Welcome to Gaia! ::

Anthony Darrow was inside the library, in his office. It was close enough to the door to hear the knocking, though he knew that whoever was out there was probably not here for a late night book. Still, he had to go and check, and he did so carefully these days. He was still very careful about his identity, even after all this time, and was not about to get complacent when he knew he told many people to seek Camelot at the library.

So he moved to the edge of the front desk, not moving out into the glass doorways of the large doorway. He had a mirror hanging in the corner of the entrance, angled to show him the doorway so he could keep an eye on it from the front desk.

He saw a strange visitor, and some people behind, but he was not powered up yet and could not tell who they were, besides Zippeite at the front door. That was enough for him, though, and he moved to slip away and head to the stairwell, climbing all the way up before he powered up on the roof and leaned over the railing, looking down at the Nega. Now he could feel the other auras as well. He hopped off the roof with a familiar motion, rather casual for a man plummeting down a few stories. He landed heavily, armor clanging, but had no issues.

"Good evening," he said pleasantly, but with a small amount of caution to his tone.

"Camelot," Zippeite exhaled. Even though his last meeting with the knight involved being sat on until he calmed down and then was allowed to run away shouting expletives and slurs, he had the same sense of relief as Hvergelmir.

But even better than an adult, Camelot was his grand escape route. The final solution to all the pain. Zippeite might have had a bit of a fictional idea of what purification was. He could get the Chaos purged from his system, and this would erase all of the bad. He could start over, clean slate. He wouldn't feel the weight of what he'd done in his chest anymore. He wouldn't be bound to anyone.

He even expected a glamour, something to prevent him from dealing with the consequences of the good bye note he had left for Gently among his things after crashing with her. He could move on from this ugly chapter in his teens and there would be no consequences.

Right?

He could still feel the delicate starseed in his coat pocket, as if it were the heaviest thing in the world. He wasn't sure why he kept it, but the weight of its presence was his largest motivator now.

"I... You said if I ever changed my mind... Well, I changed my mind..." He swallowed nervously, wondering if he would be quizzed or judged on why. Wondering if he'd be found wanting. "If... I still can..."

Camelot looked at the Negaverse soldier in surprise, remembering him all too well. The last time they met had been pretty intense, and Camelot was sure the young nega would only remember the negatives from that encounter, and not Camelot's offers of peace and understanding. It was surprising, then, to see him here now.

And with an unfamiliar face and one that was not so unfamiliar at all.

"Hver!" Camelot said, returning the hug since he was a warm and very affectionate sort of guy, and hugs had become a few and far between treat in an otherwise violent and aloof life. Outside of his family, anyway, he was usually too busy dealing with serious war stuff to take a small moment to give or get a hug. He wondered why he was thinking about something as silly as that, but he supposed he was just tired.

"Crystal?"

He cast a glance to the unfamiliar person with them, then at Zippeite. It took the Negas explanation to make it perfectly clear what they were after, and he smiled gently, nodding his head.

"Of course you can. It's your decision, and if this is what you want, I am at your service to help." He bowed a bit, glancing around. There was no one on the street, but it was probably a good idea to go somewhere that cut down the chance of random encounters. "Do you want to go inside the library for this? The door on the roof is open."

Sensing the situation start to rattle a little, Hvergelmir stepped in just a little to help Zippeite along. "That's probably a good idea," she agreed, peering up at the roof ledge from which Camelot had jumped down. "Someone might come looking for him soon if we don't hurry."

She looked belatedly back at the civilian in their group, something occuring to her. "If you can give Miss Lyddie a hand, that is?"

To Zippeite, who most needed reassurances in her opinion, she stepped in close to lay a hand on his shoulder. "You already made the decision," she said with confidence. "The rest is just letting go. I promise, this is the easy part. And we'll be here the whole time, no matter what." Stepping back, trying to play it off like every decision was something small and simple -- to remind him that some of them were -- she said, "Come on, let's go inside and get warm for a few minutes, anyway," and offered a smile.

The attention on Lydia's lack of powered abilities forcibly drew Zippeite's attention back to something he had been doing his best to ignore. Lydia knew things. She had something weird on hand that she'd given to Hvergelmir and they both seemed to know more than him.

