-Three months later, September 24th, 1999-
Oh yes, it's Friday. Which means I can rest this weekend, Mina thought as she made her way down the stairs slowly. She and 4 of the other Mystical Warriors, Lita, Mia, Raye, and Ami, had been out of bed for about a month and a half after resting in bed for the month and a half before that, regaining their strength.
At the beginning of summer vacation, she and the other girls had been captured by Queen Metallia so she could get the Silver Crystal. The Ronin Warriors, in a valiant move, came into the Negaverse against Serena's orders and rescued them, saving Serena from having to trade the Silver Crystal for the girls' lives.
But, before the Ronin Warriors could rescue the girls, the girls were tortured by Metallia's generals to the point of power loss. That's what took the girls so long to recover. They had to regain their power, a wound that not even Heather could heal. So, Mina, Raye, Lita, Ami, and Mia had to let their power come back over time. It finally came back, slowly however, and now, three months later, the 5 girls were only a little weak.
Like now. Mina knew that she still hadn't fully recovered from her ordeal. Otherwise, she'd be running down the stairs, not creeping down them. She reached the bottom of the first flight of stairs, stopping on the second floor to catch her breath.
After catching her breath, she brushed off her uniform skirt and was about to continue walking down the stairs when she heard her name called. She turned towards the direction of the sound and smiled as she saw Cye approaching her, her hero, literally. He had rescued her from the Negaverse. Without him, she might still be there. Or dead. "Hey Cye, are you ready to go downstairs?" she asked.
"Yeah, I am. How are you feeling?" Cye asked while putting on his school blazer.
"I'm feeling better. I'm a little weak this morning, though."
"Do you need help getting down the stairs?" Cye asked.
"No, but it would be nice if you walked down with me."
"No problem," Cye said.
"Thanks," Mina sighed, "I hope you don't mind going a little slow. I have a hard time walking down stairs." Cye looked over at her and said, "How about I just help you down the stairs."
"And how would you do that?" she asked. Cye smiled and said, "Like this." Closing the gap between them, he scooped her into his arms and began carrying her down the stairs. Although Mina was weak, she wasn't weak enough to protest. "Cye, put me down! I can walk by myself. I don't need you to carry me."
"But, I want to walk down with you, but I'm hungry. So, this way, I can get down to the kitchen quickly and go down with you at the same time," Cye said as they reached the first floor.
Rushing down the last couple of stairs, he set her down on the ground and said, "Do you think you can take it from here?" he teased. Mina mock-glared at him before saying, "Yes, I can," though she wished that Cye would carry her the rest of the way so she could be in his arms. "Well, then, let's go to breakfast," Cye said and the two of them started to walk towards the kitchen.
***
In the kitchen, Lita was trying to cook breakfast, but there were too many
people in the kitchen for her to maneuver correctly. Her anger getting the best of her, she
yelled, "Alright, if any of you want breakfast, GET OUT OF THE KITCHEN!" Suddenly, she found herself being stared at
by 13 pairs of eyes; everyone was in the kitchen except for Mina and Cye. "Alright, we'll go out to the dining room to
wait for breakfast, ok?" Serena said, trying to avoid getting her friend even
angrier. Lita took in a deep breath to
calm herself down and looked at Serena.
"Thanks Serena."
"No problem. Come on, you guys, let's go into the dining room." Everyone grumbled, but left the kitchen. Once the noise ended, the only people in the kitchen were Lita and Kento, who was there to make sure Lita was ok. Walking over to her, he said, "Are you feeling ok this morning?"
"Yeah, I'm just tired still, that's all," Lita said as Kento moved behind her and began giving her a back massage to help her relax. Lita moaned softly at the feeling of her muscles relaxing and said, "I love it when you do that, you're so good at it."
"Well, it's just to get you to relax, that's all."
"It works, I can tell you that," Lita said as she reveled in the feeling of Kento's fingers working the knots out of her back.
"It's what I'm here for," Kento said as he used one of his hands to brush a few strands of hair away from her neck so he could massage the muscles there. Lita slightly missed the presence of her hair at the back of her neck, but liked it in the French twist that Kento had done for her earlier that morning.
Although Lita loved it when Kento gave her back massages, she knew that she needed to work on making breakfast or they were all going to be late. "Kento, as much as I love your back massages, I need to make breakfast or we aren't going to have time to eat before we have to go to school." Kento removed his hand from her back and said, "Do you want help making breakfast?"
"Yeah, sure."
"What do you want me to do?" Kento asked, ready to do anything to help Lita, especially since she was still slightly recovering from her ordeal in the Negaverse.
"You could be a dear and start making and buttering toast while I concentrate on the business over the stove. Could you also put the orange juice and milk out on the table so the others can serve themselves their drinks?"
