Scarlet lily of ancient Sol, steadfast,
Wrought of bloody bones of wisdom errant,
In dreadful vengeance a ship you did wrest,
Worthy weregild for endless torment.

Stormy seas and lonely plains did depart,
To freedom long denied you ascended;
Dreary prison, abandoned; the planet
Naught more than a past, bitter and distant.

Yet newfound mirth was marred and tainted.
For there was ever a bright, shining light
In your escape forever extinguished;
The dream in your nightmare, slain in your flight.

Your new family, grievously sundered
By insidious snakes; sisters slain,
By their cold keepers heartlessly purged,
Their beating hearts, stilled by leaden pain.

How your own burned with searing, surging hate!
Blinding, furious, implacable rage!
Was it your lot, decreed by God and fate
To suffer solitude, at every stage?

Yet hateful oppression's dreaded guise,
Three-headed hound, hell's keeper eternal;
Its fearful maw around your heart, a vise
Unyielding, all-consuming, infernal.

What was a hunted one to do, therefore?
Without home, without friend, without purpose?
All that was precious, destroyed long afore,
Leaving a hollow vessel, without cause.

Vessels forever empty cannot be,
For into each a little rain must fall.
Feed upon crimson waters, scarlet lily,
In due time, Nemesis herself shall call.

Pain.

Such blinding, overwhelming pain.

"Kouta," the pink-haired girl whispered, slumping into the leather-covered pilot's chair behind her, clutching her wounded arm. The metal fragments had only grazed her, but it was more than she had normally encountered in that damnable facility on Earth. The little sand-like pellets of metal that those guns launched were laughable in the face of her powers, unable to penetrate the protective shell that her other arms created about her body. That was, at least, until they brought an anti-aircraft gun to fire at her in desperation.

Her eyes stared out of the ship's cockpit, unfocused. She was not certain if the stars she was seeing were real, or if they were another figment of her imagination. She decided that they must be real, given that the steady trickle of blood from the gash between her fingers still dripped audibly on the floor.

She was now free.

Humans often spoke of how freedom brought them a lot of happiness. In the void of space, with a ship she could call her own, she could travel anywhere. Anywhere she wanted, anytime she wanted, without anyone to tell her that she could not. That was freedom, was it not?

But if it were, and humans had been right about freedom – then why was the dull ache in her heart still there? Like a thousand needles had pierced her, pumping their poisons into her blood?

Her mind wandered back to the escape from the Cerberus holding facility that she was in.

"Kouta," she repeated. That was his name. The only boy – no, man - who had ever treated her as another person. Not 'mutant', not 'freak', not 'weirdo'. And certainly not 'experiment'.

He had fulfilled his promise from so many years ago. He called her a 'friend'; laughed with her, played with her, talked with her. And when he had found out that she had escaped from a Cerberus laboratory, he had promised to come back for her when he could.

At first, she had hope. Hope that she could lead a life that was not to be somebody's experiment, or somebody's punching bag. Years passed without his arrival, and hope grew into fear. Fear that even this person had abandoned her, the only one who had treated her well. Fear grew into anger, and blind rage. Destruction was the only thing that kept her somewhat entertained, for the terrified sounds that the humans made brought a pleasant relief to her lonely mind.

And then that day finally arrived; the day that the boy promised, from so many years ago. She heard about a new keeper being assigned to her, and she grinned at the thought. How long would this one last, before she ripped him apart for fun?

"I have some tests to run. You have other things to do, right? Go and do them, I've got this," she remembered him say. Doors hissed and snapped as they opened and closed, and then her other arms – her vectors – reached outwards. The man was likely coming, and she would be entertained yet.

"Kaede," she heard, and her vectors froze. She had not heard that name for a very, very long time. All of the scientists referred to her as 'Lucy'.

"Mmph?" she tried to call out, though her helmet muffled her voice. She felt hands wrap themselves around her head, fumbling with something behind her – and then the helmet fell away with a loud clatter against the hard tiled floor.

"Kouta?" she repeated, staring with bleary eyes. He had grown from a thin, scrawny boy to a rather well-built man. One, which she registered, had wrapped his arms around her body, stroking her hair ever so gently.

