I know I know, I should be doing more with the twin's past and Miku's past but I'm not ready yet! DX

I promise I will once I get past the IA flashbacks and her back story, then I will do the other's. Even the villains will get one!

Thanks to Natsumi Sakurai, it means a lot to me to get reviews like that.

~Tiruneko ;3

X~19~X

A match was struck and held out in the setting sunlight. The fire flickered gently with the wind. The crowd was silent. Everyone held their breath, waiting. Someone stands in the center of the attention. A girl with long, pale blonde hair braided sloppily looks up slowly, a trail of blood dripping off her eye lashes.

Her thoughts were blurred by a loud buzzing in her ears, and an occasional white flash of light in her vision.

"Mama where Piko?" The small girl asks, looking up at the woman holding the match.

"He's dead, and you killed him. You're an animal." The woman spits at her.

The girl recoils, never hearing such language before. She slowly reaches her hands out to grab onto her mother's shirt like she always did when she was scared.

"Mama why are they watching?"

"Die you devil!" The woman screams loudly, suddenly tossing the match down on top of the approaching child. Her hair within moments explodes into a steady blaze. Within seconds the fire has advanced, cloaking her in orange and red flames. They lick her skin, no claw at her skin, melting it off into puddles on the floor.

A horrible agonizing scream rings out. The worst kind of scream. If you weren't there to watch the spectacle, but could hear the child's agonizing screams, well, you wouldn't have been able to distinguish them from that of a monster.

"IA!" Len calls. A hand is on her quaking shoulder as she lies in the grass just outside the van, sleeping. The sky is dark and starry with a shinning crescent moon. Just like that night.

The buzzing steadily fades from her ears. She moves her head slowly to see Len's concerned face hovering over her.

"You wouldn't stop thrashing around, and you started screaming." He says worried. IA simply nods in response, holding back the tears she knows are about to come.

Her small balled up fists fly to her eyes as salty tears stream through her fingers.

"IA, what's wrong?" Len grabs her by both shoulders, watching her squirm and cry, helpless to stop it. "It was just a dream... hey, hey come on now, it was just a dream, were here."

"It wasn't a dream though Len-voice!" She screams at him, tears flying around in the sky.

The door to the van flies open and Rin storms out angrily.

"The hell is going on out here?" She yells angrily, running a hand through her matted hair. She points a finger at Len. "You shouldn't be moving, lay back down before I kick you back down and you- IA?" She says, walking over and bending down beside her.

"It was so hot!" IA screams, nearly clawing out most of her hair. "I-I-I have to put it out!" She screams desperately. "I have to pull it out to stop the burning!"

Rin and Len exchange worried glances.

"P-piko." IA whispers between sobs.

"Piko?" Rin asks, bending down to meet eye to eye with the hysterical IA.

Without warning the small girl jumps to her quivering legs, and runs forward at all her speed right into the pond. Her arms thrash around in the water, she screams all the while. Miku sticks her head out of the window in the van, her eyes wide and confused.

Len moves to run into the pond after her, but Rin stops him, running forward herself. She runs with difficulty after IA, her clothes heavy and sticking to her skin, weighing her down.

"Relax, relax IA." Rin shouts, trying to calm her. After taking a few slaps to the face Rin grabs IA under the arms, and raises her above her head, carrying her out of the water as she squirms in her arms. By the time she has fully dragged her out of the water and brought her back by the van, IA has completely stopped struggling. Instead she lays almost asleep in Rin's arms.

"Now if that's over with-" Rin says before landing a slap across Len's face.

"HEY!" He yells angrily.

"Lay the hell down, I don't want you moving anymore until you fully repair yourself. Now I'm going back to bed, and no one will wake me up until morning, got it?" With that Rin slams the car door shut, leaving Len and IA outside to sleep in the grass, staring up at the stars.

What was that about? Len thinks, slowly moving his hand to brush hair out of the little girl's eyes. She moves slightly in her light sleep, but doesn't wake.

~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~

A bag of chips slaps into Miku's face, jarring her awake violently with a small yelp of surprise.

"Morning Leek Head." Rin grumbles between bites of food.

"When I meant wake her up Rin I didn't mean throw food at her face. Sheesh." Len says, before taking a long swig of a yellow energy drink.

"God how can you drink that stuff? Banana flavored energy drink? That's disgusting." Rin groans, recoiling at the over powering scent.

Len puts her in a head lock, rubbing his fist on top of her head as she shouts at him to quit it. "Says the girl addicted to orange flavored candy!"

Miku approaches them cautiously, opening the bag of chips and taking a small bite.

"Knock it off Len!" Rin yells, shoving him away. He tumbles out of the car door and lands in the grass, rubbing his head. "I'm gonna go walk around and try and find the road again, I literally have no idea which path we took." She states simply, jumping out of the car and jogging off down a nearby path. Her bobbing blonde hair disappears into the trees, leaving Miku and Len standing outside in the grass, and IA sleeping by the pond.

After moments in silence Len speaks up. "Hey Leek- I mean Miku. Do you remember yesterday when you were crying you were talking about all the stuff you didn't know?" Miku nods. "You said 'I don't know why I killed daddy.'"

Miku's eyes widen with horror and she turns away from Len, avoiding his gaze. Her fists tighten and she stops eating.

"What did you mean?" Len asks, cautious towards her reaction.

"… I… I don't like to talk about… those days." She says, her voice barely audible.

"Oh… okay." He replies plainly, curiosity eating at him.

IA sits up, rubbing her eyes. "M-m-morning." She mumbles, crawling over to Len and resting a head on his shoulder.

Rin's footsteps travel into their small little camp by the pond and her blonde head comes back into view.

"There's a town not too far from here, be ready to go in ten!" She shouts.

Before he stood up, Len could have sworn he heard IA mutter the same name from last night.

Piko.

Author Question: Who is Piko and what connection do you think he has to IA? I want to make sure I'm shaping this flashback relationship between them correctly!

I'm no longer putting in the teams and characters, takes up too much time to keep going back and copy and pasting. I'll start putting it up again as we move into later chapters, but for the next few if you're that curious go back to chapter 18 to look.

~Tiruneko ;3