Life at Riverside Foster Boarding School was far from fun. The most prestigious foster school in Northern Lishea, and the school to have the tightest grip on its students. It turned out the most successful foster students of any school, private, foster or public, around the Sirphane River, but it had never turned out a student before the age of twenty, when Lisheans came of age, except when one was taken into a family. Girls were expected to act like ladies and guys expected to act like gentlemen. But with an age range of newborn to twenty, this is a difficult task even for famous Riverside.

So, how could anyone know what the students knew, how they fought when not under the probing eyes of any of the staff?

Popularity reigned over all the students. The higher the grade, the closer you were to leaving the school, the more popular you were, the more people knew who you were. But that was known as “second-class popularity,” meaning that was the only thing you had done noteworthy in the school. Guys and girls alike fought cruelly for the acclaimed spot of “royalty popularity”, undermining each other in gossip, breaking out into fisticuffs when no adult was watching, doing daring and dangerous things that would end in probation and a whole eighteen-month year if caught. All for “royalty popularity”, the spot that allowed you to do whatever you wanted, say whatever you wanted, without any opposition from the fellow students.

And that spot was currently held by Midori Kawa, queen of the school, and her court, known as Midori’s Gang. Anyone part of Midori’s Gang would immediately become “first-class popularity”, and if they worked hard enough, “court popularity”, one step away from Midori’s spot.

But the oddest thing about Midori’s Gang was that none of the seven teenagers, with the exception of one, cared about the popularity game. They would rather have lived without it.

Midori Kawa was the gang’s leader, and the most regal girl at the school. She didn’t even have to try; she was just that way. She walked into the school five years ago, her chin held high in a proud way, mint green hair flowing smoothly down to her knees. Her matching eyes dared anyone to challenge her, saying that no matter what, she would win. Her face was carved in a queenly fashion, suggesting that her Elven bloodline might’ve been of royal descent. Some whispered behind their hands that Midori was of the last Elves that walked among humans. Others, adamantly and enviously, stated that she was a mere human, like everyone else, and proceeded to point out the features that made her so. One of these features was her height. Tall for a fourteen year-old, almost fifteen, she was an average height for a Lishean. This proved, these students insisted, that she did not have more Elven blood than the rest of them, and was thus just another human.

Even so, with her noble appearance and her bold personality, she was given the fitting place of “royalty popularity.”

Sora Sakura was Midori’s best friend, and thus, her right hand. As much as Midori’s looks brought out her Elven bloodline, Sora’s emphasized her human bloodline. A fact she so deeply despised for no reason known even to Midori, Sora had white skin, whiter than the normal Lishean, light gray hair, and deep red eyes –an albino, in other words. She was shorter than most of the fourteen-year-old girls, and would’ve normally been ignored by her peers had she not been part of Midori’s Gang and Midori’s best friend.

Kaji Samui gained his reputation through Midori and his science class disruptions. Being in the science class meant the only the boring classes were reviews and occasional class when Kaji was given paperwork instead of an experiment. Chemical experiments were known to explode and supposedly dead animals would be rescued from being dissected by the unsuspecting teacher, much to the delight of most of the guys and terror of most of the girls. Even the simple vinegar-baking soda experiment would go dangerously wrong with Kaji. If not for being friends with Midori and his reputation in the science class, he would not stand out in a crowd by appearance alone.. He was the average height of a Lishean, and had perfectly normal blood-red hair and chocolate brown eyes.

Shiro Ameiro was one of the sweetest girls Riverside had ever known, making her exceptionally popular. Taller than most girls and thin, she had shoulder length golden-blond hair, always kept down with barrettes keeping her long bangs from hiding her face. She had sky-blue eyes that sparkled whenever she smiled, adding to her already angelically sculpted face. All she was missing were wings. Unbeknownst the teachers and principal, she often helped the kitchen staff with the cooking, even though it was against school rules. She was known to help any student that she could, making her not only popular, but very well liked.

Kuro Ameiro was just the male version of Shiro in appearances. Slightly taller than Shiro, his blue eyes also often sparkled –with mischief. His long hair was swept into a ponytail, his messy bangs were jauntily pushed out of his eyes. He was rarely seen without an impish smile, indicating that he had another plan to get into trouble; trouble that was seldom punished. Had any other student tried to copy what he did, they would have received detention quicker than a blink of an eye. Just as Shiro was liked for her gentleness, Kuro was admired for his nerve. So much so that he had a not-so-secret-admirer –Relsha Brodum. The one person on Kaotack who could drive Kuro to end only because she was the only person (with the only exception of Shiro, had long gotten used to him) whose skin he could not get under. It was often said that he could murder and still be a saint in Relsha’s eyes.

Chiro Bakane was the least favorite of the gang. Short, rather plain features, dull brown eyes, and shaggy grayish/brown hair. Timid at his best, he had a habit of ducking behind anything when Midori’s voice was raised. It was suspected that he stayed Midori’s Gang only because Midori could use him to vent her anger. Otherwise, he would’ve been thrown out the second he had tried to join. And in fact, Midori had never invited him to be a friend of hers; he slipped in by acquaintance of one her better friends. He was at least a year younger than the rest of the gang, putting him at a disadvantage when it came to schoolwork. Tests for all grades did not happen on the same day; so whenever Chiro had a test to study for, more often than not, the rest did not. So they spent most of their time doing something that most students could only wish they could get away with. Despite being part of Midori’s Gang, the students did not consider Chiro popular enough to even be second-class. When his name was mentioned, it was usually followed by a “Chiro who?”

The seventh of the gang, and by no means the least of them, was Tatsuya Kuraine. He never laughed, never spoke, and never paid attention to anyone outside of Midori’s Gang. He spoke to those closest to him by looks translatable only by them. The eldest of them, he was leader when and where Midori failed. Just as he had at his former boarding school, he held the air of a lone wolf, and the fascination of half the girls in senior high. Straight black that half-hid his red/brown eyes, wiry and tall, and a handsomely built face. A rebel to Riverside’s high standards, he never turned in assignments, skipped the punishments, and wore black instead of the school’s gray uniform. More than a frustration to the teachers, he was something of a king to the students, something he greatly disliked.

Though most of them held high ranks among the students, there was one student ready to stand against them. Relsha Brodum.

It started sometime shortly after Midori had assembled her gang. Relsha, the nosiest girl in the school, had been following a rumor to see if it was true. Her search landed her in Midori’s dorm room, going through her things. Unfortunately for her, Midori happened to walk in on her. Ever since then, the girls had been at ends with each, much to the entertainment of the students. In the past, their war had been evenly matched. Then the freshmen female prefect, Lily Curdman, was adopted and Relsha was made her successor. Relsha had now the power to punish Midori . . . . If she managed to catch her breaking the rules, which she never could accomplish.


And so one Dayesse morning, the beginning of the week, found Sora absently staring off into space. She was in her house common room –the Light house- waiting for her best friend to return from her mission. Midori didn’t exactly say what her mission was, but she had taken off in the direction of the library. For the past few weeks, Midori had been acting odd, as was remarked by her friends when she was not with them. She had said that she would explain everything, but so far, she hadn’t held true to her word.

The clock woke Sora from her reverie, telling her that it was seven, and time for her to be in the cafeteria. Her eyes flitted to it, then back to the lighthouse painted on the wall. She had no interest in dinner at the moment. Perhaps she’ll go later, when the cafeteria wasn’t as crowded. Or when Midori came back. She remained oblivious to the already-almost empty room becoming completely empty.

The shadows slowly stretched across the room, reaching for an unknown goal, at the same time, bathing the room in an evening autumn glow. Glass objects glared gold in the light and the wooden furniture was burnished a fiery orange. Silence reigned, with the exception of the clock’s ticking. The peace and beauty of the scene was rudely interrupted by sudden loud crash, indicating that someone had hurriedly thrown the door open.

Sora barely had time to react to this before several large volumes were slammed in front of her, forcing her to quickly remove her elbows off the table she had been leaning on. Startled, she looked up at the perpetrator.

“I’ve got it! It’s perfect!” Midori said excitedly. Ignoring Sora’s look of surprise and bewilderment, she proceeded to flip open one of the books and rapidly raced through its pages. “This has all sorts of maps and the such, the others have all sorts of history,” she said excitedly.

“Midori, since when have you been interested in geography or history?” Sora asked, staring at the open book.

Midori leaned toward her, a grin on her face. “Because this will help us, unlike what they teach us. With this, we won’t have to listen to another lecture in our life.”

Still baffled, Sora managed to raise an eyebrow at this statement. “We got about five years left, Midori-”

“No! Wait, where are the others?” Midori said, looking around as if she just noticed that the absence of the others.

“Probably eating dinner, like everyone else,” Sora said, frowning slightly. “You do know it’s almost eight, right?”

“Oh, yeah,” Midori said dismissively, as if eating dinner at this time was unthinkable. “Well, I need them.”

“No doubt,” Sora muttered under her breath. “Why don’t you go and get them?”

“Good idea, now’s the best time,” Midori agreed, grabbing Sora’s arm and dragging her to the common room dorm, “let’s get them now.”

“Wait! I met that you’d get them, not me!”

But Sora’s protests fell on deaf ears as Midori half-dragged her down the tower’s stairs, across the halls and into the cafeteria.

The cafeteria was the biggest room in the entire room, seating over five hundred people. Finding people was not as hard as some might think, though; the cafeteria was split up in sections. Anyone under the junior high grade had the largest section, as they had not yet been placed into a house. The junior and senior highers sat with their respective house –Light, Dark, Earth, Wind, Fire or Water. The last section was reserved for the staff members.

Midori hauled Sora down the Light tables, searching for the other five.

“Can you see them?” Midori said, a hint of an impatient growl in her voice.

“No, I can’t,” Sora sighed exasperatedly. “I’m not psychic, I don’t-”

She took a step back as she was saying and stepped on someone’s foot. Surprised, she turned around to apologize.

“We all we know that you’re not psychic, or you would’ve seen that,” Kuro said sarcastically, a barely concealed grin on his face. He turned to Midori. “You called?”

“Yes, I wanted to talk to you all in the common room,” she said, frowning.

Kuro raised an eyebrow. “Next time you send us a mind message, could you warn us? It didn’t seem to reach any of us.”

Midori rolled her eyes. “Just get to the common room, all right? And get there before anyone else does!” She dropped her voice considerably. “I don’t want anyone overhearing this.” With that, she stalked off.

“Is she finally going to tell us what’s been going on?” Kuro asked, looking at Sora.

“No idea,” Sora admitted. “But there’s only one way to find out. Let’s get the others.”


Finally, all of the seven had assembled in the empty common room. A couple of them were a little disgruntled about being taken away from dinner, but Midori was oblivious to this. All except Midori (who was already seated) chose their seats according to the unwritten chart. Chiro sat across from Midori in the most uncomfortable chair of the ones used by the gang, showing his place in the group. Sora sat at Midori’s right, as the best friend of Midori. Shiro took Midori’s left. Kuro sat on his sister’s left, with Kaji either using Kuro’s chair’s arm, or the chair next to Kuro. For the moment, Kaji was perched on the arm. Last, but far from the least, Tatsuya curled in the biggest chair, which was on Sora’s right, showing his dominance in the gang.

“Well,” Sora started, as Midori was flipping through her heavy books, “this certainly hasn’t been the best of days.”

“What are you talking about?” Kuro asked with air of one knowing, but asking the question all the same. “Today’s been the best day! Maybe not of my life, but . . . It has been absolutely brilliant.”

“Sure,” Sora snapped. “Speak for yourself. Mr. Leng gave us a pop quiz, and I know I’ve failed. Not to mention I missed the geometry class today.”

“Pop quizzes are extremely easy, what are you talking about?!” Kuro said exasperatedly.

“Even though you and Shiro manage to ace every class without knowing the topic doesn’t mean everyone else can do it!” Sora shot back.

“Please,” Shiro begged, holding up her hands, “leave me out of this.”

“Too late,” Kuro said cheerfully. “You’re already in. And you can’t back out.”

Wildly, Chiro, wishing not to get dragged in the conversation as Shiro had been, asked Tatsuya, “We haven’t heard from you yet!”

Tatsuya raised his eyebrows at him, clearly saying that it wasn’t the brightest of things to say.

“Of course we haven’t!” Kaji said, trying his hardest not to laugh. “He’s too quiet. Maybe if he made a sound more than once a week, it wouldn’t too much of a surprise.”

Tatsuya considered him for a moment with an air of detached interest, wondering whether or not he should take Kaji’s comment as an insult or compliment. After a minute or so, Tatsuya decided not to take action and turned his attention to picking at the chair.

Kaji, believing he was out of the danger zone, turned to say something to Kuro. In that moment, however, a pillow collided with the side of his head, knocking him off the chair’s arm and onto the floor. Shiro and Sora snickered, Midori tried not to look amused but failed, Chiro gave a nervous laugh, but Kuro showed the most amusement; Tatsuya merely had a look of satisfaction.

“Yes!” Kuro half-cheered. “Awesome shot!” Turning to Kaji, he said, “Bet’cha wish you didn’t say anything, huh?”

“Actually, I’m wishing I didn’t know you,” Kaji grumbled, getting back onto the chair’s arm.

“Why’s that?”

“Because, one, I wouldn’t have to listen to your ridicule, and two, I’d be in the middle of the chair and I wouldn’t’ve fallen off the chair,” was the answer.

“BE-fore anyone says anything else, I’d like to get on with why I asked you here,” Midori interrupted.

“Yeah, what were you thinking, Midori?” Kuro said with tone of mock accusation. “We have to skip dinner for this!”

“Hush, and I’ll explain!” Midori protested.

“No,” Kuro said defiantly.

“Oh, no,” Shiro said, dropping her head in her hands.

“Why now?” Sora groaned, looking up at the ceiling.

Chiro cringed, Kaji bit his lip and Tatsuya settled more comfortably in his chair, with the air of expecting something of great amusement, like a humorous play.

“You will!” Midori insisted.

“Will not!” Kuro shot back.

Midori looked ready to throw something, and the gang, all too used to her temper, prepared themselves. Shiro and Sora both tried make themselves smaller, less of a target. Tatsuya did not move, but the others knew from experience that he was ready to block anything thrown in his direction. Kuro grinned, challenging her to throw something while Kaji got ready to duck, in case the object missed its mark and threatened to knock him off the chair again. Chiro cringed even more just in case that unidentified flying object (most likely the heavy book in her lap) was sent in his direction.

“Will too!” Midori snapped. “Now, I was saying-”

“Not!” Kuro said loudly.

“Will. You. Be. QUIET?!” Midori snarled, possibly louder than Kuro. She glared fiercely at him.

“Nope!”

“Five minutes!”

“Won’t take anything under one!”

“Four!”

“Not doing.”

“Three!” There was a note of pleading in her tone.

“One’s my final offer.”

“Then, two!”

Kuro considered for a second, then said, “Fine, two minutes, and not a second over!”

“As I was saying,” she said, trying to speak quickly before her time ran out. “We all hate this place. So, I suggest we leave. Well, not like, right now. But when one of us gets in trouble, or, uh, something- something, er, or any other troublesome situation. We could be like, prepared to go by then, and so when something like that comes up, we’re out of here. I’ve looked at a couple of maps and I know where we can go to keep the school off our tails.” She lifted up the book she was holding. A picture of the circular river Sirphane was splashed on the pages, showing in exquisite detail the cities and forest it surrounded. “As Riverside’s in Alkare, we’re stuck in the Sirphane River. Great location on Riverside’s part. When and if we leave, they won’t expect us to cross the river; but there’s a ferry that can take us across. It’ll be illegal, but they won’t search for us outside the Sirphane.”

