Vision Of Escaflowne Fan Fiction ❯ When Escaflowne Rescued Trilladen ❯ There's Hope Yet ( Chapter 26 )

Book Two

Chapter One

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There's Hope Yet

Cerise snored like a grizzly bear, loud and ugly. Of course any who dared to venture forth with this information would get their ears boxed in. She simply did not snore, never has and will never have to worry about it. She's a witch after all. The sick bay was two beds empty with Helliese and King Chid, the rightful Duke of Fried, gone from the floating fortress, so she only serenaded the uncaring exhausted slumbering royals with her incessant fierce growling snore.

"Oh heavens, child, would you please wake up! You disturb the dead-literally!"

Cerise snorted a snore in respond and rolled over to face the wall mumbling how she'd like to deck Folken again first.

"Cerise! Wake up! Now!"

With a start and another snort the young witch woke up confused and sleepy. "Huh?" Raising herself up to look around and seeing no one there she thought she must be dreaming. She fell back against the pillows to fall back to sleep.

"Oh hells bells! WAKE UP!"

Cerise sat up again, gulped and rubbed her eyes like a dizzy small child. Her red long hair was plastered to the left side of her face and a skinny stream of drool crept from the left corner of her mouth. Her eyelids still wanted to dry stick closed shut and she rubbed them again feeling tiny crusty round sleep turds dislodge from the corners of her eyes. She cleared her throat and cussed out loud.

"Damnation! I just knew I was dreaming." She mumbled to herself and yawned.

"No you most certainly were not dreaming! WAKE UP!"

Cerise heard that familiar old cackling voice. "Helliese? Where are you? I can hear you, but I can't see you. "

"That's because I'm in spirit form. I have shed my mortal shell. Now get up!"

"You mean you passed on? Am I walking the land of the dead? How, I didn't try to go there?" Cerise was still half-asleep and couldn't make sense of this. Helliese was just there hours ago helping her help Allen.

"Child, wake up and be lucid. I don't have much time. No, you're not walking the land of the dead, and yes I have passed on, but must return soon."

Cerise sat up, straightened herself up against the pillows and looked around wide-eyed for her beloved mentor. "I don't understand." She spoke into the air.

"Listen to me, my dear. I have been killed by Mugwa and the Green Dragon is awake now. I will return again, but I will have to pass through the veil of forgetfulness for my soul to reach its true incarnation. I won't remember myself and I don't know how or who I'll come back as. You will have to find me, child. All of Gaea and now Earth is in great peril. You must find my spirit in whatever form I return. Once you find me use your necromancer ability to lift the veil from my mind.

"Tell Allen not to worry. There's still hope. His heart is heavy." Helliese finished.

"Allen? Why is he sad?" Cerise was becoming more awake and began to gingerly climb out of bed. She noticed that two beds were empty. Helliese was gone and she suddenly felt her ears hum and pound with blood rushing to her head. "HELLIESE!? Where are you?" She fumbled over to the bed that once rested her dearest mentor. The pillow was dented still from the weight of Helliese's head, but the warmth had long since departed.

"Calm down, my dear. We have much to discuss and I sense my spirit is restless. I will return to Gaea, but for now, you must rescue Chid. He lies next to my old shell and he is dying. He must not die. His role is vital in this war, for he is Allen's son."

"Allen's son? He's the Duke of Freid!"

"Quiet child! The tree of life is where he can be found. I died on a tree, I will return in another body on a tree. That's all I can tell you of that. But you are a necromancer and I have helped raise you. I have faith that you will recognize my spirit. Search me out so that I can quiet the Green Dragon. His belly rumbles and we must fill it. Go to Trilladen. Save Chid and find me. Ask my brother for help if you get lost."

"YOUR BROTHER? You don't have a brother!"

"The circle of light, the sun, Helliose is my twin. He will guide you when you are lost. I love you and now I need you."

And then the voice was no more. Cerise felt a great sense of urgency and jumped out of bed with new energy and a little panic too. She reached the doors to the sick bay when she heard and felt the vibrating rumbling thundering of what seemed to be a terrible storm outside the floating fortress. The doors swished open and she saw Folken and Merle hugging each other, a romantic silhouette by the window that depicted doom. She turned around and saw Allen holding the Princess' hand. They were crying, each of them, lost in their own hellish grief.

Resolutely Cerise walked over to the Knight of Caeli and interrupted their anguish. "No time for this. I know where Chid is. Helliese is dead, but Chid is still alive. Marlene rests at peace only as long as she knows you are protecting your son. You will not know peace until you have put your house in order."

