I don't understand! He's not taking any damage! Miyako squinted her eyes shut, trying to think of a plan.

"It's all in way he's built." A voice said.

She opened one emerald eye to see it was Mask's Deus who was speaking to her, "Huh-?"

"I've battled Angels like Haru before. Who use music to attack. Mask has a special customized, soundproof, outfit." He explained with a small, evilsmile. "The vibrations Haru sends out when she plays a couple notes hurt an Angel's joints. Since his clothes are soundproof he won't receive a lot of vibrations."

Her eyes widened slightly, understanding what he meant. Haru looked shocked as well, she almost dropped her guitar. We'll just have to do hand-to-hand. She thought, Let's go Haru…

The Angel charged forward, bass in hand, gaining speed till finally she was in range. Her arm with her guitar was high in the air, coming down on mask quickly. Closer… closer… Stop.

Everyone in the audience leaned forward, holding their breaths. Even the people in the screening room, save Claire, looked horrified.

The silver hair Angel's eyes widened, "B-But…" she mumbled at Mask.

"My dear you are a Power Angel, not a Speed, don't think you're too quick for me." Mask replied. He'd locked onto Haru's elbow before she could strike, stopping all movement. With that said he brought up one leg quickly, slamming into her unprotected stomach. He let go just in time to send her across the layer with a good deal of damage.

She landed with a sickening 'Crunch!' rolling onto one side and simply stopped moving.

The audience continued to hold their breaths, especially the few Haru fans out there.

"Give up-?" It seemed as if her opponent liked to talk through his Angel more than he liked talking himself.

For a moment Haru didn't reply, but ever so slowly her arm began twitching and she pushed herself up onto her feet. She shook terribly, dropping her guitar so she could stand, "N-Never…" she started weakly. The Angel turned her head upwards, silver hair falling over her face except for her right eye. That crimson colored orb burned with the desire to win, "I'll never give up-!" The audience heaved a sigh of relief, leaning back in their seats.

Miyako felt strange, light headed, she was only commanding Haru to move; but she was talking by herself! Maybe she was sub consciously commanding Haru to talk?

Mask smirked, crossing his arms, "We'll see…"

Haru growled in anger, her eyes went wild and she charged at an amazing speed. It was fast enough to match a Speed Angel's but she was still pretty fast. Once in range she pulled her arm back landing a hard punch in his gut.

She didn't end there, Haru was enraged now and she was going to make him suffer for what he said. After throwing mask off balance with her punch she fell to the ground, bringing her leg around and knocking him off his feet. Once she had gotten him on the ground she curled her fist into a ball, landing another punch aimed at his head.

The Angel stepped back to examine her work, her eyes returned to normal and she seemed to calm down. Well she did let out all her anger on him…

Mask barely moved, he seemed shocked, as did his Deus. His head was bent in an unnatural way, the fabric on his stomach had been torn off from the power of her punch, and his legs seemed fine… for the most part.

"Angel Mask is unable to fight! Angel Haru wins!"

With that said the audience burst into loud cheers, the battle had barely lasted a minute and the 'comic relief' Angel had won!

"Miya! A word please-?" Chris called to her trotting over. She barely got out a 'sure' before her friend started talking, "What happened out there-? You destroyed his Angel."

"It was a quick battle. I know Haru is a power and all but I didn't know she was that-"

"No…" she said looking rather grave, "You literally destroyed his Angel. Mask's arm is broken is several different places, his leg is hanging on by a wire, his voice box was destroyed and his neck joint are shattered. Why did you-?"

After listening to all this Miyako felt her stomach lurch, "It wasn't me! I-I mean…"

"How could it not be you-? You were controlling Haru…"

"I-I-I mean… I didn't mean to do it. I don't know what happened," by now she had sunk down against the wall, arms wrapped around her legs, "I lost control and Haru tapped into my feelings or something."

"… What do you mean-?"

"I was upset when Mask underestimated us… and she got angry because I was upset…"

Manymonths later a large pink envelope arrived. Everything was written in baby blue ink that changed to purple when in the sun, the Piffle Princess logo was faded to a watermark in the background. And… it was lemon scented! The envelope was addressed to 'Miss Miyako Anna Haya', and requested her presence at the Semi-Finals in Japan!

