Miaka was impatient the entire ride back to the bandit hideout. They had met the person who could raise the dead, Miss Shoka, but she had told them that she couldn't leave the village without losing her powers. So the three of them were hurrying back to the bandit's hideout to bring the body of Tasuki to the village. However, they seemed to have lost their way, and were wandering around a graveyard. Nuriko was just about to suggest that they turn around when a hand popped out of the ground and grabbed the leg of his horse. Nuriko was thrown clear, but the horse was being pulled into the ground.

"What the hell is going on??" He shouted, out of breath, as more hands and bodies emerged from underground. They clustered around the three, and Miaka and Hotohori were also thrown from their horse, which ran off in fright.

Hotohori drew his sword and started swinging, but there were too many of them to fight. Just when it seemed hopeless, a voice roared around them.

"Get down on the ground!" It shouted. Nuriko, Miaka and Hotohori dropped quickly and the corpses turned to see who had shouted. That proved to be a fatal hesitation, for the voice shouted again. "Rekka Shinen!"

A wave of fire flew toward the corpses and burned half of them, but the rest were still coming.

This time, the voice was echoed by another when it shouted, "Rekka Shinen!" Hotohori looked up in time to see two dark figures standing on a ledge, outlined by the moon. As they shouted, twin flames shot out from them and devoured the rest of the corpses.

As soon as the danger had passed, Nuriko and Hotohori helped Miaka to her feet as the two figures jumped down and ran forward.

Miaka gasped in delight. "Misara!" she cried, running forward to embrace her. As the two were hugging, the other figure came out of the shadows. It was Genrou, the leader of the bandits.

"I know she isn't completely healed, but she insisted on coming with me." Genrou said to them.

"Why did you come, exactly?" Nuriko asked, suspicious still of the redheaded bandit.

Genrou chuckled, and Misara smiled too. "Haven't you guessed?" he asked. "I'm Tasuki!" He pulled his sleeve up to reveal a shining symbol on his forearm.

The silence was almost deafening, until Nuriko shrieked, "You jerk! Why did you tell us Tasuki was dead?!?"

"Hey, I couldn't just leave the gang!" Tasuki shouted, offended. "I'm the leader now, and I couldn't just run off with ya'll. I almost didn't come at all, until this girl convinced me. Then she begged to come along." He rolled his eyes. "At least I'm here, right?"

"That's not the point!" Nuriko said, still screaming.

Miaka and Misara laughed. "Thanks for convincing him, Misara." Miaka said. Then she frowned and put her hand to her forehead. "I don't feel so good..." She said, wincing.

"Are you alright?" Hotohori asked worriedly.

Miaka smiled. "Of course! It's probably just 'cause I'm tired, that's all. Let's go back to Miss Shoka's village, okay?" The others nodded and they headed off.


By the next morning, they were back in Miss Shoka's village, and Miaka wasn't feeling better. In fact, it was clear that she was really sick. She was, however, still hungry, and when she noticed a fish lying on the ground, she pounced on it. Unfortunately, someone else had the same idea, and Miaka got into a fight with a very dirty-looking guy. He grabbed the fish and took off with Miaka on his tail. The four rolled their eyes and rushed after her.

"Miaka!" Misara called desperately. "That fish probably wasn't very clean anyway! You might have gotten sick from eating it off the ground like that! Just let it go!" But it was no use. They followed the two up to a house a little ways from the village. It was very rundown, and when they arrived, panting, in the doorway, they saw that the inside wasn't very different. Miaka was a little upset, since the strange man had fed her fish to his cat, but when Hotohori noticed the different bottles of medicine strewn about, he decided to question this guy.

"Are you a doctor?" He asked, not very tactfully.

"Not anymore." The guy grumbled. "Leave me alone."

"Please, sir, this girl is very sick-can't you help her?" Nuriko pleaded.

"No!" He roared, spinning around and facing them. They all took a giant step backwards. "I want nothing to do with people! Leave me alone!"

They hurried out of his house and down the path back to the village, all a little upset at the strange guy. Misara took another look over her shoulder at the shack, and saw his shadow in the window. He must have seen me, she thought, when the shadow quickly disappeared. He seemed a little familiar, she mused, but decided to forget it. Suddenly, Miaka collapsed, and they crowded around her anxiously. Hotohori felt her forehead.

"Miaka, you're burning up!" He cried, and Nuriko started to wring his hands.

"She might have that disease Miss Shoka told us about!" He said nervously, hopping from one foot to the other. "What're we going to do?"

"We've got to get her back to Miss Shoka's house, and fast!" Hotohori said firmly. The others nodded in agreement, and they hurried into the village to find Miss Shoka.


Later that night, in Miss Shoka's house, they crowded around Miaka, who was lying in bed, and definitely sick with the disease. Misara wasn't feeling too hot herself, so she excused herself from them and went to rest in another room. After tossing and turning, she finally fell asleep.

Meanwhile, Miss Shoka had broken some horrible news to the Suzaku warriors. It turned out that although she could raise people from the dead, she could do nothing for the ones who were alive and sick. The only solution she offered was to kill Miaka, and then Miss Shoka would bring her back to life. At first they refused, appalled at the thought of murdering their priestess. Hotohori realized their situation and tried to kill her, but even though she begged him to, he couldn't do it. So the three warriors left her in Shoka's care and went to find that cranky old guy and beg and plead for him to come and heal Miaka.

Misara was having another strange dream. Unfortunately, that cute guy with blue eyes was in it, and all he did in the dream was look at her. He didn't draw the sword that she saw him carrying, and he didn't speak. All he did was stare, and it unnerved her, even in her dream. Suddenly, she saw Tamahome behind him, covered in bloody wounds and bruises. Then the tall guy with the blue eyes raised his hand, closed his eyes, and all of a sudden, Tamahome died.

Misara bolted up in her bed, covered in sweat with tears running down her cheeks. Although she couldn't see it, she could see the red light shining from her forehead. She could feel something, in her heart, which she couldn't explain. However, she knew better than think it was just a bad feeling. It was obvious Tamahome was in trouble, right that minute, and she couldn't do anything about it. She was still recovering from the Eiken episode, and she couldn't think of anyway to get to him, wherever he was.

"I don't even know where Kutou is!" She said out loud, her exclamation echoing through the dark room. Suddenly, she gasped, as a new thought struck her. Chichiri could get to Tamahome...he had this kooky teleporting power that could take her right to Kutou, and Tamahome. Her shoulders slumped. How am I going to get to Chichiri? She thought some more, then wanted to hit herself. She was the Goddess of the Sky, for crying out loud! She uses Chichiri's powers when he's in trouble, so why couldn't she use them when Tamahome was in danger? This seemed very reasonable to her, and she decided that she might as well give it a try, and fast, since her head was starting to swim from the pain. She closed her eyes and concentrated as hard as she could. Although she was unaware of it, both Chichiri's and Tamahome's symbols were glittering, one on her forehead, the other on her knee.

Suddenly, she felt different. Something was different about the air. She opened her eyes, and her hands flew to her mouth to stop herself from screaming. She was in a completely different place, and like the red walls and decorations of Konan, everything here was all one color. Unfortunately, it wasn't red, which meant she wasn't in Konan. It was blue.