"Yeah, no problem." Lita smiled at Kento and said her thanks before turning to start making breakfast. Kento gave Lita one last smile before turning to do the tasks that Lita gave him in helping prepare breakfast.
***
After breakfast, the group started out to their respective schools. Alex, Michelle, Darien, and Mia went of to Tokyo University, Celia went off to work, and
the rest of them went off to high school, all of them in their junior year of
high school except for Heather, who was in her sophomore year. The year before, Heather had completed her 8th
grade year and freshman year of school in the same year at her old school, so now, she could go to school with most everyone else. At school, she was respected and even had a
few friends, unlike her last school.
They all walked to school with relative ease, considering that 4 of them didn't have all of their strength back. When they got to school, they separated and went off to their respective classes. Most of them shared classes with each other with the exception of Ami and Rowen, who were in the honors program at their school and were the top two students in the school. Which one of them was in the top of their school differed all the time, but Ami and Rowen were always in the top two.
At that moment, the two of them were walking off to calculus together, one of the many classes they shared. The two of them had the exact same schedule, which was because there was only one honors program for the junior class and the two of them were in it. As they neared their class, Rowen turned to Ami and said, "Are you feeling better this morning?"
"Well, on what basis are you talking about? In general, yes I'm feeling better, but, on a day-to-day basis, I'm feeling a little worse than I did yesterday. I don't think we should have stayed up as late as we did last night working on our physics homework."
"No, we finished that at a reasonable hour. The reason why both of us are tired is because we stayed up talking for an extra hour last night," Rowen pointed out.
"You have a good point there, Rowen," Ami said as they walked into their calculus class. They were early by 5 minutes, but they were still the last two to arrive besides the teacher. "Well, tonight, we should go to bed earlier," Ami said.
"Why, tonight's a Friday night, Ami. We can't go to bed early. Besides, we have to mediate the late night training sessions between Sage and Kento, otherwise they'll kill each other."
The two of them took their seats in the front of the class, ignoring everyone behind them as per usual, but everyone in their classes was used to that. They knew that Ami and Rowen lived in the same house with Sage, Kento, Cye, Ryo, Serena, Raye, Lita, and Mina. They had gotten used to the weird conversations that the two of them had when they first walked into class in the morning.
Just as Ami and Rowen sat down, the teacher, a tall woman in her early thirties, walked into the room and everyone settled down as they waited for class to begin.
***
The morning periods flew by and before everyone knew it, it was time for
lunch. "Come on, they're going to wonder
where we are," Raye said as she tried to hurry Sage.
"Raye, they know where we are. They know that our class before lunch is all the way on the other side of the school from where we eat lunch. But, on a good note, I see you're feeling better today, Raye."
"Yeah, I am feeling a little better today. I had a hard time doing PE this morning, but, other than that, I was fine. Every day, I feel a little stronger," Raye said as she beamed at Sage. Sage smiled back, happy to see that she was feeling better.
When she was recovering, Sage had been worried about her because he couldn't do anything to make her feel better. But, he stayed with her for most of the day when she was in bed, as the other guys did with the girl that they liked. Sage smiled at the period in time. A few good things came out of it. One was that whenever the girls used their power, they seemed to have more of it, like they had more power reserves that came from not using their power for so long.
The other good thing that came out of it was, besides the fact that the Ronin Warriors were closer to the Mystical Warriors, Ryo and Mia seemed to be back on the same foot, so to speak, as in they were actually getting along and they were talking again. Sage never found out what happened between the two, but he didn't care anymore because two of his best friends were now talking to each other regularly again.
Sage pulled his thoughts away from three months ago and concentrated on the present. He listened quietly as Raye gave him a recap of what had happened to her throughout the morning. Then, Raye said something that caught his attention. "What was that?" he asked her.
"I said that Craig Goldsmith asked me out this morning. I automatically turned him down. I wouldn't go out with him if he were the last person on earth. I don't care if he's the most popular guy in school with the exception of you and the other Ronin Warriors." Sage nodded at Raye; she had a good point.
In the last year that the guys had been there, they had been the most popular guys in school, but essentially untouchable, except for Mina, Ami, Raye, Lita, and Serena, who lived with them. It bothered the girls they went to school with to the point of insanity for a while, but, now, for the most part, most of the girls they went to school with had learned about the attractions that existed between the members of that untouchable group of 10. A few guys in school had tried to ask out the girls, but were immediately rejected. None of them even had a chance.
Raye and Sage walked through the hallways of their school, finally exiting the school and entering the courtyard where the immediately spotted the others. "Over here!" Serena yelled as she spotted them. Raye and Sage only smiled at each other before walking over to their friends.
