* NiNe * Succor

This is in Koki's point of view.

Holding the glowing knife, I shielded my eyes from it's brightness.
Tai came running in, gripping his katana, "Koki, what happened?!"
"Dan took her!" I said angrily.
"Wait! You have her knife!"
"Yeah, why is it glowing?"
"Her knives can track each other! We can find where she is!" Tai said gleefully.
"Well, that's a start. Did you guys finish off the impostors?' I asked, looking into the kitchen.
Shylo and Kei were tying up one of the impostors carefully. Shylo looked up at me and smiled, "Got one of them alive for questioning."
"I'm not sure they'd be much help. But we can see," I said unsure.
Kei looked at the bound man, "Do you know what is going on?"
The man had a pained expression and showed fear, "I-I do not know much."
"Well, tell us what you do know," Kei said threateningly.
"I just know that they planned to capture the twin girl. And if she does not answer their questions, they torture her," he said, shaking slightly.
Shylo gasped, "Let's get going . . . NOW!" She stomped out the door.
"Shylo! Wait we need to make sure we know where we're going!" Tai said, running after her.
I looked at Kei, and he looked back at me. I was sure we had the same facial expression.
We left the man there and walked quickly to join Shylo and Tai.
"We'll get her back, Tai. Kei and Koki seem to be good at that," Shylo's voice was heard down the road leading out of the city.
Kei and I stopped at this and looked at each other in confusion.
"Well, if Koki was any good at that, he could have saved her before she was taken," Tai said smugly.
Kei smirked, looked at me, then chuckled. I hit him in the forehead with the palm of my hand and stomped to Tai and Shylo.
"So how do we work this knife?" I asked Tai with dislike.
"Give me it," Tai said, sighing angrily and taking it from my hand. "You twist the grip and it will give the exact city or town it is in." Doing that and aiming the grip at a wall, the knife gave a projection of a city name we all knew: Mainland. Then it showed a red dot on a specific house and a blue dot signifying the knife he was holding in Rin Wind.
"It's not moving! She must be there!" Shylo shouted with relief in her voice.

We headed off to the Mainland as quickly as we could, but we had one difficulty. That difficulty was Elias showing up out of nowhere.
"Well, Koki, are you truly on their side or luring them into traps?" he asked with the rudeness I hated.
"I'm really on their side, Elias. And you should not expect me to hesitate in killing you," I replied darkly.
Tai glared at me with question.
"I think you two should duel," Kei said calmly.
Shylo and Tai nodded in agreement.
I knew what they all meant by this. A test to see if they should trust me or not. I nodded and stepped closer to Elias. Elias also took a step closer.
"Of melee weapons, of course," Shylo hesitated.
Elias pulled out his fancy combat knife of about a foot long with a curve hard to explain. I took out my dagger and held it tightly. It was a simple dagger with a straight but sharp blade and rectangle grip.
"Your call," I said to the three.
" . . . go!" Tai yelled.
Elias rushed at me and lunged his combat knife forward. I sucked in my breath and moved to the side, dodging it by a few inches. I sliced at his right arm, holding his knife, and hit it straight on. He pulled his arm away from my dagger and gripped it quickly. He handed his knife to his other hand and slashed at my leg, but I jumped up then landed. With the chance, I slashed at his chest with a rapidness I did not know I had. Blood was flung to the ground; and a gasp was heard from Shylo. Elias fell to his knees, dropped his blade, then clutched at his fatally bleeding chest.
"Fine, you won. You expect me to surrender?" Elias said, breathing loudly. "I think not. I'd rather die. So do it!"
"Well, if you are so willing. I will, but I had little against you to tell the truth. Only the fact that you're a pain in the butt and a Ruler," I said, breathing heavily but quietly. "You fool."
I took my blade, closed my eyes and shoved my dagger into his chest. Then I stood up with some more blood on me and walked over to the three.
"There, one Ruler down. Let's go save Kay now," I said, looking at them with tiredness.
"First we should bandage you," Shylo said with a grave look.
"But I'm fine, let's go," I said, walking toward the path but collapsed on my knee. "Why am I suddenly weak?"
Shylo cleared her throat, "Your big gash in your stomach has opened immensely."
I looked down slowly and saw blood seeping through my shirt, "Oh."

