Escaflowne 1. Javchan

Author: Jav_chan

**The Witch of Gaea**

For a long time she didn't say anything. He wondered if she even spoke. Allen hadn't said anything about her, what she was like, or why she was so important. Her mid-length hair was tied off into a tight braid, and the clothing she wore was as revealing as any of the other women that worked here. The expanse of pale skin that he could see was enough to make him swallow…at least until he saw the faint bruises that littered her shoulders and arms. For some strange reason he felt uneasy about those blemishes. His stomach churned as his mind skirted around the possibilities of _how _she could have gotten those bruises.

"The Tower. Seperation. Change." She finally turned to address him, holding a strange card up in her hand as she stared at him. "This is what you represent."

Her voice was even and strong and it really didn't match the expression on her face. Something about her green eyes were bruised and dull, and as he studied her hands he noticed that the strange card shook in her grip.

Van knew that she had to be the woman that Allen had sent him into the border territories to retrieve but for some reason he couldn't equate the picture that the knight had painted of her with the faintly tanned woman that stood in front of him.

"You…"

"My name is Hitomi." She said softly before turning back to the desk. Without uttering another word she started to gather up her cards. "Kio wouldn't tell me yours."

"Kio—you never spoke to Allen?"

When Hitomi turned around she gave him a smile that was indulgent, the type that a mother would give a demanding child. Something about that irritated him and if they weren't so pressed for time he would have said something.

"A former Knight of Caeli and the military strategist of the Abaharaki prancing around Zaibach's border towns?" She shook her head, turning around abruptly and reaching for a strange pale blue bag.

Van had a rather distinct feeling that she was laughing at him. He didn't pay too much attention to Hitomi as she put her cards into that bag. It wasn't until she reached for a bow and a quiver of arrows that he realized how much they would stick out.

"You can't bring that. We have little enough time as it is. We'll stand out to much if you carry a weapon. The bag is bad enough as it is."

"Oh hush." Hitomi snapped, her back still turned to him as she pulled a crumpled roll of leather and a clunky cedarwood cane out. "You have a sword."

"But I'm a man. You aren't."

"Such observation skills, dear sir. Don't worry. Now do you think you could tell me your name?" It was almost curious, the way her tone and words were so easy and yet she held herself too stiffly, as if she was painfully aware of what little time they had to leave.

As if she was afraid.

She unscrewed the silver head, an elegant etching of a cluster of feathers, and he watched as she pressed at the top and bottom arc of her bow. The wood suddenly straightened, and it was only then that he noticed the pieces of brass against the dark wood. He blinked, more surprised then he should have been, when the neatly collapsed bow slid easily into the apparently hollow confines of the cane. Several arrows quickly followed, and then she was screwing the feather top back on. She laid the cane down briefly, before undoing the ties of the leather roll.

The leather roll, it turned out, was nothing more than a less obvious version of her blue bag. She stuffed her bag, along with a quiver of arrows, into this leather monstrosity. Before she could reach for the shoulder straps, Van stalked over to her and picked it up. He knew that his own expression was just as stubborn as hers as he hoisted the bag over his shoulders. The weight was enough that it made him stagger slightly. How could she carry it so easily? That alone was enough to make him reassess her supposed frailty.

He wanted to know why she looked so bruised, so broken, even underneath the obvious steel in her personality. It just wasn't the time for it. They needed to leave—

A sudden commotion from downstairs had him swearing as his hand moved towards his sword. He hated travelling without the sword that was his family heirloom but if they were stopped it would make it much too obvious. He listened hard and tensed at a familiar, raspy voice.

Damn Dragon Slayer.

For a moment he forgot about his duty. For a moment he wanted nothing more than to try his luck at spilling the blood of the man downstairs. Then slim fingers wrapped around his wrist and he was suddenly reminded of his priorities. Her face was paler, almost white, and he could feel her fingers tremble slightly.

It didn't surprise him that the Dragon Slayers were the cause of her tension and distress, but he did wonder if there had been more chaining her to this brothel besides a duty she felt towards the Abaharaki. If perhaps she felt a need to…protect the women who worked here.

"The back." She whispered. The sharpness of her tongue seemed to have disappeared, as if withering under an old, debilitating fear. "There is a back stair that should allow us to leave without them noticing us. We need to hurry."

She held back at first, as if she needed some sort of shield between whatever could possibly await them in the hall. The possibility made him uneasy, but thankfully the hall was as dark and quiet as it had been when they had first arrived. The way she peeked out around him grated a bit, and made him think that there was some truth to Gaddes' theory that there is no creature more puzzling than that of a woman. Although he appreciated her sense of caution he would have appreciated it more if she was less timid about it. It was only for a very short time that she hid behind him but somehow it almost seemed like an eternity.

She made a small sound, it might have been a sigh but it was probably the loudest sound that she would allow herself to make as she carefully led him down the back stairs. She froze only once, her slim fingers wrapping around his wrist as she froze. Her eyes had suddenly gone wide and her mouth was almost colorless. It was only when he stopped to ask her what was wrong that he heard Dilandau's harsh, grating voice.

"_Bring her to me. She knows something."_

Instinct had him reaching for his sword, but it was the tightening of those fingers around his wrist that stopped him. A shiver snaked down his spine when the surprisingly soft pad of her thumb brushed lightly against the receptive skin of his inner wrist. She tugged at his hand in a manner that was so faint he would never had felt it if he wasn't suddenly concentrating on her. Her too wide eyes were regarding him and something told him that this woman _knew_. She knew who it was that was responsible for the scar that was almost directly over his heart, for the reason that Fanelia had burned. She knew all of these things and others that she just couldn't.

