Stuffed Animal

by Adri Mars

(AU) 17-year-old Sakura Kinomoto has been waiting for seven years for her childhood sweetheart, Syaoran Li, to return before her father finds her a suitor. News spread of a movie cast and crew arriving in town, including Japan's hottest teen idol today, but when he arrives in Tomoeda and meeting Sakura and the locals, he slowly realizes that he had lived here in his forgotten past.

25. 24: Operation Chiirou

STUFFED ANIMAL

by Adri Mars

CHAPTER 24: OPERATION CHIIROU

Card Captor Sakura © CLAMP/Kodansha. The only thing I own here is this fanfic's plot and whatever original characters I may create here.

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QUICK NOTE: I write all my author notes at the end of each chapter, so please, don't forget to read them once you reach the end of this page. I'm putting this "quick note" back on because some of the reviewers don't read the author notes below- My replies to the reviewers are included in the author notes below!

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Monday (Week before the Tomoeda Festival)

FROM: Kinomoto, Sakura

TO: Daidouji, Tomoyo

SUBJECT: RE: Greetings from London!

Hi Tomoyo! I miss you so much already. Thanks so much for your latest email, so here's my email reply to you!

England must be a beautiful country for you to have such a long email talking about your trips there. I'm glad that you're currently having fun and that you don't feel homesick. Also, I'm glad that you're able to get together with your relatives living there too including your grandparents. Maybe one day I can come and visit you and your family there when I start college. Of course, the only way for us to actually be able to travel there is for me to beg to God that Dad becomes a guest lecture at a few of the universities there, but with the whole Mongolia expedition awaiting for him and his team, it may take awhile. We'll just see!

I'm at the library right now using free wi-fi for my laptop. I had no idea how much work that was needed at the archives department when Mio-chan had to show me some of her usual duties as volunteer. Lots of resourceful publications come in from the periodicals and reference sections are being delivered here and that we had to sort them, file them, label them, enter them in the library database, a lot of things! It's really crazy! Although they can be tedious and exhausting, at least we weren't bored. We ended up chatting about our usual daily lives and everything. She asked me how Syaoran and I became an official couple and I asked her the same with her boyfriend from the Nijibe soccer team. Usual girl talk.

Speaking of Syaoran, he hasn't written to me yet. Well, that's what I think because Shulai hasn't talked to me about any messages coming from Syaoran yet. Sunday was our very first soccer practice and that was the only time Shulai and I got to see each other. He had been busy tending to his visiting father and even made visits to the hospital to see Uncle Xiaojin. He did inform me that Uncle Xiaojin was a bit more stable now but still unconsciously asleep. I really do hope Uncle Xiaojin would wake up soon and show some vital signs to the family. I'm very sure that Syaoran misses his father so much so I'm sure Shulai has been busy calling him, Eriol, Meiling, and update them regarding Uncle Xiaojin's condition. Maybe soon, I'll hear word about how Syaoran has been doing.

I've been bringing my own lunch, sometimes I made enough so Mio-chan and I can share. We're actually alternating with the lunch. For example, today I brought homemade lunch for the two of us. Then tomorrow it'll be her turn. Syaoran said before he left that Shulai would be eating lunch with us everyday, but because of things going on with his family right now I'm sure he doesn't have time. Well, if he doesn't show up for lunch today, I'll get to see him at soccer practice in the afternoon, anyway..

I haven't been keeping in touch with Chiharu, Rika, and Naoko yet. They've been busy with their cheerleading routines for the sports camp, plus of course, Chiharu has been making up lost time with Yamazaki as a couple since all of the hype and hoopla of the idols Li Xiaolang and Eriol Hiiragizawa has finally ended for the time being. I do see Yamazaki during soccer practice also, so at least I'm not exactly out of touch.

It's only Monday and it's still early here and I can hear the librarian calling Mio-chan and me to the booth, so I'll end the email here for now. Talk to you later!

#

FROM: Hiiragizawa, Eriol

TO: Daidouji, Tomoyo

SUBJECT: RE: Places outside London

My dearest Tomoyo,

I'm glad you're enjoying England so far even though you've only been there for two days. Thank you for inquiring me regarding some suggestions on the best places that you can visit outside of London.

My father's side, well, that is, his mother's (my grandmother's) side, is a member of a quintessential English aristocracy, the Wimseys. They own a lot of manors and estates throughout England, parts of Scotland, Wales, and Ireland also, but sadly to regret that I haven't visited all of them. The ones that I'm familiar of are the ones closer to London, somewhat. The ones I love to visit are in Eastbourne (South of London, English Channel coast) and we have a centuries old country home near the Ilfracombe area in Devon (West of London, close to the northern coast). Attached are a few photos and also the addresses of the homes I just described to you.

I've also attached an address and phone number for you to contact my parents. I've already informed them so they should be aware that you're currently there. When you do decide to visit these country homes, be sure to introduce yourself as a family friend of the Hiiragizawas and that my father gave you permission to visit and stay there for a period of time. The patriarch of the Wimsey Clan , my granduncle, has already set up a will with both my parents as beneficiaries to some of the Wimsey assets and fortune, although we don't really need the money (the assets, such as the country homes, would be really nice though! Hehe…).

It's really scorching hot out here in Kagamineshi and how I long for the cool and subtle weather of Tomoeda, but we're surviving. Meiling and I have become guard dogs and have been keeping our eyes and ears open on Xiaolang and Mai Hirashiki. Although things are well with the shooting, it's a whole different story behind the scenes. Xiaolang is doing all he can to keep Mai busy and stick to him, which would give Meiling and I some time to search her dressing room and even her quarters at the hotel for dear Sakura's Chiirou. No luck so far, I'm afraid. Best news so far is that those two haven't kissed each other, whether on set or behind the scenes. Not yet anyway.

Well, my break's almost over and it's my turn to shoot my scenes. I will write more later.

Cheers! - Eriol

#

FROM: Li, Xiaolang

TO: Li, Shulai

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Oh, Yun Hwa; Yamazaki, Takashi

SUBJECT: Early Status for Monday

No sign of Chiirou yet. I'm killing myself by trying to use my so-called "hidden charms" on Hirashiki just so she gets distracted from getting to her quarters and dressing room. Tomorrow is where most of the love scenes and kissing scenes are gonna be shot. Hell I'm getting myself shot tomorrow if you know what I mean.

Regards to your old man (Uncle Ming) and Uncle Yiaowen. Hope the two of them had a good flight to Japan. Please pass on the message to Uncle Yiaowen that his daughter (Meiling) misses him so much and that she'll call him or email him, whatever's more convenient.

Hope Sakura's doing well. I miss her already. Send my love to her, will you? :( Also, please update me regarding my father's status.

#

FROM: Li, Shulai

TO: Li, Xiaolang

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Oh, Yun Hwa; Yamazaki, Takashi

SUBJECT: RE: Early Status for Monday

Dad and Meiling's Dad arrived safely yesterday. So far, so good.

Been visiting the hospital to check up on your dad. Still unconscious but at least he's breathing. My dad and Uncle Yiaowen are doing well, they landed safely, so it's all good. I was almost caught by Dad when he joked with a greeting of "Who are you? And what have you done to my son?" Nevertheless, Dad was happy to see the "somewhat newly" reformed me.

Soccer practice is doing real well. The entire team is already aware of the whole Chiirou thing so now all the dudes are acting like bodyguards with Kinomoto. Ain't she the lucky one. Your sis Fanren is getting louder than usual, ranting about the rights and wrongs about Tomoeda. Seriously if she's so damn pissed, she should attend the town council or something and rant her concerns there. Jeez!

Do whatever you can with Hirashiki, dear leader. I'm not quite sure HOW you want me to send your love to Kinomoto, man. You want me to kiss her or something? O_O

#

FROM: Daidouji, Tomoyo

TO: Kinomoto, Sakura

SUBJECT: RE: Greetings from London!

I'm so glad that you're doing well! I was beginning to worry that you may be moping around all this time because I'm not there and Syaoran's not there with you in Tomoeda. I'd be moping around too if both my best friend and my boyfriend weren't around either. But I'm glad you've got Mio-chan and Shulai and the entire soccer team to cheer you up, ne?

Tomorrow, my dad set up an appointment with the admissions advisor at the BRIT School regarding my eligibility to attend next year. I've already prepared my portfolio and everything to show her my fashion design illustrations and I also finished editing my portfolio video of all the documentary shots I made of Tomoeda. I really hope I'd be eligible for their film program. My fashion designing and illustration is just a backup just in case I don't get in to film.

I just got an email from Eriol. I had no idea that he is a member of the Wimsey Clan! Well, that is, his father is half-Wimsey. I wonder if Eriol's related to famed English author Mortimer Wimsey. My dad is assigned as the producer of the upcoming film version of Mortimer Wimsey's bestselling novel "Ashes to the Gods." I should ask Eriol that and then maybe I can finally have connections! You should read that book when you have the time. I thought I found a few copies of them in the library, and since you volunteer there, all the more convenient!

Don't worry about Syaoran. I'm sure once he decides to send a message to you he'll inform Shulai about it. Either that or maybe Shulai's been really busy with family stuff. I mean for one thing, his dad just arrived, and second, he also has to do hospital visits with Xiaojin-san so he can have something to report to Syaoran too. Remember, patience is virtue! ^_-

Sorry for the short email. I'm actually getting ready to go to dinner with my dad and a few of my dad's friends. Will write more when I get back! - Tomoyo

#

FROM: Daidouji, Tomoyo

TO: Hiiragizawa, Eriol

SUBJECT: RE: Places outside London

Aww, there you go again with your English gentleman personality. Even in emails too!

Thanks so much for your suggestions regarding the English countryside and all that. I didn't know that you and your family are members of the Wimsey Clan. I was wondering if you're related to the famed author Mortimer Wimsey of "Ashes to the Gods" fame? My father told me that he's from the aristocratic Wimsey Family, but I'm not sure if we're talking about the same Wimsey Family as the one you mentioned in your previous email. If so, then wow, what a small world!

Thanks for informing me about Syaoran and Chiirou and everything related. I don't know if Shulai's slacking off or anything like that or that he's simply busy, but at least I got something to report to Sakura.

You're such a sweetheart, Eriol Li Hiiragizawa. Too bad I can't insert the Wimsey somewhere in your name! - Tomoyo

#

Tomoeda High School Soccer Field (Monday afternoon)

When Sakura and Mio finished their volunteering shift at the library, Shulai and Yamazaki were already waiting at the lobby area along with their sports bags. Last Sunday, they already planned that they would meet up like this whenever their volunteering shift ended and making it a habit for the next two weeks or so. So far, all was well.

But before they made their way to the soccer field, Sakura and Mio took the time to change their clothes to the appropriate gear for soccer practice, with Sakura donning her practice jersey uniform and Mio donning a white t-shirt that sported the Tomoeda High School logo and navy blue white-striped sweatpants. Luckily the school was only a three-block walk from the library, therefore all four of them were freely to walk openly like any local youth.

Shulai took a deep breath as they continued to walk along the sidewalk. Yamazaki walked next to him and patted him on the shoulder.

"Shulai," Yamazaki chuckled, "why you so nervous, man? This town's been quiet since the stars left."

"Too quiet, man," Shulai frowned, gently wiping the light sweat off of his forehead. "Damn too quiet."

"Aw," Yamazaki gave a teasing grin. "You're just bitter because you're missing Syao-chan and Eriol and Meiling, ne, Shulai?"

The doppelganger cousin glared at his new friend. "Sounds like you miss them more than I do, Yamazaki."

"Maaaybe, but I miss them nevertheless, hehe." Shulai shook his head while Yamazaki continued to grin.

Sakura joined in. "Thanks so much for waiting up on us, guys. Really appreciate it."

"Aw, think nothing of it," Yamazaki said. "With your true love gone and your best friend gone for the time being, I'm sure you could use some good company."

"Also," Mio joined in as well, "I couldn't thank Shulai-kun enough to hang out with me whenever I wait for Sojiro-kun, so thanks so much, Shulai-kun. I never had any brothers and you're like a brother to me."

Shulai shrugged, but shyly smiled. "Hey, anytime, Kuroda."

"I'm sure Li-senpai would be really proud of your good deeds thus far, as well as your father, Shulai-kun."

"Hope so," Shulai gave a nervous grin.

"Oh, um… speaking of Syaoran, have any of you guys heard from him yet…? Has he sent anything?" Sakura answered in a low voice.

"He just did," Shulai smiled. "And he's got a message for you. But I have to pass it on to you in private though."

"Hoe? How come? You can just forward it to me."

"It's in Chinese, Kinomoto. Since I still suck writing in Kana and Kanji all at once, I think it's best if I just read my translation to you."

"I guess that makes more sense then!" Sakura chuckled.

"My Japanese is still rusty so I may sound abrupt, but… if I sounded rude in my translation, that'd be my mistake, so, just warning ya."

"Well, I can always correct it along the way, Shulai."

"That's why I brought an electronic Chinese-Japanese dictionary with me so I can get the exact translation and how to say it right."

"Dude," Yamazaki chuckled, "an electronic Chinese-Japanese dictionary! Somehow the dictionary part brings back memories."

Sakura laughed softly. "You're right. When we were still at elementary, Syaoran used to bring his Chinese-Japanese dictionary book with him in class and even outside. He used to be so soft-spoken because of the language barrier."

"Did he?" Shulai grinned. "But hey, y'all gotta be grateful now. He don't need one anymore."

"He learns really fast and that's a rare skill to have. Sure, a lot say that us Japanese can be prejudiced against Chinese and Koreans, but Syaoran became the coolest kid in Tomoeda back then!" Yamazaki announced. "His coolness intimidated all the dudes, almost all the girls were crushing on him too! But back then he used to sit next to me, so that's how we ended up being tight."

"Heh, I'm sure the leader wouldn't forget that, Yamazaki. I'm beginning to see gradually why he treasures this town so much and its people."

The four continued on chatting while strolling their way down the block until they reached their high school, where the rest of the soccer team awaits for them.

#

Some an hour and a half later passed and practice was already complete. Touya and Yukito made sure that they weren't distracted as much while they were on the field when they had the sports camps' cheerleading squad lead by Naoko practicing their first new routine. Because the soccer team finished early, a few of them stayed to watch the cheerleaders do their dance routine. Sakura even gave a few pointers to some of the newer cheerleaders on how to make their transitions smoothly and crisp on the sides.

When the girls were done, Sakura met up with Naoko, along with Chiharu and Rika. Shulai and Yamazaki waited along with her, while Mio hitched a ride with Kaho as they live only a block from each other. Sakura and Naoko embraced each other when the former noticed the latter's new look.

"Ne, Naoko, you're not wearing your glasses?"

"You know I always take my specs off whenever I'm in a cheerleading routine," Naoko smiled. "I'm wearing contacts as always."

"How can I forget?" Sakura laughed. "And I remember that when you do wear contacts, you always wear the ones that have different colors on them. In fact, you're wearing green now!"

"Yup!" Naoko chuckled. "The green just makes me feel that I'm channeling your dance moves powers so I can perfect my own routine. Hope you don't mind."

Sakura laughed. "I don't mind at all! I think it's really cool!"

"Whoa!" Yamazaki interrupted again when he noticed more than just the green contacts on Naoko. "You're wearing your hair in a half-ponytail like Sakura would normally do too! If your hair only has lighter color, Nao, you'd be a spitting image of Sakura! What'd you think, Shulai?"