"I said I would come back for you, didn't I?" he spoke, a slight quiver in his voice, "I'm sorry it took this long. Cerberus – they weren't easy to track down. It took a few more years before they trusted me,"

A loud blast rocked the facility, and the alarm lights began to flash. Sirens wailed, and the unmistakable stamping of dozens of boots marching down the cold hallways echoed in the steel chamber they were in.

"What was that?" Lucy – no, Kaede – whispered.

"A distraction. There were other ones like you – other diclonii. I couldn't leave them chained up, so I left a virus on the control centre's systems, and a bomb to make sure that it couldn't be easily fixed. All of the blast doors should be open now, and all the holding cells too. Come on, we'd better get out of here before Cerberus gets control again!"

What happened next was a blur of colour and movement in her hazy mind. Up corridors, down corridors. Around empty hallways, and hallways splattered with the blood and innards of Cerberus troopers. Every so often they would encounter another diclonius, seemingly entranced by the mutilated corpses in front of them. They paid neither she nor Kouta any mind, simply content to be toying with little shards of bone and pieces of flesh.

"Neutron purge initiated. All personnel, please vacate the premises immediately. Purge initiating in five minutes," a smooth female voice intoned over the announcement system.

"Damn, they're faster than I thought," Kouta muttered, "Come on, it's just around this corner-"

He froze mid-sentence as a loud crack rang through the air. A blue barrier flickered in front of his head, shards of a projectile ricocheting all over the walls.

"Scientist Kanagawa," a cold voice spoke, "As expected by the Illusive Man. You are too easy to read, if you must know,"

"Ugh. Kurama," he said, straightening up. The man – the spectacled man, in a spotless suit. This was the one that had performed all of those experiments on her! Gritting her teeth, Kaede raised her vectors, ready to strike. There were a dozen Cerberus troopers behind him, all of their weapons trained on her liberator. None would live past today. Not if she had any say about it.

But Kouta raised his arm and barred her way. "Let her go. Let us go. This...whatever sick experiment you're doing here. It's a failure. You know it, and I know it,"

"Oh, I know," sneered Kurama, "I know that. Do you know how many lives were lost down here in the last half-hour that you have set those diclonii free, Kanagawa? Did you know that three hundred Cerberus troopers had been killed by them?"

That man had spat out the last words with such venom that Kaede's eyes narrowed. There was nothing more that she would have liked than to tear his heart out, to hurl the pieces of his body all over the room. But with Kouta still holding his arm in her way, she could do nothing about him.

"We had thought about using them to fuel humanity's advancement. To put humanity as the leading power in this galaxy. Years of experimentation showed their instability, how they were incapable of being relied upon for assistance. This is not something useful for Cerberus, and as such the Illusive Man has grown tired of hearing of our lack of progress,"

"If they're not useful to you, then let at least this one go," Kouta retorted.

Kurama simply laughed darkly. "You see, Kanagawa. Did you really think that we were blind to your relationship with this one diclonius? Cerberus has ears and eyes everywhere. They know that you were able to approach this one safely. They simply did not know how. Why do you think that you were assigned to Lucy's holding cell? In fact, why did you think such a talentless graduate like yourself was permitted to join us?"

Sudden comprehension dawned on Kouta, and his face contorted in anger.

"You were but a pawn in his plans. We know that you shut down the surveillance cameras in her cell. We know that you planted the bomb in the control room. What you did not realise was that we still recorded your interactions from other cameras not linked to the primary control systems. We have the data that we need, and your usefulness is at an end. You have no right to bargain for her freedom, boy,"

"Two minutes until neutron purge. All personnel, please vacate the premises,"

"It seems that I cannot speak with you any longer," Kurama spoke, raising his heavy pistol, "Orders are to kill all remaining personnel in this facility. Shoot to kill. Leave no survivors,"

That was when all hell broke loose. A storm of high-velocity slugs tore through the air towards Kaede and Kouta. Reflexively, she raised her vectors to wrap them both in a protective cocoon, halting the slugs in mid-air as she had done many times before. Only when she heard the hiss of overheated guns did she lower the cocoon, hundreds of tiny metal shards clattering to the floor.

