"Just when we'd thought everything was goin' in a new direction, ol' Keitaro had to pull another of his disappearing acts."
- Mitsune Konno; 'On a Wing and a Storm'

Chapter VIII:
Biggest Accomplishment and Runaway

August 15, 2006
Auditorium C, Tokyo University, Tokyo, Japan
1205 hours, local time

Silence filled the auditorium at Tokyo University, unbroken save for the flipping of pages and the scratching of pencils on paper. The entrance examination for the fall/winter term of Tokyo University had just begun.

As he skimmed over the first page of the exam, Keitaro felt a smile creep across his face. Hey! I actually understand this! Yes! Four years of hard work are finally paying off!

The third-year ronin paused to run some rough calculations in his head. Let's see, if I score at least eight-five percent on today's test, then I'm in. He flipped through the test booklet, scanning the material he would be tested on. Hey, I can definitely get at least eighty percent on this blasted English exam.

With his grin continuing to widen, he realized that he was in danger of burning himself out again, as he'd done at the previous center exam. Whoa, whoa, calm down there. Just take it one step at a time. Let's see, my center exam scores were… Yeah, no doubt. At the rate I'm going, then in a few weeks…

His mind drifting into daydream mode, Keitaro watched in happiness as his most recent fantasy played out in his mind. It was a few weeks after the exam, and the results had been posted. All of the residents of the Hinata, from Seno to Shinobu, were crowded around him, waiting with bated breath, as he scanned over the acceptance board.

And there it was!

"You're on the list, man!" Seno called.

"You made it!" Kitsune added.

Stepping up beside the kanrinin, Seno suddenly caught Keitaro with a sweep-kick, knocking his feet out from under him and sending the manager falling backwards into the waiting hands of the other residents. Grinning from ear to ear, the swordsman joined in by grabbing Keitaro's feet, and then all of them proceeded to throw him into the air in jubilation, proclaiming, "Congratulations, Keitaro!"

"Keitaro…" a voice called out as they set him back on the ground.

He spun around to find Naru standing there, waiting for him, clad not in her usual sweater and skirt, but in a beautiful white wedding dress, complete with a veil, and with her wings curled around her back and resting on her shoulders. She held a bouquet of flowers in her hand, and a light red blush on her cheeks.

"You did it, Keitaro," she said, her eyes shimmering with happiness. "Our promise has been fulfilled."

Without warning, the scene shifted to a chapel. Naru was still wearing the wedding dress, only now her wings were extended behind her, adding a perfect touch to her look. Keitaro's attire had changed to a well-cut tuxedo, and he noticed that the pews were filled with every one of their friends and family, all the people who had supported them every step of the way.

Suddenly, the stained-glass window high in the chapel shattered and a shadow fell over the proceedings. All eyes turned up to find Seta Noriyasu, Keitaro's sometime employer and Naru's former tutor, perched on the broken windowsill like the devil in Alloway's church.

"Hold it right there, part-timer!" he called out. "You think you're ready to hold Naru's hand?" The absent-minded archaeologist grinned. "I'll test you to see if you're worthy of her! Ready, go!"

The scene shifted once more to a beach at sunset. Naru, Keitaro, and Seta were the only ones present, their shadows stretching out to the horizon in the fading light of the sun. Naru stood a good distance away from the two men as they fought it out at the water's edge, trading punches and kicks in a flurry of movement so fast that it made her dizzy to watch.

"Please stop, both of you!" she cried futilely. Even she knew that she couldn't get them to stop at this point; it was a matter of honor between them. They would accept no other outcome but victory.

Then, above the sounds of blocking and swinging blows, she heard two especially hard cracking sounds, and both combatants froze in place, before simultaneously collapsing face-first into the sand.

So perhaps they would both accept defeat…

"You pack one hell of a punch, part-timer," Seta said. Pushing himself to his feet, the archaeologist dusted himself off, helped Keitaro up, and then walked toward the setting sun, calling over his shoulder without looking back, "I know I can entrust her to you now." He waved jauntily. "You take good care of her now."

