Cross My Heart, and Hope to Die Chapter 3: Things That Will Bite, a ronin warriors fanfic

Author's Introduction:

When last we left our heroes (I love saying that!) they were bedding down for the night after rescuing Mia from the police, who seemed rather put out that she'd discovered a dead body in the university library. The day is saved, right? They can put this all behind them, right?

Yeah, right. I didn't think so, either.

Cross My Heart, And Hope To Die

A Ronin Warriors fanfiction by Firestar9mm

Chapter Three: Things That Will Bite

Something's wrong, shut the light
Heavy thoughts tonight
And they aren't of Snow White
Dreams of war, dreams of liars
Dreams of dragon's fire
And of things that will bite
Exit light, enter night

(Metallica, Enter Sandman)

Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.

The clink of a fork against a plate woke her up. Morning sun made her squint, and the scent of toast tickled her nose.

Mia realized the blankets she'd thrown off in the night had been tucked around her. Two pieces of buttered toast lay on a small plate next to the glass Sage had given her the night before, which was now filled with juice. Her stomach rippled in anticipation, and she stared with sleepy eyes at the items for a second, curious as to why the toast wasn't making its way into her mouth on its own.

"Don't you want it?" a voice asked calmly.

"Cause we'll eat it, if you don't," another laughed.

Tilting her head on the pillow, Mia saw Sage and Ryo across the room at the dinette table. The former was already dressed, blond hair combed to its usual perfection, sipping at a cup of tea. Ryo, by contrast, was still in a muscle shirt and a pair of boxer shorts, hair sticking up all over his head, shoving the last forkful of scrambled egg into his mouth.

Mia smiled. Modesty had no place in a bachelor pad; here it was she who was out of place and confronted with the devil-may-care reality of boys. "Don't eat my toast. I want it."

Sitting up, she stretched her arms over her head, arched her back, and rolled her head, feeling more than hearing the bones crack and pop. Taking the plate of toast and the glass of juice, she walked over to the dinette table.

"Here, Mia," Ryo said, getting up from his chair to offer it to her. "I'm going to shower before it gets any later. There's bread in the bread box if you want more toast."

Mia was quite content to eat the toast she'd been given, relaxing in the simple pleasure of having something warm in her stomach until she noticed Sage had abandoned his tea in favor of watching her lick butter from her fingertips. She paused mid-lick, tongue still out, eyes narrowing at him. He regarded her with his usual basilisk stare, and she let her tongue slide back between her lips before asking the question.

"Why are you staring at me?"

"Selfless concern?" He arched a blond brow. "You slept fitfully last night. You were calling out."

She blushed, averting her eyes. "Sorry if I kept you awake."

"You didn't," he said immediately, picking up his teacup again.

Mia blinked as he sipped, then tilted her head, amused. "Then how do you know I slept fitfully?"

He hadn't been expecting the question, and she was treated to a rare sight—Sage Date choking on his tea very ungracefully. Embarrassment sat on his brow and she could practically see the gears turning in his head as he tried to come up with an answer.

She smiled sweetly, patting the hand that held his teacup. "You didn't have to sit up with me."

He shrugged off the touch, composing himself enough to lift the cup to his lips again, making a dismissive sound that indicated the discussion was closed.

Mia polished off the remaining toast crust. It was as good an answer as she was likely to get from him, and she was used to his detached disposition. Sage was ice and zanshin, but straight as a die.

He drained the cup and put it down on the table. "Now you are staring at me."

Caught, Mia searched her surroundings for a believable excuse and settled on Sage's clothes. "I didn't even think you owned jeans."

When Ryo had told Sage the guys' plan for that day, Sage had foregone what was practically his uniform of sport coat and trousers for a pair of jeans and a dark t-shirt under an open, loose-fitting button-down shirt, and even though his sneakers betrayed their newness with how white their laces were, he looked comfortably casual—for him, anyway.

"I am on vacation, after all," Sage said, eyes twinkling. "No hats or shirts with slogans, but I'm sure Rowen can deliver in that department." They shared a smile.

"Shower's free," Ryo called cheerfully, emerging from the bathroom in a cloud of steam and shaking his wet hair out over a red-sleeved baseball shirt. He had no problem with being casual—his jeans were his most comfortable, having been faded from multiple washing and multiple wearing, and the right knee was blown out from a long-ago fall during a soccer game. "All yours, Mia. There's an extra towel and washcloth on the sink. Sage, wanna help me load the gear into the duffel bags?"

"Sure," Sage said, putting aside his empty teacup, while Mia asked, "Gear?"

"We thought it would be fun to go hang out in the park," Ryo explained. "Play a little baseball, maybe. Sound good?"

She beamed. "Sounds great! I won't be ten minutes." Retrieving her overnight bag from where they'd left it beside the sofa, she headed into the shower.

When the boys heard the shower spray hiss, Ryo opened the closet and started piling sports equipment into a duffel bag. "Seems like she's bouncing," he said to Sage. "You think she's okay?"

The blond shrugged. "I'm not sure. A distraction can't hurt her, though. It's good that we're all together."

"That's always good," Ryo agreed, hauling the bag out of the closet. "Here, take this, willya?"

Sage caught the handle of the bag and overbalanced as it threatened to drag him to the floor. "Jeez, Ryo. What do you keep in here, rocks?"

"A dead body," Ryo joked, and then both boys instinctively turned towards the hall, where Mia could be heard humming to herself over the sound of the water.

It was a perfect day to play in the park. The sun was warm but there was enough of a breeze to keep the air from being uncomfortable, and even the walk through the paved paths to the meadows was entirely enjoyable.

Sage had been right about Rowen's choice of attire—the Ronin of Strata's blue forelock peeked out of the window of a ball cap that he wore backwards. His black t-shirt read, KEEP STARING, I MIGHT DO A TRICK. He was buoyantly cheerful. "It is gorgeous out today," he exulted. "Speaking o' gorgeous…" He hooked his chin over Mia's bare shoulder, his favorite embrace. "How ya doin'? How'd ya sleep?"

"I'm fine." Mia reached around to tug on his forelock affectionately. "Slept just fine."

Sage's eyes flickered at the lie, but he said nothing.

"So you managed to ignore Lumberjack Sage's snoring, huh Mia?" Kento teased cheekily, and the flicker in Halo's eyes became a flare. The blond opened his mouth to snarl at his friend, but Cye and Rowen interrupted as one to save the day.

"You're the one who snores, Kento!" they insisted in unison.

"Took me f'reva t'get t'sleep!" Rowen added.

"I felt like my ears were bleeding!" Cye agreed.

Ryo chuckled, elbowing Sage. "See, the uncomfortable sofa doesn't seem so bad now, huh?"

Mia joined in the teasing. "Please! Try having all of you in the house at one time! The last time I had all of you over, everyone fell asleep on the living room floor. Most of you were snoring, Rowen spilled half a glass of beer into my handbag, and White Blaze ate one of my stiletto-heeled shoes."

"Oh, come on, Mia," Ryo laughed. "He had to have something for dessert after he ate your raincoat."

"That reminds me, I owe ya a handbag," Rowen said, scratching his nose sheepishly.

"You owe me a shirt. You threw up on me that night," Kento added.

Eventually, they found an expanse of grass that was perfect for a makeshift baseball diamond. "Gimme your hat, Ro," Ryo said. "It'll be home plate."

Rowen covered his head with both hands. "Hell no. This is my fav'rite hat."

Kento turned to Mia. "Can we use your purse?"

The "purse" he was referring to was actually Hiro's satchel—after a moment's thought, Mia had brought it along to the park with them. She hadn't felt right leaving it behind for some reason. Now she held it out of Kento's grasp. "This is not a purse, and you absolutely may not use it," she scolded. "This is Hiro's. He gave it to me yesterday to look over."

The boys were surprised at the admission. "You should have given that to the police," Sage said. "It's evidence."

"Evidence in what?" Cye said. "It was an accident."

Mia blushed, scuffing one flat shoe across the grass. "I didn't mean to keep it. I must have been hanging onto it pretty tight when they brought me downtown and they just assumed it was mine. There's nothing useful in it anyway—just a book and some notes." She tossed the satchel gently under a tree. "I'll figure out what to do with it later."

"It can be home plate until later," Kento said, but stopped at a warning glare from Sage.

After a little further debate, home plate ended up being one of the empty duffel bags, along with first base. Second base was a large rock that was probably going to trip anyone trying to run past it, and third base was a sock, graciously donated by Kento.

"This sucks," Rowen groused. "Th' object of th' game is to try t' hit a triple, not t' avoid tryin' t' hit a triple."

"Don't worry, Rowen," Cye said cheerfully. "You can't hit that well anyway."

"So who's playing third?" Ryo asked.

Rowen looked at his friends. "One, two, three—"

"Not it," three boys chorused.

Mia basked in the warm sun, stretching her legs out as she watched the boys argue over who got to play what position. Funny how even the strangest situations could resolve themselves into sunshine, as long as you were safe with the people you loved. It was like having a blanket all around your heart, she thought. Sighing, she closed her eyes and rested against the tree they'd designated as the dugout.

"You can sleep if you want," a voice came from beyond her. She had to smirk at her guardian angel standing by.

"Don't you ever get tired of babysitting me?" she asked, cracking one eye open to look at Sage.

He didn't look nearly as amused as she felt. "I'm not babysitting you. But you didn't get much sleep last night. You kept crying out. If you're tired and you want to rest, go ahead. We'll look out for you."

Mia wondered what she'd said in her sleep to make him look so concerned. "And let Rowen play first base?" was all she said. "No way." She picked up the glove Ryo had loaned her and wiggled her fingers inside it—it was a little too big for her hand.

Sage's eyes darkened, managing to look disapproving without moving any facial muscles. "Suit yourself."

Taking the glove off, she exchanged it for a glove of Ully's that he'd left at Ryo's apartment. By contrast, this glove was too small, but still a better fit than the first, which she tossed at Sage's chest. "There's no one playing shortstop."

She was rewarded with a smile as the warrior of Halo accepted the glove, slipping it onto his hand and flexing the leather experimentally. "Fine, but I'll be bored to death there. Ryo can't hit anyway."

"I heard that, you frilly jerk," Ryo said cheerfully from home plate as Sage and Mia walked onto the field. "I could hit it if Kento could pitch."

"That's it. You're walking to first, Wildfire. Hope you brought your athletic cup." Kento wound up threateningly. "One error, coming up!"

There was a moment where no one really believed that he'd do it, and then Ryo squealed, "Kento, no!" and twisted away from home plate. Too late—the ball had struck him on the upper thigh.

"Er-aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!" Rowen crowed, pumping his fist in the air like a drum major.

Since there were only six of them, there was no way to make teams, so everyone just rotated positions and took turns at bat. "We should have brought White Blaze," Kento said, winding up another pitch. "He's the best catcher and the best outfielder out of any of us."

"He's th' best umpire, too," Rowen agreed from the outfield—he'd wanted to be as far away from Kento's sock as possible.

"You're just saying that because he can't talk," Ryo laughed. He was playing first base.

"We couldn't bring him into the city," Mia said at home plate. It was her turn to hit. "The first time he ever stepped paw into Toyama, the National Guard had to be called in. Remember?"

Ryo grinned, remembering that day. "Those chumps were the least of our problems that day."

"He's still a good umpire," Kento insisted. "And he's a better catcher than Sage."

"That does it. The next one's going between your eyes, Kento," Sage said. He was crouched at home plate with his glove, his once-immaculate sneakers now covered in dirt.

"Pitch the ball already," Mia said, dusting her hands off on her jean shorts before picking up the bat. "We don't need an umpire to tell you I'm going to knock it out of the park."

Kento grinned. He'd started out lobbing easy lollipop pitches to Mia, but treating her like a girl had turned out to be a mistake. She'd already lost two baseballs by hitting them too far for anyone to chase. One of them was probably in the street somewhere beyond the park gates. "Big talk, big sis! Just for that, you're getting my Iron Rock Knuckle Ball!"

Winding up, Kento threw the ball. Mia swung the bat, driving the blow from her hips, hands stinging as she made contact with the ball. Crack!

"Whatta shot!" Rowen exclaimed from the outfield as the boys all jogged back to chase the ball. Mia bolted to first base, hanging a sharp turn around Ryo.

Cye was out in center field like lightning. The ball bounced over a swell in the field, and as he crested the hill, his foot caught on something, sending him sprawling. Sky and grass blurred in his eyes and nose for a second, and his hand slid on something wet as he struggled to stop himself.

Rowen slowed to a jog as he caught up. "Yikes! You okay, Cye?"

Rolling to a sitting position, Cye wiped at his nose. "Yeah, just took a bit of a tumble. Where's the ball?"

Rowen frowned, blue brows meeting over blue eyes. "Hold up. You're bleedin', kid. You're bleedin'."

Glancing down at his pale blue windbreaker, Cye saw that it was splotched with dark blood and dirt. In fact, his hand was wet with it too, and he'd inadvertently smeared it across his nose and mouth. "Oh," he said, confused. "Oh, dear."

The baseball forgotten, Rowen knelt by his friend. "Where does it hurt?"

"It doesn't," Cye said, brow creasing as he stared at his hand, trying to figure out why he wasn't in any pain. "Doesn't hurt."