“Um, ‘any other troublesome situation’?” Kaji asked.

“Uh, yeah,” Midori said, not giving anything else.

“You want us to take part in something illegal, too?” Kaji asked.

“Uh, yeah,” Midori said.

“Where will we go?” Chiro asked, glancing nervously at her. “I mean, after we supposedly cross the Sirphane. And even that’s not a given. So, where will we go after the river?”

“Haven’t figured that out yet,” she answered. “I just wanted a way out without anyone stopping us.”

“So, let me get this straight,” Sora said. “Just in case any one of us gets in trouble, or, ah, any other troublesome situation, we’ll have ready-made packs to go and get out of here. We will cross the Sirphane River, but we’ve got no idea where we’re going after that. Meanwhile, we could suffer starvation and dehydration, or severe injuries or diseases, get killed by wild things, or, I guess it’s possible, by someone extremely crazy who just shoots us all, or even end up with some enemies because we ran away and didn’t take them so they might try to track us down . . . with the one benefit of leaving here forever?”

“Uh, yeah, that’s basically it,” Midori said.

These words were greeted with a silence, until about thirty seconds later, when Kuro was allowed to talk again.

“Well, I guess it all balances out,” he said cheerfully. “A few possible bad things in exchange for leaving here forever. Sounds like fun.”

Midori looked at him, as if she were going to challenge his use of ‘fun’, but she instead let it go and looked at the others.

“Well, on one hand, we’ll be free of Riverside,” Kaji said thoughtfully. “On the other hand, we’ll be running for the rest of our lives, or at least until we turn twenty, as to avoid getting caught by Riverside. It’ll be easier for Tatsuya, as he’s the eldest, but the rest of us have to wait at least five more years . . . . So this could be the worst mistake of our lives, yet the best opportunity we’ll ever have . . . .”

“Don’t forget that it might ruin our futures for jobs and such,” Shiro reminded him, watching Midori thoughtfully.

“But if we’re on the run, we might find something to do that won’t require contacting anyone,” Sora said.

“But we might be hunted down for that,” Kuro said, with an unusually serious tone.

“So, something like this shouldn’t be taken very lightly,” Kaji finished.

“Well, whatever you decide, I’m leaving,” Midori said determinedly. “And whoever goes with me will, but if you want to stay, that’s fine with me.” She looked pointedly at them.

Tatsuya shrugged, obviously giving his consent to going. No one was surprised at this; Tatsuya absolutely hated it at Riverside.

“I’ll go too,” Kuro said.


“And I,” Shiro said as soon as her twin volunteered.

“Well . . . .” Sora took a deep breath. “Yes . . . .”

“Alright,” Kaji agreed.

“Me too!” Chiro put in.

“Then it’s decided,” Midori said in relief. “We’re all leaving. I didn’t want anyone else finding out, or else we’d get in big trouble. And when I mean trouble, I mean lockdown trouble. I’ve also read about that; students idiotic enough to talk of their plans about leaving were instantly put in lockdown.”

Lockdown was when the student was watched, thirty hours a day, seven hours a week by every single staff member. Instead of using their dorms at night or even the common rooms during free time, the student was placed in a lockdown room, a room with no windows and no furniture except a bed. The door was locked from the outside, was impossible to pick, and the only key was held by the principal. This type of room only spoke of Riverside’s paranoia of losing students, and increased the students’ desire to leave Riverside.

“Ah, the dramatic suspense of it all,” Kuro said in a misty voice.

“I wonder if that’ll be his reaction if he’s the only one sent to lockdown?” Shiro said, amused.

“No, we figure that if it’s anyone, it’d be Tatsuya,” Kaji said. “How many detentions and you haven’t shown up for any of them?”

Tatsuya shrugged.

“Well, there’s one upside,” Shiro said thoughtfully.

“What’s that?” Sora said, frowning. “I thought we’ve covered the pros and cons.”

“Not this one,” Shiro contradicted. “No more Relsha.”

A heavy silence fell over them as they all thought darkly about Relsha.

“No more having her follow me around!” Kuro said, relieved.

“No more prefect bossiness!” Sora sighed happily.

“Oh, no, that reminds me,” Midori groaned. “Sora, Shiro, we’ll have to keep anything that could give away our plans locked up where Relsha will never find it.”

“Well, everything will be well locked up in the lockdown room,” Kuro said brightly.

Midori glared reprovingly at him.

“Thank you for the encouragement,” Sora said with a weak smile.

“Oh, I’ve just thought of something!” Kuro said, his eyes shining mischievously. “We can just wait for Kaji to set fire to the science room again; we’ll be out of here in no time!”

“Look, I didn’t mean to do that!” Kaji protested, a little heatedly.

“But, you did mean to bring in that possum, right?” Kuro said slyly.

“I thought it was dead!” Kaji said, frowning as Shiro and Sora, even Midori, snorted with laughter.

“Ah,” Kuro said, closing his eyes at the memory, “that was really one great day, wasn’t it? Of course, the teacher thought it was dead . . . Till he picked it up. How many girls screamed?”

Kaji shook his head, disgusted, but amused.

“Look, if we can get back on topic, there’s still a few things that must be organized and straightened out,” Midori began.

“Ah, that can wait,” Kuro said, getting up. “Meanwhile, I’m going to get dinner, before it runs off. It’s probably gone by now, thanks to Midori.”

“I’m not done!” Midori hissed.

“And I don’t care!” Kuro retorted. “Hanging around who-knows-where, when’s the next time we’re going to eat? So, why not eat now? It’ll probably be our last meal!”

After he said this, he headed for the common room door.

“Kuro, I’m so killing you!” Midori growled, but only those who remained heard her.

“I think I’ll follow,” Shiro said, getting up as well.

Sora shrugged, turned to Midori and asked, “Coming? Obviously, without Kuro, we can’t discuss much.”

“I guess we’ll have to tell each other any new developments throughout the day,” Midori sighed. “Which isn’t the greatest thing, but . . . .”

“Alright then, let’s eat,” Kaji said, leaping off the chair.

Only Tatsuya remained where he was.

This will bring more trouble, Midori, he thought. I believe a lot more trouble than you think. Is it really wise for me-?

Midori and Sora zipped through halls, once again trying to beat the clock to class, this time for fun instead of trying not to be late. It was Dayquatr, signaling the end of the school week. The girls were headed for their art class. Two students, inattentive to anything else except their idol conversation, walked right in Midori and Sora’s path. The girls swerved to avoid them, but the ignorant students turned, right back into their path and colliding with the girls.

“What were you doing?” Midori asked furiously, picking herself up from the floor. “We were trying to go around you!”

“Well, you should warn people next time you race in the halls!” one of the students argued.

“Maybe you should pay attention,” Sora snapped, accepting Midori’s helping hand.

“We were!” the other protested.

“To what?” Midori shot back.

The other paled, recognizing Midori.

“C’mon,” she whispered to her companion. “It’s Midori.”

Giving her a frightened look, the first followed her friend.

“They need to learn a lesson about paying attention,” Midori scoffed.

“So did you, five years ago,” someone said behind them.

Midori and Sora turned. Shiro had appeared behind them.

“Well, we were younger, weren’t we?” Sora protested, a sheepish grin on her face.

“You were ten,” Shiro pointed out. “Old enough to know how to pay attention.”

“How do you know?” Sora said teasingly. Shiro just smiled.

“Well, see you around,” she said airily.

“Sure,” Sora called. She stared off after Shiro, remembering their first encounter with Shiro. They had been racing, like they had done only a minute previously. They hadn’t touched her, but Shiro had completely freaked, spilling everything in her arms all over the floor. Apologizing, the two girls had helped Shiro pick up her things. But even then Shiro did not look reassured, and continued to flinch whenever she was handed her stuff, as if she had been expecting them to attack her.

“We’ve got to go,” Midori said, pulling at her friend’s sleeve and bringing her back to the present. “Or we’ll really be late.”

“Ah, what’s skipping a class?” Sora said jokingly.

“A chance to miss our opportunity,” Midori replied seriously.



Kuro felt Kaji prodding him.

“You awake?”

“Decaf’s fine,” Kuro answered, not bothering to look up. “Add a hint of chocolate, a little cream, and of course, a lot of sugar.”

“Uh, I asked if you were awake,” Kaji said.

“And I told you what kind of coffee I’d like,” Kuro said simply.

“Did that event last night really tire you out?” Kaji said in disbelief.

“No, Relsha’s wearing me down,” Kuro groaned. “Know how many times I’ve had to take a detour in order to avoid her just today? More than one, I can tell you.”

“You can’t tell me the rest?” Kaji said. From his tone, Kuro knew that his mouth was twitching in amusement.

“I forgot the total,” Kuro replied.

“Aaah.”

“And what are you doing, Kuro? Sleeping?” Midori’s voice came in.

Finally, Kuro lifted his head.

He was in one of the classrooms. It was way too early to be there, but Kuro preferred getting to his classes early, the main benefit being that he could avoid Relsha a whole lot easier. For this class, Kaji had accompanied him, and it appeared that Midori had arrived early as well; an unusual happening with her, as she nearly always ended up one of the last to arrive at class.

“Nah, can’t,” Kuro answered.

“Can’t?” Midori’s tone was cool and Kuro knew immediately what she was hinting to.

“Midori, it was a joke about setting off those firecrackers in the boys’ dorms last night, I didn’t actually do it!” he said in protest.

“Oh, really?” she said, her voice unbelieving.

“Really! Ask Tatsuya!” Kuro said.

“But the Foam dart gun fight actually took off,” Kaji muttered under his breath. Kuro shot him a look as Midori glared at them, having heard what Kaji said.

“Foam dart gun fight?” she said. “No wonder you’re tired. How long did this go on?”

“Ummm . . .” Kuro hesitated, unwilling to answer.

“Not long?” Kaji suggested.

“Well, not long after Tatsuya joined,” Kuro admitted. “He got a little fed up with the racket some of the guys were making and shot them all. Mind you, if Tatsuya hadn’t joined, I would’ve won.”

Midori just gave them a look. “And the teachers didn’t catch you?”

“They did,” Kuro said happily. “Except, they joined.”

Midori shook her head. “No way. Just, no way.”

“Don’t you girls have Foam fights?” Kaji said in defense.

“No, Shiro’s told me,” Kuro replied before Midori could open her mouth. “She wishes, though.”

Midori glared at him.

“So, how and why did you get here early?” Kaji asked, swiftly changing the subject.

“I walked,” Midori said. “And because I wanted to get here early. Problem with that?”

“Maybe,” Kuro replied, grinning. She ignored him.

“Anyways, I’ve just remembered something we’ll need when we leave,” Midori said, finally getting where she wanted to go.

“A map?” Kaji suggested.

“No, we’d be sensible to bring that,” Kuro contradicted.

“No, something for shelter,” Midori snapped. “I’ve checked the weather for the next week, and it says it’ll be raining for several days.”

“I’m surprised, that’s sensible,” Kuro admitted.

Once again, she ignored him.

“I just can’t believe that I hadn’t thought of it before,” she muttered, angry at herself. “I mean, it’s extremely important. And speaking of which, I need to make sure the others know about this.” With that, she got up and stalked out of the classroom.

“Midori, wait!” Kaji called. “Surely it can wait - !” He looked at Kuro, a small frown etched on his face. “Surely it can wait till after class?”

“Nope,” Kuro said. “It was the only thing that made her come in here, didn’t you know?”

Kaji was shaking his head. “If she’s not careful, she’ll get detention the day we decide to leave.”

“Only increases the thrill,” Kuro answered happily. “She’ll probably remember class just before it starts.”

“Maybe she’s hoping to get expelled,” Kaji sighed.

Kuro bit back his retort. With Riverside, no one wanted to get expelled; they just didn’t know it.


Through the whole of Biology that day, thanks to Midori, Kaji was running through his head everything the gang had thought of to bring. As a result, he was barely listening to the teacher; a first, as he usually was most attentive in class.

Staring at the class’s frog, he tried to think of something that they had forgotten. For some reason, he felt that whatever it was that they were forgetting was very important. Food? Yes, Shiro made sure of that, thanks to her helping out in the school’s cafeteria. Shelter? Midori had approached them earlier with that and Sora got to it before anyone else could. They had also remembered things for the change of weather. Sora had practically filled her bag with water containers, believing that they wouldn’t always come across it. Kuro had unearthed a map of the surrounding area that didn’t need to be ripped out of a book, as Midori was all too willing to do if they could not get a hold of one. As far as Kaji was concerned, they were ready to walk out the door at any minute.

So what was it that they were forgetting?

“Samui?”

Kaji jumped and looked at the teacher, who was peering at him with a look of exasperation.

“Uh, yeah?”

“Can you answer my question?” the teacher asked, frowning slightly.

Kaji hesitated. “Um, what . . . what was your question?” he asked, a little guiltily.

Mr. Summons, the teacher, just stared at him. The rest of the class was trying their best to quiet their snickering.

“You’re not going to repeat it, are you?” Kaji said, his heart sinking. He hadn’t heard a word about what Mr. Summons was talking about.

“I shouldn’t need to,” the teacher said coolly.

“What if I forgot?” Kaji asked hopefully.

“I shouldn’t need to,” the teacher repeated, a little more sternly this time.

“I . . . don’t know?” Kaji suggested.

Mr. Summons looked at him in frustration. “Please try to pay attention next time,” he said stiffly before moving to another student for the answer.

Kaji felt a little hot from embarrassment. Normally, he’d have the answer to whatever question in science right off the bat, so something like this was a little humiliating.

But despite this, Kaji once again lost focus by instead turning his attention to planning. Thinking about their cue to leave, he pondered Midori’s meaning of “troublesome situation.” What in the world she meant about that, Kaji knew that only she knew. Was she expecting one of them to get in trouble again? Or something more serious?

A strange buzzing filled his ears. He shook his head in annoyance.

Doubtless the classroom next door had turned on the TV, he thought, trying hard to ignore it as he went back to his pondering.

But . . . There was no class next door. That room was empty at this time of day.

Kaji blinked and straightened, wondering where the sound was coming from. The buzzing noise grew gradually louder. Glancing at the rest of the class, he saw that he wasn’t the only one who noticed the noise.

“Ignore it, please,” Mr. Summons said impatiently. “Let us get back to our subject.”

Only a few students heeded his word. The rest, Kaji included, instead looked around, hoping to find the source of the noise.

BzzzzzzzzzzzzZZZZZWHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!

Kaji, closest to window, had only two seconds at the most to leap out of his chair in order to avoid it.

CRASH!

Some heavy, shiny object crashed through the window, ricocheted off Kaji’s desk and onto the floor. The students nearest the object hurriedly leapt out of the chairs and fled to the walls. Others who were farther away from it crept closer to get a better look.

The object was beeping sinisterly, as if waiting for one of the students to just touch it. Kaji slowly got to his feet, shaking broken glass out of his hair. As soon as he looked at the object, he froze, the only one in the room able to recognize it for what it really was.

A bomb.

“Get . . . Back,” he warned the curious students. “And get out of this room.”

Mr. Summons drew himself up. “I believe, Samui, that I’m the one in charge here, not you!”

“Sir,” Kaji said, eyes still on the bomb, “that’s a bomb.”

At these words, several of the students panicked and instantly fled the room. Mr. Summons frowned severely at Kaji.