And then Keitaro was alone on the beach with Naru. He turned toward her, smiling, and took her hands in his. Leaning in toward her, the last thing he saw as he closed his eyes was her beautiful, smiling face.

And as if performing the actions of an alarm clock, Seno's voice suddenly rang out in Keitaro's mind: "Bing, reality!"

This successfully jarred the daydreaming examinee back into wakefulness. He shook his head once to clear it, then picked his glasses up off the desk and turned his attention down to his test. Well, that was a nice daydream, but now it's time to get to work.

What he next heard gave him strong reason to believe that he'd done something recently to severely anger God; the voice of the exam overseer calling out, "You have five minutes left."

WHAT?

Keitaro's eyes immediately shot to the wristwatch he had laid out beside his exam. As his mind registered that almost the entire given period for the exam had indeed passed, he felt as if the floor had been pulled out from beneath him. No! Swiftly edging toward panic, his eyes shot from his untouched answer sheet, to the other examinees hurrying to finish their tests, back to his answer sheet, and down to the exam sheet.

This can't be happening!

Auditorium C, Tokyo University, Tokyo, Japan
1505 hours, local time

"How'd you do, Mutsumi?" Naru asked as she walked alongside the older woman toward Keitaro's exam room.

"It went off without a hitch," Mutsumi replied, smiling proudly. "I didn't faint this time."

"That's great," Naru said, stopping as she reached the exam room. "I feel pretty good about my test, too." Grabbing the handle, she twisted it in her hand and then flung the doors open. "Hey, Keitaro! How did you–"

She stopped as she realized that the room was completely empty. No examinees, no student helpers, no test proctors, and no Keitaro. She frowned as she released the door handle, feeling a sense of sadness wash over her. He'd promised that he'd wait in the exam room for her after he was done…

In her usual thoughtless way, Mutsumi breezed into the room and proceeded to inspect every row of desks, checking in the leg wells and between the aisles, just in case Keitaro was hiding in there somewhere. Despite her vast insightfulness, there were still times where she possessed the thought processes of a child. "Ara, if Keitaro's playing hide and seek with us, I think he's winning," she announced.

Naru ignored her friend's silliness and entered the room, walking toward the only desk that still had papers on it. She felt drawn to it, and as soon as the words on the top sheet of paper became clear in her vision, she knew why.

Don't look for me; Keitaro.

Her heart leaping up into her throat, she rushed to the desk and snatched the piece of paper up, giving it a stare normally used to force information to make itself known to a certain ranger from Texas. She felt tears welling up in her eyes, and her face contorted into a grimace as she fought to contain them.

As if sensing Naru's pain, Mutsumi suddenly stopped her childish antics and turned toward her friend, an expression of absolute seriousness dominating her airy features. She crossed the room to stand by her younger friend, and read the note that she still held in her hands.

Without a word, she pulled Naru into a comforting hug, and almost immediately the angel broke down, sobbing into Mutsumi's shoulder as she wrapped her arms around the Okinawan native, crushing the note inadvertently as she gripped the back of Mutsumi's shirt.

Tightly holding her friend, Mutsumi raised her head and stared off through the near wall, internally cursing their mutual friend's impulsive habits. Keitaro, there's nothing in the world that would cause Naru to stop loving you, so why run away? Couldn't you see that this would only hurt her more?

Downtown Street, Hinata, Japan
1518 hours, local time

"Keitaro?"

The third, make that fourth-year ronin finally raised his head from staring at the concrete to find his old friends, Shirai and Haitani, standing in front of him, looking at him worriedly. Shirai was holding some sort of flier in his hands.

"Eh?" Keitaro muttered, completely drained of feeling. "Oh. Hey, guys."

Shirai and Haitani exchanged glances. "Uhh, you okay, Keitaro?" Haitani asked.

"Never better," the Hinata kanrinin replied lifelessly.

"Riiiight…" Shirai said, obviously not buying it. He looked down at the flier he held, then raised it so Keitaro could read it. That is, of course, considering that their friend looked up from the ground again. "Hey, check this out, man. It's a job listing we found at university."

