Prince Sid sat upright in the middle of the throne, his small figure swallowed by an enormous chair, sweat beading his brow. The sweltering heat of afternoon seemed amplified by the council's heated arguments volleying back and forth across the room. The main topic of discussion was the rumor that the country of Seri was building arms again, spies saying Seri's armies had doubled in the past year. This rumor had coursed through the many kingdoms that Seri was seeking to complete what Zaibach couldn't finish: a complete takeover of Gaia.

The council argued over everything from building their own standing army to leaving Seri alone. Sid let them propose ideas and vent frustrations, noting which ones were plausible and which were absolutely ridiculous. Only one man refused to join in on the debate: Councilman Takhna. Sid noted the heavyset councilman was strangely silent this meeting, watching the others languidly like a waiting panther. When the whirlwind of arguments paused, wanting to be fair, he turned to Takhna, "What do you suggest, Takhna? You haven't voiced your opinion, yet."

Taking his cue from the prince, Takhna began to speak. "We must ally with Seri, denouncing all of our other alliances." Shocked silence engulfed the room before the torrent picked up speed again, everyone chorusing protestations and insults at Takhna. When the roar dwindled to a murmur, Takhna spoke again, his voice imperious, "I feel this is the *only* option we have at this point in time." He challenged Sid with a condescending look. "You *asked* for my opinion, my lord."

Sid tried to swallow through a dry throat, not liking the turning of events. Seri and Freid had never been on good terms with each other, especially after what was now becoming known as the attempted Zaibach takeover. "Why do you think that?"

"Seri has power, the power to destroy Freid if they want to. Creating an alliance with them will give us a peace of mind."

"You're forgetting what happened with Zaibach!" Councilman Klnik shot, voicing everyone's opinion. "We were allies, and look what happened! They came and tried to destroy our kingdom! Damn it, they completely destroyed the capitol!"

"And what did our alliance with Asturia do?" Takhna retaliated, his voice an even mechanical sound. "They abandoned us. They willingly *let* Zaibach into our borders. I say we cut off the alliance."

"No!" Sid interjected, unable to keep quiet much longer as Takhna openly insulted the people that he had admired. "Allen came and warned us about this. It's our fault we didn't listen. I am not cutting off any alliance with Asturia."

"Is that so, Your Highness?" Takhna inclined his head, his tone containing a hint of derisiveness.

Sid continued, bent on converting Takhna to his point of view. "Our main allies are Asturia and Fanelia. Without their help-"

"Fanelia is a backwoods country which is just starting to get back on its feet again," Takhna interrupted, refusing to bend. "Its king is a young prince who'd rather play with Guymelefs than orchestrate a complete economical rebirth."

"You forget Escaflowne helped us," Sid's cold voice chilled the room, despite the blanket of heat covering the room.

"Escaflowne is dead, your Highness," Takhna parried. "It hasn't been seen for two years, and the king of Fanelia seems to have no intention of bringing it back again. All Fanelia is is a burden to our economy. Isn't that why you're going there tomorrow? To give them more money?"

Sid bared pearly white teeth, prepared to slice down Takhna's stone exterior, when Kaja, his bodyguard did it for him. "You are speaking out of line, Takhna!" he snarled, hand on his hilt. "How *dare* you speak to our king in such a disrespectful manner!"

"How dare *you* address me without my proper title, Kaja." Takhna's eyes flicked uninterestedly towards him before returning to the young king. "You can not harm me for speaking my opinion."

"Your opinion is treasonous!"

"It is merely an opinion. I do not need to defend myself."

"Your fine words can't fool me, you worthless..."

"Enough!" Sid's tiny voice rang through the hall like a great gong, abruptly halting Kaja's next barrage of insults. Sky blue eyes fixed on Takhna, reflecting the older councilman's stubborn resolution. "I am *not* going to betray either Fanelia or Asturia, Councilman Takhna, no matter what."

"The withdrawal of an alliance is not betrayal, my Lord."

"You don't seem to understand, Takhna. I think it's best that you see Fanelia for yourself, since you are cooped up here in Freid all the time. Therefore, you will accompany me to Fanelia tomorrow."

