Vision Of Escaflowne Fan Fiction ❯ Bloody Hands ❯ Goodbye, Escaflowne ( Chapter 17 )

Van had just finished digging the grave when Mercutio's little brother arrived at the Schezar manor.

When he'd packed the last bit of snow on top of the grave, birds had already begun their early morning chorus of tiny chirps and squawky caws. Van had always loved the sound. The morning light and the sound of birds went hand in hand, and it had always been a nice combination.

But now the multitude of voices sounded more like a horde of lamented moaning mourners than anything.

Van crouched next to the little brook, most of it frozen, that was babbling and splishing, twisting through the forest. He submerged his bloody sword, and watched some of the crimson droplets be taken by the flow and be carried downstream. The sword rippled and contorted under the clear water.

"Meet me... under the willow tree... and I'll be hap-pee..."

He felt strangely like he had the night after Celena had come into his room (before Gatti had come to bid him good morning), with a morbid twist.

"First time for everything," he grumbled, scrubbing at the dried, faded blood with his thumb. The icy creek water chilled his hand through his glove. "Get your first lay, bury your first slay."

He almost laughed out loud. Would have if it wouldn't have been utterly insane. Under different circumstances, maybe. If the joke hadn't come from where it came from.

The day was still crawling on its pudgy, infant, morning legs when Van had finally managed to clean his sword (which would never be clean again, darling, ha-ha). The birds continued their chirrupy funeral procession. Morning. Mourning. Same difference. Van once again came close to laughing.

"Mourning Morning," he muttered out loud. "For you, Hitomi. They're mourning for you and not him."

"This thing is heavy," Wolf Urai grumbled into his heavy cape, the collar swallowing his little chin. His eyes peered over it like one of the ladies from far west, where it was custom to cover part of their faces.

The warm breeze came again, whispering.

"Not much farther," it breathed, echoing slightly into his ruffled blue-black hair.

It had been the soft, gentle voices that had told him Sebastian was dead. He almost hadn't needed the voices to know. He had almost felt Sebastian's heartbeat flump desperately in his weak (but warm) chest that one last time, and then sleep forever. And it had been the voices that had told him how to get out of the hotel room.

But of course, silly boy. Sebastian may have forgotten the balcony, but you haven't, have you?

"No," he had whispered excitedly. "No, I haven't."

It had been the voices that had led him up to the gates of the Schezar manor, and then hissed, with hisses that were smokey-like, 'No, boy! No! Not here, Wolf. The forest.'

Sometimes Wolf had to ask them to repeat themselves because he couldn't quite understand them through the smoky fog of their deep voices.

The woods were scary. Even in the faint light of the morning they were scary. Wolf pushed that thought into the little cabinet of his mind. The fact that his lips were nearly bleeding from being chapped so bad went somewhere back there too, though not in the same pocket. Somewhere along the 'Ignore This' shelf. He had no time to worry about his lips. Or his hands, which were practically shrieking to be warmed, tightening their grip on the rough rope that was dragging the heavy coffin. Figured that Sebastian wouldn't have brought an extra pair of gloves. Of course not. He had planned it all along. All along he had planned to do it alone.

Stupid baka.

Wolf's gloves covered his palms well enough, but the fingers had been worn off.

"Where?" Wolf hissed. His breath leaked out of his blue lips in a thin gray fog. He was scared. He supposed the voices knew. Wolf wasn't scared of them because he knew perfectly well who they were. Maybe they were the ones who had told Sebastian that Van Fanel was in the Schezar manor.

"Where is he? I've been walking forever," Wolf whispered.

"How far into the woods can you go?" a soft, smooth, gentle voice asked. The warm breeze stroked his soft six-year-old cheek.

"Halfway," Wolf answered, grinning broadly and forgetting his fear. "Because after that you're walking out of the woods."

"Right," the breeze sighed thickly, ruffling Wolf's mussy hair affectionately.

Wolf could almost see his brother again. Asking him that silly little riddle. The first time he'd asked it, it had bothered Wolf so much that he'd nearly thrown a fit over it. What do you mean how far can you walk into the woods?! How long have you been walking?! How big are the woods??

And when Mercutio had finally told him the answer ("Halfway, of course. After that you're walking out of the woods."), quite smugly, Wolf had nearly thrown another fit because he hadn't figured it out.

Now we'll see how far you can walk into the woods, Van Fanel, Wolf thought. We'll see how far you can walk into the woods. And it's not halfway.

And that was when he saw something in the midst of the pale gray trees. Someone crouched down over the little stream, arm working slowly. Scrubbing. Wolf knew almost psychically that it was a sword. The sword that he'd used to kill Sebastian with. He was cleaning it. Cleaning it! Wiping the blood off as if it had never happened!

"I have a good enough aim from here," Wolf said, setting the coffin down (his back sighed with relief) and reaching behind for his bow. "I can shoot him with an arrow easily and-"

"No," Gatti's hiss interrupted. "Do it like we said. That way is much better. And much less obvious. If you kill him with an arrow, it will leave an awful mess. And we can't stick around to help you clean it up."