Haitani nodded, and chuckled. "Manual labor overseas, with no experience necessary," he said, naming the high points of the flier. "Terms subject to change. Ain't that pretty fishy? What the hell kind of job is that, anyway?"

Needless to say, both university students were shocked when Keitaro suddenly reached up, without looking, and seized the flier from Shirai's hand, before brushing between them and continuing his bleak, depressing walk down the sidewalk. All without uttering another word to them.

Hinata Apartments, Hinata, Japan
1547 hours, local time

By the time Mutsumi and Naru returned to the Hinata, the older woman had managed to calm down her friend, but only just so. On the way back, Mutsumi learned that Naru had immediately jumped to the conclusion that Keitaro had assumed he'd failed his exam again, and had gone off to commit suicide rather than face whatever perceived negative reaction Naru would've had toward such news.

"I…it wouldn't have been such a big deal," Naru had sobbed. "I could've waited…another year… I wouldn't have been mad at him… He didn't have to…" Unable to bring herself to utter the phrase 'kill himself,' she broke down again, burying her face in her hands and crying her heart out.

"Don't think like that," Mutsumi had said soothingly, patting her younger friend's back and ignoring the glances from passersby, some of them disgusted, but most sympathetic. "I know he's okay. He just needed to get away for a little while so he could think, just like the last couple times. He'll be okay and come back in a few days."

The two entered the apartments in uncomfortable silence, save for the occasional hiccup Naru emitted from having cried so hard. Kitsune had been planning another celebration party for when the testing trio had returned, but the fox woman was currently passed out on the couch, a half-empty bottle of sake dangling from her fingers, and three completely empty ones surrounding her.

The only sounds in the living room were the tiny sounds of blasters, explosions, and war cries from the PSP in Seno's hands, the swordsman sitting on a loveseat with his back toward the entrance. He was completely engrossed in his game, Star Wars Battlefront II, and didn't notice the two women enter.

Both of them knew from experience that when he got caught up in a game like that, it would take very little, short of a real-life explosion right in his face, to get his attention. The pair began to cautiously sneak toward the stairs, hoping to get up to Naru's room without drawing the attention of any of the tenants.

They were halfway across the living room when the only other thing capable of getting Seno's attention away from a video game appeared at the top of the stairs. "Seno, have you seen my–" Motoko began, then noticed Naru and Mutsumi sneaking across the living room. "Oh?"

"Seen your what?" he asked, then looked up, immediately spying the sneaking pair. "Eh? Oh, hey guys. You're back pretty late. Where's–" He had been about to say 'Keitaro,' but the way that Mutsumi suddenly turned toward him and made a slicing motion across her neck silenced him. Time to improvise. "Ahh, where's… uhh… my copy of the third volume of A.I. Love You! Didn't you borrow that from me, Mutsumi?"

His poor attempt at a save was noticed by everyone except Naru and Kitsune, the latter too busy being unconscious, the former too busy being distraught over her missing boyfriend to even have paid attention to what Seno had said. But still, appearances had to be maintained.

"Oh, silly me!" Mutsumi replied, chuckling nervously. "I thought I left it with you before I went to exams this morning. Wasn't Motoko wanting to read that series?"

For her part, Motoko wanted to know how in the hell Mutsumi knew that. She had seen the series amongst Seno's collection of manga and decided at random to read it. Even though the third volume was not missing from his bookshelf, she had in fact just finished reading that volume, she still wondered how Mutsumi knew she'd been reading it.

"Naru, why don't you go on up to your room?" Mutsumi suggested, smiling innocently. "I'll see if Seno's manga is still in my bag, then I'll come up and bring you some tea."

Nodding dully, Naru made her way up the stairs past Motoko, who gave her a friendly smile, before continuing up to the third floor.

As soon as she was out of sight, Motoko rushed down the stairs to sit on the loveseat with Seno, who had paused his game and tossed the PSP aside. "What's wrong with Naru?" she asked, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees, her chin resting in the palm of her right hand.

