New chapter, in record time! Woo!

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I am a soldier. Death is my business. I bring death to the enemy, the stupid, the weak, the unlucky. I am a driving fire cleansing the land of weakness.

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A voice, incredulous with horror and disbelief:

Chesta!

Escaflowne ripped into an Alseidies.

Dallet!

Liquid metal spurted from the gash near the cockpit in another melef.

Miguel!

Dilandau and Celena could see the boy's face as he was dragged backwards by the enemy, to be captured. It was the last time Dilandau saw him alive.

Gatti!

Celena could feel the sweat rolling down Dilandau's face in rivers. She could feel his terror at the berserk Escaflowne before him, and she wept at the weight of it.

Viole!

Machine destroyed machine, and each time, a boy died.

She saw the Dragonslayers die, over and over again.

Horrible…

Her world was crumbling around her. She was holding on by a thread, nearly overtaken by terror, consumed by the swiftly opening void rushing fast as high-atmosphere wind and howling like all her boys had. Every time she blinked, she saw their last moments on the backs of her eyelids.

Outside. There, the clouds covered everything. The sun could not penetrate their mist. She could feel herself being pulled downward into the clouds, feel herself swallowed up in the cold, darkening fall.

At the bottom, there was only Dilandau.

They were his strength…he didn't see them as people, exactly…but they were still so important to him…

She held the rose to her face, savoring the smell the way she had not been able to savor the last moments of her boys' company. The black leather of her glove creaked as she gave the stem one last ineffectual squeeze and then, seemingly carelessly, tossed the rose into the air. It surprised her how easily it fell, how silently, gone to the cold dark loneliness without a fuss.

"In memory of you incompetent fools," she said.

As the rose became a speck and disappeared from sight, she lost everything her boys had given her. The void finally overtook her.

It took her easily. She didn't so much as whimper.

She sank to her knees as everything fell apart.

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She almost remembered Jajuka as Celena. It was hard to tell whether or not her small child's arms reaching up to the kind beastman belonged to a boy or girl. She felt tired, and hungry, and scared, but herself.

"It's alright, I'm here, Dilandau. It's all right, it's going to be fine."

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She was very close to him. She could see the lines of his puny body through the steam, crouched and facing away.

Easy pickings.

She raised her sword and started to lunge.

"VAN, LOOK OUT BEHIND YOU!!!"

It was the Mystic Moon bitch, of course. Startled, Van turned, at just the wrong moment. His sword came up, and before she could finish the brat, a searing line flashed across her right cheek.

My face?! He cut my FACE!! A shaking hand reached up to assess the damage. Oh, it felt deep. It was going to scar. My beautiful face!

Her perfection…gone. How could this happen?! She could feel herself teetering on the peak, threatening to fall from the heights where she belonged. She was above all others. Her power was perfect, supreme over life and death. Her body was perfect, strong and beautiful. The Dragon had destroyed one of her perfections without a thought.

Curled up and shaking on the floor, she made a vow:

Van. I will kill you.

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Near midmorning, Celena gained enough strength to wake up and drag herself out of her horrors. She clawed her way out of the drugged sleep, gasping and opening teary eyes to a concerned Allen. He leaned forward, resting a hand on her shoulder, and moved closer to his sister.

"Don't touch me," she whispered. "Please." The knight's hand fell back, and Celena shuddered deeper into the bed. The shaking wouldn't stop, it seemed, and she curled up small and defensive. Finally conscious enough to express her devastation, the girl wept, long, loud sobs shaking her seemingly broken frame. Allen murmured soothing nonsense words, and even as she sobbed his sister went about assuring herself of her freedom. Eyes screwed shut, face turned to the briny pillow, she hugged herself and rubbed her limbs to make sure that she existed, that she could touch and feel and move.

After a few minutes, her sobbing subsided, and the plain and unthreatening physicality of the room gave her comfort. All comfort vanished when Celena remembered how she had gotten there: the blow, the fire, and the needle.

That damned needle.

Slowly, Celena sat up. She rubbed at a puffy eye, swiped a sleeve across a runny nose as she sniffed. Her hair was going in all directions, and she felt nauseated. More significant to her appearance, though, was that she now had a desperate determined light in her eyes. She looked like she had survived a flood.

She looked directly at Allen.

"I don't think sedation was a good idea."

"Celena, I'm so sorry, we had no idea—"

"It's alright. Don't worry about it." Her voice had an unnerving dead quality to it, like she was beyond caring about such things.

"I have to go." She stood up and started walking towards the door.

"Go? Where?"

"…The beach." As she opened the door, she was surprised to meet Millerna, just reaching for the doorknob from the other side. The older girl burst into tears when she got a good look at Celena.

"I'm so sorry! This is all my fault, I didn't know you'd have dreams, you looked so frightened but we couldn't wake you!" She stepped forward to hug Celena, but the younger girl was too jumpy to be caught in the princess's embrace. Sidestepping quickly, she started down the hallway, reassuring Millerna as she backed away.

"It wasn't your fault. Don't worry about it. I have to go now," she repeated. She got further and further away, but now Allen had made it out the door and was nearly on a level with her.

Celena ignored his presence by her side, and kept walking.

"Celena, you can't go alone! It's too dangerous!" He laid a hand on her arm, a firm gesture that said he didn't want to hear an argument.

"Please don't touch me." Celena gently pulled her arm away, and looked down at the floor in front of her feet. "I'm sorry, Allen, it's not something I can deal with right now."

"I never wanted to hurt you, Celena!" Allen looked heartbroken. "But I really don't think I can let you be alone right now."

Celena kept walking, at a steady pace, to the palace entrance. As they turned the last corner, a cool sea breeze swept over the pair and helped lift Celena's nausea.

She stopped in the sunshine, letting her eyes adjust.

"Alright. We'll go to the beach."

##All of us.##

Allen sighed with relief.

The brightness of the sunlight seemed to bleach away the madness of the night before.

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As quietly as possible, Celena dressed as sturdily as her tourist wardrobe allowed. Perhaps it was her mental stillness that kept her body from making noise: for the whole day, even her more urgent thoughts had been subsumed by the millpond, shocked calm of her mind. Now that it was night, she felt that the world was finally in tune with her interior.

Pulling the cloak around her shoulders, she gave her sleeping brother a sad, guilty look. She did not feel noble in taking advantage of his exhausted sleep. The fact that he had not slept the night before to watch over her was no help.

I love you, brother. But I must go.

Skirting the chair Allen was slumped in, she made it to the door, and opened it, again silently. Slowly, slowly she opened it onto the darkened hallway.

She was almost surprised that there was no one there. Closing the door softly behind her, she made her way swiftly through the halls of the palace.

First, to the kitchen for food and supplies.

Then, to Fanelia.

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