Yay! I hope you all enjoy reading this story as much as I love writing it. The plot gets deeper with every page I go through (whether in my notebooks or on MW). This chapter really gets the real object of this story going, aside from making it sound like a grown-up version of The Cyborg Children. But now that I've thought about it, it's gotten to be much better without 0021. Reminder! I don't own Cyborg 009!

"Blah" – spoken verbally
(Blah) – spoken mentally
Blah – personal thoughts

-&-&-&-

Riprendere

Chapter Two: Broken Destiny

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"Fuck off, Arien." Xiaka snapped. She jumped out of the helicopter and began toward Tsukasa's chambers. A boy, however, interrupted her as she pissed her merry way down the hall.

"Xiaka, we need to talk." A boy said. He had dark brown hair and blue eyes. "You, I hope, confirmed that Mirllyne was with them?"

"Pierre, I strongly advise that you get the hell away," Xiaka said. "I'm in a shitty mood, so don't mess with me."

Pierre grabbed her by the shoulder. "You're coming with me, Xiaka. I'll call Tsukasa and postpone your meeting with her. Right now, we need to have a long conversation."

Xiaka turned and looked him straight in the colbat eyes. She reluctantly sighed and followed Pierre back to his office. It was a large room, though not as vast as Tsukasa's office was. The walls were plainly black, and one wall was a window showing the underwater ocean, like Tsukasa's. Pierre sat down behind his desk, and Xiaka followed suit and sat in the only other chair in the room.

"So…Mirllyne is indeed working with them?" Pierre asked. Xiaka nodded. "As are the children of the shrines, and all of Generation Zero?"

"Yes, you bastard. How many times do we have to repeat ourselves?" Xiaka demanded, now idly playing with the water outside the glass. "They're all there…all but Hope."

-&-&-&-

Joe lay awake in his bed. Jet was snoring loudly, hardly two feet away from him in the dark, and making the impression that a rather large beast was breathing close by. But that wasn't the reason Joe was still awake. The reason was D.S.. Who was she? What did her name stand for? Where had she come from (well, he knew she was from France), and whom was she working for? Why was she helping him? How come no one else could see her?

Questions whirled around in his mind. Finally, when he could no longer take Jet's snoring or the pressure of thinking, he stood up and left for the kitchen. The Dolphin was hardly lit and this time of night, and whoever was piloting had to be on serious coffee and sugar every ten minutes. As he walked in, he found he was not alone.

"Morning, Joe." Mirllyne said. She, like himself, was in pajamas. She held a steaming mug, and the way the room smelled, it was probably tea. "Why are you up?"

"Mirllyne, did you ever know a person named 'D.S.?'" Joe asked. He didn't know why; it just came out of him. Mirllyne cocked her head to the side. She took a sip of her tea.

"Absolutely not." She said. She giggled. "Well, I'm going to try and go to bed. See you later in the morning, Joe."

Leaving the mug behind, Mirllyne rose and departed from the room. Joe sat down in the seat she had recently vacated, and found it warm. The mug was nearly drained; with only the lumpy tea leaves at the bottom.

"Oh, I didn't know anyone else was awake. Hello, Joe."

It was Pandora. She looked as if she'd awoken only recently from a vivid nightmare and was still thinking about it. She sat down in the seat across from him, seized Mirllyne's mug, and drank the remainder.

"I'm sorry. Did you want to be alone?" Pandora asked. She was extremely refined. Her icy eyes looked across to him. "Or did want you try and ask something?"

Joe blinked at her. "Have you ever known a little girl named D.S.?"

Pandora placed a hand on her head. "No, I don't believe I ever have. I'm sorry that I can't help you."

Joe smiled. "It's okay. Do you know why Mirllyne is so secretive about angels? Whenever someone asks her about their appearance or mannerisms, she finds someone else to talk to and doesn't answer."

This time, Pandora's eyes were as wide as hubcaps. She rose and filled the kettle with water and put it on to boil. As she sat back down, she looked to Joe.