Takhna bowed his head slightly, his mouth forming a ghost of a smirk. "If your highness wishes it, I am eager to go."

"Then I shall go too!" Kaja declared, eyes driving daggers into Takhna. "I will see this arrogant son of a dog humbled!"

Sid nodded, wearily. He could not pierce the adamantine shell surrounding the councilman, regardless of how much effort he put into it. An undercurrent of murmured agreements followed Kaja's declaration, fierce eyes targeting Takhna.

"Council dismissed for today," Sid called, rising from the pillow, redirecting any festering hatred towards Takhna. He did not want the council to turn into another feeding frenzy, though it appeared that was what Takhna craved.

All bowed respectfully as Sid turned to leave. His bodyguard trailed behind, casting warning glances towards Takhna, whose bow was less than civil. "I don't trust him, Majesty," Kaja muttered, thumb playing with the cold steel of his sword in tune with his thoughts of Takhna. "Why are you taking such a volatile man with you to Fanelia?"

"To show him what I'm doing is right!" Sid sighed, easing the weight of the crown off his head with a tiny hand. "Once he sees how hard Van is working, he'll turn around."

"Why do you need him to? All he does is argue with everyone else and demand that his ideas are best!"

"Because he helped us rebuild Freid. His solutions and connections helped us to get back on our feet again. I have to convince him to do the same for Fanelia."

"If you say so, Majesty," Kaja grudgingly conceded. "I promise you to keep a close eye on that one while we are in Fanelia."

"Thank you, Kaja." Sid smiled warmly at his doting bodyguard. Ever since Kaja had taken the role, he had acted like a surrogate family to Sid. He was glad to have such a staunch supporter with him; it helped ease the weight of the crown a little. Especially since there were vicious jackals among his council, patiently waiting for Sid to make an error and take over the country. Sid had no way of knowing who they were but he prayed one of them was not Takhna himself. The man had been instrumental in picking up Freid's pieces and rebuilding it almost to its former glory. If only Sid could convince him to do the same for Fanelia.

* * *

A gentle breeze wafted in from the window of Hitomi Kanzaki's room, rippling the curtain into rolling waves of energy. It pulled at the pages of her textbook, mischievously contemplating whether to turn the pages or not. Hitomi brought a stop to that with a firm hand, not losing concentration in her studies. Seeing it's first target unmovable, the current changed course to the next available prey: a deck of cards. "Oh, no," Hitomi moaned as the deck splattered all over the floor and her. She plucked them off her lap before diving to gather the rest off the floor.

Hitomi's heart accelerated as she saw the two upturned cards lying together on the floor, the edges barely touching each other. With a knowing grin on its face, Death was edging closer to the Tower as if predicting Hitomi's own fate. Tentatively she reached for them, dreading the tingle she hoped wouldn't come. An ominous thundering like the beat of a timpani rumbled in her head, in tune with her quickening heartbeat. She touched them.

Nothing.

A sigh of relief escaped her lips as she picked them up, placing them with their companions in the deck. No visions or predictions of the future had come to her since she had visited Gaia and stopped fortune telling. She wondered if her magic had been tied with her own desire to know the future; and now that she no longer wished to know, it had dissipated.

/I'm just a worrywart, like mom,/ she thought, absently shuffling the deck in her hands. The visions had always been tied to Gaia before, so now that that world was resting in a pillow of peace, there was no need for her magic. She allowed her thoughts to meander, bringing up the radiant image of a dark-haired angel in her mind.

"Van," she whispered, smiling to herself. She could feel him, even now worlds apart, fluttering in her mind like a moth on the edges of her consciousness. If she reached for him, that bright star within herself, he would cross the dimensions that separated them and appear before her, a transient being in her world. Slowly, she pulled back from the temptation, not wishing to bother him. He was busy rebuilding Fanelia. Although she would have welcomed a brief visit, he needed to be on his world right now, not speaking to a lonely girl in Tokyo.

"Hitomi!" The shout snapped her back to the present moment. She twisted her head to glare at her younger brother, Kazuo, scowling at her in annoyance. "I've been calling you for *hours*! Are you deaf or something?"

