Lightning flashed in the capital city, it was unnatural for this time of year but the people accepted it and went on with their daily lives except for one red-haired girl in an empty room in a castle. She was sitting on a desk with the candle burning low; she quickly ate her ice cream and flung it behind her, shattering it, before grabbing another glass and starting to fill it with ice cream again. Although she had eaten at least 5 glasses of it she didn't care, all she could think about was the pain in her heart and how she had to keep her mind off of it.

A knock on the door, the girl tensed, there wasn't supposed to be anyone up this late at night, she got up and washed her face so she looked at least fresh. She opened the door to see a pink haired girl with a concerned look on her face, "Is everything okay Rita?" the girl asked.

"Yeah, everything's fine Estelle" Rita replied cheerfully, "Why? Is something wrong?"

"No, its just that I heard some glass smashing several times and it came from your room so I thought" she said trying to look inside Rita's room.

Rita blocked Estelle's view and said, "Nah, must be the lightning. Go get some sleep; it's your 20th birthday tomorrow right? Wouldn't want to get sick now do you?"

"Of course you're right. Goodnight Rita"

"Goodnight Estelle" Rita said and closed the door; as soon as she did she started to sob silently. She went back to the desk and continued to eat her ice cream, now nearly run out, as she remembered the cause of such pain.

Flashback

"Hi, could you possibly be Rita? My name is Alexander and I'm researching on blastia."

"Blastia? You do know that it went out of existence a few years ago right?"

"Yes I know but I want to know its history and since you were sort of a blastia expert before it disappeared I thought you might know a bit about it"

"And why should I help you?"

"How about for starters I treat you to dinner?"

End flashback

Those words were the start of a painful cycle that she had yet to know. As she continued to work with Alexander she continued to be attracted to him despite having pushed people off time and again with the exception of Brave Vesperia and Flynn. He was a hard working man with jet-black hair and a not so handsome face but not ugly either but somewhere in the middle yet not average. He had a thin body but could somehow find an inner strength that allowed him to lift things at least one and a half times his weight but it was his emerald eyes, like Rita's that captivated her and soon she found herself falling in love with him, however, she was unable to tell her true feeling as she was afraid of rejection so she had let it be and thought of a better time to say it.

As they continued their research together they discovered that it may be possible to somehow harness a weaker version of aer that can be used in every day uses. They relentlessly pursued this line of thinking and soon they discovered it, a weaker version of aer called 'helium' that could be used to at least activate small machines that could be used to farm, repair and minor defence work, when they presented their findings to the mages at Aspio, needless to say the mages were overjoyed and immediately presented their findings to the capital where they were then refined into mini blastias. Alexander and Rita were hailed as pioneers and were given many honour but however all proceeds were given to Alexander, who, promised to give Rita a 50-50 percentage of the profits which she did receive for a time but had recently stopped.

When she confronted Alexander he was, of all places, in a pub. "Alexander do you remember me?"

Alexander looked at her not recognizing her for a while before saying with a surprised look on his face, "Oh Rita. How are you?"

"I'm good but uhm… you see…"

"What is it?"

"The profits"

"Oh right the profits." He looked around him and quickly said, "Come with me to the front"

Rita followed him to the front where it was starting to rain when he said with a cold voice, "Rita I hate to tell you but you're no longer getting the profits"

"What? Why?" Rita said angrily, "I helped you on that research"

"Yes you did but as far as the empire and the mages at Aspio are concerned" he said wagging his fingers, "You never helped me"

"What do you mean I never helped you? I was there when you- we- presented our findings."

"You can say that but the mages will say that you were never there"

"How is that-" as Rita began to realise, "You paid them off"

"Yeah, there were so much money coming in that I had a surplus to pay them off all of them to ensure that I get all of them" he said emphasising the world 'all'.

"But, but" Rita started unable to say it

"Oh face it Rita. It's a cut-throat world out there, you got enough money from your rich friend Estelle as well as other research that you're doing now."

"But I love you" Rita blurted out

He stopped talking for a minute as he considered what Rita had just said before laughing out loud, "You loved me?" he asked, "That is the most ridiculous confession I've ever heard and believe me I've heard a few"

"But-"

"Listen to me Rita. I hate you. You get it? I've always hated since the beginning, I only tagged with you because I thought you were the best chance of me getting some money and what do you know? That worked so now I have no use for you, so get out of my sight and stay out before I lose it and if I ever see you again I assure you. You will not live to see the next dawn." And with that he left Rita, alone and in the rain. She ran towards the castle not looking back, her heart broken into thousands of pieces, she had always know that it was hard to find someone she cared about other than Estelle, someone she wanted to be with forever. She thought Alexander was her chance and she found out that it wasn't, her one chance. Gone. Forever.

Once she got to her castle she ran to her room and shut the door. She then cried her eyes out and was like this for the rest of the night. In the morning she managed to clean herself up a bit and went on with her day but now, here she was, a full two days after the even and still she couldn't forget about him. 'I have to be strong' she thought to herself, 'For Estelle's sake' and with that final thought she fell asleep on her desk.

A/N: Please review my work. This is my first time writing a tragedy fanfic so sorry if it's not perfect.