"Hey!" Sakura cheered. "You're right, Taka! We can be like twin sisters, Naoko!"

Naoko chuckled nervously. "R-really? I didn't notice… but it'd be fun!"

Shulai slowly got closer to Naoko to examine her. "Hate to admit it, but you're right, Yamazaki. You'd be like me, Yanagisawa."

"Like you?" Naoko wondered.

"I'm the spitting image of Xiaolang, heaven forbid," Shulai sighed. "Maybe I should change my hair color and the color of my eyes too by wearing contacts so I won't have to look like him."

Chiharu chuckled along. "I swear! If you ask me, I think Naoko and Shulai would easily imitate Sakura and Syaoran and fool everybody real well!"

"That's a little too much, Chiharu," Rika made her statement.

"But it'd work!" Chiharu grinned. Right then, everyone in their group broke in to laughter.

"Ne ne," Sakura cheered, clasping her hands on to Naoko's. "Maybe for this year's cultural festival, we can dress up as twin couples and fool everybody!"

"Except Syaoran isn't a Tomoeda High School student," Yamazaki interrupted with a fact.

"Mou… you're right…" Sakura gave out a huge sigh. "And he's already done with high school too. All he needed to do was to take the Daigaku Kentei and then he'll be eligible to take college entrance exams. He's already way ahead of us."

"Not that ahead," Shulai grinned. "Not far ahead, Kinomoto."

The teens made their way to the locker rooms to change in to their usual clothes and head back home. They strolled down together until they reached the fourth block, where they now split up and head back to their designated neighborhoods. Yamazaki, being the gentleman that he is, would be walking Chiharu home and will be late to head back to the Li Residence.

At this point, Sakura and Shulai were the only ones alone. They made their way to their neighborhood with silence first. After all, Sakura knew that she wasn't exactly buddies with Shulai, but remembering Syaoran's words to her before he left, she had to break the ice with his doppelganger cousin.

"Shulai—"

"Hey Kinomoto." Just as Sakura was about to get his attention, Shulai beat to her first.

"Y-yeah? What's up?"

"Wanna stop by that park with that penguin in there?"

"S-sure."

Luckily they were only just a block away from the park. They got to the benches near the penguin slide and sat at a yellow-colored bench. They sat at each end of the benches, completely apart from each other. She waited for him to say something. Instead, he reached for his phone and turned it on.

"Hey… why are we here, Shulai?"

"Xiaolang's message," he immediately answered.

"Hoe?! He has a message for me?!"

"Since I still suck at writing your crazy writing system, I'll just have to read it to you and try my hardest to translate it."

"I guess you have a point there," Sakura smiled. "I guess it's easier just reading it out loud than struggle to write your translation in Japanese and then forward it to me. Saves more time."

He then took out his electronic dictionary and turned it on. Right then, with his phone in front of him, he began to read and translate to her:

"'My love…'"

"Hoe? 'My love'?"

"Well, that's what he wrote in his message. Quit interrupting me and lemme read and translate!"

"Okay, okay! I'm sorry, I'm just excited, that's all!"

"Right, right. Anyway…" He cleared his throat and then began to read and translate again:

"'My love - How has Tomoeda without me been treating you? It's hot as hell over here in Kagamineshi and this place is seriously landlocked compared to the wonderful coast of Tomoeda. I miss the beaches, the mild sun and the cool breeze, the quaintness of the entire town and its people. Kagamineshi may be another town but somehow it looked a lot more commercialized than it is over there. Their fan clubs are bigger and a whole lot more fanatic than the ones in Tomoeda, so at least you should give Mihara and Sasaki credit for keeping their fellow fangirls under control when Eriol and I were around. Hope everything is well with you, your family, and everyone else I failed to mention…'"

"Is this a long message?" Sakura asked curiously. "Oh I hope so, it's been way too long already!"

"It's only three days, Kinomoto. You oughta be grateful he actually took the time to write to you."

"I know, Shulai. Anyway, please continue. I won't interrupt anymore!"

"Right…" Shulai raised his eyebrow that startled Sakura within. The way he raised his eyebrow looking skeptical reminded her of Syaoran again, and she knew it would be way too difficult to pass through that with Shulai looking so much like him from the eyes to his toes. Nevertheless, Shulai continued on.

"'Eriol and I began our soccer practice yesterday afternoon with the middle schoolers here. Bunch of really cool, talented no-nonsense kids, you know. And the isolation of the middle school from the actual town gave us a lot of peace from those crazy Kagamineshi Wolfpup girls and his moonies. Next time you guys head to practice, send our regards (mine and Eriol's) to the rest of the team. The first three days including today were mainly minor lines and scenes that I had to complete before the big one tomorrow.'

"'Speaking of the big one tomorrow, there is a favor that I ask of you and Shulai and Tak even. On weekdays during summer, there is a celebrity news show that airs at late night (about 11 pm) called 'Summer Stars Network" at TBS with Karin Arisugawa. She's also the cousin of Ai Aihara, that field reporters of 'Oshare-na Teens' who stopped by Tomoeda to check up on us and interviewed you guys briefly before. Anyway, their huge feature that they always report everyday is all about our shooting and the going-ons with the cast and crew. I want you guys to watch it everyday, and if you see any news that involves me and Mai Hirashiki, please report it to Shulai so he can report it to me. It doesn't matter how harmless or not, just inform me. I have night scenes to shoot as well, which is why I can't watch the show myself. Thanks so much for this!'"

"Huh… I wonder why he'd want us to watch SSN for? Chiharu and Rika normally watch that. I watch mostly baseball and soccer with my dad and Oniichan…"

"Beats me," Shulai shrugged. "I haven't been watching TV that much either. Ah well, maybe he's expecting something to come out from SSN. Maybe about the movie or something or probbaly anything about him, good or bad. Whatever it is, I have to report everything to him."

Sakura sighed lowly. "This sucks… why can't we just contact each other directly… it's so unfair…"

"Well, he's doing all he can to protect Chiirou from that bitch," Shulai rolled his eyes, shaking his head. "Anyway, I ain't done yet."

"Okay. Please continue."

Shulai coughed lightly and continued. "'Although the past three days since arrivle at Kagamineshi have been good so far, I have been mostly in really bitter, bad moods. I have been sticking with Eriol, Meiling, and Yun and his Korean idol cousin who just arrived at Sendai three days ago so I don't have to deal with that nosy tramp Hirashiki. The first two days was horrible. She kept coming in to my hotel suite and knocking on my door every single damn minute just to see if I was there or not. Whenever I gave her attention, she starts inspecting me, like grabbing my phone to see if I have been making contacts with you. She's already convinced that we already broke up because she witnessed herself that I broke your heart big time that Friday. I don't know what she was going on about, but I decided to play along in case I finally find my chance on getting Chiirou back.'"

"Wait… we broke up last Friday?" Sakura gave Shulai a rather confused look. "But we've been together the whole day and we didn't break up!"

Shulai shrugged again. "The chick's delusional. Anyway, continuing." He cleared his throat and proceeded. "'It's only been three days, love, and I thought that I've gotten used to be apart from the ones I love, but with you, I couldn't breathe properly… couldn't sleep properly… was able to think straight when it came to my role and my lines on the set but couldn't think straight on everything else… Last night while I was trying to sleep, I started thinking about you, how you must have suffered throughout those seven years missing me while during that time I was building a brand-new life without being aware of what I've left behind…'"

As Sakura listened on to Shulai reading Syaoran's message on his phone, she detected that a change of tone suddenly occurred in Shulai's voice once he got to the part where he began talking about his condition as signs on how much he missed her. For Sakura, all of a sudden, Shulai's voice was no longer his own. In fact, she could feel her heart being gently touched by the tone of his voice as if Syaoran's spirit had just channeled inside Shulai and more like he was reciting all these words to her rather than reading everything from his phone screen.

"Syaoran…" Sakura softly muttered, then dropped her head, covering her mouth. She avoided her eyes from forming any tears. "Oh my poor Syaoran…"

Shulai stopped reading and lifted his head. "What?"

"He's all alone out there in Kagamineshi, Shulai… man, I wish I could just travel there and make a surprise visit."

Shulai lowered his phone and then rubbed his chin. "You know, Kinomoto… that idea ain't that bad really Of course, train fares and bus fares going inland have been expensive nowadays."

"Hoe?" She winced and gazed her eyes right at Shulai's own amber eyes. Now, she thought to herself. How on earth did Shulai know about the small things Japanese, such as the transportation fares heading Westward from their town?

"Er… I… I heard it from the dudes at the team!" Shulai quickly made himself an excuse. "So… yeah…"

"Oh! Right!" Sakura giggled, sighing out in relief. "Is there anymore…?"

"Yeah." He lifted his phone and began to recite his translation. "'I hope you're faring better than I am right now. You're not alone, after all. I have a look-alike who could at least level your inner emotions of missing me who's with you now. Sadly, there's no Sakura look-alike here in Kagamineshi, and even if there was, I wouldn't know her that well. I really wish I could talk to you directly without any distractions coming from here.'

"'Break's over and back to work. Kagamineshi local dishes are delicious, but not as scrumptious as the packed dishes that you and your family made for us. It's only three days but I can't wait to go back home. I'll write more when I have time again. Yours always, Syaoran.'"

Sakura smiled happily and then embraced Shulai as her way of saying thanks. "Thank you so much, Shulai. This really means a lot to me."

"Seriously, that was hard to translate. Sorry if the Japanese I used are really basic. You know I ain't that fluent yet." He crossed his fingers, turning his head away.

She giggled while shaking her head. "I think you've done wonderfully. I mean… the way you gaze at your phone and then right at me and the way you expressed his words… it's like… you're possessed!"

"The hell? Me, possessed?" Shulai broke in to laughter, even though inside him, he could feel his heart beating rapidly from nerviness. "You know, if I wanted to, I can pursue a career in acting myself."

Her eyes widened in shock. "Hoe? You're… you're in acting too?"

"Yup. Quality acting. As in serious acting, you know? Like for stage plays and musicals and occasionally for independent film."

"Wow! No wonder! The talent of acting and performing must seriously be in the Li genes!"

He shrugged his shoulders again. "Yeah. No choice if you got family working in the industry, especially if you've got a father who's the current CEO of Sunbow Entertainment and Promotions—"

"Hoe? Wait a sec!" Sakura gasped with excitement. "Are you telling me that your father is the CEO of Sunbow Entertainment? Really?"

"Oh yeah, definitely," Shulai answered in a rather callous tone. "Uncle Ming— I mean my father— he helps out a lot with the family conglomerate but you know Li Enterprises owns Sunbow Productions and even its subsidiary talent agency, Sunbow Entertainment. Xiaolang, Eriol, Meiling, all three of them are Sunbow talent. Oh yeah, and Hirashiki too."

"Mou, maybe you should introduce me to your father one of these days, ne?"

"Heh, you think that's a good idea?" he smirked. "I think it's better if Xiaolang's the one who would do the introducing, because if I introduce you to him myself, he's gonna think funny ideas about us."

"Oh…" She refrained herself from chuckling by covering her mouth. "I guess you're right about that."

"Yeah, whatever."

She turned back to him again and moved the subject back to its original. "I'm serious, Shulai. You can really imitate Syaoran so well. I mean, sometimes your small mannerisms really remind me of Syaoran, like the way you twitch your nose with your thumb or even the way you comb your fingers through your hair, and most of all, the way you smirk too reminds me so much of him! Well, maybe those small gestures must be a family thing so I never really make a big deal about it."

"Who knows… or maybe I'm actually imitating Xiaolang!"

"Stop it, Shulai," she broke in to laughter. "Maybe it really is easier if you would just read and translate it from your mouth instead of struggling to write your Japanese translation on paper, re-type them, and forward them to me. Besides, somehow, I really like the way you read the messages earlier. I'm serious when I said that you look like you're possessed by Syaoran's spirit!"

"Heh, problem is, he ain't dead," Shulai snickered. Moments later, he changed the subject.

"By the way, Kinomoto."

"Hoe?"

"I don't want to ruin moods right now, but somehow, it's perfect timing."

"What is?"

"Well… with… Uncle Xiaojin having a stroke and then Uncle— I mean my father— and Meiling's father flying over to help Aunt Yelan conduct business as always within the enterprise. You see, there's another reason why my father flew over to Japan as well."

"Oh? What's that?"

Shulai turned his head around, making sure that there was no one present around them. Then he turned back to Sakura and began to explain: "There's some illegal activity going on within the Japan branch of Sunbow Entertainment. It seems that they're losing money here and there on things they don't even remembered— or recorded— dealing with. For instance, there's a lot of expenses dealing with the media, more specifically, especially with the paparazzi and the tabloids."

"But… doesn't all talent agencies do that anyway just for them to keep silent about their homegrown talents?"

Shulai leaned himself against the bench, slipping his hands in his pockets, gazing at the full-green oak tree right in front of them. "Yeah, Sunbow does that a lot, but they always have records of them. This case though had no records whatsoever in their systems and the actuarial and accounting departments of the agency have been bugging my father about the issue."

"Ah, I see. So, your father, Ming Li, flew down here to investigate, ne?"

"Yeah. On Wednesday he will be traveling to Tokyo to meet up with the execs of the Japan branch regarding the issue. Whoever's squandering money from the agency's account will seriously get caught."

"I really do hope they find the culprit responsible for all the money loss, Shulai…"

"Yeah, seriously."

Somehow, Sakura found the aura around her getting warmer. This only meant that she could trust Shulai enough to sit a little closer to her. She scooted slowly to him, while Shulai remained indifferent. "Ne, Shulai. After telling me all this, you and your father must be really close."

"Heh, we are when my mom's not around," Shulai broke in to laughter. "Still though… I really owed my father an apology for my… gallivanting around. Well, things are well so far."

"Sorry we don't have many too many pretty girls in this town for you to choose from, Shulai," Syaoran apologized with sincerity. "But you know… time will come…"

"I'll deal." He stood up from the bench and gazed at the clock of his phone. "It's getting a little late. Parents probably waiting for us to come home for supper."

"You're right. Let's head home."

The two teens strolled their way back to their neighborhood. They greeted fellow townsfolk passing them by, with a few more mature Wolfpup fans recognizing Shulai as the cousin and not the Li Xiaolang they've come to know and love. While the other immature fangirls only bugged the two teens regarding Syaoran's return to Tomoeda, they managed to overcome them and found their way back to their neighborhood.

Like a gentleman should, Shulai escorted Sakura to the front door. She reached for her keys in her soccer duffel bag and was ready to open the locks of the door herself.

"Well then, Shulai. Guess I'll see you tomorrow morning."

"Yeah. We'll have to leave maybe fifteen minutes earlier so we can stop by Kuroda's place."

"That's right, Shulai. I almost forgot."

"Okay then. Seeya, Kinomoto."

"Seeya, Shulai."

With that, her temporary bodyguard made his way next door, while she unlocked the doors and entered. When she dropped her duffel bags on the floor at the living room, she heard her father calling out for her.

"Just in time, Sakura!"

Sakura approached the dining room, where she found Fujitaka already serving dinner at the table. She noticed that he only set the table with only two plates and two sets of utensils.

"Hoe? Where's Oniichan?"

