Running Blind [Part 4]
	 		     Trouble Brews

	Moriko had spent the last week in the hospital and wasn�t allowed to
leave until the tests confirmed that nothing was wrong with her.  As she
walked back to her apartment dark thoughts ran through her head.  
	Was it true?  The doctors had been whispering about something bubbling
up.  They had said it was only a matter of time before it spilled over,
like a full wine glass.  Was that going to happen to her?  Moriko flipped
her briefcase over her shoulder and looked up and the gray sky and the
bubble of glass and steel that protected them from it.  This planet had
been so beautiful; trees, streams, flowers, animals, but now�there was
nothing left.  It was odd that everyone remembered the war except her. 
She had fought in it, although only fifteen at the time.  Was she also
responsible for what happened out there?  Things that haunted her partner
and friends, shouldn�t they haunt her too?  Before she even realized it,
Moriko stood in front of the minishrine dedicated to the past warriors
and the dead.  
	"Hi, Mama, Papa, I wish you were here now�" she whispered and pulled out
a white flower from her satchel.  She walked up to the small altar and
placed the flower upon the piles of others.  The shrine was nothing but
an altar with a roof and some trees bending over to give protection from
the rain.  
	"How touching, Moriko, coming to see your dead parents," a steely voice
laughed at her seriousness.  "Why is it that you don�t turn like everyone
else?"
	Moriko swung around and faced the only person she ever felt any hatred
towards, Hikaru Kurayami.  He stood there defying the guards and taking
advantage of the empty streets.  An artificial breeze blew past, as it
did everyday at this time, setting his black cape and loose black attire
in motion.
	"You�re so clich�, Hikaru, why not break tradition and wear white as the
evil villain?" she countered while chanting an attack and warning blast. 
"You know that it�s dangerous for idiots to wander around at night.  You
might get lost, then again, that�s not much of a loss."
	"And you�re so predictable, Moriko Yoruhana," the demon smiled and waved
his hand.  A sudden and intense burst of pain was felt at the base of
Moriko�s neck.  She fell forward and rolled over in time to dodge another
swing of a large bat.  
	Moriko popped up at a point between the two adversaries, making the
fighting arena a triangle, "What�s your problem, Hikaru?  Can�t fight
your own battles?"
	"No, I could, but that would be too easy.  I prefer to watch you suffer
and die, so you�ll be facing him," Hikaru waved his arm and the unknown
assailant became known as he stepped out of the shadows.  
	The weak twilight slowly illuminated his gray boots and loose gray
pants.  As he stepped further out into the light, Moriko watched in
horror as the light showed his white shirt, neatly tucked into the dark
brown belt.  The bat was dropped to the ground as Yurei Shiyume stepped
out to face his best friend.
	"Hello, Mori, it�s been awhile since we last laid eyes upon each other,
hasn�t it?" he smiled and looked to the shrine.  "Couldn�t have picked a
better place for me."
	"Y-Yurei�.y-you�re not�.not dead�" Moriko looked at him in utter shock
and horror.  "And you�re a traitor?  Gentle Yurei?"
	"Hah, gentle Yurei died long ago.  Now I�m strong, stronger than you or
Ryuhi or anyone!" he began to charge his powers, calling upon the dead
and buried.  Yurei had control over the deceased and the lost souls
because his name meant "Ghost of Death Dream."
	"Now prepare yourself, Moriko," the Demon Lord Hikaru ordered.  "Prepare
yourself to fight for your lives, against my first in command, Yurei."
	Ryuhi walked out of the Defense Post and waved to Sora.  No questions
had been answered that day and he suspected none would ever be.  All
Tsurumi said about the wars was, "That�s classified business."  Ryuhi had
been in the wars only briefly at the end and wasn�t sure about anything. 
Moriko didn�t even know what happened, so she wasn�t any help.  What was
this?
	"Well, no use thinking about stuff that won�t get done.  I�ll take
tomorrow to think it through, but right now I�m hungry," he said to no
one.  It was comforting to hear his own voice in the silence that always
seemed to hang over the Post.  He looked up at all the empty apartments,
ones that used to belong to old companions, now dead.  Everything in the
Post had an aura of death and loss.  The gray sky, abandoned buildings,
dry cracked concrete floors, everything.  
	He looked up to the sky and wondered, "What were you-"
	A sudden explosion rocked the buildings around him, causing pieces of
loose granite to come crashing down around him.  The ground shook from
the force and trash cans went rattling down the holes and gaps that
appeared in the ground.  The noise was terrible, like forty million
cannons being fired at the same time that supply trucks went by.  A
bright green light was coming from Ryu�s immediate left and he took off
in that direction.  That blast was an overblown warning sign, trouble was
here. 


___________________________________________________________________
Get the Internet just the way you want it.
Free software, free e-mail, and free Internet access for a month!
Try Juno Web: http://dl.www.juno.com/dynoget/tagj.