He didn't understand this sudden knowledge, but it was seeing the silent plea in her eyes, the wordless beg for him to stay his hand this one time. There would be time enough for vengeance later.

Seized by a sudden impulse, Van pulled her close and he only noticed the faint tremors as he wrapped an arm securely around her waist. A thought that was too wicked, too Allen-like, came to him when he glanced down and saw her pale cheeks colored with a faint blush. It appeared that whatever it was that she feared was right on the other side of the wall beyond the secret stairs. It also appeared that she was the type who needed to be distracted to be kept from thinking about things that would one day break her. For some odd reason he felt rather grateful that distracting her was a simple matter.

"Hitomi." He lowered his head so that he spoke very close to her ear. She stopped and shivered a way that he just knew that had nothing to do with fear.

"Midori!"

For a moment he forgot that he was in enemy territory. Van jerked and looked up, feeling a bit like a child who had just been caught doing something wicked.

Although that certainly wasn't too far from the truth.

The madam of the establishment hurried towards them. He eyed her warily. She was called Eries, after the late princess of Asturia. Her hair was the same pale gold, but the way her ears pointed at the tips had nothing to do with the golden caps that the princess had been so found of. A bruise marred her cheek and Van knew that it hadn't been there when he had arrived. Hitomi pulled away from him suddenly and something about her _changed_. Her green eyes narrowed, almost angry, as she rushed towards Eries.

"He hurt you." It was said simply and when her voice shook Van couldn't tell if it was from anger or fear.

The elvish madam gave Hitomi a rather sardonic smile. "He's looking for you, Midori."

"He'll tear this establishment down."

It irritated Van how she could go from being so clingy to concerned and foolish. While he certainly couldn't dismiss the injury Dilandau had inflicted upon the madam, they just didn't have time for this. Allen was convinced that this woman was a very important key to winning the war. A witch with abilities even someone as sensible as the former knight could believe in. He really didn't care about that at the moment. What he did care about was getting this woman to safety as he had been _advised_ to.

With that bastard so close, too close, they needed to leave _now_.

"I know you don't want to stay here, Midori. You've always hated it here. Not surprising though all things considered. You may care about me and my girls but you don't care about what this place stands for."

Hitomi took a step back, almost as if she had been slapped. He didn't care for her hurt expression and found himself stepping forward to stand by her side before he was even aware of what he was doing.

"We know better then you do," Eries continued, "the risk that we are taking. We knew it the day we took you in at Dryden's request. You've done a lot of good here, and helped us to stem Zaibach's influence in this area, but there isn't anything more that you can do. Besides you promised Allen, didn't you? That when the Abaharaki came you would go. Now leave. We both know what will happen if he finds you. This man," He couldn't help but flinch when her eyes darted over to him, "is sworn to protect you."

Van really didn't remember making any such vow, but he something about those words felt strangely right. His fingers curled around the hilt of his sword and something inside him, something that he hadn't even been aware of, shifted. It was almost as if there was something that had been missing since Fanelia had fallen two years ago, and he had found it.

Eries led them out to the stables where a horse was already saddled and ready to go. Van busied himself with settling and tying Hitomi's bag on the horse. He didn't say anything when the madam pulled Hitomi aside to say a few final words of farewell.

"Leave Midori here. She has no place outside a brothel." The woman's lips lifted up when Hitomi's twisted down in disgust and the younger woman shuddered at the memories of the past year and a half. "Become Hitomi once more and let Midori become nothing more than a shadow."

When Van looked over his shoulder to see if Hitomi was ready to go her expression was unreadable. She didn't utter a sound as she walked over to him and he helped her into the saddle. It was only when he snapped the reigns and the beast suddenly took off that she gasped and wrapped her arms tightly around his waist.

It wasn't an unpleasant feeling.

XXX

They had almost reached the edge of the dense woods where Escaflowne was hidden when they heard the sounds of pursuit. Dilandau's grating voice carried along the wind shouting orders for his dragon slayers to cut them off.

"_Bring me his head!"_ His spine stiffened when he noticed the all too familiar edge of insanity that laced Dilandau's voice. Hitomi's hand twisted in his tunic suddenly and he could feel her press her cheek against his back. It was the next words that made her shiver, _"And you will bring her to me!"_

Even as he urged the horse faster, Van couldn't quite stop himself from wondering just what this woman was to Dilandau, and what he had done to her to make her fear him. The possibilities were endless and each one made him ill. Gripping the reigns in one hand for one bone jarring moment he placed his hand over hers where they were clasped around his waist before taking the reigns again and snapping them.

"Just a little bit more. I promise," He hesitated a moment before continuing. Van just didn't know what spurred him to say it, and he only hoped that he didn't sound like a fool, "I won't let them touch you."

He almost didn't hear her softly whispered word of thanks.

XXX

It had been easier than he had expected to lose Dilandau's men. They had abandoned the horse not long after entering the forest, and Hitomi had pulled a small satchel of dried flowers from the pocket of her dress and swiftly tied it to the saddle. Van had no idea what it was, and he didn't care. Whatever it was, it was enough to keep the Dragon Slayers—the finest stealth warriors Zaibach had to offer—chasing a riderless horse. He could only hope that the horse would keep going long enough. Hitomi had assured him that it would, but that didn't reassure the unease that churned in his gut.

The forest was dark, the trees thick enough to drown out most of the sunlight, and there was no noise. No sounds at all. He wondered at how Hitomi walked behind him so soundlessly. If it wasn't for the hand that trembled faintly in his grasp it would have been easy enough to forget about her. Van kept his sword ready. It would take some time to get to Escaflowne, especially now that they had been forced to relinquish their horse, and he didn't dare think that their luck would hold that long.