“Is this some sort of –”

“This isn’t a joke.”

Mr. Summons studied Kaji’s face with an almost frightened air. The beeps of the bomb became quicker, indicating that it was going to off very soon.

“RUN!” Mr. Summons commanded, completely losing his cool.

He and the class followed those who had listened to Kaji, bumping each other in attempt to all squeeze through the doorway at the same time. Kaji was the last one in the room. He knew running for it could cost him dearly. If he tripped even once, he knew it would be too late to get back up. Walking to the door would take too long. Instead, he tried to think of how much of an impact it would have. Briefly, he wished that Tatsuya was in that classroom. Tatsuya would be able to disable the bomb in only a few seconds. Only because of his weird obsession with almost anything that could relate to fire was the gang able to recognize explosive devices.

Glancing at the positioning of all the furniture in the room, Kaji found that escaping the explosion was virtually impossible. The students had kicked the desks and chairs in a sort of barricade around the door in their panic. Though he was no expert, he knew enough to know that the bomb was built to create an explosion large enough to set the whole room on fire. The corners, which were probably the farthest away from the bomb as Kaji could go, had wooden items; some of the things that would be the first to catch on fire and therefore offering no protection to Kaji. Climbing out the window was an option, but by the time Kaji got out, the bomb would go off and possibly knock down the walls; if not that, then it would propel the shards of glass from the windows at who knew what speed. The only option presented to Kaji was to stay where he was and pray that he wouldn’t get harmed much, a very unlikely happening.

The bomb gave off one last beep, then exploded.

Kaji instinctively ducked, covering his face with his arms. Desks, chairs, shelves, books, and a whole lot more crashed into him. He felt the heat of the fire from some objects as they hit the space of wall next to him, sometimes even burning him.

Gasping, and in extreme pain, Kaji panted, “So, Midori. Does this count as a ‘troublesome situation’?”

Then everything went dark.



“ ‘- crying, “They are here, the Knights are here!” The Assassin Castle, now located on the Kawa property, for the first time, and last time, in its existence saw battle, between the Knights and Assassins. By skill alone did the Assassins pull off a victory, though they were not without their losses. Casualties for the Knights, historians say, were at least sixteen thousand, four hundred thirty-eight with one thousand, five hundred ten injured. Out of the ten thousand assassins housed at the Assassin Castle, only forty-two lived, all with severe injuries. Though they had won the battle, the Assassins felt that they could no longer stay there. As a result, all but one of the them, Adroit Kawa, left the Assassin Castle. The remaining Assassin did not live in the castle, but built a small cottage some distance from the castle.’ ”

Shiro finished reciting the passage and sat down, knowing that her teacher was trying to hide the look of astonishment. She knew that she had said the whole thing word-for-word without looking at the book, just like the teacher had wanted. She also knew that the teacher was hoping for her failure, which would be Shiro’s first.

“Very good, Miss Ameiro,” Mr. Leng said, reluctantly giving her his rare praise. He scrutinized her carefully, as if searching for evidence to use to accuse her of somehow cheating. Shiro’s expression was mild, completely used to this look. As if he didn’t give her that same look every time she answered a question right.

It was because she and her brother were above the average student. Never once had they failed to answer a question correctly, never once had they failed to achieve a perfect score on a test. On top of that, they knew things that even college level students didn’t know. It wasn’t because they were bookworms, or that they managed to cheat. As Kuro had put it when the principal confronted the both of them, “It just comes to us naturally, as if we had known it all along.” This only increased suspicion of foul play among the faculty.

Mr. Leng turned his attention away from her and onto the class, taking a deep breath. “Can anyone tell me where the Assassin ‘Inn’ was originally set?”

One student raised his hand. “Uh, that Jorsenson place . . .”

“You’re going to have to be more specific, Robiner, as the Jorsenson family owns a lot of historical properties.”

The class giggled as Robiner tried figure out which Jorsenson property held the original Assassin Inn.

“Um, the Thievery’s Mill?”

Another outbreak of giggling. Mr. Leng sighed.

“No, that is where black-market items were sold, when the true-blood Elves had disappeared and the government had banned Elven objects,” Mr. Leng said with the patient air of one trying not to sound exasperated.

Before Robiner could try to find another property name, there was an enormous BOOM! and the entire classroom shook, as if a violent earthquake just took place.

“Earthquake!” shrieked one girl, diving to the floor. Immediately, just as it had come, the shaking stopped.

“Not an earthquake,” Shiro said sharply. “That was definitely a bomb!”

“No need to let your imagination get ahead of you,” Mr. Leng said, frowning at the class. “Whatever it was, it’s gone now and it’s nothing that you should concern yourselves with.”

Shiro didn’t agree, but she said nothing as the teacher continued with the lesson. She pretended to be listening, but she was really listening for the sounds of a siren, indicating that her guess was indeed correct. Perhaps this was the “troublesome situation” Midori had talked about? Hopefully, no one was injured. But with the way it had affected the classroom, she doubted that everyone got away unharmed. After several long, agonizing minutes, she heard sirens in the distance. Waiting a few more seconds, she raised her hand.

Mr. Leng ignored her until he was finished with his paragraph. Finally done, he looked at her. “Yes, Miss Ameiro?”

“I just remembered,” Shiro said, making her voice sound apologetic. “I forgot something in my locker, and it’s very important.”

“And just what is this important thing?” Mr. Leng said impatiently.

Putting on a dejected and hurt face, she answered, “It’s a gift from one of my friends. You see, it’s really important to me, and I just don’t feel right without it. So, Mr. Teacher, may I please go and fetch it? I shan’t be long.”

Mr. Leng glared at her. “I’m sorry, Miss Ameiro, if you have forgotten that in your locker. But you are in the middle of class, so you will have to wait until the end.”

Fake tears welled up in Shiro’s eyes. “B-but sir,” she said pleading, “th-that’s from Lily. I re-really need th-that. It’s b-been ha-hard after she’s left, a-and so I’ve kept it with m-me at a-a-all times. I p-put it in m-my locker t-to get my b-book and th-then the bell rang, s-so I couldn’t p-pick it back u-up. P-please sir, l-let me get it. I sh-shan’t be long.”

As she looked up at Mr. Leng, her vision started to fade. It happened every now and then ever since Kuro had removed her bandages from her eyes. Occasionally, her sight would just grow dim, but more often than not she went completely blind; just one of the few reminders that she was not completely cured of her illness. Only Kuro knew about her disabilities; her friends were aware of nothing.

She struggled not to show on her face her frustration at the timing, which she succeeded.

Mr. Leng looked at her, a little troubled at the sight of her tears. “Very well, Miss Ameiro. If you’re quick, you may retrieve it.”

“Th-thank you, sir!” she sobbed, leaping to her feet and darting out the door. No, she wouldn’t be very long. If this was the time they were all waiting for, then she needed to find out and grab her bag. By the time Mr. Leng searched for her, she’d be long gone. If it was just a false alarm, she’d be back in the classroom in no time, pretending that she had gotten what she had supposedly left to retrieve.

However, her sight gave her issues. Only because of her knowledge of the halls did she manage to reach her locker. Leaning against her locker door, she closed her eyes, and waited, knowing, knowing that someone would come and tell her what had happened.



He leaned against the wall, eyes closed. He held his breath, listening, waiting. Kuro had decided to skip that hour’s class merely because he could. Now he was making sure that no one came searching for him. He didn’t really have a purpose for being there. He was just there; he preferred to be alone at this time and going to the common room would only cause him trouble.

He sensed the vibrations before he actually felt them; he opened his eyes and, narrowing them, glanced down the hall. “Troublesome situation” indeed. It was a message loud and clear to Kuro: He had to leave now or else.

He turned the opposite way and made his way to the lockers where they had stored their runaway things.



The shaking caught Chiro off guard. He was grabbing his books for his next class when the things stacked haphazardly in his locker started to spill out and he was forced to grip the locker door tightly to keep his balance. A flicker of fear flashed across his face, but he quickly rearranged it into an expression of determination. He knew what the earthquake meant.

And he’d be successful if only he could . . . .



Tatsuya showed no signs of surprise when the tremor went through the school. While the rest of the study hall group panicked, he remained where he was, waiting for an opportunity for the teacher’s back to be turned. In only ten seconds, Tatsuya’s chance arrived and he slipped out of the room completely unnoticed. With that done, he wouldn’t have anyone searching for him; by the time he had finally left the school they would realized that he had been in the room and had left during the chaos.

Tatsuya was never bound to his promise to Midori; if she didn’t take this opportunity, he wouldn’t be with the time they did leave. The ones who had sent the bomb sent a death note and they sent it in the wrong room. Lucky for Tatsuya. He knew exactly who they were trying to scare: Him. Now that they found him, he was leaving.

Good luck finding him again.



“It’s alright, he’s still alive!”

“The ambulance is on its way!”

Kaji smelled the acrid scent of gas and wood smoke. His entire left side burned with pain, covered with a warm, sticky and wet substance. Blood.

He stirred, but even the slightest bit of movement caused his head to throb. Wincing, he opened his eyes, a blurry sight of the wrecked classroom coming into view. A blurred outlined of a person blocked half of the room. He felt something leave his right arm, which he realized was someone’s hand, which had been there to check his pulse.

“Where are you in pain?” the person asked.

Kaji blinked, his vision still fuzzy. “I . . .” He let his voice trail, finding it too much effort to work his jaw. Had he not been in so much pain, he would have given in to his desire to sleep. Though something other than the pain kept him awake, a nagging feeling that he forgot something.

As he struggled to figure out what he was forgetting, the people around him were talking in whispers, as if afraid to disturb him until the ambulance came. Footsteps told Kaji that more people had entered the destroyed room. They were the paramedics. His brain slowly kicked into action, as if half-heartedly determined to find what he was forgetting before the paramedics came any closer.

“Careful now, careful.”

Not yet, there was something else that was important.

“Amazing that he survived the bomb.”

Yes, it was something about a bomb.

“How many fingers am I holding up?”

This was meant as a distraction as the other paramedics attempted to pick him up carefully, but Kaji’s eyes did not see the fingers in front of him. They stared off at something neither the paramedics nor anyone else in the room could see.

“Think he lost sight?” one of the paramedics whispered.

No, it wasn’t anything about sight. It was related to the bomb.

Bomb . . . The whole scene flashed before him, reminding him of what he had to do: Tell the others.

He blinked several times to clear his vision. Adrenaline coursed through his veins, telling him to ignore the intense pain, which he gladly did.

“I’ve got-” he began, his speech slurred. He tried again, more clearly this time. “Gotta check . . . Check on . . . someone . . . Need to know . . . If they’re . . . safe . . .”

“No, you’re going to hospital now,” someone said gently, but Kaji pushed the hands that held him away.

“No, not going,” he insisted. He got to his feet, using to the wall to steady himself and ignoring the stabbing pain that swept through him. He had a mission and he wasn’t going to let a little thing like a fatal wound stop him. Once again, he pushed away hands that made for him.

“I’m fine, need to go,” he said, walking unsteadily towards the door, tripping over the stuff that blocked his way. Someone grabbed him –gently, but firmly- and started pulling him back.

“You’re not fine, you need to get to the hospital,” the person said.

Kaji felt he had no choice. These people obviously weren’t getting it. He paused, twisted his head around, and bit the hand holding his arm- hard. Instantly, the person let go, gasping in pain and surprise. Ignoring him and the others behind him (and the stabbing pain), Kaji picked his way through the room and out the door. Stumbling a little, he raced down the hall, skidding around corners and knocking shocked people out of his way. He caught snatches of their comments.

“Is that blood?”

“Does this link to that earthquake?”

“There shouldn’t be running in the halls! Wait- it’s one of Midori’s . . .”

“He should be more careful!”

“Is he running from the principal?”

“Are you kidding? The principal never runs!”

“Oh, haha.”

He ignored it all- the comments, the greetings, and the insults. He had only one purpose.

Finally, finally!, he reached the last corner and whipped around it. There, standing by her locker waiting, was Shiro. She turned when she heard him and greeted him with, “So, was it a bomb, Kaji?” She paused. “Are you injured?”

Considering his whole left side was covered in blood and, now that he had slowed down, he was limping, Kaji thought that this was a rather dumb question, which was not like Shiro.

“Uh, yeah,” he said. “And yes, it was a bomb. Blew up in my classroom.”

“Guess you have that period off,” she sighed, smiling. “The others should be here soon.”

“Soon’s not enough,” Kaji said a little testily. “The paramedics are after me.”

Shiro raised an eyebrow, but said nothing. Instead, she seemed to have turned her attention elsewhere. “Aaaaaaaaaaand, there’s Kuro,” she said, glancing down the hall.

Kaji looked, but saw no one, heard no one. He gave Shiro a confused look. She didn’t respond to it, nor did she explain herself. Kaji shook his head, believing that it was some sort of connection that the twins had. Until what she said next.

“And Chiro’s just joined him, of course, asking about Tatsuya,” she muttered. Kaji wasn’t sure if she was talking to him, or to herself.

He was about to ask her how she knew this when he heard footsteps. He glanced behind, a little worried that the paramedics and school faculty had caught up with him. Shiro sensed his fear.

“Like I said, it’s just Kuro and Chiro,” she said.

Sure enough, the two people that came around the bend were Kuro and Chiro. Kuro was grinning.

“So, Kaji, did you mix two chemicals together to make that happen?” he teased.

Kaji frowned. “Did not. Someone else did and threw it through the window.”

“Gotta hate it when that happens,” Kuro said, still way too cheerful. He looked at his sister and something flickered across his face. Concern? Fear? Kaji barely even registered the look and started to wonder if he had imagined it. Perhaps it was just his head injury.

“Anyone else coming?” Kuro asked his twin.

She was silent for a while. Then she answered. “Midori and Sora. I can’t tell if Tatsuya’s coming, he’s so quiet. I’ll be able to tell if he gets closer. He’s good, but he’s not that good,” she added with a grin.

Kaji could’ve smacked himself if he didn’t already hurt; Shiro and Kuro often did odd things like this and the rest of the gang learned to ignore it. It was one of those weird things the twins never bothered explaining.

The next few minutes that Midori and Sora took to get to Shiro’s locker seemed to drag. Kaji kept believing that somebody would surely find them, and their plan would be ruined for the time being.

“So, how’d you escape the paramedics?” Shiro asked Kaji.

He blinked. He really couldn’t remember how. “I . . . just left,” he said, shrugging.

“Lucky, I had to make up a story for Mr. Leng,” Shiro said. “We’ve got to be quick, ‘cause I told him that ‘I shan’t be long’. He’s probably looking for me now. Oh, Midori, Sora! Hurry up!” she called down the hall.

Kaji heard footsteps, and by the sound of it, they were running. Seconds later, Midori and Sora appeared around the corner. They were gasping for breath.

“What, is everyone here already?” Midori panted.

“No, but we’re apparently on a time limit,” Kuro said brightly.

“What’s the time limit?” Sora muttered.

“Mr. Leng and the paramedics,” Kuro answered. “We’re waiting for Tatsuya, now.”

“What’s taking him so long?” Midori growled, opening her locker, which was right next to Shiro’s. They put most of their stuff in Midori’s locker with the foresight that they probably wouldn’t have the time to get back to their dorms.

“I don’t know, probably he’s suspected for the bomb,” Kuro said, grinning.

Midori ignored him.

“He shouldn’t keep us waiting, we’ve got –” Midori began, but she was cut off by Shiro.

