Chapter 12: Cliffhanger

Andy and Jin made good time digging to the boys' dormitory. Andy marveled at how quickly he was moving dirt; ever since the "Training of the Grave," he had noticed that his affinity for his Element ability had grown stronger. They came up just to the left of the entryway to the building, right behind a shrub that would serve to conceal Andy's tunnel.

"Alright, let's go grab your computer and get out of here," Andy said. "Call it instincts, but I don't want to stick around longer than necessary."

As if to validate his suggestion, a Vector flew by overhead before circling the building and heading back towards the main hall of the academy. Vector X, based on the profile. The sound of the engines nearly deafened the two students.

"Gah! What are they thinking? Flying a Vector that low to the ground here of all places?" Andy exclaimed.

Still muttering about how his eardrums would never be the same, he stalked off, following Jin into the main lobby of the boys' dormitory. It was sparsely furnished, with just two couches, a coffee table, and a T.V. There was also a ping-pong table in one corner, but that hardly saw any use in recent days. From what Andy had heard, the girls' dormitory was about twenty times better equipped than theirs; one day, he intended to dig a hole all the way to that Eden to find the truth out for himself.

At this hour, few students were present within the dorms although there always were a few that faked being ill to get out of class. Not much risk of being spotted by one of the hunting party here. Still, Andy's instincts told him to be wary.

"Why are we sneaking through the hallways like a couple of thieves?" Jin asked after Andy scouted around a corner cautiously for the fourth time.

"It adds to the tension," Andy replied. "And I bet that the moment I stop doing this, we'll run into someone we don't want to meet."

Jin sighed, clearly not understanding what Andy had meant. As an avid horror movie fan, Andy had all the survival tropes memorized, enshrining their lessons within the temple known as his mind. He wasn't sure how being extra cautious would play out in this scenario; horror flicks were rather inconsistent about which type of individual survived until the end.

"Alright, I have my computer," Jin called from their shared bedroom. He ran out clutching the rectangular device to his chest. "Let's get back to Zessica-san before she starts worrying about us."

They were in such a hurry on the way back that Andy didn't even pause to look around the corners. After all, it had been all clear not 30 seconds ago and no one had been following them; no sense in wasting more time. In retrospect, Andy should have taken his own warnings more to heart. Rounding the first corner, Andy almost ran smack into someone who should not have been there.

"Shrade—," he said, a tinge of worry creeping into his voice.

"Hello Andy," the older boy said, smiling gently. "I take it you know that I'm part of the hunting team as of ten minutes ago?"

Andy took a step backwards. This was quite possibly the worse matchup he could think of aside from MIX, whose power was his exact opposite. He had seen Shrade's ability in action before and knew that there wasn't anything he could do to really defend against it. What was important now was to get Jin away; the other boy held the key to shutting down the hunting team's ability to find their targets.

"Jin," Andy said softly. "I'm going to buy you some time, you need to get away from here with the computer."

"What? That's stupid, Andy. We're a team, I can't just leave you. Besides, we'd all get hit with a penalty if you get caught."

"Heh," Andy laughed, "Then I'll just have to not get caught. It's alright, just leave this to me."

Shrade was standing there watching the pair as they conversed. From anyone else, waiting while the enemy planned would seem foolish and arrogant; from Shrade, it was clearly a gesture of politeness.

"Are you done yet?" he asked patiently.

"Thanks for waiting," Andy said, "That was awfully polite of you. But unfortunately, Jin and I—need to get past you!"

Slapping his hand to the ground, Andy bore a hole through the floor beneath his and Shrade's feet. The two fell through to the basement, leaving the way clear for Jin to make his escape. As he ran by, Jin shouted his thanks down to Andy, who briefly flashed the other boy a thumbs-up.

"Damn," Andy thought as he fell, "I think I just tripped a death flag with that last one."

Well, the fall didn't kill him at least. Even Shrade, who had a fairly frail body, managed to land on his feet without any trouble. Sometimes Andy wondered if the whole "he has an incurable physical condition which could kill him" thing was just a hoax. Then again, he couldn't think of any good reason why the higher-ups would lie about that.

