Well, heeeeeere's Rark again with another chapter to Don't Shed a Tear. I hope you guys are enjoying reading it as much as I do writing it. After that long break between chapters two and three, I thought it'd be a good idea to start cranking these out a bit faster ;; Before we start, I want to say, inside this chapter you get to see what I've wanted to see for Chizie since I've gotten into the pair. Also, you'll notice that I'm taking a more serious tone to this fic and that'll faze in and out of the rest of the fic. Enjoy!

Note: I do not own anything to do with the Negima!, Negima!? and Mahou Sensei Negimabrands... No matter how hard I wish...

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Chapter Four

Don't Shed a Tear

The foundation of the aged tower trembled beneath the footsteps of a gargantuan, inhuman beast with a twisted resemblance to a bird. It's jagged maw opened as it let out a sickening screech. The noise rung in Chisame's ears as she felt a feeling of cold, brooding, terror consume her. Her only thoughts were of hopelessness and fear. Her body started to shiver in fear from the isolation that this dark feeling had swept across her. Tears started to stream from her eyes when a warm glow came from behind her and slowly brought her back to reality.

Chisame stood staring off at the demon in the distance being drawn to the tower, the realm of terror had disappeared as swiftly as it had come. She wondered if it was all a dream. A weight on her shoulder and a pulling on her waist told her otherwise. Zazie had her hands wrapped around Chisame in a tight hug and had her head resting on Chisame's shoulder. Chisame put her right hand comfortingly on one of Zazie's embracing arms. Zazie looked up. Every movement that the pair made seemed very slow, as if to make each other at ease. Both of them gazed off into the distance towards the demon, who was getting ever closer, but were never truly looking at it. Their eyes seemed to gaze into the unseen. The future, the past, perhaps even another dimension. Whatever they were seeing, they did not move, flinch or blink. They just stood in that embrace, staring into the unknown, together. A seldom tear streaked down Zazie's cheek, glimmering slightly as it passed over the tattoo of the same, before it landed, coolly, on Chisame. The moment had faded back into reality. Zazie, broke the silence, "Jiki, reaps terror where ever it goes. You, got pulled into his realm..." she paused when a slight tremble had found it's way into her voice. Chisame noticed and decided to lead the conversation,

"He's coming this way, isn't he?" Zazie nodded, Chisame felt it on her shoulder. "Shouldn't we mo..." Chisame had to think about what she was going to say next. She honestly didn't want to leave this spot, but with a gigantic monster coming at them, it was hard to think of what to do. There were so many unanswered questions, what Jiki is, how if got here, how Zazie knew what it was called. Chisame's mind kept on telling her to panic and how none of this made sense, her mind was going a mile a minute, but something insider her told her that none of that mattered, right now, Zazie did. Chisame has decided on what to say, "Zazie, you seem to know something about this. Is there anything we can do to stop him?" Zazie, turned her head and gaze away. Chisame put her other hand caringly on Zazie head. "It's all right Zazie" Chisame managed to turn herself around and faced Zazie with a smile. Zazie looked up, into Chisame's bespectacled eyes.

"No it's not," Zazie said while shaking her head again. "I shouldn't have got you involved, I'm sorry!" Zazie cried out. Chisame opened her mouth to speak but found Zazie's mouth instead. Her eyes went wide in surprise before a bright white light flashed in front of her eyes.

"Beep... Beep... Beep... Beep..." The electric metronome of a computer with to many button pressed went on, "Beep... Beep... Beep..." Chisame mumbled awake as she rose her head from her keyboard. Sunlight poured into the solely occupied room. Chisame's glasses had slid down her face. She lifted them in front of her eyes before tossing them on her bed, deciding it was to bright for them right now. Chisame stood up and started to looked around the room and herself in a haze. "But last night I was..." Chisame started to mumble to herself, "I went out to see..." A small pulse of pain shot through her head. She quickly put a hand where the pain went through. "I...I... can't remember what I did... Did I do anything at all?" Chisame tried hard to think about the night before, but nothing more came to mind. "I...I must have just dreamed it, whatever it was..." Though that was what she decided it must have been, there was a feeling of emptiness that she couldn't shake. She sat down, hanging her head over the back of the chair, and starred up at the ceiling. "Do I even have school today?" She thought to herself. If she did, there was no desire to go. "It's not like I've never skipped before." Chisame rose from the chair nonchalantly and put on a pair of jeans and a Z.O.E T-shirt before putting her glasses back on, picking up her laptop and heading for the door. She stepped out the door, but before closing it, she took one last look across her room. There was a feeling she couldn't shake that there was something missing. Trying to shrug it off, Chisame closed the door and headed for the train station.

Outside Chisame's window, leaves ruffled as something quickly left it's branch of a seat.

