Krizzie: Before you read this, please, PLEASE read the edited version of the 20th chapter. I know this is a lot to ask of you, but I revised it a bit to clarify some things. If you did read, please say so in your review. Gomen, minna!
Chapter Twenty-One
Kaede nervously rapped her knuckles on the door and waited patiently for anyone to answer. She sucked in a breath as Maki came into view; eyes still a little red from the drama fest earlier. Kaede pretended not to notice it.
She smiled. "Yes? What can I do for you?"
Kaede stumbled backward a bit before she bowed down low. "Hello, I'm Kakutama Kaede."
"Hey." Maki greeted back, extending a hand which Kaede shook gratefully. "I'm Toho's team manager, Maki. Can I help you with anything?"
"A-Anou… I was wondering if… if b-by any chance I c-could sp-speak with K-K-Ken-san?" She forced a small smile back, silently cursing herself for stammering so much.
She waited for a moment, lifting her head up after realizing that Maki was being abnormally silent. "Maki-san?"
"I'm afraid not." Maki replied abruptly, her lips pursed into a thin line as she studied Kaede's face. "I have to politely ask you to leave, Kakutama-san, you're not wanted in here."
Kaede's eyes widened before she backed away a step, her heart banging against her ribs. "Why? Did I say something wrong?"
"Don't play dumb, Kakutama. I know who you are." Maki finally snapped, closing the door behind her. But despite that, her voice still seeped through, going through Kaede like a cold, sharp breeze. "I remember every detail of your innocent face."
For a moment, Kaede had the urge to shout at the top of her lungs and bang at the door, just to let Maki hear her out. She wanted to shout at everybody that she never wished for it to happen, that everything was just an accident, that she had nothing to do with anything, that even if she did intervene, it would do nothing to ease the damage that it did.
But in the end, it all came out in a whisper, so soft and fragile that in a moment it was lost in the wind, silent and unheard as if it never did come out at all, and just when the wind rushed out of her lips, the tears began to come down in rapid succession, staining her rose-tinted cheeks.
Not for the first time in her life, Kaede walked away, weak with shame and guilt.
--
Tsubasa was about to go out and tell the others to get ready to leave when the door opened and Ace stepped in, carrying with him two cups of freshly-brewed coffee.
"Is that for me?" the young prodigy asked with little delay, eyeing the steamy cup in the other guy's hand. "I could use some caffeine right now."
Ace shrugged and handed it to him. "By the way… I just wanted to… you know… congratulate you and everything, uh, about the win?"
"It wasn't exactly a win, but thanks all the same. If you're looking for Kabayakawa-san, she's with Nakazawa and the others. I think they're having some pretty heated arguments about the lack of effects of bleaching detergents to Ishizaki's uniform."
"Interesting." Ace nodded skeptically before stirring his own cup. "Is Misaki-kun with them?"
Tsubasa eyed him. "Your friend's there, it would defy all laws of nature if he's not."
Ace chuckled. "Of course! Now, if you'll excuse me…" he stood up and bowed.
"Tell them to pack up for me, would you?" Tsubasa asked. "We'll be leaving in thirty minutes."
"Sure."
--
"You seem down, did anything happen while I was gone?"
Kaede glanced up to see Sata before she offered a smile. "Nothing much."
Sata grinned. "Following the cliché, I suppose "nothing much" means information explosion."
Kaede nodded and, seeing how solemn she was, Sata sat down beside her and just offered company. From far away, they could hear some of the remaining people from the match talk about the events. And a particular group of girls discuss something about putting a smoke bomb in the referee's yard.
"Have you ever felt responsible for a tragedy, Sata-san?"
"Hm?" Sata looked at her. "It depends. What kind of tragedy?"
Kaede dug half of her face on her knees. "A bad one concerning someone you really care about."
Sata contemplated for a moment before finally shaking her head. "Can't say I do. About all the tragedies I caused mainly involves stupid cheerleaders during the first day of school, and those are the major ones."
"I see." Kaede bit her lip. "Well, suppose you were in my shoes, and you were given the choice of doing something about a really bad thing, but you find yourself too weak to do it… and now you're suffering from the what if's. What would you do?"
Sata looked at those ruby eyes, almost pleading at her to reply a concrete answer to such a vague situation. "Well, I would probably do something now to make amends… and state my reasons for not being able to help, I guess. But in the real sense… I probably would've left it alone. If I wasn't the one who caused it, it's not my fault, right?"
"Right."