"I know who she is. But she would murder me if I told you a word more on the matter." Pandora said in a hushed voice. Joe had to lean in to hear what she was saying. "But, in other matters, there seems to be a reason why she latched onto Sadie. I know Sadie and Francoise have never been the best of friends…"

Pandora silenced herself. "I've told you enough. Probably too much. I'm going to go to the bathroom and back to bed."

She, like Mirllyne, rose and left the kitchen. Joe felt the need to urgently talk to D.S. now that Pandora had brought up why Mirllyne was around. As if the tiny girl had read his mind, D.S. fell onto the table. Her hair was now tied in a loose braid and she wore pajamas.

"Bonjour, Joe. Comment allez-vous?" D.S. muttered drowsily. She stood up, upturned his palm, and laid down in it. "You called moi for a reason. What ees eet?"

"Do you know why Mirllyne is here? And what Pandora knows about it?" Joe asked. He looked to his palm to find the five-inch girl asleep. The tea kettle began to steam, awakening D.S. once more.

"Oui…I know why." D.S. said. "But eet would be best eef I deen't tell you quite yet."

With a small flash of light, she vanished once more. Joe was left even more puzzled from before. There was something being kept from him, and from a lot of other people too. But now wasn't the time. Now it was time to be asleep. He'd ask someone in the morning.

-&-&-&-

"Whatever genius can make cyborgs can afford lighting, can't they?" One girl asked another as they walked down the dark halls of the base.

"Yeah. What did we cost to remake?" The second asked. They had never seen what the other looked like; from the moment they'd woken up, they'd been in the dark. "This looks like the place, 0024. Shall we go inside?"

0024 nodded in the darkness and punched in an access code. For the first time in a long time, the two girls saw what they looked like and what they were wearing.

0024 had long, dark brown hair tied back into a braid that reached to the middle of her back and brown-green eyes. She wore a navy blue trenchcoat (had she been able to see the back, there was a large baby-blue gothic butterfly on it), a teal blue sleeveless turtleneck, a navy blue mini-skort over tight black capri pants, and knee-high combat boots bound with bright blue laces and decorative silver buckles.

The other girl was a little shorter and looked a few years younger. She too had dark brown hair, but her eyes were instead dark brown. Her clothes consisted of a black zip hoodie, a pale purple tank top, and dark blue jeans.

"Ah, 0024 and 0026. So nice of you to come." Pierre said. "As you know, we have arranged a false alarm to attract the cyborgs. There, you will capture 003 and return her here."

"We're going alone?" 0024 asked.

"Of course not." Pierre answered. "We're sending 0037 and 0049 with you. 0018 and 0020 will be waiting there for your arrival. I trust you understand how to operate these crafts?"

-&-&-&-

"I have nothing precious to me." Mirllyne said. "Wait…only one. Excalibur is my prized possession, and it's not really even mine. But that's another story for another time."

The girl smiled and played with the hilt of Excalibur. It was a beautiful thing in the light, especially with its strange crystals.

"So you really are a cyborg?" Lily asked calmly. "Then you're like us…I can't believe this…"

With that, she rose and left the room. Omega smiled sadly. The room was now deserted except for Mirllyne and Omega. Mirllyne laid Excalibur down on the table and sighed.

"How long," Omega began, "Are you going to hide the truth from them? It's not going to be long until the angels find you and tell them what you are. Would you rather tell them yourself or have them find out in a crueler way? The choice is yours, Mirllyne. We all know, as do the children of the shrines and Sadie."

Mirllyne lowered her eyes. "Omega, do you know something…anything…about Polaris? What happened to her?"

Omega stood and shook her head. "There are still stars in the sky. You can keep wishing, Mirllyne, but the wish won't come true until the end. I'll see you later."

Mirllyne was left alone in the living room with only the hilt of her sword as company. She picked it up and held it as if to fight an invisible opponent. A three-foot blade shot out of it, catching the light just as the other crystals did. Mirllyne smiled at it and cradled it in her arms.

