"May you rest in peace… uhh, what's the bird's name?" asked Zasalamel who was performing the funeral rites for Tira's birds. They were all standing in a graveyard and burying her birds that died in the tornado incident. It has been officially three days since that disaster and the only reason why Zasalamel agreed to perform the funeral rites was because Tira wouldn't bury her birds without the rites. The smell of rotting ravens was starting to drive him insane so he finally agreed.

Tira let out a loud sob and blew her nose on Nightmare's nice new mourning clothes. "It was Beaky! How can you not remember Zassy!"

Zasalamel sighed and continued saying the words to the funeral rites while everyone else watched with great boredom. After this, they were going to be heading to the courtroom for Rock's trial and hopefully, he won't be sent to jail. For the past three days, things have been rather chaotic and the only good thing that really happened was that Nightmare got cured.

The rest of the time was spent on repairing the bullet holes on the ceiling in their living room, cleaning up, and replacing or repairing broken furnitures. On a side note, there was no artist on earth who could repair Xianghua's painting. Her rage was hot enough to speed up global warming by 80% and Cervantes came closer to death than he had imagined. Fearful for his life, he had handed over some of his pirates treasure so that she could buy another one and to Xianghua's luck, she found the same painting being sold on the internet and is now waiting for the thing to arrive in a few days. Bangoo was currently grounded forcibly in his room and they would only let him out when Rock comes back.

Zasalamel looked down at the eighth dead raven and asked dryly, "What's the name of this one?"

Tira let out another loud wail and Nightmare gave her a few pats on the back with his demented arm while she soaked his shirt with tears and snot. Nightmare sighed and continued comforting her because it was all thanks to her that he's back to normal (he doesn't know that she used him as a battering ram).

Meanwhile, at Raphael's castle….

"Talim, could you pass the salt?" Raphael asked gingerly. Everyone was sitting at the dining table and eating their breakfasts while chit chatting with each other about Rock's upcoming trial that they were going to go see later. For the past three days, things have been relatively peaceful after Algol cured everybody using the powers of Soul Calibur. Things were kind of tense between him and Talim though. After that little pill incident, she's been ignoring him. Most people would've thought that she would just smile and forgive him but apparently she didn't. There's a saying that the gentler a person is, the worse their anger would be when they actually get angry. Talim gave him a brief glance before continuing to drink her milk.

Everyone stared for a moment before Cassandra quietly handed over the salt shaker. "Here you go."

"Thanks Cassandra." As he digged in to his bacon, he began thinking that at this rate; Talim would join the other team if he doesn't figure out something. Just then, a fierce peregrine falcon flew in through one of his open window and landed in front of the priestess.

"Watch out Talim!"Maxi (with his hair restored back to normal) jumped out of his seat and attempted to pull Talim away from the dangerous bird.

But Talim laughed and shook him off her. "It's ok Maxi. This bird won't hurt me." The priestess reached out for the falcon and it obediently landed on her arm. "Hello Alun, what are you doing here?"

Everyone eyes widened and Setsuka said, "That's your bird!"

Kilik flipped his cellphone opened and quickly accessed the internet. "It says on Soul Calibur wiki that she has a bird but it doesn't say what type it is…." Kilik looked at the bird and arched an eyebrow. "I would've never guessed that it's a falcon."

Talim giggled and gave her pet a few pats on the head but then she noticed a small rolled up letter tied to its feet. "Hmm? What's this?" She took out the letter and a confused expression crossed her face.

Yoshimitsu cocked his head and put down his spoon. "Who is the letter addressed to? Thou are making me very curious."

"It's my grandmother's writing but it's addressed to Raphael…" Talim looked at the vampire in question and she grudgingly handed it over to him.

He raised an eyebrow as he held the letter in his hand. Everyone leaned in to try and peek but he shoved them back. When he was sure that they couldn't see the letter, he began reading it.

To Raphael Sorel,

This is Talim's all powerful grandmother, who is also the elder of the village. I've found out about those pills you've gave to my granddaughter and I know what happened. Don't think that you can hide anything from me, I can read the wind. If anything else happens to my sweet granddaughter, I'll send a twister your way every day, every month and every year for the rest of your life. When I die, my descendants can take over. So it looks like you're now my granddaughter's permanent baby-sitter until she returns home. Best of luck to you, because you're seriously going to need it.

