A/N: Oh, man, it's been what, 4 months already?! Agh, I've really been procrastinating…. Apologies to all of you that actually missed this story, and many thanks to those of you who reviewed! Let me see here…

To CrapPishh: Oh, is that what you did with your guild? Wow. I'm glad that your new guild is fun to be with, though; personally I think that the best thing for a guild to be is nice and sociable. :D And yeah, the cliché returning concept with her, but then again, a lot of my guild mates have a habit of doing that. Oh well. Thanks for the review! :D

To HonestNinja123: Wow, I don't think I've heard of that quote, but that's a great one! I really like it a lot. Well, just a little more drama to come, but hopefully it works out in the end, yeah? Thanks for the review and the awesome quote; I'm taking note of it. :D

To martelswrath: Glad you liked it, Jo. I'm happy you like reading about stuff you already experienced. XD Teehee!

To Raneia: *blatantly ignores Kai* :3

So, to tell you the truth, this chapter was supposed to be joined with the future Chapter 7, but I separated the chapter into two parts, partly because the chapter would have been too long, but also because I felt that there was too much to put into one chapter without making it seem like info dumping. That's pretty much why this chapter is so short in comparison. Apologies for procrastinating for so long just to give you such a disappointing chapter…! And as the chapters continue, it seems to become more and more dramatized and inaccurate…which is not good…! Well, there's only one more chapter to go, and then the epilogue.

Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I do not own MapleStory, LoveLess, IoveIess, or any of the characters involved except Namina, who I technically do not own, either.


"I can't believe it."

A sheaf of papers, which I had been carrying to the bulletins, falls out of my hands, and I turn to familiar guild members—Butta, Rain, and SJB—all of them wearing similar countenances of shock as they gaze down at a blinking window in their friends registers. "She's actually…?"

"If you think you're imagining this, your imagination must be bad enough to affect all of us, too," SJB muttered, examining his register. He taps a few buttons and presses on his earpiece. "Chi, is that really you?"

"SJB?" Chi's voice, confident as usual, streams through my earpiece, and I turn to the appropriate channel as well. "Where are you? What happened to you all?"

No one answers.

"Why is my guild empty?" Her voice is becoming shriller with each question. "What happened?"

The four of us are at a loss for a reply, and the awkward silence stretches past several minutes.

"Well?" Her voice rises. "Answer me!"

Rain is the one to speak up first, her voice timid as she stammers, "C-Chi, we're sorry…We're in the old LoveLess; we thought you were gone…But—"

"I can't believe you!" Chi screams, startling us all. "How could you? Why would you all leave? I promised you a guild with a leader, and you're back in the guild that was deserted?"

"It's not deserted, Chi!" Butta interrupts loudly. I notice that his hand, pressed against his earpiece, was trembling. "Nyan and Martel returned! We have a leader now!"

"That's a lie!" she yells over him. "I can't believe any of you! You're all traitors! How could you betray me like this?"

"We didn't betray you," SJB interrupts curtly. "You weren't there to be betrayed."

Chi screams obscenities, and we exchange looks again. Rain's hands are at her mouth, and she is shaking.

"Rain! You, of all people, are the one I'm most shocked at!" Chi's voice is becoming almost unbearable to listen to, but I breathe deeply, hoping that she would explain herself somewhere along the way. "I thought we were friends no matter what happened to us! We're childhood friends! How could you do this to me?"

"I didn't mean to," Rain whimpered. "I'm sorry, Chi! But you said you moved on!"

"That doesn't matter to me! I hate you all! I'll never forgive you!"

"Chi!" Their voices are a chorus of indignation and desperation. I feel as though I wanted to join them, but the impulse comes too late, so I keep my mouth shut.

"Forget it! I hate you!"

And suddenly, SJB's face pales, right before Butta's does as well. Shortly after, Rain breaks into sobs, and falls to her knees. I rush to her side and kneel down, patting her back.

"What happened?" I ask, looking up at the two males as Rain wails.

"She deleted us," SJB says, his face unreadable again. "All of us. At least…"

The three of them turn their gazes to me—even Rain, who was still hiccupping, her eyes red. I blink, and flip open my register.

"She's still here," I say, shaking my head. "Why would she do this?"

SJB shrugs. "Maybe it's because you didn't say anything. She probably thought you were away or something."

Rain whimpers, and Butta kneels down to pat her on her back softly as well.

"I can't believe she'd do this," he says quietly, looking down at the floor. "I never believed it would be this bad…"

"That's the problem, Butta," SJB comments. "I don't think anyone could have predicted this."

Beside me, Rain clutches to Butta's arm, tears still dripping onto the floor, and I have a sudden impulse to join her. This was not possible. It was not supposed to turn for the worse in such a way.

The only hope that I clung onto was my old belief about everything. A problem had to get worse before it got better. This problem would be solved, eventually. Hopefully.

