Disclaimer: Tenkuu no Escaflowne is property of Bandai and Sunrise, all rights reserved. I am in no way affiliated with these companies, and am not making profit. Any similarities between my work and anyone else's is purely coincidental. Lyrics to "Hello" are property of Evanescence, all rights reserved.

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"Whisper Memories" -- Part 1: Hello

By The Last Princess of Hyrule

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Playground school bell rings again,
Rain clouds come to play again . . .

- X - x - X -

Yukari was dead.

That was the only thing Hitomi could see, the only thing she could hear, feel, and breathe. Her whole world, everything that had been, that was, and could ever be, stopped in the moment she saw her friend, a broken body and a bloody knife amidst the bark chips of the primary school playground.

There were tears flowing down Hitomi's cheeks, tears mixing with the steady rainfall streaming from black clouds covering the heavens. If she had been thinking of it, Hitomi would have said God was weeping for Yukari just like Hitomi, but all Hitomi's thoughts were blank save for the fact that Yukari Uchida, her best friend, had commit suicide. The rain splashed onto Yukari's pale face and rolled into her glassy periwinkle eyes. Everything in Hitomi's mind was Yukari for that one instant in time, and then Yukari was nothing.

Hitomi sat back on her heels, wood chips stabbing her legs and the cold breeze bighting her arms. Damn it, Yukari, Hitomi thought. How could you . . .? Hitomi's body was shaking and her tears came in torrents of salty liquid, washing her face of all the anger she had been feeling only moments ago until there was only grief.

"She's dead, you know."

Hitomi jumped and turned. Several feet above her, leaning over a metal guardrail on the top of the play equipment with its worn red paint, was a young man, staring down at her with a blank face. He had deep crimson eyes and icy blue hair complemented by the deep azure of his school uniform. There was something mysterious and yet familiar about him that Hitomi could not quite place.

"W-who're you?" she asked between sobs. "What're you doing here?!"

"Waiting," he said. His voice was deep, like the rumbling thunder crashing overhead. Dark clouds had rolled in late that afternoon, covering the city of Tokyo in shadows. Leering, haunting shadows—shadows with dark power that had brought with them the catalyst, which drove Yukari to her last moments of life.

- X - x - X -

Has no one told you she's not breathing?
Hello . . .

- X - x - X -

"Dad came home last night," said Yukari.

She and Hitomi were on the metro train headed for school. It was early Tuesday morning and outside the windows, Tokyo was lit up brilliantly. On those dark days in January, sometimes the sun did not rise until second hour at school.

"How come?" asked Hitomi, turning down her CD player. They were sitting on a long bench-style seat facing inward of the train.

"Mom called him. She wanted to apologize for throwing him out last time," Yukari explained. She was looking out the window over her shoulder at the lights whisking past like thousands of fireflies. It was hard to tell by the expression on her face that Yukari was upset over this, but Hitomi saw her hands clenched in her lap and knew better.

"Stupid bitch," she commented.

"Yeah."

"So . . ." Hitomi hesitated. This was a rather touchy subject for Yukari, hard to bring up, hard to talk about, hard to believe, yet not at all hard to understand. "What'd he do?"

Yukari's eyes began to fill with tears. "Well, it was about six when he came home last night. Mom made him a fancy dinner and we all sat around the table like we were a real family or something. They asked me about school and all that stuff, Dad said Mom's cooking was excellent, and all the usual crap. We even sat around the TV and watched a movie together."

Under her muddy brown skirt, Hitomi saw Yukari's right knee begin to shake. "I went to bed early that night so I wouldn't have to talk to him. At like ten or something he and Mom went in her room and . . . well, you know. I had to turn up my radio pretty loud not to hear her screaming. It was pretty gross."

Hitomi made a retch and looked repulsed. "They should get a hotel or something. Or get you one."

"Or let me spend the night with you," Yukari agreed.

"For sure."

"At least then I wouldn't be around when Dad was there." She turned back to Hitomi. "You know, I even asked Mom if I could call you and spend the night at your house because he was coming, but she wouldn't let me. She said we had to be a family again."

"She's full of shit."

"No doubt."

"So, did he do anything?"

Yukari looked down at her lap, rubbing her hands together nervously. "Yeah."

