Akashi frowned as his car slowed to a stop. There was still plenty of gas and his foot was not touching the break. He pulled out his cellphone but found he had no signal. He tried to restart it, but it still wouldn't move. Akashi sighed, and turned off the car before stepping out and lifting the hood. He couldn't see anything obviously wrong with the engine. He could already feel the beginnings of a head ache coming on. He didn't have time for this.

He had a business meeting to be at in three hours and he still had quite a ways to go. He knew he should have simply taken the private jet, but air travel was so tedious when he could get himself somewhere just as easily, if slower, with a car.

He decided to walk a little and see if he couldn't find a repair shop. He made sure to lock his car and take the keys with him. Perhaps if he had bothered to look behind him he would have noticed the vines starting to engulf his car, but he strode forward, looking straight ahead, with impeccable poster. Holding all the dignity of the CEO he was, even when he thought no one was watching him.

Akashi thought he heard the sound of laughter and wiped his head around to catch sight of the source, but only saw a hawk looking down at him from its perch in a tall tree. Was it normal for hawks to have silver blue eyes? After a few tense moments of looking around and spotting no one he continued walking. Although, he did pull his keys out of his suit pocket and arranged them between his fingers so that they would cut deep if he had to punch someone to defend himself. He told himself he was just being paranoid, but he didn't put his keys away.

"What the . . ." When he'd been walking for nearly a mile he came to a stop as he looked at the forest that was blocking his path. Growing right over the asphalt of the road.

Instinct told him to turn back. He should walk away and go back to his car, because this forest shouldn't be here. He had driven this road before. Less than a year ago, but these trees were big enough to be hundreds of years old.

Yet he also felt a pull to go closer, and for some reason the sun was setting even though it should have been midday. Before he knew it his legs were moving and he was walking into the forest. The asphalt soon fading away until it was as if it had never been there in the first place.

Shadows danced in the fading light of the sun, giving the illusion of movement around him. He heard running footsteps that stopped mid stride, but saw no one to cause them. He tightened his grip on the keys and decided it was time to go back to his car.

Akashi turned around and started walking the way he had come, but nothing looked the same, and it was getting dark. There was no way that he could find his way back to his car like this. As appalled as he was by the prospect, he was aware that he didn't have much of a choice but to spend the night in the forest or risk getting himself more lost.

So, he clicked on the miniature flashlight on his keychain and looked around for sticks to make a fire with. Once he found those and arranged them with leaves for kindling he pulled a lighter out of his pocket.

Akashi didn't make a habit of smoking, but he did keep a lighter on him at all times. After all, plenty of business men did smoke, and Akashi was always willing to offer a light if they needed one. He'd bum a cigarette off of them as an excuse to make conversation and soon he was friendly with someone of potential use to him.

Now he used it to start a fire.

He planned to stay awake through the night, but he couldn't seem to keep his eyes open.

"Tetsu-kun, what do you think he is?" Akashi heard a female voice asking while he struggled towards consciousness, what he presumed to be a few hours later.

"Human. He's certainly human. And just like the others, he brought odd things with him." A monotone voice replied, and Akashi heard the sound of his lighter turning on. And then an exclamation of pain and the sound of the lighter hitting the ground. "I told you it made fire." The monotone voice said.

"Kurokocchi, aren't you going to heal it for me?" A third voice whined.

"No. Next time you'll know not to play with the things humans bring with them." The voice now held the faintest traces of amusement.

"You're so mean, Kurokocchi!"

Laughter sounded from nearby, and Akashi recognized it as the same laughter he had heard when walking on the road.

"I presume you had something to do with this?" The female spoke up again.

"Of course. I was getting bored. What's a hawk to do with himself?" A fourth person answered.

"Sleep with trees." A new person drawled lazily.

"Please leave me out of this." Someone else said, sounding irritated.

How many of them were there?

"Hush. I think he's waking up." The one with the monotone voice said, as Akashi was finally managing to force his eyes open.

He caught a glimpse of blue and then he blinked and there was no one there. Perhaps he had been dreaming? No, the voices had sounded very real. And his lighter was no longer in his pocket. It was lying on the forest floor as if someone had dropped it. Akashi felt tension running through his whole body. There had definitely been people around him.

This was a set up for one of those horror movies that he'd never felt inclined to watch. They weren't frightening, which meant they failed in their goal, and failure was not something he tolerated. And he wasn't afraid at the moment either, but he certainly had a healthy amount of caution. He was in no rush to die after all.

Akashi slowly got to his feet, narrowed eyes taking in his surroundings as he pocketed his dropped lighter.

The fire had died over night, but everything looked different again. The tree he was leaning against and the fire were the only things the same. All the other trees seemed to have shifted, if not completely changed. Where he had been on barren ground there was now grass. It was no use saying that something wasn't right. He'd known that as soon as his car had stopped.

As he started walking again he caught blue movement in his peripheral vision. His hand shot out to catch what it was, not turning his head to indicate that he had noticed before his hand made the movement. His fingers wrapped themselves around something soft and solid and he turned to look at what he had grabbed.

A man with large blue eyes and blue hair only a shade or two lighter than his eyes. He had a crown of flowers adorning his head, and his ears went up into a fine point. His lips were slightly parted in surprise as he looked at Akashi's hand on his wrist.

A wrist that Akashi quickly dropped when a large black panther came up next to the blue eyed boy and growled at Akashi until he took a few steps back.

"Aomine-kun, it is not necessary to scare him." The blue eyed stranger said, seeming to be speaking to the panther. Akashi recognized him as the one with the monotone.

And then, before Akashi's eyes, the panther turned into a man. A tall, dark skinned, man wearing nothing but black shorts. "He grabbed you, Tetsu. He could have used that thing that burned Kise." The lazy drawl was gone from his tone now, replaced by protective anger, but Akashi remembered his voice as well.

"That thing burned Kise because Kise was being an idiot." The stranger, Tetsu apparently said, not looking even a little surprised by the transformation.

"That's not nice, Kurokocchi." A tall blond, who was literally emitting light from his body, protested, seeming to come out of nowhere to drape himself onto the smaller one. Akashi took note of the red patch on the skin of his thumb where the fire had burned him.

"You are both rather rude. You haven't given me the chance to introduce myself to our new guest." The smallest of the three said, brushing the blond off with practiced ease. He turned his attention to Akashi, who was watching them with wide eyes, blue meeting red and gold. "Hello. I am Kuroko Tetsuya. I'm sure you have a few questions. Let me get the rest of my friends and we'll try to answer them for you."

Akashi hesitated a moment before nodding. "Akashi Seijuro. Interesting to meet you."