Just Like You

by Lost-Remembrance

Daisuke falls into a deep depression with self-mutilation and dangerous suicide attempts... and there’s nothing Dark can do about it. [One-Shot]

Updated Date: August 3, 2005

Note: Due to fanfictions rule about sonfics, this one-shot had to be vamped and redone to fit the rules. I'm terribly sorry about this.

Disclaimer: I don't own DN Angel or the title, Just Like You, by Three Days Grace.

Rating and warnings: PG-13--suicide/deathfic, gore, some language.

Note about the Story: This story is more along based on the ANIME, not the manga.

Category: Angst

Summary: Daisuke falls into a deep depression with self-mutilation and dangerous suicide attempts... and there's nothing Dark can do about it.

Status: complete one-shot

Just Like You

by: Lost-Remembrance (Red Tail)

'Daiskue, what the hell are you doing!' Dark screamed in his mind, trying to take control over the red-heads body yet the younger teen refused. He flinched inside the younger boy's body, feeling the mixed emotions rush at him like a out of control train.

'I'd rather be six feet under than have him here anymore!' Daisuke's mind seethed with anger, blotting Dark's voice away from his mind. 'He's a bastard…ruining my life and taking everything from me! They never loved me any way!'

Images of his mother pampering him, getting him ready and loving Dark…but what about him! He growled and grabbed the nearest object he could grab.

The nearest sharpest object that is.

'I told you to stop it!' Dark shouted angrily, Daisuke throwing him the darkest inner glare he could send to the Dark Phantom theif.

He raised the knife, pressing the cold steel metal against his tender flesh, feeling the pulsing blood rush through his veins. His jittery nerves calmed down, sensing the cool metal pressed against his flesh. He didn't even need to bat an eye at what he was about to do.

He remembered the first time that he had found out a way to get rid of all the turmoil and emotions running through his system. It was only sensible that to cut off the emotions, he would have to cut off what they were running through. And they were running through his blood.

He couldn't help but let his shoulders slump, rub his eyes occasionally from the lack of sleep. When did his whole world turn upside down? He winced, remembering the first day that it had happened.The happiest day of his family's life, maybe not his when he finally understood the "responsibility" and the effects of being the next Niwa to have the Phantom share his body.

One could say his destiny.

He laughed mentally, still feeling the presence of Dark lingering in his mind, most likely deciding to give him some peace as to what happened during the last "mission" and how he had almost snapped. He closed his eyes, taking a deep breath and calming himself.

" Hey Daisuke!" He turned, a fake smile on his face as he ran over to his group of friends, most already starting on some things that were going around the school.

" Yeah, well I heard that Sakura found out that her friend didn't need to do that—all she did was go into the bathroom and take the razor."

" You're kidding! Didn't it hurt?" A wince from one of his friend's closer girlfriends. He found his ears picking up on the conversation, wondering what they were talking about.

" Yeah, guess it did." The person shrugged. "But… she's always been a loose cannon, all she does is make a couple of shallow cuts and then everything goes away."

A gasp, "What about the scars?" Daisuke let his mind wander, wondering about the possibilities.

" Just wears a long sleeve or wrist bands. Nothing to really worry about."

" Have… have you ever tried it?" Daisuke remained silent, still listening in on the conversation.

" Oh yeah, once though. I was mad and it was like a rush." The girl grinned smugly, "Kind of like getting high."

The girl next to the one with the dominate look on her face snorted, "Like you would know about getting high?" Daisuke reeled at what he had just heard, he had tried some substances, usually just fooling off with his friends who decided to chance some things…but he had never cut himself.

He glanced down at his virgin wrist and shivered,a chill running up his spine and he shoved the thoughts away, letting his mind dwell on school.

Later on that day, after school, he had made his first cut.

He was pulled out of his memories, Dark's protests reminding him he wasn't in the past anymore. Since that time, he had made over five cuts each day, sometimes more depending on how he was feeling.

And the girl was right, it was like a rush. And it was just as addicting as crystal meth.

The angry yells of his family's beloved Phantom Dark were drowned out by the sound of pounding blood rushing to his ears, filling the room with an eerie quiet that the teen enjoyed and couldn't help but lavish in. Peace and silence, something he hadn't had since he turned fourteen.

