Title: Eternity
Author: Yih
Written: January 2003
Disclaimer: All rights are Clamp.
6: Switched Bodies
"Ah ha!" Kero exclaimed triumphantly as he landed on precisely the right spell. The rest of the occupants in the room, Eriol, Sakura, Touya, Ruby, Spinel, and Yue glanced over at Kero's direction with dubious expressions. First off, Kero had already made that sound a hundred times so far and none of the spells he had found thus far had any use in the tedious process that they were undertaking.
"Let me guess," Spinel said derisively, "you found the spell."
"I did!" Kero cried out victoriously. "How did you guess?"
Ruby and Spinel both exchanged an entirely disgusted look at Kero and in their opinion, his lack of any possible intelligence. It was times like these that Spinel was glad that Ruby was his partner guardian and not Kero. Heaven forbid if he had to put up with a stuff mouse with low level of intelligences, he already had to put up with Ruby and that was torture enough.
"What do you have for us?" Eriol asked in a tired, but still his voice was threaded with patience and kindness. Maybe Kero had something this time. It might be a maybe, but they had to try because so far, no one had turned up anything remotely close to what they were looking for.
Kero flew over with the heavy tome and pointed to the spell that he'd found. He was grinning as Eriol's eyes widened at what he read: How-To- Switch-Entities-In-Every-Way-Shape-Or-Fashion. The fact that there were no guidelines, but instructions on how to manipulate the spell to get it the way desired made this the perfect spell. "Kero found it!" Eriol exclaimed excitedly.
"Good job, Kero!" Sakura said, hugging the stuffed mouse affectionately while in the background, Spinel and Ruby both face-faulted. Trust the dumbest of them to have the most luck.
After spending a few hours pouring over specific details that had to be manipulated for their purposes, which was to remove an entity from a body with two entities. There were actually detailed instructions on this, which had been the problem with using the Switch card since it didn't recognize separate entities, switching entire entities to different bodies rather than a specifically targeted one.
They also spent time to actually do a small test to make sure that everything worked out fine. Well, it worked and they were quite confident it'd work. And of course, Eriol was enthused and full of confidence, which only made the rest of them feel so much better. Just before they were about to do the spell, Eriol asked to speak to Sakura privately.
"What do you want to talk about?" she said in a cheerful, though highly anxious voice.
He smiled reassuringly. "It's nothing major, but I think you're more nervous than Touya is--- and he's pretty frazzled."
Her cheeks turned pink. "I can't help it," she admitted. "I'm just scared something will go wrong."
He took her hand and squeezed it. "Nothing will go wrong, I won't let it, okay? Have I ever failed you before?"
The way he was looking at her, made her cheeks turned even pinker and this time it wasn't from embarrassment. That had been the way she had wanted Syaoran to look at her, but he had never had and eventually her crush on him had faded. But as her heart started fluttering even more and this was not about nerves, it was something entirely different. She smiled beautifully at him. "No, you haven't. You're wonderful, Eriol! I've full confidence in you!"
The way she was gazing at him, made his heart skip a beat. Was he just dreamer or were her eyes softer and looking at him in a light that wasn't entirely like 'friends'? He must be dreaming, she wouldn't think of him in a romantic sense. Yet, it still felt good that she had confidence in him and that she'd call him wonderful, he could live with that for now.
"Let's go back in and get on with the spell. Relax," he repeated, "and nothing will go wrong. Nerves only tend to make your focus unsteady and we definitely need your focus there, Sakura."
She nodded and she took the hand he offered. As she was holding his hand, she felt something electrify within her at his simple touch. She glanced sideways, disappointed that his expression didn't change, it was the same. She'd felt something, hadn't he?
Behind the cloud of smoke that had indicated that the spell had gone right, none of the people in the room could tell if the spell had gone correctly until they heard the distinctively voice of Yukito exclaim happily, "It worked! At least, I'm okay, are you okay, Yue? Wow, this is like the first time that I'll be able to talk to another part of myself! This is so incredible!"
