Author's note: Howdy! Well, this is my first piece of writing for the Cardcaptor Sakura section. I hope you enjoy it!
Warning! As it states in the summary, this fic contains girl/girl love. Yuri. Shoujo-ai. If you hate this, whatever. Just don't read it. It's pointless hating me for liking something that you hate.
Lastly, the nicknames provided in this chapter mean 'Prince Element' and 'Princess Star'.
Chapter One: All Grown Up
Eighteen-year-old Kinomoto Sakura, dressed in a red costume that was covered in ribbons and frills, her eyes and hair covered with a matching mask and hat, faced the three burly bank robbers in front of her with a fierce determination. Beside her stood her boyfriend of seven years, Li Syaoran, who was dressed in a blue costume that was covered in shiny golden cuffs and buttons, his eyes and hair covered with a matching mask and hat.
"So, what's with the freaks?" the first thief asked mockingly. "Is the circus in town?"
The second thief laughed. "It looks like it," he replied.
"Hey, wait a minute..." the third thief said, "aren't they the superheroes from TV?"
The second thief paused. "Yeah..." he replied, "yeah, they are! They've changed their costumes, but it's still them!"
The first thief chuckled darkly. "Well, well..." he said, dropping his bag of money on the floor, "Godai-ouji and Hoshi-hime... Nice to finally meet you." He pulled out a machete. "This should be fun, right, boys?"
The other two dropped their bags, but didn't pull anything out. "Yeah, it will," the second thief replied.
"You ready?" Syaoran asked quietly, pulling his sword from the scabbard on his back.
"Yeah," Sakura replied just as quietly, pulling out the necklace that her Star Key was attached to. Lifting it off her head, she threw it in front of her, where it glowed blue. She then lowered her voice, so that the thieves wouldn't hear her. "The Key which hides powers of the Stars... show your true form before me. I, Sakura, command you under our contract." She raised her voice again. "Release!"
Before her eyes, her Star Key extended into a Star Wand, which she quickly grabbed and spun around like a baton. She then took an intimidating stance.
"I can take Godai-ouji," the first thief said. "You two go for Hoshi-hime."
"Got it, boss!" the other two replied.
The first thief lunged at Syaoran and the two blades clashed, each male pushing back and forth to try and overpower the other. The thief pulled away to swing at Syaoran's arm, but Syaoran blocked him. The thief then tried again, but, again, Syaoran blocked him. This continued on, with the thief swinging and Syaoran blocking.
The other two thieves crouched into a martial arts stance before lunging at Sakura. Caught by surprise that they were martial artists, she was unable to move before the second thief spin-kicked her across the face and the third thief drop-kicked her.
"Sa-!" Syaoran called out before stopping himself. "Hoshi-hime!"
As the second thief leapt into the air above Sakura and his foot came hurtling towards her face, she quickly rolled out of the way and his foot hit the concrete. She rapidly clambered to her feet, not willing to give them any more chance to attack her while she was down.
"Not bad, little girl!" the third thief said with a smirk.
"God of Thunder, answer my call!" Syaoran's voice suddenly called out. A moment later, the first thief was blasted into the nearest wall by a flash of lightning.
"Boss!" the second thief cried.
Sakura was glad for the momentary distraction, because it gave her time to come up with an unusual idea. She could probably solve this problem with any of her Sakura Cards, but she figured it would be interesting to try something new. It would certainly suit the situation, not to mention give her a whole new ability.
She pulled out three cards, separated them between her fingers, then threw them above her. "Fight! Power! Jump!" she called out, touching them with her Star Wand. In a split second, she could feel their powers combining inside of her.
"Alright, no more fooling around!" the third thief growled.
Sakura glanced at Syaoran. "Godai-ouji! I can take care of these two. You make sure the other one stays down."
"Alright," Syaoran replied.
Turning back to the two thieves, she watched them rush up to her. Unfazed, she tossed her Star Wand to the floor and readied a martial arts stance. Waiting until the last moment, she ducked and dodged the double volley of punches that came her way. No matter which way their fists flew, she was able to dodge.
