JP: Here's the next chapter! Yay! So the usual disclaimer, I do not own Yugioh! Nor Kok. Although she's AWESOME!
PLEASE REVIEW!
"Good Morning!" Skye shouted, waking the two 'love birds' in the recliner. Alister's eyes snapped open comically and Lola let out a shriek.
"Was that necessary?" the other girl demanded, scrambling clumsily out off Alister's lap and stalking over to her best friend.
"I'm sorry, but it's almost noon and I was hungry. Raphael wouldn't let me cook or eat until you two were up since the kitchen is right next to you guys."
"Never again," she snarled. "I'm going to get a shower."
"Have fun," Skye called after her best friend, ignoring the dark mutters being sent her way. Looking to Alister, she put a hand on her hip and arched an eyebrow. "So how did you sleep?"
"Very comfortably." There was nothing on his face to give away his emotions.
"You liked it," Skye replied, her grin widening.
"And what gave you that…what's that in your hand?" he asked, pointing to the where she was holding the camera. "Tell me you didn't."
"Didn't what?" asked Skye innocently. "Oh, you mean take a picture?" she continued, feigning surprise when she saw the camera in her hand. "Oh no, I just happened to have it."
"Fork it over, you," he said shortly.
"Now, now. Who said I took anything?" she said playfully, rolling back and forth on the balls of her feet.
"Give me the camera," he snapped, lunging for the girl. Skye tried to make a break for it, but Alister caught her by the wrist tightly and pulled her backward, causing her to yelp in surprise.
From a neighboring room, Raphael's voice called out to them. "Alister, you're one of my closest friends, but if you've hurt Skye in any fashion there will be much violence involved."
Skye capitalized on this opportunity to call out piteously, "He did, Raphael! I think my wrist is sprained!"
Alister took this chance, though, to pry the camera from her hand and make a quick getaway just as the blond came into the room to figure out what was going on.
"What happened?" he asked, looking to the shorter girl for an explanation.
"Alister wanted my camera and took it from me, and I think he hurt my wrist," she replied, holding her slightly red wrist out for him to examine.
Raphael's expression darkened. "Did he, now?"
"She could blackmail me with that picture! I'm not planning on being her servant to that any time soon," called Alister from somewhere outside the room. He had wisely chosen not to stay put.
"By breaking my wrist?" snapped Skye indignantly.
"Oh come on, you cry baby! I had to deal with worse injuries and I didn't even grab you that hard."
"You still hurt her, Alister," Raphael growled.
"I did not. She's greatly exaggerating with that injury, and Skye had better tell me where that picture is."
"I didn't take one," she said, sniffling melodramatically.
Raphael glowered in the direction where Alister's voice was coming from. "Alister, apologize."
"If I come out, I may lose a few years off my life. I'll just apologize right from where I'm at."
"You do that," said Raphael, before scooping Skye into his arms and going into the kitchen with her. "I'll be making lunch. As soon as you apologize you can have some lunch."
Skye giggled as the man set her gently on the counter. "Raphael, what are you doing?" Skye asked as he went to the freezer.
"Getting you an icepack for your wrist," he replied, getting out a small blue bag.
"Alister didn't hurt me, you know. I faked it," she said, shuddering when the cold bag went on her wrist.
"You made a big deal out of it, so you're getting an icepack. Why did you fake it, anyways?"
"So that my knight in shining armor could rescue me—and the memory card to my camera, where the picture Alister's looking for is at."
"And this memory card is where?"
Skye gave him a wicked grin. "In the one place Alister wouldn't dare go poking around in," she replied, setting her hands pointedly across her chest.
One of Raphael's eyebrows arched. "Even though you put the memory card down the front of your shirt and you may have been faking it earlier, I can already see a bruise starting to form," he said, gently taking her injured hand and showing her the mark on her wrist. "It's not nice to antagonize Alister, Skye."
"Well then it's a good thing you came to my rescue," she replied, kissing him on the cheek chastely.
He smiled, but then frowned. "Why did you put the card in your bra?"
"If Alister had touched my girls it would have given you the right to beat him to a pulp," she stated matter of factly.
Raphael gave her an odd expression, uncertain if he should be disturbed or…well, disturbed seemed to fit the description of his emotions at the moment.
"So you two are official now?" Skye asked from her position on Raphael's lap (he was sitting on the recliner).
"What does it look like to you?" said Alister flatly from where he was sitting on the sofa, though his hand momentarily tightened around Lola's.
"Watch it, Alister," Raphael said mildly. "You still aren't entirely out of the doghouse with me, you know."
Alister grimaced, but said nothing.
"So, Lola, are you?" Skye asked, looking at her best friend. The Hispanic girl was sitting next to Alister, almost curled up beside him. Her hand was intertwined with the redhead's and she had not let it go since she had sat down beside him.
"Yes," she said, almost giggling. "He just doesn't want to admit it."
"High time," commented Raphael, but Alister shot a glare at the older man.
"Look who's talking. You and Skye took two years to get together, you have no room to talk," retorted the redhead with a scowl.
Valon's voice suddenly cut over Raphael's reply with a smug, "Alister 'n' Lola sittin' in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N—!"
"Finish that and die, Valon," Alister hissed, glaring daggers at the young teen.
