Author's notes: This isn't really all of Chapter 15: B. But I figured I'd made you all wait long enough. Sorry about that, by the way. I've been busy trying to find a job, getting my license, and breaking up with my cheating scumbag of a boyfriend. Anyhow, you don't care! On to the meaningful, if short, chapter! ^_^



Chapter 15: B By Android Eleven





An empty, dark and misty atmosphere surrounded Takeru as his eyes slowly fluttered open. Disoriented, he sat up and rubbed his forehead, trying to get his bearings. The last thing he remembered was... Hell, he wasn't sure. His last thoughts were a complete blur and the fact that he had no clue as to where he was presently did nothing to help.

Slowly he pulled himself to his feet, not noticing that he didn't have his staff with him, and looked around. There was nothing there. Or rather, there was nothing there but thick patches of mist across a dark expanse of bleak gray space. The atmosphere unnerved Takeru; complete darkness would have seemed more natural. The damp grayness was spooky.

Sighing he bent down and picked up his feathered green beret from where it had fallen to the ground. Using it to brush himself off, he started walking towards what he assumed was the side of this area. But he may as well have stayed right where he had woken up for all the good it did him. He didn't seem to be going anywhere. And worst of all, as he moved, the fog seemed to increase, swirling around and going quickly from thick to frightening as it surrounded him.

Noticing this, Takeru stopped walking and stood still. But it did nothing to dissuade the oncoming mist. It got so that the Ishidan prince could barely see his hands in front of his face. Takeru tried running again, but, being unable to see, he tripped and stumbled to the ground, where the fog enveloped him like a blanket.

Just as he thought he may very well suffocate, the mist parted slightly and what looked almost like a mirror formed directly in front of him. He was too busy catching his breath to see as the picture first appeared on the surface of the "mirror", but when the people who appeared on it began to speak, Takeru could hardly help but notice.

At first, their faces and voices were blurred, a little like how one would hear and see things from underwater, but as the Prince stood once more and stepped hesitantly toward it, they began to clear. Slowly, but then more quickly as Takeru came closer, until finally the people inside it looked and sounded real and Takeru had practically walked into the mirror. He sensed it, rather than saw it, as the mist behind him moved to envelop him once more and changed shape, taking him into the reflection.

*

~ Four figures were around a round table in a room where the walls were made of stone and the only light in the room came from three windows very high up on the wall to the left of the door. On closer inspection, one could see that only two of the four figures, those whom were standing, were male, while the other two, still seated, were adorned in dresses, of blue and purple respectively. The two men, one in green, the other in black, appeared to be arguing.

"We all agreed that our magic and knowledge was to stay in this circle!" The man wearing green was shouting savagely at the other man as Takeru appeared in their midst. None of the four took any notice that someone had just joined their group from out of nowhere.

"And what will happen to that knowledge when we are no longer here to use it?" the other man asked angrily. The man in green narrowed his eyes.

"The knowledge will pass to our children, the same way it was passed to us. That is how it has always been and I have no intention of letting it change with us."

Takeru took a good look at these two men. The one in green had golden blonde hair, much like his own, and greenish-blue eyes. The man wearing black had dark hair and black eyes. They were both tall, slender men, but they bore with them a sense of power that kept Takeru from judging them only by their appearances.

The man-in-black's eyes were flashing. "You know as well as I do that my heir's magical abilities are severely limited. And your own son's powers are nothing to boast about either. But I have found one who could actually grow to have powers that would rival my own, if given the proper time and training. And it is this child I wish to take on as my apprentice, not my weakling son!"

The blonde man seemed unsure how to reply. After thinking for a moment, he approached the table, taking a seat and speaking quietly to the two unhappy- looking brown-haired women seated there. A minute or two later he nodded morosely and stood once more.

Takeru came closer, very much aware that no one here had taken the slightest notice of him, and tried to hear the blonde man's lowered voice. "As your friend," he said quietly, placing a tentative hand on the other man's shoulder, "As your friend, I am advising you not to do this. Not to take on this boy as your apprentice.

"But as a fellow member of the circle," The blonde man sighed and removed his hand, "I do so inform you that there are no rules against such an action and that you have our permission to do as you wish with him."

The black-eyed man said nothing, but smirked triumphantly. The blonde man slumped defeatedly into his chair. The man still standing bowed once to the trio at the table and then left.

The woman in blue shot a worried glance at the blonde. "Are you sure that there is nothing that we can do about this?"

He merely shook his head. "We simply did what the rules told us to do. We are not permitted, at this time, to do anything more. But I can't help thinking that we will all grow to regret it someday." ~

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Back at the Kamiya castle the atmosphere was so tense, Sir Jyou was of the belief that, had he been so inclined, he could have cut it with a knife. Prince Takeru was missing and there wasn't a clue as to his whereabouts. It was as though he had vanished into thin air.

As the three sets of royals and their companions sat for dinner, Jyou noted how Baron Daisuke and Count Iori were seated on either side of King Yamato and how the Ishidan guards all stood at attention a few feet behind them. They were protecting their king, afraid someone may come after him next. Ever since they had learnt of Takeru's disappearance, none of the Ishidan nobles had gone anywhere without numerous guards accompanying him.

