A/n: Uh...sorry for the long delay. School and I was in the ER for something really stupid. I have an ovarian cyst, if anyone was wondering. Anyway, here's chapter iv at last! I really enjoyed writing this chapter, so I hope everyone enjoys reading it. ^.^ Oh, and once again, thank you so much for reviewing! You guys are awesome!!!!!
Chapter IV: Trouble
Michaela watched Jade, Anise, and Ion walk down the stairs leading out of the ship. They were stopped in front of a mountain, apparently where the seventh fonons were originating from. She had been told to stay on the Tartarus while the others went to investigate, probably because she would have only gotten in the way if she did go. She sighed as the stairs were lifted back into the ship and leaned her elbow on the railing. Now what? She figured she had two options. She could either stand around and be bored, or she could get Cheapie and go exploring on the Tartarus.
"Well, that's an easy decision," she said to herself. She turned and headed back to her room. Cheapie of course was still fast asleep where she had originally put him on the table. Michaela rolled her eyes and poked the bird. "Hey, wake up."
Cheapie stirred and blinked sleepily up at her. "Huh?" he said.
"Come on. I want to go exploring, but I don't want to go by myself." Michaela poked him again.
"Cheapieee. Why do I have to go with you?" Cheapie said.
"Because you just do. Now come on!"
Looking annoyed at being woken up, Cheapie flew up to her shoulder and landed on it. "Why are we going exploring?" he asked.
"Because Ion and the others left so now I'm bored," Michaela said. She went back into the hall and looked around. It was blissfully free of soldiers. She grinned and started off. "I wonder where we should start…" She opened a door next to them and looked inside. It was empty except for some more bunk beds. Boring. Closing the door, she looked around again and decided to see what was at the other end of the hallway. Sure enough, there were a set of stairs at the end leading down. Michaela started down cautiously. The stairway was so dark as she went down that she could barely see in front of her except for the occasional strange glowing light on the walls.
"Maybe we shouldn't be coming down here, Mikey," Cheapie said in a frightened voice that matched Michaela's own misgivings.
"Shh," Michaela hissed. "And don't call me that." She crept down to the bottom of the stairs to an equally dark hallway and peered down it. There was a door at the end of the hallway, and a light moving underneath the doorway.
What is that? she wondered as she moved toward the door and pressed her ear to it. She could just make out voices coming from the other side.
"York, hurry up with those crates!" It sounded like a woman's voice. "Urushi, what are you doing?"
Michaela heard a crash and then the sound of something crashing and a man howling in pain.
"Honestly." It was the woman again. "I have to do everything." There were some shuffling noises and then the door opened and Michaela fell on her face at someone's feet. Pushing herself to her knees and looking up, she saw a woman standing there. She wore a hot pink dress with a slit up to her hip and a matching pirate hat over her hot pink hair.
"Who are you?" the woman asked, folding her arms in an 'I'm better than you' manner.
"Um, uh…" Michaela stuttered. She took a deep breath and tried again. "I might ask you the same thing!" she said, crossing her arms as well and glaring up at the woman in an attempt to hide her fear.
The woman smirked. "Hmph. Urushi, it looks like we have a rat. Tie her up!" She waved her hand at Michaela dismissively and walked back into the room, hips swaying. Michaela narrowed her eyes at the woman's back. Stupid haughty bitch…
A man came towards her. He was short and fat, and dressed in a green outfit with a bushy beard and paint over his eye that made him look like a clown or something. Before she could react he grabbed her and dragged her to a pole in the middle of the room.
"Hey!" Michaela shouted, struggling. "Ugh, how many times am I gonna be manhandled in a twenty-four hour time span?"
"Let her go!" Cheapie cried, flying up to the man and trying to peck his eyes out.
"Hey, what the hell is this thing?" the man, Urushi, demanded. He swatted at Cheapie.
Michaela grinned at the fact that Cheapie had actually taken her advice and used the opportunity to wrench her arm away from Urushi. Unfortunately he had landed a blow hard enough to knock Cheapie back and grabbed her again before she could do anything else. He forced her arms behind the pole and tied them together with a rope.
