This chapter will conclude the mine mission. So far, I have used a lot of Time Guardians in this story, but I managed to glaze over Xiao Lee (the disguise master). He will come up somewhere I'm sure…

I noticed there was not a lot of Creed POV. I am just caught up in the plot. Perhaps I'll remember to inject a few here and there.

Leeching Control

Belga observed the battlefield. Nazier was holding off Shiki and Maro quite well, despite the nonstop bleeding. 2 huge holes from Belga's missed bazooka shots created a battlefield to fight on. He loaded his rocket launcher again and aimed at the Shiki, who was just standing aside and letting the huge bug soldier do all the work. Suddenly, a heavy palm came out of nowhere and hit him in the chest and his shot went wide. Unexpectedly, it was so heavy that it threw him in a trunk, breaking that said trunk, and proceeded to throw him against the next three trees after that.

SHIT! That fuckin' blob of fat just made me waste my last shot!

He shifted his hold on Uruslaguna (1) and wielded it like a hammer. Using super fast speed, he stepped behind Maro and aimed for his head. A sudden shift in the air though, and his bazooka resisting his downward swing. Instead, it chose to lurch upward, taking him with it. Down below, Maro smiled.

"How do you like my gravity shield? You are helpless without a long range weapon here. Why don't you float up there for awhile and watch you companion die?"

Belga turned toward Nazier, who was already on his knees, spitting out blood. The immortal insect soldier just kept regenerating. Shiki walked toward Maro, turning his back on his Tao servant. Belga turned away too, not wanting to witness the horrid decapitation of Nazier under the insect's energy beam.

Suddenly, gravity return to normal, and dropped unceremoniously on the ground. Looking up, he saw the bandaged Taoist standing above a collapsed Maro, bees buzzing all around him like an aura.

Shiki stared down at Belga, and then shrugged. "I might as well control you, too. I hope you wake up earlier than this guy. I really don't want to carry this fat ass home."

Belga suddenly felt a sting at the base of his neck.

Darkness clouded his vision.

Back on mansion grounds, Shiki turned toward Belga, who was carrying the fat ass, and saw that Maro was finally waking up.

He sighed, "Put him down. Creed-sama will be back soon, so go back to Chronos. And even though my bee's venom can last up to a month now with the help of Doctor, I want you to wait outside the mansion grounds for me every week to report on Chronos activities." Shiki felt a massive amount of Tao gathering next to the cliff side by the mansion. "Now go!"

Belga ran, jumped into a tree, and disappeared from sight.

A moment later, the cliff was suddenly extended 600 meters out. The new soil's color was grayer than that of Creed's land, and rockier. Ekidonna stood in the middle of the new land, on top of a rocky cave. Shiki watched, unsympathetic, as she collapsed and rolled down the cave side. Creed never gave a backward glance, preferring to help a limping Train walk back to the mansion.

At the same time, the winds whipped up, and Doctor's helicopter came into view. It landed between Shiki and Creed, blowing dust every which way before the rotors stopped moving. Kyoko, Sheldon and Doctor stepped off it.

"GAH! Kuro-sama! You got hurt!" Kyoko rushed to Train's side opposite of Creed's, and offered her shoulder for Train to lean on. Creed would have fumed in jealously had it not been his preoccupation of needing to get Train to the doctor as fast as possible.

Doctor, seeing the impatient look on Creed's face, rushed toward them. He looked Train up and down, and sent out his ki to sense any injuries. There was not a scratch on him and not a bone was cracked. He pulled out his analysis visor and nearly fell over in shock.

Train's energy levels were hitting the negatives. The negative hundreds! By all accounts, that should be impossible. Even a dead man had some energy activities within him produced by dying cells. He wondered briefly if his visor had broken or something, before observing the rest of the Hoshi members and finding their energy levels normal, if not a bit depleted.

"Creed-sama, Train-san needs medical attention, now."

"I feel fine! My limbs are a bit heavy, but that's what exhaustion does. I am NOT going into that undignified excuse for a bath tub." Train turned determinedly away from the offending stasis chamber, and tried to walk out the lab. He made it 2 steps before collapsing on the ground.

Creed looked at Doctor exasperatedly. Doctor stared at Train pleadingly. Train glared at Creed defiantly. All in all, not much progress went on as stares shot across the room.

Finally, Creed relented. He nodded toward Doctor, who stepped forward with a needle and injected Train, who could not move an inch to avoid it.

"This injection will bring you energy levels back a little, but it's only temporary. It will not bring it up to anywhere near normal, and after it wears off, your levels will take a plunge lower than that of now. Within an hour, you're going have to comeback, before you drop dead from exhaustion—literally."

Train made to protest, but Creed interrupted, "No argument."

He was nodding in obedience before he realized what he was doing.

(1) It seems all the Time Guardian weapons have names, and his bazooka is named this.

Yes! I finally got back to one of my ideas that started way back in chapter 2…namely: what is Shiki up to? So far, Flash, Belga, Ekidonna and Maro are under the control of this sneaky Taoist. He would love to get his hands on Train or Doctor, but he can't do that without Creed noticing that something is wrong. So…who is the next victim?