Thanks for all your wonderful reviews! For those who asked, this is a S+S fic with a twist. You'll see... ahhh... I love suspense!

Disclaimer: I don't owe anything aside from characters of my creation and the storyline.

Syaoran's Angels

Chapter 3: Countdown 'til Paris

Location: Los Angeles a.k.a. City of Angels, America

Sakura sat on the steps leading down to the Angel's underground training as she stretched the muscles in her arm readying herself for what was to come. She hid a smirk as the sound of talking floated up from the training room.

"A little higher," a voice called.

The sound of grumbling could be heard accompanied by the sound of a ladder rung creaking as someone stood heavily on it.

"A little to your left," the voice called.

More grumbling.

"Perfect... no wait a minute... a little lower."

"I'LL SHOW YOU A LITTLE LOWER!" Meiling cried finally running out of patience.

"Watch out!"

"WOAH!"

"BANG!"

Meiling had a painful meeting with the ground as she stumbled off the short stepladder she had been using. Tomoyo shook her head and studied the room.

"This seems to be okay," she commented glancing down at the diagrams she held in her hands.

Meiling muttered to herself as she straightened the ladder and stepped onto it again.

"What is this stuff?" she asked holding up the thick thread they had been using.

It was silver in colour and glittered slightly in the light.

"That is a metal cable," Tomoyo told her, "It's better than thread since it's a million times stronger and has a little bit of flexibility."

"Why can we use normal thread?" Meiling questioned as she placed the end of the cable onto the wall and nail-gunned it to the wall.

"Because I don't want to keep replacing broken thread. There is no way Sakura can break this stuff. Even a kitchen knife can't cut through this stuff," Tomoyo replied.

She demonstrated by pulling at the cable with all her strength. Nothing happened.

"See?"

"Are you ready now?" Sakura asked bounding down the stairs.

"Yeah," Tomoyo took a breath as Meiling climbed down the ladder and joined them, "Okay, this is where you would enter the room. The artefact is supposedly to be at the opposite wall, smack bang in the centre. Got it?"

Sakura nodded.

"Don't touch the cable," her friend added.

Meiling removed the stepladder from amidst the metal cables criss-crossing the room and Sakura's first attempt at going past all the pretend motion detectors was underway.

The American Angel studied the tangle of cables and made her first move. She stepped gingerly amidst the cables carefully lifting her leg among the cable making sure she wasn't touching any of the wires. She ducked under the next one and stood up carefully surveying her surroundings. Making her decision she dropped down again and swung her legs around slipping them under one of the cables and bent gracefully at the waist and placed her hands and arms over the cable. She then performed a quick flip bringing her legs under then over the cable and planting solidly on the ground over another cable. Finally she raised herself slowly making sure to bend her head back as she avoid another cable. She straightened and took a deep breath.

The whole room was silent as Meiling and Tomoyo watched Sakura's every movement carefully making sure that she was touching any of the cables.

"So far so good," Tomoyo called softly.

Sakura nodded and closed her eyes gathering her wits. She opened her eyes and made her next move.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Rika had been watching the building for well over half an hour. After making sure there were no surveillance cameras around, she swiftly crossed the street carefully keeping her gloves hidden from view. She walked up to the front door and pushed it open. It swung open silently and she came to another door. The front door swung shut behind her shutting out the noise of the outside world as she tried to open to second door. This one was locked.

Rika stood back and withdrew a gun from the leather holster she wore around her hip. She pointed the barrel at the lock and pulled the trigger.

"BAM!"

The bullet smashed the lock to scrap metal and the door swung open. Rika stood there frozen for a minute, a few minutes ticked by and satisfied that nobody had heard the gunshot she made her move. Placing the gun back into her hip holster, Rika surveyed the empty building with her blank eyes as her hands twitched slightly. The metal claws adorning the leather gloves glittered in the sunlight streaming in from windows. The assassin blinked as she heard a noise. Tracking down the source of it, she came to a door, which was partially open. The sound of voices reached her as she slipped in through the tiny gap careful not to make a noise. Stealthily she padded down the stairs and listened carefully.

"Sakura, lift your left arm higher a little," a voice called.

Rika's face was expressionless, like it always was as she silently moved in for the kill.

Sakura nodded to acknowledge Tomoyo's advice as she lifted her arm slightly higher avoiding the cable.