Between being bitter and confused and wanting to bolt, it was taking all of his energy to stay rooted to the ground. Camelot helped. Things, at least, felt safe here. Although safe was relative and usually a lie.

The four of them making it inside didn't do much for his twisting stomach and tightening chest. "Okay... How does it work?" He asked, pacing the library after they'd entered. "There's no chest grabbing or... right?"

To say it was an unpleasant process would have been an understatement. Zippeite was nervous, but he knelt as instructed and tried not to twitch when the sword touched his shoulder.

The warmth was welcome at first, and then it burned. He cried out and tried not to falter in his resolve at the pain, but half a decade of Chaos was not an easy affliction to drive away. He had been nearly a child when the Negaverse recruited him.

But when he stumbled up to his feet, he was neither a child nor Chaos' recruit any longer.



Helicon, Knight of Mercury rose to his full height and stared in awe at his gloves, and then inspected the rest of his wardrobe with fascination. With wide, golden eyes he looked at Camelot, and then to Hvergelmir and Lydia as he stepped in a small circle, and then back to his gloves, turning his hands over and inspecting the lights and lightweight spaceage material that made a unique armored bodysuit.

He didn't say anything for a long time, like he was trying to figure something out, and then he finally looked at Lydia with his brow furrowed down. "Did you shrink?"

Oops.

He might not have been a child, but enough of his memories seemed to have vacated to the point he still thought he was the tiny high school freshman who thought the Negaverse fought aliens.

"Who are these people? This is weird. It's late," He stammared, noticing how dark it was. "What's happening? My mom is gonna so mad if I'm home late, oh god..."

There was no such thing as a good day, Hvergelmir supposed. Not in a war.

She had thought, once, that something like this might be a happy occasion. Cause for celebration -- a comrade brought home at last, everything made right again. But, maybe selfishly -- probably selfishly -- she watched what had happened, and saw Zippeite's reaction (no, not Zippeite's, someone else's, someone with a name she didn't know) -- and she felt the profound sorrow of what she'd been warned would happen sinking into her skin.

Everything that's happened to him -- the things he's decided -- he doesn't remember. He doesn't remember any of it.

Did they call such things a mercy, she wondered? Perhaps they were -- if he could go home from this and never have to encounter any of it again. But she rather thought not; youma still roamed the streets, agents of the Negaverse still shadowed the unsuspecting, the city was still not safe. This young boy, freshly made new, would see it all come to pass again -- and all his experience of it, gone. All his scars and their lessons, past and forgotten. Now he was at the bottom of a hill he had to climb again . . . and this time he had enemies whose faces he wouldn't even know.

It was a cruel thing, no matter what anybody said, to rob a person of that. The only mercy in an amputation is that you live.

It made her feel hollow and a little sad, to think that she was a stranger to him now. Hvergelmir had only known Zippeite a short time -- a few brief encounters -- but there was a special place dug out in her heart for the sad, angry young boy who had lived so obviously near-crippled by his own fears, but who had trusted her more than once at great risk. She'd gone with him to the very end -- if this was what you could call an end -- but it seemed she'd be the only one to remember the journey.

They are not mine to keep, she thought to herself -- and something nearly stirred in her memory, some niggling sense of deja vu she couldn't place -- but the feeling was gone again before she could make sense of it. It didn't matter: the end result was the same. He didn't need her friendship anymore.

She'd be happy for him. That was what mattered, after all -- he was free of the Chaos that had been holding him. He was free to have the chance he needed to make his own life. And he had someone by his side who cared about him -- whether or not Hvergelmir and Camelot were odd strangers to him now.

. . . Camelot.

Hvergelmir had only seen one purification attempted before this, but she remembered how well prepared Princess Iris had been for it. She'd known to expect the horrible, exhausting drain of it -- known to expect that she'd lose both her transformation and (Hvergelmir suspected) her consciousness. She didn't know if Camelot knew these things, or if it would be different for him because he was a knight, but he didn't have anyone else with him just now, no one who might know to expect it.

Rather than give Lyddie back her transformation pen, Hvergelmir scurried over to Camelot's side with grave concern, ready to catch him if he slumped unconscious into her arms. "Are you alright?" she asked, worried, trying to brush the hair away from his face to see if he looked pale.