It was only a short while later that they were discovered.

Dilandau was never one for subtlety, but his appearance had still taken Van completely by surprise. The way Hitomi had curled her fingers until her nails were digging into his skin had been the only warning.

"_I've found you Van!"_

The half crazed shout had him dashing to the side, pulling Hitomi with him as a sword sliced through the air at them. His landing was less than graceful and dirt and decayed leaves filled his mouth and blocked his vision. Just behind him Hitomi emitted a strangled sort of sound and when he finally managed to brush the leaves and dirt away he just barely noticed the way she was scooting back until her back was pressed against a tree. There was a rush of sound and instinct had him rolling away from the spot even though a leaf in his hair was still obscuring his vision. There was a whispered word, he couldn't quite catch it, and then the air was thick with the feel of _something_ and Van could suddenly see again.

"_You bitch!" _This time it was Dilandau who was distracted, fury etched into every line of his pale face. _"You stupid, traitorous bitch!"_

Van didn't have time to glance over at Hitomi to see if she had moved away from the tree or to wonder why the leader of the Dragon Slayers suddenly rushed towards her, his crimson eyes glinting with a crazed light. They were close, much too close to the tree that Hitomi was huddled against by the time his blade met Dilandau's wild swing. Those red eyes focused on him, a look of confusion briefly crossed that face, as Van used his momentum to send him stumbling back.

He needed to finish this quickly. Although there was a strangeness in the air that seemed to prevent the sounds of their battle from carrying, and even though he knew that—for the time at least, Dilandau's subordinates were distracted, he needed to get Hitomi to Escaflowne and get back to base.

He didn't hesitate to dart forward meeting Dilandau's wild return strike. A chill snaked down Van's spine at how inhuman Dilandau looked at that very moment, snarling with his eyes a bloody red. He looked like an animal, the muscles in his neck straining as he tried to push Van back. It was as if he was gripped with a single minded determination that was focused on getting to the woman just behind them.

Dilandau wasn't seeing him at all.

Another time he would ponder that, but right now the murderous bastard was a wild enough fighter that Van needed to fight him with everything that he was.

"_Out of my way, Van!" _

Sparks jumped up from where their blades connected as the young king met every one of those thrusts. It was nearly overpowering, the way it way it vibrated from the tip of his sword all the way down to his bones. If the situation wasn't so desperate then he might have laughed at the nearly ticklish sensation.

Balgus had always chastised him for letting simple things distract him from a battle. It was those words of reprimand that flitted through his mind when he heard a scream behind him. His grip faltered only slightly, but it was enough for Dilandau to take advantage of. The nearly insane force of his blade sent Van stumbling back, his own sword flying from his grip as he fell back. Something thrummed in the air, something that made his back, just below his shoulder blades itch but there was no time to think about it. No time to think at all. He was rolling, going through the motions of training that had been ingrained in him ever since Folken had disappeared, his mind focused on one thought. _Get the damn sword. _

"_Look out!_" His hand closed around the hilt of his sword at the same time the shrill, feminine shriek rent the air. He was turning, his sword swinging in a desperate attempt to block whatever attack it was that was coming his way. The strange heaviness in the air seemed to grow thicker and it made his movements feel sluggish. He did finally manage to turn fully to face the attack that he just _knew _was coming. It was the dark material that was so very different from the Dragon Slayer armor that made him pause. It really wasn't time, and it certainly wasn't the place for it, but for some reason Van really couldn't help but notice the way that her bodice seemed to push her chest _up_.

It was a soft, almost pained gasp that diverted his attention from the brief expanse of pale skin and made him look up at her. Her green eyes were startled, wide. Everything felt strange, almost surreal. Then his gaze went down until it landed on the blood stained, silver tip protruding from just under her breasts. He couldn't look away from the dark stain growing on her dress. Hitomi let out a soft, pained cry as the sword was pulled from her body with a sickening _squelch_. The soft cry echoed in his ears with all the force of a shriek. Even as his hand tightened reflexively around the hilt of his sword he couldn't bring himself to look away as she started to fall.

XXX

"_Why do I need to go?" It was a struggle but Van just managed to keep his voice neutral. "Just because his kingdom had been razed to the ground didn't make him any less a king. He wasn't some errand boy that Dryden could order around, leader of the __Abaharaki__ or not. Besides weren't these _escort _missions more Allen's style?_

_Dryden's brown eyes were solemn__,__ something about the way he gazed down and idly touched the flat top of the ruby embedded in the center of the ring that was a gift from his now estranged fiancée made Van realize just why Allen wasn't being asked for this. A look that could have been regret shadowed his face before he finally spoke. "We didn't know what to do with her__.__"_

"_Her?"_

"_By the time Allen came across her too many people had seen her and rumors had spread. Bad rumors. The type that __drew__ the attention of Dornkirk and the Dragon Slayers." Dryden ignored the way Van stiffened __at __the names and continued. "They were scared of her gift, of her Sight. She's a Seer, Van."_

"_Seer?" "Van was starting to feel like a parrot._

"_We needed to hide her. We thought __where__ we put her she would be safe."_

"_Who is _she_?"_

"_If Zaibach were to discover who…what she really is and where she came from it would spell disaster for us. A Seer is one thing that we can't let them get their hands on."_

_He resisted the urge to sigh and resigned himself to the fact that he really wasn't going to get the answers that he wanted. He had forgotten that birth didn't really matter to this man. Once a merchant by trade, Dryden valued talent against all else. If it wasn't for Dryden__'s__ own personal issues with Allen then Van might have taken some pride in the fact that _he_ had been selected._