It had to be…


The sound of breaking glass attracts my attention.

I turn my head to see SJB, who is staring at the ground, where the remains of what used to be a decorative vase now lies, scattered across the floor. He sighs and shakes his head, swearing. "Talk about a failure of a Thief."

I give him a reassuring smile as I head towards a closet for some cleaning supplies. "Don't worry about it, SJB. I'm sure we can buy another one—or maybe not; we all know we don't use those anyway."

He sighs again and half-heartedly kicks the shards closer together. "Never mind that, Nami. I needed to talk to you—there's something wrong with Rain."

"Rain?" I pause and turn around, a broom in my hand. "What happened to her?"

He sighs and takes a seat on a wooden bench. "She left the guild. While you were gone—she returned to Chi's new LoveLess."

My eyes widen. "What? How?"

"Chi invited her."

"Well, not that kind of how, but thanks anyway. Seriously, what happened?"

He says nothing for a minute, only pausing to adjust his sunglasses. "She had a fight with someone, I guess. But the real reason is that she didn't want Chi to hate her, plain and simple. They've been friends too long for Rain to allow her to hate her."

I look down at the ground, brushing the shards together slowly. "Oh."

Was it true? Rain had always been a superficial sort of person, I knew—she had never seemed to care about what happened between her friends, unless she was an actual part of the drama. So why was she so acting so different this time?

Suddenly, a shadow falls across the floor, and the two of us look to the side to see Butta at the doorway, his arm resting against the door frame. "What's going on, you guys?"

We turn to him in surprise. "Butta!" I exclaim. "We're alright, I guess…What are you here for?"

He steps to the side and leans against the wall. "I was bored, so I was wandering around in the guild hall. You guys sound like you're talking about something important."

SJB nods. "You were there when Rain left, weren't you, Butta?"

Butta sighs, running his hand through his hair as he looks up at the ceiling. "Was I there? Of course I was, but I wish I hadn't been."

I frown, now walking to the closet to obtain a dustpan. "Was it really that bad?"

"I guess you could say that," I hear Butta reply. "I…" He hesitates. "I think I was actually part of the reason for making her leave."

My eyes widen, and I whirl around. "What? You made her leave?"

"Sorry, Nami, that came out wrong." Butta crosses his arms, closing his eyes, and continues, "What I meant was that she would have left even if I hadn't said anything, but I've probably made it worse. She was angry that Chi seemed like she hated her, obviously. She was planning to return to Chi's branch, but I tried to stop her. I guess she got mad at me, though, because she said that it was basically our fault that everything happened the way that it did, and I have no idea why."

Both SJB and I shrug, and the Hermit motions for the White Knight to sit next to him. He does so, virtually collapsing as he slumps on the bench. "It probably wasn't even really your fault, Butta," SJB says, facing back to the floor as I begin to brush the glass shards into the dustpan. "Like you said, she was probably going to leave anyway. Maybe she just had pent-up anger she was dealing with." I nod silently.

Butta straightens up, and he smiles slightly. "Maybe her pent-up anger had nothing to do with the guild drama. Maybe she was just having a bad day." SJB's mouth turns up slightly, and I resist the temptation to smile as well at our little game.

"Maybe she didn't get to yell at Dan for being an idiot that day," I mutter, keeping my face straight as I dump the glass into a garbage bin. "Maybe she was just suffering from teen angst." Butta's smile widens.

"I don't know what you're trying, but thanks anyway, guys." He turns around and begins to walk out of the guild hall. As the distance increases between us and him, we hear him add, "I hope Martel and Chi forgive each other soon."

"So do we," the Hermit and I reply quietly, as the sound of his footsteps fade away.


I sigh, and in the empty room, the sound of it is unusually loud.

"What 'cha up to, Nami?"

I lift my head up from the heavy records book on which it had been resting, and I see the wildly blue hair of Stella. I smile sleepily and give her a small wave. "Just records, Stella. N-N-Nothing to worry about."

She laughs as I stifle a yawn, pulling out a chair to sit in front of me. She prods the book with her index finger. "Lot of work, huh? Especially with the new members?"

"Mm," I agree absentmindedly, rubbing my hand across my eyes. I stare at the small lettering for a few moments before I put my pen down. "Stella, you were Sissy's friend, right?"

Stella tilts her head, but nods. "Why the sudden question, Nami?"

"Nothing much." I shrug. "It's just…I haven't seen her in a while. She was so nice…I miss her."

Stella nods again slowly, lowering her head to rest her chin on her crossed arms, which lay on the table. "I guess I'd have to blame Nullus for that."

"Nullus?" My eyes widen temporarily as I mentally pound my mind for memories of the slightly familiar name. "That Bishop, right? Wasn't he one of those really fast trainers?"

