Chapter 9
'obligation'
The sunlight was long gone. In its place, inconspicuous but effective streetlights lit the area with their whiter and more man-made glow. Long shadows stretched out from trees and the carefully manicured shrubbery lining each cobbled path. The atmosphere in the park was as humid and sticky as anywhere else in the city, but at least it was quieter. Glowflies drifted in and out of the patches of flowers, winking brightly at one another, contributing their own tiny lights to the park. Eric had never been here as far as he could remember, but he was tired of walking and lost, and this seemed like as good a place as any to rest.
He wasn't totally alone here; a few couples strolled about, and someone was jogging past a little farther away. It was peaceful here, it was normal and Eric soaked up that peace greedily, starved for his relatively ordinary life that he'd led until just a few days ago. More than anything else, he wanted it back.
A perky young pair strode past him at an intersection of paths, the male unclipping his phone from his ear, and Eric almost leapt on him.
"Excuse me!" Both of them took a wary step back, startled and expressions uncertain. His clothes had dried, for the most part, but he was still a wrinkled and scruffy mess and really couldn't blame them. "Can I borrow your phone? Just for a minute? It's an emergency."
The primly dressed boy hesitated, hand automatically clutching his phone a little tighter. They were probably interns. They had the look of interns. "Um, I don't -"
"Please," Eric pressed, his tone sharp with exhaustion. He took another step toward them and held out his hand, not meaning to look threatening but probably doing a good job of it in his desperation. The boy hastily tossed his phone at Eric, more to keep him at a distance than from any motive of kindness, but Eric didn't care. He pressed the dial button and recited the numbers rapidly, pacing away while the interplanetary call went through to get a measure of privacy. The girl crossed her arms and scowled at her boyfriend, probably unimpressed with his lack of spine, and he cringed.
The last ring broke up with a click.
"Masters here."
"Dad?" The connection wasn't great, with this cheap phone, and Eric raised his voice over the prickling of static. "Dad, can you hear me? It's Eric."
"Eric? What the hell is going on over there, what have you been doing?"
"Oh god, Dad, everything's so crazy." Eric's shoulders sagged and he closed his eyes, almost tearing up in relief at the sound of a familiar voice. Everything would be okay now. "I don't know where to begin, I -"
"Why in hell did you vote against that 314 bill?" his father demanded, sweeping over Eric's fumbling words and shocking him into speechlessness. His feet stopped moving and his mouth opened and closed twice, stupidly, while a glowfly flickered past.
"What?" he finally managed.
"Do you know how many calls I've gotten from my friends these past couple days?" the man ranted. "Shares in ceruleum are dropping like rocks and everyone's missing out on fortunes, do you have any idea how much we stood to gain from this?"
"What?" Eric said again, stunned mind frantically trying to catch up. "Dad, did you invest -"
"No, of course you don't. You don't know anything, screwing around and getting drunk, wasting everyone's time while you block simple bills for no reason at all."
"But I -"
"And then you disappear, leaving me to try and apologize for your idiotic actions. I can't believe you would do this to me!"
"To you?"
"Hold a Senate position. It's the easiest job in the universe, all you had to do was sit down, shut up, and vote like everybody else. And yet somehow, you still managed to screw it up. I should have guessed it would be too much for a shiftless bum like yourself to cope with. So what do you have to say for yourself?" For the first time he paused long enough for Eric to speak. The glowflies were starting to blur a little in his vision, running together in a hazy cloud of gold. Vaguely he noticed that his chest felt tight, and his breathing had become painfully raspy, even worse than when he'd watched that newscaster cheerfully announce his death.
"I-I just thought you'd want to know I'm not dead."
His father snorted. "Surprisingly enough, considering the people you're mucking around with. I hope you know now just how recklessly stupid you've been."
"Yeah," Eric said slowly, eyes still following the glittering insects, "I think I do."
"So what are you going to do -" His father was cut off abruptly when Eric pressed the Off button, and he unclipped the earpiece with an impatient yank. A chipped granite bench stood near him, embossed brass plate informing him that this was 'your tax dollars at work', and numbly he collapsed onto it.
After a few minutes of staring blankly at the hedge opposite, the intern approached and cleared his throat.
