Fala, blza? (Brazilian internet language.)

A/N: I don't have anything to say really... I guess I should apologize for being a week late. Especially since the only reason I was late was my complete lack of not laziness. Thanks for the reviews once more. (Not many, but at least I got a couple of juicy ones.)

Disclaimer: Think of CCS as a big sack of potatoes. CLAMP would be the sack and I would be the shrimp, which means I have nothing to do with the potatoes whatsoever.

The Plot Thickens: After saving Sakura from the shot, Syaoran seemed a bit changed. Little did Sakura know that he was already on his pursuit for the lifting of the spell that tormented him. She didn't really care though, since this slightly friendlier Syaoran resembled even more the boy in her dream, which meant she didn't have to fight by herself anymore. Touya, on the other hand, was unhappy with how close Sakura had gotten to danger. He started to have second thoughts on leaving Sakura's protection up to Syaoran, despite the mysterious duo of puppet masters assuring him that everything was still under control. Meanwhile, In Hong Kong, Yelan revealed some secrets about the situation to Mei Ling. Secrets that even Syaoran didn't know about, like how and why Syaoran got the spell and the fact that the puppet masters have as a final goal something that needs Sakura's magic and needs her to get experience before doing it. However, she omitted the means she used to learn this sort of information, and whether she knows or not what the puppet masters' final goal is.

Moving on:

"Character Talking"

Character Thinking (Pay attention here! There's no more circle thingies around the thoughts! Just Italics now.)

(Me Talking)

All the life on the planet is based on a magical energy called 'Mana'. The Sun and the Moon provide this mana to every corner of the planet. Those who learn to manipulate the mana are called magicians. A long time ago, Clow Reed mastered the use of both Sun and Moon mana and created his masterpiece in the use of these types of magic, the Clow Cards. Half of them used the mana from the sun and half from the Moon. Now, after accidentally setting those cards on the loose, Kinomoto Sakura must help Li Syaoran, a descendant of Clow, and Kerberos, the guardian of the cards, to capture the cards which, not having Clow to provide them with mana anymore, are going on a rampage after the magical energy they need to live.

Card Captor Sakura

Chapter 7: Sakura and Syaoran - Act II

Part 3: Sakura's Second Try

Sakura let herself relax as she entered the bathtub. It had been a tiring day and a bath was all that she'd been waiting for.

In that day, she had gone from crying in fear on her bed, to facing her fear, to feeling maybe a bit too overconfident, then being face to face with death and then all of a sudden she wasn't sure what she was feeling anymore. It was only now, in her own little bathtub world, that she took the time to think about the day's events.

She knew that Syaoran staying was a good thing. He could protect her after all, so there was nothing to fear. However that feeling of confidence, that will to fight by herself had stayed somewhere in her mind and she couldn't help but wonder what would have happened if the boy hadn't shown up.

Could she have dodged the Shot? Or maybe deflected it? Seeing how desperate she'd been when fighting by herself showed her how she relied on him to the point of being unable to act on her own.

She sank her head in the hot water for a couple of seconds and let her mind release those thoughts even if just for a brief moment. When they came back they were easier to understand. She knew what she had to do.

Syaoran was staying, but she couldn't depend on him like she had been until now. She had to prove to herself that she could do things by herself. He wasn't her guardian or anything.

"That's it!" She said to her confident self. "I gotta learn to fight too. Next time we face a card I'll show Li-kun that I can handle it myself."

Syaoran reentered his apartment for the second time that day, sporting the same smile as last time. This time Wei was following him.

"The people at the school were very kind weren't they?" Wei commented.

Syaoran nodded. "I thought we'd have to spend the whole day there signing forms and stuff like that."

"Indeed, that was very fortunate." Wei said. "Now we have all the time we need to settle other affairs."

Syaoran cringed. He'd been delaying that part for a while. First with the excuse that he needed some time to rest, then the school, but now he had no more excuses. "Shall we unpack then?" He asked with a goofy smile on, knowing that it wouldn't work.

Wei chuckled. "I believe there's something more important for you to do now."

"I'll write her a letter!" He appealed.

"And let her worry for half the week about what's happened?" Wei asked raising a brow. "You know she'll call us here as soon as she finds out we didn't take the plane."

"But..." Syaoran searched his mind for an argument. It had been relatively easy making his decision of staying when compared to telling his mother he had deliberately disobeyed her order.

"I'm sure she'll understand." Wei said. "She didn't know back then that such an opportunity had been presented to you."

Syaoran sighed. "Yeah... I guess you're right."

