Wind whipped around her slender form, the already-fallen leaves of autumn flying up from the ground and
swirling around the young woman with every wing-beat of the giant, white-blue bird. "I take it back!" she
announced, clutching on to the nearest lamppost. Her jacket, unzipped, was flying behind her as a cape. "I don't
want to catch the cards, after all!"

"Too bad!" shouted Keroberos angrily, hanging out of her pocket, his tiny voice almost lost to the
gale-force breeze around him. "You broke it, you bought it, and there ain't nothing you can do about it!"

From her spot across the sidewalk, Tomoyo grinned and pulled her camera from her face, grinning. "You
look gorgeous with the wind in your hair!" she squealed, not at all noticing that she was starting to be
pushed along the pavement by the force of the Fly card's flapping wings. "This footage will be PERFECT for my
video montage that's due at the end of the semester! Absolutely perfect!"

A mutter of "hoe...?" was lost to the wind.

"C'mon, Cardcaptor!" squeaked Kero, hopping out of Sakura's pocket and struggling against the wind so
he could look her in the eyes. "You NEED to do this! Just take the Key of Clow, say the words of initiation,
and get on with it!"

The brunette sighed and tugged the pendant from around her neck, letting it settle in the palm of her
hand. It was almost surprisingly heavy for such a little thing and, the long she looked at it, the more she
realized that it was speaking to her. Or, if not speaking to her, bringing the realization of words she had
never before heard to her lips.

Her fingers slipped from the edge of the lamppost as, for a moment, the bird in their midst calmed,
wings curling gently at its side. Green eyes glazed over, unblinking, as the young woman stared down at the key
in her hands.

"Say it!" stressed the orange plushie, his black eyes darting back and forth between the giant card and
the silent student. "We ain't gots much time, ya know!"

"Oh key that hides the power of the dark," began Sakura, her eyelids fluttering shut. The words formed
on her lips without thought, taking over her body, causing shivers to run up and down her spine. The pendant
rose from her palm and began to dance on air, twitching ever-so-slightly. Energy, power without form, the likes
of which she had never experienced, swirled around her, kicking up leaves and dirt. "By the contract, reveal
thy true form to me. This, Sakura commands!"

Wings lifted as, slowly, the key morphed, becoming a bright pink staff with the same odd, bird's head
shape on the end of it. "RE - "

A gust of wind picked up suddenly, and - the next she knew - Sakura opened her eyes to find the world
turned upside down.

"You okay?" gushed Tomoyo, rushing over to the very foot of the technical building's front stairs, where
her best friend had landed upside-down.

Sakura Kinomoto grunted, glancing at the key that had landed scant inches from her nose.

"I quit," she muttered.

========================
"An American Cardcaptor"
A Cardcaptor Sakura Alternate Universe Fanfiction
Written by Kate "SuperKate" Butler
Chapter 2: "The Fight or Flight Mechanism"
========================

"Okay, let's done try this again," sighed the guardian beast of the Clow, shaking his head slightly. He,
as well as the brunette cardcaptor and her strange, video-camera-totting roommate, stood in the handicapped
stall of the women's bathroom. Just outside of that very building, he knew, was a giant bird. And, from what he
could tell, the Fly hadn't yet decided to take the offensive, because the walls around them still shuddered
every few seconds.

The room shook, and Kero struggled to remain standing and, therefore, keep himself from sliding into the
open toilet. "Them words'll come back if ya let 'em!" he encouraged, the squeaky Southern accent seeming a bit
unusual for a creature called the guardian "beast." "And then, y'all be able to get that there card!"

Green eyes glanced down at the Key of Clow. What kind of crazy dream was this? Sakura wrinkled her nose
as she held her hands in front of her body, her arms extended to their full length in front of her. "This is
insane," she muttered irritably, her eyelashes fluttering shut.

Her roommate grinned eagerly. "Sakura is so good for this kind of footage!" she praised, squinting
through the viewer of her camera to catch every second on vid-disk. "I can't wait to extract digital photos from
this!"

