AC 191

The young woman looked out the window, down into the garden below. A tiny girl with short red hair was picking the flowers, a mischievous grin on her face. Someone should keep closer watch of her, thought the young woman. She winced, as the waves of pain in her body grew fiercer. It was getting worse every day. But she refused taking drugs to deaden it. Slowly the pain subsided to the familiar dull ache, and she looked down into the garden again. The little girl was gone. Only a few flowers scattered on the gravel path, already wilting in the heat of the artificial sun, suggested her presence.

Leia wondered what life was like on Earth. Here, in the colony, everything was made to be exactly as it was in their homeland - the houses, the trees, the weather. They don't know how lucky they are, to be warmed by a real sun, she thought. Another regret of hers. She would never get to visit the Earth. Or see her daughter grow up.

There was a framed photograph of her on Leia's bedside table. She reached for it, silently cursing the illness that made so simple a thing so difficult. With a sigh she gave up, and contented herself with simply looking at the photograph, and brooding. She had a lot of time to think now, confined to her bed like the wretched invalids she looked after when she was well, when she was a nurse.

There are so many things I will never be able to do. That thought, depressing as it was, didn't affect her, not really. She was too used to it; the words were worn and frayed from thinking of them so frequently.

She sank back into the pillows and closed her eyes. At least now I will be able to see Trowa again. Trowa, her brother. Everybody loved Trowa - his smile, his charisma, his intelligence. He was many years older than herself, and she had worshipped him. When he was killed while going to visit Earth, a part of her died too. But she knew there was something wrong about him. Him and father both. She was slightly ashamed of her father. He was greedy, and manipulative. It took her eighteen years to figure that out, and when she did, she saw through his every move.

Of all her regrets, all her private worries, the one that saddened her most was knowing she'd have to leave her young daughter in the care of other people. People that would bring her up well, but who would not love her. My poor, dear Mariemeia. Forgive your mother.

Looking at the photograph, she was dimly aware that the little girl looked nothing like her father. Her hair, her skin, her cheekbones - all belonged to the Barton family. All, that is, except for her eyes. Those were his eyes. The eyes of Treize Khushrenada.

Treize. The name brought back a flood of memories. He was a real gentleman, she thought for the umpteenth time. So charming and well mannered. She smiled as she recalled how her heart fluttered at the first sight of him, still sleeping from the minor operation that patched a bullet wound he'd received in battle. She'd never met anyone quite like Treize. Their brief romance ended when he left, going back to Earth with his soldiers and his ambitions.

She knew now that it was absurd of her to believe he'd stay. He had a future, one that did not have room for her. When she found out she was pregnant, she was at first ashamed. Ashamed that she could let such a thing happen to her - an unmarried woman with no means to support her child, a girl still living in her father's house. Even after she could no longer keep the pregnancy a secret, she would allow no one to tell Treize. What good would it do? He would never be the kind of father their child deserved. She resolved, as the weeks became months, that she would bring up this child without what little help he could offer. Also, having a child out of wedlock would damage his reputation. Foolish or not, she loved him with all her heart, and would not hurt him for the world.

Father was not as angry as she had anticipated. After the first initial shock and the very loud argument that followed, he was more or less reconciled, and looked upon his daughter and later his granddaughter if not with love, at least with tolerance. Mariemeia was born and two years went swiftly past for Leia, who now knew why he did not turn her out of the house upon first hearing the shocking news. Ever since her brother Trowa was killed, her father, Dekim Barton, was constantly harassing her to get married and have children. They had no other living blood relatives, and he wanted an heir, descended directly from him to inherit the Barton Family's business empire. Leia feared what Mariemeia would have to go through when she was no longer alive to protect her. Her grandfather was a hard man, and a cunning one too. She didn't stand a chance against him if he decided to manipulate her.

And the mysterious illness, the illness no doctor could diagnose, was killing her. She would die very soon. A matter of days, possibly hours, she was informed. She lived at the hospital for the past few months, but came home for the time that remained to her. As if it mattered, she thought bitterly. What difference does it make? I cannot hold her, I cannot tell her how much I love her. The only people she saw now were the doctors and nurses that Father hired to keep her comfortable. This whole part of the mansion was quarantined because they weren't sure if her illness could spread to others. So she could only see her dear baby from a distance, where she could not hurt her.

Leia listened to the soft bleeping of the many devices positioned around her bed. They suddenly became louder, as if alarms had gone off. As she gasped from the pain, that damned agonizing sharpness, as footsteps and frantic voices reached out to pull her back, she could think only of Mariemeia. I love you.

***

AC 194

She looked at the picture with her intense gaze, the one that sometimes unnerved people when she fixed it on them for too long.

It was taken some time ago, when she was about two years old. The expression on her face fascinated her. It was so…happy. She secretly wished, in the deepest part of her heart, that she could go back to the carefree blitheness of early childhood. The person that held her was her mother, Leia. In the picture you could only see part of her, the hand and chest. Other pictures, from old, forgotten family photo albums told Mariemeia she was slender and pretty, with large eyes and short hair. But she did not remember her mother at all.

Her mother's name was seldom mentioned. Leia…she had all but faded from the memories of everyone at the Barton Family estate. Forgotten. Everything that was once hers had long since been thrown away, everything but the photo albums, (which also contained pictures of the beloved Trowa Barton) and of course, herself, Mariemeia.

It was by mere chance that she found out as much as she did. From bits and pieces gathered over the years, she knew that her mother had slowly died of an unknown, painful illness. But she never complained, Mariemeia recalled. Her grandfather had told her who her father was, the famous Treize Khushrenada, and in telling her who her father was he could not very well leave out her mother. So he told her, grudgingly, of his only daughter. "She was a good nurse, and a loving mother," he'd said, and no more. Mariemeia knew better than to ask more, but could not stop thinking of her.

She was a loving mother. She died of a painful illness. She was a good nurse. These things told her nothing. What was she like? She wanted to scream at all of them, at her grandfather. Demand answers. Cry when she periodically visited her mother's grave with grandfather. But Mariemeia knew all that would bring was reproof, scorn, pity. She didn't want their pity. She wanted her mother.

Of course, this was intensely secret, buried deep inside the cold, adult façade she showed to the world. Because that was what they wanted, what grandfather wanted. And her pride would not let them see otherwise.

Sometimes, when she sat very still and tried very hard, she would remember fragments of a happier time. Someone catching her as she took her first wobbly steps and fell. Hearing someone singing in a sweet, high voice. Being rocked gently until she fell asleep. But she was never sure whether these memories were of her mother or her nursemaid or someone else entirely.

Carefully she replaced the framed photograph on her bedside table, and shut her eyes. Her last thoughts before sleep claimed her were of her mother. I love you.

Author's Note:
Most people don't even know of Leia Barton's existence! I wrote this fic in her memory, and made it as credible as possible. Since she died even before the OAV series, and appeared just briefly in one Episode Zero (Heero's) it's not surprising that no one knows about her. Well, Mariemeia had to come from somewhere people!

Her brother Trowa is not the Gundam pilot Trowa, of course. ^_^ I'm sure you know that the original Trowa Barton was murdered right before the eyes of Nanashi while on a mission to the Earth. He offers to take Trowa's place, and name - and does. But few people, I think, know that Trowa was the brother of Leia as well as the son of Dekim Barton.

I haven't seen Endless Waltz - yet - but I do know that Mariemeia's attempt to take over the world was really orchestrated by her grandfather, Dekim Barton. He must have manipulated her, because do you honestly think a seven-year-old would try to take over the world and (almost) succeed completely on her own? So in this fic Leia's worries are justified, no?