Unten Aber Nicht Heraus

"What's the matter Lucy?" Kouta asked the diclonious as she quickly headed for the door. Everything had been normal around the house until about fifteen minutes before when Lucy sensed Kaneda's presence to the east.

"It's...it's gone... his presence is gone" Lucy replied sadly as she turned away from the door and looked at Kouta sadly.

"You don't mean he's...dead do you?" Kouta asked, throwing on his coat, "Come on, we're gonna go check anyways" he continued, handing Lucy her coat and then leading her outside.

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Up high in the sky, Roan was being treated for several serious injuries including a ruptured spleen, while Akiso talked on the phone with the director about how they should proceed.

"Akiso, I want you to kill Roan now. He has done his job, but I'm afraid we cannot hold up our end of the bargian" Kakuzawa said, showing some contempt in his voice.

"But sir! We can't possibly kill him, he's done everything you asked of him. I cannot kill him" Akiso replied back to the cruel man who immediatly ordered her to kill roan again. "No sir, I will not kill him, and neither will you!" the small woman exclaimed into the phone and then ordered the copter to be set down and Roan and her dropped off.

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Deep in the Toukanarya Woods, beneath a large pile of trees, Kaneda slowly bagan to come to. Using his vectors to move the trees off of him, the badly injured diclonious tried to stand only to fall back to the ground. His face was caked in blood and his chest was black with bruises, and showed his broken ribs. His left shoulder hung low from where it had been dislocated, and his stomach showed that he was bleeding internally.

"It's...a...good thing I ...can heal quickly" the bloody boy said as he leaned against a tree and tried to head into Gakimakio, remembering the extra abilities he and Lucy had as the original diclonii. "I sure hope...she still lives there...and remembers...me" he continued as he slowly staggered towards the village.

"Lucy, are you sure this is where you sensed him?" Kouta asked the pink-haired diclonious as the two of them pulled up near the Toukanarya Woods, and got out of the car.

"Yes this where I sensed him, but I'm starting to sense another prescence in there" Lucy replied as she felt the other diclonious move towards Gakimakio village at a slow, but steady rate. "He's very hurt and heading for that village, but it doesn't feel like Kaneda" she continues as a tear rolled down her cheek.

"Well lets go see if he's still alive" Kouta said urgently to the sad girl as he grabbed her hand and rushed into the forest. She's lost so much uin her life, please don't let her lose her brother now Kouta thought to himself as they tracked down the injured diclonious to question him.

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"So it seems Akiso has gone AWOL with Roan. Well then deploy numbers 34,35,36, and 37 now." Kakuzawa said to his second in command, Ryojh Akumaro, handing the short, bald man several sheets of paper authorizing the release of the four sister diclonii.

"Yes sir, but we have reports of a diclonious's presence in the Toukanarya Woods, we believe that it is Kaneda sir" Ryojh replied to the director awaiting any additional orders.

"You are to find any diclonious other than Lucy and kill them, but bring Lucy here alive" the director said with his back turned as he waved Ryojh away.

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"Thank you... Kanoe... thank you..." Kaneda slowly said as he passed out on a small bed in one of Gakimakio's small, yet lovely, cottages at the town's border with the woods.

Beside him cleaning his wounds was a young woman not much older than he. She had medium-length brown hair that fell just upon her shoulders, and brilliant emerald-green eyes. Blood was smeared on her once yellow sun-dress from where she had tried to help support Kaneda when he arrived at the house not five minutes earlier.

"Kaneda... how long has it been?" she whispered softly to herself as she cleaned his cuts and then stroked his bloody hair. "You always said that you'd come back... but I never wanted it to be like this" she continued even softer as several tears began to roll down her soft face.

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"Akiso... what are we doing here?" Roan asked the small woman as they stood outside of the Kaede house. They copter had dropped the two off with four S.A.T. members who decided to stand by the scientist and diclonious.

"We're here to get some help from an old friend" Akiso answered as she dialed a number into her cellphone and put it to her ear. She stood silent for a few moments as the phone rang and then a familiar voice picked up.

"Hello?... Oh it's you, so have you decided to jump ship as well? I understand, I'll be out in a minute" the voice said as Akiso explained the situation and then hung up. A few minutes later the front door of the Kaede house opened and out stepped Kurama and Nana. "So it's time then?" he asked,Smiling and holding a assualt rifle.

"Yeah it is, but first we need to get our other members" Akiso replied, looking to Roan who nodded back and confirmed that both members were alive and near each other. "Now then let's go help Lucy and Kaneda" she said, revealing her weapon, an .50 Desert Eagle handgun and ordering the resistance to bring the van around.

