AN: First MKR fic! Finally on paper! Hurrah! My brothers are glad because now I'm not just telling it to them. They didn't like Rayearth that much to begin with and I think I made them hate it. ;; Sob, sob.

Takes place a year after the Rayearth Manga ends, so you have to read that to understand this since I use no references to the anime, having seen only the episode with Ascot in Selece'shrine. And I assume that there was a year between books 3 and 4, which makes the Knights 16 and in tenth grade. Cephiro is now 'Formerly Cephiro' since the end of the sixth book said for the reader to pick the new name and I wanted to make it easier for others to read since everyone who's read the manga knows that name. Tell me if any info is wrong, okay?

Disclaimer: You though I owned Rayearth?! Ha, ha ha! I wish! But I don't. Boo hoo. All OCs are MINE! Anyone or anything that does not appear in the manga is MINE!!!!

The Return

Hikaru Shido's dog, Hikari, ate his dinner while she stroked his fur. They'd been together since Hikaru was a little girl. She was the only one who could interrupt him while he was eating. Hikaru's face was troubled, as was her spirit. Two things bothered her. One was in another world and the other was at school.

Recently, when she and the two other Magic Knights had taken a trip to Cephiro, the world itself seemed subtly different and once or twice alarms in the castle had gone off so everyone had to leave in a hurry. The Knights hadn't managed to convince Clef or the others to give them any information.

The problem at school was a new girl. Normally that wouldn't bother Hikaru, but there was something about this girl… She didn't talk much; the teacher explained that the girl hadn't spoken more than ten words total since a traumatic event six years before.

It was not the silence that bothered Hikaru so much as the girl's manner. She never stood up for herself, but stood up for Hikaru, getting her point across to the very few bullies in a way that always got her detention and a few bruises. (No prizes for guessing what it is.)

She kept looking at Hikaru strangely. It was unnerving. Hikaru was reminded vividly of Cephiro in every form she'd ever seen it every time she laid eyes on the girl. The new girl looked at Hikaru that seemed like she was studying Hikaru and trying to warn her of something.

The girl looked so sad. But the teacher had said she'd had a very traumatic event happen to her. Maybe she still regretted something she'd done at the time. Hikaru still remembered how full of regret she'd felt after Emeraude's death, after she and her friends together had killed her as Emeraude had wished. Hikaru had managed to come to terms with it when she was summoned again and learned more about why the last Pillar had done what she'd done.

Why does it feel like the two are connected? 'Formerly' Cephiro and all that happened there, and the new girl? What's going on? Hikaru wondered. After glancing at her watch and realizing what time it was, she stopped stroking Hikari and quickly jumped to her feet. Hikari stopped eating to look up quizzically at his friend and mistress.

"Sorry, boy," she apologized with a final stroke. "I have to go. I promise I'll be back soon and I'll give you a long walk then." She raced to the door as Hikari went back to eating, shoved her boots on, and was halfway out the door before any of her brothers knew it.

"Hikaru," her eldest brother called. "Where are you going?"

"I promised to meet Umi and Fuu, remember Satoru?" she replied.

"Will you be back by dinner?"
"Sure!" With this short exchange of words Hikaru was racing down the street toward Tokyo Tower. (We all know what happens when she goes there, don't we? Hee, hee.)

"Good-bye, honey," Mrs. Ryuzaaki called after her daughter, Umi.

"See you at dinner," Umi called, her long blue hair and school uniform swirling around her as she turned back toward her parents to wave as she ran off, picnic basket in hand.

"She's so energetic nowadays," Mrs. Ryuzaaki commented to her husband next to her.

"Yes, just as she was this time last year and all the time since," he said, his eyes following his daughter's speedy form as she turned a corner and vanished from his sight. His wife noticed his look.

"Maybe she did fall in love last year like we thought and just isn't willing yet to introduce us to him," she suggested, hugging her husband.

"We can only hope," Mr. Ryuzaaki replied. "Hopefully she'll get up the courage soon. I would like to meet the man who's made my precious daughter so happy."

"I'm going now," Fuu told her sister as she unlatched the front gate. Kuu turned from her weeding in the garden to look at the younger girl.

"Are you going to Tokyo Tower again?" she asked. Fuu nodded, readjusting her grip on her bag. How in the name of magic did Umi manage to convince me to bake cookies? she wondered. I'm not a very good cook and she knows it. Why didn't she make them? Hers are so much better.

"You're going everyday now. Bring me back some of those chocolate hearts, okay?" Kuu called after her sister as Fuu opened the gate.

"Sure thing," she called back with a laugh. Kuu had such a sweet tooth. Making sure the door latched properly, she set a fast pace toward the landmark that was also a tourist sight and memorable spot for her and others.

Tokyo Tower. Grand tourist sight, place many school field trips went to, high enough to see the entire city from the observation deck… and place of another world's worth of memories. Upon reaching the nearly empty observation deck, Hikaru was swamped with memories. Fuu giving her change for the binoculars, seeing Umi for the first time, the floor turning to water and pulling her under, meeting Clef and Mokona, battling in the Spring of Eterna, Presea making her evolving weapon, meeting Rayearth, the Battle against Emeraude, seeing Lantis, discovering that he was Zagato's brother, fighting against Eagle for the first time, Mokona revealing himself as the creator of Cephiro, Mokona pulling her and Eagle to Tokyo to fight, discovering she was the new Pillar, coming back with Eagle, the Mashin becoming the one mashin a second time so she and Umi and Fuu could speak to Mokona, and him leaving with the Mashin as the three girls floated there and came back down to their loved ones, Umi to Ascot, Fuu to Ferio, she herself coming down holding Eagle to Lantis. She stood by the railing, looking out and seeing only the memories one after another until someone grabbed her from behind. It turned out to be Umi, clutching a hamper and grinning. Fuu was less than a foot behind, also holding a bag. Hikaru wondered what her friends had planned.

"Well, let's go!" Umi urged. Laughing at their taller friend's impatience, Hikaru and Fuu agreed and the three of them clasped hands, forming a small circle. Their power surged around them again and they were transported to Formerly Cephiro.

One of the three other people on the top floor noticed the short flash of light and opening of a portal that no one should be able to notice. No freakin' way, she thought, brushing her blond bangs out of her astonished eyes. I did not just see what I thought I saw. Have Magic Knights been summoned again? Who's the new Pillar? Am I going to have to go back there again? She shivered in her t-shirt and jeans as though in response to her thoughts. What's that fluffball Mokona doing now?

AN: Short, I know. Sorry, but I wanted a cliffhanger ending so people may continue to read this and I wanted to put in this girl. Yes, she's my OC (duh). She obviously has a bit of history with Cephiro and has some business to attend to involving Mokona. Hee, hee. Hear the poor creator scream in terror. Maybe. Not sure what I'll have her do to the little fluffball, supposing either of them show up in Formerly Cephiro. Loads of apologies for OOCness as I started writing this while my Rayearth manga was being borrowed and has just been returned. I'm trying to keep the girls' personalities the same, but the most sincere apoligies if they stray in the slightest. Please help me correct any in the later chapters!