Cyanis plucked a hat off of her head, so she could scratch herself in a spot behind and between her fluffy, luxurious ears. The fact that she hadn't been wearing a hat until just now is immaterial; she needed a hat on her head to take one off and scratch the back of her head where it had been sitting, and so she does. Er, did. It's kind of in her hand, now. 

"Well doesn't that just beat all. How'd we wind up here?"

Behind her, the motley assortment of allies she'd rather not have or need did whatever it is that they were doing. In front of her, a crashed helicopter burns and smolders, though not quite as spectacularly as the Imperial Palace and its roses. 

"Well they say any landing you can walk away from..." offered Kat.

"Is insurance fraud." Actia finished for her.

"Wait," said Cyanis, "Is that the play here? Are we defrauding the weird sad, obviously rich lady who lives here? Probably all alone and oohhhhhhhhh, yeah ok! Wow it's so nice to have a plan for on-- I mean again!"

Actia was silent: she simply pulled free a tube of blue lipstick and painted a colon and a three on her lips. Kat was less silent, but that wasn't because she had a lot to say in this moment and more because she was excitedly hopping up and down at the thought of being part of a Foxgirl Scheme one more time. 

"Just quick thinkin' and expert helicopter, uh, stuff, Cy," said Yue, "Sorry you blacked out and don't remember it. You were so cool, actually. Never seen anythin' like it!"

And so saying, she threw her sword into its sheath from behind her back. Only the little click of the metals touching betrayed her at all. Actia narrowed her eyes at the sound, but the most dangerous thing a fox could ever do is call attention to an Anime when they are in the middle of anime...ing. Wisely, she let the moment go. 

"Ooohohoho! Well! I will say, it's good to get some credit and respect around here for once! Thank you, Yue Just! But for the record it goes against the Foxgirl Code to lift even a [i]single[/i] pawsie's worth of effort in service to charity! I will of course be expecting full remuneration for my heroics in the form of hrmfrblurbl[i]gjghlllllle?????[/i]"

"Er," er'd Yue, "My name's just Yummmmmph?!"

Luckily there were only two sillyheads still talking. Because Bella only had two hands. 

Without the yapping, she could hear the silence of this place. Was it surprising? For all the bombast of the exploding rose tresses there was hardly any noise to be heard. The crackling of fire, the soft collapse of the grand scheme of pipes running in and through everything, and the trellises holding up the flowers besides them, the bursts of light and heat whenever a petal caught right to send the inferno towering ever higher...

All of it was quiet. All of it was gentle, in its way. As violent and bombastic and beautiful as it was possible for anything to be, and yet the noise that it produced felt muffled and almost prerecorded. Bella did not collapse and howl from the overload of it all. She did not even need to cut off her hearing to keep going. She breathed in the smoke and tasted perfume. 

She was home. And home was burning. All around her a million memories burst into bright red nothing and tumbled down to ash. All around her steam hissed where the ocean seeped through unformed walls and lapped at this art project which was nothing less than the destruction of everything her childhood had held dear. The only place she'd ever wished to return to, the only place she'd ever wanted to live, the only place she'd learn to hate as much as she'd missed them. 

Thousands of memories burst into glittering sparks and ash around her. The little theater that she and Redana had watched all of those ridiculous movies in as children was gone now. She would never get the chance to teach the screen the magic of Prion Paula. Her fingers would never again caress the banister where her hand had once come into contact with Redana's and their fingers had nearly intertwined. She would never smell ammonia in the courtyard past that hallway and know that Mynx was lying in wait. She would never...

Could she really not do it? Even now, as every beautiful thing that was left to her memory burned to dust around her, could she not make herself hate Nero? Where was the anger she was supposed to feel? Where was the fury that had propelled her across the galaxy, through every horrible task she'd been asked to face? It was true that she hadn't felt it when she fought Taurus over Beri, or when she'd fought Sanalessa for Vesper's sake, or...

"Ah, shit. When did I lose it?"

Bella looked down at her claws, as they pressed against the lips of a swordswoman and a fox. With a sigh, she released them both only to immediately snatch Yue around the waist and throw her over her shoulder.

"I need a new weapon, then. You'll do."

"Haweeeeep?!"

"Come on, Redana. If she wants a beautiful death, let's go take it from her. The rest of you... I don't care. This is my home, go loot it or whatever. If you can find anything worth stealing."

"Foxgirl Heist, Foxgirl Heist, Foxgirl Heeeeiiiiiisssst~!"

"...Thank you, Kat."

"You're welcome Actia!"