HEY EVERYBODY! I'm really sorry about the late chapter-- my computer broke down and we had to get a totally new one! Not that I'm really complaining-- It's a flatscreen 17" modem, but still, I couldn't get any data off my old computer so the chapter I was gonna upload was technically "deleted" and so now I have to start all over!

Thanks to all who reviewed!

Disclaimer: Standard

And Onto the chapter-- that I had to write... again


Anna reached her room after luch surprisingly full and satisfied. Hao had reluctantly let her go after she told him she wished to take a nap. And although Hao had let her go, she would not be surprised if he turned up in her room in a few minutes.

Quickly, she took the necklace out of her hiding spot. Staring at it thoughtfully, she climbed up onto her bed, the last spot where she had talked to her fiancee. It seemed so long ago, when it had only been a few hours. My how time passed by slowly when you're away from the one you love.

Title

There, she said it. She was in love with the lazy-boy Yoh Asakura. The girl with no emotion had finally cracked. She was totally and completely in love with the fool and she didn't know how to express it, not even to herself. She had tried to deny it. Void of any emotion she was, and that was the way she originally thought she would stay. But she never denied things that she knew were true, and so she just had to come to terms with it.

And look at what he'd made her do so far! In the past DAY she'd cried, smiled, and even felt fear! She'd felt things she'd never felt before! And she didn't particularly like that.

Now that the initial shock of being kidnapped was over, she essentially had had time for the logic of her mind to come through with explanations for things. She had made one conclusion so far, that Yoh Asakura was the start of all this emotion, and that he would be where it would stop.

She knew she couldn't stop feeling these things until she was back with the person whom she felt was her home, her life.

Anna hadn't loved in a long time, so long, that she'd even forgot what it felt like.

And when she started to get this strange feeling in her stomach,

that woozy,

achy,

breathtaking,

sick feeling,

right in the pit of her stomach,

she had no idea what it was.

All she could gather was that it came most when Yoh was around.

And that she didn't want it to stop.

It somehow felt...

right,

safe,

warm,

and incredibly... unlike her.

Maybe that's what attracted her to it. The fact that it was so different...

...just like him.

And perhaps the fact that it eminated from him was what led her to be incredibly attached to him in the first place. He was the closest thing she'd had to family since...

the accident.

And he was the only one who could really tolerate her.

Perhaps that's why she loved him.

She had loved her family, oh yes! But when they died...

Anna never thought she would feel loved or cherished again.

And then stupid ol' Yoh Asakura had to come along and make her feel. Make her gorw so attached to that feeling, the one she felt before but couldn't place, the one that only came from one person, him.

The one she wished she could have felt for the rest of her childhood,

for then, maybe she wouldn't have turned out like this.

But she also never would have met him.

It was true. Had her parents and siblings NOT died, they never would have been introduced.

She wouldn't have become and Itako.

She wouldn't have met her new family.

She wouldn't be a fiancee.

She would be a normal teen.

But she wouldn't have met him.

And somehow, having him was what made all the pain of turning out like she was, go away.

And she started to cry.


The subject of Anna's thoughts was not-so-very-far away, trying desperately to hurry the charging of a battery in a certain walkie-talkie.

"Hey Morty!" he called. "If I plug this cable in, will it charge faster!"

"No, Yoh!" the short blonde called back.

"What if I-"

"No, Yoh!"

"But what about-"

"NO YOH!" Morty shouted directly in his face. Yoh looked stupefied that Morty could yell. Morty looked guilty, and then calmed. "Nothing will make it go faster, Yoh, you'll just have to wait,"

"If I turn it on now, will it work?"

Morty paused carefully before answering. He didn't think Yoh should try it now, especially since Hao could be with Anna. But he also didn't want to lie. "Yes, Yoh. If you turn it on while it's on the charger, it'll work,"

"Really!" Yoh hastily turned to put on the power.

"But wait, Yoh!... Maybe you should wait anyway, y'know, in case Anna's with Hao or something,"

"But I just want to see if she's there, and if she got the talkie back," Yoh said. 'And even hearing her voice at this point would help,'

Morty paused again. "Alright. But we have to extra quiet, just in case,"

Yoh quickly and quietly turned on the walkie-talkie.