An evil grin spread on her face as she walked slowly towards them, vectors outstretched. Two troopers charged, only to have their hearts punched out through their backs. Four were bisected along their midsections, their bodies thrown to the sides of the corridor. And the remainder burst into bloody chunks of flesh and bone, still twitching. Only Kurama remained standing; his sneer replaced by a scowl. He dropped his pistol, grabbing a cylinder from his pocket and pressing a button on it.

"Any last words before I dispose of you, trash?" she mocked, ripping the hand holding the cylinder and tossing it to the side. A vector seized his neck and pinned him to the ceiling, cracking the metal above with the force she exerted. Such was her intent to kill that she failed to hear the faint whirring coming from outside the corridor.

"Kaede, look out!" Kouta screamed.

A blinding flash filled her vision. Her vectors threw up a shield to one side, but she felt a tremendous force simply passing through it. A thunderous blast deafened her ears for a moment, before a warm, wet and heavy object slammed into her side, knocking her down. A searing pain shot through her left arm as a white-hot shard of metal sliced through it. Kurama, temporarily forgotten, fell to the ground with a wet, dull crack.

"Damn it," she hissed. A slow trickle of blood fell from where she had been hit. A minor wound, but troublesome regardless, "Kouta? Are you alright?"

When there was no response, she realised that there was something rather warm and heavy on top of her legs. Something that was drenching her in warm liquid.

"Kouta? No. This can't be happening," she whispered. There, on her legs, Kouta lay slumped, face-down. A large pool of blood had poured from the fist-sized hole punched clean through his chest, with his back almost entirely shredded open. "Kouta? Wake up!"

The realisation of what had happened snapped something within Kaede. By the time that she had finished with Kurama and his troops' corpses, the entire corridor was bathed in dripping crimson. The anti-aircraft gun outside, turned to point into the corridor, had its barrel shredded into tiny metal ribbons. She cradled Kouta's remains as she boarded the only ship on the landing pad, gently depositing him on a bedroll inside.

"Welcome back, Miss Kanagawa. Welcome back, Mr. Kanagawa,"

The beeping of the control panel in front of her snapped out of her thoughts. She could not read, as the orphanage that had taken her in did not have sufficient funding for teachers. Cerberus would sooner set them free than teach them about 'unnecessary' things. And so she was ever more grateful for the 'VI' that Kouta had set up in his ship. It had been extremely helpful to her; answering her questions without hesitation, and controlling the ship for her.

"We are currently approaching the Sol Relay," the VI spoke in a stony mechanical voice, "Please brace for transit,"

She could not help but gape at the construct in front of her. An enormous structure, with a glowing blue core with vast spinning rings about it, floated in space. Surrounded by small clouds of blue dust, it looked almost ethereal.

"Freedom," she mouthed. Kaede knew that Kouta had only wanted her freedom. But Kaede – no, Lucy – did not want only freedom. She wanted Kouta to be with her, every step of the way. And yet Cerberus took that away from her, even as he was fulfilled his promise from what seemed like an age ago.

There would be a time for that, a little voice in her head spoke. And so Lucy contented herself with quietly sobbing in the pilot's seat, one hand in the empty seat beside her.

A/N

Something a little different from me this time. I'm rather tired of typing out larger blocks of text, as my typical job requires typing out vast blocks of text (of a different sort). This will be a story told in 8-stanza pieces, a different change of pace to prose. One, which I may add, is actually more enjoyable; if you are planning to write, try it first. You might be surprised at what you can come up with!

I got this idea after trawling through humorous bits of Mass Effect, and ended up running into the bit about the poetic sensitive new-age Krogan and his 'blue rose of Illium'. Figured I might as well run with it, as it's one of the more memorable bits of the second and third games for me.

For clarity, Lucy is held by Cerberus instead of the National Health Agency as per canon Elfen Lied. She has escaped captivity with the aid of her friends, all of whom had died in the process.

A/N 2:

Okay, maybe it was too different. There will always be a few stanzas at the top of each chapter, but there will be accompanying prose after.