Utena turns and shifts in the bed, tiredly; she's been having trouble
sleeping lately. This might be because of the key of Order's altar around
her neck on the thick silver chain; it glitters when she turns herself on
her side, mumbling, frowning into her pillow.

Uneasy dreams don't help your situation, either. Random images. The smell
of asphalt. Children's laughter. Cold, biting wind. Bright light.. things
that aren't connected, but seem to be part of the same shape.

Utena moans softly and shifts around, restless in her unpleasant sleep,
too tired to try and shift her dream into something more pleasant; she's
just absorbing images now, and frowning.

They remain disconnected.. until they are not. The images reform and
settle, connect themselves to form a more whole picture... your
consciousness floating into the dream, like any unusually narrative
dream...

...you're waiting at the bus stop with several other kids in your class.
Everybody's wearing heavy parkas, because it's winter, and there's a lot
of snow on the ground. But spirits are bright.

Utena shivers, rubbing her hands over her arms and watching her breath
shift into white in the air in front of her...

Utena looks around. Where is she? What's going on? Apart from the bus
stop, which is apparent by the big yellow sign with the picture of the bus
that says STOP, that is.

Everybody's carrying a box, including you. They're talking excitedly about
the reality fair today.. it's the culmination of a lot of weeks of
homework, and the winner will get candy! You're standing by the side of...
of.. an infinite road, stretching in both directions. No other houses or
features. Snow covers the ground on either side of the road. This isn't a
NORMAL place.

Utena frowns slightly.. looking down at the box which weight she now feels
in her mittened hands... what's in it? Definitely not normal if there's..  
just road and snow... her breath still frosting the air before her.

Utena . o O ( Reality fair...?  )

It's just a shoebox. Ordinary cardboard. But the lid is on, so you can't
see what's inside. You notice two nearby kids.. because you're a kid too,
same age as them. One is a little girl with blonde hair in mismatching
socks and clothes, colorful and cheerful, with freckles.. her box is a
little battered. The other is a boy wearing entirely shades of gray, with
gray hair cropped short and a serious expression. His box is perfectly
clean and new.

The girl waves to you. ^_^ "Hi! What's yours?"

Utena uhms. She suddenly feels small, and says, "... I don't know." It's
the honest truth. But she smiles to the girl. "Should we look?"

The girl smiles. "I'll show you mine!" She opens her box, and.. inside,
it's all glowing rainbow colored puffystuff. Eight little glowing golden
dots flutter around it randomly. "Isn't it pretty? Those are my
butterflies."

The young boy watches, with indifferent interest.

Utena leans over. "... Ooh. That's amazing. It's really pretty. Did you
make that?" But then it suddenly hits her... gold butterflies..? She looks
at the girl again... really noticing now. Liking her; she reminds her of
Anything-chan... her mismatched socks and all, Utena has this instinctive
protective feeling toward her. She hasn't noticed the young boy yet.
"Gosh.  What's mine then." She reaches to pull open her box's lid to see.

Inside yours is an upside down castle, a castle of roses. And there's a
cute little girl in a boy's uniform with a sword, and a cute little girl
in a nice red dress. You spent all night working on it.. although you're
not sure if it's what you really want, not yet.

The girl peeeers inside. "A revolution? Wow! That's neat."

The boy hmms. "It's more efficent to create a reality in an initial state
that matches its final state."

Utena giggles softly. The castle's stuck to the lid, so when she lifts up
the lid, she can look at the delicate little pastel-colored spirets with
their tiny little flags. She hms quietly and shuts the box up again with a
murmured, "It's not done yet." And then she looks at the little boy,
closely. All grey. Very grim, isn't he...? "So what's yours like then?"
she asks defensively.

The boy lifts his lid, which is hinged and rotates to a perfect right
angle. Inside.. is a mesh of silver lines, in a perfect grid. All lines
equidistant, a cube of absolute mathematical precision. Glowing pulses of
silvery light, the 'life' of this world, trace along the lines in patterns
that follow formulas. "My world is very structured, and has no intrinsic
flaws. It can run for eternity with no difficulty."

The girl makes a face. "That's boring!"

Utena winces. She feels.. revulsion. Fear by it... the silver lines are
pretty, in a grim sort of way, like a spider's web, maybe.. but spider's
webs are still more random than that. Her instinct is to reach in and...  
pull. Tear at the lines and make them uneven.

The boy closes the box quickly. "Don't unsettle it. I don't want anybody
messing it up. It's perfection."

The girl hmphs. "Perfection is stupid. Imperfection is where things are
really beautiful and fun. My world is based on chaos, and my eight
butterflies make neat new things and can do what they want and have free
will."

Utena hms quietly. "You need both. But it's got to be just right."

The boy disagrees. "You don't need both. Order always defeats chaos, in
the long run, even when it's the order of nothing. It's a logical
impossibility for a chaotic system to endure."

The girl pouts. She doesn't like this guy. "I'm rubber, you're glue!"

Utena opens her box up again, looking at the castle and the little figures
inside the box. And she reaches and puts her arm around the little girl.  
"Well, *I* like it. I think it's beautiful."

The girl smiles. ^_^ "My name's Chaos. What's yours?"

The boy shakes his head, walking away.. but thoughtful. Plotting.

Utena uhms. For some reason, she can't remember her name right now. She
shrugs a little and smiles. "Not important..." She hms. "Hey, I had an
idea. Why don't we put ours together...? I'm not really happy with mine..  
can you help maybe? You have such a pretty one."

Then the boy overhears. He's back next to you.. even though he didn't walk
between there and here. "Of course your world isn't complete. It's lacking
an organizing agent to keep it consistent." And he takes your box away
from you.

Utena heys! and snatches for her box back. She grabs hold of his arm and
TUGS.

Utena says, "That's not yours!"

The boy holds it away. He's bigger than you, and doesn't seem to care how
you feel. "I can fix it." He opens the lid.. and takes a small figure, a
prince in white clothes with dark skin and two faces, and puts that into
your box. Then he hands it over. "Now it's perfect. It has a cycle and a
purpose."

The girl stamps her foot. "That was mean! You're not supposed to mess with
other people's realities! It's in the RULES!"

The boy shrugs. "The rules go against the well being of reality."

