Part 12.

The King of Stornway was more than happy to recieve Prince Art's news, though he would not be anywhere near as happy as he hoped. Art explained the situation as he and the group had found thus far. The Dragon Barbatos, alive and rampaging, not only blew up Upover in Greygnarl's absence, but a demonic wizard named Zoma summoned the dragon and destroyed the ship of soldiers bound for Wormwood Creek. Luckily, however, the team had defeated Zoma, only to set off a larger plot by someone else from outside the Celestrian lands. He told the King that he saw a large flock of dragons of all sorts in the sky from his home in Cannock, heading straight to the Celestrian lands at top speed.

King Scotch rubbed his beard, trying to soak in all that was explained. "This is horrible," he said. "Prince Art, I cannot evacuate my people. It would cause terror and dischord in them, and we would have nowhere to go." The king shook his head. "I don't have much to offer you, except... wait, where is your young lady friend?"

"Suzuri is at the Quester's Rest, Your Majesty," Art said. "She needed a break after seeing so much tragedy."

"Poor girl must ache," The King pulled out a strange, shining golden whistle from his pocket. It dangled off of a golden necklace, almost glittery in the same way that the Seal of Loto had. "I wanted to ask you to give her this." He placed it in Art's hands, then smiled. "It fell from the sky the night the two of you offered to take our troops to Upover. I see that it might be an answer to our prayers."

Art put the whistle in his pocket. "I humbly accept your gift on Suzuri's behalf, Your Grace. As a Descendant of Loto, I must go out to find and defeat the cause of this. If you will excuse me."

"Be brave, young warrior," the King said as Art turned to leave. "For the crown, the church, and for yourselves."

Art fumbled with the whistle in his pocket as he exited the castle and found his way back to the Quester's Rest. He went back up to the second floor, as always, accidentally walking in on Suzuri saying, "Art's so very gentle when he's thrusting."

She was turned away from the door, so she didn't even know that Art had walked in. "He's so warm naturally, but to be that close is heavenly," she continued, sounding as if hearts were going to not only circle around her head but fall out her ears. "So comfy. He's an angel, I swear."

"That's... nice," Alicia said when she looked at the open door. "Umm, hey, shall we talk about something else?"

Tara nodded. "Yeah, these new pastries are just delicious, have you tried them?"

"Hey, you wanted to know how he was," Suzuri said with a shrug. "What's going on here?"

"Well, y'know, there's some things that just shouldn't be discussed," Alicia said. "And you were starting to go into the TMI catagory."

"Something is too TMI for you, Alicia?" Suzuri asked, getting off the bed. "You sure are acting strange." When she turned to look at the door and saw Art there, she blushed. "Oh... you must have... heard."

Art nodded. He'd never walked in on a group of girls talking about that before, and it really caught him off guard. "Suzuri," he said, walking closer to her. "Things are going on. We need to leave the city. Please, believe me on this, I don't have time to explain. We all need to leave."

She climbed off of her bed and ran over to him, grasping around his chest. "Art," she whispered tenderly, "I've come to a decision, finally."

"Another one?"

"I've decided that I'm going to be honest with Ciresso and... confess that I want to be with you," Suzuri said, planting a kiss on his cheek. "I don't want to lie about this anymore."

"We really don't have time to discuss this," Art said. "The King wanted me to give this to you." He pulled out the shiny golden whistle from his pocket, and she twitched.

"H... how did the King get this?" Suzuri asked.

"He said it fell from the sky the night Upover was attacked," Art handed it to her. "I don't know what its for. I have no idea why he'd want to give you a golden whistle, but-"

Suzuri hung the whisle around her neck. "If we've got trouble, then we need to move. This right here, this will help us a lot." Then she pulled Art's face down to look at her. "My Prince, I'm afraid that if we don't settle this soon, we're going to regret it."

Art nodded. "That forboding feeling. I know. C'mon, you three, we're getting a wagon hitched up. This isn't going to end well at all." He turned to leave. "Bring all of your belongings with you, all right?"

The girls listened, of course, bringing themselves and their stuff down to the town square to wait on the guys. Ciresso was walking around like he had no ideas of what to do next when he saw them coming out.

"There aren't any wagons or horses here in this town," Ciresso said. "We can't all travel as a group, all of our supplies and everything on foot."

