A/N: Sorry about the slight delay with this chapter. I ended up getting sick on my day off, and I'm a big baby who can't write if he has a headache.

As usual, I greatly appreciate any feedback you kind folks leave in the reviews, and this time, I gotta give a special shout-out to user Vincent Van Goggles, a.k.a. Arthur, for acting as my beta reader. As we move into the part of this story that incorporates characters from the most recent Haruhi novels, I'd like to know if my characterization of any of them seems off. I'm not as confident with the newer characters, so be sure to give me a heads up if I completely destroy them. :D

That being said, I hope you enjoy chapter six.

"Hey again, close friend."

Sasaki's voice caught me by surprise, but it was a welcome one. Even if Tachibana only brought her along because she wanted to pitch her side of things to Haruhi, having Sasaki around would help keep the conversation a bit more balanced.

The black haze of Kuyoh's hair was there, too, facing away from the entrance. I wondered if Haruhi and the others could see her, or if she was preventing people from noticing her, like usual. I guess if I can see her without her having to be pointed out, she's probably visible to everyone.

"Hey, Sasaki. I didn't know you were coming. It's been a while, hasn't it?"

"That it has," she said, "although not nearly as long as last time. I hope you haven't forgotten about me entirely."

Of course not. The truth is, when you know Haruhi, your free time becomes fair game for whatever crazy scheme she comes up with. She can be hard to schedule around.

Our usual booth was too small for the seven of us, so we ended up moving to one of the longer tables. Tachibana sat down directly across from Haruhi, which I'm sure was no accident.

"I never thought I'd be having this conversation with you," she said. "I do wish it had been under better circumstances, though."

So you know everything that's happened so far, then?

"I know that your friend Miss Nagato was... let's say, taken... by Miss Kimidori. And the same goes for your time machine, right?"

Miss Asahina stared down at the table in front of her. She seemed somewhat nervous about talking to Tachibana, but then, she was her former kidnapper. "Yes, that's right."

"And my esper powers are essentially useless without closed space," Koizumi said. "I get the feeling they'd still work if I were to enter one of Miss Sasaki's closed spaces, but I can't imagine that would help us get Miss Nagato back."

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Haruhi watching Kuyoh, staring with enough intensity to spark nuclear fusion.

"So you're really an alien?!" she finally asked, leaning forward across the table.

A little louder, please. I don't think they heard you across the street.

Kuyoh didn't seem to realize she was being spoken to at first, but after a few seconds, she turned to look at Haruhi. Her smile was beautiful, but it was also the very definition of the term 'uncanny valley'.

"Yes, I am what you would call an alien," she said. I really had to marvel at how much her ability to communicate had improved since I first met her.

Haruhi looked her up and down, then sat back in her chair, apparently satisfied. "I'm Haruhi Suzumiya. It's really good to meet you!"

I could only imagine the endless stream of questions Haruhi was struggling to suppress right about now.

"And you're an esper," she said, pointing to Tachibana. "Hey, hold on. I recognize you. Weren't you with Sasaki that day? When Kyon actually showed up on time for once?"

Tachibana nodded. "That's right. I'm glad you remember. And yes, I'm an esper. I can show you my powers, if you like."

In a move that must have demonstrated more restraint than the Kurobe Dam, Haruhi declined. "Maybe later. More importantly, how are we getting Yuki back?"

Koizumi gave Kuyoh his best smile. "What do you think, Miss Suoh? Can you help us?"

Every eye in the group was on her.

"...attempts to communicate... have failed," she said. "Emiri Kimidori is—not present."

I think you misunderstood the question. We know Kimidori isn't here, we're asking if you can find her and take Haruhi's powers back.

"She is not present," she said, repeating herself. "Emiri Kimidori's location is unknown."

Seriously? She's somewhere even you can't find her? I mean, sure, she has Haruhi's godlike powers, but I hadn't expected her to be able to hide herself like that.

"You're kidding," Tachibana said. "You really can't find her anywhere?"

"She is nowhere."

