Midnight-blue eyes were focused on the road ahead of him and nothing else. He had biked this route perhaps a thousand times over the years. Oh sure, by this point he was old enough to have a license (which he did only because his father had teased him about not having one) but he had little use for cars.

He paused a moment, a frown on his face as his thoughts turned towards why he was coming out here. It was a chance to be sure. There was still time for him to turn around, head back to his apartment, and backlog this silly venture.

No. He had to know. As he pulled off to the side to rest and catch his breath, a free hand went to the satchel strapped to the back of his bike. The manuscript contained within it was what was pushing him to be here now. He closed his eyes and let out a loose breath, he had not realized how high his nerves had become.

Rowen Hashiba pursed his lips in thought, running a hand through his blue hair. Maybe this was a bad idea. He had found that thing solely by accident, or maybe it wasn't. That was what was scaring him. He had thought it was over, that his days as a Ronin Warrior were past him, but what if-? What if it wasn't behind him, what if he and the other four were still bound to foolish oaths that they had taken on as boys?

"No, I have to know for sure," the archer murmured to himself as he started to pedal again deciding he had taken long enough of a break.

There was only one person he could think of that could make sense of what he had found, and only one person who could help point him to the path he should take. He and the others had known for a while, there was no way the remaining four didn't know she had been staying with Mia off and on for the last year.

She always took great care in making sure not to be around when one of them dropped in to check on the red-head. The five young men had fallen apart, had stopped being friends as they tried to figure out what life without their armor meant, but they still checked on Mia. The young woman had hated the fact they had grown so far apart, still hated it. Rowen remembered their last argument: the fiery red-head scolding him thoroughly for not talking to his friends.

His rebuttal had been the only reason they were friends was because of the armor, her retort had been what about Sage seeing as how the two of them had been close before the armor. It, well things changed that was all. There had not been that many physical scars due to the healing power of the armor but the emotional had been many. They just wanted to move on, to forget it ever happened. Doing that made it easier, easier to reconcile the fact they had died, that they had given up parts of themselves that they would never see again.

Mia had given him a sad look, told him to leave. If he hated his past that much, he shouldn't come and see her again. She had almost seemed to expect the reaction from him, reflecting on it later Rowen had wondered if she had the same talk with the others.

She probably had, save for Ryo. The little brother she would always strive to the upmost within her power to protect, and more so if it be required. Ryo had always been alone before the armor, what did he have to go back to?

That particular guilt was eating at Rowen with every day that passed. He and the bearer of Wildfire weren't really all that different. Rowen's father was buried with his work, his mother still as much an airhead as ever, he had no actual life to go back to either save for his beloved studies. The archer had at an early age retreated to books, and he had found himself right back there upon the destruction of the armor.

The five of them had remained at Mia's a week after getting back from Africa, only to return to their lives in a way far different from any of their previous partings: they had splintered. Even now they remained apart. It was a trend the archer saw continuing and he wondered at the end of it all, if maybe it wasn't better that way.

He let out a loose breath and forced himself to calm. His rising agitation would surely alert her and he did not want her knowing he was there until it was too late for her to bolt. His thoughts turned back to last month when he had profusely apologized to Mia for his asinine behavior, and pleaded with her to eventually forgive him for being such a downright asshole.

She had cracked up in laughter, saying that he sounded more like the sly smart-ass she remembered. Then queried if he had found a girl and that was why he was out of his funk, which sent him turning bright red and spluttering. Mia could call him a smart-ass all she liked, the way he saw it she was the queen of wisecracks.

The archer had then decided to pry a little, because he knew Mia was not alone in that big house. He may not have had the armor of Strata anymore, but he was still sensitive to that presence: they all were. After all, she had grown up with them. Bounced around from house to house at the seeming whims of her legal guardian, but the archer knew better. It had been done on purpose as she was as much of a lure as they were. For whatever reason, her abilities as shaman and their abilities as Ronin muted each other. Not cancelled each other out, but worked in such a way to prevent things from sensing them.

There had always been demons and spirits of malcontent in the world, Rowen had often denied that fact before the war with Talpa. After it, he had no choice but to acknowledge that it was real and had always been so. He had just been blind to it, like any normal mortal because like the little shaman had said: "It was trained out of you, Ro."

