Ann walked unsteadily across the ground until she came to the disorganized desk. There were spent ink wells, piles of scribbled notes, most of it doctored from the Creed, passages about the applications of Alchemy and some various incantations steps and uses. Ann ignored it all, even though the writings before her were considered to be the musing of an Alchemic prodigy, a genius. She had once thought such things.

But now they were just the writings of a dead man.

Sitting behind the desk swiftly Ann stared at the mess feeling beret, but unable to life a hand to begin cleaning it up. Cleaning up his mess. Making more of him disappear from the world.

Slowly she reached into the bodice of her robes, and with a frustrated yank, she snapped the chain that had been dangling between her breasts forwards.

The chain was golden as was the large quarter sized lockets that hung from the chain, creating the sign of infinity. There was a clasp at the sides that allowed the thin sides of the locket to pop open to reveal the images inside.

The first thing she saw was the image of Eric Aron holding a young girl in his arms. Or more like the image of the man, back when he had been a fun loving fourteen year old kid. Beautiful. And charmingly kind.

On the other side of the locket there was the image of Ann’s own face looking back at her, about fifteen years younger. Her skin was darker having gotten more sunlight back in those years. Her eyes were kinder. Her eyes were also riveted on the boy in the image as they embraced in friendship.

Back then Ann and Erick had bonded over their mutual lack of family. Orphans both of them.

Ann had always been an orphan, but when she started showing an aptitude for the gift of Mana she had been taken into the Brotherhood at the age of 9. While it seemed that Eric had no one to raise him but Master Hovel after his Uncle was killed when he was nothing but a baby.

They had met in their younger years, and bonded as young children often do. They had pursued Alchemy together for years, they had been trained in that Base. Lived in that Base. The Brotherhood had been their lives together.

Ann had once only cared about doing what Eric wanted.

She had been awed by his flawless mind, which could grasp things in Alchemy that she always struggled to comprehend. But...as puberty came, and the year of their 18th birthdays passed, both Eric and Ann were taken and put through the Training of their Wills. A brutal training, a dark process of blood and pain and trail by error. Ann had been trained by another female Alchmists who had enjoyed her work as a trainer a bit too much if Ann’s scarred back was any indication after all this time.

But Eric....he had been gifted Hovel as his trainer. Ann had heard him screaming through the, hard metal doors.

After that Mana was awakened in them. Their Will, giving them the ability to shape and manipulate the dangerous energy, but they were changed both by the experience, and by the cold burn of their birth right. Mana took something from them both and never gave it back. Not that they had tried very hard to get back what they both sacrificed for this power. They were taught to exhault in the dark emptiness they now carried, the absence of the light in them was a burden they no longer had to carry.

But the Mana gave them power and dark desires in return...and they had both been encouraged to indulge in the darkest of urges. To chase to deep the emptiness, let the burn of Mana be all that remained.

By their own choices both Ann and Eric became hard and cold. Their friendship was soon turned to one of rivalry. And bitter competition.

But....in this image in her locket Ann saw something she had forgotten, something she hadn’t felt until she was down there, staring at his remains. Until her heart had been broken...untill she realizsed that the part she had belived lost of her own soul, the part she had believed to be dead and gone, flickered back alive. Or perhaps she had simply burried the last of her light out of foolish naievite? Either way the loss of him shocked her in a way that she had not been prepared for, in a way that felt familar. she had sufferd so much loss, she had become quite numb to it.

She flashed to an image of him. Then she saw the mangled mess of him that had been turned to bloody paste in the bowels.

Images also came to her of the creature that had accosted them.

Ann had been taught all her life that the Bane was a magnificent God. A god that would sooth the ill of mankind, and banish death into eternity. She had been taught that their God had hand selected them from among man, special beings with the capacity to do the will of GOD, and that they had all of their knowledge and power of Alchemy and Mana because of the teaching of their Bane. Their Scion. The Divine Sun. The Deity of Darkness.

Just a mere brush with the Gods power had left her fumbling like a fawn after new birth....but she couldn’t quite ignore the visage of the one she had once felt to be holy. Because her interminable God Bane had never looked like a Ghoul in her mind.

Her sweeter version of the Scion hadn’t been graced with gore smeared fangs and teeth. Her Scion hadn’t had pieces of a man’s skin dripping off of its jowls.

And the Grand Master’s reaction to the God hadn’t gone over her head. He had been hopelessly aroused. Standing inches away from the desecrated body of man he had raised since childhood...and he had been aroused. His excitement pressed hard to his clothing as the God touched him and spoke to him.

What kind of God elicited such a thing in a man....raw lust almost vile in its open display? What kind of SAVIOR exalted after the death of a man that had been so loyal and devoted to him? Like a son.

Ann swallowed and cursed herself.

How dare she!? This was the God of all she had. All she wanted. All Mankind deserved! How dare she judge the Master?

Emotions threated to take her back into the tears. The sobs wanted to come. She wouldn’t let them. Ann pushed the images away in fierce confusion and loss. Her heart hammering, her hands trembling. Hatred rage and anger built up in her breast. Something wanted to come out, that she was deathly afraid to release. To think like this....what a spit in the face to her divine right. What a horrible slap to her honor as a Child of the Sun. Suddenly cold fury like the cold flames of Mana pulsed across her senses. She opened her self to the tundra of cold desires. The numb need to inflict her will on the world, or other beings.

Slowly she put out her left hand. Ann opened her mind to the pulse around her.

Like a switch being flipped, the world before her was called into sharp clarity. The white walls. The mucky smell. The cold air thickened about her wrists and hair. She felt as if she were floating and falling all at once. She struggled to breathe as the numbness settled over her nerves feeling like burning cement in her veins. The Mana pulsed across her hands and arms, like the tendrils of black flames, swirling, scrunched up symbols of Alchemic runes spun and danced at her fingertips. The black flames glowed in her haunted eyes.

She put her arm out towards the necklace hanging from her right hand. So easily she could destroy the meaningless trinket. So easily she could cast the image of him into the void and be free of it. She knew not what else to do with it. And now that he was gone it seemed foolish to hide the locket in the folds of her robes, for fear of its discovery.

Fear that seemed so idiotic now. So useless.

She would discard the image and get on with emptying out his chambers. She would burn all of his clothes and books, and possessions. She would discard him.

Just like Hovel discarded him. Just like God discarded him....to rot in the Bowels. Forgotten by a God and a Man he worshiped....

“Blasphemy!” Ann cried at the thoughts, as she closed the locket, and threw it to the ground. Shaking she grasped her arms and closed her eyes. “I must go. I must give benediction. I must attend Supplement today as the Second...! I must.”

Ann turned and swiftly departed the room. Sobbing like screams caught in her throat. She left the space as it was. The task of clearing out his things had been given to her two days ago...and it seemed that for yet another day it would go undone. She refused to acknowledge why.

She told herself she wasn’t running. She wasn’t running from these strange emotions.