Heka: No, Statuette of Carmelle is not going down in flames; no, it's not ending, they haven't even touched the Statue yet, and yes I am continuing, and yes, they will be chibi! Also I would like to thank EVERYONE who reviewed, and yelled at me to update, even though I didn't and I'm REALLY sorry, and this is to make up-

Shigure: Oh hoho. How long was the hiatus?

Heka: … Since… March.

Dark: I'm ashamed of you!

Heka: I'm sorry…

Dark: How could you not write such a story where I play such an important part!

Heka: Sorry…

Shigure: Enough of the nonsense. Go show what your readers have been waiting to see for so long…

Heka: Yes sir!

(Pointless bit here as Sesshoumaru wanders around aimlessly, glaring at Dark and Shigure, before blasting the walls apart and leaving with Rin pulling at his robes.)

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Dark closed one eye and left the other open, propping his face with his elbow on the bar top counter that was in his portion of Daisuke's brain. He reached behind him and took out a random martini and sipped it nonchalantly.

'Tell me when you're done okay, Daisuke?' he murmured lazily, swallowing his drink.

'Dark, can't you be any more helpful!' Daisuke exclaimed, slightly exasperated at this show of nil interest from his literal, partner in crime. 'I'm going to die here!'

Dark scoffed. 'Don't be ridiculous. Your mother loves you.'

'Well she loves me only because you're in me!' Daisuke snapped, staring at the board on the small table in front of him. Too late, he recognized the folly of his words.

There was a slight tense pause.

'You know that's not true, Daisuke,' Dark said quietly. 'Your oka-san loves you for who you are.'

Daisuke swallowed hard. 'Yeah, well I hope so too...'

'Now chop-chop, get across the board. The walls aren't going to rust, you know...'

(A/N: This sentence was taken from a movie. Well the idea was anyway. Can anyone say what movie it is? A recent one, stars Martin Freeman and Alan Rickman! Inspired by a book!)

'Okay, Dark,' replied Daisuke obediently. 'Wait a minute, why are you drinking a martini?'

Dark rolled his eyes, taking another sip from his glass of wine. 'This is a metaphor, my wonderfully dense crimson-eyed friend. I look 17, which means I can't technically drink. But what I'm trying to say here is-'

'Fine, fine, I get the point. It means that I'm taking so long that you're practically aging in front of my eyes.'

'Excellent job, kiddo. And please don't use the word aging to me again. It sounds so... old, you know.'

'Oh shut up.'

Daisuke focused again on the board. It was staring back at him innocently. He hadn't made his first move yet; he knew it was his first move, 15 minutes of panicking and not doing anything to the board told him so. He lifted his hands, and finally, painstakingly, took a step forward using the left-most piece of the first row of three gaming pieces in front of his side of the triangle.

He moved to the left.

Dark applauded. 'Well done! Smashing move, I'll say! You really stumped the enemy!'

'Dark...'

'What? Just giving you some encouragement, is there anything wrong with that?'

'Dark, I know what sarcasm is.'

'Oh, well.'

His opponent's middle piece of the first row moved to the right silently.

The doors creaked closer, as if in warning.

Daisuke took his second move, using his last piece of jump over the piece in front of it in the second row.

Once again, the opponent moved quietly, the left piece in his second row leaping over the piece in front of it.

(A/N: Dude. she's really playing the game! hahahahahaha...)

'Good one kid! Get all your pieces out first then run for it!'

'Was that being sarcastic?'

'Goodness Dai-chan, you're smart for pointing out that my first comments were sarcastic but please refrain from the restraining order of English.'

'Dark!'

'What?'

'Oh never mind.'

Daisuke let out a breath of air, and made his third move. Taking the right-most piece from the second row, he jumped it over the piece from the first row, bringing out most of his pieces from their 'house'.

His silent opponent did the same, moving its remaining piece from the second row, jumping over a piece from the third row, into the open ground.

The last piece was left behind.

'Ha ha! He's stranded his last piece!'

'There's no need to get so excited, Dark, the doors are almost onto us!'

'Funny. I thought they moved at a constant speed...'

Daisuke was seized with a sudden thrill of terror.

'No, Dark they don't... they accelerate!'

'Argh! The horrors of mathematics are upon us! Quickly, quickly, QUICKLY!'

'What? What?'

'MOVE-MOVE-MOVE!'

-/-

Satoshi shut his eyes for a moment as he wandered around the second storey of the building. Technically this was a very stupid thing to do when he was in a very lovingly booby-trapped house and wearing a skirt but he felt that he was entitled to do so.