The way she said that was unsettling. If Kuyoh couldn't find her, where could she be?

"Well, that would be the million dollar question," Koizumi said, crossing his arms as if he'd just made some brilliant insight. "If we can't locate her, we won't be able to fix the situation."

My heart sank. We weren't even five minutes into the conversation, and we'd already hit a wall. If we still had Miss Asahina's TPDD, we could just go back and stop Kimidori before she left the island, or at least see where she went.

Wait.

"Kuyoh, are you able to travel through time?" I asked. Nagato had been able to stop time in the spare room of her apartment for three years, so surely the Heavenly Canopy Dominion had similar capabilities, right?

"Under normal circumstances, the answer would... be yes," she said. "My abilities have been—limited by Emiri Kimidori. Temporal transfer is no longer possible."

Dammit! She's been limited, too? Kimidori really didn't leave us anything to work with.

"What about the rest of your powers?" Haruhi asked.

"Meaning of query unclear. Define 'powers'."

Sasaki stepped in. "She's still able to do things besides time travel, if that's what you're getting at. Right, Kuyoh?"

No response.

I decided to give it a whirl. "Are you still able to..." Ah, how had Nagato put it? "Can you still manipulate special data?"

Slowly, she nodded. "I am able."

Well, it was a start. It was a hell of a lot better than nothing, that's for sure.

"If I may, I'd like to summarize what we know so far," Koizumi said. "Just to make sure I understand everything. Miss Asahina, your TPDD was taken by Miss Kimidori, and we have reason to believe she may have done the same with any other time travel-enabled devices that existed at the time. Is that right?"

"Yes. That's what it seems like, anyway. I don't know for sure if she took anyone else's or not."

He pressed on. "And Miss Suoh's ability to travel through time has also been suppressed. As far as I can tell, we can reach two separate conclusions from this."

Koizumi pulled a pen from his pocket, and held a hand out toward me as if asking for a napkin. I really need to start charging.

"Thank you," he said as I handed one to him. We watched as he drew a simple diagram: a stick figure standing on top of an arrow that presumably represented the flow of time. Then, he drew a dotted line from the stick figure toward the future.

"The first possibility is that Miss Kimidori has altered the laws of this reality in such a way that time travel is no longer possible." He scribbled through the dotted line to show that the person's access to the future had been cut off. "If this is the case, then it would seem rather redundant for her to also take Miss Asahina's TPDD."

"Right," Haruhi said. "It'd already be useless, so there'd be no reason to take it."

"Precisely."

You two can stop patting each other on the back any time now.

Koizumi ignored me and went on, drawing a second copy of the original diagram. "It seems more likely to me that Miss Kimidori left the possibility of time travel intact, and has merely removed our access to any device that would allow us to take advantage of it." He drew a small X through the corner of the stick figure's head, which I guess was supposed to represent the TPDD being removed.

"So if your hypothesis is correct, then time travel is still possible," Sasaki said, "we just don't have any way to do it."

"That would be the case, yes," he said, putting his pen away. "Of course, it's only a theory. But if we could create a new TPDD, we might be able to go back and stop Miss Kimidori before she escapes."

You say that like it's no big deal. First of all, I doubt we even have the technology to build a time machine in this day and age, let alone the knowledge it would require. Unless...

I leaned forward, looking past Koizumi and Haruhi to Miss Asahina. "Do you know how to make a new TPDD?"

She shook her head. "I only know the basic theory of how they work. I have no idea how to actually assemble one. Our computers are... well, it's classified, but I'm not very good with the type of computers you use in this time."

Just as I thought. Even without her TPDD, she's still brainwashed beyond the ability to help us.

"What about you, Kuyoh?" Tachibana asked. "Do you know how to construct a time machine?"

"It is impossible," she said. "I am no longer able to create the necessary technology. I also do not... fully understand—your method of time travel."

