"Don't worry, Amu! We'll help you get your egg back!" Yaya said. Amu had just finished recounting the story of her X-egg to the rest of the Guardians. It was Thursday, the day after our battle with Utau, and the cold sprinkle of rain that was coming down outside of the Royal Garden seemed to match the mood of Amu's story. But, of course, neither Yaya nor the others were going to let this get them down; as I had suspected, Tadase and Yaya were eager to help Amu out. To Kairi and Rima's credit, they listened attentively during Amu's retelling, despite the fact that they probably didn't know Amu well enough to care.

Tadase, whose face had been grim throughout all of Amu's news, now turned to Eru. The little angel chara was sitting on the table in front of Amu, looking a tad bit nervous. Perhaps she felt guilty that she was siding with Utau's enemies. "Is Utau really using her songs to turn people's eggs into X-eggs?" Tadase asked, the look in his eyes telling me that it was hard for him to believe this. I wondered why it seemed like such a shock - I mean, we'd seen X-eggs come out of people at that one Utau concert we were all at. Had he not believed it then? Or was there something more behind this? And then it hit me: at that concert, Azami had overheard that angry conversation between Ikuto and Tadase, when they had mentioned that Tadase used to call Ikuto 'big brother.' And now, with the information from yesterday, I knew that Utau was Ikuto's sister. What if there was a connection between Tadase and the two siblings?

Eru nodded sadly. "She's taking a lot of X-eggs, but I know she doesn't really want to do it! She's only doing it because Easter tells her to!" Now that I really listened to Eru's voice, I noticed that it somehow sounded nasaly in a goody-goody sort of way - one of multiple reasons I was starting to dislike the chara.

"We can't let Utau get away with this," Tadase said to all of us, after some thought. "She can't go on using people's dreams like this. And as Yuiki-san said, we'll do everything we can to get your egg back, Hinamori-san." Tadase and Amu looked straight at each other for a moment, but then Amu blushed and looked away. Tadase didn't seem flustered, but I thought I could see the beginnings of a blush coming to his cheeks as well. Kusukusu giggled.

"So what do you propose we do, King?" asked Kairi. Rima now acted like she was ignoring the conversation, though it seemed obvious to me that she was listening intently. She wasn't sincerely concerned about what was going on (which made me hate her even more), but it would be hard not to be at least distantly interested.

"We'll confront Utau after her next concert," Tadase replied. "We can stop any X-eggs she makes, and after she's done singing, we'll get Amu's chara back. By force, if we can't get her to give it up. Yuiki-san, do you know when her next concert is?"

Yaya was always up-to-date on all the news about anything popular; of course she knew. "She's got a concert tomorrow night, at the big concert complex downtown!"

I doubted Yukari would be happy with this plan. Because if I had to be with the Guardians, then I wouldn't be able to help collect X-eggs at the concert, which was what I was guessing she needed me to do. And if we did go up against Utau, Yukari would probably force me to reveal my true colors. Easter probably didn't even need me as a spy anymore - now that they had Kairi, what was holding them back from making me go all-out against the Guardians? I flashed my glance over to Kairi, wanting to know what he thought of this plan. But he seemed perfectly calm, untroubled by the idea.

"In practicality, that will be next to impossible, King," Kairi said. "Utau is so famous that I doubt we could get near her. And at a concert, too many people would be around for us to be able to do anything. That's not even counting the fact that none of us have tickets."

I nearly sighed with relief, because Kairi was completely right. The plan would never work, which meant that there would be no need for Yukari to make me fight the others.

This seemed to be a let-down for Tadase. "I suppose you're right," he admitted. "But there must be someway that we can stop Utau and get Hinamori-san's egg back."

"You guys shouldn't go to any trouble for me," Amu mumbled, avoiding everyone's eyes. "If I can't even keep an 'X' off of my own egg, maybe I don't deserve a fourth chara."

"That's silly, Amu-chan!" Ran piped up. "We've got to get her back!"

"Yaya thinks Ran is right!" Yaya said, as enthusiastic as always. "Utau can't keep taking X-eggs from people, and especially not from you!"

Amu smiled, but it was weak. It didn't look like she had much hope for getting her egg back. "Thanks, Yaya. But what can we possibly do?"

