Chapter Two
Sylviana awoke to hearing Harlock moving around in the camp. Even though it was still a little dark, she could see that he was now wearing a warm looking cloak.
"Good morning, Sylviana." Harlock murmured, absently, from where he now stood.
"'Morning. How did you know I was awake?" Sylviana asked.
"I was making too much noise for anyone to sleep through." Harlock replied, dryly.
"Ah. What are you doing up so early?" Sylviana asked, curious as to what the pirate was up to at that time of the morning.
"Getting ready to move away from this clearing." Harlock replied, as he bent to pick up his pack, grunting as he moved his right shoulder too quickly.
"What happened to you?" Sylviana asked, noticing the note of discomfort in Harlock's voice.
"Slept on my shoulder wrong. It's a bit stiff." Harlock replied, as he shifted his pack into a more comfortable position.
"I see. So you intend to carry your stuff on that stiff shoulder all day?" Sylviana asked, dryly.
"Yes. Is that a problem?" Harlock replied, in the same tone of voice.
"Not really. It's really none of my concern whether or not you are in any pain. I am a bounty hunter, after all." Sylviana said, stuffily.
"Then why did you even bother asking?" Harlock asked, as he shouldered the distress beacon as well.
"I thought I would be nice and ask, that's all, pirate." Sylviana snapped.
"Here we go with the whole 'pirate' thing again." Harlock muttered, then stood and waited for Sylviana to get her belongings gathered. Sylviana narrowed her eyes, but didn't say anything more as she got up and began gathering her things. All that day was spent hiking over some of the most beautiful terrain Sylviana had ever seen. During that morning they had walked through a lush forest, and when afternoon came, they found themselves in an open field that was filled with brightly colored wildflowers. And to top it all off, dusky blue mountains could be seen in the distance. She turned when she heard Harlock sigh and saw a wistful expression on his face.
"The Earth was once this beautiful……………..but I wonder how long it will be before the machine men come here and destroy all that is alive?" Harlock murmured, forgetting for a moment that Sylviana was there. In that instant, Sylviana saw the man Harlock was, and not his mask; he was merely a man who was fighting for his home, and the beauty he remembered it having.
"Did you have any family there?" Sylviana asked. Harlock snapped out of his trance and looked at her, startled that she'd said anything. Then he calmed down again.
"My mother died when I was very small, so I don't have any memory of her. My father disappeared when I was ten, so I pretty much grew up alone. Well, not quite alone, since Tochiro, Emeraldas, and Maetel were around most of the time. But it wasn't the same." Harlock murmured, as he set his pack on the ground and sat down beside it.
"So you're an orphan too. I can relate. My parents were killed when some space pirates raided. My brothers and I barely managed to escape." Sylviana admitted, as she sat down as well.
"So that's why you hate pirates so much………….Rest assured, if you are as old as I think you are, then my father had probably already dealt with the pirates that had murdered your parents before he disappeared." Harlock said, half-jokingly, half-seriously.
"Probably. Who knows?" Sylviana murmured, surprised that Harlock was comforting her, if even in an offhand kind of way. For a few moments, there was silence, but it was a strangely comfortable one. And it was a silence that was broken when Harlock settled back and hissed in pain when his shoulder met the soft ground.
"Shoulder still bothering you?" Sylviana asked, looking over at him from around his pack.
"It's sore, but it won't kill me." Harlock replied, not looking at her, but gazing at the wispy white clouds above.
"You're stubborn, I'll give you that much." Sylviana muttered, as she did the same and looked up at the clouds.
"Tochiro and Emeraldas are of the same opinion." Harlock said, with some amusement in his voice.
"Did you ever figure out how to hook that beacon up?" Sylviana asked. She got a grumble in German for a response.
"I'll take that as a no. What are you going to do if you can't get it working?" Sylviana again asked. This time Harlock sat up and looked at her.
"I hope for a miracle." Harlock said, as he got to his feet and walked a little ways from where they had stopped.