Utena throws the box back at the boy. "I don't WANT you messing with my
things!" She feels ANGRY. Very angry.

The boy lets the poor box fall to the snow. "I don't want it. It's still
not perfect enough to be included in my collection."

Chaos picks up your box.. "I'll take it. I can fix what he did. Okay?
Don't be mad."

Utena walks over and PUNCHES the boy. "That's what I think." Schoolyard
rules- you mess with someone, you get the consequence. She tries to grab
for that stupid box of his. Definitely reverted to little kid mode now.

He doesn't seem fazed by the punch, and has an infinitely strong hold on
his own box. "Chaotic emotions lead to an unreasonable state. It can't be
helped." He turns, and starts to go.

Chaos grabs your arm.. "Don't. He's just mean to everybody."

Utena fumes, her head spinning. "Who IS that jerk? I'm gonna get him for
that. I didn't say it was okay to mess with my things. Didn't want his
help." She kicks at the snow.

Chaos looks down. "That was Order. He's mean because he doesn't care about
anything. He ruined poor Anno's world too.. just to show that one crazy
chaotic person can wreck everything. He's always trying to prove he's
better than us."

Utena sniffles irritably and rubs at her nose, feeling the cold on her
legs under the skirt of her black dress. "Jerk." She looks unhappily at
her battered box, a couple of the towers cracked on the castle, and the
figurines all messed up inside. "He ruined it."

The bus pulls up at infinite speeds, then stops, a huge yellow vehicle.
The doors open. "Sit down! We're runnin' late!" A kid replies. "Ah, we're
always running late, you piece of crap." "WHAT did you say?!" "I said I
need to go and buy a decent map." "..oh. So do I."

Chaos takes your box and hers, and smiles. "Come on, I'll help fix it
while we ride to school." She heads onto the bus, and leads you to a seat
you both can share. ^_^

Utena follows, sniffling. She climbs up the big steps into the bus and
follows her new friend over into place, hopping into a seat, with her
little feet not touching the floor, kicking against the vinyl seat.

Chaos props up your box on her lap, and opens it.. "Aww, it's not too bad.
Look." She heals the cracks in the tower, and sets the figurines up..
frowning at the third one, the prince. "I don't like that. It's going to
just make the same stuff happen again and again."

Utena says, "I'm gonna throw it away." She reaches in to try and pry out
the little figure.

The figure is.. absolute coldness. Ice to the touch. Rooted in place by
the power of order.

Chaos eeps. "Don't!" She pulls your hand away. "...all Order's stuff is
like that. He doesn't let people change it."

Utena says, "It's mine!" Utena huffs. "I'll MAKE it. My world. I can make
it go away." She pouts again, and glares into the box, trying to force it
out to go away. -.-"

The prince figure doesn't move. It's solidly there, as if it was always
meant to be there.

Chaos shakes her head.. but smiles. "Don't worry. I know how to fix it.
You just have to work AROUND that. Okay?"

Utena sighs. "Okay. But he ruined it. Now I don't know what it could've
been." She crosses her arms over her chest, looking into her box
despondently.

Chaos nods.. "It'll have to be different. But that's okay. Everything
changes when your world is really ALIVE." She leans across the aisle of
the bus, to talk to the kid sitting there. "Hey, oneechan, can you help
me?"

An older kid, with ivory white skin, messy black hair and an ankh around
her neck looks up from her copy of Cosmopolitan. "Huh? Oh, hey, Chaos.
Who's your friend?" She smiles to you. n.n

Utena looks over with big eyes. o.O Who's she talking to? Binkbink. "...  
Don't I know you?" she asks the older, pale, pretty girl.

The older kid smiles. "Everybody does someday. My name's Teleute, but you
can call me Death. I'm pleased to meet you." She waves.. then looks into
the box. "Aww, man. Order's a jerk. He messed up your world?"

Utena smiles, liking the older girl too. She sighs and nods, sitting back
with a frump, the little cardboard box in her lap. "All ruined now. I
wasn't done. I was gonna put have Chaos help me, but he stuck that.. THING
in there."

Utena pouts, and sniffles. "I didn' wan' it in there."

Death hmmms. "I see. Well, we can't take it out.. but one of THEM can."
She points to the other two figurines. "I like the one in the dress. I'll
help them both be reborn, and learn things they wouldn't learn otherwise.
And then she'll find a way to stop the pattern." She takes the little rose
bride figure, and hugs it to herself a moment.. then sets it back in the
box. "There. In time, it'll all be okay."

Chaos beams. ^_^! "Thanks, oneechan! You're the best!"

Utena wows, looking up. "... Thank you, Death." It's important to be
polite for something like this. That's what her mom always said. Be polite
when people help you. She rubs her eyes. "... Sorry..."

Death looks sympathetic.. "I know." She sighs. But smiles. "You'll be
happy one day. I know you will." She slips her walkman headphones back on,
and listens to Nirvana.

Chaos looks over at you..?

Utena closes her box quietly, sealing up the little prince who's a girl,
the other prince with two faces, and the little figure in the dress under
the castle. "I don't like it very much now. Even though it's fixed." She
shakes her head and looks back to Chaos with a faint smile. "Can I see
yours again? It's so pretty."

Chaos smiles, and opens her box.. all the pretty puffstuff, like
imagination waiting to happen... and her eight little butterflies, so new
to the world, infantlike in the way they flutter about in curiousity.  
"Those are my children. They're so nice. They're going to decide who they
want to be. And one day, they'll grow up and make an even bigger world!"

Utena says, "I wish I could make something like that. This was my first
time. I don't think I'll try again after this." She makes a face at her
box. "I wish I could get him back. It's bad to feel like that, isn't it?  
But I don't feel very nice about it. You've got such a nice world though.  
You should win for sure." She smiles over. "Better close it up so it's
gonna be safe."

Chaos closes her box. "Don't feel bad. It's not what you wanted to
happen..  but never give up." She smiles. "This is the fourth world I've
made. I think I'm done, though.. they all link together so neatly. I have
a nice daughter who's going to be named Canal in one of them, she's
pretty..."

Skreeee. The bus rolls to a halt in front of Infinity Elementary School,
and the kids file out. Chaos leads the way for you.

Utena ohs. "You've got a lot of talent." She giggles softly. "I wish I
could see the other ones." She follows you while you lead her on, still
carrying her battered little box.

