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Hooded Eagle - Part 6.

A Saint Seiya fanfiction by Ariane Kovacevic, AKA Fuu-chan.





"So he beat you too, didn't he?" There was weariness in Shaina's voice. "Apprentices usually become stronger than their masters when their time comes, but to defeat you on his first try...." She paused, looking out the room's small window, and suddenly stared back at me. "You did use the Eagle Toe Flash, didn't you?"

I nodded silently, and reflexively winced as Kiki applied a bit too much pressure to the bandage around my chest. His fingers rested briefly on my right arm, and he said apologetically, "I'm sorry, Marin. I know it hurts, but I have to make this tight to efficiently help the broken ribs to mend."

A humorless smile came to my lips, and I replied, "I know, don't worry about it. There isn't much pain anyway." It was all very far away, as if it was happening to someone else.

Remembering Shaina's question, I said in a quiet, detached voice, "Yes, I did use the Eagle Toe Flash, it was the first attack I used because I didn't want to give him the slightest chance of watching my fighting style before going ahead with it." I fought the reflex to shrug, and continued. "He countered it perfectly. He even went so far as to wait until it almost connected before reacting, to show me how futile trying to defeat him was." Something like anger stirred within me. "I'm sure he observed when Merle challenged me, and considering what you said before," I bowed my head, closing my eyes behind the mask, "I have to admit it's very likely Lune knowingly, deliberately refrained from stopping Merle from going through with this insanity...that is, if Lune didn't go so far as to push Merle to it."

Kind and silent Merle, always somber except when a beautiful smile lit his face. Withdrawn but careful of everything that went on around him. Trusting the only person he called a friend, trusting so absolutely....

"There, I'm done. You're free to go when you feel like it. There will be some pain as long as you're not fully healed, but the bandage should keep most of it away. If you need me to redo it, just come back here. You're always welcome in the House of Aries."

I bowed my head. "Thank you, Kiki."

I stood up, walking around the room experimentally, feeling the pain spreading through my body with each movement, but all in all very much bearable. I stopped beside the chair on which I had left my shirt, and reached out to pick it up. As my fingers touched the rough fabric, the memory of Lune's hand right above my throat came back to the fore of my mind, undeniable. As clear and harsh as a stab wound, and I whispered tonelessly in the small room, "I let him pass." My fingers clutched the cloth. "I allowed Lune victory, I yielded when--"

"Bullshit!"

I started when I heard the fury in Shaina's voice. "What would your death have changed, tell me?! Nothing, nothing at all!" She snorted. "you were defeated either way. Choosing to die would have been incredibly stupid and selfish. Have you suddenly become so proud that you can't accept failure?"

Kiki nodded from the other side of the room. "You shouldn't be so harsh with yourself, Marin; and besides I'm sure Athena herself would tell you that you were right to yield and not to choose a death that wouldn't have gained anyone anything."

I shrugged, unheeding of the pain, and proceeded to slowly put the shirt on. Fortunately it was the kind you had to button on the front, so I could do it alone. Once I was done, I told them quietly, "Think what you will."

Both Lune and Merle had been my students, I knew them better than anyone else in the Sanctuary. I had always been aware of their incredible potential, as well as of their inner conflict, of the overwhelming need to go where they were forbidden to in order to find the part of themselves they missed. I had kept silent, I had never brought the matter out in the open with the two young men, foolishly hoping the problem would eventually find a solution on its own. Well, it sure had found one now.

I had banished Merle from the Sanctuary, and Lune...Lune was about to seize a power he'd thirsted after for years. No matter how many layers of sugar one tried to coat the whole matter with, a very simple truth remained.

I had failed my duty, betraying the Goddess' trust, and the Gods only knew what the consequences of that would be.




Lune stopped running, closing his eyes and sending his anger back to the shadows of his mind. Fury wouldn't help him, wouldn't lead him out of the labyrinth he'd been trapped into. A veil of calm slowly settled over him, and he made himself breathe deeply, focusing on what his senses were telling him.

He was still in the third House, at least he was certain of that. He could also feel the *presence* all around him, the strange cosmo which had engulfed the whole place as soon as he had set a foot inside it. It was as if something here was alive, and was reacting to his intrusion.

But why?

Why bar him the way?

