We rush Miles to the medical building and Eva's breath hitches upon seeing us carrying her brother in. She quickly takes Miles away and places him on a hospital bed, tending to his wounds. In the meantime, Ashton stirs around in his sleep and Rem gasps whenever he audibly groans and his eyes flutter open. Rem clasps her hands to her mouth and runs over to his bedside, laughing as she cries in relief. I notice that Drusilla has finally left the building and is most likely staying with Dexter, which makes me relieved that she's doing better, and Xilia is missing too.

"Ashton?" Rem smiles and clasps her hands over top of his as his eyes lock onto hers.

"Rem...I missed you," Ashton smiles back at her tiredly and she cries harder as he pulls her into a gentle hug.

"Ciel," I frown, still worried about both him and Miles, and glance over at him, "are you alright?"

"I'm fine," Ciel sighs and shakes his head, "don't worry about it."

"I'd better go make sure the guild is running properly..." Skye sighs wearily, her eyes darting between Miles and us, "tell me what happens."

"And Valerian and I have somewhere to be," Veddrian says, roughly tugging on her brother's arm as Skye leaves the medical building.

"We do?" Valerian furrows his eyebrows in confusion and Veddrian glares at him while she elbows him in the ribs.

"Yes, we do," Veddrian hisses and Valerian's eyes widen.

"Oh, right..." Valerian breathes out, his eyes flickering between me and Veddrian, "sorry...we'll be back later. I promise."

Valerian and Veddrian quickly rush outside of the building with fast steps, leaving just me, Ciel, Katiana, and Sampson with Miles, Rem, Eva, and Ashton. After a few moments, Eva finishes bandaging up Miles and he lies there resting on one of the beds, still unconscious. Eva sighs as she walks over, her eyes weary as she looks between the four of us.

"He'll be fine." Eva says, "He's going to be out cold for another few hours though. I don't know what happened, but...I'm glad you brought my brother back in one piece."

I nod softly in response before Eva walks away to file away more papers and make a medical report on Miles. Rem and Ashton talk in the background while Sampson and Katiana take a bed beside Miles and sit there waiting for him to wake up, Sampson with his arm around Katiana's shoulders as she leans her head on his shoulder tiredly.

"Are you sure you're alright?" I ask Ciel once again as we stand by the door.

"I'm sure I'm fine," Ciel sighs and the two of us head over to sit on another bed near Miles, Ciel running his hand through his hair in the process, "it's just...something that's been happening to me for a while."

"What happened to you?" I ask quietly, carefully.

"After I was healed, Elise had me train endlessly," Ciel starts after a few moments of silence, taking a pause, "she had me fight her battles for her most of the time, thus how I now have this scar over my eye. Luckily enough, the hit didn't do any real damage to my eye itself, just this now faded scar. Elise though...she had a habit of beating me into submission whenever I wouldn't agree to do what she said. One time, she went farther than usual and landed a hard hit to my head. Now, I occasionally get sharp jolts through the side of my head and my ears ring whenever it happens. It's not much to worry about, but it's...not pleasant to say the least."

"I'm sorry," I whisper sadly, "you shouldn't have had to go through that."

"Yeah..." Ciel sighs and glances up at the ceiling as he leans back on the bed, his hands behind him, "but if I hadn't, I wouldn't be where I am now. I probably wouldn't have gathered the strength to run off and come find you. Elise may have trained me to benefit her, but everything she put me through, that hell, made me stronger too. She thought she was breaking me, but she was really just making me resent her even more and making my resilience stronger. Celes...I...I don't know where we stand or what you think of me, but I know that I really missed you and I want you in my life. You're still my big sister, and I don't know what I do if I lost you again."

"I'm not sure where we stand either," I frown before it fades away into a small smile as I glance over at him, "but you're still my brother, Ciel. I do want you in my life, and I hope that you can become part of my new family that I've made for myself, because it's truly wonderful. I've missed you too. All these years, knowing you might be alive and out there somewhere, a hole was in my heart knowing that you weren't with me instead. And now that you're here, you'd better not plan on going anywhere unless you want me to kick your ass."

Ciel smirks at me before he bursts into a laugh and I narrow my eyes at him.

"What's so funny?" I cross my arms against my chest and Katiana smiles fondly as her and Sampson watch.

"That response was just so incredibly you that I couldn't help but laugh." Ciel smiles warmly, "I missed this..."

"Me too," I smile back at him, throwing an arm around his shoulders to pull him down into a hug, "me too...and you know what? Maybe, one day, you can become a Vanguard too."

Ciel smiles and wraps his arms around my waist in response, knowing that I haven't forgotten his dream.

"Yeah..." Ciel breathes out, "maybe."

As I pull out of the hug, I direct my gaze back to Miles and I frown. I know Eva said that he'll be okay, but I'm still worried for him. I sigh and climb to my feet, the other three training their gaze on me as I do so.

