Disclaimer: CLAMP owns them. I'm just playing with them for a bit.

A/N: This is my first fic in this fandom, so don't kill me.

Paths of Fate

It was a lovely, warm, sunny day. A perfect day to spend time with those you care about. A perfect day for a date with Himawari, for example!

Then why on Earth was Watanuki stuck with Doumeki as well?

"Oh, it's always so exciting here!" Himawari said happily. "Do you come to the amusement park often, Watanuki-kun?"

"Not really," Watanuki replied. "It's rather boring here without anybody with me, you see!"

"Then do you come here with Doumeki-kun?"

"What? Why would I want to come here with him?! I don't want to be around him any more than I have to! That stupid, idiotic –"

"Shut up," Doumeki said, interrupting his tirade. "What's that?"

Watanuki and Himawari both looked in the direction he pointed. There was a building they'd never seen before, although this was certainly not their first time in the amusement park.

"Oh, that looks exciting!" Himawari asked. "The sign says, 'Paths of Fate.' Let's go check it out, okay?"

Well, who was Watanuki to disagree with an angel? In no time at all he found himself before the 'Paths of Fate,' with a member of the amusement park's staff explaining to them the basics of it.

"The idea is simple," the man explained with the air of somebody who had told the same story countless times. "There are three entrances and five exits to this house. If you choose to try it, you will be blindfolded, after which you enter the house through one of these doors when the light above them is green. Inside, you will find rooms with more doors. Some have a handle only on one side, so you can't just walk right through the shortest route to the other side of the building!"

"And then what?" asked Himawari. "What happens once we go out?"

"Well, here, we mark which one of the doors you choose to enter," the man explained, "and at the exit, which door you come out through. Using this combination we determine which of the fifteen possible routes you have picked. As these paths are chosen partly by yourself, partly by coincidence, they can be called fated. The whole point is that several people go through the house to receive their own 'fated number', after which you will be given paper slips to reveal what is your destined relationship with each of the fated types of people."

"What do you mean with a 'destined relationship?'" Watanuki asked warily. He wasn't sure he liked the sound of this thing. It was a bit too familiar…

"They vary quite a lot," the man told them. "There are 'fated lovers', 'bitter enemies', 'acquaintances,' 'good friends', and so on. Because your combination is determined by fate, fate also tells which relationships your paper will show with other people."

"That sounds –" Watanuki started, meaning to say, 'stupid', but something stopped him. After all, this was his perfect chance to prove that he was indeed meant to be together with Himawari! Their destinies were definitely locked together.

"That sounds great!" Himawari said, clapping her hands together. "I want to go first. You'll come after me, right, Watanuki-kun, Doumeki-kun?"

"Of course, Himawari-chan!" Watanuki announced happily. "Whatever you want is fine with me!"

Giggling at his enthusiasm, Himawari allowed her eyes to be blindfolded. She then stood waiting as the man gave her some last instructions. "If you get lost inside the house, simply remove the blindfold," the man advised her. "There will be clear signs there showing the shortest way outside. And once you are on the other side, press the button next to the door there, and the light on this side will turn green so that we know to send the next one after you. The one taking care of the other side of the house only knows which door the last person went in through, so it's important not to hurry or you won't get your own combination!"

Himawari nodded, then walked towards the wall, looking slightly hesitant. Finding the closest door, she opened the door and stepped in. A red light lit above the doors

It took forever, at least in Watanuki's opinion. Every second without the sweet Himawari was torture! When the green light finally was lit, he hasted to get before Doumeki.

"I want to be next!" he announced. "You can be after me." With some luck, he would be able to spend some time alone with Himawari before the idiot found his way out of the house! He probably wouldn't convince her to continue without the idiot – she was so sweet and caring and wouldn't leave anybody behind, not even somebody like Doumeki – but at least he would have a non-Doumeki-interrupted moment with her!

"…Whatever," was Doumeki's only comment. It was like he didn't even care! Well, he clearly didn't care much about Himawari, so he clearly didn't deserve her, either.

Allowing himself to be blindfolded, Watanuki then headed towards the doors. He didn't want to look like an idiot before the annoying archer, after all. Himawari's hesitation had been merely cute, but he wouldn't hesitate!

Fortunately he found a door right away, stepping inside and closing it firmly after himself. There. A moment of Doumeki-free time was awaiting him!

For some time he wandered around, opening doors and closing them behind him, following along walls to find more doors, wondering how long it would take until he got to see the sweet Himawari again. Finally, though, he simply couldn't find any more door handles in the room he was in. Now, what was this? There were supposed to be doors everywhere.

After another moment of annoyed searching, Watanuki decided to remove the blindfold for a while. Maybe the door handles in this room were at a different height than usual and that was why he couldn't find them. After all, what else could be the reason? With this logic in mind, he removed the blindfold and glanced around to spot the closest door.

There were no doors in the room.

It wasn't just that none of the doors had a handle in the inside. There were simply no doors at all. The walls were equally blank everywhere. There wasn't even anything he could have come in through.

