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Fortunately, Chrysotile did not have to spend very long deciding. The young woman on the bench turned toward his aura like a deer toward a snapped twig: immediately, and with her full attention, but with a stillness that bespoke an ingrained carefuless. Her head swiveled in his direction, eyes squinting toward the dark. The rest of her body, shoulders down, remained poised and unmoving.

Hvergelmir had been doing this for some time. She put effort -- sometimes maybe an excessive amount of effort -- into being non-threatening.

"Hello?" she called out, very slowly lowering a book to her lap. "Is someone there?"

Hvergelmir smiled. Well, now -- she was getting a reputation. That was a good sign -- it meant Metallia's ranks were fractured, people were questioning her authority among each other. Word was spreading that they had other options -- and someone safe to talk to.

"I couldn't hurt you if I wanted to," she assured the young man. "And I don't want to." She tapped a finger to the seal tattooed across her left shoulder. "This mark is a sign of my oath -- I'm sworn not to harm you unless you try to harm me."

She slid sideways along the bench, making room. "I'm called Hvergelmir Knight of the Cosmos," she greeted him, leaning to lay her book aside in the grass. "And I'm the person you're looking for. Have a seat; tell me your name."

He was nervous. It wasn't hard to tell. Hvergelmir had dealt with nervous sorts before -- Zippeite had been half nerves and half anger -- and though 'try to be calming' was always obvious, beyond that, it was worth remembering that a nervous Negaverse agent could also be a dangerous one. It was up to Hvergelmir to keep things relaxed.

"Well," she said, "this war has seen its fair share of purifications. I know a bit about them, as it happens." Her voice was measured and serious -- but not grave. This was not a depressing topic, for her. "They're not easy . . . but most things worth doing aren't easy." She smiled, her look a bit far-off.

"You'd need a Prince or a Princess, or a Royal Knight -- they have the power to do it. I'm told it's a bit painful and exhausting for the person being purified. And it takes a toll on you -- afterwards, you might lose some of your memories. Either your powered life, or your everyday life. No one's been able to figure out a connection to which one goes for each person, yet, as far as I know. But that adjustment -- that loss -- that can be a bit difficult."

Hvergelmir looked over at Chrysotile, cautious. He was lean and rangy, all angles and youth. She didn't want to push too hard on a first meeting. Let the agent offer as much information as he liked without too much pressure.

"It can be hard, starting a new life for yourself from the ground up. But for most people that do it . . . the old life they led was hard, too."

Hvergelmir nodded. These were good questions.

"As far as I know, without exception, Negaverse agents -- lieutenants, captains, generals, and general-sovereigns -- become knights if they convert back to our side. Your Negaverse sailor soldiers become our sailor soldiers. So if you do choose to do it, you won't suddenly be defenseless . . . though I'm sure whatever training you've received with the Negaverse has already given you the understanding that one on one, an agent has more powerful tools at their disposal than a knight does. You'd be accepting that risk."

She paused, then smiled, gently rallying. "But I promise you, that doesn't necessarily mean this life we live is a death sentence. More people leave Metallia's service than I suspect they want you to know."

As for the question of who could perform the purification, well . . . "If you were always meant to be a knight, that's in you regardless of which sort of royal performs the act. Sailor princes and princes, as well as royal knights, can all restore an agent to the knight they were born to be. I know of one royal knight -- Camelot -- who could do it, and a few royal sailor soldiers as well. If you want me to help you put something like that together, I can."

Her gaze had strayed, though -- it was something else he had mentioned in the conversation, something more personal. 'The command of the biggest joke in the Negaverse, Quartz.'

She remembered Dionysia's sad, startled eyes as she sat chained to a chair in a dark room. Feeble light that snuck in through cracks in the wall barely managed to illuminate the whites around his iries; the rest of him was cut in darkest silhouette, with the occasional flashes of his teeth when he spoke.

"Quartz was a knight like you, once," Hvergelmir said, briefly distracted: "It was a shame, what happened to him."

But Chrysotile's own story was of greater concern now. Something he'd said had shot up a gigantic red flag, its bloodied color rippling across her mental landscape.

"Regardless of what memories you manage to retain, you'll have to get an entire new identity," she cautioned. "Your old friends won't recognize you, and you should aim to keep it that way, for your safety and theirs. Especially if you have family in the higher echelons in the Negaverse -- I imagine they'll be much more likely to come after you for defecting, even if you have been laying low all this time. A new name, a new job -- new hobbies and interests."