Topic: Missing
Genre: Action. Again.
Canon: By definition, no.
Rating: PG
Length: 1600. I lobby that any action scene will always push the wordcap and should thus be exempt.
Special Requirements: Rewrite any part of the canon, minus one main character. The story should assume that the person picked had never existed.
Tease: As an action writer, I naturally weed out the one character that thwarts all the good potential fight scenes in CCS. Yeah, you know who I'm talking about. (Stop! –whine- I don't want to fight you! –whimper-)
'match met'
Spring was an actual season here. Warm but not too warm, the afternoon sun shone down on the school cheerfully and a breeze tickled the young green leaves. Students gathered in knots and jabbered, not ready to go home while the weather was so pleasant. It was peaceful, it was tranquil.
It was an illusion.
Li darted back and circled his opponent warily, aware that his breathing had gotten louder and a line of sweat had formed under his bangs. She, on the other hand, was hardly breathing at all, and her expressionless face didn't twitch as she attacked again with unhurried grace. Unhurried did not mean slow, however, and Li slid away from the lethal point with molecules to spare, bracing his own sword against the blade and pushing.
An opening! He swept his blade in but somehow she managed to move back in time and twisted out of his path. He barely managed to leap clear before she reversed the motion of her sword and sliced at his chest.
The tie on his sailor suit uniform fell away; that was close. Shakily he exhaled and raised his sword again in attack posture.
"C'mon," Kero complained loudly, stuffing his face with potato chips on a nearby tree branch, "what's taking so long?"
"Stuff it, plushie," Li growled, never taking his eyes off the girl for a moment. "I'd sure like to see you handle a sword."
"I -"
"And no, Mortal Kombat II does not count."
She threw a quick feint, and Kero hmphed. "Well, move it along. We're gonna miss Gundam Wing!"
"Perish the thought," Li muttered, and then she attacked for real. It was so fast he almost didn't block it in time, and desperately he parried the strike away from his body. She advanced, her thin blade stabbing and slicing the air with meticulous accuracy. She was just so damn fast, and Li couldn't read her intentions as he'd been trained to do in sword combat. She had none. Over and over again she jabbed at Li and he retreated, all his energy channeled to defense.
"She's kickin' your ass," Kero drawled.
"Shut up."
Swords flashing in the dappled sunlight, Li parried her attack and thrust forward. She was forced to block and for the first time almost stumbled in her haste. Eagerly Li pressed forward and attacked twice in a flash of aggression. Metal blade clanged against metal blade in rapid staccato rhythm and then they parted again. Li was panting now, and he dragged a sleeve across his brow to mop up extra sweat. He wondered if the Card's host was tiring too, or if she could even feel her own fatigue.
"Careful," Kero was lecturing from behind him. "You want to disarm the kid, not hurt her! It's not her fault she was possessed."
"I know," Li snapped irritably. "I am being careful, damn it. But this is the Sword Card itself that I'm fighting. It's not easy!"
"Maybe you could distract her somehow? You know anything about her?"
The host seemed to have gathered herself for another round. Eyes still chillingly blank, she advanced upon Li and he raised his sword in readiness. He knew the face quite well, she sat in the desk next to his in class and he'd seen her every school day since he'd moved to Japan.
"It's, um, Dai-something. Can't remember."
"You don't even know your own classmate's name?" Kero wailed, and Li met the attack with a crescent block.
"It's not my fault she never talks. I think she's scared of me."
"Gee, can't imagine why."
"Could you do me a favor and shut up?"
The thin sword slashed downward in a high strike and Li blocked it near the hilt, just short of a fatal connection with his skull. He pushed it away in an arcing motion with his sword, with an automatic impulse to reverse the motion and slice at her throat. But no, he couldn't end the fight in such a manner. While he hesitated she attacked again, sweeping the blade right at his neck. He was in no position to block it and instinctively he dropped to the earth, underneath the fatal strike. Years of training directed his muscles before his mind could, and he used his momentum to spin on one knee and sweep his leg across her ankles. She squeaked and hit the grass flat on her back, and the sword flew out of her grasp.
Angry, the disenfranchised spirit tried to return to her hand but Li threw himself over her body.
"I won't let you," he panted, sword pointed threateningly, and the Card wavered.
"Now!" Kero cried.
"I know that," Li answered tersely, and yanked the key off from around his neck. He broke the cord every time; it couldn't be helped.
"Key that hides the power of the Dark, show your true form before me. I, Li Syaoran, command you under our contract! Release!"
The tiny key lengthened into a staff, and with sword still in his right hand he struck at the Card with his left. "Return to the guise you were meant to be in. Clow Card!"
The willful magic resisted only a moment longer before finally conceding his victory. It dissolved, and reformed as the Card under his staff's beak. Exhausted and relieved, he sat back on the grass next to the unconscious girl and tried to reclaim his breath.
"About time," Kero yawned, and Li scowled.
"For your information, I could have won any time I wanted."
"Sure."
"I had to do it without hurting her."
"Uh-huh."
"Watch it, you loud-mouthed excuse for a guardian!" Li brandished his sword at the hovering creature. "If it wasn't for me you wouldn't have anyone at all to gather up the Cards, which you lost when you were taking a thirty year nap!"