The wind changed, bringing the scent of spoiled meat over the ridge, and both boys saw what Cye had tripped on—a lump of matted dark fur and bloody flesh that had lately been a dog or other animal. It was difficult to tell even at this range what it had been, but a severed paw lay almost forlornly amidst the carnage, and a length of bone that might have been a muzzle had a few broken teeth still attached.

Instinct forced Cye into a backwards scuttle, feet pushing him along the grass away from the corpse, grabbing at Rowen's sleeve with a bloody hand to pull him along. "Ugh!"

"Whoa, Nellie!" Rowen wheezed in agreement, getting clumsily to his feet and hauling Torrent up with him.

By now, the others had wandered closer to see what was wrong. "Guys, I circled home plate three times already," Mia said, tugging on the straps of her green camisole. "What happened out here? Where's the ball?"

"Everything okay?" Sage asked. "Looked like you fell, Cye, di—what is that?"

Cye had his windbreaker over his nose and was trying to wipe the blood away from his green-tinged face. "I think it might be a dog," he said through the fabric.

"Oh, gross," Mia said. "Poor thing!"

"What happened to it?" Ryo asked, squinting. "It looks like it exploded."

"It's that thing," Kento said, stabbing the air with a finger. "That thing in the newspaper. The beast what's been eatin' things."

"That's just a story, Kento," Sage said. "The Sun-Times is a rag; they made that up to increase circulation. It probably got into a fight with a bigger animal, that's all."

"A way bigger animal," Kento argued. "Like a beast."

"There is no beast!" Sage snarled.

Mia had produced a handkerchief from the pocket of her denim shorts and was wiping carefully at Cye's face. "Stop it, you two," she admonished before turning back to the Warrior of Torrent. "You okay, Cye?"

"Feel a little sick," Cye admitted. "I want to wash my face."

She nodded, patting his shoulder comfortingly. "Right. Let's get out of here."

"We're out of baseballs, anyway, thanks to you, slugger," Ryo teased Mia.

Kento stretched his arms over his head. "Anyone feel like hitting up the diner for lunch? I dreamt about those cheese fries all night."

"I could eat," Ryo said, then turned to Cye. "You okay to eat, Cye?"

Cye's face still had a greenish tinge to it, but he nodded. "I'll be okay once we get there."

They began packing the gear back into the bags, except for Kento, who was hopping around on one foot trying to put his sock back on. Mia had just picked up the bat she'd dropped when she noticed the satchel still leaning against the tree like a good cat. "You guys go on ahead," she said, walking over to pick it up. "One of the books in here came from the university library. I'm going to go return it. I'll meet you at the diner, okay?"

The Ronin groaned collectively.

Sage was the first to say it. "No." He didn't bother to explain the sentiment; his tone of voice and the intensity of his violet eyes made "no" quite enough.

"Lighten up, gorgeous!" Rowen whined. "No one's gonna care if a book's a li'l overdue. Just f'rgetta 'bout it."

"The library probably isn't even open, Mia," Cye said. "Especially after…" He trailed off.

"I'll be in and out. Just for a second. I'll leave it on the front desk and then leave," Mia promised. "When the next term starts someone will reshelve it."

"No," Sage repeated, in a warning voice, the kind you use to tell a young child that you're about to count to three.

"Come on, Mia, don't you want cheese fries?" Kento cajoled. Unfortunately, tact had never been one of Hardrock's strong points, and he pressed on: "No one's going to be looking for that book anyway, not if your friend took it out. He doesn't, you know, need it…"

It was the wrong thing to say. A shadow flitted through Mia's eyes and her hand tightened fractionally on the handle of the satchel. "I'm going to take it back. I don't want to hang on to it."

Sage treaded neatly on Kento's foot as he crossed in front of his friend to stand in Mia's way. Hardrock winced but said nothing, knowing he'd put his foot in his mouth. Besides, it didn't hurt so badly when Sage was wearing sneakers instead of dress shoes.

"Do I have to letter the word 'No' on my knuckles and knock you out with it?" the blond asked whimsically, smiling disarmingly at Mia.

Ryo smiled, shaking his head as he watched how badly Sage was handling the exchange. A statement like that wouldn't scare Mia at all, because she knew he'd never make good on it. Sage respected women; he didn't hit girls. And it was folly to counter a ridiculous suggestion with an idle threat.

"I want to get rid of it," Mia repeated. "I just want to put it back where it belongs and put this whole thing behind me. Please?"

Sage sighed and held out his hand for the satchel. "Then give it to me. The university's only a few blocks over from here. I'll bring it back for you."

Instead of handing him the satchel, Mia pulled it stubbornly closer to her body. "Why can't I do it? I can do it myself."

Ryo glanced to Rowen, who put his hands up in an I'm-staying-out-of-this-because-I-know-where-it's-going gesture. Similarly, Kento and Cye were pretending to be very very interested in the grass and the sky, respectively.

"I don't want you back there," Sage said simply, still holding his hand out for the satchel. "Not after what happened."

"I can handle it," Mia said. "Will you stop treating me like I'm made of glass? When are you finally going to start believing that I can handle myself? Haven't you seen enough to know that?"

"That's different," Sage said, and his friends winced at the direction they knew this was going in. "That's just…different."

Mia had heard it all before too. "Here we go," she said, poking the dirt with the end of the wooden bat to emphasize her point. "Go go gadget double standard!"

Sage blinked, his face darkening. But instead of delivering his usual frosty retort, he surprised all present by backing down. "You're right. Fine. Do what you want. Excuse me for giving a damn." Lifting one of the duffel bags stiffly, he stalked towards the path. "I will be at the CJ."

An uncomfortable silence settled in his wake. Mia sighed heavily. "Damn it. Sorry about that, guys."

"Don't apologize to us," Kento laughed. "Apologize to him!"

Mia arched a brow. "Apologize for sticking up for myself? Not a chance!"

"Sage only wants your safety, Mia," Cye said gently. "He doesn't say things like that to hurt your feelings."

Rowen grinned. "Yeah. It's just that he was standin' behind th' door when they handed out tact. I know, cause I was standin' next t' him."

Despite herself, Mia smiled. "I'll be fine," she insisted. "You won't even have time to order before I meet you at the diner."

Ryo put a hand behind his head. "Maybe Sage is right," he hedged. "I don't think this is such a great idea."

Mia's face fell in disbelief. "Whose side are you on?"

It was Cye who answered, a little sheepishly. "Maybe…his."

Mia tightened her grip on the satchel, seemingly unaware of the fact that she was still holding on to the wooden bat. "I bet I beat you guys to the diner," she declared, turning in a swirl of bright hair and walking stiffly down the path that led to where she'd parked her Jeep. "If I find another body, I'll just scream," she added sarcastically over her shoulder.

Ryo smacked his hand lightly against his forehead. "Please tell me that there was no way we could get out of that gracefully."

"At least she has a legitimate reason to be upset—she stumbled on a dead man less than twenty-four hours ago," Cye said as they began the walk to Kento's car. "What's Sage's excuse?"

"Th' same one, I think," Rowen said wisely.

Sage was leaning against the CJ when they arrived, sulking with his arms crossed over his chest. His nostrils flared with temper as he counted his friends, noticing that Mia was absent, but he said nothing.

"You want to drive, Sage?" Kento asked cheerfully, graciously attempting to soothe the blond. "You can drive. Want to drive?"

Sage glanced in the direction they'd come from, shaking his head absently, no.

"I am not sittin' in th' middle this time," Rowen said, climbing into the passenger seat. "One'a you suckas c'n ride bitch." Ryo and Cye immediately waited to approach the car, knowing that whoever moved first would be stuck sitting in the hated position. Sage wasn't paying attention to any of it; his gaze was far away as he looked down the path.

Ryo sighed affectionately, waving a hand at his friend. "Go," he said, knowing exactly what Halo was thinking. "But don't blame us when she screams at you for being overprotective. We'll see you both at the diner. And if you don't like what we order for you, tough."

Wordlessly, Sage loped off in the direction Mia had taken.

"He is so predictable," Kento laughed, getting into the driver's seat and turning the keys in the ignition.

"I am not playing referee to those two all week," Ryo declared, climbing in next to Cye now that no one had to sit in the middle of the back seat.

"Don'tcha worry," Rowen said, smiling from the passenger seat. "They'll work it out. They always do."

The library was wrapped like an obscene Christmas present, yellow tape bearing the legend CRIME SCENE – DO NOT CROSS blocking the doors.

Mia shifted her weight uneasily from foot to foot as she stood in front of her Jeep. Maybe the boys were right and she shouldn't go in…

The weight of the satchel made itself suddenly apparent to her, and she set her jaw with grim resolve. She was going to put this behind her and enjoy her holiday with her friends. Just once, she was not about to let some tragedy or disaster ruin her good time!

Still…there was no need to be careless about this.

When she'd stormed off in a huff earlier, she hadn't realized that she'd brought the baseball bat with her until she'd driven the few blocks between the park and the university and it had rolled from the passenger seat to clatter to the floor as she'd pulled into a parking spot near the library.

Hesitantly, she opened the passenger's-side door and took the bat along with her. She could laugh at herself for it later.

When she screwed up the courage to walk closer to the building, she realized that the door was actually ajar. Pushing it open, she ducked under the tape and slid inside before she lost her nerve. The fleeting thought that she was probably doing something illegal occurred to her, but she pushed it aside. She wouldn't be here long enough for that to matter.

It was dark, darker than she'd thought it would be in early afternoon. All the curtains were drawn over the windows to prevent rubberneckers from gawking at the scene, and since no one was working or studying there were no lights on, leaving the room a cave of shadows with the occasional corner of a counter or table catching the barest sliver of light from the edge of the windows. Mia actually stumbled into an empty book-return cart, bruising her thigh and nearly toppling the whole thing over. Muttering a curse, she made her way to the front desk, feeling its smooth surface with one outstretched hand, the other clutching the satchel.

The story probably would have ended there if she hadn't glanced to the side, towards the shadowed outline of the staircase where Hiro had fallen. She could just barely make out the banister in the stingy light. A shiver shook her senses, and she wished irrationally that she'd brought a sweater as if she were truly shaking from cold instead of from nerves.

Something made her fingers release the satchel, leaving it forgotten on the front desk. She just needed to see it. Just once. One more time, and then forget about it, forever. Just one more look…

A noise made all her senses stand on end and she drew the bat up in an offensive stance. Maybe she didn't have mystical armor, but she was no slouch—Grandpa had insisted that along with books and legends, she learn her way around a few traditional weapons. While the bat was not as balanced or familiar as her beloved naginata, which was mounted on the wall of the Koji manor, it was still nice and heavy in her hands.

Suddenly all the warnings she'd dismissed were prickling along her skin. Sage's ferocious concern didn't feel quite so suffocating now; she felt a flicker of guilt for how touchy and mean she'd been to him. She desperately wanted to apologize, and an irrational fear that she might not get the chance crackled through her brain.

Stupid, she chastised herself. It's a library. It's an empty, creepy library. Back up your big talk and look at it, then get the hell out of here. Prove to them that you were right and you don't need to be protected like a—

In the midst of this pep talk, Mia choked up on the bat reflexively. That was definitely a noise. Someone was in here with her.

Planting her feet, Mia whirled suddenly and lashed out with the baseball bat. It was a wild swing, but she managed to catch something with the very tip. There was a hoarse gasp of pain.

A familiar gasp—

"It's me," he hissed from a crouching position on the floor. "Put the bat up."

"Sage?" Mia asked in disbelief.

"Yes." The word was stretched tight with pain. "Please, put the bat up."

"Oh my gods." The bat fell from numb fingers as she flew to his side. "Where did I get you? I'm so sorry!" Then she squinted. "You scared me, Sage. What are you doing here?"

"Following you," he said through gritted teeth. "I…I tripped. I tripped on this stupid cart…" He glanced back at the offending obstacle, which was resting at an angle from the force of two people walking into it.

Mia pursed her lips. "Yeah, I didn't see it either."

Then Sage smiled, although it was tinged with pain. "I'm glad you brought the bat. That was a smart thing to do."

Mia blinked. "I hit you with it. That's bad."

"Yeah, but if I had been a bad guy, it would be good," he said, grunting as he got to his feet and pulled her up by the hand. "You just clipped me. It's not as if you sliced me with that lance you practice with."

"Where?" she asked softly, trying to examine him in the dim light. "Where does it hurt?"

His eyes went soft for a second. "Not now. We should get out of here."

"But—I wanted to see..." She turned back towards the staircase, a bad idea—one of the most effective ways to get Sage angry was to turn your back and ignore him.

Sage sighed heavily. "I'm not going to be able to talk you out of whatever you've got in mind, am I?"

Mia's gaze drifted from his to the space where Hiro had lain. There were still a few pale smudges in the old, pilly carpeting. Chalk outlines were never as easily erased as one would think. They clung stubbornly to the places that had once seemed so safe.

"I…" The longer she stared at the smudges, the brighter they seemed against the dark carpeting. "I wanted to see it." Without her conscious control, her voice had dropped to a whisper.

She'd long suspected Sage of being an empath. She saw her own pain reflected in his eyes before their color frosted over and he slew it with a frown. She never blamed him for his coldness; she knew that he was sensitive and his detached disposition was the only umbrella he had against the weather of other people's emotions.