From Talim's grandmother, Kalana

P.S. This letter will self-destruct after you've finished reading it. (Written in invisible ink).

Raphael sighed and looked at Talim with great annoyance. "I have to baby-sit her?" And the letter exploded in his face.

A few hours later at the Court Room…

Taking a seat in the audience section, Team Draw sat down nervously as they awaited the outcome of Rock's trial. When Bangoo found out about what happened to his dad, he begged them to let him come, promising that he won't cause any trouble so Zasalamel had finally relented and the kid was sitting to his right and beside the aisle. Luckily for his team, they got front seats before random civilians came in to watch as well. "Bonjour, monsieur baldie."

Zasalamel ears twitch at the sound of that familiar and annoying voice and when he turned around in his seat, he suppressed the urge to summon his black hole in the middle of the courtroom. "Raphael, why are you and your teammates here?"

Raphael grinned and sauntered over to the other audience seats on the left side of the court. "How can we miss seeing you lose one of your valuable teammates? I can't wait to see the look on your face when that happens."

Before Zasalamel could say something back, the judge sat down and began hammering for silence. "Everyone, rise!"

Everyone got out of their seats for the little speech about courtroom protocol and etc. When everyone sat down, the players of the court was presented and Team Draw looked at Rock (the accused) who was being led to his seat, supposedly beside his defense lawyer who's not here.

The judge looked at Rock and said, "Sir Rock, do you have a lawyer who'll be representing your case?"

Rock gulped and looked at Zasalamel. "Where in the world is my lawyer!" he mouthed frantically.

Zasalamel glanced down at his watch and frowned. That's weird, he had ordered Cervantes to take his ship and travel to England to pick up the supposedly 'best lawyer in the world' two days ago. They should've been here by now. And then, the doors to the courtroom slammed open and Cervantes, dressed in a lawyer's outfit complete with the white wig and all, entered. "Sorry I'm late, I'm Rock's lawyer. And he scrambled to sit beside Rock in the defendant's chair."

This was really bad… Zasalamel turned around in his seat and hissed to Taki. "Taki, listen up. I need you to cause a distraction so I can speak to Cervantes for a moment. Especially the part of why he's now Rock's lawyer."

Taki smirked and nodded. "That'd be a smart thing to do. Cervantes is probably the worst lawyer in the world and he'll more likely triple Rock's punishment than help him," replied Taki as she looked around to make sure no one was looking at her. In a quick second, she launched three ninja smoke bomb to the ground and panic immediately ensued.

"Ouch! Who's stepping on my foot!" cried Maxi.

Siegfried backed off Maxi's foot and said a quick apology but then he stepped onto Cassandra's foot and knocked her backward into Dampierre. "Siegfried! Watch where you're going!" shouted Cassandra as she tried to find her seat again.

"Amy! This seems rather suspicious wouldn't you say?" whispered Raphael quietly as they were engulfed in smoke.

Amy nodded and said, "First we have Cervantes as Rock's lawyer, now we have someone setting off a random smoke bomb… Zasalamel is definitely up to something. We should seize this opportunity to make sure that Rock gets jailed father."

Raphael smiled evilly and called for Ivy who was sitting a few seats away. Walking over to him, she tilted her head and waited for him to say something. "What is it now Raphael?"

"Do you want revenge on Cervantes?"

Her lips curled upward into a smile. "Now we're talking."

Meanwhile, Zasalamel had sneaked up to Cervantes and he quickly poked him in the back. "Cervantes! What is the meaning of this? Where in the world is Rock's real lawyer that I paid for!"

Cervantes gave him an apologetic smile and began explaining. "Everything was going really well actually. The guy got onto the boat and we were sailing through some very fine weather. But then things got nasty and we were hit with a really big storm and…"

"He went overboard?" asked a horrified Zasalamel.

"Yeah. I mean, I tried to save him but then the kraken popped out of the waters it ate him!"

Zasalmel gave him a quizzical look. "The legendary squid of the sea ate him?"

"Yeah!"

Zasalamel rubbed his eyes tiredly. "Look, just try to do your best by not saying anything that'll jeopardize Rock's chances." And he hurried back to his seat as the smoke cleared up.

After a few minutes of intense hammering by the judge, things were finally back in control. "Well, now that things have finally calmed down, let us turn to our persecutor and her lawyer." Everyone turned to look and it was… Ivy. The judge cleared his throat. "You are… the persecutor?"