"Starting tomorrow morning, he and Kaho will be heading out to Sendai to check out some stores where they can search for wedding-related things along with Yukito and Nakuru. He'll be staying over at Kaho's for the entire week, but he'll still be at the soccer practices for coaching."

"Wow," Sakura giggled. "Oniichan's finally getting serious in wedding preparations now!"

"About time too," Fujitaka shook his head. "Well then. Let's eat!"

"Yummy!"

The father and the daughter took their places, opening their plates upward, and both pressed their palms together with their cheery voices calling out.

"Itadakimasu!"

#

Tuesday (Week before the Tomoeda Festival)

FROM: Li, Shulai

TO: Li, Xiaolang

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Li, Meiling

SUBJECT: Dad's here!

'Sup? Anyway, I'm gonna make this quick 'cuz soccer practice is about to start soon.

My dad (Li Ming), as you know, is president and CEO of Sunbow Entertainment, and you know it has three branches (Hong Kong, Japan, Korea). I know that the three of you and that bitch Hirashiki are signed under Sunbow, but sadly, that's all I know. I don't exactly know what really goes on behind the scenes, let alone acquiring and managing potential talents in the industry, but you know, I guess you can say that the estrangement that we had with each other due to my… gallivanting… is beginning to fade away. Guess you could say that's a good thing family-wise.

Anyway, did y'all know that there's some internal scandal going on with Sunbow regarding the quick depletion of the media funds at the Japan Branch? Someone's in the Japan Branch, dunno who, is messing with the agency's bank accounts and the funding for the media fees are running out quickly. In fact, that branch has been receiving notices from a lot of media corporations demanding payment for promoting Sunbow talent when there's not even a record of them in their systems somewhere. When Dad told me the entire story, I was thinking "What the hell's going on over there?! I hope Xiaolang, Eriol, or Meiling ain't involved in that mess or else we're in deep… you know!"

Generally I don't really care about this stuff but since I'm bored out of my mind (not saying that Kinomoto or Yamazaki or those three chicks are boring) and we've run out of stuff to talk about as father and son, but now I'm curious. Y'all got some knowledge on this going on?

#

FROM: Li, Meiling

TO: Li, Shulai

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Li, Xiaolang

SUBJECT: RE: Dad's here!

Holy crap! Actually the girls (except Hirashiki) and I had been in our usual chats at the dressing room earlier and one of them mentioned something about Sunbow running out of money. I thought it was really weird when she told us about it since none of them are Sunbow talent, you know? So that's what it's all about? Sunbow's running out of money to pay the media to promote us to the masses?

So, what's Uncle Ming going to do about it, Shulai? Can we (as in my dad and even Auntie Yelan) help out?

Regards to Sakura and Chiharu, Rika, Naoko, and Yamazaki, and everyone and say hello to them for me! - Meiling

#

FROM: Hiiragizawa, Eriol

TO: Li, Shulai

CC: Li, Xiaolang; Li, Meiling

SUBJECT: RE: Dad's here!

Director Terada just called a meeting with me and the producers earlier today. I was already preparing to do my scene but we had a private meeting. Turns out that the producers received word that the unrecorded expenses that Sunbow is being charged were all heavy promotions for "Cherry Blossom, Little Wolf," and of course, Xiao and Hirashiki. Producers are already looking at both Xiao and Hirashiki as the main suspects behind the squandering the money for special promotions of themselves to the masses. That makes no sense though because neither he, nor even our manager, Wei, even have access to the bank accounts in Sunbow at all.

Okay, if this were true, then it makes no sense. Why would our dear Xiao would do such a thing, squandering money from the agency's media funds just to have other media productions promote himself and the movie as much as they can when he can always use his own money or even family-supported money to do all that? Actually, the better question is, why would Xiao rip off his own family's subsidiary?

I don't know how Hirashiki's name came up, but she too is suspected as well. After all, both of them play the main couple of the movie, so in a way, it makes sense they would be suspects. Still, Xiao being one of the suspects of the money squandering is absolute bollocks to me.

Xiao can't join in the reply with us right now. He's already working on his scene with his "new" lady love, Mai Hirashiki. (sarcasm intended there)

Please give my regards to dearest Sakura, and Yamazaki as well. I might as well include the three lovelies, Chiharu, Rika, and Naoko in there as well. Lastly of course, Touya and Yukito as well. - Eriol

#

FROM: Li, Shulai

TO: Hiiragizawa, Eriol

CC: Li, Xiaolang; Li, Meiling

SUBJECT: RE: Dad's here!

Great… and I wanted to read what Xiaolang has to say about all this, but you guys, don't panic though. My dad isn't suspecting Xiaolang or Wei of being behind this at all. He doesn't have any concrete suspects to identify, but as of now, everyone is a suspect. I mean y'all may never know, it could be someone who isn't even involved with your movie project and was probably doing a favor for someone who is involved.

My dad will be meeting with the execs at the Japan Branch in Tokyo tomorrow, so relax. We'll get our answers soon. And yeah, I'll pass on your regards to the Tomoeda locals here. - Shulai

#

FROM: Li, Meiling

TO: Li, Shulai

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Li, Xiaolang

SUBJECT: RE: Dad's here!

Sorry for the super-late reply, Shulai! Xiaolang's finished with his scenes with Hirashiki. Eriol and I are thinking of having a little meeting regarding this matter with them. I felt a little uncomfortable watching their scene takes because they had to kiss several times to make it right. Funnily, it's not Xiaolang who's having problems, but Hirashiki herself. She keeps showing this reaction that she's expecting him to kiss her in which the script even says that she was overwhelmed in confusion when he leans down and kisses her. My god, how can the media think she's a breakthrough actress when she can't even act right when it comes to kissing with innocence?

By the way, I asked Xiaolang before if it's alright for him to just give me Sakura's phone number so I can just report to her directly instead of Shulai. After all, I speak and write better Japanese than he does. But for some reason he refused. What the hell is going on here? I know about Chiirou being missing and Chiirou being held captive under Hirashiki, but why won't you let me in to your plan?

Come on, guys… - Meiling

#

FROM: Hiiragizawa, Eriol

TO: Li, Shulai

CC: Li, Xiaolang; Li, Meiling

SUBJECT: RE: Dad's here!

Meiling - If Shulai and I have the authority to let you in our carefully-calculated plan, we would tell you, but I guess Xiao felt like it's dangerous to have too many people involved. I mean, Sakura isn't even involved in the plan herself, but she does know that Hirashiki does have Chiirou with her. Neither does Tomoyo since she's currently in England right now.

But I can tell you this one little thing, Meiling. Xiao isn't himself.

We're only waiting for Hirashiki to hurry up and change so we can head over to the coffee shop and have our little meeting. Will update you with what we come up, Shulai.

#

FROM: Li, Shulai

TO: Hiiragizawa, Eriol

CC: Li, Xiaolang; Li, Meiling

SUBJECT: RE: Dad's here!

Sorry, I only got your emails just now. Soccer practice just ended and Sakura and I are at the Penguin Park right now. She was waiting for me to read and translate Xiaolang's new message to her. I already sent Xiaolang her reply to the one he sent yesterday, so hopefully he reads it.

Okay, update me. If we find any flaws coming out from Hirashiki herself, then we can finally use that flaw to our advantage to get Chiirou back. Good luck! - Shulai

#

A coffee shop in Kagamineshi (mid-afternoon)

At the Stardust Hotel located at the central square of Kagamineshi, the four teen stars, also supervised by their managers and other guardian personnel to protect them from any harm, arrived at a table, where they ordered their favorite lattes and other coffee beverage drinks from the booth. When Mai Hirashiki showed him, her arm was completely wrapped on Syaoran's left arm, which made Meiling cringe and Eriol showing a callous expression. Nevertheless, their private meeting was about to begin.

"Okay, so, um, this is like the first time that I'm actually having a secret meeting with the three of you! I'm so excited, hee hee!" Mai laughed cheerfully, with Meiling immediately glaring at her from across the table, while Syaoran and Eriol looking rather indifferent. "Xiaolang is still giving me the silent treatment up to now." She quickly nudged Syaoran on the side. "Well, say something, Xiaolang dear!"

"It's Li to you, Hirashiki!" Syaoran broke out his silence. "Just because you're on the winning side right now, doesn't mean you have the right to be disrespectful to someone you barely know!"

"Oh, what's with the formalities? I mean, we're dating now! The media still has yet to announce it, of course!" Mai winked. Meiling crossed her arms and her glaring still continued.

"Dating? I think you need your sanity drugs, Hirashiki. That wasn't part of the deal. You forced me to break up with Sakura Kinomoto, but nowhere in our little contract did it say that I have to start dating you. Do you have any idea how difficult it is for someone to break up with someone he loves so much just because some conniving little bitch has him tied under her string? You got no frickin' idea how I'm feeling right now!"

"Aww," Mai chuckled. "Well, I'm here now. That hillbilly is back at that boring town and have no means of coming all the way here just to see you. Besides, outsiders aren't allowed in the sets anymore—"

"Alright, that's enough!" From out of the blue, Meiling slammed her fist against the table, startling her and Syaoran. "Can we get this meeting started? Jeez!"

Eriol shrugged and cleared his throat. "Alright. The reason why we're having this meeting here isn't about your personal drama with Syaoran, Hirashiki. This is about the dilemma that our agency, Sunbow Entertainment, is currently facing. Apparently, I was informed by the movie producers and even Director Terada himself that Sunbow is losing money, most especially coming from the media fund account. Sounds like someone among us talent is desperate to gain attention from the masses."

"Oh no!" Hirashiki gasped mockingly. "But who would do such a thing? I mean Sunbow is one of Japan's biggest and highly prestigious talent agencies with high-quality homegrown talent! And I believe that each of us have an equal amount of exposure from time to time, especially when we're involved in to a really huge project, like the CBLW movie project, right?"

"Well duh, that's common sense!" Meiling remarked. "But here's the weird part. Since the loss of money is coming from the media funds being depleted, that can only mean one thing. Some sneaky talent must have some connections with Sunbow personnel, particularly with the execs, maybe, who has the ability to withdraw money from the media funds account and spend it on various media companies to help promote that talent heavily more than the rest of the other Sunbow talents involved in the CBLW project. Oh, and we forgot to mention, those unrecorded expenses that's coming in to the accounting department have CBLW as their promotional features in their magazines and blogs and even TV commercials."

"That and also," Eriol added, "the media funds may even be used to pay off a certain media company in exchange for not showing a scandalous piece about one of their talents. Tabloids, for example. Keeping their mouths shut is a whole lot more expensive than actually promoting what they want to show to the public."

"So," Syaoran finally broke in to silence, crossing his arms. "In short, the four of us are suspects."

"What? Why am I included?" Mai gave a pout.

"Because, idiot, we're the only four who's being managed by Sunbow!" Syaoran burst his frustration at her. "Of course all four of us are suspects!"

"Fine, fine!" Mai frowned, crossing her arms. "I guess I'll have a talk with my manager about this!"

"Xiao, Eriol, and I share the same manager, Wei," Meiling indicated. "Knowing Wei all of our lives, he wouldn't do such a thing!"

Syaoran then lifted his head to face Wei, who had been sitting at a table nearby, and nodded at him. Wei returned the nod, acknowledging that he can hear the discussion from where he was sitting. He turned back to the teens once more. "Wei had been with us for the past month away from Tokyo. He's a very loyal manager to us and he always informs us about everything. He's not the type to keep secrets from us just for our own unknown benefits. But we'll also question him later."

"Well, that's all we could do for now," Eriol said. "Look, let's keep this little agency scandal between the four of us and not spread it around everyone here or else some sneaky paparazzi may catch on to it and report it to their favorite tabloid magazines. I don't want this being leaked."

"Promise!" Mai cheered with her hand raised. "Scout's honor!"

"'Scout's honor,' yeah right…" Meiling muttered, rolling her eyes. "Whatever, just keep quiet about it, because if you decide to become loud, Hirashiki, we'll seriously know who's been ripping the agency off!"

"Oh come on now, Meiling, I haven't done anything wrong!" She grinned. "Well anyway, tonight is yet another important scene shooting, ne, Li?"

Syaoran remained silent, only to respond to her by rolling his eyes. She continued on. "I think it's a good idea for the two of us to practice our lines together— alone— so we can get the scene shooting complete, don't you think?"

"Ugh, do I have to?" Syaoran crossed his arms.

"Well duh! Remember… I've got something you really, really want… ne? If you don't do as I say you can say goodbye to that worthless precious… thing!"

Quickly Syaoran stood up, glaring right at her. "Alright, alright! I'm coming!"

Mai then turned to both the cousins with her usual goody-goody grin. "Well then, Li and I will be making our way to a private place where we can practice our lines. See you then at dinner, you two!"

While the two leading actors made their way out, Meiling immediately punched her first against the table's surface. "Grr… I'm serious about this, Eriol! Next time she gives me that same smirk I wouldn't hesitate to rub her entire face off!"

"Now now, Meiling," Eriol patted his distant relative on her hand. "Very soon , Xiao will be able to locate the poor little stuffed animal. The hardest part right now is him actually getting a whole lot much closer to Hirashiki."

"Gosh, starlets are such snobs! All they really care about, first and foremost, are themselves and the attention they have. I think Mai Hirashiki has ADD or something."

Eriol broke in to laughter while shaking his head. "You used to crave for attention when we were younger yourself, you know."

"After being with Xiaolang, I've changed— a lot! I have seen so many errors of my ways before just by getting to know that bitch."

"Well, anyway, Meiling…" The two sipped on their beverages when Meiling changed the subject. "There's something I have to ask though, Eriol. It's about your last email to me."

"Hm?" Eriol's eyes widened. "What about it?"

"What exactly did you mean by 'Xiao isn't himself' when I asked you about Xiaolang's intentional plot in getting Chiirou back?"

"Well, that's basically it. He isn't being himself."

Meiling contemplated a little, then gave a suspicious glare. "Is that why Xiaolang has been acting as if… as if he's not missing Sakura? All he does is complain and give disgusted looks towards Hirashiki whenever he's with us. There's barely a single word about poor Sakura!"

"Well… um… I guess it's just his way of not getting himself distracted emotionally by thinking of a crying and heartbroken Sakura and focus more on his primary mission— getting Chiirou back without ruining his relationship with Sakura."

"Hmph. Well I hope he really is acting as part of his mission. Then again, Xiaolang's acting is way too superb that he can probably just act and imitate anybody he knows and very familiar with."

"Yeah? Such as?"

"Shulai… our dear troubled cousin who's pretty much bored out of his mind by not getting any of his usual Hong Kong booty… and the fact that his father has arrived in Japan too…"

"Well there you go, Meiling. Xiaolang is using his superb acting skills on to his plan. All we can do right now is just sit down and watch things unfold. Knowing Xiaolang, he would never fail once he gets serious with a task."

"Xiaolang acting it is. I believe you, Eriol."

The two made a toast of their coffee beverage cups and began sipping again.

#

Wednesday (Week before the Tomoeda Festival)

FROM: Li, Xiaolang

TO: Li, Shulai

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Oh, Yun Hwa

SUBJECT: Found but not retrieved

Much to my disgust in… "almost"… bringing her to bed, I found the target. It was simply just sitting there along with her own collection of stuffed animals (and she says Chiirou is worthless? Frickin' hell…) just sitting on top of her dresser in her hotel suite. Now the only thing I need to do is figure out how I'm going to retrieve Chiirou without Hirashiki noticing that it's gone missing. While Hirashiki was in her restroom, I took a quick snapshot of Chiirou's location in her suite and is now attached to this email.

