A/N Hi all, I am updating fro my sister's place. It's so busy here that I haven't had time to type! Grr. Anyway- on with the story!

Julia stood in her white lab coat, testing the cells from the body that was exhumed and brought to her clinic in Okinawa. She had noted the laceration that went half-way through the girl's skull. It was amazing she had survived as long as she had. It was obvious there were no amazing powers this girl possessed- she couldn't be more than 17. The fact that she had lived without aging for such a long time made Julia think this girl was an undiscovered queen.

Looking at her face, Julia noticed her eyes were more slanted and her skin was darker than Saya's. It was the results of the blood and DNA tests that confirmed the girl was just an ordinary Vietnamese teenager that happened to give birth to something special. Her belly was cut open for the autopsy, but revealed only that she had given birth Nothing more about the baby that came from the tests.

Confounded, Julia went back to the door and pressed a button for the intercom. "David, I need to speak with you," she announced into the speaker.

"I'll be there in a moment," the disembodied voice responded.

As she removed her gloves, she exited the room and waited. She pulled out a cigarette and lit up, taking a long drag and calming her nerves and her frustration. A silver and blonde haired man with heavy lines around his mouth came to stand before her. He smiled slightly, thinking this would be a warm visit between husband and wife, but the smile disappeared as he noticed her cigarette.

"David, we need to find the baby this woman had. I believe she is one of the princesses," she informed.

David's brow furrowed when he spoke, "It took us two years to have the necessary paperwork to find this body, let alone exhume it. It will take even more time to sift through the numerous orphanages to find where she was- not where she is."

Julia looked at him with hope gleaming in her eyes, "We could send Hagi there. Maybe he could sense her presence."

David shook his head and responded, "Hagi is looking for Fimm Örvar, where the kidnapped princesses have been taken. I know he's the one that discovered the name was Icelandic for Five Arrows, but finding the facility where the women are is more difficult."

"I know," she responded. "The chiropterans that they created are much weaker than the ones we faced 20 years go. Perhaps they can be killed with those bullets Joel developed while you and Kai were in England."

It's not just the chiropterans, Julia," David responded. "The facility seems to be underground. There's a permanent layer of under the ground there. It will be difficult to fend off chiropterans and find the entrance to the facility.

Julia took another drag from her cigarette and thought. Her eyes lit up as she came to a realization. "Lulu," she said. "Lulu could take over his efforts- just for a week."

David gave her an intense gaze and asked, "She is already there, helping Hagi and the army of Red Shield members that are fighting their way through. Even if she did get past the chiropterans, do you think she'll be able to sense the weak signatures of the princesses without Hagi? "

Julia puffed and pressed her head against the wall behind her. After a deep breath she begged, "Just for a week. He'll find her in a week, David."

He shook his head, "You know Joel is more concerned about rescuing those princesses. He would not want to abandon them for something like this."

"I could explain the situation," she suggested.

He gave her a lop-sided grin and responded, "You could, but I know he'll say no."

Okamura kicked the dirt as he came out of yet another remote orphanage. Mao was filing her nails by a nearby tree. Finally looking up with a smug look she asked, "So… what did you get?"

"Another dead end," he answered. "They never had a baby here that fit the description."

She huffed in frustration and then wondered out loud, "Jeez, how hard could it be to find a fair skin, blue-eyed baby among a bunch of dark-skinned, brown-eyed kids?"

He leaned against the tree next to her and huffed, looking up at the branches moving in the breeze. After a moment of contemplation, he took out a pack of cigarettes and pulled one free. A sudden breeze slapped it from his hand and he looked accusingly at Mao.

"What?" she asked, looking completely clueless.

They were both startled by a young boy standing in front of them. He gave a smile that made them feel gooseflesh rise on the back of their necks. The boy spoke in fluent Japanese, "You shouldn't smoke those, you will die."