For he had just seen one of the most horrible views he had ever seen in his entire life.

His image(s) in the room full of mirrors.

He had been utterly horrified by it- the lacy white cardigan, the pink dress; the flowers embroidered at the edges… the whole image had just been so terrible that his mind was nearly rendered dysfunctional at the sight of it.

Thus he had backed out of that terrible room and continued his way, staring at the many beautiful portraits and statues around the house. There had been this particularly attractive painting, which was of a woman, with sleek long black hair, staring directly at the viewer. She was very beautiful, and the little plaque at the bottom of the picture informed him that this was Carmelle Kranjin, the original owner of the house. Satoshi nodded to himself. This was the picture of the woman of which the statue they were going to steal.

'Huh?' Krad muttered to himself. Satoshi had a very weird way of speaking English… Shrugging to himself, he continued thinking of tall pillars, fires and fluffy bunnies and for some inexplicable reason, the 108th number of 22 over 7.

Satoshi had continued walking (peacefully) around the house, until his brain very cautiously reminded him of something. Odd. The weird woman from the Niwa family apparently left most of her traps in the first floor as he hadn't encountered one within the last five-

Satoshi ducked methodically.

Nothing happened.

He stood up again, stared warily around and gathered himself. This always, always happened in movies, books, and whatever. Every time the protagonist forgot himself or herself in an area with many booby traps, the traps they forgot about would spring, and all that was could be said of them would be the fact that they'd have to brought out on a stretcher, and usually muttering the words 'The mustard! The mustard!' over and over again in a most horrible manner. Yet here, nothing happened.

He tried, once again, to assert himself.

He was on the second floor of the cursed building. He had gone past three doors, the first female room, the room full of mirrors and a dark one he didn't dare to speculate about. The floor was lined with velvet, something which he was glad of, as it muffled his feet, having lost his sneakers when he got burnt by the mad flaming door. He had seen a pair of beaded slippers near the door of the female room, and automatically had refused to wear them when Krad had begged for him to do so.

He knew that the mansion had three levels and that Daisuke was probably getting diced, chopped, burnt, drowned and pierced to his accidental death at the first storey. That meant that the statue was either at the third, first, or second storey.

Satoshi hoped to hell that the building didn't have a basement.

He was going to die, something he quite readily admitted to himself, getting to that level.

As he looked around him, he noticed that the white walls had no holes in them. There were also no secret compartments and no scary monsters or pictures that stared at him as he walked, which made this level even worst, as he didn't know when or where the next attack would spring from. He had felt around then and there had been absolutely nothing, nothing at all, he knew of this earth that would be here on the second level that could kill him.

And the thought of that was driving him insane.

HOW COULD THAT WOMAN LEAVE THIS ENTIRE LEVEL BLANK!

Even though the possibility that there were no traps at all did occur to him but the fact that he knew the Niwa woman perfectly well disagreed against that irritating thought and threw it down the well. This woman must have booby trapped this damned level somewhere and Satoshi was determined to find it, to rest his tortured soul, body and mind.

'Bit stupid really. Hasn't the thought that she really didn't booby trap this level at all occurred to you at all?' Krad said finally, after reading the read-out of Satoshi's brilliantly cool mind.

'Yes. But she can't have done that. She's too titchy-' Satoshi stopped.

'Titchy?'

'Shut up.'

'Satoshi's using weird words!'

'Shut up-'

'Satoshi's using weird wo-'

'Do you want me to continue or not?'

'... fine.'

'Perhaps the word that I should use is twitchy. Yes. Twitchy. She's too...' he amended again, '-edgy to leave a level alone just like that.'

'Hasn't it ever occurred to you that she might have taken reverse psychology lessons?'

'Yes. Yes. That thought occurred to me too. But she can't have done something like this.'

'Why not?'

'Because- haven't you seen the first level!'

'Yeah. What about it?'

'Hasn't that told you anything about that woman?'

'That she's mad?'

'And?'

'Insane?'

'And?'

'... oh.'

'See? So she can't have just left this level blank. it's not like her!'

Krad appeared to think about it, something which Satoshi seriously doubted. 'Yes... I see what you mean. Well, chin up Charlene! Stay alert!'

'I am NOT Charlene.'

'You are to me.'

'I will not be Charlene. My name is Hikari Satoshi and you better remember it, Krad. You've been with my family for eons!'

'Nonsense!'