"_Where is she hiding?" Most likely it would be some back water village that was far away from the fight as possible. His hands clenched into fists at the thought. _

_It was only then that Van realized that Dryden hadn't answered him and—was he wringing his hands?_

_The leader of the Abaharaki was indeed wringing his hands. If Van hadn't known __him__ for so long then he wouldn't have noticed the tiny nuances in Dryden's usually self assured expression that indicated that he was __embarrassed__._

"_A brothel in one of the border towns near Zaibach Proper."_

_It was several moments before the former king could find the words to speak._

"_You left a Seer—someone who could possibly change the course of this damn war—at a whore house on the outskirts of the _original Zaibach kingdom_?"_

_Averting__ his gaze, Dryden __tapped__ his lower lip __thoughtfully__, his voice careless. "Yes, we did. It wasn't until later when I recalled a rumor I heard that unless it is done with proper ceremony a Seer can lose her gift once her virgin's blood has been spilt."_

XXX

He couldn't remember what had happened to Dilandau, something that Allen berated him for once they were safely behind the walls of the Abarahaki fortress. He had just reacted, as was his tendency. One hand had just reached out for Hitomi, catching her as she fell, as he lashed out with his sword. Whatever he had done had been enough to make the Dragon Slayer shriek in pain and rage. When Van had looked up again, once Hitomi was braced against his chest, he had seen Dilandau stumbling back, shrieking as he clutched at his cheek. The memory of the burning of Fanelia was still fresh in his memory and now, someone he was supposed to protect was bleeding because of that bastard. It had been so very tempting not to give chase. It was the way her blood was already soaking through his tunic, that he could feel it's wetness against his skin which quelled that urge. He would never be able to forgive himself if he let her die.

Van drove his sword into the soft dirt before settling her down on the ground. She let out a pained gasp at the sudden jostling, even though he tried to be as careful as possible, and her eyes opened slowly to watch him. She was silent, her breath pained as he shredded his tunic on the edge of his sword. A strange sort of calm settled over him—it nearly evaporated when his fingers brushed over the soft curve of her breasts as he untied the laces of her bodice, his face had never been so hot—as he wrapped the strips of fabric over her wound. Aside from her breasts—his thumb brushed against a curve as he tied the final strip and despite the situation he couldn't help but marvel in their softness—it wasn't that different from dressing the wounds of someone on the battlefield.

His stomach rolled when he sat back and looked down at his gloves. They were wet and completely soaked with her blood. He shuddered and resisted the urge to rip them off. He would need them to fly Escaflowne.

Hitomi cried out when he gathered her up in his arms. Her fingers clenched before laying flat against his chest.

"They're coming." She gasped and turned her head so that her cheek was resting against his shoulder. "We need to go now. I can delay them a bit, but you need to hurry."

It was awkward but somehow he had managed to pull his sword out of the ground and sheathe it.

The heavy sound of hooves coming their way was just reaching his ears as he moved into the thick undergrowth that obscured the trunk of a nearby oak. He held onto her tightly as he tried to make them as small as possible as a horse came to a stop right in front of them.

"They'll leave soon." Hitomi whispered so faintly that he could hardly hear her. He wanted to ask her what the hell she was talking about, but he couldn't speak. It had nothing to do with worrying with whether or not Shesta and the other Dragon Slayers heard him. Did she really have to move her head so that her mouth was pressing against him like that? She was making it really hard to listen to what it was that they were saying, and it didn't help that undergrowth was muffling the sounds of their voices.

At least he was pretty certain it was the undergrowth.

For all of the legends that surrounded his mother's blood line, Van had never been one for magic. The closest he had ever gotten to _magic_ was at the rite of dragon slaying and the blood pact needed to awaken Escaflowne. Dryden's talk of seers, mystics, and the powers of a mermaid's flesh was something that he had always tried to stay far away from, but even he could admit that there was some strange, mystic quality to this forest. Even that strange pressure was back.

A whisper rustled through the trees and the horses shifted, causing the Dragon Slayers to mutter uneasily.

"I've found him! I've found Dilandau-sama!"

He didn't recognize the voice, but then with the one exception of the time when he had stayed in Fort Costello and the Dragon Slayers had accompanied Zaibach's Strategist and the Asturian King, he had never known who the individuals who made up Dornkirk's pet group were. That had been several months before Fanelia had been razed to the ground, and King Aston had already been reduced to little more than a puppet.

It didn't long for them to leave the clearing after that, and it was only Hitomi's pained breathing that forced him from their hiding spot the moment the sound of horses' hooves had started to fade away.

"Come." She turned her head away from his chest—Van wasn't certain if he was grateful for that or not—and looked across the clearing. Branches snapped, causing his grip around her slender form to tighten in reflex, and it was a full heartbeat until a nose pushed its way through, and the intelligent brown eyes of their horse stared back at them. It didn't hesitate the way Van did and made it's way over to them as if it knew that time was of the essence.

Grabbing the reins he wasn't as careful with Hitomi as he should have been, they had wasted enough time as it was. He gave her a soft murmur of apology and with a snap of the reins the horse took off into a quick gallop. They needed to reach Escaflowne before Dilandau found it in the next village otherwise they would never make it in time.

"Next time," He looked down at her as their horse ran through the forest. Her mouth, tight with pain, was curved into a smile. "Next time, pay attention to the battle, Your Majesty. Not my breasts."

When had he told her that he was a king?

XXX

He couldn't stop staring at his hands. Van had known that her blood had soaked through his gloves but he hadn't expected it to be so much that it had stained his skin red. His stomach wanted to be violently ill, but he owed her this much at least. He had to stay here and make sure she survived.