Wolf narrowed his eyes and watched Van stand up. The dark boy sheathed his sword.

"All right," Wolf whispered. "Give it to me."

A long and thin syringe landed on the ground in front of Wolf with a soft thump. He crouched down and picked it up, careful to avoid the needle end. Drawing his bow, he set it up like he would any other arrow.

It stretched in protest as he drew his elbow back and closed one eye. He inched forward, tiny boots crunching the snow.

His tongue peeked through the corner of his mouth (no Sebastian to tell me not to stick my tongue out. How far can you walk into the woods, Van? As far as 'Bastian did?). He wiggled his fingers, aching so sharply from rope burn that the pain was almost insolent, and gripped carefully, still inching forward.

Van heard the snow crunch behind him. He whirled around.

Wolf shot the syringe.

Halfway, Van Fanel. Because after that the door is locked and the boys are coming. The boys are coming and the door is locked.

Halfway.

Scruff

Crunch

Swish

Scruff

Crunch

Swish

Van opened his eyes, with much difficulty. They seemed to have been sewn together with the thickest eye-matter ever. His lashes felt like tiny armor belts weighing his eyelids down. He couldn't move. He could barely even breathe. His windpipe had shrunken to half its normal size and it was all he could do to get clean air into his lungs and carbon dioxide out of them. In with the good, out with the bad. In with the good, out with the bad. Out with the bad. Out with the bad, darling. Van Fanel had won.

But somehow he hadn't.

Scruff

Crunch

Swish

Scruff

Crunch

Swish

And just what in fuck's name was that? Van forced the tiny armor belts to let him open his eyes.

Nothing. Colors, maybe, but nothing concrete. Browns and pinks and yellows and whites. Van's skin felt like wrinkled leather. There was a sharp, digging pain between his shoulder blades. His fingers had evidentially followed through with their frostbite threats, because he couldn't feel his hands at all. Nor his toes. His arms were covered in a thick film of dull ache. He was so cold that the pain was almost warmth. His bottom lip had seemed to peel into two pieces right down the middle, as if it had been ripped.

And the smell. Good God, what in fuck's name was that smell?

He blinked again and the colors became sharper and clearer, but still made no images.

Scruff

Crunch

Swish

Something moist and cold sprinkled his cheeks. Snow?

He opened his mouth slightly, cracking his peeled lips, and cautiously poked his tongue out. Some of the falling stuff had landed on his lips and was now on his tongue.

And it wasn't snow.

"AAch!!" Van spat it out fiercely. The bitter, grainy taste of wet dirt. More of it struck his face, this time harder. More of it. Marbleized clumps of it smacked against his forehead and trickled down to the (ground? floor?) surface he was (lying? standing?) on. It thumped against something (a ceiling?) above him. Something hard. And then it trickled through the cracks and landed on his face.

He opened his eyes wide and realized why the colors weren't coming together. Because they were only coming through thin ingots of light. Cracks. He was inside of something. What? A closet?

"Hello?" he called. He was surprised at his own voice. It sounded froggish and raw. Sleepy. As if someone had scratched up his voice box.

"You're finally awake!" a voice shouted happily, muffled from behind the door.

"Who are you? Where am I?"

For a moment he thought the voice belonged to Prince Chid. It sounded just like the little aristocrat, too mature for five years. Or maybe it was six by now.

"You're halfway!"

"Nani??"

It confirmed that the boy from outside was not Chid.

More dirt whumped against the coffin.

COFFIN?! Van though hysterically. Is that what I just thought?! Coffin?!

He balled one fist and slammed it against the wood. The specks and large clumps of dirt bounced dully on the surface.

He's trying to bury me alive!! Oh fucking god, whoever it is, he's trying to bury me alive!!

"Let me out of here!" he cried, as loud as his raw throat and shrunken windpipe would allow him to.

Everything had suddenly fell together like a riddle he'd been stupidly oblivious to before, (how far can you walk into the woods?) and he realized that he had been drugged. That was why he could barely see. That was why he couldn't move. Why his chest seemed to have capsized. Why his throat felt like it had been operated on by a two-year-old with a scalpel.

His windpipe shrank to half its half-size, and his heart doubled its own size in his chest, threatening to burst out of his ribs.

And the smell.

Almost against his own will, (like turning his head to watch a blood bath of a battle with morbid, almost relentless curiosity) he took one long, deep breath, feeling his nostrils widen.

He remembered thinking that the Dragonslayer ghosts had smelled like death itself instead of smelling dead. That thick, airy, musky smell.

Now it was different. The scent of death, the scent of dead death, not death that was back

(the cat in the hat came back)

for revenge, but death that was dead and beginning to smell so.

Death that's dead. Heh. Cat's not coming back anymore is it, Mercutio?

