Chaos Cardcaptor Sakura

""These Kaos Cards bring out the worst in all of us, don't they?""

- Tomoyo Daidouji, Chapter 6.0: A Duality of Despair

Chaos Cardcaptor Sakura is a Cardcaptor Sakura fanfiction written by DrakeTheDuelist. In Tomoeda, between Seasons 2 and 3, a mysterious set of "Kaos Cards" from Clow Reed's past reappear and begin terrorizing Tomoeda. Leading them are two Guardians: Lycan and Damien, who have differing opinions regarding how best to reach their goals. Sakura and Syaoran both wind up involved in the effort to capture all eight Kaos Cards, but Sakura is aided by a mysterious substance called the Elixir of Fire, a potion capable of empowering the user with superhuman resilience to everything, as well as a few... personality quirks. After a few captures, infighting begins to break out between the Guardians of Kaos, as well as between the Card Captors themselves.

It hasn't been updated in quite a while, to the annoyance of the very few fans the series actually has. Though it gets out into the mainstream very little, good things have been spoken of it, so it can't be that bad... Though not finished, rumors have been swirling about a pair of successive sequels, the first being Chaos Card Captor Torika and the second being Science and Sorcery. (And the latter of which is rumored to have its own sequel entitled The Next Day.)

As of April 17, 2011, DrakeTheDuelist declared Chaos Card Captor Sakura to officially be a Dead Fic, partially for reasons of the pressing demands of Real Life, and partially to avoid any Unfortunate Implications that the fic’s supposed ending would result in. And to make things even crazier, he mentions that he might someday pick it back up again.

It can be read here.