Sata stood up. "I hope I've been of help."
"Yes." Kaede smiled. "Just talking to you made me feel better. Thank you."
"No problem. I'll be off now, okay, Kaede-chan? You'll be alright by yourself, right?"
"Sure." Kaede straightened herself out and assured Sata with a genuine smile. "Please tell Sanae-chan I'm just here if ever she decides we're going home."
"No problemo!"
She dropped her hands to the ground and stared at the sky, watching the clouds drift slowly by as Sata's footsteps slowly faded away. She was about to doze off when a shadow hovered above her, and it took her a while to recognize the smiling figure above her.
"Melina-san!"
--
"You're ugly."
Ishizaki was just about ready to retort at the blonde's stated reason about her dislike for him when Ace showed up.
"Hey. Is Misaki-kun there?"
"And what the hell would you want with Taro-kun?" Anna demanded hotly, attention successfully diverted. "He's not going to succumb to your faulty seduction frolics anytime soon!"
"I do not intend to seduce him." Ace said with a perfectly straight face she had come to loath.
Anna scoffed. "Liar! You shouldn't fool yourself into thinking that your flirty moves and superficial kindness would earn you his heart! Misaki-kun knows better!"
He glared at her. "And if you know better, you would keep your goddamn mouth shut! Because just as I shouldn't fool myself into believing he would fall for my antics, you should not fool yourself into thinking he would fall for yours!" Ace snapped back with such intensity that Anna couldn't quite believe that it was him who spoke. "Now if you would excuse us, Misaki-kun and I have a very important subject to discuss."
"Yu-Yukushi-san?" the young midfielder stammered.
"And Tsubasa says to get ready. We'll be leaving in thirty minutes."
Then he grabbed Taro's wrist and walked away.
--
"We're leaving in thirty minutes." Melina stated quite happily.
"And where did you hear that?" Krizzie asked, sounding not quite as jolly as she.
"From Ace." Melina shrugged. "It's not that hard. Our time of departure isn't exactly confidential information."
Krizzie growled. "Damn it, this is all your fault! If you hadn't been so slow…"
"Sorry 'bout that. I didn't exactly plan for a grand entrance, you know."
"Whatever. Ken's leaving sooner than we are anyway so finishing all these is just wishful thinking. We'll resume when the time's right." She looked at the ground with a slight frown. "Look's like Kaede would have to wait as well."
Melina giggled. "Right. Um… about Kaede…"
--
"So… we're delaying…?" Genzou asked hesitantly.
"You heard me. We're leaving in fifteen minutes. We couldn't do anything in fifteen minutes." Ken snapped.
"But we're all set!" Sata protested.
"That's not my problem. Krizzie would think of something. But for now, everything's postponed."
"How do we know when?" Sata asked. "I doubt Krizzie would have the guts to move back with us after what happened in the field."
"This is the reason they built portable phones." Sata narrowed her eyes at Ken. "Krizzie probably has your numbers."
"She doesn't have mine." Sata snapped.
Ken gave her a look. "Believe me, she does."
"Damn it!" Genzou cursed. "That means I'll have to suffer through more preparations!"
Ken smirked. "And that's the slow torture of the curious cat."
--
Anna watched the bug try to roll over for a few more moments before finally giving in and looking at the upturned view of Taro and Ace, ignoring the heavy feeling of blood flooding her head. "I wonder what they're talking about…" she muttered to herself.
Kumi's face was rudely shoved next to hers, and she definitely didn't appreciate it when the face grinned maliciously. "Want to go find out?"
Anna contemplated a moment before she shook her head. She sat up smoothly and turned the bug around. "Nah. I think they deserve a little privacy."
Kumi pouted. "Come on! Just a few seconds and we're out of there."
"No, Kumi." Anna declined firmly with a glare. "Even boys have the right to keep and share secrets that we girls couldn't meddle into."
"But what if Ace is telling Taro bad things about you?" Kumi tried. "Shouldn't you have the right to defend yourself in front of one of the cutest boys in the team???"
"Ace wouldn't do that."
Kumi snorted. "Oh please, do you really believe his amount of loyalty would last to that point? He's a guy! Alone with another guy, who happens to be the sole receiver of both your affections, mind you, and just talked back to you earlier! Blabbing about the time you accidentally peed your pants wouldn't even amount to a second of dillydallying!"
This time, Anna considered it. The way the manager had put it… it wouldn't hurt, right? Besides, she could be right. Ace wasn't exactly known to be honest, or really loyal for that matter.
