Disclaimer: the author does not (but she wishes she does) own Escaflowne.

Author's Notes: I want to dedicate this story to my Mom, my friends

Tenika Dargan, Tyries, and Tikia Thundaren, and to all Escaflowne

fans. Thank You

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Not What You Look Like

"Damn," I thought, "If he had hit me one more time my bindings would have come undone." here I adjusted the bindings that hold my breasts down as I thought over the past few days. 5 days ago Lord Dilandau had assigned Miguel and I to track down the "Dragon". We found him in a day and foolishly provoked him to fight. Here we lost miserably and only just had enough power to escape. Upon flying back to the Vione, I lost control of my melef and crashed. Miguel pulled me out, but in the process of rescuing me from the burning wreckage of my melef, his stealth cloak went up in flames, badly damaging his melef.

When we returned to the Vione, Lord Dilandau hit me and Miguel soundly across the face. Furthermore, when he found out that my melef was a pool of liquid metal and ashes, and Miguel's melef had lost it's stealth cloak and was badly damaged from the fire, he proceeded to beat our brains out. The only thing that saved me and Miguel from being beaten to death was Gatti's arrival with a message for Lord Dilandau from Lord Folken. It read: Come to the Bridge at once ~ Folken Strategos. Lord Dilandau quickly gave us the, 'don't-do-this-again-or-you-will-suffer-the-consequences' kind of speech, then stalked off.

"Whoa," Miguel muttered under his breath as he pushed himself off the floor, "Master Dilandau was in a pretty bad mood…"

"No kiddin," retorted Gatti. "What happened?"

"You heard," Miguel replied as he limped over to where I was still lying crouched on the ground. "Need help, Kusha?"

"Sure. Thanks, Miguel," I said with my face in my hands.

"Are you ok?" Miguel asked as I started shaking.

"Y-yes I-I'm f-fine-e," I sobbed, "It's just that I've never been hit so much with out fighting back." by now my sobbing had slowed enough that Miguel could see me blushing.

"God, you gotta toughen up a bit if you can't handle being hit around like that."

Meanwhile, Gatti had been watching us with a look of disdain on his fine featured face. "You two had better get out of here before Lord Dilandau gets back, otherwise he'll start on you again."

"Right." replied Miguel and I at the same time. We smiled at each other.

"God, you two are pa-the-tic," moaned Gatti as he watched us limp out of the room while supporting each other. Miguel just rolled his eyes at me, and I just giggled and nodded back.

"Yo, Miguel," I asked him, "Could you walk me back to my room?"

"Sure, Kusha," he grinned at me "Need some rest, huh?"

"Yeah."

"Don't worry; everyone does after their first beating," he grimaced at me "Well, here we are. I think you can get to your bed by yourself."

"Of course I can," I retorted, and pushed the door open, then slowly limped over to my bed "Thanks Miguel."

"Anytime, anytime." I watched him close the door, then threw my self onto my bed sobbing. After a while, I rolled over onto my back and started adjusting my breast bindings.

"Hmmm… That Miguel guy… What's his last name again…? Ahh, now I remember, it's Labariel… He is a pretty sweet guy. I think I'm starting to like him." I could feel my self blushing. "Well, I can't go around falling in love with guys when I'm supposed to be one."

I guess I was tired, because the next thing I knew Viole was shaking me roughly and yelling in my ear, "KUSHA, WAKE UP! KUSHA, WAKE UP!"

"What's the matter, Viole?" I yawned in his face.

"Lord Dilandau wants to see us all in full uniform!"

"Fine, fine, calm down," I smiled weakly up at him "Least I slept in my uniform."

"Whatever, just hurry up, otherwise I'm going to be the one to get in trouble." There was a long pause as I strapped my sword around my waist.

"COME ON!" Viole practically yelled in my ear. I turned on him, my patience wearing thin.

"God Viole, calm down, it's not like we're doing a drill for the General Adelphos or something like that."

"We are!" came the reply.