After bandaging my wound, I felt better. So we headed back on our travel to the Mainland. It took us five more hours, but we finally got there with no other problems and kept looking at the knife-map for the house location. We eventually came to a mansion much fancier than the others. This mansion looked familiar to me . . . if only I knew why . . .
"Oh, no," I breathed.
"What? What is it?" Tai asked urgently.
"This mansion, I've been here before. It's my uncle's," I said, staring at the mansion with shock.
"Our uncle's? But I have never met him," Kei said with a questioning look.
"Be glad," I whispered.
"Why? What is wrong with him?" Shylo asked.
"He-he was experimented on by our father. It was supposedly successful. He can move faster than a normal human and has more strength. But his body is truly in a weak condition. He is pale, thin, and his irises are pure white," I answered calmly.
"He should not be that hard," Tai said, whipping out his pistols.
"You do not know that. He's tough for his size."
"Well, let's go and save Taryn. NOW!" Shylo yelled.
Kei and Tai held their guns out and headed for the door. I had my Uzi in my left hand and my dagger in my right. Shylo followed behind me with her longbow and arrows ready. Tai looked through the small window and looked around inside in every direction he could see. Soon he said quietly, "Two on each side, one on the staircase in the middle of the room." Then he kicked the door and walked quickly straight ahead, pointing his pistols in his hands on each side. He shot the first two on either side, the next two; then he aimed at the one on the staircase and finished.
"Nice, Tai!" Shylo shouted quietly with glee.
Kei and I were looking cautiously through the rest of the main hall. There was the set of stairs in the middle end and three doors on each side of the hall. Suddenly we heard a scream as if in pain from the right of the hall. First guess . . .
"Taryn!" Tai shouted, turning his head swiftly to the three doors on the right. He rushed to the one closest to the entrance, opened it, and saw a long hall filled with doors.
Another scream was heard but with less strength. Tai must have heard it from the next door, because he rushed to it and shouldered it open. Kei, Shylo, and I moved with him. We saw a smaller hall with just one door on each side. Tai and Shylo rushed to the right one; and Kei and I went to the left one. At almost the exact same time, two of us opened each door. Kei and I looked in and saw Taryn pretty much dangling from chains. She had her knees resting on the ground with her hands hanging in the chains that were attached to the ceiling; and her ankles were chained to the ground. There was blood running down her arms; and she looked pale as though she had been there ever since she was taken. She had her head hanging down and her hair over it. Tai and Shylo rushed quickly over to us.
"Taryn?" I called.
She lifted her head slowly and looked at us, "I . . . can't . . . believe . . . "
"Taryn? What's wrong? Do you need food?" Kei asked.
" . . . water . . . " she whispered.
We looked around, but no water was found. Shylo took her canteen out and helped Taryn drink some.
"The key . . . is somewhere behind the crystal stuff," Taryn said calmly, looking to her left toward the crystal-like substance.
Kei went behind it and found the key obviously, because he rushed to her quickly and unlocked her chains as fast as possible. Taryn let her arms fall helplessly, then fixed her sitting position. Kei pulled her up to stand, "Who has bandages?"
"I do," Shylo pulled her pack out and two rolled up bandages.
Tai rushed over and bandaged her right arm, while Kei bandaged the other with Shylo watching. I took lookout at the door. My uncle was great at showing up at unexpected times. But he did not show up. At least, he did not . . . yet.
After they finished cleaning and bandaging Taryn's wrists, she looked a little better. Quickly she went to a desk, took her other glowing knife which was blinking from atop, put it in her boot, then opened up a deep drawer, and pulled out her katana.
"He took my gun. I don't know where it is," she said, obviously drained of energy.
"Did he do anything to you?" I asked.
"Well, besides hanging me to chains without a chair, he questioned me about things I obviously did not know the answers to," she said, rubbing her bandaged wrists.
Tai was beside Taryn looking in the desk for more stuff. Shylo was beside me and turned around. Suddenly, there was a squeal from Shylo. We each bolted our heads toward the door. And there waiting for us was my uncle Droi holding Kei with a knife to his throat.
"It's hard to tell which one of my nephews I have," he said with his usual calmness that creeped me out.
Kei's face was in an expression of pain, probably because Droi was gripping him with his unbelievable strength. I glared at Droi and took a step closer.
"Hm, this is a puzzle. How fun. Which twin is it? You act tough in front of me," he directed towards me. "You could be Kei since he did not know me."
I heard Shylo and Taryn breathe in sharply. Tai stepped beside me.
"Ah, the girl's twin brother. I noticed your bullets penetrated my men in the hall. Very nice aim . . . for a boy."
Tai tensed up in anger.
I held him back with my arm. "Let me distract him. You guys run out of here," I barely breathed into Tai's ear.
"Oh no, you don't!" Taryn silently shouted, running up behind me, grabbing my shoulder, and pulling me around to look at her.
"I'll get him off Kei. And if I'm lucky, I can get him," I whispered.
"You know I'm not dumb! And you aren't going to get yourself killed like this!" she shouted normally this time. "Tai, give me one of your pistols."
Tai handed her his orange pistol and a bag of ammo clips.
"If you want to go head on, go ahead. We'll be back-up," Taryn said calmly.
We all faced Droi.
"I would appreciate no guns, please," Droi said quietly, pulling Kei back with a weak grin.
"Fine, we'll battle it out," I said angrily.
"I'm helping," Tai said, standing next to me again.
"Yes, I am worth having two against one. I do not mind," he threw the knife to the left wall and shoved Kei at the right wall almost knocking him out. He stepped slowly toward us with a smirk of great evil.