Chaos takes your hand, laughing.. "That is a secret. I can't show anybody
yet." She leads you into the school, and to the cafeteria, where
everybody's setting up.. the huge banner across the ceiling reads 'N-TH
ANNUAL REALITY FAIR'. There are little cards for where everybody's
supposed to sit; and wow! You're sitting right next to Chaos.

Utena holds Chaos's hand and giggles, clambering into her chair and
fidgeting a little, nervously. She wore her best dress today, but it all
feels so stupid now, with her world all broken. :( Resting her hands in
her lap she sets her box on the table in front of her.

Chaos sets her box on the table too. n.n Proud of hers.. but feeling a
little bad for yours, when she looks over. She wants to cheer you up. Hmm.  
Blink! "Hey! You wanna go get some cookies before the judges get to us?"  
Points to a table across the cafeteria where every kind of cookie that
exists are displayed.

Utena uhms... She looks down. "Nuh-uh. I'm not hungry. Uhm... go ahead
without me."

Chaos's face falls. "Aww, okay." She walks off, to fetch the cookies...

The empty seat next to Chaos is taken.. Order has a seat, setting his box
and neatly aligning it with the edge of the table.

Utena reaches over protectively and puts her arms around Chaos's box. -.-
She swaps her box with the one that Chaos put on the table, so if he tries
anything stupid at least Chaos's nice world won't break.

Order doesn't look over, but speaks. "I saw that. Clearly, such a simple
strategy can be parsed by myself."

Utena says, "I don't care. You already messed up mine, but I won't let you
mess up hers."

Order ohs? "So you won't mind if I continue to improve yours?" He glances
at your box.

Utena says, "Leave mine alone TOO." She makes another grab for HERS. Utena
will just hold BOTH of them. -.-

Order shrugs. "You're being emotional and irrational. A natural response
from a chaotic being."

Chaos returns with an armful of cookies.. and frowns. She tosses her
cookies at Order. "Go away!"

They bounce off the boy, who simply blinks.

Utena looks up, holding the two boxes tight in her arms, away from where
Order can get to them any more. "Mean jerk..." She sticks her tongue out
at the grey boy.

Order stares down Chaos. "You've always been a problem in my way. I bring
perfection to this school, and you oppose me."

Chaos stands her ground. "Only because you're mean to the other kids and
you ignore the rules. I won't let you push everybody around."

Utena puts the boxes down on the table and moves over to stand next to
Chaos. "Yeah! You don't get to have everything YOUR way."

Order ohs? He forms a small, small silvery ball in his hand. "But my way
is the eventual way of all reality. Because all worlds collapse that are
not perfect, and once collapsed, they become nothingness -- the pure order
of zero."

Utena reaches out and slaps Order's hand.

Chaos sticks her tounge out. "Death-Oneechan says that's how it's SUPPOSED
to be. You're the cheater, you big fat poo poo head!" Order's hand is
slapped down. He pauses.

Utena says, "Don't CARE." Utena says, "You don't get to be the big mean
jerk any more." Utena says, "Take your stupid box and GO AWAY."

Order says, "You need to be taught a lesson. That I am the one who is
always right." He gestures.. and you and Chaos, who are together and away
from the table, are encaged in a box of lines. Impenitrable.

Chaos eeeps! o.o Very scared. She pulls at the lines. "Stop it!"

Utena yells at the top of her lungs, "TEACHER!!!!"

Order walks quickly to Chaos's box.. he takes a small object out from his
sleeve. A chair, an altar, with chains and a lock.. all silver. And he
drops it into Chaos's box. It sinks into the puffystuff like a rock.

Chaos screams in terror, feeling that fall into her world.. and faints.

The Teacher walks over.. a wise man, with a kindly face. "Is there a
problem?"

Utena kneels down next to Chaos and puts her arms around her, glaring
utter HATRED at Order. "He's RUINED both of our worlds...! He put us in
this CAGE and messed things UP!"

The Teacher looks at Order. "Did you do this? Don't lie. You know I know
all that is."

Order nods. "I had to show them the truth of Chaos's fragile existence.
They're simply overreacting."

Utena exclaims, "He didn't have ANY right to do that! We don't even know
what we could have had!"

The Teacher takes a moment of poise, in thought. "You know the rules,
Order. You mustn't change where one stands. You mustn't force the
boundaries of what must be. What you have done breaks those rules."

Order remains firm. "If my change goes on without fail, then is it not
what was intented? If it is stopped, I will agree to punishment. But until
it plays out, you cannot know if it's not what The Principal intended."

Utena cradles herself around Chaos, furiously. She cries. "You didn't have
ANY right to do that. You PUSHED your stupid crap on us without even
ASKING if we wanted to share. I HATE YOU!"

Chaos wakes up... slowly. But remains horrified, just listening,
quietly...

The Teacher looks at Utena. "He is right, in his arguement. But as I
cannot punish him.. yet... I cannot protect him, either. This is a matter
between students. I will watch over, and be there for the outcome. I
apologize for the distress it causes, but that is the way of us, as you
know." And .. he vanishes.

Order doesn't smirk. But he COULD, if he was capable. "Do you hear that,
Chaos? I dare you to prevent this. I dare you to keep your own powers from
being ordered. Will you accept?"

Chaos is too scared to respond... shocked silent.

Utena says, "You SHUT UP... you stupid JERK."

Utena says, "If I wasn't sitting in this CAGE, I'd BEAT YOU UP for this."

Order shrugs. "The challenge stands, regardless. The outcome will be
predictable as I forsee." He takes his box, and calmly walks away at
infinite speed... the cage vanishes.

Chaos starts to cry, quietly... eyes wide with fright.

Utena says, "Big stupid jerk can't even fight FAIR. He had to CHEAT."

Chaos says, "...my world.. my beautiful world.."

Chaos buries her face in your shoulder, weeping.

Utena holds you tightly in her little arms. "I'm sorry. I'm real sorry,
Chaos.." She doesn't really know how to comfort, but she does the best
that she can, her hands restiing on your back. "... I'm sorry..."

Chaos looks up. "He wants to contain me! He's not SUPPOSED to change where
we stand, but he made something that can enslave me! Make me break my own
world.. and I can't stop it! I'm powerless!"

