[AN: Sorry, sorry. Short chapter again. I promise this story will get somewhere in the next few chapters… I hope]

XVI

Ryo Sakuma, know online as Bear, put a comforting hand on Subaru's shoulder as they silently looked at the auburn-haired girl lying in the hospital bed, connected to all sorts of machinery. To his surprise, Subaru hadn't shed a tear in all the time they had been looking at the motionless Tsukasa. He guessed that she had already used up all of them while crying on Tsukasa's shoulder. He sighed. If his suppositions about the girl's feelings towards Tsukasa were right, and he hoped they weren't, things were going to be very complicated.

"Don't you wonder where she is?" asked Subaru, softly, "in The World, I mean. What could she be thinking now?"

"I don't know where she is" he answered, and was going to leave it at that. Yet before he could stop himself, he continued with an incredibly accurate comment, "but she's thinking about you"

XVII

Tsukasa awoke with a scream. He lay on a completely white floor, beside an old and broken bed. When this place was surrounded by ever-changing scenery the bed was intact, and a small girl used to float above it, sleeping. Yet now it was just an infinite blank emptiness around a bed that had seen better days. Tsukasa closed his eyes, letting the terror of the nightmare slowly fade away in the white light. He felt beads of sweat on his forehead. It had been so vivid, so real, he had been sure something had happened, or was going to happen, to Subaru. Yet it could not be. Morgana was no more; he was free from that malevolent voice in the sky. He slowly opened his eyes and sat up, then he opened his eyes even wider in surprise. Right in front of his face floated the familiar cat-like figure of Maha, the creature that had once worked for Morgana, but in the end sacrificed itself to save him.

"…Maha?" he asked incredulously. The small being nodded and seemed to smile. Then it looked concerned.

I'm really sorry about what's happening now, it said, the words appearing directly inside his mind, I can do nothing to stop it.

Tsukasa was still thinking what to ask when it looked back sharply and slowly faded from existence.

XVIII

Subaru went down an empty street, deep in thought. She was thinking about Tsukasa: about a way to help her, about when and if she would see her again but, most of all, about her own feelings for the girl now prostrate on a hospital bed. Only in her absence was Subaru beginning to realize what Tsukasa really meant to her. Her own heart surprised her and, in a way, scared her. She had always realized that she was closer to Tsukasa than anyone else, and that their relationship extended beyond normal friendship sometimes, yet now she cried almost every night, regretting not having time to do things, to say things, that she'd never thought she'd do or say to a girl. Bear knew, or suspected, at least. That had been made clear with his comment at the hospital. She just hoped it wasn't too obvious, she still had to work out how to deal with herself, much less other people.

She was so deep in thought that she didn't see the young teenager until he was just a few meters away from her. She immediately stopped, surprised. The youngster looked identical to the screenshot Mimiru had sent her of the strange Wavemaster called Edo. The robes had been replaced by white trousers, shirt and what seemed to be a lab coat and there was no staff to be seen, but the face was an exact duplicate. When he turned around to look at her and she saw the three red symbols marking his cheek, she discarded the notion that it could be a coincidence.

"E… Edo?" she asked him slowly. He stopped and looked down at her. He seemed surprised, almost scared.

"I… I don't know you" he said quickly. Subaru heard a sort of low-pitched buzzing and felt what she could only describe as static in her mind. She blinked and the strange youth was gone, nowhere to be seen.

XIX

"So what do you think, old man?"

Bear looked down at Mimiru with a sigh. The girl had the uncanny ability to interrupt his train of thought in the most unfortunate moments.

"Think about what?" he asked her back.

"About Tsukasa, and Edo and… everything"

Bear shook his head slowly. "I don't know"

Mimiru looked down. "Me neither"

For a long moment there was silence, and then Mimiru asked "How's Tsukasa… in the real world?"

The older man shook his head sadly. "Not well. He's not expected to live much longer"

Again, for a while, silence, which Mimiru once again interrupted. "Poor Subaru"

Bear nodded silently.

Mimiru sighed and looked up at the older man. "I'm going to log out…"

Bear nodded, again. Golden rings soon swept the image of the young Heavy Blade away, leaving him alone with his thoughts.

XX

Maha looked at Edo, a concerned expression on its cat face.

They're after you, Edo, it said, you should take more care to hide.

The young Wavemaster shook his head. "That would be taking away my freedom as much as if they caught me, so what's the point?"

The point is they won't have you have you trapped there again.

Edo stood up and looked down at the cat in the pointy hat. "They can't catch me, anyway, they can't even se me if I don't want them too"

Maha floated up to eye level  and frowned at him. You aren't invincible, Edo.

Edo made a waving away gesture, as if it wasn't important, and started to walk off. Maha flew in front of him again, it's hair bristling in annoyance.

Listen to me!

Edo looked at the cat-like creature and frowned. "You are starting to get very annoying. I don't think I want to see you again"

With those words Edo faded away from the field, leaving only an annoyed Maha glaring at the space he had occupied for a few moments before it faded away, too.