"There, now stay quiet," he ordered, marching back to the woman and another man whom Michaela assumed was also his companion. This man was dressed in a blue pirate suit and had an eye patch over his right eye. She resisted the urge to roll her eyes at their lame sense of fashion and instead turned her attention to figuring out how to get out of here. The weird trio was currently loading piles of crates through a second door in the wall, this one leading outside, onto a cart.
"Cheapie, are you okay?" Michaela whispered, trying to keep her voice low enough that only the bird would hear her.
He sat up and shook his head. "Yep!" he said loudly.
"Shh!" Michaela hissed, cringing as she glanced at the bandits as she assumed they were. Fortunately they didn't seem to have heard and weren't paying her any attention. "Listen, I want you to go tell the soldiers—Oh wait, they can't understand you. Um…" She thought for a moment. "Okay. Jade and the others went up a mountain outside. Go find them and then start freaking out. Hopefully they'll get the idea that's something wrong. Okay?"
Cheapie nodded. "Okay!" he said. "Should I flap my wings around wildly and scream a lot?"
"Yeah, whatever! Just go and be quick about it," Michaela hissed. Cheapie nodded and flew back into the hallway. She sighed and leaned her head against the pole. Hopefully he would prove dependable. While she waited, she watched the bandits load the rest of the crates onto their cart which took about half an hour. Once they were finished the woman came to stand in front of Michaela and smirked down at her with her hand on her hip.
"Well, hopefully someone will come and find you," she said. "This should teach those military fools to mess with the Dark Wings." With a last flip of her hair, she turned and swayed out the door. York and Urushi closed the door behind her and Michaela was left alone.
"That Cheapie better get back here really fast," Michaela muttered.
She started trying to undo the rope tied around her wrists, but it was tied too well and after ten minutes or so she had only succeeded in starting to rub her skin raw so she decided to quit and just waited patiently…well, impatiently.
~*~
Cheapie flew as fast he could towards the mountain Michaela had told him about, hoping that Ion, Jade, and Anise hadn't gotten very far. He also hoped that this was the right mountain, because Mikey would probably kill him if he got it wrong. He started to flap his wings harder, flying as fast as he could. She would also kill him if he didn't hurry, and it hadn't taken him long to learn that Mikey could be very mean. He hadn't gone very far when he saw the people he was looking for down below and flew down to them.
"Cheapie! You have to help Mikey! She's in trouble!" he cried, even though he knew they couldn't understand him. He flapped his wings urgently, hoping they would get the message.
"Hmm, what's this?" Jade asked, adjusting his glasses.
"Cheapie, what's wrong?" Ion asked. She held out her hand for Cheapie to land on. Cheapie sat on Ion's hand and continued to flap his wings, chattering away loudly. Ion turned to the Colonel. "Jade, I think something may be wrong with Michaela."
Just as the Fon Master said this, a loud explosion came from the direction of the Tartarus, followed by a puff of smoke. "So it would seem," Jade said, eyeing the smoke. "I suppose we should head back then. The seventh fonons will just have to wait."
"We can investigate the fonons for you, Colonel!" Anise suggested in her usual flirtation voice.
"No, Anise. I think we should go back to the Tartarus with Jade. I'm worried about Michaela," Ion said.
Anise crossed her arms in a pout. "Michaela this, Michaela that. Just because you're too blind…" she muttered under her breath so that no one else could hear her as they turned and began walking in the opposite direction. She stormed after them.
They followed a spastic Cheapie to the Tartarus and down to the lowest level. Jade raised his eyebrows when they reached the door, knowing that this was where they carried several crates of gun powder. They opened the door to find the room empty and Michaela sitting on the floor tide to a pole.
"Well, well. What have we here?" Jade said.
~*~
Just when Michaela had decided Cheapie must have gotten lost or distracted and had given up hope of someone ever finding her, the door opened and she heard a voice say, "Well, well. What have we here?"
She looked up to see Jade standing in the doorway with Ion and Anise close behind. "Mikey! Are you okay?" Cheapie cried, flying into the room.
"Brilliant, what took you so long? And haven't I told you not to call me that?" Michaela said. She sighed. "Whatever. Can someone please untie me? These ropes are starting to hurt."