"Heh, now we finally rebel against Kakuzawa, I've been waiting for this" Kurama sneered as he got into the van and helped Ryan move Roan into the vehicle. "You going to be able to fight when the time comes?" he asked the injured diclonious as he sat next to him and Nana.

"I'll be fine, remember I can heal just like Kaneda and Lucy, ya'll made sure of that" the tall diclonious answered, flashing a small smile and giving the former scientist a thumbs-up.

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"So you're Lucy? You're Kaneda's sister?" Kanoe asked the pink-haired diclonious as she and Kouta stood outside Kanoe's beautiful, yellow cottage. She had just finished cleaning Kaneda's injuries when the two knocked on her door.

"Yes I am. How is he? Is he alright?!" Lucy replied, the urgency in her voice growing as she continued to talk.

"Well... he's pretty banged-up, bu...but I think he'll be okay" Kanoe replied her voice cracking with worried uncertianty as she thought about his injuries.

"I hope you're right. I hope he's okay" Lucy replied to her smaller counterpart as tears began to run down her worried face and Kouta put his arms around her and lead her inside, trying to comfort and reassure her, as Kanoe led them to the room Kaneda was at.

Meanwhile, miles away on his island facility Kakuzawa smiled sinisterly as he watched the copters carrying the only four sister silipets fly towards the mainland, knowing that it wouldn't be long before he had Lucy and forced the world to bow before him and his race's power.

"Lu..Lucy...you're here...listen to me...you're in danger... hide while you can" Kaneda managed to gasp out in between his attempts to breath, as blood began to fill up in his mouth, causing him to start coughing it up. Kaneda's injuries had healed considerably from the battle with Roan but even so, they were still extremely serious and were going to take several days to heal with even his regenerative abilities.

"Kaneda.. how did this happen? How?" Lucy asked struggling to find the words to say, as she quickly helped him clear his mouth and throat of the blood build up. As soon as Kanoe had helped lead her to Kaneda she had began to look over his wounds as he slowly began to awake.

"Kak...Kakuzaw..a... sent someone after...me...so please...be careful...Lucy" Kaneda said slowly, strugging to get the words out as more blood began to build up in his throat and he lapsed out of conciousous again.

"He'll be okay Lucy, he just needs rest" Kanoe and Kouta said to the upset girl as she kept trying to help clear Kaneda's throat of the blood that kept filling it up.

"They're right Lucy, plus we're here now" Kurama's voice suddenly said as he and several S.A.T. emergency response medics rushed over to Kaneda's side and slowly moved her so they could work. Not far behind them was Roan who stumbled into the room still feeling the effects of the battle.

"Who are you?!" Lucy suddenly exclaimed, slamming him into the wall with her vectors injuring him even more than he already was, and causing Akiso and Kurama to have to restrain her.

"Lucy! Listen, he's on our side, he's with us now!" Kurama said, pleading with the angered girl as she tightened her grip on Roan's throat.

"Lucy!...Leave him... alone... now" Kaneda suddenly said as Ryan applied several field dressings to his still-bleeding injuries and hooked and IV to his arm. "Let him go...he's here to...help" the injured Diclonious continued before slowy slipping into unconciousness once again, causing Lucy to let the much larger diclonious go.

"I'm...I'm sorry fo..." Lucy started to aplologize to Roan but was stopped when he held his hand up in a you-don't-have-to manner and said that she had every right to do what she did.

"How long do we have before he'll be ready Ryan?" Akiso asked the S.A.T.'s tall, dark-haired medic as he turned away from Kaneda and announced that he'd be okay.

"Well with how serious he wounds are it'll be atleast two days with his regenerative abilities, but I can't tell for sure it could be just one day or several weeks" the media replied shaking his head and shrugging his shoulders.

"There's no way Kakuzawa will give us that long, if I know him he's already got a chopper heading this way with several Diclonii and S.A.T. teams. So our first objective is to get Kaneda out of here and to somewhere safe until he's healed, and then we move from there" Kurama said as he and Ryan began to move Kaneda to one of the trucks and Akiso led the others to another truck, and pulled away from Kanoe's house.

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Hey yall it's me Sean, the author of this fic. Just here to tell ya that I'm sorry for the delay in updating and that I hope you enjoyed this chapter and the twist that it had in it. Also letting you know that if you have any ideas for how I can make this better, I would love to hear them and get your imput. Until later, Auf Wiedersehen.