Slowly setting into the comfort of the hills, evening slowly began to arrive in Atlantis. A calm breeze passed through the clouds keeping the air from turning stagnant. The rest of the land seemed to be carrying on as though the day was as normal as the day before. Even the smoke that hovered in the distance faded away. No reminders remained of the events from the night. Atlantis moved on, but they couldn’t forget.

Even if she acted assured and ready for their endeavor, underneath it turned into a raging maelstrom. She felt a little unease by taking on the challenge of saving her brother alone. Yori was her brother, it should be expected that she would go. The addition of her friends traveling with her with the same goal changed everything. Knowing that anything she did affected everyone with her sent her past simply fretting and nervousness.

The weight on Yumi’s body felt worse than she remembered. Her chest tightened and hammered on her through her pounding heart. She didn’t even know if sweat covered her or the heat overwhelmed her. Between the moments when her mind wasn’t spinning with all of her fears, her legs ached refusing her. She never felt such pain before. Her success and strength didn’t mean so much previously.

An anvil suddenly dropped on Yumi’s shoulder shattering her body and the delicately managed balance. She let out a yelp of surprise and turned to find Fumiko’s hand on her shoulder. If the hand hadn’t been resting on her, Yumi would have collapsed to the ground as a puddle. Her reaction took Fumiko a little back, giving her the time to recover her breath. “I-I’m sorry! I-I was distracted…concentrating…”

Fumiko gave her a small grin, “You looked a little tense.”

“Wah! I-I…”

“You don’t have to stress. We might have forced it upon you, but we can protect ourselves. So don’t think you need to bear everything alone. We’re all friends here.”

Yumi felt a little relieved by Fumiko’s words. She looked around at Seiji and Chiharu behind them. The two kept silent for the entire time since meeting Yumi. It didn’t take the strange intuition that Fumiko had to see that they didn’t look pleased.

They were always at each other’s throats when a moment of calm came. The only thing keeping them in line was a purpose to their travel. Even with a purpose, both remained more than a healthy distance apart from each other of at least two meters. They looked to be trying to flank Fumiko and Yumi with their position. The sight made Yumi giggle a little, forgetting herself.

Seeing the two in mute disagreement, Yumi returned to her question from earlier. They seemed out of place and least likely to actually agree to be together. She looked over at Fumiko again. “You never did completely answer my question. Those two don’t get along very well, but they came along. How come?”

“Yeah…” Fumiko sighed thinking about it for a moment. She tilted her head back looking at the two of them. The events replayed quickly through her mind trying to sort it all out. “They’re like an older brother and younger sister sometimes, though I doubt you want to tell either of them that.”

She gave Fumiko a quick nod of agreement. “So what made them come?”

“If you can believe it, Chiharu was the first to speak up.” She thought about the scene, still trying to sort out the reasons for herself. “Chiharu’s a difficult one. She’s very transparent most times, but there’s a hidden layer under it all that she does a surprisingly good job of masking. I’m not sure if we’ll ever know her true reasons, but she is motivated despite her front of disinterest.”

“I didn’t know…” Hearing the analysis from Fumiko made Yumi look back at Chiharu to see her in a different light. Yumi didn’t know what to think of her anymore. “So what happened?”

Fumiko tilted her head back thinking about the scene. “Well I guess we have some time to kill.”

Chapter 127 – Intrusions

“Yumi!” Saki turned to face Yumi only to be blasted with wind. The force was enough to kick up dirt and make it difficult for her to see. She had to hold up her arms and squint her eyes. “Yumi!” Saki shouted through the cloud to no avail. Once the wind calmed and she could see again, nothing remained. Yumi was gone. “Yumi!”

“Where the hell’d she go?!” shouted Seiji looking around the area. He ran about the close proximity trying to figure out where she had gone. Even in the distance, he found no trace of her. “How can she just up and disappear? She’s not supposed to have powers like that I thought!”

Saki disappeared from sight as quickly as Yumi had. She left no words for the stunned and frustrated Seiji. Fumiko pulled herself out of the daze that surrounded her mind and forced herself to focus. All of the things happened so fast she didn’t have any choice. She needed to have her head on straight for everyone. Seiji came back to the group yelling and grinding his hands together with Saki’s disappearance. “Calm down, Seiji. She probably just went to find Yumi and bring her back. She’s not leaving.”

“I know that!”

The volume of his voice made Fumiko lean a little. She felt unnerved by seeing him so close to her. Even though she had gotten used to him in the group and called him a friend, she still felt a little uneasy with him. Unlike the rest of the group, he had a very rough thug-like appearance. His temper broke far too often and his strength made that even worse. She didn’t like it any more than seeing Chiharu baiting him. Keeping the two apart seemed the best, but Fumiko had no control over either. “You going to calm down then?”