Inside she withdrew a letter, two planes tickets, some papers, a sticker sheet of supposedly famous angels ("Why is there a sticker sheet? I don't even know who these Angels are…"), and some more documents. Everything inside the envelope was apple scented.

Most of the papers were release forms, so they wouldn't be reliable if she got on the wrong plane and ended up in Timbuktu. Other sheets were just applications on the in depth things of your Angel. While filling it out she wondered if this was actually a survey in disguise:

What is you Angel's Name?

Haru

What are his/her parameters?

Power/ Speed (Primarily power)

Do you consider your Angel guided by any sort of object or thing?

Music (pop/rock)

And so on and so forth.

Miyako flopped down on her bed with a heavy sigh, school had ended awhile ago and it was almost November! She had eagerly awaited the coming of her Junior year, but she realized how much life sucked with school AND Angelic Layer. She'd been training with Haru and Chris let her borrow Metallica to get a feel for different Angels. It was awkward at first but the girl came to realize that training hard with a different Angel seemed to make controlling her easy-to-control Angel much easier to use. They had grown much stronger, but the only problem was nobody wanted to abttle her. After seeing what she had done to Mask everyone feared their Angel's might suffer the same fate.

Chris had battled her a couple times though, claiming that Miyako now had complete control over Haru, and that she no longer had that anger problem. Claire on the other hand, had become obsessed with training. She almost failed her final exam after replacing the time she reserved for studying with hand-to-hand practice. Chris told her she would wear out Shani's joints if she continued her seven-hour training sessions.

Claire didn't care. She never wanted to do anything anymore except train. She'd gone pretty much insane; if she messed something up she'd get angry and train harder. Several times Shani had simply shut down when her motherboard inside got overheated. Though the girl didn't seem to care, she'd pick Shani up, dunk her in cold water and throw her back on the layer; expecting the Angel to work again. Usually this method cooled down the motherboard at least a little.

Usually the water trick worked but Chris was right about wearing out the Angel's joints. She was no longer lightning fast, nor was she elegant and gracefully. Her ballet like moves became stiff and choppy. Her hair lost its shine after being dunked several times. Her outfit had begun to fade to an ugly gray with pink blotches, also due to the dunking. There were visible scratches on the plastic that was her skin, most looked like nail marks. Some of the glue that held her hair in place turned black and began to run down her head, giving off the appearance of black blood also due to the water. In some joints she had begun to rust. Angels were water proof to an extent but shouldn't be exposed to too much.

Shani was no longer beautiful; she was an abused Angel working till her system shut down. Her powder blue eyes had faded to a pathetic grayish blue. It was a horrible sight, most people pointed ad said they felt back for 'that Angel'. Some thought her costume was meant that way and ignored Shani. Others thought Claire had lost her mind, most people believed this.

Miyako and Chris baked her a cake and brought it to her house once during the summer. They had gotten worried when they couldn't get a hold of Claire. Her parents sad she'd been locked in her room for three days and refused to come out. Claire's father said she would sneak out when everyone was asleep to get food and take care of business.

The two would walk up to their friend's old house, everyday for a while. And everyday they would hear the same thing: 'She's locked in her room'.

After returning to school they were approached by what seemed to be a new student. Her auburn hair was very messy, knotty, and dirty. Her pale blue eyes were tiny and full of fear. Her jeans were torn at the knee, and her shirt had seen better days. The girl was also hunched over a little. "Can we help you-?" they had asked.

"Juss wanted to ask how Haru and Metallica are."

"You know our Angels-? They're fine." Chris had replied to the strange girl.

She reached into her pocket, pulling out Shani, who had also seen MUCH better days. You cold only imagine the reaction Claire received.

The phone on her desk rang, and Miyako snapped out of her daydream. She slid down the ladder of her loft bed and ran to answer it, "Hullo! Miya's room, how can I help you?"

"Yo." Came the tomboyish voice on the other line. Miyako flopped down in her swivel chair and giggled.

"Hi Chris."

"Did you see what days were going to be gone? For the tournament I mean."