At first they heard nothing but static.

But static turned to something else when they realised that it was tears.

"Is that Anna...crying?"

This statement seemed to attract silence from all over the house. In moments, the rest of the gang was in the room, listening intently to the noise on the walkie-talkie.

They heard for themselves the sound of the ice queen's tears.

"Stupid, stupid, Yoh!" Anna sobbed softly.

Yoh looked at Morty, pleading for permission to say something to her, to comfort her.

Morty looked uncertain, but Yoh made his case.

"She's not with Hao," he whispered. "Anna would never let Hao see her cry,"

Yoh's logic dawned on Morty, and he slowly nodded.

"Anna?" Yoh whispered into the walkie-talkie.

"Yoh?" Anna whispered softly, staring at the piece of electonics before her.

And ironically, that's when there was a knock on her door.

"Haven't fallen asleep yet, I see?" came the cruel voice from the man who was her captor.

Anna sniffed silently, and dried her tears, determined not to let Hao see her cry. She kneeled on her bed.

"No, sire," she replied. She silently begged that if it was Yoh she actually heard, he would stay quiet.

"Well, then. You won't mind if I come and join you, will you?"

"Of course not sire," she said, inwardly wincing. What a scene this must have been to Yoh on the walkie-talkie. She hoped no one else was listening.

Hao did a flying leap onto the bed, landing on top of her, straddling her waist. His knee landed on the necklace.

The necklace shattered.

Anna gasped.

"Hmm, surprised?" Hao asked, mistaking her gasp, tracing her sides with his hands.

Now, she prayed no one was listening.

Yoh and the others waited with bated breath.

"Anna?" Yoh tried again.

"Haven't fallen asleep yet, I see?"

Yoh and the gang inwardly gasped, their surprise evident on their faces.

"No, sire"

"Well then you won't mind if I come and join you?"

Yoh was getting mad now. The others slowly backed away from him, making sure that if he decided to vent, it would not be on them. They had seen what an Asakura can do when angry, and they didn't have to see it on a personal level.

"Hmm, surprised?"

Yoh put down the walkie-talkie now, so as not to inadvertantly break it.

Silence.

And then a stifled moan over the line.

Had Yoh been holding the walkie-talkie, he would have dropped it.

The others all gasped, then immediately covered their mouths, trying to take back their noise so that Hao didn't hear it.

But they didn't hear a break in the activity over the line.

He hadn't heard them.

Yoh, curious now if he could stop the activity, reached for the walkie.

"No! Don't, Yoh!" Morty shouted, then had two hands slapped over his mouth by Pilica and Jun.

Yoh withdrew his hand.

"They can't hear us," he stated.

The rest all exhaled their gasped breaths.

They listened in silence to the scene...

some unwillingly using their imaginations to convey the movements of the two people on the line...

and some just staring into space, trying desperately not to hear the activity.

"Hao, STOP!" They heard Anna shout.

Yoh once again moved toward the talkie, as if it could take him to her so he could rescue his damsel.

"Is something wrong, my dear?"

Yoh almost threw up, along with everybody else.

Yoh could hear Anna trying to catch her breath.

Anna quickly came up with a lie. "I'm sorry, Master. It's just so overwhelming that I- I need some space to sort it all out,"

"What's overwhelming?" they heard Hao ask.

"Everything!" Anna shot back, "Being kidnapped, becoming a queen, your advances- It's just a little too much to bear,"

"... I see,"

"Not that I don't think I'll get used to them!" she added quickly, almost as if she was scared of getting in trouble, "But... you see... I..."

"You still like him don't you?"

"What?"

"Yoh. You still like him,"

"What do you mean?- I- I don't-"

"You do," they heard a door shut faintly.

Yoh turned off the walkie-talkie.

He had heard enough

TBC!


THANKS to all reviewers! I LUV YOU ALL!

AND

before you kill me for adding more Haoxanna, plz don't! I won't be able to finish the story if you kill me, and it adds dramatic tension!

I'm sorry!

I'll try not to add any more! I really will!

animebookworm