“There he is,” Shiro muttered. “What took you so long?” she added to Tatsuya.

Are we going or not? Tatsuya’s look said as he approached them.

“Heard it too?” Kuro asked.

Tatsuya nodded.

“Enough chit-chat,” Midori snapped, tossing them their designated packs. “Let’s go before they catch us!”

“Going somewhere?” said a cold, oh,-so-horribly-familiar voice.

Relsha.

“Issue?!” Midori snapped, spinning on her heel to face her.

“It’s supposed to be class time, and all of you are out of class,” Relsha said smugly. She glanced at Kaji. “Goodness gracious, what happened to you?”

“Dressing up for Scare-day, now aren’t I?” he said through gritted teeth. They’d be lucky to make it within ten feet of the front door with Relsha.

Relsha’s eyes had spotted their packs. “You’re planning on running away,” she said quietly.

“Your point?” Kuro asked, a little rougher than he probably meant.

“That’s not allowed.”

“I’m pretty sure there’s a lot of things that aren’t technically allowed at this school, but we do it anyways,” said Sora stiffly. “Now get out of our way.”

“I don’t think so,” said Relsha, her voice getting higher. “You shouldn’t leave Riverside; you’ll be put in lockdown for this! How would that feel, every member of the most popular gang getting lockdown for trying to run away?”

“Very satisfying,” Kuro said simply. “But they can’t keep us forever, and they should know that.”

“But you shouldn’t run away!” Relsha cried.

Kaji heard Shiro muttered something incoherent under her breath.

Raising her voice, Relsha screamed, “RUNAWAYS! RUNAWAYS IN THIS CORRIDOR!”

She was about to yell something else, but Midori slapped her hand on Relsha’s mouth.

“You’ll shut up, or so-help-me I’ll kill you,” she snarled. Midori’s face clearly said that she would carry out her threat if Relsha so much as squeaked. Relsha’s eyes widened in fear, actually taking Midori seriously for once. Still keeping her hand on Relsha’s mouth, Midori said angrily, “Now that this idiot has gone and let everyone know where we are, we’ve got to find an alternate route out.”

“The window,” Kuro suggested.

“No, seriously,” Midori hissed, glaring at him.

“I am being serious,” Kuro said.

“They’re coming,” Shiro warned.

“This window has a tree that actually leans over the garden and outside the Riverside fence; we’ll be able to take two birds down with one stone,” Kuro pointed out. “In other words, we won’t have to bother scaling the wall with the teachers trying to stop us.”

Midori had angry uncertain look.

“Will Kaji make it, though?” Sora said, glancing at the tree sitting outside the window.

“Don’t worry about me,” Kaji said stiffly, trying to stay conscious now that his adrenaline was fading. “We’ve got to get out of here.”

“All right, we’ll have to do it,” Midori growled. With both hands, she pushed Relsha hard into the locker doors. The crash echoed eerily down the hall.

“Nice going, you’ve made them speed up,” Shiro said, rushing to the window and trying to open it. Kuro came to her aide.

“Sora, you first,” he said, turning to her while still holding up the heavy sash. “And Kaji, you’re after her.”

Sora hesitantly got onto the ledge and stepped uncertainly on the tree branch, steadying herself by placing a hand on the outside wall.

“Crouch,” Kuro suggested. “It’ll help you keep your balance and you’ll have a smaller chance of falling.”

“Quickly!” Shiro hissed.

Relsha started to stagger to her feet, taking a deep breath. Midori raised a fist. “Silence!” she threatened.

Relsha’s open mouth bared itself into a snarl. “Stop me,” she growled.

“Relsha!” Kuro said suddenly. She looked at him, surprised. His tone was different than the usual tone he used with her.

“Please,” he said, quiet, pleading. “Don’t yell for them.”

Kaji stared at Kuro, his face clearly showing his shock, forgetting that they were running out of time and needed to leave very quickly until Tatsuya pushed him to the window. Shiro steadied him with her hand.

“Chiro, you next,” she said, as Kaji carefully lowered himself onto the branch, wincing whenever his injuries protested.

Relsha was still looking at Kuro, surprised.

“We can’t have them chasing us,” he said, his voice getting softer, gentler.

Relsha’s surprise melted into tenderness.

“I- I-” she stammered, looking around and remembering that Midori was there. This seem to harden her a little.

Chiro slipped onto the branch, whimpering as he looked down at the ground.

“Just keep crawling,” said Kaji harshly.

Gulping, Chiro looked up and slowly started to move forward.

“She’s going with you!” Relsha said angrily.

“We need to go,” said Kuro, still softly, still gently. “But you were meant to stay here. You need to stay here. You know this. I know you know this.”

Shiro got onto the sill. She sat on the sill, waiting patiently for Chiro to move completely out of the way. Sora, who had reached the trunk, snapped, “Do you want us to get caught?! Get a move on!”

Kaji could tell that Chiro was scared out of his wits going at the pace he was going, but he had no sympathy. If they got caught because he couldn’t swallow his fear for two minutes . . . .

“It’s all right,” Shiro said kindly, “you won’t fall. You’re doing fine.”

A silence drifted out of the window as Relsha struggled for something to say.

Shiro’s words had an effect on Chiro. He started moving faster, as he truly believed Shiro was right. She deftly slid onto the branch once Chiro was out of her way. Midori took Shiro’s place on the sill.

“But in order for you to stay out of trouble, you can’t say that you’ve helped us, all right?” Kuro’s voice came from the window.

Midori landed on the branch. Tatsuya stood on the sill, holding the sash for Kuro to get through.

“But- I-” Relsha stammered.

Kaji made it to the trunk. He carefully started to maneuver around it, praying that he wouldn’t misstep and fall.

“Relsha . . . . Please,” Kuro pleaded.

There was a pause. Then, barely audible, Relsha said, “Oh, all right then, go! And . . . Good luck.”

Free at last, Kuro finally slipped out the window and stood on the branch. Tatsuya let go of the sash, letting it crash against its frame, and joined Kuro.

Kaji was halfway to the fence when he heard the window open.

“Stop!”

“Faster!” Midori commanded.

Sora made it to the fence. Kaji saw her white face become even whiter at the sight of the drop.

“I-I can’t!” she gasped helplessly.

“Jump!” Kuro called.

“Don’t do it!” someone at the window cried.

Sora started panicking. “It’s too far!”

“You’ll make it!” Kuro shouted back. “Trust me, you’ll be fine!”

Still very pale, and not very encouraged, Sora edged closer, looking as if at any moment she would just turn around.

Kaji looked up and exclaimed, “Oh, wow!”

“What?” Sora cried, her voice hitting pitches she had never hit before.

“It’s amazing, look! Quickly!” he added hurriedly, excitedly. He saw her look up, her fear momentarily forgotten, her body relaxing, and her grip slipped.

“KAJI!” she cried as she fell.

“What-” Midori began sharply.

“She’s fine, she wasn’t as tense,” Kaji said, coming up to the edge. “The impact wouldn’t’ve hurt her as much.” Closing his eyes, he pushed off the branch.

He landed hard on the ground, causing the blackness to threaten to encase him again. He sat there for a few moments, willing the pain to not overtake him, trying to fight the urge to throw up.

“Chiro, as much as I hate to be a spoilsport, they’re joining us in our party, so you can’t take your grand old time staring at the ground!” Kuro’s voice said. “Or does Shiro have to push you off?”

With a yelp, Chiro landed next to Kaji.

“Don’t ever do that to me again,” Sora growled, when Kaji finally opened his eyes.

“We were in a rush,” he pointed out as Chiro got out of the way just as Shiro landed.

“I thought I was going to die!” Sora retorted.

“Well, you didn’t, but I think I might,” Kaji groaned.

Sora’s expression softened. “I’ll have to help you once we’re out of the danger zone,” she said apologetically as Midori landed and nearly got toppled because she didn’t get out of Kuro’s way fast enough.

When Tatsuya landed, Midori glanced at Kaji worriedly. “We can’t go fast in your condition, and they’re already on the tree. What are we going to do?”

“Easy,” Kuro said. “These teachers are wimps when it comes to adventures, I’ve found.” He picked up a good size rock.

“You’re actually going to - ?” Midori began.

“Yes, I’m throwing it at him, and you’ve got to get going,” he said. “He’ll be more concerned about his poor forehead than he will about us running.”

With that said, Tatsuya got Kaji to his feet and kept him from falling as the gang made their way slowly into the forest that stood before them.

They had just made it into the trees when all of them heard an “ow!”, telling them that Kuro’s rock had found its mark.

They were finally free.

“Not, don’t make me leave!” Midori cried.

“I’ve got to, I’m not letting you stay here!” he insisted, narrowing his eyes at her. He sighed and looked away. “If only you hadn’t chosen this path . . .”

“Come with me! Please don’t leave me!” she begged.

“You’ve made your choice and I’ve made mine,” he answered. “Don’t try making me change my mind. It’s already made.”

“Can’t you see the unfairness of it?” she pleaded. “It’s not right, it’s . . . just not right! They won’t be able to live norm-”

“Midori, you don’t have much time!” he said, cutting her short. He picked her up and swung her into the saddle of a Palomino horse standing next to them. The horse snorted in surprise and pranced sideways, forcing Midori to grab the reins and a chunk of its mane in order to stay on.

“Please, come with me!” Midori begged, trying one more time. “I don’t know what to do, where to go, anything! I need you!”

“No!” he said, shaking his head. “The last person you need is me! Staying here with me, or if I go with you . . . you’ll get killed! Me being around you is suicide on your part, Midori!”

“So what?” she retorted.

“So I’m not going to let that happen to you!” he shot back. “Now go! Go before they find out where we are!”

“Where?! And what should I do?!” Midori asked.

“Someone on the other side of the forest will find you,” he assured her. “They’ll help you.”

“Who?!” she asked, but he had smacked the horse, encouraging it into a gallop. As the horse broke into a breakneck gallop, she called, “Toraaaaaaaaaaaa!”


Midori sat bolt upright. She was panting heavily, as if she had really relived the past. She tried to slow her breathing, calming herself, then took in her surroundings.

She was in a dark place; not entirely dark, but dark enough for her to not be able to see her surroundings clearly. The ground had a soft yet hard kind of feel, as if she was in a tent, lying on top of some blankets. She reached out and let her sense of touch see for her eyes. Her fingers brushed the wall of a tent, and everything came back to her.

They –she and her gang- were who knew where in the forest. It was where they had fled when they escaped Riverside Foster Boarding School. They had left the school a week ago, and after a couple of days of traveling, they had settled here for long stretch of time. Midori wasn’t comfortable staying anywhere, however, for more than a week at a time and traveled for a couple days. Why? That was the question Sora and Shiro kept asking her. But she never answered them. Truth was, she didn’t want to. She felt a little guilty about keeping it from her friends, but she tried justifying it by telling herself it would never involve them and so there was no use in bothering them with it. The guys of the group were actually fine with relocating, with the exception of Chiro, who always found reason to complain about leaving, and Midori had an odd feeling that Tatsuya was relieved because of it. She often wondered why, but, as she wouldn’t say anything herself, she didn’t ask. She also knew she wouldn’t get an answer.

Sighing, she exited the girls’ tent. Upon exiting, she saw Shiro coaxing a fire to life, but no one else was around. Stretching her legs to get rid of some of the cramps, she walked over to Shiro.

“So, Shiro,” she said. “Where are the others? Still sleeping?”

“At this time?” Shiro said, raising an eyebrow. She poked the fire and a flame appeared. “Midori, you’ve actually slept in.”

“So, where are they?” Midori asked, a little cross with herself. She preferred to be the first one up, so being told that she was the last one up did not suit her.

“Let’s see,” Shiro responded, not completely focused on the topic. “I know for a fact that Kaji’s getting me more firewood, and I think Kuro was joking about trying to catch a deer with his bare hands, but knowing him, he could actually be trying it right now. Anyways, if that were true, it might take a while for Kuro to find one, and Kaji is probably not helping by laughing too hard. Sora’s not too far; she’s found some interesting plant that she said something about curing fevers-”

“You really didn’t listen did you?” Midori said, not knowing whether or not she should be amused.

“Only to Sora, because she was going on about what plants she hoped to find,” Shiro explained dismissively. “But, anyways, I believe Tatsuya is searching for something, or doing something like that. And of course, where there’s Tatsuya, there’s Chiro.”

“So, in other words, breakfast isn’t ready,” Midori translated.

“Yeah, the bacon we brought spoiled,” Shiro said, shrugging.

“I thought you confirmed the food we got to be good,” Midori frowned.

“I did, but I don’t know what happened to the meat,” Shiro said. “A lot of it looks like it’s going to go bad. Perhaps I misjudged.”

“And, the other food?”

“Vegetation we won’t have to worry about,” Shiro said. “Sora’s apparently an expert in the matters of that. So if the rest of the food spoils, we’ll just have to root for edible berries. I don’t believe we’ll starve as long as Sora can find something.”

“What about me?” Sora asked, stepping out of the forest and into the clearing where they had made their camp.

“Nothing important,” Midori informed her. She eyed the bunch of leaves that Sora was carrying. “What’s with that?”

“Coolflame,” Sora answered. “It helps fever, and on a journey like this, I’m not taking any chances.” She picked up one of the packs and stuffed the leaves into it. “It takes a long time for it to rot, and the healing power actually increases with time. Before it is rotten, though.” Having said this, she sat down next to Shiro.

“Sora, do you happen to know when the guys will get back?” Midori asked her.

“Nope,” she replied. “I thought that Kaji and Kuro would’ve been back by now, considering it shouldn’t take long to gather firewood, and Kuro has no chance of catching a deer.”

“I wouldn’t be too sure,” Shiro cautioned. “Kuro can be fast if he truly wants to. The deer won’t know what hit it if Kuro put his mind to it.”

“I still think he’s got no chance,” Sora said.

“Only because there are none in the area,” Shiro said with a smile.

Sora looked over at the fire. “Why aren’t you cooking anything?” she asked, frowning.

“Because it’s going to rain soon, and I won’t be able give anything to you guys that tastes good,” Shiro responded.

“Shiro,” Midori sighed, glancing up at the sky, “it’s sunny out without a cloud in the sky. It’s not going to rain soon.”

“I can smell it,” Shiro answered simply.

Midori shook her head. But if Shiro said it was going to rain soon, she felt she should probably trust her, as Shiro had said weird things before that came true.

There was a rustling in the forest and Chiro entered the clearing.

“Let me guess,” Shiro said, amused, “Tatsuya left you behind and you can’t find him, can you?”

“I wish he weren’t so quiet,” Chiro moaned. “It makes so many things difficult. For all he cared, I could’ve gotten lost.”

“But, you didn’t,” Shiro pointed out. “You’re here, safe and sound.”

“Barely,” Chiro said. “It was extremely hard trying to find my way back.”

“It’s just like class,” Midori said sarcastically. “Nothing to worry about.”

Chiro flinched as if Midori had smacked him. Midori sighed. This was always how Chiro acted. Sure, she probably didn’t help matters by throwing things at him, but she felt justified as he wasn’t supposed to be hanging around them in the first place.

Feeling bored with the present conversation, Shiro dug her book out from her bag and started reading.

“Out of everything we packed, I can’t believe you didn’t forget your book,” Sora teased.

“It’s very interesting,” Shiro said. “When I’m done, you can read it. It’s a tale about the Assassins and Knights during the Romekian empire.”

