"She's been taking this whole business a lot better than I thought," Matt said. He swung his legs around and sat up. "Don't get me wrong - I hate putting her through all this, too. But I don't see any other choice."

"Its not that," R.D. said, shaking his head. He spared a glance back at the girl as she entertained the two younger children.

"All this time, Ileyna's been our only method of extracting the Essence," R.D. explained quietly, making sure Rossiu didn't hear--luckily he was helping Leeron and Hugo at the moment. "I don't think we've seriously thought about the ramifications of that. While you and Helena and our enemies have only had pieces of Omega Essence for a short period of time, Ileyna's had her's all her life. She's been bonded with it for nearly ten years... and she's bonded with it like no one else has."

He sighed, tearing his eyes away from the girl. "So what happens if we try and take that from her?"

Matt lifted a foot, resting it against the rock while he flapped his arms over his knee. Damn, R.D. was right. Just ignoring the fact that it gave her special powers...if they took the Essence from her, would she even stay alive? Okay, maybe she wouldn't drop dead like Helena apparently would if her Essence was removed, but could they risk that?

His lips tightened. "Well," he said after a pause you could fill with a cement truck, "I guess the best thing we can do is get the Chronomancer to make sure nothing bad happens to her once we yank the Essence."

"I don't trust the Chronomancer," R.D. said bluntly. "Yes, we have him to thank for letting us know of the threat Magister represents, but its because of him we're in the dark about everything else. He hasn't told us what Magister is capable of. And he certainly didn't tell us about the others he's sent scurrying after the Essence!"

He sighed, taking a breath to calm himself. It wouldn't do to blow up now and alert the girls that something was wrong. And Leeron and Rossiu may mistake it for something else. "We don't even have a way to get the Essence from her anyway. And she'll be there when the Core finally rebuilds itself. I don't like it, but we may only have one option here when it happens, and I don't like it. I don't like it one bit."

The thought was appalling. He had seen what the Omega Core was capable of. And what Core Genesis planned to do to the Multiverse. But did they even have any other choice?

"What option is that?" Matt said. Unpleasant visions of the 'option' floated in his mind.

"That's easy, Matt," R.D. said, his voice even softer than before. "Ileyna becomes the host of the Omega Core."

A short gasp of wind buffetted their clothing.

Edited by The Helldragon on November 24, 2009 at 17:55:08.

The thought was simply too horrifying to contemplate. Give control of the Multiverse's most powerful, and most dangerous, sentient artifact to a nine-year-old girl from a war-torn planet? Ileyna was a sweet, simply, and shy little girl... not the kind of person to be given power of something that intends to annihilate the entire Multiverse and begin it anew. The same artifact that had murdered Helena and brought about the creation of an Avatar of Destruction, Dragon Drive FINAL.

The girl's laughter carried on the wind.

R.D. and Matt remained silent, both knowing that the conversation was essentially over. They both knew that later that night, they'd need to inform the girls, after everyone and Ileyna was asleep.

Night fell, opening up into the brilliant expanse of stars and the giant moon that hung in the sky. They all settled down for the night, while Leeron continued work on the Firebird--luckily, whatever he was doing with those drones, it was quiet. Rossiu and the three kids retired into the Ganmen house, while Kamina, Simon, and Yoko bunked down in sleeping bags of their own. The others did the same, but only until they could hear the others fall asleep. After a few minutes, quietly, R.D. slipped out of his bag and made his way around the house and Ganmen, waiting for Matt, Helena, and Alasea to show up.

Soon Matt came around the corner, hands in pockets and shoulders scrunched due to the chill air. Helena followed. She wore the heavy and fat coat she used to survive the cold caves when the group was adventuring with Samus. She moved with a shuffle, but her eyes tried not to look tired.

Alasea came around just after Helena, rubbing at her eyes with her hand. She had a blanket draped around her shoulders, held tightly over her chest to try and escape the chill.

"What is it you and Matt wanted to tell us?" she asked.

"We figured it'd be best to tell you now," R.D. said. "We may have a problem down the line concerning Ileyna."

"What's wrong?" Helena asked, her words almost a murmur.

Matt rested his knuckles against his hips dramatically. "We might have a problem on our hands. R.D. has brought up the disturbing notion that Ileyna might end up as the new host of the Omega Core when all of the Essence is gathered in one place."

"What? Why??" Alasea asked, sounding distraught at the notion. If they weren't entirely awake then, they were now.

"Ileyna has never been without her Essence," R.D. explained. "Its bonded to her like no other piece has bonded to others. Removing it may kill her. So if she wants to live, we may have to make it so that she retains her piece when the Core reforms, so that she becomes its host, like Matt was before her."

"And then there's you, Helena," Matt said.

"What about me?"

Matt folded his arms. "Well, remember that you've got a piece of the Essence inside you. We don't know if, uh, taking it out of you will kill you or not.

But let's not panic yet," he cut in, watching Helena's face sink. "Next time we see the Chronomancer, we're gonna talk with him and make sure everything works out all right, okay?"

"Our only clue as to what happens if we take your Essence is the word of Geese Howard," R.D. said. "And he wasn't even sure himself. He may have just been saying it to screw with our heads."