"What are you doing in my room?!" Hitomi shot back. "Don't you know how to knock? What if I had been getting dressed?"

"Like *I* wanna see your naked bod," Kazuo snorted, contorting his face to show his disgust. "I'd rather keep my lunch in my stomach."

"Do you mind?"

"Hey, I thought you gave up playing with those!" He indicated the tarot deck. "Trying to see if you get a boyfriend in the future?"

"You aren't going to *have* a future if you don't get out of my room!" Hitomi stood, hackles raised and fists clenched.

"Ooo, I'm scared! What're you going to do? Kill me with paper cuts? Mom! Hitomi's threatening me with a deck of cards!"

"Kazuo, you...!"

"Hitomi! Kazuo!" Mother stormed up the stairs, irritation crackling around her. "Are you two arguing again?"

"She/he started it!" Fingers pointed accusingly at the other sibling.

"That's enough!" Mother held out a package neatly wrapped in a furoshiki to Hitomi, conveniently placing herself between the bickering siblings. "Hitomi, could you be a dear and deliver this to the Suzuki's for me?" she asked.

"What about Kazuo?" Hitomi demanded as her little brother made a triumphant face at her, sheltered by their mother.

"I asked *you* to do it. Since you don't seem to be studying, I think you have the time."

Hitomi took the package, scowling at Kazuo who was laughing silently at her from behind his shield. "Fine," she muttered, walking huffily out of the room and down the stairs. She marched straight to the platform near the outside door, put her shoes on, yelled, "I'm leaving!" and closed the door before the ritual answer reached her.

She blew out all her frustration into a large breath, then walked out of the yard. "Why are little brothers such pains?" she complained, cradling the large bundle in her arms. She glanced up at the overcast sky, bleakly gray, hoping it wouldn't rain before she got back.

She stepped out onto the street, tucking a hand into her pocket. The deck of cards started to vibrate against her hand, thrumming through her fingers with little waves of energy. Hitomi swiftly withdrew her hand, allowing the deck to fly out of her pocket, slicing into the overhead clouds. Rain poured down from the gaping wounds, shifting to blood red, pooling on the ground. A dark blanket crashed over the street, erasing away the familiar scenery. Hitomi dropped the package from her mother, heart thundering in her chest. As it hit the ground, the earth began to shake, birthing a Gymelef in an angry detonation in front of her. More Gymelefs burst from the earth like tall weeds, bleeding red in the onslaught of rain. Through the looming mecha, Hitomi saw Escaflowne and Shezar, two white knights standing alone surrounded by the ocean of Gymelefs she was in, some she remembered as Zaibach's creations.

"Van! Allen!" she cried out, running frantically towards them on legs made of lead. The ocean swarmed at the white Gymelefs, rumbling around her as she ran, enclosing Escaflowne and Shezar in a broiling ocean. She continued her futile run as the ground gave way, chunks of red earth splitting apart from beneath her feet. Screaming, she fell in the darkness with masses of crimson earth whirling around her until she collided with the ground. It was a wooden floor, with three white paper walls stretching to infinity around her in the darkness. "The castle at Fanelia," she whispered, recognizing the bleak interior. Rising, she noticed the gaping mouth of black before her, a dark shadow concealing the rest of the room. Prince Sid backpedaled out from the shadow, eyes wide with fear, oblivious to Hitomi's presence. A gleaming knife edged closer to him, the assassin slowly emerged from the curtain, hands first, then chest, then...

The screech of rubber on cement brought Hitomi out of her vision in time to see the red car tear towards her in a futile effort to stop.

* * *

Van despaired at the looming piles of papers that were all marked "Needs to be done *today*" growing on his desk. He felt secluded in a small cell, trapped by three thick walls of paper. If any more came, he wouldn't be able to see over the wall without standing. It didn't help matters much that he spent one minute working to every ten staring out the window into the inviting scenery, wishing he didn't have to be indoors. He bit down on the brush handle, half-toying with the idea of shoving a pile off the desk so he didn't have to sit upright to see the window.