Conversation stopped for about a minute as we all tried to think of some way to halt Utau's X-egg harvesting. Or, more precisely, Tadase, Yaya, and Amu tried to come up with some sort of idea. Kairi and I wouldn't be coming up with a plan for obvious reasons, and it didn't look like Rima cared enough to stress what small brain she had with such thoughts. Actually, now that I thought about it, I doubted she even had any brain worth considering; she probably had her servants do all her thinking for her. I really hate that girl. No, not girl - that doesn't describe her accurately. Thing? Spoiled brat? Monster? I thought for a moment, then came up with the perfect title. I had trouble holding back a smile of maliciousness as I thought, She's a queenly pain in the butt. That describes her perfectly.

When a minute had passed and no one came up with any helpful ideas, Tadase spoke up. "We can all think about it tonight, and we can try to come up with a plan tomorrow. For now, let's all go home."

* * *

As I walked to school the next morning, Azami and I wondered how Yukari would react to yesterday's meeting. I trusted that Kairi had told her all about it, since they were brother and sister. But, in all truth, neither Azami nor I had any idea what Yukari would do. Perhaps she wold just ignore the Guardians until they were a more immediate threat. Or maybe she had something more devious in mind. We ended our speculation by deciding to see if I could talk to Kairi alone sometime today, to figure out if his sister was planning something.

Luckily, I didn't have to wait long, nor did I even have to look for him. As soon as I walked in the front entranceway of the school, I saw him leaning up against the wall, looking over a couple of pages of homework. It seemed like an odd place to be working on anything, and I guessed he had ulterior motives for studying there. As if to confirm my guess, Musashi saw us and said something to Kairi, making him look up from his homework.

Kairi put his homework back in his bag, then came over to me. "Deuce, I'm glad I could catch you before school started. My sister wanted me to tell you something. Let's talk over here." As he led me over to a noisier hallway where we would be less likely overheard, I thought, He says he's glad to see me, but he certainly doesn't sound like it. He just can't seem to lighten up. It makes me miss Kukai. As soon as we were in a good, noisy spot, Kairi started talking.

"I told my sister about the meeting yesterday-" I knew it, I thought to myself. "-and she doesn't want to take the chance of the Guardians someday deciding to interfere with Utau. Until she can come up with a better solution, she wants you to volunteer to capture X-eggs at all of Utau's concerts."

"How would that help?" I asked.

"The Guardians won't bother as much with Utau if they think you are taking care of the X-eggs," Kairi explained. "You can offer to go and collect the X-eggs, then bring one or two of them to school so that Hinamori-san can purify them. It gives you an excuse to be at every Utau concert in the area, and since you'll only be bringing a couple back to be purified, my sister will still be able to accumulate a large amount of X-eggs. And after being at so many concerts, you'll be able to testify to the fact that it would be impossible to even try to get the diamond egg back." He said this all more like a report than an actual conversation. Which I guess made sense - he was just relaying orders, after all. "The Guardians are aware of your parents'... lax rules when it comes to staying out at night, correct?"

"Yeah," I said. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"I simply wanted to be sure. If they already know that, then they won't ask questions about why your parents would let you go to every concert."

I nodded in understanding, then waited a moment to see if he was done talking. He seemed to be, so I decided to move on to a new topic of conversation. I'll admit that I was curious about Kairi. He already seemed to know everything about me, thanks to Easter and the records of the Guardians. I, on the other hand, knew next to nothing about him. "May I ask you a question?" I said.

"Go right ahead, Yamada-san," Kairi said courteously.

I tried to think of a way to phrase it without sounding nosy, but that was next to impossible. "Do you live around here, Sanjo-kun? Because I had never seen you around before you started coming to Seiyo."

If Kairi was surprised by me asking a personal question, he didn't show it. "No. Before now, I lived in a town quite far away from here. Now that my sister wants me to help her, I'm living with her closer to the downtown area. And now, if you'll excuse me, class will be starting soon," Kairi nodded his head politely, then went off in the direction of his classroom. Looking at a clock and realizing that he was right, I headed back to my own room. I wished I could talk with Azami about everything Kairi had said concerning the plan, but that wasn't something I could easily do when there were so many other students around.

When I got to my class, a lot of the conversations suddenly ceased, which could only mean one thing: people were talking about me. I wondered what it could be this time. I suppose they could have been talking about my dislike of Rima, but I'd thought that they were already bored with that. As I sat down in my seat and the conversations around me gradually resumed (though more softly than before), Mai came up and greeted me.

"Have you heard what the new rumor is about you?" she asked curiously.