"Um, can I have my phone back now?"
"You gotta cigarette?"
The intern looked properly disgusted. "Certainly not."
Eric grunted and dropped the phone in the other's open palm, not looking while the kid clutched his girlfriend's hand and hit a brisk pace for the other side of the park. Instead he dug out his crumpled pack and flipped back the lid. They'd been as soaked as he was, but maybe after drying out a little at least one would light up.
He prayed that one would light up. Because a cigarette was the only thing standing between him and insanity right now. He hadn't even had one smoke since all this started the night before and god had it only been one day?
The cigarette refused him and he spat it out. Eric's whole world had been turned upside down and every time he thought he knew something it turned out to be just another lie. He'd accidentally stumbled into the deadliest ever of secrets and not even his own father cared if he survived or not.
Again he thumbed the latch and put a cigarette to the flame – no good.
"C'mon, c'mon, please, please," he mumbled under his breath, spitting out damp and useless cigarettes one after another in an ever widening circle around his feet. He didn't see the dirty look a passing jogger shot him, or even the jogger. "Please don't let me down now, you're all I've got…"
This was his last shred of self-control, he knew, if he couldn't even set one damn cigarette aflame then he would fall apart and give up. With trembling hands he put his lighter to the last of the pack, and miraculously the flame took. The thin wisp of smoke curled up into the air like a beacon of hope, and eagerly he plucked it from his mouth to exhale. Unfortunately, his hands were shaking so badly the cigarette slipped out his grasp. Clumsily he tried to catch it and knocked it right out into the middle of the path, where it rolled to a stop with one end still glowing.
Eric let out an anguished cry and dropped to his knees to snatch it up, rescue it before it died and left him totally alone. But just before his fingterips could reach it, a solid black shoe stepped on it and crushed it to the ground.
Dread clamped down on Eric's lungs and he looked up, up past the highly polished shoe and the crisp black suit, to the hard lined face and barely-visible earpiece.
The face cracked into an insincere smile and a badge flashed briefly across his vision. "Senator Masters, Capitol Security. You've proved very difficult to get ahold of today. We have to reason to believe you may be in danger here, please come with us to Security Headquarters."
Come with us.
Heart thumping, Eric rose to a standing position, eyes skittering to the side. Another suited man stood in the shadow of a nearby tree, and at the edge of the park a car stood waiting.
"If you please," the agent prompted crisply with a gesture, clearly expecting Eric to start walking. The car's rear door was already open, allowing a glimpse of formless black inside. Eric was not about to get in that car. "Senator?"
Eric bent his knees and slammed into the agent with everything he had, ramming his shoulder into the other man's chest. He grunted loudly in pain and surprise but Eric didn't wait to see if he actually fell. Instead he turned and bolted, leaping onto the bench before he cleared the hedge. There was a shout and something whizzed past his shoulder before the bullet embedded itself in a tree.
Eric hit the grass hard and scrambled to his feet, trying to keep low and still run fast at the same time. Not far behind him he could hear the first agent shouting to bring the car around, and move in.
He shouldn't have made that phone call. But it was too late to worry about that now and he dug his heels into the grass to turn a sharp corner, putting a stand of young trees between him and his pursuer. All pretenses abandoned, another silent bullet zipped through the air and splintered the bark near his head.
"Stop where you are!" he heard the man shout. Eric paid no attention and sprinted alongside another thick hedge, expecting to get a bullet in his back at any second. He couldn't see anyone else now, where had the interns and joggers gone? If they were smart they were lying low, maybe even calling the police, never suspecting that the police wouldn't come to stop these attackers.
The park ended straight ahead of him and he pounded for the street, not even knowing if safety lay there but too panicked to care. A squeal of tires split the air and the agents' car pulled up in front of him, cutting him off. Again Eric screeched to a halt and broke to the right, wheezing, knowing it was futile, that they were too close and they were going to catch him. He couldn't run fast enough, his lungs burned and his labored breathing was so loud in his ears that he couldn't even hear the shouts of his pursuers anymore.
Smoking really is going to kill me, he thought in a detached, absurdly ironic sort of way. He stumbled over the curb and into the street, and another silent bullet shattered the rear window of car parked behind him. Twin blinding lights fixated on him and the agents' car shot toward him at a deadly velocity. He couldn't get out fast enough, couldn't escape, and they'd finally pinned him down. This time he was going to die.
