The Insider
Act 1 Chapter V
?Damn that German whore!?
The young Midii Une looked up at her mother, an action formed by habit, and no longer real interest. Her mother uttered this phrase often, at times when domestic life was proving particularly frustrating, as though this ?whore? (whoever she was), was responsible for the dinner burning, or the milk being off, or an upset glass tumbling out of the cabinet and smashing into glimmering shards on the kitchen floor. It was always the absent German woman?s fault, not ?milie Une?s.
?milie Une was a neurotic woman, and not a beautiful one; she was plain and waif-like, her hair as limp as string and her mouth set in a permanent downwards curve. To the ignorant observer, it was quite a conundrum to understand why it was that the dashing Victor Une had married her in the first place. The answer lay in her landowner father?s vast amount of wealth and Victor?s penniless good looks.
The couple?s four offspring- the eldest, Midii, their twin sons Luc and Leonce and the youngest son, Adrien- all displayed their father?s flaxen locks, but while the first three had comely faces, Adrien had fallen victim to his mother?s inherent pout. Perhaps it was just that he was the baby of the family, and ?milie preferred him- possibly empathising with his unfortunate plainness- meaning as a result, he was constantly mollycoddled and petulant. Or perhaps, Midii had pondered many a time, as she gazed over the cradle at her ugly brother, he would simply always be that way, a miserable-looking adult, unable to do anything about his inversed smile. As it were, he would not make adulthood and would die at the hands of their father, but that was all to come.
At this moment in time, seven-year-old Midii was quite oblivious to the future- though she knew rumours about the war which would be a part of it- content to lazily ponder the question of who the ?German Whore? must be. She wasn?t sure what kind of a woman a whore was, but she had formed the opinion it must be someone beautiful or else her mother wouldn?t be driven to such jealousy.
?Midii, go make yourself useful,? ?milie hissed, scooping up the sugar she had spilled all over the counter top. ?Go and fold that washing for me.?
?I don?t want to M?re!? she replied. ?The boys never have to do anything??
A slap connected with her cheek. ?You?re the eldest and it?s your duty!?
?milie?s father?s business had recently gone bankrupt following charges of corruption. Subsequently, the money he bestowed upon his only daughter stopped flowing into the purse of Victor, whose living was to make paintings in a drunken haze, few of which he sold. Jobs were hard to come by and Victor Une used this as an excuse for remaining bone idle.
?You could join the Alliance,? ?milie had suggested on more than one occasion. ?It?d be easy. The more the merrier in their ranks.?
?No?I?m a pacifist,? her husband replied, gesturing to the thick tome, banned by the Government- ?The Writings of the Peacecrafts?- majestically enthroned on the bookcase. ?I couldn?t be a soldier; it would go against my nature.?
?milie spat; ?Pacifist? That?s what they all say when they?re too ashamed to admit to being work-shy cowards. Those Peacecrafts didn?t have to earn a living, did they? They got paid for being inbreeds with royal titles. You can?t afford to be a pacifist, Victor!?
Midii didn?t know what a pacifist was but her mother made it sound like a curse. No, she would never be one. She would earn a living even if she had to do something terrible. She would be brave enough to do what was right.
****
It wasn?t long before ?The Whore? made an unsolicited appearance, arriving at the Une?s lowly home in the Maures hills of southern France, carrying a battered case. The first thing Midii heard her say in an odd French accent was ?You didn?t tell me you were still married, Victor, this is a disaster!?
?Uh?Liesl?,? Victor replied with a nervous laugh, gesturing to his offspring scuffing at dust in the yard, ?these are my children: Midii, Luc, Leonce and Adrien.?
The German woman wasn?t the beautiful floozy that had sashayed coyly through young Midii?s imagination. She was thick-set, bespectacled, with hazel eyes and chestnut brown hair tied up severely in what looked like a big pastry on the back of her head. Ignoring the introduction to his children, Liesl, barrelled in with her reason for coming:
?I need your help! My Anetta has run away,? she said, suddenly heaving with sobs which steamed up her glasses. Victor feebly offered her a clean handkerchief from his pocket, and she sniffed into it with pantomimic drama.