We're still investigating regarding the whole fund depletion case within Sunbow Ent., but we've been really busy working on our lines and scenes. The good part though is that we've been doing very well that we might even be finished before the end of the week, however, if that's the case, then we're running out of time. We might even be back to Tomoeda next week, but then it may even become harder if we wait that long.

Well, just a quick email. Gotta meet up with Director Terada briefly.

#

FROM: Oh, Yun Hwa

TO: Li, Xiaolang

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Li Shulai

SUBJECT: RE: Juicy Stuff!

I was just showing Meiling a few dance moves just moments ago while everyone was in the dressing tent getting ready for the next scene shoot when I overheard Hirashiki talking on her phone. I couldn't exactly get the entire convo, but I did hear that she was speaking about "paying a large sum" to publish the biggest story the entire teen showbiz scene would ever experience. Dunno what the hell that means but I thought that maybe it's got something to do with that money scandal with Sunbow Ent. I'm not pointing fingers and all of that, so don't kill me please!

#

FROM: Hiiragizawa, Eriol

TO: Li, Xiaolang

CC: Li Shulai; Oh, Yun Hwa

SUBJECT: RE: Juicy Stuff!

Meiling is doing all she can to try and get Hirashiki to open up to her own personal promotion plans regarding herself and the movie, but Hirashiki is no fool. Well, not a hundred percent per se. Well, we don't have enough to pinpoint her as a prime suspect just yet.

Maybe Xiao can decide which practice spot that he and Hirashiki can practice their lines and then have one of us (Meiling?) take Chiirou away and keep him somewhere safe where she would never find? Maybe?

#

FROM: Li, Shulai

TO: Hiiragizawa, Eriol

CC: Li Xiaolang; Oh, Yun Hwa

SUBJECT: RE: Juicy Stuff!

Thanks for the photo BTW, my clan leader!

Too risky, Eriol! She may be an idiot but she's not completely an airhead if you know what I mean. I think what Xiaolang needs is a substitute so she can't tell the difference.

Maybe Kinomoto can help. Later tonight at Mooncastle Diner, there's a special event where stuffed animal makers will be volunteering to provide workshops and make them Tomoeda stuffed animals for a donation to support Tomoeda's museum and its special education programs. Guess who organized that event— Big Sister Fanren the youth coordinator of Tomoeda, of course!

Kinomoto, Yanagisawa, and Kuroda would be three of those volunteers since Fanren had a nice visit at the library earlier today (Yanagisawa, Mihara, and Sasaki were there too working on their summer homework or something). Sakura, you already know. Kuroda, she gave a Tomoeda stuffed animal to her man once (but the bastard didn't even give her anything in return… ah well.). But yeah, what I can do is send you this replica, and when you have a chance to be in Hirashiki's suite again by yourself, you can quickly switch it with this new one, walk away with the real Chiirou, and send it back here to Tomoeda. Then it'll be mission accomplished.

How's that for a plan?

#

FROM: Oh, Yun Hwa

TO: Li, Shulai

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Li Xiaolang

SUBJECT: RE: Juicy Stuff!

Ohhh… I think I know where you're getting at, Shulai! Man, you really are damn smart! Now I can see why you got away being a high-class gigolo, dude! Girls are so dumb! (not offending our favorite Tomoeda girls now!)

Now that gives me another good idea. Hidden camera!

Ask (Takashi) Yamazaki about it. He's got an uncle who owns an electronics store in Tomoeda. He's actually one of Tomoeda's most resourceful kids since he's got uncles who own small businesses that make up the majority of the commercial square of the town. First, the post office, and then the electronics store. He has another uncle who owns a car repair shop too! Anyway, that's beside the point.

#

FROM: Li, Xiaolang

TO: Yamazaki, Takashi

CC: Li, Shulai, Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Oh, Yun Hwa

SUBJECT: RE: Juicy Stuff!

Yo Taka,

I'm including you in our group emails. I know you're busy with Mihara and soccer, but I have a favor to ask you. Shulai will come by and talk to you about this. Anyway, here goes.

Does your uncle in the electronics store sell spy cameras that are small enough to fit a stuffed animal? If so, can you and Shulai meet up maybe tomorrow or something? Hopefully Sakura or any one of the girls would be able to create a replica of Chiirou with a small camera installed inside it. Hopefully…

#

Mooncastle Diner (early evening)

There was a one hour break between the end of soccer practice and the very special Tomoeda stuffed animal workshop at Mooncastle Diner event. Sakura had the time to head back home from their high school, take a quick shower and dress up to attend the stuffed animal-making. When she went over to the local arts and crafts store, she discovered the most perfect satin fabric that was perfect enough for the outer covering of the stuff animal and the fact that the color shading was as green and as dark as that of the original Chiirou Syaoran made and gave for her. She just had to buy it, among with the rest of the materials needed. Luckily for her, her father went shopping with her and paid for the slightly expensive fabric.

Much to a surprise in the beginning, the one facilitating the workshop was a familiar face among Tomoeda High School, where she works as a fine arts teacher there. She already began the workshop and even provided extra materials available for those who couldn't afford to purchase their materials. She listened very carefully while looking down at the worksheet packet of instructions and procedures. The teacher also provided them her personal website which contained many tips and tricks in to sewing products other than clothing.

"Sakura, my sista!" Takashi Yamazaki approached her at one of the Tomoeda stuffed animal booths while Sakura already began sorting out the white cotton filling for the stuffed animal. "I was told that I could find you here!"

Sakura placed the filling on the table and grinned. "Where's Chiharu?"

"She's with Yanagisawa at the moment," he answered. "So, what type of stuffed animal are you gonna make this time?"

She gave a soft sigh and gazed at her materials already laid out at the table. Dark grayish green-colored satin cloth, a few smaller-sized assorted colored satin clothes, and a few black beads that would resemble the eyes of the stuffed animal. "I'm gonna make a replica of Chiirou… just in case I may never see sweet Chiirou again…"

Yamazaki patted her gently on the shoulder, then took a seat across from her. "You don't have to worry about that anymore, but you know, I think you should continue on making the new Chiirou."

"Hoe? What do you mean by not to worry about it anymore?"

"Got the news," he grinned. "Syao-chan's found Chiirou! Looks like that Hirashiki chick has got some fetish with stuffed animals. She's got a bunch of them displayed in her hotel suite. Dunno why she's got them when they're only gonna be there for two weeks."

She gave a sigh of relief. "Oh thank goodness!"

"The problem is, Syao-chan hasn't had an idea on how he could get Chiirou back without her noticing that it's gone from her little collection. Not yet anyway. So, Shulai—"

Just as he was about to continue, Shulai arrived by himself at the diner. He immediately spotted Sakura and Yamazaki and approached them. "Yo, Shulai! Just in time, man!"

He nodded and took another seat from another table and sat next to Yamazaki. "Yeah? What'd I miss?"

"I was just about to tell Sakura your plan, man," Yamazaki grinned. "I already told her that the peeps at Kagamineshi already found Chiirou."

Shulai shook his head. "That Hirashiki tramp is getting in my nerves even more than it does with the clan leader, seriously."

"So, what do you have in mind to get Chiirou back, Shulai?" Sakura asked curiously.

"Well, I could see that you got the materials laid out already and… oh yeah, colors that match your Chiirou stuffed toy!" Shulai grinned.

"He'll be the backup Chiirou, that's why I'm gonna replicate what Syaoran did with the original Chiirou with this one," Sakura said firmly.

"Good. Anyway, the plan will be this: You go ahead and finish the stuffed animal as always. Then hand it over to Yamazaki because he's gonna install a small spy camera inside of it. Then we send this out via turbo express or something to Kagamineshi and pay the high cost to have it shipped the next day. In turn, Syaoran, Eriol, or probably Yun or Meiling are gonna find a way to switch the original Chiirou with the bugged Chiirou and then send the original Chiirou to you via next-day shipping."

"Whoa! That's an ingenious idea!" Sakura gasped excitedly. "Well, I don't think I'll be able to finish this for the entire night, so maybe I'll be able to finish it before the end of tomorrow."

"Yeah, not a bad idea!" Yamazaki nodded. "Tomorrow's only Thursday, so we can go ahead and ship it on Friday, and then via next-day, Syaoran should receive the package on Saturday. Perfect scheduling!"

"Mou," Sakura winced. "Can I ask something? What's with the camera for?"

"Well," Shulai began to answer. "We're not just out there to rescue Chiirou from the evil clutches of Mai Hirashiki. We also have to catch her in the act as well."

"Like what kind of act?"

"You know, making her confess… or rather re-confess… that would turn things around against her in our advantage. Call it a hidden revenge tactic."

"Okay…" Sakura blinked curiously towards Shulai, whose confidence became a whole lot more visible by the way he looked than he was before. Although seeing Shulai actually taking things seriously is a huge improvement, to Sakura, the way Shulai had been expressing himself lately seemed natural yet at the same time, out of character. Why out of character? Because to Sakura, Shulai was becoming more like Syaoran and all the more she yearned for him to return back home.

"I saw some black transparent-surfaced beads at the materials boxes over there," Yamazaki said, pointing at the area where there were open boxes of various materials and accessories for free. "Instead of those plain black beads for the eyes, just use those."

"Are you sure, Taka? Just how small is this camera that you plan on using anyway?"

"Oh believe me," Yamazaki grinned. "They're the perfect size to those clear eyes, Sakura!"

"Well… your words, Taka. I hope you're right about this…" Sakura stood up from her spot and headed to the materials section to grab a few of the materials including those dark transparent beads for the eyes.

#

Some two hours later, the teens and fellow stuffed animal-making students exchanged their byes as the workshop finally ended. Fanren, who was present also, was greeted with those who attended the workshop as well as the customers who came to dine in. Once she was able to clear herself out of the greeters, she spotted her look-alike cousin and her brother's sweet girlfriend nearby. She made her way from the greeters and approached the two.

"So, how'd you like the workshop, you two?" Fanren grinned.

"Memories came back to me, Fanren-nee," Sakura gave a soft giggle. "I'm trying to redo replicate Chiirou."

"Hm, that's a challenge, Sakura. I heard that Syaoran went further in to purchasing the best high-end fabrics money could buy to make that original Chiirou bear for you," Fanren winked.

"Well, I don't mind taking over the challenge. He'd be surprised when he sees it!"

"Oh I bet he will. Right, Shulai?"

Just as the older Li girl gazed at Shulai, he simply grinned. "Oh I'm sure he'll be really surprised, Gajie."

"Well then, the Tsukishiros will be cleaning up the rest here. We've already packed up with our own materials. Gotta thank Miyao-san for sharing her fine arts and crafts expertise to the masses, it has become a success!"

"It is! Congratulations, Fanren-nee!" Sakura applauded, with Shulai gently applauding himself.

"Today's workshop is actually just a trial period of a project that I plan to open for all the masses. I call it the Tomoeda Culture Workshop Series! With the expected success of CBLW, fans are gonna want to flock all the way up here and experience the beauty and authenticity of Tomoedan culture. When that happens, we'll be having this culture workshop series project ready and all set to go! What do you think?"

"That's an awesome idea, Gajie," Shulai expressed his voice with a smile on his face. "I'll support your project too!"

"Aw, you're so sweet, Shulai, you're beginning to sound more like Xiao-chan!" Fanren teased while Shulai raised an eyebrow in suspicion.

So… I'm not the only one who's noticing Shulai's… strange personality improvement… Sakura's voice spoke within her. In fact, Shulai isn't actually making an improvement… it seems as if… he's acting more like Syaoran!

"Well then!" Fanren exclaimed. "I got the SUV for the night, so why don't we go home together?"

"Good idea!" Sakura smiled. "Too bad Taka isn't here anymore. He had to go and bring Chiharu home."

"Well, he's a man, so he can handle himself," Fanren grinned. "Let's go!"

#

Just five minutes later, the Lis and Sakura arrived at their neighborhood. Fanren went ahead and excused herself inside as Shulai decided to walk Sakura home to her doorstep. But when the two teens arrived, there were no lights illuminating through the windows. Sakura did not expect that her father would not be home this late night.

She never really liked being alone at home, especially at night. When that happened, she would normally invite Tomoyo in. With Tomoyo still in England and the girls have their own personal businesses they had to take care of, there was no other choice. After all, Shulai was here.

"Um… I know this may sound… um…"

"You want me to come inside?" Just as Sakura was about to finish, Shulai continued where she trailed off.

"Um… well… since you're my guardian and all… yeah!"

Shulai seemed indifferent and shrugged his shoulders. "Sure thing. I got nuthin' else to do anyway."

"Thanks, Shulai!"

She grinned and unlocked the doors with her keys. When they stepped inside, they found the house quite neat and clean without the crazy antique clutter that she had gotten used to thanks to her father and his research team on Mongolia. There was a note that was left on the coffee table written by her father:

There is an emergency at CRU tonight. Apparently, Dr. Sawaguchi, the lecturer for the Introduction to Anthropology class, had to call in sick and the dean called me up to substitute for her tonight. It'll be a three-hour class, so I'll be home late.

I made dinner at the table. Just heat them up in the microwave. I made enough for you and a possible guest you decide to invite since I know you don't like being alone at home.

Love you - Dad

"Wow… Dad's in the university substituting for a lecturer for tonight's summer term version of the Intro to Anthropology class. But there's dinner ready for us! You haven't eaten yet, haven't you?"

Shulai shook his head. "I ate a lot when I went to visit Uncle Xiaojin at the hospital and just burned all that out through soccer practice. But yeah, if you got enough for me, sure thing!"

"Great!"

Sakura proceeded in to preparing dinner as Shulai made himself at home by scanning around the living room. Along with his observations, his eyes stumbled upon a huge framed portrait on top of the fireplace. He got closer to the portrait and gazed at the photo of the Kinomoto siblings during their childhood years. Behind them are their parents, Fujitaka and Nadeshiko.

"So… how old were you when your mom died?"

She approached closer to the living room while she waited for the microwave to finish heating up their dinner. "I was very young. I was around three-years-old. I have to admit that I never really knew my mother that well when she was alive."

"She's really beautiful, Sakura…"

"She is, ne?" Just as she was about to continue on about her mother, she realized something in Shulai that she was unfamiliar with. She then gave a chuckle.

"Ne, Shulai. You called me Sakura."

"Eh?" Shulai turned to her with a curious look. "Is that… am I being rude?"

She quickly shook her head. "You might as well call me by my first name. After all, there's two of us…"

"Oh. Right," he shrugged his shoulders. "Forgot about your brother."

"Yeah. Looks like Oniichan will be spending the rest of the week with Kaho-neechan, as well as Yuki-niichan and Nakuru-neechan preparing for their weddings in the city."

"I gotta give credit to your brother and his buddy for making some time to coach us during practice."

"Of course! They really care a lot about the youth here in Tomoeda, you know. It's crystal clear what their goals are going to be once they earn their masters from college."

"I guess," he shrugged once more.

"Anyway, I hear the microwave beeping. Dinner's almost ready!"

"Great!" Shulai followed Sakura to the dining area, while Sakura brought out the dish— a huge heaping of Whisperjay Stew— from the microwave.