Sakura entered her room wearing casual clothing but with a towel still around her hair.

Kero was, as usual, playing her video-game and breaking all of her high scores. That wasn't much of a feat since Sakura barely ever played it, but Kero was pretty sure he was above average level.

"Hey there!" He said not taking his eyes off the screen.

Sakura unwrapped the towel and dropped it on her bed. She proceeded to dry and comb her hair, entertaining herself by watching Kero's efforts to reach all of the buttons on the controller. He looked like some sort of cartoon character.

After she was done with her hair she laid down on her bed. Her face formed an inward smile. "Kero-chan." She called softly.

"What?" Kero answer roughly, due to the harsh movements he was doing.

"How do you think I'm doing so far?" She asked, turning her head to face the guardian. She was reminded of Syaoran when Kero started talking without looking at her, but she knew that with Kero, it wasn't her that was driving his gaze away but the video-game that drew it in.

"What do you mean?" He asked, though it didn't sound as if he was interested in whatever Sakura had to say.

"In getting the cards." Sakura answered. "Do you think I'm good at it?"

"Sure." Kero answered absentmindedly. "You're doing fine."

Sakura frowned. "Kero-chan!" She called louder.

"What?" Kero said in the same uninterested tone as before.

"You're not paying any attention!" the girl protested.

Kero sighed. He soon concluded it would be a better idea to pause the game before Sakura did something cruel, like turning off the TV or even unplugging the console like she had done once.

"Fine!" He said impatiently. "What is it?"

Sakura was still frowning, and she found out that her question couldn't really be done with a frown on. It just didn't match. So, she relaxed her face. "I want to know if you think I'm a good card captor."

Kero chuckled, much to Sakura's embarrassment. She felt childish.

"Don't worry Sakura." He said, holding back his chuckles. "I know you're worried about what happened today, but that has nothing to do with it. You're still very young and you've just found out about magic. It's only natural that the brat can do all of that stuff. He's been training ever since he was born."

"But how can I be the mistress of the cards if..."

"You got it all wrong." Kero assured her. "Magical skills are important if you want to control a card, but the most important thing of all isn't that. It's a much rarer quality. The one I'm supposed to judge."

"And what is it?"

"That's something you have to find out by yourself."

Sakura blinked in confusion. "By myself?"

Kero nodded. "I'm sure you'll find your answer in time." He said with a smile. "But in the meantime, don't worry yourself over things like that."

Sakura nodded with a smile. "Thanks Kero-chan." She said.

"Think nothing of it." Kero arrogantly replied. "But there's nothing wrong in wanting to improve yourself, you know?" Kero continued. "If you want to become a better magician all you have to do is keep practicing. You've sure improved a lot since I met you."

"Right!" Sakura said. "I'll try my best to become a good card mistress."

Kero made the closest movement to a thumbs-up his paws allowed him to make. "That's the spirit."

As far as I'm concerned she's already got what it takes to be our mistress. He told himself.

"Hello, mother?"

"Xiao Lang! Where are you?"

"I'm... I'm still in Tokyo."

Sigh. "I thought so."

"I'm really sorry, but other things happened. I have a good reason for staying."

Silence.

"Other things?"

"I... I talked with the man who cast the spell."

"You did?"

"He came to me. Twice."

"And what did he want?"

"He said he needed me to stay here. He also said that he would take the spell off."

"What?! Is that true?"

"Yes. He said that the fastest... the best way to remove it was if I stayed here. If I get rid of the spell there's no reason why I shouldn't stay right?"

"Yes..." Pause. "I'm really glad to hear this. I'm sure that father and mother will be happy too."

Silence.

"Well... that's about it. I'm sorry to cause so much trouble."

"Don't worry. It wasn't your fault." Pause. "Good luck with the rest of the cards. Try not to worry too much about this mysterious man for now. If he's telling the truth you should probably focus on the cards rather than him."

"Right. I'll write to tell you what happened in more details. Bye mother."

"Goodbye."

Syaoran put the telephone back on its place. "That was easier than I had thought."

The next day went by as quickly as it came. Syaoran didn't attend to school, which disappointed Sakura and Tomoyo. They later found out he was only going to attend from the next week onwards.

Sakura had wished that another card would appear that morning. She had been anxious to put herself to the test. But such a thing didn't happen. Instead she had a completely normal day at school, as if Syaoran had never even come to Japan in the first place.

It was only when returning home from her cheerleading practice that things changed.

Sakura was taking her usual route back home, completely unaware of the figure that stalked her in the shadows. Its red eyes watched Sakura's every move as it jumped swiftly from behind a postbox to the top of a tree and then inside a bush.