"No, but I'm dying to know. What is it?" I said.

Mai smiled a little bit, as if glad that she would be the one to let me know. "Well, everyone saw you in the hallway with Sanjo-kun this morning. No one hung around long enough to hear what you two were saying, but they're all thinking that something special must be going on between the two of you."

My mouth practically fell open in disbelief, causing Mai to start giggling at my expression. Me with Kairi? That seemed unlikely. What dragon in her right mind would fall for that stick-in-the-mud? Azami was practically dying of laughter as she rolled around in middair, unable to control her amusement at this new rumor. Or maybe she, like Mai, was laughing at my expression. I quickly composed myself somewhat, then said to Mai, "How in the world does anybody get that out of us talking to each other? Can I not talk to a guy without people thinking that something more is going on?"

Mai stopped giggling, but the smile stayed on her face. She knew I was just joking around with my questions. "Well, you are a Guardian," she pointed out. "You can't even walk to the bathroom without people scrutinizing your every footstep." We both laughed at this. Sadly, it was almost true - the whole student body was so obsessed with the awesomeness of the Guardians that if we did anything out of the usual, everyone would know about it in a matter of minutes. "And try looking at it from our point of view - you hardly ever talk to anyone outside of our class in the mornings. You normally come straight to the room, so maybe this time everyone has a right to be curious."

"I guess that's true," I relented. "Still, knowing this class, the rumor will get pretty exaggerated. By the end of the day, everyone will probably think that Kairi and I are running away to the Bahamas," I said sarcastically.

Mai's grin widened. "Did I not tell you that part of the rumor?"

We both started laughing, but soon enough, the bell rang and we had to get back to our seats. The class was boring, and without anything to preoccupy my mind, the Darkness slowly started to rise. I'd just had another attack of the Darkness last night, which had rendered me hopeless for at least a couple of hours. I had thought that maybe I would be safe from it for at least a day, but no dice. In fact, I would have sworn that it got worse every time it managed to drown me in despair, rather than wear off over time. But it had never been so strong as to overwhelm me around other people, and today wasn't anything new as far as that was concerned. I managed to get through class, though the Darkness had been strong enough that I hadn't learned a thing.

When lunch time came around, I found out that the topic of Kairi and me had spread throughout the school. No surprise there. By the time I'd received my lunch, Yaya, Kairi, and Rima were at the table, and Yaya was grilling Kairi on what had happened between us. And as soon as I sat down, Yaya turned her attention to me.

"Miyuki-chi! Kairi won't tell me what's going on!" Yaya complained. "But you'll tell me, won't you, Miyuki-chi?"

I looked over at Kairi, but he pretended to be too interested in his food to notice. "Uh, once everyone else gets here. Then I'll tell everyone."

Yaya pouted, but didn't argue. Thankfully, Amu and Tadase arrived soon, which meant I didn't have to deal with Yaya's grumpiness for long. In fact, once Amu and Tadase had taken their sheets, she was back to her regular inquisitive self.

"Okay, Miyuki-chi! Tell us what's going on between you and Kairi!" Yaya exclaimed.

"Huh? Is there something going on?" Amu asked. "I figured it was just another silly rumor."

"Nope! Yaya's sure there's something more, because neither of them would say anything until everyone got here! So come on, Miyuki-chi!" Yaya urged. Everyone turned to me to see what I would say.

I looked pleadingly at Kairi, but apparently he didn't want to be the one to say the lie. Which meant the dirty work was left with me. Thanks a lot, my so-called ally. "Well, it's just that I had an idea about what we could do about Utau. And since I ran into Kairi when I got into the school this morning, I thought I would run the idea by him."

Yaya seemed disappointed that the news wasn't gossip-worthy. Tadase grew serious at the mention of Utau. "What's your idea?" he asked.

"Well..." I once again looked to Kairi, who yet again refused to pick up the story. "I thought that maybe I could go to the concerts and grab any X-eggs that Utau creates. Then I can bring them back to school so Amu can purify them. And while I'm there, I can watch to see if there's anytime we would be able to take Amu's chara back. My parents won't mind if I'm out at night, and my smoke attack should make it easy to get the eggs."

"That's a good idea, if you're willing to take the responsibility to do all that by yourself, Yamada-san," Tadase said. "But how will you get into concerts? Open air ones like the concert we went to would be easy, but what about tonight? And how will you hold onto the X-eggs until Amu has a chance to purify them?"