He glared at her, seeing the teetering look that struggled for unflinching. It took him another moment, but realized that his presence created an imposing aura. Seiji backed off from Fumiko and parked himself a safe three meters away with his arms crossed. “…dammit…” he muttered quietly, other words came out, but none of them had any volume or intelligibility.

Fumiko waited out the seconds that turned to minutes for Saki to return. She looked around at the group trying to place everything and fully take in everything. Yuki remained unconscious in the arms of Ayumi. The Atlantean girl stayed quiet after all of the arguing, if only because she got exactly what she wanted. Chiharu and Haruo looked as distant and anti-social as they always did. She wished that she could do anything about the two of them, but other matters needed her. Saki returned empty handed. “Did you find her?”

Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.

“No…I don’t know where she is. She’s just gone…” Saki hung her head down after she said her words as though they were the only thing keeping her moving. She dragged her feet over to Yuki’s side dropping down to her knees. “…sorry…Yuki…I’m sorry…”

Staring at them was too much for Fumiko. She turned away looking over at the rest of the group. ‘Disappeared…she’s got to be out there…somewhere…’

“Speaking of which,” spoke Fumiko, in the middle of her recollection of the events for Yumi. She leaned a little closer to Yumi as though she wanted to keep it a secret. “How did you manage to evade Saki? She’s so fast I can’t imagine you being faster than her.”

Yumi leaned back a little surprised by the sudden change of subject. Her face turned a bit red, feeling as though complimented for keeping out of Saki’s hold. The more that Fumiko leaned in with intense curiosity the more Yumi became embarrassed. She lifted up her hands to her face trying to divide them. “It wasn’t anything that special. Honest.”

Fumiko narrowed one of her eyes, questioning her more with her gaze. “What did you do?”

“I flew.”

“Flew?”

She nodded softly to Fumiko. “Yeah. I knew I couldn’t outrun Saki. I’ve seen her move. But she doesn’t think three dimensionally. So I just kept myself in the air until I was safe.”

“Until you were safe? But wouldn’t we have seen you, even in the sky?”

“I had some of the dust surrounding me to obscure me. Eventually, I found a tree and hid there until I knew Saki had returned.”

“You knew when Saki returned?” Fumiko became increasingly more interested in the story that Yumi told rather than her own. She leaned in further wanting more answers and making Yumi uneasy.

Yumi tried to step away, but Fumiko flowed with her movement. “W-w-well-what about you? Wh-wh-what happened after Saki came back?”

“Huh?” The question made Fumiko stop for a moment. She realized that she forgot the original purpose of their talk. Once she remembered herself, she returned to her old position inviting Yumi back. “Right! Sorry, guess I got side tracked. Well we waited until Yuki woke up, since we thought that any decision made with him out would not be fair. We had to wait for a while, you really did a number on him, Yumi!”

“I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean—“

“It’s okay, I’m just teasing you.” Fumiko waved her hand down to dismiss her previous comment. Her eyes turned towards the back of their group to Seiji and Chiharu. The thought of them brought her focus back. “Anyway…”

“Now that you’re awake, we can go after her together!” Seiji declared, staring down at Yuki. His voice didn’t have any intention of making it a question. He stated it as a fact as though everyone already came to the same conclusion.

Ayumi leaned in around Yuki, still holding him from when Yumi gave him to her. She had a very protective look in her eyes, one only matched in intensity by Saki. “She made her choice. You heard her! Yuki’s got to get to the Capital to put an end to this! That was her wish!”

Seiji stepped in, leaning down to her almost. “Don’t give me that crap! You’re not even interested in how Yumi felt! You’re just going along with what she said because it agrees with what you want!” He started to go for Ayumi to grab her once more, but a different hand from a new side stopped him.

“If you’re so concerned, why don’t you go with her,” remarked Chiharu in a flat tone. A brief contest between the two in Seiji trying to reclaim his wrist from Chiharu occurred with Chiharu holding out. Once Seiji saw that taking her strength lightly gave him no ground, he ripped free, nearly taking Chiharu with him. She sidestepped with the motion to land on the other side of Yuki with her body between the two. “The rest of us can go on without you. I imagine it’ll be a more peaceful time with you gone.”

“I’m not in the mood for your childish games, brat!” He took a firm step forward to stand inside her space and towered over her for extra measure. The stance did nothing to intimidate her, a point that went entirely ignored by Seiji.

The scene quickly escalated for everyone involved. It made Fumiko step back worried that their emotions and egos would keep them from the important issue. “Enough!” she yelled as loud as she could, but saw it changed nothing. She made further attempts, but they proved as fruitless as the first. ‘Should be small…shouldn’t need to worry…’

Her final answer came with her arm rising to meet the middle between them. Small tendrils of light whipped around her arm tying together at her wrist and turned to a red glow of fire. The fire burst from her hand in a long column that toasted everyone’s face a little.