Ember popped out of the chimney, grinning cheekily at Alister. "G," she finished brightly. "Hey, Valon, wanna blow something up?"
"I thought you'd never ask," replied Valon with equal cheerfulness, bolting out of the front door with Ember close behind him.
"They're perfect for each other," Raphael stated, glancing down when Skye rested her head against his shoulder and smiling.
"Okay, onto bigger things," Lola started, sitting upright. "I was wondering when Valon's birthday is, since I heard him mention that he didn't know when it was; he also said that he celebrates it right about now. Any ideas as to when it really is?"
Raphael frowned, exchanging glances with Alister and then Skye. "Valon doesn't really know when his birthday is because he was orphaned at an early age. He only knows his first and last name, and that's about it."
"Not even a birth year?" asked Lola, surprised and sympathetic all at once.
"Not even that much," said Alister grimly.
Following that comment, there was an uneasy silence that was broken only by Skye's excited gasp. "I almost forgot," she said, shifting on Raphael's lap to pull out her cell phone and begin typing on it rapidly.
"Forgot what?" asked Raphael. "It must be important, since your elbow's currently lodged in my stomach."
"You've got abs, sweetheart. You'll live," she said absently as she finished typing on her cell phone and sent the message. A few minutes later the device let out a ding and Skye glanced at it, a triumphant smile on her face. "Let me up for a minute, Raphael."
"What are you doing?" he questioned as she got off his lap to go to her computer.
"I asked Kaiba to look up Valon's birthday a while back, right after I asked him to look up your information, Raphael. I almost forgot, but I just sent him a text. He had the information on hand but I never asked for it."
"How did Kaiba get a hold of that?" Raphael asked with a frown. "Dartz couldn't even find it."
"Then again it wasn't like he bothered looking," said Alister darkly as Skye went to print the email out. "Dartz was the one who burned down the church and any records it may have had."
Skye, who had gone to the printer in the kitchen to get the email, came back into the room with wide eyes. "You guys aren't going to believe this."
"What?"
"His birthday is in two months, on the fourth day."
Alister frowned, doing the mental math before his eyes also widened. "That's the Fourth of July, there's no way... Lemme see that," he demanded, snatching the paper away from Skye when she came over. The moment his eyes connected with the paper and he read the date for himself, he groaned. "Great. Just great. I knew there was a reason he was such a pyromaniac—his birthday blows stuff up."
"Well, that means there's one thing left to do." Skye started.
"Find all of the fireworks in the house that he has hidden, and confiscate all explosives in Embers lab?" Raphael asked sarcastically.
Lola answered with a nod. "You got it. The hard part's going to be finding them all…let's start with the floorboards in Valon's room and the curtains, he hides them all the time there. I'll check the curtains. Skye, you go upstairs, Alister will take the basement and get the ones from Ember's lab, and Raphael will check in the kitchen."
"Thank you oodles for this, Raphael. There goes my free afternoon," muttered Alister indignantly as he went into the basement.
"Take note of the fact I was being sarcastic," said Raphael over his shoulder when he vanished in the kitchen. "And Lola, how did you know that Valon hides them under the floorboards?"
"I got bored when I was over here a while ago, so I cleaned his room and found the loose floorboard. He didn't take it so well, and he trashed it again in half an hour," she pouted. "All that hard work for nothing. Maybe I should clean it again for his birthday."
"Speaking of birthdays, Raphael's is in three days," Alister said with a grin, having just come up from the basement.
"Shut up," Raphael growled at the red-haired man.
"It is?" Skye asked in surprise, coming back downstairs. "I had no idea it was so soon."
Alister ignored Raphael's glower and took Lola's hand. "It's about time for Jasper's walk. You going to come with?"
"Okay!" she giggled, allowing him to lead her into the front hall and, after hooking Jasper onto the end of his leash, take her out of the house.
"So your birthday is coming up?" Skye asked. "How come you didn't mention it sooner?"
"It's not something I particularly enjoy celebrating," replied Raphael, his mouth turning down at the corner.
"Well, you're just lucky that I bought your birthday card a couple months ago, when I went to the store for some more popcorn," she said, going over to the desk and rifling through a drawer before pulling out an envelope. "Your present's inside; I got it yesterday."
Raphael opened the envelope and read it, both his eyebrows raising as he read the front of the card aloud. "Roses are red, violets are blue, it ain't Valentine's Day but I still love you'. How…sappy," he said dryly, glancing at the five papers that had fallen from the card.
"I figured you would appreciate that," said Skye. "You seem like the sappy card kind of guy."
"Yes, that goes very well with my likes of rainbows and butterflies and dancing ponies," he deadpanned, a frown marring his features when he read the papers. "Plane tickets?"
"Yep. We're going to France!" she exclaimed, hugging Raphael. At her boyfriend's suddenly blank expression, she added hastily, "We are not going to Paris if you don't want to, but Versailles is a nice place to go. Besides, Kaiba had flyer miles and he doesn't use them all that often anyways."
When Raphael said nothing, she looked back up at him and asked worriedly, "Is this okay?"
"Yeah, this is…this is great," he lied, hugging her back. This should be interesting. "Why are there five tickets?"
"Oh. Alister, Lola, and Valon are coming too!"
Raphael repressed a groan. "Stupendous."
Hehehehe. Who would've thought Valon's birthday would be on the 4th of July. Explains a lot.