But the other kingdoms were no better. Each side of the dining room walls were lined with armored guards, watching over their own rulers. Princess Hikari was sitting beside her brother and had yet to touch a piece of her food. She still looked numb. For that matter, so did the Ishidans. The Kamiyans and Tachikawas were all picking at their food, glancing occasionally at each other.

Finally Taichi decided that he couldn't take this torture for another minute. Rude as he knew it was, he harshly shoved his chair back and left the dining room without so much as a word of apology to his guests. After staring after him in horrified awe for a few moments, Lady Sora stood also and quickly excused herself from the room.

Hurrying down the corridors towards Taichi's father's old study, Sora wondered what her friend was so troubled about. He had acting strange and tense all day, even before they had heard about Takeru's disappearance. Then again, it didn't take a whole lot to get Taichi worked up, so it could have been anything.

Entering the study, Sora was met with the sight of Taichi sitting in his father's old chair and slouching over the desk with one hand holding up his chin, while the other rapped its fingers on the furnished wood absently. Sora carefully locked the door behind her and went over to the desk. She gave Taichi a kiss on the cheek and massaged his tense shoulders. "What's wrong, Tai?"

The Crown Prince sighed and slumped back into his seat, relishing the feeling of Sora's probing fingers. "I don't suppose that there'd be much use saying 'It's nothing'?"

Sora shook her head. "No."

Taichi sighed again and accidentally let out a low moan as Sora rubbed at an especially tight knot on the left side of his neck. After a moment he managed to speak again. "It's. the other kingdoms."

Sora's brow furrowed and she increased the pressure of her massage a bit. "What about the other kingdoms?"

Despite the relaxing massage, Tai bit his lip nervously. "Well, you know as well as I do just how long the three of us have been at war?" Sora nodded. "Well, I don't understand why we're getting along so well. I mean, a year ago, the first thing I would have done to Crown Prince Takeru had he come strolling through the Kamiya palace gates would have been to order his beheading. And now I'm organizing patrols to go looking for him. I don't get it."

Sora's brow furrowed as she momentarily stopped massaging his shoulders. It was true, what Taichi was saying. Sora had spent most of her childhood hating the Ishidas and Tachikawas. When she and Tai and Hikari and Koushiro were children growing up together, they'd play role-playing games where the person who was playing Masaharu Ishida, for example, would always be impaled by the person playing Taichi and Hikari's father or a Kamiya knight or even themselves. Then they'd all laugh and giggle together, not thinking a thing about it. And through her adolescence Sora had had basically the same attitude.

But now she was practically best friends with Mimi Tachikawa and she had gone on short walks through the gardens with young Count Iori and King Yamato. She hadn't spent a second thought on it until now.

"It is strange, now that I think about it," she admitted, starting to massage his neck again. "But is it necessarily a bad thing?"

Tai shook his head exhaustedly. "I wasn't really sure about that either. But now with Prince Takeru's disappearance." he trailed off, but Sora knew what he meant. Taichi hadn't ordered Takeru's kidnapping and the Kamiyan guards had been with the Ishidas throughout their own search, meaning that they hadn't hidden him on their own just to cause trouble. That left only-

"Do you really think that the Tachikawa royals would do something like that?" she asked quietly. "They don't seem so bad."

"Don't forget that those are the same royals who have been killing hundreds of our best soldiers in this hellish war, Sora," he replied harshly. "I've been to the fronts during actual battle. These people have been known to catapult our own soldiers severed heads back at us in the middle of a fight. I would hardly put it past them to have kidnapped one 16-year-old prince."

Sora bit her lip absently. "What makes you so sure it was the Tachikawas? Why not Ken?"

Taichi snorted in mild disbelief. "Ken brought one carriage and is staying in the guest chambers just down the hall from my own room. Both have been searched by my own guards and, aside from a good many books in some language that none of them understand, they found nothing of importance. Where else could Ken be hiding him: his cloak pocket?" Sora said nothing, but frowned at his sarcasm. "But, I do have reason to believe that the Tachikawas are hiding *something*."

Taichi stood up and went over to his father's desk, pulling the top drawer open and taking out his father's diary. He flipped through it until he found a page whose corner had been bent down. "Does the name 'Kido' sound familiar to you, Sora?"

The redhead stepped over to him. "Yes, but that's probably because one of our prominent guests is named Kido."

Tai rolled his eyes in exasperation. "Not what I meant. I mean, before you met him, when the messenger told us the Tachikawa royals were bringing Sir Jyou Kido, did the name sound familiar to you at all?"

Sora stretched her memory back to the day when the messenger had returned, all those weeks ago. "I don't know," she said finally. "Maybe."

"Well, it should," Tai replied showing her the diary page. "Read this."

Sora read the page. When she was finished, she stood stock-still and stared at Taichi, her mouth agape. "Spies?" she asked finally. "The Kido family were Kamiyan spies?"





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