Now, this was not only odd, this was downright creepy. Why would they make a room with no entrances or exits at all? And, more importantly, how had he actually got there?

Thankfully it wasn't dark in the room, rather somewhat dim. There was light coming from somewhere but he couldn't tell for sure where the lamps were situated. It didn't help much, though; dark or light, he was still stuck inside.

Suddenly he got a creepy feeling. Something was getting near to him – and that something was not exactly friendly. In fact, it was evil. Very evil.

And it was after him.

Why did it always have to be like this? Couldn't he ever just enjoy a calm afternoon with Himawari without constant annoyances like Doumeki or hungry spirits trying to drive him insane? What was the point of the idiotic archer hanging around if he wasn't even there when Watanuki was about to get eaten?

This was simply not right. He didn't want to become some stupid spirit's dinner! Especially not in some stupid amusement park ride that wasn't even a ride at all!

Of course this wasn't sweet Himawari's fault, of course, unlike some traitorous little part of his mind was stubbornly claiming. Sure, she had chosen to come both to the park and the ride, and without her Watanuki wouldn't have been anywhere near the amusement park, but it wasn't her fault nevertheless. It was all the stupid spirits' fault, theirs and that fool Doumeki's!

The feeling was getting closer and closer. Watanuki decided that he definitely didn't like this. They might come looking for him, but they would never even find his remains. They would never know what happened to him, and sweet Himawari would mourn him, and then Doumeki would be there to comfort her and take advantage of her sweet innocence, and – and that couldn't happen, not now, not ever! It was simply wrong!

His musings were interrupted as the evil presence got too close to ignore. The next moment the spirit slid through the wall in front of him. Watanuki couldn't help the yelp that escaped his lips at the sight of it. It was simply hideous, all sharp-teethed mouths and bulging eyes and slimy skin.

If this was what the path of his fate led to, he wished that Yuuko could have been wrong for once and that fate was indeed escapable….

Backing away from the spirit, he felt his back collide with the wall. Not good. Another glance around told him that no doors had appeared since he last looked. There was apparently nowhere for him to run.

It was quite odd, really, that at this moment of impending death he could not think of Himawari. Instead, there was another face in his mind – a face he would have very much liked to punch right now.

"Doumeki, you idiot!" he shouted with all the energy the adrenaline in his body gave him. "Why can't you ever be there when you are needed?"

Of course, it wasn't summoned by his words. It was just a coincidence, weird coincidence – no matter what Yuuko said, there had to be coincidences in the world, because this couldn't be fate.

His words hadn't even stopped echoing in the little room as the wall next to him shattered. A moment later the shattered part of the wall lay on the floor in the form of a broken door, a young man standing on it. Without a single glance at him, the boy took a pose like one would when practising archery.

Watanuki couldn't entirely suppress a gasp as a bow-like thing of pure energy seemed to appear in the other boy's hands. A second later, there was an arrow, too – and then it was shot, flying through the air and lighting the whole room up while it did.

Another moment later, it sank into the spirit, breaking it into nothing.

"How did you do that?" Watanuki asked, amazed against his will. "You didn't even have a bow! Not a real one, anyway."

"It didn't seem to bother you before that I used to not have arrows," Doumeki pointed out calmly – for how else could he do so? "What's the difference?"

"There's a huge difference!" the bespectacled boy shouted. "It's completely different, all of it! Spiritual arrows I can understand, your power is to dispel spirits after all, but – how can you make a BOW, too? And SINCE WHEN?!"

"I guess I've just gotten more powerful," Doumeki replied, his calmness never wavering. "Don't shout. My ears are ringing."

"I DO NOT SHOUT!" Watanuki shouted. "AND EVEN IF I DO, IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT!"

Now, Doumeki didn't answer. He simply covered his ears in the most enraging way possible. It was obvious he was being annoying on purpose, Watanuki just knew it. He could never get a moment's peace with this guy around!

"Let's just go," Doumeki finally said after quite a lot of yelling, shouting, and arm-flailing. How dare he not even pay any attention. "See? There are doors here again. We should get going or they'll get worried."

"Oh, yeah!" Watanuki realized something. "How did you end up there? You weren't supposed to enter the house before I'd made it to the other side, right?"

"Well, you were taking quite some time," the archer replied calmly. "So, I convinced the man guarding the entrance that you had forgotten to press the button and came right after you. Thankfully I found you in time."

"But Himawari-chan's on the other side!" Watanuki realized. "Oh, she's surely so worried! She's so nice and kind, she wouldn't be calm if she knew we are in trouble. We must go and ease her mind immediately!"

"Then let's go," Doumeki said reasonably. "See? The exit's that way." He pointed to one of the doors, next to which there was a sign surrounded by small lamps, indicating it as the way to the other side of the house.

"Why didn't you say so SOONER?"

The way out seemed, if possible, even longer than their way in had been. When they finally stepped out of the house and into the daylight, Watanuki was still yelling. Doumeki still had his ears covered. How dare he?!