Taro came from the item shop in frustration. "There's nothing," he said, kicking the sidewalk.

Ciresso looked over to Suzuri, who really seemed like she wasn't sure of how to approach him at the moment. "What's wrong, Suzuri?"

She just pointed at the whistle that hung around her neck while looking up into the sky.

"How did you get that?" He started to twitch, too. "Suzuri, how did you get that?"

"Apparently, it fell around here the other night," she said. "The King wanted me to have it for some reason."

"You don't think the King knows, do you?"

"How would I know if he can see that kind of thing?" Suzuri snapped at him. "But it might solve our problems."

"What problems will it solve?" Alicia asked. "We're stuck here, and we're in danger."

Ciresso nodded to Suzuri. "Use it."

"But we... we can't!"

"We don't have a choice," Ciresso said sternly. "Blow the whistle, Suzuri. It's yours, you should use it."

When everyone was gathered together, Suzuri took a deep breath and blew it into the whistle. It was a high-pitched whistle, for sure. A few seconds later, a beam of light came and took all of them up into the sky.

At that point, the group found themselves inside a golden locomotive, everyone confused but Ciresso and Suzuri. She stood there at the controls, pressing buttons here and there.

"I can't believe they'd do this," Suzuri said. "Who in Heaven decided it was a good idea to drop the whistle to the Starflight Express in such a random place?"

"Stop complaining and get her working again," Ciresso said, ready to smash the control panel with his fist. "I don't think Stella was thinking when she made you the next successor to the Starflight Express."

They were a bit absorbed into what they were doing until Alicia stepped up and asked, "What is going on here? Would someone mind explaining something before my head explodes from all the confusion?"

Ciresso nodded. "Sorry, guys. Allow me to introduce myself. I am the mechanic and conductor of this train, the Starflight Express. This here is my partner in crime, the pilot."

Tara blinked, unable to really understand. "What do you mean?"

Suzuri turned to the group. "I humbly welcome you aboard the Celestrian railway between the stars, The Starflight Express. My name is Randalia Suzuri, and I am the granddaughter of Apus Major." When she bowed, a faint halo appeared above her head. "But in all honesty, I like just being Suzuri Heinze. Ciresso and I have been charged with keeping an eye on the Celestrian lands since we decided to come down and live lives among the rest of humanity."

Art shook his head. "Then what of-"

Suzuri smiled. "That is no problem," she said. "Everything is all right. Now, since we'll be traveling outside of the Celestrian lands, I'll need a guide. The rest of you can be settled in the quarters to the rear of the train until we're ready to land."

Alicia stepped up again. "That's it? You're just... not human, and that's all you have to say to us?"

Suzuri cocked her head to the side. "Whatever do you mean?" she asked. "I am the same person you have come to know during my stay in Bloomingdale. We tried to live seperately among the humans, but it was... so strange. The only human I've ever really felt comfortable around was Art."

"But you grew, you went to school, you-"

"Yes. We left the Observatory where all the Celestrians have lived for eons when Celestria and her realm was saved from Cyrus, reborn into human bodies, with our memories in tact." Ciresso said with a shrug. "We wanted to try to see the world apart, but that didn't work out."

Seth, Angelo, Taro and Tara carried all of their stuff back to the quarters, while Alicia and Art stayed up front to talk to Suzuri about what they'd learned.

"At least a lot makes sense now," Alicia said. "The fact the two of you have always been a bit on the antisocial part."

Art saw that Suzuri had a sad expression, so he asked about it. "Tell me, why are you so sad?"

"Because," Suzuri said, tears starting to form, "Because I love you and I was going to keep this a secret from you for the rest of our lives."

"It certainly was worth keeping," Art said with a nod. "So now I know you used to be an angel. I thought it was a compliment when you called me one. So, why isn't it a good thing for you to be one?"

Suzuri shrugged. "I just wanna be like you. All of you, who have made my life much more interesting than it was when I lived in the Observatory. I just... I just wanted to live as freely as the humans always have."

"Oh," Art said, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. "You are. That's what matters now. I don't care what you were before. You are you, plain and simple."

She reached up and kissed him, letting herself really enjoy it for the first time. Suzuri felt at home in Art's arms more than anywhere else.

"It's time to go find out what's going on in Aliahan," Suzuri said. "Show me where to go on the map. I've never been there before."

"You bet."