To Protect Our Treasure

"Seraph!"

I could only hear a very distant voice and feel the sting on my cheek. Without my knowing so, I had given in. I fell asleep.

When I woke up, or rather, was woken up, it still didn't feel real. I was engulfed in Nasty's black mass-like armor. I slowly opened my eyes after quite a bit of struggle.

Chopper was pounding my face in, trying to break in through the armor and wake me up. But even when my face was very much unveiled, he kept hitting me out of some strange sense of emergency. He kept calling out and saying something but I couldn't hear his voice.

He was barely human himself. Most of his right half had transformed into that of a dragon's. His eyes were completely different too. Among all that dragonized form and blood on him, which I'm sure was his very own, I could barely recognize him.

Right, I remembered. We were breaking up the meteors. And then...well, I didn't know. But I didn't need to. We were doing a great job, I'm sure. But it was simply too much. All of us lost ourselves into it, unleashing every bit of hideous power we held within. But still, it wasn't enough. That was to be expected. And now...what now?

**************

Lady was out of breath when she flung the huge door of Valhalla wide open. Despite her injuries, she hadn't stopped to catch any air on her way here.

On this sudden appearance, June, that had been going relentlessly at her typewriter since this morning, lifted her gaze. Her crooked glasses with one round and the other square lens glimmered in the new light that entered with the opening of the door.

"June!", Lady said, amid all her panting, "There wasn't any problem, was there?!"

"No", replied June, shortly.

"Right", saying, Lady proceeded inside, "Don't mind me, just keep on with your work."

June nodded. Lady was a little different when it was just the two of them. Like she didn't have her guard up.

Lady walked straight up to where the altar used to be all those years ago when they'd found this place. Things had changed. The tinted glass windows behind the altar had been shattered and some overgrown shrubbery now hid the opening. This too was a sign of times, she thought.

Just behind where her worktable stood now, was the mark on the ground that once stood as the altar. They'd levelled the place of course. No one there held particular regard for such things, except Prophet perhaps.

Prophet. She realized, he was lying just outside too. She took a deep breath, looking at the last mark of the long gone altar. Then with a swift movement, punched a hole clean through the ground.

June's typewriter stopped for a moment without any further movements from her. But then without inquiring about what she was doing, June continued again. Lady pulled her hand out of the ground and the surrounding area crumbled too.

Inside the hole was an intricate magic circle, drawn by Sight a long time ago. She sighed, seeing it. The reason it was put in such a place was because she was sure they'd never have to use it.

So its come to this, she thought to herself. She went back to her table and took out a small blade that had been kept for just such a purpose. She held it in her hand, to make a cut that could give blood to the magic circle.

Before she could make the incision though, she noticed blood dripping on her feet.

Grim's scythe impaling her, as she writhed and squirmed midair, came back to her mind. Of course, that injury was still there. She tossed the blade aside. And then leaning over the magic circle, she gazed at it for a few seconds.

Then she stepped down into the hole, and stared clearing the debris off of it. With the first drop of her blood, the circle was already glowing. But she didn't activate it right away, she cleared away all the debris. By then, she'd lost considerable amount of blood.

Her fur coat was the only thing covering her and it was mostly smeared in blood. She didn't like that. When she realized her current situation, her countenance shifted into an annoyed one.

She brought her hands together, focusing her magic and then placing them on the magic circle, activated it.

A blood red barrier spawned out of it and spanned outwards, covering as far as the mound where Prophet was lying.

Once the barrier was activated, she climbed out of the hole.

She placed a hand on her stomach, checking the situation. It didn't look good. The blood was dark, she thought, it was liver blood. She'd lost too much of it. Perhaps a healer would be nice at a time like this. But that was the only thing she couldn't have.

"June", she hated asking June to do anything but she wasn't sure she'd make the round trip, "Could you grab something from Chopper's room? Something he wears to sleep, perhaps."

June too realized it was out of ordinary for Lady to ask her to do anything. But she asked no questions. She silently stood up and started towards the chambers.

"Err, no, on second thoughts, he doesn't wear anything to sleep. But see if there's anything that still has its sleeves attached."

June nodded and went ahead. Lady doubted she even knew which chamber was Chopper's. Not a lot of people knew it anymore, since his room was given to Seraph. But the two were supposed to be roommates in reality, even though Chopper was barely ever home.

Lady sat herself down in her chair and waited patiently. June came back sooner than she'd expected.

It was one of the oldest shirts of Chopper's that Lady knew of. Back then, he wasn't as much a barbarian as now. It didn't exactly have intact sleeves but considering Lady was much smaller than him, it served the purpose for Lady.

After having changed, she left her fur coat resting on her chair, running a hand over its surface, she took a deep breath.

"Well, I'm off then", she said, as she left through the door.

June watched her go, silently, and then looked towards her fur coat that was no less than an injured soldier left behind, battered and bruised like never before.