The couple regarded the boy. He was wearing clothing that was torn and patched so many times that one quick pull would unravel the entire thing. His shoes were way too big and his hair a bit shaggy.

"I heard you ask for the girl. She was here for a short time," the boy informed them. "If you give me candy, I'll let you know what you want."

Okamura rolled his eyes and muttered, "Imagine that, I'm negotiating with a child." He reached into the car and found a melted chocolate bar in the console.

The boy's eyes lit up as he caught sight of the beloved wrapper. His eyes shifted from the candy to the reporter and then back to the candy. Before Okamura could protest, the candy was snatched away.

The boy informed, "Everyone called her Snow White because she was white like the snow. She got into a lot of trouble wherever she went. They found her body by the stream over there." He pointed past the trees to a fast-moving stream. "She was killed by a wild animal- that's what they tell us."

"What was her real name?" Okamura asked.

He shook his head as he began to lick the open wrapper, smearing chocolate all over his face. "No one knows. She showed up 3 months ago and they found her dead body two days ago. They burned it so the creature wouldn't come back."

They followed the boy to a pile of burnt ashes. "There," he informed, "is all that was left of Snow White."

"Creature?" Mao asked.

"Yeah," the boy answered through his chocolate smeared face, "yêu tinh killed children in the local village. It followed Snow White wherever she went. It is why she moved from orphanage to orphanage."

Mao frowned as she turned and looked at the ashes. "How did she die?" she asked as she felt the hair on the back of her neck stand on end.

The boy sucked the ends of his fingers and replied, "The teacher found her, lying on the beach with holes in her neck. I guess yêu tinh finally decided to eat her instead."

Mao winced at the boy's apathy. A young woman was murdered here, but he didn't seem to even care. Okamura thanked the boy with a sober expression and they made their way to the orphanage.

"Yes," the teacher answered, "the girl was here for a short time. Her looks were alarming enough without the added superstitions that followed her. People constantly talked about yêu tinh killing villagers."

Mao looked at the children playing outside. "What is yêu tinh?"

"It means demon," the teacher responded. She took a deep breath and sadly looked out the window. "She was so very sad while she was here. No one would talk with her and she had little more than the clothes on her back."

Okamura huffed and then commented, "Well this is a very sad ending to the life of a miracle baby."

Mao nodded and the teacher asked, "Miracle baby? She was the one born in 2021?"

The couple nodded and the teacher gazed out the window. Mao spoke up, "Could we take some of her ashes?" She then proceeded with a lie to ebb the teacher's curiosity, "Her mother's relatives recently claimed her remains and I'm certain they would want the remains of her child to rest with the mother."

The teacher nodded, "Of course."

Mao and Okamura headed to the airport with the remains of the miracle baby stowed safely in a box. They hoped Julia could at least find something newsworthy in all of this.

"Wake up!" cried Kendra as she shook her sister. It was the first time in the two years they had been locked into this place that she had seen her sister. "Jendra, please wake up."

Kaylee's blonde hair was not as curly since she could rarely fix it. Dirt trailed in lines down her porcelain face from the tears that had dried there. She missed the sunlight so much. She missed freedom. Her green eyes regarded their cell mate Renee.

She was searching the cell for a hole- a crack… anything to give them hope to escape. Her hands ran over the cold stones and iron bars. Light brown waves of hair fell over her face as she knelt on the floor and began to dig her fingers into the small hole she found.

Kendra finally was able to rouse her sister. Deep brown eyes blinked and stared in confusion at her own. She smiled through the haze of tears and said, "Hey, Sissy."

"W-where are we, Ken?" she asked her younger sister as she groggily took in her surroundings. The other two that were in the room with them instantly came to her side. She wondered at the blue hospital gowns they were all wearing and that her sister's hair was longer. The walls around her were thick and through the haze, she realized they were made of brick. Even though the place was heated and the windows were very thick, she felt a chill that caused her body to feel as if a live wire was running through her spine. "K-Ken, what h-h-happened?" she asked as her eyes widened.