The real persecutor was currently tied up, gagged, blindfolded and being hidden in the girl's bathroom by Amy, Sophitia and Setsuka.

Ivy smiled and nodded. "Yes, my name is Ms. Valentine your honor."

"Umm, but why aren't you wearing your lawyer outfit Ms. Valentine?" said the judge.

Ivy was wearing her first outfit from Soul Calibur 4 and it was rather distracting. She shrugged. "Who says an intelligent woman can't be beautiful?"

It was a rather weak argument but the judge couldn't help but be weakened by her beauty (and skimpy outfit) so he merely said, "Alright, let's proceed then. The prosecutor may start first."

Ivy bowed her head and turned to look at Rock. "Sir Rock, would you please take a seat at the witness stand so that I may ask you some question?"

After swearing on the holy book that he would speak the truth, and only the truth, etc, he sat down and waited nervously for Ivy to begin. She cleared her throat and looked down at the notes she stole from the real persecutor. "Sir Rock, where were you on June 23, at 2:30 pm."

Rock answered that he was shopping with the rest of his teammates at Soul Land's furniture shop. His teammates popped out of their seats and began affirming what he said.

"Yeah, we went shopping that day!" cried Xianghua.

"Rock was beside me when I broke that expsensive oriental vase!" Mitsurugi added loudly.

The judge banged his gravel and called for silence. "Please sit down and remain quiet!"

Team Draw sat back down in their seats and Ivy continued her questioning. "Rock, were you really present at the furniture shop at 2:30? Because according to some witnesses, they've seen you at the Zoo near Soul Land."

Rock looked at Cervantes for help and the pirate mouthed 'Deny it!' So Rock shook his head and said, "I'm sure there must've been some mistakes. I was not at the zoo."

Ivy quirked an eyebrow. "Very well, let's call in the witness then."

A zoo keeper was brought in and he sat down in the witness chair as Rock got out and sat beside Cervantes again. Ivy paced slowly back and forth and addressed the zoo keeper. "Sir, have you seen" Ivy gestured to Rock, "this man at the zoo on the 23rd of June?"

The zoo keeper peered at Rock and nodded. "Yep, it's him."

Cervantes popped out of his seat and cried "Objection!"

The judge said, "To what do you object?"

Cervantes grinned and said it'll be clear when he asked the witness some questions. The judge thought about it and nodded. Ivy sat down and gave Cervantes an evil glare. Cervantes got up and began walking toward the witness but then Ivy stuck her foot out and tripped him. Nightmare jumped out of his seat and shouted, "She tripped him! Foul play!"

Tira quickly stood up and supported her boyfriend. "Yeah! I saw it too! Someone should restrain that violent woman!"

From the other side, Yoshimitsu stood up and shouted back to her. "Thou are crazy! That pirate tripped by himself!"

Sophitia added in as well. "Tira! You're so crazy that you probably imagined it!"

"SILENCE!" The judge hammered loudly and looked at them with evident irritation. "If you don't keep quiet then you'll be thrown out!"

"Yes your honor." And everyone sat back down.

Adjusting his wig as he walked toward the witness, Cervantes got ready show them what a great lawyer he could be. "Sir, you say that you saw Rock at the zoo right?"

"Yep."

"How do you know it was him?" asked Cervantes as he leaned in close to the witness.

"I recognize his figure," the zookeeper replied nervously.

Cervantes quickly backed away and clapped his hand. "Aha! Did you all hear that? He only saw the body figure of the criminal! He never saw the face!"

Rock wiped away a bead of sweat and sighed in relief. It was a good thing he wore his SC4 outfit with the rhinoceros head that day. Since it covered his face, maybe no one was able to identify him. Pushing his advantage forward, he turned back toward the witness. "So, is there anything else you can describe about the attacker? Most importantly, you can't identify his face, can you?"

The zookeeper thought about it for a second before saying, "But it was a very noticeable mask. It was a rhinoceros mask!"

Cervantes shrugged. "What was he wearing under the mask?"

"Uhh…. His face?"

Cervantes laughed. "That's the point! It doesn't matter what kind of mask it was! As long as you can't identify the face, then you can't be sure that it's Rock!"

Cassandra and Siegfried stood up and cried, "For God's sake! Rock's the only guy we know who wears a rhinoceros mask! It was his SC4 outfit and there are a million wallpapers on the internet that shows it!"