The high-pitched shriek of another car engine pierced his senses before he saw the blur of a red convertible. Lights off, it shot out from the small intersecting street with no warning, pulling in a tight arc around Eric with a violent squeal. The government car was forced right off the road to avoid a collision, rolling partway up the curb and almost hitting the first agent.
Meilin twisted in the driver's seat with gun in hand and fired two shots, catching one agent in the chest and just missing the other before he dove behind cover.
"Get in!"
Eric's mind was frantically tumbling to process this new turn of events, and when she spoke he was still staring at her with his mouth open. But at her sharp command his thoughts collected and he dove over the door and into the passenger seat. She pressed on the gas and with a screeching protest from the tires, they shot away from the park.
"How do you always have such great timing?" Eric panted, trying to push himself into a sitting position and get his breath back.
"You might want to stay down," she replied evenly, eyes on the rearview mirror.
"Why?" A bullet zipped past his head and shattered the front windshield, shards of the synthetic glass flying everywhere. Eric yelped and covered his face with his arms, then quickly glued himself to the back of the seat.
"That's why." He was thrown against the car door when she turned a sharp right, and with shaking hands he fumbled for his seatbelt. The unwavering headlights behind them continued to close in and Meilin swore, swerving across the lanes to evade any more bullets. "I can't believe they found you so quickly," she muttered. "How the hell did they do it?"
"I, uh, kinda made a phone call to my dad…"
"You WHAT?" She took her eyes off the road long enough to pin him to his seat with a ferocious glare. "What did I tell you earlier? Weren't you listening at all? How could you be so stupid?"
"Well, excuse me for being lost and alone and freaked out. And with no cigarettes either! I had to tell my father I wasn't dead, what was going on. I thought he could fix it!"
Meilin turned abruptly onto a highway ramp, weaving through the traffic at a breathtaking speed. Eric's knuckles were white from clutching the parking brake.
"Typical," she snapped. "One whiff of danger and you run crying back to the man you claim to scorn. You really are just another politician after all."
Eric gasped indignantly, but before he could retort the pursuing car crunched their rear bumper and threw them forward in their seats. Metal grated horribly against metal and Meilin almost lost control of the wheel, before she managed to swerve into the next lane. Everywhere horns blared in protest but Meilin paid no attention, accelerating frantically to keep ahead of the government car.
"Well, what about you, huh?" Eric demanded irritably. "How did you manage to find me so damn fast?"
"Your lighter."
"What?" She zipped around a large freight truck without saying anything, and he dug the familiar object out of his pockets. It was his beloved lighter, all right, but when he turned it over in his hand he noticed a tiny metallic disc adhered to the bottom. It hadn't been there before.
"I planted it there the day I bumped into you in the Capitol," she explained briskly. "When you were arguing with Pindexter. I thought it would be a handy way to keep an eye on you."
Eric's mouth fell open. "Th-that was you? You put a homing device on me? Do you have any notion of privacy?"
"That homing device saved your life, moron. Twice! How do you think I found you in the park last night?"
"If that's the case then why didn't you get there a little earlier, huh? I almost didn't make it out of my apartment alive!"
"I was getting something to eat. I'd been shadowing you for three days! Or did you think that I just happened to be at that bar at the right time to switch out your drink? I have put everything on hold to watch you and I have been keeping you alive."
The gritty truth of her words caught him like a slap across the face and he stared dumbly at the girl behind the wheel, her face proud and angry, long hair whipping in the wind behind her. All at once he realized just how much she'd risked for him, and how much he owed her.
He opened his mouth, but before he could speak she cried out in sudden pain. Blood welled up in a straight line across her upper arm and she pressed herself against the seat, teeth gritted against the bullet's burn.
"Meilin!" The car swerved to the left in her lapse of attention and without considering the danger Eric leaned across the grab the wheel, righting their path before they crashed into the median wall. "Meilin, are you -"
"Get back!" she hissed, and shoved him back into his seat with another groan of pain. "What, do you want to get shot too? I'll be okay, it's just a scratch."
"Just a scratch? They shot you!"
