Hello readers, I am very sorry for not updating this story. I wrote this story many many years ago, and so much has happened in that time, I am still a fan of escaflowne and I will try my best to update again. Due to the much bad writing of my past self, I have rewritten this chapter and I will be doing the same to the rest of the chapters before updating with new chapters, it will also help me to get back in the swing. The reason I decided to pick my escaflowne story to start first is due to the lovely people who commented for more. So, please vote and comment, inspire me! On with Chapter 1.

Hitomi sighed softly and glanced towards the window on her left. It was a typical day outside, the sun was gently shining in the sky and it was a typical day inside, just an ordinary day.

She sighed, "Oh Van,.."

Her teacher's voice gradually came into focus in her mind, the screeching noise of pencils meeting paper was a gentle hum in the room around her. But her mind couldn't let go, she just couldn't focus on anything.

She thought about him often, what was he doing now? Was he okay? Did he miss her like she missed him? Maybe he was married by now, he was a king after all, and he probably had a lot of women keen to snatch him up for matrimony.

Absent mindedly she put her right hand up her left sleeve and rested it gently on her wrist. She knew she had scars, scars from self harm, from pain and loneliness. If it hadn't been for Van and the time she spent on Gaia, she probably wouldn't be alive right now. He made her want to breathe again. Her life was full of loneliness before she met Van, and even though she still feels lonely and depressed, it did help to think that Van was always there for her. Since she had left Gaia, they had spent many hours just talking with each other through their mental link. Van was always very encouraging of her, to continue her studies and stay on the track team. But these last few years it felt as though there was a bad connection, she just couldn't feel him through their link. Maybe he had finally found someone else, or maybe he was just fed up with her and her problems. She frowned at the mere thought of it.

Soon enough the bell rung throughout the lecture room and in a hurry, the students quickly packed up their belongings and left, still she stood, almost frozen in time. After gathering her belongings and putting them into her backpack and throwing it over her back, she made her way out of the room, last at usual.

Making her way home she couldn't help but look to the sky, the sun was still bright and the clouds looked so gentle and soft. But was it true? Was it all even real? She just didn't even know anymore. Everyday was the same, and the journey home from college each day was lonely without Yukari who had left months previous to join Amono permanently in England. What did it matter anyhow. This seemed to be her fate. Everyone left her in the end, that's how it always was for her, people just coming and going in her life. It just felt like no one cared. Like she didn't matter to anyone anymore. She often felt as though if anyone would even notice her gone, would they really care? It seemed to be that everyone had someone they belonged to and somewhere to call home. But she didn't. After leaving Gaia to come back home, she has since felt so torn. At the time it seemed to be the best decision, to come home, she was after all only 15 years old with no family or home there and yet she has often wondered if it was the best decision to leave after all. It was too late now anyhow. She had left and came back to Japan, her connection with Van broken. She came back to Japan happy, and with time her mood slowly began to sour again as the reality of her loneliness sang in.

What was the point in carrying on? What was the point in living at all? Hitomi often felt as though she was fading away to nothing. She just didn't feel alive anymore, so what was the point in carrying on, why let herself suffer anymore, why even continue.

"Haven't I been through enough?"

She was angry, hurt and upset. She often questioned whether Gaia was real or whether it was just her way of escaping her problems. After returning from Gaia five years ago her mother was concerned over Hitomi's mental state after hearing her 'stories'. Hitomi was soon referred to a psychiatrist in relation to her make believe world. Everyone said that this was something she has created herself, maybe it really was all just in her head. It was quite likely that she truly was going crazy, and maybe it was time she faced the facts about her life.

By the time she arrived home tears streamed down her face, she could feel her head screaming inside but no one could seem to hear her. No one seemed to care enough to actually notice what was underneath her smile. Her parents couldn't understand. Her brother hated her and her friends all left her. Truly she was alone. No one really cared. Why should she have to live like this? Why she did have to feel all these feelings? Why her? Why now? Why couldn't she just enjoy life? Why was it so hard?

But it was overwhelming for her. No one could understand that. No one could see just hard it was for her to live like this every single day.

She made her way to her bedroom and soon fell onto the floor with her head in her hands. Her tears continued to leave her eyes and make their way down her face leaving her cheeks stained. She just couldn't bear to live like this anymore.

She reached her hand under the mattress of her bed and sat up onto her knees. No more messing about, no more, no more. This was it, and this time she would do the job right. Maybe when they found her they would care. She cried harder, he cheeks and eyes red, she positioned the knife over her wrist and sliced it quickly, ripping open the skin raw and the blood started to pour out over her clothes. The pain was unbearable, and the numbness began to engulf her.

A sudden gust of window blew her window open and her old deck of tarot cards were swept up into the air before descending all around her.

The knife dropped out of her hand and hit the fall with a soft clatter of the metal hitting the wooden floor. The tears in her eyes continued to run and the blood continued to pore from her wrist and on the verge of becoming unconscious Hitomi couldn't stop herself from noticing the cards predominantly around her.