 * Apocalypse How: An implied Class X-4, when
 * Armor-Piercing Question: One of the few things that can truly get to somebody filled with the Power of Kaos is one of these. While often given by Tomoyo, Orchid and Lycan will use them to jab at each other (which often proves rather foolish...).
 * Because Destiny Says So: When Syaoran finally, he learns that fate and free will . How can such a thing be achieved? Because . Keep in mind, Cardcaptor Sakura was essentially a kid’s show...
 * Berserk Button: Insult Clow Reed with Yue in earshot. Not even gets away with that!
 * Big Damn Heroes: This is usually how the less-involved characters from each chapter get into the main body of the plot.
 * Syaoran in Chapter 2, even though...
 * Syaoran in Chapter 3, thereby introducing him for the first (real) time.
 * Yue and Damien in Chapter 6.5
 * Orchid (yes, by herself) in Chapter 7
 * Keroberos, Yue, and Damien in Chapter 8.0
 * A Big Damn Villains for Orchid (yes, by herself... again) in 8.5, presaged with Sarcastic Clapping.
 * Bolivian Army Ending: The end of Chapter 6.0. Syaoran is beaten, battered, and practically defeated. Yet he still gets back up. Thank you, Tomoyo.
 * Had the publication ended just one fragment earlier, the entire fanfiction would've ended with, the ultimate Despair Event Horizon.
 * Break the Cutie: Pick a character, any character.
 * Or, more subtly, Corrupt the Cutie, depending on the cutie in question.
 * Chekhov's Gun: In Chapter 8.0, you aren’t led to believe that the  do anything... until
 * Close to Home: Chapter 4’s title.
 * Curb Stomp Battle: Most fights are very short (if you don’t count all the incessant yammering) and don’t involve more than just a few swings.
 * Probably one of the most egregious of these so-called “battles” is when.
 * Curse Cut Short: Once to Damien (by Tomoyo), and once to Touya (by Sakura).
 * The author figured out very quickly that restrictive ratings kill readership.
 * Darker and Edgier: This might as well be the author’s mission statement.
 * Deal with the Devil: To use the Kaos Cards, you need to harness a “key that hides the powers of the Inferno”. (And by the Inferno, you can pretty safely bet that this means Hell.) And the Card Captor in question has to make a “contract” with this key.
 * Gin Clow makes a deal with to get his own kaos power. Later on, Orchid
 * Despair Event Horizon: It’s practically axiomatic for this to appear at some point or another. And it does: Orchid thinks of  at the very thought of it all.
 * Also see Apocalypse How.
 * Development Hell: Starting Date: January 2006 (including early drafts). Current status: Dead Fic (as of April 2011).
 * Chapter 6 was rotting so deeply in Development Hell that the author split it into two separate chapters, Chapter 6.0 and Chapter 6.5.
 * A trend that the author appears to intend to repeat with the currently in-progress Chapter 8.0 and 8.5.
 * The author had been releasing occasional “chapter fragments” of as far as Chapter 8.5, up until the supposed death of the fic.
 * Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Did Orchid just
 * Does This Remind You of Anything?: Pleas for Sakura to not use the Elixir of Fire make it sound like a drug addiction. A bit Anvilicious at first, but goes away later on as the Elixir is flanderized.
 * Drama Bomb Finale: Chapter 8.0 was about the climactic battle, while Chapter 8.5 and the epilogue mostly deal with the repercussions of everything that happened previously.
 * Early Installment Weirdness: The end of Chapter 1, and parts of Chapter 2 are the only times Sakura's crush on Yukito are even mentioned. By the time Yukito shows up again for a bit part in Chapter 6, this crush seems to be completely swept under the rug.
 * Epileptic Trees: Being a Fix Fic, Chaos Card Captor Sakura makes some educated guesses as to some unanswered questions about the series, some of which are quite dark.
 * Tomoyo is straight for Syaoran, has an entire corps of bodyguard at her disposal, was once bullied by her cheerleader classmates, and her father abandoned her. And through it all, she ‘’still’’ remains a Wide-Eyed Idealist! Silly Tomoyo, Idealism is For Ki- ...oh wait.
 * The Clow Cards are apparently only about 200 years old, which is peanuts compared to other really old stuff in anime and manga.
 * Expospeak: Much of the dialog in Chapter 8.5, particularly ’s dialog.
 * Expy: Gin Clow is this for Kurtis, a vindictive, heavily accented character from the far less successful Hive Fleet Akyron.
 * It's also strongly suggested that the old Life Card picture was an Expy of Sakura.
 * Face Heel Turn: Sakura, as she turns into Orchid.
 * Fate Worse Than Death: Anybody hit by the Fade magic will progressively lose their five senses, one right after the other, all while you go insane. While non-fatal in and of itself, how horrific would it be to live the rest of your life with no cognitive senses? And what happens to the is more like
 * Fire, Ice, Lightning: Kaos (barring, but ‘’particularly’’ Damien’s) is constantly shown with fire and other flaming imagery and colors. Orchid shows an affinity for ice-based kaos power later on. And Syaoran sticks with his canonic affinity for his lightning ofuda.
 * First-Name Basis: In an attempt to fire back at Lycan, Orchid accidentally calls Syaoran by his first name, albeit as part of a quote. She catches herself afterwards, but the Relationship Upgrade still stands.
 * Lycan has a rather interesting take on this. No character ever refers to Lycan with an honorific (except for Orchid calling him “Lycie-chan”). Similarly, Lycan only once refers to Sakura with a “-san” honorific, but drops this later on, more often referring to her as “Kinomoto Sakura”. According to Word of God, Lycan does this as a derisive reference to the fact that he’s a predator, and pretty much everybody else is his prey, something like a slaughterer calling a cow by its zoologically-correct binomial nomenclature. No one else refers to Lycan with honorifics because they’re just not quite sure what to make of him / it.
 * Fix Fic: Kind of. What originally started as an attempt to explain why Sakura could use the Clow Cards with a Star Wand, this fic poked more holes in the plot than it mended. Granted, some holes needed poking, while others were exercises of unnecessary cruelty.