"I can still drive," she panted, and peeked at her sideview mirror. "They're too close. We lost speed there." Impatiently she pressed on the gas pedal but they weren't accelerating fast enough; soon the agents would be level with them and they were both dead if that happened. She'd wedged the gun between her seat and the parking brake and yanked it out, with another stifled gasp of pain.
Eric heard, and his eyes fell on the gun she was handling gingerly, trying to work her finger through the trigger while moving her arm as little as possible.
"What do you think you're doing? You can't drive and shoot with your arm like that."
"No choice, Senator. They're going to catch up to us, I have to make them fall back."
Eric smiled wanly and shook his head. "You really do too much, you know that?" And without warning he snatched the gun out of her hand before he fired over the back of the seat. Two bullets bit into the black plating and they dropped back sharply, tires screeching. He fired again, just barely missing the front tire, before he dropped back behind cover to catch his breath.
Meilin's eyes were round with shock.
"How did you do that?"
"Don't suppose you've ever heard of, you know, video games?"
"Huh?"
"Why am I not surprised? You just worry about the road, and I'll take care of them. This is my fault, after all."
She still looked surprised, but she nodded and concentrated on weaving in and out of the traffic after that. Eric peeked around the far edge of the passenger seat and tried again, putting a crack in their bulletproof windshield and almost causing them to swerve into the median barrier. He was still scared but realized he was no longer terrified. It must be because he was helping to fight back now, instead of relying on someone else to save him. And it was kind of a good feeling, almost as good as a cigarette.
"Hang on!" Meilin shouted.
"For wha- yeow, big truck!" She jerked the car sharply to the right and slid right underneath the gigantic cargo truck, between the two sets of wheels. It was so quick that he didn't even have the chance to protest, pressed against his seat and paralyzed with terror. The car kept to the right and she shot into an exit ramp before he could blink, and another round of frantic tire squealing and horn honking behind them signaled the agents' attempt to follow. But there wasn't any way they could get to the ramp quickly enough and Eric let out a shaky breath. He had to peel his fingers off the car door handle.
"Who taught you to drive, so I can kill him?"
"My cousin, of course." Meilin smiled grimly through the pain in her arm. "And I wouldn't advise it. Quite a few policemen and bounty hunters have discovered he is very difficult to kill."
"Nothing less from someone related to you," Eric muttered, which provoked another tiny smile. Meilin relaxed their speed and they coasted to the bottom of the ramp. Eric was about to suggest they drive to the nearest hospital when a gleaming black utility vehicle tore into the intersection in front of them and blocked their path.
"Get down!" Eric ducked his head and Meilin threw the wheel to the right, smashing through a flimsy rotten barrier that blocked the parking lot of a closed gas station. With no windshield, chunks of old wood and nails scattered over them and Meilin winced again when one made contact with her arm. The government car revved and accelerated again when they realized where she was going and she pressed the car to go faster, before they could pull into the other exit and cut them off.
"Hurry!" Eric shouted unnecessarily, anxiously watching their opponent, and they managed to pull out into the street just in time. The bigger car had to swing slightly to the left just to avoid a crash, and he gave them a parting shot in the driver's window. "But how?"
"They must have been ready to block us up ahead, they're probably closing in all around us. We've got to get out of here."
"I second the motion," he agreed heartily. The words had hardly left his mouth when another car swooped in from a side street and Meilin threw the wheel to the right. The tires shrieked and burned, but she kept the car under control and forced it into a tight spin, using their momentum to shoot backwards past the surprised agents. The car behind them couldn't pull up fast enough and they slammed into the hood of the second car. The crunch echoed loudly in the empty street, and both black vehicles nearly flipped over at the high-velocity impact.
Meilin righted their car again and they left them both in their exhaust. It was so fast, and so exhilirating, that Eric couldn't help the yell of excitement.
"Wow! That was amazing, you are amazing! That was perfect!"
Meilin exhaled a little shakily, relaxing her grip on the steering wheel. The graze across her arm throbbed.
"Almost perfect."
"Oh yeah, we should drive to a hospital, that's got to be looked at."
She shook her head. "No. By law hospitals have to report gunshot wounds to the police, they'll be waiting for that."
