Comments of Meso:

bladebreakers: Thanks for reviewing again. It means a lot.

Well, this chapter explains lots of things, so I hope you enjoy it. Please read and review!

Chapter 5: Fantasies or Answers?

Sakura shot up, screaming. Her heart was racing, and she was gasping for air. The next thing she heard, besides her heart pounding in her ears, was Kero's voice.

"Kiddo! What's wrong!"

Sakura looked across to her yellow guardian.

"I had a dream, Kero. We need to talk…" Before Sakura could say anything else, there was a knock on her door.

"Sakura, honey! I heard a scream! Are you alright?" It was Fujitaka's voice. Sakura didn't want to worry him, so she ran over to the door and opened it.

"Everything's fine, Dad! I just saw a spider…" Sakura lied. Fujitaka gave Sakura a lopsided smile.

"If you say so…But when you want to talk about it, I'm here for you," he said. Sakura looked into his kind eyes…Eriol's eyes…Sakura mentally shook her head. Why think of Eriol at a time like this?

"Thanks," Sakura said, and she gave her dad a big hug. Fujitaka turned to leave, when he stopped in his tracks.

"Two things: One, erm, "Kero" is it? You don't have to be so stiff," Kero looked at Fujitaka, then fell over and sighed.

"And the second thing is that you've got a letter from your friend in England. It's on the table in the kitchen," Sakura's eyes brightened. Fujitaka left with that. When she was sure he was gone, she ran down the stairs and into the kitchen.

Sakura remembered for no apparent the story of why they had painted the kitchen orange. When Sakura was little, she had accidentally tripped while holding an orange paintbrush. Some of it had smeared on the wall. So Sakura had decided to guard that spot and make sure that no one saw it. After standing there for about five minutes, Sakura was getting hungry, and her father was suspicious; she had never stood still for so long. As soon as Sakura went to go get a snack, her father looked at the wall. He confronted Sakura about it, and he told her that it wasn't a big deal…And before she knew it, he kitchen was orange!

Suddenly, Sakura felt something bounce off of her head. She looked down; it was half a bagel.

"You done zoning out yet? I need you to make me bacon while you're standing up," said a lazy Toya. He was reading a magazine while eating at the table.

"Make your own bacon and stop throwing bagels at me!" Sakura grunted.

"My only sister won't even make bacon for me…And I'll be off to study abroad sooner than she knows. And then who will she make bacon?" Toya then raised up his magazine once again and started reading. Sakura rolled her eyes then looked for the envelope…

There it was! It was in the usual navy blue envelope. Sakura grabbed it, and ran off.

"Honestly, I had no idea Sakura had so many boyfriends…One in China, one in England…" And before Toya knew it, half a bagel had bounced off of his head.

--------

"A letter from the Clow Kid?" Kero asked.

"Yes. And his name's Eriol," Sakura corrected as she plopped onto her unmade bed. She tore open the envelope.

Dear Sakura,

I hope you are doing well. Everything is great over here in England. Spinel and Nakuru keep me company, but they miss you, too. Of course, you are missed by me as well.

I know that Kaho, er, Ms. Mitsuki can't write to you for a while -- something has come up, and I asked her to investigate it.

Sakura raised her eyebrows. What could it be?

In case you were wondering, it does have to do with magic. Nakuru was sick a few days ago, which isn't natural. I don't want to worry you though -- she is okay now, as it wasn't too serious.

Sakura, if you know anything about this, please tell me. If we want to figure this out, we'll need to do it together.

Sincerely,

Eriol Hiragazawa

So Nakuru had gotten sick, too! Sakura was almost certain that her nightmare had been a vision, now…She quickly grabbed a piece of paper and started writing as Kero watched her from afar.

Dear Eriol,

It's an odd coincidence that Nakuru was sick -- or maybe more of a sign of some kind. Kero was quite ill some days ago, too. Also, things have been strange in Tomoeda. Everyone has been acting

Sakura dropped her pencil. She remembered Syaoran…Yesterday…The picnic, all the memories had come flooding back. Her eyes were starting to water, new tears about to flood down. Then she shook her head. She needed to finish the letter.

Everyone has been acting differently. Naoko and Rika got in a huge yesterday. Tomoyo has been quiet and sad lately. Everyone's just changing so much, becoming…cold…I've noticed that people with magic aren't being effected by this. I think someone is behind this…The same person who made a new boy attack me. And the same person who somehow made Kero and Nakuru sick.

And possibly possessed Syaoran to do what he did yesterday? …No…That was of his own will. Sakura was almost certain…

Stop thinking of him and finish your letter! Sakura yelled (mentally) at herself as she felt tears forming again.

