Magnificent

notes: This is dedicated to my grandfather. He passed away at the beginning of February 2002, and I actually started this then, I just didn’t get around to finishing it right away. During his life he was “one of those dreamers” that Duo talked about; he was the lead test engineer on the lunar orbiter, that first mapped the moon, as well as working on the Apollo and Gemini missions. He was one of the world’s great men, and I loved him very much.

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I was born in outer space. It’s not really “outer” anymore, if I think about it. The inhabited world, like the real physical universe, keep on expanding, and our perception of it gets smaller and smaller. I sprawl on my back on the cargo deck of Howard’s ship to watch the moon. It amases me, fascinates me, the way the moon looks from here. It looks too serene and ancient to be the home to mobile suit factories and war bases, even though I know they’re there. It looks so close and so dauntingly far away, even though I was even farther away only a few days ago.

My first thought is about Heero, that boy I rescued yesterday. The jerk who ripped parts off my buddy Deathscythe. I’m not sure why I’m not more pissed, why I don’t want to kill him for that—maybe I’m going soft or something. Maybe I’m just glad there’s somebody else out there fighting my same fight. Guess it doesn’t matter. He did what he felt he needed to do. Still, I wonder if he sees the sky the same way I do, if he stares up in wonder at the huge black velvet blanket that wraps us all up in it and thinks oh my God, just /look/ at it. Because he’s from the colonies, like I am, and now that I can see the moon from Earth, I wonder if we aren’t missing something, up there. Something even more profound than freedom and politics and all that other stuff we’re fighting for. Not that it’s not profound too, but this—it transcends humanity, I think. It almost makes me believe in God again.

It makes me wonder how we got here. I haven’t had much in the way of education, especially not in things like history. So I don’t know when, or who it was, who first looked up at the moon, and all those stars glittering, and said “I want to go there. And I think I can.”

I don’t know who he was, but I’m thinking of him now. I can still imagine what may not be fact.

What a magnificent undertaking it must have been! What inspiration must have driven it is mind-bending. I imagine they started small: “let’s fly,” the sayd, and began to build themselves wings.

And when that was perfected, and they could fly, they wanted to go higher. “Let’s touch the clouds!” they said; I think they must have been dreaming of it since they were children. Did I, when I was little, ever try to touch the sky? I can’t remember. I hope I did.

But someone, a long time ago, must have tried, and kept on trying. The love of space, the longing for the sky, must have kept on burning even after it was only a dream to most people.

I think about how fantastically heady it must have been when they finally made it. Imagine! The first time anyone really made it into space! The first time they saw the moon up close, or floated in zero-g, or looked down at the Earth from space and saw it the way I am so used to seeing it!

I don’t think, somehow, that they expected this. They were romantics, I’m sure of it, and I don’t think they meant for the division, the war, the hatred. I think if they could see what we’ve done to their sky, that they’d be heartbroken. I imagine them glowing with adventure, pouring all their childhood dreams into engineering equations, building great flying machines from nothing but caffeine and inspiration.

I think they loved the moon. I don’t think they would like the war-factory we have made her into.

And I guess that if we can really pull off peace between Earth and the colonies, that we’d be closer to honouring those old dreamers, and what they really intended. They set off to have adventures, to explore, to stretch their wings as far as they could go.

The moon stares down at me, silent, ancient. Around the ship, the sea is her voice. They are talking about the past, I think. Of things the human race is just too young to understand.

It’s a pretty heavy order, peace. But I hate to let anybody down, especially the people whose life’s work paved the way for my home.

I remember you, I whisper, just in case their spirits can hear me.

And I promise I’ll try.

~owari~