"So, you forsake a duet in favor of a solo performance?" Shrade asked while adjusting his glasses. They had fallen askew during the fall.

"Nah, Jin has an important task so he doesn't have the time to play with you. I, on the other hand—," Andy said, cracking his knuckles, "do."

"You do realize that your loss condition is me tagging you, correct?"

Andy suddenly realized that the older boy had slowly maneuvered himself so that he was blocking the only exit from the room. He tried to feint running past to the left and then sidestepping to the right, but the older boy had enough combat experience to just stay put at the exit. This wasn't going to be easy.

"Is there any chance that I can talk you into letting me past?" Andy asked meekly, suddenly feeling way in over his head.

Shrade took up a pose as if he were going to start playing the violin. With a smile, he said, "Let's just end this now. As a kindness to the one whose soul plays to the tempo of burning passions."

At the first notes coming from Shrade's person, Andy started feeling heavy, as if sleep were bearing down on him. He staggered backwards before hitting the wall at the end of the room, leaning on it in an effort to stay awake. His eyelids started to close and a moment later, he felt himself falling to the ground.

"Good night, Andy," Shrade said, ending his lullaby and walking over to Andy's prone form slowly.

Through some stroke of luck, Andy hadn't completely fallen asleep when Shrade stopped playing. He felt his mind reasserting control over his body as the footfalls of the older boy came nearer. Straining every fiber of his being into activating his power, Andy managed to open a pit just as Shrade was about to tag him, dropping through just below the boy's hand. He focused on the structural weakness of the tunnel above him as he continued to dig, collapsing the entrance to the tunnel and preventing Shrade from following. Then, laughing softly to himself, he fell on his back in exhaustion, the adrenaline rush slowly fading away as he drifted off into sleep.


Zessica sat on a fallen log across from Amata who was standing up; his back turned to her as he scanned the forest for signs of movement. She hadn't really noticed it before, but he had a broad back, the kind that made you feel like he could be relied on for anything. The forest didn't seem nearly as frightening when he was around.

"What?" he asked, turning around.

"Huh?"

"You have a weird smile on your face, like you know something I don't." Amata smiled at her to show that he had meant no malice with his words. That smile was breathtaking, even if it was a little different from before, when he wasn't sharing a body with Kagura.

Zessica hadn't even realized that she was smiling. Blushing and turning away so that he wouldn't notice, she answered, "It's nothing. I'm—just glad to have some company here."

That was the truth, just not the whole of it. She didn't think she would be able to say the rest of it in front of Amata at all. Not when he was merged with Kagura at least. It wasn't fair at all. No matter what she did, she could never truly have "alone time" with Amata as things were now.

"It shouldn't take Jin and Andy this long to go to the boys' dorm and back," Amata said, sounding a little concerned. "I hope they're alright."

"If they were caught, it would have been announced," Zessica replied. "But now that you mention it, it does seem like they've been gone forever. Do you have the time?"

"10:36," Amata answered, pulling out a phone from his pocket. "The exercise started at 10 precisely."

They'd been gone for just over half an hour now. Zessica was really starting to regret accepting the boys' decision to split up. What if she was the only one left? There wasn't much that she could do alone and she didn't want to cower in some hidden crevice in the forest until time was up.

"I HATE all this waiting around," Zessica declared loudly, standing up.

Amata looked at her with a puzzled expression on his face. "Then, what do you want to do?"

"I don't know. Something. Anything. I just can't stand being the one that isn't doing anything for my team," Zessica complained. She knew that feeling this way was a little childish, but it was lonely being left out of everything.

"Yeah, I know what you mean. Kagura kind of drove off my teammates, so I'm stuck solo. I doubt that's good considering my power is a bit on the flashy, attention grabbing side."

A sudden rustling in the bushes nearby drew their attention. A moment later, Jin came staggering out, trying to untangle his long robe-like coat from the brambles.

"I got my laptop," he said, holding up the prize he had set forth to get. "I'll get started shutting down the security feed."

"Where's Andy?" Zessica asked, "Wasn't he with you?"

Jin looked a bit concerned. "He stayed behind to buy me some time to get away. We almost got caught by Shrade. I hope he managed to get away; he certainly seemed confident enough about being able to do so."