?Away to where??
?The Alliance, Victor. She thinks she is in love with a Specials soldier five years older than her! She left me a note explaining she was enrolling onto the training program and is not coming back??
?Who is this?? ?milie demanded, appearing from her early morning shopping trip, as if lured by the familiar scent of infidelity, her arms laden with fresh bread from the patisserie. ?And who is Anetta??
Victor began haltingly; ?This is?Liesl Hesse and Anetta is??
?Our daughter!? Liesl cut in. ?Victor and I had a daughter thirteen years ago! Didn?t he tell you??
?So this is her?? ?milie dropped most of her groceries, leaving only a crusty golden baguette in her hand, which she swung at the hapless Victor like a beam sabre. ?And after all this time, you never told me you had another daughter??
?It just never came up!? he protested, dodging the bread his wife was wielding. ?I mean?I just didn?t think it was necessary?Liesl and I were??
?I know what she was?a prostitute you were ?painting?. Yes. Every day I have tried you forget your betrayal. Well, you can take your bloody paintings and your trollop and you can get out!?
?No!? chorused the eavesdropping children, as they would far rather keep their careless father, than their bad-tempered mother.
****
As it turned out, they got their wish, for whilst they were visiting Victor in his shabby hovel of a cottage, their mother decided it was her turn for a fling, packed her bags and disappeared with an Alliance soldier stationed in the area- Gerard Avery- who was a lucky man indeed. With his buckteeth and weedy stature, he had lost all hope that one day a woman would throw herself at him with the urgency ?milie Une had.
So the Une children remained with their father. For the first few days in his care, they thought living exclusively with Victor was boundless fun. Liesl Hesse, their new mother by default, kept things in some sort of order and was not quite the battle-axe they had expected. Whatever her past money-making venture had been, she was not slovenly and ran the house with almost military precision, keeping the children impeccably clean, though money for new clothes was scarce. Liesl found getting work hard. In their village she was a foreigner, and no-one was welcoming of this robust German woman with a pastry on the back of her head.
Victor soon ran out of money for any paints, and the small stash of cash he had left went on liquor. It was only a matter of months before Liesl realised her lover was never going to assist her in bringing the wayward teenage Anetta back, and neither was he much of a lover any more.
It wasn?t long before, she too, packed her bags for Duisburg and flounced out with misty spectacles, stepping over Victor, who lay in a stupor on the doorstep. He grabbed lazily at her ankle and she kicked him off with her heeled boot. Midii noticed a large purple mark across her right cheek, and wondered how she got it, but she didn?t have to wonder very hard.
As the weeks progressed, Midii was subjected to famished wails from the twins, and unintelligible howls from Adrien. Their father was sick most days, vomiting every time he drank a bottle of wine, but failing to see the nonsense in drinking more. He hadn?t been to the village for any food in some time, and when Midii and Luc had gone themselves to request free produce, the shop owners had looked at them in disgust.
?Go away, you rascals!? came many a cross retort. ?You?re not getting anything from me!?
This turn of events was what eventually led ten-year-old Midii to make the fateful decision to take matters into her own small hands. Her mother?s words: ?You are the eldest and it is your duty? took on new relevance, and she was beginning to see why her mother had despaired of Victor?s lack of work ethic. For a while now, the Une children had noticed the provisions trucks travelling to the Alliance base- a mile or so away, and Midii made her way there for the final time one shadowy morning.
The base was little more than a hastily converted warehouse, and the depot area housed military vehicles, while more haphazardly littered the dusty expanse used as a parking area. The only activity to be seen was the freight lorries being unloaded, and inside, Midii saw, were what appeared to be loaves of bread and cans of some sort- meat as it turned out. They did not look particularly appetising, but in her shrivelled-stomached state, anything would suffice. She was proud of the hole she had dug with only a garden trowel, which would allow her to crawl under the barbed wire fence surrounding the perimeter of the base. For three nights she had come to scrape away the earth, and now her passage was ready and waiting for her to squeeze her way to a free meal.
