09-Sep-2003
Title: Wise Men
Author: Kimmie (JaenKaeGW@hotmail.com)
Archive: GW Addiction
Category: shonen ai, POV
Pairings: 1+3
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, I mean no harm, I have no money... Stuff like that. Yeah.
Rating: PG
Warnings: None.
Spoilers: None.
Notes: I don't *really* know where this came from. Maybe just from looking through a notebook where I had some of this wisdom scribbled down? Perhaps. It's Duo POV, but that's easy to figure out from reading. Enjoy?
Before I knew him, I never thought about the things wise men say. When he first spoke to me, I only thought that his speech always sounded like proverbs. But, the first time he gave me advice; it seemed as though the essence of the world was in the egg he cracked and fried for breakfast and ate with too much salt.
The first piece of advice he gave me, with his hair falling over one eye and his hands in his pockets, was about my struggle not to show my hatred for the things I'd done. I had broken ribs, a sprained ankle, bloody knuckles, chafed wrists, and my ear lobe had come detached. It if were only the bodily pain, I would have been fine. Pain is something you deal with when you grow up between orphanages and the streets. However, I had killed men in a mockery of self-defense and loved every minute of it, until I realized the full implications of their deaths, and of death itself. It was the pain in my heart, in addition to the pain in my body which allowed me the first step in healing - acceptance. The tears which rolled down my face were not the crocodile variety, nor were they the tiny wisps of saline which seem to take no time at all to reach their destination. These were the kind of tears that my mother always told me that boys do not cry,
He, on the other hand, leaned against the wall and said, "There are times when we must cry, simply because we cannot pour out our emotions *and* continue to live. Then, there are times when crying is not enough. Sometimes, you must break down completely, then build again."
The most fascination bits of advice are the ones based on real life observations, which no one recognizes until they have need of the process being observed. Trowa, however, observes everything and seems to keep it in a storage hold in his head for safe-keeping. He can call for this advice which is always so comforting at the drop of a hat. More often than not, I wear a hat.
I've overheard some of the things that Trowa has aid to others here and it always has an effect. To Wufei one day, he said, "While justice may be grey, a mixture of right and wrong as much as it is white and black, remember that blood is red and white, right, is more easily stained than the black of wrong."
Quatre got to hear, "Look to the men who look up at you to see the kind of man you are. Only those who truly respect you will show the truth in where you are and are not worthy. "When Quatre asked if Trowa gave him that sort of respect, Trowa paused before answering."Respect is not given; it is earned. It forms a bond of sorts that links you with an ideology of who you want to be." He smiled briefly, his mouth mostly hidden by his hair. "Besides, I can't look up to you. I'm too tall." He laughed softly. "And, I am too like you. We are not the same in many ways, but where it matters, we are equals, and respect does not thrive with equals, though I acknowledge you, and that is as good as respect in our situation."
And yet, the words he said to Heero were the ones which surprised me the most, though mostly because they weren't advice, but he seemed all the more wise for saying those words. Trowa approached Heero one day after we had finished our work, and stopped him with a gentle touch to his bare shoulder as everyone headed inside. Then, his words: "There is a saying that along the path you walk lays a city called Salvation." Heero stiffened. "Please, take me with you." He relaxed.
Then, suddenly, they were together. They were walking a path together, and growing stronger because of it, and it felt good to see. Most wise men don't know how to take their own advice.
Trowa has said many interesting things when we group together for strategy meetings. He does not waste words. When he speaks, there is a purpose. It may be to help guide the actions of one of us, or to cheer us up, or one of many like things. The truth stands that I'm never certain if he's living vicariously through us. Perhaps his advice is him merely speaking from experience and telling us what he wished that he had done. But, perhaps that is true wisdom after all. Then again, for all the advice he gives, it seems hard to have lived so much at such a young age. Yet, I think perhaps we have all lived beyond our years already.
It's funny; since he and Heero got together, Heero has been imparting his wisdom upon the world as well. His wisdom is not quite so vast, and never so much like it's from a book as Trowa's. He says things like, "Dying hurts," and "Never kill anyone you know if you can help it. No matter how dissociated you are from them, knowing them makes it ten times harder to deal with." It's good advice, and goes hand in hand with another piece from Trowa: "Never fight alone. There will come times when you can't bring yourself to do your job. Have your friends around for when things become too much. Then, even if you do something you may live to regret, there will always be people who are, at the very least, *close* to understanding."
Between the two of them, the rest of us are never ill-advised. It may sound strange, but I'm certain that their advice - their guidance - is the sole reason why we are winning a war where winning seems entirely impossible. We are not alone, but it seems, sometimes, as though we are because we are together, and we have means to fight beyond what many other people do. Maybe that's okay.
It's nice to have such voices of reason on our side. As Trowa once said, "When there exists wisdom in warriors, the fight transcends the battlefield and becomes a war of wits, instead."
For the sake of those we're fighting against, I hope they have an equal pair. Otherwise, they are doomed, and while my enemies may not make me cry out on a regular basis, war is still a sad state of affairs and the witnessing of so many deaths, whether of friends or of enemies, is a profound and difficult thing. And, thinking that, I almost feel like a wise man.
Owari. ^_^
Kimmie
Please send comments to: JaenKaeGW@hotmail.com