Chapter Eight: Reflections
Day 8 - Shadow World
Eriol still didn't answer her as his eyes bored into her face. Then, miraculously, his voice came back. "I just don't..." he whispered, and suddenly stopped again, turning his head away from her. "Just leave me alone," he whispered, and turned away from here again, his eyes looking at the center of the room.
Sakura bit her lip. Unexpectedly, Sakura watched as Eriol's head started to look up, and she felt her heart soar in expectation that maybe he has forgiven her for what she had done. But when he turned around to look at her, she felt a hard wave of power crash into her mind. With that seething pain in her, Sakura gave a short cry as she fell to the ground, blacking out instantly. "E... Eriol..." Sakura whimpered.
The last she saw was him getting up, and his feet moving towards her, step by step.
*~*~*~*~*~*
Day 8 - Shadow World
Sakura groaned as she woke up, feeling tiny pebbles poke into her face as she slowly started to move again, the sun beating down at her face. She shook her head, trying to get used to the conscious world once more. Looking around, she gasped and got up to her feet, realizing that she was no longer in the cozy hole anymore. In fact, nobody was around, including Eriol and his stuff. She saw her bag and items next to her, but that was all.
Feeling a sense of loss and confusion, Sakura dejectedly gathered her stuff, and checked it. Everything was there. Including... "Both of the passes?" Sakura whispered, shaking violently when she saw them in her hands. Then... Then where is Eriol? she started to ask herself. He has not really been himself, she realized. It was horrible to feel that there could be someone she considered as a close friend for years, and yet find out that there was not a thing that she really knew about that person. She then looked up, at the long road ahead of her, and her eyes narrowed with determination. Quickly, she ran off, hoping that there would be a town within a day's walk from where she was.
*~*~*~*~*~*
Day 12 - Earth
Tomoyo and Yue stood in the center of a circle made by Cerberus, Ruby Moon, Spinel Sun, and Kaho.
"Why can't I go?!" Nakuru asked Kaho.
She smiled at the guardian. "We need Tomoyo and Yue to be there."
"Why can't I go in one of their places?"
Kaho only smiled at her again. "There are reasons, Ruby Moon. Now," she turned back to the rest of them. "Only two people can enter this time, for that is probably the most we can use our magic for to transfer you to the Shadow World," Kaho told them. "I have given you a tracker to find Syaoran. If you are lucky enough, then maybe you will get there before Sakura and Yue, and prepare for their arrival. You have the book and key with you to hand back to Sakura. We will try to get you as close of a direction as we can. I have found that Syaoran is in a city called Lyrra, thank the book for the way that I found that out, really. May luck be with you."
*~*~*~*~*~*
Day 8 - Shadow World
Eriol gulped as he was backed up into a wall by a gang of large men in the next town that he had walked into peacefully. They sneered at him, voices rumbling with incomprehensible words. Eriol narrowed his eyes at them. "Damn this..." he whispered. Sakura... He remembered how he had tried to manipulate her mind back in school so that she would say the correct answer. He remembered what he just did to that lady Klarne last night. Eriol bit his lip as he found that he could back up no more against the wall. But... I can't. I can't use any of my powers right now. It... It... No. I just can't. "Damn..."
He remembered watching as Sakura fainted last night, and wondered if maybe he was a bit too hard on her... No. he decided. I had to do it. I had to give myself time to think, away from her and her, well... ways. But what do I do now? He took in a long breath, and braced himself for whatever they were going to do to him.
*~*~*~*~*~*
Day 10 - Shadow World
"Syaoran!" Tgaeh gasped, running up to get a hold on him as he staggered to their house. Tgaeh brought him in, and led him to a bed. "What happened?" he asked, helping him lay down. There weren't any injuries on Syaoran, for the looks of it. In fact, if anything at all, he just looked the same. But he was breathing hard, as if gasping for each breath.
"How long have I been away from here?" he managed to ask as Tgaeh helped cover him with a thin blanket that he had lying around the house.
Tgaeh pondered on that a few minutes, a thoughtful look on his face as he counted the days, before saying, "You have been gone for five days. Are you well? What ills you?"
"I just need a night's rest, that's all," Syaoran managed to muster up a smile. "Then, I guess it's back to the site for me. I'm going to work alongside with you, Tgaeh, until I can figure a way to get us away from this wicked bitch." He narrowed his eyes when he mentioned her. "She... she's crazy, I tell you. She calls me in for no good reason, and I totally don't remember what she did to me... So you just watch, Tgaeh. Watch as I bring her down and make her stay that way."
Tgaeh smiled wryly back at him as well. "Then sleep, my friend." Tgaeh turned to look at Brache, though he was still talking to Syaoran. "We will take care of you and help, as our parents did."
