Scarlet Wings
Disclaimer: Don't own any of the characters or the show or anything. Makes me sad. :(
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"Mother.
"I have killed again."
Sizer stands by Pandora's crystal, keeping a hand's distance between them. She reaches out tentatively, but pulls back quickly, afraid to touch the crystal. She knows what it feels like, the same way it had felt ever since Bass had brought her in when Sizer was but six years old. It was cold.
Deathly cold.
Even the mother that Sizer had killed all those years ago had been warm. She'd clutched at Sizer, the blood flowing down from the wound in her stomach where the scythe was still embedded, and she'd been warm, even as she died.
But not Pandora.
The woman that had abandoned Sizer when she was only an infant could never be warm. She'd chosen to love the boy with the demon blood over Sizer's own angelic blood. She discarded her only daughter to the Mazoku, and wasn't worthy of the title 'mother', nor of her daughter's visits.
Sizer doesn't know why she keeps coming back. Every time she does she promises herself that it will be the last. And then another battle, another ocean of blood on her wings and – with the exception of Ocarina – her mother is the first person she comes to.
Pathetic, really.
She, Hawk King Sizer, Queen of the Skies, Red Witch of Hameln, third in rank in the Mazoku generals, reduced to cowering in front of the mother who had never loved her.
"Thank god Drum isn't around to see." She whispers to the crystal. Pandora's expression doesn't change, and anger suddenly flares within Sizer and she slams her left fist down onto the crystal directly above Pandora's face.
"How can you stand there with such a serene look on your face when I'm suffering so? You're my mother; you're supposed to love me, protect me, teach me things…
"Why don't you love me? Why did you choose him over me?"
She continues pounding on the crystal, unaware that she's crying. The force of her blows and the furious wing beating causes several feathers to fall loose, and Sizer catches one absently.
"You see this?" She yells accusingly, holding it up in front of Pandora's face. The anger flows out just as quickly as it had come, and Sizer lowers her head, tears streaming as she turns the feather around in her fingers. "You see this?" She repeats, but softly and sadly. Looking upon the feather her tears flow a little faster. "It's red. Stained red by blood from the hundreds of people I've killed. I can't remember the last time my wings were actually white…"
Her voice drops out, and she floats there for a while, her wings beating rhythmically against the silence of the room. The cold grey stone of the walls seem to close in, although the room is huge, and Sizer shivers as a chill spreads throughout her body. Without thinking she leans up against the crystal, then throws her arms around it, hugging it tightly and trying desperately to pull some warmth from it. But Pandora remains as cold as ever.
"Please," Sizer prays softly, barely even a whisper, "please let me die in battle. Let a human's sword pierce my heart and make my blood flow until I can no longer live. I don't want to do this. I don't want to have to kill and suffer anymore. I can still see him, mother. The boy whose mother I killed, who pelted me with rocks and screamed at me. "Mazoku! Murderer!" That's what he called me. Even after all these years I can still see his face, accusing me, wanting me to die. And you know mother; he's right. I am a murderer, a Mazoku with the blood of hundreds staining my hands and my wings. I've burned cities to the ground, killing those who try to oppose me and those who are only trying to escape with their lives. God, for a while I even enjoyed it. I wanted revenge upon the humans for casting me out. I wanted revenge upon you and your people.
"I've had that revenge tenfold, but what has it brought me? Enough pain and despair to last a lifetime."
Sizer turns away and lets the feather fall to the ground. The red stands out among the grey, and she wishes that they were outside where it was snowing so that the horrible feather could be buried and forgotten. But it just sits there on the cold floor and refuses to disappear, like the rest of the red feathers that make up her wings, like the boy's face in her mind.
Having come to a decision Sizer spins quickly back to face Pandora.
"I've had it with killing, with Bass, Drum and Guitar. They won't control me any more. Even if I have to kill many more people in order to deceive them, I'll bring them down. I don't know how yet, but I will. And maybe…maybe I can even save you."
Sizer presses a hand ever so gently against the crystal, then trails her fingers off.
"I don't know why I'd ever want to." She says as she smiles sadly. "It's not as if you care for me, or have ever cared for me. Who knows, you might turn me in to Bass as soon as you're free. But no matter how much I hate you, and I hate what you did to me…I can't help but love you as well. How the hell I manage that I'll never know. But I do know one thing-"
"SIZER!!" Drum's booming voice, amplified by the long and empty corridors almost deafens Sizer and she winces slightly, then her lips pull back into a snarl. She hates that dragon.
Picking up her scythe, her face sets into that of the battle-hardened warrior, and she leaves the room without so much as a glance back at her mother.
Ocarina meets Sizer in the corridor, and she can tell that Sizer's been talking to Pandora again. She desperately wishes that she could tell Sizer the truth about her mother and her 'abandonment', but Bass' face flashes through her mind and she swallows the words quickly.
"Sizer-sama." Ocarina says instead. "Have you any idea what Drum wants now?"
"None." Sizer replies, her voice distant and hollow. "But I know it'll involve more blood and death."
Ocarina sighs. Sizer-sama.
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Back in the main room Pandora stands suspended in the crystal, her face the same as always as if completely unaware of her daughter's visit.
But she'd heard every word.