Internal

This story actually didn't quite finish how I wanted it to. I can't tell you how I wanted it to end, because that will give the actual ending away...  I know. I'll put it at the end.

People seem to assume that there is something wrong with each of us. Each of us has “issues” because at a young age we were chosen. I disagree; I believe that actually, we were chosen because we have issues. Big brother watching and what not – they chose us because we weren’t stable. We’re not what they think of as normal. We’re all a bit mad. It’s the same reason why Relena was chosen to be queen of the world. She’s unhinged. Dorothy’s unhinged too. We’re all a bit unhinged, if you get my drift.

And you can watch us all in battle and make your own judgements, show when we’re totally bonkers and when we’re nearly sane. You can watch us and understand that we’ve all had horrific histories, and are living on the edge of life and death. You can sit on your arses and wonder why we aren’t stopped, why nobody helps us.

It’s because we were chosen. You know how fun it is to be specially picked because of your defect rather than ignored because of it? I imagine you won’t, you’re probably normal. You probably have big, grey eyes and long blonde hair, wear jeans on a weekday, work at the local cafe and want to be something like a writer when you grow up. And you always get asked to generally hang out with your friends but maybe… just maybe you never quite feel like you fit in? Like you’re watching them, more than joining in with them? See, now, we don’t feel like that sometimes. We know it, all the time. We know how not to mask it, and how to mask it. I mean, look at Duo. He is the single most active one of us all, and yet while he plays hard, he works even harder. He worries about all of us, watching us and hoping that our missions are a success because he wants to make sure more kids don’t end up screwed up like he is. Of course, he loves being screwed up at times, blames his childhood for needing to be close to us. We don’t mind. On the condition he doesn’t go too far, he can blame whatever he wants on his childhood. We weren’t there. We only know from what he says how bad it is. And even then you can tell he holds back. The haunted look that fills his eyes, masked by a slight glow that seems to make him shine. It’s always there, but we get blinded by the light and ignore it. He fights hard in battle. He wears his mask up until points of death, and then when he’s got nothing to lose, he lets it fall. As if he wants to get into Heaven wearing his own face, not one he’s constructed from the self-fulfilling prophecy that the media has given him.

Then there’s Dorothy. She’s one to watch for. She’s sharper than a razor, and as slippery as molten metal. She can shine and be openly devious, and nobody raises an eyebrow. She’s turned her true fears into a mask. Barbed wire surrounding her, the fact she actually is unhinged protecting her more than hindering her. You try to speak to her about serious things, and she’ll twist your words into the noose around your neck. You try to speak to her about silly things, and she’ll get lost. Her mind is set on revenge and avenging, nothing she does can have no meaning. Everything must be done for a reason. Try playing a game with her and you will lose. There is no question about it - you will lose. In one way or another – though you may not even realise it. It is logical to think that it is possible to win by bringing up her emotions, but even they’re locked off in a box of riddles. She’s still a child inside that box, hidden by barbed words, and she couldn’t escape if she tried. Her mask will never fall because even she can no longer escape it; it has grown around her body, as she has grown up, so has it. If any one of us had to go to proper therapy, I imagine she would bit the one needing it most.

Duo and Dorothy have the most prominent masks, that’s truthful enough. What of the rest of us? What of Wufei? Of Relena? They both have masks, yet one is so well moulded that it is impossible to see where the mask ends and the skin begins. Wufei has lost so much for this battle, has become so pained by what has happened to his entire family because of this fight, that he no longer trusts or believes in a single soul. He will fight when he can, because he has nothing left to live for. He does not go into battle looking for death, though, but for answers. He is knowledgeable; he understands that to succeed, tenderness and understanding must be taken into account.  Yet he has been hurt so much that the scars that cover his internal body have begun to become infected. He will speak only to those who he can be sure of wearing a mask. He knows then that he cannot trust them, but can trust them to be untrustworthy. Paranoid, in his own sense, he will not admit he is in pain, but rides it out without help. It is the most painful attitude to have, sadistic and cruel – to work on his own pain alone. And he does show that he is doing it alone, and yet it is no cry for help, but a warning to those willing to interfere. The pain slowly infects him more and more with every battle he has, and he is giving himself only small cures to prevent internal agony. It skews his judgement at times, trusting nobody and yet trusting falsities, and makes him ready to use as many rules as he sees fit – his own rules, nobody else’s.

Far from this mask is Relena’s well-hidden face. On the surface, she is a girl with the power to create and destroy worlds with words. She chases after the one boy she believes can save her from herself, in the dire hope that one day she can awaken from her dreams and nightmares and face realities that aren’t true. She does not love Heero, she knows this. She follows him because where Heero goes there will be problems. Her perfect mask of acting insane around him gives the impression that he, to her, is a weakness. It is a plan to make others see her as a naïve fool, someone who will fall prey easily – and on occasion, does so to keep the stereotype going. Yet she often knows exactly what she is doing; and because she knows, it drives her to irrational actions. Actions that make her seem as though she cannot control her temper, despite her pacifistic nature. She knows war cannot be stopped with a click of the fingers. She wishes it to stop in anyway it can, not in one way alone. By presenting herself as a pacifist, however, she fools the world into believing she knows only one strategy. It is a plot to ruin ideals, and a plot she will use until she dies; for she, like Dorothy, has become trapped up in her own mask of lies, and may even soon begin to believe what she is saying.