Sighing mightily, Mutsumi flopped down into the nearby recliner. "It's Keitaro," she said. "Naru and I went to get him after our test ended so we could come back here and party, but he was gone when we got to his exam room, and Naru found this on his desk." Pulling the crumpled note out of her pocket, she straightened it as best she could over her left leg, then handed it to Seno.

The swordsman took the note from her and held it so that Motoko could see it, then read the five simple words on its surface. Their reaction was immediate; Seno scowled as Motoko shook her head slowly. "Bastard," the swordsman muttered. "After all that me and the others have done to get you and Naru together, you go and do this to her?"

Neither woman disagreed with that sentiment.

Commercial Fishing Boat Maru, Pacific Ocean, Near International Date Line
1902 hours, local time

On a large, modified fishing boat steaming out to sea, a crew of potential applicants to the job posting Shirai and Haitani had showed Keitaro gathered in groups of various sizes. Almost all of them were drinking heavily, and most were telling stories to one another or playing cards.

The only visible exception was Keitaro, lying face-down on the deck in a puddle of tears, mashing his face into it as though attempting to drown himself. As the young man blubbered incoherently against the deck, a figure in brown pants and boots stopped beside him. "Keitaro? That you, part-timer?"

Lifting his soaked face from the deck, he looked up to find Seta standing over him, leaning partially over with his hands planted over his knees. "Seta?"

Smiling, the archaeologist helped Keitaro to his feet and led the downtrodden young man away from the pool of tears, then handed him a mug of beer as large as his head. "Surprised you decided to come along, part-timer," he said. "Want some info on where we're going?"

Keitaro looked at the beer dubiously, then decided that the figurative definition of 'drowning his troubles' was a far better cry than literally drowning himself in his own tears. So after taking an appreciative chug of the amber-colored liquid, he nodded to answer Seta's question.

The archaeologist nodded as well, then began fishing through the pockets of his battered white labcoat. "We're headed for an island called Parara…something," he said, producing a packet of cigarettes in one hand and a lighter in the other. Tapping the package against his left wrist until a cigarette popped out of the top, Seta snared it in his teeth, then replaced the package and began thumbing his lighter. "According to my mentor, this place is supposedly where the ancient turtle civilization originated, so we're going to do some excavating."

Finally managing to ignite his lighter, Seta brushed the flame against the end of the cigarette until it caught, then put away the lighter and took a deep breath of the cancer stick. He carefully watched as Keitaro continued to chug away at the beer. "You seem awfully depressed," he noted. "What's wrong?"

Sighing, Keitaro set his empty mug down and gave the bottle sitting to their side a withering glare. "I blew my chance of getting into Tokyo University," he replied bleakly, closing his eyes as he lowered his head. "I drifted off into a daydream during the most crucial part of the test."

When he got not a peep from his sometime employer in reply, he looked up to see that Seta was now sitting with one of the various groups of people. He sighed, his mood severely worsening. "Even Seta's abandoning me now…"

The failed ronin pushed himself to his feet, then wandered over to the edge of the deck, wrapping his hands around the salt-rusted metal railing. "At this rate, there's probably nobody in the world who cares about me right now," he muttered. Idly, he shoved his right hand into his coat pocket.

Feeling the weight of items within, he grabbed them and pulled them out, and found himself staring at his exam ticket and the small booklet in which he kept all his photo stickers. As he stared down at them, he felt a heavy weight pressing against his heart. "I guess… I don't need these anymore," he said, closing his eyes. Goodbye, Tokyo University. Goodbye, Hinata Apartments. Goodbye… Naru…

Rearing back his right arm, he let out a grunt as he hurled the items out to sea with as much strength as he could muster. He opened his eyes, staring out over the water as he expected them to hit the ocean's surface and sink out of sight.

To his surprise and indignation, a sudden burst of headwind flared up, sending the lightweight paper items flying right back into his face. Grumbling in irritation, he reared back and threw them again, ignoring the fact that the headwind was still against him. After another return to his face, he once again attempted to throw them out to sea.

