I awoke the next morning in a groggy mess. I had to take moment to fully register my surroundings. My head was resting on Fai's chest with his arm around my shoulders as though he tried to break my fall last night. I managed to look down and see Kurogane's head resting on my stomach as if he attempted to help me, too. We must have all fall asleep at the same moment.
I gently touched Kurogane's shoulder at the same as shaking Fai to wake them both. It took the men a full minute or two to come around which caught me by surprise since both were usually so alert.
"Mai? Are you ok?" Fai asked, wiping the sleep from his eyes.
"I'm fine. I know I make a good pillow, but Kuro-puu you're so heavy." I whined.
"What the hell happened?" Our ninja asked, quickly moving away from me. No one had an answer, so we gathered ourselves and made our way to the kitchen where Syaoran and Mokona were waiting for us.
"Hey! Did you all suddenly fall asleep last night?" Mokona asked.
"You as well?" Fai replied. Syaoran opened the front door and — to no one's surprise — things were exactly the same as before.
"Only one strip of time is repeating. From afternoon until nightfall." The boy said as we walked through the market for a third time. Here comes the kid with his apples.
"Thanks, big brother!" he repeated after Syaoran caught him again. "Are you a traveler?"
"If Fei Wong's plan is to make these people repeat the same events forever…" Syaoran broke off.
"Time nevergoes forward for these people, is that right? However much time passes, tomorrow never comes. Somehow that's… terribly sad." Mokona said as we walked through the market.
"Hey! Big brother! Thanks for before. Our shop's produce didn'tfall!"
"Thank you so much. My boy can be so clumsy."
"Yes. Perhaps there's something sad about time moving forward as well." Fai said.
"What do you mean?" Kurogane asked.
"I've had this feeling like something bad is about to happen." I added. "What if that something happened after these events took place?" Fai nodded, we were clearly thinking the same thing.
"Those clothes. Are you from another country?" The young man asked.
"The conversation is the same but there's something off." Kurogane pointed out.
"What?" Mokona asked.
"The number of people is decreasing." The ninja explained.
"That's true… Mokona remembers there being more people around the first time." Our guide realized.
"All of you have such different-looking clothing. Do you all come from different countries?"
"How nice!"
"Indeed." Fai said, a grave look on his face. "After that, someone says 'Traveling alone is nice, but traveling together is even nicer.' But that person isn't here."
"We hope you like it here! There's a festival coming up soon, too!" Another local informed us.
"What is the festival?" Syaoran asked.
"A festival to celebrate the birthday of Clow's princess, Sakura!" The local repeated.
We all gasped at once. Sakura? Our Sakura? When were we in Clow's history?