“No, thanks,” Sora declined. “I won’t get bored.” Her face brightened as she surveyed the surroundings. “Finally, instead of being stuck indoors for most of the day, or hanging around in the school’s front lawn, I get to find plants and vegetation in the forest! Riverside doesn’t know what they’re missing when they don’t let students in the forest.”

“They’re way too paranoid,” Midori reminded her.

“There’s Kaji,” Shiro said suddenly. “And he’s got firewood, finally.”

Sora glanced around to see where he was coming from and Shiro helped her by pointing to her right. And sure enough, Kaji appeared carrying firewood.

“What took you so long?” Midori asked.

“Uh, I wasn’t really paying attention?” Kaji tried. “I was waiting for Kuro to catch a deer.”

“I bet you made too much noise,” Shiro said. “Scared everything away.”

“I wasn’t that loud!” Kaji said hotly.

“Where’s Kuro now?” Midori asked.

“He’s-” But at that moment, Kaji, not noticing Chiro, took a step forward and tripped over Chiro. The firewood went everywhere, a couple of sticks actually making it into the fire. Kaji lost his balanced and grabbed Chiro’s head to keep from falling.

“Smooth,” Shiro said, while Sora started laughing. “You got some in. Did you intend for that to happen?”

“Sorry, Chiro,” Kaji apologized, straightening. “And, no, that wasn’t planned.”

Chiro looked confused and scared at the same time. “Please don’t plan it,” he begged.

“You ruined my whole plan!” Kuro said, stepping into the clearing.

“Unsuccessful with the deer?” Sora asked, grinning.

“Couldn’t find one, but I did find some squirrels,” Kuro said cheerfully.

“Please don’t tell me you caught them,” all except Chiro pleaded.

Grinning, Kuro raised an eyebrow. “Aw, c’mon. You don’t want squirrel meat? Fine, I didn’t.”

“Couldn’t’ve cooked it anyways,” Shiro said. “Rain’s on its way.”

“But-” Kaji began, stopped himself, and shook his head. “Can’t I just have normal friends for once in my life?”

“I hate to break this to you,” Kuro said, acting sarcastically hesitant. “But, we’re not your friends; we’re actually your worst enemies. We’re spying on you to report back to our boss so he can come and kill you. Thought you ought to know, you know?”

Kaji and Kuro looked at each other, Kuro grinning and Kaji wearing an unconvinced look. Before Kaji could say anything in retort, there was the distant rumble of thunder.

“Ah, a thunderstorm!” Kuro said. “Wonderful! Who wants to get struck by lightning?”

“Kaji, I think Kuro and Shiro are the only abnormal of our friends,” Sora said.

“No, you’ve got to count Tatsuya too,” Kaji pointed out.

Midori felt several fat raindrops land on her head. Only seconds later did it start pouring.

“Lovely,” Midori heard Kuro say happily, just as there was another thunderclap.



It had been raining for a couple of days. Shiro and the rest except for Chiro were outside, despite the unavoidable risk of getting wet. Granted, the rain was not as bad as it was a couple of days. They were currently discussing where they would go after the rain let up, as Midori felt the rain would last awhile, though Tatsuya was not with them and was suspected to have returned to scouting the area.

“We can’t be that far from Alkare,” Sora said, using her Riverside uniform jacket as an umbrella. “The ferry shouldn’t be too far ahead of us, so I say we keep going straight.”

“Which they’ll probably follow us easily,” Midori retorted. “Why should we take that risk? I say we should zigzag, so they won’t be able to tell where exactly we’re going.”

“They’ll follow us anywhere, don’t you think?” Sora shot back.

“Going straight is simple,” Midori said stubbornly.

“But they’ll know that we’re going to the Alkare ferry, don’t they?” Kaji pointed out. “I think we need to go south.”

“Go south?” Midori asked.

“To Wetnocom, perhaps,” Kaji replied.

“Only to be found by another foster school,” Sora sighed.

“They can’t be any worse than Riverside, can they?” Kaji pointed out.

Kuro and Shiro glanced at each other. Shiro felt differently, as she knew her brother felt as well.

“I would prefer to stay out of foster schools,” Shiro said. “There’s a chance that they’ll return us to Riverside, and then it’s lockdown.”

A silence greeted her words.

“So, then, where?” Sora said, frowning. “It seems like we just can’t get away.”

“Blame the government,” Kuro said.

“I will, thanks,” Sora said.

“Think a realtor will sell a house to minors?” Midori said helplessly.

“Midori . . . ” Sora said in a reminding tone.

“Desperate times call for desperate measures,” Midori muttered. “We all know very well that our tents won’t last forever.”

“Just five or six years,” Kuro said with a smile.

“Oh, haha,” Sora said, rolling her eyes. “You know that’s not possible.”

“You never know,” Kuro said.

Something in his voice made Shiro glance over at him. He had paled considerably, though none of the others noticed. He looked as if he was holding his breath, though somewhat reluctantly. He noticed her looking at him and glanced at her. She narrowed her eyes and frowned. He drew his attention back to the conversation.

“There’s got to be someplace safe,” Kaji sighed.

Midori looked hesitant.

“I’ll be back,” Kuro said quietly, getting to his feet.

“Going to try to catch another deer?” Kaji said teasingly.

Kuro gave a tight smile and turned into the forest. Shiro waited a few seconds before following him.

When she reached him, he was doubled over and looked as if he was having trouble breathing.

“Deep breaths,” Shiro reminded him.

“What do you think I’m trying to do?” he choked, barely able to get enough air in for the words.

“Just reminding you,” Shiro said calmly.

“Stupid lungs,” Kuro muttered crossly. “Of all the times . . .”

“At least we aren’t be chased at the moment,” Shiro pointed out. Kuro said nothing as he struggled to breath.

Just like Shiro’s eyesight, Kuro would get random attacks when he couldn’t breathe. A lot of the time the attacks were minor, enabling him to brush them off and pretend like nothing happened, fooling those around him except for Shiro. Other times, like now, he wasn’t able to breath at all for a long time. At the hospital, the doctors had called it asthma, but both the twins knew that it wasn’t the case. Whatever stopped his breathing occasionally gave him heart attacks, which were fewer now than they were nine years ago. No matter how the doctors presented it, the twins knew it what something other than asthma.

And like Shiro’s eyesight, the only thing to do was to wait it out.

“How long do you think?” Shiro questioned.

Kuro shook his head, indicating that was going to be long, yet he didn’t know how long ‘long’ was.

The minutes ticked by slowly, with Kuro’s condition growing no worse, yet no better. After about ten minutes, Shiro heard her brother finally breathe in deeply.

“They didn’t notice,” Shiro answered Kuro’s question before he asked it. “They were too busy talking about where to go next to notice. But they might question why we’ve taken so long.”

“I’m not concerned about that,” Kuro said. “That can easily be taken care of.”

“Should we tell them the truth at any point?” Shiro wondered.

Kuro looked at her. “No,” he said finally, resting against a tree. “It’s nothing they should get themselves concerned about.”

She looked at him uncertainly.

“What would we accomplish in telling them?” he shot at her.

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “But they’re our friends, aren’t they? Why shouldn’t we trust them?”

“Why should we concern them?” he asked back. “We don’t need to add to any of their troubles. Running away from Riverside should be enough for them.”

Shiro bit her lip and nodded. She wasn’t at all happy with keeping quiet, but she could tell that her brother wasn’t either. If anything, both of them were uncertain. But she couldn’t see much sense in telling them either, as it would only add to their concerns, and as Kuro pointed out, they didn’t need more.

We’ve handled this for fifteen years, practically on our own, she thought, I guess we can still handle this. After all, didn’t we survive worse . . . ?

Taking another deep breath, Kuro motioned Shiro to follow him, and both of them went back to their camp.

“So what’s going to be our excuse?” Shiro asked.

Breathing in, Kuro responded, “I heard something and wanted to see what it was.”

“And I wanted to see where you went?”

“Yes.”

The rest of the way back was silent.

“There you are!” Midori said in a way of greeting. “Where have you gone?”

“I just heard something,” Kuro replied with his usual grin.

Midori raised an eyebrow. “And what was it?”

“Nothing,” Kuro answered, lying rather casually.

Shiro glanced around the camp and noticed that Tatsuya had slipped back while the twins were away from camp. Their eyes met and his narrowed. Shiro quickly looked away, knowing that Tatsuya knew Kuro’s lie was anything but true. Instead, she occupied herself by getting back into the conversation.

“So, do we know where we’re going?” Shiro asked.

“Nope,” Kaji said. “We kind of agreed that Riverside wouldn’t be able to track us in the rain and so we should just wander aimlessly around until opportunity strikes.”

“Wow, I should miss these meetings more often,” Kuro said. “So, what’s opportunity? And why aren’t we going anywhere right now?”

“We don’t know,” Sora said dully. She looked up at Shiro and smiled, which she returned. But something about her look reminded Shiro of someone, but she couldn’t put her finger on who. “And,” Sora continued, “we also agreed that it’s not particularly desirable to be walking around in the rain, so we’re not moving.”

“Well, I don’t know about you guys,” Midori said a little irately, “but my jacket is getting soaked through.” She shook her head in exasperation. “Wish Riverside would make their jackets a little more rain durable. Honestly, for the length of time they make us wear it . . .”

“Then why wear it?” Kuro asked, grinning mischievously.

“We’re not you,” Midori snapped. “You can get away with not wearing it and Tatsuya can get away with wearing a black jacket instead of gray. But for some reason, we can’t.”

“We haven’t been in trouble as much,” Sora sighed. “Fine, I’m coming with you.”

“Only because of a little rain?” Kuro said, giving them a look of mock surprise.

“Of course,” Midori muttered, ducking into the girls’ tent.

Kuro’s eyes flicked to Kaji. “Chiro still in the tent?”

“Yeah, what do you think?” Kaji said, raising an eyebrow. “He’s a coward.” Stretching, he looked up, saw Tatsuya, and jumped, startled. “Goodness, Tatsuya. Make some noise so we know you’re there!”

Tatsuya ignored him.

Shaking his head, Kaji turned back to Kuro. “Do you know why Midori’s so uptight with staying in one spot?”

“No clue,” Kuro admitted. “But I’m actually a little more comfortable with this. Makes sure no one’s on our tails.”

“Who’d be on our tails?” Kaji asked, confused.

Shiro shrugged. “Anyone.”

Kaji looked as if he was going to say something, thought about, and shook his head.

“But of course we can’t go anywhere until the rain lets up,” he muttered.



“How long do you think this rain will last?” Sora asked Midori.

Midori shrugged. “Hopefully it will end soon. I don’t like staying here for this long.”

“Why’s that?” Sora asked, puzzled that her friend would want to keep moving.

“I guess I just don’t feel safe,” Midori said with a sigh. “And staying in one spot seems too risky to me.”

Sora said nothing, but watched her thoughtfully.

“Yes?” Midori asked, feeling Sora’s gaze.

“I was just thinking,” Sora said softly. “Why do you think that? Do you really hate Riverside that much?”

“Do I ever,” Midori said, looking away. “Every day it’s the same. Get up for school, they pound into your head all the beliefs they want you to have, and you’re expected to toe the line until you turn twenty or you’re adopted. And barely anyone is adopted because we’re teens, and who wants a teen? A teen compared with a cute little baby? What would you choose? The baby, of course. Because then you can teach it anything you want, whereas with us . . .” She gave a look of distaste.

“I know,” Sora said, still softly. “But if one of us were adopted before this . . .” She swallowed and continued. “I don’t how I’d bear it.”

Midori looked at her, surprised at first, then her face relaxed into a smile. “I wouldn’t let that happen. Not on my watch. If anyone of us had gotten adopted I’d chase down that person, find out where he or she, or they lived, and brought the rest to that neighborhood.”

Sora smiled, relieved. “Thanks, Midori.”

“I’m not letting a friend go that fast,” Midori said stubbornly before throwing her arms tightly around her best friend.

Sora laughed. “I wish it was Relsha who was adopted and not Lily.”

“Who’d want Relsha?” Midori said, frowning in a teasing way. “At least out here, we don’t have to listen to her.”

“Kuro’s definitely satisfied,” Sora said. “And so are you. Not so much with the rest of us. Remember, she didn’t bother us as much.”

“So definitely glad to be away from her,” Midori said. Something in her tone made Sora look up at her, but Midori’s expression gave nothing away.

“Well, I think I’m going to take a nap,” Sora said light-heartedly, changing the subject. “Wake me when the rain’s let up.”

“I can’t believe it . . . I could’ve sworn she’d never see again . . .”

Shiro stirred . . . Was she still dreaming?

“She could be lying. Her brother might’ve told her. He is very devoted to her, remember.”

“That’s true. But she described her room so accurately. I wouldn’t be too sure.”

Shiro blinked. She wasn’t dreaming. Her doctors were just outside her door, talking about her sudden ability to see.

“I think this must be studied.” The first doctor said, lowering his voice, but Shiro could still hear him very clearly. “Ever since those twins were born, odd things have been happening. I mean, seriously! How can a boy like Kuro average three heart attacks in one week and yet still be energetic and well enough to jump around and tell his sister everything that’s happening in the hospital? And how can he find out things that are said in rooms in which he’s not allowed anywhere near?! And Shiro, her amazing recovery that shouldn’t have happened from blindness, also her ability to survive this mysterious disease; a grown man could not have lived as long as she! And Nurse Akai claims that she knows nothing behind this all.”

“Yes, yes, I agree.” The second doctor had too lowered his voice. “They are definitely not normal. There’s got to be an explanation to all of this. Should we do surgery to find out? It seems to be the only way.”

“Well . . .” The first doctor sounded hesitant. “That might actually kill them. They might be supernatural and all, but . . .”

“C’mon! They can’t stay here forever, you know this as much as I do! Why not make the best of it? The least we can do is figure out why they are the way they are.”

“You’re right . . . Orphans with a sad history . . . And no one will take them in their condition.”

“So, if they die, it was for science and the hospital’s own good, agreed?”

“Agreed.”

Shiro heard their footsteps fade away, tears pouring silently down her cheeks. She was crying half out of shock and half out of what was in store for her and her brother. They didn’t care for either her or her brother! They were only a burden to them! She was only six . . . Did she have to die now?

She didn’t know how long she had been crying before her brother came in for his nightly visit with her. The instant he stepped into the room, he knew something was wrong.

“Shiro, what’s with the tears?” he asked.

She sat straight up, barely able to see for tears.

“They’re going to k-k-kill us!” she sobbed, trying to make herself quiet. “Just for the s-s-sake of s-s-science a-an-and the h-hospital!”

“No, they’re not,” Kuro said coldly. This was so unlike him, she stopped crying from surprise.

“Kuro?” she said timidly.

“I’m not going to let them,” he growled. Shiro had never seen her brother angry before, so this change frightened her. “Shiro, get up, we’re leaving.”

“To where?” she gasped.

“I promise you, I’ll take you somewhere safe,” he said, his voice softening. “Where no one can hurt you, or kill you. If the hospital’s going to treat you like this, I’m not standing it.”


Whoosh!

Shiro sat bolt upright, just as she had done nine years ago. The sound of the wind had scared her into wakefulness, bring her out of her nightmare. In her unconscious mind she had believed that she was back at the hospital with the doctors who plotted to kill her and Kuro for the sake of science.

That was probably the worst day of my entire life, Shiro thought, looking up at the tent ceiling. To learn that those taking care of you wish to kill you without any thought of you is possibly the worst thing.

