Chapter 26
Monday, July 24 7:20pm Hong Kong time.
Tomoyo opened her eyes and saw the ice bag on her nose. When she pushed it away she saw Sakura looking at her. The sight caused a surge of warm pleasure to flood through her. "I have my Sakura-chan back!" she thought to herself happily. But her next thought put her happiness out like a snuffed candle. "She isn't MY Sakura-chan! She will belong to the Magic Prince that I have to find for her." But this time the words didn't crush her completely. A little voice deep inside reminded her that she was magical now, just like Sakura. She even had her own cards. "No! I'm still a girl. That hasn't changed." But as hard as she tried she couldn't entirely quench the tiny flame of hope that had kindled inside.
Then when she shook her head and tried to get herself back under control again, there was another problem, or two actually, shaking her head made her nose hurt and Sakura was holding her hand. The first stopped when she quit shaking her head, but the second was still there.
"How are you feeling, Tomoyo-chan?"
"I feel fine! Except that my nose hurts, but I am thrilled that my Sakura-chan is back among the living!" She said truthfully, then gently pulled her hand away and tried to get up.
"No, Tomoyo-chan. The doctor says you have to stay off that ankle for a couple of days."
"It's not that bad." Tomoyo protested, but there was no way she could get past Sakura.
"Okay, I'll stay in bed for a while."
"I need to get away from Sakura soon...but perhaps not just yet. After all this adventure and Magic, I feel like we are ten years old and capturing Cards again." she smiled to herself, "And I really don't want to think about my sad destiny just now. I'll just think about food. I am really hungry!"
"I wonder if they could come up with something for me to eat?"
"I'm sure you can have anything you want, anytime you want. You saved all of Hong Kong, brought Syaoran back from the dead and brought ME back from the dead! The Li family considers you a great hero. And I consider you a great hero too, Tomoyo-chan. I owe you my life..."
"I wish she wouldn't say it like that. And look at me like that. I have to change the subject."
"Does anyone have any idea who it was?" Tomoyo asked.
"Well, Ieran is guessing he was a guy named Kutone or something like that. He was a really powerful Mage who caused a lot of trouble in China up until nineteen fifty or so when he was driven out in a big battle. He was suspected to have taken up residence in North Korea, but that was never known for sure."
"But YOU were the one who defeated him, don't they consider you a hero too?"
"Well, actually... They do. And it's really embarrassing."
"Sakura still blushes very cutely" Tomoyo said with a soft smile. "I only wish I could have gotten the fight between you and Kutone on tape."
"There was no way you could have, you were fighting right along side of me. And as I recall, you were using both hands to hold me from falling!"
"I guess I was. But how is Syaoran doing?" Tomoyo wanted to know.
"He's resting now. Ieran told me that it must have been very horrible to be killed by Kutong's slime needle attack. It may take some time for him to recover from the shock. But he should be fine in time. And he would still be dead if it weren't for your amazing Magic!"
XXX
While they were waiting for the family cook to fix the Japanese style dinner that they had agreed on, Kero flew into Tomoyo's room. "I highly recommend the food here! It is excellent. Particularly the cakes. The cakes are very good. You should try some."
"Kero-chan!" Tomoyo said happily. "Where have you been? I was afraid you were dead." Kero hesitated and then spoke reluctantly. "I was looking for Sakura and then suddenly I was here with Ieran. She said that I had been found in Kutong's basement-"
"Kutong?" Tomoyo interrupted as she looked at Sakura who just shrugged. "I said it was "something like..."
"As I was saying before I was interrupted! That sneaky guy caught me when I wasn't looking and put a spell on me." Kero looked embarrassed until Tomoyo asked about the cakes he had mentioned. In a moment he was happily describing all the wonderful good things they had made for him.