His pale eyes were steely as they focused on the remains of the chalk outline. "I am sorry about what happened to your friend, Mia, but you must understand that it is not your fault, nor is it your responsibility. There was nothing you could have done to help him; rather, had you been there, you might have been hurt, too."

She gritted her teeth. "I don't expect you to understand."

Sage's blond brows dipped over his eyes and he looked at her, really looked at her. She'd had that intense gaze on her before, and it spooked her just a little—she felt like he could see inside her head, her heart, her hurt. She was afraid to know what he saw when he opened his eyes like that.

He finally answered not with a word, but with an action; he stepped away from her. It was not an insult but a gesture of respect—he was giving her the space he felt she needed to do what she had to do. Nodding, she accepted his blessing and turned away from him, kneeling at the space where Hiro had fallen, touching her fingers to the rough carpet.

The chalk outline was rubbed away for the most part, more proof that the police were not treating this as anything other than an accident. The body had been carried off and there was no real need to preserve the scene despite the tape and the outline and the intensity of Mia's interview at the police station. All of that had been routine and nothing more; soon the finer details of the incident would fade away, like the chalk in the carpet.

So why this sick feeling in her stomach?

She refused to glance at Sage, who was standing guard as she looked around. The weight of his gaze on her felt oddly comforting instead of stifling. He remained a comfortable distance from her, allowing her free rein to assuage her curiosity.

Finally, satisfied, she rose and walked to the front desk, opening the satchel to remove the textbook. A flash drew her attention to the short shelf behind the desk; red eyes glinted in the darkness. Startled, she stepped back and the red eyes followed with a hiss. At first, it looked like two tiny pinpoints of hellish light, then three, then two again. A tiny furred blur darted out of the space, leaping from the darkness between the books on the shelf to the counter. Mia barely had time to see dirty fur, pointed ears, and a bushy tail—was that two tails?—before it was on her, setting its teeth into the sensitive place between thumb and forefinger.

Pain was a nasty surprise. Mia shrieked, and in her panic she flung her hand up, trying to shake the animal off as she stumbled further backwards. The skin between its teeth tore and it tumbled down her chest, tiny claws hooking into her blouse, sharp little feet scrabbling for purchase. Gasping, Mia batted at the loathsome scratching weight with her bloody hand, sending it spinning into the darkness behind the nearby stacks, blood droplets glittering in the stingy light.

All of this happened in the time it took Sage to get to her side—he'd moved forward again as soon as he'd heard her cry. He had her in the shelter of his arms like lightning, his fingers curling around her bloody hand. "What happened? What was it?"

"Couldn't see," Mia wheezed. "A…a rat? Must have disturbed it…ow," she cried as Sage examined her torn hand, hissing in sympathy. The edges of the wound were ragged, and it was bleeding freely.

"Nasty," he declared. "We've got to clean this bite. Enough; we're leaving now."

"Wait. I need the satchel…" Much as she hated to argue with him yet again, she tried to shrug off his arm, but it only tightened around her.

"Enough," Sage said, softly but forcefully. "Mia, leave it."

She pulled away from him, reaching her good hand for the satchel. "Just let me…"

Sage expelled air through his nose, an unhappy sound. He reached his own hand out. "Come here." It was a command; the tone of his voice told her that he was through playing around with her. Nettled, she looked at her hands. The good hand clutched the satchel; the wounded hand didn't want to touch anything.

Sage solved the dilemma by disengaging her hand from the satchel and taking it from her, then taking her good hand in his. "Keep the wound elevated," he said, his voice gentler. "I'll take another look when we get outside, okay?"

They'd just passed the book-return cart when something large and furry leapt from the top of a bookcase to sink its teeth into Sage's shoulder.

The weight of the attacking animal forced them apart, their hands disengaging. Mia screamed as Sage went down, taken by surprise. But the Warrior of Halo never remained disoriented for long. With a battle snarl, he reached around, grabbing the thing by its scruff and hauling it off him, tossing it away as if it were nothing more than an annoyance. With an almost canine yelp, the animal struck the wall, blending quickly with the shadows before its true shape or size could be determined. Suddenly uncaring about her hand, Mia dove for the satchel, shielding it with her body as she scooped it up. The wound stung as she aggravated it with the movement. Red flashed in the gloom, but it was impossible to locate the sources.

As Sage regained his feet, Mia saw that his shirt was torn to ribbons over his shoulder and chest, and her heart seized—but instead of torn skin and blood seeping through the ruined fabric, she saw the gleam of metal. "What…?" she wondered aloud, but the scene playing out before her answered her question in seconds. With a leap and a small flare of matter-destroying energy, Sage was between her and the place where the thing had fallen, no longer clad in jeans and the ruins of his shirt, but in shining, form-fitting silver and green subarmor.

"What the hell was that?" he asked shortly, his eyes on the shadows that had swallowed the animal.

Mia was still bewildered from pain and confusion as she got to her feet. "I don't know—a dog—a big dog, maybe?" But even as she said it, the rational part of Mia's brain, the part that had seen the reality of Hiro's death in this very room—it knew that big or small, the chances of two animals with blazing red eyes taking refuge in this place were infinitesimal.

Still, there was no time to theorize about it while the thing—or things—was still loose in the room. As Sage turned his head to search for the it, Mia saw a bloody, ragged cut on the side of his strong neck, where the thing's teeth had scored him. The skin around the wound was red and angry. How could all of that have happened in seconds?

"You're hurt." She reached to touch the wound and he hissed, tossing his head.

"Don't—don't do that. Burns," he panted.

"Burns?" she asked, even as a throb from her injured hand echoed his pain. The wound felt raw, as if she'd scraped it, and a glance at it showed her the same red, angry blotches.

What the hell was going on here….?

To distract herself from her own fear, she reached for Sage again. "Let me see," she said as he shied away from her. "No, I said let me see."

Sage craned his neck, shrugging her gently off. "Stay behind me."

Whimsically, Mia remembered the mountain, she and Sage sticking close together as they were harassed to the front and left by carnivorous animals.

"What would a dog be doing in here?" she whispered.

"When I showed up, the door was ajar. Did you leave it open?" Sage's eyes were scanning the shadows, but there was no sign of the animal.

"No, I found it like that," Mia whispered back. "There's no telling what got in here or when."

"Don't worry," Sage murmured, not looking away from his target. "I won't let anything happen to you."

The satchel was dangling forgotten from Mia's good hand. Something tugged on it from behind and she shrieked, pulling it free and stumbling into Sage, who spun to see what the problem was.

The animal was snarling at them, blocking the exit. One pointed ear twitched and the red lights blinked like two evil eyes before appearing to circle its…face. The light only gave up the barest details—shining off wet, bared gums and vicious fangs and only hinting in places of its size.

"We're boned," Mia quipped, hanging on to Sage's arm. "Nice knowing you, Sage."

"Quitter," he shot back. "We're not done for yet. Stay behind me."

A bass growl—too big a sound for where it had come from, really—trickled from the animal blocking their escape. Saliva dripped from the thing's jaws and hissed when it came in contact with the worn carpeting. Mia blinked as thin wisps of smoke rose from the floor, but she had the sinking feeling she'd had when she saw Hiro's body—trying to convince herself that she was not seeing what she was seeing. Red shone once more in the gloom, flickering above the place where the crimson eyes were slitted hatefully at them.

Something was definitely wrong with this animal.

"Wait a minute," Mia gasped. "It's bigger. It's getting bigger."

"Don't be ridiculous," Sage said, but there was something thin and nervous in his voice. "It's a stray mutt who came in here to hide, and we disturbed it. I won't let it hurt you. Stand back, okay?"

"No, don't go near it." Mia stepped backwards as he'd instructed, but she didn't like it. "Dogs just don't attack people, it could be injured or frightened or something—there's something wrong."

Sage's glance had fallen to the baseball bat, which had rolled forgotten near the book return cart. Chancing taking his attention off the animal for a second, he dropped to his knee to pick it up. Seizing its chance, the animal pounced—not on Sage, but over him, towards Mia, who raised the satchel to block with a little scream.

The thing had barely started to slobber against the satchel when it was knocked out of the air by Sage, who'd retrieved the baseball bat. Snuffling, the animal regained its feet and intercepted his next swing by seizing the bat in its teeth and worrying it.

Panicked, Mia looked around for a way she could help. The dull gleam of a fire extinguisher on the wall presented itself to her, looking friendly behind the door of its case.

In case of emergency, break glass.

Glancing back, she saw that Sage now had the ends of the bat in each hand. The animal had its jaws around the center, and he was forcing it back, his feet spread wide to anchor him.

Yes, this definitely qualified as an emergency. Dropping the satchel, she surprised herself with her own boldness and placed her left fist in her right hand, using all her strength to force her right elbow into the glass, shattering it.

It was all she could do not to scream at the pain. Nothing was ever as easy or smooth as movies led you to believe. Ignoring the numbness that thrilled up her right arm and the way the jagged glass scraped her, she forced both hands through the broken case and grabbed the extinguisher, her bleary eyes unable to distinguish the best place to aim in the unforgiving shadows.

Sage had regained the upper hand. Choking up on the bat, he swung at the beast's foreleg and it shrieked, wide open jaws and gleaming fangs giving away its general position. Mia saw her chance as it reared and brought the fire extinguisher up, pulling the pin and aiming the nozzle at its face. Foam frothed between her and the thing and it squealed.

"Back off, Fido!" Mia snorted, swishing the nozzle for maximum coverage. "Sage, are you okay?"

The thing snapped its jaws, unsure as to what this strange substance was, but not looking too happy about it. Shaking its head, it scattered foam like a rabid animal.

The fire extinguisher spit the last dregs of foam, and Mia tossed the can in a spinning arc, striking the beast in the chest. It backed up two more steps, huddling up on itself. Sage swung the pesky book-return cart to the space between and toppled it with a swift kick, trapping the animal.

"Let's go," he said, circling to Mia's side. "It'll be back on its feet and angry as hell in a second."

"I need—" She was on her hands and knees, retrieving the satchel.

Sage seized her hand in his, hauling her to her feet. "Let's go, while we still have skulls!"

They took off towards the door like scared wolves, the roars of the wounded beast following them out. Sage kept a tight hold on Mia's hand, practically flinging her past the place where Hiro had died, making sure she kept her feet as he covered ground like a fever dream. Behind them, the animal could be heard venting its rage on the book-return cart; wood splintered and wheels squeaked, and then Sage was forcing the door open and tearing at the crime-scene tape, pulling Mia out into the overheated afternoon.

Sunlight beckoned to the child in her, promised her that the monsters wouldn't get her, not while the day was so bright and Sage had her hand in his. She chanced a glance back over her shoulder, but the paths were empty, just as empty as they'd been the night before.

"Wait," she gasped, pulling on Sage's arm, using her weight to slow him down. "Wait. Listen. Hear it?"

He stopped, breath coming in quick short puffs. "What? I don't hear anything."

"Exactly." She glanced back at the building. "Why isn't it chasing us?"

He gave her a look that plainly said he thought she was crazy. "What?"

She frowned. "It's weird. It jumped on me, bit me, jumped on you, bit you, tried to eat my bag, then tried to stop us from leaving. Why isn't it trying to finish the job?"

Concern flickered through Sage's eyes. "Mia, a rat bit you. That other thing…that was a dog or something. They were two completely different animals."

Mia's frown deepened and she caught her lower lip between her teeth. Somehow, she knew that Sage was wrong. Rats didn't have bushy tails like that. The dirty fur, the sounds it made…the feeling of malice and evil that had surrounded it…and the eyes, those two totally aware red eyes…

"Its eyes…" she whispered. "The red eyes…"

"Eyeshine," Sage soothed. "The light was dim. When you shine a little light into an animal's eyes in the dark, you get eyeshine back. It was just a dog, Mia."

She shook her head, feeling hysteria bubble up in her throat. She reached shaking, bloody fingers towards his neck. "No, you're wrong—it bit you, it burned you…"

"A scrape," he said, taking her hand in his. "It pounced on me; I struggled with it. That's all."

Mia's head hurt. Every instinct told her that they had just met up with something bad—something very bad. And yet, every fear that spilled from her mouth sounded senseless in the face of Sage's calm logic.

"I'm scared," she whispered, the rasp of her voice sounding unnaturally loud in the still afternoon.

Sage squeezed her hand, very gently to avoid hurting it further. "Come on. Let's go find the guys."

He let her hold his hand all the way to where she'd parked the Jeep, something she was very quietly grateful for; every so often she'd shiver uncontrollably, her fingers tightening around his. When they got to the car, she dropped the keys twice, her shaking fingers unable to work properly. She felt Sage's hand on her shoulder as she got to her knees the second time to retrieve them.

"Do you want me to drive?"

She shook her head as she rose, staring intently at the keys as if focusing on them would allow her to hold onto them more tightly. "No. I can do it. I'm okay." She was almost mumbling it, as if she were trying to convince herself, not him. "I'm better now."

But she wasn't better. When she turned the key in the ignition, Mia's head spun. It was too unreal, all this—she in the driver's seat once more, Sage beside her, his subarmor gleaming in the light of the dying day, his eyes drifting to half-mast as he leaned against the window. Just like before.

The more things change, she thought whimsically, the more they stay the same.

Carefully, she pulled away from the curb, trying to remember the way back to the Starlite Diner. Aloud, she said to Sage, "You had your subarmor. You had your armor with you the whole time."

Sage blinked at her. "Yes. So?"

