oh my gawd! Someone should slap me! NO! Punch me! Please! I feel soooo bad! I know I said I was writing it as you we spoke in the last chapter, which was months ago, and I was, then bam! Life hit me and I got writers block, then I started reading and watching Shugo Chara a bit, then I tried to figure out what I was doing next, and ya, I'm just rambling and giving excuses...but seriously, someone needs to come and punch me like every month that I don't update, or maybe just send me a message...I feel so bad, but you guys probably wanna read huh? Well I'll let you do that! Enjoy!

Oh! And I don't own Shugo Chara in ANY WAY, if I did, Amu and Ikuto would have kissed(on the LIPS) within the first meeting and at the end they would have gotten married, anywho! On with the show!

CHAPTER SEVEN

"Amu? Amu? Are you ok?"

Amu looked up into Senji's eyes, "Ye-yeah. I-I thought I felt something. Someone."

Senji looked at her concerned as he led her into the van. "I hope you're not coming down with something. I'd hate for that to happen."

Amu looked at him curiously as she sat down in the back seat, "Why?"

Senji slid into the seat next to her and closed the door. He turned around and smiled as he placed a hand on her cheek, "Because I don't want any harm coming to you, I care about you too much to let that happen."

Amu blushed but didn't turn away from his touch; it was as if she couldn't even if she wanted to. "Thank you, Senji."

He rubbed her cheek and before he let go, he placed a soft kiss on her temple, whispering, "No thanks needed."

Amu shivered as his hot breath ghosted over her ear. What-what's wrong with me?Why-why am I feeling this way? She wondered. Amu had been so preoccupied with Senji's touch and breath and kiss that she failed to notice Senji's chara on his shoulder, smirking away as he played with a card in his hands. He may have looked like Rhythm, but oh was he the total opposite, instead of playing with music he played with cards-taro cards. Senji slowly put his hand down and put it on Amu's hand that was sitting next to her. Again, Amu didn't pull away; instead she just looked out the window to hide her growing blush.

The drive was a short one, and when they pulled up to the building, she immediately recognized it as Easter's old headquarters. She turned to Senji with wide eyes, "What are we doing here? Where are you taking me? What are you going to do to me?" She panicked as she tried to yank her hand away, but Senji quickly caught it, making Amu yelp.

"Amu, calm down, we're not going to harm you. We're just going to run a few tests, like what the doctor does, nothing else, ok? C'mon, trust me." Senji explained as he held her hand in both of his. Juke's eyes glowed a bit, and so did Senji's, but Amu never noticed, seeing as she felt like she was in some sort of trance, she just simply nodded. Senji smiled and led Amu out of the car. "Good Amu, now follow me, we have a lot of tests to run." Amu just simply nodded as Senji took her hand and led her to the back entrance and toward Poison's lab, once Easter's lab, but with a few modifications.

Once they arrived to the lab Senji sat Amu down on a chair as he went to get set everything up. Juke floated up next to Senji and quickly looked back at Amu before speaking, "Why are you using your powers on her? I thought you didn't care about her? What's the point?"

Senji just continued with what he was doing as he spoke, "I don't know, it just seems…she seems…interesting. I want to get to know her, and maybe we won't have to force her to join us, maybe after a while, I can persuade her to join us." He said as he stole a glance at the still dazed Amu.

Juke floated in front of Senji's face, "Are you sure it has nothing to do with the fact that you might be growing feelings for her?" Senji stared wide eyed at Juke and opened his mouth to speak, but Juke stopped him, "I'm your chara, a part of you, I can feel it within you, you're starting to have feelings for her, and it's not gonna end well, I'm just telling you that now. I know our power is manipulating emotions and their bodily functions, but it's not permanent, Senji, you know that."

Senji sighed as he nodded and leaned against the control panel in front of him, "I know, but there's just something…different about her. I want to get to know her, I want to see what makes her tick, what makes her happy, what makes her sad, I want to know everything bad about her."

Juke nodded before floating over to Senji's shoulder and sat on it, "I know, I'm just telling you that in the end, Poison will have her brainwashed and without emotion, no matter what you do or say, she won't ever feel the same, even if she wanted to. She won't have the capability to."