The noise it made whilst hiding in the bush was enough to draw Sakura's attention. The girl immediately turned her head around. After looking to each side twice with caution and finding nothing, she decided it was either nothing of importance or nothing at all.

The figure continued its sneaky pursue of the girl, following her through several different streets of Tomoeda. Every now and then Sakura would turn feeling as if she was being watched, but she saw nothing. As a matter of fact she hadn't seen anyone at all in her whole walk, which only increased the sensation of being followed.

Just keep going Sakura. She told herself as she started skating faster. It's just in your mind.

Sakura wouldn't have been so scared that day if she had simply turned around and seen a card or a monster, but her situation had led her to think of a dreadful possibility that scared her much more than any monster.

It's not a ghost, It's not a ghost, It's definitely not a ghost! She yelled in her mind, skating even faster. Just because all these usually crowded streets are empty, noises are coming from apparently nowhere and you're getting goose bumps it doesn't mean there's actually a...

By the time she reached the Penguin park she was absolutely sure she wasn't alone, and as she had anticipated, the park was completely deserted. Now that there weren't even houses around, whatever was stalking her would have the perfect opportunity to make its move. She was sure she could feel it getting closer but didn't dare look back. Instead she reached for the small key hanging on her neck and held it tight, ready to use it if necessary.

Her built up nervousness was released in a wave of adrenalin when she felt an aura manifest behind her. It's a Clow cardยบ Without thinking twice she spun her body around so she was facing the aura, but there was nothing there. "Release!" She shouted, letting her staff grow to its true form.

Relieved that it wasn't a ghost after all she felt a little extra confidence building up. She removed her skates quickly as they might get in the way of a fight and, walking back a couple of feet through the path she had come from, she looked around for the exact source of the aura, and there, from behind a bush, the card showed itself.

Sakura promptly put herself in an instinctive battle position when she saw the figure jump out of the bush; however, when the creature landed on the cemented floor in front of her she couldn't help but think something was wrong.

"It's a..." She walked a few steps closer, slowly. "What's this? A bunny?" She questioned nobody in particular, frowning in annoyed confusion.

Indeed, it was a strange card. All the cards Sakura had seen so far looked like humans, animals or an object that had something to do with it's name, however, the creature standing in front of her didn't look like anything she had ever seen. Its ears and feet were long like a rabbit's, but its body didn't resemble one at all. It had a long tail that was probably twice its size, which wasn't much. All of that covered in a big fluffy pink fur. Somehow that combination didn't look as cute as it might sound, specially due to the card's deep red eyes that added a sinister effect to its expression.

Sakura wasn't sure if the card was dangerous or not. It was just standing there, staring at her, but at the same time it looked angry it also looked completely harmless.

And then it jumped. And it was a real high jump for a creature so small. It could have jumped over four or five Sakuras, one on top of the other, easily.

Sakura watched as it passed over her head and landed on the other side where it started jumping in the same spot, this time in short and quick leaps. "Hoe? Is it trying to tell me something?"

All of a sudden the card turned its back on Sakura and started running away. Or jumping away rather.

"Wait!" Sakura shouted, running after the card. It was much faster than her and soon it became quite obvious that she would never reach it on foot. She took her cards from her pocket. "Fly!"

She did the maneuver of jumping off the ground that had already become instinctive to her and flew after the strange card. It wasn't easy to keep up with it, as it constantly jumped through the trees around Penguin Park with amazing agility. Sakura tried to follow it as closely as she could, but she kept getting the feeling the card was only playing with her. Whenever she managed to get closer, it would just get faster. It seemed nearly impossible to surprise it too, even though they were flying and jumping around in circles.

At one point Sakura saw it jump over the Penguin King and followed suit, but when she got to the other side of the giant toy the card had already escaped somewhere. She tried circling the park a bit in search of its tracks but didn't find anything. Its aura was slowly disappearing too and eventually Sakura was left with no means of finding it again. "It got away..." She stated in defeat.

The girl sighed as she landed. She had been wanting so bad to prove she could handle a card on her own and when the opportunity showed itself she let it slip away. "Maybe I need more training after all." She told herself gloomily.

"I'm home!" Sakura announced, closing the door behind her. There was no answer. "Hello?" No answer again. She sighed. Of course, tou-san's got a meeting at the college and kaa-san is modeling for that magazine today.