She shook her head and looked around her. The rain had let up only the previous day, and so Midori had uprooted them all to move to an area several miles off. They had found a river and all had agreed to stay by it as long as possible, taking advantage of it and hoping that it would lead them to the Sirphane. In Shiro’s opinion, Midori seemed nervous, as if she were certain someone was following them, and not just the school.

Sora and Midori were asleep, but Shiro felt restless. This had always been the case with her; once she woke up, she needed to do something. Believing no one else would be awake if Midori wasn’t, Shiro decided ease her restlessness by taking a walk not too far away from the camp. Perhaps by the time she got back everyone would be waking up. Quietly, she got of the tent and closed the flap, hoping that the sound of the zipper did not wake the other girls. She straightened up, enjoying the cool breeze that swept through the forest.

She set off in one direction, following the river upstream. She paused every now and then to inspect something she found interesting. Sometimes her vision would blur, making her take longer to identify the object.

At the same time, she was going over in her head all the events that had happened to her. Some of her memories she avoided, preferring to stay away from them; forever, if it was possible. She realized that most of her life consisted of running while Kuro tried to find one safe spot for them. The hospital tried to kill them and Riverside made both Shiro and her brother feel trapped. Riverside might’ve been safe, but it kept a tight hold on its students, as if it believed that they could keep the students from having to face the world; a mother overprotective of her child.

If we want somewhere safe, but at the same time a place where we can be ourselves freely without restriction, what is it that we really want? Everywhere we can go to ‘be ourselves freely’ isn’t safe, and every safe place is restrictive for safety purposes. Wouldn’t that make what we’re looking for impossible to find?

But something in the back of Shiro’s head told her it wasn’t true. It told her that all she was looking for was a home.

She paused and glanced back at the others, now a good distance from them.

Riverside takes all sorts of kids; children of divorced parents, broken families, orphans, those who are abandoned . . . Did any of my friends know their parents? And if so, what happened to bring them there?

Shiro did not remind herself why she was left at Riverside. It was one of the things she wanted to forget.

There was a soft crunching of leaves as someone with a very quiet footfall approached her. She immediately identified it as Tatsuya’s and calmly turned around.

“Tatsuya,” she greeted him with a smile. She was happy that one of her friends was here.

He nodded his own greeting.

“I didn’t expect you’d be up,” Shiro said, turning back to look a flower she found intriguing. “I thought everyone was asleep when I got up.”

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Tatsuya shaking his head, telling her, Well, you thought wrong, didn’t you?

Mostly to break the silence and less to bring on a conversation, she commented to Tatsuya while motioning towards the flower, “It’s pretty, isn’t it?” It reminded her of the day the storm first broke out. “By the way, what were you doing when you left Chiro? The day the rain started?”

She faced him, surprised to see a look of confusion on his face. She immediately knew he was confused about Chiro and not the date.

“What? Wasn’t Chiro with you?” she asked, a little confused herself.

Tatsuya shook his head.

“He said he was,” she said. “Why would he lie?”

Tatsuya shrugged, but something flashed in his eyes.

Shiro frowned. “I think you know.”

He gave her a sharp glance. I don’t.

“It seems that your look says the opposite,” Shiro pointed out.

I only have a guess.

“Which is?”

To keep an image around Midori. Can’t have her thinking that he’s not in character, now can he?

“That doesn’t explain the lie,” Shiro said.

‘Course it does. You should know that the only reason Midori hasn’t chased away him is because she’d call herself a coward for fighting a weakling. If Chiro showed otherwise, Midori wouldn’t hesitate to kick him out.

“You don’t seem to care if she did,” Shiro said, half-smiling.

Tatsuya’s next look came with a hiss. I hate it, having him tag along. Drives me nut ‘cause I’m the one he follows around.

“We all have something we don’t like,” Shiro said with a sigh, turning to go back to the camp.

Crack!

Shiro whipped around, heart pounding. It was a footstep, but none she recognized. Tatsuya flinched and looked at her questioningly.

“Someone’s coming!” she hissed, trying to keep the panic out of her voice. “And it’s not anyone I know.”

Tatsuya glanced around, trying hear what Shiro heard. Then he looked back at Shiro, looking at her with a little concern, which she ignored. She continued to listen. The footstep was light, and was accompanied by a four-legged animal with paws. The four-legged animal sounded like a big cat, though it seemed different. The sound was coming from the direction she was facing. She closed her eyes in order to smell it better. It smelled like a cat, and a hint of canine with human. She opened her eyes and looked at Tatsuya.

“We need to get out of here,” she said. “A large creature and a human, they’re after us.”

He gave her a suspicious look before seizing her arm and dragging her farther away from the camp. Shiro heard the footsteps hesitate before following the change of direction. Could they hear them? Or scent them? Or was it just a guess where they were going to go? With every step that she and Tatsuya took, their pursuers doubled their pace. Shiro could then hear the cat and human bounding swiftly through the forest, as if nothing impeded their way. Meanwhile, Tatsuya and Shiro were finding it a little harder to get over fallen trees, avoid roots and large branches and avoid crashing into trees.

Shiro’s vision started dimming and her stomach started churning. She knew she was no longer able to run, or she’d be seriously ill.

“Tatsuya!” she gasped.

He stopped immediately and she heard him turn to face her.

“I can’t go on,” she panted. “I can’t go on. I feel ill.”

She had just let slip one of her carefully guarded secrets, but she didn’t care. Now wasn’t time to worry about that. The footsteps were getting closer.

“Go, it’s coming, just go,” she begged.

She heard him hiss in frustration, telling her that he was going to do no such thing.

The footsteps were so loud now that Tatsuya could hear them. But the way that Tatsuya had stiffened told Shiro that he wasn’t going to turn back on his word, or in his case, hiss.

“Aha! Given up running? Discovered it is futile?”

A rough, female voice cut through Shiro’s increasing headache caused by her nausea.

Tatsuya gave the newcomer a warning growl.

“No need to be like that, though I have no use for you,” the newcomer replied. “I’m after your little friend, Shiro.”

Shiro steadily stood up and slowly faced the newcomer, ignoring the wave of nausea.

Though her eyesight was not very good at the moment, she saw a tall woman with choppily-cut short red hair. Her eyes were a brick red, made noticeable by her lightly tanned skin. She was lean; she looked built for running and leaping. Her face was sharp and her ears were slightly pointed and grayish. By her side, coming up to her shoulder, was a creature very much like a lion. It had no mane, two pairs of translucent wings, and a barbed tail instead of a bushy end. The lion stared at its prey hungrily, but was obviously holding itself back.

“Hello, Shiro,” the woman said, now ignoring Tatsuya. “So very pleasant to meet you.” Her eyes flashed and she reminded Shiro vaguely of a wolf coming down on its prey.

“Who are you?” Shiro managed to ask rather steadily.

“Names aren’t important,” the woman said indifferently, brushing away Shiro’s question. “Especially not for you. Your time’s up. Know how long we’ve been chasing you? Doesn’t matter.” She grinned, showing extremely sharp canine teeth.

“Why do you want me?” Shiro asked, frowning.

“Why do you care?” the woman shot back. “Miolay, pup, you know your job.”

The creature leaped at Shiro, but before it could reach her, Tatsuya leapt in its way and the two of them crashed into the ground where they wrestled each other.

“Ta-!” Shiro began, but was cutting off by the woman leaping at her. Shiro felt the woman’s claw-like hands close around her throat. Shiro kicked out, tripping the woman and bringing them both to the ground. For what seemed like hours they fought against each other, trying to get the upper hand but always failing.

A gunshot rang out, startling both the woman and Shiro. They looked over to see Tatsuya getting out from under the large creature, gun in hand and the creature lying still.

The woman gave a furious growl and, taking advantage of Shiro’s distractedness, seized and rammed her into a nearby tree. Shiro’s head collided with the trunk, forcing her to take a deep breathe in order not to throw up. Shiro had barely time to register what had happened when she heard footsteps taking off and another gunshot. She heard an angry hiss from Tatsuya and sensed him coming over to her.

By now, her vision was blurry, her heading felt it was going to split in two and she felt too ill to move. But she forced herself to tell the black blur she knew to be Tatsuya, “Got . . . To . . . Tell . . . the . . . Others . . .”

And then she passed out.



*


*


*


Sora was horrified at the condition Shiro was in when Tatsuya came back with her. She was out cold, a great gash on her forehead. There were telltale bruises of a fight on her arms, and a few cuts.

“What on Kaotack?!!” Sora cried when Tatsuya laid her gently on the ground.

Tatsuya gave her a swift, silencing look before motioning to Midori to follow him. Midori then motioned to Kaji to come with them. Once he had the two of them, Tatsuya turned and disappeared where he had appeared with Shiro minutes before.

Sora flew to her pack, retrieving what was necessary out of it.

“Will she survive?” Chiro asked nervously, staring at Shiro.

“Of course she will,” Sora said brusquely. “It’s not fatal. Painful, yes, fatal, no.” She glanced at Kuro as she said this and noticed that he was extremely tense. She was confused for a second, but thought nothing of it as she turned to her work by cleaning the cuts.

“I wonder how she got injured,” Chiro wondered aloud.

“Don’t we all?” Sora said a little stiffly.

“That’s true,” Chiro sighed. “But I’m just saying.” He paused for a second, then said, “When do you think they’ll be back?”

“Don’t know,” Sora answered, getting a little annoyed.

“I don’t think it should take that long,” Chiro said. When Sora didn’t respond, he said, “Do you know what could’ve injured Tatsuya?”

“Are you going to keep asking questions?” Sora snapped, glaring at him.

Chiro looked startled. “I-I just want to know.”

“Then ask Kuro,” she replied, turning back to Shiro. “And pray that he’s got more patience than I do.”

“The answer’s no to all your questions,” Kuro said before Chiro could his mouth.

“What if I asked Shiro was your sister?” Chiro shot, trying to pass off as clever. “What if it wasn’t a yes or no question?”

“Chiro, you’re not going to win with Kuro,” Sora sighed, shaking her head.

“Yeah, actually, I believe I can,” Chiro argued. There was a note of strange defiance in his tone that made Sora look up and give him an odd look.

“Then you’ll get nowhere,” Kuro said, his tone saying this was final.

After that, there was silence until Kaji’s and Midori’s voices signaled their return. By the sound of the voices, the two were arguing about something.

“-Ever it is,” Midori was telling Kaji, “I’m calling it a lion until we’ve got a real name for it. And it had better not be the-creature-that’s-not-a-lion-but-sorta-looks-like-one.”

“Oh? And why’s that?” Kaji challenged.

“Because I said so, that’s why!” Midori responded.

By this time, they had reached their camp. Midori had her chin raised in defiance at Kaji. Kaji was frowning in disagreement.

“And how does that give you right to say whether or not it should be called that?” Kaji retaliated.

“Because I’m me, and that’s why,” she said. “Got a problem with it? Oh, well, get over it. It’s not the-creature-that’s-not-a-lion-but-sorta-looks-like-one.”

“Amazing, she repeated that word perfect,” Kuro noted. “You know how hard I’d laugh if that were true, though?”

“No, thank you, I really don’t,” Midori replied. “Sora, how’s Shiro?”

“Well, as you see, still unconscious,” Sora answered. “The injuries aren’t fatal, but they will be sore.” She was struggling to keep a straight face. She had known Midori to be always like this. Even when she and Midori had moved around, Midori managed to intimidate people she didn’t even know by maintaining her self-proclaimed authority. Sora had rarely seen Midori challenged about her authority and the only one who known to do it constantly was Kuro. “So,” she added, “what’s this about a lion?”

“Not,” Kaji corrected her.

Midori glared at him before answering Sora. “There’s a creature back there that looks like a lion, yet it’s got two pairs of fly wings and a mace-like tail. It’s also bigger than a lion.”

“It doesn’t have a mane, either,” Kaji added.

“Bigger than Shiro?” Sora questioned.

“It looks like it might be able to take down anyone standing here easily,” Midori answered.

“Really?” Chiro asked nervously, peering around the area, as if one of the creatures was stalking them and would jump on them at any time.

“It’s dead,” Midori snapped at him.

“It might’ve thrown Shiro into a tree,” Sora surmised.

A low hiss made her jump. She had forgotten that Tatsuya was with them.

“What?” she said, turning to look at him. “Are you saying it wasn’t the creature that threw her?”

He nodded, and for the first time Sora noticed the deep cuts on his right arm. There was also a slash his cheek. They looked far worse Shiro’s injuries.

“You are going to let me see those,” she said firmly, distracted from the conversation.

Her order merely got her a snarl of defiance.

“Anyways, you were saying she wasn’t thrown by the creature?” Kuro said, bringing her back to the original topic.

Tatsuya nodded again, avoiding Sora’s glare.

“Was there someone else?” Midori asked, her tone suggested she did not enjoy surgically removing the details from Tatsuya.

Tatsuya nodded, something flashing in his eyes.

“One of us knows this person,” Kuro stated. When he got questioning looks from everyone but Tatsuya, and of course, Shiro, he explained. “Riverside’s not going to be attacking us with lion-creatures, are they? Pretty sure that’s against their policy. Also, they wouldn’t be attacking us, they’ll be using the police to search for us; they want to bring us back ‘safe and sound’ to Riverside so we can suffer lockdown. Since we don’t even know what this lion-creature is, it is conceivably safe to say that before we met at Riverside, we met no one who would attack us. However, unless I’m mistaken,” he continued, his eyes narrowing, “one of us staying quiet and lying. All of your reactions say that you haven’t ever heard of the lion creature. But, that means nothing. It could be good acting. People don’t go after people without a reason; it can be a dumb or good reason, but they don’t come after people without reason. And tell me, who would go around attacking seven teens in the forest? With a creature like that? Someone knows something, and they know why that creature and person were there.”

Silence met his words. Even though Sora knew of no one in her past that would come with a creature that was described, she felt guilty, as if she were hiding something from the others. She had a feeling that the others felt the same way, but probably for different reasons.

Midori’s proposal to leave Riverside came back to Sora. Was it because Midori herself was trying to get away from someone? Did she know what was going on?

Then there was Tatsuya, who never spoke. Everything about him was a mystery; the only things certain about him were that he liked black and refused to speak.

Chiro did not seem likely to be a culprit of hiding secrets. He was an open book that could be easily read. Sora was sure that if he held a secret, everyone would know.

There was also Kaji. Kaji had been at Riverside before Sora and Midori had arrived, in fact, before Kuro and Shiro had arrived. It seemed unlikely that he could have made any enemies before they had met him, but the years were long and anything could’ve happened in that time.

Last of all there were Kuro and Shiro. Sora doubted that one knew something that the other didn’t, because they were extremely close. Like Tatsuya’s, their past was a complete mystery and the conversation somehow always managed to be changed whenever the former topic even started to scratch what their life before Riverside was like. To Sora, it seemed likely that Kuro said what he had because he knew that he and his sister were the ones holding back the information.

Sora drew her knees to her chin, thinking about this. She didn’t know why she hadn’t thought about it before, but she now just realized how little she knew these teens she called her friends. Could they still be friends if they were holding secrets from each other? Secrets, as Kuro pointed, that put all of their lives in danger?

Everyone was distracted by Shiro’s stirring. She finally opened her eyes, giving a bewildered look when she noticed everyone looking at her.

“How do you feel?” Sora asked softly, glad to have a reason to break off her thoughts.

Shiro paused before answering. “Dizzy, and I’ve got a pounding headache,” she replied, her speech slurred.

“With a lump that size, I’m not surprised,” Sora answered. “You may have a concussion.”

