Walking into the room, she nearly choked when she inhaled a lungful of
volcanic ash, spluttering and sweating in the heat. Feeling her bare feet
burn and callus on the overheated floor, she yelped when she realized that
there were painful burns on her arms and legs. Her hair was singed and her
eyes were watering from the warm air. Where was she anyway?
It wasn't until now when she began walking that she noticed the rolling hills of red sand and large round sun. It was so hot... it was like the air was on fire. Sakura let out a scream as she felt a wave of melted sand formed into lava mount higher in front of her.
With a smacking sound at the bottom of her feet, Sakura felt sand climb up to her knees, sucking her down into the white tundra. 'White sand.' Sakura thought to herself, trying not to move or panic. Taking in a breath, she tried to slowly wiggle herself out. It didn't work at all; just make the small white grains climb up to her shoulders. Sakura looked up to see the white wave descending onto her, feeling her fall deeper and deeper. She was about to be buried a thousand meters below!
~*~
"Syaoran, wake her up!" Tomoyo begged, looking down at her friend's sweaty and tormented face.
"Just wait until she wakes up," He replied darkly, never even turning his gaze at either of them. Dream sequences freaked him out in truth.
"Sakura, please get up!" Tomoyo yelled, reaching to her friend's should and shaking her awake.
"Nani?" Sakura whispered quietly, still looking sweaty and asleep.
"You worried me for a minute." Tomoyo said quietly, looking down at her knees.
"We're back at the riverside." Sakura observed, getting up and looking around.
"Know where we're supposed to go yet?" Syaoran asked.
"Dude, she just woke up, give her some freaking slack." Yue snapped, biting a piece of chocolate off a candy stick.
Syaoran held out his hand, demanding a bite of the candy stick. Yue relented and handed it over, nearly tearing when Syaoran took a chunk of gummy sugar off the end.
"And I thought I was the only one addicted to sugar." Kero said, shaking his head.
"I thought you liked pudding." Eriol said out loud,
At this, Kero's face conspicuously brightened at the mention of pudding. "Speaking of which."
"We were just at the food store!" Syaoran yelled, obviously upset by his friends' casualty.
"I do where to go." Sakura said, rubbing her eyes awake, "But I never got your name."
"Actually, I never got most of your names either." Tomoyo said pointedly, suggesting that she didn't want to travel with strangers.
"Eriol's the dumb ass, Kero is the pansy, and Yue's the wise-crack." Syaoran said simply, pointing at the others.
"And you're." Sakura murmured.
"Syaoran the stick-up-the-ass." Yue finished for her.
"What'd he tell you?" Kero said with a grin, as he took Sakura's hand and yanked her up.
"You were the game guide I met the other night." Sakura said softly, recalling the sound of his voice.
"Nice to finally meet you face to face." Kero said with a smile.
"Now let's get going!" Sakura said loudly with as much bravado she could muster. She swung her staff in the direction she had seen where the Fire Card was located. She nearly shuddered when she recalled his large centaur shape, burning brightly in the sky.
~*~
"Exactly how long have we been walking?" Tomoyo demanded, wiping off a stream of moisture running down her face.
"Only eight hours," Eriol said with a smile, "Here, you can hitch a ride on my back if you don't lean on me."
"Be careful not to gag from the smell either." Syaoran said with a smirk.
"How come you guys are so rude to each other?" Sakura asked, walking next to Kero, "But are so nice to us?"
"It's just something we do to pass the time." Kero said with a shrug, "We're friends in real life too. I met Eriol and Syaoran on the soccer team."
"And before that, Kero and I grew up together," Yue said with a grin.
"Unfortunately, Eriol and Syaoran never get along." Kero stated with a smirk, "So they're always yelling at each other when we're playing games."
"This is a lot nicer than getting sand in my shoes," Tomoyo said with a small sigh as she pressed her cheek against Eriol's back.
"I said stop leaning!" Eriol grumbled as he ambled along with the dark haired girl on his back.
"I'm surprised you haven't fallen over yet," Syaoran noted.
"Syaoran, I'll always be the better man when it comes to ladies," Eriol replied with his British accent.
"I'm. hungry." Kero pouted as he heard his stomach grumble.
"Suck it up princess, there's a bar over there." Yue snapped.
Sakura leisurely strolled up to the door with the rest behind her. She was enjoying their company and the bright sun, something she hadn't had much of since the snow in her hometown started settling in.