A brown eyebrow twitched, but it's bearer said nothing.

Another gust of wind slammed into the building, this one with more force that previously. There was a
splash as the orange guardian beast fell off the edge of the toilet seat and into the cold water below. "Hurry
up!" he howled, reiterating what he had already said a few hundred times. "The card senses ya! Y'all are SCREWED
if you don't go and act fast!"

Nodding, the brunette put on the most determined look she could muster, shoving the key in front of her
body with all her might. "Oh key that hides the power of the dark!" she commanded, her voice echoing through
the tile-walled room as she spoke. "By the power of our contract, reveal your true form to me! This, Sakura
commands!"

"It's working!" announced Kero somewhere from beyond the wall of swirling energy. Green eyes popped open
as the pink, bird-headed staff appeared, and Sakura felt her hand shake. "Take the staff! Become Cardcaptor
Sakura!"

"RELEASE!"

There was a pressure in the air, like a clap of thunder without any sound, as the college sophomore's
hand closed around the staff. She flipped it around and over the side of her thumb, twirling it with a foreign
ease. "Let's go smash some Clow Card!" she declared, turning to rush out the stall.

A thump sounded as she smacked into the closed door. "Sorry!" giggled Tomoyo as she reached down and
unbolted the lock. "The reflection of the light on the mirrors cast a hideous backlight, and I didn't want to
ruin the video."

The dripping-wet guardian beast of the Clow eyed her suspiciously. "Y'all are one WEIRD kid."

She smiled and shrugged. "I do what I can."

===

Sakura screamed as she found herself flying through the air and toward the technical building, her
cardcapturing staff sticking out of a charming pair of pine bushes. She landed on the thick grass of the lawn
with an audible 'thump,' suddenly glad that she hadn't been three feet more to her right; otherwise, she may
have very well not lived to tell the tale. "This isn't working!" she announced to her supposed guardian beast,
watching as he grasped the Staff of Clow in his mouth and brought it toward her, smiling sheepishly. "Your
suggestions of 'just go and attack the sucker' don't seem to work very well!"

The orange-yellow plushie's smile faded and he said nothing, resigning himself to stare at the nearby
Clow Card. Moaning slightly, the brunette collapsed back onto the grass and buried her face in her hands.
Cardcaptor. Yeah, right. A Cardcaptor who had yet to do anything more substantial than be thrown through the
air by a giant bird and that same bird's giant, windy wing beats. Why, if it wasn't for the wind, she -

"Wind!" she exclaimed softly, dinning into her pockets for a moment and pulling out, of all things,
the one card that had been left in the bottom of the Clow that very day. "What if I use this?" she questioned,
wagging the cardboard-weight paper in her guardian's face.

Lighting up like a midnight star, Kero grinned, clasping his paws together in midair. "Yes!" he
announced happily, bouncing up and down despite the fact that there was no ground for him to use as a springing
board. "Just tell Windy to - "

"Lift me on the wings of the breeze and deliver me safely to the Fly card!" called the brunette,
tossing her card into the air before smacking it with the staff. "WINDY!"

A gust of wind took off from the card, but it was a gust of wind with a smiling, female face and
beautiful yellow-green wings. Wordless, it lifted the teen into the air and brought her hurdling toward the
giant, winged Clow Card that was still seated in the middle of the quad.

"You IDIOT!" screamed Keroberos until his voice ached, his wings hardly flapping fast enough to carry
him after his charge. "If ya go and do that, the Fly card is gonna take off!"

There was a flash of pink as Sakura, standing precariously on the wisp of wind, twirled the Staff of
Clow in her hands as though it was some sort of baton. "Not on this watch, it's not!" she announced, hopping
off the back of the kind-hearted Windy card as she spoke. Within a breath she was free-falling the seemingly
endless distance between the sky and the Fly card. "Return to thy true form! Cl - HOE?!" She hit something
soft and warm with a jarring thud.

