Ashu appeared in her illusion-world, looking ticked.

"Okay, darnit, I need a catharsis. I need to figure out what's going on, say bye-bye for the billionth time to my sisters, and get on with my life, for crying out loud."

The song started playing. She winced, pain welling up within her. The tears begged for release. You still have… all of me, the song declared. The rest of the lyrics flowed over her, reopening every emotional wound she'd tried to close.

When you cried I'd wipe away all of your tears. She remembered Dniu, begging, begging to be free of the illusion that none of them knew was illusion. Crying, begging to stay in the real world, begging not to go back to that Hell of pain and loss and battle, a world she was never cut out for in the first place.

When you'd scream I'd fight away all of your fears. Combo, being tortured. She remembered the screams that had pierced both their worlds, stunning her out of a rock song she'd been listening to. Her, comforting Combo with words that now rang bitter against the walls of her skull, admonitions to smile eerily, to put her head down, to stop screaming. No comfort. Small wonder the woman had turned out so cold.

She remembered other things, too.

Dniu, left to decide between life and death for another, abandoned by her sisters in the decision, left totally to blame for whatever she chose, be it revenge or letting the enemy go. The pain it had caused her resonated as an echo in Ashu's soul.

I held your hand through all of these years. Had she? Had she even given half a whit about her sisters all these years? Sure, she'd cried. Cried and cried when they were far away and she couldn't reach them. But when she could reach them, when they needed her… she'd abandoned them to the cold and icy ideals of battle. Kill your enemies. Don't give up the fight. Don't give in to emotion. Never, never give in to emotion.

The tears threatened again. She'd spent so much time, emotionless. Cold to the cries of others. She'd seen a thousand deaths and she'd live to see ten thousand more; a few people had meant nothing to her. She'd never been able to muster even a show of sympathy, of caring.

She understood, now. Why she was still like this, wounded and crying. She'd done it to herself. As the rain fell, the droplets hard and pelting around her, bleeding scars appeared along her wrists, symbols of all the damage she'd done to herself. And it wasn't the killing, it wasn't the fighting, it wasn't the carelessness about life and death; it was the fact that she hadn't cared for the living.

She'd told herself forever that the first people she'd ever loved, the first people she had emotional attachments to, were her sisters. But this was a lie. She'd missed their presence, sure. Not only had they justified her, made her whole, but they were the link to that glory world of a life by the sword. But loved them? No, she'd never really loved them. When they'd needed her, she hadn't been there. She pushed a finger along a scar, through it, widening it, losing herself for a few moments in the pain that took place of her thoughts. Tears squeezed from her eyes as she felt the dig of her rough skin, the scrape of her fingernail against the tender flesh.

And that was it. That was the reason, why she hurt so much, why she was so defunct when it came to giving comfort to others, why she could only hug them and lie that it was all right and not even know when she should and should not do it. Why that song brought back what she'd thought she'd finished. She'd screwed it up and until she figured out when, and how, and tried to solve it somehow, she'd never be a comfort for anyone she couldn't empathize with from experience; and even then, not much of one.

Combo. She'd screwed up so bad with Combo. Combo was koori, ice, the cold one. Her icy exterior a barrier to the emotions of the outside world. The ultimate warrior, because the title of "perfect soldier" was taken. Seemingly no emotions. Given a choice, she'd leave behind a comrade to die rather than risk the mission. Heck, she'd leave behind a comrade to die in practically any circumstance just because all her closest comrades were suicidal, anyway. She'd needed someone to reach out to her, to be more than a close comrade, more than someone to joke with, more than someone to laugh at her cynical gallows humor. She'd needed someone to break apart the coldness and make her a whole person. The last thing she needed was a group of followers, calling themselves her sisters, who obeyed her every order and gave her reassurances like "Stop screaming".

Perhaps that was why she was so close to Dniu, the only one of the five who saw her as an equal, not a leader. The one who didn't give a curse about her cold personality, her position of respect, and insisted on trying to make her more fashionable and sociable. But even Dniu couldn't break through the shell, mainly because she tried the wrong way, partly because she soon began to try to become like Combo. Dniu trying to become Combo was like fire trying to become ice. It was impossible, and once she'd reached a certain point of jading she just broke down, unable to take the stress of the war anymore. That's where she'd screwed up with Dniu. Dniu had come running for help, begging to take the place at home while another sister went to fight, but her pleading was practically ignored, her fervent request refused. Granted, there was rationale. Shaye, the sister that would take her place, had screwed up earlier, contributing extensively to Combo's death. But rationale is a sick and twisted weapon to use against emotion.

Shayel. Shayel's case was perhaps the saddest case of all. While Combo had from the start been cold, and Dniu had become jaded willingly, Shayel was unlike both of them. She'd started out gentle, kind, a lover of plants. Over the course of the war, she was generally ignored, except for the fact of her supposedly close relationship to her younger sister, Shaye. Ignored, leaving unspoken everything, she became jaded and cold. When Ashu came to destroy the world, the first eyes she'd seen were Shayel's, the eyes of one who has crossed a line somewhere and can never go back.

Ever.

Ashu breathed. There. She'd said it all, thought it all. In a sense, knew it all; knew why their memory still haunted her, why that song still brought so much pain to her. And as she realized this, as she realized her mistakes and repented for them, the pain brought by the song faded more and more. The scars on her arms stopped bleeding, faded into faint white reminders of what she'd done and what she should never do again.

You still have… all of me. Well, not any more. The rain stopped. The sun, ready to bake the muddy ground into cracked dust, lit the world Ashu had made for her catharsis. Stepping into the bus stop, she disappeared.

And that was it.