A soft thunk, like the sound of a pillow hitting a wall, startled him out of his reverie. To his horror, the pile had grown since he last looked at it; he couldn't see over the wall without looking up. And the sight there was something he rather wouldn't see either.

"Your Majesty, you should spend less time preoccupied with that window and more time with *this*," Uran gestured wildly as he admonished, nearly knocking over parts of the wall. "There is the castle's repair to see to, foodprices to decide upon, and there is still that... are you even listening to me?!"

"Yes," Van answered automatically, scanning another fifty-page proposal for the clearing of the forests to produce more farmland. Administrative decisions had never been his forte; he was more comfortable in a warrior's armor. Uran helped out, when the Wolf-man wasn't chiding him for being inattentive to his many lectures on how to govern properly. He leafed through the report, then tossed it aside in the growing pile behind his chair.

"That is *not* how you treat such documents, your Majesty!" Shocked, Uran hustled to the pile, fishing for the discarded proposal.

"I don't want to burn half the forest just to get farming lands," Van answered, reaching for another set of papers. "We have good enough soil and resources to farm on the land already cleared."

"You aren't taking into account the population boom." Uran's voice sounded muffled, mingling with the sounds of shifting papers.

"Ten children born this year isn't a population boom."

"Yes, but there is the *future* to consider. We have the potential to rebuild..." Van dropped Uran's murmurs into the background, burying himself in another stack of papers.

"Master Van!" A welcome, cheery Merle leaped on top of the wall, eyes glowing. "Allen and his sister have just arrived with Miss Milerna! They're waiting for you in the front hall!"

"Oh, good." Van tried with difficulty not to leap out of his seat and sprint to the hall to greet them, dropping the documents back on the desk. They could wait.

"What about these?" Uran emerged from the discarded pile shaking a chunk of papers in earnest.

"I wouldn't want to be rude to our guests," Van hedged, forcing his legs to slow to a walk. Merle pounced after him, knocking down an entire section of the wall to Uran's chagrin. Van hid a smile, reminding himself to secretly thank Merle later.

A gentle breeze embraced the sun-dappled outdoor bridge leading from the central building of the castle to one of the smaller areas, playing with the pendant around Van's neck. He took it wistfully in his fingers, drawing up the vision of a dusky-blonde girl in his mind with a pang of guilt. It had been a while since Van had actually had time to visit Hitomi on the Illusionary Moon; the demands of Fanelia greatly outweighed the yearnings of his heart.

Through the broken roof of the walkway he could see the Illusionary Moon, a blue-green globe dotted with white wisps that was Hitomi's home. When he visited, they could never touch; only look and speak. That was enough for both of them, it was better than eternal separation. He absently caressed the glowing crystal with his thumb, reaching for her bright presence in his mind.

Like a bolt of lightning, a cold dread struck deep in his back, racing urgently along his nerves to envelop his whole body. Pain followed briefly on its heels, grabbing Van's spine, twisting it into knots before leaving as quickly as it arrived, bursting from his chest, leaving a place of emptiness in Van's heart. The dread congealed into a mass in his stomach, coupled with fear. He heard Hitomi's faint mental cry echo in his mind before it was torn away, her shining light snuffed out.

"HITOMI!" he cried out, wings exploding from his back. The column of light shot down from the sky, yanking him towards the Illusionary Moon. Blinded by the brilliancy, he pressed himself further upwards, fear driving him faster. The column started to change around him, swirling red and white punctuated with a wail starting its crescendo. The alien sound shrieked around him, battering his eardrums and tearing away the light like threads of silk.

His heart stopped beating. Hitomi lay pale on a stretcher being hauled into the large vehicle (he remembered it was called an ambulance), plastic veins slowly dripping life-giving liquid into her. The doors to the ambulance slammed shut, denying him entrance, and sped off to its destination. Trailing it, Van willed himself to breathe through lungs that felt like they had collapsed, praying to any god that would listen that Hitomi be okay.