"Shh," Kendra soothed, "I'm not sure why they drugged you for so long, but I will give you the details. A little over two years ago, we were taken from our homes. They run tests on us and usually lock us up individually… I don't know what's changed. I think they knew you were able to contact the chevalier- Hagi. I don't know what to do, Jendra."

The elder sibling could sense her sister's panic and sat up carefully, trying to shake the dizziness. "I still feel weak," she informed, "but I will try to contact him. First I need to get something to eat."

She tried to sit up, but blackness swirled behind her eyes and she fell back into Kendra's lap. Renee brought her some of the slop their captors called food and began to feed her. She was very thin and her bronze complexion was rather grey looking. "She needs a transfusion," she shouted, catching a guard's attention.

A few minutes later, a white lab coat appeared in the door. The doctor had olive skin and dark black hair. His eyes were the color of warm sun tea. He quickly moved to attach an IV drip to the woman lying on the floor. "There are cots on the side," he informed as he motioned to the wall.

Kendra's eyes followed where he motioned and then back to him. Her black eyes burned into him as she growled, "Let us go."

The doctor smirked and gave a short laugh, "We know your power levels. We have studies you and your fellow princesses. You don't have the strength of the queens. Your power is all in the blood that flows in your veins, that is why we do not sedate you."

Renee pushed her way into the conversation, green eyes blazing, "Then why did you sedate her?" She motioned to the barely conscious form on the ground.

He smirked again, "You know why." The princesses just stared at him, they knew the answer. She was the one that could contact the red queen's chevalier, Hagi.

The princesses stared as the man rose to leave- watching intently as he left. As soon as he was through the heavy metal door, they sprang into action removing the IV. "Get her head," Kendra commanded as she pulled her thin gown down over her shoulders.

The princesses lifted her to her sister's neck and they used the needle to scrape a wound into Kendra's neck. Jendra smelled the blood and her eyes snapped open, but did not glow like the queens. She fed on her sister's offering, but pulled back after a time- not wanting to take too much. They all knew the blood that was given was drugged to keep her asleep.

It wasn't long after they arrived that Kaylee reiterated what she had heard through the wall- a meeting between the CEO and the doctors and scientists in charge of the program.

The head scientist introduced himself as the assistant to the late Dr. Collins before he began to explain his findings.

He cleared his throat and began, "The creatures that have been dubbed "princesses" by Dr. Julia Silverstein are not as powerful as the queens. They are the product of the chevaliers and human women. Their blood is weak in comparison to queens as well as chevaliers.

They do need blood to survive, so we will need regular supplies. We must be careful to keep them well fed, since we will be taking blood from them at regular intervals to create the mice that will guard this facility. We will see which one creates the strongest and most intelligent mice, the rest will be released at that point."

"Why didn't we just take the sleeping queen?" another voice asked.

"Her chevalier returned," a heavily French accented voice answered. "We thought that he was dead, but he proved to be very resilient. No human is capable of defeating him, all of Diva's chevaliers have fallen either by his hand or his queen's. There is no one that could defeat him to take her from him. It is why we chose to take the next best thing, the princesses."

The doctor continued, "As you all know, the offspring of the princesses have very little powers and their blood cannot produce chiropterans. However, they do need to consume blood to survive, but not as much as queens of chevaliers."

"But the chiropterans that we have created from their blood are all weak and they are defeated easily in comparison to the ones that were created by Diva's blood," someone argued.

After a few moments of arguing chatter, the doctor spoke again, "We believe that since the red queen defeated the blue, her blood is stronger. A princess from her bloodline would be invaluable to the project."

"Is there one? We have yet to find one and neither has the Red Shield, according to our spy," someone spoke up.