Zasalamel snapped his finger. Lizardman and Yun-Seong jumped out of their seats and launched themselves over to tackle Cassandra and Siegfried. Pandemonium ensued as the two sides began fighting and the innocent bystanders quickly ran out of there. "How dare you attack my people?" And Raphael launched himself at Zasalamel.

"Why can't your people just keep their trapholes shut?" And the two tried strangling each other.

"I don't think so." Amy smoothly tripped Bangoo who was going after her father.

"You're lucky I don't hit girls!" said Bangoo as he tried to get up.

Amy smiled. "That's good for me then." And she stomped on his hand.

Setsuka was holding on tightly to Mitsurugi's right hand while Taki was holding tightly on to his left hand and the two were pulling on hard. "I will have my revenge!" And Setsuka tugged even harder.

Taki pulled the other way and said, "I won't let you hurt my teammate!"

"You're both hurting me so will you please let go!" shouted the samurai. It felt like his arms was going to be ripped off.

Beside them, two Ling-Sheng Su students were getting ready for battle. "Do you really think you can defeat me?" Kilik readied himself into a martial arts stance.

Seong-Mina did the same thing. "Just to let you know Kilik, edgemaster said that I was a better student than you."

Kilik gasped. "Take that back!"

"Make me!"

And the two attacked each other. Xianghua and Maxi were fighting a few feet away and Xianghua said, "Maxi! If you don't get out of my way, we won't be friends anymore!"

Maxi dodged one of her fists and sighed. "Don't be like that Xianghua. Seriously, why don't you join our side? I'm sure Raphael would welcome you with open arms. And you can be with Kilik again."

"MY RESOLVE CANNOT BE SWAYED! I'M NOT CHANGING SIDES!" Xianghua tackled Maxi and pinned him to the floor.

Someone ran past them in a panicky frenzy. "AHHH! Someone, save me!" cried Talim as she ran away from Tira.

"This is revenge for my ravens!" cried the insane girl as she chased after Talim.

Talim shut her eyes and screamed, "Raphael! You're a terrible baby-sitter!"

Raphael heard the priestess scream and he quickly turned his head to see Tira getting closer and closer to Talim. "Hilde! Go rescue Talim! I don't want to have her grandmother come chasing after me with twisters!"

Hilde used her lance to launch herself to Talim's rescue and with a grunt; she thrust it toward Tira who deftly dodged it. "Stay behind me soldier! For my honor, I will protect you!" And she placed herself before Talim.

"I'm coming Hilde!" cried Siegfried as he hurried forward to join Hilde.

"I'm coming Tira!" And Nightmare did the same thing but Hwang and Yun-Seong popped into their path and the four men tumbled into a heap on the floor.

Cassandra, Dampierre and Sophitia were fighting Voldo and Lizardman but they were having a difficult time. Weaving around their feet like some kind of snake, Voldo came up behind Dampierre and wedgied him. Dampierre screamed, "You coward!"

Cassandra kicked forward but Lizardman blocked it with his shield and he double slapped her with his tail. "Cassandra! I'm coming to help you!" Sophitia jumped onto Lizardman's head and began hitting him with her shield.

"ORDER IN THE COURT! ORDER! ORDER!" screamed the judge who was banging his gravel really loudly. The gravel broke and the judge stared at it. "Oh come on! You know what! Case closed! Rock is innocent because I'm having a killer headache!"

Ivy growled and she leapt out of her seat. "You can't be serious! How are you going to explain how he carried a dead lion and gave it to the cashier as payment for a hammock?"

Cervantes stood up and smoothly answered. "Maybe he found the dead lion that the real killer dropped somewhere."

"You know what! I don't care anymore either! I just want to strangle you!" Ivy whipped her whip forward and it slapped his white wig off. Cervantes drew his swords and the two began fighting while the judge and the jury left. Reinforcements were called in and everyone in there was thrown in jail for ten hours for disrupting behaviour. Except for Rock.

Darkwings13: Hope you guys enjoyed reading. I enjoyed writing this chapter even though it was kinda difficult since I was not familiar with court protocol. Anyway, it says that Talim has a bird name Alun and typically, everyone would think that it's something small and cute like a canary but I thought a powerful hunting falcon would be more interesting. And I guess Tira must really love her birds. So after this, the contests will be coming up, but knowing me, I'll somehow drag it out and make it long. Please bear with me, I love you guys who are reading this. Thanks and bye.