Amata couldn't help but burst out laughing. He knew his roommate's personality too well not to. Jin stared at him like he was going insane. Zessica looked at him, completely taken aback by Amata's seemingly uncaring attitude towards his friend; something she knew was very unlike him.

"Ah, I needed that," he said, wiping away a tear that was welling up in his eye. At the expression on Zessica and Jin's faces, he added, "Sorry. It's just that Andy used to quote a bunch of movie lines that he wanted to use in real-life. He's always so over-the-top about everything; I'd bet he was hamming it up even when facing off with Shrade."

That did seem like something Andy would try, though with the threat of punishment…Actually, never mind, Andy didn't seem to care much about being reprimanded, as all the holes he dug around the campus would suggest. Zessica smiled, realizing that she had been getting a bit too serious over the Supreme Commander's ridiculous idea of training.

It didn't take long for Jin to break into the Neo-DEAVA mainframe. Multiple windows of data popped up on the screen, each showing the feed from a single camera on the school grounds. Zessica looked over Jin's shoulder, but the jumble of information flowing across the monitor made her feel dizzy.

"You know, it'd probably be helpful to leave the security cameras running," Jin said as he scanned the images on his laptop. "We'd be able to track the hunting team quite handily with this. I see Shrade still in the boys' dorm...looks like Malloy is there too. No sign of Andy, I guess that's good news. It looks like Instructor Dantes is the one piloting the Vector X, and Suomi-sensei—"

Jin paused, a horrified expression spreading across his face. His computer screen filled with static and suddenly went black. The three students turned around, looking for whatever had caused the laptop to crash.

"Well now, what have we here?" Suomi-sensei said as she stepping into the small clearing. "You know Jin-kun, hacking into your school's mainframe isn't proper behavior for a student."

Jin fell to the ground, pinned down by some unknown force. Turning to look at Zessica and Amata, he pleaded with them to leave him behind.

"What? We can't just do that," Zessica protested.

Amata looked just as resolute as she felt. They both stepped in between Jin and Suomi-sensei in unison.

"How did you do that to Jin-kun?" Zessica asked, her expression showing that she demanded an answer. "Your power is magnetism, isn't it?"

"My fault," Jin groaned from his position on the ground. "I keep several toolkits in my coat for emergencies. I never thought that being prepared would actually end up working against me."

Suomi-sensei calmly looked at the three students. "Now then," she said, "are you going to take Jin-kun's suggestion and leave a man behind, or are you all going to let yourselves be tagged out by me?"

Zessica had always thought of Suomi-sensei as a rather strict and conservative instructor, but her expression now clearly showed that she was taking pleasure in acting the villain. Perhaps teaching day in day out had stressed her out to the point where she longed for some form of revenge against her students. Zessica quickly tried to think of options to get out of this mess.

Incapacitate the teacher? There wasn't any flexible yet strong enough material she could bind Suomi-sensei with. Twisting a branch or tree trunk into snapping and falling on the woman would work, but that was unethical, not to mention dangerous. She tried to pull Jin-Kun to his feet but found that while she could lift his arms, she couldn't lift the rest of him off the ground.

"Any ideas, Amata?" she asked desperately.

"Just one, and it involves talking Kagura into using one of our three Element ability uses to help someone that isn't on his team or named Mikono-san; I'm not getting my hopes up," Amata answered apologetically. He shut his eyes and remained motionless for a while.


"I heard everything you and the girl said, and you already know my answer," Kagura replied before Amata could even get the question in.

"And here I thought you and Jin-kun were friends."

"Just because two people occasionally interact doesn't make them friends. Jin and I used one another to meet our goals, it was as simple as that. He and I both know that in the end, the weak are culled and the strong live on," Kagura said. Then, he added, "Or that's what I thought he understood."

It was somewhat saddening to think of how much Jin had changed since he had left Altair. But oddly enough, it seemed like the other boy was happy with the change Vega had wrought in him; Kagura couldn't see how becoming weaker could make anyone happy. It made no sense and yet, he found himself intrigued by this paradox. Maybe he could find an answer by helping the "Last Son of Altair."