"But -"
"It'll be fine. We have to get out of here, anyway." She pulled into a deserted side street and parked against the curb, then killed the engine. The quiet that followed seemed out of place after a night like theirs. "There's still more out there, you know, roving the neighborhood. We should ditch the car and lay low."
"But surely they'll find it and tow it away."
"Yeah?" She opened her door and threw him a disinterested glance. "You know it's not mine, right?"
"Oh… oh, brother." He rolled his eyes and got out. She was already several steps ahead of him, and he watched her toss the gun into the storm drain before she turned and started walking again. "Hang on. Wait, Meilin, please?"
"What?"
"Your arm, it's really bleeding." He fumbled at his buttons and pulled his wrinkled office shirt off, leaving him in just his thin T-shirt. "Let me at least wrap something over it. Okay?" She looked as though she might refuse, and he ripped his sleeve into strips before she could say anything. "I, uh, used to lifeguard at the university pool when I was in college. I know some first aid."
"You mean you've actually worked?" she scoffed, looking skeptical. But she did stop walking and let Eric approach her with his impromptu bandages.
"Well, I mostly did it because it was a good way to meet chicks. But you really wouldn't believe the stingy allowance my dad had me on, either. A guy could barely get drunk with it."
She held her arm out, but looked away when he started wrapping the cloth over her flesh, avoiding his eyes. "I guess I owe you an apology, huh?"
"Hmph."
"I'm sorry. I just got freaked out when I saw that news clip. I thought if I could just tell my father…" He shook his head. "You were right. You really are the only one that wants to see me live. I should have never left you like that."
She sucked in her breath slightly when he pulled the knot tight, allowing for some circulation to her arm. "And you still came and rescued me anyway, again. Why do you keep risking yourself like this to save me, Meilin, haven't you figured out that I'm not worth it? You said it yourself: I'm just another politician."
She took a step forward, her arm sliding out of his grasp, eyes still averted.
"I don't think you're just another politician," she murmured, so low he could barely hear her. "We shouldn't be hanging around like this," she added, louder. "We need to distance ourselves from the car. Come on."
A person would never guess she'd just been shot, the way she strode away so quickly. But she was right. Eric could only sigh and follow, discarding his ripped shirt in the nearest trash can.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
It was the deepest, most restful sleep Tomoyo had had in a while. She woke gradually and made no move to get out of bed, gazing at the familiar walls of her bunk while her thoughts roamed here and there. As usual, plans had been thrown into disarray and her anticipated trip to Clearwater was obviously out of the question. This meant laundry still needed to be done by hand, for the time being, and food supplies were probably running low again. They wouldn't starve, with that crate of instant noodles and grains, but fresh fruit and vegetables were another story altogether. Speaking of which, she should get started on something for breakfast. Yukito, at least, was bound to be hungry after everything had happened on Partine.
She sat up and stretched, automatically grasping her robe and towel from where they hung over her head. First a shower, then she'd take inventory in the galley. The part of her that was always attuned to Sakura prompted her to pause in the corridor and open her cousin's bunk, just for a quick check.
The bed was empty, but that wasn't a cause for alarm. Many mornings they'd woken to find Sakura cuddled in bed next to her brother and Yukito, but Tomoyo didn't want to open their door and possibly wake them. She would just shower first, and turned to make her way to the bathroom. That was when she noticed that the door next to hers, Li's, was wide open and for no other reason than simple casual interest she glanced in on her way past.
That was all she'd intended, anyway, a brief glance. When her head processed that glance, however, she nearly tripped over her own two feet, and promptly threw herself back to the doorframe. Once, twice, she blinked, but she was not imagining things. Li lay fast asleep on his side, hair splashed messily against the pillow, the blanket in tangles. One bare arm curled protectively around Sakura's waist, nestled cozily against Li's body and also quite asleep, her breathing low and even. The pair looked so uncharacteristically at peace, and happy, that Tomoyo had to clap a hand over her mouth to refrain from squealing. She could hardly explain it, having never expected a scene like this, but now that she was looking at them it just seemed so right. Never had she wished harder for her old camera.
"Tomoyo?"