She looked up and took a deep breath. She was halfway there but a giant tangle of cables still stood in her way. She stood there for a second contemplating over what to do next.

"Try slipping under the first cable and going over the other," Meiling suggested.

Sakura pressed her body against the ground and slithered beneath the first cable, bending at the waist she raised her chest off the ground whilst still keeping her legs flat and placed her arms over the next cable.

She then did the same with her legs and found enough room to stand up and turn back to her friends.

"How am I going?" she asked with a small smile.

Then all hell broke loose.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Meiling caught something glinting in the room's light and immediately her instincts kicked in.

"TOMOYO! GET DOWN!" she roared.

Just as the words left her mouth somebody leapt out from shadows. Meiling instinctively ducked as she felt something whoosh by overhead.

"Meiling!" Sakura yelled.

Meiling ignored her and back-pedalled as she tried to see who her opponent was. A petite woman with short curly dark hair stared at her with creepy, blank eyes. Meiling gulped seeing those eyes but her attention was immediately drawn towards the gloves the woman wore. Or more specifically the long metal claws on those gloves.

Expressionless the woman lunged at her, her claws slicing through the air. Meiling sidestepped one of them but the other came down and left a long cut on her arm. Biting back a curse, Meiling grabbed the woman's arms and swung her around into a wall. Tomoyo jumped back as the creepy-eyed woman lunged at her trying to shred her to ribbons with the claws.

Determination in her eyes, Tomoyo dodged another attack and punched the woman in the face. The woman ignored her injuries and instead scored a cut on Tomoyo's shoulder.

"TOMOYO!" Meiling growled as Sakura echoed her.

Meiling leapt into the air and launched a quick succession of kicks at the woman's chest each one landing with deadly accuracy. She landed and grabbed the stunned woman's arm and threw her away.

The woman hit the tangle of metal cables and tripped over one sprawling amongst the metallic ropes.

Meiling cursed as the woman stood up again. Whoever this woman was she was seriously freaky, she still hadn't said a word and her eyes still had that same blank look.

The woman slashed at the metal cables but her claws merely glanced off the metal.

"Told you they were strong," Tomoyo smirked to Meiling.

Meiling glared at her as Sakura charged at the woman.

Jumping over and ducking under the cables, Sakura made it to the woman and rabbit-punched her in the shoulder. The woman turned to look at her and attacked trying to slash at Sakura but she was greatly hampered by the metal cables surrounding her. Sakura expertly leapt over the cables and dodged her advances. Landing onto one of the cables themselves, Sakura smiled as the cable bent slightly. She leapt off it and kicked the woman in mid-flight, the woman gripped her chest but kept her eyes trained on Sakura. Sakura twisted around in midair and allowed her back to slam into two of cables strung between the walls of the room.

"This rocks!" she crowed.

Sakura bounced herself off the cables and body-slammed the woman. The woman stumbled backwards and tripped over one of the cables.

"Sakura! Get out of there!" Meiling yelled.

Sakura shrugged and leapt, ducked and flipped over the cables until she rejoined her partners. The Angels moved into defensives stances.

The woman stood up and yanked a number of the cables pull them free from the walls. Meiling sighed seeing her whole morning's work being ripped away.

The woman leapt over the fallen cables and attacked again her claws becoming nothing more than blurs as she whipped than around.

"Go for the legs!" Sakura yelled.

Tomoyo ducked a swipe and tackled the woman. She grabbed the woman around the ankles and sent her toppling as Meiling charged.

"I don't know who you are pussy cat," Meiling taunted the woman, "but you messed with wrong girls."

Meiling grabbed the woman around the waist trapping her hands against her own body. She ran towards a wall and slammed the woman into it with all her might.

"CRACK!"

Meiling felt the body go limp and let go as the woman slumped to the ground.

"Is she dead?" Sakura asked breathing heavily.

Meiling checked for a pulse.
"Alive but knocked out," she confirmed.

"Who is she?" Tomoyo asked.

"And those eyes," Sakura shuddered.

Meiling had to agree with her.

"Who knows, who cares?" Meiling shrugged, "Get some handcuffs and we're delivering this kitty to the police."

Sakura and Tomoyo couldn't agree more.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Eriol parked his rented car alongside the road and getting a pair of binoculars out from his bag he trained it onto the building where he had been told the Angels were.

He was a patient person preferring to spy in on his quarry before going in for the kill. Killing was a very delicate job that required much patience and skill if one wanted to succeed in what he did.