Once Sakura served the main dish, along with piping hot white rice and a pitcher of ice water, the two teens were finally ready to dig in. She placed her hands together, with Shulai following suit.

"Itadakimasu!" Sakura called out.

"Itadakimasu…" Shulai murmured. Then, the two began serving themselves with their dish.

"Huh… so this is Whisperjay Stew, huh? The one the folks have been buzzing about."

"Yup! It's Syaoran's favorite, Shulai."

"Well, let's see what the fuss is about…" He took a bite along with the rice and then gave a gasp. "Whoa! It's really delicious!"

"It is, ne? Glad you like it! It's an ancients-old Kinomoto Family recipe! Actually my dad is the current master of this particular Whisperjay Stew. Me and Touya still have a long way to go to master the recipe by ourselves."

"Thanks for dinner, Kino— I mean Sakura. I really appreciate it."

"Thanks for accompanying me tonight, Shulai. For some strange reason, I really a whole lot safer with you around now."

"Really? Weird… I thought you'd do anything to run away from me since I'm a notorious gigolo, the blacksheep of the Li Family Clan—"

"But Syaoran placed his utmost trust in you to keep an eye on me, Shulai. I know that you two still don't exactly like each other even now, but somehow deep inside, you really do have high respects for Syaoran."

Shulai gave a slight snicker. "Heh, gotta admit, it's hard to hate that jerk for the rest of your life. I'm still a little that I lost my place in the inheritance line to the leadership seat, but dammit… this is Li Xiaolang we're talking about!"

"Yeah! This is Li Xiaolang we're talking about!" Sakura imitated him. "I'll never get used to calling him by his Chinese name. I'm even surprised that I even pronounced your name right, Shulai."

"Well thanks for that, Sakura…" Shulai grinned as he continued on with his plate.

"Ne, that reminds me. Have you been watching that SSN celebrity news program on TV? I haven't been watching TV as of late. Been busy."

Shulai finished sipping his glass of water. "Yeah, I have. Hell the entire family next door have been watching it everyday. So far, nothing interesting. Well, nothing about Xiaolang or any one of the stars anyway. But there have been a lot about CBLW."

"Good thing I haven't missed anything at all!"

"Well, speaking of the SSN, it starts in thirty minutes, so we might as well finish dinner."

"You're right!"

#

Some thirty minutes later at the family room, Shulai made himself comfortable while flipping the channels using the remote. Sakura just finished serving two pieces of Tiramisu cake and two modest mugs of hot cocoa. Without even aware, Sakura naturally sit right next to Shulai, rather than sitting apart from him like earlier and the past three days. Shulai, on the other hand, just shifted his eyes to see Sakura sitting next to him. Still indifferent as always.

"Alright, here it is!" Shulai found the channel and the two fell silent, watching the beginning of the news.

So far, nothing among the highlights interested them and simply talked about random things about these highlights out of the blue. When the highlight segments were finished, the camera now focused on the host and began briefing the first news item. The words "Is it love at first sight for the cherry blossom and the little wolf?" that came from her mouth almost gave both Sakura and Shulai a surprise heart attack. What even made it worse was that the names "Li Xiaolang" and "Mai Hirashiki" were even mentioned after that news headline.

"What the—" Sakura's eyes opened in shock while Shulai slowly shook his head.

"This is nothing!" Shulai crossed his arms. "It's probably one of those promotion gimmicks that the producers and their agencies cooked up with to promote the film."

"But aren't both Syaoran and Hirashiki Sunbow talents?"

"Dammit! Forgot about that—" Shulai gritted his teeth and slammed his fist against the square pillow over his lap. "What the hell is Xiaolang up to now?!"

The host then introduced both Syaoran and Mai sitting on their own unfolded chairs in an exclusive SSN interview live in Kagamineshi. Initially, Sakura should feel so much glee within her that she gets to see Syaoran on TV, however, she noticed something else that she thought was rather out of place.

"Is… is that really Syaoran…?" Sakura muttered as she continued staring at him while he spoke. Not only his appearance seemed different, even with the way he responded to the interview questions seemed rather callously informal. If this were Syaoran, she thought, he would sound a whole lot more professional and enthusiastic, however…

"Man…" Shulai muttered while shaking his head. "He don't look so good…"

"Maybe he's still pressured with the whole Chiirou bit," Sakura sighed deeply. "I swear, this is all my fault…" She lowered her head, hiding her face with her hands.

"Come on, stop blaming yourself," Shulai sighed. "Okay, so you dropped your stuffed animal while you were sleeping. It happens. What shouldn't be expected is that tramp had to sneak in to the Wolf's Lair just to find him and then decides to piss us off by stealing your stuffed animal."

"And…" Sakura turned to Shulai with a wondering expression. "For some strange reason Syaoran's voice doesn't sound like his own… it's like… I don't know… like he's a… completely… different… person…"

"Er…" Shulai quickly bit his bottom lip to prevent himself from blurting something random. Then, he cleared his throat and picked up from where he bit his lip. "Come on now, maybe he's doing that method acting… thing… like some A-list actors would do on showbiz… method acting… like… while you're currently in a movie project and you're portraying the main character, even when you're not working on the set, you're simply living your life as the character you're portraying in the movie project. For example, Xiaolang's character in CBLW. Right now, even though SSN is interviewing him about the movie, he's answering them as if he's the main character, not as Li Xiaolang himself. You get it?"

"Wow…" Sakura gave a soft whisper. "I had no idea there is such thing as… method acting… like that…"

"It's not much of a special method of acting, it's actually more of like a special method of practicing your role, like capturing your character's thoughts, feelings… you know, the essence of what makes that character… that character, you know?"

"Syaoran's an amazing actor… ne?"

"Heh, you better believe it," Shulai snickered.

"But he didn't have to continue doing that method acting thing while he's interviewing right now…"

"Actually now that I thought of it, he isn't really method acting. He just looks really bad…"

"Shulai!" Sakura hushed him. "That's my boyfriend you're talking about there!"

"You think?" Shulai snickered. "Right now, there's one thing that I would have to say about him on TV… right now…"

"Oh? And what's that, Shulai?"

"Well… right now… at this moment with that interview… Xiaolang isn't himself."

"What? What do you mean?"

"Well, you said so yourself. You said that Xiaolang looks so different now compared to the one you've gotten to know and fell in love with. Ne?"

"Oh no… what's wrong with him… is Mai Hirashiki doing horrible things to him now? If she is, seriously… um… I need to borrow money to ride a train to Kagamineshi and rescue him from her evil clutches!" She stood up with one fist tightened. "No… make that… I'm going to rescue both Syaoran and Chiirou from Mai Hirashiki's evil clutches! I swear I will!"

Shulai stood up and gently sat her down back on the couch. "Now's not the time to get mad. After all, it's just an interview about them, how they're doing, and the movie—"

"'Now now, the Japanese grapevine have been buzzing around about the two of you rumored to have… a special summer love… would you be willing to let us know what this is about…?'"

Shulai suddenly sat down slowly while muttering the words: "What… the… hell…?"

"Hoe?!" Sakura shrieked. "Summer loves? Oh no! Looks like the paparazzi has found out about me being Syaoran's—"

"Shh…" Shulai hushed her as they listened in. As many of the stars do, both Syaoran and Mai only provided safe answers. Both said something about the season being summer and it is the perfect time to find that someone special and love simply blooms while others become so delusional about summer love that they start imagining other famous idols having summer loves of their own.

Finally, their segment ended, as both Sakura and Shulai sighed out in relief. At this point, Shulai reached for his phone and began to send text messages in Chinese towards Syaoran regarding the interview. In the meantime, Sakura found herself lying down in shock to the other end.

What on earth did she just watch then?

#

Thursday (Week before the Tomoeda Festival)

FROM: Li, Xiaolang

TO: Li, Shulai

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Oh, Yun Hwa

SUBJECT: About SSN's interview last night

Just got your message and I know how pissed you are, Shulai. You have the right to, but I have no choice. Though I'm glad that you informed me that Sakura did not react like a crazed angry fangirl when she saw me and Hirashiki sitting together during the interview. I also had to give a safe answer to that interview regarding the "summer love" question. There's just no way in hell that I would reveal to the public about Sakura. Hell no.

And also, I'm sorry if I haven't been asking you about Sakura. It's not because I didn't want to bother or anything, but let's just say I have confidence in her surviving two weeks of me not being around her. Like I said, she's gotten through seven years. What's two weeks?

Anyway, that's all for now. I know you're pissed but please don't screw this up for me now and abandon Sakura!

#

FROM: Li, Shulai

TO: Li, Xiaolang

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Oh, Yun Hwa

SUBJECT: RE: About SSN's interview last night

Ha! Now you're really becoming just like me, Xiaolang! See, I have a sensitive side too!

Sakura's fine. By the way, she permitted me to call her by her first name, so please don't get pissed at me for that. I'm very well aware that Sakura Kinomoto is your girlfriend so I'm respecting that. It's not like I'm after her heart anyway. I hate admitting this to you, but with you being the next clan leader after Uncle Xiaojin, I am intimidated and damn scared of you.

Anyway, about Sakura. We're at the library right now with their volunteering again at the Archives section. Seriously no one goes to this section except for the super nerds and the scholastics like Sakura's old man. They're not doing anything right now so they're continuing on finishing their stuffed animals. Yeah, she's replicating Chiirou, just as according to plan. She's almost finished, she said. Oh, on the sidenote, Kuroda and her man Sojiro Kisaragi made up and he's frequently visiting her on a daily basis now. Then again, I'm there also, doing the same thing and making sure there aren't any goons trying to get near both girls. I'm just being a heroic guardian after all. Heh.

Once she's finished, she'll hand it over to Yamazaki so he can install that spy camera. Then hopefully on Friday morning, we'll express ship it to you and will get to you on Saturday. Then do your thing and then be a total screwup to her. That's it, nothing more to report.

#

FROM: Hiiragizawa, Eriol

TO: Li, Shulai

CC: Li, Xiaolang; Oh, Yun Hwa

SUBJECT: RE: About SSN's interview last night

I have a question for the both of you meddling look-alikes. Do any of you plan on informing Sakura regarding our plans? I mean, now that I thought of it, even though this is for her own good, why are we leaving her out?

In short, when will your roleplaying be over?

#

FROM: Li, Shulai

TO: Hiiragizawa, Eriol

CC: Li, Xiaolang; Oh, Yun Hwa

SUBJECT: RE: About SSN's interview last night

I'm tempted… I mean, I've been indifferent to her for 4 days and… dammit it's really killing me. And what's a little scary is that Sakura has become… way too trusting with me. If we get closer and closer, she'll find out about the plan and she'll be really furious with us, especially me…

It's like that stupid Li curse and that "golden elixir" crap again!

#

FROM: Li, Xiaolang

TO: Li, Shulai

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Oh, Yun Hwa

SUBJECT: RE: About SSN's interview last night

I gotta admit. This "method acting" bit really is effective! Now I'm becoming like another person, but damn, both of us are playing two roles that everyone else is gonna get confused!

Maybe I should just forget about the whole clan leadership bit and just go full-time in showbiz? I can pretty much do anything as much as you can, ne? We do share the same blood after all, right?

I thought Sakura is able to tell us apart from each other, man. Guess not…

#

FROM: Li, Shulai

TO: Li, Xiaolang

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Oh, Yun Hwa

SUBJECT: RE: About SSN's interview last night

Seriously, this is a warning to you, dude. You better be careful with what you're saying when you get interviewed by SSN and all those other media people. We may be aiming on retrieving Chiirou back but we also have to protect Sakura's identity from the public until the right time finally comes. If we're going to reveal Sakura's identity to the world, then it should be by her consent. I don't want anyone else, not even you, and most especially not Hirashiki, be mentioning her name in the mix on interviews! Do you understand?

And another reason. Sakura is watching. You wouldn't want to make her cry with just the careless words you say in an interview. Your love for her is being tested here!

#

FROM: Oh, Yun Hwa

TO: Li, Xiaolang

CC: Hiiragizawa, Eriol; Li Shulai

SUBJECT: RE: About SSN's interview last night

Eh?! We're still roleplaying? *O_O* Now I'm really confused, yo…

#

Tomoeda High School Soccer Field (late afternoon)

Sakura made several passes to her strikers when she found herself an opening. She hoped that one of her strikers would pass the ball back. Just as she predicted, one of them kicked the ball mid-air, aiming towards her direction. She quickly jumped up to use her head and hit the ball right towards the goal net. Rather than hitting the ball, she hit something hard instead, making her fall unconscious on the ball.

Moments later after about ten minutes of being unconscious, she slowly regained consciousness and instead saw Shulai gazing right at her. Still, she felt the slight headache but it wasn't quite life threatening. She gasped in shock to realize that she was already at the sidelines, being unconscious all this time.

"Oh… oh no! What… what happened?"

"Shh…" Shulai slowly dabbed on her small bruise on her left forehead, which made her hiss in pain.

"Ow… what… what's that pain…?"

"You had a collision with Denten when you were trying to hit the ball with your head to the goal. Apparently Denten was already there and you hit the side of his head instead."

"Oh no! Where's Denten-kun? Is he alright?" She shrieked as she got up. She began to scan around the field to find him when she was startled to hear another young male voice near her.

"Right here, Kinomoto… man, what a hit!" She turned her head to see one of the Amber Emerald boys, a certain junior named Sho Denten, sitting next to Shulai with an ice pack on to his head. "You really got guts, Kinomoto!"

"Sorry, I didn't see you, Denten-kun…"

"Happens all the time in soccer, you know," Denten grinned. "Good thing Kaho-san and Kuroda were present and took care of us right away. If my girlfriend were here she'd be freaking out as if she's in some kind of shoujo manga or something. Well, glad you're okay."

"Hm, speaking of that…" She then glanced right at Shulai. For some strange reason, she found Shulai's expression on his face calming, airy, and seriously attractive, right at the very same attraction level as that of her temporary long-distance boyfriend. "Ne, Shulai, why aren't you playing?"

"I'm done for now," Shulai answered. "Kaho-san and Kuroda are at the nurse's office right now getting some painkillers. You need to lie down and rest. I still gotta patch up your wound on your head. It got a bit bloody so that's why I'm gently wiping it off with cotton and hydrogen peroxide."

"Thanks so much, Shulai… you're really sweet…" Sakura smiled.

"Well, I gotta head over the cooler to grab some water. You guys want some?"

"I'll pass for now," Sakura said.

"Get me a can of unsweetened iced green tea, dude," Shulai called. Denten gave his thumbs up at the two as he made his way to the cooler.

As they waited, the two began another conversation again. "I… I had this weird dream while I was asleep… or unconscious…"

"Oh? Was it good? Was it bad?"

"Actually…" Sakura found herself smiling. "I'm… I don't know, really…"

"Well, you're smiling all random so I'm guessing it's something good."

"Maybe!"

"So, what's it about if you don't mind telling me?"

"I know this is going to sound weird, but…" She refrained herself from giggling, but then she mustered up her inner courage and faced him. "I dreamt about Syaoran being my guardian instead of you."

"Eh?" This wasn't the clueless "eh" that we're hearing of. This was more of a startled "eh" that would make anyone become suspicious of him. "Can you say that again?"

"I said that I dreamed that you are actually Syaoran and that you, Shulai, is actually over there at Kagamineshi right now… and then in the end, it turns out that I'm on the gag comedy show Gotcha-Cam da! getting punked and caught on camera. I was a little sad…"

Shulai broke in to laughter, shaking his head. "You watch that show? Gotcha-Cam da!, I mean?"