No one had ever told her those things weren't real, and by being tossed from clan to clan she had never had the stable reinforcement she needed to build those walls. Yet, it had served one purpose: to keep him and the others safe from that type of harm. Just long enough for them to find the armors and come into their own power. Power she had claimed they had always had. The shaman seemed convinced they never needed the armors to be different, and now that he reflected on it maybe that was true.

The armor of Strata was gone, but he still felt a pull to the sky. Still could stare up at it and get lost in his thoughts for hours. He hated being grounded to Earth, missed the feeling of being in the air. Had his armor really been that much of a burden? Rowen slowed as the large house suddenly came into view.

He was everywhere and that was starting to frustrate him. He needed to keep calm and focus on why he was here. He needed to keep his thoughts from jumping from one line to the other. Yet, that dream the other night had set him on edge. Then to find this book in the library, well it had caused the rest of the warning flags to go up. The armor might be gone but his instinct as a warrior was still very much intact.

'Right, back on topic,' he schooled his thoughts and features; something he had picked up from the blond swordsman. Mia had not divulged much, though she had admitted she had a friend staying with her that was helping with her research. The red-head had commented it was only fair as the person was funding her project. Rowen had given a wry grin teasingly asking as to when the ever-logical-skeptic Mia had started taking help from supernaturally-inclined people. The retort had been: "Right about the time I started playing babysitter to five boys wearing mystical armor."

Rowen had flushed in embarrassment as it had been more than an adequate touché, and his ears still went red at the memory of it. She had seemed slightly taken aback by his guess though, for it had shown in her face. There was no sense in Mia denying it, as he had gently told her. The five of them no longer had their armors, but it didn't matter they knew the shaman's presence regardless.

"Just tell her I said "hi,"" the archer mused aloud, as he resumed his earlier pace. "She was probably bent as hell with that one." This thought had served to amuse him a great deal. He had always enjoyed ruffling the younger girl's feathers. It had been a long time since he had spoken to her, and even longer since he had seen her. She was in for a surprise today.

He saw that Mia's new sports-type car was not in the drive, though the old dilapidated jeep sat in its spot. She had kept the vehicle for sentimental reasons, she had told him: the main sentiment being Ryo had avidly protested her getting rid of it. The archer had known Mia would be out, she had said she was going away for a few days to do a presentation up at a university somewhere (he had only been half paying attention).

That gave him the perfect chance to drop in on the shaman, and have a one on one talk with her. There was no way she was going to be able to pull one of her infamous vanishing acts this time. She was sensitive to their presences, but she had admitted to him once that his was hard to nail down unless she was really focused or knew he was stopping by. When he had given her a smug grin at hearing this information her flat retort was: "It's only because your armor is just as much of an ass as you!"

He chuckled to himself at this recollection. Finding out she had known Cye had helped to explain her mouth. She was heavy on the sarcasm, wit, and swearing even though she was three years younger. Then again, if she reminded Rowen of anyone it was Sage. Her mannerisms were identical to the blond's: calm under most forms of pressure, respectful to all, confident with a sense of humility, but terrifying when her buttons had been pressed too hard.

The archer always imagined that if Sage hadn't been raised to such strict bushido code, that there would have been no difference between the two of them. That was another scary thought right there.

"Not as scary as her reaction to this is going to be," Rowen wryly grinned to himself as he grabbed his satchel and slung it over his shoulder. Another thing she had in common with Sage was she absolutely hated being surprised.

He walked up the steps and paused, the doorbell just in reach but his hands froze. Now that he was here that pit in the middle of stomach had grown. A frown framed his face, when had he gotten so nervous? He had broken into a slight sweat at some point, but it wasn't from the exercise it was from nerves.

The archer shook himself, "Get it together, Rowen. You have to do this." Pep talk now over, he pressed the doorbell and waited. He could hear someone shuffling about inside, walking towards the door, and then it opened.

Rowen was momentarily taken aback by the person that greeted him. It had been a few years, but she had changed immensely. She was a good two inches taller than what he remembered, and her features which had always been childlike had changed to that of a typical teenage girl. Though, she certainly could compete with him in the being far too thin for Cye's tastes category.

Her hair had always been stubborn with blonde bangs and the rest raven-black but it had been short. The bangs now hung in her eyes, and the rest of it was in a long braid that went down past the middle of her back.