"Fine," Kagura replied, "Give me control of the body."

"You mean you'll—?"

"Do it before I change my mind, weakling."

Was that a smirk Amata twisted his face into before passing control to him? Kagura didn't really care, he just wanted to find an answer to his question. Did relying on others make you stronger as a person? Or had he always been correct in isolating himself? The old man in red was ridiculously strong and yet always seemed to rely on others to do the fighting. Mykage was the same. Kagura was getting more confused as he thought about it. Might as well just stop thinking and start acting.

"Reverse!" he shouted. Jin practically shot up off the ground as the magnetic field keeping him immobile dissipated.

To prevent the woman from merely reusing her power, Kagura took advantage of the brief moment of shock when her Element ability was dispersed to close the distance and strike her on the back of the neck hard enough to knock her unconscious. He was careful to avoid contact with the woman's hand as she collapsed onto the ground; he wasn't sure if that would constitute getting "tagged," but he wasn't going to risk it.

"Thank you, Kagura," Jin said breathlessly as he brushed himself off. He stretched out a hand, intending to shake Kagura's hand, "You really saved me there."

Kagura turned away and ignored the other boy. Saving the other boy was probably going to prove to be a complete waste of effort.

"I'm going on alone," Kagura said, making a point not to look at the other two. "I'm not a part of your little 'team' to begin with and I'm not going to stick around until that woman wakes up or someone else from the hunting team finds us."


Cayenne ran across the track field, not caring whether he was spotted from the air or not. Behind him, Sazanka called out to him to slow down so she could keep up. Camping out on the roof had been an unforeseen disaster. Distracted by the Vector's presence above the building, none of the members of Team One had realized that Malloy had snuck to the floor directly below them, guided by the pilot of the Vector X. Worst yet, the person who had fallen through the structurally weakened rooftop and got tagged had been Shrade. Cayenne had only managed to get away with Sazanka before he fell to a similar fate because there had been a grappling hook inside the pack of supplies he had picked up.

"Damn it," Cayenne cursed as he slowed down to match Sazanka's pace. If only he had been willing to activate his Prophecy of Despair, Shrade might not have…

They made it into the woods safely and began looking for a place where they might be able to find shelter to burn some time off the clock. They would have to move fast; Cayenne knew that whoever was piloting the Vector had probably seen them from the air. Luckily, they found a cave that looked promising. It offered protection from aerial reconnaissance and an elevated vantage point from which they could see anyone approaching.

"Let's hole up here for a while," Cayenne said, dropping his load onto the ground.

He checked his ammunition and the supplies he had left. A first aid kit, flashlight, radio, length of rope, a signaling mirror, survival knife, two flashbangs, and a box of matches. Everything he could possibly need. Sazanka, without being asked, immediately returned to her role as the lookout; Cayenne didn't blame her for Shrade's capture, the fault was in his own oversight.

An announcement over the P.A. system cut into the air, "Andy W. Hol has been eliminated. 1 hour 45 minutes remain in the training exercise."

"So they managed to get him as well," Cayenne mused.

Things were starting to pick up; the hunting team now had five members. The teams focused on survival were now down to seven members total. One more capture meant that both sides would be equal in numbers. Andy's affinity for tunneling meant that members of the hunting team could pop up from underground almost anywhere. Even more worrying was Shrade being on the other team. Cayenne was already hesitant to fire tranq darts at anyone, but his friend was physically frail; a tranquilizer might worsen his condition to the point where it required extended hospitalization. He wasn't willing to risk the safety of his closest companion for the sake of one of the Supreme Commander's ridiculous training exercises. Maybe it was time to find the other groups and band together.

"Vector sighted," Sazanka warned, pointing at the skies.

A black dot was moving swiftly in their direction. Cayenne raised the scope of his weapon to his eye to get a closer look. The Vector was heading straight for them, as if the pilot knew where they were. It landed in a clearing nearby.

Cayenne knew that now was the time to decide on whether to fight or run. He chose to fight. It was the option that made the most sense to him. If he managed to eliminate the pilot, Cayenne would get rid of the enemy's eye in the sky and could claim the Vector for his own. Once that was in his possession, it would be all but impossible for anyone from the other team to tag him out in the remaining time. Also, he had the high ground and a numeric advantage; the odds were in his favor.