Touya grinned, when Yukito got excited he had a tendency to get a little ditzy and hyperactive with his words as well. It was cute and adorable, so he didn't mind it much if at all. It was when Yukito wasn't hyperactive or ditzy that he was worried because that meant one of two things: that Yukito was sad or that Yukito was sick. His incessant talking was indeed a very good sign.
"Yes," Yue answered in a soft, refined voice, "I'm okay. I have to admit, I respect Kero much more for putting up with his stuffed animal form now." His voice had a hint of amusement at the fact he was no longer in human form but in a too cute bunny form. "It feels strange."
As soon as the smoke cleared, Sakura rushed over to Yue's side and scooped him up in her arms. "Oh you are too cute!" she exclaimed as she tickled his little white belly. Yue scowled, which only made his features even more adorable. "That's so cute!"
Ruby and Spinel moved over and had to admit that Yue was looked awfully adorable. "Yue can no longer have that indifferent look on his face anymore," Ruby remarked. "He'll have a cute smile on his face for the next few decades! KYAAAAA, I'll have so much more time to memorize his features! WYAAAA!"
Spinel and Kero sweatdropped at Ruby's excessive excitement over the fact that Yue was going to have a little cute bunny smile basically plastered onto his face since there were only two expression he could have a smile and a larger smile. Well, he could learn to frown as Kero did, but it'd take some time to getting use to. All in all, Kero and Spinel had huge grins on their faces as they tried to suppress their laughter.
"I'm glad everything worked out," Eriol commented, trying to shift the conversation to the successfulness of the spell rather than the obvious products of it. "You were fabulous, Sakura."
She blushed as she always did whenever someone complimented her, but she couldn't help but feel that she wasn't only flushed from his compliment but from the fact that whenever he looked at her, she felt like she was on a different level. The change had happened only an hour ago, but she didn't think these feelings had just surfaced in an instant, she'd always liked Eriol as a friend.
It was just recently that she realized that maybe she liked him as more than a friend. That thought didn't alarm her or confused or even puzzled her, she only wondered what she'd too. She was terribly afraid to be rejected because after all, she was only Sakura and he was Eriol. She was cute and childish, while he was gorgeous and mature. How could she win such perfection as he was?
"Is something wrong, Sakura?" he inquired softly, a worried look on his face. What concerned him was that her eyes were so much further away from him than she actually was.
She shook her head immediately. "No," she said sheepishly, "nothing's wrong. Nothing's wrong at all!"
The way she said it didn't convince him in the slightest that she was okay. She was trying too hard to make it seem like she was okay, which made him only believe the opposite. "You aren't good at hiding your emotions."
"You aren't," Yue agreed.
It was then that Sakura realized that this moment she was sharing with Eriol was far from being private. She was so shocked at that, that she let go of Yue, who being a bunny without wings immediately crashed to the ground. Her eyes widened as she cried out, "I'm so sorry." Then something dawned on her. "You can't fly?"
Yue grimaced. That hadn't seemed like a high fall, but considering that he was a stuffed animal of the size that he was, that had been a pretty good distance. "I don't have wings," he said pointedly.
Eriol chuckled. "That can easily be fixed," he remarked and with a wave of his staff, Yue now had wings. "Try them out," he urged.
"That's easier said then done!" Yue grumbled, disbelieving how much he was sounding like Kero. "These are new wings, it's not like I've had them for hundred of years."
Everyone chuckled at Yue, who only glowered at them which reminded everyone too much of Kero. That made them laugh even harder while Yue tried to get his new wings to work. He managed to rise himself up a few inches before he hit the floor again. He tried again, but too no avail he couldn't make himself get any higher than half foot.
"I'm tired," Yue stated wearily. "I give up!"