Her head was nearly level with his torso, and she tilted it back to glance up at him, violet eyes wide in shock at seeing him there. She opened her mouth but no sound came out at first.

She then resolutely worked her jaw, said flatly, "Mia's not here," and proceeded to try and close the door on him.

The archer couldn't help himself, he laughed at her reaction. Putting up a hand to stop the door from shutting on him, he smirked, "Nice to see you too, Elayne."

"Rowen," it came out in a growl, as she struggled to get the door shut. "She's not here."

The young man quickly became solemn, "I know. I didn't come here to see her. I came here to see you."

The struggle abruptly stopped, and she curiously peeked around the door a perplexed look on her face, "Huh?"

"I came to see you," the archer repeated, tone gentle as he tried hard to keep the edge out of his voice. "I need to talk with you."

She closed her eyes a moment, seeming to think it over in her head, she re-opened her eyes and quirked an eyebrow at him, "Really? Cause like, I'm pretty sure I've sent you a handful of letters and left you some voicemails that you never answered."

He flushed red in embarrassment, let out a nervous laugh, "Seven letters, and eight voicemails in the last year. I'm sorry! I honestly just forgot to reply!" She did not seem to be convinced the bored look proof of that, and he added meekly handing her two sealed envelopes, "Here's a couple of my replies."

Elayne took them and started to laugh, "Ro, you're such an ass. Did you leave your brain out in space or what?" She shook her head, but motioned for him to come in then stepped aside so he could enter.

Rowen took the invitation and walked into the house, quickly slipping out of his shoes and into slippers, "Might have. Or maybe I never had one to begin with."

"Ya the guy that's on par with a super computer never had a brain," she dryly commented with a roll of her eyes. She tilted her head at him, "Want something to eat?"

"Nah, I'm good," his ears perked up at hearing the sound of the tea kettle whistling away on the stove.

"Tea then?" she asked with a knowing grin, she chuckled when he gave a nod.

Rowen settled himself at the dining room table, laying the satchel down, though he kept it closed. His eyes were trained anywhere but there. He wasn't sure what he was so afraid of, but he was tense. He drummed his thumbs on the table as he waited for the girl to emerge from the kitchen.

She was quick to do so, ever the prompt person, just one more trait she shared with Sage. It made sense to him that they would have some similarities, after all they were cousins. Yet, he was always reminded more of a pair of twins than anything else. He had even heard Sage's grandmother make the remark that Elayne was more Date than Mogami, that she had been born to the wrong family. Of course Elayne's sly retort was that Sage took after her clan, seeing as how Date Masamune's mother was Mogami.

It was so strange, he was thinking about the others now when he had not thought of them in months. Well maybe a passing thought here or there, but nothing like this. He gave an inclination of his head in thanks as she handed him the cup.

His midnight blue eyes were focused on the swirling liquid. This plan had sounded so good in his head, but now that he was here he was having trouble executing it. Maybe, maybe he had made the wrong choice after all.

Elayne sat across from him and sipped at her tea calmly, her eyes were closed maybe half in thought or half in sleep. He wasn't quite sure which it was, it could have been the latter there were bags under her eyes. It reminded him he was not sleeping well either. Rowen let out a frustrated sigh and ran a hand through his hair. Crap, what was he supposed to do?

"Starting at the beginning tends to work best," the teenager offered, putting down her cup and placing her head on her hands to look at him. "Or you can sit there and continue to put yourself in knots."

He momentarily balked, letting out a nervous chuckle, "I forgot you could do that."

"You came here seeking the advice of a shaman," Elayne snorted back a laugh, "And forgot she was sensitive to your emotions? Dude, seriously? Are you even from Earth?"

"Oi, stop with the space jokes already," the archer gave her a sulky look. "You're so mean, just like your twin."

At even this remote mention of the blond the girl scoffed, and she leveled him with a look, tone of voice calm, "Ro, stop dwelling on it, and spit it out."

"I-I," he paused and swallowed, eyes going to the bag. "I wanted to come to you with this, because I think this is more your area of expertise than Mia's. You are going for linguist right?"

The girl's eyes were suddenly half-lidded, "Ya, Nakahara-san insisted on me doing "useful" studies due to my position in my clan. Basically he wanted me to be a doctor, which I told him was not happening so it's the nurse practitioner thing instead. And the languages thing comes in handy being the legal ward of a Japanese ambassador. Plus it helps the shaman aspect of things too, in a roundabout way."