Tomoyo guessed that the time in London was a reasonable hour, so she called Eriol. Once he was assured again that everyone was fine she related a very brief version of what happened. He was, not surprisingly, delighted and impressed. "I told you that you had a lot of potential power! But it seems even I underestimated you. Now I can understand why you had to be the one to go by yourself. I didn't know about this Kutong and would have met him on my own, with apparently fatal results. It was fortunate indeed that Ieran gathered so many Mages and even more fortunate that you have such an amazing shield. It is certainly a relief to know that Sakura and her cards are safe now. But since the news has obviously spread, there may be more who are interested in her. You had better stay close to The Cardmistress just in case."
"Of course, I will." Tomoyo answered without really thinking about what this meant.
Not long after the phone call, Tomoyo's dinner was served to her in her bed.
"Now I want you to tell me everything that happened to you since I spoke to you on the phone yesterday... but it was last week to you, wasn't it?"
"Yes, it was last week to me, but you just heard me tell the story to Eriol." Tomoyo sighed.
"Not very well, and I couldn't ask you any questions. Now I want all of the details and don't leave anything out! And the first thing I want to know is just how your nose got broken."
"Well, actually you broke it." Tomoyo said with a little smile.
"Me! I couldn't have! It was broken when you woke me up." Sakura protested.
"I didn't say you were awake. But seriously, it was my own carelessness that was responsible. It seems while I was carrying you out of Kutong's house I dropped you."
"What?! You couldn't have!"
"Oh but I did. I was dodging Kutong's fireballs and you slipped out of my arms. Fortunately, the fireballs all missed you, but then I had to catch you. And I did it very badly. I was -so- frightened of you hitting the ground before I could catch you, I came at you way too fast and ran into you. My poor nose hit your very hard head and was broken." Tomoyo finished with a grin.
"So that explains this bump on my forehead." Sakura said as she fingered it.
"Your bump is my fault actually, I hit you with my nose." Tomoyo finished and then laughed.
"Okay...I'm sorry I have such a hard head, but now tell me all the other stuff, and don't leave anything out." So Tomoyo started her story over again, but this time she included all the little things that she hadn't bothered to tell Eriol. The only thing she did leave out was how painful getting her Magic awakened had been. "Sakura doesn't need to know about that."
Sakura was suitably amazed at Eriol's "Card use" final exam. Then chuckled at how she had used Fiery to frighten the teen aged boys who had blocked her way. She grinned at the story of the food vendor and how people had dropped to their knees and was amazed that Tomoyo had flown all the way from Hong Kong to Tokyo with her own wings. She applauded Tomoyo's cleverness at sending the cards one by one to be sure they all got to the right time, then laughed again at what had happened to Tomoyo's fly card in the bathroom.
"I'm really surprised at how well your mom took the news about our Magic and everything." Sakura finally said.
"I'm not. She is really a very intelligent and understanding person. And I promised to tell her about our Magic in this...world, no, Eriol called them Timelines. Anyway would you have any problem with it if I told her when we get home?"
"I'm not sure. But I guess if you think it's okay..." Sakura hesitated and then shrugged as she finished. "Then I guess it's okay."
"Good! Now I can look forward to telling her." Tomoyo finished with a smile.
"You know back when I told my brother all about the cards and Yui and everything, I was worried just what he would do. But it was never a problem. Still, as far as I know, my dad still doesn't know anything about my Magic. It seems like he is always away now anyway." She looked sad for just a moment then grinned and spoke happily, "Now I can call you Card Captor Tomoyo! After all, you did sort of capture the cards, and you really did keep them from destroying this whole city and killing millions of people. That's much more than I ever did!"
Tomoyo couldn't help but feel embarrassed at Sakura's praise. Sakura noted this and then continued with a grin, "Tomoyo-chan also blushes very cutely." Then they were both laughing together. Tomoyo stopped first and just listened to her Sakura-chan's laugh. She thought it the most wonderful sound in the world.
End of Part 1
Continued in "Tomoyo's World - Part 2 - Bitter Turns to Sweet!"