YamiPhoenixfire: Houston, we have a stalker…

Phoenixfire: SHUT UP! (throws pillow)

YamiPhoenixfire: Like that's really going to kill me…

Phoenixfire: (grins and pulls out nuke)

YamiPhoenixfire: Um… disclaimer! Right, Disclaimer! Phoenixfire does not own Baten Kaitos, nor does she own her stalker ex boyfriend who tried to get her to go out with him AGAIN via mutual friends. However, she may soon own a restraining order if he won't leave her in peace. (Hint, Hint)

Phoenixfire: I may also own a headless alter ego if you don't SHUT UP!

Chapter Eighteen: Meetings

"Hmm, glowy multicolored barrier… large building with people camped outside… well, I think this was where we were supposed to end up," Gibari said.

"Agreed," Savyna replied. "However, I think we have a problem."

Gibari looked askance at her. "No, really? Besides the fact that we had to abandon three members of our group? Why, whatever else could be wrong?"

Savyna sighed and rolled her eyes. "Their clothing. It's completely different from what we're wearing. They'll know immediately that we're not from around here, and we don't know enough about this world and the people here to lie convincingly." Savyna had a point. Most of me people seemed to be dressed in pants of a blue fabric and various shirts.

"Um… I saw a store displaying clothing back in the town…" Melodia said somewhat hesitantly. Since she was currently with a group of people whom she had tried to kill in the not-so-distant past, she felt a bit awkward about drawing attention to herself.

Xelha sighed. She didn't like the thought of stealing, and liked it even less since Melodia had suggested it, but… "Does anyone else have any other ideas?" Xelha asked, almost pleaded.

"If you're uncomfortable with stealing, we could always leave some gold in the store," Melodia added.

"Okay, we're going to lose more time by going back and we might run into the guys in the blue suits again, but it WILL help us to avoid a lot of unwanted questions. So, let's get going."

Unbeknownst to them, a little girl with shoulder-length brown hair and dark brown eyes had seen the group of strange-looking people staring at the building and then turning around and leaving. With the curiosity of a twelve-year-old, she decided to follow them. No one noticed the little girl leave. Most people were too busy trying to keep track of their family and close friends to be troubled with one little girl. Those who did know the girl were more or less too busy trying to keep her ailing older sister alive to be bothered to track her every movement.

And so, Rana Sanders managed to slip off undetected. All in all, she was very proud of her 'stealthiness'. She crept off after the strangers humming the James Bond theme under her breath.

Luckily for Kalas, Ayme, and Folon, the area where they were being held was quite small. There were only about twelve cells, none of which had been in use except the one where they had been being held. All they had to do was walk up a set of stairs, and they were in a small room with a desk, some technical appliances, and one very surprised man in a blue uniform, who Kalas and Folon quickly rendered unconscious. This resulted in a VERY pissed Ayme, as she had wanted to question the man. So, two beatings and a lecture upon the idiocy of the male sex and blue-haired people in general, they set about to scouring the room for their weapons. No such luck.

"Damn! This isn't a big place, where could they have put them?" Ayme snapped, sitting down on the desk. She sat on a remote of some sort of remote and one of the monitors turned on.

"This is Cathy Reyson with Channel Fourteen local news. It is now going into the second week since the unidentified flying object appeared above the skies of our fair county, cutting us off from the rest of the state and country, with no end in sight. We once again encourage you all to evacuate to the Memorial Hospital. Food shortages have been reported throughout the area. We would like to encourage…" The pretty blonde woman who was talking looked off to the side, as if something had piqued her interest. "Wait…! This just in from local police, we have finally apprehended the blue-haired criminal responsible for multiple attacks upon our citizens! He is currently in custody of our local police force! And remember, you heard it first from the Channel Fourteen local news! Reports say that he was captured with the two people who broke into and attacked local South Clearwell High School, critically injuring one student. This student's name has not been given, although according to doctors, the student was released about two days after the appearance of the flying fortress. However, there were several people at the scene of their capture, who fled when police arrived. Were these people accomplices, or simply innocent bystanders? The police cannot tell us, but warn people to be suspicious of strangers wearing 'odd garb'. Office Keith is here now to give us the details."

