Chapter 7: The Town of Howling Willows
"And as time passes, you realize that the thin line between reality and dreams becomes blurry"
Soon there was light again but as Kaeli suspected there was no evident source of light or sun or anything like that so, where did the light came from? The TR was a floating platform surrounded with an invisible shield practically impossible to cross, a changing colourful labyrinth. Only those who had their vessels targeting the TR were able to enter it, as she learned through the night Eriol and herself had spent talking about the base and how it was built.
"So how did you get in here the first time?" –a mischievous smile appeared on Eriol's face before answering.
"We built it from scratch" –he replied truthfully to Kaeli's surprise. Obviously these people had more aces under their sleeves that she had noticed- "Hey kid… uhm… I mean, Kaeli, I've been wondering about something you said the last time… When we were on the ship, something about a dream of us, what did you mean by that?"
"You're not a stranger, I've dreamed of you before"
"Oh, that time? Uhm… well, lets say it's like a movie, a videotape, and every night since I remember it's being played while I'm asleep, but sometimes the tape is dirty and the image blurry and then I, well my head ejects it and I wake up but can't remember the whole dream and then…"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Slow down! Breathe and start all over again, and this time, in a comprehensive language, ok?" –apparently Kaeli had said all of that very quickly and without breathing.
"It's like," –she started again, with a somewhat melancholic expression on her pretty face- "every time I sleep, I see another world, a continuing story, in which you've appeared more than once, I don't know why or how, but that's how I feel like I know you, like I can trust you… but there are also some side stories, filled with suffer and misery…" –her expression now seemed somehow darker, almost as if she was suffering deep inside.
Both stood in silence for a couple of minutes, Kaeli replaying the horrible images she'd seen in her dreams and Eriol thinking about her words.
A while later when everybody had woken up and eaten breakfast, Eriol told them that Kaeli was now part of their team and gave her back her watch now with the TR coordinates, along with a wristband-like device they used to communicate with each other. The girl had already seen one, when Meiling found them, Syaoran called her through it.
The next day, Kaeli was about to leave, she accidentally overheard Syaoran asking Eriol why he had let her stay.
"Maybe she's here for a reason… I never heard of anyone who could travel without a device or a spaceship. Deep inside, something tells me that her role in all this is more important that we think" –after that, the blue eyed boy left for his room, but the group's leader went through the door where Kaeli was standing. They stared at each other for a few seconds, and then he left.
She opened her eyes to find herself back in the orphanage, then suddenly an idea hit her: she had spent two days at the TR! She saw Miss Aikawa enter the room wide-eyed throwing her arms around the no-more-missing-girl and squeezing her in a warm hug.
"Where have you been? I was worried to death when I didn't see you and Sakura that morning! Where's Sakura? Isn't she with you?" –Kaeli felt a tug in her heart as she heard that and was about to scream when she saw Yuni standing by the door.
"I'm sure she's fine Miss Aikawa, Kaeli will bring her back, right big sis?" –a mischievous smile as she stated this.
As if hypnotized, the orphanage keeper released Kaeli and left the room with a lost expression.
"Don't waste time. Call them" –she pointed to the other girl's left wrist, where the communicator was hidden under her long sleeved gown. Somehow puzzled she lifted her sleeve only to see a small red light flickering in the screen accompanied by a beeping sound. Kei appeared in the screen as she pushed the answer button, not long after that, Kaeli saw Syaoran pushing the twin out of the way to make himself visible for her.
"We've got a problem, your friend might be in trouble, come back right now" –he hung up right then leaving Kaeli utterly shocked. In less than two minutes she had changed her clothes and was manipulating the watch. She looked back only once to see Yuni with a reassuring smile.
As soon as she arrived, Syaoran, Meiling, Eriol and herself left on the Firearm for the Town of Howling Willows.
The scene reminded Kaeli of a movie she saw once in TV, 'The legend of Sleepy Hollow', but she was too concerned about her friend to be scared. A second later they had landed, Meiling set off to do her job, as she was the explorer of the group. Nothing alive could be seen except for themselves, and the wind seemed to produce some weird sound when brushing against the old buildings, half falling apart. Wait a second… was it really the wind?
"That's why it is called the Town of Howling Willows, the villagers tried to escape from the dreadful ruler by fleeing into the woods, but he placed a curse upon all of those who dared to defy him" –the story seemed somehow familiar to Kaeli as Syaoran explained to her, and there was a particular house she could see through the left window of the Firearm that caught her attention. With both hands pressed against the crystal she hurried her memory to remember something about it, but when she thought she had something, Meiling came back with the space recognizing report. They decided on a plan and got off the spaceship heading for a two stories building just across from the house Kaeli had been watching.