In other words, we're right back where we started. It was strange to hear someone like Kuyoh say she didn't understand something, though. Was that also Kimidori's doing? Dammit. We were essentially up against a god. The only reason we were still alive was because she didn't even see us as a threat. Of course she'd have made sure Kuyoh couldn't help us travel back in time to stop her. She was smart enough to cover her bases, and she knew we wouldn't have the technology to—...

I slammed my hands down on the table and shot to my feet. "Miss Asahina!"

"Y-Yes?!"

"What sort of parts do we need?"

"Wha? Uh, that's classified! I can't—"

"A metal rod, covered in lines that look sort of like a spiderweb!" I said, leaning forward across the table. "Does that sound like something we could use?"

Her eyes widened, and though she obviously wasn't allowed to say, the look of shock on her face told me I'd hit the nail on the head.

Haruhi stood as well. "Hold it. What the heck are you talking about? Do you actually know where we can get parts for a time machine?"

I moved back and sat down, resisting the urge to laugh at myself. I hadn't told anyone else about the strange object Miss Tsuruya had dug up back in February, and to be honest, it had slipped to the back of my mind. I'd had a feeling that it would be important someday, though, and it looked like that day had finally arrived. Kimidori may have gotten rid of the TPDDs, but if it's just a circuit we're talking about, it might still be there. I doubt she even realized it exists.

"I'm afraid I don't follow," Koizumi said. "Are you saying you have access to some kind of future technology?"

I couldn't be sure. Miss Asahina did say their computers exist like thoughts in their heads, rather than physical machines; if this is part of a TPDD, it would have to be a pretty old one, by their standards. "Maybe. It's a long story, but I have something we can at least call a lead. Miss Asahina, do you think I could borrow your phone for a minute?"

She reached for her pocket, then froze. "I don't have it," she said. "I forgot, it's still at Miss Nagato's apartment. We left in such a hurry, I didn't have time to grab it."

Oh, I forgot. I'd been using my phone as a light at the time Kimidori showed up, but everyone else had been sleeping. "Then, I don't suppose you know Miss Tsuruya's number by heart?"

I'd been lucky. Another minute or two later, and the first break of the school day would have ended, leaving us to sit and wait for another chance to call Miss Tsuruya. Even luckier was the fact that her phone was able to take and send pictures, which meant I could show Miss Asahina what the circuit actually looked like without having to go anywhere. Leave it to Miss Tsuruya to carry around a picture of something like that on her phone.

"Of course I do!" she'd said. "Isn't it megas mysterious? Don't worry, I promise I haven't shown it to anyone, if that's what you're worried about!"

I hung up as quickly as possible to avoid getting a headache, and as soon as I got the picture, I headed inside to show the others.

"How about it?" I asked, holding my phone up so Miss Asahina could see. "Is this something we could use?"

She was stunned. "Ah! That's a classified information! B-But how did Tsuruya get one? And why do you know about it?"

I explained that I'd had Miss Tsuruya go back and dig where the oddly shaped rock had originally been, and she'd actually found something.

"Unbelievable!" Haruhi said. "I knew there was buried treasure there! Dammit, Kyon, we could have found a mysterious alien artifact if you hadn't messed things up!"

Hey, I was just following instructions! Besides, if you'd found it, it'd probably be all dinged up and worthless by now. At least the Tsuruya family was able to keep it in good condition.

Miss Asahina sulked. "This is helpful, but it won't do us any good by itself. Even if we knew how to assemble a TPDD, we still don't have a classified information. Uh, I mean..."

My excitement came to a grinding halt. "Wait, you mean there's more? What else is there that doesn't exist yet?"

"Well, you see, TPDD stands for classi— wait, no, that won't work. Um..."

"Time Plane Destruction Device."

She looked up at me in surprise. "H-How did you know that?"

I couldn't resist. "That's classified."

That seemed to satisfy her. Who knows? Maybe she was used to hearing it from her superiors just as much as she said it to us.

"It works by creating a small classified information in the time plane, then using a classified information to send classified information through." She pointed to the picture. "This part can classified information the classified information, but there's no way for it to create the classified information to send it through."