 * Fun with Acronyms: The author is quite fond of these, having given every one of his previous major fanfictions (which did not exist) a three-character acronym. Didn’t work too well with ‘’Chaos Card Captor Sakura’’, given that getting the acronym to three characters would result in “CCS”, an acronym most commonly associated with the parent series. What’s an author to do? Answer: Chaos Card Captor Sakura -> CCCS. Shortening that down even further, there are three C’s, allowing the acronym to be shortened to “C (x) 3 (+) S”. Hence, "C3S".
 * Fur Against Fang: Damien is a half-human with monstrous fangs and bat wings. Lycan is a hyperspace wolf lizard. Much Fantastic Racism abounds.
 * Gambit Roulette: Lycan's, concluding in Chapter 8.0. Yeah, so he’s the supposed head honcho bad guy, and he really means for Sakura, his chosen Card Captor, to wind up with the Kaos Cards in the end. Normally a surprise, but given the source material, it’s not much of a surprise. The roulette comes in when But even this is a ploy, as
 * Lycan’s plan plays Gambit Roulette a bit more realistically, considering that
 * Good Is Not Nice: Gin Clow himself.
 * Gratuitous English: Used as a literary language barrier against the language in which the fanfiction is written. Damien is supposed to speak mostly English and a little Japanese. Everybody else (except maybe Kero and Lycan) is supposed to speak mostly Japanese. The result: when Damien breaks out into Gratuitous English ("Little Wolf"), the rest of the cast hears this within their own accent ("Riteru Wurufu").
 * Used as a plot device when Damien doesn't realize that "the Cherry Blossom" (heard as "Chari Burosomu") is actually "Sakura", and then freaks out at seeing her in person.
 * Heroic BSOD: If you talk to Lycan for long enough, you will get one. Even if you're Tomoyo.
 * Ho Yay: Damien and Yue, and their rivalry doesn't even seem to matter. (If anything, it makes it worse!)
 * Hyperspace Is a Scary Place: Of course it's a scary place. Lycan lives there.
 * Impossibly Cool Weapon: The Inferno Crossbow.
 * Informed Ability: Apparently, Syaoran is a biology whiz. Justified, considering he's been studying it.
 * In-Series Nickname: A lot of characters have in-universe nicknames, either given by others, or self-assigned:
 * Sakura = Orchid
 * = Lycan
 * Lycan = Lycie-chan
 * Reed Clow = Clow Reed
 * = Kaos Encarnate
 * Insult Backfire: Lycan revels in how horrific everybody thinks he is. What's even more disturbing is that he enjoys it when you tell him how hurt you are.
 * Let Us Never Speak of This Again: One of the reasons why no character in season 3 of Cardcaptor Sakura will refer to events that occurred in Chaos Card Captor Sakura.
 * Laser-Guided Amnesia: The other reason.
 * Lotus Eater Machine: Chapter 2 starts out as this, but It Got Worse. Quickly.
 * MacGuffin: The summer project.
 * Made of Evil: The Elixir of Fire.
 * Gets flanderized later on. Whereas at first it’s an artifact so dangerous that one would have to cross the Godzilla Threshold to even consider using it, the Elixir of Fire is, in more recent chapters, as Bottled Heroic Resolve which is broken out repeatedly, deliberately, and seemingly without thought.
 * Meaningful Echo: “Zettai Daijobu”, which Syaoran stews over throughout the entire fic.
 * Lycan: “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice… you shall not live long enough to do.” Sadly, this echo was rather obvious because this incredibly narmtastic line, echoed in Chapter 7, was first written back in Chapter 2, long before Lycan’s character was fully established, or even before the writing got all that good.
 * Meaningful Name:
 * Orchid: If you've ever seen an Orchid before, they're actually quite pale. This contrasts sharply with the Cherry Blossom (i.e. "Sakura") flower. Orchid actually chooses this name.
 * Gin: The Japanese word for "silver", which is the only thing that can kill werewolves, according to their most common depictions. (Of course, Our Werewolves Are Different.) Silver is also a very contrasting color to black, which in Japanese is "Kuro", which sounds very similar to the Japanese pronunciation of "Clow".
 * Lycan: Keeping in mind that Our Werewolves Are Different, Lycan claims that this was the name people devised to label him. He then took it and ran with it. Sort of the in-series version of a Fan Nickname. (Not to be confused with that nickname...)
 * Damien: Named after an excommunicated Catholic missionary.
 * Meanwhile Back At The: One of the few consistent formatting decisions in the entire fic, a scene change will always be signified with the same pattern: *-*-*. Word of God on this is that the keystrokes are (shift) 8 (un-shift) dash (shift) 8 (un-shift) dash (shift) 8 (un-shift). These keystrokes prevent auto-formatting on a line of straight dashes or asterisks that can potentially mess up the format when posting. The stated purpose for these abrupt scene changes are to make the fic read more like an anime and less like a book, harkening to the fic’s anime basis.
 * Monster of the Week: The Kaos Cards tend to this for a while. The first four chapters are reminiscent of the majority of the Cardcaptor Sakura series in that they involve the basic Find-Identify-Counter-Defeat pattern.
 * Most Writers Are Male: Evident in the amount of comparative attention (particularly in the internal thought processes department) that Syaoran gets, compared to Sakura.
 * Motive Rant: As a prose fic with Alternate Character Interpretations galore, most character development is done with this. Basically, if a character spends more than three straight sentences talking without interruption, you can bet you’re reading one of these.
 * Chapter 8.5, full stop.
 * My Death Is Just the Beginning:
 * Names to Run Away From Really Fast: Lycan, Damien, and a number of the Kaos Cards (most blatantly with the ) all qualify. But by far the name to run away from the fastest is, mentioned only once, with the only implication being that.
 * Neck Lift: Shown by Orchid (with her foot, no less!), to demonstrate how imposing she actually is.
 * Ominous Latin Chanting: There is a bunch of crazy-speak in Chapter 8.5, especially one line repeated over and over again (right as ) that would be otherwise indecipherable to the characters who hear it. Hint: . Translated, the repeated message is
 * One True Threesome: Tomoyo apparently  . A Take That to those that interpret a 10-year-old's relationships as more than just friends on no further grounds than Ho Yay Fetish Fuel.
 * Order Versus Kaos
 * Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: Only instead of abusing capitalization, the author abuses italics. All! The! TIME!!!!! If you’re seeing capital letters, it’s because people are SHOUTING! PARTICULARLY! LOUD!!!
 * Purple Prose: Pretty much everything after Chapter 4, though compared to other fanfictions, this could have been the case from as early as Chapter 1. The later chapters are just ridiculous. And the Shards of Kaos? Whoo boy!
 * Put on a Bus: Meilin. Justified in the fact that she wasn't physically there at the time, but the author bypassed any opportunity to cameo her in somewhere,.
 * Rage Against the Heavens: Chapter 8.5. does this a lot.
 * Mind Rape Is A Special Kind Of Evil: If CLAMP works have one ubiquitous trait, besides Ho Yay of course, it would have to be that the spiritual / emotional consequences always trump the physical consequences. Following that logic, this ought to make a fair amount of sense.
 * Red Eyes, Take Warning: Lycan. Rather than blinking with organic eyeballs, his eyes flicker red to signify blinking.
 * The glimmer of kaos energy in the eyes of anyone possessing an unnaturally massive amount of kaos, such as the Elixir of Fire. See Sakura / Orchid and.
 * Refuge in Audacity: Sakura’s supposed in Chapter 6.0.
 * Sadly Mythtaken: The Li family has a legend that tells an apocryphal story about Clow Reed defeating the forces of Kaos, including Lycan. (This story likely had an Unreliable Narrator, having been presumably written by the Li clan.) Aside from the basics (there really are Kaos Cards), just about nothing else in this story is accurate. (For instance, the Kaos Cards are not nocturnal. Chimera was only specifically handwaved to take on the characteristics of diurnal animals.) Cue Syaoran’s Heroic BSOD when he realizes all too late that Sakura had been fighting forces far beyond her abilities, at least thus far, by herself.
 * Save the Villain: Pretty much the entire point of Chapter 8.5. But... who is the villain?
 * Schrödinger's Butterfly: Chapter 2.
 * Sequel Hook:
 * Lycan: “Let’s just say that some things in this world that transcend even Kaos.”
 * One of the previous Card Captors of Kaos was mentioned to be.
 * Lycan calls Damien.
 * Another hint at the sequel crossing into Cardcaptor Torika:
 * Shout-Out: Numerous in source and breadth:
 * "Broken", the title for Chapter 5, is from the Seether / Amy Lee song of the same name.
 * Ironically, the early scenes of Chapter 5 are indicative of Matchbox 20's "Unwell".
 * Lycan: “What did you mortals hope to accomplish by coming here?” A shout-out to The Maledict from Doom 3: Resurrection of Evil. The Maledict says a very similar line right before you begin the final showdown.
 * Keroberos’ comment,, diminutively suggesting that
 * Of all things, to Dawn of War. See how many you can find...
 * Kaos. Though that ought to be a given.
 * When Yue and Damien go at it, expect to hear a lot of “heretic”, “heathen”, and the all-purposed “scum” thrown around. While pretty scathing and out of place in your average Cardcaptor Sakura fanfiction, these are all ubiquitous catch-all terms for everything from cartoonish super-villainy to mild misdemeanors in the 40k universe.
 * Destruction and Despair, the two alignments of the Kaos Cards, are also two out of the three fires lit by in the Legend of Zelda: Oracle games. (The third fire, Sorrow, is basically Despair Lite when you think about it.)
 * Orchid seems to be rather skilled at twirling around a scythe...
 * See Ominous Latin Chanting.
 * : “Oh yes, witch. I am Lycan. And I have seen everything.”
 * Shown Their Work: All the way back in Chapter 1, the numeric combination that held the Kaos Cards in the museum was “520”, referencing May 20, Nadeshiko’s birthday.
 * Spin-Off: Shards of Kaos. Depending on the ‘shard’, they can be prequels, sequels, expositional additions, focusing on tertiary characters, or other means of exposition that would otherwise deviate too far from the main plot. Word of God describes these as being analogous to Stories From the Sakura Book for Cardcaptor Torika.
 * Tailor-Made Prison:  in Chapter 8.5.
 * Transformation Sequence: The "unfolding" of the Inferno Crossbow is described more briefly each time. You should know how it works by now.
 * The use of a Transformation Sequence is also averted on occasion when a character's Meaningful Name cropping up, signifying a transformation, sometimes because the actual transformation was either extremely subtle or off-screen. For example, suddenly referring to Sakura as "Orchid" signifies her change from one disposition to another, and calling Kero by "Keroberos" refers to him in "Big Kero" form (the latter of which isn't widely recognized as canon).
 * What Do You Mean It's Not Didactic?: Word of God’s explanation for the aforementioned Purple Prose is that Chaos Card Captor Sakura'' is an intentional and deliberate parody of this trope.
 * Xtreme Kool Letterz: Though the title is Chaos Card Captor Sakura, the titular magic is never stated to be “chaos”, but “kaos”. This is, in part, to differentiate between the magic (kaos),, and the state of disorder (chaos)]], in part to make the obvious reference a little less obvious, and in part as a Japanese Funetik Aksent.
 * You Cannot Grasp the True Form: Lycan. You physically cannot shine a light on his body such that you can get a clear look at him. Also, any projectile attacks directed at him merely sink into his skin, like shooting at a wormhole. In fact, Lycan uses this power as a Mind Screw in its own right.
 * Mirage. She tends towards looking like Sakura in order to allow people to see her.
 * The Life Card,.
 * You Should Know This Already: None of the canon characters die. Also, neither Syaoran nor Sakura manage to confess their love without the threat of a Reset Button. There still has to be a Season 3.
 * "Sakura" means "Cherry Blossom", and "Syaoran" (also "Xiaolang") means "Little Wolf". If you didn't know this before, then the Gratuitous English will largely be lost on you.
 * In fact, you might want to go through the entire series at least once before reading, in the author’s hopes of increasing instances of Fridge Brilliance.
 * "Sakura" means "Cherry Blossom", and "Syaoran" (also "Xiaolang") means "Little Wolf". If you didn't know this before, then the Gratuitous English will largely be lost on you.
 * In fact, you might want to go through the entire series at least once before reading, in the author’s hopes of increasing instances of Fridge Brilliance.