Utena shakes her head, her own wide, blue eyes shaking with fear. "I won't
let him." She brushes her thumb over your face and hugs your close. "It's
okay. Why don't we put our stuff together. Death said mine would be okay
in the end. Maybe if we put it all together we can fix it somehow."

Chaos sobs.. nods. She gets up, weakly.. and takes your box, and folds it
somehow, placing it inside her own. "Will.. will your girl with a sword
help me? Will she fight for me to stop this? Please, please say she will!  
I'll give her my gift and she can maybe stop it.."

Utena nods, sniffling too. She holds your hands. "Neither of us got to
finish what we were doing. So maybe we c'n do it okay together. I promise.  
You c'n have whatever works from mine."

Utena asks, "... Why don't we get everyone that Order messed up and put
them together...?"

Utena says, "I bet that'd be good. Maybe with lots of people, there's a
way to stop the big stupid jerk."

Chaos takes your hands, trembling.. and nods! "Yes! I'll even bring in my
daughter Canal from the second world, and I'll make a trickster who can
redeem until he can help you, and.. and all my butterfly children will
aid, and... and they'll make it right." Pauses. Quieter. "They're better
than us, in a lot of ways. They can do what we can't."

Utena nodnods and watches, and puts her arm around your waist so that
everyone knows we're working together now as partners, so no more stupid
dumb jerks show up and mess with things any more, and she sniffles and
leans against you. "Yeah... they'll make that stupid thing go away. We're
gonna win the contest, too, 'cause nobody's gonna have stuff like we got.  
Right?"

Chaos smiles. "Right! We'll kick that bully out, and take the blue
ribbon!"  She's happier now. "We can stop him. And if we win, he'll get
punished by The Principal and then he can't hurt anybody else. I'll never
give up.  He'll cheat and try to stop us, but we'll win! We WILL!"

Utena says, "Yeah! We're gonna win!" She smiles a little now, though her
eyes are red; she's happier that YOU'RE happy. She hugs. n.n "We're gonna
win, for sure."

Chaos thinks. "But are you gonna remember this, one day? So you know why
it's so important? Because you're the girl with the sword and she's you in
one aspect.." Looks down, shuffles her feet. "I still wanna be friends."

Utena says, "Let's put lots of people in. So that we can make sure that
there's always lots of chances to stop this. And let's have.. lots of good
things and bad things and all kinds of things and places to go and..." She
trails off, embarrassed. She giggles nervously. "Uhm.. I promise I'll try
and remember. I wanna be friends forever!"

Chaos smiles. She likes your ideas a lot, each one you come up with.  
"You're smart. I was right.. you're good at reality. I'm happy to be your
friend."

The dream starts to disconnect.. a few things at a time. A table floating
off, the sign vanishing.

Utena looks around, but as things fade out the last thing she can see is
the little Chaos-girl in front of her, and she holds her hand quickly and
squeezes it, wrapping her little pinky around the other girl's little
pinky... "Promise! I promise!

Chaos wraps her pink around yours. A child's promise, eternally binding.
"I promise too." And her smile.. before a penguin waddles by, and
everything goes back to normal, meaningless dreamscape.

Utena gets distracted, as things shift back to normal, and she still feels
young and silly and gets distracted by the penguin, following it around
with a giggle for a while on its random course as it just sort of waddles
around the void...

The penguin waddles around, warking all the way.. cute fluffy little
penguin, through the rainbow fields of dreaming...

Then the penguin is severed in half, lengthwise, by a silver line. It
falls in half, in a bloody mess.

YOU HAVEN'T REACHED ADOLESCENCE YET. YOU HAVEN'T REALIZED THE TRUTH.

Utena EEKS! and jerks back, before SHE walks into that line too, drawing
her hands back to her chest and sniffling as she just STARES at the poor
sliced up penguin... starts to cry. "LEAVE ME ALONE!!"

Order's mesh starts to close in around you, like the cage you were trapped
in before. CHAOS NEVER UNDERSTOOD. NONE OF THE OTHERS UNDERSTOOD. THIS IS
THE WAY OF ALL REALITY. IT EXTINGUISHES, WITHOUT PERFECTION. YOU WILL DIE.
YOU WILL DIE AND NOTHING YOU DO WILL HAVE MEANING.

... There's nothing forever, is there? What's the point of living, when
all anyone ever does is die? ... A bolt of lightning. And the blast that
radiates through the church window, throwing a painful surge of white
light into a rose-filled coffin... and then she blinks, and her eyes open,
and the light is in them.. she cries out, "NO! It's BECAUSE WE DIE that
EVERYTHING WE DO IS MEANINGFUL!"

Utena exclaims, "MEANING COMES BECAUSE WE DIE! BECAUSE WE'RE LIMITED AND
IMPERFECT! THERE'S NO MEANING IN PERFECTION!"

The ordered mesh shatters, line broken and shoved away by the force of
that statement, by the light of revelation. ...A STANDARD DEFENSIVE
RATIONALIZATION FOR THE IMPERFECT. YOU'LL SEE. I WILL OPEN YOUR EYES UNTIL
THEY BURST. But then.. the dream ends. And you awaken.

Utena sits up, jerking away from her pillow, the key shimmering as it
bounces and lands against her neck.. a red line along her neck where the
chain tangled up in her restless sleep.

Xelloss sleeps like the Rock of Gibraltar next to you. z.z Apparently he's
not having very interesting dreams.

Utena gathers her breath back, and brushes her hand through her hair,
dampened with sweat. Her mind chases the meaning of her dream... of course
she didn't make the world, she didn't have anything to do with it. But...  
but she knows at least the last moments were true. That's something she
learned when she was 8, BEFORE Dios came to her and showed her the vision
of the Rose Bride for the first time. It was only after she realized it
that she was led to the mourning wall of the Bride. She shivers, clutching
a sheet against her bare chest, until her heart stops racing... grumbling
softly to Xel beside her, at least ONE of us is sleeping.

Utena slips out of bed and wanders over to fetch a gown or something,
sitting down at her mirrored vanity and gazing into it while Xelloss
sleeps.

