"It's just his frustration talking...he didn't mean it. Please don't cry..."
Ellis, who was currently curled up in a fetal position on the cold stone floor of her lab, looked up at her favourite chimera. It was an exotic if battle-useless amalgamation of a cobra and an eagle. Its form was rather serpentine but it was covered in golden feathers. Ellis had dubbed her creation Keiwen, and the intelligent creature had become something between a pet and a friend to the girl.
"It's so hard, Kei-chan. I love him so much, and he isn't even kind to me any more," Ellis sobbed.
The chimera wrapped itself gently around the crying human, its approximation of a hug. "Of course. But you told me yourself that love is never easy."
"Never would've said so if I'd known you'd turn it back at me," the girl returned with an insincere scowl. She'd mentioned the old saying to her pet when it had developed something akin to a crush on one of Ellis' newer creations, a fish-man she called Rahanimu. One more strange thing about Ellis' serpent-avian -- it was oddly passionate.
"You would've, too. You said it to make me feel better, after all."
"You're awfully sure of yourself," Ellis sniffed, wiping at her eyes.
"I know you pretty well, don't I, Ellis-sama?"
"Sou desu ne..." the girl murmured, resting her head against the chimera's neck.
"Feeling better, Ellis-sama?" Keiwen asked at length.
"Hai. I know I shouldn't let him get to me. After all, he's been looking for a cure since before my mother was born. Of course he'd be frustrated, and of course he can't contain his anger all the time." Ellis absent-mindedly touched her cheek; a nasty purple bruise had formed there where Rezo had slapped her. Pretty good aim for a blind man.
"Ellis...?" Akahoushi Rezo's voice drifted into the lab, echoing slightly against the stone surfaces of the walls and floor and sounding vaguely unreal.
"Re-rezo-sama!" Ellis exclaimed, startled. She hastily extricated herself from Keiwen's 'embrace.'
"Ellis, I want to apologise. I had no right to take my anger out on you, much less strike you." The great sage sounded tired and only somewhat sincere. Or perhaps that was just the odd echo effect giving that impression.
"Of course, Rezo-sama. I understand." How many times had she said those same words in response to such apologies in the last year? Fifty? A hundred? More?
As priest's steps faded away, Ellis kept her gaze fixed on the doorway where'd he'd stood. With a sigh, she forced herself to stand. She had research to do ...
"A-CHOO!" Ellis sneezed for the umpteenth time. The book she was studying, one Rezo had 'found' a few days before, had been coated thickly with dust and as soon as she'd opened it, the motes had assaulted her.
"Stolen again?" Keiwen inquired, slithering up to her creator.
"The former owner didn't need it nearly as much as Rezo-sama does," Ellis protested weakly, although she, too, was getting worried by Rezo's increasingly harsh methods of information procurement.
"Is it there?" Rezo demanded. He strode into Ellis' chamber, not bothering to knock. He hadn't bothered for over a year.
"Gomen nasai, Rezo-sama. There's nothing new in this volume."
"Kuso!" Akahoushi cried, slamming his fist into the wall hard enough to bloody his knuckles.
"Rezo-sama!" Ellis jumped up and ran to her beloved. "You mustn't -- "
"Silence, you useless little bitch! You've been no help at all. Why I put up with you is beyond me." Ellis managed to avoid his distracted blow, but his words hit truer than any physical strike could.
"Stop bullying Ellis-sama, kono yarou!" Keiwen suddenly made its presence known.
"Nani -- ah, another of your worthless toys, Ellis?" Rezo sneered. "The only decent job you've ever done is creating the new form for Zelgadiss, and you couldn't even have managed that without the Chimeric Grimorum I gave you."
"You stole," Keiwen corrected in a sharp hiss.
"Keiwen," Ellis hissed herself, attempting to shush her pet.
"What care I of the means? I care only for curing my eyes! Nothing and no one else matters, least of all laws meant for lesser beings."
"Lesser beings? Is that all I am to you now, Rezo-sama -- a 'lesser being'?" Ellis was torn between dispair and rage.
"That," Rezo corrected coldly, "Is all you ever have or ever will be to me."
Ellis decided on rage. "You -- you bastard! All this time...how dare you use me like this! You convinced me you cared, but all this time, you only wanted me to be your eyes."
Rezo stiffened angrily at the word "eyes." Ellis continued, unaware of the power he was calling to his staff.
"Did it even occur to you that there may be no way to fix your -- " she suddenly stopped, finally noticing the increase of magical energies.
"I grow tired of you, komusume," the great sage stated quietly. He lifted his staff --
-- Ellis closed her eyes and braced herself for death --
-- the staff moved towards the ground --
-- there was a flurry of movement --
-- CLANG! --
-- and a deathcry echoed through the room as the chimera Keiwen's form was reduced to ashes.
Ellis' eyes shot open at the horrible sound. "Keiwen!"
Rezo, his face impassive, regarded the scene with his sorcerer's sight.
"Kono -- you...killed Keiwen."
"I should think you'd be happy I missed," Rezo said coldly, his earlier rage becoming mere apathy.
Ellis stared at the man she'd adored for years with wrath-filled eyes. "I hate you," she stated simply, facing him. Then, with a strange sort of calm filling her, she slapped Akahoushi.
Rezo's face remained apathetic; he reacted not at all to Ellis' impassionated actions.
"I am going to procure a better servant," Rezo said at length.
"Going to manipulate your own flesh and blood like you manipulate everyone else?" Ellis inquired bitterly.
"I will be seeking the Philosopher's Stone. Look up all references you can find on it," he ordered as if nothing had ever happened.
His non-reaction so stunned Ellis that she was unable to come up with a reply before the great sage turned and left.
Ellis dropped to her knees beside the remains of her favourite creation. "Gomen nasai, Keiwen...gomen nasai."
An idea occurred to her suddenly. She's dabbled with kopii technology in her study of chimeras. Perhaps she could create a kopii Keiwen...?
Carefully, heedless of the tears starting to flow down her cheeks, Ellis gathered all that was left of her pet and friend.
Months had passed since Ellis and Rezo had...parted, and her anger had died into mourning -- mourning for her pet, mourning for herself, mourning for the Rezo she'd loved and who had been replaced by a heartless bastard.
"Ellis-sama?"
"Hm?" Ellis looked at the chimera addressing her. It looked almost exactly like Keiwen, but it was totally emotionless. Ellis bit back the tears her failure engendered.
"There is news. It seems that Akahoushi Rezo-sama has been slain."
"Nani?! Slain? By whom?"
"The sorceress Lina Inverse, Rezo's kin Zelgadiss Graywords, and a swordsman known as Gourry Gabriev."
"No..." While part of her was elated, the part of her that was still a girl in love -- most of her -- cried out in pain. How could she ever make things up with him now...?
Looking at the creature before her, Ellis got an idea. "Sou ka...a kopii...one that will be like Rezo-sama was before his madness..."
And a spark of madness ignited in Ellis' own eyes.