"So you were expecting trouble."

Sage's lips bent in a smirk. "Of course I was expecting trouble. I was following you."

Just like that, the spell was broken. Fear was replaced by outrage, and Sage eclipsed everything else in her attentions, just as he always managed to. Mia tapped the brake reflexively, mouth dropping open in surprise. "What is that supposed to mean?"

Sage speared her with a pale glance. "We've been in Toyama for three days," he said, "and already there have been corpses, both human and animal, trouble with the local law enforcement, and whatever the hell that thing was." Shaking his head, the Warrior of Halo actually laughed. "Boy, have I missed you."

Mia wondered if smoke was filtering out of her ears. "Sage Date," she said slowly, trying to keep her voice level, "you miserable…"

He raised his eyebrows at her in a "you see?" expression, that smirk still playing around his lips, and she realized exactly what was happening—knew the pattern they'd fallen back into. Her anger carbonated into laughter, bubbled up her throat and past her lips, and those winter-cool eyes melted just a little as he returned her smile.

"I've missed you, too, you horrible brute," she chuckled, and he relaxed, fitting into his seat as comfortably as if they'd never stopped driving five years before.

The little waitress with the dark ponytail and the heavily made-up eyes had recognized Kento right away and made a big fuss over the boys, making sure to seat them at the same table in her section. But two of the chairs remained empty, tea in front of one and a soft drink in front of the other.

Cye glanced worriedly towards the door, craning his neck. "Where are Sage and Mia?" he asked. "They're late."

"Maybe they got stuck in traffic," Ryo said calmly. "I'm sure they'll be along soon."

Silence settled over the table, each boy imagining what had happened when Mia realized that Sage had followed her. No one wanted to say it out loud, but eventually Cye gave voice to their collective thoughts.

"Maybe she killed him."

Ryo was the first to laugh, muffling it into a napkin, and it didn't take long for the others to join in.

"What's so funny? We could use a laugh," Sage said dryly as he crossed the room to the table, interrupting the merriment.

The four seated Ronin stared at the last two members of their party. Mia, hair mussed and mascara smudged, was holding her torn hand at eye level, trying to keep it elevated and reduce blood loss. Her elbow was black and blue. The shoulder of Sage's t-shirt was more or less shredded; one of his sleeves was shorter than the other, the torn piece tied tight around Mia's injured hand and soaking up blood. Sage's button-down had somehow disappeared, and blood was drying in a thick line from his ear to his collarbone.

The little waitress bustled up to take orders, but she stopped abruptly, her mouth falling open at the sight of the bedraggled latecomers.

Sage smiled beatifically, holding Mia's chair for her. Sitting calmly at his place, he beamed at the waitress. "Two cups of ice, please?"

By the time the story was told, the waitress had brought their lunch orders, politely and silently distributing them and then leaving them to their conversation. As soon as they were in relative privacy, the other Ronin barraged Sage and Mia with questions. Sage's eyes flickered to Mia, whose brows were dipped low over her ocean eyes. She was not paying attention to the french fries she was eating; the boys could practically see the gears turning in her head, and Sage knew that she was replaying what had happened to them over and over in her mind, fighting to isolate details and make sense of what they'd seen.

"Give it a rest, guys," Sage warned. "That's the whole story. We're both okay."

"Jeez louise. It took a chunk outta each a'ya!" Rowen said, examining Mia's hand gently. She hadn't protested when he'd asked to see it, drawing it out of her cup of ice to let him look it over. "I toleja it was a bad idea t'go in there. Ya shoulda just stayed with us, gorgeous."

Sage glanced at Rowen. "Leave her alone."

Everyone looked up in surprise at that, even Mia.

"What are ya talkin' about, Sage? You were th' one who threw a fit when she said she wanted t'go," Rowen pointed out, confused.

Sage repeated calmly, "Leave her alone. We're okay, just a little scratched. Everything's fine."

Ryo said nothing, but watched the entire exchange with intense tiger-blue eyes. Everyone could tell he was filing this away to think on it later.

"Maybe it was the—" Kento began, and before he could even finish the sentence Sage was interrupting him.

"Don't say it."

Kento slammed his hands down on the table excitedly, as if he couldn't believe Sage was persisting in his disbelief. "Dude! Come on! You saw it up close!"

"We didn't really see anything," Sage said. "I was really more concerned with keeping its teeth out of us to pay attention to what it looked like. All I know is that it was angry and it had very sharp teeth. That could be anything."

"That's the thing," Mia interrupted, her eyes focused on the Formica tabletop. Her expression was calm and her voice was soft—she was thinking aloud more than she was really speaking to any of them. "It could have been anything." Something sparked in her eyes, an idea just taking shape in her whirring mind. "It can be anything. It can be anything—a rat, a dog."

The boys exchanged glances.

"Mia. You're not seriously going to tell us you actually believe what—" Sage's eyes jumped guiltily to Kento but he kindly corrected himself by saying "—a tabloid is saying? You're way too smart for that."

She blushed slightly, looking pleased. "You think I'm smart?"

Sage blinked, then his brows dipped over his violet eyes. "Don't change the subject. What happened to us today was a little weird, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's supernatural."

Mia smiled affectionately at the Warrior of Halo. "You always blow off anything you don't get."

Sage blinked. "There's nothing to get. What you're saying is crazy."

"No, it only sounds crazy," Mia argued. "The five of you can call up mystical armor and fought a war against the forces of evil. That sounds crazy, too."

No one could top that.

Cye finally spoke. "Whatever happened, I think it's best that you don't stay in the city tonight, Mia. Why don't you spend the night at the cabin? White Blaze is there and vicious rats and dogs are no match for him."

Sage nodded. "That's a good idea."

"Why don't we all crash at the cabin tonight?" Ryo suggested. "Plenty of room for everybody if no one minds sleeping on the floor."

"We've been sleeping on the floor anyway," Kento chuckled. "Might as well all sleep on the same floor!"

"I'll cook supper," Mia said happily, warming to the idea. "What do you guys feel like having?"

"We'll all cook supper," Cye decided, taking a pen out of his pocket and getting a napkin to write on. "Let's make a list."

Eventually, it was agreed that Mia, Cye and Kento would do the grocery shopping while Ryo, Sage and Rowen headed to the cabin and dusted it out. Mia was relieved—she'd had visions of spiders and other nesting insects lying in wait for her and White Blaze. Ryo had said that no one had been in the cabin for months.

Kento always made grocery shopping interesting. The first fifteen minutes were usually spent taking the bizarre items he selected out of the shopping cart and putting them back.

"This is full of essential vitamins and nutrients," he argued from behind the bag he was showing to Mia.

"A jumbo-sized bag of Enchiladitos?" Mia asked incredulously, staring at the cartoon nacho with the sombrero and mustache on the front of the bag of chips.

Kento made the bag dance by waving it at her. "Come on, Mia," he cajoled, then launched into the Enchiladitos jingle, waving the bag in time with the tune. "Enchila-di-tos, they make you wanna eat 'em."

Mia frowned, snatching the bag out of Kento's hands and putting it back on its shelf.

Cye muttered a curse as he forced their cart down an aisle. "Why do I always get one with a wheel that sticks? Kento, put that down," he added quickly. The Warrior of Hardrock already had a can of Easy-Cheese in his hand.

"It's for the Enchiladitos," he assured them, even as Mia intercepted the can.

"Is there anything you don't put cheese on?" Torrent asked as Mia replaced the can on its shelf next to the Enchiladitos.

"Duh. Ice cream," Kento said, and then his eyes lit up with inspiration. "Let's get ice cream."

Mia pronounced in favor of the ice cream, with an extra gallon for White Blaze to have to himself. A small fistfight occurred in the freezer section; Kento refused to let them buy any ice cream named after hippies or celebrities, prompting Cye to make a Chunky Monkey joke that ended in violence, but Mia sealed the wounds with Magic Shell and everyone left the freezer section happy.

It got progressively more difficult after that. Mia and Cye got into a spirited debate over flat versus ridged chips, and Kento's simple but passionately eloquent argument for Chee-tos was all but lost in the confusion.

"I hope the cleaning is going less violently than the menu selection," Cye laughed as he and Mia shook hands over a bag of party mix and moved on to the far more serious question of chicken vs. fish for an entrée.

Ryo and Sage stood facing each other, each with a mop in his hand, brushes to the floor at the ready.

Rowen stood holding a sponge between them. "Okay, ready? Wait for it…go!"

He dropped the sponge and the other two boys sprang into action, using their mops like hockey sticks to bat the sponge across the hardwood floor. Rowen circled them as they fought for possession, firing off his excited play-by-play.

"Wildfire makes a bold start but Halo forces him up against th' wall! Oh! Wildfire turns an' steals th' puck! Halo's hot on his heels an' cross-checks Wildfire inta next week! No high-stickin', no high-stickin'! Wildfire's got th' puck—he's goin' for th' slap shot!"

Sage tried to intercept the sponge, but slid on a section of floor they'd already mopped and lost his footing, sprawling on his side. Ryo batted the sponge over his fallen friend, where it hit the wall with a wet smack.

"Wildfire scores!" Rowen announced. "Halo is down an' Wildfire takes th' goal! Th' crowd goes wild! Here comes th' zamboni!" The Ronin of Strata rode out into the arena on White Blaze's back. The tiger happily pushed his front paws—which had scrub brushes fastened to them—along the floor.

Ryo brandished his mop and broke into a victory dance, but he also slipped on the wet floor and landed next to Sage, who was on his back clutching his stomach, as if the laughing hurt.

Rowen hopped off of White Blaze's back. "After th' post-game wrapup, be sure ta join us for our excitin' special feature: It Came From Beneath th' Drain."

"Last one to the bathroom has to star in that one," Ryo declared, hauling himself up from the floor. Sage grabbed the leg of his jeans to slow him down. Rowen sprinted out ahead, only to lose his footing on the newly mopped floor, allowing his friends a chance to take the lead. It was anyone's race by the time they got into the hallway.

"So who do you think would win in a fight, Mia?" Kento asked as he and Mia stared up at an entire shelf of cereals. "Frankenberry, Booberry, or Count Chocula?"

Mia looked at him like he were dumber than a box of one rock. "Count Chocula. He's got fangs. He'd kill Booberry in a second."

"Booberry is a ghost. He's already dead. I'm getting Rice Krispies," Cye informed them, reaching for the box.

"That doesn't have any marshmallows in it!" Kento whined.

Mia's eyes lit up. "We could put some in," she suggested. "Make treats. Want to?"

"Or s'mores," Cye said with happy inspiration. "It's a cabin—we've got to make s'mores."

"I'm on it!" Kento was already heading back towards the baking aisle to look for marshmallows.

As they waited, Mia got on line to wait for their turn at the register. She scanned the magazines at the checkout idly, selecting an issue of Cosmopolitan and thumbing through it. "You know what kills me about this magazine? In order to be flexible enough to get into the sexual positions on page twenty-six, you have to do the trendy yoga exercises on page seventeen."

Cye chuckled. "Sometimes I think you're only pretending to be an intellectual," he said affectionately, chucking her under the chin. "You know what Rowen calls that magazine, right?"

Mia nodded resignedly. "Nympho info," they agreed in unison as she replaced the magazine on the rack, and then the market's intercom went on.

"Cleanup on aisle four. I repeat, wet cleanup on aisle four."

Mia and Cye pointed wearily at each other, both declaring, "You go get him." After a moment, they raised their fists. "One, two, three, go." Cye put his hand out flat while Mia extended two fingers.

"Aaah, dammit. Okay, I'll get him." Cye loped off towards the back of the store.

Mia grinned. Cye always picked paper—he hadn't beaten her yet. She reached to put the last items from her shopping cart onto the conveyor belt when a tabloid headline caught her eye—the Sun-Times. MONSTERS IN THE STREETS, it proclaimed, showing pictures of blood-spattered brick and shredded clothing. Remembering what Kento had said about the beast, she thought quickly. Grabbing a copy of the evening edition of the newspaper, she folded the tabloid inside it and tossed the whole thing in with her groceries just as she got to the register. "This, too, please."

The cashier didn't even bat an eye, just bagged the papers along with the chips and dip.

"I didn't do anything!" Kento howled somewhere behind her as Cye dragged him towards the register. "It said FREE SAMPLE!"

Three Ronin Warriors sat with their backs against the wall. Each clutched a weapon, but these were not blades or bows. Sage held a broom, Ryo a mop, and Rowen a feather duster. Still they cowered, unsure of these weapons' ability to defeat the menace that lay in the room beyond.

Around the corner, a cockroach twitched its antennae.

Rowen set his jaw. "Okay. One, two, three—not it," he said quickly.

"Not it," Sage echoed almost immediately after.

"You lose, Ryo," Rowen said.

Ryo frowned. "Ah, dammit. Okay, here I go." Brandishing his mop, he got to his feet and charged into the room with a blood-freezing battle yell.

The cockroach bravely stood its ground. Unfortunately, it didn't see White Blaze calmly padding up behind it. The tiger crushed it thoughtfully with one massive paw, then glanced beneath the pad to see his handiwork.

Three Ronin Warriors breathed a collective sigh of relief.

The three shoppers marched in line towards the Jeep, each laden down with the spoils of their hunt. A crinkling brought Mia's attention to the last of their party. Kento had lagged behind, his concentration diverted from walking and focused more on rummaging through the bags he carried.