Satoshi opened his mouth to reply but his mind completely sagged at what the angel had said.

'I-what?'

'What?'

'You're not from our family?'

'Yeah. Never was. Heck I didn't even know who you were went I got trapped in you, kid.'

'Then... then...' Satoshi's mind was just falling apart.

'The Dark thing? That's just because he's like really cute and all...'

Satoshi's mind began shutting down. This could not be true...

'... cute? You go after him because he's cute...?' he managed, swallowing hard.

Krad shrugged. 'Weeeelll yeah. What did you expect?'

Satoshi's mind had gone into critical mood and was going to enter brain freeze when Krad burst out laughing and subsequently toppled off whatever pillar he had been sitting on.

'YOU BELIEVED THAT! YOU ACTUALLY BELIEVED THAT!' he collapsed, laughing uncontrollably.

Satoshi's brain freeze froze (pardon the pun) in its track and began to heating up, in anger.

'...you lied.'

Krad's face became a grotesque mask as he replied 'Duuuuuuuuhhh!'

'You. Lied. To me.'

'Yes-yes-yes-yes-yes-yes!'

Krad emerged again from the depths of Satoshi's mind and continued laughing, this time in gasps.

'You're just absolutely wonderful, do you know that? It's just amazing how... how naive you are! Really!'

Satoshi wanted to kill that angel. He was going to have a lot of fun with him after he got the statue. When he-

'You shouldn't use the word 'when' you know. You should use the word 'if',' Krad replied earnestly, stopping Satoshi's train of thought again.

Satoshi raised a delicate eyebrow as he stopped and stared around him. There was a small staircase in front of him, leading very invitingly to the third storey. If the statuette was there, he'd be the first to find it. It definitely wasn't on the first floor, the flaming dragons, the burning door and whatever other monstrosities that the homicidal woman had put in there proved that. The second floor, on the other hand-

A vein in Satoshi's forehead twitched.

He had to find out where that trap was. She had left the entire corridor blank! The rooms were predictably booby-trapped yes, he had encountered the mad spikes, the- here he winced again- the dreaded room of mirrors, the dark black room that he didn't dare go into because of what other horrors that the woman could come up with-

'Coward.' Krad grinned, licking off some toffee he had stolen from his own mind.

'Would you go in?'

'The statue so obviously isn't there.'

'I rest my case.'

'What case?'

'It's a figure of speech.'

'What speech? You spoke?'

'Krad...' Satoshi cautioned, his voice rising in warning, as he rubbed the bridge of his nose.

'Anyway, I continue what I said before. You should use the word 'if'. Not 'when'.' Krad grinned.

'Why?'

'Because 'if' brings out the possibility of other factors, Charlene darling. 'When', is certain.'

Satoshi's mind ticked hastily as he worked it out. He registered the 'Charlene darling' thing, but decided to let it slide. For now.

'I'm going to kill you, Krad. When-'

'You mean if-'

'No, when I get the statue.'

'Oh phooey.'

Taking note of the position of the staircase, Satoshi continued his round around the second floor, desperate to find out just where the traps the insane woman had placed were.

-/-

'That was close, Daisuke, very, very close…' Dark was muttering, breathing in and out deeply, his Tamer doing the same thing.

Daisuke was now currently looking down at the room containing the set of Chinese checkers, and the set with its counters were currently being squashed to oblivion as the walls crushed them relentlessly.

Around the fifth move of the game, Daisuke had realized that there wasn't really any more space to move his body, and found that the need to stand on the counter was becoming more urgent than ever. More out of a fit of hysteria than anything, as Dark was hyperventilating in his head and shouting out his will to whoever who would listen, i.e Daisuke, he had upended the entire set of Chinese checkers, which had clattered onto the floor in an alarmingly loud manner, before getting crushed by the walls.

Looking around hastily, trying not to imagine that the sounds of the counters crunching and cracking were not his bones (a considerable feat, as Dark was currently screaming that they were going to die), he had noticed a hidden panel at the ceiling.

'Dark! A panel!'

'We're going to die, we're going to die, we're going to- what?'

'A panel!'

'Well what the hell are you waiting for Daisuke! Jump up there and escape!'

'There's nothing to support me!'

'Are you stupid or something? The walls are so close, just use them as support!'

'Oh, right!'

Leaning on the wall behind him, Daisuke took a leap and felt his faithful sport shoes catch on the wall and slowly began to work his wall up, thanking his family for the many years of training that they had given him.

'Don't forget friction.'

