The sky was filled with fire, the clouds replaced by smoke. The sun hide from the slaughter in the sky as planes cut each other down, littering the ground and ocean with burnt steel carcasses, twisted from force of impact. The violence of the new Sengoku Jidai threatened the heavens themselves as gunfire ripped trough the air, there were no more gods to save any of them, they had long abandoned the nation that had cut itself up in pointless war.

"Where the hell are all these planes coming from?!"
"Watch you back Nani-chan, you've got a-"
"Ryujii-san? Ryujii-san?? RYUJII-SAN!!"
"Nani, he's gone, he got- ACK! Shitshitshitshit I'm on fire! Ahhhhhh-"
"Dammit my seat is jammed! I can't eject! Mayday! Mayday! I'm going dow-"

Ashikaga Nishizawa looked down at the floor of her MSO-6, sweat dropping like bombs over the clan's homeland right outside. Her knuckles had long gone white from fear, from worry, from desperation. This was supposed an easy scouting mission, like taking a nap for the legendary Hayabusa Clan 5th Air Wing. Yet, all of them were being out gunned, out matched and out numbered, swatted down like flies. The radio was only sending hyperventilation and panic, the lucky were able to get off a few words of a death poem before exploding into gory fireballs vaporizing any trace of them. 

"Ashi, Ashi!" Nishizawa snapped back to reality as she looked to her right; her brother was right there next to her, she could feel his smile warming her crying body up, "Ashi, don't worry I'm here for you, I'll be right next to you. I promise."
"P-p-promise nii-sa-sama?" the girl wiped away her tears.
"Of course, my adorable little sister."

Nishizawa smiled as she reached to put her hand on the cockpit glass, her brother doing the same. "Nii..." she whispered. She could almost feel their hands meet as she pressed her hand against the glass, covering it in fingerprints and sweat.

Suddenly, her brother's plane was filled with the vibrant color of blood. Red like roses of which death blossomed from. Nishizawa had no air to scream for her brother's name as enemy planes dove in, tearing the plane to shreds. The burning twisted metal lurched to the side, slamming into Nishizawa's MSO-6. Alarms blared as flames danced up her arm, burning her straight to her soul. THe agonizing pain scorched her skin as her tears failed to put them out until she was engulfed in the fire, her plane diving like a meteor into the ground. One bit of the wing was ripped off, than another part, and another part, all until the whole wing was gone. 

Spinning and tumbling in a fiery spiral of death, young Nishizawa let forth one last scream, only for the fire to run inside of her, burning her throat, incinerating her tongue and filling her lungs with smoke and stomach with ash.

[hr]
[i][b]*BRIZZ BRIZZ BIRZZ*
*click*[/b][/i]

Nishizawa opened her eyes to the sight of the hanger ceiling, one hands clutched to the controls to her MSO-6 as the other brought down swift justice on her alarm. The Seishin Gado had sheltered her through the night once more, but it did nothing against her memories as the voices still haunted her. Nishizawa sank into her seat and sighed, she was so brash back then, her failure was paramount now that news of the Hayabusa Clan had been destroyed reached her ears. There truly was no other place for her, even here was just and excuse to run from her failure. 

Panning around, she could tell she had set up sleeping in here last night. Two large pillows had accompanied her in, on to lean on and one to cuddle with. An old blanket sheep printed had tucked itself in, a bit too small as Nishizawa's tiny feet dangled from the ends of. The panel of buttons aside her held up an alarm clock, a notebook, a small clip lamp that she had attached to the edge of the cockpit. A book laid open, leaning against an empty bowl of Lamen, its page only read the words "Happily Ever After", citing the end of the fairtaly. But most importantly, there was a trinket of home: a tiny music box that [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uw0lgj12II]produced the loveliest of music[/url], given to her by her brother. 

With her small hands, she gently cranked the aged brass handle and opened the wooden lid. At one point there was a spinning dancer in the center, gracefully twirling to the soft notes, but it had long disappeared with a small craft of two planes giving chase like an upside down baby toy you put over cribs. Around the spinning plate was a beautiful padding of golden silk, frayed around the edges with small burn marks spotting the delicate fabric but shiny and sleek none the less. And on the inside lid, a picuter strapped in suspended motion, framing the past for Nishizawa. It had been a picture of the Hayabusa 5th Air Wing, all lined up against her brother's plane, [i]the Rose of the East[/i]. The girl could list off everyone names in a second: Ryujii, Nani, Otome, Haru Haru, Toujo, Hoki, Nobu, Hideyoshi, all the people who died due to her errors. Holding back the tears, Nishizawa stopped staring into the past as the music stopped and closed the lid before throwing her blanket off and dismounting the plane.

Leaping down from the cockpit, she sniffed herself and realized she hadn't changed out of her clothes before going to bed and smelling particularly like oil and roses. She winced and grimaced. Stripping herself down as she walked toward the showers, Nishizawa threw all of her clothes into a passing laundry basket and ignored the looks of the people who happened to see her figure walking down the halls.

Twisting the little knobs on, she let the water stream out and rain onto her body. The lukewarm water wasn't exactly invigorating but she didn't feel like drowning herself in a bucket of ice or boiling herself, her nightmares gave her enough of a burning sensation.

Shutting off the showers, she whipped a towel off the rack and wiped herself down, draining the water out of her white hair before putting the pins back in. The lockers flung open for her as she reached for a new uniform and skirt to put on, carefully sliding each button in the right hole, each stocking pulled straight and true to the form of her slender legs. 

Walking out of the locker rooms, she stared down the hallway and traverse its long halls before turning into the common room. It was practically empty but that meant Nishizawa had control over the coffee machine which she soon exploited to make her favorite coffee, if it could even be called that. Only a quarter was real coffee in her cup, the rest was cream and sugar and marshmallows and whatever else sweet she could dig up.

Sip by sip, time passed and people entered and left the room, often with friends talking and gossiping, lucky them. It wasn't until the bombastic Welsh-Scottish-British-Irish-Gaelic-Something-From-That-Place-man Ronald burst in with the assignment (Nishizawa was infamous horrible with geography of anything not in Asia so its not entirely her fault). She listened with empty eyes, already making her mind up about the the longer route, it would be safer and if something is safer then people wouldn't die. It might take a while, but at least no one would get hurt to the level if they decided to follow Charles Lindenberg.

Roland smiled at her as he walked out, Nishizawa not bothering to return it and instead stare into her now empty cup. Faint voices in her head screamed in agony, but she once again, like so many times before, quickly shut them down and went back the coffee machine which had its original contents removed and replaces with some "organic arabic coffee beans picked by wondering bhuddist monks" coffee or something like that. Sipping her coffee one more time, she looked up into the light fixtures, remembering how the 5th used to zoom into the sun as a race, memories returning once more, "Don't repeat the tragdey."

Staring back into the depths of her cup, she began to sing to herself, [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iP7mVihaW_M]"Red like Roses brings me to the place you rest..."[/url]