Suddenly, she saw that the second thief was trying to drop-kick her, so, grabbing the left fist, and then the right fist, of the third thief as he tried to punch her, then leaping into the air, she managed to avoid the second thief's leg, as well as lift the third thief off the ground. The momentum then carried her into a somersault, which she used to throw the third thief away from her. The force of the throw was so strong that he flew across the street and dented a brick wall. She, on the other hand, landed perfectly on her feet and twisted to face her other opponent.
The second thief gasped in shock, turned and ran away from her. Unwilling to let him get away, Sakura chased after him, leapt high into the air and brought her foot down between his shoulder blades. He fell flat on his face, denting the concrete, and she gracefully back-flipped and landed on her feet.
After a few moments of glaring at the man lying by her feet, she suddenly realised what she'd just done and squealed in delight. "Wow! I'm a martial artist! Just like the ones on TV! How cool!"
"Nice work, Hoshi-hime," Syaoran said. She turned to him and saw him walking towards her with a smile on his face. "The other guy didn't get up again. He's unconscious." He glanced around and chuckled as he came to a stop in front of her. "I see these guys are too." He looked into her eyes. "You didn't hit them too hard, I hope."
Sakura chuckled sheepishly. "No, I tried not to. I just want to punish them, not kill them."
"That was brilliant, Sakura-chan," Tomoyo remarked as she emerged from the bushes, holding her new video camera.
"Definitely!" Cerberus called out, flying above Tomoyo's head. "A very clever way to use the cards, Sakura!"
"Jeez..." Meiling said as she popped up next to Tomoyo, clearly annoyed. "Sakura, if you needed a martial artist's help, you could have just asked me. I could've taken 'em."
"Sorry, Meiling-chan," Sakura replied with a nervous smile.
Meiling glanced away. "Although, it was pretty cool to watch you kick so much ass..."
Suddenly, a police siren rang out through the night. "Oh, it's the police," Tomoyo said, turning off her video camera. "We'd best hurry home."
"Yeah," Cerberus added, folding his tiny arms. "These guys aren't getting up any time soon, so let's split. The cops will find them soon enough."
Sakura nodded. "Alright," she replied. "It's getting late anyway." She began walking away. "Let's go."
"Hey, Sakura," Syaoran said.
She stopped and turned to smile at him. "Yes, Syaoran-kun?"
"Don't forget your Star Wand."
"Hoe?" She blinked at him in confusion, then flew into a panic as she realised what he meant. "Hoeeeee!" She quickly ran back to pick it up.
Daidouji Tomoyo was silent as she played back the footage of Syaoran and Sakura's earlier fight with the three bank robbers, admiring the new costumes that she'd made, as well as the sheer magical power that the two lovers had used to defeat their foes.
Once the video ended, she switched the lights back on, ejected the tape and, with a sigh, placed it in a nearby box to be stored with the rest of Sakura's adventures as the Card Mistress. Once upon a time, the mere thought of filming Sakura doing absolutely anything at all would have given her a thrill beyond any other. The fact that Sakura had become a Cardcaptor had been the world's greatest excuse to make her costumes, get her to wear them, then catch it all on camera. Her beautiful, perfect angel goddess, wearing the costumes of her own design.
It wasn't like that anymore, though. These days, she did those same things more out of habit than anything. It was still a fabulous filming opportunity, capturing Sakura in a fancy costume, using her Sakura Cards, and Sakura was still the absolute cutest girl that she'd ever met, but the obsession had disappeared... and there was a reason for that.
Glancing to the side of her at another box, she scanned the contents for a moment before pulling out one of the tapes and sliding it into the camera. Pressing the 'play' button, she switched the lights back off and watched the large screen in front of her.
"So, I'll see you tonight, okay, Yoshida-kun?" Meiling asked, smiling at her boyfriend.
Kentaro stood as straight as a plank of wood. "Yes, Li-san!" he replied. "I'll be there at six o' clock!"
Meiling scowled. "You'd better not be late again."
"I won't! I promise!"
Meiling nodded, satisfied. "Good." She glanced over at the camera and huffed in annoyance. "Tomoyo!" She shoved the camera away. "Why the hell are you filming this? Enough already!"