"Ok doll, I'll buy you a drink." Eriol said as he slipped Tomoyo off his back.
"I'll be there in a second, I just need to show Sakura something." Tomoyo said as she gave him a thank you smile and turned to her friend.
"We'll save you a seat." Syaoran said stiffly as the four boys headed inside.
"I think he likes you." Sakura said with a smile.
"Never mind that." Tomoyo said, dismissing the ropic as she held up her watch. "But I think you're getting hot in all that spandex, so we'll give you a costume change."
"Nothing too showy please." Sakura said, watching Tomoyo scroll through various outfits. Most were hardcore style, ranging to frilly ball gowns to bizarre costumes to leather battle suits.
"I don't like those styles anyway, so don't worry about it." Tomoyo said, still immersed in finding the right outfit. After a few moments, she finally decided on an outfit and yelled, "Here we are!"
With a beep of her watch and a wave of her hand, Sakura stood in her newly formed outfit, sporting the oriental genre. With a delicate red paper fan in her hand with the picture of a cherry tree on it, Sakura slightly fanned herself as she felt the blood rush to her cheeks as she tugged the buttons in the shape of pink petals on her silken Chinese jacket. Rearranging the yellow scarf that was tied around her waist so she was more comfortable, she stole a nervous look at Tomoyo, wondering what her friend would think.
"You look lovely Sakura." Tomoyo said with a smile.
"You've changed too." Sakura said with a smile as she assessed Tomoyo's brilliant blue kimono that stopped at her knees. Wrapped around the entire fabric was the etching of a phoenix, its wings winding around Tomoyo's body.
"Nice bird design." Sakura commented as the two linked elbows and opened the door.
"Designed it myself." Tomoyo chirped, "Now let's get going!"
~*~
Syaoran's sword snapped through the air, nearly making Sakura lose consciousness. With a sharp lunge twist of his blade, he sent her blade spinning in the air, landing several feet away from her feet.
"You need to be more aggressive in your defense, and put more of your weight into your charge." Syaoran said gruffly, as he yanked her sword from the dirt and handed it too her.
'Girls can where jeans, cut their hair, where shorts and boots, 'cause it's ok to be a boy. But for a boy to look like girl is degrading, because you think that being a girl is degrading. But secretly. you'd love to know what it's like, wouldn't you? What it feels like for a girl?'
"Sakura, you alright?" Syaoran said as he waved his hand at the girl's face, which revealed her to be in deep thought.
'When you're trying hard to be your best, could you be a little less?'
Snapping out of her trance, Sakura directed her attention back to the boy who was trying to teach her to properly handle a sword. Not that it was a necessity, but he seemed to worry about her, in his own, subtle, very hotheaded way.
'When you open up your mouth to speak, could you be a little weak?'
"You know, this really isn't necessary." Sakura stated, as she took the staff as it changed to its original form.
"Prove it to me then." Syaoran said as he assumed his favorite stance. "Show me that you don't need it."
'Do you know what it feels like for a girl... what it feels like in this world?'
With a spin of her hand, the crystal clear blade ejected itself from Sakura's hand, the weapon shimmering in the pale moonlight in all its glory.
"Nice upgrade." Syaoran said calmly, not even fazed.
Wordlessly, she pointed her blade at him, the silent acceptance of his challenge.
Swinging the blade at her unblocked knees, Syaoran was slightly shocked when she jumped clean of the attack, flipping over Syaoran's back with ease. Moving with agility, she quickly maneuvered from harm's way, taking Syaoran into a metal gridlock as Sakura clenched her teeth and stood her ground.
"We'll stop when one of us gets hit with the blade." Sakura said quietly as she flung him off and charged without a wasted motion.
Unfortunately, Syoran greatly underestimated Sakura, nearly losing his balance as he battled her off, watching with stunned surprise as she slowly rose from defense to offense.
"This is where you lose." Sakura whispered as she threw Syaoran back several meters, not even bothering to fix the strand of hair that had loosened from one of the bundles on the side of her head. "And also where you learn I will never need to prove anything to you, or anybody else who doubts me."
'She's. noble." Syaoran thought, knowing that whatever was about to come, was something that he just might not be able to handle.
