Chapter 8

"Prepare to die, spy of Zaibach!" the dark-maned youth shouted at him. Chrno somehow managed to roll out of the blade's path as the boy lunged and got unsteadily to his feet, feeling the sap of Astral energy even more now that he was forced to become active.

"I don't know what you're talking about!" he gasped.

The boy was remarkably quick on his feet, and had already recovered from Chrno's narrow escape, setting himself up for a charging diagonal slash that Chrno had no hope of avoiding.

"Van, no!" a girl's voice cried out. The combatants stared at the girl who had run suddenly in front of the swordsman, blocking Chrno from the murderous assault with the blade an inch from the underside of her right breast. "He's not a Zaibach spy. I don't know how I know, but I'm sure of it."

"Hitomi," the swordsman Van growled, "Get out of the way."

"Van, listen to me," Hitomi said, "You've trusted me this far, and I've been right every time- the attack on Fanelia, on Allen's castle, on Palas- please, trust me now. He's no threat to us."

"He snuck up right behind us," the boy insisted, though the fire had died from his eyes. "He knows our location, and if he's not part of Zaibach, what is he doing in a Zaibach mining operation?"

Chrno was confused. Evidently he had stumbled upon enemies of the miners he had thought to seek aid from. Well, whichever- the important thing was to keep from getting skewered by the boy. "I'm not a Zaibach spy. I don't even know what a Zaibach is," he stated.

The boy seemed mollified a bit by this, as he sheathed his sword. However, Chrno realized that he was not convinced, and probably would have Chrno's head part company from his shoulders if he did anything to raise the young man's suspicions. Also he was not presenting the strongest of arguments standing behind this girl as a shield.

"Very well," the young man said. "If you think he's not from Zaibach, Hitomi, I shall leave him in your care." He turned to Chrno. "You should know, though- it is only by the grace of the Lady Hitomi whom you cower behind that I do not kill you where you stand. If you betray the trust held in you, I will not hesitate to kill you." With that, he stormed off.

"Wait, where are you going?" she called.

He called over his shoulder, "I'm going to scout around. Go find a cave to hide in."

The girl turned to him, evidently embarrassed by the flush rising in her cheeks. "I'm sorry. Van's not usually like that. My name's Hitomi Kanzaki." She gave a little bow, the pendulum swinging into the air and back onto her collarbone.

Now that she was properly facing him, Chrno studied his saviour. She was about as tall as Rosette, with apple-green eyes and sandy brown hair, and she wore an outfit that looked (quite ludicrously, Chrno thought) like an American Navy sailor's uniform with a miniskirt and patent-leather shoes. She carried a strange, purple-and-green bag. It was far too big to be a purse, yet it was the closest thing Chrno could place it to. She looked to be about a year or so younger than Rosette. There was something about her that reminded him strongly of the nun, but he couldn't quite place it…

He saw that she was looking at him curiously. Mentally he shook himself. "I'm Chrno," he said, extending his hand in greeting. As Hitomi moved to shake it, her eyes fell on his shoulder and she gasped.

"Your arm!" she exclaimed.

He looked at it. There was a long gash on his upper right arm. Evidently he had

(The arms were coming down at him, they seemed to fill the sky, there were so many)

(One grabbed his arm, gouging him with it sharp claws)

scratched it somewhere. While not alarmingly deep, the wound was bleeding freely- a waste of Astral energy Chrno did not need. She motioned for him to sit down as she rummaged through her bag, pulling out gauze bandages. Those, at least, Chrno recognized. 'Must be a variety of medicine bag,' he thought. 'It's certainly big enough to hold enough for an army.'

As she dressed the wound, he found himself asking, "Why did you save me back there?" The question popped out his mouth so bluntly he wondered where it came from. She stopped dressing his wound, shocked at the unforeseen question. "I mean, I thank you, but how did you know that I wasn't working for this Zaibach person?" He backpedaled frantically.

She smiled softly at him."I- I don't know how I knew," she said, "But I just got this feeling that you weren't here to hurt us, y'know?" she looked at him curiously. "And Zaibach isn't a person; it's a kingdom. Any resident of Gaea should know that."

"Where?" Chrno asked. 'Gaea?' he thought, confused.

Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Wait. Where did you say you were from?" she asked him. Chrno decided to go with the truth.

"New York," he said, hoping she wouldn't decide to call Van over to finish the job after all. Her eyes went from squinty suspicion to wide-eyed astonishment so fast Chrno thought that her eyeballs had exploded in their sockets.

"New… York…" she breathed, "You're from New York…" Unexpectedly, she grabbed him by the lapels of his red coat. "How did you get here from there? Did you come in a pillar of light like me? Did you see anyone, like a dragon or something, just before it? Can I get back using the way you came?" she demanded.

Chrno thought about having to shoot himself in order to be able to traverse the Gate. "I don't think you'd quite enjoy going to New York the way I came here," he said. "But what's this about pillars of light and dragons?"

So Hitomi filled him in on what was happening. It seemed she was transported to Gaea, along with Van, by some unknown force. When she arrived they went to Fanelia, a small kingdom where Van was from. Zaibach forces came and destroyed Fanelia, with Van and Hitomi fleeing for their lives in something called the Escaflowne. After that they met a man named Allen Schezar and flew to Palas, the capital of the kingdom of Asturia, pursued by Zaibach. Zaibach managed to catch up with them in Palas, and once again Van, Hitomi as well as Van's childhood friend Merle had to fly away in the Escaflowne, leaving Allen to duke it out with the leader of the Zaibach troops. Evidently that was why they were here, in what Hitomi called a 'Dragon Graveyard'- Zaibach mined precious Drag-Energists from the fossilized corpses of the countless dragons that had come here to die. Dragons used these Energists like a heart, while they powered Zaibach's war machines, the Guymelefs. If they could destroy this mining operation, it would put a serious kink in their machinery.

Chrno held up a hand. "That's all very interesting," he said, "but I haven't heard anything about a war of this magnitude going on, and I'm pretty sure there are no dragons as big as houses on Earth."

That's when Hitomi dropped her bombshell. "It's not on Earth," she said, pointing heavenwards. The sun was setting and the stars could begin to be seen. But the stars weren't what were grabbing Chrno's attention; he was staring at something much bigger and closer than that, yet smaller and further away than he ever imagined.

Where one would expect to see the moon beginning to show itself, he found himself looking at the Earth above his head.