Oddly enough, he felt a strange peace that seemed to start in his stomach and ripple through the rest of his body. He wasn't sure what caused it. Maybe the fact that his job had been done. He'd done all he could. More than was expected of him, really. He'd broken out the Coward mold of assumption that the rest of the world had placed on him.

Fuck you, brother, he thought calmly, with growing satisfaction. If this is how it's going to end, then I'm glad I lasted longer than you, traitor.

And he was glad about other things. He was glad that he'd lived to see a day that his brother, the traitor, would not. He was glad that he'd defeated Dilandau Albatou after all. Oh, how he had felt that day he'd given him that scar. The way his eyes had gone wide, those slick pink pupils all but disappearing in the white. The way he'd trembled. The way he'd touched it gingerly, unbelieving. How could this barbarian, this boorish backwater samurai... how could he have touched the sculpted, groomed, delicacy of soldier grandeur that was Dilandau Albatou?

Easily, Van Fanel thought, the strange satisfaction still swelling inside, Easily, that's how.

And then there was the Dragonslayers. What they had done to Celena. What they had done to Hitomi.

We're even now, Gatti. See you in Hell.

The dirt from outside seemed like a distant, mellow lullaby from another world.

Goodbye, Celena. Goodbye, Allen. Goodbye, Escaflowne. Goodbye, Escaflowne.

Was there anything left? Was there anything else he felt he needed to finish?

'A samurai's life is meant to protect others',' Allen had once said.

(are you just going to sit back and go like this? are you just going to wait until the wet dirt suffocates you? until you die of thirst? until your mouth gets to dry that you leave it hanging open, hoping you can squirm around and get one of those flakes of dirt in your mouth? just because they're moist and you'd do anything for water?)

Van hadn't heard from that snide little voice in a long time. He'd thought he'd killed it when his sword punctured (with a squishy sound) the Boy's stomach.

And for once, he agreed with it. No, he would not go like this. There was still Celena. There was still Escaflowne.

"Let me out!" he shrieked again, the fierceness in his voice shimmering, but less demanding and dramatic than he had intended, weakened by his windpipe, which had reached an almost straw diameter by now.

"Quiet, now, Van-sama," the boy called calmly. "We're halfway there."

Van squirmed his body until he was on his side, meaning to slam his shoulder against the lid.

That was when he discovered the origin of the smell.

Even in the thin ingots of faint light, he could see the glazed, glassy brown eyes staring blankly ahead. Smeared blood, dried and cracked on cheeks that were now starting to lose color. Jaw twisted and broken, hanging off of his face at an odd angle. His head hanging off of his neck in an even stranger angle.

The dead body was pressed so close against him that he could not move to escape it. His fingers touched the Boy's dead cold ones. His mouth nearly touch the cracked leathery one.

Van Fanel screamed.

"Stop being a child," the child called from the mouth of the grave. "You should be man enough to handle consequences if you're going to be a man some day."

"Noo!!"

The dirt fell.

For quite a long time, Van Fanel beat against the lid of the coffin in vain. He beat against it, screaming until his raw voice box was worn out, the whole time the boy from above was filling up the grave he had made.

But now, either the boy was gone or the dirt so muffled sounds from above that he could no longer hear him. Van had given up the whamming after he'd broken his shoulder.

And the whole time, the Boy Without a Name touched him with cold fingers and a wet crotch where his organs had ceased to function under will.

Have a little irony, it's good for the blood, Van thought to the Boy, because he could not speak, not even in a whisper.

I wonder if I'll still be alive when it's spring? Oh. I don't want to die in the winter time. I don't want to die like this. I want to see spring again. God fucking bless, I want to see spring again before I die.

Goodbye, Celena. Goodbye, Allen.

Goodbye, Escaflowne.

The Gods, the Angels, the Dragonslayers... have finally decided to let my body be.

Wolf gathered the digging utencils and felt the breezes fade away. Gatti had said they wouldn't have been able to stay if there had been a mess, and he was right.

"Goodbye, Gatti. Goodbye, Sebastian. Goodbye, Mercutio," the boy whispered. Leaves ruffled in a slight morning breeze. The sky was beginning to lose its gray hue and a pink-yellowish color was starting to haze over the horizon. Wolf could not see the sun, but he could see its orange-fresh blurry cloud painted across the sky.

He stuffed one small hand, just starting to lose its baby-pudginess, into his cape pocket, and started out of the Schezar woods.

He puckered his lips and whistled the tune of a slow, melancholy Fanelian song he had heard from Mercutio long ago.

"Goodbye, Escaflowne."

A blackbird flew from its perch on a tree limb, and flapped furiously into the pink and blue sky.

Fade Out
___________________________________________________________________________ __________________

Astoria
Purple, 13th Moon
'God Grant He Lie Still'

"(now wrong's the only right
since brave are cowards all)
therefore despair, my heart
and die into the dirt"
--ee cummings