But he didn't have to wait very long for his very glimpse of the girls.

He caught sight of the Asian girl first who was carrying someone over her shoulder.

Hang on... Eriol narrowed his eyes as he saw something familiar.

The woman the Asian girl was carrying was wearing gloves and those claws... Eriol sucked in his breath.

"Rika," he murmured.

Eriol kept a close eye on his fellow assassins and he knew that Rika was one of the rising stars in his line of work. It always paid off to watch his fellow killers, it also paid off to kill off people who did too well. Eriol didn't like competition.

As Eriol contemplated over this new revelation, the other two girls walked out as well. Eriol watched with narrowed eyes as Rika was bundled into a car.

He didn't like this one bit.

If the girls were strong enough to take out Rika than facing them with brute strength was not going to work. Some other method had to be used.

But what?

He peered into his binoculars carefully studying each girl. With a small smile on his face, he watched the lavender-eyed beauty who had caught his eye in the photo.

A plan began developing in his head. He calculated the risks and liked the results.

"Perfect..."

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Meiling sat with the back to her wall, exhausted from spending the whole night fixing up the metal cables again. With a cup of coffee clutched between her hands, she ignored the throbbing pain in her cut arm.

Sakura, showing no side effects from yesterday's close shave with the assassin expertly twirled around sweeping legs over two cables and planted it in an empty space before bringing the rest of her body over.

"You know you have to do this blindfolded," Meiling called.

"What?" Sakura almost lost of her balance but steadied herself quickly.

She turned to Meiling and sent her a disbelieving look.

"You won't be able to see the beams of the motion detectors," Meiling informed her.

"Great," Sakura grumbled, "I've got less than four days to learn how to do this whilst being blindfolded."

With renewed energy she attacked the criss-crossing cables. After five more minutes, Sakura did her last flip and landed straight in front of where the artefact was supposed to be.

"Oh yeah!" Sakura cheered pumping her fists.

"Good," Meiling smirked as she stood up.

She held up a piece of black cloth.

"Now for the blindfold."

Sakura sighed and made her way back to Meiling.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Tomoyo sat in front of her computer again, her shoulder still hurt but the pain was slowly subsiding. She had just woken up, which explained why her normally neat hair was mussed and she was still wearing her purple pyjamas. Stifling a yawn, she searched extensively on the Internet for information about their clawed assassin.

Biting onto her bottom lip, Tomoyo tried every site she could think of, she even hacked into the police files but this assassin whoever she was must be a beginner or an expert. Either way she was still as mysterious as she had been when she had first appeared.

Tomoyo sighed and stretched her back.

She heard yelling coming from the training room and blinked in surprise. Getting up she went down to see what Sakura and Meiling was up to.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Sakura undid her blindfold and sighed as she worked herself free from the tangle of cables she had managed to stumble into. Meiling cackled with amusement as Sakura managed to work her head free to glare at her.

"This isn't funny!" she snapped.

Sakura tried to get up and was sent sprawling again as she cables twined around her feet. She landed in an undignified heap as Meiling laughed again.

"What's so funny?" Tomoyo walked into the training room and smiled seeing Sakura pick herself up again, "Doing it blindfolded?"

Sakura nodded.

"Having luck?"

"None." Sakura said glumly picking her way back to the starting point to attempt it all over again.

Sakura yanked her blindfold back on again and stepped amidst the metal cables. She slipped under the first one okay but as she tried to go over the next one she smacked her forehead right into it.

"Ow!" Sakura jumped up and her neck collided with another metal cable sending her tumbling back to ground.

Meiling burst into laughter again as Sakura growled in frustration and started all over again.

"Good luck," Tomoyo said sympathetically.

She turned to leave.

"Where are you going?" Meiling asked her retreating back.

"I'm going to get breakfast."

Tomoyo went up to bedroom and began changing.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Eriol couldn't help but smile seeing the smoky-grey haired girl leaving the building. She walked to one of the cars parked along the street and got in. A few minutes she drove off. Eriol waited for a few seconds before starting up his rented car and began following the girl.

She didn't suspect thing.

Eriol was careful to keep a few cars in between them but kept her car within his sights.

He smiled up into rear-view mirror and liked what he saw. A well-dressed, handsome young man smiled back at him. He adjusted his shirt's collar slightly before turning back to his driving.