Wings flapped, and the next thing she knew, Sakura was in the sky, soaring above the university on the
back of the enormous Clow Card. "THIS ISN'T HOW IT'S SUPPOSED TO GO!" she shrieked, burying her face in the
feathers as she held on for dear life. Her college was slowly becoming a speck below her, one small dot of
black and brown across a landscape of trees. "HELP!!!"

"Seal it!" cried a small voice, and she glanced down to see a familiar orange-yellow creature clutching
onto the tail of the Fly card, his little eyes pressed shut as hard as they could possibly be. "I don't care
howya do it, just SEAL THIS DAMNED CARD!"

"Right!" Shakily she struggled to her feet, the clouds whipping past her as she rose. "Return to thy
true form!" she screamed, bringing the beak of her staff down toward the neck of the strange creature. It
stopped in midair, a small pink rectangle forming where there had previously been nothing else. "Clow CARD!!!"

Energy, orange and pink and purple and blue and every color and none, flowed around her body, warming
her, bringing a smile to her face and a strange strength to her body. As the energy flowed, a card appeared in
midair.

The sensations stopped and the card nestled itself between her fingers. "The Fly..." she read aloud,
a small grin crossing her face. "I actually went and - AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

"Use the card!" screamed Kero, his wings tucked close against his body as he followed the brunette in a
nose-dive aimed at the ground and only the ground. Her scream was so loud that it almost covered up his voice.
"Use the Fly Card, and QUICK!"

Green eyes peaked open for a moment, as though questioning his authority. Then, in a bolt of inspiration,
she realized that she really didn't have much a choice in the matter and so she released the card in midair,
somehow not surprised by the fact that it followed her in her tail-spin toward the fast-approaching ground.
"FLY!" she commanded, waving her staff randomly in the basic direction of the card.

Suddenly, she wasn't falling anymore. She blinked as she glanced up at the staff, watching as its
wings flapped idly in the breeze. She frowned slightly as, slowly, she began to descend. "Is that ALL it does?"
she asked, wrinkling her nose.

Kero groaned, smacking himself in the head with a paw. "Next time you're on a one-way flight down to
the ground, I ain't givin' you any advise," he muttered.

Sakura scowled up at him, eyes lowering into a glare. "Oh, this is MY fault?" she questioned bitterly,
her legs swinging in the air as she hung from her Staff of Clow. "If YOU hadn't been sleeping on the job,
everything would have been just FINE!"

"Oh, it woulda?" he returned angrily, his eyebrow twitching slightly. "Well, if YOU hadn't gone and
opened MY Clow book in the first place, than the cards wouldnta escaped!"

"Oh yeah?"

"YEAH!"

"Well, at least *I* am not a stuffed TOY!"

"You take that back!"

"Make me!"

"NEVER!"

===

Sakura Kinomoto sighed and shook her head as she walked down the sidewalk, the normal spring in her
step somehow lost on an otherwise decent autumn morning. The days were really starting to cool down, and - after
pointing out this supposedly amazing face - Tomoyo had thrust a hand-made jacket into her friend's hands before
pushing her out of the door and off to her Myths and Legends class. But the jacket, blue with white trim and
the hand-embroidered initials "SK" on the sleeves, just got tossed over a slender shoulder as she strode back
from the history building, a frown plastered on her face.

If someone had told her the day before that she would become a magical girl called the Cardcaptor, she
would have reported them to a mental asylum before laughing her head off. But her brother's old adage had
finally caught up to her, proving that the truth was, indeed, stranger than fiction. Sighing, she hung her
head, shaking it miserably. "With my luck," she muttered, wrinkling her nose, "I'm going to end up flunking
tomorrow's biology exam..."

"Morning, Sakura!" announced a voice, and green eyes rose to see two familiar forms coming toward her.
She groaned, burying her face in her hands as a blush took over her face. NOW, Touya would have the opportunity
to quiz her about the missing Clow book in front of her long-time crush! Could this day POSSIBLY get any
worse?