"Are you okay?" Joe asked, poking his head in. Mirllyne barely had time to gather her thoughts before she realized another person was in the room with her once again. "Wow…is that what your sword really looks like? I thought it was broken…"

"No, Excalibur isn't broken." Mirllyne said, recalling the blade. She stood up. "And didn't you say that we were going to see what we could find out?"

"And why are you so happy about it?" Joe asked, keen about her reaction.

"Because, I get to show you what I like to wear in public. Tell the guys to tape their noses shut."

-&-&-&-

Half an hour later, Mirllyne breezed out of the bedroom she now shared with Sadie, Lily and Epona. Jet and Albert were walking by, having a choppy conversation. Then their eyes caught Mirllyne. Normally, she wasn't much of anything. But in what she was wearing now, she could have bid herself off for a couple thousand dollars.

She wore the absolute sexiest thing she could have found – tight black leather and silver buckles. Her jacket, which she carried in her arm, had buckles at the elbows and fell to her knees. At her wrists, it belled. It buckled six times across the front and a high collar with a buckle around it. What she wore without the coat was just as stunning. It covered from her neck down to her knees, a cross of black belts with silver buckles looped around her waist with the hilt of Excalibur hanging from them. At her knees, her boots began. The heels were only an inch and a half high and were thick. Instead of having her hair tied into its usual pigtails, it was tied an inch from her head in a high ponytail, and fell to her waist. The shirt covered her shoulders, then cut off. The neck came down to her chest, then came up in a cross around her neck, buckles and all.

"…Mirllyne?" Albert asked. She turned to look at him.

"Yes?" She answered. "I told Joe to warn you! And no, I was never a porn star. Get all the dirty thoughts out of your heads, 'cause I don't think Tirzah and Lily would be very happy if they caught you gawking at me."

Mirllyne continued on her way to the control room, putting her coat on meanwhile. Jet and Albert eventually managed to turn around and continue in the opposite way. As they did, they continued their conversation at a much slower pace. Seconds later, two entities swung down in front of them and knocked them off balance.

"Peace! Come along, boys, we thing we found something good this time." Tirzah said, jumping down over Jet.

-&-&-&-

While everyone else was in the control room, planning on investigating a possible Black Ghost scheme, one lone girl sat in the living room and working on her summer homework for college. As she sang quietly along to Hikari (the Japanese version of Simple and Clean), two figures walked through the door.

"Make me look like her." Both Pandora and Francoise demanded.

"I would like to look like Francoise for a simple reason," Pandora said. Sadie sighed and looked up at the two.

"Okay, fine." Seconds later, Pandora was an exact replica of Francoise. "Now leave me alone."

They left, talking happily once again.

"Would you please explain why the hell we're doing this?" Ra demanded. She looked highly reminiscent of a clash between Kingdom Hearts and Xenosaga with brown hair to top it off.

"Because," Panthos said, "What else would we be doing? Watching Pandora and Poseidon swap spit?"

"We are all laughing so hard, Panthos." Pandora said. Panthos did a double take when he saw two of the same girl in front of him. Both laughed. He rubbed his eyes and looked once more at the pair.

"Pandora insisted upon it being her that looked like me," Francoise explained. "Though I am still uncertain why."

Panthos looked to Fate. Fate looked to Epona. Epona nodded. They, at least, knew what the hell was going on, unlike nearly everyone else in the room.

"We're doing it to see if we can find out more about what happened," Fate said. "The main difference is this time, we can help you. I'm pretty sure that Tsukasa won't have…"

"How the hell do you know the leader's name?" Ra demanded, fingering a gun at her hip.

"How the hell do we know you're not working with them?" Mirllyne demanded right back to the crossover. Ra recoiled and shot them both a nasty look. However, this only raised more of an impression that she'd hopped straight out of a video game from her PS2, ribbed sleeveless turtleneck and cameos and all. The entire room, as a matter of fact, looked like an MMORPG.

