Fushigi Yuugi Fan Fiction ❯ In Dreams ❯ Chapter 14 ( Chapter 14 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Disclaimer: I own no Fushigi Yuugi Chararcters, Places or Ideas.



Mark paced around his room, wondering what he could do. He had slept until noon that day and was finally up and about, now that it was three fifteen. Secret by Maroon 5 played a background to his thoughts as he walked around the piles of junk that his normally clean room had accumulated since Jenn's disappearance. Head phones and books lay in various places at the tops of the piles. He distractedly wondered where on earth he had gotten so many pairs of headphones, but quickly wrote it off to just not throwing the old pairs away. Thinking about head phones wasn't helping his present situation any. In his dream the night before, he had seen Jennifer, or rather, Tarakai, as she was now called, right before she collapsed. The little scene that she had made had been completely false.

In the time that he had known Jenn, not once had she ever spoken like that. She would have said, "It's his problem, so let him deal with it," not, "It's his loss because you are telling the truth. No, she never would have said that, not in that tone of voice, in any case. It just wasn't scornful enough to fit the posture she was using. Obviously, it was fake or scripted or something and the faint only stiffened his resolve on the issue. The main problem though, was that Amiboshi didn't know any of that. So far as he could tell, it was just a momentary break in the spell. Even if he had known, Mark was sure that his brother would only have written it off to the after effects of the drugs, but then again, he didn't know Jenn like Mark did.

Jenn had always hated taking any kinds of drugs, including, but not limited to, aspirin. She had a good reason though, in Mark's opinion. If the things only worked half of the time, then why bother? She was either completely drugged or completely not, there was no in between stage. He had no doubts that even with whatever old fashioned drug that Nakago was using, it would still work the same way. Why should her body start acting differently now after years of being the same? It didn't make sense, which was why Mark was sure that Jenn's "lapse" was a fraud of some sort. He just didn't know enough about the situation to know what it was yet.

He sighed and sat down. His thoughts were getting nowhere and at this rate, his train of thought was going to derail. If only he had read those stupid books! Then he would know exactly who everyone was and exactly what was going on, not just some snippets here or there. He couldn't even borrow them from Jennifer because she was obviously unavailable. He pursed his lips in thought. There had to be some way to read the books. He had tried to go and buy them the first day after Jennifer's disappearance. Unfortunately, they were now either out of print, or nowhere to be found. He sighed again and leaned back. There had to be-

Ah ha! That was it! He could borrow them from someone else! He closed his eyes and racked his brain, trying to think of who it was that had always been talking to Jennifer about them. He finally came up with a list of about five people... Unfortunately, if he remembered correctly, Jennifer had once told him that only she and one other person had the whole set and that everyone always borrowed for her instead of the other girl. He went over to his desk and wrote down the five names that he still had in mind... Maybe if he saw them he would be able to figure out who it was... Hmm...



Well, Lily was obsessed with InuYasha and wasted all of her spare cash on wall scrolls, so it wasn't her. Marissa did have the books, he now remembered, but they were in Japanese and therefore not very helpful. Lynn wanted them, but she bought Ayashi no Ceres and swapped with Jenn every now and then, instead. He couldn't think. Only two names were left: Diana and Marie.

The unfortunate thing about being left with those to names, however, was that neither of them went to the same school as Mark and Jenn, so he didn't have very much information on them. Diana was definitely an obsessed fan-girl and had actually tried to stalk one of the voice actors... But she wasn't very well off and Mark doubted that her family had money to waste on manga. That left Marie. It was a terrible thing that Marie hated him. Things could never just be easy, could they?



Taraka i sat up and took another drink of water. She had woken up a while ago, but she still had a headache that hinted at having drunken ten bowls of sake. Luckily for her, however, she wasn't sick to her stomach as well. That would have been a terrible way to wake up. She couldn't exactly remember drinking ten bowls of sake, but then again, if she had drunken it, what were the chances that she would remember? She couldn't remember anything after sitting in the war tent after Soi had so nicely braided her hair. She set her cup down and raised her hand up to her hair, to see to the state of her braids. They seemed mostly intact, so she didn't take them out.

She rubbed her forehead and pulled her feet out from under her blankets and onto the floor. She slowly got up and walked over to her little chest at the far side of the tent. On her way over she looked for Soi, but since the Seishi wasn't there, she just sighed and continued on her way to fresh clothing. She upped her pace as she changed her clothes, finally a little more awake, now that her headache was fading. When she was finished, she ran her hands down the patterned brocade and smiled. It was very beautiful and in her favorite color as well. She grinned again and then went out of the tent and into the main encampment.

She walked over to the war tent, a sudden thought coming to mind. Her eyes flashed as a brilliant plan formed in her mind. When she had looked at Nakago's plans the other day she had seen that there was only one strategy that he didn't have a complete set of counter measures for. With her plan, however, he would only need one counter measure. Her grinned turned evil as the details solidified in her mind's eye. She was so excited that she would have skipped, had it not been shameful to do so. Dignity did have a price sometimes.

When she finally reached the inside of the command tent she saw that Nakago was back from his errand with the priestess. She bowed formally, when he acknowledged her, and then approached the table in a rush, speaking quickly through her pleasantries. "Did your mission with Mistress Yui go well, General?"

He gave her a curious, searching look, obviously wondering what she wanted, "Yes. It was completed efficiently, even though Mistress Yui did cause some problems, it went well and was finished within the time I set for it. Was there something specific that you wanted, Lady Tarakai?"

She nodded, "Yes, there is, General. I was thinking over the 24th attack from the south and I believe that I have thought of a versatile way to counter it with minimum loss." Nakago looked up at her with shining eyes. Tarakai could easily tell that it was something that had been plaguing him, else he would have dismissed her hence, upon hearing her admonition. He then cleared a side of the table and motioned for a servant to fetch the coordinating map.

