Disclaimer: I might be tempted to find religion if I could say I owned Trigun

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Awakening

A/N: Well, I'm alive. After being banished from the internet for two weeks, battling the flu and a virus, I finally managed to get another chapter done! Terribly sorry about the long wait, I hope the chapter's worth it… *bows* gomen nasai.

She was enveloped in white; wrapped in a milky blanket of warmth. Her whole body felt comfy, as if she lay upon a down blanket, although she floated in nothingness. She felt wisps of her hair float around her face, tickling her cheeks. Her eyes opened, aqua orbs that had thought they'' seen their last, and looked around her. Milky whiteness stretched around her. Rhianne hugged herself, marveling in the warmth and sense of security that came from being here, and wondered if this was some sort of heaven. In a flash, all her memories flooded back to her, and her eyes widened in shock. She had died. This must be heaven, because there was no way she could have survived the barrage of bullets that she had been subjected to.

She pulled herself into an upright position, abandoning the fetal position she had awakened in, and stretched her shoulders back. She stretched her hands out, splaying her fingers and rolling her head around her shoulders. She wiggled her fingers and toes, stretching her leg muscles. How long had she been sitting like that, she wondered idly and she moved her fingers around, marveling at the strange feeling of nothingness between them. Her index finger brushed something and her idle thoughts came to a halt.

She flexed her shoulder blades, and felt something move with them. Drawing her arms close to her, shrugging her shoulders in, Rhianne saw large, opalescent wings fold in around her with the movement of her shoulder blades. Her eyes widened; these were her wings. Her Angel Wings. Which could only mean one thing…

Frantically, Rhianne twirled around in what now seemed like her milky white prison, looking for some sign of the exterior of the bulb. She swiveled around, watching as the wisps of her hair floated, as if in water, around her head.

Although she knew the vastness of the bulb; how large it had to be to manage the current of energy channeled through it and the Plant Angels within, being inside a bulb was a completely different experience.

It seemed to stretch on infinitely before her, an ocean of placid whiteness. It felt like a big, down fluffy blanket in here…except not. She could almost relate the feeling of the interior of the bulb to a bath. But that ideal was annulled when Rhianne opened her mouth, half-expecting some unknown liquid to spill down her throat, and tasted nothing but air. She blinked for several seconds, not really comprehending what was going on. Although she had come to the conclusion that the interior of the bulb wasn't like water; she could liken the feeling to being in a bath. And even though the lack of liquid in the bulb made it rather hard to liken it to a bath, the floating feeling almost reminded her of the bath…or the ocean. She sighed and shook her head, watching as her hair floated around her head in the milky nothingness; it was a waste to dwell on something so insignificant, and her time was better used going down towards the bottom of the bulb and seeing what was going on. And even more importantly, where she was.

Looking towards her feet, Rhianne made the assumption that that was the way towards the bottom of the bulb…unless she had awoken upside down…she shook her head. It was very hard to maintain a logical strain of thought inside the bulb. Idly, she wondered if this was the effect the bulbs had on the Plant Angels, before her mind turned to chocolate parfaits… She shook her head again, this wouldn't do. She had to get out of here before her entire sense of logic was overwhelmed. Bending down, she started to move down the bulb in motions that mimicked swimming, but soon found it easier to move her wings for transport, as her arms got tired very quickly.

For what seemed like ages Rhianne swam through the bulb, eventually closing her eyes against the placid whiteness. Her eyes grew tired, looking at the snowy interior, that seemed nearly blinding and dull at the same time. If she looked at it long enough, she fancied she saw it moving, swirling and moving like the snowflakes the color mimicked. She had stopped once, her mind toying with the notion that there was something there, something she should go see, but she dismissed herself of the notion and quickly took to closing her eyes after several thought of backtracking and seeing if there was something there.

I wonder if Knives misses me?

She wondered idly as she moved along, her wings flapping silently in the vastness of the bulb. She touched on this thought a bit, firstly thinking that he might be angry with her for making such a rash decision regarding the gunmen and Rinoa. Then, as she moved into thoughts of him simply being happy she was alive, a small voice at the back of her head interrupted her original train of thought:

Why go back out there? What's so good out there? Here, in the bulb, it's safe. You don't need to think about your problems, you'll never go hungry, never be ridiculed again. You can stay here, free from pain, forever. No one will ever hurt you again. No one will ever make you cry. Eventually, you'll forget what it's like to feel pain. You'll only know calmness and serenity. Everything will be perfect; calm and simple.

"Wabi and Sabi…." Rhianne echoed quietly, using one of the ancient languages she had picked up as a child "…calmness and simplicity."

