As usual, I do not own Tsubasa.

Chapitre 6: Sweet Vanilla

Later that night Syaoran and Kyoki entered their home, both a little tired from work.

"I'm going to go lay down for a little bit." Kyoki told Syaoran, Mokona, and Sakura after they all said their hellos. She then walked to her room where she laid down on her bed, looking out the window.

"Do you think Kyoki-chan is feeling all right?" Sakura asked, worried.

"I don't know. I think there is something bothering her though. All day she seemed to be thinking about something. She was kinda off in her own world. And she kept muttering something about holding someone's hand didn't mean anything... or something like that... And she didn't eat anything at lunch time or during any of our breaks."

"Mokona thinks she is sad about something." Mokona said, sitting on the table, a piece of cake before him.

"I wonder what it is..." Sakura wondered. "I know! I'll make her a snack. Maybe that will cheer he up a little."

Syaoran nodded.

"Mokona will help." Mokona said happily. "You should give her a piece of the cake that Fai made for us."

Sakura nodded and prepared a piece. When everything was ready, she took the plate and fork and took it to the room. She quietly walked in and called Kyoki's name.

The dark haired woman sat up.

"I'm sorry for waking you up, but I thought you might like a snack." Sakura said.

"Oh, I wasn't sleeping, it's ok. But thank you, I was getting kinda hungry."

Sakura gave her the plate. "If you need anything, just let me know, ok?"

"Ok, thank you, Sakura." Kyoki smiled at the young princess.

Sakura nodded and left the room. When Sakura came back out, Syaoran was sitting in the armchair reading the book.

"Is that book interesting?" Sakura asked.

Syaoran nodded. "Yes. It says in here that the Shadows started to appear four years ago. Also, four years ago a feather was seen falling from the sky, and landed near the mountains to the north. I'm unsure if the Shadows are connected to your feather. But Kyoki thinks they may be. I told her about what I found out during our breaks. She suggested that if the feather were to leave this world, than maybe the Shadows would too."

"Do you sense the feather, Mokona?" Sakura asked.

Mokona concentrated for a few moments before shaking his head. "No, I don't."

An hour later, Kurogane was on his way home when Fai who was waiting for him confronted him.

"Hello, Kuro-pii. There is something I need to tell you, remember?" Fai said happily.

Kurogane nodded. "Yea, I know. There is something I need to tell you too."

"Oh there is! I'm so happy." Fai said. "Would you like to go first?"

"Yea. Look over there, it's King Ashura." Kurogane said pointing to a tree behind Fai.

Fai spun around, looking frantically around for the man he was running from. He looked... only to find no one even resembling him. He turned back around, thinking of how he was going to tell Kurogane that was not a nice thing to do... but the taller man was gone.

After losing Fai, Kurogane headed back to the apartment. On his way walking up the stairs, he found Kyoki sitting on the stairs to the second floor.

"Kurogane-san, I need to talk to you. Would it be all right if we go back to Hen's to talk?"

"Fine." He said as he turned around and went back down the stairs.

Kyoki followed right behind him.

As they left the building, Fai watched from street corner. He smiled as he watched them.

Minutes later they were in the bookstore selection of the building.

"At work earlier, Syaoran was reading that book, he told me..." Kyoki then proceeded to tell him what Syaoran had told her. "I think they will appear more and more often. Syaoran also said something about the Shadows looking for hosts. So since they are doing that, they may come out more often, I think. I'm probably wrong though."

"Why did you only want to talk to me? Why not talk as a group?"

Kyoki looked down at her hands. "I don't want the others, especially Sakura or Yume, to see what they do to people like Hen."

"What are you planning?" He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against one of the walls filled with books.

"I think we should investigate the area around the mountains where the feather is said to have fallen. I took some time off from work, not that it matters since we are only in this world to get the feather. So I'm going to go whether or not you want to come or not."

"I'll go. But only to make sure you don't do anything stupid."

"Thank you. Would it be all right if we investigate the night after tomorrow. I'm pretty tired from work and I didn't sleep very well last night. I wanna be fully rested before we head out."

Kurogane nodded. "Let's go back."

"Okie dokie." Kyoki said as she left the building. "Oh, hey, has Fai talked to you yet?"

"He tried to."

"What do you mean, he tried to? Either he did or didn't." Kyoki said, peering up at him.

"I told him King Ashura was behind him and ran off."

"Wow..." She started to laugh. "That's beautiful. I never expected you to do a trick like that."

He shrugged.

"You know, you have to talk to him eventually."

He remained silent.