Tropes present in the Shards of Kaos

 * Anachronic Order: The first shard was entitled I am Kinomoto Sakura. The second posted shard was entitled I am Daidouji Tomoyo (using a short-lived episodic format of "I am [Name]"), and it even dovetails off the previously posted shard, but was released as shard three. (Word of God referenced a 'second' shard involving Keroberos and Damien back in the past.) Card Captor Nadeshiko breaks this mold.
 * Canon Immigrant: Tobias Erikson, who is far more subdued and mundane than he is in Science And Sorcery. And if you know anything about Science and Sorcery, Tobias doubles up as a living Chekhov's Gun.
 * Fanon: Galore. Amongst others, the Kinomotos previously lived in Shinjuku, and.
 * Peer Pressure Makes You Evil: Poor Chiharu, getting mixed up with the wrong crowd...
 * Prequel: Card Captor Nadeshiko. Though we only see the tail end of the Final Judgment, there is an entire implied series around it. (The author just didn’t want to press his luck...)
 * Power Trio:
 * Nadeshiko: Hot Mom, Ill Girl, Magical Girlfriend
 * Sonomi: The Unlucky Childhood Friend, Clingy Jealous Schoolgirl Lesbian, and probably an Expy for her daughter.
 * Fujitaka: Alternate Character Interpretation sets him up as more of a fiercely passionate romantic (who isn’t above swearing) who mellowed out after the “catastrophe” of Nadeshiko losing the Judgment.
 * Keroberos is conspicuously absent…
 * Written by the Winners: The implication behind the inconsistencies between the official Cardcaptor Sakura canon and the fanon of Chaos Card Captor Sakura (and beyond) is that the characters only remember a rosy version of the past, rather than the actual gritty truth of what really happened.