Aelita glanced out of the window to see Jim running into the park. She wordlessly left the room, hurrying into the courtyard, followed by Odd, Lucy, Yumi, and Ulrich.
"Milly!" Yumi gasped as Jim carried the younger redhead out of the trees. Her arm was bleeding profusely. Tamiya followed the pair, looking quite shaken, her broken video camera hanging limply from one hand.
"What happened?" Lucy asked Tamiya, trying to look comforting.
"Th-Th-The the creature… in the forest… attacked us." Tamiya stuttered, watching Milly's limp form get carried away.
"What did it look like?" Aelita asked, urgency showing in her eyes and voice.
"I… don't remember," Tamiya said, "Sorry Aelita, I got it on tape but it's not likely to work anymore."
"That's ok." Odd said, trying to comfort the younger girl, as he put his hand on Aelita's shoulder, "Why don't you see how Milly's doing."
Tamiya nodded quickly and turned to hurry away.
"Wait." Aelita called, jogging after Tamiya, "Can I have the camera?"
"It's broken," Tamiya said uncertainly.
"I know; can I have it?" Aelita pressed.
"Sure." Tamiya said, not knowing what use Aelita could out to it, but not caring to keep the terrible memory.
"Thanks." Aelita said, taking the mauled camera from Tamiya and hurrying back to her friends.
"What do you want the camera for?" Yumi asked, looking at the used-to-be camera.
"Maybe I can save some of the tape." Aelita explained simply, "Should we let Hiroki know?"
"About what?" Ulrich asked.
"About Milly. He'd want to know." Aelita explained, as if it were obvious.
"Probably a good idea." Yumi said, somewhat dismally.
"I'd like to get a look at Milly's arm anyway, I could go tell Hiroki." Aelita suggested.
"I'd best go with you." Yumi agreed, "It's better that way."
"I can see if Jeremie's ok, and see if he can salvage some tape." Lucy added.
"I'll go with you, you never know what could happen." Ulrich said.
"Which leaves me all alone." Odd complained.
"You've got Kiwi." Ulrich said, giving his friend a playful shove, "You'll live."
"Fine." Odd sighed dejectedly.
"It won't be too long." Aelita promised, giving Odd a light kiss on the cheek.
With that the teens split into their various groups and headed off in search of whatever they were supposed to.
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"So, any idea where Hiroki could be?" Aelita asked.
"Might be a good thing to know if we want to find him huh?" Yumi mused.
"Yea, so you have any ideas?" Aelita prodded.
"No, but I bet Johnny would know." Yumi said.
"And Johnny is…" Aelita prompted.
"Easy enough to find." Yumi concluded.
Sure enough, Johnny was sitting on a nearby bench with Hiroki.
"That solves problem one and two." Yumi muttered.
"There were two?" Aelita said sounding surprised.
"Yea, finding Hiroki, and talking to Johnny, who needs to find where my face is." Yumi muttered.
Aelita smiled, suppressing a giggle.
"Hiroki!" Yumi called, stopping a small distance away from the bench at which the boy in question sat.
"What?" Hiroki asked, turning around to lean on the back of the bench.
"We need to talk to you." Yumi said, not going any closer to her brother and Johnny.
Hiroki hauled himself to his feet and dragged them all the way over to where the two girls stood. "What is it?" He asked.
"It's Milly." Yumi began.
"She got hurt pretty bad, we thought you might want to know." Aelita finished for her friend.
Hiroki's face fell, his eyes widening.
"She's in the infirmary, we're going there now." Yumi explained shortly.
Hiroki turned wordlessly towards the main building and began to walk towards it.
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"Jeremie?" Lucy asked as she knocked on her door.
"Ermph." Came the muffled grunt in reply.
"Jeremie!" Lucy flung the door open and threw herself at Jeremie, hugging him tightly, although the force of her flying hug made him stumble backwards a little.
"Hi Lucy." Jeremie said, gasping slightly for breath.
"Lucy, let him breath." Ulrich scolded from the doorway.
"Sorry." Lucy said sheepishly, releasing her grip on Jeremie.
"Don't worry about it." Jeremie said, waving it off.
"Hey Jeremie," Ulrich said casually, tossing him the broken camera, "Can you save anything from it?"
Jeremie attempted to catch the flying wreckage, but couldn't. He bent down to pick it up, his leg obviously still hurt though, because as he bent down his leg twisted to one side to relieve it of some weight and he winced in pain.
"What for?" He asked, poking at the broken camera that lay in a heap on his floor.
"Tamiya got the creature on tape, Aelita wants to know what attacked Milly." Lucy explained.
"And she's got too much else to run around doing to do it herself?" Jeremie asked lightly, although a hint of bitterness crept into his voice.
Ulrich gave Jeremie a warning look while Lucy looked on, utterly confused.
"I can try." Jeremie conceded, "But I can't promise anything."
"That's all we ask." Ulrich said, slight warning detectable in his tone.
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I hope you like that chapter. It will get better, I was running out of ideas for keeping it at an even pace.