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It hadn't been so long ago that every visit to her world was filled with rage. She'd thought the place empty, for all of its stark beauty. She'd thought that it was useless, that it was holding out on her. It could have protected her, in so many situations. Other senshi's did it, all the time, and yet she'd still been corrupted, and stabbed in the back, and tortured.

Then she'd forgiven it, and after that, it had saved her life twice now in a matter of months. There was probably some lesson there, but Cybele wasn't dwelling so much on that.

She was, however, dwelling on her world as often as she could, and she was grateful that being a Princess meant that she could visit as often as she wanted. After the hospital and the machines, and then the days after that of being home but still more or less bound to a few rooms, with people always around her, always worrying, she needed the crisp air and the sound of the wind rustling through the leaves, and the feeling of grass against her bare feet.

After every time she went, she came back a little stronger. There were supposed to be healing qualities to nature, she supposed, and all of that magic that people had been using on her over the weeks seemed to have had some effects, too.

She was bright-eyed now, rosy-cheeked. Her wound was still a bit tender, and she was still going to need a few sessions of therapy for her arm movements, but the worst of everything was healed over.

There were rules to these trips, though. She would come back within a certain time. She wouldn't go after any auras, at least not alone. She was being good about these things, keeping her promises.

That meant that when she appeared back on Earth, she looked around the small garden that she'd come out to, ready to power down to try to draw less attention. However, she found that she was not alone.

On top of that, she recognized the woman who was reading next to her. She was the one who had lent her that book in the hospital, not that she'd recognize her like this.

"Oh. Hello there. Sorry," she said, because she knew it wasn't exactly normal to appear out of thin air.

The woman was startled, and Cybele could understand why. It was more than just the fact that she'd appeared out of nowhere, which could, on its own, be a bit of a shock.

Cybele had never had a mundane life. This version of her had been born into Chaos and war, but it was different for others. When you were the kind of person who ran errands at hospitals and read autobiographies, something like this was either proof that magic was real, or else something that you'd have to do a lot of mental gymnastics to disprove.

She wasn't sure what her responsibilities were in a situation like this. Should she say something more, once Kaðlín managed to get a few breaths in? Should she just walk away, and let her come to her own conclusions about this whole experience?

She was trying to decide when she got a shock of her own.

"Cybele?" she asked, to confirm, blinking away the surprise and doing her best to hide it under a thick layer of manners and acting instinct. "That's me. My name is Cybele." She gave a nod, and smiled in a customer service sort of way.

"Celadon, though? I'm not sure."

Although, if she thought about it, she had some suspicions. She'd heard the phrasing before. Siegfried of Neptune. Agrippa of Ganymede. She'd had that conversation with the Code.

"Unless, is that a Knight?"

A broken necklace. That sounded about right, compared to the sorts of things that Pages usually had. Paradise had started with just a ribbon. Cybele didn't know if someone had whispered her name to her when she'd awakened, but perhaps it had gone like that.

That, or there was something else going on here. Cybele already felt a wave of warmth washing through her chest, that could have turned into something like excitement, or protectiveness, but she bit her lip lightly and didn't give into it, because she wasn't sure. There could have been a mistake, or the Negaverse could have even sent someone after her to tell stories and try to get her to let down her guard.

She hoped it wasn't that, though. She wanted to like Kaðlín.

"Did anything else happen when you touched this necklace?" she asked, all those thoughts held back behind a polite mask. "Did your clothes change?"

That would be the tell tale sign that she was Celadon.

A spark came to Cybele’s eyes that she couldn’t quite hold back, even with the slim chance still remaining that this was some kind of very elaborate trap.

It didn’t sound like it was, though, not if the girl was willing to show her what had happened.

The Code had told her that she might be able to feel it if a Knight of Cybele awakened, or that she might not. It seemed that she hadn’t been able to tell, possibly due to being half-dead at the time, which was unfortunate. If she’d known, perhaps she could have sought her out faster or something, given some answers so that she wasn’t just wandering around with no idea what had happened to her.

“It sounds beautiful,” said Cybele, who did have a bit of a soft spot for clothes even if they didn’t symbolize things like this. “If you could show me, I might be able to give you more answers, yes.”

She’d know things with certainty.

“If you think of yourself like that, if you call on it, sort of? You should be able to become like that again.”

There were still no auras around, and it was secluded enough. They were safe.

It was one thing to think, to hope. It was another thing to watch an unremarkable outfit shift and soften into something unlike anything she'd ever seen on a Knight before.

Her dress was Grecian, and as dusty pink as the skirt on Cybele's princess dress. Her shoes were familiar, not exactly like Cybele's but not so different either. Her accessories were rustic, and at her belt and on a few other places around her outfit, where Knights tended to wear their symbols, Cybele saw it. There was the silver bow that had become part and aprcel to her as a symbol of this identity.

She sucked in a breath. Then she let it go, and as the warmth of an Order aura washed over her, she let go of all of the suspicion that she hadn't quite been able to shake, and after that she was grinning. She still kept some self control. It wouldn't help a confused Page if she tackled her in a hug while laughing or squealing, but the thought was there.

"It is beautiful," she said, and she meant it in a way that went deeper than the looks. "And I have your answer, too, although I'll warn you that things might get a bit more confusing before they get less confusing."

The warmth swelled in her chest all the same. She'd walk this girl through it, best she could. "You are the Knight of Celadon. It's a title, and one that comes with certain abilities. My title is Senshi of Cybele, which is the world where Celadon is located. That's where our connection comes in."

She paused, waiting for the inevitable questions, but couldn't help slipping in, "And you're the first Knight of Cybele that I've met, and it is an honor."

She was really focused in on the Knight aspect of this, over any of the magic, which might have been Cybele's fault, and she pressed her lips together as she tried to figure out what the best way to explain this would be.

"I am a Princess, yes," she said, because there was no getting around that, not at this point. The fact that she was in her Eternal guise at the moment didn't change that. There was some type of royalty to her now. The Code had said as much. "And if you wanted to look at it in that way, you could say that Cybele is the kingdom and that Celadon is your keep, but it's not quite-"

She took a breath. For a while she'd felt like she was almost getting used to this new power and role, but then something like this happened and she felt new, and overwhelmed, and almost small even though she was the strongest that she'd ever been.

"You don't have to swear loyalty to me unless you want to. Being a senshi means that my power comes from the world of Cybele. Yours comes from something called the Code, which is separate, and a bit mysterious if I'm being honest. You'd have better luck asking other Knights about that."

A moment passed, and then she added, "But if you are at all interested in helping me protect or restore Cybele, I'll swear loyalty to you. I'll protect at support you as much as I can."

The curtsy didn't bother Cybele. She was no stranger to formality. She simply curtsied back, in a practiced motion, sweeping her skirts out to the side. This next question, too, was easier to answer than the others, although it was also a bit heavier.

"Chaos," she said, although her lips twisted somewhat just to speak of it. "A force of evil energy that manifests in different ways. I don't know the details of how Cybele fell," although maybe she should have, as a Princess. Ganymede knew so much about history, but it seemed that Cybele's own brush with Chaos had even scrambled her memories of the past. "But I know most of the worlds fell to it a thousand years ago. Earth survived, but it's not entirely safe, either."

That was probably an understatement, but Cybele was trying not to be overwhelming.

"I don't know if you've heard the rumors of the monsters in the city? They're fueled by Chaos, as well."