"Kento! Stay out of those bags!" Mia scolded. "It's not that long until supper. We just left the diner!"

"We left the diner over an hour and a half ago, and I barely ate anything there," Kento whined. Cye rolled his eyes, remembering the two sandwiches and cheese fries Kento had put away as the Warrior of Hardrock pleaded with Mia. "Please? Just one little bite of ice cream."

The supermarket's parking lot had been full, the hours before suppertime being a busy period in the store. Mia had had to park the Jeep further away, across the street from the park they'd spent the morning playing in. Kento stared longingly at the gates as Mia directed them to pack the grocery bags in the back of the car.

"There might be a hot-dog stand in the park," he piped up hopefully. "Please?"

Mia frowned, her arms folding to cradle her breasts. "Okay, but we can't be too long or the ice cream will melt."

"Yay!" Kento cheered, dashing across the street and through the park gates like a little kid. Cye and Mia followed at a more leisurely pace, shaking their heads amusedly at each other.

"Aw, man," Kento whined. After walking past the dog park, the carousel, and the meadow, they'd finally happened upon a hot-dog cart at the bottom of a flight of stone steps that led to a small man-made lake. But the cart's vendor was nowhere to be seen.

"Tough luck, Ken," Cye laughed, picking up a flat stone and skimming it across the small pond. "You'll just have to hold out until supper."

Mia could see from the shifty look in Kento's eyes that he was considering raiding the cart. "N. O. No," she said, taking her keys out of her pocket and jingling them. "Let's go."

"Come on," Kento wheedled. "Like they're going to miss one lousy hot dog. And a soda. And some ketchup."

Licking his lips, he jokingly feinted towards the cart. Mia took it as a serious attempt and moved to block him. The result was that Kento knocked into her, harder than he'd meant to. Mia fell ungracefully to the ground, losing her grip on her keys and sending them into the lake with a splash.

"Tell me my keys didn't just end up in the drink," Mia groaned, letting her head drop against her outstretched arm.

Kento smiled sheepishly. "I am so sorry."

But Cye brightened. "I'll get them." He showed Mia his palm, then flipped his fingers like sleight-of-hand, producing a blue sphere like magic. In the late afternoon sunlight, it was hard to tell if the object caught the glow of the dying day or gleamed with a light of its own.

"You guys just carry those around with you no matter what, don't you?" Mia asked with a smirk.

Cye smiled angelically. "Force of habit." The same flare of energy she'd seen around Sage in the library earlier was disguised this time by the splash as Cye dove smoothly into the lake. His subarmor glinted like scales beneath the water.

Kento helped Mia to her feet apologetically. "I'm so sorry, Mia. I was just playing with you."

She patted his arm. "It's okay, Kento. Cye will get the keys and then we really should get back to the car, okay?"

The water rippled and then broke over the triumphant Warrior of Torrent. "Got them," Cye said cheerfully as he resurfaced, the wet keys jingling as he shook them.

"Yay!" Mia cheered.

Cye pushed himself onto his back, floating in the water as easily as if he were reclining on a sofa, a grin on his face.

"How's the water, man?" Kento called.

"Come on in, it's fine," Cye laughed, folding his arms behind his head.

Kento looked around shiftily, then reached into his pocket and produced a sphere identical to Cye's except that the faint light it gave off was orange instead of blue. "You think this'll help me float or weigh me down?" Hardrock chuckled before the brief blinding light encased him in his own subarmor.

Mia frowned, hating that she always had to be Big Sister and spoil everyone's fun, but if they didn't get to the cabin soon the guys were going to be impatient and the ice cream would be melted beyond rescue. "No. Come on, you two, out of the pool, adult swim only." She put one hand over her eyes like a visor, but still squinted in an expression of disapproval.

"Come on, Mia, you don't have to be on your best behavior out here," Kento teased, heading towards the lake. "This is vacation, remember?"

"Kento, catch!" Cye called, tossing the keys to Kento, who caught them and looped them around his metal gauntlet.

Something stung Mia's hand. "Ow," she cried, waving the appendage and searching for the source of the pain. Before she could locate it, another sharp pain bit at her bare shoulder. More stings danced across her forehead, and she looked up, still shielding her eyes with one hand.

Across the lake, a restaurant catered to the upscale clientele of the nicer areas of the city. Twink lights danced out over the water, strung on cords and powered by electrical cables running from the light poles all over the park. A cable stretched from the restaurant patio across the lake to a pole beside the water; something that looked like a squirrel was atop the power line, and a fountain of sparks was falling from the transformer to the ground where Mia was standing. "What the…" she began, and then the question was replaced by a realization that this squirrel had two tails, and its fur was blotched with ugly, dark patches. Red eyes slanted almost contentedly above needle-sharp teeth, which were bared and working furiously.

Mia had seen those teeth before—but they'd been much bigger when they'd been dripping corrosive saliva in the library hallway, bared in a hungry grin at her and Sage.

It's that thing—

Mia's earlier bad feeling exploded into full-blown panic. It seemed comical somehow that something so small could scare her so much, but she knew that it might not stay that small much longer, and every cell in her body screamed that they were in danger, that something terrible was about to happen.

"Cye," she said levelly, afraid to raise her voice and alert the monster. "Get out of the water."

Cye, who'd only had one ear above water, resurfaced and shook droplets from his hair. "But I haven't—"

"Get out of the water, now," Mia repeated, edging away from the light pole.

"What the…hell…?" Kento had seen the thing.

"That's it," Mia said out of the side of her mouth. "That's the thing that attacked us in the library."

Kento blinked round eyes up at the tiny monster, and then he did something that made Mia want to smack him—he laughed.

It started with a tiny disbelieving hoot. Then a small chuckle. Then a robust guffaw, and he doubled over as if the mirth hurt him. "What?"

"Kento, hush!" Mia said, one eye on the beast and one on the Warrior of Hardrock.

"You've got to be kidding me," Kento snickered. "You and Sage ran for your lives from that thing? It looks like a toy."

"It was bigger, Sage got second degree burns from its spit, and it bit me," Mia snarled, still standing still and tense as a doe prepared for flight. "Now stop laughing and don't make any sudden moves."

"Chill, gorgeous, Hardrock's got you covered. Watch this." Disregarding Mia's instructions completely, Kento jogged to the light pole and began climbing the metal spokes that were used for maintenance.

"Don't you dare!" Mia hissed, grabbing at him and coming up with a handful of air.

Kento's armored boots clanked against the metal spokes as he climbed the light pole. His intention was to chase off, or at least startle, the funny-looking little animal, but it surprised him by advancing instead of retreating as he ascended. Most small animals scattered when a human got too close, but this critter actually scampered from the wire to the pole as Kento approached. Opening its tiny jaws wide, it clamped them around a higher spoke with a little clink and tried to worry it, spittle flying and slopping over the metal. Kento chuckled as it repeated the process on the adjacent spoke, its furry cheek pressed against the wood surface of the pole. It bared its fangs at Kento with a little hiss, as if issuing a challenge.

By now, Kento was close enough to take a swipe at the animal. It danced out of his reach, bouncing back to the power line, where it swayed, watching him with…

…red…

…eyes.

Kento blinked. Surely that wasn't possible. Balancing as best he could with two feet and one hand on the metal spokes, he swung a gauntleted hand at the little animal. "Get lost," he told it mildly. "Jeez, you're an ugly little booger, aren't you? Go chase some pigeons and quit scaring my friend."

Deciding he needed a little more height, he stepped up another spoke and grabbed onto a higher projection. Reaching his left hand out, he swiped at the creature again—and the metal spoke he was hanging onto wobbled, sending him off balance. As he gripped tighter, the bar came away from the wood, and Kento dropped it without thinking. It landed with a splash in the lake, and Cye called, "Watch out, Kento! What's going on up there?"

"Come down from there, Kento!" Mia called nervously.

Kento wasn't listening; he was wide-eyed, trying to steer his flailing arm towards the only other spoke within reach, trying to keep his feet steady. Latching onto the spoke, he redistributed his weight, but the spoke came free from the wood immediately.

From their low vantage point, Mia and Cye couldn't really see what was going on, but they did notice when Kento dropped like the stone he was named for.

"Kento!" Mia shrieked, dashing towards the light pole. Cye was moving too, but before he could get to solid ground, Kento's fall was stopped as suddenly as it began.

Further down the light pole, the metal spokes were still firmly anchored to the wood. One of them had caught a slat in Hardrock's subarmor, halting the warrior's fall awkwardly. More shocked than anyone by the reprieve, Kento flailed helplessly in the air for a second, searching for a foothold. Unfortunately, the spoke above had come loose and fallen; the ones below were out of his reach. He was trapped, unable to get purchase and just out of range to attack the animal, which chattered away on its perch. The noise sounded absurdly like laughter, sparking fury in Kento's brain. "Come—here—in my—hands!" he growled, waving his hands wildly but uselessly at the creature, which responded by chittering louder.

Had Kento been able to turn around and look at the light pole, he would have seen what caused the spokes to loosen—a damp, smoking rivulet of saliva had eaten away at the wooden pole, and even now it was dissolving its way further down.

"Stay back," Kento called down to his friends. "Get back and keep your heads down."

The animal made a sound like an outboard motor, and a third red light flickered briefly over its gleefully malicious gaze. The tiny rumbling sound gave way to another chattering laugh.

Kento wasn't laughing anymore. He suddenly understood Mia's seemingly irrational fear of the tiny, ridiculous animal. It had trapped him up here and was working on severing the power line, but Mia and Cye were too far below to see the true danger of the situation.

He couldn't call his armor from his precarious position. Luckily, he didn't have to. He had Mia's keys.

There were a lot of keys on Mia's keyring—two to unlock her mansion's door, one for her Jeep, one for her filing cabinet, and one for her mailbox; she also had the key to Ryo's father's cabin as well as keys to both Ryo and Rowen's apartments (the latter had lost seven sets of keys on the streets of Osaka.) Eight keys, all sharp-toothed and strung on a metal ring and a long lanyard that bore the Shinsai University colors.

Keys, while not pre-eminent among the tools of war, are a nasty missile weapon. Swinging the lanyard like a flail chain, Kento got the keys whirling at a lethal speed above his head, trying to gauge the right angle. When he thought he had it, he struck out, letting the keys stretch the length of the lanyard and scoring a direct hit on the animal's flank, the center of mass. It squealed, a big noise for such a little creature, then lost its balance on the wire, tiny paws scrabbling at the cable to no avail, scoring one more tear on the insulation before it dropped like a stone, blood drops glittering in its wake. It hit the water with a splash, another thing that seemed too big for its small size.

Kento muttered a curse when he realized it wasn't dead—a blood trail on the surface and a shadow beneath marked that it was moving, and very fast.

Cye surfaced, looking nervous. "What the hell was that?" he asked, shaking water from his hair.

"What was what?" Mia asked nervously, still crouching off to the side. "How big was it?"

Before Cye could answer, the earlier work of the animal's teeth and claws paid off, and the cable it had been perched on broke.

There was a horrid snap, a sizzle and a rain of sparks. The severed power line lashed the air as if it were alive, and then its wounded, flashing tip plummeted towards the water like a shooting star from hell.

"Cye!" Mia shrieked, using her back foot to push herself from her kneeling position into a hard run towards the water, one hand stretching towards the Warrior of Torrent. Seizing his metal gauntlet, she threw all her weight back towards the ground, knowing that getting him clear of the water was the goal and anything after they'd have to make up as they went. Unprepared for the sudden tug on his arm, Cye overbalanced, one foot slipping on the concrete lip of the pool just as the power line touched the surface of the water. There was a flash of light, and the current leapt from the pool and arced across the toe of Cye's metal boot.

Mia was so startled by his scream that she clutched his hand instinctively, and she barely had a chance to register a searing pain across her palm before the power of the jolt forced them from the water.

Falling was not an accurate word to describe being hurled from less than ten feet. Mia's arm was nearly torn from its socket as Cye was thrown heels over head past her, his grip on her hand dragging her along for the ride. Concrete burned the skin from one shin and then air whistled through her ears and her vision blurred.

Every bone in her body bounced and blood exploded into her mouth when they hit the ground. The world pinwheeled for a second, and then the weight of Cye's subarmor stopped their skid across the abrasive concrete. Mia ended on her back, staring up at the impossibly fluffy clouds. How could things be so beautiful when death was following them around, nipping at their heels? Cye's hand was still clasped in hers, convulsing around it as the aftershocks of the current sent spasms through his body.

Oh my gods. Cye. Her heart squeezed tight at the thought of what might have happened to him.

"Cye?" The name came out in a spurt of blood—she'd bitten through her lip when the current had sent them sailing. Squeezing his hand, afraid to turn her head lest her brains fall out or she see he'd been fatally wounded, she kept her eyes on the clouds and repeated, "Cye? You with me?"

He answered with a sound somewhere between a whimper and a groan. "Did somebody get the license number of that…squirrel?"

Her sigh of relief was wet with tears. "Can you move? Is anything broken?"

Kento was shouting down to them. "Are you guys all right? Cye? Mia? Cye! Answer me, buddy!" His voice was taking on a slight edge of hysteria.

"Down here," Mia said, but she couldn't seem to force her voice above a whisper.

"We're fine," Cye groaned, although he didn't sound fine. He tried to haul himself up to a sitting position without letting go of Mia's hand.