Shiro closed her eyes with a pained expression. “Great, that’s the last thing I need.”

“Who attacked you?” Midori said quickly, obviously trying to settle the matter.

“Midori!” Sora said, exasperated. “Give her a break, she just woke up!”

Shiro took a deep breath, then answered, “I don’t know.” She slowly sat up, wincing when some of her joints protested. “She said names weren’t important.” She paused, blinking as if she just realized something. “How’d she know mine?”

“She . . . knew your name?” Sora asked uncertainly as Kaji and Midori exchanged worried glances. Kuro’s expression darkened and Chiro looked even more nervous. Tatsuya made no reaction. It wasn’t surprising, as they suspected he had been there for the whole thing.

“Yeah,” Shiro confirmed. “She knew my name; she was looking for me.” She stopped, then continued. “She’s been chasing me, said my time’s up. But she said ‘we’ve’ been chasing, not ‘I’ve’ been chasing.” She looked at Sora and she saw her own worry reflected there.

“Who’s we?” Sora muttered softly.

Shiro shook her head. “Then after that, she sent that miolay on me, but Tatsuya stepped in the way.”

“My-oh-lay?” Kuro said teasingly. “Is that a fancy term for sleeping or something?”

Shiro’s mouth twitched when he said this, but she answered, “Nah, it was some sort of lion.”

“Told you,” Midori said to Kaji.

Kaji rolled his eyes.

“Oh, you saw it?” Shiro asked, surprised.

“Tatsuya showed it to Midori and Kaji,” Kuro explained.

“Ah,” she responded, closing her eyes and nodding.

“So, that leaves the question, who’s after us, and who here knows why?” Midori said, her brow furrowed.

Sora glanced at Kuro and saw for might have the first time a frown on his face. He exchanged a look with his sister, in which they seemed to silently communicate to each other. After being able to read Tatsuya’s expressions fairly well, she could tell they were asking the same thing; Why just us?

Sora turned her attention to the others, believing she had misread it; anyways, Shiro and Kuro could’ve been saying a different thing altogether.

“Well, since we’re obviously not safe here, let’s keep moving,” Midori said, walking over to her tent. “This person could’ve gone for reinforcements.”


YEAR 1889 of the 9TH TURN


Black smoke unfurled from the destroyed building. It had been bombed only hours before and there had been no survivors, save one. Two figures could be seen in the middle of the ashes, surveying the damage that had been done. One was a youth no older than twenty-five. The other looked as if he was in his forties. The young man was timid, and kept looking around anxiously, as if expecting someone to discover them there. His companion remained calm, bending over a very charred object, examining it with experienced eyes, but he did not touch it.

“Um,” the youth began, speaking in a hushed tone. “You’re sure that it’s-”

“Yes!” the older man barked impatiently. “What, nervous? ‘Course, if you had done the job properly, we wouldn’t be here, trying to get some lead out of this. Anyways, we’ve a right to be here. I wouldn’t worry.”

They lapsed into silence. After a few minutes, the older man straightened.

“No doubt about it,” he said. “He got away- just not cleanly,” he added, nodding at the object he had been surveying.

“Now what?” the younger man asked hesitantly.

“Now what?” the older man laughed. “Why, we’ve got to finish the job that you should’ve had in the bag, that’s what! You should know this, we never leave business unattended and unfinished! What have you been taught, eh?”

He turned around, surveying the landscape. Yep, you can’t run from us forever, lad, he thought. Because I know your secret that you’ll undoubtedly keep to yourself.

YEAR 1889 of the 9TH TURN


“Can’t find her.”

The woman turned to look at her youngest son.

“What do you mean, ‘can’t find her’?” she demanded, narrowing her eyes at the dark skinned teen.

“Can’t find her,” he repeated. “She’s gone.”

She bit her lip and turned away, willing herself not to cry. She so wished it wasn’t true. If only the girl would return. She’d apologize to her for every wrong she had ever done to her.

“Gonna call the police?” the boy said in a bored tone.

“No, they’re not much help,” the mother replied.

“Can’t say I’m not happy,” the boy said in a somewhat cheerful voice.

“How dare you?!” the woman snapped, wheeling around to face him. His eyes grew wide in shock.

“What?!” he said, trying to play innocent.

“You will keep those thoughts to yourself!” she growled. “And now go tell that to your brothers! Not one word of how happy you are because she’s gone! That’s what got her lost! Not one word! Now GO!”

He scurried off, tripping on the threshold as he left.

She closed her eyes in pain. Oh, what have I done? My daughter, what have I done?

YEAR 1895 of the 9TH TURN


“My fault?!” she screeched. She narrowed her eyes. “How is this my fault?!”

“You know perfectly well why!” he snapped.

“Aha!” she said shrilly. “Aha! You know it’s not my fault, but once again, you pin the blame on me! You always blame me!”

“Oh, no!” he protested. “It was you! You have him now, don’t you! I’ll tell the court to keep him from you! All you want it to murder him, making it look like an accident and take the inheritance!”

“And you won’t?!”

“He is my son. I care for him, unlike you.”

She laughed shrilly. “Liar! You never cared for him and you never will! It is I who care for him!” She glared at him. “Mark my words, I’ll find him first. His inheritance will never be yours!”

YEAR 1895 of the 9TH TURN


“Do you think that we could still find him?” she asked her twin hopefully.

“Find him?” the girl repeated. “It’s been like, nine years. He’s probably de-”

“Don’t!” the first protested. “Please, no, don’t! That would make it seem final! I don’t want it to be final!”

“It’s only a possibility,” her sister pointed out. “I was just pointing out a possibility. I mean, he could still be alive.”

“Why, oh why did he leave?” the first moaned.

“Um, that had better rhetorical,” her twin said, holding up her magazine.

“Actually, it’s not,” the first admitted.

The twin sighed. “You should really know why he left. Unless you really think he enjoyed his time here?”

“No!” the first said in horror. “No, I didn’t mean that! I don’t think that at all! I just really wish he hadn’t left . . . I felt safer with him. Now they . . . Now they . . . They’ve turned into maniacs!”

“Pyromaniacs,” her sister corrected.

“Yeah, whatever!” She paused. “I don’t like it here. I want to leave.”

Her sister nearly dropped her magazine. “Leave?! Where?! How?!

“I don’t know how,” the first said. “But I want to find him. I know he’s still out there!”

“Look, he’s not even fully related to you,” the sister said, shaking her head. “How in the world can you tell that he’s still alive? And, anyways, even if he were alive, he could be anywhere!”

“I just know, all right?” the first responded. “And, who else looks like him? A famous actor? Seriously! We’ll know when we find him!”

“He could look like anything now,” the twin pointed out. “After all, it’s been nine years. Anything could’ve happened. Do you hear me? Anything.”

“I don’t care,” she said stubbornly. “I’m going to search for him. And you’re either coming with me or staying.” She held her chin up defiantly.

Her twin sighed. “I’m going with you, sis. It’s dangerous to go out there alone.”

YEAR 1894 of the 9TH TURN


The doctor gulped. This was his only chance to figure out what was with the twins. Talking to Captain for his help. “Help” meaning an experienced search party.

The secretary hung up and looked at him. She smiled and said to him, “He said you may go in now.”

The doctor nodded in acknowledgement and entered Captain’s office. Upon entering, Captain waved his hand at an empty chair opposite him, inviting the doctor to sit. The doctor sat down a little gingerly.

“You said this business was important?” Captain said in a tone that clearly stated that it had better be worth it.

“Yes,” the doctor replied, then paused, wondering how to go on. He cleared his throat and continued. “You see, about fourteen years ago, twins were born at my hospital. A boy and a girl. The girl was born nearly blind and with a deadly disease. The boy was born with a weak heart and lungs. However, despite all this, they lived longer than they should’ve. But they were also orphans, and no one wanted them in their fragile and expensive condition.”

“These twins,” Captain said, interrupting the story. He sounded slightly interested. “What were their names?”

Surprised, the doctor answered, “I believe the girl was named Shiro and her brother, Kuro.” He paused, then added, “Ameiro.”

“Aaah,” Captain said, leaning back comfortably in his black chair and nodding. “Continue, I am interested.”

“You see, five years later, the girl, Shiro, began seeing perfectly, after four years of being blind,” the doctor continued. “Not only this, but the boy, er, Kuro, averaged at least three heart attacks a week, but was still energetic enough to race around the whole hospital three times without showing signs of tiring. Naturally, I was curious on how they were accomplishing all this. So I wanted to perform, ah, a research surgery, to figure this all out. Now, there’s a flaw and I’ve come to you for your help, if you will help me.”

“This research surgery will kill them, won’t it?” Captain said.

“A minor detail,” the doctor said dismissively. “But I haven’t come for your help on that.”

“Then, what is it?” Captain questioned.

“You see, they’ve disappeared,” the doctor answered. “I do believe that Kuro was behind the whole thing, but, anyways, they left before the surgery could even be set and now we can’t find them.”

“So, you want me to find them for you,” Captain finished, leaning his elbows on the elaborate desk.

“If you would be so kind,” the doctor added quickly. “If you don’t, I’ll understand perfectly.”

“Except, here’s another problem,” Captain said. “I myself have grown an interest in the Ameiro twins, but for different purposes, nothing like yours.”

“Is there any way we can work this out without fighting?” the doctor asked, his heart sinking.

“It depends,” Captain responded. “What were you planning to offer?”

“What did you have in mind?” the doctor said, seeing a glimmer of hope.

“Well, not money,” Captain said in a bored voice. “I have plenty of that. Definitely no free hospital visits, I have no need for that. But I do need a skillful doctor to work for me. A doctor skilled on many levels. I think you can help me there.”

“I’ll help you if there’s something in it for me,” the doctor said, the hope rising.

“I’ll tell you what,” Captain said in a business tone this time. “When they’re caught, I get Kuro. But you receive Shiro to perform your research surgery. In return, you agree to, oh, a lifetime service under me?’

“Throw in a retirement plan and I’ll agree,” the doctor said.

“A retirement plan it is, then,” Captain said, nodding his approval. “And not one of those plans that have a ton of loopholes and fine prints.”

“Agreed!” the doctor said eagerly.

“One more thing,” Captain said holding up a finger. “Thanks to a spy of mine, I happen to know the whereabouts of the twins. With them is a girl with the name of Midori Kawa. I wish a few . . . experiments be done.”

“What sort of experiments?” the doctor asked, a little confused.

“Let’s just say for now that she’s got the wrong outlook on life,” Captain said.

“Ah, I see,” the doctor said, nodding.

“So is this a deal?” Captain said, holding out his hand.

“Absolutely!” the doctor said, taking it.

The secretary popped her head in. “I’m sorry, master, for not using the phone. But there’s someone here to see you. And he’s really kind of anxious.”

“Let him in,” Captain said, waving his hand. “I need the information he holds.” He turned to the doctor. “Mr. Doctor, meet my spy. The very one who will deliver the Ameiro twins to us.”

It was autumn, but it felt like a summer day. The heat beat down on the seven teenagers mercilessly.

They were traveling again, as Midori refused to stay more than several hours in one place. The little rest that they got made Midori irritable, Chiro even more jumpy, Tatsuya cutting and the rest weary. With the exception of Kuro. Kuro had not slept the past two nights and still felt like he could go on forever. But the atmosphere made him tense.

“Midori,” he sighed, “do you really have any idea where we’re going, or are we just walking around randomly? I’m pretty sure we’ve seen this tree before.”

“Oh, hush,” she snapped.

Kuro raised an eyebrow. Meaning you don’t know where we’re going and you don’t want to know that we’re going in circles. All you’re really doing is making things worse. If there is someone chasing us, we’ll never be able to retaliate in this condition. This weariness is wearing on your temper, and the rest of us who have more patience are losing it. What’s making you so antsy, Midori? You’re definitely hiding something. No doubt it’s about the miolay and Shiro’s attacker.

He glanced back at the others. Sora looked asleep on her feet, Kaji kept falling behind, Tatsuya, though everyone knew to not say anything to him, was expressionless, Chiro kept flinching at the slightest noise. Shiro kept walking steadily, but Kuro could sense she was not feeling well.

“Midori . . .” he began.

“What?!” she snarled, spinning on her heel to face him.

Startled, Chiro jumped and landed on Tatsuya’s foot. Tatsuya gave an angry cat-like growl, shoving Chiro off him. Sora reacted to the growl, bumping into Shiro, knocking her into a tree. Chiro landed into Kaji and both of them fell to the ground, Kaji glaring at Chiro.

Midori and Kuro had paused to watch this, the only two not affected. Kuro turned back to Midori.

“I’m not going any farther,” he said.

Hearing this, Shiro slid down the tree and sat down. Sora saw her sit and collapsed next to her. Chiro got back up, but Kaji didn’t bother. Tatsuya leaned against another tree, waiting for the fight to be resolved with a dark expression on his face.

Midori glared at him, then looked at the others.

“And if I don’t continue, you know perfectly well that Shiro’s not going to,” Kuro said.

Midori seemed to be struggling with herself. Kuro knew she wanted to stop and rest, but another part of her told her to keep going.

“Fine!” she spat. “We’ll stay here until morning. Hope you’re happy.”

“Relieved’s the word I’d use,” Kuro corrected.

And the gang certainly looked relieved. Sora curled herself into a ball and Kuro wouldn’t have been surprised if she had fallen asleep. Shiro hugged her knees and glanced at her surroundings, trying to catch the scent of anything suspicious, or at least hear it. Kaji made no movement to show that he had even acknowledged the conversation. Tatsuya had already disappeared. Chiro looked back and forth between Midori and Kuro.

“Um, are- are we going to eat anything?” he asked.

“Sorry, but I’m not digging through all the stuff we packed,” Shiro said. “We’ll only just be repacking it.”

“I’ll be willing to find frogs if it means we can eat,” Kaji offered.

“I’ll cook them if someone makes the fire,” Shiro said.

“What, we’re not dissecting the frogs?” Kuro said in mock surprise. “Don’t worry, Shiro, I’ll make the fire.”

She gave him a steady look. “I don’t trust you near a fire right now.”

“W-will we need water then?” Chiro asked.

“Of course,” Shiro said. “But I’m wi-”

“Then I’ll go find a spring,” Chiro interrupted, dashing off.

Kuro narrowed his eyes in the direction that Chiro left. He didn’t like the fact that Chiro had cut his sister off like that and he didn’t like how quickly he had left.

“Is she even awake?” Kaji said, nodding at Sora.

“I don’t think so,” Shiro said, giving her a small poke. When she got no response, she looked at Kaji. “Does that answer your question?”

“All right, all the more frog for us!” Kaji said with a tired smile.

“Don’t you even dare,” Sora muttered.

“Oh, you’re awake,” Kaji said, pretending to be disappointed.

“Kuro?” Shiro whispered while Sora and Kaji were discussing this. Her voice was too low for the others to hear. “What’s wrong?”

He drew his eyes away from the forest and to her. “A suspicious thought. I might chase after Chiro in a minute or two.”

She nodded, understanding.

“I think I’ve delayed enough,” Kaji sighed, getting to his feet. “I’ll try getting a frog.”

“Sounds like there might be running water over there,” Shiro said, nodding her head in the opposite direction Chiro had left.

Kaji gave her a weird look before heading off in the direction she had pointed out.

Sora looked at her. “Do you like, have water detector or something?” she asked.

Shiro shrugged. “I just had a feeling.”

Sora said nothing more on the matter.