The familiar clicks and clanks of the train as it rolled down the tracks were nothing but white noise to someone as used to them as Chisame. She was coming back from the city after a bit of shopping. The trip was to try and comfort her as well as being practical A few new pieces of fabric for outfits were needed and bought, a couple discs anime that she'd been looking forward to, and some bandages sat in bags on the seat next to her. She didn't know how it happened, but while she was grabbing for one of the holding straps on the train, a sharp pain came from her hand. Noticing an open, bleeding cut, she decided it would be a good idea to keep it wrapped up. As she rode the railed car, she stared at the bandaged cut and slowly, and lightly, traced the shape with her finger. There was something about it, something important, that she just couldn't remember. A pained expression crossed her face as she tried so hard to just get a blip of why it felt so important. The train was slowing down now, and a digitized "ping" came over the speakers, "Mahora Academy Dorms, next stop, Mahora Academy Dorms". Chisame looked over at her bags and sighed, "Just great," she mumbled as she went to lift the bags of purchases she had made. The weight of the bag in her hand caused for another shot of pain from the cut. As she left the train, she had to look back, not fearing forgetting something, but a feeling of longing for something missing. Again, she shrugged it off and she hurried to make it out of the closing doors.

A gust of hot air went up from behind Chisame as she left the train and it started off again. It was never a pleasant experience, always stuffy and horrible smelling, this time though, it seemed cooler and had a nicer sent then usual. "Heh, must've put some frightfully new technology in there, like and air freshener," she said sarcastically to herself and had a small chuckle about it as she continued her walk off to the dorms. It wasn't exactly a far walk from the station to the dorms, but it seemed like it with the weight on her cut for Chisame. She stopped several times to just put the bags down and give her hand a break from it, so the walk back took ten minutes longer then usual. When she did make it back to the dorm, she realized that the doors might make getting in difficult, but once she reached the doors, one seemed to open by itself. Chisame looked around curiously, "Um, all right then..." She said before walking through the thoughtful door. Once in, a silver blur knocked into her, causing for her bags to be dropped. A flood strange feelings rushed through her at once and she turned to catch a better glimpse of whatever it was that bumped her. "Hey!" She shouted as she turned, but whatever it was had disappeared by then, and again Chisame was left with a feeling of missing something, but this time, she wasn't going to just let whatever it was just pass her by. Chisame kicked her stuff off to the side of the entrance and ran off in chase of the mystery blur.

It moved at a speed that was inhuman. Darting quickly across the open walk, dashing through the bushes at the side and bounding between the trees. Chisame was finding it more than difficult to have her eyes keep up with it. Eventually, she thought she saw it stop in a tree, and quickly run under it. "Hey!" Chisame called up at the tree, there was no response. "Ummmm, I just wanted to thank you for holding the door for me." She called out, again there was no response. "So, ummmm, thank you." Chisame said with a bow at the end. Through out this, oddly enough, Chisame didn't feel strange bowing and talking up at a tree. For Chisame, getting the blur to reveal itself to her was a priority. Silence followed her bow, and Chisame slumped her back against the tree, feeling neglected. She rubbed her thumb across her lips, "I remember things now, that don't make sense, and I remember things that I shouldn't be, but only after you..." Chisame paused to think again, "Your important to me, but I'm not sure why..." Chisame's voice seemed to trail off into a sadness that she could only briefly understand. "And," Chisame sniffled, "and, I want to know why there's a sadness in me whenever I think about what happened and who you are. It's not just sadness, there's also... Something else, something I've never felt before...I..." She had started hugging her knees and was crying into them. A small gust of win from behind Chisame blew her hair towards her feet, a soft hand caught the hairs and brought them back behind Chisame's head, brushing her cheek as it passed. Chisame turned her head, eyes closed, towards the hand. Again, timed seemed to slow. Chisame remembered this feeling, she remembered the moonlit clocktower, she remembered the beast in the distance, and she remembered her first kiss. "Zazie!" Chisame quietly exclaimed. "It doesn't feel right that it should be anybody else. It has to be Zazie." Chisame thought. All of this within the moment before she opened her eyes to see only the normal scenery.

Chisame's heart sunk with her body as it fell to her knees. Tears flowed down her face. "Why?" She cried out between periods of sobs. The pain she felt was so overwhelming, it hurt just to live. Chisame wanted to curse at Zazie for making her feel this way, but couldn't because... Chisame gasped. "You fool... Why'd you have to make me do something like that..." She said, tears still trickling down her face, with a slight smile. She wiped the tears away on her sleeve and noticed a piece of paper on the ground in front of her. It read, "The meeting tomorrow, don't go. Wait next to the tree you can see from the class window." Chisame nodded, as if the letter were spoken from the writer herself. "Of course." Chisame called out, "I've got somethings to say too". With that, Chisame headed back to the dorms and hoped her purchases were still at the door.