Anna sighed. "Fine, but just for a while." She looked away.
"Wait, you didn't really have a moment like that… did you?" Kumi asked hesitantly.
"N-not quite. A-anou… let's go."
--
The team was already waiting by the bus when he finished and he checked his list just to make sure they're complete.
"Where's Taro?" he blinked. "And Yukushi, and Kabayakawa, and Sugimoto?" he paused again. "Genzou and Tsukahara-san's missing too… and did Costello-san come with us?"
"Taro-kun's with Yukushi-kun." Sanae replied, a grin crossing her face. "The two probably tailed them. Genzou and Sata were together earlier, and I'm not sure if Melina-chan came with us."
Tsubasa sighed, sounding thoroughly exasperated and wondering why the heck he wasn't teamed up with normal people. "Five more minutes then. Would somebody please call them?"
--
"It's really quiet in here." she commented, fingers brushing over a long scarf. It felt nice, but it was so dark she couldn't quite make what the color was. "Stuffy too."
"There's still time to escape, you know. Just in case. That lovely piece of cloth could eventually lead to your unfortunate death, and believe me, no one would even want to notice it's not suicide."
She laughed. "Quit worrying. It's lovely. It won't kill me."
"Don't be so sure about it. Beauty deceives, my dear."
"Don't be silly. Melina's a good and smart girl. She probably won't even do anything to harm us. Much less kill us."
"It's the "probably" I'm worried about."
"Look, it's okay, okay? Relax. I'm sure she has a good reason for everything she does. She's practical and worthy of our trust."
"I really couldn't say much about your opinions, dear friend. May I remind you of your first impression about a sweet Krizzie Kurisaki who's just misunderstood and just needs a reliable friend?"
"It wasn't that far from the truth. She's just not comfortable with opening herself up to people."
"All I'm saying is, what if you're wrong about Melina's character too? What if she's a sick killer's accomplice in some sick plot of rape and murder?"
"For a young girl, you're too vulgar. Besides, that's hardly considerable. "
"What if she's a kidnapper and decides to kill us? Won't you agree that's highly possible?"
She sighed. "I doubt it."
"OMFG!!! What if she's a member of some insane American organization of Historian freaks and wants to take us hostage so Japan would pay for the damage they did on Pearl Harbor?"
"Kaede…"
"OMG, SHE COULD BE PART OF THE CHINESE MAFIA THAT'S PLANNING TO FEED US TO A HUNGRY PACK OF BLOODTHIRSTY CANNIBALS SO THEY CAN OVERTAKE ALL ORIENTAL COUNTRIES TO CLAIM THE TITLE FOR THEMSELVES!!!"
"Dammit Kaede, stop trying to conjure ridiculous incidents and just SHUT THE HELL UP!"
Kaede's mental battle finally subsided after she heard an ungraceful thud beyond the dark corners of her wooden prison. "A-anybody there?" she stammered, her hands blindly searching for something, anything that she could use to protect herself.
"Hello?" she repeated but only got the same answer: silence.
After a while, she relaxed, thinking that whatever it was finally gave up and left her alone. She leaned back, pushing away some clothing that managed to flock on her face. She crossed her arms and waited.
And waited.
"What if Melina's some kind of ghost from another dimension that wants to unite with us so she could permanently reside on earth and forget all about her nasty adventures in faraway galaxies?"
Kaede sighed before she shifted around and tried to clear her mind. "Calm down Kaede, stop imagining impossible situations which Melina could leave you stuck in. You're just paranoid. Melina's a sweet, caring human friend and she wouldn't abandon you, much less sell you to a bunch of power-hungry pharaohs in Egypt. Besides, this is the 21st century, think rationally!!!"
"Then why would she cram us in a pitiful wardrobe and disappear for almost a half hour?"
"…"
Kaede stiffened. "Think positive things Kaede." she mumbled to herself, desperate, as beads of sweat dampened her shirt. She played with her hair. "Maybe she's not sending you to Egypt, maybe she has the heart and would just send you to Timbuktu instead, huh?"
She paused, her red orbs widening in realization. Frantic, she repeated her words in her head.
"Is that supposed to be good?"
Kaede fainted.
Krizzie: I'm really, really bored, not to mention that I'm pissed off because of stupid joint pains from combined training and practices, so excuse the crap I did on the last part. I just thought about it after reviewing LS's description of Kaede. Hopefully, I didn't exaggerate it too much.
Review!!!