* * *

**Word count: 4,997**

* * *

**Well, Suils spoils all my fun. She wouldn't let me keep this tidbit:**

Van gasped and arched into that delicious touch. "Gods." His voice was rough as the calloused fingers slid over his skin. He reached for that dear face, twinning is fingers in that golden hair, and moaned at the sensations.

"Gods, Allen!"

**Be thankful to her.**

**Shameless Pimping:**** Also there was a whole section with a quote from Golden Girls in which Allen is referred to as a ho. I will be posting that to my own ffn account as a separate piece.**


	2. Spirit0

Author: Spirit0

**The Guardians**

Most people tried to forget that he was a demon. And most of the time, it was easy to forget. People thought about how young, how kind, how concerned he was for them. People looked at him and saw a thin, muscular fifteen-year-old boy preparing to be a man, working hard to be their future king. These people were proud of him, their prince, and would smile at him, bow to him, give him fruits and vegetables they had grown and crafts they had made. They had no fear of him; he looked just like any of them — Fanelian, and by extension, human. That's why most of the time, it was easy for them to forget he was a demon.

But he knew that with the dragon-slaying ceremony, his rite-of-passage to become king, being in a few days, people were talking now, talking about his demon blood and whether it had cursed the royal Fanel family. Both of his parents had passed away when he was a young child and his brother, Folken, was presumed a coward that ran away or dead after never coming back from his rite-of-passage ceremony. People were wondering if he'd have the same fate, and assumed that if he did, it was from the curse of his Draconian blood.

There had only been one time that he had made the Fanelian people come face-to-face with his demon self. He had been a smiling four-year-old, ready to show off for his adopted sister, Merle, to prove to her that he could _so _fly, just watch! Merle had begged him not to, begged him the whole time that they climbed up to the roof, but he wouldn't listen. He had been so excited, feeling the light wind and the sun on his bare chest on a warm day, staring down at the ground far below and knowing that he would be soaring above Fanelia, that only he, his brother, and his mother could do such a thing. He let his wings burst from his back, his tiny white feathers falling slowly to the ground below, where people stared up at him and gasped in horror while he jumped off the roof.

He tried to flap his wings once and one of them faltered and he was spiraling to the ground almost as soon as he'd jumped. Panic overtook him, but there was nothing for him to do but watch the ground as it got closer and closer. He wanted to cry. But his mother flew up to catch him before he hit the ground, before he started crying, before anything bad at all could happen to him. She held him to her chest and he watched as her feathers, the feathers of a full-grown, full-blooded Draconian, began falling to the ground, as her wings folded in, to shelter them.

_"Van_, _ you must never show your wings to anyone. Promise me,"_ she said, her lips forming a frown he'd never seen before, a frown that made him cry into her chest while he apologized and promised never to show his wings again.

His wings felt like they were crushing him sometimes, though, forced to remain inside his body, waiting to come out and stretch, waiting to soar through the sky. But he didn't let them out, not even this late at night on his balcony overlooking his country, because he was afraid that someone would see him and be reminded that he was a demon and needlessly fear him.

He went back inside his room, pulled back the covers on his bed, and got under them. The night, he told himself, was for sleeping, not for thinking about flying to the moon.

xxx

_"God, protect me during night and day, as well as my mom, my dad, my brother, my relatives, my cousins, my friends, and everybody else in the world, Amen."_

It was a stupid prayer that she'd made up when she was a stupid eleven year old that she said every night. It was stupid for lots of reasons, one of them being that "relatives" was an all-encompassing word that would make it so that she didn't have to say mom and dad, brother and cousins. Another thing that was stupid about it was that God couldn't protect everyone in the world and she knew it. God couldn't even protect her friend and long-time crush, Amano, she'd found out the next morning, the morning after Amano had been killed by one of his fellow track and field teammates.

But even the day after his death, she still said the prayer before she went to sleep. She wasn't sure if she believed in heaven and spirits and souls, but just in case, she hoped Amano's soul was protected, that it rested in peace in heaven. It was all very stupid, she told herself, but she couldn't change the prayer now, after four years, nearly 1500 nights, saying it.

She was afraid of sleep, though. Before he'd died, she'd seen his death, his being shot, in a nightmare. But like most dreams, it was fuzzy and not based in reality, and she forgot the specifics of the dream only a few hours after waking up. Even when she was telling him about it, she had difficulty explaining it. He'd just laughed it off anyway and ruffled her hair before they went their separate ways to class. She'd forgotten about it by the next day. It was only now, after he was dead, that she was afraid it had been a prediction of the future.

At school, her friends would ask her to do tarot card readings, mostly of their love lives, and even she had to admit that her predictions were eerily accurate. And then her dream, the dream she wished she'd never had, came true. Would her current dreams come true? They were even worse than the first, not in content, but in the way they possessed her thoughts, unwilling to let go. She got stuck in the dream, even when she was awake; she was forced to roll around, to feel itchy, to feel thirsty, to feel irritated, to feel sick to her stomach, to feel sad. She eventually took cold medicine just to make her sleepy, to make her eyes droop, her limbs relax, and her brain think of more pleasant things than being chased by a man with black hair and red eyes and a sword who was trying to kill her. He never actually succeeded in killing her, he couldn't catch her, and sometimes he didn't even seem like he wanted to catch her or kill her, he just stood there, looking at her. But he carried a sword, and always they would both start running again, running through the undefined and unfamiliar setting.

This routine of being paralyzed by dreams even when awake, being chased by the man with the sword, the taking of cold medicine to fall asleep, continued each night. She fell asleep during most of her classes at school. Her teachers let her off the hook, because they knew Amano had been her friend and that he'd just died and that she must be going through a rough time. She did not tell her mother about her problems sleeping. Her mother looked at her daughter and saw how tired she was, but said nothing. Her mother only seemed distressed about it once, when Yukari had called her to inform her, in an anxious I-don't-know-what-to-do voice, that her daughter had fainted at a track meet. Yukari had waited for her to regain consciousness, talked to her briefly in an attempt to cheer her up, and then walked home with her.