Utena . o O ( So I was right... Dios came about as a result of Order.
Revolution is Order to... it's a cycle that goes nowhere, just like
Himemiya said it was. But all this started when we sent the Rose Bride
away....  )

You gaze onto yourself. ...were you really in that memory? Was it a memory
or a dream? You didn't make the world, right, but... neither did Chaos,
did she? God did. How much of it was real?

Utena traces her finger along the edge of her own reflection. She
remembers having asked the Lord about that once. And it's true and not
true.  Everything is true and not true... yes and no at the same time. Is
there truth in what Order said as well? ... You haven't reached
adolescence. But neither has HE. He's still being mister no-share.

.. Just like some damn grubby-pawed kid who can't play fair because...
because why?

The gods are not hard concepts. Even Order. He's using Chaos, and he's
stubborn as hell... so it's true and not true and true without being true.
If all of that was just a metaphor for something happened.. because that
FELT like the roots of this, of why everything is how it is right now....
then does that mean you were there? Or some analog-you, on par with Chaos?
God was Christ and vice versa, but Christ was a man, in one aspect.

Because he has to prove he's right.

Even when he is not.

Right, because he has to prove that he's right. But WHY? Chaos had... a
friend. Did he ever?

Does a perfect ordered being feel a need for friends?

Does it have a CONCEPT of friends?

When something isn't loved, what happens to it? It... shrinks, and becomes
mean, and cold, and unbalanced, and ... tries to pretend that it doesn't
care. Right?

Under human definitions, yes. Possibly true, possibly not in this case.
Clearly they weren't all human kids in a human school... that was just a
framework you could understand something more alien through. But maybe.
Maybe that's true.

But humans are reflections of their maker's design. Nothing EXISTS in them
that didn't exist in what made them. It's possible to create something
from nothing, but... wasn't the whole LAST time it came down to something
like this... a choice of what was human and what wasn't?

That feels true, yes. Reflections in a reversed sense, sometimes.. since
humans can do things the makers cannot.

Utena sighs, gazing at the mirror, tilting her head. She remembers that
she was asked to choose and could make no distinction. God, power, evil
and good.. it's all the same. If everything is the same, then... her
instincts say there is more undone here than done. Bullies don't ACT like
bullies just because that's what they ARE. Something MAKES them that way;
she doesn't believe anything is truly born bad. Even the Mazoku are what
they are because that was how they were INTENDED to be... and you can even
understand them if you know enough ABOUT them.

Proving that theory is going to be hard, considering how aggressive Order
is, and resistant to accepting anything he doesn't agree with. With a
tendency to smack you down if you try.

Utena sighs again. But she looks at Xelloss, who's sleeping rather cutely
in their bed. If you asked someone 500 years ago, "Could this Mazoku be
saved?" what would the answer have been according to common sense? 'Hell
no'.

Xelloss z.z...

But there he is, isn't he?

Xelloss is, all snuggled up adorably.

Utena pushes away from her desk, and walks over, around the bed, kneeling
down beside it, smoothing her fingers through his dark violet hair. No one
would have ever said he could have been saved, then. And back then, he
COULDN'T have been. Someone had to show him the way.

Chaos, in the dream, did say the trickster would have to be redeemed to
help you...

Utena leans over and kisses his forehead. "Xel...?" A quiet whisper.

Xelloss mrr. -.o "Wha?" Sleepy-like.

Utena smiles. "Wake up...?"

Xelloss rubs his eyes. "Is the world ending?.."

Utena shakes her head. "I don't think so." The key bobbing, her hair fuzzy
around her shoulders. "I just wanted to talk a little. I just had a
dream."

Xelloss sits up. "I could check in Ops to see who made it, if you want..  
satisfaction is garunteed." A smirk.

Utena blinks. "... Actually, yes, I do." She nods, drawing back and
tightening the white robe around her.

Xelloss makes a 'phone' shape with his hands. "Hello.. yeah. I was
wondering, who just organized Utena's dream?...... yeah, I'll hold."
Winces at the elevator music that plays near his ear. =.= "...ah, okay."
Blinks.  "Really. You don't say... yeah. Okay, thanks." Hangs up. "The
boss did."

Utena closes her eyes. Not hurt... a little surprised. And starting to
feel like she understands a little more. "... Xel, I'm starting to get a
plan, about Order. You probably won't like it at all. It's a crazy plan."

Xelloss hrms. "As much as I hate crazy plans when they involve people I
care about, I'm the first to admit they're usually right. What is it?

Utena sits down on the bed and links her fingers together before her,
resting them in her lap. "We're going about this entirely wrong. We're
making it worse. I think... he needs a friend. I think something happened
that made him not understand the value of being less than perfect.. or..  
he's really scared to admit that he's not. One or the other."

.........

Utena says, "We've been treating this like a dead on war... with only one
side possible as the winner. But it's NOT LIKE THAT. -NOTHING- is like
that. Ever."

Xelloss checks your head for large bumps. o.o

Utena blinks. "What..?!"

Xelloss says, "I'm making sure you didn't get a concussion or something."

Utena batbats lightly at your hands. "I'm -fine-."

Xelloss asks, "A friend. You want to get Order a friend and he'll skip
off, la la la?"

Utena pokes you gently in the chest. "Xel... I hate to use you as the
example, but... you wouldn't be here if someone hadn't tried to save you."
Utena says, "You would still be the you that you can't even tolerate
THINKING about having been."

Xelloss ois. "I reached OUT to try and get where I am, too. I took
actions.  I'm the one who manipulated Lina into giving me the Mazoku Lord
key, so I could start to redeem myself.. I'm not saying you didn't help,
but there's a difference between trying other options and wanting to be
what you are. I don't see Order seeking a change.

Utena asks, "How do you know he's NOT?"

Utena sighs, and takes in her breath and tries again.

Xelloss says, "Because.. it's obvious. Every action he's taken is to
assemble this thing and screw this world."

Utena says, "When you're socially stunted and completely out of touch with
people, what do you try to do? Put your Mazoku brain back on."

Xelloss hms. "Well, if I was pure Mazoku, I wouldn't give a flying fork."

Utena says, "When you have no way to communicate what you need because you
don't even know how to BEGIN to ask, what do you do? You take, you
-grab-... you try and force things because you can't figure out any better
way."

Xelloss says, "Utena, the Mazoku aren't nice guys trying to get out.  
They're idiots who can't SEE that there's a better way."