"Damn, this is bad! Now they'll be looking for Xelha and the others too!" Kalas hissed as the picture changed to a heavyset man in the familiar and now hated blue uniform.

"Ahem. Ah, yes, there were six others…" and then the man proceeded to furnish whoever was watching (which they had to assume would be a fair number of people) with accurate descriptions of their traveling companions. Although it was amusing to watch the poor man fish for words to describe Mizuti, the implications weren't the least bit funny.

With an annoyed sigh, Kalas reached for the remote to turn the infernal thing off. Unfortunately for him, Ayme was still sitting on it. Letting loose an angry shriek, the sniper lunged at him and they both tumbled onto the floor as Ayme tried to choke the life out of him.

"Teach… you… a… lesson… pervert!" Ayme hissed

"Remote… all I wanted… was the remote… to turn… the damn thing… off!" Kalas choked out.

"Oh," Ayme replied, sanity slowly bleeding back into her expression as shedisengaged her hands from his throat and got off of him.

"You could have helped," Kalas growled at Folon, massaging his bruised throat as he staggered to his feet.. The blue-skinned Imperial was doubled over; laughing so hard he could barely breathe.

"Y'know… from the right angle… it almost looked like the two of you were making out…" he wheezed.

Ayme and Kalas simply stared at him, their mouths hanging open and eyes widening in mirror expressions of shock. Then they both leaned over and relieved the unconscious policeman of his weapons (Ayme took his gun and Kalas purloined his nightstick )

"Wanna say that again, Folon?" Ayme asked. The sound of the hammer being cocked echoed though the room.

"Um… no! I said nothing! Nothing at all!" Folon said hastily. He had seen Ayme pick off a fly with a throwing knife from fifteen feet away. He knew that, at this range, if she chose to fire, he was a dead man.

Ayme opened her mouth to reply, but was interrupted by an ear-splitting scream. A young girl, who appeared to be about five or six years old, bolted inside. Her yellow eyes darted around as she looked for someplace to hide. Her dark blue dress was torn in several places, and she was missing a shoe. She then focused on Kalas and rain over to him, clutching his cape and whimpering.

"H-hey! What's wrong, kid?"

"I-I-I… I don't know what I did wrong!" she sobbed. "All I did was h-heal him and he started y-yelling at me! And now he's c-chasing me, and trying to h-hurt me! All I wanted was to be friends!"

"Shh, it's okay, we won't let him hurt you… just stop crying already!" Kalas moaned.

"O-Okay… I-I'll t-try…" she stuttered, Kalas's usual brusque attitude making her eve more nervous than she had been before. "y-you can stop him, right? I mean, y-you've gotta be his brother or something… you look exactly alike!"

"Huh?" Kalas asked. However, before he could get a decent reply, the door was blown open. Everyone whirled, weapons brandished…

"Well," said the Dark Kalas. "This is an interesting turn of events…"

"Um, Melodia, I don't think that the shirt is supposed to cover your hands… maybe it's too big?"

"I like it like this," Melodia replied. She was wearing a white turtleneck sweater that had sleeves that came down so low that they only left her fingertips showing, and a white skirt. She had removed her traditional headdress and allowed her hair to hand loose. Surprisingly, her hair was actually long enough to fall to her mid back.

"I don't think… oh, whatever. Ignore me," Xelha sighed. Instead of mixing and matching, she had simply made her outfit mimic what one of the life sized dolls was wearing. She had on a very tight pair of light blue pants, a light pink shirt with very thin straps, and a dark pink long sleeved shirt of very thin fabric over that.

"Speaking of sizes, don't you think those pants are a little small on you?"

"Are you saying they make me look fat?"

"I'm saying they make you look… cheap."

"What was that?"

"Ladies, ladies, fight the monsters, not each other!" Gibari begged. He didn't look much different than he normally did, he'd found a pair of brown pants and a dark orange short-sleeved shirt that read 'Got Fish?' (I know… lame, lame pun, but I HAD to do something with fishing! It was just too good to pass up!)

Xelha resisted the urge to say something along the lines of 'She started it!', as she knew it would make her look childish. So she simply contented herself with glaring at Melodia. The other young woman returned the favor with equal intensity.