"Be my spotter. We're going to take out the pilot of that Vector," Cayenne whispered to Sazanka as he shouldered his weapon. He didn't think he would really need her help for this, considering his accuracy on the shooting range, but he didn't want to risk another mistake like he made with Shrade.

The girl nodded and crawled next to him, looking through her binoculars in the direction the Vector had landed. One minute passed in silence, and then another. Five minutes lasting an eternity stretched into five more lasting even longer. Unable to handle staying perfectly still any longer, Sazanka stretched her shoulders and her back.

That proved to be a mistake. With a cry that was cut short, she collapsed onto the ground, struck down by an unseen enemy. Cayenne cautiously moved to her side where he found a small triangular dart piercing her neck, the point just barely deep enough to penetrate the skin. He checked her breathing; relaxed and slow, as if she were in a deep sleep.

The person he was facing was obviously a skilled sniper, capable of staying undetected until opportunity presented itself. Also, that type of accuracy, firing uphill with a small dart that could be blown off-course by the slightest breeze without Cayenne seeing where the shot had come from…his enemy could be none other than Instructor Dantes. It seemed that the tales passed around the boys' side of the school about the man's exploits had some truth to them after all.

Sazanka was out of the fight. Cayenne had no idea when she would regain consciousness. He couldn't get away with her, not with Instructor Dantes out there somewhere, waiting. He had no choice but to use his "Prophecy of Despair" to locate his target and secure a quick victory over his teacher.

He focused on seeing beyond what his eyes alone could perceive. A glowing cross, tapered to a point at the ends, appeared across his forehead.

"Prophecy of Despair." Growing up, his ability lived up to its name, activating automatically in the presence of anyone who would soon befall misfortune. His earliest memories were full of people being abducted to Altair, falling victim to unavoidable accidents, or getting mugged and/or murdered. No matter what he did, his predictions inevitably came true. It had taken him many years to gain rudimentary control over it and now, it only activated when he wanted it to or if something drastic was going to happen to someone he cared about.

His ability had strengthened since the "Training of the Grave." Now, he was able to use it to see up to ten seconds into the future. Those several seconds were just long enough for him to prepare and act, but short enough that the future was still uncertain, meaning that he could alter unwanted consequences.

"Come on. Where are you, instructor?" Cayenne muttered.

His ability also had another useful effect. He could literally "see" misfortune as a vague black mist radiating from its point of origin. Right now, a man-shaped patch of said mist was rising from behind heavy brush; Donar Dantes had to be hiding there. The cover was too thick for Cayenne to shoot through and be guaranteed a hit, so he waited in ambush.

Another ten minutes passed.

Cayenne continued to monitor Instructor Dantes through his scope. The man had not budged an inch since Cayenne had spotted him. He was an impressively patient and disciplined soldier.

"You're not bad, Suzushiro Cayenne. But you still have a lot to learn," a cool, collected voice stated from somewhere above him.

Cayenne turned towards the source of the voice, completely startled due to how focused he had been facing the other direction. There, standing on a rocky overhang overlooking the cave, was Instructor Dantes. Through the "Prophecy of Despair" Cayenne could see a massive "cloud" of misfortune surrounding the man, completely blocking out his form.

"But—how—?" Cayenne turned towards the other source of misfortune he had seen. He grunted as a dart hit him in the leg. He tried to raise his own weapon at the Instructor…no use. His arms wouldn't budge.

"A decoy dummy dressed in my clothes. I had figured you might be able to spot it if you looked carefully enough, so I purposely left that there while I snuck around and flanked you."

The instructor carefully climbed down to Cayenne's level, taking his time. Neither Cayenne nor Sazanka were going to be moving anywhere fast. He stopped to tag Sazanka first. Immediately, an announcement made it known to everyone participating that she had been eliminated. Turning around, he reached out to tag out Cayenne. Just before he made contact, a sound made him freeze and look off to the side.

A spilt second later, the Instructor was hurled to the side. Cayenne strained to move his neck and see just who had saved him. It was the last person he would have expected.