A thought came to mind, amking him wonder questions he had never thought of before. Perhaps the famous Dark Theif had never been in the body of a suicidal teen before? Daisuke wondered darkly what would happen to the most loved family member in his family—living in his body and taking over him whenever he had the chance to do such.

Bastard.

The cool steel was pulled away gently, pressing down to make an indent. More than an indent though, a bloodied line across his healing wrists. He closed his eyes and enjoyed the light-headed and giddy feeling he was receiving. Relief flooded over him and drowned out the confusion and hate echoing deep in his bones and body.

Sighing in content, he whispered to himself, "Somehow everything was perfect at a time." He tilted his head and listed to the sounds of his blood rolling off his cut wrist and smiled at the tickle it created from his nerve endings to his back. The wound itself didn't bother him.

'Then why are you doing this!' Dark harshly retorted and Daisuke opened his eyes sharply and narrowed them as he stared at the mirror he had placed in front of himself to see the face of Dark staring back at him. He missed the reflection of himself.

He snarled, curling his fist as if ready to punch the mirror but knew he couldn't. Not yet. He got up with his anger creating energy that needed to be released and locked the door this time, making sure no one could enter unless they had a key, which no one did, or they managed to break down the door.

"This is against you and me now." Dark snorted at the comment, thinking Daisuke was just bluffing, just a wimp with no guts to even tell Risa how he felt about her straight out. He laughed at the thought, wondering how he had easily gotten the girl wrapped around his finger.

'You and me?'

He glared, eyes narrowing into slits as he calmed his breath. "We're two different people." Dark raised an eloquent eyebrow, wondering where this was heading. "And we're cancelling each other out."

Dark remained silent. 'What are you talking about?' The sound of his voice made Daisuke want to punch him, beat him until that sound in his voice was just a mere whisper of what it once was.

He took another deep breath, fearing that his voice would hitch on him, crack as his eyes glazed over. He clenched them tightly, leaning over the mirror as tears started to well in his eyes. And even as this was happening, he was still trying to fight the tears.

"You know…" His voice was small, holding pain and suffering that he never wished anyone to hear, "I don't understand why everyone looks at you, loves you." A sniffle and Dark looked up in the mirror, facing Daisuke completely, "I could be like that…better."

'Better?' Dark's eyes were cold and he laughed, 'Better than me?' It was an unspoken voice that didn't reach Daisuke's ears, telling him to just be himself, threading off from Dark himself. He didn't want to see the lively teen in such pain, emotional or physical.

Daisuke growled when he heard the comment, hissing slowly out through clenched teeth and turned to face the person living in his body with a coy and cold smirk upon his face. His face felt awkward and he wondered, when was the last time that he had smiled. His eyes were dead, no life or light shining in them.

His mother screamed at him, saying how stupid it was of him the first time he had "accidentally" taken too much sleeping pills that the doctor had given to his mother. The dark circles under his eyes had yet to vanish, the constant thoughts of what death would be like, or falling asleep and never waking up.

There were so many ways to die.

So many that he had tried before.

"What are you laughing at?" He raised an eloquent eyebrow and sat in front of the mirror, narrowing his eyes and looking back with a knowing look in his eyes, Dark glared back in return.

'Well? Why are you just looking at me?' Dark ground out with a laugh at the end, crossing his arms and looking back at Daisuke. His voice held an icy touch now, warning the teen if he was going to try anything. Anything stupid like cutting himself again.

The angry jagged lines that already marred his scarred flesh were healing, or healed. They had been made in a previous attempt, Dark somehow managing to either foil the attempt in a slightest bit that barely made a difference or such. Somehow, fate seemed to like Dark…or Daisuke.

Dark preferred to think it was him just for the hell of it. Besides, if Daisuke killed himself he wouldn't be able to get back at the missing for the moment Krad. How was he supposed to steal things, sometimes for the good of the world, as well as ladies hearts if he was six feet under the ground with a crazy kid with the intent on killing himself.

"Tell me," Daisuke questioned, leaning in to the mirror and staring forcefully at the thief without that cold smirk on his face. Dark shivered inwardly, the cold and dead eyes of the once bubbly and cheerful boy staring straight at him. Somehow, he felt guilty but struggled to push the feeling away. Why would that be? He had tried to save the boy, and himself, numerous times.

"Tell you what?" He retorted back sharply, being the first to break the unsaid staring contest.