Alright, I'm pretty sure you're just screwing with me now.

"I think I understand," Koizumi said.

What? How?

"She's saying this piece can send data, for lack of a better term, through time. However, for it to work, we need another device that creates an opening for that information to pass through. Fujiwara mentioned the fact that the TPDD leaves holes in the time plane, isn't that right?"

Miss Asahina lowered her head, then gave a slight nod. I remembered Fujiwara explaining the same thing to me during a group meeting, but how the hell had Koizumi figured it out based on one passing comment and a series of 'classified information's? Have I been underestimating him this whole time?

The conversation fell silent once again. I noticed Haruhi staring ahead with a dazed look on her face, but it was probably best to leave her be. She was probably just overwhelmed by all of this.

After an awkward thirty seconds or so, Sasaki broke the silence.

"What about Fujiwara?"

You're kidding, right, Sasaki? Fujiwara? The guy who tried to kill Haruhi? The sneering bastard who took advantage of us to try and change the course of history? That Fujiwara? If you think I'm going to him for help, you're sorely mistaken. I'm grinding my teeth together just thinking about it.

Koizumi seemed to share the sentiment. "I don't think going to him for help would be the best idea, considering what happened last time."

"Agreed," I said. "We can find Kimidori without his help. There's no way I'd come crawling back to him like that."

Sasaki sighed. "I thought you might say that, I just—"

"And who the hell do you think put you in charge?"

Haruhi stood, glaring at me. "In case you forgot, I'm the brigade leader, Kyon. I give the orders around here! And if this Fujiwara guy might be able to help us get Yuki back, then I say we go see what he has to offer. We owe it to her to try."

"I'm glad you agree," Sasaki said, smiling. Haruhi and Sasaki on the same side? Yeah, no. It doesn't matter what I say. Trying to stop them would be like trying to fight a Super Saiyan with my hands tied behind my back.

"But there's still no guarantee he'll be able to help us," Tachibana said. "We don't even know for sure if he's still in this time. He could have gone back to the future months ago."

There has to be some other way. I looked to Kuyoh, desperate for alternatives. "Isn't there anything else we can do? Maybe Kimidori's hiding inside a data jurisdiction. Or what about the scorch marks we saw on the pier? It looked like a rocket had taken off from it. Does that give you any clues?"

"None."

Come on now, you didn't even try.

"You don't have to go if you don't want to," Tachibana said. "I could try to talk to him and see what we can work out..."

Yeah, no. Sorry, but I don't feel comfortable leaving things up to you, considering your track record.

"Then how about this," Koizumi said. "Let's start by giving him a call and seeing if he's still in this time. If he is, we can find out whether or not he'd be able to help us track down the other parts we need to build a working TPDD. Who knows? Maybe we'll get lucky and find that his wasn't taken to begin with."

I don't know if I'd call our enemy having an extremely powerful piece of technology 'lucky'.

"Relax, Kyon." Haruhi grinned. "If he tries anything, I'll show him who he's really messing with. Besides, I want to see the guy who tried to kill me and confront him head-on."

I sighed inwardly. Of course you do, Haruhi. "What about you, Kuyoh? Are you still on his side, or what?" She'd been loyal to Fujiwara several months ago, but after things fell apart, it was hard to say whether or not she'd still do what he said.

"The current threat level is unknown, but high," she said. "The Data—Integration Thought... Entity must not be allowed to remain in possession of this ability."

"I take it that means you'll cooperate."

"Our goals are similar."

Oh man. Were we really going to go through with this? "I give up," I said. "Just do whatever you want. Whatever gets Nagato back the fastest." If I'm lucky, maybe it'll give me a chance to break his nose.

Nagato had gone through much, much worse for me, after all. If I really thought about it, it would be incredibly selfish to avoid Fujiwara's help just because I didn't want to see his smirking face. We owed it to her to do everything in our power, even if the thought of it made me sick to my stomach.

Fujiwara, you'd better cooperate, or there'll be hell to pay.