Sakura smiled and scooped Yue up into her hands and nuzzled him which caused him a flush a light pink. "I'll take you home so you can get some rest. Come on Kero."
Kero started flying after them, while Eriol said suddenly, "I'll take you home."
Sakura looked back at him. "That'd be great!" she exclaimed. She was delighted that he was going to take her home, but she was also extremely nervous, which Kero and Yue both noticed. There was an awkward few minutes as they drove to her house before she finally asked, "How are things in England?"
"Like they always are," Eriol responded immediately. "How are things here?"
"Good," she remarked. They again fell into silence. In her lap, the drive was taking much longer than the spell had to transport them to Eriol's house, so both Yue and Kero had fallen to sleep. "They're so cute," she commented. "It'll take a while getting use to Yue being so cute."
"You're cute," Eriol blurted out.
She blushed heavily. "You're cute too," she murmured back shyly.
He glanced at her as she was staring at him. The way their eyes met gave her the same electrifying feeling, the same feeling Eriol had had every time they touched. He recognized something different now, though. He recognized that she also felt something because her eyes didn't have the same nuances that they had had before. "Sakura?"
"Did you feel that?" she asked.
He nodded. "You felt it, too?"
She nodded.
"I have something to tell you," both of them said at the exact same time. "You go first. No, you go first."
"I'll go first," Sakura declared, her face a bright pink. He nodded with his agreement. "I've never had this feeling before... I think I like you."
Author's Note: OMG! I can't believe I actually wrote in this again, it's all thanks to those reviewers that kept nagging @ me after my last update. And YES, I realize it's been a REALLY, REALLY long time--- 6 months. I'm really sorry, I really did want to finish this, thus this was actually suppose to be a ten-parter, but I've condensed the story and moved the action much more quickly in this chapter. I do apologize, but I'm getting to the cool WAFFY chapter next and I promise it won't take me 6 months this time. But wasn't this chapter worth it?! Please review, YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW MUCH IT HELPS. It keeps fanfics from dying. It certainly makes me write!
Author: Yih
Written: January 2003
Disclaimer: All rights are Clamp.
6: Switched Bodies
"Ah ha!" Kero exclaimed triumphantly as he landed on precisely the right spell. The rest of the occupants in the room, Eriol, Sakura, Touya, Ruby, Spinel, and Yue glanced over at Kero's direction with dubious expressions. First off, Kero had already made that sound a hundred times so far and none of the spells he had found thus far had any use in the tedious process that they were undertaking.
"Let me guess," Spinel said derisively, "you found the spell."
"I did!" Kero cried out victoriously. "How did you guess?"
Ruby and Spinel both exchanged an entirely disgusted look at Kero and in their opinion, his lack of any possible intelligence. It was times like these that Spinel was glad that Ruby was his partner guardian and not Kero. Heaven forbid if he had to put up with a stuff mouse with low level of intelligences, he already had to put up with Ruby and that was torture enough.
"What do you have for us?" Eriol asked in a tired, but still his voice was threaded with patience and kindness. Maybe Kero had something this time. It might be a maybe, but they had to try because so far, no one had turned up anything remotely close to what they were looking for.
Kero flew over with the heavy tome and pointed to the spell that he'd found. He was grinning as Eriol's eyes widened at what he read: How-To- Switch-Entities-In-Every-Way-Shape-Or-Fashion. The fact that there were no guidelines, but instructions on how to manipulate the spell to get it the way desired made this the perfect spell. "Kero found it!" Eriol exclaimed excitedly.
"Good job, Kero!" Sakura said, hugging the stuffed mouse affectionately while in the background, Spinel and Ruby both face-faulted. Trust the dumbest of them to have the most luck.
After spending a few hours pouring over specific details that had to be manipulated for their purposes, which was to remove an entity from a body with two entities. There were actually detailed instructions on this, which had been the problem with using the Switch card since it didn't recognize separate entities, switching entire entities to different bodies rather than a specifically targeted one.