"I told you it was just forty winks!" Kero flared indignantly. "And it is most definitely not my fault that some lady had enough magic to open the clasp -"
"Which you should have been guarding -"
"- and then collapsed when the Cards scattered -"
"- which you also should have been guarding -"
"- leaving me without anyone to designate the Cardcaptor!"
"Anyone? What about me?"
Kero waved a negligent paw. "You're all right, in a pinch."
Li snarled, but cut off his prepared retort at the sound of a soft moan. The Card's host was waking up.
"She's coming to," Kero hissed, stating the obvious. "Sword!"
"Doll!" Li hissed right back, and smirked when Kero scowled. Then he obediently dropped to the dirt, still. Li's sword and the sealing staff retracted to their tiny forms, and he stuffed the Card into his pocket to join its nine siblings. Whatever the plushie might say, it wasn't too bad for six weeks.
"Mm?" Her eyes fluttered open, and she blinked owlishly at Li. Eyes looked normal, that was a good sign. Again he tried to remember her name, but could only get as far as Dai-something. "Wha… Li-kun?"
"Yeah. How do you feel?"
"Dizzy." She put a hand to her head and grimaced, then tried to sit up. She couldn't quite make it, but Li made no move to help prop her up. "What happened?"
"You fainted. I saw you go down just outside the school." His classmate blinked again and took in the trees around them, and the schoolyard's brick wall not far away.
"Oh my…"
"Gone shopping lately, brought anything new into your house?"
"Er, I went shopping on the weekend with my friends." She looked even more confused at the incongruous question, but Li wasn't about to explain. "We bought some jewelry; I got a pin. I decided to wear it today -" She patted her uniform collar, looking puzzled. "Oh, it's gone. I must have lost it when I fainted." She pushed herself upright and scanned the grass around them, not that she was going to find it.
But he wasn't going to tell her that.
"Good luck," he muttered, and stood up. Her face looked so white still, and as an afterthought he patted his pockets. "Here." A square of foil-wrapped chocolate landed in her skirt's folds, and she glanced up in surprise. "Eat that. It helps."
"Er, thank you. Li-kun?" He'd turned away, but stiffened at the shift in her tone.
"Yeah?"
"Is this your stuffed animal?"
Drat. He'd almost forgotten again, and wearily he turned around. Oddly, she wasn't holding Kero by a careless leg or wing, but cradling him gently in her outstretched hands. There was something very tender about her touch, almost as if she knew.
Before Kero could get too spoiled, he whisked him out of her hands, letting him dangle by one foot. He'd get bit later, but it was worth it.
"Yeah, thanks. Present for my- my cousin. She might be coming to Japan soon."
"Oh, how nice. You must be sure and introduce me to her when she arrives. I always wanted a sister or a girl cousin my own age, but I only have Touya-kun."
Reflexively Li clenched his fists, surprised at the sudden flare of hostility. He'd never heard the name before, but something about it –
A sharp pain in his hand brought him back, and with a yelp he released Kero. Stupid stuffed animal.
"Li-kun?" Uncertainly her eyes moved from him to the inert plushie on the ground, whom she just might have seen waft easily to earth rather than falling.
"Cramp. Gotta go." It was the most he ever said of a goodbye, when the people of this town woke up dizzy and confused to find him standing by. Angrily he swept Kero off the grass and strode away.
"I loathe you."
"Right back at you, buddy."
Ten down, forty-two to go.
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Disclaimer: I do not own these characters
Everybody else was doing angst, so I thought I'd go for something a little more light-hearted. This swordfight is tame compared to my others, but considering the circumstances I guess it can't be helped. Li might have been a little rough around the edges in the beginning, but he's still not going to kill a girl just to get a Card. It's always been my opinion that if Sakura wasn't there, Li would have made a damn decent Master of the Cards – he certainly worked hard enough for it. But without Tomoyo and Sakura to play peacemaker, you can imagine how antagonistic things would be between Li and Kero.
I tarried for a while on the question of what would happen to the Cards if Sakura never existed. Would Touya make the better Captor, or Li? I still think Touya would be good, but I went with Li here so I could write a swordfight. But how would he come to have the key?
After some thinking, I decided that the book made its way to the Kinomoto household just as it was supposed to. But Nadeshiko suffered an early miscarriage and thus Sakura was never born, leaving Touya an only child. Going on the flimsy premise that the pregnancy and labor of her second child wouldn't drain her strength, Nadeshiko did not succumb to the disease that would have killed her a few years later. So if Nadeshiko never died, maybe she and Sonomi kept contact and Tomoyo and Touya would know they're cousins – though not necessarily close ones. Nadeshiko had enough magic to hear Kero snoring and open the clasp of the book, but collapsed under the sheer torrent of energy when all the Cards escaped. Seeing her out for the count, Kero would realize she wasn't suited for the purpose of recapturing the Cards and thus took both book and key with him to find someone that was.
And then Li showed up from Hong Kong. They might dislike each other on sight, but Li is still Kero's best chance at reclaiming the Cards. And although Yuki and Touya do still exist, without Sakura around their paths would not have yet crossed. Only a matter of time, though. And no matter what universe they're in, as I've always theorized, Li and Touya will despise each other.
Li: This is the third time you've featured me in an action fight for your challenge, Peacewish. I think Sakura's starting to suspect us.
Me: She'll have a lot more reason to by the time I'm through with you, my cute Little Wolf. (pinches his cheek) Don't tell her, and I won't tell Touya. Deal?
Li: You're hurting my face.
Me: Good.