"I sense someone on the second floor" –Eriol said as they entered the old house. Sense? Did he mean 'I think there's someone up there'? or was it literally 'sense'? –"Reveal your secrets" –he commanded apparently to no one in particular with both hands outstretched revealing, to Kaeli's astonishment, a staircase they hadn't seen until then. As they climbed up, doors started slamming and opening up, but not only that, children were coming out of them. Kaeli was holding some kind of weapon Meiling had given to her in her left hand that looked more like a regular boomerang to her.
Suddenly she felt someone grabbing her right hand and when she looked that way she felt her eyes widen in terror. There was a kid holding her hand, but he seemed terribly beaten up with deep cuts on his face and arms and a missing eye. She desperately tried to get rid of his grip, but he wouldn't let her go, quite the contrary, the boy started to pull her arm. Kaeli tried to scream, but her voice had abandoned her, she was unable to say a word as the kid pulled her closer and closer. He bit her arm and was only then she was able to scream, more because of the pain than anything else.
Meiling and Eriol came to her rescue as they were closer, the latter using some kind of magical power Kaeli had never seen to get rid of the boy. She felt to her knees holding her bleeding arm with the spare one close to her body. Meiling ripped the end of her sleeve and wrapped it around the girl's wound.
"We'll get Hyosuke treat you once we get back, now we have to hurry and find your friend, eat this, it will ease the pain" –Eriol handed her what looked like a candy, but she dismissed him with her unharmed hand.
"I'm fine, lets go" –but suddenly felt dizzy and images started to flow through her head. Before anyone could ask what was wrong she had stood up and sprinted out of the house, followed closely by the blue eyed boy.
"She's in there" –she stated pointing to the green and white house across the street –"There's a hallway with mirrors, one of them is false, we have to break it and go through the secret passage, then we'll get to an abandoned factory. Somewhere in there there's a room with a combination locked door" –lost sighted, Kaeli walked all the way to the green house. Eriol, thinking that she was suffering some kind of side effect from the kid's bite like poisoning or something like that, followed her and called Syaoran through the communicator.
The four of them entered the house together, which appeared to be moving as the walls kept squeaking. Kaeli lead them up three sets of stairs, confirming Eriol's suspicion that this was no regular house, as they had seen a one story building from outside, then they took a lift to an upper level. Three of the crystal hunters silent in astonishment as the novice one lead them through corridors and secrets doors as she knew the path by heart. And as she told Eriol a while ago, they reached a hallway that had mirrors instead of walls.
Stretching a hand out Kaeli motioned Syaoran to lend her his backpack, which he did. Then the amethyst eyed girl knocked lightly one mirror, and then another one, and another one until she reached one that sounded hollow, took out a mini-bomb from Syaoran's backpack and placed it on top of that mirror..
"How come she knows where we're going?" –Meiling asked somewhat suspicious, but her question was left unanswered as the mini-bomb exploded in that precise instant.
When they had finally arrive to the factory area, machines started to go on by themselves and Kaeli wasn't sure where the locked door was, but she could bet anything that Sakura was in there, her amethyst-like eyes scanned the area in search for a clue but the floor started to move and three dark hunters revealed themselves. Meiling was fighting with a blond girl just a couple of inches taller than her, Kaeli recalled her as Vyper, the girl who had attacked her back in the pools-like room. Meiling's martial arts and speed where impressive. Syaoran had an adversary too, but instead of kicks and punches he used some golden cards with Chinese inscriptions on them. A very big man was fighting Eriol, who had unleashed a sun shaped rod from a key.
Kaeli took advantage of the distraction and sprinted to an area she felt familiar not without falling a couple of times because of the floor still moving in every direction. At the end of a large hall, she could see the door she was looking for and ran for it without thinking twice, and once there the combination came to her mind. Finally the door opened revealing a scared Sakura who threw her arms around her friend.
"Let me get this straight. You knew the path and the combination because of a dream?" –Kei asked for the umpteenth time.
"Well… yeah, sort of…" –her wounded arm now held a clean white medical cloth.
Sakura was still speechless when they got to the orphanage; she had been thinking that their last trip to spaceland and the pyromaniac man had been a weird dream of her, but hey, weird dreams also come true, don't they?