“Perhaps I should find where Chiro went if that’s where the water is,” Kuro said, going to find Chiro.


He had been on what was hopefully Chiro’s trail for several minutes when the scent of something dead hit him. It was strong, but he could tell that he was some distance away from it. Trying not to gag, but all the same, curious, Kuro followed the scent.

A huge lion, its transparent wings broken and bent, was lying on the forest floor. Dried blood caked the earth around the creature. A tell-tale bullet hole in the creature’s chest told Kuro exactly what he wanted to know; this was the miolay that Tatsuya had shot. After the incident and they were all on the road, Shiro told Kuro the whole story. So he knew that this was the miolay they had met.

We’ve been going in circles! I knew it! But if we’re still close to the miolay, then we’re more than likely close to danger and anyone who’s hunting us. But how did we stay in the same area? Was it because Midori took too many turns?

Running water . . . Shiro said she heard running water nearby. The day they had met the miolay they were camped near a river.

Kuro realized that they had made a fatal mistake in geography.

Alkare was the city were Riverside was located. Alkare was also the city closest to the Sirphane River, the river that always went in a circle. Midori had led her gang into the Ula’kay Forest instead of into Alkare city, to where the ferry was. Kuro remembered that one brook branched off the Sirphane and curled tightly into a spring. And that spring was miles away from Alkare. So now, they had been walking in a circle around Ula’kay Forest, following the brook instead of the river, instead of going west. They were going east.

How could they have missed that?

Kuro shook his head, grimacing. Why didn’t we think of this? We need to cross the river now before we run into anyone. Not an easy task, as the Sirphane next to the Ula’kay is the deepest and widest.

He turned to tell the others when he heard a noise. Turning, he saw Chiro.

“There you are!” Kuro said.

Chiro flinched.

Kuro rolled his eyes then continued, “You headed in the wrong direction. The water’s the other way. C’mon.”


They arrived in camp about fifteen minutes later. Kaji was there, apparently successful with having caught only one frog.

“Frog legs, Kuro?” Shiro asked, motioning towards the fire. “We’ve got two.”

“Nah, I’ll wait till there’s more,” Kuro said. He glanced at Chiro and noticed that his expression clearly said that he was going to be ill. “I think Chiro’ll pass too, as he looks like he won’t be able to stomach it,” Kuro added, very amused. “Anyways, we’ve got a little issue with our running away.”

“How’s that?” Midori asked, frowning.

“The miolay is back there,” Kuro said, jerking his head.

“We’ve gone in circles?!” Sora cried.

“Not completely, but if we keep following the brook, we’ll end up at a spring,” Kuro answered.

“Oh, no,” Shiro said. “We’ve been going east, haven’t we?”

“Yep, and it’s too late to catch the ferry now,” Kuro said.

“That means we can’t cross at any ferry,” Midori said, burying her head in her hands. “Why didn’t I realize that when we didn’t meet town?”

“Can’t we just go back?” Chiro asked hesitantly.

“Nope,” Kaji said. “All of Alkare will know we’re gone by know, so the ferrymen will know to look out for us. We can’t keep going west, that’ll bring us to Ula’kay City, and they’ll know we’re missing from Riverside. Meaning we’ve got to cross here.”

“We can’t!” Midori protested.

“One, if we’re between Ula’kay City and Alkare, that means we’re in the Ula’kay Forest,” Sora pointed out. “And the Sirphane is-”

“Yes, yes, the deepest and widest at this part,” Kuro interrupted.

“It’s also autumn,” Shiro said. “You’ve done geography, Chiro, you should know what that means.”

Chiro shook his head sadly.

“It’s at its roughest,” Kaji answered. “We could go south.”

“That would bring us into the Sadwen Meadow,” Shiro said, shaking her head. “Tourist attraction, as it’s a national park. Then under Sadwen Meadow is Wetnocom, who will have also heard about our escape. We can’t go southeast or southwest because Wetnocom people have a habit of building houses near the river.”

“Alkare and Ula’kay as well, just not in the forest,” Kuro said.

“Funny how the most dangerous place to cross is the safest place,” Kaji said.

“Can’t we just wait until the river freezes over?” Chiro asked.

“The way this autumn’s turning out, it’s going to be a warm winter,” Sora said. “It’ll take near the end of Yoldum for it to freeze, and even then the ice could be thin.”

“Even if that weren’t the case,” Midori put in, “we’d freeze before the river did. And once it did, the towns outside of the Sirphane would hear, putting us at an even more disadvantage. We have to cross now, while they still think that we’re inside the Sirphane.”

“And we should cross now, while whoever’s chasing thinks we’re still in the Sirphane,” Kuro added.

“Yes,” Midori agreed. “We’ll rest tonight and hopefully cross the river tomorrow.”

“Though I’m not happy about having to swim across it,” Kaji sighed.

“You’ll be happy when we’re on the other side,” Sora pointed out. “Every other runaway was caught inside the Sirphane.”

“If we’re crossing the Sirphane tomorrow, then we’ll need our packs light,” Shiro commented. “All right, I guess I can find energy to dig out some of the food we’ve got.”

“But what’s the closest town to the outside of Sirphane?” Kaji asked.

“Yoan or Zaday,” Midori answered. “But Yoan’s west of Alkare and Zaday is in the east. The closest for us is Nakis.”

“But Nakis is the capital,” Kuro said, shaking his head. “We don’t want to go there, as it oversees all foster schools.”

“We’ll just live off the land until we get to another town,” Midori said stubbornly.


Kuro watched the dying embers of the fire. It was not yet midnight, but everyone had gone to sleep with Kuro taking the first watch. Tatsuya still had not returned, but no one was concerned. They all knew that he’d be back by morning.

Kuro was concerned about the crossing that would take place the next day. He knew that something would happen while or after they crossed. The woman Shiro had met was still in the forest somewhere, that much he knew. What if she came on them while they were crossing? Or they found that she had already crossed? And what if she brought reinforcements?

A rustle in the trees made him look. Tatsuya was in the tree, looking down at the camp. Noticing that Kuro saw him, he settled on one of the branches.

“You’re late,” Kuro said softly.

I missed something, I assume? Tatsuya’s look asked.

“Yep,” Kuro confirmed. “We found that we’re going the wrong way and we’re crossing the river tomorrow.”

You saw the miolay.

“Yes,” he answered. “I’m surprised none of us thought of it before.”

Riverside never let us out; typical that we don’t know our way around. You’ve got to hand it to them, they sure knew what they were doing when they built their school on the inside of the Sirphane.

“Just another reason to hate them,” Kuro commented.

Exactly.

“So, what have you been doing?”

Scouting. Trying to make sure the woman doesn’t come back.

“Makes sense. I have a feeling we’ll see her tomorrow.”

You too? Anyways, are you planning to stay up all night again?

“You’ve noticed?”

I don’t sleep the entire night away. Not when I feel unsafe.

“So, then, what is safety for you?”

Across the Catam border.

Kuro looked at him in surprise. “That far south?”

I have my reasons. Let’s just say for the moment it’s the only place I’ll ever feel safe.

Kuro narrowed his eyes thoughtfully. “Catam’s government is in shambles. The economy is horrible and everyone’s poor there. You’d really want to go there? It’s going to be worse there than here.”

Yes. Sorry if you’ve got an issue with it, but depending where Midori goes, I’ll be parting. I’d like to know where she’s going once we’ve crossed the Sirphane. If she plans on going south over the border, then I’ll come. Otherwise, I’ll set off by myself.

“You’ve been there,” Kuro said quietly.

A low hiss confirmed his statement.


Early that morning, there was a reluctance in getting up. No one was looking forward to swimming across the Sirphane in autumn. The walk to the river was silent, as everyone was lost in their own thoughts.

As if trying to dissuade them, the Sirphane River looked fiercer than any of them remember when they camped near it a week ago. It looked deeper than fifteen feet and wider than twenty. Passing was going to be harder than they had imagined.

Midori looked at Kuro, fear in her eyes. He returned her look with a raised eyebrow, asking her if she really wanted to go back to Riverside with the prospect of facing lockdown.

“It should be a quick in and out, shouldn’t it?” Sora said drily. She dipped her hand into the water, immediately withdrawing it. “It’s freezing!”

“Well it’s this or lockdown,” Kaji said with gritted teeth. “At least we should be able to get out of the water; whereas with lockdown we’ll be lucky if we get out before we’re twenty.

“Should get out, anyway,” Shiro said.

“Thanks, Shiro, for being so optimistic,” Kaji muttered.

“There’s no way we’ll have dry things when we cross,” Sora said. “Everything in the packs will get wet. We should’ve eaten all the food yesterday and this morning; it’ll get ruined.”

“And get cramps?” Shiro said, frowning. “I guess we’ll just have to leave the food here.”

“I don’t think we have a chance of bringing everything across,” Midori commented. “I hate to say this, but it looks like we’ll have to get rid of the tents. And anything else that won’t survive the water.”

“Bye-bye electronics,” Kaji said.

“We don’t have any,” Sora said, confused.

“I know,” Kaji answered.

“We’re really going to swim?” Chiro asked, looking horrified at the river.

“Do you have a boat we don’t know about?” Kuro asked.

“No, but-” he began.

“Then stopped looking so stunned,” Kuro cut him off.

“We had better find civilization quickly when we cross,” Sora said, looking at everything they were leaving behind. “I know we agreed that we’d live off the land until we got to a town, but I have a feeling we’ll starve before that happens.”

“We’ll discuss it after we’ve crossed,” Midori said shortly. “So, all at once, or one at a time?”

“How about we cross, like, now?!” Shiro said urgently.

Kuro could hear what she heard, though not as sharply. Footsteps running after them.

“Yeah, c’mon, no time to delay,” Kuro said. Without warning, he leapt right in.

“Kuro!” he heard Midori call.

He was surprised at the coldness of the water; Sora had been right, it was freezing. But he didn’t let that stop as he struck out for the other side. Another splash told him someone else had leapt in.

“Ah, that’s cold!” Shiro cried out. “C’mon, we’ve to-”

She was cut off by another splash.

“Kaji! Watch where you’re jumping, please!” she called out.

Kuro started to feel his breath being restricted. His lungs were tightening up.

Not now! He thought desperately. Not here!

The current was dragging him back, trying to sweep him away.

Another splash.

“Sora, Tatsuya, Chiro, come on!” Midori called to those still on the shore.

“Stay on this side, why don’t you?” a new voice said.

Kuro managed to find a rock to cling to and turn himself around just as Sora screamed.

A woman dressed in red was standing very close to Sora and Tatsuya.

“Oh, no!” Shiro cried.

Kuro looked in her direction. The pack she had been carrying had been swept away by the river.

There was another splash; Tatsuya had pushed Sora into the river. Kaji had also found a rock halfway across the river and was now coaxing Sora to him.

“You’re not getting anywhere!” the woman screeched. She rushed towards the river, but Tatsuya blocked her path, knocking her down.

“I don’t think I can do it!” Chiro yelled.

“You’re gonna have to!” Midori yelled back. “Get in now!”

The woman immediately got to her feet. “Get out of my way, before I kill you!” she told Tatsuya.

He calmly pulled out his gun and aimed it at her.

“Kuro!” Shiro called.

Kuro barely heard her; he was trying to get his breath back. His grip on the rock was slackening. Everything started fading.

“Chiro, Tatsuya, come on!” Midori screamed.

Still no air.

“Kuro, wake up, don’t you drown on me!”

He was vaguely aware of someone saying this; he had no idea who it was. But at that moment, his lungs unstuck and he was able to breathe again. He tightened his grip on the rock, thankfully drinking in the air.

He heard a splash. He knew that Chiro had finally jumped. A gunshot rang out. The woman screamed in agony. Looking back, he saw that Tatsuya had shot the woman in the shoulder. In pain, she was now doubled over, not paying attention to what was going on around her. Tatsuya was pacing the edge of the river, as if looking for the best place to swim across, but even from he was, Kuro could the uncertainty in his eyes. This confused him; Kuro knew Tatsuya wanted to leave the country. But it seemed like there was something holding him back.

“Kuro!”

Kuro looked back to other shore. Shiro had already made it and Kaji was helping Sora out of the water. Midori had passed him and Chiro was struggling to get across.

Pushing himself away from the rock, Kuro struck out for the shore, getting there at the same time Midori did.

“Tatsuya!” Shiro called to him. “Get in!”

The woman started to straighten up, her eyes fire.

“Quickly!” Shiro urged.

Chiro had made it to the rock Kuro had been on.

Tatsuya grabbed the last pack and threw across the river.

“It’s not going to make it!” Midori said.

“Yes, it is!” Kuro contradicted.

Just as he said that, the pack landed on the shore, almost in the river. Shiro snatched it up before a wave could carry it away.

“My pack!” Chiro cried out. “It’s gone!” He was clinging to the rock, a frantic look in his eyes.

“Just get over here!” Midori yelled.

“NO!” Shiro screamed louder than the two of them.

The woman had launched herself at Tatsuya before he could jump into the river. Both of them rolled down the bank and fell into the frigid water.

“Tatsuya!” Shiro called.

“Where is he?!” Sora cried, leaping to her feet when she saw what had happened.

“I’m stuck!” Chiro said desperately. He was closer now, but he was getting nowhere.

Kaji somehow managed to round up a branch and pushed it out to Chiro. “Use this!” he said.

“I can’t see him, not even the woman,” Sora said quietly.

“He can’t be gone, he can’t be gone,” Shiro insisted, still scanning the rough waters.

Chiro clambered onto the bank, coughing and sputtering. Now that he was out of the water, no one paid him any attention and continued searching the waters for Tatsuya.

For a while, no one spoke. The minutes ticked by slowly and there was still no sign of him.

After fifteen minutes, Midori sighed and said quietly, “I don’t think he made it.”

Everyone slowly started to gather up the remaining packs except Shiro. Kuro noticed and up beside her.

“I don’t want to believe it,” she said in barely more than a whisper. “Why didn’t he go in?”

Kuro shook his head. “I don’t know. And I don’t want to believe it either.”

“He’s got to be alive,” Shiro whispered. “For some reason, I believe that I’d know otherwise.”

“Well, can you hear anything?” he asked, coaxing her to use her long-range senses.

Shiro paused. “It’s qui- no. I can hear footsteps.” She widened her eyes. “It’s not the woman!” she said happily, jumping to her feet. “He’s on this side, he just came out farther down! Why didn’t I hear that? Guys, wait!”

The others stopped and looked at her.

“He’s still alive, he’s just farther down the river,” Shiro said, pointing.

“How do you know this?” Midori asked suspiciously.

“Call it a hunch,” Shiro said dismissively. “Why don’t we just a little while longer?”

“A little longer,” Midori sighed. Kuro knew it was because she also did not want to give up that Tatsuya had gone.

So they waited a little longer in silence, sometimes glancing over to the other side to see if anyone showed up. Then Sora’s scream shattered the silence.

Kuro whirled around to see Tatsuya, drenched and glaring at Sora.

“You’re back, I mean, you made it!” she stammered.

He gave her a look saying, Did you really think I’d drown?

“Well, as you didn’t come back up, we did think you drowned!” Sora protested.

“Does this mean that woman’s on this side too?” Midori asked, frowning.

Tatsuya shook his head. His next look said, But she’s not dead.

“Good, let’s get away from away from here,” Midori said. “After a rest, we can discuss what next.”

“And dry the things that need to be dry,” Sora added. “Next time, Tatsuya, you’re throwing all the pack across the river.”