"I'm sure I can figure out some way to get into the building. And as far as keeping the X-eggs go, I bet they'd stay quiet if I put some of my smoke in a bag and shut them into it." A pang of guilt swept through me as I realized that the lie was coming along effortlessly. It was like I was so used to lying to the Guardians that I no longer even thought about it.

"Are you sure you want to?" Amu asked, her voice still shaded with doubt. "It could be dangerous, and if part of this is just to get my egg back..." she trailed off.

"Don't worry about it - I'll be fine," I reassured her. "And while your egg is important, so is stopping Utau. You don't want her getting away with all those X-eggs, do you?" I made a mental note to punish myself somehow once I was home. This lie was going way too far. I wasn't simply covering for myself anymore. I was lying more than I needed to. What point was there in me sounding so committed to stop Utau? I could have just told Amu that I'd be fine, which was the truth, and ended my reassurance at that. But no, I had to go on and practically shout to the world that I was dead-set on stopping Utau, which couldn't be farther from the truth. Even Tadase seemed to notice my new (but fake) enthusiasm; he looked kind of surprised at my sudden surge of helpfulness.

Amu didn't respond, but she was obviously comforted by my words. I was glad that she seemed less worried, but I hated myself for the lies. But at this point, I guessed a lie or two more probably wouldn't matter - I was already the worst friend anyone could ever have.

* * *

I gave Ginger some much-deserved attention that night as I waited to be picked up for the concert. Ginger had been a great help to me these past couple of nights, and I suspected that the Darkness would be giving me a lot more trouble if I didn't have her around. She had helped me to get a hold of myself last night, for example. And it seemed like I was a lot less likely to be seriously bothered by the Darkness whenever I was petting something soft and cuddly. But I'd been so preoccupied in my own troubles this week that I'd barely done anything more for her than feed her and clean her litter box. Azami, though still acting jealous of the attention I gave Ginger, was tolerating the cat.

When it was about half past six, I went to my closet to pick out an outfit for the concert. I immediately ruled out the few brightly-colored outfits I had - I was definitely not in the mood to wear those. Instead, I ended up in a mostly black short-skirt and tight-fitting tee outfit. Add my black X-egg collecting purse into the mix and I had a very darkly-themed look. It really wasn't the most stylish outfit in the world even by goth standards, but it would do.

A little bit before seven, a black car with heavily tinted back seat windows pulled up in my driveway. Easter way over-emphasizes their whole evilness aspect, I thought to myself, recalling the multiple other times I'd been carted from place to place in these ominous-looking black cars. I was surprised to see that Yukari was driving the car; I'd figured it would just be some generic Easter henchman sent to pick me up. She motioned me to the seat behind her, and upon opening the door I saw that Utau was sitting on the other side. She glared at me as I got in, but I did my best to ignore her. Then again, when someone like super-idol Hoshina Utau glares at you, I'll admit it's kinda hard to brush it off as nothing. She was probably still angry that I interfered with her fight with Amu.

Iru, on the other hand, held no bad feelings towards Azami. "That was a pretty awesome transformation the other day!" The devil chara said to Azami as I finished buckling up. "Almost as good as Lunatic Charm!"

Azami scowled. "Almost? What do you mean, almost? Dark Dragon was clearly the best transformation at the park. If we'd wanted to, we could have obliterated you with ease."

"Are you joking? We could have wiped the floor with you guys even at half of our power!" Iru boasted.

As the friendly bickering continued and Yukari drove the car towards downtown, I noticed that the Amu's diamond X-chara was hovering near Utau. The chara was staring at me, but she didn't seem annoyed or angry like Utau was. But nor was the gaze happy or sad or any other emotion I could name. Maybe the gaze was devoid of all feeling, and yet that seemed wrong, too. Whatever it was that I saw in the chara's eyes seemed to look right through me, as if she could see every thought and action I had ever done. The feeling made me shiver, and I quickly looked away. As soon as eye contact was broken, the feeling left, though the memory of it remained.

When we got nearer to our destination, Yukari finally spoke up. "Miyuki, here's what you'll be doing tonight." Azami and Iru stopped their friendly insults to listen. "You are going to be providing smoke effects for Utau's opening song. I don't care how you do it, as long as you make it look good and you make sure that you get your X-energy smoke spread throughout the crowd. After the X-eggs from both your smoke and Utau's song have come out, it'll be your job to collect the eggs. Yet again, I don't care how you do it, just make sure that you get all of the eggs and that you aren't seen. Understand?"

