Ryo dodged to hide behind another tree as the shadow of a low flying dragon and its rider passed over head. This was getting ridiculous. Ryo had barely made any progress in reaching Mia's house, because of all the people looking for him. That had been the fourth dragon in less than ten minutes. He was getting nowhere fast. He looked up at the sky, and then around trying to find another low outcropping he could hide under for awhile. Seriyu's men were defiantly going through the forest with a fine toothed comb making sure that they didn't miss him. Ryo hurried over to his next hiding spot and waited to see if anyone had noticed his mad dash. He breathed a sigh of relief. He at least was in semi- familiar territory now and at least knew the general direction to head in. But at the rate he was going with having to hide every five seconds, it would take him a day just to get to the city.

'But, I have to hurry.' He thought to himself. 'There's no telling what that jerk will do if Sakura figures out that that man isn't who he is pretending to be. I bet White Blaze isn't giving him an easy time either.' Ryo thought with chuckle as he glanced around and kept heading toward Mia's house.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Sakura stared at Seriyu in amazement as they were eating lunch that afternoon. She wasn't the only one. Everyone else was also exchanging glances. The disguised Seriyu didn't notice the furtive glances passed around the table as he continued to eat an enormous meal. He finally glanced up and noticed he was the only one eating.

"What?" he asked looking around the table.

"Are you ok?" Cye asked him.

"Yeah, why?" Seriyu asked wondering what the heck he had done wrong now. Pretending to be a person he knew nothing about was harder than he imagined it would be.

"You're just eating a lot more than you normally do." Kento said simply. That was an understatement. Ryo normally wasn't one of the heavier eaters of the group. But today he was shoveling food in his mouth right and left, as if he hadn't had a good meal in weeks.

"I'm just really hungry today." Seriyu replied as he finished. The others decided to ignore his strange behavior and turned too the subject of what to do with the day.

"Hey, let's go out and play some soccer or something." Sage suggested.

"Yeah, we haven't done anything like that in a long time." Sekhmet agreed.

"I'm in." Sakura said her voiced echoed by everyone else's.

"What about you Ryo? You in?" Cale asked turning to him.

Seriyu looked at the group, he hated soccer. "Naw, I think I'll just watch this time." Everyone's mouths dropped open in shock.

"You can be captain!" Sakura offered, knowing he loved picking teams.

"That's alright." Seriyu said not noticing the shocked looks. "I have some other things to take care of." He said as he left the room.

The others gave each other worried looks as they went outside to start their game. Sakura lagged behind the others. 'Since when does Ryo not want to play soccer? It's his favorite sport.' Sakura really didn't have time to think of it again until later that night. She, Alanna, and Mia were about to fall asleep when once again, they were disturbed by a small scratch at the door. Sakura went to the door and opened it to reveal once again a despondent White Blaze.

"He locked you out again?" Mia voiced in surprise when she saw the tiger jump on Sakura's bed. "That's the second time!"

"I know." Sakura said situating herself between the two tigers. She lay back down and suddenly sat back up.

"Is it just me or had Ryo been acting a little…well…peculiar lately?" She asked the two other women.

"Peculiar? Sakura he's been acting down right weird." Mia said. Sakura face saddened.

"I know." She said sadly.

"What do you think is wrong with him?" Alanna asked gently.

"I don't know!" Sakura said fervently. "He keeps shrugging it off. Maybe he's getting nervous about our upcoming wedding. I mean, it's in less than a month."

"I don't think that's it." Mia consoled. "He's been waiting for this wedding since he asked you to be his girlfriend."

"Well, something is up. And tomorrow, I'm getting him alone and finding out what!" Sakura said decisively.

"When?" Alanna voiced.

Sakura thought for a minute. "After training, he'll be so tired that he won't be able to walk off." She said as she lay back down and fell asleep.