"Well, this sorta applies, and sorta doesn't," the archer continued on, he realized how lame he sounded right now. He finally opened his satchel and pulled out a worn manuscript, "I stumbled across this in the library last week. Been there so long there's no real record of it, and they let me have it for a steal to get it off the shelf so they could put useful volumes there. But it's-it's what is in it that I think falls under your side of the spectrum."

Her violet eyes had narrowed and focused on the book the minute he drug it out, a scowl now framing her face as he gently placed it on the table so that it sat between them. She made no move to grab it at all, her eyes trained on the cover as she read the lettering.

She looked to the archer, saying softly, "No. You didn't accidentally find this, it called to you. Didn't it, Rowen of Strata?"

Rowen's eyes went wide at her accusation. Well he had figured she would be able to pick up on the truth: he had felt a pull to that worn volume. It still made him uneasy that she knew. "But, but they're gone! So's the power."

"Are they?" Elayne tilted her head as she looked at him. "I remember telling you once, that you didn't need the armors to special or to be powerful. Did you think it would all just go away when they vanished?"

"Yes, no," the archer was on his feet in an instant, throwing his hands up in the air in frustration, "I don't know! We were kids fighting things that should have never existed; playing with powers we had no real understanding of."

"And who's fault would that be?" the girl remained in her seat at the table. Not allowing his swirling emotions to get the better of her, even though they all too easily could have. She remained calm with him and patient allowing him the chance to vent his growing frustration and unease.

For that Rowen was truly grateful. It had been so long since he had someone he could just talk to about any of this. He hadn't wanted to burden Mia with it, though he knew she would have been willing to listen, he hadn't been willing to talk to her about this. He had let it sit within himself and stew, and now it was all rising to the surface. He was doing nothing to hold it back, and the girl seemed content to just sit there and deal with it.

"Ours," he scowled, sides heaving in and out with angry breaths. "We could have listened. I'm sure you warned each of us in the same not so subtle manner." At her amused grin, he snorted but didn't dwell on it, he continued on with his angry rant, "How can it not be over? Why us? I don't want to hear that "we best fit the virtues" line of crap either!" His eyes went to the book, anger flickering within them, "And I want to know how someone knew what we were going to do before we even did it. It's a play, An, someone made our lives into a play!"

She had taken the book in her hands having retracted them very quickly as almost she'd been burned by the paper, but she was gentle with it now turning the pages ever so carefully as her violet eyes took it all in. She finally glanced up at him, noting he was shaking but she wasn't quite sure which emotion was at the forefront: anger or fear.

Elayne sighed heavily through her nose, "You done now, Spacecase? Or do you need to angst some more?" She knew there was no point in talking to him if he was still as wound up as he was giving off.

Rowen let out a shaky breath, hands clenching and unclenching at his sides as he tried to collect himself. He finally returned his eyes to her though they were still stormy they had lost most of their sharp edge. He was used to her curt words, hell that had been the only way she had ever been able to get through his thick-skull, so he wasn't the least bit bothered by them.

"No, no I'm good," the archer finally said after several moments of tense silence. He ran a hand through his hair, starting to calm. He gave her a small grin, "Thanks An-chan."

"Elayne," she corrected, eyes having gone back to the volume before her. "And you're welcome, but I only did it cause your emotions were starting to grate on my nerves."

He let out a chuckle and resumed his seat at the table. She had always had that ability, the ability to put anyone at ease. She had been good at it as a child, but now that she had training under her, hell he hadn't even realized she'd been working on mending his wary emotions since he walked into the house. He wasn't surprised at her deflecting his thank-you either, after all-

"Compare me to Sage in your head just one more time," she said in warning, eyes now tearing away from the book and back onto him.

Rowen laughed, "A'ight, a'ight. My bad. So? You going to answer any of my, erm-"

"Emotional outburst that was totally on par with one of Ryo's guilt trips?" she offered when he stalled for a word, tilting her head to the side with a grin at the way his ears went red. "The armors chose you because of your potential. Sure, the fact you were the most aligned with the virtues imprinted on them by Kaosu had a hand in it, but your clan symbols weren't exactly engraved in them by accident."

"And that thing," he pointed at the book in disgust, the scowl back on his face. "They made our lives into a play."