I didn't like being ordered around like this, but the thought of my punishment for misbehavior made me hold my tongue. "Yes, Sanjo-san."

Yukari remained staring at the road, but I saw a victorious smirk come to her face at my answer. She could tell that I was still afraid of punishment, and she knew that she wouldn't have to worry about disobedience. It made me feel used, like a trained dog that lived only for Easter's amusement. I hated it. But unless I wanted to face Kazuomi again, there was nothing I could do about it.

Azami was clenching her fists and lashing her tail back and forth, showing that she didn't like this any more than I did. I looked over to Utau and her charas again, my eyes challenging them to just try and gloat at my weakness. But instead, I saw something that looked like a flash of sympathy in Utau's face, though she quickly hid it. Even Iru looked troubled to some extent. Dia simply continued to stare at me, her gaze impassive.

We arrived at the concert hall soon, and I was left backstage as stage crew around me set up for the concert. I basically just settled myself behind some large crates that were backstage, so that I was out of the way of all the hustle and bustle. As I waited, my mind drifted back to the rumor that had started earlier today.

So me and Kairi as a couple, huh? Well, I guess it's not that preposterous, considering the circumstances. I mean, we both work for Easter, and we both have charas. And, to be honest, he's not half-bad as far as looks go.

"What are you thinking about?" Azami asked, breaking my train of thought.

I shrugged. "Well, it just seems to me like that rumor about Kairi and me might not be all that ridiculous. We're both on the same side, after all."

Azami looked at me incredulously. "I've told you before - a dragon doesn't need anyone. You'd be better off just forgetting stupid stuff like this. But even if you do insist on it, at least find someone better that Kairi. He's a fourth grade geek who can't keep his nose out of procedure and business."

"Well, what about Musashi?" I asked as I smiled at Azami's bluntness. "That's who Kairi wants to be. So what's he like?"

"He hardly says anything, and he doesn't seem much better than Kairi," Azami replied. "He's just as focused on responsibility as Kairi. Put the two of them together, and it's almost worse than Kiseki in exactly the opposite way."

I laughed a little bit, in a surprisingly good mood for once. For Azami to compare them to Kiseki meant that she must really not like them. "I guess you're right," I said, still laughing. "It was just a thought. Speaking of them, are they here?"

Azami shook her head. "I haven't seen them around."

Just then, Utau passed by my hiding place. There was still about ten minutes before the start of the concert, and it looked like she and her band were done tuning and preparing. Since she didn't appear to be doing anything important, I decided to take this opportunity to talk to her, and try and get her to stop being so angry with me. The truth was, I really admired her for both her abilities and her strength, and I didn't particularly want her as an enemy.

"Hey, Utau! Mind if I talk to you for a minute?" I asked before she'd walked too far away.

She turned around and glared at me. "Oh, it's you. Sanjo-san was looking for you earlier. And don't talk to me like we're friends." Utau began to walk away, but I walked in front of her to stop her.

I was about to apologize for fighting with her the other day and for talking to her informally, but apparently Azami had other plans. Chara-change plans. Rather than saying sorry, I found myself talking back.

"You know, it's rude not to listen to what others want to say, Hoshina-san," I said, mockingly emphasizing the formal use of her name. "You shouldn't irritate a dragon without thinking about the consequences."

Utau clearly noticed my chara-change, but she seemed unintimidated. "If I ever see a real dragon, I'll keep that in mind."

My temper flared, but I decided to keep my cool rather than lose control of myself. "You know, I had been planning on explaining exactly why I helped Amu out when you fought her a couple days ago. But now, I see that someone as high and mighty as yourself doesn't need to listen to a dragon's sound logic."

"Oh? But you seemed so determined to explain yourself to me. Do all dragons give up this easily?" Utau said. She was trying to keep calm, but I could tell she was starting to get annoyed. And she wasn't the only one - both Azami and me were getting angry as well.

Still, this was getting to be a battle of wits, and I couldn't let my anger get the better of me. "No, it's not that at all. But not even a sensible human would waste any breath trying to talk to someone like you."

"Utau! Miyuki! Get in your positions!" Yukari suddenly called from the other side of backstage.