* * *

Hitomi was alive. Barely. According to the doctor, she was in a deep coma. Van sat empty on her bed, placed in a sterile room lit by a cold white light emphasizing the pallor of her face. Her family was crowded around her, unaware of the shell of an angel sitting beside her. Van had retreated into a cocoon of nothingness, unaware of time slipping by in flocks of well wishers and friends voicing their concerns for Hitomi. He stared at her unmoving pallid face, his heartbeat anchored with the constant beat of the heart machine.

Nothingness was a fleeting companion. Memories of Hitomi approached him timidly, seeping through the cracks in his cocoon. Her angry face as she complained about Kazuo. Hitomi sighing in despair at the thought of University Examinations. Her tender smile, eyes alight with love, every time he visited.

His heart wrenched inside his chest as he focused on those green-gold eyes; the same ones he might never see again. Grief twisted his heart as guilt and shame applied their fetters on him. He should have been there. He should have protected her. /It's my fault./

Tears burned his eyes, coursing down his cheeks as grief moved up to clutch at his throat. He tried to swallow it down, but it stubbornly remained as the guilt clawed at him. "Hitomi!" he sobbed, allowing the sorrow to swallow him whole, escaping in violent shudders as tears streamed down his face. He hid his face in his knees as he grieved, drawing them closer to curl into a ball of little comfort. He couldn't feel her presence in her mind any more; he was alone. Only the incessant rhythmic beep of an alien machine and the frustrated sobs of her mother in tune with his own gave him company.

The setting sun had washed the room orange, painting a deceiving color on Hitomi's face, before Van had finished crying. Empty and exhausted, he retracted his wings, wiping away the residue of salt on his face, looking towards Hitomi. He wanted to touch her, to gently brush aside the dusky gold tendrils of bangs clinging to her forehead like her grieving mother was doing now. Even that tiny comfort was denied him; his fingers passed through her as though they were mist when he tried. Truth laughed mockingly at him, he did not belong in this world. This was not his reality, but hers. And he had to return.

The constant ache anchored in his chest, weighing heavily as he laboriously rose, his legs shaky from a day of sitting. "I'm sorry," he whispered to her mother, a bundle of sorrow tearing her handkerchief apart like the threads binding Van to her world. However, forgiveness and empathy could not come from dead ears; a body so attuned to her daughter that no voice could reach her. Like Van, she had locked herself away in her own cell of self-contempt.

Reluctantly, he brought forth the column of light, his eyes remaining on the deathly pale face of his lover. Too spent for tears, he memorized every detail of her face as the light surrounded him and dropped him back to Gaia.

* * *

He was deposited in a bleak, untouched section of the palace where the repair staff had yet to visit. Van sifted through charred wood and paper, venting his frustration and grief through clearing a path out. When he had made it through the lake of charred remains and had entered the hall, Merle was scampering towards him, Allen close on her heels, both looking relieved.

"Master Van!" Merle jumped on him possessively, grinning with delight that he was finally home. Worried, she studied his face. "Are you okay?"

He gave her a ghost of a smile as he brushed her rose-colored hair out of her ears. She was all he had left, now.

"Van!" Allen hurried towards him, blue suit flapping in his haste. "How is Hitomi?"

"Is something wrong with Hitomi?" Merle's gaze wandered back to the room she had come from in confusion.

"She isn't dead," Van managed to say around the lump in his throat. He bowed his head, hiding behind his black bangs as tears threatened again.

"I see." Allen stood in indecision for a time, before placing a comforting hand on Van's shoulder. "I think you had better come with me. There is someone you should meet."

Reluctantly, Van allowed Merle to pull him to the room she and Allen had come from, dragging the manacles of guilt with him. He heard Melerna's bright chatter coupled with Serena's solemn alto, both prying Allen with questions as they entered. Merle tugged him inside, Allen shushing the two women with his hands. Van peered bleakly through his crop of bangs, raising his head only slightly to acknowledge the visitor. A young woman was sitting on a placemat between Melerna and Serena, confusedly measuring her surroundings. Van's head snapped upright as he saw her, his heart forgetting to beat. /It *can't* be!/ he thought, staring into green-gold eyes as familiar as his own.

"Hitomi?"