They also spent time to actually do a small test to make sure that everything worked out fine. Well, it worked and they were quite confident it'd work. And of course, Eriol was enthused and full of confidence, which only made the rest of them feel so much better. Just before they were about to do the spell, Eriol asked to speak to Sakura privately.
"What do you want to talk about?" she said in a cheerful, though highly anxious voice.
He smiled reassuringly. "It's nothing major, but I think you're more nervous than Touya is--- and he's pretty frazzled."
Her cheeks turned pink. "I can't help it," she admitted. "I'm just scared something will go wrong."
He took her hand and squeezed it. "Nothing will go wrong, I won't let it, okay? Have I ever failed you before?"
The way he was looking at her, made her cheeks turned even pinker and this time it wasn't from embarrassment. That had been the way she had wanted Syaoran to look at her, but he had never had and eventually her crush on him had faded. But as her heart started fluttering even more and this was not about nerves, it was something entirely different. She smiled beautifully at him. "No, you haven't. You're wonderful, Eriol! I've full confidence in you!"
The way she was gazing at him, made his heart skip a beat. Was he just dreamer or were her eyes softer and looking at him in a light that wasn't entirely like 'friends'? He must be dreaming, she wouldn't think of him in a romantic sense. Yet, it still felt good that she had confidence in him and that she'd call him wonderful, he could live with that for now.
"Let's go back in and get on with the spell. Relax," he repeated, "and nothing will go wrong. Nerves only tend to make your focus unsteady and we definitely need your focus there, Sakura."
She nodded and she took the hand he offered. As she was holding his hand, she felt something electrify within her at his simple touch. She glanced sideways, disappointed that his expression didn't change, it was the same. She'd felt something, hadn't he?
Behind the cloud of smoke that had indicated that the spell had gone right, none of the people in the room could tell if the spell had gone correctly until they heard the distinctively voice of Yukito exclaim happily, "It worked! At least, I'm okay, are you okay, Yue? Wow, this is like the first time that I'll be able to talk to another part of myself! This is so incredible!"
Touya grinned, when Yukito got excited he had a tendency to get a little ditzy and hyperactive with his words as well. It was cute and adorable, so he didn't mind it much if at all. It was when Yukito wasn't hyperactive or ditzy that he was worried because that meant one of two things: that Yukito was sad or that Yukito was sick. His incessant talking was indeed a very good sign.
"Yes," Yue answered in a soft, refined voice, "I'm okay. I have to admit, I respect Kero much more for putting up with his stuffed animal form now." His voice had a hint of amusement at the fact he was no longer in human form but in a too cute bunny form. "It feels strange."
As soon as the smoke cleared, Sakura rushed over to Yue's side and scooped him up in her arms. "Oh you are too cute!" she exclaimed as she tickled his little white belly. Yue scowled, which only made his features even more adorable. "That's so cute!"
Ruby and Spinel moved over and had to admit that Yue was looked awfully adorable. "Yue can no longer have that indifferent look on his face anymore," Ruby remarked. "He'll have a cute smile on his face for the next few decades! KYAAAAA, I'll have so much more time to memorize his features! WYAAAA!"
Spinel and Kero sweatdropped at Ruby's excessive excitement over the fact that Yue was going to have a little cute bunny smile basically plastered onto his face since there were only two expression he could have a smile and a larger smile. Well, he could learn to frown as Kero did, but it'd take some time to getting use to. All in all, Kero and Spinel had huge grins on their faces as they tried to suppress their laughter.
"I'm glad everything worked out," Eriol commented, trying to shift the conversation to the successfulness of the spell rather than the obvious products of it. "You were fabulous, Sakura."
She blushed as she always did whenever someone complimented her, but she couldn't help but feel that she wasn't only flushed from his compliment but from the fact that whenever he looked at her, she felt like she was on a different level. The change had happened only an hour ago, but she didn't think these feelings had just surfaced in an instant, she'd always liked Eriol as a friend.