My anger faded as my chara-change went away, and I turned back to Utau with a satisfied smile on my face. This argument was fun, in its own way - not quite like an actual physical battle, but it was good competition of who can think the quickest. Now that I wasn't chara-changed, I decided to get straight to the point. "Okay, the truth is, I like to compete, too. Like you and Kukai were saying the other day. I just really wanted to fight that day and, admittedly, trying to protect Amu was a good excuse for a fight. Why don't we have a real fight sometime? That is, unless your afraid of losing." I said this last part with a challenging smirk.

I half expected Utau to still be annoyed with me, but, to my surprise, she dropped her hostility. A small but confident smile crept onto her face. "I'm ready for a fight anytime, just so long as you're not a sore loser. Because there isn't even a small possibility that a kid like you would be able to beat me." And with that, she walked over to the stage where she took her position for the beginning of the show. I thought about going over and arguing, but decided it would be best to let her have the last word - for now.

I quickly made my own way over to the side of the stage. From there, I could look out at the stage and a little bit of the audience, but I would be so shrouded in shadows that no one would notice me. At the moment, the curtains were drawn and the stage was almost completely dark. I craned my neck to look back stage again, and I saw that Yukari was motioning for me to get on with my job.

"Well, it looks like we get to be the ones to start the concert," I whispered to Azami. I wasn't feeling any guilt now about misleading the Guardians - thanks to my little battle of words with Utau, I was in too good of a mood to be anything but excited. After making sure that I was definitely out of sight of both the stage crew and the crowd, I transformed with Azami.

"Hopeless Haze," I muttered. A dark tongue of flame appeared in my hand, noticeably bigger than it had been in the past thanks to the massive amount of X-energy I now had surging through me. I made the smoke move its way onto the stage, making it heavy so that it would roll along the floor like fog. When the smoke had covered the stage so much that you could barely see below anyone's knees, the curtains were pulled back and the first chords of the organ played - the intro to Meikyuu Butterfly. I made more smoke and gradually let it begin to drift off into the audience. A couple of dim blue lights were now on, creating an eerie effect as it made the smoke seem to glow.

Then a spotlight flashed on right as Utau began to sing. And before even the first line of music was done, I was having trouble keeping back the flood of Darkness. It was just like the time I'd gone to the Utau concert with Mai, only this felt a hundred times stronger. As Utau made it to the first refrain, I could tell that I wouldn't be able to hold back the power any longer.

So, rather than hold back the haze, I let it go, doing my best to maneuver it the way I wanted it. Smoke positively poured from the fire in my hand, nearly too much to control. My first priority was to keep the smoke from enveloping the stage; if that happened, then the fans wouldn't be able to see, and it probably wouldn't make it any easier for Utau or the musicians to do their job. So I directed the smoke to spread itself throughout the audience part of the concert hall. Since it was a massive room, this worked well enough, and I soon stopped worrying about it getting out of control.

And as soon as I stopped worrying about it, an almost insane grin came to my face as I felt the power of both the Darkness and the music working me up into a sense of ultimate power. There had to be at least two thousand people in the sold out crowd, and now they were all under my control. They seemed no less enthusiastic, but I knew that with every breath they took, my haze would affect them. As long as the music kept playing, most of them would stay basically normal. But there would be those whose dreams were vulnerable, and it was over them that I had my greatest power.

When Utau reached the last refrain of the song, her bat-like wings appeared and a new wave of strength surged through me. All of Utau's determination felt like it was racing through me, powering the Darkness. And as I turned back to the crowd, my mouth dropped open in surprise. In a crowd this large, I would have guessed that my haze - at least, before my latest boost - would have been able to draw out maybe ten or fifteen eggs, since I normally wouldn't even be able to cover half of the crowd with smoke. And if the last Utau concert I went to was anything to go by, Utau would have been able to get about the same amount. Combined, that should have resulted with thirty eggs at most, and that was assuming there wasn't any overlap between our targets.

That was why I couldn't believe my eyes - there had to be at least fifty X-eggs floating above the crowd.

The only reason for this that I could think of was that maybe Utau's singing had powered up my attack, or maybe my smoke had powered up her singing, or maybe a combination of the two. But whatever had happened, I considered it a miracle of epic proportions. Just the knowledge that I had the power to do this was invigorating, even if I had been helped out by Utau. I quickly ducked back stage, then flew upwards, not caring if any of the stage crew saw me.