Hitomi put a comforting hand on her friend's shoulder, causing the girl to flinch.

"It was around midnight when he came in my room," Yukari went on, her eyes locked on a piece of old chewing gum on the floor. Her voice was quiet, not quite a whisper but not a normal conversation volume. "I was asleep so I didn't hear him come in. I didn't hear him till he was on the bed next to me. Then I woke up and he was running his hand along my side.

"I got up and tried to shove him away, but he grabbed my wrists and held me down. Then he stuffed a rolled-up sock in my mouth so I couldn't scream." Her hands had gone white and, when she released them, Hitomi saw the sharp imprints of her fingernails on the palms. "You can pretty much guess the rest after that."

"Fucking bastard," Hitomi muttered, just loudly enough that Yukari could hear but no one else. "Someday I swear to God I'm just gonna take a dull knife and saw his damn balls off."

She reached out and grabbed her friend, pulling Yukari into a tight embrace. Yukari bawled into Hitomi's shoulder, her cries were muffled the fabric of Hitomi's shirt. None of the other passengers took any notice of the two girls.

"It's gonna be okay," Hitomi whispered in Yukari's ear, rubbing her back gently. "I promise it'll be okay." Yukari's tears drenched the front of Hitomi's off-white uniform jacket and when they got off the train, it looked like Hitomi had been shot with a squirt gun. But no one asked questions.

- X - x - X -

I am your mind,
Giving you someone to talk to,
Hello . . .

- X - x - X -

Hitomi watched the stranger carefully. The circumstances of his being there were lees than in his favor. Hitomi was suspicious. Could Yukari have actually been murdered? I don't want to think she'd have killed herself, but it makes sense. This guy could just be in the wrong place at the wrong time . . . Hitomi, however, did not want to think about him in that way. It was much easier and gave her much better closure to think of him as Yukari's killer. "Who are you?" she asked again.

"My name is Folken," he said. "I'm a senior at—"

"I don't give a fuck!" Hitomi shouted. "I just wanna know what the hell you're doing here! What did you do to my friend?!"

Folken climbed limberly down one side of the play equipment, his lanky form descending gracefully. "If you're thinking I killed her, you're wrong. I followed her here. You see, I work after school at this place," he jerked his thumb back at the primary school building, "as a math tutor for some of the kids. I saw your friend out here and came out to see what she was doing. It's not that often I see another high school student around here."

"Yeah, that's fuckin' great, isn't it?" Hitomi, stricken with rage and grief and confused by Folken's statement, jumped to her feet. A thousand irrational thoughts rushed through here head and all of them reiterated the original thought that Folken was the reason for Yukari's death.

"So you just looked out the window and watched her kill herself, huh?!" Hitomi screamed accusations at him. "Is that it?! Is this like your idea of fucking afternoon entertainment?! Huh?! HUH?!"

Folken held up his hands and took a step back. "Hey, that isn't what I said at all! By the time I got permission to go outside for a few minutes, your friend here was already stabbing herself."

"She has a name, you know! It's Yukari! And don't you dare talk about her like that! Why the hell didn't you try to do something?! Why in the fucking hell did you just let her die?!"

"I didn't."

By that time, Hitomi's blood was boiling, racing through her veins like F-1 cup finals. Both her hands, gripped in white-knuckled fists, were shaking with rage. "How dare you . . ." she whispered, her voice barely audible above the rain. She didn't even have a chance to run at him before he stopped her.

"You did."

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If I smile and don't believe,
Soon I know I'll wake from this dream . . .

- X - x - X -

It was lunch, one month before Yukari's death. She and Hitomi were sitting alone under a tree in the courtyard, eating. Yukari, looking around at the rest of the students, put down her bowl. "How many of them do you think would notice if one of us was missing?"

Hitomi kept eating. "What do you mean?"

"Like, if I died tomorrow, how many people would notice?" Then she added, "Not counting teachers, since they take roll and all that."

"I would," said Hitomi. "I bet Van would to." She nudged Yukari in the side, jeering about the girl's boyfriend, a freshman who, though both agreed was rather cute, in his own weird way, Hitomi did not take seriously. "And Dilandau and our other friends."

"That's not a lot."

"Well, I'm sure people will notice. It's not like they're just totally oblivious to you."

"Coulda fooled me."