"You!" he managed to exclaim.

Kagura loomed over him, looking at Cayenne's prone form with that infuriatingly mocking grin plastered to his face. The other boy bent to retrieve Cayenne's dropped weapon and, without hesitation, fired on Instructor Dantes as he was recovering. The man collapsed back onto the ground in a heap.

"I had thought that the teachers here could provide me with at least a little bit of a challenge," Kagura scoffed.

"You—what are you doing here?" Cayenne asked incredulously.

"If it isn't the brother of my wench," he answered, causing Cayenne to scowl at him. He did not like this boy at all.

"Mikono is not your wench," he said angrily, trying to get up to his feet so that he could deck the smug intruder. He still couldn't move.

"She will be…once I reclaim her from that bastard Mykage. You have no say in the matter; one who was too weak to hold on to her. Though I have to say, you did play your part as bait well. I guess it wouldn't hurt to keep you around…Reverse!"

Cayenne felt strength returning to his limbs as whatever paralytic substance was on Instructor Dantes' dart exited his body. He flexed his fingers experimentally. When he found that he could move them perfectly well, he swung his arm around and tried to connect his fist to the other boy's face. Needless to say, Kagura avoided it easily.

"Is that any way to treat your rescuer? I suppose Amata was wrong about doing good deeds and others returning the favor," the wild boy laughed. Turning his back to Cayenne, he dropped the dart rifle and sprinted off, reaching tree cover before Cayenne could pick up the weapon and shoot him.

"Damn it," Cayenne said, utterly frustrated. Like it or not, he felt like he owed the other boy a debt and, as a proud member of the prestigious Suzushiro family, he was honor-bound to pay that debt off.


"I don't see how you can still think that 'teamwork' and 'friendship' are valuable," Kagura said disdainfully to Amata's presence inside his head. "After all, I beat both instructors on my own without any help and, each time, they had cornered people who were teamed up."

Kagura bit down on an apple, savoring the sweet juicy taste of the fruit. The boy had had the audacity to go to the cafeteria in the middle of the exercise and request food. As he sat down to eat, a small but growing crowd of curious students gathered on the periphery, whispering amongst themselves. All the details of Fudo Zen's training exercise were supposedly kept top-secret which, of course, meant that everyone in the school now knew that Kagura Demuri had taken down two instructors in less than half an hour.

It was now an hour after Kagura had defeated Instructor Dantes; in that time, no other students had been caught. Amata kept saying that he 'had a bad feeling' about how quiet the hunting team was…the coward. If the other team was too intimidated by him to give chase, all the better for Kagura. He would win this little game of the Supreme Commander's and show Amata that friends were worthless.

"It is valuable, Kagura. Both times you had the advantage of surprise because the instructor was focused on someone other than you," Amata argued back. "You wouldn't have fared nearly as well if it was one-on-one."

Kagura gave a snort of derision. "As long as I have my power of 'Reversal,' I'm untouchable."

"What about that time I slugged you across the face?" Amata countered.

"Lucky shot."

"I still hit you."

They went back and forth with that argument almost childishly. After a while, Amata kept silent, probably to keep the conversation from degenerating into name-calling and insults. Kagura frowned. Amata did have a point about both times he had knocked out one of the instructors. Still, credit for the accomplishments was rightfully his.

He raised the apple to his lips again to take another bite, but as he did, the ground beneath him caved in, revealing a deep tunnel. At the bottom stood Andy, covered completely in dirt and dust, hands outstretched to tag Kagura as he fell.

Kagura didn't want to use it, but he reacted instinctively to the danger.

"Reverse!" he shouted and was immediately levitated out of the hole and back inside the cafeteria. He didn't even register the fact that he had used up his third and final Element power use until a second later.

With a look of dawning realization, he quickly ran for the exit to the cafeteria, only to find it blocked off by Malloy and Sazanka.

"You've given our team quite a bit of trouble, Kagura-kun," Sazanka said in her typical overly cheerful manner. This girl seriously creeped Kagura out. She had seemed way too excited when she had found out that he and Amata were sharing the same body and constantly pressured the two of them to talk about their experiences; that in itself wasn't so bad, but every time she had asked, there had been a little bit of drool running down from the side of her mouth.