Slipping the Data Card from her pocket, and looking at it for a minute, she wasn't surprised to look up and see Syaoran charging her while her attention wavered. Immediately activating its ancient powers, she felt a vein of adrenaline flow through her body as several funnels of water circled at her feet. With water that glowed filling up the crystal of her blade, and emitting power that rippled through the air, Sakura too lunged, the two flying towards each other.
Within half a second, Syaoran was on the floor, shocked, defeated and completely soaked from head to toe. With a shuddering gasp he realized just how powerful the newly captured card was. The sleeve on his short had been torn, and no blood was flowing. She had timed it perfectly, with no flaw as though she had been training for twice as long as Syaoran. On top of that, Sakura wielded the skill of a pure naturalist.
"Are you alright?" Sakura asked, taking in a deep lungful. She hadn't expected such a large amount of energy to be needed. Dialing up her stats on the game watch on her wrist, she saw indeed that her magic stats had been reduced to less than half.
"Whoa, you kicked his ass!" Eriol said with a grin as he leapt down from the tree.
"I'm fine." Syaoran snapped, ignoring Eriol's remark.
Tomoyo stood rather speechless as she appeared from behind of the trunk of a large oak.
"That was probably the best improvisation of fencing I've ever seen." Kero said, crossing his arms.
Sakura didn't answer, she just flopped over onto the now muddy ground, trying to make her head stop pounding.
"Sakura!" Tomoyo said as she rushed over to her friend and picked her up.
"She'll get used to it." Yue said dismissively, not particularly worried after what he had just seen.
"We should Syaoran to carry her back since he lost." Eriol said with a mischievous grin.
"Speaking of Syaoran. where is he?" Kero asked, looking around.
~*~
Syaoran pounded the door open, tossing his family sword onto the table. Cracking his knuckles, he delivered a ferocious punch to the wall, pressing his sweaty forehead on the wall as he tried to make sense of what had just happened.
'I've never been beaten so badly before!' he thought angrily to himself, 'especially by someone who had never even held a sword before this!'
With a sudden inspiration, he flopped onto his bed, trying to make peace with the raging inferno inside of him. Comparing both his and Sakura's statistics on his watch, he saw with a mounting dismay that they were both at the same level with similar powers and strengths, except Sakura's special ability menu was more expanded. Syaoran did have a huge disadvantage though. No only did he have more experience, but his attack and defense were higher.
'So how did I lose?' Syraon said as he shut his eyes, 'it had to be more than that attack! Had to.'
It wasn't until now when she began walking that she noticed the rolling hills of red sand and large round sun. It was so hot... it was like the air was on fire. Sakura let out a scream as she felt a wave of melted sand formed into lava mount higher in front of her.
With a smacking sound at the bottom of her feet, Sakura felt sand climb up to her knees, sucking her down into the white tundra. 'White sand.' Sakura thought to herself, trying not to move or panic. Taking in a breath, she tried to slowly wiggle herself out. It didn't work at all; just make the small white grains climb up to her shoulders. Sakura looked up to see the white wave descending onto her, feeling her fall deeper and deeper. She was about to be buried a thousand meters below!
~*~
"Syaoran, wake her up!" Tomoyo begged, looking down at her friend's sweaty and tormented face.
"Just wait until she wakes up," He replied darkly, never even turning his gaze at either of them. Dream sequences freaked him out in truth.
"Sakura, please get up!" Tomoyo yelled, reaching to her friend's should and shaking her awake.
"Nani?" Sakura whispered quietly, still looking sweaty and asleep.
"You worried me for a minute." Tomoyo said quietly, looking down at her knees.
"We're back at the riverside." Sakura observed, getting up and looking around.
"Know where we're supposed to go yet?" Syaoran asked.
"Dude, she just woke up, give her some freaking slack." Yue snapped, biting a piece of chocolate off a candy stick.
Syaoran held out his hand, demanding a bite of the candy stick. Yue relented and handed it over, nearly tearing when Syaoran took a chunk of gummy sugar off the end.
"And I thought I was the only one addicted to sugar." Kero said, shaking his head.
"I thought you liked pudding." Eriol said out loud,
At this, Kero's face conspicuously brightened at the mention of pudding. "Speaking of which."
"We were just at the food store!" Syaoran yelled, obviously upset by his friends' casualty.
"I do where to go." Sakura said, rubbing her eyes awake, "But I never got your name."
"Actually, I never got most of your names either." Tomoyo said pointedly, suggesting that she didn't want to travel with strangers.