I landed on a walkway above the lights, which looked like it was usually used for maintenance. The lights around me were turning and flashing in time to Utau's next song, probably being controlled by a computer somewhere. From my vantage point, I could easily see the cloud of X-eggs that had gathered near the ceiling. Using a bit more smoke, I called out to them, coaxing them towards me. They came willingly, surrounding me until I was in the center of the cloud.

I thought about bringing my haul backstage to Yukari, but decided against it. For one, there was nothing we'd be able to do with such a large amount of X-eggs. More importantly, I didn't want to come down. I could quite literally think of nothing that could make this moment in time any better - I mean, I was in dragon form, surrounded by X-eggs that I had created, and looking down at an entire crowd of people who were powerless before my might. Not to mention, below me music was playing that was both strong and inspiring. With the Darkness in me, I had plenty of energy to keep up my character transformation - I saw no reason to come down.

And so, I stayed among the lights for the remainder of the concert. And the feeling of power that remained throughout the entire concert felt like nothing else. Perhaps it couldn't replace friendship or other so-called 'good' feelings, but nor could friendship ever compare with such a sense of empowerment. When the last song ended, I flew down to one corner of the back stage and changed back to normal, regretting that the concert ever had to end. I prepared to chara-change immediately in order to keep the X-eggs in line, but it turned out that that wasn't necessary - the eggs continued to stay close to me, even without a change or transformation.

I stayed in my corner for a while, watching the stage crew and band as they cleaned up and put everything away. Once I saw that Yukari and Utau were looking around for me, apparently ready to go, I got out of my corner and walked towards them. When I approached them, I could see that Utau was shocked at the number of X-eggs I had floating above my head. Of course, she, Yukari, and me we were the only ones who could see the swarm - all the rest of the stage crew were oblivious to eggs floating just above their heads.

Yukari smiled coldly, pleased with the results. "Nice job, girls," She said to Utau and me as soon as I was within hearing range. "I'm sure Kazuomi will be more than satisfied with your work." I grinned, though I couldn't have cared less whether Kazuomi was pleased or not. I was simply proud of my work.

We managed to stuff all of the X-eggs in the trunk of the black car, and then we drove to Easter just a few blocks away. Yukari's card key had access to the entire building, so we were able to drop off the eggs in a storage room near the labs. I didn't bother asking what they'd be used for - probably either new experiments for bringing out the Embryo, or else more energy for me. I kept seven for myself to bring back to the Guardians on Monday, so that they would think that I'd done my job. As soon as the rest of the eggs were securely locked up, we went back to the car. I was somewhat disappointed when Yukari dropped me off first - I had really been wanting to see where an idol like Utau lived. Then again, that didn't matter. Tonight had been great, and a small disappointment like that wasn't going to get me down.

However, there was one thing that nagged at the back of my mind, and I mentioned it to Yukari before I got out of the car. "Sanjo-san, if we're able to create that many X-eggs at every concert, there's no way we'll be able to keep it a secret from the Guardians for long. Anyone with a chara for ten miles around probably could have felt that many X-eggs being created at once."

"I'd thought about that, but I've decided that it doesn't matter," Yukari replied. "With that much power at our disposal, the Guardians will no longer be a threat, even if they realize what we're doing. We'll continue doing this at every concert Utau has in this area. Speaking of which, the next time you'll be needed will be two Thursdays from now - there's going to be a smaller concert on the other side of town. I'll have Kairi fill you in on the details on Monday." She said nothing more, so I got out of the car and she drove off into the night. I watched the car until it was out of sight, then went inside to get a much-needed night's rest.

I'll once again apologize for not getting out these chapters sooner... I mean, it's Summer, and yet it's nearly been two weeks since the last chapter... I must either be getting busier or lazier as the Summer progresses... (probably a mix of both, to be honest) Still, you got a long chapter in thanks for your wait~ (well, it would have been long anyway... the wait was just made longer because the chapter was long...)

Note concerning the story: Up until now, there's never been much more than a week's gap of time between chapters in-story wise (not update wise). That will probably change soon, perhaps with the next chapter. Of course, I almost always mention in-story how long it's been since the last chapter, so you'll know once it happens. This is just a forewarning.

Extra-special thanks for everyone who has been reviewing! I actually got nine reviews on the last chapter~! (Which is an accomplishment for me)

I'm seriously going to try and get more chapters out more quickly, but I can't make any guarantees. (especially considering that it's nearly 4-H fair time... dang...)