Utena rubs at her forehead a moment. "Okay. Not the BEST example... Uhm."

Utena ahs, and latches onto another. "Akio."

Xelloss says, "Didn't Akio kill Reiko and rape Anshi? o.o"

Utena says, "But he's not LIKE that now."

Utena says, "He did those things because he didn't know any better. Just
like you did the things you did because you didn't know any better."

Xelloss says, "True, but that's only after you changed him."

Utena looks frustrated; she flops backward on the bed, the key bouncing up
around her throat. "I just... I'm not communicating this clearly."

Xelloss rubs his head. "Sorry.. I can be dense, sometimes." n.n;;

Utena says, "He doesn't KNOW any better. He's like a stupid kid that,
because he doesn't know how to ASK or how to share or anything- maybe bad
parenting-... he just lashes out trying to get attention."

Utena says, "Kids can be really mean and stupid like that."

Utena says, "especially when they're not loved, when they don't feel like
they MATTER."

Didn't he say he kept going around trying to help the others and they
didn't appreciate his perfection?

Xelloss asks, "Gods have parents?"

Utena turns on her side and flicks her thumb out along your forehead, her
own eyes closing, sharing the dream she had with you. It can explain
things better than her pathetic attempts to use language can.

Xelloss blinks...... soaking it all in. Very shocked. o.o

Xelloss is speechless, for a short while.

Utena watches you. "... Does it make any more sense now...?" she asks.

Xelloss finally speaks. "...yes." Pause. "What a little bastard." Pause.  
"...what were YOU doing there?"

Utena shakes her head. "I don't think I was. I think it was just.. my mind
putting me there so I'd see it personally... feel it."

Utena says, "Or.. maybe I was." Utena shakes her head. "I'm not
comfortable thinking of that." Utena gives you a weak and wry smile. "I'm
sticking to my story."

Xelloss says, "But.. no, wait. But you interacted with her. You started
things and did things that actually translate into stuff that's happened.  
And you are the knight now, the one that she talked about who would
help.."

Xelloss ehhehs. "Right."

Utena says, "So... maybe... if that's the case, Xel..."

Utena shivers, putting her arms around her chest. "Maybe *I* screwed up."

Xelloss ehs?

Xelloss asks, "Why?"

Utena says, "You know how much I like to blame myself for everything.
Maybe it's TRUE this time."

Xelloss says, "Hold on. What did you do that's wrong? Order would have
been a jerk regardless."

Utena closes her eyes and takes your hand. "Look at that dream. Look at
the events. I overreacted.. if that was me, and I don't know if it was. I
freaked out when he messed with the little box I had with the Bride and
the castle. But without the Prince, there wouldn't have been any purpose
to it.. it wasn't finished. Having that in there... gave it some purpose.
But I freaked out.

Xelloss says, "No. No way. Look, Utena, people react, stuff happens.
That's how people are. You didn't forsee what would happen and you
couldn't prevent it without that. There can't be blame. It's not like you
did this deliberately."

Utena says, "No... but I picked a side.""

Utena says, "And ... Xel, listen to me. Listen closely. WHAT has been the
ONE thing that every stupid thing that's happened to me has said, over and
over again."

Utena says, "There IS NO ONE RIGHT SIDE."

Xelloss hrms.

Xelloss says, "...then maybe it's been that way to show you that. A hard
knock lesson."

Utena says, "Both of them.. the Lord and Order... they're both being
selfish.. they're making this into sides. But they're part of each other..  
just the way everything ELSE in this world is one part of another."

Utena nods. "Exactly.

Xelloss says, "Still.. I wouldn't collapse into a little pile of self
loathing and angst over it. Okay? Everybody has faults and we work to
amend them. It's nothing to be blamed for."

Utena says, "I'm not." Utena smiles quietly. "Actually, honest to God,
Xel, I'm not. But I do have a part of the blame for this. If that dream is
true.  And I have to work to fix this, too. I should never have picked a
side.  Maybe things would have gone the same.. but I tried to protect the
box, and that made it all the more.. valuable. And maybe the world
wouldn't be the way it is if all those things I saw DIDN'T happen.." She
shakes her head.  "I just feel... that I've done wrong."

Xelloss shrugs. "Maybe this was all intended. You heard Order. We don't
know until things unfold how it was supposed to be, according to... I
would hazard 'The Principal' maps to the god above all. Judas did wrong
and it was right to do."

Utena sighs, shifting herself in the bed to lean against you. "Maybe. But
I think we ARE going about this wrong. And I think I have to try and fix
that. I don't want to break the promise I made to her... but who else is
willing to even TRY and show Order how not to be a child?"

Xelloss leans against you, as well. "You've got me. Utena, I trust you to
handle this. You really do have insight beyond me here, and.. you seem to
be personally involved. Just be careful, okay?"

Utena closes her eyes. "I'll be careful. But I have to go to him. You know
that, right..?"

Xelloss pauses. "..go to him?"

Utena nods. "You can't make friends unless you're willing to play in the
same sandbox."

Xelloss now looks really unsure. "Last time he bumped into us, he was
trying to kill us. You want to go to his home territory?"

Utena nods. "Just me. No one else. Anyone else goes.. they'll go hostile,
as fighters on a side. I can't go and be on anyone's side. He can't kill
me, Xel. Remember? Nothing can kill me now except old age. He can hurt me,
but I won't die. It makes me the only one who CAN do this.

Xelloss frowns. "I don't like it. Not one angstrom." Pause. "...but I
trust your judgement. How do you expect to get to him?"

Utena sighs. "I don't know, for sure. Right now.. I have Order's key and
Chaos' helm. I'm between both worlds, marked by both sides.

Xelloss says, "Yes, but you have Order's key to prevent him from Ordering
Chaos. Or something." Shakes his head. @.@ "Well.. inside the manacle was
his world, if you recall, so..."

Utena grins quietly. "But when chaos wears order's key... doesn't that
mean Chaos is ordering Order? It goes both ways, I think."

Xelloss says, "I have a headache. ;.;"

Utena says, "The only other way I could approach him and be level is to
surrender the wings of Chaos and the key as well.""

Xelloss o.O "Surrender them?! After all we went through to get them?"