"Have you then, Tarakai? Let us see what your mind has wrought." He took the map and spread it gently on the table, weighing down the four ends with smoothed river stones engraved with the symbol for each of the four gods, even if the southern stone was in the worst condition of the four token offerings.

Tarakai reached across the table and picked up some of the battle tokens. She arranged the enemies forces so that they matched the positions stated in Southern Attack #24. She pursed her lips as she tried to place them from memory. She leaned back and examined her work, only to move two pieces one coordinate north each. She then laid the pieces representing their own forces in a mish-mash on the defending side. She then began to tell Nakago her strategy, moving pieces and pointing out positions as she went.

"If you take a half legion of infantry through this large valley right here, then you can bring the rest of the force, another legion and a half over through this valley, which takes you behind Konan's forces here. To act as a diversion to the Konan forces, you can have the half legion bring supplies enough for a full legion and make the sentries far-ranging. The Konan scouts then won't be able to get a clear count of the force numbers, so they will revert to checking supply numbers. They will then think that this is our main force and will focus their efforts at this point ignoring this pass over here where we can bring in the rest of the forces.

"But if the Konan numbers are enough that they are a threat to the half legion, than instead of extra supplies, send in a command of light cavalry skirmishers to lower their numbers and offset the balance."

"That would work very well, but we have no skirmishers." Nakago said calmly from his seat at the side of the table. Tarakai looked over at him and blinked. She then turned back to the map; racking her brain for something else that would work.

"If you send in a half command of heavy cavalry, backed by two commands of pole-arms, then it should still work out fine. Just have then do a few charges and retreats behind the pole-arms." She moved a few more pieces around.

"That is a very good solution. It is a marvel that I did not see it myself, for it seems so obvious now, but you must keep in mind, we only have seven commands of pole-arms and three and one half commands of cavalry, two heavy and one and one half light." Nakago said, lining up the appropriate counters as he spoke. Tarakai blinked again and then took the counters, placing them where she had directed and then placing the extras with the rest of the infantry pieces.

"I think I see now... Well, as long as the weather is clear, it should work." She looked up at Nakago, hopefully. He didn't acknowledge her in any way, but he was busy writing on the 24th south attack scroll, so she didn't bother, she just grinned and left quietly. If he needed her, which she doubted that he would, he could summon her. Now that she knew the army's real numbers she could try and plan out other strategies...



Suboshi sat quietly in the mess tent with Tomo and Soi. Well, he was quiet, Tomo and Soi were making a war of their own and plenty of noise. Currently, they were yelling at each other about the comparative moralities of their powers, or at least, that's what the fight had started out as. At this point, however, it was kind of hard to tell, as they were reduced to childish, and not so childish, name calling. He sighed, watching them. He had woken up that morning to realize that Amiboshi had left again. He had instinctively known and when he had checked by way of his mental and emotional link his thoughts had been confirmed. His brother now rested safely within the city of Sairo once again.

He had hoped to speak with Amiboshi more and try to come up with a solution to their problem. Since Jennifer was still in limbo, her task of getting the Seiryu Seishi out of Nakago's power was laid on their shoulders, though mainly Suboshi's because it was somewhat his fault that Jennifer had been poisoned in the first place. As of yet, he had no idea how he was supposed to do that. At very least Tomo and Soi were talking to each other now, rather than shooting each other glares, even if their conversation was far from civil it was still a step above what it had been.

Yui was another problem all within herself. She had returned with Nakago, thankfully all in one piece, but she had immediately barricaded herself within her tent denying anyone and everyone entry. Suboshi still had yet to discern if the ban was also in place against Nakago, but it might take a good while for him to find that out, seeing as how Nakago was once again within the battle tent nosing over plans and giving commands to his underlings that overran the encampment.

He had yet to meet Miboshi, as well. One of the servants had fleetingly mentioned that he had arrived with Nakago and Yui when they had returned in the very dawn and rising of the sun that morning, but he hadn't seen the last Seishi yet. He didn't even know what to expect. Nakago had prepared him ahead of time before meeting the others, but Miboshi was a complete mystery to him. Even his power was unknown to him. And to Tomo and Soi as well, who had both denied knowing anything on hurried words between arguments.

He sighed and rested his head on his hand which were crossed on the table. Tomo and Soi were now glaring at each other from across the tent and making various growls and snarls when either made a move. Suboshi marveled that two people that were normally so compose individually could be reduced so low when put together. He didn't even know why they had begun talking to each other in the first place. When he had come into the mess tent to eat they had just begun their heated "discussion" over the morality and now it was quite shocking to see how it had progressed. Or rather, digressed, depending on how you looked at it.

He flinched when Soi finally gave up and just threw a bowl at Tomo, missing him, of course, but that wasn't the point. The fact that she had thrown it was enough. She made a disgusted noise before storming out of the tent and back to the one that she shared with the lost minded Jennifer. Poor girl. He had gone in to see her that morning, at the beginning of Soi and Tomo's argument, but before they stood up, and had seen that she was pale and her skin was drawn. There were light tear stains on her cheeks and Suboshi wondered what horrors her inhibited mind had conjured. He only hoped that the reality she faced when she woke up wouldn't be so terrible.

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"Yo! Well, Since Aiko was asleep when I wrote this, it has not been beta-ed so don't kill me for grammer or anything. Thanks to: Reinasinnax, Lirael1, I lov Redheads w/ Fangs and Aiko6 for reviewing. I'm glad you all liked the chapter."-
The Muses Tk and Zv DuVeraun