Two females, trapped in their own falsities, two comrades, lying through masks and wearing them better than Venetian dancers. What of the others? Of Quatre, and of the brown-haired soldier? Of myself?

Quatre has little to blame but himself, I would state, for his instability, though he would not disagree, he would not agree either. He has the pressure of becoming an heir, fitting a perfectly arranged business – all of which he could do without thought- so why chose him, what makes him unbalanced? The fact he wishes for nothing more than to be free of his title. Wearing the suit, he presents the perfect image, yet beneath the smiles and bright blue eyes, he loathes every second of it. Part of him, it would seem, longs for a reason, more than that actual reality, to be unstable. And that in itself makes him so. He would never understand that envy could twist a person so much that it can cause them to become crooked. He used to believe people would do as they willed for good, though in fighting this battle, he seems to have woken up to the fact that people can fight and act for reasons that are not necessarily good, in the eyes of the public or in the eyes of their consciences. Attacking Trowa, he will say, was a mistake that had to be made before he could realise that he needed help. That he had to perform before he could admit he was envious of those who were less fortunate than himself because they had what he appeared to believe were less pressures. Yet he felt sorry for them as well. You watch him listen to Duo speak, and his eyes will almost fill with unshed tears of hatred – for both the situation and himself. He hates being envious of people with less, and hates himself for wishing it upon himself when he is so well off. Hating himself has pushed him into limits of insanity; hating himself is what the doctors picked up on. To know that this would happen, send him the blueprints anyway – they knew it would send him over the edge – there must’ve been reasoning for choosing to do this in that order. Choosing unbalanced people to perform dangerous tasks – looking for escapes and answers that people can’t give.

I myself have very little task in looking for an escape; I merely look to find answers that I know can’t be found. I don’t speak enough for people to believe I’m normal. They believe I have social issues. They think that in fact, I should talk more. But that’s because they don’t realise I need to focus more on what I have to do, rather than what has happened to me before now. They chose me because of it. They know that something wasn’t quite right upstairs, that I wouldn’t give away secrets despite any torture, because I don’t speak much. I was nameless for a long time, the name and mask I wear only appears during battle, outside of that, I focus my attention on what weak and strong points the others have. And I know I shan’t leave this trap when the war is over, because in truth, I don’t want to. I like analysing people, places, understanding the hidden faces behind the masks. I wouldn’t tell people about their masks, though I’m telling you now. Heero is much the same. He speaks only when spoken to, though he seems to hold a weak mask. He isn’t sure how to react in social situations, whereas I do. I on the other hand, cannot look at a person and understand how well they will do, should they be put into certain positions. He can. He was trained well; I was lost and taught myself. Either way, we both seem to end up on the same level. The doctors chose us because we aren’t quite social enough to become a nuisance, unlike Duo or Quatre. Also, because we don’t speak as much we don’t appear to have emotions. We do, of course, it would be impossible not to. Heero has quite a lot of affection for us all, Duo especially. Duo was the first of us to befriend him. Relena he will tolerate, because he knows, as I do, that she wears a mask for public, not because she wants to. It is possible to say I too, have affections for the others, because without them, I would be alone. I may be lonely, even with them, but at least I am not alone. I’m not the only one with issues. They chose us because we had issues. They knew we’d bond over them. We’d look for comfort within one another. The doctors seem to assume it was best to keep us together. They watch us mould together, form a group. Become a group of friends. It’s their way of entering us into the real world again. They tell us every time we get together, that we should try to keep together, bond as much as possible. Even though we know there’s a war on, they keep trying to persuade us it’s better to be there together. We all fight, they say, so it is better to fight together. They don’t seem to understand that by getting us together we are becoming a liability. We get together and chat, all of us, about strategies, when we can. We talk about ways to succeed in our mission. We talk about the best tactics. Wufei believes offence is best defence. We attack. We win. We bond over the strategy, find weak points, strong points. We understand each other, help each other out. The doctors encourage us further and further, even give us help along the way. Almost as if they wanted to see what it would be like for us to join together as one.

A force not to be reckoned with, the papers called it. Said we were too strong for our own good.

They didn’t know how to cope with us when we all attacked at once; couldn’t stop us from escaping. Now we’re free. The world doesn’t know how to react. People assume there is something wrong with each of us. We’re not what they think of as normal. We’re all a bit mad. Relena’s unhinged. Dorothy’s unhinged too. We’re all a bit unhinged.

At least now we’re unhinged and free.

The ending I wanted this to have was to imply that they were actually mental patients in an insane asylum, that had escaped when joined together. I can't really get the feel at the end, though, and it was late, so I gave up. Sorry guys. I might come back to this later.  *hugs*