"I'm gonna go check on something," I say, wondering if I've received any more mail and also knowing that I should update Skye, "I'll be back in a bit."

"Alright," Katiana nods, her eyes locked onto mine knowingly.

I force a smile before I head out of the building, meeting Eva's gaze on the way out. Eva simply smiles at me as if to say that everything will be okay in the end as I head out of the building. I make my way to the guild area and find Skye moving around lots of packages from behind the counter, Ilroy helping her.

"Celes!" Ilroy beams upon spotting me and I smile back at him.

"Hey, Ilroy," I say as I approach the counter, Skye's eyes flickering over to me.

"How is he?" Skye asks.

"Eva said he'll be alright. He should wake up in a few hours," I say and Skye nods with a relieved smile.

"Good," Skye sighs as she places a package on a shelf.

"Ilroy," I start, directing my attention to him, "do you happen to have any more mail for me?"

"Oh, actually," Ilroy smiles as he goes up to the counter and reaches below it, pulling out another envelope, "I got this earlier today."

Ilroy hands me the letter and I breathe out as I carefully open it, pulling out a sheet of white paper. My eyebrows furrow in confusion when I see that it's an entire letter this time and I begin to read it.

'Dearest Celes,

I apologize if my previous letter caused any form of concern or weariness, for it was poorly conveyed and may have came across as a potential threat. I suppose you may wish to know the full truth about what happened, so I intend to tell it to you. I'm not sure what messages you were told or who informed you of what happened, but what I shall tell you is the truth and nothing but the truth. I have always loved my family with all my heart, despite indeed working for Elise. You see, I simply wanted to try and provide the best life I could for you and Ciel. I was somehow allured by her false promises, unable to see beyond them in my time of desperation. So, you see, I never intended for any of this to happen. I...thought I was picking the right side, the winning side, but I see now that I made a grave mistake. It's not about picking which side you believe will win, it's about picking the right side. Back when I was younger, whenever I met your mother, I knew that by heart. But as I grew older, I suppose my wisdom may have faded. I suppose I should've known better, especially given my occupation.

So, I'm writing this to you in hopes of saying I'm sorry. I only wanted what was best for you both, but I only ended up bringing burden to our family. It is true that your uncle fought me, but it was a lie that he killed me. He couldn't bring himself to do it, so he instead forced me to leave without a trace and informed you all that I had died in an accident. I'm aware that Ciel was told otherwise and he firmly believes that I was killed by Christoph, but that's not the case. I decided that leaving would be the best option, that distancing myself from you would keep all of you safe. In fact, it only seemed to do the opposite. Not that Christoph gave me much choice, but I figured he'd treat all of you better than I managed to, not that you knew at the time of my wrongdoings. I never wanted to leave you all behind, you must understand that.

Whenever I heard of Christoph's and Jessica's deaths, I mourned and worried for your sake and Ciel's sake. I was informed you made it away safely, that you were the one who contacted authorities, but that Ciel was nowhere to be found. It was later made clear to me through my spying endeavors that he ended up captured by Elise, which is the very last place I had wanted him to end up. I blamed myself, thinking that my connection to you had caused the attack on the four of you. I wished that I hadn't left so that I had been there to defend you and that maybe things would've turned out differently, but then I suppose you wouldn't have become the strong woman that you are today. Unfortunately, I cannot tell you everything in this letter, for I worry about prying eyes. However, I hope that this has brought you some new light and understanding of what has happened.

You may be wondering why I chose to write you now of all times, why I chose to wait until now. That, my dear, would be because of said prying eyes. Elise is not the only evil out there, as you will find out in time, I'm sure. I only wish that you take care and watch over Ciel and the rest of your companions, and especially yourself. This will most likely be my last time writing you, for I must return to the shadows once more. Writing this letter itself may prove to be...dangerous...to me, but you deserved to know at some point. I hope that you take comfort in knowing I always loved all four of you and that I never would wish anything bad upon any of you. I want you to know that I'm proud of who you've become and I wished to return your locket, for I found it when I went back to investigate the house after hearing about what happened. I suppose the investigators must have missed it. With that said, perhaps I'll find a time to write you once more in the future, or perhaps not. I know you won't be able to answer me since I've not put a return address on this letter, but I know that you'll probably smile and put this letter somewhere safe, your answer being kept in your heart, whatever it may be. And, deep down, I hope that you still have some love for your dear old father.

Sincerely,

Matthias

I smile as I carefully tuck the letter back into its envelope, my heart clenching in my chest.

"A good letter, Miss Lunes?" Ilroy smiles hopefully as Skye glances at me curiously.

"Yeah..." I breathe out, glancing up from the letter to meet Ilroy's lively eyes as I smile once more, "a good letter."