Lune had won the challenge, he had the right to go up. Who could be going against the laws of the Sanctuary? It didn't make sense, and what was more nobody had tried to attack him during the whole time he'd been running around in circles. Every so often, there was a break in the shadows of the small temple's inside, an inviting way out which Lune had quickly found out led only to the entrance of the House. He was allowed to go back, but not through. Try though he might, Lune couldn't fathom whose will was behind this funny little joke. He had tried breaking his way through, he had tried destroying the House from the inside, unsuccessfully. He had even come to wonder whether his surroundings were part of the real, solid world.

Sighing softly, Lune admitted to himself that he could keep running for as long as he wanted, he still wouldn't get anywhere. So, out of devices, he did the only thing he could. Quietly, he asked:

"Why?"

Once the echoes of his voice had faded, silence was his only answer. Lune closed his eyes, willing to wait for a while, and set on one thing: he wasn't going back. No way.

Flicker of light.

Touch, featherlight.

Vibration, almost imperceptible.

*Within*.

Echo, slowly rising.

Calling....

Calling....

This sound, coming both from everywhere and nowhere at once, within and without, haunting....

Sobs.

Shaken to his bones and unable to shut himself from whatever was happening, Lune slowly turned on the left, towards the heartrending cries, and drew in a sharp intake of breath when he saw.

The Gold Cloth of Gemini was set on the marble floor a few steps away from him, facing him from its right side. The soft, infinitely sad sounds of sobs were emanating from it, the very feeling of them resonating with something unnamed deep inside Lune's heart.

Hurting.

Despite himself, Lune took a step towards the Gold Cloth, feeling the terrible loneliness radiating from it as if it was his own, as if.... He froze when he saw clearly the face sculpted in the helmet's right side.

It was crying.

Lune watched, numb, as impossible tears ran down cheeks of gold.

Incredibly pale blue eyes....

A presence by Lune's side, always.

supporting even though he preferred silence.

Patiently bearing with Lune's pranks.

Loyal.

Trusting.

Merle. Merle, the friend he had--

Stop!

Lune shook his head furiously, gritting his teeth as he chased the images and memories away. Damn whoever it was who was trying to play mindgames with him, they were in for a disappointment. He didn't care about the past; regrets were for weak fools who never accomplished anything in their lives. With a humorless smile on his lips, Lune walked to the Gold Cloth and observed it closely. It was crying for real, somehow, and it looked like it was behind the maze Lune was stuck into, as well as the stupid, unwanted images which had assailed him just now.

But this was impossible. Lune knew the Cloths were living beings, still....

They couldn't be sentient as well, could they?

Lune stared at the Gemini Gold Cloth in wonder, uncertain what he ought to make of this strange turn of events. One thing was for sure, though. Loath though he was to admit it, he wouldn't win through, at least not now. Eventually he sighed, and whispered softly to the crying Cloth, "I'll be back, you know. You can try to stop me, you can hurl feelings and memories at me, but it will avail you nothing. I will reach my goal."

There was no reply, not that Lune had expected any, but instead an opening appeared in the wall on his left, showing him the entrance he had used. Chuckling despite himself, Lune nodded and stepped towards the light.

Once he was out of this House, he'd have a few questions for Aquila Marin and Ophiuchus Shaina.




I set the mask down on a flat stone beside me, and bent down to dip my hands in the stream. There was pain, distant, resulting from the movement, but I hardly felt it. Kiki had a knack for bandages, and most of all I didn't care about the pain. It wasn't a part of me, or rather it belonged to a part of me which had almost become alien to me.

Like the nightmarish memories of a little girl I didn't want to remember I had been, a little girl the Aquila Saint in me denied she had ever been.

I splashed cool water over my face, in the faint hope it would also wash away those insane fragments of my past, which of course it didn't. It didn't matter much, except for the fact that it meant the knowledge that it was Lune who had shown me the stars shining within me remained. It felt wrong, for some reason I couldn't have named.

It was the wondrous feeling of the cosmo within me which had allowed me to endure and go on for as long as I could remember.

When training sessions were too hard.

When everything in the Sanctuary just collapsed.

When the Specters of Hades had come, and silently killed in the night.

When I had felt the Goddess die.

When I had felt...Aioria's cosmo fading out into darkness.

When they had set the mask on the face of a little girl who had no way to escape, nowhere to go, a little girl who had had nothing but a promise, and the feeling she had touched something magical.

I closed my eyes, focusing on the drops of water running down my face, on their coolness upon my skin, and tried to convince myself there wasn't a painful lump in my throat. Too many things had happened, too fast. Everything had come down around my ears while I had just stood by and watched, unable to prevent events from happening. Helpless.

No, it wasn't true. I had done something.

