The Dream Shifter

Chapter 76

Yuki was becoming increasingly curious about what was going on as another loud crash of metal echoed out to their feet. Yuki looked at the other onlookers through his books questioningly. The adults seemed only interested enough to listen and not investigate making Yuki a little frustrated. 'I wonder if the girl they saw was Saki… Only one way to know…' He readjusted himself with his book once more and pushed through the remaining thin crowd to get to the entrance of the park. "I'm going to find out what's going on." The others looked back at each other trying to figure out if he was expecting them to go with him or just announcing it to them for no apparent reason.

Everywhere he walked he could see things thrown about the park. It looked like someone had emptied all of the trash bins in the park and spread the contents. Then as though unsatisfied with just throwing junk around they drove a motorcycle or bicycle through destroying all of the flowers and half the bushes. "Saki?!" he shouted hoping that he might get a response from her, but there was nothing. "What happened here?"

As he went deeper into the park there were even more than just clashes of metal and things breaking. He was certain that he was hearing girl's voices shouting and grunting, but he did not know why. "What the…" Yuki pushed on walking with some caution in his step as he approached closer to what he believed to be the source. The noises became louder along with the voices becoming clearer to him. "Is someone fighting back there?"

"Are all you going to do is preach to me?"

"I'm not going to fight you!"

"I'm not letting you go!"

"I think that's Saki!" said Yuki as he recognized her voice. It pushed his feet forward a little faster to get through the distance and appear around the foliage with Saki jumping away from a girl attacking her. "Hey Saki!"

The middle schooler caught Yuki's voice by reflex and turned her head over to him. There was not even a moment's thought as she charged for a loaded down Yuki. Yuki stepped back not certain what he had gotten himself into now that he had a young girl sprinting for him with a look in her eye that he was all too familiar with.

Saki had slid back to keep her distance from the girl, but it was only an instant for her to see the change in target. The Yuki Protection Meter jumped to an immediate five and Saki burst into a full sprint to close the distance in time. Her mind was no longer thinking about anything other than protecting Yuki. The thoughts of staying out of the fight and being peaceful vaporized with a narrowed look in her eye.

The girl was in mid-air pulling back her arm for a quick punch closing the distance quickly, but Saki covered the ground with remarkable speed coming into striking distance. Using the already built up momentum she brought up her leg horizontally as she leapt into the air keeping the motion going connecting her thigh to knee with the girl's stomach knocking the wind out of her and making her cough up some saliva. The sudden change in speed and direction on the girl bent her over and around Saki's leg before throwing her away into the bushes disappearing with only her legs sticking up. Saki came to a sliding landing on the cement rotating around to check Yuki. "Are you alright?"

"Wow, Saki! That was an awesome kick!"

Saki could not hold back the sweat at hearing his reaction. She marched over to him glaring at him a little annoyed, when she got over her shock. "I asked if you're hurt!"

"Oh uh? Yeah I'm fine. Not even a scratch."

Saki looked Yuki up and down trying to get through the wall of manga that he was carrying with him. "I thought you were only getting a few today?"

Yuki's face turn red looking embarrassed. He almost lost control of his books, but salvaged them in time. "Well I found some that I've been looking for a while for." He blinked catching the moving, twitching leg of the girl that tried to attack in the bush. "Who's the girl?"

"I'm not sure yet. I've been trying to calm her down."

"By hitting her? She looks like she's in middle school!"

Saki snapped her head over at Yuki getting taken off guard by Yuki's accusations. "What?! No, she attacked me!"

"But look how hard you hit her. You probably knocked her unconscious!" Yuki set down his books realizing that they were getting in his way. He walked over to the bush looking in and then away getting a little embarrassed from the sight he caught. "How could you be so mean?"

"What?! But I didn't…" Saki was swinging back and forth between anger and guilt and trying to prove her own innocence in the matter. She did not even realize that she was being defensive with Yuki. "I was protecting you!"

"Well you didn't have to hit her so hard, she's younger than you."

"She was attacking me and that other guy! Why you treating me like the villain here?" Saki grabbed Yuki by the shoulder pulling him back so that he would look at her face rather than shouting to his back.