Hitomi stopped eating and turned to her friend. Yukari's shoulder length cherry-colored hair looked untidier that day than usual and there were distinct bags under her eyes. Her uniform, usually crisp and clean, looked rumpled, as if it had been cast aside in a heap when she got home the previous day.

"Have you been sleeping lately?" asked Hitomi concernedly.

"Not really," Yukari admitted. "I dunno . . . I guess I'm just never really that tired anymore."

"Has your dad been around?"

"He's living with us now."

Hitomi knew what was going on immediately. Yukari was suffering child abuse, abuse Hitomi had thought finally over when Mrs. Uchida kicked her husband out of the house after learning of her daughter's deflowering.

Several years earlier, Mr. Uchida had gotten it into his mind that women his own age weren't any fun anymore. For a while, according to Yukari, he would pay school-age prostitutes off the street to come home with him. Yukari caught him four times when she was a freshman after school, once even in her own bed.

After she told her mom, Mr. Uchida did not bring home anymore street hos. Instead, he used Yukari to get his kicks. Yukari was unfortunate enough to come home after school everyday and be by herself until Mrs. Uchida got off work at six thirty. Mr. Uchida was unemployed; therefore always home when Yukari arrived. That was the beginning of her sophomore year.

When Hitomi finally managed to get Yukari to tell her about her dad, she wanted to call the police. But somewhere between the tests on Yukari's rape kits coming up negative and Mr. Uchida's sudden metamorphosis into an ideal father figure, something went wrong and Yukari's case was closed, determined that she was lying to get attention.

That was when everything hit rock bottom. Mr. Uchida, of course, nothing close to an ideal father figure, threatened Yukari he would kill her if she ever tried something like that again. Yukari had been powerless against her father ever since.

"Your mom let him come back?" asked Hitomi, appalled.

"Uh huh." Yukari had gone back to her lunch, shoveling it rapidly down her throat like there was no tomorrow. Almost as if she were purposefully trying to choke on it.

Hitomi slammed her bowl on the concrete. "That stupid bitch!" she swore. "What the hell was she thinking, letting him back in?!"

"I dunno."

"God damn her, she's gonna regret that." Hitomi shook her fist menacingly.

Yukari shrank away, trying to be inconspicuous, and finished her meal in silence.

- X - x - X -

Don't try to fix me,
I'm not broken,
Hello . . .

- X - x - X -

"Yukari didn't need a warrior, you know," said Folken. "She needed a friend."

"I was her friend!" Hitomi retorted sharply. "What the hell do you think I was?!"

"You were always trying to fight for her and protect her from everything. Every time Yukari told you about her mom or her dad, you'd get angry and start threatening them." Folken folded his arms over his chest. Hitomi's fists fell limp at her sides. "Yukari just wanted your shoulder to cry on and your support to help her get through it."

All of the rage drained out of Hitomi like the rain falling overhead and she sank to her knees. "I was trying to help her," she said, starting to cry. "I wanted to help her more than anything."

Folken took a few steps closer and placed a hand on Hitomi's back. "Hey, it's not your fault."

Hitomi lashed out and knocked him away. "What the fuck do you know?! It's all my fault! It's all my God damned fault! I shoulda fucking been here!"

"Did she ever tell you she was going to kill herself?" asked Folken.

Hitomi rubbed her eyes savagely with the back of her sleeve. "No."

"Then how would you have known to be here?" He knelt next to her. "It wasn't your fault this happened."

Hitomi scoffed. "You're full of shit, Folken. You just said it was my fault."

Folken sighed and tried to smile. "The first thing you need to know about me, Hitomi, is that you shouldn't believe a thing I say."

"Then how do I know it wasn't my fault?"

"Uh . . ." Folken rubbed his the back of his neck. "I don't know." He smiled a little. Hitomi glared. "Err . . . just believe what you feel is right." He held out a hand. "Come on, Hitomi, let's get out of here."

Hitomi looked from the hand to Folken, suddenly very suspicious. "How do you know my name?"

Folken's smile froze on his face.

"How did you know all that stuff about Yukari and me?" She started to get up, her legs shaking unsteadily beneath her. "What's going on here?"

- X - x - X -

I am the lie living for you so you can't hide,
Don't cry . . .