Everyone involved shut up immediately and turned with rusted necks to stare in disbelief at Fumiko. Stray burnt hairs flowed in the air as the embers faded. The slightly burned faces suddenly turned a little blue seeing the towering presence of Fumiko before them all. “Enough fighting!” Once she released her yell, she calmed down feeling better. “Now I can see that no one here is going to be able to agree on us going as a group anywhere. So let’s take Chiharu’s suggestion—“

“Now wait a—“ Seiji stopped himself just as he interrupted Fumiko. Her glare at him promptly shut him down and made him back a step away.

“Let’s take Chiharu’s suggestion and take it a little further. The only way to make everyone happy is going to be splitting up into two teams.” She looked down at Yuki, who looked equally terrified despite not having said a single word. “Unfortunately, Yuki, you're not going to get a choice in the matter. To satisfy Ayumi, you’re going to need to head to the Capital.”

Yuki held his words while his mind ran through everything. His head tilted up towards everyone. “But who’s going to find Yumi? We don’t know where to find her.”

His question brought a new silence to the group. Saki’s attempt failed, leaving them with no options to locate Yumi. However, an unexpected answer came from Chiharu. “I’ll be able to find her.”

The certainty in Chiharu’s voice had them all curious, but Fumiko beat them to the question. “How will you be able to find her?”

“I can use my powers and skills in tracking. Additionally, I have a general direction where she’s going.”

Fumiko accepted her confidence and moved on to the rest. “Chiharu is going to be in Yumi’s group. I’ll go as well. I assume that Ayumi is going to be with Yuki.” She didn’t need confirmation from the look in Ayumi’s eyes. “Well then, what about everyone else? Who’s going with us?”

“I’ll go too,” spoke Seiji. His voice had calmed down and he seemed in control once more. He looked over at Saki almost glaring again. “You’ll make sure he stays safe, right?”

Saki glared back a little, looking like she took his question as an affront. “Of course, who do you think I am?”

Yuki raised his hand up, interjecting between them. “Hey you two, I am right here. I’m not defenseless, you know. I can take care of myself.”

Saki and Seiji both leaned together to stare down at Yuki. “If no one watches you, you’ll try to take everything on yourself and do something reckless!” Their unison voices made the others almost start to laugh a little. Yuki’s eyes flitted about becoming a little embarrassed with the situation. He had no response for them, as they both knew him too well.

Fumiko looked over at Haruo, ever quiet and detached. “What about you?” He stepped a little closer to the back of Yuki making his stance clear. “I see.” She looked over at the others feeling good about the solution. “So Chiharu, Seiji and myself will locate Yumi and rescue Yori. Once we’ve done that we’ll do everything we can to catch up to you.”

Yuki stood up looking very serious. His eyes narrowed with his expression. “We’ll meet back outside of the Capital. Promise me!” He put out his hand with his open palm faced down jutting straight for them.

“Definitely!” replied Seiji, slapping his hand down on top of Yuki’s hand. He finished his response with an eager grin.

Fumiko added her hand to the center along with Saki. They gave a firm and agreeing nod to Yuki binding their promise. The others left themselves out not interested in the childish notion of the promise. Seiji didn’t take no for an answer and pulled Chiharu, complaining, to put her hand in. Saki followed up with Ayumi taking a card from Seiji’s book and dragged her forcibly. Yuki pulled Haruo along, only slightly reluctant.

Yuki looked around at everyone, seeing them all as a group, his friends. “It’s a promise! Everyone comes back safe and we all put an end to this!” He smiled to everyone, feeling the infectious nature of Seiji’s enthusiasm. It slowly built around to the others with even Chiharu looking a little flushed and Haruo less stern than before.

The conclusion to the story made Yumi feel warm. She couldn’t help but smile a little herself as Fumiko finished. ‘Everyone’s together…I’m glad!’ Yumi turned to Fumiko wanting to say something to her, but suddenly forgot her words. A stabbing pain ripped through her head making her scream aloud, startling everyone. ‘What’s…happening…’ The wave of pain passed as quickly as it came, but returned equally intense. She could no longer stand, the pain leaked through her muscles. Yumi collapsed to the ground unable to control the burning agony that coursed through her veins like fire.

Her hands crawled over her head and pulled at her hair. The source of the pain remained in her mind. It felt like a barbed wire rammed through her eyes and stirred in her brain. She scratched at her head trying to relieve the suffering. It shifted around bumped coarsely through her and split her skull. Through all of the screaming of her voice and the yelling pain, she heard a voice. ‘Brother! Why are you in pain?!’