"Yeah! I'm a huge fan since childhood! Me and my dad and Oniichan would always watch it every weekends. I know it's cruel but it's fun seeing random people getting punked and caught on camera. Unfortunately, I became a Gotcha-Cam victim myself… and on national TV too!"

"Oh… okay…" Shulai gave a gentle sigh of relief, but deep inside, he found himself gritting his teeth nervously.

"Mou… this is bad, Shulai…" Sakura sighed. "Every single night I just couldn't stop dreaming of Syaoran being here on my side all this time… it's like he never left for Kagamineshi… he kept on whispering to me how much he loves me that even though he had to travel to finish the final scenes of the movie that he just couldn't afford to leave me alone…"

"Erm… you know… this is kinda scary but sometimes… I feel like I'm beginning to act more like him…" Shulai gave a slight nervous grin. "But… they're just dreams, you know?"

"But… what if…" She then gave out another sigh. "What am I thinking? I get my hopes high way too much… I need to stop that…"

"Eh, you just need a rest, that's all. We're just waiting for Kaho-san and Kuroda to come back and patch your bruise up."

"Thanks for always being here for me, Shulai. I really appreciate it."

"Anytime." Uncharacteristically, both smiled at one another, making themselves feeling comfortable.

Some minutes later, the two team managers arrived with a refilled First Aid Kit. Mio had to tend to the other players at the sidelines while Kaho went ahead and approached Sakura and Shulai.

"Thanks for being patient with us," Kaho chuckled. "The school nurse arrived and was just organizing things in there to get ready for the fall term."

"Hi Kaho-neechan," Sakura greeted. "Thanks for helping me out after I had that bad fall."

"Come on now, Sakura, you're an athlete. You've had an injured foot before in the past. A scratch on the forehead is nothing," Kaho laughed. She began to prepare to patch up Sakura's small wound. "But as always, you're the tough and brave girl athlete Tomoeda is still familiar with."

"I can't help it but love and play sports, Kaho-neechan!"

The two girls laughed when Kaho turned her head towards Shulai. "Thanks for being here for Sakura, Shulai-kun."

"No problem," Shulai nodded.

"You know, I'm glad that Sakura isn't all depressed since her long-time sweetheart Syaoran-kun left. Who would've thought that he's got a cousin who looks so much like him. Maybe you're helping Sakura suppress her sadness."

Shulai gave a slight shrug. "Just being a good neighbor, I guess, and of course, Xiaolang is my cousin who will eventually become my lifetime boss within the Li Clan. Might as well start getting used to it."

"Maybe," Kaho chuckled. "But still, what a surprising turnaround. I remember the time we first met, somewhat. You were completely indifferent and aloof at everything that we do here in Tomoeda. In fact, you check out random pretty girls and even ignore Sakura even if she simply wanted you to be her 'brother from another mother.'"

"The hell," Shulai broke in to laughter. "She's got a lot of 'brothers from other mothers,' Kaho-san. She's got Tsukishiro and Yamazaki."

"True… true…" Kaho smiled. She then placed a bandage patch onto Sakura's wound and gently taped it with surgical tape to keep it secure. "Still, Shulai… I'm impressed. It's like… ever since Syaoran-kun left, you suddenly become a lot more mature… more caring… and a lot more open to the people around you… what an improvement. It's as if… as if…"

"Lemme guess… It's as if I'm not my own self, right?"

"Yeah, that's it!"

"Hm, interesting. The fact of the matter is… what if… what if I'm not really my own self?"

Kaho fell silent while she gazed at this cousin. Some moments later, she smiled after realization. "Well, I can say this. On behalf of her brother Touya, I'd like to thank you for taking care of Sakura. I know he's hardheaded and would never admit his gratitude for you being here, so I'm saying this for him. Take care, you two."

"Thanks for patching me up, Kaho-neechan!" Sakura grinned.

"Always welcome, Sakura." She patted both Sakura and Shulai on their shoulders and left to aid to the other players.

Sakura slowly got up while gently securing the bandage on to her forehead and turned to Shulai. "Ne, Shulai. What was that all about?"

"What about?" Shulai grinned innocently.

"You know… I mean, it's weird. Last night on that SSN interview, I thought that Syaoran didn't look like himself there. Now Kaho-neechan says that you've become so kind and consider that you're completely a different person yourself! And then you said… 'what if I'm not really my own self?'"

"Well," Shulai cleared his throat. He quickly grabbed his face towel and began to wipe off the sweat slowly trickling down the sides of his head. The matter of fact is that the sweat was not because of the heated sun, but because of the tension building up inside of him. If someone where to witness his behavior now, the first thing that someone would suspect would be that Shulai was definitely hiding something from Sakura.

"Xiaolang now only has the company of his fellow idol celebs and an annoying bitch named Mai Hirashiki… and the middle school boys soccer team they're practicing with over there. And I'm here in Tomoeda alone from my generation of the Lis. With the company of people we're not quite close with, we become different people. Or rather, we're changing from our usual selves."

Right then, he gazed directly at those emerald orbs with that same curious stare. "But if I ask you this, Sakura… which one would you believe about me?"

"Hoe?" She knew immediately that she would remain puzzled once she hears Shulai's next statements.

"Would you believe if A - I'm trying hard to change for the better or B - I'm not who everyone says I am?"

As expected, Sakura stared at him with that adorably confused expression. "I… I don't get it…"

"You don't need to answer it right now, Sakura. Just… take the time to think about it."

"Oh… okay…" She gave a deep sigh, then hissed softly when she felt a bit of the sting on her bruise. "Ouch…"

Moments later, Yamazaki arrived at their spot, who just finished playing his role in the current game and then replaced by a second string player. He sat down next to Shulai while grabbing his iced water bottle and his face towel. "Whew, what a game!"

"Great job out there, Taka!" Sakura applauded.

"Oi, you alright now, Sakura? You took a really big hit!" Yamazaki spoke his concern.

"This?" Sakura grinned, pointing at her bandage patch. "Nah, this is nothing. We're athletes. We always sacrifice our bodies for the sake of the game! I had a whole lot worse than this!"

"Here's a little advice though, Kinomoto!" Yamazaki changed his tone. "Chiharu is a vain princess! She takes her precious time making sure the curls of her pigtails are as perfect and as bouncy as they can be, plus she makes sure that she's got no blemishes or scratches anywhere on her pretty face. That goes the same with most of the girls too, including Tomoyo."

"Oh come on, Taka, Tomoyo isn't like that," Sakura laughed. "I mean she doesn't mind getting her face dirty at times from doing hard labor work, you know?"

"Anyway, most girls think that guys get turned off whenever they see an imperfection on a girl's face. It's like saying that once you get a bruise as huge as that anywhere on your face, it's believed that you're forever scarred and you'll never find an eligible man to marry. Even though I kept telling Chiharu that I don't care how scarred her face may be, as long as her personality doesn't get scarred for bad reasons, that's all that matters. She doesn't believe me…"

"Ha ha," Shulai chuckled. "Only reason why she doesn't believe you with that is because you're way too well-known as a pathological liar!"

"Hey, I speak the truth and the just here, Li!" Yamazaki defended himself.

"But I have to agree with you though," Shulai nodded in acknowledgment. He turned his eyes right at Sakura. "You still got the sweet, angelic face that we all have grown to know and love."

"Aww…" She found herself blushing, which was always unexpected for her. With Shulai he absolutely had no effect on her, being that her heart already belonged to his cousin, Syaoran. Even when Syaoran wasn't present at that time, she still haven't found anything attractive about Shulai that could define his infamous gallivanting habit. But lately, something else was definitely changing, and for her, this was obviously a bad thing.

No Chiirou, no Syaoran. That was always her belief. But no Chiirou, no Syaoran, but there's Shulai?

Right then, Shulai heard his phone ringing in his duffel bag under his spot. He reached for it and checked the name that flashed on his screen. "Oh crap… it's my dad. I'll have to take this call. I'll be back." He stood up from his seat and made himself distant to have a private call with a relative.

Sakura exhaled in relief as Yamazaki scooted closer to his girl buddy. "That reminds me, Sakura. How's your neo-Chiirou?"

She gasped in a startle. "Ah, I almost forgot! I finished it this morning right after I had my breakfast. I even brought it with me so I can give it to you. Hang on a sec…" She reached for her duffel bag underneath her spot and took out her newly-crafted modern version of Chiirou, wrapped in bubble wrap.

"Whoa, this is awesome! It looks exactly like Chiirou!" Yamazaki cheered happily.

"I hope there's enough room for that spy camera you plan to install, Taka."

"Nah, this is perfect! Well, you'll have to help me install it, since you're the one who knew more about this cute little bear than I do."

"I sewed a zipper at the back instead of the usual traditional stitching for easy opening. It shouldn't be a problem for you to open up the stuffed toy."

"This is perfect! After practice, let's go head over to my uncle's electronics shop and soup up this baby!"

"And then hopefully tomorrow morning we can ship it via next-day shipping to Kagamineshi!"

"No need," Yamazaki grinned. "There's also a Same Day shipping service too! If we send it tomorrow morning, it'll get to Kagamineshi hours later on the same day!"

"Waah! That's a great idea!"

"But it's a whole lot more expensive…"

"Hoe, really? I didn't know that! Maybe we can chip in—"

"It's about 8,500 Yen, Sakura. I doubt you'd have enough money to chip in… plus I know my folks. They're not gonna lend me that much money just to ship a gift to someone. They're all cheapskates! And we're the only ones who know about this plan… you, me, and S— Shulai."

"Hoe, that would've been really awesome if we'd be able to send our Chiirou-cam to Syaoran and the others on the same day! And then they can finally execute their plan over there to get original Chiirou back!"

Just as the two were about to continue discussing, Shulai arrived with the phone on his hand and immediately answered: "Do it, Yamazaki. I'll pay the 8,500 Yen for the Same-Day shipping."

"Eh?!" Yamazaki and Sakura exclaimed in a startle.

"But Shulai, I thought your parents cut you off from your bank account so you don't have any money either!"

"Heh, not anymore." Shulai grinned while waving his phone. "That was my dad who called. He said because I have been behaving real well for the past week that he's going to test me on my… new reformation. He wants to see how responsible I am now with handling my money while living here in Japan. Fine then, a test it is!"

Sakura and Yamazaki applauded while Shulai took his seat right between them. "That's wonderful news, Shulai!"

"My hard-earned money from my childhood days acting in Cantonese Opera… never again…"

"Hoe? You were an actor in Cantonese Opera?" Sakura cheered happily. "Wow, so acting really is in the Li blood! I've seen pictures of Chinese opera before and I've always been curious! Dad says they're very poetic and colorful, but then I don't know Cantonese or Mandarin so I can't really relate…"

Shulai shrugged. "School got busy and I was sorta failing… so I had to give up a lot of my extracurricular activities including child modeling, calligraphy, Cantonese poetry, and Cantonese opera to concentrate on school. I started at age 5 and I stopped at age 12. But martial arts and soccer— damn, I can't give up martial arts and soccer, you know?"

"Amazing!" Sakura cheered. "Maybe you should consider going back to showbiz again, or something… if not, maybe modeling?"

"Cantonese opera isn't exactly showbiz, so to speak. You need specialized training and expertise to actually be eligible to perform in a Cantonese opera. Since I haven't been performing, I would be a little rusty."

"I mean, it doesn't have to be Cantonese opera. I mean… maybe you can be the new Li Xiaolang of the Asian teen idol scene!"

"Yeah, why not?" Yamazaki added. "Maybe you can replace Syao-chan when he retires!"

Shulai slowly shook his head with a grin on his face. "You two really think I should try out showbiz and modeling?"

"Yeah! We'll even start the very first Japanese branch of the new Li Shulai Fanclub!" Yamazaki shrieked with enthusiasm. "We can call ourselves… the Wolf Doppelgangers!"

"I don't think so, Taka," Sakura shook her head while refraining herself from chuckling. "I don't think that's a bad idea. Besides, we'll be graduating soon and by the time Shulai becomes famous in showbiz, we'd all probably be working adults then. Let the younger generation build their own fanclubs."

"You're right, huh…" Shulai spoke in an airy voice. "We'd all be working adults then…"

Just as they were about to continue with their conversation, they hear the whistle coming from Yukito, who was also calling everyone at the sidelines to come up to the field with a brief meeting. The three ran to the center to join in the brief players' meeting.

#

Friday (The week before the Tomoeda Festival)

FROM: Daidouji, Tomoyo

TO: Kinomoto, Sakura

SUBJECT: Have you read this?

Blooming Summer Love Outside "Cherry Blossom, Little Wolf"? (click here)

It's nighttime here now and I'm alone at home. (My dad's mansion that is…) I'm currently watching a documentary about the history of the British Monarchy right now as I'm typing this email to you. I was surfing the internet for more info regarding the British Monarchy so I can start working on my documentary film for submission to complete my admissions to the BRIT School. I thought of doing a double-take on this one. Since I'm both interested in designing and filmmaking, I thought about the fashion trends and the changes and evolution from the earliest days until today worn by royalty, nobility, and aristocracy and how some of them can apply to today's fashion trends. For instance, the popular gothic-lolita theme in Harajuku is very influenced by the elegant and sophisticated dress styles during the Victorian Era in England, as well as early French fashion. These past few days, I have been filming shots and taking photos and attending these historical events all around and about the London area.

This weekend, my dad and I will be visiting the Jasmine Country Home in Devon. Eriol's father's family (the Wimseys) owns the place and my dad and Eriol's father already made contact not too long ago and said that Mr. & Mrs. Meriwether Wimsey and Family (Eriol's cousins on his dad's side) are currently staying there. We'll be there for about four days and for sure, I'll be taking lots of pictures to show to you because I heard how beautiful, palatial, and peaceful it is over there and that the Wimseys are very friendly and welcoming. Apparently Eriol moves fast and he's already informed the Wimseys about my dad and myself.

Anyway, about the link that I just linked you— have you read that? While I was searching around for links about the British monarchy I stumbled upon the Japanese celebrity news sites. I was rather shocked when I read that article. I started to ask myself things like "Is this really the Syaoran that we knew?" and "I wonder how Sakura is feeling right now after reading this?" That's why I just had to write to you immediately.

Please do write back when you can. No need to rush. I would still have my laptop and internet connection with me when I get to Devon. :)

Love you - Tomoyo

#

FROM: Kinomoto, Sakura

TO: Daidouji, Tomoyo

SUBJECT: RE: Have you read this?

Hi Tomoyo! Thank goodness you're doing very well there! I thought you disappeared or something since you haven't been replying to me as much, but I can understand that you're already soaking yourself in to the British lifestyle, so to speak. I can't wait to hear more from you regarding Eriol's relatives and Devon and that fashion documentary that you're making!