"Eriol's the dumb ass, Kero is the pansy, and Yue's the wise-crack." Syaoran said simply, pointing at the others.
"And you're." Sakura murmured.
"Syaoran the stick-up-the-ass." Yue finished for her.
"What'd he tell you?" Kero said with a grin, as he took Sakura's hand and yanked her up.
"You were the game guide I met the other night." Sakura said softly, recalling the sound of his voice.
"Nice to finally meet you face to face." Kero said with a smile.
"Now let's get going!" Sakura said loudly with as much bravado she could muster. She swung her staff in the direction she had seen where the Fire Card was located. She nearly shuddered when she recalled his large centaur shape, burning brightly in the sky.
~*~
"Exactly how long have we been walking?" Tomoyo demanded, wiping off a stream of moisture running down her face.
"Only eight hours," Eriol said with a smile, "Here, you can hitch a ride on my back if you don't lean on me."
"Be careful not to gag from the smell either." Syaoran said with a smirk.
"How come you guys are so rude to each other?" Sakura asked, walking next to Kero, "But are so nice to us?"
"It's just something we do to pass the time." Kero said with a shrug, "We're friends in real life too. I met Eriol and Syaoran on the soccer team."
"And before that, Kero and I grew up together," Yue said with a grin.
"Unfortunately, Eriol and Syaoran never get along." Kero stated with a smirk, "So they're always yelling at each other when we're playing games."
"This is a lot nicer than getting sand in my shoes," Tomoyo said with a small sigh as she pressed her cheek against Eriol's back.
"I said stop leaning!" Eriol grumbled as he ambled along with the dark haired girl on his back.
"I'm surprised you haven't fallen over yet," Syaoran noted.
"Syaoran, I'll always be the better man when it comes to ladies," Eriol replied with his British accent.
"I'm. hungry." Kero pouted as he heard his stomach grumble.
"Suck it up princess, there's a bar over there." Yue snapped.
Sakura leisurely strolled up to the door with the rest behind her. She was enjoying their company and the bright sun, something she hadn't had much of since the snow in her hometown started settling in.
"Ok doll, I'll buy you a drink." Eriol said as he slipped Tomoyo off his back.
"I'll be there in a second, I just need to show Sakura something." Tomoyo said as she gave him a thank you smile and turned to her friend.
"We'll save you a seat." Syaoran said stiffly as the four boys headed inside.
"I think he likes you." Sakura said with a smile.
"Never mind that." Tomoyo said, dismissing the ropic as she held up her watch. "But I think you're getting hot in all that spandex, so we'll give you a costume change."
"Nothing too showy please." Sakura said, watching Tomoyo scroll through various outfits. Most were hardcore style, ranging to frilly ball gowns to bizarre costumes to leather battle suits.
"I don't like those styles anyway, so don't worry about it." Tomoyo said, still immersed in finding the right outfit. After a few moments, she finally decided on an outfit and yelled, "Here we are!"
With a beep of her watch and a wave of her hand, Sakura stood in her newly formed outfit, sporting the oriental genre. With a delicate red paper fan in her hand with the picture of a cherry tree on it, Sakura slightly fanned herself as she felt the blood rush to her cheeks as she tugged the buttons in the shape of pink petals on her silken Chinese jacket. Rearranging the yellow scarf that was tied around her waist so she was more comfortable, she stole a nervous look at Tomoyo, wondering what her friend would think.
"You look lovely Sakura." Tomoyo said with a smile.
"You've changed too." Sakura said with a smile as she assessed Tomoyo's brilliant blue kimono that stopped at her knees. Wrapped around the entire fabric was the etching of a phoenix, its wings winding around Tomoyo's body.
"Nice bird design." Sakura commented as the two linked elbows and opened the door.
"Designed it myself." Tomoyo chirped, "Now let's get going!"
~*~
Syaoran's sword snapped through the air, nearly making Sakura lose consciousness. With a sharp lunge twist of his blade, he sent her blade spinning in the air, landing several feet away from her feet.
"You need to be more aggressive in your defense, and put more of your weight into your charge." Syaoran said gruffly, as he yanked her sword from the dirt and handed it too her.
'Girls can where jeans, cut their hair, where shorts and boots, 'cause it's ok to be a boy. But for a boy to look like girl is degrading, because you think that being a girl is degrading. But secretly. you'd love to know what it's like, wouldn't you? What it feels like for a girl?'
