Freezing Rain
by
Captain Anonymous


Johnnie walked towards the house as the rain fell around him. The droplets hit the deep puddles that had formed on the sidewalk, from the pure white snow as it melted away.
Johnnie walked up the stairs, like a man going towards the gallows.
His heart raced, he could his skin grow warm. His cloths didn’t feel right against him.

He finally came back here.
It was probably the wrong for him to be doing.
He knew that better then anyone.
But he had to be here.

He felt like he didn’t have control of himself he raised his shaking hand, and knocked on the door.
Maybe she wasn’t here.
Maybe she was working late.
He probably be that lucky.
What would Midii say.
His mind raced as he tried to focus himself.
He tried to calm down.

The door opened, slowly, letting the soft glow of the lights shine on him.
Lady looked at her cousin as he stood, his blonde hair was wet, looking darker.
She looked at him for a moment, she couldn’t say anything to him.
Maybe she had been expecting him.
“Please come in, out of the rain.”
Johnnie stepped into the doorway, walking past Lady. He didn’t look at her, his face was as cold as the rain outside.
He walked across the floor, into the living room, taking each step slowly.
The house was warm, he could feel his skin, as it warmed up.
He could hear the sound of the door closing behind him.

Lady stood there for moment, looking at him.
“I had a feeling that you would be coming back here.”
Johnnie didn’t turn around, “Is that so?”
“I talked to your sister. I know, I knew that you would probably come back here after what happened.”
Johnnie walked over to the fire place, and looked down at the mantle.
It was a dark wood finish, an antique, beautifully carved.
He laid his hand down on it, feeling the wood.

“You really don’t know what its like, you never will. What its like to be this way. How horrible it is. The guilt and the pain never seem to go away. It just stays with you. Over and over again. No matter what I do, I just can’t seem to escape it, bury it, or put it to rest.”

Lady looked down, “I know how you feel, I can understand what you went through. I know that there is nothing really I can say that change how you feel. But I want you to know that I don’t hurt you or any one else any more. I know how hard it can be to forgive someone who has caused so pain. I’ve know that pain myself.”

Johnnie moved his hand along his coat, into his pocket, touching the switchblade with his cold fingers. “Midii forgave you for what happened. She went through hell, but managed to pay her own price and escape it. She’s stronger then I’ll ever be. She had to be. After you left, she did everything for us. Gave up the one person she loved for us.”

Lady looked at Johnnie, she looked at his eyes. How pale they were. Johnnie went on, “I don’t want her to have to go through the pain ever again. Not because of you, or anyone else.”

Lady could see the pain inside of him, “I don’t want hurt her, or you, or anyone else. I’ve changed since then, I know that there is nothing that I can do to change the past, and there is really nothing I can offer to take the pain. For a long time, during the war, I was in far too deep. But at the end, he, he helped me understand, made me remember the person I was, the person he cared about.”

Lady could see a shimmer, a flash of metal in his hand, as he still kept the blade at his side.

Johnnie looked at the wood, tracing the carved pattern with his finger. “Why did it have to happen like this?”

Lady looked at him. She could feel chill go through her body.
For a moment, she could remember, back to the war.
Back to that day on M.O. II.
That glorious, horrible, beautiful, awful day.
Right before the end of the war.
She could remember Relena.
Standing face to face with her.
Lady had pulled out her automatic service pistol, holding it out in her hand.
Lady had been the one who had killed Relena’s father. She killed so many people during the war.
She didn’t know how many lives she had taken.
How many people she hurt.
His Excellency was gone.
There didn’t seem to be much for her to live for.
Part of her wanted, prayed for Relena to pull the trigger.
To end all of her pain.
To let her join the one she loved.
But she didn’t want to take it that way.
She wanted an end, an end.
What he had wanted all the way until the end.

Johnnie said softly, “There’s nothing I can do now. No matter what happens, there won’t be a happy ending.”

Lady touched his hand, feeling into it, against the blade.
“It doesn’t have to happen this way. But if its what you want, then go ahead with it.”
Johnnie looked down at her hand, “Not much of a choice is it. I thought about it, lived for it. But I can’t. I just keep seeing those violet eyes staring into me. Haunting me. I can’t do it again. I don’t want to.”

Lady looked down, “I understand.”
Johnnie looked at her.
He couldn’t do it. For a moment he thought of sliding the metal blade into her, letting her blood spill.
If he did it, all it would cause would pain, and he wouldn’t be any better then she had been.
All the suffering and pain still go on.
He couldn’t do it.
He took a deep breathe, he felt cold all of a sudden.
He fell to his knees. The cold blade fell to the floor.

--------------


It was about 2 A.M.
Trowa slowly turned over, moving the warm blankets around him.
There was still sound the light of rain outside, it was very faint.
For a moment he laid back, and could hear the sound of Midii’s breathing as she laid beside him.
He lifted his head, she was asleep.
Trowa carefully laid back down, careful not to disturb her.

Trowa remembered for a moment, going back to before the war.
The sound of the rain, as it fell on the tent shelter.
The wind blowing.
It was one of the few times that he couldn’t sleep, where the ghosts just kept haunting him.
The sound of the rain, it sounded too much like the sound of shell fire.
There was no one to comfort him, to tell him that it was all right.

On the other side of the tent, he remembered Ralph.
He was asleep, in his hand was an old photograph.
Trowa never really saw it closely, it was probably a picture of Chris.
Trowa remembered thinking about her.
How much she reminded him of the girl he left behind on that wind swept hill.

Back on the colony, when he had no name, no past.
He could feel Trowa, the man who’s name he would take, come up to him.
He could almost feel the weight of his arm around him.
The photo he showed him, it just seemed so clear in his mind, even now.
He remembered at it, as Trowa told him about his sister and her daughter.
The blonde woman in the photo, it didn’t always seem clear at the time, but it seemed to call out to him.
Not too long after that, Trowa was gone. Dead.
He had decided to keep the name.
Duo and Quatre had suggested at the end to keep it.

The name he took, and the mobile suit, that he really believed was truly his to begin with.
The Heavyarms.
Sometimes he wondered if never became the pilot, if he would have gotten this far.
It was all a double edged blade.
What to Mitchell and Sylvia, what happened with Ordway.
If he would ever have been with Midii.

There was no answer waiting in the darkness.
Maybe it didn’t matter anymore.
Just as long as they were together.


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