The driver and some soldiers finished unloading the food crates, hefting them towards the nearby shutter doors, which were raised electronically. As they disappeared into the depot, Midii gripped her carpet bag tightly, resolving to fill it with as much as she could in their absence. Nimble as a cat, she leapt onto the back of the lorry, procuring three loaves of bread, several cans of meat, and a large bottle of spring water. It would have to do. Scurrying across the grass to her hole, she scrambled through and tugged the carpet bag after her. It wouldn?t fit. Damn. She wrenched it with more force.
?Take some stuff out!? her sensible child mind suggested to her, but she would not take heed. No, her family needed all they could get. Climbing back through the hole, she decided to try and manipulate the bag instead, pushing it through first with all her might. The effort this took and the blood pounding in her brain, deafened her ears completely to the approach of footsteps.
?Well, well, what have we here?? a middle-aged voice exclaimed in amusement. ?If it isn?t a young miss stealing our food.?
?I need it!? spat Midii, her tone feral, and if she had been a cat, her back would have been arched and every hair raised, in order to ward off the burley, ruddy-faced oppressor.
The soldier snatched her by the ankle and held her aloft, so her tattered skirt fluttered down, inside-out, and her grubby panties winked in the new morning sunlight. The two comrades flanking him laughed. ?Why do you need it, mademoiselle??
Fear bloomed in Midii?s chest and plugged her throat with nausea. What would they do to her? She had heard stories about the depravities of soldiers. ?My?my father is sick,? she croaked, as the blood gushed southwards into her head (she was too shamed to say ?alcoholic?), ?and my little brothers have nothing to eat.?
The soldier put her down and she remained in a rumpled, undignified heap for a moment. ?Where?s your mother??
?She left?with someone from here??
One of the younger men slapped his thigh, grinning. ?Avery- it?s Avery?s mistress she?s talking about.?
?Well,? said Red-Face, whose pips showed that he was a Second Lieutenant, though Midii did not know this at the time. He had probably been loitering outside having a few smokes when she had been spotted. ?You?re too young to be any of our mistresses, so how about, instead of us locking you away for stealing our food, you help us with something very important??
?What do I have to do??? Midii asked, meekly climbing to her feet and straightening her skirt.
?Something very easy.? The Lieutenant leaned very close so she could smell his unsavoury, tobacco-laden breath. ?You have to make a friend.?
****
Slowly, as the memory paled, Midii faded into dust as though in a swoon and Anna Cheznick rose from her hard bed, faintly acknowledging her interrupter. That Noin, was so intrusive- that tall Mediterranean woman with the sultry sweep of hair obscuring one eye. Through the weeks she had spent in Agent Fire?s ?care?, Midii had decided that this woman had probably been very striking in her younger days. Now her attractiveness was thinly- and only thinly- veiled by age, as though muted behind a curtain of gossamer.
?You?ll be pleased to know I?m not here to ask you questions,? Lucrezia said, her back uncomfortably straight. ?It?s time for your exercise.?
?Ah?will someone be filming me for a documentary on how humane this Martian detention centre is??
Noin shook her head, unresponsive to the sarcasm.
?You think this place is some big secret?? Midii continued, with vitriol and said, as she always did; ?Mark my words?people are going to know. I?m surprised there isn?t a protest already from some NGO?.?
The older woman?s voice was terse. ?Do you want some time away from this cell, or should I leave you here another day??
Midii crossed the room in slow steps, towards her captor. Cocking her head to one side, she said; ?You know something? Unkindness doesn?t suit you, Ma?am.?
?Shall I tell you something? Do you think we?d be keeping you here if we had no evidence of what you?re involved in??
?If you had the evidence, you wouldn?t be interrogating me every day, would you? To think the populace believe Preventer is an upright organisation?you?re just like the Allia- ?
A sting bloomed across Midii?s left cheek, reminding her of her mother?s outburst. Noin?s face had grown pale as a corpse as she retracted her slender hand. Her indigo eyes were stricken, the lock of dark hair falling across her white brow now hung limp, looking more sad than sultry. ?I?m sorry,? she uttered in a quiet gasp.
?Like I said,? Midii replied, her tone unwavering, ?Unkindness doesn?t suit you. Ma?am.? She shifted her torso to one side, resting a hand on a lean hip, her strange eyes like blue and green orbs boring into the other woman?s face. ?So what are you doing here, Agent Fire??