Cursing in one of the Star Wars languages he'd picked up from Seno, he was about to throw them out one more time, when his eyes fell on something on the back of the exam ticket. "Huh? What's this?"

Turning the ticket upright so he could read the writings, his eyes widened as he realized that the back of the ticket had been well-meaningly vandalized by everyone who lived at the apartments, wishing him well during the upcoming exam.

Get into Tokyo U, Keitaro! Su

I hope you pass this time. Haruka

We'll be Tokyo U students together? Mutsumi

Go on and work hard. ? I came up with this idea all by myself! Are you moved? Are you crying? Kitsune ?

Because of sempai's support, I work harder at school now. I believe that you can pass, sempai! Please work hard and good luck! Shinobu

I know you have courage and strength, Keitaro. Show me some results! Motoko

Take it easy and keep focused. I know you can do it, man. Seno

As he read the messages they had left him, he felt tears begin to well up in his eyes. "You guys…"

For a fleeting moment, he almost thought Naru hadn't signed the ticket, but then he realized that her message was hidden by his thumb, in the very corner:

Keitaro, Whether you pass or fail, we'll still have our promise, and each other. Love, Naru

Numbly, he read over the message Naru had left him several times, even going so far as to run his thumb over it to ensure that it truly existed. He fell to his knees, clutching the exam ticket to his chest. "Naru… how can I… I could never forget… any of you…"

He raised his free hand to his face, feeling tears seeping out from behind his glasses, around his hand, to slide down his face and fall to the deck of the ship below him. The misery of all the friends he was trying to abandon crushed in on him.

"I'm not even... worthy of your attention, Naru…" he whispered between sobs. "You, an angel, and me…? I'm just a worthless failure…"

Almost as if confirming his statement, the winds suddenly shifted, ripping the exam ticket out of his hand and blowing it out over the open ocean. His head shot up and he stared in horror at the sailing scrap of paper, feeling as if all his memories, all his ties to the friends he had failed, were being taken away from him on that scrap of paper.

"NO!" he shouted, leaping up from the deck and jumping after the exam ticket. "I won't let any of you go! Especially not Naru!"

As his flailing hand secured the exam ticket in his grasp, he grinned triumphantly. Then his mind caught up with his body, and he realized that he was no longer on the ship. In a comedically-cliché cartoon moment, he looked down to see nothing but ocean beneath him, before performing a spectacular belly-flop into the sea.

Up on deck, Seta looked up at the sudden splashing sound. "Hmm?"

With the surface rapidly receding above him, and his consciousness swiftly fading from lack of oxygen, Keitaro reached out imploringly to any gods or deities that would deign to intervene and save his life. But to his expectations, no such divine intervention came.

To think, I'll die in a place like this… he thought. I'm sorry, everyone… sorry, Naru…

He felt something thin and wiry brush against his back, before turning and seizing hold of him. A spooky, disembodied voice called out to him, "This is not your grave… But you are welcome in it…"

His last thought before losing consciousness was an ironic one; that even in death, he could not escape his damned daydreams.

Hinata Apartments, Hinata, Japan
1726 hours, local time

"Hey Su, go get that lightsaber you've been working on," Seno said.

The hyperactive girl grinned and dropped the two bowl-shaped electrical inducers she'd been holding, then reached behind her back. "No need!" she exclaimed. "I brought it down with the rest of my interrogation devices!"

She produced a bladeless, cylindrical weapon hilt and held it out to the swordsman. He, in turn, took it in his right hand, his left resting prominently on the sheathed hilt of his sword. In a departure from the norm, Seno wasn't wearing his usual red buddy Jesus shirt. This time, he wore a black shirt with an image of Chuck Norris wielding a pair of submachine guns, with the phrase "I don't step on toes, I step on necks" beneath it.

Turning the homemade lightsaber over in his palm, the swordsman cast a wicked grin over to the bound forms of Shirai and Haitani on the living room floor. He and Motoko had been out shopping when the raven-haired woman had spotted the two, and sensed that they knew something about Keitaro. Thus, she and Seno had captured the two former ronins and dragged them back to the apartments for an interrogation.