"Are Lyude, Savyna, and Mizuti done yet?" Xelha asked. Gibari opened his mouth to answer…

…when they heard a loud crashing noise form outside.

"Owie," Rana muttered as a piece of the concrete that had been broken off the wall by a mace strike that had been meant to pulverize her clipped her cheek. The monster leaned back, and that disgusting eye in its belly opened up. She hurled herself to the right just in time to miss being blasted by a beam of dark magic. "I am the Light, dispeller of Darkness! Guardian Spell: Shining Seraphim!" The light magic slammed into the monster, bringing it to its knees. However, it got right back up again, and it looked more mad than hurt. "Oooh!" she growled as she tore her sister's necklace off her neck. "Stupid pendant! If you're more than a piece of junk jewelry, than help me out of this mess!"

As if in answer to her desperate call, the pendant began to glow a dark red. As Xelha, Melodia, and Gibari came out of the store with Magnus brandished, they saw the glow fade, revealing a girl who appeared to be about sixteen or seventeen years old with shoulder length bright red hair, wearing a dark red shirt with one of the sleeves torn of at mid shoulder, a pair of lighter red pants that cut off at the knee, dark red boots, and half a silver bird on a piece of ribbon around her neck. Her most interesting articles of clothing were the gauntlet on her left arm and the blindfold that covered her eyes. She turned to Rana.

"'Bout time you called me, kid. I was getting pissed, with all that waiting." The strange teenager said to a startled Rana. "Now…" she seemed to scan the area, then focus on the monster. "AH HAH! Anger management!" she cried gleefully, three metallic claws springing from her gauntlet as she charged forward, twirling her mace.

Phoenixfire: And that's the end of the chapter. I promise to update, unlike SOME people I know (coughInamecough)

Ah… where was I? Oh yes… reviewer responses.

Wolf From the Hidden Flames: Cool penname. Yes, Love was different from what most people would have expected. (YamiPhoenixfire: Beware! Philosophy Ahead)(Phoenixfire: You really want to die, don't you?)(YamiPhoenixfire: MEEP! I'll be good, just put the wards down!) Love, if you really think about it, can be a very selfish emotion. I mean, you want this person, and you don't want to share them with anyone. That sounds very selfish to me. Furthermore, Astarael is in a very bad place emotionally. Her mother keeps yelling at her, her sister's trying to kill her, and SOMEONE is impersonating the guy she does like, who is going out with another girl. So yeah, Astarael's Love being a dark elemental? Not really very surprising…

DarkSoccerKnight7012: I reviewed Fire Emblem: Shadow of Bern. I was going to read some of your other stuff, but my internet kinda… died. Which also killed my initiative to get this chapter finished, which pushed this chapter's release date waaaay back. Life sucks, don't it? I'm glad you liked my story, and as to weather Tales of Symphonia or Baten Kaitos is better… I don't know. Both had their good and bad points. Both had really great plot twists. And considering I really game for plot…

wingsofheart: (blinks) wow, haven't seen you in a while. Glad you're still reading my story!

Katrina Ice Angel of Darkness: (grins) yeah, that part was funny, wasn't it? Glad you like the story!

Iname as One: And the world shall bow before my l33t Fire Emblem skillz! (YamiPhoenixfire: I don't think anyone really ca… ARRG! THE PAIN!) Yes, you SHOULD update your story! Or I'll… I'll… I'LL GIVE YOUR SISTER PATH OF RADIANCE SPOILERS SO SHE CAN TORMENT YOU WITH THEM! MWAHAHHAH!

Didactylos: Glad you like the split personality thing.

YamiPhoenixfire: Phoenixfire said that she wasn't going to do that little hints for the next chapter thing, because it makes her life a hastle. So, guess what I'm going to do? (Takes deep breath) Next time on Crimson Rain: See Kindness Run. Run, Kindness, Run! Kindness is Running. Running from who? Why, the dark Kalas, of course! Kalas and the Dark Kalas make a bet…

Phoenixfire: (knocks YamiPhoenixfire out with a large skillet) Stop giving away all my secrets!