?I am here to take you for some exercise, and as I said?.?
?No. I mean; what are you doing here? In this place.?
Noin?s temporary faltering subsided, and she visibly steeled herself, flicking her fringe back like the forelock of a proud mare. ?I am here to protect the peace of this Nation. Unlike you, who are here to disrupt it. Now if you don?t mind??
She held out the handcuffs, indicating they were to be applied, but there was something ever so subtly apologetic about the gesture. It struck Midii deeper than she could have expected, mingled with that close memory of the Lieutenant with foul breath standing before her child self, assuring her the task would be ?very easy?. It had been a lie. Yes; one would have to look closely to realise it, but unkindness did not suit her either.
****
Though plans had been in motion for a while, the Winner-Pujol wedding had been divulged to the press only a week before it was to take place, and that same week, the groom had supplied the news to Trowa Barton, as though he, too, was eagerly waiting to cash in on the high-profile affair; snap a few profitable photos or sell a story to some newspaper or glossy celebrity magazine.
Dorothy, are you okay??
?Yes?? The statuesque woman at the window turned to face Relena Darlian and offered a wan smile, one ivory gloved hand resting on the sill. If Dorothy was to be a mythical beast, she would be a unicorn, Relena thought, abstractly, as though only just aware of the bride?s graceful bearing and blonde, almost silvery hair, fine as a woven thread brushing her shoulders. ?Why wouldn?t I be??
?Well, you are about to be married.?
?I?ve done it once before. You forget.? There came that smile again.
The women were preparing for the wedding ceremony in a top floor room of an ancient, recently refurbished ch?teau in Toulouse, one that had cost thousands of ES dollars to rent, and a venue Quatre hadn?t thought twice about acquiring as a base for the bridal party. All maids and those ?insufferable? ladies-in-waiting types (according to Dorothy) had been ushered from the room, leaving only the two old friends in each other?s company.
?Old friend? suggested a more amicable history than had ever taken place. But the years had smeared themselves over those past days, when they had met at the Sank Kingdom Academy as teenagers, the elapse of time almost- but never quite- convincing Dorothy that she had been there to embrace the Pacifist teachings just as the other students had. She had sat at her desk, drinking in Relena?s noble, if na?ve vision, without objection, conceding that there was indeed no path to true Peace to be forged through battle.
No, it would never be the truth. There was no sense in dwelling on what had happened instead, though, was there? No point denying to herself that she had once embraced war, however much she had inwardly loathed it, and poured scorn on kindness, however much she secretly possessed it, or that she had once stabbed the man she was about to marry. Perhaps she shouldn?t have agreed, in marrying Quatre, to marry her past. Water under the bridge, so he often said. But this was not simply water; it was sludge, black and insidious, threatening at every bend to turn and travel backwards.
Relena shifted on her feet, her toes trapped in agonising court shoes. ?You look beautiful, Dorothy.? However trite a remark it was, it was true. The hair and makeup team had certainly earned their pay. Dorothy had expressed she did not wish to attend her wedding looking like the wedding cake, so had opted for a sedate ivory cocktail dress with a slight fish tail and a beaded trim. On her head sat a small diamond tiara. She adjusted the modest veil in the mirror beside the window, before attaching it herself.
Whatever Relena said, Dorothy knew she looked more haggard than at her first wedding to Josep Pujol, a dashing Spaniard from the old Catalan region- many years her senior. He was the son of Romerfellar bigwig and the CEO of the lunar-based company AutoAero, and once, the only man she would ever yield to. Sitting across from him in the lawyer?s office, as they finalised their divorce, she had begun to piece together what might have wowed her; his insightfulness, his intelligence, his charisma. Though his looks were much different, his manner reminded her of Treize Kusherenada, her deceased cousin and one-time leader of Oz. Only now she noticed in him certain flaws she had also seen in Treize; the subtle persuasiveness, the smiling charm of a manipulator.