I think I know who this person is. I've seen them in my dreams. I don't know much about them, though, except for the fact that they have a lion's paw for a hand…

Can you please tell me more about Ms. Mitsuki's mission? I'd love to hear about it!

Please reply as soon as you can.

From your friend,

Sakura

Sakura sealed her letter in a pink envelope and left it on the kitchen counter; she would send it later.

Sakura thought long and hard about Eriol's letter. Kero didn't bother to ask about it, since he could tell she was thinking. Why was this person doing this? Would she have to use her magic, her Sakura Cards, once again?

Finally, Kero could bare it now longer. "What's up, Kiddo?" he asked. Sakura continued to think for a moment before answering.

"Nakuru, Ruby Moon, she got sick, too,"

"No way! Did Spinel, too?" he asked. Sakura shook her head.

"No. But Eriol has gotten Ms. Mitsuki to help investigate,"

"Well that's good!" Kero cheered.

"Kero, there's something I should have told you a while ago."

"Your dream?"

"Before that. How everyone has been acting weird…How Warren attacked me--"

"What now!"

"My two dreams…Kero, I should have told you so long ago…"

"Just tell me now! Maybe there's still something we can do!" So just like that, Sakura spilled out everything. Kero was enraged as he heard about Warren's attack. He was saddened when he heard the truth about Rika during the big fight. But Kero's biggest reaction was to Sakura's dreams.

"No way…" was all he could come up with. Sakura waited for more.

"Well, now that you've told me that…There's something I should tell you." Sakura looked at Kero thoughtfully. "When you told me this…It reminded me of a story Clow told me long ago, when he was still living." Sakura was already enticed.

"I can't believe I had forgotten this, but…Clow Reed…He technically didn't create the Clow Cards,"

"WHAT!" Sakura shouted.

"Remember, this is a story. There's no way that I can insure that Clow didn't make it up himself. Remember that he didn't want to be the strongest magician. He could have simply made this up so it didn't seem so," Sakura nodded. "Anyways…He didn't really create the Clow Cards. He said that there was a magician before him who had made the Cards. He said that one day, a threadbare man walked up to him and insisted that he take a book of Cards. Clow, being the magician he was, wouldn't take them without an explanation.

"The man asked if Clow could just open the book. Clow, being prepared for the worst, opened it to find a little deck of cards inside. The man nodded and started talking about how he had made the right choice. Then he explained about the Cards (they had no name at this point) and how they had powers-- but only to the chosen guardian.

"But Clow had no idea what this had to with him. So he was this "guardian"? The man explained that he had used up all of his magic to create a guardian/chooser for this deck of cards. The second creature was the judge, to make sure that the chooser had picked the right person.

"'If this is so, why did you personally give me this book?' Clow asked. The man only replied tat he would get to that part. Then he explained about the third creature that he had created, using up all of his magic."

"A…third guardian?" Sakura exclaimed. Kero nodded.

"The two creatures from before weren't as powerful as Yue and I, as this magician didn't have as much power as Clow. He had made the two guardians have Moon and Sun powers, like Yue and I. However, his poorly created guardians had too many differences, and they constantly got in unstable fights,"

"What do you mean by unstable?" Sakura asked.

"'Unstable' as in they had fights that loosened their spellwork." Sakura gasped. "Even if I did fight with Yue, it wouldn't be unstable because we were created better. But back to the story…To balance the two out, he used the last of his weak magic to create the third guardian-- Eclipse.

"Eclipse did carry out his duty-- he kept the two out of fights and used his equal powers of Moon and Sun to keep the two in line. But being created even more poorly than the other two, he was incredibly unstable. Because of this, his Master hated him and didn't take care of him well.

"Eclipse finally got sick of his poor treatment and struck back against his master. His Cards being of no use, since he had no more magic, he was thrashed incredibly. The Moon and Sun creatures didn't try to stop Eclipse for one reason: he promised that if he had overcome their Master, they could be free…"

"That's terrible that they didn't like their Master…" Sakura said sadly.

"And it was unfortunate for their Master. Running away from his own creations, he gave the book of Cards to Clow. After explaining this to Clow, he then left Clow with the Cards and was never seen by Clow again." Kero finished. He sat thoughtfully.

"If Clow didn't create the Cards, how did they get the name Clow Cards?" Sakura suddenly asked.

"He did the same as you -- transformed them." Kero then sat and yawned. "If you don't mind, we could talk about this later. I would like to take a nap after telling such a long story." Sakura couldn't help but smile. Kero nestled himself into Sakura's bed and fell asleep. As for Sakura…She had a letter to correct and mail.