"What are you doing?" Sylviana asked, deciding to let the matter drop about the distress beacon.
"Looking for a better place to spend the night. It looks like there might be a storm heading this way and camping on open ground would not be a good idea." Harlock replied, as he disappeared from sight. After only two hours, Sylviana could see that the space pirate had been right; dark clouds were gathering quickly in the east and were heading right for the valley. Just as the wind started picking up, she saw Harlock return.
"Sylviana! I've found a cave about an hour's walk from here! Do you think you can walk that far in this?" Harlock asked, shouting over the wind.
"Yes! Lead the way!" Sylviana replied, as she and the pirate shouldered their packs and equipment and started on their way. The way to the cave Harlock had found to shelter in was treacherous at best. Tree roots and loose gravel were the most of their concerns. Finally, they reached the shelter; it was a huge cave, and Sylviana secretly wondered if there were any cave paintings in the deeper parts of it.
"Nice choice." Sylviana commented, sarcastically.
"Thanks." Harlock muttered, with a 'this is the thanks I get' tone in his voice. Sylviana grinned, but noticed that Harlock was now searching his pack for something.
"What are you looking for now?" Sylviana asked, as she got a fire started.
"Pain killers." Harlock muttered, under his breath.
"Why? Can't you handle the pain?" Sylviana teased, getting a dirty look from the space pirate for a response. With a sigh, Harlock sat down and put his back to the stone wall, stubbornly refusing to let the pain get the better of him like it just had. Sylviana smirked at him when she saw his sulky glare from across the cave, but blinked in confusion when he looked away and shivered.
"Harlock?" Sylviana asked, as a little concern sneaked into her voice. He looked at her again, then silently stood and walked off, disappearing into the shadows at the far end of the cave.
"Eesh……………………moody………….." Sylviana muttered, under her breath, bewildered by the pirate's sudden mood swing, but then shrugged it off, assuming that it was one of the pirate's quirks. As she started a fire, Sylviana again found herself thinking about what rotten luck she was having. She was stuck in the middle of nowhere, in a cave, with a very moody space pirate. Not exactly her idea of a good time. After an hour, Harlock returned, and placed a sodden bundle beside the fire.
"Changed clothes, I see." Sylviana muttered, noticing that he now wore a flight suit identical to the one he'd just placed beside the fire to dry.
"Had no other choice. It's certainly better than becoming ill here." Harlock replied, even though he already looked pale.
"You don't look so good." Sylviana said, frankly, as Harlock gave her a rather irritated glance.
"And you care for what reason?" Harlock asked, surprised when the huntress closed the distance between them and placed a surprisingly soft hand on his forehead.
"You dumbass, you've got a fever." Sylviana grumbled, as she placed her hands on Harlock's shoulders in an effort to get him to sit down. Harlock hissed in pain when her hand grasped his right shoulder, and whatever color he still had, fled at the firm touch.
"Hold it. Let me see this shoulder." Sylviana ordered, getting a somewhat shocked look from the pirate. But he did lower the top half of his flight suit and allowed Sylviana to see his sore shoulder.
"Damn, pirate, this wasn't caused by sleeping on this shoulder the wrong way." Sylviana muttered, when she saw what the pirate had been hiding. The place over his shoulder blade was a mass of dark bruises, and it stretched down to his ribs. When she placed a hand lightly on the center of the bruising, Harlock jumped, inhaling sharply at the touch.
"Sorry. This looks bad. When did this happen?" Sylviana asked, though she had a feeling what the answer would be.
"During the crash." Harlock replied, when he was able to breathe again.
"I see. Looks like we'll be staying here for awhile." Sylviana said, as she rummaged through her pack, removed her first aid kit, then started treating Harlock's shoulder and ribs. Harlock said nothing, but she could tell that he was listening. When she had finished, Sylviana tucked the injured arm into his flight suit, while he put his uninjured arm through its sleeve and fastened the suit part of the way up.