"Great," Kento called sarcastically. "Save me." Now that the immediate danger had passed, he was feeling silly about his current predicament. Realizing that his friends were in no shape to perform a rescue, he sighed. "Okay. Hail Mary time," he said, swinging his weight back and forth in hopes of jarring his subarmor loose from the spoke. By this time, the corrosive saliva had eaten its way further down the pole, loosening the spoke enough that Kento's plan worked—the spoke came free and down came Hardrock, landing so hard that he was forced to one knee to distribute the shock. Ignoring the pain, he hurried to his friends, who were huddled together, checking for injuries.

Mia turned her head to Kento as he approached, her bright hair frizzed and wild. "Oh Kento," she sighed. "Are you okay? Did it bite you?"

"Forget about me," Kento said, a little roughly, kneeling beside them. "Can you guys move?"

Cye swung an arm. "Good. You?"

Kento's eyes were shimmering, and his laugh was a little damaged, but he tried anyway. "Your hair," he giggled. "You guys look like…"

"We stuck our fingers in a socket?" Cye asked, smiling encouragingly.

Kento giggled wildly. "Stuck your finger in a socket, that's a good one! Hee hee…and there I was, completely useless, dangling up there like, hee hee, bait on a fishing line!..."

Mia ruffled his hair, a static shock snapping the air between them at her touch. "Feel that," she said quickly. "See? We're alive. We're all right, Kento!"

His lip trembled for a second, and then he bravely forced the fear away, grabbed her hand and kissed it. "Damn skippy, gorgeous. But next time get attacked where I can reach, 'kay? I want in on the action, too!"

Mia and Cye exchanged smiles. "Will do, Ken," the Warrior of Torrent said.

"I think it's safe to say this expedition was a failure," Mia sighed, trying to finger-comb the snarls out of her hair.

"Not a failure," Cye said, his face growing deadly serious beneath his wild, static-teased hair. "We are alive. We win."

Seeing the wisdom in his words, she nodded, subdued, and reached her hands out. Each Ronin gave her one, and they squeezed, shivering and fear passing between them like the electricity itself.

And, like the electricity, a scream soon jolted them back into movement.

"Oh my gods! Did you see that?" A girl was standing at the top of the stone stairs, her hands on her cheeks in shock, staring at the two Ronin and Mia. More voices joined the first.

"What's going on? Are those guys all right?"

"I saw something flash—"

"Should I call an ambulance?"

Mia watched as a crowd of people began spilling down the stone stairs towards them. "Is it too much to ask that the monster comes back?" she asked out of the corner of her mouth, eyes wide with a rabbit-in-the-headlights look.

"Get the car," Cye whispered back urgently. "We'll think of something."

"But—"

"Go now," Kento agreed, giving her a little push to her feet. Mia sprinted down the path, a little giggle of hysteria rising in her own throat, but a lump of tears and bile stopped it from getting to her lips.

The girl who'd screamed had dizzy eyes and pale pigtails that seemed to move on their own, waving like striking snakes as she glanced back and forth between the two armored boys. "Are you guys okay?" she asked rapidly. "Should I call 911?"

"We're cool," Kento promised as more people approached. "Nothing to see here."

"Is that metal you're wearing?" a boy asked, pushing his glasses up his nose with his index finger. "Isn't it a little early for Halloween?"

"He's a stuntman," another girl shrieked excitedly. "They must be filming a movie!" Whipping her head dizzily from side to side, she asked, "Are we on camera?"

Kento exchanged a look with Cye, who was still too stunned to speak.

"Yes!" the warrior of Hardrock exclaimed with sudden inspiration. "Actually, it's…it's an early scene for Armor Plated: 2!"

"Ooooooh!" a few girls squealed.

"I never even heard of Armor Plated: 1!" a guy called skeptically.

Kento gave the speaker a look that plainly said he thought the guy was dumber than a box of one rock. "Really? Dude, where have you been? It was a blockbuster hit in America."

"Can I have your autograph?" A girl thrust a pen and paper under Kento's nose. With a flourish, he signed it and handed it back to her.

"Tony DiNozzo?" the girl cooed. "Hi, Tony. I'm Miho!"

Kento kissed the girl's hand, making her giggle.

"Yup, that's the name, don't wear it out. This is my co-star, Derek Zoolander." He clapped Cye on the shoulder, ignoring the way Torrent winced. "Looked pretty realistic, didn't it?"

"What's the film about?" someone called.

The last thing Cye had wanted was attention, but now a crowd was amassing around them. Kento warmed up to his role, his hand gestures getting more flamboyant and his voice getting deeper and more macho as he described an imaginary sequel to an imaginary film that sounded like the summer flop to end all summer flops.

"Listen—Tony," Cye said through gritted teeth, clamping gauntleted fingers onto Kento's arm. "Don't we have to meet with Morshower to negotiate our salaries?"

Kento snapped his fingers. "You are so right. We've got to book."

A disappointed moan sounded from the ring of girls around them, and Kento smiled. "Don't worry, ladies, you'll see us again on the big screen!" Kento cheered. "Now, where is that good-for-nothing assistant of mine?" Spotting Mia at the edge of the crowd, he snapped his fingers at her. "Pepper! You lazy girl, you were supposed to bring the car around fifteen minutes ago! Chop chop!" He finished this off with a camp flounce, then added, "And bring us some more donuts and coffee! I'm not paying you to sit on your ass."

"Come on, Tony," Cye growled, hauling on Kento's arm.

Allowing himself to be dragged through the crowd, Kento called, "Remember, everyone—Armor Plated: 2! This time, it's bulletproof!"

Cye reached his hand for Mia, and the three of them hustled out of the park, like young children fleeing from a sudden rain shower. The Jeep was parked at the curb beyond the gate, promising sanctuary.

Once they were safe in the car, Mia ran a hand through her tangled russet hair and turned to her boys. "Are you two all right?"

"Just some scrapes," Cye said. "If you hadn't spotted that cable when you did, I'd be microwaved Torrent by now." Chuckling, he brushed his knuckles against her arm. "Thank you, Mia."

Mia smiled and tossed her head, embarrassed. "No big. What about you, Kento? You okay?"

"Good as gold," the Hardrock warrior promised, knocking on his armored breastplate.

"Good," Mia said. Without warning, she lunged forward and grabbed his ear, pulling.

"Owwwwww!" Kento howled.

"That's for calling me your assistant and snapping your fingers at me!" Mia hissed. "You pompous, macho, Ronin—diva!"

"Ow! Ow, ow, ow, ow," Kento yelped. "Cye! Do something, man!"

After a moment's thought, Cye did do something—he grabbed Kento's other ear and twisted.

"Owwwwwwwww!" Kento bellowed. A few dogs in the alley nearby perked their ears in sympathy.

By the time Mia, Cye and Kento reached the cabin, the other three boys had finished cleaning and the cabin was spotless—which was more than could be said for the bedraggled grocery shoppers. When they arrived, Ryo and Rowen were in the living room, playing a card game that they halted the minute they saw the state of the latecomers. Sage was coming from the shower, dressed in clean clothes and finger-combing his hair; he also stopped in his tracks at the sight of his friends. Cye was pale and his hair was sticking out at odd angles. Mia looked like she'd had a horrible perm and her lower lip was dark with a blood bruise where she'd bitten through it. Kento was the least battered of the three, but his eyes kept darting nervously to Cye and Mia as he helped them bring in the grocery bags.

"So, Axl, Slash, how'd it go this afternoon?" Ryo asked, taking in the sight of Mia and Cye.

Cye had had enough for one day. "Oh, shut up, Ryo, y'bloody cheek," he snarled, stalking past his friend.

"He's cranky," Mia hedged, forcing a smile.

"What happened?" Sage asked.

"A squirrel—" Mia began, then stopped. Looking at the confused faces around her and realizing how ridiculous she sounded, she faltered. "I dropped my keys," she said softly. "Kento and Cye helped me get them back, but there was…there was an accident."

Rowen and Sage exchanged glances. Ryo looked as though he wanted a more in-depth explanation, but Cye took charge at the sight of Mia's traumatized expression. "Why don't you take a long hot shower, Mia? We'll put the groceries away and when you're done maybe you'd be nice enough to start supper?"

Mia brightened at the idea of being useful, even in something as simple as a culinary capacity. She relaxed and nodded. "Okay."

When she was gone, Ryo tried again. "What happened, Cye?"

Cye sat wearily down, running a hand through his static-teased hair. "Wait till she's in the shower. Kento and I will explain."

As Mia cleaned up, the boys unpacked the groceries while Cye and Kento explained what had happened. For once, Kento wasn't ranting about beasts; he was oddly quiet, only speaking to corroborate or add to what Cye was saying about a small, strange animal and the events that had led up to their near-electrocution.

"A squirrel?" Rowen asked, arching a blue brow as he arranged cereals in a cabinet. "A squirrel made you guys look like you've been playin' th' Raiders? An' losin'?"

"I'm just saying squirrel because I don't have a better word for whatever it was," Cye growled, tearing almost ruthlessly at the plastic that covered a roll of paper towels in frustration. "I don't know what it was."

"It had red eyes," Kento said. "I swear on my grandmother's grave, it had red eyes. And big teeth. Pointy teeth—don't squirrels have, like, buck teeth? These weren't like that."

"I saw it beneath the water, but I didn't get a good look because it was moving so fast," Cye continued. "It was swimming, and squirrels can't swim…can they?"

Ryo's tiger blue eyes bounced to Sage, who was staring at a container of milk instead of putting it away. "Sage?" Wildfire asked. "Are you okay?"

Instead of answering, Sage turned to Kento. "How big was it? Exactly?"

Kento shrugged helplessly, tugging on a ash-colored forelock. "Dude, I don't know. Little. You know, we were thinking it was a squirrel, but like I said, the teeth…and the ears, they were sort of bigger."

"Bigger like a dog's?" Sage asked. "Sort of pointed?"

Kento brightened. "Yeah. Yeah. Like that. The nose, too, it had sort of a…snout. Squirrels don't have snouts, do they?"

"And a big tail, right?" Sage said. "Big and always moving?"

Cye answered this time, pointing his finger in an a-ha motion. "Yes! I was at a bad angle because we were below it, but for a minute I thought it had two tails." Torrent blinked.

"And it was noisy," Sage finished. "Really loud."

Kento and Cye exchanged glances, nodding at the blond.

Ryo was beginning to wish he'd seen the thing as well; he was feeling hopelessly out of the loop. "Sage?" he asked. "What are you saying here?"

The blond's eyes were distant. "The library…"

"You're saying you think this was the same thing?" Cye asked, eyes wide.

"I'm not saying anything," Sage answered sharply. "Yet."

"Mia thought it was," Kento said, remembering Mia's fear of the little animal. "She said, 'It's that thing'."

Sage looked briefly upset. "It doesn't matter. She was scared. I told her we wouldn't let it hurt her. I promised."

Ryo was rummaging in the last grocery bag, his hand closing on the newspaper that hid the tabloid Mia had purchased. Knowing how much giving his word meant to Sage, he felt the need to reassure his friend. "Don't worry, Sage. We'll keep your promise. Whatever it is, it's gone now, and we're all here. Let's just start dinner, okay?"

Footsteps could be heard down the hall. Ryo let go of the newspaper without looking at it, leaving it in the bag and shoving it aside. "Happy thoughts, guys. She's coming."

"You are my fav'rite person eva," Rowen sighed happily, leaning back in his chair and patting his stomach. "That was awesome."

Mia grinned from across the table. "Thank Cye and Kento. They decided on it…with their fists."

Cye and Kento offered their laughing friends big, cheesy smiles.

White Blaze echoed the sentiment from his place at Ryo's feet, licking his chops happily. The big cat got up, nosing around to see if anyone hadn't finished their char-grilled tuna, tail whacking happily at the table till the plates and silverware shivered.

"Who's ready for dessert?" Kento asked happily. "We got ice cream."

White Blaze was ready; he reared up to put his massive front paws on the table, his weight pulling the tablecloth so that the plates slid hazardously towards the edge of the table.

"Whoa!" Cye rescued the last of his char-grilled tuna, while Sage calmly saved the plates from falling to their destruction.

"Down, White Blaze!" Ryo chuckled. "Down, boy. You'll get ice cream."

Instead of scolding, Mia just smiled at her furry roommate. "Don't you worry, I got you a whole gallon, just for you," she cooed.

"He's gonna tip the table, Ryo, do something!" Kento said, holding the edges of the table down.

"You spoil him," Ryo said to Mia, pretending to be stern.

"I knew you were going to say that," Mia laughed.

"I'll get it," Sage said, getting up and heading into the kitchenette.

"Spoons, too, Sage," Mia called after him, while White Blaze gnawed happily on the sleeve of Ryo's shirt.

There was no answer; after a pause, the others exchanged confused looks. Kento called out hopefully, "Sage? Ice cream?"

Mia got up from her chair and headed towards the kitchenette, her first instinct immediately being to help. Stopping at the doorjamb, she noticed Sage standing in the kitchenette, the ice cream forgotten as he leafed through something—the tabloid she'd purchased earlier at the supermarket. The newspaper she'd hidden it in lay in two separate sections on the counter.

