Flight from the Mystic Moon
While on the flying air-ship which Allen seemed to run as captain, I keep company with Celena. The room became mine and we dined together and sometimes Allen would join his sister. In a short period of time I came to realize many odd things that I suppose came with being sucked into a beam of light and landing on an invisible planet that thought earth was evil. Something was very wrong with Celena also. Not because she was sweet and polite, but she seemed to lack something that was ingrained in the human race, something she terribly lacked. Allen didn't seem to notice or was the reason she was this way. She lacked nerve and survival instinct. She didn't do things that could be difficult on her own and all the other men on this air-ship either didn't notice or didn't care, but I could see it. She was completely fine with sitting around all the time reading and talking about past events and not ever knowing about things going on right now. It was unnerving; the only use I'd made of her is digging up things on the current King of Fanelia, Van.
"So no-body here is gonna tell me anything I want to know? What the hell is with that? I ask and I know you all know, but will you tell me? I have the right to know! It's my mother! It's my life and it's my planet that no-one is helping me return to! What is wrong with you people?"
This was the argument that had seen me win the approval of the men under Allen's command and had also set me into room arrest with Celena. Allen had stared blankly for a few minutes apparently stunned before picking me up and removing me from the hoots and hollers of the crowd. I liked the crew Allen had. Still didn't like Allen though.
"You are most unlike your mother, Keori. Please do not make a disruption like this again." He said that but I was not allowed to leave to even try. So know I sat looking over a patch work of different colored earth below me. I didn't even know where we were going... Was Allen taking me to meet Van or was I just baggage? I cursed often which Celena found rather interesting along with almost everything else I did.
"If you didn't look like a woman you could easily pass as a man with your tone and speech. Allen is rather shocked with your language so he had to leave you somewhere. I'm sorry you have to stay in this room though…" She was far too nice and I was very tired of hearing her say she was tired, but her conversation gave me an idea; a beautiful one.
"Celena, you have to help me. Your brother won't and I need to return home. Do you know what it's like to have a home and not be able to go back to it? I need to get off of this ship or at least be able to walk around it without being disrupted. Can you help me? Will you help me?" The look I got then told me I was screwed.
Or so I thought.
"I think… I can help. I would want to get home and I would do… whatever it took to get there. The most I can do for you are to bring you clothes that might help." I grinned. I doubted anyone imagined I was so tired of being pushed around, that the hair my mother was so proud of and hung down to my tail-bone, was about to be chopped off.
"You bring me those clothes Celena and that would be great." I was getting out of this place.
By the time Celena had returned to the room, Most my hair lay on the floor in long lengths of brown. I stared into the mirror and looked back at myself with green eyes. My mother's eyes, I found it funny that here every one said I looked nothing my mother, yet on earth they all said I looked nothing like my father, Amano. So when I pulled on the mens clothing Celena brought I thought I could pass as a stranger if not for my voice. Only thing left was to get Celena to agree to take me where I needed to go and I knew an airship would have something along the lines of what I needed.
"Celena? There's just one last thing I need from you. I just need to you to lead the way and I will do the rest." I didn't feel bad at all for asking these things of her until later, but by then, what was done, was done.
With Celena at my side and dressed like one of the men, I passed complete unstopped. No one looked twice and I didn't, thankfully, run into Allen. I knew that a ship that flew had a cargo area and I knew every ship had some sort of safety precaution incase something went wrong. With my heart beating painfully in my chest, feeling like any moment Allen would grab me and take me back, I looked for and found what I needed. All at the same time though my body felt weak and sick; I was not a fan of heights in the slightest. In the corner hanging the length of the cargo hull were parachutes… or what I figured was.
"What are these?" Celena told me and I almost jumped with joy. "Great." I took one off the hook and Celena stepped away.
"What are you doing? Do you plan to jump?" She didn't think I was serious. Hell, I didn't think I was serious.