It was just recently that she realized that maybe she liked him as more than a friend. That thought didn't alarm her or confused or even puzzled her, she only wondered what she'd too. She was terribly afraid to be rejected because after all, she was only Sakura and he was Eriol. She was cute and childish, while he was gorgeous and mature. How could she win such perfection as he was?
"Is something wrong, Sakura?" he inquired softly, a worried look on his face. What concerned him was that her eyes were so much further away from him than she actually was.
She shook her head immediately. "No," she said sheepishly, "nothing's wrong. Nothing's wrong at all!"
The way she said it didn't convince him in the slightest that she was okay. She was trying too hard to make it seem like she was okay, which made him only believe the opposite. "You aren't good at hiding your emotions."
"You aren't," Yue agreed.
It was then that Sakura realized that this moment she was sharing with Eriol was far from being private. She was so shocked at that, that she let go of Yue, who being a bunny without wings immediately crashed to the ground. Her eyes widened as she cried out, "I'm so sorry." Then something dawned on her. "You can't fly?"
Yue grimaced. That hadn't seemed like a high fall, but considering that he was a stuffed animal of the size that he was, that had been a pretty good distance. "I don't have wings," he said pointedly.
Eriol chuckled. "That can easily be fixed," he remarked and with a wave of his staff, Yue now had wings. "Try them out," he urged.
"That's easier said then done!" Yue grumbled, disbelieving how much he was sounding like Kero. "These are new wings, it's not like I've had them for hundred of years."
Everyone chuckled at Yue, who only glowered at them which reminded everyone too much of Kero. That made them laugh even harder while Yue tried to get his new wings to work. He managed to rise himself up a few inches before he hit the floor again. He tried again, but too no avail he couldn't make himself get any higher than half foot.
"I'm tired," Yue stated wearily. "I give up!"
Sakura smiled and scooped Yue up into her hands and nuzzled him which caused him a flush a light pink. "I'll take you home so you can get some rest. Come on Kero."
Kero started flying after them, while Eriol said suddenly, "I'll take you home."
Sakura looked back at him. "That'd be great!" she exclaimed. She was delighted that he was going to take her home, but she was also extremely nervous, which Kero and Yue both noticed. There was an awkward few minutes as they drove to her house before she finally asked, "How are things in England?"
"Like they always are," Eriol responded immediately. "How are things here?"
"Good," she remarked. They again fell into silence. In her lap, the drive was taking much longer than the spell had to transport them to Eriol's house, so both Yue and Kero had fallen to sleep. "They're so cute," she commented. "It'll take a while getting use to Yue being so cute."
"You're cute," Eriol blurted out.
She blushed heavily. "You're cute too," she murmured back shyly.
He glanced at her as she was staring at him. The way their eyes met gave her the same electrifying feeling, the same feeling Eriol had had every time they touched. He recognized something different now, though. He recognized that she also felt something because her eyes didn't have the same nuances that they had had before. "Sakura?"
"Did you feel that?" she asked.
He nodded. "You felt it, too?"
She nodded.
"I have something to tell you," both of them said at the exact same time. "You go first. No, you go first."
"I'll go first," Sakura declared, her face a bright pink. He nodded with his agreement. "I've never had this feeling before... I think I like you."
Author's Note: OMG! I can't believe I actually wrote in this again, it's all thanks to those reviewers that kept nagging @ me after my last update. And YES, I realize it's been a REALLY, REALLY long time--- 6 months. I'm really sorry, I really did want to finish this, thus this was actually suppose to be a ten-parter, but I've condensed the story and moved the action much more quickly in this chapter. I do apologize, but I'm getting to the cool WAFFY chapter next and I promise it won't take me 6 months this time. But wasn't this chapter worth it?! Please review, YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW MUCH IT HELPS. It keeps fanfics from dying. It certainly makes me write!