?Quatre romanticized about having our wedding in a desert tent,? she said, changing her mental subject with slight toss of the head. ?He was full of talk about me arriving atop a camel. I told him not to be so ridiculous, I hate the things! The spitting, and smell?and he?d have probably had me dressed in some belly-dancer?s attire jangling and wobbling all over. And think of the sand!?
Relena tittered politely. It wasn?t that Dorothy?s account wasn?t genuinely amusing, but she knew the issue ran deeper than the camel or the unorthodox location. Quatre?s entourage of Maguanacs, his close-nit family, welcoming as they were, were not a unit the former Miss Catalonia could penetrate easily.
Instead, the wedding would take place in a quaint church just a mile away; selected to seem modest, but in reality, technology would pervade the rustic location as some guests would be forced to watch the proceedings from the sunshine outside, on large projected screens, almost as though this was some sort of celebrity music concert rather than a wedding. Neither bride nor groom had wanted so many guests, but the extent of the invitations largely owed themselves to business politics.
Relena understood this. It had been the same at John?s funeral a year ago. The attendees were there, largely, for their own benefit, to demonstrate their own fitting shows of grief for the newspapers, to prove they were still a part of the Vice Foreign Minister?s in-crowd. Her late husband, John Vincent, a highly-esteemed barrister, had never been a large man- in fact, quite the opposite- but had never taken much notice of his soaring cholesterol or high blood pressure. The heart attack was waiting to happen.
The only person who hadn?t felt the need to make a show of grief was the couple?s son Leith, who had remained nonchalantly dry-eyed throughout the ceremony. The fifteen-year-old still spent most of his time in his room reading comics and pretending the rest of the world didn?t exist. Relena knew her son loathed the swarm of photographers that followed them wherever they went, and if he was born a shy soul, his home environment had only served to worsen these tendencies. Relena had been somewhat disturbed to realise that even the death of his father could not prompt a tear from the boy. John had, countless times, urged his wife to get their son screened for various mental and social impediments. ?How can a child of mine be such an.?android?? he would despair.
?He?s just shy,? Relena would console him. ?He?ll grow out of it.?
?That?s what we said when he was two?and the other kids were talking and walking and he wasn?t?and then when he started school and he had no friends??
?Darling, the psychologists already told us he isn?t autistic. He?s very bright.?
?A kid can be bright and autistic, you know.?
John never meant to be patronising, and his wife tried to be tolerant as he subjected small Leith to batteries of tests. But despite his digging, there were no conclusions to be reached on why a child he had fathered had Leith?s demeanour. Other than the one conclusion Relena kept to herself, that affable John was not his father.
Dorothy?s sons, by comparison, were perfectly talkative, and precocious in a way that wasn?t cute. Aniol and Appelles, aged six and eight, were dark-haired and eyed like their father, and only the eldest boy, Aniol?s, curiously pronged eyebrows told of his maternal influence. There was something rather unsettling about them- ?Creepy,? was the word Leith had used in a reluctant tone, when Relena had asked him to make sure they kept out of mischief. It wasn?t as though the garrison of stone-faced security guards around the ch?teau grounds were going to do much about two unruly boys. They were most likely more alert for any stray photographers and journalists who might have been tipped off, with gall enough to approach the premises.
She glanced out of the casement windows at the cultivated lawn below, to see the Pujol boys tormenting an old dog with clumps of freshly mown grass, circling it like carrion as they tossed their green confetti all over it. Leith, sitting an acceptable distance away with his legs crossed at the ankles, had his head buried in a dog-eared comic, on the front of which was a Gundam. Relena knew which comic it was; it was his favourite, though she could not recall which mobile suit was illustrated on the front. She had only memorised the physical details of one such suit during the war, but not because she was intrigued by its buster rifles or vulcan guns; her interest in death-inducing machinery was minimal. It was only a matter of time, she mused, before entertaining comics involving Gundams were circulating. The first one had come into print before her son was born, to an outcry by the older generation that it was only glamorising weapons.
?Relena?? said Dorothy, her brow burrowed. She sounded too morbid for a bride on her wedding day.
?Yes??
?It must have been terrible.?
?What??
?When you got married. Letting go of?you know what I mean. Who I mean.?