"Sakura, you alright?" Syaoran said as he waved his hand at the girl's face, which revealed her to be in deep thought.
'When you're trying hard to be your best, could you be a little less?'
Snapping out of her trance, Sakura directed her attention back to the boy who was trying to teach her to properly handle a sword. Not that it was a necessity, but he seemed to worry about her, in his own, subtle, very hotheaded way.
'When you open up your mouth to speak, could you be a little weak?'
"You know, this really isn't necessary." Sakura stated, as she took the staff as it changed to its original form.
"Prove it to me then." Syaoran said as he assumed his favorite stance. "Show me that you don't need it."
'Do you know what it feels like for a girl... what it feels like in this world?'
With a spin of her hand, the crystal clear blade ejected itself from Sakura's hand, the weapon shimmering in the pale moonlight in all its glory.
"Nice upgrade." Syaoran said calmly, not even fazed.
Wordlessly, she pointed her blade at him, the silent acceptance of his challenge.
Swinging the blade at her unblocked knees, Syaoran was slightly shocked when she jumped clean of the attack, flipping over Syaoran's back with ease. Moving with agility, she quickly maneuvered from harm's way, taking Syaoran into a metal gridlock as Sakura clenched her teeth and stood her ground.
"We'll stop when one of us gets hit with the blade." Sakura said quietly as she flung him off and charged without a wasted motion.
Unfortunately, Syoran greatly underestimated Sakura, nearly losing his balance as he battled her off, watching with stunned surprise as she slowly rose from defense to offense.
"This is where you lose." Sakura whispered as she threw Syaoran back several meters, not even bothering to fix the strand of hair that had loosened from one of the bundles on the side of her head. "And also where you learn I will never need to prove anything to you, or anybody else who doubts me."
'She's. noble." Syaoran thought, knowing that whatever was about to come, was something that he just might not be able to handle.
Slipping the Data Card from her pocket, and looking at it for a minute, she wasn't surprised to look up and see Syaoran charging her while her attention wavered. Immediately activating its ancient powers, she felt a vein of adrenaline flow through her body as several funnels of water circled at her feet. With water that glowed filling up the crystal of her blade, and emitting power that rippled through the air, Sakura too lunged, the two flying towards each other.
Within half a second, Syaoran was on the floor, shocked, defeated and completely soaked from head to toe. With a shuddering gasp he realized just how powerful the newly captured card was. The sleeve on his short had been torn, and no blood was flowing. She had timed it perfectly, with no flaw as though she had been training for twice as long as Syaoran. On top of that, Sakura wielded the skill of a pure naturalist.
"Are you alright?" Sakura asked, taking in a deep lungful. She hadn't expected such a large amount of energy to be needed. Dialing up her stats on the game watch on her wrist, she saw indeed that her magic stats had been reduced to less than half.
"Whoa, you kicked his ass!" Eriol said with a grin as he leapt down from the tree.
"I'm fine." Syaoran snapped, ignoring Eriol's remark.
Tomoyo stood rather speechless as she appeared from behind of the trunk of a large oak.
"That was probably the best improvisation of fencing I've ever seen." Kero said, crossing his arms.
Sakura didn't answer, she just flopped over onto the now muddy ground, trying to make her head stop pounding.
"Sakura!" Tomoyo said as she rushed over to her friend and picked her up.
"She'll get used to it." Yue said dismissively, not particularly worried after what he had just seen.
"We should Syaoran to carry her back since he lost." Eriol said with a mischievous grin.
"Speaking of Syaoran. where is he?" Kero asked, looking around.
~*~
Syaoran pounded the door open, tossing his family sword onto the table. Cracking his knuckles, he delivered a ferocious punch to the wall, pressing his sweaty forehead on the wall as he tried to make sense of what had just happened.
'I've never been beaten so badly before!' he thought angrily to himself, 'especially by someone who had never even held a sword before this!'
With a sudden inspiration, he flopped onto his bed, trying to make peace with the raging inferno inside of him. Comparing both his and Sakura's statistics on his watch, he saw with a mounting dismay that they were both at the same level with similar powers and strengths, except Sakura's special ability menu was more expanded. Syaoran did have a huge disadvantage though. No only did he have more experience, but his attack and defense were higher.
'So how did I lose?' Syraon said as he shut his eyes, 'it had to be more than that attack! Had to.'