- X - x - X -

Folken's fourth hour was English 2. He hated English with a vengeance. What possessed anyone to learn the stupid language was beyond him. Why even bother speaking English when everyone in Japan spoke Japanese? And it wasn't like Japanese was such a hard language to learn. It made far more sense than English.

But Folken had other reasons for taking the class, and the biggest one was sitting two desks in front and to the left of him. Hitomi Kanzaki, with her golden brown hair and glittering green eyes, taking notes and paying avid attention to the teacher at the head of the classroom.

She's so pretty . . . He thought to himself, so many times he felt like screaming it out in front of everybody. But that would cause him to look like even more of a freak than he already appeared. Imagine, a senior having a crush on a sophomore. It was just not done.

Who made up these stupid rules anyway?! He wondered, his mind as far from the English language as it could possibly be. What's wrong with sophomores anyway? Sure, a lot of them are really immature and all that, but there are some really hot girls.

A girl with red hair next to Hitomi leaned over and whispered something in Hitomi's ear. Hitomi turned and looked around the back of the classroom. Folken quickly averted his eyes and looked down at his homework. For the rest of the class, he didn't look up, for fear she would turn around and find him watching her.

The bell rang and Hitomi and her friend dove into the throng of students hurrying to lunch. Okay, this is it . . . Folken took a deep breath and followed out the door.

That day he told himself he was finally going to confess his love to Hitomi. It had taken ages for him to even work up the courage to think about the possibility of her not being disgusted by him. Folken wasn't a jock, or a rebel, or anything cool or interesting, he was just another genius trying to survive his peers.

Oh . . . shit-oh-shit-oh-shit-oh-shit-oh-shit-oh-shit, said Folken to himself as he approached the place where Hitomi and her friend usually ate their lunch. I can't go through with this! With a sudden change of heart, Folken averted his course and crept up into some bushes behind the girls and listened to their conversation. Later, he couldn't figure out what had driven him to eavesdrop in the first place.

"Did he really say that?" Hitomi pressed with a laugh.

"Would I lie?" Her friend's face was scarlet. "He seriously just got up in the middle of class and told me he loved me!"

They were both howling in glee by this time.

"I told you freshmen were dorks!" said Hitomi. "Only someone as stupid as Van would just shout out they loved you to the whole class!"

Her friend shoved her. "Obviously, you've never been in love, Hitomi, otherwise you'd know that when a guy tells you he loves you, it's the sweetest feeling in the world."

"Yukari, if any guy ever gets up and does something like that to me, I swear I'll beat the living shit outta him."

Yukari rolled her eyes. "This is why you'll never get a boyfriend."

"Yeah, well who says I'd even want one?" Hitomi stuck out her tongue. "Too romantic."

By this time in the conversation, Folken was slowly creeping away, shocked beyond words. Suddenly, Hitomi wasn't the perfect girl he'd imagined her. All the times he'd wanted to shout out he loved her, to shower her with romantic gifts and whisper sweet nothings in her ear to make her smile, and she despised them.

I'm such an ass, he berated himself. Just my luck the only girl in school worth liking and she's not a sap. Just perfect . . . He was about to slink back through the bushes and go about his self-pitying way when he caught snatches of a new subject that made him change his mind.

". . . If I tell you, he'll kill me."

What? Folken came back and peered out at Yukari, who was doing most of the talking.

"C'mon, I already know about him and the stupid hos," said Hitomi. "I'm your friend—I wanna help."

Yukari looked away. "Well, last night he came home really late. Mom was out with some of her friends for a girl's night out or something. She wasn't going to be home until this morning to get ready for work. Dad knew all about it.

"I was just in my room doing my homework. I wasn't, like, trying to piss him off or anything, he just . . . just . . ."

"Yukari . . ."

"He came in and asked me if I needed any help with anything. I said I was fine, but he asked again. He kept asking till I finally got up and told him I could do everything myself just fine without him. That was when he got really mad and kicked my TV off the stand. I started swearing at him. I mean, that thing cost a lot of money and it was my TV and . . ."

Yukari turned her head to face more toward Hitomi and Folken saw a glistening trail of tears falling down her cheek. "He started yelling at me to shut up and I kept yelling at him to go away and then he was on top of me. He started hitting me and pulling on my clothes. I tried to push him off but he's just too heavy . . ."