Jade knelt down and deftly untied the ropes binding her. She breathed a sigh of relief and rubbed her wrists. "So, would you care to explain what you're doing here and why the crates that were here are gone?" Jade asked.
"Uhh…" Michaela blushed. She hadn't planned on getting caught on her little expedition. Oh well, that wasn't important right now. "Well, I was exploring." Jade raised his eyebrows at that statement but let her continue without interruption. "I wound up here and there were these three bandits stealing the crates and they tied me up and left me here."
"Bandits? What did they look like?"
"I don't know. There were two pirates and some weird clown dude," Michaela said. "The lady said they were the Dark Wings."
"Ah, I should have known," Jade sighed. "It seems we simply won't be able to finish this journey without constant interruption. Which direction did they go in?"
Michaela shrugged and pointed her finger to the other door. "That way I guess."
Jade turned to leave the room. "We'll have to chase after them, I suppose," he said as he left. "I'll leave her to you, Ion."
"Are you alright, Michaela? Did they hurt you?" Ion asked, coming over to her. Anise meanwhile was glaring at her with her arms crossed and her legs spread apart in a childish stance.
"No, I'm okay," Michaela said. She pushed herself to her feet and stretched her arms a little, flexing her fingers. "It's nice not to be tied up anymore."
"That's good. Then let's go back to our room," Ion suggested. Michaela nodded and the three of them (and Cheapie) headed back upstairs just as the Tartarus jolted forward, nearly knocking them off balance. Michaela put her hand on the wall to steady herself.
"Do you think he'll catch them? I don't think they were gone for more than fifteen minutes before you guys got here," Michaela said.
"Of course he will! He is the Colonel," Anise said.
"Oddly enough, I don't find that hard to believe," Michaela commented.
Anise's smile quickly changed to a frown. "Although he wouldn't have to if you hadn't gone and caused trouble." Michaela bit her lip.
"Anise, you shouldn't say such things," Ion said.
The Tartarus jolted again, followed by the sound of cannons or something being fired. Apparently Jade really had found the Dark Wings. They made it to the room before another jerk, and Michaela quickly sat on her bed before she lost her balance and fell over.
The jerking and firing continued for several minutes until they heard Jade's voice loudly say, "You, there! Move your coach before you get caught in the crossfire!"
Michaela looked up, confused. "Huh?" Then she realized he must be talking to someone outside. "Oh, right," she mumbled. She glanced over at Cheapie who had seated himself on her pillow. He was sound asleep. She smacked her forehead. This bird…
~*~
Jade turned the speaker off and returned to standing calmly with his hands in the pockets of his uniform. "Commander!" one of the soldiers manning the Tartarus called. "Enemy has crossed Rotelro Bridge! They're putting gunpowder on the bridge!"
"My, my. They intend to drop the bridge, do they?" Jade commented. So, they were using the gun powder they stole. He smirked.
"Fon slot activation detected!" another soldier said. "The enemy set off fonic artes using the fifth fonon! The bridge is going to explode!"
Jade sighed. Ah, so much fun. "Tartarus, full stop!" he ordered. "Activate fonic barrier."
"Yes, Sir! Tartarus, full stop!"
"Fonic barrier activated!"
The Tartarus slowed to a stop and a shimmering shield surrounded the ship just as an explosion filled the air and Rotelro Bridge crumbled to pieces. Jade adjusted his glasses. Well, with the bridge out, there would be no investigating the seventh fonons at Tataroo Valley. "Set the course for Engeve," he told the soldiers as he left the room. For now they would rest at the grocer's village and decide their next move from there.
~*~
"Ion, I've been meaning to talk to you about Michaela," Jade said to the Fon Master as they were preparing to leave the Tartarus and go into Engeve.
Michaela's head jerked up at the sound of her name. Ion also looked up. "Yes, Jade?" the Fon Master asked.
Jade glanced at Michaela with his red eyes, she was still in awe about those, and then back at Ion. "Although I agree that she should not be left alone for now, it does seem that we may need a reason for others' benefit of why she is traveling with us."
"This is what I've been trying to tell him all along," Anise said. "So, Colonel, do you think we should leave her in Engeve?" Michaela narrowed her eyes, but let it slide.
"Well, well. Jealous, are we?" Jade said.