?I did the right thing,? Relena replied, evading the probe with all the finesse of a diplomat. She felt as though she was squirming in a straightjacket.
?I see??
?And besides,? she added, ?the war was almost twenty-five years ago. What does it matter now??
Dorothy squinted in thought. ?Have you let go of it??
?I think? I have. And this is your wedding. Today?s about you- and Quatre. Not me.?
?Do you ever think that now John?s dead?- Dorothy was never one to euphemise-??of looking for???
She lifted her bouquet and tilted it, as though it was a microphone demanding an answer, one it was half-certain would not be granted. Relena absorbed the image of the friend before her, a ghost in the pale sunlight, her blue eyes gently calculative and edging closer, though her figure did not move. Only her veil twitched, faintly upset by the small desk fan. Loathing her itchy ostentatious hat and the twisting feeling of pretence, Relena made her lips curl around the answer: ?No,? she said, then firmer. ?No. That is not an option, and never will be.?
?You?re scared of becoming a princess again, is that it?? Was Dorothy mocking her? Surely not. ?A?damsel? After all these years you?ve worked at being strong, at being a realist?Or is it because???
?It?s because he?s dead, Dorothy,? Relena said, and the balance in her tone surprised her, made her think perhaps she had finally accepted it after all. ?Heero Yuy is dead.?
TBC?
-- El Su/Ashy
The Insider Part 5
Moderator: Lauren
Hey!
I didn't think anyone read this story here, so I stopped posting it here anymore simply because I was too lazy to format it all . But you will be less depressed (I hope) to know that there are, in fact, 5 other chapters to be found here if you search: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/gw-fan/
Thank you for your comments! I'm not suprised this fic hasn't any other reviews as it's such a change from what I guess people usually look for in Gundam Wing fics. But I thought it'd be something a bit different to write about the characters years into the future. I felt like I'd gotten comfortable writing about them maybe 6 years on, tops, and wanted to challenge myself. So I'm glad it appears to be working
. And yes, the idea of Duo with a beard cracks me up too!!
As for the Dutch name issue you brought up, to be honest, I hold my hands up and say if you as a Dutch person say it's a mistake, it probably is! I'm English myself, and had no idea about the correct original spellings. To my knowledge, there is no grammatical rule in English dictating only captials can be used in this instance; in fact, I'd much prefer to use the original spelling and if I'd have known of it beforehand, I would have. I simply researched some names that might seem appropriate, but obviously, whoever I took the research from (can't recall now) didn't see it fit to use the lower case. But thanks for pointing it out, it might seem a small thing but it's an interesting point and I'm glad you made it!
I might, when I get chance, get the other chapters on here too. I am currently getting around to finishing the first chapter of the next act. Hope you enjoy what's left to read of the story so far!
Thanks again,
-- El Su
I didn't think anyone read this story here, so I stopped posting it here anymore simply because I was too lazy to format it all . But you will be less depressed (I hope) to know that there are, in fact, 5 other chapters to be found here if you search: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/gw-fan/
Thank you for your comments! I'm not suprised this fic hasn't any other reviews as it's such a change from what I guess people usually look for in Gundam Wing fics. But I thought it'd be something a bit different to write about the characters years into the future. I felt like I'd gotten comfortable writing about them maybe 6 years on, tops, and wanted to challenge myself. So I'm glad it appears to be working
. And yes, the idea of Duo with a beard cracks me up too!!As for the Dutch name issue you brought up, to be honest, I hold my hands up and say if you as a Dutch person say it's a mistake, it probably is! I'm English myself, and had no idea about the correct original spellings. To my knowledge, there is no grammatical rule in English dictating only captials can be used in this instance; in fact, I'd much prefer to use the original spelling and if I'd have known of it beforehand, I would have. I simply researched some names that might seem appropriate, but obviously, whoever I took the research from (can't recall now) didn't see it fit to use the lower case. But thanks for pointing it out, it might seem a small thing but it's an interesting point and I'm glad you made it!
I might, when I get chance, get the other chapters on here too. I am currently getting around to finishing the first chapter of the next act. Hope you enjoy what's left to read of the story so far!
Thanks again,
-- El Su