though sickening, was nothing more than he
had expected.

Heero Yuy was lying on the ground. A pool of blood had
drained from his temple and lay like a great red lake
around his head. The gun had dropped from his hand and had
been drenched in the flood. The irony of someone dying in a
graveyard hit Quatre all at once, and he wanted to laugh and
be sick at the same time.

Trowa quickly recovered from his shock and took Quatre's
arm. "Come on," he said in a low voice. "There's nothing
more we can do here."

Quatre had to agree that he was right, but he couldn't tear
his eyes away. Was that a smile on Heero's face? It was, he
finally decided. A strange, disturbing smile, but a smile
none the less.

With a shudder, Quatre allowed Trowa to pull him away.
There wasn't anything more either of them could do now.

Fini

Okay, M.E. I don't think your muse is really on vacation in
Hawaii. I think she staged a hostile takeover in my brain.
What else could have inspired me to write something as
angsty as this?

1) Now, who can tell me what book this is a reference to?
::glares at Blue Jeans and M.E.:: Shut up, you two; I know
_you_ know!
2)WWI was commonly referred to as "the war to end all
wars." Oddly enough, there was another world war only 21
years later. Depressing, huh?