Senji turned around and sighed as he looked at Amu, "I know, and I wish it didn't have to come to that," Senji said as he put his glasses on and picked up a syringe, "But I guess there's no changing fate."

~.~.~.~

"Augh!" Ikuto screamed as he punched the nearest wall in his room. The 'rescue plan' did NOT go as he expected. They had gotten in, not as quiet as he would have liked, and found a grizzly old man with nothing more then riddles to tell them.

There was a light tap on his door before it opened to reveal a worried Utau, "Ikuto, are you ok? I heard you scream." She asked as she walked over to him and placed a hand on his shaking shoulder.

He released a very shaky breath, "We had just missed her. She was right there and we were too late. Poison has her within her grasp, and it's going to take everything we have to get her back." He seethed as went to punch the wall again, but was stopped by Utau's hand on his hand.

"Ikuto! Stop it! Breaking your hand is not going to help Amu!" She yelled as she twirled him around to face her. "What! So you're just going to give up because you didn't succeed the first time? That's not what Amu would do! She would keep trying and trying until she got you back, in fact she did, remember? She never gave up, and neither should you!" She encouraged, but when she saw Ikuto's eyes, she saw the distant, given up look, and she slapped him.

Ikuto looked up, stunned and placed a hand on his cheek, "What the hell!"

Utau's hands went to her side as she spoke quietly, "Don't give up, Ikuto, Amu never gave up on you, don't give up on her. She's waiting for you to come save her. Don't let her fall into that darkness that we fell into, she won't be able to handle that. You can do it, you can get her back, I know it, she knows it, hell, even that kiddy king knows it, you just need to believe you can do it."

Ikuto sighed before he gave her his trade mark smirk, "Right. I think I have somewhere to be. I'll see you later, Utau." He leapt onto his windows ledge before jumping to the ground and running off towards the only other person who cared for Amu almost as much as Ikuto.

Utau smiled before leaning out the window and yelling, "Don't take your time! She's waiting!"

~.~.~.~

Amu laid on the cold table in the middle of the empty examination room as the scientist looked at the readings on the screens on the other side of the viewing window. The readings were high for someone her age, and showed great amounts of power, most of it hidden, and if they could tap into that and control it, they were sure to make her work for Poison, and they needed to do was create a dark egg out of her energy and then all will fall into place after that. The scientist looked at each other, and then to Senji, who was staring intently at Amu's still form on the table. "Sir, may we begin?" Spoke up one scientist.

Senji blinked before he looked down at them and nodded, "Yes, but start off with a low frequency, we don't want all that energy to dissipate before we even get a chance to harness it." The scientist nodded before he pressed on button, which caused restraints to appear on Amu's wrists and ankles, then another, which caused a low hum to emit from a machine that hovered over Amu's body.

"Going to level two." Said a scientist as he turned a knob to a higher energy frequency. Amu's body started lightly shaking, and low groans were escaping her mouth. "Level three." Now Amu's body was almost convulsing. "Level four." Amu's body was now trying to wrench itself from the restraints and screams were coming from her mouth. "Level five." Amu was now screaming bloody murder and her back was now arched totally off the table, as if her body were to float up if she weren't restrained. After two more minutes of her screams, and black energy started forming above her form and started shaping into an egg. All the scientist's eyes and Senji's started growing into saucers as they witnessed this phenomenon. Their plan was actually working. Their theories were correct. They finally succeeded in what Easter failed in-creating the perfect weapon. Another minute passed before the egg was fully created and the scientist shut the machine off before two of them ran in to look and examine the egg. After observing the egg they placed it into a container and put it in a machine to run more tests. "Sir, we did it! We actually did it!" Exclaimed a scientist, but when he turned around he saw Senji rushing to Amu's side, placing a hand on her, now, pale cheek.

Senji rubbed his thumb over Amu's pale cheek and he leaned in close to her ear, "Amu, this was for the best. You did great. Now, we can be together, work side by side getting ride of your traitorous friends that left you hear to suffer. Amu, you're no longer alone, I'm here." He whispered as he placed a kiss on her pink lips.

Weeeeeellllll? How was it? Good? Bad? Ugly? Tell me! And punch me to work faster!