She stopped just short of Touya and his best friend, smiling charmingly at the latter of the two young
men. Age twenty-five, Yukito Tsukishiro had been the object of her constant affection since she had met him,
four years previous. There was something about his laid-back attitude that made him endlessly appealing and -
as much as she tried to avoid the subject when it came up - his gorgeous brown eyes and charming smile certainly
didn't detract from her crush, either. Her brother had never asked, though, and she had never told, something
she was unbelievably grateful for, even IF it was her personal opinion that he knew.

"Hi-ya, Yukito!" she beamed, trying her best to put on a happy face. He smiled back, eyes slanting closed
behind his wire-rimmed glasses, but she could see her brother make a face. Ignoring it, she pressed on, sticking
her hands in her back pockets. "How's it going?"

The medical school student shrugged slightly, his face still lit up with a smile. "We were just on our
way to the Union for brunch," he informed her pleasantly, the mention of food causing his face to brighten
further. "You want to come?"

Touya snorted, tossing his head of dark hair. "I doubt that monsters eat more than three square meals
a day," he returned smugly, smirking as he watched his little sister's face redden in complete and total anger.
"Besides, she should be up in special collections, reading that book of hers again."

"Book?" blinked Yukito. "What book?"

"Eheheheheheheheheheh, yeah, THAT..." drawled Sakura, scratching the back of her neck guiltily. For an
extremely brief moment, she was obscenely grateful that her brother hadn't noticed the missing volume from the
room; after all, if no one noticed, then she didn't have to explain away its sudden disappearance. And the longer
it went unnoticed, the more likely it was that she would get off the hook. "I really SHOULD be working on that
paper, shouldn't I? Heh, I'm such a slacker..." Her cheeks grew a big ruddy as she made eye contact with the
still-blinking Yukito. Sighing, she hung her head. "Have a good brunch though..."

Reaching down, the glasses-wearing man ruffled her hair playfully. "Don't worry, Sakura, we'll have a
good time," he assured her before he started down the sidewalk and toward the Student Union. "Later!"

Touya bopped her playfully on the nose. "Yeah, Monster, we'll have a good time without you," he teased,
following his friend away.

His sister whirled around on her heels, shaking her fist at his retreating shadow. "You just WAIT,
Touya!" she threatened, her face twisting into a snarl as she spoke. "One of these days, I'm going to get you
BACK for all these years of mental anguish, and then you'll be SORRY!"

"What's dat all about?" questioned a bored voice.

Sakura sighed, shaking her head as she turned to head back toward her dorm building. "Eh, my brother is
an - HOE?!"

Black eyes blinked, and tiny eyebrows knitted together. "Ya brother's a ho?" repeated Kero, cocking his
head to one side as he floated in midair, scant inches from the girl's nose. "That dun make much sense if you -
MMPH!"

"You IDIOT!" she hissed, gripping him around the neck as she moved to stuff him into the side pocket
of her book bag. "Do you WANT people to see you floating around like some sort of magical creature?"

His head popped out of the pocket, and he frowned up at her. "But I AM a magical creature," he insisted,
sounding quite perplexed by this concept. "In MY day, I could go around and do whatever! I was feared by them
people of Hong Kong!"

She gaped at him, her lips opening into a tiny 'o' as she gazed down at him. "How would YOU be feared?"
she inquired, staring back down the twisting path toward her dorm building. "You're nothing more than an orange
plushie." Pausing to consider this, she snickered slightly, pursing her lips. "Sounds like one of Tomoyo's
l33t-sp34k t-shirts if you ask me. 'Ph33r the plush13' or something."

"Har har, laugh it up," he returned, wrinkling his nose up at her. "My true form is so super-cool that
you'd be shakin' in your li'l sneakers if you saw it." He smirked slightly. "You'd prolly run away from me
faster than you ran from the Fly card, too."

Bopping her guardian beast on his little orange head, she stuck out her tongue at him. "I didn't run
away," she reminded him matter-of-factly, frowning a bit as she spoke. "I hopped on its back and I nailed the
sucker! That certainly isn't MY fault." She paused, frowning as she thought about the happenings from the day
before. "So, Kero, do I have to catch ALL the cards?" she questioned, raising an eyebrow down at the little
plushie-beast.