And little did they know that this was so very true. Half these players were not what they appeared to be. One had a guardian looking after them, one had the devil at their back, four were to be torn apart, and the rest were in for rude awakenings.

"Look over yonder, cowpokes," Eleanor said sarcastically. "The rodeo's started without us. What a damned shame."

-&-&-&-

"Hey, there they are!" An anxious girl with blue-streaked light brown hair exclaimed. "Arien, they're coming right now!"

Arien, when not locked in the labyrinth of darkness, wore a black knee-length dress that tied around her neck to serve as straps and brown ankle-high boots. Her wings were out on display and her halo was above her head. No one was around this place to look at the interesting gaggle of people thrown randomly together.

First of all, there was 0024 and 0026. They looked strange to start it off. Then came 0020 and 0018, standing together and looking like brother and sister. After that, it was 0037 and 0049. To top it all off, there was Arien looking out of place in her dress. Each readied their weapon of choice as…

"HEY YOU! FUCK OFF MY PLANET!" Ra sounded off, pulling out her two biggest guns and firing full speed ahead with them. Arien smiled at the game-crazed seventeen-year-old tomboy and held out her own hand. The bullets continued to fly, and she was prepared. But none of the opposing gaggle was.

"And poof!" Arien exclaimed. The bullets froze in their places and fell helplessly to the ground.

"That was definitely the worst opening to a battle ever," Panthos said. "But forget that."

Seconds later, illusions of beastly creatures broke out from Panthos's hands. They weren't real, but having them cast from the illusion threads made them look just as bad as the real thing. Tie paused to watch for a second as he waved his hands around to sustain the illusions for a while longer.

(You communicate this way, do you not?) Fate asked. (If you do, then you can hear me. Fire at Arien and let her freeze your bullets for you. Two or three of you aim for her around her back, and the rest pick another cyborg.)

It felt as if no time had passed. These battle plans were formulated as if Fate had known what was going to occur. And going on what she'd told them, she probably had.

(You don't know what you're dealing with!) Mirllyne warned. (Fire on laser or something like that! Use your powers! Use acceleration! USE WHAT SHE LACKS!)

Apparently, this message got through loud and clear. If Arien was indeed an angel, then she wouldn't have an accelerator. This caught on fast. Arien was firing ice. She was the angel of ice. She didn't have fire. She didn't have water power. She didn't have transformation. She didn't have super-strength.

Four accelerators went off and Mirllyne began to relax. Omega appeared beside her and laughed.

"You think that just because you can do that, they'll believe you?" Omega remarked. "I may not have those things, but…"

"Put a sock in it," Mirllyne said happily. "It's my turn."

Mirllyne raced forward to meet her own doom. Arien turned and noticed her coming.

"Ah, Mirllyne. Why so angry? Was it something I did?" Arien asked sweetly, sending a swirl of ice crystals toward Mirllyne. Mirllyne held a hand in front of her and a shield of fire formed around her to protect her from the ice.

"I would have expected more from you!" Arien laughed. "You have a sword and all you can do is shoot fireballs! You're pathetic!"

Mirllyne clenched the hilt of Excalibur on her belt.

(Whatever happened to 0021?) Panthos asked. (She was Mary Sue last time. And what do we get? A sword-slinging fire-breathing bitch.)

(Panthos, STFU. I'm trying to sleep.) Sadie's voice clapped through his head. Mirllyne didn't seem very happy about this either and sent a rather large fireball flying toward him full speed.

(Now be quiet and stay outta my way.) Mirllyne snapped. The sword grew from the hilt and Mirllyne held it out to face Arien.

"If that's what you want, I'll LET YOU HAVE IT!" Arien shouted in reply. A flash of blue bounced around her from her feet up and her entire outfit changed. Her hair was now in two long French braids, decked with ice crystals. Her dress had become a sleeveless icy blue one and translucent white fabric graced from her elbows down. From her knees to her feet were thick black boots with icy crystals growing out of them. Her wings were now glazed with thin icy-white material. Multicolored tattoos stretched across her entire body.