About that article you just linked me, I just read it now. I'm actually at the library again at the computers. I'm currently entering some info in to the library database right now while Mio-chan is assisting some students there regarding the sources that they're looking for. We've been really busy at the library lately, more and more of these old publications had been arriving to our floor and it's been really hectic. Mio-chan had been volunteering here longer than me so she gave me the easier tasks while she handled the harder ones. Anyway…

I forwarded that link you gave me to Shulai. He's at the hospital again visiting Syaoran's father. Earlier just now the three of us (the third one being Taka) headed to the post office and shipped a special replica of Chiirou that I made myself since Wednesday to Kagamineshi, addressed to Eriol's name via EMS same-day shipping. Apparently, Syaoran found Chiirou in Mai Hirashiki's hotel suite and it's piled up at the center of all her other stuffed animals (who knew she was a fan herself). Even though Mai-chan is a little… I don't know… slow… but Syaoran isn't underestimating her. Once he's got the chance to break her guard down, instead of him taking Chiirou away, he'll replace Chiirou with this other Chiirou that I just made. Then he'll have the original Chiirou ship via EMS to us and then Chiirou will finally be back and secure with the happy owner where he belongs!

Going back to that article, I'm not too worried about that. I know I should be panicking right now, but I made a promise to Syaoran to trust him and I believed a single word he said about it. Syaoran is frank and honest about things. He even advised me to trust Shulai while he's gone so I wouldn't have to be depressed and sad because of his absence.

But then, I'm beginning to worry a bit. It's about Shulai. It's really hard to explain, but… Shulai has changed so much and that we're getting closer, to me it feels as if Syaoran never left… you know what I mean? Maybe that's just a sign that I'm missing Syaoran so much that I'm becoming delusional and I'm seeing his gigolo cousin as him. It's really bad, I know…

Anyway, enjoy your time in England! Write when you can! - Sakura

#

Kagamineshi (lunchtime)

Just few minutes before lunchtime at an open orchard field in Kagamineshi, Eriol and Meiling were already wrapping up their final scene of the entire movie. After this, they are officially free and are now allowed to head back home if they wished. Because Operation Chiirou was not yet over, plus the life of their beloved cousin is still in danger from the clutches of Mai Hirashiki, the two opted to stay until the entire shooting project is finally over.

"And… that's a wrap!" Director Terada called out once Eriol and Meiling embraced each other tightly, officially ending the scene and appearance of their characters in the movie. Everyone applauded for them, with the crew and other cast members watching them praised and embraced the two for an exceptional, wonderful job.

"Great job, Eriol and Meiling! Thank you so much for being part of this project! That was absolutely outstanding!" Terada also embraced the two, then Eriol and Meiling exchanged hi-fives with each other. "Alright, before we wrap up the other scenes with the reset of the cast, let's all head back to the hotel for lunch!"

Eriol and Meiling hopped back in to the Wolf's Lair, where they find Syaoran reading his lines and Wei just getting off from the phone. With that, Eriol and Syaoran exchanged hi-fives as their sign of victory. Meiling approached to Syaoran's master bedroom to change her clothes while the boys sat at the dining area. Wei approached them and sat right next to Syaoran.

"Masters, I just got off the phone with Madame Yelan," Wei began. "There is good news and bad news."

"Alright then," Eriol nodded. "What's the good news?"

"Don't you wanna hear the bad news first?" Syaoran asked his cousin curiously. "I prefer hearing the bad news first."

"Master, I… I think the good news would be more appropriate in this situation to go first."

"Fine, fine. So what's the good news?"

"Well, I am happy to announce the good news about your father."

"Uncle Xiaojin?!" Eriol gasped happily. "Please, go on, Wei!"

"Your father had just woken up from his seven-day coma." Syaoran and Eriol then gave out sighs of relief.

"That's the best news I've ever heard, Wei. Thank you!" Syaoran expressed his relief.

"The bad news…" Wei gulped. "His body's paralysis has spread throughout his system… up to the point where he can no longer speak properly."

Syaoran stood up with eyes wide open. "What? What do you mean he can no longer speak properly?"

"He lost the ability to speak, Master. It's a good thing that he can still move both is arms, but pretty much almost his entire body had completely shut down. I'm sorry about this, Masters…"

The two boys then gazed at each other with worried looks when Meiling arrived wearing a simple floral blouse and tight denim shorts. "Hey, what's with all the gloomy faces, you guys?"

"It's about Uncle Xiaojin, Meiling," Eriol said. "I think you better sit down."

Eriol began informing Meiling of the news, in which she gave a panicking expression. "Poor Uncle Xiaojin… this… this is just horrible!"

"Since the two of you are already finished with the movie itself, would you like to head back to Tomoeda immediately to visit Master Xiaojin?"

"No!" Meiling expressed. "We're still not done with what we need to do! Xiaolang's not finished yet!"

"I'll be fine, Meiling," Syaoran informed her. "If you and Eriol wish to go back home to Tomoeda, you can. I'll be fine on my own—"

"Not with Mai Hirashiki around, Xiaolang!" Meiling began to argue. "Keep in mind that she still has you wrapped around her finger and that you still haven't retrieved little Chiirou also!"

"I know about that! I'm still waiting for the right time for me to make my move!" Syaoran returned to the arguing.

"Honestly, Xiaolang, in case you didn't know, I have been observing you myself as of late. You seem like you're even reluctant to even get Chiirou back! I mean, did you forget that you've got the sweet and cool Sakura waiting for you back in Tomoeda? I mean all of a sudden you're just letting Hirashiki walk all over you like a doormat and not do anything about it!"

"What'd you say, Meiling? Could you repeat that for me again?" Syaoran stood up with his fists against the table when Eriol stood up, calming the two down.

"Alright you two, stop it. Let's all relax now and take a deep breath." Slowly, the teen idols sat back down as Eriol continued. "I know that Uncle Xiaojin's inability to speak has hit us real bad, but keep in mind that he's still alive! Limited, disabled, but alive! I'm pretty sure Auntie Yelan is working now with your father, Meiling, and Shulai's father, regarding how they will be running the family business with the current CEO no longer has the capabilities of doing his job, both as CEO and as the leader of the Li Clan. But we all need to calm down and focus…"

"Let my mother be the acting CEO of the enterprise," Syaoran demanded. "I'm not ready to take over the clan just yet!"

"Let's all just be calm and wait for the official decree, Master," Wei said. "Now, speaking of attacking Hirashiki-san the right time, I did receive a package two hours ago via EMS addressed to you, Eriol."

"Me?" Eriol stood up as Wei retrieved the package from the driver's seat of the motorhome. "Who's it from?"

"Well, the address came from the Li Residence back in Tomoeda, but the recipient's name is none other than the young Takashi Yamaza—"

"Open it! Hurry!" Eriol suddenly demanded, with Syaoran and Meiling getting up with their seats. Wei carefully opened the box with a swiss knife.

Once opened, Eriol removed the bubble wrap and then found a small folded note. He unfolded it, only to find that the message was written in a writing system he could not read.

"Well?" Meiling impatiently asked. "What's it say?"

Eriol glared at her. "Meiling, you know as much as I do that I can't read Chinese!" Quickly he handed the note to Syaoran, which he began to read the message inside.

"It's from Shulai. Of course he can't write Japanese that well, so he had to write in Chinese…" Syaoran said. He sat back and then translated the note to Eriol.

"'Just as we planned, the uncanny replica of Chiirou is now in your hands, made with love and pride by Sakura's loving hands. Inside is the very innovative micro-spy camera that Yamazaki and his uncle carefully installed. The dark transparent beads used for the eyes are black enough to resemble the one on the original Chiirou, so that is where the camera's lens are going to be located.'

'In addition, we also installed a nano-microphone located at the right paw of the replica bear. It's invisible to the naked eye, but it's seriously powerful and it can pick up every single noise you can hear throughout the entire room— as long as the door's closed, of course. The two devices are also heat-sensitive and can detect any living thing that enters the room. Once it does that, the devices automatically turn on and start their recording, so in short, there's no on and off button in there. Both devices installed also feature a very powerful 4G LTE range strong enough for the signals in Tomoeda to pick up. Everything that is recorded will be shown in a special software in Yamazaki's laptop. Over there, he'll be able to see and hear what's going on in there. We're bringing in Yanagisawa in the surveillance as well, since she's also good with the video programming and editing. It'd be nice if Daidouji were here as well. She'll be able to help us as well.'

'I know this may sound a little out of character for me, but I'm really begging you this time. Please retrieve Chiirou back from Hirashiki and do all your final movie scenes flawless and perfectly, then come straight right home here to Tomoeda. I'm not asking this because of Sakura. I'm asking so you'll be able to see your father again. He's alive and well but the stroke really killed off some of his nerves and now he's unable to speak anymore. I think right now, it would truly delight him to see you.'

'Take the replica Chiirou with you. Please find a way to get the replica in to her collection of stuffed animals and take the real Chiirou with you. Don't wait any longer. You need to break away from Hirashiki once and for all. - Shulai.'"

Syaoran leaned back with his eyes closed, while Meiling gazed right at both Wei and Eriol. "Okay… um… can you explain to me what the hell is going on here? How come I'm the only one who doesn't know what's up? I'm family too, you know!"

Eriol then turned to Syaoran. "Well, Xiao? Do I have permission to let Meiling in to the operation?"

Syaoran slowly opened his eyes. "Shouldn't you be asking Shulai about that?"

"Eh?" Meiling blinked in curiosity. "Why the hell do we need Shulai's consent for?"

Right then, Syaoran and Eriol turned their faces right at Meiling, with the completely lost and confused teen idol continued to show her bewilderment. Right then, Eriol began to inform Meiling of the operation, as Syaoran took out the bugged Chiirou replica from the box.

"Well, hello there, little Chiirou!" Syaoran grinned while gazing right at the glassy dark beads of the stuffed bear's eyes.

#

After the cast and crew had their lunch, Syaoran, along with his backpack, made his way alone to Mai's suite. The initial plan was for the two of them to rehearse their final scenes together before the actual filming starts much later. Knowing Mai Hirashiki, for sure, would still be busy making herself pretty, she would be lowering her guard down and let him wonder around his suite while she prepared herself.

When he reached the third floor of the hotel, he knocked on the door. As expected, she came to the door. "Who is it?"

"It's Li," he answered. Quickly, the door opened and it showed a rather messy-looking Mai standing right in front of him!

"Waaah! Oh Li, I'm so surprised that you're here at my door!"

"Like I have any other choice…" He rolled his eyes.

"Come on in!" He entered, as she shot the door behind her. He proceeded to the living room area and took a seat. From where he was sitting, he can finally see the stuffed animal display including Chiirou right at the center. So close, yet so far.

"I'm so sorry I look all messy! I'm still getting ready and all that!"

"I… I thought that you and I would just practice our lines here. It's a whole lot more private than outside or even at the lobby."

"Great idea! I was actually thinking about that, hee hee!"

"Your manager isn't here, is he?" Syaoran began to scan around the suite, making sure there was no one else present.

"Oh, I gave my manager the rest of the day off. He needs to go shopping anyway to buy a few things and souvenirs for his family anyway, so we're all alone!"

"Good," Syaoran nodded.

"Oh, where are my manners!" She shrieked. "Um… would you like anything? Um… tea, coffee, iced water, juice…"

"You got any iced chocolate milk?"

She gasped again. "Of course! My manager made a pitcher full! Let me go get it for you!" Quickly she headed to the kitchen to serve her guest a glass of iced chocolate milk.

Meanwhile, Syaoran, still with his backpack on his back, got up and stood right in front of Mai's stuffed animal display. While she was not looking, he slowly opened his backpack so the mechanisms inside the replica Chiirou inside would start picking up the audio taking place inside the closed suite.

"Mou, Li-kun! Your chocolate milk is here!" From behind, Mai sneaked behind him with a snicker on her face. Syaoran took the glass from her and he began to sip on it.

"Thank you…"

"Love my stuffed animal collection?"

Syaoran felt a slight startle when he felt a jolt inside, but still remained indifferent towards her. "I have to admit it, but I do like it… especially that particular dark grayish green one that you stole from a local Tomoeda girl. You do know that stealing is against the law, right?"

Mai laughed at the latter statement. "I'm just… borrowing it… from her, you know? I'll eventually give him back to her, come on now! Besides…" Right then, her playful voice suddenly became more sinister. "Why does she matter to you anyway? You've done the deed of tearing her heart in to pieces anyway. And we're almost finished with this movie project that would ensure millions of viewers and millions of profits for all of us! We can finally go back to our old lives in Tokyo, being famous and entertaining more fans as always, ne?"

"Only because you stole the damn stuffed animal from her!"

"Like I said, I'm just simply borrowing it from Kinomoto—"

"Without her permission."

"Remember our little agreement, Li!" Mai turned back to her threatening self again. "Say one single word about our ordeal, you can say goodbye to your precious Chiirou!"

"You're borrowing it and yet you plan to destroy it anyway. That's stealing for revenge, Hirashiki."

"Oh shut up already, Li! I'm warning you!"

"And to think we all thought you would be a whole lot more professional than that. Is fame really that important to you?"

"Fame?" Once again, she broke in to laughter, shaking her head. "Oh, my rise to fame is the least of my concerns. I have a much more prized goal which of course, involves you. I'd like to see within my eyes on how treacherous you are with girls altogether. Sure, I know how much of a heartbreaker you were, but after discovering your secret relationship with that plain Tomoeda girl, I just had to see it in my eyes to see how the great Li Xiaolang breaks the heart of a plain jane commoner as in oppose to a famous idol such as myself or even with a Chinese aristocratic girl like…"

"Like…?"

"Like…" She began to tap her chin and bit her lip while continuously smirking at the same time. "Liu Bailing, perhaps?"

Immediately, his eyes widened in a startle. The last time he's mentioned the name of Liu Bailing was when he was telling Sakura of that one particular test he had to endure when he turned sixteen back in Hong Kong. How on earth could a Japanese teen idol girl like Mai Hirashiki know about that bit of his own past? He had never shared it with anyone else outside the Li Clan with the exception of Sakura.

No, don't let her get to you… His inner voice warned him. He knew that she was probably doing a distraction tactic to revert his eyes away from the Chiirou bear at her display. Keeping in mind of Chiirou, he went along with what she was about to throw right at him.

"Surprised?" Mai gave a chuckle. "Don't be. I'm not expecting you to know that I would know of her. She was a foreign exchange student here in Japan three years ago in my middle school and she ended up in my class. She's actually mentioned your name to me, actually. Of course I believe that time the two of you haven't met face-to-face yet… but she has seen you through the Hong Kong showbiz scene. A child actor-turned most sought-after teen idol in all of Asia? And you know, she's got a serious crush on you back then! I thought it was rather adorable!"

Syaoran still remained silent as she continued on. "When she showed me pictures of yours in those Chinese showbiz magazines, I thought to myself that I should also be in the running as well! I mean, I'm as eligible as Liu Bailing is to be your future bride… except of course, I'm quite an exotic, elegant Japanese girl with the best breeding there is! Anyway, after she left, we decided to keep in touch with each other… and two years later, guess what! Oh my… the two of you met on your sixteenth birthday!"

Oh crap… Syaoran wanted to grit his teeth to show his anger and hatred towards this idol girl but again, remained calm and indifferent as always. Mai noticed how unaffected he was and then continued on. "You know, I was rather upset… crushed… when I learned that on your first meeting— on the night of your birthday— you and her actually slept together! She actually bragged about it at me through emails and that she claimed that she had the victory that she would be your future bride! God, I can't believe how good you are at breaking hearts, especially with girls who had never really had a chance to meet and speak to you. Right then, I knew that I can't lose to someone like her. I mean, I'm an aristocrat myself too, but I'm a whole lot more famous… and more beautiful… than she is. There's no way she would embarrass me like that, especially in high-class Asian society! Good thing it turned out that none of her boastful with you was true after all when you announced in public that you and Meiling Li are dating. You have no idea how heartbroken I was and I wanted my revenge against her, but after you two broke up, looks like I didn't have to! Tee hee!"