"Hey," she said, blushing as she stepped forward. "Silly, huh? I saw in it the checkout line in the supermarket. I was just curious—"

Sage's brow was creased in thought as he flipped through the glossy pages. "Have you read this yet?"

Mia blinked, getting over her initial embarrassment. "Um—no. I hadn't gotten the chance. Why?"

"Come on," Sage said resignedly. "We should talk to the others."

Kento pouted as they returned to the dining room. "I do not see ice cream."

Sage slid the open tabloid onto the table so everyone could see it. "Put your stomach on hold for a second and look at this."

The Warrior of Hardrock's eyes lit up as he leaned over the magazine. "All right, the Sun-Times! Maybe they've got a new article on the beast!"

Cye's eyes narrowed at Sage. "Now are you saying you think it's the same thing?" he asked, repeating his question from earlier.

"I want to know what you think," Sage said. "You saw something today, too." The Warrior of Halo turned to Mia. "You, too," he said, a little more gently. "You're the only one who was with all three of us when we saw…whatever we saw."

"You said it was a dog," Mia said warily. "You said—"

Sage looked mildly embarrassed to be admitting, even subtly, that he might have been wrong, but to his credit he continued. "Forget what I said for a minute. What do you say?"

Mia braced her hands over the table, her bright hair spilling over Kento's shoulder as she leaned above them. She, Cye and Kento all peered at the two-page spread, examining the color pictures while Ryo and Rowen crowded close to look as well. Sage waited patiently, arms crossed over his chest, frostbitten gaze steely. "Is it what you saw today?"

The pictures were less than helpful—one was a blurry long shot of an alleyway at night, the bricks spattered with a dark substance that was probably blood but just as easily could have been chocolate syrup. The focus was obviously the lump of bloody fur and flesh huddled near a garbage can; most likely an unfortunate alley cat. But in the background, an indeterminate furry blob could be seen fleeing the scene. If you looked close, the bushy tail appeared to be forked in two. Another picture focused on a dirty sewer grate, but there were two blurry points of red in the dark depths, and a faint glare above them, as if there might have been three sources of light, not two.

Cye sighed, rubbing a hand across the back of his head. "I hate to say it, but it could be. It really could be."

Sage frowned down at the tabloid. "Damn it," he sighed.

"What?" Cye asked. "What's wrong?"

"What's wrong is that I think it's what I saw, too," Sage admitted.

All the boys looked at Mia, who nodded.

"We don't know for sure," Sage pointed out quickly. "It's just a possibility."

Bolstered by the support of her earlier theory, Mia smirked at Sage. "You just don't want to admit that Kento might be right about something."

Rowen snorted a laugh into his hand while Kento beamed. "Thanks, big sis!"

Sage put his hands out in a "whoa" gesture, trying for order. "I'm not saying Kento is wrong. All I'm saying is I think we should think. I'm not saying something didn't attack four of us today, I'm just saying we don't know exactly what it is."

Rowen immediately snapped into tactician-mode, nightsky eyes going steely as he glanced back and forth between his friends. "'Kay. So what do we know?"

The five Ronin and Mia were the sort of people you'd want to have in a round-table discussion in a place like a college classroom or a police squad room. "We know that something—or things—attacked Sage and Mia in the library," Cye said, "and then Kento, Mia and me in the park."

"It bit me," Mia supplied. "When it was very small. It had very sharp, pointy teeth."

"Like the squirrel-thing," Kento jumped in. "It had fangs."

Mia winced and clutched her throbbing, bandaged hand in agreement. "I think it can make itself bigger," she said. "Or at least look bigger."

"That doesn't make any sense," Ryo said.

"None of this makes any sense," Cye countered. "Squirrels can't swim, either, and this one did. I saw it swimming. Swimming fast."

"Maybe squirrels can't swim," Rowen declared. "Maybe they can, but they just don't."

"The point is that they don't," Cye pressed. "Even if they could, they don't. And a dog," he continued, looking to Sage, "would not attack a fully grown man unless he was hurt or unconscious. But it did attack you, Sage."

"It attacked me because I struck out at it," Sage persisted, but his voice betrayed his own faltering confidence in his theory.

"Okay," Ryo jumped in, hoping to be useful. "Why did you hit out at it, Sage?"

A sudden flush colored Halo's cheek. "It attacked Mia. It was going after—" He stopped, blinking, embarrassment forgotten as he remembered. "It wanted her bag."

"Hiro's bag," Mia clarified. "It tried to take it from me. When you dropped to the floor, Sage, it came over you after the bag. It didn't want either of us; we were just in its way."

"I repeat: this doesn't make any sense," Ryo said, rubbing at an unruly eyebrow in intense frustration. "If only I'd been there."

"Careful what you wish for," Cye said darkly, looking over the gory pictures in the tabloid. "I don't think we've seen the last of this thing."

Mia took charge, tossing her hair over her shoulders and putting on a matter-of-fact expression. "Okay. I know it sounds crazy, but I really think we're all talking about the same animal here. We all noticed the same things about it—sharp teeth, red eyes—"

"I saw three eyes," Kento said. "I mean, the thing was right in my face and I was a little panicky, but I could swear I saw three eyes. Anyone else get that impression?"

After a beat, there was a soft sigh and Sage raised his hand.

"I figured I'd just made it up," the blond said tiredly. "It was right on top of me; it was trying to get through me to Mia and I was…I wasn't thinking clearly." That flush crossed the bridge of his nose again.

"Out of all the senseless theories we've got here, Mia's senseless theory makes…well, the most sense," Cye said, cheering up a bit. "Guess there really is a murderous beast on the loose!"

Ryo's brows shot up. "Whoa."

Kento was fidgeting, his eyes dancing with glee. Noticing this, Sage treated his friends to a rueful smile. "Go ahead, Kento. You can say 'I told you so'."

Unable to help smiling, Kento clapped Sage on the shoulder. "Nah, that just doesn't quite cover it, buddy," he said cheerfully.

He lasted about a minute before breaking into a triumphant grin and adding, "But I did, I told you so, you schmuck."

Sage smirked. "Don't push it, Hardrock."

"No friggin' way," Rowen said. "I don't b'lieve it!"

"What, that there's really a beast?" Ryo asked, wishing he'd been there to see it too. He was feeling hopelessly out of the loop.

"No, that Kento wuz right about somethin'!" The Warrior of Strata grinned cheekily.

Kento frowned. "Dead," he declared, pushing his chair back and rising menacingly. "You are so dead, Strata."

Cye restrained Kento in a half-nelson almost calmly, as if he were so used to it that he didn't even need to concentrate any more.

"So what do we do?" Ryo asked, while Rowen dodged around him out of Kento's reach.

"Do?" Cye asked, holding a struggling Kento steady effortlessly. "What we do is stay the hell out of its way."

"What!" Kento forgot about killing Rowen and broke free of Cye's hold to smack a fist into his open hand. "This thing's been killing people. I say we take it out."

"I think I agree with Cye," Mia said slowly, as if she were thinking. "At least for now. We don't know enough about this thing yet to make any kind of concrete plan of attack. We need more information."

Kento gave his "big sister" an eager, pleading look. "That's where you shine, beautiful. Get your books! Look stuff up!"

"Enough," Sage said sharply. "Whatever we're doing, we're not doing it tonight. It's late, and I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm dressing my wounds and going to bed."

Ryo nodded. "Good idea. Sleep'll do us all some good, and in the morning, if we still feel strange about it, we can talk it over some more."

Eventually, everyone agreed with this, even Kento, and they dispersed to their various nighttime routines. All except for Mia, that is.

Hiro's satchel lay against her overnight bag as though it were snuggling up to it. Now she padded across the floor and retrieved it, bringing it back to the empty table. It was much easier to spread out across the larger surface here than it had been in the coffee shop, and she tried to look at everything with fresh eyes, as though something would jump out and give her a clue as to why a strange, unreal animal that shouldn't exist would want to take something in this bag away from her.

Still, no matter how she studied the notes, the result was the same—she wasn't even sure how what the pages contained could make up a thesis project, let alone something bigger. And the only person who could have answered the ever-growing list of her questions was dead. No one would ever be able to understand this book, not now or ever again.

Mia blinked, the whimsical drawings of nekomata and kitsune seeming to scamper across the pages in her exhaustion. She closed the cover gently on all of Hiro's careful notes and understood fully, for the first time, the waste of his life.

A sigh from the doorway caused her to look up, tongue sticking in her mouth as she saw what was there. Sage was leaning against the doorframe like an ad for expensive cologne, hair tousled adorably, his chest bare and his eyes sleepy. Mia had to force herself not to follow the lines of his muscles down his torso to the waistband of his loose pants, where her imagination was tempted to take over.

Forcing her eyes to his face, Mia managed to discipline her lips enough to form words. "What is it, Sage? Do you need something?"

He shook his head, eyes pale and drowsy as he looked her over with a tilt of his neck.

Mia felt her own lips twist in a playful smirk. "Just wanted me to see how good you look without your shirt on?"

Blood rushed to Sage's face. He straightened, as if suddenly aware of his unintended posing against the door, and the angry mark on his neck was more clearly visible. "The burn doesn't like anything touching it. Every shirt I have has a high collar, and it rubs against the wound. I'm trying not to aggravate it."

Mia was briefly disappointed at his instantaneous return to severity, but she smiled. "I was only teasing, hotstuff. Lighten up."

Sage's lower lip dropped in the slightest pout and his flush deepened, only reinforcing the careless male-model look. "Speaking of burns—"

"We weren't," she interjected cheerfully.

Sage's eyes narrowed as he continued. "Speaking of burns, I came here to check on yours. How is your hand?"

She shrugged, unwrapping the gauze and turning in her chair to show it to him. "Hurts, but it's just a scratch. You should worry more about yourself. Yours is a lot worse than mine."

"Halo takes care of me," he insisted, his eyes the deep violet of an autumn night sky. "It's you I c—" He stopped, correcting himself, "It's you I'm worried about."

"I'm okay," she said softly. "Thanks to you."

Those winter-cool eyes warmed over for the sparest of seconds. "Are you?" His eyes dropped to the books spread out over the table.

She gave a little chuckle, flipping the notebook open once more, the pages overlapping the glossy tabloid beneath it. "Want to know a secret?" she asked. "I sort of wanted it to be a dog."

A moment of perfect understanding passed between the girl and the Warrior of Halo as he answered. "Me, too."

"You were right, though," she said after a pause. "We've all had a long day and…"

She trailed off, something on the pages finally making sense to her; she was nearing the end of the section where Hiro had summarized his collected legends about demons and all the pieces that made them up, forked tails and strange eyes…

That's it, she realized, a small possibility snapping into place in her brain. But before she could vocalize it, she was distracted from the notebook by Sage's sudden closeness, the way his cheek brushed hers as he leaned in to see the book, one arm on either side of her, large hands braced against the table. He'd seen the connection too. "What the hell?" he demanded, his voice soft but ferocious.

She didn't understand how she knew—but as soon as she said it aloud, the more she was sure she was on the right track. "There's something here." She tapped a finger on the notebook for emphasis. "Hiro knew about the strange animal we've been seeing."

Sage snatched the tabloid up, his icicle eyes scanning the print like frozen radar. Snapping a finger against the page, he said, "There. It says the first incident was reported over a month ago. When were those notes written?"

Mia shook her head helplessly, flipping notebook pages. "They're scattered all over. Hiro wasn't exactly the most organized person in the world—he had a system, but it's erratic. It must have made sense to him, but I can't really understand it."

The tabloid crinkled in Sage's fist. "Do you think Hiro was studying this…this thing?"

Mia chewed her soft lower lip. "It's a thought. And it would make sense that he was trying to tie it to ancient legends—I mean, we can't agree on what this animal looked like or what it really is. A demon makes more sense than anything else we've come up with so far." She leafed rapidly through the pages, growling softly in frustration at herself. "And now there's something out there, killing people…" Her gaze drifted to the satchel. "And trying to steal Hiro's research."

Summer-bright eyes met winter-cool ones as she looked up at him. "This was no accident. There's someone else involved here."

"There's no proof of that," Sage said, not liking the direction this was going in. "Let's just say you're right and Hiro was trying to study demons. Who's to say that he didn't stumble across this one, and it didn't want to play nice with him?"

Mia shook her fox-colored head. "Demons don't push people down staircases and try to make it look like an accident. If Hiro had discovered a demon and it turned on him, it would have just torn him to pieces, like those homeless people, those animals." She placed a hand on the tabloid, fingers brushing his. "And a demon wouldn't try to steal the evidence and cover it all up. Don't you see? There's a person behind this."

Sage fought to calm himself, his grip on the magazine releasing slightly. "You," he said softly, "are certainly never boring, I'll give you that."

Before she could ask him what that was supposed to mean, Ryo appeared in the doorway, grinning. "Can you two keep it down? Some of us are trying to get some sleep out here." Arching a brow at his friends, his expression turned serious. "You guys okay?"

"Maybe this can't wait till the morning after all," Sage said. "Are the others still awake?"

Ryo's brows knit. "Yeah. What's going on?"

It was Mia who answered. "The plot's thickening."

In a matter of minutes, they were all gathered in the dining area again, each fighting to be heard over the others.

"I told you," Kento was saying. "I told you this was serious and no one believed me and—"

"I still say we should just keep out of this," Cye maintained, shifting his weight from foot to foot uneasily. "This hasn't got anything to do with us and we should just stay away from it."