"Past. The Wheel of Fortunes reversed. Bad luck that is unexpected."

She started to feel weaker and the pain in her wrist wouldn't cease.

"Present. The Moon upright. Imagination. Illusions. Inability to see things clearly sometimes resulting in personal depression."

"Future. Death upright. The beginning of a new life as a result of underlying circumstances transformation and change. Major changes. The end of a phase in life which has served its purpose.."

She breathed a last time before darkness over took her.

00000000000000000000000000000

"But, Your Majesty-!"

"NO! I will not continue you this conversation any longer!" Van said as he rose from his chair at the head of the table.

"But Your Majesty, you must marry soon to produce an heir, the Princess of Naravein would be a good political mach! It would ensure a good alliance between Fanelia and Naravein-"

"Silence! You will restrain your tongue when I say so Adviser William" Van shouted before turning to leave his conference room.

Since he had turned eighteen, all his advisers seemed to talk about was marriage and he was really getting ticked off now because it was stressing him out. It was bad enough that he hadn't spoken to Hitomi in years and the fact that he had so many piles of paper work to do as well as general training and now this. It seemed as though all they cared about was ensuring that their country had an heir from him. He sighed, it was understandable, Van was after all, the only living member of his family left. The burden of ensuring there was another Fanel king was his responsibility. It was just so much pressure for him.

He quietly made his way outside of the palace and into the gardens.

As he lay on the green grass in the palace gardens his thoughts drifted to the Mystic moon which hung in the sky. He wished that Hitomi had stayed with him all those years ago. Van missed her a lot. It had been almost five years since he last saw her, or touched her or just been in her presence. He often wondered if she had changed, if he ever saw her again, would she look any different. Would her smell have changed? Or her touch? So many questions that he wished he had the answers to. Was she happy? Did she have another? The thought made him frown and he sank even deeper into the grass. Maybe if he had told her more of how he felt, maybe she would have stayed with him. So many things he wished he could redo over, just so he could change the life he had now.

He heard someone sigh, and he looked around to see Merle. She stood leaning against a castle wall gazing over at him. He quickly sat up.

"What's wrong Merle?"

She began making her way over to him.

"Don't you think I should be asking you that question?" She replied.

"What do you mean?" he asked, looking up at her

"Oh come on Lord Van, I know you, why do you have to be so sad," It was more of a statement than a question of hers.

."I'm not sad-"

"Don't lie Lord Van." She cut him off.

He seemed slightly taken back.

"Merle" He started.

She sat down beside him.

"Why won't you just go to her Lord Van?"

"If she wanted to be here Merle then she would have come." He looked away from her.

"Maybe she can't. Maybe there's something wrong that she can't"

"Merle. She doesn't want to be with me. She has a life there. She has family and friends there, it's been years, she has probably moved on."

"But how do you know that? Maybe she hasn't, Maybe she wants to be here as much as you want her here Lord Van."

He didn't know what to say to that. And his silence seemed to encourage Merle.

"Why don't you just go to her Lord Van?"

"Merle-"

"Please Lord Van. I just want you to be happy" Her eyes began to water as she clung to his arm.

"Please Lord Van!"

"Merle, I can't just take her away,"

"But!"

"No Merle."

"Won't you at least make sure she is happy Lord Van?"

"I don't know."

It was getting dark and he looked up at the sky. The stars were so bright and beautiful tonight and all he could think of was what Merle had said to him earlier. It would be good to see her again, hear her voice. To see her happy would help him move on with his life, despite the fact that he really didn't want to

"Maybe your right Merle, I would be more content to live my life if I could she her doing the same.." His gaze dropped to the ground. It would be had to see her happy and with someone else, but if that is the push he needs to stop this nonsense over her, then he would have to do it.

He pulled his shirt over his head, throwing it on the ground below him, he welcomed the pain of releasing his wings and he gently stretched them before he leaped into the air.

As he was soaring through the sky he held onto the pendant she had given him before she left and closed his eyes, and began thinking of her, her smile, her laugh, just everything about her that he loved And soon enough he was caught in the blue light as it took him up to the Mystic Moon. It seemed to pull him up higher and higher before quickly descending him on the foreign planet.

The blue light gently hovered him in front of a small building, and he assumed it must have been Hitomi's house. It was very strange for him to look at it and all of the similar ones around him. He pulled himself higher into the sky with his wings and towards the only source of light in the house which was on the first floor. As he got closer, it was easy to see that the window was wide open, and as the image in front of him became much clearer, he was numb to the core.

Hitomi lay there on the wooden floor covered in her own blood both her tarot cards and her waist length fair hair spread out around her. There was a small silver knife on the ground close by and it seemed that was what had caused the blood.

He quickly pulled in his wings and climbed through the window before making his way over to where her body lay on the floor. His eyes scanned over her unsure of how to pick her up in the fragile state she was in, putting an arm under her neck and knees he picked her up bridal style. He didn't know what to do, but his first reaction was to check her breathing and as he listened closely he could just about hear a faint one. Climbing back out the window he spread his wings once again to fly them both home as quick as possible.