"Oh, God . . ." Hitomi reached out and pulled Yukari into a hug.

"I'm not like those girls on the streets," she cried into her friend's shoulder. "He kept telling me I was nothing but a whore. I'm not a whore, though! I don't wanna sell my body on the streets! I don't wanna have sex with strange guys, and especially not with my dad!"

"Of course you don't," said Hitomi, trying to sooth her but how did one sooth a girl who'd been through hell and back just as they broke the news? "You're nothing like that."

"But Dad said I was," Yukari went on. "He said I liked it!" She let out a fresh wail. "I didn't like it though! It hurt and he was mean! He wouldn't let me go! God, I'm not a bad girl! I'm not! I'm not! I'm not!"

- X - x - X -

Suddenly I know I'm not sleeping,
Hello . . .

- X - x - X -

"I know," said Folken to Hitomi. Might as well bite the bullet. "I heard about her and her dad and what he did to her. I . . . I was listening to you one day a long time ago." He saw her face fill with horror. "I didn't mean to, I swear! I only wanted to try to talk to you, but I wussed out and hid in the bushes. I didn't mean to hear what I heard, I swear to God!"

"You bastard," was all Hitomi could say. There was not an ounce of energy in her body left for her to fight with. It had all drained to a puddle on the ground just like Yukari's blood.

"Hitomi . . ." he started. "I'm sorry. I didn't want this to happen."

"Go away," she said. "Leave me alone."

"What are you going to do?"

"Nothing." But he saw her eyes flicker over to the knife in Yukari's cold hand.

Folken shook his head. "I can't. Hitomi, I can't let you die too."

"Why the hell not?" she looked up at him, new tears in her eyes where she thought she'd cried dry. "What's it to you if I live or die?"

Folken looked away, feeling his cheeks grow hot with embarrassment, despite the gravity of the situation. "Because . . . well . . . I love you."

Hitomi scowled. "Well, fuck you too."

"I knew you'd say that." Folken got to his feet. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a silver cell phone and flipped it open.

"Who're you calling?" Hitomi demanded.

"An ambulance," he replied, dialing the number. "For Yukari."

"They can take me too while they're at it."

Holding the phone to his ear, Folken bent over and picked up the knife. "I don't think so." With his heel, he dug a shallow divot in the dirt beneath the wood chips and dropped the knife into it. The phone picked up as he pushed some dirt to cover it.

"Emergency Services, how can I help you?" asked the voice on the other end.

Folken walked over to Hitomi and handed her the phone. "I think you'll want to talk to them."

Hitomi hesitated.

"Hello?" asked the voice, barely audible above the patter of the rain.

Reaching out a shaky hand, Hitomi grabbed the phone and held it to her ear. "My friend is dead," she said and went on to give the school's address and hanging up before the recipient could get a word in edgewise.

Hitomi flipped the phone closed and threw it in a mud puddle forming near her feet. "Why'd you do it?" she asked Folken. "Tell me the truth."

He knew exactly what she meant. "I did."

"The first thing you need to know about me, Hitomi, is that you shouldn't believe a thing I say." Folken's words came to Hitomi's mind as he spoke. "I thought I shouldn't believe a word you say," she accused him.

"No, you shouldn't." he said, "but I know you do."

The wails of an ambulance siren pierced the quiet schoolyard but Hitomi's eyes remained locked on Folken's somber face until she was helped into the vehicle herself.

- X - x - X -

I'm still here . . .

- X - x - X -

"That guy's staring at you, Hitomi," Yukari whispered one day in English class.

"Who?" Hitomi turned around. There didn't seem to be anyone looking her way.

"That guy, with the blue hair."

"Him?" Hitomi was shocked. "But he's a senior. What'd he be looking at me for?"

"How am I supposed to know?" Yukari giggled. "All I know is that he hasn't taken his eyes off you since class started."

"He's really hot," Hitomi stated.

Yukari licked her lips. "Yummy."

This caused Hitomi to giggle. "Are you sure it was him?"

"Yeah!" Yukari almost sounded hurt. "He was totally checking you out!"

Hitomi sighed dreamily. God, he is gorgeous. I sure hope it was him looking at me . . .

- X - x - X -

All that's left of yesterday . . .

- X - x - X -