Utena says, "Xel... if I go to him with neither key or wings, he won't pay
attention to me. If I have both the key and the wings, at least... there's
no hostility. The war can't continue if I've got the pieces that the sides
would use against each other."

Xelloss groans. "My head is splitting. Look, just.. promise me you won't
be slaughtered or captured or break the world. Okay?"

Utena says, "I won't die. I don't know about the rest, Xel. Honestly. I
don't know. I could be destroying everything by this. If that's the
case...  well. I don't want it to go that way, and I'll fight it with
everything I have."

Xelloss hrms. "Close enough." He sits back. "Well... do what you gotta.  
Night's young."

Utena leans over and kisses you- not a short kiss, either. A long one,
with a subtle connotation that she may not be able to come back for
another.

Xelloss doesn't like that connotation. So, he disregards it.. kissing just
enough to make it a nice long one, but not a farewell forever kiss.  
"...I'll see you."

Utena sighs and brushes away from the bed, standing up, one hand closing
around the key around her neck. And her wings appearing, unfolding and
glowing. "Xel... if I don't make it...if something goes wrong... just.."  
She bows her head. "I hope you forgive me."

Xelloss smiles. "You'll make it." That's all. He leaves it at that.

Utena turns her back to you, so all you can see is her hair, and her
wings, shining brightly. She stifles back her fear, and concentrates on
the cool silver metal in her hand.. probing into it.

His world is in there. Like all things Order, Order is consistent across
space and time. You can feel the tight infinite mesh of pulses and wires..
there is no membrane. You can just.. be there.

Utena makes that choice... and is there.

Ordered world. You are the only thing even remotely chaotic here. All
there is is mathematics, pulses of energy, and existence. Infinite
existence, unchanging, looping onto itself. Perfect and static.

Utena looks around. She calls out softly, "Isn't it lonely like this...?"

Lines snap into existence, to contain you.. to seperate you from the rest
of it. So you're safely isolated. YOU ARE IRRATIONAL TO CHALLENGE ME HERE.

Utena says, "I didn't come to challenge you. Or to surrender."

THEN YOU HAVE NO PURPOSE HERE. LEAVE.

Utena fights down fear. Fear is instinct... but instinct won't help here.

She suppresses it and enforces calm on herself, just as she did before.
And she replies, "I wanted to see what it was you wanted to show me."

He seems highly suspicious. YOU CAN NEVER COMPREHEND IT. NOBODY DOES. I
WILL STOP YOUR HEART AND END THIS. And.. a great crushing pain, in your
chest....

Utena sinks, surrenders. Doesn't flare up with her chaos, and the pain...  
it's bad. But it can't kill her... she gasps out, "... How do you know I
can't..? You haven't tried."

THIS IS IT. THIS WORLD. ABSOLUTE PERFECTION, INFINITE EXISTENCE. THIS IS
THE ONLY THING THAT WILL ENDURE. YOU WILL DIE, HERE, OR LATER, OR
WHENEVER, BUT THIS WILL ALWAYS BE. IT WILL OUTLIVE EVERYTHING ELSE BECAUSE
EVERYTHING ELSE COLLAPSES INTO ITSELF. JUST AS YOU ARE NOW. Unbearable
pressure on your chest.. you can feel things breaking, popping...

Utena's face contorts, she cries out with the pain of it... ribs
collapsing, and snapping, but she's not dead... her neck tilts back, she
wheezes rather than speaks. ".. because you're making this happen..."

The pressure relents.. but the damage is done. NOW, LATER, IT DOES NOT
MATTER. YOU WILL END. I WILL ENDURE. BEYOND EVERYTHING, I WILL. BECAUSE
PERFECTION IS THE ONLY WAY TO BUILD REALITY THAT SUCCEEDS.

Utena moans softly, fighting to hold her mind under a pain that should
have crushed her. "... you're... afraid... you want to live forever...
because you're afraid. You're.. hiding... won't even show me your perfect
self..."  It's hard to speak, so hard with compressed lungs punctured and
full of blood, blood in her mouth..

Utena says, ".. hurt things.. because you don't want them to get close to
you... want to be pretend you don't need anything..."

Order is taken aback. FEAR? I DO NOT KNOW FEAR. THERE IS ONLY SUCCESS AND
FAILURE. I DO NOT FAIL. NOTHING ABOUT ME CAN FAIL. LOOK AT YOURSELF; YOUR
BODY FAILS. IT WILL LIVE, BUT IT WAS SO EASILY DAMAGED. NEED? WANT? I HAVE
ONLY ONE DESIRE. AND THAT IS TO ACHIEVE PERFECTION. TO PERFECT EVERYTHING
THERE IS.

Utena says, "... so you won't be alone... with the end..."

I WILL NOT BE ALONE. I WILL HAVE EVERYTHING. I WILL BE EVERYTHING. BUT
TRUE PERFECTION IS TO HAVE EVERYTHING ELSE ALSO BE ME. MY LITTLE SHINING
EXAMPLE IS NOT ENOUGH.

Utena says, "... 'f you're the only perfect thing.. there's only one of
you..." Her eyes well. Tears. Tears for her pain, certainly.. but tears
for you as well. You can feel them.. they fall from her easily, colliding
into the wireframe boxgrid you closed around her. "... you don't want to
be alone. you know you're alone... y' don't like it.. so you try to make
more of it... but we didn't play along... so you got mad..." Utena tries
to raise her head. "... mistake. we were wrong. We made mistake."

I DO NOT GET MAD. I AM MERELY ILLUSTRATING HOW USELESS IT IS TO NOT JOIN
ORDER. ORDER IS THE ONLY WAY TO ENDURE, TO SUCCEED. THIS CONTEST WILL
PROVE THAT. I WILL BE VICTOR OVER CHAOS AND THE RIGHTFUL TRUE DESTINY.
MISTAKE? YOU ADMIT YOU WERE INCORRECT?

Utena says, "... some mistake mine. Some yours. Some everyone's. Everyone
made mistake."

I AM NEVER WRONG. I AM RIGHT. THIS IS THE WAY IT WILL BE. I WILL PROVE IT
TO BOTH OF YOU.

Utena says, "... y' said... needed to become ... adolescent." That last
word takes her a while as she has to force it through her body. "... still
children. We're all still children. Want to grow up now. You want too,
too.  Don't you. Silly game... stupid game. Nobody sharing."