And every resident was out for blood that day.

Motoko stood beside Seno with the unsheathed Hina blade held loosely in a reverse left-handed grip, her own brand of the 'Demon Eyes' expression turned full-power on the hapless victims. Kitsune was on Seno's other side, a broken, jagged-edge sake bottle in hand and a malicious expression on her face. Giggling madly, Su scooped up the electrical inducers and smacked them together, causing a burst of electricity to leap between them, highlighting her features in a terror-inducing blue backwash. Shinobu stood off to one side, a frying pan clutched in her hands and tears in her eyes, but she looked more than willing to do her share to extort any information about Keitaro out of the prisoners.

Kitsune stepped up to the prisoners, leaning forward and resting her left arm on the matching knee, and brandishing the broken bottle threateningly. "I think it's about time you two pigeons started singin'," she said, a deadly-serious tone underscoring her normal accent. She waved the bottle threateningly over Haitani's lower region. "Before I suddenly lose control of this here bottle with its very sharp edges."

"P-please don't hurt us!" the taller man squeaked, squirming violently in an attempt to get away from Kitsune.

"We don't know anything!" Shirai added. "Honest!"

Standing up straight, Kitsune turned to look toward Seno, as did the other interrogators. The swordsman had drawn his blade two thirds of the way out of its sheath, angling the flat of the blade toward the prisoners.

"We don't know where Keitaro went!" Shirai proclaimed.

A crack appeared in Seno's blade.

"Wrong answer!" Kitsune exclaimed, grinning. "Since you two are bein' difficult, that means we've got no choice but to bring out our most successful, and terrifying, interrogator."

On cue, Su bounded back toward the closed door leading to the kitchen, yanking it open to reveal Haruka standing behind it, clad in her usual attire, and armed. Kitsune, Haruka, Seno, and Motoko had discussed beforehand that she would arm herself with a simple bullwhip as a show of intimidation, but all three conspirators blinked in surprised when she stepped out with a full-sized cat o'nine tails, with several additional braids tied into the dangling rope tails.

Wincing visibly, Seno knew that Haruka was definitely not taking the disappearance of her nephew lightly. Partially to scare the prisoners, and partially because he knew the potential of bloodletting was going to be high, he turned to the youngest two members of the Hinata apartments and said, "Su, Shinobu? I think you two should go upstairs. Now."

Shinobu immediately nodded and headed for the stairs, her eyes glued to the whip as though it were a snake coiled to strike her. Su, on the other hand, pouted. "I wanted to watch!" she protested.

Motoko turned her glare on the obstinate foreigner. "Su, do as he says," she ordered sternly.

Dropping into a full-body pout, Su sighed theatrically and trudged along the path Shinobu had worn; even she knew better than to mess with Motoko when she had that expression on her face. For several moments, the only sounds were Su's footsteps as she trudged up the stairs, and the terrified panting of Shirai and Haitani.

With the kids out of the room, Haruka crossed the living room to stand before the captives. "Save yourselves some pain," she said in her usual deadpan tone, snapping the menacing weapon in her hands. "Tell us where Keitaro is."

The pair squealed in terror, but Shirai stopped suddenly, his face turning red. "Well… if it's Haruka… I might not…mind…"

"I WANT NOTHING TO DO WITH YOUR TWISTED FANTASIES!" Haitani shrieked, as Motoko and Seno both grimaced at Shirai's apparent fetish, while Haruka's right eye twitched.

"Believe me, kid," she told the shorter prisoner, "if it'd been a bullwhip, you may have gotten off with just a few lash marks. This is guaranteed to leave scars, and some of the places I aim won't be pleasant at all."

As the color drained from Shirai's face, Haitani looked around desperately for any salvation. His eyes fell on Naru, sitting against a wall nearby with her legs drawn up to her chest, her forehead resting on her knees, and her face hidden by her legs.

"Come on, Naru, help us out!" he begged. "We seriously don't know anything."

At his plea for help, Naru stiffened, but didn't look up or change her posture.