"The monster isn't doing this on its own," Mia insisted. "Someone's controlling it. Someone's out there doing something evil, and that is our business."

"It doesn't matter who's controlling it," Kento argued. "The beast is the bigger concern here. We have to take it out, pronto."

"Someone who knew what to do," Mia shot back. "Someone who knew how to call it. The demon may be dangerous, but whoever's giving it orders is the real monster here. That's who we need to aim for. If we get him, the attacks will stop."

"How would we even find them?" Cye interrupted. "We wouldn't even know where to start. This is a bad idea."

As soon as he had an opening, Sage joined the conversation with his characteristic deliberate thinking. "Why does there have to be a difference, Mia?" he asked. "If we take out the demon, that's great. If we come across the person who summoned it, we can stop them. Either way, the killing ends."

"It won't, don't you see?" Mia sounded weary. "This person isn't screwing around. That thing nearly killed us today."

For the first time since the argument had started, Cye blanched. He had no answer for that.

Strengthened by her conviction, Mia continued. "We were lucky today. That thing knew what it wanted to do in the park and nearly pulled it off. And before that, it was hiding out in the library. If Sage hadn't been there, I'd be toast and they'd be calling it an accident, just like those animals, those dead homeless people in the news. Just like Hiro." Sighing as her adrenaline ebbed away, she held up the notebook in her hands. "This is serious stuff, guys. Every scholar, monk, priestess, professor, and archivist agrees on one thing—calling up demons is a big deal. It's not like dialing a number out of the phone book. A lot of elements have to align for the ritual to work, and it's dangerous. If something goes awry, it can have a very negative effect on the spellcaster." She bit her lip. "Someone risked a lot to do this. Whatever their goal is, they want it very badly and they're not afraid to kill anyone who gets in their way."

"We got in its way, and we're still here," Kento said encouragingly.

Mia blinked at her "little brother". "Come on. If you sold your soul for something—if you wanted it that badly—you'd kill to protect it. Wouldn't you?"

Silence settled over the group, each thinking of the things they loved best, the things they'd risk more than their lives for.

Sage spoke up. "What's our next move?"

Cye turned to him, incredulous. "Are you serious?!"

The argument broke out all over again.

"Even Sage thinks we should take care of this," Kento said.

"We don't have a plan," Cye argued.

"Stop it," Mia cried. "We can't fight amongst ourselves."

Rowen pushed himself into the middle of the group. "You guys are actin' like a buncha—"

"All right, listen," Ryo yelled, the better to be heard over the conflicting arguments. It was the first time he'd spoken since they'd reconvened. "Listen to me, everyone."

All eyes turned to Wildfire.

"Here's the deal, guys," Ryo continued. "Whatever else is going on, we know for sure that there's a demon out there, and five will get you ten that it's behind those weird mutilation attacks. The police don't believe in demons. They won't investigate that angle, and even if they did, they aren't equipped for it. Whether the monster's doing this on its own—" He glanced over at Kento, "—or someone's controlling it—" Here his gaze swung to Mia, "—it's dangerous and it needs to be stopped. Well, you know what I think? The gang's all here. Let's do something about it."

"So much for a peaceful vacation," Cye said, smiling ruefully. "Would someone promise me a cup of hot tea when all this is over?"

"I'm serious," Ryo continued. "Right now, we're the ones with the power to do something about this. And we might be the only ones who can. Anyone who wants to bow out can do it now, but I say we fire it up." The Ronin of Wildfire thrust his hand out palm down in the middle of the group.

Surprisingly, the first agreement came from Sage, who silently but determinedly placed his hand over Ryo's. He didn't smile, but there was a familiar gleam in his eye. He was ready to go to battle.

"Yeeeeeeeeeee-haaaaaaaaah!" Kento cheered, clapping his hand down so hard that the other two boys winced. "To arms, baby!"

Cye rolled his eyes. "Here we go again," he sighed, but put his hand firmly on top of Kento's. "To arms—if we absolutely have to."

"We absolutely hafta," Rowen said, nodding and adding his hand to the pile. "Someone needs t'show this demon how we do things downtown."

And then, all eyes, all smiles turned to the last person in the room—the last member of the team.

"What about you, gorgeous?" Rowen asked, eyes twinkling. "Are ya in or are ya out?"

Mia felt her chest tighten with a sharp, sweet pang of happiness, even in such a troubled time. Miles and months be damned. Wherever these boys were, she was home and time had no meaning.

She curled her hand on top of theirs and squeezed. "Friends together," she agreed. "To arms."

In her dreams, Mia was in the university library again, her boys and White Blaze crowded around her, all waiting for her to explain her theory.

"Get your books!" Kento entreated. "Look stuff up!"

Yes, she thought, reaching for a book on the shelf. Pulling it out, she heard a hiss and red eyes flashed in the gloom before teeth set themselves once more into her hand.

Mia sat up with a gasp. Her hand was throbbing, most likely from being pressed beneath her body as she slept. She unwrapped the gauze from it, examining the wound. In the morning, she'd rewrap it.

Combing her fingers idly through her hair, she glanced around the cabin and tried to slow her breathing, feeling safer already at the sight that greeted her. Her boys were lying in blanketed clumps on the cabin floor all around her, and she smiled at the sounds of snoring coming from the far corner, the bundle that contained not Sage, but Kento, dead to the world with a sheet twisted around his chest.

That'll be something to tease him about at breakfast, Mia thought gleefully.

Sage, by contrast, was lying quietly beside the low sofa they'd insisted she take. Mia thought that after she'd stepped on him that first night at Ryo's, he'd have wanted to stay as far away from her as possible, but he slept soundly on the hardwood floor, his face as calm as ever as if the music of the spheres were playing behind his closed eyes. Ryo was cuddled against White Blaze, who was sprawled out perpendicular to the blond with his nose tucked under one paw. All Wildfire's troubles were smoothed out beneath his tangle of hair; every so often his nose would twitch as he chased dreams. Mia suppressed a giggle; the boy and the tiger looked remarkably alike as they breathed deeply in the slow rhythm of slumber. Cye was curled up nearly into a ball, holding his pillow around his head, perhaps to drown out Kento's snoring.

The roll of blankets closest to the door was empty. Pulling the hem of Ryo's borrowed "Milk Ball" t-shirt down over her lycra shorts, Mia padded outside on bare feet, opening and closing the cabin door as quietly as possible so as not to wake the others.

Someone was sitting on the grass, arms stretched out behind him, hands braced against the ground. His face was tilted up towards the night, the moonlight carving his profile into high relief.

"Rowen," Mia said, and the boy turned bleary eyes to her, startled by the sound of her voice. Rubbing at one eye with long fingers, he said, "Mia. Hey. Was just sittin' out heah, stargazin'. Couldn't sleep."

The beautiful longbow at his side told the real story, and Mia's heart burned with a feeling of incredible sweetness. The Ronin of Strata had been standing guard for all of them.

"Next time, wake one of us," she suggested softly, walking closer, the grass cool and soft under her bare feet. "We'll take turns." Sinking down into the grass beside him, she arranged Ryo's borrowed shirt around her thighs. "I can't sleep either. I'll sit with you."

He slanted a grateful smile at her, then turned his gaze back to the heavens.

"It is beautiful, isn't it?" Mia sighed.

"You can't imagine it unless you've been there," Rowen answered, his eyes hooded and dreamy, the sparkling tableau above them reflected beneath his lashes.

"Can you believe it?" she asked, bumping her shoulder against his. "The earth spins and drags everyone with it, warriors and tigers and girls who tag along, but the stars stay still and watch it all go by."

"Nah," Rowen said, ripping up a clump of grass and tossing it aside. "Stars don't stay still at all! They go everywhere."

"How do you figure?" she asked, twirling a blade of grass between her own fingers.

"Stars go everywhere," he repeated. "They're on the surface of water, an' in girls' eyes, an' in wind chimes an' champagne n'stuff. Stars are all around us." He pulled at another tuft of grass, as if he were suddenly maddened by being earthbound. "Makes me just feel sorry f'r everyone who doesn't know what it's like. Sometimes, I really think that people only fight an' kill each other 'cause they've neva swam th' Milky Way, an' they dunno what starlight smells like." His heaven's-blue eyes stared formlessly into the grass, his thoughts far above in space. "If they knew…"

Rolling her weight to one hip, Mia moved behind the Ronin of Strata, wrapping her arms around his chest from behind, cradling him between her knees and pulling his head back to her shoulder so they could both look up. "You'll be back up there someday, Ro. All the true warriors rest in the stars." She pointed to three stars in a line and the surrounding points of light. "See? Orion the Hunter. He rises every night, and the scorpion will never sting him again." A wave of her hand indicated another small line of stars. "Sagitta, the arrow that slew the dragon Tiamat." She smiled, pressing her cheek against his temple. "You'll be there, too, shooting stars across the night. Heaven's archer."

His hair tickled her face as he relaxed against her. "Could charm a black hole inta lettin' ya jump out, talkin' pretty like that. So, ya like 'em?" he asked, as someone might ask, Do you like my new shoes, or, Do you like my car?

"I love them, Rowen," she assured him. "They're wonderful."

"Pick one," he said, one hand straying to his longbow. "Pick a star an' I'll shoot it down for ya."

She smiled. "You pick. Bring me a good one."

"Bring ya th' very best one," he promised. "Th' prettiest one for ya." He pointed. "What d'ya think of that one?"

Mia giggled, cuddling her friend. "Silly. That's the moon."

Author's Notes:

"Go go gadget double standard!": Mia is putting a spin on a line from the 1983 cartoon Inspector Gadget, which my cousin and I used to watch as kitts in Brooklyn; when Inspector Gadget would use one of his mechanical arms or weapons, he would say the command "Go go gadget (whatever)."

Mia can be seen practicing with a naginata in one of the OVAs (I think.) A naginata is a pole weapon with a curved blade at its tip and a metal cap at the other end to counterweight. They were used by samurai, but later on became associated with fighting women, which is totally cool. It also makes sense—the samurai women were expected to be able to defend their homes while their men were away. And I'm sure they did a hell of a job of it, too! Naginata eventually became used for sport instead of for battle, being viewed as a tool of etiquette and discipline. I wish I owned one, but till I can get one I'll have to settle for my no-dachi replica and the nifty wall mount my neighbor made for it out of Brazilian mahogany.

Enchiladitos, they make you wanna eat 'em: Late at night, Star likes to watch "Aqua Teen Hunger Force" and laugh her fool head off. Enchiladitos and their very catchy jingle make an appearance in the season 2 episode, "Super Bowl". (sings) Ay yi yi yi, I am Enchiladitos…

Frankenberry, Booberry, and Count Chocula: Ahh, the breakfast cereals of my youth. Now, those esteemed marshmallow monsters are hosting Zombie Idol on Robot Chicken.

"Nympho info": While I'm not exactly sure where the term originates, we called Cosmopolitan magazine "nympho info" when I was in college. I hate women's magazines (except for Vogue; I love to look at pretty things, even if I can't afford them) and I especially hate Cosmo, which is so obsessed with sex that it's actually boring. And I obsess enough about my weight without magazines telling me that everything I eat is an indulgence and eating it is an act of weakness. That's complete slosh. I'm going to keep my dating details to myself, and I'm going to eat cookies whenever I want. Whatever! I'll do what I want!

When the crowd approaches Kento and Cye in the park, Kento makes a series of anachronistic references to pop culture. He tells them his name is Tony DiNozzo, a reference to a character on one of my favorite television shows, NCIS. He also introduces Cye as Derek Zoolander, a reference to the main character of one of my sister's (and my) favorite Ben Stiller movies, Zoolander. (Cye is really really really good looking!) Finally, Kento refers to Mia as Pepper, a reference to the ever-efficient Pepper Potts, assistant to Tony Stark in the entirely enjoyable movie Iron Man (which is of course based on the comic books of the same name.) The film Armor Plated, naturally, does not exist. Only Kento could come up with such an idea!

Ryo's cabin: I do not know the floorplan of Ryo's cabin. I've seen some pictures of it in art books, but I really don't know what the rooms are like so I just made it up. For some reason I see it having a kitchenette, not a full kitchen, and being mostly open-plan.

Axl and Slash: At the sight of Mia and Cye's electric-shocked hair, Ryo makes a reference to Axl Rose and Slash, frontman and early lead guitar for the ever-awesome Guns N' Roses.

Constellations: The constellations Mia tells Rowen about are northern-hemisphere constellations. I wasn't sure they'd be visible on the hillside Mia and Rowen are sitting on, but my beta says yes. The specific constellations Mia calls attention to are Orion, who's probably more famous for the three stars that make up Orion's Belt. In Greek legend, Orion treaded on the scorpion, which stung and killed him in retaliation. As reward for being such a great warrior, they set the hunter in the stars with his dog. When Orion rises, the scorpion sets, ensuring that it will never sting him again. Sagitta's legend is Mesopotamian—the god Marduk slays the monster Tiamat with that enchanted arrow. I thought that fit Rowen rather nicely.

"Milk Ball": Anyone who's seen my Ronin fanart on DeviantART would know that I can't let an opportunity to poke fun at that ubiquitous "Milk Ball" shirt go. I have got to get me one of those.

Next chapter: The Ronin start sleuthing. And we finally get to the subplot my team's been waiting for. Goodness knows I've been waiting to get to it!