Stella makes a sound of agreement, frowning. "She had a lot of admiration for him, you know. She was always so excited when he talked to her…so she always tried to get a chance to talk to him. He didn't, of course, care much about her. After a while, she…her feelings…strengthened…you know?"

"Mm," I say again, fixing my eyes on my finger tracing a spiral on the tabletop.

"So she told him about it, I think. He didn't…well, he didn't say anything about it. He pretty much ignored her, and she didn't really like it. So she moved on."

"…Moved on?" I look up briefly from the spirals of the wood to meet Stella's eyes. "You mean, she's really—"

Stella sighs. "Gone. Gone for good, probably. Maybe she got tired of this world, anyway."

We sit in silence, and I trace more spirals. For Sissy to become tired of our world…Nullus must have been horrible to her.

I look up at Stella.

"Whatever happened to Nullus, anyway?"

Stella shrugged. "He's still in the new LoveLess, with Chi. Apparently, he's acting like her new best friend."

I frown. "What a jerk."

"Not really," Stella replied lightly, rubbing her staff's top with one of her pajama sleeves. "She's got to have some partner, especially with Majeh's supposed absence."

I look down at the records book again, and scratch my head. "Huh. I forgot about him."

Stella laughs, but says nothing else, and silence falls between us. We continue to sit there awkwardly, and I look in different directions, but nowhere in general.

Nullus, Chi's new best friend? It was a strange idea to think about, but at the same time, it was probable. Nullus was a Bishop who trained endlessly, in that never-ending quest for power. Chi was the Priest who led her guild ruthlessly, in a never-ending search for her own power. If Majeh, a person who only seemed to act for his own intentions…


"Nami? Are you there?"

I raise my head, shifting my focus away from my schoolbooks. "Majeh? Is that you?"

"Yes," he says, his voice a whisper in my earpiece. "Listen, I've been kicked out of the guild—LoveLess, are you still in it?"

"Well, yeah," I reply, my eyebrows rising, "But Majeh, you've been gone for months. It's only understandable that you would have been expelled by now."

"Nami, it's not about why I was expelled," he interrupts, "what I meant to ask you was if you'd invite me back."

I hesitate to answer, remembering a distant echo of Martel's voice, explicitly telling me not to invite Majeh back. "Majeh…"

"Please, Nami?"

I clench my fingers into a tight fist, scrunching my eyes shut. 'Say no, say no, say no…'

"One minute, I'll send you an invitation."

Damn.

A moment later, an automated voice announces Majeh's arrival into the guild—although there is no one there to hear it but me and one silent guild mate—and I hear Majeh's laugh. "Thanks, Nami. I really appreciate it."

"Mhm," I say half-heartedly, once again immersed in my books.

-0-

"Sometimes I wonder whether or not Gawk and Martel are ever going to come back."

I sigh and keep my eyes trained on my books, not even bothering to look up to see who is speaking. "Of course they're going to come back," I say, digging my fingernails into the wooden table in an effort to keep my voice even. "It's only a matter of time now."

"You know, I don't know why Majeh had to make his own guild. We were perfectly fine without a leader—the Jr. Masters did a great job with managing everything while they were gone, and it's not like we really needed that many Jr. Masters, right?"

"I guess," I reply half-heartedly.

"That reminds me. How'd he even get back into the guild? Anyway, it doesn't really matter. I heard he got expelled as soon as Martel saw him there. Isn't that hilarious?"

I make a sound of agreement, but everything he is saying seems to be muted, and his words begin to sound more like background noise.

"So I heard that he made his own guild, because he didn't get to be a Jr. Master again in the original LoveLess…"


I hear the scraping of chairs, and I look forward to see Stella standing, staff clutched with both hands. "Going somewhere, Stella?"

She nods, smiling as she points at the book my arms are resting on. "I have to let you finish your work, don't I?"

I give an exaggerated groan, and Stella laughs as she pushes the door open, but her eyes seem to soften as she looks at the piles of books and scattered notes around me. "See you later, Nami. Maybe a Party Quest later?" She shrugs halfheartedly, giving another weak laugh.

"Sure," is my late answer, right before the door slams shut.


"No! Never! Absolutely not!"

"Come on, Martel! Just think—"

"No! What are you, stupid?"

"Fine! Forget about it!"

I walk through the portal of the free market to see Rain storming out, her dark hair fluttering behind her like a curtain—her hair is now free of her hair ties—as she spins awkwardly to avoid bumping into me. "Sorry, Nami," she says shortly, before she disappears into the swirl of lights. I blink twice, scratching my head, before I sigh and approach Martel.

"What just happened?" I ask, tilting my head. Martel exhales rather violently as he turns to me, and I jump backwards, pulling my arms up to my chest reflexively.

Martel shakes his head. "It's okay, Nami. It's not your fault."

"Then what was—?"