Tomoyo giggled, her lens now pointing at the floor. "Sorry, Meiling-chan," she said. She lifted the lens back up at Meiling. "But you're just so cool that I need to capture it on film."
Meiling rolled her eyes. "Jeez..."
"Sorry, Tomoyo-chan! Meiling-chan!" Sakura's voice called out. The camera moved away from Meiling to look at Syaoran and Sakura, who were walking towards them from the school building, hand-in-hand. Sakura was smiling sheepishly. "Syaoran-kun needed to see Honda-sensei about something. Are you two ready to go home together now?"
"Yeah, yeah..." The camera moved back to Kentaro and Meiling. "See you later, Yoshida-kun!" Meiling turned and walked away, past the camera while curling her mouth at it.
"See you later, Li-san!"
Tomoyo smiled fondly as the tape ended. Ah, Meiling; how her feelings for the Chinese girl had changed over the years. Once upon a time, she'd merely seen her as a good friend and ally, but, now, she meant more to her than anyone could possibly imagine.
Seven years ago, after an eleven-year-old Sakura had confessed her love to Syaoran, he and Meiling had gone back to Hong Kong, promising to come back permanently one day. Syaoran, of course, had wanted to come back for Sakura, but Meiling had said that she'd wanted to come back for three reasons. One, her brash and bossy personality meant that she didn't have many true friends back home, so she'd wanted to be around Sakura and Tomoyo. Two, she'd wanted to keep an eye on Syaoran and make sure that Sakura would be a good girlfriend to him. Three, she'd wanted to take a leaf out of Syaoran's book and try for a Japanese boyfriend. Sakura had fallen over in disbelief at that last one.
Apparently, the cousins had had trouble convincing their parents to agree to it at first, prompting them to argue against each other's parents instead, mainly because Syaoran had always been rather frightened of his mother. Eventually, the parents had agreed to let them come back at sixteen, but neither child had been happy about this, so it had been argued further. Finally, it was agreed that they'd come back at fourteen, so the following three years had been spent growing up, training and arranging the necessary paperwork to move to Tokyo.
During those three years, Tomoyo had continued to film Sakura's very move, although, admittedly, there had become less and less to film. With nothing magical going on anymore, Sakura had never had much chance to use her Sakura Cards... and, after a while, she'd started gently refusing Tomoyo's requests to use the Create Card to invent new filming opportunities, as well as gently refusing to wear the costumes that she'd made for her.
Sakura had still used her cards, but mainly for mundane things, such as washing Cerberus with Bubble, rushing to catch the school bus with Dash, creating birthday bouquets with Flower, teleporting items towards or away from her with Move, shunning noise when she was studying with Silent and getting rid of insomnia on exam nights with Sleep.
At last, when Tomoyo and Sakura had reached their final year of middle school, Syaoran and Meiling had come back and there had no longer been any need to talk to them through emails and letters. Sakura had been overjoyed and she and Syaoran had become an instant couple, holding hands everywhere they went.
Tomoyo, who had strangely gotten less interested in filming Sakura by that point, but still doing it anyway, had started hanging out with Meiling more, if only to give the lovebirds more time alone together. After a while, Tomoyo had suddenly realised that Meiling was rather cool, with how bold, brash, strong and independent she was, so she'd started filming her as well as filming Sakura.
Some of the time, Meiling had enjoyed the attention, making sure to either pose, flex her muscles or perform some martial arts whenever the camera was on her. Other times, however, she'd get moody and shove the camera away, telling her that she was invading her space a bit too much. Tomoyo had greatly enjoyed filming her, because she'd provided much entertainment whenever Sakura had been out on a 'private, no stalkers allowed' date with Syaoran.
It was only when they had entered high school that it had suddenly dawned on her that she felt something stronger than friendship towards Meiling. That fact that the girl was so bold, brash, strong and independent made her attractive. She was so vastly different from Sakura that it had enthralled her. Finally, she'd found something thrilling to film again.
A few months later, Meiling had gotten her first boyfriend, a boy by the name of Kuroki Renjiro. He would be the first of a long string of boyfriends, all of which Tomoyo could remember the names of. Renjiro was particularly easy to remember, however, because he'd been the first boy that she'd filmed kissing Meiling.