After taking her skates off, she ran up the stairs to her room, eager to tell Kero about her meeting. They would probably go back to the park and Kero would find a way of luring the card out. Of course, that meant Tomoyo would want her to dress up again when she heard about it, and Syaoran... Just this time she wanted to try it without his help.

She slammed her door open, bursting in the room. "Kero-chan! I met a Clow ca... Kero-chan?" Kero was nowhere to be seen. The TV was on and a video game was paused. "Hoe? I've never seen Kero-chan leave a game unfinished for anything."

She looked all around the room, even searching her drawers, but there was no trace of the guardian. "Where could he have gone to?" Sakura wondered.

After giving another thorough check in her room, she decided to search the house. It was as empty so Kero might have gone to the kitchen.

"Kero-chan!" She called as she walked down the stairs. There was no answer. He wasn't in the kitchen either and now Sakura was starting to worry.

Meanwhile, back at the Penguin Park.

The weird Clow card walked out of its hiding spot. It had gotten tired of waiting to be found. It excitedly looked around for its chaser to mock the loser, and then it would fight the girl properly, after all it had been long since it had seen such a big source of mana. It would be a waste to merely play with it.

The card looked around itself, but the girl was nowhere to be found. She had run away in the middle of their game. That was unforgivable. Letting its aura flare up it started stomping on the ground as hard as it could. It would find her and teach her a lesson for walking out on their game.

Kero had spent the past few minutes flying through Tomoeda, knowing his destination well.

He had been wondering throughout that day exactly what had made Syaoran change his mind out of the blue like that. He had suspected from the beginning that his family would summon him back upon hearing of the cards' new mistress, but it didn't make any sense for him to want to go back and then change his mind at the last minute.

It was only then that Kero remembered the spell. It had been a mystery to them for a long time and, though Syaoran had denied his knowledge of the spell's nature, Kero had always known the boy was still hiding something.

The guardian had speculated in the past few minutes that the spell was probably the real reason for the boy to be going away in the first place. After all, he had been very eager to get the cards up until that day. If that was the case, his change of heart about his decision probably meant something new had come up involving the spell.

Kero didn't think twice before flying out the window and going straight to Syaoran's place. He needed some answers. Little did he know how many new questions would come up when he reached his destination.

There, on the private roof section of his apartment, was Syaoran waving his sword around like he had been so many times before. Kero didn't bother to wait for him to stop. He landed on the small table with a parasol and called out for the boy.

"Hey brat!"

Syaoran ignored him, much to his disappointment. He was expecting to surprise him, but it was quite clear that the boy had spotted him a mile away.

"Alright, I'll let you finish your practice." Kero said. He immediately turned his attention to the glass full of lemonade beside him. "Ah... Lemonade." Putting his mouth around the straw he sucked the glass dry in a matter of seconds and got hit in the back of the head by Syaoran even faster.

Syaoran returned his sword to its talisman shape. "What's your problem?"

Kero moaned in pain, rubbing the back of his head. "I was thirsty."

Syaoran glared at him. "And you came all the way up here because it was the easiest way to get a drink?" He asked sarcastically.

Kero snorted. "For your information, you're the one to blame for me being here." He proclaimed, pointing to Syaoran dramatically

Syaoran raised a brow. "And how is that?"

Kero smirked. "I've been thinking about your little problem." He said. "And I think there's something about this spell that you're not telling me."

Syaoran frowned. "What are you talking about?"

"I think you know exactly what this spell does, and I also think you've found out how to get rid of it, and that's why you gave up running away." Kero stated with confidence pressing his face against Syaoran's in a deep stare.

Syaoran froze. The guardian had him. He had gotten everything right and he didn't need Syaoran's confirmation to know it. How did he find that out? He asked himself.

But then he relaxed. He didn't have anything to hide anymore, right? The only one he couldn't tell the truth to yet was Sakura. He had handled the situation pretty well and that was nothing to be hiding from Kero. "Right. That's true." He said firmly. He wasn't about to loose his composure in front of Kero.

Kero made a thinking pose. "That means you must know something about the nature of the spell too. I mean, what kind of spell is it?"

Syaoran sighed. "Alright, I'll tell you everything."

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A/N: Just two things to say in my defense before you review. First, I'm sorry, but Mei Ling will appear again soon. There just wasn't any way I could put her here. Second: I know that the current date on the story is July 13th and that's supposed to be Syaoran's birthday, but let's say: "What if Syaoran's birthday wasn't July 13th?" Yes, so, as you see, it was another deliberate change. I didn't forget about the guy's birthday. When is it now? Wait and see.

Bye! See ya next chapter.

-This chapter was edited by Meredith Summer.