The orange-yellow toy considered this before shrugging noncommittally. "Ya gotta catch a whole lotta
'em," he answered after a pause. "Maybe not all of 'em, but enough that I can release my powers and you can
become the true Cardcaptor. Then, the others should all kinda follow the lead of the ones you've caught."

"'A whole lotta 'em?'" quoted the brunette, stopping in mid-stride to glance down at him. He giggled
in embarrassment, face turning just a tad red. "Kero, just how many cards ARE there, total?"

A reply was muttered, but it was much too soft to be heard.

"WHAT?" growled the girl, picking him up by one of his round little ears and dangling him in front of
her face. "HOW many cards, Kero?"

"....fifty-three..."

"FIFTY THREE CLOW CARDS?" the brunette howled, shaking him violently by the ear as she blinked dubiously
at him. "His teeth rattled together as he flapped back and forth in the air. "How in the name of HELL do you - "

She froze, blinking in confusion for a moment. "I feel strange..." she muttered, letting Kero go as she
moved to slowly examine the area around her. They were on a rather deserted stretch of sidewalk, which cut
through a grove of trees before coming out in front of the stretch of dormitories. A shiver ran up her spine
as she glanced around, peering between trees and through shadows, in search of...something. For some reason, she
couldn't figure out what it was.

Clambering to his feet with a groan, Kero blinked. "A Clow Card!" he exclaimed, hopping up into the air
to hover near the brunette's shoulder. "Ya musta got some real good magic powers from somewhere ifya can sense
a card already!"

"A...card?" Sakura frowned, her fingers moving to clasp around the Key of Clow. Another shiver, this
one more powerful than the first. "Where is it, then?"

Black eyes lowered, peering into the grove of trees that were clumped next to the walkway. "I know that
ya ain't gonna wanna hear this, Sakura," he breathed, wings flapping idly as he stared into the shadows, "but
it's in there."

Sakura moaned, smacking herself in the forehead. "Yeah, of COURSE it would be hiding in a grove of
maples! Why NOT?" She sighed and pulled the Key of Clow from around her neck, pausing to glower down at the
little, floating plushie. "You know, when I DO catch all these cards, I think I'm going to use one or two of
them on you. Are there any 'instant death' cards in the deck?"

"Har," growled the guardian beast irritably, wrinkling his tiny nose. "Just release the staff and let's
go. The card dun seem to've sensed ya yet, which means ya might catch it before it knows you're here."

"Right!" agreed the brunette. There was a breath of wind and flash of light as her lips formed into the
familiar incantation, the chant that would release the Staff of Clow and allow her to seal the Clow card. "Let's
go!"

And with that, the cardcaptor and her guardian beast plunged into the darkness of the trees, the sunlight
locked out of view and leaving them with nothing more than shadows.

===

"She seemed really detached during class," sighed Chiharu Mihara, toying idly with the end of her braid
as she spoke. Bright brown eyes glanced up and down the nearly-abandoned hallway, studying the dull brown-red
floor tiles with a certain concerned idleness. "When Professor Terada went around and asked how our papers were
going, her face went totally pale, and she freaked out." The brunette's nose wrinkled as she glanced across
the hall and toward the other girl, her next-door neighbor on the floor. "Do you know what's up, Rika?"

Rika Sasaki shrugged noncommittally, leaning up against the wall as she shook her head slightly. "To be
honest, Yoshiyuki really didn't tell me anything, and I even went through the trouble of asking him about it."
She wrinkled her nose, toying idly with the gold ring she wore on her left hand. "I know that he did purposely
give her that legend as a challenge, but I don't think he knows what to make of her complete and utter panic."

Two sets of eyes glanced toward the third young woman in the hallway, who had been busily pasting
pictures of her roommate to their door before the conversation had started. The gaze made her flush slightly,
but - somehow - she managed to paste a smile to her pale face. "Who're we talking about?" questioned Tomoyo
Daidouji as she pocketed her roll of masking tape. She did her best to look charmingly confused. "Anyone I know?"