"I can't stay, Allen has no intention of helping me and I want to go home. Thanks for the help Celena." Celena took another step away and I peeked out the window. I knew if I so much as opened that door I'd be sucked out. I just needed to pluck up the courage to pull the lever to open the door.
"Please reconsider. This is not the time or place to do something like this." She was far to nice. Anyone else would be screaming their fool heads off or jumping at the chance to knock me down. I almost felt bad that she might get in trouble for what I was about to do.
"I can't. I hope to see you again though." I placed my hand idly on the lever and breathed like there wasn't enough air. A loud clank and sound of Celena's voice made me turn my head back and I listened to her talking to someone on a phone-type device.
"Yes, in the cargo hull. Please hurry. I don't' know if she even tied it right." If that was Allen I was in very severe trouble, but that was only if he could catch me. The only issue now was that my body refused to pull the door lever.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck…. Come on, just do it!" I yelled at myself. I must have looked insane. In the distance down the hall and even above me I heard the rumbling sound of feet on steel and iron catwalks. Men's voices calling out to each other and all of them talking about 'the girl'.
"Come on! Just do it! God dammit!" I was shaking, the pack on my back was heavy and the grip I had on the release cord was sweaty, my other hand white knuckle gripped the lever still unable to move.
"Keori!" Shit. I cranked my head and Allen stood next to Celena about 40 feet away. He waited. If I pulled the door open and they were any closer, they'd be sucked out with me. They stayed away and I could not be caught. It was a stalemate and I couldn't open the door. "Step away from there! Don't you dare do this!" I laughed at him. Loudly and nervously while my body shook beneath me, I was going to throw up soon if I stayed like this; that was how fearful I was.
"You think I was going to wait around for you to do what you want? I want to go home Allen! That evil planet of mine, I want back!" I screamed at him as more men gathered around to watch the situation.
"She won't do it, Allen. There is no way she is going to jump from this high up in the sky." I ignored that.
"You know nothing about this place! Do you think you can just jump and make it on your own, just like that?" Allen held Celena behind him to defend her like I was some kind of monster, and his arguement had a point.
"My mother did fine! Don't you think I can manage? Do I look that weak to you!" I was nowhere near as lucky as my mother. Allen still had my pendant and I had no cards to foretell the future… what was if they worked.
"Your mother, Hitomi was lucky to have made it as she did. It was pure chance she returned home." The magic word. He told me what I feared most, that no matter what I did, I still might not ever be able to return home.
I had tears on my face then, being told I would not or might not be able to go home. My mother and father, my best-friend and even my cat were beyond my grasp and in my mind I saw them all fade into black. Even now I was forgetting what my mother looked like.
"I will go home!" I put too much force into that sentence and pushed down on the lever before knowing it. Next thing I knew was I was surrounded my nothing. The ground rushed up to crush me in its grip while the sky refused to let me fly. I could do nothing but scream. I knew, and not from experience, that I couldn't pull the cord too early or too late. Perhaps I should have thought on this more… I couldn't hear my voice, my screams were carried away before my ears could catch them and as fell I figured I was close enough to the ground.. or at least I hope I was.
I yanked hard on the cord. Nothing happened and I continued to fall steadily towards my death. A large bang sound echoed above me and a black spot fell from the airship, so small that I could not make it out. I yanked on the cord again and again and nothing happened.
"Pull damn you, pull! Let go, you stupid parachute; work!" Something flashed in my mind and I pulled once more on the cord which released and caused me to be lifted higher as wings of cloth billowed out and caught air. I could have cried, laughed, screamed, or jumped for joy if I thought my legs could hold me up. When I looked back up I saw a figure I was not impressed to see and wished this thing would land nicely, but faster.
In the sky Allen's 'Gelmelef' dropped down at a frightening speed to catch up to me and I felt new fear. There was no water below me, only the thick, dense green of trees as far as the eye could see. And it was rushed up to meet me me far faster than I was able to cope with.
I continued to scream.