I WAS MATURE AT THAT POINT. YOU WERE NOT. I HAVE SEEN THE TRUTH AND YOU
DENY IT. THIS WILL BE ILLUSTRATED CLEARLY WHEN MY SINGLE TOKEN OF ORDER
DOMINATES ALL OF HER CREATION. YOU WILL NOT ARGUE ME AWAY FROM REALITY.

Utena says, ".. then show me real truth. Not pain. Not pretty lines.
-Real- truth.""

The lines vanish.. and.. you're ASSAULTED by it. Flawlessness. Infinity.
Smoothness beyond comprehenshion, beyond even the atomic levels.
Consistency and regularity and organization that persists forever and ever
and has always been here, no beginning, no end, no time, no space... only
EVERYTHING, in one absolute reality. Order. Pure and ultimate.

THIS IS AS CLOSE AS I CAN SHOW YOU UNTIL YOU MERGE WITH ORDER, AS YOU
WILL.

Utena gasps.. flooded by the smoothness, the normality, the rigid shapes,
the deepest levels of everything. It sends her mind reeling into shock for
moments... until she realizes that that same perfection is found.. in
chaos. That the forces that drive organization stem from need, even if
it's cellular need, to combine, to retain a shape, nothing exists just
because it IS, everything exists to a will. It calms her fright and she
says weakly after a while.. "... pretty. It's pretty." Language doesn't
serve well. "Y' willing to even TRY and see in me..?"

Order is nonplussed. THERE IS NO POINT. I HAVE SEEN WHAT MAKES YOU UP, AND
IT ISN'T VERY IMPRESSIVE.

Utena says, "oh?" Utena laughs raggedly, coughing away blood. ".. t' show
me what you see in me."

A diagram appears.. messy bone and blood and tissue and ugliness. Fragile,
easily shredded, formed from the most random choices of aminio acids with
little consistency from body to body. And your world.. madness and
violence and destruction and construction with a general downward slope
into oblivion.. you can 't rely on anything and there's no way to be sure
that the world will be there when you wake up the next day. A rickety
system of ladders and scaffolding that could just collapse under its own
weight at any second. Doomed. Pointless.

Utena says, ".. 'd 'xpect that..." Utena wheezes.. "... from someone who's
never been human." She shakes her head. Dizzily lifts her hand and reaches
out, creating a very small shape... tiny. So tiny you have to strain to
even know it's there.. but of course, as it's her creation, it probably
shines like a beacon. It's a single atom. Deconstructed. Your perfect
miracle of the atom, carefully dissected in a reasonable manner. The
particles whirl. And they whirl in an ordered pattern.. but compelled by
chaotic forces. Goes deeper. tiny subparticles upon sub particles to the
smallest level. All moving and whirling in an endless, frentic energy
dance... ORDERED freneticism. Coexistent forces.

Order... doesn't want to agree. THAT DOES MIMIC MY WORK IN SOME SMALL
FASHION. BUT IT DOES NOT CHANGE THE OUTWARD EFFECT OF IT ALL. YOUR WORLD
WILL DIE AND BURN OUT. MINE WILL NOT. NOTHING ORDERED CAN STOP EXISTING.
IT WILL NEVER FAIL. I WILL NEVER FAIL.

Utena says, "y're talking about appearances.. not actuality... doesn't
matter what it looks like on the outside... s' what's inside."

Utena takes it further. Opens her body, as if it were a medical diagram..  
showing you. Results, not speculation... how your pressures applied to her
have destabilized the order in her body. How the careful array of
arteries, veins, and codependent systems collapsed with your action. Now
chaotic.

A STRUCTURE CAN HAVE ORDERED FOUNDATIONS AND STILL ULTIMATELY KOWTOW TO
CHAOS. He pauses. YOU BEGIN TO TIRE ME. LEAVE.

Utena heh's dimly. "... tired...?"

The mesh that holds you flies off, to take you away from here... to
deposit you back in the World of Dreams, where you came from, with the key
you were holding around your neck. Right where you left. Order's kicked
you out.

Utena laughs weakly, spilling blood all over. "... sore loser." She slumps
into the carpeting of the bedroom.

Xelloss O.O

Xelloss DIVES to the floor, and immediately pushes healing energy into
you, as much as he can manage...

Utena blacks out for a little while while you do that... but comes around
after a while, enough that she can speak to you, her body too tired to
move, though. "... think... I got through.. a little."

Xelloss kneels next to you.. holding your hand. "..was it worth it?"

Utena nods after some thought. "... think so. Gave him... something new to
think about." The key's still on her neck; he didn't think to take it from
her... so she must have done something right.

Xelloss sighs. -.- "I know how this is going to end. It'll be like Gaav. A
race against time, ending in one huge confrontation when the altar's
assembled. I don't like it."

Utena exhales in a deep, slow manner. "... not so sure."

Utena says, ".. he could have taken the key from me, Xel. He didn't."

Xelloss hrms. "True... and if you can't operate the altar without it..."

Utena says, "If we don't.. panic... lose our heads... might be able to
resolve this without big spells and noise and end of the world."

Xelloss asks, "You're sure it can't be used without the key, right?"

Utena says, ".. dunno. Guess so. 's what the Lord showed me." She looks to
you. "Cold floor.. c'n I be in bed now?""

Xelloss carefully lifts you.. walking over, and helping you into bed.
Pulls the covers up.

Utena lets out a ragged breath and tries to smile to you, so you won't
worry too much. "... think he was listening. I really do. He seemed to
understand a little before he kicked me out."

Utena says, ".. said he was tired. For a perfect being... s' saying a lot.  
Said I tired him out."

Xelloss smiles.. "I'll take that as a good sign." Climbs into bed next to
you. "You're home now. Get some rest.. recover. You did well.

Utena closes her eyes, "Yessir..." Drifting away some, she surrenders
herself to the pillow and the warm covers. "... wish he would just...  
understand... got to see some neat stuff..." She's pretty much mumbling to
herself as she goes under. Something you can't quote track about particles
in motion.

Xelloss sighs.. this is taking a toll. -.- For a moment, he wishes they
could live happily, without conflict.. but that's not how they live. He
sighs, swallows, accepts, and rolls over to get some sleep as well.