"Let's do it." Arien said. Her voice was low and dangerous. Ice whips flew from her fingers. Mirllyne twirled Excalibur and deflected the ice.

(This could take a while…) Omega said sadly.

"Never mind this." Mirllyne said. "What did you come here for?"

"I came for 003!" Arien snapped. "Now hand her over and I won't force 0024 to use her favorite weapon on you."

Pandora ran forward. "Take me, then. They have no use for me."

Arien smiled. She flicked a hand and 0037 and 0049 seized her by the arms. Pandora cast Francoise and the rest a look that clearly read 'follow my lead and you'll be fine.' Or at least, it was something like that.

"Let's get going! The sooner we get her back, the sooner we get Hope!" Arien called. Pandora's face paled and flashed to absolute fury. She jumped off the ground and swung 0037 and 0049 down and they were knocked out. 0024 blew into a little whistle and giant blue monarch butterflies came flying out of thin air.

"So, you aren't 003…are you…" Arien said, seizing Pandora's neck.

"No! I am! I promise!" Pandora cried. Even her voice was the same.

"That who's that over there?" Arien asked with a note of satisfaction in her voice.

"My sister." Pandora answered. "Night, Arien."

With a snap of her fingers, Pandora knocked out all the opposing cyborgs and Arien. They vanished and Pandora gave a sigh of relief. In seconds, she looked like herself once more. Panic had set into her features.

"Let's go back. And get away from here." Pandora said.

-&-&-&-

Tsukasa and Zaffiel were awaiting Arien's less than graceful return. Arien was swearing up and down in every language she knew at Pandora.

"Need you be so loud?" Zaffiel asked. "I don't think they can hear you in Tibet."

Arien kicked her. "The message is out, dammit! What the hell else do you want me to do?"

"Calm down, for starters. Then you can sit down." Tsukasa said politely. Arien gathered herself and sat down in the black swivel chair. "There. Relax, Arien, that was just to get them warned for it. Now Pandora will be freaking out and defense will be low."

-&-&-&-

Joe lay in bed once more wondering about the events that had occurred that day. Why had Pandora directly lied? He slid further toward sleep. Pandora and Francoise did have stunning similarities, such as both being 003 (well, Pandora was –300), but did that matter?

Finally, a black curtain draped across his vision. But it wasn't dark for very long. After a minute or so, an indirect light began to shine. He heard far-off laughter, as if he were in a vast mansion. The giggling drew closer, but the light continued to shine dimly in another room. It was almost like he was in another person's dream. The giggling now sounded as if it were only a few feet away now.

"I'm so happy you made it tonight!" A female voice said happily. Three female figures walked into the room. All three wore red silk nightdresses. The one who had spoken had a long blonde braid running down her back and icy blue eyes. The girl next to her had a sheet of silvery hair that fell to her waist and clear, bright blue eyes.

From here, Joe was able to make some bizarre guesses at the first two girls. The first girl looked like Pandora without a haircut and cool-colored clothes on. The silver-haired girl was obviously Selene. As the last of the three girls stepped into enough light for Joe to see her features, his heart skipped a few beats. Her hair was honey blonde, flipped out at the ends, and was held by a red ribbon. Her eyes were like two shimmering aquamarines as they caught the light.

It was Francoise.

The three sat down on an embroidered couch. Pandora turned to her companions. Briefly, the dream was interrupted by a flash of white light. An image of a sad-looking girl holding her wooden box came to him. This was the Pandora he knew, except wearing a knee-length skirt. The first dream returned.

"So, Selene, is it true?" Pandora asked. "Are you planning to marry Endymion?"

Selene blushed lightly. "Yes, it is. How, by the way, did you know?"

"Eos told us." Pandora explained. "Pandora, did you decide to marry Prometheus?"

Joe was confused. Why had Pandora called Francoise by her own name? This dream was getting stranger every second he stayed asleep. Francoise seemed to react to this name, however.