"Can you write with both hands?" Sylviana asked, curiously, as she watched him skillfully maneuver his left hand on the buttons.
"I can, if I chose to. Being ambidextrous does come in handy at times like this." Harlock said, as he allowed part of the chest to go unfastened.
"You're full of surprises, aren't you?" Sylviana asked, smirking despite herself.
"Probably. Depends on what you consider a surprise." Harlock said, wincing when he moved his injured arm into a more comfortable position.
"Hmph. You're more stubborn than Zero." Sylviana said, as she put her hands on her hips and glared at him.
"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that." Harlock muttered, in response. Yet again uncomfortable silence descended onto them, as Sylviana sulkily watched the storm rage from her seat. She turned around again when she heard him grumble something under his breath and saw him get to his feet.
"What are you doing?" Sylviana asked, impatiently.
"I saw something at the back of the cave that deserves a closer look. I'll be back in a few." Harlock said, as he went to retrieve a flashlight from his pack, then disappeared into the darkness.
"Hold up! Wait a darned minute! You shouldn't be moving around with your shoulder the way it is! Come back here you stubborn……………!" Sylviana shouted, then growled in frustration when he didn't listen to her.
"Damn stubborn males! And some guys still wonder why I'm still single!" Sylviana thought, as she too grabbed a flashlight and left the comfort of the fire. To her surprise, the floor was level and smooth all the way to the back of the cave, and she saw that the pirate was looking at something engraved on the wall.
"What did you find?" Sylviana asked, getting over her anger towards the pirate's stubborn nature.
"Take a look." Harlock said, moving aside so Sylviana could see. She gasped in astonishment when she saw what appeared to be an intricate relief appear on the stone wall.
"It's beautiful." Sylviana murmured, as an entire scene unfolded before her eyes.
"It's an old story. Whoever was here before us had a good knowledge of Earth's literature." Harlock said, as he gently passed his good hand over the carvings.
"What do you mean?" Sylviana asked, as she looked again at the wall.
"This wall depicts three elves. Take a guess at what that means." Harlock said, as he shone the light on the faces of the carved wall.
"Three elves……………..? Waitaminute! Three Elven Kings! The Lord of the Rings!" Sylviana blurted.
"Got it. And I think the other walls also have scenes from famous books on them, as well." Harlock said, as he cast the beam across the other walls.
"Let's take a look." Sylviana said, as she went to another wall and shone her light on it. To her shock, there was indeed another carving, but it was a far cry from the peaceful scene of the three Elven Kings. What she saw resembled a countryside similar to the one she and Harlock had walked through earlier that day, but it had old airplanes strewn across it. What really caught her eye were the two men in the picture. One of the men was very short and looked distressed, as his companion, the tall man, limped away, holding a bleeding arm as he went.
"Well? What is it?" Harlock asked, from the other end of the cave.
"I think you should look at this." Sylviana said, not trusting her eyes, nor her mouth to try and explain this new image to the pirate. When he had joined her at the wall she stood at, he gasped when he saw what she saw.
"That man walking away looks exactly like you, and the little man in the background looks like Tochiro. What is this all about?" Sylviana asked, disgruntled at this finding.
"The reason there is a resemblance between the man in the foreground and myself is because that man was my ancestor, Phantom Harlock II. This wall depicts a moment in My Youth in Arcadia. Whoever was here before must have had a copy of that book. I wonder who was here…………….?" Harlock murmured, trailing off into thoughtful silence.
"You know, come to think of it, this place's floor is smooth, almost like a museum's. I wonder if the people here before us had built something like that here." Sylviana suggested.
"Maybe…………" Harlock said, but didn't sound convinced.
"Who do you think it could have been?" Sylviana asked.
"Never mind. Let's get back to the fire." Harlock said, avoiding the subject and walking back to the warmth of the campfire.
"Was I imagining things…………………or was there hope in his eyes just now?" Sylviana wondered, as she followed the pirate captain back, more than a little confused by all that they had found.