Title: Tin Soldier
Series: The Unforgiven
Author: DarkOne Shadowphyre
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Fandom: Gundam Wing
Genre: Angst, Alternate Universe
Pairing: 12345
Rating: PG-13
Summary: 'There won't be any trumpets blowing on the Judgement Day. On the bloody morning after... one tin soldier rides away.'
Warnings: Potentially intense subject matter. Not a happy series.
Disclaimer: Gundam Wing and related characters and themes belong to Bandai, Sunrise, and Soutsu Agency. This is a non-profit work of fiction.
Notes: I blame it on listening to Nightwish and Metallica while eating cheese and looking at GW fanart. Suddenly I was getting imagery in my head. And seeing as how my artistic muse lends itself more towards painting pictures with words instead of acrylics...
Dedication: To whom it may concern—To err is human, to forgive divine.
Distribution: Ask, and ye shall receive.
His fingers move automatically to the keys of his laptop, eyes never leaving the screen as he types rapid-fire commands, each impacting the system with the precision of a well-aimed bullet. His reflection gazes back at him from the screen, overlaying the sharply defined coding that scrolled across before him, a remote mask of a face that holds no warmth, no fire, no compassion, and no mercy.
No feeling.
His fingers stutter on the keys. A muttered curse and two harsh taps to the keys and the minor glitch is corrected as if it had never existed. Finding the rhythm is more difficult this time, but he does, and he continues to work through the coding, finding familiarity in the single-minded intensity of his concentration on this task. He finds a strange sort of comfort in this, strange in that the source of this comfort was the memory of another time when this same concentration was bent on a different mission.
A mission of destruction.
'Monster!'
He freezes, head cocked to one side, listening. There is no sound in this tiny little room save the electronic hum of the laptop and the almost inaudible sigh of his breathing. He is alone here. There is no one here to speak to him, no one to yell or scream or curse him for being who and what he was, for doing his job, for being alive.
'What kind of creature are you?!'
No one but himself. His own mind, his memories and nightmares are more than enough. They have to be; he is permitted no other companion. It had seemed inconceivable that he might require companionship, and so he is denied it. What use for a companion does he have? He, who has no emotions, no feelings, no humanity or compassion, only orders?
What use, indeed?
'You're not even human!'
He hasn't bothered asking why. He had expected this for some time, known inherently what would occur when the objective was met and the weapons crafted to achieve that objective became obsolete. And what is he but yet one more obsolete weapon?
'You dare to call yourself a soldier, you freak?!'
No contact. You may not leave. Those are the terms of his continued freedom, such as it is. He has honoured those terms, insomuch as he can. He has not left the colony he was placed on; more recently he has not even left this room. There have been no messages sent to the four men he had once fought along side; he has not sent any messages to anyone, nor have any come for him.
'You some kind of robot or something, Zero One?'
No name, only a designation and a series of aliases. His childhood is a contract with an assassin, which he has only the word of the assassin that it exists. The rest was spent in training to become what he is now—a weapon used and then discarded. He is retired, not as a soldier in service to country or colony retires, but retired as a useless firearm is retired when the time of war is past. Locked away from the world, free but still imprisoned, forbidden contact with those that might have a hope in understanding him, knowing him, knowing the truth...
But what is truth except an interpretation?
'What happens to a tin soldier when play time is done?'
His fingers move automatically to the keys of his laptop, eyes never leaving the screen as he types rapid-fire commands, each impacting the system with the precision of a well-aimed bullet. His reflection gazes back at him from the screen, overlaying the sharply defined coding that scrolled across before him, a remote mask of a face that holds no warmth, no fire, no compassion, and no humanity.
'He rusts.'
-Owari-