Hiiro no Kakera. Love it, don't own it. Sadly. Just some thoughts I had after episode 7, I believe it was. Enjoy the story!

It's not fair.

It's just not fair.

I don't know how much more I can take of this.

Four of the closest friends I have in the world right now, and yet they all still insist on saying such things to me.

What am I supposed to say to it all?

"We are just tools."

That's what he said to me. "We are all just tools. Tools to be used by the Tamayori princess."

If I'm being completely honest, it makes me sick. That they should all think of themselves as objects, as somehow less than human. As less than…me.

What am I supposed to do with that?

I've tried so hard up to this point to make friends with all of them. As long as we're stuck together by "destiny" or whatever they want to say, we might as well get along right?

And they're all good people. Very good. How could I ever even consider thinking bad of someone who has devoted their life to protecting mine? That would be just selfish and…wrong. Just plain wrong.

I've tried to tell them that. But they don't listen. They don't listen to me. Mitsuru-chan told them that Grandmother wanted them to do what I said. But does that only apply to when we go into battle? That's what Mitsuru-chan said. But I'm their princess, right? Doesn't that mean that they always have to listen to me? I don't know. It's not in my nature to just boss people around, even if I am in charge for the moment. But when I insist and protest and state it nicely, they don't listen.

I wish they would, just once; I still have so much I wanted to say, especially on that one walk home. When Takuma and Yuichi first really started going on about being less than human. But somehow I just couldn't make myself say anything more than what I did. All they had done all day was yell at me for disagreeing with them. Mahiro-sempai, too. He was so angry at lunch…I hardly knew what to say to him on the way home!

One moment from the walk sticks out very plainly to me. That moment when Yuichi said that from a human's point of view, they were nothing more than animals. I wanted so badly to say, "That's not how I see you; and I'm human, right? So doesn't that mean that just maybe you are more than animals? Because a human DOES see you that way?"

Can anyone even follow that logic? I can. It makes sense to me. But I don't know how to tell them, how to show them, how to…how to just…just make them understand. That they're not just animals. Not to me. Never to me.

How do I tell them?

How do I tell them that even though they failed to defeat Aria's servants, even though I had to bargain away one of the Artifacts in exchange for the lives that they had been one hundred percent ready to sacrifice for mine…that they still matter? That despite every little setback that they all seem to see as some colossal upset, I'd still rather have them over any old Artifact any day?

I can't very well say that, though can I?

They'll just yell at me again, won't they?

The Artifacts are super important. If that Seal goes down and the Onikirimaru is released, the world could end. WOULD end. I can't say it.

They'll just get upset again. I don't want that anymore. No more.

No more.