She took a shower when she got home, then did her homework and ate dinner and did some more homework. Then she attempted to go to sleep. She fell asleep, but a few hours later woke up, plagued by her raven-haired assassin. She crept downstairs to take her cold medicine.

But there was none left. Every night, she'd realized there wasn't much medicine left, but had forgotten to go and buy more every day. Now she only had a few drops. That wouldn't do anything. That wouldn't keep the itchiness, the anxiousness, and most importantly the assassin, away. For the first time in over a week, she felt alert, awake, while trying to think of ways to make herself the exact opposite: apathetic, asleep.

The only real solution was to go out and buy some more cold medicine from the 24 hour convenience store a few blocks away. She went back to her room to put on clothes. She put on her school uniform, even though she had a fleeting thought that perhaps the skirt would make her a target for sexual predators and decided that she didn't care, because the sword-wielding killer in her dreams, she decided, wasn't a sexual predator.

It was a quiet walk to the store at 2 AM. There was no one else walking around and only a handful of cars passed by her on the way there. Funny how less people made it more creepy. When she entered the store, the sales clerk looked immediately towards the door. Funny how the one person in the most lit up place she'd been so far was the one who scared her the most.

She placed the cold medicine on the counter and went to pull out her wallet. She didn't notice that the man at the counter did not scan the cold medicine and tell her the price.

"I need to see your I.D.," the clerk said. She looked up at the sound of his voice. He was looking right at her with his tired brown eyes and a solemn frown.

"What?" she asked.

"I need to see your I.D. To see if you're 18. I can't sell you cold medicine if you're not 18."

"Why?"

"You could get high off of it . . . or overdose," She knew that the sales clerk thought she was already high off of it . . . which meant she was more likely to stupidly overdose on it.

"Oh. Right. I'm sorry for the inconvenience," she said, reaching for the medicine to put it back on the shelf. The clerk grabbed it first.

"It's okay. I've got it. You should just go home," he said, sounding concerned. She figured his real motivation was that he didn't want anything to do with her if she actually did overdose or get killed on the way home.

She started walking back home, resigned to the fact that she had to tell her mother that she was having trouble sleeping and that she honestly needed to see someone, a doctor that could prescribe her sleeping pills or a psychologist that could sort out her jumbled-up mind, so that she could sleep again. She could feel her eyes start to water with tears. That's all she wanted. To sleep peacefully again. Why couldn't she just go to sleep?

xxx

Lying in bed, his hand placed on his forehead, Van wondered what life was like on the Mystic Moon. He got up and walked out onto his balcony so that he could see the Mystic Moon, as if this would make his imaginary visions of life there more real.

There was a lot of blue on the Mystic Moon. Water, he supposed. Oceans. He'd never seen the ocean. If the Mystic Moon had oceans, were there mountains there, too? People? Draconians? The Mystic Moon didn't seem too mystic in his mind. It was probably exactly like Gaea. There would be no Draconians there. And even if there were, they'd be considered demons, just like here.

He really needed to go to sleep. His dragon-slaying ceremony was tomorrow. Funny how the reason he needed to go to sleep was the same reason he couldn't go to sleep. Ironic. He leaned on the railing of his balcony and did not smile. He half-expected his swords-master, Balgus, to come in his room and tell him to go to sleep. Balgus usually had good timing like that. And Balgus had complete confidence that Van would succeed at slaying a dragon.

Despite all his swordsmanship training, he had never killed anyone or anything in his life, minus a few bugs that he found crawling in his room. He had never been in a fight that wasn't controlled by and fought under the watchful eyes of Balgus, who would never hurt Van. He had no desire to fight or kill things. Violence only perpetuated more violence.

And he still didn't understand why he had to kill a dragon anyway. What had the dragon done to him? Nothing. Sure, the Fanelian city was protected by mountains and walls to protect themselves from wandering dragons, but wasn't that only natural? The dragon didn't know any better. It was just trying to live the only way it knew how. And why shouldn't it fear humans? He was human and he was the one hunting the dragon.

He remembered asking his brother when he was only a little boy why the Fanelian princes had to kill dragons. His brother had simply said that it showed they were worthy of becoming king, that they would be strong and be able to protect Fanelia. Folken had said all of this with a smile on his face, not a malicious smile, but one that showed Folken found Van's sympathy towards the dragons just as commendable and courageous as killing a dragon was supposed to be.

He wondered if the dragon he would fight would be the same one that killed his brother.

The dragon he would fight. He gripped the railing of the balcony. The dragon he _would_ fight. It was a definite thing. He would do it. He had to do it. Because if he didn't, he'd be like his brother. Weak. Cowardly. Dead. He didn't want to fight the dragon, much less kill it, but he definitely didn't want to die. No. He had to kill it. He had to show everyone he wasn't cursed. That he'd make a good king. He had to show that he was strong enough to protect his people. So he had to kill it. He had to.

"These are such selfish reasons to kill a dragon . . ." he whispered to the night. He gripped the railing more tightly. Protecting other people wasn't selfish, he told himself. That was the main reason he had to kill the dragon. If he failed, who would rule Fanelia? It would leave Fanelia open to political chaos and foreign invasion. He would hate to see the rural country his forefathers had founded be forced under the control of one of those more urban countries, like Astoria or Zaibach. Especially Zaibach. He'd never heard anything good about Zaibach, with their new technologies and emphatic studying of history.