"Watanuki-kun! Doumeki-kun! Are you all right?" Oh, who cared about the stupid Doumeki, anyway? Sweet, sweet Himawari was there, and she was clearly worried about them – which meant she cared about them – and she had said his name before that of the idiot!

"Oh, yes, everything's all right," Watanuki hastened to reassure her. "We just ran into a hungry spirit in there."

"Oh?" Himawari seemed startled. "It didn't harm you or anything, did it?"

"Oh no!" Watanuki said happily. "It did nothing of the sort!"

"Because I went and shot it," Doumeki said.

"Really?" The girl smiled. "You are so amazing, Doumeki-kun!" Before Watanuki could get into a hysterical fit, though – which was, in fact, quite fast – she pointed somewhere. "Come on, let's get your sheets so we can compare our fates! That's the whole point of this, right?"

"Right!" Watanuki said cheerfully. Ah, Himawari was so cute when she smiled!

"Ah, let's see," said the woman tending the exits a moment later. "It seems the last one to go in went through the first door – that's you, right? And you came out through the fourth, so this is your fate!" Smiling, she handed Doumeki a paper slip. Turning to Watanuki, she then seemed apologetic. "But if you came earlier, I don't know which door you entered through. I'm sorry, but you should have come earlier!"

"Oh, what a pity!" Himawari exclaimed. "I was so looking forward to comparing our fates!"

"…He went in through the first door," Doumeki said. "I was right after him so I saw it. And we came out through the fourth door together. The lights had got broken or something."

"Well, if that's the case!" With another smile, she gave Watanuki a paper slip, too. "Have fun finding out your destiny!"

"Oh, that's great!" Himawari looked at her own paper as they walked away. "With your combination, Watanuki-kun, it seems that we are 'good friends!' I'm so glad!"

"Ah, yes," Watanuki said with a sweat drop, amazingly enough not falling into hysterics. "I'm not sure whether that truly applies; after all, I did take my blindfold off halfway through!"

"But that was also fate, wasn't it?" Himawari smiled brightly. "Nothing happens by coincidence, after all. And I'm glad to be 'good friends' with Watanuki-kun!"

Ah, Himawari-chan was smiling at him! Watanuki was floating high, high away…

"Oi."

What a way to land! "My name's not 'oi!'" Watanuki roared, turning to look at Doumeki. "And what is it, you –"

"You got the one-four combination, right?"

"Yeah. What of it?" Watanuki glared at the other boy. How dare he interrupt his lovely Himawari-thoughts! And why did he always have to be there, anyway? Didn't he have anything else to do except bully Watanuki?

"…Nothing in particular." The archer simply glanced at his own paper slip, nodded, and put it back into his pocket.

"Oh, what did you get, Doumeki-kun?" Himawari asked happily. "Mine was two-four! How do we work out?"

Why was she saying such things to the idiot? There was truly no justice in the world!

"I got the same combination as he did, remember," Doumeki replied after a brief moment of silence. "So, it's 'good friends,' as well."

…That was it. That was the last thing he needed. The big bully got the same combination and thus the same destined relationship with Himawari! It couldn't be right, it was simply because they had taken the blindfolds off, yes, that was it, their destinies were messed with…

"Oh, that's so great!" Himawari exclaimed. "And what about you and Watanuki-kun? Are you friends as well? You get along so well!"

"… Something like that, I guess. I didn't really look." Then what had he been asking him for? That was so absolutely annoying!

"Well, you still have your paper right there, Watanuki-kun, right? What is it for you and Doumeki-kun?"

Ah! How could he refuse to fulfil Himawari-chan's request? Immediately Watanuki looked at his paper slip, looking for the right number there.

For a moment, he froze. Then, he very quickly tore the paper into tiny pieces nobody could make any sense of. "It's wrong! It's all wrong! Because we took the blindfolds off it didn't work right!" he wailed, continuing to tear the paper until he couldn't get it into smaller pieces anymore.

"Oh, my!" Himawari seemed slightly surprised, though not startled, at his sudden outburst. Well, she would be used by now, wouldn't she? "Was it that bad? Oh, don't worry about it, Watanuki-kun. Even if it was 'bitter enemies' or something, I'm sure you don't have a reason to worry. This is just a little game, right?" Her smile was as dazzling as ever. "After all, you two are clearly very close!"

"Yeah, that's right. It doesn't work like that. There's nothing true in it!" Watanuki said hastily. "Why don't we go look at something else now, okay?"

"Sounds good!" Himawari hurried ahead with Watanuki at her heels like a loyal little lapdog.

Doumeki stayed behind for a moment, looking indifferently down at the paper pieces on the ground. After a moment's thought, he crouched down to pick up one that had somehow been saved from Watanuki's rage complete enough for the words on it to be legible. Reading the words, Doumeki stood still for a while, looking thoughtful.

Then he just made a little, non-committal sound, and let the piece of paper flutter from his fingers before hurrying after the other two.

The words 'fated lovers' seemed to glow slightly in the afternoon sunlight.