She jumped and whirled around at the sound of Touya's voice, desperately slapping at the panel for Li's door as she did so. It slid shut behind her, cutting off the view and just in time. Touya pulled himself out of his own bunk on the opposite side of the corridor, hair still scruffy from sleep and a towel slung over his shoulder. He squinted drowsily at her and she painted an insincere smile on her face.
"Up already? Did you get enough sleep?"
"Yep," she assured him. "I feel great, never better."
"Good." He yawned and rolled his neck once, trying to alleviate the stiffness. "What about Sakura, did she sleep all right? Yesterday might have been too rough on her, maybe I should check."
"She's fine!" Tomoyo said a little too quickly, and Touya blinked in surprise. "I mean," she amended, "I just checked on her. She's sleeping like a baby."
"Really? That's good. Were you going to take a shower?"
"Yes- I mean, I was. But go ahead." She flashed another fake grin and combed her fingers through her long hair. "I want to brush my hair before I wash it. Please go first."
She saw a flicker of disbelieving curiosity in his black eyes but it was still very early, and he shrugged. "If you like. I'll be done in a few minutes." He set off, and Tomoyo waited until she'd heard the bathroom door bang shut before she dared to open Li's door again.
Neither had woken, but she thought Li might be stirring a little. She scrambled down the rungs and patted his arm timidly. "Li?" she ventured with a whisper, afraid to raise her voice. "Li, are you awake? Please wake up."
He stirred again as she pleaded but his eyes didn't open, and he clutched at Sakura a little more tightly. The simple unconscious action was enough to make Tomoyo melt with delight, but this wasn't a time to get distracted. Touya wouldn't be long.
"Li, please!" Anxiously she gave his arm a sharp tug, and this time his eyes opened. Drowsily they focused on Tomoyo without recognition, and she bit her lip. "Li, you have to wake up!"
He blinked and frowned, alertness filtering into his eyes. "Tomoyo? What's the problem?"
"You! This!" She gestured frantically, and for the first time Li consciously noticed Sakura curled up next to him.
"Oh," he groaned, "damn." He closed his eyes briefly and then unwound his arm, pushing himself to a sitting position. "Nothing happened, I swear. She couldn't sleep, and we… talked some. I guess we just drifted off."
"Never mind that!" Tomoyo hissed, though she was dying for details. "Touya is going to kill you. He's showering right now, we have to get her out of here!"
Li swallowed another groan and nodded, gently shaking Sakura's shoulder. "Sakura, time to wake up."
"Sakura," Tomoyo chimed in, "please wake up, you can't stay here. Please?" Her cousin was an extraordinarily light and restless sleeper, thanks to her vivid nightmares, and the problem usually lay in putting her to sleep, not waking her up. But Sakura didn't even twitch. "You really do have an effect on her. She's never slept so soundly before."
"Great," he muttered. Sakura wasn't budging, and the captain was going to have hysterics if he caught them like this. He pulled on his shirt and climbed over her and out of bed. "Stand back, and open the door."
He scooped the thin girl up in his arms while Tomoyo scurried to comply.
"But how can you climb up without your arms?"
"Don't need to climb."
"What?" He bent his knees slightly and jumped straight up, landing easily on the corridor floor and eliciting a surprised squeak from Tomoyo. Sakura didn't stir, totally undisturbed, either for the jump up or when he dropped gracefully onto the floor of her own bunk, and settled her on her bed.
"He turned the water off!" Tomoyo reported frantically from above. "Hurry!"
Yes, he needed to hurry. He took the time to brush Sakura's wispy bangs back from her face, though, and run his fingers across her soft lips.
"You really do put me through so much," he murmured, "you know that?"
Maybe she smiled a little in her sleep, he wasn't sure. But he couldn't linger anymore and leapt into the corridor, just in time to hear the bathroom door open. Tomoyo looked panic-stricken and he had to drag her out of the hallway and down into her bunk, slapping at the panel to shut the door seconds before Touya's footsteps sounded outside.
"Tomoyo, shower's free. I'll start breakfast."
"Okay!" she called out, when Li prodded her. "Thanks!" He continued on his way to the galley, steps fading, and she collapsed against the wall with relief.
"That was too close. Thank goodness."