She hadn't meant to film such a thing, but the two had been going on a date one week after becoming a couple and she'd felt compelled to stalk them and film whatever happened. The moment that they'd entered a secluded area of the park, Renjiro had dove straight for Meiling's mouth. Tomoyo had had to stifle a horrified gasp, an unfamiliar sensation burning in the pit of her stomach as she watched Meiling jolt in shock, then, slowly, as if she hadn't been sure of herself, but willing to try for Renjiro's sake, return the kiss.
Tomoyo had accidentally filmed Syaoran kissing Sakura before, but she'd certainly never felt such a powerful emotion as that. She'd had no idea what it was at the time, but it had felt like her body had been slowly rotting away from the inside out. She'd continued to watch as they'd broken apart, Renjiro gently caressing Meiling's face before bringing her forward for another kiss, this one slightly harsher than the first. This had carried on a few times, until Meiling had finally decided that it had been time to go home.
After that day, Tomoyo had never been able to look at Meiling the same way again, especially after playing the footage back to herself the very night of the incident. The way that Meiling's body had pressed up against Renjiro's... the way that her mouth had moved against his... the way that her legs had been rubbing against his... the way that she'd tried to gain dominance from the third kiss onwards...
Her love for Sakura as a child had been pure and untainted. All she'd wanted to do was hang around Sakura, be there for Sakura, film Sakura's every move and make sure that Sakura was happy. She gripped her skirt as she recalled the good old days of childhood innocence. Now, she was attracted to Meiling in a whole different way. She'd found Sakura irresistibly cute. She now found Meiling irresistibly sexy.
For a long time, she'd felt like she was being poisoned by the lust. She'd wanted, and still wanted, to do things to Meiling that would make the Chinese girl recoil in horror if she knew. She'd never, ever, desired any such thing of Sakura. Sakura had been, and still was, a pure and angelic piece of artwork that was not to be tarnished or tainted in any way. She was beauty and perfection personified. Never had she had any filthy thoughts about her.
Meiling, however, was a different story. She was not perfection or a piece of artwork. What she was instead was a real, solid girl, living on the same level as Tomoyo. They were both average in appearance, they were both from rich families and neither had magical powers. Sakura was the daughter of a model, so, of course, she was blindingly beautiful. Meiling seemed to come from an average-looking family. Sakura was naïve and childish. Meiling was smart and mature, compared to how she'd been as a ten-year-old. Sakura was the head cheerleader with a boyfriend who was the captain of the soccer team. Meiling was the head of the girls' kenpo team.
Meiling was a solid girl. No hair that was the perfect shade of brown, but hair that was as black as the sky at twilight. No eyes that were the perfect shade of green, but eyes that were as red as blood. She was real, she was solid and Tomoyo thought she was unbearably sexy.
She sighed as she switched the lights back on, after such a long spell of sitting in the dark, and ejected the tape. She stared at it in her hand for a few moments, smiling sadly at the thought of Meiling with her new boyfriend. She'd been dating the guy for almost a month now and, although he always seemed to be incredibly on-edge whenever they talked, they seemed to get along fine. Sure, Tomoyo wanted Meiling to be happy, there was no denying that. Despite wanting to ravage the girls in countless amounts of ways, she still had the same heart as the one that she'd had at ten years old. If Meiling could be happier with someone else, then she'd gladly let that someone else take her... but, secretly, a dark part of her soul was anxiously awaiting the next break-up. She never really wanted Meiling to keep a boyfriend for too long, but she wasn't about to stand in the girl's way either.
Placing the tape back in the box, she vaguely wondered what Sakura was doing at that moment. Ah, Sakura; not the first girl that she'd ever crushed on, but definitely the first one that she'd obsessed over... and what an obsession it had been.