***
After lunch, the rest of school went by with ease. When school ended, the
group of 11 warriors met in the front of the school, as they always did, before
walking home from school together, making small talk along the way. "So, Heather, how was school?" Rowen asked
the younger girl as the group prepared to take a short cut through the
park. Since Heather was a sophomore, she
didn't see any of the others as often as they saw each other.
"Oh, it was fine. I got an A on my biology test," she said proudly. Rowen held out his hand, expecting a high five, which Heather gave.
"Alright," Rowen said, "And who helped you study for that test?" Rowen casually reminded. Heather rolled her eyes and said, "You did, Rowen. Thank you."
"No problem." They walked in peace for a few more moments before Serena felt an evil presence approaching. "You guys, stop. I think something is coming." As if on cue, a wide portal opened up in front of them and what came spilling out of it were hundreds of hybrids, ready to try and destroy the Mystical and Ronin Warriors. "Well, well, looks like we get to fight," Lita said. Serena whipped around and looked at Lita. "You are not fighting," she said.
"And why not?" Lita asked.
"Because you don't have your strength back yet."
"It's almost all the way back and I feel fine," Lita said. She turned around and looked at the other girls. "Do you guys feel fine?" she asked. She got three nods in affirmation. Turning back to Serena, she said, "See? We feel fine. We can take care of ourselves and we're going to help you in this fight."
Serena finally gave in and said, "Fine, but if you get hurt, I can't say I didn't warn you." Serena dropped her book bag on the ground as she cried out her transformation line. "Power of the Moonlight! I call upon the armor of the Moonlight! Armor of the Moonlight, TO ARMS!"
"Power of the Artic! I call upon the armor of the Artic! Armor of the Artic, TO ARMS!"
"Power of the Phoenix! I call upon the armor of the Phoenix! Armor of the Phoenix, TO ARMS!"
"Power of Lightning! I call upon the armor of Lightning! Armor of Lightning, TO ARMS!"
"Power of the Heavens! I call upon the armor of the Heavens! Armor of the Heavens, TO ARMS!"
"Power of the Gods! I call upon the armor of the Gods! Armor of the Gods, TO ARMS!"
"Armor of Wildfire, DAO JIN!"
"Armor of Halo, DAO CHI!"
"Armor of Torrent, DAO SHIN!"
"Armor of Hardrock, DAO GI!"
"Armor of Strata, DAO INOCHI!" Within seconds, the Mystical Warriors appeared along side the Ronin Warriors, all of them ready to fight to the end. Kento, and his impatience, started off the battle with his attack. "IRON ROCK CRUSHER!" From his attack, rocks and boulders were unearthed and, mixed with Kento's raw power, came crashing down upon the hybrids, destroying a good number of them. The other warriors joined in with their own attacks, quickly destroying the hybrids.
Over a year of fighting with each other had turned them all into a well-oiled fighting team, almost undefeatable. After the last of the hybrids had been destroyed, the power from all of the attacks had faded and the air settled around them. The humming noise from all the power used disappeared and once everything was silent, the group of 11 warriors could hear the sounds of clapping coming from behind.
They all whipped around to see Talpa, floating in the air, looking down at them with a sneer on his face. "Talpa," Ryo said through gritted teeth, announcing Talpa for him.
"Yes, it is I, General Talpa," the dark-haired general said with flair.
"What do you want?" Raye asked.
"I want one thing and one thing only," Talpa answered.
"If what you want is the Silver Crystal, you better go home because you're not getting it," Serena yelled.
"My dear, I don't want your little crystal."
"Then what do you want?" Serena asked, confused. Enemies never showed up in person unless they were going after the Silver Crystal.
"I want a fight. All you against me."
"Are you sure you're up to the challenge?" Lita asked.
"Oh, I'm more than ready to fight you. Do you accept?" Talpa asked. The group of warriors looked at each other, giving each other confirming looks and then Serena turned back to look at Talpa. "Yes, we accept," Serena said.
"Not without us, you don't."
**********
Hi all! Thank you so much for the reviews! I feel so loved! : P To CTRNikkiM, I'm glad you like the Ami/Rowen pairing. That's Chica's fave pairing as well! And to thescientist, don't worry, there's much more Raye/Sage coming in the next book. I'm trying to take it easy and update not too frequently, because I want to space things so that we don't suddenly get to an end (we're finishing book 5 right now) and leave you waiting for more. However, my patience is non-existent. : P Lucky you! Anyway, here's the last and second last chapters of book 2 now! This may be the last update for a little bit (a few days) as I have two papers due this week alongside a mountain of homework. College is evil sometimes! Anyway, enjoy! ~DestinyBabe