"What?" Anise cried. Michaela raised her eyebrows at that statement. She couldn't think of any reason that Anise would be jealous of her for, but she saw a slight blush on Anise's cheeks as the younger girl placed her hands on her hips. "Of course I'm not jealous!"
"It would seem I hit the bull's eye," Jade commented. "Well, Ion?"
"Actually I had considered Anise's insistence that bringing a regular girl with us would raise some questions, so I thought of a solution," Ion said with a sweet smile. "I've decided to make Michaela a Fon Master Guardian."
"You what?" Anise and Michaela exclaimed in unison. They exchanged glances.
"Ion! You can't just make her a Fon Master Guardian," Anise said. "We don't know anything about her."
"I have to agree with Anise on this one," Michaela said. "I can't be anyone's bodyguard. I can't fight or anything so I can't even protect myself, let alone anyone else!"
"Don't worry. It's only a temporary job, and you won't have to fight," Ion assured her.
"But—"
"Think of it as a disguise," Jade said. "This way you can follow Ion without raising any suspicious questions."
That did make sense…sorta. Michaela sighed. "Okay."
"There's a uniform for you in the wardrobe in our room. I hope it's the right size," Ion said.
"Well, then. Anise, we'll trust you to explain everything to Michaela. Ion and I will go on ahead and wait for you in Engeve," Jade said with a smirk in the two pouting girls' direction. Before either of them could protest, he and Ion climbed down the ladder.
Anise groaned. "Come on, let's go."
She and Michaela went below deck to the room and Michaela opened the wardrobe. Hanging in it was a dark blue uniform made of three pieces. While Anise turned away and Cheapie slept on the table, she changed from her regular clothes into the uniform. It had a short pleated skirt with skin tight shorts to go underneath it, and a shirt that cut off just above her midriff, exposing her bellybutton. The shirt was longer in the back and made of stiff material. It broke off into two half-diamond pieces, similar to Anise's bright pink uniform, that hung down to just above her knees. She felt a little self-conscious in it because of her exposed stomach, but other than that the uniform was actually pretty cute. It had a hot pink design on it that added some color to the plain blue.
"Aren't you done yet?" Anise demanded, turning around to check. She saw Michaela standing there with her arms covering her stomach, looking as innocent as ever. She frowned. "Listen," she said, stomping over to Michaela and glaring up at her with her hands on her hips. "I want you to know that I don't trust you for two seconds. You might have Ion fooled, but that's because he's been sheltered from the real world all his life. I'm not so naïve, and I won't be fooled by your innocent, confused play."
Michaela blinked at the pigtailed girl, not quite sure what to say. "I'm not really, I mean…Wait. Did you say he?"
"What?" Anise asked. Now it was her turn to be confused.
"You called Ion he. Come to think of it, you called him he earlier," Michaela added thoughtfully.
"So?" Anise said. She peered at Michaela as a thought struck her. "Hold on, are you saying you thought Ion was a girl?" She put a hand to her mouth, trying to stifle the laughter. She didn't succeed and burst out laughing.
Michaela colored. "W-what? She—I mean he looks like a girl, okay?"
"You thought Ion was a girl! I can't wait to tell him!"
"No! You can't tell him!" Michaela cried, waving her arms around. Randomly Jade's comment from earlier went through her head. She grinned. All of a sudden it made a lot more sense now. "Well, that explains a lot." She pointed an excusing finger at Anise. "You like Ion, don't you?"
Now it was Anise's turn to blush. "What? Of course I don't!"
Michaela jumped up and down in excitement, jabbing her finger in the air at Anise. "You do! You do! That's why you hate me so much! You were jealous!" She laughed.
"That's not true!" Anise cried in protest. "And even if it were, it's not like I" She broke off, casting her eyes to the floor with a pained look on her face.
Michaela's smile faded. "Is something wrong?" she asked, concerned.
Anise looked up with a wide smile on her face and put her fingers to her cheeks. "Of course not! I'm just cheerful Anise!" she said, giggling. "Come on, Ion and the Colonel are waiting for us." She skipped out the door.
Michaela watched her for a moment. That was definitely put on. What was up with Anise?
End of Chapter IV.