After a few more minutes of driving the girl stopped in front of the shopping mall and got out, Eriol parked his car a few metres away and taking long purposeful strides walked into the mall. He spotted her immediately amongst the crowd and began tailing her.

Adrenaline pumped through his body as he anticipated what was to come.

He smiled to himself as the girl walked into one of the many cafés located inside the shopping mall.

Eriol waited and then he saw the perfect opportunity.

And he took it.

Tomoyo hummed to herself as she walked into the café and ordered a coffee and a bagel. She knew there were people checking her out but she ignored them. It was too early in the morning for flirting and she needed a good shot of caffeine before she could even think straight.

Tomoyo thanked the waitress as she handed her order over. Throwing the money onto the counter, Tomoyo walked out of the café.

She began puzzling over what the mysterious woman assassin meant. Was she somehow connected with Spinnel Corporation? Tomoyo trusted her instincts and right now they were screaming at her. That woman had probably been hired by the Corporation to take them out of action. Tomoyo shuddered remembering the woman's blank eyes void of emotion and wondered what was wrong with her.

She was so caught up in her thoughts she was oblivious to her surroundings.

"BAM!"

She ran into something warm and hard. Tomoyo let out a small cry as she stumbled backwards but a pair of strong arms grabbed her waist before she fell over. She looked up to thank her rescuer but the words died on her lips as she stared up into the most handsome face she had ever seen.

He's hot! she thought blushing profusely.

"So... sorr... sorry!" Tomoyo managed to stutter.

She mentally hit herself for acting like a teenager girl getting a note from a secret admirer. The man smiled at her, his dark blue eyes barely hiding his amusement.

"No worries," he said easily.

Tomoyo took a step back and studied him. He was around her age, she guessed. He was tall and had a nice muscular figure. His dark blue eyes watched her as she studied his face.

He had nicely tanned skin and his face was framed by long straight grey-blue hair. His lips were soft and they were smiling at her revealing straight white teeth.

"Hello?" he asked his voice was pleasant to hear and very refined.

"What?" Tomoyo blinked out of stupor as the man looked at her quizzically.

"Are you okay?" he asked with concern.

"Yeah... yeah of course I am," Tomoyo gave a little laugh as she tried to hide her embarrassment.

Miraculously her coffee had survived her stumble with the man and she sipped it slowly to give her hands something to do.

The man laughed and his laughter was warm and inviting.

"Haven't woken up yet?" he asked with an easy grin.

Tomoyo smiled at him.

"Well, nice to meet you..."

"Tomoyo," she plucked up her courage, "What's your name?"

"Eriol Moon," he said giving her a false last name.

Eriol... nice name

Tomoyo snapped out her semi-trance and her eyes widened as she remembered where she was and what she had to investigate.

"For the last time I'm very sorry," she said looking at him squarely in the eyes, "I didn't mean to bump into you."

"There's no need to be sorry," Eriol assured her, "I don't mind it if beautiful woman bump into me."

Tomoyo blushed and mumbled a goodbye before fleeing.

He is hot! her mind seemed to be melting into a useless pool of liquid as Tomoyo fought back the urge to look back.

A blushing Tomoyo raced to her car and drove off hurriedly.

Eriol smiled to himself and congratulated himself for a job well done.

She is beautiful the thought came unbidden into his head.

The assassin shook his head trying to get rid of that thought but the grey-haired beauty lingered in his mind's eyes even as he walked back to his car and drove off.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Hmm... Eriol and Tomoyo meeting for the first time... is it love at first sight? (duh!) But how will Tomoyo react when she finds out Eriol is an assassin? You'll just have to find out...

Okay, for all the people who reviewed this is going to be a S+S, with a slight twist. You'll see, they'll meet in a later chapter. You'll just have to wait.

Next chapter:

The five days are up and girls are flown into Paris as they undertake their mission to get to the artefact before Spinnel Corporation does. But what happens when two international thieves have their eyes fixed on the same prize? Will the Angels succeed or will they fail? And what is Spinnel Corporation's infatuation with this mysterious artefact? Find on in... Midnight Raiders

A/Note: I've had equal number of people wanting A or B storyline. If you review please, please choose one! (B is a little ahead at this point)

Also should Sakura find out that her mother, Nadeshiko was an ex-Angel who was killed when she was betrayed by one of her own teammates?

And should I add in anime character cameos in later chapters?