"Oh…yes. I'm going to move away to live with him." Francoise said. Pandora sighed. It was obvious that this was not the same Pandora Joe knew. This was probably her mother, or something of that sort.

"I still find it strange how we're not related in any way, and yet we are so very similar to one another." Pandora said. "I'm going to miss you when you move away. Will we ever get to meet him?"

Francoise nodded happily. "But of course! He's coming to visit us tomorrow. I know you'll love him, Pandora. He's very kind.

"We won't take him." Selene promised. "The two of us already have boyfriends. And besides, our taste is different."

The dream was interrupted once again. This time, it was an image of a glittering silver city with the moon draped in the background. In front stood Selene, Luna, Diana, Artemis and Umbra. What the hell was going on? Was Sadie doing this for the hell of it?

The three burst into giggles again. Judging by the way she looked at them, Selene was the eldest. No one else seemed to be in the house with them.

Joe thought it was strange that none of them had noticed him yet. As soon as he had gotten the thought through his mind, Francoise's head snapped up as if to search for someone. She looked straight at Joe for a few seconds, then turned her head away. She made no movement to tell the others. It seemed like she hadn't even seen Joe standing in front of her. He took a step closer.

The dream went completely blank. In the distance, he heard someone calling his name urgently. But it was a dream, so did he have to answer to it? Another image slide show began. The first image was of a blazing bronze and gold city with Apollo, Helios and Eos in front of it. Then it was a shot of Epona is a tropical garden. The images stopped flowing and…

"We're gonna have to do something drastic soon if this doesn't stop!" A worried, anxious voice screamed. She was far away…Joe wondered if that was part of the dream or if it was really happening. It was no matter, anyway. He now stood on a dirt driveway with a huge mansion behind him. There were clouds of dust and carriages all around him. A carriage was pulling up and Francoise was dashing from the mansion's porch. As the door swung open, Joe froze in his spot instead of walking to get a closer look.

He had just stepped out of the carriage. If he wasn't dreaming, he wouldn't have believed what he was watching. But he wasn't so certain about the dream part of this now that so many people he knew were in it. What was doing this? Was Black Ghost trying to lure him toward doing something? No, that was impossible, Black Ghost was gone.

After kissing briefly, Francoise introduced dream-Joe as Prometheus. Prometheus politely kissed Pandora and Selene's hands. Francoise hugged both her friends, then took something from one of her many bags.

"I want you to have this, Pandora," Francoise said. It was a small wooden box with a golden latch. Pandora took it from Francoise's hands and eagerly opened it…

The dream vanished.

"JOE! JOE!" The girl's shrieking voice was drawing closer by the second. There were several other voices talking at the same time in worried tones…loud blipping noises sounded all over…he opened his eyes to find a starkly white Pandora sitting on his chest, watching him.

"Oh my God," She said breathlessly. She looked at Joe as if something horrible had just occurred. "What the hell is going on?"

Pandora's voice sounded horribly shaken. As Joe looked around, he saw more of the people on board looking terrified: Fate, Jet, Albert, Sadie, Lily, Tirzah…but where was Francoise?

"Pandora…" Joe said slowly. Pandora's focus returned to him. "I was having this strange dream…there was a woman who looked like you…and one who looked like Francoise…and Selene was there too…"

"Joe, what happened in this dream?" Pandora asked, getting off of him. She grabbed him to sit up as Lily put pillows behind him.

"Well…you, Francoise, and Selene were all in a house, talking. Francoise was telling you how she was moving away to live with Prometheus. Then it changed and I heard someone screaming…"

"That wasn't a bizarre dream, Joe. You were looking at what happened thousands of years ago." Pandora said. "Do you know what was happening?"

Joe shook his head.

"You and Francoise were dead."

-&-&-&-&-

HELL YEAH! This is probably one of the single most important events in the story. I'm getting so used to writing character death, it doesn't even seem strange anymore. What is strange is all the stuff I have…I'm gonna be dead by the next semester…