I had exiled Merle. Merle, who had only wanted to help me as he could, who had never ever wanted to hurt me. Merle, who had come as close to understanding as was possible, like...Aioria.

All this, because of the silver mask I was forced to wear on my face. Because of the silver mask which allowed me to be the loyal, unfeeling, inhuman killing machine a female Saint was required to be. How could strangers understand that the mask was both the symbol and the seal marking the sacrifice little girls were forced to make when entering the Sanctuary: to abandon sensitivity, kindness, compassion, and their very femininity itself? How could those who hadn't experienced the cold silver walling their faces away *understand*?

Because of that, feelings like affection and love were forbidden, became threats to our identity, or rather what it had become. Because of that, I had let Aioria go to his death alone, without telling him....

How sometimes, in the heart of the night when I was alone, watching the stars, I had wished he would ask me to remove my mask.

I dipped my hands into the stream once more, and harshly splashed water over my face, focusing on the pain flaring in my ribs. It would have been better if Lune had killed me, it wouldn't have left me with the knowledge of the mistakes I had made, and with useless regrets over events which were past, irremediably beyond my grasp. At least I hadn't killed Merle, I had managed to avoid that. Perhaps in time I could forget the sound of my mask cracking before him, perhaps in time I could forget the feeling of his arms holding me close, of his warm cosmo enfolding me in the peaceful, unreal moments right before dawn.

Perhaps one day I could become again what I was supposed to be, the emotionless warrior that a little girl's memories had broken, had been slowly unmaking for years...this little girl who had stubbornly refused to die, clinging to the stars a strange but kind boy had given her in the darkest of nights.

"Could you please put that mask on, my Lady?"

I started as I saw the shadow beside mine, and reached out to do what the voice had said. Goddess, that he'd been able to come to my side without my feeling his presence at all, even if my mind had been wholly focused on something else....

Once I had secured the mask on my face, I turned calmly towards Lune, and told him, "Courtesy demands that you let your approach be felt when you come to a female Saint's house unannounced, Lune. I thought I had taught you that."

He laughed, bowing deeply. "My apologies, Lady Marin, I have erred indeed. I didn't want to startle you." I looked straight into his eyes, and saw no spark of amusement or humor in their eerily clear green pools. Lune was very focused at this moment, he had come here for very precise reason. "I am happy to see that your wounds don't seem to cause you too much discomfort."

I let that pass without commenting, waiting for him to say what was on his mind.

Watching him.

And the little girl who was haunting a part of my soul shivered in fear. Coldly, I asked myself why. Why fear? This young man had held my life in his hands, it was true, but this was no reason for the distress I could feel rising in the deepest, most secret part of my heart. The silence stretched on between us, until eventually I slowly, deliberately shrugged, keeping the pain the movement implied to myself, and said in a quiet voice, "The only true discomfort I feel is when I think you set Merle up so he'd challenge me."

There was no reaction to my words. None, save...there, a flicker of those eyes, which might mean anything.

Lune smiled at me, a smile which never reached his eyes. "What Merle did, he did on his own, my Lady, and it's certainly not my fault if he chose to ignore the advice I gave him against going ahead with his idea." Was it anger that had sparked in Lune just now? I watched as the clear emerald eyes clouded, ever so slightly, as if a breeze was stirring a lake's crystal waters, and I found that my heart was beating too fast.

Oh sweet Goddess, could it be? Could it be that Lune somehow still felt something towards Merle, that ambition and need for power hadn't engulfed the whole of him? If it were so....

"The matter of Merle's exile will find its solution in its own time, I'm sure." Lune made a dismissing gesture. "I didn't disturb you for such an uninteresting reason. Instead," Lune squatted down beside me, and stared steadily at my mask's blind eyes, adding softly, "I have a question for you, Lady Aquila Marin. What kind of traps have you or others set along the Great Stairs to prevent passage, and how does one avoid them?"

I looked back at him, completely taken aback by what I had just heard. There hadn't been any traps laid by anyone since the late Pisces Gold Saint had strewn the way from his House to the Temple of Athena with his Royal Demon Roses, and those had been destroyed by Seiya a long time ago. Eventually I told Lune, "One doesn't do anything. There is no trap barring the way, nothing. Once you defeat the guardian, you have the right to pass through."

"Unfortunately, I don't believe you, my Lady." Lune's voice was flat, carefully devoid of emotions.

I bent down towards the small brook in front of us, dipping again my fingers into the stream, and replied ironically, "Oh? Well, it's too bad I guess, since I can hardly change the truth to suit you."