Time passed. He did not sleep. The sun rose and he did, too, his eyes feeling tired by his mind alert, fueled by the adrenaline of anxiety. Today was the day. Today was the day he'd kill a dragon. That he had to kill a dragon. He threw on his clothes and went down to breakfast. Nobody spoke to him because it was plain that he did not wish to be spoken to.

"I will escort you to the edge of the forest at the base of the mountains, Lord Van," said Balgus. Van mounted his horse and nodded. The weight of his armor made him pity the horse.

Many Fanelians lined the main road to see him off. Merle clung desperately to his leg, telling him over and over to be careful. He found that he could smile at her and reassure her that he'd be all right. He could lie to Merle, if it would wipe away the tears that were forming in her eyes.

They reached the edge of the forest in what felt like no time at all, compared to the night he'd spent lying awake, waiting and waiting for the sun to come up so that this day could begin and then come to an end. Van and Balgus sat on their horses staring into the forest for a moment.

"You'll want to leave your horse somewhere safe, Lord Van. Somewhere where the dragon you are fighting can't harm it."

"Yes, Balgus."

"You will return by yourself, with the dragon's heart, the Guymelef energist, to prove that you slayed the dragon and are Fanelia's rightful king."

"Yes, Balgus."

Balgus stared at Van and Van stared back, stared openly at the scar that went from Balgus' scalp, across his left eye, sealing it forever, almost to his chin. Balgus had many scars. Van had never asked about them. He knew that Balgus had been through many wars and fights to protect Van's father and mother when they were still alive and he wondered if the swords-master could even remember how he'd gotten all his scars.

"Remember, Lord Van, that the dragons can sense your fear and your anger. To gain an element of surprise, you must rid yourselves of these emotions. And remember that only a dragon's stomach can be pierced by a sword. The rest of its body is covered in protective scales."

"I'll remember all your advice, Balgus."

"Then I know that you will succeed, Lord Van," Balgus said, before he turned his horse around and kicked it into a trot. Van watched the trail of dust become fainter and fainter from his mount.

xxx

He waited outside a dragon's cave all day, but no dragons came until nightfall; this made him regret even more that he hadn't been able to sleep. His adrenaline had started to wane during the day, during the hours of crouching outside the cave, waiting. But he could feel the adrenaline coming back when he spotted a dragon coming towards him. The dragon did not see him. He waited until the dragon was closer before he sprang.

He'd misjudged the distance and the size of the dragon, though, and the dragon's yellow eyes locked on to his figure in a heartbeat. The dragon bared its teeth, its forked tongue going from side to side. He tried hard not to think about how one of its teeth was the length of his arm. The dragon let out a squeal of warning before it sprang at him, forcing him to roll out of the way and be off guard.

He dodged the next attack and got back on his feet quickly, running towards the dragon, holding his sword in both hands, ready to jam the point into the dragon's stomach. But the dragon's tail was faster than his legs and it took all his balance and strength to jump back before its barbed tail tore him in two. "Shit," he said under his breath, conscious of the dent its tail had made in his armor.

It only got worse. He could see the fire burning in its throat for only a second before it came shooting out of its mouth. He'd only had a second to unlatch the shield built into his the armor on his arm to protect himself from the fire. The shield was a useless piece of charred, smoldering metal after the attack.

He had no time to discard the shield. He started to panic and realized that now it was too late to dodge. If he let the dragon get close to him, let the dragon touch him in any way, he was done for. But he couldn't jump out of the way. It would crush him with its giant feet. A flash of wings came into his mind. He could fly away. But what about the armor?

He took his chances since the other option was assured death.

It hurt a bit, forcing the muscles he hadn't tried to so much as flex for over ten years to sprout from his back, to fit through the cracks at the sides of his armor, the place where the front armor plate connected to the back, to launch himself into the air, to fly. To fly for the first time in his life. To fly for his life. To outfly the dragon, when it realized what he was doing. To fly away to the Mystic Moon.

xxx

She was glad that going back was always shorter than going somewhere because she was starting to become scared of the dark. The streetlights only made it scarier, in a way, the way they cast her shadow and the shadows of trees, cars, making them look like shifty people, ninjas. Except ninjas weren't real. She had to keep reminding herself that everything that existed in the dark also existed in the daytime. And the stuff in the dark didn't attack you in the daytime.

The last street she had to cross was up ahead. There were no cars going through the light. She looked behind her every once in awhile, scared of sounds she wasn't even sure she'd actually heard. She could see the headlights of a car far off down the road. She was almost at the light when she saw a flash. Lightning. She started walking faster. Something flickered on her left that wasn't lightning. An attacker. She jumped and balled her hands into fists, as if she actually knew how to fight and had any strength. Her hands fell to her side quickly, though, when she realized it was a long white feather. She was at the corner when she saw another one and reached out to catch it.

Then she was watching the corner, the ground, the Earth get smaller and smaller. The car passed at a crawl below.

xxx

He flapped his wings and went higher. He was flying. The dragon was flying, too. But he was faster than the dragon. He heard its angry screech as it tried to keep up, struggled to rise higher and higher, before it gave up.

Even though the dragon didn't pursue him anymore, he kept flying higher and higher, because he hated himself, hated how he had failed, just like his brother, had failed and had been reduced to his demon-self. What if someone saw him? Knew how he'd cheated during his rite-of-passage? He would never be king. His people would be forced to remember the curse his Draconian blood had brought upon them and become leaderless. They would have to exile him. He flew higher and higher.