He pulled away from her fishing into the bush trying to find something safe to grab onto of the girl. "Help me get her out of the bush, Saki." There was silence from behind him as he looked around for an arm in the bush. He thrashed around with his hands going between the branches trying to keep free and not get scratched up in the process. "Hah!" he said finally locating an arm of the girl. When he went to grab the girl's arm he felt the bush shift and move suddenly making him look over at the girl to see if she was trying to get out. However, he saw that it was Saki who exchanged Yuki's slightly confused face for a grudging assistance. "Saki…"

It took her a moment, but they finally had the girl by the arms. Yuki counted the time down with Saki to pull together getting her freed from the bush and dropped on her knee slouched over with them still holding her arms. Yuki let her go making sure that she did not fall over while she was still unconscious. "Umm…little girl? Are you alright?" He put his hand on her shoulder hoping to be able to get her to wake up with a little shaking. "You hit her pretty hard, Saki…"

Saki was turned away trying to keep her anger in check while Yuki took the wrong side of the situation. The words coming from Yuki continued to grate on her making it worse until she turned at the waist to look back at him. "What you want from me?! You want me to say I'm sorry? Fine! I'm sorry! Happy?"

Yuki faced turned blue for a moment trying to figure out where all of the rage that Saki was venting was coming from. "Uh, can you search her for identification?"

"Huh?" Saki's emotions cracked in half taken off guard by Yuki's redirect. She was not sure if she had missed something that Yuki had said.

"We need to find out who she is and try to get her to her parents." Saki looked back at him still staring a little blank at him trying to catch up. "I'm not doing it! S-She's a girl!"

"Fine…" Saki pushed useless Yuki out of the way and knelt down staring at the girl. She was a little surprised that for some with so much energy and fighting talent she had been knocked out so easily. The matter of finding identification was going to be difficult for them if she did not have it on her. She could not find any school bag or pack that she might have been carrying leaving only her school uniform. Saki swallowed slowly not sure what she was feeling about having to help this girl knowing how she was acting just a few minutes ago.

The search had to wait; the girl started to move on her own slowly looking up. It only took a moment, as though it was programmed into her, for her to leap to her feet taking a safe distance away from a still kneeling Saki and go into an attack stance.

Yuki jumped in between the two hoping that he could defuse the situation. "Woah! We aren't here to hurt you! It's alright Miss…" He offered his hand out to her as an invitation. However, she just stared at him almost with disgust. "I'm Yuki."

The girl did not change her stance towards the two of them and checked out of her left eye to see that the boy she had targeted before was still nearby keeping his distance from any of them. His silence nearly made him seem invisible, contrary to his size. "I was mistaken…"

Saki stood up from the grass looking around Yuki at the girl. "So you're apologizing for attacking us?"

"I thought he was a worthy opponent, but he's just a weakling."

Saki could not help but sweat a little from the unexpected respond as well as seeing the stone statue remains of Yuki. Yuki could feel the laughing wind blow through as he turned stone white at the word 'weakling'. It did not make any sense, but he could not say a word. Upon seeing Yuki's reaction and letting it set for a moment, Saki started to laugh uncontrollably with the others staring at her confused.

Once she was done laughing, Saki stepped around the still petrified Yuki towards the girl. "I'm Saki! What's your name?"

The school girl still looked narrowly at Saki, but finally backed off her stance standing normally. She looked disappointed or frustrated. "I'm Chiharu…"

Saki looked over towards the boy from their school hoping to finally get a word out of him. However, he remained quiet not quite staring, but more just watching them. They were interrupted by the sound of something breaking under feet. Chiharu immediately snapped turning towards the noise in a prepared stance. Saki rushed over to Chiharu putting her hand on her shoulder hoping to ease her down.

Out of the exit of the park, or entrance in this case, came three boys with rough trouble seeking looks. They stopped just inside the park taking notice of the four students. However, as Yuki was coming out of his frozen state and turned the center boy, wearing a different high school uniform, pointing to Yuki. "Hey boys, looks like we got lucky! Wait…You're Hayashi aren't you?! I've got some payback for you!"