Li grunted, presumably in agreement, and she opened her eyes to give him a more thorough looking over. No normal human could jump like that, especially with another person in their arms, and she remembered again how he'd saved her the day before.
"You're a sorcerer. Aren't you?"
There was hardly any point in denying it. Li nodded fractionally.
"Touya hates magic, you know."
"Gonna tell him?" He raised his eyebrows slightly and she shook her head.
"No, I wouldn't do that. You saved my life yesterday; you didn't have to."
"It was nothing."
"Did she ask you to?" The unerringly perceptive question took him by surprise, and he looked up. She smiled wanly. "Maybe you don't understand just how different she is around you, but I see it. You have some kind of connection with her – I guess it has to do with your magic?"
"Maybe," he acknowledged. "I really don't know either."
"Oh. Has she told you anything? About what happened to her, that is?"
"Sort of." He winced at the way her eyes lit up so hopefully. "But I don't understand most of it myself," he added quickly, and her face fell. "She can't communicate things the way she'd like to. They reconstructed too much of her mind."
Tomoyo's hands flew to her mouth, stifling a horrified gasp. "They what?"
"Surgery." He tapped his temple with a finger, his own initial revulsion mirrored in her eyes.
"Who could do such a thing?"
"Someone with plans." Tomoyo's face had gone pale and she sank onto the edge of her bed. "You all right?"
"No," she whimpered. "I'm sorry, I just…" She wiped away a tear, struggling to get control of herself. "It's so horrible, that's all. Why? Why did they do it?"
Li crossed his arms and leaned against the wall. It was obvious that she loved Sakura a great deal, and that she intended to keep his magic a secret. It wouldn't hurt to trust her with some of the story.
"I was on Tyrinthia following a lead," he explained, "for a phantom government project called Clow. Caught wind of it on D.C. almost a dozen standard months ago."
"That's about when Touya and Yukito rescued Sakura."
"Mm." He'd noticed that too. "Supposedly it would be the doomsday for sorcerers everywhere. Far-fetched rumors, sure, but I had to see for myself what it was all about. I finally managed to pin down a finance trail through the government base there, but my investigation got cut short that night. I didn't have the chance to do much more than confirm its existence before I had to go. But it was listed as classification 'nova'."
Tomoyo listened quietly, trying to understand, and frowned. "The… same classification you said Sakura was. Right?"
"I think they're the same project."
"Oh. You mean- you think Sakura is some kind of weapon?"
"Maybe."
"No!" She shook her head emphatically, long black hair swishing with the movement. "No, you're wrong. Sakura would never – she could never hurt anybody. That can't be right."
"There's more ways to hurt than just physically," he pointed out in a low voice. "And I don't know if she is the weapon. She might just be the trigger. But she is part of project Clow, and trust me when I tell you she is more valuable than you could ever imagine. She showed me what she knows."
He grimaced at the memory. "And it wasn't pleasant."
Tomoyo didn't look as though she knew what to make of all this new information, but at Li's last comments she gave him another speculative look.
"She really is trying to reach you. Isn't she?" He raked his fingers through his hair and nodded. "You probably understand more about her than any of us, by now. I certainly don't know anything about sorcery or government plots. But," she added, more firmly, "I have known her since we were babies and there are some things about Sakura that I do know. So I think I should tell you that she loves you."
Li inhaled sharply and looked away, at the floor. But it wasn't a surprise, not really. Her words had merely given form to something he already knew deep within.
"I won't ask you what your feelings are," Tomoyo continued. "It isn't my place. But I see the way you look at her and how you both are when you're together, and- and I know she's important to you." He looked up when she paused, watching her search for the right words. "She's so fragile, and I don't want her to be hurt anymore. Can you at least promise that you'll be there for her? Protect her?"
Li considered her words and nodded. "I told her last night, and I will tell you now. I won't let anything hurt her."
He knew how deeply she cared for her charge, but the relief that shone out of her tired eyes surprised him nevertheless. She fully and totally trusted him.
Tomoyo caught him off guard when she rose to her feet and embraced him in a gentle hug. "I don't think you're a criminal at all," she murmured. "Thank you."
Automatically he stiffened, unused to such a friendly gesture. But it felt good, to be trusted to something so important. So precious.
"It's a promise."
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Disclaimer: I do not own these characters