The dusk turned into night in a flash. Literally. He stopped flying and just hovered, looking around. There were all these lights on the ground that didn't look like fire lamps. There were stars in the sky, but there was no Mystic Moon. A small, white circle hung in the sky. It looked like the moon that hung beside the Mystic Moon, only smaller. Was that possible?

The land below had trees and grass and houses, he could see, but the houses looked strange. They all looked so . . . ornate. So much detail put into the roof and the wood surrounding the windows and the doors and even the material the actual house was made of. And there were all these winding paths between chunks of houses. Roads? Why was nothing next to them? No houses or stores? And how was that sign bright like that? He shouldn't be able to read it in the dark. And why were there parallel yellow lines splitting what he supposed was a road? And honestly, why was there different colored, man-made rock that lined all the roads?

A person was walking on these man-made rock tiles along the side of the road. He supposed it was a girl, since she was wearing what looked like a skirt. A very, very short skirt. Could she not afford better clothes? And what was with that bland top? Very unbecoming. And what kind of heathen girl was she, to be walking around in this darkness, even with all these bewitched lights around? She should be at home, sleeping.

Moving lights. He spotted them in the distance, moving rapidly. He couldn't make out its body too well. But a creature that had lights that projected for eyes! He was glad that creatures on Gaea didn't have such abilities. And this one seemed so fast, too. It was sticking to what he thought was a road for some reason, though. Maybe it was just a path for all these creatures. And that girl was about to cross its path.

The girl had stopped walking and seemed to be looking at something in her hand when he swooped down and lifted out of the path of the Light-Eyed creature. He had to beat his wings harder to lift two people, even though she didn't feel too heavy cradled in his arms.

She focused her attention on the ground first before turning to him, her lips slightly parted and her eyes wide, much wider than they should've been normally. He stared back at her just as blatantly, wondering what she saw in him, because all he saw was a girl with ridiculously short hair, an uncouth outfit, and eyes that could look pretty if they didn't look like the eyes of a crazy person, although he was already pretty sure she was a crazy person.

"Am I dead, too?" she whispered, still looking at him.

"No . . . I saved you."

"Saved me . . ? I thought you were supposed to kill me."

"No. I saved you. From that creature."

"Creature?"

She wasn't just crazy, she was dumb, too.

"The creature that was coming towards you. With the eyes that could project light."

She looked down at the road. "You mean the car?"

"Is that what you call those creatures?"

"They're machines . . . What are you talking about?"

"Machines?" he asked. "Like Guymelefs?"

"I must be dead . . ." she whispered again, looking away. "Or dreaming . . ."

"Neither," he insisted, beginning to fly again. "Would you be able to feel the wind like this, if you were dead?"

She wrapped her arms around his neck and closed her eyes. "Put me down!" she screamed into his ear.

But the darkness had changed again. The Mystic Moon was back in the sky. He had returned to Gaea with this girl in his arms. He had run away from his rite-of-passage by exploiting his demon powers, and now he could potentially be seen with a foreign girl in his arms? He blushed at his lack of forethought. He landed quickly and set the girl down on her own two feet. She held onto his shoulders.

"Please let go of me," he said, conscious finally of the metal biting into his bare skin beneath the armor. He had no shirt to wear in front of this girl, which was indecent.

"I'm sorry . . ." she said, stepping away from him.

"What's your name?" he asked, feeling that it would be an important detail, considering he was now stuck with this girl.

"Hitomi. Hitomi Kanzaki."

"I'm Van Fanel, prince of Fanelia."

"Where are we . . ?"

"Gaea."

"I'm either dead or dreaming."

Something snapped in him, because he knew she wasn't dead and that this wasn't a dream, that her being here was the result of something terrible, of him being a failure, a demon, a curse, and that he didn't get to write himself off as dead, no, he would have to live with the consequences, with her. The best he could hope for was execution, the worst, exile. He grabbed her shoulders and shook her and watched her eyelids bunch together from the pain.

"I told you you were neither dead nor dreaming."

"Okay . . ." she whispered and he released her.

"I didn't mean to hurt you," he said, looking down at the ground. "But the pain is proof that you're awake and alive."

"I saw you kill me in my dreams," she whispered. "It keeps me up every night."

He stood silently in the dark for a few moments before saying, "I would never kill you, even in your dreams. We should sleep."

"Sleep . . . here?"

He didn't know exactly where they were, so, "There's no other choice."

xxx

He woke up to the sound of her screaming. He grabbed his sword and turned towards her until he realized there was no one there. She was screaming in her sleep. In her nightmares.

"Hitomi . . . wake up." He didn't want to yell, but he knew that she hadn't heard him. "Hitomi! Wake up!" Still nothing. He had to shake her awake.

She opened her eyes and slapped him across the face with the palm of her hand. She placed her hand over her mouth. He didn't know whether it was from regretting that she hit him or whether she was suppressing another scream.

"Who's there?" came a voice from the woods. Van put his hand on the hilt of his sword instead of answering. A man with long blond hair, blue eyes, and a sword at his side approached from the left. Van had no idea who this man was. But Hitomi seemed to know.

"Amano . . !" Hitomi said.

* * *

Word Count: 4,902.

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AN: I admit, it's like a bad trip on LSD (or what I imagine a bad trip on LSD would be like). But ya know, it could only be so long, and I focused more on the beginning than the end (when I started running out of words). Basically, I thought 1. Van's Draconian blood needed to be more important 2. the similarities between Allen and Amano needed to be creeper and 3. wouldn't it be more interesting if Van was supposed to kill Hitomi or something?**

**It doesn't really address what would happen or why they'd meet other characters. That's what your imagination is for. Although I will say, I imagine Dilandau as a failed experiment by Zaibach to create another Draconian.**

**Hope it wasn't too bad.**

**-Spirit0**


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