But I am not able to finish my inquiry; Martel has already brushed past me, disappearing into the portal I had entered through. I gape at the portal for several seconds, until SJB enters through the blend of light colors.

"Close your mouth," is his first comment. I comply, and he sighs, propping a chair up to sink into it. He looks up at me, and arches an eyebrow.

"What?"

I shake my head noiselessly, breaking my gaze from him, and wave my staff, conjuring a chair to sit in front of him. I open my mouth to say something, but I realize I have nothing to say, so I shut it again, and we sit together in silence. Above us, the clouds drag along the gray, never-ending expanse of the sky, and I look down, sighing as I breathe slowly.

"This drama's been going on too long." SJB's voice, a sudden sound that cuts into the silence, startles me. My head snaps up in response, eliciting what sounds like a crack from my neck, and I groan, rubbing my neck as I roll my head around slowly to relax it.

"You said it," I finally say, sighing, and he raises an eyebrow again, but does not reply. We sit in silence once again. I decide to pass the time by tugging on a loose string hanging from one of my golden sleeves, and I slowly draw it out, smoothing it as the pressure of pulling it causes the fabric to wrinkle, and—

"This is awkward," SJB comments, alarming me. The string snaps from my sleeve, and I nod silently, my cheeks burning as he adds, "I don't even know why I'm here."

"Well, why wouldn't you be here?" I mumble, winding the string around my index finger. The corners of the Hermit's mouth turn up slightly. "I don't understand," I say, abruptly shifting the topic, and SJB's grin vanishes instantly.

"Understand what?"

"The drama?" I say, waving my hand absentmindedly. He sighs, and I frown. "No, I mean it! I don't get it at all! Why do we always keep arguing? Every time it seems like there's a solution, someone else has to come around and mess things up again, and we never stop fighting! It's like it'll never end, and it bothers—"

"Me. It bothers me too."

I stare at him. "Excuse me?"

"You're not the only one tired of it, Nami." He leans back in his chair, pulling his arms back so his hands cradle the back of his head. "Take what just happened, for example."

"I would, but I only heard half of it," I say, smirking. "What happened?"

"Rain was making an offer to Martel—one that Chi gave to send to him. She says that Chi's group is willing to forgive Martel and Nyan's—that is to say, our—group."

I smile. "That's great! I guess—"

"If," he continues, silencing me, "Martel apologizes to Chi."

My smile disappears, and I scratch my head. "Apologize? What for?"

He shrugs. "Good question."

I stand up suddenly, knocking my chair to the floor. "That's just ridiculous! Why would he apologize? He hasn't done anything—we don't even know what we're apologizing for; why should we do it?"

"Nami." He holds up a hand, and I sit back down quietly. "I know what you mean. But I think he should just apologize."

"What? How could you—" I yell, standing up again, but I am instantly pulled down by SJB with so much force that I slide off my chair and onto the ground. I reflexively swing my arm, effectively hitting him on the back of his head and knocking his sunglasses off of his face. He releases me with a sigh, dusting himself off as he picks up his sunglasses, which are now slightly wet from the snow on the ground.

"Nami," he repeats firmly, settling back into his chair, "I didn't mean he should apologize the way Chi thinks he should. I meant that he should just do it. Just say the words. It doesn't have to mean anything."

"But…" I stammer, "what's the use?"

It wasn't fair for Chi or Rain to do this to Martel. All Martel had done was come back from his prolonged absence, and to see that everyone had deserted him must have been torture. Chi and Rain—and Majeh's name flits across my mind before I bat it away—had made their guild by their own decisions, and they were the ones who had taken us away from Martel. Martel was simply taking back what was supposed to be his guild mates—and I could understand his disappointment with us. We had promised them that we wouldn't leave them.

But I suppose that, like many of our other ideals, promises were meant to be broken.

He lets his sunglasses dangle loosely from one of his hands, his deep violet irises concentrated on my crimson ones, and I take a step backwards. "If they want an apology, he should just give it to them," he says, with more ferocity than with what I was familiar for his character. "Just give them a sentence and let this trouble vanish. No one wants it anymore."

My eyes widen slightly, before my eyelids lower again, and I look to the floor. "I wonder who ever did."

I hear a soft laugh from him—such an unusual sound, coming from him. It had never really occurred to me until now how well SJB had concealed his thoughts. Come to think of it, who in the guild had heard him speak, save for a few rare instances or advice, or among the other Junior Masters? Who had even seen his face, apart from those who were close to him? He never seemed to say much, but what he did say, I realize, always struck the target straight through the center.

I hear the sound of the Hermit rising from his chair, and I look up to see him placing his sunglasses onto his face.

"It's about time for me to leave, Nami," he says, his face an emotionless mask once again. "I don't want to intrude on your time anymore." He turns and walks away without another word, the snow crunching beneath his boots.

I open my mouth to say something, but I realize there is nothing to say.