"Only your roommate," responded the duel-braided girl with a roll of her eyes. "You're her best friend
in the WORLD, Tomoyo. Spill."

Cursing all the powers that were and THEN a few, the dark-haired girl shrugged her shoulders and screwed
her face into a sorry little expression. "I wish I could say I really knew," she returned, hoping she sounded
at least a BIT uninformed. "I know that she's been struggling with the project, but I think the only one NOT
struggling with the project is Rika, and that's because she's got all the insider's help she needs."

"Tomoyo!" blushed the auburn-haired beauty, her face turning bright, bright red as she hollered at the
girl who lived across the hall. "Yoshiyuki would NEVER give me extra help on a project like that! He has morals
and values!"

"Maybe he wouldn't give you HELP," smirked Chiharu, winking at her friend, "but, since he IS your fiancé
and all - he just might give you an easier topic. Didn't you say that your myth is on the birth of the Greek
Goddess Athena?"

Rika's face drained of all color as soon as the words escaped her friend's lips and, for a long moment,
she stood dumbfounded against the wall, her lips moving and trying to make their way into coherent words. "I...
Well... You see..."

She was STILL stammering for the right words as Tomoyo closed herself in her bedroom, giggling.

===

"I don't see anything that COULD be a Clow Card," complained Sakura idly as she moved to plop down on
a toppled-over tree trunk. The little patch of woods was deeper than she had remembered it ever being and - as
if that wasn't enough trouble in and of itself - the thick green foliage above cut off almost all the sunlight
there was to be had, leaving them in the shadows. "But, at the same time, I still FEEL it."

Nodding, Kero landed lightly beside her before collapsing into a pile of wings and feet. "I dunno WHAT'S
goin' on in here," he admitted, his voice weary with defeat as he laid on the moss-covered log. "I can FEEL the
card, but I can't see it, and - to make matters WORSE - all them there leaves are makin' it awfully hard to see
anythin'!"

The brunette sighed, closing her eyes as she did so. Why had she taken that stupid Myths and Legends
course in the first place? It wasn't a required course for history majors, it was an ENGLISH class! Chiharu
had even suggested she NOT take it; despite everything his fiancée claimed, Professor Yoshiyuki Terada was
strict, picky, and sometimes even mean-spirited. And the fact that he constantly gave his nineteen-year-old
wife-to-be all the perks and pleasures didn't make him any easier to take in.

Still, the topic had intrigued her, and her stupid English-teacher brother HAD assured her that, yes, it
was really a WAS a good class, as long as Terada was allowed to think you had potential. All you needed, after
all, was potential.

Somehow, being late to class diminished potential. Sakura sighed and rolled her green eyes, glancing up
at the foliage above her. The leaves were thick and large, beautiful really, not yet turning to the browns
and golds of the leaves around them...

She frowned. "Hey, Kero?" she questioned, pursing her lips.

"Hmm?"

"Is there a 'tree' card in this Clow of yours?"

"Of COURSE!" exclaimed the orange bear-cat, suddenly hopping up and flapping his wings furiously. "It's
gotta be the Wood card!" He grinned up at her, his little black eyes slanting shut in delight. "Ya seem to be
gettin' the hang of this pretty fast, kiddo."

Ignoring his comment, the brunette seized her staff in her hand, twirling it briefly like a baton before
raising it high over her head. "Return to thy true form! Clow CARD!"

After a few seconds of light, energy, and swirling winds, light burst into the grove of trees, peaking
through the branches above and shining down on the girl and her guardian.

"Yeah, Sakura, rock ON!" cheered Keroberos happily. "Next thing ya know, you'll be the TRUE cardcaptor!"

Rolling her green eyes, she shook her head. "Or I'll die trying, right?" she questioned, cocking an
eyebrow at him.

Kero chuckled and forced a grin. "Not REALLY," he responded guiltily. "Maimed, bloodied, toothless,
maybe, but NOT dead."

"Grrrrrrrrreat."

===
End Chapter 2.