Cerise looked Princess Edwina squarely in the eyes. "This world will only survive as long as there is forgiveness in it. Allen's soul craves peace, yours craves love. There cannot be love without forgiveness, nor can you forgive without love. Look to your husband and know his pain finally."

Cerise walked up to the princess and Allen and placed her palms on either forehead, closed her eyes and gave Princess Edwina a glimmer of Allen's tortured soul. While still lying in bed, Princess Edwina's bruised body grew heavy from her heart. A fearful heavy weight spread through her whole being and pressed on her soul. Stark loneliness seeped in and scorched her soul and she cried out from the broken heart that was truly Allen's pain.

"Stop!" Princess Edwina cried out.

"STOP! Don't hurt her!" Allen yelled at Cerise. "She doesn't need this, she's still wounded! Leave her alone!"

"See how he worries for you?" Cerise spoke only to the princess. "You started out having faith in Allen not even knowing why. Now that you've learned who he truly is you shun him and cling to a pain you don't need. Do you want to save Gaea? You're not up to it like this. Be selfish and lose this world and Allen with it." Cerise released them both and the melding of their souls with all of its injuries was left up to them to deal with.

Cerise walked over to King Van and shook him unceremoniously awake. Hitomi was thankfully left to sleep. She was not needed. But Van was as well as Folken. "No time for you to rest, Draconian. You have to speed things up around here. Celena is Dilandau again and will need assistance getting to Trilladen. She wants to join Mugwa and that's what we're going to help her do."

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The world was awake in a fury of explosions. The land shook and quaked. The seas were in a torrent of foreboding clashing waves and clouds that violently stirred them. The world was giving its dying gasps of breath into the atmosphere steeped in poisonous gas as the slow determined process began. The Green Dragon was in fact the internal furnace of the planet and it was being turned inside out.

Gaea itself was created by the will of one immortal being whose love for the righteous of Atlantis was so strong that through the sheer force of selfless love from that pure heart took the wishes and hopes of the people of Earth and created Gaea. An agreement was made between siblings. Helliese would guard Gaea and Helliose would light both worlds and their moons with the warmth of his being. Atlantis would die, but the lessons so needed to be learned from that death would still have a chance to be learned by the inhabitants of both worlds. Thus the twins separated and Helliese took on a mortal body while Helliose remained in the heavens to watch over all.

But the balance was not shattered as her blood fed the mighty Dragon's temper. Someone had shed the blood of his mother, his creator. In a wrath so holy the Green Dragon was summoned forth to avenge the death of Helliese. The world would suffer and her death would be atoned. Fumes of poisonous fury jettisoned through shunts forged by volcanoes. The belly was hungry for more blood and would not rest until all the blood of the living was consumed.

Gaea has a soul known as the Green Dragon. The soul was devoted to mother and she has been slain. The soul's will was the wind. The dirt was Gaea's heart. The Green Dragon was the planet. Trees bent down and broke as the heart of Gaea was breaking with grief.

And Mugwa let it happen. He let all of the children of Gaea feel terror at this doom threatening them. He had a plan for that terror. He held onto that knowledge like a smug secret locked in his breast. The ground beneath him trembled in a rage, yet he only had to wish it and the ground would quiet down. But first, he had to let the children of Gaea feel the blackness of a terror so strong that it enslaved them.

Walking to the Royal Gardens that were now his own he gazed down at the innocent looking rock garden that was beginning to stymie the Magnolia trees. At the base of the trees beautiful crystals of vibrant translucent colors were slowing growing. They were forming and growing, fed by the poisonous gasses released from the belly of the beast. Soon they would be large enough to harvest. Mugwa was overcome with a glowing sense of pride in his own accomplishment. Soon, the whole world would regard him as a god; at least those he would permit to live long enough to join his invincible army. As for the rest whom he planned to exterminate, they would never recognize him as anything but a monster.

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The people of Palas didn't all just disappear. They were walking to Freid. They were walking with one purpose over mountains and through valleys they trudged along as if in a trance. When they grew hungry, they hunted wild game or picked from the fruit of the land and ate. When they were tired, they slept. But no one spoke. No one smiled or joked around. There was no joy, not in one person. The pain of it was too great. For any that tried to remember who they were, the pain in their forehead would blind them with its intensity. Everyone just walked to Fried so that the pain would stay away.

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Princess Edwina looked at her husband. His worried eyes glowed with love for her. She understood about Marlene now. She was ashamed of herself for not trusting him. She looked away in her shame, but he couldn't take the isolation that her averted eyes offered so he gently turned her chin back in his direction. Whatever happens in the future, his life was with her now. He would make right the wrongs being done to this world. He didn't know how, but just looking into her eyes, he knew he could do it.