"No Rowen, no. At one point? This was a prophecy book," Elayne gently shut the worn volume. "People like me, shaman, miko, anyone on Earth that isn't your average human have never been quite safe. Too much fear, far too much hatred. Oracles, anyone with the ability to see things before they happened would write them down, sometimes in hundreds of volumes. Ordinary people would find them turn them into stories, or in your case a play."

"See, I knew I needed to talk to you for this," the archer admitted. He sighed, "So that means, what? That Destiny and Fate are absolute, that they cannot be changed?"

Elayne shook her head, looking at him in amusement, "I would have thought battling demon emperors, warlocks, and guys running around in their underwear would give you a little more perspective than that. Nothing is absolute. Every person has a choice, Ro. They can accept things, or they can ignore them."

The young shaman was on her feet now. She walked over to him and placed a hand on his shoulder, "You could have taken any number of paths to reach where you are right now. That's the thing about Fate, we make it ourselves. For every door you go through, the option you could've taken still exists but it just isn't available to you anymore. That manuscript? Is just the road you all actually took. I'm sure there was an actual book at some point with all the other options you could have taken written out."

"But it's not a coincidence that I found it now," Rowen could see where her line of discussion was going. "It called to me. So why?"

"I'm not going to lie, there is an awful lot of malice attached to that thing," Elayne had removed herself from him now, walked back over to the book and gently picked it up. "It has been through true horror. I don't like it at all, it is making me very uneasy. The malice is pure, untainted and in such a state it is extremely powerful." She handed it back to the archer, sighing as she rubbed at her forehead.

"What do I do?"

"Well, you've got two options," the girl said, leaning back against the wall as she looked at him. "Follow your instinct and send it to a certain Wildfire Ronin like you planned to do, or you can burn the damn thing and leave me the hell alone."

Rowen chuckled, "Temper, temper, small fry." He smirked at her visible eye twitch, but his amusement faded as the true weight of her words sunk in. "So, it's still not over and I can decide to walk away now? Go on living like none of this ever happened, or face whatever is coming and accept it?"

"I think that's pretty much what I just said," she dryly commented. Silence fell between them for several moments and she abandoned her spot by the wall to go and stare out the window. It was just now starting to turn to dusk. "You're going to need to head back, Ro. Unless you wanna crash in your old room for the night. I know you biked up here, I would have heard a car."

Rowen let out a chuckle, and grabbed the manuscript putting it back in his satchel, he got to his feet, "Thanks for the advice Elayne."

"Ro?"

He stopped, turned his head back to look at her, "Ya?"

"As your friend, knowing what you and the others have gone through, knowing how you have suffered, I want you to burn that manuscript and ignore whatever it is that's going to happen," she murmured quietly. She looked up at him a small smile on her face, "But we both know what you're going to do. So, be careful, kay?"

Rowen gave the girl a lopsided grin. Yes, he had already come to his decision. It may not have been the easy one, but he would forever be driven to what was right. Just like a typical hero.

"Don't let it go to your head," the shaman teased catching the thought. "I just want you to stay safe, that's all."

"I will, no worries imp," he had walked back over to her, and he gave her a quick hug. "You keep safe, too. I'll see ya around."

"Or at least try to respond sooner when I call you," she hollered after him. "Absentminded professor!"

"Nah, that's my dad," Rowen called back, slipping back into his shoes. "I will make an effort though, just no promises!" He opened the door and stepped out into the cooling air, eyes going to the now setting sun. Crap, he really had dallied too long. There was no way he would safely make it back, most certainly not in the dark. And she had probably known that, the little snot!

"Well, looks like I'm spending the night after all," the archer said with a resigned sigh, as he turned and walked back into the house.

A/N: Hi guys, so I wrote this almost three years ago now and it has been sitting in my Doc folder since. This is a super short story that ties into TGOL. There was always supposed to be a prequel to TGOL that explained how the Ronin ended up knowing Elayne (as TGOL wasn't the place to explain it since it detracted too much from the main story line): that is not what this is. This would be a pre-Message story (that I may, or may not actually write the Message portion of one day {don't get your hopes up; I've scraped that story four times so far} that does touch base on how Rowen and Elayne know each other. This story is complete, but it may take me a bit to get the rest of it uploaded. Thanks for your patience and enjoy!
-LG