Thus, the result was that now, they were on the second storey of the house, and staring down into what would have been their fate, should Daisuke had not spotted the hidden panel, and saved their lives. Dark breathed a sigh of relief.

'Right. Now that that's over…'

Daisuke sat down on the floor, just relaxing after his (second) near brush with death. Closing his eyes, he allowed his mind to wander as he felt his heartbeat slowly reach normal rate.

So, it was rather safe to say that the first floor didn't contain the statue, with all the terrible traps there. He supposed that it was just a distraction-

'WHAT?' Dark shouted, causing Daisuke to open his eyes again.

'Dark! Please!'

'You mean- you mean- the fact that we nearly died… it was just a distraction?'

'Err… I guess so… this is oka-san's style after all…' Daisuke murmured, scratching his head.

'I am going to kill her,' Dark intoned in a monotone voice.

'You can't!' Daisuke replied, horrified, getting up.

However he slipped and fell. Dark stopped his rambling about murdering his surrogate mother until the next afterlife and peered at his Tamer.

'You fell?' he asked, barely able to mask his amazement.

Daisuke blushed slightly. 'Err… yes… there's something wrong with this floor- '

'Are you sure it isn't just you?' Dark asked again, this time smirking.

'Yes Dark! The floor's slippery!' Daisuke replied, brushing his hands against the floor and checking it. It was cold and slightly damp, which meant that it was either ice, or marble, or just his sweat.

'Oh dear.'

Daisuke groaned. 'Knowing oka-san, she probably did the walls and the ceilings as well, making this a completely frictionless room.'

'You know about friction?' Dark looked honestly surprised.

'We do learn stuff in school you know…'

'Hmph. So you know what to do right? Don't move; at all.'

'Then how do we get out of this room?'

'That's for me to know and for you to find out.'

'If you're talking about magic…'

'Duh!'

'We can't use magic!'

Daisuke tried standing and getting his bearings. He saw that the room was completely icy blue, shimmering and glittering in the dim lighting of the room coming from the small bulb in the centre of the ceiling.

He slipped again. However this time, his hand caught the floor and his sports shoes scrabbled hopelessly against the floor before he collapsed into a painful bundle on the floor.

'Owwww…'

'Okay Daisuke, I am helping you now, partly because I don't want to see you hurt and also out of sheer boredom. Don't thank me after this, because I want to go home and sleep now,' Dark muttered as Daisuke sat up again, rubbing a rather tender part of his anatomy.

'Yes Dark,' Daisuke replied meekly.

'Now can you see a door?'

Daisuke looked around. The walls were blue as well, and there was no door… hold on, hold on, there was this faint outline which might have looked like a door if the light was just right and if there was more colours and a better defined shadow-

'Don't let the artist in you take over, Daisuke.'

'Yes. I see it, Dark.'

'Good. Now you know this is a room with minimal friction. Means that every move you make, you'll get faster and faster, until you bloody damn well become a flat spot on the wall right, or by some freak chance you bounce off it, and then you're history. Understand?'

'Yes.'

'So, I want you to aim yourself, very very precisely, to the door. Can you do that?'

'Yes.'

'Good. Because if you miscalculate, we will bounce off the wall, and once we bounce off the wall, we're dead because of all the freaking rules of Newton.'

'Yes. I understand.' Daisuke had a sudden fleeting image of him skidding all over the room, forever accelerating, in a very cartoonish manner.

'Very good. We don't want to end up like that,' Dark continued, indicating the image. 'So please aim properly.'

'Okay.' Daisuke's eyebrows knotted as he perfected his aim, and pushed off, knowing for certain that his aim was true.

However, there had been a problem which neither of them had foreseen; that even though the floor was practically frictionless, there had been the factor of the apparent gradient of the floor, which none of them had taken into consideration.

Thus it was that there would be a slight bump on the floor, and they predictably hit it, spun out of control, and crashed into a wall.

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Heka: Okay, ugh I end here. I'm sorry. I'll do the Harada twins another time. Sorry to leave you on a cliffie (again) and practically NOTHING was accomplished here but hey, the chapter's up!

Dark: this was just to tell them that you're back yes?

Heka: That's why you're my muse… Good boy, Dark!

Shigure: Yes… Dark wants a bone?

Dark: I will make you wish you were dead.

Shigure, Heka: Please review!

Heka: And flames are welcome, really. I'll just like use them to erm…

Shigure: Burn Dark. He's just feathers and all… it ought to be easy.

Dark: No, use them on Shigure's house. Yes. A much better choice.