Kagura fled back towards the windows. Without his ability, the drop would be impossible for an average human being. Kagura, however, was anything but ordinary, and he jumped out the window without hesitation, kicking off the wall and catching on to ledges all the way down to the ground below.

Outside, waiting for him, were Instructor Dantes and Suomi-sensei, both of them looking eager for a rematch—and slightly vengeful. Kagura barely managed to dodge Instructor Dantes' mechanical hand as it shot from his arm at him, guided by a steel cable. Slipping to the side, he made a break for the forest, intending to lose his pursuers there with his superior speed and agility.

Only one obstacle remained in his way. A tall, blond-haired boy with a thin frame and a half unbuttoned shirt. The one person on the opposing team that Kagura had no desire to tangle with, especially now that he was not allowed to access his powers.

Kagura made to run around Shrade, intending to bypass him entirely, but before he could, his body seized up, held captive by Shrade using his ability. Soundwaves that manipulated the senses and hijacked the body. Kagura was fast, but even he could not travel the 343.2 meters per second needed to avoid Shrade's power.

Kagura fell to his knees, barely able to stay conscious. As he struggled against Shrade's demonic symphony, he became vaguely aware of the sound of footsteps from behind him. It seemed the rest of the hunting team had caught up.

In his head, he heard Amata saying, somewhat sadly, "And that is why teamwork is important, Kagura."


The girl slowly became aware of something dripping onto the floor nearby. She had no feeling within any of her limbs and her very existence seemed detached from a physical body. She had been confined to darkness for so long that she could no longer remember when she had first been placed into this realm of oblivion.

Drip drip drip.

The sound would have been soothing at any other time, but in the darkness, each drop sounded far louder than usual and echoed all about her. It became maddening after a while. She prayed for someone—anyone , to release her from this torment.

You have been abandoned…

She tried to deny it. Tried to scream at the voice that invaded her head and mocked her efforts.

They left you here to die, left you here to rot.

She screamed out a name that she could barely remember. Her voice didn't come out. That name was someone important to her; she knew that much, at least. Someone who would give everything to take her from this place. The name soon slipped from her mind like dry sand between one's fingers.

You have been abandoned by him. Just like you were 12,000 years ago.

No! She tried to scream again. Her voice still refused to come out. She felt squeezed, pressed into nothingness by the oppressiveness of her environment.

They will not come for you. Not Apollonius, nor Apollo. You ARE alone; as you deserve.

Apollonius. That name rang in her heart. But if that name rang, the second sounded like all the trumpets and all the horns in the world at once, resonating with her very soul.

You still feel hope? There is no hope for you. When you come to realize that your treacherous love has been repaid in kind with betrayal and treachery. When you come to realize that your so-called love has abandoned you to your fate. That is when you will realize the truth. That dark, unwanted truth that you name despair…

The girl wanted to scream, to cry, to curl up and disappear. The voice in her mind had finally gone quiet, but her prayers for release went unanswered. She tried to focus on those names. Apollonius…Apollo...Apollonius…Apo…

Drip…Drip…Drip…


*Notes: I don't really have much to say about this chapter (blatant lie right there, I always have stuff to say.) It was fun to write, especially the parts with Andy trying to show off. Unlike the anime, he hasn't felt the crushing despair that was part of his character development so I'll need to arrange for him to change due to some other stimulus. Kagura finally lands in trouble; I've always felt that he spams his power too much in the anime. Fall into a hole? Reverse. Someone's flying around? Reverse. Giant sword wielding mecha slicing your own giant mecha in half? Reverse. That was part of the reason behind the "three uses of Element abilities only." Speaking of Kagura, I feel like Amata and Kagura are acting sort of like brothers now, complete with trying to one-up the other. I didn't really intend on doing it this way, but its an interesting enough dynamic so I think I'll run with it and see how it goes.

No points for guessing whose perspective the final segment is from; I'm pretty sure that it's obvious. The training arc will finish up next chapter and I can safely say that something major will happen by the end of the next chapter. Title preview:

Chapter 13: Yin and Yang