"But what about Ileyna?" Alasea asked, looking concerned. "We can't force her to do anything like that. Especially not with that monster of a device."

R.D. nodded. "We don't know for sure with her either. But we do know she's different. We don't exactly have much choice here... maybe, if we're lucky, she'll be able to control the Core unlike anyone else ever has."

"Because I did such a great job with it the first time," Matt said, cracking a smile.

Despite the tension, R.D. had to hold back a chuckle. "Well, at least, there might not be any truck monsters any time soon."

"So what are we going to tell her?" Alasea asked.

"Nothing, yet. We might be wrong. The Chronomancer, as much as I don't trust him, may have something figured out. But until then, we keep quiet on this. We'll tell her when she needs to know."

"The Chronomancer may be one of those silent types, but he's a good guy," Matt said. "I earnestly believe that. I really think he'll help us if we ask him."

"We'll find out when we see him next," R.D. muttered. He flexed his hand a bit, causing the fabric of his glove to creak as it was stretched.

"All right, I'm goin' to bed," Matt said. "We've got a busy day tomorrow. That Jigitalis guy is the only lead we've got, and a stupid lead is better than none at all."

He walked off a bit before pausing and facing the others again. "...am I really as strange as Kamina is?"

"Sometimes," Helena said.

R.D. just walked off, past Matt as he went back to bed as well, leaving the girls by themselves.

"... well, at least they're not hiding this from us," Alasea murmured, sounding troubled. She spared a glance to the blue metal house, where Ileyna lay within.

"I thought Matt was the only one hiding things from me," Helena said.

"I don't know if R.D.'s hiding anything else," Alasea said. "But at least they're not hiding this. I couldn't blame them if they had wanted to."

She sighed and leaned against the Gurren's leg. "But Ileyna? With the Core? I don't know if I could handle that."

"How bad was it when Matt had the Core?" Helena asked.

"Its hard to control, apparently," Alasea said. "There were times where we'd spend minutes just for Matt to create something that worked properly. A good portion of the time, what he tried to do blew up in his face."

She looked up into the night sky as she remembered. "Apparently whenever he used the Core, some of the energy used would end up tearing through the barriers between dimensions. Every use meant a new hole. The reason why Matt traveled through the Multiverse was to return the Omega Core to its resting place and fix all those holes."

And then the Omega Core went on a rampage and killed Helena. And they had to give that thing to Ileyna?

"And what else?" Helena asked. "You travelled with Matt. You must know what he's been keeping from me. You might as well tell me now."

"I'm sorry, Helena. But I can't."

Alasea shook her head.

"No, whatever Matt's hiding from you, he has to tell you. At the least, I made him promise that he'll tell you, and tell you soon. And I'll make sure he doesn't go back on his word."

"That's a bunch of crap," Helena said. A swirl of dust whooshed past her legs. "He won't spill it, he's too afraid. If he made you promise not to tell me, I'll take the blame. But I'm sick of being kept in the dark."

Alasea sighed and looked off to the side. If she told Helena everything, Matt would be angry with her. If she told Helena nothing, then Helena would be angry with her. So it looks like she had to compromise.

"I'll tell you one thing of the things you wanted to know," Alasea said. "Just one. This is yours' and Matt's issue so he has to tell you the rest."

Edited by RisingDragon on November 24, 2009 at 20:43:09.

"Okay. I'll ask him about the rest tomorrow. And you got to help me make him talk, okay?"

"I'll try," Alasea said.

She lowered herself down to the ground, leaning against Gurren's foot.

"We didn't find you, per se, on Persior," she started. "What we found--or what Matt found, at any rate--was a small statue of a dragon. He thought it was cool, so he decided to keep it. Well, after that, whenever we got in trouble a dragon kept appearing to help us out. Whenever it did, the statue disappeared from its little pedestal.

"Some time later, we got into something that was a bit over our heads. We fought a demon named Bruno, and his superior... Cora. We couldn't stop Bruno, no matter what we did. R.D. and Matt and Hugo are still sore over that loss. We only escaped because Aisha, another Daughter of Dawn like myself, detected us and warped us to safety. That night, in Aisha's home, you spoke to us for the first time."

She could remember it clearly. They had been alerted from their bedding by Matt's terrified scream. When they had arrived... "You spoke to Matt first. Only he could see you, though. When we got there, we found him... well, screaming at nothing. Then he did something with the Core, and we could see you, too. You told us that you were the dragon that had been helping us. And you told us what you were."

She looked over at Helena, frowning a bit. "You told us your story, about Persior, and what had happened to you. And you told us how you met the Chronomancer, who said you were going to be Matt's Stand, to help protect him on his way to the Eternal Sanctuary."

Alasea neglected to tell Helena what happened between then and the next morning. That was embarrassing and had nothing to do with Helena's predicament. She kept talking. "The next day, we got attacked by Malvettix for the first time. You were seriously hurt in that battle... somehow. And during that battle, the Core did something of its own volition. You ceased being a Stand that day and regained a corporeal body. And you've been like that ever since."