A grin twisted Seno's features. "Boy, you just signed your death warrant. Haruka, put the whip away. We're about to not need it."

Smirking, Haruka coiled the whip and looped her arm through it, then reached up to pull her expended cigarette from her lips. She crushed the burning end between her fingers, then tossed the unlit butt away. "Naru, you remember what we told you," she said. "Let 'em have it."

The trio of interrogators cleared space, while the prisoners blinked in confusion, and Naru remained motionless.

And then she wasn't there anymore.

The last thing Haitani saw was a flash of white, and then the rapidly-receding Hinata apartments below him.

Shirai, meanwhile, had gone completely ashen at the sight of Naru crouched on the floor before him, her form still outstretched from delivering the devastating strike that had launched Haitani clear out of the building. And as to how she had managed to cross the room faster than the eye could follow? Well, most of the reason why Shirai was as white as a ghost had to do with the equally-white wings extending straight up from Naru's back.

"I take it you've heard the saying 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned'?" Haruka asked him. As he nodded dully in reply, she smiled thinly. "Well, neither does Heaven. Ready to talk?"

Fortunately, Shirai was spared from having to answer by the phone ringing. Demonstrating a remarkable dexterity with the cat o'nine tails, Haruka snapped the whip over, secured four of the nine tails around the handle of the phone, and then jerked it back into her free hand. All without looking.

"Hello, Hinata Apartments," she said.

"Hey there, Haruka!"

She sighed. "Seta? I'm busy right–"

"Oh, that's alright. I just wanted to let you guys know where Keitaro is."

"What? Where Keitaro is?"

At just the mention of his name, Naru's head snapped over to Haruka and she leapt up from where she crouched, snatching the phone away and bringing it to her ear. "What's going on! Is Keitaro with you?"

The archaeologist chuckled. "Yeah, he's with me. We were on a boat and I saw him fall into the sea, but apparently he washed up on this island. I don't know how he did it; it's a long way to swim."

"Seta, what island are you on?" Naru demanded.

"Hmm, let's see. It's called Parara…err, something. I'm not exactly sure how to pronounce it. It's in the Pacific Ocean, just about–"

Seta's voice cut off suddenly, replaced by a dialtone. Evidently, the call had been disconnected. "Seta!" Naru screamed into the phone. "Seta!" She growled and threw the receiver at the wall. Nobody was surprised when it split along the middle.

The next thing they knew, Naru had vanished up the stairs, leaving the rest of the group extremely confused and wondering what the hell was going on. "Ten to one says she's going after Keitaro," Seno said.

"I'm betting your side," Kitsune replied. Motoko and Haruka shook their heads.

"Yeah, I better go, too," he said, then started up the stairs.

Motoko was only a step behind him. "Why do you need to go?"

"Well, somebody's gotta stop her from killing him," he answered. "And two, I owe him an ass-whuppin' myself for coming this close to undoing the work I did to put them together."

The swordswoman pondered this for a moment, then nodded. "You'll probably need help to stop Naru from killing him," she said, then smiled at her husband. "I'll come along, as well."

Less than ten minutes later, the trio stepped out of the front door of the apartments. Naru was loaded down with a suitcase full of clothes and other items, and had slung a coat over her other arm. Motoko and Seno traveled light by comparison, each with a simple travel bag stuffed with two changes of clothes and personal hygiene items. Likewise, both carried their respective swords.

"I'm telling you Naru," Seno was saying, "all that junk's going to be a liability. Do you really need that many different outfits?"

"It's no big deal," she replied. "I'm not like you two, anyway. It's not as easy for me to travel so lightly."

She looked up, meeting eyes with her fellow examinee and friend, Mutsumi. "Oh, hello," the Okinawan native said, then looked at their bags. "Are you all going on a trip? But Naru, don't you want to see the exam results?"

Naru blinked, then quickly shrugged it off. "Could you check for me?" she asked. "We're going to find my idiot boyfriend and bring him back."

With that, the younger woman stepped past her friend and continued down the stairs. Seno gave Mutsumi a 'What can you do?' shrug and followed.

The great journey for Keitaro was on.