"Telling him you already have a girlfriend would be the nice way of telling Fai 'off'. That way his feelings won't be hurt too badly, hopefully. I had to do that one time when this guy from school kept asking me out and I didn't like him very much. At least not in that manner. So I made up some name and told him I had a boyfriend with that name, and he left me alone. So you could use that too and just tell Fai a made up girls name and say it's your girlfriend. And if Fai asks where she lives, you could say she's from your home world. Or if you don't want to make up one, you could just give the name of a real girl you like. Chances are that Fai may not know who this person is, ya know?"

"Yea. I'll come up with something. I'm not too concern about it."

"Oh, really? So that is why you told Fai that the person he is running from was behind him and then ran off?"

"Shut up, idiot."

Kyoki laughed at his bewildered expression.

The moment they got back, Kyoki excused herself and bee-lined it for her room where for she laid on her bed, pretending to be asleep. Luckily for her no one tried to talk to her. Late that night, after making sure that Yume was unconscious, she made her way out to the living room where she expected to be alone, but found Kurogane sitting in the armchair, eyes close, television turned on with the volume on low.

She opened the refrigerator door and saw that Yume had made her up a plate for dinner and placed it off to the side. Yume even left a small note informing Kyoki that the food was for her. Tears welled up in her eyes as she brought out the plate and placed it in the microwave.

"So you're finally eating." Kurogane said, opening one eye to look watch her.

Kyoki quickly wiped her eyes and turned around, smiling at him. "Yep. Are you out here to avoid Fai-chan, Kuro-kun?"

He opened his other eye but did not answer her question. "Are you avoiding your cousin?"

Kyoki laughed nervously, but nodded her head. "Hehe, yea. I don't even know why either. Well, I do... but not really..."

The microwave beeped, causing Kyoki to jump slightly.

Kurogane turned his attention back to the television that was playing some kind of ninja movie.

Kyoki sat at the table with her back facing Kurogane. For most people she couldn't stand eating in front of them, but Kurogane it was different. She didn't really care, but tonight, she didn't want him to see her eat. As she ate she thought about how kind it was for Yume-chan to leave food for her after not talking to her for two days.

She hadn't noticed Kurogane getting up until after he was standing beside her chair as he flicked her on the back of the head. "Don't get so worked up over this."

"I-I'm not." She stammered.

Kurogane snorted as he made his way to the refrigerator and took out a bottle of alcohol. He then went back to the chair and continued to watch his movie.

After Kyoki was finished eating, she debated quickly over something as she put the dishes away. After making up her mind, she ambled over to Kurogane and poked him on the arm.

"Hey Kurogane... would it be all right if I slept on the couch?"

Kurogane looked at her out of the corner of his eye, then turned his attention back. "Do whatever you want."

"Thank you." Kyoki walked over to the couch and laid down. Within seconds she was sleeping.

"Idiot."

The next day during the afternoon, Syaoran and Kyoki were alone in the apartment. Fai, Kurogane and Yume were at work while Sakura and Mokona were out buying groceries as Syaoran sat on the armchair reading his book, while Kyoki was on the couch watching television.

As he read, he kept glancing at her out of the corner of his eye. He had been wanting to ask her if everything was all right, since she had a little bit of a sad look as she watched the machine. The show she was watching wasn't a sad one, it was a comedy actually. Over the last six months he had noticed that when she was upset she would watch funny shows to cheer up, but this time it didn't seem to be working.

"Kyoki-chan?" He lowered his book.

"Y-yes?" Kyoki said, surprised that he didn't call her -san.

"Is there anything wrong? Are you all right?"

"Heh? Oh... I'm all right. Nothing is wrong, really." She smiled at him.

"Oh, ok." Syaoran wanted to find out what was wrong, but he was unsure what to say. He thought about asking Yume (since they were best friends) or Kurogane (it seemed the two of them had been spending a lot more time together lately) regarding Kyoki. She always tried to cheer the others up when they were down, now he wanted to return the favor.

"How's the book going? Find out anything new?" Kyoki asked him.

"Yea, but there isn't much about the Shadows or the feather yet. It mostly talks about the Demon Lord. It says in here that he is not like most of the neighboring Demon Lords who cause misfortune upon the villagers. This one seems to get along pretty well with them. But it seems the Shadow problem has put a strain on their relationship."

"Hmm, he sounds like a interesting demon." Kyoki said, nodding.

"Yea." He said as he began to read more of the book.

I just want to add a quick thank you here to all of you who have read this fanfic. I hope that everyone enjoys it. I have had a lot of fun writing this. Anywho, there was something I was going to add here, but I think I will wait until the next chapter to put that up since I can't really remember what I was going to say now. Opps. Sorry. xD