He reached out towards me, and his fingers gripped my left arm, harshly pulling me against him. I managed to stifle a moan of pain, and then he whispered in my ear, "Don't play gales with me, Lady Marin, I am not in the mood."

I laughed in his face. "Threats, Lune?" I shook my head. "Do you really think you can frighten me that easily?" I stared at him steadily, adding in a quiet voice, "If you want to finish what you started, feel free. You will be doing me a service."

There was a heavy sigh coming from him, and I felt the pressure on my arm lessening.

"I'd think you wouldn't stoop so low as to threaten frail young women who're in no shape to defend themselves, Lune."

Lune started, releasing me, and I smiled inwardly as I heard the sarcasm in Shaina's voice. She joined the both of us, and I noticed that, beside her left arm in a sling, she was limping. Not that badly, but still. I turned back towards Lune, and had the surprise to see his cheeks coloring slightly. He said in a carefully controlled voice, "It's not that, but I must know who or what is preventing me from going through the House of Gemini. There is no exit to that House, and the Cloth inside it--"

"You saw the Gold Cloth of Gemini?" There was more than a bit of incredulity in Shaina's tone.

Lune looked sharply at the both of us, then he said, "Yes."

There was more to whatever had happened, I could tell by the tension in his body and the troubled light in his eyes. Shaina gestured helplessly. "Ah well, that doesn't change the fact that neither Marin nor I ever set any traps along the Twelve Houses, and neither do we know of anyone who'd have done such a thing. You can kill us on the spot, that won't change the truth."

Lune's eyes locked on me for a long time, as if searching the blind mask for clues, and eventually he looked away, whispering, "I think you're telling me the truth." His eyes grew distant. "But still I must win through. I *must*." Sighing softly, he stood up and bowed to us. "Please forgive my unseemly behavior. I will leave you, and try to find the key to this mystery another way." That said, he turned on his heels and briskly walked away. I stared at his retreating back, wondering.

Had Gemini Saga reached out to us form beyond the veil of death one last time?

Was this the Goddess' will?

If so....

"Pfeh, you should really have taught him proper manners, Marin."

I turned towards Shaina, who was still facing the direction into which Lune had disappeared. She snorted, and then faced me. "Ah well, I didn't come here to comment n your way of teaching apprentices, even though there would be plenty to say on that subject. I came to ask you one thing." She paused, as if hesitating, and then went on, "Are you feeling any better?"

The question was simple enough, but the echoes of the responses it triggered within me rippled on and on, amplifying and reaching out to engulf my whole self. I tore my eyes away from Shaina with difficulty, and looked down at the stream before us, wondering which answer I should give her. At last, I shrugged. "It doesn't matter."

She nodded wisely. "I see." She sighed, slowly, gingerly sitting down beside me, careful of her left arm and shoulder. Following my suit, she stared at the stream of clear waters for a while, before saying quietly, "I knew something was wrong when you came to the House of Aries. Beyond having been defeated, something happened, something that troubled you so badly it's as if you'd lost a part of yourself."

As if I'd been shaken to the roots of my being....

No. Enough with all that stupid nonsense.

Enough.

I didn't want to think about it anymore, I didn't want to remember the little girl crying in a dusty corner of my soul, I didn't want to see again Merle's eyes as he had realized what he had done.

The pain in those eyes, the sorrow....

The desperate wish....

His arms gently holding me close....

The need, burning, overwhelming, to kill him. To protect myself. To....

The mask, coming down on a terrified little girl's face.

My face.

My...face....

"Leave me alone." I barely heard my harsh whisper, focusing as I was on breathing, and on the pain radiating from my ribs. Absentmindedly, I saw I was hugging myself fiercely. Shaking my head, I repeated, "Leave me alone."

A long silence followed my words, until eventually Shaina stood up without looking at me, and left without a word. I bowed my head and bit my lower lip until I tasted blood in my mouth. Somehow, I managed not to howl to the world all the feelings and emotions tearing me apart.




Ophiuchus Shaina staggered, but managed to catch her balance on the old stone wall. Cursing inwardly against Lune for being the cause of the pain claiming her body, she admitted to herself that taking a long walk with her wounds might also have been a mistake on her part.

Mistake, perhaps, but necessary if she wanted Marin to snap out of whatever madness was slowly but certainly coming over her.

Shaina waited in the wall's shadow, content to catch her breath for a while, when suddenly she felt a presence, and in the same time a tall figure appeared before her. Grinning behind her mask, she said, "I'm glad you found me before I had to start looking all over for you, Merle."

End of Part 6.


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