"Have you ever…" He paused, "Been in someone else's body like mine… a suicidal person." Dark glared as Daisuke fingered the knife in his hands, twiddling it on his fingers.

"No." Dark snapped back, flaring at the blade as t edged closer to the flesh of the teen's wrist once more. "From all the stuff that you're doing…I would think that you really do want to die."

"What made you think that?" Daisuke questioned back with a false look of innocence on his face, smiling at he accidentally nicked himself with the sharp blade and a small rivulet of blood appeared on the pin point of the wound, oozing to form a bead of blood.

"You've got to stop this—think of what your mother would think!" Dark tried, hoping that it would calm the boy but jerked back with a wince when he realized it did nothing of the sort and instead infuriated the boy even more.

"Mother?" He laughed coldly, "It seems that the only things she's worried about would be you." Daisuke growled out with narrowed eyes as a glare began to get plastered to his face also.

"It would seem you're jealous."

"Perhaps, perhaps not. You've taken everything from me." Daisuke leaned in to the mirror once more, the knife scratching the glass and creating a line around Dark's face. He smiled coldly, looking deep into Dark's eyes.

"You're afraid." He took the knife away from the mirror and placed it on his other wrist and held it over it gently, preparing to the the same treatment to it as his other wrist. "I can see it in your eyes."

"So what if I am?" Dark retorted back, looking with dark eyes at the uncaring teen. "Are you afraid of what you're going to do?"

The blade stopped twiddling in Daisuke's fingers. He turned slowly to Dark with a distant look in his eyes that made the thief shiver, goose bumps starting to form on his arms. "Afraid?" The word fell harshly from his tongue. He turned now absolute zero looking eyes towards the person looking at him in the mirror.

The feeling of victory stopped, a gut feeling that was ominous and foreboding rushing through Dark's senses. He remained silent, hoping that he wouldn't make the situation worse. That, or somehow things would turn for the worse and thus lead to something terrible.

"You—" Daisuke laughed coldly as he pointed to the thief in the mirror. "Think that I—" He pointed to himself now as if making sure he had the whole line of speech correct and not misunderstood, continuing he added, "am afraid?"

Dark remained silent once more, crossing his arms again and leaning back onto an imaginary support system. He turned to look at Daisuke with a calculating glance before sighing an losing his eyes,

"Perhaps…" He kicked himself inwardly for the slip of tongue.

"Really?" False amazement was in the red head's voice, as if the silent dare to show he wasn't indeed afraid in the air. "Well, we'll just have to see about that. After all, you can't live in such a coward's body, right?" He spat angrily out with venom.

"Why are you doing this?" Dark questioned as he visibly flinched when the knife made contact once more and slashed gently, and easily across his skin to draw blood once more. Luckily, the other wound on the wrist previously done had scabbed over during their little "talk".

"Why?" He lifted the knife and put it down beside him to lean into the mirror, taking droplets of his blood and smearing it in a circle which had a line going through it of where Dark's face was, "Well…perhaps something was always wrong with me…or maybe it was the fact I was used since the day I was born."

Dark was silent once more, not really having anything to reply with—or retort. It was true that Daisuke's mother had wanted a boy for a very long time, somehow considered a fanatic at times. They did go rather hard on the youth, training him to be great and all once the Phantom Dark appeared.

"Cat got your tongue?"

Dark snarled, "You know because of your little "problem" you've made a living hell for everyone that cares for you!" Images of an empty medication bottle limply held in Daisuke's hand flashed in broken memories, the strength of the drug spacing his memories.

"Shut up!" Daiksue screamed, punching the mirror so that his knuckles began to bleed from small pieces of glass shards cutting his flesh. Spider-like cracks formed like a crater on the thick slab of mirror. "You don't know what you're talking about."

"Maybe I do, maybe I don't. In fact, I don't even know why you're doing this! You were perfectly fine before all this—or whatever happened to you. Get a grip!"

"You're right," The knife slashed roughly against Daisuke's wrist as he harnessed his fury into energy. He leaned into the mirror and his eyes were half-lidded, warily watching Dark. "I was perfectly fine before all of this happened. Before you came into my life!"

"So that's what this is all about!" Dark shouted back with just as much anger. "This is about me, right!"

"Yes it is!" Daisuke shouted with just as much anger, grabbing the mirror on it's side's as he lifted it, "It's about you taking everything from me!"