She smiled again to herself, recalling that her goddess of purity wasn't so pure anymore. Last year, when she'd been seventeen, she'd been filming Meiling in the school grounds before the bell had been due to ring when Syaoran and Sakura had come wandering in, arm-in-arm, pressed against each other, chatting avidly, blushing and laughing. Even Meiling had stopped what she'd been doing, which had been talking to Naoko, to watch the unusual behaviour. The most disturbing thing, of course, was Syaoran laughing as he clung protectively to Sakura, which hadn't been happening until that point.
Tomoyo had turned to Meiling and muttered with a smirk, "Li-kun slept at Sakura-chan's house last night, didn't he? I remember Sakura-chan letting it slip on the phone yesterday."
Meiling had turned away from Naoko and muttered back, "Yeah and Sakura's father was sleeping over at the university last night. Syaoran let it slip before he left our house yesterday."
Tomoyo had giggled. "And Kero-chan was sent to my house, because Sakura-chan said he was 'annoying' Li-kun."
This, the two girls had realised, meant that the only ones in the house all night had been Syaoran and Sakura, as Sakura's older brother, Toya, had already moved into a house with his boyfriend, Yukito, the year beforehand.
The moment the couple had descended upon them, Tomoyo and Meiling had pushed Syaoran and Sakura, respectively, out of earshot of anybody else. It was then that Tomoyo had smiled deviously and asked them if they'd had fun last night.
The reaction had been hilarious. Both faces had exploded in a bright red blush before they'd sprung apart so fast, one would have thought they'd been burned. They both then stared at the floor, spluttering out things like "What are you talking about?" and "I've no idea what you mean!"
Tomoyo had decided to turn on her video camera and capture the moment to laugh at again later, while Meiling had decided to intervene. Grinning like a cat that had caught a mouse, she'd asked if they'd taken each other's virginity the night before. Syaoran and Sakura's faces had burned even brighter and Syaoran had fidgeted while Sakura had squeaked "Hoeeeee..." while scuttling behind Syaoran to hide.
One month after that, the pair had strangely announced that they'd decided to use their magical powers to bring down crime in Tomoeda, since they had been old enough to handle it by then and had wanted to put their ofuda and Sakura Cards to use after them being inactive for so long. Tomoyo had been excited about the new footage that she could capture of Syaoran and Sakura in action, but the thrill of seeing Sakura in hand-made costumes hadn't been anything like it had once been years beforehand.
Standing up from the couch, Tomoyo headed into the kitchen to fix herself something to eat; she'd grown hungry with all that reminiscing. As she walked over to the freezer and opened it, she thought to herself about how many of her childhood friends were with the people that they loved most now. Yamazaki Takashi and Mihara Chiharu were still a couple and had taken each other's virginity at sixteen. Yanagisawa Naoko had broken up with her long-distance boyfriend at fourteen, but Tomoyo suspected that she'd recently found herself a new boyfriend, as she'd been acting very giddy lately, but had refused to give details about it. Sasaki Rika had married Terada Yoshiyuki soon after turning sixteen and had become Terada Rika. On their honeymoon, he, a non-virgin himself, had taken her virginity.
Tomoyo hummed thoughtfully as she pulled out some fish and vegetables and closed the freezer; the only ones left in their large group of eight that were still virgins were herself, Meiling and Naoko. Naoko had stated once that her long-distance boyfriend had been her first boyfriend and she'd barely ever seen him in person. As for Meiling, she may have had numerous boyfriends over the last four years, but the Chinese girl had always insisted that she'd never gotten past second base with any of them. This had been comforting to Tomoyo up until this point, but she had no idea how much longer it was going to last. What if Meiling fell in love with Kentaro and claimed him as her number one person? What if Kentaro suddenly gained a burst of courage one day and tried to make love to her on the spot?
Tomoyo chuckled to herself; no way that last one was happening. Meiling would be more likely to castrate him than consent to sex that came without warning.
Ah, Meiling; Tomoyo could still remember the day she'd realised that she didn't simply desire her, but had fallen in love with her. Unlike with Sakura, her childhood obsession, her love for Meiling burned with an adult passion. She wanted her heart, her soul and her body. She wanted everything that was Meiling all to herself. With Sakura, she'd been happy to see her happy with someone else... but Meiling sparked a selfishness that she'd never known she had. It was frustrating, to say the least.