He rolled his eyes as he finished the chocolate milk. "Thank you for the chocolate milk. See you tomorrow—"

"W-wait! Wait a minute!" Just as he was about to head to the door and exit himself, Mai quickly pulled him back in despair. "I'm… I'm sorry… I… I didn't mean to make your mood sour—"

"Sour?! If you really have these… feelings… for me… not once did you ever ask me how I was doing! It was always you, you, and you! Did you even ask me how I was doing after you forced me to break up with Sakura— all to rescue a stuffed animal I made her seven years ago? Or did you even ask me how I'm doing today?"

"Li-kun, I—"

He charged forward against her with fury in his amber red eyes. "I'll tell you what my mood is today, Hirashiki! My father had a stroke last Friday and he was in a coma at the hospital for almost the entire week! And earlier today, I received news from my mother that my father had woken up, only to learn that he had lost his ability to speak! I may never hear my father's voice ever again by the time we're finished her and return to Tomoeda! You're already a pain in the ass and you have become an even bigger pain in the ass for me!"

Mai shuddered in shock and placed a hand over her mouth. "Oh my… I'm… sorry… I… I really am!" She was about to get closer to her as he backed away from her.

"Don't ever come near me! I only came here as a professional co-actor in order to practice the final scenes we're about to do with you. After all, it's part of our job. But you sure do enjoy making everyone feel miserable, don't you? Never mind Liu Bailing, she's no different from you are, which was why I rejected her. But with Sakura Kinomoto… isn't it clear with you about my relationship with her? She may not be aristocracy or a famous teen idol like the two of us, but if we're speaking of real beauty inside and out, you can't even compare to her. Now, are you done boasting yourself right at me, Hirashiki?"

She slowly sat down and found herself hiding her face in shame. He turned himself away from her with a temptation of leaving the suite once and for all. But he can't at the moment. He still has yet to replace Chiirou at her stuffed animal display with Sakura's replica.

Right then, she stood up and took a deep breath. "Look. Let me get myself ready and then I'll go grab my script. Please wait here. I'll be back shortly." With that, she made her way to her room, in which he made sure that she does close the door.

Once she closed her door, this was Syaoran's opportunity to swap Chiirou with his new twin. He took down his backpack and opened it, revealing the bugged Chiirou replica. He reached for the original Chiirou and compared the two to see how authentic the replica is compared to the original.

You're awesome, Kinomoto! Well, except for the zipper at the back… but she won't be able to tell anyway! He grinned to himself and slowly placed the original Chiirou inside his backpack and then placed the bugged replica in its place. Quickly, he closed his backpack, wore it again on his back, and then reached for his phone.

In case Mai surprisingly exits the floor, he began to dial Shulai's phone number. He waited for the ringing to stop when he finally heard the voice he longed to hear.

"Hello?"

With that, Syaoran began to answer his cousin in Cantonese. "It's me. I got the original Chiirou. Spy Chiirou is now in place!"

"Well well, clan leader! We could see that now. We can see you very clear from the micro-camera!"

Syaoran then turned his head towards the eyes of the replica Chiirou. "Seriously? You could see me?"

"Yup, and you're also gazing at us too through the bear eyes!"

"Hold up. Us meaning…?"

"Me, Sakura, and Yamazaki. The coaches gave us a break today to give the second string players time to practice. We're actually at the library right now with Yamazaki's laptop. Man, this camera's seriously topnotch! We're talking about HD quality here, man!"

Syaoran sighed in relief. "Um… did you guys… hear…?"

"You mean Hirashiki's little revenge and holier than thou speech? Oh yeah, we even got a recording on it. Jeez, she's so pathetic!"

"How's Sakura and… the whole thing…?"

"If you must know, she's not exactly sad and heartbroken, just as that bitch Hirashiki said earlier. Actually she's a lot more pissed off right now at her."

"I don't blame her. I'm probably more pissed off right now than she is. But at least we've got enough evidence for charging her for stealing."

"Stealing is a big deal here in Tomoeda. If she says she's only borrowing it from Sakura, then why is she threatening by eventually destroying it?"

"She's seriously deranged… anyway, I got the original Chiirou with me in my backpack. When I'm done in here I'm going to have Wei ship him back to you guys. Then we'll just hope for the best until we're finally finished with this damn movie project."

"Right. In case there are pro-Hirashiki goons out there, don't send it directly to Sakura. Send it directly to Yamazaki."

"We're pretty much sending it back to our house since Yamazaki still lives there with us!"

"I know that, but Hirashiki doesn't actually know the address to the Li House. At least with Yamazaki's name as the recipient there instead of mine— or Sakura's even— no one will suspect."

"Alright, your call then. I gotta get off now. She just exited."

"It's a good thing you're speaking to me in Cantonese right now, Cuz."

"Hey, I'm not as dumb as you think after all."

"Alright then. We've got our eyes and ears open for you. Good luck."

"Yeah… bye, Mom!"

Quickly, Syaoran hung up as Mai appeared with her hair tied up and wearing a rather sultry-looking dark red halter top and tight denim shorts that resembled daisy dukes.

"Oh! Phone call?"

"My mom," Syaoran answered sternly. He then approached the couch and sat there, while Mai decided to sit at the loveseat across from his couch. "I have to answer that, so I hope you don't mind."

"N-no. Not at all. I mean, it is your mother after all…"

"Yeah. She just wanted to know how I was doing and how I'm coping with my father's current condition."

She swallowed nervously and sighed. "I'm… I'm really sorry about your father, Li-kun. I really am."

"Well now." Syaoran opened his backpack slightly and took out his script. "Shall we begin?"

"Sure thing."

#

Later at the library, Sakura, Shulai, and Yamazaki had been watching carefully through the Chiirou-cam the ongoings inside Mai Hirashiki's hotel suite. So far, nothing shocking or insulting has happened just yet. They simply became professionals practicing and acting out their lines while even correcting each other regarding their diction. At this point, with nothing much going on, Sakura had found herself drowsy and was about to sleep against the surface of the table.

"Tired, Sakura?" Yamazaki asked curiously.

"I… I'm sorry…" Sakura murmured while keeping her eyes open. "Maybe I just got bored watching them… working on their lines… and all…"

"I gotta admit he's pretty good at being professional!" Yamazaki chuckled while watching them on his screen. Meanwhile, Shulai gave him a slight glare. "Well, just speaking the truth!"

"He has no choice, anyway," Shulai rolled his eyes.

"I guess that's all they're going to do anyway…" Sakura yawned.

"Do you wanna go home and take a nap? I can stay here and update you guys if I see anything interesting."

Shulai stood up. "I'll take you home, Sakura."

"Thanks, Shulai." She turned to Yamazaki to thank him. "Please, update us… well, update me first if Mai-chan does something to Syaoran… or vice-versa…"

"You'll be the first to know. I promise!"

"Later, man." Shulai and Yamazaki made fist bumps with each other as the two made their way out.

Yamazaki continued on watching the situation at the Hirashiki hotel suite when the two finally finished their lines. He got up from his slouching and concentrated on the scenario happening on his screen right now.

"Looks like you're good to go, Hirashiki. Hopefully we'll finally get all these final scenes done before the end of next week."

"Yeah! Finally! I think we'll do real well tomorrow and the next few days after!"

"When will you consider giving back Chiirou to me?"

"No worries, I'll definitely give the stuffed bear back to you, okay?"

"You're not that very good of a liar, Hirashiki. Next time I come in here, I expect for Chiirou to still be sitting there in the middle of your stuffed toy collection…"

"Remember, the deal still stands! Say one single word about us to anyone else, I'm going to throw Chiirou in to the recycling shredder, you hear?"

"— which also give me grounds to report you to Tomoeda Police and arrest you for theft of private property, Hirashiki. Now we're even."

"Grr… fine! I'll give Chiirou back… like… tomorrow!"

"I'll believe it when you actually do."

Yamazaki shook his head with his eyes staring at Mai on the screen. Syaoran finally made his exit to the door, leaving the replica Chiirou alive and open. He then placed his hands behind his head, relaxing himself of this entertainment.

In the scenario, Mai heard her phone ringing. She quickly answered and greeted with her rather expressive yet annoying laugh.

"Oh my gosh, you're not gonna believe this, Goro! It looks like the patriarch of the powerful Li Clan is nearing his end! I feel really bad for dear Xiaolang but… that would mean that my parents can finally persuade his mother to consider me as his new bride! What do you think, Goro?…"

Yamazaki raised an eyebrow of intrigue. 'Keep talking, Hirashiki… I wonder who this Goro guy is…"

"… When that happens, I can finally retire from showbiz too, but not without power publicity regarding me and this movie! Were you able to get the media funds scheduling booked?… What? The stuffed animal? Oh, to hell with it. I'm gonna tear it apart anyway, and knowing the influence my parents have over any police force anywhere in Japan, there's no way the Tomoeda Police can ever prove of that little nasty mean joke I played on that poor Tomoeda girl… The more Li Xiaolang threatens me, the more that I am at an advantage, don't you understand that?… Well, are you sure you've got the funds secure and make sure that no one notices the changes, Goro?… Good! Good to hear! And that is why my father hired you as my manager! You are simply the best!… Yeah, I'll see you later tonight!"

Mai hung up the phone and then broke in to laughter and skipping around her suite like a happy little girl with her favorite candy in her hand.

"Oh, Mai Hirashiki," Yamazaki almost chuckled to himself. "Even when you're alone, you're such a big mouth, aren't you?"

When Mai finally disappeared from the living room, that was also the time when Yamazaki can finally head back home. Today was definitely a good day. On his way back home, he called Shulai on his smartphone.

"Yeah, hello?"

"Dude, it's me, Yamazaki."

"Oh hey, wassup? Got anything good?"

"You at home right now?"

"I'm actually at Sakura's right now. She invited me for some refreshments."

"Great! I'm coming over!"

"Whoa-oh! I guess that means you really got something good to show us!"

"But of course, man! Anyway, see you guys there!"

Once Yamazaki hung up, he skipped his way to his neighborhood and right next door, where the Kinomotos live. Good thing Chiharu and the cheerleading squad have practice again and that he didn't have to get distracted by her on a very important mission day such as today.

---

A/N: Whoa, fast update! I'm pretty glad that I was able to find/squeeze some time to write as much as I can. Been watching Netflix streaming movies with Mom and thanks to those movies, I've gotten some great ideas and I'm finally free from writer's block BWAHAHAHAHA! /ahem/

An avid reader(-to be?) sent me a PM yesterday and I just want to bring this up to all the readers out there, just in case another one of you sends me a PM saying the same thing. I just want all of you to know that I do not do the following:

#1 – I do not write reader/fan-requested fanfics. Simple reason why: I don't have all the time in the world to write fanfics as specified by the ones requested it due to my busy offline life. In fact I'm barely on the computer at the longest hours. If anything, the closet that I can come to going online while taking care of Mom and her fractured foot was through my phone, in which I can't really write fics using that. And...

#2 – I am a "traditionalist" CCS fan. To be more specific, I am a "traditionalist" Sakura & Syaoran couple/pairing fan. After all, it's those two that makes up the entire CCS story, right? Plus, for a writer, it's very difficult to write a fanfic where you feature another pairing or a non-canon pairing and then have no inspiration for them. As writers, we all know that it is difficult just finding inspiration for crafting a story in general anyway. I'm not hating on other pairings or anything like that, but please understand where I'm coming from as a writer and as a fellow fan. I'll just say it this way. Like all writers and readers, I too have my own preferences and what I just mentioned are those preferences I' mentioned. Hope you all understand!

Oh, one short sidenote from the story also: EMS stands for Express Mail Service, which is a United Nations (?) worldwide express parcel delivery system handled by the nations' postal service. Japan often sends all of their packages and parcels through EMS. (I know because when I used to order my J-Pop CDs from CD Japan (online), I always see the "EMS" label on their packaging labels) Most nations have EMS, which also includes the USPS (United States Postal Service). And of course, just like any mail service, you have to pay higher fees.

One more thing also. I guess it's also safe to say that I am almost finished with "Stuffed Animal." I still don't know how many chapters left, but yes, it is definitely almost finished. If any one of you own any of those fanfic communities on FFnet, please add "Stuffed Animal" there. Thank you! ^_^

Lastly, my usual shoutouts to the new readers, followers, and those who added "Stuffed Animal" to their favorites. And then, my usual review replies:

dancingfingers – Yup, good to be back. ^_^ I actually took a gamble in making Sakura show a bit of her weakness. Although she's mostly pleasant, she was always optimistic with things as if nothing and no one would ever stop her. I know that was a bit out of the blue but I had to show a little bit of vulnerability to Syaoran somehow. Scenes like that would eventually pop up somewhere which is why I rated this T in the first place. I actually don't have the guts or even have the talent or inspiration to write any lemon scenes if you know what I mean. XD

Narquissa – I miss you too! Always one of the first to review LOL. ^_^

Mishrav Mikura – Hi there! Awesome, you're a KabayanTech contributor too? Mine is primarily opinion articles regarding the latest social media trends and what not and occasionally any news I may gather from the local newspapers and stuff. I live in the Bay Area, just about 20 miles north of San Jose, the "capital city" of Silicon Valley. Anyway, my prayers go out to you and everyone in the Philippines due to the typhoon and those awful floods. Thanks for reading! ^_^

Littlepuppylost – And here's another long-ish chapter just for you hehe. ^_^

fuu – thank you for reading. ^^

ria – yup, long time no see! I haven't really concentrated much on Astral Towers but I'll eventually will. ^_^

Just a reader – This chapter should've given you clues already. ^^ Oh, as for my age, I'm in my 30s. Don't laugh because of my adult age, because if you think about it, CCS first premiered in the late 1990s. I was already in my early years of college around that time. The little kids (age 8+) who grew up watching CCS (or Cardcaptors on U.S. TV later on) are in their 20s already. ^^

sakura 42002 – About Naoko, there's already clues in this chapter. Arigatou. ^_^ (BTW, I know what "watashi wa sore o aishita" (I love that) means, although it's actually more appropriate/simpler/correct if you say "Kore ga suki desu." (I love this) "Kore" means "this," while "sore" actually means "that." ^^)

Reader277 – Hello! As mentioned, it's close to the ending. ^_^

NollasBlack – Long time no see! Regarding 911, I looked up in the internet and stated that "911" is the North America emergency phone number, so I thought Mexico also used "911" since Mexico is part of North America. Thanks for clearing that up though! XD

yingfa07 – Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoy this chapter too!

PurpleEyedGoddess – I still feel that there are a lot of improvements that I need to work on in terms of structure (ie. grammar, vocabulary, punctuation, etc.). English is so difficult for non-native speakers like me LOL. (even though I'm an American citizen XD)

Lady Dalila – Welcome aboard and thank you!

And that's it, folks! This is Adri Mars and remember: Fuji apples are a Japanese hybrid species of apple deriving from two American species of apples: The Red Delicious and the Virginia Ralls Genet apples. They are crispy, very sweet flesh, and they have a very long shelf life of 3-4 months (1 year if they're refrigerated). /random fact/ :D