*~*~*~*~*~*
Day 12 - Earth
Tomoyo nervously held onto Yue's hand with one of hers, and a bag of the needed items in her other. She bit her lip as she closed her eyes, blocking everything out so that she wouldn't have to hear it all as she waited. Probably would be best if she didn't see what was happening. She sighed as she thought about everything, anticipating everything that was going to happen.
It was great that she was finally going to find Sakura and Syaoran again. After all, it had been eight awfully agonizing days waiting for Ms. Mizuki to find some way for them to go back. Yue was chosen to go with Tomoyo because he was close to Sakura. That, and it just felt right for him to go, as if it was a hunch as to something good. (And Kaho insisted that it must be him who goes with Tomoyo as well...)
Shaking a bit, she looked up at Yue, who turned to look down at him. Though he never smiled, he just nodded his head at her, as if to comfort her without having to curve his lips up. Tomoyo did smile though, at him, and sighed one more time. She'll find them. She'll find them, and everything will be just fine. Everything will be fine... She continued to keep telling herself that, even after the chanting from outside of her head started.
*~*~*~*~*~*
Day 10 - Shadow World
Syaoran just let his eyes stay closed while he laid there on the bed that Tgaeh provided. It may not be as nice as the one he was sleeping on in that lady's palace, but it felt much more heavenly than that place ever will. Opening his eyes, his first thoughts were of what Sakura was doing, but then he started to reminisce. He sighed, remembering how he got out of there. Escaping from that evil place...
"Go," Mushi had told him.
Syaoran stared at him in confusion. He was sleeping, and Mushi had just decided probably to shake the life out of him, because he felt his head nodding back and forth for a while even after he stopped doing it. This soldier just barged into 'Her Majesty's' room and is now telling to get the heck outta there. Syaoran didn't know whether to thank him for the escape, or for the assumption that it might be a trap.
"Um..." Syaoran started.
"Come. You need to go before she sucks the life out of you."
It was then, right after when Mushi said those words, when Syaoran felt the tiredness and exhaustion flowing in and through him. He had then let Mushi lead him out through all these ways of avoiding all the soldiers. Once out of the palace, Syaoran was able to find his way back here. Mushi had left him, and gone to do whatever he was doing before he was pondering, Oh! I think that I'll just go bring that guy back out from the palace who I just brought in a few days ago. That sounds nice. Okay. Then, Syaoran had gone back. Back to the only place he could call home, anyway. Syaoran sighed as he turned over in the bed, and soon found himself slumbering off to give in to the sleep.
*~*~*~*~*~*
Day 10 - Shadow World
"He has escaped back to the village," a maiden whispered softly, bowed to the ground in front of a large and grand bed, covered in a large veil of white cloth. "Shall we send a bahrrn to get him back?"
She sighed, closing her eyes for a second to take this in. Then, she ordered in a clear voice, "No. Let him do as he wish. He is powerless to anything drastic, really. And besides that, it was probably a bahrrn who helped him leave this place, anyway. Ah... yes. Just let him be," With those words, she dismissed the maiden off, and slumped back into her soft bed. Dtarna took in a long breath, and then waved her finger around above her head. Suddenly, a clouded viewer appeared above her, and she watched as a sleeping Syaoran laid on a plain bed, having a fitful slumber as she watch him move constantly around.
"Oh, how can he stand it?" she muttered to herself, trying to put herself in his situation currently. "Those sheets are not even fit to be used as blankets. Yet he enjoys it there... Away from me..."
She then slowly smirked. "You just watch, little wolf," she cooed softly at him, expanding the image a bit. "I'll get you one day, because you do belong to me. I will own your Name, and we will be together for eternity... Until then, I'll be watching you. Watching you for most of the time, anyway." She clenched her hand into a fist, and the image faded and puffed off into a gray-colored smoke.
*~*~*~*~*~*
Sakura looked up at the blue sky as she ran down the trail, never leaving it even if she felt tired or hungry. No. She must catch up to Eriol. It was about time that she did something to that guy.
Eriol gulped, trying to hold back his urge of using his magic to blow them all away. I can't do it... I won't. I really must not use my magic. Then, he closed his eyes, and took in a deep breath. Oh, Sakura... I'm so sorry for what I did to you.
Tgaeh look out the scroll again, and stared at the words over and over again. "He must be the one," he whispered. "He must be the one who will save us all. He already speaks of revolution..."
Tomoyo felt a gust of wind start under her feet, expanding around her. "I'm coming," she whispered. "It's about time..." After all, how can a team such as we be separated in the first place? Tomoyo still had her eyes closed as she was sucked in under her feet through a portal, and the same happened to Yue.
Syaoran tossed and turned in his sleep. Dreams. Leave him alone, he wanted. Leave him alone. Yet they kept telling him things. Giving him images that he wished to block out.
Dtarna frowned dully as she stared up to the ceiling. She needed an idea. Any idea, to help her gain his Name.