"The chevalier Hagi is extremely loyal," a voice commented. Kaylee was certain she had heard the voice before. "Dr. Julia claims that he would never betray his queen, so there would be no offspring from him. The other chevalier, Riku, was only a chevalier for a very short time before he mated Diva and died. Their offspring would be our best bet."

"The new queens?" the French accented man asked. After a moment he added, "Interesting."

"It would be difficult if not impossible to take them," a gruff voice informed. "The Red Shield has operatives guarding the Myagusuku household day and night. Besides, the chevalier, Hagi, has already trained them to fight. The two were tested against their mother's mice and easily defeated them. We would lose too many resources just to attain them."

"We can put that idea aside to discuss at a later date- once we have established a large enough army of weaker mice," the French accent spoke.

There were sounds of agreement.

The meeting concluded and she heard one last bit information being shared. The doctor's voice spoke again, "Please remember that subject 7 is to be kept sedated. I must emphasize she MUST not awaken, understood?"

Kaylee shook off the memory as she noticed Kendra's worried look. Renee, a registered nurse reassured, "It will take time for the medication to wear off. In the meantime, we all need to give her some of our blood- taking turns. She should be awake in a few days."

Hagi was once again on the move, an informant had tipped him off to a strange occurance in California. They found a few dead bodies in an alley in L.A., but the information that the police did not release was the fact that the bodies had holes in their necks. Two puncture wounds to be precise. The bodies were shriveled and dehydrated- not a drop of blood left in their systems.

Figuring it was a rogue chiropteran they had missed, Hagi decided to investigate.

The night sky was peaceful and clear. The black velvet of the space between the twinkling stars looked soft enough to touch. The moon was not visible this night- a new moon. It was the perfect night for flying. No one on the earth below him would see the darkly clad man with black velvet wings soaring through the night skies above them.

This was the perfect way to travel. Hagi would take planes from time to time, but the security checkpoints and flight delays were bothersome to a chevalier that was needed to certain locations immediately. Right now was one of those times.

He was nearly to the west side of Texas when his vision hazed with red and he felt a familiar warning sear his blood- a chevalier. The chevalier wondered at the thought, but outwardly his expression remained like stone. He hovered a moment, torn between his mission and his curiosity. He then continued on knowing he could always return to investigate.

When he landed in LA, he was greeted by the informant. The man was small and so slender that one would think a strong breeze would carry him straight to the next state. His grey eyes were always wide, making him appear eternally nervous. He shook Hagi's hand and led him into the small apartment to brief him on the situation.

He tapped the newspaper that was laid out on the table. A photo of two bodies, leaning against one another nearly covered the page. Hagi could see the puncture marks on their necks, even though the photograph was grainy. It was certainly the work of a chiropteran, but he couldn't tell if it was a princess or another of the beasts created by Diva's blood.

The nervous looking contact informed him, "This happened a few days ago, August 20, 2035, but in the time I've waited for you I found out something else…"

The nervous man padded over to his laptop, bringing the machine with him to the kitchen table. "The attacks happened at regular intervals last year- about every two weeks. It was thought that the attacks were the work of a serial killer since the bodies were sliced up so badly. Weird thing is the lack of blood."

Hagi looked at the screen, noticing the pictures of the victims. Deep gouges and slices riddled the bodies that were slumped in various alleys and sidestreets- not a drop of blood on them. What caught Hagi's attention was the fact that they were all males. It took a lot of strength to bring down a full grown man. The men were all propped against walls or dumpsters with their flies undone.

"This is not the work of a chiropteran," he informed the man calmly.

The man raised an eyebrow asking, "How can you be sure?" He turned to find a vacated space where the stoic man once stood.

Hagi bounded through the alleys, catching remnants of the scents and the presence of something more powerful than the mere chiropteran. Another princess had been here- had killed here. She was surviving under the guise of prostitution. Where she was now was becoming abundantly clear.

He took to the air, heading east toward the location where he had last felt the strong presence. He was baffled as to why her presence was so strong- it had the same feel as a chevalier.