"Err…"

"Can you check now? The parentals have it and they're at work."

"Yeah, sure! Hang on-- it says," her stomach lurched.

"What-? Khaki been putting Haru in dresses again?"

"No… it's much worse than that." Miyako shook her red pigtails, "We leave on December twenty third, arrive on the twenty fourth. Rest for a day, the twenty fifth, and the tournament is on the twenty sixth! We won't be home for Christmas!"

"Miyako… you do realize what you're giving up for this… this… game!" her father was not at all happy about this. She nodded, making her slightly curled hair bounce, "And you still want to go-?"

"Hai…" (Miyako speaks Japanese too), "I really want to go. This may be my only chance!" she pleaded, "And… I can be there for Christmas, bring the wireless web cam around the tree and the laptop and I'll watch you guys open presents and you can say hi to me too! And… and… for the big Haya family feast you can put the laptop in my spot and I'll be with everyone! I can-can take part in the conversation, say hello to family!" she was desperate for an excuse to go.

He sighed heavily, rubbing the temples of his forehead. He glanced at Miyako's mother who sobbed but nodded to her silent question, "Very well…"

"Thanks…" Miyako said solemnly as her parents signed the permission slip and reluctantly handed it back to her.

Back in her room she sat down at her desk, staring at the signed slip. She was getting her light to read by from the hallway, but she noticed that it suddenly grew dark as a little figure stormed into the doorway. Spinning around in the swivel chair she raised a brow, "Can I help you, vermin?"

"Yes you can! You can stay here for Christmas!" Khaki, Miyako's little sister flipped the switch for the light. Dust drifted from the lamps and Miyako twitched as there was a sudden brightness to her room.

"Khak… you know I can't do-" she was interrupted by the enraged little girl.

"Don't you 'Khak' me! Christmas at the Haya house is the only time we get to see our Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, and you're just skipping around with your stupid doll, running off the Japan and letting down everyone! Everyone comes to see you! You're popular! You're on TV! You were on the front page of the newspaper!"

"Need I remind you that was the school newspaper? Seakittie high hasn't anything interesting to write about and someone saw me on TV and wrote an article. And need I also remind you it was on the Piffle Princess Show, it always shows the high lights of big battles from the big tournaments!" she narrowed her jade eyes at the girl, "incase you haven't noticed I'm not popular."

Khaki's face began to turn a cherry red, "If you don't stay- then-then- I'll make you stay!" With that said she slammed the door shut, stomping down the hall screaming. The room became very still, until a painting fell off the wall of course.

Suddenly Miyako had a pretty bad feeling about all of this. She only had one permission slip-sheet. And Khaki didn't need to get a hold of the sheet; she could destroy her plane tickets. She'd have to hide them; Khaki was capable of finding most anything. So in the middle of the night Miya heard the rocks hitting her window, she opened the window and grinned.

"Hey! Jesse!"

"Hurry! It's way past curfew for me! Just drop the tickets and permission slip!"

"Kay!" the girl had shoved the tickets and slip in an envelope. She closed it and tossed it down, "Thanks a ton!" she hissed back a little late because he'd already snatched the envelope and rocketed towards his house.

Even with the permission slip safe in a place Khaki would never be able to get it, she still had this strange nagging feeling. She glanced at Haru who had slumped over, Miyako gulped; it might be a bad omen. No matter what bad omens she received, or how many diabolic plots Khaki attempts to keep her home. She was going to that tournament, nothing could stop her now.

Note: Whew! That took a little while! I'd like to thank all my reviewers for well the reviews. So thanks Starberry, Myth Keeper, Motok and Day Dreamer. Oh, and thanks a lot Starberry for the review on ATO. My goal was to keep getting reviews even after it had been completed. (Grin) Oh… and the sequel will be premiering in a few days; get your tissues 'cause I put in a lot more drama, tragedy, and some twists ya won't believe.

If anyone can guess who sings the song that's the chapter title I'll give you pocky. If you review period I'' give you pocky. Extra pocky who an guess the artist of the song though. (Hint: Starts with a B)

Until next time!

-S.R. Sparran aka Ve1vet