Yes, wabi and sabi…everything will be easy for you. No more pain. You'll forget the emotions, the people that hurt you…

"But I don't want to forget." Rhianne cried, surging ahead, vainly hoping that the voice was only found in one area of the bulb. But, as her subconscious had suggested, she was wrong.

Everything will be so easy…

"But then I wouldn't be living. Life isn't easy, and that's what makes it life. Life is tough, it throws shit at you and you have to take it and deal with it. That's how you learn to grow…"

No one will ever break your heart again… The little voice in her head chided, tauntingly for it was a part of her mind that, although manipulated by the programming of the bulb, knew her memories.

"Maybe so, but I'd rather go out there and have my heart broken than to stay here and wonder what could have been; than to miss out on something potentially wonderful."

Eventually you would forget about your feelings. You would know only calmness and happiness…

"Yes, and in exchange, I would forget how to love."

And what's the matter with that? Knives is only going to break your heart, you know. You mean nothing to him. He won't miss you at all, because you are only a barrier in his genocide plans, and a rather large barrier at that. He'd rather stop loving you than to give up revenge on the Humans. You know that, even if you won't admit it to yourself.

The voice trailed off and silence settled in Rhianne's mind like a fine dust. Her thoughts stopped with the speech of the voice in her head. Her movements halted for a moment, then, slowly, she curled into a ball, wrapping her magnificent wings around herself for a moment.

"No….not Knives… no…

"KNIVES!!!" she cried, throwing herself back, stretching her arms and legs and throwing her head so far back the it nearly reached between her shoulder blades. She felt tears spill from her lids, pearly and opalescent against the bland whiteness around her. She closed her eyes tightly, and fought her way desperately to the edge of the bulb. She had to see Knives.

She knew that the voice was wrong; that it was just a part of her brain being manipulated by the programming of the bulb, but, yet, she couldn't dismiss its words.

He'll just use you up and spit you out, just like he's done to everyone he's ever known…

Her wings flapped hurriedly in the interior of the bulb, her head thrashed back and forth, her hands clasping her scalp, knotting themselves into her hair as she tried to rid herself of the terrible feeling that the voice had invoked within her: worthlessness.

With the proclamation the voice in her head had made, Rhianne suddenly felt a wave of doubt spread over her. What if it was true? What if she was only a pawn in his genocide plans? Was the only reason he had followed her to ensure that he could keep her feelings for him alive and manipulate her and use her in his plans? Was that his only priority?

Her hands tore at her hair, pulling it tightly, causing her scalp to burn. No, this wasn't the way to think. She removed her fingers from her hair and shrugged her shoulders back, causing her massive wings to beat, moving her through the void of the bulb. She closed her eyes tightly and clutched at her head, screaming as the voice reappeared.

Why resist the calmness of the bulb? You'll be better off here than you would ever be out there with him. You've been a failure all your life, why waste the rest of it out there, when you could be safe and calm in the bulb? You failed Corrin, you allowed yourself to be exploited by the army and your body literally used as a weapon. Or, rather, the life of your-

"NO! You're wrong! I never meant to disappoint Corrin! All I wanted to do was win the war for his sake! You know nothing- NOTHING!" She moved her wings faster and faster, trying in vain to outrun the voice in her head, although she knew it wouldn't happen; you couldn't run from your own subconscious.

Just stay here…

"No! I can't I've got to see-" Rhianne opened her eyes angrily, and was met with a pair of ice-blue ones boring into her own. She recoiled slightly, not prepared to be met with such a piercing stare upon opening her eyes.

"Knives!" she gasped, placing a delicate hand over her mouth in surprise, before removing it and breaking into a small smile "I missed you. Please let me out"

Knives said nothing in response, he just stared up at her with his wintry eyes, which suddenly seemed so hurt, so innocent and childlike. And, as his eyes bored into Rhianne's aqua orbs, it struck her that he seemed hurt. And she swore that through the thick glass of the bulb, Knives' eyes sat behind a pool of unshed tears. He blinked, and in an instant the water clouding his eyes was gone, and his eyebrows narrowed angrily, and he glared up at her.

Why Rhianne…?

A single thought reached her mind, before he cut off the link and stormed away, leaving through a door at the far end of the room. "Knives?" she pleaded gently, pawing a little at the wall of what now seemed like her cell.

"KNIVES!" she cried pleadingly, pounding her fist at it, creating nothing but a hollow thud that echoed throughout the empty bulb. She waited a moment, and, when Knives did not return, curled up into a little ball, resting her forehead against the warm surface of the bulb, and cried; feeling, for the first time in her life, utterly and completely alone.