"Stop being so selfish by taking your own life!" Dark hissed back, "I haven't taken everything from you—you just think I have for some idiotic reason!" He ran a hand through his hair roughly, clenching his teeth and rubbing his temple to try and sooth the pain. How was he supposed to steal stuff if Daisuke was as unstable as he was now!

"Selfish!" Daisuke growled out, face flushed almost to the color of his hair. His eyes were blazing, "At least I don't try and steal every girl's heart within a ten mile radius!"

"At least I'm not suicidal!" He shot back with just as much fury, the whole plot to try and calm the raging boy down shot down the drain. "I'm not a coward! I'm not blind to what I have!"

Daisuke glared, dropping the mirror roughly as a loud crash filled the room and brought a awkward silence afterward other than the heavy breathing of the red head youth. The shards of glass scattered across the floor pooled around him with his blood, some droplets on the shards themselves.

"I'll show you coward." He grabbed the knife, cutting his hand on glass shards all the way and lifted it over his wrist. Just a little bit deeper. He sliced his wrist roughly, cutting deeper than he ever had before. Blood instantly started flowing from the fresh wound, flowing from his veins with the beat of his slowing pulse.

"I have nothing." He whispered, vision getting blurry as he raised his other wrist weakly, using his last strength to also slash the other wrist just as deeply. The room began to spin around him, the whole world stopping at the same time. Silence hung heavily in the air and the clattering of the knife was the only sound in the room.

Noises and voices from below were heard and he distantly heard his mother screaming his name…and Dark's. Heavy footfalls made it obvious they had climbed the stairs and the rough rattling of the door and it's knob, despite it being locked tightly, showed the door's resistance in not letting them in. 'Good,' He thought through a haze in his mind.

The shouting of Dark's voice in his mind stopped, slowly drowned out by the pounding of blood in his ears once more. The pounding slowed, the pace no longer keeping the same as he felt a small spasm of pain hit him despite his happiness and pride to finally completing what he meant to do in the beginning.

He showed Dark he was no coward.

He fell backwards, body bouncing a little bit as he hit the floor roughly, gravity affecting his body. Blood pooled around him, slowly emptying the pints pumping through his body as his heart faltered in it's beat. Daisuke felt a smile grace upon his lips, not a smirk, not a cold grin, just a smile of happiness.

He closed his eyes and everything went black.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The door was thrown open, luckily a skeleton key hidden above on the door's frame. But the door collided with something, causing a low thump to resonate in the eerily silent room.

Like anything that a person stuck in a first-class horror film could imagine, Emiko slowly let her eyes trail down to the floor, her shoe touching something obviously solid. Her eyes widened, glazing over with unshed tears as her pupils dilated, pulling back in fear.

"No...!" Her chest rose and fell in heavy heaves as she forced herself to reamin breathing. Her fet seemed to move backward on their own, the command not from her. Her back collided with the wall, the room's temperature hitting her flesh when she was pulled out of her trance.

She shook her head, sure that it was a figment of her imagination, it wasn't possible, after all. Her eyes fell to the floor and she screamed, falling to her knees and looking with wide eyes at the smashed mirror, blood mingled with the glass shards and then something else…

Her son's body lying on the floor, motionless. A serene smile was on his face, almost as if he was alive. She scrambled over to grab the boy's wrist's and then blanched, turning to the side and feeling the tinges of bile creeping up in her throat.

Her body heaved and the remnants of breakfast fell onto the floor, mixing with her child's blood that pooled around the still form. "Daisuke…Daiskuke…" Her mind reeled, her voice saying his name over and over again, her voice gaining a louder tone each time.

Then she shook him, trying to make him wake up so he could see his eyes and his smile as he said, "Joking!" With that goofy grin on his face again.

But, perhaps he never did realize that the grins and, soon with time, the smiles also disappeared and faded like the day to night.

Choked sobs escaped her quivering lips, her shapely frame quaking with whimpering and crying sounds as she grabbed her son's limp body, pulling him so he was lying on her lap. She'd never get to see his shining eyes again.

Throwing her head up to the heavens as tears streaked down her face, trailing into ever wrinkle and crevicice, she found no comfort as the sun continued shining and the heaven's didn't cry with her. She found no comfort that her son was never coming back.

The name almost died on her lips as another sob escaped her mouth, mixing with the name, "Daisuke!"

OWARI