[TRC] The Orphan

Title: The Orphan
Rating: PG
Warnings: Some violence; Sakura/Syaoran, blink-and-you'll-miss-it reference to Kuro/Fai.
Spoilers: No specific spoilers. Set in an unspecified time period after Outo but before Tokyo.
Summary: While traveling from world to world in search of feathers, they come upon one world that seems strangely quiet and empty. When Syaoran is diverted from the search from feathers by a fascinating archaelogical discovery, he finds out too late that there are some things that should be left sleeping.
Author's Notes: This was written as a gift fic for Bottan, for her birthday (only a few MONTHS late, sorry about that! orz) Her request was for Syaoran to get himself into trouble, and then for the others to protect him and get him out again.

( Civilizations came and went, leaving only their artifacts behind to remember them. )

~end.

Author's notes: I'm not very good at describing mechanical things, sorry; since none of the travelers came from a very technologically advanced world, they don't really have the vocabulary to describe all the things they see. But the machine itself was based partially on the hunter-seeker machines from The Matrix, and partly on the Fabrication Machine from the movie 9. And its ability to morph its component parts was an effect of the feather; without that it couldn't have changed itself.