Disclaimer: We have run out of witty disclaimers, so the horrible has happaned. We have succumbed to the power that is the typical disclaimer:
The llamas, Cat, and Neko do not own Card Captor Sakura, it's plot lines, or it's characters.
We are also sad to say that had issued a rule so that we can not respond to reviews in chapters. We appriecate your reviews anyway, and if you leave us one, we will be sure to go and review one of your stories as well.
Flame. Although it contains many uses, only one will be a focus of this story. While you might hear about many a fires, flame is not meant in the literal sense. It is meant as the light that will draw one young girl into her spiral of darkness.
Sakura Kinomoto now officially hated math. Not that she hadn't hated it for the past 9 years of her life. But it is now official, because Sakura Kinomoto had managed to announce it to her entire senior math class, when she had been called upon to answer a particularly hard problem. Which she is sure the teacher knew she couldn't answer. So when the final bell rang, signaling the end of the school day, you can just imagine Sakura's relief. All was well with Sakura now, as there was a nice sized tub waiting to be filled at her home, so the girl could soak all of her troubles away. And she would have proceeded to do just that, if it wasn't for the shrill scream that suddenly filled her ears. Quickly reacting to the panic consumed shout, Sakura rounded the upcoming corner at a tremendous speed, only to freeze at the sight that welcomed her.
Filling up almost the entire street in front of her, were at least 50 people, many of them laying on the ground in pools of blood. And while Sakura might not be the brightest girl in her math class, or even close, she was street wise enough to recognize what was going on in front of her. A gang war. Sakura was still standing in shock as the fighting ensued, when she heard a scream almost exactly like the one that had caused her to come over here in the first place, causing her to snap to attention. Surveying her surroundings as fast as possible, she found the creator of the screams to be a girl who looked not too much older than herself, with long purple black hair falling around her. The reason the girl was screaming was extremely obvious, as she had a large man holding her in a headlock, with a knife pressing into her back.
Without thinking about the consequences of her future actions, Sakura ran quietly up behind the man, and delivered a swift kick to his wrist, causing him to drop the blade. While the man tried to decipher what had just happened, and hold onto the now struggling girl in his arms at the same time, Sakura executed a quick roundhouse to the mans face, which forced him to drop the purple haired girl in order to clutch his now broken nose. Giving the man one last hard kick to the head, which rendered him unconscious, Sakura rushed over to the girl who lay but five feet away, after grabbing the knife which had belonged to the man slumped on the ground, his face covered in blood.
"Are you okay?" Sakura asked, concern filling her voice.
"Y-yes." Came the stuttered reply.
"I'm Sakura." Our new heroine said softly, offering her hand to help the girl stand up.
"Tomoyo. Daidouji. Tomoyo Daidouji." The girl now know as Tomoyo said.
"Tomoyo!" Came a concerned yell, from a blue haired boy.
"I'm okay Eriol, she-Sakura-saved me." Tomoyo stated, looking at Sakura with a world of thanks filling her eyes.
Eriol then ran up to Tomoyo and Sakura, hugging Tomoyo as soon as she was within reaching distance. While the two hugged, and muttered hushed reasurences to each other, Sakura was looking around, taking in the sight of battered bodies all around her, and the backs of the fleeing gang. The other gang was efficiently gathering all of their wounded, and talking with friends who had not been injured. Many of them began to get into cars, or onto motorcycles, and left.
"Sakura? Sakura?" Came the gentle voice that knocked Sakura out of her seeming trance.
"Hmm? Oh, yes, Tomoyo right?" Sakura replied, shaking her head to help her dazed feeling flee her body.
"We wanted to know if you would like to come with us back to our house. There we could explain what just happened to you." Tomoyo offered, indicating also to the blue haired boy she had called Eriol.
"I…sure." Sakura hesitated, deciding to go after thinking of the empty home that awaited her. Yay, bow down to the power of peer pressure.
Farewell for now our friends, and let longing not remain bittersweet.